Category: Uncategorized

The year 2020 was a strange year. Let’s all hope that 2021 will be a lot better. For me, it was also a change in my photography. In March when the pandemic hit Finland my calendar was empty in one day. Luckily I had some online lectures that were arranged by Olympus and a local camera store here in Helsinki. YouTube kept me also busy. I was very fortunate that spring was not a total catastrophe what it comes to my business.

The other day I was going through my best/favorite images from 2020. It was very interesting to look back and see what I have photographed. I made about 21.000 images during 2020. That is about the normal amount and it was about the same as 2019.

The reason is that I did quite a lot of bird photography. That usually means a lot of photos. The reason for doing that is of course the new 100-400mm f5.0 – 6.3 and the 150-400mm f4.5 lenses. I was able to test them both. I also had a chance to test the Bird AF on the E-M1X.

It was very interesting to learn about bird photography this year. It started before the pandemic. I traveled north to meet Jari Peltomäki. He gave some tips and then we headed out to his eagle hide. That was my first experience photographing from a hide. It was a very good experience and the knowledge I got from that trip was very valuable for my tests with long lenses later in the year.

I went through my favorite images on a video. I also want to see your best/favorite image from 2020. Sending it to me for feedback on my Live Stream on the 5th of January 2021 at 1 PM (GMT).

You can send your image from here.

This month’s challenge is outdoor macro. I know that it is not the best time here in the north to do outdoor macro, but that makes it more interesting. Finding something to photograph is harder when there is not much flora to photograph.

Of course down under it is a different thing. I hope to see some summer/spring images!

Check out the video and get inspired.

How to take part?

Send your image via this link. It will take you to a Google Form. From there you can send your image. You need to be signed in to Google.

Submitting an image to my feedback session you will grant me the right to show and critic the image during the Live Stream. If you submit an image it does not mean that it will be given feedback. I try to give critic to everyone, but if there are a lot of images I will pick the best ones. Also if the subject is inappropriate I will not show the image or give feedback. All images and other info will be deleted after the Live Stream.

This is important: Make sure that you have all the rights to the image you submit.

I will give feedback to about 30-40 images.

Send the images by Tuesday the 1st of December 2020 12 AM PM EST, which is 5 AM GMT on the 1st of December.
My Livestream will be on the 1st of December at 1 PM GMT.

Keep on photographing and send your image for feedback. The video below is the Live Stream where I gave the feedback.

Noise Reduction has been improved greatly in recent years. Now that AI has been more common in image editing software the noise reduction has become even better.

DxO PhotoLab 4 is the best one on this right now. Its DeepPRIME algorithm does astonishing work reducing noise.

DxO PhotoLab 4 is part of my workflow.

I use now DxO PhotoLab 4 for my noise reduction. It also has the tools to correct distortion, vignetting, CA, etc. on images. It has tons of modules for different camera-lens combinations. Images look so much better after going through DxO PhotoLab 4.

What is great about DxO mark is that it works with older cameras too. Here is an image from 2015 photographed with E-M5 MKII and M.Zuiko 25mm f1.8 lens. The ISO was ISO3200.

As you can clearly see how much better and cleaner the lower part of the image looks. You probably guessed that the lower part is from the image that was edited with DxO PhotoLab 4. I only used DeepPRIME and lens corrections. That way there is slightly different cropping. DxO PhotoLab 4 has made a lot better job fixing distortion etc.

Correction Modules for camera-lens combinations

I did not have the module and DxO PhotoLab 4 automatically suggested to download the module for this combination.

DeepPRIME does not ruins the details in your image.

Below is an image from November 2014. It was photographed with E-M1 and M.Zuiko 12-40mm f2.8 Pro. I used ISO3200. This image has a lot more details and DxO Photolab 4 made an excellent job getting rid of the noise and still it was able to keep the details in the image.

Great Deal on DxO PhotoLab 4 right now!

DxO PhotoLab 4 has a very special price between the 26th of November to 30th of November. The price is reduced by 40%. Click the banner below or this link to get the deal. (Affiliate link).

I think that DxO PhotoLab4 is so good that everyone should use it.

I also have a video about DxO PhotoLab4 and DeepPRIME.