Ryan Richardson's Movie Ratings for 2009 (with help from Serenity):
It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas, and that's not just because of the recent snow storm. So n light of the season I've decided to take a break from photoblogging and talk about movies and Amy Adams just in case you need something to tide you over while you wait for the National Guard to dig you out from the impromptu igloo around your house.
The movies are rated from blech (don't bother) to meh (if you like this kind of movie it might be for you) to Oh Yeah! (which is that I enjoyed the film, but not necessarily to the degree that one would expect from the use of an exclamation point).
Things Your Photographer Needs to Know
Cold weather means it's time to start wedding planning.When the cold air has finally penetrated the earth I find myself in a lot of little coffee shops huddled over a tiny table with a couple talking about their wedding. Often they have this beautiful dream of what's going to happen on their wedding day, sometimes that dream has fallen to the relentless press of reality and the Plaza has become the VFW Hall but the passion is still suffusing their voices.
It's rare that a bride and groom can answer the questions that a photographer would really like to know: what color are the ceilings, how is the light at the time you're planning your event, how much control do you have over the lighting? There are a thousand little details that you learn about when you're a photographer, that you just take in automatically the way that some people breathe in air (or that adept school teachers sense mischief).
Still there is at least one point where couples can really help a photographer during a meeting, so the photographer can better help the couple.
Timing is Everything
2009 Holiday Camera Buying Guide
The one major problem with giving a great new digital camera as a gift during the holidays is that by the time it's opened, all the best moments have passed. Still, a digital camera can be a great gift for the holidays allowing your loved ones to capture the wonderful little moments that make enduring the month of music and garish decorations worth it.
The problem is that there are about a million digital cameras in the marketplace with names that were written by a cat running across a keyboard (S90? LX3? DSC-W190?). Clicking over to B&H Photo will net you 200 different makes, models and colors to bemuse and bewilder you, and that's before you start looking at what these cameras are supposed to do. Relax last-minute shoppers, help is on the way to start narrowing down those 200 to a dozen or so.
Bride Blushes at Racy Photos, Studio Sued
I've shot a lot of bridal preparations. Getting the hair together, the makeup, the shoes, the dress and wrangling the bridesmaids can make for a lot of great little moments and great moments are part of what makes a great photo.
Of course just because the moment is striking doesn't mean a photographer should click the shutter.
Recently a Long Island bride sued her wedding photographer because the photographer clicked when she shouldn't have (or maybe not as the case will bear out) but beyond that the studio shared those photos as part of its portfolio. The bride found those photos of her in her lingerie getting ready and was aghast claiming that she had asked the photos not be taken in the first place let alone shared with the World Wide Web.
Say it with a video
The world of photography is changing and it's not because of megapixels. How can this change help you communicate?
For professional photographers convergence - the coming together of still shooting and video - is still looming on the horizon. Sure many new camera bodies have video built in but for now the still photographer can dip a big toe into the water but remain in the world of static images to tell stories.
In the age of the Internet we've all spent far too many hours browsing through YouTube, leaping from one set of videos to the next in search of a good laugh at The Evolution of Dance [youtube.com], something to rock out to [youtube.com] or a webisode [youtube.com] to kill time with. The amount of material that's out there is incredible, on YouTube alone over 20 hours of video are uploaded every minute (that's right, you can officially never watch every video of someone's cat getting confused by a laser pointer).