Terry White's Tech Blog

March 11, 2013March 11, 2013

My Travel Portrait Lighting Setup – Updated

rapid_octa

I usually do most of my photography work in my studio where I have access to great studio lighting by Elinchrom and Westcott. When I go on location locally I tend to use my Elinchrom Quadra Kit. However, when I go on the road traveling by air I usually travel with a speedlight or two and portable modifiers. My new modifier of choice is the New Rapid Box 26″ Octa. I’m a fan of octa shaped modifiers and having a truly portable one is going to be great. I got the chance to try it out this past weekend during my session at the Day of Photography conference and I loved it.

Here’s my setup

Rapid Box – 26″ Octa

Nikon SB 910 speedlight – any speedlight will work.

2 PocketWizard PlusX Transceivers. While the light is mounted outside the box and therefore can be triggered using the Nikon Commander system built-in to most of their midrange and pro DSLRs, the Nikon system requires line of sight. Therefore, I use the NEW PocketWizard Plus X to give me greater range and positioning.

Lowel Uni-To Light stand 8′ (folds down to 21.5″)

Westcott X-Drop “Slate” Background Kit

Continue reading “My Travel Portrait Lighting Setup – Updated”

March 8, 2013March 9, 2013

A Fantastic Week on the Adobe Create Now World Tour

Once again I wanted to pause for a few moments and thank all of you who came out for the Adobe Create Now World Tour! I enjoyed seeing you all in New Jersey, Baltimore, Milwaukee and Chicago. The venues were packed to capacity with almost every seat taken in every city. The reception was overwhelming. Here are a few quick captures from this week on the road…

Even after adding more capacity twice, Milwaukee still sold out faster than any other city!

Here’s a 49 second look at the Milwaukee event

Baltimore Crowd

Great turnout and great venue in Baltimore. Some decided to make the trip to see me a second time after seeing me in DC. Thanks!

Continue reading “A Fantastic Week on the Adobe Create Now World Tour”

March 6, 2013

How To Use Adobe Photoshop Touch for iPhone and Android

PStouchIcon

In this episode of the Adobe Creative Suite Podcast, Terry White shows how to use the New Adobe Photoshop Touch for phones to composite images, remove a background and add a logo before sending it to the desktop version of Photoshop layers and all.

You can get Photoshop Touch for iPhone here

You can get Photoshop Touch for iPad here

Yes you can also get it for Android here.

Are you missing out on my Bonus Content?

See more of my Adobe Creative Suite Videos on my Adobe Creative Suite Podcast and get the App below. It features EXCLUSIVE CONTENT that no one else gets to see. This episode has a BONUS CLIP that is available only in the App! My iOS App is a Universal App for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. I also have an Android version on the Amazon App Store:

To make it even better, get one of these

Brushing with your finger is ok, but if you want more precision I highly recommend getting one of these Wacom Bamboo Styluses for touch screens.

You can get one here.

March 5, 2013March 8, 2013

Traveling with an Apple TV

AppleTV-2010

Im quite fond of the Apple TV for streaming content, watching movies and displaying my photos throughout my studio. This little box does a lot and with each software update Apple adds more capabilities to it. Recently I saw a deal on a refurbished one and I decided to snag it and use it as my “on the road” Apple TV. The idea is that since I travel so much and it seems that most hotels now have flat screen HDTVs in their rooms that I could potentially use an Apple TV to stream my own content during down time. However, the thing you have to keep in mind is that the Apple TV was never really designed to be taken on the road.

It needs a network connection

AirportExpress_2012

Unlike the 1st generation Apple TV, the newer models don’t have hard drives in them. So there really is no effective way to load it up with content before heading out. You have to either stream to it from a computer/iOS Device or you have to stream to it from the internet. The Apple TV has both WiFi and an Ethernet port. That helps a lot! Although it has WiFi it was not really designed to connect to random hotspots. There’s no web browser and therefore no way to really accept the terms and conditions even if the WiFi is free. I have been traveling with an AirPort Express Base Station for years. If my hotel room has an ethernet port I can just plug the AirPort in and provide WiFi to all my devices, including an Apple TV. Also the newer AirPort Express Base Station has an additional Ethernet jack so that you can even plug in a wired device to share the connection, such as an Apple TV. However, if there is no Ethernet port in the room and the WiFi network isn’t wide open you would be pretty much out of luck. You could use a MiFi or tethering to a smartphone/iOS device. You could also share the hotel WiFi connection from your laptop using Internet Sharing to the Ethernet port on your Apple TV. Before I’d do the latter I’d have to really really want to use my Apple TV. Otherwise I could just plug the computer into the TV and bypass the Apple TV altogether.

Continue reading “Traveling with an Apple TV”

March 4, 2013March 3, 2013

My Websites are Responsive and More Mobile Friendly

TW_all-screens

In case you haven’t noticed this site was updated with a “responsive” design a couple of weeks ago by the very talented web designer Erik Bernskiold. With the use of custom CSS he has made it so that the same site/content is displayed nicely no matter what screen you’re viewing it on. If you’re looking at this post on your computer go ahead and give it a try by simply resizing the window to be more narrow from the right. The page will respond and the content will scale or readjust as needed all the way down to a smartphone size. The same goes for my BestAppSite.com While I have the good fortune of Erik working on my terrywhite.com and bestappsite.com sites, I have other sites that I maintain myself. My Terry White Photography.com site is also now responsive thanks to an update to the The Turning Gate Lightroom Plug-ins that I use to generate my photography site. At last my photography site also looks even better on desktops, tablets and smartphones. The fun doesn’t stop there. I use Adobe Muse to author my MacGroup.org site and using Adobe Muse I was able to add both Tablet and Smartphone layouts to that site. Adobe Muse doesn’t currently offer responsive design, but it does offer the ability to create tablet and smartphone friendly layouts. There are pros and cons to both and here’s a great article that weighs in on the Responsive vs. Mobile Layout Debate. With that said, the MacNews blog (blog for MacGroup-Detroit) is now Responsive thanks to a template update by Page Lines.

twp_iPad

Like I said, I have Erik to work on my major sites that don’t require as much day to day design updating as my other sites and thanks to Adobe Muse, 3rd party WordPress plug-ins and The Turning Gate I can have a good mobile experience on all my other sites. I’m in no way a “professional” web designer/developer, but I do have websites to maintain. If you’re wanting to make your site Responsive and you don’t have an “Erik” you should check out the new Adobe Edge Reflow tool. If you want to build your own sites with mobile layouts, check out Adobe Muse.

March 1, 2013August 30, 2013

New Lower Cost PocketWizard

PocketWizard Plus X features:

• Auto-Sensing Transceiver: Easy to use. No settings to make.

• 10 Channels: 1-4 Classic plus 5-10 low-traffic channels

• Backlit Channel Dial: Easy to set channels in the dark

• Internal Antenna: Compact, more rugged design

• Auto-Relay Mode: Trigger remote camera & flashes simultaneously

• Transmit Only Mode: Positive operation in large groups

• Side View Design : Better subject view on camera

• PocketWizard reliability: PocketWizard compatibility

They are now in stock here

February 28, 2013February 28, 2013

The Big Apple Showing Me Some Love on the Adobe Create Now Tour

wpid11750-2013-02-27-17.42.45_sm.jpg — Always great to be greeted with a line of fans waiting to see me!

I just wanted to give a quick shout out to all who attended my Adobe Create Now World Tour event in NYC last night at the NY InDesign Users Group Meeting. Thank you for attending the event and making me feel welcomed!

A packed house, great crowd and great facility!

wpid11756-BEJeeiqCEAEi4kq.jpg-large_sm.jpg — Photo by Sandee Cohen

Thanks Sandee Cohen for taking this shot and tweeting it.

wpid11754-2013-02-27-17.54.48_sm.jpg

If you live in the NYC area and you’re into InDesign I can’t think of a better group of people that you should get to know and get involved with. Join your local InDesign Users Group here.

I look forward to seeing you tonight in New Jersey or on one of my upcoming Create Now Tour stops.

February 27, 2013February 27, 2013

Adobe Photoshop Touch for iPhone and Android Smartphones

Photoshop_touch_iphone5

Just in case you missed my post over at bestappsite.com, I wanted to give you a heads-up that Photoshop Touch has just been released for iPhone and Android Smartphones.

Adobe Photoshop Touch for phone offers powerful new capabilities for smartphone users:

· Enhance images using popular Photoshop features such as layers, selection tools, filters, tonal and color adjustments

· Apply effects and add graphical text for endless creative possibilities

· Edit images as large as 12 megapixels with layers

· Combine images together quickly using the Scribble Selection feature, and easily refine your selection with the Refine Edge tool

· Automatically sync images to Adobe Creative Cloud™ with free 2GB of storage

You can get Photoshop Touch for iPhone here

You can get Photoshop Touch for iPad here

Yes you can also get it for Android here.

To make it even better, get one of these

Brushing with your finger is ok, but if you want more precision I highly recommend getting one of these Wacom Bamboo Styluses for touch screens.

You can get one here.

February 26, 2013February 26, 2013

Lightroom 4.4 and Camera RAW 7.4 Release Candidates Posted

Lightroom 4.4 is now available as a Release Candidate on Adobe Labs. The ‘release candidate’ label indicates that this update is well tested but would benefit from additional community testing before it is distributed automatically to all of our customers. The final release of Lightroom 4.4 may have additional corrections or camera support.

Bugs Corrected in the Lightroom 4.4 Release Candidate

The following bugs that were part the Lightroom 4 releases have been corrected. The team appreciates the very detailed feedback the community has provided on Lightroom 4 and we’re excited to correct a number of issues experienced by our customers. These issues have been FIXED:

The crop overlay tool resized incorrectly when used in conjunction with the “Constrain to Crop” checkbox in the Lens Correction panel
Background graphics were not correctly rendered within the Book Module
The supplied lens profile for the Sony RX-1 did not contain vignette information
Previews of photos in portrait orientation were blurry when viewed in the filmstrip in the Develop module. (Mac only)
Stack badges displayed the wrong count when creating new stack that included a preexisting stack.
The Filter scrollbar within the Library module was not rendering properly.
Auto-tone was not working properly when used in conjunction with the Exposure adjustment slider. (Win only)
The Black&White button was not creating a History state within the Develop module. (Win only)
RGB color readouts were specified in the Adobe RGB colorspace rather than the ProPhoto linear colorspace. This occurred when working in Soft Proofing within the Develop module.
Adding a page behaved inconsistently in the Book module depending on the method used to add a page.
The state of the “Remove Chromatic Aberrations” checkbox within the Lens Correction was not persistent between sessions of Lightroom.

Please provide feedback on your experience with the Lightroom 4.4 Release Candidate in our Feedback Portal (link – http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family)

New Camera Support in Lightroom 4.4 Release Candidates

Canon EOS 1D C
Casio Exilim EX-ZR700
Fujifilm X100s
Fujifilm X20
Hasselblad Lunar
Leica M
Nikon 1 V3
Nikon 1 S1
Pentax MX-1

Release Notes

Lightroom 4.4 RC includes a correction to the demosaic algorithms for Fujifilm cameras with the X-Trans sensor. This specifically impacts the following cameras:

Fujifilm X-Pro1
Fujifilm X-E1
Fujifilm X100S
Fujifilm X20

Camera Raw 7.4 and DNG Converter 7.4 Release Candidates are now available on Adobe Labs This release includes bug fixes, new camera support, and new lens profiles.

New Camera Support in the Camera Raw 7.4 Release Candidate

Canon EOS 1D C
Casio Exilim EX-ZR700
Fujifilm X100s
Fujifilm X20
Hasselblad Lunar
Leica M
Nikon 1 V3
Nikon 1 S1
Pentax MX-1

New Lens Profile Support in the Camera Raw 7.4 Release Candidate

Lens Name	Lens Mount
Canon 24-70 f/4L IS	Canon
Canon EF 35mm f/2 IS USM	Canon
Nikon 1 NIKKOR 18.5mm f/1.8	Nikon
Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 70-200mm f/4G ED VR	Nikon
Sigma 18-250mm F3.5-6.3 DC MACRO HSM	Pentax, Sony
Sigma APO MACRO 180mm F2.8 EX DG OS HSM	Sony
Sigma 35mm F1.4 DG HSM A012	Canon, Nikon, Sigma
Sigma 17-70mm F2.8-4 DC MACRO OS HSM C013	Canon, Sigma
Sony E 10-18mm F4 OSS	Sony

These items have been FIXED in Camera Raw 7.4 Release Candidate:

The grayscale visualization associated with Noise Reduction Luminance was visible after mouse release. This occurred when positive Clarity was present.
The command/control + A “select all” keyboard shortcut did not select all photos.
Modifying the brush size using the Right-click + Drag method did not increase or decrease the brush size by the desired amount.
The crop overlay tool resized incorrectly when used in conjunction with the “Constrain to Crop” checkbox in the Lens Correction panel.
Hovering the mouse over a local adjustment pin would turn off the desired mask.
Horizontal artifacts occasionally appeared in DNG files.Improved interactive performance at intermediate zoom levels (e.g., 33% and 66%)

Release Notes

Camera Raw 7.4 RC includes a correction to the demosaic algorithms for Fujifilm cameras with the X-Trans sensor. This specifically impacts the following cameras:

Fujifilm X-Pro1
Fujifilm X-E1
Fujifilm X100S
Fujifilm X20

Thank You

February 25, 2013February 24, 2013

Join me Tonight in LA and NYC on Wednesday for the Adobe Create Now Tour

AdobeCreateNowBanner

Hey guys! You can catch me LIVE at the Adobe Create Now World Tour Event in Los Angeles tonight (Monday 2/25) and New York on Wednesday (2/27) . I’ll be covering the latest and greatest Adobe innovations and updates for our design products.

Where is the Create Now World Tour Coming to a City Near You?

If you want to check out the events happening in your town click the banner below: