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Kapiti Coast Photographic Society

Kapiti Coast Photographic Society

Category Archives: Useful Links

News from the Darkroom – July 2013

31 Wednesday Jul 2013

Posted by KCPS in Meeting Report, News, Useful Links

≈ Comments Off on News from the Darkroom – July 2013

News from the Darkroom

Here’s the latest newsletter by Michael Martin, from the Monochrome Film Users Group.

This group caters for those interested in capturing images on black and white film of different formats and darkroom techniques for processing and printing.

Meetings are normally held on the third Thursday of the month.

The next meeting is on Thursday 15th August at the home of Bill Harris, at 12 Kohekohe Road, Waikanae at 1930.

Meeting Reviews

July’s meeting was the sixth for this year and topics covered included; developing FP4 plus film in Adonal; the pros and cons of using a quick developer; further thoughts on print development; accurate measuring in the darkroom; and critiquing prints and negatives.

Group Presentation

Tuesday July 16th saw five of our group give a presentation to the Kapiti Camera Club. This involved showing the various film format cameras we use with a commentary and show of some of our work. Feedback from Kapiti Camera Club has been very positive with members been impressed with the different film formats and cameras presented and the quality of the images shown. Our group enjoyed the hospitality of KCC and the opportunity to share what we do.

Thank you to all involved.

Group Outing

This coming weekend will see seven of us on a photographic trip to Castlepoint from Friday to Sunday. The weather forecast promises to be challenging so watch this space in our next newsletter.

New Products

SPUR have announced another new developer, Acurol-N, which they believe when used with Rollei Ortho 25 film (which is a rebadged MACO made film), will redefine sharpness. Read about it at The Online Darkroom at http://www.theonlinedarkroom.com/2013/06/spur-more-exciting-developments.html

It is great to see a company like SPUR pushing the boundaries with new products.

Not a new product but an opinion on trying out different films while still available. The article titled “12 Films Worth Shooting With Before They’re Gone” can be found on   http://www.popphoto.com/gear/2013/07/12-films-worth-shooting-theyre-gone written by Stan Horaczek.

While we are onto web sites one our members, Des Johnston has a blog with some of his photos and other items. Check out http://desmondjohnston.wordpress.com

This Month’s Images

This month’s images were captured on my Nikon 35Ti on 35mm Kodak 400 TX film developed in Agfa Rodinal Special and show members of our intrepid group showing off at the Kapiti Camera Club.

The Presenters. (L to R – Fred Wotton, Michael Martin, Brian Smith, Arthur Wong, Herman Visser).

The Presenters
(L to R – Fred Wotton, Michael Martin, Brian Smith, Arthur Wong, Herman Visser)

Brian with Linhof Technica 4x5

Brian with Linhof Technica 4×5

Fred with Leica 35mm

Fred with Leica 35mm

Herman with Pentax 645

Herman with Pentax 645

Arthur with 8x10

Arthur with 8×10

.

Food for ThoughT

“The production of a perfect picture by means of photography is an art; the production of a technically perfect negative is a science“.
– Ferdinand Hurter, [1844 – 1898] Photographic scientist and researcher.

Look, See, Compose, Capture and most of all Enjoy.

Michael Martin.

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DxOMark Camera Sensor

19 Wednesday Dec 2012

Posted by KCPS in Useful Links

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What is DxOMark, and why should you care?DxOMark

DxO Labs make software called DxO Optics Pro, which does a very good job of post-processing images, based on a very large database that they have developed from analysing the performance of camera sensors and lenses.

That database turns out to be useful in its own right. Amongst other things, it lets them give a score for how good a camera sensor is. Although that’s only one part of what contributes to “Image Quality” (IQ) for a camera system, it’s an important part.

So it’s worth checking out the DxOMark Camera Sensor ratings if you you are interested in a new camera body, or one of the new mirrorless “compact system cameras” that are increasingly popular. It’s very interesting, also, to see how some of the major makes such as Canon, Nikon, Sony and Fujifilm compare. (Spoiler alert – Canon needs to pick up its game.)

To find out all you need to know about DxOMark Camera Sensor, and more, I highly recommend this recent article on The Luminous Landscape.

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New PSNZ Blog

08 Saturday Sep 2012

Posted by KCPS in News, PSNZ Notices, Useful Links

≈ Comments Off on New PSNZ Blog

PSNZ has launched a new blog. This has worked well for KCPS, and I’m sure it will for PSNZ as well.

Please click on blog.photography.org.nz to read the launch post from the PSNZ President, our own KCPS member Shona, and more posts as well ….

… and subscribe to follow along with the PSNZ blog, as many more posts are added to keep members of PSNZ and affiliated clubs such as KCPS up to date.

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Wellington Interclub Print Battle Thursday

20 Monday Aug 2012

Posted by KCPS in Reminder, Useful Links

≈ Comments Off on Wellington Interclub Print Battle Thursday

Come and join the contingent to support KCPS and enjoy the fun at the Wellington Interclub Print Battle, this Thursday 23 August. Details of the competition and event are at http://wic.org.nz.  It’s on at 7:30 pm in the Loaves and Fishes Hall, corner of Hill & Molesworth Streets, Thorndon.

You can either meet us there, or carpool down. To carpool, meet in the carpark near Domino’s Pizza on the corner of State Highway One and Ihakara Street (see map below) – we’ll be leaving from there at 6:15 pm.

Portrait Workshop Notes

Notes prepared by Colin McKenzie for the Development Group Portrait Workshop on 6 August are now available from the KCPS Resources page.

Here’s a couple of posts on the Digital Photography School site about portraits that may also be helpful:

  • 6 Portrait Lighting Patterns every Photographer Should Know
  • 10 Ways to Take Stunning Portraits

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Photography from Space – Mt Tongariro Ash Cloud

08 Wednesday Aug 2012

Posted by KCPS in News, Useful Links

≈ Comments Off on Photography from Space – Mt Tongariro Ash Cloud

As photography enthusiasts  we concentrate on our efforts on ground-based photography, or sometimes from the air. Photographic imagery is also a valuable tool from space – to assist weather forecasting (of course), and also to monitor ash plumes from volcanoes.  The ash can be very dangerous for airline operations, but isn’t always easy to detect when there is lots of cloud around.

A new polar-orbiting satellite was recently launched (Suomi NPP) and NASA has just posted an image from it, showing the ash cloud from Mount Tongariro, around an hour after it erupted late Monday evening.  You can see the impressive  full image at the NASA site, but below I’ve cropped in to show the central North Island with the ash heading east towards Hawke’s Bay.  This image was from around 12:55 am NZ time – note the lights from major population centres as well.

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Timelapses

05 Tuesday Jun 2012

Posted by KCPS in News, Useful Links

≈ 2 Comments

I’ve always been fascinated with time-lapse imagery – especially of clouds and weather, naturally.

I’ve dabbled a bit myself, with my most recent examples being of Comet Lovejoy last Boxing Day (I also posted a still image on our KCPS blog), and cloud over Kapiti Island in January.

Around then I was in touch with a friend of a friend from Taupo, Bevan Percival, who was just getting going on time-lapse photography. Boy has he got going.

I highly recommended you check out his “NZ Landscape Timelapse Volume 1” on Vimeo or YouTube. Do watch it in HD (1080p).  It’s a series of time lapses mostly around the central North Island, and just stunning.

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Stereographic Streetviews

17 Tuesday Apr 2012

Posted by KCPS in News, Useful Links

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Here’s a bit of techy fun – Google streetviews as you’ve never seen them before.

A very clever person has taken the full streetview images in every direction and warped them around geometrically so you can see the whole view as one image.  And if you click and drag on the image itself you can interactively change the shape, and view and warping.

The image above came from this view from Bowen Street, Welliington, near the Cenotaph and Beehive.

But you can use Google Maps to go look anywhere. Big Ben, for instance.  Have a play, and enjoy!

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Adobe Photoshop CS6 Beta

22 Thursday Mar 2012

Posted by KCPS in News, Useful Links

≈ 1 Comment

Well look here – another public beta from Adobe to play with.  They have just released Photoshop CS6 Beta.  But be careful with your Internet datacap – it’s a 1.7 GB download for Windows!  The Mac download seems slender by comparison at 984 MB.

Russell Brown has done a video on his six favourite features of this release. It’s available on the Photoshop Youtube channel, along with a lot of other “sneak peeks”. The “Content Aware Move” tool is particularly interesting.  The Raw processor is similar to the new develop tools for the recently released Lightroom 4.

CS6 does look nice. But remember the Beta will expire in a few months, and then it’s time to pay the Adobe Tax again for those who wish to upgrade from an earlier version.

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Development Group Report & AV Production

07 Wednesday Mar 2012

Posted by KCPS in Meeting Report, Reminder, Useful Links

≈ Comments Off on Development Group Report & AV Production

Picture of people taking pictures of people taking pictures of ..

We had an excellent turnout of 15 people for the first meeting of the year.  Since it was such a lovely evening, we took photos out on the balcony and down by the river first, and then went inside for Murray’s informative presentation about the basics of aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and exposure adjustment.  A lively discussion followed, which moved into the subject of audiovisuals.

Next Session – Audiovisuals

The plan for the next session (Monday 2 April) is for a kind of “show and tell” on audiovisuals.  Those (who wish to) should prepare an AV of up to two minutes, with up to 30 images. Don’t forget the rule of thumb that each image should be displayed for no longer than around 4 seconds. Each AV will be shown, and then the author will explain how they did it.

For those on Windows who don’t already have some kind of Audiovisual programme, Windows Live Moviemaker from Microsoft looks quite good, and is a free download.  You need to be on either Windows Vista or Windows 7 for this, though.

If you are on Windows XP then something different called Windows Movie Maker should already be installed in your system if you have updated to Windows XP Service Pack 2, and is worth a try.

Feel free to add comments below if there is other software you prefer to use to make AVs – free or otherwise. As a Mac person I use and like Fotomagico, but there are many different packages available.

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You Say You Want Some Resolution

23 Thursday Feb 2012

Posted by KCPS in News, Useful Links

≈ Comments Off on You Say You Want Some Resolution

My very first digital camera was a Nikon Coolpix 950, purchased 13 years ago. It was a 2.1 megapixel camera, producing 1600 x 1200 pixel images. I really enjoyed using it, until one day I accidentally left it behind on a plane. And so the never-ending series of digital camera upgrades ensued. But that’s another story.

Today’s camera phones range up to around 8 megapixels. For example, the iPhone 4S produces images which are 3264 x 2448 pixels.

DSLRs provide, of course, even more resolution, with the latest 36 megapixel Nikon D800 clocking in at an impressive 7360 x 4912 pixels.

Clearly, today’s cameras are capable of producing digital images of much more than the 1024 x 768 pixels which is the current gold standard for “projected images” or “digital images” in competitions and salons.

That’s why our committee proposed last year that we would move to a new allowable maximum digital image size for our KCPS salons of 1600 x 1200 pixels. We thought it was time to move on, and this decision was endorsed when discussed at our AGM in November 2011.

It’s important to mention that this is a maximum allowable size (i.e., no more than 1600 pixels across, and no more than 1200 pixels high).  Less is OK as well. And this will also allow for more freedom in aspect ratio for cropped images, within those constraints.

Image resolution is important at four stages – capture, production, judging, and display:

  1. Capture – as noted above, there is no difficulty in capturing images of at least 1600 x 1200.
  2. Production – this will depend on the photographer’s computer display. Many monitors these days are tending towards the HD aspect ratio of 16:9 or 16:10.  Common resolutions now are 1920 x 1080, 1920 x 1200, and on up to the 27 inch iMac resolution of 2560 x 1440.
  3. Judging – again, this will depend on the judge’s computer display. But it is very likely that they will have good resolution displays.
  4. Display. For projection at the KCPS salons our own projector has a native resolution of 1200 by 800 pixels (WXGA). We did consider limiting images to this, but decided that it was time to “move on”, even if not all the detail in an image of (up to) 1600 x 1200 could be projected just now. Technology is advancing rapidly. For example, rumour has it that in early March Apple will announce their iPad 3 with a “retina” display resolution of 2048 x 1536.

So don’t forget that starting with our 2012 Summer Salon (images due by 12 March) you can submit digital images of up to 1600 pixels across, and up to 1200 pixels high. The process for submitting these images is about to change, but that’s also the topic for another post.

Finally, for more than you ever wanted to know about display resolution, check out the Wikipeda entry.

Wikipedia Display Resolution Graphic

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UPCOMING EVENTS (Click on EVENTS in TOP MENU FOR FULL LIST).

  • [Busy] 13/02/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Otaihanga Boating Club, 19 Makora Rd, Otaihanga, Paraparaumu 5036, New Zealand KCPS meeting -
  • KCPS Meeting 13/02/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Otaihanga Boating Club, 19 Makora Rd, Otaihanga, Paraparaumu 5036, New Zealand Regular meeting - details updated nearer the time.
  • Committee Meeting 15/02/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm
  • KCPS Committee Meeting 20/02/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm TBA
  • KCPS Meeting 27/02/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Otaihanga Boating Club, 19 Makora Rd, Otaihanga, Paraparaumu 5036, New Zealand Regular meeting - details updated closer to the time.
  • KCPS meeting 27/02/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Otaihanga Boating Club, 19 Makora Rd, Otaihanga, Paraparaumu 5036, New Zealand
  • KCPS Development Evening 06/03/2023 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Otaihanga Boating Club, 19 Makora Rd, Otaihanga, Paraparaumu 5036, New Zealand Regular opportunity to develop your skills with a practical session. Details of each development night to be announced closer to the time.As usual, there will also be a general Q&A opportunity for those with current problems or interesting techniques and tips they wish to share.

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