I got a cheque so that must mean that I will have a photo in this month's Pacific Yachting magazine (Dec 08). If I come across it in the news shelves I sense I'll be learning a lot about yachting in the Pacific.

Also, this marks the first time a magazine that has contacted me through a Flickr search has paid actual money. I've been published before but now I can say I've actually been compensated in spendable already-spent currency.

Look for my photo in the article about Howe Sound.

Links:

Joe McNally was nice enough to mention the Vancouver Strobists in his blog today. Our workshop leader for the day, Andrew got a mention so I guess we are that much closer to genius. You can also see the gorgeous shots taken by Joe of our model Cindy Fay near the bottom of the post along with a quick description of his setup. A lot you can do with two speedlights, eh?

At least I can say that I moved a light panel for McNally too if I never get up to anything else semi-famous.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention what a good hostess Jessica of Pacifica Photography was who generously provided us with space for the workshop and kept our energy up with snacks and liquids.

Both the Luminous Landscape and Nikon blogger Thom Hogan have weighed in on the new Nikon D3x -- the 24mpx DSLR that Nikon has aimed at pulling in the medium format market -- and Michael Reichmann and Hogan have concluded that the market positioning for this $8000 ticket item isn't there.

Hogan writes:

The Price
Bottom line: 12 million more pixels will set you back US$3000.

We can't talk about the D3x without talking about the D3 and pricing. D3 prices have been collapsing for some time. That's despite the fact that Nikon has not lowered the price to dealers (at least here in the US; not 100% sure about the rest of the world). That's a sign of very weak demand, as in at least one advertised price I could find, the dealer was selling below what they paid for the product. Now we get a camera that is really only different in the sensor (and FX sensors cost basically the same to manufacturer, no matter what the pixel count on them [yes, there's probably a modest yield difference, but not enough to justify much of a price change]), yet we have a substantive price increase. Anyone else see the problem with this picture? Nikon's asking us to pay more for the equivalent. I say equivalent because you can look at it this way: you can buy the same camera with either high ISO and dynamic range improvements, or you can have it with more pixels. For some reason, more pixels costs US$3000. Really?

STINKY OLD MEN SHOULDERING ME ASIDE.

Friends don't let friends stop bathing.

Friends don't let friends wear musty flannel shirts they don't change for weeks.

My fellow photographers. Pledge this to me. Don't be like the old camera show guys. It's not good.

What: A photobooth at The Parade of Lost Souls -- Vancouver's premiere night festival where people dress up, perform and gawk
Where: Underneath an awning in a store entranceway at 1st Ave and Commercial Dr.
Time: Beginning 6:30pm to whenever people want to stop having their pictures taken

Look for me in the light cavalry uniform. ;)

Michael Reichmann of Luminous Landscape has caused hundreds of high-end Blad users to clench their hearts in fear by doing a head-to-head shootout between the new Canon pocket (albeit high-end) digital and the Hasselblad H2 with digital back Phase One P45+ digital back.

He makes plenty of conclusions but more importantly conducted a blind test of images produced by each and asked his panel to see if they could tell which produced which. The result? No one could easily tell the difference between the images produced by either.

None of this means the death of medium format. Far from it. There are many reasons to shoot medium format and not just for image resolution. Hopefully it does mean the absurd pricing of digital backs is going to get a kick.