Pro-Tip #10: Fall Foliage Photography

Here are some tips to help you as you venture out this fall in hope of capturing some autumn color:

Follow the internet fall color reports for the areas you plan to visit to help you arrive at peak color.  Every area with fall color will have multiple sites/blogs keeping you updated.

Research the weather; you are looking for calm days. Wind is the enemy of fall color shooters so go out on a calm day, you’ll get more keepers. Overcast days also make great days for shooting fall color as they tend to be less windy and less contrasty as nature provides the natural soft-box. Also, the wind tends to die down at the beginning and end of the day, not to mention the light is best for most any outdoor photography during this time. If you do find yourself stuck in the wind, don’t try to beat it, rather; accentuate it by using slow shutter speeds and make some dreamy abstracts. Moister will also help bring out the color saturation of the leaves, so look to shoot after a rain shower or in early morning fog that collects on the leaves, you will get richer more vibrant captures. Frost is common in the early morning hours this time of the year and can add an extra element of interest to your leaf close-up shots. Finally, if you are lucky enough to get an early fall snow that does not knock all the leaves to the ground consider it a bonus.

Pay attention to the direction of your light. Most trees will look great backlit which gives leaves a translucent quality and adds a nice rim light emphasizing their shape and form and helps separate them from the background as well as each other.

Use a polarizing filter to help darken your blue sky, saturate leaf color and reduce haze not to mention the removal of any reflective glare coming from wet or shiny leaves.

Look for complementary colors. Complementary colors work to enhance each other by making each appear more vibrant than they would alone. Think warm yellow/orange aspen leaves against a cool blue sky or bright red maple leaves against an evergreen backdrop.

Don’t forget to shoot the fallen leaves on the ground; these can be as colorful as those on the trees. Don’t be afraid to gather-up some colorful leaves and strategically arrange them on a foreground rock or log, the pros do it, you can too.

What setting should you use? You need to use fast shutter speeds to freeze motion and wide-open apertures to blur your backgrounds for those specimen shots. Try 1/250 or faster and f/2.8 – f/4. Of course, you’ll need to use a smaller aperture for those grand scenic vistas of mountain side color, try f/8 or f/11 for those shots where you are not including a close foreground element to maximize sharpness. Finally, when you are close to a foreground element you will need to go even smaller, f/16 or f/22 to maximize your depth of field.

Use these tips to help make your next fall foliage outing a success!

onOne Software Announces Perfect Photo Suite 8

Click on boxes to go to www.onOneSofrware.com for more information

Portland, OR – September 4, 2013 – onOne Software, Inc., a leading developer of innovative and timesaving solutions for digital photography, today announced Perfect Photo Suite 8—the photographer’s choice for photo editing. Perfect Photo Suite 8 is a full-featured, standalone photo editor that integrates seamlessly with Adobe® Photoshop®, Lightroom®, Photoshop Elements, and Apple® Aperture® and it includes all the best tools a photographer needs to create extraordinary images. Key new features include the Perfect Enhance module for essential photo adjustments, the Perfect Eraser with content-aware fill technology, the Perfect Batch processing utility for applying workflows to multiple images at once, and a re-engineered Perfect Effects module with twice as many filters, customizable presets, and integrated FocalPoint™ technology.

The new tools and capabilities alongside Perfect Photo Suite 8’s eight modules—Effects, Enhance, B&W, Portrait, Mask, Layers, Resize, and Browse—allow photographers to enhance, retouch, and stylize images in a layered workflow, replace backgrounds, create high-quality enlargements, prepare images for output, and batch process workflows. The modules share a unified interface, each targeting a specific imageprocessing task. Each module provides only the tools necessary to complete the job at hand, eliminating
screen clutter and confusion for the user.

“We listened intently to the digital photography community about what they wanted for their image processing in today’s world of plug-ins, online apps, and subscriptions,” said Craig Keudell, president of onOne Software. “We made it a priority to respond quickly and design a cohesive new product that continues to focus on photography and is built for photographers of all levels, from enthusiasts to professionals. We’ve leveraged our extensive experience as a plug-in company and evolved the Perfect Photo Suite into a complete and powerful photo editor that, unlike existing plug-in collections, works as one, elegantly designed product that seamlessly integrates into any workflow.”

New in Perfect Photo Suite 8:

• Perfect Enhance module – Perfect Enhance provides essential tools for basic enhancements. Use it to adjust brightness and contrast, remove a color cast, remove dust spots and power lines, and add sharpening and vignettes. It is an ideal module to start with when using Perfect Photo Suite 8 as a standalone application or when quick corrections are needed.
• Perfect Eraser – Using content-aware fill technology and simple brush strokes, the Perfect Eraser removes objects and automatically reconstructs the image with realistic results.
• Twice as Many Filters – The Effects module now includes new adjustable filters including: HDR Look, Dynamic Contrast for tonal clarity, Vintage, Grunge, Antique, and more.
• Customizable Presets – All built-in presets included in Perfect Photo Suite 8 may be deconstructed by their filter settings and personally customized.
• FocalPoint is now in the Effects Module – The best parts of FocalPoint technology to create bokeh, tilt-shift, and selective focus effects after the shot, are now in the Effects module as the
• Lens Blur filter.
• New Browse module – Images can be browsed and directly accessed from Perfect Photo Suite wherever they are stored—on the computer, an external drive, a connected network, and even on a cloud-based storage service like Dropbox, Google Drive, or Apple’s photo stream.
• Perfect Batch Utility – Powerful batch processing of actions from one or multiple modules, including the insertion of a watermark.
• Multiple File Handling: As a photo editor, you can now open and work with more than one image at a time. Move between images to edit or copy layers from one file to the next.
• Improved Masking Bug: Redesigned Masking Bug in the Effects and Layers modules make mask creation easier and more intuitive.
• Higher Quality Effects: Performance enhancements improve effects by minimizing artifacts without sacrificing processing speed.
• Improved RAW file handling: Open and process RAW files faster and with better quality. Support for new cameras also added.
• onOne Software Announces Perfect Photo Suite 8, a complete photo editor for every workflow

Availability and Pricing
The new Perfect Photo Suite 8 will be available November 26, 2013. Pre-orders are available immediately at www.ononesoftware.com/store. Perfect Photo Suite 8 is available in three editions: Premium, Standard, and an edition for Adobe Lightroom & Apple Aperture. The Premium Edition works with Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom, Aperture, Photoshop Elements, and as a
standalone application. Owners of previous versions of Perfect Photo Suite Premium Edition can upgrade for $99.95. New users may pre-order the Premium Edition for $179.95. For a limited time, pre-orders of Perfect Photo Suite 8 Premium Edition will include a complimentary Essential Video Guide to Perfect Photo Suite 8, which provides a comprehensive collection of getting started training videos for Perfect Photo Suite 8 ($40 value).

Click on box to go to www.onOneSoftware.com for more information

Perfect Photo Suite 8 for Adobe Lightroom & Apple Aperture works with Lightroom, Aperture, Photoshop Elements, and as a standalone application. It is available for $129.95 | $79.95 upgrade. The Standard Edition works as a complete standalone photo editor and is available for $79.95. New users who pre-order Perfect Photo Suite 8 will immediately receive a complimentary license for Perfect Photo Suite 7.5. Customers who pre-order Perfect Photo Suite 8 will receive all upcoming Loyalty Rewards that will be delivered monthly to owners of the Perfect Photo Suite 8. For those who have purchased Perfect Photo Suite 7.5 on or after August 1, 2013, onOne Software will issue a complimentary upgrade to Perfect Photo Suite 8 via download when it is available. For more information on Perfect Photo Suite 8, please visit http://www.ononesoftware.com.

About onOne Software
onOne Software, Inc., is a leading developer of innovative software tools and apps for digital photography and offers time-saving software solutions for photographers of all levels, from enthusiasts to professionals. Leveraging its extensive history as successful plug-in developer for Adobe Photoshop, Photoshop
Elements, Photoshop Lightroom, and Apple Aperture, and continued development of cutting-edge technology, onOne publishes unified solutions that offer both full-featured photo editing capabilities and the flexibility of traditional plug-ins. Founded in 2005, onOne Software is a privately held company located in Portland, Oregon. For additional information, visit www.ononesoftware.com.

Press Contact: Amy Chan, onOne Software, achan@ononesoftware.com, 503-968-1468 x 137
General Press Inquiries: press@ononesoftware.com
onOne Software Announces Perfect Photo Suite 8, a complete photo editor for every workflow

Online Press Center: www.ononesoftware.com/press
onOne Software Blog: www.ononesoftware.com/blog
Facebook: www.facebook.com/onOneSoftware
Twitter: www.twitter.com/onOneSoftware
Google+: www.ononesoftware.com/plus
©2013 onOne Software, Inc. All rights reserved. onOne Software, the onOne Software logo, and Focused on Photography are registered trademarks and Perfect Photo, Perfect Enhance, Perfect Effects, Perfect Eraser, Perfect Batch, and FocalPoint are trademarks in the United States and are the property of onOne Software. Adobe, Photoshop and Lightroom are registered trademarks of Adobe Systems, Inc. Apple and Aperture are registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. All other trademarks are property of their
respective owners.

Regards,

Patrick Smith
onOne Software
503.968.1468 ext. 124
sales@ononesoftware.com
www.onOnesoftware.com/affiliates

Topaz Adjust SALE - 50% off Sept. 9th - 30th

Dynamic Color, Detail and Exposure Control

Infusing your images with vibrant color and stunning detail has never been easier. From exposure and color balance to subtle photo pops, HDR effects, grunge style and more, Topaz Adjust’s intuitive and powerful tools make it easy to recover and enhance any image. With control over creative exposure, detail and color, Adjust is an essential part of every photographer’s toolkit.

This effect-packed Photoshop plug-in is is designed for photographers who want to achieve advanced color and detail techniques in less time and with half of the effort. Adjust also simplifies the HDR process, allowing you to instantly enhance local contrast, depth, detail and color - with just a single image.

The new Topaz Adjust 5 features productivity-increasing tools which allow you to be more effective, while streamlining your workflow. With the new local adjustment brush you can selectively enhance, taper or remove adjustments from any part of your image. You also have the ability to reduce the overall strength of your adjustments and stack effects - for a more comprehensive workflow.

• 107 new presets for an even faster and more creative workflow.

• Edge-aware selective brush used to dodge, burn, smooth and brush out effects.

• Ability to stack presets and effects via the new "Apply" button.

• Transparency Slider which controls overall strength of applied effects.

• Preset Collections which organizes default presets; includes a user collection.

• Integration of the new histogram and curve tools.

• Finishing Touches Tab with tools for diffusion, grain, borders, vignettes, tone adjustments and more.

Topaz Adjust is one of our most popular plug-ins and doesn’t go on sale very often, Topaz Adjust will be 50% off ($24.99) from September 9th through September 30th with this promo code: septadjust.

Better yet, if you are new to Topaz, this product will be included in their Complete Collection where you get all 14 Topaz products at a super discount, use my discount code, gclure, and save an additional 15% off the Complete Collection.