Ben Cochran
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
I am sorry to hear that for you Phil. I really admired the way that you opened the magazine to more of an interactive resource to the subscribers, including members of this BB. I hope you know how much respect people have for you, including myself!
My best wishes for you and I look very forward to your next chapter. I remain excited about your tremendous value improving another resource of knowledge, education and public awareness, for us all.
*What is the correct terminology to describe “angle of view” or whatever you call it when discussing lenses on a DSLR cropped sensor vs Fx?
Love the shots Neal, and what a great purchase! Looks like you all had a beautiful white christmas there. Iowa though? Where are all of the corn fields ? 🙂 Guess your brother is also proving that he believes in your MD skill ;), don’t guess he would want to consider using that shot for his company logo 😀
The angle of view, rather picture view angle, is one of the three elements that comprise the “field of view”. I think that is what you were asking about, in relationship to the multiplier of focal length with crop factor.
Dear Canon user’s: Hehehehehehehehe ;D ;D and we still have the other low light pro body fx advantage too 😀
Aaron, As Shannon mentioned, they do run promo’s from time to time. Also, some of the professional organizations get a pretty good discount but they are tightly controlled. Adobe pulled the discount for the NAPP (National Association of Photoshop Professionals) due to gross misuse by some members.
The main reason that I wanted to respond: You may want to wait on the upgrade, CS4 has some issues and bogs down more than CS3, I would wait and see if the upgrade fixes that. Also, if you are on a Mac, you will not get to take advantage of the 64 bit and even the 32 bit has issues.
David: Well, slap my Momma I am on my way 😉 ;D
I have a couple of ideas, that I would like to try. Got some free time and may go try some shots this weekend.
Thanks Neal 🙂
Hey, with that new patient, guess that means that you have to put a new category in your portfolio. Kind of an odds and ends file..
Damned Neal: ;D Doctor, Lecturer, Amazing Fly Tyer and Flyfisher, Photographer, Wireless Network Consultant and now on your way to Author 😉 Well done my friend :)!
Shannon, you didn’t say this but you did remind me of something that I am normally very careful about. I normally try to qualify my offerings as my own knowledge or things that I have heard or researched. I really should have said: “In their testing, the inks fade rates were—“ I try to be more precise but you are correct, the tests results and conditions will vary. In my own experience, however, I have some proofs that I stored in unfavoring conditions, for over a year. The inks are still in great condition but the papers have faded. This has caused the whites to shift a bit but the white, printed area, is still more vibrant than the faded yellow tint of the paper.
I have heard and talked to several friends about the RIP printers and some that do have them. Their advice was that it is not worth the extra thousand dollars. For large commercial use and in print environments it is, on the same note, it is also the other functionality that makes it best suited or the larger print shops.
I don’t use the sealers, I leave that up to the galleries and I don’t think that they use them either, mostly UV glass in the frame. When I am stateside, the most that I use this printer for is, for proofing.
Will, The ICC profiles are a bit more complicated than that but they can be fun and is that element of digital darkroom that gives a darkroom bit of feel. Your monitor will have on ICC profile while the printers have a different one. The different types of paper and same types of paper, from different manufacturers, will also have different ICC profiles. For instance; an ICC profile for Cannon Glossy will have a different ICC profile than Epson Glossy, this is because the ink lays down differently and absorb differently. The different monitor settings, RGB, sRGB, CMYK and so on, also have different ICC profiles. The same thing for publishers, unless they use the exact same commercial printing facility, their CMYK ICC profiles will vary, even though the printers use the exact same paper.
Now, to make this simpler and to get to answering your question. You cannot completely duplicate the ICC profile that a particular publisher uses, unless they always use the same commercial printing facility and provide you with their CMYK ICC profile. Then, you would only get complete accurate color match if you printed your proof through their commercial printer. However, there is a way to print your own and get “close enough for comfort”, I do it all of the time.
First, you can do a proof on your own monitor and with the use of CS3; caveat is that a wider gamut monitor becomes more important as an sRGB will display sRGB no matter what ICC profile the user chooses. Under “View”, on the CS3 toolbar, select “Proofing Setup”. In the drop down menu, you can select CMYK for proofing a basic CMYK profile, or you can choose custom and select the ICC profile, from a new menu, that has the ICC profile of the paper that you plan to print on. Keep in mind that converting to a CMYK workflow will not work as you will still be printing to a RGB printer but you can still get close enough in many cases.
I prefer to print my contact sheets, when time allows and if the reps do not mind the extra time, that is unless they are on set and want to take finals the same day and when they leave. Once I have an idea of the type of paper, which final publication will run in, I can print on similar paper and have a good idea of how my finals will commercially print. You have some of the magazines that you have been published in so, you have an idea of the type of paper. Find that and “do not” use document paper as it is a terrible print for proofing. Print several prints and use the advance printer settings “option bar” to adjust the final print until you get a “close for comfort” print on that paper. Save those custom settings, in the advanced printer settings menu, and name them after the publisher. This way you can just pull those settings and print all of your proofs with the same settings and feel more comfort in knowing that they are close enough. Once you send the images to the publisher, they will adjust to CMYK, some now use high-end RGB commercial printers though. The main thing is that they have your final RGB or Pro Photo RGB (for now, I would stay in the RGB with TIFF or DNG though), this allows the GA’s and AD’s to be able to have color comparison and helps in the adjustment process, if they are good and care [ch9786]. The main thing is that you do get close enough and a lot of my proofs seem to be spot on with the final publication.
Yes, you can get a good printer in the $400.-$500.00 Range that does support ICC profiles and prints very good. I will caution on the type of OS that you are running though. Be glad to help you out more, just let me know you OS system and you do not want to get caught up in the bugs of compatibility with the Epson R2400 and Leopard. I have 2 of those printers and managed a good work around on them. They work great on windows based platforms but it seems that Apple and Epson spent more time blaming each other for the issues as opposed to resolving them.
I agree with the printing aspect and it sure does put a lot more back into photography, as well as the feel of photography. When you compare the cost of printer and ink to commercial print, you still come out ahead printing your own prints. More than this and along the lines of what David Anderson stated, it gives the photographer back total control of how their photographs appear in final print. It truly is a great tool for proofing and gaining better control/correction of the entire digital darkroom process as well.
Having access to the paper ICC profiles makes all of the difference in the world and printing really adds more to the digital darkroom experience, much more than just pushing the print button. I am a HUGE fan of the Epson printers and even though their paper and ICC profiles are great, White River also has great papers. I poured some water onto one of my Epson Enhanced Matte prints and then dabbed as well as swiped the water off, immediately after printing… No smear at all and looked just as pristine, got to love that! [ch9786] The inks are also tested and showed to not fade for 199 years so; it is great for museum archival prints. As David said, they have come way down in price and dependent upon the size of print, that a person wants, you can get an A3 (13” X 19”) pro printer, that supports ICC profiles, for just a few hundred dollars.
Fashion and Fashion Advertising are one of the strong markets of use for the larger sensors and 48 MP is put to good use in that sector. The main thing is being able to shoot digital with ISO’s above 400-600…
Will, bail out package, that is hilarious lmao
From what I have heard, it will be around 48MP and simply blow the other low ISO MF backs out of the water. I have also heard that it may be an FX-MX format camera, allowing the user to switch and use a lens adapter for the different lens formats. Also, Nikon use to manufacture medium format lenses for another camera manufacturer, this will not be virgin territory for them. I just wish that they would build the body that they have planned 10 years from now, so that I can start saving some bucks on all of these upgrades
Aaron, if you are thinking of getting a Mac Book Pro, you won’t need a docking station for the larger display. The Mac Book Pro’s have a larger logic board and come with the attachments for hard wiring directly into the cinema displays. In other words, they are already compatible. Save the money and think about adding the Airport extreme wireless network, you can add printers and multiple hard drives (with a separate USB hub) directly into your wireless network and also use it as a router. It is also great for sharing files with other computers in the network, just finished doing that with mine and this rascal is pretty fast [ch9786]. I recommend saving the money on a docking station and perhaps add a wireless mouse and keyboard too, you may be one happy chappy.
WOW John!!!! Those are truly great shots and no color cast issues, you did a FANTASTIC job on these!!!!!
LOL— And I guess you want a couple of days notice so that you can starve those little kittens first 😉
Well, I thought that I would bring my cute little pets along but I don’t like to bet on animal fights, something wrong about profiting off of a winner so…
I bet you $100.00 that your cute fury little kittens don’t even show up ;D ;D
No problem at all John 🙂 At least we did hit the nail on the head as far as why they want their submissions this particular way. 😉
With the last bit of information, it did sound more like they would much rather have the legal size or A4 sheets. I am very impressed with the information as it sounds like this publisher is very well established and more professional.
Sounds like you have a good plan and most importantly, it is inline with their protocol. Best of luck on this and you need to let us know how it turned out so that we can celebrate with you :).
Also, very glad that you were able to satisfy your original printer issue :).
Great, we are on the same page now. Yes, the JCCS is a thumbnail contact sheet but formatted and measured to fit into the cover slot of the CD case. It makes it easier to store in the CD and decreases the odds of it getting lost as loose paper. With the confirmation, that you provided, I would go with the TIFF’s as well. It doesn’t sound like they are using the thumbnails as proofs as much as they are using them for subject matter, composition and basic exposure, if the first 2 are liked, they will then open your CD images and then proof those.
You may even want to use both types of Contact Sheets, redundancy never hurts. Still though, do what you feel most comfortable with and treat my suggestions as just opinions.
Great photography Neal!! I must say that I miss that photographer from just a few months ago, felt I had better security back then LOL. Keep up the great work, my friend, love seeing your “great” photographs!
Rob S… nice photographs and the art works are very interesting, that seems to be a very interesting place for a wedding, as well 🙂
Not to make this more complicated, are they asking for proof sheets or Contact Sheets, basically a Jewel case Contact Sheet (JCCS)? It sounds to me like it is the later, as it will serve as an enormous time saving tool for them. The additional information tells me a lot more, as well.
I am just guessing here but it sounds like they are not loading and warehousing the photographs, on a harddrive, as much as they are storing the CD’s and using the Jewel Case Contact Sheets as a quick reference to CD content and a method of searching for their library of stock images. The other side, of what they are more than likely doing is this: When dealing with a new photographer, they will peruse the JCCS and if they see images that they like, they will then load the CD and go to the file name. If it corresponds to their requirements and needs, they will then load, save and tag these images into their database. Either way, it sounds like they are very busy and meeting their guidelines, plus making it better for them, will go a very long way in moving the photographer to the top of their list.
If it were me and unless there is more information that I do not know, at present: I would create the contact sheets at 4.5” X4.5” and add a ¼” border, the reason for this is ease in display as the average jewel case is 4.75” and the ¼” border makes it easier to view. The main thing is making it easier for them to store and see what is on the CD, at a glance. I would then load the CD with TIFF’s as once they decide to open a file, it sounds like they are then looking for all details and quality for use. I would not count on them wanting to waste more time in requesting a TIFF later from a CD full of JPEG’s. Also, make sure that copyright data and contact information is in the metadata as it sounds like they will not want to have to keep looking everything up and can just get it off of the open file. Print your contact information in the border of the JCCS as well.
As far as your question on monitor – printer profiles. No, it is not correct but this comes with a caveat: Use what is available and what works best for you. If your prints are printer better with your monitor profile, stay with that but normally the printer and monitor are calibrated completely different and have different gammas. If you are happy with the end results, stay with what looks best for you. Also, those inks do need time to cure and 24 hours is about correct.
I know that you know this but for anyone else that may be interested: Never ever send in RAW of NEF files, they are your proof of ownership and metadata can be stripped. Also, some GA’s actually prefer PSD’s over TIFF’s but TIFF’s are most often requested and/or desired.
It would be nice to know if they actually want proof sheets, which does no sound normal, or the contact sheet. Best of luck with your submissions!! 😉
