May 9, 2011

by Gavin Seim: My family and I have been on the road for about three weeks now as I teach workshops and hunt pictorials. Last fall we spent a month and a half. We love to travel and aside from all my gear, I have a plethora of resources that we rely on to make our travels safer, cheaper and a more enjoyable.

I’ve decided to stat a list of my favorites. Besides the essential Google Maps, I find these to be great tools and use most of them even when I’m not out for a long trip. You’re welcome to add your favs in the comments. I’ll also come back and update this or re-post in in the future as I find new stuff.

If you want to follow my photography travels and see where I’ve been, you can do so on my journal, or get frequent updates on my Facebook page. Lets get started…

Our Shamrock 21ss camped near Bryce Canyon Utah. Spring 2011.

All Stays Camp & RV. For Apple and Android.

This $6 app is worth every penny and more. It’s paid for itself countless times in saving money camping, time traveling, and preventing headaches. It’s a must have for campers.

It lists  pretty much anything a camper or RV’er might want. From truck stops to campgrounds, to wall mar parking lots. It’s not perfect and something it misses things but it’s data base is huge and no matter where you are it will usually give you options.

This is my favorite, but All Stays has various other apps that you may find useful. iExit for example shows what’s coming up and the next exit. Check out their website for their offerings.

 

GeoTag Photos Pro. For Apple and Android.

This is a cheap way to get location info into your photos. Make sure you camera and phone time is the same. Turn on this app and start recording. When you get home upload the data and login to there website to A. Use their web app to merge dates into your RAW or JPEG files. or B. Download a GPX file and use it with a LR plugin like JF Geoencoding Support.

Read More

April 1, 2011

Click To Listen>> Photography Podcast. PPS #76
Review in iTunesVote on Podcast AlleyDirect Podcast Feed

Today’s Panel... Gavin SeimDenns ZerwasKerry GarrsonBarry Howel

On this roundtable we go LIVE with listeners in the chatroom and calling in. There were a few glitches but for a first live show it came off well. Lots of business talk in this one so if you don’t want to hear about things like Facebook marketing, use the time indexes below to skip segments.

 

This is a live show. Uh no, not the PPS live show. I just thought this would make the post a bit cooler 😉 Gav

NOTE: Due to a double link the feed iTunes was pulling the previous episode for the first hour or so. If this happened to you, delete the redundant episode. Then right click Pro Photo Show in your podcast list and choose “Show All Podcast Episodes”. #76 will show up again and should be the updated file when you re-download.

Podcast #76 forum discussion:

Notable Time Indexes:

  • 00:00 Introductions and DZ’s Awesome intro.
  • 03:14 News and random bits.
  • 23:40. Future gear and vintage gear.
  • 33:00 Aperture presets announced and workshops info.
  • 36:30 Kerry likes the Wacom Intuos 4.
  • 42:18 Lightroom 4 Predictions.
  • 53:17 Talking about marketing and Facebook use.
  • 1:20:50. SquareUp and taking credit cards.
  • 1:32:38 Picks and gadgets.
  • 1:46:34 The after show.

 

Links to things we mentioned.

Gavin’s new Lightflow Aperture Presets are now available.

TinEye image search is a good tool… http://bit.ly/ebdfTl

Gavin’s Workshops coming this April.

Lightroom Power. April 18th Oakland
Lights & Shadows. April 16-17 Oakland CA, April 25-26 Pismo Beach CA.

64 and 128GB SD cards from Lexar.

Read More

March 2, 2011

Aperture 3 has been for just over a year now. I’ve mentioned various times that I was working on a complete preset collection for Aperture and in the interim I’ve even released a few Aperture freebies. Well the day has come and after months of planning and experimenting with the best Aperture can do, I’m really proud to announce a set of presets that I hope will set a standard.

Lightflow presets are here and ready to rock. It has more that 50 presets. It’s been tested, planned and re-tested as I went under the hood with Aperture adjustments to make a set of presets that offer as much creativity as it does efficiency.

I won’t blabber on further, because you can get all the info on the LightFlow presets page. After that I hope you’ll help me spread the word and let your friends know that there’s new Aperture presets in town.

Read More

March 1, 2011

Click To Listen>> Photography Podcast. PPS #75
Review in iTunesVote on Podcast AlleyDirect Podcast Feed

Today’s Panel... Gavin SeimDenns ZerwasEric GuggenheimMark Teskey.

On this roundtable we discuss a lot of tips and mistakes to avoid from various genres of photography. We also get into some news, industry and business talk and more.

Podcast #75 forum discussion:

Notable Time Indexes:

  • 00:00 Introductions, micro 4/3 stuff and other news.
  • 21:25 Workshops announcements.
  • 26:17 Techniques for different situations. Architecture.
  • 35:09 Techniques for different situations. Outdoors.
  • 53:15  Techniques for different situations. Weddings.
  • 1:00:50. More tips on photography. Avoiding mistakes.
  • 1:20:40 Marketing. Things on our mind about the industry.
  • 1:37:15 Announcing Pro Photo Show LIVE.
  • 1:42:14. After show. Random things.

Links to things we mentioned.

Info on live show. Post coming soon with details. I’ll add a link.

Lights & Shadows. HDR and tone workshop. Coming to CA in April.

LR Power, Lightroom workshop. Coming to CA in April.

The new Fuji X100 rangefinder style.

It goes head to head with the Leica X1.

Some other interesting models.

Ricoh GXR,

Sigma DP2.

Read More