Tag: technique

The Decisive Moment

The June Photography Club meeting will be held on Wednesday, June 11, 2025, at 6:00 p.m.,  at the Community United Methodist Church  (434 Lewis Street) in Pagosa Springs. While the program will start at 6:30 p.m., feel free to arrive anytime after 6 p.m. to socialize.  Photography Club meetings are open to the public. Please use the side door near the parking lot to enter.

Our topic this month is The Decisive Moment. We will discuss the meaning of this photographic concept and how to capture images of this type.. 

Photographers have the ability to record a fleeting moment in time. With the right light, good composition, an interesting subject and perfect timing, a photograph can be filled with unique emotion. The French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson is credited with originating the phrase “the decisive moment” to describe the process of photographing these situations. 

For our June program, we will watch and discuss a video by National Geographic photographer Joel Sartore, offering ideas for practicing and achieving “decisive moment” photographs. Done well, this includes understanding your subject so that you can pre-visualize the timing and the composition needed to achieve your desired image. Although Cartier-Bresson pioneered this idea in his street photography, there are many other photographic situations such as wildlife, sports, and events where the concept may apply.

Following the presentation, we will have our monthly Image Share. Club members may bring up to five images to show and discuss. These should be brought on a thumb drive or SSD. With the new monitor at the church, size your images around 4000 pixels on the long side for best presentation. 

This meeting will also be available by Zoom. Club members will receive the Zoom link by email, others may request it from abutler@mac.com . 

Virtual Shutter Therapy

For June, the Club’s Virtual Shutter Therapy topic will be “Spring Flowers”.  Our Pagosa Springs flowers are on display to attract pollinators and photographers.  Vibrant colors and a variety of sizes from tiny to bold grace our hillsides. Please take part by sharing up to three photos on the topic, as comments to the post on this topic on our Facebook page at  https://www.facebook.com/PagosaPhotoClubport . This theme is open for entries until July 6, and is open to all photographers. Like and comment on the works of others. 

Low Light Photography

The next meeting of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club will be held on February 12 at the Community United Methodist Church, 434 Lewis St. The meeting will start at 6:30 pm, but feel free to join us for socializing and discussion of various photographic topics at 6 pm. Photography Club meetings are open to the public. Please enter the Church through the side door next to the parking lot.

This month’s discussion will be on the topic of Low Light Photography. Making photos when the light is low, such as after sunset, in the deep forest, or in dimly lit interiors, has its challenges. However, modern cameras and good technique can overcome many of these and open up a new world of photographic opportunities. This month’s program will center on a 30 min video presentation on Low Light Photography by National Geographic photographer Joel Sartore. We will then discuss some of the situations where you are likely to be faced with low light, and solutions to allow making of great photographs under these challenging conditions. 

Following the program, we will have our monthly image share. Photography Club members may bring up to five images (on a flash drive) each to share and discuss. This meeting will also be available on Zoom for those who can’t attend in person. If you are not a Club member, contact abutler@mac.com for the Zoom link.

Virtual Shutter Therapy—Minimalism

Each month the Photography Club sponsors a Virtual Shutter Therapy session on our Facebook page. For the February topic, explore the art of minimalism through your lens. Focus on simplicity, negative space, and intentional composition. Highlight subtle details, clean lines, or a single striking subject. Use light and shadow to emphasize your vision. Let less tell more—what story can you convey with only the essentials? Before March 2, please share up to three photos by commenting on the post on this theme at the Club’s Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/PagosaPhotoClub. This challenge is open to all photographers, whether a Club member or not. Please show your appreciation by liking and commenting on the works of others. 

Photography Club Membership

Did you get a new camera or lens for Christmas? If so, joining the Photography Club would be a great way to get tips on using your gear and learn more about photography. The Pagosa Springs Photography Club is open to everyone who loves making and viewing great photos. Our members use cameras of all types, from smartphones to medium format. Benefits of membership include our educational programs, image sharing and discussion, photo outings, and contests to help each other improve our photography. Club membership is just $25/year. You can apply for membership on our website at https://pagosaspringsphotoclub.org/about/, or at one of our meetings. 

PSPC Oct 9 Meeting-Astrophotography

M-31 (Andromeda) © David Duquemin

The October meeting of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club will be held on Wednesday, October 9, at the Community United Methodist Church, 434 Lewis St. While the meeting will start at 6:30 pm, feel free to join us for socializing at 6 pm. Photography Club meetings are open to the public. Please enter the Church through the side door next to the parking lot. This month’s presentation will feature Dave Duquemin, speaking on Astrophotography. 

In his presentation, Dave will explain how he photographs deep space objects including distant galaxies like M-31 (Andromeda). Dave is a retired commercial airline pilot. He is a member of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club, and also enjoys building and flying airplanes. 

The presentation will be followed by our monthly image share. Photography Club members may bring up to five images each to share and discuss. This meeting will also be available on Zoom for those who can’t attend in person. The Zoom link will be emailed to members; others who wish to attend may request the link by email to abutler@mac.com .

AI in Photography, August 14

Night sky at Chimney Rock, de-noised using AI (© Dave Anderson)

The August  meeting of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club will be held on Wednesday, August 14, at the Community United Methodist Church, 434 Lewis St. Join us for social time at 6 pm; the meeting will start at 6:30 pm. Please enter the Church through the side door next to the parking lot. This month’s presentation will feature Dave Anderson, speaking about Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Photography. 

Artificial intelligence (AI) is now in common use in digital photography. One example of AI use is adding functionality to digital cameras including face, eye, and other subject recognition and tracking, scene recognition, and intelligent automatic cameras. AI is also used for post-processing images, including reducing noise, sharpening, digital enlargement and removing minor imperfections. Generative AI is being combined with digital photographic images to add, delete, replace or modify objects, to expand overly-cropped images, turn single images into panoramas, change the image background, or to change the style of a photographer’s images, blurring the line between photography and digital art. Dave’s presentation will discuss the main AI approach to image analysis and classification, Convolutional Neural Networks. He will also cover use of two generative AI approaches to image modification, Generative Adversarial Networks and Diffusion models, as well as AI-based defensive measures to combat uninvited image web-scraping for training sets. A number of examples will be used to illustrate these approaches.

Dave Anderson has a wide range of experience in photography, from film to digital imaging and uses both medium format and standard dSLRs. He has been a member of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club for several years.

The presentation will be followed by our monthly image share, for which Photography Club members may bring up to five images each to share and discuss. This meeting will also be available on Zoom. The Zoom link will be emailed to members; others who wish to attend may request the link by email to abutler@mac.com .

The Pagosa Springs Photography Club welcomes everyone who enjoys making and viewing great photography to join us. The Club sponsors educational programs, image sharing and discussion, and outings to help our members improve their photography.  For more information about the Club, and to download a membership application, visit our website at https://pagosaspringsphotoclub.org/about/ .

2D Photography-June Meeting

The June meeting of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club will be held on Wednesday June 12, at the Community United Methodist Church, 434 Lewis St. We will begin with social time at 6 pm, and the meeting will start at 6:30 pm. This month’s presentation will be by Joe Sinclair.  Joe will discuss techniques and tips for photographing flat subjects, or 2D Photography, such as documents or paintings. 

Joe Sinclair has been a member of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club for several years. In addition, he is a member of the Napa Valley Photographic Society in California. He has been photographing for 60 years with both film and digital cameras, and has received numerous awards for his photos. As photographers, it is often a challenge to represent our three dimensional world in a two dimensional photograph. However, in this presentation, Joe will discuss the challenge of accurately photographing two dimensional subjects. He will explore techniques and considerations for two-dimensional photography (photography of flat objects) that while simple to do are important to understand. The talk will then relate two-dimensional photography to normal photography, an understanding that is very useful for improving one’s skills as a photographer.

The presentation will be followed by our member’s image share. Photo Club members may bring up to five images to show and discuss with the group. Please bring these on a thumb drive. They should be saved as jpeg files of at least 2000 pixels on the long edge. 

This meeting will also be available on Zoom. The Zoom link will be emailed to members; others who wish to attend may request the link by email to abutler@mac.com .

The Pagosa Springs Photography Club welcomes everyone who enjoys making and viewing great photography. The Club sponsors educational programs, images sharing and discussion, and outings to help our members improve their photography.  For more information about the Club, and to download a membership application, visit our website at https://pagosaspringsphotoclub.org/about/ .

Masking in Lightroom

The February meeting of the Pagosa Springs Photography Club will be held on Feb 14 at the Community United Methodist Church. Come at 6 PM for socializing; the presentation will begin at 6:30 PM. This month, we will have a presentation by Doug Coombs on Masking in Lightroom.

Lightroom (LR) introduced very powerful new masking tools in October of 2022. Learning to use these new tools is a game changer for photographers who are serious about post processing. Before this, LR had masking but it was not nearly as powerful as tools in Photoshop (PS). When you shoot a photo with your phone, the manufacturer’s software is using sophisticated algorithms to post-process it. If you shoot .jpg in your camera, your camera is doing the same. Ansel Adams was a master at post-processing in the darkroom and altered his original image greatly to take it beyond journalism to fine art. 

Moonrise Over Hernandez – Ansel Adams

See https://petapixel.com/2018/11/07/the-story-behind-ansel-adams-iconic-moonrise-hernandez/ for an article on Moonrise Over Hernandez, one of Ansel Adams’ most famous photos.

Today we can do much more, with more control and more options digitally, which has raised the bar considerably. People used to ask me if a photo was “photoshopped”, as if post-processing in Photoshop (PS) is somehow cheating. All fine art photos of all sorts have been post-processed from the beginning of photography, at least to adjust overall light balance, contrast and emphasis. LR and Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) use the same photo processing engine. LR is separate from PS and includes many photography-specific tools. PS incorporates ACR with many additional tools in PS itself, often used after post-processing in ACR. In terms of processing a raw photo, ACR and LR are basically equivalent. Doug will discuss the masking tool in LR and ACR from the LR perspective and then demonstrate how he has processed some photos using LR masking. It is not uncommon for him to use multiple masks in a photo. Each mask is considered a local adjustment and emphasizes some particular aspect of the photo. It could be an animal’s eye, head or portion of its body. It could be the sky, foreground or band of vegetation in a landscape. It could be part of a person’s face including eyes, lips, teeth, cheeks and more. Doug  will provide useful links from YouTube at his presentation.

Even if you don’t use LR or ACR, masking is a universal tool found in other post-processing software, so this presentation should be useful.

The photo of the eagle below, has four masks.

The naturescape below, has three masks.

This program will also be available via Zoom. Members will receive an email with the Zoom link, others may request it by email (abutler@mac.com).

The Pagosa Springs Photography Club welcomes all who enjoy making and viewing great photography. The Club sponsors educational programs and outings to help photographers hone their skills.  For more information about the club, and to download a membership application, visit our website at https://pagosaspringsphotoclub.org/about/ .