Author Archives: Michael

The Great Sphinx

the sphinx

It’s been a busy week and I’ve had no internet access for days but the touring of Egypt has been great. I’ll have to catch up with more images after I get home, but here are a couple from the icons of Egypt: the pyramids of Giza and the Great Sphinx.

Having seen so many great images of these structures in my life, it was a little hard not to be disappointed in seeing them in person. While not as commercialized as many tourist sites in the US, there is a lot to distract a person from the grandeur of these monuments. Aggressive vendors actually shoving things into your arms as you walk past and then demanding payment, riders on camels following you for great distances all the while offering to pose for photos for a few dollars, etc., etc. No one takes no for an answer. Sites I would see later in the week would make up for any disappointment, however. And it’s undeniable that the pyramids are a wonder of the world. I might get another opportunity to visit them tomorrow. We’ll see if the experience is any different.

pyramid and sphinx

The camel riders descend on the tour buses:

tour buses and camels

Arriving in Cairo

tut mask

Landed in Cairo, Egypt yesterday afternoon and have been busy exploring since. Not much time to write now but here are a few photos from today — the Cairo Museum, an early morning felucca ride on the Nile and a couple of market shots.

felucca on the nile

cairo market

market blur

Good night, Shanghai

Shanghai Pearl Tower

I had dinner atop the Oriental Pearl Tower on my last night in China and hoped to finally get that dusk shot I’d been waiting for. Not only was it threatening rain, but I had learned the night before when trying to shoot the skyline that most of the buildings were not lit until about an hour and a half after sunset. So, no twilight skies with lit skyscrapers on this trip. After dinner, it was pouring rain. Buckets. But, as I made my dash out of the building with my gear bundled tightly under my raincoat, I looked up and saw the tower lit for the first time. I found a small overhang from a ticket window that provided enough shelter that I could get this shot. One of the last 5 of my trip — and the rest of those were primarily shots I took of my amazing hotel room to show friends.

Not the shot that I had envisioned, but I like it. If the lights couldn’t be on while there was some sky color, I’m actually glad to have had the cloud cover so that the spotlights had something to illuminate. I’ll just have to come back when that newest tallest-building-in-China is complete and get my skyline shot from across the river then.

I’ve been lazy the last two days and haven’t updated my Alamy files at all so I keyworded 36 images this morning to cover today’s goal as well as that of the past two. Now I’m all caught up — for the time being. Only 874 more images to prep to meet my May 1 goal of 2000 images.

Shanghai – the last day

shanghai morning

Hopes for the sparkling twilight or early morning skyline shot of Shanghai dimmed on the morning of my last day in China when I awoke to more overcast skies. Still, a cab ride down to the riverfront couldn’t hurt. If there’s no sunrise, surely there will still be something to shoot.

The color that was lacking in the sky was provided by the silk garments worn by the wonderful people of Shanghai who seem to come out every morning to exercise along the promenade. I previously posted a shot of a gentleman flying a kite that is one of my favorites from this trip. It was also shot this morning under the grey blanket of clouds and just goes to show: it’s not always what you are looking for, but what you find.

My Alamy goals are progressing well. Since my last post I’ve keyworded 95 images (my goal for those 5 days was only 50) and I uploaded another 223 which passed quality control earlier this evening. It’s a bit of a gamble to upload so many images at one time because, if any one is rejected by QC, the entire batch gets chucked out. Happily, everything sailed through.

I can’t get overly confident in my goals, however. Starting this weekend, I’ll be on the road for two weeks and probably won’t get any keywording done at all. I’ll need to either make up the slack before I leave or have lots of catching up to do when I get back. At least for now I can say that I’m ahead of schedule.

Pearl of Shanghai (part 1) and goal setting

Pearl Tower, Shanghai, China

I mentioned in an earlier post that my main goal on this trip to the Shanghai region of China was to get a good, iconic skyline shot of the Oriental Pearl Tower and the recently developed Pudong area. I showed a photo of two nearby skyscrapers — currently the tallest in China — with a fairly blue sky behind. This shot was taken from the observation platform of one of those skyscrapers, the Jin Mao, a few minutes later. The haze was much thicker from above and I’ve actually boosted the contrast quite a bit here to somewhat compensate for it.

A tip for those of you who have also found yourself shooting through glass in situations like this: get your lens as close to the glass as possible and drape your jacket over your head and camera to block any reflections coming from behind and beside you. You might look stupid but it gets the job done. Any color cast from tinted glass can be corrected in Photoshop.

This was not the iconic shot I wanted but in some ways the haze helps to separate the Pearl from the older city in the background so I don’t think it’s is a total loss. I still wanted the shot that was in my head, though. I’ll post my progress on that front as my last two days in Shanghai sped on in the coming posts.

Meanwhile, in the present, I’ve been making goals for the coming year. I’m not really a New Year’s Resolution kind of guy but I do like to have goals. They keep time from getting away from me.

Over the last year, I neglected my image files on Alamy. Between travel, moving, and feeding other stock agencies, I just didn’t increase the number of images placed with Alamy the way I should. So… 2009 is my catch-up year.

As of yesterday, I had 1024 images online with Alamy directly. I say “directly” because other agencies I put images with also put them on Alamy so, technically, I have more on Alamy but these 1024 images are those that I am directly responsible for. For those of you who don’t know, Alamy requires more of the photographer in return for a larger percentage of sales. You do your own editing, you do your own keywording, etc.

I’ve decided to set a goal of basically doubling my Alamy files by May 1, 2009. My goal is 2000 images posted and keyworded. That comes to about 10 images per day which doesn’t sound like much to keyword, but I’ll also have to prep and upload about 900 of those. This morning I keyworded a dozen images so — so far — I’m ahead of schedule. Which I need to be, because I’ll be away the first two weeks in February so I need to get a head start.

If I meet my first phase goal by May 1, the second phase will be to double the number again by the end of the year. By January 1, 2010, I want to have 4000 images with Alamy. Quadrupling my files in one year seems daunting but I have a backlog of images that need to be on the market. My hope is that, by quadrupling my images this year, I can quadruple my 2008 income from Alamy in 2010. When you put it in dollar terms, there’s quite an incentive.

I’ll post progress reports of my new goal on this blog. I’m still deciding how to do that exactly but it may just be a series of short “progress posts” or a line at the end of each regular post. Either way, I hope by making my progress public, it will provide a further kick in the pants.

Wish me luck.

Inauguration eve

I ran across a link to the New York Times’ feature, Obama’s People on John Nack’s blog this morning. I really feel like these portraits show a government “of the people”. Check ’em out and watch the “behind the scenes” as well. What a production it must have been to generate this seemingly simple series of shots.

I can’t say how excited I am about the inauguration tomorrow. Oh, how I would love to be there.

Forces of progress

Shanghai financial district

I still have a few more photos from China that I want to share before my next trip begins on the 1st of February. This is a shot of two of the tallest buildings in China — part of Shanghai’s Pudong new development area. This area has sprung up from nothing in the last two decades and is now a symbol of both Shanghai and a changing China. Such a symbol that my main goal for this trip was to get a good, iconic skyline shot from across the river with the futuristic Pearl Tower and these other giant skyscrapers. More on that effort in the days to come but I’ll use this shot to talk about the shelf-life of Shanghai skyline photos.

In the guidebook I purchased just prior to my trip (published in 2005) photos of this area showed only the 88-story Jin Mao on the left. It was then the tallest building in China. The building on the right has since popped up — taller — and is now the tallest building in China. Great time to get some new, updated skyline shots, right? Surely that guidebook publisher is looking for new images when they go to reprint. But wait. Construction is already underway just blocks away for another new building that will eclipse both of these towers. Looks like my shots will be stale in a few months time, too.

Just as well. Even though it looks like a beautiful day in this shot, haze made getting a distant skyline shot difficult during my two days in Shanghai. I’ll post a few shots that I did manage to get during that time over the next couple of weeks but that twilight shot of sparkling towers reflected in the river just never came together for me. Flexibility is the name of the game, though. There’s always something to shoot.

Progress has also been affecting my life in other ways lately. I’ve recently updated all of my Adobe software to the CS4 versions. That would include Photoshop, InDesign, Dreamweaver, Flash, Fireworks, Lightroom, Contribute… you get the picture. It’s always a little unnerving to update so much software all at one time — especially software that you depend on daily for your livelihood — and there have been a few hiccups but nothing insurmountable. It’s just that darned learning curve again.

Don’t get me wrong — I love to learn new things and I thrive on change — but there’s just a whole lot at once right now. Beyond the software, I’m still sorting out my new travel kit and the new D700 and D300 bodies. I finally decided it was time for a new bag, so I ordered a Think Tank Photo Airport Ultralight.

think tank bagThis bag weighs in at just over 2 pounds when empty so it adds very little to the carrying weight which is a major concern of mine, especially when getting through airports. The dimensions look good for the overhead bin and it has a very sleek outer surface that should avoid snagging as it gets stuffed in. I’ll typically still pack a small bag in my checked luggage that I can use on the street. Backpacks are great for getting all of your gear to a location, but they’re not so convenient when you’re trying to get to a lens fast on a busy Shanghai street. So far, I’m very impressed with this as a travel bag and look forward to putting it and all the other new stuff through their paces next month.

Seventeen days and counting until my 2009 travel year begins. I’d better start going through that 400+ page D700 manual.

Happy New Year!

Here it is, 2009. Where did the time go? 2008 was an amazing year for me, filled with plenty of travel — even though we swore we would cut back so that we could buy a new house. While we did buy a house, move, and sell the old one, we didn’t do a very good job of cutting back on the travel which made for a very busy, very hectic year. I even started traveling earlier than normal with a February trip to Banff:

Banff, Alberta, Canada

Hard to believe that was less than a year ago. That trip set a great tone for 2008. Truly an amazing destination. This year will begin with another amazing place and I’m starting 2009’s travel even earlier. The first week of February will find me in Egypt. The rest of the year is a mystery at this point but with a start like that I’m sure it will be a wild ride.

The past month has had me furiously processing the images from 2008. I normally don’t like to be more than one trip behind but I didn’t even come close this year. I’m now in shouting distance of being caught up and may be finished by the end of the weekend. I want to feed all of my stock outlets before I start the 2009 travel so I need to keep moving. The China trip has been fully processed and is already in the hands of one stock agency. Once I see what they accept, I’ll place the rest elsewhere. I’ll show more here over the next couple of weeks as well.

Enjoy the new year everyone! I hope it brings success, health and happiness to you all.

Winter

frozen pond

If anyone suffered retinal damage from the two previous, intensely-colorful posts, I’ll offer a couple of soothing, nearly-colorless images today. We’ve been getting some snow lately and yesterday morning there was also a light fog so I thought it might be a good time to get out and do some testing of the new equipment. The shot above was made with the full-frame Nikon D700 and the Nikkor 17-35 at 35mm. I’ll try not to keep saying this but it is soooo nice to have that lens back as it was intended. The cropped factor of the previous Nikon bodies reduced the 17mm end to the equivalent of a 25 — not nearly as fun and a real loss when it came to interior work.

trees in snow

This shot is from the D300 with the 24-120 kit lens that came with the 700. This will be my first lens with vibration reduction so it will be interesting to see how it fares. The image above was made at the long end of the zoom at 120mm, roughly equivalent to 180mm since it was on the cropped-sensor body. I’m looking forward to having a full-frame and cropped-sensor body as it really expands the range of the lenses I carry. I imagine I’ll keep a wide on the D700 most of the time and take advantage of the crop factor on the D300 to get that extra telephoto reach.

More glorious yellow

Zhenjiang, China

Three monks at the Buddhist temple in Zhenjiang, China. Great faces, great color. How can you go wrong?

The packages I mentioned in my last post have arrived. Unfortunately, I’ve had little time for anything other than unpacking them. First among the new arrivals is a shiny new Nikon D700. I’ve waited a long time for a full-frame digital body from Nikon and the first thing I did was introduce her to my Nikkor 17-35mm. This had been a favorite lens of mine on my old film bodies and it’s good to have the wide end back. I think these two will be nearly inseparable.

An odd circumstance of pricing made it cheaper to buy the D700 with the 24-120 lens than without. It wouldn’t have been my first choice in a mid-range zoom but since it was basically free I could hardly say no. I’ll put it through its paces and see how it does. On the D300 it will be a crop factor similar to a 36-180 so if I carry it along with the 17-35 on the D700 I’d have most bases covered.

Part of my reasoning of going with the D300 and D700 is that their controls are arranged very similarly. When I was shooting with the D200 and D300 in China, I was constantly hitting the menu button on the 300 when meaning to hit the preview button (Nikon — stop moving buttons, please!). This would typically bring up the menu with “format card” highlighted which was particularly disconcerting. Anyway, while the two new bodies aren’t exactly the same, more similarity will help. As will their both having much better high ISO performance. I’ll post images and more thoughts when I get the chance to get these cameras into the field.

I should also mention that I added a Lensbaby Composer to the order. I borrowed a 2nd generation Lensbaby from my friend, Doug, when I went to the Gaspe last summer and had a ton of fun with it. The Composer is a little more rigid and controllable than the older models but I hope it will still be as enjoyable. I have to say my initial reaction was mixed. The build seems a little rough and the swivel clicks loudly when you first shift it from its current position. Maybe that will loosen up with use or I’ll get used to it. We’ll see.

The other major addition to the ol’ camera bag is a new iPhone. I’ve been nursing an ancient old cell phone for years but finally made the move to join the rest of the 21st century and now have a phone that can actually receive a text message! First reaction to this piece of gear is sheer joy. I can’t believe how sweet this piece of technology is. I’ve already hit the app store for a sunrise-sunset calculator called Focalware, too. I had something similar on an old Palm device and found it very useful. Nice to have that info handy again.

So much to experiment with in the coming days. Sure would be nice if the weather would cooperate with a nice day for shooting this week but it looks like it will be luxurious if it gets above freezing. Maybe we’ll get a good snow…