The Pros and (Mostly) Cons of Upgrading to a 4K Monitor

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I'm in the process of getting back into photography which will mean a new camera, more on that in a later post. But the first step for me was a new computer, one with the horsepower to handle a modern day camera and its RAW files. Along with the computer comes a new 4K monitor. 4K is great for media consumption, right? Your characters on your favorite show or movie really look detailed and realistic. Scenery looks wonderful. Everything looks great, right? Wrong. You know what doesn't look great? That photo I took in 2012 that I thought was sharp but is very much not. I transferred over my past catalogs of photos over to Lightroom Classic and eagerly began opening up some of my favorite photos. At first I was happy with how the colors looked and how the scene was composed. Then I noticed it was a little soft. Well I had just gotten a new contacts prescription so that must be it. Changed to my glasses and the photos were even blurrier! I went through photo after photo and most ca
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Sunset Over Trinidad

Sunset Over Trinidad
I started 2014, photographically, on the wrong foot. My shooting has been uninspired, and so I went to shoot something I do enjoy and usually get good results with. A sunset. This shot was taken in a clearing with bushes at least as tall as me. And this is the reason why I love my rotating/tilting/flipout screen on my G3. I bumped the ISO up then held the camera up as high as I could while looking at the tilted and rotated screen to try and frame the shot. Once into Aperture I straightened the shot, adjusted for exposure then sent the photo over to Topaz Labs. There I did what's becoming a first step for most of my photos and doing some pre-sharpening or capture sharpening with InFocus, some DeNoise work for the sky, Clarity to work on contrasts and color in the sky (slight saturation bump), then some creative sharpening in Detail. I think when you shoot things in silhouette, like the rock on the left, the head in the center, or the tops of some small trees on the right, giving a little extra sharpness really helps to make them pop. This was taken just a little after I took my first shot for the blog, that you might have missed because I was too lazy to make a post for the blog and just used my Google+ post.

I also have a new project, +The Patch - PhotogrAphy Themed CHallenge, that I'm running with three other photographers. We have over 130 people signed up so far, and people are welcome to join at any time. It's a different take on the theme per week projects in that there is also a monthly theme. So photos should include both themes. This was much easier to do when planning the themes, but not so easy once I started to get behind the camera. In fact I really don't like the shot I submitted for the project. Another wrinkle in this project is that the curators/moderators and I will be picking our 3 favorite shots that we think represent the themes given every week, then those photos will be voted on by the other members to get a winner for the month. The winner will receive a plugin from +Topaz Labs!

Our first dual theme was New Years and Renewal for the monthly theme.

Week 1: New Year/Renewal
I set a scene up with a journal entry on the tablet, fresh calendar on the phone, Tylenol in the foreground, and the remnants of a celebration in the background. This was supposed to be my backup shot because I was sure I was going to find something better. I hate when I have to use a backup shot. I'm hoping to do better with next week's theme, Resolution/Renewal.

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