Relatable images

I try to stay up on what other people I know who photography are doing. In other words, what sort of photos are they taking? I look for techniques, locations, subject matter, etc. How did they produce that image? At what lengths did they go to get it?

There are times though, that I have a VERY hard time looking at the images. Why though? Most of the time, I have a hard time relating to the image at hand.

For example, I will look at photos of Philmont for days. Even though they might be some pretty boring and tell very little of a story, it is the subject at hand that keeps me going.

Conversely,  I've seen photos of the Dew Tour- guys with skateboards or bikes, and I just am not interested. I don't care how the image was shot, what magic lighting conditions were done, or extreme effort was put forth. The subject matter bores and really does not engage part of my brain to have me explore more.


So my question is- how much of a photographic lesson am I missing out on if I do not relate to the subject?

Auithentication for printing?

While, as a photographer, I can appreciate the effort, the implementation of the method is laughable.

Let me explain- when I go places with family, I usually take photos of everyone. Just the way it is, and I very much enjoy doing it. On a recent trip, I took a series of photos of the children there and shared with the family members involved. One of those family members took a copy of the image to their local Walgreens, and wanted it printed. Walgreens said, (paraphrasing here) "This is a professional photo and we cannot let you have it until we see you have permission to have it printed."

Huh.

The photographer in me thinks this is a good thing. Stops idiots from just stealing images, getting them printed, and re-selling without permission.

However the computer geek in me laughs, almost cries at this. They accepted an email from my account saying I took the photo and the family member had permission to have it printed. Seriously- that was it. There is no method, nor will there ever be for Walgreens, to understand true authentication of the image release for use. There is no nationally secure photographers release location for printing. If all it takes is an email, how hard is it for anyone to sign up for a fake photographer email address and send yourself emails saying you have permission to print the image?


Walgreens- all you are doing is stopping the idiots who don't understand you can have more than one email account from getting prints. Whats worse, if a grandparent comes in with an image for their grandkids given to them from a family member... and it is professionally done, they don't have the 'release' to get it printed. It is simply preventing someone from getting that image printed of their grandkids.

Could not agree more

Scott Bourne was exactly on target with his post, "I Only Shoot With Natural Light." I read it and couldn't help but smile at my own ignorance back in the day.

Here is what I wrote up regarding how I was dealing with light sources back in December of 2011.

I fully admit I did not look at alternative light sources because of a lack of knowledge. I was afraid, it was easier to just work with what was there. I couldn't see the image because I didn't know. I did not work towards 'crafting' an end result. I only was taking photos because they were interesting results. Now I see images in my head, and how the results should be. As an example, this past December I was asked to take a couple photos for/of a magazine. I thought about it, and the method of lighting the scene, and the results came.

Do I wish I had dove right in to lighting and such? Probably not. There are stages of learning required for various things. Some people understand things naturally and can process multiple points all at once, for the rest of mortals, it takes time. Like understanding the rules of photography through practice and trying. Then once it is understood, you can break the rules for reasons that are understood regarding impact.

Whats important? The image, only the image. As Scott accurately points out.

Memory

(been way too long since my last post- been lacking motivation to post)

Today I am wondering how much memory should I have with me? Well, that's a tough one for a very enthusiastic amateur to know. My shooting style can range from a shot of a caterpillar on the back deck to vacation with family, to a local sporting event.

I recently came back from vacation where I was shooting family fun. I was restricted in backups or archiving. Lots of chimping and deleting as we progressed to recover memory. I was shooting RAW, my default file format. I had two 8 GB cards, and a 2 GB card. For a grand total of 18 GB memory.

Yet I ran out. Even with all the clearing and such... I did not have enough storage. For the record, it was north of 700 RAW photos in about 4-5 days.

What should I do in the future to not run out of space? Here are the options I have:

• Buy more memory. It is 'cheap' enough now... a 16 GB card is about $40. Bringing my portable storage to 34 GB. About 1300 RAW photos.
  
• Buy a portable memory cell. A 320 GB one runs about $136 from B&H. Thats the cheapest one, and smallest. I could dump images for days with this. They have a 1 TB for $619.
  
• Use a laptop for portable storage. Problem is, I don't own a laptop... I don't know about packing and caring for a laptop on trips. Even a refurb'd, generic as heck, Dell runs $579. (500 GB) A refurb'd MacPro is over $1,000. MacAir doesn't have enough storage to make it feasible at the price.
  
• Don't take as many photos- thats just despressing.

I don't know what the answer is right now. Anyone want to be my corporate sponsor and provide me with more storage? I got a big Disney trip this fall, and I refuse to run out of memory!