AlanKlein

55 minutes ago, PapaTango said:

You may also wish to investigate "Errors & Omissions" (aka professional liability) insurance if doing regular commercial client work.  This protects you and your business from claims if a client sues for negligent acts, errors or omissions committed during business activities that result in a financial loss.

For many years I kept this along with traditional Liability insurance (accidents, damage, etcetera).  The average coverage for this is around $1M, but a smaller amount such as $250-500K serves a small operator well, and is a very reasonable cost for the protection it provides in this overly litigious society we inhabit.  

Errors and omissions is more for architects and consulting engineers when they design something wrong. 

2 hours ago, Ricochetrider said:

Any freelance operator should have a liability policy in place to cover property damages on the job- as well as possible comprehensive coverage for their own gear. I’d advise she contact her insurance agent and ask that person about policy rider coverage for accidental death & injury- and/or ask for such coverage from the “major video company” as a one-off condition of employment under the job contract. 

Another good question to ask the employing “major” company is: who owns and operates the ultralight aircraft? Could be there’s a third player and I’d make sure their insurance is up to par. 

Additionally, in such a situation as described, I’d be thinking about PPE (personal protective equipment) such as a harness and lanyard or other fall protection- among other possible equipment. That’s a typical early question on any OTJ accident situation: “was PPE in place?” 

Best general policy, always: 

CYA 

She needs personal liability for herself as well in case someone gets hurt and sues her as a result of her actions.  I can't imagine the major studio hiring her doesn't have requirements to work for them as an independent contractor, just to protect themselves.  I'd check with them.   Usually personal liabilityt and property damage comes with Workmen;s Compensation insurance as well if she;s set up as a business. 

As an old guy who shot chromes slides, there wasn't any cropping or editing back then.  The slides came back from the developer mounted and ready for projection.  Even negative film came back already printed on 4x6 prints with no editing.  The only time I edited was when I was englarging for let's say a 5x7 or 8x10 so cropping was done.  But that's it.  Of course, today, with digital and scans, I do edit more.  But frankly, I don't knw if my pictures are any better especially considering the time I spend on them compared to yesterday.

Slides imposed a discipline to try to get it right in the camera.  I tend to shoot today the same way.

T Bird.

Nice shot.  Very interesting,  Not something we see around here in New Jersey.  The black like outside border is OK but I find the colored inside border distracting. 

1. From a pratical standpoint, could people really tell the difference between AdobeRGB and sRGB looking at one or the other but not both next to each other?

2. If you intend to post on the web, is it better to start with sRGB in the camera, or doesn't it matter?

9 hours ago, William Michael said:

Even on websites where Right Click and then [Save Image] is disallowed, once an image is published on the web, it is able to be downloaded if the desire to do so is present: note, even if the image has been 'deleted' it can be found.

Understood that locks on doors inhibit naughty (opportunistic) events happening and it would be nice in a perfect platform to have lots of user options, however my view is, publishing low res images suffices do do away with big-time theft of one's work.

As we don't have a perfect platform (but have made recent big advancements) I reckon time spent looking at the big picture item fixes is better spent than making a user option to have download image "on" or "off" - I do think most people understand (or should understand) that once they publish ANYTHING on the www, it can be found and subsequently downloaded.

WW     

What would be considered a good low res file?

On 2/15/2023 at 6:25 PM, httpwww.photo.netbarry said:

Defense attorney did a good job then. Maybe they were a photographer. Prosecutor could have put up a digital photography expert, but then again it would throw a bad light on the poor video copy. Disturbing that a prosecutor would do that to get a conviction.  Should be reported to the state bar if it turned out it was done at the attorney's direction. It might have been done by the cops.  Civil trials are a bit different then criminal trials though and as I said I've never seen the authenticity of  photo challenged at trial in 35 years doing this.  That doesn't mean it's never happened anywhere before.

I've been involved in civil cases as a defendant and witness and many attorneys play games with evidence.  They either are not providing it or just providing selective evidence that supports their side, even though it's all been subpoenaed. 

When I worked in construction management, I used to use a Polaroid instant film camera shooting progress photos, hidden construction areas, etc to keep for later problems that may come up.  We often needed it to get Archtitects and inspection agencies to sign off work that may have missed inspection when the work was done.  Digital cameras were a lot better than Polaroids and I also had the pictures date stamped when shot.  Now that I think of it, I believe I got my first digital camera from my employer. 

On 2/8/2023 at 7:51 AM, Normanski said:

It’s a helluva job being a spammer, ain’t it?

I don't understand why they are doing it.  What's the point?  Could someone explain?

Take your pick.

Kodak had most of the earliest patents on digital sensors and photography.  But their heart wasn't in it. 

There are other topics on how manipulation is occurring with more frequency.  But I'd like to examine how people feel it effects their own photography.  Is anyone seeing that AI for example, creating photos without leaving your armchair, is undermining the desire to do photography with a camera?  If someone can get landscape "photos" that are better from their armchair than you could ever get waking up before sunrise, what would you do?  Switch to street photography, portraiture, or quit?  Or buy an armchair?

How is technology effecting your desire to do this hobby?  What changes do you see making?

11 minutes ago, samstevens said:

Important to remember that these days, viewers should be aware of the potential for propaganda photos to be manipulated. We should be used to it by now. Back in the day, people trusted photos more so propaganda could pass and did pass easily. Just ask Stalin and Goebbels.  

It's not only photojournalism but also portrait, landscape, and other "regular" photography.  You know something is not normal when the viewer asks, "Did you Photoshop it?"  Now the question will  become, "Is it a photo or AI?"

12 hours ago, httpwww.photo.netbarry said:

Sorry Dustin didn't see that post. I was thinking it was" find the pope in the pizza" from SNL. same difference.  I wonder when the Warhol case will be decided. Just to carry on with Warhol, people have said in today's environment whomever owns Campbells would have sued Wharf; for trademark infringement, but at the time, the head of the company wrote Warhol a letter saying he was an admirer of his art and wished he could afford to buy one of the soup can works but since Warhol apparently had expressed a liking of Campbell's Tomato soup, he sent him 2 cases. 

As far as the discussion about using photos in court I actually do have some experience. as a litigation paralegal.  I can't recall ever having a photo challenged in court as to its accuracy as long as the proper witness is used to introduce the evidence.  For instance accident scene photos taken by a police officer are generally admitted if the officer that was at the scene can testify that is how they recall it, especially if they took the photo whether film or digital, though the pictures are often challenged on other grounds such as relevancy..  I always thought digital photographs could be tricky because parties don't produce raw files and often don't know what they are.  Also with any photograph the focal length of the lens can affect the appearance of objects, giving different impressions of distance etc. When ever I went out with an expert and they were taking photos if size and distance were important I would ask them use a "normal" lens

 

The recent case where a defendant killed two or three people to defend himself at riots in the street who he claimed attacked him had two issues with photos during the trial. 

First, the defendant claimed one of those he shot tried to grab his legal rifle from him.  The video wasn't clear.  Then it came out that the prosecutors submitted at trial a version with less resolution.  When the judge ordered the prosecutor to produce the original video, it clearly showed the defendant was right. The person he shot did in fact grab his rifle.  The judge was so perturbed, he nearly threw the case out right there due to prosecutor malfeasance, but let it go on.  In the end, the defendant was found innocent of all the shootings because he was acting in self defense.  Frankly, had he not been, I think the judge would have declared a mistrial after the jury spoke.

Another situation came up at the same trial when the prosecutor mentioned they sharpened another video or photo.  The judge asked them to explain the procedure. They couldn't do this to his satisfaction.  They way it came off to him is that the photo could have been manipulated although we photographers know what normal sharpening does and is not the same as cloning.  The judge was not convinced and would not allow the photo in as evidence. 

On 2/14/2023 at 12:16 PM, samstevens said:

Yes, all true. But also a non sequitur. I wasn’t questioning the greater ease and greater mass access for digital photos to be manipulated. I was saying that an unretouched digital photo (for example providing the raw original) would be as reliable in court as an unretouched film photo.

Sam, I was responding to the part of your post that said: "Propaganda and alterations of photos for nefarious reasons were alive and well during the film only days."  The only point I was making is that most regular photographers were not doing what many regular photographers do today because computer software has made it easy. 

On 11/20/2022 at 10:37 AM, samstevens said:

Of course, you can say the same thing about a digital photograph. “So long as it’s not retouched, it’s definitive.” The key isn’t film or digital. It’s whether we can perceive or prove any retouching. Propaganda and alterations of photos for nefarious reasons were alive and well during the film only days.

https://www.history.com/news/josef-stalin-great-purge-photo-retouching

As an old timer amateur, no one back then except experts and artists finagled their photos.  They sent them out to a 1 hour developer and got back 4x6" prints or slides of what they shot.  Digital and computers have made alterations easy to do.  So altered pictures today are at a different level in complexity and frequency.  

On 11/20/2022 at 9:18 AM, jnancz said:

as soon as someone makes a latent image it's been altered and manipulated

Unless someone is God, there's not way to duplicate what happens in the real world.  So photography is limited.  It's why we say a portrait picture shows a "likeness" of the person photographed.  It can't actually be that person.  So manipulating to get an image is different than changing it so it is unrecognizable from the original scene and present a false duplicate to fool people.  

On 11/19/2022 at 3:44 PM, Ricochetrider said:

A good friend of mine is a photographer for a former newspaper that’s now an online (local) news service. He’s not allowed to alter, edit, enhance or post process in any way. At least one photographer who worked with him has been fired over this hard, fast rule! 
 

@samstevens excellent point about labels. Thanks! 

Some newspapers allow adjustments such as to correct lighting and contrast, but that's it.  Newspaper are dealing with trust, supposedly.  They often lie in their text but want honest photos.  Very strange.  

Thanks for the detailed explanation.  What does the third option Edit Original do? 

2 hours ago, paddler4 said:

I think what may be the issue here is that in some cases, Lightroom will give you the option of sending the new file to an external editor with or without Lightroom's edits. 

This is a key issue if you decide to go back to Photoshop a second time--not a great habit, but sometimes necessary. In that case, if you want photoshop to open the PSD or TIF with layers, you have to tell LR to open it without (subsequent) LR edits.

I no longer have Silver Efex to check since I replaced my computer recently.  But I just tried it going from LR to PS Elements for additional edits which should give the same options.  What you mentioned is one issue. The checked selection.  But notice the third selection.  I never tried it but it seems to edit the original file.  Can anyone explain what it does.  This is Lightroom license purchased Version 6.1.4  (Classic?)

4 hours ago, httpwww.photo.netbarry said:

You are correct that as long as you work from a copy of the original file you effectively don't have to worry about altering your file in PS.  But whenever you flatten the image or make any edit and save the file it is altered. Going back in history does work, but once you close the file the history is gone and the file is altered and subsequently altered  with any operation you may do. You can then use the copy you've made if you want to start over, but then you will need to make yet another copy of the original and so on.  In parametric editors the underlying file isn't altered. You can go back to any image in LR, and I think Capture 1 at any time and re-adjust, or remove all your edits without altering the underlying image.  So in PS if you set levels and contrast alone you are destroying pixels in the image once you save it. Every time you work on the image, you are removing information from it once you save it.  That doesn't mean PS is inferior, but it will alter your underlying image.  I have the bundle and use both programs as some things I find easier to use in PS and can pass the file between both programs especially especially re-touching and sharpening which is the latter stages of my process.

I think the parametric editor puts a layer of instructions that interpret the image in the viewer, but doesn't alter the under lying image where programs like PS actually alter the underlying file. It is a major difference.

One caveat with Lightroom.  If you switch to another editing program from within Lightroom such as Silver Efex for BW edits, I believe one of the suggestions is to apply the Efex edits to the original file when switching back to LR.  So you want to be sure to select the option that creates a new photo file after you apply the Efex edits. 

On 2/5/2023 at 5:41 AM, rodeo_joe1 said:

Prompted by another thread, I was recently looking at the spectral sensitivity curves of some B&W films. This one seems pretty typical:

So if the aim is to emulate the look of film, then I'm wondering if the PhotoShop 'auto' conversion option puts that kind of spectral bias onto a colour original? With a dip in the green response and a boost to the blues and orange-reds.

Because I seem to remember reading previously somewhere, that the aim was to emulate the apparent colour luminosity response of the human eye, which is totally different. 

Just curious really, since I generally simply 'play' with the colour sliders until the preview looks right.

And all totally irrelevant if the aim is to emulate a yellow, orange or red lens filter of course. 

However, there are some features, like highlight and shadow preservation sliders, that are only available during RAW processing. Those are extremely useful in some cases and would need to be used before B&W conversion. 

WRT to non-destructive editing - surely it's all 'non destructive' as long as you don't overwrite the original raw or camera JPEG file? And philosophically; isn't all editing essentially destructive? I.e. getting rid of the unwanted. 

(Re: The above film spectral curve - it might be more useful if translated from a logarithmic to a linear form... or then again maybe not.)

Exactly what I do.  Trying to guess what the eye might like beforehand doesn't work for me.  Better to adjust to my eye until it looks good and figure it will work with most other people as well.  

She's a cutie.   As mentioned by others, the eyes are not sharp because of too slow shutter speed with the iPhone.  When you get a dedicatd camera, you'll be able to deal with that better.  One recommendation.  Get a camera that has an articulating screen on the back so you can stand while aiming at you baby low down, looking down into the screen.  It'll make it easier on your back.  

I opened on of those posts and noticed the poster had 50 or 60 posts.  How did they do that? It will bypass the "new" posted blocking procedure/ No?

What's phishing again?