Michael Reichmann has relaunched his Critique Competition; you send in your photographic submission for a particular theme, Michael selects the best and worst and offers his critique, then declares an overall winner. The theme for August is Harvest.

“I will publish selected submission as they come in. Each competition lasts approximately a month, though depending on my travel schedule and workload any one competition may be cut short or extended.

Please note that not all submission will be published and critiqued. Only those which I feel are of particular interest (good or bad) will be put online. Also, I can not enter into private correspondence about your submission.”

Website: Luminous Landscape - Critique Competition

Tomorrow is the day when Canon will make the big announcement that they are claiming will be “historic”. Unfortunately I’m just an amateur photographer with a full-time job, so I won’t be able to attend the 2-day event (not that I was invited anyway!). Ian Burley of DP-Now, however, is joining the 400+ members of the European press at the Canon extravaganza in London. Ian has kindly set up a webpage that will be updated as the news breaks, and you can also sign-up for a notification email that will deliver all the news straight to your inbox.

Website: DP-Now - What will Canon reveal?

LTL Imagery is a small business based in Vancouver, Canada, whose website offers a lot of information for the digital photographer. Here are some links to get you started:

- Dynamic Range in Film Scanning

- All About Digital Image Resolution

- Film Scanning Pointers

- Digital Photographic Printing

- Film v Digital

Yesterday saw the 2nd birthday of the popular digital photography site, Digital Photography Now. DP-Now’s editor, Ian Burley, marked the occasion by hinting at new features that will be added to the website by the end of this year.

“There is much in the pipeline, including a revised forum, database-driven buyers guides, a new and better page design with much better navigation, and much more.

From a part time experiment in online publishing in August 2001, by the end of 2003 we are aiming to be a serious player in the online digital photography publishing stakes. By then we hope to have completed all the site developments we have been working on so hard during the last 9 months - most of them unseen, to date.”

Luminous Landscape have published an interesting article by Mark Pelletier called “A Journey to Photograph the Nomads of Northern Sudan”, which features some good photography and useful tips for travel photographers.

“Finally at the well and the smell of camel dung is overpowering, yet the light is good, the heat is bearable, and the D60 batteries are fully charged. My goal in situations like this is to shoot so much that the novelty of a strange guy taking pictures of them will wear off. Hopefully then they will become less self-conscious, continue working, and begin treating me only as an annoying pest or at best invisible.”

Website: Luminous Landscape - A Journey to Photograph the Nomads of Northern Sudan

28MM is an online photography magazine that showcases traditional, digital, and lo-tech photography by amateur, hobbyist, and professional photographers. The new August issue is now online, featuring some great photography by the likes of Emsese Gaal (Photote), Sean Slavin (NoWhere Photography) and Sensiti (Sensitive Light).

Website: 28mm.org

Mike Johnston’s Sunday Morning Photographer column tidies up a few loose ends before he goes on vacation, including the replies that he received about his recent “Where the heck is digital black and white?” article.

“Perhaps predictably, I heard from more people who agreed than disagreed with what I had to say. Only four people who wrote professed to be totally happy with the way they make black-and-white prints from digital files.”

Website: Sunday Morning Photographer - “Odds and Ends”

Sensitive Light is a well-designed weblog that features some absolutely stunning photography by it’s owner, Sensiti. This experimentation on the theme of smoke is particularly beautiful, and there are also some great hoverflies and damselflies images. Sensitive Light is a great way to start your Sunday morning!

Website: Sensitive Light

The August issue of Nature Photographers Online Magazine has been posted today and features some new articles that will appeal to nature and non-nature photographers alike. There’s a review of the new Fuji Velvia 100 slide film, “The ‘Ethics’ of using Filters”, which discusses the use of filters in landscape photography, and “The Africa Safari Primer” - well, we can all dream, can’t we?!

Website: Nature Photographers Online Magazine - August Issue

As usual on the 1st day of the new calendar month, a number of online magazines and publications have posted their monthly updates. First up is ePhotoZine with a new range of techniques for August. This month’s articles include “Fill-in Flash explained”, “Selective toning in Photoshop” and “Using Graduated Filters” - once again there’s a nice balance between digital and more general photography techniques for you to try.

Website: ePhotoZine August Techniques

Adam Harvey from zoozoom.com has asked me to let everyone know about a photography project that you can all help out with.

“I’m working on a collaborative photo project, that I though you might be interested in and looking for ways to ask for help with the project. The working title is “Internet Portrait Project” and it involves using the internet as an artistic medium to create a portrait from user’s images (headshots). You can look at it at the zoozoom website where it is hosted (it is a collaborative effort between the magazine and myself).

Website: http://www.zoozoom.com/projects/main.html”

Tom Morris has let me know about a new photoblog that he’s just started called Photonymous. There are already some excellent images there so it’s definitely a site to add to your Favourites.

“You may be interested - I’ve just started up a weblog specifically to put photographs on. There isn’t much at the moment, but I’m hoping to add more pictures as I scan them (I’m all film!). The address is http://tom.bbcity.co.uk/photos”

Mike Johnston’s Sunday Morning Photographer column this week asks: Where the HECK is Digital B&W?!? You will be nodding your head in agreement if you consider yourself to be a black and white photographer.

“Another way this plays out these days is that the ?tyrannical? market wants color. Most clients prefer it, most consumers take it for granted. Thus, most digital cameras, and printers, and programs take color as a given.

So, okay. The only trouble with that is that a small minority of us happen to be black-and-white photographers. I came of age at the very tail end of the era in which B&W was considered the only ?serious? artistic medium. Worse, I prefer B&W. Virtually all my work is black-and-white, and, believe it or not, that?s by intention.”

Website: Sunday Morning Photographer

The latest issue of Vivid Light Photography has now appeared online. The featured article this month is probably something that most of us won’t ever experience: “What Do You Say To A Naked Model?”! Other articles include an enthusiastic review of the new Fuji Astia 100F film, a look at digitally adding borders to your photos, and the excellently-written “Un-conceived Notions - Look Past the Expected”.

Website: Vivid Light Photography

Jason Sanford, who is the editor of storySouth, a US-based website that “showcases the best fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry that writers from the new south have to offer”, has let me know about their latest online photo exhibit. Called “Roadside Christianity”, the exhibit by photographer Joe York focuses on various Christian-themed images found along southern roads. This image is my personal favourite, just because of the idea that Jesus requires his own campaign head quarters… :-)

Website: storySouth - Current Issue

Michael Reichmann from Luminous Landscape has posted some pretty amazing photographs from his recent trip to Iceland. Definitely find a few minutes to see what the combination of a digital camera, a professional photographer and a naturally beautiful landscape can create.

Website: Luminous Landscape - Iceland 2003

Website: Luminous Landscape - Iceland in Black

There are a lot of new July updates out today! The latest issue of Nature Photograpers Online Magazine includes the articles “Same Old, Same Old?Why does all Nature Photography Look the Same?”, “Introduction to Large Format” and “Focal Length Multiplier”. Well worth a read even if you don’t consider yourself to be a nature/wildlife photographer.

Website: Nature Photograpers Online Magazine

28mm, the online photography magazine, has updated for July with the work of 12 new photographers.

Website: 28mm

Stuck in a photograhic cul-de-sac? Tired of shooting the same old same old? Searching for some much-needed inspiration? Then “26 Things: the international photographic scavenger hunt” might be just what you’re looking for…

“print this page out and take one creative photo for each theme over the month of july 2003.

the aim of this photographic project is to make us open our eyes and get creative with the things and people around us, to see how we each interpret themes.”

Website: 26 Things

The new July 2003 issue of megapixel.net, the “Monthly Digital Still Camera Web Magazine”, features new reviews of these cameras:

- Canon PowerShot S50
- Canon S400/IXUS 400
- Fuji FinePix F410
- Olympus Stylus 400
- Sony DSC-V1

and this printer:

- Canon i850 Bubble Jet Printer

and a look at the Four Thirds standard for digital cameras.

Website: megapixel.net