Lowepro Slingshot camera bag

Since I love this camera bag so much, I thought I'd write about it and spread the love (to my massive readership of like 4 people).

I use the Lowepro Slingshot 200 AW (the AW is for All Weather).



As its name alludes, it's a sling-style bag that only has one strap. If you're wearing it and need to get to your camera, you just rotate the bag from it's position on your back to right in front of you, just like in the third photo above. You unzip a flap that gives you easy access to your camera. It also opens up all the way like in the second photo for full access. I take this bag everywhere with me, and it performed flawlessly on a pretty rigorous 3 week trip through Italy. It also has a small pocket at the bottom where the nylon cover sits out of the way when you're not using it, but when it starts to rain, you can pull it out and cover the entire bag in just a few seconds to keep the moisture out.

I "de-badged" mine so that it has no mention of Lowepro on it anymore, just to make it look more generic and so it doesn't scream "I'm a camera bag, come steal me!".

My only small nit with the bag is that the seam on the nylon cover is starting to come apart where the stitching is, which started before I had hardly even used it.

I bought mine from Amazon. The Lowepro 200 works the best for me, but they sell it in 3 sizes (100, 200, 300).

Colorsplash flash by Lomography

For only $35, you can buy this flash and add some really wild color to your images. Here are some examples from a fellow flickr user in the flickr d200 users group.

From Lomography's site:

A patented colorwheel system puts several colored flash filters at your finger tips for instant selection; with additional filters included to exchange within the wheel. Using a variety of techniques, the Colorsplash Flash will vigorously slap a burst of color onto your glowing long exposures, deer-caught-in-headlights instant shots, or bright high-contrast daytime images. Play with different perspectives, color tones, exposure times, and light situations for an endless variety of gorgeous outcomes.

Also, they can be bought on eBay for slightly cheaper.

Apparently the Colorsplash works with the standard hot shoe on most cameras.

46 useful photoshop shortcuts, in two parts

From digital-photography-school.com:

• 18 Exceptionally Useful Photoshop Shortcuts
• 28 More Exceptionally Useful Photoshop Shortcuts

Also, don't forget to read through the comments at the bottom of these posts for even more user-submitted tips & tricks.

Battery caddy

These battery holders seem like an effective way to carry backup batteries for flashes or what have you. If you're someone who shoots weddings these could save you some precious seconds if you need to do a quick-change.

http://www.personalbatterycaddy.com/html/SlimLine.htm

Quoted from personalbatterycaddy.com (empasis mine):

• Six different versions hold 4-9V, 4-AA, 6-AAA, 4-C, 4-D, or 4-CR123 batteries.
• Store your batteries in a compact, easy to find caddy.
• Originally designed for pilots, but also great for camping, boating, travel or at home.
• Dispenses batteries with one hand for safety and convenience.
• Terminal protection at both ends regardless of how the battery is inserted.
• Made of high quality engineered plastic.

Best time of day for photography?

sunrisesunset.com will let you create monthly calendars for most major cities that show times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, moonset, and twilight (civil, nautical, and astronomical).

http://sunrisesunset.com/

Here's an example for San Francisco in September.

photo textures from Jesh de Rox

Jesh de Rox sells a texture package that allows you to change the way your photos look by applying textures to your photos in post-processing. His home page contains a flash slideshow of before/after shots that are pretty incredible. Some of the examples go from looking like a pretty typical wedding photo to looking like a painting that I could see myself hanging on my wall.

From his site:

"you are purchasing 35 high-res Texture image files used in Jesh de Rox's award winning experiential post processing style, as well as the license to use them for personal and commercial photographs and/or art pieces."

Really cool stuff. I'm not very proficient with Photoshop myself at this point, but it does mention that the texture set comes with a short instructional video to help get you started, although they suggest taking one of their workshops to get the full experience.

http://finearttextures.com/

How to get a D200 into 'Bulb' mode

I imagine this wasn't hard to do for most D200 owners. Apparently, I'm not like most D200 owners. It took me a while to figure out how to get the damn thing into Bulb mode.

Here's what to do:

Hold down your Mode button and turn the rear thumb dial (on the right side-top of the back of the camera) until you see the letter M appear in the top lcd display. Let both buttons go. Now you're in Manual mode. Next, and this is the part that took me a while to figure out, you'll need to turn the same rear thumb dial to the left until you see BULB appear in the lcd. This may take a while, depending on how your camera was set before trying this. Don't lose hope... it's in there, you just may need to turn it like 20-30 clicks. The thing is, you probably noticed that if you just start turning the dial, nothing happens. Before your turns actually start doing anything, you have to first activate the auto-focus by either tapping the shutter button halfway or by hitting the "AF-ON" button right to the left of the rear thumb dial. Once you've done one of these, you can start turning the thumb dial and make your way to BULB.

If you're wondering why you would even want to use BULB mode, I use this mode to do long exposure shots at night. It allows me to hold the shutter open for as long as I want, and get cool light-trail effects, which can be seen in the shot below.