I’ve always felt that getting it right in the camera is the most important step in creating great images. Too often you hear people comment “you can fix that later in Photoshop”. The most important aspect in creating great storytelling images is being able to recognize a moment as it unfolds before you. Being able to sense and capture the decisive moment. Dressing it up in Photoshop later with crazy, wacky actions is not my cup of tea. I feel that a naturally honest moment deserves a vision that involves some degree of post production. But one should not rely on post production to make a great image.

This is the heart of my personal Photoshop action set, called RK Fundamental Actions. The basic nuts and bolts of good image making. Seshu, a Connecticut photographer recently reviewed the RK Fundamental Photoshop Actions on his blog. Seshu is a passionate and talented photographer. Be sure and subscribe to his blog (as well as this one).

Since posting last week about my post production technique, I’ve received a number of emails from photographers saying I was crazy for sharing my secrets. But they missed the point. The secret is not in your tools, but your vision. The tools are merely that—tools, to help you realize your vision.

For example. Let me share with you an example from a recent engagement session that illustrates the thought process of my vision. Here is the image, straight out of the camera with minor tonal adjustments. When I captured this moment, I had a feeling about the moment. The placement of this couple in relation to each other, to their environment. The lens choice that I used, the direction of the light, the compositional elements present in this image and how I chose to frame all of it. My exposure, my depth of field—all in a split second. But more important, I knew what I wanted to do with this image long before I pressed the shutter button.

Italian photographer Domenico Froschi writes “Out of focus areas carry an important weight in my work; they are the equivalent in poetry of reading between the lines. They open the doors to an unknown imagery, where shapes, although still being vaguely familiar, challenge and at the same time lure us to a softer and exciting world.”

I’ve always been intrigued with the “image within an image”. In the darkroom, I would spend hours exploring. Pictures within a picture. The out of focus areas are fascinating and every bit as important. It’s the vision of the artist. This is how I put together the final image using pieces from the original. Areas of color and shape.

Mastering your tools is the first step. Taking the time to master the fundamentals and establishing a good base to work from is fundamentally important. That is what my action set is all about. The basics.

If you’d like to explore the basics as I have, then I encourage you to pick up a set and begin your journey. This Photoshop action set is being offered at an introductory price. Until a dedicated site is published, please contact me directly through Randy Kepple Photographs. Post your comments and questions below. I’m happy to answer any specific questions or reply to you directly.

It’s hard now to imagine a time when there were no digital cameras and Photoshop. Long before I became a professional photographer, I spent much of my life in a darkroom. Starting in 6th grade with a darkroom in a basement and later becoming a professional printer specializing in hand crafted, custom fine art black and white prints.

My printing technique involved a lot of dodging and burning by hand. Selectively darkening and lightening areas of the print using my hand in various shapes. Think shadow puppets. I also created a set of tools, various shapes cut out of black art board and taped onto pieces of coat hangers. Sometimes, I would add texture to my prints by exposing through a piece of dry mount tissue or other objects. I could change the focus by tilting the easel during exposure. I even had a processing method that used two different developers. All of this was the technique of printing. The look was achieved through experienced post production techniques.

None of this has changed aside from the tools of the trade. Now, instead of a traditional darkroom, we have a digital darkroom. The advantages are mind boggling. Gone are the health related issues associated with the chemicals of a traditional darkroom. The modern darkroom offers tools to create repeatable results. These tools can be altered to fit your vision and style and saved. With Photoshop, the steps taken to create a particular look can be saved as an action. This saves a tremendous amount of time and allows me to bring a fine art feel to nearly everything I do.

The problem with many photographers starting out is they are looking to cut corners. Trying to bypass the vision, previsualization and technique. Looking to create art by purchasing a Photoshop action and pressing a button. Sure, you can quickly mimic the look and feel of everyone else out there that you admire, but it’s not as simple as that.

Compelling images begin with good exposure, composition and light. A moment worth capturing that can hold the attention of the viewer. While shooting, I have a vision for the image I’m creating. In addition to the technique of lighting and framing and capturing my image, in my mind, I already know what I want to do in post production. I have a vision. That vision is tempered with a technique I’ve developed from knowing my tools. Knowing what to reach for to achieve the look I’m wanting to create in my image.

Here is an image from a senior session. The first one is straight out of the camera with no post production other than processing the RAW camera file to a working production file. The second image has been retouched, cropped and enhanced with Photoshop. The image I had in my mind when I was shooting.

Over the past 10 years, I have created a set of tools, Photoshop actions that are the foundation of my work. Many photographers have approached me, asking if I’d ever sell them. I decided to put together a set of my actions, called the Foundation Set and started selling them earlier this year. It’s been a word of mouth, labor of love and if you are interested, let me know. As someone who is very particular about his images, I’ve never been impressed with any of the creative action sets that are available, with one exception. Totally Rad Actions or TRA.

Created by Doug Boutwell, these Photoshop actions are truly innovative and hip. They’re fun and as the name says, totally RAD dude! If you are looking for a creative jump start or a fresh look to your images, you would be hard pressed to find a more well rounded or more creative set of actions. Never press play and expect art. A true artist rolls up their sleeves and gets dirty. These actions are best used with vision. They are fun and that’s what creativity is all about.

Last, but not least are textures. Digital textures are photos of anything from a concrete wall to a faded, yellowing piece of paper. These are brought into Photoshop and layered over an image. Using the same tools of a traditional darkroom, such as selective dodging and burning, masking and varying opacities and blending modes, you can transform an image into a work of art. I use them sparingly, but haven’t fully utilized their potential yet.

One of the problems with textures is they don’t always work. A lot of hit and miss. Doug Boutwell, in a true moment of inspired genius is poised to once again transform post production workflow for photographers. His soon to be released TRA Dirty Texture Plugin for Photoshop will offer a visual tool to quickly assess any texture file with your image. I can only shake my head in amazement at the brilliance of this new tool.

Here are a set of before and after images to help illustrate how an image is transformed, with vision and technique utilizing every tool possible. What are your thoughts? Favorite recipes? Take a moment and share. Thanks for stopping by!

I’m a long-time Apple Macintosh enthusiast and my trusty 12″ Powerbook G4 has been with me since 2003. It’s not so speedy anymore, but it fits the fold down tray on an airplane and perfectly suited for writing, checking email, surfing the web and accounting. When the hard drive started making noises and running noticeably slower, I knew it was time to replace it.

Empowered with a set of tools and a strong heart and the power of the Internet, I decided I was just
geek enough to pull this off. (I must warn you that the following image is quite graphic and may cause some of you to squirm in your chairs.)

Searching the Internet I learned 10 ways to remove the hard drive, all of them different. With each screw that I added to a growing pile, my journey into my Powerbook continued. At one point I had to walk away, wondering if it were possible to reach the center of a Powerbook. Let’s not even talk about how I was going to get it back together again.

In the end, my inner geek prevailed. Everything went back together and there was no smoke when I fired it up for the first time. I must confess that I was amazed by this experience. How they cram all of this into such a small container and make it do the magic that it does is truly amazing. The new hard drive was slightly larger than my cell phone!

I know you’re asking yourself. How far does this geek thing extend in your life? Well, not only can I enact my own computer repairs, I’m the IT guy. I dabble in code (designed and built my web site) and I beta test for a number of software companies. In fact, beta testing for Photojunction just finished. It’s now called Remix and you can read about my involvement at their blog. This was a redesign from the ground up and involved months of testing and discussions. At this point, I can’t discuss other projects as I’ve signed nondisclosure agreements.

Why do this you ask? Because getting involved enacts much needed change. Many times software is so close and then misses the mark. Getting involved means you are working directly with the programmers and you help shape the future development. No more complaining about why this feature is missing or what were they thinking when they put this here…you get to be there when it happens and that is being a geek of the highest order.

One last geek confession. I’m an avid fan of the Harry Potter series. From preordering on Amazon to anxiously counting down the days until it arrives. It’s what I enjoy doing on family vacations every summer. As in years past, I had the final installment in my hands the day it was released. However, I did not read it. Perhaps it was because this was the end, the last book in this magical series. I’ve been glancing at it for over a year. This week, I decided it was time to jump into this world once more and finish the journey I started all those years ago.

Finally, if you haven’t seen the adventures of another geek, Matthew Harding, then treat yourself. Take a few minutes to watch this marvelous journey. I dare you not to laugh and smile. This is living life in the moment at it’s best. Enjoy the summer!

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

I still use Macs to this day and while there were some very dark days for Apple in the 1990′s, it’s great to see them back on top. With this success comes a new generation of users and software applications being developed at a record pace. The choices are endless and nothing makes smile more than a new piece of software that makes my life easier.

Thanks to JP at ShutterMonkey (a recent Mac convert) for bringing this time saver to my attention. 1 Password will remember all your username and password combinations for web sites and even keep a secure wallet with your credit card information. Need to fill out a form? It will do that too based on an identity that you create. Best of all, it will even generate unique, strong passwords for you and remember those as well. It’s well documented that with so many sites requiring unique login information that people are using the same password for everything. This is a very dangerous! Within my first week of using this software, I created over 20 new combinations for sites that I frequent daily. One password is all you need!

In case you are still apprehensive, watch this great video that explains RSS in plain English. It’s presented by the great folks over at Common Craft. Thanks guys! Now, watch this video and be sure to add my blog to your favorite flavor of RSS reader. All you have to do is click the little orange icon…c’mon…I dare you!

I started this blog in 2005 when I redesigned my web site. My goal was to share stories and images from the weddings I photograph and other events that I think people would be interested in from the life of a professional photographer. It’s a way to stay connected with the wonderful people who hire me. The images are fresh and constantly changing and it shows my growth as an artist over a period of time. The more I can get readers to come here every week and visit, share comments and continue to have interest in my photography, the more people I can reach with my blog. But more importantly, it’s a way to show a growing body of work that doesn’t require a web site redesign every 6 months.

Most blog readers are bloggers themselves. I have some ideas for the winter months that I hope you find interesting. I’m thinking of enlisting a group of photographers who will challenge each other to blog a picture a week. We may even attempt a picture a day. It would require a great deal of dedication, but what a great way to grow artistically. If you think this is a good idea or even a bad idea, leave a comment and let me know what you think. And since a blog post is worthless without in image (thanks Cory Anne) here is a random image from the archives.

UPDATE – 2010: As it so often happens with software startups, BlogRush is no longer with us. May they rest in peace. I hope they take their skills and ideas and create new ways for bloggers to find readers.

75%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

Every week I look at the statistics for my web site and for the past year, my blog has remained the most frequently hit page on my website. Blogs have become commonplace in our society and as much a part of everyday life as reading a newspaper used to be. A few months ago, I discovered what the whole RSS thing was about and it’s as if a lightbulb went off. I thought I’d encourage you to add my blog to your RSS feed and enjoy the ease of using a feed reader to stay connected with your favorite blogs. And if you enjoy what I have to say, I encourage you to leave comments. Nothing is more frightening than the deafening sound of silence for a blogger.

What is an RSS feed? Have you ever been to a blog and noticed the orange square with the white radio waves in the url? This indicates the blog you’re visiting has an RSS feed. Most current versions of web browsers, such as FireFox make it very easy to subscribe to a blog by simply clicking the symbol and adding that blog to your subscription. Then, whenever new content is posted to your favorite blogs, you are automatically notified. This saves you a lot of valuable time if you subscribe to a lot of blogs. You don’t have to manually check every day (or every week in my case) to see if there is a new post.

Another way to subscribe is by using a feed reader. This is a simple application that manages all your blogs and notifies you of any updates. Many of these readers are free and some ask a minimal fee. There is a nice list of readers for any platform at the RSS Compendium. Personally, I use NewsFire for Mac. The more I use it, the more I like it.

If you like my blog and I hope you do, please take a moment to subscribe and I’ll continue to share my life in images and stories and see where this takes us.

For months I have been anticipating the release of the movie 300. As stunning and visually inspiring as the trailers are, for some reason, my wife was not as anxious as I to see this movie. Fortunately, my friend James was up for a screening and I decided the only place to experience this movie was at Cinetopia Theater, a new state of the art digital theater right here in Vancouver that I’ve been wanting to visit for a long time. Be sure to visit their site and read about this incredible theater, which will save me from boring you with all the geek stuff.

A long time ago James told me that every “first” in his life was marked by a special memory. I’ve carried that forward into my own life as well. I wanted my first experience in this perfect viewing environment to be memorable. Sharing this movie with a dear friend… is a first I will not soon forget. Amazing and jaw dropping are the only words that readily come to mind.

The movie 300 is an operatic treatment of the battle of Thermopylae, visually based on the historically inspired graphic novel by Frank Miller. Film critic for the Arizona Daily Star, Phil Villarreal, reviewed 300 as a monumental masterpiece. Honestly, there isn’t much more I can add to his review.

I was completely drawn into the archetypal story of the Spartans. Some might argue that there wasn’t much plot, but I would simply call this movie visceral. It’s a story of duty and honor and passion. I had the same feeling from watching this movie that I’ve had when watching any of the Star Trek or Star Wars movies. Visually stunning, perfectly composed compositions, the camera draws you into another world. This movie is everything a movie is supposed to be and it sticks with you for days.

Movies inspire me. Watching how they visually tell a story, how they compose the frames and how it’s all lit and put together. And they can never turn the camera vertically. Every frame is composed horizontally. I’ve often wondered if I could photograph an entire wedding horizontally and solve the creative challenges of space, light and form.

This movie will makes it’s way into my eclectic collection of movies when it’s released on DVD. In the meantime, I may have to journey to the east side of Vancouver one more time to revel in this graphic story of passion. I’m sure there are women who will enjoy this movie, but it was hard to find one at the screening I attended. That’s alright with me. It’s nice to take a break from romantic comedies, suspenseful dramas and go right for the jugular.