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Posted: Sat Dec 31, 2005 4:57 pm
by SteveB
Great shots, Buck! Love the one that is being published! :D

Was that shot as-is, or was there some digital darkroom tweaking? What gear didja use, filters, etc? C'mon, give us photo nuts the geeky stats! :p

Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2006 12:53 am
by Buck Forester
Thank you! I still haven't seen the magazine yet myself.

SteveB, the image is 100% as-is. It's a match of the Velvia 50 slide. I was just looking at it through an 8x loupe on a light table and it was just like being there again! As for gear, these were all shot with a Canon Elan 7 using Velvia 50 slide film. I used either a 2 or 3 stop hard GND filter (Galen Rowell/Singh-Ray) and I'm pretty sure I used a Hoya Moose warming circular polarizer but I'm not 100% sure. It was obviously handheld as I was the kayak. Since I really liked the scene in person and wanted to come home with an acceptable image, I bracketed the crud out of the scene... changing GND filters, bracketing f-stops, with and without a polarizer, etc. I burned at least one roll of 36 exposures on this scene, many came out okay, many completely sucked, which is why I bracketed so much. And being handheld I wanted to make sure I had some that were sharp to choose from because shooting Velvia 50 handheld, with filters, in a tippy kayak, wasn't an ideal thing. I wish I had the new Velvia 100 at the time because I could've used the extra stop. Now that I have a digital slr as well, I would've taken both film and digital shots. I only go bezerk with bracketing at those special times when light and scenery come together in a way that you HAVE to get it right at least once. Otherwise I'm not so consumed with the image.

Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2006 10:44 am
by wingding
I have the magazine picture - it is very nice, but not as nice as the one you have posted here. I guess they had to crop it, but I don't know why they had to put some guy named Brian's photo over part of it - he sure isn't as pretty as the picture. :)

Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2006 11:07 pm
by SSSdave
Terrific reflection shot with the end of the canoe and red paddle. Maybe you could jazz up the end of that paddle for your next trip with some colorful rainbow paint job or such.

...David

Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2006 11:42 pm
by Buck Forester
I agree SSSdave, that bright red paddle doesn't really jump out enough, it needs a little sprucing up. :D

I finally tracked down the magazine and saw the layout for the first time tonight. You always lose something in such a dramatic crop (making a vertical out of a horizontal image), but I'm still honored they wanted the image! One interesting thing is they have me, in quotes, mentioning 14,500' peaks in the background, which, ha ha!, isn't true at all. The highest peak in the area, I believe, is Mt. Dana at just over 13,000'. Not even Mt. Whitney, the highest spot in the lower 48 and still a couple hours drive south, isn't quite 14,500'. I'm surprised that one got through the verification process, but oh well. It was such a fun process and a personal honor that it's no biggie. What's a little exaggeration from an adventure oriented magazine here and there? :cool:

Posted: Fri Jan 06, 2006 12:13 am
by SteveB
Buck, I really like the first shot. If you still have rights to it, have you considered getting nice prints on Crystal Archive and selling 'em? I'd be interested in a nice poster-sized one... :)

Posted: Fri Jan 06, 2006 12:57 pm
by Buck Forester
Thanks, Steve! Yes, I'm actually in the process of having a number of slides professionally drum scanned and Lightjet 5000 printed on Fuji Crystal Archive paper. Being a huge fan of Galen Rowell, I spoke with the manager of Mountain Light Gallery (and a number of other professional photographers) on which services they use for drum scanning, editing, and printing. The consenses seems to be a place called Color Folio for drum scans and Calypso Imaging for Lightjet 5000 prints, both of which are in the Bay Area. But Calypso just recently purchased a Tango drum scanner so maybe I'll just do it all with them. I want to have images printed on the best stuff available. Not that I think my images are so good, but because it's not really as expensive as I thought and I could still charge MUCH less than the big dogs but still have the same technical quality as far as the scanning/printing goes. And I shoot the same film, use the same filters, tripods, and point my camera at pretty stuff, etc., so they should come out pretty good. My markup won't be that much (maybe in a few years if I make it big I can, who knows!) so I'd be glad to get you a copy. That particular image is still at National Geographic, they haven't sent it back yet, but as soon as I get it back I'll get it drum scanned and printed. I'll keep you updated. I'm still in the process of creating an adventure website where I'll have some selected images for sale too. A few days ago I sprained my back so I can barely move right now, YOWCH!, so the process is slow. Thanks for your interest!

Posted: Fri Jan 06, 2006 5:51 pm
by SteveB
Buck Forester wrote:The consenses seems to be a place called Color Folio for drum scans and Calypso Imaging for Lightjet 5000 prints, both of which are in the Bay Area.
I looked into Calypso a couple years ago, and their prices were a serious turn-off. Maybe they've gotten better since then, but it was just cost-prohibitive to have some of my stuff printed by them. There's a local shop here that does better-than-average prints, and I'm going to have them do some poster size stuff for me as a test, so we'll see.

If you want some help on the website just give me a shout; been doing this for years! :) And definately keep me in the loop on getting your prints made! I'd love to get one uncropped like above!

Posted: Fri Jan 06, 2006 6:09 pm
by Buck Forester
I may take you up on the website thing, I'm like a fish out of water learning this stuff. As far as Calypso, if you only make a single print they're expensive, the next one is much less, and if you make 3 or more of the same (in the same order) it's not too bad. For example, to print a single 16x20 is $93.00 - ouch!, but the second one is $23.50, and each one thereafter is only $14.00. So if you just want to blow up one of your photos, it's expensive. But if you wanna crank out 20 prints of the same image to sell, it's not so bad. Considering Galen sells his non-limited editions for $450-ish, that's quite a markup. And I'm sure they get even better pricing. So if I sell an image for $150-175 for a 16x22, after a few it would have paid for the drum scan and the initial high print costs as long as I printed quite a few upfront. I'll sell images to those who request them directly from forums like this, and the emails from people who saw them in the Sac Bee photo contest for much lower than that. I've had quite a few requests from the Sacramento Bee exposure and I'm just honored people want them, so those will be around at-cost. Boy I sure do type fast. Thanks again!

Posted: Sun Jan 08, 2006 3:44 pm
by mountaineer
Use http://www.slideprinter.com/home.html! Pro drum scans for $30 and for a 20x30 glossy print it is 31.25 for the first print and 25.00 for additional prints. The super glossy display prints are awesome! They run a bit more though. 42.20 for the first print and 33.75 thereafter. The pro scan will make a print up to 30x45.

I just had this image printed from a 35mm slide in 20x30 and it is impeccable quality. I have been using The Slideprinter since before the digital age, about the late 70's.
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