Spring Time!

Hello All, yes, it's been a while since I've written anything. Time to get back into it.

Spring is here - warm weather is upon us and time to get out with our cameras and dust off the sensors for another season. Did you reset your clock in you camera? Flowers starting to bloom - how about trying macro! Most point and shoot cameras have excellent macro capabilities. Try it! You may want to use a tripod for some of your creations. Macro will show lots of movement because of zooming in tight to the image. Practice - the results are really neat.

Also, spring brings about my photography classes. I will be starting my spring Basic Digital Photography class, Tuesdays for the next 8 weeks, and keeps me busy. As much as I have researched most topics for the class - things change and I must keep up. Cameras are changing - more capacity, faster, more features, you know - it's endless. So, back to research-----

I'll be back to you in a few days, after class starts and Easter has passed.

Keep that camera at your side!

Jan

It the time important?

Now that daylight saving time has ended and we have changed our clocks, you may want to think about doing the same to your cameras. Most students in my digital night classes admit they don't bother.

Here are some things to consider as to doing so;

When you go on a vacation, do both you and your spouse capture images? What happens when you process all of your files and you want to have both sets of images in chronological order, which there are programs for? If your times are not the same, your image order will be all a-skew! By making sure your cameras are as close in time as can be, your final order will be as taken from both cameras.

If you are photographing an event by 2 or more persons, say a wedding, you definitely want this event in order. This has happened to me where the photographer I hired told me he changed his camera, only to find out when I did the processing it wasn't. It took me quit some time to manually re-order the files to the correct order of the event.

Another thing to consider is to change the time on your camera to local time if you travel. When you are trying to re-create an itinerary, this could become very confusing. When my wife and I traveled to Italy, there was a 6 hour difference and I didn't change my camera, it was on EDST. When we got back and we were trying to figure some of the places we visited based on the image files, I realized my mistake.

Is the time important? You bet it is!

Panoramic Images - Our newest product

One thing the helps separate us from other services is adding different products for the clients to choose.

I recently completed a large assignment for a new client who wanted to showcase areas of the overall sites I photographed. My suggestions was panos - which are 8 x 24 inches which fit his need exactly! See these 4 samples below. The client was very happy!

You just need to be creative and willing to make changes to you normal list of products, and let clients know you're willing to do so.

Alway have a camera with you!

One early evening I went to my fire station for a meeting and while waiting for the rest of the people to show, one on the members came in and said "you need to come out and see this"! Well, as the title of this blog states, I pulled out my point and shoot camrea and quickly grabbed these shot.

Enjoy!

WWII Show at Reading Airport

Hello All,

Today my Dad, 2 brothers, nephew and I went to the Reading WWII airshow. What a great day for this! It started as a normal day - getting the camera equipment ready, ya know, camera bag - extra lens - vest and monopod, the norm---- then the sunscreen. Well I tried something new, it was like putting spackling. It coated my legs and arms almost pure white - I looked like a ghost, but I was protected. Grabbed a hat, kissed the wife and off we went!

After an 1 hour trip, we were parked and got on a bus that took us into the airport. We spent all day walking around enjoying the sites, listening to the roar of the radial gas engines of loads of aircraft.

We went into the hangar to see all the different displays and much to our surprise, there were several war vets that were on many of the missions of WWII signing autographs! That was awesome! I'm not much of a history buff, but this was really neat to see. I also realize I need to bone up on things - too much Photoshop------------

Anyway these are only a few of the over 200 images I've taken today!

Enjoy!

Follow us around the world!

One of the things I do for all of my photography students is present them with one of my business t-shirts. After handing them out the last night one of the students said, "Hey, I'm going to China - I'll get a photograph of me wearing it there".



This reminded me of a program one of my clients did for their Med-E-Vac service where people would go on vacation and take a picture with one of their t-shirts by a sign or building that showed the area they were.



So, the light went on and I decided to start one for Doddy Photography! I did some checking and found a program that will track points on a globe where I can attach a link to a photograph to the area taken. It's just getting started and I have several people on board and by the middle of the summer I should have several points logged.

I will put up some local one to my hometown area to make sure everything is working. So check back later to see if I've added to this blog!

If you are interested, please e-mail me at jcd1@doddyphotography.com

Thanks!









Thursday, June 18th, 2009------------








OK, here is the first of several images from around the world! These are from Iraq. One of my photography students' son is there and sent these. Note - this is how I received them.
















I will be waiting for others!

A Great Easter Holiday!

I hope you all had as great an Easter Holiday as I did. My daughter and grandson were here for 6 days. My son-in-law is in the Marines and is on training and couldn't join them. He's preparing for his third tour---------

Anyway, what a great time with Anthony - he's 6 months, cute as a button and was tons of fun.

Here's a few images-------

As you can see, he is very cute!

We had a good time at my parents place, did the Easter Egg Hunt for the rest of our grand kids and nephew. It was a little cold were we are - so the egg hunt was made easy to keep it short. When is the warm weather coming?

Anyway, it was good to just take a few days and do mostly nothing but have fun with Anthony and relax - 4 days goes quick!

So, back to work - more catalog work, processing uploading etc.........

Boomer Esiason CF Fundraiser

OK, it's Sunday evening and I'm somewhat tired. I was donating my photography services for a Cystic Fibrosis Dance Fundraiser all day today for a close friend of mine's daughter, an event called "The Motion".

I started around 8:30 by setting up a booth area to exhibit some of my recent works, which was stalled because there wasn't an area for me, we had to create one. OK - we finally moved tables around (we were in a cafeteria) and I got things set up - 9 - 16 x 24's here, 1 - 16 x 24 here, the pano here and finally the etched granite here! Good - that's done.

Next, I set up the camera equipment and started to photograph the dancers. The first one on deck was Leslie Feliciano from NY. He really had the class moving - I was getting tired just watching them and him------------! There were several others including The FR3SH Dance Company, Zumba with Ann Poko, Philadelphia KIXX Dance Team and finally Juli Kell.

A local radio DJ was the MC, and many vendors were setup selling their "goods", and the food was Great! Everyone donated either products, time or services to this great cause.

OK, 10 hours later the finally, a local band called Hiccup Hellen who rocked the house for about an hour. I have to admit, I didn't stay until the end - I have a rough time with really loud noise, but they were good and I have images to prove I stayed!

OK, that's it for now. I must get to process the images and post them for all to see.

Until then - sleep well----------------------

First Night of Digital Photography Class!

Well, things started some what shaky. As I was doing the last minute changes to my presentation and went to shutdown my laptop, it decided to do 32 updates. Yikes! I needed to leave for class---

Well, it finally finished and off I went! Class started off OK then the freshly charged battery in my Gyro Mouse died - thank goodness for spares. Next, because of the bronchitis I had last week, I stared to lose my voice - 45 minutes to go - now what? Fortunately, drinking water and some lozenges help me through.

I hope my students enjoyed night one - only seven more to go! Don't forget - use manual!

See you next Tuesday.

Just the beginning!

Hello Everyone!

I've just created a blogger area for my business that I will be using for my digital photography classes and other things.

Since I'm just getting started at this, it will be slow until I learn all the ins and outs.

Thanks!