NEW: One-To-One Mentoring and One-Day Field Workshop

I just updated some of my website, I know it is overdue, to include One-To-One Mentoring and new workshops. This is in response to those emails I sometimes get asking, what’s the best way to shoot X?, how can I improve Y?, how did you capture Z?, or a request for an image critique. Sometimes, if I am around I can respond with a short answer or a link direct to one of my articles but anything more can get time consuming. Of course taking one of my workshops offers the best opportunity to ask a myriad of questions. However, often peoples schedules have little flexibility or they prefer more extensive and personalized help in the area of landscape, wildlife, citiscapes/nightscapes, composition, digital darkroom or image critique... To that end I am now offering both One-To-One mentoring and private One-Day Field Workshops which can be combined.

One-To-One or personalized mentoring, begins with an assessment of your needs and weak areas. Then, through a combination of emails and phone conversations, appropriate electronic handouts, along with image critique, we will work towards improving your skills as a photographer so you can recognize and capture great compositions. Prices start at $199 for consultation, materials, 2 hours of phone time, critique for 20 images.

One-Day Field Workshop at New Jersey and Pennsylvania locations include
the Delaware Water Gap and Waterfalls at Ricketts Glen. These are a single day in the field shooting along with a walk and talk about landscape photography. The shoot includes image critique.

Happy New Year!!!

On a Personal Note, 53 and Still Going Strong

Last September I wrote a blog titled ’52 and Going Strong’. I had just finished my second cycle of the famed, P90X Extreme Home Fitness program which helped whipped me into incredible shape, and not just for my age. Now, a year later I’ve completed my fourth 90 day cycle of P90X and I am proud to say that I have made further progress, dropping 8 more pounds to 178, the lowest weight I’ve been in about 15 years. Not only that, I broke my personal chin-up record, now 30 reps, and my pushup record, 60 reps. If it sounds like I am bragging, well, perhaps a little. Long ago I was inspired by fitness guru Jack LaLanne, who performed new feats of strength each year on his birthday, I got into the habit of always ending a training cycle on my birthday with the goal of breaking new personal records. However, although I have been doing this since the mid-90‘s my weight had creeped up to an unacceptable 220 pounds, at 5’ 10”, about 4 years ago. Activities like backcountry hiking while lugging my photography gear became too restrictive. Not anymore.

So why am I writing about this in a photography blog? Because being overweight or out of shape is often a major a excuse for not getting shots that are more than a 15 minute walk from the car. In the past two years I got into hiking and camping for my landscape photo shoots. I had captured most of the easy, near the car shots, in my favorite places and began to explore the backcountry to shoot lesser known waterfalls and views from mountaintops. I often refer to these shots as the ones I earned. Being in great shape lets me take on major physical challenges that require up to 11 hours of strenuous mountain hiking. This year I took on my most ambitious mountain hike, the Franconia Ridge Trail up to and across three mountains in the Franconia Notch in New Hampshire. As a matter of fact I did it twice with the second trek earlier this week - blog to follow when I return home. The reward for this effort was unsurpassed views, a very soar body, and a grand sense of accomplishment. There is nothing like standing on top of a mountain you climbed or hiked that is the highest for miles around. These places are also allow for opportunity to shoot 360 degree panorama views.

I guess the moral of all this is if you enjoy nature and want to capture landscapes that have not been photographed by thousands of others, you need to be in good shape to get there. Don’t let age or weight become the excuse. It is possible to whip your body in great shape, even in your 50’s, if you have the time, dedication and discipline to take care of your most important piece of equipment, your body. I do recommend the P90X for that since but it is not simply a way to get strong, it is a way to get super fit - see short success story video from the President of Beach Body who completed and describes the course. A word of caution, P90X is not a program to go from out of shape to good shape, it is a program to take you from good shape to great shape - possibly the best shape of your life. If I can do it, so can you.

Looking for a Workshop....

Workshops are a great way to get out, travel to wonderful locations, enhance your photographic skills, and return home with many WOW shots to add to your portfolio. Of course I offer several Landscape Mastery workshops in some of the best fall foliage locations in the northeast like Acadia National Park, White Mountain Forest and the Delaware Water Gap, which I think are great because of reasons I list in this article. But, not everyone can or wants to visit those locations. So how does one find places that might work for them without extensive google searches? Well, the answer is www.allphotoadventures.com.

Allphotoadventures.com is relatively new website that has the largest selection of landscape, nature and wildlife photography tours, workshops, courses, holidays and expeditions, not just for the US but around the world. The site has a growing list of workshops and even Photo Tips which is definitely work checking out. You can register now and try it for free with a special introductory offer through June 30, 2011. Give it shot, pun intended.

Windland Smith Rice Awards Ceremony at the Smithsonian

Last week I had the privilege of being honored at the Smithsonian Museum as a winner of the Windland Smith Rice International Awards ceremony - that's me the 3rd from the right in the brown. This contest is sponsored by Natures Best magazine, a big, beautiful quarterly magazine that features some of the finest work in nature photography. The ceremony, held at the Smithsonian, included the category winners as well as those that achieved highly honored status (tie for second). The annual contest included approximately 26,000 entries submitted by photographers from around the world who are either professionals or advanced amateurs. My alaskan bald eagles picture was the winner in Birds category and can see seen or purchased here.

This ceremony also kicked off the annual Windland Smith Rice exhibit at the museum. My work, along with other highly talented photographers will be on display until the fall for all to see. It was indeed an honor to among the winners and an extra special honor for myself since this marks the second win for me. In addition to my two wins, 2008 and 2010, I was also Highly Honored in 2009. It is certainly a special feeling to know my work is being displayed at one of the finest museums in the world. The exhibit helps to inspire other photographers as well as bring public awareness of the beauty and wonders of the natural world.

Laptop Hard Drives - Bigger is Better

Todays laptops are rapidly becoming desktop replacements, especially with Intel’s new line of CPU’s which blow away the performance of older, Core2Duo processors, and with 8GB of RAM (2 x 4Gb) costing less than $100. Although most laptop monitors are TN panels and not ideal for image editing, (color and brightness vary with viewing angle), this limitation is easily overcome by using a quality external monitor like an NEC. The only other significant piece of performance related hardware left is the hard drive.

The hard drive you use affects both performance and storage capacity. Faster drives have faster read/write times allowing the computer to boot faster, load applications and image files quicker, and let you scroll through huge files with less lag. In addition your hard drive may also be used for scratch when you run out of RAM. Super fast SSD drives are the future and in a league of their own when it comes to performance but they command a huge price/GB making them out of the range for most people. For example, a 500GB SSD costs nearly $1,000 while 7200 rpm 500GB Hitachi Travelstar costs only about $60 (as of this writing).

If you are a photographer you likely have a growing library of images and if you prefer the flexibility of a laptop without having it tethered to a external drive to access a huge library then there is good news. Laptop drives now sport up to 1TB capacity although these 1TB drives currently have a slow spin rate of only 5200-5400 rpm (WD and Samsung). Those drives are also thicker, 12.5mm, since they use three platters and may not fit in some older laptops (they do fit in all unibody MB and MBP laptops). However, if you want both speed and storage the best option might be the latest 750GB 7200rpm drives like WD Scorpio Black or Seagate Momentus. These are faster than 1TB drives because although the density is about the same, they spin about 30% faster and that means better performance.

I recently replaced the 320gb, 5400 rpm stock drive in my MBP with a big, fast 750GB,Western Digital Scorpio Black for only $109 from Amazon. Scorpio is WD’s name of their laptop drives while ‘Black’ is their faster, 7200rpm drive (WD Blue spins slower at 5400rpm) Note: replacing the hard drive or the RAM in a Mac laptop does not harm your warranty unless you break something in the process. This drive has extremely positive reviews, especially with MBP owners. The Seagate is also a good choice but reviews have it as a bit noisier and it only has a 3 year warranty while the WD is 5 years. In addition to now having significantly more storage there are also very tangible performance differences. For example, boot times for my MBP, went from about 48 seconds down to about 35 seconds - this is with the new drive storing about 500GB. Software loads about 20-50% faster with Photoshop CS5 opening in as little as 7 seconds the first time after booting up. Also, the ability to scroll through a huge number of large files is noticeably faster as is waking from sleep mode. Bottom line, my laptop, a 15” 2010 MacBook Pro, is just snappier all around.

I used Carbon Copy Cloner, Mac only, to clone my slower stock hard drive. Installation of that drive took under 15 minutes - you can google videos for how to swap the drive. If you think that you don’t need that much space, then think again. Ideally you should have more space than you need if you want to keep your computer snappy. As a drive fills up information is stored closer to the center of the platters instead of the outer portion. Data density is constant but the speed at which the out part of the drive passes by the heads is faster than the inner part so having a fast spinning drive that has plenty of empty space is required for optimum performance. If you are looking to boost performance and store more stuff, consider the 750Gb WD Scorpio Black with a 5 year warranty. Mine is dead silent with only the slightest vibration that I feel in my fingertips. Some user report no vibrations at all but I can’t make that claim. Performance is not all about CPU speed. That is just one bottleneck, the others are RAM and your hard drive. Just check to make sure you do not violate your warranty when upgrading.

Long exposures with a Hitech 4-stop ND

These days many people look to the latest cameras to capture sharp hand held images in low light using very high ISO settings for the fastest shutter speeds. A fast shutter speed freezes motion but there are also advantages to working at the other end of the spectrum - ultra slow shutter speeds. Slow shutter speeds can blur motion and create many desired special effects from motion like moving cars, people, clouds, water....

Experienced landscape photographers know that the photography is not just a technique to record your surroundings. Good composition and light, along with special effects like long shutter speeds can separate your work for others. Long exposures on a windy day can soften clouds; in streams it changes the texture of water in rapids or can capture beautiful leaf swirls in circulating pools of water; on beaches is can create an ethereal look when waves crash against the shore, and for waterfalls it lets you capture a silky look. Long exposures are done by using one or more methods like dialing down ISO to a very low setting, stopping down (unless you desire selective focus), and using a ND or neutral density filter. A CPL or circular polarizing filter, which is IMO the single most valuable filter to own, has the ability to act as a 1 - 1.5 stop ND filter. Screw on filters like a 3-stop ND filter are great but sometimes when the light is strong, and/or you want very long shutter speeds, 3-stops is just not enough. The next move is a denser filter like a 6-stop screw-on, or a very expensive Singh-Ray vari-ND, or using something like a flat 4-stop ND filter from Hitech.

I strongly prefer the flat design of 100x100mm 4-stop Hitech ND, which I have been using for about 2 years. The problem with the 6-stop screw on is that it can get too dark to easily compose or focus, especially in low light with a f/5.6 lens. Also screwing on and off can be a bit of a pain and time consuming. The nifty alternative is something like the SR vari-ND - which I also owned and used for about a year before before settling on a square 4-stop Hitech. The reason I did not like the SR is 1) it does not meter correctly due to the physics of the design so one must use manual mode and take a test shot or two to determine the proper exposure settings for set filters settings - if you are experienced and work quickly and instinctively as I do this can be real drag, 2) it is useless for the widest angle work since it will vignette - that means that you must own two sets of filters to cover all possible focal lengths. A flat filter held over anything has zero vignetting, 3) it is easy to over dial in the density which results in a weird cross pattern from the dual polarizers which is not obvious in the viewfinder. 4) they are very expensive and therefore tricky to justify especially since you will likely need still another filter to handle the wide end, and 5) it is slower to use than simply holding a square filter over the lens or mounted filter.

I shoot a significant amount of waterfalls each year plus many streams and shores... I often use a CPL filter to manage glare when working with water which also helps with about a stop or so of density. If longer exposures are desired but not glare handling I just screw on my six year old 3-stop ND. When I need more the just hold my 4-stop over the lens or filters since there is no fear of vignetting and I can quickly see and shoot both fast and slow shutter speeds without screwing around, (pun intended) or metering things. If I desire very long shutter speeds like 20 - 60 seconds and plan on doing a lot of that type of work I simply can use my Hitech with a Cokin Z-holder so I don’t have to keep holding yet can quickly remove and replace. All my grad-ND’s are the larger Z-size since I prefer to handhold and bigger is easier to hold. This works great when doing things like capturing the pattern of swirling leaves where I want as long an exposure as possible, like a minute or more and using Bulb mode where one needs at least one free hand to end the exposure. However, more often than not I simply use it hand held.

To see what I am doing I first compose (possibly with a CPL or another 3-stop ND screwed on which is plenty of light to see what I am doing). Once I compose I use the AF button to lock in the focus without locking in the exposure - which is what happens when you depress the shutter halfway. I then place the filter over the lens, expose and shoot. This gives me plenty of flexibility to quickly shoot something both fast and slow as well as have my viewfinder bright enough to see. Very simple, very fast, and very affordable, my 4-stop Hitech ND resides in my Tamrac filter belt pack along with my other round filter filters so it is always at my fingertips. At about $70 this filter is nicely priced and will help you produce some very nice captures impossible without it. A few weeks ago as winter came to an end I hiked to Kaaterskill Falls in the Catskills on a bright sunny day. Using my CPL filter, ISO 100, and f/13, the water was still moving too fast to get a silky look so I just reached down and grabbed my 4-stop and held it over my CPL and voila, I was able to get my desire speed of 1/10 sec in bright light and a silky waterfall. I own 10 filters, 5 grad-ND, 2-CPL’s (different sizes), 2 ND’s, and a clear filter for foul weather condition. With those I can do just about anything and they are always at my side. I highly recommend this design filter over the alternatives.

Are You in Shape for Spring?

It’s spring and many landscape photographers will be going outdoors over the next few months to shoot. For those that already have many of the easier shots in their portfolio, meaning the captures that require little effort and are within a five minute walk from the car, it might be nice to explore more possibilities by hiking into the backcountry. However, if you are packed on the pounds over the years or from had a sedentary winter this task might be a bit of a challenge. I write this blog since this month represents three years from when I hit my peak weight of 220 pounds at 5’ 10”. Although I have been into bodybuilding for about 35 years and was strong I was also overweight and not in the best of shape for hiking far with a tripod and other necessary photo gear. On a spring trip to the Great Smoky Mountains in 2008 I had some backaches and frequently popped motrin to reduce soreness brought on by carrying excess weight. Plus, I really hating getting down low to shoot flowers. It was a turning point, especially since my pants were a tight fitting size 38. New clothes or new body was my choice I went for the latter and now wear a loose fitting size 34.

Losing weight and getting in great shape when one is middle age is tricky business that requires sacrifice, some knowledge of proper nutrition, and discipline. Within one year I was down to about 200 ponds and within two years I was closer to 190 and in the spring of 2010 I found myself going where few photographers have gone before, hiking well into the backcountry of some of my favorite shooting locations. Not only was getting into shape by changing my diet and exercise routines but I was also shooting many beautiful places like little known waterfalls and mountaintop views that I earned by hiking to them. The added plus was that now that I was fit enough to hike for miles and miles, the hiking itself helped to burn off even more fat - I got myself down to 179 pounds in late October 2010, weight I hadn’t carried since the mid-90’s.

So how does one get there from here? That’s complicated but it obviously involves a combination of proper diet and exercise. A little over a year ago I changed shifted my workouts from heavy weights to using my body as the weight (pushups, chin-ups, yoga...) by embracing the P90X program which is an intensive home program, less for going from poor shape to good shape, and more for going from good shape to great shape - or better stated, the best shape of one’s life. But, exercise alone is not enough. It must be supplemented with proper diet. I won’t get into much detail on that but I can recommend a few nutritional tips that everyone should observe. These include the followings, always eat something upon awakening - not a donut but proteins and some fat, eat frequent smaller meals instead of one or two large meals, cut down on processed food, especially simple carbs, cut down on carbs in general, and don’t eat within 2 hours or before bedtime. Personally I also juice often, mostly carrot and apple juice (for about 20 years), and take a spoon or two of fresh cod liver oil for my essential fatty acids, Braggs raw apple cider vinegar with the mother each day and use probiotics as well. I got into apple cider about four years ago after experiencing a few months of agita or heartburn. Popping antacids offered temporary help but it just didn’t go away. I then learned that the symptoms of too much stomach acid are the same as too little. Almost all doctors will put you on a purple pill - for life. Anyway, I then assumed my problem was too little acid and tried ACV and voila, my heartburn went away permanently. Plus, the ‘mother’ that normally gets filtered out in commercial products, includes enzymes and probiotics that body needs. I mention this only because heartburn medication is one of most common medications and many people might be fighting the wrong war.

So if you want to get out and about in the great outdoors to shoot in places that others don’t to get unique pictures in your portfolio, you need to be in good shape and not carry around more than you have to, both in gear and around your hips and waste. It is easier to carry 20 pounds of gear if you can get rid of 20 pounds of fat and are keeping yourself fit. The photo above is me, taken earlier this month at the age of 52 and a half. I did get pumped for the shot by doing only one set of chin-ups, 26, and one set of pushups 56 - both were new personal records (I am 185 lbs in that photo). If I can do it so can you, just eat right and exercise. Happy shooting!!!