On Monday, many of us will fire up our Apple devices and tune in to the WWDC Keynote Address. Rumors of new MacBooks and iPads have been swirling around for some time. But this is a developer conference, so software enjoys a spotlight as well. And for photographers, there may be a few unanticipated cameos.

Among the predictions of more integrated Artificial Intelligence in Apple technologies, few are talking about the ongoing evolution of Photos for macOS, an application that already leverages AI, and is bound to increase its role on that platform.

As Photos helps us make the transition from manual organization (star ratings, color labels, etc.) to object recognition, facial awareness, automatic geotagging (iPhones, et al), and intelligent grouping, we most likely won't see many UI changes, but will indeed experience greater depth in capability. And that's why this software is such a dark horse.

Experienced users know what I'm talking about. If I enter "San Jose" in the search box for my Photos app, it displays all the shots from that city. I've never used a San Jose keyword, caption, album, or anything else. But I do record an iPhone image or two that has a nearby timestamp with my other cameras, and Photos puts it all together. As it does with search words such as ocean, building, car, and hundreds of others. I don't spend time organizing stuff in this app. That's its job.

Yet, unless there's something really big in the works, I doubt that Photos will get much airtime on stage Monday. Maybe a mention. Something like, "and Photos is much smarter too." Somehow, that seems fitting for this little gem on an intelligent app.

Book or Videos: Photos for macOS

Explore the world of modern photography with my The Apple Photos Book for Photographers that features insightful text and beautiful illustrations.

And if you'd like to cozy up to a video at the same time, watch my latest lynda title, Photos for macOS Essential Training

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

You can buy any T-Shirt in The Nimble Photographer Shop for $10. Any size, any color, any design. And if you use the coupon code FREESHIPJUNE - you will also get free USPS Priority shipping.

This offer is good between now and June 15. Any shirt for $10 plus free shipping. Get Yours Now!

Late-day lighting is more than just adding a orangish-yellow cast to the scene. There's a bit of magic mixed in there too. And you can infuse a little of that vibe into your images by using the Golden Hour filter in Luminar.

In this free video on the Macphun site, I demonstrate how easy and powerful the Golden Hour filter is. Then you can add a little magic to some of your landscape work as well.

Luminar is an Editing Extension as Well

You can learn more about using Luminar as an editing extension in my lynda.com training, Photos for macOS: Advanced Editing Extensions.

And if you'd prefer to cozy up with a book, check out The Apple Photos Book for Photographers that features chapters on basic editing, advanced post processing, and editing extensions.

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

This is The Digital Story Podcast #586, May 30, 2017. Today's theme is "Wide Glass Can Save Your..." I'm Derrick Story.

Opening Monologue

Clients can put you in the tightest spots, and I don't mean just with scheduling. Physically, I've found myself with big shots to capture and virtually no room to record them. Then there are the times your arms aren't long enough, the steps aren't high enough, and room just isn't deep enough. How does one survive such tight squeezes? By going wide, my friend. And that's the focus for today.

Wide Glass Can Save Your...

When I'm walking around exploring the world, I typically have a standard zoom mounted to the camera. With my Pentax KP, I like the 20-40mm HD. On the Olympus Micro Four Thirds, I favor the 14-42mm EZ zoom.

But I dare not attempt a pro shoot for clients with just my standard zooms. Sometimes I need longer lenses, but the ones that have really saved me are the super wides. And here are a few stories about them.

My Favorite Wide Lenses

There are some great wide optics on the market today. Here are five that have caught my eye.

• Venus Optics Laowa 7.5mm f/2 MFT Lens - $499 - This A super wide and fast rectilinear lens has really sparked my curiosity. It's due for release in mid-June.
• Rokinon 7.5mm f/3.5 Ultra Wide-Angle Fisheye Lens - $299 - This one is a fisheye, but it has saved my bacon on numerous shoots. Hold it perpendicular to the subject, and the results can be stunning.
• Sigma 10-20mm f/3.5 EX DC HSM Autofocus Zoom - On Sale for $449 - This optic is available in Canon, Nikon, Pentax, and Sony alpha mounts. I have the Pentax version and I love it.
• Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L III USM Lens $1,999 - I depended on the version II of this zoom in my Canon days, and adored it. Version III looks even better. A true pro optic.
• Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 14-24mm f/2.8G ED Lens - $1,896 - Nikon shooters can go even wider with this top shelf zoom. This will bale you out of some tight situations.

Exposure Even More Important for Video Work

As helpful as an external light meter is for our still photography, it's even more critical for movie making. And anyone who has ever had to correct exposure in post knows exactly what I mean.

The Sekonic Speedmaster L-858D-U handheld light meter has full HD Cine and CINE modes, with the ability to measure from 1 to 1000 fps or shutter angles of 1 to 358 degrees. One of the features that I really like, is that you can hold down the meter reading button and see continuous readouts as you move the meter around the scene. This will help you choose the best overall aperture for that take.

If you want to learn more about the Sekonic Speedmaster L-858D-U handheld light meter, visit the link in these show notes.

Red River Paper's new Palo Duro Etching paper aims to recreate look and feel of fine art darkroom prints

Via Imaging-Resource.com.

Texas-based Red River Paper recently announced a new fine art paper, Palo Duro Etching. The new paper is a 100 percent cotton rag paper and is free of optical brightener additives. The paper is designed to offer warm white tones, deep blacks and a subtle texture to accurately recreate traditional darkroom fine art prints.

Red River Paper owner Drew Hendrix says of the new paper, "Our new Palo Duro Etching paper is one of the finest photo papers we have ever produced. From its subtle-textured surface and quality 'feel,' to rendering warm natural tones and deep rich blacks, Palo Duro Etching will satisfy even the most critical eye." The museum-grade paper is produced to deliver this high quality over a long period of time too thanks to its acid free base stock and coating. Further, the paper has a thickness of 21 mil and a weight of 315gsm.

The textured matte paper is said to offer deeper blacks than most traditional matte papers thanks to a special barrier coat that is placed between the paper base and the inkjet receiving layer. This ensures that the ink remains in the inkjet coating rather than bleed through into the paper base, which would diminish the richness of the black ink.

Palo Duro Etching paper is available now in both sheets and rolls. The sheet sizes are: 4 x 6, 5 x 7, 8 x 10, 8.5 x 11, 9 x 13, 11 x 14, 13 x 19, 17 x 22, 17 x 25 and 13 x 38 inches. Fifty-foot rolls are available in 17, 24 and 44-inch widths.

Updates and Such

Big thanks to all of our Patreon members! I was able to pay for the podcast server and the backup system from last month's pledges. Your contributions are making a positive impact.

Registration invitations have gone out to Reserve List members for the Autumn in Wine Country Photography Workshop. If you are on the Reserve List, but didn't get your invite, please contact me. You can learn more about the workshops by visiting the TDS Workshops Page.

B&H and Amazon tiles on www.thedigitalstory. If you click on them first, you're helping to support this podcast. And speaking of supporting this show, and big thanks to our Patreon Inner Circle members.

And finally, be sure to visit our friends at Red River Paper for all of your inkjet supply needs.

See you next week!

More Ways to Participate

Want to share photos and talk with other members in our virtual camera club? Check out our Flickr Public Group. And from those images, I choose the TDS Member Photo of the Day.

Podcast Sponsors

Sekonic Light Meters - Learn more about the amazing Sekonic Speedmaster L-858D-U handheld light meter by listening to next week's show and visiting the Sekonic web site.

Red River Paper - Keep up with the world of inkjet printing, and win free paper, by liking Red River Paper on Facebook.

The Nimbleosity Report

Do you want to keep up with the best content from The Digital Story and The Nimble Photographer? Sign up for The Nimbleosity Report, and receive highlights twice-a-month in a single page newsletter. Be a part of our community!

Want to Comment on this Post?

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

For those who visit Sonoma County regularly, such as for my workshops, another must see stop while in town is the California Indian Museum and Cultural Center.

Greeting card by Eric Wilder, a Kashaya Pomo Indian of Northern California. You can see more of his work at ericwildergraphics.com.

Among its many treasures, is a gallery of portraits by well known photographer of Native Americans, Edward Curtis, educational materials, many outstanding displays of Native American works, and a truly interesting museum store.

A display in the Precious Cargo exhibit, California Indian Cradle Baskets and Childbirth Traditions.

The museum staff is both knowledgable and open to spending time with visitors to answer their questions. Admission is free, but you can make a donation or purchase a keepsake in the Museum Store. It's definitely worth a visit.

The Museum Store is filled with artwork, gifts, housewares, smudge sticks, ointments, and more.

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

If you've never explored the Skin Tone tab in Capture One Pro's Color Editor, you're in for a real treat.

Unlike trying to adjust skin tones with the more generic white balance setting, Skin Tone in the Color Editor is designed just for portraits. In addition to hue, saturation, and lightness just for the complexion, you also have smoothness slider that makes everything look just a little better.

But the real magic surfaces with the uniformity sliders that help you offset areas of color shift, especially in the shadows. And what a difference these controls make in the professional appearance of your portraits. Take a look at this free training video that walks you through the entire process.

This is just one of the videos from my latest lynda.com/LinkedIn Learning course, Capture One Pro 10: Retouching. I focus on portraits and product photography in this course. And there are lots of handy tips, like the magic uniformity slider, for you to discover.

Master Capture One Pro

Start with Capture One Pro 10 Essential Training that will quickly get you up to speed with this pro level imaging application.

Then drill down into mastering the editing tools with Capture One Pro 10: Retouching and get supremely organized with Advanced Capture One Pro: Catalog Management.

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

At first, I thought that infltr was just another filter app for my iPhone. But after a little testing, I've found it to be quite the creative workspace.

My initial interest was to find something new for my Instagram shots. And infltr is quite good for that purpose. You choose an image from your camera roll, select a filter, then tap on it and move your finger around the shot. As you do so, the filter changes. When you see something you like, stop and publish. You can also save your creation as a custom filter.

But the app goes well beyond that, including features such as:

• Saturation, brightness, contrast & filter intensity.
• Crop: 17 different presets.
• Transform: rotate, straighten, flip horizontally & vertically, perspective horizontally and vertically.
• Undo edits & view the history of your edits.
• Metadata screen that includes camera type, lens, ISO and more.

Plus, infltr allows you to edit photos, Live Photos, videos, and GIFs. In other words, just about any type of visual content on your iPhone.

Other handy features include a built-in camera function, iMessage App and Apple Watch compatibility, and the ability to connect to Adobe Creative Cloud and Dropbox.

For a mere $1.99 investment, you will breath new creative life, and functionality into your iPhone photography with infltr.

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

This is The Digital Story Podcast #585, May 23, 2017. Today's theme is "The Crossover Shot" I'm Derrick Story.

Opening Monologue

How many times have you held back a shot because you thought it was too cliche? Or maybe it featured what we call a mature subject, such as a sunset or the Golden Gate Bridge. But, maybe, just maybe, it's more artistic than you realize. And it's even possible that both photographers and the general public would admire it. That's what I call the crossover shot. And it's the first topic for today's show.

The Crossover Shot

I want to start by telling you a story that happened just a few days ago. Seven of us were reviewing 3 days worth of pictures that we had captured on the Northern Sonoma Coast. This is postcard territory for sure, and one of the biggest internal struggles group members were having was choosing eight original images for the final class presentation.

Among the various subjects, everyone had a sunset shot. Yet, not one of those dazzling twilight images made it into the final presentation. And afterwards, as we talked about our choices, each photographer felt that it was either too cliche or that someone else would present theirs. So no-one did.

This gave me the opportunity to talk about the crossover shot. Images that appeal to both the hardened photographer as well as the Mom with loving eyes. And from that discussion, I have five key points to share with you today.

• Just Because It's Common, that Doesn't Mean it's Bad - Most of us are leery of photographing postcard subjects. But that doesn't mean that you can't add your own artistry to them.
• Just Because It's Difficult, that Doesn't Mean it's Good - Yes, we're proud of those images that we had to work really hard to capture. But...
• We're Often Not the Best Judge of Our Own Work - Having non-photographers review and comment on our photos helps bring balance to our final selects.
• Consider a Mix for Your Final Choices - If someone lobbies hard for an image that you feel isn't artistic enough, consider including it with one that you also feel strongly about.
• Respect for Those Who Achieve Crossover - And learn from them. Just because someone is popular, that doesn't mean they've sold out.

A Remote Trigger As Well

In order to accurately measure the flash output on your subject, you want to measuring from that position. So how do our trigger the flashes?

The Sekonic Speedmaster L-858D-U handheld light meter also is compatible with optional radio triggering modules for PocketWizard, Elinchrom EL-Skyport system, and the Phottix Strato/II protocol.

These modules provide multiple zones, flash power control (except for Phoenix), and model light control (except for Phoenix). And since this is a radio system, you can stand just about anywhere, inside or out, to trigger the flashes and take a reading. The Speedmaster also provides the old school PC terminal connector for those who use wired systems as well. And if you don't want to mess with any of that, there's a tripod socket in the bottom of the unit, so you can mount it on a stand.

If you want to learn more about the Sekonic Speedmaster L-858D-U handheld light meter, visit the link in these show notes.

More Stupid Photographer Moves

Here are some of my favorites from the TDS Facebook comments on last week's podcast.

Mark: Yup, I've done the 'Went out with a spare discharged battery', and I can add one 'Formatted the wrong card' (fortunately without erasing any good images that mattered!).

Carl: Realizing half way through a shoot that the only memory card I have is nearly full because I failed to format it. Now that I think about it this is two stupid mistakes.

Richard: I often leave the house with just a camera and lens...and no memory card. Then I'm just carrying jewelry.

Rob: My doh moments: camera still in bracketing mode from the day before, and I wonder what is wonky with the exposures.

Jim: I routinely found myself with a bag of discharged batteries. Now when I charge a battery I wrap an elastic band around it. Now the discharged ones are easily identifiable because they are the ones in my bag with no elastic on them. It also has a side benefit in that it prevents anything in the camera bag from shorting the terminals.

Jerry (from our recent workshop): Yes, I put my batteries in their chargers on the power strip before I went to bed. Problem was, the switch on the power strip was off. So I was looking at a day of exciting workshop shooting with a batch of dead batteries.

New Capture One Pro 10 Training Videos

lynda.com and LinkedIn Learning have just released Capture One Pro 10 Essential Training. And I talk about this title, and those related to it, during this segment of today's show.

Updates and Such

Big thanks to all of our Patreon members! I was able to pay for the podcast server and the backup system from last month's pledges. Your contributions are making a positive impact.

Registration invitations have gone out to Reserve List members for the Autumn in Wine Country Photography Workshop. If you are on the Reserve List, but didn't get your invite, please contact me. You can learn more about the workshops by visiting the TDS Workshops Page.

B&H and Amazon tiles on www.thedigitalstory. If you click on them first, you're helping to support this podcast. And speaking of supporting this show, and big thanks to our Patreon Inner Circle members.

And finally, be sure to visit our friends at Red River Paper for all of your inkjet supply needs.

See you next week!

More Ways to Participate

Want to share photos and talk with other members in our virtual camera club? Check out our Flickr Public Group. And from those images, I choose the TDS Member Photo of the Day.

Podcast Sponsors

Sekonic Light Meters - Learn more about the amazing Sekonic Speedmaster L-858D-U handheld light meter by listening to next week's show and visiting the Sekonic web site.

Red River Paper - Keep up with the world of inkjet printing, and win free paper, by liking Red River Paper on Facebook.

The Nimbleosity Report

Do you want to keep up with the best content from The Digital Story and The Nimble Photographer? Sign up for The Nimbleosity Report, and receive highlights twice-a-month in a single page newsletter. Be a part of our community!

Want to Comment on this Post?

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

Capture One Pro is a powerful imaging application that combines photo management, RAW conversion, and post production all under one well-designed roof. And version 10 ups the ante by adding features such as output proofing and 3-step sharpening.

In this course, I embark on an in-depth exploration of Capture One Pro 10. The teaching structure mirrors the design of the software itself, with chapters that step through each of the tabs in the program, from organizing to editing to outputting images.

Highlights include:

• Organizing assets in the library
• Correcting color casts with the Color Editor
• Understanding the HDR sliders
• Straighten lines with keystone correction
• Diffraction correction
• Using a gradient mask to fix a sky
• Soften skin with a brush
• Output proofing
• 3-step sharpening

Here's an overview movie that will give you a good feel for the course.

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.

Having just spent 3 days on the rugged coastline of Sonoma County for our Northern CA Coast Tour workshop, I had the opportunity to photograph the bounty of spring.

I was packing my Pentax KP with a 1998 SMC Pentax-FA 100mm F3.5 Macro lens mounted on it. I had purchased the lens used for $90, and I wanted to see how it performed on the state-of-the-art KP digital body.

As I was looking at the previews on the back of the camera, I thought, "Hmmm, those look pretty good." So I kept shooting. The autofocusing was relatively swift, although not as quiet as with modern systems. The lens itself was very light, so it was easy to hike with. And I could turnaround and capture a landscape shot with it when I wasn't tracking down flowers. In fact, I like looking a landscapes at 150mm (cropped sensor) for a change of pace.

When I got back to my room and reviewed the images in Capture One Pro, I thought again, "Wow, these are alright." So my $90 purchase for a autofocus macro lens with a maximum aperture of f/3.5 seemed like a good investment. A very good investment.

We all have our "go to" optics that we buy new and pay top dollar for. They serve as the foundation for our work. But it's fun to have a few speciality optics too. And finding them at bargain prices is even better.

More Articles About the Pentax KP

The Pentax KP Review: The Final Verdict

Pentax KP Review - Part One - Top Deck - An overview of the Mode dial, Function dial, and other controls on the top panel of the camera.

Pentax KP Review - Part Two - The Back Panel - An overview of back panel controls and the menu system for the Pentax KP.

Pentax KP Review - Part Three - Image Quality - A hands-on look at how the camera performs with Pentax Limited Edition optics.

You can share your thoughts at the TDS Facebook page, where I'll post this story for discussion.