Posts

Posted on

Nikon’s NEW Lenses! I want one or two of these :)

The NEW highly anticipated 85mm f/1.4 lens is here. I have the older model and it is definitely one of my favorite lenses. The depth of field is amazing! I LOVE IT!  So what's new with this updated model? For one it's nano coated and everyone that I've talked to that has a nano coated lens swears by the difference it can make in cutting down glare and getting sharper shots. I have the new Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 lens with nano coating and it's very nice. The other thing that this lens supports AF-S autofocusing on some of the consumer/prosumer bodies like the D5000. Although I'd love to have this new lens, I can't really justify the upgrade unless I sell the one I have (hint, hint). My current lens works great, so I may have to sit this one out for now.

You can pre-order the Nikon 85mm f/1.4 here for $1,649.95.

 

 

The New Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR Lens

 

When I travel and I can only take one lens, it's usually going to be my Nikon 18-200mm lens. However, that's a DX lens and therefore isn't really designed for full-frame cameras like my D700. This new 28-300mm changes all that. This would be the ONE lens I'd want to carry if I could only carry one lens for my D700 or my D5000! It's also a VRII lens and has the nano coating. Papa needs a new travel lens baby, and I think this is it! 

You can pre-order the New Nikon 28-300mm f3.5-5.6 lens here for $1,049.95. 

 

Two more lenses

Although the first two lenses I mentioned above are the ones that I'm currently drooling over, Nikon did announce two more lenses:

The AF-S Nikkor 24-120m f/4G ED VR and AF-S Nikkor 55-300 f/4.5-5.6 ED VR. 

Posted on

Nikon Breaks Out with a D3100 and it’s So Close To What I Want!

In case you missed it, Nikon introduced their New D3100 DSLR body just this past Thursday. This camera was rumored for quite a while and the rumored specs were pretty accurate. So it wasn't a shocker to see it, but there was one feature that I was hoping to see that didn't seem to make the cut. My current travel camera is a Nikon D5000 and I like the size and weight of the D5000 for travel, plus the ability to shoot video. The one thing that would have made me upgrade (or downgrade) to the D3100 in a heartbeat would have been audio in. Sigh…. While the D3100 steps up to 14.2 MP, adds 1080p video (Yay! and about freaking time), continuous auto focus in Live View (we'll have to see if it really works or not) and 12,800 ISO (equivalent), the audio for video recording is still limited to the built in Mono mic. 

 

I want good audio too

Most video cameras have crappy built-in mics. However, most video cameras also let you plug in a better mic via a stereo audio input. To make matters worse is that the built-in audio on Nikon DSLRs is only 11hz. A bad mic with bad compression, equals really really bad audio. Giving this camera 1080p, auto focusing video is AWESOME, but the limitation for many is definitely going to be the audio. Now if you plan to shoot video with your great lenses in all of the D3100's 1080p glory and then add your own sound track or music later, then this won't be a big deal, but if you need the source audio from the event you're recording, then you're going to either have to record the audio on a different device and merge them later in post or have sub par audio to go with your great video.

I would upgrade to a D300s at this point, but I'll continue to wait and see what comes next since the D300s was last year's model. It DOES have audio in, but it's only 720p video and if I'm going to spend the bucks, I'd rather wait since I don't think Nikon is done for 2010 just yet 🙂

 

What to do?

If I didn't already have the D5000, and was looking for a small Nikon DSLR with some pretty cool features, then I wouldn't hesitate to get this one. The price won't break the bank and it has a few features that even the higher end models don't have yet. I may still sell my D5000 (since my D5000 doesn't have audio in either)  to get this if I get a good price on the D5000. For now, personally I'm in wait and see mode.

You can get the D3100 here for a great price of $699.95 with a 18-55mm VR lens

 

Also be sure to check out the NEW Nikon Coolpix S1100PJ Camera with a Built-in Projector!

 

 

You can get the New Coolpix S1100PJ here for $349.95.

Posted on

Facebook Adds Places: Time to Update Your Privacy Settings Again!

You might remember my recent post "Are you sharing too much on Facebook?" in that post I gave you some tips on how to control your privacy settings so that only the people that you want to see your status updates and photos are the ones that actually see them. It's time to revisit this again now that Facebook has added "Places". 

 

What's Places?

Places is  a new feature on Facebook that allows mobile users to "check in" to the different places they may visit. This is not a new concept as sites like Gowalla and Foursquare have been doing this for a while. It's a social networking thing amongst "close friends" and "family" and of course Facebook wants in on it (I'm sure there's money in knowing the establishments that your customers frequent the most). The concept is pretty simple. You visit a location, business, park, etc. and with a mobile device like a smartphone you either use the Facebook app or the Facebook mobile site to check in. That "check in" is then posted to your wall/news feed for all of your "friends" to see. If you don't want your friends to know where you are every minute of the day then don't use it. It's pretty simple to not tap or click on it. Problem solved. 🙂 However, there's a little more to it than that with Facebook at least for now. The problem is that your "friends" can tag YOU when they check in to a location. This is a plus from a convenience standpoint when a group of friends are hanging out and a big minus for those that don't want to play! Your friends don't need your consent to check you in! I can already hear the privacy groups screaming about this and luckily although it's ENABLED BY DEFAULT, you can turn it off (see below).

Here's another Privacy gotcha according to Macworld.com:

Another problem is that, while new places users create are private by default, they can become public if enough users check into them. Even if such a place is your house or apartment, Facebook will automatically promote the place to being public after an unspecified number of check-ins. For now, there is no way to prevent your home address from becoming a public location on Facebook aside from asking your friends to not check in at your next party. If a sensitive location becomes public, the only way to attempt to remove it is to flag it for Facebook to review, and ask others to do the same.

So the obvious thing not to do here is DON'T use Places to check in to your private residence. I never saw the need to do this on Gowalla, will definitely NOT be doing it on Facebook Places.

 

Changing your privacy settings – NOW!

Whether you plan to use Places or not, you should adjust your Privacy settings NOW! I already use Gowalla, but unlike Facebook I only have less than 10 Gowalla friends! These are the few people that are close to me that I would want to know my current location at any given time. So the same goes for Facebook! If I do use the Places feature, I don't want my 1,500+ "Friends" to necessarily know where I am. I want those "Close Friends", "Family" and "People I actually know" to know where I am. Again, this is where the Facebook Lists Feature pays off again. You can designate a List of the people that you would want to see your Places' Check Ins.

The default for Places is set to "Friends". 

 

Also don't forget to DISABLE the ability for Friends to check you in to Places if you don't want that:

If you don't want ANYONE to see where you are even if you're tagged, change the setting to "Only Me" and you should be OK for now.

Posted on

Great Portable Speaker 2 Go

As a frequent traveler I'm always on the look out for a portable (smallest I can find with decent sound) speaker system for my iPod/iPhone. My main interest is personal listening in a hotel room. Although there are lots of small speakers out there, the problem is if you make it too small it sounds like crap! I'm a fan of the AirCurve acoustic speaker by Griffin, but I also like powered speakers too. My continuous search led me to the iMainGo 2 Handheld Speaker Case for iPhone and iPod. First off, there is nothing really iPhone/iPod specific about this case. It should work fine with just about any phone or MP3 player. There's a standard mini plug that goes in your device's headphone/line out jack so it should work with just about anything including your laptop or iPad.

What I like best about this speaker is that it's powered by standard AAA batteries that last about 30 hours on one set/charge. It would be nice if it were AC powered and had a dock connector to charge your iDevice, but I can live without that for portability, battery power and price. It's already hard enough finding enough plugs in a hotel room. Not having to plug in the speaker to use it is actually a good thing.

 

It sounds good too

One of the things I was most impressed with is the sound of this speaker in comparison to other portable systems I've tried that cost more and are bigger. 

If you're looking for something small that sounds good and works with just about any device you carry, this is it.

You can get the iMainGo 2 for about $39 here.

 

Continue reading “Great Portable Speaker 2 Go”

Posted on

What’s Your Offsite Backup Strategy?

Yes, believe it or not there are people still out there that don't backup their computers on a regular basis and I suppose there always will be those people. It typically only takes one hard drive crash and the loss of important files and time to make someone backup their computer. As I've always said, "there are those who have lost data or those who are about to lose data – backup!" With all the digital photos and video you're taking, it's even more important than ever. With film cameras, you could at least go back to the negatives (to a point). Now with everything being digital, the file you import from your camera/card IS THE NEGATIVE! That's all you have. So let's say you do backup regularly. There are still some other considerations. Let's start off with the various categories of data storage and my workflow.

My working copy – There is always "current" data on my computer. My main, everyday computer is a Macbook Pro and whatever I'm currently working on is usually on the internal drive of that computer (if it's an intense video project, then it's on my Mac Pro). For the sake of example, let's say I just did a photo shoot at the studio. This means that I shot directly to my computer via tethering into Lightroom 3. The RAW .NEF files are sitting on my internal drive. Before I leave the studio, I plug in an external Firewire 800 drive and copy the folder for that shoot. This is just a temporary backup for the trip home. Yes, I'm that paranoid and don't want to lose the whole day due to a weird problem or crash between point A & B. Once I get home, I convert the .NEF files into .DNG files right in Lightroom and pitch the .NEFs. I also begin my Selection and Rejection process. The rejects go to the trash too. At this point I have a gallery for the client that I post online and they make their selections. This process can take a few days before they get back to me, and usually within an hour my MacBook Pro is backed up over my network via Time Machine. So now I have a 3rd copy of the photos. I do whatever is necessary (retouching in Photoshop CS5) to get the final images ready and they are delivered. Once everyone is happy. I move the images to the next location.

My network file server – this is a dedicated Mac mini (running Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard Server) with a Drobo connected to it for mass storage. I'm using just under 1.5TB's of space on my Drobo and therefore it can be backed up onto an external 1.5 TB Firewire 800 hard drive. Yes, I backup my Drobo because while the Drobo is great at protecting you from drive failure, it does nothing to protect you against data corruption or accidental file deletion. My Drobo is backed up every night automatically via SuperDuper! to the external drive.

 

Archiving – this is the grey area for me. My idea of a archive is a set of files that you're done with. The client is happy, you've been paid and are under no contractual obligation (or the date has past) to hang on to these files. You don't really need them, but you just don't want to delete them "just in case." For me, I put these kinds of files on misc. external hard drives that may be lying around and I don't worry about them (no I don't trust/like DVDs for long term storage). The reason is, in over 20 years I've yet to have to load up a file from an archive. So I'm not too worried about these files and I'm keeping them just because I have the extra drives around the office. I've had a couple of archive drives die on me and I didn't flinch. I couldn't even remember what was on them and really didn't care. Of course your needs may be different and you may need to hold on to this data. I guess for me if it's important, then it's still on my file server above.

 

Off Site Storage – Now we get to the point of the post and that is "what's your offsite backup strategy?" For me, it's rotating those 1.5TB drives (I have two identical backup drives) that backup my server, to my safe deposit box at the bank. Most people just don't believe that a disaster will strike their perfect homes/offices. You'll never be robbed because of where you live and the tornado, flood, fire, hurricane, etc. always happens to the other guy. Um, ok! So be it! Then do me a favor. Have an offsite backup if for no other reason, than to have more than one backup of your "important" files. While it's rare that both your main drive AND your backup drive will fail at the same time, it's not too rare that a virus or other malware can infect them both. After all they are all connected to the same computer right? 

 

What about online storage? I think the online backup services are good. I don't really use one for the simple reason that it would take forever to backup and restore 1.5TB's of data online. It takes about a day to do it via Firewire. How many days would it take to do it over the internet? What I look to online storage and backup for is to backup smaller "in progress" projects. 

 

So what's your offsite backup strategy?

Posted on

It’s All About The Light!

As a photographer I certainly value having a set of GREAT DSLR bodies and a wide range of lenses to choose from. However, the question always comes up, "do I have to have a top of the line camera to get a great shot?" Any photographer will tell you NO! It's about having an "eye", a great subject and GREAT LIGHTING! So after seeing a video over at the FStoppers site, I wanted to put this theory to the test. Here's my video shot using the Westscott Spiderlite TD5s and the end results may surprise you! Although I start off the shoot with my Nikon D700 and 70-200mm f/2.8 VRII lens, I finish it with my iPhone 4.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpQePVqpbmI

 

See more about Westcott's lighting products by joining me on the Top Pro Tour.

 

G-Design iPhone 4 Tripod Holder

Posted on

Adobe Updates Photoshop Express for iPad, iPhone, Android and features my photos!

Adobe just released an update Photoshop Express (formally called Photoshop.com Mobile) App for all iOS devices! Besides being a great App, I'm stoked to have my photos featured on the Adobe tab 🙂

What's New In Version 1.3

• Initial support for iPad
• New name: Adobe® Photoshop® Express
• Updated UI
• Bug fixes and performance improvements

Features specific to iPad:

• Support for portrait and landscape orientations
• Redesigned Online, Edit, and Upload workflows
• Ability to work on multiple photos in sequence from within a single workflow
• Redesigned Organizer view with simplified album sharing
• Updated icons and visuals that make it easier to navigate and use the Editor
• Ability to upload to Photoshop.com and Facebook simultaneously

one small bug: Although everything seems to be working great on the iPad, I did run into one bug while launching the app in landscape mode with the Adobe tab chosen on the iPad. So if you have a crash just launch it in portrait mode first. If you switch to any other tab, say the Edit tab for example, you should then be able to launch the App in Landscape mode just fine. I've already reported the bug and it appears to be related to other Apps (in my case ePrint) trying to hi-jack the sample images. 

UPDATE: The 1.3.1 update is now available that fixes the iPad landscape launch crash and other bugs.

 

You can get Photoshop Express for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch as a FREE download here from the Adobe

This update is also available for Droid owners too!

 

I recorded this video to walk you though some of the features AND I've got a tip for using the iPad Camera Connection Kit:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvnNfJIwSug

Posted on

Join Me on the Westcott Top Pro Tour

Westcott just announced their Top Pro Tour! This is your chance to join me and my fellow Westcott Top Pro Photographers as we teach our favorite lighting setup and various digital photography workflows around the country. My tour stop will be in Michigan on October 7th and while that's still a couple of months off, I didn't want you to miss the other cities that may be closer to you. The tour officially kicks off on September 12th and runs through November 17th.

 

This is your chance to see, touch and learn various lighting setups from some of the nation's best photographers.

You can find out more details here.

Posted on

Yes You Can Use JPGs in Adobe Camera RAW!

One of the questions I get all the time is "how do I open up a JPG file in Camera RAW?" Unfortunately it's not as straight forward as I'd like it to be. Simply double clicking the JPG will open it up in Photoshop as a JPG. However, if  you want to take advantage of Adobe Camera RAW's ease of use and non-destructive workflow, I'll show you how you can in this episode of the Adobe Creative Suite Video Podcast:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYvbh-Wxz_k

Posted on

How Would You Change the Nikon SB-900?

As a Nikon shooter, when people ask me why I use Nikon over the other brands I tell them that I really am not into the religious war between the various camera brands out there. I bought a Nikon D70 (upgrading from an Olympus EN-20) back in the day because at the time the specs met my needs and of course once you start investing in lenses you're pretty much locked in. So honestly I don't really care what you use. I don't! If you're a Canon shooter and you're happy with your gear, more power to you. That's great! Go out and take great pictures because that's what it's all about anyway. Once I get past the story about how I started, I then tell them that now that I am a Nikon shooter there are a couple of things that definitely keep me with Nikon over the other brands (besides the lens investment). One is the integrated GPS support in the Nikon DSLRs.

Although I wish the GPS chips themselves were built-in to ALL CAMERAS, I do appreciate the fact that I can buy the GPS module of my choice and just plug it in. The Nikon DSLRs will automatically record the Geo location information into the metadata of the images (both RAW and JPG) and there's even a menu for it right on the camera.

The other thing that I LOVE is the built-in support for wirelessly controlling the Nikon Speedlights.

If you have a Nikon DSLR that has the Commander mode/feature built-in, then the pop-up flash can be configured to send out a pulse (instead of/or in conjunction with a flash) to not only fire the Nikon Speedlight remotely, but also control the power output directly from the back of the camera. You can even control different groups of Nikon speedlights turning the power up and down as needed. This way you can put the lights on stands or anywhere you want around your subject.  If your Nikon DSLR doesn't have the built-in Commander, you can buy an external one and put it in your hotshoe.  I use both these features all the time and would miss them dearly if I were to switch brands. I started with an SB-600 Speedlight. Then I bought an SB-800 and then an SB-900. I have and use all three when needed. The other night I was having dinner with some fellow Nikon shooters and we got on the subject of the SB-900. We all agreed that in many ways the SB-900 was actually a step backwards from the SB-800. So the question becomes…

 

How would you change the Nikon SB-900?

Yes, I know you would drop the price to $99 🙂 So let's move on to the features. We all agreed that the one new feature that is VERY NICE is the simple selector switch to switch the light from being a Flash to a Remote Flash. So simple and so long overdue. On the previous models you'd have to dig through the menus to make these simple choices. Beyond that it was hard to come up with things we liked better. The SB 900 is bigger than the 800, but yet doesn't put out any more power. It just makes it harder to fit it into your existing cases. Also Nikon still only puts the sensor eye on ONE SIDE of the speedlight. While you can swivel it around, it would GREAT to have this sensor on BOTH sides or make it RF based instead of requiring line of sight. We can assume that Nikon is probably working on the their next Speedlight and here's what I'd want:

  • Either give me a sensor on both sides or make it RF based
  • Make it smaller or give it more power. Pick one!
  • Give me the option of buying an accessory that allows me to plug it into the wall! If I'm using it inside and power is available why should I have to use AA batteries.?
  • Lower the price a bit. It's hard to justify buying more than one of these when you can get strobes for the same price!

 

How would you change the SB 900?

You can get the SB-900 here from B&H for $459.95 (List price $570)