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» Photo tip from the road

I’m in southern Sweden with my cousin and his family this weekend as I previously wrote. However I thought I should give y’all just a little on the road tip. When you are out shooting and travelling, do stock up on memory cards, even if you have your laptop with you. You don’t want to be loading all the shots over to your laptop and throw them away from the cards. You’ll want to keep them on the cards and load it over to the laptop. That way you have an extra backup copy of the shots, just in case anything should happen to, say the laptop during the travel or a HDD failure. You’ll probably not have had the time to do a backup on your photos. Don’t learn this the hard way!

» Wednesday News

A lot has been happening in the tech world, especially since the iPhone 3G release. I’m going to try and focus a bit less on all iPhone news and instead go in on the other things that’re happening.

• What is the world coming to?! A father of three got complaints from other parents when he was at a park with his sons taking pictures of them. He was accused of being a pervert and even for taking pictures of children and putting them on the internet. The whole story ended with the father getting a police officer to confirm to them that he was doing nothing wrong. Read the full story.
   
• Last week I told you about the interview Scott Kelby did with attorney Ed Greenberg. Well this week on this weeks Photoshop User TV, Scott is doing a follow-up interview with photographer and copyright advocate Jack Reznicki. It pretty much takes off where we left with Ed last week and finishes up the major concerns a photographer and graphics designer might have. Scott has the interview clip on his blog.
   
• A buddy of mine turned me onto a very cool site called woork. On the site Antonio Lupetti talks about different techniques, scripts and css styles to make cool web things. The posts are always interesting and contains great information overall.

» The deal about Copyright, Model Releases and Public Shooting

There are a lot of discussions going on always about what you can do and can’t do when it comes to legal issues and photography. As Ed says in the interview, photographers have a trend to ask other photographers to get a simple solution to the problems. Well, most of them aren’t true and most times don’t apply to the situations as you think. Scott Kelby however took a little different approach and asked Intellectual Property Attorney, Ed Greenberg to come on as a call-in guest on Photoshop User TV which is airing next week. Scott posted the clips of the interview yesterday on his blog however. In the interview, Ed clears up the major things about Copyright, Model Releases and Public Shooting.

• Listen to the Interview

» Soirée pacifiques

 

Soirée pacifiques
^{© Erik Bernskiold 2008}

This was taken yesterday at a beach just by the house I’m staying in here on the island of Northkoster. Really beautiful sunset at a very beautiful beach. The title "Soirée pacifiques" are French for peaceful evening.

» How to: Shoot Fireworks

For all in the USA, July 4 is coming up tomorrow and there’ll likely be a lot of fireworks displays. I posted this little how-to right before new years this year and reposting it again for all of you going out tomorrow to take some shots. Good luck and have a safe and fun evening!

How To?
First off dial in Manual mode and set the aperture to f/11 or f/13 or something in the likes then set the shutter speed to Bulb, usually indicated by a B. Now when the firework explode, press the shutter and then when the burst has exploded and is wearing off, you let go of it and you should have a working picture of a firework. If you wish to capture many in one frame, just keep it pressed and make sure the frame is pitch black until the next firework goes up. Adjust the aperture as fits between the shots.

Equipment?
It’s best to have a camera that you have full manual mode on but special firework modes can work, although best result is given with a full manual mode. It’s really necessary to have a tripod because you’ll be working with second long exposures that you simply can’t hand-hold. Also learning from own mistakes, never extend the center column on the tripod, even if it feels like you need to, I did it last year only with a good sacrifice in quality in the images. It also helps if you have a remote release to minimize camera shake further as well. I think also a lens in the zoom range of 18-55 or similar works really well because it allows you to get close enough in the sky (if you are close) and also to get some foreground in there as well if you want to, without changing lenses, changing lenses is a no-no!

Position and Preparations
Get to the fireworks display in time and make sure that you know where they are going to be shooting from and set up in a good place where you can see the display and if you want also include some foreground such as the water or something alike. Also make sure you have clean memory cards that are formatted and that they work, also make sure to have your batteries charged and working! Don’t forget to take something warm to wear if it is cold outside either, and good gloves! I hope this little article can benefit you and it is really fun to photograph fireworks!