24August2008
Posted by Scott under: Photo Assignment.
Photo by Scott Bourne
As promised, we’re moving the next photo assignment to Photrade. You can participate just as if we were on Flickr - all you need to do is sign up for a free Photrade account. In order to participate you MUST enter the contest from this link..
http://www.photrade.com/contest/twipphotoassignmentcircles
If you enter from any other link you may not be able to log on and participate.
The contest rules and all other pertinent information are available on the contest page on Photrade. You may vote on other photos, and share information on how people can vote for your image. We hope you like this new method of running the assignment. It’s in its early stages so we may have to iron out some bugs. If so, please be patient and help us spread the word.
Thanks.
24August2008
Posted by Scott under: Tips.
Photo by Scott Bourne
If your copy of Photoshop is acting weird or exhibits bizarre behavior, it’s usually because your Preferences file has been corrupted. To fix this, reset Photoshop’s Preferences to default by clicking COMMAND - OPTION - SHIFT on a Mac or CONTROL - ALT - SHIFT on a PC while launching Photoshop. You will see a dialog box that says, “DELETE THE ADOBE PHOTOSHOP SETTINGS FILE?” Click yes and you will revert back to the default Preferences, Photoshop then will often run like a Corvette on a full tank of gas!
NOTE: If you take this step, you may have to recreate some of the settings you regularly use in Photoshop so act accordingly.
23August2008
Posted by Scott under: Articles.
If you’re like 97% of the photographers who read this blog, you are involved in digital photography. And that means you have to consider backing up your digital photo library. You do have a backup don’t you? If not, stop reading right now and go make at least one back up and then come back to the blog.
Assuming you understand how important it is to backup your digital photos, you might have access to a backup drive you hadn’t counted on - your iPod.
That’s right, the iPod makes a wonderful backup device. If you have a large enough iPod (The new iPod Classic from Apple offers up to 160 Gigs of storage) and if you have a small enough photo library, your iPod (in a pinch) can make a wonderful emergency backup device.
Back when I photographed weddings, I carried my iPod with me and transferred images from the CF cards to my laptop and then from the laptop to the iPod. I carried the CF cards and the iPod in my pocket during the wedding and left the laptop in the trunk. That way I always had the wedding stored in at least two locations.
Read the rest of this entry »
22August2008
Posted by Scott under: News.
Microsoft’s Photosynth is live at http://photosynth.net
If you aren’t familiar with Photosynth, check it out. It has great potential. Here’s what Microsoft says about
Photosynth…
“Photosynth is a potent mixture of two independent breakthroughs: the ability to reconstruct the scene or object from a bunch of flat photographs, and the technology to bring that experience to virtually anyone over the Internet.
Using techniques from the field of computer vision, Photosynth examines images for similarities to each other and uses that information to estimate the shape of the subject and the vantage point the photos were taken from. With this information, we recreate the space and use it as a canvas to display and navigate through the photos.
Providing that experience requires viewing a LOT of data though—much more than you generally get at any one time by surfing someone’s photo album on the web. That’s where our Seadragon™ technology comes in: delivering just the pixels you need, exactly when you need them. It allows you to browse through dozens of 5, 10, or 100(!) megapixel photos effortlessly, without fiddling with a bunch of thumbnails and waiting around for everything to load. “
21August2008
Posted by Scott under: Tips.
Photo by Scott Bourne
Photoshop BLENDING MODES are powerful tools to speed up tonal correction and dust removal, among other things. They influence how a layer interacts with layers below it. They can be found in the upper left corner of the LAYERS PALETTE. When you create a duplicate or new layer, (some examples) you will see the word NORMAL in the top-left corner of a dialog box. If you click on the word NORMAL, it opens other choices, giving you real power at your fingertips.
Some of the Blending Modes that might interest photographers are:
MULTIPLY adds density and darkens the image.
SCREEN does the opposite of MULTIPLY
OVERLAY, SOFT LIGHT, HARD LIGHT are a mixture of MULTIPLY & SCREEN to boost image contrast.
I encourage you to experiment with these modes on duplicate or Adjustment Layers. Try adding them and adjusting their opacity for more unique combinations.
20August2008
Posted by Scott under: Articles.
Photo by Scott Bourne
It’s easy to get in a photographic rut. You take a class or read a book and get excited and then years go by and you find yourself shooting the same way you did two, three or even four years ago. Have you gotten lazy? When was the last time you got up 30 minutes early to make CERTAIN you got the best light? Did you jump out of the car at your last photo shoot, plop down the tripod at the first place you saw, fire away and then call it a day? Or maybe you just shoot everything with the same lens now because it’s easy.
This post is designed to shake you up a bit and challenge you to get busy. Don’t be lazy. On your next photo shoot, try not to have any pre-conceived notions. Don’t play it safe. Just one time, go for broke. Try something new. Shoot from a different angle. Try a setting on your camera you’ve never used before. Shoot with a really high ISO or use a really slow shutter speed just to see what happens. Get closer than you ever have before and use an extremely wide-angle lens. Try thinking in black and white.
These are just a few of the ideas you can use to motivate yourself to try something, anything, that’s new. Who knows, you may come up with a prize-winning image.
20August2008
Posted by Scott under: Photo Assignment; Site Info.
Effective next week, we’re going to move the TWIP Photo Assignment Competition to Photrade. They are offering a custom contest engine that will allow YOU to help pick the winners. You can vote on the winning photo - as long as it’s not your own.
The Flickr contest forum will be closed after that event for new posts but we will leave it up for those who want to look at the pictures.
Again, there is no fee to participate in the Photrade contest. There is no signup fee at Photrade and everything else will stay the same.
We will also only discuss the contest during the show from now on. There will be no separate blog post about the contest. if you want information on the contest and the new prizes and themes, you’ll either have to listen to the show or catch the show notes.
We’re making this change to spur more participation along the lines of an actual assignment, and trying to remove the competitive nature that has sprung up in recent months surrounding the contest.
We appreciate the fact that not everyone will like this decision. We welcome anyone who wants to participate in our new system to do so. More information coming soon.
NOTE: We will provide a way for everyone to get onto Photrade, even though they are in Beta. Please stay tuned.
