Just learning to shoot photos? Go manual, not auto

Beginning photographers often make the mistake of depending way too much on the automatic features in DSLR cameras, Peter Phun at PhotoCorrect says. He suggests learning in manual mode:

When you’re learning, the best you can do is to learn to adjust the settings on manual. That way you can figure out what you did wrong. Shooting on auto will not tell you much when you’re trying to troubleshoot. Programs that can read exif information which record shutter speed, ISO, aperture, White Balance are revealed when a picture is taken on Manual Mode but not so in Auto.

In this post, Phun lists nine more common mistakes that that beginners make.

3 simple steps to buying (and using) your first DSLR camera

For many folks, the hardest step in learning to shoot photos is deciding on a camera. Here's some
great advice from Chaz Curry at PhotographyBlogger:

1. Buy the cheapest Canon or Nikon DSLR (body only).
2. Buy a 50mm 1.8 lens.
3. Start shooting immediately.

For details, follow the link.

A pocket-sized tripod for iPhoneography

From blogger Glyn Evans:

The portable and flexible tripod makers Joby, have just released their latest creation, the GripTight Micro Stand. Designed for any smartphone with or without a case, the GripTight Micro Stand grips your smartphone safely and securely via a spring loaded mount/grip, allows multi positioning via a machined aluminium mini ball head, that lets you tilt your smartphone 36 degrees in any direction, and can be quickly unfolded when you need it and folds up compactly to about the size of a car key when you don't.

4 tips for more effective storytelling

From Kathy Oneto at Fast Company:

Some tips on storytelling can be found from research consultancy Latitude, which recently released part one of its study, “The Future of Storytelling,” which identifies trends and audience attitudes about content. The tips Latitude provides on telling stories are the following:

1. IMMERSION--Create an immersive experience through content that is delivered in multi-media and that is multi-sensory;
2. INTERACTIVITY--Allow the consumer to become a part of it;
3. INTEGRATION--Ensure there is coherence across the many touchpoints; and
4. IMPACT--Make it lead to action

Meograph lets you package your client's story in terms of time and space

From Rachel McAthy at journalism.co.uk:

Multimedia storytelling tool Meograph has announced a number of new updates to the platform, including making the geographical pinpointing of a 'moment' within a story optional.

The tool, which enables journalists to plot the times and places of a story on a map and timeline, was launched in July this year. Users can also add multimedia content to each 'moment', such as images, YouTube videos and links to outside articles, as well as audio narration.

The end result is an embeddable Meograph, a playable multimedia package that documents a story.

What can a publicist learn from Circa?

While much of the journalism/PR world recoils in semi-horror, I'm finding Circa to be pretty damn intriguing.  And is it really that far away from other innovations. In many ways, Circa reminds me of at least three other innovations in news gathering:

• Storify, the curating tool that allows users to grab the essentials from all over the web and to rearrange them into a curated story.
• The social media news release, the somewhat quixotic attempt to redesign the boring news release into a format that reporters would find actually useful.
• USA Today, which "broke" the newspaper back in the 1980s much the same way that Circa is attempting to redefine news for an online generation -- to much of the same howls of derision. (It now vies with the Wall Street Journal for the largest national circulation in the U.S.)

Mobile publicists (and content journalists in general) should pay careful attention to Circa. It may be showing us a better way to package our content and to attract a 21st century audience.

How to create a video-editing station with an iPad

From Adam Dachis at Lifehacker:

Tablets are so popular that we've supposedly entered a "post-PC era," signifying the death of the personal computer. While we don't think that's happening quite yet, many people are actually getting things done on tablets. Well, at least Flickr user Matthew Pearce is, and he's got a tiny little workspace to prove it.

7 ways to make it easy to scan your content

People don't read -- they scan.

That's the point of this useful post from designer Roger C. Parker. He offers seven tips for improving scan-ability, as well as a link to a free 14-page, best-practices guide to designing white papers that are more readable.

• Readability Design: 7 Tips for Engaging Content

Tip: How to use Instagram as a publicity tool

A tip from Camella Mendez at the Content Marketing Institute:

Use Instagram to share unique, behind-the-scenes content that not only gives your audience a good reason to want to follow you there, but also helps you solidify a personal relationship and build loyalty with your customers new and old. Instagram is a perfect place to get even more personal with your biggest fans.

How to choose the right microphone for videography

Once you start working with video, you learn something early. While the quality of the video is important, the quality of the audio is absolutely vital.

An audience will put up with crappy video, but not crappy audio. It's just too annoying. Folks will just skip your video for the next one.

That's why you don't want to depend on your camera's built-in mic to capture audio. Instead, you will want to work with lapel mics, handheld wireless mics and shotgun mics. That can get expensive, but it's worth it.

I think it's fair to say that, if you have to choose between a top-of-the-line camera or first-rate audio equipment, you should put your money into the audio. (Unless you plan to never conduct an on-camera interview or to capture ambient sound.) It's that important.

With that in mind, here's a solid guide to selecting microphone from Videomaker.com

How to control your GoPro Hero camera from your smartphone

Here's the tutorial from GoPro. You will need a smartphone, the GoPro app, and a GoPro Hero camera armed with a GoPro wifi backpack.

It's all about the light: A short guide to getting the most out of aperture

Mobile publicists must master a wide range of media. It's no longer enough to understand just writing copy. We have to learn (among many other things) how to shoot our own photos.

Even if you are shooting with a smartphone, it's a smart idea to understand what photographers call the exposure triangle: shutter speed, ISO and aperture.

Shutter speed is simply how long the shutter allows light into the camera. If you want to stop a runner in mid-stride, you want to use a short speed. If you want to capture the moon at night, you need a long speed.

The ISO is a concept from the analog days of photography. It is the "speed of the film." A low ISO is good on a sunny day. A mid-ISO is good for indoor work. A high-ISO is good for darkness. But beware: The higher the ISO, the more "noise" you are likely to capture on your image. Generally, an ISO of 200 to 800 is considered all-purpose, except for the most extreme situations like night photography.

Then there's aperture, which controls how much light reaches the shutter. The smaller the aperture, the deeper the focus. So if you want everything in the shot to be in focus (think "Citizen Kane"), you want the smaller aperture you can reasonably use in your situation. If you want to blow out the background or the foreground, and focus entirely upon the main subject, then you want to open up the lens to the widest aperture that is reasonable for the situation.

It's all a matter of balancing how much light goes to through the aperture to the shutter, and how much light your camera registers on the image.

OK, that's the executive summary. Here's short guide to walk you through getting the most out of your aperture settings from blogger Ashley Beolens:

• Aperture – PictureCorrect

Mobile devices are maturing as news outlets, Pew study says

From the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ):

Half of all U.S. adults now have a mobile connection to the web through either a smartphone or tablet, significantly more than a year ago, and this has major implications for how news will be consumed and paid for, according to a detailed new survey of news use on mobile devices by the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ) in collaboration with The Economist Group. ...

News remains an important part of what people do on their mobile devices-64% of tablet owners and 62% of smartphone owners say they use the devices for news at least weekly, tying news statistically with other popular activities such email and playing games on tablets and behind only email on smartphones (not including talking on the phone). This means fully a third of all U.S. adults now get news on a mobile device at least once a week.

Mobile users, moreover, are not just checking headlines on their devices, although nearly all use the devices for the latest new updates. Many also are reading longer news stories - 73% of adults who consume news on their tablet read in-depth articles at least sometimes, including 19% who do so daily. Fully 61% of smartphone news consumers at least sometimes read longer stories, 11% regularly.

Why brand journalism works, from a former CBS News reporter

From former CBS News reporter David Henderson:

Brand journalism works to engage audiences. Why? Because it delivers stories audience want to hear. People have heard more than enough PR-type promotions, and therein is the rub. The big stumbling block is acceptance of new concepts by the PR and communications industry. They won’t budge from decades-old habits and tactics.

The way I see it, sharing a story that audiences care about is a whole lot more effective to get someone’s attention than falling into the predictable rut of traditional PR … which has not changed much in decades. While technology has changed, PR has remained in the mode of announcements, promotions, publicity and pushing stuff at audiences that by and large no longer are listening.

The Flip Cam gets new life as an iPhone app (what else?)

Don't know about you, but I really loved the FlipCam. It was elegantly designed, easy to use, and produced amazing HD video. The audio was lacking, but the next generation would have improved on that. Then Cisco bought it up, hyped it, then dumped it. But what can you expect from short-sighted greedy SOBs?

But now the Flip is reborn as an app for iPhone. All I can say is ... cool!