Join Rick and Jason for an exclusive birding safari to the Rio Grande Valley in Texas

Our first-ever workshop was a trip to the Texas Rio Grande Valley in 2007. Since then, we’ve had the pleasure of leading more workshops and meeting more people, and the experience has been wonderful. We often get asked “when are you going back to Texas?” Well, we’ve managed to work out a first-class birding experience for four nights in the Rio Grande Valley, May 30- June 3, 2012.

The Texas Birding Experience is an exclusive photo workshop. As many of you know, you don’t just wander around with a 500mm lens looking for birds (although we’ve done that, too). If you want the best bird photos, you’ve got to get close. And by close, we’re talking less than 75′ in most cases. We’ve teamed up with the Dos Venadas Ranch in south Texas, where you can shoot from professionally designed photo blinds. There are numerous blinds on the property; some face West (for morning shooting) and others face East (for afternoons). Each blind faces an array of natural perches with clear lines of sight. Even better, most of the blinds also offer a small pond, which not only attracts the animals, but gives you even more creative shooting possibilities.

The other thing about great bird photography is diversity. You don’t want to sit around filling your memory card with shots of one or two species. The Rio Grande Valley excels here, too. Because it’s so far south, you can find birds here that you won’t see anywhere else in North America. Other birds, like the painted bunting, are very common. There’s also a raptor blind, where you’ll be able to photograph Crested Caracaras and Harris Hawks from up-close.

When we went to Texas in 2007, we had to drive back and forth from Rio Grande City each day, and scrounge around for whatever fast-food restaurant was open. This time, we’ve arranged first-class accommodations at a hunting lodge that’s only 3 miles from the main field site. Moreover, the lodge also has a set of blinds that we’ll be allowed to shoot from, so early mornings won’t be so painful! At the lodge, our participants will get air-conditioned double-occupancy rooms, and free WiFi Internet. There’s also a conference area so that we can review our images and work on post-processing as a group.

Also included in your stay is a full meal plan. No late-night runs to McDonalds on this trip! You’ll get three home-cooked meals every day, including a light breakfast, snacks for the blinds, full lunch and dinner, and a happy hour every evening. Beer and wine are included! Talk about a great way to unwind while you download your photos and enjoy the Texas sunset.

Because space is extremely limited, we’re only able to offer six (6) openings for this one of a kind workshop. Your tuition of $2899 covers:

• Private Ranch Access and Blind Fees
• Guide Fees
• Field and classroom instruction sessions
• Double-occupancy lodging
• All meals and happy hour each evening
• Ground Transportation, including airport pickup if needed (nearest airport is McAllen, TX (MFE))

The last time we went to Texas, we came back with thousands of images. And this was before we had our D3/D300′s! We recommend bringing a crop-sensor DSLR (D300s is perfect) with 300+ mm lens. The 200-400VR is perfect in most cases on this trip, but you could also use a 300mm f/4 with 1.4x converter and get great shots. If big lenses are something you’ve always wanted to try but just don’t have the budget for, you should consider a one-week lens rental. It would be worth the experience.

Register for this workshop by March 1, 2012 and save $200 off the tuition fee

Without looking at the EXIF, do you know what sensor format I used here?

We all hear about “full frame” and “crop” sensors, and usually there’s a certain air of smugness about having a larger sensor. Nikon currently has three sensor formats (outside of the Coolpix line): FX (24 x 36mm), DX (16 x 24mm) and CX (13.2 x 8.8mm). Let’s take a quick look at the pros and cons of different sensor sizes in today’s digital photography. 

Resolution (Megapixel Count)

Resolution is simply the number of pixels (photosites) on your camera’s sensor. Most modern cameras offer between 10 and 24 megapixel resolution. Nikon’s CX-format cameras (1-series) are 10.1 megapixels. The DX-format D7000 is 16 megapixels, and so is the newly announced D4 (FX format). The 24 megapixel D3x is FX format.

So what’s the difference? More resolution means the potential to capture more detail in an image. I say potential, because you need good lenses and good technique to maximize image quality. A blurry 24 MP image isn’t useful, even if it has 24MP. The more pixels you have, the easier it is to print large or crop into the image and still have good detail. It really doesn’t matter what format you have, strictly speaking, when it comes to the number of pixels.

Noise and ISO

What does differ with larger sensors, however, is the size of the photosites. For any given resolution, a larger sensor will always have larger photosites than a smaller sensor. Here, you’ll see sometimes profound differences in the noise level of high ISO images. The 12MP Nikon D3s is practically noise-free through ISO 3200. On the other hand, the D300s (DX) with nearly equal resolution produces noticeable noise (albeit not really bad) above ISO 1000. But there are other things to consider when judging noise, most importantly is the size of the final “print.” I’ll use the term “print” loosely here, as sometimes the final image is a JPEG posted to the web. For very small images (less than 1200 pixels wide), the simple act of downsizing the image reduces noise to the point where it might not be noticeable.

Depth of Field

The larger your imaging sensor, the easier it is to get very shallow depth of field, even without f/1.4 lenses. Many portrait photographers prefer the look of an isolated subject, and bigger sensors (and fast glass) is the best way to get that look. However, there are times when shallow depth of field isn’t always ideal. Macro photographers are always trying to get maximum DOF, to the point where “focus stacking” becomes an option. Here, a smaller sensor has the advantage of producing an effectively greater DOF. When you’re focusing on moving subjects, especially ones coming directly towards you, having a little extra DOF can also help get sharp shots. Photographers using a “full frame” DSLR for the first time might think they’re having focus problems, when in fact it’s the reduced DOF creating more apparent softness in their images.

Lenses and Gear

As sensors get larger, the size of the image circle required to cover it also increases. That means bigger sensors need bigger lenses. While it’s relatively easy to go “wide” with a large sensor, if you want to use telephoto lenses you’ll also need significantly longer focal lengths to get a comparable angle of view to a crop-sensor camera. A 300mm lens used on FX format is a medium telephoto, while that lens is the equivalent of a “super-tele” on a DX body. You’d need to use a 450mm lens on a Nikon D4 to get the same sensor coverage as a 300mm lens on a D300 or D7000. Conversely, if you like wide-angle shots, then it’s far easier to use a larger sensor. A 24mm lens is fairly wide on a D3x, but it’s like using a normal lens on a D300.

The side-effect of larger sensors is that your lens bag gets bigger and heavier. I can carry the equivalent of a 27-80mm and 80-300mm zoom kit in a belt pouch designed to hold a single pro DSLR body when I’m using my Nikon 1 V1 (CX). The whole kit with both lenses weighs a mere 527g (1.16 lbs). A similar kit with my D3s (24-70mm + 70-300mm) would not only take up more space, but would weigh in at 2.8kg (6.4lbs)… and that’s without the battery! And don’t get me started on the price of those kits…

Choosing what’s best for you

Clearly, there are some things that large-sensor cameras can do better than crop-sensor ones. If you make your living shooting high school sports in poor light, then there’s no doubt that a D3s (or D4) is going to give you a distinct advantage in terms of cleaner shots. But there’s also something to be said about a small, lightweight kit that won’t necessitate a visit to the chiropractor after you use it, or make you stand out as a “pro” while on vacation. In a world where fewer people are printing and most images are shared via Facebook or Flickr at (relatively) low final resolution, the need for high-resolution, high-ISO cameras isn’t nearly what we thought it was a few years ago. For the casual shooter, just about any DSLR (or mirror-less compact) will deliver image quality unheard of to those of us who grew up shooting film. Of course, Nikon and Canon (and others) will continue to push the technological limits of sensor technology, just feel good knowing that by knowing your own true needs you’ll be able to make the best choice as to what kind of camera you should get.

First things first.  Don’t obsess too much about noise in an image.  If you try to eliminate every last trace of noise, you’ll get a smeared up, plasticky-looking imaging that isn’t very appealing.  It’s better to have a bit of graininess left in an image than to wipe it out entirely.  A little bit of grit can actually increase the perception of sharpness in a print.  If you’re going to eliminate a component of noise in an image, it’s best to go predominantly after color noise, which is the stuff that looks like colored specs.  Also, before going nuts with noise reduction and sharpening techniques, consider making a test print.  You’ll probably be pleasantly surprised at how little of problem you have before doing anything fancy,  Especially in smaller print sizes, noise is rarely much of an issue in the real world.  A great composition or creative idea trumps a bit of noise any day of the week.

So, what are some good principles for achieving nice high ISO results?  Here are a few:

- Avoid underexposing an image.  As soon as you start increasing the brightness or exposure sliders, adding fill light or using the shadow protection slider, noise will start to become more prominent.  Getting the correct exposure for the image (one that results in you not having to brighten the image) is a good starting point.  I actually dragged the brightness of the above image down about a half-stop in post-processing.

- Realize that sharpening and noise reduction are yin and yang functions.  Sharpening will increase the perception of noise, while noise reduction will blur the image.  Success lies in a careful balance of the two for your image.  Good settings or technique sometimes require an iterative approach to these controls, looking for the compromise that suits you.

-  Higher ISO sharpening settings are typically lower intensity, higher radii settings than low ISO settings.  Compared to your sharpening settings that you use for landscape shots or other images with a lot of detail, you’ll want to reduce your intensity a bit, raise the radius by 50-100% and then either boost the masking slider (LR/ACR) or increase the threshold value (NX2).  Those last two items are very different controls, but some of what they accomplish is similar.  In both cases, you’re trying to eliminate sharpening from regions where there’s either little detail or the change in a tonal value is small.  In LR3, look for preset that Adobe provides called “Sharpening – Wide Edges (Faces)” under “Lightroom Presets”.  It’s great for portraits, but it’s also very good for higher ISO photos.  The key items are the lower  intensity, higher radius setting, coupled with masking set to about 60, which confines the sharpening to edges.  By the way, its companion called “Sharpening – Narrow Edges (Scenic) is great for low ISO landscapes.  In NX2, you can also consider using high-pass sharpening, which similarly has its effect mainly on edges.  I’ll let you look up how to do that in Jason’s e-book on NX2.

-  Do color noise removal first, and then add luminance noise removal only if absolutely necessary.  When I’m working in LR3, I always start by switching my sharpening setting to the one I mention above.  I often find it’s sufficient when combined with the default color noise reduction setting of 25.  I might have a little grit in the image, but it’s not a problem.  If I still see the effect of color noise, I’ll bump that slider up a little higher before touching the luminance NR slider.  If I’m still not satisfied, I’ll dial in a bit of luminance NR, usually in the range of 10-30, almost never in excess of that for images with much detail.

-  Consider doing only local sharpening or NR where it’s needed.  You can do this in both LR/ACR, as well as NX2.  LR/ACR uses the adjustment brush, whereas in NX2 you’ll use selection control points.  Both work well.  With NX2 you can also apply NR in a limited area via a selection control point.  Lightroom doesn’t explicitly offer that at the moment, but there’s a trick you can do with the adjustment brush and negative amounts of sharpening.  If you use an amount of -1 up through -50, you’ll remove sharpening from a region (which is a way of limiting it).  If you use -50 or less (it goes up to -100), you’ll paint in some blur, which at smaller doses can be a form of noise reduction.

-  For really nasty noise problems, consider using a dedicated tool.   Many times these are Photoshop plug-ins, but a lot of them work as standalone tools or via Lightroom.  Good ones include Nik Define and Topaz Denoise.  Both of those support 64-bit processing, which a number of older ones don’t.  The algorithms in those programs are more sophisticated than those in raw processors, although LR3 is really quite good, and I hardly ever use those plug-ins anymore.

-  How you work tones in an image matters.  I already mentioned the problems associated with brightening an underexposed image.  If you have large areas of your image that you want completely dark (like in the above image), sliding the “blacks” slider a bit to the right (increasing the value) will clip the shadow detail, which is where a lot of the noise hides.  It’s also where it can look ugliest on a print.  If it’s wiped out via this control (or a levels/curves adjustment), sharpening will be easier, too.  In the above image, I bumped up the blacks slider just a touch and noise in the part of the image was greatly diminished.

-  If your raw converter has something like a clarity slider, use it.  LR3/ACR 6′s clarity slider can add snap to an image that might be suffering from lowered contrast that’s due to noise (think higher ISO sports shot).  A value of 20-40 is usually good.  For NX2, explore the use of very low intensity, high radius sharpening settings or move the image to Photoshop and do the same.  The image above had clarity set to 30 in LR3.

-  Consider doing a black and white conversion instead of color.  If you had to go sky-high on the ISO setting, and results in color just don’t look good, trying making a black and white conversion.  Black and white eliminates weird color patters and eliminates the problem that all cameras have with lowered color saturation at their extremes.  High ISOs and black and white look a lot like good old Tri-X film, which is often a great look.

That’s probably enough and keep the second paragraph in mind (don’t obsess).  It’s rare for me to spend more than about a minute stewing over sharpening and NR settings.  Get them close and then be done with them.  If you’re spending 10-20 minutes working NR and sharpening settings, you need to revamp your workflow or just ease off a bit on the perfectionism.  Hope this helps!

What did skipping the middle ground do for me?  It made me consciously think about whether or not subject isolation was important, how much I wanted to pull the viewer into the image (easier with a wide angle), and I came to find that those were more natural focal lengths for me.  When I take a look at my images from a shoot, it’s amazing how despite the fact that I have a set of fairly wide ranging lenses, the most successful images usually skip that middle range of 50mm or so.

Fixed focal length prime lenses make this exercise the easiest, and these days I like to pair my D700 (which is my more portable camera) with  24mm 1.4, 35mm 1.4 and 85mm 1.4 AF-S lenses for urban photography.  They’re fast, sharp and fun to use.  You can isolate subjects well or get plenty of depth of field.  Less expensive FX solutions could include a 24mm 2.8, 35mm 2.0 and an 85mm 1.8.  Those are still very good lenses, and they cost and weigh dramatically less.  There’s also the option of used lenses, including the still superb 85mm 1.4 AF-D.  For a DX body, the choices are a bit more awkward in the wide-angle realm, but a 24mm and 50mm work pretty well in the other ranges, and an 85mm can work well for tighter compositions.

If you’re using zooms and don’t want to invest in primes, no problem.  Just try to consciously avoid that middle ground in your shots as an experiment.  You can always come back to it when you want (after all, many great shots have been made with 50mm lenses), but stirring things up a bit might give your shots some added punch.  Give it a try!

Method 1: Narrow Depth of Field

Using a fast telephoto lens at close range causes the background to go completely out of focus. By orienting myself perpendicular to the cormorant, I was able to get most of it in focus (click to enlarge).

Depth of field is the perception that objects in front of or behind the exact plane of focus are either sharp or soft. Depth of field is an optical property, and it depends on three things: lens aperture, focal length, and distance to your subject. While all lenses can be stopped down to maximize depth of field, you’ll need a wide aperture (fast) lens to minimize DOF. Most budget lenses offer maximum apertures of f/4 or smaller; to really get good subject isolation, you’ll want a lens that has f/2.8 or faster. Some of the classic “portrait” lenses offer fast apertures of f/2 or f/1.4.

While aperture is important, focal length is another determinant of DOF. A telephoto lens will have a narrower DOF at a given subject distance than a wide-angle or normal lens. This helps to explain the common “portrait” focal lengths of 85mm, 105mm, and 135mm. Two of my favorite portrait lenses are the 85mm f/1.4 AFS G Nikkor and the 200mm f/2.0 AFS G VR Nikkor. If you’re on a budget, the 85mm f/1.8 Nikkor is also excellent. DX users will find an extreme bargain in the 50mm f/1.8 AFS Nikkor.

Lastly, subject distance is a component of DOF. Regardless of the aperture and focal length you choose, the closer you are to the subject, the shallower the DOF will be. In fact, with extreme close-ups, the DOF is so shallow that many macro photographers will stop down to f/22 or greater just to try to get more of their tiny subjects in apparent focus.

The best way to limit depth of field, therefore is to use a fast telephoto lens at a relatively close subject distance. Shooting for limited depth of field requires some practice, because you will be dealing with a very shallow range of perceived focus. Because the focal plane will be very thin, you’ll want to orient yourself as perpendicular to the subject as possible. If the subject extends beyond the focal plane, it will quickly go soft. For portraits, make sure the subject’s nearest eye is in focus. For inanimate subjects, make sure that you define the area of interest by focusing on it precisely. Live view focusing can often help in these situations, especially if you’re using a tripod and the subject is static.

Another thing to check when you are using limited DOF is the corners of the frame. Look for distracting background elements, especially large bright areas. Usually you can reposition yourself very slightly and eliminate the unwanted background, especially if you’re using a telephoto lens.

Method 2: Post-Processing Techniques

If you don’t have a fast lens or a scene that works well for isolating your subject, you can use post-processing techniques to draw the viewer’s attention to your subject, away from the background. One of the simplest techniques is the “vignette” effect, which can be applied manually by darkening (or lightening) the corners of the frame, or using plug-ins like Nik Software’s Color Efex Pro 4. The advantage of using plug-ins is that it is very easy to create a wide range of edge effects. For example, Color Efex Pro 4 offers four different filters for creating edge darkening/lightening effects:

• Darken/Lighten Center
• Vignette
• Vignette: Blur
• Vignette: Lens

Each of these filters produces a slightly different effect using different methods. If you don’t have a plug-in to create a vignette effect, you can simply use the brush tool in Photoshop, paint with either black or white in a new layer, and adjust the layer opacity to taste. Often times you’ll find that you don’t need to make the corners extremely dark to see a noticeable effect. Try toggling the layer visibility on and off to preview the effect at different opacities.

I used the "Vignette: Lens" filter in Color Efex Pro 4 to add the corner darkening to this image (click to enlarge).

Darkening the corners in this image diminishes the busy background of the aircraft hanger. I used the "Vignette" filter in Color Efex Pro 4 to produce the effect (click to enlarge).

There are also software tools that try to emulate narrow DOF by blurring the image. One such tool is Alien Skin’s Bokeh software. With this software, you can recreate the look of different apertures and focal lengths and define the area of the image that is to remain sharp. In my experience, Bokeh does a very good job on most images… better than what I could achieve manually using the on-board blur tools in Photoshop. When adding blur to an image, be very careful not to get too extreme. Usually extreme settings will end up looking incredibly artificial.

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-  Import images via Lightroom 3 and as part of that, apply a metadata template that’s oriented to the year.  This automatically fills in contact info for me, as well as the year in the copyright field

- I let LR3 use my default image editing parameters, which override the standard values in the following way:

–  I use color profiles generated by the X-Rite Color Checker Passport (I like the way they look plus they give all of my cameras, independent of brand, the same look and starting point).

–  For my infrared D300, I use a special infrared color profile that re-centers the white balance range so that the color temperature range is centered plus a override the white balance setting to a custom one based on normal daylight.  This gets me better results than what the camera can do by itself or that LR can do

– Sharpening gets altered to an intensity of 40, a radius of 0.8,  a detail setting of 35, and masking value of 0.  This is a bit stronger than the default value and renders fine detail better.  It’s best for landscapes and other subjects that have lots of detail and are shot at low ISO values.  If I did predominantly portraits or higher ISO work, I’d use something like 35, 1.2, 25, 50.  That accentuates shapes more than texture and minimizes noise in areas of the image lacking detail.

–  I enable lens correction so that distortion and light fall-off are automatically fixed for lenses that are supported in Lightroom (which is pretty much every lens I use these days).

– For certain cameras, I alter the default value for exposure according based on a value called the “baseline exposure”.  Not getting into the intricate details (which would be a separate article), recent bodies have a value of zero, but older ones vary.  The D3, D300 and D700 all have a baseline exposure value of +0.5, which means I dial-in a default setting of -0.5.  The D3X is +0.25, so it gets -0.25, but my D3s is zero, so nothing is altered.  If you want to do the same, convert a NEF to a DNG format and then view the DNG in something like Photome and look for the Baseline Exposure value.  I’ve found this yields a better starting point, but your mileage may vary.

That’s it for things that happen during importation.  It may sound like a lot, but since I have my defaults set that way, I just import and it all happens automatically.  Very nice.

After keywording (a different topic) and going through images and determining which ones are keepers, I edit those in LR3 (both global and local adjustments) and make liberal use of its great syncing features to copy settings from one file to others. I’ll then process a subset of them in Photoshop CS5.  Sometimes that will be for specific features I find helpful in Photoshop (like content aware retouching, exposure blending, pano stitching, …lots of things) and sometimes it’s because I want to use a plug-in.  Some of my favorite plug-ins these days are the following:

-  Nik Color Efex Pro 4.  I especially like the tonal contrast and detail extractor functions, but I also like glamour glow, dark contrast, sunshine, and classical soft focus.

-  Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.  It’s the best way to convert images to black and white that I’ve found.

-  Nik Viveza 2.  Sometimes I’ll do local adjustments in LR3 or Photoshop and sometimes I’ll use Viveza.  All work well – it just depends on what I’m trying to do and what mood I’m in.

-  Once in a blue moon, I’ll use OnOne’s Focal Point to blur out a background slightly if the bokeh is a bit ugly.  Again, I don’t do this often.

-  Also on an infrequent basis, I’ll use Topaz Adjust 4 for more graphic looking images or Alien Skin Exposure if I want an image that resembles a specific film.  Again, those are fairly infrequent things and Color Efex Pro 4 and Silver Efex Pro 2 also do film emulation well.

In almost every case, when I initially go into Photoshop from Lightroom, I’ll open the file as a Smart Object.  This means that not only are all my plug-in settings (and many common Photoshop edits) non-destructive and reversible later, but I can even edit the original raw settings later if I want.  That can be handy for certain plug-ins, and it’s also a good way of taking advantage of technological improvements in raw processing over time.  I never use those plug-ins from Lightroom because it eliminates the option of updating settings later.  Since I sometimes change my mind on how I want an image to look, and this makes future changes easy.

That’s about it for a top-level summary.  I hope it helps in your photography!

Canon EOS-1D X: A paradigm shift?

Canon has announced a new flagship DSLR, the 1D X. This is an 18-MP, full-frame (24x36mm) sensor DSLR that is capable of a top frame rate of 12fps (although 14fps is possible with the mirror locked up). New tweaks include a fully redesigned AF system, and an in-spec top ISO of 51,200 (expandable to 204, 800 if you dare…).

But the part of the commentary surrounding the 1D X that caught my attention was this tidbit on Rob Galbraith’s site (and similar comments elsewhere by those “in the know”): “Going forward, the EOS-1D X will be the only 1-series camera the company makes, or at least it will be once it becomes a shipping product starting next year.”

What? No 1Ds? That’s an interesting paradigm shift, because it suggests that Canon’s market research has determined there is little or no market for a high megapixel sensor in a flagship body. Sure, the top-end cameras with the crazy pixel counts are expensive (that’s why I still don’t have a D3X), but the message Canon is sending is that the 5D series will be the high megapixel body and the 1D series will be a hybrid photojournalist camera. Moreover, we see the end of the 1.3x crop (APS-H) bodies with this new camera, and the move to 24x36mm format implies that Canon is now favoring photosite size over photosite count.

From a sales perspective, this shift certainly makes sense. I’m sure Nikon and Canon only sell a minuscule fraction of D3x and 1Ds bodies as compared to their faster cousins. But there are nice things about the “pro” body style that often go missing in the lower-end cameras. Or maybe, Canon’s working to develop an entirely new high-end line of bodies that offer high megapixel counts with even larger sensors.

While I’m not a Canon user, my own experience owning Nikon D3s, D700 and D300s bodies has shown me that there are often nice little “extras” in the flagship body that go beyond the integrated battery grip. For example, in the D3s, I get some features that might be overlooked:

• Real-time DOF preview in Live View Mode
• Exposure bracketing indicator in viewfinder
• ±3EV metering display in viewfinder
• Full weather-sealing
• Built-in viewfinder cover
• Dedicated controls for bracketing

While none of these features are “dealbreakers,” they’re awfully nice to have, especially when you get used to them and then switch to a lower-end body.

Despite the major advances in imaging technology over the last several years, there’s still a fundamental trade-off between image resolution and speed/ISO. Camera companies have to make tough decisions about how to position their product line(s), and which photographers to cater to. I, for one, have wished at times for a DX sensor in a D3 body. As much as I love my D300s and D700, I gravitate towards the D3s most of the time I’m out shooting. For most photographers, I think 18MP represents a perfectly reasonable combination of resolution and performance. I would suspect that Nikon will follow suit with their follow-up to the D3s. What’s in doubt now is whether we’ll see a “D4x” or if the rumored high-resolution D800 will take its place in the lineup.

The Canon EOS-1D X will be available in March 2012 at an estimated street price of $6800.

After nearly six years and over 150 episodes, we’ve come to the conclusion that it’s time to retire our microphones and bring the curtain down on The Image Doctors podcast. This is not a decision that we made lightly, but it is something that was in our best interests. We would like to thank all of you who have followed us from our humble beginnings in December of 2005 and also those of you who maybe just recently discovered us.

We never expected The Image Doctors to be such a popular production within the photography community. We are especially thankful to all of the great photographers who have joined us over the years to help enlighten our listeners on exciting ways to foster their interest in photography. Even more than that, we are humbled by the sheer number of our listeners who have written us or posted on our Facebook Page to ask questions, suggest topics, or offer their thanks for our tidbits. Without you, we’d never have made it this long. Finally, we’d like to thank Nikonians.org for their steadfast commitment to delivering The Image Doctors podcast free to everyone around the world.

We wish everyone who supported us the very best going forward and good light.

-Jason Odell & Rick Walker

Our first stop was a boarded-up convenience store, which we shot in “crummy” mid-day light. We emphasized side-lighting and textures, and shot for black and white as well as HDR.

The next stop was the old train museum, where we spent the better part of two hours roaming the old equipment yard, working as many subjects as we could.

We finished off the evening shoot with a less than perfect moonrise over the plains, but it was still nice to be out there.

The next morning we headed over to a nearby wind farm to photograph the turbines in the early morning light. We got some great color in the sky and in the adjacent corn fields. We then photographed along some of the dirt roads outside of Limon, where the cows were quite interested in our activities.

We want to thank all of those who attended, and we hope to see you again soon!