Let's talk about gear

Buying New Gear I: Lenses

It's been a while, and I've promised multiple times to post new content more frequently than every two years... all I can say is, I'm sorry, and I actually have something to write about today. If you keep up with me on social media, you know I had a little incident a couple weeks ago in which my Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 USM II telephoto zoom lens took one for the team. It retails for around $2000, I somehow managed to buy it (eight years ago) for $1500, and the factory repair facility quote $860 to replace the two cracked elements and the broken retaining ring, plus cleaning and lubricating. I'm going to see if a local guy might be able to do it for significantly cheaper, but I'm not holding my breath. So while I've waited for word on my lens's fate, I've been shopping for replacements.

Just for giggles, I checked out a ridiculous lens that seemed to feature a ridiculous price: a 650-1300mm Opteka f/8-16 telephoto zoom (and they sell it with a doubler, so you could effectively have a 1300-2600mm lens!), for $189 on Amazon. Whaaaaaaat??? The more I looked into the details, however, the more I realized why it was so cheap, aside from (I'm sure) relatively cheap components:

It's got massive zoom capability, which seems like a great thing because that's why you bought a massive zoom lens, but realize the more you zoom in on something, the more small movements of the camera are going to affect the stability of the image. Even with a tripod, if you're zoomed all the way in, you can't have any wind or vibration (you'll probably want a shutter release cable) and if you're not using a mirror-less style camera, even the motion of the mirror swinging out of the way to take the picture might introduce too much vibration (so you'll have to be in mirror lock-up mode) And you can pretty much forget tracking a moving subject while zoomed way in, unless it moves less than a mile an hour. So lots of turtle action photography.

It's relatively heavy, at 7 pounds, so lugging it around with the rest of your kit is going to be a chore,

It's 18" long, which means when you're NOT using it, it won't fit into a lot of backpacks, so you're going to have to use it's own carrying case,

With a maximum aperture of f/8, you're either going to have to dial your ISO way up to compensate for its low light-gathering capability or only shoot in really bright sunlight (or possibly both).

So you're going to use this for stationary subjects on a clear, calm day with plenty of bright sunlight, and preferrably under conditions that stay the same long enough for you to futz about with all the settings on your camera to get the shot just right. Not exactly ideal for, say, a wildlife photographer, for instance, whose subject might up and fly away at any second. However, under the right conditions, it might just be the lens you need: I'd bet it would get pretty good moon shots on a clear night, because you're probably going to do long exposures anyway, and you could get some really good detail.

The lesson to be learned here is to think about the kind of photography you want to do, figure out range of focal lengths and general capabilities you want out of your lens, and find the glass that fits your style of photography, your technical needs, and your budget. THEN buy the lens; don't be like the folks reviewing products on Amazon who didn't read the description carefully enough and then complain that the lens is too heavy (it SAYS it's seven pounds, so giving it one star for being exactly as advertised is just silly), or that it takes really dark pictures (i.e. you don't know how to use it correctly or what conditions it's really for) or that it was hard to focus on things because your hands were shaking too much. Caveat emptor, my friends: know what you're buying before you shell out any simoleons.

In my next post, I'll discuss the pros and cons of image stabilization in lenses, whether specialty coatings really make lenses worth 10x more, and how best to care for your glass (first tip is for free: dropping them onto asphalt is not recommended.)

Patreon and On and On

I know, it's been a long while, but I'm reviving the blog for an important reason: Adventures in Art still lives! A few months back, I came to the decision to close Adventures in Art down, because it simply wasn't making any money and wasn't really even getting much attention. When 50% of your annual sales are to your mom, you can't really call it a business (unless  your mom is LOADED, I suppose)

Then I learned about Patreon. Patreon.com is a crowdsourcing site dedicated toward artists seeking ongoing patronage from fans and arts enthusiasts who want to support their work, and is pretty much tailor made for the kind of fundraising I need for Adventures in Art. The big problem with sites like Kickstarter or Indiegogo is that they're intended to raise funds for one big project, so for me it would be a photo book or shooting specifically for a big gallery exhibition or something, neither of which I can promise on any reliable time scale. Patreon allows you to collect donations on an ongoing basis, and all you have to do is continue to provide content, which I'm more than happy to do if I can raise enough to afford to do so; it is the escape clause from my artistic Catch-22 of being unable to afford to get out and shoot, and therefore can't earn enough to take enough time from the day job to go shoot.

So if you've been a fan of my work in the past and just didn't want to shell out the big bucks to purchase any but still would like to help me continue creating more art, please visit my Patreon page, subscribe and commit to a monthly donation (doesn't have to be much, even $1 a month can make a difference over time). Thanks!

https://www.patreon.com/miketakesahike

The Body (Photo)Shop

What are the acceptable limits on the use of Photoshop or other editing software? The true answer is that it depends, and it's much more complicated than saying you should or should not use them in a given situation or to accomplish a limited set of tasks deemed appropriate under all conditions.

It all comes down to a matter of intent and transparency. I am a photographer and digital artist. If it suits me, I have no qualms about adding or subtracting elements from a shot if I think it creates a better image by doing so, but I will always let people know that an image has been digitally altered if it's necessary for them ot know (if I am submitting it for publication or to a contest, for instance). If they don't need to know, or if it's blantantly obvious that the image isn't a depiction of reality, I don't (no, I didn't ask a model to stand next to a wild Alaskan brown bear -- not sure my liability insurance covers mauling specifically)(mental note: ask insurance agent about mauling coverage)

When it comes to portraiture, I try to use Photoshop sparingly. I will obviously use color correction, adjust exposure and contrast, white balance and cropping on every image, regardless of the software I use to do it, because things don't always turn out perfect in camera. Beyond that, it's a case-by-case basis for any deeper edits. Because some of my shoots are in people's homes or in confined or awkward spaces (sometimes one and the same), I have to use the "wall socket and ugly lampshade filter" to remove distracting elements or extend a nice neutral background beyond where it actually existed to remove distracting elements from the scene (landscape photographers refer to this as the "telephone pole filter.") Some poses are visually interesting but tend to cause your skin to pooch out in a somewhat unattractive way, so I will use the Liquify tool to return the model's profile to how it was when standing up straight -- I'm not actually taking off pounds, I'm just making sure the model doesn't look like she's carrying more than she really does.

And you have to realize that in my business, while I'm tasked with making my clients look good, it's about making sure the body they've GOT looks good, not the one our society TELLS her looks good. A lot of people are a bit self-conscious about their appearance, which is why people get their pictures taken so infrequently. Imagine how you'd feel if you screwed up your courage and got photos done, but then discover the photographer has decided you would look better if you were 30-50 pounds lighter and the final images don't really look like you any more. What, I'm not good enough looking, so you have to make me skinnier than I truly am? And you gave me a nose job. And my skull is a different shape, because my cheeks are definitely not way up there.

I believe the photos I take should represent my clients being fabulous RIGHT NOW, rather than what they'd be if they took of twenty pounds or had surgery. It's the little so-called imperfections that make your face interesting. On high school seniors, I'll edit out acne, because that's not who they are, it's just a function of genetics and temporary hormonal surges, and I'll occasionally edit away the neck wattle that might appear because I had asked them to look down and they did so by tilting their whole head rather than with just their eyes. But I'm not going to make a curvy woman into a stick, because it's dismissive of how beautiful she is and it's not necessary to change anything -- if I'm doing my job as a photographer, I don't need to alter anybody, because they're going to look stunning no matter their shape and size.

Reflections on 2013

As I look back on 2013, I am struck by how I've changed as a photographer over time. There was a point not so very long ago when I questioned whether or not I was worthy to call myself a professional, and I was hesitant to dive into uncharted waters or challenge myself with new projects. I told myself that maybe with more training or just more experience, I could think of myself as legit. I was scared to get started on anything new because I tied my notion of success to the number of prints I sold or the dollar value in my bank account at the end of the year, when in truth, an artist must gauge success internally, on the level of satisfaction one feels doing the work.

Of course I want to earn enough to make a living from my photography and quit the day job (who doesn't?), and I'm working on making that a reality, but if I'm really enjoying what I'm doing and I feel like I'm creating something beautiful and worthwhile, then maybe it doesn't matter how much or little I earn in recompense, or even if anybody likes what I do -- ars gratia artis, baby.

There have been some missteps and bad luck along the way, of course (nearly freezing to death while NOT photographing eagles along the Skagit comes to mind), but the things I've seen and learned have mostly been positive, on the whole: rounding a corner to see my first snowy owl in the wild, seeing wild Alaskan brown bears up UNCOMFORTABLY close and personal, meeting new models and creating art together as I branch into more portrait and digital work, and pursuing new business opportunities.

Thus encouraged (with many words of affirmation and several swift kicks in the behind from my ever-patient wife), I look forward to 2014 not with dread or trepidation, but with excitement over what new experiences I may have and in what ways I will learn and grow as an artist and as a human being. My head swims with all the project ideas I have for the future, and I have only to figure out the logistics to make them a reality. If things go the way I plan, I may be a very busy boy in the coming year.

Fear not, nature lovers - I fully intend to continue shooting wildlife whenever the opportunity presents itself. Since it looks like this winter will be a record-breaking irruption of snowy owls, you can be sure I'll head out to see them in mid- to late-January, and maybe I'll also go looking for bald eagles along the Skagit again. I intend to go further afield and hit Eastern Washington again, as well as venturing into Oregon, Idaho and British Columbia to get those landscape shots I love so much. And we are in the planning stages for a return trip to sub-Saharan Africa, to get shots with a better camera and more experience under my belt, in the place where the very idea of a photography career was born.

In the meantime, I still have a number of matted prints that I'm trying to clear out (the exact number is 3,104,225), selling for $3 for 5x7, $5 for an 8x10 and $20 for 16x20. Unless you live in the Seattle area, I cannot guarantee you will receive it by Christmas if you order today, but I will ship as soon as I get your order. Please have a look and take these off my hands (these are basically selling at cost, just so I can get rid of them, so you're not going to find prints cheaper than this. You can find them at my Photoshelter site. I also have lovely 2014 landscape and wildlife calendars for sale for $13 +S&H, also on Photoshelter. Get them now before they're gone!

And as always, I'm looking for ways to build the business and find new clients for my portrait studio. So please, if you know anyone looking for a photographer, send them my way! I'd love to talk to them and set up a session. I see big things ahead for 2014, and I'd like for all of you to be a part of it!

The Wedding That Wasn't, Part II

I received an email a few weeks ago from someone we'll call Mr. X, who was wondering if I was available in October to shoot a wedding. My first wedding shoot! I was elated, of course, though his next statement made an eyebrow go up: he said he was impressed with my business profile on Manta.com. In case you didn't know, Manta is a business rating site, kind of like Yelp or Angie's List. While I am technically listed on Manta.com, my profile basically says, "Seattle photographer," and lists our address and phone number. So Mr. X is apparently easily impressed, but I shrugged and said, "Whatever."

After a few more emails in which I learned very little about the specifics of the wedding, I sent him my price sheet with my current package deals. Didn't hesitate, just said that his uncle would be paying my fee via cashier's check or money order. I said, "Money's money, so I'm not going to worry about it until the check actually arrives." Mr. X emailed a couple of days later, saying that his BROTHER had sent the check via courier, but had accidentally added my price AND the payment to their wedding planner in one check, so could I please write a check or money order and send it to the address they would specify later.

If you're not screaming, "Don't do it!" as loudly as I do when I watch a young girl about to investigate a strange noise in the basement in a horror movie, you should be. This is a fairly common form of Internet scam, known as an Advance Payment Fraud. I'd heard of it happening to people on eBay and Craigslist, where someone will win/buy an item, then "accidentally" overpay for the item and ask the seller to just send a Western Union moneygram for the amount overpaid. With cashier's checks and money orders, because they're issued by a bank or financial institution, your bank will accept them and make the funds available to you within a day or two, but the check itself has to be mailed back to the originating bank before someone will realize it's bogus, sometimes as much as ten days later. By that time, you've already sent the check to the buyer for the difference, and you've already shipped whatever item they had bought off you. So now, you're out the money you just wired, you have to pay back to your bank the price of the item you just sold, you're also out the item you were selling, and more than likely, your bank is already in the process of prosecuting you for fraud for trying to deposit a bogus check (because as far as they know, there is no buyer, and you're just trying to scam the bank).

At this point, lots of alarm bells were going off in my head, as they should have, but there was still a tiny iota of optimism that said, "Well, what if this is legitimate? What if I'm just dealing with the most disorganized, uncommunicative person who speaks English as a second language, and whose family comes from a country in which it's legal for her brother to marry her widowed aunt, making him her brother/uncle, who is wealthy and willing to pay for her wedding expenses out of the goodness of his heart, but isn't terribly organized himself (it's genetic, I tell you) and goes to the trouble of actually adding all the expenses up and writing a single check for it all and sending it to me? *pant*pant*pant* I wouldn't want to yell at them and call them frauds if they were legitimate, because I don't want to scare away potential clients."

Two things: If you read my previous post, you know my #1 rule for Internet financial security: if it feels like a scam, it's probably a scam. And secondly, as many business educators will tell you, if they are not your ideal client, don't be heartbroken if you have to cut them loose. You should focus 80% of your energy in attracting the people who fit the profile of your ideal client, in terms of income and budget, temperament, and the kinds of products and services they expect out of you. If you're spending 80% of your energy trying to please the 20% of your total clientele who are demanding, cheap or penny-pinching, overly critical fussbudgets who are looking to get more than they're due for the amount of money they're paying you, then you're doing something wrong. So even if they are legitimate, the minute they start making life difficult for you, you should be willing to say, "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I just can't work with you," and walk away. Be polite, but be firm.

However, since part of me was amused with this little game, I didn't say anything, and waited for the check to arrive. It was sent via FedEx and arrived this past Wednesday afternoon, and it kind of made me angry in a way, because these people aren't even trying to fool me. If I got burned by someone with a really clever con, sure, I'd be mad, but I'd have to nod and say, "Okay, that was good. I never saw that one coming."

These fools? Mailed a check from Georgia for someone who claimed to be currently living in Texas, in payment for a wedding that will be occurring here in Seattle, and I was supposed to wire half the amount to a purported wedding planner in.... West Padukah, Kentucky? Oh yes, and the name on the bank account from which the check was supposedly drawn? Colorado State University. Really? Did they think I wouldn't notice that someone on the Board of Regents for CSU was supposedly writing a check for their sister/niece's wedding expenses? And Kentucky? If you're planning on moving from Texas to Washington and are going to have your wedding up here in the Seattle area, presumably after you're moved and gotten all settled in, why in the name of all that's holy would you hire a wedding planner in Kentucky?? "Yes, ma'am, if you could just contact florists, churches, musicians, caterers, decorators, and bakeries you don't know in a state you may or may not have ever visited in your life? That'd be great."

So to sum up:

1. Cold-contacted me via email, saying my virtually non-existent Manta.com profile was impressive, and wanted to hire me to do wedding photos
2. Won't tell me where the wedding will be, so I can contact the venue and make sure photographers are allowed (some churches actually don't allow photographers in their weddings... never really understood why not)
3. Is a little confused over which relative will be paying for my expenses, which is really something you should know ahead of time.
4. Sends me the wrong amount of money, and asks me to just forward the difference to somebody after I cash the check.
5. Tells me to send the excess money to someone whom it doesn't make sense would be involved in this wedding.
6. Writes the check from an account that has absolutely no business sending funds for a wedding. (Called the bank, and the account exists, but the check didn't mention the Board of Regents, just Colorado State, so we all agreed it was probably bogus)
7. Has suspiciously bad English writing skills, which isn't necessarily an indication of wrongdoing by itself, but taken in conjunction with the rest, tells me they're a foreign national scamming Americans.

Sadly, they have my name and address, so I can't counter-scam them too much, or someone might actually show up at my door one day. Instead, I found the website for the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), which is a joint operation between the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center, and filed a complaint. It's usually meant for people who have already lost money to a con to report the crime and hopefully help catch these people and maybe get a bit of their money back, but I figured, hey, crime in progress here, people; maybe if you jump on this, you'll catch a scammer in the act of scamming someone. I'll let you know if I hear of any action, but I thought I would relate my tale to you, dear friends, that you might learn from my experience and gain much needed paranoia when dealing with the faceless horde that is the Internet. For those of us who run small businesses, con artists like this waste our time and energy, and if you are approached by one, run away! I kept going with this one probably about three weeks longer than I really should have, but part of me hoped they would prove to be legitimate, because I really, REALLY wanted to shoot a wedding. *sigh* I wish these people would go away, or at least leave me alone, but since they're not, it behooves us all to be on the alert for them. There, you have been warned.

The Wedding That Wasn't, Part I

Since you're reading this, I know you have Internet access. Therefore, I know you have received at least one phishing email from someone trying to scam you out of hundreds or even thousands of dollars, and a few of you have even fallen for some of these con games. The Internet is like a sea full of hungry sharks, and as soon as you indicate weakness, some indication that you are even the slightest bit greedy or gullible -- preferrably both -- it's like blood in the water. If all the spam I've received offering me money were real, I would be a multi-billionaire by now.

As a public service, therefore, here are a few rules to keep in mind if you are contacted by someone offering you money.

1) No one wants to give you money, so 99.9% chance it's a scam. Period. People don't offer you money out of the blue. Even if you're entitled to some money, the people holding it will make it as difficult as possible to collect, because maybe they can use the money to make more money through investments and such; it behooves them to delay paying you as long as possible

2) If you didn't buy a lottery ticket, YOU DIDN'T WIN THE LOTTERY. Especially if it's a lottery you've never heard of, in a country you've never visited. See rule #1

3) If you don't know the person or anyone mentioned in their message, they are not a relative, and even if they are, they aren't going to give you money (if you're that distant a relation that you don't know who they are, why would they leave you money in their will?) See rule #1.

4) No one "selects your email at random" to win money. See Rule #1.

5) If someone wants to smuggle money out of a foreign country because they have come by it by illegitimate means, they're not going to choose YOU to move it. You are not the A-Team. You are not Billy Ocean or any of his associates. Unless you have diplomatic immunity, own a container ship or a reliable submarine, or have ties to banks in the Caiman Islands, you do not have the wherewithal to smuggle large sums of cash (you do know they trace wire transfers for security purposes, right? The sudden appearance of $20 million in the bank account of a school teacher or a cabinet maker is going to raise a few eyebrows.) In any case, even if it was true (which it isn't), secretly transferring large sums of money without declaring it or paying taxes on it is illegal, and not only could YOU lose money, but you could also go to jail for being complicit to a fraud.

6) Learning grammar, syntax and spelling really pays. Even uneducated Americans can speak and write English well enough to be understood and sound American, and while spelling is sometimes a weak point for many people, even middle-school dropouts will know enough to place verbs and nouns in the correct order. Oftentimes, however, since many of the Internet scammers are foreign-born, their grasp of English is usually not so hot. It might not be a fair measure of potential clients or long-lost relatives or legitimate legal entities who are seeking you out to give you money for something, to base your decision to give them access to your money solely on bad grammar or a really thick accent, it's unfortunately still a good practice to distrust anyone who claims to be an American but sounds like the instruction manual for an imported electronic device. ("Please to be sending a checque soonish for very fast processing your happy monies...")

7) No one, and I mean NO ONE accidentally pays $1000 extra for something they bought on the Internet, requiring the seller to send them money back. People can be stupid, but people are pretty tight with their cash, and don't want to spend more than they actually owe. See rule #1!! This leads into today's lesson; please continue reading Part II.