Advanced Digital Imaging | Jeff Curto

Photo 1250 - Advanced Digital Imaging - College of DuPage

Jeff Curto | Office: Arts Center 274 | 630.942.2527 | curtoj@cod.edu

Syllabus for this course (PDF)

Below are some links that you will find useful to you in this class. I'll refer to this website frequently, so you may want to bookmark it.

For more general Photoshop and Digital Photography related links, visit the page for my Photo 1201, Tools & Techniques for Digital Photography class

Use the pop-up menu below to jump to a link category:

Color Management Links:

Color Printing:

Apple Pro Color - An excellent introduction to the topic of color
CS3 Video Tutorials - Adobe has teamed up with Lynda.com to provide some excellent free tutorials for the CS3 suite
Color Management - A Dutch site that has some great info. Parts in English
DP BestFlow - ASMP's excellent site that helps you find a workflow that works for you
Kuler - Adobe's very cool online color exploration software and it's FREE!
Cambridge In Color - A neat page of color management and general digital photo info
Download Profiles - InkjetArt.com's page of ICC profiles for use in a variety of printers with "non-standard" (read: non-Epson) papers
ColorVision Color Basics - Good info about understanding color
Cathy's Profiles - Cathy makes profiles for your digital devices
Introduction to Color Management - From Dry Creek Photo, a great intro to color management concepts
Bruce Fraser on Color Spaces - A nice overview of wide-gamut spaces and why they are useful.
X-Rite Systems Classroom - Great learning tools for color management
ColorMatters This is a really wonderful site that is ALL about the art and science of color
Color-Correct Vocabulary - Bruce Fraser presents an excellent overview of the terminology associated with Color Management
Chromix - An excellent site that covers color management from start to finish
Colour Physics FAQ - Got a question about color? Find your answer here
digitaldog.net - Andrew Rodney, color guru, is The Digital Dog
International Color Consortium - The ICC's home
Understanding ProPhoto RGB - A great article about howthis large-gamut color space is great for photographers
Color Management in Photoshop CS5 - Jeff's "handout" on managing color (PDF) For anyone using Photoshop CS4, here's the older version of the handout that's specifically for Photoshop CS4
Color Test Image - Use this image to help you compare output sources:
- as a JPEG file (about 550KB)
- as a TIFF file (about 11.2MB)

B&W Printing:

B&W Digital Printing - Clayton Jones' excellent series of articles that give an overview of black and white digital printing and related issues
QuadTone RIP - Harrington's QuadTone RIP; an inexpensive solution to B&W printing with inkjet printers
Piezography.com - One of the standard-bearers for high-quality B&W printing
Paul Roark - Roark had done a lot for the B&W fine print world; here's his great page of B&W info
MIS inks - Perhaps the easiest entry into B&W inkjet printing

Printed Output Links:

These are some (but not all) options for you for printing at an outside service provider:

Local:

P.J.'s Camera - Our pals right here in Glen Ellyn (Dry Creek profiles available)
Advanced Imaging - A lab in Downers Grove, Illinois
Precision Imaging and Photo - A downtown Chicago print service provider (Dry Creek profiles available)
Picture Pros - This Lombard-based print service has profiles available both on their site and through Dry Creek
Lightbox - From East Dundee, IL; a high-quality print provider
Helix Color Service - In our own backyard; images can be dropped at any Helix location
Costco - Good, inexpensive prints, but you've gotta be a member (Dry Creek profiles available)
Walmart - Get your prints from Walmart or Sam's Club (must be a member of Sam's Club to use their service)
Target - Yep, you can get your photographs printed at "tar-jay"

Online:

Pictopia.com - Professional-level color output in a color-managed environment
West Coast Imaging - Professional-level color output. They know color management, too
Laser Light - High-end printing service
Nancy Scans - Nancy scans high-res and outputs BIG color prints
White House Custom Color - High-quality color printing for photographers
The Print Room - Order color prints online
Lambda for Less - 99 cents a square foot... yes, you heard that right...

Archive, Print & Sell:

Photo shelter - Archive, Buy and Sell Photographs

B&W:

The Print Lab - Custom B&W printers in Chicago
Damatian - Custom B&W printers

Resources:

Dry Creek Photo - This is cool; a website where you can get profiles for Fuji Frontier printers all over the USA!

Book Printing/Publishing Links:

Book Publishers - You will use one of these services to create your book project book:

Aperture - Apple's Aperture software provides a very high-quality book production environment that is very, very flexible.

MyPublisher - An online "one-off" book publishing service. Truth be told, Apple's iPhoto book service uses MyPublisher to print their books. A fairly simple process to make a book.

Blurb - Another online "one-off" book publishing service. Very high-quality books and standalone software for both Macs and PCs. Lots of options, tons of layouts and designs. Probably one of the best choices for making books. They also offer an online sales option for your published books.
- Step-By-Step Video guide - Blurb has a great video tutorial on making a book
- Scan it like you mean it - A nice post from the Blurb Blog about scanning things other than photographs to make your book
- Blurb's webinar on color management in Blurb & Photoshop - a bit of a review for students in this class for the first half of the presentation, but the last half is solid info about how to get the best color in your Blurb book.
- Blurb Lightroom plugin - use your Lightroom Library in Blurb's software
- Blurb's Photo Book Now competition - Check out the entries in the student book category here
- How to Sequence your images - great advice from Blurb
- Prepping your images for Blurb books - resolution and more
- Type for your book - Blurb's articles on typography Part 1 and Part 2
- Blurb tips and tricks - some neat tidbits about using their software
A&I Books - An interesting-looking, high-quality on-demand publisher
Book service comparison article redux - Another really good comparison of various book publishing companies
Pikto - Another photo book publisher
Printing Industry Terms - Don't knowyour bleed from your blueline? Check here!

Other Options and Ideas:

Democratic Books - Not a book printing place per se, but something you might think about on down the road
How to make a Chapbook - A nice tutorial in 2 parts: Part 1 & Part 2
Russell Brown on Handmade books via Photoshop: You've got to scroll down to the books section of the page (nearly to the bottom) to see these nice movies about a neat idea

Web Publishing Links:

Web Image Demo - The "web image basics" demo pages used in class
10 Secrets to Successful Online Portfolios - great advice from photographer website provider Photoshelter.
Build a better online portfolio - A good webinar from PhotoShelter
7 Rules for creating a professional portfolio site - a good set of guidelines
How to make a website - A start-to-finish guide
Designing a Better Portfolio Website - Part 1 & Part 2 - Great advice on the process

Authoring Web Galleries in Lightroom & Aperture:

Though they aren't "websites" because they offer no comprehensive navigation features, Bridge/Photoshop and Lightroom can build web galleries. With a little html gruntwork, you can make those galleries into a website.

Lightroom - Lightroom can output a nice web gallery. A third-party company makes this interesting looking plugin for Lightroom that makes more complex web pages
Aperture - A nice video from the mothership about how to create a web gallery in Aperture

Other Simple Web Authoring Software:

Free Desktop Software:

SimpleViewer - Free flash-based web galleries. Installed on our Macs (Mac & Win)
PostcardViewer - The same folks who make SimpleViewer also makes this spiffy little flash gizmo (Mac & Win)
Weebly - A freebie website solution

Pay-For-It Software:

Dreamweaver - It's the industry-standard (Mac & Win - Expensive)
RapidWeaver - A good, inexpensive ($40) template based web authoring solution. (Mac-only)
Shozam! - A $30 Windows web gallery solution, albeit with a stupid name (Win-only)

Services for Building and Hosting Photography Websites:

LiveBooks/edu - A very cool, easy-to-use website solution for student photographers
Squarespace - Customizable websites for everyone; some good options for visual creatives
PhotoShelter - "The complete solution to show and sell photography."
VisualServer - From PhotoEye comes a great-looking software/hosting solution
FolioSnap - "Self-Managed Websites for Creative People"
FolioLink - "Show and sell your work online"
ZenFolio - "The Premier Showcase for your Images"
PhotoBiz - "Josh uses it, so it must be good"
Photocrati - Highly customizable templates that are based on WordPress
FolioMob - "Mobie Friendly Portfolio Websites for Professional Photographers"

Blogging Platforms:

WordPress

WordPress comes in two different "Versions," each with its own set of web pages, support sites, etc. The two versions are based on exactly the same technology, but with different capabilities. Think of it them as "Lite"(WordPress.COM) and "Regular" (WordPress.ORG) versions of the same product.

WordPress Version 1:

WordPress.COM - The "Lite" version of WordPress. It's free, and it's hosted on the servers at WordPress. This is by far the easiest way to get started in WordPress; you can be up and running a blog in minutes.

To get started, you create an account with WordPress. That account creates your "WordPress User," and from that account you can create as many WordPress.com blogs as you want. So, the name of your blog can be different from your user name.

Another feature of your WordPress.com user name is that it can be used by other bloggers to give you the correct permissions to allow you to author articles on another blog.

All WordPress.com blogs have a web address that looks like this: http://yourblogname.wordpress.com. It's possible to "tie" a WordPress.COM blog to a custom domain name like www.myblogname.com, but you have to pay a fee for that privilege, something WordPress.COM offers as an "upgrade."

Also note that with WordPress.COM sites, if you are planning to use one as a host for a Podcast, you'll need to find another online space (like Libsyn) to host your Podcast files.

There are some ways that a WordPress.COM blog can be extended and changed, but you can only choose from a somewhat limited set of options that include a few very useful "Widgets" for the sidebar of your blog and around 70 "Themes" that change the appearance of your blog.

WordPress.COM offers a great set of support pages, including Getting Started with WordPress.com - A guide to the simple setup for WordPress.com

WordPress Version 2:

WordPress.ORG - The "Regular" version of WordPress. This is an "Open-Source" blogging solution with a huge community of users and developers who develop (mostly) free "plug-ins" to make WordPress do a lot more than it can do "out of the box."

This solution is substantially more flexible than the Lite "they host it" version, but... you're hosting it, so there is a bit more legwork to get WordPress installed and set up. If you are reasonably "tech savvy" the famed "WordPress 5-Minute Install" shouldn't be too daunting.

WordPress.ORG is also free, but you have to host it on your own server, not on WordPress' servers. Your hosting provider may already have it installed for you; many do. This takes a lot of the legwork out of setting up a WordPress blog. Check with your hosting provider for details. A self-hosted WordPress blog is generally considered the best blogging platform for businesses and is very, very popular.

There are hundreds and hundreds of "Widgets" available for customizing the functionality of your blog and thousands of "Themes" available for customizing the appearance of your blog.

Some support pages for setting up a self-hosted WordPress blog:

Getting Started in WordPress - A really clear "get going guide"

First Steps with WordPress - Another "get started" guide

For both "Lite" and "Regular" versions of WordPress, a fun and potentially useful tool is WordPress for iPhone which allows you to write and post (or even save as draft) blog entries from your iPhone.

Blogger

Blogger - Google's entry into the free blog-o-sphere

Getting Started with Blogger - Google's support pages
Getting Started with Blogger - A good guide from an "Educational Technology Guy"

Digital Storytelling / Movies / Slideshow Links:

Storytelling Basics:

Ira Glass, of NPR's "This American Life" on the art of storytelling; this is required watching for the class

What's the Deal with Storytelling? - A great write-up and video about storytelling from the Permission to Suck site
Vimeo Video School - Somewhat more oriented towards videography than still photography, this is a great resource
Multimedia Shooter - A weblog about still photographers who are using multimedia
Center for Digital Storytelling - Information about digital storytelling from an excellent source
Electronic Portfolios - A good resource
Producing Multimedia That Supports the Still Image - Some thoughts on producing an audio slideshow
Elements of Digital Storytelling - From the University of Minnesota School of Journalism
Digital Storytelling from the University of Houston - a great site with a ton of info; thanks Joanne B for the tip.
How to Podcast - A web page I created for a presentation I gave about Podcasting

Storyboarding Resources:

How to Storyboard - A nice short intro to the art of storyboarding
Storyboard PDF #1 - A premade storyboard in PDF format for you to download
Storyboard PDF #2 - If you don't like the layout of the first PDF, try this one
Storyboard Generator - And if you want something completely different, make your own storyboard layout with this neat online tool
Tell an story in 5 pictures - OK, this isn't really a "storyboarding" resource, but there is a Flickr group that is called "Tell a Story with 5 Pictures" that does a great job of exploring how to do series and sequence images.
Tell a story in pictures podcast - worth exploring

Software for Recording and Mixing Audio:

GarageBand - Apple's really easy to use software with which you can record your voice, create your own audio using "loops" and mix the two of them together. You could also take existing audio and mix in "voice-over" with that audio. All our Macs have GarageBand installed.
- Getting Started with GarageBand - Apple's 98 page PDF on how to use the software (don't let that scare you; it's really not that hard to use)
- Recording Audio with GarageBand - Just the basics on how to get sound into GB
- GarageBand Keyboard Shortcuts - For you Power Users

Audacity - A free, open source software for recording and editing sounds. (Mac & Win)
- Audacity Tutorial list - From the Audacity folks, a list of several good Audacity tutorials.
- Audacity Tutorial for Podcasters - Or really anyone. Just the basics, complete with some video sections. Nice.

Tips for Audio Recording :

Mastering the Craft - A great set of tutorial pages about audio from the Association of Independents in Radio. They also have some great links that can be found here
PCRecording - A nice tutorial site about how to record any audio to your computer.
Sound in the Story - A really fine long-ish (21 pages) PDF on the art of location recording, mostly from the creative standpoint (what to do as opposed to how to do it)
Digital Audio Principles - From the Lynda.com training website; some freebie samples of their online audio class
Dave Schroeder on Lynda.com - Dave Schroder's online "course" on digital audio. The first few lesson bits are free (and quite good) you've got to pay for the rest.
The Pen is Mightier than the Mic - A nice piece by an author who is making his transition to the spoken word.
Guide to Recording Voice - Nicely done tips about how to sound your best
The Voice Recipe - What's your voice like? This is a very, very cool and fun site about how we speak
Record Audio on your iPhone - The ultimate gizmo records sound!
Zoom H2 Manual - We have some Zoom H2 recording devices; here's a PDF of the user manual.
Tips for voiceover recordings- Great set of videos on placing microphones and on technique.
Microphone primer - Basic mic advice - want more? Go to the Microphone University

Great Audio (As Inspiration):

SoundPortraits.org - Amazingly good audio documentaries by an independent production company dedicated to telling stories that bring neglected American voices to a national audience
American RadioWorks - ARW is public radio's largest documentary production unit; it creates documentaries, series projects, and investigative reports for the public radio system and the Internet.

Resources for Music for your Story:

Friendly Music - This may be your best choice... great music, no copyright issues and low price
JewelBeat - Some free music and sound effects on this website
Freeplay Music - Royalty-free music that you can use in your presentations. We also have this music on our lab's Macs, loaded into iTunes.
Podsafe Audio - Music created specifically for use in Podcasts
Podsafe Music Network - More established than the above resource, another place where you can download good music created specifically for use in Podcasts or other shared media.
Triple Scoop Music - Great royalty free music, for a fee
MobyGratis - Contemporary musical artist Moby has a way you can use some of his music for free in non-profit presentations.
Copyrights, Digital Files and your Slideshow - A nice copyright primer from the Photo to Movie folks
More about Copyright and the Public Domain

Software for Authoring Your Story (Primary Options):

iMovie - Comes with every Mac and is easy to use for both images and audio. Allows panning and zooming of images. For most students in this class, this is the best option, as it's easy to use yet fairly powerful. Makes QuickTime movies that can be played on computers, on the web or ssexported to iDVD for distribution on DVDs. iMovie is installed on our Macs
- iMovie '09 Tutorial - A nice overview as a PDF file
- Exporting Your iMovie - Some great tips on getting smaller file sizes and higher quality
- Zooms and Freeze-Frames in iMovie
- Editing to the Beat in iMovie '09 - Boom chacka!

Aperture - Apple's Aperture is an amazing tool that will alllow you to make easy, good-looking slideshows. If you already have your images in Aperture to begin with, this may be the best tool to use.
- Aperture Slideshows -A YouTube video about how to create a slideshow (with or without full-motion video) in Aperture

Apeture Slideshow tutorial - Another good tutorial
Aperture slideshows - a blog post/tutorial
Advanced Aperture slideshow- greate video tutorial from Lynda.com

Soundslides - This inexpensive ($40) flash-based software (Mac & Win) has become a defacto standard for multimedia presentations for online newspapers. It makes only Flash files, not QuickTime or any other format, so it's may not be the right choice if you want to distribute your story on DVD or CD-ROM. Soundslides is installed on our Macs.
- Soundslides Manual - Official documentation
- A Soudslides Tutorial
- Convert your Soundslides to QuickTime - Just follow the instructions

GarageBand - Though primarily an audio creation application, GarageBand can also be used to author an "enhanced Podcast;" which is a podcast with embedded images. If you want to distribute content via a podcast, this is an excellent option for doing so. GarageBand is installed on our Macs.
- GarageBand Video Tutorials - Nice, short videos that cover the basics of recording & editing in GarageBand
- Recording your Podcast with GarageBand - Apple's instruction page
- GarageBand Podcasting Basics - Some QuickTime movies from Lynda.com

PhotoToMovie - Sort of like iMovie, but without the video capabilities. A very powerful, yet easy-to use tool for making motion (with audio) out of still photographs (Mac & Win). PhotoToMovie is installed on our Macs.

Other (Secondary) Story Authoring Options:

ProShow Gold - A Windows only software package that's sort of like iMovie, but doesn't do video, just animated still images
Authoring Tools - A nice overview of several useful authoring tools for Mac and Windows
Mixcraft - A "sort of like GarageBand" application for creating and mixing audio on the Windows platform
Make Better Time-Lapse Movies - a freebie application that dovetails with Lightroom to make the process easier

Software for putting your Story on a DVD:

Apple's iDVD - A tutorial on the easiest way to get your slideshow on a DVD that can be played on a computer or on a DVD player. This is what we have available in our labs and all of our computers can write DVD -R discs (that's DVD "minus" R).

Easy DVD Creator - While there are about a bajilion options for creating DVDs on the Windows platform, Roxio's product is one of the leaders

Examples of Digital Storytelling Movies & Slideshows:

Stories by Dana Atchley - The guy who first showed me the power of sound and images was Dana Atchley. You'll need to click on the movie screen to play the movies. Use the links at the bottom of the page to select a few of his other stories.
Grandpa's 90th - Former student Ben Chernivsky's story about his grandfather. Notice how important his voice is.
Aston Martin Vantage V12 - The visuals are stunning, yes... but pay attention to how sound sets the mood for the piece and what sorts of sounds are used.
Gardyn - This uses video, not still images, but it could easily have been done with stills and the incredible sounds that the creator has recorded and mixed together.
LOOKBetween Multimedia Spotlight - Great stories, curated by FlakPhoto's Andy Adams
The Fallen - A moving and interesting piece about Robert Kennedy's funeral from the New York Times
The Photography Channel - Photographic Storytelling for Electronic Media... these are very strong examples of what's possible
Mulimedia Muse - A nice clearing house of great picture stories
Hats - Done in Soundslides; a simple set of images that uses location recording effectively
Essence of Atmosphere - A nice show from New York Times photographer Nicole Bengiveno
Digital Stories from Arizona - Great, simple stories from students (not necessarily photographers) from Scottsdale, AZ
Iraqi Kurdistan - An excellent still-photo slideshow that takes advantage of rapid image sequences
Magnum Photographers In Motion - A nice set of Magnum photographers' photographs. Also available as a Podcast here.
Stefan Rohner - Rohner's B&W slideshow "Humans"
Couple Lacks Sight, Not Vision - A Soundslides example with voice over
Wrestling - Pro wresting mixing music and on-site recorded sound
Coryn - Simple images, simple images, clear voice over and a powerful message
Dulcimer Festival - Nice mix of images and sound
Granada, Nicaragua - A short Soundslides show that has some great animation/editing effects
Punk in Drublic - Check out all the different formats that this presentation is available in. Note the tradeoff in size vs. quality. Also note the very cool use of a stationary camera and moving subjects
Life Through Time - Franz Lantig's and engaging work in a beautifully told story format (don't expect to produce something this sophisticated in our class, but it does give you something to shoot for)
Media Storm - Brian Storm's Media Storm website is one of the best storytelling sites around
Pictory - Excellent storytelling site
Visual Edge - A website for a workshop for journalist storytellers with some great stories. Also be sure to check out the lessons page.
Bridges to Understanding - Photographer Phil Borges has established a cross-cultural storytelling program that's designed to help people learn about other cultures. Here are some examples of what they are doing.
Soul of Athens - Great stories about Athens, OH
16:Moments - Though not a "photo" story, take a look at how well this piece works with sound and image
Everybody has a story - Imagine this set to music with voiceover narration of the quotations...
Bastardo Dot Biz - One of the best projects a student has ever done - by Courtney Penzato

Apple Aperture Links:

Apple's Aperture website - Starter tips from the Mothership
Aperture Tutorials - Like it says
Inside Aperture blog - A frequently updated blog of Aperture tips and tricks - very deep with lots of downloadable actions, etc
Aperture Users Network- One of the best organizations for Aperture support and info
Aperture Adjustment video - a free video about how to use Aperture's adjustment tools

Adobe Lightroom Links:

Adobe's Lightroom Video Tutorials - Starter tips from the Mothership
Adobe TV - Yowza! Seemingly a bazillion videos about all Adobe products.
Julieanne Kost on Lightroom - The best Adobe teacher out there
Lightroom Killer Tips - A great website/podcast about Lightroom
Lightroom Tips - A clearing house of good tips and tutorial videos

Digital Asset Management Links:

DAM Useful - A clearing house of sorts for information about digital asset management and a place where you can buy the best resource about DAM, The DAM Book.
DAM on Wikipedia - A really good roundup of all of the issues and solutions to DAM
UPDIG - Universal Photographic Digital Imaging Guidelines is an organization dedicated clarifying the issues affecting accurate reproduction and management of digital image files.
Controlled Vocabulary - Great information on how to choose and use keywords
ASMP's Digital Photography Standards and Practices - An outstanding and important collection of ideas about standards and practices for professional digital photography
PhotoMetaData.org - A good metadata info clearing house

Image Galleries - Assignment Inspiration:

William Eggleston - One of the most important color photographers of the 20th Century. Check out how he used small portfolios
Philip Trager - One of my favorite photographers... he works with both architechture and modern dance
Elliott Erwitt - Outstanding street photography
David LaChapelle - Pop culture taken to the extreme
Martin Parr - Social interactions and documentary
Abelardo Morell - Camera Images of Camera Obscura Images
Angelika Rinnhofer - A contemporary photographer with ties to both commercial and fine art worlds.
Eolo Perfido - An Italian fashion and Portrait photographer... with a twist
Keith Gerling - A gum-bichromate printmaker
Loretta Lux - Photography? Painting? Photoshop? All of the above? Does it matter?
Ashes and Snow - A striking site for really amazing work
ParkeHarrison - Some of the coolest work being done today
Michael Kenna - Kenna works in series and does a great job of publishing that work in book form
Monica Denevan - Beautiful B&W work from Burma
Julie Blackmon - Interesting slices of life. Posed? Does it matter?
Douglas Menuez - Great work, fab-o website
Mark Tucker - A wonderfully varied set of images from a prolific photographer

Podcasts - Audio and/or Audio/Video presentations about photography

Lenswork Podcast - Brooks Jensen's short and to the point musings on the creative process in photography
Camera Position - Yeah, I feel a little funny recommending my own stuff as class support, but my podcast is about creative process and creative ideas