Resources
Education And Resources
Education may be one of the best resources any community can have or provide. Our club was born, partly, to eductate a community of photographers learning about the new technologies of color photography. The original name of the club, Photo Color Club of Worcester, reflects this. Now, in addition to color, we have new areas to explore. We do this in many ways including: technical sessions, sponsoring speakers, one-on-ones with advanced photographers, and this online reference.
Shown in image on the right: Fran Audette teaching his matt cutting techniques to members at one of our 2007 meetings. (Photo by Casey)
In the past, during the BI years (Before Internet), we had a small archive of papers, magazines, and books. These would be passed around amongst our members. We'd have First Wednesday sessions each month, half competitions and half technical. As the age of enlightenment came upon us, that is, in our DI Years (During Internet), we moved a lot of our tutorials online for members to peruse at their leisure from home. However, the expansive nature of web-based information being what it is, it just no longer makes sense to keep archives of our own. Now, we can use this website as a pointer to the many cyberplaces you can visit to learn almost anything you want about our wonderful photographic craft.
Note To Members
Know of a good site? ...let us know about it and we'll link to it here.
Let's get started...
General Information
Click here for a collection of articles written by various members.
We use both Google and Yahoo's online tools for things like email lists, calendars, documents, and so on.
- Yahoo Groups - you can sign up for a free Yahoo account if you want access to more of Yahoo's features. Or, just request we add you to the group. The 7HCC groups is for dues paying members only. The 7HCC Digital Group (our technology side ) is completely open.
- Google Docs
...as cloud computing becomes more of a norm, you'll see these resources expand their offerings. We hope to take advantage as much of this as we can. Our Wiki's are an example of our adoption of such things.
Nikon has a weekly online show. Check it out - DTown.
Interested in something that's not online? Locally, we have resources that offer great courses.
- Zeff's Belmont - check out their Imaging Education Center
- Calumet Cambridge - they host hundreds of educational events throughout the USA
- Craig Milner (Worcester) - can be contacted through Meetups (just ask someone)
- Worcester Craft Center
- Worcester Art Museum School
- Digital Photography School - newsletters, tutorials, info about equipment, RSS, and other useful stuff.
If you are cruising the Internet, here are some interesting off ramps to consider:
- Rob Galbraith - Digital Photography Insights, lots of good information about equipment that is sometimes not seen in the more traditional review sights. But the really neat stuff is his pointers to interesting photo collections by the likes of National Geographic, Sports Illustrated, and others...worth a daily visit.
- Digital Media Net - home for a number of forums about things digital, from still photography to video
Want to ask someone a question, face-to-face? ...try coming to one of our meetings, or you can visit a Meetup:
- Worcester Photography (Center) - started by Scott Erb and Donna Dufault, this is an eclectic group and you're likely to meet someone with just the right skills and experience to have an answer (meetup website)
- Boston Photography Meetup - live closer to Bostons? ...this is the group for you. (meetup website)
Need Some Inspiration?
Every once in a while, it's nice to be inspired. If you come across a link to some very special, please send the link to us so we can post it for everyone to enjoy.
- National Geographic Photo Editor David Griffin: Photography connects us with the world
- Fritz Mueller Photography - Images from the Yukon
- Aloft - David L. Ryan images from aloft
Equipment
As photographers, we love our toys. What are the best ones? Of course, it's subjective, but some sites are quite good are getting to the core of it.
- DP Review - a good website to exchange information, read top-notch reviews. One of the premier web resources for photography.
- Camera Labs - lots or reviews
- Fred Miranda - also a good site for Photoshop actions and plug-ins
- Ken Rockwell - some hate him, but his reviews are always interesting reads
- By Thom - here's a Nikon specialist
- Popular Photography Magazine - you get a lot more than just reviews, and they've been around a lot longer than we have
Workflow And Tools
Workflow in a film-based system has been documented for decades and you can learn about it from many resources. With slides, it was quite simple: shoot, send, receive, admire. Print flows could be as simple, but for the darkroom types, it was much more of a science, as anyone who had studied Ansel Adams' work would know. You could labor for hours, or days, over just one print.
As "digital" has taken over so much of our photography, we will limit most, if not all, of the resource links here to the digital domain.
Workflows can change as new tools become available. Before Aperture and Lightroom, which are specifically designed with workflow, tools existed to help with individual images. Your work would begin with a decision about raw or jpeg, and then go from there. The raw shooters had good tools, but often they were slow and/or hard to use. Many opted for the simplicity of jpeg and made sure their shooting techniques were optimized for perfect exposures. Newer tools are faster and make a raw choice so much easier. So here are some resources to help you along your own workflows...
- You Suck At Photoshop - a humorous way of learning some advanced features; just watch the series
- Shoot Smarter - new content every Monday
- Imaging Info - geared for pros, but lots of useful stuff for everyone
Lightroom Keyboard Shortcuts:
- Lightroom Keyboard Shortcuts - Adobe site
- More Lightroom Keyboard Shortcuts - from the "Lightroom Queen"
- Even more LR Shortcuts - from DigitalMedia
- Last one, LRKBS's - from Photoshop Users Group
More Lightroom:
- Adobe Photoshop Lightroom - Best practices - Julieanne Kost
- Video Tutorials: Julieanne Kost and Matt Kloskowski
Lightroom Newsletters and Blogs:
- http://lightroom-news.com/
- http://digitalmedia.oreilly.com/lightroom/
- http://www.lightroomkillertips.com/
- http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/lightroom/
- http://tv.adobe.com/#pd+Lightroom
Tools
- Optik Verve Labs http://www.optikvervelabs.com/ - home of VirtualPhotographer, a terrific Photoshop plugin that is, unfortunately, PC only
- Photo Tune - a nice collection of plugins for Photoshop from OnOne Software in general, but PhotoTune and Skin Tune make things quite easy in getting color right. Both Windows and Mac platforms.
Technique
Photography is from the Greek and it means painting with light. So, it should be no surprise that knowing how to use lights is important to successful photographers. Here are some sites that can help:
- Photoflex - here's a lighting company that has online tutorials for learning good technique. Of course, they don't mind if you use their stuff.
- Photoflex Lighting School - some more from Photoflex
- Westcott Community and Forum - Westcott, another lighting source, has this resource available.
- Shoot Smarter - a variety of useful tips for all manner of photography
- Profoto and Annie - short video of Annie Leibovitz working using a crew and cameras to make a portrait
Presentation
Professional
If you're already a pro, then you may already know about these organizations. If not, check them out.
- PPA - Professional Photographers of America
- PPANE - the New England chapter of PPA
- NEIPP - New England Institute Of Professional Photography (part of PPANE)
- CIPNE - sort of the PPANE of the commercial photography world