Be a progressive communicator

By Bob Knopf

At my first OWAA conference in Louisville, Ky., in 1981, noted communicator/ photographer (and humorist) Lefty Kreh gave an awesome photo workshop. His words stuck: “If you like what you did last year, you haven’t progressed. If you don’t progress, you’re professionally dead.”

Outdoor communication is our field. To be professional means we must be current. We must take steps forward each day. We work in all media, and we need to be adept at all communications technology, particularly digital communications.

To say digital communication is not the way of the future is ridiculous. If you haven’t begun your digital photo portfolio, now is the time to start.

Most of us are already partially digital. If you use a word processor for features and stories, you’re digital. It’s time to initiate this process with our photographs. Begin either by converting your top film photos to digital or by shooting new photographs digitally.

We do not shoot digital photographs to make us feel good, impress our peers or find a new way to spend money we don’t have. We do it to survive. We do it for the new opportunities it provides. We need to be digital to do business as usual. Digital photography saves time for you and saves money for the folks to whom you sell. This is of growing importance as publications cut costs on all fronts. Digital photos save them a processing step.

Today, a digital camera contains every ISO, color balance and film brand in one 2x2x1/8-inch card. My entire digital camera system is smaller than the film bag I used to take on a weekend photo trip. We can change camera settings to adjust for lighting and photography conditions; we can select ideal settings for each photo. Each shot is chronicled, so we see our best and worst ones immediately, saving us from shooting 18-20 images of the same thing. Today’s top-of-the-line digital cameras offer the resolution needed to shoot cover photos that magazines will relish.

Many digital naysayers act as though buying a digital camera means you must throw out your film camera. For now, use both. Start learning digital photography so you’re not behind the learning curve. You’ll soon realize that digital photography is here to stay.

Advantages of Digital Photography:

Speed. Digital photography is fast. You know the exact quality of the photo in seconds. Extra takes and excessive bracketing are eliminated. A four-hour photo shoot becomes a 25-minute photo shoot. When you finish, you know you have great photos.

Quick Response and Turnaround. On a catalog assignment, you can shoot a photo, show it to a client in another state or country and get approval or suggestions for changes in minutes. You do fewer setups because you know the ones you’re doing are perfect.

Cost. No film, no film processing. While 35-mm equipment might be less expensive, digital photography wastes less time. If you’re worth $50 per hour or more, concerns about equipment costs are silly. Plus, digital camera prices are dropping fast. A 5.0-plus mega-pixel camera (the minimum needed for professional work) costs less than $750.

Learn. A digital camera is the greatest photography teacher you will ever have. You learn by instantly seeing your photo mistakes, and you can correct them in minutes.

Bob Knopf is a writer-photographer who specializes in digital communication of outdoor recreation topics, both as a freelancer and as a business consultant.

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Why have a Web site?

By Laurie Lee Dovey

Question: Do you have a Web site, and is it a valuable part of your business?

Answer: Yes, I have a Web site that covers all of the services that I offer as well as my writing, photography, speaking and teaching credentials. The site is invaluable:

1] It shows prospective clients, publishers and others that I’m up to date with technology, which is important to everyone with whom I work.

2] It gives me a place to keep my full bio that’s easy for people to access if they need to know more about me.

3] It produces business. I receive requests for work even though I don’t market the site to new clients. I use the site for potential clients – ones I’ve already contacted. I tell them to visit the site to see what I offer or to check out my credentials. If I focus on advertising the site address, it should bring numerous inquiries. I’m working on my marketing right now.

4] It substantially reduces work time. I use the FTP (file transfer protocol) portion of my site to receive images from manufacturers, and I upload images for magazines so editors can download them from the site. This saves an incredible amount of time, conserves money on postage/shipping and provides a valuable service to the publications with whom I work.

5] It allows editors to quickly view images. I use part of my site to present images to editors and other clients for review and selection. Editors can view from a few to hundreds of digitally formatted images online, quickly and easily, and then tell me which images they want me to send for final review, which saves all of us time and money.

6] It gives me a place to display graphics that I’m working on with clients so they can quickly and easily review them. This saves the hassle of sending e-mail files that might not be compatible between computers or in a format that clients can’t view because they don’t have the software necessary to open files. They can go to the Web site and view an e-letter, Web site layout, image, article layout, catalog page, etc.

7] It provides worldwide visibility for the cost of a daily cup of coffee. I pay my Web hosting company about $25 a month, but my site is large. Many people can get by for $10-15 a month. It’s a small price to pay for publicity that I could never achieve otherwise! 

Laurie Lee Dovey, www.webimages.net, is a freelance writer and photographer.

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Speed up your Windows XP computer

Windows XP – either the home or professional version – is the best Microsoft operating system yet, offering stability and a great degree of customization. However, if you’re manipulating large files, such as video or photographs, you need to squeeze every ounce of power from your computer.

Fortunately, a simple fix will increase the speed at which programs open and operate. Go to Start>Control Panel>System>Advanced. Click on “Performance Settings,” then select “Adjust for best performance.” 

You’ll notice that colors will change on menus and taskbars. That’s because XP’s default setting has fancy graphics that eat up memory and CPU power. But don’t worry; the display quality of your photos won’t be compromised.

Another way to increase your computer’s speed is to change the values of your Paging File (Swap File) size in Control Panel>System>Advanced>Virtual Memory. Set the minimum and maximum values to twice your amount of RAM. That is, if you have 256Mb of RAM, set both your minimum and maximum paging file limits to 512. Doing so makes more memory available when you’re multitasking. Ever had Windows tell you that “your computer is low on memory – close one program and try again?” That’s because Windows, though pretty efficient at managing memory, can’t react fast enough to change the Swap File Size when you are using powerful programs such as image editors. The answer is to manage it yourself – by following the tip above.

Michael Furtman, www.michaelfurtman.com

A "craft" project

Lust after those expensive canvas and leather camera bags imported from Old Blighty?

I did, but didn’t want to spend $200 plus. Happily, an OWAA gift – received during our Duluth conference – plus a free mouse pad from a local radio station, plus a $20 Domke insert, plus five minutes (and that included taking these photos) yielded a do-it-yourself “Billingham” bag that I use to tote a classic Leica. The Duluth sponsors’ logos are printed on the body-side panel of this sturdy canvas bag, so they don’t show when I carry it. By the way, on an earlier trip to Duluth I bought another, somewhat larger bag, which I also converted to a camera bag. That added $60 more to the total cost – still far below what a “store-bought” canvas camera bag costs.

Check a camera store Web site (such as B&H) for Domke inserts (the one I used is a three-compartment #FA230), which come in a variety of sizes. I plan to use several of them to pad out a small backpack for carrying larger gear on extended hikes.

Before...                                                                     After!

Mike Levy

Translating MIME

Back in the days of DOS, e-mail programs rarely supported HTML (HyperText Markup Language). If you tried to e-mail a picture to someone, the program would convert it to MIME, Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions. When you see it in your text-only e-mail viewer, you see it as a l-o-n-g paragraph of gibberish. But MIME can be formatted to readable text.

Nowadays, nearly everyone who uses Windows has WinZIP, an archiver that lets you save files in half the space that readable files occupy. My e-mail program is Outlook 98. It supports HTML, but occasionally I’ll still receive something in MIME format, usually in a digest of e-mails from a newsgroup. If this happens to you, highlight the entire MIME section and save it to a different file name. I saved mine to MIMETEST.UUE. The “UUE” suffix makes the file visible to WinZIP.

Load WinZIP and click “Open.” To open your file, go to the directory where it is saved and double-click the filename. You’ll probably see a file listed as UNKNOWN.001. Double-click that, and WinZIP will convert it to a readable format, and you can extract it and save to a different file name.

Bill Clede, www.clede.com

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American Birding Association

Those interested in the “birding trail” phenomenon should review the new pages on the American Birding Association’s Web site. A detailed inventory of currently known birding trails is presented by state and province.

Contributed by Paul J. Baicich, www.americanbirding.org

Ducks Unlimited

Ducks Unlimited (DU) has launched a new and improved conservation section on its Web site, featuring information on wetlands, waterfowl and DU projects in a user-friendly format. Among its highlights are interactive maps detailing DU’s conservation initiatives; an online waterfowl gallery with descriptions, pictures and audio recordings of various waterfowl species; and new material about wetlands, grasslands, waterfowl biology and governmental affairs.  For active waterfowl enthusiasts, the site includes plans for how to build and set up wood duck boxes at home. Contact Laura Houseal, 901-758-3764.

Contributed by William H. Geer

Stripers Forever

Stripers Forever is a newly formed, Internet-based, nonprofit organization dedicated to having wild, migratory striped bass declared and regulated as gamefish in Atlantic coast marine waters. Its Web site features background materials and states Stripers Forever's advocacy positions. The organization is establishing a listserv of communicators who are interested in receiving electronic news releases concerning the East Coast striped bass fishery and Stripers Forever; sign up at the Web site. Please contact Brad Burns, president, with questions.

Contributed by William H. Geer

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Special offers from myTopo and Mapcard

Build your own topo or aerial photo map at mytopo! Within 48 hours, your custom map will be printed and shipped to your door. You can center any place in the United States on your map, choose the zoom level and grid lines and personalize your map with your name and a title. Maps come in several sizes and range from $9.95 to $29.95.

Tech-E-Letter readers receive a 10-percent discount on all map purchases. In addition, visit www.mytopo.com, and type “OWAA” in the yellow-highlighted box at checkout to receive a 10 percent discount anytime in 2003.

MapCard offers access to a comprehensive and powerful mapping system that allows users to annotate, print and save unlimited topos and aerial photos. The editors at Backpacker magazine just named MapCard Best New Product of the Year for 2003. MapCard is a private Web site, accessible only to subscribers. Subscriptions can be purchased online or at many outdoor retailers, including Cabela’s and Sportsman’s Warehouse. 

Tech-E-Letter readers are eligible for a trial membership to MapCard. Follow the link and experience the benefits of membership!

contributed by Paige Darden
PR/Marketing, MapCard/myTopo

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Tom Goldsmith: www.timberdoodles.com

OWAA member Tom Goldsmith’s Web site is as funny and irreverent as his cartoons. “As long as the money is there or something easier comes along I will keep on drawing silly pictures,” he says in his bio. But a look at his gallery of artwork reveals a seasoned pro, who draws for a love of art and has a keen understanding of his subjects. Check out his sketches of labs if you have a soft spot in your heart for anything canine, and take a few minutes to appreciate his Web site design, with a clean, colorful and appealing layout by Ray Blades.    

Nominated by Lisa Carter

If you are interested in having your Web site promoted here or linked in this space, or if you know of another OWAA member who fits the bill, please send us the link and tell us why your nomination deserves to be featured in a future issue of the Tech-E-Letter.

Browse other OWAA member Web sites!

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MPI Outdoors: www.mpioutdoors.com

MPI Outdoors is in the Spotlight. Manufacturers of a full line of outdoor products, hunting gear and shooting accessories, MPI’s Web site is a gold mine of resources for outdoor communicators. The site not only has up-to-date, informative product information but also contains valuable story ideas and interesting “fun facts” on everything from who invented the zipper to why deer lose their antlers.

Nominated by Betty Lou Fegely

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Who is Dr. P.C. Woodknot?

Lost as an infant in an old-growth forest, Dr. P.C. Woodknot was raised by a vegetarian wolf commune until age 10. Discovered by a band of barefoot hikers and returned to the awkward bosom of humankind, he grew up in an organic, high-tech household, and the rest, as we all know, is histrionic. If you have a question for Dr. Woodknot, please submit it to him care of the OWAA Tech-E-Letter feedback form. 

Dear Dr. Woodknot,

What are those funny things in e-mails and on the Web that don’t make much sense until you look at them sideways? There sure seem to be a variety of them.

Signed,
Visually Challenged

Dr. WoodKnot replies:

Dear Virtually Clueless,

You are, of course, referring to the e-mail smiley face and variations thereof. They are also called emoticons, and they are a way to restore some of the cues that are lost in keyboard communications.

The basic 3 emoticons are:

:-)  happy 

:-(  sad  and

;-)  winking

Hundreds of emoticons have been invented, so, yes, there is quite a variety. While I think it is fair to say that emoticons should not be used in formal business writing, they can be very popular in casual settings.

Here are links to three illustrative emoticon collections:

Mr. Dave Barry starts you off with the basics but it gets strange pretty fast! Might be advisable to have a cocktail or two beforehand. ;-)

You’ll find a very comprehensive set of straightforward emoticons here. This site could be considered the O.E.D., or Oxford Emoticon Dictionary. :-)

Some real works of art can be found on this site, such as

(_8(|)  Homer Simpson or

    :-.) Cindy Crawford