I love to travel but flying is not one of my favorite things to do. The word gravity comes to mind. The physics of getting a plane the size of a football field (at least it seems that big) into the air and keeping it there for several hours boggles my mind. I had an air force pilot try to explain aerodynamics to me once but the word gravity was all I could hear.
Tuesday we flew to Las Vegas so I could attend the national Photoshop convention. At one time there was a direct flight from Bend to Las Vegas but that was discontinued. Now we have to fly either to Seattle or Portland to get a connecting flight. Our first flight was to Seattle. The flight was actually pretty good. I was in the window seat and had a wonderful view of Mt. Hood as we flew by.
For a change the weather in Seattle was beautiful. When we left Seattle the pilot got permission from traffic control to fly low and close to Mt. Rainier. Mt. Rainier is 14,000 feet high and we were flying at 16,000 feet. I was on the view side of the plane but in the middle seat so my view for photos was a little restricted. Still, it was gorgeous.
Taking photos from a plane has challenges. First, the seating is very cramped and trying to adjust to take photos without knocking out the person next to you isn’t easy. Fortunately the person next to me was my husband, and he was able to dodge my elbow. Second, you’re shooting through a very small, and usually dirty plane window. So what I did is set my aperture as wide as I could and set my shutter speed accordingly. I ended up shooting those photos at f/3.5 and my shutter speed was around 1/3200 at ISO 200.
The Photoshop Convention was fantastic. The keynote address was very entertaining and there are some exciting new developments in Photoshop and Lightroom. All of the classes I took were great. My head is swimming with information now and I’m hoping to be able to use some of the techniques that I learned in my processing. There is more to Photoshop and Lightroom than I will ever learn in my lifetime. I won’t bore you with details of all the classes, but they were all very good.
A multitude of vendors had classes and exhibits on their products. Some were interactive. A fun one was a studio light set up where we could photograph their models. Since I don’t do much studio photography, it was fun to practice that technique. It was like being thrown into a bull pen trying to dodge photographers though. Everyone was trying to get in to get their shots.
I didn’t get a chance to take as many photos of Las Vegas as I would have liked. It was 103 degrees and I couldn’t be out in the heat for more than a few minutes. Plus, I was in classes every day, all day and by the end of the day, I was exhausted.
It was a fun few days and I hope to go again. Now its back to the real world.
Maralee
Through My Lens 
I was wondering about the couple of days missed . . . I won’t even attempt to attend those conferences until I have some time to dedicate to reinforcing and practicing what I would hear and learn.
But it does sound like a lot of fun.
It was a lot of information. We got a great workbook that has everything that was covered in the convention so even the many classes I couldn’t attend, I got some good information on. My in-laws live there so it was a good excuse to kill two birds with one stone. Visit them and attend the convention. No wonder I’m exhausted.
Wonderful photos. I wish I knew more about Photoshop. I just put Elements 10 on my laptop and can’t do more than resize my photos for the web. Everything else is Greek to me. I did take a intro class once so I need to go back. Looking forward to seeing the results of what you have learned.
BE ENCOURAGED! BE BLESSED!
Thanks, Francine. Most of what I learned on Photoshop I learned by trial and error with the help of a few tutorials. There are a lot of great free tutorials on YouTube.
What wonderful photos from the plane… never had much success myself out of the big (football field) size planes but have hundreds from a bantam microlite… the only way to fly is in a micro… where falling is not an option… specially when the micro is fitted with a parachute… don’t know if it works and hope we never have to find out…
I’d love to go up in a smaller plane to take some photos from the air although I don’t know if it would be from a micro plane. :-). The plane we were on had very dirty windows and there was a bit of a glare.
1/3200 how can you be sure that was the speed lol
I just trust that my camera is right. 🙂 I can’t count that quickly. 🙂
WOW …. love your studio photos – stunning ladies with fantastic hair. Glad that you got so much out of the convention – I understand that your memory card is full of information. Looking forward see what comes out of it all – my pick from this is the palmtrees.
The studio work was fun since I don’t do that much myself. I would have liked to get get out and take more outdoor photos but I could only take about 10 minutes in that heat.
Your studio photos where stunning … the girls. I have heard that LV can be hot hot … glad you enjoyed the convention and that you came back with loads of new ideas to show me.
What a cool convention! I would love to learn more about PS and LR. I just started using LR and am loving it but only know the bare necessities! Great shots!
I do a lot of processing in LR. It has come so far – it can do most everything.
Sounds like you had a super time! I’m hoping to make one of those conventions one of these days! Great shots.
Thanks, Carissa. It was a lot of fun. I’d like to go again sometime.
Those studio shots are amazing! So jealous of the opportunity you got.
Nice! I would love to do a course like that now, to get some knowledge into this rusted brain of mine! Love your portraits.
My teacher used to tell us about the Photoshop conventions. I just consider myself way too much of a novice to show my face anywhere like that. Maybe in 20 more years of practicing.