The Obsidian Stock Blog

OpenRaw.org, an organization dedicated to pushing camera manufacturers to publicly document their RAW image formats, has released its 2006 survey of photographers and imaging professionals.

Albeit long, it’s an interesting document that showcases the concerns of people in the industry about ever-changing, manufacturer-proprietary RAW formats and its potential pitfalls.

More than two-thirds of the 19,207 participants expressed concern that they won’t be able to open or edit raw files created by older digital cameras. The most telling statistic is the 90% of respondents who agreed: ‘Once a digital image is written to a file by a camera, data in all parts of the image file should belong to the photographer who captured the image. Camera makers should publish full and open descriptions of all parts of the raw image files their camera produce.’

What *is* the RAW problem, exactly?

From OpenRAW.org: In the short history of digital photography, manufacturers have released numerous cameras with constantly evolving RAW formats. This has lead to the existence of a vast number of RAW “dialects,” even within each major brand, that store image and camera setting data in a different manner.

In some cases, manufacturers have even encrypted the data within newer RAW files. Intentionally or not, this encryption has placed full access to the images stored in these files out of reach of the photographers that took them. Unless, of course, they limit themselves to tools sold by the camera manufacturer.

To date, this vast number of RAW formats has been hidden by the transparent support offered in RAW converter software, provided by both the camera manufacturer and various third parties. At the time of writing, the open source dcraw converter currently supports more than 200 formats. However, as manufacturers lose interest in their discontinued products and drop support for them, the true impact of all of these “dialects” will be felt.

Photographers will find their older images inaccessible, as future software versions lose support for older cameras. In the worst cases, entire brands may disappear, as has already happened with Contax.

The OpenRAW Solution: The goal of OpenRAW is to encourage image preservation and give creative choice of how images are processed to the creators of the images. To this end, we advocate open documentation of information about the how the raw data is stored and the camera settings selected by the photographer.

More info is here.

Most people (photographers and their clients alike) seem at times a little fuzzy on what copyright really means, and how to deal with it.

In today’s Washington Post, Dave Johnson sums up what copyright is, details out the various levels of copyright protection for your images, and the actions you can take if a violation occurs.The article, “Your Photos, Your Rights, and the Law” is a good read if you want to start clearing out those cobwebs in terms of what is legal. Recommended for Obsidian Stock photographers and clients alike.

Obsidian Stock welcomes Bend photographer Scott Schechtel to our ever-growing roster of talented contributors.

Scott was born and raised in the Chicago area, but got immediately obsessed with Oregon at the age of 10 after seeing a picture of Mt. Hood in a travel book. Following his first visit to the state at 14, he was determined to attend Oregon State University to pursue a degree in Forestry - and eventually fulfill his dream of living in Oregon.

He has since worked for the US Forest Service, performing timber stand exams and surveys, and fought wildfires throughout the Pacific Northwest.

Today, his photographic file from many years and miles of backpacking across the Western states accompanies articles he wrote for magazines such as Camping Life, Mountain Living, Cascades East, Backpacker and Hooked on the Outdoors.

Scott continues to seek the road less travelled, and plans to publish field guides detailing his discoveries. Now a full-time freelancer, he also designs websites and writes on topics ranging from fire fighting to building a home.

You can see more of his photographic work right here.

Microsoft has announced a new image format called Windows Media Photo (with a WDP file extension). According to their white paper, this new format offers compression ratios close to JPEG-2000 but with the computational requirements of JPEG (smaller files with the same image quality). The use of new algorithms are also claimed to reduce the visibility of ‘objectionable spatial artifacts’ (those mosquito JPEG artifacts). Windows Media Photo supports a wide range of image formats including both fixed and floating point numerical representations (think wide dynamic range), various color spaces, metadata (including EXIF) and even transparency. This new format will be supported in Windows Vista when it arrives and will be made available for Windows XP. There has been no word yet of support for the format in any hardware devices.

More info is here.

Specs are here.

This is an update of a topic touched on in an earlier Obsidian Stock blog entry: Congress To Consider Softer Version of Orphan Works Bill

After months of debate and negotiation, a bill on orphan works has been introduced in Congress. Photography groups continue to oppose the bill, but say it is not as bad as they feared.

The Orphan Works Act of 2006 (H.R. 5439) is based on a recommendation from the U.S. Copyright Office, which photography groups decried as a dangerous erosion of copyright law. But the bill also makes some concessions to rights owners, including delaying the effective date of the law until 2008 and ordering the Copyright Office to put more information online to help people find copyright holders.

The bill was introduced Tuesday by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) and will be reviewed Wednesday at a meeting of the House Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual Property, which Smith chairs.

The bill (the text of which was posted on the web site of the American Society of Media Photographers) gives no special consideration to visual works. It does, however, direct the Copyright Office spend a year studying copyright small claims and report back to Congress. Photo groups have been pushing for an easier and less expensive way of settling small copyright disputes, which now are handled by federal district courts.

Full Story here.

Via Reuters:

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan’s Canon Inc. said on Thursday that it would consider halting development of new film cameras as it focuses resources on digital models, the latest sign of the rapidly fading role of film in photography.

A spokesman at Canon, the world’s largest digital camera maker, said it would consider whether it needs to continue developing both compact and single lens reflex (SLR) film models because the markets for both are shrinking.

Canon said it would continue to produce and sell existing models and make a final judgment on the business in the future while monitoring market demand.

Canon’s statement follows an announcement earlier this year by rival Nikon Corp. that it would stop producing most of its film cameras, expect for a few professional products.

Konica Minolta Holdings Inc., meanwhile, has said it would exit the camera and photo film markets, where it has been losing money amid stiff competition and weak demand.

The photographic film and film camera markets have been shrinking rapidly in the past few years due to the rising popularity of digital cameras, which can take and store photos without the need for film.

Obsidian Stock is thrilled to welcome Nancy Ryan to our growing roster of talented contributors.

With roots in North Dakota and Minnesota, Nancy came to Bend in 1978, where she worked as a firefighter for 4 years before joining the District Attorney’s office. She’s now a legal assistant to attorney Max Merrill.

On the weekends, evenings or whenever time allows, Nancy is out and about, shooting with her digital Nikon and a variety of bad-ass lenses. She gets her kicks aiming all that glass at birds, flowers, and whatever else trips her fancy - creating images that celebrate the natural world in it’s most captivating form.

And when she’s not out kayaking, bicycling, dirt biking, camping or fishing, you might be able to catch her belly-dancing her little heart out as a member of the exotic and beautiful dance troup Gypsy Fire.

See more of her photography here.

The Copyright Office has suggested legislation that, in its current form, could have a devastating impact on professional photographers.

The proposal would limit, or in some cases eliminate, the damages available against an infringer of an orphan work.

What is an orphan work? It is a work or image, presumed to have copyright protection, but whose owner cannot be located even after a reasonably diligent search conducted in good faith.

Full Story.

At the same time, the American Society of Media Photographers has met with representatives of the Copyright Office and the Library of Congress and with industry partners to discuss the online registration of photographs from within existing and future digital asset management programs.

“With on-line registration on the near horizon, this feature will make it much easier to actually register your copyright and more fully protect your images,” says Richard Anderson, chair of ASMP’s Digital Standards Committee.

Full Story.

Obsidian Stock gives an enthusiastic shout to our newest contributor - Patrick Windsor.

Armed with a degree in commercial photography from the Art Institute of Seattle, Pat set out to show his audience “the view through the window of how I see the world”.

His breathtaking imagery of flyfishing and other outdoor recreation in Central Oregon (together with his jovial spirit and laid-back nature) certainly has wowed us, and we’re thrilled that Pat has chosen to associate himself with our agency.

He says “from photographing Grizzly bears in Alaska, to capturing the first light on the Three Sisters, my passion for photography burns brighter with every image my lens records. I love what I do, and I cherish every moment.”

When he’s not behind the camera, you will probably find him casting a flyrod, or during the winter, snowboarding the slopes at Mt. Bachelor. And when he’s not shooting, he’s working as a flyfishing guide and instructor on the pristine waters throughout Central Oregon. He lives with his two Labrador retrievers in a little log cabin on the Deschutes River in Sunriver.

Welcome, Pat - and we encourage our readers to take a minute and check out his gorgeous photography.

In my other blog, I’ve written today about a recent gig, photographing Pilates exercises for a friend of mine’s brandnew pilates studio in Bend.

Short of recreating the entire article, I thought I’d rather link to the page where I detail the technique I used to create the motion effects.
Try it for yourself!