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Weekend Links

iffles — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 01:35:45 +0000

f/4.0, 1/400 sec, 65mm, ISO 200

The above photo was a pretty popular one of mine on flickr recently, so I thought I’d throw it in here even though it really has nothing to do with any of the links you see below.

Still a bit confused about aperture is and how it affects your photos? Check out this article about aperture from The Discerning Photographer.
I’m a Gimp Girl for life, so I don’t need convincing, but if you’re still debating if Gimp or Photoshop is the way to go, check out these 10 reasons why Gimp is better than Photoshop at Light Stalking.
Also at Light Stalking, they’ve posted 7 things photographers should never do – it’s an interesting list (and one that I’m sure we’d all love to add to).
Looking for some tips on reflection shots? Claire has you covered. Check out these 6 tips for photographing reflections!
Upgrading your camera? PetaPixel has 5 tips for reselling your camera if you’re looking to get rid of your old one.
Finally, I liked to wish a “happy birthday” to Ronan Palliser’s photoblog – you’ve seen his blog pop up a number of times in these Weekend Links entries – mostly because I love his photography and the way he writes about every shot he takes. He celebrated one year of blog posts with a flash-lit cake, and of course, a detailed description of how he was able to get the shot! (btw, Ronan himself had a birthday earlier on in the week,

And now in the Your Links section:

Doesn’t look like Maciek has posted since late last year, but maybe if all leave comments about the beautiful photography in entries like this, we’ll start seeing some more entries! (Btw, that link takes you to the translated-to-English version of the page)
I don’t know if suewells2511 actually wanted to show up in this section, but I was checking out her 365 project on her blog (she posts them once a week) and decided you guys had to see week 7 if only for that amazing landscape shot.
Jessica recently started her photoblog. I’m excited because I’ve seen some of her photos on flickr that I love so I think I’ll enjoy the blog, too. I know I liked her the shots from her first photowalk!

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The best of Monthly Theme: Shapes

iffles — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 19:10:23 +0000

Well, its about that time that I show you my favorite photos submitted to the monthly theme group on flickr for February. The theme last month was “shapes” and…you guys, you did amazing! This is SO HARD for me, because I really want to showcase ALL of your photos because there were so many good ones! I’m really impressed with the number of shapes you guys were able to find, I thought this was hard theme, but you guys blew me away!

There is already some amazing Black and White photography in the group pool, so be sure to join on the Mono March fun!

by hexapetala - I love the bright red of the stop sign in contrast to the muted tones in the background. Related, I like the harsh lines of the stop sign in contrast to the smooth circle in back. Great shapes!

by Eva und Michael - love all the different shapes in this skyline, especially all the repeating windows on the building on the right.

by dpksh - First, I'm amazed at anyone that can knit. Second, I love the triangle formed by the knitting needles. Third, I love the pretty colors :)

by kristenmoss - fun corkscrew shape in the foreground and bokeh diamonds in the background! Love!

by shirley319 - so many shapes! So many colors. Is this a school art project? It looks like it, which makes it that much cooler. Think of how many kids are so proud of these creations!

by shannon.waller - so apparently I really like contrasting shapes, because I love the bricks surrounding a circle, which holds the ... what is that? wood? Whatever it is, it's more skinny rectangles. Neat!

by Lillume - gah! Love! The colors, the DOF, the repeating pattern, the CIRCLES!

by moveandfire - windows make great shapes, don't they? and I loved the wall behind the window. Btw, moveandfire, I love your flickr profile icon :)

by GenBug - is it too cheesy to say I love this? Fantastic reflection, too!

by PhoenixRyzing - from the description of this photo on flickr: "Everyone takes a photograph of the tops of crayons. I decided for the photo challenge of "shapes" I would take a picture of the circular bottoms." - what a great idea!

by Shotslot - Confession: I'm a sucker for photos of lights. But what really makes this shot for me is the self portrait :)

by Photos by Fritz - All I can say is awwww! My heart melted a bit when I saw this. (get it? melted? I'm sorry, my sense of humor sucks.)

by kkaldrich - It's the description of the photo on flickr that really got me: "The green onion plopped on the plate just like that. On Valentine's Day. And then it was yummy." I love that in the midst of preparing food, when something like this happens the first instinct is to run and grab the camera!

by mtbcat - hello repeating circles, nice to meet you!

by rachel_pics - a family of hands! With pretty pink squares as a background. This is such a great family portrait!

by MarthaH214 - shapes inside of shapes! So many pretty colors, too!

by Atlantis_breeze - I love the contrast between the bricks on the left and the bricks on the right - and the star pattern on that one brick on the right.

by Tryphyna2010 - of course! There are so many great shapes IN our camera! What a great idea for a shot.

by melissac79 - beatuiful colors!

by BrianPColt - the shapes and oclors are BOTH awesome in this photo. Plus, that looks like Skeeball and I LOVE me some Skeeball.

by .:SindyHand:. - such beautiful colors. And great composition. It's a lot harder to take this photo than it looks!

by BirdingRVer - once again, I'm loving the contrast between squares and circles.

by thedigitaliris - I love it when people find great photo ops in everyday things like this. And that bright pink is fantastic!

by jinspain2002 - I'm sure at this point you all know why I like this one. A square inside a circle inside a rectangle. yay!

by laura oliver1 - ok, I have to admit, I'm not even sure what this is! It looks kinda like the butt-end of a lens (I'm sure there's a much more proper term for that), but almost like it's TOO simple to be that. Is it? Well, whatever it is, I love the circles, and I love the colors and lines of whatever it's sitting on.

by evelynspikes - love the texture in this one.

If I didn’t pick yours, I’m sorry… but trust me, it was a tough decision!

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Gimp Quick Tips: Part Two

iffles — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 03:42:11 +0000

This was not the entry I planned on writing tonight – which was one about faking an HDR effect in Gimp, since one of you asked for it many moons ago. Long story short – I think my computer really does not want me to write that entry, as this is the third time I’ve attempted it and something has gone wrong and I’ve lost some of my work. It will get posted eventually, though, I promise – right now I’m just a bit annoyed and bitter about the whole thing (again), so I’m walking away from it (again).

So, instead I’m going to write a follow-up to this Gimp Quick Tips entry, and give you MORE quick tips! How exciting!

New Layer From Visible

You guys all should know by this point that I like to play with a lot of layers. Sometimes I’ll end up with multiple layers with all different blend modes and opacity and I realize that I want to do something to the image as a whole and not just one of the layers (like adjust the levels, or sharpen the photo). I used to right click on each layer and select “merge down” to combine two layers together into one, but that was a pain because it sometimes took a while if I had multiple layers, and I’d also lose all those individual layers I had.

The fix? Go to Layer –> New from Visible. Which does exactly what you think it would do – it creates a new layer that contains exactly what you see on the screen RIGHT NOW. Yay!

Dragging Guide Lines

Are you playing with the perspective a photo or rotating it and wish that you had a guide line to base it off of? You might have realized you can add guide lines to your photo by going to Image –> Guides –> New Guide, but then you have to know either what pixel you want the guide at, or at what percentage, and sometimes you just want to place one where you want it by yourself.

Well, you can! Just click and drag from the ruler at either the top or left side of Gimp and you’ll be dragging a guide line:

In order to to remove the guide line, make sure your “move” tool is selected (looks like the icon you see on the right), and you can drag the line around again and to remove it, drag it back up into the ruler again. You can also remove ALL guides on your photo by going to Image –> Guides –> Remove All Guides

Dragging Images into Gimp

So, you’re working on a photo in Gimp and you want to add a texture to it that you have in your file system. Did you know you can drag and drop it from the file system into your image in Gimp and it will add it as a new layer for your automatically?

Show Layer Mask

We’ve talked about Layer Masks before, but I always like giving a quick recap each time, because if you’ve never used them before, I know they can be confusing. A layer mask is something you can add to your layer and then paint either white, black, or shades of gray on it to control the opacity of certain parts of a layer. Basically – a pure white layer mask (which is what a mask is by default) means your entire layer is completely opaque. But if you were to draw a black line right through the middle of it, everywhere you drew the line would be transparent – so you could see through to the layer below.

Often I find myself creating my own layer mask, or using a script that adds a layer mask for me, and I want to see the mask itself. Usually when working with the masks, you see the result of the mask (so, your layer turns more transparent or opaque) instead of seeing the black and white you’re painting with. To see the mask itself, right click on it and select Show Layer Mask:

And now you’ll see the mask. You can edit it, too, of course, from here. To go back to how it was before, just right click on the mask again and select Show Layer Mask again to uncheck it.

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Weekend Links

iffles — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 19:47:04 +0000

This recent photo of John & I breaks a lot of rules, and technically isn't a good photo. But I still like it. f/4.0; 1/13sec; 24mm; ISO 800

Remember, today is the last day of February, so it’s the last day to take photo with Shapes as a theme for the monthly themes group on flickr. Once again, I’m going to wait until next week to post my favorites, to give people time to edit and upload them. The theme for March is Mono (or, black and white, but Mono March is so much more fun to say, isn’t it?).

Are you into film photography? The folks over at Epic Edits recently launched Feeling Negative – a site devoted to film photography.
Can’t decide what route to take for you photowalk? flip a coin! Such a simple idea, but I love it. I think I might wait for the weather to warm up before I try it, though, that coin could get pretty cold right now!
For those of you that use Lightroom, did you know that color sliders are useful even after converting to grayscale? Check this out.
Here’s a cool trick to make zebra stripes in icicles.
Do you spend too much time processing your images? Here’s 10 time-saving tips for post-production. I’m guilty of not following a few of these…
Think every photography accessory is really expensive? Check out these 7 pieces of photo gear for less than $10.
Ronan Palliser uses an example of a photo of a bride and groom to illustrate that sometimes it’s ok that a photo isn’t “technically correct” and some people might not like it for that. Sometimes, what really matters is just telling a story.
I have to admit, most of this was greek to me, but if any of you use Aperture 2 and are thinking about upgrading to Aperture 3, it sounds like you might want to read this.

I promised I would eventually got around to posting more links to your blogs, but I don’t seem to have any! Have any of you sent me a link that I never posted? I feel like I’m missing some… once again, all you have to do to get your blog mentioned in this section of my “Weekend Links” post is to leave me a comment and tell me! (btw, priya82 – I got your link but the blog had only one post that was a year old and it didn’t have any photos on it, so I wasn’t sure if that was the right one?)

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Why I Think it’s OK to “Cheat” on Photography Projects (sometimes)…

iffles — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 02:49:58 +0000

f/3.5, 1/125 sec, 10mm, ISO 200

You guys are all aware that I’m attempting three photography-related projects this year. Well, less than two full months into the project, I’m already cheating on one of them (my 52 photowalks). I started to feel guilty about this for about 2 second before I fully rationalized my decisions and decided, ya know what? It’s ok to cheat on our photography projects sometimes. I know the arbitrary rules of “a photo a day” or “a photowalk a week” are reasons why some people don’t do these projects at all (and if you’re dedicated and motivated enough to go out and use your camera creatively without a project – I salute you… I’m not one of those self-motivated people), but for those of you that are doing a project like mine, and have perhaps missed a 365 photo, or couldn’t make it on one of your 52 photowalks, I present you with my reason as to why it’s ok to cheat on your personal photography projects.

Meeting the Goals of Your Projects

When I did my 366 project (it was a leap year), I used to jump out of bed at 11:45 PM (scaring John who was sleeping next to me, of course), and start muttering something about not taking a photo, and end up with a lousy camera-on-auto, badly-lit, arms-length self portrait. Yes, I met the goal of taking my photo during that 24 hour period – but was that really the goal of my project? I started that project for three reasons:

To document a year of my life
To learn how to use my camera
To take more creative photos

One day during my 366 project, I realized I hadn't taken a photo of myself that day, but was relieved to find this photo of John's and my feet on my memory card for that day. Very out of focus, but it still counted!

An arms length photo of me with bed head meets none of those goals. If I had forgotten to take that photo completely and took two the next day that documented what I was doing that day in a creative way (and not on Auto), that would have met my goals more. So why be so restrictive with the time deadline?

The same thing applies for whatever rule you broke, of course. Perhaps you’re doing a self-portrait 365 and forgot to take a photo of yourself on some day, but did take a really great photo without you in it. So? If your goals were similar to the ones I listed above, doesn’t that fantastic photo still apply?

Avoiding Risk to Yourself or Your Camera

This is a big one for me during this time of year when it’s snowing a lot. I’m actually terrified of snow when it comes to my camera. I’ve read all the articles online about how to protect your camera and lenses, but I still think the best way to protect your camera from snow is to not go outside when it’s snowing. Since I have to go outside for my photowalks, and I work during most of the daylight hours of the week, that really narrows down the amount of time I can find outside when it’s not snowing. I’d rather skip a week in my photowalk project than damage my camera or lens.

I’m also not going to risk my own health (do you like how I wrote about the dangers of risking my camera before risking myself? Does that say something about me?). I’ve been fortunate enough that this has never really been an issue for me, but there was one year (before I got into photography) that I was hospitalized for almost a week, and then essentially bed-ridden for the following week. I wouldn’t have had many options then if I were in the middle of some projects. I don’t think anyone would look down on me for putting my camera down for a week or two then.

Related, of course, is the health of your family. Once again, I think this is an obvious one, but if you have a loved one that is suffering, I’m not sure it’s really appropriate to say “hold on, honey, I see you’re in pain and all, but I really gotta go take some photos – be back in an hour or two!”

Level of Cheating

This is something that’s a personal choice for you, and is all going to depend on what the project means to you. For instance, last year was my first year doing 52 photowalks, and I would have been pretty devastated if I had missed a week completely (and I never did, actually). But as the only rules I ever gave myself were “leave the house once a week and take photos”, I suppose I was a bit flexible in my definition of a photowalk on some weeks. For instance:

The photo at the top of this entry? That was on one of my “photowalks” that was actually a bike ride I went on and stopped to take some photos at one point. This was probably the least “cheatingish” thing I did, but I still felt a little bit of guilt about it.
I spent Easter at my sister’s house, and took a lot of photos around her house (and of her kids). It was not a walk at all, and something I would have done project or not, but… I did leave my house, so I figured it counted.

Does an Easter Egg Hunt count as a photowalk? It's up to you!

This year, since I’ve already successfully completed a 52 photowalks project last year, I’m not so concerned about the one-a-week thing as I was last year. So I might stick with a goal of just doing 52 in a year, not necessarily one a week.

Another example – When I did my 366 self-portrait project, I insisted that I actually take every photo with my finger hitting the button, whereas I know other people are perfectly ok with allowing someone else to take the photo, as long as they themselves set up the entire shot. Like I said, it’s a matter of personal preference.

You have to draw the line somewhere, of course

Just because I’m justifying doing some cheating here and there on your project, don’t let it become a habit! If I had cheated on my 366 project and took 7 photos every Saturday instead of one every day, that’s no longer really documenting my daily life, is it? And I’m sure they wouldn’t be as creative, because I’d be rushing to get each of the 7 photos done in a day.

Besides, another main reason I do these projects is to be able to look back and think “look what I did, I really accomplished something”. If you cheat too much, you’ll lose that sense of pride.

Why I Cheated

In case you’re curious, since I mentioned above that I already cheated in my 52 photowalks, I thought I’d tell you what I’ve done. I consider my “weeks” to be Thursday-Wednesday. Today is Wednesday, and for various reasons (mostly travel and snow-related) I haven’t had a chance to go out and do a photowalk. Why am I not sweating it?

My goal was to continue to enjoy my photowalks that I had already been going on, learn more about my camera, and take less nature (and more urban) photos. If I go on two walks this upcoming week, is that hurting any of my goals? No.
The main reason I wasn’t able to go out this week is because I wasn’t home often when there was light out AND no snow. I don’t like taking my camera out when it’s snowing, and I’m not going to risk that just to get a photo before the end of the week
As far as my level of cheating? Last year, I’m not sure I would have let this slide. But because I’ve already finished one year of 52 photowalks, I’m a bit more relaxed about my “rules” this year. I’ll make up somehow, and if I don’t? Meh. then I’ll have done 51 photowalks in a year, and that ain’t bad, either.

So, if you’ve cheated on any of your projects and still kept going, I give you a pat on the back. Virtually, at least.

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Weekend Links

iffles — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 03:45:55 +0000

The curve of this building is what makes the photo interesting, in my opinion. f/5.0, 1/100sec, 19mm, ISO 200

I realize it’s been a week since I posted here, and I’m back only to post more links. I think I’m going through a bit a creative rut right now.

I guess it’s appropriate that my first link is Shotslot’s inspiration ideas for the creatively challenged – a post that includes some links to jumpstart your creativity. (earlier this week, he also posted some links about portrait photography).
Doing some nature photography? Check out this list of 5 great resources for nature photographers.
Looking to make the jump from automatic to manual? You might find this article interesting, then.
I know I’m usually promoting free things around here, but if you’re willing to pay a small amount for something – you must check out Michelle’s (from mytwoseasons.com) new photo veils that she has for sale. They work like textures to give your photo a completely different look and feel – check out all the before and after images here and pick up your copy of the whole package!
Over at Epic Edits, there’s been a lot of talk about using Curves to edit your photos, but this week they’ve also posted an article about using curves when composing your photos.

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Beginning of the Week Links

iffles — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 02:36:09 +0000

Here's some clouds from above - taken out of an airplane window! f/8, 1/1000sec, 50mm, ISO 100

Yeah, I really don’t have a reason for not posting this on a Sunday like I usually do. For now I’ll just blame a combination of the snow, the Olympics, and Valentine’s Day.

Do you think you need a more expensive camera? Maybe you don’t (the timing of this one is great, btw, as I’m planning on writing an entry soon that is really a great follow-up to this)
When it comes to composition, sometimes it’s all about breaking the rules.
Here’s a few simple, helpful portrait photography tips.
This short post is something that I think is really important to understand: Understanding exposure meter settings.
I often get asked “where do I start after I first download Gimp?”, and if you’re looking for a few very basic things to do, check out this list of quick tips.
I meant to post this article about how to photograph clouds last week, but it somehow missed the list!

I think I got one or two more links from your blogs to post, but in the interest in getting this posted at a decent hour, I’m going to hold off on them until next week – I have a very efficient filing system, though (I leave the emails from the comment system in my inbox as unread – I’m so high-tech and organized, no?), so I won’t lose them. Well, hopefully.

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Introduction to using UFRaw to edit Raw files

iffles — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 03:39:58 +0000

This photo doesn't have anything to do with this entry, it's just what I was editing with taking screenshots. f/4.0; 1/640sec; 70mm; ISO 200

I love Gimp – I think you might have all realized that by now. But there’s one thing Gimp can’t do all on its own. And that’s editing RAW files. The good news is, though, that there are other options. The first option is that your camera probably came with some software that allows you to manipulate RAW files. I’m guessing mine did, because I know it came with software, but I’ve never installed it. That’s because your second option is to use some sort of free software.

There is, of course, a third option, and that is to pay for software, and that opens up a lot more doors – and I’m assuming gives you better products, too – but part of the idea behind this website was to show you cheap/free ways to develop your photography habit (get it? Develop? I crack myself up).

So, the two free programs I hear about most often are RawTherapee and UFRaw. I had plans to use both of these products and give you a comparison and tell you why I liked one of them more than the other, but to be honest, I still haven’t tried RawTherapee, and I find myself wanted to discuss the adjustments I make to my Raw files, so I’m going to forge ahead and just tell you how I use UFRaw. I’m guessing that the options I use in UFRaw are also available in RawTherapee, so if you’d like to try that, feel free! But for the sake of this entry, I’m only going to talk about UFRaw.

Download and Install

Before you even download UFRaw, please check the list of supported cameras to make sure it can support your RAW files (notice that being the list of “Cameras supporting DNG” there’s a long list of “Other supported cameras”).

Once you’ve determined you can use UFRaw, you’re going to have to download and install it, obviously. You can download it from this page, and you’ll see it’s available for about 20 different distributions of Linux, as well as Mac (note: if you’re already using the GIMP on OS X application bundle, the gimp plug-in is already bundled in with that, apparently), and Windows.

It’s been a while since I installed UFRaw, but if I recall, the installation was really straight-forward and simple.

If you use Windows:

I’m just going to make a special note here – if, like me, you use Windows (not saying I’m a fan of windows, just being honest here.), you’ll notice that there’s two options for installing it. The first option is the “MS-Windows for dummies”. The second option is “MS-Windows for geeks”. This is the first part of the instructions under MS-Windows for geeks:

I build UFRaw using a cross-compiler in Linux. It is also be possible to build UFRaw in the Cygwin environment, which imitates the Unix environment on MS-Windows. After setting up the environment and installing all the required packages the installation procedure is the same as for Unix. If you want to compile UFRaw in another environment or with a different compiler then you are on your own.

If that does not make any sense to you, just do the “for dummies” one. I won’t hold it against you – because that’s what I used, too!

Opening a RAW file:

There’s a couple different ways to open your Raw files in UFRaw. You can open UFRaw itself and you’ll be presented with a dialog box that allows you to select a Raw file:

Or you can right click on your photo and select Open With –> UFRaw:

Finally, you can just open your RAW files directly into Gimp – so however you typically open them there (whether it’s dragging them into Gimp or doing a File–>Open, or whatever you do) and it will automatically pop open UFRaw.

Making Adjustments

So, here’s what UFRaw looks like when you first open a RAW file with it:

Click to make bigger

As you can see, there’s a number of things you can play around with here, but I’m going to concentrate on three things for this “intro to UFRaw” entry: Exposure, White Balance and Saturation. Why? Two reasons: they’re easy, and they’re the three things I use most.

Exposure

The first thing you probably want to play with is this slider in the upper-left:

It’s the exposure slider. So, if your picture is a bit underexposed, slide it to the right. If it’s a bit overexposed, slide it to the left. IS THIS NOT THE COOLEST THING EVER???? This slider was half of the reason I started shooting in Raw. I’ll get to the other half in the bit.

If you look a few buttons to the right of the exposure slider, you should see the button you see to the left of this paragraph. It’s the “auto exposure” button. Sometimes this button is a one click exposure fix. Sometimes, though, it gets confused by really bright things in your photo (like the sun) and wants to make you photo really underexposed just to make sure that no spot is overexposed. Still, I usually start off with using it just to see what it suggests and adjust from there.

If you’re curious about what parts of your photo are over or under-exposed, look down in the lower-left of UFRaw and you will see these checkboxes:

See how it’s telling me that that 12, 21, and 8.8 percent of my red, green and blue channels are overexposed? If I check that checkbox and hit Indicate, it will start flashing the overexposed areas on the picture. Neat!

White Balance

This is the second half of the reason I started shooting in Raw. Sometimes it’s really hard to get the white balance right in camera. Or sometimes we actually get it right, but we want to make the photo look warmer or cooler on purpose. changing the white balance of a Raw photo is so easy!

Underneath the Exposure slider there’s a row of tabs. If this is the first time you’ve opened UFRaw, you should be on the White Balance tab already (which is the first tab and it looks like an old-fashioned scale with blue on one side and red on the other. Oh, ha! I only just now got that. Balance. Scale.). So you should see the following:

The first thing in that section is a dropdown that contains some default White Balance settings:

But you can also manually adjust the white balance. Here’s a tip: you do NOT need to select Manual White Balance to adjust it, so just pick whichever white balance is closest to what you want, and then start moving the sliders below the dropdown. The one I adjust most often is the Temperature one. Moving it to the right makes the picture warmer (so more reddish/orangish/yellowish), and moving it to the left makes it cooler (more blue).

You’ll notice there’s an eye-dropper next to the sliders, too, so if you have a perfectly gray point that you want to base your white balance off of, you can click the dropper, then click on that spot in the photo and it will adjust the white balance using that. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve EVER used this – other than playing around with it.

You might need to adjust how much green is in your photo, too, which you can obviously do with the slider under the Temperature slider. I probably only have to do this in about 5% of my photos.

Saturation

I often add some saturation into my images in UFRaw. I know it’s easy to do in Gimp, too, but I prefer to do it to the Raw file. The Saturation tab is the fifth tab and it looks like this:

Pretty much the only thing I do here is play with the Saturation slider – making it less than one will desaturate the image (setting it to zero will make it completely black and white), and setting it above one will make the image more saturated. When I do adjust this, I typically set it between 1.3 and 1.6.

Denoise

Ok, I lied, one more thing really quick. If you go back to the White Balance tab, you’ll notice there’s a Denoise slider at the bottom of that section. If you have a photo with a lot of noise (one taken with a higher ISO, for instance), it’s often helpful to play with this slider to remove some of that noise.

An Important Piece of Information!

At this point, I want to be sure to mention: UFRaw REMEMBERS all your settings from one photo to the next – so if you have it on Auto Expose with a Manual White Balance and Saturation set to 1.60 – it will use those settings by default on your next photo.

Opening the file in Gimp

This step is slightly different depending on how you opened the image. If you did one of the first two methods I mentioned (opening UFRaw and then selecting the file, or right clicking on the file and selecting to open with UFRaw), you’ll see a Gimp icon in the lower-right:

Clicking this icon will open the file in Gimp.

If you opened the file directly in Gimp and then the only options you see fewer options, but one of them is OK:

Clicking OK will open the file in Gimp.

For more information

There was recently an article on DPS about using UFRaw, and the person who wrote it does some different adjustments than I typically do, so for another “intro to UFRaw”, be sure to check out that article!

For a bit more advanced (but also more in-depth) reading, be sure to check out the user guide on the UFRaw website.

And if you have any specific questions, feel free to ask in the comments. By the way, and this applies for all entries, if you ask me a question in a comment, I’m usually pretty good about answering them – but I do so as a reply to the comment, which should automatically email you with the email address you used in the comment form (or Disqus/Twitter/OpenID account). So, if you’ve asked me something, watch out for an email at that address.

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The best of Monthly Theme: Textures

iffles — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 18:58:47 +0000

January’s theme for the iffles.com Monthly Themes group on flickr was Textures and there were TONS of great submissions. I spent this past weekend looking through them all and wanted to take some time to share my favorites. This was SO HARD for me to do. I had to narrow down the list twice because I had way too many the first time. There were some amazing photos in the group – if yours didn’t make the list this time, keep posting – February’s theme is Shapes!

by Eva und Michael. What bright colors!

by team.breeze. Oooh, that red!

by ShellyS. I don't know what this is, but I really want to wrap myself up in it!

by evelynspikes. So many textures in one photo - the peeling paint, the bricks, the stones... yum!

by coraline97. If this is not the definition of texture, I don't know what is. I'd love to see an experiment using this as a texture on a photo

by Jon Game. The detail, the shallow DOF, and the amazing colors. Just fantastic.

by laura oliver1. Not only do I love the texture and DOF, it was really nice to see some green in with all the other winter photos :)

by jinspain2002. Ouch! :)

by Eva und Michael. I love that it's black and white and I love the grain in it

by hanamik. The texture on the ground is a great contrast to the cute shoes!

by mtbcat. I especially like how the lock itself looks brand new against the old, textured chain.

by mtbcat. The pop of yellow against that texture? Perfection.

by summer_daze. This texture is formed by sap leaking from the leg of their coffee table. How freakin' cool is that?

by Sarire. Not only do I love the texture, but look at the pops of blue and green there on the right! Nifty!

by Stephanie.Grace. This is one of my favorite colors at the moment, so I had to choose it!

by jafael. I love how the entire frame is filled with ouchies!

by thedigitaliris. Love the texture of the wood and screws and paint

by .:SindyHand:. I love everything about this photo - the composition, the DOF, the warm tones... and of course the texture!

by laura oliver1. This one took my breath away.

by dpksh. The peeling trees are just fantastic - especially against the pure white snow behind them.

by Tokyo Rhino. Do you know what that is in the foreground? It's the snout of a mom of that baby rhino. Awesome.

by Inspirophoto. Love the colors.

by BirdingRVer. Another texture that makes me say Ouch!

by GenBug. I'm a sucker for raindrops, and these are shaped so perfectly.

by bouncyczech. I love that this is something so recognizable, but not how we usually look at it.

by Rick Zawodny. So much texture!

by laura oliver1. Such great timing with the raindrops and the ripples make a great texture.

by jinspain2002. I have to admit, this photo didn't scream texture to me, but it was so incredibly beautiful I had to include it anyway.

by Grumpy Cake King. Not quite sure what it is, but I definitely love it.

by kkaldrich. This one actually made me chuckle when I first saw it :)

by shirley319. Beautiful.

by shannon.waller. It's like a tiny little dish of texture!

by melissac79. A beautiful (and cold!) texture.

Don’t forget – February’s theme is Shapes! So keep posting to the group!

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Weekend Links

iffles — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:36:27 +0000

This is about it as far as family portraits go in our house. He looks thrilled to be with me, doesn't he?

I’ve gone through the iffles.com monthly themes group on flickr and have picked out my favorites from January (which was hard – there were so many good ones!), and those should be posted tomorrow. February’s theme is shapes, interpret that however you like and submit them to the pool!

Brian Cooney recently got a chance to photograph his first basketball game – his little brother’s. He was nice enough to write about his lessons learned.
Have you ever wondered how three bananas can help improve your wildlife photography skills? Well. Wonder no more.
I love bold colors, but they’re sometimes hard to capture in photography. Here are some tips to help you do just that.
Tara Whitney is doing her own persnal project this year – trying to capture at least one family portrait each month, for one year.
I’m sure you’ve heard how every time you open and resave a jpg file, you lose a bit of quality. To see that in action, check these out.
Take a look at Epic Edit’s Introduction to Curves.

And now for more of YOUR links. I’m always willing to look at your photography-related blog – all you have to do is tell me in comment that you want me to, and I’ll link to it in the next Weekend Links entry!

Josiah is also sharing his 365 photos on his blog (appropriately called A Photo a Day). My favorite of his recent photos is this one of a snowy tree-lined road. I like that he also talks about how he edited the photo.
bumblebeezack recently started a photoblog with some great photos on it. My favorite appears to be of the underside of some bridges – impressive!
Noreen has a photoblog, too! She’s going to try to complete all the DPS assignments this year, so be sure to follow her blog to see her submissions. In the mean time, check out 3 different angles of a famous Seattle landmark
Ashlie is posting a photo a day (not necessarily one she took herself, but just anything that inspires her) and writing 1000 words to go along with it, which I think is a really cool idea. Check out the first post.

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