With only minor drawbacks, the new Olympus ultra-zoom camera delivers unbelievable coverage in a compact package.

By Ron Eggers

The Olympus 7.1-megapixel SP-550 UZ is one of the dual-LCD cameras that are the proving ground for some innovative capabilites. In place of an optical viewfinder, these cameras have a second LCD that displays exactly what the lens sees, just like DSLRs. Optical viewfinders are generally better suited for precision framing and focusing, but LCD viewfinders work well enough, and certainly better than the coupled viewfinders on most consumer cameras. And the dual-LCD design has some advantages over DSLRs: they’re more compact, less expensive, and sometimes have features that aren’t feasible with DSLRs.

Caption: Not only do you get great zoom with the Olympus SP-550 UZ, you get extreme macro capability as well. Photo ©Ron Eggers 

Mikkel Aaland turned his experiences from a once-in-a-lifetime photography expedition to Iceland into a striking guided tour of Lightroom in "Photoshop Lightroom Adventure" (O'Reilly, $39.99). Along the way he shows readers how they, too, can use Lightroom to create exciting new images. More importantly, Aaland, an award-winning photographer and bestselling author, inspires readers by providing a far deeper experience than most instructional manuals. Part Icelandic road trip, part photo essay, "Lightroom's" photo-rich pages come packed with beautiful, exciting photographs from a dozen talented working photographers.

"Yes, it's a technical book. Yet it's not only a complete guide to the latest version of the application, but a pleasure to look at, too," explains Aaland. For this is not an update of previous Lightroom versions, but the first book written specifically for Lightroom 1.1. "And my new book honors photography through the beautiful images that fill every chapter," adds Aaland.

Professional Photographer magazine's Web Exclusives gives has a special excerpt from Chapter 3 of Mikkel Aaland's "Photoshop Lightroom Adventure," Editing a Day's Shoot in Iceland.

Download a PDF excerpt from Chapter 3 of "Photoshop Lightroom Adventure" (8.4MB)

Photoshop Lightroom Adventure
Mastering Adobe's next-generation tool for digital photographers
By Mikkel Aaland
First Edition: July 2007 (est.)
ISBN 10: 0-596-10099-X
ISBN 13: 9780596100995
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/9780596100995/
Copyright © 2007 O'Reilly Media, Inc. All rights reserved. Used with permission. 

If you are in the market for a new camera bag, and you happen to be of female persuasion, you might want to look into Jill-e Designs.

Co-owner Jill Dorn and her partner traveled to Imaging USA last year and scoured the trade show looking for camera bags. They returned home determined to design, market and sell a line of camera bags and accessories specifically designed for women. Dorn has a background in sales and marketing, specifically for photo retail; her partner has a background in product management. They also enlisted the aid of their husbands. One is a professional wedding/portrait photographer whose feedback was instrumental in the design of the bags. The other helps with logistics. Together they formed Jill-e (rhymes with Billy) Designs, designed the bags, found a manufacturer to make them, and have hit the road. The Web site (www.jill-e.com) went live in June, and they sponsored PPA's Chicks Who Click retreat for women in photography, also in June, to great success.

New York Historical Society to premiere powerful, original exhibition commemorating the 6th anniversary of September 11. More than 1,300 remarkable photographs, oral histories and artifacts create a new remembrance of the World Trade Center Attacks.

Press Release—Here is New York: Remembering 9/11/01, a haunting new exhibition commemorating the sixth anniversary of the World Trade Center terrorist attacks, featuring more than a thousand stirring photographs, together with a bold display of artifacts pulled from the rubble and hundreds of oral histories, opens Friday, August 31 and runs through January 1, 2008 at The New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West (at 77th Street).

Photograph taken by Christopher Hubble, Franconia, NH

Press Release—Software Cinema Training announces the release of Compositing Exposures to Light Architecture & Landscapes by author Bob Coates. In this CS3 Photoshop tutorial DVD, Coates highlights some of the new features that make extending the dynamic range of images through capture and blending multiple images of the same scene.

“It’s definitely made it easier for me to do my real estate photography,” says Coates. “With the new Align tool in Photoshop, it’s not the disaster it once was if the tripod gets bumped a little while capturing multiple exposures. Used to be if there was even a tiny movement of the pod, that meant extra time allotted to aligning the images in Photoshop in post-production. Now, it’s a breeze. I capture exposures from outside the window, in the shadows, tungsten lamps, flash and more, then blend them all together for a look the eye can see but the camera could never capture in just one exposure without a LOT of extra work on the site. It’s cool!”

Press Release—Kingston Technology Company, Inc., has posted an interview with legendary photojournalist Harry Benson on its Icons of Photography microsite. A witness to history, Benson shares what it was like to be standing next to Robert F. Kennedy when he was assassinated, how he got his first big break as the only journalist allowed to interview a mass murderer in prison, and how it felt to march with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In addition to his photographic exploits, Benson expresses personal goals such as his longtime desire to become a professional football (soccer) player.

The interview marks the second in a series called 20 Questions, which gives site visitors an up-close-and-personal look at some of the world’s most respected photographers. Kingston encourages photographers who visit the Icons of Photography microsite to take an active role through features including Ask the Icon, which gives photographers an opportunity to pose their own questions and Critique My Image, which invites photographers to submit a photo to be constructively critiqued by one of Kingston’s Icons.

Press Release—Software Cinema has announced a seven-city one-day workshop tour featuring Jack Reznicki, "Lighting and Digital Photography Training Camp." This is your opportunity to learn the secrets and techniques of the legendary Jack Reznicki. PPA President Jack Reznicki is one of the busiest commercial photographers around, and this is your only chance to see him reveal how he works from shoot to finish. You will learn the nuances of lighting, how to get great images in the camera, and how to protect those images. Learn how Jack increases productivity using Photoshop Lightroom. Rarely do you get to learn and ask questions of someone like Jack, and this is his only tour this year. We invite you to sign up early. The seats are limited, and the information is awesome.

Topics include …

• Histogram, white balance and other camera essentials
• Lighting overview
• Basic one-light portrait lighting with live model
• Pro lighting techniques with live model
• Importing, processing, printing files in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom
• Masking in Photoshop
• Copyrights & ‘Copywrongs’

Cities on the tour:

• Seattle, WA - Mon, Aug 06, 2007
• South San Francisco, CA - Tue, Aug 07, 2007
• Los Angeles, CA - Thu, Aug 09, 2007
• San Diego, CA - Sat, Aug 11, 2007
• Phoenix, AZ - Mon, Aug 13, 2007
• Dallas (Irving), TX - Wed, Aug 15, 2007
• Washington, DC - Sat, Aug 18, 2007
   

The one-day seminar is $99. Go to Software Cinema for more information.

While some of us yearn to free our inner painter and take a summer in Tuscany to study art and technique, the real world often has other plans for our time. Or perhaps, if you're like me, your initial attempts at painterly portraits may have been a blunt introduction to your lack of painterly talent and how much time it takes to make a painted photo look like real art. This is when software like Alien Skin Snap Art can offer a satisfying compromise between your artistic vision and cold reality.

Pastel, Still Life imported custom setting from Snap Art forums.
All images ©Joan T. Sherwood

Prescription glasses for nearsighted people cause a distortion that makes the portion of their face seen through the lens look as though it's farther away than the portion not covered by the lens. Many people are so accustomed to seeing it that it doesn't register in face-to-face interaction, but it becomes more noticeable in a portrait.

“Can you fix that?” my client asked when she saw the distortion through her husband's lenses in their portrait. "Of course," I said. "We can fix almost anything!" That was easier said than done. After several unsuccessful attempts at cloning and painting the missing cheek within the glass frame, I decided there must be a better way. I finally arrived at a method that works well without adding too much work.

Artists and photographers have used picture frames, edges and borders for hundreds of years. Such creative embellishments enhance the original artwork while integrating it into the environment where it's displayed. That's true for physical frames, edges and borders, and it's true their digital counterparts. These days you can find a vast selection of specialized Photoshop-compatible add-ons and plug-ins that can be used to add professional-looking borders, frames and edges to electronic images.

Images ©Ron Eggers

I've looked at borders and edges plug-ins before and have been impressed, if not overwhelmed, with the large number of configurable templates they offer. Most offered so many possible configurations it was difficult to find them again in order to re-use them. In most cases, the search was so time consuming that it was easier to go with an application that only offered a few hundred borders and edges than to wade through the literally thousands that others included.

In this review we'll examine the features and functionality of three digital framing software options:
onOne Software's PhotoFrame Pro 3 and the optional Pro Digital Frame Bundle; Kubota Imaging Tools Sloppy Borders, Volume One; and Graphic Authority Library.

In the July issue of Professional Photographer magazine, Joe Farace reviewed the Fujifilm FinePix S3 Pro UVIR digital SLR, the first production digital SLR that’s capable of taking photographs in the ultraviolet  (UV) and infrared (IR) light spectrums.

Here we show the results of his testing with raw file capture.

This image was incorrectly captioned in the July issue. It should read: This is what a raw file captured with the S3 Pro UVIR looks like when initially opened in Adobe Camera Raw. For my raw file tests, I removed all color by moving the Saturation slider all the way to the left. The latest version of ACR, 4.1, only works with Photoshop CS3 but also functions perfectly with Photoshop Elements, so you can get the latest greatest raw conversion software as part of a $99 imaging program. © 2007 Joe Farace

Digital negatives have pumped new energy into the alternative printing arena. Since the first edition of my Making Digital Negatives for Contact Printing was published in 1995 (I call that long-past period the Paleolithic era in digital imaging), I’ve heard from people all over the world who are thrilled with their new power to combine the old (chemical-based photography) with the new (digital capture and control).

Today the friendliest way to make digital negatives is with Photoshop and modern inkjet printers, using these inkjet negatives to print on classic photosensitive materials like cyanotype, platinum/palladium, and silver gelatin. When we do the steps properly, we can make contact prints that rival the quality of prints made from camera-original negatives. You gotta admit, this sounds like fun!

Figure 1: Windmills, Spain, Platinum/Palladium Print from a Digital Negative, by Dan Burkholder

By Ron Eggers

The digital single lens reflex market continues to expand as new companies enter the ring and the established vendors release new models. But changes are coming more slowly now. Resolution isn't nearly the crucial issue it has been. The emphasis now is on speed and quality.

Maximum resolution for DSLRs has hit a plateau, crowned by the 16-megapixel Canon EOS-1Ds Mark II. The rumored 22-megapixel Canon DSLR remains a rumor; instead, Canon released the EOS-1D Mark III, with a 10.1-megapixel sensor, Integrated Cleaning System, 100 percent viewfinder, 45-point AF and support for Live View technology. 

At one point, Olympus was about the only company making DSLRs with live view, giving photographers the option to compose images on the LCD rather than in the viewfinder. Now Canon and Fujifilm also make live-view DSLRs.

Prices on all digital SLRs are dropping, with some entry-level DSLRs selling for as little as $500. The new Canon Mark III comes with a price tag of $4,495.

Press Release—Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 1.1 is now available as a free upgrade for existing users, with added functionality and support for Windows Vista. Lightroom 1.1 adds a flexible image management system for multi-computer workflows, improved noise reduction and sharpening, and raw file support for 13 additional digital cameras from leading manufacturers including Canon, Nikon, Olympus, and Phase One.

“Although the beta period has ended, we are happy to say that Photoshop Lightroom continues to incorporate user feedback with this latest update,” says Tom Hogarty, product manager for Photoshop Lightroom. “We are committed to continuing this partnership with our customer base by working together to make a program that best suits their digital imaging workflow needs.”

Lightroom enables professional photographers to import, manage and present large volumes of digital photographs helping them spend more time behind the lens and less time at the computer. Improvements in Lightroom 1.1 include a new image management system that allows flexible multi-computer workflows. A catalog-based system means photographers now can move images and information quickly between their computers. Lightroom 1.1 further streamlines the digital photography workflow with the addition of a convenient way to synchronize folders in the program with new or changed photos. Other changes include improved noise reduction and sharpening functionality, utilizing customer feedback and technology from industry-standard Photoshop.