Worth a click.. The Big Picture, from the Boston Globe

We all accept our information intake in different doses and forms..  for me, a picture tells a much more touching story than the printed word.  Something to do with spending much time on the back-side of the camera I suppose..

Click to head of to The Big Picture

The Boston Globe offers a wonderful way to stay connected not only with the immediate and high level story of current world shaping events, but with the feeling and emotion that accompanies every happening..  To describe the destruction and pain filled recovery of the earthquake in Haiti in a factually accurate neatly spaced columns in print doesn't do the job quite like a single picture.

The Big Picture, News Stories in Photographs, delivers smiles, tears, joy and disappointments that one can't garner by reading black and white text.   Pay a visit when you have time.  The story boards are short but robust.

Limit the images you display to a small handful of your absolute best work..

So you have one of those shooting moments where you can do no wrong.  It's compete with the proverbial planetary alignment and you come home with gigabytes of the perfect image...the same perfect image...captured over and over...on high-speed burst, at 9 frames a second.   While my first thought is that you might want to be more selective with the images you are making (know when NOT to push the shutter release), storage is cheap these days and buried in the volumes of images are subtle changes in light, expression and detail that might make the wear and tear on your camera's shutter worth it after all..

However....

You don't need to share every one of those images.  Doing so will surely numb your audience.  Remember Chevy Chase in European Vacation?  Caught in the traffic circle round-about passing Big Ben...And Parliament..

What happens when you come across a web gallery or slide presentation with all images having a sameness?  Fast forward please!  PLEASE!  Run and hide!  Quick..I'm nodding off..  am I drooling?

Edit your work with ruthless precision and display only a small portion... the absolute best stuff. 

I just shot a Sweet Sixteen party for a client.  942 images.  The first cull got that down to half the number of images.  The second cull halved it again.  I am working down to the nifty fifty to send the client and then I'll get it down to under a dirty dozen to  upload to my website.  You can look at just so many 16 year kids dancing with feather boa's, Risky Business Wayfarers and...well you get the idea.. 

There's Big Ben, and Parliament...

Work that continues to inspire me

I don't know much about this photographer, but I know I lover her work..  I follow Deb Layden's blog and web posts with childish anticipation.  Ironic because her niche is "capturing the experience of childhood and beyond".

Pay a visit to her website...she has a wonderful eye, produces some inspiring compositions and does fantastic work in post production and delivery.  She also does some workshops that I have on my To-Do list for this year...


Pixel Fairies Productions..  Website and blog

Holy Smokes! Now THAT's a pool!!

Another incredible image from HDR guru Trey Ratcliffe.  Head over to his website StuckinCustoms for more of his work (and the hi-res version of the image below).  Not sure what is more engaging..the calmness of the water or the enveloping blue of the walls and ceiling..   Trey offers this tidbit about the indoor pool..."Here’s a cool fact about this pool.  Part of Hearst has now been gutted so there is room for the IT department.  The IT department uses the water from this pool to cool their equipment…  wild, eh?"  

Click the image for a larger version and the story..

 

(And if you think pool is cool, check out the library...)

High Dynamic Range image processing - Is it getting an undeserved bad rap?

High Dynamic Range photography, or “HDR” as it’s known by those familiar with the technique is basically the process of merging various exposures of a subject into a single “merged” image.  This merged image typically contains image fine detail in the extreme highlights, mid-tones, and shadow areas.

With a light touch, the technique gives photographers the ability to capture scenes that would be impossible to capture with a single exposure. For example, balancing scenes consisting of varying daylight and incandescent light sources. The technique essentially gives photographers the ability to represent in an image the dynamic range that we’re able to capture with our eyes but typically not with our cameras.

But with great power… (More after the jump...)