Thanks

A lot of new photoshop techniques I've never seen before in this. I didn't know you could brush in camera raw.

If you want to go with a DSLR.. you can't beat this package on Fleabay (grey market)
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Nikon-D3300-...AAAOSwll1Wx7d4

does anyone have experience with the sony a6000 or sony a7 series? Im considering upgrading my trusty, but now quite old, canon 40d for something new. I mostly shoot landscape and rock climbing pics so i want something with high speed shooting, but is also light weight for backpacking trips. Im very interested in the new sony a6300, but have never shot mirrorless or sony.

I finally made it up to Yosemite in the winter. I never got the snow on the valley floor (and then clear skies to get fresh-fallen snow with granite things in the background) I was hoping for. It came down to like 500' from the valley. But I had a great time and got some decent misty shots. I got to try cross country skiing for the first time too - which was a blast.

Decided to invest in some new strobes and bring them on the road with me while covering poker tournaments. Definitely still have to dial these things in, but certainly enjoying the added challenge.















For any of you that are interested, the strobes I picked up are the Bolt VB-22 bare bulb flashes. They really are amazing little units. So much more portable than alien-bees. The battery pack with interchangeable batteries is genius, definitely worth every penny. They are built solid as hell, too. I picked up two of these bundles:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...flash_and.html

I like your blog .Totally interesting also extraordinary blog interesting picture gallery. Give more pictures. Thanks for this blog article.
Look at another beautiful Newport engagement! Could not have loved shooting my cousin and her family's engagement session more

I would stay away from the Sony system. Their cameras tend to overheat, lenses are overpriced, customer support is terrible/nonexistant, and the battery life is horrible. I would just upgrade your Canon to a newer body and get some decent glass

I have a a6000 and pretty much none of the listed above is true.

Sony doesn't fix their cameras. Look at this video how their customer service deprartment treated one of the bigger names on youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apCc5JD4PYs

I had a Sony A65 and in hot weather it would often overheat and go into shutdown mode, I was so happy to sell that system on Ebay. Google Sony Axxx/NEX/A7x and there's a lot of people with overheating problems.

battery life in the Sony's average about 200-250 shots, compared to 950-1000 in Canon/Nikons (obviously models will vary a bit). The EVF is is the main culprit here.

Sony mirrorless lenses are more expensive than comparable Nikon/Canon lenses. A 50mm 1.8 is almost $300 while the cheapest Canon and Nikon nifty fifty run about $110-$135. It goes on down the line. Sony 35mm $448, Nikon's 35mm DX is going for $180 now. The Sony has OSS but who needs image stabilization at that focal length? It's not neccessary

If I were to buy a mirrorless system, I would opt for Fuji..

Spent three weeks in Indoenesia. These are my favourite shots:
First picture is Borobodour Temple on Java. The second one is the view on the Bromo Volcano.

Nice, I've never been to the borobodour temple, but I've been to Bromo and it looks like your weather was much better mine! The Bromo shot is solid! Where did you shoot it from? But it does kind of look like the whole plateau is falling off to the bottom right... You might want to straighten the horizon a bit if you can

I'm not a professional photographer and I really don't know anything about poker photography, but I can't help but wonder what is so special about your photo set? So maybe as an amateur judging a pro you can give me some sort of insight...

#2 the colors are a bit muted, seems like there should more highlights. Did you not feel like correcting the verticals?

#3 Everything looks good, but you can't help but wonder why he's standing and what he's looking at...

#4 Nice photo, flash looks a little bright, his hands are kinda cut off, but I'm sure you would have included them if you could have gotten the right angle.

#5 Looks like he's about ready to fall off a cliff, really don't understand the lack of vertical correction, weird purpley tint to the left side of his face

#6 No real qualms about this one, I'd crop out some of the unfocused chair if I didn't have to keep the photos in the same dimensions

#7 Great photo! I think your photos of chip stacks are probably my favorite!

#8 A bit yellowy, and doesn't look sharp...

#9 Color balance in the face and the hands doesn't look the same

#10 Too much highlights in the face, same as #9: incongruence between color balance of hands and face. Hands look yellow.

#11 Great shot

#12 Also a very nice shot

I know I come off as dick with this sort of critique. In my mind, anyone with the right glass and decent PP'ing skills could shoot these photos. I could be totally wrong, I probably am. And I'd love to hear why! But almost every photo I see there's something that bugs me. Maybe I'm jealous that you're getting paid to shoot these and I'm not. I know you're a solid photographer, and I enjoyed a lot of the portrait and action stuff you posted earlier in the thread, but I find this photo set pretty underwhelming.

And I know I'm responding like 6 weeks later... but hopefully I'll hear back from you!

Let's see here, as for your first two photos, I think the B&W version is stronger, but I don't like the lack of detail in the sky... was it totally blown out or was that just the way you chose to pp it? And I especially don't like the way that the mountain in the top right is so blown out and lacking detail.

I really liked the photo with the frosty road and the signs "icy" and "do not pass" Although I wish you would have included more of the road in this photo, as thats what really drives the point home.

The composition in #9 is exceptional. But I can't help but think it could use a bit more contrast or some dodging and burning, it looks a bit flat.

#10: does this waterfall defy the rules of gravity?! Fix those verticals!

#11: Nice photo, but oh so blue! maybe mask out the sky and warm up the mountain a bit. And that top left part of sky, you definitely need to tone that down, it's about as unnatural looking as it gets.

But overall some cool stuff, I need to hit Yosemite one of these days!

Suzzer, I was looking at your desert valley shots, the photographers overlooking zabrieske point is definitely the best composition. The last two are solid also, but need some details pulled out of the shadows I think. Also the horizons are off... isn't that landscape photography 101??

Is anyone else into time lapse or aurora borealis photography? I like to combine both, but am a little bummed the season is over for the next 4-5 months. This is my latest video edit:

All good man, appreciate the feedback. To be honest this was my first time attempting to use strobes at a poker tournament, aside from winners photos. The reason i bought them was to bounce them off ceilings in dim light rooms, given the right circumstances. Unfortunately for me, the first casino I used them in had red walls and black ceilings, which forced me to shoot them from high up directly into the field. Thats the reasoning behind the ****ty shadows, and colors being off set. It's also a challenge because due to the high demand for photos with live updates, I am limited in how often i can move around the lights and position them for a photo. Majority of them are shot with a super basic lighting solution for the entire tournament area.

I have plenty of experience in using lights with portraits and shoots on location, but using them in terms of poker is certainly a new challenge. Learning new things every stop, and happier with the later run of photos.

These Hong Kong pics from the 50s are amazing: http://designyoutrust.com/2016/02/ho...by-a-teenager/

I went back to Yosemite for the SUPER MOON.

Is this a composite?
I really like this one.

Thanks! No that first one is just by night moonlight. I don't think I tweaked it in photoshop at all. Just picasa - where you can't spot edit stuff.

This half dome moon pic is a composite. I managed to not focus the moon, so I had to paint in a focused moon from later. Also there's no way to see the foreground and have the moon not blown out - w/o spot editing. But to the naked eye that's pretty much what it looked like - so I don't feel bad about blending images.

There's no EXIF that I can see. What were your settings?

I guess maybe Facebook strips that off. Basically the technique we would use is to set the zoom we want. Then take the camera off the tripod and focus on the moon to get an infinity point. Then re-mount the camera and take the pic.



The weird thing is picasa shows more info than Mac. I had to borrow someone else's lens because I stupidly didn't bring my wide angle.

After several mishaps and snow adventures I made it to Sequoia National Park for one day of shooting in the snow. I got some pretty cool light for these first two pics at the end of the day.














(Outside the park)