Why You Should Check All Your Layers Before Saving For Web

With some of the interesting post-processing “personal projects” I’ve seen photographers do recently, I have to admit my first reaction upon seeing this is “there’s a fun project here”.

Imagine the possibilities of selective removal in your landscapes… that tree, for instance. hmm…

(Laurie and I had a discussion about why the hair was moved onto its own layer. My best guess — they want to repurpose the image with different hair colors, so you turn it into it’s own layer so you can manipulate it easily).

 

Why You Should Check All Your Layers Before Saving For Web:

Here’s a Photoshop protip: before saving a final version of a photo for publishing on the web, make sure all the layers you want in the image are actually visible. Apparently some Photoshopper working for JCrew got careless with his layers, which led to the above catalog photo showing a model with transparent hair (in fact, the hair appeared by itself in a separate photo). The catalog entry has since been fixed, with the invisible-haired woman replaced with a boring photo of a blue blazer.

 

Merced National Wildlife Refuge Video

One of the goals I set myself this year was to try to do more storytelling instead of just posting images, so one of the things I’ve started doing is experimenting with different tools to publish that help tell a story.

This is one of those experiments, a video slideshow of Merced National Wildlife Refuge, which by now you’ve probably figured out is a favorite place of mine. Nothing too fancy here, just working out the workflow and making sure I can go end to end through the tools, but I think it turned out pretty well (would love to get your feedback on this…)

Merced National Wildlife Refuge from Chuq Von Rospach on Vimeo.

 

Pescadero State Beach

A weekend drive up the coast with Laurie gave me a chance to experiment a bit with the new 24-105. Afternoon sun gave it some decent light, and the wave action was picking up in front of the recent storm. The circular ND and I had some arguments, which I need to look into. Overall, a decent image, not a great one. But it’s got some interesting elements, and this is a location I love to experiment at….

Does my favorite author now have to spend a couple hours a day on Facebook?

January 24, 2012 | Trent Nelson | Photojournalist:

Tech people keep saying that artists can make it without the distribution systems, and they all trot out Jonathan Coulton as the example of someone who has made it on his own (by the way, he’s amazing). He offers his music for free, or you can buy it, and he does great. Hooray, there’s one guy making it. One guy.

Okay, you can add Radiohead and Louis CK, but both made their reputations over years in the old media system and only now have the power to make independent new media work. That’s three, so I’m still seeing a lot of artists left out in the cold.

Here’s a question to think about as a new artist-friendly distribution model evolves…

The employees of the old media distribution system did a lot of work, like promotion, financing, and obviously distribution. Who is going to do that in the new model? The artists? Does my favorite author now have to spend a couple hours a day on Facebook? Because I really want my favorite author working on the next book, not tweeting or other garbage that could be handled by someone else.

The problem with the old model was that the distribution system forgot who they worked for and started to think they were the important part. The new system will turn it around and put the creatives in charge. Maybe the band of the future will sign a record company to a deal instead of the other way around.

There are actually a bunch of people making it. But they tend to be smaller, they tend not to have a big PR machine pumping them onto the networks. The old system tended to push massive success towards a very few, whether it was Stephen King or Michael Jackson. There was a middle ground where you could grind out a living (and occasionally someone would turn that into a very lucrative business, like the Grateful Dead did). And there was a huge mass that the old systems didn’t want anything to do with at all that never got a break. And in most cases, they old system was right (ever sit down and read a slush pile in a publisher’s office? Seriously, most of it, be glad they filtered the worst of it away).

But yeah, that also limited access to some good talent as well. And as this new model evolves and matures, eventually the old system will figure out how to find and pull talent out of the pool and turn them into the next Stephen King or Michael Jackson and they’ll continue to be the promoters and publicity pushers for the elite super-earners. But their role as gatekeepers is diminishing, and will die off.

thank god (but that also means that we need to find other ways to protect ourselves from that slush pile, folks; in whatever form it takes).

Does this mean your favorite author will have to spend time pushing themselves on Facebook? When starting out, yes. But look at someone like Trey Ratcliff. He’s just hired something like his tenth employee. As his business grew and his revenues went up, he brought people in to take on parts of it. That’s always been the case with small businesses. That is the model we’ll see moving forward. The talent (whether singer, video maker, photographer, app developer or author) will continue to do the parts they’re good at and enjoy doing; as their income grows, they can farm out other parts — bring in someone to help with marketing and publicity, or proofreading, or formatting their ebooks, or handling Facebook. Whatever is not economic to do themselves, but needs doing.

This is nothing new. But it does mean you can’t succeed JUST by being a good talent; you need to be able to run your business, too (or get successful enough to hire someone to run it for you); in fiction, agents sometimes took that on. For that matter, that’s a common case for pro sports, too. I expect you’ll see the agent role mutate into more of a business manager instead of a submission broker.

The model for this is well known; it’s not new, and it’s been used successfully for a long time. What’s really happening is that all of these talent-centric industries are moving to that model with increasing speed, and the transition is at best unsettling for those caught in the middle. And it’s going to create problems and failure for some, and opportunities and success for others.

Which, honestly, sounds a lot like what talking movies did to silents, and what television did to radio, back in the day. And in both of those cases, some people woke up without a future, some people moved from one to the other just fine, and some found opportunities created where none existed before. But now, just being a good writer (or singer, of photographer, or…) isn’t enough to be a successful one.

If it ever really was. (I have my doubts).

(hat tip: BW Jones)

Just Hanging Out….

Spent some more time down in Moss Landing with the Sea Lions. Watching them argue with each other is endlessly fascinating, as long as I’m upwind.

This one is just hanging out in the water. the reason he’s sticking limbs out of the water is to regulate their body temperature.

While down there this trip, I saw the ultimate in lazy. A sea lion had ended up laying on the dock with his head out over the water. Three of his buddies (the dock they have taken over is a bachelor pad; it’s all of the males that aren’t yet able to win fights for the girls. Think of it as a  Pinniped frat) have laid down on top of him, so it’s going to take some effort to move.

Too much effort. I stood there and watched him with his head full in the water, blowing bubbles as he exhaled. And when he wanted to breathe in, he’d raise his head just enough to grab a breath, then plop his head back into the water, where he’d slowly start blowing bubbles again. This went on the entire time I was there. Because it was too much effort to actually move his head out of the water.

That to me is a zen mastery of lazy.

For more images of this sea lion group, click through this image:

Sea Otter and Kayaker

Moss Landing is a good place if you want to photograph sea otters, since there’s a colony that lives in the harbor. Here was one that was wandering around the harbor, but when a kayaker went by, stopped and watched her. She was careful to keep her distance, and once she passed, the otter went back to doing whatever it was he was doing….

 

 

Coming in for a landing….

A red-breasted merganser hits the water and puts on the brakes, flintstone style.

But not without leaving a few skid marks… Gotta work on that landing, pilot.

 

Merced Birding…..

I have acquired a strong fascination with the cranes and geese that visit California’s central valley in the winter. There are a number of places you can go to take them in, but one of my favorites is Merced National Wildlife Refuge, which is roughly halfway between Santa Nella and Merced. It’s about two and a half hours of driving from home, so it’s not a trivial drive, but it’s very much something I can do as a day trip.

The cranes and geese start arriving around the end of October, and start leaving in February or March. I’ve gotten into the habit of trying to get out into the central valley three or four times a winter to visit and photograph the birds and the area; more if I can. Some of those trips Laurie and I do together and make it an outing, but sometimes, it works best for me to go solo and just focus on trying to get pack as much into the trip with as much intensity and focus as I can.

There is just no way to be enthusiastic when the alarm goes off at 4AM. The best I can muster is not turning it off and rolling over; a quick hot shower and I’m off after clothes stashed in the other room, because my one goal right now is letting Laurie get back to sleep. Some mornings, you walk out the front door and look up into the dark sky and realize you’re screwed, and you might as well go back to bed. It’s 4:30, it’s 40 degrees, and it’s clear skies.

South to Gilroy, I find the open Starbucks (thank you, bless you). Over the hills, and down into Santa Nella and Los Banos. And into the fog. Now, I’m worried; I might arrive and be fogged out. The fog is playing games with me, though, as Tule fog can; sometimes it goes away. sometimes it’s impenetrable and you’re driving by braille. Outside of Los Banos, it lifts, but only about 20′, so it’s as if I’m driving in this weird grey tunnel. It’s a weird feeling, with the air completely clear around you, but when you look up, you can see nothing.

I make it to the refuge at 7:15, beating sunrise by about ten minutes. The fog is there, but not heavy. When the sun hits, it’ll build a bit, then it should burn off before too much time passes. I pull into the refuge to set up the cameras and get ready for the show. I can hear the geese stirring in the distance. My car thermometer reads 35 degrees. I reach for my coat, and realize I left it at home. All I have is my in-car denim jacket that lives there for these kinds of situations. It’ll help, but it’s really not heavy enough.

I’m the second car into the refuge. One has already headed up the auto tour a bit. I’m in the entrance area, unpacking gear and setting up the car the way I like it for these trips. A lone bird flies through. It turns out to be one of the few glimpses of an Ibis I’ll see today.

Those who have a fantasy that the life of a nature photographer is a glamorous one, set the alarm for 4AM, drag your butt out of bed, and go sit on a bench in the local park for a few hours and wait for something to happen. Maybe something will, maybe it won’t. That, in a nutshell, is nature photography. As you get better at picking locations, the chances something interesting will happen goes up, but it’s never guaranteed. Hours of prep, minutes of opportunity. Maybe.

Some people like to visit a lot of places. Get to know a few places well, rather than see lots of places superficially. You can go overboard on that, become too insular, too “cocooned”, but for me the attraction is to understand a place, not just see it. To watch as it changes over time and through the seasons.

 

This trip to Merced is my “new job vacation”; instead of taking time off and going somewhere, I took the accrued vacation and put that money into gear. It’s also my first “serious” trip to start learning how the gear should be used in the field. I’m consciously experimenting more with the wide angle, forcing myself to use it and not get so heavily into the rhythm of shooting at 400mm and seeing everything in that mono-vision.

I am going to have fun today. I don’t intend to let the cold stop me. Or the fog. Or even doofuses. Those are all things to work with, and around, they can only be excuses if you let them. Early on, the fog makes bird photography tough, putting everything into soft focus. I spend more time thinking about how to bring the refuge to those that can’t be there.

Opportunities do exist, of course.

A loggerhead shrike sits up for a portrait session. This has been one of my nemesis birds; I have lots of so-so images of them. I don’t have many I’m proud of.

Now I do.

I spend the afternoon with the geese, alternately trying to figure out how to show what it’s like sitting out in a marsh with 10,000+ birds, and trying to get some good flight and landing shots.

How do you describe 10,000 birds visually in an image?

That seems a good start. It’d be a better image if it was a panorama, but I didn’t want to get out of the car and risk spooking them to set up for a formal pano, and the handheld one wasn’t very good. Some days they work, some days they don’t.

Geese, everywhere. Never quiet, and there’s always motion.

Every time I visit a refuge, I want to do video, I want to do audio. I want to try timelapses. I now have most of the gear I need for these, but haven’t had time to practice the setups. Next visit, hopefully.

Then the geese explode; they’ve been spooked. The entire flock hits the air at the same time. The noise is intense, almost as intense as the visual chaos. Birds are flying everywhere. I don’t know how they avoid collisions, but they do.

 

And then it’s quiet, and empty. The geese have gone in to settle for the night. I can feel the first tendrils of fog seeping back into my It’s time for food, something hot, and the drive over the hill home. Until next time.

All of the images from this trip have been collected into a slideshow. To view it, click this image:

 

A couple of minor “where I am online” updates…

I had someone ask me why I had switched from posting my shared link posts to posting a collection of my twitter feed. The answer is simple: when Google updated Google Reader, they removed the sharing option I was using to queue up posts for the Shared Links, breaking my setup. I played with a couple of options to replace it (funneling them through Instapaper worked, but seemed the wrong answer to the wrong question), and finally decided to just consolidate it into twitter, because (a) I could with minimal work, and (b) I didn’t have a better option I liked.

To be honest, I think it makes the feed too noisy, and I’m not thrilled with it. I keep hoping that Google will release an RSS feed out of Google+, which I think would make a better option for this. Or maybe I’ll go see about creating something with iffft. I’m also thinking that maybe this could be a custom app I build that I feed stuff to, that spits out the articles once in a while. In other words, I’m doing this until I decide what a better solution is and I get that built.

My general view of what I want to post on the blog looks something like this:

• Photos, with or without some supporting content (generally short, 1-2 paragraphs)
• Long form writing (> 1,000 words), where I work on a topic in more depth and spend some time putting the article together. In general, when I go beyond 2,000 words, I’ll tend to split it up into multiple parts, because I find really, really long form gets unwieldy and people stop reading.
• Short form writing (200-500 words), a quick note on something that doesn’t need in-depth analysis.
• Links, which optimally are in a digest/list format. These are designed to give those links some visibility and Google juice, and are to bring to your attention stuff I find interesting and well-written. Please note “interesting and well-written” may or may not include “agree with”. These are things that I don’t feel warrant my commenting on, though, because I find blog posts that boil down to “hey, this is neat, read it!” ungodly awkward and boring…

The link setup has annoyed me since, well, forever. I mostly like how Daring Fireball and Duncan handle it, but I still think doing links as a once-a-day digest reduces the noise factor and pulls them together better. I’m at the point where I’m ready to build a quick web-app that I can feed it to and a cron job on the back end to suck it out once a day for posting. Hmm. I wonder if I could do something like that with evernote and a special tag? (Hmm. have to go explore that…)

In any event, the Twitter feed stuff is “good enough” for now, but not what I want long term. And I’m open to suggestions on ways to solve this problem, whether it’s something off the shelf, wordpress plugins, or other ideas. But I hadn’t thought about doing it via Evernote until just now; I have to go look into that…

I should also note in passing that I killed my 500px.com account today. I can’t say anything negative about 500px, I simple never figured out what I wanted to do with the site that made it worth investing time into building the site up or putting effort into posting and interacting over there. In my continuing effort to not let “keeping up with my social media stuff” take over my life and lead to information bankruptcy, sites like this have to fit into my long-term ideas for where I want to have my stuff exist. I could never find a way to use 500px that seemed like it added anything, it all seemed to duplicate other things i was already doing.

I like 500px; they do a good job of displaying images and taking care of photos. Their social media aspect is decent. At some point, I may figure out how to leverage the site. When I do, I’ll go back. Until then, I didn’t want something that never got enough time and energy to stay up to date hanging around looking vaguely abandoned (which it mostly was).

It’s not you, it’s me (and in this case, I’m not just being polite…).

 

 

Quick recommendation — ArtisanHD

This year for the holidays I decided to try something different with a couple of my gifts. Every year, I try to make christmas gifts for the family a little personal, and in the last few years, that’s meant something using my photos.

This year, rather than a standard framed print or a calendar, I had prints done via ArtisanHD on Plexiglas. It looked like an interesting, modern alternative to the standard matted print. These images in the 12×18 size (good for 11×14 prints) ran a bit over $50, and to be honest, I was blown away with how they looked.

If you’re looking for something different and memorable, with good quality, something that’s going to leave an impression — this is something you might want to consider. I liked the quality of the final product, I was very happy with the quality of the print, and in fact, I did one for myself, which is going up in my cube at work tomorrow, too. And I expect it’ll get people to come into the office and ask about it.

Definitely recommended.

 

 

A red-Tailed Hawk

 

 

To be honest, this young red-tailed hawk seems to be enjoying this warm, sunny morning almost as much as I was….

 

 

Best Photos of 2011 — the list

Once again Jim Goldstein has compiled the list of “best of 2011″ pages by photographers around the net. This year, the list has grown to almost 300 photographers, and there’s some amazingly good photography available.

You should really check these authors out!

 

1. JMG-Galleries Best Photos of 2011 – Jim M. Goldstein
2. Dalal al-Dhubaib’s flickr – Dalal al-dhobaib
3. www.mawpix.com – Matthias Wassermann
4. 2011 Retrospective – Alex Wise
5. Jon McCormack Photography – Jon McCormack
6. Top 10 of 2011 a Exploring Light Photography – Chris Moore
7. The year in review: My favorite 2011 Photos – Ed Rosack
8. Dave Wilson Photography – Dave Wilson
9. Top 10 from Behind The Clicks – Mohammad Noman
10. Art in Nature Photography: Best of 2011 – Floris van Breugel
11. Alaska Photography – Mike Criss
12. My best photos from 2011 – Lasse Sørnes
13. http://www.500px.com/photo/3230405 – Keivan Zavari
14. My Five Best Images of 2011 – Peter Cox
15. My Top 10 images of 2011 – Charlie Widdis Photography
16. MY TOP PHOTOS FROM 2011 – Chaz Curry
17. Best of 2011 – Juan Guevara
18. Stories From Home – David Patterson
19. My Best Of 2011 – The Photographs – Sven Seebeck
20. The Uprooted Photographer – Zach Frailey
21. Top ten wildlife photos of 2011 – Burrard-Lucas Wildlife Photography
22. Eleven From Twenty Eleven – Jacob F. Lucas
23. My ten favorite photos of 2011 – Stefan Bäurle
24. Changing Perspectives – Jenni Brehm
25. 2011 Top 10 Photos – Andrei Olariu
26. Best Photos of 2011 – Ahmed Almuhairi
27. Favorite Photos of 2011 – Pat Ulrich
28. Top 11 of 2011 – Younes Bounhar
29. Natural California – John Wall
30. 2011 – A Review – Jim Denham
31. yeeehah.com – William R. Bullock
32. 2011Top11 – Kate Church
33. Top Ten Photos of 2011 – Steve Cole
34. Top 10 of 2011 – Brian Rueb
35. http://www.davidjohnstonart.com/index.html – David Johnston
36. 7 Images of Denver in 2011 – Neil Corman
37. My Top 10 for 2011 – Lon Overacker
38. Craig Ferguson Images | The Year That Was – Craig Ferguson
39. My Best Images of 2011 – Clark Crenshaw
40. “Sort of the best of 2011: ants – Jeroen Mentens
41. Best Photos Of 2011 – Dawnstar Australis – Daniel McNamara
42. Skolai Images – Carl Donohue
43. Favorite 10 of 2011 – Alan Dahl
44. Tony’s Blog – Tony Unwin
45. Best of 2011_Laurie Rubin – Laurie Rubin
46. FlixelPix Best Photos of 2011 – David Cleland
47. Ilja Melnikov – Ilja Melnikov
48. Best of 2011 – Rob Tilley
49. Free Roaming Photography 12 Best Photos from 2011 – Mike Cavaroc
50. Adventures Through the Lens: 2011 in Review – Rebecca R Jackrel
51. Top Photos of 2011 by Gary Crabbe / Enlightened Images – Gary Crabbe
52. My 10 Best Photos of 2011 – Michael Russell
53. Digitized Chaos’ 2011 faves – Rian Castillo
54. Top 10 Photos of 2011 – Mike Chowla
55. John Fujimagari’s Best of 2011 – John Fujimagari
56. 10 Best Landscape Photos of 2011 – Cody Duncan
57. Best photos from 2011 – Janis Janums
58. Best Photos Of 2011 – David Leland Hyde
59. PhotogAbby’s Photoviews – Abigail Gossage
60. Do Not Get On or Off While in Motion – G. Kaltenbrun
61. Tony Wu’s Underwater Photography Blog – Tony Wu
62. 12 Months – 12 Favourite Images – Petr Hlavacek | NZICESCAPES IMAGES
63. Alpenglow Images | Greg Russell Best of 2011 – Greg Russell
64. An End of Year Retrospective for 2011 – The Top 11 Images of ’11 – Derrald Farnsworth-Livingston
65. 11 from ‘11 – Dru Stefan Stone
66. William Neill’s Top Forty Images for 2011 – William Neill
67. Dave’s Best Of 2011 – Dave Reichert
68. 10 Best Photos of 2011 by Scott Thompson – Scott Thompson – Scott Shots Photography
69. My best 10 images of 2011? – Duffy Knox
70. My 5 Top Photos from 2011 and Photography Year in Review – Tommy Holt
71. Russ Bishop Photography – Russ Bishop
72. My Top 10 Favourite Images of 2011 – John Dunne Photography
73. Asif Patel Photography – TopPhotos2011 – Asif Patel
74. The Best of 2011 – Neil McShane (aka Mononeil)
75. Top Nature Photographs of 2011 by Mark Graf – Mark Graf
76. Year 2011 in 10 photos. – Filip Lucin
77. Views Infinitum: Best of 2011 – Scott Thomas
78. Dobson Central Photography – Top 10 Photos of 2011 – Ken Dobson
79. “The Best of Myrmecos – Alex Wild
80. Your Favorite Shots from 2011 – Fred S. Brundick
81. Patrick Gensel – The Best Of 2011 – Patrick Gensel
82. 100 Favorite pictures from 2011 – Patrick J Endres
83. My Ten Favorite Photos of 2011 – Randy Langstraat
84. KennethVerburg.nl – Kenneth Verburg
85. Naturography: My Top 5 for 2011 – Mike Spinak
86. Edith Levy Photography – 2011 A Year in Review – Edith Levy
87. G Dan Mitchell Photography – G Dan Mitchell
88. Jonesblog – Bryan William Jones
89. Timages’ 2011 Top Ten – Tim Mulcahy
90. naturalvision-photo.com – Derek Griggs
91. Favorites of the Year: 2011 – Ken Trout
92. Beetles in the Bush – Ted C. MacRae
93. Chuqui 3.0 – Chuq Von Rospach
94. Peter Carroll Photography – Peter Carroll
95. My photos of 2011 – Frederico Quintao
96. http://raptorgallery.wordpress.com – Glenn Nevill
97. Best of 2011 – Brad Barton Photography – Brad Barton Photography
98. Non-Rocky Best of 2011 – Erik Stensland
99. My Favorite/Best Photographs of 2011 – Inge Fernau
100. Best Photos of 2011 – Ryan Golias
101. Best of 2011 – Larry Rosenstein
102. Best of 2011 – Mellimage
103. The Quiet Picture – Year 2011 In Pictures – Minna Kinnunen
104. My personal Top 10 images from 2011 – Alexander S. Kunz / Daylight Colors
105. 11 Best of 2011 – Olivier Du Tré
106. Best Photos of 2011 – Jim Coda
107. Living Wilderness: Best Images of 2011 – Kevin Ebi
108. Oxherder Arts – Best of 2011 – Don Schulte
109. my best images of 2011 – Rhoda Maurer
110. http://www.stamates.com – Jim Stamates
111. Organic Light Pan – Youssef Ismail
112. Rick Diffley Photography – Rick Diffley Photography
113. Best Images of 2011 – Robin Black
114. PhotoWalkPro – Jeff Revell
115. Highlights from 2011 – Roman W. Schatz
116. Uncommon Depth – Roberta Murray
117. TKM Journal – Highlights of 2011 – Kent Mearig
118. Amanda Herbert’s best of 2011 – Amanda Herbert Photography
119. Google+ – Umes Shrestha
120. Anne McKinnell’s Top 10 Images of 2011 – Anne McKinnell
121. Best Photos of 2011 – Jim Maher
122. www.fredmertzphotography.com – Fred Mertz
123. Top 10 Photos of 2011 – Ireena Worthy
124. 11 in 2011 – My Favorite Photos – Debra Feinman
125. 2011 Top Ten Plant Photos By John Manuwal Photography – John Manuwal
126. www.azaelmeza.com – Azael Meza
127. David Sharp – The Best of 2012 – David Sharp
128. Looking back at 2011 – Ivan Makarov
129. Best Photos of 2011 – Pete Miller – USKestrel Adventography
130. My favorite 10 of 2011 – John Christopher
131. Neil Creek – Photographer – Neil Creek
132. JohnLPhoto Best of 2011 – John Lemen
133. Momentary Awe – Catalin
134. 2011 Top Ten – Andrew S Gibson
135. “Crest, Cliff and Canyon – A. Jackson Frishman
136. 2011 – A Good Year – Margaret Summers
     Temporarily Removed at the Request of Photographer
137. Favorite Photos from 2011 – Richard Wong – Richard Wong
138. latoga photography – Favorite Photos of 2011 – Greg A. Lato
139. Looking Back – 2011 – Derek Fogg
140. My Photo Blog – Ron Niebrugge’s favorite photos from 2011 – Ron Niebrugge
141. My 10 Favorite Photos of 2011 – Dan Bailey
142. My 11 favorites from 2011 – Kurt M. Lawson Photography
143. Happy New Year – Lori Ann Cole
144. My Top 10 Mixture – Ashley Cottle
145. Google+ Beach Photography – Jennifer Brinkman
146. Top 10 images of 2011 – Denise Goldberg
147. www.azaelmeza.com – Azael Meza
148. Erwin Kessing Photography – Erwin Kessing
149. The Closing of the Year – Eustace James
150. Mark Feenstra Photography: 10 Favourites from 2011 – Mark Feenstra
151. Best Photos of 2011 – Ingo Meckmann
152. Dynamics of Light and Shade – Richard Murphy
153. My 20 Best from 2011 – David Maurer
154. Top11 2011 – Patrick Ottoy
155. Best of 2011 – David Edenfield
156. Little Time Machine – This was 2011 – Pete Carr
157. The Owl and the Wildcat – Jen Joynt
158. Best of 2011 – Alison Wells
159. My 2011 Best Nature and Landscape Photographs – Steve Sieren
160. Best photos of 2011 on Flickr – Jono Hey
161. Best Photos of 2011 – Ken Snyder
162. Best Photos of 2011 by Ilya Genkin – Ilya Genkin
163. My best of 2011 – Terri Jacobson
164. Piya Trepetch Photography – Top Ten Images from 2011 – Piya Trepetch
165. My Best 10 Pictures for 2011 – Barbara Newson
166. Woo’s 2011 in Pictures – Gary Woo
167. My (Possibly) Ten Best Photos from 2011 – Jim McCoy
168. Favorites – 2011 – Daniel Leu
169. Closescapes Favourites From 2011. – Marshall Black
170. Nature and Landscape – Small Choice 2011 – Ben Schreck
171. http://wernerpriller.wordpress.com/ – Werner Priller
172. Peter de Rooij’s Top 10 for 2011 – Peter de Rooij
173. Best photos of 2011 by ISIK MATER – ISIK MATER
174. Best Photos of 2011 – ysvry
175. Focused Planet Photography – Justin Scicluna
176. Best of 2011 by Carl-Johan Rådström – Carl-Johan Rådström
177. Western Skies Top 11 From 2011 – Björn Göhringer
178. My Best People Shots – Matt Goode
179. Darin Rogers Photography: Best Of… – Darin Rogers
180. http://www.juzno.com/ – Rob Castro
181. Remembering 2011 in Photos – Aaron Hockley
182. Favorites From 2011 – Brad Mangas
183. Robb Hirsch Best of 2011 – Robb Hirsch
184. Best Photos of 2011 – Sathish Jothikumar
185. My best underwater photos 2011 – Suzy Walker
186. Year 2011 in review and favorite images – QT Luong
187. “10 From Michael Toye – Michael Toye
188. Photoimagery.net – Peter McCabe
189. 2011 – Our Favorite Images of the Year – Isabel & Steffen Synnatschke
190. ylitalot.net – Juha Ylitalo
191. Top Ten Photos of 2011 – by Brian Grzelewski – Brian Grzelewski
192. Jim Nickelson Favorites of 2011 – Jim Nickelson
193. 2011: My Top Ten Images – Michael Frye
194. My Top Images of 2011 – Andrew Kee
195. Favorites of 2011 – Simon Ponder
196. 2011’s Top 10 Picks – Vidya Narasimhan
197. My Top Ten Favourites from 2011 – Adriana Glackin
198. Top Ten of 2011 – Fedor G Pikus
199. Best Photos of 2011 – Hady Moslehi
200. Mara @ Fantasia – Photo Round up of 2011 – Mara Acoma
201. My Journey through 2011 – Kevin Thornhill
202. My 10 personal favorites of 2011 – Marleen Hallaert
203. Favorite Photographs From 2011 – Seung Kye Lee
204. Best Photos of 2011 – Michael Gerken
205. Simple Photography – Jay Shah
206. My Top Ten Photos of 2011 – Mike Isaak
207. http://lensmankc.com/?p=811 – Amit Jung K.C
208. baliultimatephoto.blogspot.com – Hendra Wiguna
209. My Favourite photos from 2011 – Alan Owens
210. John Dusseault’s top 10 of 2011 – John Dusseault
211. Favorites of 2011 – Plastic[Picture]
212. Farsighted – Ron Artigues
213. Google Plus – Darren Harmon
214. Bill Hornbostel Photography – Bill Hornbostel
215. Korwel Photograpy blog – Iza Korwel
216. Favorite Photos of 2011 – Elizabeth Brown Photography PhotoBlog – Elizabeth Brown
217. 2011 Highlights – Alan Grinberg
218. TJTPhotography.com – Ted Truex
219. Thamer Al-Hassan Photographer – Thamer Al-Hassan
220. Top 11 of ‘11 – Brian Arnold
221. Looking Back – 2011 Top Ten – Jessica Sweeney
222. Light Coming Back – Favorite Images of 2011 – Jennifer Durham
223. My Favorite Landscape Photos of 2011 – Joshua Cripps
224. Favorites Photographs from 2011 – Sudheendra Kadri
225. João Almeida Photography – João Almeida
226. Le meilleur de 2011 – The Best of 2011 – Francis Gagnon
227. Five Pictures for 2011 – David Lloyd
228. Ian Ference – Google+ Top Photos 2011 – Ian Ference
229. Marcin P?kalski – Google+ – Marcin P?kalski
230. www.thephotographerblog.com – Mandy Jones
231. My Top 10 of 2011 – Clement Biger
232. russell.tomlin at Flickr – Russell S Tomlin
233. Yosemite – Sheldon Neill
234. My Top 10 shots for 2011 – Greg Berdan
235. Best of 2011 – Dan Baumbach
236. Top Photos 2011 by Mark Dodge Medlin – Mark Dodge Medlin
237. The Carey Adventures – Peter West Carey
238. http://www.wildernessadventureimages.com/ – Michael Burkhardt
239. “Looking at the West – Andrew McAllister
240. Photos and Ramblings by Steve Mattheis – Steve Mattheis
241. My Favorite Photos of 2011 – Brandon Doran
242. Shanti Gilbert – Best Of 2011 – Shanti Gilbert
243. “10 of 2011 – David S. Ottavio
244. Best photos from 2011 – Mark J P
245. Heather’s Flickr – 2011 Top 10 – Heather Wallace
246. Ben Chase Photography – Benjamin Chase
247. Hypo-theses – Ian Stimpson
248. “Best photos of 2011 – Robert Kusztos
249. “Best of 2011 – Anton Huo
250. Best of 2011: JMG Gallery – Stephen Zacharias
251. Flickr Best of 2011 – Esther Reyes
252. My Top 10 of 2011 – The Siggins Photography – Richard Siggins
253. Andrew Benson | Best of 2011 – Andrew Benson
254. http://www.johnpaulcaponigro.com/blog/ – John Paul Caponigro
255. Google+ – Jim Davis
256. Beckmann Images – Best of 2011 Images – 500px – Matt Beckmann
257. Google + – Paul Conrad
258. Avelino’s Best of 2011 – Avelino Maestas
259. JMK Photography’s Best of 2011 – J. Krasner
260. Rob Dweck’s Top 10 From 2011 – Rob Dweck
261. www.myFedoraPhoto.com – Neal Fedora
262. Best of 2011 on Google+ – Robert Mann
263. My Top 10 Best Photos from 2011 by Matt Suess – Matt Suess
264. My Favorites from 2011 – Michele Wassell
265. My Top 10 Images of 2011 – Tom Bushey
266. A Selection of Favorites from 2011 by Christine Hauber – Christine Hauber
267. Favorite Images from 2011 – James B Martin
268. Kauai 2011 – Sharon Willson
269. “Best of 2011: Top 10 – Mark Hespenheide
270. shirley lo photos – shirley lo
271. Google+ – Christina Lawrie – Christina Lawrie
272. My Ten 2011 Faves – Rich Greene
273. Sunset at Vizhinjam – Agnisoonu K
274. Gary Randall Photography – 2011 – Year in Review – Gary Randall
275. 2011 faves – Anthony Chiong
276. NewmanImages: 2011 in Retrospect – Jay and Sue Newman
277. My 11 favorite pictures of 2011 – Marc Perkins
278. My Best Images of 2011 – Vaibhav Tripathi
279. My Best Shots 2011 – Annika Ruohonen
280. Top 11 Photos of 2011 – Shane Srogi
281. Wolfcats Top 10 images – Wolfcat
282. Alexander Filatov Photography – Alexander Filatov
283. Wendy Baker Photography Best of 2011 – Wendy Baker
284. My 6 best of 2011 – Patrick Smith
285. randomfire: The best of 2011 – Ramin Miraftabi
286. Closing California Parks – Eliya Selhub
287. MY BEST OF 2011 – Stan Rapada
288. 2011 Top 10 – Kyle Jones
289. 2011 Studies | Best of 2011 – Oskar Bruening

Great Blue Heron

A Great Blue Heron seen at the Merced NWR.

 

How not to be a doofus with a camera

The one thing that marred the visit to Merced was that I ran into a couple of doofuses. Here’s a quick guide on how not to be a doofus with a camera (or binoculars).

The “Area Beyond This Sign Closed” sign evidently didn’t apply to this couple, who entered the refuge shortly after I did and headed back into tour area ahead of me. The car is significantly beyond the “do not enter” sign, and they are significantly beyond that. What you don’t see or hear here were the three or four coyotes that were actively making a lot of noise somewhere off to the left of this scene but between me and them. Sorry, but “it’s okay if the ranger doesn’t catch us” doesn’t sit well with me. I guess it’s also okay if the coyotes decide  not to catch them, too.

These two seemed to be fairly knowledgable birders and at first glance their gear seemed to be of the “okay, they’re serious about this” quality. Not “take out a mortgage” glass, but “we’ve upgraded once or twice” glass. One would hope that serious birders would know to stick to the rules and not do things that impact the birds. Unfortunately, for some birders, “getting the bird” is most important, even to the detriment of the bird.

In fact, this is a minor transgression. They’re on a maintenance road. It’s just annoying to me when I see someone who’s first act when they arrive at a place like this is to put themselves above the rules. Rules which are there to protect them and to protect the birds they were interested in enough to come and visit. I just don’t have a lot of patience with the “it’s okay if I don’t get caught” mentality. Of course, you never know who might know the rangers and email them a picture of them, their car, and their license plate…

Just saying’.

But the big doofus was in the afternoon. I’ve made my fourth trip through the refuge, this one to sit with the geese until the light fails or they leave. The geese are being moderately cooperative, with about 10,000 sitting in a large group with the close edge about 50 yards off the road, just past the back observation area. I’ve found a parking spot where I have good views, good light, good angles, I’m off the road, and I’m in the car shooting, watching and hanging out.

And along comes a photographer, walking up the access road, camera, tripod. Pro-caliber Nikon body, pro-caliber nikon lens. expensive tripod. He walks up, and proceeds to set up and start shooting. Right directly in front of me, directly in my line of sight.

Okay, say freaking WHAT? It’s not like my car’s invisible. I decided to defer having a cow and give him some time to get some shots in. Instead, I grabbed my long lens and started taking flight shots around him, since he only moderately impacted that. When he heard my camera going off, he looked, saw the lens, and asked me if he was in my way. And I noted that yes, at some point he was going to be impacting my shots. So he then said “well, tell me when I am” and turned around and went back to shooting. After about five minutes of that, he graciously decided that was good enough and moved to a new location off my rear fender that was out of my line of sight.

This is wrong on any number of levels. First of all, you don’t just plop yourself down in front of someone and start shooting as if they aren’t there. He compounded this — his actions and the way he said things made it clear to me that until he realized I was also a photographer that this was okay. It was only once he realized I had a camera that he worried about impacting my sight lines. It doesn’t matter if I have a camera or if I’m just there for, say, a gorgeous sunset with the geese, you don’t have the right to decide to just set up camp in front of me.  I was mildly annoyed when he did it. I was majorly annoyed when I realized he thought it was okay until he realized I was another photographer, because that implies that he does this to others as well, because, evidently, his camera gives him right of priority view or something. And that he did it without acknowledging my presence until I hauled out a lens about as big as his.

I didn’t make a deal with it with him directly, because nothing good ever happens when you do, but man, this is annoying, because it’s this kind of behavior that gives all photographers a bad rep. When someone with a lens wades in and just plays this kind of game, it makes us all look bad to non photographers. So, kids, when you have a lens out, remember that your actions and how you act leaves an impression on those around you, and that impression is not just about you (and what a doofus you are), but on photographers in general. If you don’t care what people think about you (and I clearly think this man is a doofus) worry about what people think about all of us other photographers. Because it’s actions like this that get all photographer’s access restricted, when enough doofuses do things that annoy non-photographers enough to start making rules.

But it gets better. Or worse, I guess.

The other thing my friend didn’t realize was that he was scaring off the geese.  He was standing out in the open moving around a lot, shifting his camera around. Every time he did, a few geese closest to him took off and flew off or flew deeper into the pack. I figured it was only a matter of time before he spooked a goose that spooked the flock and caused them all to leave.

Okay, a quick digression. Refuges allow access to restricted parts of the refuge. Many parts are out of bounds so that the birds can go places where they don’t have to deal with the stress of interacting with humans. that’s why humans shouldn’t be going into out of bounds places. At refuges like Merced, access is via a gravel road set up as an auto tour. One of the rules they encourage you to follow is to stay in the car, and use it as a blind. There’s a reason for that: the shape of a human scares the wildlife, and they move away from you, or they leave. If you’re carrying a big camera with a long lens, it looks an awful lot to geese like that other long, pointy thing that got pointed at uncle bob before he fell out of the sky and was never seen again. When you’re that close, the geese are going to notice you and react to you, especially if you’re moving around a lot.

What ultimately happened, though, was that another photographer arrived, parked back up the road a bit, and walked out from behind the screening trees to where the rest of us were (three or four cars, the photographer wandering around. fairly big crowd, actually). He was wearing a red sweatshirt, and got two steps out from behind the screening brush. The flock jumped, and suddenly we had 10-12,000 geese in the air in total chaos. Within a minute, they’d organized and flown off, and we were all sitting there staring at an empty pond.

That is why the rangers tell you to stay in the car, and use it as a blind. Because these folks didn’t, the rest of us lost access to the birds, too. Show over. So much for trying to get a picture of the flock in golden hour light.

If the first photographer had been more aware of how is movements were putting the geese on alert, the second photographer appearing might not have spooked them. Or maybe he would have. Or maybe nothing would have happened (but in the previous times i’ve been in this situation, there’s a fairly decent change they’ll find a reason to get spooked, whether it’s person, noise, or raptor. But one can hope). The point is, I guess, is that if people had been following the recommended rules, the chances we’d have had a longer time watching the birds would have gone up significantly. By being that close to the flock and unaware of what their actions were doing to the birds, they messed it up for all of us.

If you’re going to shoot wildlife, you should strive to understand their behaviors and know how to minimize your impact on them. Failing that, at least know what the rules of the refuge are and follow them, because they’re designed to help you do that. It’s sad and frustrating when I see people who seem oblivious to the stress they’re putting on the animals; this isn’t Disneyland, and these aren’t audio-anamatronic robots.

I’m still wondering what that morning couple’s plan was if those coyotes decided to come out and say hi. They were, after all, only 100-150 yards out from their position. Fortunately, a coyote is generally uninterested in taking on a person, but there were at least three in a group together. That’s not a situation I particularly want to be in, out in the open with a coyote between me and my car where I might be safe. What I did was watch from the “do not pass this point” sign for a couple of minutes, just to make sure there was no sign of the coyotes moving, then I wished them luck on whatever they were doing and moved on. I wonder if they even realized the coyotes were there? (they were sure noisy enough…)

And my friend the doofus? I guess I see that kind of behavior often enough now that it’s merely annoying. If he hadn’t moved, I’d have eventually escalated the situation, but I figured if I gave it time, it’d solve itself without creating a fight, and it did. Once they scared off the flock, there was no reason to stay, so I fired up the car and headed back to the front of the refuge, because if there’s no active flock involved, that’s a better place to photograph the evening fly-in (except when it’s not), where I ran into a nice couple who was there for the first time, and I spent some time trying to help them with what to expect. It was, unfortunately, a fairly weak fly-in, with the cranes mostly missing until very late when they all flew in at once, and the geese — well, they’d already flown off to the evening roost for some reason, so activity was low.

But still, even a lousy sunset on the refuge is better than most things…. And I’ll give this one a C+.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dawn Breaks at Merced

Dawn breaks at the Merced Refuge. Or it tries to — the tule fog has other ideas. The Geese see if before you do, and the sound of the morning chorus echoes through the fog.

The alarm went off at 4AM, at that point, my only goal in life is to shut it up and get into the shower so Laurie can keep sleeping. The shower gets you going. I know the Starbucks will be open — the one 45 minutes down the road.  Welcome to the glorious life of the nature photographer. Bed beckons. So do the Geese. This time, the geese win.

The sun vainly tries to lighten the sky, but for a while the tule fog beats it back, leaving it a faint cold smudge. Then the geese roar to life and leap to the sky, flying out for a day’s work of whatever it is geese do.

It’s 7:15AM. The geese’s day has just started. Mine is three hours old and 120 miles from the bed already. And all I can think of is whether I’ll end up with anything worth showing to the world.

I can’t decide which of these images I like better. Probably the first. What you don’t see of course, the first thing I saw, was the huge blotch of sensor dust front and center. I’m really, really hoping it’s not on every image I took with that body the entire day, but I’m guessing it is. That’s Lord Murphy for you, a quiet “don’t get cocky, kid” — that dust blotch wasn’t there yesterday when I checked. But it was fixable. This time, this image.

This is the first published images off of my new T3i and my 24-104F4L lens. They are going to become best buddies, and dust blotches notwithstanding, this seems to be the beginning of a beautiful friendship. By the time this day is done, I’ll have driven 400 miles, been on the road almost 16 hours, and shot over 1,000 raw images, taking in both a sunrise and a sunset at the refuge, and visiting another nice birding place in the vicinity during mid-day times. I found a nice decrepit barn and forgot to take a scouting shot (but it needs late afternoon sun), spent some good quality time with tens of thousands of Ross’s Geese, and got home exhausted and happy.

And had plenty of time to think about how I wanted to do things when I wasn’t sitting with my finger on a shutter button.  Sometimes it’s about getting alone with your thoughts because it’s the only way to sort them out. And sometimes, it’s the only way to stop avoiding them…

But mostly, it’s about the birds, and the world they live in, and figuring out how to bring it to life for those not privileged to be there in person (yet).

 

Experimenting here on the blog…

Just so you know; I’m starting to experiment with some things here on the blog. One experiment is a new category that just appeared, “Tales from the field“.  I just finished a long (400 miles of driving, 16 hour day trip, 1000 images shot) trip out to Merced to take in the Cranes and Geese. My typical post-trip workflow includes crunching like hell to get through all of the images and get them processed and posted and then trying to write a trip report with a set of photos or slideshow (or both). this compresses the time I spend on that part massively — and I don’t think that does me, the images or the stories of the images any favors.

So instead we’re going to try working on it over time, posting images one or a few at a time, with the story of the images, and then later, pull that all together and publish it as some kind of ebook on the site as a cohesive whole. that fits me current mood of trying to get serious about the whole ebook/epub thing, and allows me to process the images and give them more effort towards bringing out the best in them, and write something that’s more narrative and less book report. So if this works, I think better results will come out on all fronts.

And if it doesn’t work, I’ll stop it and try something else. And you can tell me how well I’m doing… The first Tale from the field will be arriving shortly…

Lightroom 4 Beta released

Lightroom 4 Beta released | Pixiq:

On the 6th Anniversary of the very first Public Beta of Lightroom, Adobe have announced the availability of Lightroom 4 Beta. Being a full version update this means loads of new features. Some are immediately obvious, and some not at all.

 

New Lightroom beta. At first glance, I like the feature set a lot. I really want to look into the new processing setup. The geek in my says “download and get going”, the rest of me goes “oh, wait! we got real stuff to do!”

So I’ll let everyone else play on the bleeding edge, and see how it goes. But it looks good.  I wonder if Apple has Aperture 4 up its sleeve, too. Just because I’m curious what it might do. I’d love this to continue to be a horse race, with the two pushing each other…

For me, though, I think I need to bet on status quo. but I’ll be looking forward to hauling it out and seeing how it works for real. Maybe with beta 2.

 

 

Testing the new lenses…

I had to go visit the dentist this week, and I had just enough time free before the appointment that I could sneak down to the Palo Alto Duck Pond with my gear and do some head to head tests and start learning how the new lenses are going to operate.

This exercise was intended to try to understand a couple of things: first, how well the image quality of the T3i stands up to the 7D, so I know what situations I have to depend on the 7D, and when I can use the 2nd body. Second, I want to get some sharpness tests of the 70-200F2.8l+2.x combo against the 300F4+1.4x to see whether the former would work as my birding rig, and if not, how far can I push it before image quality starts to fail. And third, I’ve just had this nagging question about whether the 7D needs to be serviced and whether it’s giving me the clean, sharp images I expect from it.

To try to start figuring this out, I sat next to the pond (trying to avoid the kids with the bag of bread and the resulting chaos, not always successfully) and shoot the same subjects at the same time using the same settings so I have some rational images to do comparisons with. For all of these images, both bodies were set to ISO 400, AF to the center sensor, Aperture mode (adjusted by +2/3 stop as I typically do), with AF set to AI Servo and autoexposure to Center Weighted Average; I had no custom settings set.

These images are shot raw, with almost no processing; perhaps a bit of exposure and contrast tweaking, but all have the same default sharpening and no noise reduction or lens correction. The camera profile was set to camera neutral. All lenses were shot hand held, with IS on, set to setting 2.

Also, just to be clear, here’s the list of lenses and bodies I’m experimenting with. You have to be really careful because after a while, all of the letters can start running together, and it matters whether it’s the “70-200F2.8L IS” or the “70-200F2.8L IS II”. The “2.X II” teleconverter isn’t as sharp as the newer “2.X III”, but if you aren’t paying close attention, you can miss the difference in the model naming.

• 7d body
• T3i body
• 70-200F2.8L IS (not “IS II”)
• 2.x Teleconverter II
• 1.4X Teleconverter II
• 300 F4 IS

Click through each image to see the large version:

• The 7D, with 70-200X2x at 400mm, F8
• The t3i, with 70-200X2x at 400mm, F8
• here it is at 300MM, F8
• 300F4+1.4x at F5.6

Here’s a second round, shooting at something close up instead of relatively far away:

• 7D, 315MM @ F5.6
• 7D, 300F4+1.4x @ F5.6
• 7D, 280mm – 70-200+1.4x @ F5.6
• 7D, 280mm – 70-200+1.4x @ F5.6
• T3i, 300mm – 70-200+2x @ F5.6
• xT3i, 400mm – 70-200+2x @ F8
• xT3i, 300mm+1.4x @ F5.6

 

So my verdict?

If you look at those last two images side by side, you can see an obvious difference:

The right image is significantly sharper. That’s the 300F4+1.4x combo. The 70-200+2X seems to be acceptably sharp up to about 300mm, and then softens. In some cases, especially with relatively close birds, it might be “good enough” if the other lens isn’t available, but honestly, I think that’s wishful thinking. It’s just too soft. The quick testing I did with the 70-200 with the 1.4x seems to be nicely sharp, but even that the sharpness falls off as it heads towards max magnification.

This is normal with teleconverters. It’s not a matter of whether the image will degrade, but whether that degradation is acceptable. The 2x will soften your image; don’t pretend your 300+1.4x is going to be as good as a 400F4 — this is understanding the tradeoffs between quality, budget and having to hire a sherpa with a mule to carry it all.

So, my bottom line?

I’m not seeing any significant change in image quality between the 7d and the T3i. This is good; I didn’t expect to, since they use the same sensor down in the bowels; the pricing difference between the two bodies is primarily about manufacturing and features — and when you pick the two up in each hand, you can definitely tell the difference. The 7d feels built like a rock, the T3i feels more “plasticky” and is definitely lighter. It seems perfect for my needs as a 2nd body, though, and a good value compared to the 7D. (this also implies there’s no obvious issues with the 7D body indicating it needs a trip to the shop. also good). This means I can feel comfortable using both bodies, within the limits of the T3i — for instance, the more limited buffer for burst shooting.

The 70-200+2x combo is noticeably softer at 400mm than the 300+1.4x is; for my purposes, it’s “too soft”. This doesn’t surprise me much. I was hoping I could use it as my primary birding gear, but I wasn’t depending on it. I now know to stick with the 300 setup for that. From what I can tell, the 70-200+2x is acceptably sharp up to about 300mm, so in a pinch, I can use it if the 300mm is handy with some limitations, but the 70-200+1.4x is even sharper in that range, so I should use that instead.

Shooting at F8 helps, as you might expect, when compared to wide open. But doesn’t make enough of a change to change the results.

(and because I want to be clear on this: this isn’t a ‘problem’ with the lens. I was experimenting to see if I could push the envelope in an attempt to lighten the kit I haul around. I thought it was unlikely I’d get away with this without spending a lot more money on the 70-200F2.8 IS II lens, which is just beyond my budget. My opinion, honestly, was that I’d rather buy these lenses now and save up for my 500mm than put even more money into the more expensive 70-200. That’s all part of looking at the bigger and long-term picture of what your needs and priorities are….

The attempt was worth a shot, and now I know. Doing these kinds of tests is an aspect of learning your gear, so you know without thinking (or worrying!) what to grab to make a shot happen. If you know what the gear can do — and what it can’t — you can focus more on the shot, and less on wondering if you’re going to get it.

Do you know how your lens will react if you change it from F5.6 to F11?  What center-weighted exposure mode does vs. evaluative, and when to use which?

you really should, because if you stop to think through which settings to use when, by the time you think it through, the shot will be gone. Putting time into experiments like this is part of the process of making the gear more invisible to the moment.

 

 

 

 

Close but no cigar….

Behold the Say’s Phoebe.

One of my test images using the 70-200+2x combo. This could well have been a really nice photo, with one minor problem. That being the stupid bird is flying away from me. But even so, I kinda like it. This is actually heavily cropped; I like the sharpness and the wing detail. Even shooting at 800ISO with the 7D, the noise cleaned up nicely. I was madly trying to get the camera/lens to AF using spot focus as the bird hovered and flew around looking for a bug to eat, and this is an image where it locked in well. The 70-200 color rendition seems different than the 100-400 in subtle ways, but I like it. It’s going to take a bit of getting used to and experimentation to understand how to process images well, but I’m starting to get a feel for it.

 

Now, if only the stupid bird would TURN AROUND.

(in reality, none of my shots from Coyote Valley were keepers, but some were interesting in various ways anyway, and useful for figuring out the lens, which was the real point anyway…)

 

photography in 2012

I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want to accomplish in 2012.

No, that’s not true, what I want to accomplish is easy: push to improve, push to be more relevant, push to generate images that people care about, push to contribute more to the larger community.

What’s not been so clear is how to do that. I have general thoughts, which boil down to “the map says it’s off in that direction, let’s go!” and seeing what happens — and while I”m going to actually DO that, I’ve wanted to have something a bit more concrete in the plan for the year.

I had to have a long talk with myself about why I was doing this — at the core, what was it that makes photography pleasurable. Ultimately, I’ve decided, it’s that I really like seeing my images up on the wall: fine art prints. Something I realize I let kind of disappear when I retired the HP 9180 printer. Does this mean bringing in a new printer and getting back to playing with making images myself? Or do I print images through a lab and frame them up? I dunno. But I’m exploring the latter right now, and at the very least it’s a direction to explore. I think NOT printing my images, going to online/onscreen only, let me relax my mindset on what a quality image was, and so I need to get back into the mental view of requiring my stuff to be better, good enough to warrant being printed on Hahnemuhle Pearl Rag, not just on the monitor.

I need to learn my new lenses, and I intend to dabble in time lapses and video and see what happens. those aren’t goals, those are pure lab experiments.

But I knew I needed something to focus my work. it’s time for (cue dramatic music) a personal project.

Actually, two.

One I’ve known I was going to do for a while. A couple of years ago, a number of bird photographers decided to do an informal contest to see how many species they could photograph in a year. I ended up with about 120 or so, about a third of what the winner got, but it was a lot of fun, and it forced me to focus both on my birding and my bird photography. I’ve decided to do that again this year and see what happens. I’ll be adding some pages to the web site soon to support this, and I’m integrating it into some work I’m designing into the next generation of the site I’m designing.

I wanted something that pushed me in new directions, and I really had no clue what it was. But this morning, as I was working on some images I took yesterday at Coyote Valley, it all came together. One of the reasons I started on the Dare to Thrive project was to showcase what was special about Silicon Valley, away from geekdom, cubes and high tech.

That sounds like a great photo project to me, so that’s what I’m going to do. For 2012, I’m going to be looking for the Silicon Valley most of us don’t see, don’t look for. The parts away from the job that make this place a great place to be. The things take take us beyond a job to having a life. Arbitrarily, I’m going to limit this project to things no more than a 45 mile drive from the center of Silicon Valley, and arbitrarily, I’m setting the center of Silicon Valley to be Infinite Loop in Cupertino, because it amuses me and i=I know it’ll piss off various people, and that also amuses me.

The 45 mile limit is defined specifically to end Silicon Valley short of San Francisco, because to me, that city is many things, but it’s not Silicon Valley. It’s it’s own environment and reality. Once you set the stake in the ground there, we might as well use that to define the boundaries. Since this is all arbitrary, what the heck. It works for me.  And I want to exit 2012 not just with images, but with an ebook that’s published in some form where I tied it all together and show my vision on this, as opposed to just having some photos.

It’ll push my photography into new areas. It’ll push me to visit places I’ve meant to visit but never gotten to. It’ll push me to explore and research and find new places, and research how to get it written and formatted and published, beyond just pushing the shutter button. It seems like a bit of a reach, and that’s why I like the idea. and I’m guessing there will be interesting blog fodder along the way, just because that’s what I do.

To give a sense of what I’m aiming for, here’s an image that is the essence of it.

In the background is Hangar 1, the historic hanger at Moffett Field that they are now stripping the skin off of because it’s full of asbestos. This is one of my oldest images and one of my favorites, because of the juxtaposition of the open space I’ve come to love around the valley, and the buildings that come out of the history of this area that led to the industries that Silicon Valley was built around. If there’s an iconic image that defines Silicon Valley for me, it’s that building — and yet, within view of it, you can completely get away from all of the high tech and tilt ups and cubes and traffic that many people think defines Silicon Valley today.

That is Silicon Valley.

And that is silicon valley.

And so is this.

And this is what inspired me to do this. These are some test shots I did yesterday, what David duChemin would call scouting shots.  This is out in Coyote Valley, and I found that dead tree snag to be an interesting items. I was experimenting with the 70-200+2x, and it seemed like a good test of the sharpness (this is far away from my shooting location….). OTOH, the light was bad, the air was hazy, and there was some heat shimmer, so these aren’t by any means what is possible with the subject. But it catalyzed at the moment what I’ve been trying to find in terms of my direction for the next year, and I know I’m headed back there at a different time with better air to try again and get the shot I know is out there…

 

 

 

By the way, this hooting location has its own fascinating Silicon Valley connection. It is on the land Apple wanted to build it’s corporate campus on. Not Infinite Loop. Not the “spaceship” campus it’s trying to build in Cupertino, but their first corporate campus, back in the early 1980s. If that campus had been built, the pastures that are some of the best wintering land for raptors here in Northern California would have instead been yet another corporate campus. Fortunately, that plan never happened.

How things could have been different.

Welcome to 2012. it’s going to be an interesting ride. Don’t forget to take pictures along the way…