Make Big Images With Small Desktop Printers
By Christine Pentecost– I have a beautiful, scenic image in my collection that begged to be displayed larger than could be output by my desktop printer– which only can use letter-sized paper. Surely, I thought, there must be some way to solve this problem and, as it turns out, there is. Image Splitter is a very simple-to-use (and free) software program that takes an image and quickly divides it into sections which can then be sized to...
Add Value and Security to Your Images
By Arthur H. Bleich– If you currently sell (or would like to sell) prints of your best work here’s a technique I’ve used successfully to assure buyers that if they resell my photographs some day it can be proven that they are genuinely mine and not unauthorized copies. I began doing this a few years ago when a friend who sells prints at art shows and fairs in this country traveled overseas and found copies of his work being sold...
Back to Basics: Resolution Simplified, Part 1
By Arthur H. Bleich– Resolution goes hand-in-hand with almost every aspect of digital photography– from image capture to the final print. If you want your photographs to be the best they can possibly be, it’s necessary to have a basic understanding of it. At first, it may seem confusing because many who try to explain it often use the wrong terminology or throw lots of numbers around which only makes things worse. This is my...
Get Maximum Shadow Detail in Your Prints
By Tim Grey– In many cases a print will not reflect the full level of shadow detail as actually exists in the image file. Instead, that shadow gets “blocked up,” similar to the way shadow detail gets clipped in an exposure that is too dark. You can compensate for this issue by essentially brightening the value of black, causing all neighboring tonal values to be brightened up accordingly. With the vast majority of printers I find that...
Keyboards Short, Long, Fat, Thin, Loud, Soft And More
By Arthur H. Bleich– For years I wanted to take a circular saw and cut the numerical pad off of my keyboard. The the last time I used it must have been…I don’t even remember. But there it sat, just taking up space and putting my mouse just beyond a comfortable reach. Then, one day, tucked away on the Web, I found two companies you’ve probably never heard of– Fentek and Matias. Fentek has the largest collection of specialized PC (and...
FREE GIFTS! The Nik Collection from Google and Nik Tutorials from GreyLearning
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past decade, you know just how coveted Nik imaging software programs are. Google bought Nik in 2012 and has announced that as they focus on long-term investments in building photo editing tools for mobile use, including Google Photos and Snapseed, they’re going to make the Nik Collection desktop suite available free. Actually, insiders say Snapseed was the prime target but Google had to...
Pros Choose Tony Bonanno To Print Their Best Images
Flip a Tony Bonanno coin and it’s a winner either way it lands. Heads, it’s an internationally renowned photographer based in Santa Fe, New Mexico who travels worldwide to shoot architecture, travel, documentary, corporate events, editorial and fine art photography. Tails, a talented digital print maker who works with both Epson and Canon large-format printers and outputs images for other pros. Bonanno is recognized as a Master...
Try Soft Light For Great Portraits
By Arthur H. Bleich– In the early days of amateur photography, enthusiasts were always being warned to “keep the sun at your back” because films were slow and needed lots of light to record a decent image. But before photography became the beloved hobby of the masses, Victorian studio photographers had discovered that the best way to light their subjects was to avoid the sun altogether. They set up indoor studios with...
How To Survive If Your Drive Takes A Dive
By Arthur H. Bleich– There are few things more chilling than to see this message pop up on your computer screen during startup: “This disk is not readable by this computer.” Is your data still on the hard disk? Is it a software problem? A hardware problem? A connection problem? What happened? If it’s your internal drive that’s gone south, you won’t even be able to get online for help. You get that numb feeling of fear. Well, hang in...
Cash In On Greeting Cards!
By Drew Hendrix– Electronic greeting cards may be click ‘n easy but the public still has a voracious appetite for printed cards; all it takes to enter the market and start making money is a printer, the right Red River Paper card stock and, of course, your best images. The Greeting Card Association estimates that more than 7 billion paper cards were sold last year at prices ranging from $2 to $10 and that women accounted for...
Richard Baker: War and Peace
By Arthur H. Bleich– In 1966, Richard Baker aimed his M-16 at the Vietnamese; today he uses an arsenal of analog cameras to shoot them. His goal is to photograph all 54 ethnic tribes in the country where he was once sent to fight. Now 68, the twice-wounded Army veteran has been back to Vietnam about 15 times since the war ended; he jokes that he’s done more tours of duty there than any other soldier. Capturing images on pin-hole and...
What To Think About BEFORE You Shoot
By Arthur H. Bleich– Chances are you already know about different post production work flow techniques that can be used in Photoshop and/or Lightroom after you’ve shot your pictures. But it’s equally important to establish a workflow you can follow before you even make the shot. Here are nine things you should think about before you lift the camera to your eye. I’ve grouped them so when you begin to follow this recipe you only...
Quickstart Guide To Inkjet Papers
By Drew Hendrix –Today’s selection of inkjet papers provides amazing creative opportunities for photo enthusiasts by offering quality, control and cost savings previously unknown to photographers who worked with conventional photo papers. There are many more options to let you match the paper’s surface to suit your photographic style. Weight, texture, shade and more can finely tune the look and feel of your prints. Never in the...
“Pure Images” are a Myth
By Bryan Peterson –As the years have gone by, I have been pushing myself further and further away from the “obvious” photographic opportunities and more toward the “unseen,” as well as toward creating images from “scratch” (i.e., using props and/or models, and creating compositions that are in fact inspired in part by observing the world around me or simply writing down those ideas that seem to pop...
Backup Therapy for Paranoid Photographers, Part 2
By Tim Grey– Variability. I am often asked whether it is best to use a full backup solution where the backup is replaced each time you perform a backup, or an incremental backup where only changes made since the last backup are copied. My answer is to use both of these approaches. There are advantages and disadvantages to each type of backup, and so I encourage you to use more than one approach to help make up for the limits of each...
Backup Therapy for Paranoid Photographers, Part 1
By Tim Grey– To me a big part of why I capture photographic images in the first place is to preserve memories that are important to me. By definition, if I intentionally pressed the shutter release button on the camera then the photo I captured is important to me in some way. Therefore, I want to make sure that my photos are stored in a way that minimizes the risk of loss. Hard drives fail—all too often—and I want to ensure that a...
Digital Photos Are Not Forever!
by Drew Hendrix – Today’s digital world is fraught with danger when it comes to protecting precious photos. They easily can be ruined even when we think they’re safe and securely stored on magnetic or optical drives, CDs and DVDs or somewhere up in the Cloud. Digital disaster regularly befalls governmental agencies, educational institutions and companies big and small despite their best efforts to prevent it. It can also happen to you...
Shoot Masterpieces On Your Kitchen Table
by Arthur H. Bleich– When the weather outside turns frightful why not stay inside, where it’s nice and warm, and shoot some still lifes. What’s a still life? It’s simply a creative arrangement of objects which you design. You’ve probably seen classical still life paintings such as flower arrangements or bowls of fruit with fish or fowl in the scene. While these are more traditional still life subjects, yours should be...
Altering Reality– It’s Nothing New
By Arthur H. Bleich– Critics of computer-altered images usually divide photography into two time periods: the honest analog days and the dishonest digital ones. If it were only that easy. Tinkering with images is as old as photography itself; it’s merely become more sophisticated. In the early days of photography, “spirit” photos depicted departed loved ones hovering near the living, and fairies were shown dancing in the woods. And...
Editing for Print – Sharpening with Tim Grey
If you are printing your work, getting it to look good on the monitor is just the beginning. To make it look awesome on paper, you have to do a bit more work. Red River Paper has teamed up with photography expert and educator Tim Grey to bring you a video series called Editing for Print. Over the coming weeks we will explore a few simple but critical edits before printing that have a big impact. This week we look...
Our Sponsors
