October Outing

Outings Update

September outings were to
Lumsdale Waterfalls (near Matlock)
Barrow Hill Roundhouse

Keep and eye on your e-mails and listen to announcements for details of future outings.

Lens For Sale

Keith Naylor has the following for sale

Canon MP-E 65mm f2.8 Super Macro Lens

This lens is unique as it offers magnifications of 1:1, 2:1, 3:1, 4:1 and 5:1

New this lens costs £800, Keith is looking for offers OVER £400.

If you are interested please contact Chris Jesinger for Keith's details, also check the below link for details of the lens.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/lenses/mp-e-65.shtml

Big Changes afoot at Adobe

If you are a currently an Adobe Photoshop user then you maybe in for a shock, as on the 6th May 2013 Adobe announced that they no longer plan to sell retail versions of this software and all future editions will be available by cloud based subscriptions only. You won’t be able to purchase boxed editions of Photoshop together with a DVD and you will not be able to update your existing versions without a subscription. This seems partly induced to reduce piracy but be left in no doubt at the end of the day renting your software from Adobe will cost considerably more. This will probably have some effect on most club members at some time in the future.

I’ve provided some information and voiced my opinion on my blog here, and I’d be very interested to see what club members think of this move by Adobe.

Club Outing April 20th

A relatively small group of us met for coffee at the café in Edensor village (on the Chatsworth estate) before moving on to Chatsworth Gardens. The weather was excellent, perhaps the first truly spring like day so far this year. Naturalised daffodils in the gardens provided an excellent show and good photographic subjects. We were pleased to have with us new member, Garry Owen who I hope got something out of the day. This was also the first time Eileen Murray accompanied us on a weekend outing and hopefully it will not be the last. We plan monthly days out through the Summer and members will be kept informed of the arrangements.

Birches by Chris Jesinger

 





The group outside Café at Edensor

 

Daffodils by Chris Jesinger

 

Lightroom 5 Beta Released

Exiting new tools in Lightroom 5 Beta

This cames as quite a surprise to me, but on Monday (15th April 2013) Adobe released a free public beta version of Lightroom 5 for download and testing by their user base. It's only just over 15 months since Lightroom 4 beta was released, and 13 months since the official launch of Lightroom 4, so with that in mind we should anticipate a final version of Lightroom 5 in just a few months time.
Lightroom 5 beta has some really exciting new tools, which Adobe describes with the following:

• Advanced Healing Brush – Easily remove objects and fix defects—even those with irregular shapes such as threads or lint—with a single brush stroke. Take precise control over what's being removed as you make unwanted objects just disappear.
• Upright – Straighten tilted images with a single click. Upright analyzes images and detects skewed horizontal or vertical lines. You choose one of four correction methods, and Upright can even straighten images where the horizon is hidden.
• Radial Gradient – Lead your viewer's eye through your images with more flexibility and control. The radial gradient tool lets you create off-center vignette effects, or multiple vignette areas within a single image.
• Offline editing with Smart Previews – Easily work with images without bringing your entire library with you. Just generate smaller stand-in files called Smart Previews. Make adjustments or metadata additions to Smart Previews and your changes will be automatically applied to the full-size originals later.
• Video slideshow sharing – Easily share your work in elegant video slideshows. Combine still images, video clips, and music in creative HD videos that can be viewed on almost any computer or device.
• Improved photo book creation – Create beautiful photo books from your images. Lightroom includes a variety of easy-to-use book templates, and now you can edit them to create a customized look. Upload your book for printing with just a few clicks.

My Favourite New Features

Top of the list has got to be the Advance Healing Brush, which now almost puts Lightroom on a par with Photoshop and is something Lightroom users have being crying out for since version 1. The restriction of just circular spot healing is gone and you can now paint an area to be healed or cloned. Your round-tripping to Photoshop may even become a thing of the past from now on. They have also added a Visual spots mode which makes it so much easier to identify any dust spots now.

Closely followed is the Radial Gradient Tool, which really aught to be renamed as it is far more than just a gradient tool. This now provides Lightroom with a tool more akin to the very popular U-point control point technology used by Nik Software. Once caveat though, it really should have the area inside the selection (the inverse selection) as the default mode not the outside area; watch the video below and you'll see what I mean.

Lastly they have added a couple of features that were omitted from the first version of the Book Module that appeared in Lightroom 4. You can now edit and save your own User Layouts, and finally you can now add Page Numbers. With the latter the book module has suddenly become so much more useful and we can, at long last, create proper books. All we need now are Chapters, Index pages and Contents, then the Book Module would be an absolute winner.

Download Your Copy

You can download the beta version fro the Adobe website here and use it for free until the on June 30, 2013 when product expires. You have to have a registered user account with Adobe. Do remember it is a beta version so not the final version and intended for testing and feedback purposes so most probably not bug free. Do by all means join the Lightroom 5 Discussion Group to assist Adobe and to voice your own opinions on the new features too. Your contributions can help shape the final release version.

Lightroom 5 Beta New Feature Videos

There are already a host of videos to be found online but here are my favourites on some of the new features contained within Lightroom 5 beta:

Top 5 New Features

Advance Healing Brush

Upright Feature

Book Module Additions and Refinements

Using the Radial Filter Tool

I hope you all enjoy trying it out.
 

MONTHLY COMPETITION FINAL RESULTS

CLUB MONTHLY COMPETITION 2012 - 2013
CUMULATIVE & FINAL RESULTS ROUNDS 1-4
Digital (Advanced) Winner Marcel Walker
Digital (Club) Winner Peter Joyce
Colour Prints (Advanced) Winner Peter Farthing
Colour Prints (Club) Winner Paul Booker
Mono Prints (Advanced) Winner Peter Farthing
Mono Prints (Club) Winner Anne Millen

Left click to enlarge image

 

CLUB OUTING TO CASTLETON, FEB 2013

Last Saturday (Feb 2nd) a group of us visited Castleton and Cavedale.

Start point was the Pool Cafe in Hathersage for brunch before moving on to Castleton Village.

Rather than all attempt the somewhat strenuous climb into Cavedale we split up and met later in the 3 Roofs Cafe.

We later moved on to Stanage Edge with the intention of getting some sunset panoramas but the clouds did rather get in the way.

Images - Chris J










Thanks to those who came along, hopefully everyone had a good day out and managed to get some images.

Our next outing is planned for February 23rd (note - changed from 16th).