Shoot Like a Pro: Get the Most Out of Your Digital Camera.
• May 3, 2012

The current crop of digital cameras puts enormous power in your hands, but you have to know how to use it. Many of these suggestions may involve an additional investment, but you will find yourself amply rewarded.

Read the manual. Your camera is a sophisticated electronic device and may include macro features, various lighting settings, video capabilities and more. You will get the most use out of your camera’s features if you read the manual and learn how to use them. While it is tempting to use your camera’s automatic settings, you may be missing out on a lot of creative potential.

Consider stepping up to a Digital Single Lens Reflex camera (DSLR). These can use interchangeable lenses and generally have larger image sensors than compacts. The camera’s sensor is the electronic device which captures images. Larger sensors, generally speaking, are superior because more light can be stored on them, which produces a sharper image with a less digital “noise“. It is not just the numbers on the imaging chip that is important, but also the size of each pixel. Cameras with larger sensors also generally work better in low light (and higher ISOs).

Get good editing software. Pictures can always be improved after the fact by adjusting for color balance and saturation, composition, contrast, exposure and sharpness.

Take many pictures and use a large memory card, taking care to use the highest quality setting. In difficult lighting situations, experiment by bracketing your exposures.

If your camera allows you to save information in the RAW image format, do so, though this will involve an extra step to convert that image to a JPG in your computer. The purpose of RAW image formats is to preserve the maximum amount of data obtained by the camera’s sensor. RAW files may be substantially larger than JPGs, but allow for greater control over the final image.

Don’t be afraid to use flash in some daylight situations. Try to avoid shooting in harsh sunlight, which often introduces unacceptably high contrast and deep shadows. Unless there is cloud cover, early morning or late afternoon is usually preferable. When you are confronted with a bright mid-day sun, and your subjects are close to the camera, try using your flash to “fill in“ (lighten) the deeper shadows. Consider investing in an external flash for additional power, and an attachment to diffuse (soften) its light.

Love Ball
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The Love Ball supporting the work of the Montgomery Country Humane Society, an event “for everyone who loves animals,” was held at the Hyatt Regency Bethesda on Nov. 13. Clearly many people fit that description. They were accompanied by canines on their best party manners, many garbed in festive attire—elegant doggie coats, tutus and other fabulous creations. Nary a bark was heard at the seated dinner hosted by Holly Morris of FOX 5 Morning News with special guests Aly Jacobs of MIX 107.3, 9 NEWS NOW at Noon anchor JC Hayward and Angie Goff of WUSA9 TV. As one speaker refreshingly noted, “protecting our animal friends crosses all political lines. [gallery ids="99555,104564,104595,104569,104591,104574,104587,104579,104583" nav="thumbs"]

100 Years of Quiet Wonder: Harry Callahan at the NGA
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This fall art season has brought a number of heavy-hitting exhibits to the Washington stage. Edgar Degas’ dancers arrived en masse to the Phillips Collection, the Corcoran Gallery’s 30 Americans exhibit has ignited racial and social discourse through the work of internationally acclaimed contemporary African American artists, and Andy Warhol has all but taken over the National Mall, with concurrent shows at both the National Gallery and the Hirshhorn. Looming on the near horizon are major exhibitions of Picasso, Annie Leibovitz and George Bellows.

But with all the sweeping, florid grandiosity of these major retrospectives, Harry Callahan at 100 stands out for just the opposite reasons, and in all the right ways. Tucked away in the basement floor of the National Gallery, the collection of work on view, commemorating the renowned photographer on the centenary of his birth, brings us perhaps the most intimate, utterly immersive show of the season.

Throughout his career, Callahan proved himself a discerning and incisive observer of the American subconscious, exploring a diverse range of visual ideas and concerns. He was also a fine teacher, as head of the photography department at the Institute of Design in Chicago and then a professor at the Rhode Island School of Design. A college dropout with no early artistic ambitions and almost no formal training, he grew up “not being able to do anything that I felt good about,” until he picked up photography as a hobby. Five years later, he was a professional photographer.

Callahan’s first major influence as a photographer, and someone who had a profound effect on his career, was Ansel Adams, who he met through a photography club while living in Detroit in his 20s. Later in life, Callahan said of Adams:

“There was something about what he did that hit me just right… He had pictures which were what I felt was photography… And I don’t think they were the great pictures, or the ones that were considered great of his, that really made me excited. It was the close-up pictures, near the ground, which I felt from then on I could photograph anything. I didn’t have to go to Yellowstone or the Grand Canyon, I could photograph a footprint in the sand and it would be like a sand dune. And I think this was probably the most freeing thing that could have ever been for me.”

The grandeur of the ordinary and the limitless scale of the intrapersonal are ongoing themes in Callahan’s work. And while he was also well known for his bold and constant visual experimentation (he was, among other things, one of the first fine art photographers to experiment with color), what stands out in this concisely curated show, which spans work throughout the course of Callahan’s entire career, is the status to which he raises our most basic surroundings and occurrences.

You will see trips to the beach. You will see trees throughout the season. You will see parked cars. You will see weeds and grass and junk. You will see buildings, storefronts and houses the same as you see when you look out your front door. And all of these images are engrained with a restlessness and fascination, as if the artist, having forced himself to evaluate the world immediately around him, demands that we too consider our world and come to a quiet understanding.

However, the most powerful series of images are of Callahan’s wife Eleanor. A photographer’s portrait of a loved one is hardly uncommon. Alfred Stieglitz, a seminal founding figure in fine art photography, famously photographed his wife, Georgia O’Keefe, with brazen sexual charge. Photographer Edward Weston’s portraits of his wife Flora are stark, severe and contemporary. But Callahan’s portraits of Eleanor are love songs in thin, black frames, and that sincere vulnerability is what makes them so engrossing. They show woman as woman, lover, mother and daughter, and speak of a more encompassing relationship based in profound trust, love and respect. Whether wrapped in a coat outside a bleak apartment building or lying naked in their bed, Eleanor becomes a symbol of a husband’s perception of his wife’s beauty, strength and fragility. And Eleanor does her part, looking into the camera, saying everything and nothing with her gaze, like she is looking right into her husband’s eyes.

Callahan’s photographs work on a level that comfortably serves dual, perhaps opposing functions. On the one hand, you can evaluate the socially critical, the autobiographical, the theoretical, the experimental and the technical nature of his work and walk away with your brain tingling. At the same time, and with equal bearing, the photographs are plainly beautiful. They are nice to look at. Like a Rothko or a Rockwell, there is a peaceful and satisfying presence about the work that washes you over inexplicably. Anonymous building facades of endless brick; cold, leafless trees reaching their draconian fingers into the ever-cloudy skies; the pensive, lovely faces of women, their downcast eyes distracted by the very matter of life, wherever it may be.

Callahan’s images are beautiful because they are made up of that which we balance just outside of our daily attention. These are the ever-present backgrounds—emotionally and physically—of our own stories. It feels like Callahan just chose to tell them.

‘Harry Callahan at 100’ is on view at the National Gallery of Art through March 4, 2012. For more information visit NGA.gov.

D.C. Theater Gears up for the Holidays
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It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

No kidding, folks. Looking ahead just a little bit, you might want to brace yourself for Scrooges and Nutcrackers, coming up sooner than you think. We give thanks, and god bless us everyone.

Just to start you off, “A Christmas Carol” returns like clockwork to the Ford’s Theatre, beginning Nov. 18 and running through Dec. 31. This is the production adapted by Michael Wilson and starring acclaimed Washington actor Edward Gero, who can go from Shakespeare to Mamet to Scrooge in a heartbeat. Michael Baron directs. Click here for more information

At the Olney Theater, Dickens and Scrooge will also be on hand with “A Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story of Christmas,” performed by Paul Morella and adapted from Dickens’ original novella and reading tour. Dec. 13 through Jan. 1. Click here for more information and to buy tickets

Meanwhile, among many Nutcrackers for the season, you can count on the Washington Ballet and Septime Webre’s version to return to the Warner Theater for a nearly month-long run, Dec. 1 through 24, while the Kennedy Center will have the American Ballet Theatre’s version Dec. 8 through 11.

A Couple of Guys Named Othello and Othello and Iago and Iago

These days, we’re seeing two versions of Shakespeare’s classic tragedy about Othello, the great Moor general in Renaissance Venice, the passion of his life Desdemona, and Iago, perhaps the most despised villain in Shakespeare outside of Richard III. You can see what you can do with style and silence at the Synetic Theatre’s production now in the midst of a three-way run at its Crystal City space, or take in a more classic, wordier, sound-and-fury version at the Folger Theatre, directed by Robert Richmond, which has already been extended through Dec. 4.

Seriously, Folks

There’s serious drama afoot all over the region, beginning with a production of Arthur Miller’s “After the Fall,”his most revealing, autobiographical play about a playwright named Quentin and his tragic, glamorous wife Maggie (hello Miss Monroe). Jose Carrasquillo directs this rarely performed play, Mitchell Hebert stars as Quentin, and Gabriella Fernandez-Coffey is Maggie through Nov. 27.

At Arena Stage, history plays a big part in both Amy Freed’s “You, Nero” and Bill Cain’s “Equvicocation.” The latter concerns Shakespeare, the infamous Gunpowder Plot and the relationship between artists and kings. It comes from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Cain’s play will run Nov. 18 through Jan. 1 with the cast of the original Oregon Shakespeare Festival production.

“You, Nero” is part of Arena’s American Voices New Play Institute, with Freed continuing to work on a play which first opened at South Coast Rep and Berkeley Rep in 2009. It makes its D.C. debut Nov. 25 and runs through Jan. 1. Danny Scheie stars as Nero, an emperor who may have been the first emperor-as-public-celebrity.

For one night only, you’ll have a chance to see one of the landmark plays of the 1980s and the tragedy of AIDs when Forum Theatre will stage a benefit performance of “The Normal Heart” by Larry Kramer, with an all-star cast of area actors including Holly Twyford, Mitchell Hebert, Will Gartshore, J. Fred Schiffman, Rick Hammerly, Michael Tolaydo and others at the Round House Theatre’s Silver Spring stage, where Forum is in residence on Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m.

Kevin Converses with Michael and Broadway Does Shakespeare

Star of the stage and screen Kevin Kline (“Sophie’s Choice”) will join Shakespeare Theatre Company Artistic Director Michael Kahn for the second installment in the Classic Conversations series at Sidney Harman Hall Nov. 28.

Speaking of the Shakespeare Theatre Company, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, the run will be short but the occasion sounds terrific, with a concert-style staging of “The Boys from Syracuse” with a book by David Ives (“The Heir Apparent”) hooked up to Rodgers and Hart’s classic score. “The Boys” is of course a Broadway musical version of “The Comedy of Errors” which features two sets of twins unaware of each other, the kids from Ephesus. Nov. 4 through 6.

Theo Adamstein: Photo Enthusiast for FotoWeek DC
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In a time when everyone is seen as being passionate about something, be it ever so trivial, it’s not difficult to resist using the word.

But when it comes to Theo Adamstein and photography—specifically Foto DC and FotoWeek DC, which is set for its fourth annual  festival and celebration of all things photo Nov. 5 through 12—the characterization fits. 

It’s not as if Adamstein doesn’t have many manifold interests and talents— he’s been a high-profile architect, a very busy cultural promoter and activist in D.C., a busy businessman and owner of Dodge Chrome, Inc., a highly original custom photo and high-end imaging lab with locations in Silver Spring and Georgetown.

Mostly, these days, he is the executive director and founder of FotoWeek DC and Foto DC, which, as he readily admits, has consumed him. “Right now,” he said near the end of an interview at the Foto DC year-round headquarters in Adams Morgan, “I am not a practicing architect. This has taken over my life.”

This being FotoWeek DC, which, like many  recent cultural celebrations and festivals like the Fringe Festival and Passport DC, has gained a firm foothold in the city and gained national and international attention. It’s grown like topsy, not bad for a non-profit endeavor which yearly seems to find itself in an ever-growing and ever-changing series of venues with an expanding mission and every more particpants in its competitive portions.

Four years ago, Adamstein, a man with several careers under his belt and some influence on the cultural scene with board membership on several institutions, noticed that Washington seemed bereft of any major competitive and celebratory photography festivals.

“There just wasn’t anything,” he said. “I know we had and have numerous talented and gifted photographers and photojournalists,  in the Washington area, but no festival, no major marketing tool, nothing much.” Pulling together enthusiastic friends and people he knew in the Washington cultural and photography circles and from his architectural world, Adamstein founded FotoWeek DC, which included a competition, primarily for local photographers, workshops, lectures and an array of exhibitions. And with it’s high-profile launching and the presence of museums and galleries, FotoWeek DC was a major success. It made a splash in the photography world here and echoed elsewhere.

For Adamstein, who’s no dilettante when it comes to photography,  the world of photography is rich, diverse and serious. “It was my major interest when I was a young boy and it remained so, even though I ventured into other careers,” Adamstein, a native of South Africa, said. “I pursued photography seriously and with passion, and I still do.  I specialize in landscapes. I’ve had shows and exhibitions.”

Photography, of course, embraces many arenas, interests and genres and occupies the talents of all sorts of photographers and photography from photojournalism, to art photography, to the professional photographers who work for newspapers and slick magazines,  the portraitists and fashion photographers and the documentarians.

“We’ve tended to promote and exhibit work with a certain view, in the arena of justice, environmentalism, social and green issues, there’s a documentarian theme to some of it,  but not all of what we do,” Adamstein said.

In fact, speaking with Adamstein in the Adams Morgan DC Foto Space—a big, airy space once occupied by a high-ended furniture store—illustrates much of what he’s talking about. He’s dressed in gray black, a man with a strong, empathic face and an expansive, energetic way of talking tinged with a hint of South African accent. He’s got a suitable dose of charisma necessary for a pioneering type. He talks big-picture, encompassing not only the festival and its growth, but also the explosion of changes that have occurred in photography itself.

“Digital imaging has changed everything,” he said. “It changes the way a photographer looks through the lens. It’s fast, its malleable and it’s both cheap and expensive. Photographers can do more in the environment of the computer culture, but they’re also faced with more choices and decisions. It’s a process, and it’s ongoing. So, we try to stay on top of it.”

FotoWeek DC, in fact, has become the capstone celebration and effort of what is now a living institution.  “There’s a permanence now,” Adamstein said. “We do things the year round—the Cherry Blossom Festival competition, the project with the Crystal City Business Improvement District and so on.  We’re very fortunate to have this space here.”

If you look at this year’s festival, you see a large effort with a focus on both competition and celebration, opportuned with critical components such as cross-fertilization, partnerships and partnering, promotion and education. “You have to get everybody involved,” Adamstein said. “We’ve had support from the business and commercial community. You work hard the year round trying to get grants, and you get the international community involved on Embassy Row. We have ways for individual, local photographers to be involved, not just in competition, but with links to resources. What you’re doing is creating a community of photography.”

“Here’s a great thing,” he said. “Chicago doesn’t have anything like this. New York doesn’t really have a major festival. We do, and to me that’s exciting. There’s so much potential for growth.”

The venue and space challenge is always there, every year. “The thing is you have to have exhibition space—and we’re lucky this year again to have the Corcoran Gallery of Art participating. We have this space, where we’ll have our night visions component, and we have Pepco’s Edison Place Gallery, and, of course, we have FotoWeek Central on L Street.

That’s a 50,000-square-foot  space, site of the former Borders Bookstore, donated to FotoWeek by Somerset Partners LLC, which will be housing 14 (yes, 14) exhibitions alone and will be a co-site of the launch party along with the Corcoran Gallery of Art.

“We live in a very unique city with unique opportunities,” he said. Listening to him, you can hear the sounds of the future of photography in his voice.  His enthusiasm—his passion, if you will—is boundless.          

“The competition aspect has expanded. It’s gone international,” Adamstein said. “But that’s a good thing. We in the city will be able to see the works of photographers whom we might not otherwise see. Conversely, our photographers will have a chance to have their work seen by the world.

“I believe in partners, in linking up, that’s what the new digital age lets us do.  I believe in bringing this to our young people in the schools. [There is a project donating digital cameras to students.] And I believe we can be a resource for photographers. 

“And this—FotoWeek DC—is a celebration of photography.” 

FotoWeek DC Highlights
November 5-November 12

FotoWeek Central, 1800 L Street NW

?International League of Conservation Photographers, RAVE Retrospective

?Flash Forward for 2011 from the Magenta Foundation

?Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting Beyond Witness

?2011 FotoWeekDC International Awards Competition Winners

?2011 FotoWeekDC Thumbnail Show

?2011 FotoDC Uncover/Discover Series

?PhotoPhilanthropy: Witnessing Change

?Facing Change: Documenting America

?Women Photojournalists of Washington, 2011 Annual Juried Exhibition

?Embassy of Spain, Alberto Shommer Retrospectiva 1952-2009

?FotoWeekDC Youth Contest Winners

?Critical Exposure

?2011 FotoWeekDC Cherry Blossom Contest Winners Corcoran Gallery of Art and the Corcoran College of Art + Design

?The Corcoran Gallery of Art and the Corcoran College of Art + Design will be free to the public Nov. 5 through 12 in celebration of FotoWeekDC. Free noon lectures by Stephanie Sinclair, Amy Yenkin, Trevor Paglen and others as well as portfolio reviews by renowned curators, educators and critics will take place Nov. 21.

George Washington University Kogan Plaza

?NightGallery’s digital HD exterior projections on the south façade of GW’s Lisner Auditorium Nov. 7 through Nov. 19.

Pepco’s Edison Place Gallery, 702 8th ST NW

?“Colors of Life” from its 2011 International Photography Contest organized with “Every Child Matters.” Also: vintage photography from the 1920s, 30s and 40s from former National Geographic photographers B. Anthony Stewart and J. Baylor Roberts.

FotoWeek DC Launch Parties.
?Nov. 4 from 5 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. at FotoWeek Central and the Corcoran Gallery of Art and College of Art and Design.

For further information and details about FotoWeekDC events, go to fotoweekdc.org.

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From Art to Email: A Brief History of Photography.
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Since its inception, photography has been a fusion between science and the creative eye. The first permanent photograph was produced in 1826 by the French inventor Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. The term “photography,” from the Greek, means “drawing with light” because at first it was considered a drawing aid. Its first popular incarnation was the daguereotype in 1839, named for its inventor Louis Daguerre. Each daguerreotype was a one of a kind image on a polished silver plated sheet of copper. The format appealed to an emerging middle class, which could not afford expensive oil portaits.

In 1884, George Eastman of Rochester, NY invented film, which replaced the photographic plate; thus a photographer would no longer need to carry boxes of plates and toxic chemicals around. Four years later, Eastman’s Kodak camera went on the market with the slogan “You press the button, we do the rest”. Suddenly anyone could take a photograph and leave the complicated development process to others. Photography came to the mass-market in 1901 with the introduction of the Kodak Brownie; and continued to broaden its appeal in later years with the creation of the 35mm film format, color emulsions, the Kodak “Instamatic”, the Polaroid instant process, film cartridges and one hour photo kiosks.

The first digitally scanned photograph was produced in 1957 by Russell A. Kirsch, a computer pioneer at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The first such photo was set at 176 x 176 pixels. But the image quality of affordable digital cameras did not approach that of film until just recently. Manufacturers continue to push the envelope on chip design and image processing software, and storage costs continue to decline. Digital cameras are now as common as telephones, because they are often one and the same. The physical act of taking a picture has become highly automated, to the point where the most technology-challenged among us are capable of taking perfectly exposed and focused images, if perhaps not always artistic ones.

Digital photography has already had a profound effect on how people take and view photos. For dedicated hobbyists, digital is also about replacing the darkroom with the computer, and sharing those images with the world via the Internet. Learning any new skill involves trial and error, and the instant feedback that digital imaging provides cannot be underestimated. Mistakes can be instantly deleted, so the cost per image is no longer a concern. It is the difference between carefully firing a muzzle-loaded rifle versus blasting away with a machine gun. The latter requires less operational skill, but has a much greater chance of success.

The optical system in the modern camera works the same as that in the older cameras – using a lens with a variable diaphragm to focus light onto an image pickup device. The diaphragm and shutter admit the correct amount of light to the imager, but in the case of digital, the image pickup device is electronic rather than chemical. Basic rules of photography, like lighting and composition still apply, but the latest cameras have been liberating in the sense that one can devote that much more attention toward capturing the image and less on camera mechanics.

Salvation Army Luncheon
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The Salvation Army Women’s Auxiliary of Washington, DC, held its 61st annual luncheon and fashion show at The Ritz-Carlton West End on Sept. 29. Jan Smith Donaldson and Cynthia Steele Vance emceed “The Elite of the 2010 Collections” from Saks Fifth Avenue, Chevy Chase, modeled by Veronica Valencia-Sarukhan, wife of the Ambassador of Mexico, and Ronit Ziswiler, wife of the Ambassador of Switzerland. Local personalities walking the runway included Kay Kendall, Bob Ryan and Philip Bermingham. Event Chair Faye Morrissette was optimistic that the event would reach its $150,000 goal. [gallery ids="99273,104405,104384,104401,104397,104389,104393" nav="thumbs"]

Trick Or Treat in Georgetown [Photo Gallery]
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Halloween in Georgetown is always a fun evening.

Check out Philip Bermingham’s images from this years Halloween night in Georgetown. [gallery ids="110037,109947,109942,109937,109932,109927,109922,109917,109912,109907,109902,109897,109892,109887,109882,109877,109952,109957,110032,110027,110022,110017,110012,110007,110002,109997,109992,109987,109982,109977,109972,109967,109962,109872,109867,109777,109772,109767,109762,109757,109752,109747,109742,109737,110041,109732,110045,110049,109727,110053,109782,109787,109862,109857,109852,109847,109842,109837,109832,109827,109822,109817,109812,109807,109802,109797,109792,100353" nav="thumbs"]

Harman Center Gala
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The Harman Center for the Arts Annual Gala celebrated Michael Kahn’s 25 years at the helm of the Shakespeare Theatre Company on Oct. 17 in over the top style, as was to be expected. The attendees were a Who’s Who of Washington from the Supreme Court to theater elite. The gala performance showcased the Broadway cast of West Side Story, the Joffrey Ballet and Denyce Graves among other memorable performances that included the actors of the Shakespeare Theatre Company wowing the house. Legendary appearances included Edward Albee, Pat Carroll, Chelsea Clinton, and Terrence McNally. The festivities continued as mimes guided guests to a post-performance gala dinner and frivolity at the National Building Museum. [gallery ids="100357,110057,110064,110061" nav="thumbs"]

Innocents At Risk Conjures Up Old Havana
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Innocents At Risk and Airline Ambassadors hosted a Standup For Children Gala: An Evening in Old Havana on Oct. 19 at The Mayflower Hotel, which hails itself as “Washington’s Second Best Address.” Mike Walter emceed the program which included a video produced by Innocents At Risk, the internationally recognized nonprofit to stop the scourge of human trafficking founded by Deborah Sigmund in 2005. The evening was co-chaired by Nancy Rivard, who in 2009 brought additional support from Airline Ambassadors. Gabriela Ferrer and members of The Miami Sound Machine opened their performance with “How Can You Take Something that Does not Belong to You?” [gallery ids="100358,110062,110088,110084,110067,110080,110076,110072" nav="thumbs"]