Archive for the ‘Photography’ Category

Author exhibitions at MoMA, new books, and upcoming events

Published by Megan O. Read, author relations manager | Friday, March 19th, 2010

Currently on display at the Museum of Modern Art in New York is the work of lynda.com author and interactive designer Brendan Dawes. The Cinema Redux project is part of the Action! Design over Time exhibition. This is Brendan’s second time exhibiting at MoMA. In 2008, Cinema Redux was featured in the groundbreaking exhibition Design and the Elastic Mind at MoMA. Two Cinema Redux pieces have since been acquired for the MoMA collection. A limited edition print from Cinema Redux is available from Coudal.

Cinema Redux of Vertigo (1958, Alfred Hitchcock), by Brendan Dawes.

An excerpt from the new book from James Ball and Matt Gottshalk, and lynda.com authors Robbie Carman and Richard Harrington, From Still to Motion is available for a sneak peek. lynda.com author Ian Robinson and his wife Lisa shot most of the photography for this fascinating book on creating video with your Digital SLR. This book is available for pre-order on Amazon.

Drupal instructor Tom Geller is giving an online, all-day Drupal workshop on March 29th from 9am-5PM (CT). For more information, check out Tom’s blog, or sign up here—lynda.com blog readers get 10% off!

Join Anne Marie Concepcion for her InDesignSecrets seminar on Thursday March 25th in Secaucus, NJ at 9am (EST). If you can’t make the New Jersey date, check out the rest of the North American tour dates.

The CMS Expo in Chicago is coming up on May 3-5, and Joomla! Expert Jen Kramer is a featured speaker, and Core CMS Track Leader at the 2010 CMS Expo. Details and registration information available here.

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Digital SLR trends and the convergence of photography, video, and audio

Published by Jim Heid, associate content director/Photoshop and photography | Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

I shot this with my new Nikon D3S using an ISO speed of 8000. Shooting with high ISO speeds puts photos at risk for a bit of digital noise, but they allowed me to capture this fast-moving performer without blur, without flash, and without a tripod. Dreamy.

I bought a new camera recently: a Nikon D3S. I’d been reading all about the D3S and similar cameras, and decided that I had to experience their capabilities for myself. It would be good for my job as a photography content manager here at lynda.com, I reasoned, and it would be more fun than paying my mortgage.

It turns out I was right on both counts, though my mortgage holder has yet to weigh in.

(more…)

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Chris Orwig book signing in Santa Barbara this week

Published by Megan O. Read, author relations manager | Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

Meet lynda.com author Chris Orwig at his book signing this week.

Today on Chris Orwig’s blog, the lynda.com author announced that he will be signing his recent book, Visual Poetry—A Creative Guide For Making Engaging Digital Photographs, on Thursday, February 4th from 5-8 p.m. at the Cota St. Gallery, 23 East Cota Street, in Santa Barbara, CA.

From comparing poetry and photography, to giving practical photography tips and techniques, the book features a multitude of extraordinary photographers as ‘guest speakers’ that include John Sexton, Douglas Kirkland, Chris Rainier, Todd Glaser, and many more.

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Master your compact camera with our latest live-action course

Published by Jim Heid, associate content director/Photoshop and photography | Thursday, January 28th, 2010

In Chapter 1, Getting the Most Out of the Lens, Derrick shows us how to use sunglasses as a polarized filter.

Compact, point-and-shoot cameras are getting better and better. They’re also getting more complex, sporting features that give you the kind of creative options that were once the exclusive domain of bulky, expensive cameras.

With our latest course, Getting Professional Results from a Compact Camera, photographer Derrick Story shows you how to master your camera’s exposure settings, control its flash, and squeeze every bit of performance out of its optics. Go on-location as Derrick shoots everything from panoramas to macros to nighttime shots, then return to the computer and see how to make them look their best.

This course is one of a growing series of live-action courses that we’re publishing. The world is about more than software, and we’re working hard to bring it to you. In our Photo Assignment courses, we take you on location to learn how to shoot natural light portraits, master fill flash, and conquer tricky backlight situations. (more…)

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Photoshop Top 40 Countdown with Deke McClelland: #12 – Camera Raw

Published by Crystal McCullough, executive editor | Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

Camera Raw is an independent application that lets you develop your raw photographs and exploit every byte of the vast information captured by your digital SLR camera. Not just powerful, it is a force unto itself. In this week’s Photoshop Top 40 Countdown, Deke shows us how to tap into its many features.

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Improve online sales with professional product photography

Published by Crystal McCullough, executive editor | Monday, January 4th, 2010

In Product Photography for E-Commerce, designer Dane Howard shows how to take professional-looking photographs that showcase products and build buyers’ trust. Using a practical approach, Dane covers objects from collectible coins to real estate, and the lessons can be applied to just about anything that can be sold online.

When it comes time to capture images in the studio, Dane discusses how to select a camera and other equipment on any budget. He shares his favorite tips and tricks for getting the most out of camera angles, backgrounds, and scene lighting. He reviews image editing basics, such as cropping and retouching photographs, and explains how to take a presentation beyond a 360-degree view with the integration of rich media.

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lynda.com author Derrick Story in the booth, on location, and on film

Published by Megan O. Read, author relations manager | Friday, December 11th, 2009

The talented Derrick Story has been recording in and around Ventura this week working on a new lynda.com course about getting professional results from a compact camera. Here are a few snapshots I took of him while hard at work on his project:

DerrickStory

A few stills of "author booth life" taken with a Fujifilm Instax Mini 7S.

Yesterday Derrick shared an inside look at his work with lynda.com and how recording live on location can keep you on your toes on his site thedigitalstory.com. Get the scoop on his experience with us, as well as all sorts of cool camera reviews, photography tips, and more.

If you have missed any of Derrick’s lynda.com courses, now is a great time to log in and catch up. And we encourage you to join the Flickr groups, peruse the existing photos, and add your own shots to the groups that accompany his lynda.com photo assignment courses here: Natural Light Portrait Photo AssignmentBacklit Portrait Photo AssignmentFill Flash Portrait Photo Assignment. Let us know what you think!

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Learn Lightroom 3 from Photographer Chris Orwig

Published by Jim Heid, associate content director/Photoshop and photography | Wednesday, November 18th, 2009

lightroom

The computer industry is usually a secretive place. Companies keep their product plans to themselves, and all product discussions take place under the Cone of Silence from TV’s Get Smart.

That’s one reason why Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 is a breath of fresh air. Adobe has made a prerelease version of its popular photo-management and photo-enhancement software available for free downloading. Curious to see what’s new? Grab the beta preview and try it.

But how do you learn it? By diving into Photoshop Lightroom 3 Beta Preview, a new lynda.com course from Chris Orwig, photographer and instructor at the Brooks Institute. It’s more than two hours of detailed instruction on all the new features in Lightroom 3’s beta version, and it includes comparisons that illustrate what has changed from Lightroom 2.

Chris will also be doing courses on the final version of Lightroom 3 next year. But why wait? Download the free public beta and dive into the next version of Lightroom right now.

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New photo assignment: Using backlighting to your photographic advantage

Published by Megan O. Read, author relations manager | Monday, October 26th, 2009
backlit

Derrick Story and his model, Denise Crosby, show us how to best use backlight, reflection, spot metering, and fill flash for stunning professional-quality photographs.

Derrick Story is at it again! He is bound and determined to make us better photographers, and his new series of Photo Assignment courses really do give us all an opportunity to strut our stuff.

The latest in his series is the new course, Photo Assignment: Backlit Portraits, Derrick show us how to achieve really interesting effects in a typically unintuitive shooting style—backlit. Check out his new courses, and then join me in posting pictures to his latest Flickr group, where we can all learn from each other.

Have fun shooting and see you all on Flickr.

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Your next photo assignment: Fill Flash Portraits with Derrick Story

Published by Megan O. Read, author relations manager | Wednesday, October 21st, 2009

derrickstoryblogimage

Derrick Story has just released another photo-assignment course on lynda.com with a show-and-tell Flickr component. This course, Photo Assignment: Fill Flash Portraits, explains the benefits of using flash photography outdoors in bright light in order to achieve great looking portraits in otherwise tricky bright light.

This technique will help you build off of what you learned in Derrick’s first Photo Assignment course, but is also a terrific stand-alone course to help you brush up on your photography when you are at daytime, outdoor events.

There is also a new Flickr group set up and ready for you. So get outside, grab your camera, and take some fill flash photography with us. Looking forward to seeing your work on the Fill Flash Portrait Photo Assignment Flickr group.

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