Friday, July 31, 2009

Maine Media Workshops

I traveled up to Maine yesterday to drop off my daughter at camp and then drove across on Route 17 to Rockport to meet with Kate Izor from the Maine Media Workshops. The workshops were in full swing and classes and enrollment were solid. Stan Grossfeld had given a presentation about his Pulitzer Prize winning work on Wednesday night. Photographers John Goodman and Zig Harvey were in the middle of a workshop as well.
It is great to see that this wonderful place that so many of us have visited is alive and well with some solid leadership and passionate people. Kate and I had a great meeting and discussed ideas for future workshops and collaborating together.



When I left I got to travel down the coast in search of a Lobstah roll.


I found Shaw's, somewhere near Pemaquid Lighthouse. ZuZu, my faithful travel companion, kept looking for seagulls to chase, but had no luck. She's a great a great car traveler and never once asked me to change the music!

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Walter Cronkite and JFK in Hyanisport 1963


As a kid growing up in Connecticut, I remember when Walter Cronkite came to our local junior high school in 1975 and shared with our class many of his favorite moments in his life. He recalled sitting with JFK in Hyannisport and his reporting on the Apollo mission.

This shot of these two great men is available at The Boston Globe Store - order your copy today!

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Boston Globe Store - All Star Photo


We have hunted through the Boston Globe Store and come across this vintage 1946 All Star Game photo from 1946 - 65 years ago!

You can order your copy of the photo directly from the Globe Store and have it printed at DSI!

Monday, July 13, 2009

DSI Exhibits at NECCC in Amherst, MA


DSI had a great looking booth at the New England Camera Club Council meeting and trade show this past weekend. This was the 64th annual conference and some of the attendees we spoke with have been coming there for the past 30 years in a row!. Kathy Skarvan of Ava Art was with me on Friday to discuss her customer framing. She saw some familiar faces from past shows we have done together.
We also had some of Ted Dillard's books on display and sold copies of RAW Pipeline and his latest book, Smart Object Pipeline.

Eric took in a few orders for the new IR Conversion service we are offering through Precision Camera. Folks are excited to learn about a new option for their older cameras and that we can make true silver prints from their IR files.

There were many great workshops and photographers on hand to discuss their work, travel programs and various techniques. Ron Rosenstock had a great talk on both Friday and Saturday. People are excited to see his new work, Infrared, was printed at Digital Silver Imaging and that we have his images on display at our gallery. We had taken two of his images with us to the show.

The trade shows are most fun when we get to meet people and make new friends. Paul Friedman owns a great rental company called Lens Pro to Go in West Concord MA. He has been in business for over 3 years and has built up a solid reputation and provided outstanding service for photographers looking to rent all kinds of Canon and Nikon gear.


Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Nik Software July Newsletter feaures DSI promotion


Nik Software has included Digital Silver Imaging in their July newsletter under their promotions section. Nik Silver Efex Pro is our favorite Photoshop Plugin. It has dramatically improved our work flow at the lab and consistently produces the best files we have printed here on our true gelatin silver papers. Nik has recognized DSI as one of the premier B&W digital photo labs in the country.

Remember, you can order Nik Software and use the DSI code for a 15% discount plus get processing discounts only at DSI.

Order your copy of Nik Software today through DSI and save!

Monday, July 6, 2009

INFRARED DIGITAL CAMERA CONVERSIONS - FREE SHIPPING!

Digital Silver Imaging has partnered with Precision Camera of CT to provide the absolute best Digital IR conversions. Precision Camera offers the finest in camera repair and has factory trained technicians. They also have the most sophisticated camera and lens calibration equipment. Precision's is also doing the conversions at a fraction of the cost compared to the competition. You shouldn't have to spend too much to turn your under utilized camera into a creative tool.

Digital Silver Imaging has partnered with Precision because Infrared Photography has generally been a Black & White medium. When Precision launched the new service, we decided to partner with Precision to unite the their technical component of IR photography with our true B&W printing services. It makes perfect sense to bring these two services together.

Click here for more details

DSI is offering free return shipping on any conversion in July or August.

Keiko Hiromi at Gallery Bauhaus, Tokyo



One of our friends, Keiko Hiromi, documentary photographer from Dorchester, has her work exhibiting at Gallery Bauhaus in Tokyo (Japanese language website).

Keiko's work from Jacques Cabaret features performance and backstage photos of drag queens, and is some of the coolest work I have printed in a long time.

For those of us who don't read Japanese, here are details -

Galley Bauhaus
Open 11am~7pm
Closed on Sunday, Monday and Holidays

Address: 2-19-14-101 Soto Kanda Chiyoda-Ku Tokyo
Phone #: 03-5294-2566

If you're lucky enough to be in Japan this July, check out the show.

- Jay

Boston Globe Store - Photo of the Week


This shot of the old Paragon roller coaster is another favorite of ours and is from The Boston Globe Store
. The shot is from the Boston Globe Archive from Boston, MA 7/19/78. The camera catches expressions of peoples faces as they ride the worlds longest and highest coaster at Paragon Park

Click here to go directly to The Globe Store to order your copy of the photo.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Photoshop Infrared compared to Digital Camera Infrared


We asked Mark Soares, Professional Services Representative from Precision Camera, to help explain the difference between Infrared (IR) photography done in Photoshop as compared to converting a digital camera to do infrared capture.

Here is how he explained it to us:


"There are a few differences between the real thing and a Photoshop filter applied in post processing. When you use an in-camera high pass filter you are only allowing the camera to expose for the infrared wavelengths, which means your image will be free of most visible light. This may not seem like a big deal to some people but the fact is, when shooting a true IR picture you want to have an image that is as true to that wavelength as possible. Just like the manufacturer's applied a lowpass filter to block IR light from affecting the image, you should block out everything else when shooting an IR picture.

When using a camera that is converted to expose for the full spectrum, your camera will expose for all the wavelengths. This causes the image to be soft by nature because the IR focal plane is behind the visible light plane, and the UV plane in turn is in front of the visible light plane - when you sandwich all those wavelengths into one flat image, because they have different focal planes the image will be softer.

The other issue with using a full spectrum camera and performing adjustments in postprocessing is that Photoshop will usually perform an adjustment where one of the channels (green usually) is copied, then blurred on purpose (to create the softness which is natural in IR photo) and overlayed on top of the image. The file is then converted to B&W and the contrast punched up. There is some deterioration of the image there since you are manipulating it to the point of losing detail in the highlights. The end result will not look like a 100% true IR image because the postprocessing is dependent on the amount of green in the image, whereas the IR image will factor in the actual IR light from the subject being photographed.

The best analogy I can come up with is comparing it to music.
An image captured with a full spectrum camera is like listening to the whole song (guitar, bass, drums, vocals). If you wanted to remove all the instruments and just listen to the vocals, it would be very difficult because all the information is intertwined and embedded with each other. Basically, the instruments and vocals have combined to create one song which cannot be broken down to its basic elements (unless you have the original tracks of course).

An image captured with an infrared camera is like a song with just the vocals (for example), and all the drums, bass and guitar are not audible, in fact, they have never been recorded. The sound will be nice and clear without any distortion because you are not manipulating it to get the vocals out, like you would if you wanted just the vocals from the full song.
A dedicated IR camera is a very limited device, however, it is very good at what it does. It allows for the isolation of a wavelength range with minimal deterioration of the image.

That's my take on it!

Mark Soares - Precision Camera


© Ron Rosenstock

Great description, Mark! If you're looking to have your camera converted, Digital Silver Imaging has partnered with Precision to bring you the absolute best Digital IR conversions at a very competitive price.
Click here for more details about our IR conversions.

Barack Obama, New Editor Harvard Law Review

DSI is pleased to be the official black & white printer for The Boston Globe image archives. We get to see some fantastic images come through from the Boston Globe Store. One of our favorites is this shot of Barack Obama as the new editor of the Harvard Law Review. We made a number of prints from this file on his inauguration day.

Infrared Camera Conversions


DSI is pleased to partner with Precision Camera, the world's largest camera repair facility based in Enfield, CT, to provide Digital Infrared Camera Conversions. Precision has earned their reputation for over 59 years in the camera repair business. With their repair authorizations, test equipment and factory service training from all the major camera manufacturers, no one does camera service and IR Conversions better than Precision Camera! Precision is also able to provide their IR conversion service at a fraction of the cost of the competition.

Point & Shoot IR Converions.....just $129
D-SLR IR Converions....just $249
Full Frame D-SLR IR Conversions....just $299

This is for either the 665nm or the 715nm conversion and includes any lens you want calibrated. The competition will charge you more if you send in anything other than a 50mm lens!

Precision has chosen Digital Silver Imaging as their preferred lab partner to help promote this service and to provide our true B&W printing for their IR clients. DSI will charge the same price plus has special printing rebates when you send your conversion through us.














©Ron Rosenstock

We make it easy to convert your camera:
  1. Email your camera & lens make, model and serial #'s
  2. Fill out our credit card application form or call us with your information
  3. We will email you a pdf with a shipping label
  4. Pack and ship your camera & lens to Precision
  5. You will receive your converted camera in 1-2 weeks
Click here for more details about the IR service from Precision Camera, but please return to DSI to complete your conversion order.

Potter Photography - B&W Infrared Conversion

Judith Potter (Potter Photography) of RI has just converted her Canon 20D through DSI and has produced some great new IR images. You can check these out in a new video of her images here.

Check out the new IR Conversion Service from DSI through Precision Camera.

David H Wells - Article on Outsourcing

David H. Well, one of our clients from Rhode Island, has just written a great article on the importance of outsourcing his photographic printing and why he has chosen to use DSI as his preferred lab for B&W digital printing.

Here is an excerpt from his blog:

"As photographers, outputting our images as final prints, is one area where many photographers think they should invest a lot of time and energy. I am NOT one of them. I know how much per hour I can make if I teach a class, do an assignment or work on my stock photography business. All of those activities pay me much better than spending months, even years, learning how to make first rate prints from my digital files. So, I for one outsource my color printing to: http://www.adoramapix.com. Similarly, I outsource my black and white printing to: http://www.digitalsilverimaging.com/index.php I am now able to get first rate prints for very reasonable costs. The one thing that I invest energy in when it comes to printing my images is the calibrating of my monitor and the profiling of my images to match the profiles of the photo labs that I use. Printing your own work can give you pleasure so that is something to put into the calculation but for me, printing images is work, work that someone else can do better and more efficiently."

You can read the rest of David H Wells' Blog here.