Photokina TV Interview.

 
Earlier today we sat down for an interview for Photokina TV in Cologne, Germany. Here’s a segment that is available online:

New Color Management and Printing articles.

 
We are on a roll producing Color Management and Printing articles. Our latest batch covers several important topics, starting from “choosing the right inkjet media” to the new “Color Mode presets on Canon’s PIXMA PRO-1” to “Understanding and Installing ICC Printer Profiles” and even creating your own “custom ICC Printer profiles” with X-Rite’s i1Profiler.

If you want to learn more, make sure you reserve a place in one of our upcoming two-day workshops: “Inkjet Printing: Color Management and Calibration” and the incredibly fun “Creating Custom Photo Books with Adobe Lightroom 4.” Here is a sample book from the workshop.

Great interview with X-Rite Coloratti on Color Management.

 
Last month, I was invited to join the prestigious X-Rite Col­oratti team, which includes the world’s top pro­fes­sional pho­tog­ra­phers. I was interviewed by X-Rite about my work, as well as my thoughts on color management for digital photographers, and specifically for those shooting video. We also chatted a bit about my views on how video has changed the playing field for all professional photographers. Please take a few minutes to listen to this short clip of our conversation.

We recently shot a series of video tutorials, focusing on the importance of color management and monitor calibration for video editing. Here’s the most recent episode.

If anyone is interested, there are a few spaces left at my upcoming workshop: Inkjet Printing: Color Management and Calibration at the International Center of Photography in New York City, Aug 4th, 2012.

Please feel welcome to leave any feedback, questions or comments below.

How to switch from iPhoto to Adobe Lightroom.

 
Question: I would like to start using Lightroom as my photo editing software but up until now all my photos have been stored on my iMac and in iPhoto. I am tearing my hair out trying to figure out how to 1) transfer my iPhoto library to an external hard drive and then 2) transfer that to Lightroom. I’ve been reading about this on the Web but am skeptical of trying to do it myself.

Answer: The first step is to find out where are your images stored. Go to Applications/iPhoto and right-click on “show package contents”.

You should now be able to see the iPhoto “library.”

The next step is to decide if you want to keep the images where they are or move them to a new location. Using Adobe Lightroom you can accomplish both tasks. I personally would prefer to MOVE the images to a fast and reliable external hard drive that is only dedicated to the images. More info about Hard Drives here and here.

In Adobe Lightroom’s Import dialog, navigate to the folder that contains you iPhoto Library, make sure MOVE is selected, and select the new destination on the (ideally) external Hard Drive.

The pictures will be MOVED from the iPhoto location, and imported  through Lightroom.

By the way. iPhoto is BAD for several reasons. Just two mention two: By default, it creates additional folders and subfolders with the capture time, making your workflow even more time consuming and painful.

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Video Essentials and Video Editing for photographers at SVA.

 
PDN Magazine recently published what we consider the “13 Prod­ucts you need to add HD Video to your busi­ness.” (You might need the password “tutorials” to download the file.) The arti­cle is also avail­able on PDN’s May print issue. If you are new to the world of Video, this list is a great place to start.

During the summer we will be offering two new workshops at the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York City: a 2-day “Video Essentials for Photographers” and a 1-day “Video Editing for Photographers” using Adobe Premiere Pro. We hope to see you there!

Reliable RAID Systems, an overview.

 
Professional photographers and filmmakers,  are always (and should be) concerned with storage devices, such as hard drives to create reliable backups and efficient workflows. All hard drives will fail eventually, that is why using RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) systems is often our recommended strategy. A RAID is a set of connected hard drives designed to store digital files and information in a much more reliable manner. Most current RAID units can also monitor a Hard Drives’ system health, fan, and power supply and warn users when there’s a potential failure.

There are several different levels at which a RAID system can be configured. In the photo and video industry, we generally use RAID levels 0, 1, 5, and 6. One way to remember them is: Fastest (0), Mirror (1), Safe (5), and Safest (6).

Interested in learning more about RAID systems? Then read this article we recently wrote for Canon’s Digital Learning Center to better understand how they work, their differences on performance, compatibility and size. Don’t wait until it’s too late to establish a good backup strategy! If you need help, don’t hesitate to contact us.

 

 

Upgrading to Adobe Lightroom 4 in 7 simple steps.

 
The following steps can be used to upgrade Lightroom 1, Lightroom 2 or Lightroom 3, as well as Lightroom 4 Beta catalogs.

Step 1. Download and Install Lightroom 4

Step 2. On your Mac’s finder, find the location of your Lightroom 3 catalog. It should look something like name.lrcat

Step 3. Right click on that file and select “open with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4”

Step 4. You should see the “Lightroom Catalog Upgrade” dialog. Be very careful with this step. Catalog names can NOT be changed later. I strongly suggest you click on “change” and determine the best location and name for your upgraded catalog.

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How to use Histograms to improve your images.

 
Histograms display a graphic representation of the exposure on a captured image. They provide highly accurate information, but their use is often misunderstood, or, worse yet, ignored. This is why we wrote an article for Canon U.S.A., explaining how to use histograms to dramatically improve your images.

As always, let us know if you have any questions.

A digital image in-depth look. Literally.

 
Ever wonder how images are captured inside a digital camera? I obviously understand the logic and technology behind the process, but SEEING it is something completely different (and very cool).

The video below, made by Lexar, shows the capturing process and also helps to understand how the speed on memory cards, and card readers, can affect your entire digital workflow.

To learn why the processors are the “brain” of the camera check this article “DIGIC Processors Explained.”

Adobe Lightroom 4 HDSLR video support explained.

 
UPDATE March 6, 2012. The full version of Lightroom 4 is available now and Adobe cut the price in half: The full version (which used to cost $299) will now be $149. The upgrade version will only cost $79. The beta version (which was downloaded more than 250,000 times) will expire on March 31, 2012.

My birthday was yesterday, and the present arrived this morning. Lightroom 4.0 (public beta) FULL VERSION is now available as a free download from Adobe’s website.

Important things to consider:

• You do not need a serial number and the beta version will not update your current Lightroom 3 (or earlier) catalog.
• The public beta comes in three flavors: Mac (OS X v10.6.8 Snow Leopard) or v10.7 Lion), Windows 32-bit, and Windows 64-bit. Make sure you download the correct version. Each compressed download is about 400MB.
• File support for Lightroom 4 beta, is exactly the same as in Lightroom 3.6 and Camera Raw 6.6.
• The public beta will expire on March 31, 2012, when the final Version 4 becomes available.

Here are the new features, organized from super awesome to awesome:

• HDSLR video support (full details below)
• Soft proofing (found under the Develop Module, not the Print Module as one would expect)
• Photo book layout
• Email directly from Lightroom (works with Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and AOL)
• Publish videos directly to Facebook or Flickr
• Geo location (via GPS metadata) with the Map Module
• Enhanced DNG workflows
• Adobe Revel (Carousel) export workflow
• Additional local adjustments including Noise Reduction and White Balance
• Powerful new Shadow and Highlight controls
• Simplified basic adjustments

 

Video

Regarding Video Support this is what Adobe has to say:

“Lightroom 3 added the ability to import, manage and tag video files but as the popularity of video capture increases it’s important to provide a single, robust workflow solution that can support all of your imaging needs regardless if they’re still images or video captures. Lightroom 4 adds native playback for a wide variety of formats from mobile phones to high end DSLRs.”

Here’s what I have to say: In version 3, we were able to import video files along with our still images, but to see the clips Lightroom needed to access Quicktime. Now we can play the files inside of LR. Also, by using similar shortcuts from well established NLE (non linear editing) software applications like Final Cut Pro and Adobe Premiere Pro, now we can set In and Out points directly in Lightroom. Shift+I (In) and Shift+O (Out).

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Conversations with Friends.

 
Today we start with Episode 001 of our bi-weekly series “Conversations with Friends.”

The goal is to meet with different people we find interesting (and opinionated) and simply chat about trending topics, recent developments in technology, new toys that we like or hate and simply have a good time while enjoying a glass of wine.  On today’s episode I talk with Justin Katz about the Eye-Fi Pro X2 8GB Wireless Memory Card. Did we like it? Watch to find out.

If you want to participate on our conversations or would like us to cover a specific topic just post a comment or shoot me an email.

Next week I’ll add the link with step-by-step instructions on how to set up the Eye-Fi Card on an iPad, an Android Tablet, and a Mac Book Pro. Here are the card’s features.

The wine we tasted was the 2009 Casarena Malbec, Mendoza, Argentina. It was very good and a great buy for $14.

Some (bad) news about Hard Drives.

 
The Hard Drive world has seen a lot of action lately.

When inventory levels plummeted 90 percent in less than a week after the Thailand flood in October, the top-selling hard drives on Newegg.com and Tigerdirect.com went up anywhere from 50 up to an absurd 150 percent. Over the past few weeks, Hard Drive prices are finally starting to drop, and the trend should continue throughout the year until supply meets demand sometime around Q3 2012. AppleInsider did a fascinating analysis on this topic by extrapolating MacBook Pro pricing.

On related news, Apple is apparently in the process of acquiring Anobit, which makes chips that greatly increase the performance of flash memory on devices like the iPhone 4S.

Seagate Technology completed the acquisition of the hard disk drive business of Samsung Electronics for $1.4 billion in stock and cash. The deal was approved in Australia, China, and the E.U.

In 2010, HDD shipments from both Seagate and Samsung represented 40 percent of the HDD market. Western Digital and Hitachi Global Storage Technologies still held the number one position with a 50 percent share. Western Digital intends to buy Hitachi Global Storage Technologies for $4.3 billion in cash and stock and the acquisition is expected to be finalized by March.

The mergers are not good for photographers, filmmakers, and any creative relying on desktop hard drives. With Western Digital’s acquisition of Hitachi, and Seagate’s acquisition of Samsung’s segment, the two companies will control approximately 90% of the market.

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How much is Slow-Mo worth? Twixtor vs. Adobe Premiere Pro.

 

Tues­days Tutorials.

We recently purchased a Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L II IS USM lens, and tested it by shooting stills and video at a skate park in Manhattan. We liked some of the footage we got, and decided to quickly play with some slow motion effects in Adobe Premiere Pro CS5.

One of our friends at Abel Cine suggested that we look into Twixtor, and we did. Here are the side-by-side videos, so you can judge the quality by yourself.

Adobe Premiere Pro CS5

RE:Vision Twixtor

The video was shot with a Canon EOS 7D, at 1270×720 and 60fps. The shutter was anywhere between 1/125th and 1/500th of a second. All the clips were slowed down to 20%. We feel that Premiere Pro did a decent job, but Twixtor definitively is the way to go. Unfortunately, the standard version is $330, and the Pro version is $600. Is anyone using another preset for slow motion with a similar (or better) quality?

Same but different – Intro to Digital Cinema.

 
As a professional photographer, transitioning into the HDSLR Cinema world for the past 3 years has been a fascinating journey. I would like to share the five main similarities and five main differences I have encountered. Read through, I can guarantee it will save you some time.

Similarities

• White balance. Think Jpg. You can tweak the White Balance in post, but you are very limited to what you can do. Instead of using Auto White Balance, set a specific color temperature (5200K for example), especially if shooting with more than one camera.

• Exposure is very critical. Pay special attention to the highlights. It is time to use again that good old Light Meter or get one specifically designed for HDSLR shooters like Sekonic’s L-308DC. Like White Balance, do your best to get it right on camera, not in post.

• Camera Settings. We are still using ISO, aperture, and shutter, but because of the frame rate, the shutter is not really a variable factor anymore. Now, we also need to add fps (frames per second), picture styles, and other interesting things to the mix.

• Composition. We go back to the basics. Rule of thirds, symmetry and patterns, texture, depth of field, viewpoint, and cropping. Luckily, that has not changed. If you have a good eye, you are good.

• Lighting. All cameras are light-tight boxes that admit controlled light only through a lens. Just because we can push sensors to 25,000 ISO does not mean you are telling a story with light. You need to light.

Differences

• Lighting. Wait! Wasn’t this one of the similarities? Yes, it is also a big difference. Remember strobes? They turned into hot lights and continuous lights. Also, keep in mind that now the camera moves, and the light should work for several angles.

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How to Sync Catalogs with Adobe Lightroom 3.

 

Tuesdays Tutorials.

I am often shooting on location, and I need to make sure that my images are safe and properly backed up. I start by creating a temporary Lightroom catalog, usually with the client’s name. For this tutorial I am going to name it “Temporary Catalog TBD.”

Click on Import and the Import dialog opens.

We can see that I have 2 external hard drives connected to my laptop, my MAIN external hard drive is called “ONE TB” and a SECONDARY external hard drive is called “ORANGE 120”.

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Can’t miss seminars at PDN’s PhotoPlus Expo 2011.

 

Last week, my great friends Ted Kawalerski, Matt Stanton, and Justin Katz helped me shoot this 45-second video to promote my upcoming seminars at PhotoPlus Expo in New York City.

On Friday, October 28, from 8:45 to 11:45 a.m., I’ll be co-teaching “Portrait Lighting Techniques & Lightroom Workflow” with Bobbi Lane. Expect a very energetic and intense seminar.

The same day, from 3:45 to 5:45 p.m., I’ll be presenting “Intro to Digital Cinema.” This 2-hour class is specifically designed for photographers transitioning into HDSLR video, and my goal is to provide enough tips and resources so that attendees will be able to start shooting video by 6 p.m. that same day. I guess I love challenges. As the title says, this is an introductory class.

To truly understand all the technical concepts, filmmaking techniques, and upcoming trends of this amazing digital revolution, I suggest you attend one of my upcoming 2-day PDN HDSLR Video Workshops in New York (Oct. 30-31), Washington D.C. (Nov. 5-6), and Los Angeles (Nov. 11-12).

Let me know if you have any questions!