Tommy Johansen in Veidekke contacted me last spring to create a time-lapse of some of their construction work. In November, on the very last night of pavement work on the E6, everything finally fell in place. I drove the 30-40 minutes from Oslo, past the barriers and signs, onto the closed part of the highway (ignoring honking and blinking lights from other cars thinking I was asleep/nuts/etc) and got to work.

It was a cold night, and taking time-lapse photos takes time, so I was wearing the same as when it was -43°C (-45°F) at Svalbard. Toasty!

Camera settings

• Nikon D300 and 17-55mm f/2.8
• ISO 1600, NEF (12-bit RAW, 4288 x 2848)
• 1/15 second exposure, f/4.5 aperture
• 2-second intervals and 999 frames, using the D300’s built-in interval timer
• Tripod: Manfrotto 190DB and 141RC

I wanted the big machinery and the people to be in focus, just the opposite of typical time.lapse movies where the moving part of the image is blurred out.

Keeping the machinery and people sharp required a short(ish) shutter speed to freeze the movements (luckily the machines move very slowly, but the Veidekke employees were more speedy), and using the a big aperture to avoid raising the ISO too high, but still getting a little depth of field. It would have been nice to be able to use a camera capable of higher ISO without more noise (when is the Nikon “D900″ coming?), or a lens with a larger maximum aperture, but my settings worked out ok.

Here is one of the photos:

D300, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 22mm, f/4.5, 1/15s. Larger version.

Editing the photos in Lightroom

I used RAW (Nikon NEF) because I wanted to be able to adust as much as possible in Lightroom afterwards. Taking the photos took many hours, and as this was the last roadwork project in 2009, missing the white balance or exposure would be.. well, unfortunate. Post-processing was quite standard: I used my Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 as the starting point, found a white balance that worked well with all the images in the series, adjusted the levels, etc.

The lighting was standard highway lighting: Quite yellow. I put the tripod below one of the streetlights, both to have as much light as possible, and to be as far away from the next one as possible, eliminating reflections and glare.

As you can see, I panned to follow the scraper maching at 00:30 and also at 01:45 to follow the other machine. This was the scary part. I knew I had to pan very steadily, and I also had to start and stop the panning without screwing up any photos. I’m quite happy with the result.

At one point a big truck needed to pass where I was standing, so I missed a couple of frames around 00:58. I stopped the interval timer, grabbed the tripod and camera, jumped over and in between the middle barriers (traffic passing me at 100 km/h 1m away), the truck passed, and I ran 4-5 meters ahead to catch up with the “machinery caravan” and started the interval timer again.

Oh, and I did export the photos to JPEG after editing them in Lightroom.

With images taken quickly after another, Lightroom and the MacBook’s trackpad can be used to “scrub” back and forth, making the still images look almost like a movie:

Making the movie

I have previously used Apple Quicktime Pro (or “Quicktime 7″ as it’s called in Mac OS X 10.6.2 Snow Leopard), as described in Time-lapse movies with the Nikon D300. But for this video I wanted titles and a soundtrack, which is not possible using the “Open image sequence…” method.

So I bought Apple Final Cut Express. It has most of the basic functions in Apple Final Cut Pro, but at a price that mortals can afford ($199 vs $999). From Wikipedia:

Final Cut Express’s interface is identical to that of Final Cut Pro, but lacks some film-specific features, including Cinema Tools, multi-cam editing, batch capture, and a timecode view. The program can perform 32 undo operations, while Final Cut Pro can do 99.

A quick Google search for “final cut express vs final cut pro” might also be interesting.

Editing in Final Cut Express (FCE) is quite easy for using the basic functionality. I used Adobe Premiere on Windows a few years ago and FCE works much in the same way. I won’t go into the details of working in FCE, as Apple has some excellent tutorials.

One important tip: Before you drag in all the (JPEG) images into the FCE bin, set the default duration of a still image to something like 0.2 seconds – or whatever you think will work for your project: User preferences -> Editing -> Type a new value in the Still/Freeze Duration Field.

More?

See the video on Vimeo, and also on Veidekke CEO Terje R. Venold’s blog Terjes tanker.

Five-minute time-lapse movie of Vancouver, Canada.
Philip Bloom’s Dubai time-lapse.
Eirik Solheim has squeezed one year(!) into 90 seconds.

Comments, links to more time-lapse movies, anything else? Input appreciated!

Possibly related posts:

1. Time-lapse movies with the Nikon D300 My camera, the Nikon D300, has a built-in interval timer....
2. Time-lapse on the tram Today I went on a tram ride together with my...
3. Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 Adobe provides some good camera calibration presets for Lightroom (included...

I now have 800GB of storage in my MacBook, split between a speedy 160GB SSD and a 640GB regular hard drive. Great success!

Apple Disk Utility showing the two internal drives: 160GB “MacBook SSD” and the 640GB “Snurre” HDD (as well as a few external drives connected).

I was originally planning to swap the 320GB drive with a regular 1TB drive and keep the DVD, but after reading the speed of SSD drives I quickly decided I needed wanted one.

There are good SSDs and bad SSDs, and after some intensive research on the interweb, I decided for the Intel X25M 160GB. It has received a lot of good reviews, it’s reasonably big (for now), and the price is ok – for a SSD.

Why 640GB?

Why not put a 1TB drive in the optibay? Because it only has space for 9.5mm drives, and the 750GB and 1TB drives available are 12.5mm. They will not fit in the optibay. It is possible to put a 12.5mm drive in the normal hard drive bay, but that means no SSD speed (if the SSD is used as a system drive in the optibay, the MacBook will not “hibernate” properly if the battery is completely drained).

How fast is it?

Fast! Boot time is greatly reduced and applications can be started simultaneously and load very quickly. I haven’t timed it, but Lightroom loads much, much faster than it without the SSD. Read How to make your Mac feel lighting-fast for some more details:

After using the Intel X25-M 80GB solid state drive for several months as a boot drive in my Mac Pro, I’m never going back to a hard drive (for my boot drive).

Super-fast system boot is the norm, and launching apps is spectacularly fast: launch every app you’ve got and they’ll all be ready for use in a few seconds. Try that with a hard drive—coffee break time.

Installation

It took me about 10 minutes for the full install. MCE supplies the screwdriver, and there’s a CD with a PDF with illustrations and text.

Here are the contents of the MCE OptiBay kit:

From the left: USB cable and USB power cable (not needed), screws, screwdriver pen, Enclosure for the DVD drive when removed from MacBook, Western Digital 640GB hard drive (bought separately, but MCE also sells hard drives), CD with instructions and the optibay adapter itself.

Tha MacBook ready to have it’s DVD drive swapped with the 640GB hard drive:

The DVD player is in the top left corner, attached with 4 screws and one flimsy cable in a tiny socket. It’s the red/brown cable in front of the fan.

I highly recommend having an extra MacBook to read the installations instructions on..

The DVD player slides easily into the enlosure, and I haven’t bothered attaching it with any screws – mostly because I couldn’t figure out how to. There is no faceplate, so it does look a little rough.

There several how-to videos available on the interweb, such as this very nice one from Steve Trotto:

Where do I keep all the stuff?

• SSD: Mac OS X, Applications, Lightroom catalog, Lightroom previews, Documents.
• HDD: Image files (pretty much every photo I have, except some time-lapse), iTunes music (might have to put some of the 100+ GB on an external drive, though..), a few movies and TV shows.
• External RAID-1 drive: Backup of all images, backups of Lightroom catalog, all the accounting stuff for Automagisk, misc. important files.
• Other external drives: Movies, music, misc. stuff.

What’s next?

SSDs will get cheaper and cheaper, and I might replace either the SSD or HDD with something bigger when “necessary”.

What else?

ChronoSync is the best backup sofware I have found for Mac OS, and Carbon Copy is great for cloning drives.

And: MCE does not answer emails. And: FedEx needed 7 days (and USD 50) to bring the package from California to Norway.

More information

I highly recommend reading these articles to get some SSD knowledge:

• The SSD Relapse: Understanding and Choosing the Best SSD (AnandTech)
• Intel X25M 160GB Solid State Drive (SSD) (Macintosh Performance Guide)
• Reconditioning a solid state drive (SSD) (Macintosh Performance Guide)

Possibly related posts:

1. Backup of images, Lightroom catalog and other things using RAID, rsync, etc When image archives consisted of albums with negatives or cassettes...

For me, this means a lot of cross-country skiing in great conditions, and not much photography at all. Except for a few snapshots with the Canon IXUS 100 IS I (almost) always have in my pocket, sometimes resulting in shots like the one above.

Possibly related posts:

1. Cycling photography It’s been a very long time since I posted anything...
2. Skiing in Hemsedal Hemsedal is the best ski resort reasonably close to Oslo...
3. Second place in photo contest I recently won 2nd place (or lost 1st place?) in...

D300, 800 ISO, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 23mm, f/2.8, 1/30s.

I was only out for about an hour, but quickly found that there are a lot of different temperatures on streetlights: yellowish, greenish, blueish and all sort of in-between stuff. I left the white balance on “auto” and decided to fix everything in Lightroom later.

After fiddling quite some time with images like this one, I decided black and white would be best. It was just too much work getting everything to look right, especially with different lights in the same photo.

D300, 800 ISO, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 17mm, f/16, 3s.

I couldn’t get the colors to look right and still keep the “snowy” atmosphere. I wanted the snow in the air to be clearly visible, which was difficult when I also wanted the colors to look right. The image above is a 3 second exposure, and this one is 1/13 second:

D300, 800 ISO, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 17mm, f/2.8, 1/13s.

Here is another long exposure (10 seconds), giving the pine tree on the left a little blur – but making the snow in the air invisible. This has both the greenish streetlights and the whiter (bluer) lights near the building on the left, making black and white an easy choice..

D300, 200 ISO, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 32mm, f/13, 10s.

A short(ish) exposure showing some of the snow in front of the light, but still giving a sense of blur/movement:

D300, 200 ISO, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 18mm, f/2.8, 1/4s.

Lightroom details

As mentioned, I left the white balance on auto, and converted to black and white. I started out with the very nice Ilford HP5 400 Lightroom preset from LifeInDigitalFilm, and adjusted a little bit extra for each image. The Ilford HP5 400 made the snow in the air clearly visible, and I think the contrast and tone curve worked well for these photos.

I wrote about Lightroom black and white presets before, and might as well paste in a little of it here:

PresetHeaven has an overview of 34 free black & white film presets for Lightroom (actually, it is 17 presets with and without auto tone).

All the presets are made by Michael W. Gray at LifeInDigitalFilm. These are the 17 films:

• Agfa Scala 200X
• Agfapan 100
• Agfapan 25
• Agfapan 400
• Fuji Acros 100
• Ilford Delta 100
• Ilford Delta 3200
• Ilford Delta 400 Pro
• Ilford Delta 400
• Ilford FP4 125
• Ilford HP5 400
• Ilford Pan F 50
• Ilford SFX 200
• Ilford XP2 Super 400
• Kodak TMAX 100
• Kodak TMAX 400
• Kodak Tri-X 400

I’m looking forward to Lightroom 3 and the “grain” effect, which I have tested a little bit in Using the Grain effect in Lightroom 3 RC1.

Possibly related posts:

1. Lightroom black & white develop presets Last day of Easter break: Rain and cold. Perfect for...
2. Oslo Opera at night The Oslo Opera has become a popular place to visit....
3. Cycling photography It’s been a very long time since I posted anything...

D300, ISO 400, 17-55mm f/2.8 @ 55mm, f/2.8, 1/40s.

The original didn’t look very interesting, but it provided a good start. I got to the result above by doing this in Lightroom:

1. Apply my standard D300 develop preset during import.
2. Desaturate all colors except red and orange.
3. Tweak the orange and reds a bit.
4. Adjust the exposure and levels a little.
5. Add some vignetting.
6. Crop.

(Update: Back-dated this post a little..)

Possibly related posts:

1. Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 Adobe provides some good camera calibration presets for Lightroom (included...
2. Using the Grain effect in Lightroom 3 RC1 Inspired by Ben Ingham’s superb photos for Rapha rides Norddal...
3. Snowy night photography After one of many heavy Christmas dinners I decided I...

Nikon D300, 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 78mm, ISO 1600, f/3.5, 1/320.

Creating the above image took less than a minute using the “B&W”, “Post-Crop Vignetting” and “Grain” controls. Very nice to have effect like this built into Lightroom. I really like the Grain effect, and it makes it very easy to get exactly the result I was hoping to get with my Grainy B&W preset.

Here is the same photo developed with my standard Lightroom preset for Nikon D300 (with some small additional adjustments):

The Lightroom 3 beta is not finished enough to replace Lightroom 2, but it’s nice to test the new features. If you haven’t already: Download the Lightroom 3 beta from Adobe Labs: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 RC1.

I saved this preset as “Rapha”, and if you would like to test it, here it is: Rapha.lrtemplate (please note that this was just a quick test with one(!) photo, so I can guarantee that you will need to make additional adjustments).

Rapha has made some of Ben Ingham’s pohotos available as desktop backgrounds at www.rapha.cc/rapha-desktops. If you like these photos – and road cycling – maybe you should subcribe to Rouleur? (If you already do, and have a spare #1 issue, let me know..)

Ben Ingham’s website is beningham.net.

Possibly related posts:

1. Lightroom black & white develop presets Last day of Easter break: Rain and cold. Perfect for...
2. Snowy night photography After one of many heavy Christmas dinners I decided I...
3. Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 Adobe provides some good camera calibration presets for Lightroom (included...

Thor Hushovd
D300, ISO 1600, 70-200mm 2.8 @ 70mm, 1/250, f/2.8. SB-800 on camera.

The race

There race circuit was only 1km long, and there were people everywhere. I think the organizers had not expected such a big crowd, but everything worked fine. Just a bit difficult to get a good view. I tried a few different spots, and ended up balancing on the round edge of a garbage can to get a good view of the riders coming through a turn.

The organizers were Norges Cykleforbund, Oslo Cancer Cluster and Kreftforeningen.

Technical details

The 70-200 focuses fast, but with aperture 2.8 the depth of field is very limited, especially when the riders are as close as 5m. I took a lot of photos in series (8 frames per second) with continuous focus. If I got 6-7 photos following a rider through the turn, about half of them has the rider’s face in focus. It was tricky keeping the focus point on the rider’s face through the curve.

I had brought my flash too, and after trying a little, I ended up using the same settings as without flash (It had also gotten a little darker, so maybe it was really -1 for the ambient light). Since I was balancing on a garbage can, the SB-800 was placed on the camera, using a small reflector from Lumiquest to soften the light a little.

Since I knew I would only get one shot with the flash (it takes a few seconds to recharge), I prefocused on a spot on the ground and took the picture one I thought the rider’s head was in the right spot. Maybe one out of 20 images were in focus. The top one, of Thor Hushovd, is the best one. Even with manual focus and f/2.8 at about 5m, it is in focus.

Some of the shots

Lance Armstrong
D300, ISO 1600, 70-200mm 2.8 @ 70mm, 1/250, f/2.8.

Kurt Asle Arvesen
D300, ISO 2000, 70-200mm 2.8 @ 70mm, 1/250, f/2.8.

D300, ISO 2000, 70-200mm 2.8 @ 70mm, 1/320, f/2.8.

As mentioned, lots of people – and the Royal Palace in the background:

D300, ISO 2000, 70-200mm 2.8 @ 70mm, 1/250, f/2.8.

There are a few more in the Oslo Grand Prix Flickr set.

Notes for next time

• Find a good spot where there will be some action, and where the background is ok. Using more than one spot is probably also a good idea..
• Bring a step-ladder. Yes, really. It’s a lot to carry around, but it can mean the difference between getting a clear view of the riders or a close-up view of people’s heads.
• Take lots of pictures. Focus is tricky, and the ones that look sharp on the camera’s LCD screen may not be sharp when viewed on the computer’s LCD (even when you zoom in and inspect).
• If it’s dark, like it was here: Crank up the ISO. It’s better with a little noise than a little blur. The D300 works with ISO 2000, but with a D700 or D3(S) I guess ISO 4000 (and more?) would be fine.
• Remember to cheer!

Possibly related posts:

1. Road cycling: TS Grand Prix, Arendal Last summer while vacationing in Risør in southern Norway, I...
2. “Kongen på Haugen” longboard contest Last year I missed the “Kongen på Haugen” (“King of...
3. Action sports workshop with Mattias Fredriksson Last September I participated in an action photo workshop with...

Most of the pictures I take nowadays are with the Canon IXUS 100 IS (or “PowerShot SD780 IS DIGITAL ELPH” in the US), which is small enough to fit in the back pocket of my cycling jacket. The pictures are so-so, but the important thing is to document the cycling, not to take impressive or technically advanced photographs. So, I end up with things like this:

I do have some cycling related photo ideas, though.. One example: Use my Manfrotto Magic Arm to attach the D300 to the bike, aiming backwards towards a rider following me, and use a long(ish) shutter speed to blur the background. I saw a very good blog post about this a while ago, but can’t find it now. I did find Alex Minkin’s setup with both camera and softbox, though.

And I might make a handle bar camera mount for the IXUS, making it very easy to snap pictures during a ride.

Do you have any cycling related photo tips/ideas/etc?

Possibly related posts:

1. Road cycling: TS Grand Prix, Arendal Last summer while vacationing in Risør in southern Norway, I...
2. Snowy night photography After one of many heavy Christmas dinners I decided I...
3. Time-lapse on the tram Today I went on a tram ride together with my...

Johan W. Simonsen
D300, ISO 400, Sigma 10-20mm @ 10mm, 1/1600, f/4.

The shot above was taken with the 10mm held out very close tu the racers when they were in the middle of the first turn. I really hope I didn’t stretch out too far, and since nobody said anything, I hope it was ok.

I needed a short shutterspeed, and after a few tries, I decided to just set the focus manually and take a series every time a racer passed. Focus was difficult to get right, because the riders chose different lines through the curve. I’d like a more blurred background, but that’s not easy with 10mm. I tried a slower shutter speed too, but since I had to move my arm quite fast to follow the riders, that also blurred the riders.

The first few shots were taken with the accidentally left on from last use of the lens, and that helped a bit on the shutter speed.. Still 400 ISO seemed to work the best.

This one is from a shady curve near the finish line. I wanted to get some nice light effects from the sunlight passing through the tree, possibly with a blurred and out-of-focus background. I tried using my SB-800 on a tripod on the inside of the curve, triggered by PW, but it was (again) not powerful enough to use in this much light. I also found out that taking a seried worked better than gambling for one shot using the SB-800 at full power (and barely noticing the effect).

Nikon D300, ISO 800, 70-200 f/2.8 @ 102mm, 1/250, f/4.

Here’s one from the same spot as the first one, but taken standing on a guard-rail and with a different perspective. Camera held high, pointing down on the rider passing underneath, and shooting a series of everyone passing. Manual everything.

D300, ISO 400, Sigma 10-20mm @ 10mm, 1/1250, f/5.

Can’t remember the reason for using a different setting than on the first one, but maybe I wanted a tiny bit more depth of field? Maybe just a coincidence.

Below is an atmospheric shot with two small ballerinas in the foreground. The 70-200 focuses quickly, and I used C (continous) focus and one focus point (no 3D or group) on the D300 for all the shots from this position. Most of them were like this.

Nikon D300, ISO 200, 70-200 f/2.8 @ 70mm, 1/1600, f/2.8.

This one is from the same spot as the previous one, but zoomed in on the rider:

Nikon D300, ISO 200, 70-200 f/2.8 @ 140mm, 1/1600, f/2.8.

A third one from the same spot, this time with some grass in the foreground for maaaximum depth.. The focus is a bit off on this one – there is very little of it when using 2.8 on the 70-200mm.

Nikon D300, ISO 200, 70-200 f/2.8 @ 102mm, 1/1600, f/2.8.

Even though I had brought two speedlights, tripod, PWs, etc, I had forgotten to charge the batteries. That meant no flash after the initial tests near the finish line. Then I decided to use the four AA batteries in the PWs and use them in the SB-600 (I have the SD-800 battery holder for the SB-800, so that needs five batteries). Since I had left the SC-29 TTL cable at home, that meant using the SB-600 on camera.

I took some test shots to make sure the flash was pointed in the right direction, adjusted the power to 1/4 (I think), zoomed out and used the built-in diffuser to even out the light a little, even on 10mm. Manual everything, and 1/250s because of the flash.

Here are two shots:

D300, ISO 200, Sigma 10-20mm @ 10mm, 1/250, f/5.6.

D300, ISO 200, Sigma 10-20mm @ 10mm, 1/250, f/5.6.

More

I took about 600 pictures, and about 80 of them are in this gallery: http://automagisk.no/kph09/. Let me know if there are some you like in there :-)

Even more

There were a lot of others taking pictures, and this thread at asfaltsurfer.com contains some of their shots.

Notes

If I there was another “Kongen på Haugen” tomorrow, I would:

• Automatically be reasonably well prepared because I had already done it once!
• Check some websites for inspiration.
• Be there a bit earlier and test out angles, etc before the qualifications and race started
• Try to borrow some nice flash gear (like I did for the dirt jumping at Hafjell), set everything up, and try to get one or two good shots, and not just running all over trying everything.
• Remember to charge all batteries
• Remember the TTL cable
• Remember to remove the polarizing filter, or at least check for it. The Sigma isn’t that slow..

What do you think?

Do you know the names of the riders in the pictures? Which shot do you (dis?)like the most? Do you have links to good longboard photos somewhere? Do you plan to ride your longboard in some spectacular place and need a photographer..? All comments appreciated!

Oh, and watch this longboard video!

You can watch it here, but I recommend watching it in HD at Vimeo.

Adam Kimmel presents: Claremont HD from adam kimmel on Vimeo.

A Film by: Ari Marcopoulos
Director of Photography: Colin Blackshear
Producer: Neville Wakefield

Possibly related posts:

1. Second place in photo contest I recently won 2nd place (or lost 1st place?) in...
2. Oslo Grand Prix Kreftforeningen (the Norwegian cancer foundation) arranged Oslo Grand Prix in...
3. Action sports workshop with Mattias Fredriksson Last September I participated in an action photo workshop with...

The Nikon BM-8 is not unique, many (most?) other accessories are similarly overpriced in Norway compared to tthe US:

• Nikon MC-30 remote control cable: 989 NOK (USD 153) in Norway, and USD 70 in the US.
• Nikon SC-29 TTL cable: 1250 NOK (USD 195) in Norway, and USD 80 in the US.
• Nikon 77mm polarizer filter: 3395 NOK (USD 527) in Norway, and USD 150 in the US.

I’m sure there are lots more examples to choose from, feel free to add them in the comments below. Both cameras and lenses have always been cheaper in the US than in Norway (and Europe in general), but the differences have not been as huge as with accessories. Here’s a lens example, just in case:

• Nikon AF-S VR Zoom-NIKKOR 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED is 18495 NOK (USD 2874) in Norway, and USD 1800 in the US.

Nikon does not want to talk about this

I wrote Bjørn Mangseth in Nikon Nordic about these big price differences in February (3 months ago now), but not even after two follow-ups have I been able to get a reply form him – or anyone else in Nikon Nordic.

It’s just as easy to buy from the US as from Norway

Does Nikon not realize that it is as easy to order from the US as from Norway? With UPS or similar shipping, delivery is as quick too. Even when ordering directly form the store, with shipping costs, 25% Norwegian tax and a handling fee, ordering from the US is often cheaper. I know people often place an order together to save shipping costs.

Because of the big price differences, I often buy equipment in the US when I travel, and sometimes buy things for friends at the same time – and friends buy for me when they are traveling.

How many sales does Nikon Nordic, and the Norwegian dealers, lose to the US each year because of the price differences? I know I would buy my stuff in Norway if the prices were comparable, which today they are not.

What about you?

Where do you order your equipment? What do you think about the price differences? Please use the comments below – thanks!

Update

Today I was looking for the Nikon EH-6 AC power adapter for D300 and other cameras. It’s either around USD 90 (NOK 512) or USD 210 (NOK 1195). I’m ordering from the US again.

No related posts.

Jørgen Peterson.
D300, ISO 200, 17-55mm f/2.8 at 23mm, 1/800s, f/4.5.

The shot above was a result of Jørgen seeing the rock from about 200m away and shouting “can we do that one?”Yes we could, and after working our way through the snow, we started shooting. The landing was quite flat, and although we measured the height of the jump to 5.5m, Jørgen did it 3-4 times. I like the evening sunlight and that the main slopes can be seen in the background.

Scientific measurements:

I wanted a picture of Jørgen sking on some sort of a ridge, spraying snow that would be backlit by the sun. I also wanted something in the foreground to give some depth. The conditions were not great, but Jørgen did his best, and here he is skiing on what looks like a ridge, but is really some bushes partly covered with snow.

D300, ISO 200, 17-55mm f/2.8 at 28mm, 1/800s, f/4.5

As the sun set, I looked for some way of using the sunlight and shadow, and got this one of Anders Magnus Løken, with a nice contrast between the foreground and background:

D300, ISO 200, 17-55mm f/2.8 at 30mm, 1/800s, f/4.5

Possibly related posts:

1. Backflip to faceplant My buddy Jørgen decided he wanted to do a backflip...
2. Windsurfing at Wittsands, South Africa The life of a surf photographer is rumored to include...
3. Action sports workshop with Mattias Fredriksson Last September I participated in an action photo workshop with...

• Nikon D300
• Nikon MB-D10 battery pack
• Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6
• Nikon circular polarizer filter
• Manfrotto 244 Variable Friction Arm (magic arm)
• Manfrotto 035 Super Clamp

I tried various settings, and ended up using 1/8s and f/22. Nice blur and maximum depth of field. To get a slow shutter speed I used a polarizer filter, which takes about 2 stops. I have a neutral density (ND) filter, but it’s a very dark one that takes 10 stops – almost impossible to see through. Using that filter and f/4 I ended up with 15 seconds exposures, which blurred everything far too much. I wanted some blur, but it should still be possible to recognize where the picture was taken. A 4 stop ND filter is added to the wish list.

The video is made with 576 images taken with 1 second interval. I tested other intervals, but I wanted to make a “fluid” video, and I can always adjust the frame rate to shorten or lengthen the video afterwards. It’s much harder to create the missing images..

I took everything in RAW (Nikon NEF), just in case I wanted to adjust the white balance or something in Lightroom afterwards. Turns out I didn’t (bother), so I could have used JPEG straight out of the camera (or “SOOC” if you’re in a hurry) and saved a few gigabytes of hard drive space.

The Nikon GP-1 GPS unit is always attached to the camera, so all the images are geotagged. I’m not sure if there’s a good way to use that information in a video. If you know of something, please use the comment form below.

I am aware that the video would be better if it was filmed at the other end of the tram, facing forward, that the wiper is not exactly invisible, etc. This was mostly for testing.

Set-up

Two shots taken with the Jesus phone while waiting:

Settings, etc

As mentioned above I ended up using 1/8s and f/22. Using a slow shutter speed makes things a bit blurred, preventing the video to look jittery. Blurring makes the video seem more natural – at leat that’s what I think. Using a polarizing filter or a neutral density (ND) filter makes this possible even in broad daylight.

To prevent the camera from changing the white balance and exposure from frame to frame, making the video uncomfortable to watch: Use manual white balance, and use RAW if you think you will have to adjust it in post-processing.

Also set the camera to manual exposure. Make a few test shots, and set it to something you think will work for the whole series.

The same goes for manual focus. No need to have the camera focus for each frame the distance is about the same for all frames. You will probably use a small aperture anyway, to get a longer shutterspeed, and that, together with a wide-angle lens, gives enough depth of field.

Shooting intervals requires power, as the camera is always on. I used only a 1 second interval, meaning that the camera was on for the entire series, including the light meter. It’s like holding the shutter half-way down for the entire time. I use the Nikon MB-D10 battery pack with the EN-EL4a battery, and for this series I also had an EN-EL3e in the camera body. Nikon has more details about the MB-D10 here: Multi-Power Battery Pack MB-D10.

How to make a time-lapse video with an SLR?

The recipe for making a video like this is straight-forward:

1. Take a lot of shots, preferably using some sort of interval timer. Nikon D300 has a built-in interval timer, making this very easy to set up. See the excellent DP Review D300 feature overview (scroll down to “Shootring menu”).
2. Use manual exposure, white balance and focus (see above).
3. Create JPEGs using numbers in the filenames, for instance “image-0001.jpg”, “image-0002.jpg”, etc. This can be done both in-camera and in post processing.
4. Make a movie with Apple Quicktime Pro: File -> Open image sequence -> choose the first image in the series. Full tutorial at Apple. This can also be done using other software, of course. I think the Quicktime way is the easiest. It is possible to export in a wide variety of formats, including H.264.

The super clamp and magic arm are great for this type of use, but you can of course use  a regular tripod or just MacGyver it. Bring extra memory cards (I used about 15GB for about 1 hour of experimenting) and extra batteries.

A related previous time-lapse post show pop up automatically below.

Questions, comments?

(Update: Added some information about settings and battery life in “Settings, etc”).

Possibly related posts:

1. Time-lapse movies with the Nikon D300 My camera, the Nikon D300, has a built-in interval timer....
2. Time-lapse with D300, Lightroom and Final Cut Express Time-lapse of about 1500 RAW images taken between 22:00...

Martin Söderström, 360 table, Hafjell.

A few days ago I discovered they had use another one too – without telling me.

When they bought the first image, they said my asking price was too high, so we agreed on a lower one. 2500 NOK for a circulation of 6000. I thought that was an ok price (if you are fluent in Norwegian, you can see some price indications here: Norsk journalistlag: Frilanssatsene). The catalog was printed, PDF put on the web, and my invoice paid.

Now, several months later, I discovered that they have created a new catalog, using another image without making an agreement with me. I discovered the unauthorized use of the other image after downloading their PDF catalog from their website, and saw a familiar-looking image covering almost an entire page. Thanks to my superb archiving skillz (and Lightroom’s nice features for keyworing, etc), I found the image and contacted the company. This is a summary of the email correspondence:

1. Me: Have I misunderstood, or have you used an image without an agreement?
2. Them: Yes, very sorry never, happened before, of course you should be paid, what about 1000 NOK?
3. Me: It’s common to get double pay, but it’s ok with the same as last time.
4. (No reply for a day)
5. I send a reminder
6. (No reply for about a day)
7. I send another reminder, saying my offer stands until a specified time a couple of days ahead. I also include a reference to a similar case that was taken to court (more below).
8. Them (after just a few minutes): Sorry, have been very busy, we understand unauthorized use should be compensated, 2500 NOK is ok, please send invoice.
9. Me: Ok, sending invoice. Case closed, no problems.

I’m not sure if they really forgot to contact me before publishing and too busy to answer emails, but the very low offer (1000 NOK) and the fact that they didn’t reply until I mentioned a similar case that ended with a court case does of course make me think a little. Please note: I’m not saying they have done anything wrong on purpose, and I know very well that I am only seeing this from my side of the table.

The case I referred to in my email, in a polite way, was one where an electronics store published a catalog and used images from the web without checking with the owner. The photographer was Eirik Solheim, and this is what happened when he contacted the company about it:

I immediately contacted the editor of the magazine in question, “Vinderen Magasinet”. She directed me to the advertiser and the designer behind the ad. I contacted the designer. She had found the image “on the internet” and reacted like I was rude and angry without any reason when I told her that she couldn’t use the image without my permission.

Eirk then contacted the manager of the store, who just referred to their lawyer. Some people might have given up by then, but not in this case. Read They stole an image of my son and just had to pay $4000 and see what happened next. Foto.no has a story about the same case, with some more details (Google translation from Norwegian: http://is.gd/sXQD).

I’m writing this hoping it can help others in the same situation. Eiriks blog post was very useful for me – thanks!

Recommendations

If you are in a similar situation, this might be of help:

• Be polite, do not automatically assume the worst.
• Ask to hear their version, and see if your view is correct.
• If you do ask for double pay (quite common, but depends on the specific case), remember to set a deadline for the offer.
• A link to Eirik Solheim’s story might help.
• If there seems to be no other solution, contact a lawyer with good copyright knowledge.

A Google search for unauthorized use of images may also give some good pointers.

What about you?

Have you been in a similar situation? Please comment below – thanks!

Possibly related posts:

1. Big price differences between USA and Norway Some time ago I wanted to buy a spare Nikon...
2. Backup of images, Lightroom catalog and other things using RAID, rsync, etc When image archives consisted of albums with negatives or cassettes...

Going to town.
D300, ISO 2000, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/400, f/10.

Always RAW

I always shoot RAW (Nikon NEF), also when I want black and white. With NEF files I can do all the adjustments later using Lightroom (or other software), instead of relying on the camera to do them for me (and saving to JPEG or TIFF with fewer adjustments possible).

So, for this experiment, I really only needed to think about “grain”, which means high ISO. Using a high ISO results in more noise from the sensor and also higher contrast, which was what I wanted.

ISO

How high ISO? At ISO 3200 the sharpness of my D300 is not that great, because the noise affects sharpness and not just noise. After a bit of experimenting, I think that ISO 2000 or 2500 gives the best results. Digital Photography Review has a very thorough review of the D300 and ISO performance.

Sample images

Some more images (nothing fancy, just testing):

Mirror.
D300, ISO 2000, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/200, f/7.1.

Pizza chef.
D300, ISO 3200, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/125, f/5.6.

Oslo architecture (not exactly the Opera).
D300, ISO 2500, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/400, f/10.

Fence.
D300, ISO 200, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/200, f/7.1.

Parking King (not my car).
D300, ISO 2000, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/320, f/9.

My “Grainy B&W” Lightroom preset

I did some small changes to the basic “Grayscale Mix”, decreased the noise reduction (to get more “grain”), tweaked the Sharpening (even more “grain”) and some other small changes.

The result is this “Grainy B&W” preset.

Better black and white presets

After fiddling around with my home-baked black and white preset, I figured I should do a quick Google search and see what else was out there on the Interweb. Guess what? Someone has already done a lot of work in making black and white develop presets for Lightroom.

PresetHeaven, for instance has an overview of 34 free black & white film presets for Lightroom (actually, it is 17 presets with and without auto tone).

All the presets are made by Michael W. Gray at LifeInDigitalFilm. These are the 17 films:

• Agfa Scala 200X
• Agfapan 100
• Agfapan 25
• Agfapan 400
• Fuji Acros 100
• Ilford Delta 100
• Ilford Delta 3200
• Ilford Delta 400 Pro
• Ilford Delta 400
• Ilford FP4 125
• Ilford HP5 400
• Ilford Pan F 50
• Ilford SFX 200
• Ilford XP2 Super 400
• Kodak TMAX 100
• Kodak TMAX 400
• Kodak Tri-X 400

LifeInDigitalFilm has a lot of film presets for Lightroom, you can buy all of them for USD 9.99:

“Please consider purchasing LIDF’s Cold Storage Collection, featuring every film preset released since inception of LIDF Plus 12 exclusive presets for supporters of the site. All proceeds support the ongoing development of LifeInDigitalFilm and its presets”

Comparison

Parking King, “Grainy BW” preset (the same image as above):

Parking King using LifeInDigitalFilm’s “Kodak Tri-X 400″ preset:

Split image for your perusing pleasure (click for larger version):

Left: LifeInDigitalFilm’s Tri-X 400 preset.
Right: “Grainy B&W” preset.

How do you convert your images to black and white? Any recommendations or tips? Please use the comment field below – thanks!

Possibly related posts:

1. Snowy night photography After one of many heavy Christmas dinners I decided I...
2. Using the Grain effect in Lightroom 3 RC1 Inspired by Ben Ingham’s superb photos for Rapha rides Norddal...
3. Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 Adobe provides some good camera calibration presets for Lightroom (included...

• Arabic
• Japanese
• Hindi
• Chinese
• Spanish
• German
• Russian
• Italian
• etc

To translate: Just click the little flag on the bottom of the right column on any page.

Because all the translation is done automatically, the language might be a bit strange, but I hope it’s still useful. The log shows that Googlebot is already indexing the trtanslated content, so hopefully it will appear in the search index too.

Please let me know if there are any problems, if I should add more languages, or if there is anything else you want to say.

No related posts.

LaCie 2big Quadra 2TB, which I use as a 1TB mirrored RAID 1 drive.

How everything is organized

I store all images on the external RAID drive,  with files and folders organized like this:

• Images/
  • 1996/
  • 1997/
  • …
  • 2008/
  • 2009/
  • Export/ (files “developed” to JPEG and TIFF from Lightroom)
    • iPhone (portable, synchronized portfolio and albums)

On my MacBook I have a folder for all the Lightroom files, including the plugins and presets:

• Lightroom/
  • Lightroom.lrcat (the Lightroom catalog, almost 1GB now)
  • Lightroom Previews.lrdata (all Lightroom’s previews, can be very big, no need to backup)
  • Lightroom Settings/ (folder with all develop presets, etc)
  • Lightroom Plugins/ ( folder with all *.lrplugin files)

See Adobe Photoshop Lightroom: Workflow and tips for more details on importing images into Lightroom, naming files and folders, organizing, etc.

The backup methods for each of these are described below.

Backup of images

I store all my images on a LaCie 2big Quadra 2TB drive with RAID 1. It appears as one 1TB drive, but contains two mirrored drives. If one drive fails, I have an identical copy on the other drive. The chance that both drives fail at the same time is very small, so this is an easy and safe way to back up without really thinking about it.  The LaCie drive(s) can also be configured so it appears as one 2TB drive (RAID 0, or “striped”), but then all data would be lost if one drive failed. Not so good.. RAID 1 performance over USB 2.0 is good, and the drive also supports Firewire 800 and eSATA (which my MacBook does not).

Before I got the RAID drive, I used two identical 500GB USB drives (LaCie Quadra) and manually copied files between them (with rsync, see below). The two 500GB drives are now used for storing music, movies (that I hope to sometime finish editing) and other things. Maybe they can inherit the 1TB drives from the RAID drive when/if single drives with 2TB capacity become available? (update: Already available from Western Digital)

Backup of images to a different drive

If I should drop the RAID drive to the ground and damage both drives at once (not very likely, but still..), I do not want to lose everything stored on them. Therefore I also backup to a different drive, an Apple Time Capsule 1TB. The Time Capsule is never moved, it just sits in the corner providing WLAN and network storage.

Apple Time Machine automatically backs up all the important files on my MacBook every hour to the Time Capsule, such as documents, accounting files, etc. The image backup is not done with Time Machine, but as a manual operation. Using Time Machine for the Lightroom catalog would trigger a backup of the very large catalog every timew an image was added or changed.

I use Mac OS X’s built-in rsync. It can do a lot of things, but I use it in a very basic way:

• Backup all image files
• If some files have been deleted on the RAID drive, delete them on the Time Capsule too

The rsync command I use is to back up all the files and directory from SOURCE (for me, it’s “/Volumes/2big/images”) to TARGET (for me it’s “/Volumes/TimeCapsule/images/”) is:

rsync -av -delete SOURCE TARGET

The “-v” argument for “verbose” can of course be skipped. The rsync operation can be run automatically at specified intervals, but so far I have done it manually. The “-e –delete” argument makes sure that any files that have been deleted from the source will also be deleted from the target.

An extra backup stored in a different location

As if the above is not enough, I also back up to a portable USB drive that is stored in my parents’ house. Portable 320GB and 500GB USB-powered drives are quite cheap, and in case someone breaks into my house and steals everything, I will still have all the files, except the ones from the days after the last backup.

Lightroom catalog backup

I only use RAW (Nikon NEF), so my image files are not really ready to use, they just contain what the camera’s sensor registered, completely without any processing. The NEF files need to get a similar treatment as is done in-camera when photographing in JPEG: Adjust colors, contrast, etc.

All the changes to colors, contrast, sharpening, etc that should be done to the NEF files are stored in the Lightroom catalog, and the NEF files are never changed. So, the Lightroom catalog is almost as important as the images.

The Lightroom catalog contains all the information about the images:

• Develop presets
• Metadata (EXIF data, keywords, titles, captions, geotags, etc)
• All editing information

The Lightroom catalog is stored on my MacBook so I can use it even when I am not connected tot the RAID drive, but it is frequently copied to the RAID drive, and also rsync’ed to the Time Capsule. Similar backup as the images.

Lightroom can also be configured to ask when started whether it should back up the catalog. I have configured Lightroom to ask every time I start (Lightroom is normally running, so I don’t see the prompt that often), and back up to the same drive. Lightroom also checks the catalog for corruption during the backup. These backup catalogs are moved to the RAID drive (and rsync-ed to the Time Capsule) every now and then, and I normally keep a few old catalogs backed up, just in case.

Note: Lightroom also writes (if configured to) XMP “sidecar” files for each RAW/NEF file, containing mostly the same information as in the Lightroom catalog (metadata, adjustments, etc). These make it possible to send a RAW file with the adjustments, etc in a separate, file, and the XMP file can also be used for recreating a lost Lightroom catalog – at least some of it. I back up the XML files together with the images.

Backup of Lightroom presets, plugins, etc

Lightroom presets are really just simple text files, as you can see in this D300 preset: d300.lrtemplate. The same goes for file name presets (for import), metadata presets, etc. Lightroom saves all these files in a hierarchy inside a folder called “Lightroom Settings”.

I save all my Lightroom plugins in the same folder as the “Lightroom Settings” folder, and install them from there using Lightroom’s Plugin Manager.

This makes it easy to backup all presets and plugins together: Copy the “Lightroom Plugins” and “Lightroom Settings” folders to the RAID drive, and (quite frequently) rsync to the Time Capsule.

Soonr online backup

Soonr is an online backup service with 500MB 2GB free storage, and more storage available for purchase. I use Soonr for all my accounting documents (invoices, receipts, etc), address book and other non-humongous files.

It is very simple to set up: Just tell Soonr which folders (or files) you want to to back up, and it does it automatically in the background. Every time a files is changed, deleted or created, Soonr will update the online backup.

The files backed up by Soonr can also be accessed online using a web browser, and you can upload files to Soonr from anywhere with web access. Soonr also allows sharing, and I am sharing all my accounting files with my accountant. Every time I save an invoice or a receipt on my local drive on the MacBook, the file is also backed up on Soonr, where my accountant can access it.

I use this highly professional and advanced hierarchy for my accounting files:

• 2008/
• 2009/
  • Bank statements/
  • Invoices/
  • Receipts/

Deleting files

I delete the images that I am absolutely sure can not be used. I do not spend a lot of time deciding if an image should be deleted or not – if I’m not sure, I don’t delete it. Why? Because deleting takes time, and storage is cheap. I read somewhere(!) that storage becomes ten times cheaper every second year, which means that in 2011 I can buy ten 2TB drives for what I paid for the one I have now. Why spend time deleting?

Lightroom provides many ways to make navigating a large image archive easy:

• Keywords
• Collections
• Ratings (stars)
• Smart collections (example: All images with the keywords “ski” and “alpine” from 2009 with more than 3 stars)
• Metadata (example: All images taken with the D300 and the Nikon 10mm fisheye)
• Geotags (ok, not yet, but Adobe has to implement this in a future release..)

There’s no need to look at all the images all the time, just create views for what you need, or simply “hide” the lowest rated images. Lightroom also supports stacks, so that 20-frame sequence can be displayed as one image in grid view.

Summary

• Backing up the images is important
• Backing up the Lightroom catalog is equally important
• RAID 1 is good
• rsync is powerful, but also easy
• Consider having a backup in a different location
• Apple Time Machine and Time Capsule can backup your system and other files automatically in the background.
• Soonr can make your accountant happy

The above is what works for me, and I hope it may be useful for others too. It takes requires some effort setting it all up the first time, but after that this is all that’s required:

1. Answer “Yes” (sometimes) when Lightroom asks if it should check and backup the catalog.
2. Do an rsync from the RAID drive to the Time Capsule every now and then. This can be automated, or done with one aliased command or a small script.
3. Update the portable “somewhere else” drive every now and then.

That’s it. You will have a quite safe mirrored drive, a second backup on a separate drive, and a reasonably updated backup in a different location.

From the lab..

This is what my work desk looks like:

The LaCie drives are behind the MacBook. The MacBook’s display is mostly used for iCal and Terminal. The Moomin mouse mat is a must. I recommend a trip to Finland to buy it. Not sure why I bought the wireless keyboard instead of the wired one – I have to charge the batteries once a month.

LaCie drives:

From the left: LaCie 2big Quadra 2TB RAID, LaCie d2 Triple 500GB (discontinued) and LaCie d2 Quadra 500GB (now in a new design). The Time Capsule sits in a shelf in a corner of the room.

What about your backups?

How do you manage your backups? Ever learnt the hard way that backups are nice to have? What do you think of the backup methods mentioned here? Comments and suggestions welcome!

Update 2010-01

I now use ChronoSync for all backups, both manual and scheduled. Highly recommended!

Possibly related posts:

1. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom: Workflow and tips I use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom for almost everything I...
2. Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 Adobe provides some good camera calibration presets for Lightroom (included...
3. Adding Google Analytics to Lightroom web template I use Lightroom’s built-in web template for maintaining my portfolio...

Here it is, a big pile of coal with some snow:

I spent maybe an hour in this very limited area, getting colder and colder. Some of the images have a kind of graphic, abstract look. Mission accomplished?

Possibly related posts:

1. Strobist in a cave under an arctic glacier The Longyearbyen glacier at Svalbard has an long, narrow ice...

An Ambassador and two dogs, near Connaught Place:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/8s, f/2.8.

The D300 is ok at ISO 1600, sort of ok at 2000, but at ISO 3200 the quality is, in my opinion, not good enough anymore. I’d love to have the high ISO capabilities of D3 and D700!

For these images I used mostly ISO 1600, f/2.8 and 1/15. A f/1.4 lens would of course have been nice. I had no tripod, so I either put the camera on something nearby and used the self timer, or took several images in a series and kept the sharpest (or less blurry) one:

1. Take a deep breath, try to keep the camera completely steady
2. Take one shot, or maybe a series
3. Repeat step 1-2 maybe 3-4 times
4. Zoom in on each image to check if it’s blurred
5. Delete all except the best one

This works best on stationary subjects, of course. I used auto white balance, since I shoot RAW and always adjust it a little in post processing anyway. There was a lot of different light sources, and using one setting would not have worked.

From the back seat of an “auto”, note the distance to the other cars:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/15, f/2.8.

An “auto” – they are everywhere:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/10, f/2.8.

Nerhu Place, an IT “hub” with a lot of small IT companies, computer stores and electric appliance stores. There was an Apple store (or just a dealer?) here somewhere too. It’s very busy during the day, but quite deserted at night:

D300, ISO 2000, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/15, f/2.8.

Nerhu Place has some cool street lights:

D300, ISO 720, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/30, f/2.8.

A lot of people were in this area near Connaught Place, where they sold food, CDs, balloons and a lot of other things:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/40, f/3.2.

Cooking food for the restaurants and food stalls near Connaught Place:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/13, f/2.8.

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/30, f/2.8.

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/25, f/2.8.

100m away from all the people, cooking, etc: Ancient temple ruins:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/30, f/2.8.

Typical street scene:

D300, ISO 2000, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/30, f/2.8.

Night fog/smog near my hotel, not far from Nerhu place:

D300, ISO 1600, 17-55mm f/2.8, 1/13, f/2.8.

Notes

I walked around alone with the D300, MB-D10 and 17-55 f/2.8, and could probably not have looked much more like a tourist than I did. I still felt just as safe as in Oslo, even when walking in dark streets and not really knowing where I was. The iPhone’s GPS-enabled Map app rocks, by the way.

When taking pictures of people, I asked for permission when when possible, and with a couple of exceptions everybody seemed to enjoy being photographed. Kids sometimes came running and wanted their picture taken. I smiled a lot at everyone, and everyone smiled back. The people I seemed very friendly, and although I was alone in an unfamiliar and enormous city a long way from home, I very much enjoyed these nightly trips and hope to do it again the next time in India.

I read Shantaram by Gregory David Roberst when I was in India, which added a lot to the experience (recommended reading no matter where you are).  I also sometimes tried wiggle my head a little to say “yes” – with varying success (the wiggling is quite similar to the Norwegian “no” wiggle)

All these image and many others are in the New Delhi set on Flickr.

I’d love to hear what you think, please comment below – thanks!

Possibly related posts:

1. Lightroom black & white develop presets Last day of Easter break: Rain and cold. Perfect for...
2. Merry Christmas A bit late, but here’s s photo I took (quickly)...

D300 with MB-D10, ISO 450, 17-55 f/2.8 at 26mm, 1/1000s, f/5.

I knew I needed at least 1/1000s to freeze Jørgen even when panning, and I wanted a smaller aperture than f/2.8 so I had some depth of field and would manage to keep Jørgen in focus. In this case, that meant f/5 and ISO 450.

About the landing, or lack thereof: I think we can at least try to blame the two persons not jumping or taking pictures for this. We spent quite some time building the jump, but had to hurry at the end because not everybody wanted to stay there any longer. So, instead of having a well-prepared and fast run-in, Jørgen had to do his best on a powdery, slow run-in.

He soon discovered that the skis were about 4cm too long for the speed he was able to achieve. Using my world class Photoshop skillz I created this sequence:

Jørgen suffered no injuries, but landed in a very awkward position in the deep snow – which he told me quite clearly when I continued taking pictures and told him to lay still instead of helping him up.

Notes

• Creating a sequence from a series of panned shots: Not recommended. Note the fake sky in the top left corner, and the fake snow in the lower right. The trees are also a bit weird if viewed in a larger size. If you want to make a sequence (which I wasn’t this time), plan it properly.
• It is a good idea to lock down everything: Focus, exposure, and also use a tripod. If you do not shoot RAW, set the white balance manually too.

This image – not the sequence – was printed on the editorial page of Fri Flyt’s ski guide for 2008/2009.

Possibly related posts:

1. Skiing in Hemsedal Hemsedal is the best ski resort reasonably close to Oslo...
2. Action sports workshop with Mattias Fredriksson Last September I participated in an action photo workshop with...
3. Second place in photo contest I recently won 2nd place (or lost 1st place?) in...

There are lots of image gallery software available, but I want my portfolio to be very easy to maintain, and I do not want to re-type the captions, etc that I already have in Lightroom. Also: I want the portfolio to be in HTML so it can be searched and bookmarked, not in Flash, Silverlight or something similar.

The only thing I am missing from Lightroom’s Web module is the option to add Google Analytics code to the web pages. I use Google Analytics to logs all traffic data on my blog (the one you are reading now), and I want to log traffic from the portfolio in the same way.

Although Lightroom does not allow you to enter the Google Analytics code, you can edit the HTML templates that Lightroom uses for generating the web pages. It does require a little hacking, but it is not difficult.

One of Google Analytics’ many features: Visitor map.

To do this, you will need:

• A Google account (create one here)
• A Google Analytics account (sign up here)
• Some basic UNIX skills, or a little courage.

Warning

There is one small, but annoying side-effect of this: Every time you go to the Web module in Lightroom, it will open up the Google Analytics JavaScript file http://www.google-analytics.com/ga.js in a web browser. I do not know why, or how to avoid it. It doesn’t do any harm, so I think it is worth it.

Also: You are responsible for everything you do, so even though I have done this and it worked perfectly for me, do not blame me if it for some reason doesn’t work for you.

Editing the Lightroom web templates

Here are the step-by-step instructions on how to add Google Analytics JavaScript to the default HTML web template on Apple Mac OS X (if you know how to do this on Microsoft Windows, please use the comment form below):

1. Start the Terminal app. It opens up a UNIX command window.
2. Change to the directory of the default HTML template (this can be done in one step, but the line would be very long, so I split it into three commands): cd "/Applications/Adobe Lightroom 2.app/Contents/PlugIns/" cd Web.lrmodule/Contents/Resources/cd galleries/default_html.lrwebengineIt is not posible to change to this directory using Finder, because it hides all the contents of the “Lightroom 2. app” (it is a directory, not a file).
3. The Google Analytics JavaScript code will be placed in the file foot.html, which is being used when creating all the HTML files. Just to be sure: Make a backup of that file: cp foot.html foot.original
4. Now it’s time to edit “foot.html” and add the Google Analytics JavaScript code. You can use any text editor for this, but some will not allow you to open files “inside” the “Lightroom 2.app” directory, as it regards “Lightroom.app” as a file. I prefer the emacs editor (automatically installed with Mac OS X, emacs cheat sheet here), which is started with the command emacs foot.html
5. Scroll to the end of the file, and add your Google Analytics code right above the line with “</body>” (you must replace “UAXXXXXXX-X” with your Google Analytics id, of course):
   <script type="text/javascript">
var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www.");
document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E"));
</script>
<script type="text/javascript">
try {
var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-XXXXXXX-X");
pageTracker._trackPageview();
} catch(err) {}</script>
6. Save the file: Ctrl-x Ctrl-s
7. Exit emacs: Ctrl-x Ctrl-c
8. Start Lightroom
9. Select some images
10. Go to the Web module and create a web gallery using the “HTML Gallery (default)” template from the Template Browser on the left-hand side. This makes sure that we are using the HTML templates that have just been updated.
11. Change colors and other web template settings as you want to.
12. Click the “Export…” button to save the generated HTML pages somewhere on your drive.
13. Open the newly generated “index.html” file in your web browser and check that the page looks as it should.
14. View the source, and verify that the Google Analytics code is present near the end of the HTML source.
15. Upload all the generated files to your web server.
16. Pat yourself on the back!

You can log in to Google Analytics right away, but it will take a while (a day, maybe?) before any traffic data will be available.

Was this useful? Please let me know in the comments – thanks!

Possibly related posts:

1. Backup of images, Lightroom catalog and other things using RAID, rsync, etc When image archives consisted of albums with negatives or cassettes...
2. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom: Workflow and tips I use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom for almost everything I...
3. Lightroom develop preset for Nikon D300 Adobe provides some good camera calibration presets for Lightroom (included...