dSLR Dad

Adobe has announced a series of free eSeminars where experts will demonstrate and explore Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom 2. These series are designed for professional photographers and photography enthusiasts, ie dSLR Dads:

Getting started with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2
Thursday, April 9, 2009 10:00 A.M. PT
Thursday, May 7, 2009 10:00 A.M. PT
Learn more ways to pursue your passion for Photography with Lightroom 2 software. In this demonstration you’ll how to use Lightroom to create amazing results from every shot and also import, manage and share your photographs using a simple, intuitive and yet powerful tool (more…)

Martin Evening as posted a video over at Lightroom-News that explains how you can improve your Black & White /  Grayscale conversion inAdobe Photoshop Lightroom 2:

Shortly after the release of Lightroom 1.0, I made a video tutorial which showed how you could use the HSL panel controls to achieve improved, reduced noise Grayscale conversions in Lightroom. That particular problem was resolved with one of the later Lightroom 1.x updates and it is now fine to use the Grayscale panel controls to achieve optimum black and white conversions. In this movie I wanted to show how you can also fine-tune the Grayscale conversion setting by combining these with Camera Calibration panel adjustments.

You can watch the entire video at Lightroom-News.com.  To find out more information or to download a free trial, check out the dSLR Dad Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 Resource Guide.

Martin Evening has also written The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 Book: The Complete Guide for Photographers.

Moose Peterson, wildlife and landscape photographer extraordinaire, has produced a video on digital Black and White photography techniques.  In the video, he covers not only how he converts all of his images using NIK Software’s Silver Efex Pro, but also how he pre-visualizes the B&W effect while in the field.  You can watch this very informative video on his MooseNewsBlog.

Nicole Young has created a great little instructional video over at TWIPPhoto explaining how to create a © copyright notice and apply it to your images in Photoshop.

As a side note, anytime you want to add the © copyright symbol, just type Alt + 0169 in Windows or Option + G on the Macintosh side.

Mikkel Aaland has a great video tutorial on how to use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2’s new Graduated Filter feature to create a Super Vignette effect.  A detailed explanation is available here.

Have you heard of TWIP? It’s a new podcast from the TWIT network by well-known podcasters Alex Lindsay and Scott Bourne. TWIP, an online media show includes several delivery methods: weekly audio podcasts, online video and screencasts. The show also features a blog, a Flickr Discussion Group and a TWIP Flickr Critique Forum.

Of particular note is the camera support discussion (part 1 and part 2) as well as the High Dynamic Range explanation video. The show is relatively new and still looking for its groove, but definitely worth subscribing to by any dSLR Dad.

Normally, since I have had the book for two weeks, I would have a complete review for you dSLR Dads. However, the dSLR Mom started reading Scott Kelby’s 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop CS3 and now won’t give it back. So instead, let me give you the quick 10 min book review. As if you were in the book store, trying to decide to buy it over a Starbucks.

Scott Kelby’s 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop CS3 is absolutely fantastic. It takes the entire Photoshop editing process and breaks it down to 7 key areas:

1. Camera RAW Processing (which is available in Adobe Photoshop CS3, Lightroom, and Elements 5 & 6)
2. Curves Adjustments
3. Shadow and Highlight
4. Painting with Light
5. Channels Adjustments
6. Layer Blend Modes & Layer Masks
7. Sharpening Techniques

That’s it. Those are the 7-points. Every subsequent chapter is a lesson in which you take a new photograph (which is available for download) and proceed to edit it, step-by-step, in any of those 7-points. You may not use all 7, but you will repeat them, over and over. If you are like me, you don’t use Adobe Photoshop every day. So when ever you do need to use it, you need an instruction book right beside you because you can’t remember all of the steps. This book solves that by repetition. Twenty-One lessons worth of repetition! I can’t wait to finish it and show you dSLR Dads the results from my work.

You can purchase Scott Kelby’s 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop CS3 at Amazon here.