I'm probably about half-way through my comparison test of Adobe's Lightroom 2 (beta), Apple's Aperture and Capture One and there are some early observations that might be of interest. I should reiterate that my testing methodology is far from scientific and largely based on whatever work I happen to be doing on any given day. The purpose of the test is to discover which of the three tools works best for my particular digital workflow and it's quite possible that you will come to different conclusions. People tend to like to draw a line in the sand about their equipment and can become quite defensive about their choices so I just want to say that if what you're doing works for you then go with it.

The first thing to report is that there's been an early casualty in this three-way shoot-off. Whilst the interface for Capture One 4 was funky and I immediately liked it, the package was just so slow to operate that it was quickly clear that it was going to be impractical for me. I'm using a one year-old MacBook Pro 2.33Ghz with plenty of spare memory so I would expect my software to whizz along quite happily. It's a laptop but that's how I work and if the software won't run on my machine then that's pretty much the end of the test as far as I'm concerned. So, whilst Capture One might boast all manner of functions and special effects that would impress me mightily, there was never any chance that I'd get as far as finding them. Importing images was reasonably quick but altering any aspect of a DNG file converted from a 1Ds MKII RAW original took an age. Also, there didn't seem to be a way to see alterations in real-time. I may be wrong about this but I'm used to moving sliders up and down and seeing the changes immediately in my image. In Capture One it seemed that I had to release the slider to see the effect. Subtle changes therefore seemed very difficult to achieve. And as it was taking a while for those changes to become apparent I quickly lost patience and ditched Capture One before the trial expired.

If anyone wants to prove me wrong about Capture One and tell me that there's a special preference setting that overcomes these problems then I'd like to hear it. As I say, the interface looked interesting and I wanted to like it so I'd give it another go if I thought I'd see an improvement.

Aperture is like dancing on ice, as smooth as silk and wrinkle-free.

So now on to the two remaining contenders. Firstly, I should remind you that Aperture 2 is a full release and Lightroom 2 is a public beta so we excuse it some quirky behaviour. What we don't excuse it for however is the clunky interface. Lightroom's modular panels are already feeling old-fashioned and although I'm pretty familiar with it so can move around quickly with keyboard shortcuts, it's just ponderous. In contrast, Aperture is like dancing on ice, as smooth as silk and wrinkle-free. It boasts that particular "Apple design" feeling that immediately beckons you in. Open Lightroom and you feel like you have to work, open Aperture and you feel like it's time to play. If they were people, Lightroom would be a dour, stodgy Yorkshire lass sitting in the corner of a smoke-filled, dingy pub drinking Stout and Babycham whilst fingering her moustache and mumbling at her whippet, whilst Aperture would be a leggy blonde model perched elegantly on a stool in the corner of a Soho wine bar, sexily sipping a cocktail before beckoning you over to her table with a smouldering pout and and a suggestively raised eyebrow.

I fear that I may be stepping up to the point at which I over-egg this analogy. What's that? I've passed the point already? Fair enough. Let's forget the aesthetics and talk about delivery. I'll pick out two things that I've discovered in my recent trial, either one of which could be a deal-breaker for me but which, when combined, probably sound the death-knell for one of these applications as far as I'm concerned.

Firstly, Chromatic Aberration. Yep, I've said it and now it's out there we'll just have to deal with it. I use the best Canon lenses available but occasionally I'll get a case of CA and boy does it itch. Clearly, it's something that's best cleared up as soon as possible. This image was shot at the wide end of a 16-35mm f/2.8 L lens (1/4 sec, f/22, ISO50 for those who like to know) and shows CA, or purple fringing, around the areas of high-contrast.


If you look at the lamp post you'll see a green stripe on the left and a purple stripe on the right where light of different wavelengths is being resolved at different points on the sensor. Probably. We don't really care why but we do want to rectify it. In Lightroom there's a cunningly named "Chromatic Aberration" tool and I bet you've already guessed what it does.
Yep, move the sliders from side to side and be ready to catch your jaw as it drops open with amazement as the fringing disappears. There's also a "Defringe" setting that will pick out the highlight edges in the image. That's all well and good. Hover your mouse over the image above to see it with the fringing removed.


So now to Aperture where a search for the Chromatic Aberration removal tool reveals... nothing. There isn't one. Has it been renamed in a cunning ploy to prevent Windows-users from taking over the Apple software? Well, possibly. Searching the Aperture help files reveals no mention of Chromatic Aberration. It does, if I remember rightly, mention "Fringing" briefly and the way to deal with it is apparently by manipulating the "Moire" and "Radius" tools. All I can tell you is that I fiddled and fiddled and the "before" and "after" image shows the results. I think I actually ended up making it worse. If you hover your mouse over the Aperture image you might not even notice any difference.

Further research on the web revealed that there are other ways of removing CA in Aperture that involve colour replacement or something but by that stage I'd lost interest. It seemed that the blonde in the Soho wine bar might not be all she was making out to be and the dour Yorkshire girl was beginning to look more appealing.

If somebody can explain to me how to remove Chromatic Aberration in Aperture as easily as it can be removed in Lightroom then I'll be keen to learn but as far as I can see, it's just not possible without a lot of fiddling and that's exactly what I'm trying to avoid.

I'd say that the Aperture brushes are more intuitive at first glance

So, on to my second finding. Both Lightroom and Aperture have new "Dodge and Burn" tools that supposedly provide functionality previously only found in Photoshop or similar photo manipulation packages - although nobody here is using anything other than Photoshop, right? OK then. Here's the thing, they both work equally well and although there's some differences in the way the tools operate it's nothing that you wouldn't overcome if you were using one or the other package regularly. I'd say that the Aperture brushes are more intuitive at first glance but they both do pretty much the same thing. Aperture's brushes are pressure sensitive whereas Lightroom's are not so if you're using a pen and tablet that might be a consideration. However, this might be dealt with by the time the full release of version 2 hits the shops.

But here's the killer. When you dodge and burn in Aperture a new TIF file is created. In Lightroom, you make non-destructive adjustments to the original RAW or DNG file. So if I make a small dodge and burn adjustment to 100 RAW files in Aperture I end up with an additional 100 TIF files, all taking up space on my hard-drives and creating a new asset management dilemma and requiring additional back-up space. Essentially, my files are duplicated and now I've got a pre-production file and a slightly different post-production file. What would be the point? OK, in Lightroom 1 I would have had to create a TIF file and then had to import it to Photoshop to make any dodging and burning adjustments but that's not the point, in Lightroom 2 I don't need to do that.

There are some things in Aperture that still tempt me: the inclusion of Noise Ninja and Photoshelter upload plug-ins for example. Yes, there are things that would make my digital workflow life simpler and it does feel like you're doing something creative when Aperture's open but with no decent Chromatic Aberration tool and the thousands of additional TIF files that I'd end up with it's just not enough.

I'll keep Aperture on my Mac until the trial expires and I'll keep an eye out for developments that overcome these issues but, for now at least, it looks like I'm turning my back on the gorgeous blonde in the Soho wine bar and heading home, hand-in-hand with the dour Yorkshire lass. She may not look much, but she can deliver - and that, my friends, is what counts.

Tags: aperture, lightroom, capture one

The debate about photography in public places continues in the UK and it seems to me, through anecdotal evidence, that the perceived level of suspicion of photographers shooting in public places is, if anything, increasing. Thank goodness then for Austin Mitchell and the common-sense Early Day Motion that he's raising in Parliament.

It's reassuring to hear that photographers have such a level-headed champion in the halls of power and refreshing to hear a down-to-earth approach that overcomes the argument of the reactionary and alarmist voices. We all have a right to photograph in public places without being harassed and it if it's true that photographers are increasingly being interrupted, quizzed, questioned and bothered then that's something that we should all be worried about.

Add Photography in public to your page

Tags: politics, photography in public places

I'm delighted that my web site is featured in this week's British Mac podcast. Will Green is the Guinness-drinking creator of the British Mac podcast and I'd recommend listening even if you aren't a Mac owner because of the irreverent way he presents it. Will puts a quirky spin on every item so, for example, when it's time to present the weekly Mac widget, the item is introduced to the sound of a thunder clap, ghoulish laughter and Kenneth Williams screeching "Frying tonight". The Mac Widget becomes "Frankenwidget". It's all quite refreshingly silly.

Even if you only listen to one episode, try this week's (No. 66) for the experience of Will's impersonation of Microsoft's Steve Ballmer. If you ever had any doubts about whether English eccentricity was simply a myth, wonder no more, the British Mac podcast is eccentricity personified and we salute it.

Best of all, Will is a long-standing fan of the Square and Compass pub in Worth Matravers. Now officially the "Best Pub in the World", Will used to play piano in the bar in exchange for beer. He must have been good because he once earned so much beer that he fell off the piano stool. Strangely, that really impresses me.

If you're visiting my site for the first time following it's appearance in the British Mac Gallery feature then you are most welcome and I invite you to sign up for my Newsletter. It's about as irregular as British Mac podcasts and I know you'll be comfortable with that kind of publishing schedule!

Tags: mac, podcasting

My sources suggest that today will be the day that Canon will announce the long-awaited arrival of the EOS 5D Mark II. Watch this space! And remember, you heard it here first.

Tags: canon

Matt Brandon and I have both written posts about Mitchell Kanashkevich recently and I've been enjoying getting to know Mitchell's work of late. I was especially pleased therefore when he mentioned that some of his photos are featured in the May edition on Digital Photo Magazine and the double-page spread showing four of his pictures of the Rabari, an ancient nomadic tribe from Western India. The picture entitled "Kutch Diamond" (top left) is exquisite. There's an old photographic expression that goes something like "Take a colour portrait of a person and you show the person, take a black and white portrait of a person and show their soul". Well, look into the little girl's eyes for a moment and I think you'll agree that Mitchell has succeeded in capturing the very essence of his subject in a colour photograph.

I recommend that you take a look at this photo on Mitchell's web site as it has even more impact than in the magazine scan here.

Tags: india

Sunday started so much brighter than Saturday in Swanage and so I took the opportunity to wander along the front and to stroll up the pier. Did you know that "strolling" is the correct verb to use when referring to walking on a pier? It's 40p to "stroll" on the pier as the sign at the front gate says. I also noticed that local people ask for "Two strollers please" when they pay the man on the gate. So, if you're in Swanage and don't want to seem like a tourist, ask for "One stroller please" when you pay to go on the pier. You don't get this kind of local insight on other blogs.

These two images are HDR (High Dynamic Range) constructions. I find that I'm shooting more bracketed exposures these days. It's not that I'm less certain about the exposures that I'm making, simply that it takes no more time to fire off three frames than one and I'm not using up film so there's no reason not to. I'm usually bracketing about a stop apart and I've been surprised to find that it's sometimes the "Over-exposed" shot from which I'm retrieving the most information (see my earlier post). With those shots that I'm shooting from a tripod, it's also giving me the opportunity to construct HDR images and I'm steadily learning how to get the best out of those compiled files. For some excellent tutorials on HDR constructions, take a look at the Chromasia Photoshop Tutorials.

Tags: hdr

There were several award-winners at the Jason Friend Photography Ltd. Purbeck Photo Workshop I ran today. Not least of these were the eight participants who braved gale-force winds and torrential rain to join me for a day in and around Swanage. So thanks Fran, Tom and Alex for being so upbeat throughout our rain-soaked adventure. Thanks to Sue C. and Sue T. for persevering with your cameras even as the waves crashed dangerously nearby. Thanks too to Brian, whose cheery smile seemed to grow wider as the clouds grew greyer. And thanks to Yvonne and Lee-Ann for brushing off the appalling conditions as a mere inconvenience and for declaring "it's only rain, we can't do anything about it" as soon as they arrived. Without such positive attitudes the day could easily have become much more of a chore but it was a genuine pleasure spending the day with you all.

Also an award-winner was the indomitable Chiz who ably assisted me and whose presence was greatly appreciated by us all. Thanks for driving so far Chiz and thanks too to Chiz's husband Ruben for providing a dry shelter in the form of a campervan at the start of the day.

There were unexpected award-winners in the Swanage Pier cafe (below) who sold us warming teas and coffees and who allowed us not only to dry off but also to carry out an impromptu Photo Challenge in the cafe and adjoining Amusement Arcade and Museum.

Lastly, the appropriately named "Bafta" and "Oscar" are given award-winning status for behaving so perfectly and for soldiering on through the wind and rain with their two-legged owners. My hearty congratulations and thanks to you all.



Inside the Swanage Pier Cafe

Tom gets to grips with a Photo Challenge

Waiting for the train to depart - Swanage

Taking up a position in rain-soaked Corfe Castle Station
If you are interested in future (and hopefully dryer) Photo Workshops then please sign-up for my Newsletter. Recipients of the Newsletter will hear about future events before they are published online and will receive priority booking status. You can also keep up to date with the latest news at Jason Friend Photography Ltd. where you'll see details of future workshops.

Tags: workshops, dorset

Google Maps now offers Street View for certain US locations. For those of us who'd be just as happy reading an Ordnance Survey map as a good novel, the recent advances in mapping technology have been amazing. Once upon a time the technology was limited to the legend in the corner of the map where you could remind yourself whether a cross with a circle was a church with a spire or a tower.
Now it's possible to zoom into your chosen location and to see a photo of the street. You can turn around, follow the road in any direction and even zoom in to read a sign by the side of the road. I took a quick drive around Manhattan this morning, pausing outside Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue before heading south into Greenwich Village to check out the parking situation outside my favourite cheese shop on Bleecker.

It looks like somebody drove up and down Manhattan's streets with some kind of 360 degree camera strapped to the roof of their car, taking a snap every few metres. Interestingly, although there are Street Views available on Google Maps for New York, San Francisco, Philadelphia and many other US cities, Washington has been left off the map, so to speak.

No doubt there'll soon be a Street View operation in the UK and I'll be keeping an eye out for the Google Street View Van so I can rush to the window and gurn for the camera.

Tags: google maps

I'm occasionally contacted by students and keen amateur photographers seeking tips and advice about travel photography. People often send links to their online web galleries and I'm invariably impressed with the quality of the work. So much so that I frequently wonder why they're contacting me and feel like I have just as many questions to ask them. I've had lots of help from photographers far busier and far more experienced than I am so I hope I can continue the cycle by passing on what little knowledge I have. I've posted an FAQ to answer some of the more common questions and hopefully by referring to this it will keep my answers consistent!

Of all the web galleries I've received in recent weeks, none have impressed me more than Mitchell Kanashkevich's. Mitchell wrote to me a couple of weeks ago seeking some advice and was thoughtful enough to include a link to his work. And I'm glad that he did. His images of the Tamangs of Thuman are exquisite. I think they show some real sensitivity and it seems that he's very at home in this environment. I think the measure of a great picture is one that you look at and silently wish you'd taken. That's how I feel about his study of a mother and son preparing dinner. The lighting is obviously very atmospheric but the way it falls on the ladles hanging from the wall is what I love most.

Take a look through the rest of Mitchell's galleries and I know you'll feel that it was time well spent.

Whilst we're talking about other photographers, you should also keep up to date with Tewfic El-Sawy's blog, which has become the source of an almost daily fix of commercial and editorial travel photography. I'm going to Bhutan with Tewfic later in the year and, amongst others, I'll be taking a copy of Mitchell's photo to provide additional inspiration whilst I'm there.

Tags: nepal

Prompted by a conversation with some of my friends from Winchester Photographic Society, I've given myself a couple of hours today to perform some software testing. Our conversation began as a general question about the way digital camera sensors record information but the answer made me want to re-examine the process to see if I'm getting the very best out of my digital files.

Let me start by saying that my testing is in no way scientific and there may be some of you who spot obvious errors in my reasoning or the process that I've followed. You'll be correct. I'm not a technical guru, I'm a photographer. One of my favourite analogies is to draw comparisons between photographers and musicians and in the same way that a musician doesn't really need to know the exact process used to make their instrument to be able to play a decent tune, it isn't essential for a photographer to understand digital workflow in order to take a decent picture.

However, an appreciation of the mechanics of the trumpet or the oboe, or an understanding of the dynamics of acoustics will, I'm sure, help the musician to be more "in tune" with their performance and perhaps the same is true for photography. Maybe having a grasp of the mechanics of digital workflow will help a photographer get the very best out of his instrument. I guess, at the very least, it's not going to hurt. Read more...

Tags: lightroom, aperture, capture one, tutorials

Despite the regularity suggested by the title of this post, my "Photographer of the Month" is less likely to be a monthly proclamation than it is to occur when I feel sufficiently moved by a photographer's work to write a post about them.

In other words, there might be another tomorrow or there may not be one 'til next April. What can I say? I'm unpredictable.

I've been a fan of David Noton's work for a long time and a fan of his unassuming manner since I read the first two sentences on his web site bio, "Born 1957 in England, my parents immediately snapped into action and emigrated to California. I followed cunningly disguised as a burbling infant."

David is probably better known for his landscape photography than anything else but his portfolio boasts some lovely travel images too. He makes his home in Dorset, which is always a good measure of a man.

He's recently released a DVD in association with Lee Filters and I have to say that's it's a really nice production. Apart from some vignetting on the movie camera work (always check the frame edge to edge!) and the occasional appearance of a fluffy microphone boom it's a professional production and David is a very relaxed and informative presenter. The DVD shows him at work in various locations in southern England and he discusses the basics of lighting, composition and exposure. If you're familiar with Glastonbury Tor, St. Michael's Mount or the New Forest then you'll enjoy seeing how David scouts his locations and then photographs them at their very best by waiting for the ideal light.

There are a few brief clips available online which will give you a flavour but if you're a keen photographer and want to see a professional at work then for twenty quid, it's money well spent.

I'm also going to write something about Lee Filters in the next couple of weeks so keep an eye out for that.

Tags: photography

I don't think I've heard anything funnier for a long time than Stephen Fry talking about his loathing for dancing "I hate that slovenly mixture of sexual exhibitionism, strutting contempt and repellent narcissism that it involves" in the second of his recent podcasts, or "podgrams" as he uniquely calls them.

So it was with great delight that I noticed his most recent podgram appear in my iTunes playlist this morning. Once downloaded I took a break from the office to take a walk to Sainsburys, going the long way round in order to allow time to hear Stephen's latest rant in full. You have to love Stephen Fry and if you don't then there's clearly something wrong with you. You have to admire the unashamed manner (if not the sound) with which he spends much of the first five minutes of the broadcast coughing into the microphone. You have to admire the way he returns to the microphone after a break mid-way through the podcast and apologises for the background sound of a toilet cistern filling up. It's all very normal and natural and every-day yet simultaneously flighty and fanciful and other-worldy.

He talks about one of his favourite subjects in this Podcast, Oscar Wilde, and paints the sort of glorious metaphor that we love him for. He suggests that our view of Oscar Wilde is similar to the view of the Empire State Building that you get when looking through the rear window of a taxi speeding down Fifth Avenue at night when the lights are all green. The building seems to grow more in stature the further away you get, much like our appreciation of Wilde has increased as the years have passed by. It's now 108 years since Wilde's death and in the taxi metaphor we're probably approaching Washington Square in terms of our perspective of the man.

I can't even begin to do the thing justice. Subscribe to Stephen Fry's podcasts and revel in the frippery.

Tags: stephen fry, podcasting

There's a very comprehensive review of X-rite's new "Color Munki" over at northlight-images' web site. Despite getting off to a dodgy start by spelling both "colour" and "monkey" incorrectly, the nice people at X-rite seem to have produced a tool with a host of useful functions. Not only will the Munki (seriously, we have to call it this?) calibrate your monitor for you, it will also calibrate projectors, printer output and read spot-colours from almost anything.

I like the idea of the digital pouch application that alerts clients if they're viewing an image on a system that hasn't been colour managed. It's all very well setting up your own monitor very carefully but as soon as your image files have been burned to a DVD or e-mailed to a client they're in no-man's land and the results could look hideous in the wrong environment.

At first glance the ColorMunki seems to have had some serious thought put in at the design stage and the resulting hardware appears smart and almost Apple-like in its finish. The little neoprene pouch looks funky too and it seems that the whole set-up would easily squeeze into the corner of a suitcase. So it might be that I can start taking a profiler with me when I travel. Whatever next?

If a ColorMunki comes my way I'll post a review of it and make a comparison to the X-rite Monaco Optix that I'm currently using.

Tags: colour profiling

If you visit the evrium web site this month, one of the photos at the top of their home page will look familiar to you. My photograph of Susmita, which currently graces the top of this blog page, was selected as a runner-up in their monthly photo competition. Susmita is the daughter of Finjo, my Nepalese porter and guide and was taken in the kitchen of their home in the Langtang region of Nepal. Congratulations to Steve, Mathias and Anders who were also runners-up and particularly to Nicole Gibson who scooped first prize.

Tags: competitions

I have a strategy for recording things that I want to do. It works. I'm reminded of everything.

Eventually.

Sometimes I'll just write a note in my diary, which means at the very latest I'll see it at the end of December when I look back through the year. Post-its are pretty good as I've taken to buying bright green and orange ones and I leave them where they overlap pages so they'll stick out of the pile on my desk. When I'm feeling especially technical I'll record an audio memo on my phone or take a quick snapshot with the phone's built-in camera. Taking pictures is very useful when I'm in a bookshop and see a book that I want to look for on Amazon later. The audio memos and photos are automatically synchronised with my Mac when I plug the phone in. It's very high-tech and tremendously efficient. Providing I remember to look into the sync folder.

I rarely look into the sync folder.

When I see web sites that I want to spend more time looking at later I'll drag the link onto my desktop. This is perfect because having more than five icons on my desktop sends me into an Obsessive Compulsive panic I end up going back to those pages pretty soon so that I can bin the icon. Sometimes I'll stick a note into the Google Notebook application for reviewing later and I found this morning that although it might take some time to reappear, it will come back to me eventually.

This unnecessarily long introduction was by way of explaining that I first saw an article discussing Model releases in May 2007 and copied the link into my Google Notebook for immediate inclusion into my blog. And so here we are, stretching the definition of the word "immediate".

Model releases are a tricky thing although I know that my travel images will have a greater potential market if they are accompanied by a release from the people I've photographed. I've never carried Model Release forms with me when I've photographed overseas although I have when on assignment in the UK. Perhaps it's because I know that it will often be difficult for me to give an adequate explanation of what the implications of signing the form are to my subjects and I don't want to feel that I've taken advantage. However, that's a pretty weak argument if you're taking photos anyway. I think having a local guide who can communicate effectively will help and I know that I really ought to at least carry Model Release forms with me in future.

Having said that, the piece in the article that resonated most strongly with me and which seems to fit most closely with my own approach is this discussion with Victor Englebert.

When I asked Englebert how to cope with the fact that I sometimes feel like I owe my subjects something in return for their time-and for making it possible to earn a living as a photographer-his advice was simple: "Just be nice, and they won't expect anything from you." He added that it is important to "avoid giving anything in return for the pictures you take except for a smile, a handshake or a hug, and your gratitude, otherwise it will soon become a terrible burden. If your subject is poor and has been good to you, give him or her some money, and be done with it. But don't overdo it, or soon no one will be allowed to take pictures of anyone without paying first, as is happening in many African countries."

The subject of whether or not to try to get model releases signed is a tricky one and, like most things, depends on the individual photographer's approach and especially perhaps to the style of photography. Images with a very obvious editorial feel might rarely be suitable for more commercial work anyway so perhaps the added burden of trying to get model releases is not worth the effort. I'm going to go with the "play it by ear" school of model releases in future and will ask for signatures when I can be confident that my subject understands what they're being asked to sign and why.

I've copied the article to my own site (click the read more link) in case it's ever removed from the MacTribe web site as it's a valuable piece and well worth returning to. In about a year's time probably. However, do please visit the MacTribe site to read the article in full.

Read more...

Tags: model releases

Just to round off my earlier post about this web site and the software that I use to construct it, when I'm done there are a few checks that it's worth making to ensure that your hard work is being received at the other end in the form that you expect. So here are a couple of web sites that I use to make those checks.

• Browsershots - produces a screen shot of your site as it appears in various browsers with different screen sizes, resolutions etc.
• Sitescan - checks your web pages for correct setup of Google Analytics
• Feedvalidator - checks that your RSS and Atom feeds are properly formatted
• W3 Validator - checks to see if your HTML has valid markup

Lastly, to get some idea of who is visiting your site and what they're doing whilst they're there, I use:

• Google Analytics - the ubiquitous visitor analysis tool
• Feedburner - for information about readers of your news feeds

Tags: web site

So, I've taken a very quick look at the Adobe Lightroom V.2 Beta and there are some excellent things, some unexpected things and a couple of disappointments. Overall, I'd say that it's another step towards making Lightroom an indispensable application for most photographers and, perhaps more importantly, a step towards eliminating the need to have any other image processing, workflow or asset management software.

I'm not going to use the Beta full-time as it's still a little buggy and I'm hoping that a couple of the things I saw as oversights might yet make it into the final release. Whether they do or not, I would think the upgrade will be well worth the £9.99 that Adobe are going to be charging. Wait! What's that? You think it will be more than £9.99? Seriously? I'll bet you a Tall Chai Latte that I'm right.

Here are my first and somewhat hurried impressions:

Likes

• Importing images seems much quicker.
• Filtering is much more intuitive and the ability to create custom filters based on dates, location, EXIF or IPTC data will be useful. The filter tool is much more accessible in the interface too.
• Smart Collections are wonderful and I've just realised that I can create a set of Smart Collections that will show my images at the various stages of my workflow. So I can have a Smart Folder for images just imported, another for ones with keywords applied, another for when location and GPS info has been added etc. etc. My images will automatically move through the Smart Filters as I process them and I'll never need to wonder what stage in my workflow an image has reached. (further inspection reveals that I've over-egged this one and that a lot of the things I expected to see aren't available. I nearly moved this into "Glitches" but decided that I liked the Smart Collections enough, even without some of the more obvious inclusions, to leave it here).
• Post-crop vignetting allows a vignette to be applied, as you might guess, after cropping. This wasn't possible in V.1.
• The addition of a function to add exported images to the catalogue might seem like a small thing but the implications are quite significant. Currently, I use iView (or Expression Media as it has become) to manage my incoming and outgoing images. It's going to be easier now to get Lightroom to manage the full library and it's another step towards Lightroom becoming the be all and end all of digital workflow management software.
• The ability to apply a small amount of sharpening to exported images

Glitches

• Lightroom doesn't like being moved around Mac "Spaces" and seems to relaunch the Finder
• I wasn't able to open V.1 catalogues and couldn't import V.1 catalogues into V.2. I think this will simply require V.1 catalogues to be upgraded.
• Ouch! Rendering 1:1 previews was very slow and processor-hungry. It seemed to take longer to render previews than in V.1 although that's not a scientific test and rendering hogged the processor like a selfish child with a new teddy.
• Using full-screen mode the second monitor display turns on and off and on and off and on...
• Although you can view an image in a second monitor, it's not possible to make changes here, you still have to use the first monitor and the changes are rendered after application. This seems like a half-way house to me. The point of having a second monitor is that you want to be able to make changes directly into it. This is a disappointment.
• When building a Smart Collection it's possible to look for images where "Keywords" = "are empty" but there's no "are empty" option for "Caption" or "Title". Surely an oversight. Also, with one keyword added the "are empty" criteria obviously returns nil but there should be an option to search for "Keywords" = "less than 20 words" or "less than 200 characters" or something similar.
• the "Stack with Original" checkbox inside the Export dialogue remains stubbornly greyed-out

I found that looking at the V.2 Beta left me feeling alternately impressed and disappointed. No release is ever going to offer all of the things that you might desire and Lightroom is still far and away the best, most used, most time-saving and least dispensable piece of software on my Mac but the inability to alter things directly on a second screen seems like a missed opportunity and the limitation of the Smart Collections seems like another function that could have offered even more than it does.

Having said that, the improvements to the interface are welcome, the localised adjustments will mean the I open up Photoshop even less than I do now and the little "Add to catalog" button in the Export dialogue is another nail in the coffin of iView from my point of view.

I'd recommend looking at the Lightroom 2 videos that have been posted to lightroomuser.com and also suggest Matt Kloskowski's Lightroom Killer Tips podcast if you're a regular Lightroom user.

But now I have to return my attentions to Lightroom V.1 to do some real work. There's no rest for the you know who.

Tags: lightroom

I realise that being excited about the release of a software upgrade might be considered a little sad and yes, I probably need to get out more. However, Adobe Lightroom has become such a large part of my daily workflow now that the announcement of the Public Beta release of version2 of the software was greeted with a raised eyebrow and a pause for a celebratory cup of tea in this office. Yes, celebrations are low-key in my world but the inner excitement is volcano-like and here now are my eruptions:

• Localized (sic) Corrections. That's dodging and burning to you and me. Non-destructive manipulation of certain parts of an image without needing to open photoshop
• Multiple Monitor Support - At long last I can take full advantage of multiple monitors and be able to view an image on my big monitor with the toolbars out of the way. This is going to be a BIG bonus.
• Better Photoshop Integration - The ability to export images as Smart Objects. Cool!
• Smart Collections - Not sure how these will work yet but I assume we'll be able to make collections based on certain criteria, dates, exif data, locations perhaps. Smart Collections by location, if I weren't so keen to project a demure exterior I'd admit to salivating.
• Keyword Suggestions - Lightroom will, apparently, start to suggest keywords when new words are added. Spooky!

OK, so the download has finished and I need to go and test it out. I'll report back with my findings later in the day.

Download the Public Beta of Lightroom 2
Lightroom 2 Discussion Forums
More info on Jack Nack's Blog

Tags: lightroom

I was in Swanage at the weekend. On Saturday it rained. And rained and rained. I wasn't disheartened though because Swanage is a magical place in any weather, as every Freya knows.

The forecast for Sunday was even worse. I was expecting torrential downpours and gusts if wind so strong that one's toupee might have required guy-ropes. I packed my waterproof gear, sturdiest boots and prepared for the worst. So it comes as something of a surprise to be writing this with the tingle of sunburn on my forehead.

I met up with Anne & Zoe, two friends from Winchester Photographic Society, at least one of whom must have been much better in a former life that they are in their current one as they were blessed with the sort of weather that we usually associate with the best that June, July or August can offer.

It was a beautiful, beautiful day and we managed to walk from the Scott Arms in Kingston all the way to Chapman's Pool and back to Swanage along the coastal path, taking an essential detour inland for a beer and a pasty at the Square and Compass, officially now known as the Best Pub in the World.

Beautiful weather, wonderful scenery, stimulating company. If I'd had someone to carry all the wet-weather gear I was lugging around it would have been the very definition of a perfect day.

The photo shows the lighthouse near Durlston and is my contribution to the "Black and White" mini-challenge that we had amongst oursleves.

Tags: workshops

The free desktop wallpaper for April shows a scene in Marrakech, Morocco. Click on the image above to go to the download page and to read a little more about this image.

Tags: wallpaper