Practical Artistry: Light & Exposure for Digital Photographers

Practical Artistry: Light & Exposure for Digital Photographers
by Harold Davis
Publisher: O'Reilly
Pub Date: April 15, 2008
Print ISBN-13: 978-0-59-652988-8
Pages: 176

You may be passionate about photography, and own a digital SLR with perhaps more advanced equipment as well. But do the photographs you take with this powerful equipment come out as well as you'd like? With this fascinating and beautifully illustrated book, you learn how to apply the techniques and principles of classic photography so you can make great images with today's digital equipment. Harold Davis, author and renowned fine art photographer, puts the focus in Practical Artistry on light and exposure, two crucial concepts you need to understand and master if you are to truly capture the images you see. Davis presents a generous number of his own images in each chapter, complete with technical information and an explanation of what he was trying to achieve. These striking photographs not only illustrate the lesson at hand, but also serve as inspiration for your own efforts. Browsing the photographs alone will tell you a lot. Topics covered in this book include:

Camera, lenses, and equipment
Understanding exposure and measuring light
Relationship of aperture to shutter speed and ISO
Working with depth of field
Natural lighting, studio lighting, and the use of flash
Light and color temperature
Working with white balance
Photographing at dawn or dusk
Photography at night
Capturing motion
Telling a story with your image
Capturing people, places, and things
Setting up a digital workflow
RAW processing and double RAW processing
Adjusting exposure and reducing noise
Black & white photography
And much more

Concise and to the point, Practical Artistry clearly demonstrates that photography, essentially, is writing with light, and that the type of images you produce depend on the many choices you have for using that skill. Harold Davis gives you an array of choices in full living color.

Check it out at: http://safari.oreilly.com/9780596529888

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It's the Digital Age. Do You Know Where Your Photos Are?

Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir recently found out that some of her photographs were earning money for another person. According to CNet news, several of her images had been copied from Flikr and uploaded to iStockphoto without her permission. Once Getty Images (who owns iStockphoto) was informed they removed the stolen images and are working with Ms. Guðleifsdóttir to make appropriate remedies.

Theft of digital images has reached epic proportions across the globe. Between random individuals stealing images for personal use, others reselling images (like Ms. Guðleifsdóttir was a victim of), and companies using images they haven't paid for, its hard for a photographer to not loose money. It has even reached the point where "news" agencies run by photographers have snatched images for their pages to illustrate stories under the guise of "sending traffic to the originating site."

What makes this theft so rampant is the difficulty photographers have in tracking their work. Often the photographer doesn't know his/her work has been stolen. There are a few new services, like PicScout ImageTracker that will search the web on behalf of photographers but most photographers still rely on many hours of manual image searches through popular search engines.

For now, the best solution seems to be prevention. Photographers should always watermark their images and upload low resolution/small size images to lessen their attractiveness to thieves. Images under 800 pixels on the long side at 72pixels per inch is the current preferred maximum image size of many photographers seeking to prevent image theft.

Have you ever been a victim of image theft?

Credits: Liz Masoner,
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Upcoming Photo Events And Contests

Daryl Lang compiled the following News about upcoming photo events and contests at: pdn-pix.com:

Feb. 15: National Geographic Magazine Grant Deadline National Geographic magazine has extended until Feb. 15 the deadline for its second annual $50,000 grant, which will be awarded to a professional still photographer. The winner also will have access to the magazine's facilities and the guidance of a National Geographic photo editor. The contest is open to any professional photographer whose primary source of income is through his or her photography. Details are online at nationalgeographic.com/photogrant.

Feb. 15: Center for Photography at Woodstock Photography Now Deadline Entries are being accepted for the Center for Photography at Woodstock’s annual Photography Now exhibition. The deadline to enter is Feb. 15. Details are online at cpw.org.

Feb. 19: APANY Juried Photo Contest Deadline The New York chapter of Advertising Photographers of America is accepting entries in its 2008 Juried Photo Contest, with the theme of Tell Us A Story. The deadline is Feb. 19. Details are online at apany.com.

March 1: WHNPA Student Contest Deadline The White House News Photographers Association is holding a new contest open to students from around the world to compete for the honor of WHNPA 2008 Student Photographer of the Year. The deadline is March 1. Details are online at whnpa.org.

March 13-15: NPPA Northern Short Course The National Press Photographers Association Northern Short Course Photojournalism Conference will take place March 13 to 15 at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rocherster, N.Y. The 27th annual conference will feature keynote speakers, portfolio reviews and hands-on workshops. Details are online at northernshortcourse.com.

March 15: The Great Outdoors Photo Contest Deadline PDN and National Geographic Traveler co-sponsor The Great Outdoors Photo Contest, which has separate amateur and professional divisions. Entries are being accepted in categories of Scenics of The Natural World, Outdoor Sports And Activities, Parks, Islands and Underwater, and Gardens. The deadline is March 15 with an extended deadline of March 31. Details are online at http://www.thegreatoutdoorscontest.com/.

March 28: Moving Walls 15 Deadline The Open Society Institute's Documentary Photography Project is accepting proposals and bodies of work for consideration in the Moving Walls 15 group exhibition. The deadline is March 28. Details are online at soros.org. OSI is also accepting applications for its 2008 Distribution Grants through June 20.

April 7: Minnesota Center for Photography/McNight Foundation Fellowship Deadline The MCP/McKnight Artist Fellowships for Photographers awards four $25,000 fellowships awared to mid-career photographers in Minnesota. Applications for 2008/2009 are due Monday, April 7 at 5 p.m. Details are online at mcknightphoto.org.

April 10 to 13: AIPAD New York The Association of International Photography Art Dealers will present the AIPAD Photography Show New York from April 10 to 13 at the Park Avenue Armory in New York. The show expects to host more than 75 leading fine art photography galleries. Details are online at at aipad.com.

April 24-27: ASPP Education Conference The American Society of Picture Professionals will hold its 5th Education Conference from April 24 to 27 at the Hilton Phoenix East/Mesa Hotel in Mesa, Ariz. The conference will feature eight sessions with industry guest speakers and panelists on stock, metadata, copyright and other topics. Details are online at aspp.com.

Send your suggestions for upcoming events and contests to dlang@pdnonline.com.

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A Heartfelt, YouTube-Based Wake for Polaroid Instant Photography

I greeted today's news with an instinctive combination of shock, grief, and indignant fury: Polaroid has announced it's ceasing production of its instant film, which will become unavailable after 2009. What will I do when I need more film my trusty Polaroid? What will all those people buying new Polaroids do?
Then it dawned on me: While I took Polaroid photos well into the 1990s, it's been years since I last used my camera...and come to think of it, I have no idea where it is and am not positive I still own it. And reading coverage of the film plant shutdown, I learned that the company stopped making cameras a year ago. I didn't notice at the time, which is probably a sign that I don't really have the right to be livid about the film going away.
Still, it's a sad day. I don't really need to explain why the once-iconic Polaroid instant camera was rendered obsolete: When photography went digital in the late 1990s, all cameras became instant cameras in most respects that mattered. Poor Polaroid became an anachronism; thousands of people at the Cambridge, Massachusetts company that was an icon of my Boston-area youth lost their jobs.
But in the great scheme of things, it wasn't that long ago that Polaroid was the coolest consumer-electronics company going. I was eight years old when the Polaroid SX-70--the first instant camera that shot a photo out of the camera with no work needed on the part of the photographer--was released. And I have vivid memories of lusting after a family friend's SX-70. At $180, it was an extremely pricey gadget for the early 1970s, but it was a beautiful-looking piece of machinery (parts of the case were made of real leather!) and what it did felt closer to magic than any piece of personal technology I can think of.
Polaroid in its heyday reminds me of Apple--it was a company led by a charismatic, long-serving leader (Edwin Land) that made slick, innovative, somewhat pricey gadgets. And in decidedly Apple-esque fashion, it marketed them really well. So looking at a few vintage Polaroid commercials is an entirely appropriate way to mourn the end of Polaroid photography. Thanks to YouTube, we can do that right here.

Back in 2005, we named a 1965 Polaroid model called the Swinger as the 43rd greatest gadget of the last 50 years. I'm too young to remember the camera; actually, I never heard of it until we began to plan the article. But I vividly remember a coworker, about a decade older than me, passionately argue for its greatness. And it had a TV commercial that sported both a catchy jingle and a pre-Love Story Ali McGraw...

Don't miss Harry McCracken's awesome article and watch the YouTubes he collected ... it's fun.

Polaroid may be out of the instant photography business, but the company lives on as a shell of its former self, licensing its name for use on products such as HDTVs and DVD players. I find most uses of the venerable, once-great brand on generic technology products to be embarrassing at best--can anyone tell me why it makes sense to sell a Polaroid GPS unit? But there's one modern Polaroid product that I can get at least a little excited about: Its pocket-sized photo printer, based on technology from a company called Zink. It's a unique way to get photos instantly--and hey, Zink was founded by refugees from Polaroid.
Still, I feel a twinge of sadness each time I see the Polaroid name on a modern product. The real Polaroid's technological innovations brought a lot of pleasure to a lot of people for several decades...and watching these commercials again sure reminded me just how much Polaroid cameras meant to me for a long time.

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