Category Archives: Photography tutorials

Technical photographic tutorials.

*Keep calm and take pictures. Covid Creatives Collective, Project 1 – one light

by in CC Collective, Photography tutorials and tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Hey!  How is everyone?  I’m going a little stir crazy and tired of reading/viewing stupid articles from various forms of media needing us to continue to read and watch the same, slightly warmed over pieces of information.  I get that it’s serious, and perhaps more than we’re giving credit to, but I’m gonna find ways to play with my camera as a break from it all.  Interested in some ideas and collaborations?

Well, as I’m sure most all of us are, I’m totally exhausted by the Corona virus and it’s toilet paper hoarding frenzy.  Seriously, please stop being insane and accept that a couple months supply of toilet paper will be fine.  Some of us actually need toilet paper, so please, I’m days away from taking a lot more showers.  I’m fine without hand sanitizer, that crap dries my hands out something fierce anyway.  Mrs Squeeze and I have two kids, which I’m sure if you’ve been following along at all over the last decade or so, you’re well aware of as they often pop up as photographic subjects for reviews and such.  I mention this, because we’ve all of a sudden become stay at home teachers/parents/fulltime grad student (the Mrs)/fulltime employee (yours truly) and we’re, as everyone else seems to be, juggling how to do all of that on such short notice.  We have at least 6 weeks (currently) where the kids will be at home/out of school, which has changed our daily routine to say the least.  I will be using this next month and a half (at least) to start really teaching my kids about photography as one of our “home school” blocks daily, so I’ll keep everyone abreast about how that goes as well.

Things feel different, certainly, and if trying to digest this rapid change in one large bite, I find that I get stressed and overwhelmed, so I’m actively looking for ways to bring some more normalcy back while finding routes to incorporate things I enjoy doing.  So, here’s to hoping this is the first of a few new entries where we can provide a bit of inspiration for one another.  C’mon in and I’ll share how I’m thinking of tackling some isolated “at home” time with some easy to do photo projects that require nothing more than a phone cam and a lamp, but can easily translate to more “advanced” photo equipment if you’d like…

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*Who the @#$! needs film? Comparing film to film replication software w/ @alienskin

by in General ramblings, Photography tutorials, Postprocessing techniques, Software tutorials / reviews and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

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(*this article was originally written for, and appeared on the Alien Skin blog, by me, HERE.)

Put out your torches, and put down your pitchforks.  I love film.  I shoot film, and have a freezer and fridge full of it from 35mm Kodak Gold and Ilford Delta, to 120 Tri X and Portra 160 NC.  The question I’ve struggled with though, is why?  Why do I still shoot film?  It’s expensive to process, ridiculously tedious to digitize and even with expensive drum scanning, still doesn’t reach the depth and range of modern digital files.  Well, the answer for me has been nostalgia, the feel of the image, and the ability to take a step back, and focus on shooting in a more organic way that coincides with my initial falling in love with photography in the first place.  A beautiful reality though, is that through software, and remarkable sensor technology, we can quickly and easily replicate the look of film if we want, taking care of one of those (my) criteria.

This post is not meant to be any more than a personal experiment in which I’ll look to answer this question for myself when using my go to digital solution when wanting to help analogize results within my digital reality and workflow because, while I may not need film, I sure do love to replicate the look and feel of it.  C’mon in…

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*New Aurora HDR Pro for Mac OS from @wearmacphun

by in Photography Apps, Photography tutorials, Postprocessing techniques, Software tutorials / reviews and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

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While the practice of merging exposures is a topic of much debate, I don’t really care.  If you’re not into it, I totally understand and respect that.  I too enjoy capturing and processing final images using single frames for 90%+ of my own photography.  For the other stuff though, I do love me a nicely balanced, merged exposure and have for many, many years.  I find the ability to bracket and merge in post a valuable tool when needing to be in and out of a space in a shorter amount of time (as opposed to setting up multiple lights for each and every shot which can limit the total amount of finished shots in the same time period).  I’d like to say that clients will happily pay for 4 or 5 hours while you set up and shoot, but I’ve not found many that will A) have that much down time to shoot unless I want to shoot at 3 in the morning, which I totally don’t) or B) have the budget for, or see the value in a photographer that takes that long to shoot a space.  Time is money, and the more I can save myself (and price my time to the client accordingly) the better off I’ll be. 

Over my personal journey with HDR, I’ve used quite a few programs (HDR Soft/Photomatix, Everimaging HDR, HDR Efex, Photoshop…) and when Macphun and Trey Ratcliff recently announced Aurora HDR for Mac users, I was very interested.  Much of my actual paid photography work falls into the interior design and hospitality realm, working with that wonderful group of folks at the ELK Collective.  

My goal has always been a natural representation of light and space, which as many know, can be tricky when tonemapping images through an HDR program.  When shooting an interior space, I want to take advantage of the actual dynamic range, getting detail in the highlights and shadows when and where I feel necessary, not just tone mapping for a more dramatic effect.  Well, I chose to process my most recent shoot using solely Aurora HDR Pro, and here’s what I found out about that program along the way…   Continue reading →

*From the hip. A retouch tutorial, using @alienskin Exposure, October 2015 with Billyburg.

by in Monthly retouch, Photography Apps, Photography tutorials, Postprocessing techniques, Software tutorials / reviews and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

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Hi all!  Welcome to a new, recurring feature on the blog here.  I’m partnering with Alien Skin software to work through the processing of images using their Exposure software.  Alien Skin Exposure is one of the most complete software processing solutions that I use, and I just love it.  With each new release, the functionality and depth become greater and more streamlined.  Exposure X is in its final beta, and should be ready to go very soon.  You can download a free trial of Exposure HERE if you’d like, and follow along with one of your own images as we explore what Exposure has to offer, together.  (if you’re looking for a discount code, you can get 10% off any Alien Skin software using the code “tysonrobichaud” so have at it).

Using images submitted by readers, I will retouch, process and in general, just have fun playing around with them as I might one of my own images, sharing my process step by step along the way.  I’ll be using Exposure X today (which may look a little different compared to the screenshots below, when finalized) to process a submitted image from my friend, Billyburg (see more from him on flickr here).  

Without further ado…

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*Topaz Adjust, ‘a bit of everything Topaz’ plugin on sale! w/ @topazlabs

by in Photography Apps, Photography tutorials, Postprocessing techniques, Software tutorials / reviews, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

For many of us, Topaz Adjust was the first Topaz plugin that we bought.  It was a one click solution to enhance a variety of images in a multitude of ways.  Many of the newer Topaz plugins have even been born as an expansion from some of the filters in Adjust, so I guess you could call it the OG Topaz plugin.  It has grown over the years to include many more filters and is onto version 5.

It is currently on sale for $29.99, 40% off through July (normally $49.99) on Topaz Labs website HERE (use code julyadjust at checkout).

If you’d like to see and read more about my thoughts on Adjust, come on in!

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*Wrap your subject in light, a 4 light, high key setup.

by in Lighting tutorials, Photography tutorials and tagged , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

 

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I’ve been working through some lens reviews, and wanted to take a break from the technical, to share a lighting setup.  Portraiture wise, I tend to normally go in one of two directions, either very minimal, directional, moody light, or a sh*t ton of lights.  This setup is the latter.  Using 4 lights and a reflector, my goal for shooting with Trisha was to wrap her in light from every direction.  I knew I wanted to really showcase her beautiful blue eyes, and getting enough light into them meant lighting her from the front high and low. C’mon in for the setup.

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*Freebie Photography 101, the Exposure Trifecta Part 3 : ISO

by in Freebie Photography 101, Photography tutorials and tagged , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

exposure trifecta iso

Rounding out our Exposure Trifecta is our ISO.  We discussed Aperture here, Shutter Speed here and with ISO we finalize this three pronged, exposure equation.

Understanding when and how to manipulate your exposure might be a little tricky to fathom at first, but I’m hoping that after this series, you’ll have a very good grasp on how these three factors can be used to capture an image in any situation.

We’ll look not only at ISO specifically, but we’ll tie in all three and explain how, why and when to adjust them in concert to achieve proper exposure.  C’mon in…

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*Freebie Photography 101, the Exposure Trifecta Part 2 : Shutter Speed

by in Freebie Photography 101, Photography tutorials and tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

freebie photography 101 exposure trifecta shutter speed

 

Welcome to part 2 of our Freebie Photography series where we are exploring the Exposure Trifecta.  In our first installment, we discussed the aperture of a lens and how it affects both the light through a lens, and the depth of field when adjusted. If you missed it, you can read Part 1 HERE.

Today, we’ll go over the second of our three primary exposure functions, our shutter speed.

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*Freebie Photography 101, the Exposure Trifecta Part 1 : Aperture

by in Freebie Photography 101, General ramblings, Photography tutorials and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

exposure trifecta aperture part 1

Welcome to a new series on the blog, FREEBIE PHOTOGRAPHY 101 where we will explore both technical and artistic aspects of photography and our cameras.  The aim with the Exposure Trifecta (the relationship between Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO value) is to learn how to better understand and control our exposure manually through examples and exercises to gain a better grasp on some of the seemingly daunting exposure modes and tools involved.  I’ll add articles about metering, exposure compensation, white balance and other often automated, yet powerful to understand settings that our cameras provide us the ability to control as time goes on as well.  It doesn’t matter if you’re shooting with a phone camera or a fifty thousand dollar medium format machine, understanding how an exposure is created, how a camera works while perhaps overwhelming at first, is easy, it really is.  With just a little time and effort, you’ll be understanding the hows and whys of different photographic effects and how to apply them in different situations.

When starting this blog 5 years ago, I did it to help friends and family who were interested in photography, to share techniques, and help answer questions I’d field to better understand basic photographic principals.  The site has grown and evolved into what you see today, chalk full of camera, lens and software reviews, gear-centric comparison pieces, lighting explanations or post processing tutorials, travel ramblings and editorial articles for the design collective I work with.

As is the cyclical nature of life, I’ve recently been having more and more conversations lately with friends and friends of friends who have shown interest in better understanding these powerful image creation tools and I thought it would be a good opportunity to refresh my original Exposure Trifecta article, written over 5 years ago.  Getting back to the roots as it were, and perhaps act as an introduction to some new friends we’ve gathered along the way here on the site.  So, grab your camera and a cup of coffee, we’re gonna have some fun.

If you feel like you could use a refresher, would like to add your input, or know someone just starting out or looking to better understand the Exposure Trifecta of Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO sensitivity, come one, come all.  Through my amazing ability to ramble on, and the community we’ve built through this site, we’ll get you sorted and knowing how, and when to adjust these exposure variables to understand how to completely control your photographic vision. C’mon in… Continue reading →

*Happy Halloween! Using ReMask, Clarity and AS Exposure for some holiday fun.

by in Photography tutorials, Postprocessing techniques, Software tutorials / reviews and tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

happy halloween

 

Halloween is upon us.  We’re only a week away from discounted bags of little candies and the beginnings of Christmas decorations adorning every retail outlet.  With Topaz currently offering their cool photo enhancement plugin Topaz Clarity at 25% off until this Friday Oct 31st (Click HERE and use code “octclarity”), I thought it would be fun to use it as part of a little tutorial.  Last year, when Topaz ReMask went on sale, I used my jack o’lantern as my muse and replaced my head with it.  After fielding inquiries about my penchant for replacing my head with pumpkins, cameras and various other objects over the last couple years, I thought I’d take the opportunity to show you how easy it is, while creating a fun family portrait in the meantime.  I’ve set up links to download free trials of all the plugins used if you’d like to try it yourself.  Come on in…

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