Vote for your favorite image from our MacGroup Members during the October 2011 Photowalk:

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Thanks Brian Stone for coordinating this photowalk at Carpenter Lake Park and Nature Area!

I wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone that participated in our summer photowalk. Although I missed the actual photowalk due to my work schedule, I throughly enjoyed the public viewing at the last meeting as well as the contest itself. This certainly won't be the last time we do this and we've learned a few lessons from this past one to make the next one even better. I also want to personally thank Brian Stone for his efforts in cordinating the walk and the contest. 

Amateur Photographer Category

1st Place Winner – Jamie Feldman

2nd Place Winner – Brian Stone

3rd Place Winner –  by Karen Minto

Pro Photographer Category

1st Place Winner – Rich Grubola

2nd Place Winner - Rich Grubola

3rd Place Winner – Tied for 3rd Place Paul Stoloff took both photos

As a photographer I love to "geotag" my photos when I travel. Not only do I think it's a neat technology, I just like the fact that I'll be able to more easily answer the "where was that photo taken?" question. I've given this tip a number of differnt times during presentations and in other posts, but I thought it was time to update it and give some additional tips. 

The Problem: Your camera doesn't have a built-in or external GPS

If you're shooting with a regular point and shoot or DSLR camera, chances are it doesn't have a built-in GPS chip. Although there are a few cameras out there that do have them, the vast majority do not have them. On the other hand the cameras in your iPhone and WiFi+3G iPad do have actual GPS chips in them. This means that by defualt every picture you take is tagged with Location Information in the metadata of the image. Your various desktop applications like iPhoto, Lightroom, Aperture, Preview, etc. can use this information and display a map pointing out where the photo was taken. The question becomes how do you get this Location information into the shots that you took with a camera that doesn't have a GPS chip in it?

There are a few ways to do it

iPhoto – chances are as a Mac user you already have iPhoto. iPhoto is a photo management tool and whether you use it to manage your photos or not, you can use its easy ability to "copy" location information and "Paste Location" information into other photos. The tip is to simply take at least one iPhone/iPad 2 photo at each location and then go ahead and shoot with your regular camera. When you get back to your computer, import both the iPhone shots and your regular shots into iPhoto. Now just highlight the iPhone shot and choose Copy from the Edit menu. Select all the photos taken at the same location with your other camera and right-click on them and choose Paste Location. iPhoto will add the location information to each of those photos. Aperture can do this too.

HoudahGeo – While the "free" iPhoto option works fine, I actually prefer to do this with HoudahGeo. I don't use iPhoto to manage my photos. i use Lightroom. Importing and exporting the shots into iPhoto adds too many steps to my workflow just to get Location Information into my DSLR shots. HoudahGeo is a stand alone application that can add Location information to your images from a vareity of different sources including other images. This means that I can import images into Lightroom as I always do, then I can drag those same images into HoudahGeo. I can choose one of my iPhone shots and copy and paste the coordinates from the iPhone shoot to all my RAW (DNG) files. Once I go back to Lightroom I just tell Lightroom to update the metadata from the images. Done!

the shot above is being displayed in Lightroom with GPS info. Click the image to see it on the map!

Check out HoudahGeo here

Geotag as you shoot – My favorite method is to simply geotag my photos as i take them. As a Nikon DSLR shooter I have the benefit of having GPS "support" built right in to my Nikon DSLRs. The only thing that's missing is the actual GPS unit. Nikon doesn't build the actual GPS modules into their DSLRs yet. Instead you have to plug in an external module. There are several to choose from and no matter which one you go with, you can then just shoot! Just like with your iPhone, your Nikon DSLR images will be tagged with Location Information as you take them.

Here are some Nikon Compatible GPS units. Here's one that let's you use your iPhone's GPS via Bluetooth and another that uses a separate small GPS unit as you shoot with your DSLR. Pretty Slick!

Once those photos are geotagged now what?

Once you get the Location Information into your photos chances are you'll be ready to display this information. There are several ways to do it. First off and back to iPhoto. iPhoto can display your photos on a Map. That's what the Places feature is. Not only that iPhoto can use this in your slideshows and photo books too. This is also built-in to your iOS devices Photos App too. In Lightroom you can click the little arrow next to the coordinates and it will fire up your browser and show you the location on Google Maps. If you upload the photos to Flickr (and adjust your privacy settings) your photos will automatically be mapped as well. Even the Preview App can show you a map of your photos and show them to you on Google Maps. Those are just a few ways to see where your photos were taken.

As a long time user of Apple products I for one really appreciate the amount of time that goes into not only the functionality and ease of use of their products, but also the industrial design. I think a lot of users choose Apple products because they do what they are supposed to do, but they also look cool! The iPhone is no exception. It's a beautiful product. As a person in both the graphic design and photography industry, looks are important to me too. I upgraded to the iPhone 4 for all the obvious reasons. However, there was one feature that was very high on my list and that was the improved 5MP camera that also shoots 720p HD video. I had already pretty much stopped carrying a point and shoot camera. If the video was as good as Apple claimed on the iPhone 4 I figured I could pretty much stop carrying a separate video camera too. After I got my iPhone 4 setup, naturally one of the first things I tried was the camera. I gotta say that I was extremely disappointed. My photos appeared to have a very very very yellow/orange tint (color cast) to them. As a professional photographer, I knew the problem revolved around the iPhone 4's auto white balance. However, with the iPhone camera there are no controls for this. It's factory set to auto white balance and there was definitely something horribly wrong with mine.

For the sake of doing a sanity check, I compared my new iPhone 4 to my iPhone 3GS and the difference was night and day. This problem also only seemed to affect the rear (5MP camera). Shots taken under the same lighting with the front camera were fine. As a matter of fact, the rear camera is fine too under natural light situations. The shots taken outside are gorgeous. No complaints there! 

I wasn't alone

My family bought four iPhone 4's (some from Apple, some from AT&T) on launch day. All four were having this problem. I went to Apple's Discussion Forums to see if others were having this problem and unfortunately there are dozens if not hundreds of users having this problem. I also saw an article on Macworld's website about the problem too. At first it appeared to be a problem with ALL iPhone 4s. However, after a little more digging I found people that were starting to chime in and saying that their iPhone 4's were fine. Even a few friends of mine said that they weren't having the problem. I wasn't quite convinced yet because unless you were shooting under the right conditions, you wouldn't notice the problem. It wasn't until someone on Apple's discussion forums posted side-by-side shots from two different iPhone 4's (one having the issue and one not having the issue) that I believed that this wasn't a problem that affected all iPhone 4s. This meant that I now had a decision to make. The decision was to either live with the problem until Apple fixes it via a software update or try for an exchange. The problem with an exchange is that some people in the forums had tried for exchanges (some as many as 6 times) and still hadn't got one that worked. I decided to wait for the July 16th press conference to see if Apple would even acknowledge the issue. While they did acknowledge the Proximity Sensor issue, unfortunately they didn't mention the white balance issue at all (and to this date, still haven't publicly said anything about it). I called AppleCare that afternoon and setup an advanced return. 

No luck with AppleCare

I received two replacements for two of my family's iPhone 4's and BOTH replacements had the exact same problem. Just to make sure that it wasn't an issue of corrupted data or some other weird problem with the restore process, I pulled one of the replacements out of the box, popped my MicroSIM card in and just plugged it into iTunes long enough for it to activate (NO RESTORE). Then I unplugged it (none of my data had been restored yet) and fired up the camera. The yellow tint was still there. I did the same thing for the other replacement. Same results. I went ahead with the restore process and called AppleCare. At this point AppleCare said that there was no sense in sending another replacement and that I was better off heading to my local store. That way I could test the phone before leaving the store to make sure I had a good one. I agreed, but there was one problem with this plan. The Yellow problem doesn't really show up under the Apple Store lighting at my store. The only way to reproduce it was to recreate the indoor lighting conditions that were causing the problem. This would mean bringing in a small light box and a regular household lamp. Sigh…

Why go to all this trouble? Because Looks Do Matter! Including the looks of MY photos and video!  I didn't want to have to go back and forth on this issue any more than I already had. Some have had as many as 6 replacements without getting a good one. I don't have the time to go back and forth day after day trying to get one that works. So if it meant bringing in a small collapsable light box and a small light to do this in one trip, I was willing to make that effort. After I got to the store and saw someone bringing in their 27" iMac for their in-store One-To-One training session, I felt like what I was carrying in was nothing

My Apple Store to the Rescue

First I contacted my Apple Store and told them of the situation and what I wanted to do. Luckily they were agreeable to this. So I brought in a small, colapsible light box (one that I use for product photography) and a very small table lamp with a standard household bulb. My Apple Store Genius "Dave" met me at one of the training tables with two iPhone 4 replacements to start with. I showed him the difference between my iPhone 3GS and my iPhone 4 and he could see it as clear as day. Just for kicks he tried his own iPhone 4 in the light box and yes his had the Yellow problem too.

After Two Tries – A Very Happy Ending

My iPhone 4 on the left and my new replacement iPhone 4 on the right

We took the first replacement out of the box and put the MicroSIM in from my iPhone 4. Then we just plugged it into iTunes long enough to activate it. After that we fired up the camera and sigh, it was just as yellow as mine. So back in the box that iPhone 4 went. On to the next one…….. wait for it……EUREKA! The next iPhone 4 worked! It was fine under the household light. It looked just as good as the iPhone 3GS! I cheered! High-fives and all. I left the store with a working iPhone 4 and I'm now happy to take it out and shoot stills or video any time I need to. As a matter of fact I'm just returning from an annual family reunion and while I shot 99% of the stills with my Nikon DSLR, I shot 100% of the video with my iPhone 4!

Here's a shot of the same subject above, taken with my iPhone 4 replacement and while it's not quite perfect or as good as the 3GS, it's a lot closer to what it should be:

The Bottom Line

Before you leave any comments on this post, let me start off by telling you there's no need to comment if your iPhone 4 is working fine. I believe you! If I didn't think that there were some units out there that worked, I wouldn't have tried to get a replacement in the first place. Secondly, it's still very possible that Apple can and will fix this with a software update. While I do believe that this IS a hardware defect in some of the iPhone 4s out there, it should still be able to be addressed with a software fix. The reason I think it's a hardware problem is simply because if it were a software problem all of the iPhone 4s would have this issue since they are ALL running the same software.

Is it really that big of a deal? To me it is! I paid for my iPhone 4 and I want to use one of the main features that I bought it for no matter what the lighting conditions are. You may not feel that way and that's fine. It's ok that it's not important to you. Had Apple acknowledged the issue, I may have been willing to wait. While I might have even been willing to live it and correct the still shots later in post production, there was no way that I was going to want to have to color correct the videos too.

Why isn't this issue getting more press/attention? My guesses are:

1) 1st off there is no way to know how wide spread this issue is and clearly it doesn't affect all iPhone 4s. 

2) Even those that have the issue may not even know they have it unless they've taken shots indoors with no natural light under the lighting conditions that cause the issue (using the LED flash doesn't matter).

3) Those that have noticed it (like the rest of my family and some of my friends), don't care enough to worry about it and probably haven't even reported it to Apple as an issue. Or they are waiting for Apple to issue a software fix to correct it.

4) Those that have reported and even gone as far as gotten replacements, haven't gotten one that works and have given up or they got one that works and have moved on.

I just can't believe this?  That's OK However, have a look at Apple's own iPhone 4 page regarding the NEW camera. Even their own photo is leaning towards the yellow side in the flesh tones. Granted, it's not nearly as bad as other examples shown above and around the web, but it's on the yellow side (look at her face) nonetheless:

Thank you!

I want to personally thank Dave and the Somerset Apple Store for making me a happy iPhone 4 user!

Beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder. 

Every single day there are pro photographers and amateurs alike posting their photos online for family and the world to see. Rarely do you get the occurrence of thousands of photos being posted simultaneously from around the world for the same event; showcasing the beauty the world has to offer.

Even though the 2010 Photowalk day has come and gone, the event is not over. Over 33,000 photographers took to their feet and hoisted their cameras, and once again, what came out of this event was sheer beauty.

Thousands of photos have been uploaded to Flickr for the world to be able to see what others around the world saw not just through the viewfinder of their cameras, but with the minds eye. 

Only one lucky image from each Photowalk will be selected to compete for the grand prize; so the pressure is indeed on.

But, even before the first picture was taken, there was a lot of goodwill preceding the event. 100% of the profits for event T-Shirts were donated to support Springs of Hope, Kenya Orphanage.

Interested parties could otherwise choose to just go to this web site and “Take the $10 Challenge.” In parts of the world, a $10 donation, like an image, can be a very powerful thing.

Just looking at the images that were uploaded to this event’s Worldwide Flickr account, over 15,000 so far, could take you days. But please note that the beauty of the world around us was not left to the imagination—some of it was indeed captured.

SK 3rd Annual Worldwide Photowalk

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Other states have a similar sayings about their weather, "Wait 5 minutes and it will change." Michigan's constant changing weather truly keeps us guessing.

Such was the case Saturday for my leg of the 2010 Scott Kelby Worldwide Photowalk. Held in Ann Arbor at the Matthaei Botanical Gardens, the 24th was pretty much a wash-out. Guessing whether or not the rainy weather would hold out for a few hours and watching weather reports; the best strategy was to just call it a day and wait till the next.

By the next morning I was guessing as well. It was raining harder than the day before. But that 5 minute wait proved fortuitous. The clouds opened up to a beautiful sunny day.

If you’ve never been to the Matthaei Botanical Gardens you will be in for a wondrous treat. By July all the flowers and gardens are in full bloom. Nature never disappoints. The flowers, plants, trees and “treats” were simply amazing to see and photograph. An hour into the walk, I was still photographing items 20 yards from the front gate.

You don’t have to wait for an event of this magnitude to do your own photowalk. just grab your camera and head outside.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEh72UKBSts

See the Ann Arbor Photostream HERE

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"Life Rewards Action"                                                                                                                                                                                               

As the 3rd Annual Scott Kelby Worldwide Photowalk quickly approaches, there will undoubtedly be an upsurge in the use of Photoshop for at least a week; no matter what version of Photoshop you are on.

Here's a quick and easy Photoshop technique to create a great look that will take you no time at all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_wO5g3tE_A

There are presently 5 Photowalks scheduled for the metro-Detroit area. There's plenty to see and I'm looking forward to all the photos to be seen.

• Ann Arbor – Matthaei Botanical Gardens
• Ann Arbor – U of M Central Campus
• Detroit – Eastern Market
• Huntington Woods – Detroit Zoo
• Romulus –
• Windsor, ON, Canada – Old Walkerville

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Although I use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom to manage my photos it doesn't really matter what you use, you have to take control! It's great that we've reached a point in technology that we can have literally thousands of photos on our hard drives and hundreds if not thousands on our portable devices. However, if you don't take control now you're headed for trouble.

Every time you take out that digital camera of yours and start firing you're going to have dozens if not hundreds of images to import. You'll import them, look at them, pick out your favorites and share them with friends and family either electronically or via printed projects. Great! However, what about the shots that weren't your favorites? Do you keep them? If you do, it won't take too long before your computer will slow to a crawl. Although programs like iPhoto are rated to handle over 250,000 images in a library, that doesn't mean that it's a pleasurable experience. Even if you have a super fast computer that can keep up, the question is why keep photos that aren't your favorites?

Did you get the shot?

As a photographer, that's the question I constantly ask myself on every shoot that I do. Because shooting digitally is so easy you may have a tendency to over shoot an event. What I mean by over shooting is taking dozens or hundreds of photos of the same scene, person, etc. Don't get me wrong, I know that sometimes (if not most times) it may take several frames before you're happy. However, once you've got it MOVE ON! Either move on to the next thing or change up the shot. 

Tips to keep the number of shots down

Edit in camera - If you take a shot and look at the LCD and immediately realize that shot is NOT GOOD and you have the opportunity to take it again to get a better one, immediately delete the one that's not good. This way when you get back to your computer you'll have less shots to import and the ones you import will be good for the most part.

Mark your favorites – depending on the software you use iPhoto, Lightroom or something else you'll probably either have an option to mark your favorite with a Flag, Star Rating or Color. If your software doesn't have these options then create a new Album and simply drag your favorites into it.

Edit them down – Now the real test of a photographer is to edit your shots down to just the best ones. It's not as hard as you think. You could try by giving yourself a maximum number. For example, when I do a studio shoot it's not uncommon for me to walk out with 500-700 shots. When I get home I give myself a limit of no more than 300 for the client to proof. Depending on the client, number of different looks, wardrobe changes, etc., I may set that number at 100. So with a number in mind I go through and DELETE the ones that just aren't good enough to be in that final batch of proofs. So whatever number you set for yourself, force yourself to stay within that number to give your client, friends, etc. When it's a personal shoot, meaning the shots are for me, I don't set a number as much as I try to have as few as possible. By the way, I've never had a client come back and say "Thanks for all those great shots. Can I please have that one that was just OK, blurry or with my eyes closed?"

Only show your best work

As a photographer you're judged by your portfolio. I realize that the vast majority of people here are NOT professional photographers. That's OK, but I want you to think like one anyway. Think about your favorite photographer and ask yourself what it is about his/her work that you like? Now ask yourself, how many shots in their portfolio do you hate or think are just "OK". Chances are there won't be that many that fall into this category. It's not because your favorite photographer is perfect and never takes a bad shot, it's because your favorite photographer has learned the secret of only showing his/her best work! 

Let's say you're on a site that allows you to upload and create an online portfolio. Usually these kinds of sites have a limit of the number of shots you can put in a portfolio or album. So let's say the limit is 20. Wow! Only 20? That's not very many! I know it sounds soooo limiting when you have hundreds of shots right? The reason the limit is so low is that within 20 shots people can usually tell if you're any good or not?! Also by limiting you to 20, you're likely to only put up your 20 best. It forces you to have a more critical eye! The only way a new shot can go up is if one of the old ones comes down. This means that your portfolio will continue to get better. So even if you're on a site that doesn't impose such a limit, you might think of creating your own. Say the limit is what ever number of shots will fit on one page on the site. In other words, if they have to click a next page link to get to more shots you've exceeded the limit. After all what's on page 2? Shots that weren't good enough to be on page 1!

The Bottom Line

If you do more eliminating as you go, it will take you a lot longer to reach that 250,000 or whatever limit your software imposes. You'll also only have shots that you really enjoy looking at instead of "good shot, good shot, great shot, OK shot, good shot, bad shot". You won't have 5 shots of the exact same thing/person in the exact same setting/pose. We only need to see it once! Leave your audience wanting more and not saying "when will this slideshow end?!"

Bonus Tip

Because I am a Lightroom user, this means that I only use iPhoto as a means to get "my favorite" photos to my iPhone, iPod, Apple TV, MobileMe, FaceBook and Flickr. iPhoto '09 has great integration with these devices and services. So here's a video I recorded a while back on how to automatically export images from Lightroom (although I did this back in Lightroom 1.4, the same procedure works through the current version today) directly into iPhoto:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aK5XviN8aLQ

I know, I know. You NEVER use on-camera flash. That's fine when you can control the environment.  However, controlling the environment is sometimes harder than herding cats. Especially for me since I don't shoot in a studio.  There are a couple of ways that I use on-camera flash to make better pictures. I'll show you how.

I take candid shots of people. Shots that a mother would love. Shots that are simply "Kodak Moments". Shots of personalities and memories. I don't have the opportunity to pose my subject. And, most of the time, I don't want posed shots. I just want to capture the moment or the personality. On-camera flash helps me and, even better, can help you make great pictures.

Outdoor Shooting

You should use flash when you shoot in bright sunlight. For example, the built-in flash on my Canon 30D has just enough power to soften harsh contrast and bring up shadow detail. You can adjust the ratio of fill flash to main light easily.  Once set, the ratio is good for a series of similar shots. You don't have to change any other settings. Just compose and shoot as usual. The end result is better pictures in the camera. This shot was taken about 3 PM on the 4th of July in light about as contrasty as can be.

Indoor Shooting

Getting good pictures when shooting in bars, banquet halls, and garages is difficult. The subjects are always moving and the light is variable and usually dim. If you use a built-in flash the results are ghastly – uneven exposure and harsh shadows. Using a Speedlite with direct flash is just as bad or even worse. Well, why not use bounce flash? Because it just doesn't work with high or dark ceilings. Using a brackets to hold the flash well away from the camera still makes harsh shadows and the bracket makes the camera harder to hold and shoot.

You can come close to the effect of off-camera flash and diffuse bounce light using a speedlite mounted directly on your camera. The technique I use works with both Canon and Nikon speedlite. The Canon speedlite has a diffuse reflector called a catchlight panel and an embossed panel called a wide panel. I use both. The Nikon speedlites I have checked have only a wide panel. A 3×5 card taped to the flash head is a good substitute for the catchlight panel.  Here are the steps to follow.

Pull out both panels (or the wide panel and add a diffuse reflector).  Tilt the flash head  to 45 degrees to the lens axis.

Now, shoot!

Be careful of your focus indicators. Make certain the sparkle is on the right subject. You can make post processing much simpler by using fixed color balance, set to Flash. What this accomplishes is almost magic. For most shots, the major post shooting adjustment required is an exposure tweak. That is all I did to these two pictures.

Expect to take fewer pictures per battery set. Depending on how dim is the ambient light, you should get about half the shots you get with direct flash.  Keep your spare charged batteries handy.  Go! Shoot! Make those parents happy!

I recently decided that it was time for a change in mice. I've loved my cordless Mighty Mouse, but constantly having to clean the tiny track ball was annoying me to no end. I was also enjoying the multi-touch trackpad on my MacBook, so when Wacom released the new Bamboo touch tablets, I decided to make the change.

I thought about the least expensive Bamboo Touch, but decided to go with the Bamboo Pen & Touch (list $99, street $79) so that I would have the pen for photo retouching. As it turned out, I need the pen for more than that. The touch control is not as consistent as the Apple built-in trackpad. The drier my skin, the worse it is, and I think it's due to the dual nature (pen and touch) of the tablet. I find myself grabbing the pen to drag and drop graphics and text. It's annoying.

For straight email and web surfing, the touch controls are great.  Swiping two fingers to page back and forth is easy. Horizontal and vertical scrolling with two fingers is great. Zooming in and out with the same pinch and spread motions that are used on the iPhone and iPod touch is marvelous. That said, I still had to grab my Mighty Mouse while trying to customize a video on JibJab. Some click & drag functions just seem to be easier with a mouse. I don't know whether to blame the software or the touch pad itself. It's not as consistent as the trackpad on my MacBook, but then, the MacBook can't use the stylus.

I'm not totally in love with the Bamboo Pen & Touch, but as I adjust to it and fine-tune the settings, things should improve. The pressure-sensitive pen is still great for photo retouching, and this version of the Bamboo comes bundled with Adobe Photoshop Elements (v. 7 for Windows and v. 6 for Mac) and Nik Color Efex Pro. Unfortunately, the preference panel settings are universal only. No separate settings for individual programs. With luck, that will be changed in the future.

A minor gripe is the location of the USB cable. In order to use the tablet with my right hand, I had to set it for left-hand use. The cable kept it too far to the side of the keyboard, and the cable also had a tendency to flop up over the numeric keypad on the keyboard. Cable should come off a top or bottom corner, not the middle of the side edge/ The tablet also sits too flat to the desk to be comfortable for my wrist. It's currently sitting on a book that raises it a centimeter.

If Apple had released the new Magic Mouse a couple of weeks earlier, I might not have bought this. While the pen is nice, I don't use it that often. And while I'm getting used to the touch controls, they're still not as solid as the MacBook and MacBook Pro. If anyone wants to give it a try, I'll have it at the next MacGroup meeting.