Last year I signed on to do the show notes along with Tom Newman who hosts his own podcast called the FogView Podcast. Each week, Tom and I take turns transcribing the contents of the show and posting the notes on www.twiplog.com. Each show is approximately 1 hr 1.5 hrs in length and features a regular cast of characters. I also do the show notes for Scott Bourne’s PhotoFocus podcast which comes out on the 5th, 15th and 25th of each month. The Photofocus podcast is dedicated to answering listener questions about photography. I have learned so much from listening to theses podcasts and picked up some great tips which I’ve incorporated into my own work. I highly encourage other photographers to subscribe to these podcasts and check out their companion websites for tons of great information.

• Listen to the podcast: This Week in Photography 116 – Filter Fight
• Subscribe to the TWiP podcast

On this week’s show, a listener question got us into a discussion regarding U/V filters and whether there is any point in having them on your lens.  I do have protective filters for most of my lenses however I don’t use them all the time. There are some who argue that it doesn’t make any sense to put a $100 filter in front of a $2000 piece of glass as it will degrade the image quality particularly in certain lighting conditions where you may get flair if light is entering from the side of your lens.  If I am indoors or shooting under relatively controlled conditions where I’m not concerned about something damaging the front of my lens element, I have typically removed the filter to avoid any chance of degrading the quality of my images. I tend to use my lens hood at all times which I find provides me with adequate protection. If I’m headed outdoors or into a situation where there might be a chance of something striking the front element of my lens, then I typically will put the filters back on. One thing I forgot to mention on the podcast is that the one filter that I use frequently when shooting landscapes is a circular polarizing filter. These filters can help cut down reflections on things like water, ice, etc. They also help to increase the contrast in a scene however you will lose a stop to two stops with most polarizing filters. The circular polarizing filter is also the one filter in your bag that you can’t replicate using something like Photoshop as it actually changes the quality of light before it hits your lens. For a more technical description, Wikipedia has an article on filters which explains how a polarizing filter works in more detail. If you are going to invest in any filters, this should be the one you have in your bag for sure. In terms of brand, I like to use the B+W filters which you can buy from most photography stores or order online from B+H Photo.

What’s your take on filters? Do you use them? Have you noticed a difference in image quality when you use them? Feel free to leave comments on the topic below.

Just noticed today on Canon’s website that they have released a firmware  update for the 40D which happens to be the camera I currently shoot with (although I’m hoping a 5D Mark II will be in my future soon). Here are the details on the update from Canon’s site:

Firmware update Version 1.1.1 incorporates the following fixes and improvements.

1. Fixes a malfunction that in rare occurrence causes a low battery indication to be displayed when using the EF 85mm F1.2L II USM lens. Depending on the battery check timing of the camera, the battery level displayed on the camera’s LCD data panel may shows Battery will be exhausted soon or Battery must be recharged, even though the battery capacity is sufficient.
2. Fixes a malfunction that in rare occurrence causes an Err 06 Self Cleaning Sensor malfunction to appear on the camera’s LCD monitor and LCD data panel, even when the Self Cleaning Sensor Unit is operating normally. This message may appear depending on the timing of when the camera is switch to the ON position.
3. Fixes a malfunction that prevents correct colors from being printed when direct printing. RAW images captured using the camera’s custom Picture Styles (Emerald, etc.), which have been downloaded from Canon’s Web site and registered under User Def. 2 or User Def. 3.
4. Modifies the level of subject brightness that causes the AF-assist beam to fire when using an external Speedlite.
5. Enables an external flash connected to the camera’s synchro terminal to fire even when the camera’s built-in flash is popped up.

For those wondering what a firmware update it, basically it’s an update to the software that runs on the camera. Sometimes these updates can provide new functionality to the camera while in most cases they are released to fix bugs that were discovered after the camera was released. Updating the firmware is actually quite straightforward for anyone with a little bit of computer knowledge.

Updating your camera consists of downloading the update to your computer, transferring the file to your camera’s memory card, and then inserting the card into your camera and selecting to update the firmware in the Camera’s menu. In the case of Canon you can also upgrade the firmware by connecting the camera to your computer and using the EOS Utility that shipped with your camera to install the update.

If you haven’t upgraded the firmware in your camera since you bought it, I would recommend checking the version of your firmware and upgrading if you are on an older version to ensure that you are getting the most out of your camera and not compromising your images as a result of any software bugs.

After reading about this, the first thing I wondered was why this company didn’t have an off-site backup? The golden rule when it comes to backups is that if you don’t have a backup in two different physical locations – you do not have a backup. Having a local backup is important to protect you in the event of a hardware failure, data corruption, accidental deletion, etc. However, a local backup is not enough to protect you from things like break-ins, fire, flood, or other acts of god. Thus the reason for the second backup which is stored in a different physical location.

For those who are curious, here is my backup strategy. I have a main desktop PC where I do most of my photo editing. I also have a laptop that I take on the road and use when I meet with clients, etc. In my desktop PC, I have three separate drives where I store all my photos. After a shoot, I create two folders organized by date – one on my main drive and one on a removable drive. I then import my photos using Lightroom 2.0 and use the automatic copy feature to place a 2nd copy on my removable drive.

Once this process is complete, I have a Windows Home Server with 1.5 TB of storage space. My main PC is setup to automatically backup every night so any photos I upload that day are backed up to the server automatically. On my WHS, I use the folder duplication feature to ensure that the data is backed up across at least 2 separate drives. I now have copies of my photos on 4 separate drives. Time permitting I will also burn a DVD of the most important images – particularly any client work that I’m being paid for. That takes care of my local copies.

For my offsite backup, my current method is a bit of a mishmash that needs some work but I make sure my photos always exist in two separate locations. First, I backup the jpgs of my most important stuff on Flickr and to my own website. Then, I have two removable drives plus a hard drive toaster with a 1 TB drive that I use to backup my Raw files. Every few days, I update these removable drives with the folders I’ve added since my last backup. Two of these drives come with me almost wherever I go – usually to my office or I carry them with me in my laptop bag. The third drive I leave at my parent’s house and then bring it back home to update it every month or so. I realize that this isn’t ideal but I figure the odds of the house burning down or being broken into on the same day that I have that drive at home is pretty slim. Having said that, I have just signed up for Amazon’s S3 service and will be setting up my WHS to do a backup of itself to Amazon’s web servers. Then, if disaster strikes, I will always have a copy up in the cloud that I would be able to access.

Am I being anal about backups? Perhaps. But I’d rather be overly anal than wind up losing a client’s photos or my own personal photos. Once those images are gone they are gone forever so even if you are not earning money from your photography, ask yourself how valuable are those moments to you and can you afford to lose them?

Blogs & Websites

• http://www.twipphoto.com – Home of This Week in Photography
• http://strobist.blogspot.com/ – the site to visit to learn all about off-camera lighting
• http://www.scottkelby.com/blog/2008/archives/2733 – Photoshop guru Scott Kelby’s blog
• http://luminous-landscape.com/ – the web’s most comprehensive site devoted to the art of landscape, nature and documentary photography
• http://photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com/ – a humorous look at bad applications of Photoshop
• http://www.dpreview.com – the site for reviews of photography equipment

Twitter

• www.twitter.com/scottbourne – from This Week in Photography
• www.twitter.com/frederickvan – formerly from Adobe and a contributor to TWiP
• www.twitter.com/halfpress – Aaron Mahler – producer of TWiP
• http://twitter.com/stevesimon – contributor to TWiP
• http://twitter.com/lisabettany – Mostly Lisa
• http://twitter.com/RobertEvans – commerical and wedding photographer
• http://twitter.com/robnlauren – amazing wedding photographers from Edmonton