More Satisfying Photos - weekly newsletter

Upcoming Events - Click the link for more details or to schedule yourself for any of these events.

Tu 03/16/10 6:00PM The Art Studio ($21)	Advanced	More Satisfying Travel Photos
Tu 03/23/10 6:00PM The Art Studio ($21)	Advanced	More Satisfying Portraits
Tu 03/30/10 6:00PM The Art Studio ($21)	Advanced	More Satisfying Children's Pictures	New topic!
Sa 04/10/10 6:30AM Bombay Hook NWR	Social	Photographer's meet-up
Sa 04/10/10 9:30AM Dover ($50/series)	Basic	Understanding Your Camera	Start of new 4-week series
Tu 04/13/10 6:00PM The Art Studio ($21)	Advanced	More Satisfying Nighttime Photos
Sa 04/17/10 6:00AM Bombay Hook NWR	Social	Photographer's meet-up
Sa 04/17/10 9:30AM Dover ($50/series)	Advanced	Understanding Your Camera
Sa 04/24/10 6:00AM Bombay Hook NWR	Social	Photographer's meet-up
Sa 04/24/10 9:30AM Dover ($50/series)	Advanced	More Satisfying Composition
Sa 05/01/10 5:30AM Bombay Hook NWR	Social	Photographer's meet-up	Bombay Hook is AMAZING in May!
Sa 05/01/10 9:30AM Dover ($50/series)	Basic	Camera-Computer Interface
Tu 05/18/10 6:00PM The Art Studio ($21)	Advanced	Improving Every Facet of Your Picture-Taking
Tu 05/25/10 6:00PM The Art Studio ($21)	Advanced	Artistic Smoke Photos	New topic!
Mo 06/08/10 6:30PM Chesapeake City, MD	Basic	Understanding Your Camera	New location!

Calling All Writers

Whether you just picked up a camera for the first time this week or have been taking pictures for more than 50 years, everyone has stories to tell about their experiences with photography. Lessons learned; interesting experiences; rubbing elbows with the famous, the once-famous and the yet-to-become famous; finding that bargain for your collection or passing a beloved piece of equipment on to someone who will love it all over again like you once did; helping others discover a love for image making.

We want you to share your stories!

Beginning as soon as we start getting enough material, we'd love to start featuring guest articles. They can be on any topic related to photography. Funny, touching, moving, interesting... surprise us with your experience and your creativity. Any length from a single paragraph to multiple pages. As long as it will hold a reader's interest, we'll put no up-front restrictions.

Prominent credit will be given. Photos to help illustrate your story are welcome and encouraged but not required.

Along those same lines, if you wish to announce any sort of upcoming photography-related event, buy/sell/trade your gear, send kudos to a photographer you admire or even plug your own photo stream, we'll consider those too. (As long as they have some value to the community as a whole.) We are also looking for subscribers who would like to submit 6-12 photos for a photo essay.

Big Changes in Store

Back at the beginning of the year, we mentioned changes we had in store for this newsletter and for the web site in general. The call for guest writers is just one of those changes. More are on the way. Some will be quietly slipped in while others may be announced with great fanfare. All are meant to give you a richer, more rewarding experience.

We want you to share the newsletter and spread the word. We are also rededicating ourselves to our original mission of helping people who may not have any particular interest in photography as a profession or serious hobby learn to use their cameras better, enjoy picture taking more and get results they are happier with. Your comments, questions and suggestions will help us with that mission.

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Some people have signed up for our web site or the newsletter but have never logged in. If you've forgotten your login information, drop a note tosupport@MoreSatisfyingPhotos.com and we'll gladly help you.

Main Tip - Light is Cumulative

The first and most important thing to remember about photography, and it’s as true for film as it is for digital, is that light is cumulative. For as long as the shutter is open, any light passing through the lens will be captured and recorded.

Understanding the cumulative nature of light helps to explain why some photos come out blurry when either the subject or the camera is moving and the shutter speed is slower than the movement.

However, understanding this cumulative nature of light can also aid in manipulating the effect for artistic purposes. By envisioning the outcome in advance, you can make the camera capture scenes that the naked eye can never see, such as these.

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Video Blog

Our slogan has always been that "We'll help you take more satisfying photos, no matter what kind of camera you use." But I didn't just want to say it, I wanted toprove it. So last summer I took a very limited little point-and-shoot pocket camera to the state fair. There, I had an assistant follow me around with a video camera and record my thought process as I deliberately sought out the most hellish shooting conditions I could find and tried to make a decent photo from them.

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Quick Tip - High Key

Camera light meters assume that all the light in a scene averages out to more or less a mid-tone. High Key is really a reference to a photo in which everything is noticeably (and purposely) brighter than average. Think of a model in a white dress photographed against a white background. Such photos are very hard to do well.

Most digital cameras have various preset shooting modes which aim to help. This group of settings -- they may be called by names such as "Beach", "Snow" or "Beach & Snow" -- tell the camera that the scene is brighter than normal and that it should not overcompensate. This basically overexposes the image so that brightness comes out bright.

Photo Essay - Soap Bubbles

This week's photo essay is about using bubbles to engage young children in an activity so you can get more natural, more satisfying photos of them. I have strong reservations about posting photos of children online. For that reason, this week's photo essay is open to subscribers only. Please log in to view the essay.

Trivia Bit - The evolution of middle names

Technically, according to both American and European legal precedents, any and all names that come before one's family name(s) -- also called surname(s) -- are known asforenames. The first of what may be multiple forenames is commonly referred to as one's "first name". Aside from the designation as "given name", one's first name may also be called his "Christian Name" or, less commonly, his "Hebrew Name". (The Hebrew naming tradition is slightly different than the Christian. Whereas the Christian tradition is generally to use the exact same name as someone else, usually an elder family member, in the Hebrew tradition another name is chosen that starts with the same letter. For example, a girl may be named Hannah in honor of her grandother Harriet. Hebrew names are almost always drawn from the Bible or other religious Hebrew texts.) A person may have only {tooltip}one first name{end-link}This is a law of mathematics. Only one name can be FIRST.{end-tooltip}.

Middle name(s), of which a person may have none or many, are any and all the given names after the first name. Family names, which are inherited automatically by one's parents, do not count as middle names.

How middle names came into widespread use is not entirely clear. Most probably it evolved from the desire of parents to bestow more than one given name on a child. For example, to incorporate the names of both maternal and paternal grandfathers into a child's Christian name. It is also sometimes common for parents to choose names of people they admire, frequently in the hope that the child will grow to emulate his namesake.

Another plausible theory (which I personally fancy) relates to the fact that British royalty does not use surnames. It is enough for the King or Queen to be known only by their respective given names. As such, many royals have multiple given names. Many in the middle class, wishing to elevate their apparent station in life, may have adopted the strategy of using multiple given names.

Naming conventions vary widely throughout the world. For instance:

• In Spain and many Latin American countries, most people inherit the surnames of both parents. Since both parents also have two surnames, there is a hierarchy that applies: the father's first surname, which he inherited from his father via his paternal grandfather, comes first follwed by the mother's first surname, which she inherited from her paternal grandfather. Paternal surnames always come before maternal ones, but it would be direspectful to discard either surname.
• Throughout much of the Arab world, an honorary given name (almost always given in honor of the prophet Mohammed) is given but not used to distinguish one person from another. The next forename in sucession is actually used as what westerners would recognize as the person's "first name". Some Arabs may add further honorary given forenames such as Ibn Basheer (meaning son of Basheer) in honor of the person's father.
• A few strongly Catholic countries hold a tradition of cross-gender middle names. For example, Jose Maria for a boy or Marie-Pierre for a girl. Though this is often a tribute to Mary and Joseph of the Bible, it is not always so and non-biblical names may sometimes be used.
• In most Asian countries the surname comes first and is followed by the given name(s). Asian emigrees to western countries will frequently adopt a new English given name and convert their original two single-syllable Asian given names into one multi-syllable "middle name".

Two things are quickly killing off the custom of multiple forenames:

1. the growing dominance of the English language in general, and American culture in particular, in commerce and international relations;
2. computerization.

American society strongly favors the use of only a first name and a single middle name. As most software is written by American companies, it generally only allows for a single middle name field in personnel records. As these computerized records more and more frequently become the means of legally identifying people as distinct from one another, it becomes too troublesome to maintain multiple forenames for most people.

We risk the world becoming a much less colorful place for it.

Please feel free to forward or share this newsletter with anyone you feel has an interest and could benefit from the information we have to provide.

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