Category: tutorial

How well do you score?

Jason2 Comments

First off, let me state that I am aware I missed a post and did not really give much advance warning.  Now that it’s done, and at least ready to see a beta response, I guess I can announce it here.  Well, before I make any announcements, let me back up a little bit.  Since inception about 6 months ago, I have endeavored to put forth meaningful and thoughtful comments and ideas on this blog – mostly about photography.  Sometimes I have presented things from as professional a perspective as I can muster, and at other times, I have been admittedly personal in my expressions.  Either way, it’s probably fair to say that I have been putting a lot of time, thought, and energies into posting articles, content, and interesting materials for all to enjoy.  This got me thinking about the constantly changing nature of blogs.  Something new each and every day – the time and energies to putting new and fresh content out on such a regular basis can be overwhelming, to say the least.

So, with that little nugget, I was thinking – what if I were to put together something more constant, but still with the ability to change and improve?  Not articles mind you (and my set of web gallery articles is still progressing – almost there, I promise!)…but an online, interactive approach to sharing and offering resources to help people learn more about photography.  Now that would be cool, right?  Well, here it is!  It’s the brand, new, just been born, never-been seen before:

The Online Photography Test

That’s right – I’ve been putting some time into setting up a site that can give people a place to go and see how they are doing with their photography.  Right now, it’s in a beta form, with only 20 questions, but I am hoping to add more with time, and also to add various types of tests.  Eventually, I see the site as having a set of metrics where people can go to see where they’ve improved, what they need to work on, and where they are pretty solid in their knowledge base.  Naturally I am starting with the basics and intermediate material here, with more advanced stuff to come later.  There will hopefully also be a comment section eventually, where people can submit ideas for new questions, and discuss the material or see some dialog there within the photographic community.  That clearly is “just a dream” right now, but should be fairly easy to implement if there is sufficient interest.

So, without further ado:  stop over at the beta test site and take what I am affectionately calling the OPT Test.  Take the test and see how you score!  Did you do well?  Any material you would like to see added?  Dropped?  Changed?  What do you think of the wording and format?  Since comments aren’t enabled there – please come on back here to CB and share your thoughts on the newest and latest addition to the CB set of resources.  I’ll put forwarding on at the final site once things are more cleaned up and there are various versions for people to explore.  So, take the test, and see how well you score!  Happy shooting and see you back here again tomorrow (watch those apertures!

Photoshop Reloaded – Web Galleries with a twist!

Jason4 Comments

A couple weeks ago I did a tutorial about how to create web galleries using Photoshop. As one of the steps, I advised to sort through your images first and pick out the ones you want to put in your web gallery into a dedicated folder to make the process easer once you start in Photoshop – well, that advice was a little short-sighted.

I got my most recent issue of Photoshop User (from the great folks over at NAPP), and read through an almost identical tutorial, with one notable exception – they used Bridge! That’s right, you can use the companion software to Photoshop, Bridge, to select your photos rather than sorting them before hand. Well, hey that’s cool, right? Saves you a step. Well, it could – depending on whether you have any sort of file management in place. See, in photography (and with most disciplines that use a lot of digital files), there’s an idea called digital asset management (or DAM), that gives you guidelines on how to save, store, archive, and design an effective means of managing your digital imagery. If used properly, any image you want is only moments away. It involves a lot of pre-planning, effort, and discipline to implement and maintain. So, this week I re-did the Photoshop Web Galleries tutorial with that in mind.

You get a peel into some of the basics of how I implement a DAM system that works for me, and an explanation as to why using the Bridge method for selecting your photos for a web gallery is better than the first method I used. *cough/duplicates/cough* Having said that, there are still a few nuances that Lightroom has where Photoshop lacks a little in this regard, but, if you have PS, you can streamline things a little more by incorporating Bridge.

So, without further ado, check out this week’s episode, which I am admittedly naming for perhaps a little visibility:

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

All over the map…

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Well, I know I am all over the map here, with a couple different tangents going on. I had started things last week with the theme of how to create web galleries using different software platforms, and looking at some written materials for publication. When the Photoshop World keynote and Adobe Labs announced Lightroom 2.0, I felt compelled to download that and give it a quick run through. On noticing that the “dual monitors” isn’t exactly what I had hoped, thought to share my own first look of that as nothing else really showcased how it has to be configured.

Well, today I finally bit the bullet (again) and got Quicktime Pro installed on the macbook. I had done so on my Windows desktop so I could save video files as source files for viewing while off line. Since they did not have a camera and were another OS though, I couldn’t take advantage of the Quicktime Recorder feature…actuallly it’s called Quicktime Broadcaster.

As all that was going on, I had also been doing some test prints through my own R18000, a local print shop (Sam’s Club) and an online printer. To really get a broad range of print types, I chose the metallic inks from Mpix and the results just blew me away. I think I will end up framing this one as it really did turn out better than I had thought. I know, the Photoshop guys talk up Mpix a lot, and I had already known about (and used) them, but these metallic inks are just amazing. Great prices, great results, and speedy delivery…it’s like Newegg is the place for computers, B&H is the place for cameras, NAPP is the place for photography training, and Mpix is now the place for online printing! Gotta love people who know how to do a job and do it really well! Thanks Mpix!

I went ahead and recorded a short quicktime recording to illustrate the Mpix results. It’s kind of hard to tell in this video, and it was really a half-baked idea, but figured why not….it also shows the “real” me which I’ve not done yet. Enjoy! 🙂

Lightroom 2.0 Beta – First look at the dual monitor! (A preview video)

Jason4 Comments

lrsplash.jpg

Just before I hit the sack last night, I saw that Adobe went and released Lightroom 2.0 in its beta form. I’ve already downloaded it and checked out some of the key changes. Until this release, I had used a trial version on my one desktop, and decided I’d tr it for 30 more days just a week or so ago on this main one. Well, right after recording a tutorial on creating web galleries in LR 1.x Adobe goes and does this! I shoulda known better.

The NAPP staff was clearly in on the development as they’ve got a page already set up with a first look on a lot of the key items. Great info and the features are definitely the ones I’d been waiting for – guess it’s time to buy! In my earnest to see everything I noticed though, that Matt K. does not show the dual monitor display on his first look. Was rather disappointed, so….in the interests of showing to others what I just saw, I did a little brief first look of my own. The resolution is super huge (1024×768), and it does look a little “off”. The reason here is because my one monitor is a 19″ and my other one is a 15″. So, on Windows it looks a little funny. But, it does get the gist across for those interested in seeing what’s there for the latest version. Check it out in the Quicktime download attached to this post.

As for the nuts and bolts of changes, I’ll leave those details to the pros over at NAPP and other blogging venues. Some of the more salient and interesting ones I saw today are here:

Only a few wishes…I didn’t immediately see any support for tethered shooting…but I guess that’s could go on a wish request since it’s still in beta. Also, it looks like the second monitor support means just 5 view options: loupe/grid/live loupe/locked loupe/compare/ and survey. I was hoping the 2nd monitor would be customizable with the LR panels (like Photoshop), but I’ve not figured out how to do that yet. If anyone knows whether that is something I am missing, or if it’s not been added…let me know.

Anyway, that’s the big news today – LR 2.0 beta was publicly released during the keynote at Photoshop World! With Photoshop Express, and tons of other R&D stuff coming out of Adobe – it’s a good time to be a fan! SO, without further ado, here’s my first look at LR 2.0 dual monitor setup options! Quicktime only version today (renders faster than the flash version and has wider viewing from those that visit the blog).

Creating Web Galleries using Lightroom

Jason2 Comments

As Photoshop World is starting tomorrow, I imagine most are watching the pros blogs to see what news, events, and info is forthcoming from that semi-annual event. Something tells me I will be ponying up the $500 to go to the September one in Vegas. (Benefits of NAPP membership notwithstanding…) In looking at the classes that they are offering for this Spring I guess two things caught me as surprising – first that there are so MANY classes to choose from. In a way a lot of options is a good thing, but it also has downsides. The upside is there are lots of choices. The downside is that sometimes the subject matter is so compartmentalized, you really have to pick a path and stick with it. In other words, if you pick one subject, you are also conversely choosing not to go to other subject matter. Case in point, I would like to have seen Painting With Photoshop by Bert Monroy on day one, but that conflicted with the Top 10 Photoshop Techniques by Matt K. – and since very few classes are repeated, there’s no chance to catch the other class later during the event.

In light of that – one small suggestion for future shows (like anyone is even listening to me)… offer fewer classes but repeat them more – that way you give everyone a chance to see everything. I realize it sounds kinda cheap, but for the price tag of entry, I really would rather get to learn from everyone rather than 3 or 4 instructors only.

The other thing that surprised me is that the head honcho himself, Scott Kelby, is teaching very little this go around. One of the things that has made Scott so endearing to so many is his supremely effective teaching style. yet for this Spring ’08 show, he’s only teaching three classes (and one of them is basically his 7-point system which can be gotten from Amazon for a mere fraction of the cost for Photoshop World entry. I’d rather spend my time learning stuff I can’t get from a book. As kind of the “front man” for NAPP, Photoshop World, and leading pitchman for Adobe products, it would have been nicer to see more classes with him up front. Maybe that will change for Fall ’08.

Although I should also note that Scott just busted up his leg the other day, so is heading out on crutches, and that may have mandated some scheduling changes. He is also delivering the keynote speech, which I am sure took a great deal of time to prepare, so there are possible mitigating circumstances involved with his decreased participation in the instruction. Since I hopefully will have saved enough to go to the Fall ’08 one in Vegas, I’ll look forward to seeing if he’s doing more instruction.

In other, more directly related news to Canon Blogger, I’ve finished the tutorial for this week a little early, so will post it here now. Last week I went over some of the basics of how to create a web gallery using teh automated feature of Photoshop CS3. This week, I look at another product in the Adobe family – Lightroom. Setup and generation is pretty quick and easy, just a couple pointers on what to avoid and precautions to take in putting everything together, from both the perspective of the photographer and the viewer. A little shorter than last weeks tutorial, but still hopefully useful. The flash version is linked, and the Quicktime version is attached for those tuning in via feeds, iTunes, and with iPods.

Web Galleries II (Lightroom)

Happy shooting and watch those apertures! For those going to Photoshop World, have a blast!

Creating Web Galleries

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In keeping with my latest project of putting together instructional materials on how to create web galleries, I took advantage of the video tutorial this week to go through some of the basics of how to do the task in Photoshop. It’s not as smooth as Lightroom as some of the CSS doesn’t work right in Firefox (Firefox 2.x is not W3C compliant.) Nevertheless, it does get you through the bare bones of it, and addresses some of the issues that you should consider while putting together a set of images for displaying in a web gallery. It’s a little longer than your average tutorial (11:22) but the content I think makes it worth the time spent. As always, it’s in both Flash and Quicktime varieties for both web and iTunes/iPod viewing. Enjoy!

Oh yeah – anyone know how to cure hiccups?

ETA:  Posting some of these on YouTube now, so adding links back as they go live on there as well:

<object width=”425″ height=”350″> <param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/4Ueuc4hHyCc”> </param> <embed src=”http://www.youtube.com/v/4Ueuc4hHyCc” type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” width=”425″ height=”350″> </embed> </object>

Adding Blur – and some more Photo Walk News

Jason2 Comments

Sometimes, no matter how careful you are with your setup, the in-camera limitations simply cannot compensate for a vision you have, whether it be the color range of an image, its tonal range, or even the depth of field you want to achieve. A perfect example of this was posted in our regional clubs photo site www.scphotogs.com last week. I shared a technique for adding blur to an image. While normally you wouldn’t think blur is something you want to add, as intuitively we are trained to think of images as sharp and crisp subject matter that is in focus. blur is something that can really enhance an image. I shared a technique I learned with the photog-friend, and in light of the tip, decided it would make a good tutorial as well. Check out the link for it at the end of this post. Here’s the web-version of the finished product, and a link to Jon’s photo site if you’d like to see more of his work.

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Don’t forget to vote on the poll to the right, asking how many cameras are in your house? We’re still a long way from the 100 mark, so it’ll be staying up for a while…unless we start “rocking the [proverbial] boat”. Another thing I always like to remind people about is that I am offering up some of my own imagery for sale on the artist site, Redbubble. Click the link to visit my profile and see the images I have for sale (at a steal too – just wanted to share a few with the community!) Lest we not forget, B&H is also the place where pretty much everyone gets everything photography-related, so if you visit their site, use one of the banners here. It’s the same price to you on all gear but B&H does help off-set the hosting expenses with each purchase made through these links, so help a fellow photog out! 🙂 Continue reading “Adding Blur – and some more Photo Walk News” →

Wednesday Woes

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Okay all, a tutorial just isn’t gonna happen this week…feeling really exhausted today…I think I am coming down with something.  I’ve got a few things going on tomorrow, Friday is booked up as is Saturday, so it’s really unlikely I’ll get that tutorial out I’ve been promising.  So, for the interim, I’ve bumped up the schedule on some articles I’ve been throwing together.

Today, it’s a short essay on a trend I saw for a while in lost of photo communities and forums debating the validity of high res LCD screens on SLR’s.

What happened in the photo world today?  Couldn’t tell you…anyone have any fun/interesting/noteworthy news they want to share…add it to the comments and help a guy out who’s apparently got some sort of bug he can’t shake.  Although I suspect it’s related to successive days of only 3-4 hours sleep and running non-stop.   After working from 5am-3pm, I was off to a Dr. appt, then dinner with the wife, then off to a photo club meeting and it’s now 11:45pm.  I have to be back at work at 5am – maybe I can get 4.5 hours sleep tonight…*grin*

Happy shooting though and keep those apertures tight! 😉

Tuesday Troubles

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Sorry all, the trip out west must have done a number on me because I was out as soon as I got home from work today.  In trying to muster up the energy to record, produce, and output a tutorial today, I just could not find it in me.  So, rather than deliver less than meaningful content, I’ll call this a no blog Tuesday and hopefully come out firing on all cylinders tomorrow.  Happy shooting and keep them apertures in check!

Finally Friday Frenzy

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Lots to share today – I saw over at Tips from the Top Floor that the US dates, and more importantly, locations are now set. Check them out for a location near you (hint: if you are near San Francisco, Nashville, Ft. Collins or Portland Maine, you are in luck!)

Scott Sherman and Michael Stein from The Digital Photography show have their latest podcast out – looks like the photo walk talk missed the cut for this weeks episode. Oh well…still lots of fun things to get caught up on, including their newest contest.

In other Friday folly-minded news, I know B&H has LOTS of customers – so if you’re gonna buy something, hook a fellow photog up – costs you nothing, but the few pennies I get from purchases done via click-thrus really does help to pay the overhead here, and video hosting ain’t cheap! Visit B&H via the sidebar or footer links – but if you spend too much, don’t blame me…I’ll just be salivating behind you and the new gear that I probably want!

The latest news for me is that I will be out of town all next week. As such, since I was not able to get two tutorials recorded, next week will mostly be reports from the various locations my wife and I are visiting (if she lets me surf and blog during the travels…). I always like to start each month off with a bang, but that looks like it won’t happen for March, so keep on shooting, and as always, watch those apertures!

As for the meaningful content for Friday, here’s some Landscape Photo Tips I read about in one of my assortment of photo mags that I was trying to save for the flight (I couldn’t wait…) *grin* :

  1. Use a tripod
  2. Change your perspective
  3. Look for leading lines
  4. Use ND and split ND filters to capture a full range of color
  5. Keep your depth of field deep (I shoot at f11 to f/16, but you can go as high as f/22 before actually dropping back off)
  6. Watch for edge distractions
  7. Use a wide angle lens – the wider, the better, but fisheyes can be tricky so be wary of those…
  8. Avoid polarizing filters when shooting very wide angles – if you want the deeper blue, recompose tighter to avoid sky banding
  9. Check your speeds – if shooting in a breeze, that meadow of flowers, or forest of trees, or ocean waves may be blurred – lose a stop or two if you can to minimize DOF loss and improve or avoid blurred movement.
  10. Watch our for lens flare – when shooting wide, light can creep in at funny angles all the time.

I’ll leave you with a little What The Duck, in what is becoming a regular component of my Friday posts:

What the DUck Cartoon