I alluded to it yesterday, and have already had several people inquire about the procedure to create this desktop calendar. It’s really quite clever, and kudos go out to Jeffrey Friedl over on his site for the script: http://regex.info/blog/photo-tech/calendar He does a decent job at the basic explanation, but since we are a visual world, here are some step-by-step instructions on how to run things from beginning to end! Fair warning – this does require Photoshop as the script (I don’t believe anyway) will run in Lightroom because it uses layers…
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! 🙂
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!
As you may recall, I recently started a topic on building the perfect camera. I started listing my favorite “wish list” of features, and promised I would continue the list soon. Well, as luck would have it, that “thread” of content continues today! Here is the next set of five features I’d like to see:
Megapixels – I really don’t make huge prints…16×20 is my usual upper limit, and if I need to go higher, post production tools can usually handle a notch or two higher. So, for my purposes, I really wouldn’t want more than 15 MP. Call me crazy, but I’d rather see larger pixels that blend nicer than smaller ones that produce more noise.
Video – Yeah, it’s a staple in the P&S category and slowly creeping into the SLR ranks, so I may as well add it in here. But let’s not get all lame and only throw in low end video quality…and if you think I’ll settle for the HD-like caliber of 720p, you’d be mistaken. No, make it the full HD 1080p! It’s already arrived, so also being realistic! 🙂
Frame Rate – SLR’s ar ranging anywhere from 3 to as many as 18 fps. I am not trying to capture a speeding bullet, nor am I a sports shooter for the NFL, but a frame rate on the order of 6-10 fps (raw) would be ideal. Since I am only asking for a Megapixel count of roughly 15, it’s not like the sensor would be hard pressed, so again, very realistic here, right?
HDMI support – The Canon 1D Mark IV has it, so it clearly will become a staple of at least the higher end model SLR’s if it isn’t already, so I’d better have it here. Besides, the ability to directly display movies and photos directly on your HD TV would be super cool!
Internal wireless and Bluetooth – the EyeFi card is a neat technology, but really? Think of the space a wireless card takes up these days and there is easily room inside an SLR body for that. Let me push my jpgs from shoots directly to the web for sharing. As for the Bluetooth, imagine being able to shoot and have your images pushed directly to a hard drive of 500GB sitting in your back pocket? Awesome!
Forget the first five features? Stop back here to give those a read and share your comments there. Or, if you haven’t commented yet (or even if you have and there’s more you’d like to share) be sure to chime in with your own thoughts and feature requests for the ideal camera! There’s more to come, but I promise, we’re almost done, so be sure to stop back some time soon for yet another 5 features in the DREAM CAMERA! Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow! Any features you’ve thought of that I am still missing? Care to share? Don’t forget to sound off in the comments!
I’d also like to take a moment and thank those of you who have been perusing the archives of the blog. Enough people have commented that the “49 Tips Cheat Sheet” I posted back in 2009 was missing that I decided to re-publish on request. It’s available in the store tab here for a “Dollar Download”. (Most attachments get deleted after being in the archives for 30 days, so here’s your chance to get a very handy guide for about 2 cents per tip!)
Last, but not least, a reminder that we’re starting to wrap up March as the halfway point has officially passed, so be sure to get your photos up in the Flickr contest thread for a chance to win a Cheetah Quickstand. Details here.
One of the more recent episodes from the guys over at This Week in Photography had them wrapping up their coverage of PMA, where they talked tech about all the latest cameras to come out from the various vendors. Canon was noticeably absent from the show, but it didn’t detract from an interesting comment I think Ron Brinkmann said where he wished he could pull all his favorite features from each of the cameras and basically make his own.
To me, the idea screamed “blog post”! So, I decided to go for it. I went through every major SLR on the market today and cherry-picked my favorite features from each camera. It took a while (there’s a lot out there), but I kept on plugging at it for a few days. Finally, I’ve completed the list, and here’s my “perfect camera” wish list:
Full Frame Sensor – It seems the market is trending this way, and while the added zoom on a crop sensor can be nice, I’d love to see my 10-22 on a full frame body!
EF-S support – This is Canon-specific, but because of my 10-22 and 18-55, I would really love to get that super wide angle on a full frame without vignetting or fisheye distortion…I know, the impossible dream, but hey, it’s not like such a camera will ever really exist, so I may as well dream, right?
Low Light Performance – Think Nikon here – they’re beating the pants off pretty much everyone in the market with their low light sensitivity and handling.
ISO handling – the fact that you can shoot at ISO 102400 is pretty amazing, but the noise is crazy. Sure, I’ll take the high ISO, but at least let me make decent prints from it. This kind of ties into the low light performance, but since it’s a separate spec, why not…
Multi-card compatibility – Lately more cameras are supporting the CF and the SD format cards, but mine currently does not support the latter, so, it’s on my list!
That’s it? Of course not, but do you really want me to list ALL the features I want to see in my dream camera in ONE SUPER LONG POST? Of course not! I wouldn’t want to read that either, no matter who wrote it! So, I’m saving the other segments for another day soon (hint, hint, hint)! I’m not even sure this is my “Top Five”, but it could be close. I dunno, is it worth it doing a “top five” features list? Would you? Also consider this: what is your dream camera? What are the must have features for you? How much would you pay to have them all under one hood? I know it’d be a pretty penny, but think about how useful and how long it would last you…! Sound off in the comments with your favorite features!
Don’t forget, the March Flickr Giveaway is underway where you can win a Cheetah Stand, so make sure you enter your favorite WILD pic today!
I’d been waiting for the time to put together all the videos, audio, and pictures for this review for a while and I’ve finally caught up on other projects so am getting this out for the listening and reading audiences to enjoy! For those that subscribe and read via RSS, sorry because this is a video-heavy post and you’re just going to have to visit the blog to get the content today! Trust me though, it’s worth it as I take a look at how the Drobo performs in a real world environment with hot swapping drives, and the perils and pitfalls that surround storage area networks…
Many times I have been asked what kinds of software I use to do various things for the blog, especially things like videos, screen captures, audio recording, and all that sort of stuff. One thing that I’ve never really talked about is screen captures…not the videos but actual still shots of things as seen directly on my screen. There are many programs available to do this, some paid for, and some open-sourced, with some being Mac or Windows specific, and a few scattering that cross both platforms.
Well, today, I am going to give a little nod to a Windows-only program, called Printkey. Specifically titled PrintKey2000, and under specific note that this is a freeware program (meaning it is not supported – to use at your own risk.) While I have never had problems with it, the mentality of “let the buyer beware” should always be a consideration when downloading applications, especially freeware.
Those in Apple-land know that there are keyboard shortcuts to do a screen capture of either your entire viewing area, or a specific window, and these can either be copied to the clipboard memory for inserting in an application like Photoshop, or saved outright to your desktop. While in Windows you can always use the Printscreen and ALT+Printscreen to copy either a full screen or active window to your clipboard, the ability to save directly to your desktop does not exist natively. Instead, you have to capture the screen to memory, paste into an image editor, and save out as a JPG if you want to use it. What PrintKey does is fill that void of directly saving to the desktop. This is especially handy if capturing things for posting in a blog, in creating documentation, and other useful learning resource outlets.
To use Printkey, simply download the free application from here, run the executable, and let the program start in your system tray. The entire packaged zip file is half a megabyte, so the footprint is super for those that are space conscious. Here’s a capture of the software itself in action (don’t ask me how I got it – that took a few minutes to figure out! LOL):
While there are many features wrapped up in this handy little application, the ones I use most often are the Save, Rectangle, Print, and then the dialog screen at the bottom of the screen (click the image above to see a larger view). These should be pretty straightforward to those who are familiar with the concepts, but here we go regardless:
Save – saves the current capture to an image file…you can specify whatever format you prefer (jpg gif, etc.)
Rectangle – gives you a + sign that you can drag and drop around a custom area for capturing only part of your desktop
Print – sends the captured image to your printer…(hope that was explanatory enough)
The last one is the bottm details area…I am talking about this little section here:
It’s very handy because it will tell you the dimensions of the image, how large the file is in terms of storage space on your computer, and how much free memory is left out of the total memory. While some many not need all this info, the geek in me likes to have this!
So, there you have it, Printkey2000 in action. I feel that I should also mention another really good counterpart and that is the program, SnagIt from the folks over at TechSmith. With that handy application, you can not only capture images on both Windows and Mac, but you can edit them on the fly, including inserting text, arrows to call out an area, and other fun stuff. Alas, it’s not free though – 30 day trial is allowed before you gotta cough up the $50! (Which for me is not worth it for something like this. I have some friends that use other applications too, especially for video screen captures on both Mac and Windows platforms which include names like IShowU, Camtasia, and much more. Here though, was just a little scoop on a little known application for the Windows crowd out there.
Got your own favorite little unknown program? Have you used PrintKey? Like it, love it or hate it? Sound off in the comments as new little handy utilities are always welcome. Happy shooting all and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow! 🙂
While recently participating in a Photowalk group outing to Rocky Mountain National Park, with the fellow local photogs, I learned about this great little plugin for Lightroom that allows you to export your photos directly to Flickr…all within Lightroom! It’s a pretty cool little plugin, and as you know, when I learn something new – so do you!
This plugin comes courtesy of Jeffrey Friedl, and one of the greatest features of it is the cost – absolutely free! Well, that’s not exactly true, you do need to spend one cent via Paypal, but for a penny, check out what you can do:
I started off downloading the ZIP file (and it works for Windows or Mac) and expanding the archive. Then I moved the plugin to the root of my Applications folder on the Mac (you can choose where ever you want to store plugins, you just have to tell Lightroom – and for me this is an easy place). The icon for it looks like this:
Flickr Uploader Plugin Icon
Nothing too spectacular yet, and there’s a little bit of installation and customization needed. Your needs may vary based on how you want to use the plugin, Flickr, and Lightroom, but the cool thing is that Jeffrey has put together a plugin for most online locales including Smugmug, Zenfolio, Facebook, Photobucket, and many more. So, if you use another resource, it’s worth checking out. I’ll continue here for the Flickr plugin and you can decide for yourself if it’s worth adding this tool to your workflow.
Next up, I went ahead and configured the plugin from inside of Lightroom to use my Flickr account. Here’s what I did. To start, click on Export, just as if you are exporting to disk or some other resource
Open Export Dialog
One the export dialog box is open (and here’s the tricky part), look to the far right of the gray bar across the top that says “Export to Disk”. You’ll see two little arrows which means there are menu options:
Files on Disk
If you click on those arrows, you’ll get a new dialog box (bet you didn’t know that was there – did you? 🙂 ), and the Flickr option will show up. Select the Flickr dialog one for our purposes here:
Flicker Exporter
Once you select the Flickr Exporter, you will get a new dialog box that will start the authentication process that Lightroom will use to log into Flickr. If you have multiple Flickr accounts, or specific authentication methods you prefer, these steps may change a little based on your needs. But here, I am doing things the most straightforward way:
Flickr Authentication
Next up, if you are logged into Flickr already, the plugin will open a page that will grant access to the plugin. So, it helps if you are already logged into your Flickr account on the internet. So, you’ll get a dialog box that looks something like this from the plugin to that effect:
Warning Notice from Plugin
On clicking the OK button, it will take you to the grant access page, and you’ll get another dialog box that grants the plugin access to post photos to your Flickr account (which, after all, is the goal, right?). The one notable difference you will see in yours is that my face won’t be staring back at you like here. That is the avatar for my Flickr account, so your screen should show your avatar – if it shows something different, then you are in the wrong account (but I guess that goes without saying)!
Granting Access from Flickr Side
A second confirmation screen from Flickr will also let you know that this is a 3rd party application, and just acts as a security measure to make sure you are aware of what that means. Click the button that says “OK, I’ll authorize it”, as shown below. Again, while it goes without saying at this point, your dialog will look a little different different. If it doesn’t and you see my avatar in your Flickr account, I am gonna be calling soon! 🙂
Authorization
Finally, you will get a confirmation screen on Flickr, noting what you’ve done (they make it pretty clear what you’ve done, and how to delete it if needed on the Flickr side):
Flickr Confirmation
On return to the Lightroom interface, you’ll get a confirmation screen there as well – just click it to continue:
Lightroom Confirmation
On granting access, you’ll get an authorization code, which for obvious reasons I am not going to post here, but make a note of that code and enter it back when you return to Lightroom. On completing that you will be presented with the Flickr Uploader Dialog. Here I am going to show you a few key ones that you have to scroll down to be aware of in making your uploading preferences.
Your Flickr Account login in Lightroom
This first shot (above) shows the top part of the dialog, and shows how you are authenticating on Flickr. Now, use the scroll bar on the right side to move down through the options. First stop, the Photo Set. On authenticating, the plugin will pull your complete list of photo sets from Flickr. If you don’t have any photo sets built, then none will be here. Since I do have photo sets, it will default to the first one alphabetically. You can change the sort order, and specify what photo set (if any) you want the uploaded image to be added to, as desired. For this example, I did not add the photo to an existing set, or create a new one.
Photo Set Choice
Pretty straightforward, but let’s keep scrolling through a few more key items you will want to think about utilizing or disabling depending on your work flow. The next one I think warrants mentioning here is the groups. One of the ways you can increase the visibility of your photos on Flickr is by participating in groups. More people look at them, you’ll get more feedback, and sharing our photos with others is the goal anyway, so go ahead and add the appropriate groups here. I selected the group “CanonBlogger” for obvious reasons! 🙂
Publishing to a Group
Only a few other options that I think are useful from this plugin, so we’re almost done. Next up, is another social networking one that I tend to use fairly regularly – Twitter:
Twitter posting
Last but not least are the meta tagging options you have available to you from the plugin interface. The options are just to diverse to go into detail here, and I prefer to tag photos on Flickr differently than in Lightroom, so I leave these blank, but in the interests of full disclosure, here are some of the tagging and naming options in the plugin dialog:
Tagging Photos
If you think about it, for a penny, this is a pretty good deal (I went ahead and made a donation, which I would also encourage you to do as well – Jeffrey has clearly put a lot of time into developing these plugins, and he needs to eat, just like the rest of us). So, there you have it – the process of finding, downloading, installing, configuring and using the Lightroom Flickr uploader. As I mentioned at the beginning of the post, there are other uploaders available as well, and I am going to probably go get the one for Smugmug as I have an account there too. It just makes the sharing of your photos that much easier. (Who knows, the Facebook one may also make its way into my utility belt at some point once I get more comfortable with it…)
If you have questions or problems with the installation or the uploader itself, Jeffrey has a good FAQ page here that should answer most questions for you. If not, I am sure he has an email address available somewhere for specific questions not addressed online. For my work, I think this plugin totally rocks! It’s going to become a staple in my work flow, and if you are into social media at all, I would highly recommend it for those purposes as well.
In talking about all of this, it bears mentioning that some of us are not fans of Flickr, Twitter, or Facebook, and while I can understand the hesitation of some, it’s really a matter of personal preference, and maximizing the time you spend on your computer. if these outlets aren’t your cup of tea, that is totally fine. But if you have the Flickr plugin – it is that much easier for you to participate in the Monthly Giveaways here at Canon Blogger/Learning Digital Photography!
With those thoughts, I’ll leave well enough alone as this post has gone on long enough for one day. Happy shooting (and uploading) and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow.
Today’s post comes courtesy of a comment posted to Twitter from a friend (who shall remain nameless) asking about whether a particular camera was compatible with their computer.
Being the eternal geek, I jumped right in (figured the water was warm), and suggested that it shouldn’t matter because they are using a card reader…right? As it turns out, they were not, instead tethering the camera to the computer to transfer files. While this method is needed for instant viewing (see the tethering via Lightroom post using Canon here and Nikon here), it’s not recommended for transferring of your photos and video off a card that is in your camera. I tried to find a post on this to point the person to and realized that, son-of-a-gun, I had never really discussed this in detail. So… here we go! 🙂
There are a number of reasons why it is a good idea to use a card reader and not connect your camera to your computer for transferring images and video:
Data loss/corruption – The chances for losing data is so much higher because you are relying on the computer detecting the camera, and the proprietary interface between that and the computer (with drivers and software and all that jazz).
Battery drain – Unless you have an AC adapter, using your camera to transfer pictures to your computer can be a serious drain on batteries…even with rechargeable batteries. And, if you are transferring images to your computer and your camera batteries happen to die, guess what can happen…(see #1 above)!
Software installation – When connecting your camera to your computer, often times you will need to install software in order for the computer to recognize the camera. Easy enough sure, but do you really want to bog down your computer with unnecessary software? What if that software is written to preload whenever the computer turns on? Now computer performance is decreased, you have less space for other things. Sure, hard drives are increasing in size and decreasing in cost all the time, but consider whether you will ever use the software for anything other than image transfer. If yes, then absolutely, use it. But if not – why bother? From an IT perspective, if there is a way to do something without installing software, that is always preferred to adding another layer because adding that layer adds a breaking point (or point of failure), and it’s just another item that needs maintenance and updates. After all, let’s face it. Software is not as cleanly written as it used to be…
Transfer speeds – Seriously. Many don’t realize it, but data transfers happen a lot faster when you don’t have a camera sitting between you and the computer. What may taken upwards of 3-5 minutes with a camera acting as the medium can often take less than 2 minutes with a straight connection to the media card.
So, there you have it, 4 reasons to use a card reader! Need any more? Got any of your own? Think I’m wrong? Please feel free to contribute your own experiences and share your own thoughts in the comments. Until tomorrow, happy shooting all!
In keeping with the impending Giftmas (yes, I am spelling that right, and thanks to Yankeefoxtrot on Twitter for the name), and hopefully in time for your holiday shopping, I have assembled a cornucopia of items to share with you either as the photographer, or as the one with a photographer in the family. The best thing about this list though – all the items are $25 or less. After all, the economy is tight – we all know it and everyone is cutting back, but there’s no reason to feel denied simply because photography is known as an expensive hobby! This way, there’s also no need to feel like you are asking for someone’s first born, or that the guy/gal is just in a hobby that is too expensive to give something photo-related. Actually, that’s just one of the best things about this list. The other is that these are all items that I either own, or want for my own gear bag. So, take note, link this post, and enjoy!
Battery Caddy – this is probably my most appreciated item. Ranging in price from $5 to $14, I absolutely love mine and have been meaning to get more. (Thanks go out to Scott over at Weekly Photo Tips who sent me mine as a prize for a photo contest last year – I literally love this item!)
Eneloop Batteries – Since you have a battery caddy now, you may as well stock it with batteries. Yeah yeah, I know, batteries for flashes are so mundane, but get yourself a set of Eneloops and you may re-think this. These guys are not only super powerful but they retain their charge much longer than traditional rechargeables. Plus, they really do seem to have the staying power of traditional alkalines. A set of 4 of these can be had from any store, whether it’s B&H, Radioshack, or Newegg. The link above takes you to Sanyo’s page (the folks who make them), and it includes a whole laundry list, which includes Costco!
Stickey Filters – Okay, I am cheating here for two reasons. First, because I discovered these from another list (Scott Kelby’s Gonzo Gear Guide), and second, because the price is actually $49.95. But here’s how I justify it – you get two sets of these stickey filters, so it’s really like they are $25 each. Lame? Kinda, but these are so cool, you’re gonna want a set anyway. These guys are basically gels that have a sticky side that slaps to the front of your flash and act as a filter. Boom. Done. Stickey Filters look to be so cool! No more cutting and using Velcro on your flash, no more buying sheets of gels and finding a place to store them. Stickey Filters seem to be the answer to what the gellin’ photog needs in their gear bag. Plus, they offer a lifetime replacement! That’s impressive…
Camera Bubble Level – These little doohickeys are awesome. My bubble level on my tripod cracked about two years ago and the liquid drained out, rendering it useless. I’ve been meaning to replace it until someone (I forget who) pointed these guys out to me. It slides in your hot shoe mount too, so you know the camera is level. Amazon is the linked place, but these can be found many places for $10 or less!
Remote cable release – Okay, okay, I also stole this from Scott Kelby’s list, but truth be told, I also love mine (got it at the local camera store for like $39, but that was only because I didn’t want to wait the week for Amazon to ship me one. YOu can get them for any brand, but I have to go with Canon given the blog name. It’s linked above, and can be had for $24.95 at the time of this post.
Joby Gorillapod – I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve found myself out and about with my P&S only to wish I had my tripod with me for some stability just for a few seconds. I’d heard about the Gorilla pod but never really thought about it for my P&S because I didn’t have a small portable until fairly recently. When my brother showed up for the holidays with the Gorilla Pod and his P&S, not only was he more portable, but also more stable. (Don’t you hate it when your brother beats you at your own hobby!) I had to get one, and you should too! For the P&S original, it’s $21.95!
Earbud Microphone set – When I first got my iPod Touch, it was disappointing to learn that the included headphones did not include a microphone. The tech in me should have known, but I rushed back out to get the Apple-compatible headset. When I didn’t have it with me one day, I tried the set for my Blackberry and sure enough, it worked just fine. (Why wouldn’t it, it’s the same technology in headsets – all with the same adapter.) Now that my “Apple-certified” headset has developed a short, the replacement set will be the one from Plantronics for $5 from Amazon. Shoulda gone there first! For those out there without iPhones, Touches, or Blackberries – most phones these days come with a headset plug, and the mini-RCA should work in all of them. If not, you’re only out $5. Small price to pay for the ease with which these operate (and I think they sound better too!)
Microfiber Cloths – I know, it sounds crazy, but these do get dirty themselves and you must throw them out. No biggie though when a10-pack costs a mere $17.99 you can’t go wrong! You can get different sized cloths from camera vendors like B&H, and I think even Wal-Mart Visioncare has a 3-pack for like $10 bucks, but I like the ones from Simply Good Stuff (linked) simply because the price is right, they are designed for lenses, and it’s just a cool name for a website.
Gaffers Tape – anyone who’s been around photography for any amount of time has heard of gaffers tape. It’s low tack so the sticky stuff won’t adhere to your gear, but man can it save your $%^& in a pinch. For a mere $5 you can get 12 yards of the stuff from B&H, so the question isn’t “Why?”, it’s “Why not?”
Flickr Pro – there’s so much more you can do with a Flickr Pro account over the standard free account. At only $24.95, it meets the criteria, and the photog will fully enjoy the added features, including statistics, unlimited uploads, and so much more. Plus, you can give it to them online, so it saves all that added expense of tape and wrapping paper!
There you have it, 1o things under $25 (well, 9 since I kinda cheated on one). Have any ideas of your own? Products or items you prefer? Something blatant I missed? I’m sure there are lots of other ideas out there, so sound off in the comments and let others know about your “gotta have it gadgets”.! Just in time for the holidays too! Happy shooting all, have a great weekend, and we’ll see you back here on Monday!
For those of you on Twitter (and following me), you know that over the weekend, my iPhoto library on the Mac was either corrupted, or somehow compromised in its integrity, because when I went to add in a few snapshots to it for sharing with the Twitter-verse, it crashed on me. Believe it or not, I was not worried, because I had a back-up copy of all my snapshots on my Western Digital Hard Drive. I blogged about this puppy before, in showing you how to add a second drive to your laptop in 10 easy steps.
Western Digital Passport Drive
Well, not only is the second hard drive a great way to increase the capacity of your laptop, but it also saved my bacon this weekend, because when the library was corrupted (I use the method of not importing a copy to my library and save the library on the main OS drive), it was simply a matter of creating a new library when opening iPhoto, changing the option in Preferences to not copy images in, and then sitting back and waiting the hour or so for the import to complete.
What I like about this Passport Drive though is the fact that I have dedicated storage for my photos, music, and documents independent of the OS drive. I also can easily remove it from the laptop if needed. Lastly, I also like it because I can expand this fairly easily. To do that, I would just get another drive, plug it into another USB port, and simply drag-and-drop to copy to the new location. The old primary can now be easily disconnected, become a back-up, and the new one becomes the primary. Another great feature of these is that you can easily copy data to and from it, and with surprising ease. I cannot verify this, but suspect that these Passport drives are solid state drives because they don’t get very hot, and it’s just been so awesome for letting my photos and music libraries expand without me thinking much about them.
The downside? They are a little pricier than their larger drive equivalents. With the ever-decreasing cost of storage these days though, it’s well worth the additional 20 cents per gigabyte in my opinion! (My 320 GB was like $80 – it goes for $71 now at B&H.) You can get these pretty much anywhere from your local Wal-Mart, to Best Buy, Newegg, B&H, and other retailers/e-tailers.
Oh, and there’s a moral to this story too: always, always, always…back up your data! For more reviews and other information on this drive, feel free to find your favorite review resource online. I like the ones over at TestFreaks myself (although this is a rating of the 500Gb unit), but as with any review resource, your mileage may vary.
In other blog notes of interest:
The Flickr contest is in its final two weeks starting today – it’s a prize package of three pretty sweet items, so be sure to get your entry(ies) in soon. At stake is a $25 gift card to B&H, the 11th Season of Photoshop User TV, and a book from Photographer/Author, and Friend-of-the-Blog, Matthew Bamberg. The Flickr thread is linked up at the top of the blog, but here’s a quick link for easy reference.
Speaking of the links at the top of the blog – you may notice that more content is being added. The Navigation Bar is being reorganized to include more “About” pages, Archives, My Gear, and much more. Feel free to peruse those at your leisure. More content is coming soon too, so don’t just be checking things out in your RSS feeds – lots of content is available directly from the blog!
Congrats to Mary Angelini as well for her witty comment from the Scott Kelby book giveaway – stop by her site for a good set of photo galleries to peruse too (and to congratulate her).
That’s it for today…happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow.
