Sunday, January 31, 2010

Camera Shopping? Compare the Features

Coke vs Pepsi
Ford vs Chevy
Nikon vs Canon
What is your preference? I have no advice for comparing soft drinks or cars but when itcomes to cameras I can help.
There is now a website http://snapsort.com that is set up to pit one camera against another
and provide a detailed report with one camera declared THE WINNER! A few years ago,
a person shopping for a camera would usually walk into a camera shop and tell a clerk youwant to see some cameras. Or another alternate was to flip through magazines and booksreading reviews and descriptions of various camera models. Now you can save the tripto the camera store, bookstore or library.

I spent some time on the site entering models and noting the results which are broken down to important differences and important similarities. The winner and loser also have the pros and cons of the camera listed. I think that is good because perhaps you really need a feature
such as built-in flash or very rapid continuous shooting and the snapsort team has chosen a camera as a winner but the loser camera has a unique feature you need. Then you can make your own conclusion. Another nice feature of this website is the Popular Comparisons section below each camera which helps you see other cameras which are similar to the cameras in your search.

So with this information a person in the market for a new camera can spend a bit of time at this very useful website and learn plenty about all sorts of cameras before making a big
decision about a camera purchase. By the way, I prefer Pepsi and Chevy.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Keep Your Eyes on the Horizon




The horizon appears in many photos and where you place the horizon in your shot can make a difference. If you want to emphasize the sky, use a low horizon. Or put the horizon high if you want to show the foregound. The most important thing is to be creative and shoot the scene all different ways. A great thing about digital photography is that a person can shoot like crazy and later delete the bad ones.



Usually, it is not recommended to place the horizon right in the middle. But like all rules of composition, there are times when breaking the rules works.

Another thing about horizons is that in general, you are better off keeping level. Especially in images with water ther is something a bit disturbing at a subconscience level about a lake that is tilted because the human brain knows that that the water in lakes and oceans don’t slope upwards. Many photographers make this mistake, but with Photoshop it is very easy to use the cropping tool to level the horizon. However, sometimes you may want to experiment with tilting your camera at different kinds of angles to produce a creative shot.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Quotes Concerning Photography

Many brilliant people have commented about photography and here are some that I have collected over the years.


“Photography is a major force in explaining man to man.” Edward Steichen

“We see, hear, smell, and taste many things without noticing them at the time.” Carl Jung

“Photography has not changed since its origin except in its technical aspects, which for me, are not a major concern.” Henri Cartier-Bresson

“Look for what you don't see.” Rashid Elisha

“Creativity is a radical necessity, not a luxury.” Jean Houston

“Learn to see, and then you'll know that there is no end to the new worlds of our vision.” Carlos Castaneda

“A photograph is always seen in some context; physical, remembered, imagined.” Rashid Elisha

“To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event.” Henri Cartier-Bresson

“The hardest thing to see is what is in front of our eyes.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“There is a single light of science, and to brighten it anywhere is to brighten it everywhere.” Isaac Asimov

“Composition is the strongest way of seeing.” Edward Weston

“Recording images serenity and beauty was a matter of devout observance.” Gordon Parks

"The so-called rules of composition are, in my mind, invalid, irrelevant and immaterial.” Ansel Adams

“I want my sitters to be noticed, not my work.” Lord Snowden

“The eyes are the windows to the soul.” Karsh of
Ottawa

“Look at any landscape photograph. You see the shape of things, the mountains and trees and buildings, but not the sky.” Kurt Koffka

“If I could tell the story in words, I would not have to lug around a camera.” Lewis Hiene

“The soul never thinks without an image.” Aristotle

“The best digital cameras have 6 to 16 million pixels. Our retina, consisting of rods and cones, has over 100 million sensors.” Dr. Richard D. Zakia

“Photography does not create eternity, as art does; it embalms time, rescuing it simply from its proper corruption.” AndrĂ© Bazin

“Of course, there will always be those who look only at technique, who ask "how," while others of a more curious nature will ask "why." Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information.” Man Ray

“Photography knows how to authenticate its misrepresentations.' Mason Cooley

“It's a funny thing about life. If you refuse to accept anything but the best, you often get it.” Somerset Maugham

“The negative is the equivalent of the composer's score, and the print the performance.” Ansel Adams

“I don't care if you make a print on a bath mat, just as long as it is a good print.” Edward Weston

“One photo out of focus is a mistake, ten photo out of focus are an experimentation, one hundred photo out of focus are a style.” Anonymous

“We can try to avoid making choices by doing nothing, but even that is a decision.” Gary Collins

“Photography is like art because, like painting, it seeks beauty.” Julia Margaret Cameron.

“Balance is the enemy of art.” Richard Eyre

“Much of modern art is devoted to lowering the threshold of what is terrible. By getting us used to what formerly, we could not bear to see or hear, because it was too shocking, painful, or embarrassing, art changes morals.” Susan Sontag

“Practice is everything.” Periander (Often misquoted as "Practice makes perfect.”)

“Perception is personal. We see what we see.” Richard Fahey

“There is no audience as far as I am concerned. I am the audience.” Joel Meyerowitz

“You know ... that a blank wall is an appalling thing to look at. The wall of a museum - a canvas - a piece of film -- or a guy sitting in front of a typewriter. Then, you start out to do something - that vague thing called creation. The beginning strikes awe within you.” Edward Steichen

“Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right, or doing it better.” John Updike

“If you just take a picture of what's there, it destroys the mystery, the magic.” Art Kane

“One's mind has a way of making itself up in the background, and it suddenly becomes clear what one means to do.” A. C. Benso

“It is imagination that gives shape to the universe.” Barry Lopez

“The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.” Dorothea Lange

“With all art expression, when something is seen, it is a vivid experience, sudden, compelling and inevitable.” Ansel Adams

“To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event.” Henri Cartier-Bresson

“I am not interested in nature; I'm interested in my own nature.” Arnold Sisken

“If photography is allowed to stand in for art in some of its functions it will soon supplant or corrupt it completely thanks to the natural support it will find in the stupidity of the multitude.” Charles Baudelaire

“Vertical columns, such as those found in Greek and Roman temples, look parallel from the ground because they are wider at the top than at the bottom.” Joanne Kemp

“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.” Henry Ward Beecher

“Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training.” Anna Freud

“To see an object in space means to see it in context.” Rudolf Arnheim

Photography is truth. The cinema is truth twenty-four times per second. Jean-Luc Godard

“The more one looks, the more one sees. And the more one sees, the better one knows where to look.” Anonymous

“Photography records the gamut of feelings written on the human face, the beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited and the wealth and confusion man has created.” Edward Steichen

“God is in the details” Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

“I don't know what you could say about a day in which you have seen four beautiful sunsets.” John Glenn

“Between the photographer and the subject there has to be a distance. The camera may intrude, trespass, distort, exploit.” Susan Sontag


“The magic of photography is metaphysical. What you see in the photograph isn't what you saw at the time. The real skill of photography is organized visual lying.” Terence Donovan

“A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.” Diane Arbus

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Warren Kimble is a success at licensing his art

Warren Kimble is not a photographer but I admire his business sense. Kimble is a painter and proof that some artists can become rich before they die. When I look at his art I also see proof that the art does not have to be beautiful to sell.

Years ago Kimble was an antiques dealer in small-town Vermont and then he veered into painting in the primitive style. This style does nothing for me. I find it repulsive, childish and ugly. But, hey this is what millions of people have paid good money to own so what does my opinion mean? He is rich and I am struggling to feed my kids and buy them new shoes.

Here is what happened. Kimble was painting works one at a time and selling them one at a time just like most other painters. But then he made a change that meant big rewards. He learned to multiply his earnings by licensing his work to be mass produced not only as wall art but also to be printed on towels, potholders, aprons, tablecloths, rugs, plates and etc. He paints primitive versions of barns, cows, chickens and such. People love his work.

I entered Warren Kimble’s name in a google search and got 109,000 hits. A search for Warren Kimble items on Ebay came back with 369 items including cookie jars, plates, mugs, lamps and more. So he is popular and earning a comfortable living. I wish him well and hope to someday gain some achievements of my own.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Composition Lesson: Framing


A well-composed photograph is pleasing to the eye. There are a few rules of composition that when applied properly help you create outstanding images. A hint for composing an appealing photo is to frame the image. With landscape photography this is often done by including tree branches in the edges of the image. This can also create a sense of depth.

Besides tree branches other elements such as windows or doors can be used to frame the subject. While shooting in a church I noticed an arch painted on the wall and moved over a bit so the gospel singer was framed by this arch.

Recently I used balloons to frame the subject of a portrait. Not only did this add interest to to the photo, but it also adds some color.