Digital Photography 101: Managing Cameras, Lighting, and Workstations for Specimen Imaging

Workshop Venue

The venue for the workshop is in the collections facility of the Florida Museum of Natural History, located in Dickinson Hall on Museum Road (details to follow).
Walking directions from the Holiday Inn to Dickinson Hall:
https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Holiday+Inn+Gainesville-University+Ctr,+1250+W+University+Ave,+Gainesville,+FL+32601/Dickinson+Hall+-+Florida+Museum+Of+Natural+History,+Research+%26+Collections,+Museum+Road,+Gainesville,+FL/@29.6485867,-82.3455851,16z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m14!4m13!1m5!1m1!1s0x88e8a3846bb2291b:0xe3a9b91cc92c5bb8!2m2!1d-82.338596!2d29.652657!1m5!1m1!1s0x88e8a39d92d53e03:0x891d9e673a025213!2m2!1d-82.3438233!2d29.6445166!3e2.

Hotel Information

For those traveling, the nearest hotel is the Holiday Inn University Center. We have reserved a block of rooms for our group for 1-4 May at a
rate of $109.00/night, plus tax. Dickinson Hall is about a 15 minute walk from the Holiday Inn (see map link above).
You may call the Holiday Inn directly at (352) 376-1661, using the code IDB for our group. Or, you may make reservations using the following link:

https://www.holidayinn.com/redirect?path=hd&brandCode=hi&localeCode=en&regionCode=1&hotelCode=GNVUC&_PMID=99801505&GPC=IDB&viewfullsite=true​.
PLEASE NOTE: Reservation deadline is 3 April to ensure availability at the room block pricing.

Agenda: Day 1: Tuesday, 2 May 2017

Day One
Time	Topic	Presenter(s)/Leader(s)
7:00-8:00	Coffee, Tea, OJ, Water, Pastries
8:00-8:10	Welcome & Logistics	Gil Nelson
8:10-8:40	Introductions	All (lightning PPT)
8:40-9:00	Camera Basics 1.0 - Introduction to the camera body Holding the camera; turning the camera on-off, what you can do with the on/off button - clean the sensor for example; Lens attachment - the correct way to take the lens on and off; look at the lens closely, see the blades, use a flashlight to see elements for dirt and scratches; Using DC cable versus the camera battery; Ports on the camera (tethered shooting, flash sync., wireless connector, etc.); Manual focus ring, autofocus (AF mode, AF point); Image recording quality (RAW, JPEG, TIFF) ; Erasing images in the camera versus in the computer (better in the camera from POV of camera and memory card, unless you are tethering and going straight to the computer);	Joanna McCaffrey, Zach Randall
9:00-9:10	Camera Basics 1.0 Lab - Mastering the camera software settings With camera manual in hand, walk thru the software in the camera: find the copyright text, timezone, set the image quality, where is sharpness set, (Handouts)	Gil/ZR/JM
9:10-9:20	Camera Basics 2.0 - Intermediate Camera Body Program modes (aperture, speed, manual, program) (landscape, cloudy, etc.) The Exposure Triangle: the big three: ISO, aperture (calibrated by F-stop numbers), shutter speed; Metering with a hand-held meter, or in the camera (matrix metering, center weight, spot point, evaluative, partial) Depth of field (focal length, distance to subject, diffraction). White balance (affected by the lighting in the studio), grey cards, color cards, checker cards;	Joanna McCaffrey, Zach Randall
9:20-9:30	Camera Basics 2.0 Lab Mastering the camera software settings: With camera manual in hand, practice moving the f/stop and speed around with the ISO setting to see how the images in the camera change. Handouts.	Zach Randall
9:30-10:00	Camera Basics 3.0 - Advanced Camera Body Cropped sensor/full frame, and what happens to images when you mix FX lenses on cropped frame cameras (vice versa); Focal length: prime (fixed/prime) versus zoom; lens/camera adapters for mixing and matching lenses to cameras; Macro versus non-macro (zone of focus) [⅔ : ⅓ depth of field]; Focus: minimum focal distance, focal lengths: macro lens 1:1; Advanced focus adjustments: Dot-Tune your lens? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zE50jCUPhM), adjust in-camera sharpening; Camera maintenance: the sensor, the lens (wet/dry, auto), to do or not to do, but some things are good to do regularly, and very easy (dust busters: lens cloth, dust blower), mirror up, timer; Shutter life: cameras do wear out!	Joanna McCaffrey, Zach Randall
10:00-10:20	Camera Basics 3.0 Lab - Composition Filling the frame: nothing more, nothing less; cropping images in post-processing, composition, what is important? Which lenses to use, using different lenses.	Gil/ZR/JM
10:20-10:40	Break
10:40-11:00	Camera Image Basics 1.0 Image size measurements: mbytes, Pixels: not all pixels are created equal, the 12mp Nikon D700 FX is not the same as 12 mp iPhone SE; file/image sizes; Resolution: ppi (pixels/inch) are not the same as dpi (dots/inch), a scanner (dpi) is a printer, not a camera, not comparable; sensor photosite; Image file type (RAW, JPEG, TIFF, DNG); Compressed vs. uncompressed file format;	Jeff Gage, Zach Randall
11:00-11:20	Camera Image Basics 1.0 Discussion	Jeff Gage, Zach Randall
11:20-11:40	Imaging Workstations 1.0 Imaging Workstations (squeeze box, photo boxes, copy stands) Workstation programs (Digital Photo Professional, Lightroom, Helicon Focus, Zerene) Helpful tools at workstations (hand sanitizer, fluid, pins, props, 3D bubble levels, tripods [IS off], special photo prep techniques: whitening agents [NH4CL]) Controlling lighting: in the room, and on the image. Diffused lighting is not always what you want: consider herbarium sheets versus fossil ferns, determine best lighting for the subject. Mixing light sources; light pollution; strobes versus static lighting; different kinds of lighting: polarizers, filters, using flash on camera or off camera, remote control of lights, rear curtain sync. Light quality, Kelvin, LED, incandescent, fluorescent, flash Auxiliary barcode scanner Status of Photo eBox (OR Tech)	Gil Nelson & Stephanie Leon
11:40-12:10	Imaging Workstations 1.0 Lab Discussion	Gil/ZR/JM
12:10-12:15	Q&A, Discussion, Morning Wrap-up
12:15-1:00	Lunch (catered)
Afternoon Imaging Station Tours
1:00-4:00	There is flexibility in what tours you take; there is time tomorrow for in-depth interactions. Kent Perkins - herbarium sheets, Verity Mathis - mammals, Zach Randall - fish, Sean Moran - paleo, John Slapcinsky - invertebrates Stacey Huber - lepidoptera
4:00-4:45	Afternoon Snacks, Q&A, Discussion, Afternoon Wrap-up
5-6:30	Field trip to Sweetwater Wetlands Park
7:00	Dinner: Tall Paul's / The Social at Midtown (pizza provided)

Day 2: Wednesday, 3 May 2017

Day Two
Time	Topic	Presenter(s)/Leader(s)
7:00-8:00	Coffee, Tea, OJ, Water, Pastries
8:00-8:45	Software and Post-processing Camera control software: handling images in 3rd party software versus vendor software: CameraControl Pro, Digital Photo Professional, DigiCam; Post-processing software resources: Lightroom, Photoshop, default camera tools, especially if you are tethering or stacking - when to use, context, problems to solve; Organizing files: discussion of benefits, challenges, quality control, naming, efficiencies; Archival solutions: cloud (Amazon, Dropbox, etc.), desktop, institutional drives, flash drives, DAMS (need IT support); Color: gamut: sRGB, AdobeRGB, ProPhoto (best bit-depth, largest color space); bit depth - do the best you can do, let technology catch up (early monitors are 72 bpi and not retina or 4K/5K displays);	Gil Nelson
8:45-9:15	Image Metadata Image metadata: preserving and adding metadata, e.g., EXIF, IPTC;	Kristen Grace
9:15-9:45	Discussion from previous day, directions for the day
9:45-10:00	Break
10:00-11:30	Lab & Field Hands on practice with using your camera on various specimen types	Gil/ZR/JM
11:30-12:00+	Q&A, Discussion, Workshop Wrap-up

Possible eating venues:

• The Social at Midtown http://thesocialgnv.com/menu/ (352-373-7383), 1728 West University Ave
• Tall Paul's, (352) 505-0990) 10 SE 2nd Ave, no food, order pizza across the street