New Programme 2012-13

Veronica has been hard at work on the Programme for the new season.

The season begins on 10 September and there are 29 meetings in all with short breaks at Christmas and Easter. There will be six visiting speakers, plus two evenings where we visit another local club; five competitions, plus two inter club competitions; eleven sessions where we will see and discuss members’ work, and four “how to” evenings. The programme reflects the feedback from the members’ questionnaire earlier in the year.

One of the images used in last season’s workshops by Chris Francis

It promises to be a busy and varied year at PPS!  Details are going on the PPS website as normal and the calendar of meetings is as follows;

Thanks to Veronica for all the hard work on this – and to Bill & Chris who have helped finalise it.

99 Common Photography Problems (and how to solve them)

Digital Camera World  has a great article setting out solutions to what they call “99 common problems”. They say “we have spoken to numerous experts over the years, as well as photographers like you, who may either be just starting out or have been taking pictures for a while but keep encountering the same nagging problem. From all the conversations, we’ve noticed some common photography problems that seem to plague snappers of all ages and abilities.

Below, we’ve put together 99 of the most common photography problems and offered solutions to get round them, so you never have to be in doubt ever again! We’ve offered a mix of camera tips, explanations, definitions and more to help answer your questions. And we’ve also provided links, where appropriate, to some of our photography tutorials covering these problems in more depth.”

What follows is an extensive look at a wide range of  99 issues, with concise and useful  explanations of key facts under seven headings:

1. General Photography Problems
2. Using lenses
3. Digital camera accessories
4. Digital camera settings and controls
5. Camera exposure
6. Using flash
7. Photography technique

You might be tempted to dismiss an article like this as too basic/patronising, but even a quick glance at some of the detail suggests this is a mine of information that is well worth knowing. Not only essential for those at the beginning of their photographic learning curve, but also very useful for the more experienced as well.

So have a look and see what you think.

And of course – you are bound to think of problem number 100….

And while you’re on this website, have a look at their other tips and guides. The item on ‘10 Rules of Photo Composition” looks particularly interesting.

Thanks to Ian for spotting this most useful link

Port of Tyne Photo Competition 2012

For the sixith year running the Port Of Tyne  competition is inviting you to capture the very essence of the North East in film and pictures. Entering one or more of the five categories couldn’t be easier – and you could win up to £500 in cash.

Further details of the competition and how to enter can be found here.

What is a Good Photo?

The eternal question for photographers.

In the beginning  (and far beyond for many of us), it’s often enough to make an image that is technically good and pleasing to the viewer. Indeed Googling this question will produce many answers that do little more than list the “technical’ aspects of a photograph, including “good composition”.

So I was interested to read this article which takes a more aesthetic view and includes the following perspectives:

“A good photo is a visual sentiment which has the ability to touch the mind of others.”

“…a good photo is one that speaks to me, that tell me a story …”

“Images that restore our own memories, cultural references and the sense of being human – those are the ones which moves us.”

Since this appears on a website dedicated to “the link between fine art and mobile photography”, perhaps it’s to be expected that these comments play down the technical quality of images in favour of their emotional content.

And similarly not surprising that camera clubs tend to emphasise the more technical quality of images produced with the expensive cameras and sophisticated editing software  that we have invested in – although if asked the question we would claim we are striving for both dimensions.

But the image above is very different to the winner of the 2012 Landscape Photographer of the Year with this image “Winter Field, Stirlingshire, Scotland” by Robert Fulton, Cumbernauld.

Can both of these be “good photos”? The second is more like a photo club competition winner, the first is certainly not.

Of course it’s a very personal thing. For example, I’ve always liked this image taken in a Hong Kong Subway.

But by any “technical” standards it’s weak – imbalanced to the left with little in the right hand side of the image, with poor colour balance caused by the lighting and not that sharp. Yet for me it’s evocative of our stay in Hong Kong and I like the strong  converging lines of the image.

A good photo? Who is to say. And isn’t that the real point of our photography?

                                                                                                                  Gary

Whickham PC Annual Exhibition

Could you cope with a new Camera?

The launch of the new Nikon D800 signals a step change in image resolution in a DSLR. The D800 has a 36MP sensor and early reviews reveal amazing image detail comparable to medium format digital cameras as well as remarkably low noise, even at high ISO settings.

WOW! So what’s holding you back – apart from the cost of £2600 for the body?

Well one thing to think about before you rush to order, is how your ageing (Windows XP) computer (with its 1Gb of RAM and a 250Gb hard drive) will cope with the file sizes generated by this new beast.

Let’s look at some current files sizes. I capture in RAW, edit in Photoshop format (TIFF would be similar) and only convert to JPG for final output for screen display. I use Layers for many Photoshop adjustments and this increases file sizes.

Take this early morning street shot made a few weeks ago.

My camera has an 18MP sensor (3468 x 5212 pixels in 16 Bit) and here are the file sizes involved in this image:

1. The original RAW image file out of camera      36Mb
2. The PSD version of this                                             54Mb
3. Crop  and add 3 adjustment layers                     123Mb
4. Flatten Layers and save as PSD                              50Mb
5. Save this as JPG  (2445 x 3545 pixels)                    5Mb

My 2 year old  iMac computer seems to cope without drawing breath. Even when I resize this image to A3 print size at 300dpi (42cm x 29cm), and the file size increases to 266Mb in PSD  (7.4Mb JPG), the iMac copes OK.

But what about files from  Nikon D800? Increasing the same image file to 7360 x 4912 pixels (the same as a Nikon D800) produces an out of camera PSD file of 100Mb at Stage 2 above but a staggering 555Mb (PSD) when I add the Layers in Stage 3 above.

Now that’s a BIGGGG file and just saving this brings a 15 sec “pause” whilst the iMac (with 8Gb RAM) tries hard to cope. With my previous PC I dread to think……..

When I got the iMac, the 1Tb hard drive seemed huge, but after a couple of years of working with 30-100Mb image files, it’s getting full in spite of regular archiving to an external drive.

So whilst a quantum leap in image resolution seems an enticing option, I guess it would need to come with a necessary upgrade in computing horsepower.

One other thought. Contrast these files with the current NCPF rules for PDI competitions of only 1024 x 768 pixels and 900Kb maximum. Now if these limits are deemed good for high quality projected images, why do we need to capture 50Mb+ and 7360 x 4912 pixels with a new Nikon? Alternatively, if the new Nikon is setting a resolution benchmark for the future, it surely means that existing competition rules are inadequate in terms of quality?

Whilst the Nikon is clearly designed for very high quality landscape print images rather than PDI, I can’t help thinking that it’s high time we had a hard look at PDI standards.

Some may say “who needs 7360 x 4912 pixels anyway?”, but it’s not that long ago that people argued vehemently that a 3MP camera was quite sufficient. So what do you think? Will 30Mp cameras be the norm in 5 years time or  have sensor sizes already reached the limit of what’s needed?   If it’s the former, then we had better upgrade our computers before we even think of buying a new camera.                                                                                           

                                                                                                                  Gary

Photomatix Pro Version 4.2

Photomatix have just released a new version of their highly regarded HDR software.

The update include preset thumbnails display options, improved preview size controls, and Finishing Touch adjustments for contrast and sharpening.

A free trial can be downloaded from their website here and video tutorials can be seen here.

Thanks to Ian for this news.

Adobe Lightroom 4.1

And in separate news, Adobe has issued an update (which they call a Release Candidate) to their recently launched Lightroom 4.

This udate mostly corrects a few glitches in the software  and adds support for several new cameras, but interestingly  it also includes a new tool with the addition of new color fringe correction controls.

A detailed description of how it works is given here with examples of the improved ability to remove the purple and green axial CA that can appear on out-of-focus regions, particularly those shot with fast lenses.