Now Providing Limited Editions

Hi all,

I am extremely pleased to announce that, beginning with our Africa release, our Gallery Prints will be offered exclusively as limited editions – at no additional cost.

Over the past two years, we have contemplated how to improve the value of the products that we offer. We have worked hard to ensure that our printing and framing were of the highest possible quality while remaining affordable – our working definition of value. In fact, since we began operations in 2007, we have reduced our costs and passed the savings along in the form of lower prices.

Since our founding, we have often considered whether to limit the number of prints issued for each photograph. We have weighed various arguments, including the additional value to those who purchase a print early against the increased cost and potential disappointment to those who find a print they want only after the edition has sold out. While we are uncomfortable with the idea of having someone who adores one of our prints having to purchase it at an inflated price on a secondary market, or not being able to purchase it at all, we have decided that our primary loyalty must be to our initial customers – who are ultimately responsible for the success of our business – and that the additional value they receive by obtaining a limited edition print is worth the potential discomfort down the road.

Of course, a skeptic might postulate that we have only made this change in order to charge more for our prints. However, we are not making any pricing changes based on this conversion, nor will we in the future. Furthermore, we are making this change retroactive: we are in the process of contacting all of our customers who have already purchased prints from us, and providing them with certificates designating their print as a limited edition. We believe that it is only appropriate that those who have supported us as our business has grown benefit from the increased value a limited edition print has.

Terence

City Escapes Nature Photography

Upcoming Changes

Hello,

I wanted to update you on several changes that we are making to our product lines, timed to coincide with our upcoming major release.

We have spent the past couple of months evaluating the products available from several printing companies and as a result, we have been able to significantly expand our print options. In particular, we have selected several prints that we believe have the potential to act as anchor pieces for larger spaces, and we are now able to offer these prints in larger sizes than we have in the past. Expanding into these more substantial print dimensions required us to answer several important questions.

The first determination that needed to be made was what was involved in shipping such large prints. We were surprised by the limit imposed on box sizes by our shipping carrier, UPS. We were originally looking at offering extremely large sizes, up to 3.5ft by 5ft, but found that UPS would require these prints, when framed, to be shipped freight. This would add several hundreds of dollars to the cost of the print - an unacceptable burden on our customers. Because of this, until such time as we can identify a more reasonable shipping alternative or grow large enough to obtain significant discounts from UPS, we have decided to limit the size of the prints to those we can ship with standard ground.

Even within the set of acceptable sizes, increasing the print dimensions required custom ordering each frame for each print, as few frame suppliers provide premade frames in these larger dimensions. After extensive research, we have identified custom frame makers which meet our quality standards and are able to provide excellent frames in the required sizes.

The final challenge was to identify an alternative to glass for the largest of our prints. While reflection control and museum glass are used in our smaller pictures, the weight of glass makes it a prohibitive option for our largest prints. We investigated using acrylic for these prints, which is a common solution in the art world. While acrylic is lighter and is available with a similar range of reflective properties as glass, it scratches much more easily and can therefore be harder to maintain long-term. It is also still heavy enough to adversely impact both our customer’s shipping costs and their display options. As a result, we have decided to use an alternative for our largest prints: canvas. Most of our print sizes will be available in our traditional giclee prints with either our standard conservation or the optional museum glass as they have always been. However, our larger prints will be available on canvas. Canvas provides an excellent medium for large prints because it adds additional texture and depth to the print while not requiring glass or acrylic protection. In many cases, canvas will be an option in addition to our regular prints, allowing you to choose the medium that you prefer, but our largest prints will be offered exclusively in canvas.

We are excited about these new options and hope you are as well.

Terence

City Escapes Nature Photography

To Nikon or not to Nikon

Hello,

One of the most important decisions a photographer can make is what equipment to purchase. Once a decision has been made and a brand decided upon, it can be extremely hard (or at least prohibitively expensive) to change brands because camera lenses are frequently tied to a specific manufacturer. A professional will often have $10k - $25k in lenses that would need to be replaced, in addition to the body.

We selected Nikon equipment due to what has historically been a very good reputation. Unfortunately, we have had extremely mixed results and cannot offer a whole-hearted endorsement of their products. While their products seem to work fairly well in general, we have had a couple of instances where, we believe, Nikon is not living up to their reputation.

In the first case, we had purchased a D200 camera body. This camera was supposed to have a hardened body that would allow it to take more abuse than the next lower model, and it was priced appropriately higher (a couple of hundred dollars more). Our understanding was that this camera should take a reasonable amount of abuse without failing, as one would expect of any professional camera. Unfortunately, this does not appear to be the case. We took the camera on a kayaking trip where it got a little wet – no, it was not dunked, but rather splashed, and only slightly at that. It hasn’t worked since and the estimate to repair it was essentially the same as the cost of a new, and improved, camera. This is far from the robust behavior we expected of a hardened, professional camera body, and was extremely disappointing. (The lens continued to work fine.)

We have also had several problems with Nikon’s Nikkor lenses. In at least two cases, our lenses have lost their zoom and significant focusing capabilities (even manual focusing), presumably because a center ring has loosened or gotten dirty. It is also worth noting that with at least one of these lenses, no precipitating factors caused any damage. One frame the lens worked fine; the next, it did not, and it hasn’t since. The initial estimate to repair the larger of the lenses was about $450, while the smaller was just over $200. That is a lot of cash for lenses that have only been used for a year or two, and may be indicative of a quality issue.

In addition to the unreliable quality of the products, we have had significant problems with access to parts. Nikon appears to have a poor reputation among certain retailers for providing parts (including complete lenses) in a timely manner. This can lead to shortages and the inability to purchase or repair equipment on a reasonable, much less short, timeline. Furthermore, Nikon does not appear to provide accurate information about when they will deliver – meaning the retailers and repair shops cannot provide reasonable time estimates for delivery either. We have had multi-week to multi-month delays in both lenses and repairs due to supply problems. So far, this has generated only a couple of critical problems for us, but it has come close several other times and is always extremely frustrating. Since the same retailers are able to provide new Nikon cameras and standard, but cheaper, Nikkor lenses, this would appear to be a business decision on Nikon’s part about what products to produce and distribute.

At this point, we are continuing to work with Nikon equipment (now using a D300). However, we wanted to voice our concerns about the quality of both the service and merchandise being provided. It certainly does not appear to be providing the high quality products and service that its reputation (and pricing) would suggest it should.

Note: Though we cannot confirm this through personal experience, we have heard similar complaints from our vendors and repair shop about Cannon’s timeliness and service. We therefore suggest that, when choosing a manufacturer, you speak to a knowledgeable retailer about such issues as repair times, availability of parts, and common problems encountered in addition to the specs and capabilities of the specific piece of equipment you are considering.

Terence
City Escapes Nature Photography

Photo “Badge” for Web Site

Good evening,

For those of you who have visited our web site (www.cityescapesphotography.com ), you are sure to notice the badge at the top of our home page (the banner where pictures are dynamically filled in). This badge is similar to the common Flickr badges that have started to appear around the web. However, it is not directly associated with Flickr. This piece of Javascript was written by Joe Tan and is available open source at http://tantannoodles.com/toolkit/flickr-dhtml-badge/ (Our thanks to Mr. Tan!)

This script has a couple of important advantages over the classic Flickr badges. First, and most importantly, it can use images from anywhere on the web. You tell the Javascript which images to use and it displays them in random order. This was extremely important to us because it meant that we did not need to have a Flickr site in addition to our primary web site just to host images for the badge. This allows people who click on the image to go directly to our detail page which provides more information about the image and allows orders to be placed. This also minimized synchronization issues by ensuring the badge and the underlying pages point to the same images.

The second advantage this script has is its flexibility. You can specify exactly how large to make the banner, the size of the individual images, how many images appear, what the shape of the badge is, how often new images appear, and how often the entire badge is cycled through before going dormant. This level of flexibility was much greater than provided by the official Flickr badges that I had looked at when deciding what type of badge to use.

I have had no problems incorporating the badge into our site, and have tested it on both Firefox and IE without any problems (although I will note that IE requires Javascript to be placed outside of tables). I would highly recommend this badge for anyone looking to add a little interaction to their web pages without any serious coding.

Terence

www.cityescapesphotography.com

Review of Hyperdrive Colorspace

For our trips, we needed a way to download and backup our digital memory cards without having to connect to a laptop. While this is an extremely convenient capability in general, this was particularly important in Africa, where we were not taking a laptop and would be on the road for several weeks (we had to limit our luggage and were not going to have access to electricity, other than through the vehicle’s lighter port). After looking at several options, we purchased a Hyperdrive Colorspace with 232GB of storage space. We could not have been happier with the functionality this little device provides.

The Hyperdrive has an extremely simple interface that provides one to three button access to all of the functionality one could want in the field – copying cards, erasing cards, and confirming the quality of the copies. Any of a wide variety of card types plug directly into the unit for access. It is extremely simple to copy cards, and the resulting files appear as a regular directory when connected to the PC. There was enough room on the disk to copy approximately 12,000 pictures in the raw + jpeg format we typically shoot, which is enough for at least 3 weeks on the road. The screen is small, but gives enough of an overview of the shots to do some minimal filtering if desired (we copied pretty much everything and sorted through the images on the computer screen when we got back home).

A couple of things should be pointed out, however. The official specs outlining card copy time and battery usage were not even close to what we saw in the field. That is likely because the manufacturer is promoting the simplest case – copying without verifying the data – whereas we always verify our copies. We found that instead of the advertised four minutes, it took closer to 25 minutes to copy a 4 Gb card, and that we could copy only three cards on a single charge. While the faster copy rate (and associated longer battery life) would have been nice, we felt it was very important to ensure the copy was verified.

The only other issue we had in the field was keeping the unit charged. We didn’t have access to electricity at night, and had to rely on the car charger. When using the car adapter that the unit came with, we found that the system could barely draw enough power to keep up with a copy. In order to manage the number of copies we needed to make, we ended up using the regular 110, plug-in charger and a separate car-to-110 adapter that would allow more power to be drawn. This worked well for our trip, but still required charging the unit several hours per day.

One further, but for us small, issue presented itself when we attempted to locate specific files in the Hyperdrive. Though it is simple enough to find the file if you know where it is, the system does not allow you to rename either the file or the folder to something that means something to you. In our case, this was not a major issue, as we do not use the Hyperdrive as a long-term storage system, and we can rename the files once we upload them to our computer. Nonetheless, finding specific photos did occasionally take a bit of searching.

Overall, given the size, capacity, and usability of the system, we definitely felt we got our money’s worth out of this unit and we highly recommend it.

Terence

www.cityescapesphotography.com

Comprehensive First Aid Kit

Happy New Year,

We have always taken a basic first aid kit with us on our travels, since it can be extremely useful at times. When selecting a first aid kit, you must keep in mind both the level of injury you want to successfully address, and the overall size and weight of the kit.

For short hikes, we have used standard, pre-packaged first aid kits available from outdoor stores such as REI. We have often used these small kits to patch up minor cuts, blisters, and abrasions received from a fall or other minor accident on the trail, and they work great for those situations. For trips when we are in the field for a week or two, and have access to a car, we have extended our basic kit to allow us to deal with more serious injuries for a short period of time. For example, we have included a small splint to stabilize a broken bone until proper medical help can be sought.

As part of our preparation for Tanzania, however, we felt we needed to further extend our supplies, since we would need to be equipped to handle pretty much anything for at least 24, and more likely 48, hours (the time it would take to be airlifted to a hospital that meets first-world standards). Knowing that the potential existed for us to be far from any semblance of assistance should we need it, we also added supplies that are not strictly first aid in nature, but rather general purpose, such as a signal mirror and duct tape. Taking that approach, and knowing that size was not a primary consideration since we would always be in or near a vehicle, we developed a very comprehensive first aid kit.

Unfortunately, we were not able to find all of the information we needed to develop a good kit in a single place. To come up with the appropriate set of items, we had to pull information from multiple sources, including the Red Cross. We hope that the information we present here will help save you a little work in putting together your own kit. The resulting kit fits in a medium sized over-the-shoulder bag (roughly the size of a large purse), and should provide everything that you need to triage after even a fairly significant event such as a car accident. Of course, it also contains all of the stuff required to take care of minor injuries as well. Given its size, it is not likely the best fit for backpacking trips, but it is our new standard for any trip where size is not a prohibitive measure.

Obviously, in addition to the equipment contained in the kit, the knowledge of how to use it is critical. As such, we strongly recommend at least one person in your group take an advanced wilderness first aid class to become familiar with these tools and learn how to effectively utilize them. More than one person would be preferable, as the person who knows how to use the equipment might also be the injured, and possibly unconscious, party.

We hope you find this information useful.

Terence
www.cityescapesphotography.com

Lessons from a successful safari

Hello and Happy Holidays,

As I mentioned last time, we had a great time on our trip, but there are a few things we got right out of sheer luck, and a few things we would do differently next time. In case you are planning on heading on safari sometime soon, here are some things to keep in mind:

• We went during the dry season, but we still encountered a few days of significant rain. Plan for it and your trip will be much better. We had some issues getting to camp one day due to a flash flood, but overall the rain was nothing more than an inconvenience. If we hadn’t had appropriate layers and quick drying clothes, it could have been a long couple of days.
• We spent more time at Lake Manyara and in the Northern Serengeti than we needed to. Lake Manyara is relatively small, and should be visited, however a single day would be plenty. The claim that this is the only place where you can see tree-climbing lions is not true. We saw lions in trees in many locations, but not there. While there were plenty of grazers (zebra, wildbeest. topi, etc.) in the northern part of the Serengeti, we didn’t see many of the more exciting animals (cats). While the north may be worth visiting during the migration to watch the river crossings, during the dry season we would prefer to spend additional time in the south.
• Definitely pack for the worst. We brought an extensive first aid kit, which we fortunately didn’t use much, but simply having it around was reassuring. (More details later.)
  Though we were well taken care of at camp, we were fed traditional American food. Apparently, had we specifically requested it when we booked our trip, we could have obtained African food at mealtimes. This was our major disappointment, as we would have preferred to eat more of the local cuisine. Unfortunately, we were unaware of this issue in advance.
• Bring lots of hand sanitizer and bug spray. While the tsetse flies seem to be attracted to deet, the rest of the insects appear to be deterred.
• Because you are not going to be able to head off-road in Tanzania, it is important to bring a couple of very good lenses to get shots from a distance. A good pair of binoculars doesn’t hurt, either.
• In the southern Serengeti, our camp was pretty far from the major animal viewing areas, so we spent an hour or so each way just going to and from the park. This is one of the areas where it may make more sense to stay in a lodge, since they are much closer to the prime viewing area. This is especially true if you include a hot-air balloon ride, as the take-off site is only minutes from a major lodge.
• Because we wanted to focus on photography, we were on a private safari. Much to our surprise, the additional cost was minimal, and the flexibility provided was definitely worth it. We were able to customize the time spent in each camp, and since it was just us in the car, we were able to spend as much or as little time as we wanted viewing various animals. This is definitely worth exploring, and not nearly as expensive as you would think.
• If you shoot digital, bring a way to store images from memory cards. We took over 7,000 pictures, and while we had a lot of cards, we needed a huge amount of space to hold everything. We used a Hyperdrive Colorspace, and were very happy with the unit. We will be writing up a product review on it later.

Terence
http://www.cityescapesphotography.com/