Film Grenade: The camera “captures an image at the highest point of flight—when it is hardly moving.” It “takes full spherical panoramas, requires no preparation and images are taken instantaneously. It can capture scenes with many moving objects without producing ghosting artifacts and creates unique images.” You can see it at work in this video
[Sleek.]
Source: BLDGBLOG
©Emily Knudsen
"No reflections," she was told. And while technically photography depends on light reflecting off something, the point was to shoot a highly reflective metal subject without having the light source show up on the subject as harsh highlights. In essence, the assignment was about controlling specular highlights. Read more »
[Sheesh.]
Source: Strobist
On my way home from the UK last month, I posted about my dream to travel light. As it turns out, I didn’t wait too long to start implementing it. I haven’t picked up an X100—though I have been frequently checking the various camera stores. I have, however, acquired a 13″ MacBook Air and have been using it as my only computer for the last week while on a trip to New York.
As a general-purpose laptop, the new MacBook Air is as awesome as everyone says it is. Lightweight, surprisingly speedy, and gifted with impressive battery life, Apple’s marketing is dead on. It is the perfect everyday laptop for most users. But what about for using it for something more demanding? More to the point, the question you probably have for me is: How well does it work as a laptop for a photographer?
The answer is that as long as you can live with its limitations, it’s a surprisingly decent travel photography laptop. I’ve totally enjoyed it while working on planes and trains and in cafés. It’s done everything I’ve asked it to since I bought it, including working through my photos and posting a few along the way. I even used it for light client work while in New York where I needed to quickly shoot a few dozen images and then deliver a finished photo on the spot.
So what are the limitations of the Air? One is the lack of a discrete GPU. This affects applications that can take advantage of it, like Aperture. In my experience so far, it’s most noticeable when importing a big set of photographs and waiting for the initial churn of preview generation to finish. Also, judicious use of Preview mode is called for when browsing photos. If you’re using Lightroom or other applications which only hit the CPU, however, you won’t miss out on the acceleration you didn’t have to begin with.
Another limitation is the speed at which you can get data on and off the MacBook Air. Without using a Thunderbolt display or a huge Promise Pegasus disk array, the current choices are USB 2.0 or WiFi. This means a bit of patience is required whenever you’re making big data transfers, such as to push a big set of photos from the laptop to desktop once you get home after a trip. This limitation should ease as more Thunderbolt options arrive—I really would like a Thunderbolt port expander with Gigabit Ethernet and FireWire on it—but that will take time. For now, it’s a bottleneck that has to be dealt with.
The bottom line is that if you need a single computer for your photography and it has to be a laptop, you really should be looking at the 15″ MacBook Pro. The quad-core CPU, the discrete and fast GPU, the ability to use 8GB of RAM, and the external port options are all extremely useful on a primary photography workstation. On the other hand, if you have an iMac or Mac Pro where you do the bulk of your photo processing, the MacBook Air serves as a great lightweight companion to take on the road. And for all those non-photographic things you do while traveling—email, web browsing, writing—the Air is a shining star that’s a joy to use.
Posted by
James Duncan Davidson.
[I have nothing to add. He’s right on the money. Photography is not a main use, but if you insert almost any other processor intensive task, it applies. The Air is a great general purpose machine that is good enough to squeak by on “Pro” tasks, but you’ll need a MBP for day in day out work… at least until companies start churning out Thunderbolt based extenders.]
Source: James Duncan Davidson
A headline from the New York Tribune: Notwithstanding a few drawbacks, there is still much to be thankful for this winter. (Click on the Tribune logo to see the headline in all its glory.)
David Bransby, photographer.
Brought to you by the Library of Congress and flickr.
[And little ol’ me, but, well, ya know. atmo, etc. ad infinitum.]
…are both pretty and something for which I’m thankful. The thankful part includes not having to deal with a serious storm full of shoveling and cleanup.
For years I’ve been documenting my commutes, usually around the change of seasons. Today it once again struck me to take some snaps, but since I hadn’t given it a moments thought all I had was a phone. Still, as the saying goes, the best camera is the one you have with you…
The drive starts in darkness this time of year, the sun rises as I go, and the day has begun when I get into the City. I do not recommend taking pictures while driving… but I’ve developed quite a few techniques for making this work, which I will not discuss.
And now the continuation of the Houndstooth Chronicles™. Here is a scarf I found for seven dollars that continues the journey. Casually wrapped around my neck this morning, it’s a great transition piece, keeping the drafts out in the cool mornings, yet easily adjusted and removed.
For reference, Wikipedia defines houndstooth thusly: “Houndstooth checks originated in woven wool cloth of the Scottish Lowlands, but are now used in many other materials. The traditional houndstooth check is made with alternating bands of four dark and four light threads in both warp and weft woven in a simple 2:2 twill, two over – two under the warp, advancing one thread each pass.”
I don’t see the hound in all this, but I do love the constraint of the pattern applied in so many different ways. It is that tension that makes design so exciting to me. Another favorite? Herringbone. We’ll be getting to that soon…
Lastly, a shout out to the guys at Outlier. I’ve been meaning to write something about their designs which I’ve been wearing for a while now, both on and off the bike. A full write up of the pieces I’ve worn soon…
Carolyn Write, who blogs at Photo Attorney, has a guide to registering your copyright for photographs online. If you want to pursue the misuse of your images, registration is an essential step in your workflow.
[What a mess this has become…]
Source: James Duncan Davidson
Harman Matte FB was released earlier this year, but it’s not the only entry in this latest round of new papers. More recently introduced is Harman Gloss FB AL, a baryta paper with an alumina coating, and Hahnemüehle FineArt Baryta 325. Both of these papers have been extremely well reviewed. As well, Epson is kicking in with their new Epson Exhibition Fiber Paper, a paper that’s supposed to match traditional air dried F surface photographic paper and have an incredible dMax. [More paper…]
Source: James Duncan Davidson
turnings :: daniel berlinger 