Keeping busy…

Wow… What an incredibly busy few days.  First, I hope everyone had a very happy and healthy Thanksgiving.  I spent the day with family and had a great dinner prepared by my mother.  There’s nothing better than Mom’s Thanksgiving spread.

Black Friday started of early with some daybreak photography shopping.  Yeah, I was one of the nutcases that got up at an un-Godly hour to go shopping.  There’s a first time for everything and that was my first Black Friday morning.  We’ll see about next year.  I did get a lot of my shopping done.

Later Friday, I had a big photo shoot at a good friend’s house.  She was having family in for Thanksgiving and they stayed until Friday.  There were 20+ people to photograph in large and small groups, individuals, etc.  This was an amazing family, full of life, laughter and music.  Throughout the day someone would start playing keyboard while another person sang.  What an amazing background to the photography.  It was a fantastic opportunity and the photos came out great.  I’ll post an example once I get them to my friend.

In industry news, Nikon has introduced the D3x.  Initially leaked in Nikon’s own pro magazine a few days previous, Nikon made it official this evening.  The D3x sports the same design as the D3, but with a 24.5 megapixel sensor, CMOS, FX frame (full-frame) sensor and an ISO range of 100 – 1600 with push to 6400.  Unlike the D3’s focus on low-light performance, this appears to be strictly a megapixel-buster and the first time that Nikon bests Canon’s top megapixel numbers.  The D3X will sell in December with an estimated price of $8,000. More info here.

While I like the fact that Nikon finally has a high-end camera with serious megapixels (until now they’ve never had anything close to Canon’s megapixel monsters), this isn’t a camera on my radar.  At 12.5 megapixels my D300 has plenty enough for the enlargements and type of work I’m doing.  The serious megapixels are for more commerical photographers – specifically stock and serious nature/landscape folks.  I’m looking at the D700 for it’s amazing low-light performance and compatibility with accessories for my D300.  That’s the next camera for me.

On another note, the website is coming along really well.  I have the fine-art sales portion ready to go live sometime this week.  I’m excited about being able to sell directly through my site instead of needing other sites (ie stock sites).  It’s a great opportunity to get my work out there.

This week I have a few photo shoots scheduled – a child shoot and mother and daughters.  I’m really looking forward to the opportunity and getting some great shots.  Photos from some of these shoots will be posted soon.  I want to make sure my clients get to see them first.

Stay tuned!

It’s up…

After multiple issues this week, the new website is launched.  I still need to build out the ordering page and continue to add images to the galleries, but, for now, I’m happy.  Let me know what you think.  I know I have many more pictures I can post.

Goodnight, for now!

Oh!  It’s always good to provide a link!   www.RobertTruemanPhotography.com

Welcome Inside Aperture listeners…

Today, Derrick Story released the Inside Aperture podcast where he interviewed Cathy Chung and me about the Aperture Nature Photography Workshop and our thoughts on Aperture.  Believe it or not, I haven’t listened yet (it just finished downloading), but I wanted to get a post up to welcome folks should they arrive at this site.  If you’ve been reading this blog, you’ll know I’m a HUGE fan of Aperture and many of the plug ins.  It’s changed the way I work greatly improving my speed to process images and the final output.

Last evening, I gave a presentation to my local photography club titled, The War On Photography.  This could certainly have been a polarizing discussion, but, thanks to the great folks at the club, became a very interesting one.  To summarize – in the years following 9/11 people view photography in a different way.  Influenced by a national cry of vigilance, people started seeing terrorists whenever they saw big lenses and “professional-looking” cameras.  As photographers, we found ourselves debating our right to shoot bridges, architecture, malls, etc.  Too many stories involving security guards, police and the public reacting in a negative way to photography consistently appeared on the internet and in the news.  Is our right to freedom of speech being taken away?

From my research (and I’m no lawyer and not attempting to provide legal advice) it appears that our rights are firmly intact, although education (or reeducation) is needed.  To summarize the US law regarding photography (as I understand it) is as follows:

You are allowed to photograph anything with the following exceptions:

• Certain military installations or operations
• People who have a reasonable expectation of privacy.  That is, people who are some place that’s not easily visible to the general public

Now, I’m not going to debate this law as I’m simply not an expert.  I do want to point out that, while we may have the right to do something, should we?  You are allowed to photograph children playing in a public playground.  You can photograph accident scenes, fires and other disasters.  Would I?  I guess it depends.  Certainly, I wouldn’t photograph children unless I asked the parent first.  That’s my personal opinion from having two little children.  I probably would photograph, in some way, accidents, fires, police scenes, etc.  It’s an interesting topic.

Finally, the new website will be up later today at www.RobertTruemanPhotography.com (currently pointing to this blog).  If you’re getting to this blog from that address, you’ll first be taken to the new site and need to follow the Blog link.  I’m really excited to get this going.  The site will focus on fine art prints and scheduling appointments for photo assignments.  Hopefully, this is the beginning of something good!

As always, I look forward to your comments!

A big step forward…

It’s been a good few days since the last update so I wanted to give you a quick update.  First, the interview with Derrick Story at Inside Aperture went extremely well.  Derrick is a first-class guy and extremely knowledgeable about all things photography.  His blog and podcast, Inside Aperture, plus his other podcast The Digital Story are very good sources of photography information.  It sounds like my interview with him will be in this Tuesday’s Inside Aperture podcast.  Have a listen and let me know what you think.

I finally made a big step in the advancement of Robert Trueman Photography.  After much thought, I chose a provider for the new website, paid my initial start up fees and I’m ready to start building the site.  I explored a number of providers for flash-based photography sites – Into The Darkroom, PhotoBiz, Big Folio, and Livebooks among others.  All looked really good, with easy-to-use Flash-based templates to quickly build professional looking websites for photographers.  For me, PhotoBiz offered exactly what I’m looking for – easy-to-use templates, good looking templates and an ordering system I can tied to either a pro lab or print on my own.  Currently, they’re having a 50% off start up fees offer that I used.  I chose the flash website and client ordering site.  This will allow me to display and sell my fine art photography and have a place for clients to see, select and order the proofs from a shoot.  Ultimately, I can split the site into multiple sites each for a photographic style.  There’s a lot to learn here, but I’m hoping to have something up and running by the end of the week.

Lastly, I need to step it up when it comes to portraits.  I’m very critical of photography and know what I like when I see it.  Today, I had the opportunity to photography my girlfriend’s nephew, Christopher, an adorable 5 month old.  The shoot went well.  With really young kids, you have to focus fast as they move quickly and without warning.  While I was pleased with the digital negatives I shot, I was really blown away by the final processed images.  I’ll let them speak for themselves, but I like what I see.  As always, feel free to comment!

PhotoPlus Expo…

The PhotoPlus Expo is a huge show with hundreds of vendors, both big and small.  There are also a number of different educational classes and hands-on labs (for an additional fee) with some of the best photographers in the business presenting.  If you enjoy photography, this New York City show is a must-see.

My plan for tackling the show floor was to make strategic visits to the vendors I was most interested in before exploring the rest of the floor.  Drobo (Data Robotics), Nikon, Epson, Nik Software, B&H Photo and ThinkTank Photo were my first-visit choices.  The big ones, Nikon and Epson, were quick trips to see what was going on and to check out their latest offerings.  Nikon was a huge booth with all types of equipment to check out.  From the D3 to the Coolpix line and 600mm f4s to 10mm fish eyes Nikon’s booth had it all to see.  Since most of their announcements were made a few months back, there was nothing brand new to see.  Epson was the same way (and no paper samples!).  Both were interesting with lots of hands on equipment and short-subject presentations.

At Data Robotics I really enjoyed speaking to Mark Fuccio, the VP of Sales.  Mark is an interesting guy.  A true engineer at heart, Mark’s sense of the market and how to grow Drobo’s was an interesting discussion.  Drobo has made fantastic inroads in the photography market.  It’s simple to set up, easy to use and provides data protection and expandability that any photographer, or anyone with substantial data storage needs, would find useful.  With the introduction of Drobo-specific applications (for instance limiting the amount of space Time Machine uses) and the introduction of cheaper and larger hard disks, this company is in a great position to take off.

Nik Software is the company behind great products like Viveza, Color Efex Pro and Capture NX.  I won’t go into detail on all their products – you can go to their website for that.  I’ve looked at their software and played with the demos for some time and was interested in seeing what show specials they offered.  While certainly not “must-have” software for the casual photographer, the “extra touch” their products provide make your images really stand out.  Sure enough, there was a “new” collection for Aperture – a complete collection of all their products as plug ins for Aperture.  With very little hesitation, I made the jump.  I’m very anxious to use these products.  I’ll be sure to post my thoughts as I use each tool.

ThinkTank is another company with fantastic products.  They’re known for their great line of bags and their belt system that allows you to attach various pouches and storage pieces to store lenses, extra batteries, filters, etc.  It allows a photographer to walk around with a number of extra pieces while keeping their hands free to take pictures.  Again, see their website for a list of all the attachments.  Of course there was another show special – a set of five attachments and a free belt.  Yep, I made the jump.  I can’t wait to use them!

I’ll talk about the classes in another post.  I’m very pleased with my choices and the information I’ve learned.  Tomorrow, I’m meeting with Derrick Story for an interview for Inside Aperture.  I’m excited.

In NYC – at last…

I’m in NYC for the yearly PhotoPlus Expo (formerly Photo East).  This event is the largest photo show in the country that caters to both the end users and manufacturers.  There are hundred of vendors/manufacturers to visits, products to see and people to meet.  This is my third year and something I’ve looked forward to since my last trip.  If you get the chance, go.  It’s worth it.

Tomorrow, the first day of the show, I’m meeting with Derrick Story of Inside Aperture.  It’s a great website/podcast talking about all things Aperture.  There are many folks that post so you get all kinds of input.  I’m excited to be interviewed about my experience with my transition to Aperture from my previous work flow.  I’ll post more after the interview tomorrow.

A quick note, I received a cold call to do some head shots for a young man, Will, performing at the Apollo Theater in Harlem.  This isn’t the TV show, but one of the amateur nights.  Pretty cool, though!  I went to his parents house and took a number of shots before running up to NYC.  I’m looking forward to the prints and working with him again.

Also, I finally got some cards printed.  It took me forever, but I wanted to have something to hand to folks while I’m at the show.  Of course, I waited to the last minute and ran to Kinkos to get them made.  Admittedly, they’re not the best, but I’m excited to get them done.  I’m sure I’ll meet someone at the show doing great looking card and I’ll be back at the drawing board before I know it.

For now, I need to sleep.  It’s going to be a long day.  Hey, if there’s something you want me to check, let me know in the comments and I’ll try to post about it.  Goodnight!

The Microsoft Juggernaut…

Since moving to a Mac environment, I’ve attempted to do everything on the Macintosh.  From email and web browsing to photo editing and finance I was getting most of my work complete, although was using a Windows virtual machine for Quicken.  Simply, the Mac version of Quicken stinks and, using the VMWare Fusion product, the Windows version of Quicken runs really well.  I still returned to the PC for a number of tasks including filing email, most office documents and scanning documents – basically MS Office tasks and Adobe Acrobat.

I use Acrobat for scanning all my documents to PDF.  While I can complete this on the Mac using the software that came with my scanner/printer/fax, the Acrobat product does it better.  Since I own the Windows version of Acrobat, I scan on my PC and save my documents to the Mac.  I’ll update to the Mac version of Acrobat when I upgrade to CS4 suite.

Being in the “Windows” work environment all of my career, I’ve always used MS Office.  Quite frankly, I really like the product and wasn’t looking to change.  I recently download the latest Open Office 3 product and, while impressed, still didn’t get the results I needed from converting Word and Excel documents.  Plus, I still wasn’t able to file email in the folder structure I’ve used for years.  So a couple of days ago, I broke down and purchased Office 2008 for the Mac.

Arriving today, I quickly installed Mac Office 2008.  Of course, the first app I need is Entourage (Outlook’s Mac Office counterpart).  What’s the first thing I find?  There’s no support for my Outlook PST files.  They all need to be converted to Entourage.  Okay, let’s get started… What?  There’s no built in support for this!  Sigh.  Out to the web I run looking for a solution.  It turns out there’s a company, Little Machines, that sells a program that converts PST to Entourage.  It’s $10 – a great price if it works.  I’m currently moving all my PC files, including my PSTs, to the Mac.  Then I’ll start my conversion.

So I have to ask… Why no Outlook, or Outlook support in Mac Office?  That’s crazy.  It’s the same product (Office for the Mac/Office for Windows) and all other formats are supported.  What happened to Outlook?  Oh well.  I guess it’s another way to keep you on Windows.  I’ll let you know what happens with my conversion.  I’m holding my breath!

Beauty…

The one thing I’m able to do now is quickly view all of the images in my extensive library.  When I was doing that the other day, I ran across this image from the Harleysville Apple Butter Frolic 2007.  I simply like looking at this picture and thinking how much experience she’s been through.  I think she’s a real beauty:

I didn’t see her there this year, although my girlfriend did.  I hope to see her again.

My New Workflow…

It’s been a couple weeks since I returned from the ANPW trip (far too long since the last update) and I wanted to thank everyone’s well wishes via email and blog comments.  It was a blast having you read of our adventures during the ANPW.  I’d also like to give major thanks to Scott Bourne for putting together the sponsors, prizes and pros for the first ANPW.  It was truly a fantastic experience and one I’m not soon to forget.  Also, to Martin, thank you for your friendship, Aperture instruction and for making me a better photographer.  He’s truly an amazing photographer and all around good guy.  To Steve and Scott, I really enjoyed the time we spent talking and shooting together.  I really did learn a lot from both of you from photojournalism to portraits.  It was a fantastic experience and I hope to meet up with everyone again in the future.  Don’t think twice – ENTER THE NEXT ANPW CONTEST!  I never thought I’d win and it’s well worth the entry fee ($0.00!!!).

Probably the biggest change to my photography in the post-ANPW world is my workflow.  I really liked my previous workflow, but it’s a whole new ballgame now.  Previously, I was using a Windows Vista machine.  I’m a fan of Vista and haven’t had the bad experiences I’ve heard about.  The machine was a Sony Viao with a 2.2GHz processor, 4 GB of RAM and plenty of disk.  All around a good machine.  After shooting, I would download my images using Nikon Transfer, a free, yet decent, transfer utility.  Using this, I’d set my IPTC data and keywords.  Once complete, I would fire up IMatch to catalog and take a look at the images.  I’d start rating my images and delete those that were unusable.  To “develop” my images, I’d start up Nikon Capture NX 2.  Again, many folks have complained about NX, but I really like the app.  The non-destructive edits and uPoint technology was really fantastic and I didn’t have too much of an issue getting great results.  Finally, to print, I’d fire up QImage, a Windows-only, fantastic utility for printing images.  What I love about QImage are the fantastic results coming from my Epson 3800.  Simply stunning.

Now, things are a little different.  I’ve purchased a decent 20″ iMac with a 2.0 GHz processor, 4 GB RAM and, with the firewire Drobo attached, virtually unlimited disk space.  To download my images, set my IPTC and keyword my images, I fire up Aperture.  When complete, they’re already cataloged and I’m looking through the images rating and deleting the rejected ones.  When I find one to “develop”, I simply click the adjustments tab and I’m off.  I find that adjustments are, overall, much less complicated with Aperture.  Generally, a few tweaks and I’m satisfied.  Now, I don’t have the amazing uPoint technology allowing for adjustments to specific areas of the image, but I’m finding that I don’t miss it… too much.  The Nik Software Viveza will give me this ability as an Aperture plug in.  Finally, I can print right through Aperture.  Now printing is an art form and I’m still learning, but my initial results are quite good.  Plus, with Aperture I can make books, upload to my MobileMe account, export using preset export parameters (really cool), etc.  It’s a complete gamechanger.

Overall, I’m extremely pleased with the new workflow.  It’s definitely saving me a lot of time processing my images.  With the combination of the Drobo, I have all 35,000+ images right at my fingertips and it’s still very fast.  I’m impressed.

Also, the images simply look a lot better in Aperture.  I know there’s significant proprietary tweaks the software is doing (non-destructively) to my images and it pays off.  While I can’t put into words the difference, you have to trust me that they look better.  I’m very pleased with my results.

One last thing, during the upcoming PhotoPlus Expo in NYC, I’m being interviewed by Derrick Short of Inside Aperture website and podcast.  They’re interested in my thoughts going from my old to new workflow.  I’m really looking forward to this experience.  I’ll post more information when I know more.

Since I have to post something before I go, how about an image from Indian Echo Caverns in Hummelstown Pennsylvania (near Hershey).  We took a trip there this summer.  This was my favorite shot from the trip.  Enjoy!

ANPW Day 4 – Time to Say Goodbye (almost)…

Wow, it’s finally the last day of the workshop.  We (Martin, Steve, Cathy and I) decided to sleep late and have a final breakfast together at a nice place in town.  Ahhh, sleeping in!!!  The great part of today is that I’m not heading home!  In fact, Martin, Cathy and I are taking a late-morning run up to Yellowstone to have another full day of shooting.  Martin was staying for another workshop the following week and Cathy and I were flying out on Sunday.  Sweet.

ROAD TRIP!!! After stocking up on gas and junk food, we headed out towards Yellowstone.  The plan was to drive for half the time and head back to the Tetons for sunset images.  That was the plan…

Our first stop  Oxbow Bend where I took my winning picture.  I wanted to show how many people are there to shoot Oxbow, but in the middle of the day, there aren’t many.  Oxbow is a morning spot with upwards of 100 people crowding around to get the shot.

As we progressed, we came upon a number of vehicles on the side of the road and people with cameras standing looking down in to the woods.  Wildlife.  In this case it was a mother moose and calf:

Heading further into the park we ran across a crow that really wanted to pose for a photograph.  Using the 300mm f2.8, I shot this:

While not a huge fan of the composition, I was blown away by the sharpness of this lens.  This was shot wide open at f2.8  Hmmm, where did I put my lottery ticket?!?!

Our next stop was the Artist Paint Pots.  This is an area of thermal activity where the mud in one location bubbles or shots into the air.  It’s actually very interesting to watch.  Simply set up your tripod and start shooting until you get something interesting:

Watching the bubbles

One highlight of Yellowstone is the animals.  They’re so used to people that you can often get too close.  People tend to forget that they’re still wild animals and a number of folks each year are gored, trampled or otherwise hurt.  Of course, everyone blames the animal.  I was amazed how close we were able to get to a mother and calf elk in a parking lot by the side of the road. I waited until I could improve the background to a stream instead of a parking lot and shot this:

I was also able to capture this:

Mother elk looking for her calf

Our final stop of the day was at Grand Prismatic.  This is a huge hot spring with amazing colors of red and blue from the bacteria growing in the water.  I was surprised at the amount of color this year.  It was much less than what I saw last year at this time (although still quite striking).  I’m hoping this isn’t a forecast of what’s to come, but a natural cycle of the springs:

As the sun went down, I shot into the sun for this unique shot:

As the sun went down, we ended the road trip and the last day of the trip with this image.  The colors were outstanding, the company fantastic and the location amazing: