Time to get organised

I've been shooting pictures for 4 years. Perhaps something around 150 rolls of film in this time + hundreds (if not thousands) with digital cameras that I've tested. Out of 36 frames I usually get 2-3 that I really like. I have some of my fotos digitised either scanned myself from prints or later having lab do the scanning for slides. But it's all a big mess. All my negatives are piled together in a bix box, most of them unmarked and only some of them digitised in good enough quality. My CD-s are also in a big pile and finding that one shot is a pain.

Every time I read a photo magasine I want to go out and just shoot the hell out of some cool subject. And yet somhow I never get there. I take my camera to my usual routes and get somewhat predictable results. I don't do any projects even though I want to.

So today I decided to actually draw up a roadmap as inspiration from my "official" job. I set down rough guides when I'll go fully digitised, when I'll have my negatives sorted out and organised, what projects I'll definetly do and by what date and when I'll do my first exhibition. Yes, exhibition. And have enough stockworthy photos to suplement myself with some income. At the same time I want to keep writing about photography in English and in Estonian because I like it, it helps others and occasionally earns me some pocketmoney if something gets published in local paper or magasine.

Getting where I want to be unfortunately requires some investments but I've always tried to keep an attitude that money is one resource that is not depleted. I've already taken the first steps - recently bought film scanner so I'm getting digital copies of all my best shots. It will take some time but eventually I have everything in the computer. I'm buying digital camera probably next month and external harddrive later in the summer (managing CD-s is hell). I don't want everything to bog down to gadgets and money so getting myself out and about is just as big part.

Am I going full time photographer? I don't think so. I just feel that I could get more out of the whole thing. And yes, I like ordnung.

Are you serious?

You're a business and getting online presence. Of course you need some snappy pictures to make your web look more alive. And these pictures should be of businesspeople doing business, right? So you designer (or son or whoever does your webpage) heads over to their favourite stockphoto website and gets those really professional looking photos. What the heck, they get three of them just to make the visual side stronger. And the result is something like this: http://www.hipub.net/. No, I don't know the site, just stumbled upon it. And those tacky pictures from 90something just blinded me. Please don't do that on your webpage, it looks so out of date and noone will want to do business with you. Need a bit more refresh looking photos that say "business"? Check those (yeah, I have my pics up there as well, but none on business), prices start at $1 a pop.

You can shoot a movie with EOS 20D

Kaido posted a link to übercool movie by Patryk Rebisz that is made using Canon EOS 20D digital SLR camera. It's a bit jumpy cause 20D "only" does 5 frames per second but otherwise it's really cool. Note to potential followers: your DSLR shutter is designed to take 35-50 thousand frames trouble free (depending on model, pro class cameras have higher number I suppose). After that you might run into problems like blown shutter and have to get it replaced which might not be very cheap.

Link: F (working title) (found via Kaido)

Nikon D50 and D70s announced

Good news to all Nikon shooters who are searching for less expensive way into going digital. Nikon has finally officially announced it's new six megapixel D50 which will set you back around $899 when purchased together with kit-lens. There's also update to rater popular D70, the new D70s but improvements are not very extensive. I'd say that overall Canon is one step ahead with it's camera bodys (but certainly not with it's kit lenses). Check out dpreview.com for more info.

Nikon has today announced their new affordable and easier to use D50 digital SLR. The D50 has the appearance and control layout of the D70, the major physical differences are size, weight and control layout. Under the skin the D50 has the same six megapixel CCD sensor as the D70 (and the D70s announced today). The D50 will be available in black and silver bodies and as a kit with the new AF-S DX 18-55 mm lens. The D50 Kit (including the 18-55 mm lens) will cost around US$899 when it's available in June.

Guidelines for effective photo website

Strange website by the name of Burns Auto Parts has published a really good overview on what to keep in mind when doing yourself one of thoso photosites. If you're a photographer with an eye towards selling your images you definetly should have a website. No, if you're a photographer and you want to show your work then you should have a website. If you only shoot foryourself then don't.

However, just having a website—of any quality—is not enough. Your site needs to be of a certain quality to hold the interest of most worthwhile potential clients. As in all parts of your marketing mix, there are some basic standards to keep in mind when it comes to your site—things like your branding, good, clean design, and ease-of-use. There are a rather surprising number of photographers’ websites out there that are an affront to the eye, the ear, or are so complicated or poorly designed that they may as well have no site at all. I see them every day.

Link: Photographers’ Websites – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Frequently crashing Minolta Dimage Scan Dual IV

I got myself Konica Minolta's Dimage Scan Dual IV film scanner (got mine from Amazon for $236.99). Excellent value and really decent reviews were reasons I decided to pick this model. It lacks ICE but my pockets are not deep enough at the moment to think of anything more expensive. So couple of days ago I got around and started makeing scans and what I found out was that DS Dual4 Utility software keeps crashing every now and then. Off-topic but Minolta has really come out with... substandard software anyway. And the bad thing is that you cannot just restart software as it tells you that there's something still running and you have to close it. I took a look at ongoing processes but couldn't figure out what it was. So I needed to make a restart after each crash. Do I have to tell you how stupid that felt?

Today I continued making batch-scans and again I get those crashes on my 12-inch 1.2GHz Apple iBook (read what I think of iBook as a photoediting tool). I think I finally figured it out. Looks like crashes only occurr after display goes to sleep. Scanner finishes current patch, ejects film holder and software crashes. When you turn off display sleeping then everything works fine. At least I haven't had any more crashes. Will update this post if I discover something further about it.

How's Dimage Scan Dual IV? Looks great actually. I've only scanned my first 5-6 films and doing it on maximum quality and having Dust Brush on takes quite a long time but results looks impressive. Haven't worked out some brightness-contrast issues yet (on my current settings it looks as if scanner want's to get detail from dark areas that is not really there and ends up creating bit more noisy files than necessary) but getting really good details from my shots. Did I already say that Minolta software sucks?

Stairs and bridge

Stairs and bridge, originally uploaded by Siim.

Shot this already month ago but only now got around developing the film. And this photo stood out for not even sure why. Probably because I shot it with lens wide open (F1.4) and because of that it has really soft feeling to it. The original was color negative but because of concrete and late evening grey sky very black-and-white anyway so I desaturated it totally.

How 12-inch iBook works for photoediting?

I've had my Apple 12'' iBook computer now for over 3 month and thought I'd write shortly on how it works for photoediting. When I was picking a new laptop I wanted something small and light yet powerful. After checking my options decided to order 12-inch iBook from Apple (my first Mac in fact). It comes with G4 1.2GHz processor, 256MB of memory and 30GB harddrive. I added 512MB memory and changed harddrive into 80GB. Overall it set me back around $1350.

It's great all around performer but for with some cons to be a tool for serious photographer. It's light enough so I don't have second thoughts wether to put it in my backpack or not. It has good battery life even if I'm doing serious photoediting. In most conditions screen is good and bright, of course direct sunshine kills it (as it kills probably every other LCD screen, no?). It doesn't get extremely hot and I'd say it works on the quiet side. Only 2-3 times when I've heard the vents rev up.

USB2.0 and Firewire ports come as standard on all iBooks, Bluetooth (optional) works great for syncing with my mobile. I didn't get the Combodrive that allows to write DVD-s but I'm pretty happy with CD-writer.

Biggest con is probably screen resolution. All iBooks come with 1024x768 and if you still want Mac portable but better resolution then you'll have to go with much more expensive 15-inch PowerBook. That said, perhaps coupling 12-inch screen with higer resolution is not so good idea if you want to keep your eyesight...

How fast is this thing? I usually have Safari (browser), Mail, Skype (netphone + IM), iView MediaPro (for managing my photos) and Photoshop CS open when I'm doing photo editing. Converting RAW file from Canon EOS 20D using Photoshop Camera RAW plug-in takes around 8-10 seconds. Default Shadow/Highlights to the same file takes 4 seconds. Unsharpening Mask 1-2 seconds. I'm pretty happy with those times as I rarely work with bigger files and don't see myself doing it in near future.

As for working with iView MediaPro (an excellent software to manage my 8000+ pictures) - once files are added to the library and thumbnails created then there's no visible delay when I open new folder, do a selection based on certain criteria and search through metadata of all those files is sub-second process.

All in all I'm very satisfied with my iBook so far. Great harddrive capacity (I am thinking about buying external drive for backup purposes), great speed at 768 MB of memory, good screen and really intuitive and beautiful operating system. Highly recommended.

If you've never used a Mac before and are afraid of the learning curve then my advice is - don't be. You'll certainly have to spend some time getting used to a bit different logic etc but if you have at least one friend who uses Mac and who can help answere your answeres then that's all you need.

Canon EOS 350D (Rebel XT) and 20D

I've just recently tested those two cameras. Will complete 350D / Rebel XT review in couple of days and of course translate it into English as well (my native tongue is Estonian). But I was wondering if there are already enough Canon EOS 20D reviews out there or you'd care for another opinion?

To make it short - both are excellent cameras. 350D / Rebel XT actually proved to be a pleasent surprise albeit the camera is perhaps a bit small for my hands. If you cannot wait for the full review and have made up your mind then buy it from Amazon.com, only costs you $999.

A little exercise in black and white

This is actually a very small portion of this photo. I was playing with the original and then noticed these nice green leaves. However, after tinkering a little I decided to go black and white to get more abstract feel. Because it's such a small fragment of a big picture the quality is perhaps not the best. It's shot with Canon EOS 20D (excellent camera) with kit-lens EF-S 18-55 F3.5-5.6 (really crappy lens) at F8 but is still as sharp as I'm used to.

If someone's interested in the process then used Channel Mixer in Photoshop, set red channel to 0 (original was really green photo), green to around 60% and blue to 20%. Then reduced Brightness only so slightly and increased Contrast. Final touch was to apply tiny amount of Unsharpen Mask. Now, I wish I knew more about working with black and white, when I see some fabulous photos I want to do the same but somehow fail in my own opinion. Perhaps that's the reason I still go to local camera shops and buy Kodak Tri-X or Ilford HP5 which is probably my favourite bw film.

Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day coming

Someone just reminded me that last Sunday of April is Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day. Check out your local camera club, they might have special event showing the tools, process and results, it's really fascinating and low-tech in todays digital world. Actually, you can take pinhole photos with your digital camera as well but where's the fun in that.

What's pinhole photography and how do you take pinhole photos? Check out what Wikipedia writes about it: Pinhole camera

Haven't ever got into pinhole myself but I do enjoy them. Check out www.nyclondon.com/blog for example.