I stumbled across this site looking for photography guides for lighthouses in the Northeast.  Not only did a find a quick overview to the entire East Coast, the site also had guides to several locations throughout the United States.  Additionally, the site had some pretty good essays and tips on photography.

Scott McClellan wrote his memoirs and appears to have lifted the curtain some at the White House.

Of course, the White House and others mentioned are in full-spin mode trying to discount him. 

It’s too bad they couldn’t spend this energy on real problems rather continuing to stick their heads in the sand like nothing is wrong.

One of the newsgroups I follow on a regular basis is the Wedding Forum at FredMiranda.com (http://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/board/48)

To start with, this site has plenty of high-quality photography information.

But why the Wedding Forum?  It’s like watching a train wreck.  In many ways, wedding photographers have to be the  most neurotic group in photography.  On the other hand, after following this group for more months than I care to admit, I probably would neurotic as well.  Some of the story lines and my thoughts…

• Constant competition from “Uncle Bob” with their digital SLR
• Soccer moms with their digital SLRs underpricing them.  For both of this, what are you doing to separate yourself.
• Change in business models from print-based to service based.  Most of the photographers need to embrace the digital revolution and realize that their customers don’t give a crap about copyright issues.  The believe they are the owners of the photographs and have the rights to scan/email/reprint/etc ….  The real question is which battle do photographers want to win?  My take is that they need to embrace the service side and charge for that.
• Speaking of copyrights, why do photographer’s place such great value on them?  Outside of the client (and I’m speaking only for portaiture/wedding here), that copyright is worthless.  Sure you may get lucky and shoot famous person years before hand, but that’s going to vast minority of the cases.
• Constant questions as to “I’m getting ready to shoot my first wedding.  Any advice?” “My friends, just ask me to shoot their wedding, should I say yes?”  (The standard answers are do you have backup equipment and to refer the friends to a professional)  I did get amused when the vast majority of the posters starting to pile-up a 20 year photojournalist and telling him he wasn’t qualified.  That guy had the technical skills – he would have been fired already if he didn’t.  Whether or not he had the business or people skills to be a wedding photographer is a different story.
• Along those same lines, its not whether or not you are a good photography to make it weddings, it’s how good are you at the people and business side.
• There always seems to be a disaster
• Do I give RAWs away?
• Do I shoot in RAW or JPEG?  If you have to ask this question, use RAW.  Yes, you can shoot a wedding in JPEG, but you better know what you are doing.
• Dealing with Bridezillas and other “characters” of the day.

Well the latest photography book I’ve read is actually fairly recent – having just been published earlier this year.

Overall, Matt Kloskowski’s book is solid, tutorial-based approach to layers within Photoshop CS3. Beginners and intermediate users will appreciate the style – very much the same as other books from the “Kelby Training” organization.

If you have solid understanding of the following topics (and can use independently), I would pass on this book:

• Layers
• Layer Styles
• Blending Modes
• Smart Objects
• Clipping Masks

Quite frankly, if you already own Scott Kelby’s Seven-Point System book, you can take a pass on this book as well.

From an improvement standpoint, I would have like to seen some material put into the book in a different manner(from the tutorial/step approach) such that the book could function as a reference. For example, description and sample uses of all of the blending modes and layer styles.

Matt did a great job in thinking through the examples in the book and people without much experience in this area, will learn from the book.

There’s also a nugget or two in every chapter on becoming a better post-processor:

• Split-toning & Tinting
• Photo-filters: warming/cooling
• Color correction
• Retouching: wrinkles, eyes, teeth, and skin

Final recommendation: Buy if you need more help and practice with layers.

Those who sacrificed to give us what we have today -

When you can list ten or more ways to lighten a picture.

Unforutunately, I’m only at 9 -

1. Screen blend on an empty adjustment layer
2. Levels adjustment
3. Curves adjustment by moving curve up
4. Curves adjustment by sliding white pointer to the left (same as levels)
5. Brightness/Contrast adjustment
6. Hue / Saturation adjustment, but only change the lightness
7. Exposure adjustment
8. Shadows/Highlight
9. Image -> adjustments -> Variations (select “lighter”)
   

Recently, I just read the following books (published between 1983 and 1994):

• Landscape Photography by John Hedgecoe
• The Nature Photographer’s Complete Guide to Professional Field Techniques by John Shaw
• Close-ups in Nature by John Shaw
• People in Motion by Bryan Peterson

Obviously, technology has changed the equipment most photographers use today, but the basic principles of exposure and composition remain very much the same. I found Landscape Photography to be the book most useful in terms of information. All of books had outstanding images to view and understand how they were taken. I was a little disappointed in “People in Motion” – wished it talked more about the mechanics of posing people. John Shaw’s books were both very solid, but I found much of ther materical I had already picked up in books read previously.

My mind is incapable of understanding thse following true-life events:

• Using a dead woman’s credit card 70 times for $3000 in charges
• Using a holy book as target practice. The actual item was the Quran, but this is just as revolting as using the Bible or the Torah
• Putting a newborn into trunk of a car or dumpster

What were these people thinking? What morals do they have? How did society allow “individuals” like this to develop?

Begging the Saudis to increase oil output …..

How many months of this left? 

Check out this awesome tutorial over at Layer’s Magazine at Creative Contrast in CS3.

Here’s what the techinique did to a washed-out photo I took of General Eisenhower’s plane at the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson, Arizona.

Before:

After: