There are good weeks and there are...

... if you finish other peoples' sentences, you possibly completed the title of this post with, "...and there are bad weeks." Then there are those people who have this irrepressible optimism, an intractibly positive attitude, who would have finished it, "...and there are magnificent weeks." If you fall in the latter group, I envy you and I want to grow up to be just like you.

This week has had its moments, on both sides of the pendulum. One of the things I like about writing is that it can be cathartic, especially when you focus on the good stuff. So let me do that this week, and not talk about the possibility that my eye problems might not be so trivial and...

I haven't travelled in a while. For various reasons, things just haven't worked out that way in the last couple of years. I'm hoping that next year will bring some possibilities for me. In the meantime, I'm living vicariously through some good friends' trips to Alaska, to Newfoundland, to Israel and so on. My birthday is coming up in a week or so, and my bucket list is getting longer and longer, not shorter and shorter as it should. Maybe that has something to do with my challenging week.

Why do I like teaching so much?

This is going to sound odd coming from an admitted recluse like myself, but it's because of the interesting people I meet. In the last month, I met someone who has won an Emmy and who is off to Africa for a while, an historian, a fellow who has taken pictures of grizzly bears in the wild from so close he could touch them (OK, he's nuts!), some people so new to cameras they didn't know how to look through the viewfinder, a dog breeder, and more. Every one of them has stories and life experiences to share.

My favourite thing about teaching is watching that light bulb come on. It doesn't always happen while they're here, sometimes later, but when students call and thank me for helping them see the light (pun intended), well that makes my day. With that in mind...

A call to my students and print customers

Students: please send me pictures. Please share images that you've made that you're proud of, and please give me permission to reproduce them here. Not to be critiqued, just for me and my readers to enjoy! And so we can live vicariously and enjoy the things you've done and places you've been. You have my email.

Fine art print customers: are you enjoying the artwork on your walls? Please let me know! Any suggestions? A wish list?

Both groups: testimonials would be great! I'd love to put some up on my web site and especially, I'm trying to figure out how to make this social media stuff work, so please 'friend' me on Facebook, add me to your circles on Google+ or invite me as a contact on LinkedIn.

Algonquin Park Photowalk

I'm going to be in Algonquin Park on the last weekend in September, to shoot the fall colours at their peak. Who wants to join me?

I plan to shoot at a great venue at dawn on Saturday and at another spot that will probably include a waterfall (or at least some moving water!) during the day. On Sunday I have an early morning and other commitments.

What's a Photowalk? Just what it sounds like. The walk leader chooses a venue and preps the participants what to expect. Then a bunch of people come out and shoot whatever pictures they feel like. People cooperate: they share their techniques, look at each other's work, get ideas from one another. There's no formal workshop training but the more experienced photographers usually help out.

Afterwards, there's usually a coffee shop kind of meeting where people exchange contact information. The walk leader will often make a website available for people to post their pictures. 

The benefits of doing a photowalk are (a) meeting and shooting with and exchanging ideas with other photographers and (b) an excuse to get out and shoot some pictures in a place someone else has scouted out! It's a bit like being in a camera club where you've been given an assignment, it stirs up the creative juices.

It's FREE and it's FUN.

Why am I doing this? It's NOT for the money: in fact I don't expect ANY payment of any kind for this. Go up and read point (a) in the paragraph above. If this gets me any students for my courses later on, or sells any of my fine art pictures, or kindles interest in local (Highlands) residents in starting up a camera club, then "bonus".

You should know that the Richmond Hill Camera Club will also be in the Park that weekend, along with a thousand other photographers who can't pass up the opportunity to shoot the colours at their peak. I plan NOT to interfere with them and to avoid being at the same venues at the same time (I'll join them privately on Sunday).

If you want to join me on the Photowalk September 28th, you have to subscribe to my newsletter. Here's the link. All the details will be in the newsletter or by email to people registered for the event. How do you register? Read the newsletter.

Picture time!

Everyone knows by now that my favourite venue is the Minden Wildwater Preserve. Here's a whitewater canoeist challenging the river. This colour sketch is SOOC: "straight out of the camera"! The D5100 has an effects mode that's really fun!  

Here's another one. I call this "Planning Ahead". The kayakers were thinking through their approach to the white water. I'm not sure, but I think this was at Earl's Hole, a feature on the river. By the way, by the time you read this, the D5100 might be gone. I'm torn about whether I should sell it, it's a lot of fun and has some great features I'm going to miss, not the least of which is the swivelling LCD. And the Effects mode! 

I've lived here for almost 6 years and I've shot hundreds (maybe thousands) of pictures from my dock or the corner where Red Umbrella Road and Pleasant Point Road meet. I went out two nights in a row to get this shot. My goal was to capture the nuances of subtle colour at sunset. I eliminated all the detail by exposing as a silhouette and by using the 10x ND filter to extend the shutter time. This is 8 seconds at f/8, ISO 1000. This image is available as a large format art print, check it out here.
 

On Sunday afternoon, I shot this image at the same spot. Again I used the ND filter to extend the shutter time (15 seconds at f/8, ISO 200). By the way, I LOVE the Xume filter adapter. I shot about 15 different images in about 10 minutes. Without the adapter, that would have been over an hour.  Click the Xume link at right for info. I'm going to work this one up as a fine art print too, just haven't finished it yet. 

Chipping Sparrow. I saw this fellow in the pine tree outside my front door, grabbed the D5100 (sigh!) and the Sigma 12-400mm lens and got this shot. The D5100 has a cropped sensor so you can get more up close and personal than you can with the D600 Full Frame.  What makes this image for me is the fact that the bird stepped out into the light which gave me the texture I was looking for.

1/800 second at f/8 (see a pattern emerging?), ISO 900. I had auto-ISO on to hold that minimum shutter speed, which I need for sharp images at 400mm focal length. 

That's it for today. Watch the newsletter for Photowalk information, it's exactly a month from today as I write this!

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Lazy but Talented...

Shooting people on the street

I've had a lot of positive feedback on my Old Montreal shots, particularly the old guy walking. John called it "The Traveller" and I love that name. Thanks!

As a very shy person, I have a very hard time going up to someone and asking them if I can take their picture. I don't know how people do that, and I wish I could. Some people even go the extra step and say, "please sign this model release"! I can't even begin to think how to do that.

I get that the Traveller was in a public place and therefore I have the right to photograph him, and probably to use his picture for non-commercial purposes. And there's no question that I can say what I think about him as long as it isn't outright slander (a street performer in Ottawa has taken offence that while I thought he was an adequate saxophonist and I even thought he should be in a more prestigious place, like New Orleans; but I said he wasn't "outstanding". Every week or so he writes a rambling ranting, sometimes profane comment on my blog, so I've had to block him).

Paradoxically, the few times I have asked, the people have said "yes". I don't know why I don't do it more often. How do others deal with this?

As an aside, I once took some pictures of kids eating HUGE ice cream cones at Kawartha Dairy. A parent came up to me and told me to ask permission first. I get that (we live in a sad society where you would have to!). A lesson before you point the lens...

Here's another image from Old Montreal last week.

On the way to Ottawa there were some abandoned Cessna 150's at a fuel stop.  

I wasn't the only one photographing them. Ahh, Lightroom's local adjustment brush... 

Got my Filter Adapter!

Very, very slick. This is a product I recommend. It works just as advertised: attach the adapter to your lens, screw each of your commonly used filters into a holder, then when you want to mount a filter, it simply magnetically clamps to the lens.

The magnet is pretty strong: I don't see the filter falling off, although I wouldn't rely on it riding a motorcycle at speed or banging through the brush on my ATV. To remove it, just lift it off at an angle (magnets work like that...). I tried both the 10x ND filter and the circular polarizer on my 17-35mm wide angle and they work perfectly. Note that Xume points out there might be vignetting on ultra wide angles, after all, you're adding an extra ring on the front of the lens, and they're right. Here's a test shot with the polarizer on board, at 17mm

The vignetting disappears at about 20mm. 

I bought the starter kit for $53, for my 77mm diameter lens(es). It comes with one lens adapter and two filter holders. Down the road, I might buy another kit so I can use other filters and put an adapter on each lens (and my lens caps: you can't click a lens cap into the adapter, you have to use a filter holder. That said, I don't use caps when the camera's in the bag, I have a cleaning cloth up against the front of each lens).

Shipping to Canada was only $4, it arrived in about 3 days. There's a little video on their site, click the link!

D600 dust 

I have my D600 back and yes, there are some dust spots again. Only 2 or 3 that I can see, a manageable number for now, and they only really show up at small apertures or when I do an HDR (the merge process seems to enhance them). Les Palenik has reported that he's seen some too.

But as Les points out, "...amazing IQ. Sometimes, I can crop a 24MP image into 4-6 different pictures. Or if I don't get it sharp in camera, then I downrezz it to 6-12MP which makes it sharp enough."

I think it comes down to that. The image quality is so high you see EVERYTHING. Anyway, I'm convinced the D600 is the right camera for me.

I should point out that Les is a prolific micro-stock shooter and the stock sites are very discriminating about image quality. In fact I didn't qualify when I tried a couple of years ago (I'm going to try again). So he knows what he's talking about.

D5100 for sale

 Unfortunately, I can't afford the luxury of having two cameras at this time. I bought the D5100 factory refurbished from Nikon to use while my D600 was in the shop. It has a spiffy fold-out LCD that I'm going to miss, the reach of an APS-C sensor (16.2Mp), it's light, it's fast, it has some neat built-in effects. It handles high ISO situations really well, too. Check this out:

My grandson, Ryan, with low available light. 1/125 at f/8, ISO 6400. I adjusted the exposure a bit in LR, tweaked the eyes and a bit of skin softening, got rid of some visible background in the right corner and cropped it slightly. NO NOISE REDUCTION (well I always add a touch of sharpening and NR on import for all shots, but just a touch)

Here's the deal: $425 (OBO) gets you the body and all the stuff that came with it from Nikon, including warranty. The camera sells new for $565 tax in.  If you want, I have a small MF lens, and I'll discount a DSLR course if you want to learn how to use it. Contact me. Hurry, I think this is going to go fast.

Lazy but Talented

My sister bought me a t-shirt a while ago, it says "Lazy but Talented". I wear it all the time and she knows me. There's a message here... wait for it!

My grandkids were up for a few days this week and Ryan, the 13-year old who is now taller than me, had my D5100 for a bit, while I shot with the D600. We stopped at the Stanhope Airport and there was a helicopter parked there. I took a few shots, but Ryan, who is NOT as lazy as I am, climbed up on top of a storage tank (wonder what's in it!) for a different perspective. On his own, I might add... no prompting from me.

Single frame Nik HDR EFEX toning, in case you were wondering! 

His picture was better than any of mine. The message I alluded to is, "don't be lazy. Find that unusual perspective. Make the effort".

Ryan's picture. Again toned and tweaked in LR. 1/200 at f/9, ISO 500. He was in Aperture Priority, by the way, not Automatic. Take a course! 

While we're on the subject of the D5100 (I'm starting to have second thoughts about selling it!)

This Ruffed Grouse was on the road to the Haliburton School of the Arts (the Haliburton pioneer museum is worth a visit). I grabbed the D5100 and shot out the car window. He did a little dance and fanned his tail for us! 

I mustn't forget my granddaughter Kelly. She's the "Fish Whisperer". She does everything wrong by the book, but she's the only one who catches fish! Deliberate silhouette and I was looking for the rimlighting on her hair when I shot it. This was actually shot with my point-and-shoot, so it's not the camera...

This was really tough!

I've shot waterskiing/wakeboarding from Janie's boat before. It's a real challenge! You're bouncing around, it's hard to keep the camera steady, and tougher still to keep the subject in the frame, never mind in the middle where you can autofocus! In hindsight, I should have pre-focused at his distance (the rope isn't going to change length!) and I should have put the "Active" VR on, something I forgot completely about until this very moment. Next time.

Waterskiers have their eyes closed a lot. With water streaming in their faces at 30 or 40 kph, I'm not surprised! They also get weird expressions when they're exerting physical effort or focusing on what they're doing:

David (Janie's son) is concentrating on a wakeboard trick. You probably can't see the facial expression unless you blow the picture up (click on it). 

You can see it in this one, though! Sorry, David. 

Sometimes things don't go entirely as planned... 

So here's the shot David's probably going to put on his FaceBook page...

I'm going to hop on the ATV and head over to the white water to see what's going on. TTFN...

— 30 —

To talk of many things.

...of shoes – and ships – and sealing wax..

That's what came to mind when I first started to pen this article. But really not so much, so I'll save that first line for another blog title down the road.

Nikon Stuff

As I write this, I have received "the phone call" to tell me that my repaired D600 is ready for pickup. I'll drop by Nikon in a couple of days to pick it up. According to the tech, they serviced the whole mirror assembly box, cleaned the sensor, and did a firmware update (I thought I already did that...). I asked if he thought that would solve the dust/lube problem and he said he thinks so. Time will tell...

I've been using the D5100. A bit of a false start: they shipped me a dud (wouldn't boot up). But they replaced it instantly when I came by on July 2. Unfortunately, I missed having a camera at Alison's July 1st party, but in a way that's OK, because I got to participate instead of observing.

I met a fellow at the party who was very much into Samsung cameras. His website indicates that he's a wedding photographer, although I got the impression in conversation that he actually worked at Samsung. Anyway, he had a Samsung Galaxy NX mirrorless camera that really looks spiffy, and a Samsung Smart camera with built-in Wifi. Both had huge 5" touchscreens on the back, huge zoom lenses... bears some further investigation!

The D5100 is a fun camera to use. I played with a bunch of settings; here are some pictures that I took with it.

You know I can't leave well enough alone, right? Yes, I did some Photoshop stuff... I stopped at this field of wildflowers (some would consider them 'weeds'!) and it was sort of boring, but some filters and effects punched it up a bit! 

I stayed there and looked around for other shots. I used the swiveling LCD display and LiveView to capture this one from knee height. That might be a godsend for my knee problems... however a problem that I have is "glasses on to see the scene, glasses off to see the LCD". Time for a visit to the ophthalmologist! 

Another shot from the same spot. These were all shot with the 17-35mm lens, by the way. I switched to the 70-200 later, but liked these better! You can do macro without a macro lens, but that's really on my list...

A couple of days later, I shot some stuff around the house. This is edited, of course but the acuity is a testament to the care I took with the lighting, using a reflector disk to block the direct sunlight. The sharpness is more a function of the lens than the camera body, of course. 

Spot metering and exposure compensation works well, although I feel it has a slight tendency to overexpose. Pretty good detail, enhanced with Topaz Clarity. 

The D5100 has some "Effects" modes. Here is one of them, called "sketch". This is exactly as it came out of the camera (except I cropped it). Hmmm... 

The next day, in Minden, I came across this restored 1925 Model A Ford. I thought it deserved a "vintage" treatment so I did an HDR and used Nik Color Efex Pro to make the image like this. 

So much for first impressions of the D5100. It's a worthwhile second body, and gives me the added advantage that it has an APS-C sensor so my telephoto lenses can reach out and touch further.

Field Trip to Irondale

I'm tentatively planning a field trip to the Kinmount/Irondale area for Sunday, July 21st. Here's the story:

I had occasion to visit the Irondale Church yesterday and was struck by the quaint and very photogenic interior. I've made tentative arrangements to shoot it on July 21st (date to be confirmed).

This is the Irondale Church, presently being restored. It sits at the back of a farm property, somewhat isolated, it has an air of quiet solitude to it. The building dates back to 1887, and the original bubble glass is still intact in the windows!

Another view of the exterior of the church, rendered as an HDR.  

Here's the plan: do a dawn MiniTour to Furnace Falls, about 10 minutes outside of Irondale. Head over to the church for around 10am to start shooting interiors and stay 2 or 3 hours to shoot additional shots. If you want to accompany me on the minitour, please sign up at www.photography.to/minitour.htm. The only restriction might be shooting the interior while services are under way from 10-11 am so we don't disturb the congregation.

Furnace Falls looks like this:

A 1/4-second exposure. I asked the young fellow to hold still so I could maintain focus. Enhanced with Topaz Adjust 5.  This is at 120mm focal length, cropped sensor but you can get quite close.

I'll be scouting it further before then; I think this camera position is facing East so it should be a good dawn location, weather permitting. If the weather's good, you can even swim like this lad is, which should make some interesting shots if we have some willing participants! Bring water shoes so you don't slip.

Kinmount Fish and Chips

On the way back, the skies opened up as I entered Kinmount, and there was quite a downpour. Still, the Fish and Chips shop did a booming business despite the rain!

Must be a really good place! People stood in line in the rain! Then I figured out why... 

Pretty girl, working the front counter. Could be why people stood in line! 

There's quite a bit of other stuff to shoot in Kinmount; a sawmill and a railway museum, some activity on the ATV trail... this could be a good day of shooting — join me!

— 30 —

Lemonade from Lemons

You know the old saw about making lemonade when you're dealt lemons? Another way of saying "the glass is half full, not half empty" or just "make the best of it". My D600 is on its way back to Nikon for service again.

The Nikon D600 has dust issues

For anyone who's in the industry, that's not news. I sent mine in to Nikon last February and thought they solved it; they actually changed the shutter mechanism which, I learned, was responsible for throwing oil on the lo-pass filter (that piece of glass in front of the sensor itself). It didn't work, Nikon:

This is a crop of the upper left corner of this image. It's about 2300x1500 px. This image was shot with the 17-35mm lens at f/22, and what you're looking at is a merge in HDR Efex of three bracketed shots. I enhanced it so you could see the spots better. You might ask, "Why did you let it go this far?". 

You can't see this stuff when you shoot at f/8. Well, when you look really closely, you can, but it's not obtrusive. Almost all of my shooting is done at f/8 where I can, because that's the sweet spot on most of my lenses. But this time, I wanted the depth of field.

Here's another couple of images I shot at the same location and you'll understand why. These were in fact at f/8 but I had to fight to get focus on the barn.

Both of these images are HDR merges. They will be available as large scale fine art prints. email me if you're interested. You can check out the gallery, they should be up there by the time you read this. 

Anyway, back to the "lemonade" thing. I recognize that Nikon has had some issues with this camera but I trust that they will make it right. Canon people, stop rubbing your hands together in glee, I can hear you! So the good part is, I'll get my camera back (or a replacement) soon, and it'll be great. But I'm without a camera body and that's not acceptable, so I ordered a D5100 refurb from Nikon and as I write this, I'm waiting for the Purolator man to deliver it to me!

I had occasion to handle the D5100 that belonged to a student last week. It's a nice machine, and it has two features that the D600 doesn't have that I'm looking forward to: it has an articulated LCD that flips out from the side so making those ankle-height shots will be easier (my knees are bad); and it's got an APS-C cropped sensor so when I really need to reach out and touch a distant subject, my 400mm lens will look like a 600mm on a full-frame. Everyone tells me the image quality is great, and, well, the price was right. If push comes to shove, I could resell it for what I paid but I think I'll keep it as a backup. I've been needing one anyway, I'm sorry I sold the D300 (but not sorry I got the 17-35 in exchange, Pete!).

So the glass is half-full. I'm coming out ahead.

PS: according to what I've read and heard, Nikon has solved the issue. Apparently only a percentage of early production cameras had this problem, and they've fixed it at the factory on anything made after April.

Speaking of Students...

I need some. Please go to www.photography.to and have a look at the workshops tab. My advertising hasn't kicked in yet and I need some work. I have some 3-hour and some 2-day sessions available, and a flexible calendar. Please pass this on to anyone you know who would benefit from a workshop. I'll come to you if it makes sense.

Speaking of advertising...

Last week I told you I'm a published columnist! I didn't believe it until I actually saw it in print:

Here it is! It's available on line as well, check it out here. I'm on page 2. 

They originally told me they would print the column every two weeks, but they've now changed it to every week! My faithful readers can preview the next column here!

Tuesday was a great photography day!

I had to be in Toronto on Tuesday, and headed for home late afternoon. When I was in Uxbridge for Ryan's graduation last week, I drove by a spot I marked in my mind to return to. That day was just a bright sunny one and the sky was featureless. I should have stopped but I didn't. So I had the opportunity on Tuesday and headed over that way.

When I arrived, it wasn't great, weather wise, but I stuck it out. There was a storm coming from behind me but the sky over the scene I wanted to shoot wasn't great. I spent half an hour shooting various shots, and then the skies opened up and the rain came down in buckets! I got in the car and headed for home. Not 10 minutes later, I drove out of the storm to see this:

I did boost the colours a bit, but it was spectacular. In fact there was a double rainbow, but the other one was too light to look good on film (OK, on 'digital film'!). I used Topaz Clarity on this one, by the way. I'm using it on a lot of pictures now and I really like it! 

Then I turned to my left and saw this scene:

I decided to make a painting out of this one. It took a lot of work to get it right, but I think it was worth it. Again, it will be available as large scale fine art prints. email me if you're interested. You can check out the gallery, it should be up there by the time you read this. 

Not yet done for the day. Now the sky was interesting, so I turned around and went back to the original spot, it was about 10 km back (the above picture was just South of Sunderland on Highway 12; the original scene was just before the turnoff to 12 on Highway 47 in Greenbank). So the top pictures in this blog were taken after I went back. Those were the remnants of the storm that had passed through.

STILL not done. I spent about an hour there, then headed home again. About 5km up the road from the rainbow spot, was this scene.

This is the scene that caught my eye from the road. It's an HDR, of course. As an aside, when I open Nik HDR Efex Pro, I'm drawn to one preset about 90% of the time: the "Dark" one. Here too: I clicked on it, increased the exposure about 10% and saved it. The only other things I did were to remove a red-and-white OFSC sign in front of the bridge and tone down the greens a bit. Fine art print. Gallery. Check it out.

This is marked as part of the "Ontario Federation of Snowmobile Clubs" (OFSC) trail system. Walking over to get this shot, I disturbed a very large dog at the farm to my right, but the farmer came out to corral him (thank you, farmer!). 

OK, back in the car. Another 90 minutes drive to get home. I needed a pit stop at the Tim Horton's in Beaverton and by now it was getting dark.

Earlier this week I was working on an older image that I took in Norland. I wanted to make it a dusk shot, so I created the lighting effects entirely in Photoshop. It wasn't really late in the day when I shot it:

+Ben Willmore shoots a lot of these, usually abandoned old gas stations. That's what got me thinking about it.  

Back to the drive home and the Tim Horton's:

It really was getting dark, and the lights inside the shop looked so warm and inviting. I did have to enhance it, boost the contrast and detail (Topaz Adjust and Clarity). I had another shot that showed some traffic at the pickup window, but I liked this one better.  

So. One drive home, more than half-a-dozen distinct keepers, at least 4 for the gallery and large scale printing. All with a camera infected with dust-spot-measles. It was definitely a good day.

— 30 —