Lightroom 4

I was looking around on Adobe's website and noticed that Ligthroom 4 came out a while ago and they are offering a $79 upgrade if you have 3. I thought this was a sweet deal since the program with a large student discount is $100. this made me want to look up some of the features and some tutorials for the new program. I have heard that there was a significant difference from the old version to the new one which i thought was kinda interesting since adobe is infamous for adding one extra option in one area that nobody uses and selling it as a new version. some of the cool new things that i found out include the option to create and edit HDR images in the program without having to send it into Photoshop to create the HDR. Another interesting addition allows you to work with video inside the program which was generally reserved for a video only program.

If you want to learn more about the program thelightroomlab.com is a good place to start looking for tutorials and videos about what you can do in the program.

If your interested in purchasing the program Adobe allows a trial download and you can purchase a digital copy right off their website.

Some Pictures from the Back Country

This last weekend I went to Yellowstone NP with another class and we trekked into the back country to one of the most remote places in the continental United States. This presented some pretty cool opportunities for taking pictures. I did not get around to editing them in a timely manner which is why I am waiting till this Thursday to share them.

These were actually game wardens that go out into the back country on 10 day excursions to check on people and make sure everyone in abiding by the park rules. They decided to cross the river just to check that we had our back country permits and to see if our teacher was a guide. They were on their way to the edge of the park to get ready for the elk season and to make sure that hunters didn't cross the boundary or decide to start the season early.

This was just a really cool rock with interesting colored lichen growing on it. I thought that it was cool how the lichen was in gradients of green and white.

This meadow was cool because it had a nice little stream running through it. These shots would have been much easier to take if I had had a graduated neutral density filter, but since I didn't have one I used Lightroom to try and put more blue into the sky. It worked well until I turned it into a JPEG to upload it onto this site; the sky became way too blue.

This one had the same problem as the last one. I will have to figure out a better way to do that so that the picture transfers better. I liked this scene because of the downed logs in the foreground and the one live tree. It seamed like an interesting spot for a lone survivor, but it has plenty of water next to it in that small pond. In the midground is the same field as the last one that I liked so much.

A Full Frame Camera for a Budget

Nikon is now producing a full frame camera for almost $1,000 cheaper than anyone, including themselves. This feature means that the sensor will capture more light and the lenses will preform like they were designed to. In a camera that is not a full frame most lenses will actually have slightly more telephoto power than they are designed to have with a full frame 35mm sensor.  This camera also has a viewfinder that covers 100% of the shot instead of 95% or less like most of the lower end cameras. This feature helps one frame pictures with ease instead of the shoot and check method that is needed with the lower coverage view finders.

This camera does not come super cheap however seeing as how most full frame cameras are 3,000 plus, but with the SRP of 2,099.95 and the 24.3MP it carries, it is a lot cheaper and not lacking too much in the megapixel department than the other options. This cheaper price tag comes with a few less options like the lack of a "scene" mode although it is not likely that someone dropping 2100 on a camera is going to use its dummy modes.

If you want to read more, here is a link to MSN's Gadget Box comments.
Want to know the specs or the features? Here is Nikon's D600 page.

HDR Photography

For lack of a better place to start, I will introduce a form of photography I have always been interested in. High Dynamic Range photography is a way to capture an image that will have detail in the highlights and in the shadows when either may be too extreme to capture in a single exposure in detail. The link above to Cambridge in Colour is a very good article describing what it is, how to do it and when it should and should not be used. I took a lot away from this article especially within the area of when not to use HDR. I have always been attracted to this kind of photography because of its wide range of colors and sometimes almost psychedelic look but after reading the article. I learned that there are some instances that one gains a lot from using this technique, and yet others where a graduated neutral density filter is all that is needed to make the exposure.

Here are 50 Examples of HDR Photography from thephotoargus.com