PHOTODORK

Raise your hand if you notice the quality of light around you. Man, I hope I am not the only dork raising my hand right now. I am really observant about light: the way it strikes things, the way it falls across a space, the color cast it gives to an area at different times of day, as well as the amount of it in the room with me. I’m not sure if this is a side effect of years with a camera in your hand and in front of your face or if it’s just part of being detail-oriented. Certainly both are true in my case.

Whatever fuels my acute perception of light, it was not happy with the situation yesterday.  I prefer, as much as possible, to use natural light in my photographs. An overhead, interior light isn’t going to cut it in most cases and I’m not one to spend a lot of time fussing with a lighting system.  It seems my attention to detail stalls and then completely dies in the face of technical things like reading my camera manual or learning to set up studio lights.  That stuff cramps my style, and it’s where editing can save the day.  I spent more time than usual with this portion of the photo process on this last set of images because I just didn’t have the quality or quantity of light I was looking for.  The lack of light also necessitated the use of my flash which I didn’t like at all.

In terms of editing, I’m a big fan of Adobe Photoshop.  And trust me, I’m not being paid to say that (although, I wouldn’t mind being paid to say that.  It’d still be true and I’d have more money.  Win-win).  In fact, I technically paid to say that; Photoshop is not an inexpensive program, although discounts are available if you are an educator or student.  However, if you have a program on your computer like iPhoto, Picassa or some other editing software that you use and get along well with, I am absolutely in support of this.  I still use the edit button on iPhoto sometimes when I’m feeling lazy or pressed for time or even just curious.  The main advice I would give about the editing software you use is that you should feel comfortable with it.  Photoshop offers an incredibly wide set of options and tools and that can be overwhelming.  I’ve taken a Digital Photography class and a Photoshop class just to figure out what I’m doing.  Of course, it’s also my job to teach it and I got kind of sick of looking dumb in front of 20 some-odd students everyday.  If I was going to be playing the fool in private, I might not have minded remaining self-taught.

And speaking of editing, you might have noticed that little, old Photodork.org has had some major renovations recently.  Dylan is to thank for these changes, as well as for his patience, as I was quite specific about the way I wanted things to look like around here (I know.  Me.  Being particular about something.  It is hard to believe).  In any case, I am very happy with the new changes, and I hope you are too.