What's New

Many photographers obsess over proper white balance. But what is more important – accuracy or looking good? My take on this is found in our latest essay – A Question of White Balance.

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We're pleased to announce the first of ten winners in our Winter 2010 Cheer-Up Contest. This week's winner is Mirek Elsner, of Bellevue, WA. Congratulations Mirek.

There will be nine more winners in the weeks ahead. You could be one of them. Any purchase of one of our video tutorials or Video Journals is a qualifying entry. Find out more.

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Readers who purchase our current Lightroom 2 tutorial
will be eligible for a discount on our future Lightroom 3 tutorial.

One good thing about the lousy economy, it's leading to reduced prices on cameras. Two that were just announced in anticipation of the PMA show  later this month are the Hasselblad H4D-40 at some U.S. $20,000 and the Olympus E-PL2 at about $600 – both very aggressively priced in their respective catagories.

I had preview comments (under NDA) on each of these in preparation, but since both products were leaked well in advance by other sites I've decided to save my breath. In any event, I am hoping to review them when they become available for testing. For the time being you can read about them on the major camera review sites.

What I am shooting with and field testing at the moment is the Olympus E-P2, which is turning out to be a much more enjoyable camera than I had anticipated. Look for a review soon.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

Toronto Pearson International Airport is broken and the fault lies with the GTAA. This may not be of interest to you unless you live in Canada's largest city and fly to the U.S., but if you do you need to read my latest essay titled Toronto / U.S. Travel Outrage.

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UPDATE

In the half day since Toronto / U.S. Travel Outrage was first published I have received more e-mail about it than anything else that I have ever written on this site in the past 11 years.

Thank you everyone for your thoughts, support and suggestions. Unfortunately because I am traveling in the U.S this week on a shoot (which is why this was all reported on in the first place), I am constrained in my ability to reply as I would like. So please accept this as my thanks for the communications.

I would also like to point out that I received a call from a senior representative of the GTAA and we spoke for about a half hour. He was very concerned as well as understanding, and indicated that he would be investigating all of the issues that were raised, and also would reply to them in due course. I believe that the GTAA is well aware of the problems that exists but in large measure finding solutions is difficult because the airport is subject to at least a half dozen government and administrative jurisdictions, and they don't all play nicely together, even in the face of consumer outrage.

That being the case, I have decided that I will not be flying to the U.S. out of Toronto Pearson until the current situation is fixed. Porter from the Island airport is one solution, as is driving to Buffalo, which also has  less expensive air fares. And, there's always simply accepting the fact that air travel has become a major pain in the butt, and simply isn't worth the hassle anymore except when absolutely necessary.

How can we become better photographers? Craft and equipment have their roles, but seeing trumps everything else.

Today's new essay is by author and regular contributor George Barr, and is titled Learning From The Best Images – Yours, Mine, and History’s.

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Today's Home Page photograph is the last from a series shot on the island of La Gomera, Spain last month. I have now collected these on this page for those that might be interested, since several of them don't appear anywhere else on this site once they disappear from the Home Page.

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I am now on a private shoot for a few days in the desert in Southern California, with Chris Sanderson and Jeff Schewe. We are working on our next video tutorials, and this trip will provide both fresh images to work on and location discussions.

I'll be working with my Phase One DF camera and P65+ back, and also field testing the just-released Olympus E-P2. My report on this new small Micro-Four-Thirds Olympus will appear here later in the month.

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Readers who purchase our current Lightroom 2 tutorial
will be eligible for a discount on our future Lightroom 3 tutorial.

It's contest time again. Every once in a while we run a promotional contest to remind people that we publish several unique training videos, including The Luminous Landscape Guide to Camera Raw, From Camera to Print, our Guide to Asset Management, our Adobe Lightroom Tutorial, and nineteen different issues of our unique video magazine, The Luminous Landscape Video Journal.

The prices are reasonable, the content is terrific, and your purchases help support the existence of this site.

Our new contest offers ten chances to win a full boxed version of Adobe Lightroom 3, compliments of Adobe. Every purchase of one of our products, any product, is another chance to win. Purchases made thus far in January already count toward the contest.

There will be a new winner announced roughly every week for the next few months. One of them could be you.

Thanks for your support.

What will it all mean? Clearly the Apple iPad will be a game-changing device for the publishing industry as well as consumers. For many it will be all the computer that they need, offering small size, low price, and simplicity of operation.

For others it will become their main tool for web surfing, email, as well as reading newspapers, books and magazines. It also looks to be a pretty decent game machine.

But what about for photographers? Are there features there for us? And more importantly, will the changes that the iPad makes to the publishing industry be as seismic as those created by the iPod and the iTunes Store?

I have just published a brief essay titled The Apple iPad – What it Means for Photographers. Some food for thought and hopefully some constructive debate, which I invite you to join on this site's discussion forum.

Clearly Leica is a company whose products are well loved and respected by many. This is the only way to explain the large number of people that have written to me over the past few days with comments and suggestions on my recent Open Letter to Leica. We don't all agree on what we'd like to see next, but the fact that we care speaks volumes for the brand.

I was pleased to receive one yesterday from Thom Hogan, one of the most respected technical writers in the industry, and the leading independant authority on Nikon cameras.

With his permission I have now published his letter as an essay titled Thom Hogan Considers – What's Next For Leica?

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My Open Letter to Leica, published this past week, has as I expected it might, generated quite a bit of comment both on this site's forum and elsewhere online. A bit of browsing the discussions shows about an equal mix of those that think I'm apostate and those that agree with my suggestions. Fine. As long as Leica knows what some of us are looking for – mission accomplished.

My friend Mark Dubovoy, a well known photographer, teacher, and industry pundit, has also written some thoughts on the changes that he would like to see Leica consider for a next-generation camera, and his new essay is now online.

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Speaking of things Leica, Sean Reid has written Part 2 of his Leica S2 review, based on some weeks of using the new system in a Vermont winter. Sean was one of the other journalists invited by Leica to Germany last fall for a preview of the S2 and M9. Sean brings a different perspective than mine to the S2, as he is not normally a medium format digital user. Yet, I found his conclusions to be quit similar to mine in terms of that camera's strengths and weaknesses. Reid Reviews is a subscription web site.

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Wednesday will see the announcement of the much-anticipated Apple Tablet (iPad?). Few doubt that it will be a game-changing product in the way that the iPod and iPhone have been. But will it be a device that offers capabilities of use and interest to photographers? We'll know in a few days, and I expect to have some comments about it here not long afterward.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

After nearly 60 years, has the Leica M series camera finally reached its best before date? Is an optical rangefinder camera a valid holdover or an anachronism?

There's no doubt in my mind that with the Leica M9 that company has produced a digital version of the M that finally is what Leica afficionados have been waiting for. Image quality is nothing short of superb, and with full frame and no need for IR filters what more can we want?

In my Open Letter to Leica, published today for the first time, I look at the question of whether the Leica M9 is the end of that particular road, and if so what can be done to move it to the next generation of technology while not abandoning those things that make it unique among cameras.

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When you're ready to really learn Lightroom, here's the most painless way to do so. Purchase and download our Lightroom 2 video tutorial and automatically receive a discount on our Lightroom 3 tutorial when it becomes available.

"If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video must be worth a thousand pictures.
 
Just to let you know that I found your Lightroom Tutorial most helpful in understanding, not only which buttons to push, but the gestalt behind the program.  Especially helpful was the orgainzation.
 
All in all the best $40.00 I have spent recently".

– Jim Cassatt

There's good news today for photographers and others that fly from Canada to the U.S. with carry-on on bags. As reported by the site Flying With Fish,  Transport Canada and CATSA have removed their onerous and arbitrary restrictions on carry-on bags, in effect since the fortunately aborted Dec 25 incident.

You can read more about it here. This means that photographers can once again travel with their photographic equipment in approriate bags, such as the Think Airport Security; Pelican 1514; Mountainsmith Parallax; and Gura Gear Kiboko Bag. Weight, of course, is still an issue, but that's always been the case.

Maybe the efforts of sites such as this in recent days, as well as industry associations and individuals who have been putting pressure on the bureacrats in Ottawa, had some small effect.

Photographic composition and the process that we go through in deciding how to frame and crop our images is endless fascinating. Our newest essay by Peter Cox is entitled The Photographer Excludes.

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IMPORTANT CANADIAN AIR TRAVEL UPDATE

Following last week's article on air travel for photographers I have been receiving regular updates from readers and government agencies about changing regulations regarding air travel, especially from Canada to the U.S.

Be aware that Transport Canada has just issued a new advisory in the form of a consumer awareness video which I urge everyone to view, as it contains vital information on the way in which you will be treated when you travel by air in Canada.

I urge all travelers to watch it immediately.

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Regular readers will have noted that I've been shooting extensively with the Leica M9 since its introduction some months ago. I continue to be impressed by its overall image quality.

But I have also been thinking a lot about the rangefinder camera's relevance in today's environment. Later this week I will publish an Open Letter to Leica, with my thoughts on the future of the M Series camera. Watch for it.

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The Photocrati Fund offers a $5,000 grants to non-professional photographers to undertake important humanitarian and environmental photography projects. Their stated goal is to identify outstanding, up-and-coming photographers and give them the resources necessary to pursue projects that will have a tangible and positive effect on the world.

I have no association with Photocrati but because this seems legit and worthwhile and this fund is similar to the Endowment Fund which we offered here a few years ago, I thought it worth drawing to your attention.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

First we had to take laptops out of their bags. Then we took our shoes off. Then liquids needed to be in little plastic baggies. Now, after the Dec 25 aborted attack do we need to remove our underwear before boarding a plane and also refrain from peeing during the last hour of our flights? Will the indignities never end?

Not quite, but also things are a lot more stringent than they were just a few weeks ago.

I've just returned from a three week trip to Spain, and over the past few days have flown within Europe, from Europe to the U.S. and from the U.S. to Canada – all with camera gear.

Knowing I was traveling, a number of people have written asking about my experience and what if anything has changed.

You can read about this experience and also enjoy some of the images shot earlier this month in the Canary Islands in my latest essay – Flying with Camera Gear Post Dec 25, 2009 : What's Changed – What Hasn't?

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UPDATE:

If you live in Canada, and travel to the U.S. by air, read the following update to today's article on flying with camera gear.

This is simply outrageous, unnecessary, and unacceptable! What's next? Pre-boarding enemas?

UPDATE #2:

There is now some additional information available from CATSA on what items are permissable on Canada to U.S. flights. It can be found linked here.

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I just finished going through again your recent seminar series on Where the #%*! Are my Pictures? with you and Seth Resnick, and I must compliment you and Seth on producing a great seminar.  I never learned so much in so little time and I have started implementing some of the strategies presented already.  

Your interviewing style seems to bring out the best in your seminar partners presenting the content as a story with a logical end.  DAM is an intimidating subject, but after watching the seminars, I walked away with a total understanding and how (with Seth’s experience) to increase my workflow process.

Can one effectively hand hold a T/S lens? Common wisdom says not, but in a tutorial by Rob Porter, titled Heresy, we find out how.

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I have now begun my long treck back from La Gomera in the Canary Islands to Toronto. It's going to take two full days, first via a ferry to Tenerife, then planes to Madrid, then Newark, and finally Toronto.

I hear that there's snow at home, and a lot of it. Also that much of Europe has been blanketed.

Coming from two weeks in what may be the world's most benign climate it's hard to imagine it, but I guess I'll be shoveling it again soon enough – snow that is.

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When you're ready to really learn Lightroom, here's the most painless way to do so. Purchase and download our Lightroom 2 video tutorial and automatically receive a discount on our Lightroom 3 tutorial when it becomes available.

"I wanted to congratulate you on your LL guide to Lightroom 2 which I've just watched in a marathon single sitting while trying out the techniques demonstrated on a second monitor. Despite managing a database  of 40,000 images in Lightroom this is the first time I've really deeply understood this software. The tutorial was extremely thorough, clear and enlightening. I cant wait to incorporate this new knowledge into my daily work".

Ansel Adams is an ikon for some, and an inspiration for others. Many people studied with him, either directly through his seminars, indirectly through his seminal training books, or simply though a close study and appreciation of his work.

Our newest columnist, the very fine photographer and teacher William Neill, had the good fortune of working with Ansel, and in his first column for us shares some thoughts on this best known of 20th Century photographers.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

Watch Free Video Previews of Each
Major Feature in This Issue

There is a lot of interest among photographers exploring traditional as well as historic chemical printing processes in producing digital negatives.

Tim Gray,  who does Platinum printing and who reported on this here last year, now provides us with a tutorial on Using QuadTone RIP (PC version) to Create Digital Negatives.

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If you wern't too deep in your cups early on New Years eve you may have noticed that there was a full moon. From the deck of our rental house on the island of Gomera we watched a remarkable moonrise behind a massive cliff, with wind-raked clouds racing by. My last photograph (literally) of 2009 is now on the site's Home Page.

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Most would agree that this is the Golden Age of printing papers. We have more types of papers than ever in history and most are quite excellent. A few  – not so much!

The first article of this new year is titled A Tale of Two Papers. In it I review two brand new papers, both just becoming available this month  – Canson Infinity Baryta Photographique and Hahnemuhle Baryta FB.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

Watch Free Video Previews of Each
Major Feature in This Issue

I am currently on a vacation / shoot in Spain (The Canary Islands) until mid-January, with limited internet access. Updates and new articles will therefore appear here only intermittently over the next couple of weeks.

In the meantime, our best wishes to all readers for a healthy and prosperous 2010.

It's now been a year since Sony shook up the DSLR world with its 24MP A900, priced at less than $3,000. We've offered extensive coverage of this model here, including its use by me on my last Antarctic expedition.

Contributor Bill Caulfeild-Browne today provides us with his experiences and thoughts on this camera system in The Sony A900 – One Year Later.

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When you're ready to really learn Lightroom, here's the most painless way to do so. Purchase and download our Lightroom 2 video tutorial and automatically receive a discount on our Lightroom 3 tutorial when it becomes available.

"I wanted to congratulate you on your LL guide to Lightroom 2 which I've just watched in a marathon single sitting while trying out the techniques demonstrated on a second monitor. Despite managing a database  of 40,000 images in Lightroom this is the first time I've really deeply understood this software. The tutorial was extremely thorough, clear and enlightening. I cant wait to incorporate this new knowledge into my daily work".

There are a great many photographers scanning film, either because they still shoot film or because they have a large slide and negative collections requiring digitizing.

SilverFast is widely acknowledged as the leading scanning software, and is found bundled with a number of top scanner models.

Mark Segal is an expert in both scanning technique and the use of SilverFast, and today provides us with a tutorial titled Scanning with SilverFast – The Old World Joins the New. In it Mark explores calibration, scanning with the new Epson V750 Pro, and techniques for an integrated workflow between SilverFast and Adobe's Lightroom.

This tutorial is in two part. The web page contains an introduction while because of its length and layout complexity the main tutorial is in the form of a free downloadable PDF, which can be read onscreen or printed out for reference. The PDF link is found at the bottom of the article.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

Watch Free Video Previews of Each
Major Feature in This Issue

HDR has been "big" this past year, but as many photographers as there are who love it, there seem to be an equal number who hate it.

In today's essay by Alexandre Buisse titled A Plea For HDR, we look at the esthetic dimension of HDR rather than simply providing another "How-To" tutorial.

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If you have read my recent review of Bill Atkinson's Photocard, a fantastic new App for the iPhone, you might be interested in this new hint from Bill on maximizing image quality.

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One of the top nature and landscape photographers working today is Art Wolfe, who, due to his books and TV shows, needs little introduction. But you may not be aware that Art also does travel workshops, and he has two coming up in February – one in Vietnam and Cambodia, and the other in Myanmar. I have also linked to them from my Workshops page.

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Many photographers want to prepare their own files for commercial four colour printing. This seems a deep mystery, but is actually quite manageable. When we do, as the image's creator we have much more control over final output quality than was possible in the bad old days.

A new book titled CMYK 2.0 removes much of the mystery, and we have just published a review by Ray Maxwell.

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UPDATE:

Lightroom 2.6 is now available as a free download for existing Lightroom 2 customers, and Photoshop Camera Raw 5.6 is available as a free download for existing customers of Photoshop CS4, Photoshop Elements 8 (Win/Mac) and Premiere Elements 8. DNG Converter 5.6 is also available as a free download for all customers. Click here for more information and to download the updates.

This update includes additional camera support for several new camera models including the Canon EOS 7D and Nikon D3s.

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PLUG:

My good friend Andy Biggs is an African Wildlife photographer, expedition leader, and educator. He also is the designer of the Kiboko camera bag from Gura Gear. I reviewed the Kiboko on these pages a year ago.

Andy has just put online a brief video pitching the features of the Kiboko, so if you're looking for a new lightweight yet rugged camera backpack you might want to check it out.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

Watch Free Video Previews of Each
Major Feature in This Issue

Is it possible to do landscape photography with a rangefinder camera? Of course. But what are the compromises?

In A Landscape Photography Experiment – On the Trail With the Leica M9 I explore the question of whether the new Leica M9 is a suitable camera for serious landscape and nature work.

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"Video Journal 19, one of the best. Interesting and relevant topics, knowledgeable engaging guests, and a host that gently guides the conversation through terrain I want to explore. And more, it's beautifully shot in a clean, no tricks style that keeps the conversation in focus. Well done all! This one is worth twice the price".

– paul b. kramarchyk

Watch Free Video Previews of Each
Major Feature in This Issue