Digital Photography

Summary:

In this FotoTV feature, Ralph Lambrecht demystifies hyperfocal distance and depth of field zones. Lambrecht explains two definitions of the hyperfocal distance, the first is the closest distance at which a lens can be focused while keeping objects at infinity acceptably sharp, the focus distance with the maximum depth of field.

When the lens is focused at this distance, all objects at distances from half of the hyperfocal distance out to infinity will be acceptably sharp. Second, the hyperfocal distance is the distance beyond which all objects are acceptably sharp, for a lens focused at infinity.

The hyperfocal distance is entirely dependent upon what level of sharpness is considered to be acceptable and as we learn from Lambrecht, the most most significant variable of the hyperfocal distance is lens aperture and its respective settings. This allows for selective focus to implement creative applications in photography to either highlight or emphasize an element or area of a scene.

Summary:

Adobe Lightroom 3 is the free public beta version which Marc Ludwig and his guest speaker, Thorsten Kieslich are here today to demystify the new improvements of Lightroom 3 in this comprehensive tutorial for FotoTV Tech.

Adobe has released a beta version of its Photoshop Lightroom 3 workflow and image editing software. Available immediately for free download from Adobe Labs, the new version includes features such as 'intuitive' importing, improved noise reduction, enhanced slideshows and direct online publishing options such as Flickr.

Kieslich describes that Lightroom 3 beta has been completely redesigned with under-the-hood efficiencies to better handle growing image libraries and improves responsiveness with a higher-quality processing engine. In the Library module, a rebuilt import system makes bringing photos into the software more intuitive. Users can easily specify the source and destination of their images, and save common processing, metadata or destination settings as easy-to-reuse presets.

The Library module also includes new capabilities to publish collections on popular photo-sharing sites. Flickr users now have direct access to their accounts from within Lightroom and can drag and drop images directly into their Photostreams. Flickr Pro account users can automatically synch their images and even view comments made on Flickr directly within the Library. This functionality can be extended to additional sites by adding them as new plug-ins once they become available.

Some important and fun new functions and techniques that have been completely redesigned are:

(1) Importing has been redesigned with a new import window that lets you easily see where your images are coming from and where they’re going, with lots of little improvements and enhancements to make the process easier and much more visual.

(2) Drag and Drop Publishing to the Web (and more). Now you can just drag and drop an image to have it automatically published directly from Lightroom right up to Flickr, or directly to an iPhone sync folder, etc..

(3) Pro-level Noise Reduction. This is an area that Lightroom always lagged behind on, but now they have real pro-level noise reduction that competes, or beats, about anything out there (especially because it can do its noise reduction at the Raw file level, rather than on a processed 8-bit file).

(4) Built-in Film Grain feature. There’s been a lot of buzz recently about bringing back that film-grain look, and now that’s built right in.

(5) Better vignetting by a long shot. They really enhanced the post crop vignetting, and now post crop gives you a much better looking, and more natural result (and you have two choices for the type of vignetting effect as well).

(6) You can finally export a slideshow with music embedded in the slideshow (at last), and you can have your slideshow automatically sync the length of the slideshow to the length of your song. Plus, they made it so, on a Mac, you don’t need to use iTunes to host your slideshow music.

(7) Real watermarking is here. Now you can create real watermarks, at different sizes and opacities, and put them where you want them, for both web and print.

(8) Create print layouts with photos wherever you want them. Now there’s a Custom Print Package feature that lets you put as many photos, in whatever shape and size, on the page wherever you want them (you’re no longer restricted to use a grid of uniform cells), so now you can really come up with some creative print layouts without having your hands tied.

(9) You can change the background color for prints. Now you can choose any color as your background for printed pages. I know it sounds like a little thing, but it’s big.

(10) The Collections panel is now in the Develop Module, too. This one addition will dramatically increase your efficiency because now you don’t have to constantly switch back and forth between the Library Module and Develop Module, because you can get to all your collections and images from right within the Develop Module itself.

Have fun discovering the new and improved Adobe Lightroom 3!

Summary:

FotoTV has developed FotoTV-Tech, a forum within the FotoTV platform, dedicated to covering all technology related topics such as camera hardware, software services and products.

For the first installment FotoTV founder Marc Ludwig has invited photographer and podcaster Bastian Wölfle of Digitalupgrade.de, to discuss and demonstrate several photo-editing software applications for photographers using the Mac platform. The first and most basic photo viewing and editing application is Apple’s factory delivered Preview. Wölfle demonstrates a few of the features and explains that Preview offers basic image correction tools, cropping and rotation tools. A very impressive photo editing software tool is Cooliris.

Wölfle gives us an introduction to some of the stylish features including a stunning 3D viewing Wall, noting that it is the fastest way to browse photos from the web or computer desktop, as well as the fastest way to search Google Image Search. For photographers who have a story to tell, there is FotoMagico from Boinx.com, award-winning storytelling software for photographers. As Wölfle demonstrates, with just a few simple clicks photographers can turn pictures into a neat story, even mixing photos and audio soundtracks to create professional looking and sounding slide-shows that can be shared in high resolution.

One last and clever highlight of the video is Posterazor, a photo editing software that provides photographers with a fast and efficient way of cutting large file format photos which can be printed out and later assembled as a poster. The application is really helpful for photographers who have images that are too big to print on a home printer. Have fun photo-editing!

Summary:

In this second film installment, animal photographer specialist Ruth Marcus demonstrates the best techniques and unique approach to shooting animals.

In the first film installment Marcus shared many of her favorite tricks and techniques, as well as her favorite camera systems she likes to work with. This time, she focuses more on the emotional and personal aspects involved in her work. Marcus believes that photography in general is more about what a photographer has to say, highlighting the importance of a personal perspective-- what a photographer thinks, feels and observes when photographing.

Technically, Marcus takes pride in perfecting her images, something she does with ease and so well. Her photos are noble and vivid, always telling an insightful story of the subtle movement so critical in animal photography.

Marcus never allows herself to take a boring picture, rather she'll walk around the animal, positioning herself in different, almost unconventional perspectives to get an authentic shot that conveys her individual impression of the scene.

Once again it is amusing, although educating, to see Marcus playing her harmonica to urge dogs to howl. Albeit, it goes without saying that the simplest approach to shooting animals is probably the best as Marcus demonstrates during the film, feeding treats to her four-legged models.

For most photographers taking photos of animals can be quite a challenge, but with Marcus's easy to follow specialized techniques, existing animal photographers and amateurs alike will benefit from her animal-friendly approach that certainly will help photographers capture the best possible results.