Monthly Archives: April 2009
Comparison photos from 10-22mm
Earlier this week on the blog, the 10-22mm Canon was reviewed, and in the comments, Julie asked if I could provide some comparison shots. So, in the interests of demonstrating the perspective change (and provide a few sample shots of things I thought came out well), here’s a plethora of photos. First, the comparisons… all shots were done at 1/50th, f5.0 and ISO 800 from a range of 5 feet, 10 feet, and 15 feet, and pointed straight on at the door. No post processing was done in order to preserve as “raw” a comparison as possible… At 5 feet … Continue reading
The Rule of Thirds Really Does Work!
When it comes to composing our images – we are always looking for new ways and angles to capture things. Often though, sometimes the traditional methods work too though. In fact, I would venture to guess that if shown 100 pictures where the standard rules of composition were followed, and then 100 pictures where standard rules were deviated from, the former would have more shots that found a widespread appeal. The rationale? Standard rules usually will work – that’s why they are the standards. Things like the Golden Mean, the Rule of Thirds, and Sunny 16 are all basic rules … Continue reading
Adobe’s DNG Converter
For many of us, an upgrade of one element in our tool kit comes with many unforeseen consequences and additional expenditures. Just as a new camera body can necesitate the need for larger memory cards, hardware upgrades can also come with software upgrades. The reason? Camera file formats! As camera vendors develop new proprietary formats for their raw file formats (CR2 for Canon and NEF for Nikon as the two predominant players in the game), the need has always existed to update your software to accommodate the new formats for body upgrades. The best example of this was when I … Continue reading
The Canon 10-22mm Lens Review
Happy Monday to all! Today is an exciting day here at the blog, because a new schedule of sorts is going to start, both to make reading more enjoyable, and to make writing more planned and easily executed. The reason behind the new flow is due to many listener questions asking a wide variety of questions, ranging from hardware questions to software questions, technical questions, work flow questions and the like. So, in the interests of providing answers to each of the wide subject matter areas, here’s the new schedule: Monday: Hardware – I’ll take a look at hardware components, … Continue reading
Nine is better than none…
I had been working on a list of some of the more popular listener/reader questions and some answers to share for the podcast this week. Since it is late getting out (notice the lack of a post at all yesterday), I thought it might be helpful to share an abbreviated list of some of the Q&A here… 1. What color space should I shoot in with my camera, Adobe RGB or sRGB? A. Neither, shoot in Raw! Since defining a color space is only applicable if you are shooting in jpg rather than raw, if you shoot in raw, color … Continue reading
Experimenting with Photomatix and HDR
For a while now I’ve been meaning to devote some time to experimenting with HDR – specifically comparing Photomatix and Photoshop in their production of HDR photographs. The industry preference toward the former is there for a very good reason. Photomatix produces much better results. Just look at this final shot (be sure to click the image for a larger view – the blog restrictions on size really don’t do it justice): Now, in the interests of full disclosure, I did do some additional post processing work even after the HDR processing to get the above results. But Photomatix was … Continue reading
Portraits, Promotions, and Planning
This week’s podcast episode should be available shortly over at Personal Life Media. You’ll want to listen when you really can dedicate the 25 minutes as it’s a pretty rapid fire show this week. A couple learning opportunities presented themselves to me recently and I wanted to share these before they got too fuzzy. As a result, I didn’t really get into the news of the last week, or address any listener questions. So, the show notes will be pretty short and sweet, but here they are: First up, I took a moment to challenge the listening audience to … Continue reading
No Trumpts, No Fanfare, Nada
As I was sorting through the CB archives for some content to update for todays post, it dawned on me that I blew right past post #400 without even a mention of thanks to anyone. So, at post #411 (see, I really blew right past it), let me take a moment to give some belated thanks to the listening and reading audience for the past two plus years… Your comments, feedback, emails, insights and thoughtful notes over this time have been very helpful and motivating in keeping the ball rolling, often through some rather tedious times. I’ve had people share … Continue reading
Cactus, Trigger, Zebra, Oh My!
Remember the old game of password where you said a related word to one on your card to get your partner to guess it? Well, here goes: What do the words cactus, trigger, and zebra all have in common? If you answered “flash photography” you’d be right! As you may have realized, that does mean that the podcast will not come out today – I simply didn’t have time to get all my thoughts and notes together. So instead, here’s a review of sorts that I did just earlier this evening. A while back I decided to ditch the Canon … Continue reading
Days gone by…
Okay, so it’s lame segue alert day, as our late return last night really didn’t give me time to get my act together for a post today (clearly as it’s already 6:30pm MDT). Thus, another NBP (no blog post) day is upon us. Hopefully by tomorrow my act will be together again and we’ll have a new podcast, with loads of photography goodness to share. Happy shooting and I’ll be back on top of things tomorrow…
On the Coast of Somewhere Beautiful…
A short vacation means that I’ve not had much time to generate any photo-related content, but hopefully the title will be a hint of things to come, so be sure to stop back in Monday for some photo goodness and other news and events. In the meantime, enjoy the weekend, and have a Happy Easter. On that note, enjoy a Friday funny courtesy of What the Duck! Happy Shooting!
Thursday Thoughts with Kevin Mullins
For those of you that visit the blog regularly, you know that Kevin has been a regular supporter through his kind, thoughtful, and well, supportive comments for the last few months. We all know that reading blogs of others and commenting there is a good way to not only learn but to also generate traffic for your own interests. Well, this week I am calling Kevin out, because he definitely is worthy of your traffic. Kevin Mullins is an outstanding photographer, based out of Malmesbury Wiltshire (that’s in England, across the pond, or the UK for the geographically challenged…) He’s … Continue reading
No Blog Wednesday
Sorry all – but be sure to stop in tomorrow for a really exciting Thursday Thoughts session – my first interview “across the pond” with Kevin Mullins! Happy Shooting!
Artist Statement Appeal – the power of the pen
On this weeks show, I take a look at the power of the pen – the artist statement. For those of us with aspirations of sharing our work with others via art shows, galleries, and contests/competitions, the value of the artist statement can make the difference between getting into a show, gallery or other event and buying a ticket. So, if you want to learn what the artist statement is, how to write one, and things to consider, this is the show for you. Here’s the show notes: News Links – Ansel Adams Video Getty ventures into China for Asian … Continue reading
Double your laptop storage in ten easy steps!
So, I’ve got the Macbook Pro with the factory default 150GB hard drive. Sounds like a ton of space, right? Well, we all know how quickly that amount of storage can get sucked up these days. So, I considered buying a new laptop drive, buying the latest iteration of the Mac OS and just building one from scratch again. But then I realized, I have lots of storage being eaten up in the drive already by means of exactly that – the OS, the applications, and everything it needs to run. Then it dawned on me – why not just … Continue reading
The train rides again (take two)…
For today’s post you’ve got a special treat coming, because the train rides again! If you recall, earlier this week I posted the results of a little miniature project where I tried some varying depth of field, angles, and such on a model train. The project results didn’t yield anything breath-taking in picture, but I did learn where the best areas for focusing are on trains. I found out what appealed to me, what appealed to others, and filed it away. Then, as luck would have it – I had my camera with me today on the way home from … Continue reading
Thursday Thoughts with… Rob Weiher
Hey all, here’s what’s shakin’ for this Thursday. Another “Thursday Thoughts” edition is ready, but me and the guestk, Robert Weiher, took a little bit of a different tack on thi go around, primarily because of how I came across Robert, and what he’s doing for a current project. See, Robert is a fellow NAPP member, and has started a 365 blog as a project for 2009. After seeing a few of his comments appear here, my logs pointed me back to him (it always pays to watch your comment links as you never know where the next gem may … Continue reading
Blur, Baby… blur!
Hey all, this week’s show is done and boy are you in for a treat! Not only is there some pretty ground-breaking news from the computing world, but the theme for this podcast is blur! I take a (hopefully) clear look at different types of blur you can get in your images, what can work, what will not work, and how to correct for different types. Got some great listener questions and answers that tie in very nicely to the theme, and as, always the photo tip of the week. Here’s the show notes: News Links – HP Z800 Specs … Continue reading
