This post was originally published in December 2009. I’ve just met and am getting to know Brian Matiash and since HDR photography is growing by leaps and bounds I wanted to share it with you again now.  Visit www.brianmatiash.com for more information and to see lots and lots of wonderful HDR images.  Enjoy!

by Brian Matiash

As photographers, we all have stories about how we have grown, refined, and crafted our individualized techniques, all with the goal of capturing the best picture that is within our means.  For me, it has been more of an evolution than actual growth.  It wasn’t so much building on top of what I knew as it was morphing it into something different.  It was about addressing a mental itch and experimenting with all sorts of deviations until I took my next evolutionary step in digital photography.  And that is how I found myself truly immersed in High Dynamic Range (HDR) Imaging.

HDR has gained a lot of attention recently, almost to the point where it is becoming a mainstream term in photography.  Because your camera’s sensor is not nearly as sophisticated as your eyes are in visualizing a scene with high dynamic range (all of the transitions from the brightest highlights through to the darkest shadows), HDR helps facilitate this limitation by taking the exposure detail across several ‘bracketed’ images and brings them out via tone mapping.  It is a very remarkable processing technique, and as is the case with most good things, it can be easily abused, especially when first entering the foray of HDR imaging.

Like all evolutionary trends, I started with HDR very primordially.  I fumbled with haloes and noise.  With crazy, saturated color and blown out tones.  But with each attempt, I found myself getting closer and closer to really understanding this technique, one that truly is greater than the sum of its parts.  And with my processing style evolving, so did my eye for HDR.  It was the next step in my evolution.  No longer would I would bracket everything that found itself on the business end of my lens.  I was beginning to understand what sort of images would truly benefit from the rigors of the technique.

Left Caption: Without ColorChecker Passport White Balance or DNG Profile || Right Caption: With ColorChecker Passport White Balance or DNG Profile

Left Caption: Without ColorChecker Passport White Balance or DNG Profile || Right Caption: With ColorChecker Passport White Balance or DNG Profile

Part 2 of this article explains how applying Color Management to my workflow increases my image quality.

About the author:

Brian Matiash is a Boston-based photographer who loves to capture the many facets of urban life, most notably the architecture and street life that make up the skeleton of a city.  Brian is known for implementing the High Dynamic Range (HDR) Imaging technique to bring out a level of supplemental reality and texture to his photos.

Brian has gained recognition for his HDR work and has been published in various media outlets including The Boston Globe, the Improper Bostonian, and various online photography journals.  He recently had a series called ‘High Dynamic Reality’ on display at the Hudson Street Gallery in Boston, MA.  He was also the Winner for the 2008 and 2009 Scott Kelby Worldwide Photo Walk for Boston, MA and Brooklyn, NY, respectively.

Brian was involved in Alpha and Beta testing for the ColorChecker Passport.  It is now used as a regular part of his photography workflow, both in front of the camera and behind the computer screen, because of the improvements to image quality that it brings.

Brian currently lives in Framingham, MA with his wife, Lisa and two dogs, Zilla and Chaca.  You can see more of Brian’s work at www.brianmatiash.com.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

A few of you have commented here regarding a missing Lightroom plugin after installation of the ColorChecker Passport software.  These instances are quite rare but frustrating to those of you who are experiencing them. First let me ask you to please report the issue to cmsupport@xrite.com. The folks in Customer Success are working hard to better understand the issue and resolve it and we need your help.

In the meantime they have produced a document that will walk you through manually adding the plugin. Click here to go to the webpage ColorChecker Passport – Plugin Is Not There

We do not yet fully understand this very occasional issue and would like your help in tracking down the root cause.  So please report to cmsupport@xrite.com if you have experienced the issue.  And remember to visit www.xritephoto.com for more information on color management solutions for photographers.  And follow us on Facebook and Twitter for info on new blog posts,  Coloratti updates, webinars, software updates and more.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

We caught up with George Jardine recently to talk about his new Adobe Lightroom 3 Video Workshop series.  You can find out more about the series and check out lot’s of other information including interviews, tutorials, and information on his workshops at www.mulita.com/blog. You can even get a sample of one of the lessons in the Library Module Video Workshop.  Enjoy it and learn why George is one of the most sought after teachers on Lightroom.

Enjoy this indepth conversation with George Jardine about his career and his thoughts on digital asset management and how to use the digital library in Adobe Lightroom®.

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Click on the “play” icon to enjoy the audio interview in its entirety.

“I started life as a photographer,” says George.  He went to photography school at a small technical school in Colorado and scored a great internship in Chicago early in his career that really launched him as he worked as a photographer for the first 15 years of his career in Denver and Chicago. After being encouraged by his brother to “buy a computer, move to California” in the early 1980′s he did just that.  Working in one of the first early service bureau’s he was hired by the first art directors at Adobe and ended up on the original Lightroom development team!

George left Adobe in 2008 and is a consultant and workshop leader.  He’s been fascinated by video tutorials for some time. He uses this technique in his workshop series.  His new video series on Lightroom is designed to speak directly to photographers in a way that photographers can easily understand. He relates his experience of teaching Lightroom explaining the database in detail only to have someone raise their hand and ask, “Where are my pictures?”

He contends that database thought processes are not intuitive to photographers.  His new series is designed to give a “graphical description and illustration of how the database works and how a photo library should be structured.” The new series on the Adobe Lightroom 3 Library Module is designed to simplify that process. As long as we were shooting film we had bits of film to organize but digital photography means that our actual images live on the computer.  “I think a lot of photographers are struggling with it.”

I asked George to tell me about how he created the new series. “I’ve got a fairly extensive library of my own of both scans from legacy film photographs as well as digital photographs, about 30,000 digital photographs since I started shooting digital in 2003…. We all grew up organizing our film by subject… With the advent of computers organizing by subject no longer makes sense because you can keyword your photos with any number of subjects… and find the pictures you’re looking for if you know how to tag them and how to organize them.”  George talks about the importance of understanding the power of keywords in cataloging your photos.  We have to start thinking about how to properly tag photos and organize that way.

The new series on the Library Module is 16 modules of video content and access is very affordably priced at 29.95.  “I really want this to be available to every photographer”, says George.  And he’s working on another series on the Develop Module that will be available very soon.  You can even sign up for advanced notice of that release.

There are lots of other resources on George’s website including interviews that George has collected. There are great podcasts with people like Gregory Heisler, Catherine Hall, Jay Maisel, Natalie Fobes, Pete Turner and more!  And some really cool videos from a short lesson on Subjective Color Correction in Lightroom and a new video on Greg Gorman’s Workshops. There is a LOT to explore. Take your time and enjoy at www.mulita.com.  “My motivation… is to share this with younger photographers who are just getting started to get behind some of the thinking about how these guys got started and what their vision is,” says George about the interviews he has recorded.

We are proud to have George as part of our X-Rite Coloratti team.  To find out more about Coloratti and other issues related to color management solutions for photographers visit www.xritephoto.com.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

Jim says there’s something fishy going on in Hawaii. Looks like they’re having a blast in Maui at the Maui Photo Festival!  At least from the perspective of Jim Divitale. He emailed me yesterday to tell me about a new blog he’d just posted at Digital Imaging Tune-up on his experiences there. Here’s just a little excerpt from his post…

“Swimming with the giant sea turtles face to face was a blast…They move slow enough for me to shoot… The fish… That’s totally a different story. But I will work on it for next time…”

This post is FILLED with beautiful pictures of his and Helene’s snorkeling trip (with some pretty funny ones of them sprinkled in for fun as well) and from their excursion to the Maui Aquarium. Lot’s of very beautiful and very fishy fish!

Check it all out at Jim Divitale’s Digital Imaging Tune-Up and check out all the fun at Maui Photo Festival featuring a list of presenters that includes several X-Rite Coloratti. Next year let’s all meet there!

Remember to follow X-Rite Photo on  Facebook and Twitter for all the latest news on color management for digital photography and updates on X-Rite’s Coloratti. And check out the Webinars page for upcoming programs brought to you by X-Rite Photo or check out Webinar Archives to enjoy great programs again or for the first time!

by Brenda K. Hipsher

Coloratti … take two!  Yep that’s right.  Greg Gorman Workshops has three workshop events coming up in September and October at his place in Mendocino, CA each one featuring TWO X-Rite Coloratti. In September 2010 choose from Greg with Stephen Wilkes from September 19-24 or Greg and Seth Resnick from September 26-October 1. And in October catch Greg with the Photoshop Diva herself, Katrin Eismann, October 10-15.  Check it out on the Workshop calendar page. Get the enrollment form or a direct email link to trish@gormanworkshops.com.
Greg’s workshops are unique experiences with fellow photographers in beautiful surroundings.  You’re hosted at Greg’s beautiful place with dinners and wine tastings each day.  This is education combined with retreat, rest, relaxation, and just plain fun.  And now you get TWO X-Rite Coloratti in each of these great workshop opportunities this fall.  Check it out today!

Remember to follow X-Rite Photo on  Facebook and Twitter for all the latest news on color management for digital photography and updates on X-Rite’s Coloratti.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

You’ll have two opportunities to get in on this very cool webinar called The PDF to Blurb Book Color Workflow Webinar. One of the coolest new ways to publish a super professional persentation in book form is Blurb Books. And it’s obvious that color management is an important part of producing these beautiful full color hard back bound books.

Blurb’s PDF to Book capabilities give you complete control over the bookmaking process. In this FREE Webinar sponsored by X-Rite and Blurb, we’ll cover the entire process from image capture, to soft-proofing in Photoshop® to book layout in InDesign® to upload to Blurb. For more detailed information please click on one of the registration links listed below.

Session One – 1PM Eastern Time
(12PM Central, 11AM Mountain, 10AM Pacific)
Learn More and Register Here

Session Two – 3PM Eastern Time
(2PM Central, 1PM Mountain, 12PM Pacific)
Learn More and Register Here

You can find these webinars and others on the X-Rite Photo website on the Learning Tab at Webinars.  And you can even access past webinars on the Webinar Archives page. Register for your spot today!

by Brenda K. Hipsher

Recently I came across a really nice overview of ColorMunki Photo on Bob Rockerfeller Photography.  It’s a concise and informative look at this great color management solution from X-Rite and has some great links to other blogs on ColorMunki Photo.  I hope you enjoy it.  I’ve provided some excerpts below.  You can read the entire article and use the embedded links by clicking here Bob Rockerfeller Photography ColorMunki Blog.

The ColorMunki for Color Management

by Bob Rockerfeller

I have, for a very long time, profiled my monitors with the DataColor Spyder 2 (no longer made) and later, the X-Rite Eye-One Display 2. To complete the color management chain to my printer, I had been depending on ICC profiles provided by the paper supplier, whether that was the included Epson profiles, those from Red River Paper, Moab, or others. Recently, after having some problems with Red River profiles and my new Epson 3880, I decided to go the next step and create my own printer/paper/ink ICC profiles and bought the X-Rite ColorMunki.

Ease of Use — with my experience from using other monitor profile systems, getting up and running with the ColorMunki was very straight forward. It is particularly nice that the target color test charts print out very large color swatches which make them very easy to scan.

A Mac OS X 10.6 Watch Out — I’ve read in several places that current versions of the Mac OS (10.6.4 right now) have problems using version 4 ICC profiles. I don’t know the details, but I used the ColorMunki software preferences to select version 2 ICC profiles and everything has worked fine.

Find A Good Test Image — to best judge your results, I’d recommend finding and using the same test image for comparing one profile, one paper to another, and so on. My test image of choice is the one from Digital Outback Photo. I like it because it provides gradients and incremental black and white blocks along with some typical images. The essay on their web site also provides some handy guidance on how to interpret your results.

Results — to start with, you’d expect ICC profiles offered by the paper suppliers to be very good for the Epson 3880 as the pro printers from Epson are more consistant from printer to printer. Having said that, to my eye I got a very good, and slightly better than Moab’s, profile for the Moab Lasal Photo Luster paper; colors were slightly richer and contrast slightly better. The Red River UltraPro Satin profile was somewhat a mixed bag. Red River’s profile gave me some slight banding in the test image’s color gradients, which is what got me started thinking about making my own profiles in the first place. The ColorMunki profile also created some of the same banding, but in different color gradients. Otherwise the ColorMunki profile also showed richer colors and enhanced contrast. Perhaps there’s something about the UltraPro Satin paper and the Epson 3880 inks.

Although the paper suppliers do a nice job providing generally good ICC profiles for their papers, its very likely that you will get a slightly better profile if you make your own using your own printer. And if the paper you’d like to try has no provided profile for your printer, then you will have to make your own. In either case, I think the ColorMunki is a great choice at a reasonable price.

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Thanks Bob for allowing us to post your thoughts here.  If you’d like to be a guest blogger on the X-Rite Photo blog please contact us at brenda@xritephoto.com.  And remember to follow X-Rite Photo on  Facebook and Twitter for all the latest news on color management for digital photography. Check out the Webinar Archives page for more great information and instruction in webinar form.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

Art Wolfe’s 2010 Seminar Tour called The Art of Composition has been extended 5 additional stops going right through October of this year.  I caught up with Art in Toronto and in Boston earlier this year.  This tour is comprised of six distinct lectures featuring topics like inspiration, point of view, composition, technical details, design, and light.  It’s visually beautiful, intellectually engaging, and spiritually nourishing. If you haven’t had the chance to attend check out Art Wolfe Workshops to get a list of the additional cities and dates that have been added.

Here’s a sample audio clip from the first lecture in The Art of Composition.

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Art talks about his early life, going to art school and loving photography.  His father and mother were wedding photographers.  He shares about his early love of the natural world. He was trained as a painter and painting was his first image medium. As he describes Puget Sound I could see the landscape around me. His passion for this beautiful part of the country.  I was amazed to know that he began his outdoor adventures as a mountain climber and led climbs on Mount St. Helens before the volcano blew the top of the mountain off some years ago. Great insights into the elements that inform Art Wolfe’s vision of the world and his career in photography. The entire event is filled with beautiful photographs that illustrate Art’s lectures.

People who attend this seminar leave energized and smiling. I spoke with a few of the attendees in Boston.  Check out their comments on this audio clip.

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“Art keeps reminding us … it’s not about the technology… it’s about seeing what’s there.”

“I’m always amazed how inspiring his work is… it’s a visual experience that makes me want to go out and grab my camera and go shoot more pictures!”

“This is my first time to any Art Wolfe Seminar…It was very inspiring to make me want to just get out there and go do things.”

“I’ve watched every show on PBS…Travels to the Edge… I’m a total fan. The thing about him is just this passion to take pictures.  To see someone who’s lived it… is an eye opening thing.  It’s just fun to hear him talk and sort of revive myself.”

I chatted with Art for just a few minutes after the Boston stop on the tour. Here’s what he had to say about the tour.

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When I asked him what this tour was like for him he said, “For me it’s an opportunity to hone my message. Every talk I think I’m getting better at saying it. Eventually this will become a curriculum that will become available for everybody.”

In January Art will become a part of The Luminous Landscape, described as, “The web’s most comprehensive site devoted to the art of landscape and nature photography using traditional as well as digital image processing techniques.” He’ll be known as a”Wizard of Nature Photography.” You’ll be able to learn from Art, ask him questions, and interact.  Look for more info on this project soon.

There’s nothing quite like sitting in a dark room, looking Art’s beautiful work and hearing him talk about the images, his vision, how he conceptualizes his work. I found the lectures in this tour to be enlightening and very inspiring.  I hope you will, too! Be sure to check out Art Wolfe online and the new fall dates for the The Art of Composition Tour in 5 new cities. And remember to see my favorite Art Wolfe project Travels to the Edge on your local PBS station or on DVD. All of the photos in this blog post are shown during the lectures and are ©Art Wolfe.  Enjoy!

Remember to follow X-Rite Photo on  Facebook and Twitter for all the latest news on color management for digital photography and updates on X-Rite’s Coloratti.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

Meet Martin Bailey. He’s originally from England is a Tokyo based nature and wildlife photographer who specializes in images of Japan. Martin is part of our X-Rite Coloratti program and you can read about him on the X-Rite Photo website. If you’ve ever thought about attending a photography workshop in Japan check out the Workshops tab on Martin’s website. Get insight into Martin’s vision on the Gallery tab. And if you want to learn, learn, learn… check out his Podcasts and his Blog.

Color Managed Digital Workflow

A colleague sent me a link to his recent blog post called Podcast 254 : Color Managed Digital Workflow Seminar Report.  This is a post that’s just chocked full of good information, easy to understand concepts, very understandable concepts.  Take some time to check it out. The way to take control of your color digital photography is to set up a color managed digital workflow.  Here is part of what Martin says, “My main objective was [to] relay many of the things that I bear in mind when shooting, from pre-capture, to all sorts of output methods, including slideshows, Web, PDFs and my personal favorite, prints…I started by talking about why calibration and color management is important.”

In this blog post Martin walks you through aspects of workflow that includes everything from the importance of shooting raw to auto-focus techniques to a brief overview of depth of field. Martin discussed ColorChecker Passport and goes on to various other tools and techniques in Lightroom.  This post as a LOT of information!

And near the end there are links to all kinds of other resources including Martin’s video about ColorMunki Photo. So go all the way and enjoy.  We’re proud to have Martin Bailey as part of the X-Rite Coloratti program.

by Brenda K. Hipsher

This week on Thursday, August 12, 2010 you can catch the live webinar RAW COLOR POWER with Adobe® Lightroom® and the ColorChecker Passport hosted by Joe Brady and brought to you by X-Rite Photo. Join us in this webinar and we’ll show you how to bring your digital photography color to a new level! You’ll learn how to quickly and easily capture accurate color, instantly enhance portraits and landscapes, create your own color look with one click and maintain color control and consistency. You’ll be able to achieve superior color results in a fraction of the time!

Who should watch this color management webinar?

• Professional photographers
• Photographic enthusiasts
• Anyone passionate about accurate color

Color Management Topics Covered

• Creating and Using Camera Profiles
• Custom White Balance with the Passport
• One click accurate color edits
• Matching color response of two or more cameras
• Matching color response under different lighting conditions
• Color editing in Adobe® Lightroom®
• Color editing in Adobe® Photoshop®

Choose from two times to suit your schedule and register today:

Thursday, August 12, 2010  1pm EDT  Register Here!

Thursday, August 12, 2010 3pm EDT Register Here!

Learn how ColorChecker Passport can move your digital photography to a new level of control. Find out how this tool can save you time and allow you to really enjoy taking pictures again.  Click on the links above and register today to learn more.

Remember to follow X-Rite Photo on  Facebook and Twitter for all the latest news on color management for digital photography. Check out the Webinar Archives page for more great information and instruction in webinar form.