Hockley Photography

Today I had the opportunity to shoot Startupalooza, an event in Portland bringing together a bunch of great people around the tech startup scene. I haven’t heard any sort of exact count but I’d guess there were 175-200 folks in and out throughout the day.

I held an impromptu contest, asking folks to give me a business card with a guess of how many photos I’d shoot throughout the afternoon/evening. It turns out we had a tie with a couple folks being pretty close; both Bryan Stearns and Jeff Martens guessed 400 photos with the actual number being 389. As a result of their superior guessing skills, they’ve won a discount to be used towards my photography services (I’ll be e-mailing everyone who entered the contest tomorrow).

When the rest of the photos are processed they’ll be posted on Flickr (with a followup post here).

Last night Adobe released a free, web-based photo editor called Photoshop Express (which despite it’s name really isn’t anything like Photoshop). I tried it out, it’s not a bad online editor, but based on a tip from someone else today I decided to look at their Terms of Service:

8. Use of Your Content.

1. Adobe does not claim ownership of Your Content. However, with respect to Your Content that you submit or make available for inclusion on publicly accessible areas of the Services, you grant Adobe a worldwide, royalty-free, nonexclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, and fully sublicensable license to use, distribute, derive revenue or other remuneration from, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, publicly perform and publicly display such Content (in whole or in part) and to incorporate such Content into other Materials or works in any format or medium now known or later developed.

Whoa. What that means is that if you use their service and put any of your photos into a public gallery, you’ve given Adobe a no-restrictions license to do anything they want with your photos.

Not cool, Adobe. Not cool at all.

update 3/27 21:13 - see comments

One question that I’ve been asked a few times recently is that of which DSLR camera is best for a beginner who wants to get serious about their photography? There isn’t one single right answer, but here are a few things to consider.

Brand

Go with Canon or Nikon. They’re the two big players in this market, offer a wide variety of lenses and accessories, and they both make a quality product. There are other options, such as Sony, Olympus, and Pentax, but Canon and Nikon will make purchasing equipment and seeking out resources much simpler. Which should you choose between Canon and Nikon? Either will produce great images. One major factor is that if a bunch of your friends have one brand, by choosing that brand you’ll be able to share lenses and trade equipment.

Price

Photography with a DSLR is going to cost money. You don’t have to break the bank to get started. An important consideration is that when it comes to image quality, the lenses (casually referred to as “glass”) are as important, if not more important, than the camera body. Keep this in mind when budgeting for equipment. Don’t go buy a $2,000 body and then put on a $200 lens. My recommendation is to get one of relatively inexpensive “lower end” DSLRs to learn with, and get some decent lenses with the plan that the lenses will outlast the camera when (and if) you eventually upgrade to a fancier body in the future.

Features and Numbers

Don’t fall into the megapixel marketing trap. The reality is that you can print perfectly clear 8×10 photos from a 5 megapixel camera. More megapixels will do larger sizes, but even an 8 megapixel camera can do poster prints. All of the DSLRs from Canon and Nikon will allow you to easily adjust the shutter speed, aperture, ISO, and exposure compensation. One thing that isn’t often talked about is the physical feel of the cameras. I’d encourage prospective buyers to head down to a local camera shop (I’m a big fan of Pro Photo Supply in Portland) and get their hands on a few different cameras to see how things feel.

So… which one?

If you want to go with Canon, I’d look at the Canon Digital Rebel XTi which offers a good mix of features at a reasonable price (around $500 for the body). If you decide to go the Nikon route, I’d recommend the D40x which has comparable specs and will run around $600 including a 18-55mm starter lens.

Either one will take great photos, and despite what some equipment brand-zealots might tell you, the quality of photographs will depend far more on the technical and artistic talent of the photographer than the particular model of camera being used.

Today I learned of a new website (via Thomas Hawk) that will be of interest to all you photo geeks out there: PhotographyVoter. If you’re familiar with Digg, you’ll instantly “get” PhotographyVoter. Users submit photo-related web links, and other users can then vote for that link as popular. As more users vote, the best links get driven up the homepage.

More folks participating will increase the quality, so if you’re interested in reading about photography, head over there and check it out. And if I ever write something interesting, feel free to submit one of my blog posts over there

Professional and serious hobby photographers can accumulate a lot of gear (bodies, lenses, flash equipment, batteries, storage, etc) and as I’ve grown my collection over the past few years I’ve adapted my gear-carrying methods as well. My first serious photography with my DSLR was outdoor photography and I purchased a LowePro Mini Trekker AW backpack. It worked well, easily carrying the body, several lenses, and some other small accessories. Over time, I came to realize the big drawback with a backpack system: accessing the back involves stopping, taking the backpack off one’s back, setting it down, getting the gear, then reversing the process. It wasn’t bad when I had somewhere dry to set things and had some time, but I wanted something with easier access.

Enter the Think Tank Speed Belt system. It’s a very flexible system consisting of a variety of bags that can be worn on a special belt. Bags can be added or removed from the belt as needed for a particular situation or shoot. A big positive is that the lenses or other items in the bags can be accessed while the belt is being worn, without stopping or setting anything on the ground.

I still use my backpack to bring a large quantity of gear to a shoot, but if the situation requires moving around and being able to swap equipment quickly, the flexibility of the belt system makes it my tool of choice. Photographers looking to invest in a bag should consider the type of photography, gear to be carried, and budget, and choose a system allowing for the best results for their situation.