Jim Leask on Digitizing Slides with a DSLR

 

The feature speaker at our April meeting  will be Jim Leask who will be speaking about

Taking Pictures of Pictures — Digitizing slides with a DLSR.

Jim is a software engineer and an enthusiastic amateur photographer. He started photography in the ’70s with a Nikon FE film camera, and a manual focus lens. He was always “the guy with the big camera” at events, and also liked nature photography. He learned the creative and technical skills for photography with film, then transferred these concepts to digital and digital processing.

He became interested in converting slides to digital format after the world trip He and his wife went on where they took over 10,000 slides. They had countless slides of family and events from earlier years too, but they were all locked away in a format that was difficult to use. They never saw those pictures.

He purchased a slide scanner, but found it was far too slow to process each slide so it was never used. When the full/crop frame digital cameras came along, he  investigated the idea of taking pictures of pictures. He found that worked very well.

Presentation Outline

This presentation will show how he uses his DLSR to digitize slides.

There are two main objectives while digitizing:

1) Image Quality

  • Obtain the best digital copy of the slide as possible

2) Speed

  • – so the project actually happens!

He will cover the following topics:

  • Camera gear (the camera, lens, and slide adapter)
  • Camera settings (F-Stop, shutter speed, and why)
  • Focus (settings to get good focus)
  • Lighting source and white balance (how to illuminate the slide for good colour)
  • Lightroom (capturing directly to Lightroom and cataloguing images)
  • the workflow (show captures in action – approx. 10 seconds / slide)

Digitize Media at the Library

Jennifer Armstrong at the Beaverbrook Branch of the Ottawa Public Library recently passed along this information about new digitizing equipment they’ll be getting soon:

We do not yet have a date that the equipment will be available for public use.

As for the nature of the equipment or its capabilities, I can only pass along what little I know.

The collection of equipment should allow for the following:

  • Scanning, editing, and digitizing photographs
  • Digitizing slides and negatives
  • Converting 8mm film to digital
  • Converting VHS to digital

There will most likely be only one of each piece of equipment, which means that customers will have to sign up to use them.

I will do my best to keep you and the club up to date.

For more information, please contact Jennifer.

 

Survey Results

At the January meeting and on the website, we asked the Camera Club membership to fill in a survey to tell us what they wanted from the club so we could plan the future direction and activities of the club. Thank you to all who took the time to fill in and return the survey and to Marilyn Martin and Frank Knor who prepared it and correlated the results. You can see a summary of your responses here.

Camera Club Executive

Henry’s Lighting and Portrait event

Store_Kanata

Update from Alexandra on Tuesday March 20th:

I just wanted to let you know that for the day of the event the company has decided to offer another 15% enhanced trade in value if there is anything your members are looking to get rid of/haven’t had luck selling on craigslist/kijiji.

Alexandra Leask from Henry’s Kanata has just informed us about their upcoming Lighting and Portrait event. It’s free and takes place March 25th, 9am – 11am

Alexandra says the event will include:

1) An introduction to Godox and strobes set ups for portrait lighting.

We will be going over some intermediate to advanced portrait lighting techniques using Godox strobes, multiple flash set ups and modifiers. Participants will have the chance to set up and direct their own “studio” set up and use their own gear to photograph portraits at this station.

2) Video lighting

At this station we’ll talk about how to set up a space for video, the various types of lights you would use for various set ups, and single to multiple light set ups. We will also go over the importance of colour temperature, how to match up and use light from two different sources (ex, window light with an LED bulb) and how to downsize your kit to shoot on location.

3) Single flash set ups

This station will perhaps be the most practical of the four! At this station we will talk about (and of course play with) single flash set ups, talk about when and how to adapt the flash on camera, when to pull the flash off camera, and what simple modifiers can be used with the flash or on their own!

4) Focal length and perspective.

While the third station might be the most practical this one is sure to be the most fun. At this station we’ll have a slew of lenses (with a focus on the Sigma ART primes) for everyone to play with. There will also be a demonstration to show how various focal lengths effect face shape and can add (or detract) from the scene and feeling you’re trying to create in your images. Lenses from this station are welcome to be borrowed to be used at the other three stations.

If you have any questions, please contact Henry’s Kanata at 613-836-1016.

Landscape Photography & Composition Tips

Here are some videos I chose with tips on landscape photography and composition:

 Phil Tughan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

RicharD Murphy March 2nd

Joint us on March the 2nd for a presentation by RicharD Murphy on Digital Asset Management — maintaining a library of digital image.

RicharD MurphyHaving lived in Kanata since his early childhood, RicharD first began in photography while attending the Earl of March S.S. where he was encouraged by his very patient art teachers. To further his photographic education, RicharD moved to London, Ontario and studied at Fanshawe College where he specialized in large format, commercial product photography, and experimented with a new, developing means of photographic expression: digital imaging.

RicharD has worked in Ottawa’s photographic industry for over twenty years in such areas as custom photographic printing by hand, corporate portraiture, commercial magazine photography, and technical imaging for national heritage organizations such as Library and Archives Canada and the Canadian Museum of Civilization. Through these and other activities, RicharD has continued to expand and share his knowledge of photography.

Focused mainly now on the fine art side of his craft, RicharD is inspired by the resilience and grace of nature, and specializes in landscape and found still life photography. With a mix of both traditional techniques and modern equipment, RicharD has found the means to more effectively realize the world as he sees it, and strives to create images that show a classic and timeless beauty. Having been formally schooled in photography before the days of digital cameras, RicharD still enjoys using film to capture the body of the image. These images are then brought to life via computer and then printed on various media including wood, canvas, & fine art papers.

To see examples of his work, visit his website.

 

 

Portrait Workshops

last session ed 016We have been offered the following times to meet for portrait workshop sessions at the Kanata Seniors’ Centre:

  • Thursday, 12 April – 12 – 4pm
  • Thursday 3 May – 8:30-4pm
  • Thursday 5 June – 8:30 – 4pm

After the Camera Club meeting on April 6th, people interested in participating could meet and discuss how they would like the sessions to be organized. One suggestion would be to divide into groups of three for the first session and practice on each other with regards to lighting etc.

May and June we could sign up Senior Centre members and offer free portraits.

For more information, please email me here.

Sue Carey