I got to the airport a bit early, so I have some time to wrap up my summaries of Photoshop World.

A few days ago I summarized a class/photo safari I attended with Joe McNally (Joe’s the one in the picture above) and Moose Peterson. During the shoot, I watched Joe/Moose quite a bit and learned quite a bit. Both are great shooters – each with a distinctive style. Joe is a location shooter and focuses on flash. He’s shot everything from the world’s largest laser to college sports superstars.

Even with their differences, though, they had several themes running through the experience.

Know Your Camera

There wasn’t a ton of time devoted to camera functions, which was fine by me. It was clear, though, that each knew their camera and other equipment well. When running a successful shoot, you need to make sure that you become one with your equipment. Spending time fighting with or trying to find a setting can spell disaster.

Human Light Meter

Both Joe and Moose have over 30 years experience in photography. As a result, both are walking light meters. In just about every situation, they would look at the sun and how it was interacting with the models. Then, they would say something like “This looks like f5.6 at ISO 200, with a flash at 1/4 power through a diffusor from 10 feet. They’d take a shot and only have to adjust by 1/3 of a stop or so. It was clear that experience with various conditions is crucial to success.

Working with the Model

They relayed tons of tips for working with the models. Their ability to relate to and work with the models made the shoot go much more smoothly. Making sure they were comfortable and had direction really made for great pictures. Some of their tips included:

• Always stay talking – don’t fuss with the equipment. Many models (especially when they aren’t professionals) are nervous in front of a camera. If you are fidgeting with technical things, it only makes the matter worse. Gently talking with and directing the models actions shows confidence and creates a calming effect.
• Provide a story line. Sometimes, folks freeze up a bit in front of the lens and don’t provide an interesting picture. Giving them a pop-culture action to perform can give them poses to shoot for. In one case, we were shooting a few models in an area with a good amount of foliage. Saying something like “give me an intense tarzan in a jungle look” provides a lot of context for the model and can allow them to have some fun.
• Touch the model. Making some initial physical contact can help calm nerves and establish trust. A small amount of preening (straightening some hair, a collar, etc.) lets the person know that you are interested in making them looks good and breaks down barriers.

Light, Light, Light

Not suprisingly, the number one lesson was to look for the light. Good light can tell a story and sell a picture. While walking around the location, they kept pointing to a place and saying “ooh, look at that light, we should shoot there” or “can you see that light?”.

Always look for the light.

A Few of My Photos

During the shoot, I took a few frames of the beautiful area and great models.

I shot these flowers from inside the art museum the photo safari was held at. Most of the time was spent outdoors, but we had to ride out a pretty heavy Orlando rainstorm for a few minutes.

The garden had a ton of great religous-based sculptures. This one was one of my favorite. I was able to exagerate the muted colors even more in Lightroom.

We were lucky enough to have 4 models join us at the shoot. We shot them in available light and, when it got darker, with some flashes. Unfortunately, they were using Nikon flashes, which were using Nikon wirless technology, so I wasn’t able to take advantage of the flashes. This was one I liked, though. The sun was directly above and behind her and someone was holding a large gold reflector in front of her at camera right to reflect some of the light into the shadows.

I wanted to give an update an update on my seminar yesterday. But first, a few news updates. The big one? My taking Strobist’s April Fool’s joke hook, line and sinker. Overclocking your strobe isn’t as possible as his post made it sound (at least without some serious electrical knowledge and the courage to crack open the case of your light)- very nice . Check out his update – the fact that he put effort into it makes me feel a little better for falling for it (I blame it all on the humidity in Orlando – it fogs the brain).

Secondly, and much more importantly, at least 3 different folks are reporting that Lightroom 2 Beta will be formally announced at the Photoshop Keynote this morning. This is GREAT news! I’m very excited to see what will happen. In the meantime, check out some of the new features over at the Lightroom Journal.

In short, the seminar was great and just what I expected. It was Joe McNally (author of the Moment it Clicks) and Moose Peterson providing brain dumps to the 50-person class. We started in the classroom for a few hours with Moose talking lenses and wildlife/landscape and Joe talking flash. After some trouble with the buses and weather, we were able to get out on location and do some shooting in a beautfil garden behind a local art museum (we had full access to the garden and 4 models that came along for the ride). The location was plenty large (several acres) and gorgeous.

I won’t go into all the details now, but it was amazing to shoot the grounds and the models with two of the greatest photographers around. It felt like we were on assignment with them.

We spent nearly 4 hours following them around/self guiding ourselves around the garden. When they were instructing, they would wait for some light (good or bad), adjust for it, shoot it, all the while explaining what they were doing and why. Then, they’d change the scene, the light would change and it would all start again.

I’ll provide a more detailed post about what I learned in the next day or two. I planned on doing it now, but I want to go play around with Lightroom 2 Beta before this morning’s Keynote starts!

Having a network of solid vendors is critical for any photographer and an online print house is at the top of the vendor list. As a result, I’m always on the lookout for a quality online printer.

A few weeks ago, popular photo blogger and book writer, Scott Kelby recommended a particular online printer, MPix. Shortly after reading his generous recommendation, I decided to give them a try. I ordered prints at various sizes (4×6, 8×10, 11×14 and 16×20), as well as a canvas mounted print and a puzzle. The following were my findings:

Price

MPix’s price was very competitive with other popular printers, such as Shutterfly. Canvas and print prices were within 10%, above or below, which is to be expected.

Quality

The quality of the prints and canvas were top notch. The vibrance, colors and apparent durability exceeded my expectations.

Products and Selection

The product availability is nice. MPix provides many print sizes, canvases, mounting options and gift products (puzzles, statuettes, etc.). We ordered a puzzle, which also had a good quality. The only disappoint, however, was that the puzzle seemed cut with a very basic pattern (only a few interior puzzle piece types) which made the puzzle much harder because multiple pieces could fit in various places. Also, other online printers provide tins with their puzzles to hold the loose pieces – MPix didn’t provide that.

Speed and Customer Service

They fulfilled my order within 2 days and shipped via USPS Priority for only $5. It arrived just a few days later, turning order to delivery to 4-5 days. Very nice!

Overall Impression

MPix is a very solid online printing house with a wide variety of high quality products and competitive pricing. Their speed to delivery, quality and selection help set them apart. The only disappointment was the lack of quality pattern for the puzzle and a missing tin.

A few weeks ago I ran across an interesting looking photography seminar series from a guy named Ed Pierce (www.edpierceseminars.com). The seminar turned out to be $50 regular priced and I found a discount code that brought it down to $20. I was a bit unsure of what it would be like, but figured for $20/person, it was worth finding out.

So, last night my wife, brother and I went to the $20 seminar and I have to say, it was well worth the money!

What I Liked

I liked the cost the most – it’s tough to beat a $20 seminar.

I liked Ed’s energy and presentation style. He wasn’t the most engaging instructor I’d ever seen, but he did a nice job of making a 3 hour seminar pass rather quickly. Also, Ed seems to genuinely be a nice guy. Several parts of the seminar really portrayed his love for photography and for life, which was great to see.

A lot of the information was a good overview and would have been GREAT for beginners. I did pick up a few interesting tricks for location lighting, which was nice. Also, he stressed getting it right on the camera on the front end, which I am definately a proponent of.

What Could’ve Been Better

Whenever I attend a conference or seminar, I expect a sales pitch. I’ve actually come to enjoy all the vendor booths and a lot of the other marketing because it exposes me to new products and services. What I could have passed on, though, was the selling during the presentation itself. While most segments were free of any sales pitches, a few were quite blatant and spoiled the mood just a bit.

The other piece was the level of information. I learned a few new things, but for very seasoned photographers, it may have been too routine.

Overall

In the end, the few things that could’ve been better were far outshined by an interesting, very inexpensive night. I would recommend this to almost any photographer. This seminar is traveling to a large number of cities – check it out.

The hottest book in photography right now is The Moment It Clicks by Joe McNally. So, I thought I’d give it a try – I wasn’t disappointed – it’s everything it’s been built up to be. I’ve mentioned in past reviews, that the biggest compliment I can give a book is to keep it within arm’s reach at my desk. Well, this book does one better. It may make its way into my bags/travel gear when I go out to shoot. The images are truly inspirational and the stories/lessons that go along are just as useful. Read on for a few more thoughts on this great book.

Other reviews (and there have been a lot of them) describe The Moment It Clicks as having one leg in the classroom and one on the coffee table. While I agree with that, I’d describe it differently.

How I’d Describe the Book

As I read the book, it felt like I was walking through a fine art gallery, with the artist right next to me! I’d look at a great shot on the wall and Joe would lean in and say “Hey, here’s the story behind that one…” or “Wanna know the trick on how to get that lighting?”. The combination of great images and succinct, humorous, yet informative writing style really brings it home.

Other Reasons I Liked the Book

• It’s just the right length. At 200 pages, it provides a lot of great examples, but not too many.
• It appeals to folks at all skill levels. Wheter beginner or advanced, we all need inspiration and the tricks that help us get that great shot.
• It helped prompt me to think outside the box. Several shots used an LCD projector as one of the light sources – how great is that?!?
• You get to see pictures/descriptions of his gear.
• You get to walk into Joe’s head just a bit. He tells the good stories and the sad. He shared stories about celebrities he worked with and about how his career impacted his family. At the end of the book, you feel the emotion of the book.

So, in short. Buy this book. If it’s the only book you buy this year, it’ll be worth it.

A 2-monitor setup among photographers is becoming more and more common, especially with the dropping price of supporting hardware and the influx of LCD monitors. I have a 2 monitor setup at work and at home and they are an important part of my setup and workflow.

Being a photographer, I often like to use my own work as wallpaper. One thing I’ve had problems with, though, is when I set a wallpaper with dual monitors it repeats the same wallpaper on both screens. It would be nice if I could set separate wallpaper for each or even better, span a long pano-type image across both monitors.

I’d been struggling with this problem for a while – at least until I found a great, free tool, Display Fusion. The one downside is that it is for PC users only (it works on XP and Vista) – if you are on a Mac, feel free to post other solutions in the comments section of the post.

Display Fusion, which can be downloaded here, solves wallpaper problems with dual monitors and more. After installing, you can pull up the properties of Display Fusion to configure its two primary purposes – wallpaper display and shortcut keys.

Before I decided to keep and recommend the program, though, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t a computer resource hog. I have enough background processes as it is and needed this to be small. After running, I pulled up the Task Manager and reviewed its usage under various circumstances. On Windows Vista, it idles at around 800 KB of memory and spikes up to around 1.5 or 2 MB of memory. That’s lower than most other processes, even light ones, so running Display Fusion won’t tax your system!

Based on its robust, yet simple features, small impact on system resources and great price, I highly recommend Display Fusion.

Wallpaper Display

The tool provides several options for displaying different images on each monitor or to span one image across monitors. It adds a few nice features like stretch/ centering, shifting the background up/down and left/right to get it right where you want it and to access photos directly from Flickr.  The Flickr feature lets you search Flickr groups/people/text fields and easily display rotating images from the search results.

The interface is very straightforward – I tried several images with it and it worked flawlessly. Keep in mind that if you want to span a picture across both monitors you’ll need to find/adjust one to be more panoramic than usual. It will adjust it for you if needed, but if it isn’t meant to be very wide, it could end up distorting it.

Shortcut Keys

Display Fusion is worth downloading/installing based on its wallpaper features alone, so its added support for Shortcut Keys is a real treat.

The settings display about a dozen common actions you would want to perform with program windows between the two monitors, such as moving a window from one to the other, spanning a window across both, etc. You can assign a keyboard shortcut to the various actions. They worked very smoothly with very little, if any lag, between using the shortcut and seeing the windows move as requested. I don’t move things around a lot but this is definately a timesaver.