Archive: ‘Reader Recap’
Monday, June 7th, 2010
It’s been a few weeks since I’ve done one of those posts, largely because I’ve been reading more books than I have posts on my feed reader. So to make up for this, this post is actually going to cover my favorites from several weeks worth of posts that I’ve picked up on or was really impressed by.
- Take a People-Free Photo in a Crowded Place – From one of my daily must-read sites, Lifehacker, comes this awesome tip on how you can take a serious of photos in a crowded location to make one glorious photo without the people clutter. My only complaint is that this tip is for Photoshop proper, but with a little patience and practice this can be done with any photo editor.
- Quick Tips on Photographing Public Memorials and Statuary – Photographing statues is one of those things that I’ve done for years, but I have never given much thought to it. This short post from The Photo Argus focuses on the subject and more than anything calls for greater attention to be paid to a photographic subject that is surely overlooked by more photographers than just myself.
- Six Tips for Shooting without a Tripod – I hate lugging my tripod around and I try to avoid bringing it when I’m out shooting unless I know for sure that I’ll need it. Needless to say, camera shake can sometimes be a problem, so this post from Beyond Megapixels is great since it offers some tips that I’ve never heard before, such as using a screw and string to stabilize the camera.
- The Most Surprising Amateur Photography Success Stories – Photopreneur is probably one of my three favorite photography blogs and this post is a great example of why. Sometimes success can come even when you’re not looking for it, so it helps to be prepared. Probably my most popular photo set on Flickr is my set of circus photos, and it’s an event that I wasn’t even planning to go to at all.
- Bulkr Downloads Flickr Photos to Your Desktop – I download my photos from Flickr all the time, primarily because I can access them from anywhere, so this is a great tool to have available from every connected device that I use, and it’s yet another reason why Lifehacker is one of my must reads.
Tags: Beyond Megapixels, Bulkr, Landmarks, Lifehacker, Memorials, Photopreneur, Statues, Success, The Photo Argus, Tripod
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Monday, May 10th, 2010
Happy belated Mother’s Day to all of the mothers out there. Between preparing for the holiday road trip and gearing up for my first softball game of the year tonight, I didn’t read very many posts this week, but that doesn’t make the ones I read any less important and helpful. There are several tips within the articles here that I just had no awareness of before, so I’m quite thankful for what reading I was able to get in.
- How to use a classic manual lens on your dslr camera – Not many posts come from Make the Photo! but the ones that do are always great. I’ve been looking into expanding my manual lens inventory for my Minolta X-570 manual film camera that I’ve been using lately, but I hadn’t really considered trying to shoot with manual lenses on my Canon DSLR. With adapter prices less than $10, and many of the lenses themselves under $50, I think it would be a good, cheap alternative to explore.
- Seven More Outdoor Photo Tips – Although I don’t post much from Photofocus, it’s certainly one of the sites that I trust most for advise and tips on photographic style and technique. A couple of these tips should be obvious like carry a tripod and try different angles, but other tips may come as a surprise to some readers.
- Make Light Painting Circles with Light – I don’t need to repeat my interest in light painting and light graffiti, it’s been pretty well documented on this site, but to this day, the whole concept still kinda blows my mind. The sad part is, I’ve read plenty of tutorials such as this one from DIY Photography that just makes doing it seem so simple.
- Jailbreaking Your iPad: How You Can and Why You Should – I do not have an iPad, and quite honestly, I don’t have any interest in ever owning one. That opinion may change someday, but right now, it seems completely pointless to me. The reason I’m sharing this guide from Gizmodo is because I’ve also never really understood why you would jailbreak an iDevice for any reason other than to use it on a different carrier, and since I don’t have an iPhone, there was no need for that either. This post did, however, make me realize some of the other reasons why a jailbroken device is better, namely the ability to multitask and the use of folders (which is actually included on the iPad).
- Caring for memory cards – When I first saw this post on Beyond Megapixels, my initial reaction was “Is it really that difficult?” but I have to admit that I learned something from this post that I would not have known otherwise, and that is you should always reformat the card after deleting everything off of it. I have never done that before, and I’m curious to see just how much space it frees up the next time I do clean my card completely.
Tags: Beyond Megapixels, DIY Photography, Gizmodo, iPad, Jailbreaking, Light Painting, Make the Photo, Manual, Memory Card, Photofocus
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Monday, May 3rd, 2010
Lighting and painting with light seemed to be a big theme with me last week, as the majority of the posts that I found most usual dealt with the subject matter. Another favorite post this week, although not necessarily related to photography, is one that shares some great websites that will help you save money in general. I use many of these websites myself, and really love using them.
- Pros and Cons: Natural light vs studio – Beyond Megapixels has an interesting post of comparing the benefits of natural light to studio light. There aren’t many cons unless you consider the pros of one to be the cons of the other. I personally prefer natural light, but I find myself using studio light more frequently since I tend to do a lot of my photography late at night after the kiddies have gone to bed.
- The 4 Things You NEED to Know About Light – I’m not sure if I’ve had the chance to post anything from Your Photo Tips before but if I haven’t, this is a great post to start with. Put simply the four things that you need to understand are the direction of the light, the intensity, whether it’s a hard or soft light, and color temperature. If you can master these four things, it won’t matter as much if you’re using natural or studio light from the article above.
- Making Patterned Light Painting Images – I have been trying to figure out how these folks are able to make such elaborate light paintings, and I have to say that this post from DIY Photography did more to help me understand and point me to additional tutorials than anything else that I’ve read. I’ve got a few other things in the works right now, so I’m not planning to try this out anytime soon, but I feel like some of the mystery on how to create great light painting has been revealed.
- The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Photographers – Before I go out on particular types of photo shoots, I like to re-read over some of the notes that I have and posts that I’ve saved about that particular method, and in a lot of ways the same thing applies with this type of article from Photofocus. These tips are nothing new, but every once in a while, it’s great to get a reminder about what it takes to succeed every now and then.
- Fifteen Great Websites that Saved Me Money in 2010 – This post from my favorite money management blog, The Simple Dollar, is full of great resources that many people never consider exploring or perhaps just weren’t aware of the cost saving benefits. My personal favorites from the list are PaperBackSwap.com (and its sister side SwapADVD.com), Netflix.com (allowed me to get rid of our cable subscription), and RetailMeNot.com (I don’t make a purchase anywhere online without checking this website first for discounts).
Tags: Beyond Megapixels, Light Painting, Natural Light, Netflix, PaperBackSwap.com, Photofocus, RetailMeNot.com, Studio Light, SwapADVD.com, The Simple Dollar, Your Photo Tips
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Monday, April 26th, 2010
Happy (belated) Worldwide Pinhole Camera Day! In celebration of the day, I was planning to make my first ever pinhole camera, but sadly, a stomach bug kept me from doing most of the things that I wanted to for more of the weekend. If you missed the date as well, this week’s recap features a list of 23 pinhole camera tutorials that you can do to make up for it. Also, check out some of the amazing photos that were entered in Adorama’s iPhone photo contest. Some of the photos are simply a sight to behold considering that they were taken and edited entirely on a cell phone.
- Adorama iPhone Photo Contest – This isn’t really a Reader article like I normally post, but Adorama has announced the winners of its contest, and this something that’s definitely worth taking a look at if you’ve ever doubted that you can get great photos out of a cell phone. It’s a subject that I’m particularly interested in myself and I’m certain you’ll see some posts on it as the year goes on.
- 23 Pinhole Cameras That You Can Build at Home – In honor of Pinhole Camera Day, the wickedly awesome DIY Photography blog has provided links to an interesting assortment of free pinhole camera tutorials. I am ashamed to admit that I still haven’t ever attempted to create one of these, but I’ve already printed out one of the tutorials, and I’m going to make every effort to do it this week.
- Quick Photo Boost – Here’s an easy little tip from Beyond Megapixels. If you’re looking for a quick and dirty way to enhance the colors of a photo, simply duplicate the layer in your image editor and apply an overlay with a half strength opacity. I’ve tried this on a couple of my images this past week, and although the difference is only slight it is noticeable. I’ve done some comparisons with folks as well, and they unanimously selected the “enhanced” photos as being better.
- Become a Master of Your (Photography) Niche – I’ve written in the past on the need to find your photographic style and this post from Photopreneur goes right along those lines. If you’ve been coming to this site for any length of time, you’ve probably noticed how I’ve struggled to reach where I am now in my own development of this idea, but I think we’re finally on the right path and I look forward to building on the tips listed here.
- BeetleCam Shoots African Wildlife Up Close – PetaPixel is an always dependable source for this post each week, but this is probably one of my favorite posts. The BeetleCam provides such a unique angle for viewing wildlife that we probably wouldn’t have otherwise been able to see. I would definitely recommend visiting the full BeetleCam site, as well as following them on Flickr.
Tags: Adorama, BeetleCam, Beyond Megapixels, DIY Photography, iPhone, Niche, PetaPixel, Photopreneur, Pinhole
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Monday, April 19th, 2010
Flower photography--a ton of photography opportunities right outside my front door.
Family issues kept me away for most of the week last week, so I didn’t get much of my normal reading in, and I’m still trying to play catch up on my work work. Here’s a sampling of some of the posts that I did manage to see and made note of for your viewing pleasure (and my future reference).
- The Art of Flower Photography – Flower photography is easily one of my favorite photographic subjects (no doubt, you’ve noticed), primarily because I have so much of it around my own home so I don’t have to leave the house to get some colorful photos. Over at The Discerning Photographer, there’s an entire post dedicated to the art, and I highly recommend anyone interested in this subject matter to take a look at it. He’s got some gorgeous photos to go along with some excellent tips.
- The Definitive List of Online Photography Magazines – More so than any other subject matter, when it comes to photography, I try to read just about everything that I can get my hands on, and I took this post from The Photo Argus like kids to candy. If you’re looking to add some new feeds to your Reader or just take a look at what others are doing in the art, check out some of the sites from this list. You won’t be disappointed.
- Inexpensive Lighting Solutions – This is the type of post that I live for, and the folks at Beyond Megapixels certainly delivered the goods with this one. In this quick list, they offer an assortment of different lighting options each well below the $25 mark. This is what quality photography on the cheap is all about.
- The Most Spectacular Sun View to Date – Like many people, I am both fascinated and dumbfounded by anything space related, and this high resolution photo of the Sun on Gizmodo is simply stunning. My 4 year old keeps telling me that she wants to go space, and if that happens, I will be one proud (and extremely jealous) father.
- Stabilize Your Camera with Some PVC Pipe – Sometimes people come up with things that are just so simple, that it’s amazing that no one else as come along and done it already. This weight support using PVC pipe over on PetaPixel is one of those things.
Tags: Beyond Megapixels, Flowers, Gizmodo, Lighting, Magazines, PetaPixel, PVC, The Discerning Photographer, The Photo Argus
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