Tomorrow, I’ll be posting some of the best and most successful Twitter and Facebook contests I have seen. We are going to be having the good people at @Peachpit run a few contest to give away copies of the book after release! I’d like you guys and gals to pick your favorites. So please, if you have more suggestions, let me know. I’ve got a great list already, so let’s keep ‘em comin! Note that I don’t want to do just boring, obvious contests. I’d like them to be fun, different, and engaging. Know what I mean? So, if you’ve seen some that are successful, please pass them along!

Today’s Photo

I think I could stay in Kyoto for a few years and go out taking photos every day and night! What a picturesque place… I feel like someone designed it a thousand years ago just for HDR! Now, I think this is a pretty darned good example of HDR. When you are there, you do see all these colors and light levels. Absolutely! Thank goodness for the sweet lady HDR and all her little tricks.

Today, I am announcing that a percentage of all book profits for “A World in HDR” will go to Kiva. I have written a little bit about Kiva on the Charity page here on the site. Also, I made this little video to tell you what the heck Kiva is. If you haven’t heard of it before, it’s probably not what you expect!

To get started, come join Team Stuck In Customs on Kiva and let me know your experiences! You can either put it here or on the Charity page.

I’d like to thank Sloane, who runs the Causemopolotan.com blog, who I met through Michelle Greer, who runs MichellesBlog.net (that links to a recent article she wrote after getting some notions from my reading list! – cool!)

Live Interview Today, Nov 9, on TWIP (This Week in Photography)

Watch LIVE HERE!

At 11 AM PST (1 PM CST), tune in live to the video at Leo Laporte’s TWIT cottage here on live.twit.tv. I won’t be talking about HDR today… I think that is being saved for a future interview when the book comes out. However, I will be talking about that video method I used to make the “Moments Between” video.

Come tune in Live and send Tweets along the way to @frederickvan! If you miss it, you’ll have to wait for it to be released on Wednesday! Don’t let that happen!

Today’s Photo

Our daily photo today comes from deep in the Andes. Getting to this position was not as long a hike as the others around Patagonia, but it was no cakewalk! It was one of those strange river-rock strewn areas where the rocks seemed to be the perfect size for spraining your ankles. I had the tripod extended to act like a walking stick, although it’s not the most handy walking stick with a giant Nikon on one end of it!

I’ll be live on This Week in Photography tomorrow (Monday) at 11 AM PST (1 PM CST). Frederick Van used his powers of persuasion and is getting me to reveal the whole method there on the show.

You can tune in and watch the live video on live.twit.tv. After this live show, it will be turned into the weekly podcast that will go out on Wednesday. I’ll link there too when it is ready, if I remember. (remind me, I’m getting old).

What? You don’t listen to TWIP? It’s a great weekly podcast. I recommend it! But, this time, be sure to watch it live, or else you’ll have to wait until Wednesday for the how-to!

Be sure to also follow Fred on twitter.com/frederickvan. Tweet him – he’s nice!

The First Video of The Moments Between

This got a great response – I was so surprised! Thanks for all the comments and name suggestions. People (and me) seemed to like the name “Stuck In Motion”.  It works good enough I think!

I really like how many people guessed, experimented, and tried to do it. I talk a lot about that in the book — how important experimentation is in the photographic process. I hope that those that experimented figured out some new things!

New Video – The Moments Between. Episode 2: The Kids

A great way to use this technique is to capture your family in a new way. Now, if you are like me, then you don’t get much of a kick out of seeing OPK (other people’s kids!), but, imagine this with your own family or those close to you. Let me talk a little here about the way memory works, at least, to me!

We live life a certain speed. We are only immediately, consciously aware of about 30 frames per second. However, our brain does not record and react at 30 frames per second. It can do a lot more than that.

Our brains record memories like tiny fantastic movie reels, networked together by feelings, associations, and experience. As a photographer, I always have to remind myself that the brain does not store memories like a computer stores JPGs. We DO NOT take millions of snapshots and file them away. Nor do we take hour-long TiVo recordings of the day and store them for later retrieval. The truth is somewhere in between — fleeting thoughts of moments that grabbed you and will never leave.

We do certainly sense the world at greater than 30 frames per second. You know by experience that you can pick up on the micro-emotions that appear on people’s faces when you talk to them in person. You lose a lot of that over TV or Webcams. Those means can suffice, but, given the choice, in person is always better. Case in point, I’d wager to say some of your deepest memories were experienced in person rather than on TV or over a webcam, which take an arbitrary 30 (or 24) slices of time.

Thanks again for all the interest in the HDR Workshop we announced a few days ago.  All sorts of people have come out of the woodwork with great ideas, bonus offerings, and the like.  It’s gonna be awesome.  The available slots go on sale on Friday morning (right after midnight CST.)  From the looks of the first responses for HDR seminar, I think we could get over 100 there!  But, I’m only opening 10-15 slots because I want there to be plenty of one-on-one time.

Woopra Review

I wrote a short Woopra Review and included a video.  What the heck is Woopra?  You should know if you have a blog or website! Cali Lewis from Geekbrief.TV told me about it – so a big thanks to her! (watch her show… she’s a member of the Stuck In Customs Community List!)

Today’s Photo

Okay, here is a great mystery. I know you guys like it when I post a photo and you have to guess where it is. Y’all are so dang smart that you figure it out in just a few hours. This one is harder. I’ll be very impressed if anyone can figure out this humid place. Look at those wonderful trees! Who can believe something so cool is here in Earth…

We got good news from Peachpit! You guys in many international locations can finally pre-order the book. Now, I’m afraid that you cannot get the one available here that is autographed and comes with the Limited Edition print. However, someday when I meet you in your country, I’ll be happy to sign it in person!

Today’s Photo

Today we have a fun one from Tokyo at dusk. What a cool place! I think I could climb up to the top of a different building every day at sunset and just shoot in every direction. None were bad! There is that perfect time just before the sun sets when all the lights are coming on… they sort of have that soft glow while they are getting warmed up.

I was lucky enough, thanks to a friend, get entry to run around the Crimson Lounge in Chicago on a Saturday before they opened. I think maybe some of you have seen the other Chicago photos of this location… there were so many interesting things to shoot with great angles. That reminds me — did you know that if you scroll down and look on the right, you can click there to see photos from various locations around the world?

Speaking of shooting cool stuff inside of an amazing place, we have a secret event coming up in Austin in the beginning of December. But shhh… don’t tell anyone… I’ll announce more as the time gets closer. It’s going to be quite a party. It may or may not have something to do with a major book launch from someone you may or may not know.

Second, I am glad so many of you are getting a kick out of my Five Twitter Lists! I KNOW you guys are finding some interesting people to follow on Twitter. As always, I’m open to suggestions, especially if you would like to join the Stuck In Customs Community List. Follow it, make a suggestion or recommendation (even recommend yourself – no prob!). I’ll take care of it.

Third, for today’s photo! What an amazing place. Now, knowing the crowd around here, you will be able to identify this secret spot in Tokyo. I really thank everyone out there for being so kind and introducing me to these great spots for photography. I feel quite lucky that when I travel, I have instant friends everywhere. I can’t believe it! Anyway, the gentleman who ushered me into this incredible lair was Alfie. Be sure to hit that link if you ever visit Tokyo and want to get some lessons WHILE seeing great places around the city.

Yes! It’s true. I have a new HDR Workshop page that you can visit for a few more details. This is gonna be awesome. It’s the first time I have ever offered anything like this…

It will be the first full weekend in January 2010 (9th and 10th) here in Austin (pics on link!) . I’m only going to have a few people at the workshop to keep the interaction quality high. Note that at the last photowalk, we had a 175 people show up that were local! But, this workshop will only have 10-15 people. Check back on Nov 13th to register and grab your spot!

Are you interested in this? If so, leave a comment below. I’ll gauge overall interest keep this in mind for the future. I’m very excited about it — I hope you are too.

Now, if you’re new to HDR, or are coming here from another photography site because of this announcement, I’ll post a few HDR photos below so you can get an idea of what the technique can achieve. I can’t promise you’ll make images like this — that depends on you! But, I’ll certainly show you all the tricks and tips in person that I have in the HDR Tutorial here on the site. It’ll be a great weekend, and I hope you can come!

Some Twitter Lists for You!

As you guys know, I’ve been using Twitter for the past 27 years or so. Over that time, I’ve built up a good list of people to follow. Now, I can share this list and more very easily with you. When you visit the links below, you can “Follow” the list. Or, you can also go through and follow the individuals. Any questions? Just ask below!

• Stuck In Customs Community – This is a list of everyone around here!  This is a great “channel” to listen into to hear everything that’s going on with all of us! If you ever need advice, have questions, or just want to share, be sure to follow the people inside and talk it up… that’s what Twitter is for! *Add yourself and make recommendations here! (yes it is totally cool to recommend yourself!)
• Art for the Right Brain – Here is a collection of artists, designers, illustrators, and the like that I find inspirational.  I didn’t really add any photographers to this list… *Make Recommendations here!
• Art Museums to Know – Did you know there are Museums on twitter too?  They talk about new exhibits,visiting artists, special events, and the like.   *Make Recommendations here!
• Funny Twitter Heads – A collection of very funny people on Twitter.  If you are easily offended… don’t look!  *Make Recommendations here!
• Wow – Nice Tweets! – A random assortment of people that I follow that send out all kinds of interesting Tweets on this and that.  *Make Recommendations here!

Do the good people on here a favor.  Follow the list, and then go through and follow some of the most interesting individuals inside.  Twitter is better once you build your own personalized list, and this will be a really good injection of inspiration into your world, I hope!

After you follow the lists and some people therein…

Then you can then easily switch to that “channel” in Twitter to see the latest. Also, very soon you’ll be able to add that List as a Column in Tweetdeck, a program I highly recommend. As soon as they enable this, I’ll come update this post!

And, of course, be sure to tell your friends the fun of lists, especially those new to Twitter.  If people start out by getting good links with nice art and funny comments, it makes it a much better experience from the beginning!

It’s a place where the most outrageous of the outrageous congregate. You’ve probably seen those Japanese people that like to dress up like anime characters and the like. Well that’s kind of the starting point. It goes onward from there, with everything from girls covered in pink frills to goth men wearing gas masks. In fact, in that little video I made, you can see a pair of legs/shoes in differing colors that I shot in Harajuku. This guy below was with a group of extreme rockers that were parading around the streets. They all seemed to love having their photo taken… which was cool. I could have gone to that place every day to take photos… I’ve got some other crazy ones in the hopper too for the future!

In other news, I am collecting a few ideas for Twitter or Facebook contests that you have seen in the past. The publisher (Peachpit) and I are poking around for some of the best and most successful ideas for book giveaways when it is released. Frankly, I don’t want any of those brash contests that are “My 10,000th Follower gets a Free Book!” or “Retweet this 20 times to win!” — none of that nonsense. I want something that is fun, engaging, and works! Any and all ideas are welcome! You can send them here or via Twitter.

Second, we are announcing the print that will be coming with the Premium package of my upcoming book about HDR. These will all be Limited Edition, Numbered series, and autographed prints. That is, after we stop taking pre-orders, we will stop the number and that will be that. It is a 9″x9″ print, and we have just gone through a selection process, where we had samples sent to us from different printing companies (you can see a bad iPhone shot of the selection process here). We’ve chosen the finest quality.  These will all be collector’s items, and normally we would sell these prints for over $100 each, so it’s quite a deal!

As you can tell from the pricing, I’m not in this to make a killing on the unit cost! I wanted to reward fans and friends with something special for being some of the early believers. I’m kind of a softie, frankly… and I have such a friendly relation with y’all – I feel strange charging you a lot of money!  I think this evolving artform is just fantastic, and I do all of this for the pure joy of it.  Anyway… enough blabbing…. here is the photo – “The Lonely Road to the Dinosaur Dig”. It was shot in northern Montana while I was on the way to dig up dinos with Jack Horner and a group of paleontologists.

It was quite a hike to get up here early in the morning, just as the sky was still in a dawn of deep blue. The two lakes on either side are those pure glacial blue lakes that you sometimes see from airplanes and wonder, “What’s it like to be down there?” I’ll tell ya – AWESOME! I went down there and drank from the lakes like a guanaco on holiday. It was incredible.

Now, a few days ago I started to “Connect the Community“. There are so many clever and interesting people in the community, and I thought you should meet on another! Anyway, it’s really taken off and people from the community are taking it in nice new directions – thanks!

It seems a great many of you are on Twitter, and many of us have created a “Stuck In Customs” group in Tweetdeck or Lists in Twitter. This enables me to sit there and watch/engage in a real-time stream of community activity. It’s cool! I updated that post with a 4-step guide on the creation of this real-time community. It’s very loosey-goosey… as any fun community is! Come in, engage, stay a while… drift off… create… come back and share… drift off… comon back… it’s good and natural!

(and our experiment with a Real-Time Community continues…)

Also, I got a note from Patrick at onOne software. Their new Plugin Suite 5 is avail! Cool! I use their plugins a lot with my photos. Although I haven’t done a full review, I did review Genuine Fractals, which is part of their suite. I understand that the “STUCKINCUSTOMS” code will save you 20% on all their products. Whenever I have time to write the full review, I will!

We have a special guest blogger today. Subscribers to the Free Newsletter got a sneak peek of this thing last week! Now I will bring it to everyone.

Kook Ewo. What a name! How can you not be cool with a name like that?

As you guys know, I get inspiration from a great many places and things outside of traditional photography. Kook is an amazing motion graphics visual artist. You have probably seen several Hollywood blockbuster movies that feature his title sequences. You’ll recognize some from his links below. Just like fellow Frenchman, Fabien Barral, who designed the website, I’ve had Kook Ewo design the title sequence for videos. You’ll notice his fine work in the first few seconds of this PR Demo Reel video.

Below is Kook’s Guest Post (I’ve left in many of his own words because it sounds French, foreign, and interesting!):

1) Where can everyone see your demo reel?

The best way is to have a look on my website ! http://thefrenchtitle.com

2) Tell us a little about you – what should people know?

My name is Kook Ewo. I’m 30 and living in Paris, France.

i’m a title sequence designer. That means my job is to work in direct relation with a film director to help him create the title sequence he wants (a kind of vfx supervisor but only for the title sequence). Sometimes i make the title sequence by myself (for ex solomon kane or silent hill) and sometimes i conceptualize it (write a text explaining what could happen, in accordance with the director, then make storyboards, previz etc), and then i have to find the good company or indie (never happenned yet but i’ll be happy to !) to make it : for ex, on “Splice” i asked the Chezeddy’s guys who did an excellent job. The company could be anywhere in the world and it can be a vendor that is already working on the movie, so that’s quite a simple approach.

3) Tell us about your philosophy about being an artist.

Well I would say.. “being an artist’ in our days is very relative because of all the influences we are swiming into ! So the main thing would be to find when/where we are ourselves, and try to keep it as long as possible ! It’s quite hard. I think as so much things are easy and spectacular to make today with our brand new machines ! So in my case, that means I try (try is the word !) each time to not to use the last trendies effects and try to work more on the concept by respecting the movie (and the directors) i’m working on… It’s really like fashion, sometime you see things that looks gorgeous but one year after, it looks so odd. Well, same in my job : i have to see what the “today style” is but, i have to make something which won’t get old in one year, when the movie will be released… !!

4) Tell us about your Future.

In the next years I want to continue to work with good directors to make them happy and excited by their title sequence ! What I would love (it’s actually beginning with one movie next year) is to imagine title sequence before the shootings.. cause I think it could be a way of experimenting so much new ideas…

I’m also working on two feature scripts that I hope i’ll direct someday.. now I’ve directed two shorts you can see on my website !

You guys should meet! Put your info below!

We have a great community here, so I wanted to extend this optional invitation for you all to meet one another!

So, what’s your Twitter or Facebook or both? Put it in the comments below! I know many of you have friended or followed me — that’s great — but I think you should all connect with one other too! There are many people from various backgrounds and I think you all would find some unexpected connections! On FB, some people are open about friending (like me), but on Twitter, you can follow anyone without their consent.

When you put your Twitter or Facebook below in the comments, kindly put it in the web format so people can easily follow or find you (like http://www.twitter.com/TreyRatcliff or http://www.facebook.com/TreyRatcliff). I put an example below in the comments.

Edit:  A lot of names below, see here on how to follow them!

First, here is a Twitter list of the Stuck In Customs Community. I suggest you go through there and follow people!

Second, soon, Tweetdeck will release the ability for you to auto-import a list and make it a column. Don’t know what I mean? Go ahead and download Tweetdeck and start gettin’ the hang of it. I’ll update this post as soon as you can add a “List” as a column along with instructions.

What’s my Twitter strategy?

First, I use Twitter the “right” way. That is, I have taken time to carefully build, re-build, cull, and personalize a list of several hundred people to follow. These are people I have discovered that are interesting, inspirational, or just guilty pleasures. I look at Twitter several times a day to get new ideas, unexpected finds, and news from people that have similar tastes to mine.

Second, and less importantly, I use Twitter to filter the world for anyone curious enough to follow me. I try to keep a balance of: 33% inspirational and/or artistic finds that I share, 33% sharing of my own work with everyone, and 33% connecting people who should know one another! Oh, and 1% WILDCARD. At least, this is my goal! I may not always hit those ratios, but I do my best.

Last, here are 10 Things You Need to Stop Tweeting About ! It’s really funny… those of you that don’t like Twitter probably are:

1) Following people that are full of BS that do many things on that list
2) Or you don’t want to tell the world what you are doing (THAT is okay — but… you don’t have to tell people! You can still follow people you find interesting without even sending out a tweet.)
3) You have yet to realize Trey’s Twitter Truth: “Twitter is cool because it’s a nonstop party you don’t have to hang out in a small group of mostly annoying people.”

After dark, Altus took me to this cool restaurant (btw, the original sized version has nice details on Flickr!) The manager was very nice and let us sit where we wanted and then a carte-blanche for taking photos. He asked if I would send him photos and if I charge… and I told him no… I do this stuff for fun! So, we have a smart and well-movied community here – who can tell me the name of this restaurant?

Peachpit definitely has the sample from my book up on their website now. Just click on “Sample Content” and you’ll be in good shape. There are some very good tips just in that 20 pages!

Insofar as I believe attention can be created, I think we are certainly on to something with www.HDRspotting.com. It’s purpose is to drive more attention and traffic to other HDR photographers. I understand from some people that they are getting 5x the number of views there than on Flickr! Great! It was started with the intention that attention can be created, spread, and shared in a more intelligent way. I also get a lot of emails of people asking me for invite codes. I don’t handle that! Sorry! But, I do understand that new codes are going out all the time… new features are being added every few days.

This shot below is from 17-mile drive off the famous Pacific Coast Highway in California, a little trip that produced a lot of good shots I will sprinkle in over the coming weeks and months! Hwy 1 runs down a winding coastline, and there are great sites all over the place. This spot is just north of Carmel and a stone’s throw from Pebble Beach. When I was there, I also took this shot with my iPhone. The iPhone is good… but… comon! This one is a bit better… hehe. Am I wrong?

]]> http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/10/24/the-lone-cypress-a-drive-down-highway-1-from-san-francisco-to-san-diego/feed/ 22 http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/10/24/the-lone-cypress-a-drive-down-highway-1-from-san-francisco-to-san-diego/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/stuckincustoms/EmRA/~3/XKUPUrxD48Y/ http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/10/23/a-sneak-peak-at-a-world-in-hdr/#comments Fri, 23 Oct 2009 05:10:46 +0000 Stuck In Customs http://www.stuckincustoms.com/?p=4266 Peachpit, the book publisher for “A World in HDR“, has released the a sneak peak of the book for you guys! I think it looks great so far, and I’m excited for you to see it. You can visit the Peachpit site to take a look at the PDF. One important thing to note is that the PDF is not print-quality. So, the colors and resolution are not “full res”. The final book will be perfect color quality and detail, of course!

P.S. none of the photos below are “zoomable”, except for the “Grassy Roof” one… you can get into the Flickr larger size there. Or, alternatively, you can look at the details on the PDF file.

You can pre-order the book there from Peachpit, Barnes & Noble, Borders, Amazon, or you can pre-order here on the HDR book site on Stuck In Customs.  If you order here, it is a little more expensive, but you also get an autographed copy.  Even better, there is an option to get an signed Limited Edition Numbered print.  The only time I will be offering that is for this pre-order.  Once we stop taking pre-orders, we will no longer offer this print.  Collect it now!

]]> http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/10/23/a-sneak-peak-at-a-world-in-hdr/feed/ 33 http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/10/23/a-sneak-peak-at-a-world-in-hdr/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/stuckincustoms/EmRA/~3/N5fJYuduTP0/ http://www.stuckincustoms.com/2009/10/22/steam-from-the-earth-an-upcoming-video-and-a-book-preview/#comments Thu, 22 Oct 2009 05:03:13 +0000 Stuck In Customs http://www.stuckincustoms.com/?p=4264 The photo below was shot in the Norris Geysir Basin of Yellowstone. I put together another “Walking Around Yellowstone” video with some HDR how-to activity. I think you will like it! I go through three shots and show three finished products. This is one of them. I should release it sometime in the next week or so.

Also, I got good news on A World in HDR, the new book that’s shipping before the holidays! Our publisher, Peachpit, is going to put about 20 pages from Chapter 2 online for viewing on Friday! So, come back around 1 AM CST or so on Friday morning and I’ll put up a sneak preview! Very exciting! I know you guys and gals have really been anticipating it, so I’m happy for you to see it!

When I arrived, I had to take off my shoes at the entrance. The inside was a traditional Japanese structure, raised off the floor, covered with mats and separated by rice paper walls. The monks lived and worked inside. This was plain as I moved from room to room via darkly lit hallways. I took this photo while barefoot. Little blue lights covered the grass and shone like stars. The whole place was quite unbelievable, fun, and unexpected.

Also, recently I had the pleasure of hanging out with RC Concepcion when he came down to Austin to host a photo-editing seminar along with Dave Cross in Austin. Here is RC’s HDR he shot here in Austin. I found out he was coming to Austin on Twitter, so we tweeted up a little get-together in a well-orchestrated 140-character tennis match. We went out to shoot the SRV statue in the rain, ate a leisurely dinner full of philosophical thoughts, and then I had him over to show him the “Stuck in Motion” video over at my home before it was released. I was happy that this guy, the know-it-all (in a good way) host of Layers TV could not even figure it out! BTW, if you are looking to bone up on all your Adobe products, be sure to watch some Layers TV or subscribe to the free video podcast in iTunes.

There is a curvy street that cuts through the middle of Olympic Park in Atlanta. It wasn’t too far from here where that bomb went off in 1996 Atlanta. I was actually there with my friend Scott Sadowski when it went off! I was not too close to the blast, so I was not in any danger… but we did hear it and see the commotion. So I was there for that bombing AND I was in NYC during 9/11 and saw the 2nd plane hit the WTC. I had meetings in the financial district that day, and we ended up getting stuck in NYC for many days while the airports were shut down. Again, I was not close enough to be in danger… But… I have a knack for being in sketchy situations, I guess!