My Workflow

The term workflow has become quite the buzzword in photography over the past decade or so, and with good reason. It seems that we (digital photographers) spend more time messing around with images in cataloging applications like Adobe Bridge, Lightroom, Bibble, Aperture, etc. Personally I am not a huge fan of messing around with my photos on the computer, and conversely enjoy taking them. Don’t get me wrong, I love to sit in front of the computer screen all pasty eyed as much as the next guy, but in the end clicking a shutter is more fun than a mouse. From here I am going to outline my workflow from the time the card is inserted into the reader and stop when we get to the final product.

The Workflow
The first step I take is to make a copy of the memory card’s main directory. On my Nikons this the folder that is named 101NDXXX (where XXX is the camera model). This is done by simply dragging and dropping the folder to the desktop. After the copy process is complete I eject the card. This ensures that the contents of the card are not compromised regardless of what happens on the computer.

The next step is to import the photographs into your application of choice. After using Aperture for about a year, I switched to Lightroom and never looked at anything else. Aperture had some issues with handling the DNG format, which is actually the next topic.

I use the DNG format for my raw files. Some people agree some people become rabid with hatred when they hear the term DNG. The reason that I use DNG is not entirely because of the idea that NEF might become unreadable in the future. I use DNG because it allows increased interoperability between windows and macs. However, that is still not the major reason. The reason I began using DNG is because I wanted to losslessly compress D100 files. I then found out that another advantage of the DNG format is that the xmp sidecar data (which is one more thing to lose) can be stored inside of the DNG container. This allows my photo folders to remain nice and tidy as well as unify the file types that appear. DNG also allows users to use versions of Photoshop that predate their camera.

Lightroom allows users to convert to DNG on import, as well as tag images with keywords for searching later, and also to rename the files with useful names. I use the YYYYMMDD_sequence system. This ensures that if there is an issue with the Lightroom database, that I can simply go on and continue using an application like Bridge. The individual files are stored in folders that are named with YYYYMMDD and those folders are subfolders to YYYYMM which are subfolders to YYYY.

Once the photographs are all in Lightroom, I can begin sorting the files. I do not delete any files that may be of use someday. However, I do not find black frames, white frames, incredibly out of focus images, and incredibly shaky images to be of any use, so I flag these images as rejected. If an image stands out as excellent, and likely to be used for web or final print, I flag it. This leaves me with all of my picks being flagged, all of the keep but not amazingly useful images as unflagged, and all of the ready to be deleted images as rejected. After I finish sorting I hit command + delete which deletes all of the rejected photos. This serves to clear up space on hard drives as well as to speed up the process.

At this point I ideally burn a disc with all of the files that remain on it in two seperate folders, the picks and the rest. However, being human, I am out of sync with my burning. The disc burning makes a good rainy weekend or gradual before bed process. I do however maintain three synced copies of my images across three hard drives. One of which is portable (and travels with me) to help to protect against fire and other forms of environmental disaster.

At this point, when the files reside in at least two places other than the memory card, it is safe to format the card for reuse.

Now we can begin using Photoshop to enhance beyond the basic offerings of Lightroom and then move on to posting and printing images.

Silverlight: Not so bad

Today Laurelin and I decided to try Netflix instead of Blockbuster Online. I must say that although it was nice to be able to peruse the Blockbuster store, there is no contest about this. First of all, Netflix is cheaper for what we really need. We currently have the 1 movie at a time plan with unlimited streaming. As we are both Mac users, Netflix Instant was not an option until relatively recently.

As with all things there are always strings attached. The string with this, at least to me, seemed more like barge rope than thread. I would have to install a Microsoft plugin for it to work. I grumbled about DRM and the fact that I was sure Microsoft would begin spying and snooping immediately, as well as being wholly un-mac-like. Gladly, however, I was wrong. The install was smooth, painless, and did not appear to break anything. Although the selection of movies available to watch instantly is not immense it is still useful. There are older movies and the like available for instant watching.

Quality of Streams
Let us establish that I am not a videophile in any way shape or form. I felt that the quality of video was quite nice. The quality does seem to vary based upon individual videos. The only issue with quality is that in some dark areas there is some blocking, however, if the movie is worth watching, the small quality drop is well worth the trade for convenience.

Bandwidth might be an issue for some users and I have yet to establish a benchmark of size per film. It would also be nice to have greater control over quality, i.e. being able to control the quality for both bandwidth limited customers and those who dont mind a longer buffer time but would prefer higher definition. One last preference, which would be a DRM nightmare, would be to store, for limited time, offline films to watch so that one could watch them on planes and trains and in automobiles and the like without needing to get the DVD and rip it.

Apps You Need… A Price You Can Afford

The following applications are just a few of the freeware/donationware applications for OS X that I use fairly often. They are useful enough that they should be included in the OS yet for one reason or another are left out (read: limited interest, legal concerns, and redirected focus of R&D). To be perfectly honest I have not donated money to any of these applications yet; however, as soon as I am out of college and have a little bit of spending money I will certainly pay back. Rambling aside, lets look at some software…

Alarm Clock

This small, simple, and elegant application sits up in the menu bar taking up almost as little space as it does system resources. That said it is by no means a weak application. It serves as an alarm clock, timer, and stopwatch. Alarm Clock can also wake the computer from sleep to set off the alarm in time. It is easy to figure out and quite configurable.

Find it here

Camino

Camino is a wonderful web browser for OS X. It is strong, quick, stable, and in my opinion and on my machine much more all around reliable than Safari, and far less of an eyesore/resource hog than Firefox. A quick google search will reveal lots about this application.

Find it here

Plex

Plex is a unique approach to media playing and user customization. Perhaps the largest niche that his application filled that nothing else could was that of cataloging and streaming data from a SAMBA share. The need for a library to manage digital content has become important with the large amounts of digital content that we compile. Another need that arises with all of that content is the inevitable number of filetypes, and instead of transcoding them all into an itunes friendly format and then accepting that using a network share is going to be difficult to manage at best, you could use plex. Not to mention the eye candy factor.

Find it here

OS X Sparsebundles: Better than sliced bread…

I was looking for a way to keep track of multiple libraries of photographs using lightroom.  The problem was that I had implemented some not so archival methods of organization prior to now.  Instead of switching to a new system I wanted to save my old catalog, and then start a new one.  This is where the image files come in.  However, before that bit becomes relevant I should explain my setup.  

If I had some money I would have an OS X server.  That said, I have a 798mhz XP machine with 256mb of RAM sitting in a corner, and it acts as way for me to sit in bed and move about my apartment and access my music, movies, tv, and various files.  The first problem was that XP does not play well with HFS.  MacDrive is an excellent application to work around that small issue.  That said, I would rather use linux, however, the machine runs headless, and Microsoft RDC is a nice and easy way to access and administrate the computer from my mac.

So now at this stage in the game I have a samba share that I can access on my mac.  Well that’s great, but for any application that requires correct paths or any semblance of normalcy this won’t do.  Enter the disk image.  While a standard DMG works well, the idea that I had to create the entire image first seemed unnecessary.  So I played about with sparsebundles, and it seems that they are working quite well for my needs.  I have one giant lightroom catalog and it sees the images as drives, ergo mainting paths whether I attach the drive directly or over the network.

The only issue that I have experienced thus far has been the fact that the sparsebundles appear as images when viewed in finder over the samba share, and as folders when mounted locally.  However, after much searching about the web I found no answer to my question.  If an image appears as a folder all one has to do is open up disk utility and then drag the folder to the left sidebar below the other drives.  Then select the image on the sidebar and click on mount on the top toolbar.  The drive will mount on the desktop and function properly from then on.

EDIT:  I am now employing this technique to access an iTunes database file as well as songs over a Samba share with success!

Thoughts, Musings, Maybe Photos

As I sit here on a park bench overlooking a gorgeous, yet sadly fleeting, sunset I think to myself, “it doesn’t matter what I do with my life.”  Now to rewind and explain.  Today was stressful, I found out that without a ton an insane amount of work I will not be able to graduate when I had planned.  That is pretty self explanitory.  However, as the day went on and my anxiety grew I almost fell into a state of calmness.  This calmness was permanently set while sitting and staring the gorgeous orange and purple sky laid before me.  Any decision made in college, with regards to academia, is wise.  I want to be a law enforcement officer.  I am persuing a fine art degree.  So what.  So long as I have a family to love, and care about my life and the lives of others, it doesn’t matter what I do.  What matters less than what I do, is how I do what I do.  So long as it works out in the end, it is alright.  Sometimes it takes a cool breeze and a blaze orange sky to make one realize what really counts.

My Apologies

I hate to do this, because I have always despised the idea.  However, I am installing an anti spam system on my comment section because of the enormous amount of spam messaging I have been recieving.  If you know of a better way to block this trash, and it is wordpress compatible, please let me know in the comment section.

Apologies,

Joey

Espresso… The Great Conquest

I must say, I adore espresso.  The smell, the color, and especially the taste.  However, to get a good espresso is becoming what I feel is an exercise in patience.  I am all for sitting and casually relaxing in a cafe while a Barista crafts my beverage.  However, I have noticed an inverse correlation between cost of goods and service.  I am sad to say that there are very few independent coffee shops around that satisfy my love of adequate service.  To me, a cup of coffee, espresso, whatever is not just about the physical beverage itself.  It is about the entire environment in which it is served and consumed.  All I am asking is that arrogant and rude Baristas start relaxing and warming up, they would make much better tips.  I am hopefully going to begin compiling a list of friendly and unfriendly cafes and baristas in the near future so that this great conquest can eventually end in victory for all.  

FujiFilm S5: First Thoughts

I borrowed a Fuji S5 for the weekend.  I must say, this thing is impressive.  The first test was portraiture in available light at ISO 3200.  This would make my me cringe on anything else, however, they looked good acceptable.  I am also becoming a fan of the dynamic range improvements that have been made with the S5.  My largest initial gripe with Fuji is the deceptive advertising surrounding the Megapixelage of the the camera.  They claim it is 12 megapixels while the actual resolution comes out to about 6.2 megapixels.  I honestly couldn’t care less about megapixels and all, I seem to rarely print these days, and when I do it is rarely ever larger than 11×14 which I can easily do with 6 megapixels.  More to come.

I Need to Post More

As the title says I need to post more often, a lot more often.  Not that I have any readers or anything, more for the commitment factor.  The issue is that I am actually trying to do well in class, which requires, well, commitment.  Whining aside, there are more reviews, thoughts, and general opinions coming.

Nikon D100

When the Nikon D100 came out it was adopted as a press and wedding camera almost immediately.  And for good reason, at the time a digital camera that could create quality prints in black and white, as well as color, and that accepted all of the previous Nikon AF mount lens, and even the non-AF lenses (albeit without metering).  It also accepted a slew of Nikon speedlights.  Fast forward to today.  The D100 is widely accepted as obsolete.  But who cares?  I love mine.  It creates wonderful images if handled by someone who understands its oddities. 

 

Pros:

·      Compatible with a large array of lens

·      6.1 megapixels is plenty for most applications

·      Light-weight

·      Accepts Lithium Ion batteries

·      Uses the widely accepted CF card

Cons

·      Doesn’t meter with non-AF lenses

·      Sometimes too light

·      Plastic exterior

·      Noise can get sloppy at high ISOs

·      Poor viewfinder

 

The Pros   

This camera follows the standard Nikon ergonomics, which are, in my opinion, almost perfect.  The camera is a nice size that accepts a variety of hand sizes with ease.  The camera has a magnesium sub-frame and a plastic shell.  This allows the camera to be light, yet, as mine will attest to, still durable.  The camera yields a standard Nikon Electronic Format (NEF) file.  It can be either compressed or not (I recommend uncompressed, as using the compressed method causes the camera to lock up when it hits the buffer).  An uncompressed NEF is approximately 9 megabytes, however, they nicely compress and archive to a 5 megabyte Adobe Digital Negative, which is a much more compatible and compact file type.  The lithium ion battery accepted by the D100 is compatible with the D70, D50 as well as the ability to accept batteries used by the D200, D40, and D80.  Also, when using the optional vertical release/battery grip, one can utilize 6 AA batteries in a pinch (be warned though, the battery life on alkaline batteries is very short). 

 

The Cons

As with all things the D100 does have its faults, quite a few of them.  The first major issue is the fact that the camera does not meter with non-AF lenses, quite a few of which are absolute gems.  Although lightness in a camera is appreciated in some instances, a little bit of weight can add some stability when shooting.  The plastic exterior can also be a huge disadvantage, unlike its follower the D200, the plastic can be damaged and makes the camera feel cheap.  The biggest issue that people complain about in this body is the noisy sensor at higher ISO settings.  I personally feel that it is just fine so long as the camera is kept on RAW and exposure is maintained properly.  The largest single issue that I have with the D100, which is also an issue that I have with almost all non professional digital cameras, is the tiny and dim viewfinder.  When I compare the D100 to my old Nikon FM it looks downright appalling.  A quick hidden pro about the viewfinder though is that ability to turn on a grid overlay that aids in composing horizons and other geometric images.

 

Conclusion

If you have one of these cameras and it works for you, hang on to it.  If you have a digital SLR now and are looking for a decent backup, this camera could serve you quite well if you get a decent deal on it.  Although it is limited in certain ways, many of the limitations are more than made-up for through the low prices that can be had these days.  I would however, recommend a D70s before I would recommend this camera.              

Nikon Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8

The Nikon Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8 is a fantastically versatile lens. On a Nikon digital crop body it becomes a stunning 120-300mm f/2.8. I have found uses for this lens ranging from portraiture to landscapes, and many, many more.

Pros:

· Handles splendidly on almost all cameras

· Built in rotating tripod foot is rock solid

· Has that “Don’t ask, I’m a pro” look

· Standard 77mm filter

· Old screw-driver AF

· Isn’t white

Cons:

· Hood costs extra

· Old screw-driver AF

· Screams steal me

· Generates mob mentality when using around non-photographers

The Pros

The handling of this lens is fantastic on everything from the lowly, light, D50 to the chunky D100 with grip, and is a perfect mate for the Nikon pro bodies with their strong AF motors. The rotating tripod foot is quite nice and is a beautiful balance when mounted. As with all lenses of this stature and feel, I find that people rarely ask questions about what I am photographing, unless they are asking what paper I am with. If the 77mm filter size is important to you, then you know that already, and why it is. This next point is one that generates a bit of controversy when I bring it up; the screwdriver AF system. I personally prefer lenses with the screwdriver, for some reason I trust it more. Maybe it is because everything I have ever owned that had a small, electric motor inside has broken or burned out. The screwdriver uses the small motor in the camera. Is it the same, pretty much. However, one way I only have to buy a motor once, and the screwdrivers are a lot cheaper. The isn’t white jab is simply because I feel that the black blends in with the surrounding world a tad bit better.

Cons

First of all, when buying a lens that costs nearly a thousand dollars, you would assume that it would include all of the accessories. If you were talking about this lens, you’d be wrong. You have to pay extra for the plastic lens hood ( I don’t use them for flare protection as much as actual physical protection from bumps and scrapes). As previously mentioned the screwdriver AF vs. AFS is a personal choice. As with all lenses that look like this the lens tells the general public two things;

1. This is really expensive and if you are strapped for cash to pay off your credit card balance that is accruing 18% interest (compounded nano-secondly), it would be really easy to steal this lens and sell it on craigslist or fleabay to make some cash.

2. Sometimes this is fun, but most of the time it is annoying. If I am taking a picture of a squirrel, or even a person or building, it seems that a mob of point and shoot wielding tourists will inevitably chase me down yelling things like, “Honey, what is he taking pictures of? With a lens like that it must be interesting!” “is there a celebrity over there?”.

Conclusion

If you need this lens you probably already know it. My belief is that it is a great alternative to the more expensive AFS and VR versions. Although it has its cons, it is a fantastic piece of glass.

And did I mention it takes great dog portraits?

Ruckus Music Service Review

Here comes my review of Ruckus, the music service provided free to Penn State students as part of an attempt to reduce piracy.  Last year the lovely Napster service was provided, which, although at times irritating as it would not allow one to download select popular songs for free, was ad free and simple.  Then came Ruckus…I am not sure if Ruckus was an attempt to increase piracy, or what, but it is horrific.  We are talking software engineers who must have been high bad.  First of all, as with Napster, Ruckus does not support OS X.  Sort of.  There is no native support, however, virtualization works quite well on my MacBook Pro, so I have a dedicated virtual machine that I use to access Ruckus and the occasional other piece of dreadful XP only software I may need.  The worst part of Ruckus in my opinion is the horrifically, shockingly, disturbingly, astronomical amount of popups and deceptive advertisements.  The other huge chink in Ruckus’ armour is the fact that when downloading songs one cannot simply use the Ruckus client, one must use a web browser, download a textish file, open it with the Ruckus browser and then it works.  Whew.  That was tiring.  All in all Ruckus does have its uses, and it is nice to be able to find that latest popular rap song that you definitely would not pay for, but secretly are obsessed with.  I give it 2 out of 5 stars because of the difficulty in use, as well as the frequent advertisements.    

Freedom

Finally, a break.  I speak for all college college students when I say that this past week has been really hard to pay attention, yet that attention is even more required.  I believe it is the professors’ way of trying to maintain control, can you blame them?  I have been hard at work on the giant mousetrap, and I gotta say, it is a really really fun project.   I am also excited about the “Arc Bark,” it is a people-dog day set up to help the mentally disadvantaged.  I am going to be helping to photograph the event.  That is all for now.   

Building a Better Mousetrap

The planning is now underway to build a better mousetrap. Well, actually peopletrap. The design, when complete, should be a moderately (read: not lethal) functioning and quite large spring-style mousetrap. There should be a couple of fun puns and commentaries involved, and of course photos.

Edit:

In response to the comment below, this could be the perfect time for me to get a mannequin, which I wanted for other art anyway.  Installation is always a fun thing!

Things to come

One of these days, hopefully once it warms up a little, I am gonna start doing some more urban exploration.  A type of photography in which one seeks out decaying and destroyed ruins of modern society.  I love it.  However, I also enjoy obeying laws and the wishes of others, so I go a step further than simply trespassing into the property of others, I try to get permission.  Long story short, if you are the owner of a decaying building, or know the owner of such a building, shoot me an email.

No School

No class this morning.  But of course they only cancelled it once I was already there.  I am going to do some work, and maybe I will add another photo gallery.

Fun Day

Irrelevant to anyone not involved, but I went to Cape May today with my girlfriend.  Went to the zoo and the beach.  Apparently the people of Cape May do not eat during the winter… Maybe they hibernate.  Who can know.  Pictures to come.

Moral Victory

This is the last of the boring musing/update sorts of posts for a while.  Hopefully there are some really fun DIY projects coming up and some new photos and who knows what else.  I would like to point out that there are now links to the right that link to my art and portrait galleries, as well as the links to family, friends, and inspiration.  That is all for now.  More to come soon.Â