This Week's Adventure Photography Newsletter
Published: Fri, 04/05/13
| Exploring the World of Outdoor Photography with Tips, News, Imagery and Insight | Dan Bailey's Adventure Photography Blog | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Hi , Spring is here and that means, well, it means something different for everyone, so I won't try and tell you what it means to you. Only you know that. However, I would hope that you're going into it inspired and excited for some longer days, warmer weather and, of course, new photography opportunities with all the rebirth that comes with spring.
I know I've been pushing my brand new ebook, Behind The Action pretty heavily lately, but rest assured, this edition of the Dan Bailey Photo newsletter will be much more relaxed. No urgent sales. No last minute discount codes. No pleas for you to buy my book, although I certainly won't complain if you decide to pick it up, I just won't try to convince you this week why you should. Nope, this week, it's just some fun links of interest to educate and entertain you before you dig into the weekly digest of my archived blog posts at the bottom of the page.
The Fujifilm X20 I exercised very little restraint last week and ordered the new Fujifilm X20. It arrived yesterday, and after a very brief morning of shooting with it alongside my X10 today, I posted my first impressions with a few image examples. In short, the new X-Trans sensor produces even higher resolution photos than the EXR sensor on the X10. Images are noticeably sharper and the updated image processor handles tricky lighting situations even better. Check out my sample images and stay tuned for a full review.
Why Your Digital Sensor is Like Film StockChase Jarvis wrote an excellent post last week called Camera Sensor as Emulsion + Why Your Digital Camera is More Like Film Stock Than You Realize. It's a great analysis that talks about how now that the digital photography age is maturing, sensor between camera companies are starting to become unique, just as film stocks were unique back in the day. Worth a read.
DxO Labs calls Nikon's 70-200mm f/4G VR "An enlightened lens" I've been using the new Nikon AF-S 70-200mm f/4G ED VR lens heavily for the past two months, with excellent results and great fondness for the fact that it's so much lighter than my 80-200 f/2.8 lens. It's an excellent, more affordable pro quality lens, but I'm not the only one who thinks that. DxO Labs just compared it to other 70-200mm pro lenses, and guess what. This new f/4G scored higher than even Nikon's top shelf AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8 lens. They called it an "Enlightened 70-200mm lens choice."
Color rendition, light transmission, vignetting and lens distortion scores were all excellent, and in fact, rated higher than the other lenses in its class. With its price, weight and quality, you simply cannot go wrong with this lens. Read the full DxO Labs comparison here. If you'd like to pick up this lens, you can grab it at B&H Photo or Amazon.
Photography and Writing by Traveler Glenn Charles-4.jpg?format=750w) Recently, I met a fellow traveler and photographer named Glenn Charles, who came to ride his fat tire bike in Alaska for two months. We ended up hanging out quite a bit during the past few weeks, talking about photography, writing, adventure and even getting out to ride bikes and shoot photos. I really love Glenn's work and I'™m inspired by his adventurous spirit.
Not only does he have a really top notch and unique camera setup, which includes a Nikon D800E, and three fixed manual focus Carl Zeiss lenses, he's got a great eye. It was really cool to photograph some of the same subjects and compare the style of our imagery. Check and and follow Glenn's "The Traveling Vagabond" website, his blog and his Flickr gallery, which includes a few photos of You-Know-Who. Read his post In Front of the Lens, where he talks about his experience modeling for me and watching how I work. I feel that his words and images are well worth your time.
April FoolsI'll admit, I didn't get my act together and pull any good April Fools pranks yesterday. There were some pretty creative ones out there, though. Here's a roundup of some really good April Fools posts and videos. One of my favorites is the Google Smell video. I know a guy who works at Google, and I can only imagine him working on something like this.
Lowepro Flipside Sport AW 20L I LOVE my Lowepro Flipside Sport 10L. It's my favorite "go fast and ultra light and still have adequate gear" camera pack. It holds my DSLR body, the new Nikon 70-200mm f/4G lens, my 24mm lens, the X20 and a couple of small accessories. However, sometimes 10L is just not enough room.
Lowepro recently added a 20L version of the Flipside Sport to their lineup. It's about the same size as my old Mini Trekker, which holds a full array of gear- Camera, lenses, flashes, cables, accessories. However, just like the 10L and 15L versions, the new 20L Flipside Sport AW has the flip around, back panel zipper access feature that gives you lightning quick accessibility to your gear.
In my mind, accessibility is king. If you can't get your camera from your pack into your hands in a matter of seconds, many times you'll miss the shot. Itâ™s as simple as that. I love what Lowepro has done lately with the Flipside and Photo Sport Series, and I think that the new 20L Flipside Sport definitely fills a need for landscape, travel and event photographers.
As a Lowepro Pro user, I can give a special 20% discount to my USA readers. Click here for the Lowepro store, or here to get the Flipside Sport 20L, use code LP20 in your shopping cart and you'll can save on any Lowepro bag, pack or accessory, not just on the Flipside or Photo Sport series.
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Ok, that's all for now. If you'll excuse me, I need to go out and play around some more with my new X20. I hope you have a great week and find some cool subjects to photograph.
As always, thanks for reading and please consider sharing this with your other photographer friends!
Best,
Dan
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When I was a grade school kid, I hated having to carry things. My need to run around with unfettered freedom conflicted strongly with the mundane need of having to transport certain items home from school. Homework, important notes for my parents and permission slips all got folded and shoved into the back pocket of my jeans, where they were quickly forgotten about and sent through the wash by my mother at the end of the week. âœWas I supposed ¦ 
My Brand New eBook is Here!! I'm excited to announce that my brand new eBook is finally available. Itâ™s called "œBehind The Action - Creating Adventure Imagery, Step By Step," and it's co-published by the awesome photography website, Light Stalking. It's All About The Method Over the years, I've learned that great images are not just plucked out of the air as you pass through a scene. They're crafted with a blend of vision, technical skills, a bit of luck, 
The word photography has Greek origins and it means "œTo Write With Light." Fitting, since photography is largely about capturing the quality and direction of the light as if falls upon our subject. However, photography is also about moment. Yes, light matters, but itâ™s the concept of, yes, that's right, one singular decisive moment that makes one image stand out with so much more power and clarity than others in a batch of similar shots. The word moment comes from 
The other day, I took my friend Glenn Charles, aka @trvlingbagabond, on a little bush plane adventure. Although he's had many amazing trips all over the world, Glenn had never been in a small plane before, so while he was a little nervous, he was pretty giddy at the chance to see Alaska from the air. Of course, in order to have him work off his first class seat assignment, I had him help me shovel snow away from my 
With Spring officially underway here in Alaska, the sun is now setting at well past 8:00 PM. That means much more time for afternoon and evening photography out on the trails, especially during the week. Plus, itâ™s not bitter cold, which translates to much happier models, especially when theyâ™re standing around waiting for you to set up your gear. Last week I took the lighting gear out to shoot some snow biking imagery. My flash of choice was the Photoflex 
Yesterday I did a Google+ Hangout with fellow action and ski photographer Dan Carr. We talked for an hour and covered quite a few topics, from adventure photography gear, being a pro, contacting clients as an emerging shooter and about my new eBook, Behind The Action. We even answered a few questions that were posted live on the G+ page during the event. We ran the simulcast on YouTube, where it's now preserved forever. If you missed the Hangout, or 
The other day during my one hour live interview on Google+ a viewer asked me to describe my ideal lightweight outdoor photography setup. In other words, what camera gear am I likely to grab when I'm heading out on an adventure? I thought that it was a great question, so I'll repeat my answer here to the rest of you. These days, my current lightweight camera gear setup includes the following: DSLR camera body Fixed wide angle prime Lightweight Telephoto    |
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