Archive for August, 2009

out here over there

You know what I love? Big pictures. I came across this blog out here over there, and from what I can tell it appears to be the work of three photographers, Simon Nunn, Sophie Curtis, and Alex Howard. And it has really big pictures. It’s amazing. What a great idea too, to get together with a couple of your photog friends and start a blog.

One thing we always learned studying photography in school is that people like large photos but they’re afraid of them. I don’t know why, I guess they are used to 4×6 proof size photos that you get from Walmart and you stick in a photo album, and everything else seems risky. But sometimes, seeing a larger photo just has more impact.

Check out some random favourites I had from the site:

lindsay josal

I discovered a really great photographer today, Lindsay Josal. I love the look of her photos, I’m all into the graininess, the blurriness, and the muted tones these days.

Her bio states:

Graduated with a BFA in Graphic design from The School of Visual Arts, located in New York City. I am very fond of giant pandas, outer space, short stories and birthday cake.

I should also mention I absolutely love the design of her site, it’s minimalist and it works so well with her photos. My favourite set was “While Together”. Check out the photos and visit her site for a lot more amazing photos:

blood of the young zine

I came across this pretty cool blog/zine called Blood of the Young Zine. They have lots of cool posts about photographers, and they put out a magazine too. Check out their latest issue, “Girls“. Click on the cover image to go to a pdf. Definitely interesting and worth viewing! I’ll be keeping an eye on their new content.

moo

Photographers need business cards. moo can help. Not only do they print thick high quality cards (I’ve ordered them before, so I can vouch) but they have an amazing option where you can print each card with a different picture. There are some great digital printers in Toronto, but they’ll only give you a run of 1000 of the exact same card. What would be better as a photographer than to use your cards as your portfolio? Clients would love collecting all the different photos. Another cool idea would be to use one large picture and have each card be one section of it, like a puzzle. People will definitely want to collect the whole set, and giving out your card is all about getting people interested in you.

The prices are totally reasonable, $21.99 for 50 regular sized business cards, $19.99 for 100 minicards, and they also have postcards and greeting cards too. All customizable with your photos. Amazing!

And it’s a small thing, but I love the packaging that the cards come in. Small things like that make me feel like they’re really putting a lot of thought into the whole customer experience. Highly recommended! Go get your cards and other promotional materials printed!

colorsuckr

I came across this cool online app called ColorSuckr. Basically what it does is extract the colors from a photo and give you a color scheme for artwork and design use. Pretty cool actually, you have to try it out. I love how you can move the colors around and compare them to each other and pick and choose.

Here’s an example, I used this photo:

And I got these colors:

Pretty awesome, right?

Here’s another example:

Definitely a useful tool to have on hand!

through the looking glass

Brilliant photo series, “Through the Looking Glass” from photographer sugarock, aka Elena Kalis, on flickr:

lensbaby

If you haven’t heard of Lensbaby before today, you are missing out! Let me explain: Lensbaby lenses are the answer to digital photographer’s dreams, especially if they’re tired of that super crisp and clean look that digital gives, and want something a little more like a plastic camera. There are three lenses, The Composer, The Muse, and The Control Freak. They all do the same thing with some focusing and adjusting variations, that is, have a “sweet spot” of focus surrounded by a graduated blur.

If you go check out the site and read the FAQ and take a look at all the products, you’ll see just how exciting Lensbaby is. You can mix and match types of lenses with their glass, or even go for one with plastic or pinhole. You can add filters that change your bokeh, as well as add accessories that will convert your lens to wide angle, macro, or telephoto.

Here are some examples of the types of photos you can get with the Lensbaby, taken from the website gallery. Keep in mind this is a tiny sample of what you can do with Lensbaby lenses, the options really are limitless!

light leak shots

I found this post on abduzeedo.com (tagline, abducted by design, cute) about light leak shots and I wanted to share it. Light leak is pretty much what it sounds like- light leaks into the camera and over-exposes the film. Usually this sort of thing happens with plastic cameras like the Lomo or the Holga, but it can happen with any old camera that’s not in perfect shape. People often think it ruins the shot, but sometimes it can be one of those accidents that make a photo look good. It’s a kind of look that you only see with film, so you don’t really see a lot of it these days. It’s nostalgic, in a way, because I remember seeing shots like this all the time.

Here are some of my favourites, but check out the post because there’s a lot more:

plastic life

This photo series “Plastic Life” has been circulating for some time now, but I thought I’d post it anyway since it’s pretty cool and funny, not to mention that it makes me want to get out my macro lens. The photographer is Vincent Bousserez. Check out some of my favourites below. There’s so many good ones though, so you should go check out the flickr set for more!

the orton effect tutorial

Photographer Michael Orton created this popular look, where he sandwiched two images, the first, sharp, image overexposed by two stops and the second, out of focus image, over exposed by one stop. He used film to get this effect, but it’s possible to recreate in Photoshop (what isn’t?) so I’m going to give you a quick tutorial. It’s pretty easy. There’s a variety of ways to do it, but I find this way to be the simplest.

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