Polarizers are still the one accessory filter that every photographer needs. In this episode of The Digital Story, I discuss how to pick the right polarizer, how to use it, and the pitfalls to avoid. In the show I refer to it as "buffet line" because I have lots of other goodies to cover too.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Slender. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page. Deadline for entry is May 31.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "Polarizing Filters." You can download the podcast here (31 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Want to share photos and talk with other members in our virtual camera club? Check out our new Flickr Public Group. It's a blast!

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

I depend on 3rd party plug-ins to help me customize three of my favorite photo applications: iPhoto, Aperture, and Photoshop. In this podcast I talk about a handful of my favorite add-ons, then solicit your favorites for next week's show.

Here are some of the plug-ins I wax about in the show:

FlickrExport for iPhoto and Aperture by Connected Flow

Aperture2Gmail and iPhoto2Gmail by NotOptimal.net

Shutterfly Export Assistannt for iPhoto by Shutterfly

Exposure Plug-in for Photoshop (Mac and Windows) by Alien Skin Software

BetterHTMLExport for iPhoto by GeeksRUs

What's Your Favorite Plug-In?

I want to feature your favorite plug-ins for next week's show. You can contribute by posting a comment to these show notes (be sure to wait a minute or two after you hit the "Post" button for your comment to register on the TDS server) or by chiming in on our Public Group page on Flickr. List the name of your favorite plug-in, the URL where I can find it, and a sentence or two about why you like it. Please have your comments in by Saturday, May 26.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Slender. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page. Deadline for entry is May 31.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "My Favorite Plug-Ins." You can download the podcast here (32 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Want to share photos and talk with other members in our virtual camera club? Check out our new Flickr Public Group. It's a blast!

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

The two new killer features in the Photoshop CS3 package are Adobe Camera Raw 4.0 (ACR) and the Bridge 2.0. With the Bridge, you can browse all of your images, review their metadata, rate, organize, and even add keywords. The Bridge works closely with ACR for processing your RAW, Jpeg, and Tiff files. That's right, ACR 4 can also nondestructively edit Jpegs and Tiffs now too.

In this podcast, I discuss the new features in Adobe Camera Raw 4.0, provide some tips for using it, and even touch on building a photo management workflow with these new applications. Do you really need Lightroom or Aperture? Listen to the show and find out.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Slender. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page. Deadline for entry is May 31.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "Photoshop CS3 for Photographers." You can download the podcast here (32 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Want to talk with other members in our virtual camera club? Check out our new Flickr Public Group. It's a blast!

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

You can now post your favorite pictures to our Member Photo Gallery on The Digital Story. We've added this capability so members of our virtual camera club can share and discuss photography directly.

You can read the step by step guide for getting started right here on the site. But if you want to know why we did this, then you should listen to this week's podcast.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Slender. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page. Deadline for entry is May 31.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "New Member Photo Gallery." You can download the podcast here (28 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

"I have a Polaroid back for my Holga," says Rick LePage. The back costs 3x more than the Holga itself, and I'm still perfecting exposure with it since the Polaroid film ISO is different than what the Holga is set up for. But the images this combination produces... well, they're something else."

Rick LePage is currently editor at large at Macworld Magazine. He is a knowledgeable photographer and has become an expert in inkjet printing. I have another interview with him about printing over on the Inside Aperture site. (Really worth a listen if you're in the market for a new printer.)

But today we're talking about one of Rick's favorite types of media: Polaroid film. Rick rediscovered Polaroid photography recently when he found an SX70 in good shape. It's one of the cameras he grabs on his way out the door everyday, and he's captured some great images with it. Then he discovered that you can mount a Polaroid back on a Holga, and his Polaroid experimentation broadened even further. In this podcast, Rick talks about his passion for instant photography and the process he uses to take images from camera to his flickr site. It's a terrific interview that I'm sure you'll enjoy.

Polaroid self-portrait at top of page by Rick LePage.

Links Mentioned in the Show

Rick LePage, on flickr:
www.flickr.com/photos/bigbuckaroo/
Also, Rick's Polaroid Collection on Flickr

Flickr's top 100 Polaroids:
www.flickr.com/groups/polaroid_instant_100/pool/

Great SX-70 photographer, Grant Hamilton:
http://sxseventy.com/

Lou O'Bedlam's slr680 portraits:
www.flickr.com/photos/louobedlam/sets/72157594554361877/

Land List (polaroid reference site):
www.rwhirled.com/landlist/landhome.htm

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Slender. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "Instant Holga Photography and More." You can download the podcast here (21 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

Image stabilization is one of those breakthrough technologies that truly helps photographers take better pictures. Some camera companies, such as Panasonic with their MEGA O.I.S. system, are incorporating image stabilization in every camera in their line up.

This week's podcast takes a look at the different types of image stabilization so you can decide which is the best implementation for your type of photography. Whether its optical based, sensor based, or just raising the ISO, we'll get to what's shakin' in the world of stabilization.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Window to the Soul. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "Image Stabilization." You can download the podcast here (28 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

My first non-teathered digital camera was the Kodak DC20 that had a resolution of 493x373 and 1MB internal memory. The year was 1997, and this was the official beginning of my digital photography adventure.

Now, 10 years later, most of my pictures are digital. I have outstanding photo management software (Aperture, Lightroom, and iPhoto), and I'm trying to organize a decade of images into Aperture so all of those early pictures are at my fingertips. These photos reside on CDs, DVDs, and hard drives. I found a way to pull them all together, and I talk about that project as well as the camera milestones over my digital photography career.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Window to the Soul. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "10 Years of Digital Photography." You can download the podcast here (28 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

Jay Maisel recently held court at Photoshop World in Boston. He talked about perception, color, light, and gesture. I was there marveling at his photos and taking notes trying to capture as much of his wisdom as possible to share with you.

In this podcast, I recap the highlights of Jay's presentation. In his thoughts about perception, for example, I retell a story about this photo of an arrow (shown on this page, taken by me). Jay told a friend about a photo of an arrow he just took on a truck parked downstairs. His friend said there was no arrow on that truck. Upon closer inspection, he saw that the arrow was formed in the negative space of the FedEx logo (between the E and the X). These anecdotes are useful and interesting, and can help make us better photographers. I hope you like them.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Eye of the Beholder. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "Jay Maisel at Photoshop World." You can download the podcast here (28 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

The WPPI show in Las Vegas gave me an opportunity to listen to and talk to some great photographers. In this podcast, I have a collection of tips from Art Wolfe and Joe Buissink.

I think you'll find these insights interesting and useful.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Eye of the Beholder. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "Tips from Great Photographers." You can download the podcast here (31 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.

Podcast recorded at Bally's Hotel in Las Vegas, site of the WPPI Convention. Looking out my window at Bally's, I see the Las Vegas version of the Eiffel Tower. As promised in the show, I photographed the structure at twilight. This shot was captured with the new Panasonic Lumix FX8 camera that I'm testing. Settings at ISO 400, 1/15th @ f-2.8, in Raw mode with the aspect ratio set to 16:9. You can see some noise in the sky, but the colors are vivid and sharpness quite good with the Leica zoom lens. I talk a bit about this camera in the podcast, as well as a follow up to the Canon Rebel XTi (400D) post from last week.

I went to my first official WPPI event last night - a talk by Art Wolfe, who is a talented nature photographer. Art shared lots of tips, discussed his upcoming public television series Travels to the Edge, and of course showed off his photos.

Monthly Photo Assignment

I also discuss this month's photo assignment, Self Portrait. I think it's time we get out from behind our camera and get in front of it. As with all of our assignments, I hope you add a creative twist to your approach. You can read more about how to submit on our Submissions page.

Listen to the Podcast

Now that I've piqued your curiosity, it's time to listen to today's audio show titled, "WPPI, New Cameras, and More." You can download the podcast here (18 minutes). You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes

Technorati Tags: digital photography, podcast, The Digital Story

Add Magic to Your Slideshows -- FotoMagico presentations are so amazing that your audience will be asking how you did it.