Colors in layers. A sad painting at the Graffiti Wall.

I was depressed on Saturday when I heard about the attacks and deaths in Paris. I watched the news and looked at the stories on Google but it was too much to absorb all at once. It looked like it would rain outside and the day was getting on but I decided to pick up a camera and go out for a walk. I was curious to see what people were up to at the Graffiti Wall near Lamar Blvd.

The sky was dark gray and every few minutes I'd feel drops of rain. The "Wall" was filled with people. They were there to take photographs of themselves, their friends and their families, in front of a new painting that had just gone up that morning. It was a giant French flag with the Eiffel Tower/Peace Symbol on it.

I took some photographs. More to document the moment in time than to make any sort of art. I just felt, at the moment, that it would be good to have an image to remember.

Here's the straightforward photograph I ended up making:

I cropped out the people in the front and the color confusion at the top of the frame.

After I shot different angles and different groups of people the rain decided to fall less intermittently, and more emphatically, and I took off my cap and covered my (non-water resistant) camera preparing to walk the quarter mile of so back to my car. 

As I was leaving the park I noticed the riot of colors represented in the top photograph and pulled the camera out for a moment to capture the saturated mess. It seemed like a nonsensical counterpoint to the heavy implications of the photo I had originally come to take. It's an awkward balance.

Learning more and more about customer service from real life. The saga of buying an iPhone with a defect.

Portrait of the back of my head, by Amy Smith.

On a shoot for the Pedernales Electrical Co-op.

I'll admit it, I abused my iPhone 4S. I decided that the industrial design was so beautiful that putting it in a protective case or sleeve was inappropriate. Sometimes it lived for days on the floor of my car; even days when the temperatures crested 105 degrees. It got dropped and it got rained on. In short, I was a test case for real world use.  Sadly, that cute, perfectly sized phone gave up the ghost on Sunday and went to phone heaven, where the ambient temperature never gets above 68 degrees (f) and the humidity always hovers around 50%.  It just wasn't up for another week of overcharging, coffee drenching, etc. 

So, when I knew the end was nigh I pointed the car to the AT&T store, near downtown, and threw myself on the mercy of one of the clerks who was most helpful, and who walked me through the process of spending even more money on phones that I had ever imagined to be possible in the days of yore. 

I played with the big screen iPhone 6s+ but I already have an iPad so I couldn't imagine why on earth I would need two tablets with big screens. Then I played with the 6s (regular size) but compared to my 4S the phone seemed positively monstrous. I finally settled on the iPhone 5s which felt just right. I figured that all of them were capable of making phone calls in real time, right?

We set up my Space Gray, 16gb, iPhone 5s and it was a fairly quick and convenient procedure. The salesperson was so fun that I popped for buying a protective case there even though I was pretty sure I could get the same case on Amazon.com  for a lot less. I headed home with a happy feeling of sheer, unadulterated consumer joy.

After dinner I headed back out to the studio to play with the incident light meter iPhone attachment that someone at Lumu had sent me. It's a really cool incident light meter which has an app for the iPhone. The incident dome plugs into the auxiliary (headphone) jack of an iPhone. I meant to try the meter a few months ago but my iPhone 4s headphone connector stopped working nearly a year ago. I wanted to set up the Lumu and use it for the rest of the week so I could write a review about it....

Sadly, the new iPhone 5s had one defect; the headphone jack didn't work. No sound and, by extension, no meter. It's always vexing to buy a new product and discover something wrong. I called the AT&T store but they quickly disavowed any responsibility, even though I'd made my purchase there just a few hours before. Nice but unhelpful. They sent me to Apple. The AT&T point of view was that this would be Apple's problem. But at the moment it felt very much like my problem. 

I went online and looked up Apple's customer support for phones. I had the best online chat I've ever had in the history of the web, with the Apple representative. I explained the problem and the service representative suggested I take the phone right back to AT&T. I explained to her that AT&T had just pointed the finger at Apple. I expressed frustration. The Apple rep rallied immediately, making the statement, "We will make this right for you!" 

I don't know what sort of agreement they have with AT&T but the support person from Apple immediately assumed all responsibility for the rest of the transaction. She set up an appointment for me with the closest "Genius Bar," she guaranteed, in writing, that they would be happy to swap out the phone and do all the set up for me. She basically held my hand over the internet and made everything okay. If you depend on your phone for business you know how fragile I was feeling in the moment. How abandoned I felt by AT&T, how I was pessimistically waiting for this to all turn into a customer service debacle in which I would be relegated to sending the product back to Apple for "warranty repairs." 

I was still reticent and paranoid when I headed to the Apple store at Barton Creek Mall with my plastic bag full of receipts, the box, and the accessories for the damaged phone. Then an in-store Apple service rep sat down next to me, shook my hand and introduced herself. She listened attentively to my tale of consumer woe. And, when I finished my rant, she looked me in the eyes and said, "I am so sorry. I understand how uncomfortable it is when something is wrong with your phone. I'm sorry you had to experience this. We'll take care of it right now." She looked on her iPad to see if a replacement was in stock. It was. She went and got the replacement and then walked me through the paperwork to switch phones. At this point store procedure mandated that she turn me and the new phone over to someone at a different station to do the transfer of all my info from the old phone to the new phone but! she sensed that I was uncomfortable being passed off to someone else and immediately decided to do the whole transaction herself. Everything from setting up my thumbprint I.D. to making sure my music library transferred and that my headphones worked perfectly. 

They did. 

I felt.....taken care of. I felt that Apple was honoring their commitment to a customer. I left the store with a working phone and a good feeling about an American company. 

Had I tried to do the logical thing and make AT&T responsible I would have had a bad aftertaste for the whole transaction. The product and service would be equally tainted. But what I found at Apple was an incredibly consistent (and wholly successful) effort to satisfy an aggrieved customer and make things right for me. It was the right thing to do. 

The simple message is to deliver what you promise.  Maybe even delivering a bit more than you promised. All the time. In a way that makes the customer feel wanted, needed and special. But this retail "magic" was happening all around me. 

Across the table, at the Genius Bar,  sat a young couple and they were waiting for a service person to help them with their issue. The guy had an iPad mini and it had some issue which made it shut down randomly. He was a military person and told me he was deploying to the middle east on Sunday. He wanted a working iPad so he could send messages back home. His Apple "Genius" arrived,  listened to his story first (an important part of the formula of making people happy) and then informed him that they'd be happy to swap out the product.... if they had the product in stock. She checked and I could see, looking over at her screen, that they did not have the base model in stock. The Apple rep asked the couple to wait for a few minutes; she said that sometimes they got in new stock that hadn't been entered into the system yet. She would go and check. 

She came back a few minutes later with a new iPad mini. It was the 64 gigabyte model, not the 16 gigabyte model that the young couple had brought in. I had already calculated the difference in price between the two and was ready to offer to pay the difference for them. It seemed like a kind and cool thing to do. But Apple beat me to it and offered them the more expensive model at no extra charge. Just to make it right. Then the rep sat down with them and helped them set everything up. 

I was impressed. Floored, actually. I have worked with lots of more mercenary and short sighted technology companies who would never have "thrown away money" on something like this. What they don't understand is that the story is the most important part of both of these transactions. That each person walked away being more than satisfied with the end result. That doing the "right" thing took short term precedence and will probably mean two life long fans and customers. And each of us who were well served today will tell our stories to our friends and our families. 

And now for the embarrassing coda to my part of the story. I brought the phone in because the headphone plug wasn't working. Neither the headphones or the incident meter accessory worked in the first phone. When I plugged into the second phone I had a similar problem and the Apple person adjusted the protective case I'd bought and realized that the first phone was NOT defective, the jack just was being blocked from being fully inserted by the depth of the case and an off center hole in the case where the jack would go in. 

I was embarrassed and I said to my Genius, "I feel so dumb. You must have realized that it was the case that was the problem." She said, "I wasn't sure and you seemed pretty upset and pretty certain it was the phone. My job was to make you happy with our product. Doesn't matter if we needed to give you a new phone. As long as you leave satisfied, and remain satisfied." 

By this point we had already transferred all the data and reset all the passwords. My rep went out of her way NOT to make me feel like a dumbass. She was also 100% intent on fixing MY immediate problem. My complaint. She was far less concerned about proving me wrong and her right. 

Would I ever buy a phone from any other company? Not likely. But more importantly the Apple rep (and by extension, Apple) showed me how good gracious customer service could feel. That's what I want to do for my customers. Not necessarily for more profit but mostly because----it's the right thing to do. 

I'm a little embarrassed. Not that I didn't troubleshoot my phone correctly but that I sound too much like an Apple fanboy. But I have to tell you, there are only two companies I know of that consistently give me this kind of service. One is, of course, Apple, and the other one is Precision Camera. The owners of that camera store have trained their staff to have the same dedication to customer satisfaction. 

I count myself lucky. And I will pay attention and try to apply the same philosophies to the companies I serve. I just re-learned how good exemplary service makes our customers feel. And why that is important. Bravo Apple.

disclaimer added today: Since I wrote about Apple and praised their service I think I am duty bound to state that while I am not paid by Apple, or given free product, and am not an employee or contractor of the company, I do own stock shares in the company. 

State of the Industry. Are the new "super" cameras enough to save camera makers?

Photographers looking into the mirror.

It's easier than ever to make a photograph these days. It's easy enough to send them as well. And pretty much anything you screw up can be fixed, to a certain extent, in post. So is there anything left to the industry of taking photographs for money? And what is going on in the enthusiast's space?

I just read some numbers from the video/cinema world (Futuresource), the sales of DSLRs into that world (video) fell over 40% in 2014 in Europe with steeper declines expected this year. At its height adaptation of DSLRs for professional video projects comprised about 31% of their total market. Now the rate is closer to 3%. According to the study (http://www.iptv-news.com/2015/06/futuresource-predicts-decline-of-dslrs-for-pro-video/) the reason for the decline is a retrenching back toward traditional camcorders (with XLR connectors, long run times, built-in NDs etc.) or in the other direction toward mirrorless compact system cameras like the Samsung NX1, Panasonic GH4 and Olympus OM5.2. The introduction of less expensive 4K cameras like the Panasonic G7 will accelerate this trend.

In the world of still imaging the numbers, world-wide, are equally bleak. And this in the face of a huge economic recovery in the U.S.A.

My sense is that photography as a 21st century hobby is in major decline. At the recent math conference I attended there wasn't a traditional camera in sight (except for mine). If someone made a photograph of a newly made friend, or to document a demonstration, the whole adventure was done with a cellphone. When I attended the Freescale FTF show it was pretty much the same story. Now, these shows were never overwhelmed by photographers but there were always a contingent with Canon Rebels or Nikon Something DSLRs who were making their own documentations, playing with the camera gear as a "side bar" to the main convention function. Not so anymore.

I've also noticed that among my friends, the ones I would call "committed photographers"; both professional and amateur, have largely stopped carrying their cameras around with them when we meet at restaurants, coffee shops and other routine places. It's only big events where the shooting is easy and the risk of seeming to be an outsider is low where I routinely see any remotely interesting cameras anymore. It seems more of a psychological burden to introduce your conventional camera into regular society now. People are used to, conditioned to, being randomly photographed by camera phones but being photographed by someone with a conventional camera has quickly fallen from the mainstream and become---less usual. More suspect.

But will this change toward fewer public cameras, and fewer hard core pro cameras continue given the introduction of a new generation of "Super Cameras" like the Sony A7r2, the new, beefier Canon 5d's, and the older timer of the group, the Nikon D810? Will the new capabilities of these high performance cameras cause  renewed excitement and bring a wave of new professionals into the fold?

I wouldn't bet on it. While I have no first hand information (having severed my ties with Samsung and their public relations agency over a year ago) I'm inclined to believe the recent rumors swirling about the web-o-sphere that Samsung is withdrawing from the consumer camera space in Europe and north America. After making enormous investments into the NX-1 it seems that they've done new market research that tells them that the overall decline of the camera market coupled with their inability to get any traction at all in these markets with their "ditch the DSLR" campaign, have led them to the conclusion that it's better to exit a dying (or downward trending) market rather than continue to lose money and reputation trying to buy acceptance and market share.

And that's too bad because the NX-1 was actually a good camera: at least after it received numerous firmware updates....

I am paying attention to sales numbers out of idle curiosity but I find it interesting that most of the innovation is coming from the mirrorless space. The exceptions are the cameras from Sony but even there I'm not sure they are gaining new customers to the industry but instead are just capturing Nikon and Canon customers who crave better video, the ability to use a wider selections (and mixed brand selection) of lenses while taking advantage of the always on, live view nature of electronic viewfinders. The CIPA numbers and other measures say the overall market for the "Super Cameras" is still on the definite decline but that Sony's entries are helping only to rearrange the deck chairs on the decks of the Titanic.

There will always be the stalwarts of the industry who will embrace the highest and best of the camera breeds and create an (almost delusional) rationale for the features and benefits of the "best" cameras and lenses on the market but I think the rest of the enthusiasts --- the ones more interested in making photographs rather than comparing test charts --- have come to understand that sufficiency  or good enough is just fine for huge swaths of the profession and general requirements for our hobby.

I think there is still a place for top end equipment if you are willing to leverage the benefits of the gear into your work, and if the work requires that level of quality to be successful aesthetically. Examples would be people who print large or people who require a noiseless final image. Landscape photographers, product photographers, and portrait photographers who want smooth skin tones without having to selectively blur the crap out of their images in post processing.  But things like sharpness and resolution are largely available, across formats and brands, in enough capacity and capability to provide a professional image for most uses, and especially almost any use on the web.

But here's the deal: My observations (anecdotal and statistical) aren't meant as a rending of cloth, a cry of anguish or a note of bitter despair. Far from it. As photography shifts and swirls around from popular to diluted and ubiquitous (but lesser quality) there are fewer and fewer people doing the kind of work I do with the cameras I like to use, and it's clearing out what was once thought to be an infinitely expanding pool of images and distilling new work into a more manageable collection of  high quality content.

There are more and more phone images. More and more manipulated phone images, but fewer and fewer large, printed images. Fewer instances of great lighting design and control. Fewer constructed photographs and more "caught moments of generic exchange." Fewer images that are directly competitive; especially in the professional space. It's almost as if the age of: "I only shoot available light..." photography is coming to an end of sorts, as a viable, full time, commercial venture. Replaced by a return to discipline and control.

The same things are happening in video. There's a movement toward shooting everything with iPhones or their competitors. At the same time the higher end practitioners are moving from the lower budget options of hybrid still/video tools back into video cameras made to work in the traditions of the industry (pro audio inputs, long run times, higher quality codecs, higher bit rates, etc.). It's a shift that's leaving the vast mid-section of the market behind.

All I really know is this: As camera sales have declined my business has returned on almost the same tragectory (but in an opposite direction). We're up in terms of sales and profit per engagement in an almost direct inverse of equipment sales by manufacturers. I can only conjecture that a great number of (talented) amateurs, and in-house enthusiasts at corporate offices,have moved on to other pursuits or have gotten too busy in their core jobs to volunteer to make the critical photographs that move enterprise forward. That's fine with me. I'm happy to be welcomed back.

If you missed it here is a link to a good article at the New York Times about Henri Cartier-Bresson

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/magazine/perfect-and-unrehearsed.html?_r=0

His work inspired me to roam the streets looking for images for the last 40 years. Like the one below from a Paris Metro station...

©1994 Kirk Tuck.

A tree on the Capitol grounds. Taken between work shots.

I found the perfect commercial use for the Panasonic fz 1000 camera. A client that I just finished shooting 30 beautiful, environmental portraits for followed up the portrait assignment with a request for artistic detail shots of corners of buildings with dramatic skies behind them, abstract urban and construction photographs and other images that would make wonderfully engaging backgrounds for the main pages of their website. Since it's the kind of work I also love to shoot for myself I was very happy with the commission. It sounds to me as if someone just said, "Walk around downtown Austin and shoot anything that catches your eye. Be sure to leave a bit of clean space in the top left corner for our logo treatment."

The only impediment, currently, to full scale fun is the weather. We're having zany weather in Austin this Fall. Lots of cloud cover and lots of on again, off again rain showers. The photographs that the client and I have in mind are more likely to work with some deep blue sky peeking around striations and puffs of clouds. And I very much want direct, slanted sunlight on the buildings to jack the saturation and contrast to the right levels, without having to go nuts in PhotoShop.

I found some great structures over near the state capitol building ( actually, just south) and I shot as much as I could until the gray sky cover rolled back in to douse the sparkle. I looked up the weather report on my phone and it suggested that the clouds might burn off. Since I was near the capitol grounds I strolled on over and planted myself on a bench on the main pedestrian thoroughfare and indulged in some people watching while keeping part of my brain committed to the task of observing the weather.

As the clouds moved around and suggested that more visual opportunities may be nigh I gathered myself together and started walking back toward Congress Ave. and the promise of downtown. Over to my right I spied this little tree and, though I am not a landscape photographer by any means, I decided to give it a shot.

During the course of my first day out shooting the abstractions and buildings I have come to appreciate the true value proposition of the fz 1000 camera and its one inch sensor and gorgeous (for the money) EVF. The camera is fairly light (east to carry)  but it's big enough to provide a stable platform that encourages good handholding techniques. The one inch sensor means Panasonic could design a really long and good lens for the camera --- one that's perfect for shooting outside in daylight. I could go from 25mm to 400mm (all equivalent focal lengths based on 35mm) and get the perfect crop for every shot I saw.

While I'm not sure the image stabilization in this camera is quite the equal of the vaunted, Olympus EM5.2 it's no slouch. When I push the shutter button half way down the image in the finder becomes very stable and still. Having examined hundreds and hundreds of stabilized files at this point, from this camera, I can say that I have yet to find a photo that was shot at a reasonable setting which is not tack sharp. Since the lens is well corrected and since these kinds of scenic shots don't call for very narrow depth of field I am happy to leave the lens set at f5.6 for almost everything. Again, looking through the take each afternoon, I am happy with the detail and sharpness of the lens. The only thing it requires in post processing, to be totally competitive with my other cameras is a boost of contrast and a little nudge on the clarity slider in Lightroom. A little correction and the files pop.

So far the camera meter and I agree almost all the time. There are instances where I want my image to be darker and moodier but my thumb falls right on top of the exposure compensation dial and the amount of correction is displayed in the finder. I am certain that (barring camera boredom syndrome) I will be able to handle the whole project quite well with just this Panasonic camera.

And the other attributes speak for themselves: A full range of focal lengths in one. No need to carry any extra accessories or lenses in a bag. I brought along an extra battery in my pocket but even after shooting over the course of three hours yesterday I still did not need to grab that spare. The one accessory I did take with me, attached to the camera at all times, was a circular polarizing filter. It makes the skies more fun.

It was cloudy most of this morning and, while we have a break now, it's supposed to cloud up a bit later on. I'm not concerned, the client understands the nature of this kind of shooting and is the picture of patience. I'll shoot until I have a nice catalog for them, then we'll know when the project is really over.

I'm not saying you personally need one of these amazing bridge cameras but I'm pretty sure if I didn't have an fz 1000 I'd be working harder and not getting anything that would please me more, as far as the files go. An alternative? The little Sony RX10.2. I've been playing around with one and it is at least as nice as the first version I owned. Each camera has its strengths and weaknesses. Right now I'm just appreciating that wonderful reach of the Panasonic's Leica designed zoom lens. It's really well done.

Hope you are having a fun Wednesday. I'm spending the rest of my day retouching portraits. But nice portraits of interesting people...  I'll share with you when their site goes live.