I thought I might devote today’s blog to getting to know me now. One of the biggest reasons for starting this new blog can be found under Hacks in the navigation menu. A few years back I started to develop pain in my left foot. As the bulk of my photography was event and travel, this became more and more of an issue. I did my last event at Christmas 2018, and the only travel was a trip to Florida in February, and Buffalo NY in March. So, time to get the foot fixed.
But what to do now? Fortunately, my business also includes graphic/web design which I can continue to do. But I have a camera, and a desire to shoot. I can’t get out much. I have enjoyed macro photography in the past, as well as setting up indoor shoots. Things like memorabilia – weddings, first baby, family heirlooms etc. This can be great fun, but it is hard to get it all set up on one foot. I decided to use this time to learn. I have a variety of courses through National Geographic, so I started re-watching them. In doing that I realized again how far and fast technology is changing.
So, here is one of my pet peeves, companies moving to the cloud, and not supporting older software. I started with Adobe Creative Suite 3 in 2007. I took courses, watched videos, and got pretty proficient at Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. I used Camera Raw and Bridge and was very happy with it, and still work with CS5/6 today. I have a network in my house, so managing my photos was an easy thing. Then Lightroom came about. I resisted for quite a while, but finally got a free copy of Lightroom 5 with a camera purchase. I still hate the way the libraries work, having to import everything, but it is a great editor. I now have Lightroom 6, and refuse to move to CC. I have Luminar and On1 as well, so eventually I will get away from Lightroom.
You might ask why I refuse to move to Lightroom CC. I will not do anything that relies on the Cloud. For some it is a perfect solution. For me it is a personal preference. It is just not conducive with the way I work, and the setup I have. During the next few weeks of recovery I will be learning more about Luminar and On1, playing with photos I have already taken. Don’t we all have some folders of photos we took and never processed? I know I do 😊