I am not one to push products but every once in a while one comes along that just grabs my attention. I received a perk request on our meetup.com site from a company called Riley G Designworks . A perk is an offer from a vendor for our members and it is usually a win/win situation. The vendor has a ready made audience and our members get a sweet deal in savings. The offer presented is a 10% savings on all their custom camera straps. As with any offer that comes across my screen I have a responsibility to my members to check it out first. To say the least, I was really taken in by this company's story.

Aspect ratio refers to the relationship of the width of an image to its length independent of the actual size. Aspects are typically written as two numbers separated by a colon; i.e 3:2, 4:3, 16:9, etc., where the first number represents the width. While it's not crucial to have a full understanding of ratios and how they are calculated, it does make sense to have at least a passing knowledge. "Why?"  I hear you ask. The answer, in a nutshell, is this; if you plan on printing your images you need to understand what will fit into your picture frame. Let me explain.

The biggest and most popular part of many photography communities (photography forums, Flickr) are the critique boards (read about " Finding a photo critique group on Flickr " ). Just about every subject and type of photography is addressed. The reason for its popularity is the undeclared value it has to those who take advantage of them. If you are serious about your photography a well executed critique becomes an invaluable tool. It is a mirror that reflects both your strong points and your weaknesses and, like a mirror, you need to be willing to accept all your weaknesses no matter how hard it is to hear. Having someone critique your work can be a hard blow to the ego. If you are overly sensitive about your work you may want to reconsider. However, keep in mind that the members making these observation only know you from what you post. They react to a request and will offer an opinion based on their level of experience and expertise. DO NOT take anything that is said...

Recently, a member of the PhotoCamel.com photography forum I frequent posted a question to the members of the forum; "Are you considering yourself to be an artist? If no, what else? If yes, what's your message?" While I think this is too open of a question, it does bring up a few points about the duality of photography, as a recording device and as an artist's tool. Here are my thoughts on what constitutes an artist and the use of a camera to create art. If you have a different viewpoint or philosophy about the topic, I welcome your thoughts. Feel free to share your ideas in the comments section below.

A big issue with photographers today is the problem of ownership protection of digital images. While there are a few methods and systems that can minimize fiduciary loss one of the easiest methods of image protection is the very basic and very simple watermark . For those of you who may be wondering what a watermark is, let me give a brief description. A watermark is simply a logo or logotype that is placed discreetly somewhere within the frame of your image that identifies you as the owner or creator of the image. A watermark can be placed boldly onto your image or given a subtler look by applying a transparency or incorporating it into a design element. The most basic type of watermark is simply the copyright symbol followed by your name. The watermark is then placed somewhere on your image and it identifies that image as belonging to you. For a more professional look brand the image with a logo or logotype. Anyway you decide to go, if you are going to mark up your images wit...

An old mantra from way back in the film days was to, "get it right in the camera." Now that we are in the digital age I still hear that mantra repeated time and again. Unfortunately it's usually followed with some reference to not needing to do any post processing or some other such nonsense. That should tell you my feelings on that. To prove it, I have decided to show you some post processing on an image that was done right in the camera. I normally start off showing the finished product first, but in this case I'll start with the before image. You can see that it's a pretty decent shot. Exposure is good, composition is nice, we have a nice light trail leading into our frame; a simple, quiet scene of a neighborhood bar on a corner. This is how it looks like with no editing. As with all your edits it should start with an analysis of the obvious. In this example there really is very little, but very little doesn't mean none. Again, I want to re...