1.  Pay for the cost of entry

2.  Pay for the cost of travel

3.  Pay for hotel accommodations

4.  Pay for the cost of food

It’s an expensive proposition, which I conservatively estimate at nearly $1000.  This does not mean it isn’t worth the money, because it most likely is, even if for networking purposes only (and I am sure there are educational opportunities galore)!  Let’s face it – if you want to be a “player” in the photography world, there is usually justification to attend PSw either in Orlando (Spring) or Las Vegas (Fall).

My problem is that I am something of a one-man-show.  And photography is very much a secondary stream of income, when it even does present opportunities.  My primary job has always been in IT.  I suspect it always will be.  So, to find the time off for a traditional working stiff is tough – I am often needed, and earn precious little vacation time every year.  So, unless a company that values both my IT and photography skills hires me (Adobe, are you listening? ), I will likely not be in a position to attend this event.

As is often the case, I know I am not alone.  So, here’s your chance to let your non-PSW light shine!  What are you doing this week?  For me, I am taking a little time off between jobs actually.  After accepting an offer at a new company (I am not holding my breath for Adobe), I have a week or so to spare from my calendar (but not my budget) to travel a little, and am visiting family in both AZ and NY.  Let’s face it, family should always come first, and here is no exception.  This last weekend I spent in AZ, and coming up later this week is a trip to NY.  Maybe I’ll get in a little fall foliage out east, but not sure as the fall seems to be late arriving all over this year.

So, there’s my plans, and why I won’t be there!  What’s your excuse?  Why are you not at PSW?  Sound off in the comments!  See ya back here tomorrow, and keep on shootin’!  I’ll be back again with the August contest winner and a new contest for September that will knock your socks off!

1.  In packing for your recent trip to China, what gear choices did you make for such an excursion?

I took two rigs:

(1) One for when I felt like just walking around with one camera, one lens, and no camera bag. That was a Nikon D300s (which is NOT a full frame camera), with an 18-200mm lens. That way I could go wide to tele without ever changing lenses. It’s really my all around favorite travel lens, but not quite as sharp as some of my other lenses. It’s a DX lens, so it doesn’t work with full frame cameras.

(2) In case I went someplace important (Forbidden City, great wall, temple of heaven, etc.), I took my D3 with my 70-200mm f/2.8 VR lens, and a 14-24mm f/2.8 lens. I had to carry a camera bag along with me (and I’d SO rather not). I’d rather focus on the photos, and not the gear, but sometimes you just have to lug the stuff. I also took a Gitzo tripod and ballhead.

2.  The latest season of D-town looks to have expanded coverage to pretty much all of photography, so it’s not just Nikon anymore is it?

When Nikon was the main sponsor, we only covered Nikon gear, and the whole show was very gear specific (this button does this—this dial does that), but in our second season we switched to be more a generally focused show, and more about taking great photos, and less on the switches and dials. We also do more lighting and on location stuff now, so for Matt and I, it’s really a lot of fun, and the viewership has literally gone through the roof, now surpassing Photoshop User TV.

3.  How do you get those cool highlights over camera button features in the D-Town videos?

That comes from Daniel in our video department. D-Town is not an easy show to edit, but I think he really does a kick-butt job with it, and he creates the graphics for everything we do, which is not an easy job. He’s a great editor, and a really great person as well. He’s made two trips to Haiti so far, delivering clothes, shoes, and toys for the children there.

4.  Other than Photoshop, what program in the Creative Suite is the most useful for your own creative endeavors?

To me it’s InDesign. I use it everyday (I’ve already used it today, and it’s just 9:10 am in the morning). I do a lot of my layout stuff there, and I’m in and out of it all the time, so I’ve actually gotten pretty decent at it (in fact, I co-authored an “InDesign Killer Tips” book a few years back, with Adobe’s own Terry White as my co-author. Of course, I did all the easy chapters.

Thanks so much to Dave, Matt, and of course, Scott for taking the time out from their busy schedules to sit down for a little Q&A with us here on the blog.  In case you don’t know the resources already, here are the various outlets for Scott and his work online:

• Photoshop Insider
• NAPP
• D-Town TV

That’s a wrap on the Q&A with the Photoshop Guys!  Tune in tomorrow for the latest LDP podcast – we hit the half century mark and talk about all the latest in photography news and tidbits, including listener Q&A, so be sure to stop in for that!  Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

1.  I’ve often heard that in LR post production the top-down and left-to-right approach is good, but also that setting camera profiles is a good first step, which is on the bottom right.  What’s your approach?

Once Adobe added the camera profiles, it messed up my whole top-down approach. So now I have to go all the way to the bottom to set the camera profile, then back up to the top to start developing a photo   One work around I have for it is to create a preset of the camera profiles and apply it during import. So it’s already set by the time I get to working on a photo. I have a few favorites and I usually know which ones will work (Landscape for landscapes, Portrait for portraits, etc…).

2.  Since PSU TV is more Photoshop, can viewers expect to see any Lightroom tips coming into D-Town (esp since it seems like software that is geared toward photographers)?

Actually there will probably be more Lightroom in PSU TV. Lightroom is technically “Photoshop Lightroom” and from our research most PSU TV viewers are into photography so it makes sense to cover it there. I touch on post-processing once in a while on DTown TV when I see an opening but we’re pretty packed with camera-related stuff there.

3.  Since you are asking others about keywording all the time (you can find his LR PRo questions over at www.lightroomkillertips.com ), let’s do a 180 – how often do you keyword?

Very rarely. If some generic keywords happen to work during import I’ll apply them there but if they don’t it’s rare that I come back and actually keyword after that. That said, my main areas of photography are landscapes and portraits so I don’t miss them much there. If I want a photo from Moab, I just click my Moab collection and they’re there. Same with the portraits. I very rarely have an editor call me and say “Can I get a photo of a waterfall, with a woman wearing red standing near it, during the summer, on a Thursday?”. I always teach people that if you constantly find yourself looking through for your photos based on some collection of descriptive wording then by all means they should keyword. I fully believe in it for some photographers – just not me

4.  Other than Photoshop, what program in the Creative Suite is the most useful for your own creative endeavors?

I’ve always loved Illustrator. From an artistic standpoint, Illustration is probably one of my favorites. I just really dig crisp clean vector illustrations so Illustrator is probably top on the list for me.

Special thanks to Matt for taking the time to stop in and share his thoughts and insights with the LDP crowd.  You can find Matt in several places online:

• Lightroom Killer Tips
• Photoshop User TV
• Dtown TV
• Twitter

Don’t forget, tomorrow is the grand finale – when Scott Kelby comes in for a few of his own questions with the LDP crowd!  We’ll see you then!

1.  I’ve not seen much of you on D-Town, but you’ve got your own new podcast, “Ask Dave” up and running.  Can you tell the readers a little more about it?

It’s a pretty simple concept: I encourage people to send in Photoshop questions via Twitter or the Kelby TV web site and I try to answer as many as I can, one a week. Typically the questions are in the form of “how do I…” and “what’s the quickest way to…”

2.  As the “token” Bridge fan of the PS Guys, what is your favorite new feature of Bridge and why?

I like the fact that I can quickly and easily choose images and apply batch actions, create a web site (with the Bridge Output option) and apply Camera Raw settings to multiple images. And in Photoshop CS5 I LOVE the fact that Bridge can be accessed directly inside Photoshop using Mini Bridge.

3.  With the Canadian background, I’ve always wanted to know:  What are your thoughts on Colorado stealing the Quebec Nordiques?  *Editor Note* This move happened quite a while ago, so it’s not “new” news, but given the opportunity to ask, I had to throw it in there…

At the time I was a Montreal Canadiens fan, so the move to Colorado took away one of the hottest rivalries in all of sport. The passion in those Nordiques vs Habs games was unbelievable. Having said that, Montreal fans got a good laugh when the Avalanche went on to win the Stanley Cup, much to the dismay of Quebec fans.

4.  Other than Photoshop, what program in the Creative Suite is the most useful for your own creative endeavors?

I use Illustrator quite a bit for logo creation and things like that and I really like the integration between Illustrator and Photoshop. I also spend a lot of time in InDesign, laying out workbooks and personal projects and really like the way I can import native layered Photoshop documents (with Layer Comps) into InDesign.

Thanks so much to Dave for taking the time out to tackle a few of the burning questions we’ve had! It wasn’t all Photoshop or photography, but it sure was fun!  You can find Dave on the web at:

• Photoshop User TV
• Dave Cross Online
• D-town TV

Be sure to tune in tomorrow for the next in the Photoshop Guys Series – Matt Kloskowski!

Purists may scorn such activities, and while there are some situations where editing a photo significantly can have moral, ethical, and professional consequences (such as photo journalism), I can’t help but wonder how Photoshop came to have such a bad association.  Clearly, there are differences of opinion across the spectrum on what lines shouldn’t be crossed (or “photoshopped”).  Overall though, I would say that Photoshop is not innately a bad thing (whether you think of it as a software application or a verb).

I said just a moment ago that I always try to get the picture right when in camera.  It’s not that I am opposed to pixel editing, but I’d rather avoid it if I can.  There are times (for me) though when some things cannot be avoided.  Take for instance a ballgame we went to just last weekend.  The Milwaukee Brewers were in town and it made for a great birthday present and combination Father’s day gift for Tracy and the visiting in-laws.

Being one to always take a camera in tow, I did.  A beautiful sunset ensued at the game and of course, I had to take a few shots.  When I got to skim through things the other day, noticed something in the scene that I wished wasn’t there – power lines! So, the decision had to be made – will it significantly help the composition to remove those lines?  For me, the answer was yes.  So, into Photoshop I went, and after a few minutes of editing, produced the results (click on the picture for a larger view).

Before Photoshop:

And after:

It may not seem like much to others, but to me, the shot looks a lot better without the power line.  So, what’s your take on this?  Is Photoshop a bad word?  Does the picture look better, the same or worse?  Sound off in the comments!  Keep on shooting too and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

EXIF data refers to the data the camera records about the scene you are capturing, including things like shutter speed, aperture, camera body, date, time, and all that sundry stuff.  While this may seem like useful information to have (and it is at times), it can often be misleading.  To prove this point I did a little test shot with the trusty rusty 40D in hopes that it would help illustrate the perils of relying on the EXIF data…(yeah, I knew the outcome ahead of time, but humor me here!)

For this exercise, because no models were handy around midnight, you’re gonna have to deal with yours truly here.  I captured an image and recorded several settings, and want to show you which ones were correct and incorrect in camera.  So, here’s the image I captured.:

While the camera reliably recorded things like shutter, aperture, ISO and all that jazz, take a look at the native EXIF data here, and tell me what you think is missing from the shot (I’ll share the answer tomorrow).   To leave you with a hint, it’s something pretty obvious that is missing from the EXIF, so don’t try to read between the lines too much.  If you look at the shot, and the EXIF that was reported, it hopefully will jump right out at you.

Fair warning too, because I will be using this shot to talk about a few aspects of portrait photography coming up next week…but the biggie is coming tomorrow, so tell me what you think is missing and we’ll see who gets it right.  In the meantime, go read another blog so you can stop looking at the smirky face above!  Happy shooting!

The 5 Best Kept Secrets of Photoshop CS5

1.  Sharing Your Monitor – In Cs5, the feature has been added where you can share your monitor with others so you can show people exactly what you are looking at.  I can totally see this as a feasible solution for clients that are remote to your location, and travel costs need to be kept down.  Even training seminars could be conducted this way…imagine sitting at your computer at work (or home) and watching an instructor teaching you live from their own desktop!  Very cool!

2.  Refine Edge Backgrounds – I know, refine edge has been around for a while, and we are used to seeing the “marching ants” around our selections…but now Adobe has gone and added different backgrounds to help you better make refinements to selections.  The options are the traditional Marching Ants, and several new options like Overlay, Black, White, and Layers (my favorite).  This is a huge time saver when trying to make selections from within a photo!

3.  Paste in Place – Another godsend!  After making selection refinements and masking off your layer selection, it’s now super easy to take another image from your clipboard and paste it directly into the active document.  Done with a simple keyboard shortcut: Shift+CTRL+V (Shift+Command+V on the Mac)

4.  Cache Settings - are now adjustable to your own library preferences.  If you have mostly smaller sized images in your library, you can tweak the cache to Tall and Thin to accommodate your particular editing and library needs.  Likewise, if you are used to working with larger files, then you can customize Photoshop to Big and Flat for those purposes as well.

5.  Stroke Settings – I cannot remember if this was in CS4, primarily because I didn’t have much interest in CS4, but now having used CS5 to a pretty decent degree, I am so glad this is now black instead of read by default, so I am including it here.

There’s my five “best kept secrets” of Cs5!  It takes some time to kick the tires and check out everything that new programs have to offer, so be sure you download a trial copy from Adobe.  It’s free!  Have you downloaded your trial yet?  What are your favorite “under the hood” features?  Any that you feel aren’t getting enough press or coverage in the photo circles?  Sound off in the comments!  In the meantime, don’t forget to step away from the computer periodically and take pictures!   Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

1.  Dependencies – While Photoshop is insanely popular, this popularity has spawned an entire industry of third party applications called plug-ins that get installed into Photoshop.  If you simply remove Photoshop without considering these 3rd party “apps”, you could lose their functionality.  There are also other things that become part of your work flow in Photoshop that you may want to save too, including actions, scripts, font folders, brushes, and much more.

2.  Licensing – Because it’s not a cheap application, Adobe has to carefully manage licensing, which means that any serial number can only be activated twice before it gets “locked”.  This allows you to have an installation on a desktop and a laptop, or a work computer and a home computer.  Well, if you go an just un-install or delete the files for Photoshop, you may find yourself unable to activate again should you re-install on a new computer.  The way to avoid this is to ensure you de-authorize (or deactivate) before uninstalling.  This will free up the license for use again.

3.  Other add-ons – Photoshop also has other add-in elements like automation tasks you may have added over time.  I have a few from On One, Topaz Labs, and a few others that I’ve gathered over time.  Make sure you check to make sure these don’t have installers with licensing too, because that can also be problematic for a software migration.

4.  System settings – Unlike e-mail, some settings and preferences don’t stay with you during the course of a migration.  So, it’s often helpful to grab screen captures of various setup windows so that you can get things configured just right once you get in your new digs!  Here are the 11 screens you may want to capture before un-installing off any computer:

As you can tell, there’s a lot to consider.  And, given the length of this post already with the included screen captures, to make things easier in terms of reference information, I’ve put together a step-by-step procedure to migrate Photoshop from one computer to another that you can download for free!  Enjoy!

Migrating Photoshop

Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

1.  Download the script from the link above (I downloaded to my desktop on Windows XP)

2.  Copy the script from your desktop (or whatever download location you configured for your browser) to your Photoshop folder, as indicated in the screen shot.

3.  Open Photoshop (if it was already open, you should probably close PS and restart it)

4.  Open the picture you want to apply the script to (I started with the largest size desktop I wanted to configure it for, in this case 1600 x 1200.

5.  Navigate to the Presets option in Photoshop and open the script

6.  The interface lets you select certain information such as the month it will run for, when the week starts, etc.

7.  Special mention here to include certain holidays – if you have custom days (say birthdays, anniversaries, etc) to add, create a text file for reference and point the script to that txt file location.  If you don’t want certain days highlighted,you can leave this option un-checked and proceed with the script.

8.  It may take the script some time to run (it took me about 58-61 seconds to run it on my computer, but I was multitasking with other things at the time…).  When it’d done, you’ll get a stack of a lot of layers that looks like this, with the default layer selected of “Picture Mask”.  Note:  I’d also recommend checking the option to rasterize most text layers otherwise you’ll have up to 30 additional layers of text (one for each day of the month)! The layers underneath this are where all the really cool stuff is, and the other layers are dates and effects that you can change to suit your own tastes.

9.  Once you have tailored the layers to suit your needs, simply flatten, save as a jpg and configure your desktop to use that image!  Since I typically will save to multiple desktop dimensions, I start with the original and re-size to each output, from largest to smallest saving each as a jpg then letting the script use that to create the desktop calendar.

There you have it!  The nitty gritty details on how to create a really slick looking desktop calendar for you and your clients.  Simply print as pictures through your favorite venue if you like and watch the sales come in!

One final little news note that is time sensitive – DIY Photography has a very creative approach to contests and the prize package is worthy of a nod (don’t know how he/she/they managed to come up with this big bag of goodies!), so stop over here and throw your hats in the ring:  http://bit.ly/aRQa9l

See you back here tomorrow for the latest in photo goodness!  I’ll also bring up a couple tips on how to tweak the layers to your own ends, but feel free to begin exploring your own creative approaches!

The Easter Egg had some cool trivia too. For instance – does anyone (outside Adobe) know how many babies were born to members of the team during production? WHo is the queen of the tenth floor? Is the wizard still there? If so, where is he now? Neat little nuggets just waiting to be discovered all in CS5!  Got the answers or your own nuggets?  Sound off in the comments!

Also, a final reminder about the April giveaway – some lucky participant will win an Expo Disc from the folks over at Expo Imaging.  Get your balance-themed photos in before midnight tonight to have a chance at winning!  Here’s the link:  April Giveaway

So, without further ado – here’s the most common questions I’ve seen on Adobe Creative Suite 5:

1.  I own  ***** – can I upgrade to CS5?

Pick your product, it doesn’t really matter too much if it’s a single product upgrade (not part of a suite).  If you want to upgrade  to Photoshop, CS5, here’s the list of products that are eligible for the upgrade path to CS5, courtesy of Adobe (I added the product to my shopping cart, and got this list of eligible products and the pricing path (upsell versus an upgrade):

• Photoshop Elements 6, 7, or 8 on Windows – (upsell = $599)
• Photoshop Elements 4, 6, or 8 on Mac  – (upsell = $599)
• Photoshop CS4, CS3, or CS2 (Regular or Extended) – upgrade = $199

2.  What if I purchased CS4 recently – do I have to pay for the upgrade to CS5 now too?

While there is no official “window” from Adobe, all indicators suggest that if you have recently purchased CS4, you may be able to get an upgrade.  Some sites claim the window is between certain dates such as April 12th and August 10th, but I’ve not been able to verify this information independently so the site is not linked here

3.  What about Lightroom – can I upgrade to Cs5 from that since it’s part of the Adobe Photoshop family?

No.  Although there are similarities, Lightroom is a different software path than the Creative Suite, and you cannot upgrade from LR to CS5 anymore than you could upgrade a Dell to a Mac

4.  Speaking of Macs, can I upgrade my Windows software to a Mac equivalent or vice versa?

Adobe does allow for this in what is called a “cross-grade”.  You must sign a release that states you have destroyed the other media, and pay a small fee (I think it’s something like $20) to do this.

5.  What about converting from one Suite of products to another, or converting to a single product?

While I don’t have the space to cover extensive details on the many options, and this is not official Adobe policy (I could not find anything specifically addressing all the possible conversions), I think it’s a safe assumption that you can downgrade from a more expensive suite to a lesser expensive suite or product, but not vice versa.  So, say for instance you had the Master collection.  It is likely that you could downgrade that to a web collection or a design premium.  It is also likely that if you had a suite of products, you could downgrade to a single product within that suite.  However, adding additional products to your existing ownership for free is not likely.  As the old saying goes, “there’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

6.  Are there any discounts available?

Of course there are – and if you are an eligible member of any one of a number of communities, you are eligible for discounts on products from Adobe.  The most common ones I know of include educational discounts, governmental agencies, and NAPP.  The other question that usually arises from the “discount” one is whether you can apply multiple discounts, and the answer here is no…Adobe does restrict you to one discount per purchase, so if you are a NAPP member and also a teacher or college student, you cannot apply both discounts.  Pick the one that gives you the best savings, and be happy to are eligible – many people are not.

7.  So, where do I purchase CS5?

You can’t yet – the announcement that Adobe made was kind of a teaser, to build excitement and to sort of “ramp up” for the eventual release date.  It’s all part of the marketing, hype, and advertising of upcoming products.   Also, keep in mind that Adobe, like any other software developer, has approved channels for distribution.  So, when it does become available, make sure you find a reseller in your area through their partner page.

8.  When will it be available for purchase?

Well, you can pre-order it any time you want.  But if you want an official release date, take a seat with everyone else outside of Adobe headquarters, because that information is not available (that I can find anyway).  There are several indicators that suggest the release will be in early to mid-May based on their history (Adobe usually does product releases on about an 18 month cycle, or ever year and a half) with the Creative Suite of products.

9.  What are the differences in all the packages?

Excellent question!  This is the one that vexes a lot of people, but thankfully, Adobe has put together a comparision page that not only show syou the products that go into each package, but the retail cost of each.  Rather than regurgitate all that information here in some confusing chart, simply bookmark this link:  Adobe Product Comparison Chart

10.  Are you going to upgrade?

Yes I am.  I will probably not be an early adopter, primarily because I have a couple other purchases to make first (hardware, a lens, and some lighting gear), but the advancements in CS5 are probably among the most significant of any version in the last 7 years!  I may also need to upgrade my computers to handle the  processing requirements.

That’s it – the top ten questions I’ve seen (and been asked) about Creative Suite 5!  Got your own questions?  I may not have the answers, but I can either give you my best guess, or pass the question on to someone who may know the answer, so feel free to sound off in the comments.  Also, if I got anything wrong, or if you can shed additional light, all contributions are welcome!

Happy shooting all and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

This was actually where I first learned the value of checking your entire surroundings because sometimes the best shot may be behind you.  I turned around and caught this image:

Nice enough, but not really something I wanted to include in a portfolio of sorts to include in the now well-known PhotographyBB Magazine!  Then I noticed something…apparently I had tried multiple exposure settings while on a tripod…I was bracketing!  I had the same f-stop, same ISO, but the shutter speed was changing.  Back then I was shooting with my venerable XT (now sold), and the whole idea of bracketing and even HDR was just not even close to being on my radar.  Yet here I am now years later, trolling through archives with an opportunity to go back in time.

So, I pulled the 4 or 5 images together, cobbled them over to Photomatix and ran some tone mapping (didn’t even look at the settings, just was testing a whim to see if it would produce anything).  Well, let’s just say it was…interesting.  It clearly showed my sensor was absolutely filthy (sky splotches everywhere), and I clearly hadn’t learned the fine tuning of checking the edges or even cutting off important lines (like ship masts) from the composition.  Nevertheless, the result was…accidentally interesting.  I’ll leave it to you to judge:

40% Lightroom 2

40% Photoshop CS (no query here on version #)

10% Aperture

10% Elements or some other platform, including GIMP, Corel, and others…

If you think about it – the first software platform you learn for editing photos is usually the one where you really cut your teeth, grind your fingers to the bones, and once you know it, you just know it.  So, for a new software application to come out and challenge the fact that you have this established work flow, suggesting that there is a better way can often be both disheartening and somewhat defeating.  After all, some of us can even remember dodging and burning negatives in a dark room not too long ago.

It was quite an epiphany though to see people from such a wide variety of backgrounds – some younger than me (in their 20′s), many in my age range (30′s – 40′s), and others even senior to me (50′s and up) coming out to learn about this new-fangled technology of Lightroom 3.

What it brought to mind for me was a fundamental dichotomy in the way photography has transformed us.  We have learned so much and in such a little time frame, yet there are always barriers to learning more, not the least of which is our own prejudices.  We learn something, we know something inside and out, and then something new comes along that changes the paradigm.  It’s no wonder there is still so much confusion over what “the best” way to work through images is.

One the one hand, if you have a flow, and it works – why change something that does what you want it to do, and it’s something you not only know, but are reasonably good at?  Meanwhile, on the other – what if you are spending countless hours doing something much slower than you wish it could be and this new carrot is being dangled?  Do you stick to your guns or do you lay that gun down and find a new one that fires better?

It’s a struggle to be sure, and while sticking to your guns can be a good thing in the face of a changing technology, for those of us that stick too long, we can ultimately find ourselves actually staring down the barrel of a gun.  It’s all ammo in the armaments and the important lesson I learned is that while the principles may not change the tools to flex those principles are always changing.

So, the answer for me is to stick to my guns in principle, but be ready for a new rifle and prepare to adapt to meet the needs of that new tool, because odds are, the new one will ultimately do it better, faster, and cleaner than anything that came before it….eventually!

Sort of a philosophical musing for today, but nonetheless one I wanted to share, and hopefully get some feedback on.  Are you an early adopter?  Do you come out guns blazing with new technology whenever it becomes available, or do you stick with the rounds that you know how to fire until the proven replacement has been demonstrated and taught?  Sound off in the comments, and come on back tomorrow for yet another round!

The community quickly sprung to action, pointing him in several directions, and it occurred to me that I had never done this sort of tutorial before!  It’s not too difficult but there are some pitfalls to be aware of when dealing with borders and logos in photos, especially if you are trying to program these steps into an action or script.  Suffice to say, I figured this was as good a time as any to jump back into Photoshop and keep the digits (and brain) fresh!  So, here’s a new video tutorial on creating borders and logos!  Enjoy!

Your thoughts and feedback are welcome and encouraged as always!  Thanks for stopping in, have a great week, and be sure to stop back in tomorrow for more photo goodness!  Oh yeah, and don’t forget the March contest is in full swing where the winner will go home with one of these super cool Cheetah Quickstands – the theme is wild and the link for submissions is here!  Happy shooting and we’ll see you tomorrow!

Well, when I recently twittered with excitement over the newly released calendar of some of my favorite images for 2010, someone asked me about the template I used to create those images.  I honestly answered that I didn’t really use a template as the website www.lulu.com just let me upload the images and they handled the rest.  On realizing that they were talking about the images on my Photography Website, I recalled that a template was used for those images.  I could have done a written post about this, but those take a lot of time to put together (lots of screen grabs, lots of writing, and lots of uploading), so I instead decided to put together a new video on how to create a template for your photos inside of Photoshop.  The video may take some time to load, so please be patient as this is a self-hosted video production!

Keep in mind – this is just one way – in Photoshop there are always many ways to reach similar results, and as the old adage says, there’s more than one way to skin a cat!  Anyway, this is for you @mitz!  Enjoy, happy shooting, and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!  Oh, and lest we forget, there are very few days left in the January giveaway!  For your chance to win a free copy of Photomatix Pro from the folks at HDR Soft, get your Circle-themed photos in the Flickr Contest Thread by midnight on Friday (Mountain Time – GMT-7).

P.S.  For those that like my videos and want to see the archives, check out the Learning Resource Page from the sidebar for more materials.  And as an additional side note, this is post #600.  No fuss, no muss, no fanfare, but yet somehow I landed back on video tutorials – which is kind of how it all started!  Somehow, ,ind of poetic, eh?

So, in the interests of putting some sort of creative graphic design effect together, I started playing around in Photoshop when I got home with a few different tools, effects, and all that fun stuff.  When all was said and done, the effect of all of this playing produced something that I thought would be worthy of a Photoshop tutorial.  However, I did run out of time to put all the screen shots and steps together for a blog post, so here is a teaser of what you might be seeing later this week!

The End Result

The ones that got me there…

The final result is a little surreal, but using the various effects were fun.  It also took some rather plain photos and turned them into…well, something not so plain!  When’s the last time you played in Photoshop?  Can you identify the effects used here?  Share your own pictures in the comments (remember, we have image upload now!), as well as any thoughts and or feedback.

Special thanks and shout outs to Brian for hosting the DALPUG meetings and for encouraging our creativity- he puts a lot of time and effort into these and it shows!

Only a couple blog notes for today, first that the Monthly Giveaway only has a limited amount of time left for submissions, so make sure you submit your Circles themed photos to the Flickr thread before the deadline!  Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow for more creative encouragement!

So, the second one came out okay, but the plain background of the table didn’t really work all that well…it needed something else – Christmas lights!  So, I got an extra garland that wasn’t used in the house and threw that down, encircling the paper.  But something was still missing…a little color.  What goes with green and white?  Red!  Enter a blanket strategically placed underneath it all to add a touch of color.  So, took a few shots, and liked it, but the shadows seemed kind of muted, and the lights were getting a little blown out.  Hmmm…could I be dreaming of an HDR Christmas?

An HDR Christmas

The fact that the little star burst off the one light happened was purely incidental, but I think helped the overall composition.  How about the reading audience?  What are your thoughts?  Does it work?  Need something else?  What about your own holiday-themed work?  Feel free to share thoughts, feedback, samples and such in the comments!

In other Friday news, CB now has a Facebook fan page, so if you get a minute – stop by the Facebook page and sign up.  I’ll be sharing more photos, tips, tricks, and such there in the weeks to come as well, and you won’t know unless you’re a “fan”!  For those of you getting your news from the feed, the direct link to the Facebook page is here.

Don’t forget, the December Giveaway is also still underway – over $400 of super cool prizes including software, books, prints, and papers!  Just a cornucopia of prizes, all waiting to be given away for free! Just enter your photo at the Flickr thread:  December Giveaway. The theme this month is GIVING. Interpret however you like and good luck to all.  The rest of the contest details are here.

That’s about it for this Friday – have a great weekend everyone! Going on a sunrise shoot in the mountains tomorrow wit the Meetup group here in Denver, so it is going to be an early riser for me tomorrow.  Start time of 4am!  More on that next week!  Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here on Monday!

Denver Adobe Lightroom & Photoshop Users Group

No, this isn’t spam, the blog has not been hacked, and I am not speaking in tongues here.  DALPUG refers to the Denver Adobe Lightroom & Photoshop Users Group.  Started relatively recently by a guy I know named Brian Reyman, it’s a great local resource for photographers to not only learn from one another, but also to network and get an opportunity to see some of the latest developments in the industry.

I had a chance to attend the meeting last night, and the mini-workshop that Brian ran on plugins included quick looks at things like OnOne Software, Topaz Labs, Nik, and a bunch of others.  Not only were they showing you how to use the plugins, they were offering up giveaways too!  It’s a great group, offering people opportunities to learn, share, and network with others in the field in the area.  Definitely worthy of a diversion from the regular blog schedule to give some shout outs here today.

I’ve also learned that these sorts of groups are all over the place – Adobe sponsors user groups across the globe!  So, here’s a chance to sprad the word about your area groups.  Got one you know about?  Attend any regularly?  Let me know here in the comments and link to your website or user group site so people can find you!

Short but sweet, so keep on shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

Instead, here I will simply share some of the interface, and a few before and after shots here so you can get an idea of how well this software handles noise in your images.  So, enjoy!

First up (after entering your license code), you’ll have a screen that looks like this:

Noise Ninja

You can see the yellow squares in the image on the right that shows the sections scanned to determine the noise profile for the image selected.  On the right, a closer view of what the image will look like (or at least a close approximation) after the noise reduction is run.  You see how you can make certain adjustments on one of several tabs.  On this main tab, you can see the options for Image Profile, Profile Chart and radio buttons for luminance and color values, along with the reset option.  I actually leave these alone most of the time.

On the second tab is where I vary my noise reduction adjustments (and I would venture to guess most people make their valuation adjustments based on the image used).  Here’s the options available to you:

Noise Ninja

You can see here that many more detailed adjustments can be made to the strength, smoothness, contrast, USM amount, radius, color noise, and then checking whether you want the processing done quickly (turbo) and applying the settings to coarse noise situations.  I made my adjustments to 12 for the strength, smoothness and contrast (and typically use these ones for most images with noise).

In the next tab, as shown below, you can see the noise brush, where you can apply the noise on a paint mask or an erase mask, specify the channel (luminance, chroma, or all) ad the quality of the brush trail by not only the type of edge, but also by radius and strength.  (This is very handy if you want the noise reduction faded across the image so as to leave some noise behind for artistic effect!  Normally I don’t make adjustments here either – but it is fun to play!)  Take a look at the interface:

Noise Brush

The Actions tab, as shown next, defines how Noise Ninja operates when it’s loaded.  Specifically, here is where you can tell NN wither the profile is by default configured based on EXIF data or to create a profile from the image, or to use a specific profile. This can be very handy as well if you are batch processing a lot of photos that were shot under the same or similar circumstances so that a profile doesn’t have to be loaded each and every time.  The fallback, and filter policies can also be defined here as well.  Here typically I leave the default settings alone as I prefer not to batch profess since my type of work is more geared toward fine art and individual edits rather than massive quantities.  To each their own I guess – take a look at the interface:

Noise Ninja Actions

The next tab is the annotations tab.  I almost never use this, as this is a place where you can add additional EXIF and metadata.  Since I prefer to take the values from camera rather than adding my own specific notations, this tab doesn’t get any use from me – but it can be handy if you want to vary settings based on things like manufacturer, Model, FIlm type Megapixel count, ISO level, etc.  A second tab lets you add even more…see the interface captures below for reference.   Noise Ninja to me is isn’t about editing exif data though – it’s about noise reduction, so I skip these tabs.  Take your pick:

Noise Ninja Annotations Tab

Noise Ninja Annotations Tab 2

I do occasionally reference the Image Info tab though, because some useful information can be obtained there as well.  Things like the manufacturer, model, and more specifically, the ISO setting at which the image was taken.  ISO settings can be an indication on the amount of noise that was introduced due to camera settings and thus, how much can be reasonably applied.

Noise Ninja Image Info

You can see that my first image, shot at ISO 3200, was subject to some pretty intense noise on the 40D.  So, I ran the process, and take a look at the before and after results:

Before

Before Noise Ninja processing

Some pretty heavy noise, as expected, so let’s just look at the image after processing:

After

After Noise Ninja processing

See the difference in grain?  Yeah, I was impressed too.  But is it always the case?  I ran another couple images through NN and got the same or similar results on other objects in my print box.  (Which, by the way, is a great resource for test shots when looking into lens and gear performance on a wide variety of things like noise, white balance, macro, depth of field, and much more.)  Here’s another sample crop just to show you for comparison sake:

Before NN Processing 2

and after…

After NN Processing 2

Again, some impressive results.  When push comes to shove, results is where it counts in my book and PictureCode delivers at a superb value.

Now granted, there are other noise handling programs out there, and if you ask a dozen people what they use, 5 will say one, 5 will say another, and 2 will offer up another alternative.  When push comes to shove, it really is up to personal preference on which one “works best”.  For me, it doesn’t really matter as long as you are aware of what noise is, what it can do to an image, and how to fix it.  The tool you use is up to you.  I think Noise Ninja is probably recognized well enough for a reason, and the results here seem to suggest why.

The rest I’ll leave up to personal preferences, and if you would like to contribute your own thoughts, by all means, share them here in the comments or with me via email.  If you want to try it – you can download a free copy from the folks at PictureCode here -  or simply participate in the October Contest over at Flickr and win a copy from them for free!

That’s it for today – happy shooting all, and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

Well, as you may recall, a while back during the “Comment Contest” I asked people to contribute their favorite iPhone/iPod photography-related applications.  While the iTouch has not been fully capable of testing each of these, I’ve tried most of them and am putting together a new set of posts (don’t ask me where it’s going to go, because I am starting to run out of days in the week!) to cover the latest in Photography applications for those on the go.  So, for today, I am going to do the first application review:

Photoshop.com Mobile Application

In doing so, I figured it would be best to start at home – and by that I don’t mean here at the blog (although it would be kinda cool to develop an application where you could submit photos to the Canon Blogger critique threads and contest threads straight from your iPhone!).  No, I mean starting with the source – the editor we all know and either love or hate – Photoshop!  Believe it or not, the folks at Adobe have come out with a cool little application that you can connect to via your iPod or iTouch through a web interface at www.Photoshop.com

Here’s what it does – it allows you to store your photos online, edit, and share them with family and friends, create photo albums, and galleries.   Now before someone chimes in and says “Flickr already does that”, I will concur that Flickr is probably not going to be de-throned in the online photo sharing space any time soon.  But here’s a couple cool things that you get on Photoshop.com’s site that you don’t get on Flickr.

• You can customize your background
• You get more storage (2GB free)
• More scalable service (it’s not just free and pro, there are different scales of services for whatever needs you may have)
• You can link Photoshop.com to your Flickr account (but not vice versa)

So, it’s kind of a cool little service.  What I like about it is that the interface is much more conducive to sharing photos on the go.  For those of us with limited storage on our mobiles, it’s nice to be able to just log in to a web interface and share 2 GB worth of photos and have it look both classy and professional (sorry Flickr, but your interface needs an update…).

It’s free to join (you do need an Adobe Account though – also free), and can register a personal web space as well.  I’ve already done so, and you are welcome to view my account thus far at http://canonblogger.photoshop.com as I explore this some more to see what else is there to do.  You can create your own account at the main page of www.photoshop.com, and upload/share photos and videos in as little as five minutes too.  Some other applications I am taking a look at include HDR for Free, iHandy Level, and of course, the uploader applications for things like Flickr and Twitpic.  Some games have made their way into my iTouch (don’t know how that happened! ), I’ll try to keep those out of the blog and keep things photo-centered.

If this topic takes traction, and people express enough interest in it, then be sure to stay tuned for future reviews and write-ups on iPhone and iTouch applications.  In the meantime – if you’ve got an application that you think is the bee’s knees, then feel free to share it here.  Suggestions for applications?  Share those too – I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts.  As Apple is prone to say, I am prone to ask – “Got an App for that?”  Ask here and I will do what I can to find out and review for you!  Happy shooting all, and don’t forget to upload your photos for the October contest over on Flickr. The theme is FALL and it’s sure to be a good one – 3 pics a piece, and it’s underway right now.  Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

In other blog and podcast notes, don’t forget, the $500 giveaway for the Thinktank Photo Multimedia Bag and Topaz Labs plugin bundle is still going on over on the Flickr site.  We’re in the last week for submissions so we can wrap things up by the end of September, so time is drawing nigh!  The thread to share your pictures (and the guidelines) is here for those interested.  It’s a great opportunity to take advantage of some great products from Topaz Labs and Thinktank Photo (and thanks go out to the sponsors for their generous contributions)!

In case you haven’t noticed the sidebar, there are now short little audio tips being offered up courtesy of the folks over at Audioboo.  The latest comes  the shores of Cabo San Lucas with the peaceful waves of the Pacific crashing in the background!  So, for the feed readers out there, stop on over to the blog and check out the audio tips – some hopefully good stuff there too.

Thanks also to the recording capabilities of my wife’s point-and-shoot camera, you are in for a special treat tomorrow in the form of a Quicktime video!  Until then, here’s the promised stills from the trip.  Happy shooting everyone and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow.  (Don’t forget to let me know your thoughts and feedback in the comments!)

Mexican Harbor

Negative Space

The Power of the Waves

Umbrella Dots

In Honor of Escher

Through a Window

As a little postscript, since many will ask, I did my post processing in Lightroom and Photomatix (yes, some of these are HDR images).  One image did reveal a pretty heavy dust spot on my sensor, so that one did see a round-robin through Photoshop for that one speck.

Check this out.  I took a sunset picture from here in Colorado a few months ago, and ran it through the entire collection.  Here’s the original image:

Original Sunset Straight out of Camera

Sure, it’s an okay shot, but could it be better? I sure don’t remember it being that plain looking when I pressed the shutter, so let’s take a look at some of the options available in Topaz Labs Details Plugin:

Topaz Details

Tobaz Labs Details panel - Set 2

With twelve total options, I was stunned.  A slight difference between this plugin and the Adjustment plugin is that this one does appear to chug a little slower – each time it had to re-scan the entire image and the scratch disk filled up further, so by the end of the 3rd edit, I had given up on an action for PS.  Just find your favorite initially based off previews (they are pretty close) and run with that for your output.

What I did like is that the sliders at the bottom were still adjustable for further image customization from the default “out of the box” adjustments that Topaz Labs gives you.  I also liked the number of options too.  In the Adjustment plugin the options were just a little too overwhelming for me – but 12 is just about enough.

My last note though, would be that once you have the plugin loaded, it shouldn’t have to reload again with the same photo still open.  A quick scan of the exif data should be able to say “same image” and scan no further.  That would allow for actions, and quick galleries of the various options for viewing full size images of the various options rather than the smaller previews.

What about the CB Crew?  What are your thoughts on this short review?  Have you used the Details plugin yet?  If so, thoughts on the usefulness?   Got a favorite details adjustment?  From here (I know it’s small), which ones hold the most appeal for you?  Oh yeah, the last thing – do you want this plugin free?  Then get your photo in the LDP contest today!

Anyway, happy shooting and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!  Don’t forget to enter the contest… here’s the link to the Flickr thread!

Grab the Feed

In the case of the Topaz Suite – boy did I bite off more than I could chew!  The Topaz Labs package consists of 7 different Photoshop plugins with somewhat descriptive names for each plugin package, ranging between:

• Adjust
• Denoise
• Simplify
• Detail
• Clean2
• DeJPEG
• Vivacity

There’s also two video plugins available:  Enhance and Moment.  I’ll address those in another post, just because, well… even just the 7 plugins for Photoshop was going to be a lot of plugins to review in one blog post!  Thinking I was up to the challenge, I powered on and installed each package, then fired up Photoshop.  Wanting to find an image that had some depth, color and tonal range to it, I picked one from a photo walk I did in Boulder a month or so ago of the tulips:

Boulder Tulips

Kind of a neat image:  one flower all by itself ina sea of red tulips.  The green stalks and purple base also served as a nice contrasting set of colors to see how things progressed.  So, into the first plugin I went – the Topaz Adjust.  Lo and behold, within this one plugin are 21 different photo adjustment presets! That’s right – 21!  Here’s a quick look at the interface:

See that left-hand column?  There’s 21 different variations of creative adjustments done to your photo to give you a specific look and feel to your images – all at the click of a button.  To the bottom center are all the slider controls for exposure, details, color, and yes – even noise handling.  You can select a creative style, then edit within that style to go for a unique look and feel all your own!  This is a very clever and unique approach to photography work flows, because now you can look at your photo with various edits in an simple and easy preview to see how various adjustment styles will look on them.  I’d like to give some face time to each style but there just isn’t room here in the blog to do each justice.  So….enter the photo gallery!

That’s right, I took my one image and ran it through each of the 21 possible adjustment styles.  On each style I just left the default sliders in place, but what’s especially cool is that these slider values change from one style to another, so if you are paying attention to the numbers, and you like a particular style, but want to drop just a touch of the contrast, or bump a touch of the noise, you can do so easily and intuitively!  Pretty darn cool in my book.  The styles go alphabetically in order in the gallery:

• Clarity
• Color Blast
• Crisp
• Detailed
• Dramatic
• Enhanced Contrast
• Equalize
• Exposure Color Stretch
• Exposure Correction
• Mild Color Pop
• Mild Contrast
• Mild Detail
• Neutralizer
• Photo Pop
• Portrait Drama
• Portrait Smooth
• Psychedelic
• Simplify
• Small Details
• Smooth and Flat
• and Vibrance

To see the overall effect each adjustment style has on your images, visit this companion photo gallery here that shows each – the original is listed first, followed by the 21 different adjustment styles!

This alone would be worth a giveaway prize – but this is just one of the entire suite that Topaz Labs has donated to the blog/podcast for our next giveaway.  The rest of their various plugins will have to be reviewed individually on the blog, so this means during September, I’ll take a more detailed look at each of the plugins – clearly more than one will have to be addressed each week, and I’ll try to post an image gallery so you can see the effects of each plugin on some photos.  This is definitely a product to consider as a part of your arsenal of tools though – I’ve already seen so many possibilities for photo galleries and output options on my own collections that I could be busy for months just reviewing what these plugins have to offer.

One downside to the Topaz plugins is that they are only functional in Photoshop and Aperture.  From what I understand, a LR set is in R&D right now, and should be released in very short order.  But for the time being – Photoshop and Aperture are your installation options.  The only other downside I can see to all these options is the risk of decision paralysis – when prompted with too many options, it can often lead one to indecision.  For this reason, I’ve designed an action to use in my own work flow when using the Topaz Labs Adjust plugin.  Here’s what the action does:

1. It takes my original file and creates 21 duplicate layers.
2. Each adjustment style is then applied to its own layer, and the image is flattened and saved by that style name as a lower-resolution jpg file.
3. I then go into Lightroom and look at all 21 (and the original) in either the Library module or in a web gallery module to see which one or two I like the most.
4. I’ll then go back to Photoshop and find those two layers and delete the rest.
5. Save that resulting file as a PSD
6. On each adjustment style, I then tried some various tweaks on the sliders to see if there were minor adjustments that I found more appealing to my tastes.

This is just my work flow that I am thinking will work well for me – I like having at least a few options available, and since different scenes call for different adjustment styles – the action will help expedite my work flow.  It took a while to create the action as you have to be methodical and pay attention – but the resulting options for workup are worth it in my opinion.

Anyway, back to the Topaz Labs Adjust plugin – this thing rocks and I could easily see it become a part of my work flow (who am I kidding – it really already has since I built an action to support it!  LOL)  Don’t forget, next month you can WIN not just the Adjust plugin but the entire suite from Topaz Labs.  Keep checking in for details and the theme announcement.  Thanks to the good folks at Topaz Labs not only for their generous contribution to the LDP podcast, but also for the R&D they’ve invested in this entire series of plugins!  Judging from my review of the first component – this is sure to become part of the standard set of utilities for photographers and creatives!

Okay, that’s probably enough for today.  If you’re still chomping at the bit for more info about Topaz Labs software – go check out their blog – it’s got some great info on there too and really goes in depth from Product Manager Eric Yang (this is his Twitter link – follow him, very cool guy!)!  I’ve already added it to my own list of RSS feeds!  Check back tomorrow as we get back to the previous project I started – the manually adjusted Star Tracker!  In the meantime, you also have only a short time left in the Wacom Giveaway – Friday is the last day to submit your photos!  So, if you want to Win a Wacom (Bamboo Fun) – enter today over at the Flickr Thread!

Happy shooting everyone and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!

Grab the Feed

Well, the clouds and the sun didn’t really cooperate so I gave up on that and starting fiddling around with some HDR kinds of things.  I saw a traffic light nearby and there wasn’t much traffic so tried to time some bracketed exposures (my shutter speed was getting near 30 seconds on the top end of the bracket).  Some possibilities developed, but nothing too earth shattering, and I was starting to feel a few drops of rain, so I packed up to head back over to the house – about 2 miles away.

As I was coming back to the house, the clouds that evaded me on the mountainous horizon were ominously hanging over the cityline of Denver (another scene I’d been meaning to shoot) and flashes of lightning were coursing through the clouds, with some pretty regular spikes coming down.  All of this was about 30 miles away, and heading away from me so i was feeling pretty safe except for the possibility of some raindrops now and then.

So, I found a nook by the open range, set up the camera on my trusty tripod, and tried to recall things I’d read about how to shoot lightning.  Apparently some of it stuck, because I came away with this:

Lightning over Denver

So, how did I do this?  I kept four key things in mind:

1. I used my tripod!  Stability was key because every single exposure was no less than 15 seconds!  When shooting lightning, you want to open the shutter for a longer time to increase your odds of catching it.  Because it was flashing so regularly I eventually dropped my shutter to 15 seconds and still managed 6 or 7 really good captures.
2. Keep the noise Down – I dropped my ISO to 100 for all shots and made sure long exposure noise reduction was turned on in camera.  Sure it took twice as long to capture each image, but in the long run it was worth it because there was much less noise to process on the back end.
3. Don’t touch the camera!  I set the camera to bracket exposures and put it on a two-second delay.  So, by the time the camera shutter opened I was no longer touching it, and then the second and third shots fired automatically.
4. I made sure I was in a sweet spot of my lens.  Part of this is knowing your gear – I was shooting the 10-22mm (wide angle) from Canon, and know that when it goes below f4 it can get fuzzy.  So, I was at f11 for most of my shots.  Great depth of field and everything is sharp!

Well, a fifth one was post-processing.  After a few rather unpleasant attempts to process as HDR images, I enlisted the aide of friend-of-the-blog Terry Reinert, who you know from our podcast talk a short time ago.  Terry is wicked smart (he’s an engineer) and knows the heck out of HDR.  I asked him what I was doing wrong (because the clouds were getting blotches scattered through them and generally looking poorly).  He gave some insights, what he was finding yielded better results and sent me a low res sample via email.  I liked the path he took, but the colors were not quite where I remembered them from Sunday, so dove in again with the new-found knowledge.  I tried a few quick variations on his technique, but in the interests of time, just did a short version to post here.  Once I get my final edit done (probably this weekend, I will likely be adding the image to my portfolio, so will also post that here as well.  For now though, I wanted to share the back story and a quick version of one processed version that I found appealing.  I am not crazy about the black across the bottom, but since my time was limited here, I’ll likely be addressing that this weekend when I have more time.  For now though, the quick version and a panorama crop looked kinda cool!

Thanks go out to Terry for giving a hand.   In our discussion he also mentioned possibly doing a tutorial on blending using the images, so keep your eyes on Terry’s blog (Where Art and Engineering Collide) as I may be a featured artist!  (How cool would that be?) ETA:  On posting the link to his blog, I see he’s already put his tutorial together – thanks Terry!

In other blog/photo news, as you all know from yesterday, the OnOne Giveaway concluded with Pete Petersheim being the big winner.  The new contest is underway though, with a new thread up at the Learning Digital Photography group on Flickr, so be sure to stop in there and share your images in the new thread (the theme this go around is “Fun” since the price is a Wacom Bamboo Fun!)  Good luck to everyone and don’t forget to have some fun!

Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

Grab the Feed

Well, we all know that ads only show you the quick and flashy parts of things, not the nitty gritty.  Let me tell you here and now – the Mask Pro really has no nitty gritty – it really is that easy.  Take a look at these sequences:

First off, an image I merged together during a trip to SC last summer.  It looked like it could make for a nice HDR, so I did some tone mapping and got this result:

Needless to say, it didn’t really have the “wow” factor I was looking for.  (I should also throw a mention in for the folks at HDRsoft that produce Photomatix, the HDR software utility that I was testing at the time I originally put this HDR together – still working on a review of that – I lost the trial version after re-installing XP, but will get that back shortly.)  Anyway,  given the success I’d had with some other images in HDR and the background I tried, figured it was worth the effort to blend in a different background.  Here’s the results.

Keep in mind, this was after literally hours and hours of painstakingly selecting branches, twigs, and  what not literally zoomed in to almost the pixel level.  Still, not that flattering a result and clearly a less than “stellar” job.  I relegated that to the “learn from your mistakes” folder and had not really touched it since.

So, this was my test for the Mask pro – could it do what I couldn’t after at least ten hours of agonizing masking selections and duping to repeated layers to start up the following day?  Well, let’s see, here’s what happened.

After installing Mask Pro, I loaded the tone-mapped HDR image into Photoshop.  Then, rather than taking any time to tweak, I went straight to Mask Pro (after all, it should do the work for me, right?).  After a short 7-slide presentation on the tools, my first screen looked like this:

Before I go on, let me explain how the tools on the right ended up how they were.  You see, Mask pro gives you eye dropper tools to select the colors you want to keep and the ones you want to subtract.    So, I went and selected the green eye dropper to define the colors to keep.  I clicked a few parts of the branches and signage, which took the better part of 5 seconds.  The end result was this color set:

Then I switched to the red eye dropper to define the colors to drop.  I clicked a few parts of the sky.  This took another 5 seconds or so.    The end result was this color set:

Lastly, I clicked the Magic Brush tool, from the Mask Pro tool panel

and just started painting around the sky.  I certainly did not take my time, as I was running on my Windows desktop which has a single core 2.3 Ghz celeron processor (it chugs when I load my browser fer Pete’s sake).  So, I dealt with about 5 minutes of a magic brush tool as it calculated the mask to apply as I painted impatiently across the image.  (After all, I wrote these blog posts after dinner, so time = sleep here.)

So, after about 5 minutes and 10 seconds, I have a mask that looks like this:

Yes, that was after 5 minutes!  I could already tell this was a wickedly intuitive and powerful tool (and I mean that in the best of ways), so I just stopped there and decided to take it back to PS for final cleanup and adding the new background.  To do that, I simply clicked the File menu, then “Save/apply” (another 2 seconds)…

Now back in Photoshop with the original image.  It looks the same, but take a look at the layers palette:

I know the low-res and smallness of captures for the blog make this hard to tell, but at this point I am pretty much ready to bring in the new background.  My only last step in PS is to duplicate the layer I just created from mask Pro to clean up the big blotch in the upper right, and a few specks in the rest of the sky on the third layer.   So, now I am ready to bring in my starry background again.  I place the object in the PS document to get this (for the record, I went with a different starry background to go for a more realistic effect rather than the Harry potter look of my swimming pool shots):

Finally, I just pulled the stars layer to sit below the Mask Pro layer and here’s the resulting layout in Photoshop:

The last bit took all of another minute, tops (remember, I am working off a slow processor.  The final result, which took literally less than 10 minutes (the first took over 10 hours):

Such is the power of the OnOne mask Pro – just one of the multiple plugins that are available in this Suite.  If you want this kind of power and malleability in minutes, then enter the giveaway today.  it can literally save you hours, if not days, of post processing!  Here’s the Flickr page for photo entries and here’s the link to the rules.

What can I say – OnOne rocks!  Just to give you a true frame of reference – it took me about an hour and a half to write this post – and that includes getting the screen captures, then sizing them for the blog.  I also interspersed some Twitter time and surf time as well, so it’s not like I was really in any kind of “zone” or anything.  It was just another task in an evening of multi-tasking.  The original one took me over ten hours of processing and that was with no other apps running, seriously.  I was restarting the computer just to free up the RAM for usage only by PS every evening.

This feature alone can save you days of time in the digital darkroom.  Don’t delay and enter to win today! Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow.

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