I’ve used Nikon gear since ’94. Before that I was using Mamiya and Contax with carl zeiss lenses. Due to the expense and the fact I was, well, dirt poor, I sold that gear and moved onto Nikon. I’ve generally always had tons of lenses, from wide angles to long powerful 300mm lenses. Pretty useful…
Monthly Archives: September 2009
**This is an old article and has been updated. Click here to view it** ********************* Today, I’m going to share my secrets of getting great color and monochromatic images. OK, maybe not secrets, I just wrote that because I wanted your attention. Clients often tell me how much they love the final…
December 17, 2009 - 11:12 am
Just to add about making a droplet in Adobe LightRoom. I though I’d expand and share with you as a photographer was asking.
• First of all. Copy the actions so if you mess up, you can always go back to them.
• To do this, open PhotoShop, hold the option key (on a a mac) and drag the actions in your action palette, somewhere just below. The new actions will say (subject-copy) in the title.
• Open up one of the actions you’d like to test this on. You’ll have to amend one of the actions. You’ll need to add ‘flatten’ file into each action you want to use.
• To do this, open up any file, run the action, wait for it to finish, and then at the bottom of the action palette , click the red ‘begin recording’ and then click the last order in the open action. Whatever you press now, will be recorded as an action. Go to ‘layer’ in the top PS menu, scroll down to ‘flatten’ image. Then click the red recording button to stop the action. All you’ve done is added an additional step to flatten the image. Close up the action and run a test image again. Close.
• Then, highlighting the action you want to create a droplet. To do this, click file in PS, scroll down to ‘automate’, ‘droplet’. Choose where you want to store the droplet. It could be on your desktop for example.
• In the destination, choose a location other than the original folder. I created a folder named ‘Post TIFF files’. Click suppress color profile warning. Close/Save.
• Now, go to lightroom, click the export in the menu bar. Click ‘add’ and ‘user presets’, name it the same as the action your running. Choose your file settings, tiff for example. Open ‘post processing’ at the bottom, click in the ‘after export’, then click ‘Go to export action folder now’.
• Drag the droplet you made earlier to the export action folder. Then back in LR, click on the droplet in the ‘after export’.
• Check the photos in your new export folder. A droplet can be made with any action. To save as a jpeg, you must edit the droplet and use the ‘save as’ command. If saving as a tiff, this is not necessary.
Hope this helps to clarify a few things. If you have comments, please add them below to help others.
Our little two year old pictured yesterday. I know a few of you will get a kick out of these.
September 7, 2009 - 12:59 pm
what have you done to my grandaughter?
September 18, 2009 - 11:04 am
She’s adorable. I love her expression in the last one.
October 13, 2009 - 8:21 am
lol Adorable. And the fact that they were probably taken within minutes of each other, perfectly captures two-year-olds. She’s really cute, that last photo is killin’ me. 
Kevin Mullins - I agree – by far my favourite lenses are the 35 and 85 primes. I still need a zoom of some sort but I think a 50mm is next on my list followed by a 24 and that’s my full range then. Great post Philip. Kevin
Stephen Bunn - Very well put… I have been shooting weddings for just over 12 months now and while new to this and still developing a style I have to say that my lens choice is really shaping that style. Although I own a 24-70 2.8 and a 17-35 zoom, I am finding more and more I just want to leave them in my bag as I get better results with my 35mm F2. Hands down my favorite lens as it pushes me to be more creative and move more freely. That said I do feel a little uncomfortable to use it at first as I feel clients want to see big cameras mounted with flash and telephoto lens as this shouts Professional in their minds… but as we all know, thats not necessarily the case.
Great work. thanks for posting your thoughts.
Steve
admin - Hi Stephen,
Thanks so much for your kind feedback and interesting comments.
We’re all a work in progress, right? Have a great week.How’s the weather over there? It’s been a year since I was there last but I’m hoping to get back next summer.
Cheers!
Philip
shaun - I use a 24mm 1.4 and a 50mm 1.4 a LOT for my weddings. Even with the advent of the super high ISO DSLR cameras. For anything in the 35-75 range all you need is to take a step forwards or backwards!
Super wide and super telephoto are a different matter though.