Announcements – Page 13

Photograph that freedom!

July 3, 2008 Jason5 Comments

With tomorrow being the 4th of July, I will be taking the day off from blogging. I will be taking a short trip to NY to spend some time with family and close friends over the long weekend – then it’s back to SC to finish our packing and preparations for the move to Colorado.

While many others will also be traveling and spending time with family and friends, we will all no doubt be snapping away with our cameras. We’ll likely be capturing our relatives, families and friends in various activities: eating, drinking, general merriment, perhaps a baseball game, or running with sparklers, or taking in some fireworks at the local ballpark. All of these activities are just a few of the ways in which we celebrate our freedom and the establishment of our independence as the United States of America!

The United States of America has many problems that we face. Tomorrow though, we celebrate one of the best things about this country – the establishment of our freedom from the crown of England. It’s pretty amazing if you think about it. A bunch of rough-shod farmers, a few businessmen, and political thinkers, stuck up for one another and to defend our rights. Our right to own land, unobstructed from military regimes, the right to bear arms, the freedom of speech, the freedom from religious oppression, the right to choose those who we permit to govern on our behalf – and in our best interests. Yet these days, it seems our rights to freedom are gradually eroding away. Land can be taken “for the public good”, while the country is faced with economic recession and layoffs, the military-industrial complex continues to thrive, laws continue to limit our ability to defend ourselves, speech is becoming offensive and restricted, religious zealots (or aetheists) push agendas in purely subjective directions, and elections are becoing more and more of a circus, it seems we are not as free as we once were.

Before people think this is a political post, or a rant on the social and economic woes of the times (which it kind of has been thus far), rest assured: it’s not. Instead, I am suggesting that we photographers go out tomorrow, and over the course of the next month and look for examples of freedom. Capture the essence of freedom in a photograph. Think you got a good one? Then share it! I’ve set up a Flickr group to share pictures into with Canon Blogger. We’ll go for the next 30 days, so from July 4th to August 4th, the challenge is to go out and capture the essence of freedom in a photo.

Share it with the Canon Blogger Flickr group. Once the time window closes, I’ll go through all the pictures and put a slide show together here on the blog of all the images. Plus, the best shot will actually WIN something! That’s right, Canon Blogger will be hosting it’s first ever photo contest! I’ll choose what I think is the best image that captures the essence of freedom in a photo and give that lucky winner the first ever prize from Canon Blogger. Since this is a prize that is coming out of my own pockets, there are a few restrictions though (you knew there would be). Here they are:

All shots must be taken within the United States.
All shots must be taken between July 4th and August 4th 2008
While photo corrections are permitted, editing should be restricted to corrections (adjusting shadow and highlight details, a little dodging and burning here and there, etc.) only. No composites!
Be prepared to submit an original image with all exif data, no smaller than 800 px on the longest side.
All images must be submitted to (and remain shared in) the Canon Blogger thread titled “Photograph Freedom” on Flickr.
The decision of the judge (me) is final.
2nd place, 3rd place, and Honorable mentions will also be noted for their images.
No person can submit more than 3 shots for consideration.
Shots included on Flicker should be no larger than 600px on the longest dimension.

So, the big question is still lurking in everyone’s minds: what’s the prize? Well, it’s not much, but the winner of the first ever contest from Canon Blogger will receive a $25 gift card to their choice of Amazon or B&H Photo!

Everyone who enters an image will be included in the slide show, but there will be only one grand prize winner. But wait a second, grand prize? You mean there’s more? That’s right! The 2nd, 3rd place and honorable mentioned photos will also receive accolades. Here’s the list of all prizes:

1st Place: $25 gift card to your choice of Amazon or B&H Photo
2nd Place: A DVD of all videos produced by CB thus far.
3rd Place: A CD of all articles written and shared here on CB to date.

All finalists will also get (Honorable Mentions included) a day of your photo (and website if you have one) promoted and highlighted on the blog. Naturally, all ownership of images stays with the shooter, except for the instances of display outlined above (the slide show and the day of recognition).

P.S. While travelling I hopped online while on layover at DC, and saw a link to the blog coming from Hyperphocal. Looks like they picked up my latest article I submitted, titled “Looking at Light” It’s actually a pretty good read, even if I do say so myself. But, since todays post was already on another topic, that article will likely be long gone by the time I get back from NY. So, stop over to Hyperphocal today and check out the latest! Happy holidays all and happy shooting! (Keep watching those apertures…)

Pics, Trips, and Tips

June 18, 2008 Jason10 Comments

Welcome to week 3 of the “What’s This?” series! Last week I had a close-up shot with some great guesses including carpet, a towel, and a toothbrush – but the answer, as it turns out, is a candle wick!

I had cropped out a portion of it, to give kind of a different twist! Thanks to all for participating! So, as we move into week3, here is another everyday object that I’ve zoomed in on, and taken a cropped portion to share. Can you guess what this is?

In other news, it seems I will be somewhat busy over the next few weeks with several trips on the horizon. Late June, a friend is getting married, and that will require a trip to NC. Then, shortly after that, I will be traveling (driving) to New York for the 4th of July festivities. Very shortly after I get back, I will likely be accompanying my wife out to Colorado as we transition to that area from SC. She’ll move on ahead to start her job, while I stay behind to close up shop and sell the house. Oh yeah, did I mention? We’re moving to Colorado!!!

So, for the last tidbit of news, I did actually knock out the tip for the week as previously mentioned: displacement maps! I read about this technique in my most recent issue of NAPP and had a few images that I thought it may work for, so thought to give it a whirl! Pretty neat effect, so feel free to try it out yourself!

CB Episode #44: Displacement Maps

Another delay

June 17, 2008 Jason2 Comments

400px

Sorry all, but the tutorial will likely be delayed (or possibly postponed) for this week. Some news came in today that needed some time away from the computer and camera world – reality checked in and demanded attention. I’l be back tomorrow with this week’s edition of “What’s This” and a walk around the web! Thanks for understanding. Happy shooting and watch those apertures!

Tip Teaser

June 17, 2008 JasonLeave a comment

Due to birthday circumstances, spousal attention requirements, and other frvolities of life, the tip for Tuesday has not been recorded yet. I will try to get that recorded, produced, and published today. In case it doesn’t make it out though, the teaser for it is that it covers displacement mapping with some pretty neat effects as a result. So, check back in later tonight (I am guessing around 10pm EST) to see if I was able to crunch things together in time. If not, it will likely be published tomorrow with the latest edition of “What’s this?”. So, in the meantime, keep those cameras clicking. Happy shooting and watch your apertures out there!

Magical Moments

June 12, 2008 JasonLeave a comment

wand

Does anyone remember from earlier this week why this post is so momentous? This is magical post # 200 for Canon Blogger. A few days off here and there, but since inception back on August 21st, 2007, I have made sometimes silly, sometimes serious, and sometimes useful posts to Canon Blogger. It’s been a fun ride thus far, and rather than take the kind reader on a blathering journey through some deep, thoughtful, meaningful, and insightful post laden with pearls of wisdom, trinkets of tips, tricks and techniques, I would rather just take a moment to say: Thank you!

Thank you to all the readers who have let me rant on occasion, wax philosophic on others, and bide their time for something useful, informative, or at the very least… entertaining. It truly has been quite the learning experience thus far. I would like to think I have matured a little, learned a lot, and improved the quality of the content that I’ve been putting out into the blogosphere. That judgement though, will reside with the readership. As of today, Canon Blogger (which I now affectionately call CB), is showing some pretty amazing numbers between Google Analytics and PodPress:

55008 site visits
78175 page views
55775 feeds

Yeah, okay, that’s small potatoes when you look at the more serious bloggers, photographers, and other industry pros, but for a small time amateur blogger/photographer guy like me, I am just shattered that my little page has been picked up and read that much. So…THANK YOU! I’m glad you’ve enjoyed it thus far. Hopefully over the next 200 posts the quality of the content will continue to improve, and we’ll be able to look back on this day with a chuckle. Right now, I can’t imagine it – but, as the old saying goes “You never know…”

Today is also especially magical for me because I contributed an article to a free magazine called PhotographyBB which was published just the other day. This is my first published article, so it’s especially meaningful. I would like to thank Dave Seeram over at the PhotographyBB Magazine, and the folks in their forums who have accepted me into their community so graciously and with such open arms. I look forward to sharing many years to come with all of you. Do stop over to their site and feel free to join the community yourself. It’s a great group of people. The magazine, in it’s 5th issue, has many excellent articles (one by my) and an extra treat was to be able to contribute as the photographer “In the Spotlight”. Thne one that had planned to do it had something come up and could not, so I stepped in to help fill the content out for this issue. Very cool to be able to contribute to this work, and it really is a great read, so either stop over to their site and check out all they have to offer, or at least download the article linked below for a fun read when you have half an hour to spare.

So, it’s definitely some magical moments for me, and I just wanted to take today to say Thank You to everyone who has made this such a special day for me. You all rock!

Week 2: What’s This?

June 11, 2008 Jason5 Comments

For Week 2 of “What’s This?” – the image is another typical household object, so, take a gander at the image above, then take a guess in the comments or via email…This is a _____(fill in the blank)!

After a week of various responses both via email and in the comments, there was one correct guess via email, and the answer is – wait for it – a microphone! That’s right, my Sampson CO2 Condensor Mic that I record the podcast with almost every week. I zoomed in real close and didn’t even crop to produce the photo – so congrats to Thomas for guessing the right answer!

Things are picking up for me for the remainder of the week, so a shorter post today. One thing I will suggest as a Wednesday Web Gem is to stop over at the new CB Flickr Group! I’m posting the full size pics from what’s this (the following week) and sharing photos in there as I get a chance. Stop in, register with the FLickr foolks, and share images of your own, discuss things from the blog, offer ideas, other tips and tricks, or whatever the theme for the day is! The link to the CB Flickr Group is here: CB on Flickr

Until tomorrow, happy shooting and watch those apertures!

Maintenance Monday (and a book review…kind of)

June 9, 2008 Jason3 Comments

Wrench and Book

Hey all, it’s been a busy couple of days for the blog. I’ve been doing some research and maintenance on the blog to try and keep things interesting and to hopefully let more people know about the articles, essays, tips, tricks, techniques, and such that I’ve been sharing now for the past 9 months. I realized that I was in dire need of this when I saw my post count was up near 200 (hint: Thursday will be significant…) and I had not really taken any measures to get the blog registered in any directories.

So, after some research and study, I took some time Friday and Saturday to look at a number of directories and the types of blogs that are typical of those various venues. A couple that caught my eye include:

Of these, Alltop is definitely one of the coolest ones as they have a Photography category. On looking at the category, pretty much every blog that I’ve ever been to was on there along with a few that I’d not heard of. So, I sent them an email to inquire, and as you can probably tell from the new Directory listings on the side panel, they seemed willing to at least give me a try. So, thanks and shout outs to Alltop for the quick addition. Fair warning though – for those of you that may stop in there, you will likely find new must reads to add to your daily surf list. The one that caught my eye is a blog called Hyperphocal, with Chris Bergman. While still fairly new, the approach he seems to be taking with the blog is very similar to the one here at CB – sharing information, helping other photographers, Plus, his own blogroll reminded me of Digital Camera Resource, which I’d known about but forgotten for some time. So, thanks to Chris for putting that back on my radar.

Back on the directory subject though, the listings have been moved in the side panel to the bottom, as has the Google search box and the Feedburner subscription box. I think putting all that material in the same area gives a cleaner and smoother look to the blog. An iTunes one should be up shortly, I’ve just not had a chance to get the graphic I am looking for. If anyone has other subscription services they use, or that they can recommend, I am open to suggestions here as well. Feel free to stop in to any of these directories and share your thoughts of the blog, I’ve provided direct links to those directories where CB is already live.

The last bit about podcast directories though – even though I’ve been blogging and podcasting for a little over 9 months now, the idea of promoting the blog/podcast is somewhat foreign to me. Adding CB to a few directories seems like a good idea, but I would like to hear what others might suggest for venues or approaches to take. Should I promote the blog? If so, where? How? Are the ones I picked popular? I am in uncharted waters here, so would appreciate any suggestions or comments from the readership. if you’re reading directly, feel free to post in the comments. If you are reading from a feed, or would prefer to to comment publicly, please feel free to drop me an email. The address (as always) is jason <AT> canonblogger <DOT> com.

Other maintenance I did on the blog:

I removed the Dig button that was on each post. With a grand total of perhaps 20 digs over the last nine months, it was just another graphic that was taking up space and slowing down the blog more than it needed to. So, unless I start hearing screams for it back (which I doubt), the Dig button is toast!

A few pictures were added to the header rotation. I manually rotate that periodically to change out the look and feel, depending on the post of the day, so you may start seeing a little more variety there. If I can get to it on my “To Do” list, I’ll try to add full-size versions of the header images to the Flickr photo stream.

In photo news today, I got my copies of two reprints I ordered through reading The Online Photographer. The titles are “The New West: Landscapes Along the Colorado Front Range” by Robert Adams, and “The Photographer’s Eye“, by John Szarkowski. Being a Coloradan at heart, I tore the shrink wrap off Mr. Adams book first. I’m about a third of the way through it, and the black-and-white approach he takes to address both the man-made and natural landscapes (especially along the corridor of I-25) are pretty interesting. I would definitely recommend at least seeing if your local library has a copy of this book. I know spending $20 on a book of pictures can be off-putting to some, especially when we are trying to create our own works and possibly our own books. Nevertheless, I am quite happy with the purchase as viewing the works of others helps me to refine and hone my own vision that much more. Thanks to Mike J. from TOP for the heads up on these reprints – hopefully the few pennies he got from the referral purchase will pay for at least a few minutes worth of hosting!

Last, but not least, you may have noticed from the casual reference above, CB has joined the Flickr frenzy. That’s right, there is now a Flickr group for the blog. As I mentioned, I will start uploading full-size versions of pics that are rotated through the blog header, as well as some other shots that may be fun to view that weren’t really “croppable” to header size (is croppable a word?). Anyway, on the Flickr group, anyone is welcome to share images, tips, tricks, ideas, suggestions, feedback, or just share photos with one another. Here’s the link for anyone who’s interested: Canon Blogger on Flickr Fair warning though – if I see pics in the photo stream there I will likely be giving shout outs and links to your stream on the site. (Just keep the images PG-rated is all I ask…)

Well, that should be enough news for Monday. Until tomorrow, keep on shooting and watch those apertures!

What is this?

June 4, 2008 Jason4 Comments

What is this?

Welcome to the Wednesday walk around the web. Before throwing the web gems for this week at you, I figured it might be fun to bring in a new feature for Wednesdays: “What is this?” I’ll take a shot of something at an unusual angle, perhaps zoomed in super close, or intentionally blurred. See if you can guess what it is (use the comments). If you’re right, guess what you win? That’s right! Fame, fortune, and glory! Well, not really – but you do win the “What is this?” for the week so you can brag to all your photo peers that you won the CB “What is this” photo game. I’ll make the first one easy and give a hint – this was taken in my home office. Now, with that in mind, look at the picture above, and see if you can guess what it is! Good luck to all – and now for the Wednesday web gems.

This Week in Photography (TWIP) – Scott does regular photo-related posts, just like the rest of us, but he does bring a unique approach to the table. Another cool thing: he has contests, with actual prizes! Cool blog and ltos of useful info.
Frederick Johnson – Learned about this guy in the NAPP forums. He’s the Senior Marketing Manager for Professional Photography at Adobe – and while the title and company are impressive enough – check out his Flickr stream, and he has a blog too! Very cool stuff.
Jason D. Moore – His weekly P&P listing is up – everything there is of at least a first and second glance!
John Nack – Well known Adobe guy, and on my daily hit list. Always good info there. Actually thanks to John, I should qualify the statements that I made a few days ago about Adobe using the GPU for the next version of PS – his clarification on the subject was that it might be coming…but not sure when and as he said he “can neither confirm nor deny” it – he was just sharing possible developments.
Okay, it’s a bit of self-promotion, but I’ve not heard much feedback on the Advanced Online Photography Test (a.k.a. TOP Test) since migrating it. So, stop over to the TOP TEST to take your photography skills to the next level!

That should be enough for your morning surf time, now either get back to work or get out and shoot some pictures! Don’t forget to guess on the picture above, and throw a vote in on the poll. Happy shooting, watch those apertures, and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!

Monday “McNallyisms”

May 26, 2008 Jason1 Comment

Thanks to David Hobby over at Strobist for posting this on Saturday – apparently I have been missing the boat on videos lately as Google has a pretty extensive video archive of well-known people that they get to come out to the campus in CA and speak for a short while. David posted the YouTube video of Joe McNally (which was posted last Wednesday on YouTube). Normally I guess people speak for about ten minutes or so. Joe McNally’s talk – 1 hour! He naturally talks about The Moment it Clicks, but I walk away amazed every time I hear or read a little more about it. I have to get this book! Some key snippets came out of his conversation there that I took the time to write down and thought I would share these with the blogosphere. Call these “McNallyisms”:

On the big picture:

“My philosophy about photography is that it’s a very open-ended profession.”
“Human gesture trumps everything”
“You have to have fun. If you’re not having fun, your pictures will reflect that.”

On motivation

“At the end of the day, you’ve created something that didn’t exist that morning.”
“I’m not driven by a particular type of photography…[but] by the love [of photography]”
“I have to make a picture that conveys the emotional and visual experience I am having, and if the photograph doesn’t do that, then I’ve failed.”

On technique:

“There are no secrets, no mysteries, no dark kind of ‘Keys to the Castle’ or anything…”
“It only takes one ‘Awww, shit!” moment to wipe out three ‘atta boys’…”
“The migration period [apertures, f-stops, shutter speeds, ISO’s, etc.]…taking all the sundry stuff and migrating it from the front of your head to the back of your head…you need to learn that stuff”
“Technique is important – mechanical inputs have enormous aesthetic implications. You need to learn them and be fluid with them and it enables you to be able to speak with a louder voice.”

Yeah, it’s over an hour long, but it’s worth the listen…it can remind you of what’s really important about photography, and what doesn’t matter as much as you think it does:

And speaking of remembering what’s important, and what really matters versus what doesn’t matter so much, today you simply must stop over at Scott Eccleston’s blog for Weekly Photography Tips. That, my friends, is what really matters! Anyway, hope everyone enjoyed the weekend. Hope the coming week is just as good and keep those cameras clicking – happy shooting!

Finally Friday (again)

April 25, 2008 Jason4 Comments

Well, it’s been a log week folks,and since I’ve put a bit of time into various projects this week, I am feeling somewhat sleep-deprived, so not much will happen today, except to say that my Friday post will be delayed for another 12 hours or so. Tomorrow is the anniversary (made it 5 years and she still loves me!), and we’ll be doing some stuff with our neighbors. So…I should have some time tomorrow morning to share some Friday fun with you (only on Saturday). Just to give you a hint, the theme is “Friday Freebies! So, if you want to save some money, or are just interested in seeing economical alternatives, then make sure to tune in for a Saturday morning post with the freebie fun!

About 5 days left to chime in on the camera quantity poll, so don’t forget to vote. I’d also be interested in seeing how people have been doing with the Online Photography Test Care to share your scores, ideas, and suggestions for improving and/or expanding on this? E-mail me or post to the blog. So, until tomorrow – if you’re going out, be sure to take your cameras. Happy shooting and watch those apertures! 🙂