Photography Blog DigitalPixels.net

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The artificial lighting learning curve for most photographers starts with a built-in flash or external flash mounted above the viewfinder. The photographs they take with a single flash look flat and boring because they lack shadows to create the illusion of depth or look unflattering due to the position of the shadows to the side of the head and nose.

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I just love gridspots. The amount of light control that a gridspot will give you is incredible. So, a while back I ordered some honeycomb grids from saxonpc. It is with two of those gridspots that I took the image on the left, but first thing first. In fact Saxon PC is specializing in making computer cooling solutions, little did they know that their honeycomb is just perfect for light control. OK, they knew, they made a site for it. Yet it was fun to say "little did they know".

One of the first projects on DIYP was a coroplast made gridspot, which totally rocked, but getting those nice black honeycombs tickled so much and I caved in.

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While doing the annual purging of the tryptophan ritual ysterday I came across Photojojo, which listed 12 contests on their website.  As usual, appropriate disclaimers were given as you may or may not surrender your copyrights to images even for entering the various contests.  I took a look through them, and one of them struck me by surprise:  National Geographic.  Here is the copyright condition for participating:

Alpha channels are basically specialized selection processes. Alpha channels are used to make, store or edit selections made using tools such as Lasso, Magic wand or Pen tool.

Alpha channel is another type of image masking. When we say mask, it is an 8-bit channel using 256 levels of Gray, ranging from 0(black) to 255(white). With that being said, alpha channel is a masking technique which defines a selection in black, white, and varying shades of Gray pixels. White acts as the selected pixels; black acts as the unselected area and the levels of Gray define what is partially unselected or selected depending on your view point.

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What I’m aiming for is the article I wish I’d found when I first got my camera, to help explain the relationship between three critically important parameters: the ISO speed, aperture (or f-stop number), and shutter speed.

To lead with, the easiest way I think to approach these three things is to understand physically what they mean inside your camera. So, here we go.

• ISO speed: A measurement of how quickly your camera’s sensor absorbs light.
• Shutter speed: A measurement of how long your camera’s shutter is open for when you take a shot.
• Aperture: A measurement of how wide the shutter on your camera’s lens opens up when you take a shot.

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Field of dreams: The countryside landscape has broccoli for trees, potatoes for rocks and basil and herbs for the grass. The path is made from nuts, while the basket is bread with a mushroom wheel.

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It is said that everything comes around full circle, creating a cycle. This is most certainly the case with reemergence of blank and white photography onto the scene. Why is black and white photography becoming en vogue again in a world that so emphasizes color? Despite the incredible popularity of digital photography in general, and creation of color images in particular, there will always be room for black and white.

Over the past few years, we seem a movement back to the classics, yet combining the technology of today. More and more modern movies are being filmed in black and white. Magazines are incorporating black and white ads into their publications. It is even common for the high end art galleries to have featured exhibits all in black and white. This movement is due to the artistic and emotional qualities that are just not possible to capture using color photography.

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GPhotospace.com announced today the launch of PC and Mac versions of the GPhotospace Add-on for Firefox and Flock. Leveraging the Gmail platform, the GPhotospace Add-on shares albums online many times faster than most solutions. GPhotospace also announced today that proceeds from the software will be donated to help sustainability in rural Africa through the relief organization Canadian Physicians for Aid and Relief.

Lightning-Fast Photo Sharing: GPhotospace Leverages Gmail to Create Firefox Add-On for Free Private Photo Sharing-Proceeds to Support Sustainability

GPhotospace.com announced today the launch of PC and Mac versions of the GPhotospace Add-on for Firefox and Flock. Leveraging the Gmail platform, the GPhotospace Add-on shares albums online many times faster than most solutions. GPhotospace also announced today that proceeds from the software will be donated to help sustainability in rural Africa through the relief organization Canadian Physicians for Aid and Relief.

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Have you ever had difficulties making selections and thought there was a better way? Let's review both quick solutions, and on the other side, comprehensive and details techniques for making selections. Each approach has it's place in your workflow. The more methods you know how to use, the faster and more effectively you'll move in Photoshop.

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Sooner or later, most photography enthusiast give some thought to "how to start a photography business." Unfortunately, there are a 'few' challenges that "doom" us to failure. One of the biggest challenges that we bring is our failure to make the distinctions between our love of photography (re: our enjoyment and passion for photography) and the business of photography (understanding buying and spending habits of people that are photography customers).

For example, many of us think that because our photography work is "so good," that we shouldn't have that much trouble selling it. We, sometimes, mistakenly, think that great art and photography "sells itself." Big mistake! Great photography does not sell itself. In the business world, nothing sells itself - nothing! Knowing this is critical to start a photography business.

Our failure to make the distinction between our passion for photography and our desire to be in the photo business is also evident in how we try to tell people about what we do. For example, photography customers don't care what type of equipment we use. They don't care how many mega-pixels we have, nor how much our equipment cost us, nor what brand of camera we use. Photography customers (current and potential) want to know that we can, and will, produce the highest quality photography work for them.

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Low light...it can be a photographer's nightmare. But here are some basic techniques that I use daily to overcome this obstacle. Some of this may sound mundane, but I am surprised constantly by how many photographers do not understand these basic principles.

First, let's talk about lenses.

For those of you who do not already know this, we refer to lenses in terms of how "fast" they are. This is kind of a misnomer, but what it really means is his: how big is the aperture? The larger the aperture, the more speed you can get out of the camera...hence...how fast it is. The absolute minimum aperture for exposing images in low light should be f2.8. If you have a lens that has a smaller aperture opening than this, your ability to capture sharp images will be drastically reduced. Most "kit lenses" are f3.5 to f5.6, and most of them lose aperture as you zoom in (the closer you zoom, the smaller the aperture becomes). This can spell certain doom in low light. So the first, and most important tip is to invest in quality lenses. Invest in lenses that are f2.8 or faster...f1.8 or 1.4 is even more preferred.

Second, let's talk about film speed (ASA) or CCD speed (ISO).

In a nutshell, the larger the ASA or ISO 3, the "faster" that medium is at exposure. This becomes very important in low light situations. The downside is that the higher the speed, the more "noise" one can expect. As a rule of thumb, I typically use ASA/ISO 200 for sunny days outside, ASA/ISO 400 for indoors with good lighting, ASA/ISO 640 for indoors with medium light, and ASA/ISO 800 for indoors with low light conditions. I have found that anything higher than a speed of 800 produces too much noise for what I do.

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We all do it. Even the sort of cutting-edge, super-cool street photographers who are more likely to get excited by a pile of concrete than a glowing sunset will find themselves in a spot of nature, holding a camera and thinking “That will make a nice picture.”

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