The Camera looks both ways......

You may have heard that expression before.  Lately, I can’t go a week without it being mentioned either in an article or a podcast.  I believe the first time I heard it was from the great Rick Sammon. 

I have found it to be very true and also very thought provoking.  The general idea is that there is something of you in every picture you take.  I suppose that can mean a lot of different things.

For some the meaning is that your subject will take on the same emotions you have as the photographer.  If you are unhappy or uncomfortable - you will probably get the same results from them. 

This was one attempt of getting an Easter picture of my son.  Joshua didn’t have much interest at the time for sitting through it.  So instead of postponing it, I pushed through while getting equally frustrated.  I think we both had the same expression when I snapped this one.

But maybe more importantly the phrase also speaks to what is important to us.  We tend to take pictures of things we care about or at least interest us.  We obviously take more pictures of friends and family then acquaintances. 

Even in other types of photography, it is common for people to have a special interest.  Whether you like landscapes or wildlife or whatever -  there is a good chance you shoot a bunch of the same stuff.  Or maybe not.  Perhaps you have a wide range of interest and your’e all over the place.  That’s cool, too.  Either way I think what we shoot reflects something about us. 

It’s almost like creating a pictorial autobiography for others to learn about us.  It’s too bad our ancestors didn't live in this digital age where they could have left a Flickr pool for us to review.  We would know so much more. 

What will your pictures say about you?

your best camera

To quote Chase Jarvis, “the best camera is the one that's with you”.

I was reminded of that during a recent post processing job for a client.  Besides my own photography, I often help others with their own images.

We all remember the snow, right?  Well during the first storm in December my neighbor decided to take a walk in the Battlefield to see all the snow.  It was very difficult to simply walk - much less bring along a heavy camera.  So off he went armed only with his Blackberry.  He took a series of photos of the wintery landscapes and lived to tell about his multi-hour journey.    

I’m not certain what resolution camera is in a Blackberry, but I can tell you the images were small and of low quality.  That is to be expected, it’s not a Nikon for gosh sakes:)   But that is not important.  What is important is that it was the camera he had with him and that was his best camera - at the time.  Without it he would have lost the opportunity to capture that moment in a photograph.

So with his series of small Blackberry pictures I was able to enlarge them to 16x20’s and fix them up a bit.  This is one of my favorites of the series.

click image to enalrge

I suspect the primary purpose of taking his Blackberry was to call for help if he got stuck.  Luckily it didn't come to that and instead it became his Best Camera.

Old Barn

Just a quick post of an image of a local barn.  Nothing really to the story other than I drive by it everyday thinking I should stop and take a picture of it - so I finally did.  It is actually on the land where the initial fighting began during the Battle of Chancellorsville just minutes away from my house.  

Click on image to see full size.

photo by Tom Rothenberg 

Photoshop World wrap-up

I am back home and almost settled in from last week’s Photoshop World in Orlando, Florida.  It was a great time and was everything I hoped it would be.  The only major bummer was that I got sick on the first day with some type of sinus thing and didn’t feel well much of the time.  I still don’t feel that good but hoping being back home will speed up my recovery. 

Here are some of the highlights of the trip.

Pre-Conference

Tuesday was pre-con day for the event.  These are half and full day classes on a particular topic.  You are able to get pretty deep into your topics, more so than the usual hour long classes during the rest of the conference.

I choose to do the Concert Photography session.  This was led by Alan Hess and Scott Diussa.  Alan is an accomplished concert and event shooter from San Diego.  His portfolio is impressive and a real cool cat.

Scott works for Nikon Professional Services and also shoots concerts as well as being an excellent musician, himself.  

After many hours in class we got to shoot Scott Kelby’s band, Big Electric Cat at the expo center.  We were also made aware that Nikon would award a new D300s and lens for the best shot from the session.

It was a blast shooting the band and I really got into the music.  So much so that it was a little distracting from the job at hand to get the shots.  You have to wear ear plugs that close to the stage but they sounded great and everyone had a good time.

Back to the contest.....

I did not have my normal  imaging editing tools with me so I quickly had to download the Lightroom 3 Beta from Adobe labs that evening to process my Raw images.  You could only submit 1 so I did some quick ratings and narrowed down to a few I really liked. From there I chose the 1 and sent off to Alan and Scott for consideration.   

Below are some shots I did not choose for my submission but ones I did like.

The plan was for Scott and Alan to pick the best 3 and the keynote audience, all 3000 of them, would select the winner the next morning.

Wednesday

Wednesday started early as the keynote is something that cannot be missed.  I was excited to see what Scott Kelby had planned and was sure it was going to be a good show. 

I was seated close to the stage as I was also a finalist for the Guru award in the artistic category for my image, “A Midnight Pair”.  

A Midnight Pair

They started with Scott and the guys playing a classic KISS song with photoshop lyrics in full wardrobe and make-up. They sounded unbelievable. The theme of the whole conference was a Rock show and was very well produced throughout.

After they left stage it was time to announce the winner of the concert shoot.  Alan and Scott Diussa came on stage and showed the final 3 on the big screens.  I was excited to see my image was one of the finalist.

The went through each image and asked the audience to vote by applause for the best.  Yep, I won.  I was yelling pretty loud for mine but was very nice to hear all the cheers from the audience.  I went back stage and up to receive the new camera.

Went quickly back to my seat cause the Guru awards were about to be announced.  This was already voted on by folks back at NAPP and others so no need for audience voting.  I didnt win -  but was a real honor to even be selected.  All the finalist in the Guru awards had their images on display at the event.  Here is one of me looking tired with no sleep on lots of sinus meds.

The rest of the day was spent in the classrooms and in the expo hall.  The vendor expo opened later in the day and plenty of awesome products, gear and live training going on.  

Thursday and Friday

The rest of the week was spent in the classrooms going from session to session and spending some time in the expo hall.  I really liked all the classes I went to especially those by Zack Arias.  I also met lots of fellow photographers and had a couple good conversations with Rick Sammon and Scott Kelby.  

The photoshop guys taping a live episode of Photoshop User TV

models on the expo floor posing to try different lighting set ups

Zack speaks people listenBen Willmore paints with light

Was all so very cool hanging out with some of the most creative folks in the world.  

Gone Fishing.....

All work and No All play leaves no time for blogging

Hola,

Been pretty busy around here and haven't been able to blog this week as much as I was planning.

Next week won't be any better as I will be in Orlando for Photoshop World.  It will be a actioned packed week filled with classes, events, parties and visiting friends.

I am really looking forwarded to it.  As an added bonus I just learned that I am one of the finalist for the coveted Guru award.  As they say, it is an honor just to be nominated so I am thankful just to be in the running.  It does mean I get a front row seat to the keynote address so that's pretty cool in itself.

Upon my return to the commonwealth I plan to post plenty of photos from the parties and events from the week and share any interesting stories.

See ya soon

Need a new Point and Shoot

I was in the market for a new point & shoot.  I have had many over the years but never did much research before making the purchase.  I almost always came away disappointed in the image quality of whatever I got. 

This time I decided to do a little more research.  I am very familiar with the product lines in the DSLR market but never paid much attention to the point and shoot world.

For the record I am a Nikon guy.  Nothing against Canon or any other manufacturer but Nikon just feels right to me.  I suspect if I grew up on Canon or had a significant investment in their glass I would then be a Canon shooter today. 

My check list

Stuff I had to have

• RAW support
• Built in View Finder
• Mechanical dials on the body
• Good high ISO performance
• Not too expensive 

 Stuff I didn't want

• Touch Screen
• Interchangeable lenses

 Stuff that didn't matter either way

• Super Compact
• Video

 I decided on the Canon PowerShot G11.  It feels like a small DSLR to me.  Very familiar dials with the functionality of my “serious” camera.  It is advertised as the photographer’s point & shoot and I totally agree with that slogan.  You can easily put it in "dummy mode" and get good results or use manual controls to finesse the picture, as you would with your DSLR.

photo by Tom Rothenberg - G11

 I won’t bore you with the technical specs as you can find out so much more on sites such as DPreview and BHphoto. 

It is also not quite as small as some of the other cameras in this space, but small enough to eliminate any excuses not to always have it with me.   

photo by Tom Rothenberg - G11

So if your tired getting poor results with your point & shoot camera and looking for a replacement, I can totally endorse the Canon G11 -  and this is coming from a Nikonian. 

Back on track

Wanted to thank everyone for the kind wishes this week and wanted you to know Blizten is home and doing fine.  I will start posting more updates this week including additional tutorials and some product reviews. 

Also wanted to let you know that Marc Benton is bringing back the PhotoBlogging DC site along with a new design.  Stop by and check out the great work of some of my friends and colleagues in the DC metro area.  

That's it for now.

My Pal

This was a tough week for me and my family.  We lost our buddy Donner to cancer.  It was a very aggressive lymphatic cancer that was only diagnosed a week earlier.  He deteriorated very quickly and was brave and loving through it all.  

Donner was a special friend from the beginning.  He was born on the millennium and was the most loyal companion anyone could ever hope for.  He had a wonderful life full of unconditional love and we will miss him dearly.

Donner’s life has spanned the best times of my life thus far.  In these brief 10 years I married the woman of my dreams, became a Dad to 2 wonderful girls and later had our son together.  Donner and Blitzen were there throughout our life changes and are a significant part of our family. 

 In an almost unreal turn of events we had to take Blitzen to the emergency vet last night for what they are treating as Pancreatitis.  She is on iv’s because she cannot have food or water while her enzymes stabilize.  She is expected to make a full recovery and we hope to be able to pick her up Sunday morning.

She will also miss her brother and best friend.

We love you Donner

Is it Spring yet?

Today was as warm as it has been for many weeks.  Still far too cold for my taste but I know it is just a matter of time before all the snow melts and we see blossoms on the trees.  I have a few trips back home to Florida coming up and excited for the opportunity to wear my preferred photography uniform of shorts and a t-shirt.  

photo by Tom Rothenberg

Like many, spring is one of my favorite times to capture landscape images.  From blooming Pear trees to the blossoms at the Tidal Basin our photography palette welcomes the colors we have missed for so long. 

photo by Tom Rothenberg

And for me, it cannot come soon enough.

Watermarking in LR3

In this week's video tutorial I begin a new series to cover some of the new features in Lightroom 3 Beta.

We begin with something that was on everyone's wish list for Adobe -  watermarking.  They delivered and now it's possible to do it all from within Lightroom.  

However, you may not want to.  I demonstrate how to add a standard text watermark and then show a more subtle method using an image of text as a watermark within Lightroom. 

You can download the free Beta of Lightroom 3 here.

Don't forget - use the maximize button within the video player to increase the size of the video.

photowalk with Tom

I decided to take a short photowalk around town today.  Everything is still such a mess with all the snow so I only hit a few spots.  I put this quick slideshow together for you to join me in my travels and share some of the images. 

Also, I just realized I misspelled Expodisc in the slide show. Not going to recompile it again, so were just going to let it go :)