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DMA® Digital Photography SIG Events of 2004 |
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Here are summaries of our events we had in 2004. We usually meet from 7:00—9:00 pm the first Thursday each month at Wright State University unless stated otherwise. Here is a PDF map of the campus and here is a map of the tunnel system. All meetings are free and open to the public unless stated otherwise.
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December 2004December 2, 2004: "Transferring video to DVD"The December meeting of the Digital Photography SIG focused on converting video tapes to DVD. Millard demonstrated capturing video, editing, creating menus, and writing to DVD using Nero Video Editor, a component in the Nero Burning ROM suite. Millard prefers Nero over Pinnacle because of its extensive menu creation and editing capabilities. Pinnacle can also create menus, but Millard likes Nero better. He really prefers Adobe Premiere Pro, but that completely lacks menu creation. The new Premiere Elements does include menu creation. He also demonstrated copying VHS tape to DVD with a freestanding GoVideo DVD Recorder VCR Combo, lent by Tom Thorpe. The combo DVD VCR machine solution offers far fewer editing options than the others, but is quick and easy. The presentation was rather hampered by the lack of access to a video projector, so we huddled around Millard's 15" CRT to watch the demos. Millard showed a few of the many hardware devices available for capturing analog video to a computer. For his demo, he used an ATI All-In-Wonder Radeon card. Other options include a USB 2.0 Video Capture cable such as the KWorld VS-USB2800D and others, Pinnacle Systems' USB based Dazzle or PCI card capture devices, Canopus ADVC-100, etc. For capturing from Mini-DV camcorders, you only need a FireWire port. An A/V capture card is only needed for capturing analog video, such as Beta (does anyone own a working Beta VCR?), VHS, VHS-C, 8mm, & Hi-8. You might want to read Bill Machrone's commentary "DVD-Authoring Redux" and Jan Ozer's "Video Editing 101" if you're considering trying your hand at this. There was a fair amount of discussion of DVD burners, DVD players, and DVD media (- vs. +, and R vs. RW). For more detailed info about the differences between the various DVD formats, see the DVD FAQ. It was widely agreed that Apex DVD players generally provide the best compatibility with more media and recording formats than the well known major brands, and that Lite-On DVD writers are a very good value. Although not mentioned at the meeting, KiSS DVD players also seem to be well regarded for their ability to play just about anything. It was suggested that the best use for DVD RW (whether - or +) media is for testing only. Do not use RW media for any permanent storage. Sharpie makes water based pens for labeling CDs and DVDs to avoid damaging them. A couple useful sites mentioned were cdrinfo.com and DVDr-info.com. Not mentioned tonight, but at previous meetings, was VideoHelp.com, formerly known as DVDRHelp.com. VideoHelp.com has a handy DVD Player Compatibility List. | |||
November 2004November 4, 2004: "How to Buy Your 1st Digital Camera"In spite of a fever, Millard led a discussion of what to look for when buying a digital camera - what's important and what's just hype - and gave some tips on how to determine which of the hundreds of cameras to choose from best suits your needs. Several others present added their suggestions to the camera selection and buying process. Once you understand the terminology and have a good idea of what features you want or need, and have determined a price range, a great tool for narrowing down your choice is Digital Photography Review's excellent wizzard. Dave Lundy distributed a paper with a few tips and links to help first time digital camera buyers. A copy is here. We had expected to have a representative from Micro Center to show us an assortment of cameras currently available, but that didn't work out. Millard hopes to have them early next year. Some of the many additional topics discussed before, during, or after the meeting were:
October 2004October 7, 2004: "Crime Scene Photography"The October meeting of the Digital Photography SIG featured a presentation on crime scene photography by the Springfield Police Department. Crime Scene Investigators (formerly known as detectives) demonstrated how photographs are used to document the crime scene for later analysis. We were expecting an emphasis on digital tools and enhancements to make the job easier and more accurate, but got more of an overview of CSI instead. Still, it was quite interesting. Some additional topics before the main presentation were:
September 2004September 2, 2004: "Creative Memories Digital Scrap-booking"The September meeting was a presentation by Martha Burtenshaw from Creative Memories. She talked about the importance of preserving photographs (digital and otherwise) and discussed long term print stability and storage methods. The presentation included information about computer prints versus printing from a photo lab, and what to look for when you choose a photo lab. Most importantly she demonstrated Creative Memories products for display and preserving photographs with the least possible degradation over time. Several members have asked for contact information for Martha, she can be reached at (937) 436-3885 or her web site. August 2004August 5, 2004: "Image Sharpening"At our August meeting, Millard demonstrated image sharpening, using nik Sharpener Pro!, and other programs. We experimented with image editing, then sharpened our photos using the NIK software. The highlight of the meeting was the restoration of a badly scratched and very dirty slide from the 1940's. We were able clean up the image everywhere except the sky. So we deleted the sky, replaced it with a cloud scene from another photo and sharpened the photo for printing using the NIK software. It was a remarkable rescue that thrilled everyone in the group!
July 2004July 1, 2004: "Photography Techniques & Slide Shows"At the July 1st meeting of the Digital Photography SIG we tried something a little different - a two part meeting. We began with a very informal meeting on the Founders Quadrangle (Quad) at Wright State University at 6:00 pm, an hour earlier than usual. We took advantage of a fine, if somewhat muggy, Ohio summer evening to work with our cameras outside sharing ideas on photographic technique, equipment, and socializing. There was no presentation during the informal meeting, just a chance to take pictures, share ideas, work with equipment, and learn from others. At 8:00 pm we adjourned to 302 Oelman Hall and enjoyed a brief presentation of FlipAlbum® 5 Pro by Jim Ullom, followed by some of Ken Phelps' excellent horse pictures he took at Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event.
Possibly some more photos and perhaps a bit more detail will be posted here in a day or two. June 2004June 3, 2004: "Photo Show & Tell"Our June meeting was a photo show by our members. Several of us brought a few of our favorite digital photographs (some prints, but mostly in digital format) and talked a bit about what we thought makes them good and how we took them. Our room was equipped with a video projector, but it was sadly lacking as a photo projector. Many of the finer aspects of several photos were lost. Hopefully our next room will be better equipped. Or possibly the projector wasn't being used at its native resolution and we were seeing resolution conversion artifacts. We had a general Q & A session for the first half hour or so. Some of the topics discussed were:
The main presentation consisted of several of us showing some of our favorite photos and briefly discussing them. A newcomer to our group, Nic Widjaja, showed several nice macro shots of flowers. We were treated to a couple hilarious slide shows, but not by Steve Hayden this time. Julius Brodbeck created slide shows of a wedding and a star wars scenario. Jim Ullom showed some of his favorites, but not all were his own handiwork. Dave Lundy showed a couple of his humming bird photos, a panorama from Denali National Park, and a flower shot. Someone else (sorry, I don't recall who) showed some very nice photos from Europe. Joe Solch showed several shots of his pond, including some great closeups of frogs, birds, and flowers. I know there a few others who presented some nice photos, but I neglected to take notes, and my forgetter seems to be working better every day. There were also some excellent pictures of children (same person as European photos?). It should have been mentioned that we have an on-line photo gallery for our members' use that, unfortunately, few have taken advantage of so far. May 2004May 6, 2004: "Stabilizing the Camera"At this meeting we discussed methods of stabilizing your camera. This was our first camera technique meeting and covered numerous ways to keep the camera still to avoid motion blur. We discussed the merits and disadvantages of using tripods (typically large but some are tiny, bulky, heavy, and time consuming to set up, but very stable), bipods (slightly lighter, and less stable, but otherwise like tripods), monopods (usually lighter, smaller, and quicker to set up, but not as stable as tripods), image stabilization (built into the camera - no extra bulk, weight, or setup time, but not as effective as a *pod, and probably slightly decreases battery life) and other means of minimizing motion blur caused by camera movement while shooting. We had several types of tripods and monopods to examine (including a home-brew monopod which attached to his cane by Dean Miller). A couple more esoteric items included a car window mounting device and a monopod with a curved piece at one end to sit on one's leg while seated, or brace against one's shoulder or chest while standing. Bean bags were also mentioned, but we didn't have any examples. One method that was not mentioned, but which I've used in certain situations, is to use the camera's time delay option when the subject isn't expected to move significantly. This avoids the tilting motion that frequently occurs when pressing the shutter button. Another device not mentioned is a (usually gyroscopic) platform such as a Steadicam, but those tend to be very expensive. An article on building your own on the cheap is here. Lacking any of these devices, lean against a solid object such as a wall, a phone pole, fence post, etc. to steady yourself and the camera.
Millard mentioned that a generally accepted rule of thumb for minimum shutter speed to avoid motion blur caused by camera movement is the reciprocal of the focal length of the lens. For instance, if you're using a 50mm lens (or it's 35mm equivalent on a digital camera), the slowest recommended shutter speed would be 1/50th second. If you're using a long telephoto lens, such as 380mm, the minimum recommended shutter speed would be 1/400th second. Obviously that isn't always possible due to the aperture usually becoming smaller (larger f-stop) with longer focal length, thereby reducing light to the film or CCD sensor. Some sort of image stabilization device becomes necessary to get proper exposure and to minimize motion blur, or you must use faster film or ISO setting which usually severely increases noise artifacts in the picture. Millard announced that a good digital photographer is needed to shoot a bowling event and must be able to make prints the same day, sometime in early August. If interested, please contact Millard. Jim Gundel showed some very nice baseball action shots he has taken with an Olympus C-750 for the Beavercreek SOX web site he's working on. Once again, Steve Hayden entertained us with more of his excellent slide shows. Dave Lundy mentioned a couple interesting new digital cameras. Both have 10x optical zoom and can record short movie clips at 640x480 resolution at 30fps, and are about $500. They are the Canon PowerShot S1 IS and the Olympus Camedia C-770 Ultra Zoom. The Canon is one of the very few cameras which has optical image stabilization. It also has many other interesting features. The big advantage of the Olympus camera is that it uses MPEG-4 video compression, so much more video can be shot on a given size memory card than the Canon can using QuickTime AVI format. April 2004April 1, 2004: "DVD Authoring"
This month's meeting featured an overview of current DVD authoring software, focusing primarily on Roxio's Easy Media Creator 7, a few do's and don'ts, and some practical tips. More on those later. Jim Ullom made nice name tags for us. Mine is shown here at half size. Jim also supplied a copy of Flip Album Suite 4.0 for a door prize. Thanks, Jim! Just over forty people showed up, with five first time attendees. Before we got into the main presentation, several topics were discussed briefly.
The main presentation by Joe Solch demonstrated several features (and mentioned some flaws) of Roxio's Easy Media Creator 7. First, Joe strongly cautioned against installing the Drag-to-Disc application bundled with Easy Media Creator 7. It has been known to cause various system problems, as seen in Roxio's own support community. He also pointed out that its Sound Editor is poor and suggested a very good free alternate editor, Audacity. It's available for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. On the bright side, its slide show creator is very good and includes DivX output among many others. Its StoryBuilder 2 is a basic, but easy to use video editor. Joe demonstrated both functions, and showed a video he made of videotape his daughter had shot. After Joe's presentation, Millard showed us some of the 2200 or so photos from his recent India photo safari and related some humorous incidents. He also contrasted his photography style with some expert photographers he was traveling with. Millard described the pros method as mentally composing a scene based on the lighting, surroundings, anticipated action and such, and patiently waiting for the desired combination to occur. By contrast, Millard described his method as reactionary - he sees something he likes and shoots. His method probably is probably how most of us use our cameras most of the time. For more info about DVD authoring, here is a nice DVD Overview. Also check PC magazine's article The Burning Question, a review of DVD recording hardware and software in their October 28, 2003 issue. March 2004March 4, 2004: "Five Minute Edit"Our March meeting featured demonstrations of quick photo editing tricks. What can you do to improve a photo in just five minutes using either Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 or JASC Paint Shop Pro 8? You might be amazed. We were to bring some before and after photos and describe the process you used, or just bring some photos that need some improvement and discuss and demonstrate various options. I was unable to attend this meeting, and was hoping to get a summary from someone who did attend so I could update this entry. I haven't received any comments yet. February 2004February 5, 2004: "Photo Album Software"Before our February presentation got underway, Joe Solch showed pictures from Millard's India Photo Safari. Joe is ably handling the SIG leader function in Millard's absence. We discussed some possible topics for future meetings. The March meeting will feature quick fixes—what touch-up can you do to a photo in five minutes or less. There was some brief discussion of whether to participate in the Spring 2004 Compterfest®. Details need to be arranged pretty soon if we're going to do anything. At the last show we had a booth and handouts, but almost no participation. At this meeting Joe Solch demonstrated two of the most popular programs to help organize the massive collection of photos stored on your computer's hard drive, ZIP discs, CDs, etc. They were Adobe Photoshop Album 2.0 and Jasc Paint Shop Photo Album 4. CompuPic is yet another such program, and there are many others. Both Adobe and Jasc have evaluation versions that you may download from their web sites. From the demos, it appears to me that Adobe's product is the clear winner in most cases, although the Jasc product does have a few interesting features, such as the ability to create slide shows, and to specify multiple external programs to edit various file types. The Jasc product relies heavily on you organizing your photos into directories (or folders). The Adobe product is much more versatile. It automatically creates a time-line, so you can easily locate pictures based on when they were taken or modified (I would like to be able to chose which time-stamp is used, but didn't see that option), regardless of which directory or removable media they're in. But the real key to its strength is its ability to add one or more "tags" to each picture so you can then easily locate pictures based on those tags. It includes some very generic tags, and you're free to create your own. A very neat feature of the Adobe program is a slider that allows you to instantly adjust the thumbnail sizes from tiny to huge, or anywhere in between. Joe also briefly demonstrated WinTidy,
a PC Magazine utility to preserve the icon positions on your desktop
after switching display resolution. The program had been recommended
by Dean Miller. As a teaser for next month's meeting, Dave Lundy
showed a few photos from last month's meeting
that will probably appear in the March issue of The DataBus.
He showed original and retouched photos and briefly described what he
had done to edit them. The PC he was using had been configured so that
Internet Explorer automatically resizes pictures to fit the screen.
Nancy Christolear showed a quick easy way to show those resized images
in their original size without the need to click "Tools", "Internet
Options...", the "Advanced" tab, then scroll through the long list of
options to uncheck "Enable Automatic Image Resizing", then click OK.
Simply hover the mouse over the image and an icon will appear. Click it
to enlarge the image. January 2004Thursday, January 8, 2004: "Show & Tell"The January meeting was a great show-and-tell session. Millard Mier III wowed us with a Nikon D100 digital camera equipped with an 80 to 400 mm optically stabilized lens (value about $12,000!). That camera and lens, a night scope to check for tigers looking for a snack, and a 40 GB storage system will accompany him on safari in India during the next two months. Assuming he stays well and in one piece, we hope to get a few emails with pictures during his big adventure and a real photo tour when he returns. The pictures we get during his trip will be posted in Millard's gallery We also heard about new video capture devices, cameras (both still and video), light weight / inexpensive camera stabilizers (monopods, small flexible tripods, and beanbags), battery characteristics, and slide show software. Discussion then centered on topics for the next couple of meetings. We decided to cover photo album software (Adobe Photoshop Album V2, Jasc Paint Shop Photo Album V4, etc.) in the February meeting. As with all DMA® meetings, please check the website for details! This was Millard's last session as SIG leader before leaving soon on his great adventure in India with three noted photographers. In his absence, Joe Solch will lead the SIG. Joe has been one of our most regular participants, providing useful tips at almost every meeting. | |||
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Search the contents of all the publicly available web pages at www.dma.org/photosig/ or archives of our mailing list. Subscribe to our mailing list for occasional correspondence regarding digital photography at Photo-SIG Info Page & read our archives. Check out our other Special Interest Group (SIG) mailing lists here. Users Group Contact: Nancy Christolear or Dave Lundy (937) 426-1132, digiphot-contact@dma.org Web Site Contact: digiphot-web@dma.org | |||
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