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The Selection Process

To start, let’s go over my selection process, and recap on a few workflow details. If you recall from my Lightroom Digital Workflow Podcasts, when I finish a shoot, I initially work through all of my images in a Year > Month > Day folder structure, in what I call my Photo Originals folder. I star rate to bring the best images from the shoot to the top, usually using 4 stars at the point, then once I have been through all the images, I show only the four stars to get rid of anything that wasn’t selected in the first run, then single out batches of images of similar subjects, and try to narrow the selection down to just one or two of each, by giving them five stars, and at the same time, I demote anything that doesn’t make the cut to 2 stars, my “once great” rating. I also hit the X key to mark anything that is technically flawed and now even anything that is just a duplicate or insurance shot of the same thing.

As my five stars float to the top, I start to look at the entire selection, to see if anything stands out as not really fitting, and continue to try to get to as few images as possible, hitting the number two key every so often to demote images out of the selection. By now if there’s something that needs to be done like working on the images in Silver Efex Pro 2 or Color Efex Pro 4, I’ll do that and leave a copy in my originals folder. The resulting TIFF or PSD file becomes the five star, and the orginal RAW file becomes a 3 star. That’s just my way of keeping the originals with the final processed version that I’ll take and put onto my Stock site or my gallery. If I don’t need to edit the image at a pixel level, the original RAW file is what I use. I only create a copy when necessary.

I then add titles and keywords, and change the filter in Lightroom to display 3 stars or above, to reshow my original RAW files as well as the modified files, select them all, and select an Export Preset that sends my selected images to my @Finals folder for that particular year. This does mean that I end up with a copy of the RAW or any PSDs etc. in both my originals and my @Finals directly, but I like that redundancy. Of course, I also make other backups locally and in the cloud, but we won’t go into that today. I generally end up with 300 to 500 @Finals each year, and last year I finished up at 491.

So, I then created a 2011 Top Tens Collection in Lightroom, and made that the Target Collection, so that when I hit the B key, the images is added to that selection. I then selected my @Finals > 2011 folder and started to go through my year of images. As you work through the year doing your photography, you start to create a mental list of images that really stand out, so my first pass was just a case of hitting the B key as I saw these images, but once done, I had 48 images in my list, roughly 10% of the year’s best shots.

I now selected my new 2011 Top Tens Collection, and went through again, thinking to myself, “if it was a toss-up between this and another favorite, which would I chose?” and that usually makes it easier to hit the B key again, and trim down the selection. After doing this a few more times, I got my list of candidates down to this 28 images (click on the image to view larger).

My Initial Selection Drilled Down to 28 Images

From this point on, you have to start to get pretty ruthless to drill down to just ten images from a year. I cut my driftwood camel, horse, cow shot because although I really like it, it was a man-made object, and I was still trying at least to reduce this selection down to my nature and wildlife work. Similarly, I removed the following boats in the Souya Harbor shot, though I couldn’t bring myself to remove the shot of the wrecked minesweeper that we came across on New Island in the Falkland Islands on our way back from Antarctica.

As we can see in the following screenshot of my now 15 selects, at this point, I also still had one shot of the Cocoon Tower in Shinjuku from the Gyoen Park, that I really love as a photograph. To the right of that I also still had a shot of a Airship flying over the main street in Ginza, in the center of Tokyo. I begrudgingly hit the B key to remove these two shots, and was down to thirteen, though two of these were now slotted to get an honorable mention, so I was aiming for twelve, just one more to go.

Drilled Down to 15 - Getting Very Tough to Remove Shots!

Continuing to weed out the weakest, the last shot I decided to remove was my “Get the Flock Outta Here” shot from just a few weeks ago, when I’d traveled over to Kotokunuma, a pond where a large group of Whooper Swans winter, and I captured a number of swans in a bit of a ruckus, which I really like too. I removed this because it’s a very busy shot, with water flying everywhere, and maybe more an action shot than anything, but it was a very tough decision.

Get the Flock Outta Here!

I was now down to twelve shots, but two of these alone were not in my top images. Before we move on to the Top Ten, I wanted to talk about a new pattern that I’ve noticed in my work, or at least my way of thinking about my work in 2011.

New Pattern – Synergetic Image Sets

A number of times throughout the year I found myself treating multiple shots as a group of images, where the synergy between two or more photographs raises the group of images above the sum of the individual shots alone. I’ve started to see more beauty in these small sets of images, such as the two iceberg shots from Antarctica that I made into gallery wraps to hang on my studio wall.

Two Iceberg Gallery Wraps

In this case, the top image did make my top ten, but the bottom image did not, but as a pair, or set of images, I find this to be much more than just two images. It works really well, and I enjoy having them both of my wall.

An even more powerful example in my opinion is the two photographs of Whooper Swans in flight that are left in my Collection of Top Ten images, pushing the count to twelve. These really do stick in my mind as two images that I love to look at together. Neither of these images individually would make the cut, as a set, they blow my socks off. The pale background with the white birds appeals to me a lot, and I did select both of these images for upload to my gallery after my first visit to Hokkaido in 2011, from the end of January to the start of February, before I went back with my workshop group in mid-February.

New Pattern – The Appeal as a Print

As you all know, I’m an avid printer, and I’ve found myself more and more being attracted to these sets, not so much as a Web offering, but as a printed set. The subtle shades of grey and pale blue with the white of the swans in these images make an absolutely beautiful set of prints. In this case, I don’t necessarily think that either image alone would look that great as a solo print, but two prints together, slightly off set on the wall looks incredible, and I’m finding myself drawn towards looking at and selecting images and these sets of images based on their appeal as a printed set.

Four Whooper Swans in Flight

Four Whooper Swans in Flight #2

This can also be said of the single print to a degree of course. Some images sing as a print, when they might not be appreciated as much on screen, especially at the size that we share images online in. I’ve had this appreciation for a long time though, and so today really just wanted to talk about my new appreciation for a set of images, and the printed set, in addition to individual prints.

Top Ten

OK, so having covered my selection process, and my growing love of the photograph set, let’s take a look at my top ten images of 2011. This first image happens to have been the first chronologically as well, though I have ordered this list in my favorite order, and we’ll count down from ten to number one.

#10 – Given in to the Elements

Given in to the Elements

This first shot, “Given in to the Elements”, was shot on January 29, during a solo trip to Hokkaido when I pretty much circumnavigated the island. I don’t think I talked about this trip in a Podcast, but basically I traveled by Ferry, which takes about 20 hours, up to the port of Tomokomai, and then drove across to near Sapporo in the south-west corner of Hokkaido, and the drove up the west coast over a couple of days, across the very top, down the east coast, and then over to the where we photograph the Red-Crowned Cranes in my Hokkaido tour that we’ll be starting this year in just a month now.

I noticed this derelict house with the collapsed roof from the weight of the snow as I drove along, just after stopping for another few shots just a mile or so back. There’d been a heavy snow over night, so the white pristine snow coupled with the still heavy sky made for what I consider to be quite a nice image. I worked the scene for some time, with some shots with the house framed more tightly, but this one remained a favorite because we still see that heavy sky. I purposefully framed the shot almost half and half for balance, and love looking at the detail in this shot in a print. This really stands out to me as one of my favorite shots of 2011.

#9 – Shower Me!

At the other extent of the timeline, the next shot is the most recent, shot on December 28. I’d driven over to the Kotokunuma Pond in the Ibaraki Prefecture, as I do as most year’s draw to an end, and spent a couple of days photographing the Whooper Swans that winter there.

This year was especially poignant as I learned that the quake of March 11 had cracked the embankment of this pond, and most of the water had ran off in March, leaving not much more than a puddle. The Swans that had probably intended to stay for a few more days or weeks left, flying back to Siberia for the summer and there was concern that this experience might have caused them to find somewhere else to winter this year, but the crack was fixed around October time, and the water levels are slowly rising, though still about 1.5 meters or five feet lower than usual.

Shower Me!

As you can see in this image though, as they splash around, the water is still quite muddy, but the swans did come back. I counted 75 on my second day there. This shot is very dynamic, and although this was a show of superiority from the swan to the right, it almost makes me feel as though they’re frolicking, and the guy at the back is enjoying his shower in the relative warmth as the ice that was on the pond just a few hours earlier thawed away.

#8 – Swans’ Attension

Number eight is a simple shot from Hokkaido on February 18, and you may recall the story of this shot from my Hokkaido Tour update episodes. We’d just been photographing a tree just down from the beach, where the hot springs that flow into the Kussharo Lake keep the sand warm and the water from freezing just enough for some of the swans that fly down from Siberia for the winter to make this their home until Spring.

Swans' Attention

I saw these swans all looking in the same direction, off to camera left, and grabbed a shot. My friend Graham Morgan asked what I was photographing, and I got one of those affectionate expletives that Graham does so well as he saw the image on my LCD, and looked up to see that the scene was gone.

I like this shot for its simplicity, another trend that I’m finding in my work. The swans are just close enough that the snow storm doesn’t remove much of their clarity, but the rest of the image up to the copse in the distance is gradually hidden by the snow fall.

#7 – QI #2

On our third day in Hokkaido, it was snowing heavily after breakfast back at the hotel, and although we were scheduled to go over to the Kussharo Lake where a couple of hours later I’d shoot the last image that we looked at, I made the call to first go back to the Akan Crane Center, because we hadn’t had any decent snow there over the first few days, and I was unhappy that the group hadn’t been able to get any shots with a beautiful white background.

QI #2

As if it had been prearranged, shortly after we got there and the group had all set up their tripods and long lenses, there was about thirty minutes or so of frenzied mating dances where pairs or birds like this did their Kyuuai dance in the heavy snow that pretty much blotted out the dark top half of the frame that had been getting in the way on previous days, and now with the fresh snow cleaning up the field that had become somewhat soiled, the scene was set for us all to get some shots of a lifetime. This is my favorite from this thirty minutes or so.

#6 – Wrecked Minesweeper

On our way back from Antarctica, we traveled around a few of the Falkland Islands, and this Wrecked Minesweeper had been run up onto the beach at New Island.

Wrecked Minesweeper

We’d seen the ship when we first arrived, but I wasn’t overly thrilled with the scene as the tide was much further in, and it wasn’t obvious that the ship had been run aground. After spending a magical few hours photographic albatross on the other side of the island though, I set up for a few long exposures of this ship with the tide now further out, as we waited for some others in the group to get back.

You might recall that I did a color version of this shot in my Color Efex Pro 4 video, which I also like a lot, but again, the simplicity of this shot wins me over for my top ten.

#5 - Gentoo Point – Antarctica

When I first got back from Antarctica, I’d have said that this shot, from Gentoo Point, was going to be my favorite for the year. I still love it a lot, and have a print of this at 24×36″ on my studio wall, but it kind of got pipped at the post by the next four images in the larger scale of things throughout the year. Part of it is most certainly a heightened appreciation for the simpler image, but this shot is still in my mind a kind of classic scene, even though I say it myself.

Gentoo Point - Antarctica

This too is a long exposure at just under two minutes, which gave the sea a cotton candy feel to it in the bottom right side, but also made the clouds flow a little, which coupled with the magic of Silver Efex Pro 2, created a beautiful dramatic sky. The distant peaks add to the drama and then the seven penguins that had stayed almost perfectly still for two minutes top this off, especially in a large print.

#4 – Deception Island Iceberg

As we sailed home, past Deception Island, this beautiful blue iceberg caught my eye, and with the help of a bit of Lightroom processing then later some Color Efex Pro, I was able to really bring out the heavy sky and blue of the ice to surprisingly to me, bring this shot ahead of the Gentoo Point shot in my ranking for the year.

Deception Island Iceberg

This is one of the pair that we looked at earlier, that I do believe stands well on its own too. Note that this wide 2:1 ratio is something else that I’ve found myself doing quit a lot this year too. The gallery wraps that I have on my wall here are 13×26 inches, and another size of these that I’d like to do is 20×40. That would be impressive, if I had the room left on my wall.

#3 – Reverence

Shot number three is from February 13, on the Snow Monkey leg of my Winter Wildlife Wonderland Tour. I’m still enjoying this shot so much, despite the fact that the young monkey’s face is very slightly out of the depth of field.

Reverence

This was a bit of a grab shot as I saw the youngster watching adult snow monkey shaking the snow of his mane, and I didn’t quite get it lined up squarely enough to get both of their faces sharp. Still, the expression on the youngsters face was enough for me to not only keep this in my selection, but to secure their place in my top ten for the year.

#2 – Journey Begins

Number two was a bit of a surprise, almost like a present. On the fifth of May my wife and I went for a walk in the Shinjuku Gyoen park here in Tokyo, and we’d been trying for a while to time it so that I could capture a macro photo of the seeds of a dandelion puff-ball as my wife blew them away. The timing of this was incredibly difficult, and she was starting to get frustrated, and this was one of the last shot that we made.

Journey Begins

When we got home, I went through the images, and in the original color version, I wasn’t really taken with this shot at all, so left the images in my library as they were too good to throw out, but not good enough to process.

Journey Begins (original)

Then, towards the end of August, as I recuperated from my surgery in June, to remove that pesky brain tumor, I went back through my library and these images jumped out at me. I figured that if the color version wasn’t working, it was at least worth trying a black and white version, so I threw this into Silver Efex Pro 2 and immediate fell in love with what I saw.

A little bit of selective darkening on the right side and the bottom below the seeds as they fly away, and a color filter to darken the background even more really brought this shot out for me, and this is one of those that made the hair on the back of my head stand up when I held a print of it.

#1 – Tanchou Study #7

Tanchou Study #7

At the end of my first trip to Hokkaido, after circumnavigating the island doing landscape work, I hooked up with a friend and went to the Akan Crane Center for a few more days before sailing home again on the ferry.

During those few days, I made a number of close-up crane shots that I call my Tanchou Studies. Tanchou is just the Japanese word for the Red-Crowned Cranes. I’ve been making these studies each year when I go, and always like the results, despite them starting out as a way of killing time while we wait for the birds to dance or fly in or out of the field at the center.

This particular shot though became an instant favorite of this year’s series of studies, and has pretty much stayed at the top of my list for favorite shots of this year, and may even be my favorite shot of my own, of all time. I just love it.

Again, the simplicity is appealing, to me and the fact that the white along the left side of the bird as we look at the photo is darker than the background, but then the right side, being hit by the light from a slightly overcast sky, is just a bit brighter than the background, giving us just enough separation to make us think.

The angle of the head and the eye, even though it doesn’t have much of a catch-light, has reflected just enough of the white of the snow to separate it from the black of the feather on the crane’s face. To top it off for me, the crane has that beautiful splash of red on its crown, giving us a nice color contrast. This to me really portrays this beautiful bird at it’s best, despite it not being a dancing shot like the one we looked at earlier.

2012

So, there you have it. That’s my Top Ten shots from 2011, a year that came with its fair share of challenges too. As I mentioned earlier, and as many of you already know, in June we found that I had a sizable brain tumor, and by the time we found it, I’d started to have funny turns and then as we started to work on some plans for the surgery, it caused a kind of a mild stroke that caused a change of plans, and semi-emergency surgery.

Of course, the fact that I’m still here, now working again and Podcasting each week, shows that not only was the surgery successful, but I’ve recovered well, thanks to the amazing staff at the Jikei University Hospital in Shimbashi, Tokyo.

You might also recall that although most of the tumor over my pituitary gland was removed, the surgeons decided that it was too dangerous to also remove the cyst that was the size of a golf ball in the right side of my brain, knowing that they had a good chance of shrinking that down with medication later. Despite the fact that I had an allergic reaction to the planned medication that almost killed me from liver failure a week later, I started on some new medication that would hopefully shrink the cyst a month after the surgery.

An MRI scan after two months of taking the medication, and three months after the surgery, showed that the cyst had shrunk to around 1/10th of it’s original size. Then, last weekend, I went back for another MRI, almost six months after starting on the new medication, and as the neurosurgeon, Dr. Joki, flicked through the MRI images with the wheel of his mouse, he had to do a double take. He went right past the only two images that showed anything at all. He was jumping up and down with delight as he exclaimed “We’ve won!”.

He sat down again and we shook hands, with our other hands cupped around the back of each others, and he smiled a broad smile as I fought back the tears and we looked back at the screen to see a tiny slither of soft tissue that is what’s left of the cyst. I tiny bit of membrane. That’s all there is now. The MRI also shows a bit of space above the slither of membrane, which means that it is no longer putting any pressure at all on my brain.

My wife was with me, and the three of us couldn’t believe our eyes really. Dr. Joki had thought it would take much longer to get rid of the cyst, and he’d beaten himself up about having to leave it in, in the first place. He told us though that I’d lost a lot of blood, and every time they went after the cyst, I bled so much that I any more would have meant a blood transfusion. Also, he feared that had they gone after it, they would have damaged my optic nerve, or something else, maybe causing paralysis, and he knew that I’d just given in my day job and started out as a full time professional photographer, and thought that a photographer without his eyesight might as well be dead, so he decided to stop there, again, knowing that they could probably shrink the cyst with medication.

It was touch and go for a while, with the allergic reaction and everything, but his decision turned out to be perfect. I’m so grateful to not only have come out of this alive, but to have no side affects that we are yet aware of at least. I’m grateful to Dr. Joki, the neurosurgeon, for his skills as a surgeon but also for having the wherewithal to stop when he did. I’m also grateful to Doctors Matsuwaki and Mori on the ENT department  for their part, making it possible to do the operation through my nose, and then taking care of me afterwards. I’ve been washing the back of my nose out with salt water every morning and night for the last six months, but that also stopped last week, as things are now cleared up enough for that to no longer be necessary.

Of course, there’s a whole plethora of other people that cared for me in the hospital during that time, and none of it would have been possible without the entire infrastructure, but I’m just so grateful for the way things went.

As we welcome in 2012, a number of friends online said that they bet I was happy to see the back of 2011, but that really isn’t the case. For sure, I was unlucky to get the tumor in the first place, but I was so lucky to have been here in Tokyo at this point in time, and to have been almost miraculously channeled through to these amazing doctors from the first few hospitals that I visited. It’s almost a miracle that I came out of 2011 at all, but I truly feel that I’ve come out of it stronger than ever, so to me, 2011 was not a bad year. I’m still able to do what I love, and love what I do.

I wanted to also once again thank my brother Sean and his wife Zena for coming over to support us, and of course my wife Yoshiko, for their support during that traumatic time. Finally I once again want to thank each and every one of you for your friendship and support, and thank you for sticking around. That was my 2011, and here’s to what I think will be an amazing 2012, and beyond.

Show Notes

Music by UniqueTracks

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Dan is not only an amazingly talented photographer, but along with his brother David, they create incredibly Time Lapse videos which they share on their YouTube channel. Vancouver City went viral, and has had almost 2 million views as of January 2012, and remains one of my favorite videos when I have a few minutes to sit and relax.

"The Zombies are Coming" © Dan Newcomb

"Cabbage Leaf" © Dan Newcomb

Dan posted a diagram and other information about the Cabbage Leaf shot in the forum here: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/forum

"RGB" © Dan Newcomb

Here’s an article that Dan posted in the forum about the setup for the RGB Shot: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/forum/

"Black Wolf" © Dan Newcomb

"Black Fox" © Dan Newcomb

"White Wolf" © Dan Newcomb

"Lynx" © Dan Newcomb

Show Notes

Dan on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/9453805@N07/

TimeLapseHD YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/TimeLapseHD

TimeLapseHD Site: http://www.timelapsehd.com/

Dan on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/lensslave
Music by UniqueTracks

Audio

Use this audio player if you’d prefer to listen:

Subscribe in iTunes for Enhanced Podcasts delivered automatically to your computer.

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If you do want to get involved but not sure what to do, all details of how to upload your images, and the rules of engagement are posted in the Assignment Forum at martinbaileyphotography.com. Even though I try to release this Podcast introducing the new theme within the first few days of each new month, note that I also announce the theme of the assignment on the last day of the previous month in the Assignment Forum, so you can always look there if you are heading out shooting and wonder what the theme is.

So, let’s jump right in and take a look at the five images that got the most votes from the MBP Community for the Machinery assignment. In fifth place is Leslie Granda-Hill, with “The Weigh-In”, and here’s Leslie’s back-story…

I bought the antique scale for my image “The Weigh-In” at a garage sale a few months ago- hoping to use it someday as a prop to photograph a newborn baby. Fortunately a co-worker recently had a baby so decided to use the scale as my machine for the assignment. It was a challenge to coordinate the shoot so I was afraid I wasn’t going to get an image this month. When I arrived at the location I was disappointed in the lack of natural light. I asked the mother beforehand if there would be window light at the time I would be there and she said there would be.

"The Weigh-In" © Leslie Granda-Hill

I realized that a non photographer is not able to judge the light in a situation and it is best to be prepared for anything. I had to use a high ISO and a large silver reflector to maximize the light that was coming into the room. The black “seamless” is a black bed sheet propped up on a piece of cardboard on the bed. Most importantly the baby was adorable and cooperative. Thanks to everyone for their votes and congratulations to the all the winners.

What a beautiful image again Leslie, and as you say, an adorable baby too. The fluffy white towel adds a lovely softness to the image, and the old scales make for a wonderful machine element. It’s kind of fun too that the baby seems to be tilted backwards, almost falling out of the scales, and the slight sepia feel to the image adds to the aged feel to match the scales. Totally excellent work, as usual Leslie. Congratulations on fifth place.

"The Automat" © Steve Martin

And in fourth place is Steve Martin, with “The Automat”, and here’s Steve’s back-story…

Thanks so much everyone for your votes and feedback on this image. Congratulations to the winners and to all those who submitted, it certainly was good to see the participation pick up for this assignment.

Here is my backstory for the Automat – My Mom works in the embroidery industry, and when Martin announced the theme, I immediately thought of the embroidery machines. However, as the shop where the machines are located is several hours drive, I didn’t know if I would make it there during the month of the theme. Fortunately, a last minute change in plans for thanksgiving gave me the opportunity that I needed. When I first arrived at the shop, I started with some general shots such as the following ones:

© Steve Martin

© Steve Martin

These photos show one of the Plauen machines with a long roll of fabric and the thread feeding the needles. Each one of these machines is about 30 feet (10 meters) long and about 10 feet (3 meters) high. When one is running, it has to be constantly monitored by “watchers” for broken threads, as seen in this image (below).

© Steve Martin

After a number of these types of images, I began to photograph the part of the machine that controls the stitching sequence, the brains of the machine, referred to as the automat. As the lighting was quite poor (high overhead fluorescent lights and a single incandescent bulb over the automat), I opted to use multiple exposures and HDR to bring out the details that normally would be lost (I wanted to work as unobtrusively as possible and so I didn’t want to setup a bunch of external lights). From the automat image, one can see that it is a mass of gears and levers that as far as I can tell is completely covered in grease. When it is running, it is somewhat intimidating to be near (the warning Martin gave us of not getting hurt did cross my mind during the shoot). This machine has been operational for nearly 70 years, and apart for the occasional replacement of worn out parts, functions as well today as the day it was built- a tribute to German engineering. Regrettably, for those working in the industry, this story has a bit of a sad ending. In the United States, this type of embroidery industry exists mainly in northern New Jersey. For decades the industry thrived. However, during the last 10 years, this industry has been decimated by production outsourced offshore. Where once there were hundreds of independent embroidery businesses in New Jersey, today there are only a handful left.

Well, you told a great documentary story there Steve, with four excellent shots to illustrate it, including your winning image. Thanks very much for taking the time to share this interesting story with us. Having been a “Twisthand” which is an engineer that makes Leaver’s Lace until I was 27, these pictures seem very familiar to me, and brought back memories. I love the toning in your Automat image too Steve. It’s a very subtle HDR, bringing out the tonal qualities of the metal parts, without going over the top. Great work! Congratulations on fourth place.

In third place is Morton Goldberg, with “Milling Fixture”, and here’s Morton’s back-story…

First of all I want to say how proud I am, after almost two years of trying, to finally place in an MBP assignment. I also thank Martin for providing the assignments which have given me a great learning experience and the opportunity to compete with some wonderful photographers who I greatly admire.

"Milling Fixture" © Morton Goldberg

When Martin announced this assignment, I was immediately able to visualize the photo I wanted to make. I also knew it would take a fair amount of work. This assignment was completed over three sessions, about eight hours total. There was the machine work to do, the lighting to set up, the actual camera work, and the post-processing. The machine work took the most time. About half of the total.

In the first session I did the machine work. I set up the fixture, cut and trimmed the workpiece and chucked it in the three-jaw, mounted the assembly onto the table of my milling machine, and milled the square chamfer onto the end of the workpiece.

In the second session I made the lighting setup and made the 11 frames that I intended to merge into the final photo. The lighting was done with a Lowel EGO table top lighting kit consisting of two 16 x 16 inch soft boxes each containing two 27 watt, daylight balanced, coiled fluorescent lights, an EGO sweep, and two 16 x 24 inch folding reflectors. These components can be arranged in a variety of ways. The milling fixture, which presents a tonal range from flat black to shiny reflective metal, required very even soft light. I used the EGO components to build a light tent. The soft boxes were placed on the right and left sides of the sweep. One the reflectors formed the top of the tent.

The camera I used was a micro-four-thirds Panasonic GH2 with a 50mm, f/2, Olympus Macro-Zuiko lens mounted. I set a custom white balance and put the camera into manual exposure and manual focus. It wasn’t hard to position the camera relative to the subject. Because I wanted the squared end of the work piece and all three of the engraved scales on the fixture to show, the position of the camera with respect to the subject was so constrained there was essentially only one position for the camera. Positioning achieved, I set the exposure by making test shots and examining the three color channel histograms in the GH2′s playback mode, I then made the 11 frames of the depth-of-field stack, adjusting the focus by a small amount after each shot.

In the third and last session, I did the post-processing. Because I had been careful to get an accurate white balance and exposure, there was very little to do in Lightroom. I applied two of my presets, one adding clarity and another adding input sharpening. I then exported the frames to Photoshop as a stack of 11 layers. I applied just two operations to this layer stack: Auto-Align Layers and Auto-Blend layers. It took Photoshop about a minute to work its way through all the layers for each of these operations. The resulting TIFF file was a whopping 1.3 GB.

Morton, your attention to detail in the process and in writing your back-story is amazing. The shot really shows how much pride you take in your work and your photography. I know that you’ve been participating in the assignments for a long time, so I was really happy to see your image in the winning line-up. Of course, I don’t check who’s image is who’s until I run the script to count up the votes and update the Web page, but it was a nice surprise to see your name in there.

On the image itself, I really like the choice of a clean almost white background, and your use of Photoshop to merge the eleven layers to achieve a sharp focus from front to back is pretty masterful, creating a very sharp image. I also like the color accent of the gold and red against the silver steel. All come together really nicely. Congratulations on a very well earned third place Morton.

In second place is Brian Lottis, with “The Gears Of Time”, and here’s Brian’s back-story…

Wow what a pleasant surprise. The highest I ever placed before in these assignments was tied for fifth. And when I saw how many great pictures had been posted last month, I felt my chances were pretty slim. So I am truly honored to place 2nd. Thanks everyone for your votes.

"The Gears Of Time" © Brian Lottis

The moment I saw the subject matter for this assignment, I knew I wanted to try photographing my grandfather’s pocket watch. According to a web site on this manufacturer, the watch was made in 1904. It had been a gift to him on his 12th birthday from his uncle. The story goes that my great-great uncle Robert never had kids, and promised the watch to his new born nephew if his sister named him after him. Thus my grandfather was also named Robert. When he died, my grandmother wore it from a chain around her neck for nearly 30 years. Near the end of her life, I was honored to be the chosen recipient of this wonderful family heirloom.

Now for the photography project. I don’t have any specialized photography lighting other than a very old flash unit. So I had to improvise. I remembered that my wife has a very bright daylight lamp that she uses when she’s scrap-booking. I thought that would work pretty well. And also improvised the backdrop by using a black T-shirt from my dresser drawer. I laid the T-shirt over the lamp’s box and then tipped the lamp on it’s side, shining from right to left. I placed it as close to the watch as possible.

I tried several zoom factors and distances, and finally decided that the best was when I used my 4x close-up filter so I could really show the detail in the gears. Next I realized that the shadows were just too strong, with all the light coming from the right. So I improvised a mini-reflector out of aluminum foil. That really helped even out the lighting.

Here’s I shot I took today, recreating the setup. This shot shows the camera on a gorilla-pod, but I actually took it handheld. Also, the camera angle was a bit different in the shot. But this gives you an idea of what i went through to set this up.

© Brian Lottis

Once again, thanks everyone for your votes. And congratulations to the other winners, especially cheshirecat for the very creative picture in picture composition. And thanks to Martin for sponsoring the wonderful event.

Another great winning image here Brian. It really is great to see people that have been participating for a long time start improve to the point that you’re gathering enough votes to be placed, especially with the quality of the competition in mind.

Your use of the daylight balanced lamp, and foil is pretty masterful, and I’m sure the crumpled foil added to the metallic quality we see in the pocket watch. It’s an amazing story behind how you came to own the watch too. Thanks for taking the time to participate and to share your story, and congratulations on second place Brian!

In first place is Elise Ange, with “The Agriculture Algorithm”, and here is Elise’s back-story…

Congratulations to the other winners! There were so many great entries this month. And thank you all for your votes. I didn’t have any preconceived idea for the theme. One day I went to a farm, a bank, and a laundromat. I was not satisfied enough with any of the resulting pictures. Since computers were included in the machine definition, I came up with the idea to create a photo within a photo. This was an offshoot of a couple of Martin’s past themes. I borrowed a laptop and set it up on a clear plexiglass table. I uploaded one of the tractor images that I had taken from the farm so that it filled much of the computer monitor.

"The Agriculture Algorithm" © Elise Ange

Using some daylight bulbs for my lighting, I photographed the laptop displaying the tractor image. After I processed that photo, I repeated the process and uploaded the image of the laptop displaying the tractor. I then took another photo of the laptop displaying that image. Since the color from the original tractor photo was degraded through this process and there was noise in the image due to the low lighting, I converted the final image to black and white.

As always Elise you came up with an imaginative, quality image here. The style of the laptop that you borrowed matches the theme nicely, and the idea to show another machine on the screen clinched it, I’m sure. The reflection of the computer in the plexiglass adds a lot and the black and white conversion focuses our attention on the machinery, removing distractions. Great work as usual, and another well earned win Elise. Congratulations on first place.

Thanks to the winners, and to everyone that got involved with this assignment. It looks like the December assignment of Organic had a few less entrants than the Machinery one, but still a big improvement over recent months, so let’s continue the trend. Still, there are not enough entrants here for me to comfortably approach companies to sponsor the assignment. I’m going to make you a deal here. If we can reach 100 entrants to the monthly assignments during the first half of 2012, I promise to spend the time to approach potential sponsors and line up some prizes for the second six months of this year.

As you can see, people get thinking of all sorts of things to capture some great shots, and you too can learn so much from this exercise. I know that many more of you are trying than actually post your results, but I really would like to see more of you take that final step.

The theme for the December assignment was Organic and that is currently in the voting stages, so do drop by the www.mbpgalleries.com Web site and cast your vote for your top five images before January 7, 2012. The January assignment Frozen Motion, so you’ll need to shoot something moving, or at least appearing to be in motion, and if it is moving, you’ll need a fast shutter, or flash to freeze it. You might also play with motion and flash to emphasize the motion, but it’s totally up to you. You will be able upload your images until the end of January, anywhere in the world, regardless of your time-zone, so don’t forget to post your images and see if we can’t get a few great sponsors for the assignment for the second half of 2012.

To finish today I’d just like to wish each and every one of you a Happy New Year. 2011 was a pretty turbulent year for many people around the world, so I do hope that 2012 brings peace and happiness to us all.

Show Notes

Assignment Forum: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=24

Assignment Scores: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/scores2011_1.php

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

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For my portrait work where I’m most often either working close to the car or even if I travel by public transport, I’m usually working with a client nearby, I have started to use the ThinkTank Photo Airport Security II bag that we looked at in Episode 309, but when I’m going to be out in the field, and probably will end up walking some with my gear, I use the Guragear Kiboko bag. This is a 30L bag that holds an incredible amount of gear, despite not really being that big a bag, and it’s very light as well, designed for the traveling photography. You can fit the 600mm F4 lens in the Kiboko as well, but it takes up pretty much one side of the bag, so I generally take my 600mm F4 lens in a Canon bag made just for this lens, as we see in this photograph (below).

The Guragear Kiboko bag and 600mm Canon Lens Case

Because the Kiboko bag is separated down the middle into two compartments, this photo (below) of the contents of the bag is not the easiest to look inside, but I taped the two compartment flaps together, so we can take a look.

My Nature & Wildlife Gear

You can see from the size of the 600mm to the right of the Kiboko that it’s possible to put the 600mm into one side of the Kiboko. When I fly with the 600mm, I generally put it into the bag, and put the cameras and bodies that I no longer can fit into the bag into my pockets and my laptop carry on. I also put the white bag for the 600mm into my checked luggage though, and then switch them out when I get to my location.

The things attached to the side of the Kiboko are my knee pads. I generally keep these with me for nature photography, because I never know when I’m going to want to kneel for extended periods for macro work, or a low angle, and on uneven ground, this can get pretty uncomfortable, so the knee pads help.

Gitzo Tripods with RSS and WImberley Heads

I also generally put the smaller of these two tripods on the side of the Kiboko bag, but when traveling this can tip me over the weight limit for a carry on, so I often put them into my checked luggage. I like to take both tripods when I can, because when I’m using the 600mm F4 lens, I use a second tripod with a Wimberley gimbal head fitted, so that I can track flying birds or moving animals more easily. The left of the two tripods here (right) is fitted with the Really Right Stuff BH-55 ball-head, and the second with the old Wimberley Head. There is a new version of the Wimberley Head available, which is a bit lighter and more rigid apparently, which I’d like to try, but I haven’t really been able to warrant buying the new version yet.

When I’m using all of this gear, I generally carry the Kiboko with the smaller tripod attached on my back, using the stow-able shoulder straps and waist belt, and the 600mm in it’s white case over one shoulder, and a second tripod in the other hand or over the other shoulder using a detachable strap. Needless to say I don’t walk miles and miles like this, but I can get a fair distance without it feeling too heavy or uncomfortable.

By the way, the pouch thing you can see hanging from the legs of the larger tripod is a stone-bag. Originally, as the name suggests, it’s purpose was to put stones in to weigh the tripod down and make it more stable, but I use it for putting bits of gear in, such as extenders and when I’m not using the Black Rapid Double Strap, I sometimes put another camera with a 24-70 or 70-200mm zoom lens attached into this pouch. It sags just enough so that things don’t drop out, but you can get at them easily enough as well.

If the total weight that I’m traveling with starts to get too much, I do sometimes just take one tripod, and the Wimberley Head separately, and then switch them out in the field, depending on how I’m going to be using the tripod. If I’m doing wildlife work, I generally shoot handheld with my shorter lenses, so I rarely use two tripods at once, so this isn’t a big deal. Sometimes though, especially in cold conditions, it can be almost impossible to unscrew the heads, so I do like to have both tripods if weight restrictions don’t get in the way.

I often find that even if I’ll be mainly shooting wildlife, I end up doing a certain amount of landscape work as well, and I pretty much always use a tripod for landscape work, and the Really Right Stuff BH-55 is the best option for that in my opinion. It’s an amazing ball head.

OK, so let’s take a more detailed look at what’s in my bag (below). Along the back there is the 600mm F4. You might have noticed on the earlier photo as well, but I always keep the Long Lens Support from Really Right Stuff attached to this lens. Long lenses like this vibrate as you release the shutter, especially if you end up having to shoot at shutter speeds of 1/100th or a second or lower, so being able to support the front of the lens as well as the back with this support, really helps to reduce this vibration. I have some photos of this long lens support in action in a blog post for Episode 198 if you want to see more.

Nature & Wildlife Shooting Gear Lineup

To the left are my two main camera bodies. The one towards the back is the Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III, and the one in front of that is the 1D Mark IV. The lens laying down in front of the 1Ds is the 14mm F2.8 L lens, which I generally use for ultra wide angle landscapes, but also like to point this lens up into trees or get down really low with this lens, as it gives a really wacky perspective.

Behind the 14mm, is the 16-35mm F2.8 L lens, at then the 100mm Macro L lens is in the middle of the three black lenses in a line, then the 24-70mm F2.8 lens is to the right of the three. I like to have a Macro lens with me, but unless I am going out specifically to do macro work, I don’t take my 65mm MP-E 1-5X macro lens or my macro strobes. In front of the 100mm Macro though is two 25mm extension tubes and a 12mm extension tube. I keep these all nested together like this to save space, and I have used all three of these at once to get in much closer than life-size with the 100mm macro lens. There’s no glass in these tubes either, so they don’t weigh a lot.

In front of all of this is two 1.4X Extenders and a 2.0X Extender. These are the recent Mark II extenders which are quite an improvement over the original versions. One thing I was disappointed with though recently is that it seems you can’t nest the 1.4x Extender with the 2.0X any more. The old versions used to allow this, which is how I shot my Moon video, so I was not very happy when I tried this recently to shoot the Lunar Eclipse, only to find that it’s no longer possible. Otherwise, these are great Extenders, and work really well with the new 70-200mm F2.8 L lens, which we can see to the right of this shot. The 70-200mm F2.8 L lens is also an big improvement over the original 70-200mm lens. I covered this in my review of this lens, in comparison with the old version in Episode 235 so I won’t go into detail today. By the way, I have two 1.4X Extenders, because I often find myself needing one for each camera body. I don’t use the 2.0X Extender enough to need this, but the 1.4X get used quite a lot, and so I like to have two with me.

Basically the zoom lenses that I’ve just mentioned take me from 16 to 200mm and I can get out to 14mm with that first prime lens that we looked at.If I drop the Extenders onto the 70-200mm F2.8 lens, I can get a 100-280mm lens, or a 140-400mm lens, if I use the 2.0X Extender. With the Mark II versions of these Extenders both of these are very workable combinations, so I don’t shy away from using the Extenders with my 70-200mm lens.

They also work great with the 300mm F2.8 L lens that we can see to the left of the 70-200mm F2.8.  This is the only of the lenses that we see here that I have not upgraded to the Mark II, that was released earlier this year. I am already incredibly happy with the image quality, as this lens is as sharp as they come, so I don’t really see a point in spending the money to upgrade. The extra Image Stabilization ability and a reduction in weight is welcome, but not enough to replace a perfectly good lens. In fact, the main reason that I would replace this lens, is because the Image Stabilization switch on the older version sticks out so far that I sometimes catch in and turn it off, so as you can see in the photo, I have the IS switched taped up in the on position, to prevent this. The new model doesn’t protrude as much so this risk is apparently greatly reduced. I’d like that a lot, but not enough to warrant the upgrade, unless Canon released a camera body with enough megapixels to out-resolve this lens.

Gitzo 6X Tripod with Manfrotto 519 Pro Video Fluid Head

The other things we see in this image are the Lensbaby Composer and RØDE Video Mic. The Lensbaby is small and pretty much goes with me everywhere. I love that little lens. The RØDE Video Mic usually ends up in my bag, even when I don’t necessary intend to shoot video, as you never know when a scene is going to lend itself to a short video clip.

If I’m heading out to shoot video, or if I’m traveling by car and weight isn’t such an issue, I’ll usually also pack my 5 Series Gitzo 6X Tripod with Manfrotto Video Fluid Head, which gives me the ability to smoothly pan around, for much higher quality video. I also have a second plate for this Video head with an RSS Quick Release Clamp mounted rotated by 90 degrees, so I can use both lenses with a plate on the lens that generally point forwards, or mount the body directly when I’m using shorter lenses. There are better solutions available now, but this system works for me. If you are interested, I went into detail on this in Episode 239 of this Podcast.

I also pack my Zacuto Z-Finder too, which enables me to see the LiveView in enough detail to manually focus as I shoot video, without any more specialist video gear, for the time being at least.

To prevent the inner pockets of the Guragear Kiboko bag from bulging making it even more difficult to photograph the inside, I didn’t pack any of the other miscellaneous things that I take with me, but I did lay them out to talk you through them. Not all of these go into my bag. Some go into the pockets of my photographers vest, and some like the batter charger, go into a separate bag and live in the car, or my luggage. Let’s take a look though.

Other Miscellaneous Gear

Of course, clothing wise, I’ll always take the right clothing and footwear for the conditions I expect to encounter, but at the back left, is my waterproofs, which is basically Gore Tex trousers and a thin coat, in case it rains while I’m out, and I want to continue shooting. Note that I don’t carry waterproofing for my cameras. As you’ll have noticed, I use Pro 1 Series bodies, and L lenses, all of which are splash proof, so if it rains, I don’t have to mollycoddle my gear. I do often keep a hand towel with me, and will wipe of excess water from time to time, but basically, if it rains, my gear get’s wet.

Please note that not all L lenses are splash proof, so you’d need to check yourself before doing this, but as long as they are, you’ve got nothing to worry about with a bit of rain or snow. Condensation is a different matter. If I’m working in very cold conditions, I will ensure that all of my gear is dried and packed away in my bag before I go into a warm space. This might mean wiping things off in my car before going to a hotel, or before turning on the heating in the car if that’s where I’m sleeping, but usually just ensuring stuff if in a bag and zipped up is enough to stop condensation as long as the gear is dry. If I have things that can’t be put into a bag, I do carry large plastic bags just in case, but I rarely use them for this. I find myself using plastic bags more to lay on the ground if I want to get down low. If I’m just kneeling, I’ll use the knee pads attached to the Kiboko bag in the earlier photo, but if I end up lying down, I like to have a few large plastic bags with me. If I don’t have any bags, and the shot depends on me lying down though, I’ll go ahead and get dirty if necessary.

Moving along the back line of gear, next we have my X-Rite ColorChecker Passport, which you probably already know that I use religiously. Then we have my Walkstool, which is a collapsible stool which we looked at way back in Episode 84, but this basically can be used at the height you see here, for a low stool, or you can extend the legs to a height where it get’s you pretty much to a normal sitting height. It’s great if you end up in one spot for a long time, waiting for something to happen. You can just sit down and relax with this stool.

On the right on the back row is my Black Rapid Double Strap, which I have fitted with two Really Right Stuff Quick Release Clamps, so I can attach any lens or body to it quickly. I actually often take a third camera if I’m shooting Wildlife, the 5D Mark II, and I often have a camera on each side of the double strap, and a third camera on the 600mm on the tripod, which works really well.

In the middle at the left is my battery charger for the 1 Series camera batteries, two of which we can see in front of the charger, in the front left. Right in front of the two spare batteries is my Spudz lens cloth. I like to have a nice clean lens cloth in another bag for use at hotels or lodgings on extended trips, but the Spudz are get in the field, because you can just hang them off your clothing or camera strap, and get to them really quickly. some of them are also 18% grey, so can be used as a white balance grey card if necessary.

To the right of my batteries and charger is my filter case, with a couple of filters out to show you. I carry circular polarizers in the sizes necessary for my lenses and a variety of Neutral Density filters, including ND4, ND8 and ND X400, which is a 9 stop filter. I also carry the Singh Ray Vari-ND, but don’t use this as much as my fixed ND filters. I often stack these filters too to get multi-minute exposure during the day, like in one of my favorite images from Antarctica this year.

Gentoo Point - Antarctica

The Singh Ray Vari-ND is the square leather effect case to the right of the filter case by the way. Then just to the left in front of that is my yellow CF Card case. I use this case because it’s waterproof, and floats if dropped in water, as I’ve actually dropped my memory card case on the beach of a lake in the past, but these days, with my 64GB cards, I rarely find that I change cards in the field, but I still like to use this case, just in case.

I actually had to darken them down a bit in Lightroom so you could see them in this image, but in the middle of the front row, is two spirit levels that fit into the flash hot-shoe on the camera, to ensure that I get my camera straight. I really don’t like to see wonky horizons unless it’s on purpose, so I use these religiously to ensure I have things nice and straight.

In the center of the image are two Canon Remote Timers. Again, I like to have two of these so that I can use one with each camera. This is especially important for long exposures, because you can make use of the time while waiting for one camera to finish its exposure by setting up a second camera and running more than one at once.

To the right of the remote timers is a drop-in polarizer filter that slots inside the 300mm and 600mm lenses. The front of these lenses are too wide for a traditional circular polarizer, so you put them into the special slot towards the back of these telephoto lenses, and turn the filter using a tiny cog system. I don’t use this a lot, but when overall weight isn’t an issue, I like to take it along.

In front of that is an Angle Finder C, to allow me to look down into the camera if necessary, to shoot from ground level, or for shooting in space where I can’t get my head behind the camera, and LiveView isn’t an option either. The Angle Finder rotates 360º, so you can look from the side or whatever, so it’s not just for looking down into the camera, but it’s useful when you have to shoot in a tight space, as well as looking down.

The little bag to the top right of that is just a little bag of tiny tools, and the button batteries that go inside the camera bodies to save the date etc. I’ve had this battery die on me on a trip once in the past, and I had to keep resetting the date every time I turned the camera on. That was before it was possible to change the date in post, but still, I wouldn’t like to leave home for more than a day without this little bag of tricks. It also contains some lens cleaning fluid and papers, in case I get something nasty on my protector filters, or on the front element of lenses which I don’t have filters on.

I do use protector filters, as I’ve no evidence that they reduce image quality, and I rarely see any flare from them, but they do save me from directly cleaning the front element of my lens every time. I haven’t had any problems cleaning the front element of my 14mm, 300mm or 600mm, and in fact, the front element of the 300 and 600mm are just pieces of glass, just like protector filters, but I just like to reduce the risk of scratching my lenses as much as possible. The iron thing is that even pretty nasty scratches don’t really show up in the resulting images, but I like the peace of mind this give me.

To the right of my bag of tricks are my LED LENSER P7 flashlight, which I also talked about in Episode 198, and a new LED LENSER H7R head-light. The P7 is a small but very powerful flashlight, with a dimmer and very bright setting. This is great for lighting things up in the distance, and for light painting, but since I lost my old head light somewhere, I recently researched and picked up a second LED LENSER in the H7R. This is a focusable, head-light, and has a dimmer switch taking you from really dim, to unbelievably bright for the size, with a small slider that recognizes a hundred varying steps. It also recharges via a 5V USB connector too, so I can recharge from my computer, or a USB adapter in my car etc.

With my car being a Hybrid though, it actually has a 100 volt outlet in the back anyway, so I can recharge my laptop etc. in the field. I sometimes sleep in the car, to save on hotel bills and so that I can be at the location before dawn without having to get up really early and drive there etc. Here are a few items that I use when sleeping in the car to make it a bit more comfortable.

Thermarest Self Inflating Mattress

Firstly, we see here (above) a Therm-a-Rest mattress. Here I’m showing you the extent to which the mattress will self inflate, just by taking it out of the stuff sack and unrolling it. To make it a little more comfortable, you can blow into either of the valves that you can see at the top corners of the mattress. I think this particular model is now discontinued, but there are a lot of great mattresses in the range.

The front seats in my car recline so far that if you move the seat forward, they go full-flat, but there ares still a lot of bumps on the seats, so I bought these mattresses so that me and my wife could sleep in the car. When I’m out alone though, I’ve started to fold one side of the back seat down, and sleep in the back of the car, behind the driving seat, which turns out to be more comfortable, especially with the mattress.

deuter Exosphere Thermo Stretch Comfort Sleeping Bag

I don’t need this in the summer, often just using a fleece blanket, if I even need anything, but as the cold sets in, I use the deuter Exosphere Thermo Stretch Comfort Sleeping Bag. I have the -4ºC version, which is rated for comfort down to 2º Celsius and will be fine down to -4º, although it can be used lower. I don’t sleep in the car in like 20 below so I haven’t needed anything colder yet, especially as I’m in the car, and not actually camping.

One of the main reasons that I went for this sleeping back is because, as the name suggests, it is incredibly flexible. I don’t sleep well if I’m all wrapped up like a mummy, and this thing allows you to stick your legs and arms out to a degree, which makes a big difference to how well you sleep.

So, that’s about it for the gear I use when I’m out and about for Nature and Wildlife shooting. I do sometimes pack my Neos Adventure Overshoes and of course there are various items of clothing that I use to keep warm etc. that’s really focused on winter shooting, such as my Baffin boots, and down pants, but we won’t go into that today.

Note that if you want to see images shot with any of my lenses, if you go to my About page on the blog, all of my lenses are linked to images shot with those lenses in my gallery. I know that gear episodes aren’t for everyone, but hopefully you’ve enjoyed looking through the gear I use for Nature and Wildlife shoots. Note too that I won’t include all of the links in the show notes, but many of the things I’ve mentioned are links in the blog post, and if you are looking for something that you can’t find, just leave a comment on the blog, and I’ll search it out for you.

Before we finish I’d like to also wish you all a wonderful New Year, as we say goodbye to the somewhat turbulent 2011, and welcome in 2012. I hope that 2012 brings you success, well-being and happiness.

Show Notes

View shots from each of my lenses with the links on the About page here: http://blog.martinbaileyphotography.com/about/

Music by UniqueTracks

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A few weeks ago, I was trimming some 8×10 and 5×7″ prints for my customers. The sun was flooding into my studio and Ben Harper was pouring his heart out of my speakers. The world was a beautiful place!

Trimming Photos

It wasn’t just because of the conditions on this one day that I was feeling happy though. Whenever I print, trim or mount photos, create gallery warps or do just about any photography related task, I feel totally at one with and fulfilled by my craft.

Printing

When a print order has come in over night for example, I feel a little flutter of excitement in my stomach as I go up to my studio put on my white cotton gloves to handle the paper, and the sound of my big printer firing up and the roll paper starting to feed as it’s sucked down onto the platen by the vacuums, make me smile.

As I lay some paper on my table to lay the prints on as they fully dry, I’ll walk back through to my storeroom, and stroke the front of my printer as I walk by.

I know that I might be a bit weird, and if that’s true, I don’t care, I love these aspects of my photography. Maybe I’m a bit of a control freak too. Even when I shoot my photographs, I am a stickler for nailing the ideal exposure, according to how I want the image to feel, and I like to control the white balance, so that I can see any subtle differences that the difference colors might have on the RGB histogram.

As I want to control the entire process, the thought of sending my photos in to a lab to be printed makes me cringe. I know that they’d come back OK, or even really good depending on the service, especially after all the care I put into getting my exposure and color how I like it in the base image, but I enjoy the process of printing. It give me a lot of satisfaction, and so I simply don’t want to outsource it.

I know that many of you will be thinking that I’m crazy for messing around printing 5×7 and 8×10 prints for my clients, when you can get these done for just a few cents each by uploading your images to a print service, but the thought of this just leaves me cold. This is why take a portfolio of previous printed work to a client when we first meet about the possibility of doing a portrait session.

From the start, I want to impress on them that it’s not just about the photos in digital form. I want them to see the beauty in the final prints, and have started to sell more packages with a set amount already included for the customer to select a number of prints or canvas wraps from the offset. Luckily I’m managing to attract customers that are willing to pay a little extra for me to provide beautiful photos printed with care on top quality fine art papers. This really does rely on showing them images from previous shoots printed in the same way, but luckily for me, it’s working. I’m able to make more money from each shoot, and the customer has quality prints to show their friends and family, and this leads to more work with the print in mind.

As I’ve sent out prints from the shoot that we discussed in episode 310 recently, I’ve received touching mail from each family on how beautiful the prints are and how wonderful the day was. I was able to provide a quality experience from start to finish, and because of the quality proposition, the shoot doesn’t finish with me handing over a disk of full sized images, so that the client can create their own  mediocre prints.

One thing I do though, especially at this time of year in Japan, is give the clients a DVD with selected images from the shoot resized to a size that allows the client to use the images up to the size of a postcard at 300ppi. Despite this, I was surprised recently when this latest shoot resulted in two of the families not only asking me to create large batches of New Year cards for them, printed on fine art paper, but they also asked me to include my logo, despite the fact that I priced the cards high enough for me to feel happy about the job. This is proof that they are proud of the fact that they had us shoot their images, and create these cards, to the point that they want me to brand the product, and that is huge in my mind. It shows that my quality proposition and how I’m positioning my business is working.

Honestly, although it would be easy to just hand over the full sized digital images, and have the clients print their own photos, I don’t want my clients to spend the coming years displaying and sharing photographs that I have no control over. If I’ve played no part in the creation of the prints, I have no way of knowing if they’re any good or not, and I really don’t want people to see such images thinking that they are looking at my work, when I had no part in that final part of the process, and this I think is the artisan or the craftsman in me wanting to ensure that I control every aspect. I also want to sign and stamp my work too, and I do not want to build this into the digital image, this has to be added by hand.

Framed, Signed and Stamped Print

Now, I know that even if I use a third party to print the photographs and send them to me to inspect before I send them to my client, so I could do the quality assurance and even stamp and sign them, remaining in control to a degree, but that’s really not the point. It just doesn’t feel right. I only want to sign something that I created, not just ordered on line, and at the end of the day, I enjoy printing! And because I enjoy printing, it’s my choice to build this into my business so that the shoot is not the start and the end of the job. I feel incredibly blessed to be able to make a living doing something that I love, and being able to incorporate printing, another part of the photographic process that I love into that business model is a double blessing.

By all means, if you don’t enjoy printing, and the thought of spending time printing yourself, then trimming your photographs leaves you cold, then forget about this. I’m certainly not saying that everyone should do this, and wouldn’t dream of saying that you are any less a photographer if you don’t. Of course I also know that there are sometimes business reasons for outsourcing parts of your process because it makes financial sense to do so.

Unless you set out to make printing a part of your business model as I have, the fact is that most of the time you will make more money by shooting more and doing less of these tasks, but that’s your decision. It doesn’t stop at printing of course. I’ve heard of services where you simply dump all of your RAW images on a server and a third party handles all the post processing. You can have people design album creation and much, much more these days, and if you are happy with your decision to use these services, then good for you.

What would make me sad though, is if you are outsourcing many of your processes just because you can. The photographer has historically been a craftsman and a technician. Photography is a technical art, and for me, it’s probably the engineer in me that wants to hand craft things that makes me so happy to be able to do so.

It is very easy to just hand stuff like this off to an online service, and I do appreciate that some services provide a very high quality product, so it’s not always about quality, but you could be denying yourself a lot of fun, if you too found that you enjoy the process like I do. If you haven’t even tried, how do you know that you don’t also have a craftsman, an artisan inside of you waiting to revel in the sort of tasks that make me incredibly happy.

Laminating a Canvas Print for Gallery Wrap

If you are reeling in your seat as you listen to or read this, because you already do lots of this sort of stuff yourself, then don’t worry. I know that there are a lot of photographers that do take on tasks like these themselves, which is great. I know that I’m not alone here. I also know that these tasks are not for everyone. For example I do not enjoy spending a lot of time messing around with my images in Photoshop, but some people really enjoy that aspect. That’s great too! I don’t necessarily think that it has to be an analog act. If you prefer moving pixels around and performing your craft inside the computer, then knock yourself out. The main point that I wanted to make today is that we can gain much more fun from photography than just the act of composing our images and making the exposures. This is and probably always will be the most important part of photography, but I think it can be so much more, so why stop there?

I’m starting to hear more and more people that have recently tried home printing for example. Some people bought the little Canon printer that we looked at in episode 292 and have found great pleasure in printing their own images and even framing them. Chris Blank comes to mind for example. Chris started printing and framing his beautiful work recently, and is finding the process very fulfilling.

My proposition to you is not that you necessarily start printing although that’s one of my favorite post capture activities. For example, I choose to create my own printer/paper combination profiles, using the X-Rite i1Pro calibration tools. I can download ICC profiles for my printer from Hahnemuhle and Breathing Color, but I chose to create these myself, because I want more than a generic profile. Each printer is slightly different and once the printer itself is calibrated the profiles created on another printer are never quite as accurate.

Creating ICC Profiles

Sure, this is the control freak coming out in me again, but I enjoy this process. It gives me pleasure to go through the act of printing out the patch sets and reading them in to the computer, and I have the assurance that I’m creating my images with the best possible color for my printer. This part, I guess comes back to the craftsman aspect. The craftsman or artisan in me wants things to be as good as they can be and I’m prepared to do a little more to make that happen, and this is probably why I enjoy the process.

The photographer was traditionally an artisan, and had a lot of skill in the various crafts surrounding the act of capture and printing, and although that was a limiting factor for some, for those that enjoyed the craft, it was a major part of their success. I’d like to see more photographers get back to the artisan mentality, and enjoy the processes surrounding photography as much as I do.

So, as you progress through your photographic life, and you want to do things with your images, don’t just rely on the easy options. Just because you can download profiles for your printer/paper combinations, or you can get cheap prints online, doesn’t necessarily mean that you should. Think of ways that you could achieve the same thing at home or maybe even improve on quality if you put your heart into it, and if it makes sense financially, give it a try. You might find that you really enjoy your new process, and if like me, you end up stroking your printer as you walk past it, or find yourself smiling to yourself as you trim prints for a client, then this just extends the fun of photography past the capture and post processing, and that has to be a good thing.

Show Notes

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

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When I initially went to see the people at Map about doing this Podcast episode, they were a little hesitant at first about my talking about their shop because they didn’t want me to give overseas visitors the impression that all the staff in the store speak good English, because my blog and Podcast are released in English. If you’ve ever been to Japan, you’ll know that there are few places where you can find really good English speakers, but hey, if you are just visiting with work or as a tourist, I’m sure that most Japanese people speak more English than you speak Japanese, so hopefully you’ll see this as part of your Japan experience, and enjoy the language challenge.

Map Camera is in Nishi Shinjuku, so if you come into the main Shinjuku station on the JR Train, you’ll want to head for the South Exit. If you come in on one of the other train company lines, it can be a little more difficult to find, but if you look for West Exit and Bus Terminal, or signs for Yodobashi Camera even, that will get you close. Here’s a Google map with a pin to Map Camera to help you, but basically, as you go past the Yodobashi Camera Multimedia store, you can see the first Map Camera number one store to the right on the next block. In this photo look for the black sign with GMT written on it, and then above that, you’ll see Map Camera written in black on a white background. You’ll need to click on the photo to view the larger size to be able to make this out.

Down the Road to Map Camera

Now, before we go on, I should tell you that I’m not suggesting that you totally ignore Yodobashi Camera. The chances are if you’ve been to Tokyo and asked about where to buy camera gear, you’ve already been to Yodobashi, and I do enjoy walking around Yodobashi, and buy plenty of stuff there. But, when it comes to buying camera bodies and lenses, I pretty much always buy from Map, because they’re generally cheaper. For stuff like the 5D Mark II which has been out for a while, the price gap is to just a few thousand Yen, or about $15, but for lenses, the gap usually increases much more.

For example as of Dec 10, 2011, the Canon EF 70-200 F2.8L IS II USM lens is ¥249,200 at Yodobashi, but the same lens, both new, from Map Camera is ¥212,800. That’s a difference of ¥36,500 or around US$469 at today’s exchange rate. That a 15% difference. You would get 10% or ¥24,920 worth of points that you can use the same day if you already have a card, or from the following day after you create your point card if it’s new, but you do need a valid Japan address to register for a point card, so that rules out visitors from overseas.

Even if you calculate the difference with the points though, the price difference is still ¥11,580, or US$150, which is still significant. The good thing about Yodobashi is that they will discuss a discount if you can show them that what you want to buy is cheaper elsewhere, but it usually takes time and the shop attendant has to go and get permission from their boss etc. I personally just prefer to walk into Map, know that they have already included the discount, and just buy what I want without haggling.

Map Camera Number 1 Store

The other reason that I buy at Map Camera is because they give great prices for your old gear, and they throw in a bit more if you tell them that you are going to use the money to buy some new gear at their store. They actually just give you a credit that you take to the floor with your new gear, and then you pay the difference. I pretty much always do this. We don’t cover the part exchange floor today, as they wouldn’t let me photograph it, but basically, if you want to sell something to Map Camera to partly pay for your new gear, make sure you give it a clean, put it in the original box if you still have it, include your manual etc. and take it to the 4F in shop number two, just a little further down the street. We’ll take a look at that later.

So, as you walk down towards the Map Camera sign, you could very easily walk past it if you aren’t paying attention, because the first floor of the Map Camera number 1 store is a watch shop. The entrance to the camera store is down a corridor to the left, below the checkerboard style Map Camera sign.

At the end of the passage, there’s an elevator to the various floors. I was accompanied from floor to floor by the deputy manager from the store, a young lady that used to work on the Canon floor, so I’ve known her for some time. We started on the Nikon Digital Camera floor, which you can see here (below).

Nikon Floor (5F)

Each floor contains both new and used kits, or bodies and lenses sold separately. I didn’t shoot every cabinet on each floor, but just to give you a taster, for example, as you walk around the Nikon floor, you have some cabinets like these, with used Nikon bodies (below left) and lenses (below right – click on the images to view larger).

Used Nikon Bodies (5F)

Used Nikon Lenses (5F)

They usually stock all new cameras from the day of their launch, also cheaper than most other stores in Tokyo. Here we can see the latest Nikon camera lineup (as of Dec 2011). There are also new bodies and lenses in the other cabinets, and they do sell accessories and batteries etc.

New Nikon Cameras (5F)

Next, we dropped down to the 4th floor, where I have parted with many a Yen, the Canon Digital Camera Floor (below)!

The Canon Floor (4F)

It’s a similar layout to the Nikon floor, with lots of camera bodies, lenses and accessories. Again there are cabinets of new and used gear, such as these telephoto and TS/E lenses (below right), and I also bumped into another Tokyo based photographer Paul Stevens (below left).

Paul Stevens on the Canon Floor

Used Canon Lenses (4F)

There’s a cabinet full of used 1 series Canon bodies (below left), and a fancy stand with the Canon consumer cameras, with pride of place in the middle of the room (below right).

Used Canon 1 Series Bodies (4F)

New Canon Cameras (4F)

For some strange reason I seemed to spend about twice as much time photographing the Canon floor, but again, there’s not much point in including too many photographs here. I just want to give you a feel for each floor, and also give those of you that haven’t been to Japan or Map Camera a feel for what the Camera stores here are like.

On the third floor, we have the Pentax, Sony and Sigma range of Digital Cameras (below).

Pentax, Sony and Sigma (3F)

Orobianco Italian Camera Bags (3F)

Slightly more sparse than the Canon and Nikon floors, we now have room for a Christmas tree and some Orobianco Italian camera bags. I thought these were quite funny actually (right).

They look like the designer bags that you see around town, but when you open them up, they contain padded compartments for a camera and a couple of lenses. Ideal for not drawing attention to the fact that you are carrying around expensive camera gear, but depending on where you are, you’re probably more likely to get mugged for a purse full of cash and credit cards with bags like these. That’s not much of a problem here in Japan of course.

Having skipped the watches on the first and second floor, we dropped down next to the Leica, Rangefinders, Twin Lens Reflex cameras, and the Medium and Large Format Cameras in the 1st floor basement.

Leica Rangefinders, Medium and Large Format Cameras (B1F)

They’ve also got some second hand tripods and new and used camera bags as well, as you can see here (above), but at the back of the floor, there are a number of cabinets full of Leicas (below) and cameras that take Leica lenses, as well as medium format and large format cameras.

Leica Cameras (B1F)

Map Camera #2 Store

That finishes a look at the four camera related floors in Map Camera number 1 store. Just a few buildings down from this is the number two store, with an equally camouflaged appearance, as this store has a noodle shop on the first floor.

This second building contains three floors of Map Camera, and the first building contains two floors of watches and a pen store on the sixth floor. I believe these are all owned by the same company, and really can’t understand why they don’t just put the three watch and pen floors in this building, and have one almighty camera store on all floors of the first building, but then, it’s not my company, and I’m sure they have their reasons.

It’s the same story as Store #1 here, you go down the little passageway to the left to an elevator at the back of the building. It feels a little like you’re walking into a some seedy joint, but once you get up in the camera floors you’ll see it’s just good old Map Camera.

On the third floor we have Olympus and Panasonic DSLR cameras and compact digital cameras from various companies (below).

Map Camera #2 Store (3F)

On the second floor we have a bit of a mishmash of film cameras including Canon FD, Nikon, Pentax, Minolta, Olympus and Ricoh, as well as Contax and other Medium Format cameras, Leaf backs and compact film cameras.

Map Camera #2 Store (2F)

It was weird to see so many old Canon FD mount lenses lined up like this (below) as well as some old Canon F-1 and Nikon FM3A bodies that really changed photography as we know it, back in their day.

Old Canon FD Lenses and F-1 Cameras

Nikon Film Cameras and Lenses (2F)

So, as I mentioned earlier, the fourth floor of the second Map store just down the street from the first is the Trade Center. This is where you can take your old gear to sell for cash, or part exchange for something else. I believe the percentage changes depending on what you intend to buy, but you generally get more for your old gear if you are selling it to buy something else.

As you’ve seen, the Map Camera store floors contain a mix of new and used bodies and lenses, and I’ve actually never bought anything used here. Everything comes with a warranty though, so you can do so in confidence if you’d like to save a bit of money buying used. Map is a reputable store, and will see you right if something did go wrong with any used that you picked up here, as long as you’re still in Japan when it goes wrong of course. I doubt that they’ll work with you to replace something that went wrong if you take it to another country, but I might be wrong.

Note too that if you do shop at Map while visiting from overseas, in addition to them already being the cheapest store I’ve found to buy in Japan, if you show your passport, they’ll give you another 5% discount, by removing the tax from your purchase.

As I say, don’t expect these guys to speak great English, though I believe a few of the staff members do. Remember that you’re in Japan, so both sides of your communication will need to work at it a little, but I believe like Lem, you’ll be happy that you took a look at what Map Camera has to offer. I know that as long as they are in business, this will be the first place that I go for my camera and lenses.

I’m not affiliated with Map Camera in any way, and have received nothing for doing this Podcast, other than permission to photograph most of the floors of their store. If I recall correctly, the first lens I bought from Map Camera was my old 100-400mm L lens that I bought back in July 2003, before my first trip to Hokkaido. Since then I’ve bought almost all of my lenses there and always part exchange old gear for a good price when I buy. I’ve never had a problem with their gear, or the people that I’ve interacted with, so feel comfortable recommending Map to you too.

Show Notes

Here’s a Google Map to Map Camera: http://mbp.ac/mapmap

Map have a Web site, which is great, as long as you understand Japanese: http://www.mapcamera.com/

Music by UniqueTracks

Audio

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There’s no manuscript today, as we just spoke about the upcoming tour, but you can read all of the details on the tour page at: http://www.mbpworkshops.com/snzpa.php

We need to know soon how many people are interested in this tour, so do try to get your ducks in line, and book with the deposit payment button on the MBP Workshops Web site.

Clive and I do hope to see you in Southern New Zealand next year, and here are a few of Clive’s beautiful images from the locations that we’ll visit to whet your appetite.

Show Notes

See tour details and photos at http://www.mbpworkshops.com/snzpa.php

Clive on Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/clive_copeman

Clive on the Web: http://www.clivecopemanphotography.com/

Music by UniqueTracks

Audio

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Note too that although I don’t always spell this out each month, if you do want to get involved, all details of how to upload your images, and the rules of engagement are posted in the Assignment Forum at martinbaileyphotography.com. Even though I am trying to release this Podcast within the first few days of each new month now, I also announce the theme of the assignment on the last day of the previous month in the Assignment Forum, so you can always look there if you are heading out shooting and wonder what the theme is.

There were some great shots entered for this month’s assignment again, and as usual we’re going to look at the five images that gathered the most voted from our peers in reverse order. In fifth place is Leslie Granda-Hill with “Nimue“, and here’s Leslie’s back-story.

Thanks to all for your votes this month. I went to Toronto last month and at the last minute put the hand from a mannequin in my suitcase in hopes that I would find an interesting way to shoot it for the assignment. I took it to the Butterfly Conservatory by Niagara Falls, but the butterflies did not cooperate as I had hoped. I did feel a bit strange carrying this hand around the beautiful facility and had to explain to several curious onlookers that I was shooting this for an online monthly assignment from Japan. I am sure they thought I was a little bit crazy. I also brought the hand to a sunrise shoot on Lake Ontario. The morning was unusually warm and beautiful. I tried various attempts with the hand in the sand and water. This image turned out to be my favorite. It made me think of the hand that reaches out of the water to catch Excalibur in the King Arthur legend. I desaturated it to give it a vintage look. Congratulations to all of the other winners.

Nimue © Leslie Granda-Hill

Thanks for the back-story Leslie, and thanks as always for going to so much trouble for the assignment. I’m always impressed with your ideas, and this month is no exception. At first glance, it wasn’t obvious that the hand is from a mannequin, so I was wondering how you managed to bury someone in the sand underwater while you shot this, but then of course after a closer look it becomes more obvious. Still though, it’s a great shot you set up and executed. The idea to desaturate a little is masterful as usual. It adds a lot to the overall feel of the shot. Congratulations on this excellent shot, and for placing again this month.

Next up, in fourth place is Omar Gonzalez with “The Hand That Feeds You“, and here is Omar’s back-story.

If it weren’t for my wife, I would be eating cold pizza and cereal every night! She has beautiful delicate hands that could’ve been perfect subjects alone…but!…. when she started dishing out our dinner, I knew I had my shot. I ran and grabbed my 5D Mark II with the 50mm on. I set my aperture to 2.2 to have the pasta be in focus and the hands a bit out of the depth of field. My thought here was…when there’s hot delicious fresh pasta with homemade sauce being served…the hands WILL probably be ignored at bit. I took as many shots as “my better half” could tolerate. In lightroom, I used a tad of green and beige split toning with some desaturation to give the shot its look. A small tribute to my wife that is such a great cook and takes great care of our family in so many ways.

The Hand That Feeds You © Omar Gonzalez

All of this comes across very well in your shot Omar! I fully agree with the intent behind the shallow depth-of-field. The pasta looks absolutely delicious, and your wife’s hands either side help to add the sense of family as you explain so well. I like the fact that there’s a nice bright window in the background to back light the steam. That adds a lot too. Very well done. Congratulations Omar!

In third place is Dan Newcomb with “Thin Ice“, and here’s Dan’s back-story.

Thank you for the votes! My image, Thin Ice, was shot on a frozen lake beside Yellowknife NWT. The lights in the background are from the city. I had a number of ideas but as usual I was running out of time. The hand was a $5 Halloween prop that I got from a dollar store in Whitehorse. It was a severed hand so all I had to do was stick it in the few inches of snow and it stayed upright. It was getting dark so I was using a tripod with the legs flattened out. I used my D3S with my old manual focus 50mm F1.4. In post I just did a little sharpening and played a bit with the contrast. I didn’t want to adjust the color too much as I’m partially colorblind. Black and white is so much easier for me but this image looked better in color. I was going to leave the hand there overnight to let some snow fall on it but decided against it as I didn’t want anyone to freak-out thinking a body was attached to it. Congratulations to the others who placed and thanks again for the votes.

Thin Ice © Dan Newcomb

Great shot Dan! With this one, it was more obvious that it was not a real hand, because of the blue veins but still, the detail in the hand is incredible, and for just $5. As with Leslie, I’m always amazed at how much trouble you go to for the assignment, as well as grateful of course. I think the decision to leave this in color was perfect, especially with the cold blue of the surroundings matching the blue veins in the hand. It really looks as though someone is under the snow, and died there before they were rescued. Quite morbid really, but it works very well. Congrats on third place Dan. Great work, as always.

And we had a tie for first place, both with 51 points each, but as the system I knocked up to count the scores doesn’t differentiate, the scores page shows them in first and second place. Sorry about that, but let’s look at the first, from Justin Woodward, with “The Future is in Our Hands“, and here’s Justin’s back-story.

Wow! What an honor to be among such great company. I’ve enjoyed Martin’s podcast for quite some time now, and have learned so much from his work as well as people who have submitted to his forum.

I’ve been thinking about submitting to the forum assignment for some time, and just this last month, I stumbled onto the assignment page and lo and behold, it matched my last shoot with a family that had me do infant shots for them! I contemplated posting this image from the shoot:

Example Shot © Justin Woodward

I opted for the one that I did because I wasn’t fond of the shadow in dad’s hand. There were too many distractions, I felt, to be an image that people would be drawn to. While I was shooting this particular sequence I had a lot of difficulty getting dad to have a relaxed position. He was mostly deaf, so when I was trying to communicate with him what I wanted him to do, he couldn’t read my lips, which he was very good at when he could see them. Unfortunately, he couldn’t see them while I was looking through the lens. He didn’t quite understand what I was looking for, so I ended up having to sculpt their hands. At the same time, poor Emerson, the baby, was nearing the end of his patience. He was a cute little guy, and the family was absolutely beautiful.

The Future is in Our Hands © Justin Woodward

Technically, it was a very simple shot to set up. I had an SB600 flash on my Nikon D90, and pointed it up at the ceiling in TTL mode. Not difficult at all in terms of set up. Post processing involved converting to Silver Effects Pro, and doing some tonal adjustments here and there. For color images, I still do this, and once its complete, I import both the raw file and the b&w file into Photoshop and lay the monochrome image over it as a luminosity layer, adjusting the opacity as necessary.

The difficulty in this shoot came in getting the participants to cooperate, not the equipment. I learned a lot from this shoot. It was my first infant shoot that I’ve done, and I would do a lot differently had I a second chance at it, but this is how we learn. Thanks, again, to all who voted for my image. What an honor.

Well it’s an honor to have you on board Justin. I love this shot. You did a wonderful job, especially for your first infant shoot. Thanks for all the technical details. There’s a lot for us all to learn from here too. I agree with the decision to go with the second shot here. The first one is great too, but I think this second shot is just full of family love and little Emerson’s tiny hand is just so incredibly cute.

The way he’s gripping his Mom’s hand, as babies do is great, and then the way Dad has his hand around both the mother and babies hands shows him as the loving protector of the family. Really, really nice, and great use of Silver Efex Pro and Photoshop for the black and white conversion too. Congratulations on joint first place, and I hope we get to see more of your work in future assignments Justin.

Also in first place is Dennis Brennan with “Slipping Away“, and here’s Dennis’ back-story.

My wifes hands must be magical. This is the second MBP assignment they placed in! The first was her holding a leaf in the “Backlit” assignment in July 2009.

For this assignment, I initially wanted to do something with a hand and tension. I first tried several shots with only my own hand tensed up in different positions (see this set on flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/dennisbren … 8086638868). They turned out OK, but I wasn’t particularly thrilled with any of them.

I got the idea for the shot I submitted when my wife came in the room during the “tensed hand” session. I thought two hands reaching for each other could be an interesting way to create tension. I stood behind the camera and she was to the right out of the frame. I had to reach around around the tripod & camera and I asked my wife to step back several times so she really had to reach in to the shot. I guess it worked out pretty well.

Slipping Away © Dennis Brennan

For the setup, I used 3 Elinchrom BXRI 500s. One with a honeycomb grid pointed at a darker neutral background, the other two with softboxes – one to the left of my hand and one to the right of my wife’s hand. LightRoom and Silver Efex Pro 2 to finish it up. Thanks so much for the votes everyone. Looking forward to more great images next month.

This is very professional done Dennis, great work as usual. Perfect use of the lights, and you gotta love those honeycomb grids. I have one for my Profoto Monolights and I love it. When I first saw this with the lighter spot on the dark background I was wondering if it was a honeycomb grid, and I’m happy to see that it was. It always feels nice to guess at parts of a setup, and the way we share these back-stories like this gives us all a chance to do that.

The photo works so well, though I kind of see it as two people reaching for each other, rather than slipping away, but you can certainly read this both ways. The overall dark feel adds to the drama and the black and white conversion works really well here. Congratulations on a very well earned joint first.

Thanks to the winners, and to everyone that got involved with this assignment. Please do make the effort to get involved yourself soon. As you can see, people get thinking of all sorts of things to capture some great shots, and you too can learn so much from this exercise. I know that many more of you are trying than actually post your results, but I really would like to see more of you take that final step. You might be surprised by people’s reactions to your work. I’ve known people to have huge success with images that they themselves were about to delete, so do share what you come up with, with the community.

The theme for the November assignment was Machinery, and that is currently in the voting stages, so do drop by the www.mbpgalleries.com Web site and cast your vote for your top five images before December 7, 2011. The December assignment following on from Machinery is Organic, which again is open to interpretation. You will be able upload your images until the end of December 31st anywhere in the world, regardless of your time-zone, so don’t forget to post your image before you sing Auld Lang Syne to welcome the New Year in.

End Notes

I have one piece of exciting news to tell you before we finish, and that is that Craft & Vision have just released an amazing FREE eBook, and kind of as a preview to my eBook that is scheduled for release in January, I am one of the eleven authors that have contributed to “11 Ways You Can Improve Your Photography“. I’m really excited to be involved with the Craft & Vision team, and this free eBook is a great way to kick that off. Do check it out, and don’t forget to take a look at the other titles on offer while you are there.

Show Notes

Craft & Vision eBook: http://craftandvision.com/books/craft-and-vision/

Assignment Forum: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=24

Assignment Scores: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/scores2011_1.php

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

Audio

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Download this Podcast in MP3 format (Audio Only).

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The worst part of my recovery was the first month after the surgery which was tough at times, but after that I’ve been working full, often long days in my studio and gotten a lot done with my time, so I really don’t feel as though I’ve lost much time at all, but I’ve got to tell you, it was great to get out and do a full shoot again. It wore me out, for sure. I need to do much more regular shooting to really get myself fully back into shape, and I’m heading out to the gym again now, which is great, but still, I think I can safely say that I’m back!

So, today, I’m going to walk you through a few of the things that I bore in mind as I set up for the shoot, and we’ll take a look at some of the resulting images. to help illustrate some of my points.

The Shoot

The main family that hired me for this assignment have just had their kitchen and lounge refurbished, and wanted to celebrate that at the same time as get their family shots for their year end cards, and to document their family each year as their kids grow up. This is the third year that I’ve been asked to photograph them, which is great, because they are a wonderful family to work with.

This year they decided to ask the two sisters on the lady’s side of the family to come to town with their respective families, and their mother was also going to be there too. Also the man of the house’s mother lives nearby, so we wrapped a shoot of grandma with the grand kids into the mix too, so we had a full shot list, and three hours to shoot it all in, with a hard stop at three and a half hours, as they all had to leave for lunch at 1:30pm at the latest.

I use an app called Second Shootr on my iPhone to make a list of the must have shots in a shoot. Once you have got the shot, you just tap the item in the shot list, and it moves to the completed list, so as you work through your shoot in the Not Completed view, your next shot will automatically make it’s way up to the top of the list. I actually prefer to use the To Do section for my shot list, because this also gives me a text field for notes, into which I type the names of family member, so that I can take a sneaky look if I should forget someones name during the shoot. This isn’t so important for people that I’ve shot before, but I’m not good with names, so I like to list new client’s names just in case.

I did the shoot with just my wife as my assistant, and as there was so much to do, I wasn’t able to get loads of behind the scenes footage, but I did get a couple of shots that we can take a look at. In this first shot you can see that I used a Westcott 7′ Octabank to throw light into the kitchen, which was the main location for the shoot. These large doors open up wide enough for the majority of the Octabank to be able to pump light into the room and there was a little space to the left of it for me to stand and shoot.

Making Sun

To light the living room area, which was to be the background for many of the shots, we used a 3×4′ Profoto softbox, again right up against the second window. To maximize the light that entered the room, we removed the bug screen from the right side of the window, and I also used a boom here for two reasons. The first and main reason being that the deck on which we perched the light stand ran out a few inches short of where I would have liked to have the light stand. To get the softbox in the middle of the window I need to be a little bit further to the right, so the boom allowed me to do this. Also, having used the boom like this, we didn’t have the light stand smack in the middle of the route off the deck and out of the gate there.

As we can see in this next photo, there was a third window out on the road side of the room, which we pumped a third Profoto D1 Monolight into, not just to add extra light to the room, but also to stop that window from falling dark, as it would without the extra light here.

More Lights Outside

Finally, in this next shot we see a fourth monolight inside the kitchen, to fill in what would have otherwise been pretty harsh shadows on the side of the faces of people in the kitchen for some of the photos I shot. These second two behind the scenes shots were actually from a little later in the day, as I tested the lights for another family shoot, but it’s very similar to how we started out.

Ligthing Shot

In this next portrait of the three sisters, I’d actually got that fourth monolight closer to the doorway, just to my left. I was literally standing in that little gap to the right of the octabank. If you are wondering why we even used studio lighting for this shoot, we basically needed to overcome the sunlight, which only hits certain parts of this room, even at mid day, and model the light for a more pleasing look.

Three Sisters at Breakfast Counter

The idea is to fill the room with enough light to make it possible to shoot with an aperture of F5.6 at ISO 100, for 1/160 or 1/200 of a second shutter speed. When I needed a slightly deeper depth of field, I went to F8 and changed my ISO to 200, so that I didn’t have to change my lights. I purposefully turned off the Profoto Air Remote that was on the top of my camera to stop my lights from firing and exposed one frame to show you how dark it was in this room without the lights, but there’s not much point in posting it here, as it was almost completely black. There were just a few shapes in the shadow that you can just about see, so pretty much all of this light is coming from my Profoto monolights.

With the large softbox to my right as I shot this, I had some beautiful soft light coming in and hitting the side of the three sisters faces, and the light to my side filling in the shadows just enough to reduce the contrast, but not so much that it destroyed the shadows on their faces, as you can see with the shadows of their noses and cheeks etc.

Profoto Glass Dome for D1 Monolights

Note too that I have the monolight inside the Octabank fitted with a glass dome from Profoto, made for the D1′s, which basically spreads the light out much wider to really fill the Octabank with light, so it really does give me a wide enveloping light source, with very little light falloff at the edges of the front diffuser panel.

Ideally I would have liked the Octabank to be a little bit higher, but with the restriction of having to shoot in through the doorway, it couldn’t be lifted up any more. Later in the day when this did cause a bit of a problem, we poked the Octabank inside a little, and raise it up maybe a foot, but that was about all we could manage. Still, I’m quite pleased with the results here.

As I also mentioned last week, in my review of the ThinkTank Photo Airport Security V2.0 Rolling Camera Bag, I took some wide angle lenses to this shoot, as we’d hoped to try and get some wide environmental portraits of the three sisters in their kimonos in the newly refurbished kitchen. First, here is one of the resulting shots (left) at 16mm, which is has so much distortion that it’s really not a flattering image at all. To overcome that to a degree, I grabbed my 24-70mm lens, and shot three vertical images, which I later stitched together in Photoshop.

Heavily Distorted 16mm Shot

Three Shot Pano

Of course, this now has barrel distortion, because I panned around from the same point, as I couldn’t really move across the scene here, but the faces in the shot are much more flattering in this version. Neither are really very good, but we tried at least. Luckily this was not on the must have shot list. That was covered by the image we looked at before these.

Once we’d bagged a nice shot or two of the three sisters in the kitchen, the plan was to have their mother join the group. We moved the sister who’s house it was around to the inside of the counter, and had the Mom sit between the two younger sisters, and I asked if they had a magazine or something for them all to look at together. The big sister grabbed one of her photo albums, which got them all in stitches looking at old school photos etc. as we can see here.

Three Sisters and Mom

I really like this shot. The three sisters with their Mom in the middle, and they’re all having a great time. Of course, they would almost never all be in kimonos like this, but that’s what makes it so special. It’s as though they are all together for a special occasion, and reminiscing over something, which in many ways, they were.

Three Sisters on the Deck

Before the ladies changed out of their kimonos, we had an idea for one last shot, which we see here (right).

We were able to go up onto the balcony of the house next door to shoot down onto the wooden deck that they’ve also just had built. We pulled the bug blind across to darken down the kitchen and and focus our attention on the sisters in their kimonos.

This was lit with just the Octabank, and we do have a problem in that the sky behind me looking down in very bright, with the sun just hidden behind the balcony I was standing on, but still causing the sisters to squint a little as they looked up. I was also shooting between two slats above the deck, which is why we get a slightly forced rotation, but I still quite like this shot. It was probably the best of this batch from the deck, though we got a few nice head and shoulder shots too.

It’s important to plan the flow of the shoot to make the most of the time that your client’s are paying for, so while the ladies changed out of their kimonos for some casual clothes shots, we grabbed the octabank and 3×4′ softbox to go to the man of the houses mother’s house, where we shot her with the grand kids for his Mom’s year end cards. We got the standard shots to feed the shot list, but personally, this next image is my favorite from this location.

With the Grandkids

The young guy here is remarkably relaxed here, for him, and I captured a tender moment for the family. None of their eyes are visible in the shot, but that isn’t always necessary in my opinion. This just works on a number of levels.

Again, the main light here is the Westcott Octabank pushed up against the outside window, and the 3×4′ Profoto softbox is in the room to camera right, to fill in the shadows a little, but not too much. I was also conscious here to ensure that Grandpa, who’s unfortunately no longer with us, was able to be in this family shot via his photograph in the back there.

Having used the time well, we went back to the main house and had more sessions with the sister’s families. I’m not going to include shots from each session, but here are a few more to finish with. For example, here’s a nice normal portrait of the main family…

Happy Family

That was actually one of the last shots that we got though, after bribing the boy with a Macdonalds or something. Up to that point, the son had other ideas. He’d actually brought a wooden sword to the shoot, and spend most of the time pretending to be a samurai…

Family Portrait

Which earned him a bit of friendly frustration from Dad, as we can see here.

End of the Road

After this session we did a few more shots back out of the deck, as the families wanted some photographs with the garden in the background. Here’s one of the youngest sister with her new husband, shot with the 50mm F1.2L lens.

Happy Couple

There are some hotspots in the background where the sun is catching the trees, and I’m not fond of the drainage pipes that form shapes on the wall to the right, but we got what we were asked to do here, and the clients are happy with the results. I was happy to get some nice natural expressions too.

To finish up, we shot the three sisters out on the deck together, for this last shot.

Three Sisters

I’m actually breaking a whole bunch of rules here, because I actually have these three ladies standing directly in front of the softbox, and that’s the only light, so you’d think we’d have really flat light, but I actually split the light into two, by standing directly in front of it myself. If you click on the image to show it full sized on my blog, you can make out a horseshoe shaped catch-light in their eyes, which is basically me standing in front of the huge Octabank. Because I did this, we still got some nice shadows and definition in the faces, and I of course had balanced the exposure so that the ambient light in the background was just overexposing where the sun hit some of the foliage, so there was also more natural light hitting the subjects too. All in all I think it turned out quite well.

Client Deliverables

This family had booked me with my Gold Package, which basically includes a two hour session which we extended for the additional subjects, and it also contains a bunch of prints that I’m going to start working on as each family decides which of their respective photos they want me to print for them.

I don’t just give my clients a DVD with all of the full sized images on, as I want to be in control of the quality of any prints made. They each get a Web album with the images numbered, so that they can let me know which they want printed. As including portraits like these in New Year postcards is popular here in Japan, I do provide the clients with a DVD with images resized large enough to be able to print a postcard at 300ppi, and these are also a good size for computer desktop wallpaper etc.

To provide this image data, I also create a DVD that I send to each family. I try to select a nice shot from the shoot to put on the label as you can see here. I’ve blurred out the names for privacy sake, but you can see that these are usually quite a nice memento from the shoot.

Client's DVDs

I received an email earlier today that these DVDs had arrived and the client is very happy with these and the overall experience. It makes me so happy to be able to help people to create memories like this. Although I love my nature and wildlife work, this side of my business is incredibly fulfilling, and I’m really looking forward to doing more and more now that I’m officially back to taking on assignments again.

How’d the Profoto BatPac Do?

I did also want to update you on the fact that I had two to three monolights working from the Profoto BatPac for the majority of the shoot, and at some points I had all four lights running off of it. I had them all set in battery mode, to purposefully slow down the recharge time, so that they didn’t try to suck too much energy out of the battery after firing, but apart from the odd time when I’d inadvertently take two shots consecutively and making all of the monolights scream as they warned me that they were not yet up to power, the BatPac held up very well.

I shot some 570 frames over the three and a half hours, all of which had a minimum of two monolights on the battery, usually three, and sometimes four, and it just kept going. I think Profoto have purposefully under stated the potential of this battery in their specs. It certainly outperformed them, so I’m very happy with this unit.

Car Loaded - Ready to Go!

How About the Airport Security V2.0 Rolling Camera Bag?

As I said last week, this was also the first assignment on which I used the ThinkTank Photo Airport Security V2.0 Rolling Camera Bag. You can check out the full review of the bag in Episode 309 of the Podcast, but just to close the loop on that, the bag totally lived up to expectations. It’s tough, holds a ton of gear, and although the security measures make it a relatively weighty bag, the fact that you can roll it around makes it really useful for this kind of shoot.

Thank You!

Before we finish, I’d like to say a huge thank you to this family for allowing me to make these memories with you again this year, and for allowing me to share the resulting images here on my blog and Podcast. And of course, thanks to all of you for listening.

Show Notes

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

Audio

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ThinkTank - Airport Security V2.0 Rolling Camera Bag

First Impressions

When the Airport Security V2.0 bag arrived, I was initially impressed even by the packaging. I could tell even as I opened the box that ThinkTank Photo are proud of their products. The build quality of the camera bag itself confirmed this of course — it’s incredibly well built.

The materials, the zips, the TSA approved combination locks and roller wheels themselves, everything is top quality and feels great to the touch.

There’s also a metal plaque on the back with a security code to help locate the bag if it gets lost, which may or may not be of help if the bag is stolen, but if it is genuinely lost, this should help. Even just the way it is riveted on though, with a rubberized frame around the plaque seems to add to the overall feeling of quality of the bag. Very nice workmanship all round!

Security Features

It’s not called Airport Security for nothing. The bag incorporates a TSA approved combination lock, that you clip the two main compartment zips into, and there’s a steel wire attached to the inside of the front top pocket that is also fitted with a combination lock. You can use this to attach to a second bag, or any valuables you might have in the outer pockets.

There’s a third combination lock in a panel behind the shoulder straps in a compartment in the back of the bag, with a very thick and reasonably long steel cable that you can use to secure the bag to a metal pole or other immovable object, if you really have to leave your bag somewhere, like at the side of a conference room as you shoot an event.

TSA Approved Lock

Steel Cable and Lock Built into the Frame!

Obviously this is not going to totally prevent someone from stealing your bag if you leave it in public all day, but the thick rear cable is built into the framework of the bag, so coupled with engaging the zip combination lock would certainly make this a tough target for something with a mind to walk away with you gear. I also usually loop the straps of my bag around my leg even if I’m going to grab forty winks in an airport lounge, but with this cable you could literally strap the bag to the frame of a metal bench or chair that you often see in airports.

There’s also a business card holder on the top of the bag, which you can use to tell your bag from others on an airport conveyer should you have to check your bag. I think of all my camera bags, this is probably the only one that I feel I could check if I really had to. I really don’t like the idea that the people with the ability to open the TSA locks though, have been filmed systematically rifling through peoples’ bags in the past though, so I’d still be worried until I got my gear back in one piece. If I had to check it though, this would be the bag to do it with.

Emergency Shoulder Straps

As I just mentioned, there are shoulder straps in a compartment in the bag of the bag, if you end up having to carry the bag for a way, but with all the security features and solid build, the bag is relatively heavy, so you really should think of these as an emergency measure rather than a regular way to carry the bag around. This bag is a classy, solid bag that hold a lot, but it’s designed for security and to be rolled, not carried.

Emergency Shoulder Straps

Side Pocket

Rolling Handle

The front pocket has lots of compartments for your valuables when traveling, as well as pens etc. for filling out those pesky customs forms when you fly. There’s also a good sized side pocket on one side. This is the opposite side to the side carrying handle, but it’s also the side to which you attach the tripod holder, so you might not won’t to fill it with fragile objects if you intend to also attach a tripod.

There’s  a compartment on top of the bag, under the carrying handle that contains a rain cover that totally envelops the bag when used. This is very important if you should get caught in the rain, or find yourself on a speeding boat with lots of spray etc. I dare say it would keep out dust and sand if you found the need for this too.

Everything has it’s own place, and a compartment to hide it away when not in use, and the handle for when you are rolling the bag is no exception. Open the zip behind the top handle to reveal the handle, and push the button to lift it out. It’s a good solid handle, and clicks into place at various heights. The highest position is really a good height, so even if you’re on the tall side, you’ll be fine with this bag.

What’s in the Bag?

OK, so that takes care of the outside details, let’s take a look inside…

Because the bag incorporates the handle for when you roll the bag, there’s a section down most of the back that is slightly raised, but you can generally arrange the bag so that this doesn’t get in the way too much. For example, as you can see here (right) the bag is deep enough at the bottom to fit a 70-200mm F2.8 lens in without having to lay it down, which would take up more than twice the space.

As I said, this is my portraiture kit, so I’ll take you through what’s in the bag and why I lay it out this way.

What's in the Bag?

I have it set out so that I have zooms down one side, and primes down the other, with the longer focal length at the bottom in each column. I’m showing the bag sideways in this photo though, so that you can see better.

The primes run down the left side, or the bottom, as we look at the photo, starting with the 135mm F2 at the bottom of the bag. Then we have the 85mm F1.2 above that, followed by the 50mm F1.2 and the 14mm F2.8 to finish the left bank.

These are the wide aperture primes that I really like to use for portraiture, but depending on the shoot, don’t always use them as much as I’d like. When shooting groups of people, I often have to stop down the aperture more than I usually would anyway, to ensure that I get every ones’ faces in focus, and I often need the versatility of a zoom when working at peoples’ homes, as I can’t step very far backwards or forwards to zoom with my feet, so I rely on zoom lenses more than I’d like too. They are on the right side of the bag, starting with the 70-200mm F2.8 at the bottom (or far right of this photo), followed by the 24-70mm F2.8 and the 16-35mm F2.8 above that.

Some of these lenses of course are not what you’d commonly think of as portrait lenses, but for the shoot I’m doing this coming weekend, we are hoping to get some environmental portrait shots with a number of people in a largish room, which will require some wide angles. The problem of course is that wide angles are not very flattering for portraits, so I’m also keeping the possibility of doing a multiple shot stitch using images from a slightly longer focal length, which should look a little better from a portraiture perspective. If I can get approval to share the resulting images, I’ll hopefully be able to share my experiences with you later.

Keep it Organized

I like to keep the lenses in an order like this, so that I know exactly where everything is when I reach into the bag for something. It depends on which bag I’m using, but having some sort of policy that I stick with makes life easier in a fast paced shoot.

What's in the Bag?

Oh, and the bodies in the middle are the 5D Mark II at the bottom, and a 1Ds Mark III above it. Two straps for the bodies are above that, and then the Black Rapid Twin-Strap at the top center. I switch between straps as makes sense during the shoot.

In the top left is a light meter, which I use when working with studio lighting, and to the right is a bunch of neutral density filters for my lenses, in case I have to darken things down a little to maintain a slow enough shutter speed for my Profoto monolights when shooting with wide apertures.

You can also see that I have a battery in the bottom pocket of the front flap, and next to that is my Angle Finder C, in case I want to get down low for a dramatic angle. I don’t have my rocket blower or lens cloths in here, as I keep them in my photographer’s vest pocket. I do have my ColorChecker Passport, some lens cleaning fluid and some other maintenance stuff in the side pocket as well. I’ll have a couple of Profoto Air Remotes to fire my monolights which I’ll attach to the top of each camera while I shoot and an Air Sync to attach to my light meter, to fire the flashes from the meter to get a reading.

I’ll try to talk more about the monolights later if possible, but for now, here’s a fun photo that I also shot yesterday when I was testing using my four Profoto D1 500 monolights with the Profoto BatPac, which is basically a large powerful battery that I can run all four monolights for a few hundred frames on a full charge. This will be the first time I use the BatPac on a job, so I’ll let you know how that goes later too.

Four Profoto D1 500 Monolights on a BatPac

Conclusion

In short, I give a definite thumbs up for the ThinkTank Photo Airport Security V2.0 Rolling Camera Bag. This is a work of art in terms of camera bag manufacturing, and they have spared no expense on the real security measures that could save your gear in a pinch.

Most people reading this will know that I’m also a huge fan of Gura Gear’s Kiboko bag, and I’ll continue to use that for my nature work when I tend to cover more ground off road, and a rolling camera bag wouldn’t make much sense. But from now on, when I’m working on assignments, especially when the customer is around, the Airport Security V2.0 is going to be my bag of choice. It not only gives me the ability to carry a lot of gear, but being able to roll it will keep me from getting tired, and the bag itself just wreaks of quality, so will give my clients a great impression too.

Show Notes

Details of the Airport Security Rolling Camera Bag can be found on ThinkTank Photo’s Web site here:

http://www.thinktankphoto.com/products/airport-security-v2-roller-camera-bag.aspx

I was also on This Week in Photo again this week, which you can subscribe to in iTunes or listen to here:

http://www.thisweekinphoto.com/2011/twip-228-google/

Also, check the http://www.mbpworkshops.com/ Web site for details of the 2011 Snow Monkeys and Hokkaido Winter Wildlife Wonderland Tour, for which we still have a few spots left.

Music by UniqueTracks

Audio

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The first tour with both Chris and I will be from January 23rd to February the 3rd, then the German Tour will be from February 6th to the 17th. Details of both can be found on my Tour & Workshops Web site.

My original tour is unchanged from Feb 13th to the 24th, and this has now reached the numbers required to make it happen, but there are a few spaces left, so there are plenty of options here. If you want to join us, and one doesn’t match your schedule, hopefully the other will work for you.

I will be releasing another Podcast this week, so please forgive this shameless promotion, and if you already listened to this on the Tips from the Top Floor Podcast, you can skip this episode. You and I will catch up again for the Martin Bailey Photography Podcast, probably tomorrow (Nov 10, 2011). I’m hoping to walk you through Nik Software’s Color Efex Pro 4.

Listen here:

And here are a few examples of the sort of images we shoot on these Winter Wildlife Wonderland Tour and Workshops.

Oh, and if you’d like to be kept up to date on this and other tours, like the amazing Southern New Zealand Photo Adventure I’ve just released details of, please sign up for my newsletter.

Tanchou Study #7

Reverence

Eagle Eye

QI #2

Shadow Dancing

Tough Life!!

Steller's Sea Eagle at Dawn

Swan's Attention

Old Tree with Four Swans

Bihoro Pass

Show Notes

Sign up for Tour & Workshop Newsletters: http://blog.martinbaileyphotography.com/newsletter/

Music by UniqueTracks

Audio

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dd

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So, as usual, we’ll work through the winning five images in reverse order, and to kick us off in fifth place is ogonzilla or Omar Gonzalez, with “Weathered”, and here’s Omar’s back story.

My shot, Weathered, placed 5th so thanks. Nothing special here really. I struggled with this month’s assignment (as others seemed to) so I was happy when I came upon an aqua colored wall that provided both the before and after shots at the same time. One part of the wall was weathered with peeling paint while the other side was pretty much fine. I snapped the two shots and merged them using Mac Pages to make it seem that the “after” photo was taped to the “before” wall. Again, nothing amazing here…just happy I placed…so thanks again.

"Before/After" by Omar Gonzalez

Congratulations on placing Omar! I know that you were disappointed in the participation for this assignment as well, and that comes across in your backstory. You say that there’s nothing special here, but I tend to disagree. Firstly, you had the awareness to notice the scene, and link it to a possibility for the assignment, which was great. You merged the two shots together in a way that enhances your idea, as you say, looking like you taped the photo of the after image to a freshly painted wall. In any other assignment, this would have been against the rules, but for this one, we’d asked for two shots merged together, albeit originally suggesting side by side or above and below each other. You took the initiative to take the instructions and bend them a little, to make something very special in my opinion. I love the resulting photograph, and your ability to find subjects like this, and your initiative in the post processing. Excellent work Omar!

In Fourth place is epatten, or Eli Patten with “Before and After Cooking”, and here’s Eli’s backstory.

Thanks for the votes! Not much to say with this one – I assist at a nearby cooking school and so a lot of my photography involves friends cooking and food we’ve made. I figured most people would try a seasonal theme with this assignment, so I wanted to try something different and the food idea came to me while we were preparing a meal one day. I tried a few different arrangements of the before ingredients and after meal, but in the end my favorites of each were two different orientations and I had to crop them to get them to fit next to each other nicely. I shot these with my 1.8 Canon 50mm lens wide open on my XSi, which gave me the look I was going for (on the back of the camera), but when I looked at it full size on my computer screen later, I wasn’t happy with the depth of field – it ended up being too narrow. Luckily when I made it smaller to upload them, it wasn’t as evident. That’ll teach me to not check the photos more closely on the camera’s viewfinder.

"Tomatoe Soup - Before/After" by Eli Patten

Overall though, I’m very happy with how my first MB assignment submission turned out. Thanks again for the votes, and thanks to Martin for all the work he does on the Podcast and Web site – I have just started getting serious with my photography this year, teaching myself, and your podcast has been an excellent source of information and inspiration. Keep it up!

Thanks for those kind words Eli, and thank you for getting involved in the assignment. I’ve got to tell you though, I couldn’t disagree more about the depth-of-field. Of course, the way you’ve set up these shots and the off center merge is perfect, but I think the shallow depth-of-field adds so much here. You’ve taken what could have been something ordinary, and made it very special. Now, of course, I’m biased, as I use shallow depth-of-field a lot in my work, but I really think it works very well here. I also really like the highlights on the tomatoes, and in the resulting soup. The tight crop works well, albeit after the event to a degree, and the only thing your images leaving me wanting, is a taste of that soup! Excellent work!

Moving along, in third place is cheshirecat or Elise with “The Dog Show”, and here is Elise’s backstory.

Congratulations to Leslie for her win with ‘Happy” and to all of the others who placed. Thank you to all who voted for my entry. Unlike Leslie, I did not have any specific photo shoots lined up with the ‘before and after’ theme in mind. One weekend I happened to find an all-breed indoor dog show at a sports arena in a nearby town. There were many judging areas separated by portable dividers. The other free area was taken up with dog crates and grooming tables. Much of the bathing and grooming had already been done before the owners/handlers arrived at the show so that ‘before and after’ concept was not going to materialize. I have found that the more interesting photos are taken ‘behind’ the scenes and I spend several hours wandering around taking pictures.

"The Dog Show" by Elise Ange

At one point, a couple of the people who run the show came over to me quite upset that I was taking so many photos. They had contracted two professionals and were really concerned about what I was going to do with them. I mentioned that there were a lot of other people taking photos, to which they didn’t have a good response. It sort of ruined the fun I was having and I was glad that it was almost the end of the show.

Because of the artificial lighting in the arena, I converted most of the better images from the day into black and white. I liked the slightly out of focus one of the handler and his Afghan Hound entry in the show ring. Fortunately I had taken a shot of the hound being groomed before the judging. It made an interesting story for the theme.

Agreed Elise, it does make for an interesting story, with a nice twist on the Before/After theme. Sorry to hear about your experience, as it’s never nice to be confronted by people like that, but I think you handled it well. If there weren’t any “No Photography” signs, and it was a public event, then they really shouldn’t be hassling you, but I know this sort of thing leaves a nasty taste in your mouth.

I think the way you were able to get a shot of the same man and dog during preparation and during the show works very well, and I do like the action and movement in the show shot, compared to the relatively static preparation shot, adding an additional element of change between the two images. Removing the color when it gets in the way is also a great use of black and white. Great work!

In second place is Damian Diccox with “Be Thaw & After”, and here’s Damian’s backstory.

Wow, I’m amazed that I managed to place in an assignment. It does feel a little bittersweet that the assignment had so few entrants this month so I’m going to tell myself that it’s because the assignment was so hard (please don’t anyone burst my bubble here). All in all I’m very happy to have gotten so many votes.

I spent some time trying to figure out what to do for this assignment and I tried a few before and after dark photos but none struck me as being very compelling. I then tried before and after birth photos, pregnant belly to child, but my kids are getting too old to make that work well.

"Be Thaw & After" by Damian Diccox

Late in the month I got desperate and looked through some old photos for inspiration and when I came across the snow photo of my house from 2009 and I figured that I could recreate that in the sun. The shot itself wasn’t technically hard, just a handheld panorama of four or five shots in manual mode with the 35mm 1.8 that I’ve used for every assignment. It took me a few tries to work out where I was standing for the original picture but after seeing the visual cues from the first [shot] I think that I was pretty close, It was an interesting exercise to locate my past self. I asked my wife what she thought of my entry, she told me that I should have cut the grass and moved the trashcans, but I think that she was just trying to put me to work.

It is said often by others but I’d like to state the respect and admiration that I have for Martin and the mark he is leaving on the photography world, I’m still totally enjoying the podcast after years of listening, we are all learning and growing together, what a great community.

Wow! Praise indeed there Damian, thanks very much for that, and thank you for sticking around. You’re part of what make this community great.

I love your entry by the way. I think you did an excellent job of recreating the image two years on, especially considering that it was a stitched panorama. Pretty much all of the lines are exactly the same, and with it being a panorama they both fit on the screen at once, so it’s easy to enjoy the two images. Of course the biggest thing that makes this image is the total contrast between the two images. With trees bare of leaves but heavy with snow and the full white coverage of snow that I can almost hear, or not hear for that matter, as it dampens the sounds in the neighborhood, and I can almost feel the cold. But then in the bottom picture, I can almost feel the warmth and hear the birds singing, and perhaps even the buzzing of a bee as it busily makes its way past you as the create your photographs. I love images that make me imagine what it would be like to be there, and these two shots do that so well. The only thing that bothers me about your summer time photo Damian is the trashcans and long grass… Just kidding. Great work! Well done indeed.

And in First place is Super Digital Girl otherwise known as Leslie Granda-Hill with “Happy”! And here’s Leslie’s backstory.

Congratulations to all the winners- this month really had a diverse assortment of entries! The concept for my entry “Happy” came to me as soon as I knew the assignment [theme]. I was already planning on shooting the annual clown convention that is not too far from my town. It is rare that the monthly assignments line up with an event or subject that I am already planning on shooting for the month- so I was determined to get the shots I envisioned for this month. When I got to the location I had to find a subject. I started asking some of the clowns if they would be interested in posing for the shots. It took a while to find someone that was right and would cooperate.

"Happy" by Leslie Granda-Hill

I was very lucky to happen upon “Happy” the clown. She was staying in the same hotel and we made the arrangements to meet the next morning. I had brought a pop-up black velour background that I used near a glass door to shoot the initial image knowing that I would need to use the same set up for the final image. “Happy” was a great subject to shoot. She let me photograph the whole process from start to finish, filling me in on all the details of face-paint and clown costumes. I love many of the shots I got between the before and after. As it turns out she was a microbiologist for 40 years and now is an ordained minister. She has entertained at 2000 birthday parties! I couldn’t have gotten luckier with finding the perfect person to photograph for this months assignment. I have often found that shooting for the assignments pushes me a little further than I might ordinarily go, knowing I have a certain deadline and am up against some photographers with terrific and original ideas. Thanks to all that voted for my entry. I am certainly very “Happy”!

Well Leslie, I’m very happy too, as I’m sure everyone else was or will be when they see your winning images. The backstory is incredible too, and this is exactly the sort of thing that I meant by what I said about getting involved in these assignments during the intro, which I wrote in my manuscript before reading your backstory I should say. I’m so pleased that these assignments push you a little further, and your resulting images always show that, as do the amount of votes you get from the community.

Your planning for this shoot was incredible, right down to the pop-up velour background. Your use of the ambient side light makes for a beautiful portrait to begin with, but then you have the second image with the lady made up as the clown with exactly the same pose, right down to the expression on her face. I also find it fascinating that the lady has her mouth in almost exactly the same shape as before, yet the Happy clown make-up turns it into a smile. This is obviously what the make up is for, but it’s ironic, with the two crucifixes on her cheeks too, above what we could perceive as tears. Your subject has a sense of calmness and distinction about her that really just amplifies your excellent choice in subject. Congratulations on first place, but more so, on the realization of such a wonderful photography project. Now I just need to go off and see if I can find the rest of the photos online too. Excellent work Leslie, as usual.

So, once again, do try to get involved in these assignment folks. I know that life often catches up with us, and I myself don’t enter every month, but I’m always happy when I do, and feel as though I’ve grown a little as a photographer by trying.

Note that the October Assignment which was on the theme of “Hands” is currently open for voting, until the end of November 7^th in just three days now, so do come along and vote please at http://www.mbpgalleries.com, and also note that the theme for November 2011, is “Machinery”. It’s open to interpretation, but this should be a relatively easy assignment to shoot for, so give it some thought to ensure that your images stands out. Do be careful shooting for this one too, if you end up near machinery that you wouldn’t normally get close to. We don’t want anyone getting hurt for the sake of a photograph.

Your entry has to have been shot during November 2011, so you can’t just rifle through your image archive for this, and you’ll have until the end of the last day of November to upload, no matter what time zone you live in. I look forward to seeing your entries. You can see the posting guidelines etc. in the Assignment forum at www.martinbaileyphotography.com/forum/ if this is your first time getting involved.

End Notes:

And talking of winners, before we finish, I’d quickly like to let you know that we drew the winner the Drobo giveaway that we kicked off three weeks ago. Nat Parnell from the UK will be receiving a nice shiny 4 bay Drobo very soon. After a little communication, it seems that Nat is a very talented Web Designer, with lots of recent work to take a look at over at http://threethings.co.uk/, so do check that out if you are interested in getting a professionally build Web site made. Congratulations to Nat on your new Drobo. You’re going to love it, I assure you.

Also note that I was a co-host on the This Week in Photo Podcast again this week, so do check that out as well, by searching for TWiP or This Week in Photo in iTunes or going to the www.thisweekinphoto.com Web site. Episode #226 should be in the pipe no too very long after I release this MBP Podcast episode.

Show Notes

Assignment Scores: http://mbp.ac/2011scores

Nat Parnell’s Web Design site: http://threethings.co.uk/

Music created and produced by UniqueTracks.

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I kind of take being able to communicate with Graham for granted, because we’ve been friends for a number of years, and Graham has been on my Japan Winter Wildlife Tours three times now. Then a few days ago, Andrew Masur, a valued member of the MBP Community mailed and asked if it was possible to do an interview, because Graham’s work is so beautiful. Thanks for the suggestion Andy! I hope you enjoy this too.

Listen to the Audio here:

Graham has won a number of major photography competitions…

• ANZANG Winner – Behaviour Section 2009
• ANZANG Winner – Expressive Section 2008
• Better Photography Photographer of the Year (image from Hokkaido) 2009
• Better Photoshop Photographer of the Year 2010
• Extreme Environment International Photographer of the Year 2010
• Winner Behavioural Section of the Art Wolfe ICPA (International Conservation Photography Awards)

Graham’s trip took him through the North East Passage from Murmansk to Anadyr. Along the way they visited Novaya Zemlya, Uyedineniya and Pakhtusova Islands, Severnaya Zemlya, Taimyr Peninsula, Mighty Lena River, Novosibirsk Islands, Indigirka River, Medvezie Islands, Aion Island, Kokyuchin Island/Kolyuchin Bay, Yttygran Island, Yanrakinnot Village/Pintegney Bay/Seniavinskiy Strait,Achen Lagoon/Preobrazheniya Bay and finally to Anadyr. Phew!!

The company that Graham travels a lot with again is Aurora Expeditions, who can be found at auroraexpeditions.com.au, and if you are interested in the tour of mine that Graham has been on three times, you can find details of that at www.mbpworkshops.com. We still have a few places left for the Feb 2012 tour as well, so take a look if you’re interested.

Here are the 10 images amazing images of Graham’s that we discussed.

Saint Basil's © Graham Morgan

Murmansk1 © Graham Morgan

Ice Bear © Graham Morgan

Atlantic Walrus © Graham Morgan

Pectoral Sandpiper © Graham Morgan

Ayon Island 1 © Graham Morgan

Ayon Island 3 © Graham Morgan

Wrangel Island © Graham Morgan

How to catch a reindeer © Graham Morgan

Better Half © Graham Morgan

Show Notes

Graham’s photos in the MBPGalleries.com site: http://www.mbpgalleries.com/index.php?cat=10011

Graham’s new Web site: http://www.gmorganphotography.com

To comment on Graham’s images, use the thumbnails on the Podcasts page here: http://www.martinbaileyphotography.com/podcasts.php?ep=305#Ep305

Aurora Expeditions: http://www.auroraexpeditions.com.au/

My Japan Winter Wildlife Tour details are here: http://www.mbpworkshops.com/

Music by UniqueTracks

Audio

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Last week I got an email from Julian Roberts in London asking if I could update this Podcast with my current preferences and I thought that was a great idea, so thanks for the idea Julian. Let’s take a look at the main photography related apps that I’m currently using on my iPad.

Use this audio player if you’d prefer to listen:

I won’t go into detail again on the non-photography related apps that I use, but I do just want to say that I am still using Evernote, Dropbox and Zinio to access notes and documents, and read magazines. These apps all have Mac clients available, so there was no problem when I switched from PC to Mac in January this year. How I use these services hasn’t changed. If you aren’t aware of these apps, go back and listen to episode 246 for more details. Now, let’s look at the new apps specifically for the photographer that I’m now using. These aren’t ranked in any specific order, but I’m going to start with my favorite photographer specific app.

FolioBook Photo Portfolio

FolioBook started out a bit flakey, but it’s been tweaked and recoded a number of times and is now my chosen way to show potential clients images and videos on the iPad. I don’t carry my MacBook Pro around with me all the time, but when I think there might be a chance to show my work, I drop my iPad into my bag, and there have been lots of occasions where I’ve show my work to people on the iPad, and people are always impressed, and it has led to new work on a number of occasions.

Photo display on the iPad has just been renovated with iOS 5, and we can now finally create and reorder folders on the iPad, but there is still no native way to reorder images, and UI is still the standard Photo App. With FolioBook though, you can create albums and add links to a fully customizable background, with both vertical and horizontal versions, so the photo and position of the links can be changed depending on how you are holding the iPad. There’s also a plugin that you do have to buy separately, that allows you to play video right there in FolioBook.

FolioBook Horizontal

FolioBook Vertical

(Note: Click on the thumbnails of the images at the bottom of this post to view them full size.)

I have created slideshows for most of the image that I want to show people, so I can just play those video, and as an example, I also recently created a subcategory for my new Motion Graphics intro and outro videos. You also have the ability to customize subcategories individually according to the kind of work you put into them. Another nice feature is the ability to lock FolioBook to changes until you turn the lock off in the iPad settings panel. This prevents clients from unwittingly entering the portfolio edit mode, which can confuse the hell out of them as they look at your work.

All in all, FolioBook is a very sleek way to view both collections of images and videos, and gives a very professional feel to your presentation, especially if you are careful about branding and how you categories your albums and content.

500px

500px

Released just last week, the new free 500px app is simply amazing. I’ve received varying views on 500px since releasing episode 295, An Introduction to 500px but honestly, I can’t understand how any photographer could flick through page after page of photography of the quality that they have on 500px, and not be inspired. Sure, you do see the odd image that doesn’t quite meet the stellar quality of the rest of the work on the site, but in general, it’s simply stunning, and this new app feeds it to you in true 500px style.

If you login, you get to view your own images, which is another great way to share your work with friends or even clients, as it looks so good. You can also view a stream of recent uploads from people that you follow, as well as viewing your favorites. The Popular, Editors Choice, Upcoming and Fresh streams are breathtaking most of the time, available to anyone, even if you aren’t a member. The app is totally free, so do yourself a favor and grab a copy. I guarantee you will be impressed and inspired.

Light It Digital Magazine

Light It Magazine

The Light it Digital Magazine from Kelby Training was released a month or so ago, with the first issue free. Future episodes will be available on a pay per copy or subscription basis, but if you do any kind of studio lighting, do grab the app and check out the free first issue. There was only one article that I stopped reading part way through, but I read every other article, and that’s very rare for me. There was a little repetition, but even that was interesting enough, because the articles were written by different people, and they are all well know photographers like Frank Doorhof, Jeremy Cowart and the first Feature Story was by Zack Arias, so you really can’t go wrong for $0. I will be buying future issues as they come out though. So far I’m impressed with the quality of the magazine.

KelbyTraining.com

Kelby Training

If you subscribe, as I do, and you own an iPad, I’m sure you already have the Kelby Training app, but it’s certainly worth a mention. This app is basically a window to your online Kelby Training material for the iPad and iPhone. Basically, if you have Internet access, you have every video that Kelby Training has released right there in the palm of your hand. I was recently asked if I’d recommend Kelby Training, and to answer, I checked my subscription history. I first subscribed on Sept 1^st, 2009, and I’ve renewed within two weeks of that date for the last two years. I guess this tells me that there’s rarely more than a few weeks goes by before I want a fix of education and inspiration, so I just keep on signing back up.

The quality of courses is top notch, as are the instructors for each video. Some help me learn new stuff, some affirm old skills, and then others are simply great for getting inspiration and keeping me steeped in the world of photography. I highly recommend Kelby Training and the iPad/iPhone app is a great way to consume it.

PhotoVerse

PhotoVerse

PhotoVerse is basically a list of Photography related blogs and Podcasts, that shows you all of the content in one place. It’s well organized into a number of different categories and the guy that wrote this just told me that he’s recently updated PhotoVerse so that he can update the blog content now without releasing updates of the app itself, so it should go from strength to strength now. I’ve found a number of blogs that I would not have known about without PhotoVerse, so I’m happy to have this.

The Photographer’s Ephemeris

The Photographer's Ephemeris

When it comes to getting times and azimuth for the rise and set of the sun and moon, I still use VelaClock on my iPhone more, because my phone is always with me, but on the iPad, especially when working with a group, I use The Photographer’s Ephemeris. It’s great to have a full sized iPad app for this, and the lines that are automatically drawn on the map, showing exactly where the sun will rise and fall, and you can move a slider to track exactly where it will be at any time during the day, which is great for planning, though I have never taken my iPad out with me and used this feature in the field. This app is definitely worth picking up though, even if you only intend to use it when planning where you need to be on photography trips.

Snapseed

Snapseed Help

OK, so last, but by no means least, is Snapseed from Nik Software. Now, I have to tell you that I resisted buying this app at first because I couldn’t see the point of working on images on the iPad. If I want to work on an image, I’ll do it on my computer, with the full sized RAW files, or a 16bit TIFF or Photoshop PSD file. But I decided that for the price, which is less than $5, it was probably worth buying just to see what is was like, and I was totally impressed.

I still won’t use this as a way to edit images in my digital workflow, but you know what? This app is so quick and fun to use, that you can just sit there and show people the sort of effects that you can get with the full blown Nik Software plugins, as a demonstration. I can pull up a color image for example, and in just a few taps, create a Color Efex Pro 4 style high contrast, high tonality image, or a Silver Efex Pro 2 style high structure and contrast black and white. The sliders to vary the amount of the filter applied, and ability to be able to switch between effects by sliding up and down on the screen are very intuitive, and I can literally show someone what I can do with there images right there, and we can see the effect real time.

Snapseed Before

Snapseed After

There’s a Compare button, which shows you your original image before changes as you add each filter or effect, and once you are done, you can save your image and move to another module to build on your changes. An added bonus is that you can also have all this fun on your iPhone as well if you have one. And that’s exactly what it is, a lot of fun. I sometimes crank up Snapseed now when I’m on a train, and before I know it, I’m at my destination but I don’t want to get off, I’m having so much fun messing around with Snapseed. So, although I still don’t consider this part of my workflow, it’s a great way to demo what can be done to people on the go, and to just have a lot of fun with your images. Well worth picking up in my opinion.

What We Didn’t Include

Before we finish, I know that some of you will be wondering why I didn’t cover apps that help you to shoot remotely or transfer your images directly to the iPad etc. and the reason for that is that I’ve not had a need for this kind of workflow, and so haven’t looked into this. I do use my MacBook Pro and shoot tethered straight into Lightroom, where I can apply presets and start building preview files as soon as the images are shot. And I quite often use the Canon EOS Utility to shoot remotely, though Canon are currently a bit behind in updating this application for Mac OS 10.7, Lion, so I’m missing that right now, but not to the point where I’ve looked into creating an iPad based workflow, so I’m not including anything about that today.

If you hadn’t heard of some of these seven apps though, I hope that you give some of them a try, and find them as useful as I do. If you have any killer photography related apps that you’d like to share, by all means, post about the app in the comments below.

End Notes

As it’s not a native iPad app, I won’t include this in the main topic, but I did want to quickly mention my MBP Podcast Companion before we finish, as I do use the Depth of Field calculator a lot on my iPhone and iPad. I actually wanted to mention my app I’ve recently been asked to add a few new cameras, and some of the people that asked had a typo in their email addresses, so I couldn’t let them know that I’d updated the camera list. I also recently added a number of generic film sizes, so you can now use the app to calculate depth of field for film cameras too. These will be added to the app in the App Store soon, but for now, or if you ever request a camera to be added in the future, just go to the Camera list and click the Update button in the bottom right of the screen and you’ll see all new cameras in the list from that point on.

I also wanted to quickly mention that I was one of the co-hosts on the This Week in Photo Podcast last week with Frederick Van Johnson, Syl Arena and Alex Lindsay, so do check that out at www.thisweekinphoto.com if you are interest.

Show Notes

FolioBook: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/foliobook-photo-portfolio/id382451198?l=en&mt=8

500px: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/500px/id471965292?l=en&mt=8

Light It Digital Magazine: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/light-it-digital-magazine/id455243692?l=en&mt=8

KelbyTraining.com: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/kelbytraining.com/id435998113?l=en&mt=8

PhotoVerse: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/photoverse/id409160185?l=en&mt=8

The Photographer’s Ephemeris: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/the-photographers-ephemeris/id366195670?l=en&mt=8

Snapseed: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/snapseed/id439438619?l=en&mt=8

MBP Podcast Companion: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/mbp-podcast-companion/id370096838?mt=8

This Week in Photo #224: http://www.thisweekinphoto.com/2011/twip-224-canon-olympus-lytro/

Music by UniqueTracks

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I also spent the time this week to learn how to make a Motion Graphics intro with Adobe After Effects. Including the time looking at Lynda.com training material, this took me about 25 hours, for just 25 seconds of video, but it was a lot of fun. I hope you like it.

This video along with a few others will be slotted in between live content that my friends Joseph Cristina and Trevor Current over at DigitalPhotographyCafe.com will be streaming from the Photo Plus Expo in New York, on Oct 27 and 28, 2011. To check out the live content, visit http://www.digitalphotographycafe.com/live.

Don’t forget to hit the full-screen button  in the video window to go, erm, full-screen. If the full-screen button isn’t available, click on the Vimeo link and go full-screen from there.

Note that there is an iPod/iPhone version of this video in iTunes, but when watching on a computer, the video above is better.

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I’m really happy to tell you that we are also going to give away a drobo courtesy of Drobo, so stay tuned to see how you can be in with a chance to get your own four bay drobo, to protect your precious images and other data! First here’s my review of the Drobo.

Use this audio player if you’d prefer to listen:

First Impressions – Excellent!

When I unboxed the Drobo, I was immediately reminded of how it felt when I first opened my MacBook Pro box in January. I haven’t come across many companies that get packaging like Apple does but Drobo are very close. You’re greeted with “Welcome to the World of…” on the box as you open the outer box, then as you lift that first box out, the Drobo is in a nice black cloth bag with the word “drobo” on top in white. Very nice.

Welcome to the World of Drobo

Drobo Box Contents

The top box contains all you need to connect the Drobo to your computer, including both USB and Firewire800 cables. There’s also a nice printed manual. I was surprised to see this at first, and most companies now put their manuals on the CD along with the drivers, but on the day I unpacked the Drobo I had already had a busy day, and was ready for a bit of relax time, so I was able to take the manual down to the living room and read through it in front of the TV instead of having to read it on my computer, which was a nice added bonus.

The unit I got was a basic Drobo, with four bays. As 3TB drives are still quite expensive, I decided to use eventually four 2TB Hitachi 7200rpm drives. Drobo suggests either green drives which are slower, or up to 7200rpm drives for this model, but I generally try to buy the fastest drives possible, as this will effect read/write speeds, even if the USB and Firewire interfaces are going to become the bottleneck here. The Drobo does a lot of internal data handling between disks too, which is probably faster with faster drives.

Drobo Box Contents

To test how the Drobo automatically expands as you include more drives, I initially loaded just three of the four 2TB drives, and connected the Drobo to my MacMini. As I mentioned in Episode 293 when we discussed Backing Up and Accessing Photos from Laptops, I keep a MacMini turned on and connected to some of my hard drives all the time, so that I can access my images and other data from all around my studio and house, without having to physically be connected to the drives. I don’t use straight Network Storage, as I want to be able to install Backblaze so that whenever I copy anything new to these drives, it automatically gets uploaded into the cloud.

To setup and control your Drobo, you install a cool bit of software called the Drobo Dashboard that comes on the CD. You’re asked if you want to automatically install new software and firmware updates, which Drobo suggest you turn on. I did, as it seems that Drobo release updates to smaller groups of users initially to ensure that there are no problems before carrying out the automatic updates.

Create a 16TB Volume!

(Note: if you can’t read the text on these screenshots, click the thumbnails at the end of the post.)

Something that struck me as strange initially, but makes a lot of sense bearing the technology in mind is that Drobo advise you to create your initial volume at the maximum size possible, which is 16TB. This is to allow the drive to expand in the future if you run out of space. If you have all four bays filled and you do run out of space you just pull out one of the drives and put in a new larger one. Of course, you can only do one at a time with this unit because it only protects against one drive failure. By creating a 16TB volume to start with though, this allows you to install up to four 4TB drives in the future, and the drive will be able to grow to that size without having to be reformatted.

Once you put your drives in and select your format and give the volume a name etc. the Drobo takes just a few minutes to format the drives and ready itself to protect your data. Once it was ready, I copied 1.6TB of data to the drive to start some tests.

Relatively Quiet

Speed-wise, the drobo is as fast as my other external USB drives, though when connected with Firewire 800, it does get a little faster. The unit isn’t silent, but it’s much quieter than I expected it to be for a unit of this size, even when I installed four hard drives later. Sometimes it did get noticeably louder as it worked hard copying lots of data on a pretty hot afternoon in my studio, but it didn’t get loud enough to annoy me, and it was only when it was working hard. It runs very cool too, never getting warm to the touch, which is pretty impressive, especially when you consider how hot these drives get when they’re spun up. I know this because I use some of my drives just stuck into a device (as you can see in this photo) that allows me to use bare drives, and they get very warm.

Drobo with 3 Drives Loaded

You can also see that the Drobo looks great. All in all I found it to be very well engineered. You don’t need to use a screwdriver at any time either. You drop your drives in and they just click into place, and the front panel is magnetized so that you can just pull it off to get to the drives, and reattach it easily but securely.

 Guerrilla Test

Once the Drobo was set up and had a good amount of data on it, I decided it was time to do a few tests, so at 1:00PM on Oct 9 I pulled out one of the three 2TB drives while the Drobo was running, simulating a drive failure. Once I’d pulled out one of the three drives, I opened the Dashboard, and the drive was now marked with red, and the bottom of the three green lights on the Drobo turned red, indicating the drive failure.

Drobo Guerrilla Test

I opened the drop drive in the Finder though, to see that the data on the drive was fine, and I could still access and edit my images from Lightroom, which I tried just a few minutes after pulling out the drive, which I thought was pretty impressive.

This of course though now meant that there was no redundancy, so my data was not protected against one of the remaining two drives failing. To test the rebuilding of the data and getting back to a state where my data would be protected again, I put the fourth 2TB that I’d bought into the third bay on the Drobo.

Data Protection in Progress

With the new third drive installed, the Drobo took literally just a minute or so to prepare the new drive, and increase the available volume of the drive back to 3.6TB. Note that drive manufacturers count drive capacity differently to how computers calculate it, so a 2TB drive is actually only around 1.8TB to the computer, and because you need to spread the data for redundancy across the other drives in the unit, when you have three 2TB drives installed, this gives you 3.6TB of protected storage.

Although the Drobo increased the volume of my drive almost immediately, it actually took the Drobo about 15 hours to rebuild the redundancy data to once again be able to fully protect my data. I imagine this will also vary with the amount of data you store on your Drobo. I was able to use the Drobo the whole time, and I even copied some new data across while I was waiting for it to rebuild itself.

Drobo Healthy Again

Once the Drobo was healthy again and able to protect my data, the cool graphic showing the state of my Drobo turned back to green, and a message at the bottom of the screen told me that my Drobo was now healthy again and has sufficient capacity.

Stay Informed

In the Drobo Dashboard Preferences, there’s an option to setup mail alerts, which I did, so as soon as I pulled out the drive, I received an email telling me that the Drobo was in trouble, and then another when I put in a new drive, and the Drobo started to work towards getting back into a data protection state.

I also set up my MacBook Pro to accept Growl updates from my MacMini, so as long as I’m somewhere in my house or studio, if something goes wrong with the Drobo, I’ll see this instantly on my screen, even though I might not have Mail open. I found that both of these ways of being kept up to date with the state of the Drobo give you peace of mind, especially when you’re out and about. Even if I couldn’t get home immediately to correct the problem, I could alert someone at home to take action, such as going out and buying a new drive to replace a failed one, which is pretty comforting to know, especially as my wife is totally non-technical, but although it would freak her out, I know that it would be easy enough for her to be able to do.

Increasing Capacity

Once I’d confirmed that the Drobo was now working normally with the three 2TB drives installed, I did my last test, which was to increase the capacity using the fourth drive I’d bought. Having reformatted the drive, because it was the one that I’d pulled out the previous day to simulate the failure, I inserted the fourth drive while the Drobo was running.

Drobo Capacity and Tools Menu

Again, literally within about a minute, the drive was prepared for use, and my available volume jumped from 3.6TB to 5.42TB. When you only have three hard disks in the unit it has to share the redundancy data for each drive across the other two, so for your 5.42TB of disk space, 3.6TB seems quite small as you use one third of the capacity for redundancy. When you have four drives installed though, the redundancy data is spread across three other drives, not just two, so you get to use more of the installed capacity. So for the actual capacity of four 2TB drives, which is 7.27TB, I get to use 75% of that, giving me a nice beefy 5.42TB of protected data.

Still Need a Backup Regime

Even though the Drobo does a great job of protecting your data, as we’ve discussed in the past, your precious images should always exist in three places to be totally safe. You still need to ensure that you have at least one more backup of your images close by, and ideally you’ll have at least one more copy of your data offsite, in case something should happen to your home or office.

I generally have at least two copies of my images in my studio, usually three, and then one that automatically gets uploaded to Backblaze giving me a copy in the cloud. At the end of each year I also send a hard disk with all my images on to my brother in the UK as another off-site storage solution. If you value your images and I know that you do, then do try to ensure that you have a good backup regime in place, and don’t rely just on one device, even the Drobo. You never want to be in a position where a natural disaster or single point of failure could result in you losing all of your work.

Conclusion

I’ve been aware of and secretly lusted after a Drobo for a number of years now. Since shifting to a MacBook Pro as my main computer I’ve been using multiple external drives to store my data on, and although this works, it’s always a bit of a worry to keep them powered up all the time, as most external hard drives are just single drives without any redundancy.

The Drobo

All of my drives run pretty hot too, which will doubtlessly reduce their lifespan, so there’s a contant worry that these drives will fail. The Drobo though removes that worry. With its great engineering and redundancy, as well as a really cool looking full featured Dashboard, it gives you a lot of peace of mind.

With this amount of storage I will be able to copy all of my data, not just my Photo Library which is currently about 2.3TB, and then as the data does grow, I’ll gradually switch out drives to larger ones as they get cheaper. The drives I take out won’t go to waste, as I have to have something to put my off-site backups on to send to my brother in the UK, and I don’t mind those backups being split across multiple drives.

For the studio, I’m seriously considering picking up a second four bay Drobo, and just setting that up to copy anything new from the first drive to the second drive every night, using the scheduled Copy functionality in the Dashboard, then I would be able to do away with all of my external drives, and just run the two Drobos. Just the time I’d save not having to mess around backing up to all of my external drives would probably pay for a second Drobo within a year.

Giveaway!

As I mentioned earlier, the kind folks at Drobo have agreed to giveaway a Drobo to a lucky winner picked at random from the list of people that register using a simple Web form. For your chance to win, just click the link below, and enter your details, and submit your form. That’s all you have to do.

http://info.drobo.com/l/2552/2011-10-10/BI3D8

Here’s the cool thing though. If more than one thousand people register, Drobo will give us two units, not just one, so don’t keep this Giveaway to yourself. Tell all of your friends, and let’s see if we can’t get two Drobos instead of just one.

The offer is open until midnight PST on Nov 1st, 2011. Then on Nov 2nd, Drobo will let me know who the winner or winners are and I’ll drop you a line with the good news.

Whoever wins, I know that you’re going to love your new Drobo, as much as I do mine.

Good luck!

UPDATE: The winner has been drawn! Nat Parnell from the UK will be receiving a nice shiny Drobo! Congratulations Nat! And thanks to everyone else that also registered.

Show Notes

Register for Giveaway: http://info.drobo.com/l/2552/2011-10-10/BI3D8

For more information on Drobo products, visit: http://www.drobo.com/

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

Audio

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Over the years, I’ve slowly changed how I make my images pop, and although I’ve discussed most of this in previous Podcasts, I’m going to briefly touch on this again, but let’s start with a bit of history.

Lens Quality Matters

Firstly, around eight years ago, I’d noticed that some of my images were pretty flat, and lacked contrast, and I remember someone telling me the last thing that I wanted to hear, and that was that my 100-300mm lens, one of three lenses that I’d been using for well over ten years, was a piece of crap. Until that point, I’d figured that a lens is a lens, is a lens. I’d just started using my first DSLR at the time, which was the Canon EOS D30, with the promise that I already had my three lenses, so all I needed to do was replace the camera body.

Well, if you know how many lenses I own now, you’ll be sniggering as you’ve probably witnessed me slipping down this very slippery slope, but basically, I pretty much immediately realized that two of my three lenses were indeed pieces of crap. The only lens that I could have kept was my 24mm F2.8 prime lens, but the 1.6X crop factor on the D30 caused me to set foot on that slippery slope and buy the old 17-35mm F2.8 lens, so I sold the 24mm. My mid-range zoom and long zooms were soon replaced too, and I noticed that my images now had much more depth and contrast. Luckily, now, some eight years on, even the crappiest kit lens is better than the my two old zoom lenses, so this is no long such an issue, but I mention this, because if you are shooting with really old lenses and unhappy with the image quality, it matters.

The D30 was a revolutionary camera, but the way it processed images did leave a lot to be desired. The JPEGs were OK-ish, but the RAW files were totally flat, and we didn’t have Lightroom and Camera Profiles back then to fix it. The only two options at the time were Canon’s Digital Photo Professional which remains the son of satin to this day, and never even get’s installed on my computers any more, or Photoshop. I remember that I would run entire batches of images through Photoshop, just automatically applying auto-curves, and watch the image just pop as the curves were applied.

Canon’s Picture Styles

With the 10D though, I think it was, Canon introduced Pictures Styles, which I thought was a huge step in the right direction. In my film days, I used to shoot FujiChrome Velvia which was really heavily saturated, as I’ve always been partial to very rich colors, and Velvia gave me exactly that. Now with the Landscape Picture Style, I could get that Velvia look from my DSLR. The problem at the time though, was that Pictures Styles are proprietary, and only Digital Photo Professional could develop RAW images and maintain the Picture Style.

Then Adobe developed Lightroom which I fell in love with from the initial Beta stages, although I was hesitant to shift my workflow to Lightroom because of a lack of Picture Styles. After a bit of experimentation though, I found that if I added between 25 and 50 on the Red saturation slider, and around 18 on the Blue and Green saturation sliders, the result was very much like the Landscape Picture Style, and my old Velvia positive film, so I was able to fully switch to Lightroom. I would apply this saturation to pretty much everything I shot during import, and it worked for most of my work.

X-Rite ColorChecker Passport

Adobe then developed Camera Profiles, that were very similar to Canon’s Pictures Styles, which I also tried from time to time, but couldn’t really beat my simple saturation boost. This brought us to around two years ago now, and at the end of 2009, and by now, I’d been happy with my images for a few years, and producing nice crisp, and punchy images, but then I bought an X-Rite ColorChecker Passport, and it transformed my photography again.

I reviewed the ColorChecker Passport and posted a video for Episode 227, at the beginning of 2010, which you can still go back to and check if you want, but basically, you include a ColorChecker Passport target in an image when you start shooting, and then later on your computer, you use that image to create a Camera Profile that you can apply to your images just the same as your would any other Camera RAW Profile, under the Calibration section in Lightroom or Photoshop Camera RAW. When you do this though, the colors in an image just pop right out at you. Taking my word on this and picking up a ColorChecker Passport was Jared’s major breakthrough following our recent conversation.

Let’s take a look at a couple of images that I sent Jared to convince him that the ColorChecker would make his images pop! Firstly, here’s a White Tailed Eagle that I photographed in Hokkaido just after releasing Episode 227. It’s not a bad shot, but it’s nothing to write home about either.

Eagle Eye (No Processing)

Next though, here’s the same image with a Camera Profile that I made from a photo at this location including the ColorChecker Passport. This profile has become my standard Clear Winters Day profile for my 1Ds Mark III. If you can’t see the difference here, go to the gallery at the bottom of the blog post and click on the thumbnail of the first image, then click the right side of it to switch to the second image. The difference is obvious, and if it isn’t, you have a bigger problem in the your computer display seriously needs calibrating.

Eagle Eye (with ColorChecker Profile)

One thing to note though, is that I don’t apply ColorChecker Passport profiles to all of my images. I usually do this when I feel that the color could be enhanced, or when I’m shooting something that I need to be color accurate. Even so though, I’m very happy with the depth and punchiness of my color work, and wasn’t obvious why this is until I really thought about it to answer Jared’s question. Here are a few other things that I always do.

Never Use AWB!

Firstly, I never use Auto White Balance. AWB is the daughter of satin and should be banished from the planet along with DPP. Sure, Auto White Balance can get you close, and it is a lot better than it was until a few years ago, but still, it’s the result of the camera taking a look at the colors in the scene and/or the color of the light that falls on a sensor on some cameras, and even that light is reflected onto the camera from the scene you are photographing. The result is that if you are photographing a field full of red flowers, the camera will think the White Balance needs to be more blue, and cool it down. If you are shooting a field full of blue flowers, the opposite happens and your White Balance is warmed up.

I once shot for a few hours with my AWB turned on by mistake, having made number of exposures from exactly the same location of exactly the same subject but with very slight movements of the camera, the color was shifting all over the place. I thought maybe this was so, and checked the White Balance and it was on Auto. If you want to get close, and will reset your White Balance to something constant in post, then break a leg, but personally, I would rather have everything constant from the get-go, so I shoot with either a preset, usually Daylight, or a custom white balance created from the gray card included with the ColorChecker Passport. Usually if I do a custom white balance, I then follow on and shoot the main color target on the passport, and create a camera profile to really snap the colors in, but just have control over your White Balance can make a huge difference just by itself.

Expose to the Right

I also pretty much always use Manual Exposure. This can be scary, but taking control of your exposure makes you consciously think about how you are exposing the scene. Unless I’m going for a low-key, or overall dark image, I expose to the right. We’ve covered this before too, but generally what this means is that I keep increasing my exposure changing the shutter speed until the brightest part of my image is just about touching the right side of the histogram on the back of my camera. Note too that if your camera has the ability to display an RGB histogram, turn it on. The standard gray histograms are displaying an average of the Red, Green and Blue channels, and this can give you a false sense of security. Depending on your subject, one of the channels can start to blow out, or become over-exposed before the other channels, and it’s sometimes only possible to see this with an RGB histogram. So when I say that I expose to the right that means that the right-most color channel is just about touching the right side. The two other channels might still be a way off, but you don’t want to blow out any of the channels, unless on purpose or for specular highlights.

The reason this will help with the overall punchiness of your images, is because you’ll probably end up capturing your images a little bit brighter than your camera would if you left it to its own devices. Nice bright images will generally be punchier. If you don’t expose your images like this, just try grabbing the exposure slider in Lightroom, Photoshop’s Camera RAW, or Aperture or whatever, and move it to the right until the histogram data just about hits the right side. You should be able to see that this makes your images look light and crisp. If the images appear to blow out when you do this, without your histogram running up the right side, then you have your computer display set too bright.

Shoot on Overcast Days

Another thing that I do is purposefully choosing overcast days to shoot on. Sure, the eagle shot that we looked at earlier was a beautiful clear day, and that works well, especially with a field of snow to bounce lots of light back into the underside of the bird, but a lot of the time, I head out on overcast days more than sunny days, especially for landscape work. When you shoot on overcast days, you don’t have bright reflections to deal with, and the sky is like a huge soft box, spreading light evenly and filling in the harsh shadows that a sunny day would create.

Take a look at this shot of a waterfall in the Oirase valley shot on an overcast day. There are a couple of things to note here. Firstly, if this had been a sunny day, the water would have reflected the light so much that had I tried to keep the water from over exposing, the surrounding greenery would have been much darker, and the shadow areas would have been totally plugged up and black. Also, the moisture in the air either from the waterfall or some light rain will have been keeping the surrounding foliage wet, and wet foliage is much more saturated color-wise. Pun intended.

Oirase Choushi Ootaki (Big Falls)

Shoot in the Shade

Note that even if you are going out to shoot a waterfall on a sunny day, try to find out what time of day it will be in the shade, perhaps shaded by the valley walls if they’re high enough. Although you’ll lose that soft box effect, it doesn’t necessarily have to be overcast, if you can find some good shade.

Something else to keep in mind though, and this will certainly improve the quality of light in your photographs, is try to get out to shoot during the Golden Hour around dawn or dusk. Because the sun is low in the sky the quality of light is beautiful and warm, and even if it’s direct sunlight, any shadows that are made at this time of day have a special quality. The light is just so much more pleasing than the harsh light of a sunny day.

My advice to shoot on overcast days or in the shade will help you to get nice saturated colors, but of course this depends on the kind of photography you’re doing. If you are shooting a beach scene, you may well want lots of sun, and a blue sky with some fluffy white clouds. Personally, as I look through my work over the last eight years or so, I can only find a handful of blue skies, in my landscape shots at least. They just don’t appeal to me. That really is my personal opinion though of course.

Black and White Skies

When I do include the sky, I generally want it to be thick with dramatic clouds, and then, I’ll usually end up creating a black and white image from the resulting shots. When there are patches of blue, I’ll generally still use that to create a dramatic black and white image, like this one from last weekend, that I shot with my Lensbaby Composer during a walk in the Shinjuku Gyoen Park here in Tokyo.

Cocoon in the City

I knew as I shot this that it would be converted to black and white, but sometimes I’ll try black and white on finding that the color doesn’t work the way I’d hoped. For the last few years I’ve done more and more black and white conversions, and now since Nik Software released Silver Efex Pro 2 that we looked at a few weeks ago in Episode 297, I really have fell in love with this process. This of course is not about punchy colors, but you have to admit that these contrasty black and white images have a lot of punch still. More so than a color image in some cases.

Nik Software: Color Efex Pro 4

I was a big fan of Silver Efex Pro even before the upgrade to version 2, and Nik Software have done it again with the last thing that I wanted to cover on this subject today. Even though I owned Nik’s Color Efex Pro 3, that was included in the Complete Collection that I bought a few years ago, I never really used it, and didn’t keep it as an option in my mental image enhancement toolbox. A few days ago though, I downloaded gave the brand new Color Efex Pro 4 a try, and have been blown away.

I love the dramatic skies that Silver Efex Pro gives me, and now, with Color Efex Pro 4 and the ability to use multiple filters simultaneously, I can bring out detail to create those dramatic skies in my color images as well. I’ve been back and reprocessed some of my Antarctica shots from March this year, and I really love what I can now do with Color Efex Pro 4. Here’s an example of one of the newly processed images, with a shot I called Iceberg Alley. This first image is my original processing, in which I did already bring out part of the sky and that beautiful blue ice just below the surface of the water.

Iceberg Alley (original processing)

Here though is the new version re-edited with Nik’s Color Efex Pro 4. Again, to really appreciate the difference, flick between these using the gallery at the bottom of the blog post.

Iceberg Alley (Color Efex Pro 4 Processing)

I’m not a fan of over-processed HDR images, but the effect I can get with Color Efex Pro 4 look to me like a really well done HDR. Lots of tonality and punchiness, so I figured it was worth a mention here today too. I’m going to be using this much more in the future. Remember that if you decided to buy this, or any of Nik Software’s amazing plugins, do use our code MBP15 for a 15% discount on your order, or click through from our banner on the right side of the blog.

By the way, once I’ve gotten a little more used to what Color Efex Pro 4 can do, I’ll produce a video to walk you through it, probably over the next couple of weeks, so stay tuned for that if you’re interested.

So, these are all of the things that come to mind as I’ve sought crisp and punchy images over the last eight years or so since picking up my first DSLR. I hope it’s been of some use.

Show Notes

ColorChecker Passport Review: http://mbp.ac/227

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

Audio

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Download this Podcast in MP3 format (Audio Only).

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Yesterday I received a really nice audio message from a couple of very good friends, Jack Andrys and Forrest Tanaka, which I inserted into the audio today. Thanks guys, you both rock, seriously.

Then this morning, I mentioned on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook that if anyone had a message for the 300^th episode, I’d include it and I received some great message! Thanks so much for those kind thoughts all. I really do appreciate it.

Now let’s take a look at the winning images from the August “Eyes” Assignment.

Assignment Winners

As usual, we’ll start with 5^th place, which was from David Bailey with “The eyes have it”. Unfortunately, David didn’t post a back story, so I can’t share anything with you on that, but I personally really like this image. David obviously either already had, or took the time to put together an amazing collection of eyes that look like they are for or from toys. There’s many different sizes and colors, and the thing that really makes this image for me is the strategic placement of the four large sets of eyes that are looking straight at the camera. These eyes have no whites, making them even more intriguing, and there are also a few sets of slightly smaller green eyes that also have no whites, and these grab your attention too. I can’t help thinking that the image is just a tad underexposed, but it really doesn’t detract from the image that much at all. The more you look at this, and the more it looks back at you, the better it gets. Great stuff! Congratulations on 5^th place David. Great name by the way!

The Eyes Have It © David Bailey

In 4th place is my image “Tree Frog Eyes”. I didn’t post a backstory either, but I did intend to share it with you all here, so here goes.

I did a bit of a Dan Newcomb last month, and hadn’t gotten anything for the assignment by the 30^th, but I had a bit of time free on that day, so I decided to go and do a bit of macro work in a nearby park. I had the Eyes assignment in mind as I shot, and was happy to find this tree frog sitting in the base of a large leaf. Initially I used my 100mm IS L Macro lens with a 25mm extension tube fitted, and got a number of shots that I liked. I was also using the Canon MT-24EX Twin-Lite which is two flash units fitted to the front of the lens, and you can angle them any way you want to light subjects very close to the front element.

Rain Frog Eyes © Martin Bailey

I walked away from the frog after getting some shots I was happy with, and had a few more hours walking around the park, photographing insects, and got another shot I was happy with of a Preying Mantis, but then towards the end of the day, after I’d switched to my MP-E 65mm Macro lens, which is the one that has no focus mechanism, just a zoom from life-size, to 5X life-size, and then you move the camera back and forth to focus. I decided to take a look to see if the frog was still there, and he was, so I grabbed a few more shots before I left the park. And, as you might have guessed, this frame was from my second short session with the frog, not the first batch. I did post some images from the first batch to my gallery as well, but this was my favorite. I just like the really big eyes and distortion that shooting this little guy at 2X life-size and getting really close enabled me to capture.

Thanks for those that voted for my image. I don’t enter every month, but it’s always nice to get some votes when I do.

In 3rd place is Mr Nikon, or Dan Newcomb, with “Foxy”. Here’s Dan’s backstory…

Congratulations to the other members who placed. There were some really great photos last month. Thanks for the votes and sorry for the late back story. I’m currently on a time lapse trip with my brother and the coverage was a little spotty in the desert.

Not much to tell about the back story to my photo Foxy. I was working in Whitehorse in the Yukon Territories and found myself with a day off. It was drizzling out but I decided to go to a nearby animal preserve. I was excited to learn they had a few lynx and some arctic foxes. I’ve photographed both of them in the wild before but this was a great chance to get up close and personal. When I got to the enclosures the lynx were doing a good job of hiding so I went over to the arctic foxes. These little guys were out and about and ready to be photographed. This time of year they loose their pure white coat. A sign warned not to get too close as they do bite. I placed my camera right up to the chain link fence and started firing away. Luckily they didn’t come close enough to bite me. I spent a number of hours at the preserve walking back and forth between the lynx and the arctic foxes. Besides the occasional downpour it was a very pleasant afternoon with some of my favorite animals. Thanks again for the votes!

Foxy © Dan Newcomb

And very well deserved votes they were too Dan. I love this shot. The pensive eyes, and the slight tilt to the head are wonderful, and that nose, slightly out of your depth of field making it look even softer is so cute. If these guys didn’t bite, I’d love to cup my hand around his mouth and nose and just scrumple it all up. I no scrumple isn’t a real word, but I can’t think of a better way to express this.

The shape of this foxes face is what every kid in the world would draw if you asked them to draw a fox, and I love toning you selected in your black and white conversion, and the tight crop works well too. A total favorite! Congrats on third place Dan. Great shot as usual.

In 2nd place is Super Digital Girl, or Leslie Granda-Hill with “Ostrich Eyes”, and here’s Leslie’s backstory.

I enjoyed seeing everyones interpretation of the theme this month. Congratulations to the winners- especially Cheshirecat for her fun and well executed image. For my image “Ostrich Eyes” I went to a farm that raises ostriches. I read about the farm in the newspaper and decided to contact the owner to see if I could take some photos. He was about to go on vacation so I had to get there and take my shots right away. The smell of the farm was overwhelming- especially since it was an extremely humid day. The ostrich in the photo was standing in front of a barn with a green roof (which is one of the reasons I converted it to black and white) with the light coming from behind the barn. I had to zoom my 24-70mm lens all the way out to get close enough to the ostrich. The owner of the ostriches- of which there are about 400- warned me not to get too close. While I was shooting this ostrich another one was pecking at my camera. Apparently they must like shiny black DSLR’s. Thanks to everyone for their votes. And congratulations to Martin on the upcoming 300th episode of the podcast. I think that that is probably a record for photography podcasts. I am looking forward to another 300!

Ostrich Eyes © Leslie Granda-Hill

Well thanks for the congrats Leslie. Great timing here that I’m actually recording this as the 300^th episode too!

I absolutely adore this shot Leslie. You couldn’t have gotten straighter on to this guy, but the slight angle of the neck adds a nice twist in my opinion. The detail in the eyes and the sides of the beak are incredible, and almost make me want to scrumple my hand around this guys beak too, though I’d probably get a good pecking from him as well.

You did a great black and white conversion too. I love the tones and the even gray background. Very nice indeed! Congratulations on second place with this wonderful shot Leslie.

And the winner of the Eyes assignment is Cheshirecat, Elise Ange with “Customized”, and here’s Elise’s backstory.

Wow, I couldn’t believe that my entry came in 1st among some really great photos. Congratulations to all who placed! And thanks to all who voted for it. Martin, it is good to hear that your recovery is going so well.

When I first saw the theme, I knew that I did not have a chance against the wonderful portraits I have seen posted on this site. I have always been interested in cars and have spend many hours at antique and classic car shows in past years, but not so much recently as Martin’s themes always give me such great new subject matter to pursue and learn from.

Customized © Elise Ange

Since there are a couple of great shows in August, which I enjoy, I decided that headlights might be a good substitute. I won’t tell you how many shots I took squatting down in front of cars, trying to get something that would represent eyes. One person asked me why I was shooting cars that way. I told him that sometimes it makes for an interesting picture. I think he walked away in disbelief. Many of the cars were parked in the sun with too much harsh light and too many reflections that a circular polarizer cannot overcome. I was lucky that this one car with such interesting headlights was parked in a shady area. It is almost as it came out of the camera, uncropped with a bit of contrast and sharping. I have other types of eye photos from the month; but this was the best one, albeit a little offbeat.

Offbeat certainly works here Elise. This is another favorite. All that squatting down in front of cars certainly paid off. I love the colors in this, and the way you chose a car that kind of had a nose really helped to make this one in my opinion. I like the dark line along the bottom of the frame, that helps to anchor the shot, and the subtle reflections add so much to this, without being overwhelming. I’d love to see a large gloss print of this. That would really be something else. Congratulations on a very well earned first place Elise.

So, there we have all five winners. Thanks again for all of you that got involved, of course including those that were not in the top five. The images posted for this assignment were excellent, as usual.

The voting for the September assignment Before/After, will start in a couple of days, so do come along and cast your votes before September 7^th, 2011. Also, the theme for the October Assignment is kind of following on from Eyes, and is “Hands”. They don’t have to be human hands, and they don’t even have to be real hands, as long as there’s a hand connection. I think after Eyes, Hands are incredibly telling about a person. I won’t talk much about what I’m thinking here, as I don’t want to sway your judgment, but give this some though. It should be a relatively easy assignment to enter, as hands are all around us, and you probably have one or two of your own, but I think the person that wins this will surprise us with something special, as often seems to be the case.

Note that your Hands shot has to be made during the month of October, and not something you sought out of your archives. You will be able to upload it to the Hands album at http://www.mbpgalleries.com/ until the end of October, regardless of your time zone. I’m looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

End Notes:

Before we finish I wanted to quickly say that I was Interviewed by Frederick Van Johnson for the This Week in Photo Podcast a few weeks ago, and the episode with that interview embedded is now in the TWiP feed. It was a great interview, so do check that out, and note that I’m going to be co-hosting on TWiP some weeks from mid-October onwards, which I’m really looking forward too.

I was also interviewed by Stephen Cotterell for the Photography 121 Podcast last week as well, and that interview is now live as well. Do check these Podcasts out when you have a minute.

So, thanks again for listening today, and thanks for those kind messages, as well as for listening for all these years some of you, and I hope that you will all stick around for another 300 episodes of the Martin Bailey Photography Podcast.

Show Notes

TWiP #220: http://www.thisweekinphoto.com/2011/twip-220-the-passionate-photographer/

Photography 121 #19: http://www.cotterell.net/_/Podcast/Entries/2011/9/27_Martin_Bailey.html

Music from Music Alley: http://www.musicalley.com/

Audio

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Gallery
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Thanks to those who joined and made it work!

We discuss:

Camping, while sleeping in a hammock! Also getting around in the great American West
Alternatives to the DSLR, especially for street photography
The iPhone as a “serious” camera
Retro and four-thirds type, mirrorless cameras

Don’t forget to hit the full-screen button in the video window to go, erm, full-screen.

Some of the Cameras Mentioned

Nikon 1: http://mbp.ac/nikon1

Sony NEX: http://mbp.ac/sonynex

Olympus E-P2: http://mbp.ac/olympusep2

Panasonic GF1: http://mbp.ac/panasonicgf1

And, if I started doing like 500 times more street photography than I do now, and actually made money from it, I personally would love a Leica M9: http://mbp.ac/leicam9

Participants:

Jonathan Liles: http://blog.nevermindhim.com

Ibarionex Perello: http://www.thecandidframe.com/

Jason Parker: https://plus.google.com/u/0/116277430152888225999

Jeffrey Yen: http://www.cranialaperture.com/

Jarvie: http://www.jarviedigital.com/+

I also use Techsmith’s Camtasia for the Mac, so I really wanted to make this work with Camtasia, to save me from buying another application just for this. Another part to the puzzle was clicking the System Audio button in the Camtasia recording dialog. This prompted Camtasia to install an add-on called Soundflower. The settings for Soundflower appear to be hidden while recording, but Camtasia switches to Soundflower as the audio device during the recording.

Anyway, I show you all of these settings in the video that I captured during my adventures today. I know this isn’t exactly photography related, but I think there are enough people trying to do this at the moment that it’s worth putting this out there.

Don’t forget to hit the full-screen button in the video window to go, erm, full-screen.

Note that there is an iPod/iPhone version of this video in iTunes, but when watching on a computer, the video above is better.

Here’s the screenshot that I referenced during the video to show you the settings before starting the recording. Click it to view full size.

Google Hangout Recording Settings - Click to Enlarge

By the way, if you are looking for an invite to Google+, click here: https://plus.google.com/i/rs1VTPLvrPA:hbBRmqxgaU4 (When these invites run out, leave a comment, and I’ll see if I can get an updated link.)

Here’s a link to the software that Jarvie showed us his images with, including his embedded webcam video — WebcamMax: http://www.webcammax.com/

I have searched for something similar to the for the Mac, and could only find CamTwist. It takes a bit of setting up, but it works well once you figure it out. Find it here: http://camtwiststudio.com/download/

Here’s a link to the Sleeping Sea Lion Project photos that Mike Spinak mentioned in the Hangout. Wonderful work Mike!!

http://naturography.com/sleeping-sea-lions-set-1-non-flash-version/