Secure Your Camera Bag
Here is a short and sweet tip to help protect you r valuable camera equipment. I have never been burned by this, but I have come very close a few times. NEVER leave your camera bag unzipped, unbuttoned, unlatched or un-how every you secure your camera bag. If you do, you will someday be in a rush and grab your camera bag with intent to take your next Pulitzer Prize photo, when your camera gear will go flying and (hopefully not) breaking. Photography is a great deal about discipline and this is one discipline I would HIGHLY recommend. So, I make a mental note to zip my camera bag each time I take something out. For me it is like lens caps, they are always on if the lens is not in use. I hope this helps.
I recently was taking some photographs for a local magazine cover with Christmas scene. Of course this involved Christmas Lights. I wanted to give the lights a twinkle look, this can be done with a star burst filter, but I did not have one. So, what I did was put the camera on a tripod and set the aperture on the lens to f22 (the smallest aperture on that lens) and shot some long exposure shots. The results were exactly what i was hoping for.
Christmas Lights
I keep running into photographers that are reluctant to shoot in RAW format. They feel RAW format is somehow complicated, more time consuming to process or just a mystery better left for another day. I have also heard people looked at the RAW image in the RAW (so to speak) and felt like they lacked something compared to the JPEG images that came out of their camera. I would like to dispel these notions and show the advantages of working with RAW format.
Use RAW
First of all, what is RAW format? Despite that fact that I and many other refer to it as ‘the RAW format’, it is not a single format. Each manufacture and even each camera has a format that is specific to the camera. The reason for this is that the data in the RAW file should be the data that is directly read from the sensor – since most cameras have different sensors the data and therefore files are all different. This means the camera has not touched the data or attempted to process the image in any way. Keep in mind that JPEG images are often heavily processed by the camera. Manufactures often apply heavy contrast, saturation, sharpening and tonal curves to make the images appear punchy, sharp and colorful. Having this RAW unprocessed data has many advantages for us photographers. The one downside of RAW format is that it does require processing, you can’t just slap the SD card from your camera into your photo frame and start sharing photos (unless your camera will shot RAW and JPEG at the same time, which many will). Although most photographers like to do some processing before use; if this is you than RAW will be the better choice.
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If you are looking at DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex) because you want to get more serious about photography, either treating it as a hobby or perhaps do some professional work, you should give a lot of thought to your first DSLR purchase. Keep in mind you are not just buying a camera you are buying into a system – Lenses, flashes, shutter releases, and even memory cards and software. All of these things can be specific to a band of cameras.
Lots of Choices
I recommend that when you buy your first DSLR that you investigate the entire system you are buying into, because to some degree you will be married to that system for a while. As you grow your own camera system with additional lenses, a flash or two, etc you will end up with a large investment in equipment. If you then decide to upgrade and end up going with another brand you will have to sell all of that equipment (probably at a loss) and upgrade. So it makes a lot of sense to look not only at the entry level cameras in that system, but also the pro-sumer and even pro cameras and lenses. You want to buy into a system that has headroom – room to grow. You also want to be sure the system had equipment you will want to use as you grow. Does the system have a complete range of lenses (both prime and zooms), does it have flashes that will meet your needs, etc.
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WordPress Users – I just posted on my Mark’s Playground Blog (marksplayground.com) about a plug-in for displaying Flickr images on your WordPress Blog as either individual images or as a gallery. The plug-in has a few challenges, but the overall functionality is good. You will be seeing me use it here before too long.
Here is a quick example:
You can find the post here:
http://marksplayground.com/index.php/2010/12/flickr-in-wordpress/
Since I have been re-learning Lightroom, I have playing around with Development Presets. So, here is my first published preset – Mark’s Grunge (I know – original). This preset is based on one that Scott Kelby describes in his Lightroom 3 book. I just took it to the next level. You can download it here – http://www.hammonphoto.com/uploads/marksgrunge.zip – Let me know what you think.
