Phil-Phlash's blog

Paint Shop Pro was published by Jasc Software which was bought out by Corel. Paint Shop Pro has been around for years and has had numerous upgrades. It comes in two flavors, Standard for $49.99 and Ultimate for $79.99. Upgrades are very inexpensive unlike a certain other Adobe product. It has been available on Amazon at a discount. The price may be low but this program is BIG on performance meeting and beating Photoshop in some areas PLUS it has many features left out of Photoshop Elements. The Ultimate version includes are big bag of goodies well worth the extra bucks. Paint Shop Pro uses all the same filters, brushes, gradients, etc. files as Photoshop. There are tons of tutorials and free downloads available on the web.

WOW! Yet another Mac software package. Pixelmator is an easy-to-use, fast and powerful image editor for Mac OS X users. It cost $59 to buy but there appears to be a free demo download available. Find it at http://www.pixelmator.com/ . It has lots of cool features, some of which are not available in Photoshop Elements. If you try out the demo, please let club members know how you like this package at our next meeting.

Here is another free photo editing package for Mac users. You can check it out and get a copy at http://www.livequartz.com/ . It looks easy to use and has some special features Mac users will appreciate. I am not a Mac user so have not tried this software. If you are a Mac user and give it a try, please report on this software at our next club meeting. Anyone out there (not a member of our club) reading this can also submit comments to this web site.

It seems we offer software for PCs on this web site while  ignoring Mac owners. Well, check out http://www.greenwavesoftware.com/ where you can see a photo editor for Macs. I am not a Mac owner so have not tried this program. However, I have examined the features, screenshots and demo videos on their web site and would definitely give MagiBrush-Photo a try. There is a free demo available for download. It is another tool to add to those you may already have. If you use a Mac and give this software a try, please give a report on it at our next meeting.

I found good article related to July 4th, "how to photograph fireworks". Check out  http://digital-photography-school.com/how-to-photograph-fireworks . Hope you get to see this article before the celebrating begins.

There is a well written explanation of "Equivalent Exposures" on the Shutterbug magazine web site at http://www.shutterbug.com/newsletter/063009equiv/ . This may be a topic you are already familiar with, but the article is short but well done so I suggest it as worthwhile reading.

Any club member who finds an article, tutorial, software, or hardware info on the web that may interest other members, please share it by posting a link on this blog.

This is a followup to last month's program on shooting your photos in RAW format, NOT .jpg. OK, shoot both if you like. As mentioned in the program, RAW images are captured and saved as 16-bit data files. (The actual picture data is contained in  12 or 14 of the 16 bits available, depending the camera.) The 12-bit images can have  4,096 tones of Red, Green and Blue which translates to over 16 million colors. The 14-bit images can have 16,384 tones of Red, Green and Blue, a lot more for only two additional bits. For this discussion, let's assume 12-bit data. 

While searching the web for Photoshop tutorials, I stumbled across a very good web site to share with club members. It's written and maintained by an excellent photographer and is found at http://www.luminous-landscape.com/ . Rather than try to summarize this 3500 page web site, it's better if you visit there yourself. Hold the Control key down and click on the link above. A new tab will open in your browser and transfer you to this web site. Hope you like it as much as I do.  Philippe

General Guidelines

Photographs of People, Places and Nature must depict subjects with good fidelity to reality. Post-camera changes may subtly enhance a photograph optimizing fidelity but not add to it. Cropping, removal of minor unwanted elements, removal of color cast, highlight and contrast control and subtle use of digital effects (like sharpening, gradients, contrast masks, black & white filtering, etc.) are acceptable enhancements. Photography is an art form reflecting your creative interpretation of a selected subject. Reproductions of paintings, other's artwork or photographs and mere record photos (snapshots!) of monuments, sculptures, and buildings are discouraged for presentation at the Gainesville Photography Club.