I've generally avoided using a polarizer for two reasons: It substantially cuts down on the light entering the lens and you have to constantly fiddle with it to get the orientation right--move from horizontal to vertical and you must turn the filter, move to a different angle from the sun and you must change the filter. But I've found it can make a big difference in the quality of many images so I've been mounting my polarizer more frequently this past year. Besides cutting glare and reflections it boosts the colors. You often don't notice the minor reflections or color differences until you see the same image with and without polarization. Since we strive to make the best images we can in-camera, it can be a very important tool to use especially since the effect is nearly impossible to achieve in post-process. I recently went up to Chapman Falls and the Eightmile River in Devil's Hopyard State Park to photograph the expected fully flowing falls. It did not disappoint. Rather than a Neutral Density filter I opted to use just the polarizer as it was rather overcast so I thought I could achieve some slow shutter speeds for silky water shots. That worked as expected. What I did not foresee but was happy to find, and not surprised by, was the antireflective effect on the images. Here's an example from some rapids in the river.

On the left is basically unpolarized [the filter was on but the orientation was not polarizing the light] and on the right is the same scene after I turned the filter to a polarizing position]. I would be surprised if someone could turn the left image into the right image without major Photoshop skills.
These were done on a tripod to get long exposures. In cases where a long exposure is not necessary to the image you want, a polarizer may not hamper a hand held image since newer cameras have greater sensitivity at higher ISO. 
​So consider using a polarizer more often if you don't already do so.
​Maryann

I received an email from a self-described photographer/tech geek who has put together a comprehensive guide to solving memory card problems. A quick glance through the table of contents and the reviews would indicate this guy knows what he's talking about. 
Here's the URL: https://www.softwarehow.com/sd-memory-card-error-fix/
​With luck you will never need it. Worth looking at to see what you can do to avoid problems in the first place.
​Maryann

A digital slide show is a great way to share your images with family, friends and your camera club. If you are already familiar with Lightroom, creating a slide show with background music using the Slideshow module is not difficult. It's so convenient to have this capability within Lightroom right beside your organizing and processing workflow and not have to export images to  other software. 
I've created a tutorial to guide you through the process.
Have fun!
Maryann Flick

Mike Frechette is our guest blogger this month with a View from the Board. Normally these appear in our newsletter. The newsletter is indefinitely on hiatus. Email announcements and more blogs will temporarily take the place of the newsletter. Maryann

​A View From the Board
                  At a recent board meeting, one of the members asked an interesting question: “I look at the pictures I took recently, and when I compare them to pictures I took many years ago, I don’t see how I have improved that much over time.  How do I learn to take better pictures? “
                  There ensued amongst the group present an excited and sometimes contentious discussion of how to become a better photographer.
                  I am torn between two different views.   One view is that we should enter our photographs into competitions and exhibits or whatever venue we can find so that we can get constructive feedback on how we can improve the picture.  This does two things- it makes us more aware of what it takes to make a good photograph, and two, it pushes us to the boundaries of our skills and forces us to try new things.    There are many, many techniques that we can use in photography, and as we learn the techniques, we can make decisions as to whether the picture is better if we employ those techniques.  Exhibiting and getting critiques about our work teaches us to recognize the potential of an individual photograph, and that will help us create better pictures.  Through critiques you will learn composition theories, and you will learn how basic art principles also apply to photographs.    I encourage you to take courses, attend seminars, or view webcasts about how to improve your skills.    
                  But what if you have a lot of skills and do know a lot of techniques?  Then I would ascribe to the second view which is take lots of pictures and play with light.   I learned this summer that you sometimes need to be at the right place at the right time to get spectacular photographs.  As you go about your day, take notice of places or things that you think might be worth shooting. Go back to a site when the lighting is optimal, usually early morning or around sunset.  This will encourage you to plan ahead and have a good idea of what you are trying to accomplish when you take your pictures. Do not be content to take just one picture.  I think that the tendency to take the “one and done” photograph stems from the old film days-every picture you took cost money.  Today, with digital cameras, you should take lots pf pictures, and sort them out later   If you look at the work of the well known photographers (Art Wolfe comes to mind right away) and you listen to what they say, they take hundreds or thousands of photographs trying to get just the right picture.    
                  We have an advantage today with digital photography that we did not have twenty years ago.  We can take thousands of photographs at very little cost.  Take a horizontal shot, take a vertical shot, take a weird angle shot, take shots of the same scene but with different lenses. You can sort through them and pick the best ones for printing and exhibiting.    You can improve them using software that exceeds the old darkroom techniques.    If you have a prejudice against “modifying” the pictures that come out of your camera, remember that if you shoot JPEG pictures, all cameras have programs that have already modified the picture
                  The bottom line is look around, and take lots of pictures, every day if you can.  Of course, if you DO take that many pictures, new problems arise as to storage, retrieval, organization and selection of all those photographs!  But that is a topic for another time.
 
Mike Frechette

Group f.64: Edward Weston, Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, and the Community of Artists who Revolutionized American Photography
by Mary Street Alinder
2014
Bloomsbury
 
The first paragraph of the Prologue is an apt introduction to the contents of this biographical/historical work.
“In 1932 an energetic alliance of dedicated San Francisco Bay Area photographers burst upon the art world, demanding local attention and looking beyond to the East Coast. These westerners believed they were redefining photography, finding a new way of seeing. Before them loomed two roadblocks; Alfred Stieglitz in New York and Pictorialism, the popular photographic style that was the antithesis of their philosophy.”
 
The book is a well written, fascinating, in-depth history of the emergence of fine art photography from the perspective of this group of photographers on the west coast. There are brief biographies of each of the original seven members and also bits and pieces of biographical info on later members and guest members such as Dorthea Lange. Also covered are their varied approaches to photography over the time period and their interactions with the other members of the group as well as the art world and the public. Being the era of the Great Depression, it was interesting to read how these photographers played a role in the perception of photography as an art form and how their lives were affected. For the period, it was unusual that there were several women in the group who for the most part were treated as equals to their male colleagues. The rivalry with the Pictorialists is amusingly reminiscent of modern controversies. Also interesting were the interactions with the East Coast group led by Alfred Stieglitz.
 
The author is an independent scholar specializing in 20th century photography. As a student in 1967, she attended a workshop where the instructors included several of the Group f.64 photographers. She became the chief assistant to Ansel Adams from 1979 until his death and worked closely with him on his autobiography, completing it after his death. Much of this book came from the research material collected then.

Have you read it? What did you think?

Maryann
I will loan my copy to trustworthy members on request.

http://www.psri.us/2016/06/learning-the-light/
And these 2 have loads of articles:
www.picturecorrect.com
digital-photography-school.com

A proposal to have a portrait photo shoot of residents at Gladeview Health Care Center has been raised. Before we get too involved with planning the details, I'd like to know if you are interested. We would set up one or more sessions where club members would shoot portraits and/or just resident's hands in artistic poses, perhaps with props. The best images would be printed and displayed in the hall at a special exhibit. Please leave a comment if you might be interested in doing this sometime in the coming year. [go to the club web site blog to leave your comment]
​Thanks!

Here are the award winners of the recent joint competition with Southeast CT Camera Club. Congratulations! 

From mid-February into March I spent 4 weeks in San Francisco. I hauled a bunch of camera gear not knowing what I would need since we had no definite plans or itinerary. I had my very old MacBook laptop. It’s so old it cannot run any version of Lightroom beyond 4. This seemed to be sufficient just to review images and do minor edits while I was there rather than save it all for when I returned. I had both cameras and did in fact occasionally carry both so I could have a wide-angle zoom lens and a long zoom lens at the ready. After the first couple days it was time to see what was captured. I opened Lightroom and used my USB SD card reader for upload. Imagine my surprise when Lightroom told me it couldn’t read the files! Sony ARW (their version of RAW) should be the same no matter what camera was used right? Wrong. Version 4 of Lightroom did not have the upgrade for the 77M2 so it would not read the RAW files from that camera. Yikes! What to do? My husband and I put our heads together and came up with the solution. His MacBook is newer and runs Lightroom 5 which does have the 77M2 camera update. We uploaded the files to his computer converting them to Adobe DNG files in the process. Then via WiFi I pulled them onto my laptop; time consuming but effective. Lightroom 4 was perfectly happy with the DNG files now. Fortunately, there was no problem with files from the A57, the older camera. Relieved of the problem, I continued to use the 77M2 as my primary since it’s a better camera.
 
If you are not familiar with Adobe’s DNG file format DNG stands for Digital Negative. It is supposed to be lossless and I’ve seen no reason not to believe this as far as processing is concerned. Adobe says this about creating the universal format: “By addressing the lack of an open standard for the raw files created by individual camera models, DNG helps ensure that photographers will be able to access their files in the future.” More about DNG is found at Adobe’s help site:
 https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/digital-negative.html
And a review is here: https://photographylife.com/dng-vs-raw
Google “Adobe DNG” for much more than you ever want to know.
 
Anyway, DNG saved a troublesome situation for me.