Here's why I think that creativity can save us

Published: Thu, 11/09/17

Hi ,

I hope you've having a great week so far. I just have a couple of things I'd like to share with you today.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. There's no question that we live in a very odd world right now. There are so many things that just don't seem right, and we're constantly bombarded by messaging and events that seems to drag us down as a society.

This hurts us at our core and it hurts us as a civilization. And while I don't pretend to have all the answers for how we can fix everything, I do have an idea that I think has some merit.

I think the more we all exercise our creativity in our lives, and the more we encourage everyone around us to do the same, we can make the world a better place.

I know that this might sound a little simplistic, but hear me out.

Many studies have shown that being creative on a regular basis can help do all the following:

Lower stress levels
Lower depression and elevate feelings of well being
Increase our problem solving abilities
Allowing us to "think outside the box"
Be more curious about the world

And, Being Creative Makes You Happy.

Kurt Vonnegut said that “practicing any art, no matter how badly, makes the soul grow.”

Although I can't understand all of the factors that leave some people feeling frustrated, angry or destructive, I do know that being creative helps contribute to our sense of purpose in life. The more any of us engage our creative brains, the better we feel. And when we're lost in the creative process, we're not thinking about how angry or frustrated we are about things that we can't necessarily fix in the short term.

And that doesn't even take into account all of the possible benefits that a single person's creativity can bring to the world.

I know that I have an infectious love for photography and I enjoy using my passion to help inspire you guys. I don't just want to make you better photographers, I want to help you love photography even more. My thought is that the more people find happiness with their creativity, the better our world will be.

With that in mind, I want to ask you to help me with this. Be a catalyst for creativity within your own life. Spread the love. Help inspire or encourage other people in your own circles to be more creative and see what happens in the long run.

I've expanded on these ideas in my latest post, Why Being More Creative Leads to a Better World for Everyone. Give it a read and the let me know what you think. Do you agree or am I just being naive with all of this?

LUMINAR 2018 Performance Enhancements

With LUMINAR 2018 for Mac and Windows just around the corner, a lot of you are asking how much faster it is than previous versions. This is an obvious concern, because an efficient workflow depends on efficient software that doesn't make you wait forever to even open an image or perform basic tasks.

To answer your question, I did a test with a 24MP RAW file from my Fujifilm X-T2. With Luminar Neptune, which is the most up-to-date current version, it took about 50 seconds to open the file.

With Luminar 2018, which is still a working version. It took less than 30 seconds. About half the time. This is on my Mid 2010 MacPro with 24MB of RAM, so a fairly old machine. At PhotoPlus, I watched them demo the software on brand new MacBook Pro laptops, and it only took a few seconds. The final release version may be even faster, and it will keep improving with each new update.

So, if you have an older computer, LUMINAR 2018 will see a significant speed boost over the previous version. If you have a new machine, it will run extremely fast.

Both of these images below were processed using LUMINAR 2018, so this will give an idea of what you can do with the program. I've included the original images so you can see the difference.

Also, as I mentioned in my last email, The Luminar developers have ensured me that they're committed to supporting all major camera brands and RAW formats.

Remember, there's only one more week to save $10 on the LUMINAR 2018 Preorder and get the special preset bundles. November 15 is the last day, and then it gets released on the 16th.

If you have any questions about Luminar, please let me know.

Thanks again for reading, have a great rest of your week!

Best regards,

Dan Bailey

dan@danbaileyphoto.com