One thing I tried many months ago was to open up the website to questions and I then tried to combine similar questions and answer them in a concise post. So this might be a time to try that again! You can ask a question in the comments below, or send me a message through the contact form. Your question can be anonymous if you like. I’ll wait a while and then start to create some answering posts. So, if...
One of the things we should look for in the news are the signs of events or changes in society that will start to generate articles and commentary in the coming weeks and months. As I have mentioned before, some things are just newsworthy because of the event itself – a riot, or a fire – and that sort of event does not generate ongoing demand for what I call illustrative stock photos and videos. Instead, we are looking for...
I originally wrote about how to shoot photos of fireworks for the Dreamstime blog, but thought this was a perfect time to update it and publish it in time for the USA Independence day fireworks shows. Many countries have extravagant fireworks displays to celebrate major events. New Years is a popular one almost everywhere, Independence Day in the USA and many others. But how best to capture the excitement of those celebrations when everything seems to conspire against us photographers...
I wrote about my tests of Green Screen extraction plugins for Photoshop a month or so ago, and then went through a lull in creativity and didn’t do much more. My chosen solution at that time was Key36, a unique approach that seems to combine actions that run in Photoshop with some on-line control. They offer both online extraction where you upload the file to their servers plus this Photoshop action and their payment system is quite unique as well...
I’ve been doing more green screen oriented stock photos recently because my travels have been sorely restricted! Why a green screen when it might be much easier to extract against a pure white background? Well, I wanted to produce both videos and stock photos of the various ideas and Premiere already has a great extraction tool with the Ultra Key effect and that seems to do an excellent job with getting clean edges and a smooth video composite as you...
I’ve been a proponent of taking photos wherever you can, even though there may not be an immediate market for them. As an example, when I was booked on a early flight from Dulles airport in Washington, DC (remember those days…) I spent my waiting time taking a few shots around the terminal and the gate area. As it was early, there were very few people around and I think I uploaded the shots as editorial and they have probably...
Being isolated at home can be OK for a time, but unless you are active in some way, the days can get very long. If you are able to work your normal job from home, that is great, but if that isn’t possible then what can you do. To some extent I am used to this sort of life, having worked from home for about 10 years now, but I’m missing the trips to see new places and I am...
After building my new computer, I spent some time reloading all the apps and thinking about how I was protecting my “assets” – the still and video files that are the core of my business as a stock photographer. I’m also a technology consultant (in my spare time) and so I have those files as well to think about. I maintain a system where things are reasonably well structured across various hard drives, the core of which is: Storage structure...
Way back in 2015, I built my last computer and while it was pretty good for the time, I’ve become frustrated by Premiere in particular when working with 4K videos. The playback within the app seems to have been getting worse and I started using proxies for editing and color correction, but of course it takes minutes sometimes to create the proxies from the 4K video in the first place. So with expectations of a tax refund from the IRS...
I do wonder if this is “fiddling while Rome burns”, but Luminar 4 has a new update (4.2) which has added some interesting features to the base program – particularly in terms of adding things seamlessly to the sky that you may have just replaced. I’ve written about my experiences with replacing skies in previous posts. I played with it a little and added some clouds to an otherwise blank blue sky in this image (together with some sun flare...
