Send It!!

There are a number of options available to photographers who need to send large high-resolution image files to editors and clients. The traditional method is burning the image files to a CD or DVD and mailing them. If speed is of essence, FTP is commonplace but it requires downloading specialized software and can be quite complicated to use. Most e-mail providers have a maximum 5-10 megabytes limit on file attachments on a message, so what can we do if our image files are larger?

Several web-based companies transfer huge files over the Internet, and have proven to be a viable alternative to FTP. These are:

Pando offers software to transfer files. It’s free up to 1 gigabytes of data.

YouSendIt also transfers large files. It allows files of up to 100 megabytes free with its YouSendIt Lite service.

There are online file-storage services like Xdrive which provides 5 gigabytes of storage free of charge, IBackup and FilesAnywhere that allow photographers to upload large files and mark them for sharing by clients and editors.

Sasha Dean Biyan

Sasha Dean Biyan was an aeronautical engineer and a consultant until becoming a full time photographer. He lived among indigenous tribes in Papua New Guinea and Borneo, and spent considerable time in the Amazon jungle living with the various tribes of the area. The technical and aesthetical foundations of his photography are remarkable, but it seemed to me that many of his ethnographical galleries were influenced by fashion. Intrigued, I looked his work up and discovered that he was also a successful fashion photographer. Mystery solved.

His Earth Pilgrim website is flash-based, and its navigation is somewhat quirky. The background music is new age, which I promptly turned off. My favorite gallery of the seven different galleries is Alma (Soul). For the most part, the black and white portraits stunning, and are technically spot on. Just look at the second portrait in the Alma gallery: a portrait of a Muslim Indonesian woman in Solo, whose face and eyes are simply mesmerizing…and how about the expression of the Peruvian man in Pitumarca? Yet, other photographs feel bland and “sanitized”. Compare Sasha’s work with that of Phil Borges, and you’ll know what I mean.

In my opinion, his work hardly qualifies as travel photography, but it’s certainly beautiful. My thanks to Felice for referring me to his website: Earth Pilgrim

Image Copyright Sasha Dean Biyan

Megapixels Myth?

Here's a just published article by David Pogue, the NY Times tech guy, who explains the reasons why the more megapixels a camera has doesn't mean that its pictures are better....and that all this hype and spin about megapixels is nothing but a marketing ploy by the camera manufaturers to sell more expensive cameras, and to unecessarily accelerate obsolescence.

In a test, he and his associates compared large prints using the 16.7-megapixel Canon EOS-1Ds Mark II flagship camera in a studio, three photos of the same subject were taken at three different resolutions: 7 megapixels, 10 and 16.7. The results were virtually the same.

So are the photographs using the 16.7 mps Canon virtually identical to those using a Canon EOS 30D 8.2 mps? In my view, I think they would be very close...and almost impossible to tell apart unless the photographs are blown up to print sizes such wall-size retail displays where the 16.7 mps would have the advantage. However to state the obvious, the lens used on both cameras should be the same.

Read the article:
Breaking The Megapixel Myth.

Tritone Your Photographs!

Inle Lake Fishermen - Image Copyright 2003 Tewfic El-Sawy
I occasionally decide that some of my photographs would look better in black and white, but I rarely leave them as B&W and prefer to give them a warm tone. In the above photograph of the fishermen on Inle Lake in Myanmar, I used the following technique in Photoshop (I use Mac but I expect that Windows would be the same) to tritone it:

1. Open your image (RAW or jpg), and make all your normal adjustments in terms of levels, curves, brightness, etc (but do not sharpen yet). Flatten the image.

2. Go to Image>Mode>Greyscale in the menu, which will convert your image into black & white. Then go again to the menu, and choose Image>Mode>Duotone. This will bring up the Duotone options. Under the Type pull-down menu, select Tritone where you will be given the choices of 3 inks to choose from.

3. Select these three types of inks: Black, PANTONE 1205 C and FOCOLTONE 5011. This is done by ticking on each square of the ink samples in the dialog box. Click OK to confirm your three choices.

4. Your image should now be warm toned and probably darker than you’d like. So go to Image>Mode>RGB and switch the mode back to RGB.

5. Open your Levels adjusments and user the sliders to increase the highlights and mid-tones to the levels you feel is right for the image.

6. At this stage, you can sharpen the image and save it.

John Stanmeyer

Image Copyright John Stanmeyer/VII
I met John Stanmeyer at his beautiful home and studio in Bali where he was conducting a photojournalism workshop. He is the co-founding member of VII and a contract photographer with Time Magazine since 1998. He has spent over 7 years focusing on Asian issues and has been working on a book about AIDS throughout Asia, as well as continuing his photographic documentation for a book on the radical changes in Indonesia since 1997.

For this workshop, he sponsored two Indonesian photographers who would not have been able to attend otherwise. In an interview, he said “They were taking brilliant pictures with busted equipment but they never photographed enough. At the end of the day, they only showed us a few photos. Finally, I discovered they couldn’t afford flash cards and were using only one 256 mg card. How do you support these talented people who try to communicate in difficult situations under difficult economic conditions? Their homes are in the places that we can afford to fly into and then can leave while they must stay and try to keep communicating.” The last sentence is also applicable to us, as travel photographers...don't you think?

A remarkable photographer, a wizard at photo editing and a genuinely nice guy, here’s John on Apple’s Aperture. I chose this multimedia feature because it shows him at work in his Bali home studio. He was working on that particular photograph when I was there as well!

John Stanmeyer on Apple Aperture

PDN 's Travel Photography Contest

The venerable Photography News Digest (PDN) magazine has published results of its World In Focus contest. I found David Sacks' Light Rain photographed in Uganda to be excellent, and well deserving in winning the Human Condition category. The woman carrying her baby, the tree in the distance and the movement of her skirt all contribute to a well balanced composition. The image's toning also adds considerable 'gravitas' to the image. I imagine that its color version might not be as compelling.

The remaining images in the contest range from being excellent and well worth the accolade to being pedestrian and lackluster.

One of the few really ho-hum images is one by Deborah Young photographed in Angkor Wat. What bothers me here is not the image (although I don't see what attracted the judges to it) but the caption that accompanies it. The caption says "Taken at the ruins of Angkor Thom in Siem Reap, Cambodia, a child monk sleeps while hundreds of tourists walk around him." Who are they kidding? Anyone who's been to Angkor knows very well that such a thing will never happen. Never. The caption writer (whether it's the photographer or someone else) is making it up. This novice (there are no such thing as a 'child monk') would be virtually trampled to death if he was to lie down as he is doing in this photograph. No, this image is posed, and not very intelligently at that. I have nothing against posed photographs, but what I do find ridiculous is the caption. Oh, another thing...the ruins are that of Bayon temple at Angkor Thom.

Top Image Copyright David Sacks
Bottom Image Copyright Deborah Young

Cover It Up??

I’ve seen many photographers, on my photo expeditions and elsewhere, constantly looking at their DLSRs’ LCD screens to check if their just-captured image looks right. This reflexive action, which has become a habit to some, wastes considerable time, and potentially results in the loss of the ‘decisive moment’ we all hope for. The fleeting smile, the momentary look, the brief twinkle in the eye, can be all gone while you have your head down looking at the LCD figuring out if the histogram or “who-knows-what” is correct or not. Of course, the question is why don't the DSLR manufacturers gives us an option to turn the display off? Maybe some do, but Canon doesn't.

I know that many of the war photographers and conflict photojournalists actually put black tape (you know, the tape used by electricians) over their cameras LCD screens to stop them from looking while photographing (they do that for safety reasons as well). Another more elegant solution is what is peddled by Delkin Devices as Pop-Up Shades. These come in different models to fit most DSLRs, and provide protection to the screens and double as glare guards. I’m not sure I’d like them, so if I catch myself peering at my screen too many times, I might try the electrician tape solution first....but others may prefer the pop-ups.

Delkin Pop-Up Shades.

Jehad Nga: Ethiopia's Stone Churches

Image Copyright Jehad Nga/Courtesy The NY Times
Continuing on the theme of Ethiopia as an incredible destination for travel photographers, here's a slideshow of Jehad Nga's work in Lalibela, and recently published in the New York Times. These were photographed during the Feast of Transfiguration, which occurs in early August in the Orthodox Christian calendar.

Jehad is a Corbis photographer, and you'll see that his images are often made in the dark, only a single source of light highlighting the individuals themselves. As an example, see the image of deacons during the church sermon at Beta Medeanlam which is lit by candles. How he manages that so effectively is a testament to his creativity and talent. Over the past four years, Jehad Nga's assignments have found him covering stories in Somalia, Kenya, Iraq, Liberia, Libya, Darfur, Ethiopia and Iran.

A bit of background on these images from the NY Times' Joshua Hammer: "I had arrived in Lalibela, fortuitously, just before the Feast of the Transfiguration that commemorates Jesus’ appearance in divine form before three of his apostles on Mount Tabor. Within a few minutes, my guide had whisked me to the grandest of King Lalibela’s 11 monolithic churches, chiseled out of a single mass of reddish limestone by royal craftsmen at the end of the 11th and the beginning of the 12th centuries."

Here's Jehad Nga's Ethiopian images through the NY Times:
Ethiopia's Ancient Christian Churches

A Requiem For Angkor?

Image from Sacred Faces of Angkor Wat-Copyright 2006 Tewfic El-Sawy
The Washington Post published a pessimistic article about the future of Angkor. Peace in Cambodia has opened it to the tourism industry, and the magnificent temples of Angkor have in recent years generated considerable revenue for the national government. This year, a deluge of tour operators is expected to bring in nearly 1 million foreign visitors, a sixfold increase since 2000. According to UNESCO, the total number of visitors to Angkor will reach a record 2 million this year and at least 3 million by 2010. I understand that the largest tourist numbers are from Japan, Korea and then the United States.

I saw this marauding influx first hand during my photo expedition in February 2006, and witnessed the increasing damage it caused to the temples' infrastructure when compared to my previous year visit. My driver told me that 40 hotels and inns had been built in Siem Reap over the course of only 4-5 months, giving it the feel of a gold rush town. I recall feeling that Angkor Wat would be a Cambodian Disneyland within a few years, and I read an echoing quote in the article by Khin Po Thai, a longtime Angkor guide and preservation activist who said "Angkor has become a sort of cultural Disneyland". It's sad but I doubt if there are any solutions.

Linus Harms, a Dutch photographer, has a sensitive multimedia B&W photoessay: here.

Phil Borges

I've had the pleasure of meeting Phil Borges in his home town of Seattle in 2004, and photographed alongside him in Dharmasala in March 2005 when I was assisting in his Bridges of Understanding program. His work is just superlative, and his signature style of black and white portraits with the subject's skin toned in is recognizable anywhere.

As Phil and I were photographing novices at the Chortling monastery in Dharmasala, I couldn't help but notice how our styles were different. I am a fast photographer, triggering the shutter as fast as I can....while he is slow and deliberate. I watched as he left his Canon cameras to the side, while he gently spoke to the novices and made them comfortable with our presence. He studied the narrow rays of sunlight that shone in the room, and set the novices in the positions where he could exploit that light. The setting up probably took 4-5 minutes (a virtual eternity to me), and only when he saw exactly what he wanted, did he pick up his cameras. I learnt more from watching Phil than I did from all the photography lectures I attended.

Phil’s current project, Women Empowered, introduces some of the extraordinary women in the developing world who are breaking through gender barriers and conventions in order to enhance their well being and the well being of their community.

A true and tested humanitarian photographer, his beautiful work can be seen at his website: Phil Borges

Image Copyright Phil Borges

Flash Gallery Makers

As readers of The Travel Photographer Blog know, I use Soundslides to produce multimedia slideshows for my images, and find it more than adequate for my requirements. However, for those of you who are more interested in producing simple photo web galleries using Flash architecture, there are a few products that will do that quite easily.

The simplest photo gallery is the one in which the photographer's web site has a number of image thumbnails, which when hovered on with the pointer, open on to a larger version of the thumbnail. It's effective, clean and easy to navigate. and Macromedia Flash is widely available on most computers, whether these are Mac or Windows operating systems.

There are two software packages I know of which do what I describe. The free version is called Slide Viewer which is cross platform (ie both Mac and Windows) compatible. It's a simple viewer as the name indicates, and seems quite easy to install and will build the "thumbnails + main image" type of gallery some photographers seek.

A much more sophisticated slideshow maker SlideShowPro is available, and widely used by photographers and other visual artists to showcase their work with a bit more flair. Music and background soundtracks can be added to the slideshow, and it offers other plug-ins as well. It's available for $25 through its website.

POV: Techniques

Image from Widows of Angkor-Copyright 2006 Tewfic El-Sawy
Here's another way of changing a photographer's point of view. I suggested in an earlier post that photographers had to vary their angles, and one way was to photograph from a low viewpoint. Here, I chose to photograph the Cambodian doan chi from above. Yes, being 6'3" tall does give me a certain advantage.

I wouldn't recommend that you do the same before gaining your subject's trust, and ask permission first. In this case, I conveyed my intention to the nun-widow with sign-language, and she never exhibited any reaction to my towering above her and so close. She probably thought I was photographing something in the distance.

Reuters: Use of Photoshop

As a consequence of a recent fracas involving manipulation of images of the Lebanon-Israel conflict last summer by a photographer associated with Reuters, its Editor-in-Chief recently posted rules governing the use of Photoshop to its photographers/photojournalists. These have raised a debate within the photojournalism industry as to what is digital manipulation...is it any different from the traditional darkroom techniques used by film photographers? Is it relevant to travel photographers? I think so, but you decide.

I agree wholeheartedly with these rules. My use of Photoshop is limited to the very basics. For example, I seldom crop my images in Photoshop, but I used selective sharpening on a few of my images, as well as auto levels. However, I do not use anything other than minor color correction and sharpening when submitting my photographs to buyers. Why? Because it's unethical and digital manipulation is always found out by a professional editor.

Here are the rules summary:

ALLOWED:

• Cropping
• Adjustment of Levels to histogram limits
• Minor colour correction
• Sharpening at 300%, 0.3, 0
• Careful use of lasso tool
• Subtle use of burn tool
• Adjustment of highlights and shadows
• Eye dropper to check/set gray


NOT ALLOWED:

• Additions or deletions to image
• Cloning & Healing tool (except dust)
• Airbrush, brush, paint
• Selective area sharpening
• Excessive lightening/darkening
• Excessive colour tone change
• Auto levels
• Blurring
• Eraser tool
• Quick Mask
• In-camera sharpening
• In-camera saturation styles

Paula Lerner: The Women of Kabul

A few months ago, I chanced upon a well-produced multimedia slideshow of Paula Lerner's arresting images of Aghani women in Kabul.

Paula spent much of her 21-year career as a photojournalist documenting stories for national and international magazines, and in both her professional assignments and personal work, women's issues have been a recurring theme. Knowing that Afghanistan's women face some of the harshest circumstances of women anywhere in the world, she volunteered to work for Business Council for Peace, a nonprofit organization that assists women in post-conflict countries.

Here's her work through the Washington Post:
The Women of Kabul

Image Copyright Paula Lerner/Courtesy The Washington Post

Canon Mark III Rumor?

The photography blogsphere is buzzing with rumors that Canon has a prototype of a 1Ds Mark III being tested by a select handful of photographers. Annie Leibowitz is said to be one the lucky ones.

Should this be true, the 1Ds Mark III might have a 22-megapixel resolution, a substantial increase over the 17.2-megapixel EOS-1Ds Mark II, and could deliver these extra pixels in a body that's half the size of its large, heavy predecessor.

Rumor or not, we will not know anything definite for 8 months, since the camera will not get announced until PhotoPlus Expo in October 2007.

Do I personally care? No. I think that if such a camera was to be for real, it would be better suited to studio and commercial photographers than to travel or editorial photographers...and if so, I can't wait to see what its street price will be: $8000-9000?

The Jews of Cuba

The Travel section of this week's New York Times carries a short slideshow on the Jewish community in Havana. It's a far cry from the bustling community of pre-Castro's era, but the small number of the remaining Cuban Jews keep their traditions and culture alive. The photographs are by Sven Creutzmann, a Polaris photographer.

I visited Havana for an accredited street photography workshop in 2000, and recall the Jewish synagogue in Havana Vieja, which was unfortunately closed at the time of day I visited. Havana and its wonderful people offer such a wealth of photographic opportunities, and I am impatient to be able to revisit (legally) the island. It's an absolute outrage that US citizens are restricted from legally visiting Cuba, and seeing the number of potential British tourists swarming all over the stall of the Cuban Tourism Board at yesterday's Travel Show was really galling.

Here's New York Times':
The Jews of Cuba