My Brand New Apps Are Ready To Go At Only $1.99 each!

Good Morning Everybody,

I know I’ve been laying low for a while but  I’m writing today to get the news out about my brand new $1.99 Photography Apps!

Here is the backstory. Last year, my good friend and great photographer Rick Sammon,  asked me to be part of his Mobile Masters Group and twisted my arm to produce three wedding apps [link]. Rick is really an App Master.  I finally completed the project and they look great! Read the rest of the story on the very first set of David Ziser Apps [link] below. You're going to love them

My Brand New Apps Are Ready To Go At Only $1.99 each!

As I mentioned above, I am thrilled to be announcing my brand new Wedding Apps on Lighting, Lenses, and Composition [link].  Each App contains 25 of my favorite images per App topic along with the back story, exposure data, and lighting diagram for each image. I think you'll love them!

For years we've been offering  the Hot Shots Series available at my DigitalProTalk Market Place in a printed version. Now we can offer them at a fraction of the cost - only $1.99 each - in their new App form! The printed version was very popular years ago but technology marches on and now they are a "steal of a deal" for less than two bucks each! 

We offer three titles so far:

David Ziser's Hot Shots Lighting - Lighting creates the mood and feeling in a photograph. Learn from the master, via end-result images and lighting diagrams, how you can create images with impact though the use of lighting.

David Ziser's Hot Shots Lenses - Lenses help photographers tell a story - their story and the story of the subject. Learn how to use lenses - from wide to telephoto - wisely to capture the all-important, once-in-a-lifetimes event for the bride and groom.

David Ziser's Hot Shots - Composition - Learn how to successfully compose an image via end-result images and illustrations that explain composition techniques. Camera, lens and exposure info is included too.

I hope you love the Apps. One more time – here is the link to the apps.

Enjoy!  David

p.s. Don't forget - LaDawn wanted me to let you know that she has marked things down again at our Digital Resource Center [link]. Get the deals - some up to 80% off - while they last as we will be closing the Digital Resource Center in this summer.

My Budapest Master Class: Shooting At Buda Castle, Mighty Fine Photos!

Good Morning Everybody,

What a great second day  to our Master Class we had  in Budapest.  The icing on top of the cake was the beautiful walk back to the hotel and a full day of shooting and dinner at the fabulous French restaurant, Plavilion de Paris. Most of the class, including LaDawn and I spent a lot of time photographing every course that passed by our eyes (mouth).

Like I said in yesterday’s post – this is truly the city of lights for Eastern Europe!  This first image, below, is of the Parliament House, construction starting in 1885 and completed in 1902 and at the time was the largest parliamentary building in the world I s located along the Pest side the Danube River.  This is clearly the most famous landmark in the city with it’s 691 room and it’s magnificent dome can be seen from miles around.

A little further down the river is one of the eight bridges that span the Danube.  This is the third newest the bridge of Budapest the Elizabeth Bridge.  Along with all the other bridges of the city they were blown up at the end of World War II. It is bright white cable bridge and definitely sets itself apart from the landscape.  At night, it is just beautiful to see.

We had a great second day for our Master Class in Budapest, Hungary. Clay and I both started out with PowerPoint presentations to set the tune for the week and lay out the plan for our week of shooting.

After lunch we headed up to the Buda Castle quarter. This area spreads out over a large area with pedestrian walkways, small shops, museums, and the historic castle itself. It offers plenty of great places for photography. Let’s take a look at some of the images I captured during our visit.

Buda Castle Quarter – Great Location, Great Images!

Image 1:

When shooting outdoors I always try to make the sky as rich and blue as possible. The way I accomplish this in the first photograph below is by using high-speed flash sync on my 600 DX – RT strobes. That allowed me to use a smaller f-stop and a higher shutter speed to under expose the sky just slightly. The off-camera flash also allows me to put the dimensional lighting on the subject that I always want.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with my Canon 24-105mm IS lens at 65mm, 1/1600 second at F9.0, ISO 200.  Lighting camera right, Canon 600 EX-RT speed-lite directly.

Image 2:

I love the backlit grasses at the location in which we were shooting. I asked our model, Anna, to get comfortable in the grass and backlit with her with the sun. Not only was she backlit but all the grasses were as well. All I needed to do was bring my flash in from camera left putting beautiful lighting on her face and shoot away.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with my Canon 24-105mm IS lens at 58mm, 1/1600 second at F9.0, ISO 200.  Lighting camera left, Canon 600 EX-RT speed-lite directly.

Image 3:

I love this next photograph! Again, the grasses are backlit but I illuminated Anna a bit differently. In this image I intercepted the suns rays with my 84 inch Westcott translucent umbrella, I like to call it “the cloud”. That gave me a beautiful, soft, directional light falling on her face.

Since I had to open up for the proper exposure on her, the grasses around her not in the shadow of the umbrella went even brighter giving me and almost infrared look to the image.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with my Tamron 28-300mm VC lens at 129mm, 1/320 second at F6.3, ISO 200.  Lighting camera right, sun through Westcott 84 inch translucent umbrella

In all of these images I’m sharing with you today (and yesterday) I'd like you to notice that I've maintained a loop lighting pattern on the face of the subject in each instance. It's the loop lighting pattern that creates the detail, depth, dimension, and saturation to the images I try to create.

Image 4:

In this next image we took a vantage point on the Buda side of the Danube River.  Budapest is actually two cities. Buda is on the western side of the river and Pest, pronounced Pesht, is on the eastern side. Both cities were united in 1873. Anyway, the vantage point from Castle Hill over to the Pest side of the Danube River is always a breathtaking sight.

This image was a bit of a challenge to capture. It was an extremely bright, sunny day. That meant that my exposure needed to be for the brightly lit areas within the composition. My subject was almost silhouetted in the shadows of the castle and was much darker.

I brought my flash in  from camera right and put my typical loop light illumination on the subject. With a little tweaking in Lightroom 5 I was able to raise a density of the shadows, add richness to the sky, and get this great image of our subject.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with my Tamron 28-300mm VC lens at 129mm, 1/320 second at F6.3, ISO 200.  Lighting camera right, Canon 600 EX-RT speed-lite directly.

Image 5:

This last image below is strictly available light. I saw one of the students working with Anna and noticed the beautiful loop lighting illuminating her profile against the castle towers in the distance. I simply positioned the subject against the background that I thought best fit the composition and then shot away.

Again, a little postproduction Lightroom 5 sweetened the photograph to its finished result.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with my Tamron 28-300mm VC lens at 55mm, 1/320 second at F6.3, ISO 1000.  Lighting camera right was just the natural daylight.

We finished the day about 8 o'clock in the evening and all made our way downhill to the beautiful and delightful French restaurant, Plavilion de Paris. Everyone had a great time reminiscing, joking, laughing, and enjoying each others company, the delicious food and wonderful Hungarian wines. It was a long day but one fantastic experience.

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Hey gang, that's it for me today. We have a few more days off  in Budapest and LaDawn and I are going out and check out some more the sites. After a rainy and windy day yesterday the sun is out the skies are blue and we're ready to take on the city one more time.

Be sure to check in again soon because I can't wait to tell you about our shooting session at the Budapest Opera House. One fantastic and unbelievable location and one fantastic set of images – I can't wait to show you.

Viszlat  (VEES-lat) for now,

David

Top 12 For 2012: My Top Viewed Technique Tuesday Posts, …Way Cool Stuff!

Good Morning Everybody,

Hey gang, I’m back at it this week coming to you with some exciting tutorials that you guys and girls ranked as your favorites during 2012.  Total DPT video loads for 2012 worldwide amounted to over 1,000,000 - WOW!!

I checked in with Vimeo, where all my videos are currently residing, and did a quick tally of the numbers associated with all the 2012 videos.  From those calculations, today’s post lists my TOP 12 videos for 2012.  I’ve also listed some notes with each video to give you a quick peek as to each one’s content.  There is some really good information in the listing, you might have missed, so I hope you enjoy giving a peek.  ENJOY!  -David

Here we go…

1. Give Me A Show Of Hands: [link]

Good portraiture is not all just smiles and pretty faces. It's about making the client look the best they can. And, that means right on down to the details. Those details include, in addition to so many other aspects, how the client's hands look in the image. It's our job to make them look flattering and pleasing in our images.

Most photographers pay NO attention to such things, but artists in the past had to be sensitive to the finer points of the portraits they painted as they were painting for the royal court. If those in the royal court looked bad, heads would roll.

Why not hit the LINK above and enjoy the presentation.

 

2. Exciting Event Lighting: [link]

I'm pretty excited about today's post because I want to review with you some new lighting techniques that we just instituted at a recent wedding. I've mentioned that several times that the new high ISO cameras offer us all kinds of easy, efficient lighting opportunities when photographing our events. That’s what I want to talk about today. And, I have to tell you, after this past Saturday's shoot, I am more stoked than ever to make these lighting changes to all my upcoming events.

The bottom line is this – this weekend everything went as smooth as silk and we captured some great images. Why not hit the LINK button above and I'll share with you the lighting techniques that I’ll be using from this point forward on all of our events.

3. Lightroom 4 Breaths New Life Into DOA Images! [link]

I've selected two horribly under exposed images and two horribly over exposed images, let's call them my Lazarus images. I'm going to see if I can save them in Lightroom 4.

Remember, I'm NOT trying to make a "silk purse" out of a "sow's ear" - OK, yes I am. All joking aside, I'm not trying to make a visual masterpiece out of these 4 images. I'm only trying to get them to a sell-able condition for, as example, the bride's wedding album.

Why not hit the LINK tab above and enjoy the show.

 

4. Lightroom 4 - Never Miss A Shot Again! [link]

Lightroom 4 is introducing some very cool new features. Much better integration with video is one of those features. The other is the new Book module which let's you design albums and picture books effortlessly.

But, it's understanding how these two features can work together that open up a whole slew of new possibilities for the wedding/portrait photographer. Hit the LINK button above on this video to see what I mean.

5. Fast, Easy Event Lighting - Part 2: [link]

Two weeks ago I posted a lighting centric Technique Tuesday. It was a big favorite among our DigitalProTalk readers. Because of a new high ISO cameras I was able to change up my lighting techniques at a recent wedding reception. The new lighting technique gives me a tremendous amount of versatility and ease in capturing the reception candids.

I received a few comments and emails from several of our DigitalProTalk readers asking me how I would change up the lighting set up in a smaller space. Well folks, that's exactly what happened this past weekend. I was working in a much smaller space and didn't have the benefit of second-story balconies in which to place my lights.

The cool thing this weekend was that my technique was exactly the same as two weeks ago. I chose to use one eight-foot light stand and one taller, 12 foot light stand. I attached my Quantum T5d flash heads to the light stands with each powered by the Quantum Turbo 3 power packs.

Because of the high ISO capabilities of my Canon 5D Mark III, I was able to use ISO 1600 for all of these candids. This allowed me to set the power on my Quantum strobes to only 1/16th power. At 1/16 power I was getting nearly instant recycle time from my strobes for the fast paced wedding reception.

Why not follow along with me on my video tutorial, LINK above. I walk you through exactly how I set everything up, how I covered the various locations on the dance floor, and got a great coverage at this past weekend's event.

 

6. Stylized Image Enhancement: [link]

I've been saying for months that we photographers have two tremendous resources at our disposal when it comes to creating great images. First off, we have the best digital cameras ever that let us capture the image like never before.

But more than that, we have the best software available, too. Today's iterations of Photoshop CS6 and Lightroom 4 are the best ever and are necessary upgrades to make. Today it's not just about the hardware we use on the job, it's the software too that helps us finish that job the best we are able. The combination of both gives us an unbelievable amount of versatility in creating our finished images.

Even though I captured a great image in the camera, as you'll see in this tutorial, the brand new Lightroom 4 allowed me to push the image to an even more wonderful stylized result that the hardware could not so easily do by itself. But more that that, Lightroom 4 saves me a few more steps over to Photoshop making our post-production duties even that much easier and quicker.

Why not hit the LINK button above to see what I'm talking about.

 

7. Great B&W Conversion Techniques For Wedding Portraits: [link]

I really like the B&W look in my wedding portraits. There’s something about those soft shades of gray that let the viewer forget all about the color and place all their attention directly on the subject.

But converting those portrait images to B&W, although easy, demands a bit more tweaking to get the look I want. The adjustments I make are NOT your normal B&W adjustments either. I use some sliders in Lightroom that you may have never considered using for B&W enhancements.

The finished result is what counts. Let me walk you through two images that will show you how a beautiful B&W portrait can be produced in Lightroom 4. Simply hit the LINK button above.

 

8. Central Park Revisited – Three Lighting Tips To Make Your Lighting Exciting! [link]

Hey gang, I think I've got a very cool Technique Tuesday for you today. I reviewed all the images I did at my B&H Shootout last week and selected about 15 images I want to share with you today. The gist of today's program is to focus on three specific lighting techniques I demonstrated during my shoot out.

The point of all this is that too many photographers around the country, no, around the world are satisfied with ordinary lighting on their subjects. Folks, it comes down to this - put ordinary lighting on your subjects and you get ordinary results.

Let's change it up a bit – let’s put exciting lighting on our subjects and get some exciting results. That's the point of today's lesson - how to make your lighting exciting, easily and effortlessly, without breaking-the-bank with a ton of expensive gear. Why not hit the LINK button above and see what I'm talking about.

 

9. No Flash Pizzazz: [link]

In today’s lesson I’ll walk you through about two dozen images discussing why I think these images stand on their own without any use of extraneous additive lighting.

In this tutorial you’ll get a peek as to how I compose my images, what I’m seeing in the camera before pressing the shutter button, and how I utilize all the elements of the scene to capture exciting images without secondary light sources.

Hit the LINK button and enjoy the show.

 

10. Magical Sunsets - Using Photoshop's Content Aware Fill Tool To Add Impact To Your Sunset Photos: [link]

Check out this video and see how easy it can be to add a more dramatic look to your sunset wedding photographs. It's super easy and you get a great result.

 

11. The Only Wide Angle Lens You'll Ever Need! [link]

Using the Canon 8-15mm fisheye on my Canon 5D Mark III full frame body, I will show you can achieve a true rectilinearly corrected image with a “Field of View” that ranges from 150 degrees down to a still super-wide 133 degrees depending on the zoom setting of the lens.

I’ve spent a lot of today developing and organizing the data and the images for this post. Why not hit the LINK button above and enjoy one of my favorite Technique Tuesdays ever.

 

12. High Flying Party Photography: [link]

I'm always looking to create images that neither clients nor, photographers for that matter, see very often. I want my images to grab the viewer's attention immediately.

One way to grab the viewer's attention is with a dramatic change of "camera position". A shot taken from overhead fills the bill. We've all seen those overhead shots from the Goodyear blimp taken during a football game. But, to see them taken at a wedding or Bar Mitzvah is quite the treat.

So how can we capture those kinds of images at a party. Let me show you my very easy "Pole-Cam" technique that produces images that are both fun to take and excitingly different to view.

As a bonus with today's lesson, I'm throwing in a bit of multi-lighting reception coverage too. Enjoy! I think you'll get a kick out of this week's "High Flying Party photography" tutorial. Hit the LINK button above and enjoy the show.

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Hey gang, that’s it for today.  I hope you enjoy the walk back in time and get a kick out of re-visiting some of my Technique Tuesday audience favorites.

See ya’ soon,  David

Technique Tuesday: Getting The Money Shot!

Good Morning Everybody,

Well, today is one the big days we've been looking forward to on our visit to NYC - we're attending my daughter's Honors Ceremony at Schimmel Hall at Pace University campus.  Festivities begin at 5:30p.m. with a reception to follow. LaDawn and I are really looking forward to the celebration.

Schimmel Hall,  was the location for the debut of the very famous TriBeCa Film Festival years ago as well as being the stage for Al Pacino, John Goodman, and Jeff Goldblum, and many others.

We spent most of our first real day in the city walking, and walking, and walking - about  5 miles worth.  With Elizabeth's graduation events, the B&H shootout on Thursday, and the Broadway play tickets we nabbed yesterday, our calendar is pretty well filled up for the week. And that's a good thing ;~)

You know, even with all the walking we did yesterday, I took very few photographs.  The day was cloudy and we seemed preoccupied with to many other activities. Well see what happens today.  Anyway, that's the latest, greatest update from the Big Apple. How about we get on with today's Technique Tuesday.  Here we go.

Getting The Money Shot! Getting The Essential Photographs Of The Bride

Because this is a big family week for LaDawn and I, and also vacation time for the both of us, I decided to share with you a Technique Tuesday from a few years back.  I'm also sharing it with you because it was not heavily viewed and was probably missed by most of our DPT readers in spite of the important content on how to make people look good in front of the camera.

When I reviewed this video this morning, I was surprised just how much detail  I went into when making the original post.  I really do think it points up the important reasons why we need to get these essential bridal photographs at a wedding.

Every now and then, someone will comment on one of my images of the day and that comment will give me an idea for a future post. That’s exactly what happened a few weeks ago when I posted "Rocky Mountain High" and someone commented about my cutting off the bride's gown in the photograph. You should never cut off the bride's gown.

I agree 100% with the remark, except when I cut off the bride's gown. So, how about a discussion about when to cut off the gown and when not to cut off the gown. Hey, wait a second, let me give you the whole scoop on photographing a bride - what you need to cover, how to cover it, what you should expect as final result. Fasten your seat belts and hit PLAY below and watch and listen.

______________________________________________________________

Hey gang, that's it for me today.  We're going to take in a few more sites of the city before we head to Liz’s Honors Ceremony this evening. Tomorrow is my daughter's actual graduation ceremony so I'm planning to pass on tomorrows post and plan to be here with a very "lively" post on Thursday. The title? The Worst Wedding Advice In The World For Photographers!  I'm really fired up!

See ya’ then, David

"Right Of Passage”

"Right Of Passage”
©David A. Ziser

I have to admit, I really enjoy photographing Bar/Bat Mitzvahs.  Maybe it’s the parent in me that likes to see these young men and women do well on their very special day.  As I make these images I feel the pride each of each parent whose child is making this rite of passage. 

It takes about one year of study for the young Bar/Bat Mitzvah to make it to the bemah.  That means learning Hebrew, studying the Torah portion, and then preparing a lesson to the entire adult congregation.  Each of these kids are indeed “Rabbi for the day.”

This image was made Friday before Charlie’s big day.  Charlie was a great guy to work with – obliging his parents wishes and mine for the entire photography session.  This is one of those images from our Friday shoot.  It’s a simple set-up showcasing our Bar Mitzvah reading his Torah portion which will be featured in the next morning’s service.

For this image I strived to get a dramatic profile view on my young subject then added my signature “loop light” to his face with my Quantum shooting through my Zumbrella at 1/4 power camera right and slightly behind the subject.  Balancing the ambient light to underexpose by a about 1 stop makes the subject “pop” from the background and gives us a very memorable image for our clients.

Camera specs: Canon 7D fitted with Sigma 8-16mm lens at 8mm, F6.3 @ 1/30 second, ISO 800.  Enjoy!  -David

"Reflections Of Love”

"Reflections Of Love”
©David A. Ziser

Here is another image I made in Washington D.C. a few weeks ago.  What you see here is one of those special moments that come along every now and then.  We were between locations on my shoot when I looked over at the bride and saw the beautiful natural light falling on her face from an open doorway – it was gorgeous!

I asked her not to move and then adjusted her position slightly to get the most flattering view of her.  The trickier part was getting her positioned against the background properly. I wanted no distractions behind her beautiful profile.  I carefully positioned her profile against the pillar you see much further back in the setting.  That pillar’s surface offered an clean background for our bride’s lovely face.

Background selection is where a lot of photographers fall short of the mark.  They see the beautiful lighting but lose focus on the background and end up having things growing out of the bride’s head and don’t realize it till they’re back at their computer and download the images.

You can see in this image that the lighting is a perfect loop lighting for the profile view of the face.  Should I have asked the bride to look back at me?  I think not – doing so would have compromised the lighting severely for this image.  It looks just beautiful just the way it is.

Camera specs:  Canon 5D Mark II fitted with 24-105mm IS lens at 105mm, F4.0 @ 1/25 second, ISO 1600.  Enjoy!  -David

"Fantasy In White”

"Fantasy In White”
©David A. Ziser

Here is another image from the wedding I photographed a few weeks ago.  I had taken this window light image as one of the last I made of the bride before we headed out to do the group photographs.  I like the high angle on my subject and was happy with the shallow depth of field. When I originally looked at the image, I felt there was something there but it wasn’t totally thrilling me either. 

I was spending some time over the weekend editing and generally playing with B&W conversions in Lightroom 4. The more I experimented with this image, the more I began to fall in love with it.  I was attracted to one sharp eyelash contrasting with all the other mid to high tones of gray throughout the image.

I liked how the my eye first entered the image at the bride’s eye but then slowly picked up on her very soft and gentle expression throughout the rest of the image.  The feeling was quite ethereal as I gazed longer at this image. It is not your typical wedding image but is very beautiful nevertheless.  I’ve got some more photographs to show you in the following post – hope you enjoy them.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with 24-105mm IS lens at 105mm, F4.0 @ 1/40 second, ISO 800.  Enjoy!  -David

Business Day Thursday: So Have You Taken The First Step Yet?

Good Afternoon Everybody,

LaDawn and I are sitting on a Delta jet heading home from a great 7 day visit to Washington, D.C.  Photoshop World seems so long ago in the scheme of things but what a great experience it was.  We made some new friends along the way plus it was good to catch up with some old friends we only see a few times a year.  Like I said, that's one of the best reasons to show up in person at these conventions.

We arrived late afternoon last Thursday with plans of the seeing the full bloom cherry blossoms that afternoon.  We made the decision to postpone that day's visit and needless to say the strong winds and rains that came by over the weekend pretty much wiped away the wonderful site by Tuesday when we finally had a day off.  LaDawn  found a few that she worked into a nice photograph or two.  Oh well, just another reason to return next year.

We really enjoyed our visit to the D.C. area.  As American history buffs Washington, D.C. can't be beat for a visit.  Ever though the Congress is getting little accomplished this term and we have the Supreme Court debating the Heath Care bill, there is something exciting about being so close to the action.  Myself being a “Child of The Sixties”, I had to check out the action at the Supreme Court. LaDawn was rolling her eyeballs as I was mingling with the protesters and taking as many photographs as I could get away with.

I made a comment to David, our intern giving us the Capitol tour yesterday. I noted that in spite of the intransigence we see on Capitol Hill, there must be a certain thrill working as a Senator or Congressman in getting your bill passed or keeping another one from making it through. He agreed.

I think it's the thrill of the chase that drives some of our more productive and influential Congressmen and women.  I loved being in the middle of it all these last couple of days.

Anyway, sorry I digress.  Let's get back to business - Business Day Thursday, that is ;~)

So Have You Taken The First Step Yet?

So many times I'm asked by photographers how to start their new businesses.  And, my answer is the same all the time.  

• Work on your portfolio development,
• Hook up with vendors who are doing business with people you want to do business with, and
• Practice like crazy!!!

Success does not come easy and any advice given for quick success promised by so many speakers on the speaking circuit is not the basket you want to put your eggs into, as they say.

Let's look at practical success as a three step process.

The first step to success: is to show that you can deliver a quality product to your client's.  Haven't shot a wedding yet, then learn what you need to know so your first experience isn't a "Spray and Pray" fiasco for you, and even more importantly, for your clients.  Who in their right mind would jeopardize the most important memories for the wedding couple and their families with that kind of asinine, destructive approach to wedding photography!

Begin by developing your portfolio.  Get a good friend to be your model.  Don't know anyone, run an ad on Craigslist and offer FREE pics to cute girl and good looking guy who will act as your models.  

Start Paying Some Dues!

Now pick up a wedding gown from David's Bridal or some other national bridal chain.  An out-of-date, clearance gown will cost you $50-$100.  Make up a good looking bouquet from silk flowers you can pick up at Hobby Lobby - cost, about $15-$25.  Complaining that you don't have $100 to spend on these things?  Well then, think about another job if you don't want to pay even the MINIMUM dues to earn your stripes as a wedding photographer.

“But, but, but,” you say, “I don't want to learn how to "pose" my clients.  I just want to capture the moments as they flow.”  My quick response to that is B.. S....  The bottom line is this, everyone wants to look good in their photos. Random shots will capture the occasional good photograph of the wedding couple, and maybe even that of a family member, too. But Uncle Harry can do the same thing and won’t charge a nickel. If you want to charge for your services then you better be doing something different than what ANYONE that owns a descent camera is capable of doing.

Never HOPE For A Great Shot – Prepare For One!

I, for one am not spinning the Wheel of MIS-Fortune HOPING to capture a good photograph.  I need to know that I can do it consistently every week. No exceptions!  OK, maybe you don't want to create the stylized, dramatic images I like to create for my clients - that's fine.  But at least take some time to LEARN how a person, a couple respond to a camera being pointed at them.  Learn how to make them feel comfortable in front of the camera.  Learn how to get the best expressions possible from your bride and groom.  It's NEVER about "posing". It's about getting the best, most flattering images possible for your clients on their wedding day.  And that takes practice!

Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about.  Last Friday I got the chance to practice wedding photography.  Yes, me - practicing wedding photography.  The fact of the matter is that I get the chance to practice every time I do a "Live" seminar shoot like I did for my Wedding Shootout at Photoshop World last Friday.  Yes, I was practicing like I want you to practice.

Let me give you a quick example of how I practiced working with my couple, who didn't know each other BTW, to get some great photographs of them.

I put some nice soft light on my couple by having one of the class members hold my Westcott 84 inch translucent umbrella between the couple and the harsh, early afternoon, bright sunlight.  Ahhh... gorgeous light! And, gorgeous light is a good place to start for any great photograph.

Then I took up a camera position that featured the bride and asked her to hug her groom like it was going to be the last time she was going to see him. She got into character and did exactly what I asked her to do.  It surely showed in her expression.  I even moved around the couple and grabbed a quick photo of the groom, too.   Those are the images you see accompanying this article - no posing, just great expressions!

Practice Anything – Just Practice!

So when you go out and practice, you can practice anything you want - flattering posing, how to get great expressions, better lighting, how to easily direct your subjects - anything to make your images better than the next person's. And that's the easy part because only a very few people reading this post today will ever take the initiative to do what I suggest. 

DAZNOTE: You know, I've always said, "It's easy to be the best photographer in town.  You just work a lot harder than the next guy.  And, that's easy too because there are a lot of under-motivated photographers out there.”

Parts Two and Three I'll cover in upcoming posts.  I think today's post is something for those of you who truly want to take your photography and your business to the next level of success.  The truth is - there really is no easy way to success.  Unless, of course, you win this week's New York lottery;~)

A gentle piece of advice: Take excuses out of your vocabulary and you remove the road blocks from your life!

But always remember - Do you want to hired as a HACK photographer or a professional photographer.  Its never been a question in my mind from Day 1. I always wanted to be hired as professional and worked hard and continue to work hard to be just that.

Enough said!!!

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Hey gang, that's it for me today.  We just landed and are in the middle of getting to all the emails, phone calls, and mail that has hit while we were gone. Plus, the weather is great, the grass is green, and the sky is blue - time to soak up a little bit of Spring.

Have a great one everybody.

I'll see you soon,  David.

Quick Hit Monday: Photography: Tips, News, Rumors, and Inspiration & Photoshop Freebies

Good Afternoon Everybody,

We’re blowing the top off the convention center this weekend! It’s official - PhotoPro Expo 2012 is hands down, the largest photographic event in the Midwest! We’ve already sold out two hotels but still were able to secure the $99 room rate at two more nearby hotels. 

We are also an international event with photographers attending from 25 states and Canada! The Expo Tradeshow will also be the largest in the Midwest with nearly 90 booths and Westcott’s Fantasy Model Shootout – and the Expo trade show and shootout are FREE!  WOW! You still have time to register – just use the link on the right side of the blog. 

Can’t make it to the entire show, then at least plan to come to the Expo Tradeshow and Fantasy Model Shootout – FREE Press Pass right here – scroll down to see it.  It’s going to be a great weekend!

As usual, with PhotoPro Expo 2012 only a few days away, things are at a boiling point around my studio.  I did find a minute or two to relax over the weekend and found a few cool links for today’s Quick Hit Monday.  Here we go…

Quick Hit Monday:

Photography: Tips, News, Rumors, and Inspiration

1. 5D Mark III – Coming Your Way February 7, 2012? That seems to be the rumor over at CanonRumors.com that the new camera may be released as early as next week - February 7, 2012. [link]

2. Why Wedding Photographers Prices are “Out Of Whack”: A great article that cuts to the chase and says it like it is.  A GREAT read! [link]

3. Tips on Posing a Subject Without Touching Them (With Explanations): I like this article by Chris Gampat because it is practical and to the point. Be sure to check out the “Facial Expression” chart at the end – AWESOME!  Way to go Chris!  [link]

4. Inspiring Colorization of Old Black and White Photos:

OK, this one is a little off the wall. The resulting images are eerily realistic to a photograph shot on color film – very well done. [link]

5. Fine Art Landscape, Nature & Wilderness Photography: My inspiration link for the day.  This post is also a great look at creativity by Michael E. Gordon – another very good read. [link]

Photoshop Freebies & More

1. 35 Professional Photoshop Retouching Tutorials: A fabulous link with amazing tutorials! [link]

2. 40 Cool Photoshop Tutorials You Can’t Afford To Miss: Photoshop inspiration [link]

3. How To Colorize Old (White & Black) Photo Adobe Photoshop: Beautifully done and very creative tutorial. [link] Also, see link #4 above.

4. Free High Quality Leather Textures for your Design: Some of the best leather textures I’ve seen. [link]

5. New Photoshop Brushes for Free: Brush zombies unite – another great resource for you! [link]

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Hey gang, that’s it for me today.  Lot’s of great tips, creativity, inspiration and several sources of knowledge in today’s post – Enjoy!

See you tomorrow, David

DigitalProTalk.com: 3,000th Post Today!

Good Morning Everybody,

And welcome to my 3000th post at DigitalProTalk.com. Yes, it's true, today DigitalProTalk.com is 3000 posts old. That's quite a milestone and I have all of you, my loyal DigitalProTalk.com readers, to thank for giving me the incentive to post 5 days a week for these last 4 1/2 years.

Since starting this blog around September of 2007 DigitalProTalk.com now averages about 350,000 page views a month with its 3.3 million readers coming from 205 countries worldwide!  The countries leading in readership are the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Poland, Spain, and Italy in that order.

Again, when I look at the analytics it just boggles my mind. I'm both humbled and grateful with the readers who have shared time with me at DigitalProTalk.com.

Let me give you more a few more statistics that DigitalProTalk.com has logged. The average daily postings totaling over 1500 words each day brings the total words that I blogged to just a little over 1.6 million. That many words would fill 2 copies of the Bible, both Old and New Testament or 3 copies of Leo Tolstoy's epic novel, War and Peace

There have been over 200 video tutorials posted on everything from lighting, photography, light room, Photoshop, and business building tips.

To give you a little hint on how to find all of them just enter Technique Tuesday in the search box in the top left corner of this blog.

Among these 3000 posts are over 200 Business Day Thursday posts. These posts are always targeted to photographers, from aspiring professional to seasoned pro, and focus on success tips that can help you continue to grow your business.

There have also been over 1000 “image of the day” posts. It is sometimes challenging to find an image five days a week. With each image I attempt to post the back story, what I was thinking as I was making that image, the technical details involved, and any pertinent lighting details as well. Nearly all the images have been posted with the pertinent excerpt data as well.

The easy way to explore the over 1000 images is to just search © David A. Ziser and just about all of them should pop since I include this copyright information with each photograph.

Other ways to search content on my blog is by exploring the topics listing in the right-hand column. You may have to scroll down just a bit to see them.

One thing I like about my blog is that there is no easy way to find any specific point of information. It is very much akin to my CD and DVD collection. Those collections to are neither organized or alphabetical which makes it a nice surprise when I find a CD or DVD selection that really intrigues me. I guess a different way of saying this is that, even for the occasional reader,  DigitalProTalk.com is full of surprises.

Another way to enjoy DigitalProTalk.com is to just browse through the post titles also included in the right column of the blog. Just pick any year, and then any month and then read through the titles. I'm sure you'll find something there that you like.

I've been thinking about changing DigitalProTalk.com header to read more simply:

DigitalProTalk – Stop on by, you'll always learn something here.

I think that says it all.  So in closing, let me say once again THANK YOU!! to all of my DigitalProTalk.com readers. Thank you to LaDawn for allowing me to continue to take the time to post/research daily. I've said it before and I'll say it again. I'll keep writing if you'll keep reading;~)

I'll see you again bright and early on Monday morning, all the pixels willing. Have a great weekend everybody.

– David

"Thoughts Of You"

"Thoughts Of You"
© David A. Ziser

Here is another image I captured at the beautiful Jacuzzi Winery on Tuesday.  The class was working with Megan, our lovely model.  They were outside and asked her to sit in the window and just look back at the camera.

I’m sure their photograph looked good but I wanted to see what it looked like from the opposite side.  I circled around and went inside to see what the shot looked like from that vantage point.  This was the image I saw – a beautifully lit profile of Megan. Look at the gorgeous loop lighting on her face.  The natural lighting sculpts her features perfectly giving us a very simple, easy portrait of this lovely young lady.

Compositionally, I positioned her head carefully between the boards  the “interior frame” of the wooden shutter behind her in order to frame her even more effectively for this photograph.  Her head is positioned at nodal point #4 of both the “exterior AND interior frame” of the composition.

I also like the very warm colors and how they contrast with the rich blue color of her top.  You know, when you look at this image, it is a simple/pleasing portrait.  It’s all natural lighting, easy pose, and simple composition that all comes together for a very beautiful and flattering image of Megan.

Camera specs:  Canon 7D fitted with 18-200mm IS lens at 110m, F5.6 @ 1/200 second, ISO 320.  Enjoy!  -David