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August 30, 2012

Exposure - little helpers

sekonic.jpg
OK, now everybody is choosing Manual mode from camera's choices of modes, or at least semi auto. Then you know what metering mode to choose to make your camera worth the money spent. But how can we take the correct exposure to another level? What makes some photographs stand up from the crowd, where many are just grey average, even we exposed the image to what we call correct?


Luckily, there are some cheats and aids on the market which can do exactly this things for us. Well, they won't do it by their self, they help you do it by yourself. Some of them are already built in your camera, or editing software, some of them you can buy and they are really cheap, some of them are more expensive. So let's have a look at them.

18% grey card
Grey card is simple piece of cardboard, paper, cloth or whatever printed in 18% grey shade. It also can be a reflector from one side and grey card from the other, which is quite handy. They come in different sizes and shapes, you just have to pick one which suits you the best.
grey card.jpg
How it works? If light conditions are not what you'd call ideal, let's say you have really bright background, or too dark scene, you just simply point your camera (set to auto or semi auto mode) to the grey card and take the exposure reading. As camera exposure metering works with 18% grey, you'll have correct exposure for every light condition. But be careful, "correct" exposure might not bring you desired result. It is also handy when shooting wedding, where correctly exposed bride's bright white dress is a must and it often can fool your camera's metering system. They are really cheap, some of them are downloadable for free, just ask Mr. Google.

Filters
Filters can really make a difference and make your pictures stand out from the crowd. More about filters can be found in my previous articles here and here.

Light meters
Why the hell you should invest to the light meter if your camera already has one? The answers is, because your camera takes exposure reading of the light reflected by the subject and light meter measures light falling on the subject. Those of us, who paid attention at physics lessons know it might be a significant difference with some materials and colors. For those of you who didn't, simple explanation says that some materials and colors absorb more  light then the others and reflect the rest. Therefore the light meter makes sure that you have always the right exposure. Of course you have to shoot on Manual and set every exposure value by yourself. How it works? You simply set the ISO and desired aperture on the light meter and press the button. Light meter tells you what shutter speed is correct. It has got few modes, usually sunny, cloudy and flash settings, but it vary from model to model.
Thumbnail image for sekonic.jpgSekonic 1.jpg













Light meter is also a must have accessory for die hard manual photographers shooting on film, who haven't got the option check the result on LCD screen. It is also handy think to have for studio photographers for setting lights.

Histogram
Histogram has been briefly explained here. It tells you the truth about tonal distribution through your image where LCD screen can fool you. And don't worry, if you didn't get it right in camera, histogram is also available in every editing software. Don't be scared of graphs, once you learn how to read it and use it, you never look back.

Exposure override
In semi auto modes there is a magic button called "exposure override" available. On scale from -2 for dark image through 0 for correct exposure to + 2 for very bright shot you can tell your camera if you'd like it to make the image darker of brighter. It really does the magic, it is very useful feature.

Exposure bracketing
This feature is also built in your camera (if you have a digital one). Camera takes usually three shots (you can set some cameras to 5 or more) with different exposure values (EV) and then you can decide at home which one is the best. You simply set the exposure bracketing for example to -1EV, 0EV and +1EV, but it also possible to set it in 1/3EV difference. You'll end up with 3 pictures of the same scene, but you'll be sure one of them is nicely exposed. This technique is also used to create HDR images, but you must have your tripod with you.

Posted by pkuzmin at 1:35 PM

August 29, 2012

Exposure - metering modes

exposure metering.jpg
It was easy stuff for cameras before we, photographers, get lazy. They were simple mechanical things which opened shutter curtain for time which photographer said will be good and let the light reach the film with dedicated ISO through the aperture, again, set by the photographer. But then we got lazy and we makes the camera thinks about exposure and pretty much anything. 

You can find out about how good or bad it is and what are the possibilities how camera can makes your life a misery with automatic modes here. Today we'll find out, how camera does the metering for "correct exposure" if you really want to leave it to poor camera.

So, in auto, or semi auto modes camera has to do the job for you. I auto modes completely, in semi auto you tell it what aperture, eventually shutter speed you'd like and camera calculates the rest. Let's not forget, camera calculates "correct exposure" as 18% grey tone average and metering modes are based on this fact and work with mid-tones. To give you a bit more control, how the exposure will be measured, camera offers you a few choices of metering modes. What's the difference then, if all modes work with mid-tones? Why do we need a variety of them? Well, every mode works with mid-tones, but every mode measures it in different pattern.

Spot and partial metering
Most spot meters have a precise metering circle that reads off 3% of the image frame, partial metering is little bit less precise and covers 9% of image frame. What that means? That means on whatever you point your camera, camera will think that is 18% grey mid-tone and will calculate the exposure based on that assumption. That also means you must be careful what you pointing your camera at and you should really point it somewhere where the mid-tones are. If you take the reading from highlight area, camera still assumes that is a 18% grey so the rest of the picture will be underexposed. On the other side, if you take reading from dark area, you'll end up with overexposed picture.

Spot and partial metering are ideal for portraits with back light, where multi-zone metering can be fooled by highlights in background and will underexpose your subject. Spot metering is also ideal for snowy conditions, where you should take reading form shadows to avoid underexposed image if you would do the reading form white snow. Over all in tricky light conditions with plenty of highlights, spot metering is the best choice.

Multi-zone metering
Multi-zone metering is the most sophisticated metering system available. It is reliable and will do correct exposure for vast majority of the scenes. How it works? It takes reading from whole frame, but to make it more precise, the whole frame is divided into zones. Yes, that's why it's multi-zone. It depends on model of your camera how many zones there are. Each zone takes a separate reading of whatever is in front of it, sends it to the processor where, using clever algorithms, camera decides what the correct exposure will be. 

Many times this works perfectly, that's why this metering mode is ideal for most situations without extreme light conditions. You can set it without any worries for most of your shooting and only change it if light conditions will change to something unusual.

Centre-weighted average.
This mode is a predecessor of multi-zone metering. It works on similar principle, it also takes in account the whole frame, but it hasn't got zones and it's most favorite area is center of the frame. Therefore is not as accurate as multi-zone, I'd say it is something between spot and multi-zone metering. 

But it has got it's usage. It's ideal for general portraits, where you can take reading from the face of the subject, what will be the metering's key area, it also consider light conditions in the background, but it won't give it that much attention to ruin your picture.

Next time we'll find out what aids and cheats there are available and you can use to bluff the exposure and create something different.

Posted by pkuzmin at 9:21 AM

August 28, 2012

Academy Director - Behind the Scenes, Part Two

Nikonians-Academy-Update.jpgNikonians Academy Director Mike Hagen is preparing for his custom expedition yacht photo adventure trip to the Galapagos Islands (Sept. 14-23). At press time , there are only two seats left. While preparing for the trip, Mike has filed behind the scenes reports highlighting the accomplishments and activities of his fellow Nikonians Academy instructors.

Here is Mike’s Report:
Continuing with last week's theme of showing off some of the projects from our group of professional photographer workshop instructors, we have updates from Rick Hulbert and Winston Hall. In Part Two, I'll let Rick and Winston fill you in.


Rick Hulbert

It is gratifying to work with people of all ages and skill sets who want to excel at documenting and interpreting the world around them through photography.

Hulbert_175.jpg
While the core of my teaching has centered around Architectural and Urban Photography, my recent photographic efforts include the development and instruction of workshops focusing on the following topics:

Garden Photography
Travel Photography
Street Photography
Heritage Photography
Real Estate Photography
Extended Dynamic Range Photography
Infrared Imaging
Pre-Visualization and Re-Visualization of Digital Imaging

The new series of Urban Photo Workshops that I am preparing for the Nikonians Academy will offer students instruction on any or all of the above topics as they relate to Photographing Cities and City Life.

My client base not only includes individuals from casual to professional photographers, but also includes the following Institutions, Galleries and Academies of Photography:

Nikonians Academy
Vancouver Photo Workshops
The University of British Columbia
Simon Fraser University
High Sierra Workshops

My recent photographic activities include speaking engagements at various camera clubs and professional associations.

I have recently written two published articles on enhancing ones financial bottom line though photography for Real Estate Agents and for Resort Development Industry Professionals.

If there is a request from any group of 6 or more Nikonians in any region, I will organize a "local" Urban Photography workshop specific to your needs and desires.

W_Hall_175.jpg
Winston Hall
I just finished creating a new D800 video training series called "Learn, Capture and Express Yourself with the D800 camera."

The program will be available as a DVD series or Quicktime movies. Due to ship on 15 September 2012.

My High Dynamic Range workshop has been completely updated to include the latest version of Photomatix Pro and NIK HDR Efex software.

The two day HDR workshops come to Colorado Springs, CO - Garden of the Gods on Sept 22nd and Salt Lake City on Sept. 29th.

Looking Ahead:
HDR_250.jpg
In other Nikonians Academy news, we have a very busy few months coming up in September and October. Les Picker's Acadia Maine workhop is sold out and so is Winston Hall's Monument Valley workshop.

We do have some space in our two wildlife photography workshops in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. We have a very cool two-day HDR workshop scheduled for Colorado Springs, CO - Garden of the Gods.

Also, our Master your Gear series of workshops will be traveling to Boston, MA, San Francisco, CA, Woodlands, TX, and Austin, TX with workshops like Master the Nikon D800/D4, The Passionate Photographer, and Master Adobe Lightroom 4.

For workshop details, dates and availability check our Nikonians Academy Home Page.

Posted by flashdeadline at 1:14 AM

August 22, 2012

Nikon announces three new COOLPIX cameras

NIKON-LOGO_125.jpgEasy on the budget and heavy on features, Nikon’s latest COOLPIX cameras include Wi-Fi connectivity, long-reaching zooms with vibration reduction (VR) and touchscreen operation.
The three new cameras range in price from $179.95 USD to $499.95 USD (suggested retail) and one of them will be an interesting link for social networking enthusiasts familiar with the Android operating system.

According to Nikon's official Press Releases, the three new cameras will be available next month.

Here are the highlights from Nikon USA's Press room:

Nikon’s COOLPIX S800c combines Nikon’s imaging technologies with built in Wi-Fi and the Android Operating System to allow for easy shooting and sharing of photos and HD video through various social networks.

Complete with a 16-megapixel CMOS sensor, 10x NIKKOR zoom lens, Full HD video recording, GPS and easy access to Android Apps, Nikon’s new camera is the perfect camera for “connected” individuals.

Nikon’s new flagship COOLPIX camera, the COOLPIX P7700 offers an unparalleled feature set for its class in a compact body. Featuring a 12.2-megapixel sensor, 7.1x zoom f/2 NIKKOR ED glass lens, manual controls and Full 1080p HD capability.

For the active and stylish photographer who needs a convenient camera for every on-the-go moment, Nikon has introduced the COOLPIX S01, an ultra-mini point-and-shoot. Complete with quick touchscreen operation and several Easy Auto Modes, taking photos has never been so fun and stylish.


S800c_275.jpg
COOLPIX S800c Highlights
• Wi-Fi Connectivity
• Runs the Android™ Operating System, access to Android Apps
• Easy shooting, editing and sharing photos through social networks
• 16-megapixel BSI CMOS sensor, EXPEED C2 image-processing
• 10x NIKKOR zoom lens with Vibration Reduction (VR)
• Full HD 1080p video and built in GPS technology
• Available in September 2012 in White and Black for a suggested retail price (SRP) of $349.95

P7700_275.jpg
COOLPIX P7700 Highlights
• 12.2-megapixel BSI CMOS sensor
• 7.1x zoom f/2 NIKKOR ED glass lens (28-200mm equivalent zoom range)
• Lens-Shift Vibration Reduction (VR)
• Full Manual Control (PSAM), 19 Scene Modes and Scene Auto Selector, RAW Shooting
• Full HD 1080p video capability
• Auto, Manual, AP, Custom movie modes
• Intelligent Autofocus and optical zoom
• 3-inch vari-angle LCD monitor (921,000-dot)
• Available in September 2012 in Black for a suggested retail price (SRP) of $499.95

S01_275.jpg
COOLPIX S01 Highlights
• Ultra-mini pocket-sized camera (3.1 x 2.1 x 0.7 in., 3.4oz)
• Easy-to-use touchscreen operation system
• Easy Auto Mode, including six scene modes
• 3x wide-angle zoom NIKKOR lens and EXPEED C2 image-processing
• Built-in Xenon flash
• Available in September 2012 in Silver, White, Red and Pink for a suggested retail price (SRP) of $179.95

Posted by flashdeadline at 6:29 AM

August 21, 2012

Nikonian Northern Exposure #5

 Do you want to make that jump to becoming a Professional Photographer?
However, just by picking up a camera and pushing a button does not make you a professional. Here are some great tips to become a pro, to market your photos, and to build your business.

Download Nikonian Northern Exposure #5 (NPC-NE-2012-08-14.mp3;48:02;MP3 format)


Peter Spence will give you invaluable advice and tips that you can use to become a Professional Photographer.  Includes: How Social Media Web Site like Facebook, Twitter, Flicker, and Blog will promote you to grow your photography business. ( Pictures taking by Heather Knockwood )


Posted by obrueck at 8:35 PM

New Firmware Version 1.10 for Nikon CX Lenses

Nikon has released Version 1.10 firmware for the 10-30mm and 30-110mm CX lenses. The update allows Nikon J2 cameras to be shut off by collapsing the lenses to their carry position.

The technical note reads:

When this lens is used with Nikon 1 cameras released in, or after, August 2012, the camera can be turned off by locking the lens barrel (retractable lens barrel button), even if the monitor has turned off and the camera has entered standby mode.

Editor's note - the only Nikon 1 camera released in August 2012 was the J2. So by definition (and anecdotally confirmed by owners in the field), the J1 and V1 do not enjoy this new feature.

Find the firmware links here (US links TBD - this will be updated as they become available)

Nikon Europe CX 10-30mm Firmware V1.10
Nikon Europe CX 30-110mm Firmware V1.10

Posted by covey22 at 3:47 PM

Academy director: behind the scenes

Nikonians-Academy-Update.jpgNikonians Academy Director Mike Hagen is preparing for his custom expedition yacht photo adventure trip to the Galapagos Islands (Sept. 14-23). The trip has only two seats left (at newsletter publication time). While preparing for the trip, Mike decided to file his latest update by focusing on the recent behind the scenes accomplishments and activities of three Nikonians Academy instructors.

Here is Mike‘s report:
Our instructors are some of the best in the industry. Each of them have established reputations as professional photographers who regularly work in the editorial and commercial realms.

Efrain Padro
Padro-175.jpg
The 2012-2013 issue of Guest Life El Paso, the Southwest's Prestige Magazine, features an image of a dancing señorita captured by Efrain. The image is titled Folklorico dancer.

Guest Life destination books can be found in better hotels in places like New Mexico, Vancouver and Monterey Bay.

The Summer 2012 issue of Santa Fean Magazine, Santa Fe's luxury lifestyle publication, features an article titled High Desert Drama, a behind-the-scenes look at the Santa Fe Opera.

Efrain took the photographs to illustrate the piece while on assignment for the magazine.
To see the article and photos go to pages 54-56.

El-Paso_225.jpg
Efrain's work has appeared in Geographic Expeditions catalogs, Outdoor Photographer, Frommer's Budget Travel, Photo Life (Canada), Bienvenidos Magazine (Puerto Rico), New Mexico Magazine, Texas Journey, Colorado State Vacation Guide, Santa Fean Magazine, as well as calendars, web sites, and other publications. He is the author of The Photographer's Guide to New Mexico.

Efrain is leading our five- day Puerto Rico travel workshop next February.

Lester Picker
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Les was honored with the 2011 Canada Northern Lights Award for travel journalism. Les describes his reaction to witnessing the Northern Lights for the first time in a July blog entry:

“I was standing on a mountaintop in Canada’s Yukon wilderness when they suddenly blazed across the sky. Nothing had prepared me for that moment. They literally took my breath away and I sank to my knees, thankful for the privilege of living in that moment.”

Les recently received a large contract to install 75 images at a major teaching hospital in Baltimore (Sinai Hospital).
lights-225.jpg

Several of the images are ridiculously wide; one is 29' and another is 19' and yet another at 14' wall covering). Most are fine art mounted and framed at 40x30. This is the first time the hospital has done this exclusively with an artist.

The new wing opens on Oct 10, 2012. Since this is for a traumatic brain injury unit, each image had to be vetted for appropriateness. About 1/4 of the images had to be local and had to be shot on location.

Lester is leading our sold-out Acadia NP Photography Adventure travel workshop in Maine, USA in October.

Michael Mariant
Mariant-175.jpg
Michael has been very busy between his workshops.

His schedule included work for The Associated Press and his consulting and travel photography work with the Semester at Sea study-aboard program.

In fact, right now, Michael is on the program's MV Explorer ship sailing on the Fall Semester at Sea voyage for a 107-day journey.

MV-explorer.jpg
Michael's nearly 4-month voyage will take him through the Atlantic rim, starting in Boston, then stopping in Halifax, Nova Scotia; Galway and Dublin, Ireland; London, England; Antwerp, Belgium; Lisbon, Portugal; Cadiz, Spain; Casablanca, Morocco; Tema, Ghana; Cape Town, South Africa; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Montevideo, Uruguay; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

He then sails 500 miles up the Amazon River to Manaus, Brazil, followed with a stop at the Caribbean island of Dominica, before returning to the United State in early December.

This is Michael's fourth 4-month journey with Semester at Sea. It is the same program that Michael collaborates with the Nikonians Academy for our annual Ultimate Travel Photography Workshop.

During his 4-month journey, Michael will be teaching classes in Travel Photography, Cinematography, and Digital Storytelling — in addition to wrapping up a new travel photography book. Prior to departing on the ship in early August, in between our workshops, Michael squeezed in two weeks of concert photography and video work for The Associated Press, covering several top country and rock acts.

Michael leads a number of workshops for us including Yosemite in Winter, Eastern Sierra, and Death Valley.

Looking for a workshop or photo travel adventure?
Visit our Nikonians Academy home page and feel free to search by geographical location, dates and topics.

Posted by flashdeadline at 2:59 AM

August 18, 2012

Exposure

D7000 mode dial.jpg
I am pretty sure it's been mentioned before, but if we want to talk about exposure, we have to start from basics. So what is exposure and how does it works? Exposure is amount of light reaching camera's sensor, or if you like, reaching the film in your camera. There are three main elements which control the exposure - aperture, shutter speed and ISO. That means, in whatever light situation you find yourself, those three elements must be in right ratio to allow exact amount of light reach your sensor and make correctly exposed image.


If for some reason the ratio wasn't right, you'll end up either with overexposed, or underexposed image. This may be good use if that was what you were aiming for, but if you want to manipulate pictures in that way, first you have to understand how to get it right. We are lucky now days with digital cameras and big LCD screens, where you can check the result instantly and make necessary corrections, but it wasn't that easy in film era. But even LCD is not always good reference point, especially in bright sunny day, so if you're not sure, use histogram. It is that scary looking graph of pixels, at the left side you have black and dark tones, right side is assigned to the light tones and white. That means in the middle, there are mid tones of course. The higher the peak in particular area is, the more tones are in that area. Simple as that.

correst exposure.JPG
correct exposure - histogram with mostly mid-tones

overexposed.JPG
overexposed image - histogram with mostly light tones

underexposed.JPG
underexposed image - histogram with mostly dark tones


Don't be scared to look at the histogram, it is good little helper. From images above you should see that correctly exposed image has got histogram with most tones in the middle. Overexposed image is lacking shadows, or dark tones, and of course underexposed image is lacking highlights and white tones. You are aiming for more most tones in the middle, without clipping shadows or highlights.

Controls

On the mode dial of your camera, you have the wide choice of exposure modes. Some are automatic (AUTO, scene modes), some are semi-automatic (A - aperture priority, S - shutter priority, P - program)  and there are few witch allows you to take full control over your exposure (M - manual, U - user defined settings)

AUTO AND SCENE MODES
In AUTO and scene modes, camera does all light measuring by itself. How it works? Clever sensors in camera calculate light situation and decide what aperture, shutter speed and ISO would be the best of use. Basically, metering system assume that area being metered is plain 18% grey, so average of all tones in the picture will correspond to that. Even better explained, if you'll put all dark, light and mid-tones from your histogram into the shaker and shake well, what you'll pour into the glass will be 18% grey color. 

It is similar story with SCENE MODES, but camera tries to adjust settings more suitably to scene, or shall we say type of the scene, you trying to shoot. For example if you set the dial to "PORTRAIT", camera sets small aperture number to create shallow depth of field to blur background. In the other hand, in "LANDSCAPE" mode camera sets aperture to higher value to achieve biggest sharpness through the field. In "SPORT" and "NIGHT" mode, more attention is  given to shutter speed for following reasons. If shooting "SPORT", camera is guessing you don't want to end up with blurry images, so it sets shutter speed as fast as possible and adjust other values accordingly. Of course, with some sports there is panning technique you'd like to use, but for this effect you can't use automatic scene modes. You can find out how to do that in this article. For same reason to avoid blurred images caused by shaky hands, camera sets fast shutter if you tell it you want to do some "NIGHT" shooting, or if you like low light scene, increase the ISO value and sets aperture accordingly.

As you can see, you can't set anything by yourself, so you had better forget your camera has an automatic modes.


SEMI-AUTOMATIC MODES
Even if you are complete beginner and you've just purchase your first DSLR, you should start shooting on semi-automatic modes. This gives you more control over your work, but more importantly you'll understand faster what you doing.

A - Aperture priority mode
This mode is good starting point for everybody and even professionals shoot many pictures using aperture priority mode. Basically, in this mode, you set the aperture you think is most suitable for the job (portrait, nature, macro - low aperture number, landscape, architecture - high aperture number) and camera will do the rest. But don't worry, you have more control. You can also set your ISO and exposure override. That means you have full control how good or badly exposed image you'll end up with. You can choose it on scale mostly from -2 for underexposure going by 1/3 of the step up to +2 for overexposure. 

Now you probably asking, why the hell should I choose underexposed image if I am trying to make correct exposure? Well, because light conditions are rarely perfect, so you need to mess up with the settings to make them as perfect as possible, that's what photographers do. Example: if your background is sky with white clouds, exposure you want is detailed shadows and dark tones at your object on the ground, but you don't want bleached out highlights. So if your exposure override is set to zero - correct exposure, camera depending on metering mode (I will explain in next article) will calculate the exposure and set the shutter speed to achieve 18% average through the tones. It probably will have nice shadows, but clouds will be plain white with clipped highlights. To avoid this, you can adjust exposure override to -1/3 or -2/3 and you'll still have nice shadows, but this time your clouds will have details in them as well.

S - Shutter priority mode
Works the same as A mode, but this time you are choosing your shutter speed. You can adjust your ISO and exposure override, but camera will decide what aperture will be the best. This mode is good in sport photography, or low light conditions, where you'd like to avoid blurry images caused by motion of your camera.

P - Program mode
It is simply more advanced AUTO mode, but here you have control over the ISO and also you can adjust exposure override. This mode is quite good to use if you haven't got time to think about aperture - shutter speed relationship, but you want to control the outcome.

MANUAL AND USER DEFINED MODES

M - manual mode
Most advanced settings, you control everything. You set the aperture, shutter speed and ISO (yes, there is still option for AUTO ISO in every mode, if you'd like to use it). You can check accuracy of you decision on exposure override scale in your viewfinder, where pointer on the scale shows how correct your exposure is. And also you can check your result on LCD and adjust values accordingly.

U - User defined modes
If you shoot particular scene very often, let's say you shoot landscapes in nice sunny day, where exposure settings are often f11, 1/160s, ISO 100, you can set this as user defined setting and every time you turn dial to "U", camera will be set for this exposure, so you don't always need to change it. There are usually two or three of those, so you can preset your camera for various conditions.

Next time we'll talk about metering modes, so we'll understand better how camera does the exposure readings.

Posted by pkuzmin at 6:40 PM

August 9, 2012

Nikon J2, 11-27mm CX Lens and WP-N1 Housing Announced

Nikon has announced an update to the popular J1 mirrorless camera - the Nikon J2. The latest arrival update the rear LCD screen to 921k dots resolution and adds a scene mode setting to the dial for making photos appear as panoramas, miniatures, soft color, backlighting and more. The new camera lists at USD549.99 starting cost with a kit lens.

A new CX kit lens was also announced - an 11-27mm f3.5-5.6 (MSRP USD190). Notably, this is without VR. The J2 will continue to be sold with the 10-30 and/or 30-110 kit options, with the latest addition sold separately.

Finally, an underwater housing, WP-N1, rated to 131m/430f, will accomodate either the J1 or J2 and the CX 10-30mm. The case lists for USD750 and is compatible with the Sea & Sea YS-D1 underwater flash.

Posted by covey22 at 3:17 PM

August 8, 2012

Firmware Update 1.2 for Nikon J1 and V1

Updated: Nikon USA links now available.

Nikon has released version 1.2 firmware for both the J1 and V1 mirrorless cameras. Improvements include a fix to the "low shutter speed" threshold in Still Image Mode, Auto White Balance enhancements, exposure fixes when using the optional SB-N5 Speedlight at certain ISO ranges and error messages encountered during interval shooting and power-on using the lens barrel switch.

Nikon Europe Links:
Nikon J1 Firmware 1.2
Nikon V1 Firmware 1.2

Nikon USA Links:
J1 Firmware 1.2
V1 Firmware 1.2

Posted by covey22 at 2:53 PM

August 5, 2012

Nikonians Photo Professors #8

Photo Professors Episode 8: This month the Photo Professors Homework Assignment includes a contest to win a Think Tank Photo Retrospective 10 camera bag! The Photo Professors discuss Rick Paul's renewed interest in film photography, interview with photographer and studio owner Mark Korytowski, and interpret an inspiring quote from photographer Freeman Patterson.
 
Download Nikonians Photo Professors #8 (NPC-PP-2012-08.mp3;58:03;MP3 format)
 

* Contest with a chance to win a ThinkTank Photo Retrospective 10 camera bag!
* The Photo Professors discuss the possibilities of film photography in 2012
* Interview with Photographer and Studio owner, Mark Korytowski
* Being Inspired by the words of Freeman Patterson
* Discuss our Homework Assignment and Contest rules!

Contest submissions must be sent to info@thephotoprofessors.com and received no later than September 15, 2012 in order to be considered for the contest.

 

To learn more about Mark's work, please visit his website:

Film2Frame

To learn more about Freeman's work, please visit his website:
Freeman Patterson

Length of the podcast is 58:03

 

Posted by obrueck at 11:15 PM

August 2, 2012

Berger Bros. Camera Opens New Photography Center

BergerLogo_150.jpgNew York based, full service camera store helps its customers bring their images to life with new Center dedicated to photographic art and education.

Berger Bros. Camera has just announced the opening of the Berger Bros. Camera Center for Photographic Art this July 2012 at 22 Clinton Avenue in the Village of Huntington, NY. The school is conveniently located just one block north of Main Street, opposite the Huntington Post Office and adjacent to two of the largest municipal parking lots in town.

Yvonne-B_75.jpg Yvonne Berger will serve as Director of the Center.

Yvonne is a professional photographer specializing in product, food, corporate and interiors as well as photo restoration.

She is an expert in post production tools such as Photoshop and Lightroom, color management and printing and has many years of teaching experience as head instructor of photography at Berger Bros. Camera and the Art League of Long Island.

“It has been a long time dream of ours to have a location that we can dedicate to the art and education of photography,” said Yvonne Berger. The new location will allow Berger Brothers to schedule more classes, workshops and private instruction that their local and out of state customers can take advantage of to improve their photography skills. The new location will be equipped with studio lighting, space and the atmosphere needed to learn and create outstanding photography. “We envision a hub where people can learn, connect and express themselves through the art of photography,” Berger said.

Among the many classes the Center for Photographic Art will provide are hands on photography workshops in lighting, wedding, portrait, Photoshop, Lightroom, color management, printing, food and product photography, landscape and street photography classes. One on one instruction and basic and advanced classes on specific cameras and a myriad of general photography topics will also be offered. In addition the Center will provide studio rental space; serve as a location for meet-up groups and function as a photo gallery exhibiting professional level, customer and student photographs. It’s no wonder that their logo is “The Camera Store That Educates.”

Contact the new school at 631-421-2200. For Internet sales of cameras and equipment, class schedules and to register for a class go to www.Berger-Bros.com or for the personal touch when buying equipment or needing advice call 800-542-8811 or email Brad at BradBerger@me.com.

Don't forget, you can always chat with the Berger Bros. Team in our Nikonians - Berger Bros. Camera Forum

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