Emerald Bay Photography News and Updates

I had never even considered Google Earth as a tool to help prepare for a photo shoot - but I gotta admit, that's a DAMN GOOD IDEA.

I got tipped off to it in a recent newsletter from the AIAP, an organization I'm member of. Alan Blakely, Director of the AIAP, writes:

"There are literally hundreds of cool things you can do with Google Earth, but let me tell you how I personally use it:

1. Determine compass orientation and sun angle of exteriors.
This is HUGE! I travel extensively, and one of the hardest things to determine when planning a shoot is "best time of day". My experience has been that the people on site are rarely able to tell me accurately which direction the building faces. With Google Earth I simply enter the address of the building and "fly-in" to the location and view its orientation -- amazing! [Note: WOW. That is indeed huge. Knowing the physical orientation of any location is an amazing advantage!)

2. Determine the effect of adjacent buildings, parking lots and potential conflicting businesses on a site.
Have you ever arrived at an out-of-town location with a limited amount of shooting time and discovered that your subject was in the shadow of an adjacent structure? With Google Earth you can predict these potential problems.

3. Find nearby accommodations and services.
Another huge deal for me. I hate booking a hotel in a distant city and discovering that my subject site is on the other side of town. Google Earth allows you to find nearby lodging, restaurants, etc.

4. Find directions to and from a subject site.
I realize that this is old stuff if you use Mapquest, Yahoo Maps or Google Maps. However, seeing directions plotted out on the actual view of the area is vastly superior to any written directions. Google Earth zooms out and draws the way for you.

Now, however cool that tool may be though for larger cities - Google Earth images of Central Oregon are nothing short of SUCKIE. Point in case:



In comparison - the Google Campus rocks regarding detail:



Duely noted too that the City of Bend has a similar web-based application - but after running a few searches and not turning up even obvious stuff like Mirror Pond, Wall Street or Cooley Road, I've come to the conclusion that the thing is utterly useless (never mind that it ONLY runs in MS IE, and not in Mozilla ...).

And admittedly, Google Earth may be more useful for people who travel a lot or specialize in archictural photography, but I thought I'd throw it out there nonetheless. I'm sure creative ways to utilize Google Earth for other kinds of photography can very easily be found.

Post in the comments if you come up with anything brilliant.

Labels: Bend Oregon photographer, photography, photography gear

For almost 5 years I was utterly faithful.

To my trusty Compaq Presario 7000, that is. It rewarded me with rock-solid performance, few hiccups, and a comforting hum every time I would boot it up.

But it finally came time to add another horse to the stable. Not being able to shake the suspicion that the Compaq would just lay down and die if it ever found out that I was even *thinking* of replacing it, I reached deep into my pocket and bought it a "companion" instead. Sort of the Ferrari to park next to the VW Bus to keep it company in the garage.

The culprit? Photoshop CS2. It flat out refused to run on my lame 512mb of RAM (oops - was that out loud? Those 512mb of RAM are not *lame*. Did I say lame? I meant ... moderately insufficient...).

And at the same time - whenever I was desperate enough to start it up - CS2 would give me hints and peeks at its awesome power that CS1 just couldn't deliver. The fact that I am flirting with the thought of making the leap to the 12+ megapixel Canon 5D made a computer upgrade an even more pressing issue.

So I consulted Digital Photo Pro magazine, and after some brain-storming sessions with my friend Jake, settled on a system he would build for me with the following gear:

- Chip: AMD Athlon 64 1GHz HT Dual Core Processor
- 4 gigs of RAM
- 3 Harddrives - one 74 gig, 10,000rpm drive to host the operating system and daily operations, plus two 400 gig, 7200prm drives in a RAID 1 array (meaning that they'll mirror eachother and I'll always have a backup of all the RAW and processed images that live there).
- 2 DVD burners
- ASUS A8N-VM Motherboard
- POWERCOLOR Radeon X800GT Video Card
- Windows XP Pro with Service Pack 2

Since this new machine (Codename: The Beast) is now dedicated pretty much exclusively to image processing, I've networked it to my Compaq (Codename: Beauty) via a Linksys Broadband router, giving The Beast access to all the files on Beauty (and vice versa), plus the internet and all other shared devices like printers, scanners, fax etc. A KVM switch from Zonet let's me share the same monitor, keyboard and mouse between both boxes.

And how has it all worked out so far?

I would have never thought working in Photoshop could be such a boundless pleasure. For the first time, it executes commands, actions and file modifications without the hint of a delay - if I blink, I'll miss it for sure. (And that despite the fact that for some reason, only 2 gig of the 4 gig of RAM are actually operational - the next BIOS update by the motherboard manufacturer or Windows Vista will hopefully fix that though).

A recent project that took up 1.5 gigs on my CF cards was processed in roughly a quarter of the usual time - RAW conversion is now not a time issue anymore, so there really is no excuse not to always shoot RAW.

All in all - it feels like working at the computer the way it should have been (was?) intended: at the speed of thought.

And yes - it was worth every penny.

Labels: Bend Oregon photographer, photography, photography gear

Found today on JWZ's blog: Digital Camera made from Scanner.

What a neat idea. Reading up on it some more (note: this is only a mirror, as the original site seems overwhelmed right now) it made me wish I had kept my old, but still working, flatbed scanner instead of donating it to the Goodwill...

Labels: Bend Oregon photographer, photography, photography gear

The other day, I realized how terribly harsh life must be as photo gear in my equipment bag.

Over the past two years or so, I've done some pretty good damage to my Canon 10D, my 20-35mm wide-angle lens - and most recently - to my newly-acquired Canon Speedlite 550EX flash.

Once, my tripod-mounted camera fell onto the grantite floor of a bathroom I was shooting. It was a damn tight space, and I must have nudged the tripod with my foot. The floor was ok, of course - but my 10D had a little dent in the top, and also the small diffuser of my on-camera flash had broken (although the flash was closed at the time). Everything else worked great, the lens was fine - and overall, it was nothing short of astonishing how well the camera had held up to the crash.

Burning Man then claimed my 20-35mm wide-angle lens. I had read a lot about camera handling and maintenance in the Burning Man forums prior to my departure (including warning such as "If you have a nice camera, don't bring it"), and I had taken certain precautions, such as wrapping each item in my bag in a thick ziplock bag and only taking them out if I absolutely had to. I also ended up not changing any lenses during the entire week, because I knew that dust would inevitably get onto my sensor and screw up my shots.

But - there was no getting away from that superfine alcali-dust after all. Even if you keep your camera and lens inside of a ziplock at all times (which I pretty much did), the dust will get you. Luckily, it got to me only on the very last day. After the Burn too. I got home and upon cleaning my equipment, noticed a tiny speck of dust on the inside of my lens' front glass. It showed up in test shots as a dime-sized dark blur - and made the lens of course unusable that way. I wonder how many orders for new gear B&H gets after Burning Man ...

The third accident happened only a couple of weeks ago - I was on a shoot, and my tripod-mounted camera with the Speedlite on top fell over. And I wasn't even in the room. How it could have happened is seriously beyond me. The result of it however was that one side of the little foot that connects the flash to the camera broke off. I tried to super-glue it back on - no dice. At an event a few days ago, I ended up using lengths of gaffers tape to keep the flash on top of the camera, but the contacts were not working reliably.

So - now you might ask: Why hasn't she gotten in touch with Canon yet, and gotten these items into the shop to be repaired?. Well, I did call them. But of course all my gear is *just* beyond the warranty. So needless to say, Canon support was of very little help (they suggested sending it in or just buying new gear). And here's the sole biggest reason why I won't send anything in to them: They take WEEKS to evaluate and repair your stuff. Which working pro, I ask, can be without his/her camera or main lens for that long of a time?

Sure, you could go rent different gear to cover you for the length of the repair (Canon - disappointingly - doesn't offer a service like that). But not only are good rental places hard to find, they are also beastly expensive. None of them are in Central Oregon. Or Oregon for that matter. So take for example Gassers in San Francisco. Renting a 10D will cost you a cool $100 - per day. If you need it for say 2 weeks (the lenght of the repair) - that's $1,400. That will buy you a new camera. TCR is a bit cheaper, but not much. (Note to self - get into the camera rental market.)

So I'm stuck. I either risk losing out on jobs because my gear is in the shop, or I'll pay through the nose to be able to take on those jobs, and in the end might not make any money off that work.

For the future I think I'll look at taking out insurance on my gear. Before Burning Man I had my insurance agent work me up a quote for kicks. She wanted $500 for a year's coverage. I thought of all the nifty gear I could buy with that, and declined. Of course, my new wide-angle cost me over $400 alone. Add to that the flash, and I would have made out already.

If anybody has any bright ideas however, post them here or email them to me.

Labels: Bend Oregon photographer, photography, photography gear

I love it when all those silent wishes come true. Especially on my birthday.

Canon has announced the 5D, after much speculation and churning of the rumor mill.



At 12.8mp, equipped with a full frame sensor and at the fairly reasonable price of $3,300, it's not only the dream of many photographers who have been lusting after the 1Ds Mark II, but also my personal dream come true. Not having to shell out $8,000 for a full frame camera (which will render my wide-angle lenses for architectural work at their intended width), and still getting the higher resolution is quite simply perfect.

So thank you, Canon. I appreciate the fact that you've listened to your clients and come up with a nice middle-of-the-road camera that gives us pros one more reason to stick to Canon as the preferred method of capturing high-end imagery.

Labels: Bend Oregon photographer, photography, photography gear

18 Days to Burning Man.
Then - 7 days completely off the grid.
Dream or Nightmare?

At first, the thought of dragging my delicate camera equipment into an area notorious for 110 degree heat, fierce lightning and sand storms, and fine alkaline "playa dust" made me shiver. Then I also realized that without a convenient wall outlet to plug my camera battery chargers into, I'd be out of business after a couple of days of shooting. Which was a bigger bummer than the heat, storms, and dust put together.

So a few weeks ago, I started researching my options. Sure, Burning Man is a place where people share - and RVs with generators and such will be plentiful, no doubt. I could probably sweet-talk someone into letting me plug into their power supply every so often. But - I really didn't like the idea of mooching of my brethren. Radical Self Reliance is the Burning Man theme after all.

Then, what else is there? With the help of a couple of gearhead colleagues (thanks Robert & Tom!), I was able to distill these options for remote power supplies for the wilderness:

1. The External Battery Pack: The Digital Camera Battery store will sell you this nifty long-lasting battery pack that can power both your camera and flash for a long, long time. It's small and has a belt clip and a cord, and is rechargable.
Price for the smallest, 40Watt unit = $320. Add to that $70 for the cable, and at least $99 for the car charger. Total = $510

Ouch. Not. Next!

2. The Solar Option: Yes - seize the power of the SUN! This is waaayy nifty - a 5 Watt solar panel charger for my Canon BP-511 camera batteries = $100. But wait - for only $25 more, I can get the 10 Watt Solar Panel. And man, for yet another $45 more, I can get the rollable 5 Watt Panel! For $260, I can even get the 10Watt rollable panel.
And then there is the cool iSun charger - so cute and small, and even lets me charge my AA batteries for the flash too. Damage = $160.

Sigh. That would be nice. But there's gotta be another option too. And, yes, of course there is. In true cheap-hipster form, this is the solution I came up with:

Canon BP-511 Camera Battery charger with AC plug: $12 (including shipping)
High-powered AA battery charger, with 8 2300mAh rechargable batteries, and an AC plug: $60
Add to that one of them portable power units that will jump your car and has an AC plug (which I can use to plug my chargers into): Freebie! (with the last set of tires I bought at Costco)
Total damage: $72



Not bad. But I suppose I've yet to see if this truly works. If not, there's always the Media Camp at Burning Man where I could charge my batteries (so I wouldn't have to sell my body to some random RV people - as was pointed out to me by a helpful fellow photographer ... ;-).

But in any case - this has been educational already, and I suppose can be considered as part of my gift back to the BM photo community. If anybody has any other ideas (or knows for sure that mine won't work, leave a comment.

Labels: Bend Oregon photographer, photography, photography gear

Great article in the New York Times today. Renowned photojournalist David Burnett explains why he prefers lugging around a 55-year-old 4-by-5-inch Graflex Speed Graphic camera to his Canon 20D digital SLR.

On the screen was a wide overhead picture of a John Kerry rally last fall in Madison, Wis., which Mr. Burnett shot with a Canon 20D digital camera, the same camera used by thousands of other professionals around the world. Not surprisingly, the picture looks like thousands of others that were shipped around the globe during the campaign.

The colors are bright. Every part of the image is crisp, so crisp that just picking the minuscule figure of Mr. Kerry out of the huge crowd takes a "Where's Waldo?" moment.

And then Mr. Burnett flipped to a photograph taken seconds later with the ancient Speed Graphic. Suddenly, the image took on a luminescent depth. The center of the image, with Mr. Kerry, was clear. Yet soon the crowd along the edges began to float into softer focus on translucent planes of color.

The effect is to direct the viewer's eye to Mr. Kerry while also conveying the scale and intensity of the crowd. In accomplishing both at the same time, the old-fashioned photograph communicates a rich sense of meaning that the digital file does not.

The digital picture pretends to display raw reality. The analog picture is a visualization of human memory.

Alert photographers might also remember the image David Burnett took of Al Gore on the campaign-trail that won him a "Eyes of History" award. It was taken with a $15 plastic Holga camera.

Labels: photography, photography gear

Thanks to Luke for pointing me to the website of this Chicago-based wedding photographer. Jean-Rene Geoffrion's portfolio is a study in the art and craft of wedding photography - lots of close-ups of flowers, the cake, beautiful rings, exquisitely adorned brides' dresses etc - but with a delicate and crafty twist.

Of particular interest however is his tight integration of architecture with the photojournalistic style of shooting a wedding. When you browse through his portfolio (sorry, no direct links - the site is 100% flash-based), you feel almost like the opulent churches and sleek Chicago metro-scapes substitute a character of their very own in the wedding story.

Of course, at $6k per wedding, only the wealthy can afford him, and consequently, he has the priviledge of being able to shoot in some truly spectacular locations (all aside from the diamond-and-pearls-dripping brides...).

In any case though - even if you're not particularly into wedding photography per se, his site is worth a look just for the juxtaposition of weddings and architecture.

Labels: photography, photography gear

As read today in Dave Beckerman's New York Photography Blog:

"Tokyo - Nikon Corporation is pleased to announce an exciting new technology that makes it easier to take high-quality, sharply focused portraits. Called Face-priority AF (Autofocus), this technology is an industry first and will be initially available on the new COOLPIX 7900, the COOLPIX 5900 and the COOLPIX 7600 compact digital cameras.

Franko Furkunholder, the spokesman for Nikon has announced that they are also at work on several new features such as: rule-of-thirds, leveling, tilting, and automatic expression evaluation (AEE). This last feature will not only detect a person's face but will be able to judge whether they have the expression that you want: smile mode, pensive mode, and sexy mode are currently in beta testing.

One additional feature will be a stylus touch screen enabling on the back of the camera to allow potential subjects to sign their release on the camera itself."

Sigh.

Where is is going to stop? I mean - the face priority AF doesn't sound half-bad, but "automatic expression evaluation"? Come on...

If you're too lazy (or too blind) not to know what the hell you're looking at in your view finder, you don't deserve to even be holding a camera.

As far as collecting signatures on your screen goes - I can see the whole of the privacy-protection community rise up in protest... and justifiedly so. It's about as stupid of an idea as I've ever encountered (ever heard of ... paper?). Leave it to Nikon ...

Labels: photography, photography gear

Just recently, I've written about the Lensbaby. It's a little lens with a bellows for SLR (and dSLR) cameras that brings one area into sharp focus while creatively blurring the rest of the photograph.

Fresh off the Photography Blog RSS feed though, comes the announcement of Lensbaby 2.0.

Lensbabies Launches Lensbaby 2.0 for Brighter, Sharper, Faster Selective Focus Photography

March 21, 2005, Las Vegas, NV. Today at the WPPI trade show, Lensbabies launched Lensbaby 2.0, a second-generation selective focus SLR camera lens, bringing brighter, sharper, and faster selective focus photography to professional and avid amateur photographers.

"Lensbaby 2.0 has proven to be a wonderful creative tool for demanding photographic assignments. Compared to The Original Lensbaby, Lensbaby 2.0 has a greater range of aperture settings, a much sharper 'sweet spot' of focus, and a new levitating magnetic aperture system, which makes it a snap to change apertures," said Craig Strong, the inventor of the Lensbaby and Co-CEO of Lensbabies, LLC.

Lensbaby 2.0 and The Original Lensbaby bring one area of a photo into sharp focus, with that 'sweet spot' surrounded by graduated blur, glowing highlights, and subtle prismatic color distortions. Photographers can fluidly move the sharp area around the photo by bending the flexible lens tubing.

Lensbaby 2 features an f2.0 aperture setting, plus f2.8, f4.0, f5.6 and f8.0. Lensbaby 2 is available for sale now at http://www.lensbabies.com for $150.

Sounds like an improvement, but there's still no mention of the fact that you have to move the bellows around MANUALLY - which can be somewhat of a problem for dexteriously-challenged photographers. The price point however had me shudder. $150 for a tiny plastic lens? Come on ...

Labels: photography, photography gear

People keep sending me links to some cool photo-related stuff, so for the alert reader interested in such things (and to make a permanent record of them for myself), I'm going to post them here:

Thanks to Bryan Bloebaum, a fabulous local photographer, for sending me the link to Lens Babies. This nifty line of "selective-focus" lenses kinda works like an old-fasioned bellows camera, but attaches to your 35mm (or digital) SLR (pretty much all mounts are available - yes, Luke, even for your Olympus). Some of you out there might argue that you can do all that the Lensbaby does with Photoshop too - and rightfully so - but for a mere $96, it's certainly a toy that's worth a closer look.

Thanks also to Jake for pointing me towards this enlightning article on taking off your UV filter.
And I quote: "Good modern lenses have very hard glass objectives, and/or scratch-resistant coatings. They make it difficult to scratch or mar a lens. With reasonable care, and perhaps a decent lens hood for physical protection if the objective is not recessed, there is almost no chance you will scratch the objective of your lens."
I have to say, I haven't had any UV filters in front of any of my lenses for years - I find them bothersome and unnecessary. And I can't say that they've incurred additional, if any, scratches at all. So fellow photographers - off with those UV filters!

Labels: photography, photography gear

UPDATE: I figured out the feed problem. The new feed url is: http://emeraldbayphoto.com/blog/feed/atom.xml

Since changing my site hosting from a Canadian server to a local one (thanks, Jake!), the feed for this blog just hasn't been the same. As a matter of fact, it has ceased functioning.

I'm still getting to the bottom of this, so all you alert readers out there - come and visit the site instead of just sucking the content down to your feed readers.

To boot, most of my images are currently hosted on yet another remote server, and for some reason, that one's been down for over a day now, and I haven't gotten an explanation back from the host. Hence - 99% of all the images on this site are dead links right now. I'm working on rectifying that quickly however.

On the bright side - it seems I have finally gotten the blog archive back on track. Too bad Blogger support is so totally useless - they really haven't been able to give me any more information than what I was already able to distill out of their help site....

Any nerdy advice can be directed to me.

Labels: photography, photography gear

Should I just rename this blog "I love Epson"?

Because it's true. I do love Epson. And the reason why I love them, is that they continously make my work easier, better, and - dare I say it? - more profitable.

First, I bought their Stylus Photo 2200 printer. At first glance, the $700 price tag seemed a bit steep - but in those short 19 months I've had it, I have been able to supply my clients with high-quality portfolio and fine art prints I would have had to pay a fortune for at the photo lab. Instead, my only costs incurred were ink and paper. And the best part - for the first time ever, the printer gave me 100% control over my images. Now I was able to produce prints that exactly reflected my vision and sense of color.

The second Epson feat was the Perfection 4870 Flatbed scanner. I wrote a bit about it in a post last month, and while I maintain that the Digital ICE function could be better, I'm still very happy with the overall performance of the scanner.

Now however, Epson has come up with a gadget that is truly making my heart beat faster: the P-2000 Digital Wallet. For a while now I've been looking for a digital storage device I can take out into the field with me. The two 1-GB CF cards I have for my 10D are nice, but on an extended trip or vacation (like the one last September to Europe), even the 2 GB don't cut it. On a commercial shoot, especially if I shoot RAW, I tend to max them out as well.

So far however, all the storage devices I've encountered were either simple external hard drives with CF slots, or the kind that burns your data directly to CD. None of them offered any kind of visual assurance that what you had just downloaded was *really* on the drive or CD. That kind of uncertainty just doesn't cut it when a client has just paid you a good fee to do a shoot for them, and you end up losing the images due to a read-error on the CD or similar. Sure - a laptop would remedy that. But the thought of schlepping around an additional 7-8 pounds of gear (especially out in the field) just isn't exactly my idea of an ideal temporary storage device.

As pointed out in the very thorough review by Luminous Landscape, the P-2000 solves all of those problems: it's small enough to click into a belt, has a large 4-inch screen that lets you not only verify your download, but also look at your images in greater detail, and best of all - a really long battery life. A 40GB harddrive and a fast download time give plenty of storage and speed in the field. And at 500 bucks, it seems a small investment for that all-important peace of mind.

So it's perfect. Just what I need. It's going on my X-mas wishlist.

Labels: photography, photography gear

Yeah, I know - it's been a while.

But between work and travels up and down the West Coast, sometimes precious little time remains for creative writing (I should know - I'm soooo behind on writing an article for O'Reilly Media on digital image restoration ...).

Nonetheless, here's something that probably all folks who either already own a digital SLR or are thinking about owning one will be (and should be) interested in: The-Dust-On-Your-Sensor Issue.

For the uninitiated: the CMOS sensor is that delicate part behind your camera's mirror that digitally records the image in a dSLR. During lens changes or while working in dusty conditions, particles can slip behind the mirror and cling to the sensor. To gain access to the sensor, a function in your camera menu will lock up the mirror indefinitely.

Today, the Photography Blog posted a press release by a company named IMS (short for "Intelligent Mobile Solutions Limited"), trumpeting their new and fabulous "specially created cleaning stick for removing dust from digital SLR camera sensors". Supposedly, it works by "using a unique micro-pore swab to create a mini vacuum effect, gently lifting dust from both CCD and CMOS type sensors".

To that I say: Ha! They obviously don't know about those stubborn stuck-on oily particles!

You see - I've had my Canon 10D for roughly a year now. After the first few months of ecstatic shooting pleasure (with an utterly clean camera), I started noticing small and fuzzy dark spots appearing in my photographs. I blamed them on random dust on the lenses, and at first they were so insignificant, that I was able to simply and quickly rubberstamp them in Photoshop.

Over time however, the spots started to become a serious issue. Especially when I had a client project on a tight deadline, the luxury of removing spots from roughly 50-60 shots became a time-consuming chore I couldn't afford. I obsessively cleaned my lenses. To no avail.

Then I started hearing in forums and from fellow photographers about the one issue, camera manufacturers will rather swallow their tongues than talk about: pesky dust on the glassy sensor of your dSLR. Sure enough, it turned out, this was the very cause of the dark fuzz in my pictures. Guerilla cleaning techniques ranged from using cotton swabs with alcohol, to those little blow brushes, to the "Copperhill Technique" (see below).

I had a little blow brush, so I thought "what the hell", and very gently tried to blow-brush the dust off my sensor. The brush must have had a tiny bit of oily residue (no doubt from being handled by me) on its tip however, and it readily deposited it on my sensor. Great. Now I had a very visible oily smear on my sensor too.

Not knowing if I had scratched the sensor as well, I panicked. After all, a new sensor is rumored to run about 500 bucks.

For kicks, I emailed Canon Support for advice on how to go about resolving the problem. Sure, they got back to me within an hour - but their only lame suggestion was to have the very delicate sensor professionally examined and cleaned, i.e. send the camera in to their service center. Ha. Good one. Like I can do without my work tool for weeks on end. Besides - online horror stories abounded about sensors coming back from "cleaning" dirtier than they had been delivered. So - no.

Then, my buddy Luke suggested the Sensor Brush from Visible Dust, based on a favorable review by one of my favorite sites, Luminous Landscape. Desperate as I was, I rushed out and ordered the brush for 60 bucks (incl. shipping). Visible Dust turned out to be a very slow company for shipping, and so the brush took almost 3 weeks to arrive from Canada. (I've had gear ordered from Canada be at my doorstep within 3 days!)

Knowing the root of my problem now though, I went digging around online for a more immediate solution. And so I came across the Copperhill technique. The reviews were so glowing, I decided it would be worth the few bucks in supplies to try it out. It turned out to be the one and only (and sane) way for me to clean a sensor.

For 36 bucks (12 for the squeegee, 24 for the cleaning solution and 100 PecPads) I now had a kick-ass setup. Sure, rubbing the squeegee across the sensor was a bit unnerving at first. But I got the hang of it pretty quickly, and adhering religiously to the prescribed method yielded a scintilliating sensor - free of dust, oil, and whatever else decided to accumulate there.

The Sensor Brush turned out to be a dud though. Shipping was slow, there was no documentation included (not even an invoice!), and the brush did exactly zip. I tried it a few times, but not once did it make a noticable difference.

So for those out there with dSLRs: read the Copperhill tutorial. Sure, it's a bit long-winded, but it really works.

Either way - you're gonna have to bite the dust. Or the dust will bite you.

Labels: photography, photography gear

Two days ago, the nice lady from Fedex brought me an anxiously-awaited goody: a large box containing the Epson Perfection 4870 flatbed scanner (no, not the more expensive "Pro" version - the only difference between mine and that one is a piece of color calibration software I don't need - oh, and $150).

I decided to treat myself to this scanner due to the fact that my old and trusty Microtek Scanmaker V310 was showing signs that it was about to croak any minute - and because I had recently scored a print restoration project that was in essence going to pay for the new scanner. I needed it to perform the work, so why not go ahead and indulge myself at the same time?

To make a long story short - today, I hooked up the little beauty (installation was truly a breeze with Win XP) and did some first test scans to see if the machine was really able to live up to the hype.

For that reason I dug into an envelope and scanned an image I had been dying to digitally preserve: Geraldine Chaplin with Morgan, Paris, May 1973



I'm not exactly sure how the original 3x5 black and white print turned up in my father's photoalbum, but I do know that the kid in the picture, Morgan, is the son of an old friend of my parent's from their South Africa days, Susie (she was most likely also the photographer). Susie was a hipster chick from France who I faintly remember because she always wore these oversized sunglasses and had long blonde hair - she was rumored to have been friends with Chaplin, Picasso, and Dali in the 70s in Spain. Morgan became a successful male model in Paris in the 80s. After that though, my parents lost touch with her.

As it may be - I've always thought, despite the apparant blurr, the image has a real natural charm to it, showing Geraldine in all her youthful beauty and Morgan as a cute, playful kid.

So today, I scanned the image using a variety of the 4870's scanner options. My first try was the 16-bit black and white, which turned out like this:



I wasn't too impressed. While the image had good contrast, it seemed to have lost most of its pleasant warm tones.

Next up was 48-bit color - this one was indeed quite a bit better, preserving those warm blacks, yet lacking in contrast:



Since the image also had a few problems with scratches, dust, and even a white hair outline in the original negative, I thought this is where the much-touted Digital Ice function would come in:



As the sharpeyed reader will attest though, Digital ICE did little to really clean up the image. It only took care of the most obvious of scratches, and left blemishes like dust and the hair outline perfectly alone, which I had to spend about half an hour correcting in Photoshop. This was indeed a bit disappointing, as I also have the Digital ICE function in my Minolta Dimage Scan Elite II film scanner, and there, it truly does a great job.

This all being said though - I know this is only my very first test on the scanner, and as time goes on, I'm sure I will come to love and appreciate it. Just like I've done with every other Epson product I've ever owned ...

PS: What do you know? The envelope has also coughed up a picture of Susie. Just like I remember her...

Labels: photography, photography gear

Before I took off on my trip to Europe in September, I contemplated all the gear I'd need to take with me: camera, lenses, batteries, extra CF cards, write-able CDs for backup, filters, hoods, remote release, bags with wheels, small carry bag for day trips - but would I need a tripod? I mean - really? How many times would I shoot in situations where I'd truly need a tripod? Would the added weight and bulk be truly justified?

Now, I have to add that over the years, I've developed a rather steady hand. I've learnt to brace myself whenever possible, and use all kinds of locally available objects like tables, chairs, ledges, rocks etc. to steady myself or the camera. So when I bought a new tripod earlier this year, I went for an ultra-sturdy Bogen-Manfrotto - something that would be suitable for the architectural photography I mostly do. Ultra-sturdy however also means ultra-heavy and ultra-bulky. So that tripod was 100% out for travel.

I yearned for a small, ultra-light, carbon-fiber Gitzo - but the high cost of one of those puppies quite honestly scared me off. So - a monopod maybe? Nah. Too weird. Besides I doubt their true usefulness.

So I went to Europe, travelling light (as I like it) and without a tripod. Mostly, the weather was such that I could shoot at ISO 200 or 400 and get a sharp picture.
But indeed there were a few instances where I wished I had a tripod.

One of them was a fun-filled evening at the pool hall with my old friend Tom. Being as it is that we've known eachother for 15 years and he's been my pool teacher for equally as long, we never let an opportunity pass to play a game, whenever and whereever in the world we can manage to meet up. That evening however, I'd brought my camera with me for the first time.

After a few warm-up games, we decided to see if we could photographically capture the path of a billiard ball on the table as it travels into a pocket. We experimented with various settings, but it turned out, that the path only starts really showing up around a half-second exposure. Of course that's way too long to hold steady, so I mostly braced myself - but still, I didn't come back with one tack-sharp photograph. What's below is as good as it gets:





Moral of the story? Never travel without a tripod. Not even if you don't think you'll need one. Ever. Because there's only one certainty - that you will come across a situation when you'll see the shot of a life time, and you'll be stuck having to shoot handheld.

Now where did I leave that info about the Gitzo again?

Labels: photography, photography gear, travel, travel photographer

Who would have thought?

According to David Pogue's NYT column this week, lamp shade posts can be of surprising virtue to a photographer. I quote:

The tripod mount on the bottom of most digital cameras has exactly the same thread diameter as a typical hotel lampshade post. In a pinch, you can unscrew the lampshade and use the exposed screw on the lamp itself to steady your camera.

And no. I'm not going to wonder about how exactly he figured this one out. Draw your own conclusions.

Labels: photography, photography gear