Deputy Brian Harris of the Kane County Sheriff’s Office in Utah was shot to death on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2010 while pursuing a burglary suspect.  He is survived by his wife and two children.  Learn more about Deputy Harris and this tragic incident on his Officer Down Memorial Page.

Purchase any iFotoGuide iPhone app during the month of September and I will donate 100% of my half of the sale proceeds to a memorial fund that has been established for Deputy Harris’ family.

iFotoGuide apps provide everything you’ll need to plan a photo trip to Arches, Yosemite or Grand Canyon National Park.  Gorgeous photographs accompany each description of locations within the park that are ideal for photography.  You’ll learn how, where and when to make postcard worthy photographs on your next vacation to these parks.  Each iFotoGuide app also includes an interactive park map, lodging and dining information, park information and more.  At only $4.99 each, iFotoGuide apps are a bargain compared to guidebooks costing $20 or more.

Please keep Deputy Harris’ family, friends and co-workers in your thoughts and prayers.  From the Kane County Sheriff’s Office website: “Anyone wishing to make a donation to the Brian Harris Family fund may do so at any State Bank of Southern Utah location, or at the Kanab branch, 98 W. Center St., Kanab, Utah 84741, 435-644-5828.  Contact Kane County Sheriff’s Office for additional information, 435-644-2349 or 435-644-4916.”

In Valor There Is Hope

John Shaw’s “Photoshop Field Guide” has been my bible for years.  So, when “John Shaw’s Digital Processing: A Personal Workflow Using Lightroom 2 and Photoshop CS4″ was released I purchased it right away at a reasonable cost of $25.  What follows are a few of my thoughts on what, at the time, was John’s latest e-book.  Note: he has since released “Using Lightroom 3 and Photoshop CS5″ ($15).  Both e-books may be purchased on his website, which earns you a PDF of whatever book you’ve chosen.

John clearly states on his website that neither of these titles are intended to be “how-to” books.  Rather, they are a rare glimpse inside the processing habits of a seasoned pro.  In fact, the highlight of the book for me were the examples where John discusses not only the step-by-step workflow used on each image, but his reasons for making each adjustment.  Truly invaluable material.

I’ve been using Lightroom since version 1 was released in 2007 (or maybe early 2008).  I’ve read and own a couple ”how-to” books, the best of which is Nat Coalson’s “Lightroom 3: Streamlining Your Digital Photography Process“.  It’s safe to say I’m no spring chicken when it comes to using Lightroom and Photoshop.  I mention this because I believe someone newer to working in the digital darkroom will find John’s e-book much more useful than I.

Having said that, here’s what I really like about John’s e-book:

• As usual, John doesn’t use technical jargon or geek speak.  His instruction is easy to understand and flows nicely.
• I’m glad he spent a few pages discussing the importance of devising a system for organizing your digital files early in your career.
• The short chapter on “Getting Started” touches on just about all of the most important aspects of configuring Lightroom for optimal performance.
• His thoughts on the initial edit of images after downloading them to your computer were helpful.
• Shortcuts!  Using shortcuts in Lightroom can dramatically increase the speed with which you are able to process images and John details the most used ones, even providing a handy cheat sheet.

What didn’t I like?  Really, it isn’t so much that I didn’t like certain things.  I just found that for me, as a fairly experienced user, some of the content was too basic.  By no means does that make this a bad investment.  If you are newer to using Lightroom and Photoshop, this may well be the best place to start.  If you’re an experienced user, you’ll benefit from the examples and possibly from one or two of the Photoshop tutorials on such topics as image blending or luminosity masking. 

The bottom line is this: you can’t write a fairly generic book and have it appeal to newbies and power users at the same time.  ”Digital Processing: A Personal Workflow Using Lightroom 2 and Photoshop CS4″ succeeds in keeping both sides happy about as well as can be expected.  Would I spend $25 on the book, if I had known then what I know now?  Yep.  Those examples I mentioned earlier are worth the price of admission alone.  Consider the rest of the content a nice bonus.

I haven’t yet purchased “Lightroom 3 and Photoshop CS5″ although I do plan to pick it up.  I’ll do a separate review on it at some point in the future.  If you’ve got either one, please take a moment to leave a comment with your thoughts and opinions on them.

It isn’t often that I get all fired up about software.  However, the announcement that Nik Software’s newest Lightroom and Photoshop plug-in, HDR Efex Pro, will be available for public consumption in October has me as giddy as a girl in a prom dress.

I’ve experimented with HDR in the past using what most consider the current industry standard software – HDRSoft’s Photomatix.  Frankly, I wasn’t terribly impressed.  Now, that isn’t to say that stunning images can’t be created using Photomatix, or for that matter, any other HDR software.  To the contrary, just read Royce Howland’s guest post on my blog last week, “Why I Love HDR - Part 1“.  Then pay a visit to his galleries to see some of the most amazing HDR landscape photography I’ve ever seen.  Clearly, Royce has mastered Photomatix.

After failing at HDR I went back to using filters to tame dynamic range.  Then I tried my hand at manual exposure blends.  While I love the control and final result of blending images by hand, I don’t love staring at a computer monitor for hours on end doing the tedious work required of the technique.  So, I’ve gone back to using filters.  Again.

Now, in walks Nik Software and their badass new HDR Efex Pro plug-in.  Okay, fine – I’m being a little sensationalistic.  I can’t really call it badass yet because I’m not one of the chosen few who was given a pre-release copy to run through the wringer.  But, if it’s even half as good as their other plug-ins it will in fact be badass.  Nik Software knows how to make software for people like me, who would much rather be outdoors photographing than sitting at a desk.  I have complete faith that HDR Efex Pro will allow me to create stunning, natural looking images in less time than blending by hand.  Naturally, you’ll all be the first to hear my initial impressions once I’ve had some time to spend under the hood with it.

Nik is currently taking pre-orders  on HDR Efex Pro, slated for release in October.  Anyone who purchases the Nik Complete Collection after July 25, 2010 will receive HDR Efex Pro free upon release.  And, if you don’t feel like paying full price for any of the Nik plug-ins, you can always use coupon code “BEDGE” at checkout to receive a 15% discount on your order from the Nik Store.

Until October, tick-tock…

Are you excited to try out Nik Software HDR Efex Pro?  What HDR software are you using now?  Let us know in the comments section!  

All text and images are provided courtesy of Royce Howland and are protected under copyright laws.  I invite you to link to this article but please do not re-post the content without prior approval from Royce.  A huge “thanks” to Royce for writing this article and allowing me to publish it here on my blog.  As a side note, if you’ve ever wanted to photograph the Canadian Rockies in autumn you should definitely check out Royce’s “Fall 2010 Photo Tour“!  Enjoy the article and be sure to leave your thoughts on HDR in the comments section.

I’m mainly a landscape photographer, and I’ve been using High Dynamic Range (HDR) techniques in my work for about 5 years now. During that time I’ve used HDR on many images. In fact, I’d venture to say that HDR has become nearly indispensable to my way of working. I don’t use it for everything, and it’s not the only tool in my toolbox, but it’s a very important part of my process.

I’ve done some thinking about HDR and photography, and written about it as well as discussed it with people. I’ve also read quite a bit written by others, both pro and con. It’s now clear to me that there are two kinds of people in the world: those who love HDR, and everyone else.

(Side note – okay, okay. Really, there are two kinds of people: those who think there are two kinds of people, and everyone else. But this is about HDR and photography, not some kind of social studies. And I needed a controversial-seeming opening line.)

Elliott Peak At First Light, White Goat Lakes

When I show my images or prints and disclose something about the part that HDR plays, those who know about digital photography or post-processing frequently have a reaction like “Wow, that doesn’t look like HDR, it looks natural!” Hmm. First, thanks very much – it’s a gratifying comment to receive. It’s my intention to present art, not artifice, and I don’t want my use of technique to be very front-and-center to the visual experience. The main point should be the image itself, not the processing.

But second, there’s something else going on with this interaction. Maybe there’s an implication that my images don’t look like HDR because HDR must look “unnatural”. Just maybe there’s a feeling that there’s a little something different to my images even though they still look kind of “normal”. There are definitely some assumptions about what a “natural” or “normal” photograph is. What’s up with this?

Perhaps a few of those who know that HDR exists and don’t love it simply don’t understand it the way I do. That’s right – HDR isn’t bad, it’s just misunderstood! I don’t want to try to convince anybody to adopt something they don’t need; but on the off chance there is room for clarification, I thought I would write something new about Why I Love HDR.

So what’s to love? I can sum it up in two phrases, five words: high fidelity capture and creative development.

High Fidelity Capture

The Sun Is Shining… But the Ice Is Slippery, Preacher's Point

I don’t want to spend a ton of time on this part because it has been written about at length, by myself and others. However it does set the stage so I don’t want to gloss over it too quickly, either.

High fidelity capture is about the technical or craft part of the equation: one aspect of mastery of tools and techniques. Craft is interesting, and it’s an important part of things like achieving personal style, effectively interpreting subject material and presenting an engaging vision. Many photographers really gravitate to the craft aspect of photography. I suppose in part it’s because the tools and techniques are tangible, fun to debate, learnable by many avenues, and we can feel a sense of accomplishment in getting a grip on successive elements of the craft.

Thinking about the craft of digital photography, I remember a time not so long ago when a category of debates raged. Remember these? RAW vs. JPEG. Lossily compressed JPEG vs. lossless TIFF. 8-bit vs. 16-bit. Image layers vs. destructive image edits. sRGB vs. Adobe RGB vs. ProPhoto RGB. On and on they went, until they mostly just sort of died away; now we rarely read or engage in these arguments any more. Why? Because they are all arguments about fidelity and it has become more or less accepted that throwing away fidelity early in the digital image workflow isn’t that great an idea, as a rule.

Sure, there are cases where sacrificing fidelity is a trade-off that can – or perhaps must – be made. Photojournalists targeting deadline-driven distribution via low resolution print or web reproductions. Sports or event shooters ripping through massive volumes of frames and needing efficient workflows with rapid turn-around time. Travel photographers going for long periods of time without access to plentiful storage, electricity or bandwidth. But for those of us who are more like fine art landscape photographers working from home base, raise your hand if you still shoot 8-bit sRGB JPEG’s in the camera for your main work. Anyone? No, I didn’t really think so.

Okay, so with that set-up, consider an HDR image file – and I mean a real HDR image file. One with a file type like .hdr or .exr, not something that’s been rendered back down into a normal TIFF. Think of this HDR image like a RAW file on steroids. It sniffs at debates of bit levels, color space gamuts, or tone curves. It sneers at issues of dynamic range like clipped highlights or noisy, blocked shadows. An HDR file is something called a scene-referred image. At its best, it’s got all the contrast, every hint of detail, the full range of color of the original scene, all the way from the brightest highlights to the darkest shadows. In essence, it has all of the light. Photographers work with light – it’s the foundation of our medium. Doesn’t it sound appealing to have access to all of the light in a single, high fidelity capture? It does to me! My frustration with the dynamic range of digital capture some years ago is precisely what first prompted me to try HDR when I first discovered it.

Are there limitations? Yes, you bet. They come up largely because for most of us, currently, HDR is a bolt-on to traditional digital photography with cameras that aren’t actually designed for HDR. (“Traditional digital photography” – there’s a generational statement!) We HDR shooters typically take a bunch of exposure-bracketed frames and merge them using software on a computer. Some cameras coming on the market recently (notably from Pentax) are starting to push HDR functions into the camera, but so far they’re still based on taking multiple exposures and somehow merging them after the fact. Merging exposures brings the same kind of problems as with any frame blending technique – moving camera or moving subject elements in the scene. Motion over time leads to the need to develop image alignment & morphing approaches, ghost removal retouching tools, that kind of thing. These are time consuming, sometimes don’t work well, and can’t solve everything even when they do work.

But trust me, this will change – in fact it is changing. Digital photography is photography, and so many of the hallmarks of the last century or more of the practice still apply. But it’s also digital, and that means profound advances in photographic capability are happening extremely fast compared to what went before. A digital camera is in large part a computer running software; things that only can be done on a desktop computer today might be done in the camera tomorrow. There are native HDR capture cameras already in existence that can capture HDR files without shooting separate exposures and then merging them. These cameras are specialized, expensive and limited in ways that make them unsuitable for most of us. But more R&D is going on and I believe we’ll have affordable, useful, native HDR capture cameras well before I’m too feeble and broke to use them. (Knock wood!)

Summing Up

Fresh Snow in Bright Sun 2, Mistaya Canyon

Okay, I’ve covered this part of the topic for the moment. Let me sum up. Regardless of how I get an HDR file, what I end up with is a high fidelity capture of the light on the scene. It has some nice characteristics that I can’t get easily (or at all) any other way for certain kinds of scenes – all the detail, all the color, all the dynamic range, none of the noise. That sounds great, almost like a TV commercial! There are limits, many related to motion; but in situations where those limits aren’t a factor, a new kind of master image file is there for the taking.

I love having this kind of high fidelity master, both as a point of philosophy and practicality. But such images, and the processing techniques that produce them, are mainly about craft. It isn’t sufficient to stop there because I haven’t really done anything yet in terms of my intent to realize the final image. As Ansel Adams said in one of his most commonly quoted statements, “You don’t take a photograph, you make it.” Having taken a high fidelity capture, going on to the next stage – creative development – is where the real action is for my image-making. And I think that’s also mostly where those who don’t love HDR are getting hung up.

So that’s the real big question – I’ve got a high fidelity capture, now what do I do with it? Stay tuned for part 2, where I’ll address creative development.

About Royce:

By day a mild-mannered IT consultant, Royce Howland is also a photographer based in Calgary, Alberta. Initially drawn to photograph birds and wildlife through his experiences as a birder, Royce became increasingly focused on turning his lens on the land itself. He loves exploring the rich array of photographic opportunities in his home region of the Canadian West, as well as travel destinations including the American Southwest and England. He is a member of the editorial team at NatureScapes.Net, and contributes photos and articles to various online and print publications. For more information, visit http://www.vividaspectphoto.com/.

Yes, this is a photography blog but it’s written by and for those whose photography is done outdoors in the mountains, canyons and deserts.  Since folks like us often spend time hiking to our photographic destinations I’ve decided to start including a few gear reviews of outdoor equipment I’m using as I explore the great outdoors.

I jumped on the softshell bandwagon back in 2002 or 2003, when Arc Teryx released their first softshell jacket.  I still own and use that jacket, which says a lot since I tend to go through gear at an alarming rate.  When most people think of softshells they think of heavier weight jackets and pants designed for cold weather.  That’s great, and they do work well in the cold, but for years I’ve wondered why no one had released a lightweight softshell pant for hiking in warmer climates.  Seemed like a no-brainer to me.  Finally, this year, I found just such a thing.

What I Like

The North Face Outbound Pant is constructed using a thin softshell material with a DWR (Durable Water Repellent) coating.  Unlike the old nylon fabric that most hiking pants are made of, these do not restrict movement at all thanks to four-way stretch.  Instead of binding and becoming uncomfortable they just stretch as you move, barely even reminding you that you’re maxing them out.  These pants are just flat out comfortable.

The DWR coating kept my legs dry in light rain, morning dew and when rock hopping cascading creeks.  I can’t say they’re waterproof but they have yet to absorb water.  It just beads up and rolls right off.  Nice!

The fabric is thin and doesn’t initially inspire confidence in it’s ability to withstand abuse.  After six weeks with the pants, hiking in slickrock desert and alpine mountain environments the pants still look new.  No holes, no loose threads – nothin’.  While six weeks certainly isn’t a long time I have worn my Outbound pants a lot during that time so I’m comfortable saying they’re built to last.

The North Face has included some nice touches, too.  There’s a small zipper pocket on the left thigh, vents at the knees and a built-in belt.  The fit is roomy without appearing gangsta rap baggy.  I really like that you can buy them in waist sizes instead of just “small, medium and large”, and that you can choose your inseam length.  Super handy when you’ve got disproportionately short legs like me.  The North Face Outbound pants are also available in a women’s cut and sizes and as shorts.

What I Don’t Like

At $80, they aren’t cheap but they aren’t the priciest, either.  My main complaint involves the built-in belt.  It seems to ride up over the waistband and dig into your skin after you’ve worn the pants for a while.  I notice it more toward the end of a long hike when I’m forced to cinch the belt down a bit tighter.  It’s a minor annoyance but an annoyance nonetheless.  Finally, I wish they were available in a color other than gray or khaki.  Yes, I am now being uber-picky.

Other manufacturers are now making thin softshell pants for hiking/scrambling/climbing.  I’ve seen some by Marmot and another pair by Arc Teryx.  Both are more expensive than the Outbound pant, although I suspect they are every bit as good.

Conclusion

The North Face Outbound pants totally rock.  They’re comfortable, durable, water repellent and well-featured at a reasonable price.  They are definitely worthy of my seal of approval.

Dan and I were fortunate to partner with former Artist-in-Residence at the Grand Canyon, Adam Schallau, to create our latest iFotoGuide app for the iPhone/iPod Touch.  Adam’s intimate knowledge of the many locations and moods the Grand Canyon has to offer, both on the North and South Rim, virtually guarantees that your next photo trip to the park will be the most productive one yet.

iFotoGuide: Grand Canyon is filled with useful content and inspirational images.  The app is designed to help you plan your entire trip, from selecting lodging, renting a car and finding a good place to eat all the way to the really good stuff – where to set up your tripod, when to be there and what equipment you’ll need to create dynamic images.  As with all iFotoGuide apps, it is fully interactive and allows you to access critical information in several ways.  We’ve even stuffed a full park map into the app with zoom and pan capabilities!

Visit the Apple iTunes App Store to download iFotoGuide: Grand Canyon for your iPhone or iPod Touch today.  At only $4.99, it’s significantly less expensive than your average guidebook!

I vaguely remember the old days, back before I had an SLR and lenses and filters and a tripod, when I’d see a pretty scene, whip out my point & shoot and take a picture before continuing on my way.  I wasn’t creating art.  Nope, I was just memorializing on film (yes, film) a scene or a moment that intrigued me.  Nothing more, nothing less.  Things are different today.  I lug around a big D-SLR with several lenses, a few filters, a tripod and a bunch of other stuff that I use not to record simple memories, but to create something approaching “art”.

Over the years I’ve heard photographers say they are “taking pictures, making images, capturing a moment, shooting photos” and a billion other phrases that essentially mean the same thing.  Or do they?

I can’t help but think that “taking pictures” or “shooting photos” is entirely different from what I and most other serious photographers do when we head out with our cameras.  I like to think that I am creating art.  By it’s very nature, art is subjective.  What I think is a gorgeous piece of artwork you may think is a bunch of squiggly lines on canvas.  So, the images I create, that I consider art, you may consider just another pretty photo.  Or, maybe it’s just another ugly photo.  Only you can decide that.  The point is this – I’m not just documenting a scene before me.  I’m trying to create something that is elevated from being a mere snapshot to something that others may consider to art.

What’s the difference?  Here’s what I think.  Taking a picture doesn’t involve much, if any creativity, very little effort and no creative vision.  You see a big mountain reflecting in an alpine lake, you walk up to the lakeshore, point your camera and click the shutter.  Done.

Creating art works in a whole different way.  Let’s assume the same situation; big mountain and pretty reflection in alpine lake.  Maybe you’re there mid-day and the sky is clear blue.  As you approach the lake you’re analyzing the scene before you.  Are there wildflowers lining the lake?  Is there an interesting rock just off the shore, or maybe the water is so clear you can see rounded cobbles receding into the depths of the lake.  Would any of it make an interesting foreground?  You study the landscape to determine if the rising or setting sun would best illuminate the mountain peak and whether or not there’s a ridge or a peak that will block that beautiful light.  You walk up and down the lakeshore looking for the most dynamic position from which to photograph the scene.  Will you need to use filters to control dynamic range or tame glare on the lake?  Maybe the scene would look better in autumn, or summer.  Perhaps you’ll have to keep coming back, over and over, to get just the right conditions with dramatic clouds over the peaks as golden light bathes the slopes and the perfectly calm lake catches a crystal clear reflection?  These and many more are all considerations flying through our minds as we visualize the art we want to create at this magnificent location.

And that brings me to a conclusion and a question.  Is the difference between “taking pictures” and “creating art” the act of visualizing an end result, then using your creativity and skills to make an image that fulfills your vision?

Now that you know how I feel, let’s hear your thoughts.  Is there a difference between “taking a picture” and “creating art”?  If so, what is it?  The discussion is open!

A couple weeks ago I upgraded from Lightroom 2 to Lightroom 3.  The upgrade, installation and catalog transfer went off without a hitch.  I was most concerned about transferring my LR2 catalog to LR3, and I did back up the catalog before initiating a transfer, but it was still a bit nerve wracking.  Fortunately, it was super easy and there were no complications.

At the time I upgraded I had just returned from a trip to the Tetons where I led a 3 day workshop with Adobe Certified Expert, Nat Coalson.  During the workshop Nat walked everyone through the process of importing, editing, cataloging and processing images using Lightroom’s powerful database and RAW conversion utilities.  He also mentioned that Lightroom 3 renders images much better than Lightroom 2.  Needless to say, I was anxious to not only see my images from the trip but also to see what this new version of Lightroom could do.

Once my images were imported I began the editing process.  I immediately noticed a different in how images were rendered using LR3.  They looked better, cleaner maybe, although I can’t quite put my finger on it.  Definitely an improvement.  I found a few images and got to work processing them.  All was going smoothly until I started using the adjustment brushes, clone/heal tool and the graduated filter – they were slow.  Super slow.  Unbearably slow, actually.  All of those tools screamed in LR2.  Why now were they all dogs?

I did some research and it didn’t take long to discover that this was a common problem.  I emailed Nat and asked if he had any suggestions.  Luckily, he did.  He also sent me a couple links I hadn’t already found that I discovered were quite helpful.  It appears that Adobe is also aware of the issue and are working to resolve it.  That’s all fine and dandy but I needed it fixed NOW because frankly, I don’t have much patience.

One of the links Nat referred me to was an entry written by the Lightroom Queen on her blog.  This is a great article and her blog is an awesome resource for anything and everything related to Lightroom.  Bookmark it and you won’t regret it.

In the end, I did two simple things that seem to have worked to speed up the performance of Lightroom 3, including using the aforementioned adjustment brushes.

1)  Optimize your catalog.  This alone helped a little bit, but I didn’t see significant improvement.  I’ve got Lightroom 3 set up such that every time I quit the application I’m prompted to back up and optimize the catalog.  Not a bad idea, really.

2) Increase the Camera Raw Cache.  The default setting for this cache is 1 GB.  Unless you’re using a 3.2 megapixel camera from 2001 this likely won’t be enough.  The maximum cache is 50 GB.  I set mine to 30 GB.  Problem solved.  I’ve had no issues with LR3 being sluggish in about a week now.  Making this change seemed to have the most profound effect on Lightroom 3 performance.  To increase the Camera Raw Cache, on a Mac, follow this click string: Lightroom > Preferences > File Handling.  At the bottom of the dialogue box you will see “Camera Raw Cache Settings”.

I have no doubt there are other fixes but this is what worked for me.  It will be interesting to see what Adobe does to resolve the issue globally.  Whatever it is, hopefully they get to it sooner rather than later.  Adobe, are you listening?

Got a tip to share that’ll make Lightroom run faster?  Post a comment and help out a frustrated fellow photographer!

Some call me obsessive, others call me compulsive and I admit to both.  Over the last decade I visited Yellowstone National Park at least a dozen times.  Each time, while driving through the park, I passed a forest of ghostly trees whose trunks were bleached and faded from acidic hot spring runoff and intense alpine sun.  Each time I thought, “Hey, that’s a really cool location and one day you should stop and see about making an image of the place.”  I’ve had this image in the back of my head since my first visit almost ten years ago.  It has gnawed at my brain for damn near a decade.  Finally, a couple weeks ago, I decided to do something about it.

Early June, 2010 I decided to pack up my truck and head north for a two week road trip in the greater Yellowstone area.  This was my opportunity to make the image I’d been visualizing all those years.  It would require an overcast day, ideally some mist or fog, and a little luck in finding a successful composition.  Why luck?  This forest is literally right off the road.  The shoulder is about a foot wide, then it drops a couple feet into a meadow that is filled with runoff from hot springs where the rangers and common sense tell us we shouldn’t walk.  If you’ve ever been to Yellowstone you know that any person with a camera on a tripod attracts the attention of motorists, many of whom are driving rented RV’s that they aren’t used to driving.  When your ass is hanging over the fog line and you’re peering through the viewfinder with cars and RV’s speeding by you’ve got to be a little bit lucky to find a composition and avoid becoming roadkill.

When I arrived at the location I parked my truck in the only pullout I could find nearby which ended up being about 1/4 mile away from the ghost forest.  A short walk later and at last, there I was, standing before these beautiful but wretched trees with camera in hand.  The sky was uniformly grey but there was no mist or fog lingering amongst the trees.  Win some, lose some.  I scoped out the area and tried several compositions.  There was a small creek doing a gentle “S” curve through the trees.  Nice, but not it.  Then I found a section where the trunks were more spread out and the water was deep enough to catch some reflections.  Cool but still not what I had in mind.  I zoomed in, I went wide angle.  I just wasn’t feelin’ it and I was starting to get frustrated.  I had to keep telling myself that the image was here and that I just hadn’t yet found it.

After 30 minutes or so I started walking back to my truck with my head hung low.  I had failed.  The image wasn’t there after all.  Surely if I were a better photographer I would have realized my vision!  As I passed the end of the ghost forest I looked back over my shoulder for one last farewell glance.  What did I see?  The image!  Given a bit of distance the trees seemed to huddle closer together, presenting an almost abstract form.  There were the strong vertical lines, the somber color palette and seemingly infinite assortment of stark tree trunks.  I knew a longer focal length would compress the scene and make the trunks really appear to be stacked one on top of the other.  I quickly set up my tripod and went to work composing an image.  It didn’t take long and I had almost exactly what I’d been after all this time.  I made the image with the intent of cropping out most of the foreground to create a panorama, which would also contribute to the semi-chaotic and abstract nature of the trunks.

What’s the lesson here?  First, keep good mental notes.  If you see something that has potential but you don’t have the ability to work it right away, remember it.  Better yet, keep a “wish list” in a notebook, on your laptop or in your iPhone.  Second, don’t give up if at first you don’t find what you’re looking for.  Keep at it.  Dedicate yourself to working the location.  Lastly, when you do give up, don’t forget to look over your shoulder as you walk away.  You just never know when the photo you envisioned is going to decide to reveal itself to you.

Got a story to share about an elusive image?  Leave a comment and feel free to link to the image.  Maybe all our stories of the one that almost got away will inspire someone to go out and make some art!

Tonight I feel a bit like a mad scientist.  For some unknown reason I got an itch to try something totally new in Lightroom and Photoshop.  I made this image of bison grazing in the meadow at Mormon Row in the Tetons while there a couple weeks ago.  Straight out of the camera the image wasn’t terribly exciting but I felt it had potential.  Those of you who are familiar with my work know that my images are generally pretty straightforward.  I don’t apply creative effects and I process the images to look more or less like the scene did when I photographed it.  A little tweak of contrast here, add some saturation there, darken a sky now and again and do a little dodge and burning – voila, the final image appears.  I have nothing at all against images that have been heavily manipulated.  Photography is an art and we should feel free to create our art on our own terms.

Now, I have obviously taken some serious creative liberties with this image.  For starters, my camera doesn’t make square photos.  I used a fairly heavy digital grad filter to darken the sky with a heavy dose of clarity to give more separation in the clouds, added some global negative vibrance to mute the colors, made a curves adjustment to increase contrast, dodged the bison to make them stand out a bit more from the meadow, added a vignette and some “grain” – all in Lightroom 3.  I exported the image to Photoshop CS4 and experimented with different blurs using the gradient tool to keep the bison sharp-ish while blurring out the background.  I didn’t like the results of any of those efforts.  What to do?  Hmmm…

I decided to see what Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 could do for the image.  I used their “Classic Soft Focus” filter first, painting on the effects only where I wanted them.  I was getting closer but something was still missing.  I tried a few other filters that didn’t work out before discovering the “Glamour Glow” filter.  A very subtle application gave me the results I was looking for, again brushed on sparingly.  I used Nik Viveza 2 to add some additional global contrast and whiten the whites.  The final step was to use Nik Sharpener Pro to sharpen only the bison.  What you see here is the final result of all that wackiness.  Total processing time: about 35 minutes.

I think one of the greatest attributes of digital photography is that it has opened up a whole new world of creativity, both in the field and in post-production.  When it doesn’t cost a penny to click the shutter most photographers are more willing to try new things, experiment with composition and stretch the boundaries of what they’re comfortable with.  Things get even more exciting in the digital darkroom with panoramic image stitching, HDR, blended exposures, an endless variety of filters and plug-ins, not to mention what is possible with nothing more than Lightroom and Photoshop.  And, if you don’t like the results of your weird science, it’s real easy to go back to square one and start all over!

What do you think?  Some have said this image is “too flat”.  Some simply don’t get it.  That’s cool.  Certainly, this is not the kind of processing that is going to appeal to everyone.  I’m just really curious to hear your comments as I really stepped out of my comfort zone with this one.  Be as harsh and critical as you dare.  I’m a big boy and I can take it.  What have you done to experiment and broaden your creative vision?  Let’s hear some ideas!