As we rush to get our last minute gifts purchased for the holidays, here is the final set in the five part series of gift ideas for the photographer. I kept the criteria simple:
Category: photography gear
25 Gift Ideas for 2010: Part 4
We’ve come a long way, with Part One, Two and Three giving fifteen of my best items I keep in my gear bag and for all around technical purposes. The list continues today with Part 4 – and only one more to come before all 25 are done! So, without further ado: Continue reading “25 Gift Ideas for 2010: Part 4”
25 Gift Ideas for 2010 – Part 3
The tryptophan hasn’t quite kicked in yet, and your afternoon football game needs a break. Stretch those legs and surf along to one of these fine buys – Black Friday or any day! Continue reading “25 Gift Ideas for 2010 – Part 3”
25 Gift Ideas for 2010 – Part 2
Last week began the grand-tastic gift guide for 2010, where I shared 5 of 25 great gift ideas for the photographer in your life. I keep the criteria simple. First, I must either own or want it! Second, It must be $50 or less. To read the first five in part 1, feel free to hit the archive for it here. Otherwise, today, we continue with Part 2:
1. Wireless Trigger System: Pocket Wizards, Radio Poppers and Cybersyncs are great if you’ve got the moolah, but for those on a budget, there should be some happy medium to get reasonably reliable triggers. I had tried the Cactus triggers myself, and they were a good point of entry, but really just were too unreliable. My buddy Kerry Garrison from Camera Dojo has researched the heck out of this and knows his stuff on lighting. He’s put together a great kit that includes everything you need from transmitters to receivers, and PC Sync cables too, all for the budget-friendly $50 rate! Check out his demo video here and get your photographer a set of these. I can’t wait to get my own set!
2. Lexar Memory: Everyone could use an additional memory card, and with prices dropping rapidly, the 8GB UDMA CF cards are now within the budget-conscious range, so pick up a spare (or two) of these as we never have enough in our bags…this one is linked from B&H but pick your own vendor of preference as the deals are across the internet.
3. Black Rapid RS7 – Okay, so it’s 8 bucks over the limit, but for the portability and easing of camera holding during extended sessions, the Black rapid RS 7 is a godsend. If you don’t have one – get one, plain and simple. Visit here to buy one today!
4. Online Training – a month or two from either Kelby Training or Lynda.com is just the ticket to help the photographer in your life help themselves. Whether it’s a refresher on Photoshop, boning up on Indesign, or even learning how to set up a WordPress blog or website, these are great resources for online training. Monthly rates are $25 on average, and with the holidays approaching, you could easily find discount codes or bonus offers for signing up, so consider this valuable option. It’s all part of the mentality of helping people advance in their craft through education!
5. Light Stand – I have been procrastinating getting a second light stand for some time now and there is just no excuse. The primary is an Impact stand I got from B&H and it has served me well, so I just need to add this to my own wish list, and encourage you to add one to yours (if you don’t already have enough that is…but then again, do we ever have enough lightstands – it’s a VAL you don’t have to feed or take out for beers after a shoot!)!. Here’s my own preferred one: 10′ Impact Lightstand (Tracy, are you reading this?) I should probably note here that I am linking to the 10′ tall heavy duty one – well worth the extra investment in my opinion, but for the super budget-conscious, these can get as cheap as $20 for a light duty 6′ one!
Okay, so consider it 5.5 suggestions today. I’m sure you have your own ideas too, so feel free to throw your own suggestions in the mix. Remember, with two down and three to go, keep the ideas coming as I do have some room open for a few more! Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!
25 Gift Ideas for 2010 – Part 1
We are officially into the holiday frenzy, and with Black Friday sales creeping up quickly, it’s time to start thinking of some gift ideas for the photog in your own family…or to drop subtle hints to others (if you want it for a present)! Over the next few weeks, I’ve got 25 great gift ideas to share with you. I’ve tried to keep true to some principles with these gift selections, so just to let you know, here’s my barometer for inclusion:
A. I either own it or want it! If I don’t own it, how can I say it’d be a great gift? Only if it’s something I want!
B. Let’s be realistic, the current economic trials are hitting us all hard – and throwing $100+ ideas on a gift guide is too rich for the blood of many photog-types in the trenches, so it’s gotta be cost-effective (nothing over $50)
To keep this manageable, it’s been parted out into five posts – each with 5 items. These are in no particular order, with no favoritism or affiliation to the actual products or vendors. So, without further ado:
1. Ditty Bag – My brother had some of these on our canoe trip earlier this year, and they proved invaluable in keeping my gear dry. $27 for a three-pack of dry ditty bags is a steal! From REI:
2. The Photo Mug – What can I say? I want one of these muchly. With my own expenditures being withheld to ones that are needed versus wanting, and not splurge items, I just have to hope someone in my family sees this:
3. The Battery Caddy – I know, this was in last years showcase, but that should tell you how much I love this. Mine was won in a photo contest online about three years ago and it has never left my camera bag. Brilliant idea, and worth its weight in gold! More options available than the AA clip shown here.
4. Flickr is probably one of the most recognizable photo sharing sites. With a pro account ads are banished and you are not limited in your daily uploads nearly as much. Only $25 gives the gift for a year!
5. Pocket Rocket from Think Tank. A sponsor of the Lightroom workshop, Think Tank gave us a bunch of these to include for each participant. I had to have one myself too, so out went the $17 – totally worth it!
Number 6-10 will be out soon, but I still have room on the list for some late additions, so if you’ve got some ideas, feel free to share (sharing is a good thing) either here in the comments or with me via e-mail. Happy shooting and we’ll see you tomorrow (or possibly Friday)!
Hardware Review: Think Tank Airport International V2.0
We all have camera bags. Whether you use a Point-and-Shoot, an SLR, or any other type of camera, you are putting it somewhere eventually that could be defined as a bag. These bags are made in such a variety of shapes, sizes, colors, and straps, it’s really amazing sometimes how many options there are for the photographer today. But like it or not, if you have a camera – you are gonna need a bag! Continue reading “Hardware Review: Think Tank Airport International V2.0”
Keep on Shootin'!
It’s been a while since an episode of LDP ran, but as we keep on shootin’ our way through life, so to does LDP continue on albeit not as frequently as any of us would like! Nevertheless, I get caught up somewhat on the photo news beat with some of the top stories over the past three weeks, have a great conversation with Tyler Stableford, a recent addition to the distinguished annals of the Canon Explorers of Light group. He’s been featured in photo magazines including Sports Illustrated, National Geographic, and many more. A recent series on the Colorado F-16 fighter pilots is what caught my eye about him and we recently had a chance to chew the fat…on this show! Continue reading “Keep on Shootin'!”
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Hardware Review: Sigma 4.5mm Fisheye (Circular)
As things start to settle down again, I’ve got a pile of reviews pending work, so this past weekend, while in bachelor status temporarily, I really knocked out a few projects, including getting caught up on some overdue reviews and blog writing. Today, the first of these projects is the Sigma 4.5mm fisheye lens review. This is a super cool lens, and has a lot of opportunities for creative exploration. I took the typical test shots indoors to get a feel for where it’s strengths and weaknesses are, how it focuses, and then took to the streets. Continue reading “Hardware Review: Sigma 4.5mm Fisheye (Circular)”
The Perils of Polarizers
Happy Monday all! My apologies at the absence on Friday – it seems some gremlins absconded with all my time on Thursday, so in the absence of any halfway decent content, decided to make it a legitimate “no blog” day heading into the weekend. But, a new week is here, and I’ve got a cool topic to cover briefly with you…that being:
Polarizing Filters
Polarizing filters can be a godsend – they can really bring out blues in a sky, or minimize reflections in windows, and can really help to improve the quality of your work. At the same time, polarizers can also be very tricky to use. On my recent trip to Arizona (I shot a weekend with Rich Charpentier of The Airstream Chronicles), there were many opportunities to bring out the gorgeous blue sky, and contrast it with the amazing colors in the orange rocks that the American Southwest is known for.
The problem with polarizers is that the blue that is brought out is not a consistent blue – it usually gets stronger as you move toward the light source. So, when you go to stitch things together, the results can be less than satisfactory with evident banding and shifts on hue of the blue skies. Take a look at the example below to see what I am talking about regarding the banding…
See how the sky has blues that aren’t consistent? It’s because I did not rotate the filter to accommodate the shift in blues as I shot across the scene.
Another problem is kind of hinted at above – what if you have a sky where you want the blue to pop, but the foreground includes a water reflection that is an integral part of your composition? The answer here is to expose both with, and without the polarizing effect, and then blend together the two shots later in post production. Masking off parts of images is much easier to deal with than the polarizing effect in the sky, but it’s a pitfall of panorama photography to be aware of.
As it happened, later on that day I was capturing another scene where there was no sky, so it was a non-issue. Here, the key is to remember to spin your filter so that the reflection does reveal itself, otherwise you will think you are doing something severely wrong when you can see the reflection with your eye, but not through the lens. I probably spent a good five minutes trying to change the angle of view before I realized it was just a quick spin of the filter to reveal the reflection below me…
As, as you can see, there are benefits to polarizers and there are also downsides to consider as well. When used correctly, they can really add to the character of an image. For those looking at specific recommendations, here are the ones in my gear bag:
But enough about my thoughts on polarizing filters – what about you? Do you think they are legitimate tools to alter a scene? What about reproducing the effect in post production? Which ones do you use? Do you have a favorite or do you prefer all photography “au naturale”? Sound off in the comments or via email!
Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow for more photography goodness!
Cameras at Ten Paces…
If you think about it, cameras often share terminology with them…we go out to “shoot”. We aim, we fire, and our shutter release is often analogous to a trigger not only in what it does, but in the proper technique (slow and steady as you exhale). So, when I read recently about a camera holster, it kind of made sense. The entire system seems kind of cool, and they claim it’s designed for “even the heaviest of professional grade camera gear”. In a line of work where gear is often just off-the-charts expensive, I was surprised to find the Spider Holster system in its entirety happily priced at just a tad bit over $100 ($109.99 plus shipping).
They’ve got some interesting videos and product shots on YouTube and their website, so it might be something worth considering if you are interested in eschewing the traditional camera bags, shoulder straps, neck straps, and other more typical carrying scenarios. What I liked is that it takes the pin that attaches it to your belt and moves it off center so you can easily and comfortably rotate between shooting in portrait or landscape mode. It also looks cool that the setup allows for use of just a regular belt that you would normally already have (although they do recommend that you use their belt for the heavier gear…) Here’s a few of their product demos embedded here…
It does have almost a cowboy look and feel to it, and for the street photographer or serious photo walker it could be very useful, regardless of whether you feel like John Wayne or Dirty Harry. Consider it a lightweight approach also if you are out scouting new locations to shoot. Another feature that I like is that it also seems pretty able to keep your gear from falling from looking at the other videos of people running with the belt, going up and down stairs, and even snowboarding with it.
All in all, it seems kinda cool, and I’d say it’d be something to look into as the summer months approach if you want to be “light and mobile”. (This would have been very handy when in White Pocket, AZ). Their company website is at www.spiderholster.com if you are interested in learning more about them. The only question that really remains to be asked on this gear is:
Do ya feel lucky?
(Okay, lame, but it just had to be said! Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!)