Category Archives: apple

Shooting tethered

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It’s snowing outside so I’m playing indoors today.

I’ve been setting up my new 13″ Retina MacBook Pro and ran across an article about shooting tethered in Lightroom 4. I thought I’d give it a try, even though I only do a small amount of studio photography compared to field work. For some reason I always thought that tethering would be a lot more involved than it turned out to be. In fact, all I needed was a USB cable to connect my Nikon D700 to my MacBook. Turn on the camera and open Lightroom and, under the “file” menu, you can initiate tethering. Lightroom found the camera automatically and in no time I had a little toolbar added to my Lightroom interface that showed my camera settings: shutter speed, aperture, white balance, etc. Here’s a glimpse of the setup:

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The Lightroom toolbar has a shutter button so you can fire the camera from the laptop. Hit the button and the camera makes an exposure that is immediately transferred to the laptop and opened for review right there in Lightroom.

I know. Lots of photographers have been doing this for years and it’s nothing new, but it was a revelation how easy it was to set for a first-time user like me. I’m reminded of the first time I realized that my Nikon had a built-in intervalometer for shooting time-lapses. More and more often, features that used to be costly added expenses are now built into modern gear, although sometimes they’re not heavily promoted. It pays to noodle around a bit every now and then to see what wonders are hiding in those electronics.

You know, I was thinking that this tethering feature wouldn’t be all that useful in the field but, now that I think about it, it could be extremely handy when doing things like night photography. I know when I was shooting the Milky Way in western Kansas last summer, it would have been nice to have had a way to be able to check exposure and focus during the shoot better than I was able to do on the camera LCD. The USB cable travels with me anyway, so this capability comes at no extra expense, weight, or bulk. Just the kind of thing I like.

The mother of all upgrades

It’s an exciting and scary week around here. I’ve been putting off upgrading my old G5 Mac tower for far too long. It was running fine but beginning to get a little tired. I could respect that. I get a little tired, too. But then Snow Leopard came along — running only on Intel-chipped machines — and I began to fall behind. Still no biggie. No real urgency. And that became my downfall.

Now we have an update from Adobe to the entire Creative Suite — CS5. A few days later, Lightroom 3. I held out until after the WWDC just in case Apple made any updates to the Mac line-up (something without a shiny screen maybe?) but, when there weren’t, I pulled the trigger and placed my order. Or should I say “orders”. Piles of boxes have started to arrive and the installation process has begun but I think I’m in for a multi-day process. Common sense has always told me to just update one thing at a time. Then, if something goes crazy, you know what is likely to blame. There will be no such common sense this time. New hardware and all new software. If there is a conflict, I’ll have one heck of a time figuring out where it is. Luckily, that doesn’t happen as much as in the old days. I also tend to stick with just the necessary software — not a lot of system modifiers, etc. that can lead to trouble. Call me overly cautious but I make my living with these Macs and I don’t care to spend my time trouble-shooting software conflicts when I can be billing hours.

With all of these updates there will be a slight shift in the focus of this blog. I plan on doing more technique and how-to posts, sharing what I learn about the new features in Photoshop CS5, Lightroom 3, Aperture, etc. We’ll see how it goes but this may be just the first phase of this new direction. Exciting times for sure.

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…

Aperture 2 released

Aperture 2

Apple has released a new version of Aperture. I’ve never tried Aperture myself. It looks interesting enough but my poor, aging G5 has never met the minimum requirements to run it. Now, however, it seems Apple has lowered the requirements to the point that I just sneak in. Or I’m reading something wrong. At any rate, I look forward to downloading the free trial and seeing what it can do but it will have to wait. Too much work right now with my trip to Banff just over a week away. Patience, patience…

MacBook Air

MacBook Air

There you have it. The new MacBook Air from Apple — the world’s thinnest notebook computer. It’s an achievement for sure but I don’t think I need to place my order today. Thin is great — light is even better — but I’d really like small. I would like Apple to make something like Fujitsu’s Mini-Notebook with a CF card reader built right in. I don’t need a large screen but being able to do very minor Photoshop work and send emails is about it. Basically something that would allow me to get files to clients from the road in a pinch. And small and light would be key. And rugged wouldn’t hurt. I’m afraid I’d snap that MacBook Air in half in my backpack. Oh, well.

On the other hand, I did like seeing the addition of email to the iPod Touch. That and a portable storage device with a card reader and I’d have a lot of my needs taken care of. I’ll do some thinkin’ on that.

Anyway, the excitement is over now. I’ll have to switch over to DP Review’s PMA report to see what the camera manufacturers will bring us at the end of the month. There’s always somethin’…

Oh, and I promise to actually post a photo one of these days.

Twas the night before Macworld

Macworld ExpoTomorrow is one of my favorite days of the year: the Macworld keynote. The end of all the speculation on the rumor sites about what Steve Jobs will unleash next. Last year the iPhone. This year? Will it be the MacBook Air? We’ll soon find out.

Until then, I have this news from the BBC and other sources that Egypt wants to copyright its antiquities including the pyramids and the sphinx. The BBC reports:

Egypt’s MPs are expected to pass a law requiring royalties be paid whenever copies are made of museum pieces or ancient monuments such as the pyramids.

Most of the focus seems to be on three dimensional replicas at the moment but will photographic images also require permission and royalties? According to The Guardian, “the law would not prevent artists from drawing images of the monuments or historic sites, as long as the images were not exact copies.” One could assume that a photograph would be considered an exact copy. Hopefully more details will be available soon.

Now I’d better get downstairs to put milk and cookies out for Steve Jobs so that he’ll put something good in my stocking tomorrow. Merry Macworld, everyone!