Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid.

Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid.

I went out to the Haliburton Zombie Walk. Last year I got some great Zombie pictures; not so much this time. First of all, there were a couple of hundred participants last year, this time only twenty or so. That's partly because (I think) (a) it was at Pinestone instead of Haliburton Head Lake, (b) they made it an all-day affair, with a party at night (which I skipped), (c) if you went to haliburtonzombiewalk.com they hadn't updated it from last year and it still said the walk was on November 1 instead of October 31 (in the promo videos on the home page. The correct date was inside the site), and (d) there was at least one other competing event. I know there was a party at the Red Umbrella Inn too, and I heard "lots of zombies were there".

So I didn't find anyone taking the event seriously; makeup and costumes were a shadow of what they were last year. Frankly, I couldn't find much that I felt like shooting.

Zombies don't live in the same space-time continuum we do so they're hard to photograph since they move in and out of another subset of the 11 dimensional multiverse. In-camera multiple exposure with a single one overlaid. 

However what they did do right was the "Terror from Wonderland Road" setup underground at Pinestone. Really well done! Photography was somewhat of a challenge, since it was DARK in there! I did get this one, though:

Bloody Terror from the Deep. As I said, it was dark. This shot was with my wide angle (objects are closer than they appear!! Bwa-ha-ha). For my photographer friends, 1/15 sec at f/2.8, ISO 6400. Some Lightroom and Photoshop, including added textures, then I was fortunate to have Topaz Glow and Impression to bring out the details. 

That's going on my Top 25 gallery page today. Now I have to find one to delete!

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Musings: the retiree's dilemma

I read a couple of articles recently about "the best places to retire". It's a dilemma and I don't know what to do. I perceive that eventually I will probably have to move, but don't know where.

For many years I had a dream of sitting at a computer, writing the great Canadian novel while looking out the window overlooking a beautiful lake. What I have is not perfect: the window could be bigger, the lake could be closer, the novel...well I'm still working on that. I didn't envision being alone. I didn't think that photography would figure into my life to the extent that it has. But essentially I have realized my dream. Realistically, I have to start thinking about some other factors, health and mobility needs to be considered.

If you don't know me personally, I currently live in an almost-lakefront-property (I'm across the road) on 12-Mile Lake, just North of Minden, Ontario in the Haliburton Highlands. I moved up here from the Toronto area in 2007. I like the area, but I'm not too fussy about the town: it's small, has limited resources and except for emergency services, has no hospital facilities. There's a huge arts community up here, though.

I despise the thought of living in a city. I won't go "South of the 401" unless I must. But I may be forced to do so because medical facilities and services are non-existent out here. Is it inevitable that I'll need them? Well there are really only two possibilities, if I drop dead, then no. If I get sick or if creeping ailments get worse, then yes. By the way, NOT YET. Maybe I'm just being paranoid. But I should think ahead.

Suburban Toronto is probably prohibitively expensive, with even a small condo apartment going for $400K. Unless I just rent... which is not totally out of the question.  Ditto Niagara-on-the-Lake, Kelowna BC. Or anywhere outside of Canada (medical insurance issues). Some towns with good facilities are not appealing: Lindsay, Elliot Lake, etc. Five years ago I might have thought about Newfoundland (I love the place) but realistically, winters... and if I'm less able to enjoy nature? I'm thinking about Huntsville. Maybe... but I'll need to do some on-site research.

As I re-read what I wrote above, it comes across somewhat fatalistic. It's not like that: just musing about what my next step might be.

It's a dilemma.

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SmugMug Gallery Update

I watched a video stream from Terry White (Adobe, Lightroom guru) and he gave me an idea. He has an online gallery that shows his favourite images. "Why not," I thought. "I'll make one too". I did, and put it on my Smugmug site.

The premise is this: I have thousands of images, and obviously I have favourites. These are not necessarily my BEST shots, they're the ones I like the best right now. So I created a gallery called "Top 25" (actually it's the top 24 images plus a little video: so it's my "Double Dirty Dozen plus One").  When I take another picture that I like as well or better, I'll upload it and delete one picture to keep the number the same. That's going to be tough...

Anyway, pop over and see my favourites. Here's the link. I'll wait right here.
I dare you...

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Can you stand another fox picture?

I chose to show you this one despite what some people think is a distracting branch because I think it tells a story and it frames the animal. The more challenging branch was actually the one that passes in front of his ears, which I gently cloned partway out. The other fox pictures are more like 'portraits'. To me, this one says (a) it really was shot in the wild; and (b) the fox thinks he's hiding from me and then as he realizes he's been seen, he gives me "the stare". Although his stance doesn't say it, his expression says that he's poised to run away.

I rendered this one a little dark in order to draw the viewer's eyes to the fox's muzzle. I brought out as much texture in his coat as I dared. Almost all the editing was done in Lightroom, just a little Photoshop to do the cloning and add some clarity.

Custom iPhone case

Remember I said I had to fiddle with the iPhone 6 Tough case I had ordered, in order to accommodate the audio plug? The new one arrived, with the same problem. This time I tried using my Dremel tool but those who know me know that I'm useless with tools, and I made a mess again.

Here's the new case. I love it! 

But the audio plug doesn't fit right. 

And this is the mess I made. 

RedBubble acknowledged the fault this time, sent me a credit, and said they would address it, but made no promises. Fair enough.

PS: my pillow arrived too. It's awesome! I'm going to order another one with a fox image on it. One for each end of the couch!

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I really have to give props to 3 Legged Thing, the company in England that made my carbon fibre tripod. If you've been a longtime reader, you might remember that I tripped and almost fell, saved by the tripod which isn't really designed to support 270 lbs! So I broke a couple of bits. The tripod still worked, but not perfectly. Then I did a stupid thing, putting Ron's 600mm f/4 on a gimbal mount on this lightweight tripod. I broke the column. Full disclosure: MY FAULT. It's strong, but that was way overboard.

So I wrote to them and I got a surprise overseas phone call from Danny, 3LT's president. They then shipped me the parts I needed, free of charge. Despite the fact that it was my fault. I fixed it up but not perfectly because I hadn't recognized that I had bent another segment. I wrote again a couple of days ago asking if I could buy a whole new leg assembly. They refused to sell it to me. They're sending it to me for free.

This is the kind of company you want to deal with. Not only do they make OUTSTANDING products, but I can't think of any outfit I've dealt with that is so responsive to their customers. You can buy 3LeggedThing tripods via their website (if you're in North America, choose their US store at the top). You can contact them directly here. Do it. Tell Dave I sent you.

By the way, 3LT's stuff isn't cheap. Not the most expensive, either, but the Brian (named for Queen's Brian May – look up the story on their website. Bit of a search but worth it!) carbon fibre tripod and AirHed will set you back about $500. But then it's virtually weightless, super strong and made by photographers for photographers. My only quibble is that you have to be diligent about locking all the friction nuts and there are lots of them, the price you pay because it folds down from 'this' small to 'this' tall (higher than I can reach!).

If money is no object, then the names "Gitzo" and "ReallyRightStuff" are the way to go. But 3LT makes as good or better tripods. If you want an inexpensive field tripod, look at the MeFoto products. But the build quality isn't the same. And then there's the customer service...

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Everyone should watch movies

And TV shows and commercials... as photographers, it's humbling to see what the REAL cinematographers (and photographers) do. We all seem to try to emulate them, and of course most of us are doing it on our own, with limited equipment and budgets and resources. But not only do they have perfect lighting and attention to detail, but the use of composition to convey a message or mood is inspiring.

The other night I watched "Road to Perdition" (again!), with Tom Hanks and Paul Newman. The photography was mind-blowing, especially some of the black-and-white special effects scenes. It's a good movie, but by all means, watch it for the cinematography.

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— 30 —

And so it begins!

A new year is upon us. What will it bring? 

It is winter in the Highlands... when the wise man stays inside to edit his images instead of going out in the -30° temperatures and vicious windchill to take more pictures. Nobody ever called me wise...

So there's a mix here, of musings and images! 

To start things off, here's the new banner for this blog (I change it every now and then). 

I took this from out on the ice, between my dock and the Red Umbrella Inn. After some other edits, I used the "Turner Afternoon" preset to capture this impression of the southern shoreline 

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I came across this inspiring list the other day and saved it to my desktop. I spent some time searching for it so I could properly attribute the list, but failed. The deepest I managed to get was to an image on Pinterest. Anyway, here it is, "author unknown":

Rules to live by? I admit it's a lot easier when you don't have to go to work every day... 

Gallery Exhibit

As mentioned earlier, there's an exhibit at the Agnes Jamieson Gallery in Minden: on until February 7th. 25 outstanding photographic images, all available for sale but they'll be gone by the time the exhibit ends, so get there early. This is a juried exhibition, pictures selected by the Curator of the museum (Laurie Carmount). The gallery is located on Bobcaygeon Road in Minden, Ontario. If you're not from this area and you're interested in any framed (or unframed) images, let's talk...

Note: my images are individually hand signed but not numbered: which makes them unique... 

 

  
From the "Sporadic Musings" department...

Early Adoption 

I was thinking about the pros and cons of being an "early adopter". I've been one from time to time over the years (less often now because I need to watch my pennies more).  As an "early adopter" you get in before they get the bugs out! But you do have the "latest and greatest"!

Take my iPad, for example. I bought a Gen1 really early and loved having it. But in their infinite wisdom, Apple decided to keep coming up with updated operating systems which won't run on the old iPad 1 (best I can do is iOS 5). Because the app suppliers follow suit, a lot of apps won't run on my iPad. Facebook crashes every time I click a video in it. Time for a new one, I think. But if I had waited for Gen2, I'd still be in business.

I also "early adopted" a Sony BetaMax VCR many years ago. 'nuff said?

I guessed wrong with my D600 too (insurmountable technical issues). I was lucky enough to be able to swap it for a D800. Of course 6 months later along came the D750...  

It occurs to me that one derives great satisfaction from having the latest and greatest, but only for a short time until the rest of the world catches up. Then the next generation comes along and suddenly you're behind! And no way to catch up unless you have bottomless pockets...

This is different from putting off buying something because something better is in the wings. There's always something bigger and better coming along if we're talking about technology: but if you wait until the absolute best camera or computer or car comes along, you'll be without one until the day you die.

PanAm Games

I drove by the Minden Wildwater Preserve the other day, site of the PanAm Games this summer. It's hard to imagine how they're going to accommodate so many people there. It doesn't make sense to enlarge the little parking lot for a one-week event. And there's room for MAYBE 100 spectators on the riverbank. (in fairness, there's the other side of the river too: but room for fewer people and physically quite challenging to get to, so I wonder about liability issues). 

I also heard that people up here are thinking they can rent their homes and cottages for the week for hugely exorbitant sums of money. Wishful thinking, I expect. 

My application is in for press accreditation, I'm sure they're going to severely limit the numbers. They responded to my email inquiry saying, "you should be hearing from the Olympic Committee shortly." Stay tuned...

Here's a pencil sketch of what the river looked like on New Year's Eve. Rendered using John Stevenson's complex action for Photoshop CC and Topaz Impression, with a bit of dodging and burning and tweaking.

And so it begins...

The ice fishing season is under way. As of yesterday, there was 8" of ice on 12-Mile lake. And because of the weather conditions in the past week or two, it's good, solid clear ice. This thickness is more than enough to support a car. Certainly I had no worries about driving my ATV out there this afternoon.

I had these two kids pose with the ice blocks their father had cut from under the ice fishing hut. I added some saturation to the blue of the ice so you could see it better, and the kids give it a sense of scale. You can see the real colour on the second block in the image.

Here's their vehicle, a Polaris side-by-side ATV. Some of my neighbours take winter seriously! 

Another neighbour has this beautiful ATV. I was struck by two things when I did this image out on the ice this afternoon. First of all, the smooth delicate colour transition in the sky (although I admit I increased the saturation for this shot) and the awesome vehicle my neighbour acquired for riding out to the ice fishing huts and clearing his snow. It's a Bombardier Can-Am side-by-side ATV with bogie-driven tracks and I'm guessing this can go ANYWHERE. 

I used a Topaz Impression "watercolour" preset selectively on this image, and added a motion blur to the background. I was trying to convey a sense of power out on the isolated ice surface of 12-Mile Lake.

UPDATE: I wrote the above a week ago. The banner image at the top of this post was shot today, and so was the following shot which I have repetitiously titled

"and so it begins"! There will be a couple dozen more Ice Fishing huts out there soon 

And last one for today:

I'm not sure why I'm taken with this picture.You have to blow it up to appreciate it (click on it). The subtle textures and brushstrokes of the Cezanne preset (modified) match the lighting and gradation of the scene. I'm debating printing this to canvas.

— 30 —

The Times, they are a-Changing!

You know how it says, "sporadic musings" on the header? Today is one of those days!

Today I read a short post on Facebook by someone commenting about how it used to be when we were kids: how we would go out and play, ride bikes without helmets, play games with sticks and other sharp objects and have our mothers yelling at us that "you'll put someone's eye out" and somehow we never did...

It evoked a train of thought I've had on and off, even in the middle of the night when I have been literally scared to death and filled with wonderment and hope all at the same time. There's been a lot of change since those days... and

Our world is on the cusp

There's a new technological revolution coming. No one can argue that there have been new products that have changed the world we live in but when there are a number of advances that occur at the same time, a confluence will occur that will bring about a massive shift in the way we live. Here's a small example.

I saw a clip where they showed some kids a Walkman and they were dumfounded. Another one with a dial telephone. 20 years from now, kids will be interviewed and shown, I don't know, an iPhone and they'll have a hard time grasping what it was for. That's a given, But I was reflecting today on a number of things going on right now:

Personal Drones

I just watched a video on John Nack's blog that was really impressive. If you're going to Africa, take a GoPro camera and a quadcopter with you! Check out this clip shot in the Serengeti: Link Here.

I think these drones (let's call them that for brevity) are going to represent a real revolution in our world, not only the photography game. We've all read about Amazon playing with using drones for deliveries, but seeing videos like the one above, and with all the other technology coming into place like YouTube-like capabilities, increasing bandwidths and storage, remote controllable electronics, makes it clear that we're going to see a real change coming.

Just on the photography front, since the payloads of these RC copters is getting up there, and since cameras are gaining a lot of remote control capabilities, I could see a huge proliferation of aerial images. Put a new generation mirrorless camera with some good optics under one of these.

Imagine, if you would, a world in which there are not just a handful of these flying machines out there, but thousands of them. You're standing at the south rim of the Grand Canyon in a few years. Or Yosemite or Yellowstone or, closer to home, Algonquin Park. Think you'll be getting calm wilderness landscape shots? Not unless your Photoshop skills are honed and you're able to clone out those sky machines. Imagine the traffic jams in the sky!

There will come a point in time when manually controlled drones will not be allowed. Everything will be computer regulated. Sure, the kids today with the skills they're honing playing video games will be able to fly these things but when there are thousands of them in the air at any given time?

This is an invention that is going to revolutionize our lives. Mark my words! Maybe you didn't read it here first, but I'm definitely hopping on the bandwagon. Am I going to get one? No, not yet. I'm not really into video and it's not there yet for me, but I probably will in a few years! I know a couple of people who should be getting into this right now, though (talking to you, Howard, and Gary, and others... you know who you are!).

You can buy this DJI Phantom Quadcopter complete with a GoPro Hero3 camera for under $800 at B&H Photo.

Fuel Sources

There's a rumour about an experimental VW that gets 300mpg. Apparently it's a diesel/electric hybrid. And I'm sure there is a breakthrough out there involving quantum entanglement to step up the power available to us by orders of magnitude. There will be a day when fossil fuels will no longer be needed although I think we'll be in a hybrid state for quite some time to come, but it's coming.

Driverless vehicles

Again, the technology is on the cusp of being there. There are only a few out there, being developed by the Googles of the world, but it won't be long. Safety concerns will rear their ugly heads, politicians will lobby for and against the technology, there will be accidents, but slowly when computer reliability approaches 99.99999% or even more decimal places, it will become a non-issue
There will be roads on which you will not be able to drive without onboard computer control. More and more of them... And you KNOW the next step will be the world of the Jetsons. How long will it be before people will be scooting around in the sky? Yes, you need training and a pilot's license to do it today, but add computer control into the equation and a child will be able to control a vehicle, whether it's on the ground or not. The first time I saw a hovercraft, I realized that the days of our reliance on smooth surface routes are numbered.

Here's a scary thought: would you fly in an airplane built by Microsoft? The "Blue Screen of Death" might take on a whole new meaning! Today I had another one of those on my desktop computer, imagine if it was controlling your flying car! 

Direct computer connections

Google Glass is a fleeting fad. The next step will be contact lens technology where images can be both captured and viewed without external eyewear, but the step after that will be direct connection to the brain, where the sensor will be the eye itself and images will be transmitted directly to the optic nerve.

There's a TV series called "Intelligence" where an agent with a microchip implant is directly connected to the cyber grid. Far fetched? I don't think so. We're almost at the point where if someone can imagine something, someone else can make it real: look at Star Trek – except for warp drive and the matter transmitter, pretty well everything is out there or on its way (did you know that Transparent Aluminium exists?)!

So how will it all come together?

I'm not a futurist. There are far more qualified people out there who can predict where we're going – Dr. Michio Kaku comes to mind, read his "Physics of the Future" (which was written in 2011 so it's already obsolete!). I don't know. I think if we all sat down and thought about what the world will be like, even in as little as the next decade, we'd all come up with different answers.

But you have to be blind not to see that our kids and grandkids are going to live in a technology-driven world that we can't imagine. I may live long enough to see it but like my 92-year old mother who uses her iPad to play solitaire and nothing else, I imagine I'll be a relic who will only be able to gape with wonder at what the world has become.

Another reflection on computer crashes: remember when you first got your latest computer (or in fact, when you got any computer in the past)? My recollection is , "wow, this is so fast!" and "look how great everything runs". What happened? Why do we get Blue Screens, why do we have endless issues? It's usually not the hardware: it has to do with installing updates and upgrades. Why can't we just leave well enough alone? Set up a computer to run program "X" (let's say Photoshop), then block all updates, especially from Mickey$oft and Apple (if that's the way you go). Won't it continue to run great, just like when you first got it? 

Updated Fine Art Gallery

Since my laptop computer crash, I've been restoring programs and utilities one at a time. Today I set up the SmugMug link in Lightroom and took the opportunity to update my Fine Art Limited Edition Prints Galleries. Here's the link: there are two galleries, "New and Featured Images" and the archive that shows all the prints I have available.

Enjoy the images, and if you want a fine art print, prices start at $1000. Just kidding, they're reasonably priced and would look fantastic in your home or office!

Speaking of upgrading...

It's that time of year! Spring has sprung and visions of making pictures that don't involve snow are dancing in your heads! Time to learn about how to use that camera better, or to get a handle on that incredible program known as "Photoshop" or penetrate the mysteries of Lightroom. Come do a workshop.

I've updated my workshop pages at www.photography.to/workshops.htm. I changed a couple of the courses to reflect what people seem to want, but I still  don't show any dates because I'm very flexible (Although I did publish some course dates because they needed it for the Summer Guide in the Highlands). The most popular course has been the 2-day DSLR, but I'm now showing a 1-day basic skills session and coupling that with an optional 1-day field session.

Because I teach to small groups, even one-on-one, you get to choose what you want to learn and how long you spend doing it. Just want a theory session? Or would you prefer to do a field trip and get some real-world experience? I'm easy, I can make the time if you can. Let's Talk!

If you don't feel the need, I'll bet you know someone who does! Please share!

Lots of words, not a lot of pictures!

Yeah, well... time to fix that!

While dinner was cooking, I thought I'd try to capture the essence of the small prime rib roast I was cooking on the BBQ. I used my flash off-camera (about 1m to the left and slightly above, with the Gary Fong diffuser). I tried a couple of shots using a reflector to add some light to the dark areas, but I thought this simple version had a better feel to it. I turned up the burners momentarily to show them, and even cloned in an extra strip to see it better. For the record, it was delicious, properly medium-rare!

So there was this blue jay in the tree. I've taken so many pictures of them, I thought I'd try to make this one a little different. I used a Topaz Simplify preset on this one. One day I'll put all my black background images together somewhere! 

Out near the white water preserve, there's this old church cemetery. Now I think this is the original old church itself, although there's another building across the road that seems to be more current (but still old and rustic). This is hand-hewn log construction and seems to still be weathertight. This is a 5-shot HDR and I used the 10x ND filter to make the exposure times range from 1 to 30 seconds, to try to get some motion in the clouds.  

Generally speaking, this is my least favourite time of year because of the almost monochromatic browns and beiges that paint the landscape. So drag the shutter to 1/10 second and move the camera while the shutter is open and voilà, a really nice abstract emerges, ready for large scale printing on canvas or matte paper! You want one. I know you do. Let's Talk!

— 30 —

News, news and more news!

There's a lot of stuff going on in the FACzen photography world. I'm making good progress in certain areas, still spinning the wheels in others but we'll get there! In the meantime, here's the news of the day!

New PHOTOGRAPHY.TO website launched

Maybe that's not entirely accurate. Let's just say, "updated". Most of the links to the active stuff have been changed or updated, and I've added new pages for new projects. Check it out!

Maintaining a website is an ongoing task. It never ends, there's always something to fix, to add, to change. I'm no expert (I don't think I'd even call myself an "intermediate") so I probably do things the hard way, but my goal is to make it easy to navigate and attractive to my web visitors.

■ The greeting page has been changed to make it easier to navigate. If you know what you're looking for, there are big buttons to guide you. Or you can browse more easily.

■ The "Workshops" button will now take you to a list of different workshops. You can access the calendar from there, and you can sign up online for any session we have scheduled (and some we don't!).

■ There's now a direct link to my Smugmug gallery, where you can browse through all of my art prints and choose which one(s) you'd like to see gracing your walls. New images are also in a featured gallery. Although I haven't enabled a pure e-commerce site, you can easily get in touch to order or discuss anything you're interested in.

■ I need to work on the eBooks section. My goal is to make most of these publications free and available to subscribers to my Newsletter. And of course, there are new eBooks in the works.

■ Speaking of the Newsletter, I'm working on revising the format so that it becomes a simple weekly HTML email with highlights from this blog and other news, plus special offers for my loyal readers. My goal is to add a "0" to the number of subscribers before the end of the year. If I do get there, I'm actually going to have to start paying MailChimp for their services instead of using their free account!

■ Tips. Let's make "Tips" the heading for the next announcement, shall we? 

By the way, if you think the buttons up there are neat, here's the link to the tutorial I posted last year on how to make them in Photoshop in case you missed it. After you set it up, it takes 2 minutes to make a new button!

In fact, here's a timesaver: here's the actual PSD file I created to make my buttons. Feel free to download it and to share it, but if you do, I'd ask you to subscribe to my newsletter and ask anyone you passed it on to, to do the same. Fair?

I'm about to become a published columnist!

I've been published before, but the local newspaper has agreed to publish my "Behind the Shutter" photography tips articles as a bi-weekly column! The first one will appear in Haliburton County Living on June 27th (I hope I'm not jumping the gun with this announcement, but I'm excited and wanted to tell everyone about it!). You can access a virtual copy of this publication here.

A copy of this publication is distributed to every household in the Highlands, so it's the widest circulation paper up here! If you live in the Highlands and you're reading this, watch your mailbox!

Along with each article, I'm creating a "Tips" web page. It will contain additional information, example pictures, eventually a comments dialogue (as soon as I figure out how!) and of course links back to my other projects and programs.

You can access the Tips pages from the main photography.to website. I could put the link here, but in fairness, I won't since you might be reading this before the initial publication date. Eventually, I plan to create ePub versions of these columns and combine them into an ongoing series of eBooks.

If that isn't enough news...

Ten of my images are on display (and for sale) at the Rail's End Gallery & Arts Centre in Haliburton. A couple more are going in next week, requested by the curator. The only bad part is that my framing isn't good enough, so they're in a rack in clear bags.

The Rail's End is responsible for the annual arts festival in Haliburton. Unfortunately, it was too late to participate this year (fourth weekend in July, FWIW), but my application will go in for next summer. This is a juried show but I'm hopeful I can get in. I have to work on my framing.

Spreading the Word

You will find advertisements for my workshops every week in the Haliburton Highlander. In addition, a bare-bones schedule of DSLR workshop dates is in the Haliburton County Summer/Fall Guide 2013 (I had to give them the dates long before I got things finalized!).

Courses & Workshops

I've finished the curricula (or curriculums. Or agendas. Whatever word you prefer) for three new courses. My program now contains the following, in addition to custom courses for more advanced photographers.

■ Basic Skills, a 3-hour workshop for new shooters regardless of what kind of digital camera they have,

■ Introduction to Photoediting, which is another 3-hour session designed to introduce people to programs like Lightroom™ or Photoshop™,

■ DSLR workshop, for new and not-so-new owners of DSLR cameras. This venerable 2-day session will take the newer photographer to the next level, and

■ Mini-tours where I take participants to exceptional venues, such as dawn, dusk and whitewater sites and give them tips on how to achieve better images in the field.

What's next? Full weekend or even longer field trips. High on my priority list of things to develop and I'm really hopeful of having something for the peak Fall Colours season up here this autumn.

So I've been a busy boy. There's more stuff in the works, but I can't announce it yet, so watch for it!

Creative Cloud

Not for me at this time. As usual, Adobé has come up with some neat new stuff, but not enough to be a game changer for me. Ditto Lightroom 5. I think I'm going to pass and wait and see.

A big issue for me is the concept of ongoing rental. If they would come up with some sort of acceptable solution that would allow you to keep the last version you paid for in perpetuity if you decided to stop, then maybe. But I can't see being hung out to dry if you can't afford to keep paying them sometime in the future.

It's been out for two days and I heard it's already been cracked. I'd rather use CS6 that I bought and paid for than pirate CC.

The bad part is, all the technical blogs I read talk about nothing other than the new fancy features in CC or LR5. No great new tutorials on CS6 or LR4. That said, Glyn Dewis just did one on the liquify filter (here's the link to the YouTube) and although it was about CC, most of it works in CS6.

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*update: it looks as though Adobé may have been listening. The rumour mill says that they've covered most of what I mentioned. I read in a prodesigntools.com article:

• The new CC apps will install and work alongside any older versions of Adobe software like CS6, CS5, etc., and will be able to backsave or export to CS6 file formats.
• In fact, Creative Cloud members will have access to download and install prior versions from an archive of selected desktop releases starting from CS6 onwards.

In an accompanying article, they also said,

“In the event that Adobe decides to discontinue any of the products in Creative Cloud, we will make the most recent version of the product available for download free of charge to active Creative Cloud members for a period of no less than 90 days. Such downloads will not require a subscription and will be licensed on an as-is, no warranty basis …”

What's missing is "what happens if *I* decide to discontinue my membership in CC...". Can I buy a download of the as-is version of the software. If they do that, I'm in.

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Speaking of Software...

I don't post a lot of these, but this is a goodie. Here's a deal for you. I use different plugins in Photoshop, but the one I go to when I want to tweak an image or spice it up is Topaz. Mostly I use Topaz Adjust, but lately I've started using Clarity as well and I love them both.

Topaz Labs has just announced a huge promotion, starting June 24 through July 7. The complete Topaz Bundle is being reduced from $299 to $199 — that's $100 off — and worth every penny.

Click this image to go to the Topaz site. To get the discount, your promo code is 'july4' (without the quote marks). Disclosure: they pay me a little affiliate fee if you click the link and end up buying the software.

Topaz Clarity is not in the bundle, it's $49.95 and I'd be buying it at that price if I didn't already have it. In the bundle, you get Topaz Adjust, DeNoise, B&W Effects, ReMask, Lens Effects, Detail, Simplify, Clean, InFocus, DeJPEG and Fusion Express. That last one lets you access all of the Topaz Plug-ins directly in Aperture, Lightroom and iPhoto. There's a 30 day free trial, so go for it. Give it a shot and see if you like it as much as I do.

Time for some pictures

You know I don't do a blog post without current pictures. So here goes.

My grandson, Ryan Davenport. His graduation was Thursday night. You know I don't go anywhere without a camera... 

When I originally wrote this, I said...

Believe it or not, this was the very first frame, the very first picture of the night. I took a shot just to test the lighting. 100% natural light from a window. Minimal Photoshop, just to retouch the skin a little. 120mm focal length at f/8, ISO 1000, exposure compensation -2ev. This is precisely the shot I had in mind, I planned it while I was driving there. It's very satisfying when the first shutter release worked.

All true, except I now changed the picture. In the first one he was serious, here I got a good natural smile. This is actually 6 frames later, same values except 82mm instead of 120mm, so it's cropped a bit.

The reason I'm posting this is, well, look at the fantastic grandson I have! OK, well actually, I wanted to point out that I used Topaz Clarity on this image, after the basic retouching. It made some very subtle but changes to the image. Not being a portrait photographer, I'm not sure what's good and bad, but I really like this image.

I was going to add some kayakers, but I figured you've suffered enough. Maybe next time. Instead, I'll show you last night's dinner

Both are HDR's, but processed differently. The infrared element and rotisserie on my new BBQ do a fine job on chicken! I threw the asparagus and peppers right on the grill after the chicken was done, a little olive oil and teriyaki seasoning, 3 or 4 minutes, that's it. Great dinner!

So I guess that'll do for today! A lot going on.

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