digital photo pro 20150506
DESCRIPTION
PhotographyTRANSCRIPT
ARTLINEDesigned for exceptional
speed and clarity, the
lenses in Sigma’s Art Line
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BY SIGMA
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With its fast maximum aperture of
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or more than 50 years, Sigma has been
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Sigma’s Art Line currently comprises nine lenses— 30mm
F1.4 DC HSM | A, 18-35mm F1.8 DC HSM | A, 24mm
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the Sigma Art line was conceived with them in mind.
F
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Also available in the Art Line are three prime lenses
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DN | A, 30mm F2.8 DN | A and the 60mm F2.8 DN | A.
Available for Micro Four Thirds and Sony E-mount systems,
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6 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
MAY/JUNE 2015 Vol. 13 No. 3 digitalphotopro.com
Contents
FeaturesPORTFOLIOS
36 DAVID DOUGLAS DUNCAN’S 20TH CENTURYRenowned photojournalist David Douglas Duncan hopes to influence the future by connecting dots of the past in his new book My 20th Century
By Ashley Myers-Turner �� Photography By David Douglas Duncan
44 2014 BLACK & WHITE WORLD CONTEST WINNERSWe showcase the winning photographs from the 2014 DPP Black & White World contest
50 AIRVincent Laforet utilizes the crowd-funding model to take his aerial photo series “AIR” around the world
By Ashley Myers-Turner �� Photography By Vincent Laforet
Dav
id D
ougl
as D
unca
n
Editor’s Note In this issue of
Digital Photo Pro,
we feature an article by Courtney Dailey.
The Los Angeles-based photographer has
become a role model for emerging pros
for more than her ability to take photos.
Dailey is an excellent example of a pho-
tographer who never loses her cool on set,
and in the article “View From The Top,” she
gives some great advice for everyone who
works with challenging clients—and that’s
really everyone.
For a lot of young, talented photogra-
phers who have been encouraged to take
a “my way or I won’t do the job” approach,
Dailey’s advice is particularly important. She
is the Shao-lin master to the emerging pho-
tographer’s Grasshopper, encouraging the
headstrong youth to use the opponent’s
energy to create an even more potent strike.
Martial arts TV analogies aside, Dailey builds
business by finding a way to be a creative
partner even when the client doesn’t think
they want one.
The era when the photographer was
expected to rule the set with an iron fist is
over. In an age of social media and blogging
platforms that enable anyone to have a voice,
the value of collaborative processes is being
seen by everyone, from the client to the tal-
ent. Of course, there has to be order and
there has to be a leader, but the job of the
leader is now to encourage feedback rather
than stifling it.
In addition to Dailey’s article, we have a
number of articles around this issue’s Black
& White theme. The appeal of monochrome
never dies. After years of distilling the process
of converting color images to black-and-white
� digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 7
in software, many photographers are finding
value in going back to more of a longhand
method. Ming Thein is a photographer and
blogger based in Kuala Lumpur, and his
article on evaluating an image and using the
channel mixer to make the conversion will
give you new insights into what’s possible
beyond Nik Silver Efex Pro.
I’m also extremely excited to have a
profile of the great photojournalist David
Douglas Duncan. At age 99, Duncan was
a witness to and part of many of the most
important events of the 20th century. DPP
Associate Editor Ashley Myers-Turner inter-
viewed Duncan, and his anecdotes and
comments about the changing nature of
photojournalism, as well as his role in bringing
so many of the 20th century’s stories to life,
are both inspiring and thought-provoking.
As I wrap up this editorial, I want to point
you over to the DPP website. Earlier this year
we gave digitalphotopro.com a completely
new look. The responsive design lets you
enjoy the content on any device, from a large
Cinema Display down to a smartphone. In
addition to the new look, we’ve also been
adding new online-exclusive content. Have
a look at the new Hands-On Gear Reviews to
see our take on cameras, lenses and other
equipment for pros. Getting to this new look
and new content has been a long time com-
ing, and we’re going to be adding much more
in the coming weeks and months. Please
let me know what you think and what other
content you’d like to see. You can find me on
Twitter @DPPRobinson or you can email me
at [email protected].—Christopher Robinson,
Publisher/Editor
MAY/JUNE 2015 Vol. 13 No. 3 digitalphotopro.com
Printed in the U.S.A.Digital Photo Pro is published by Werner Publishing Corp. Executive, editor ial and advertising offices: 12121 Wilshire Blvd., Ste. 1200, Los Angeles, CA 90025-1176, (310) 820-1500. Email us (editorial matters only) at [email protected] or visit our website at www.digitalphotopro.com Copyright © 2015 by Werner Publishing Corp. No material may be reproduced without written permis-sion. This publication is purchased with the understanding that information pre-sented is from many sources for which there can be no warranty or responsibility by the publisher as to accuracy, originality or completeness. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering product endorse-ments or providing instruction as a substitute for appropriate training by qualified sources. EDITORIAL SUBMISSION: Digital Photo Pro assumes no responsibility for solicited or unsolicited contributions and materials. Submissions for review should be limited to no more than 40 photographs. Please submit duplicates for our review. Otherwise, insurance for such materials, in transit or in our pos-session, must be the responsibility of the writer or photographer. Digital Photo Pro does not accept or agree to the conditions and stipulations printed on delivery memos, packing slips and related correspondence as they are presented without prior notice accompanying submission materials. Exceptions to this disclaimer of liability on the part of Digital Photo Pro must be prearranged, executed in writ-ing and signed by both parties prior to the shipment of materials in question. All submissions must be accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) with sufficient postage to cover the cost of return. The class of mail and insurance coverage for returns will be determined by the amount provided for on the SASE. Writer/photographer guidelines are available on request, with the en-closure of an SASE. SUBSCRIBERS: Any obligation we owe to you, including delivery of your magazine, is contingent upon you providing us with your correct mailing address. If the Post Office notifies us that your magazine is undeliverable, we have no further obligation to you unless we receive a corrected address from you within two years of the Post Office notification. BACK ISSUES are available for one year prior to the current issue. To order within U.S., send $9.00 plus $4.00 post-age and handling (Canada: $9.00 plus $5.00; International: $9.00 plus $10.00) for each issue to Back Issue Dept., Digital Photo Pro, 12121 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1200, Los Angeles, CA 90025-1176, or go online and visit the eStore. No orders processed without proper funds and specific issue information.Digital Photo Pro is a registered trademark of Werner Publishing Corp. Copyright © 2015 Werner Publishing Corp. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.
To Subscribe Or For Subscription Questions:www.digitalphotopro.com or (800) 814-2993or email [email protected]
Member, Alliance forAudited Media
Member
EDITORIALCHRISTOPHER ROBINSONPublisher/Editor
WESLEY G. PITTSManaging Editor
MAGGIE DEVCICHSenior Articles Editor
ASHLEY MYERS-TURNERAssociate Editor
MIKE STENSVOLDSenior Editor
J. ANA FLORES, KRISTAN ASHWORTHCopy Editors
DAVID SCHLOSS Contributing Technical Editor
JOHN PAUL CAPONIGRO, ROBERT HAWK,MICHAEL GUNCHEON, WILLIAM SAWALICH Contributing Editors
JEFF SCHEWE, DOUG SPERLINGProfessional Advisors
ARTKURT R. SMITHArt Director
ERIC BECKETTAssistant Art Director
CANDICE OTAGraphic Designer
WWW.DIGITALPHOTOPRO.COMWESLEY G. PITTSOnline Director
MIKE DECKER Web Art Director
DAMIAN GREENE Web Developer
LISETTE ROSE Web Production Associate
IMAGING GROUPCHRISTOPHER ROBINSONPublisher/Editorial Director
KURT R. SMITHExecutive Art Director
MAGGIE DEVCICHCopy Chief
EDITORIAL OFFICESWerner Publishing Corporation12121 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1200Los Angeles, CA 90025-1176(310) 820-1500
Contents Equipment68 MONOCHROME CAPTUREDedicated black-and-white digital cameras can deliver better and sharper images for those who don’t have a need for color
TECH
60 MONOCHROME CONVERSIONInstead of always taking a one-click solution, learn how to take control over the subtle tones to create richer, more nuanced black-and-white images
Text & Photography By Ming Thein
PHOTO BUSINESS
72 VIEW FROM THE TOPEnergy, flexibility and a fearless attitude—pro beauty photographer Courtney Dailey shares insights on how to keep clients coming back
By Kristan Ashworth Photography By Courtney Dailey
8�| Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
20
20
24
Myth: You can’t get shallow depth of field with mirrorless cameras.
E-M1
Image shot with the Olympus OM-D E-M1
with the M.Zuiko 40-150mm f4.0 PRO lens
by Olympus Trailblazer, Peter Baumgarten
Fact: See photo above.
The powerfully compact Olympus OM-D E-M1 delivers an amazing shallow
depth of field with its patented system of digitally designed lenses. But
don’t take our word for it, get all the details at getolympus.com/myths.
GET POWER. GET PORTABLE. GET OLYMPUS.
21
10 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
MAY/JUNE 2015 Vol. 13 No. 3 digitalphotopro.com
Digital Photo Pro (ISSN: 1545-8520)—Vol. 13 No. 3—is published bimonthly except monthly in November and December by Werner Publishing Corp. Executive, editorial and advertising offices: 12121 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1200, Los Angeles, CA 90025-1176, (310) 820-1500. Periodicals Postage Paid at Los Angeles, Calif., and at additional mailing offices. Single-copy price—$6.99. Annual subscription in U.S., Possessions, APO/FPO—$24.97. Canada—$39.97; other foreign—$39.97, including postage and taxes. Payable in U.S. funds. For orders, address changes and all other customer service, phone toll-free (800) 814-2993. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Digital Photo Pro, Box 37857, Boone, IA 50037-0857. Canada Post Publications Mail Class Agreement No. 1559788. See magazine mast for specific information on solicited and unsolicited contributions and the purchase of back issues.
ON THE COVER: By Karolina Wilanecka, from the 2014 DPP B&W World Contest. See page 44.
ADVERTISING/SALES
Los Angeles(310) 820-1500, Fax (310) 826-5008
SCOTT LUKSHEastern Advertising Sales Manager
MARK HARRISSenior Advertising Sales Manager
MICHAEL E. MCMANNSenior Advertising Sales Manager
CLAUDIA WARRENAssistant Advertising Sales Manager
SIOBHAN VALENTINEAdvertising Coordinator
MARKETINGBASAK PRINCEMarketing Manager
KENT LAMDigital Marketing Coordinator
PRODUCTION/MANUFACTURINGJESSE GARCIAProduction Director
MAGGIE DEVCICHEditorial Production Manager
TAMMY REYESProduction Manager
CONSUMER MARKETINGLIZ ENGELConsumer Marketing Manager
SUE C. WILBURData & Analytics Manager
TOM FERRUGGIANewsstand Sales Manager
BUSINESS/OPERATIONSLORIE SHUMANController
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WERNER PUBLISHING CORPORATION12121 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1200Los Angeles, CA 90025-1176(310) 820-1500
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Contents
76 SOLUTIONS: PREFLIGHTThe future of drones for professionals is becoming clearer
COLUMNS
26 VISIONEER’S GALLERYHarmoniesJulian Lennon’s “Horizon” exhibit links photojournalism
and fine art for a humanitarian cause
By Baldev Duggal
28 (R)EVOLUTIONSynthetic Profiles Make big changes to the image at a small pixel price
By John Paul Caponigro
Departments6 EDITOR’S NOTE 12 FIRST TAKES 20 DPP IN FOCUS 32 HI-TECH STUDIO: FILM SCANNERS82 MISINFORMATION: CAMERA TECH
24
24
Earn a Degree or Take Classesin San Francisco or Online
School of Photography //Advertising / Documentary / Fashion / FineArt / Still Life
Let Your Creativity Break Free
Academy of Art University 888.680.8691 // www.academyart.edu
Founded in San Francisco 1929 Yellow Ribbon Participant
Visit www.academyart.edu to learn more about total costs,
median student loan debt, potential occupations and other
information. Accredited member WSCUC, NASAD, CIDA
(BFA-IAD, MFA-IAD), CTC (California Teacher Credential).
Student Photograph by Kim Smith
School of Photography
Firs
tTak
es
In the article “View From The Top,” Los Angeles-based fashion and beauty photographer Courtney Dailey gives insight into how she works with her clients to build on
their ideas. It’s been said that advertising art directors are frustrated photographers at heart, and most pros have experienced at least one creatively inclined client who
wanted to dictate the shot to the nth degree. Dailey has a knack for taking that kind of domineering approach from a client and rechanneling it to a more collaborative
end. Ultimately, the best art directors recognize when they have a partner instead of a glorified shutter-button-pusher.
12�| Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Cou
rtne
y D
aile
y
14 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Firs
tTak
esFi
rstT
akes
Dixie Dixon
Feat
ured
in
the
Apri
l is
sue
of D
igita
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oto
Pro,
Dix
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ixon
’s p
rofe
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nal
phot
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phy
care
er i
s on
the
fas
t tr
ack.
For
any
one
who
has
atte
nded
one
of
her
sem
inar
s, t
he d
ynam
ic y
oung
pho
togr
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less
ene
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is i
mm
edia
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evid
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ings
tha
t sa
me
ener
gy t
o th
e se
t, ge
nera
ting
an a
tmos
pher
e of
cre
ativ
ity.
16 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Firs
tTak
esDuggal Visual Solutions’ Capture The Moment Contest Winners
Firs
t Pl
ace
Deb
ora
S.S
. Fi
delis
Cun
haK
iki,
only
one
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mee
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new
born
si
ster
in th
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w
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corr
idor
of t
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hosp
ital.
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i’s e
yes
and
hand
s ex
pres
s a
uniq
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mom
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f dee
p lo
ve
amon
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of D
PP, w
e’re
pro
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inne
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olut
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omen
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t. D
PP E
dito
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toph
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was
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onte
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is D
ugga
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ar. E
ntri
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and
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ne r
emem
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long
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and
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mig
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for
get
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soon
dep
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, in
part
, on
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pho
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an
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As
view
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we
crav
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stor
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visu
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tol
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n st
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pho
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a st
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is s
elf-
evid
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and
the
tale
it
tells
mig
ht a
lso
evok
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resp
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,
capt
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view
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even
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and
bur
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to m
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Dug
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Mom
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SP 15-30mm F/2.8 Di VC USD[Model A012] for Canon, Nikon, and Sony* mount
Introducing the world’s first** fast full-frame ultra-wide-anglezoom with image stabilizationPush your vision even wider with the new Tamron SP 15-30mm F/2.8 Di VC USDzoom — the world’s first in its class with image stabilization. The latest additionto Tamron’s line-up of SP (Super Performance) lenses, designed for both for fullframe and crop-sensor DSLRs, is built to the highest standards, and enablesyou to capture images of expansive vistas free of annoying lens aberrations thanksto Tamron’s use of proprietary XGM eXpanded Glass Molded Aspherical lens elementtechnology. This bold new zoom delivers superb corner-to-corner resolution—equal to a prime lens— at every focal length and a bright F/2.8 aperture throughoutits 15-30mm zoom range. Its rugged design features a fluorine-coated front element—which sheds water and repels dirt—and enhanced moisture resistant construction.Fast. Ultra-wide. Image stabilized. Powerful from any perspective.
*Sony mount without VC**For F/2.8 ultra-wide-angle zoom lens for full-frame DSLR cameras (Source: Tamron)
Focal length: 15mm Exposure: F/11 0.6 sec ISO400 © Ian Plant
www.tamron-usa.com
Perspectives of power
18�| Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Firs
tTak
esDuggal Visual Solutions’ Capture The Moment Contest Runners Up
1
2
� digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 19
1) Anna MarriageThis is my daughter Eleanor. We were watching the rehearsal of her first ballet show. The older girls were on first, and she watched them in the space in front of the stages (where the rows of seats were to be put).She stood and started emulating their moves; she got totally absorbed in the moment as she danced and tried to copy what they were doing—it was magical—and loads of the parents saw what she was doing and went “Awww.” She later was on stage as one of the Alice in Wonderland bunnies. It was a proud-parent moment.
2) Eric TkindtIn August, somebody stole my Nikon D3S, so I was obligated to buy another (a better one, with thanks to my lovely wife), the Nikon D4S. This camera is much better in high ISO, so I could now take pictures in dark places, like boxing arenas. I went for the first time to Ghent to see boxing, and that night the last fight was for the World Title between the Brazilian world champion Anderson Clayton and the Belgian opponent Sasha Yengoyan. At a certain moment, the Brazilian was going down in the corner where I stood, so I could take this picture with the winner in the opposite corner. In this picture, you see everything that is “sports,” what it means: winning, losing, emotion. A better sports photo I will never make. I was at the right place in the right moment.
3) Froi RiveraOne afternoon, I was working in my house in good weather. Suddenly, the rain started to fall strongly, and I went to the window to take a look. I saw kids outside still playing despite the rain, so I immediately ran and grabbed a camera. I didn’t have an umbrella, so I just took a towel with me and went outside on my balcony. With just the towel to cover me, I took photos of these kids running and playing. The rain was really strong, flooding the street ankle-deep. The light was good, and the dynamism of raindrops and the flow of flooding water was also timely. I waited for the one moment, when the kids would eventually come close to each other, which they did! They stretched their hands and huddled, and I immediately took this shot.
4) Ian GilmourWhen I arrived at the station, which is a cold and lonely place at this time of night, I had planned to photograph the train guard with the signal box in the background. When I had my camera and tripod set up, a train pulled into the station, and just as it pulled away, a man came running up the stairs and just missed it by seconds. The next train was in one hour. It was a very cold and frosty evening, and I pitied this man standing, waiting in the freezing cold. (The café wasn’t open.) I took this shot after a few minutes and then went home to a warm fire, still thinking about him waiting there.
5) Jessica SantiagoI took this photograph in a retirement home. That day I went there with a group of friends to celebrate Mother’s Day with all the elderlies who live there. This old lady barely could speak, but she was so happy to receive our visit. She was so happy to know that she wasn’t forgotten there. Me and my friends just wanted to give something else to them on Mother’s Day last year, but they gave so much more to us.
3
4
5
20 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
DPP
In F
ocus
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am
era
sI
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ita
lE
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ipm
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rag
e I
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Canon EOS 5DS/5DS RNow providing an affordable alternative to a medium-format camera, Canon has developed
the EOS 5DS and 5DS R models, which offer the highest resolution of any 35mm DSLR, to
date. Both the 5DS and 5DS R use a 50.6-megapixel, full-frame CMOS sensor and Dual DIGIC
6 processor, allowing quick 5 fps continuous shooting for capturing the full sharp, detailed
50-megapixel resolution, and the 5DS R model further maximizes sharpness with a canceled
low-pass filter. Both cameras use 61-Point High-Density Reticular AF with 41 cross-type
sensors and have a sensitivity of ISO 100-6400 (12,800 extended). The cameras have a
built-in intervalometer, shoot 1080p full HD video and offer a creative Time Lapse Movie
function that automatically builds a time-lapse video from still images. While the cameras
maintain the familiar 5D body, the chassis, baseplate and tripod lug have been reinforced
for stability and to reduce camera shake. List Price: $3,699 (5DS); $3,899 (5DS R).
Contact: Canon, www.usa.canon.com.
Ultrawide-Angle Zoom LensTamron continues to add to the company’s unique line of lenses for full-frame
cameras with the SP 15-30mm ƒ/2.8 Di VC USD ultrawide-angle zoom lens.
The 18 optical lens elements in 13 groups include an eXpanded Glass Molded
Aspherical element, and several Molded-Glass
Aspherical and Low Dispersion elements,
preventing geometrical distortion and
ensuring lateral color correction
throughout the zoom range. Utilizing
Vibration Compensation, the lens corrects
for slight camera shake in low light and
slow shutter speed situations. The
Ultrasonic Silent Drive maintains quiet
autofocus action with high torque and
precision. The Broad-Band Anti-Reflection
coating and Extended Bandwidth &
Angular-Dependency coatings reduce
ghosting and flare, while the fluorine coating
repels dirt and water. List Price: $1,199.
Contact: Tamron, www.tamron-usa.com.
24mm F/1.4 Art LensSigma has introduced the new 24mm ƒ/1.4 DG HSM Art
lens for full-frame DSLRs (38mm when used with an
APS-C sensor). A fast, wide lens that’s versatile among
many still photography genres, it’s also useful for video
work. The nine-blade aperture provides a round bokeh.
The 15 optical elements in 11 groups include FLD and
SLD glass for minimal chromatic aberration, particularly
at the edges of the frame. An aspherical element has
been placed at the rear of the lens to improve
performance when shooting wide open by correcting
axial chromatic aberration and sagittal coma flare.
Easily switch from autofocus to manual focus by rotating
the focus ring, a feature introduced by the 50mm Art
lens. The 24mm ƒ/1.4 DG HSM Art lens is compatible
with the Sigma USB dock and Mount Conversion service.
List Price: $849. Contact: Sigma, www.sigmaphoto.com.
digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 21
OM-D E-M5 Mark II ��
The new OM-D E-M5 Mark II by Olympus features a redesigned 16-megapixel Live MOS Micro Four Thirds
sensor combined with a TruePic VII Processor. The camera shoots with a 1/8000 mechanical shutter
speed and 1/16000 electronic shutter speed in Silent Mode. RAW files can be shot at up to 10
fps with S-AF and 5 fps with C-AF with tracking enabled. The 81-point Fast AF offers an
expanded focus area, while the Small Target AF focuses on a small area across the entire
frame. The 5-axis image stabilization provides 5.0 steps of compensation for sharp handheld
shots as slow as a 1⁄4-sec. shutter speed. A 40-megapixel High-Resolution Shot mode employs a
pixel-shift technique using the voice coil motor IS unit to capture eight sequential images,
moving the sensor 0.5-pixel steps between each shot and then combining images (use of a
tripod is recommended). Video mode captures 1080p up to a 60p frame rate, and includes an
external audio input and a headphone jack for audio monitoring. Movie Teleconverter, time-code
settings and an external HDMI monitor connection are also supported. The camera features a
dust- and splashproof body, and when paired with some M.ZUIKO DIGITAL lenses, can be used in
the rain. The Supersonic Wave Filter uses high-frequency movement to remove dust and debris from the sensor.
The OM-D E-M5 Mark II also features a three-inch, 1.04-million-dot vari-angle touch screen and 2.36-million-
dot electric viewfinder, plus WiFi capability. List Price: $1,099. Contact: Olympus, www.getolympus.com.
Samsung NX500 ��
Samsung has taken the core technology of the NX1 and
packaged it in a small size, producing the powerful,
yet portable NX500. The 28-megapixel, backside-
illuminated APS-C sensor and DRIMeV
processor provide quick high-quality stills and
video. The BSI APS-C sensor supports 4K and
UHD video recording with a built-in HEVC codec,
which compresses file size to maximize storage
space without harming quality. The DRIMeV
processor produces accurate color reproduction
with improved noise reduction, and when paired with
the Hybrid AF system, results in 9 fps continuous shooting. The NX500 also
includes Samsung Auto Shot, which uses motion detection to predict perfect
timing for capturing an action shot. The three-inch touch-screen display has
tilt and flip functionality. The NX500 has built-in WiFi, Bluetooth and NFC
capability. List Price: $799. Contact: Samsung, www.samsung.com.
Video Travel TripodThe Aero Travel Tripod Kit for Video by Benro is a versatile and compact
option for shooters who are constantly on the go. The S2 version supports up to
5.5 pounds and folds to a compact 18.3 inches, while the S4 version supports
up to 8.8 pounds and folds to 21.7 inches. The tripods utilize a reversible
folding leg design to maximize a mobile travel profile. When extended, the legs
have three locked leg positions. The removable leg and center column can
be combined to create a monopod, when needed. The removable fluid head
provides 360° panning and smooth tilting, and a bubble level. The quick-
release plate uses a safety lock. The S4 version features a removable handle
for mounting on either side of the fluid head. The Aero Travel Tripods also
include quick-flip leg locks, a weight hook and a carrying case. List Price:
$199 (Aero S2); $259 (Aero S4). Contact: Benro, www.benrousa.com.
�� Macro LensThe wide-angle Panasonic LUMIX G MACRO
30mm ƒ/2.8 ASPH MEGA O.I.S. lens
offers sharp and high-contrast image
rendering to macro enthusiasts. The 1x
life-size magnification and 4.13-inch
focusing distance provide a deep depth
of field, while the multicoated lens
elements reduce ghosting and flare.
Nine lenses in nine groups make up the
240 fps Drive AF and MEGA O.I.S. for
accurate focus and stable framing. The
durable metal mount ensures reliability
for everyday use. List Price: TBA. Contact: Panasonic, shop.panasonic.com.
22 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
�� Air 1 CommanderNissin Digital has developed the new Nissin Air
System (NAS), a 2.4 GHz wireless radio
transmission system with a 98-foot range for flash
communication. Utilizing this technology, the
company has released the Nissin Di700A flash with
built-in radio receiver and has announced a
summer release of the Air 1 Commander
and combined kit. The Air 1 Commander
uses eight radio channels to control
flashes in TTL or manual mode. Flashes
can be controlled and divided among
three groups—A, B and C—with multiple
flashes in each group. From the Air 1
Commander, you can control the Di700A zoom
head. List Price: $259 (Di700A for Canon,
Nikon or Sony); $79 (Air 1 Commander for
Canon, Nikon or Sony); $299 (Complete Kit).
Contact: Nissin, www.nissindigital.com.
DPP
In F
ocus
DPPInFocus
>> check out www.digitalphotopro.com/gear/in-focus for more info
Rugged RAID Hard Drive �� Continually meeting the needs of the traveling photographer, LaCie has packed increased
speed, capacity and safety into the company’s mobile and durable packaging with the
Rugged RAID hard drive. The two internal hard drives have a combined 4 TB capacity
(equivalent to 60 64 GB memory cards), reducing the number of drives you need to
pack. When used in the preconfigured RAID 0 mode, speeds reach up to 240 MB/s.
The drive can also be switched to RAID 1 mode for built-in safety. Powered through
the integrated Thunderbolt cable, there’s no need for an external power source, and
the additional USB 3.0 connection ensures usage with Mac and PC computers. The drive is
dust- and splashproof, even during operation, and can withstand drops of up to five feet and one ton
of pressure. LaCie Private-Public software allows for full drive password protection or protection of
certain volumes with AES 256-bit encryption. List Price: $449. Contact: LaCie, www.lacie.com.
�� DaVinci Resolve UpdateBlackmagic Design has improved CinemaDNG RAW image
processing and workflow with Avid editors with the DaVinci
Resolve 11.2 update. The free download has updated the
CinemaDNG tone curve and soft clip option for improved
colors and realistic detail when converting to a reduced color
space. New DNxHR encoding and decoding support allows for
a fluid workflow with Avid editors by allowing high-resolution
media and sequences to move between systems, and AAF
import with timeline resolution gives accurate round-trip
support with Media Composer 8.3. Additional features
include flag and marker support in ColorTrace and support
for RED SDK 5.3. List Price: Free update. Contact: Blackmagic Design, www.blackmagicdesign.com.
Flexible Lighting ��
The Westcott Flex 1-Panel Kit provides a way to shape light to your
specific situation in a convenient lightweight kit. At only seven
ounces, the 10x10-inch 55W LED mat has 256 light-emitting
diodes and a moldable frame to adapt to each shooting situation.
The kit is available with a 5600K daylight mat or 3200K tungsten
mat. Each flex mat is water-resistant and dimmable from 5% to
100%. Each kit includes a Flex LED panel, dimmer, power supply
and cord, X-Bracket clip mount, diffusion panel and water-resistant
extension cord. Estimated Street Price: $699. Contact: Westcott, www.fjwestcott.com.
In F
ocus
New Tools Of The Trade
�� Versatile E-Mount LensSony has announced the Distagon T*
FE 35mm ƒ/1.4 ZA to their lens lineup.
The full-frame E-mount lens is a
perfect match for the a7 series, as
it’s designed specifically to pull
double-duty as a lens for still shooters
and filmmakers. The Direct Drive Super
Sonic Wave AF Motor uses piezoelectric
elements oscillating at ultrasonic
frequencies to drive focus while
remaining quiet enough for filmmaking.
The aperture ring’s tactile click steps can
be turned on for still photo use or turned off
for reduced noise during video use. The wide 9-blade
aperture provides a round bokeh and is optimal for low light
and shallow depth of field. Zeiss brings high quality and
resolution throughout the image, and the T* coating nearly
eliminates lens flare. The body is water- and dust-resistant.
List Price: $1,599. Contact: Sony, store.sony.com.
�� High-Capacity microSDSanDisk has announced the development of the world’s current
highest-capacity microSD card. The 200 GB Ultra microSDXC
UHS-I Premium Edition card uses a new design and production
process to increase storage capacity, storing up to 20 hours
of full HD video. At the same time, the card maintains fast
transfer speeds approximating 90 MB/s, which accommodates a
transfer of 1,200 photos per minute. The card has a 10-year limited
warranty. List Price: $399. Contact: SanDisk, www.sandisk.com.
Glow ParaPop ��
Expanding the successful Glow HexaPop portable
strobe line, Flashpoint has developed a softbox and
umbrella modifier blend with the Glow ParaPop 28. The
12-sided, parabolic-shaped softbox has a 28-inch
diameter and 19.5-inch depth, providing a 105° light
spread with graduated subtle shadows. Made from heat-
resistant UV-A and UV-R diffuser material with internal silver
reflector fabric, it’s lightweight with reinforced support rod pockets, seams and
Velcro® closures. The speedring assembly is compatible with most brands of flash
heads, monolights and speedlights. The ParaPop 28 comes with removable inner
and outer diffusers, a removable cold-shoe, angle-adjustable shoe bracket and
protective case. List Price: $229. Contact: Flashpoint (Adorama), www.adorama.com.
�� Removable RAIDG-Technology has announced two new drives to the G-RAID line with up to 16 TB of
space. The G-RAID with Thunderbolt 2 and USB 3.0 and G-RAID with USB 3.0 provide
an all-aluminum enclosure for two removable 7200 rpm drives that can be configurable
as RAID 0, 1 or JBOD. The housing uses quiet-cooling fan technology. The G-RAID with
USB 3.0 offers transfer rates up to 400 MB/s, while the G-RAID with Thunderbolt 2 and
USB 3.0 offers transfer rates up to 440 MB/s for multistream HD, 2K and compressed 4K
video workflows. List Price: $599-$1,199 (G-RAID USB 3.0); $799-$1,299 (G-RAID with
Thunderbolt 2 and USB 3.0). Contact: G-Technology, www.g-technology.com.
HD Metal Prints ��
Online print service WhiteWall has combined true-color high-quality printing with long-lasting
durability in the new HD Metal Print option. Using a thermal sublimation process, the full color
spectrum and maximum resolution of each print is transferred and sealed into the metallic
surface. At 1mm thick and featherlight, the aluminum is UV-, scratch- and moisture-resistant,
making it a great print option for outdoor spaces, bathrooms or kitchens. Prints may be smooth
or brushed, and have a white or transparent primer. Sizes range from 3.5x3.5 inches to 59x39
inches, with a variety of frame options. List Price: Varies. Contact: WhiteWall, www.whitewall.com.
Follow Focus ��
The new Follow Focus MVA511FF by Manfrotto utilizes a double-sided drive, allowing gearbox
rotation for focus pulling in either direction. The 35mm friction wheel and 50-tooth drive gear can
be used with lenses that do or don’t have gear rings. The follow focus has a slide switch for hard
stops, and a marking disc can be clicked easily into place to allow for focal reference points. It
attaches to standard 15mm rods for pairing with a rig and can be mounted on either side of the lens
for both right- or left-handed operators. List Price: $599. Contact: Manfrotto, www.manfrotto.us.
26 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Julian Lennon’s “Horizon” exhibit
links photojournalism and fine art
for a humanitarian cause
By Baldev Duggal
HarmoniesVisioneer’s GalleryVi
s Ga
llery
This song by Julian Lennon, released in 2011, serves as a poignant prelude to his recent photography exhibit “Horizon,” at the Emmanuel Fremin Gallery in Chelsea, which travels worldwide thereafter. A musician, a photographer and a phi-lanthropist, Lennon is deeply commit-ted to the well-being of all species and the health of our planet, and promotes several endeavors through his organi-zation White Feather Foundation. I had written about Julian Lennon back in 2010, when we helped launch his debut photography exhibit “Timeless”
in New York. No doubt the undercur-rents of Julian’s journey in life, as the first son of one of the most admired and tragically lost artists on the planet, John Lennon, led him to a fair share of soul-searching. Combine that with a heart full of artistic skill, poetic yearning, empathy and compassion, and what we have in Julian is a truly multidisci-plinary artist whose connection with the world touches sundry chords.
Born in Liverpool, England, Julian Lennon began his artistic trajectory at a young age, with an inherent talent for
Deb
orah
And
erso
n
©20
15 J
ulia
n Le
nnon
, Fo
llow
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ulia
n Le
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, H
ope
©20
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ulia
n Le
nnon
, R
ever
ence
“Tired of this world, all the good that we do
Never seems to get through, it’s a shame
We’ve pleaded for change but the wars carry on
Whether you’re weak or strong, don’t you know?
I can change, you can changeEverything wrong with our livesWe can change all of our lives”
—Julian Lennon
>> More On The WebYou can see more ofBaldev Duggal’s Visioneer’sGallery columns on theDPP website atwww.digitalphotopro.com.
playing musical instruments. As an observer of life in all its forms, Julian developed his personal expression through such mediums as music, acting and documentary filmmaking. In 2007, the door opened to yet another, photog-raphy, as Julian captured images dur-ing a musical tour for his half-brother, Sean. “Timeless,” his first photo ex- hibition, staged in Manhattan inSeptember 2010, debuted Julian’s con-siderable talents behind the camera, as seen in photographs of Sean Lennon, U2 and his painterly landscapes. His ability to immortalize moments of inti-macy and introspection is perhaps best captured in his portraits of Bono and Princess Charlene of Monaco.
The principal goal behind Lennon’s latest series, “Horizon,” is to marry pho-tography with humanitarian efforts. “I have always felt that I have observed life in a different way than others, prob-ably because my life has always been very different than most,” says Julian. His attuned worldview recently led him to see firsthand the results of a Charity: Water and the White Feather Foundation initiative, bringing critically needed clean drinking water to parts of Africa. During these travels through Kenya and Ethiopia, Julian captured a wide variety of images, with the inten-tion of inspiring viewers to learn about unique indigenous cultures and to help raise awareness of their plights. Its sig-nature image, “Horizon,” juxtaposes man and nature in a meditative solo walk upon a majestic mountaintop. The beauty of landscape shots like “Follow” find a complement in the humanity of others, among them: “Reverence,” with a group of tribal elders focused intently, during a community gathering, to dis-cuss clean water and their environment; and “Hope,” a bright-eyed Ethiopian child, with a wise, yet insightful vision of life yet to come.
Empathy, says Julian Lennon, is the bond that unites the planet. He offers, “We are all in this together, and hope-fully someday, the world will realize that…and photography is one way to share, learn, appreciate and experience other cultures, which in turn, allows
us to empathize with other people’s lives.”
Featuring exquisite por-traiture and landscape pho-tographs, “Horizon” blurs
the lines between fine-art photography and photojournalism. “Reverence” is a timeless portrait, the light in the room perfectly illuminating the tribal group’s hardened faces. Says Lennon of the picture, “These are the leaders of the community. NGOs and charity organi-
zations that work with them. Here we were with Scott Harrison of Charity: Water, and it was reverence, indeed. The handoff of a water well. The long white clothes you see, the cotton wraps and long scarves, they protect from heat and cold of the desert. They have a natural insulation for both. Scott was honored with such a scarf. It is a ceremonial piece. Water-work is the message. Awareness is at the heart of the series.”
(Cont’d on page 79)
28 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Make big changes to the image at a small pixel price
By John Paul Caponigro
Synthetic Profiles(R)evolution(R
) evo
luti
on
How can you change the appearance of a digital
image without changing the numbers that assign
the color values? Change what those num-bers mean by changing the image’s ICC profi le. Using abstract or synthetic pro-fi les, you can make massive changes to an image with little to no cost, changes that ordinarily would cause big prob-lems using standard methods, such as
posterization and noise. It’s a practice known to color geeks and few others. When you’ve got a big job to do, it can get you out of a pinch in a hurry.
In most cases, we think of using color management to accurately match colors when moving between different color spaces; ICC profi les are used to describe different color spaces and to make pre-
cise transformations to values moved from one to another to maintain con-sistent appearances. In very rare cases, when profi les are assigned to image fi les without a color conversion, the appear-ance of the image changes; values stay the same, but their meaning changes, so the image looks different. So when you use this unorthodox method of color
digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 29
adjustment, you get a change in appear-ance without changing the values in the fi le, and this is particularly useful when you want to pay a very small price for making very big changes.
This is worth restating. What exactly is the difference between assigning an ICC profi le and using an ICC profi le to perform a color conversion? Using an ICC profi le to convert color changes values to maintain the appearance of an image. Assigning an ICC profi le changes the recipe for colors without changing the values in an image, so its appearance changes.
Real Vs. Abstract Vs. Synthetic Profi les
You could say there are “real” and “abstract” profi les. Real profi les de-scribe the color capacity of real-world devices, like monitors and printers. Abstract profi les describe theoretical color spaces that don’t refer to spe-cifi c devices, like the standard editing spaces we use in everyday digital
imaging—sRGB, Adobe RGB (1998), ProPhoto RGB, etc. Both real and abstract profi les are designed to main-tain a consistent color appearance. So what’s a synthetic profi le? It’s an ICC profi le that’s designed to change color appearance or to solve a color problem.
Creating Synthetic Profi lesYou can create synthetic ICC profi les
with Photoshop. Go to Edit > Color Settings, and making sure More Options is checked, go to Working Spaces > RGB > Custom RGB. In the fi nal window that appears, you’ll use three variables to create a synthetic profi le: Gamma, White Point and Primaries.
Gamma affects brightness and con-trast. Gamma is the midtone adjust-ment applied to compensate for nonlinear characteristics of capture and display systems. It’s the slope of the input-output curve. A slope of 1 is linear, or with no change between input and output. Values larger than 1 make shadows darker; values less than
1 make shadows lighter. ColorMatch RGB and ProPhoto RGB have gam-mas of 1.8. sRGB and Adobe RGB (1998) have gammas of 2.2. You can set a value as low as .75 and as high as 3.0.
Gamma is the most useful setting of the three; it’s excellent for mak-ing industrial-strength adjustments to exposure. It has one variable.
White Point is the color temperature of white produced by combining red, green and blue primaries at maximum strength. It’s measured in Kelvin. 5000K is the temperature of daylight (at high noon) and the industry-standard view-ing light. A higher value is cooler (bluer); a lower value is warmer (yellower).
White Point is useful for gross color adjustment; the results are best fi ne-tuned with other tools in Photoshop. It has two variables.
Primaries are the chromaticities (hue and saturation) of the red, green and blue components that defi ne a color space. Each primary is specifi ed by an x and a y coordinate. There are nine defaults to choose from, including Adobe RGB (1998). If you’d like to start with val-ues from other color spaces, including the other standard editing spaces like sRGB, ColorMatch RGB, Adobe RGB (1998) and ProPhoto RGB, using the RGB drop-down menu, specify a color space fi rst; this sets the starting point. Then pull up to Custom RGB, where you can modify those values.
Primaries is the most complex and diffi cult to use of the three; it requires a lot of experimentation. It’s capable of making exotic color adjustments that can’t be duplicated with other tools in Photoshop, but it’s much harder to pre-dict and control. It has six variables.
To make it easier to preview the results of your explorations with syn-thetic profi les, discard the profi le of the image you’re viewing. Go to Edit > Assign Profi le > Don’t Color Manage This Document. Photoshop uses the current Color Spaces Working Spaces settings to display fi les without ICC profi les. If you don’t do this, you’ll have to save a synthetic profi le and then take the extra step of applying the profi le to see the results, which will slow you down considerably.
1)
2)
1) Photoshop Color Settings dialog
2) Photoshop Custom RGB dialog
30�| Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
When you’re ready to save your syn-thetic profiles, use the Color Settings RGB drop-down menu and pull up to Save RGB. Don’t use the Save button on the right side of the Color Settings dialog; instead of saving an ICC profile, this saves all of the Color Settings as a .CSF file, useful for syncing multiple Adobe applications. When you finish creating a synthetic profile, click Cancel in the Color Settings dialog; you don’t want synthetic settings to become your default RGB editing space, as they’re used when creating new files.
If you want to archive or share syn-thetic profiles, you can copy the profiles out of the folder they’re saved in. On a Mac, profiles are saved with this path: Library > Color Sync > Profiles.
To apply a synthetic profile, goto Edit > Assign Profile. You cansee before and after appearances by checking the Preview box on and off.
Exploring Your OptionsBecause using synthetic profiles is
so abstract, it’s useful to explore youroptions by comparing the results of mul-tiple profiles side by side. While you’reexploring your options, at any one time,have a minimum of two identical filesopen in Photoshop so you can carefullyassess the results of different profiles.
Make a number of synthetic profilesbased on your standard editing space. Mystandard editing space is ProPhoto RGB,with different gamma settings varyingin 0.1 or 0.2 increments. When you saveyour synthetic profiles, use a standardnaming convention to tell the differencesbetween them, such as SYN ProPhotoG2.2, SYN ProPhoto G2.4, etc.
Once you’ve applied a synthetic pro-file, should you convert the file to a stan-dard editing space? You don’t need to.Your synthetic profile uses the standardICC language and should be accuratelyread by any software that’s ICC-compliant. One advantage tokeeping it in the syntheticcolor space is that your filewill accurately inform youabout its creation. But if itmakes you feel better, youwon’t pay much of a price if
(R)EVOLUTION
With just a little experimentation, you’ll find you, too, can make big changes to your images and pay a small price using synthetic profiles. Using synthetic profiles is color adjustment without editing values; they change no values, but they do change the mean-ing of those values—and thus their appearance. Don’t believe it? Check your histogram when you assign a pro-file. You won’t even see it move! It’s kind of unbelievable. Try it. See it with your own eyes. You’ll quickly become a believer, too. DPP
John Paul Caponigro, author of Adobe Photoshop Master Class and the DVD series R/Evolution, is an internationally renowned fine artist, an authority on digital printing, and a respected lecturer and work-shop leader. Get PDFs and his enews Insights free at www.johnpaulcaponigro.com.
you convert to a standard editing space;the few minor quantization errors asso-ciated with such color conversions arealmost always invisible to the naked eye.
Fine-Tuning Your ResultsWhile you’ll be able to perform the
lion’s share of color adjustment usinga synthetic profile, most images willbenefit from additional fine-tuningthrough standard image-editing prac-tices in Photoshop.
Am I saying that ICC profiles are usedto change values so the appearance staysthe same? Yes. Am I saying that a color
space is just a recipe for color,and that there are many differ-ent RGB recipes? Yes, but whilethey’re the standards, sRGB,ColorMatch RGB, Adobe RGB(1998) and ProPhoto RGB arejust a few among many.
>> More On The WebJohn Paul Caponigro’s in-depth instructionals on image-processing and printing techniques are available as an extensive archive online at digitalphotopro.com/ technique/revolution.
3) ProPhoto Gamma .8; 4) ProPhoto Gamma 1.8; 5) ProPhoto Gamma 3; 6) Arbitrary Primaries
3)
5) 6)
4)
dpmag.com/weddingsandevents
Capturing milestone memories and major moments is what photography is all
about. Submit your best images of weddings and other significant life events
for your chance to win prizes and get published in Digital Photo magazine.
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32 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Hi-T
ech
Stud
io
Hi-TechStudio Film Scanners
Film scanners let you convert slides, negatives and
even prints into digital images for yourself or your
clients. They’re a great way to convertyour old film archive into digital form.Mastering scanning takes a while, andif you just have a few film images orprints you want digitized, it’s probablybest to have a pro lab like Duggal (www.duggal.com) do it. But if you have a lotof images to scan, enjoy controlling theprocess yourself, and have the time, agood film scanner is the way to go.
Film scanners are available used for$100, but for pro-quality results, you’llwant one of the higher-end models.There are two basic types of scanners,dedicated film and flatbed. The latteroperates somewhat like photocopiers,and can do prints as well as slides andnegatives. Dedicated film scanners do
Discover the hidden value in your fi lm archive when
you digitize your slides and negatives
a typical 14-bit DSLR, and way betterthan the 256 tones of a JPEG image.In practice, the number of tones will be less, but still suffi cient to accurately reproduce a transparency or negative.
DmaxManufacturers list the maximum
density their scanners can deliver, which affects dynamic range. These fi gures should be taken with a grain of salt, but higher is better, and you should look for a scanner with a Dmax of at least 3.6. A higher Dmax means potentially smoother gradations and better shadow detail.
Profi lingA scanner will deliver decent results
right out of the box, but you can fi ne-tune your particular scanner by cre-ating a custom profi le. Essentially, you scan a test target containing color patches and a grayscale, and the profi l-ing software guides you through the process. The IT8 Calibration feature in LaserSoft’s SilverFast Ai Studio makes this a simple two-step process (see the “Scanning Software” section).
FormatOf course, you want a scanner that
can handle the slides, negatives and TOP, LEFT TO RIGHT: Hasselblad Flextight X1; Epson Perfection V850 Pro Photo Scanner
a better job with negativesand transparencies, butcan’t scan prints. We’ll look at both types in a bit, but fi rst, here are some general scanner considerations.
ResolutionScanner manufacturers
provide resolution fi gures for their products. The important one is the opti-cal (hardware) resolution;
that’s the maximum the unit can deliver without quality-reducing interpolation. Some scanners have different optical resolutions, depending on the size of the original you’re scanning: higher for 35mm, lower for 120.
More resolution (more ppi) means you can make bigger prints without seeing the pixels. But take into consideration the size and quality of the original being scanned: The scanner can’t pull out more detail than the original image contains.
Bit DepthMost higher-end scanners can
deliver 48-bit scans (16 bits each in red, green and blue channels). This means, in theory, that they can deliver up to 65,536 different shades of gray or color tones—better than the 16,384 tones of
34 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
HI-TECH STUDIO
prints you want to scan. If your archivesare all 35mm, a dedicated 35mm film scanner is ideal. If you have medium-format originals, you’ll want a scanner that can handle those. If you have 4x5 sheet film, you’ll need a scanner that can handle that. Scanners that accept larger originals cost more than scanners that don’t, so consider your needs and budget when choosing a unit.
Light SourceMost newer scanners use LED light
sources, which warm up quickly and are energy-efficient. Other light sources can be good, too; the most costly scan-ner discussed here uses a cold-cathode source. But if you’re choosing between two scanners of equal price class, the one with LEDs would likely be the better choice.
Scanning SoftwareEach scanner comes with scanning
software, which you use to operate the device and make scans. SilverFast Ai Studio (now in version 8.5) is an excel-lent third-party scanning product that works with many scanners, provides more capabilities (including easy pro-filing) and is a worthwhile investment if you’re going to get into scanning seriously. Some scanners come with a version of SilverFast; if it’s not Ai Studio, there’s usually a discounted upgrade path included. Estimated Street Price: $299. www.silverfast.com
Scanning Black-And-WhiteYou can scan black-and-white origi-
nals in monochrome or in color. You should try both ways with your scanner to see which produces results you pre-fer. Note that color scans will be larger (three channels vs. one), but may deliver better results when converted to mono-chrome using Photoshop or a dedicated monochrome software solution such as Nik Silver Efex Pro (www.google.com/nikcollection), onOne Perfect B&W 9 (www.on1.com), Alien Skin Exposure 7 (www.alienskin.com), Topaz B&W Effects (www.topazlabs.com) or Tiffen Dfx v4 (www.tiffensoftware.com).
Scanning PrintsThis article is about film scanners,
although the Epson Perfection V850 Pro can scan prints, as well. A variety of print scanners are available, too, includ-ing many that can do slides/negatives and prints. As mentioned, dedicated film scanners generally can deliver bet-ter scans from slides and negatives. If you have both a print and the negative, you’ll get better results from scanning the negative, as a negative holds more information than a reflective print can. If you’ve done a lot of work to make the print—dodging, burning, toning, etc.—you may want to scan the print. But you can do a lot more working from the negative digitally than tradi-tionally in the darkroom. If in doubt, try both ways, and see which works best for you and that specific image.
ProductivitySome scanners are easier to use than
others, and some are faster than others. When comparing speed specs, make sure they’re for the same parameters (same size original, highest-quality scan mode, etc.). As for ease of use, check out user reports, or get a demo at your local dealer. Some manufac-turers have demo videos on their web-sites, which give you an idea of what’s involved in using a given scanner.
Some scanners have batch-scanning capabilities—they will accept a stack of slides, or filmstrips, rather than just individual slides or frames. Keep in mind that you’ll probably want to adjust scanning parameters for each image individually for optimum results, but if you have a lot of slides of similar images, batch processing can be a time-saver.
(Cont’d on page 78)
TOP: Pacific Image PrimeFilm 120 Pro Multi-Format Scanner; ABOVE: Plustek OpticFilm 120 Film Scanner
I)’ve been a photographer for a very, verylong time. I’m 99 now, can you imagine?”laughs iconic photojournalist DavidDouglas Duncan. “With all modesty, I’vehad more curiosity, I think, than any
other photographer—between Picasso, War, theKremlin, Palestine, Saudi Arabia—and I’velived longer.”
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David Douglas Duncan’s
By Ashley Myers-Turner �� Photography By David Douglas Duncan
Renowned photojournalist David Douglas Duncan
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Duncan, also known simply by his monogram DDD, has covered many subjects during his career. One of his fi rst sets of images came from a hotel fi re near his university. Duncan noticed a guest attempting to reenter the burning build-ing to save a suitcase and photographed the scene. It turned out this guest was
the infamous gangster and bank robber John Dillinger, who was attempting to save a suitcase of stolen cash. While these images were lost, the moment sparked Duncan’s passion for journalism.
From here, Duncan submitted photo stories to newspapers and magazines such as The Kansas City Star, LIFE and
ABOVE: In July 1946, Duncan documented ships with thousands of Jewish refugees and Holocaust survivors attempting to enter Palestine at the Port of Haifa.
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hopes to infl uence the future by connecting dots of the past in his new book My 20th Century
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David Douglas Duncan’s
BELOW: A Japanese offi cer helps the U.S. Marines during WWII Operation “Victor V.”
RIGHT: Because of Duncan’s relationship with Richard Nixon during WWII, the photographer was asked to cover the 1968 presidential primaries and shot Nixon’s party acceptance speech from just below the podium.
MIDDLE RIGHT: While documenting a Berber village in the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco during 1955, Duncan was amazed by the culture’s gender equality, as a woman was found innocent of adultery by the village elders.
FAR RIGHT: Prince Faisal was appointed Crown Prince in 1953, after his older brother became King of Saudi Arabia. Faisal later ascended to the throne in 1964 and was assassinated by his nephew in 1975.
digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 39
National Geographic before enlisting in the Marines as a combat photographer. He cov-ered World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. Duncan covered conflicts in Turkey, Africa, Eastern Europe and the Middle East as a full-time LIFE Magazine photographer. And he spent many years pho-tographing his friend and neighbor Pablo Picasso, resulting in six books about the artist.
With so much experience and 27 books already published, it could be easy for the 99-year-old to relax, but Duncan has just pub-lished his 28th book, My 20th Century (Arcade Publishing, 2015). While you may expect a book with that title to move chronologically, Duncan has deliberately avoided that struc-ture, methodically choosing images that are personally and historically significant, and connecting the dots in a visually thematic way.
Over the phone from his home in France, Duncan enthusiastically guides me through the pages. He directs me to a layout in the middle of the book.
“You see exactly how the time frame isn’t important. It’s the picture frame. That’s off the coast of Peru in 1939, an expedition for the American Museum of Natural History. Guano, it’s a source of fertilizer—those mounds in the foreground. But that’s not the point. The point is that on these two pages, the sky is full, full, full of thousands and thousands of cormorants, right?” asks Duncan, his voice full and animated.
“Okay, you go to the next page, and the sky is full of American Marine bombers and fighters, with a traitor, a Japanese officer in
the foreground, going in to bomb the head-quarters of the Philippine Islands. So we go from birds to planes. Visually, I hope people understand that I’m trying to say, look, there are two ways to see things in the air.
“You go to the next page,” he contin-ues. “I’m on the Missouri, only two weeks later—and I was from Missouri, Kansas City—and the Battleship Missouri was host battleship for the surrender in Japan.
“The next page is a year later. We’re off the coast of Palestine. These people are the refu-gees from Buchenwald. And Palestine today is a big problem. Nobody talks about the settlements, so I think the book is a very clear portrayal of the roots of history for the last 50, 60, 70 years. I’ve tried to connect history.”
As we move through the book, jumping through time, we’re also jumping between images in black-and-white versus color. I ask Duncan if he has a preference.
“The subject decides for me,” Duncan says. “It would be ridiculous to photograph [Picasso’s] paintings in black-and-white. You have to shoot them in color.”
“The subject decides for me,” Duncan says. “It would be ridiculous to photograph [Picasso’s] paintings in black-and-white. You have to shoot them in color.”
I can hear Duncan shuffl ing through the book for an example. “On pages 86 and 87, there are two pictures side by side. Here’s Picasso in an identi-cal headdress as [Chief Ben] Stiffarm on the right. Each would be okay, but what’s more effective?”
Duncan moves backward two pages. “A picture that probably is the most effective group photograph I’ve ever shot
in my life. Ever. Not one woman today has the privilege of the Berber women up in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco in 1955, who the men are defending,” he says. Duncan spent time document-ing the Berber culture, which is based on tribal social structure. The image shows a woman on trial for adultery who is then found innocent by the village elders.
“Two pages back, I go back to the death of Abdul Ibn Saud. The picture is 18 princes side by side. These are the sons of Abdul Saud. In Islam, you’re only supposed to have four wives. There are 18 sons, ranging from prob-ably about 14 to maybe 60. Where are the daughters? There are no princesses of any age visible,” describes Duncan.
He then connects the two images. “Here, at the same time, one woman is visible versus many not visible at all.”
As we continue to move backward through the book, I ask Duncan about his war photography.
“That’s where I originally met Richard Nixon,” says Duncan, refer-ring to World War II. “He was in con-trol of a little observation plane over Bougainville. He was also supply-ing ammunition and food to Fijian guerrillas on the top of the mountains in Bougainville. I joined them for a month, back in the Japanese lines. He made the photograph of me coming down out of the top of Bougainville on the back jacket.
“It’s funny how your life connects you to a lot of people, that’s for sure.
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David Douglas Duncan’s
“It’s funny how your life connects you to a lot of people, that’s for sure. Life is really just one big river. You go down it.”
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ABOVE: Cormorants nesting on the slopes of San Lorenzo Island in Peru, shot by Duncan in 1939 on an expedition for the Lerner American Museum of Natural History.
FAR LEFT: Duncan stood aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay to document the signing of the Japanese Instrument of Surrender that ended WWII on September 2, 1945. Duncan wrote a letter to his parents that said simply, “Dear Mother and Dad, This is the Day! Love Dave”.
LEFT: The Khe Sanh Marines go home on February 8, 1968. This is Duncan’s last photography in Vietnam.
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Life is really just one big river. Yougo down it. Nixon said, ‘I’m going torun for president. Do you want to tryto photograph it?’ We live in the southof France, so I flew to Miami Beach,where he got the nomination.”
Duncan directs me to a page towardthe end of his book, to an image ofNixon writing his party acceptancespeech. “He didn’t have a speechwriter,” says Duncan. “He wrote everyword himself, Nixon. And, in the
7:05. They gave me total freedom to say anything I wanted to say. And I kept saying what I was thinking. And they kept moving me back and back and back,” reminisces Duncan. “But I had a hell of a lot of fun, I should tell you!”
While the television spot didn’t work out in the long run, Duncan’s openness to experimentation did bring a new format to viewers. This unre-stricted spirit is what initially intro-duced Nikon lenses to American pho-tographers years before. He was shown the lens brand by a Japanese photogra-pher while stationed in Japan and was impressed by the quality, then replaced all his own lenses.
“I switched in my life from a Rolleifl ex system to the Nikon,” notes Duncan. “The fi rst page in the book, it really shows the history of different kinds of cameras I’ve used.”
And Duncan’s openness to new tech-nology doesn’t stop there. “Today, I’m not shooting the big Leicas,” he says. “I’m shooting with a $300 camera. Amateur. Digital. Really fantastic. I
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David Douglas Duncan’s
RIGHT: Eighteen sons of King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud after the death of their father at the Royal Palace, Jeddah, in 1953.
Duncan believes the impact of digital technology is far-reaching, noting, “Everybody is a photographer now. It’s rather diffi cult for old professionals, but it’s wonderful for reporting the news. Probably the most fabulous picture out of Iraq, Abu Ghraib, at the prison, of the poor guy covered with a black cloak, his arms out. He looked like Christ being crucifi ed. And a soldier shot it and sent it to his family. That was the number-one picture out of Iraq. Not by a pro, but by a soldier. It’s a different world!”
next shot, I’m right under the podium where he’s giving the speech.”
During Duncan’s convention cover-age, the head of NBC News Reuven Frank asked if he would want to try a fi ve-minute television spot to show his images and provide commentary. I ask Duncan about the experience of work-ing in a different type of platform.
“I forgot about that, sure! I had an NBC program! I came right after Huntley-Brinkley for fi ve minutes at
� digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 43
have it on my belt all the time. It weighs nothing, and the print is unbelievable.”
Duncan believes the impact of digi-tal technology is far-reaching, noting, “Everybody is a photographer now. It’s rather difficult for old professionals, but it’s wonderful for reporting the news. Probably the most fabulous picture out of Iraq, Abu Ghraib, at the prison, of the poor guy covered with a black cloak, his arms out. He looked like Christ being crucified. And a soldier shot it and sent it to his family. That was the number-one picture out of Iraq. Not by a pro,
but by a soldier. It’s a different world!”Duncan muses about how his images
will contribute to the present day. He’s planning to send his book to two of the princes he befriended while shooting in the Middle East in hopes of provid-ing a book donation to schools in Saudi Arabia. He has also passed the book along to other current-day influencers.
“There was a story in The New Yorker about Mark Zuckerberg. He finallygot religion,” Duncan jokes, referring
to Zuckerberg’s 2015 challenge to read a new book every other week to learn more about various cultures, histories and technologies. “I sent him a copy of the book. I’m optimistic. You have to play your luck in this business.” DPP
David Douglas Duncan donated his photo-graphic archive and other materials to the Harry Ransom Center in Austin, Texas. Learn more about the permanent exhibit at www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/web/ddd.
How would you light this?
Jeremy Saffer shares how he got the lighting results he wanted, at dynalite.com.
Your creativity, our lighting.dynalite.com 908.687-8800jeremysaffer.com
1st Place (Sandbox)Photographer | Dennis Ramos“Sandbox” is a photo montage taken during an
experiment with long exposure and off-camera flashin outdoor settings. I didn’t achieve my desired
technical composition in-camera, but looking at theseries of shots I made, I was able to put together the
elements I needed to create the concept I wanted.
Nikon D300S, Tokina AT-X PRO SD 12-24mm ƒ/4 (IF) DXat 18mm, ƒ/11 at 180 sec., ISO 100
2014 B WWorld
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We showcase the winning photographs from the 2014 DPP Black & White World contest. Special thanks to our
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sponsors Hoodman, Lexar, LumiQuest, Manfrotto and Tamrac for enabling us to make such a successful contest.
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2nd Place (Lakeishia)Photographer | Roza SampolinskaI was inspired by the Greek mythology of Medusa, who was a monster, a Gorgon, generally described as having the face of a human female with living venomous snakes in place of hair. Gazing directly into her eyes would turn one to stone.
Nikon D700, two strobes, reflector
(Poblano)Photographer | Bruce BainThe inspiration for this image began with the intent to capture an image with deep shadows and present it as black-and-white. As its twisted shape would help create the desired shadows, a poblano pepper was used as the object. The first images were of the whole poblano. After the original images were taken, the pepper was to be used for cooking and was cut. I was intrigued by the design, form and shape revealed. The cut pepper was suspended in front of a black background and sidelit. The image was converted to black-and-white with Nik Silver Efex Pro.Nikon D800E, Micro-NIKKOR 105mm ƒ/2.8, Elinchrom D-Lite RX 2 strobe, Manfrotto tripod, ƒ/8 at 1⁄25 sec., ISO 400
(Skyway II)Photographer | Dennis RamosThis is a two-shot panorama view of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge in St. Petersburg, Florida.Nikon D300S, Tokina AT-X M100 AF PRO D 100mm
ƒ/2.8 at 100mm, ƒ/11 at 120 sec., ISO 100
H O N O R A B L E M E N T I O N
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(Symphony Of The Ocean)Photographer | Eduardo FujiiI took this shot at Carmel River State Beach on the California Central Coast, a protected beach south of Carmel-by-the-Sea. It’s a favorite spot among locals. The sea is usually calm, giving someone a false sense of security. Strong currents make these waters very dangerous. On this day in January, wind waves also contributed to the perilous sea. Extremely dangerous, but incredibly beautiful, the scene left no doubt of the mighty power of nature. I was captivated by the vision and sound of breaking waves resonating in harmony with my own inner sensations flowing within, just like Tchaikovsky’s symphonies.
Canon EOS 30D, Canon EF 70-200mm ƒ/2.8L
(Dream Flower)Photographer | Julia SableThis picture was taken on a meadow at sunset in the Poconos—the light made this flower look almost unreal. I had my small camera with me, a Canon G10, which did a fine job in this situation. Canon PowerShot G10, ƒ/3.2 at 1⁄60 sec., ISO 100
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Vincent Laforet utilizes the crowd-funding model to
take his aerial photo series “AIR” around the world
By Ashley Myers-Turner �� Photography By Vincent Laforet
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P)hotographer and fi lmmaker Vincent Laforet recently found himself in a position familiar to many profes-sional photographers. After
shooting New York City at night from a helicopter 7,500 feet in the air to illustrate the power connection and intersecting paths through the city’s grid system for a Men’s Health maga-zine article about coincidence, Laforet wanted to extend the project to other
cities, but the magazine moved on to the next story, and Laforet no longer had the funding support.
Instead of shelving the project until another corporate funding deal came through, he took the initiative to add the “AIR” project to the multime-dia story platform Storehouse.co and watched as social media spread the project across the Internet. A viral success, Laforet found himself with the opportunity to harness the public’s
interest and has turned the fi rst indi-vidual assignment into a crowd-funded series through presales of a series book, postcards and prints.
Laforet has now added Las Vegas and San Francisco to his “AIR” series, with more cities to follow. I recently caught up with Laforet who told me about the project’s inspiration and exe-cution, and his plans moving forward.
DPP: What inspired the concept for the “AIR” series?
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Vincent Laforet: It was kind of just one of the most amazing series of coin-cidences. I had been wanting to shoot these types of images. Since I was maybe 13 or 14 years old, looking out of planes out of LaGuardia or LAX, you can always see these lines of streets and all the activity below. It’s very beautiful for anyone watching out of the window. And, obviously, these cameras came out in the past year or so that shoot in very high ISO and allow you to actually pho-tograph this. I’ve really been waiting on the sidelines for capture technology to
and nothing really happened with it. Then I put it on this new platform called Storehouse, and it went absolutely crazy. Now I’ve been getting a tremendous amount of still photography jobs and offers as a result of this. I was ready to give up on photography because I make most of my living as a commercial direc-tor. I’m working on my fi rst fi lm next year, which is now being pushed because of this. So it’s one of those weird things where life has a way of telling you what you should be doing.
DPP: How did you hear about
catch up to this desire of mine to shoot through the night.
DPP: You shoot a lot of aerials...Laforet: I used to. That was back when
I was an editorial photographer, which is almost, at this point, fi ve years ago. I used to shoot a lot of aerials—National Geographic, for almost every magazine. But the industry has undergone a lot of change and can’t afford to do that any-more. On average, in the past three or four years, I’ve done one aerial assign-ment a year, maybe two. Now, I shot this for Men’s Health and published it there,
� digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 53
As both photographer and director, Vincent Laforet is continually pushing the limits. In 2002, Laforet was a part of The New York Times Pulitzer Prize-winning team for their work covering post-9/11 overseas events. In 2008, Laforet directed “Reverie,” which was the first major short film shot using the Canon EOS 5D Mark II, and in 2010, Canon asked him to be one of the first filmmakers to shoot with the Canon EOS C300 cinema camera. Now a Canon Explorer of Light and Canon Printmaker, Laforet also consults for Apple, Carl Zeiss, Adobe, Leica, Bogen, Lexar and X-Rite. While he has been recently focusing on commercial directing, Laforet’s first film has been put on hold while he continues to work on the “AIR” still photography series. After shooting New York City, San Francisco and Las Vegas earlier this year, Laforet plans on reaching London, Paris, Barcelona, Madrid, Amsterdam, Sydney, Melbourne, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Tokyo before the year’s end.
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Storehouse, and why did you choose to use that platform as the format for sharing this project?
Laforet: The founder of Storehouse is Mark Kawano. I’ve known him since I worked as a consultant for Apple on Aperture. He used to work on that team. And he’s been talking to me about doing something like Storehouse for years, so when he did it, I was one of the fi rst users.
DPP: What do you think made the images go viral on Storehouse versus another platform?
Laforet: I think it has everything to do with social media. I read magazines all the time online, so I think reading habits have changed. And I think Storehouse is a very elegant way of showing these images beautifully. It was really successful, and it just went completely crazy as other media became less relevant to people.
DPP: How was the experience of shooting “AIR” different than the other aerial shoots you’ve done?
Laforet: This is one of the most spec-tacular experiences in that there’s a
really true sense of discovery. I’ve never seen these images shot before. We’ve done a lot of research and we haven’t found an instance of anyone photo-graphing at night from that altitude, due to the simple fact that it probably was just not technically possible until this year. You go up with these veteran helicopter pilots who have been doing this for 20 or 30 years, and they’ll tell you, “I’ve never seen this.” That’s a wonderful thing to hear because it’s really hard to discover an image in 2015 that no one has shot before. So
>> More On The WebFor more cutting-edge imagery from fine-art and commercial photographers, see the Profiles section of DPP on the web at www.digitalphotopro.com.
for Sydney, Melbourne, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Tokyo. And, of course we’ll be going to São Paulo, Rio, Santiago, Dubai—you name it. We’re going to go around the world. We have sponsors like G-Technology, who have offered to fund the project. And, then, we’re preselling a book. And the beauty of that is, there’s nothing more beautiful than having the public fund this project. It’s one thing to go to a corporate sponsor, that’s great, but if I can set forth a model that other photogra-phers can reproduce and have fans help fund the project by prepurchasing the book—it’s a win-win for everyone. That’s where the Internet comes full circle. You see a dwindling industry in terms of bud-get and business models; we should also see there are new ones that are taking hold, and this would be a classic example of that—of someone just going on assign-ment, putting it on a social-media plat-form, and the next thing you know, it turns into a one- or two-year-long project funded by members of the public. And, that, to me, is the best outcome of these new technolo-gies and platforms.
DPP: Is there something you’re hoping viewers take away from your images?
Laforet: I think the reason I called this “AIR” is because it’s not something that anyone owns. It’s something that we all share in. It doesn’t matter how old you are. It doesn’t matter how rich or poor you are. We all breathe the same air. We’re all responsible for it. And when you’re in New York City on 5th Avenue looking up
there’s a genuine sense of discovery. The reaction is overwhelming and overall very positive. I’ve gone from planning on directing my film next year to putting that aside and traveling the world to photograph as many cit-ies as I can. I think that’s an absolutely amazing thing.
DPP: What other cities are you plan-ning to go to?
Laforet: Oh, you name it! We’re going to Europe in May, so London, Paris, Barcelona, Madrid, Berlin, Amsterdam. And, in June, Australia
Laforet used Storehouse.co to share his “AIR” series. A 2014 Apple Design Award Winner, Storehouse has opened the platform to a diverse worldwide community eager to share stories through photos, video and text. Storehouse has specifically designed the site to adjust to any device format for a high-quality viewer experience. Check out the Storehouse community, and add your own visual stories at Storehouse.co.
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at the skyscrapers, you seem very small and insignifi cant. When you’re up in the air looking down at the city, you have a sense of togetherness, and the world feels much more approachable and much more connected. I think people are having a visceral reaction to that. Aerial images have a way of showing you scale and make it much more tangible and much more per-sonal. In an ironic way, it makes you feel more connected.
DPP: Do you take a different artistic point of view to each city to capture each place in a different way?
Laforet: I try to approach this just as I would each assignment from The New York Times. I try to identify what makes each city unique and capture that visually in the image. Every single city—the grid, the topography, the downtown, the height of the build-ings—it’s unique. The lighting is unique. And my challenge is to try and capture the ethos. One of the ways to describe it that somebody else used is that, in many ways, the streets are like fi ngerprints, which I think is a really
nice way of putting it. The grid and layout is the individual fi ngerprint for each city.
DPP: What gear are you using?Laforet: I’ve been using several
bodies. A Canon EOS 5DS, the new 50-megapixel camera. I’ve been using the 1D X because the high ISO really sees at night. And then I’ve tried a vari-ety of medium-format backs, PhaseOne. And, more recently, I’ve used some of the new Zeiss optics that are specifi cally made to shoot wide open and are extremely sharp—the Otus.
DPP: Is it diffi cult using all of the equipment while being up so high in a helicopter?
Laforet: I have an assistant named Mike Isler, who I’ve been workingwith for a decade and who has been doing this with me for hundreds of hours around the world. He takescare of all the gear behind me, does all the lens swaps. It’s a very coordinated team effort. He’s also a pilot and a pho-tographer, and we have a pretty good understanding of what to expect and how to do this by now. It’s a well-oiled
machine. I can tell him what cameras and lenses I need, and I can focus on making the images.
DPP: When do you expect to have the book ready for publishing?
Laforet: We’re expecting to have the book published by the holidays at the end of this year, and it’s looking right on course. And we’re also doing other things, like lithographs and postcards. People are reacting very viscerally to this and asking to have prints made. That enables me to shoot more cities. Obviously, the $2,000 to $2,500 per hour for a helicopter is expensive, and it’s not something I can fund, and it’s not something magazines can afford to fund. The public can afford to fund it by buying a book, or from postcards or a lithograph—everybody wins. I want to go to more obscure cities, as many cities as possible. All the money we’re raising right now from the book pre-sales is going into production. DPP
Visit LaforetAIR.com and Storehouse.co/air for more information about supporting the “AIR” series.
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Monochrome CONVERSION
Instead of always taking a one-click solution, learn how to take control over
the subtle tones to create richer, more nuanced black-and-white images
Text & Photography By Ming Thein
digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 61
There’s no denying the classical appeal of black-and-white photography. Whilst a certain style of color, for example, Kodachrome of the ’80s, or the pale washed-out negatives of the ’60s and ’70s, or Velvia of the ’90s, evokes the nostalgia of a certain period in time, the very lack of color has the completely opposite effect of rendering an image timeless—even more so if there are no obvious subject or visual cues of the era.
It’s then interesting to note that black-and-white photography was originally a limitation, not so much a conscious choice: There was no chemistry for rendering color. Even then, it wasn’t until relatively recently that accurate color was possible—and now we’re well into the digital age, where we have the benefit of deciding after capture how we would like to present our images.
Perhaps this isn’t entirely accurate. Firstly, there are cameras such as the Leica M Monochrom and Phase One Achromatics, which only capture luminance information and can’t make a color image afterward. Secondly, an image conceived, executed and presented in either color or black-and-white always will be more visually powerful than one that didn’t have a clear idea from the outset. The pres-ence or absence of color changes composition: Different colors have different “visual weight” and relative prominence; in monochrome, we only have luminance information, and bigger/brighter is always more obvious. Even so, there are ways we can improve the presentation of an image using modern processing. Let’s start by demystifying two things.
1Certain cameras have particular black-and-white characteristics—partially true, but,
even then, only if you use JPEG. If you’re shooting RAW, they provide different start-ing points—this is from a tonal response point of view—but, ultimately, you can get a con-sistent look regardless of the camera, even if some require more postprocessing work than others. I know because I have to do this all the time—“the images look different because I used a different camera” isn’t a viable excuse for a professional.
2There are benefits to a monochrome-only camera. Partially true, again. The Bayer fil-
ter and subsequent conversion is an interpola-tion of neighboring pixel image data to extract color information; luminance information is lifted from the photosite. Any sort of interpo-lation will reduce tonal accuracy and increase noise because the luminance value you’ve got is now an approximation instead of a true value.
OPENING PAGE: A scene with obvious contrast is simple enough to convert from color to black-and-white. ABOVE AND BELOW: Often, we’re photographing a scene with color contrast, but comparatively little luminance contrast. In situations like these, a more labor-intensive conversion process will result in a stronger monochrome image.
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Original
Gradient Map Low-Key Gradient Map High-Key
Desaturation
digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 63
However, it’s fairly easy to see that whilst there are benefits to shooting mono-chrome-only, you actually can convert a color RAW file into a monochrome one and lower the perceived amount of noise—though not to as low a level as a monochrome-only camera. If you have a poor interpolation method, then the luminance values can be affected, too—once again, increasing the percep-tion of pixel-level image noise in a color image. Bottom line: Monochrome-only will give you, yes, lower noise, and, yes, better detail.
However, what you lose from a monochrome camera is the ability to control the relative luminance level of individual color channels. Why is this important? Suppose your color scene has a relatively small range of back-ground tonal values, but your subject is a very different color. Its luminance may be the same as the background, but it stands out because of the difference in color. Normally, this kind of image is a very bad candidate for monochrome because you’d end up with something very flat-looking. (Real-life transla-tion: Running out and buying an M Monochrom isn’t going to solve your black-and-white conversion woes, but it will give you an interesting start-
dard linear black to white transi-tion (press D in Photoshop first, then add a new gradient map adjustment layer), which gives very similar, but not quite the same, results as desaturation. Gradient maps with a straight gradi-ent tend to result in a higher-contrast image than desaturation. If you want to experiment a bit, it’s actually pos-sible to put intermediate control points into the gradient and bias it toward a high-key (mostly white, black fades out faster) or low-key (black stays for longer) look. What actually works here will, of course, depend on your image, however, so be prepared to do some fiddling. The good news is, if you use a new adjustment layer, the gradient is easily modifiable without having to redo your entire conversion.
Channel MixerFinally, we’ve got the channel mixer.
Best used on the RAW file in ACR, this lets you decide how much of each indi-vidual color channel goes into making the final image. Note that the tool only uses the luminance components of each channel, and it’s additive; this means that color (and perceptual color) information is discarded. To make things even more complicated, there’s a separate black-
ing base—especially when it comes to noise and dynamic range. Those of you who don’t mind doing a bit of work, hold on to your normal cameras. And, in fact, most of these techniques apply equally to the M Monochrom, too.)
The good news is, if you’re prepared to do some work, different colors but simi-lar luminance can be overcome for tonal separation in monochrome. It’s still possi-ble to separate the subject from the back-ground; there are even a few options. Park that thought for a moment because we have to introduce the basics of black-and-white conversion from color first.
DesaturationThe simplest method is to throw out
the color information, leaving lumi-nance values only. You’re then free to do whatever you wish to complete pro-cessing of the file. After much inves-tigation and experimentation, this is actually the method I use, coupled with another trick or two. Desaturation can be done in ACR (Saturation slider, first tab) or in Photoshop (Hue/Saturation tool, then desaturate the master).
Gradient MapSlightly more complicated is using
a gradient map. You can use the stan-
ABOVE: Completely different, but equally valid presentations—the very distinct mix of predawn light and sodium lighting created the original colors (which are accurate to the real scene) and potential for tweaking tonality with the channel mixer.
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and-white conversion adjustment layer in Photoshop itself that effectively does the same thing as the ACR conversion, but it only has six channels for you to play with instead of the eight in ACR. In this case, more is definitely better, as it allows for much finer tonal control. It’s very important to remember not to shift any adjacent sliders to opposite ends,
though: If you do, there’s a very high chance of posterization. And, don’t for-get that magenta runs into red, so these two values should also be similar. Imag-ine a snake: The slider positions should be joinable with a smooth curve.
Remember the earlier conundrum of how to isolate a different-colored, but similarly luminous, subject from the
background? The solution to this is, of course, the channel mixer. You can increase the luminance of the primary color of your subject and decrease that of the predominant back-ground color, or the reverse—thus creating visual separation between the two elements. The problem comes when you’ve got a mixture of colors in both subject and background, and they’re shared—here, chang-ing luminance of different channels isn’t going to help you. There are some images that simply don’t work in black-and-white.
This isn’t the entire toolkit, of course. You’ll find that after this kind of conversion, things look rather flat. This is actually a good thing because it means you’ve got plenty of tonal and dynamic range information to work with; there isn’t any-thing clipped on either end. Digging a bit deeper, we need to remember that the way the human eye perceives contrast and separation is highly depen-dent on both differences in hue and comparing immediately adjacent areas as our eyes scan the frame. We don’t “see” a whole scene at once; our brains compensate with persistence of vision so we can experience large areas simultaneously.
It’s not so easy to replicate this in a still frame because of the limits of output dynamic range. The best thing to do is, once again, remember that we only need to: a) have general global zones to give an image some overall structure; and b)
make sure the local areas make visual sense in isolation. Two of Photoshop’s tools will be your best friends here: the dodge and burn brush, and the curves tool. A tablet is also extremely helpful for these things, as it gives you precision control and feathering over your brush application. It lets you avoid hard edges and odd abrupt transitions, and permits
ABOVE: Some images just don’t lend themselves to black-and-white conversion through luminance adjustments. Here, the luminance values in the coat and skin tones are too close, and the image just can’t be adjusted to create a satisfactory result.
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highly precise editing without having to resort to lasso masking.
At this point, it’s probably worth talking about plug-ins and filters. The former are either a set of Photoshop
they’re extremely popular and used by many “Internet street photographers” either to save time or because they’re unable to get their desired results from a nuts-and-bolts conversion, I person-
actions or a separate program, which control the conversion—specifically, the luminance translation of each color channel into a luminance value—and the tonal map of the final file. Whilst
ABOVE, LEFT: In this version of the photo on the previous page, the channel mixer was combined with a virtual red filter to create a darker, more dramatic sky. ABOVE, RIGHT: Night scenes like this are particularly good candidates for a more controlled black-and-white conversion because you want to be sure to maintain detail in the photo.
RON RICE ON SCHNEIDER B+W FILTERS
www.schneideroptics.com
There was the shot I was looking for, just outside of New Orleans on the private road to an oldplantation—majestic Oaks, overgrown with Spanish moss. I set up my tripod dead center of thequiet road, reached for my Fujifilm X-E2 and chose the XF50-140mm f2.8 OIS lens. On front of thelens I chose a B+W filter because I know they will always be as good or better than any of mylenses. I mounted the B+W F-Pro Mount Circular Polarizer and dialed in the sweet spot to get justthe right amount of color saturation to make the shot pop.”
“
Fine art photographer Ron Riceis based in Nashville, TN.
B+W
EXPO
SUR
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digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 67
sively because of the amount of control possible, especially when combined with dodging and burning (and not to men-tion the undo option!). If only Ansel Adams had it so easy! DPP
Ming Thein is a fine-art/commercial pho-tographer and author; you can find his blog at mingthein.com. He also teaches workshops internationally and has a range of postprocessing videos available, includ-ing The Monochrome Masterclass.
ally avoid them because they don’t give you enough fine control, and even worse, everybody’s images that were run through that filter look the same.
Photography is arguably art and very much down to personal taste. If you’re 100% happy with the way those results look, that’s great, and, honestly, I’m jeal-ous of the amount of time you’ve saved in your workflow. However, claiming this is art is disingenuous; it’s like find-ing out Ansel Adams shot BW400CN (a black-and-white film designed to be run through a C41 color-processing machine) and developed it at the local pharmacy—instead of Tri-X or Plus-X, controlling his development time and chemical composition, and then cut-ting precision masks to dodge and burn portions of his subjects. You’re no more in control of the creative process than a diner in a restaurant controls the pre-sentation or timing of his or her dish.
There’s a second type of filter that’s useful, and in either form, it performs a similar function to the channel mixer—it either admits or cuts out light that’s of a certain range of wavelengths. The most common example of this is a physical red filter that goes over the end of your lens; the effect is dark skies because very little of the blue spectrum passes through the red filter and onto the recording medium. It works with digital, too, but you have to remember to adjust expo-sure accordingly, and obviously not use it in color mode. You can also replicate this effect digitally afterward: Add in a new layer, make it one color, and then select the appropriate blending mode; then only do your black-and-white con-version. There are interesting results obtainable through this method.
Finally, if you pull back the black-and-white conversion layer slightly—assuming you didn’t directly apply the conversion to the image—it’s also pos-sible to use a color layer to create a ton-ing effect; sepia or platinum is probably the most common. You can even use a graduated fill layer to provide a variable effect; this is especially useful for increas-ing the density of skies, for instance.
Personally, I prefer to shoot color and then convert to black-and-white, not because I can’t decide up front how a
scene should be presented, but because there’s a lot of flexibility in how I want to handle the conversion later to highlight certain aspects of my subject or achieve a certain tonal feel. Whilst all of these techniques can be applied to JPEGs, best results obviously will be achieved with RAW files because more information has been retained: You, as the artist, can then decide how to allocate that tonality across your available output scale. I use the channel mixer method almost exclu-
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Monochrome Capture
digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 69
There are three basic ways to produce a mono-chrome (black-and-white) image with a digi-tal camera: Shoot it that way using your camera’s monochrome mode; convert a color image to monochrome using your RAW converter, Photoshop or special-ized monochrome software; or shoot with a monochrome digital camera.
Using your camera’s monochrome mode has several advantages. You can use the camera’s built-in filters (includ-ing the old black-and-white standbys red, yellow and green), you can view the image in monochrome on the LCD monitor, and if you shoot RAW rather than JPEG, you have the ability to pro-cess the resulting file into monochrome or full color after the fact. The primary drawback is that conventional digital sensors, with their Bayer RGB filter arrays, don’t provide optimal mono-chrome image quality—more on this in a bit.
Converting a color image into mono-chrome in your computer offers the advantages of lots of control—your home computer is more powerful than the one built into your camera, and can handle more complex algorithms, and specialized monochrome software such as Nik Silver Efex Pro provides pow-erful conversion and finishing tools. And you can convert any digital image, whether it was shot recently or it’s a
the missing color data for each pixel.This process works quite well—all
major-brand digital cameras except Sigma’s use this method on amateur as well as pro-oriented models (see the “Sigma/Foveon” sidebar). However, the demosaicing process does have some drawbacks. First, a lot of light is wasted, since the colored filters block two-thirds of the light from reach-ing each pixel. Second, the demosaic-ing process produces aliasing—moiré, color artifacts and the like. To combat this, most sensors also include an anti-aliasing (AA) filter, or optical low-pass filter (OLPF), which slightly blurs the image at the pixel level to minimize moiré. This, of course, also slightly reduces overall image sharpness.
So when you use your camera’s monochrome mode, or convert a color digital image to monochrome in your computer, you’re working from a color image that was fabricated from a monochrome image using colored filters and complex image process-ing, and then turned back into mono-chrome. There must be a better way.
There is: a monochrome camera. The sensors in monochrome digital cameras don’t have color filter arrays because there’s no need. Thus, they record all the light (per the sensor’s quantum effi-ciency) that falls on each pixel; none is lost to color filters, so sensor sensitivity is, in effect, higher. There’s no demo-saicing, and thus no color moiré and no need for the blurring AA filter. So images from a monochrome sensor are inherently sharper than converted color images, and sensitivity is higher. Of course, the monochrome camera can’t produce color images, so you have to consider your needs. Monochrome cameras are quite costly, so most pho-tographers probably will be better off doing monochrome with their regular digital cameras—which can deliver excellent monochrome images despite the drawbacks. But for the mono-chrome connoisseur, the monochrome camera is the way to go.
Note that all digital images can suf-fer from aliasing—when you sample real-world scenes with a fine grid array, some aliasing (“stair-stepped”
scan from an old Kodachrome trans-parency. Photoshop’s Channel Mixer gives you tremendous control over the tones in the image. (See “Monochrome Conversion” by Ming Thein in this issue for more about using the Channel Mixer.) The main drawback to convert-ing a color image is the same as with using the camera’s monochrome mode: That color original image suffers the effects of demosaicing.
Why Monochrome Cameras Do It Better
Conventional image sensors consist of a fine grid of millions of pixels or photo-diodes that record light in proportion to its intensity. Each pixel can detect how much light strikes it, but not what color that light is. To provide color informa-tion, most manufacturers position a grid of primary-colored filters called a Bayer array (named after the Kodak scientist who devised it) over the pixels, with one primary color, red, green or blue, covering each pixel so that each pixel receives only light of that color. Then, through a process known as demosa-icing, the camera’s processor (if you shoot JPEG) or your RAW converter (if you shoot RAW) creates a full-color image, using color data from neighbor-ing pixels and interpolation via com- plex proprietary algorithms to furnish
<< Leica M MonochromIt’s a bit ironic considering the Leica cachet, but the M Monochrom is far and away the lowest-cost monochrome digital camera available today. It’s essentially a classic Leica M rangefinder camera, but with an 18-megapixel, full-frame (35.8x23.9mm) monochrome CCD sensor that has no RGB filter grid and no AA
filter (but it does have an IR filter to cut off wavelengths longer than 700nm). Like all M-series Leica cameras, the M Monochrom can use the full lineup of legendary Leica M lenses (from 16mm to 135mm), and each frames just as it does on a traditional 35mm Leica M camera, thanks to the full-frame sensor. ISO range is
320-10,000 (and there’s even an auto ISO feature). Unlike most digital cameras, the M Monochrom has a histogram that displays the unprocessed, unmodified raw data, rather than data for a camera-processed JPEG image—very helpful for nailing those RAW exposures (the camera shoots DNG RAW files, as well as JPEGs). You can tone JPEGs in-camera. Digital aspects aside,
the M Monochrom is a Leica M camera, with quick and easy rangefinder focusing, quiet operation, and a rugged body featuring top and base plates of machined brass and a housing manufactured from a single piece of magnesium alloy. Dimensions are 5.5x3.1x1.5 inches, weight is 21.2 ounces (body only). Estimated Street Price: $7,200. us.leica-camera.com
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edges, moiré, etc.) will occur if thepattern of the subject is the right sizeand at the angle to conflict with thesampling grid. The finer the pixelgrid, the less likely this is to happen, somore and more DSLRs and mirrorlesscameras today are doing away with theAA filter as pixel counts go up. Andmedium-format digital cameras havenever used AA filters. Aliasing—whenit occurs—can be corrected in post-
processing, as medium-format usershave operated from the start.
Monochrome CamerasToday, there are three basic mono-
chrome digital cameras on the market,from Leica, Phase One and RED. Theyrange in price from over $7,000 to over$40,000, and that’s their primary draw-back. But in terms of monochromeimage quality, they offer the best there is.
<< Phase One IQ260 AchromaticWhen DSLR users talk about full-frame, they mean 35mm full-frame: a sensor measuring about 36x24mm, the size of a full 35mm film frame. To medium-format users, full-frame means the size of a full 645-format film frame. That would be 6x4.5cm, in theory, more like 56x41.5mm in terms of actual image area. Phase One’s IQ260 Achromatic medium-format digital back (available as a kit with the Phase One 645DF+ camera body, or with mounts to fit many popular medium-format and technical cameras) features a 60-megapixel, full-frame medium-format monochrome CCD sensor that measures a whopping 53.7x40.3mm—more than 2.5X the area of a full-frame 35mm DSLR sensor and 1.5X the area of the 44x33mm sensors found in lower-end medium-format cameras. Besides the huge sensor size and 60
megapixels (and the resulting superb image quality), the back offers a 3.2-inch, 1150K-dot touch-screen display, 13 stops of dynamic range and ISOs from 200-3200. The back is ruggedly constructed
of 100% aircraft-grade aluminum, and can be operated as an independent unit, tethered to a computer or wirelessly from an iPad or iPhone using Phase One Capture Pilot. Besides having no Bayer filters or AA filter, the IQ260 Achromatic has no IR cutoff filter, so it can also be used for infrared photography. Estimated Street Price: $44,495. www.phaseone.com DPP
RED EPIC Monochrome
Many still photographers may think of RED as being only for video. However, RED’s DSMCs (Digital Still and Motion Cameras) can produce superb still images, as well as feature-quality video. The EPIC Monochrome features the RED Mysterium-X Monochrome sensor, a 30x15mm unit that can deliver 14-megapixel still images, as well as video up to 5K (5120x2700) at rates up to 59.94 fps. Native ISO is 2000; dynamic range is 13.5 stops (up to 18 stops with RED HDRx). Adapters are available for PL, Canon, Nikon and Leica lenses. RED offers two electronic viewfinders and LCD monitors from 5.0 to 9.0 inches, some with touch-screen capability. Images are saved to REDMAG 1.8-inch SSD units from 48 GB to 512 GB, or the RED MINI-MAG 512 GB. There are two versions of the EPIC Monochrome: the EPIC-M is handmade in California and carries a two-year warranty and a $25,000 price (Brain only), while the production EPIC-X (also made in the U.S.) carries a one-year warranty and a $20,000 price (Brain only). The RED EPIC-M Dragon Monochrome adds 6K (6144x3160) video, 19-megapixel stills and a 16.5-stop dynamic range to the above features, thanks to the Dragon-M sensor with interchangeable DSMC Monochrome OLPF. It sells for $31,500 (Brain only). www.red.com
Sigma/FoveonSigma’s DSLRs and compact cameras with Foveon X3 image sensors don’t use Bayer filter arrays and demosaicing. Instead, they derive color from the fact that different light wavelengths penetrate silicon to different depths. Foveon sensors stack three pixel layers, in effect, the top layer recording short (blue) wavelengths, the middle layer, medium (green), and the bottom layer, long (red) wavelengths. (It’s really more complicated than that, especially with the latest-generation Foveon Quattro sensors, but it’s simpler to think of it this way.) The result is that these sensors record all three primary colors (as well as full luminance data) at every pixel site, no demosaicing or interpolation required—and, thus, no AA filter required, either. The result is sharper images than produced by Bayer sensors of equal horizontal-by-vertical pixel count—and better
monochrome images. The Foveon monochrome images aren’t as good as those from dedicated monochrome sensors, but they’re better than those from Bayer sensors—and the Sigma cameras cost a lot less than the monochrome digital cameras. The Sigma SD1 Merrill DSLR sells for around $1,999, the DP1, DP2 and DP3 Merrill compact cameras (with built-in wide-angle, normal and short tele lenses, respectively), for around $799, and the new dp1, dp2 and dp3 Quattro compacts (with wide, normal and short tele lenses, respectively) for $999. www.sigmaphoto.com
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When trying to put together a portfolio for her
makeup work while living in Detroit, Michigan,
Courtney Dailey couldn’t find anyonedoing the New York-style beauty shotsshe had in mind so, since she had acamera and experience photographingfriends in college, she decided to shootthem herself.
“Really quickly, my photography busi-ness began to grow uncontrollably,” sherecalls. “I was offering something thatno one else was really doing in that city.It grew so fast that, within a year and ahalf, I had to look to a bigger market.”
The perfect SoCal weather ledDailey to Los Angeles 10 years ago.“Things blew up,” she says, lookingback. “I’m really glad I took that risk.”
Taking risks has served this makeupartist turned beauty photographer andmentor well, and she’s a perfect exam-ple of how personality and professional-ism (or lack thereof) can make or breaka business. With some of the top publi-
cations and brands as clients, and plenty of experience navigating this competi-tive industry, we turned to Dailey for her pro tips on how to stay on top.
Pursue New Skills That Fit Your Business
Dailey recently had an eye-opening experience when she lost a bid on what could have been a life-changing job. “The reason I didn’t get the bid was because I don’t have a director’s reel,” she says. “Even though I’m a photog-rapher, because things are changing so fast, now they want someone with multimedia experience.”
While Dailey regularly directs photo shoots, this was the first time she had ever been asked for a reel. She has already put the wheels in motion, how-ever, and emailed her contact at the company, letting her know that “I’ve scheduled six projects that I’ll be direct-ing to build my reel,” notes Dailey, “so next time you approach me, I’ll have this beautiful presentation for you.”
Dailey understands that the industry is changing quickly and that she has to be tuned in to what’s being done in dif-ferent markets. “Video is growing very fast, so I know that’s something I need to do, and now I’ve seen the evidence that I have to do it. You have to feel out what’s best for your business and what will help you grow. I don’t think you should do anything that’s not right for you. If you have no interest in directing, then say, screw it, I don’t want to do it. But if you feel that it can help you grow and you’re interested in it, embrace it.”
Know Your Clients And Their Markets
1On a shoot for a skincare line for teenagers, Dailey faced a client who
wanted flashy, futuristic imagery, which she felt didn’t fit the audience. “I imme-diately said, listen, I think we need to take a step back and realize who you’re marketing to,” says Dailey. “I explained to the client that I was happy to shoot exactly what they wanted, but I would also like to do a few shots that felt a little bit younger, fresher and more airy.”
The client was still adamant about what they wanted. “I said, that’s fan-tastic, but just for me, let’s take an extra 10 minutes and put her in a dif-ferent top and utilize this beautiful background and see if you like it,” adds Dailey. “They loved it and said it was much more approachable.”
A similar situation occurred on a shoot for a hair care product, where Dailey convinced the client to refine the idea and narrow their focus to just the hair.
“I had the hairstylist comb the mod-el’s hair out into this beautiful S curve and I took two or three of these shots, and the client loved it,” she recalls. “You have to take what the clients want with an open ear, but you have to give them options. Sometimes clients will look at competition and feel that’s what they need to do. I’ve been down this road so many times. Sometimes they’ll think too big and you have to show them that simplicity is stronger.”
View From The Top
Energy, flexibility and a fearless
attitude—pro beauty photographer
Courtney Dailey shares insights on
how to keep clients coming back
By Kristan Ashworth �� Photography By Courtney Dailey
1
1
74�| Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
Be Creative And Give Clients Options
2On a shoot for Cosmopolitan, Dailey stuck to a clean, simple look
against gray paper that she had seen used in other layouts in similar issues. But she had another concept that she was really excited about and decided to go for it.
“I wanted to go with something more exciting and colorful,” recounts Dailey. “I kept thinking about a tropical rain forest with jewel tones. I had my ward-robe stylist pull colorful gemstone jew-elry. I bought some very tropical leaves at a greenery florist here in L.A. So I placed the leaves up in my backyard and shot in bright, midday sunlight. It was a risk, but I really had this vision. I then presented both stories to the magazine, and said here’s the story that feels very similar to what your content normally is, but here’s a variation that I think is really strong, and they went completely nuts over it. I thought, what’s the harm in doing both? If they choose the gray background, I can still take the green
background idea and sell it to a different magazine with a totally different story.”
When it came to shooting a jar of cream, Dailey went through about 15 different versions with the client. “This image is version number 10,” she says. “Everyone wanted microscopic changes
made. It was painstaking. Faces are so organic, but products are so structured and symmetrical. When you’re dealing with symmetry, it’s so much more dif-ficult to make things perfect.”
Not to mention working with the cream itself. Dailey used a pastry bag
to pipe the cream on top of the jar. Butgetting the perfect swirl wasn’t as easyas you might think.
“I think I did 10 different swirls,”Dailey recalls. “Finally, they wentback to this one, the one I thoughtthey would hate; the one I just did ona whim. After going through this, Ilearned to be much more careful withthe way I move forward with my cli-ents. I’m going to make sure that theyunderstand they can’t make 18,000changes to an image. There needs tobe guidelines. I did what I felt wouldwork, and they ended up loving it inthe end. Sometimes clients don’t knowexactly what they want, so you justhave to give them different options.”
>> More On The WebFor more cutting-edge imagery from fine-art and commercial photographers, see the Profiles section of DPP on the web at www.digitalphotopro.com.
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Be True To Your Work
3When a cosmetics company told Dailey that theircampaign was called “Summer in Hi-Def,” she real-
ized she had recently shot a story that was a perfect fitfor that title, but was for a different client. “They lovedthe images and wanted to buy them,” Dailey recalls.She had to turn the offer down, but not without firstpresenting a solution. “First of all, I believe in truth inadvertising. This wasn’t their product on the model.
Don’t Doubt Yourself
4As most professional photographersknow, you’re not always going to
agree with, or have the same vision as,your client. But some gentle nudgingcan help move you in the direction thatultimately will make both you and theclient happy. Dailey put these skills touse when working with a cosmeticscompany on a shoot for their spring/summer line, where they envisionedeverything clean and white.
“I saw it being more free and feminine,so I really had to package this idea,” saysDailey. “I put together a mood board ofhow I saw this image shot, and I reallyhad to persuade them that this was theway to go. And, once we did get to thatpoint, they were comfortable moving inthat direction. One thing I’ve learned isto not doubt your gut. This is your work;this is your career. If you feel that the cli-ent is going in the wrong direction, it’sbest to let them know ahead of time and
then lead them down the right path.”Having the confidence to take risks
and showcase your diversity can lead to repeat business—whether that’s in the future or on the same set.
“I was working on a really large U.S.-Canada campaign for this company that I had never worked with before,” says Dailey. “The client had actual sto-ryboards of what they needed; it was so literal. So, luckily, one of the hairstyl-ists on the team was a real risk-taker. Once we knew we had what the client wanted, it was time to have fun: We messed up the model’s hair and put a fan on her, and the client loved it. I was then able to negotiate those images for their international campaign. So I got a national campaign and an interna-tional campaign from the same client.
“I think it’s worth it to take that chance,” concludes Dailey. “If the cli-ent doesn’t like it, then you have extra images you can put aside that may work for a different campaign down the road.” DPP
See more of Courtney Dailey’s work at www.courtneydailey.com and learn about her mentoring and workshops at www.photobeautycoach.com.
It was something very different. I told them that I thought it was best that we reshoot this so it was all true to their line. So I persuaded them to do another cam-paign with the same story, lighting and model as the campaign they loved, but with their own products, and the campaign did really, really well.”
3
3
4
76 | Digital Photo Pro digitalphotopro.com
DPP
Sol
utio
ns
DPPSolutions Preflight
In February, the FAA issued the much anticipated
proposed rules for drones titled “The Overview
of Small UAS Notice of Proposed Rulemaking.” Prior to the notice, there was a lot of speculation and more than a little apprehension about how the U.S. would handle drone usage. Short of plain outlawing unmanned aircraft in U.S. airspace, the biggest concern was that the FAA would recommend that drone operators be considered pilots and have to attend a sort of fl ight school and be licensed. That didn’t happen. In fact, most of the fears that were circulating on the Internet proved completely unfounded, much to the collective relief of hobbyists and professionals alike.
Here are some of the highlights from the February notice:
UAS pilots will be considered“operators”; you won’t have to go to fl ight school to be able to use your drone.s�%VERY� ��� MONTHS�� OPERATORS� WILL�
have to pass an aeronautical knowledge test at an FAA-approved facility—this seems to be similar to the way fi rearms are licensed in some states, where buyers must take a short written test every few years to prove rudimentary knowledge.s�/PERATORS� MUST� BE� VETTED� BY�
the TSA.s�/PERATORS� MUST� BE� AT� LEAST� ���
years old.s�/PERATORS� MUST� MAKE� THE� DRONE�
available for inspection upon request.s�/PERATORS� MUST� REPORT� ACCIDENTS�
WITHIN����DAYS�IF�THEY�RESULT�IN�INJURY�
or property damage.For the drone itself, the highlights
from the notice are:s�4HE� DRONE� MUST� WEIGH� LESS� THAN�
55 pounds.
s�h3MALL�UNMANNED�AIRCRAFT�MAY�NOT�
operate over any persons not directly involved in the operation.”s�6ISUAL�LINE OF SIGHT�MUST�BE�MAIN
tained by the operator or a visual observer at all times.s�4HE�DRONE�CAN�ONLY�BE�m�OWN�DUR
ing daylight.s�4HE�DRONE�S�MAXIMUM�ALTITUDE� IS�
TO�BE�����FEET�
All of these requirements are for recreational usage, and some have sug-gested that this means any sort of commercial usage will still require a h3ECTION� ���� %XEMPTION�v� WHICH�
involves plenty of convoluted govern-mental forms and registrations. That’s not certain, by any means, however, AND� SOME� EXPERTS� ARE� PREDICTING� THAT�
The future of drones for
professionals is becoming clearer
TOP: A behind-the-scenes screenshot from the Spike Jonze short, Pretty Sweet, which was shot in one take with a drone. ABOVE: The DJI Inspire 1 has a 4K camera built in.
� digitalphotopro.com May/June 2015 | 77
commercial requirements simply will echo the recreational rules.
In an interview with Pro Video Coalition’s Jeff Foster, noted drone attorney Peter Sachs said, “There is nothing wrong with requiring an appropriate level of aeronautical,meteorological and airspace knowl-edge. That makes sense. However, requiring a manned pilot license to fl y a three-pound plastic drone commer-cially is like requiring a medical license to apply a Band-Aid. If the reported FAA proposed regulations are actually adopted, the United States is destined to remain a third-world nation with respect to drones.” (See the article at www.provideocoalition.com/drone-law-update-faa.)
In the fi nal analysis, we still have to wait and see what the actual regulations say. Following the February notice, there was a 60-day period for comments and input. Final rules and regulations had been targeted for later in 2015, but they could take a couple of years.
In the meantime, check outthe Small UAV Coalition (www.smalluavcoalition.org). Their mission statement says, “The Small UAV Coalition advocates for law and policy changes to permit the operationof small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) beyond the line-of-sight, with varying degrees of autonomy, for commercial, consumer, recreationaland philanthropic purposes. Ourmembers, including leading consumer and technology companies such as Airware, Amazon Prime Air, DJI, Google[x], GoPro, Parrot, and 3DR, believe that U.S. leadership in the research, development, and production of unmanned aerial vehicles will benefi t consumers in all walks of life. We believe that, working together, we will be able to remove unnecessary policy or regulatory hurdles that impede small UAV development, sales, job creation, and services.”
While there are plenty of accounts about threatening letters and phone calls from the FAA to commercial operators, the future is likely to be much more friendly for professional photographers and videographers...we hope. DPP
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HI-TECH STUDIO(Cont’d from page 34)
A Selection Of ScannersBraun FS120 Medium-Format Film
Scanner. Braun’s FS120 is a good choice for those who have both 35mm and medium-format film images to scan, as it accepts 35mm slides and filmstrips through 120/220 films (up to 6x12 for-mat). Its optical resolution is 3200 ppi, Dmax is 3.6+, and bit depth is 48 (16 bits per RGB channel). The light source is white and IR LEDs; the sensor is a 3-line CCD. Built-in technology auto-matically removes dust and scratches. The unit connects to a computer via USB 2.0 (or 1.1), and requires Mac OS X 10.5+ with 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo or better and 1 GB of RAM, or Windows XP, Vista, 7 or 8, Intel P4 2 GHz and 1 GB of RAM. Dimensions are 15.7x8.1x6.7 inches; weight is 11.7 pounds. Estimated Street Price: $1,995. www.braun-phototechnik.de/en
Epson Perfection V850 Pro Photo Scanner. The Perfection V850 Pro is a flatbed type that can handle sizes from 35mm slides through 8x10 transpar-encies and negatives, and prints up to 8.5x11.7 inches. It’s also the lowest-cost unit presented here. Optical resolution is 4800x9600 ppi (6400x9600 ppi with Micro Step Drive technology), maxi-mum Dmax is 4.0, and bit depth is 48 (16 bits per RGB channel). ReadyScan LED technology provides fast scan-ning with no warm-up time required. The Perfection V850 Pro connects to a computer via USB 2.0, and requires Mac OS X 10.6.x-10.10.x or Windows 8-8.1, 7, Vista, XP or XP Pro x64 Edition. Two sets of film holders speed up batch processing, and hold up to 12 mounted slides or up to 18-frame 35mm strips, one medium-format frame up to 6x20cm and one 4x5-inch frame. There’s also an 8x10 film holder. Dimensions are 19.8x12.1x6.0 inches; weight is 14.6 pounds. Estimated Street Price: $949. www.epson.com
Hasselblad Flextight X1. The X1 can handle film sizes from 35mm through 4x5 inches. Its unique design features a vertical optical system that provides a glass-free optical path between your original and the lens. Flexible holders
keep the film flat. Dmax is 4.6, and bit depth is 48 (16 bits per RGB channel). The X1 can deliver a 6400 ppi scan from 35mm in 7.15 minutes, a 3200 ppi scan from a 60mm original in 6.02 minutes, and a 2040 ppi scan from a 4x5 origi-nal in 5.08 minutes. You can save a 3F “raw” scan and open it later and make any desired modifications, a history of which will be embedded in the 3F file for future reference. A cold-cathode light source and a power supply located outside the scanner both reduce heat. Dimensions are 25.6x15.4x9.1 inches; weight is 45.2 pounds. Estimated Street Price: $13,400. hasselbladbron.com
Pacific Image PrimeFilm 120 Pro Multi-Format Scanner. The quick PrimeFilm 120 can handle films from 35mm through 120/220 (up to 6x12cm), delivering 3200 ppi, 48-bit (16 per RGB channel) scans with a Dmax of 3.6+. The light source is white and IR LEDs, and the sensor is a 3-line RGB CCD. Unique Magic Touch technol-ogy removes dust and scratches. The PF 120 connects to Mac (OS 10.5+, Intel processor) and Windows (XP/Vista/7/8, Intel P4 2 GHz or AMD 2 GHz or better) computers via USB 2.0 (not USB 1.1-compatible). Dimensions are 6.3x7.8x15.78 inches; weight is 12.3 pounds. Estimated Street Price: $1,399. www.scanace.com
Plustek OpticFilm 120 Film Scanner. The OpticFilm 120 can handle films from 35mm through 120/220 (6x4.5cm through 6x12cm). Dynamic range is 4.01 (with SilverFast Multi-Exposure; the unit comes with SilverFast Ai Studio 8), theoretical Dmax is 4.8, and bit depth is 48 (16 bits per RGB chan-nel). Input (CCD) resolution is 10,600 ppi; output (lens) resolution is 5300 ppi. The light source is LED. Patent-pending adjustable-pitch 120 film hold-ers hold the film flat, while motorized transport speeds workflow. Features include quick and simple Auto IT8 profiling and iSRD dust and scratch removal. The OpticFilm 120 connects to Mac (OS 10.5+, Intel processor) or Windows (XP/Vista/7/8) via USB 2.0. Dimensions are 8.3x14.7x7.4 inches; weight is 12.6 pounds. Estimated Street Price: $1,999. plustek.com DPP
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VISIONEER’S GALLERY(Cont’d from page 27)
This beautiful moment of intimacy binds us to the tribe, powerfully invok-ing the realization that water is the cru-cial element upon which our collective survival depends. And, unlike in many of the pictures we see from the world of charity, there’s a feeling of pride and dignity that exudes from the faces in the photograph, clearly a refl ection of the empathy with which the photogra-pher treats his subjects.
“I’m very much more a fl y on the wall. I don’t want you to see me. I don’t want to know you’re there. I just want to capture,” states Lennon. This unintrusive presence has allowed Lennon to capture candid pictures that we instantly connect to. Lennon also includes some landscape photo-graphs in the exhibit that seem to have been created in the Daguerreotype era, spectacular, almost otherworldly land-scapes captured by him in composi-tions that celebrate the incredible, vast and arid African horizon.
Our retouching, printing and mount-ing teams worked together to make this exhibit the success that it was. Fine Art Account Manager Hillary Altman at Duggal has worked closely with Julian for over fi ve years now since we createdthe pieces for “Timeless.” It’s thrillingfor all of us to see this remarkable art-ist progress as he has, bringing incred-ible beauty and warmth to his pictures.All photographs in “Horizon” wereproduced by our fi ne-art digital archi-val printers on Durafl ex, mounted to1⁄8-inch nonglare Plexi, with aluminumbacks and braces, except for “Hope,”which was printed as a digital fibersilver-gelatin print and then custom-framed in a black fl oat gallery frame.
Whether he moves through musicor photography, I look forward to thestories that Julian Lennon has in storefor us. Judging by the work he has cre-ated thus far, what we know for sure isthat he will always connect us to whatis most real. DPP
Visit Duggal at www.duggal.com or checkout the blog at www.duggal.com/connectand see their newest articles.
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Prices, specifications, and images are subject to change without notice. Manufacturer rebates are subject to the terms and conditions (including expiration dates) printed on the manufacturers’ rebate forms. Not responsible for typographical or illustrative errors. © 2000-2015 B & H Foto & Electronics Corp.
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Mis
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There is no ideal camera
>> More On The WebGo to the DPP website at www.digitalphotopro.com to learn more about cutting-edge technology and how it’s changing photography.
to emphasize economy, luxury or performance. Continuing in this vein, camera manufacturers seem to be creating their lines so photographers can identify where they want to be in the overall hierarchy and then adding other trim levels. It’s like you decide that you generally need a 5-series
BMW and then you can choose the 528, 535, 550 or M5.
Automotive analogies aside, the simple fact is that there really isn’t one ideal camera for all possible situations and styles. We don’t all have the
budget to purchase an infi nite number of cameras so we make compromises. And compromise isn’t a bad thing. Any device that tries to be all things to all people is likely to be good at nothing. Think of a car-boat. It’s probably not going to be a great car
and you don’t want to rely on it to fl oat. (For a great “real-life” example of this, see Top Gear, Season 8 Episode 3, when Clarkson, Hammond and May were challenged to modify cars to cross the English Channel.)
For professional photographers, the ideal camera is the one that makes the most money for you. It could be a $400 GoPro if you’re creating crash photos and videos for clients. Or it could be a $40,000 medium-format camera with a 150-megapixel back. Instead of getting hung up on juggling the specs in a comparison chart, choose a camera that does the job and add others as you encounter clients with other needs. A lot of professionals will fi nd that they might start with a Sony a7R for its resolution, then add an a7S when they have to work in low light or deliver some 4K video. DPP
As a professional photographer, you’re sure to
get the following question from friends, family,
acquaintances, friends of friends, Facebook
friends…you get the picture. The question is, “What’s the best camera?” The simple answer is that there is no best camera. The right camera is the one that can do what you need. A sports photographer has very different requirements than a portrait photographer. One places a premium on a fast AF system, while the other will sacrifi ce speed for maximum bit depth and color fi delity.
When Canon introduced the EOS 5DS and 5DS R, there was plenty of reaction from the marketplace. If you believe the expression that a good deal is one that makes everyone unhappy, Canon hit a home run with these DSLRs. Complaints came from fi lm-makers who wanted more motion features, action shooters who wanted more speed and landscape shoot-ers who wanted higher ISO. In fact, Canon added two DSLRs to their EOS 5D line that complement the existing EOS 5D Mark III beautifully.
Sony is using a similar strategy with their a7 full-frame mirrorless lineup. The a7 Mark II has moderately high resolution and solid motion-capture features. The a7R is a high-resolution model with a 36-megapixel sensor (as of press time, the Great Rumor Mill that is the Internet is fore-casting 50 megapixels, with a chance of more megapixels coming by summer of 2015), and the a7S is a low-light and 4K motion titan. Every-thing is a trade-off. You can’t have the a7S’s max ISO of 409,600 on a full-frame sensor with 36 megapixels...at least not yet.
The current trend is to extend camera models horizontally. This is much like car manufacturers who add different trim levels to a model
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