Making the move: Please check the site and update your RSS feed

Hey folks, especially those reading via RSS, I'm making the move to Word Press because of Blogger cancelling FTP blogging. I'm pretty much ready to go, so please check out the site and update your feeds. There'll be house keeping being done for the next while when we 'move in', but all is basically ready to go. Sorry about the short notice, but I only discovered about Blogger yesterday.
I suspect the new feed will be either feed:http://lightroom-blog.com/wp/feed or feed:http://lightroom-blog.com/feed so please update!

Changes

Hi folks,
As Blogger are removing FTP blogging from May 1st and I'd prefer to retain control over my content, it looks like I have to consider moving to a wordpress blog. This means making sure posts keep the same format to be findable, as well as sorting out those that read the blog exclusively via RSS. I may just use a basic template until I get all the details hammered out, or even go with a brand new design. Hopefully all you readers out there will keep with me as I update and expand. I've need Wordpress style pages for the blog for a while, so I guess it's time to make the jump. I'll keep you all informed and warn when the time comes.

LRB Exhibition 1.1 minor bug

There's a minor bug in mail.html file inside LRB_Exhibition.lrwebengine. This affects people using the contact form.

Line 69 is missing a ')' in the release version.

As this part of the plugin is about to undergo changes, merely fixing this and doing an update does a disservice to those that just updated. Rather than have folk lose an update I'm offering a replacement file with simple fix instructions and will get 1.2 out quickly with a new Alt tag system based on Image Info.

Fix Instructions.

Download the new mail.html file (zipped version)
In Lightroom, open Preferences (Edit>Preferences on PC, Lightroom>Preferences on Mac).
In the Presets Tab, click 'Show Lightroom Presets Folder'.
When this folder opens, double click on 'Web Galleries' to open it.
Finally open 'LRB_Exhibition.lrwebengine'. On Mac you need to right click on this and click 'Show Package Contents'.
Replace mail.html with the zipped file.
Restart Lightroom.

Roaches Hall

For those not interested in general and speaking news, feel free to skip this. Last week I was away in Roaches Hall in the Peak District of England at the invite of Paul RG Haley. I know Paul from the SWPP and Twitter. The premise of this annual residential week is sharing and training, mainly geared to wedding, portrait, boudoir and some fine art nude photography. I was there to talk Lightroom, but also did a session on Off Camera Flash using the Canon ETTL system and manually using radio triggers (in this case Elinchrom Skyports). In the evenings I also did a lot of impromptu Photoshop sessions, which went down really well, with a lot of oohs and ahhs from those around. These evening times also gave people a chance to ask me direct questions about Lightroom, things that they wouldn't ask in a group sessions, which I thought was valuable for them.

Photo by Steve Ramsden (Yorkshire Wedding Photographer)

Other things on during the week included Aladdin Gulec revealing quite a lot of SEO tricks. I will be incorporating some of this information into my plugins, or at least allowing users to access them if they choose. That said, if a user is interested in SEO, I'd highly recommend them do a course. For this session, I was sitting beside Adrian Downing, who actually taught Aladdin some of the things he was showing, so I got even more SEO info from him.

Also there was Richie Crossley, a Maltease fashion photographer based in London. Richie has a knack for being the centre of attention, so needless to say we got on like a house on fire. Richie showed off a few techniques for fashion and headshots, as well as talking about rapport. Check out his site, it's well worth a look.

The final thing I really enjoyed was sharing a twin room with Steve Ramsden. Although the house was reasonably large, most people were sharing. This is actually great for networking, and sharing with Steve was no exception. We had great getting up and going to bed talks about sales, marketing, training and a whole host of other things. Steve took the photo above BTW.

One other benefit to the course is that the models used for the classes are available for hire. Why is this good? Well shots taken during workshops and classes are usually disqualified from competition. By booking the model and shooting yourself, the images shot may be used for portfolio and competitions. Of course you also pay the model for their time!

Kudos to Paul for organising this week, his 5th of this kind. I know I'll be there next year, assuming I get invited!

LRB Exhibition updated to version 1.1

LRB Exhibition from Sean McCormack of Lightroom Blog has been updated to version 1.1. Feature additions and bug fixes include:

1.1
Added Top Gap
Added Numbers checkbox
Added body image check box.
Fixed repeat
Changed less for fewer
Change UI colours
Added a Switch to the galleries to hide the menu and force all images into Gallery 1, acting as a single gallery rather than a website.
Added Number Height slider
Added Menu Gap slider
Menu gallery swap
Menu and Identity Plate transparency choices
Added Flickr code and made icon.
Body Height added
Fixed spacing in Gallery numbers for Gallery 4, 5, & 6.
Add tiles for number colour and hover colour.
Changed copyright date
Fixed bug that caused error code to be visible when someone enters a period (.) in a number box.

Current users can update using their download link, and this counts as one of the 9 downloads they purchased. It's not compulsory to download, unless you need the features and bug fixes here. The 9 downloads can be used as the user sees fit. For those interested in the plugins features and purchase information, you can access the main LRB Exhibition Page.


Update:
Some folk seems to be having update issues, this is because e-junkie has locked customers that I gave a partial refund to when the discount code didn't work initially. If you forward the link address to me, I'll fix this.

Update #2:
There's a minor bug in 1.1's mail file. Fix instructions are here: http://lightroom-blog.com/2010/03/lrb-exhibition-11-minor-bug.html

Back from Focus

Hi Folks! I know I've been a bit quiet here, but that's because I was at Focus On Imaging for most of this week, along with preparing for it. I did 2 talks a day on the Phototraining4U.com stand. I know I've mentioned it before, but I'm their Lightroom Master, so I was there promoting this new aspect of the training. The other new Master there was Kenny Martin, showing off a new portrait promotion called 'Photo Noir', or 'Back 2 Black'. I was very impressed with his talks. (As a former MPA president, he's well able to present!).

For my early talk, I did a landscape develop tutorial, followed by a beauty retouch tutorial. In the late talk, I did a little on Split Toning for Sepia and Cross Processed looks, followed by showing off my plugins. The plugin talk was a little short the first day, so I got up early on Tuesday and made a power point presentation to give it more direction.

Thanks to all the people that came up to speak to me both with questions and, of course, those with compliments on the training that's up on Phototraining4U.com.

Finally I should mention that there's plans afoot for a UK tour with Mark Cleghorn from PT4U. We'll be doing a Photoshop and Lightroom tour in November, so keep your eyes peeled for more information on that.

ProPhoto Resource

Cris Mitchell has just announced a whole slew of articles from industry experts for this months Pro Photo Resource online magazine. I've an article on Lightroom Metadata Handling there this month. Go check it out.

Focus on Imaging

Hi folks,
I'll be at Focus on Imaging in Birmingham from 7th-10th of the month (yep next Sunday is the 7th). I get in during the afternoon of the 7th so I don't think I'll be speaking that afternoon. I will be on the remaining days on the Mark Cleghorn/Phototraining4U stand (F50) though. Times are not confirmed yet though. See you there.