My Top 5 Favorite Features In The New Photoshop CC 2019 Update

So Adobe just released their new updates for the Creative Suite, and of course I jumped right in to Photoshop to see all the new features.  There were a lot of them in this update, though some were quite minor, and overall there was nothing completely game changing; however there's still plenty of things to get excited about in the new update.

Here's the video I made about my top 5 favorite updates, and how I use them.

How To Photograph Lightning!

So it's monsoon season in the southwest, which means lightning!!!  I recently shot a few timelapses and stills of lightning, and they went viral.  Then of course, I got many requests for a lightning tutorial, so here it is!

And for those who don't want the video, here's a written version with the breakdown:

How to photograph lightning: Cheat Sheet

*Remember, this is NOT the perfect settings for every lightning scenario, it’s meant as a starting point and general guideline!

Before you go:

·         Check the weather, look for smaller storm cells if possible

·         Check the lightning strike map

·         Fill your gas tank

·         Bring RAIN GEAR

·         Water and snacks

·         Extra batteries

Once you’re there:

·         Try to stay 5 – 15 miles away from the cell

·         Pay attention to direction the storm is moving.

·         Staying BEHIND or to the side opposite cell movement is good for your health

·         If in front of cell, be prepared to move quickly

·         Lens hoods can help keep some rain off, especially if you don’t point the lens up at an angle (this only works with no filters or round filters of the same diameter)

Camera settings

·         Shoot in Manual mode

·         Your ideal shutter starting place should usually be between 1-10 sec (longer if super dark out).

·         If it’s daytime, use an ND Filter. Here are some different options for both round and square filters, for all budgets:  *Square filters require a filter holder; make sure you get the right one for which ever system you choose! (I will have more videos about square filters soon.  Here’s a very short video I did about a cheap square filter system

o   Round 10 stop

o   Round 3 stop (you can stack filters too if needed)

o   Cheap Square 10 stop

o   Mid Price Square 10 stop

o   High End Square 10 Stop (also comes in 6 and 15 stop versions)

o   10 Stop ND for Phones , Phone Filter Holder  

o   Here’s a video about ND and Polarizer Filters I did a while back

o   Here’s a video about How to use filters with phones

·         Aim for an exposure that’s a little UNDEREXPOSED (1-2stops), especially in daytime conditions; this will help ensure the lightning is not drowned out in the ambient light, and that the lightning will not be overexposed if it’s dark out.

·         Start with a low ISO ~100

·         Set your Aperture to whatever it needs to be to accommodate the ideal shutter and ISO (and remember to err on the side of slightly underexposed)

·          Set your focus and then lock it down to manual focus (using live view and zooming in to nail infinity is a great way to do this)

·         The longer your focal length, the shorter you’ll want your shutter speed, to help reduce camera shake, e.g., if using a big telephoto, like 200+mm, then you’ll want to keep it around 1-2 seconds tops, shorter if you’re greater than 200mm.  The most I tried, with varying success was 300mm at 1 sec, and 400mm at 0.5 sec (400mm at 1 sec produced a couple of useable shots, but not many) Take wind in to consideration too, especially for longer shutter speeds. 

·         Have a solid, steady tripod

o   Add weight to it by hanging your gear bag or a bag of sand/rocks/anything with significant weight, or hold it down if necessary

For timelapses:

·         Get an intervalometer if your camera does not have a built in one.

o   Here are a few that I recommend:

§  Cheap Intervalometer (make sure to get one that works with your camera)

§  Alpine Labs Spark (my secondary choice)

§  Alpine Labs Pulse (My main controller)

§  There are many many others out there; these are just what I use.

·         Set your intervals to 1-2 seconds LONGER than your actual shutter time, e.g. if your shutter is 5 sec then set your interval time to 6-7 seconds.  This is important!

·         For a solid timelapse you want at bare minimum 150-200 shots, I usually do 300 or more, but that’s just me…I love timelapses, and they are my business.

BONUS: Editing multiple lightning images

Here is the link for my tutorial on this.  It’s VERY EASY!

That’s about it!  You should be totally ready go chase Thor down and capture some EPIC lightning images!

Be sure to follow me on Instagram and Facebook to see more of my lightning images, and everything else I’m up to!  And tag me on Instagram @lightbendersvisuals if you get some awesome shots, I’d love to see them!  Thanks for making it this far, and good luck shooting lightning…don’t get zapped…

Photographing The Stars With A Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus

So I've done a few videos on the cameras and photography abilities of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 and S9 Plus on my YouTube channel and I keep getting comments and requests to do a video about if they can shoot the night sky.  Well I finally went out the other night to test it and made a little video about it.

Here's the video if you'd rather watch than read:

So I went into it thinking that it would be pretty bad and that the phone image just wouldn't work out or hold up at all.  Well, I was kind of wrong.  First off, I didn't have good conditions for shooting stars, since the moon was out and 80% full, and the Milky Way wasn't scheduled to show above the horizon until after midnight, and I couldn't stay out that late that night.  Barring those two issues, I was surprised at how well the phone did, despite its limitations.  The biggest limitation I was bummed about is the fact that even in Pro Mode, the S9 Plus only has a max shutter speed of 10 sec.  There's absolutely no reason for that.  They could have easily set it to 30 sec, which would have made this a much more capable and desirable night shooting phone. The other limitation is the S9 Plus only has a max ISO of 800.  I mean, you really wouldn't want to max out a phone's ISO anyways, the sensor is just so small and it would look absolutely horrible.

So just for fun, I decided to compare my phone to my Canon 5D4 and 1DX2.  I think we all know which came out on top for that one, but I'll post the images anyways.  For the comparison, I set both cameras to roughly the same settings.  

Galaxy S9 Plus image (above) settings: Pro Mode, f/1.5, 10 sec, ISO 200, manual white balance, and manual focus.  

Canon 5D4 image (above) settings: f/4, 10 sec, ISO 200

Canon 1DX2 image (above) settings: f/2.8, 10 sec, ISO 200

Obviously, the DSLRs win on everything, but I was surprised the S9 Plus image didn't look too bad.  Another thing to note here is the lenses, I didn't have the same lenses for the DSLRs, and obviously the phone's camera lens is much less quality than the real lenses.  So this was in no way a scientific test at all, it was just for fun. So you can actually get some night shots with a smartphone.  I plan on going back out and trying again during the new moon and when the milky way is up, so be on the lookout for that video and blog!  Oh and if you like this kind of stuff and want to see more, then definitely go check out my YouTube channel and subscribe there, because I post at least 2 videos every week and there's a lot more content.  I try to keep the blog going and updated, but sometimes it falls behind.  So go subscribe to my YouTube and follow me on Instagram for more daily stuff!