Well here’s your chance to try something different.

The Illinois State Cross Country Championships are this weekend. In Peoria – where they always are. Right here – and so accessible to YOU. If you have had a hankering to shoot a little sports, this is indeed a unique opportunity. Head over to Detweiller Park this Saturday where you can see no less then six races, hourly starting at 9am and “running” pretty much non-stop to about 2:30pm.  Each race (three classes – male and female) lasts about 20 minutes – and then you get 40 minutes between races to explore the very rich myriad of activities going on around these state championships.

There are a number of reasons to shoot this event. While you pay $10 per car for parking, the events themselves are free. Load a few shooters into one car and it’s downright cheap. There are almost a limitless number of places to photograph the runners (although I’m partial to the end of the long straightaway at the start of every race). And those runners pass by numerous times so you get lots of chances to perfect your techniques. The color – of all the uniforms and thousands of spectators – mixed in with the greens and fading leaves at Detweiller – make for some slick vistas.

Here’s a map for those of you who’ve been under the rock and aren’t sure where Detweiller Park is. And a course map gives you a feeling for where the runners are going to be. I personally always shoot the start and then take advantage of the timing to move toward Rt. 29 to get them passing in numerous places. The area along side Park Road, up towards the finish line, is usually packed with people (and I mean PACKED). Hustle a little to get a good spot. Most people are very accommodating to letting you sit under the rope to get your shot. The only warning: the course marshals are notoriously tough on folks crossing the course at times. Always try and know where you are and where you are going – or they’ll do it for you. But there are still almost a limitless number of places to shoot from.

I leave you with a series of images I’ve shot out there over the years…

Elizabeth Halford is a British portrait photographer from Hampshire, who specializes in children and families. And all of you here in Central Illinois (4,062 miles from the lovely little town of Hampshire) might be wondering something like “So what.” Well listen blokes – I want to thank Elizabeth Halford because she made my day just a little bit easier. Let me explain.

I think most of you know I’m a bit of an evangelist when it comes to the web site Flickr.com. Flickr hosts all of the images that appear on this blog (and many more) – and it has done a lot of other positive things for me as I try to promote photography in the Central Illinois region (hello Peoria Flickr group!). And yet I’m always somewhat slack-jawed when I hear someone say how they don’t know about/use/wonder at the marvel that is Flickr. I know they’re not a perfect website – but they get it right far more then they get it wrong and they’re also great promoters of all things photographic.

Now – let’s get back to England’s lovely Elizabeth Halford (maybe she’ll pay me a few quid everytime I mention her name?). Elizabeth was kind enough to write a great introductary article all about Flickr over at Digital Photography School. Kind of an everything-you’d-want-to-know primer on all the goodness that is Flickr. And because she’s written it – I DON’T HAVE TO DO IT MYSELF. And that – THAT – is why I want to thank Elizabeth Halford. She rocks. From 4,062 miles away.

So if you’ve wondered about flickr – go read her article at DPS and let the light shine on in. So thanks Elizabeth Halford of Hampshire, U.K. You’ve done good.

A few things of note upcoming at the Peoria Camera Club.

Tomorrow, Tuesday, November 3 – Suzette Boulais from Peoria’s ArtsPartners will be dropping by. She will be discussing the goals, and features of Arts Partners – a great supporter of all arts in Central Illinois. She will also explore how that organization and PCC can benefit each other. Suzette is a good and energetic presenter and is a real champion for the arts here in the River City. And she’s showing up at the PCC in what will be a VERY busy week for her.

This Saturday, November 7, from 9:00am till 4:00pm, the club will hold their annual Fall Workshop. Geared at studio photography – either traditional portraiture or still-life/table-top – the workshop gives photographers a chance to play with lots of different set-ups and to work with many models who will be on-hand.  It’s just $25 to participate. Get the details over at the Workshops portion of the website.

And on November 17, local photographer Barb Hoffman will be on-hand to review all of the entries in the PCC’s recent Urban Landscape competition. Barb knows her way around Urban Landscapes to be sure – and it would be worth just to hear her critique.

All meetings are held at the Immanuel Lutheran Church, 4911 N Knoxville Ave, located on the northwest corner of Knoxville and Glen Ave. Meetings run from 7:30pm to 9:30pm.

 

(Well look who dropped by again to start us off on this Monday morning – our favorite Vision author, Ms. Stacy Hanna. And today we get the conclusion to the story of too much broken gear. But fear not – it’s a happy ending.)

Let’s all just taken a brief second and say “YAY!” with me. “YAY!!!” Okay, that feels so good. I finally have my lenses back home where they belong. It has been a long couple of months without a chunk of my gear that I use regularly. If you are not aware, It all started with my adored 18-200mm lens making bad noises, which was then followed a week later by my beloved 24-70 falling one foot to the ground with a crunch at a wedding. You can read all the details of what happened here.

To sum it up quickly. I sent my 18-200mm lens into Nikon through the local camera shop and then for experimentation purposes, I sent my 24-70mm into Nikon myself directly. In my previous article, I explained how to use both methods if you need to send your gear in for repair.

It has been seven weeks since I sent in my my first lens and yesterday I received the second lens back to me in the mail. Seven weeks is a long time without your babies, I mean, tools.

After rejoicing about my reunited family, I thought I should also share with you all the details of how my experiences were with both methods of getting my gear repaired. I’ll start off by saying that I highly recommend that you send your own gear in for repair. I found this method to be the best for several reasons:

It is cheaper. Period. The local camera shop charges $20 to send your gear in for you. The cost for me to FedEx 2nd day with insurance straight to Nikon – $14.00 I’m already coming out ahead.

You have to fill out the paperwork yourself regardless. Yep, you heard me right. You can either go to Nikon’s website and fill out the required online form with the details of your repair, serial number, proof of purchase, etc. or you can either tell the clerk and the camera store or worse yet end up hand writing it on their much less clear and more cramped form. I spend far less time typing up my responses to the questions on the form than I did trying to explain it to a sales staff member that hadn’t yet been trained on how to handle manufacturer repairs where I ultimately ended up hand writing it on the form myself. I think is is probably much better communication to Nikon repair staff when they can easily read your typed responses than your chicken scratches, don’t you?

You know where you gear is throughout the entire process. When you send in the gear directly you get direct contact with Nikon staff when you gear arrives. You are mailed a quote either explaining your gear is covered under warranty or a quote for the repair cost. You are given information to log into your own account and approve or reject the repair work and once payment has been received (if necessary) they will begin your repair. Throughout this process, you can login at anytime and check the status of your repair. I was able to see that they received my lens, processed the paperwork, ordered replacement parts, performing the repair, cleaning and shipping. I even got a slip of paperwork with my lens when it returned listing out what parts had been repaired/replaced. I was always up to date with what was going on.

I can’t say the same for the camera shop. I had to call several times just to check in. I didn’t know when they shipped my lens after I handed it off to them. They “hadn’t heard anything yet from Nikon”, and never offered on their own accord to call and check the status for me. I was told “it may be a couple of weeks” before they hear anything. I’m sorry, but what was that $20 for? I ended up contacting Nikon on my own about the lens I had the camera shop send in and guess what? They replied immediately on the same day with a status update. They were great to work with and I always had my questions answered with Nikon. They just reaffirmed my love for their products because they have the customer services to back it up. Thank you, Nikon.

 

So, to sum up my experience, I can without hesitation say that you should save the money and just ship your gear in for your repair yourself. The process is straightforward, you can get your questions answered easily if you need to and apparently you will have to do the work regardless since giving your gear to the camera shop doesn’t mean it is worry-free for you. You aren’t paying extra to have them “handle” it. If you care about your gear enough to have it serviced, then you won’t be sorry you dealt with it yourself.

Oh, and just in case you were thinking maybe I had it out for the local camera shop. I must say that I am a firm believer in shopping local when I can. I like to support the local economy and local families and am usually willing to pay a little more to do so. However, like any smart consumer, I also expect that shopping local means good customer service just like I would give to my own clients. I’ve shopped on many an occasion at the local camera shop and they always have the gear I need or want, but Nikon simply had a better customer experience and customer service. If you need to buy something, I can happily say go shop local, they will likely have what you need, but for getting gear repaired I think you will be happier working directly with Nikon yourself.

I’m taking the rest of the day off here again. I know. Again.

Head over to the Enjoy Illinois blog to see what clever words of wisdom I’m imparting over there about something familiar to Central Illinoisians. And if you head down toward Banner Marsh – over in Fulton County – you’ll no doubt eventually stumble across this silo.

Well here comes November. I think November is a month that often gets cheated. We’re in such a hurry to start the holiday shopping extravaganza that we often ignore this month – except perhaps for Thanksgiving. And the eleventh month has a lot going for it. The last full month of autumn, with lingering colors and surprisingly warm days on occasion. The crispness in the air, football on Thursdays, Tofurkey. Okay – not sure about Tofurkey.

This image was made in November of 2006 up at Illinois’ Matthiessen State Park in the Wishing Well. The park is where Lake Matthiessen water cascades down some 11 waterfalls over about a half-mile before joining the Vermillion River. A joy to see any month of the year.

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Not to beat duChemin over the head (figuratively not literally) but as he says “Gear is Good, Vision is Better.”

No better proof of that then to check out the work of Australian teenager Leila Berney, who is just 17 years old, owns a Canon 400D (aka a Rebel XTi), does no Photoshop, and simply has an idea and style that reaches out. Her large gallery over at DeviantArt has a lot of variety – and is full of hits – and misses. But the thing of it is, she goes for it photographically speaking and while reaching stays true to herself. It doesn’t matter what camera you have or what your Photoshop secrets are. It matters that you take your camera with you and that you shoot what matters – to you. The old saying about “Dance Like No One is Watching” has a photographic equal: “Shoot Like No One Else Will See”. Shoot for you – and the rest will follow. Take a look at a few of Leila’s pieces:

Found via Alison Zavos on the Feature Shoot blog

And yet we must balance every “Vision is Better” rant with a “Gear is [Still] Good” mantra. We talk about how many frames per second we can get. Yo dude – 7fps? 8fps? 10fps? Raw? Well screw that. Check out what 1,000,000fps can do for you if you like to photograph bullets. In flight.

via John Nack

Oh – and check out this notion. So you wanna be a commercial photographer? I wouldn’t put the stress that high – I think it’s one of the greatest jobs out there.

I’ve been doing some thinking on the whole Raw vs. JPEG thing. But lets back up for a moment.

When I got my first Digital SLR (my old Nikon D70 – purchased about five years ago), I made the choice to shoot JPEGs. On one hand I didn’t have the experience, software, or wherewithal to move right into Nikon’s Raw. On the other hand, shooting in JPEG still produced good images that you could tweak somewhat in Photoshop. Of course when I look at a lot of the early images I shot in JPEG and worked over in Photoshop, I think I actually made them worse. But all kidding aside, they were good images that worked for what I was doing.

Then I attended one of the Spring Seminars that the Peoria Camera Club puts on – with Rick Sammon I believe – and he kept harping on why I, Dave Vernon, was not shooting in Raw. And he was right. By then I had a sense of what I wanted to do photographically and Raw was one way to achieve that. I got into Raw very deep and very fast and now – here in 2009 I couldn’t imagine shooting any other way. I’m certainly a Raw evangelist but … and here’s where it gets dangerous – I think I have an open mind when it comes to JPEG.

There’s nothing like teaching photography at the Peoria Art Guild to give me – as the teacher – an education. A lot of my students don’t give a rat’s rear end for Raw. They don’t – and they don’t give that same tush for doing any post-processing out of camera. Nope. So guess what? Yeah – Raw is an awful choice for them. Awful. They are built for JPEG and that’s really the only acceptable avenue. So my job isn’t to proselytize to them about Raw. My job is to shut my mouth and make sure they’re getting the most out of their JPEG shooting experience. And that’s what I do. But in doing that I’ve come back around to the plus of shooting JPEG. Let me expand on that a bit.

My typical workflow, for say, event photography, is to shoot it in Raw and then process it in Adobe Camera Raw. I’ll color correct, crop, and make minor adjustments to my selects – but I won’t ever take them into Photoshop. I’ll then use Camera Raw to essentially export JPEGs that I deliver to my customer. But why not shoot these in JPEG and save me a step or two?

I wax on to my JPEG shooters that one of the most important things you can do is take the time to set your camera up correctly before you shoot – so your picture control and white balance is spot on since changing it after the fact is made more difficult. And once you’ve done that – why not shoot in JPEG? Or at least Raw + JPEG if you’re chicken. Have you seen the options in your camera’s Retouch menu? In my Nikons, there is stuff like D-Lighting, red-eye correction, cropping, black-and-white, filter effects, and color balance. You also have Picture Control – where I can adjust sharpening, contrast, brightness, saturation and hue – before I shoot. And interestingly that’s what I’m going to do after the fact anyway in PS. So why not?

If what you do demands Raw – then great – Raw is a powerful format with lots of post-processing benefits. If not – consider if JPEG could work for you – and save you a ton of time. We’re all about getting the best image in camera anyway – so having an image in a final format in camera seems like it isn’t a bad idea. And if you don’t believe me – read this blog entry from Bob Krist – who has been known to shoot a frame or two for National Geographic. He’s come around to the same basic point-of-view.

And here’s a few minor JPEG trivia items for you to carry around all day.

• Even if you shoot Raw – your camera still makes a JPEG. It’s what you see on your LCD. That JPEG image is essentially embedded within the Raw file. If you want to get at it, there’s a nice little program to do that. Saves you from shooting in Raw + JPEG.
• We (probably) all know that JPEG is also a compression format which is not lossless. Every time you re-save a JPEG you’re throwing away a little bit of data. But if you want to edit a JPEG in some post-processing software go right ahead. Doing it once or twice won’t significantly alter your file’s quality. Doing it 600 times however…
• When you pick the “quality” of a JPEG file at saving time – you’re really allowing how much compression you want. I always tend to like about 70% – enough compression to save a little space without sacrificing much quality. That’s just me and you’re actual miles may vary.

And one other thought for you folks thinking about Raw. I had a student mention to me the other day that they couldn’t open their Raw file in Photoshop. If your Raw processor came out before your camera did, then this is probably the case. You need to make sure you have the latest update (or at least an update that included support for your camera) of your software that includes support for your camera. Every time the major camera manufacturers introduce a new model, Adobe is quick on the bandwagon to release an update to ACR to support that camera. Check your software’s Update function (usually under the Help menu) to see if there are any free updates available.

 

I love whimsical when it comes to travel photography. When we were passing through Lismore in Ireland a few years back, I noticed this plaque outside a public loo. Admittedly, the inside of the bathroom was pretty nice – albeit rather simple – but nice nevertheless (and I’m a little frightened I can remember it). I also love that they have a plaque even though they didn’t win. And what happened in 2003? What has to go wrong to make you slip down the list?

All of that is a lead-up to this. If you’ve ever done any travel photography, you know there’s a million things to consider when it comes to this topic. Consider the fact that I really debated for days over whether or not to take my tripod to Ireland (a debate that I wouldn’t have today – it goes everywhere with me). The tripod lost – I had my reasons – none of them good in retrospect – but I had my reasons. Come to think of it that was also the first trip on which my wife realized that travel is a French word meaning “wait for photographer”.

Well – Thom Hogan – who usually writes exhaustively on ALL things Nikon – has graced us with a nice new brand-neutral article on ALL things travel – as in what do you need to consider before you make the big trip. If you haven’t read Thom before – be forewarned - he’s very thorough. I’ve had trips shorter then this article – but you will be prepared.

 

…because you should see this too.

Photographer Cheryl Jacobs Nicolai launched her own blog back in May with an article she’d written years earlier. The first line – on style – has gotten a lot of play in the photography blogosphere in the last few days – and it should. It’s that good. Take a look at the specific quote, but then go over and read the whole article – it will probably have some influence on you as a photographer. Seriously. But still – start here – simply:

“Style is a voice, not a prop or an action. If you can buy it, borrow it, download it, or steal it, it is not a style. Don’t look outward for your style; look inward.”

Anything that is relevant to my personal style is driven by my passion for being out in nature. While I do numerous kinds of photography – it’s landscape shooting that always recharges my batteries and leaves me wanting more.  When I look inward, that’s what I see – and that’s what I try to translate into my work. Photographing at f/1.2 isn’t a style – it’s a technique. Photographing what the heart finds  - now that’s a style.

And hey – just to save a little space – entertain yourself briefly with this: 10 Fascinating Recently Discovered Photographs. Have a great day.

Let’s consider this a Twofer Tuesday, shall we? Let’s especially consider that since we have to fill space to once again force my list under the picture – all because I’m too cheap to make the picture smaller. It’s a tough life.

Anyway, we just got done – mere moments ago – listing five more photographers again. And since this isn’t a 10 More Photographers list, I had to make the tough choice to split this up or I could have done it all in one post. But compulsiveness has its price. And since we were discussing this in the Landscape Expedition class at the Art Guild – let me list five other landscape shooters who blow my mind (and we’re going to leave Ansel off the list – that’s a no-brainer). But if I had to make a list – I’d want these five folks on it:

• Jack Dykinga (www.dykinga.com)
• Carr Clifton (www.carrclifton.com)
• Tom Till (www.tomtill.com)
• David Muench (www.muenchphotography.com)
• Galen Rowell (www.mountainlight.com)

and because I can’t be counted on to count to five accurately, let’s throw in:

• Thomas Mangelsen (www.mangelsen.com)

Alright – that should hold you for a few days.

We’ve done this twice before, so it’s time for Part 3 of our little series “5 More Photographers” – where I highlight five shooters who a) I really like and b) who have websites we can point you at. We’re going in a few different directions today. The first two guys (Tim and Pouya) I discovered through other folks who pointed them out to me. The next two gals (Elizabeth and Laurie) are here because as we worked through a list of important landscape photographers in the current Peoria Art Guild Expedition class, we realized we needed to highlight more female landscape photographers. And the last dude (David) on the list is here because he’s here in Central Illinois and it’s about time we pointed you over to his website.

• Tim Mantoani (www.mantoani.com) - his Photographer’s Portraits are simply wonderful (via Scott Kelby)
• Pouya Dianat (www.pouyadianat.com) – a wonderful command of available light (thanks Joy Miller)
• Elizabeth Carmel (www.elizabethcarmel.com) – just wow with the landscapes
• Laurie Excell (laurieexcell.com) – wonderful teacher to boot
• David Zalaznik (www.davidzalaznik.com) – An absolutely fine Central Illinois landscape shooter

See you in Part IV – sooner then you think.

And still I think of y’all.

Just three items – kind of under the something new, something old, and something – well – something I think I mentioned but probably didn’t and I’m too lazy to search for it.

The new: Ms. Annie Leibovitz, apparently a portrait photographer from New York City, turned out a family portrait of a nice young couple and their two daughters from Washington D.C. Apparently it’s on the Internet now – and is getting a lot of attention. This woman isn’t too bad, but the dad could’ve put a jacket on. Is he really THAT busy?

The old: Deke McClelland – Photoshop Teacher of Yore – continues with his Photoshop Top 40. We’ve got 14 in the bag – and 26 to go – but if you haven’t checked in for a while, head over to lynda.com and see what’s going on. All nice videos on techniques we could all afford to do better.

The something – well: Syl Arena – a man with noticeably more hair then me – has been posted a nice long and yet readable series on “Lessons I Didn’t Learn In Photo School”. Amazingly, he has gotten to number 100 where it appears he stopping and selling them in book form. But you – gentle reader – can still see all 100 on Syl’s blog. And to be honest – only about 97 or 98 or worth anything.

Alright – after seeing “10 Things I Wish I Could Tell Every New Lightroom User” early this morning, Adobe has just done something cool this morning for those of you who think you might want to make the jump to LR.

Adobe is offering you access to the public beta of Lightroom 3. For free. For 6 MONTHS. That’s huge. You can go download it right now – for free. You can install it – for free. And you can use it for six months – for free. Of course at the end of April you’re screwed – because you’ll be hooked on it and dependent on it – and you’ll have to plunk down the dollars to buy it – but it will be a good investment.

Scott Kelby – who knows a thing or two about Lightroom – offers his list of the ten major improvements over the already awesome Lightroom 2 (currently 2.5) software on his blog today. Just looking at that list tells me what impressive features abound in LR 3.

The only possible gotcha in this whole thing is that this truly is a beta release of software. It’s out there for evaluation and commentary. It should run fine, but if you decide to make it the key tool for your business before April 30, 2010 – you may want to slow down. Go get it. Go play with it. See how it can change your life post-processing workflow.

You take a few days off from the blog and you expect maybe all photo bloggers would have the same courtesy – so you don’t fall SO far behind. Yeah – not so much. Thanks McNally, LaForet, duChemin, and the rest – you’re all killin’ me. Let’s get this show on the road. You’ve peed right? This may take a while. (Nice – I know).

§ Let’s start with duChemin – the dude has been busy. Besides the fact that he has a new book coming out in November (called VisionMongers – Making a Life and a Living in Photography – a follow-up to the pretty darn wonderful “Within the Frame”), he’s also been prolific with the eBooks lately. All three of his pretty worthy eBooks are for sale in his bookstore – and for very reasonable prices. And while you’re there consider Within the Frame. Speaking of books, David also had a pretty outstanding list of books that every photographer should read that he posted a few days back. Less about photographic technique as a body – and more about vision and seeing. I’m thrilled to have read four of the books – and Patterson’s “Photography and the Art of Seeing” is high on the list of things to get too.

§ And even though duChemin tells us that gear is only good and vision is better – we’re all on board that gear is still essentially… good. Don Giannatti, the madcap genius behind the wonderful lighting website Lighting Essentials put up a lovely little post a few days ago about what gear he is in love with. I can speak to the Honl gear – it’s good stuff. And I’m thinking the Kacey Beauty Dish is near the top of my shopping list. Don’t tell my wife – but I NEED that Beauty Dish.

§ Bill DeKay, a photojournalist up in the Great White North, has started a photo blog dedicated to Canadian agriculture. And while you may think so what I would say to you this: Have you been on a drive outside of the city lately. Have you seen all the freakn’ agriculture right here in Illinois? It’s nice to get a similar and yet different perspective. I do a lot of ag shooting so even if you guys don’t care – I’m ALL OVER IT!

§ McNally. Gotta link to a little McNally. Leave it to a guy like Joe – who I admire more then just a little bit as a photographer to aspire to – to tell us how badly he sucks. Even more interesting I guess is his message that we all suck but that’s cool because we all want to get a lot better. Joe spent a week sucking under the care of one of the true legends – Jay Maisel. Joe spent a few days at a Maisel workshop in New York and he struggled to get better. And – to our benefit – he blogged all about it. Go over and sympathize with him.

§ Been a little hesitant to make the jump to Lightroom like me (I’m a Bridge/Photoshop guy – what can I say)? Well – don’t be a coward like me – but make the jump and do it with your eyes open. This little entry over on the Photofocus blog – written by Rob Sylvan – gives you the list of 10 Things I Wish I Could Tell Every New Lightroom User. A useful list this – a little hand-holding before you make the jump is a good thing.

§ As a Photoshop guy – and as a human being that abhors artificial things in my natural pictures – I’m intrigued by some news coming out of Adobe Labs – the folks who are working on Photoshop about three versions down the road. If you’ve ever tried to touch a wire out of a shot – of something slightly complicated – you wish that Photoshop simply did it better. Coming down the pike – context-sensitive healing. And this demo version – over on Facebook – but probably findable elsewhere – looks heavenly.

§ The new shows at the Peoria Art Guild – featuring a lot of different Central Illinois photographers is excellent. I spent a few minutes with Doug and Eileen Leunig at the opening last Friday and I got some advance notice of what will be a very slick show the Leunigs are putting on at the Picture This Gallery in Peoria Heights. Entitled “Gathering Light – Light Paintings by the Leunigs”, the show will feature Central Illinois landmarks in a very different and stunning way. I’m looking forward to it – at Picture This November 2 – December 15 – with a reception on November 13 from 6-8pm.

§ I’ll leave you with this. Canon is set to introduce the EOS 1D Mark IV camera any day now. It is part of their top of the line pro gear and will be one of their two flagship pro cameras (along with the current 1Ds Mark III). Like the recently introduced Nikon D3s, this new camera will do amazing – no mindblowingly amazing – work in low light. And like the D3s – it will do it in HD video. Vincent LaForet – as he did when the 5D Mark II came out – got his hands on a preproduction model and made a film. Called Nocturne, it was shot in two days in Los Angeles. At night. In available light. At ISO 6,400. And it is gorgeous. OMG gorgeous. Here’s the catch. For some unfathomable and at least yet unexplained reason, Canon had LaForet take the video down (it was here on Smugmug – not so much now). Vincent muses on about it a little – and I’m sure it will be back soon – but it was gorgeous. [Ed: In fact after I wrote this post - and before I posted it - I found the vid on You Tube so it's embedded below.] Interestingly, John Harrington has a pretty good guess as to why the video was taken down. And it brings up another blog you Canon lovers should love. IF you don’t know who Chuck Westfall is – this blog won’t help – but it will still entertain. Chuck – in reality – is the manager of the Camera Divison Technical Information Dept. of Canon U.S.A. So an important guy in the Canon hierarchy. The awesomely snarky (and full of swear words) Fake Chuck Westfall blog – on the other hand – lives to constructively criticize (okay – maybe just criticize – perhaps it was the biting satire that gave it away) the powers that be at Canon for missteps any big company is going to make. The fact that Canon has gone to court to try and get this blog killed – and the fact that they have not succeeded – makes it even jucier. Oh yeah. Now who’s going to start a Nikon equivalent?

And the aforementioned YouTube version of Nocturne: