pictures to prove it™

Pete Souza and crew have broken new ground again as the White House has created the OFFICIAL WHITE HOUSE PHOTOSTREAM on flickr. At first i was skeptical, but after browsing the images for awhile, i find it really compelling to have these images so accessible. this is one of the few things i’ve seen that i think has the potential to hold their attention and honestly teach kids something about government.

even the comments are worth your time.

hi fives.

John Harrington talks about his prep for the inauguration.

im not sure how i feel about this? originally i thought the beauty of this camera was it’s size, but every time i turn around someone has made something to make this tiny camera as big as the others.

thanks for sending me this bill.

For years i’ve only considered using the Domke Gripper camera straps. they are great. they are designed with rubber woven into the strap to grip your clothing to help keep my camera from falling off my shoulder. it’s a really simple design and it works.

sometimes wear my camera across my body (riding my bike, working in protests, carrying more gear). it’s comfortable, easy to walk with and if you are using two bodies, they aren’t banging on each other. this is the time that the gripper is less than optimal, because it doesn’t slide across your body when you raise your camera to your eye. it clings to your clothes and tries to bring them along too. today i stumbled across this video.

it is called the R-strap and it was dreamed up by a shooter named Ronald Dean Henry. it looks really comfortable and well made. it will cost you about $50, which is nothing really when it you add the comfort factor to the idea that you dont want to hang your camera from something you don’t trust to hold it.

If for some reason (maybe you’re thrifty or maybe you’re crafty) you decide to make your own version, there are already a few designs online. you can find them here and here.

i for one am going to get the R-strap. you can expect a full review after i spend some time using it.

in the DC area it is available from Ace Photo. i dont know if you have been to the new location, but it is the best store in the area, by far. Mo that owns Ace is a fair and funny guy. the only problem is the shop is all of the way out by Dulles.

i constantly find myself watching podcast tutorials and how-tos online. this evening i found that the good folks at Apple always want to make sure you know how their products work. they’ve got a few dozens tutorials on their site. they run about a minute each and they are worth your time. you’ll learn something and you’ll wind up using some of them.
i never feel like i know enough about how to really utilize what programs will do. these are simple, but they help.
hi fives to the cats at apple.

the ones i liked most were probably:
pictures in email
maps in address book
and i really love that perfect word.

it doesn’t end there either, because they’ve got tutorials up for everything from aperture and finalcut to iphoto and idvd.

now im just curious when they are going to ask users to make these tutorials.

i dont think most of these count as tips. this might be better named “Deke McClelland’s 106 photoshop keystrokes.” regardless, he knows his photoshop and it’s funny. no not funny. it’s silly.
if someone out there has broken his record, please send me a link. send it to Deke too.
your time might better be served on his website. he has some great video tutorials of Photoshop CS4 (which looks so hot by the way). you’re going to want it, so go watch his videos and let your mouth water. you might want to spend some time on Adobe’s site learning about it too.

Umm Deke, when is this actually coming out?

i just noticed that Vince Laforet posted the film he made with the 5d mkII and in my humble opinion it looks amazing. he has a lot of skills and he had help from champs Yoni Brook and Andre Costantini (plus a handful of others) so check it out and be so stoked.

they’ve got some behind the scenes footage too. now how long until i can buy this thing?

Photokina (as always)is the bearer of loads of good news. today Leica announced the S2.

Engadget reports — Leica’s making some pretty remarkably bold statements about its new S-      system. The first device to take advantage is the 37-frickin’-megapixel S2, which sits between Canon’s EOS 5D and EOS 1Ds MkIII in terms of body size. The company designed the camera to provide “the quality of medium format and the handling and flexibility of 35mm,” and the outfit also has nine S-system lenses on tap. As for expectations? Leica says it’ll perform “twice as fast as Hasselblad H-series cameras,” and if that wasn’t straight-up enough, the firm’s David Bell proclaimed that “[Leica] thinks it has the best professional camera system in the world with this.”

more about it here and here.

Ben Lowy has been talking about this camera being released for a little while and i continued to say “that’s dumb, they wont call it that” as well as “it isnt coming out anytime soon.” now on both of those counts, i stand corrected.

The Canon EOS 5d mkII has been announced.

probably the most interesting post about it has come from Vince Laforet. he not only got his hands on it, but he managed to make something with it. you can read his post here.

then i found this video that is a nice walk though of the camera.