Killing Time

I knew this going in, but with the acquisition of a large format printer (the Epson 3880 – more on that later – so far very impressive) comes a whole ‘nuther skill set – color management. I’ve been poking around the edges of this without really doing much about it as long as I’ve been manipulating photos on the computer and creating web pages on the Internet. Now it’s time to get serious. In order to help me do that, I began looking at color calibration tools as soon as I started seriously considering the Epson. No sense having a nice printer like that if I can’t get the prints I expect to out of it.

After looking at several of the moderately priced systems, I finally settled on the Spyder3 Studio by Datacolor (they have a newer model out now – the Spyder3 Studio SR). Why? Mainly I liked what I was reading in the reviews, and the system could handle both ends of the process – monitor and printer – without breaking the budget.

Installation of the software and callibration of my laptop monitor was a breeze. I’m seeing variations of color in all my applications that were never there before. Subjectively, the results are great.

When it came time to try the printer callibration, I ran into a glitch in the Windows version of the software that made it impossible to proceed through reading the target pattern. That might have been an annoyance except that the technical support was the best I’ve ever received from any company I’ve ever dealt with in the 20+ years I’ve been working with computers. After exchanging several emails with David Miller, Senior Software Developer, there was a new release of the software published before I even had a chance to get home the next day. And then he went above and beyond and took a look at my first profile and made some suggestions.

In a world that has largely settled for mediocre in just about any area you might want to consider, Datacolor’s customer service is simply outstanding.

Well, the year is quickly drawing to a close. Fall color is quickly flying past, and it’s time to take look back at the “New Year’s resolution post” and check progress.

- Get Organized. Nope. Not an inch of progress. I did manage to give the site a face lift this summer, though.

- Show Off. Currently working on selecting some pictures to make LARGE living room sized prints from. Contests? I’ve entered a few online that weren’t outright “rights grabs” where you have to give up all your rights to your photo whether you win the contest or not. Last night, though, I actually did win a place in my very first photo contest with this shot:

I guess the winning photos will be in the newspaper sometime in the near future, so I guess I get another 15 minutes of fame. Sharing online? Some sort of consistency would probably help. Still struggling there.

- Try something new. Well, just about the time the weather was getting nice enough for me to start getting out the Bender, we had to go and move. Now that the year is nearly over, I’m finally pretty much done with all that, so I hope to start playing with that again. I’ve been looking at large format printers since the summer. My husband may have just made it possible for me to actually acquire one of these, and I believe there is still a rebate going on for the one I want which will make the price much more appealing, so it’s possible that by the end of the year I’ll be delving into the other end of the photographic process – making prints worth putting up on the walls.

- New perspectives. While the technical skills continue to improve making it easier for me to reproduce in two dimensions what I see in three, I’m still fleshing out how I uniquely see the world.

- Do some good. It’s a pleasure to use my photography skills and equipment in service to Christ. It’s probably an odd thing to do, but I told a pastor here, “You know how some people dedicate their babies? I dedicate my cameras.” And I do. It’s God who has given both the equipment I have and the skill to use it, and when I get a new camera or lens, I take it to church with me and lay it on the altar and dedicate it to the Lord’s service first. Do I get a lot of pleasure from it that’s not at all related to serving the Lord? Absolutely! But if that ever begins to take first place in my heart, I have a tangible reminder of where my blessings come from and who really owns “my” stuff, and that’s a blessing too. I’d still like to explore this area in more depth, though. As far as teaching, since my daughter is the one who inherited my Rebel, I get the pleasure of throwing her a tip or new technique to try now and then, as well as watching her progress.

- Challenge myself. The photowalks have sort of come to an end during the moving process. Not to say that it will stay that way forever, but . . . . Taking pictures of people I don’t know. Is it only photographers who react badly to having their picture taken? Maybe just some photographers.

- Start a project. The only “project” currently in the works is trying to decorate the new place with some of my photographs. Mostly, it’s my own indecision holding that one up. I finally made some small prints of potential candidates while mom and dad were here, but that’s as far as I’ve gotten.

- Take my camera everywhere. Definitely. Good move.

Here’s another picture entered in last night’s contest that didn’t win. Enjoy.

Seeing stuff like this always makes me wish I had the decorating gene. I don’t. Boy do I don’t!!! I see nice stuff in the store but never think it might look nice in my house. I see nice arrangements in other people’s houses and never think to try to do something similar in my house. I go shopping for food regularly but never think to go shopping for anything else. I suppose I could hire someone, but i never think to do that either. Hey! At least I have matching lamps in the living room for the first time in my life.

Okay, so I’ve been spending way more time out with the camera instead of sitting in front of the computer, and a whole month has passed. I can’t say I’m all that disappointed. But since the subject is Green at I ♥ Faces this week, here’s a little green.

why my shot didn’t work. I might have avoided this very simple mistake if I had been able to read G. Dan Mitchell’s post on Monday instead of today, but that just gives me another excuse to go out and try again. (A real burden, I know).

So what happened?  Well, I had been dragging my husband all around the North Coast of Ohio all day looking for likely places to hang out and do some serious photography as the weather warms up, and towards the end of the day, in hopes of finding a spot to catch both the setting sun and the rising full moon about a half hour later, we finally arrived at a place that looked good for also trying out the digital view camera.  So I got that all set up, and did a 6-shot sunset view (I see one corner where I must have messed up the focus a little when I shifted the standard.). 

Unfortunately, the eastern view was completely clouded over, so we started to head south, stopped for coffee, and by the time we arrived at a reservoir where I knew we wouldn’t have any trouble being after dark, I set up to try the same thing with the now mostly clear full moon and its reflection over the mostly frozen lake. The shot of the moon itself was about as perfect as I think I can do. But I made exactly the mistake that Dan talks about in his post.

Rely on your histogram to check exposure – not on how the shot looks in the display. If the shot looks like what you see at night, it most cases it will be way underexposed – and, as a result, you’ll have a very noise image and you may end up with artifacts like banding. Instead, use an exposure that produces a balanced histogram curve – or, “expose to the right” as many of us like to say.

I looked at the LCD screen to check the rest of the shots in the series. I didn’t look at the histogram. The rest of the shots were totally useless. On the other hand, I did get to see a little bit more about how well my Nikon lens, Bender 4×5, and Canon XT play together, which is pretty nice. And I also got to experience what it’s like to lug a surveyor’s tripod up about 50 steps and back down again. I’m sure glad I don’t smoke anymore!!

Compare that one with a similar full moon shot at the same location a few years ago taken with a Sigma 28-80 zoom at 68 mm.

So far I’ve been very pleased with the time that I’ve invested into the Bender kit. Now I wish I would have done it sooner.

The day was also nice for just strolling around and getting a few snaps. I did get to see another bald eagle not too far from the place where I saw a juvenile in September 2007.

A view of the marsh . . .

And another trail at another marsh . . .

Because sometimes you go out intending to do one thing and end up stumbling onto something else – like an icy waterfall:

or an over-protective goose:

All in all, it was a great way to break in the new boots.

It’s a new week at I ♥ Faces, and this time I actually have a few minutes to submit a few pictures.

Kids – this one was taken while she was swinging on the porch swing looking through the back of the swing.

I call this one “A Century of Smiles.”  This lady was 101 years old at the time.

And for the pets, who could fail to fall in love with Spunkmeyer at his perkiest, chipperest self.

Don’t ever ask a visual artist what color snow is. They won’t say “white” and leave it at that. I stumbled onto this question on another web site last month and have been thinking about what color snow is ever since. An example. This morning there was an absolutely glorious sunrise. I took a series of shots (nothing spectacular – they’re just quickies out my window before the moment passed. I don’t see a bit of “white” snow in either picture below.

Color swatches from both images:

The roof in the first picture – definitely not white.

An area of pinkish looking snow in the second picture – also not white.

An area of bluish looking snow in the second picture – more nonwhite snow.

I’ve seen other colors of snow too. The only time I think I’ve ever seen truly white snow is on a blindingly bright, clear blue sky day at high noon with no trees or anything else around to reflect a different color into my eyes.

So what color is snow? It depends . . . .

On our most recent photo outing, Angie was unable to go because of the launch of I ♥ Faces, but Jean and I took a trip to Glass Axis in Columbus, Ohio.  This was actually a fascinating trip for me, and will probably be worthy of another visit(s).  I recognized all kinds of kiln equipment and stuff from my high school days in the pottery shop, but this was a whole new world.  Lots of fire and heat.  I had read on the web site that the shop is not heated and wondered about that, but now I know why.  No heat is needed.

As far as my photo resolutions post, this trip hit on a number of issues mentioned there, particularly taking pictures of people I don’t know.

Head on over to the Gallery to view more images from Monday’s outing.

Here are a few of my favorite shots from the day:

My first entries for I ♥ Faces both ended up with furrowed brows. I’ll try for some smiles next week.

Here is my furrowed brow entry for the kids contest:

Here is my furrowed brow entry for the adult contest:

TPK

Good luck, Angie! Looks like you and Amy are off to a roaring start.