Eastern Screech owl from the Carolina Raptor Center.

I’ve been very remiss about updating this site lately. I have been doing a bunch of traveling for fun and work. I also got married recently, so that took up some of my time.  This last weekend I went out to the Carolina Raptor Center with some of the folks from the Carolina Nature Photographers Association (aka CNPA). What a nice time with a great bunch of folks. I am headed out to the High Sierra’s with His Light Workshops at the beginning of June. We’re hitting the Bodie ghost town, Mono lake and an old railway museum. It’s looking like a great trip!

A special shout out to the Haverstocks, what great people and wonderful photographers!

The second day was sunny in the afternoon, so shadows were a little harsh while you weren’t under the cover of the trees. We brought along a few reflectors / diffusers to help direct the light or in many cases block out the sun. While shooting an old De Soto, I was blocking the sun for someone and when I lifted up the reflector I noticed the sun bouncing off the gold side. It made all the rust just pop. So of course I started shooting that way the rest of the day and told anyone who would listen. It just worked.

Here is an example:

I have the pleasure of teaching again with Jim Begley, Chuck Barnes and Bill Fortney. These guys are really special to me. Some of the most amazing folks I have had the honor to be around. I could never shoot another frame and still would be happy just because I met all the wonderful people I have.

Down at the bottom of the module you can select a track log.

The track log I use is a GPX file (which can be exported from your GPS or even a GPS application on your iPhone). I use GPS Kit on my iPhone to track my movements and generate a GPX file which I can email or download. This will display a track once loaded into Lightroom that you can add images to.

So here’s the odd part. I downloaded the GPX file to my desktop and loaded it into Lightroom, after which I deleted the file thinking that Lightroom would just copy the file into the catalog or directory. It does not copy it, if you delete it, Lightroom no longer knows about it and won’t display it.

I set up a directory with my catalogs to put all my tracklogs. You can also put it into the directory that the images live in, load it and don’t touch it. Either way, keep those tracklogs and don’t delete them, they’ll be gone for good.

P.S. I am LOVING Lightroom4. I’ll be giving a lesson on it at the upcoming Bill Fortney His Light workshop down in Old Car City.

The new features include (copied directly from Amazon):

• Highlight and Shadow Recovery – Bring out all the detail that your camera captures in dark shadows and bright highlights. Now you have more power than ever before to make great images in challenging lighting conditions.
• Photo Book Creation – Create beautiful photo books from your images with a variety of easy-to-use templates included in Lightroom, and then upload your book for printing with just a few clicks.
• Superior Image Processing – Get the absolute best from your images with state-of-the-art image processing controls. Make precise overall adjustments or correct targeted areas.
• Extended Video Support – Organize, view, and make adjustments and edits to video clips. Play and trim clips, extract still images from them, or adjust clips with the Quick Develop tool.
• Advanced Black-and-White Conversion – Gain powerful control over the tonal qualities that make or break black-and-white images. Precisely mix information from eight color channels when you convert to grayscale.
• Superior Noise Reduction – Achieve amazing, natural-looking results from your high ISO images with state-of-the-art noise reduction technology. Apply noise reduction to the entire image or target specific areas.
• One-Click Adjustments to Multiple Images – Save time when processing many images. Apply the same develop settings, exposure, or contrast, for example—to all the photographs in a group at once using presets or syncing.