Selective Colorization

You've probably seen photos in which one color is kept (yellow for instance) while the remainder of the photo is turned to grayscale or Black & White. This editing technique has always intrigued me, and in truth, baffled me, until I recently learned how to do it myself in Lightroom (and realized it's relatively simple). By definition, selective colorization is "a post-processing technique where most parts of a photo are converted to black and white while some parts are left in color." The technique is utilized to draw he viewer's eyes to a particular part of a photograph; to make it "pop." I've found that this technique has brought new life and focus to some of my otherwise "busy" photos.

But then, does this go against my basic post-processing mantra - less is more? What really gets to me about post-processing is when the photographer tries to trick the viewer - when we have to ask ourselves, "Was this edited, or not?" Through selective colorization, I'm not trying to fool the viewer into thinking I took a better photograph than I really did. The photos are clearly edited. No one (at least, no one I know) sees the world in black and white with a splash of color here and there.

Maybe I'm just altering my theory in order to allow for my new favorite editing technique :)

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

tree eert

My goal, one day, is to take a reflection shot that blows the world away! Baby steps, baby steps.

:) Thanks for following us in our photographic journeys.

Brookside Gardens

My friend/photographer Ashley Kurzweil and I made a field trip to Brookside Gardens in Silver Spring, MD today.

We arrived around 2PM, on a mostly sunny day, and the lighting was perfect.

Here are a few shots from the adventure. There are some pretty cool flowers and plants in this world, and Brookside is a great place to go to visit them.

Small Actions, Big Results

A couple of weeks ago we were lucky enough to be contacted by Sarah Ause, fellow photographer and animal lover, who works for Best Friends Animal Society in Kanab, UT. You know all those photos of the cute kittens and pups that need to be adopted? She took them. Are we a little jealous that she has the best job in the world? Yes. For those who don't know, Best Friends is one of our preferred charities and Lauren and I actually visited them briefly while traveling this summer. We're already planning a trip back and hope to volunteer for a couple weeks.

Anyway, we've become e-friends (did I just coin that term?) with Sarah and she's been giving us a ton of tips related to improving our photo skills. She's really talented, and self-taught, which we love. She also offered to make a post about Photos That Give on the Best Friends Facebook fan page. While a seemingly small gesture, I knew this could be big for us. Best Friends has over 125,000 fans, all of whom received a PTG shout out on their news feed yesterday afternoon.

We've gotten over 1,000 visitors to our website (so far) from all over the world! Seriously - Africa, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, South and Central America, Canada, Asia, etc etc etc. We've added 50 fans to our Facebook page (and at only 175 or so fans, that's a big jump), and we've even made a couple sales. But most importantly, we're connecting with people who are interested in and support our mission - getting e-mails from other photographers, comments on photos, and justification that what were doing makes sense. Having someone say "Hey, I think you're doing a good thing" is just as good as making a sale.

So thanks Sarah, and everyone else at Best Friends, for helping us spread the word about our mission. Hopefully it leads to bigger donation checks from us in the coming months.

Impossible is Nothing

If you've followed our blog over the past couple months you know that I had my first Canon Rebel DSLR, along with 3 lenses, stolen out of my truck this summer while we were traveling cross-country. I filed a police report, called local pawn shops (in Tracey, CA), and scoured Craigslist postings for my gear, all to no avail. But maybe it's too early to give up hope. Check out this article.

National Geographic Photo of the Month: Cockfight

by Ario Wibisono

Suradita Village, West Java, Indonesia (2010). Children playing with their roosters. Actually it was not a real cockfight because the roosters didn't wear blades on their feet. Children like to play this game because they almost never have toys in their life.

Letting the Cat Out of the Bag

Royal is a good lookin' cat. That's really all there is to say about that.

Photoshopped or Not

Last night my friend e-mailed me a link to a photo from someone's Flickr gallery with the question: "Was this photoshopped?"

Since I don't have the permission of the photographer to use his photo I'm not going to post the image or share the link, so bear with me in my description.

I'm not going to lie - I've gotten so used to admiring highly processed photos that I've almost come to accept them as real and kick myself for not producing images of the same quality. So before I answered my friend's question I had to think about it logically.

Let's look at this photo for a second. First of all, it's a great shot. The sky is interesting. The tree is exceptional. It's framed well. Then I started breaking down the photo. I've seen clouds. I've seen blue sky. But I've never seen blue clouds, as they appear in this photo. Then I looked at the grass: neon green? Neon yellow? And there appears to be a spotlight of sunshine around the tree, which seems unlikely with that level of cloud cover.

I quickly came to the conclusion that this photo had been created using HDRI, a method in which multiple exposures are used to create a wide dynamic range between the lightest and darkest areas of an image. It's pretty cool - and the results are, well, unreal (literally).

I'm not writing this post to bash people who use HDRI or other methods of post-processing (see previous post on my experiences with Lightroom). I truly believe that as consumers of digital photography we have skewed perceptions and expectations of what is real. I recently saw a highly touted (by photography forum members) photo that depicted the most surreal purple sunset. I thought, "Wow, what a fantastic moment - this photographer was really lucky to capture that." And then I realized that the water had a purple tint. As well as the grass. And the branches and leaves on the trees. The whole photo had a purple tint and in all likelihood there wasn't even a hint of purple in the sky that day. But we're so awed by these images that we don't stop to think that maybe, just maybe this wasn't how the scene truly presented itself.

And that's why I respect photographers who accurately portray what they see through the lens. A photo that I know is real. Photographers who spend more time more pre-shutter release than post exposure. Who don't try to fool the viewer into seeking out a scene they'll never be able to recreate because it doesn't exist. Being true to the scene while still creating an interesting image is the real skill. That's the kind of photographer I want to be.

Editing in Lightroom

I have Adobe Lightroom installed on my computer, but in truth, I have no idea how to use it. I import, I export, and I have no clue where the files are going. There are endless sliders with titles that mean nothing to me. Aside from contrast, brightness, and saturation I might as well be reading Japanese. To the best of my understanding Lightroom is used mostly to edit color and light, while Photoshop takes it a step further by allowing users to add/move/remove entire objects, among other things.

While I have no desire to become a post-processing wizard, cropping out objects and pretending they were never there, I wouldn't mind learning some basic skills to improve the quality of my photos. For instance, sometimes I'll trash an otherwise solid photo because one area is under or over exposed. And up until now, the only way I've known to try to adjust that is by changing the exposure, which affects the entire frame and doesn't really help. However, Lightroom allows the user to adjust "Fill Light" or "Blacks" - enhancing just the areas that need work, which can salvage a shot. You can brighten a dark area without making the already bright areas too bright. And you can darken a bright area without making the already dark areas too dark. There's also a slider titled "Recovery" which saves (recovers?) otherwise lost dark areas and diminishes overblown highlights. How it does this? No clue.

Here is an image of my friend Adam that I edited in about 5 minutes this morning in Lightroom. Honestly, if it takes more time that that it's not worth it to me. I changed the color scheme (Sepia) and added some vignetting to draw the viewer's eye to the subject. I still think it's a little overexposed, but I'm just practicing at this point so I'm not too worried about it.

Don't worry, this isn't the beginning of me over-processing my images and becoming obsessed w/ every little detail. I think I just have to me more opened-minded to the benefits of some minimal, yet quality, post-processing.

Searching for Inspiration

Sometimes there's no way around it: Maryland is ugly.

Okay, not the entire state. But most of it. When you live in the suburbs it's hard to find inspiration. For us there are basically 3 options:

1. Metro or drive into the city (D.C.)

2. Head north to the country

3. Stay in our apartment and take endless pictures of our dog and cat

While I never truly get tired of 3, yesterday I opted for 2.

My friend and fellow photographer, Adam Bank, picked me up and we headed toward Poolesville, a suburb of D.C. nonetheless, but much more country than Rockville. And we actually found some pretty interesting spots. Old family-run businesses no longer doing business. Homeless kittens roaming the grounds. The remains of an old brick house of unknown origin. And a lock of the C&O Canal that seems largely unexplored that we will most certainly visit again.

Lauren and I were lucky enough to travel across the country this summer for nearly 2 months, hitting some of the most stunning places in America - inspiration calling to us from every corner. But when you're back in Maryland you have to get more creative. You have to get down on your elbows and knees and search for that interesting angle. You have to go out driving for miles searching for that tree that calls out to you, or that old, broken-down barn that begs to be framed just right. You have to keep your eyes open and you have to do the work. You have to be willing to go out shooting for hours knowing that you might come home without a single usable shot.

While these aren't my best, here a couple of the highlights from yesterday's outing.

rockin' the surburbs

Perhaps it's my lack of creativity, but it's hard to shoot in the burbs.

I was determined to get out and shoot today, but didn't feel like hopping on the metro to go downtown (I do that every day for work!) or getting in my car to explore one of my favorite places, downtown Frederick (driving around here sucks).

So, I threw my camera around my neck and walked out the door with no real destination.

I took pictures of train tracks; posters on telephone poles; even our apartment building.

I found myself snapping pictures without emotion.

Some of my best shots came out of very strong emotions, like my Street Dogs series.

Perhaps this is why I'm starting to get antsy about traveling again.

Sales

When you own a small business, making a sale is exciting. Especially when you're semi-pro photographers running the operation out of your over-crowded one bedroom apartment, and doing the majority of your marketing through Facebook, Twitter, and word-of-mouth. The most rewarding part about selling a print is knowing our art is hanging in someone else's home - someone we don't know. It's just cool.

When a sale comes in, we're excited to find out who bought it (do we know them or not?), where they live (are they in the DC area or someone else in the country), what photo(s) they purchased (was it one of mine or Lauren's?), and what size/finish they choose. It's interesting to see which photos are popular - sometimes it takes us by surprise.

The other day we got our first repeat buyer. It makes us feel legitimate. Someone liked our photos enough to take a chance and order a couple online, and loved them enough to go back to the site and order more. And that leads me to my final thought:

Thank you. For anyone who has made a purchase from Photos That Give, we truly appreciate it. We appreciate that you like our work, but we're even more thankful that you enable us to give back to all the organizations that make a difference.

The Making of "Simply Beautiful Photographs" - National Geographic book by Annie Griffiths

Photos That Give's first field trip was to National Geographic in D.C. last week to attend a talk by Annie Griffith's, world famous nat geo photographer and author of nat geo's new book: Simply Beautiful Photographs.

The talk was inspiring and educational - Annie talked about what makes a photograph great: light, composition, and moment, just to name a few.

Watch this video for a condensed version of the talk, and to see some of the photographs included in the book.

Stay tuned for details on our next field trip!

Nat Geo Event: 10/26: Masters of Photography

National Geographic will be putting on a Masters of Photography event, starting next Tuesday, 10/26 and running until 12/08.

Here are the details on the first event of the 3-part series "Capturing Beauty"

October 26, 2010
Time 7:30 p.m.
Price NG Member: $16 (series: $42); General Public: $18 (series $48)
Address:
1600 M Street, NW
Washington, D.C. (Farragut North/West Stops on the Red Line).

I've been going to National Geographic events at their Auditorium for years now. They always have photographs on display, and their events are always unique, educational, adventure-filed, and inspiring.

Here's a brief description of the 10/26 event:
For the new book National Geographic Simply Beautiful Photographs, veteran photographer Annie Griffiths plumbed the Society’s Image Collection to select the finest photographs from its legendary archive. The result? A spellbinding visual journey…from stunning landscapes and magnificent wildlife…to fascinating cultures and rarely visited destinations. Spend an evening with Griffiths as she recounts the stories behind the images, and explains the critical qualities necessary to create beauty in a photograph.

If you'd like to join me next Tuesday, please send an email to: photosthatgive@gmail.com.

kitty nose.

Royal posed for me before I headed to work this morning.

I hear cats are typically elusive and sneaky, and play hard to get. Not Royal. He sat and glared directly into my lens.

This was the best shot of the shoot. I like it because the focal point is his pink nose.

Photography Contest

We thought you may like to know about National Geographic's upcoming Photography Contest.

Here's the Scoop:
Deadline: November 30, 2010, 9:00:00 a.m. US Eastern Time
Entry Fee: $15 per entry.
Categories: People, Places, and Nature (no limit on # of entries per person).
Format: Digital
Date: Photos must have been taken within two years of submission date.

PTG wants to know what photos you think we should enter. Let us know by commenting on this post. Thanks!

Life in Color: Green, Green Photos -- National Geographic

Life in Color: Green, Green Photos -- National Geographic

Photos That Give Mascot: Royal

Last month, we blogged about our other Mascot, Donovan. We've got some pretty cute mascots, don't you think?

This was taken with my Droid Incredible as royal started to fall asleep in his favorite spot: 10 feet up, on top of our kitchen cabinets.

Help PTG Grow: Give us Feedback!

As an organization we are young, and getting press like we did today on D.C. Daily Candy really helps us grow.

We learn more about how to run our organization, including how to make it easier for visitors to navigate the PTG website, what style/type of photograph our visitors prefer, etc. and our motivation is to improve PTG in order to make substantial donations to charitable organizations.

We are so thankful for the support our visitors have given PTG, not only through photo sales, but through feedback as well. We'd love to hear from you.

Send us a message by clicking on the Photos That Give "contact us" link.

Thanks for Giving Back!

Photos That Give on D.C. Daily Candy!

Photos That Give is featured on today's "Here's The Plan" - a D.C. Daily Candy feature that comes out on Sundays with the scoop on area events and "diversions."

We are really excited about showing up on Daily Candy's radar. As a result of today's feature, Photos That Give is getting a tremendous amount of attention (photo sales and website visits, just to name a couple).

Below is the D.C. Daily Candy Blurb and the picture they chose to represent us.

HELP

Photos That Give
What: Purchase prints ($20-$85) by D.C.-based photographers Lauren Udwari and Josh Marans from the new online gallery, which donates 10 percent of all proceeds to charity.
Why: Color and black-and-white street scenes, desert landscapes, and farmers market close-ups benefit Vets Without Borders, Stop Hunger Now, Habitat for Humanity, and others.
When: There’s a blank space on your wall.
Where: Online at photosthatgive.com.

ghosting effect

I recently came across PhotoNotes.org, which claims to be the most comprehensive photographic glossary online.

Many of Photos That Give's followers, fans, and supporters are burgeoning photographers themselves, and so I thought I'd share this dictionary.

I'd always heard about a "ghosting effect" as it pertains to photography, and so I looked it up on PhotoNotes.

Ghost:

1. Glowing patches of light caused by lens flare.

2. Blurry ghost trails caused by camera motion or subject motion during the exposure.

The picture above comes from "Parkour in NYC Photos: How to Get the Shot" on National Geographic Adventure.

It's a good example of ghosting effect. Read the article to find out how the photographer created this effect.

Guilty as Charged

Our photo-hosting provider, Smugmug, has a pretty popular forum called Dgrin (or Digital Grin - Smugmug's logo is a grin...) in which photographers can get advice about gear, techniques, and all other things photography. Every now and then they host a "Mini Challenge" in which a forum user chooses a photo theme for a contest, and everyone can enter 3 photos pertaining to that theme. The winner gets to choose the theme for the next contest, judges the winners, and so on.

Being relatively new to the forum, I came across my first challenge about a month ago with the topic "Animal Attitude" which judged the photo's ability to show an animal's attitude, but also had to have solid photographic elements such as composition, lighting, etc. On a whim I scrambled through the PTG animal photos and made 3 selections. I thought at the least it would get us some exposure.

The contest ended on the last day of September, but I forgot to check the results...until today. And I was shocked to see that "Guilty as Charged" nabbed 2nd place out of hundreds of submissions! What does this mean for us? Well, not much. But it's great to get recognized and receive positive feedback about your photos. Here is what the judge said of the photo:

SECOND PLACE...
photosthatgive - Guilty as Charged
An attitude of guilt or shyness is on this dog's face and the composition of cropping, sepia tone, the moody lighting and depth of field is great! Bringing into focus the eyes which scream the theme! I personally would have cloned out the shiney tag on the dog's collar but no big deal.

Little does he know we don't use Photoshop and I wouldn't know the first thing about cloning out a dog collar. All the more reason to be proud of ourselves - we're beating out the Photoshoppers with our raw photos! (P.S. I took this photo indoors, handheld, in poor lighting when I was just learning how to use my first dSLR.)

I'll bask in this one for about 5 more minutes, then I have to go to work.

New York Mixed Martial Arts Initiative

My sister (Polly) and brother-in-law (Justin) recently started the New York Mixed Martial Arts Initiative (www.newyorkmma.com) which aims to create and continue after school MMA and self-defense programs for inner city high school students throughout New York and across the country. These programs serve as gang and violence alternatives for underprivileged youth while promoting self-disciple, confidence, fitness, and emotion well-being. Justin is also known in the sporting world as the Fight Lawyer, writing regularly on his blog which covers the legal aspects of Mixed Martial Arts, Boxing, and other contact sports.

Being the supportive brother that I am, I enlisted Lauren and myself to take photos of one such after school program in action on a recent visit up to NYC. These photos will be used at a fundraiser for the organization later this month (it's taking place in NYC - contact us if you'd like more information about attending). The photo shoot posed a challenge for us as we're not typically "event" photographers - we don't have much experience photographing people - especially quick, young people kicking, punching, and doing flips at full speed (in less than stellar lighting conditions). It was definitely a learning experience for us on many levels.

On our cab ride from 34th street to 105th, the cab driver tried endlessly to understand why we wanted to go to Spanish Harlem, seemingly trying to convince us not to go. The area had character - we met up with the director of the program, David Grodky, and I grabbed a corned beef sandwich, as good as any in New York City. Park East was about what we'd expected from an inner-city high school.

This was a particularly exciting day for the program participants as they were not only going to be photographed by real photographers, but they were also receiving MMA gear donated to the program by Everlast. At the start, the kids were about as uncertain about the situation as we were. Should they look at us? Should they pretend we aren't there? Should we tell them to pose a certain way? Should we only shoot naturally? But all that uncertainty disappeared when the kids started ripping into their new Everlast gear, each choosing a pair of MMA shorts, a moisture-wicking shirt, and a mold-able mouth guard. They quickly changed into their new gear and their faces lit up - they were striking fighting stances, flexing their muscles, giving each other five, laughing it up - imagine them, these kids who rarely have a good thing happen to them, now the centers of attention: getting new clothing, having their pictures taken - they were in heaven.

The rest of the shoot went smoothly as we watched the students in action, eager to show us their best moves. We saw take-downs, sparring with pads, and instruction on new techniques from their instructor/history teacher, Mr. Grodky. Lauren and I were excited to see such talented, motivated kids, clearly proud of the skills they've learned. We hope the pictures capture the camaraderie and sportsmanship exhibit by all the participants - they truly are learning more than just MMA techniques.

I wish we could share some of the photos now, but we're working on having the parents sign photo releases since almost all of the students are minors. We're looking forward to visiting the program again next time we're in New York, and hopefully by this time next year similar programs will be more widespread throughout the city.

Marketing...

...is a lot of work. People don't just find you on the internet. Facebook. Twitter. Blogs. Forums. Farmer's Markets. Newspapers. Magazines. Word of mouth. However, it feels good to know it's working - when you're getting hits on the website, having more people "like" you on Facebook, attracting followers on Twitter, and making more sales in general. It's motivation to keep working hard, even though it's challenging at times. Ultimately, we want Photos That Give to continue to expand:

1) so we can make more substantial donations to the charities we (and you) care about, and

2) so we have the financial means to keep dedicating a large portion of our time to PTG because, well, building this project from the ground up has been a lot of fun.

Photo Outing: Downtown Silver Spring and Brookside Gardens

We decided today would be a good day to shoot, so we drove around town with our cameras on our backs, looking for inspiration.

Here are a couple of keepers from today's outing to downtown Silver Spring and Brookside Gardens.

Photos That Give Mascot - Donovan!

Donovan is our border collie mix. Josh rescued him over five years ago, and they've been attached at the hip ever since. I suppose he kind of likes me too ;)

He's very photogenic - check out his shots on the pets section of the Photos That Give website.

I must admit I took this picture with my HTC Droid Incredible (gasp!) as we relaxed on the deck before maryland's notorious code red humidity made being outside unbearable.

So, now you've met Donovan. Our Mascot. Our buddy. And with out any doubt, the best dog ever.

Press Release: Photographers Will Donate 10% of All Proceeds to Charitable Organizations

Best Friends Animal Society. National Park Foundation. Habitat For Humanity. These are just a few of the charitable organizations receiving donations from D.C. Area photographers Lauren Udwari and Josh Marans, who launched Photos That Give on August 23, 2010.

“Our mission is to donate 10% of all photo proceeds to charitable organizations that mean something to us,” says Lauren Udwari, who fell in love with photography on a two month trip to Patagonia, Chile in 2009. She returned with dozens of photos of street dogs. Two months and one photography exhibit later, she had raised over $1000 for Vets Without Borders.

Josh Marans describes how the idea for Photos That Give was born: “The idea came to us as we were about to embark on a two month road trip across the country in June. We were trying to figure out a way to make a living doing what we love, while simultaneously giving back to the organizations we love. That’s how Photos That Give started.”

Photos That Give already has a strong presence online. In addition to their website, you’ll find them blogging regularly on their blog, posting on their Facebook page, and tweeting on Twitter. “It’s important to connect with your audience on as many levels as possible. The more outreach we do, the more sales we make, and the more we are able to donate” explains Josh.

Photos That Give aims to expand beyond the Internet this Fall. Look for their booth at the D.C. Eastern Market Flea Market in October. They’re also working to coordinate a Photo Exhibit and make their prints available at various stores and boutiques downtown.

For more information about Photos That Give, contact the photographers at photosthatgive@gmail.com or 301-531-GIVE.

a photo funny

courtesy of toothpaste for dinner comic site

Good News All Around

The website launched this morning and we're receiving awesome feedback from family, friends, and people who've heard about PTG through the grapevine. It comes to a point where you just have to put it out there and hope for the best - Lauren and I are both writers and wordsmiths (and slightly anal?), so we'd go back and forth, changing the verbiage, adding a comma here and there all hours of the day (and night - in fact, I do my best thinking in the shower), but now we're happy with the finished product. And we hope you are too. We're mostly excited to see which photo gets purchased first (Lauren swears it'll be one of mine, but she never gives herself enough credit) and to which charity the first donation will go.

I'm also excited because my new camera body arrived early this morning from our favorite camera store, B&H Photo and Video in NYC. If you don't know why I had to order a new camera see post below re: Smash & Grab. I've got a great new lens, a serviceable camera body, and am feeling inspired to take some new shots to add to our collection. Hopefully there'll be something on there you'd like to see hanging on your wall.

Ollie

Ollie has proven to be quite the subject for me this weekend, while I'm in charge of this little four-month-old golden doodle. His expressions are priceless, he poses with such patience and poise, and he's only peed in the house once.

BURST!

I'm not convinced that even the greatest photographers can will inspiration; creativity is not a readily available resource. Ideas can slowly creep to the surface (hibernating long enough to cause a bit of worry) or they can BURST! from your brain in an adrenaline-producing manner.

My inspiration came to me in burst form last night, as I walked to the Quarry-house in Silver Spring to meet a friend for beer before seeing The Kids Are All Right. The sky was gray and the streets wet from a recent rain. I was walking quickly toward my destination, head down, noticing a stream of fluorescent light from one of the stores I walked by.

It was a Barbershop. A black man sat in the chair, eyes closed, knees falling in opposite directions as the Barber shaved the graying hair off his head. That's when the burst happened. The scene was so appealing to me; almost moving. It was such an interesting, every-day representation of my city's culture. One man getting a routine hair cut, another doing his work to get by, and not another soul to crowd the frame. I wanted to preserve the image to share with someone else. And that, I think, is what photography is all about.

And so I would like to make a photographic series and call it "Barbershop." Although the subject is self-explanatory, I think it will provide me with many interesting sub-subjects: barbers, customers, kids, interesting shop spaces (walls, ceilings, floors), hair cutting supplies, and on and on and on.

Josh likes the idea. Of course this helps because he is my partner, and I know his perspective and endless supply of good ideas will enhance the project. Together we can put together an interesting collection of shots.

But can we do it? Can we capture not only what we're seeing but what we're feeling? Practice makes perfect, right? We're going for it.

Smash & Grab

This is a term I had never heard until someone smashed two of my truck windows overnight in Tracy, CA (a suburb of San Fran) and snatched up my camera, 3 lenses, and all accompanying accessories. Of course, I could have avoided this by not leaving $2500+ worth of camera gear in the truck while we were sleeping soundly in our Fairfield Inn hotel room. Luckily we had both of our laptops and all of Lauren's camera gear inside with us. A slight downer to an otherwise successful cross-country adventure.

I'll let Lauren write an overview in a later post because she's better at that kind of stuff, but for now I'll just say the trip was amazing. We drove over 14,000 miles during a 6-week, coast-to-coast trip which included two border crossings into Canada, nearly two dozen National Parks, a number of State Parks (and RV Parks for that matter), getting pulled over twice (with two verbal warnings), and way too much McDonald's and Subway.

The good news is that I had recently backed up my photos to my laptop before my camera was stolen, so Lauren and I will be adding a number of our x-country shots to the Photos That Give library over the next couple of days. Although I'm currently camera-less, we're committed to getting PTG up and running within the next week or two which includes finalizing a logo, adding a few more charities, and making the last few tweaks to the website.

We're looking forward to the launch and hope our most recent photos will inspire everyone to explore the diverse landscapes of our country.

hee hee

acadia national park and the challenges of landscape photography

It's been just over a week since Josh and I left for two months of cross-country driving. We've got several beautiful New England towns in the rear view mirror, including Cambridge (MA), North Conway (NH), Freeport and Camden (ME), and one National Park: Acadia.

We had been anticipating Acadia as much for its backpacking as its opportunities for taking landscape shots. Although we explored the park for days, taking pictures all day, every day, we sit here in Montreal, looking at our photos wondering why they aren't better...more powerful...sharper.

Josh, keener on landscape photography, did some research and came across some helpful hints, found here:
http://digital-photography-school.com/11-surefire-tips-for-improving-your-landscape-photography

To summarize:
1. Choose a small aperture setting (large number), therefore maximizing your depth of field.
2. Use a tripod to ensure complete stillness.
3. Have a focal point.
4. Consider your foreground (is there a point of interest in it?)
5. If you focus on the sky, enhance it. Otherwise, keep it in the upper third of your shot.
6. Use of lines to lead viewer to a focal point in the image
7. Capture Movement - wind and such.
8. Weather - sunny days can be boring. Storms are cool.
9. Shoot during golden hours - around dawn and dusk.
10. The Horizon. Two questions to ask: is it straight and where is it compositionally? (consider rule of thirds).
11. Change your point of view (think outside the box).

Seawall by Josh/Montreal Marriott by Lauren.

leg one: New York City

We left Friday for our tremendously anticipated two-month road trip around the country. Our trip started with a drive north to New York City, where Josh's sister Polly and her husband Justin live. With a gorgeous apartment on Park Avenue as our home base, the weekend has proven to be a good opportunity to take pictures. Of junk at the Brooklyn Flea Market. Of taxis zooming by Grand Central Station. Of Polly's new pug, Oscar. We played around with different lenses for various effects, including Josh's new Macro lens, a graduation present from his parents for his recently acquired masters in counseling from Johns Hopkins (counseling is his back up career in case this whole photography thing doesn't work out ;). Next up: Boston!

Summer Road Trip (x-country)

On June 18th 2010, we hit the road for a two month cross-country adventure. Armed with nothing but our truck, camping supplies, and cameras, we will set off on a photographic adventure that we hope leads to a ton of photos; photos that give back to the organizations we support. We'll be journaling along the way, and posting photos to www.photosthatgive.com. We'd love for you to check in ;)