As promised from last weeks post on Youtube, I promised to share the “how to” on the creation of the little teaser video for transitioning from a black and white photo to color. For those that don’t remember, the video is here: Continue reading “Creating the color video”
Tag: photo
Product Review: Backlit Box
When the folks over at www.backlitbox.com approached me about reviewing the product and participating in the initial research and design of their new product, I was happy to oblige as new products that come into the marketplace are always engaging to participate in during development. So, I submitted one print for work-up, considering the line of products (images back-lit by laser lights). I chose a shot of the moon hanging beautifully over the harbor of South Carolina. When I got the product, I was skeptical at first because there was hardly any color to the image. However, when I plugged it in, the color became quite brilliant, and lit things amazingly well – better than I would have anticipated.
I did have some notes to go back to Faxon (the owner): the back of the box had no hanging wire mechanism, which put me in an awkward position of having to nail a picture hanger into the box myself, and without knowing how it was wired up for electrical, made for a potentially damaging situation. The other thing I noticed is that a thin line of light was evident around the perimeter of the box on all four sides. As we discussed at length later, this was an unfortunate side effect of the production line, with no real professional way to mask this light spill (we both agreed that gaffers tape or electrical tape would just look rather amateurish).
Not long after that, I had an idea when noticing a piece of trim molding in my office was peeling…what if there was a thin piece of trim molding that surrounded the print…this could effectively black out the border thereby avoiding the light spillage. I relayed the thoughts to Faxon, and shortly before I left for my trip, he informed me that the 2nd generation product was ready to ship and to send another photo in for production.
After sending in another image (a sunset over Folly Beach), I got the updated product literally 24 hours before my departure on vacation, and the end of the April contest series…so the review had to wait until now.
First off, let me say that I was (and am) very impressed with the professionalism that Faxon exhibited during the entire research and development process. Not only did he take constructive criticism well, but he also was quick to implement changes where improvements were desired, including not only a photo hanger on the back now, but also the trim molding to effectively eliminate the the white line of light around the border. Take a look:
The image looks amazing and I was surprised even that it was one from my own portfolio! Give the image quality, back-lit intensity, and visual appeal from this product, I must heartily give it a two-thumbs up rating, even though it is likely still in development. While most products usually are, this one even more so as he continues to improve upon the original design to deliver a better quality product to his client base. For the cost of printing, it almost is a no-brainer to consider these as part of your portfolio of products to offer clients. I’ve seen two different landscapes, and Faxon has shown me displays of portrait work and architecture work as well that have really rocked my socks off!
It’s a great product that will only improve with time, and is something every photographer should have both in their own portfolio, and as a product offering to their clients. For more information, and to upload/order your own images for production, please visit www.backlitbox.com
For those interested in having product reviews done on your own product line, please feel free to email me, as always. I do also appreciate the many requests for reviews of various products from the readership here, and all it takes is a request to me for a review to begin the process of communication with respective vendors for review copies, so keep chiming in with these ideas – it’s your suggestions that keep the product reviews coming, so sound off in the comments with what you’d like me to review next! Until then, happy shooting!
I'm going on Auto Pilot
After some serious burning of the night oil, I’ve got the last Newsletter of the year ready for release – if you want to get it, the push goes out at 10:30am eastern time. This means subscribers will also get a sneak peak of the final 5 items on the 25 for $50 gift guide list for 2010. That final list will be released here on the blog tomorrow with full photos and write-ups of each, so if you miss the newsletter, be sure to stop in on Wed. for that.
The final podcast for 2010 is recorded and in the gates, ready to be run on Thursday too, so this is going to be a week with lots of multimedia and distributions for everyone to download and enjoy as we head into the holiday season. On that note, I’ll be enjoying the rest of this week off (so no blog post on Friday), and hopefully get the rest of my own family and friends shopping completed in short order. What is it – ten shopping days left? If you’ve not started yet, time’s a wastin!
And, oh yeah, one last item to note…Lightroom has had it’s latest update to 3.3, and Camera Raw (for CS5 users) to 6.5! You can grab the downloads here for Lightroom, and on the Raw Converter the downloads are Windows and Mac specific.
So, on that note, I am going to let the powers of scheduled posts and media distribution do their work while I catch up on a few Z’s and other things! I will check in periodically for comments, questions, and other feedback items, but for the rest of the week, this baby’s on auto-pilot! Happy shooting, and we’ll see you next week…..unless of course anyone has any questionszzzzzzzzzzzzzzz?
Water and Light
The idea of writing with light is nothing new to photography, the very word itself means to paint with light (from the Greek photo, meaning light, and graphos meaning write), the most successful photographers through time are ones that have incorporated an effective use of light in their work.
While reading through the Sept. issue of Rangefinder, I found myself re-visiting the subject yet again, and with artists who I’ve seen and admired before, including Clark Little and Eric Curry (you may have seen Eric’s work featured over on David Hobby’s Strobist site periodically…brilliant lighting setups!). The whole idea gave me a moment of pause – how much of my own work has been cognizant of the power of light? (It was a very Joe McNally/National Geographic type of moment if such a moment could be attained by an aspiring one rather than successful ones like those mentioned above.)
Nevertheless, taking cue from their inspiration, I perused my own portfolio for the theme of light. It was actually quite extensive, so much so that another theme had to be incorporated to pare things down further. Since Clark Little’s work has always been a source of inspiration and envy, I decided to go with a water pairing. How have I managed to capture both water and light effectively? The exercise was a good one, and looking at your archives with a new vision or perspective has always been one I encourage. So, without further ado, here’s my take on combining the themes of water and light:
As inspiring as it was for me, take this cue as a source of inspiration for yourselves…pick a theme (or two), and peruse your archives (or go shoot with the theme in mind), and see where your creativity will take you. Got ideas for creativity along these lines? Share ’em in the comments too, as ideas for inspiration are all around us. Check out what everyone says in the comments section below!
Happy shooting all, and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!
Shooting From the Hip
While recently taking a reality break and visiting family in my old stomping grounds, I had a chance to tour the Farmer’s Museum in Cooperstown, NY. Viewing museums like these is a lot of fun for both kids and adults – kids because of the activities, and adults because I think as you get older, you can start to appreciate with more awareness just how tough things were (or how easy they are now). Continue reading “Shooting From the Hip”
Free 3d Photo Maker
I don’t often do a weekend post, but every once and a while, and since I have reduced the blogging schedule somewhat, figured I’d share this little nugget here today.
A friend told me about a site that produces tons of free applications for things like video, audio and stuff – that I should check them out. I took a look and sure enough – there’s literally dozens of apps they offer for free. Now, my mantra is always that “you get what you pay for” but when I saw they had a photo-specific app, figured I had to at least try it. It’s called 3-D Photo Maker, and is a pretty quick and easy download/install and to create the images. (I don’t think there’s a Mac version as of yet.)
It’s a neat idea and I am not sure what algorithms they are using, but here’s the upshot of what it does. You reference two images and it does some sort of processing to them that theoretically creates a 3-D look. It was hard to tell the results because you do need those 3-D glasses to view the results, but on a first glance, it’s kind of neat. Here’s a few sample screenshots from the program:
For those interested in trying it themselves, the download link is here:
Free 3D Photo Maker
Let's Make a Deal, or Not
While reading through the foot high stack of magazines in an attempt to whittle it down, I found myself re-reading a Photoshop User magazine from a few months back. I often re-read magazines and find hidden “nuggets” (as I call ’em). These are fodder for blog posts right here, and last night, I came across an oldie but a goodie. It was the April/May issue of this year so not too long ago. Ed Greenburg and Jack Reznicki were talking about this idea that companies will often lowball or no-ball a photographer in an effort to get their pictures.
Photo Montage Tuesday
Normally, I start the week with either a hardware review, a software review, or something along those lines, but there’s a couple things that have bumped the traditional schedule. So, check these tidbits out to start the week:
First off, Scott Kelby has announced the 3rd Annual Worldwide Photo Walk! It’s a pretty big deal now as there are some major sponsors that contribute prizes to this, and it’s just a super cool time. There are usually a couple that start up for the Denver area, and if you’ll be around, let me know and I can post which group I’ll be in so you can join (or avoid) as needed! 🙂
Next up, I am having a couple really exciting podcasts coming up in future weeks, so my one that I recorded over the weekend will never see the light of day – it was a solo run, so not as much fun as, perhaps talking to Rob Sylvan (Also a NAPP Helpdesk writer) or Martin Bailey! They are coming up soon, and we’re recording soon, so get your questions in via comments, email, or the free 800 line: 866-809-8663!
In other blog news, you may notice three new sponsors in the sidebar: Adobe, NAPP, and Red River Paper!
- Adobe – So, if you’re trial version of CS5 is almost up – order the full version here and you can still take advantage of great savings. Just come through the side panel link here to get the same pricing as elsewhere, and when you do, you’ll be helping me keep costs to a minimum on the blog and podcast!
- NAPP – For the NAPP link – you can sign up for a membership through this affiliate link and get lots of special bonuses, and the referral also helps to keep costs down too…(I think you get like 2 additional months free or something like that).
- Red River Paper – These guys are terrific – not only have they donated prizes in the past to monthly giveaways, but their continued support and service to both myself and readers/lilsteners is now available through the affiliate link in the sidebar. Enjoy (especially their latest Pearl Metallic paper – totally rocks!)!
Finally, speaking of contests, the May giveaway entry deadline has passed and the winner of the free copy of PTGui Pano Software is: AlinNZ! Congrats to him and to Alin – if you contact me via email, I’ll get you in touch with PTGui to have them send your license key to unlock the software! Great photo, and thanks to all for participating!
Click the photo to be taken to his photo stream and comment on his excellent body of work there as well. Congrats, and for those interested in the June contest – the news is posted on the Flickr site with all the details, so head there for more info. I’ll go into more details on it later this week, so keep on feedin’ on the blog! Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!
Creating a Monthly Desktop Calendar
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! 🙂
And the Oscar Goes to…
Okay, it’s not an Oscar, nor an Emmy, but the LDP Monthly Giveaway is sufficiently popular that selecting winning images is very tough. Here’s what happens once the contest is closed: Continue reading “And the Oscar Goes to…”