In the Moment:
Michael Frye's Landscape Photography Blog

Craft and Vision Sale

A small waterfall in Yosemite NP, CA, USA

A small waterfall in Yosemite. This photo was used for the fifth example in my Exposure for Outdoor Photography ebook, where I discuss using slow shutter speeds.

Black Friday arrived early at Craft & Vision, and everything is 50% off until midnight on Saturday. That discount includes Exposure for Outdoor Photography, my ebook about understanding the essential technical fundamentals of photography. The book starts with a comprehensive discussion of histograms and the different ways of adjusting exposure, then goes deeper by taking you through ten practical, real-life examples where I’ve used these basic principles to control the exposure, the sharpness, and the photograph’s message. Normally the book is only $5.00, but through Saturday it’s only $2.50, which is quite a steal!

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50 Percent Off Everything at Craft & Vision!

Half Dome, oaks, and high water, June 16th, 2011, Yosemite NP, CA, USA

Half Dome, oaks, and high water, Yosemite. The latest issue of Photograph magazine includes my article “Singing the Blue Sky Blues,” about how to make the most of cloudless days.

Today and tomorrow, everything is 50% off at Craft & Vision. And better yet, they’re donating 20% of every sale to the Red Cross to support Syrian refugees.

That discount inclues Exposure for Outdoor Photography, my ebook about understanding the essential technical fundamentals of photography. I also recommend Piet Van den Eynde’s Lightroom 5 Unmasked and Lightroom 6 Up to Speed as supplements to my Landscapes in Lightroom ebook; while my ebook covers the Develop Module in depth, Piet delves into all the details about the other modules. And I can also recommend anything by David duChemin.

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Finding Rhythm

Curious deer, Yosemite NP, CA, USA

Curious deer, Yosemite

We all know that music has rhythm. Speech has rhythm too: the cadence of words, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs gives language its order and structure, and makes it easier to understand.

We don’t usually think of photographs as having rhythm, but they do – or, at least, good ones do. Most effective photographs have some kind of repetition, a pattern that helps give the image cohesion and rhythm.

The tenth issue of Photograph digital magazine just came out, and it includes an article of mine called “Finding Rhythm.” I’ve been thinking a lot about visual rhythm lately, so I was happy to have this opportunity to write about it for the magazine.

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Two eBook Reviews

VisualToolboxCoverThe Visual Toolbox: 50 Lessons for Stronger Photographs
by David duChemin
Craft & Vision; 201 page PDF ebook

Craft & Vision has just released their second “Big Book.” This one is called The Visual Toolbox, by C&V founder and publisher David duChemin.

I’ve said before that I think David is an excellent writer and photography educator. But this time he’s outdone himself; The Visual Toolbox is one of the best photography-instruction books I’ve ever read.

It really is a toolbox, covering almost every aspect of photography, including exposure, depth of field, composition, balance, light, how to slow down and really see, and much more. But what sets this book apart is David’s ability to offer fresh perspectives and ideas on familiar photography topics, and get you to think about these subjects in new ways.

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Zone System Article in Photograph Magazine

Zone System: Photograph_ZoneSystem


The summer issue of Photograph, Craft & Vision’s quarterly magazine, just came out today, and it includes a new article I wrote called “When Old Meets New: Understanding the Zone System.”

Digital Photography today gives us tremendous control over image contrast, but even with all this control, we’re still missing the answers to some basic questions: What is my camera’s real dynamic range? Will this scene fit within that range? If so, how do I determine the right exposure? When do I need to bracket exposures and use HDR?

Luckily, the Zone System give us a framework for answering these questions. I’ve written about the Zone System before, but in this new article I dive even further into how the Zone System relates to digital photography, and how it can answer those questions about image contrast. I include instructions for how you can test your camera’s true, usable dynamic range, how you can use this knowledge to make better exposures in the field, and how you can apply the Zone System to the digital darkroom.

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