Every once in a while you get a chance to take pictures of something that is just different and that alone makes it a little more interesting and exciting. Today I had my chance.

My wife surprised me with a hot air balloon ride from Tucson Balloon Rides as a gift for our 20th wedding anniversary. I had never gone on a balloon ride but it seemed like fun. I was also intrigued because I had seen the pictures of the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta and always thought it would be fun to take pictures of the balloons – they are so colorful and unusual that the chance to get up close to one for the first time seemed to demand that I take a camera.

We were on site at 5:00am and got the chance to watch the crew prep the balloon and then we took an 1 1/2 hour flight. It turned out to be more fun than I had expected. It was a very peaceful day in terms of wind which made the ride nice and smooth. The thing that surprised me the most was how quiet and calm it all was in between the pilot firing the burners. I’m so used to hearing an engine in the background of some kind when I fly that it was almost eerie.

Our pilot, a guy by the name of Kevin Wilbur, also helped make the trip a good one. He just sort of inspired confidence and if he was bothered at all by the fact that he never knows just exactly where he’ll land once he takes off you certainly can’t tell. Heck, he even made a tip-over landing sound like fun though in our case that never happened. At the end of the ride his wife Tammy had graciously fixed a light brunch featuring some homemade banana bread with chocolate chips. If you have the chance you should take a trip with these guys.

Equipment used: D700, and my f/2.8 fisheye and the 24-70mm f/2.8 and an SB 900. Photos finished in Lightroom 4.

Additional Pictures

But I’m becoming less of a fan as time goes on because my future relationship with Adobe is cloudy thanks to the Adobe Creative Cloud.

Adobe Creative Cloud is coming and if the reports and press releases I have read are correct I am concerned. Cloud services are all of the rage at the moment and for good reason. For some tools and services a cloud based approach truly enhances the user experience and delivers important benefits.

Adobe Creative Cloud though feels like an attempt by Adobe management to force people to move to a model that is far more expensive but provides little additional value. It feels a little like that infamous Netflix pricing decision.

Here are the issues that I see:

Moving to a Subscription Model
This makes perfect sense if you are Adobe. Subscriptions allow Adobe to smooth out its revenue stream, free it from the tyranny of the treadmill upgrade cycle, and reduces the hassle of having to convince users to upgrade every 24 months for “milestone releases” and then mid-cycle releases which I assume would arrive be annually. It remains to be seen how big or important the annual releases will be.

Adobe keeps telling me that the Creative Cloud will be available at an “extremely attractive and affordable price”. Currently that “extremely attractive and affordable price” is $49/month with a year commitment.

A one year commitment at $49/month is $588 which was just about the upgrade price for my last version of Adobe CS Design Premium. If you are required to make an annual commitment and Adobe continues their 24 month milestone upgrade cycle then you’ll have to pay for two years in order to take advantage of those the major milestone upgrades. That brings the total financial commitment to $1,176. Gosh, this feels even more “compelling” now. Wait, I thought I saw you stumble, let me give you hand up onto the upgrade treadmill. Really, once you get used to it you’re going to love it…

And what about access to your files and work? What happens if I have to cancel my subscription for some reason? Does that mean I can no longer access my files or work on the things that I have created? For some, that might not be a big deal but it is not a viable option for me.

Remember Netflix
One last thing about on pricing & upgrades: Adobe’s recent announcement that they were going to require users to upgrade to the latest version of their software in order to continue to receive future upgrade discounts is pure management stupidity. They backed off of this in part because of the open letter that Scott Kelby sent them but the delay is only temporary.

I suspect that somewhere in the bowels of Adobe, there is a cadre of newly minted MBA, spreadsheet jockeys talking about “acceptable customer attrition rates”. Ignore them. They are wrong on this issue. You’re about to “Netflix” yourself. There is still time to “just say no” to this stupidity.

This whole thing about the subscriptions and the upgrades has done more than other single thing to make me think that Adobe no longer really cares about their customers. It feels like arrogance and it comes across like a desire to punish the slow movers. Maybe I’m wrong but it’s the impression that I get.

Application Access
According to Adobe’s press release I’ll have access to the entire portfolio of tools including the new generation of software that “embrace touch interaction to re-imagine how individuals interact with creative tools “.

Maybe I don’t run in the right circles but I’ve never met anyone that truly knows how to use all of the Adobe tools or even has a need too. If you are doing professional level work (or you aspire too) you have to focus intently on small area to become good. It’s very, very hard to be truly good at more than one or two things. Print design, web & interactive design and video all require different ways of thinking and different skill sets. For that reason I suspect that the vast majority of people don’t need more than 2-4 applications for the core creative work they do.

I personally use Lightroom and Photoshop primarily. I use Illustrator & InDesign some and occasionally I’ll break out Dreamweaver. I have no need for Flash, After Effects or Premiere Pro, Edge or Muse. I could care less about touch enabled apps. I’m not doing any serious work on a tablet and the ability to upload the files and edit them somewhere else is not compelling at the moment.

While this might be enticing to larger creative teams or ad agencies I still wonder why should anyone have to pay for tools that they cannot or will not use? Not every member of every team needs every tool. It’s just another way to try and justify the high monthly subscription price.

I don’t want to be forced to pay for a bunch of stuff I’ll never use.

Automatic Access to upgrades
This sounds great but while some features are compelling I don’t want/need everything every time. I have upgraded to every major version of Photoshop and Illustrator but a good example of this is the recent Adobe CS 5.5 upgrade.

I read the features, realized they didn’t appeal to me for the $389 upgrade price and so I saved my money. I would be really angry had I been forced to pay for that (of course with the new Adobe upgrade policy mentioned above, I’ll probably be financially punished this kind of disobedience).

I believe customers vote with their money. If Adobe adds compelling features people, myself included, will upgrade. If not, they won’t. While that kind of pressure is tough on a company, it encourages (forces?) Adobe to do the very best possible job that they can because it’s not compelling people won’t buy it.

A subscription model eliminates that pressure to perform and I think sets users up to fund minor upgrades that may or may not be meaningful or needed.

Interaction with the Creative Community
What kind of interaction is Adobe going to offer that I’m not getting now for free through the web, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other websites now?

Adobe has not elaborated other than to say, “the Community will facilitate presentation, sharing, and collaboration on creative projects”. Ok. I take it back. I don’t really know that means. Maybe it will be “Kuler” than I think. It could mean anything. Or it could mean nothing. Clearly my marketing brethren have been hard at work because while they have said a lot, there is nothing meaningful to it at all.

Conclusion:
So where is all of this going? I don’t know. I guess we’ll wait for all of the details to come out but based on what’s been shared so far it’s my prediction that my relationship with Adobe will be partly cloudy with a good chance of storms moving in over the next 12 months. I sincerely hope I’m wrong. I sincerely hoping that someone at Adobe is listening to what customers are saying and thinking seriously about the impact on long-term, small customers like myself.

I’d love to hear from others who might know more about the Creative Cloud or whether they think my reasons are wrong. Drop me a line if you like.

However, I do believe that the D800 is not the successor to the D700 as I had so fervently hoped it would be. After looking at the specs, the prediction that it is the baby brother to the D3x was right on. If you’re a studio or landscape photographer or someone who shoots images that need to be printed in really large formats then this may be the perfect camera for you.

Initially the incremental price difference between the D700 and the D800 made me think seriously about getting the D800. However, after examining the specs, and then thinking seriously about the kinds of pictures that I am taking now, I ordered the D700 and I have not looked back.

For me these were the key issues:

• I simply don’t need 36MP for 90% of what I do. Sure, there are times where I would love to have the the extra resolution and size but those times are rare. Maybe one day I’ll see my pictures on a billboard but until then I’m ok with the 10-12MP range.
• I know that real photographers don’t care about storage but at 36MP storage becomes a much more an important issue for me. With each file being about 75MB or a tiff file being 210MB I’ll be chewing through CF cards and back-up disks at about 3X my current rate. Again that would be fine if I was able take advantage of the of the increased resolution in a meaningful way but for now it has no real impact on me for 90% of what I do. Another short-term factor is that the price of storage is way up right now due to the flooding in Thailand. This will come down in time but it is a factor in the short-term.
• I’m not 100% convinced that the ISO performance will be as good as they say it is. I think there are some physics limitations that will preclude that from happening. I suspect that most of the improvements are based on better image processing and noise reduction algorithms but that’s just a guess on my part. I’ll be very interested to see the reviews and hopefully I’ll be wrong on this.
• I am not a video guy. I love the idea of video but the truth is that shooting good video requires a different set of skills and equipment than I what I have/know with the camera being just a small first step. I have no illusions of creating a video like the D800 promo that was shot (see it here). Watch the behind the scenes “making of” video and you’ll see the amount of work that goes into something like that is far beyond what the average person would or can do.

• As an amateur photographer who only gets paying projects occasionally, I’m still building out my equipment. I can save the money and get the next lens of the Nikon Holy Trinity (14-24mm f/2.8, 24-70mm f/2.8 and the 70-200mm f/2.8) which will probably help me more in the short-term.

Predictions about what’s next for Nikon
I think that in the next 18 months (by Aug. of 2013) Nikon will release the D400 (or the D900?). This will be a full-frame, 16-18MP, high ISO camera priced at about $2,500 and will be to the D4 what the the D700 was to the D3. This will be the camera I’m waiting for and I will jump on it with both feet when it arrives.

Until then I plan to enjoy the heck out of my D700.

However, it’s time to take step back because if the rumors of the pending D800 announcement are true, I don’t think it’s going to be what most people were expecting. I believe that it’s not going to be the successor to the D700 as much as it will be the little brother to the Nikon D3x.

Conventional wisdom says that a company will release the flagship model of their product line and then wait some period of time in order to skim the cream off the top of the market. The professionals, early adopters and affluent customers will jump in early and pay a premium for the “latest-and-greatest” version of the product. Then, after the initial demand begins to cool off the more economical models announced.

Nikon has followed this approach in the past. When D3 was announced in August of 2007 it stood alone for almost a year before the D700 was announced in July of 2008. This gave Nikon almost a year to charge premium prices for their top-of-the-line model. When the D700 arrived it delivered most of the functionality of the D3 at a little more than half the price. (see this excellent Nikon product history chart  for a complete timeline at ByThom.com)

If this line of thinking is reasonable then you have to ask, “What incentive is there for Nikon to release a D800 now so close to the launch of the D4?” All that would accomplish is to cut into the sales of the D4 and logically that is the last thing Nikon would want.

So what is going on here? I think the answer may lie in looking further at the Nikon product line launch history. In December of 2008, five months after the launch of the D700, Nikon released another premium camera: the D3x. The D3x distinguished itself in three important ways: it had a 24 MP sensor, lower (poorer) ISO performance, and a monster price tag of $8,000. This camera seemed primarily designed for studio and landscape work where higher resolution can be important.

With that in mind, one could ask, “what if the rumored Nikon D800 is not intended to be the successor for the D700 at all but rather the little brother to the D3x?” Nikon could pull off a technical and marketing coup if they could deliver a 36 MP camera with comparable ISO performance to the D3x at a retail price of $4,000.

This speculation, and that’s all this is, would make sense from a marketing perspective as well. Nikon has had plenty of time to “harvest” the premium buyers for the D3x and because it’s designed for a different buyer they could announce it and not expect for it to cannibalize sales of the D4.

So, for what it’s worth, that’s the only scenario that makes sense to me personally as to why Nikon would even consider announcing the D800 model now. I guess we’ll see very soon how far off the mark I am. According the NikonRumors.com there is a press conference scheduled for February 6th when all will be revealed.

Do you think I’m crazy? Tell me why!

For more pictures click here.

On Saturday July, 23 my father and I were invited to Arcosanti, Arizona to photograph Flame Chen‘s newest show: Electropolis. Inspired by the 1923 film Metropolis, by Fritz Lang,  Electropolis is part performance art, part circus-theater and part concert featuring a lot of fire and 500,000 volts of electricity. The band Ensphere provided the musical backdrop for the evening with heavy, hypnotic guitar riffs and trance like melodies while Flame Chen’s performance updated and reinterpreted the themes of power and control for a modern day audience.

Many thanks to Flame Chen, Paul Weir and Alfonso Elia for extending an invitation to us and allowing us to be a part of Electropolis.

Scott Bourne posted an interesting question to his photofocus blog today about why do people like to take pictures of old and deteriorating subjects because it’s so opposite of the traditional or classical beauty that many people look for. This question caught my attention because I love taking pictures of things that have been abandoned, forgotten or broken.

Old cemeteries, abandoned factories, houses, cars, planes and ghost towns are all things that get me excited about picking up a camera and discovering their hidden pictures.

Here are three reasons why I love taking pictures of old, distressed things:

1. It’s a visual reminder that nothing lasts forever. Build whatever you want but everything fades away with time. It reminds me that I need to focus on the things that really matter in life – the people and relationships that are important to me. In the end, everything else is transitory and will be forgotten.
2. Old things have character and hidden stories – I’ve never gone into an abandoned building or walked through an old cemetery or ghost town without looking around asking myself, “What happened here?  Who were these people? What did they try and do? Did they think it would last forever? What would they say if they could see this place now?”  Old places carry the scars of life and that gives them a character that I don’t often find in my usually sterile world. From bullet holes in truck windows to the house that’s been forgotten with the furniture still inside…it’s all fascinating to me.
3. It’s a challenge – It’s hard to get into some of these places and sometimes the lighting conditions are difficult. I like the challenge of trying to get the picture and it’s always an adventure. There is a huge sense of satisfaction that comes from knowing that most people would not have made the effort.

I believe that the growth of HDR has had a big impact on this type photography as well. HDR makes it possible, especially in darker places, to capture the mood and share it completely with your viewer. If you try and use flash you will get flat, boring pictures and you’ll destroy the ambience of the place and the moment.  HDR when used with care, really allows your viewer to experience that place the same way you did.

What do you think?

This year, I had the good fortune to be a part of the media circle team that was invited to take pictures of the 2010 All Souls Procession here in Tucson, Arizona. This is a unique event and for the first time I had backstage access. One part parade, one part performance art, one part sacred ritual – people  invest a lot of themselves into this event. You can see the passion they have everywhere you look.

• Parade Pictures
• Finale Pictures

For a photographer, it’s hard to think of how this could get any better. Most participants are dressed for attention and are happy to have their picture taken. Flame Chen, a new circus and fire theater performance group, always dazzles in the the grand finale with lavish costumes, aerial acrobatics and, of course, lots of fire.

It’s easy to get swept away in the flow of people as the procession begins. Everywhere you look there are photographs waiting to happen. For every moment you capture another hundred drift away in the swirling eddies of people.

Shooting conditions are tough though. It’s a low light environment with lots of action. You need a flash to freeze the action but because most of the people paint their faces white, it’s easy to over expose their faces  if you’re not really careful. If you don’t use a flash it’s easy to get a blurry, muddy mess.

For the finale, I lugged my tripod along. While I don’t like carrying the thing in a crowd, it really made some of my favorite pictures possible. There was no way to use the flash at the end without destroying the ambiance of the show. I kept getting nasty pictures with an overexposed foreground and a background that would go almost instantly to black. So I stopped fighting it and stopped down my aperture and started using longer exposures to capture the movement of the dancers – something that would not have been possible without the tripod.

In the end, I had a great time and am looking forward to next year. I’m especially indebted to Many Mouths and One Stomach (MMOS) and Alfonso Elia for letting me “officially” join the fun. Thanks guys!

They’ve created vinyl album, CD and jewel case templates to help graphic designers mock up their artwork and creative concepts quickly so the client can get a realistic idea about how the final project will turn out.

In order to make this as realistic as possible, they needed two pictures of each product – one picture exposed normally and the other four f/stops darker than normal. GoMedia pulls all of this into Photoshop and creates  a way for you place your artwork in the file and immediately your artwork will take on some of the texture of the paper or glare of the plastic etc. It’s a very slick effect and will save you hours of tedious work.

In order to get the shots, I built a large cardboard box and then painted the inside “green screen” green. This allowed GoMedia to quickly isolate and change out the background to any color they wanted too. Everything worked great until we started shooting the jewel cases that were transparent. Dropping the green out of those did not give the best effect, so I re-shot those on a white background so that was a lesson learned.

Trust me when I say that GoMedia has done the grunt work and you will save hours of tedious work create your own templates. You  can check them out here.

The Dia de lost Muertos Parade is coming up in Tucson on Sunday, Nov. 7.  I’m so excited because this event is a photographer’s paradise. One part parade, one part performance art and one part sacred ritual – there is always something visually interesting taking place. I’ve posted some pictures from last year’s parade.

A friend got me permission to go on Davis Monthan Airforce Base in Tucson, Arizona. While driving around the base some members of his squadron landed after completing a year long deployment from Africa. As the plane rolled up to the flight line the families were waiting for their loved ones. After everybody began to leave I captured this picture of a lone airman carrying a bunch of gear from the plan while part of the service crew was working on it in the background.