Getting It Right In Camera

I came across an article the other day, from a blog called Jonas Hellsen Photography. It made such an impact on me, and struck a chord that I wanted to share it. See, he touches on the topic of getting it right in camera and poses the thought that retouching is actually part of photography and, in a way, always has been.

For me, I’ve always kinda thought this: In this digital age, with all of the tools we have both before and after capture, I don’t care where you get it right? All that matters to me, is that you get it right. Whether it’s right in camera or whether it’s right in Photoshop (or any post-processing) does it really matter? As long as it’s right, isn’t that what counts?

So, as you’re surfing around this weekend, I think his article is definitely worth reading.
I’m off to chaperon my son’s field trip to Disney today. Wish me luck! Tomorrow I leave for Adobe Max for the weekend, so I’ll make sure I report anything cool that happens here next week. Enjoy and have a great weekend!

Nikon D800 12-Month Review (Would I Buy It Again?)

So I’ve been shooting with the D800 for about a year now. At first I was borrowing/renting one for selective shoots, but I pulled the trigger a while back and bought my own. Most of the reviews I read about the D800 were all written within a month of having the camera, so I thought it’d be cool to write one a year later.

NOTE: I wrote a post here a while back about my choice of the D800 over the D800E

Things I Like
Overall, I’m really happy with the D800. The settings are simple to operate and having been a Nikon shooter for many years I don’t have many issues with the menu system, button placement and getting around.

For starters, one of my favorite improvements (over the D3 that I was shooting before) is the auto timer mode. See, the D800 is primarily a nature and landscape camera for me. It’s almost always on a tripod and I’m almost always bracketing with 5 photos (I don’t do HDR with them though, but more on that in another post). With my D3, I had to press the shutter 5 times or always have my cable release with me so I didn’t have to continually touch the camera between photos. But the way the timer works on the D800, I can set it to take 5 photos, two seconds after pressing the shutter. So I just press the shutter once, wait 2 seconds and the camera will fire off the 5 shot bracket automatically. It’s great because I don’t have to worry about having the cable release with me all the time (I usually just carry it for long exposures beyond 30 seconds).

I also love the way the camera feels. I actually like the smaller form factor (compared to the D3 and D4). I do have a battery grip for it, but I usually only use it when I’m shooting portraits since it has the vertical shutter release.

What About File Size?
Another thing I love is also one of the things I hate too – the file size. The 36 megapixel sensor is awesome. The files look amazing on my display. Aside from the obvious advantages of being able to print large, I think there’s more to it. I mean, it’s just plain cool to have that kind of file size and detail available to zoom in to. Let’s face it, if you’re a photographer then you’re a visual person. Aesthetics and visual experiences matter. Even if you’re not printing the photo that large, editing a photo with that kind of detail is just fun and visually stimulating. I may not always print the photo as large as I can, but it’s sure nice knowing that I can.

Another advantage of the large images is that it let’s me shoot a little more “loose” than I normally would, because I know I can crop the photo and still have plenty of resolution to work with. Don’t get me wrong, I do like to get my crop right in camera, but I’m also shooting a lot of wide angle stuff (landscapes, cityscapes, etc…). Images that will need some lens correction in Lightroom/Photoshop. Because the perspective fixes we do to our photos typically means you’re going to lose a lot of the area around the edges of the photo, it’s nice to know I can still use the lens corrections without giving up important parts of the composition.

However, it has wreaked havoc on my storage. If you go out and shoot 200 photos you’re talking about taking up around 10 gigs of space. So I’ve had to buy hard drives a little sooner than I normally would have. It’s also been good at forcing me to delete photos too though. I find myself going through older photo shoots more often and deleting the rejects a little more thoroughly than I normally would have.

Things I Don’t Like
As I just mentioned above, the file size is a little hard to get used to. Not just from a storage space perspective, but they also take longer to edit since you’re waiting on the progress bar more. I find myself doing a “quick” edit where I reduce the image size from 7000 pixels wide to 3000 px and running my filters and plug-ins just to see what I like. It only takes a couple extra minutes and then I’ll go back and edit the full size photo from scratch once I know the direction I want to go. If I had to get through hundreds of photos a day, this would definitely be a slow down in my workflow. But I don’t. I typically walk away with only a few keepers from a landscape shoot, so it doesn’t take me too long to experiment.

Another thing that ticks me off is that the D800 doesn’t have the ability to separate my bracketed photos by two stops. So my only choice is to shoot 5 frames (all separated by 1 stop) and later delete the +1 and -1 photos so I only have the +2 photo, the metered shot, and -2 photo. Other Nikon cameras have this feature, and Canon has had it for years now, so I’m a little annoyed that the D800 doesn’t have it. It seems like it would be such a simple firmware update right?

Would I Buy It Again?
There’s the magic question right? Knowing what I know 1 year later, would I buy the D800 again? The answer: most likely. My hesitation lies with knowing that there’s the D600 out there. The D600 is an awesome camera. It’s still got a huge 24 megapixel sensor so you could still print really big. It’s cheaper than the D800 and I think it’s just about every bit as good.

If I were given the choice today though, I’m pretty sure I’d still go with the D800. The only reason is that from time to time, I may need the extra resolution. For starters, I teach and am constantly zooming in to photos to show people certain areas that I’m teaching about. It’s nice to have that extra resolution, so people can see whatever I’m talking about large on a projector screen. I also sell prints now and then, and it’s nice to be able to deliver a very large print should some one need one. But if you’re not teaching and showing large photos on screen and you’re not selling prints, the D600 is a REALLY attractive alternative.

So there ya have it. A 1 year review of the D800. It really is an extraordinary camera. Shooting with it has made me want to go reshoot some of my favorite photos so I can print them even larger. It’s great to edit, and when you see the photos you’ve taken in all of their 36 megapixel glory on your display, it makes you glad you own it.

Thanks for stopping by today. Have a good one!

Announcing My Latest Landscape Photography Workshop Update

I’ve had a new workshop added to the schedule and a change to another one so I wanted to write a quick post to update you in case you’re able to attend any of them.

First, last month I wrote about a workshop I’m doing with Bill Fortney in Washington state (the Palouse region and Olympic National Park). The workshop was sold out almost as soon as it was announced, but a few people cancelled at the last minute, so there’s a few open spots. I think there’s two, but if you call and beg Bill I bet you can squeeze a third out of him, but that’s it. There’s simply not enough “personal” time for each person in the workshop if we take too many folks. Also, I just found out we’re going to be making a stop at Mt. Rainier for a day too. Can’t wait! Here’s a link to Bill’s site to find out more and contact him if you’re interested.

Next, I’m going to be helping out on a workshop shooting Colorado in the fall with Tom Bol and George Theodore. This area is supposed to be beautiful this time of year, and any workshop with Tom and George is a great workshop. There’s only room for 15 photographers total, and it’s very close to being full so jump on it if you’re thinking of going. Here’s the description from their website:

“Glowing aspen and blazing scrub oak, clear crisp days, snow in the mountains as background, Colorado’s fall is spectacular and its greatest show is the San Juan Range in the Southwestern part of the state. You’ll be dazzled by the colorful display of foilage. At this time of year, with the lower angle of the sun, we can shoot almost any time of the day. Using the small community of Ouray – surrounded on three sides by 13,000 foot snow covered peaks – as our base, we’ll cover several shooting locations in all directions including the ever popular Last Dollar Road to Telluride.”

I hear over and over again that these multi-day workshops really help catapult people’s photography and post-processing skills so I hope that I can meet you at one of them. Thanks!

Moab Photography Update: False Kiva

Things are going great with the landscape photography class here in Moab, Utah. We’ve had our share of great weather and not-so-great weather, but I think it all makes for a good class because that’s the reality of shooting landscapes and outdoors. However, the other evening we hiked out to a fairly undocumented Class II archeological site and it was a spectacular sunset. The site is called False Kiva. It’s a human-made stone circle of unknown origin in a cave in a remote area of Canyonlands National Park. It’s hard to find actual directions on how to get out there (on purpose), and at the park ranger’s request, it’s not something I’d post, as they’re trying to keep foot traffic to a minimum for this site. It was about an hour hike each way and wasn’t too bad until you got out to the actual site, where it got tricky getting down the rocks and then back up another few hundred feet to the shallow cave-like area.

Anyway, I thought I’d share one of the photos processed in Lightroom 5, Photoshop and finished off with onOne’s Perfect Effects. I have photos of it while the sun is still up and setting, but this twilight photo is one of my favorites.

(click to see it larger)

It’s been a long week, but we’re just about finished and heading back home today. As soon as I know more info on when the class will be published I’ll be sure to give you an update. Have a great weekend!

Before and After Video – Photo Processing with onOne Plug-ins

Recently, onOne Software gave the the opportunity again to host an episode of their Perfect Inspiration weekly video series. This time around I processed a photo of my cousin’s son from start to finish using Lightroom and Perfect Effects. The thing I really like about onOne’s series is that they incorporate a story into it as well, so you get a little bit more than just the techie photo stuff.

Here’s a link to their Perfect Inspiration page and you can see the before/after as well as the video right on the page. Plus, you’ll probably enjoy poking around the site and watching some earlier videos from some other great photographers. Thanks again to the folks at onOne for including me and for making kick-ass software! Have a good one!