Landscape, Nature And Travel Photography

I’m excited to announce the release of my first iPad app, ePhotobook White Sands HD, a collection of fine art photographs taken earlier this year in White Sands National Monument, New Mexico.

Features of Note:

• High resolution images, sans watermark, that can be explored in detail above and beyond the resolution of the iPad
• Previously unpublished photographs
• Exclusive essays
• Twitter & Facebook integration to share with friends
• Web based content via RSS to keep you informed of new workshops, app & ebook releases, photographs and more

Inspiration and beauty for only $4.99 USD

Note: ePhotobook development services tailored to professional photographers are now available. Inquiries for ePhotobook authoring services are now being accepted.

Technorati Tags: photography, mobile, app, Apple, iPad, White Sands National Monument, fine art

In my previous post Thoughts on the iPad: Where Will Your Audience Be Next Year? I noted that current tablet computer trends are painting a picture of a transformed landscape where one’s audience might be interacting with online content in a radically different manner and frequency. Not only does mobile access through a device like the iPad impact navigation & content structure, it has the ability to shift expectation in how web viewers pay for content. There are some very clear signs pointing to this shifting trend and it begs the question, “Has the code to web revenue been cracked?”

Advent of the App Store
One thing is certain Apple’s iTunes App store has changed the landscape before us since its release in mid-2008. With the release of the iPhone 2.0 OS software came the App Store, supplementing the iTunes music store, and soon others were quickly trying to duplicate the wild success of this newly created platform.  Now Apps downloads are on course to  surpass music downloads from the Apple iTunes store by the end of 2010. In roughly 2 years time that is an amazing accomplishment considering the current rate of music sales on iTunes has taken 7 years to reach its current level.  The larger phenomenon of the app craze has even spawned an App convention that is taking place here in San Francisco this week.

While Apple wasn’t the first to create an App platform (Facebooks App platform was released in 2007), they’re the first to tie it to a wildly popular consumer device, the iPad. As previously noted in my first post to this series All Eyes Are On The iPad. Are Yours?, it has been predicted that Apple will ship 12.9 million units this year, with shipments rising to 36.5 million next year and 50.4 million in 2012 and by any means that should be an eye opener. An eye opener because the combination of device sales and App download forecasts might just be indicators of a perfect storm on the horizon that shifts how many people interact with content on the web.

Revenue: Has the Web Found It?
Will the web as we know it be replaced by Apps? I doubt it, but where the web failed to convert user activity into revenue Apps just might be the long sought after holy grail many web entrepreneurs have been waiting for. While Apps have proven to be a potentially lucrative revenue creator not all App stores are created equally. In February 2010 Distimo reported that 75% of Apple Apps and 43% of Android Apps were paid apps and later in August 2010 Pingdom reported similar findings that 70% of Apple Apps and 36% of Android Apps were paid apps.

Interesting findings from the May 2010 AdMob Mobile Metrics report is that on average users of the iOS (Apple) and Android platforms spend at least 79 minutes a day using apps (note: Apple iOS users spend 89 minutes a day) and download 9 apps per month. The user activity is definitely a positive as most web sites are lucky to break the double digits in user activity sessions. The phenomenon of app dowloading has spawned an interesting trend as well… a mild addiction to downloading apps. In passing I’ve talked to several iPad/iPhone users that enjoy downloading apps almost as much as using the apps themselves. Nielsen reports that iPhone users for example download on average 40 apps versus Android users at 25 apps, both of which are an increase over 2009 findings.

Pricing
App pricing best practices seems to be the big mystery at the moment and is something I’m still researching. One interesting piece of data I surfaced concludes that downloads are not linked to price. This was in relation to game apps which might very well carry a different customer expectation to the photography market. While I can’t say much in definitive terms about app pricing I can say that higher prices will only be supported by app content/services that are of high value to users. There have been no shortage of apps commanding upward of $89.99 or more that have found themselves in the iTunes top-revenue/grossing list. Ultimately pricing will have to be tailored to the nature of the app. A photographer may very well want to release a free portfolio app in an effort to draw as many eyes as possible to their work versus charging for an eBook.

Looking into the Crystal Ball?
The web certainly will not be shrinking into oblivion, but content or services being produced to generate revenue may very well be predisposed to the app world.  What apps have going for them, unlike standard web content, is that they come bundled with the expectation they cost money to acquire and use. For the truly creative who frame content of value in an app there is certainly money to be made. On the flip-side of that sentiment with hundreds of thousands of apps in the current marketplace not all apps cost money. Free is not just an attempt to standout, for the savvy developer, it’s part of a calculated strategy. It’s important to note that vast majority of apps are not likely to be profitable, falling into the category of loss-leaders (see my series starting with Assumptions of Free and Taylor Davidson’s great article Free isn’t a problem, it’s an opportunity), but they do offer a unique opportunity to engage & introduce your work and services to others.

In my eye the iPad holds great promise for photographers with the right application. As to how photographers can get the most out of the iPad and take advantage of these trends you’ll want to read my next post on the subject. Stay tuned…

Related Article:
Only 13% of Aduls Pay for Apps - Fast Company (published hours after this post)
Additional thought…

If the app market is such a huge success with so few users, and already generating billions of dollars in revenue, how big will it become when it apps are as ubiquitous among adults as texting and taking pictures?

Technorati Tags: photography, photo, Apple, iPad, app

In my previous post All Eyes Are On The iPad. Are Yours? I noted how the iPad was setting the stage for a publishing revolution with its transformational user experience. How have I come to this bold prediction? Three key signs have led me to the belief we’re on the cusp of a publishing revolution in short order.

1. Tablet computers are currently the next must have device.
2. Touchscreen interaction / navigation will be spreading to traditional computers
3. Touchscreen interaction / navigation is defining an entire new branch of user interaction & user experience

Must Have Device
If you haven’t noticed already there are iPad giveaways around every corner. Apple’s iPad has captured the imagination of millions of people by changing how they interact with content on the web. This same fervor hit consumers in the 80’s with the mouse and here in the 2010’s touchscreen technology is making online viewing less abstract and physically more interactive. Apple’s ability to hit it big with the iPad, as with their other successful product launches, inevitably results in competitors releasing cheaper takeoffs. Odds are if you know someone who wants a gadget for Christmas they’ll be asking for an iPad. If an iPad isn’t in the budget you can bet that your local retailer like BestBuy will be selling a variety of competitors to fill the void.

Expect Touchscreen Interaction on Your Computer
Mobile devices are an intuitive place to utilize touchscreen technology. Mobile devices with their small footprint must be compact for portability while walking a fine line to provide an easy to view screen with easy navigation capabilities. Ask a child to view something on a computer and their first reaction invariably will be to point to the screen. This exemplifies the simplest navigation tool available… our fingers. As mobile devices become ubiquitous amongst younger generations such navigation is not only going to become intuitive, but expected.

The difference between a 3.5 inch (9 cm) and a 9.75 inch (24.5 cm) diagonal touchscreen of an iPhone & iPad may seem less than notable, but the increase in real estate to present text, images and video is huge. Everything (navigation cues, graphics, buttons, etc.) becomes easier to identify, touch, and move. Larger screen sizes also create greater opportunity for new and innovative navigation and presentation layers.  This type of content interaction is not likely to be lost on traditional computers with even larger screens, as recently surfaced Apple patent filings of a touchscreen iMac confirm we’ll be seeing more of this style of interaction on future computers.

Evolution of Web Use & Design Standards
In a recent edition of Wired magazine it was prognosticated that the web is dead.

Over the past few years, one of the most important shifts in the digital world has been the move from the wide-open Web to semiclosed platforms that use the Internet for transport but not the browser for display. It’s driven primarily by the rise of the iPhone model of mobile computing, and it’s a world Google can’t crawl, one where HTML doesn’t rule. And it’s the world that consumers are increasingly choosing, not because they’re rejecting the idea of the Web but because these dedicated platforms often just work better or fit better into their lives (the screen comes to them, they don’t have to go to the screen). The fact that it’s easier for companies to make money on these platforms only cements the trend. - The Web Is Dead. Long Live the Internet

How the data is parsed to come to this conclusion is questionable in my book (video is not considered the web? really!? What about YouTube?), but this Wired article in general raises an interesting premise and should make you think twice about how you’re experiencing the web today and how you & your audience might be experiencing it in the future.

The iPad, being the first out of the gate, will have a disproportionate amount of influence on design standards and user experience trends for the touchscreen oriented content. Knowing these standards and understanding how users are interacting with online content is critical whether  that content resides in a web page, app, peer-to-peer site, etc.  The question then raised is how does your web site translate to a touchscreen device like an iPad? In case you were unaware iPadPeek is a great way to see (just be sure you disable Flash on your browser first).  The even bigger question is how will your audience be viewing the content you produce and publish online?

Will traditional web sites hold up? Will apps be the dominant channel of online publishing? Will mobile viewing overtake traditional computer viewing? I have a notion of how things will play out in the future and it centers on a maturing model of revenue generation, but details to this thought will have to wait for the next post in this series Thoughts on the iPad: Cracking the Code to Web Revenue? Stay tuned…

Technorati Tags: photography, Apple, iPad, publishing

It’s been 10 days since the release of Apple’s iPad and in an attempt to avoid blind hyperbole I wanted to get at least a weeks worth of use under my belt before I shared my thoughts on it. Here are 5 important reasons photographers should take note of the iPad.

1. It’s More than just an iPod
One of the most common complaints I’ve heard is, “Why pay so much for a big iPod Touch?”
I have to admit I thought the same thing when I first saw Apple’s announcement of the product, but having the device in hand I realized there was a lot more to the iPad (see my next point).  One of the main reasons people have this thought, even after trying out the iPad for a short period, is that the vast majority of applications available at the time of launch were iPhone apps. Not many iPad apps were out yet and due to super tight secrecy there weren’t a lot of developers that had access to the device to refine their designs & approaches. The result, only a handful of really well engineered iPad applications have been made available to get a feel of what the device can offer. Tough to see the iPad being something beyond an iPod when you have so few iPad optimized applications to use.

2. Transformational User Experience
If you take one thing away from this blog post it’s “interactivity“. This is the single component of the iPad that converted me from cynic to evangelist.  How much different could interaction be between an iPhone/iPod and an iPad? If there isn’t already one I’m sure in the near future there will be a user experience ratio generated to chart impact of  touchscreen size to resulting user interaction. My guess is the amount of user interaction squares with the doubling of diagonal screen size. Seeing that the iPad has a screen that is roughly 2x’s the diagonal size of the iPhone, my calculation is that users will interact with the iPad x^2 times more. In other words if I interact with content my iPhone 5 times in one sitting I’m likely to interact with content on the iPad 25 times in one sitting. The iPad is designed to leverage greater interactivity.

The larger screen size enables a variety of new possibilities in relation to user interaction with content.  This is really important if you’re a photographer. Whether you think of this consciously or not, you are a content creator and large touchscreens enable viewers to interact with content in completely new ways.  At this early stage of adoption there is a lot of experimenting under way to determine future interaction designs and standards.  Bottom line… for the first time viewers can interact with your photographic work via touch, beyond the realm of print.

3. New Publishing Opportunities
The iPad serves up a new image publishing opportunities in web sites and iPad applications looking to leverage gesture based navigation. Gesture (touch) based navigation works exceptionally well with images versus text and has the air of cool as this mode of content interaction is so new. In addition the resolution and screen size of the iPad benefits from large image use that might otherwise be prohibitive in standard web displays.  Bottom line look for popular publications who are able to leverage the iPad platform to be in search of a lot more imagery at larger dimensions. If you’re a photographer who has it in mind to self-publish you’re going to have a lot of opportunity to highlight your own work in a similar fashion.

4. Think Beyond Apple
Whether you love Apple or hate them the iPad represents the first widely available tablet computer to consumers with a channel to acquire a variety of content (books, music, movies, tv, etc.) The true significance of this for content creators is that once web and application designers latch on to design, display & navigation standards every iPad competitor will leverage these standards as well rather than reinvent the wheel. Whether Apple’s star shines or fades in the tablet computer market their impact will be long lasting. This is something I had alluded to in my earlier post Why the iPad Doesn’t Matter, Yet Matters and it is for this reason that it’s important to track trends and developments with the iPad.

5. Placing Your Bet
How heavily should you invest in the iPad phenomenon? Should you buy an iPad? Should you be developing web content that is iPad optimized? Personally I think the larger touchscreen is as revolutionary, if not more so,  than the advent of the computer mouse. Can you imagine trying to create content for a device that uses a mouse with out having a mouse enabled device? I think the same holds true with the iPad. It’s tough to explore the capabilities of a device if you aren’t working with it. I don’t think anyone will be harmed if they don’t jump on the early adopter bandwagon and there certainly will be viable competitors out there that release cheaper touchscreen devices. Whether now or later once you delve into this new format of content interaction you’ll have a clearer picture to the opportunities. While this is an all Apple forum at the moment it won’t be for long.

Worthy of Watching & Reading on the Topic:

Why the iPad Doesn’t Matter, Yet Matters – JMG-Galleries

Sorry, Adobe, you screwed yourself – Sharing the Truth One Thread at a Time

Not Your Typical iPad Unboxing Video (Humor/Review)

Technorati Tags: Apple, iPad, photography, photographers

In no short order the iPad has been receiving a ton of hype since its release, but rather than get sucked into the hype echo chamber I postponed my review until I had sometime to use it. Now that 10 days have passed and I’ve used my iPad in almost every way conceivable here is my review.

iPad Impressions
The Apple iPad is a really slick device. It has a great feel to it. It’s balanced, fits well in your hands, is extremely well constructed and looks sharp. The software that powers it runs seamlessly and integrates into Apple’s solution suite perfectly. The application platform is a perfect extension of what has been in place for the iPhone for several years. I received my iPad via UPS and activating it online was a breeze. Apple did a great job in getting the glitches out of the activation process that plagued past iPhone launches. Application management is a breeze and the while the on screen keyboard takes some getting used to its quite usable. If you prefer a traditional keyboard you can still use one as long as its Bluetooth enabled.

My biggest complaints about the iPad are minor ones:

1. The  name leaves something to be desired
2. The screen is easily marked up with fingerprints
3. If you have an iPhone headset it won’t work in the standard headphone jack of the iPad.

Complaint #1 sure the iSlate would have been a better choice, but we’re stuck with iPad so if you get one suck it up.

Complaint #2 fingerprints are to be expected as its a touchscreen device. The good news is the screen cleans up easily.

Complaint #3 Apple has used a couple headphone standards in past generation iPhones where the jack has three connections to accommodate a remote. I had hoped the latest standard would carry over to the iPad so I could use existing headphones. No such luck iPhone headphones don’t fit, won’t work and we’re back to using only a standard headphone jack.

I told you… the complaints are minor.

But wait you say….
You use a PC?
In that case yes the cost is pricey by comparison, but easily offset by other benefits (see
5 Reasons Photographers Should Take Note of the iPad).

It’s a computer that lacks multiple ports?
There is nothing you can’t do over WiFI that a port would provide you… after all it’s intended to be a mobile device not hooked up to a ton of wires.

What about it’s lack of Flash support?
Sorry friends at Adobe… it doesn’t matter. The faster you forget about one standard versus another the better off you’ll be. There is ample competition to provide Flash alternatives. Flash isn’t the only game in town, but I’ll admit falling back to a known standard is nice.

Technorati Tags: Review, iPad, Apple

As you’re probably aware the iPad is on the way and its going to save the world! All will be right again when the Apple iPad hits the streets in early April. Nikon and Canon photographers will sing Kumbaya together, dogs will get along with cats and newspapers will again be profitable… well you’d think that would be the case from all the hype. I’ve had several conversations over the past several weeks with friends about the iPad and as a huge fan of Apple I will hold no punches in saying I’m underwhelmed with the device that has turned out to be nothing more than a  mega-iphone less the phone. That being said there is one thing about the Apple iPad that has grabbed my attention and it has nothing to do with the device itself.

I’ve read various blog posts to the effect that the iPad will usher in a:

• new era of photography – bzzz! nope.
  A new digital medium of display isn’t going to transform photography, but it might add to the “cool” or “hip” factor of a photographer as they show their work. The Apple logo on a touchscreen mobile digital photo frame will surely wow a few folks, but it won’t “change photography”. Display devices don’t change photography.
• new era of image responsibility -bzzz! nope.
  Image theft is pervasive because of a wide spread attitude that content online is free. Digital files don’t have value because they’re intangible. No alarm is going to sound when you walk out a storefront because you have an image on your laptop, iPhone or iPad. A new device isn’t going to usher in a new era of responsibility. That cat is already out of the bag and I’m hard pressed to believe its ever coming back. Deterrents such as financial penalties provided by copyright law, image tracking software (PicScout IRC, TinEye, etc.) and other innovations ideally should keep this in check.

What has grabbed my attention is an undercurrent of buzz in relation to content. What the iPad offers is a color display, a supporting network of content distribution via Apple’s iTunes store and broad market appeal. Whether the iPad turns out to be the next iPhone success or Newton failure its mark will be left in how content is crafted, displayed and consumed. This is why the iPad matters, yet doesn’t matter. It’s launch is the landmark, not the device. While Apple will certainly make a shiny penny in selling the iPad it will have the longest lasting impact on content creators & publishers.

• Why the iPad doesn’t matter
  After the launch of the iPad, Apple will have set the mark in cool and user experience pointing the way for competitors to emulate. Device sales will be a brand war and nothing more. The edge in relation to sales will be given to companies with complimentary services & software. No doubt Apple will have the competitive edge as they’ve exemplified with the iPod/iPhone. What makes the iPad irrelevant is that it’s also a WiFi device. Content can be pulled from any location or distributor that has web presence.
• Why the iPad matters
  What makes the iPad relevant is that it will shape expectation in how online “books” are formatted & presented. As the first  color displayed tablet/ebook reader that is made widely available, the iPad will have a substantial influence on consumer expectation in relation to how one interacts with digital content. The iPad’s WiFi capabilities gives content creators and publishers of all sizes equal footing. Seeing that iPad friendly content can be hosted anywhere on the web, content creators & publishers should take note of the format and presentation standards for people viewing their work via an iPad or equivalent.

What’s your opinion? Is the iPad the savior of photography, a means to a content standard or something else entirely?

Technorati Tags: photography, Apple, iPad

Over the past week I’ve received a few inquiries from readers wondering whether I use Apple’s Aperture or Adobe’s Lightroom. The answer… I use Lightroom. The decision is rooted back when Aperture was first released and Adobe put Lightroom out as a Beta. At the time I was about to purchase Aperture, but before I did I went to MacWorld to get a little more information on it. The 2006 MacWorld was one of the best ever because there was a huge push around photography so there were tons of organizations and software manufacturers that would have otherwise never been there. When I talked to an Apple rep about Aperture I asked questions around…

• How well does Aperture integrate with Photoshop?
• What color space does Aperture use?
• How flexible is the “vault” for image storage?

These three questions sunk my interest in Aperture.

How well does Aperture integrate with Photoshop?
Well it turns out at the time that it didn’t very well. I don’t recall the exact details but combined with the answer to the next question I felt the two didn’t play as nicely together as I would have hoped.

What color space does Aperture use?
This is what really turned me off. At the time Apple was using a custom color space that they created. When I talked to the Apple rep about this he was telling me how it supported more colors blah blah blah. When I asked him what hardware supported this color space he couldn’t answer. It all amounted to Apple creating a color space that went to 11 (a la Spinal Tap the movie). The only thing that he could say was that it must tie in to their on-demand print service. The discussion left me wary and unimpressed as most photographers at the time had begun to accept Adobe RGB and ProPhoto RGB as the standard color space to use.

How flexible is the “vault” for image storage?
At the time the “vault” storage model was very inflexible. The “vault” was tied to one drive. If that drive failed you were SOL and there wasn’t a meaningful system to back up the “vault” at the time. I believe Apple has since fixed this, but too little too late as far as I’m concerned.

So pretty straight forward about Apple’s Aperture… why Lightroom?
Lightroom was beta at the time and it too had its limitations, but…

1. Its ability to port files over to Photoshop with little hiccup was a big selling point to me. For the type of photography I focus on I still need to make localized edits in Photoshop.

2. The ability to start off with non-destructive edits and the space savings that afforded was huge.

3. Keywording and metadata… I really liked the system Adobe set up for this. Having a database to query and pulling images with certain keywords was huge. By the time the beta wrapped there was a backup mechanism in place as well.

4. Post-beta Adobe threw in mapping dust spot removal so you could carry over spot removal from one image to another, they expanded their web export features and they expanded the functionality of their RAW converter.

Additional feedback I heard from other pros was that Aperture had very unintuitive controls and this matched up pretty well to my initial demo experience at MacWorld.

Honestly I have no allegiance to one or the other. I’ll use the best tool available, but at the time Adobe had the edge even though it was beta and not all the features were baked in yet. As a result I’ve been on the Lightroom bandwagon ever since. Adobe did just release Lightroom 2 Beta and they’re expanding their feature set to include Smart Collections which is another huge feature I’ve been looking for & they’re expanding they types of non-destructive edits that you can make. Apple has never been open about their software so Adobe’s transparency and beta program makes it easier to stick with their software.

That’s the history behind my choice to use Lightroom.

What do you use and what factored into your decision?

Technorati Tags: Adobe, Lightroom, Apple, Aperture, software, photography, application, beta, post-processing, post, processing