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Sony A7RV Users Manual – Recommended.
The Friedman Archives Guide to Sony’s A7RV by Gary L. Friedman. I’ve owned the, rather complex, Sony A7RV for over a year and have used it extensively. It wasn’t until I purchased Gary’s online edition of this book that I came into a nearly full understanding of all its features and how to use them. Although I have studied the Sony Help Guide, and free e-books about the camera, nothing gave me the clarity that this book has. Gary presents his information in a very organized manner and explains the features in a down to earth way. As a result some of the things that I just couldn’t quite get…
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To shoot or not to shoot? That is the question.
So for years and years and years I would not shoot landscape photography unless it was an overcast sky. Reason being I didn’t want shadows in my scene, but in particular on my buildings. I found them rather unsightly. I also sometimes will take a portion of an image from my “library” and past it into another image for artistic effect. Therefore I wanted everything in my library to have the same light falling on it – which in my case was soft light from cloud cover. This was a plan that worked fairly well for me. However, I’m now very close to my mid-60’s and the clock is running…
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Downtown Portland Maine
Downtown Portland Maine Cheryl and I stayed a few days at the Westin Hotel in downtown Portland ME during mid September of 2018. We spent a lot of time in South Portland and surrounding towns as we preferred that to the city scene. This shot was taken from Bug Light Park. That’s the home of the Bug Light Lighthouse (see Bug Light Lighthouse post). The park was very serene with the Atlantic ocean on the north and east side. It also presented a beautiful view of downtown Portland. This is a vibrant city of around 68,000 and Maines most populated. The shot was taken about 15′ above the old abandoned…
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Knife collection (folding knives only).
[wzslider autoplay=”true” interval=”4000″ lightbox=”true”]I like folding knives. We used to call them “jack knives”. I like how they look, I like how they feel and I like using them. There… I said it. My fascination began with an Uncle of mine. He would come down from Boston and visit us in the summers. He was a rugged old Korean war veteran. The kind of guy that when he spoke you listened. He always carried a pocket knife. He would love to take out his knive from his pocket, carefully open each blade, and extol the value of carrying such a tool. That image just stuck with me my whole life.…
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Shoot RAW!
[wzslider height=”800″ info=”true” lightbox=”true”]If your camera has a RAW setting you may just want to use it. This is particularly important if the photograph is important to you and you want it to look it’s very best. Here is why: 1) RAW format does not lose any information from the image during processing. 2) You can recover most, if not all, of the “hidden” info. from an image that doesn’t show up on your original using RAW. 3) JPEG format loses considerable information during processing due to the compression that takes place. 4) You’ll have limited ability to recover lost highlights/shadows with a JPEG/TIFF (vs. RAW) 5) RAW does not…
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Painting with light – (well not really)
[wzslider height=”800″ info=”true” lightbox=”true”] I belong to an online photography site that has weekly “challenges”. This challenge was: “Make RED your focal point in the photograph”. As a result I came up with painting the light bulb. Here is how it was done: 1). Black 1/4″ sheet of plexiglass bottom and backdrop. 2). Modeling clay was used at the base of the bulb to secure it in the upright position. 3). L.E.D. continuous light panels were used with a diffuser attached. 4). Lights were placed on each side pointing at the light bulb. 5). Small bottle of RED paint that is typically used by model builders. 6). Tripod. 7). Infrared…
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7 Flaming Bacardi’s.
I belong to an online photo community called Digital Photography Challenge. A recent challenge was to photograph 7 of any object as long as they are all the same. My wife Cheryl and I came up with the idea of photographing 7 flaming shot glasses. Sounded cool to me because I had never photographed fire before. We set this shot up on gloss black plexiglass and used the same for a back drop. We then lined up the glasses and filled them with Bacardi 151 Rum. This was used because it is 75% alcohol and burns easily with a nice looking flame. We shot this at night, in the garage, using…
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Interview with Photographer Ron DiCostanzo
[wzslider height=”800″ info=”true” lightbox=”true”] This is the first of what I hope will be many interviews with photographers to follow. I came to know Ron DiCostanzo through a business relationship. I would see Ron setting up product shots as well as beautiful fishing pictures that were blown up and in their conference room. We quickly realized that we both share a passion for photography. Bio: Ron is 51 years old, married with two children and lives in Stratford, CT. He is the General Manager of ZeeBaas. He enjoys fishing, photography, woodworking and lure building. I’d like to share the following discussion we had: Welcome Ron and thanks for participating in our…
