PhotoActive

Episode 30: Jason Snell Takes Control of Apple Photos

December 21st, 2018  |  35 mins 36 secs

apple, apple photos, cameras, ebook, iphone, jason snell, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, take control

If you want to learn all about something, write a book about it. Or, to avoid yourself a lot of work, read someone else’s book about it! Jason Snell has written several versions of his book Take Control of Photos, and he joins us to talk about what’s new in Apple’s photo software and ecosystem for the Mac and iOS devices. We also talk about making print books and calendars, features that were removed from Photos earlier this year, and how machine learning is going to play a more important role in photo software.

Episode 29: Christmas Gift Guide

December 14th, 2018  |  27 mins 3 secs

Jeff and Kirk do their first Christmas gift guide. But they don't choose (much) gear.

Episode 28: Low-Light Photography

December 7th, 2018  |  27 mins 24 secs

a shot in the dark, aperture, apple, cameras, dark shooting, iphone, iso, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, low-light, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, shutter speed

The winter months are dark for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, so how do you create good photos in dimly lit environments? Your camera wants to make the best exposure possible, but in low-light situations, that can lead to long shutter speeds and blurry camera motion. Kirk and Jeff cover the many options for dealing with dark scenes in this episode.

Episode 27: Flying High with Ian Schray and Drones

November 30th, 2018  |  29 mins 15 secs

apple, camera drone, cameras, dji, drone, drones, faa, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, quadcopter

In traditional photography, a great piece of advice is to “zoom with your feet,” or, move yourself closer to a subject. What happens when the subject is 400 feet high? Or you want a unique viewpoint that wouldn’t be possible without a crane? This week we talk to Ian Schray about flying drones: quadcopters outfitted with cameras.

Episode 26: RAW Power 2.0

November 23rd, 2018  |  36 mins 38 secs

apple, cameras, gentlemen coders, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, raw power, raw vs jpeg

This week we’re joined by Nik Bhatt, former developer of Aperture and iPhoto at Apple and now a distinguished gentleman at Gentlemen Coders. Using his deep knowledge of how Apple’s raw photo editing engine works, Nik has just released RAW Power 2.0, an app for macOS and iOS. We talk about RAW Power’s unique features and learn some of the fascinating ins and outs of raw image processing.

Episode 25: Understanding iCloud Photo Library

November 16th, 2018  |  32 mins 17 secs

apple, cameras, icloud, icloud photo library, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo backups, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast

If you use Apple’s Photos app on your Mac or iOS device, are you also synchronizing your images via iCloud Photo Library? In this week’s episode, Jeff and Kirk talk about the pros and cons of Apple’s cloud service for photos. Why should you consider it? What are the downsides? And if your images are in the cloud, is that considered a backup? (No, it’s not. We explain why.)

Episode 24: Manual vs Automatic Camera Settings

November 9th, 2018  |  31 mins

aperture priority, apple, auto camera mode, cameras, f8 and be there, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, manual photography, manual shooting, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, program mode, shutter priority

We (good-naturedly) wade back into the question of “What makes a REAL photographer?” In this case, we’re talking about shooting using entirely manual controls or using the auto or semi-automatic modes on your camera. (Spoiler: Anyone with a camera is a real photographer.) We discuss when each approach works, and the advantages of knowing how shutter speed, aperture, and ISO all work together.

Episode 23: Printing Photos with Rick LePage

November 2nd, 2018  |  33 mins 10 secs

apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, printing

Do you print your photos? Although we know we should make prints, but getting from screen to paper isn’t always easy. It turns out, though, that printing is much easier today than it used to be. In this episode, we welcome photographer and publisher Rick LePage to talk about printing photos at home, from hardware to paper to inks.

Episode 22: Editing Photos in iOS Apps

October 26th, 2018  |  32 mins 21 secs

We’ve talked about using an iPhone as a camera, but what about as a photo editor? The iPhone and iPad have come a long way since the early models, and they’re now quite capable digital darkrooms. But can you do “real” editing on them? Jeff and Kirk reveal how they use their devices with their photos, and cover some of the top editing apps for iOS.

Episode 21: High Dynamic Range (HDR) Photography

October 19th, 2018  |  32 mins 19 secs

apple, cameras, hdr, high dynamic range, iphone, iphone xs, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast

“HDR” used to bring to mind surreal landscapes with garish colors and very few shadows. Fortunately, high-dynamic range photography has matured beyond those early days, and is a useful technique for getting more detail out of any scene. The latest iPhone and other smartphone cameras use HDR liberally to create good shots in all types of situations. We talk about making HDR photos using traditional cameras and techniques and also the new iPhone's computational methods.

Episode 20: The Blur-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named

October 12th, 2018  |  33 mins 37 secs

The recent release of new iPhones that improve the Portrait mode feature spurred us to talk about bok... Kirk can’t say the word. But that’s okay, because neither can Apple VP Phil Schiller (correctly, anyway). Yes, we’re discussing background blur and shallow depth of field, how to get the effect with traditional cameras and lenses as well as the faux version in some smartphones, and why you’d want to in the first place.

Episode 19: Michael Rubin and Classic Photos

October 5th, 2018  |  35 mins 36 secs

arnold newman, black and white, conversation, elliot erwitt, igor stravinsky, magnum photos, michael rubin, photo podcast, photography, podcast

Episode 18: Katrin Eismann on Photographic Literacy

September 28th, 2018  |  39 mins 27 secs

Katrin Eismann has been at the forefront of digital photography from the beginning—literally shooting with earliest-production cameras that, in one case, was tethered to an external hard drive that weighed 12 pounds—which gives her an excellent perspective of where digital photography is today. "Photography is based on technology," she says. "The changes in technology influence the aesthetic and practice of photography."

Episode 17: Prime vs Zoom Lenses

September 21st, 2018  |  33 mins 5 secs

Photographers often focus on cameras, but it’s the lens that can have the most impact on your photos. In this episode, Jeff and Kirk talk glass: lenses. When do you want a prime lens, which has a fixed focal length, and when does a zoom work better? Why are prime lenses often better? And why not just use one zoom lens that hits both wide and telephoto ranges? We sort out an often confusing topic.

Episode 16: Buying and Selling Camera Gear

September 14th, 2018  |  33 mins 13 secs

Do you have a pile of old cameras and lenses stashed in a closet somewhere? Or do you sell your used gear to make way for new goodies? What about buying previously-owned cameras and lenses? This week, Kirk and Jeff talk about buying and selling your photo gear: where to do it, pitfalls to avoid, and more.

Episode 15: Time-Lapse Photography

September 7th, 2018  |  29 mins 57 secs

camera app, how-to, iphone, time-lapse, video

Time-lapse photography can create dramatic short videos - think about clouds zooming overhead throughout the course of a day or flowers blooming in seconds - but creating time-lapse videos turns out to be remarkably easy. In this episode, Jeff and Kirk walk through the process of using the Time-Lapse mode in the iOS Camera app as well as capturing time-lapse photos with traditional cameras.