MelenCourses

Black and White photography Course

2012-01-25T18:20:00.002Z

http://www.melencourses.co.uk/courses/dslr-photography-course-three-black-a-white.html

http://www.thegmcgroup.com/pc/viewCategories.asp?idCategory=698

New Olympus Pen Mini

2012-01-25T18:18:00.000Z

http://special.olympus.eu/pen/en_GB/olympus-pen-ep3-camera-SLR-digital.htm

http://special.olympus.eu/pen/en_GB/olympus-pen-epl3-camera-SLR-digital.htm

http://special.olympus.eu/pen/en_GB/olympus-pen-epm1-camera-SLR-digital.htm

500D FOR SALE

2012-01-23T18:21:00.003Z

My Canon 500D for sale £325 ono

click link for details

David Noton, Chasing the Light, Roadshow, Hemel Photographic Society 2012

2012-01-09T19:22:00.004Z

David Noton the famous landscape photographer is coming to Hemel next year, if you are interested contact the Hemel Hempstead Photographic Society.

http://www.davidnoton.com/roadshow.htm

http://www.davidnoton.com/roadshowenq.htm

Hemel Hempstead Camera Club

Monday 19th March 2012

Please contact the Club directly for Tickets...

01442 228098

Old Town Hall, High Street, Hemel Hempstead

Hertfordshire HP1 3AE

Novoflex adapters for GF1 and other cameras

2011-12-10T22:35:00.001Z

Novoflex a German company makes adapters for fitting other camera manufacturers lenses on your body.

Leica to GF1, or Nikon to Canon for example

http://gf1group.blogspot.com/2011/12/adapters-for-microfourthirds-cameras.html

Danger Nose

2011-12-08T12:59:00.001Z

GF1 and Mirrorless Camera Group

2011-12-04T15:39:00.001Z

New photography group just started up for smaller mirrorless changeable lens cameras. If you have a camera and want to join us please let us know.

We will be going on 'Day's Out' and posting photographs for discuss on this blog.

http://gf1group.blogspot.com/2011/12/hello-and-welcome-to-group.html

Night Time on Dunstable Downs

2011-11-30T19:15:00.001Z

http://cultofyellow.blogspot.com/2011/11/night-time-photography-on-dunstable.html

MelenStudios Christmas BBQ 18th December 1200-1600

2011-11-29T11:54:00.001Z

Alistair Peck and Jay Mclaughlin

If you would like to come to the Christmas BBQ on the 18th of December please sign in and follow the blog and let me know. Feel free to email but also look the right hand side and click I'm going.

You only need to bring some thing to eat, drink and a smile. Also some warm clothes might be useful as on occasion some people's fingers have gone blue.

The studio will be open and for those who get cold some where warm to step in side.

Last years BBQ was much warmer and enjoyed by everyone there.

http://melencourses.blogspot.com/2010/12/yellowmelen-christmas-bbq.html

http://melencourses.blogspot.com/2011/07/melenstudios-bbq-21st-august-2011-at.html

New Panasonic GX1

2011-11-28T16:47:00.001Z

Panasonic have released a new micro four thirds camera the GX1. This camera is an improvement on my favourite little camera the GF1. I had felt the GF series had been cheapening itself with touch screen and then the removal of the hotshoe on the GF3, but the with the arrival of the GX1 that makes sense - a two teired lined up.

On first glance the GX1 doesn't look as pretty as the GF1 but that is just an aesthetic quality - if it was YELLOW i might change my mind. The build quality looks to be as good as the GF1 so i might see if i can get my hands on one and test it.

http://www.panasonic.co.uk/html/en_GB/Products/LUMIX+Digital+Cameras/Overview/The+New+Lumix+GX1+Compact+System+Camera/8314557/index.html

http://www.panasonic.co.uk/html/en_GB/Products/LUMIX+Digital+Cameras/LUMIX+G+Compact+System+Cameras/DMC-GX1/Overview/8318238/index.html

They have also introduced new lenses LUMIX G X H-PS14042 lens and the LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 45-175mm. The LUMIX G X 14-42mm is a pancake zoom lens, which is superb.

Videos
Lenses
http://www.panasonic.co.uk/html/en_GB/News/Latest+News/Two+new+high+performance+lenses+for+Lumix+G+cameras/8015136/index.html#anker_8015138

http://www.panasonic.co.uk/html/en_GB/Products/Digital+Camera/Lumix+G+Lenses/H-PS14042E/Overview/8022468/index.html

Comparing the GX1 and the GF1
GX1 is 16mp, 9 fps, ISO range 160 -12800
GF1 is 12mp, 7 fps, ISO range 100 - 3200

Difference between iPhone 4G and iPhone 4Gs

2011-11-28T00:04:00.001Z

Lovely Hemel Hempstead at Christmas time shows both to be slightly noisy but the iPhone 4G is much noisier and lacking detail.

Below are both at 100% and also at their relative sizes, the iPhone 4Gs naturally exceeds the 4G and i wonder with lots of light how large it could be printed to an acceptable level. I was surprised by my Cow in a field how well that looked at on a 12"x12" print.

iPhone 4Gs

iPhone 4G

iPhone 4G iPhone 4Gs

30% Ilford BW prints

2011-11-27T22:52:00.001Z

SPECIAL OFFER - 30% off 10inch Prints

(Sizes 8x10", 10x10", 10x12", 10x15" Only - Offer ends 31st December 2011)

http://www.ilfordlab.com/page/61/Black-and-White-Prints-From-Digital.htm

B&W LIGHTJET PRINTS up to 50in x 50in

http://www.ilfordlab.com/page/86/NEW-B-W-PRINTING-SERVICES.htm

Ilford's prints have a consistent and neutral image tone (no colour cast).

Strong blacks and detailed highlights.

Bright white base for stunning black and white photographs.

Superb quality and robustness.

Excellent batch-to-batch and print-to-print consistency.

No printing colour profiles required.

Ilford produce fantastic black and white prints and i use them all the time for my BWs. The tones replicate brilliantly and evenly and the there is absolutely no colour cast as often found with colour prints of monochromes. They print from digital files or film.

Size (in)	Size (Pixels)	1 to 4	5 to 14	15 to 24	25 to 50	51 +
4" x 6"	1200 x 1800	£1.29	£1.09	£0.90	£0.70	£0.45
5" x 7"	1500 x 2100	£1.87	£1.60	£1.31	£1.03	£0.66
5" x 15"	1500 x 4500	£3.99	£3.40	£2.81	£2.20	£1.8
6" x 6"	1800 x 1800	£1.91	£1.63	£1.34	£1.06	£0.86
6" x 8"	1800 x 2400	£2.55	£2.17	£1.78	£1.41	£1.16
6" x 9"	1800 x 2700	£2.88	£2.44	£2.01	£1.58	£1.3
8" x 8"	2400 x 2400	£3.41	£2.89	£2.39	£1.87	£1.54
8" x 10"	2400 x 3000	£2.98	£2.53	£2.08	£1.63	£1.35
8" x 12"	2400 x 3600	£5.12	£4.35	£3.59	£2.82	£2.3
10" x 10"	3000 x 3000	£3.72	£3.17	£2.61	£2.05	£1.68
10" x 12"	3000 x 3600	£4.48	£3.80	£3.13	£2.46	£2.01
10" x 15"	3000 x 4500	£5.59	£4.75	£3.92	£3.08	£2.52
10" x 30"	3000 x 9000	£19.16	£16.29	£13.42	£10.55	£8.62
12" x 12"	3600 x 3600	£9.22	£7.83	£6.46	£5.07	£4.15
12" x 16"	3600 x 4800	£12.27	£10.43	£8.59	£6.74	£5.52
12" x 18"	3600 x 5400	£13.81	£11.74	£9.67	£7.59	£6.22
16" x 16"	4800 x 4800	£16.32	£13.87	£11.43	£8.98	£7.35
16" x 20"	4800 x 6000	£20.43	£17.36	£14.30	£11.23	£9.2
16" x 24"	4800 x 7200	£24.52	£20.85	£17.17	£13.49	£11.04
20" x 20"	6000 x 6000	£25.55	£21.73	£17.89	£14.06	£11.51
20" x 24"	6000 x 7200	£30.68	£26.08	£21.48	£16.87	£13.82
20" x 30"	6000 x 9000	£38.32	£32.58	£26.83	£21.09	£17.25
24" x 24"	7200 x 7200	£36.84	£31.32	£25.80	£20.26	£16.59
24" x 36"	7200 x 10800	£55.20	£46.93	£38.64	£30.36	£24.85
30" x 30"	9000 x 9000	£57.49	£48.86	£40.25	£31.63	£25.87
30" x 40"	9000 x 12000	£76.65	£65.15	£53.66	£42.16	£34.5
30" x 50"	9000 x 15000	£95.81	£81.44	£67.07	£52.70	£43.12
36" x 48"	10800 x 14400	£110.31	£93.76	£77.22	£60.68	£49.64
40" x 50"	12000 x 15000	£127.74	£108.58	£89.43	£70.27	£57.49

Adobe Cloud and Photoshop CS6 upgrade from CS5 only!

2011-11-24T12:04:00.001Z

Adobe are announcing that they are introduction a Cloud system for software, where by you can lease it monthly. This also means that to upgrade to Photoshop CS6 you need to be on CS5 or CS5.5. They are offering a 20% discount on CS5.5 for this month only, if you do not have it you will need to pay nearly the full cost for CS6.

The new system will offer more flexibility and enable you to use more software and a lower price based on your monthly hire cost.

Read further information on the links below

http://blogs.adobe.com/ukchannelnews/2011/11/11/creative-cloud-more-choices-for-customers/#comments

This is an interesting read below on the petapixel link with some very good arguments. Essentially if you upgrade or buy something new you have to pay for it. Just because software is not a physical product it doesn't mean there is no value placed on it. The DVD box might only cost £3 to produce but the research and 9000 employees need paying for their time.

You would charge clients for your time and you certainly wouldn't give out an image on CD or via email for free. You had to buy your camera, software, training, studio, computer and spend a few hours converting your RAW file.

This is just a change not bad, not good but a change. For some people this flexible approach will really suit them and you have always have a choice to purchase different software.

http://www.petapixel.com/2011/11/16/adobe-will-only-offer-photoshop-cs6-upgrade-price-to-cs5-owners/

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/search/index.cfm?loc=en_gb&term=cs6&refsite=OLS-UK

"We are excited to announce that membership to the Adobe Creative Cloud will be available in the first half of 2012 at a price of $49.99 per month for individuals and $69.99 per month per seat for workgroups, both for an annual plan.

Our move to this membership model allows us to keep our customers up to date with the latest Adobe innovations in our tools and related services. Creative Cloud will provide maximum flexibility, offer lower cost of entry, and add cutting-edge innovation on an on-going basis to keep our customers ahead of the changing technology and device landscape.

For customers who prefer to remain on the current licensing model, we will continue to offer our individual point products and Adobe Creative Suite editions as perpetual licenses. With regards to upgrades, we are changing our policy for perpetual license customers. In order to qualify for upgrade pricing when CS6 releases, customers will need to be on the latest version of our software (either CS5 or CS5.5 editions). If our customers are not yet on those versions, we’re offering a 20% discount through December 31, 2011 which will qualify them for upgrade pricing when we release CS6."

http://blogs.adobe.com/ukchannelnews/2011/11/11/creative-cloud-more-choices-for-customers/#comments

Digital SLR Photography in easy steps - Book

2011-11-08T17:18:00.004Z

Affordable Digital-SLR cameras have transformed the world of digital photography. Not only have they given credibility to digital photography in the professional world but, more importantly, they have released a world of photographic possibilities for anyone looking to get the most out of their digital camera.

Digital SLR Photography in Easy Steps begins by demystifying digital cameras and explaining their functions and capabilities. It also shows how to create a robust workflow for downloading, cataloguing and editing images taken with a digital SLR camera.

http://www.ineasysteps.com/books/details/?9781840783780

'In Easy Steps' Photoshop books from Waterstone's

2011-11-02T23:58:00.001Z

These book are really easy to read and to follow. The Photoshop Elements was excellent and i see no reason why these photoshop books won't be as well.

Only £11 and free delivery from Waterstone's, they have to be worth it. We will be buying some for the studio.

There are many other titles from Adobe Photoshop CS 2 to CS 5, Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Indesign.

http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/advancedSearch.do?buttonClicked=1&author=Robert%20Shufflebotham

The 'In Easy Steps' series covers a wide gamut of subjects from photography to business

http://www.ineasysteps.com/books/

Wireless Flash Kit using Speedlites

2011-10-24T19:33:00.000+01:00

It is worth looking at reliable softbox and wireless trigger when using your speedlites as portable studio kits.

A Canon 580ex II or a Nikon SB900 are ideal for this, two or three if you can afford it or borrow some as they weakend considerably on Hi Speed Sync or Auto FP. Using flash with bright sun light and trying to darken down skies when photographing with the settings 100 ISO, 1/4000th of a second at ƒ2.8 is difficult. Having several will help.

A Lastolite Ezybox softbox 60x60cm as a kit gives you a stand and bag aswell.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lastolite-Ezybox-Hotshoe-Kit-60cm/dp/B0017LNQJ8/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1319480045&sr=8-3

You will need PocketWizard Flex TT5 and TT1 will allow you using the speedlites wirelessly at 1/4000th of a second if you wish.

Lots of batteries - at least twice what you think you would need.

Canon Pro Solutions Show 25th & 26th October 2011

2011-10-19T10:01:00.000+01:00

Canon Pro Solutions show on 25th and 26th October 2011 at the Business Design Centre in Islington, London. Aimed at video, broadcast and still imaging professionals, visitors will experience Canon’s complete workflow solution from image capture to output.

http://www.canon.co.uk/About_Us/Press_Centre/Press_Releases/Consumer_News/News/Canon_Pro_Solutions_Show_2011.aspx

They may release new kit with any luck and these speakers are attending below

Canon Ambassadors Jeff Ascough and Jonathan & Angela Scott, Magnum Photographer Martin Parr, Digital Cinematographer Philip Bloom, Landscape Photographer David Noton, Wildlife Photographer and Filmmaker Charlie Hamilton James and Landscape Photographer Charlie Waite.

Corel PaintShop Pro X4 - new improved version

2011-09-30T18:10:00.000+01:00

The new PaintShop Pro X4 have a wealth of features to rival photoshop and only £59!

Discover the photo-editing software that gives passionate photographers more to love! This release extends the legendary photo-editing power of PaintShop Pro with 75 new and enhanced features based on the needs of real photographers like you. Create your best images yet with exciting new pro-level effects. Explore new tools that help you tap into the latest photography trends like HDR and tilt shift. Enjoy a streamlined workspace and dramatically faster tools that let you see results as you work. When you’re ready to show off your best photos, sharing online is just a click away.

http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/gb/en/Product/1184951547051#versionTabview=tab0&tabview=tab1

Nikon 1 V1 - interchangeable lens camera

2011-09-23T13:51:00.002+01:00

Nikon have just bought out a smaller rangefinder style compact camera to compete with the Panasonic G series, Olympus' Pen series, those of Sony's NEX, Samsung NX, Fuji and Pentax's Q. The Panasonic GF1 is still my favourite camera.

It will be really interesting to see how this Nikon performs at 10mp it is the right resolution for the camera's sensor size and big enough to print (how big do you really want to print?). The sensor size is smaller than the GF3 so i would love to know how this relates to image quality and noise with higher ISO's - my GF1 is a little grainy at 800 ISO but i quite like it. This smaller sensor size, is nearly half the area of Panasonic GF3, will affect the focal length a 2.7 multiplication factor on full frame and Nikon offer a 10-30mm lens.

Sensor size graph comparison

Panasonic GF3

17.3 x 13.0 mm

Nikon 1 V1 and Nikon 1 J1

13.2 x 8.8mm

http://www.europe-nikon.com/en_GB/product/digital-cameras/nikon-1/nikon-1-v1

http://www.europe-nikon.com/en_GB/product/digital-cameras/nikon-1/nikon-1-j1

Interchangeable lens cameras on Warehouse Express

http://www.warehouseexpress.com/interchangeable-lens-cameras/b3189

http://www.pcworld.com/article/240419/hands_on_with_the_nikon_1_j1.html

Are Canon next and will it be an APS sized sensor and replace the G series cameras?

SWPM - Jorgensen in Hemel Hempstead TODAY

2011-09-21T20:48:00.001+01:00

I went along to the SWPM Exhibition showing Jorgensen albums at the Holiday In at Hemel Hempstead today where i met Chris Woods from South West Photo Mounts (SWPM).

There were some very nice CD Folios, some with magnetic strips about the size of small book and one with 10 pages to put your own photos in. Both excellent quality and value. Also being displayed was a very nice black album with many different types of matts and layouts, 30 sides all printed and assembled for only £250 - an amazing price considering what you get and what your clients will receive.

SWPM are an excellent British company with really good customer service and a superb attitude so please do give them a call .

01803 668380

info@swpm.net

http://swpm.net/

Google Plus

2011-09-21T19:32:00.000+01:00

Google Plus has gone live today have you joined, are you joining?

Google has just unveiled Google+, its ambitious answer to Facebook. It turns all of Google into one giant social network, thanks to a core group of social products and a new navigation bar that integrates sharing into every single Google product.
http://mashable.com/2011/06/28/google-plus-review/

At the end of the day, Google+ is a solid product on its own. But it's not rich or new enough to get people to make the switch.

And there's nothing keeping Facebook from making changes on the features that Google+ does better. It already has a 700 million user head start.

http://www.businessinsider.com/google-plus-review-2011-6#ixzz1YcC08eIA
http://www.businessinsider.com/google-plus-review-2011-6

New Photo Day Out - Brighton

2011-09-21T10:16:00.000+01:00

On Tuesday 18th October a day out to Brighton.

If you are interested please follow this link and sign up to join us for an Autumn Seaside Photography Day Out.

The themes of the day will be Dada and Surrealism.

We are fully booked for this MelenCourses Day Out, please look out for our next Day Out you will need to join the site before you can sign up.

Brighton Photography Day Out

Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 out today!

2011-09-20T14:04:00.002+01:00

http://www.adobe.com/uk/products/photoshop-elements.html

Adobe Photoshop Elements is now 10 years old and is fantastic value for money and there are most of things you need from Photoshop to edits your photos in this software for only £80.

New Features

http://www.adobe.com/uk/products/photoshop-elements/features.html

Photographers Photographs from the Wedding Course

2011-09-20T12:00:00.002+01:00

Just some of the photographs taken on our Wedding Course at Ashridge House, Berkhamsted, by the photographers.

Richard Hurst, - www.richardhurstphotography.co.uk

TO SEE MORE PHOTOS CLICK HERE

MelenCourses Wedding Course August 2011

2011-09-19T19:24:00.003+01:00

Ashridge is such a fantastic venue for photography let alone wedding photography. Using the beautifully ornate Lady Marion Alford Room (LMA) as a our base were able to use the many varied locations around this 19th Century building. These are some of the photographs Alistair Peck took from the day. Click below to view more and to more of Alistair's work and the next wedding course in 2012.

The models we used were Cat Wilyman and Mike Risbridger, and there was a archeological excavation on the lawn looking at 15th Century walls!

The next Wedding Course at Ashridge

http://melencourses.co.uk/courses/wedding-photography.html

Alistair Peck

http://www.humaneyestudio.com/hes/Home.html

http://eyefortheordinary.blogspot.com/

CLICK TO SEE MORE PICTURES