By Megan Just

One of the easiest and most effective ways to reduce your carbon footprint is by pooling resources and combining efforts. Teaming up with other local photographers and businesses is not just good ecological sense, it's good business sense. Pooling resources will reduce your overhead costs and increase your profits. Here are seven tips to help you begin combining efforts:

1. Exchange Information

Develop a directory of green-minded photographers and photography-related businesses in your area. Networking can lead to more local shoots and helps build a stronger local economy. Approach related businesses and establish a referral program for their clients and yours. Make it a point to share information with other nearby photographers about your locale, like new shooting locations or shops that give discounts to locals. With the combined knowledge of your group, everyone can be a local expert.   

2. Go Halfsies

Buying in bulk is better for the environment because it reduces packaging and transportation (and cost!). Team up with other photographers to buy high-count packages of stock items you all use, such as print bags and print boxes.

3. Cooperative Studios

Why pay for a studio space that you only use a few times a week? Organize a cooperative studio space with other photographers. You can share more than just the cost of the space and utilities; in a cooperative space, you can share common tools like studio lights, tripods, backdrops, etc.

Continue reading "Tips for Greener Photography: 7 Ways to Pool Resources" »

By Stan Sholik

I’m sure most professional photographers have some device in their camera bag to white balance their digital captures by now. The majority of these devices, ranging from an ExpoDisc to a coffee filter, provide a white balance by correcting the color temperature of the light before you begin shooting, saving it as a preset for the session.

While this approach yields excellent results for white balance, these devices do nothing to assist us in adjusting midtone brightness, shadow density and contrast to ensure we are taking full advantage of the dynamic range of the capture.

Datacolor, with the introduction of the $59 SpyderCube, takes a different approach to white balance and in doing so provides a device that addresses all of the visual elements we need to extract the maximum tonality from our images. Standing only a little over three inches tall, the SpyderCube is the Mighty Mouse of color balance.

Also included in the SpyderCube box is a cloth carrying bag, not shown.
©Stan Sholik

Continue reading "Pro Review: Datacolor SpyderCube" »

By Cheryl Pearson

Many photographers spend countless hours learning the latest tricks and techniques for retouching images using Photoshop. Accomplishing the desired effect can be tedious and time consuming. Then we work to perfect the techniques so that retouching won't slow down our workflow.

But what if you didn’t have to work so hard? What if one application did all this retouching for us with just a few simple steps? Anthropics Technology’s Portrait Professional v9.0 software attempts to create what we need, and even goes one step further. Not only does this program retouch the photograph, it slightly restructures the face giving it a more pleasing appearance. While most of us would need an array of tools, filters and adjustments to accomplish all this in Photoshop, Portrait Professional v9.0 can do this extremely complex task with just a few clicks of the mouse.

Portrait Professional v9.0 seems too good to be true, but it’s actually extremely easy to use and streamlines workflow in a way that saves a tremendous amount of time. So how does it work? The software was developed through analysis of hundreds of faces and the creation of a knowledge base of appearance and aspects of attractiveness so that the software could be programmed to essentially  know the changes needed to make a portrait more appealing without altering the facial features too drastically.

Images ©Cheryl Pearson.

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By Diane Berkenfeld

Sometimes though, you have to push the ISO capability of the camera or shoot with less light than you’d like. That’s where noise reduction software comes in. Adobe Photoshop has a noise reduction feature, but it's not as robust as the plug-ins and standalone applications whose primary function is to reduce noise. Most raw conversion software also incorporates noise reduction, which works well for raw file shooters.

These comparison examples from Nik Software Dfine 2.0, Imagenomic Noiseware 4.0, and Picture Code Noise Ninja supplement that article from the July issue of Professional Photographer magazine. All images ©Diane Berkenfeld.

This original (left) was captured with an Olympus E-20 at ISO 160. Click for larger view.

Click through for 100% detail image comparisons.

Continue reading "Supplement: Noise-reduction Software Image Examples" »

By Betsy Finn

Alien Skin’s Snap Art 2 is a natural artistic plug-in for Adobe Photoshop that allows you to choose from different media and to perform limitless combinations and adjustments.

My college art training regimen included painting, drawing, and art history, so I was excited to see how closely Snap Art 2 could approximate different visual media techniques. Snap Art 2 offers a number of basic starting points: color pencil, comics, impasto, oil paint, pastel, pen + ink, pencil sketch, pointillism, stylize, and watercolor.

The Snap Art 2 interface includes options containing a variety of Abstract (low realism), Landscape (moderate realism), and Portrait (most realism) settings. I selected the “Color Comics – Large Feature Size” and added a focus region to retain detail in the cat’s face. Before applying the filter, I made sure to save my modifications as a new custom setting.

The comparison below shows several of my favorite media selections. I’ve enlarged the comic version so you can see the shading detail. The watercolor media setting, when set to abstract (with a focus region), was one of my favorites in the series (also see detail comparisons).

Continue reading "Pro Review: Alien Skin Snap Art 2" »

Earlier this month, Kim Larson wrote about her wedding workflow and how she uses Nik Silver Efex Pro with Adobe Lightroom. Here she provides a screencast to demonstrate how the two applications work together.

The “all you can eat” lens!

By Don Chick, M.Photog.Cr., CPP

What kind of genie would you need to call if you wanted a lens that is reasonably priced, has fantastic zoom range, and is super fast? We’ll let you know when we find one, but in the meantime, if you’ll settle for two out of three, Sigma offers the new 18-250mm F3.5-6.3 DC OS HSM lens for an MSRP of $800.

On my Canon DSLR (with a 1.6X lens factor) its 13.8X zoom ratio translates to a 29-400mm equivalent! Combine that zoom ratio with optical stabilization, macro capability, an MSRP of $800, and you have a lot of lens for the money.

I must admit that when first asked to do this review I was skeptical about a lens in which the manufacturer was trying to do so much in one package. There have to be compromises to balance zoom range, speed and cost, but Sigma has done a great job combining features in the 18-250mm.

The first thing that I noticed was the weight, which, at around 22 ounces, has a substantial feel and heft of quality to it. Even though the lens has that feel, the overall size is not that big. When set at 18mm, the overall size is 3.1x 4 inches long (excluding lens hood). When zoomed to 250mm, the overall length increases to about 7 inches. The markings are white against a black body, so they stand out and are easy to read. Sigma eliminates an additional expense for the user by including a lens hood designed specifically for this lens.

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By Jack Reznicki, Cr.Photog.Hon.M.Photog., API

Don’t you just love it when software does what you want it to do, even goes beyond your expectations, and is relatively inexpensive? The new remote DSLR app by onOne Software for the iPhone and the iPod Touch is just that. A $19.99 app that lets you not only fire and control the settings on your Canon EOS camera (and very soon your Nikon) remotely but is also simple and elegant, with some neat surprises. Like an easy to use intervalometer. 

If you don’t want the extras, you can even get a simple version that fires your camera and reviews the images, for $1.99. Yes folks, no typo, just under 2 bucks.

You do need to have your camera tethered to a WiFi enabled laptop or even a small net top computer via USB cable for it to work. Once that’s done, you are set up on a private network connection directly to your camera. You pay for and download the app from the iTunes App Store, load it to your iPhone or iPod Touch. Then download and install the free DSLR Camera Remote Server software from the onOne website onto your computer, and off you go. Just remember to turn off your camera connection software, Canon Utility in my case, or the app will read “busy” when you go to connect. I was amazed and pleasantly surprised with how easy it was to install and have it running. None of the usual hair pulling.
 

On a recent shoot for the Toys R Us Special Needs Catalog, I set up a Canon EOS 5D Mark II at the ceiling of my studio to capture a bird’s eye view of my shoot. While the camera was tethered, I was not. I could go anywhere and either take a photo and see it come up on my handheld iPod Touch, or I could set it quickly to Live View and get a real time motion view of what the camera saw. I could watch from my office, which assistant was working and which was napping. At any point, I could hit the “fire” button and take a photo. Too dark? Wrong white balance setting? Well, at a touch on my iPod Touch I could change the exposure, the white balance, the shooting mode from manual to automatic, change the EV, the ISO, even the color space. No need to pull out a ladder and contort my head to look at the camera settings. Or worry about how it might look later, as I can see it as it captures. Think of the great possibilities of shooting from remote. Like photographing from a bird blind, self-portraits, interacting with a child on set or shooting from hard to be at places, like behind a basketball backboard.

Continue reading "Pro Review: onOne DSLR Camera Remote for iPhone and iPod Touch" »

By Theano Nikitas

Gallery wraps are gaining in popularity with the general public as evidenced by more than a few online sites offering wrap services for consumers. The do-it-yourself photo and canvas versions from Hahnemuhle were introduced last fall and offer a relatively simple and cost-effective method of wrapping photo canvas.

Hahnemuhle offers three options for gallery wraps: Gallerie Photo Wrap, a simple, all-in-one option, as well as Standard and Pro Gallerie Wrap systems. The former is available in two set sizes: 8 ½ x 11 and 13 x 19 inches, with finished sizes of 6 x 8 and 10 x 16, respectively. The latter two offer more versatility since wrap bars are available in boxes of 20 in lengths from 8-24 inches (Standard) and boxes of 8 at 8-60 inches (Pro). Each type requires corner positioners, corner braces, pins and archival glue. Center braces are available for the Pro versions.

As someone who always had problems stretching canvas for art class, I thought I would be the perfect test case to try out the Hahnemuhle Gallerie Wrap. Using the Standard sizes, I opted for an 8 x 12 set-up to wrap a vertical shot of a grey Heron printed on Hahnemuhle’s Monet canvas.

Click any image for larger view. Images ©Theano Nikitas

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By Mark Levesque, CPP

Canon’s penchant for refining existing models rather than develop replacements from the ground up goes not only for their cameras, but also for their printers. The Canon PIXMA Pro9500 Mark II is one of the latest examples. This wide-format printer builds on the original Pro9500’s success, with a 10 cartridge LUCIA pigment ink set, and the ability to print borderless 13 x 19 prints on a variety of media. The Mark II utilizes the Canon Full-photolithography Inkjet Nozzle Engineering (FINE) technology along with a sophisticated 7,680-nozzle print-head structure to output extraordinary detail and quality. New with the Mark II are features like the ability to print 16-bit files, and Ambient Light Correction featuring Kyuanos technology, which allows the user to specify the lighting situation a particular print will be subjected to prompting the printer to adjust colors accordingly to compensate.

The Canon PIXMA Pro9500 Mark II is designed to fulfill photographers’ demands and uses a multiplicity of ink colors to achieve wide-gamut color printing as well as smooth tonal gradations on black-and-white printing on both matte and glossy papers. Impressively, there is no need to swap ink tanks as required with some competitive printers aimed at the same market segment. The superiority of this arrangement is obvious, but as a practical matter, it saves both time and ink, especially if you frequently alternate between printing on matte and photo papers.

This is a serious desktop printer, and it requires a significant space commitment (7.5" H 26" W 14" D with trays up; 14" H 26" W 36" D with trays extended). In addition to the size of the printer itself, consideration must be given to the space requirements both in front of and behind the printer to accommodate art papers, which are fed in through the front and pulled through the back of the printer before printing starts. The benefit of feeding the paper through this way is that it does not get bent at all, which preserves the coating, but a 13x19-inch Super B sheet extends significantly out the back of the printer to accomplish this, requiring some careful consideration about printer placement.

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