Photo Walks Today

Tamron has several free podcasts by leading pehotographers. These podcasts cover a wide variety of subjects including nature, wedding and portrait photography.

Check them out at: http://www.tamron.com/lenses/learning_center/pro_learning_center_podcasts.asp

Photoshop Express Beta Update
Adobe is offering free photo editing software online

   Adobe has created a web 2.0  community based application for sharing photos. You can upload your photos to the site and share them with others online, much like Flickr.com or Smugmug.com -(Free Smugmug Trial).
There’s nothing really new there, however the thing that makes the Photoshop Expresssite unique is the free photo editing they provide. If you’ve been wondering about Photoshop Elements the tools are like an Element lite version. It’s a great way to trial the Elements software.
 
   To make the site even more sharing friendly – Adobe just announced some major improvements.
    1) Flickr intergration Now you can pull photos from your Flickr photostream or album into Photoshop Expressfix them up and then return the fixed up version to your Flickr account.

   2) Enbeddable player You can now create slideshows and post them on Facebook, MySpace and other sites.

   3) Save As  Now you can create many different versions of the same photo and save them all in your album.

Have some fun, again Adobe is offering this service for free with up to 2GB of storage space.

PS – here’s a link to a Free Smugmug Trial

Deception Pass Whidbey Island Washigton 

Whidbey Island is a beautiful place to take your camera for a day hike or a weekend trek. There are many parks, campgrounds to focus on. There is an insiders guide to Whidbey Island, including maps and locations called the Flatlanders Guide To Whidbey Island available for free download. It’s a great place to start when planning your photo trek on the island.

If you enjoy photographing birds the Whidbey Audubon Society’s Guide To 15 Special Spots On Whidbey  includes a map and the birds you might find.

Don’t forget the floria as well. On a recent trip I found these gems growing amoung the rocks along the shore.

    A guide to the parks and recreaction can be found here - and don’t forget the visitors booth as you leave Clinton it’ll have up to date maps and information.

Give Away Of The Day Today Is Image Mender:

Grab your copy now and install it on your computer today – you can decide if you want to use it or not later!

Giveaway of the Day – Image Mender
 May 17, 2008
Image Mender – the program allows you to remove any lines or blemishes on your images and it also helps you to remove larger marks, logos or any other undesirable elements. Image Mender is easy to use.

The clear and user-friendly interface of the program enables you to work. You just need to highlight the part of the image you would like to correct, and then Image Mender will do the rest. After editing, you can save it in the desired format.

Major functions:
Intellectual reconstruction – the program reconstructs the image under the cleared spot so fine that the traces are hardly noticeable even after the removal of large fragments;
Ease of use – operating Image Mender is a lot simpler than operating Photoshop Clone Tool. You only need to select the fragment to be removed from the image;
Supporting various formats – the program supports the following formats: JPEG, TIFF, BMP, PNG, TGA, MNG, RAS, RAW, JP2, JPC, PCX;
High performance – the program is written completely in the C++ language, which ensures its high performance.

Find It Here: http://www.giveawayoftheday.com:80/image-mender/

Here’s a list of five places to practice your photo skills without leaving the Seattle Metro area.

1. Discovery Park - with it’s miles of nature trails, views of the Puget Sound and West Point Lighthouse this makes a great place to take photographs year round.

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2. Saint Edward State Park - nature trails, dog walkers and views of North Lake Washington makes this an ideal location to try out macro photography as well as testing your longer lens as the floating planes take off and land at the Kenmore airport.

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3. Seattle Arboretum – What’s to say about one of the most beautiful parks in the city? Every tree is a work of art. Combine that with ivy covered bridges, views of Lake Washington an occasional group of youngsters in that age old summer tradition of swinging from a tree into the water – you have the picture perfect subjects.

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4. Alki Beach – This is where the photographers go – day and night - to capture those Cityscapes you see on every postcard. I love to capture the city at night, and the skyline has changed since I first took my camera there one evening in the late 1980’s.

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5. Lincoln Park – With the Fauntleroy Ferry docking here this is a great place to capture a Puget Sound tradition – a photo of the Ferry. There is a bike/walking trail that runs along the water. While the trail itself is busy at times and not much to look at – the west facing view makes it a great place to capture a sunset over the Puget Sound.

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