I have to say so far I have been more than impressed with the new iPhone 4. As most of you who know me well know that my iPhone and me are inseparable. Everywhere I go my iPhone is right by my side, ready to check Twtiier, Facebook, Email, browse the web, the list goes on and on. I also have always been quite happy with the quality of photos from the iPhone. For a quick snapshot when I am out with the family it has always served its purpose well. With the iPhone 4 Apple brings the sensor up to a 5 megapixel camera and while some people have scoffed at that compared to other phones with a 8 or 12 megapixel camera remember pixels really don’t tell the story of the performance of a camera. Actually so far in tests done by macworld the iPhone beats the droid and other 8 megapixel cameras.

I went out and did some side by side testing against the previous iPhone (3Gs) and here are some of the images. You will really see the iPhone 4 shine when it comes to low light. The last 3 images were all shot in pretty low light and there is a big difference in image quality with the iPhone 4.

The first image is from the iPhone 3Gs and the next from the iPhone 4 for all of the shots in the gallery below. Click on any image to view it larger.

What if you could spend time being coached by one of the top travel photographers in the world?

Digital Photography School (DPS) has released a brand new e-book this week that is a really great read for anyone into travel photography. Here is some more info about the eBook, to buy it
click any of the links below to go to the DPS website. If you haven’t read one of the DPS books yet they are really good reads, well written with great images, and they back up their work with a 60 day
money back guarantee if you aren’t happy with the book. You really can’t go wrong if you are looking for some new inspiration. Get the book and more info online here:
Transcending Travel – A guide to Captivating Travel Photography

Here is a little more info about the book:

Transcending Travel is an eBook designed to give you the skill and inspiration to take riveting travel images, ones so striking you’re friends won’t be able to stop talking about and sharing them.
The great thing about it is that it’s just as applicable whether you’re traveling near or far from home.
Best Still – This Week it’s 25% Off!

Transcending Travel – What’s Inside
Written by acclaimed professional travel photographer Mitchell Kanashkevich, Transcending Travel is a downloadable PDF eBook specifically designed to help you improve your travel photography.
Here’s why we’re super proud of this eBook and believe it’ll improve your photography:
Because it’s meaty – 80 pages packed with brand new teaching on a wide spread of topics (see below for what it covers)
Because it’s actionable – A great blend of theoretical knowledge and practical advice
Because we SHOW you how – Each page contains inspiring real life example images to illustrate the subjects (with EXIF data so you know what went into the shots)
Because it propels you to DO something – Exercises throughout the book take this away from just being about ‘theory’ and get you DOING something with the knowledge you’re learning
Because it’s for everyone – Accessible by beginners shooting with basic gear, yet challenging for more advanced photographers with a DSLR
Because it’s accessible – Beautifully Designed, Easy to Read and Available for Immediate Download as a PDF Today
Because it’s Guaranteed – you get a 60 Day No questions asked Money Back Guarantee
Here’s a sample shot of how a typical page is laid out.

Click here to get the e-book now!

This post was brought to you by AppEzzy – iPhone and iPad apps for photographers

Being a photographer in today’s digital age mean much more than just shooting photos and printing them for your clients. Your marketing and branding are all such a big piece of your business and your brand really touches everything. From the little things like the envelopes you use to bigger things like your website and everything in between it all makes a huge difference in setting the tone of your business. One pretty big part of my business doing weddings and portraits is hosting my events online. You have to be able to showcase your work to your clients online and providing them with a website that matches the look and feel of your branding is key.

So today I am going to be doing a review on Collages.net. As a disclaimer they are a sponsor on this site, which has nothing to do with this review. As with all of my reviews I believe in bringing you all totally honest and straightforward feedback.

So first lets start with what Collages.net is and why I think a service like this is very important. At any event you can have hundreds of people who are all really your clients. The bridesmaids, groomsmen, aunts and uncles are all potential clients, not only to purchase photos but also for future business. So much of this business is word of mouth and you want to make sure that you WOW everyone during every step of the way. Most of the guests won’t see the beautiful album you create for your client or the amazing canvas you create for them, but they will look at the images online. So having a web provider that has a beautiful look and can incorporate your branding into is a very big part of your overall image.

So what exactly does Collages.net do? They really do more than just showcase a gallery of your photos. We can all do that ourselves fairly easy with Lightroom or many other products that let you put a quick web gallery up. Collages.net has a full shopping cart functionality so people can not only just order prints but at the same time customize them a bit by cropping the image or turning it to Black and White. And really one of the best part about their site is the order fulfillment.

For me I also like to have an online company that also can handle the printing and do a great job. When a order from a client is placed it can go directly to collages professional lab “Collages color” where they print and send everything off directly to your consumer. You can choose to have them sent to you if you need to re-package with your branded studio packaging but I always prefer to have them handle everything. That is part of what makes this service so great, you can be out doing what you should be… shooting more photos all while your event site is selling images and taking full control of the entire order from start to finish. You do pay for this service, a fee is charged per order but in my mind it is so worth it. One order that a client makes can take up a lot of your valuable time, you have to take the order, find the files and prep them, submit to your lab, get them back, invoice them, collect payment and then package and mail it off. All of this sometimes for a $30 order can be very time consuming. So why not just have collages.net do all of the fulfillment and save you a ton of time.

Collages.net also offers a wide spread range of products from proof books to album designs, so it makes their service really a one stop shop for you. Once your order is uploaded you have access to many different products like albums, books and cards. You also have access to the guest book for your event which will show you the email address for everyone that has logged into the event. This is good to have for your future marketing so you can continue a relationship with everyone from the wedding. They also have reporting you can do on the traffic of the event so you can get a view of how many people are visiting your events in certain timeframes.

Now that you know a little about Collages.net and the services they offer here are some of my other thoughts about their services. You can also view more info about their services online here: Collages.net services

They have a few different monthly plans that are very affordable and a yearly plan that really is your best option. With the yearly plan you pay $599 for the year and can upload as many events as you need. You also pay a smaller amount for your service fee (which is 9% of your online orders) and get a $250 product credit to use towards their products. Overall I definitely recommend them if you are looking for someone to host your weddings and portrait events online.

Also check out this video walkthrough showcasing some of the features and customization of the event websites:

Collages.net Premium Websites from Collages.net on Vimeo.

If you read my earlier post about the Apple iPad you will know one of the areas where I think this device will really shine is when it comes to the apps. There are already some very cool apps out for the iPad and companies have only had a very small amount of time to create these. I think in another year there is going to be just an abundance of apps to help you edit photos, organize your business and showcase your photos better than any other portable device out there.

After using the iPad for over a month now here are some apps that
Here are 10 great apps that can help your photography business:

Pages
I am a big fan of Apple’s Pages desktop software. As a visual person I had always been aggravated by using most word type apps like Microsoft word, I always wanted to move a image a few centimeters to the side or do little graphic changes that could never be easily done. Then pages came out and it was amazing, now I could finally edit a word doc like I wanted to. With Pages for the iPad you have most of the same great features that Pages for your Mac has all in the iPad and its great touch screen. You can easily move photos around your word doc with a flick of your finger, its a must have for anyone who needs to create any type of docs.

LightTrac for iPad
A perfect app for photographers who shoot on location. Will show you the angle of the sun at any given time along with sunrise/sunset info. We reviewed this a few weeks ago, check out the review here:

Angry Birds HDLots of fun and great graphics. You always need a few fun games on your iPad and this is a definite must have. After a busy day of shooting what better fun that flicking Angry birds on your screen and having them knock over evil pigs It really is a fun and challenging game where you have lots of play time. With 135 levels it requires logic, skill, and brute force to crush the enemy.

1Password for iPad
Keeps all of your passwords in sync with your desktop. This is another app I love for my computer, you can create strong passwords and it remembers them all for you and keeps them safe. The only downside with the iPad is that safari doesn’t allow plugs-in’s so you can just view the password or use their built in browswer. But still a very useful app.

Keynote
Another amazing mobile version of apples iWork productivity suite. Nice way to make presentations while on the go and a beautiful interface.

Moodboard
This is a cool app to put all of your ideas down on one Corkboard style board. It’s a great way to paste a photo and type up some quick notes to organize your ideas. There is a free version that lets you do most of the things the pro version does so you can try it out first. Mood boarding is a proven technique used to organize ideas and inspiration in the early stages of production. MoodPad will help you pin down the visual feeling and direction of your work, whether on the web, in your home, on a canvas, or within a community such as fashion or photography. Moodboard is built to serve many different mediums of creative expression!

Photogene for iPad
First off this is not Photoshop, but for 4 bucks a pretty cool app to crop, rotate, sharpen, do level and curve adjustments and more. If you want to be able to do some quick edits to your personal images this is a perfect little app.

CameraBag for iPad
For those of you who love your Photoshop and Lightroom actions this is your app. It gives you 11 different filters to apply to your images and includes some like “Helga” (to give you a Holga type effect) and “Lolo” for all you Lomo photographers out there. Check out some images people have edited with this app on flickr at: http://www.flickr.com/groups/camerabagapp/

And I have to end the list with the 2 apps I have written; Portraits 101 and Wedding Photography 101. These guides walk you through some key concepts to improve your photos. Everything is explained in real life terms with beautiful large sample images. If you want to learn to improve your portrait or wedding photos check them out for some great tips and ideas.

Do you have a favorite iPad app? Let me know, I am always looking for some great apps to review so send a comment below.

One of the accessories I have been waiting to get my hands on for the iPad is the camera connector kit. This adapter gives you the ability to plug in a SD card or a powered USB CF reader to your iPad and download the images. It’s $29.99 so not too bad to be able to transfer your images straight to your iPad to view, however does have some limitations. First i’ll review the process of transferring images over and then cover some of the limitations at the end.

The camera connection kit comes with 2 different adapters both which plug right into the 30-pin plug at the bottom of your iPad. One adapter is for SD cards and the other has a USB port so you can plug in any USB card reader. Once you plug in the adapter the photos app will open up with 3 new tabs at the top. On the left there is a delete all button. In the middle it adds a new camera button to show that you are connected to a “camera” and the right has a import all button. Each image on the card is shown below and you can tap on any image to select. Tap on multiples and tap import which will then give you the option to import selected or import all.

This adds the photos into a new Album in your Photo app on the iPad titled “Last Import” and also as a new Event with the title as the Date. From here you can treat them the same as any photos on your iPad, email them, do a slideshow, set one as wallpaper, etc…

Then when you sync your iPad with your computer iPhoto will show all of the images you have downloaded and give you the ability to transfer these images over to iPhoto.

A couple of limitation the adapter and iPad have right now that limit what you can do with it:

1) The ipad does not have enough power to power a card reader so you can only connect card readers to the USB port that have their own power. I have a reader that is powered by the USB and it turns on for a second but then shuts off and gives you a warning stating that “The attached accessory uses too much power”. This is really too bad since one of the best things about the iPad is how portable it is and plugging an adapter into the bottom, then a USB card reader into that which has to have another plug going into the wall is kind of a pain. It would be nice if they also had a CF card adapter as well.

2) If you shoot any video with your camera it will import the video clip but won’t play on the iPad. When you import these video clips to your computer they will play just fine in iPhoto however it would be really nice to be able to view the videos directly on the iPad. Maybe a software update for the photo app will come out that allows this?

3) There also isn’t many solid editing apps yet for the ipad so don’t expect to do anything major with the images once you download them. I am sure this will change with time. This really is a brand new type of device and has only been available to developers for a few months. Once companies start programming for the iPad I am sure some creative and useful apps will be coming out. The apps are one thing i think will really set this apart from other tablets out there, with such a nice display and multi-touch we are just seeing the start of a new way of interacting with your computer.

Although there are limitations to what the device can do right now if you shoot a lot in the field and need a way to quickly backup your images this is a great option. The iPad is so much more portable compared to a laptop and can really be a perfect portable solution for photographers. You can also use this as a way to quickly proof your images with your clients if needed. The screen has a very good resolution so if you have a client who needs to see a preview on location this would work great!

This post brought to you by AppEzzy – Creating iPhone and iPad apps for photographers

If you liked Mike Larson’s Camera toss, this can take your photography to new “levels”. For any of you extreme photographers out there who want to get an amazing angle of that bride and groom check out this RC helicopter to strap your camera to! I think I am a little too chicken to send my camera up this high in the air, but would love to see some footage from anyone out there!

Aerial video with a Canon 5D , 7D helivideo.com from Eric AUSTIN on Vimeo.

The biggest question I get from people starting out is what type of gear I recommend. Here are some of my top pieces of equipment and while I am a Canon shooter Nikon has some very similar stuff when it comes to lens selection.

I am actually a firm believer that gear doesn’t make the photographer, your creativity must come first. Someone with the best gear out there but no vision is going to be very limited as to what they can create. On the other hand a toy plastic camera in the hand of an artist with a solid vision can’t be stopped.
That being said though gear is still important a lot of times to get the vision you have your mind turned into reality. I will list out here our standard gear that we use to photograph a wedding and why we bring what we bring.

With weddings I actually bring a lot more equipment than most people I know. After awhile you know what you use and are comfortable carrying around and with the way that I shoot I want to make sure that if I get a great idea I can have all the available tools to make that idea a reality.

I’ll list out the basics in this article and follow up with a few more with some of the small little things that I finish my gear box off with. To start out one piece of gear that is essential is my rolling pelican case. This case is pretty huge but can fit a ton of gear in it. Here is a amazon link to the case:

This case is indestructible, has decent wheels and can fit most peoples entire needs for a wedding day.
Mine is usually packed with the following:

Canon EOS 5D
(my camera of choice). This is the first digital camera that I really fell in love with. Reminds me of the beauty of film that I used to get. It has beautiful skin tones and a excellent tonal range for a digital camera. The noise if pretty good (although I have heard the 5d mark 2 is even better with noise).

Another amazing camera if your budget is a little less is the Canon EOS 7D
You can read my review of the 7d here: Canon 7d camera review

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L II IS USM
. I think this lens is a must have for a wedding photographer.
This lens is perfect for getting in close during the ceremony and the image stabilization really helps out during church weddings. This lens has great optics and gives you a really good range for portrait work.

Canon – 24-70 mm – f/2.8 L USM. Another lens that gets a lot of use in my camera bag. This lens is very versatile, you can get great wide shots during the reception as well as a decent portrait lens at 70mm. You have a lot of flexibility with this lens and with the fast pace of a reception it gives you the chance to go from wide to mid range without changing lenses.

Canon EF 50mm f1.4

One of my favorite lenses and the cheapest in my bag. I opted for the 1.4 lens vs. the 1.2 lens after a lot of thought and viewing images from both lenses. I think the 1.4 is an excellent lens and for the price difference vs the 1.2 I think there is a minimal difference in quality (plus I like the much smaller and compact 1.4 to save a little weight). This lens is so crisp and produces amazing colors, when you really compare a nice prime lens like this to a zoom you will see a pretty big difference in quality. For anyone starting out on a small budget I would suggest this as a perfect starting lens.

Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS
Another amazing prime lens. The focus is a little slow on this lens when compared to a few others in my bag but the macro is where this really shines. I normally only use this lens for a few images a wedding but its so worth it. To get a really cool looking macro shot of the rings or the flowers can only be done with a true macro lens like this.

Canon EF 15mm f/2.8 Fisheye Lens
. This is a lens that I think can be overused a lot and while I do like the fisheye look for a few shots I try to keep it to a minimum. With my style of shooting I am trying to tell a story of the day in an artistic way so I might use this lens for a few bride and groom shots or for shots of the church or reception room but thats normally it. Don’t get me wrong I do love the lens just think you need to be careful not to get too carried away with some of these specialty lenses.

A few Vivitar 285HV Flash, some canon speedlights round up the essentials in our bags at a wedding. There are a few other specialty items we bring with us but we will save those for some later articles.

Check out most of these items at amazon here. Amazon gear site.

Also I have a list of our Lighting essentials here: Digital Photo Buzz Lighting Essentials

For anyone who shoots outdoor portraits or landscapes the sunset/sunrise and angle of the sun is always something you are looking up. I shoot a lot of outdoor portraits and always find myself going online to find the sunset time. Normally I get the sunset time based on city which always isn’t totally accurate. It also doesn’t take into account if there is a mountain nearby that will block the sun at its lowest angle so if I am not familiar with the location I always have to have a buffer when scheduling shoots.

Now there is a really great app for the iPad called LightTrac for iPad. This handy app will allow you to pull up any location and shows either a map view or satelite view from google maps. There are 3 lines on the map to show you the angle of the sun at sunrise, sunset and the displayed time. The displayed time by default will be the current time but with a slider at the bottom of the screen you can change that to any time and get a preview of what angle the sun will be coming in at any time of the day!

I shoot a lot at a few different local places and saved these location to the app. Now with one tap I can access my favorite locations and see what the current sun angle is.
If you turn the iPad into a portrait view it will also give you some additional information like;

The app ran perfectly I had no issues with it and had only one small request that would make it perfect. I rate things pretty hard but give this app a solid 4.5 out of 5 stars. It does everything it is set out to do and has a simple and clean interface. My only suggestion would be when you move the app around by dragging to a new location for you to have the ability to drop a pin at that location and save that. Other than that it has everything I need and I will be using this app a lot in planning out my shoots.

You can download this app from the app store here

LightTrac iPad app

Here is the description from the developer:

LightTrac is a must have tool for any outdoor photographer interested in knowing the best times to shoot their subjects outdoors. Whether you are a landscape photographer or wedding photographer or a nature photographer, use this to find out Sun’s elevation and direction over any outdoor subject at any time of day. Use it to scout for new locations ahead of time. Use this tool to be there at the right spot at the right time. Sun’s azimuth and elevation changes throughout the year depending on which hemisphere you are located, so this is useful even if you think you know your spots well.

This app also displays the different phases of the moon in the month and also the current phase of the moon. Sun, moon event times and position data are all calculated by the app and they are found to be very closer to the chart published by US navy (http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/RS_OneYear.php

After a few more days of use with the iPad here is a more detailed review. You can see my first impressions here: iPad first impressions, as I use the ipad more and more I am changing my thoughts about it. If you have an iPad share your thoughts so far in the comments below.

Is the ipad a breakthrough revolutionary product or just a big iPod touch? That is the question I get a lot. When it was first announced I know people were disappointed. They expected apple to create something so groundbreaking nobody other than them could have imagined. But it still had that Apple hype. Steve jobs has called the iPad “magical” and after just a few full days with it I have to totally agree with him. My first impressions of the ipad were good but not great, it wasn’t until I logged onto wi-fi and bought some apps was I really able to get the full experience.

So what does the iPad really do that makes it revolutionary vs a laptop? It does email, the web, entertainment just like a laptop does, why it is so different? The main difference is in how you interact with the ipad because of the touch screen. It just feels right. I know that might be strange to say, but the web, reading books, even tweeting on a touchscreen feels right. You feel more closely connected to your content, even though it’s digital it feels analog in a way. When ebooks got big a lot of people started to miss that physical feel of the book. This doesn’t give you that exact feel but does bring a new way of interacting with your media that just works.

The other thing that is going to really set the ipad apart is the app store. You can already use the over 200,000 apps that are for the iPhone but the real difference is going to be with the native ipad apps. Developers are already coming up with some really amazing apps and over the next year I think the assortment of apps that take full advantage of touch screen and size will make the ipad shine. Using touch makes most uses (other than writing long reports) so much better and I do think will really change the way we use computers.

So all of this “better feel” stuff is great and all but how would this benefit a photographer? Here is how I will use the ipad in studio and a little video walk through of some features included with the iPad.

For me this is actually going to replace my laptop 90% of the time. I mainly use my laptop when traveling or on the go to check email, browse the web and get on social media like facebook and twitter. The iPad is so much more portable compared to my laptop I have started using it already for most of my on the go work. I am also going to hook it up to my LCD TV in the studio to showcase slideshows when meeting with clients. I have slideshows from most venues that I work in iTunes and will have these loaded on my iPad. When meeting with a client getting married at a specific venue I can quickly bring up a sample wedding and show them. I could have done this on my laptop just the same but this will get people talking. Since it’s such a new product and has so much hype I am sure that will get people talking. Whatever we can do during the first meeting with clients to get their attention and to have them remember us the better. Brides are always meeting with multiple photographers so having something that makes you stick out can make a big difference.

I am going to also offer proofing from the iPad as an alternative to the coffee table books we currently offer. Every market is different but here in the valley most of my clients are very tech savvy. I offer clients a hard bound book with all of the images printed on but give them other alternatives like a DVD proofing system or 4×6 prints. Now I am going to add into the options an iPad that comes pre-loaded with all of the wedding images. This will be an add on cost (and I don’t worry about having the digital files kill print sales, I price my shooting fee to what I need to make without print sales and will charge an extra fee for this as well). I also require brides to purchase a album with us before any other digital products so they have a high quality printed product from us first that showcases the artistry of the printing. This will be something totally different than what most other people are offering (at least for a little while) and again give my studio an advantage over others. When you use cutting edge technology clients do see that and see you as an innovator, they want photographers who are doing something unique and different not just the same old thing. I am sure that as I use it more and more I will change the way I use it for business and find more ways to get use out of it.

Here is a video with a walk through of some apps Apple included on the iPad:

iPad review from mark stagi on Vimeo.

And if you are looking for a new app for your iPad, check out my Portrait 101 guide here:
Portrait 101 iPad app

This post brought to you by AppEzzy – Creating iPhone and iPad apps for photographers

IPad. First reviews

After using the iPad off and on today here are my first impressions. First of all I do have to say that it is a very different type of device. Because of the touch screen you interact differently with it compared to any other type of computer or even the iphone. One thing that apple did really well and as a creative person I totally appreciate is the UI and the apps that came with it. It really has some of the most beautiful apps i have used, everything is polished beyond polished.  The detail in the apps is gorgeous and everything runs very smooth.  Apple really left no detail untouched from the calendars program to the notes it is designed with more detail than most desktop software.    

The size for a portable computer is great, i could see using this while traveling as a perfect device to check my email, the web, blog.  Most of what I use my laptop for could very easily be replaced with the iPad.  Only a few things it can’t do that my laptop can do is because of software.  But I am sure as companies get creative and release apps you could very easily replace your laptop with an iPad. All I need is a few client proofing type apps and quick editing and it can easily replace a laptop  Once companies create apps that take advantage of the touch screen I think you could have a mobile device that can do much more than a laptop of today.  Touchscreen does really open up a new and more intuitive way of using a computer.  The apps are really going to be what sets this apart and knowing the excitement from some developers I think there is going to be some groundbreaking stuff coming out down the road.

Aside from the business uses of the iPad it makes a extremely good entertainment device. Although I have never used a kindle, the books feature is great. You can change the fonts and font size and after reading for awhile it didn’t strain my eyes at all. Movies are clear, photos are brilliant, and with a stand it makes for a cool photo frame when you aren’t using it. For entertainment on the go this is the best device I have ever used.  So slim and lightweight and the battery is great. I didn’t track ever minute today but have been using it for hours and still have 80% battery life left.   

There are some limitations to it though.  First it really is a web based machine, most apps are designed to be used while you are connected to the web so if you travel a lot the 3G model i think is your best bet.  I purchased the 16GB wi-fi version and have been on the go all day today (I am actually typing this from the car on my iPad in the notes program). There have been so many times already that I really needed to use a program but couldn’t since I am not on wi-fi. The other thing to get used to is the keyboard, without the tactile feedback it takes you some getting used to.  Maybe after a few days i will be used to it but maybe not.  It isn’t terrible but it is small and takes some time to get the hang of it.  The spell check does work well and is very easy just tap a word  and it will give you suggestions so even with the small keyboard it is easy to fix your mistakes 

There are a lot of ways you can use the iPad for your photography business. I’ll go into some more detail later on this week and give some reviews of different apps that you can apply to your photography.

I’ll also have a more detailed review out soon and a top ten list of apps that i have found useful.