Category: Computing

This week is Apple’s Developer conference and in the opening speech yesterday as well as the Software announcements was the new MacBook Pro with Retina Display, this could be excellent news for Photographers.

Not so sure about them dropping the Firewire Ports but they did say a FW to ThunderPort Adapter will be available so Photographers like me with lots of external FW drives will not feel left out.

I have to admit I am tempted as my MacBook Pro is now four years old, if I upgrade to a Nikon D800 this year then the new MacBook Pro will be an essential upgrade.  Until then I can wait.  I’ll be interested in how shiny the new display is as well as the Colour Gamut.

It would be nice to be able to do colour critical work on a laptop, but i’ll not hold by breath.

With the recent release of Adobe Lightroom V4 we were expecting Adobe Photoshop CS6 to follow soon.  Well we did  not have to wait long as Adobe have now announced a Public Beta of Photoshop CS6.

More information can be found from the usual suspects.

• Chris Bennett’s Photo Blog
• Scott Kelby
• Terry White

Lets hope they release some nice package deals of Lightroom and Photoshop so users of both can upgrade cost effectively.

A question that comes up often is, what iPhone and iPad apps do I use to help me in my Photography. While not an exhaustive list, these are what I use.

Some are actual photography utilities but others such as 50 Best Photos are more for inspiration, while weather apps, tide app and iBird are useful for reference.

1. SnapSeed
2. 50 Best Photos
3. iBird
4. WeatherPro
5. gps4cam
6. iEphemeris Pro
7. PhotoAssist
8. Photosmith
9. Expositor
10. Elinchrom Skyport WiFi
11. tideApp
12. Exposure Calculator

Is the iPad a suitable tool for the travelling photographer, well in certain areas yes.

Now I will be the first to admit its not going to replace your computer, but as a portable device is does have many attractions to the photographer.

We all should know by now the importance of backup.  Your photographs are not safe until you have a second copy of them.  For a number of years now, many photographers have been carrying portable backup devices like the Epson pictured above.  These small dedicated devices have small hard drives in them and a card reader to quickly backup your cards.

I now use the iPad for this task, and while the storage is limited, you can review your images on the large screen and cut the chaff from the wheat so to speak.

For users of Adobe Lightroom, there is a product called PhotoSmith, once your photographs are safe on the iPad you can use this to add your metadata and key words. Once your back at your office you can sync with your computer and your photographs are where they belong and the boring task of adding metadata and key wording is already done.

So that covers backup and some of the more boring data management task but what about the creative function.

After Photosmith my next most used app is SnapSeed.  This is a great app from Nik software who make possibly one of the best Black & White Converters available.  If you after processing your RAW files and trying out different ideas then this is the ideal app.

From simple Black & White conversions like this to more adventures and dramatic shots.

For studio users, Elinchrom have released their remote control application, I can now remotely adjust the power and settings of my Elinchrom flash heads direct from my iPad.

While I have not tried it myself there are now wireless tethering options.

With the release now of Photoshop Touch and iPhoto more and more advanced post processing techniques can be used.  Whilst you might not end up publishing shots produced on your iPad due to limitations on the size of files it can handle, it makes a great tool for when you feel inspired and want to try out ideas.

Lastly we have not mentioned portfolio displays.  The iPad makes a great way of showing off your photographs to potential clients.

Whilst they may be better ways of accomplishing many of these tasks, the iPad can do a very satisfactory job, and it is small, light and how many laptops have 10 hours of battery life.

If you feel only a real computer will do then take a look at Apple’s MacBook Air, the 11inch model is not much bigger and the i7 version with 250GB solid state hard disk and 4GB of RAM is far faster and more powerful then the spec would suggest.

The title of this blog post is far more impressive then the actual content 😉 As I am sure most of you know, the new iPad was announced yesterday.

I’ll leave the details for others to write about, but later i’ll blog about some of the apps I use in iOS to make my Photographic life easier.

See Chris’s Blog for more details on the new iPad.

The big two announcements recently were of course Adobe Photoshop Touch and the New Apple iPhoto. It’s apps like this that are beginning to move the iPad from a passive viewing type device to a creative device.

Well after a relatively short beta period, Adobe Lightroom V4 has been released.

Lots of information and training is now becoming available so I would advise you to check out some of the free on line tutorials and if your going to purchase V4 and want to make the best of it, I can recommend either the video tutorials from either Kelby Training or The Luminous Landscape.

For more info on V4 check out lightroomkillertips.com and Chris’s Blog for more info and links.

For version 2 and 3 I upgraded immediately as there was functionality I really wanted to use straight away. Now I think I may wait. Last time when Adobe Photoshop CS5 was released they did a double upgrade offer that made the Lightroom upgrade a lot cheaper. Hopefully they will do the same this year.