Journal Entry for Friday, December 28th

Year End Reviews In addition to regular monthly reviews and maintenance/performance checks, each year, starting about mid-December, I begin making a year-end review of all the files and programs on my computer. If one wants to get the most out of their programs, help insure that their computer runs smoothly, and make sure that there is always space for their pictures and data, monthly and yearly reviews are an absolute necessity. Unfortunately, as I get older, it appears that everything I do is taking longer and longer. Here it is, nearly the end of the year and I’m only about 80% complete. Maybe next year I will need to start earlier. It seems like every time I complete a task, it leads me to another that needs attention. What is it that I do that takes so long you might ask? Here is a summary of just a few of the things I have checked, reviewed and updated: Note: This list does not include all of the individual steps for performing some of these items such as making temporary backups or creating system restore files and rebooting between various operations, etc.

Check 01: Uninstall/Delete Unused Programs: I review each of the programs installed on my for relevancy. It seems that I download a lot of programs throughout the year and sometimes only end up using them once or twice. If I haven’t used them in the past 3-4 months, I uninstall/delete them. Check 02: Update All Used Programs: I then check each of the remaining programs for updates and download and install updates as needed. Check 03: Review Hard Drive Status: As I have three internal drives and two external drives storing various picture and data files, I check the storage capacity of each drive to insure that I have enough space for storing the new years’ pictures and data.  Check 04: Review/Update Back-up Procedures: I review my folder structure, folders and the picture and or data files contained there-in, relocating files and folders as needed, and then make needed changes to my overall backup plan to insure that all important files are being backed up. I also determine if any data files need updating and make a list for future use. Check 05: Update Data Files as Needed: Using the list of files requiring update found during the previous check, I make needed changes. For example I ended up updating some of my estate files, my inventory files, financial information (credit cards, checking, etc.), my safety deposit box files, my email contact list, address book, etc. Finally, when all this is complete, I run a series of OS and computer cleanup and maintenance procedures that includes such items as the following: Set a New Windows Restore Point Review of all Startup Programs Check for Driver Updates Check for Windows OS Updates Run Disk Cleanup Programs to Delete Temporary Internet Files, Clear Browsing History, Manage/Delete Cookies, and Empty the Recycle Bin Run Registry Cleaner/Defragmenter Run Disk Defragmenter Vacuum/Clean Inside of computer A detailed year-end review will insure that your OS and programs are up-to-date, that your computer and peripherals will run faster, that your system is safe from attacks, provide you with the peace of mind that all necessary files are being backed up and that you have adequate space for a new year's worth of pictures and data.

How To Capture Sharp Photos

It appears that help tips and articles on how to take sharp photos abound; rightfully so, as it is probably the most essential element of a quality photograph. Regardless of whether you have decided to concentrate on landscape, wildlife, sports, macro or portrait photography, your ability to achieve proper focus, maximize depth-of-field, e.g. the range of sharpness, and compose it to enhance the images' message will arguably be the first criterion by which your work will be judged. In order to learn how best to take sharp photos, you need to know reasons why an image may come out blurry. These can range from the simple, the improper holding of the camera during shooting or a dirty lens, to a poor quality lens. Improper camera settings such as too slow of a shutter speed, too high of a ISO setting, the cameras' vibration setting being set to off or improper focus of the subject are all things that can lead to a blurry image. Click "Read more ..." for additional info and focusing tips. THERE ARE MANY THINGS THAT CAN LEAD TO A BLURRY IMAGE  from the Equipment to Camera Settings to Improper Shooting Techniques  First, let's look at the issue of the equipment: POOR OR INFERIOR LENS:  If you had a Compact Camera (CC), sometimes called a point-and-shoot camera, or Sub-Compact Camera (SCC) the price range of the camera will usually dictate the quality of the lens. This also applies to cell phone cameras. Be sure to check out the specs and camera reviews before you purchase. If you have a typical DSLR (Digital Single Lens Reflex) camera or a mirror-less camera that uses an EVF (Electronic View Finder), you will have the option of using interchangeable lens’. Most of these cameras generally come with an inexpensive "kit" lens priced at the lowest end of the manufacturer's range so as to not add much to a camera price. These lenses often offer "zooming" and are generally slower and may not offer consistent sharpness at all focal lengths. LENS PURCHASE TIP: Invest in a good prime lens: Make the investment in a good, fast (f/1.4/f1.8) prime lens. Prime lenses are relatively inexpensive, ranging between $200 to $400.  Very few zoom lenses can achieve the same optical quality as the prime lenses, because prime lenses have simpler design and are optimized to perform for only one focal range. Although you lose the ability to zoom in and out, prime lenses are much faster than most zoom lenses and are excellent choices for low-light and portrait photography. Because of the shallow depth of field, they are also capable of producing pictures with beautiful bokeh (nicely blurred backgrounds).  If you have never used a prime lens before, give it a try and you will not regret it. ZOOM LENS TIP: Make sure the Shutter Speed equals the focus distance: When using a zoom lens that goes beyond 100mm, apply the general hand-holding rule, which states that the shutter speed should be equivalent to the distance in mm of the lens. For example, shooting at 200mm would equal a shutter speed of 1/250 of a second. When using zoom lenses, focus at the focal length you plan to shoot at. In the past, in the manual focus days, lenses were parfocal, meaning that you could zoom the lens and the focus would stay the same. Many of today’s lenses, however, are not parfocal.  So changing the focal length by zooming causes focus drift, and the lens is no longer focused where it was before it was zoomed.  The better bet is to zoom the lens where you want it for your composition, and then focus the lens. DIRTY LENS TIP: Keep your lenses clean: A dirty and a greasy front element of the lens is a guarantee to inaccurate camera focusing and poor image contrast. This is especially true when taking pictures with the very small lenses found on a cell phone. Next, let's examine camera settings:  SHUTTER SPEED TOO LOW: Even though the image stabilisation systems built into today's lenses and cameras have a mechanism to compensate for accidental camera movement, thus allowing slower shutter speeds to be used when the camera is handheld, it is still a good idea to adhere to the general rule that the shutter speed should be at least one second divided by the focal length of the lens e.g. if you are using a 100mm lens, shutter speed needs  to be at least 1/100sec, which because of the way shutter speed is set usually translates to a setting of 1/125sec or faster. APERTURE TOO SMALL: Although using a small aperture increases depth of field (the size of the focused area in the shot) it also increases the impact of diffraction, the bending of light as it passes over the edge of the aperture blades. This bending prevents the light from focusing on the sensor and thus softens the image. The smaller the aperture, the greater the proportion of unfocused light reaching the sensor, so the greater the softening effect. This means that there is a compromise between depth of field and sharpness. Rather than closing the aperture right down to its minimum setting, it’s better to open up by stop or two. AF FOCUSES ON THE WRONG SUBJECT: Whenever you let the camera take control of the focus point selection it may get it wrong. Many cameras are calibrated to focus on the nearest subject towards the center of the frame. As a result if your subject is near the edge of the frame or not the closest object to the lens the camera may focus on the wrong point. This is even more true when shooting subjects close-up. Because the camera usually looks for something in the mid-distance, you may find that the background is in focus rather than your intended subject. The simple solution is to control the focus point yourself by selecting something like Single Point AF. Then half-press the shutter release to focus the lens, before recomposing the shot while keeping the shutter release button pressed. When the scene is correctly composed push the shutter release all the way to take the shot. SELECTING THE RIGHT AREA TO FOCUS ON: Whether photographing people or animals, always focus on the closest eye to you. This is very important, especially when dealing with large apertures between f/1.4 and f/2.8. As long as the eye of the subject is sharp, the image will most likely be acceptable. IN SUMMARY HERE: Learn how to properly focus your camera: Because most cameras have some several "auto-focusing" modes, it is important that you learn what they are and when to apply them to our advantage. The first thing you need to learn here is how to differentiate between a camera shake/motion blur and a focus problem. When a subject in your image is soft or out of focus, while something else in the foreground or background is perfectly in focus and sharp, it is a focus issue. If the whole image is blurry and nothing is sharp, it is most likely a slow shutter speed or improper camera holding technique that is the issue. Next, you need to understand what can cause an "auto-focus" malfunction.  lack of light can cause auto-focus malfunction. Make sure there is plenty of light for your camera to properly focus. A lack of contrast can cause auto-focus malfunction. The camera auto-focus system works by looking at the contrast around the focus area, e.g. if you try to focus your camera on a clean white wall, it will never be able to acquire focus, because the camera will not see any areas of contrast. Tip: Place the rectangular focus area to an area with the most contrast. Examples are: edges of objects, lines separating different colors, numbers and letters printed on objects, etc. Don't be afraid to focus multiple times until you can clearly see in the viewfinder that the object is in focus. If you have a small viewfinder and can't determine if the subject is in focus, just keep re-focusing, taking multiple pictures. During the post editing process, you will be able to tell which one is in best focus. If the camera won't acquire focus where you want it, then you are probably using "multiple-area" focusing and need to switch to "center point" focus. Focus on the desired object, then slightly move the camera to obtain the best composition. If you use single AF mode to photograph a moving object you’ll find that the camera focuses the lens on the subject at first, but that the subject moves out of focus. Consequently, if you are shooting continuously only the first image will be sharp. As it name suggests, in continuous AF mode the camera continues to focus the lens for as long as the shutter release button is held down. Lastly, let's examine shooting situations and shooting technique:  BODY MOVEMENT: You can help prevent body movement by maintaining a proper stance and controlling your breathing. Place your feet shoulder width apart, with one foot slightly ahead of the other. Cradle the lens by gripping the bottom of the lens with your left hand and hold the body with your right hand, finger placed on the shutter release button. Tuck your elbows firmly against your body. Press the eye cup of the camera firmly against your head.  Control your breathing by completely exhaling before pressing the shutter. CAMERA SHAKE: Preventing camera shake can be easy. First of all, if your camera or lens has such a function, make sure that your "vibration reduction" or "image stabilization" is set to “On”. In the case of my Panasonic cameras, this is an in-camera menu function for my 14-42mm lens, and a switch on the lens for the 45-200mm Zoom lens. If you can’t use a shutter speed fast enough to freeze accidental camera movements, or hand-held camera shake, then you need to put the camera on or against some form of support. This can either be natural like a wall or rock or in the form of a monopod or a tripod. Also keep in mind, that just touching a camera mounted on a tripod can be enough to set it wobbling a little and make your images soft. Fortunately, it’s relatively easy to resolve the problem with a remote release. Remote releases come in two forms, wired and wireless. Remote releases are especially useful when you want very long bulb exposures because they avoid you having to press the camera’s shutter release button throughout the duration of the exposure.  MOTION BLUR: It doesn't matter how rock-steady the camera is, if the subject is moving the image will be blurred. If you’re shooting a moving subject and you want it sharp rather than blurred the shutter speed has to be fast enough to freeze the movement. A shutter speed of 1/60sec or 1/125 is usually fast enough to freeze a walking person, but if you’re photographing sports like football and hockey a shutter speed of around 1/500sec is usually needed. Remember, using fast shutter speeds means using a higher sensitivity (ISO) setting and/or opening up the aperture to let more light into the camera. If you are photographing a person, have them freeze and not move while you take their picture. When you work with slow shutter speeds, even if you do everything right, your images might still come out blurry just because the intended subject is moving while the shutter is open. This is called motion blur. When photographing close-ups of flowers on a windy day, I have sometimes used an umbrella to block the wind and keep the flower from moving. ISO SETTINGS  TIP: Start with ISO set to its lowest value: Always start with your camera's lowest ISO value. This is usually ISO-100 or ISO-200, depending upon your camera. Increasing this under certain lighting conditions may be necessary. If your camera has an Auto or Intelligent ISO setting, set it to ON. Even though higher ISO setting will increase "noise", it’s worth remembering that a little bit of noise is usually preferable to a badly burred image. CREATING DEPTH-OF-FIELD or Bokeh    Depth of field (DOF) is that distance within an image between the nearest and farthest objects that appear acceptably sharp. The first thing you need to understand is that for any combination of sensor, lens, focal length and ƒ-stop setting, there's only one precise point of focus; everything else within the area defined as the DOF is technically un-sharp but perceived to be acceptable, with the sharpness decreasing as the distance from the precise plane of focus increases. The two things you usually want to do are to maximize DOF and to place it strategically within an image. Controlling Depth Of Field In Single Captures: On digital sensors, expanding DOF is a continuing challenge for photographers, but it can be achieved in single captures, with varying success, in several ways. Using a wide-angle lens (16-24mm for full-frame DSLRs) offers nearly unlimited DOF, but tends to create a distorted perspective. Moving farther away from the subject (say, an imposing tree in the middle ground of a landscape image) can bring the primary subject into focus; however, this isn't always desirable, possible or practical. On the other hand, using a telephoto lens at larger apertures is a good option for minimizing or strategically placing DOF. This "selective focus" can be a strong compositional tool. Achieving the largest possible area of sharpness: Stopping down the aperture of a lens is typically the best option to increase DOF. For all lenses, the smallest lens opening offers the greatest DOF. However, be aware of two things; first, that the smaller the aperture, e.g. ƒ/22, the more the DOF is compromised by diffraction - the bending of light rays as they enter the very small lens opening at an angle; and second, that a smaller ƒ-stop typically mandates a longer shutter speed which causes the image to be more susceptible to camera and subject movement. All of these variables must be considered when attempting to achieve the largest possible area of sharpness. Tip: Another technique that can be used to maximize DOF is tilting the front optic to induce the Scheimpflug principle - a geometric rule that describes the orientation of the plane of focus of an optical system (such as a camera) when the lens plane is not parallel to the image plane. Determining the Hyperfocal Distance: For each lens and ƒ-stop combination, there's a point called the hyperfocal distance, from which all objects will be sharp into infinity. The greater the focal length and the larger the aperture, the farther away the closest focus point will be. A good prime wide-angle lens will have DOF markings on the lens barrel to make this setting easier to attain. By placing the marking for a certain ƒ-stop on infinity and reading its corresponding marking on the focus indicator, you'll have set an approximate hyperfocal distance for the lens. For example, with a wide-angle lens of 16mm set to ƒ/16: the area from one foot in front of the lens to infinity (the hyperfocal distance) will be sharp. Ways camera, lens and exposure choices affect DOF: When choosing the lens and focal length needed to properly frame your subject, remember that ... Longer focal lengths yield less DOF. When choosing an aperture to expand or concentrate the DOF so the subject is in focus, remember that ... Smaller apertures yield more DOF. Choose the exposure and ISO required for proper lighting and capture speed. Make adjustments among all these variables to achieve the resolution and exposure you seek. GENERAL SHOOTING TIPS TIP - Shoot in Aperture-Priority mode: When using this mode, set the aperture to the lowest value e.g. f/3.5, and let the camera set the shutter speed. Don't be afraid to take a couple of test shots and review at 100% to evaluate the sharpness. If they don't appear sharp, you can always increase the minimum shutter speed or bump up the ISO setting. Always make sure that your stance, holding of the camera, and your breathing is controlled before pressing the shutter. Aperture also plays a big role in achieving optimal sharpness. For landscape photography, generally use apertures between f/8 and f/10; for portraits, use apertures between f/1.4 to f/8, depending on how much background you want in focus. Keep in mind that playing with aperture changes the depth of field and will have an impact on the lens bokeh. TIP - Use a polarizing filter: Polarizers are famous for darkening blue skies on sunny days, but they are just as useful in other situations. In misty or hazy situations, polarizers can help cut through that haze.  Haze has the effect of softening an image, so using a polarizer to eliminate the haze enhances sharpness. So don’t hesitate to put the polarizer on your lens, even when darkening a blue sky isn’t the reason. TIP - Use a tripod for low-light situations:   For shooting lightning storms, fireworks, city lights and other cool stuff at night, a sturdy tripod is a must! Don’t buy a cheap tripod designed for point and shoot cameras, but rather invest in a heavy duty, sturdy tripod that can handle your DSLR. Having a self-timer mode or a cable/wireless shutter release is also very helpful, to minimize camera shake. TIP - Select the AF point you want to use: Place the center AF point on the spot you want in sharpest focus and use the “Focus and Recompose” method of focusing to create their images.  Be careful when shooting at wider apertures where the depth of field is shallower. When you do this, the focal plane shifts, moving it away from where you originally focused, which may reduce sharpness. TIP - Shoot in bursts: Set your camera to AF-C (Auto Focus in Continuous Mode), then photograph your subject in bursts by just holding the shutter button. Shooting moving subjects continuously helps improve the odds that you’ll get a shot that is spot-on. Firing off 3 or 5 shot bursts can also help freeze the motion of your subject, especially with a bit of panning. Sometimes you’ll get just enough of the subject in focus with everything else blurred because of the motion, leaving you with a nice isolation that highlights the emotion of that moment.

Journal Entry for Monday, Nov 26th

Hard Drive Failure

Was talking this past week with my niece, a part-time photographer, who indicated that her hard drive crashed. Because it was making the telltale clicking sound as it futilely attempted to access her files, it appears to be a mechanical failure. And yes, she forgot the cardinal rule of computing: All hard drives eventually fail. Panic! Based upon the size of the drive and number of files, she has been quoted a minimum cost of over $1,200 from more than one data recovery company to salvage her pictures. 

Several years ago, I also experienced a failed drive with no working backup and know the feeling of panic thinking everything may be lost. This story made me think back to a post I made almost a year ago after I decided to use Carbonite, an Internet Cloud storage and backup site. Even though I have total piece of mind now that I’m using this program, because it is getting near the end of the year, I decided to go back and review my backup scheme and folders. In doing so, I actually found some folders that I had created over the past 9 months that I had failed to add to Carbonite. Thank you Kristina for this reminder.

I now have more than 300,000 pictures and data files (representing 350GB) backed up to Carbonite’s secure data center. If you want to learn more about this program, read last February’s post  Making Photo Backups

Journal Entry for Sunday, Nov 25th

Today’s Photo Tip – Learn To Shoot in Program Mode: If you are like most new camera users, you probably set your camera to its ‘auto mode’ and began snapping away. The many technical and  feature improvements in digital cameras over the past few years have made it easier and easier to rely upon a camera’s auto mode feature for taking high quality images. Unfortunately, no auto mode is 100 percent accurate – meaning a small percentage of your pictures might suffer from less than perfect exposure and focus. One solution for this is to switch to Program Mode. Read the following tip to learn more about these two functions … Intelligent Auto Mode vs Manual Program Mode .

Journal Entry for Thursday, Nov 23rd

Today’s Photo Tip – Shoot In Manual Mode: If you are like most people, you shoot most of your pictures using your camera's “Intelligent Auto” mode or one of dozens of preset Scene modes. The ever improving quality and features found within today’s digital cameras are making it easier and easier to capture great pictures without making manual adjustments for ISO, Aperture, Shutter Speed, for Focus. Probably one of the most important aspects of any photo is sharp focus. The problem is that with even the best camera, no camera’s auto mode can know the exact spot in a scene that your eye has determined the central point of interest – requiring the sharpest focus. Read this tip to learn how to obtain the best focus and composition for your pictures … Tips for Obtaining the Best Focus.

Journal Entry for Sunday, Nov 18th

Velbon Sherpa 600RF Tripod I recently obtained this brand new, full-size tripod at a silent auction held by the Henderson Symphony for a bid of $75. Considering it had a retail price of $160, I felt like I got a great deal. To read up on its details, click the My Equipment tab at the top of the page and scroll down.

Journal Entry for Monday, Oct 1st

Recently I created a new category called Photographic Musings, where I can place random thoughts concerning my journey to becoming a better photographer. You can visit it any time by clicking on the link located under SITE CATEGORIES found at the upper left side of this page. Check out my latest musing titled,  Photography or Art?

Journal Entry for Sunday, Sep 2nd

Today's Photo Tip – Producing Better Landscape Photos: As a new season of hiking excursions with the Henderson “Rock-hounds” is about to begin, I thought it appropriate to review some info I had saved regarding the subject of landscape photography. As many of you know, landscapes and panoramic pictures are some of my favorite subjects. I gleaned info from several different articles to create the following photo tips. To read this photo tip click here ... Tips For Producing Better Landscape Photos.

 

Journal Entry for Friday, Aug 17th

Today's Photo Tip – Organizing Your Photos: This subject is so important, I made it one of the permanent tabs at the top of the site when I created it. Because it is a process that I often ‘tweak’ to make improvements, today I decided to emphasize its importance by adding it to my Photo Tips category.  Though I know there are probably several programs out there that help organize photos, I prefer using a manual method that I created some time ago. To read this photo tip click here ... Tips For Organizing Your Photos.

Intelligent Auto Mode vs manual Program Mode

Today’s Photo Tip: – Learn To Shoot in [P] Program Mode: As you have probably learned by now, the [iA] Intelligent Auto Mode setting on your camera will take a very good picture about 95% of the time. But what about the other 5% of the time? First, you need to understand what is happening in the [iA] Intelligent Auto Mode. Though it may vary by camera, these modes automatically determine the camera settings needed to obtain proper exposure and obtain quality results.  Note: Though your camera should have similar settings, the specific settings noted in [bold-faced brackets] are for a LUMIX DMC-G2.

Auto Modes: Here’s what’s going on in my camera. The [iA] Intelligent Auto Mode attempts to identify the 'type' of scene you are viewing and then provides settings to best capture the image. It determines if the framed subject should be photographed as a i-portrait, i-baby, i-nighttime portrait, i-scenery, i-nighttime scenery, i-macro, and i-sunset(v). Based upon motion and lighting, it then determines where to focus, the white balance, color balance, and the best shutter speed and aperture(i). Additionally, it determines settings for the following:  Sleep Mode (5 min), Flash Mode (on/off), Flash Synchro (1st), Burst Rate (high Speed), Auto Bracket (sequence), ISO Sensitivity (100-800), Metering Mode (multiple), Red-Eye Removal (on), Exposure (standard), and Focusing (23-area)(ii). If there is too little contrast or light, it may have trouble focusing. Unfortunately, scene identification is imperfect, so when it fails, the camera uses generic settings (general shutter speed, aperture, and 23-area focusing) that should still capture a good image - just not necessarily the best. Hence, the other 5%.

Program Mode: These situations can be remedied by switching to the [P] Program Mode(iii). This semi-automatic mode is similar to your camera’s auto mode because it will automatically set a proper exposure value for your shot. (as far as the lens aperture opening and shutter speed). However, what makes using it different than shooting in Intelligent Auto mode is that you can have complete control over either aperture or shutter speed while the camera chooses the best exposure values. Other settings that you will be able to control in the [P] Program Mode will include the ISO, light metering, focusing, and flash settings. In complex lighting scenes or scenes that would make it difficult for the camera to achieve focus on a desired object, the camera's light meter can be fooled, producing an underexposed, overexposed or slightly out of focus image. As noted above, the [iA] mode automatically uses 23-area focusing and the multiple metering mode. In [P] mode you can switch to [Spot Metering], allowing you to focus on and read the light from a small area rather than from the overall scene. You also have the option to select [1-area Focusing], or any of the Auto Focus Mode Dial’s other three focusing modes (23-area, AF tracking, or face detection). In addition, you will have the full menu of flash options available, some of which are not available in the Intelligent Auto Mode depending upon which scene it selects. As previously mentioned, the aperture and shutter speed can also be adjusted somewhat in the [P] mode. Once you compose a picture and press the shutter half way down, you will be able to see the lens aperture and shutter speed the camera has chosen on the camera's LCD screen. If you think the shutter speed might be too slow (or if it is the aperture setting you want to change for depth-of-field), there will be a dial on the camera to make the desired adjustment(iv). The camera will automatically adjust either the aperture or shutter speed for a proper exposure. As you can see, the [P] Program Mode offers you a variety of shooting options for capturing a better focused image, while at the same time still insuring proper exposure.

In Summary: Using [iA] Intelligent Auto and specific [SCN] Scene Modes will provide you with very good images most of the time. However, in scenes with low light and little contrast, switching to the [P] Program Mode and making a few quick settings can often improve image focus and exposure.

(i) NOTE #1: Usually, pressing the shutter halfway will show most of these settings on the display screen. A red or flashing red icon indicates a problem. (ii) NOTE #2: You have the option to modify some settings by pressing the [Q.MENU] button on the back of the camera. (iii) NOTE #3: Every Digital SLR camera and Mirrorless camera has a “P” mode setting. However, more basic compact cameras won’t have a program mode. (iv) NOTE #4: This  will be called using the Program Shift or Flexible mode. It is part of the regular Program mode. Check your camera’s instruction manual for more precise instructions. (v) NOTE #5: Scene modes automatically fine-tune the focusing, exposure, and light sensitivity for obtaining the best picture associated with the selected mode. Manually selecting a scene mode will generally create better pictures than if you use the [iA] mode.

Tips For Obtaining the Best Focus

Today’s Photo Tip – Shoot In A Manual Mode: If you are like most people, you shoot most of your pictures using your camera's [iA] (Intelligent Auto) mode. The first thing to remember is that this mode, as well as some SCN modes, override whatever focusing selections you may have made using the camera’s Auto Focus Mode Dial, by making their "best guess" selection. Therefore, because the camera cannot really know exactly what area in the picture you desire to be in SHARPEST focus, it may not capture it in sharp focus. Note: Though your camera should have similar settings, the specific settings noted below in [bold-faced brackets] are for a LUMIX DMC-G2.

Step 1.  Using the Mode Dial, switch to one of your camera’s "manual" shooting modes [P][S][A][M].  Each of these modes will allow you the ability to set a specific focus mode and specific regions to focus on. Step 2.  Next, using the Focus Mode Lever, select either [AFS] (Auto Focus Single) or [AFC] (Auto Focus Continuous). If the subject is stationary, select [AFS]. This mode will 'lock' focus on the subject when you press the shutter halfway, allowing you to then move the camera to frame the subject for the best composition. For taking shots of rapidly moving subjects or firing in Burst Mode, select [AFC]. This mode will keep the focusing motor operating during the interval between shots in an attempt to retain focus. If you are taking nature close-ups where intervening branches or reeds are between the subject and the camers, you may want to select the [MF] (Manual Focus) mode. This mode turn off the auto focusing motor, requiring you to determine the focus on the display screen as you turn the lens' Focusing Ring.

Step 3.  If using either the [AFS] or [AFC] modes, use the Auto Focus Mode Dial, to tell the camera how to focus the subject area; [1-area], [23-area], [AF Tracking], or [Face Detection]. Most users typically use the [23-area] focusing mode as their default setting. However, when doing so, this mode forces you to place your subject where the pre-defined focus points are. Herein lies a typical problem. Either the focus point is too small to cover the areas of interest or it might not be exactly where you want it, meaning that you cannot "frame" or "compose" the picture the way you want it. In order to insure that your intended subject is in sharp focus when using this mode, you need to focus first on the exact spot you want in sharp focus and then recompose the shot in order to obtain the desired framing. To obtain the sharpest focus where you want it, re-set the focus mode to [1-area] focusing, then point the camera at the subject, placing the area that you want to have in sharpest focus directly in the center, press the shutter button half-way to confirm it (either by a beep or the green dot indicator inside the viewfinder). Then, continuing to hold the shutter button half-way down, move the camera and recompose the picture, fully depressing the shutter when you are satisfied with the composure.

Step 4.  Finally, you can secure the focus point by pressing the AF/AE Lock Button to lock the focus [AF/AE Lock] (Auto Focus/Auto Exposure Lock) on the back of the camera. Depending upon this button's menu settings, you can lock either focus, exposure, or both. While continuing to depress the shutter button half-way, press and hold the [AF/AE] Lock button, then, continuing to hold the shutter button half-way down, move the camera and recompose the picture, fully depressing the shutter when you are satisfied with the composure. Using the menu settings you can also set this button to HOLD. This setting lets you release the button and still retain the locked focus, exposure, or both until you press the button again or take the picture.

Things to remember when recomposing: First, is that you might end up with a poorly focused image if you recompose too aggressively. This is especially true when shooting at very large apertures and close distances. Your focus plane shifts when you recompose, so if you have a very shallow depth of field and you are standing too close to your subject, recomposing too much could result in a soft-looking/unfocused subject. The upside of this is that the resulting effect may help to focus attention on your desired subject. If you cannot get a sharp image, try to keep the focus point as close to the subject as possible and then recompose a little. Less shift means less change in focus plane. If you shoot with long-lenses over long distances, you do not have to worry about this as much.

Tips for Producing Better Landscape Photos

Today’s Photo Tip – Taking Better Landscape Photos: The goal of any landscape photographer is to create crisp, clear images in good light. The good news is that you don’t have to have a costly digital camera to take stunning landscape photos. Spend less time thinking about the technical aspects and more about the impact your photo will have on the people who view it. While it’s important to understand the elements of exposure, none of those things will guarantee a viewers emotional connection to the subject. Every photo needs to tell a story or create a feeling. When shooting a landscape photo you need to take the time to read and to understand the land e.g. as the sun moves, see the way light changes the contours and shapes within the landscape. Light gives landscape its own voice; it creates mood and emotion in a landscape, causing it to say something to the viewer. It needs to draw them in and make them wonder. It needs to pique their interest. People look at images that are interesting. It is only interesting if it communicates something to them and makes them wonder about something in it. Try to portray a sense of feeling or an emotion. Here are some things to consider when taking landscape photos.

The Equipment Factor: Though you don’t need a costly professional quality camera, you do need a good digital camera. A digital camera with interchangeable lenses is always best, though many of todays high-end compact cameras can compete quite well with DSLR’s. When using a camera that uses interchangeable lenses, realize that there are many different types of lenses for photographing landscapes. The sharpest lenses for taking landscapes are prime lenses; a lens that remains at an unchanging focal length, meaning it does not zoom in or out. As a result of this immobility, the lens has a better optical quality that will cause your panorama photos to turn out sharper and clearer than if you used a zoom lens. If you want the best advantage to start with, purchase a wide angle prime lens. With that said, there are two other pieces of equipment that will improve your landscape photography; a sturdy tripod and a remote shutter cord or remote shutter release cable.  A tripod provides you with very tack sharp and clear images in many different kinds of daylight by holding the camera free from movement. However, even pressing the shutter release on a camera set on a tripod can cause camera movement. To complete the scenario of being "rock steady", buy a remote shutter release. It will mean that you do not have to come into contact with your camera whatsoever, increasing your chances of getting even sharper photos. Additional Tip: Wherever possible, try to avoid using filters as filters typically soften images and therefore reduce sharpness. After this, everything else is a matter of timing and technique. Timing and Lighting: Though often hard to control, lighting for landscape photography is incredibly important. Everyone pretty much knows that taking a photo in the best possible light is key to obtaining good results. The reason why any landscape photo looks so vibrant and beautiful is because of the lighting. Without good lighting a landscape photo will just look dull and lacking in interest. And no amount of post editing will fix this dilemma. You may have heard that the best light for most photography is very early or very late in the day, when the sun is low, and the light is soft and colorful. This is a good rule to follow most of the time. This gentle light is called sweet light. You will find that the light is soft and gently colorful. When pictures are captured at these times of day the light, hues and tones give your scene a totally different look compared to shooting mid-day. Shooting in mid-day sunlight can create unwanted shadows, washed out colors and a general lack of depth. Shooting in a gentle light gives you back those soft colors, muted tones and gentle skies without horrible shadows ruining your landscapes. However, at the same time, remember that shadows can be crucial to providing a sense of depth and dimension. Their sense of darkness provides shape, form and emphasis to the part of the photo in the light. Additional Tip: Use your histogram. Expose to the right. What does this mean? When using your digital camera’s histogram, ensure that the range of tones are pushed as far as they can go to the right-hand side of the histogram graph without touching the right-side. Doing this will increase the amount of information recorded in the image and therefore quality! Composition: Many photographers simply say, "see it, shoot it". Instead, you should always try to create a more interesting composition. Concentrate. Sometimes all it takes to make a photo a success is to move a little to the left or right, or move in or out just a little more. If you just point the camera in the general direction of the subject without thinking about what you are doing, your results will not improve. If you slow down and really examine what you can see in the viewfinder before you press the button, your success rate will improve. Generally, compose an image to exclude more and include less; remove any element that does not add to the image. Simple things to look out for include; trees and power-poles obstructing part of the shot; litter on the ground (pick it up); aircraft or distracting clouds in the sky (wait for them to pass by); blurry branches on a windy day (wait for conditions to settle for a moment). All these things and more can ruin a photo, and they can all be remedied by taking a good look to make sure your picture has captured everything you want, and nothing you don’t want. Many photos can be made more interesting not by zooming right in on the subject, but by zooming out, or standing further back to capture more of the surroundings. As an example, everyone loves taking sunrise and sunset photos. A brilliant sunset sky can make a great photo, but it can be made even better by looking for a good subject for the foreground. The key is to find something that stands out against the sky, with an outline people can recognize; a tree, a fence, a windmill, a pier, even a row of power poles. The subject does not have to dominate the photo; in fact it is probably best if it only takes up about ten percent of the composition so that the sky remains the starring attraction. Additional Tip: Capture panoramic images by stitching multiple image captures together. Ensure that the camera is set to manual shooting mode, manual white balance, manual focus, overlap each image segment by approximately 25% and ensure the tripod is perfectly level. Positioning the camera in a portrait orientation will also give you more scope when it comes to cropping!   Camera Settings: Shoot in RAW format for maximum quality if you plan on doing any post production editing. Though there may be some accepted rules to create landscapes, there is never any ideal camera setting for a landscape shot. As a general rule, lighting is key.  Using a smaller f-stop is usually what landscape photographers try to achieve. Though a lesser f-stop, such as f-22, is generally regarded as an ideal f-stop for most landscapes, switch to manual focus and focus one-third of the way into a scene and do not use the smallest aperture of the lens (i.e. f/22). Instead use at least 2-3 stops up from the smallest opening in order to achieve sharper images. This is purely because it helps the camera to focus suitably into the distance. If you are shooting at a medium distance of 35-70 feet, f-13 or higher works absolutely fine too. Naturally, you always have to take your lighting into consideration. As far as shutter speed is concerned, since you have a tripod and shutter cable, your shutter is not one of the major important factors that take precedent in your landscape photography. As long as you have your shutter on a speed that won’t blur due to wind, then chose a medium speed such as 1/125th of a second. Try to use a ISO of 100, but not more than 400. The higher the ISO the more your color will be affected. Once you have the camera set up on a tripod, a small aperture setting, and the best lighting you achieve, you are ready to begin shooting. Additional Tip: In tricky lighting situations, take a series of three shots: the first shot two stops under exposed, the second shot perfectly exposed and the third shot two stops over exposed. Additional Tip: To further improve depth of field and sharpness and get images appearing tact sharp from the near foreground to the distant background, capture two separate images with the first focused on an element in the foreground and the second on an element in the background. Then blend the two images together later in your photo editing program.   Post Editing: Once you have created a series of landscape shots, you can then take them home for editing. Finding the right photo editing techniques for landscapes isn’t that tricky. You must first know what you are trying to achieve. Whether you want to boost the color vibrancy, soften or mute the colors, add light or turn it into a monochrome, sepia or split tone scene, remember the main thing is to keep your shots sharp, broad and vibrant. You may have to enhance the sharpness a little using the sharpen tool in your editing program. Increasing contrast, color vibrancy and boosting shadows are all tools that will improve your photo as long as you don't overdo them. Additional Tip: If you had trouble with your light when capturing your photos, and took the time to capture three shots (under, over and correctly exposed) then try HDR.  Using HDR techniques, you can then create one single photo which is a blend of all three of the shots to bring out the best from all of them. This will bring about natural highlights to your shadows and reduce your highlights to a more natural looking appearance. This “blending” is a professional landscape editing technique that can really rescue your photos.

Why Do Photographs Matter?

Photographs communicate what is important to us. They provide us with recorded memories. We often have a strong urge to distil our most precious moments into images; ceremonies of birth and birthdays, marriages and anniversaries, holidays and new homes and other purchases, all recorded because they matter to us. Photographs are our personal story, a narrative of our lives, places we’ve visited, people we’ve met or those we love. They provide us with a legacy that we can share with others. ...

Photography or Art?

Fine art photography generally refers to photographs that are created in accordance with the creative vision of the photographer and can be anything from portraits, to landscapes to still lifes. Art is primarily created by the imagination of the artist, while technically, photographs are created by electro-mechanical devices. However, a camera is incapable of selection, composition, timing, and editing. I don't know about you, but I am an artist and a photographer, though I like to consider myself more of an artist than a photographer. Even though I am constantly striving to become a better photographer, I generally see it as a means to creating more artistic photographs. As I'm sure is the case with many photographers, I often take numerous pictures of the same subject with varying film modes, composition and exposures. In this process I am always trying to be creative and come up with something new and pleasing that will hopefully separate the end result from the norm. As a result ...

Journal Entry for Sunday, July 29th

Today's Photo Tip – Packing For A Photo Shoot: Today I added a post to my Photo Tips category on the importance of having a list for the items you want to take on your photo shoots. Call it “Murphy’s Law”, but it seems that whenever I leave for a daytrip of photo taking and don’t take the time to check my photo equipment list, there is always something that I forget that I wish I had. There is nothing more distressing than finding out that you forgot to charge a battery, or take the water bottle out of the freezer, pack a snack bag, take a hat, or pack your “small” camera. I hate to admit it, but there have been times when leaving in a hurry early in the morning I have forgot at least one of these items. To see what I pack for a daytrip photo shoot, check out this photo tip here … Packing For A Photo Shoot.

Journal Entry for Monday, Jul 09th

Panasonic LUMIX DMC-ZS19 During the course of the past year, I have found that the time it takes to change lenses in the field (from a wide angle to a telephoto) has often caused me to miss some really good shots of birds and various animals. I also wanted something that I could carry around on a more regular basis that was not as bulky as my LUMIX DMC-G2 Four-thirds system. Not wanting to spend the money on another expensive camera body, I have been looking for a small footprint point and shoot camera that still offered me many of the features I’ve been used to on my G2. Well the look is finally over. I finally decided upon the Panasonic LUMIX DMC-ZS19. Measuring only 2.32" high x 4.13" wide x 1.11" deep and weighing only 0.45 pounds, this compact digital travel camera has a 14.1 megapixel MOS sensor and comes with a powerful 20x optical/ 4x digital zoom (35mm camera equivalent: 24-480mm) LECIA Lens and a 460,000 pixel 3.0" TFT Touch Screen LCD Display. It has a super-fast autofocus, 10 frame/second continuous shooting, a great auto mode, and Full HD 1080/60p video recording. Its iA (Intelligent Auto)  is probably the best point-and-shoot mode in the business. Though it lacks RAW support, white balance bracketing, and manual focus, it provides a decent set of manual exposure controls as well as more than a dozen scene modes. Some other handy features include Intelligent Resolution which does a nice job of sharpening your photos, a new HDR mode, which really improves how high contrast photos turn out, and an in-camera panorama stitching feature. It had 72MB of internal memory and supports SD, SDHC, and SDXC cards.

Tips For Organizing Your Photos

Today's Photo Tip – Organizing Your Photos: This subject is so important, I made it one of the permanent tabs at the top of the site when I created it. Because it is a process that I often ‘tweak’ to make improvements, today I decided to emphasize its importance by adding it to my Photo Tips category.  Though I know there are probably several programs out there that help organize photos, I prefer using a manual method that I created some time ago. The basic steps below provide a summary of the process I use that is outlined in the “Saving Pics” tab. After reviewing this post, click the tab at the top for more detail.

Step 1. - Transferring Negatives To The Computer: The first step is to get your negatives off the camera and onto your computer. Select a hard drive with the necessary storage and create a single folder into which you download all of the photos from your camera.

Step 2. – Properly Catalog Your Negatives: Create negative folders with a “Neg-“ prefix in the title, followed by the dates of the photos and a brief description of the topics.

Step 3. – Develop a Personal System For Filing and Naming Your Edited Photos: I create subject folders for the permanent placement of all my edited photos: This can be as simple or as detailed as is needed in order to help you locate your pictures in the future. Starting out you may only need a few folders, however, as time goes on and you continue to take more and more pictures, it will be relatively easy to add additional subject folders, and sub-folders, as needed. Use a naming convention that makes sense to you having regard to how you expect to search for your photos later on. Once you have created the necessary subject folder(s) in which to store your pictures, select and open the appropriate folder and or sub-folder, copy and  paste the newly created negative folder. After pasting the negative folder, rename it by removing the [Neg-] prefix. Once you have the negatives copied to an appropriate subject folder, you can begin the process of editing them. Refer to my tab titled “Editing Pics” for more information on this all important process.

Step 4. - Preparing Picture Files for Permanent Storage: After completion of the editing process (see Editing Pics), you will be left with a corresponding photo with its original camera title for each edited picture. As all of these files are still in the original “negatives” folder, you can now delete these unedited photos. This will vastly reduce the amount of storage space used on your computer. Next, close the folder and rename it by inserting an [-E] after the date in the folder name, indicating that it has been reviewed edited.

Step 5. - Review for Placement Into More Specific Subject Folders: Because the final subject folder may have a generic name, often indicating the place or location where the pictures were taken, I then review each of the edited pictures to determine if any of them need to be copied to a more specific subject folder, e.g. if while taking pictures at Cold Creek Nevada, you also took pictures of some cacti; then copy just these pictures to a subject folder that contains just pictures of cacti.

Step 6. – Finally, Perform A Backup:  If you have a manual backup process that involves saving files to either an external drive or to a separate drive in your computer, you should now copy these two folders to the appropriate backup location. If you don't currently have a backup plan, then you need to establish one NOW. Never assume that your photos will always be safe.There will come a day when either your computer or one of its drives will fail and without backups of your photos, everything may be lost FOREVER. I’ve had it happen and recently a close friend of mine just lost everything because he didn’t have a backup. I currently have two plans in use. First, I back up all my photos on my computer’s internal hard drive to an external hard drive. Secondly, I use Carbonite, an Internet Cloud storage solution that takes the worry out of backing up by securely and automatically backing up all of my selected files to a state-of-the-art data center on highly reliable disk arrays. Once you install Carbonite, you'll never have to remember to back up again. The automatic backup runs continually in the background, backing up new and changed files whenever your computer is connected to the internet. Click here to learn more ... Making Photo Backups.

Journal Entry for Wednesday, May 15th

Hoodman Cinema Kit Pro Because I take a lot of pictures out in the desert on bright sunny days, I often have trouble seeing the image on my camera’s 3-inch rear viewing screen, making it difficult to compose and focus shots. I recently found and purchased a product that effectively resolves this problem; the HoodLoupe 3.0 with a 3x Magnifying Eyecup and Hoodcrane. The HoodLoupe has a 1 to 1 Magnification +/- 3 Diopter Adjustment and  is designed to fit over a 3 inch LCD viewing screen, effectively blocking out any glare from from the sun or other unwanted sources. The hypoallergenic silicon rubber 3x Magnifying Eyecup slides over the HoodLoupe, further sealing out ambient light. It can rotate to accommodate either right or left eyed shooters. The HoodCrane attaches to the universal hot shoe mount and is designed to hold the HoodLoupe in place, yet swing up and pivot out of the way for shared LCD viewing or still shooting.

Journal Entry for Friday, May 4th

NEW Blog Site Today I worked on a project that has been on my to-do list for a long time, specifically, creation of a separate Blog site for posting all of my “art” related projects, thereby getting them off of my Photo Gallery site. Even though I was able to ‘copy’ over many of the individual pages, I still had to design the sight from scratch. I’m sure it may require some “tweaking” over time, however, I was relatively pleased with the day’s effort. The good news is that my photo site will be a little less cluttered. Check it out here … Ken's Eco-Art Gallery. Send me an email and let me know what you think?  Any ideas or suggestions for improvements?

Journal Entry for Saturday, Apr 22nd

Over the past couples of years I have made four visits to the town of Cold Creek, Nevada, famous for the many wild horses that roam the town, yards and overall landscape. Today I decided to create a new subject category titled, “Wild Horses” to act as a depository for some of the better pictures that I have captured of these beautiful animals. Check it out … Wild Horses at Cold Creek

Journal Entry for Monday, Apr 9th

Follow-up on Carbonite Backup Program Back on February 26th I put up a post about using Carbonite, a “cloud” backup program, to backup all of my photos and other important data files. The only negative thing I have to say about this program is how slow the initial back up is. It’s been a little over a month now, and I still haven’t completed backing up all of my files, though I’m almost there. As of today I have 57,000 files (mostly pictures) backed up for a total of 134 GB. But here is the good news. The other day I was working on editing a collage and saved the new edit without changing the filename, thereby causing the original collage to disappear. In less than a minute with just a few clicks I located the lost file in my Carbonite backup and “poof” it was instantly restored. They even sent me a report (copy below) showing that the file was restored back to its original location. I couldn’t believe how easy it was, no thinking, no converting – just click and restore! By far the easiest backup program I have ever used. LOVE IT!

Journal Entry for Saturday, Apr 7th

Lost City Museum, Overton NV After our hike to St. Thomas on Thursday, we drove to the Lost City Museum in Overton. Today I put together a post on my photo gallery site to provide info on this historical museum. Even though Connie and I had visited this museum back in 2008, I learned even more about the area today. Built by the National Park Service in 1935, it houses an extensive collection of Virgin Anasazi artifacts from Pueblo Grande de Nevada (Lost City). It is even built on the ruin of an actual Virgin Anasazi pueblo and offers a reconstructed Anasazi building that is open to visitors. A later extension was actually built on top of some ruins in order to protect them.  It was established as a place to move the artifacts from Pueblo Grande de Nevada which was going to be partially covered by the waters of Lake Mead as a result of building the Hoover Dam. Check it out here … Lost City Museum.

Journal Entry for Friday, Apr 6th

St Thomas Nevada Yesterday I hiked to St. Thomas, Nevada. This is the second time I have visited this unique spot. St. Thomas, Nevada, is a ghost town in Clark County, Nevada, in Mopa Valley near where the Muddy River flows into the Colorado River. It was abandoned in 1934 as the waters of Lake Mead submerged the town. It is now located within the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. Fast-forward 73 years to today, and a 9 year drought has provided an opportunity to explore a ghost town. One can relive history as they walk the towns streets, around foundations, walls, and grated cisterns that dot the site, along with numerous alkali-crusted trails branching in all directions. The ruins of St. Thomas are protected by the National Park Service as a historic site. Check out today’s update to my original post here … St Thomas Nevada.