TWiP Log

TWiP Weekend Workshop—Joshua Tree Wrap-up (part 1)

2010-03-02T00:21:34Z

Last weekend, Feb 19-21 2010, co-host Frederick Van Johnson (host of TWiP and frederickvan.com) and I ran the first TWiP Weekend Workshop, in Joshua Tree, California. You can read about the build-up to the workshop and how we decided to go as "big" as we did on Frederick's blog post, here. The short version is, we decided if we were gonna do it, we were gonna do it right.

18% Grey lesson. Photo credit: Alenka Vdovič (click to view more)

It was an all-expenses included weekend in Joshua Tree, commencing with a lecture Friday night and a welcome BBQ at the Fairfield Inn & Suites Twentynine Palms—Joshua Tree National Park hotel (where we stayed for two nights), two fantastic locations on Saturday including a gorgeous "boulder garden" on private land and the 1940's-built movie-set of an "Old West" town called Pioneertown, covering topics such as basic to advanced lighting and working with models, lunch at the deliciously authentic Pappy & Harriets, and to close the day, a beautifully hosted cocktail party followed by dinner and a photo-sharing presentation at the Joshua Tree Business Center. Sunday morning, Frederick delivered a presentation on Adobe's Lightroom 2 and beta-3, and I gave a tour of the new Aperture 3, followed by lunch and an afternoon of studio lighting demonstrations where everyone had the opportunity to plug their camera into the "big lights" and experience a studio shoot.

The success of the is best spoken by the attendees, who said…

"What a fantastic weekend… It will be a lasting experience for a novice like me. The setting, the learning, the fellowship and the overall experience were first class—far beyond my wildest expectations." — Harry Schaefer, attendee

"Joshua Tree was simply magical, thank you all for making the workshop such a rewarding learning experience and fun time regardless of the lens cap being on or off." — Topher Martini, attendee

"I got so much more out of the workshop than I had hoped for. Even getting to practice with one lighting technique would have made the weekend worth the trip but we got to practice with 4 different techniques—all the way from ambient light to studio strobes." — Nancy Nehring, attendee

"The weekend was a first class event! The instruction was informative and presented in a manner in which I felt comfortable asking questions. Thank-you!" — Jennelle Marcereau, attendee

"The weekend really exceeded my expectations in every way. It was perfectly organized and well instructed. Our group seemed to be best friends after the weekend and we all left having learned a LOT of great stuff!!!" — Paul Cool, attendee

"That you for making this such a great experience" — Latti, model

In a follow-up post, I'll describe the process we went through with the students to produce some of the following shots.

Simulated sunset, single strobe. Attendee Paul Cook modeling

Multi-strobe gelled shot with Honl Photo modifiers. Model Latti modelingStudio lighting setup; Profoto in 4'x6' softbox and two-light white seamless. Assistant Alenka Vdovič modeling

TWiP Weekend Workshop - Joshua Tree, CA!

2010-01-18T05:44:48Z

Introduction

Welcome! Come be a part of the first TWiP Weekend Workshop, to be held in Joshua Tree, California, where you’ll spend the weekend shooting and learning with photographers Joseph Linaschke and Frederick Van Johnson.

All Inclusive Workshop Fee: $1,250 - Limited to 20 attendees!

We’ll be shooting at Pioneer Town, built as an Old West movie set in the 1940’s, as well as Boulder Garden, an area of fantastic natural beauty including massive boulders, serene desert and Joshua trees. Along with shooting some amazing landscapes, you’ll be working with professional models, learning to pose, compose and direct in a combination of settings and lighting situations. There will even be opportunities to try your hand at macro photography!

We’ll have presentations on both Apple’s Aperture and Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. We’ll work with all forms of lighting including natural light, single and multiple small strobe, and studio lights. We’ll have loads of lenses and lights to borrow and try out throughout the weekend, so you’ll have a chance to shoot with that lens you’ve been dreaming of buying!

And we’re even offering a bonus “Photography 101” class for folks who arrive early to help you brush up on the basics of photography. We'll be covering topics like understanding ISO vs shutter speed vs aperture, what all those camera modes mean, and how to read a histogram.

Overall, this weekend will be packed with education, experience and fun!

Who’s it for?

This workshop is designed for dSLR owners of all levels who want to learn to get a lot more from their camera and the world around them. We’ll be working from some pretty basic to pretty advanced education throughout the weekend, so it’s very much open to all levels from the weekend-warrior to aspiring pro.

What’s Included?

Hotel accommodation at the brand new Marriott Fairfield Inn & Suites Twentynine Palms for Friday and Saturday night. All rooms are suites, and you’re welcome to bring a partner, or entire family for no additional charge (the hotel has a pool and of course Joshua Tree National Park is only 10 minutes from the hotel for them to enjoy).

All meals from Friday dinner to Sunday lunch are included.

The amazing itinerary below!

All photos courtesy Deb Mallants

Itinerary

Friday

5:00pm – For those who can get into town early enough, we’re offering a bonus Photography 101 class at the hotel.
6:30pm – Meet & greet BBQ. A great opportunity to get to know your hosts and fellow students! This will go on throughout the evening, so even if you can’t be there by 6:30 don’t worry… we’ll be there until bedtime!

Saturday

6:30am – Continental breakfast in the hotel
7:00am – Hotel departure (45 minute drive)
7:45am – Pioneer Town arrival
8:00am – Shooting in Pioneer Town. We’ll have two models, a make-up artist, and multiple locations to shoot in, including a fantastic bank, saloon, bath house and even a jail! We’ll spend some time as a large group and some broken into two smaller groups. In the morning we’ll start shooting with available light, and as the sun gets higher, introduce bounce cards, reflectors and gobos to manipulate the harsh mid-day sun. We’ll be discussing composition, posing and instruction of models, and photographic technique.
12:00pm – Lunch! The charming Pappy & Harriet’s will provide a respite from the midday sun and a hearty lunch.
1:00pm – Continue shooting in Pioneer Town. We’ll give the models a break and focus on shooting the natural beauty in and around Pioneer Town itself, also giving you time to explore and shoot on your own, with your instructors close at hand.
2:00pm – Location change! (10 minute drive) We’ll move to Boulder Garden and spend the first 45 minutes or so exploring locations and picking out some favorite shots to shoot in. This will be an opportunity to capture some beautiful natural scenery, local foliage and more.
3:00pm – Time to put the models back to work! In Pioneer Town we were shooting against man-made structures; out here, it’s all natural beauty. We’ll pick up where we left off with lighting manipulation, and move into single small strobe and eventually multiple small strobe lighting.
4:30pm – We start prepping for a 5:30 sunset shoot, using models and multiple lights.
5:30pm – As soon as the sun is gone, we’ll wrap up and head out (20 minute drive)
6:00pm – Arrival at the “Joshua Tree Business Center”, where wine and beer and hors d'oeuvres will be waiting. Over the next hour or so we’ll relax, talk about the day, and for those who have laptops, browse through your photos and make some selects. Anyone who likes can hand in some of their favorite shots and we’ll all have a look at them after dinner.
7:30pm – Dinner is served!
8:30pm – After dinner we’ll break out the projector and have a look at some of the best images of the day, also giving an opportunity to ask any remaining questions from the days lessons.
9:30pm – head back to the hotel (20 minute drive)

NOTE: For those feeling inspired and awake, don’t forget that we’re in the desert, far from big-city lights. If you want to head out and shoot the night sky, the moon will be at first quarter.

Sunday

7:00am – Breakfast (available all morning). Checkout before…
9:00am – Hotel departure (20 minute drive) back to the “Joshua Tree Business Center”. Coffee service available.
10:00am – Aperture presentation. Joseph will take you on a tour of Aperture, showing the basics and reserving the last 20 minutes for specific questions.
11:00am – Photoshop Lightroom presentation. Frederick will take you on a tour of Lightroom, showing the basics and reserving the last 20 minutes for specific questions.
12:00pm – Lunch!
1:00pm – Studio lighting instruction. We have large covered outdoor area where we’ll set up studio lights and a backdrop and shoot the models again. This will round out a weekend of lighting education from sunlight to strobe light!
3:00pm – That’s a wrap! Time to head home.

What’s not included?

Travel to and from Joshua Tree.
Snacks during the day. There is a grocery store across the street from the hotel, as well as a snack shop in the hotel itself.

What to bring?

Appropriate clothing for the weather (see below)
Solid shoes or boots. You’ll be in the desert.
Your camera and lenses and flashes and plenty of memory cards, of course!
A laptop if you have it. Not required, but if you have one you can make some selects Saturday night and share your best shots.
(this list may grow; registered attendees should be sure to read any updates we send out!)

Other things to consider…

We’ll be moving a lot of people around, and will be asking for driving volunteers. When you sign up, you’ll see a checkbox asking if you’d be willing to drive. Larger vehicles are better (like SUV’s) as that will allow us to move people and gear.

Your vehicle should be able to accommodate four people minimum. We may not need everyone who volunteers, but those who we use will receive a $40 “gift card” for gas!

This workshop is in February in the desert. Weatherbase.com an average high of 68˚F which sounds absolutely lovely—but be prepared for cold or heat snaps. And it will get cold fast as the sun goes down.

About your hosts

Frederick Van Johnson is the host of TWiP and a photographer in the San Francisco Bay Area. For more about Frederick, visit http://www.frederickvan.com

Joseph Linaschke is a professional photographer in Los Angeles. He also runs the website ApertureExpert.com and is a guest-host on TWiP. For more about Joseph, visit http://www.photojoseph.com

Advanced File Management in Aperture

2010-01-10T17:00:36Z

File management in Aperture (or anywhere, really) is one of those boring, dry subjects that you probably would've fallen asleep during the lecture for if Aperture were taught in University. As it turns out of course, it's a lesson that you really should have paid attention to in school, and now that you're deep in the throws of your comfortable "one day I'll take the time to make it better" workflow, you just can't bother to change it. Even thought you know you should. So let's make today your "one day".

Of course if you're reading this and you're relatively new to Aperture, then you're in luck… getting off to a well planned and organized start is always a better way to fly.

One of the first critical things to understand in Aperture is the difference between a managed and a referenced Library. Without understanding the difference between the two, you may find the rest of the file management structure to be mildly confusing at best… or downright infuriating at worst. So here's a primer on the difference, starting with an explanation of that all-important Master File.

The following is an excerpt from my new eBook, "PhotoJoseph's 10 Tips on File Management in Aperture". For more information on the eBook and where to get it, scroll down to the end of this post.

Master File: This is the original file that came off the camera. It could be a .JPG if you’re shooting JPEG (but you’re not... right?!), a .CR2 (Canon raw file) or .NEF (Nikon raw file) if you’re shooting raw, or even a .TIF or .PSD file if you scanned a print or negative. Whatever it is called, this is the original, sacred, never-to-be-touched file. You can think of this like your negative (if you used to shoot film at least... if not, ignore us old folks). One of the beauties of Aperture is that it treats this file as an “untouchable”, and other than renaming it, almost nothing you do in Aperture will ever make a change to this file (except of course deleting it— so be sure you read those dialogs that say “are you really sure you want to delete this file?” before hitting OK, OK? OK!).

Managed: This is the easiest way to work with Aperture. When you import pictures, you have a choice on where to store the files. The first choice is “In the Aperture Library”. From the Import dialog...

If you select this, Aperture “Manages” the files for you. It brings the photos into the Aperture Library (that’s this thing in the Finder, probably in your Pictures folder), that includes all of your Aperture photos, any changes you’ve made, metadata you’ve added, everything.

If you were to crack it open and poke around, you would find your original master files, each one nestled snug in a folder along with metadata files, thumbnails, previews and more. A word to the wise... don’t. Just leave the Library alone, m’kay?

There are advantages and disadvantages to working this way.

The advantages are, for one, you never have to worry about where your files are. You know where they are, and Aperture knows where they are. It’s impossible to lose them. It’s also really easy to back them up. If you run Time Machine on your Mac, all of your photos are backed up. If you use the File Vault feature in Aperture to make a backup to another drive, all of your photos are backed up again (yes you can do both, and yes I recommend you do).

The big disadvantage of letting Aperture manage your files is that you are limited to the storage space of your single internal hard drive. So if you shoot a LOT of photos, chances are you will eventually run out of space on your internal drive. And you probably moved to Aperture from iPhoto because you do shoot a lot of photos. Once you run out of space, you’ll have to create another Aperture Library on another hard drive, and constantly switch between them. That’s a pain. Also, using up all the space on your internal drive for photos means less space for documents, videos, music, and everything else you store on your Mac. So that’s why Apple added the option to store your files as “referenced” (added in Aperture 1.5, for those keeping score).

Referenced: This means that the actual master files are stored outside of the Aperture Library. This could be absolutely anywhere you want. On the desktop. On an external USB or Firewire hard drive. Across multiple external drives. Even burned onto CD or DVD. (However you do want that external drive to be a fast one, especially with large raw files. I use a Drobo on FW800, and the new Drobo S, with eSata, would be even better.) When you import your photos, the “Store Files” choice includes the ability to choose a new location; just point to where you want them to be stored. And of course again, there are advantages and disadvantages to working this way.

The advantages include the ability to have a virtually unlimited number of photos in your Aperture Library. Since the space-hogging master files can be spread out over multiple drives, the library itself, still stored on the internal drive, stays relatively small, freeing up space on your internal drive for other things. Also it means you can browse the files in the Finder without having to look in Aperture. If you name your Master Files something clever, then you can even know what they are without opening them. It also means that incremental back-ups are much faster. Only the new files themselves have to be backed up, since none of the old files ever change, so just those new files get copied to the backup drive. With a managed library, the entire Aperture library has to be cataloged and potentially re- backed up. I do think that Time Machine does something a bit more clever than just re- backing up the entire Library again, but in my book simplicity is best, and there’s nothing simpler than a pile of raw files in a folder. And finally, there’s plainly something comforting about seeing your original files nicely organized in a folder structure that you can view and understand without any other software involved.

The main disadvantage of working referenced is that your files may not be backed up automatically. Granted if you have an external drive on your Mac for your Master Files, and you have an even bigger drive as your Time Machine backup, then those files can be backed up by Time Machine. But if you end up using multiple drives, it can get more complicated, and you need to be more fastidious about your backup regimen. Also the File Vault backup in Aperture will not backup your Master Files if they live outside of the Library; only the changes (metdata, adjustments) made to those files are backed up. So again, you just have to be aware and understand the implications of your choices. There is also the opportunity for Aperture to “lose” its connection to the Master file. Rare, but it happens.

As a point of comparison; most hobbyists use Managed, most pros use Referenced.

The preceding is one chapter, actually Tip #0 (with 10 more to follow), from my eBook "PhotoJoseph's 10 Tips on File Management in Aperture". I'm offering a 20% discount to the first 100 TWiP listeners to download the eBook using the promo code TWIP20 — to read more about the eBook and to download it, head over to my eBooks page at ApertureExpert.com and be sure to remember your TWIP20 discount code!

Also, in case you're worried that Aperture 3 might be coming soon and render this eBook obsolete, don't worry… I will provide a free update to a revised version of the eBook to anyone who purchases this eBook within 30 days of any announcement from Apple. Got that? If Aperture 3 comes out in the next 30 days, you'll get a free update on this purchase!

10 New Years Resolutions Every Photographer Should Make

2010-01-02T20:33:39Z

I am clutching my 5DMKII and literally buzzing inside, thinking about the photographic potential of the new year. The possibilities are endless.

Now, I just have to commit the time and passion required to become a great photographer. In that spirit, I think we should all try to keep these 10 New Years Resolutions. Now, everyone say after me:

1. I will learn how to use my camera.

This seems like an obvious point, but we are all guilty of skipping our camera manual and just fiddling with settings. Ah, this one works right? Spot-metering? Why not. Hey, what does that button do? Seems to make things darker. Hmm. I'm going to admit something to you that I ask you to keep hush-hush. I haven't actually read my 5DMKII manual. I know. Horrible! I'm guilty of arbitrary button pushing and royally messing up shots because I don't really know how to use my camera. Let's all become technical experts of our cameras this year. Deal?

2. I will not use the Auto setting on my camera.

Instead of relying on your camera's dubious Auto settings, force yourself to learn how to use manual settings. Upgrade to Aperture priorty mode (AV) first. Once you understand Depth of Field, jump into Manual mode. You will make mistakes and feel frustrated when you completely blow-out a shot, but this is the way we learn. Don't get discouraged by your mistakes. Learn from them and push on!

3. I will not use on-camera flash

The only photos you should take with an on-camera flash are ones that end up on your Facebook wall of shame. Tape down that pop-up flash if you have to. Instead rely on your skills as a photographer to capture shots in low-light.

Shoot with a wide-open aperture, as low as your lens will go. Decrease your shutter speed & increase your ISO. Steady your camera on a tripod, gorilla pod or table top. Invest in a good lens. I suggest the 50mm f/1.4 or the f/1.8 if you are on a budget.

Canon Rebel Xti (400D) + 50mm f/1.4

4. I will not be hindered by the gear I do not have.

You can take great shots with any camera. From an iPhone to a $20 Holga to cheap point and shoot to a 1DMKIII. Don't let your lack of gear limit you, but rather let it open up new possibilities to be creative. Until 6 months ago when I upgraded to a 5DMKII, I was shooting on a Canon Rebel Xti (400D). I shot weddings, actor's head shots, fashion, landscapes, you name it. You don't need a 5DMKII to work as a photographer. Get creative. Be resourceful. Rent lenses. Make reflectors with $2 poster boards. There is always a way to do things cheaply, you just need to hunt around a bit.

5. I will shoot in RAW

Everyone, go find your camera right now. I'll wait for you. Got it? Ok. Set your picture quality to RAW. Done? Good! Take some snaps in RAW right now. Feel the power. Now you can start shooting for real.

5DMKII, 85mm f/1.8, 1/200 at f/2.0, ISO 100.

6. I will learn how to process my shots

No shot comes straight out of the camera perfect. Every shot needs a little bit of processing TLC to take it to the next level. Learning how to process photos can feel overwhelming at times especially if you are technically challenged. It really isn't that scary, just time consuming. I recommend starting with Lightroom. You can download a free trial and take it for a spin. If you are completely confused, sign up for a Lynda.com account. It's the best video tutorial site on the web.

7. I will share my photos with others on the web

I know so many photographers that take thousands of photos, upload them on their computer, and never share them. Some lack the confidence, some are worried about copyright infringement, and some just don't find the time in their busy schedules to share their photos. What a waste! If you are not currently sharing your photos, go right now and join Flickr, Tumblr or Facebook and post three of your best shots. Done? Great. Hi-five!

8. I will accept critiques of my work.

Receiving criticisms about your photos is difficult and sometimes hurtful, but it is the only way we can progress as photographers. Yesterday I asked Joseph Linaschke to look at my portfolio and tell me honestly which shots should go. He told me to ditch 4 pictures out of 16. Pictures that I had spend hours shooting and retouching. I didn't want to get rid of them and it physically hurt me to remove them, but after I did, my portfolio was much stronger.

Canon Xti, 85mm f/1.8.

9. I will set goals and be proactive about my photography career

I have personally been in a photographic rut for the past couple of months. The weather has been rainy and miserable. I've had been taking on other work to pay the bills and I've lost focus with what I want to do with my photography.

So right now, you and I are going to sit down and set some goals, both small stepping-stone goals and big lofty life-changing goals. These are some of mine:

*I will learn one photography-related skill every day

*I will continue to improve my Photoshop skills on a daily basis

*I will book at least one creative fashion shoot every week.

*I will build a network of creative producers, stylists, make-up artists, and models

Lofty goal: *I will get my photography published in a major publication this year!

Your turn! Write them down and post them on your blog, Facebook page, Twitter, Tumblr, etc. Get them out there in black and white type where you can't dismiss them.

10. I will connect with other photographers

There is a vibrant and passionate photography community sharing their knowledge and experiences everyday. If you aren't currently visiting the vast array of photography blogs and resource sites, you are missing out on a wealth of knowledge that won't cost you a cent. Right now, join Twitter and follow these photographers.

Let's make 2010 a productive and inspirational year! What New Years resolutions are you are making?

Friend me on Facebook, Twitter, & Flickr.

liveBooks.com - Helping Photographers Flash the Web

2009-12-26T00:23:51Z

An interview with John Philpin, CMO of liveBooks.com (link below).

One of the many problems facing photographers today is the necessity of having a slick looking website, however most shooters lack the skill-set (or desire) to get into the "weeds" of building a site reflective of themselves. We're long past the age where having a website is optional, today it is imperative that every photographer who intends to do any level of serious business on the Internet has a web presence that reflects both their art and skill, while also providing a way for potential clients and customers to get to know and contact them. Easier said than done.

has been around for several years now -- their main goal is to help build websites that reflect Photographers' craft and artisanship. The problem facing the liveBooks is that their audience is faced with a sophisticated problem, that is, creating a website that's beautiful and functional while remaining flexible enough to allow the owner to keep it up-to-date and fresh. When you've got ISO, F/Stops, raw, etc, who wants to deal with CSS, Flash, HTML, CMS, FTP, and browser compatibility?

...a little known fact is that liveBooks sites have mirroring HTML counterparts to optimize SEO and to help make them Google-friendly.

Like I said, it's a sophisticated problem but this isn't to say the audience isn't sophisticated, they'd just rather be out taking photographs and building their businesses than dealing with the complexities and the code behind designing a competitive website. liveBooks aim to take away the pain

of deploying a professional web presence by essentially acting as the outsourced graphic design and web development firm for the photographers who hire them. John Philpin is the Chief Marketing Officer of the company, and in this interview he talks about some of the problems facing photographers today, how a new pricing structure deals with many of the cost objections photographers have voiced. We also discuss how they're spending the $5 million they just took from investors, and what's next for the company in terms of priorities. If you're at all interested in learning about liveBooks, definitely check out their website -- after listening to this interview (link below).

David duChemin - Visionmonger

2009-11-29T23:58:22Z

I recently had the honor of sitting down to record this audio interview (via Skype) with author/photographer David duChemin. David is one of those "next generation" photographers that "gets it". He is fluent in the latest and greatest photographic trends, technology, social media, etc. And along with being a sickeningly talented photographer, he's also a brilliant marketer. Wrap all of that up and you've got an artist who can not only create masterful visual imagery and write about it -- but one that can also publsih it. He's a one-man creative ecosystem. Click through for the full audio interview...

His latest book "VisionMongers - Making a Life and a Living in Photography" is the most recent fruit from the "duChemin ecosystem". It's a very different sort of photography book... meaning it's not a "how-to", and it's not a "look at all my pretty pictures" coffee table book. And honestly, it's not even a combination of those two. It's a book about doing what you love, loving what you're doing, and sustaining yourself in the process. It's a brilliant read. But warning... it's sticky. Once you pick it up, you may not be able to put it back down.

His official bio neatly summarizes it all: "David duChemin is a Vancouver-based international assignment photographer specializing in Humanitarian and world photography. A nomad, visionmonger, unashamed do-gooder, and sometimes author, David's photography is online at Pixelatedimage.com. His words are available at Pixelatedimage.com/blog and in his first book, Within The Frame, The Journey of Photographic Vision."

Subscribe to TWiP on iTunes to hear the full interview, or listen to it on my blog at Frederick
Van.com

Where are those Long form Interviews?!!

2009-09-27T01:44:56Z

Hey Twippers... we've been experimenting with inserting abbreviated interviews into the main TWiP podcast feed in an effort to keep the overall show to a reasonable length. The idea was to allow folks wanting to hear the entire interview to do so from here on Twiplog.

Well, as the saying goes... "the best laid plans", you know the rest.

Suffice it to say, we're having both technical and production issues hindering getting the episodes up on this blog in a timely fashion.

SOOO... if you're here looking for the long form interviews mentioned on the TWiP podcast, you can hear them over on my blog here.

And if you'd like to subscribe to "JUST" the long-form interviews in a feed, you can do so in iTunes here.

Enjoy!

Frederick

What's up with TWiP!?

2009-07-07T23:53:54Z

You know what happens when you dance on the "bleeding-edge"? You get your feet cut. We're always trying to push the envelope with the This Week in Photography podcast (TWiP) — sometimes it works, and unfortunately sometimes it doesn't.

Our latest push was into video. The the TWiT crew graciously agreed to let us broadcast and record TWiP using their facilities — but as they say, the best laid plans... So, though the show was flawlessly broadcast, we had some issues getting the resultant files from Petaluma to their destination for production. Grabbing files from a "hot set" is kind of like trying to remove groceries from the trunk of a moving car.

So, until we get the details worked out we're going to revert back to doing TWiP as an audio-only podcast. We should get the video part nailed in the next couple of weeks though.

My apologies to all of the listeners who have been patiently waiting for TWiP to show up in their iTunes feed, we'll be back in full force shortly.

TWiP #94 Recording Today: Frederick, Ron & Steve with Scott Bourne

2009-06-15T10:50:20Z

Sincere thanks to our dedicated show notes writers, Bruce and Tom, for keeping on top of the episodes. They have been the primary source of content on the blog these last few weeks with the rest of us up to our eyeballs in early summer activities and projects (personal, work and otherwise).

Activity on the blog should be picking back up here as we continue to roll out new aspects of TWiP. For instance, we've done our first test run of video simulcasting our recording sessions from the TWiT Cottage back with Episode #92. We'll be returning to that with next week's show (#95) and hope to make that our weekly routine. With that underway, listeners can tune in to watch us record our episodes live at http://live.twit.tv (11 AM PST / 2 PM EST). Once we determine the re-run schedule for the videos, we'll post that information here for those that miss the live sessions.

This video simulcast does not change our podcast format, though... it's still an audio podcast and will continue to be released in the same format. The video broadcast from the TWiT Cottage, though, allows us to begin interacting with listeners live (there are chat rooms attached) and helps us, as hosts, engage a bit more with one another (some degree of eye contact, finally!) since we're spread all over the country. :)

We're also changing our recording equipment and techniques soon which should bring a level of audio quality to all of the co-hosts to match those in the studio. This is a change in mics, recording hardware and our recording method (local recording for all participants re-assembled by our editors and engineers). Skype will continue to be how we link up, but the audio you hear will now be recorded locally to each host leading to richer sound and more consistent levels.

Frederick, Steve and Ron will be holding down the fort today and talking about the latest photography news with special guest co-host, Scott Bourne. :) Alex and I will rotate back in next week with the return to the TWiT Cottage and the live video simulcast.

Enjoy!

- Aaron

P.S. There's a new poll for this week's show. Check the left sidebar and tell us how social you are when it comes to your shooting. :)

Last Three Assignment Winners & New Sidebar Link

2009-05-08T18:49:02Z

As I mentioned in last week's show, we've been derelict in getting the assignment winners posted for the last three contests.

I've just fixed this problem with new entries here on the blog.

First off, there is now a new sidebar link entitled Assignment Winners which you can find on the left under the Navigate heading. Head there anytime to see any of the stories categorized as 'assignment winners' which will contain these and all future such announcements.

I decided to date the two older winner postings with the correct dates for when those contests ended. This causes those entries to thread properly into the story history (despite having just been written for the first time today). I did that to preserve the chronological order of the contests in the grand scheme of TWiPlog's content. Hope that makes sense to everyone.

Congrats to these winners and our apologies for taking so long to highlight the photos here on the (very BETA) blog we're still building. :)

- Aaron

P.S. Next up: color adjustments to the blog color scheme... we're hearing your feedback regarding contrast and readability!