The ever popular Web 2.0 image service Flickr and long time stock photography giant Getty Images announced yesterday that they will soon come together in a joint venture. As a frequent user of Flickr and looking to upgrade my camera (to a Nikon D300) - this is all very, very interesting.

The Flickr Blog states:

You all take remarkable photographs. From documenting momentous change to capturing the small precious moments around you, the Flickr community has been sharing some remarkable photographs for over four years.

Team Flickr has long wanted to create a way to make it easier for those who use photos as a part of their daily business to do so in a way that respects the talent and rights of our members.

The great folks at Getty Images and Flickr are joining forces to create a collection of royalty free, rights ready and rights managed photographs. This announcement is just the first step and there’s a lot to do before we launch. We’ve created a FAQ to address what we think will be the initial questions.

The Getty Image Press release states:

“We are excited and proud to be partnering with Flickr to offer our customers even more choice for their projects. Our customers will be able to select and use the best imagery from a fresh collection of high-quality images chosen by us from Flickr’s diverse and prolific community,” said Jonathan Klein, co-founder and CEO of Getty Images. “Flickr is the ideal partner as we continue to move the imagery industry forward by offering the broadest range of high quality digital content to our customers.”

Getty Images will be the exclusive commercial rights manager of the photos selected to become part of the collection. Flickr members will benefit from Getty Images’ global sales and distribution teams helping to market their images and from Getty Images’ expertise and experience in rights and clearances of visual content. Getty Images’ customers will benefit from the fresh, unique and individualistic perspectives of members within Flickr’s global community.

It’s an interesting move, Getty Images and Flickr are combining for the largest and most comprehensive stock photography library; Flickr currently holds upwards of 2 billion images. Getty will have it’s team of photo editors sift through user authorized Flickr photo streams and select images they feel meets the Getty Image standard and will then offer the image to Getty clients.

So it looks very unlikely that the poorly lit pictures you hosted on Flickr for your Pyrex Bowl eBay auction will have a chance at making the cover of Time Magazine anytime soon. Keep in mind that images shot with sub-par digital cameras may carry less consideration due to their resolution size. The better the resolution and quality - the more likely an image will make it to publication. Getty’s suggested digital camera’s and models are:

• Nikon: D2X, D2Xs, D3, D200, D300
• Cannon: EOS 1D (Mk 1, 2, 2n & 3), 1DS (Mk 1, 2 & 3) 5D, 30D, 40D
• Leica: M8
• Olympus: E3

Though, it is still unsure what Getty’s take on image requirements, quality and resolution from Flickr will actually be.

Depending on individual rights assigned to images, Getty’s clients pay anywhere from $29 to $200,000 for usage rights to an image. For the photographer, this means a check of roughly 20% - 40% of the licensing fee depending on the client’s purchasing terms with Getty. This makes me wonder not just what amateur photographers think about this new opportunity, but what Getty’s current roster of represented professional photographers feel about the deal… Will this dilute the pool of revenue for those who have depended on an exclusive partnership and representation with Getty?

Flickr is stating that the final phase to the venture could take anywhere from a few months to a few years to implement while they design an interface for the Getty editors to navigate through their database. Though, they are hoping to having it online later this year.

Last week Tara and I took a stroll down to Gas Works park to view the sunset after a long hot day. My goal was to get a sweet sunset shot of the city, but I came away with something a little less generic. After taking several (unsatisfying) shots of the city I turned around and looked up the hill as saw this:

The basic design of this image can be summed up in to two basic photographic design techniques: the Rule of Thirds and Framing (with negative space). By placing the subject near the edge of the frame, rather in the center, an image becomes visually more interesting to look at. The human eye is so used to seeing the subject in the center of our vision; therefore it’s only natural to place the subject in the center of a picture as well. The sky, though has nothing in it (negative space), is just as interesting as the subject itself because there is so much of it there with out being too distracting; it adds a dramatic effect to the already interesting silhouettes.

Next time you are out taking pictures - at a barbecue, as a hobby or just for fun - experiment by placing your subject in different parts of the frame. Use other nondescript elements in the background to help frame the subject, lead the viewers eye and accentuate what you are focusing on.

See other examples of Negative Space and the Rule of Thirds.

My Flickr Pick is back with an all to awesome sci-fi twist. I know I’ve been all over Flickr the past week or so, but a website that holds millions of images is bound to turn up several humorous imagery gold mines - and this one does not disappoint.

Cindi Geeze has been taking pictures of her storm trooper figurines in what would be described as normal everyday snap shots, if it were real life. At dinner, in the snow and during valentines day; Cindi’s imagination has been able to convey emotion through the mask of a storm trooper toy… as weird as that sounds.

I can tell you all about what is there, but as they say, a picture says a thousand words; so you best check it out for yourself. You can find it on her Flickr page in Storm Troopin’ which has already been viewed over 100,000 times as well as her other toy shots. You can also find an interview with Cindi on the Star Wars Blog.

Whoa, sorry I’ve been a bit weak on updating the past week, I have no idea where the time has gone. Honestly, I have four half written articles that I started with the intention on being short and sweet but are quickly mutating into something bigger than anticipated. Some very cool things are in the works though, more on that later.

I’ve really been immersed in Flickr and my photography lately. The other night I dug out my “archives” that date back to 1995 when I first got into the whole picture thing. I’ve started scanning some of my favorites and posting them on Flickr. There is something very satisfying about finding old photographic gems of my past. It’s a great way to see how my eye for photographic design has changed, evolved or remained the same.

So a good rule of thumb would be, if I’m lacking at updates here - check out my Flickr page and you are bound to find something new that I have recently created or something I have uncovered from my past.

Stay classy, internet people…

I’ve had my Flickr account going on almost three years now. Admittedly, it’s not something I’ve used a whole lot in the past - but recently, with my latest photo surge, I’ve really become involved in the culture and community surrounding Flickr.

This is mostly attributed to what you could call “being discovered” a few weeks ago. Random people started commenting on my images and marking them as favorites. The feedback was encouraging and only magnified my urge to get out and shoot combined with my new found enjoyment for cycling photography. I’ve also started doing my part and letting other photographers on Flickr know what I think about their images through marking my favorites and commenting on their technique and composition.

I woke up this morning to find two of my images included in the Flickr Explore pool. This is monitored by a super secret algorithm that measures the “interestingness” of an image through the swarm of Flickr users interested in a particular image; loosely based on such aspects as comment count, user favorites, views and overall frequency. Included in the Explore pool are the top 1,000 Flickr images that have been deemed interesting by Flickr’s secret sauce. One of my cycling images is currently number 69 and one of my tulip images is number 105.

You can see my photography on my Flickr page as well as what images I like by visiting my favorites list. It is my favorites list which I draw from for my weekly Flickr Pick, that of which, I know I have been slacking on lately. I promise I’ll get back to more frequent updates…

I went to take some shots of another cycling race that my brother and the team he rides for was in on Thursday. The weather wasn’t the most ideal for what I was looking for, but I feel I made due with what I had… overcast, slow shutter speeds and experimenting with my flash to get any sort of shadow or depth.

It’s rather difficult to shoot fast moving objects on an overcast day surrounded by trees. I walked the course during the 5:30pm race to get a feel for what lines the riders were taking and where I should best position myself for my brother’s race. I found one stretch that offered a decent amount of light, a pleasant background - away from ugly sign posts - and where the riders came very close to the curb that I would be standing at.

The first few test shots proved to be mediocre at best. They were flat and boring due to the aforementioned lighting conditions. So I decided to experiment a little bit with my flash (Nikon SB-800). I was already shooting at a 30th of a second, forced to only take pan and blur shots; I figured it wouldn’t hurt to break a few rules and start popping my flash. This idea brought me some fairly interesting and great looking shots and hopefully I didn’t annoy any of the riders with the flash.

You can view the images on my Flickr page along with the rest of my photography…

We take snap shots of vacations, events and every day occurrences. We record our experiences through imagery and video; but what about all those hours spent cooped up inside the office, cubicle farm or the meeting room? Is it really all that boring? Sure, you spend a lot of time at work; it’s the same scenery day in and day out, nothing special. But what if you tried looking at it from a different perspective? Maybe through the eyes of your first day… or a visit to someone else’s office for the first time.

Office Snapshots is a weblog that collects pictures from places people spend most of their week. Though, most of the images are of Web 2.0 internet startups/companies, some are readily familiar to everyone. You will find Web 2.0 offices like Craigslist, Google (Zurich), Threadless and Tumblr. They also have some large corporations as well: GAP Inc., The New York Times, Adobe and my favorite Pixar. (Who wouldn’t want to work at Pixar!?)

Call me a nerd, geek or weirdo… but I find these pictures pretty interesting. It’s a view into a professional world that isn’t familiar to me where others work (and sometimes play) in their own everyday “mundane” environments. Mostly, it turns out to be a case just like dog owners look like their pets. I was surprised to see the Craigslist HQ look like it did, but then it really makes sense when you think of what their website looks like.

It makes me wonder how interesting people would find the office I work in… and how interesting your office might be.

This past week I have made three separate trips on absolutely gorgeous days with my camera in tow. Tara and I went to the University of Washington campus because the one hundred year old cherry tree’s are in bloom and they always make for a great photo opportunity. As I’ve mentioned before, I also went to my brothers cycling race as well as Golden Gardens in Ballard for the sunset with Tara on Saturday.

I go through these weird phases with my photography. Though I love photography, it seems I will be satisfied with work I have done and then take a break for awhile; often spanning months between even picking up my camera and not realizing it. I’ll be the first to admit, I’m a sucker for good weather and a sissy during inclement weather. Which is a shame because you can get some really great shots when it looks like a dogs butt outside, (See old proverb: “Even the sun shines on a dogs ass occasionally). I just find it difficult to muster the motivation when it is wet, cold and nasty outside; often times, living in Seattle, the weather doesn’t always lean in my favor.

Never the less, after this past weeks excursions, I have officially caught the photography bug again. I really did find a new enjoyment in cycling photography. It’s different than what I’ve previously been interested in; architectural and abstract. I’ve never liked taking pictures of people, I hate telling them what to do. I like to quietly move around a subject and find my shot rather than direct it. I guess that’s why I fall back on architectural, the structure isn’t going anywhere and I have all day to silently move around it looking for my shot. Cycling is still people pictures but in a way that I am still at the liberty to move around looking for my shot without having to give direction. It is at a fast exhilarating pace where I have a small window to snap the picture which is just the kick start I needed. And nothing sounds better than, “I like to shoot people… [with a camera].”

This may also be the perfect time for me to start an ever popular project shown on many flickr pages, the “365 Set.” Where you shoot and upload a picture to flickr every day for a year. I’ve always been intrigued by this but never really had the motivation to do it. But I think it will help force me to enjoy photography through the wet and cold winter months and become more consistent with my imagery and an over all better photographer. Starting in the spring should give me enough momentum to make it through next winter.

In the mean time, I’ve had several requests on how I executed a certain design aspect of some of my images, more specifically how I was able to blur the background but have my [moving] subject in focus. I would love to tell you how I did this, but I feel I must lay some obligatory basics first that create the foundation for photograph design.

So I am going to get to work on writing some articles on “Photography Design” to cover some techniques that like I use and for you to try. And hopefully, you have some techniques that I don’t know about and can share with me too! Expect the first one, very basic, in the next day or so on the Light and Exposure effects of Shutter Speed and Aperture… or something close to it.