Hi ,

 

I just finished up with my Spring Photography Giveaway and am excited to announce that winners have been chosen. I’m really excited that so many people entered, and it was great to read all the entry forms that described “The coolest thing you’ve ever photographed.” Unfortunately, I only had so much gear to raffle off, so if you didn’t win, fear not, that wasn’t the last time I’ll be giving stuff away. Keep your eyes open for a summer promotion.

 

I like doing promotions like that because not only is it great to get some gear into the hands of a few readers, it’s a chance for everyone to get excited about photography. Not that you lack and excitement in that area, but I find that keeping my finger on the pulse of the photography world keeps my photography drive in high gear, which of course, translates into the motivation to get out there and keep shooting. 

 

If you’re a new reader, then welcome, it’s great to have you aboard. I’ll do my best to inform, educate and otherwise entertain you as we explore the world of outdoor and adventure photography, and keep you posted with news, relevant links and specials. Be sure and check out my Primer for New Readers: 10 Posts That Define My Blog to get up to speed on the kinds of content that I typically post on my site.

 

I occasionally like to highlight some of my past blog posts and articles that you may not have seen unless you spend time going through my blog archives. One post I brought back this week is Get the Most Out Of Your 50mm Lens, in which I detail a few ways to use this common, yet often forgotten about glass that often gets pushed aside whenever we buy zooms and wide angles. I always end up coming back to my 50mm lens, and so should you. There’s a reason that it’s considered a classic.

 

 

Adobe Lightroom 4 has been out for a few weeks now and if you have’t had a chance to check it out, I’d highly recommend doing so. I made a seamless transition to LR4 with no problems or bugs and really like the new features and updated image processing engine. 

 

As easy as Lightroom is to navigate and use, it’s packed with tons of features. If you’re new, you’ll probably want to consider getting some sort of reference guide to help you get the most out of the program. Martin Evening’s Adobe Photoshop Lightroon 4 Book: The Complete Guide for Photographers is probably the best and most comprehensive guide to help you learn all of the program’s capabilities. Martin walks you through each of the modules and teaches you everything that you’ll want to know about the program. 

 

Nat Coalson’s book, Lightroom 4: Streamlining Your Digital Photography Process is another great reference. Nat’s teaching style is also very professional and he explains everything as if he’s teaching you one-on-one. Whereas Martin Evening’s book is the most comprehensive guide, this book is all about efficiency.

 

Also on the horizon is Scott Kelby’s Lightrom 4 Adobe Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers, which is due out in a month an available for pre-order. If you’ve read Kelby’s book before, then you know his teaching style. His LR4 book promises to get you up to speed with time and studio tested techniques and workflow

 

 

If you learn better through video tutorials, then check out the Lightroom Made Easy video course at Steele Training. It’s a 24 video series that covers everything from setting up your workspace, to importing, organizing and processing you photos so that they look the best that they possibly can. 

The course includes 5 hours of instruction and costs about the same as one of the books. More info on the Steele Training Website

 

 

After years of sporting dual 17” monitors, I finally made the jump and purchased a 24” widescreen display to complete my new office. Let me just say, Wow! Whole new world. My choice was the Dell U2410 24-inch Widescreen LCD Monitor. It’s got a very high contrast panel for critical image work that calibrates well, plenty of real estate, (1,200 x 1,920) Adobe RGB color space and a very reasonable price tag, at just over $500. For price and quality (it gets very high ratings), I think it can’t be beat. Plus it doesn't have the glossy glare of the newer Apple displays.

 

By comparison, the Dell 27” is $900+ and the 30” is $1,200+. One 24” is still a lot of room, and for around the same amount of money as those other two sizes, you could get two 24” displays and have a HUGE plot of screen. 

 

Check out the Dell U2410 at Amazon and B&H Photo

 

 

For you sports and action shooters, here's a great site- Action Photo School. It's run by two young, talented, up and coming sports photographers named Connor Walberg and Daniel Milchev and it's filled with tutorials, tips, blog posts and a great selection of information about how to improve shooting in this style. If you've got your own ideas, you can even pitch to them and contribute to the site. 

 

They also have occasional contest and giveaways as well, and pretty good ones that that! Overall, it's a great site that's run by a couple of great guys and it's worth a look.

 

 

Once again, welcome new readers. Be sure and check out past issues of my newsletter to see what you’ve missed and to see other great deals and bits of photography related goodness.

 

To the newsletter veterans, thanks for sticking around. To everyone, I hope you enjoy the rest of April and prepare to launch yourself into May with reckless abandon and maybe even some new gear and/or techniques. I'm furiously working away on my new "behind the scenes" ebook and hope to have it out before summer. Stay tuned...

 

Happy shooting,

 

Dan