Hi {name},

Welcome to the Lenscraft in Focus July 2020 newsletter.

This past month has been a little odd photographically speaking. I had thought that I would be out with my camera again, but I haven’t. I also thought my newly converted Infrared camera would occupy a lot of my attention, but it hasn’t. Instead, I found myself rediscovering Topaz Labs.

If look back 10-12 years, I was a big fan of Topaz Labs. The software was powerful, and they had a valuable lifetime upgrade policy. You would buy the software once and then continue to receive free upgrades for the life of the product.

But then Topaz began releasing software that seemed to serve no purpose (for me at least) before turning to Artificial Intelligence (AI). I did try out some of the early AI products but was less than impressed. But recently, I tested a new update of Gigapixel and was really surprised at how well it had developed. I then tried out DeNoise AI (free to me as an existing user of the old DeNoise software) and was amazed by the performance. As a result, I spent this past month upgrading and experiment with the latest versions of Topaz software. You can read my thoughts about Gigapixel from last month as well as my review of Topaz Studio which I published a couple of weeks ago.

But what my rediscovery of Topaz software has reminded me is why I love plug-ins so much. They allow me to achieve results quickly that would take lots more work using just Photoshop. This is what makes them so valuable. It’s also made me realise that I’ve drifted away from covering some of these in recent years and have perhaps become overly technical. The reason why I started to write books is that I wanted to help people create great photography easily. When I find tools that can help you achieve this, I should be sharing that knowledge. That’s what Lenscraft is all about.

But despite Topaz capturing my interest, I haven’t deserted Infrared as a topic.

A few Lenscraft readers have been in touch to ask about my approach to processing Infrared photography. To help, I’ve published a new article on the subject and my approach may surprise you. I’m a big fan of doing things as simply as possible when it comes to photo editing and my Infrared editing is no exception. You’ll find more about this in the “New Content” section below.

I hope you enjoy this month’s newsletter. I think I’ve managed to find another interesting collection of resources to share. And if you come across any interesting articles elsewhere, do let me know.

New Lenscraft Content

Over the past month I’ve focused on publishing new tutorials and updating old ones. Here’s the list of what you can find on Lenscraft.

Camera Club Presentations

Unfortunately, with the spread of the virus in the UK and government restrictions, I’ve suspended all camera club presentations. Once life gets back to normal, I’ll publish a list of presentations here.

From Around the Web

This month, I’ve discovered a few things that you might find useful or interesting.

Elements of Photography on issuu

Whilst I was browsing through issuu, the online magazine stand, I came across the book “Elements of Photography”. I have seen this book on the bookshop shelves, and it’s been around for a while. I can’t say that I like all the photography (some are terrible in my opinion), but it is a good book with some useful advice. The reason I mention it here is that like many of the magazines on issuu this book is free to read.

Here’s the link (https://issuu.com/marusyadesign/docs/the_elements_of_photography-underst).

 Landscape Photography Magazine

If you love landscape photography and enjoy reading and looking through images, it’s worth getting the free editions of Landscape Photography Magazine. You do need to create a free account but there’s no requirement to buy anything. I’ve subscribed to the paid version of this magazine for years (since issue 3 and the latest is  112) and always enjoy reading it.

Here’s the link to the free annual issue (https://landscapephotographymagazine.com/free-downloads/annual-issue/)

The Most Over and Under Rated Film Cameras – Have Your Say

Last month I asked you to nominate the most under and overrated film cameras. If you would like to have your say, here’s the link to the survey.

https://forms.gle/vWEfq5i84quDQDWa9

So far, there has only been a couple of nominations. If I can get enough responses, I think it would make an interesting article, especially given the growing popularity of film.

Monochrome Conversion