First, decide what and why you want to order from a lab. Here are some reasons I use a photo lab:

•    I need a large quantity of prints that would take too long to print myself.
•    I want a smaller or larger print size than my own printer can produce.
•    I want a print on special media like metal or canvas.
•    I want to reproduce my picture as a poster, note card, calendar or book, which I can’t do myself.

With your goal in mind, evaluate potential photo labs using the following points. These are my most to least important characteristics:

•    Print Quality
•    Print Sizes
•    Paper / Media Types
•    Turn-Around Time
•    Submission & Delivery Options
•    Physical Location
•    Price

You can often discover a lot of basic information by visiting the company’s web site or calling them. Consider these suggestions for each topic.

Print Quality—This is the most important characteristic. Look for a photo lab that can print your pictures to match the way you have adjusted them using photo editing software. (Calibrate your monitor to ensure accurate colors.) If you are not to the point of editing your own digital pictures, then you want a lab that corrects your pictures in a way that you like.

Print Sizes—Find out what sizes the photo lab can print your images, from smallest to largest. You may want a lab that can print a full-frame image from your digital SLR without cropping. This means print sizes such as 8×12 inches (not just 8×10) or 16×24 inches (not only 16×20). If you are sending images from a compact digital camera, a Four-Thirds mirror-less camera, or a camera phone, then look for print sizes that match these proportions. Also check to see if the lab can print squares and panoramas. This gives you more creative freedom when cropping your images.

Paper / Media Types—These days pictures can be reproduced on a wide range of materials. Digital prints are made by exposing photographic paper using lasers and developing the image with chemicals on traditional glossy and matte surfaces. But you can also have images reproduced on canvas, fine art  and watercolor papers, metal, and fabrics such as silk, using businesses with large inkjet printers.

Many photo labs offer “press printed products.” These are greeting cards, posters, business cards, and similar paper products that used to require a print shop with a printing press. Now photo labs print them  in-house using a digital press, which is a fancy copy machine. This allows you to order smaller quantities, saving time and money compared to a press run. The more paper and other media options a lab offers, the more flexibility you have for sharing your photos.

Turn-Around Time—Check to see how much time it takes the lab to finish the prints before they are ready for shipment. Basic prints can often be produced in 24 hours and ready to send the next business day. Items like canvas gallery wraps, large metal prints or books may take longer to both make and deliver. If you need really fast response time from a lab, be sure to find out their standard processing time. And remember that you need to allow more time at peak business times such as the Christmas holidays.

Submission / Delivery Options—Most photo labs allow you to place your order using a web browser. (You need a high speed internet connection to make this practical.) You create an account, upload your pictures, designate the sizes and number of prints for each, and pay with a credit card or PayPal. Some photo labs require you to download specific ordering software called ROES (Remote Order Entry System). This software is usually customized for that lab and its products. A few labs accept images on CD or thumb drives sent via regular mail or delivered in person. Be sure to check the web site if you need to use this submission method.

Also review the variety of delivery options. Besides the US Mail and courier services like UPS and FedEx delivery to your door, the lab may be able to provide drop shipping services. This means that you order the prints (or other products) and have them shipped directly to a customer. Drop shipping can be similar to any online store delivery, such as sending flowers or a gift to another person. Or the lab may partner with you or another online business to make the shipment look as though it came from your studio directly.

Another delivery choice is creating an album on the photo lab’s web site that you can share with family and friends. You upload the photos you want to make available for printing. Then you email relatives and acquaintances a link to the album. They log in, order and pay for their own prints or other products made from your pictures. When this service is provided for professional photographers, it is called “print fullfillment.”

Physical Location—With the magic of the internet, you are no longer limited to working with whatever printing services might be available where you live. But there are advantages to doing business with a local photo lab, if they can provide the products and services you’re interested in. You can easily visit and see samples of the work they do. (Great for a quality test.) If you have questions about how to prepare or submit your pictures, you can talk to someone in person. If you need custom work done to adjust your image and make the best quality results, it is always easier to do this when both you and the technician can look at the proof and agree on what needs to be changed. Plus, if you order from a local lab, you usually cut down on the turn-around time since no special delivery arrangements are necessary.

Price—Cost is last on the list of criteria because you may be willing to pay more for quality prints available in a variety of sizes on a plethora of media. This is not to say that money is no object! Only that it’s reasonable to pay for good quality results and excellent customer service. You might also be willing to pay more to support a local brick and mortar store in your community.

Making the Choice
The best way to determine print quality, ease of submission and delivery as well as overall customer service is to do a real-world test. Select a variety of images (5-6) that are typical of the kinds of pictures you have printed. Typically, you would include a landscape, a portrait (individual or group), maybe an architectural shot and a black and white image. It’s often helpful to include a picture that’s difficult to print, such as one with a wide contrast range (very bright highlights and very dark shadows) as well as a photo with subtle or strong colors. Order 4×6 prints of this group of photos from several different photo labs you’re considering. When you get all the prints back, lay them out on a table and decide which lab has done the best job with the prints overall and with the photos that are most important to you. This can be the lab you start with.

You may decide to use different labs for different products and services. Maybe there is a local lab that makes acceptable 4×6 snapshot prints to share with your family. But then you use an online lab to turn a great family portrait into a large canvas gallery wrap. In both cases, you want to be sure that the quality of the product and the customer service meet your expectations as well as your budget. By partnering with a quality photo lab, you can get your best photos out of your hard drive and into the world with a minimum of effort.

Here are a few vendors to consider when looking for a good source for having your images printed:

MPix

White House Custom Color

Shutterfly

MPixPro

Custom Digital Imaging

This may be due to using longer focal length lenses (which inherently give us less depth of field), or it could be that you are trying to get something very close AND very far away sharp.

In this example of the Aspen trees, I was using a 200mm lens to visually compress the trees and remove unwanted background. This resulted in a composition where it was physically impossible to get all of the trees sharp. When faced with this type of situation the solution is to shoot several images each focused on different area of the frame and then use Photoshop to blend them together.

The image below shows the three separate images. In the first image, I focused on the front tree. For the next exposure, I focused on the second tree back. The last shot was focused so that the far tree was sharp. Each image was made at an aperture of f16 to spread out the depth of field.

Select the three images in either Lightroom or Bridge. In Lightroom choose Photo>Edit In> Open as Layers in Photoshop. In Bridge choose Tools>Photoshop>Load Files into Photoshop Layers.  The image below shows how your new document will appear with the three stacked layers.

Select the three layers by clicking one and then Ctrl-clicking (Cmd-clicking for Mac) on the others. Click the layer where I have it marked with an X.  Clicking in other spots on the layer will have a different effect. The image above shows all three layers selected (yellow) Choose Edit > Auto-Align Layers. From the resulting dialog box Choose Auto for projection. Un-check Vignette Removal and Geometric Distortion. Now that your layers are all aligned, Choose Edit>Auto Blend Layers. Choose the Stack Images option and check the Seamless Tones and Colors box as seen below.

Voila! Photoshop has blended your layers together and created a final photo that is sharp throughout. The image below shows the resulting image with the Layers dialog box. Notice that Auto Blend has masked out the necessary areas to create the final image.

Here’s a tip for the next time you travel.  While you’re waiting to be crammed into your seat between to talkative souls who don’t understand the concept of personal space you can either stare at your ever changing departure time or you can go photograph.

Leave the fluorescent filled gate areas behind and seek out more interesting subject matter, you might be surprised at what you might find.  Often, common areas or spaces between terminals offer scenes that rival any amusement park.  I tend to gravitate to neon filled tunnels but stark corridors provide a mood all their own.

No tripod needed; just pick an ISO between 800-1600, sit on the floor or lean against a wall and shoot.   For me, people set the scene and my images tend to include both subject and context.  I get my composition and exposure figured out and then just wait for the right person to walk by.  The best part is that in a short time you’ll get plenty of opportunity, as everyone trying to make their flight will need to pass in front of your camera.

Enough talk, I know you’re visual.  Here are five shots taken at three airports. I hope they provide a bit of inspiration for your next trip. Have fun on your layover but don’t get so caught up that you miss your flight!

Considering these limitations, I’ve started using my iPhone as a sketching pad preceding the act of “hauling” out the big gear when I think the composition might be important. Sketching can be loosely defined as a preview of the possibilities. Perspective and framing is just one advantage of sketching.

With the explosion of smart phone applications that mimic what post processing software can do for with our DSLR files, now not only do I use it for composition, but also for sketching what a close up, panoramic or high dynamic range (HDR) image might look like. I would have never thought my little phone could become such a valuable tool for my serious photo work!

Even the default camera that comes with the phone is fairly rudimentary and I’ve found third party apps that control exposure and focus (among other things) much better at these basic camera functions. ProCamera by Jens Daengen is my first choice for capturing any image on my phone.

All of us close up photographers using our DSLR camera’s know what kind of time and energy it takes to set up and shoot a macro shot whether the composition ultimately works or not. We’ll, why not try one with the phone first to see if you even like it?  Unfortunately, the lens won’t allow you to focus as close as a true macro lens or extension tubes will. The subject will not be sharp after hitting the shutter, but all you’re looking for is the sketch to see if the composition is worth your time…awesome!

HDR software has also created a buzz in the photo world, and now with your iPhone and Pro HDR by eyeApps LLC, we can now capture and render highlight and shadow detail from high contrast scenes by processing more than one exposure. It’s a common occurrence shooting landscape scenes or building interiors with outside views. Pro HDR is the app that can accomplish this and the results are surprisingly good, but not without significant limitations. Higher contrast scenes require a broader range of exposures than the app will allow to create a realistic interpretation. And the jpeg file format won’t produce great results compared to the image quality captured with a raw file on your DLSR and processed with a computer application like HDRSoft’s Photomatix.

A panoramic perspective is a blast to shoot and process and the merged files are capable of producing big beautiful wall prints. The workflow also requires patience, time in the field to set up and capture, and merging all the files on the computer requires time and energy. It’s worth it if the scene is good, but sometimes after all of that we realize the final output isn’t worth the high cost of printing and displaying it “big.” With the simplistic setup, capture and processing capabilities using a pano phone app like Autostitch by Cloudburst Research, we can now sketch it first to see what the possibilities are like from our DSLR. What an enormous time saver!

So the next time your on the way out the door to do some serious photography with your beloved DSLR, don’t forget your little phone camera and do a little sketching!

I will be teaching at our upcoming Photo Weekends in Cheyenne, WY  in May and in Missoula, MT in October.

You can also join me for one of these Workshops in 2013:
Basic Photography – Cheyenne, Wyoming
Basic Photography – Missoula, Montana
Death Valley National Park – Stovepipe Wells, California
Flash Photography – Missoula, Montana
Grand Teton National Park – Jackson Hole, Wyoming

Part by choice and part by chance, I was able to shoot from a variety of perspectives, which made the overall collection of images much more interesting and unique. The standard shots from the side with the camera lens parallel to the subject (usually the wings and an eye) with me shooting from my “strike zone” were most available. But looking up I found butterflies perched on leaves overlooking things, and looking down I found surprise reflections in the pond and a pair trying to mate. Getting two large, opened wings in focus is next to impossible, but playing with the height and angle of my camera got me close to full focus even with two spread-winged butterflies in the same frame. Shooting head-on, from the rear (still focusing on the eyes and antennae), at an extreme close-up, with the subject upside-down, and with the butterfly on my friend’s arm gave me images that would supplement and enrich the collection of standard shots.

Technically, I shot most of the accompanying images with a 90mm 1:1 macro lens and twin flash at f/16, ISO 100, at 1/200 sec. I used a makeshift monopod (actually a rifle monopod with no tripod head) since there was little time or space to use a tripod). I did try out a 180mm 1:1 macro lens (the butterfly on a blue background), but found it much heavier and harder to use hand-held even with the monopod.

The chance to shoot such elaborately colored, live bugs in pseudo-natural surroundings year-round in the cool Pacific Northwest is a treat. Now that I’ve got my fix (three visits) and the sun is beginning to peak out now and then I’ll head back to the ponds and parks to try my luck with the natives.

www.steverussellphotos.com

As with most forms of photography, macro imagery benefits from having a strong main subject; A subject that stands out and keeps the attention of the viewer. One approach to strengthening your main subject is by ensuring that you background does not compete with it.

I consider the background to be the most important part of my macro imagery.  It is the most difficult area to control and can make or break an otherwise strong main subject.  By subduing our backgrounds we keep the main subject free from visual competition.

So what causes this visual competition?  Simply put, areas of interest.  As our eyes move across a photograph they are drawn to certain areas of interest first.  I call these locations Attractions & Distractions. Bright areas, contrasty areas and areas of sharpness all draw the eye.  Logic would dictate, then, that an effective photo consists of a main subject that is bright, contrasty, and sharp, while our backgrounds are kept dark, low in contrast, and out of focus.  This, of course, is impossible to do in every situation, but keeping these ideas in mind can help us better design our compositions.

Here are a few tips that will help you better control and subdue your background.

Use a Longer Lens
Macro lenses typically come in three different focal length ranges: 50mm, 100mm and 180mm.  The longer the lens, the more narrow the field of view.  A narrow field of view shows less of the background. It is much easier to control the background when you are seeing less of it.  The following illustrations demonstrate how much more background is visible with a 50mm lens as opposed to a 180mm macro lens when the main subject remains the same size.

In the following pair of images you can see how I have kept the main subject nearly the same while the backgrounds are completely different. Using a 180mm lens, I only needed to move my camera about 3 inches to achieve this.

Watch For Bright Areas In The Background
Carefully examine the scene for random bright areas in the background.  These distractions really draw your eyes away from the main subject.

Keep Your Background Low in Contrast
A low contrast background tends to be less competitive with your main subject.  The easiest way to achieve this is by keeping your main subject sharp and your background out of focus.  When the background is out of focus, the bright and dark areas blend together to create a lower contrast as you can see in the examples below.

There are three ways to keep your background out of focus.  The first is by using a larger fstop.  The image to the left was shot at f22 resulting in a very sharp background.  The image to the right was shot at f4.  This lets the background elements blur together supplying lower contrast.

The second way is to keep your main subject as far as possible from your background. In this first image the leaves behind the flower are about 6 inches behind the main subject.  This will be difficult to really blur. In the next shot, I found a similar flower where the background was about 3 feet behind.  You can see the background is much more pleasant in the second image.

The last way is to get closer to your main subject. The images below demonstrate that the closer you get, the less depth of field you will have.

Controlling your background takes practice and patience, but give it a try, experiment a little.  Try longer lenses, getting closer to your subject and using wider apertures.  I think you will find these little tricks do a lot to make your macro photographs far more appealing!

Want to learn more about macro photography?Join my colleague Tony Rizzuto for our upcoming Macro Photography workshop beginning on June 30 and ending on July 5, 2013.

You can catch me at one of our upcoming Photo Weekends in these cities:
Great Falls, MT
Hartford, CT
Rochester, NY

I am also leading these Workshops in 2013:
Colorado Mountains and Wildflowers
Glacier National Park

Some call it a Multi-Element Diopter, some an Achromatic Filter and others a close up lens.  Very confusing but really it’s just a high quality filter made up of two elements that allow you to get really close to your subject and still focus.  Think of it the same way you do a pair of reading glasses…you know, the ones you put on when you can no longer hold your book close and still focus on the words.

Don’t confuse this with the inexpensive close up filters made of a single piece of lower quality glass.  This filter is made of two pieces of high quality glass and doesn’t degrade your image the way the cheap ones do.  Spend the extra money; you’ll be glad you did.

The cool thing about this gadget is it can be used with any lens 70mm or longer.  Put it on your telephoto lens and get really close to that Dahlia or stick it on the front of your macro lens and magnify things beyond life-size!  It’s that easy.  Put it on, get close and focus.  (One word of caution, it will make your low quality lenses look even worse so use it only with your higher quality lenses.)

How do they work?  As you get closer to your subject it gets bigger in your viewfinder (and on your sensor).  The problem is that you can get close to something to make it big but that doesn’t mean that you can focus on it.  A Multi-Element Diopter lets you get closer than normal (to make something big) and still focus (to make it sharp).

There’s one SMALL catch; once you put it on your lens you’ll loose your ability to focus on anything that’s not close.  Kinda like looking across the room at something through your reading glasses.  No biggie, put it on only when you’re going to shoot macro, after all it’s a macro accessory!

Much like your reading glasses Multi-Element Diopters come in different strengths.  And much like your glasses they are “rated” in diopter strengths.  Simply put, as the number gets higher you can get closer and still focus, resulting in more magnification.

I know that by now you might want a little shopping advice so I narrowed the list down to two that I’ve used and love.

Canon 500D Close Up Lens (+2 Diopter Strength)
Marumi DHG Achromat (+3 or +5 Diopter Strength)

So, grab one, put it on your lens and start getting close!

If you are interested in learning more about macro photography and want to learn to create big images of tiny subjects, I will be teaching a Macro Photography workshop from June 30 – July 5, 2013. Hope you can join me!

Well, now on the heels of that release, Mark is announcing his latest product, a video tutorial series detailing color correction techniques in Photoshop and Adobe Camera Raw. In this series, Mark shows you how to use Photoshop and Adobe Camera Raw to optimize color, contrast, brightness, and saturation in your photos so they do justice to what you saw (or imagined) while you were shooting.  In addition to learning how to produce beautiful, accurate color, you will discover how to create gorgeous black and white, sepia, retro, and vintage-toned images. Announced just yesterday – April 16, 2013 – this video series is available for download from Mark’s site. For the first week, it is available for $19.95 after that it will jump up to $24.95.

If you have ever had the pleasure of learning from Mark, you are well aware of what a great teacher he is. And if you aren’t familiar with his work yet, I highly suggest you swing by his site and be blown away by the altered realities he creates. If anyone knows what it means to combine creativity with technology to achieve a desired outcome, it’s Mark S. Johnson. He’s one seriously creative and talented guy.

The only thing better that having his work downloadable straight to your computer is being by his side learning his techniques from capture to computer. If the idea of this experience excites you, you are in luck. Mark is leading a workshop for RMSP this coming June called Creative Compositing. Held in his hometown of Boulder, Colorado this workshop takes you to places like the scenic Chautauqua Meadow, the eclectic Pearl Street Mall, and a train museum loaded with historic character. During this week you learn Mark’s secrets for using Photoshop to create masterpieces out of your images. This workshop will help you understand how you can create images like the ones seen below.

If you are interested or have questions, please call Bob McGowan at 800-394-7677 or send him an email at bobm@rmsp.com

Remember the old adage that “knowledge is power?” If you spend ten minutes per day looking at images from those who have truly mastered the art of landscape photography, wedding photography, macro photography, etc., then your own photographic skills will rise. Spend ten more minutes each day reading an article or watching a video tutorial from someone at the top of their craft, and your ability to craft a compelling image will skyrocket.

It’s easy for me to suggest that a few minutes of research time each day is all that it will take for you to become a better photographer. I am comfortable dishing out this advice because it matches my own personal experience and because I see it repeated again and again amongst the students who attend my photography workshops. Until recently though it was hard for me to point to a single website where I can consistently find the best photos, the most informative articles, and the most inspirational video tutorials.

In the past, I had to bounce all over the web to put in my twenty minutes of daily photographic research time. I used to jump from site to site, or blog to blog, each day to find my daily inspiration, but now Google+ acts as my central hub for contemporary photographic inspiration. Unlike other social sharing platforms, Google+ is designed to foster meaningful conversations between individuals who share similar interests. As a learning tool Google+ is the place to be right now for those with a serious interest in photography.

Reading, Sharing, Creating

It helps to draw distinctions between three distinct types of online social activities to understand the value of a social layer like Google+ as a learning tool. On a social network you can:

• consume content from others.

• pass along things that you found engaging or that your peers shared with you.

• distribute your own original content.

For serious photographers the breakdown of activity looks like this:

• viewing images from inspiring contemporary photographers.

• re-sharing and commenting on content that you the find compelling.

• posting and sharing your own images, videos and articles with the world.

It is up to you to choose which type of activity best suits your needs each day. There is no rule that says you must add something into the information stream everyday. I know a lot of aspiring photographers who do not want to share anything of their own yet but who are delighted to watch a daily stream of incredible images from the world’s best artists. For these photographers consuming photographic knowledge, without adding anything of their own into the pool, is an excellent use of their daily research time.

I know other photography students who delight in sparking up meaningful conversations with those who inspire them. For these artists just watching what others share online does not provide enough engagement. These students have questions that they want answered by those who inspire them. On a friendly open network it is possible to interact with anyone if you are polite and if your questions / comments add something of value to the collective conversation.

Finally, there are photographers like me who feel the need to share my work with the entire network. I share images, videos and words with the hope that my content will inspire or inform someone else. When someone posts a good question or an insightful comment on one of my posts, I feel compelled to answer it.

Sharing inspiring content supports my mission as a photography instructor, but there is no rule that says I must post something of my own making everyday. There is no rule that says I must answer every comment immediately. I do what I can to add something meaningful to the collective stream of information, but when I have nothing to say, I am happy to just sit back and absorb inspiration from others.

That’s my advice for those just dipping their toes into the Google+ pool. When you are new here, find some sources of inspiration and then sit back and watch what they do for a few weeks. Spend some time tracking down the artists whose images, and words, speak to you first.

As your comfort level with this social tool rises you might begin to ask questions and add comments to the posts that you find particularly insightful. If your comfort level with this public forum reaches the point where you feel the need to distribute your own work, then please leap into the social sharing game with both feet. But when you are getting started here, there is nothing wrong with just using Google+ as a source of daily inspiration without sharing a single word of your own.

Where Can I Find The Most Inspiring Photographers On The Google+ Network?

In the Google+ world, subscribing to someone’s news feed is called “following” or “circling.” When you add someone into one of your circles you are telling the platform that you want the ability see anything that this person publicly posts. When I tell Google+ that I want to circle an inspiring artist like my colleague Tim Cooper, it is a one-way street. Circling Tim does not force him to follow me back nor does it expose any of my private information to him.

So the big question becomes “who should I follow here?” Fortunately there are three ways to find great sources of inspiration on the Google+ network. Each method has its own unique value and all are worth exploring.

Option 1: Join A Community That Shares Your Interests

Joining a Google+ community is a great way to see photographs from artists all over the world. Google+ communities are a great place to discover new and interesting people. Most communities are open to anyone and they are a great way to find those with whom you share a particular interest. I am active in the Photoshop and Lightroom Users Community, the Landscape Photography Community, and the National Parks Community because these match my interests.

After you join a Community, spend a few days or weeks just watching the information stream. Whenever you see particularly inspiring work, check out the poster’s Google+ profile page. If you like what you see on their profile page and in their photo galleries, then consider adding them to one of your circles. Also consider adding the community moderators to your circles. Often community moderators are experts in their field and these are generally friendly people with a real interest in knowledge sharing.

Free advice about online communities: Please mind your manners and don’t share too much personal information. Remember that communities are meant to foster open conversation. When posting, or commenting, within a community be very polite. Be friendly. Be nice to others. If you are rude the community, moderators will kick you out. If your Google+ behavior is really abusive, then you can get yourself banished from the whole network.

Option 2: Use A Shared Circle To Find New Sources of Inspiration

Circles are a way to group together those that you follow on Google+. You can control the frequency of posts that you receive from different types of people by organizing your contacts into circles. I have built a circle for members of my family, for example, and I have set the frequency setting way up so that I will automatically see everything that my loved ones post on my homepage.

Circles are a great organizational tool but they serve a second purpose, too. Circles can also be shared publicly. This is one of my favorite features on Google+. Thanks to circle sharing, you can add this collection of my forty favorite Google+ photographers into your news stream in a single click! Forty+ Photographers Whose Posts Consistently Inspire Me On Google+

Note: This link will not take you to my shared circle unless you are currently logged into your Google+ account.

Option 3: Build Your Own Circles

Connecting with the right folks is a continual process. I add new sources of inspiration to my circles everyday. Communities and someone else’s shared circle are just starting points. Eventually everyone uses the “”Find People” button to track down other friends, family members and additional sources of inspiration.

When you use the Find People button, Google+ uses the data that you have entered in your profile, and the list of who you have already circled, to suggest new contacts. If you are a GMail user, then the Find People tool will also search through your GMail address book to see if any of your email contacts are also active on this network. I don’t use the Find People box everyday, but when I hear about an artist or read an insightful article online, I often pop open this box to see if the content’s creator is also sharing work publicly here on Google+.

One last tip: “plus mentions.” Adding the +symbol and then a contacts name creates a hyperlink to another Google+ users profile page. Whenever I share content from another Google+ photographer, or talk about a colleague’s work, I try to add a plus mention that leads to them.

By adding this link I am making it easier for someone who reads my post to find out more about this photographer and if desired to add them into one of their circles. Using plus mentions, I can give credit to my sources and make it easy for those who follow me to connect with someone else that I think they might also want to follow.

Learn More About Google+

I hope that you found this guide useful. I hope that this advice makes it easier for you to start out your Google+ experience with the right connections. If you liked this article then please click here to find me on Google+.

Additional Resources

• Introduction to Google+
• How To Set Up Your Google+ Account
• Connecting Adobe Photoshop Lightroom with Google+
• What The Plus! Google+ for the Rest of Us
• Google+ For Photographers

I will be teaching several sessions of our Lightroom for Photographers workshop in 2013. I’d love to have you join me in one of these locations:

Lightroom for Photographers – San Antonio, Texas (5/9—5/12)
Lightroom for Photographers – Oklahoma City, Oklahoma (5/30—6/2)
Lightroom for Photographers – Chicago, Illinois (6/6—6/9)
Lightroom for Photographers – Cedar Rapids, Iowa (7/25—7/28)
Lightroom for Photographers – Nashville, Tennessee (8/1—8/4)
Lightroom for Photographers – Wichita, Kansas (8/8—8/11)
Lightroom for Photographers – Duluth, Minnesota (9/5—9/8)

I have been teaching about the importance of the Google+ social sharing system for a year. I speak about Google+’s value as a educational tool in all of my photography workshops and at my Adobe Photoshop Lightroom software training seminars. The message that I try to deliver in my lectures, articles and video tutorials about Google+ is pretty simple: we photographers, like all artists, need to surround ourselves with a limitless pool of inspiration.

As artists, our skills will stagnate unless we continually surround ourselves with new influences. When we connect and learn from others -  when we spend time exploring new sources of inspiration -we gain knowledge and the quality of our art rises. Google+ offers an endless stream of inspiration and knowledge sharing. In my opinion, Google+ is the best place on the Internet right now to learn about new photographic techniques and to find others who are creating inspiring art.

Google+ is free and open to anyone. Google+ is a fabulous platform, but setting up a new account without any guidance can be a little tricky. So here is a step-by-step guide to the new Google+ user account setup process.

I must add that this guide reflects my tastes and opinions. Much of what I suggest here is purely personal preference. Throughout this tutorial I will recommend turning on, or turning off, certain switches because that’s the way that I like things to work. Once you are more familiar with the Google+ platform, I encourage you to modify or reject any of my suggestions and configure this tool to better suit your tastes.

I must also add that the screenshots and the steps involved in the setup process are ever evolving. The brilliant minds at Google are constantly working on improvements for the Google+ platform. Today’s screen grabs should be good for today–April 5, 2013–but by next year things are going to look different. Innovation never ends here….

Google+ Account Setup

The road to Google+ happiness begins with Google account setup.

Step 1: Google Account Sign In

Since Google+ is integrated into a slew of other Google products one account–one email address and password–is all you need to access dozens of products. If you currently have an account at Gmail, YouTube, Google Voice, etc. then you can use your existing email address and password to signup for Google+.

If you do not currently have a Google account then this is your opportunity to create a new identity. Your new Google account includes Google+, a free Gmail email address, Google Calendar, and 5GB of free online Google Drive storage space. You might choose to ignore these features but they are nice bonuses that come bundled with every new Google+ account.

Step 2: Add Suggested People

Google+ is all about creating connections. If Google’s database already knows anything about you then this screen is your first opportunity to follow the news from your friends, your family members or your coworkers.

You can skip this step for now if you want. You will have additional opportunities to connect with friends, family, etc. once your Google+ account is active.

Step 3: Google Suggested User Circles

Google+ is different from other social network. This is a place where you can learn from a global community of photographers most of whom you have never met. This is a place where you can follow the public postings–photos, videos, and articles–from photographers that live thousands of miles away, but when you are new here it is hard to know where to start.

To help you get started here, the Google+ site designers select small groups of experts on a particular subject and group them together by topic. This suggested lists of experts–the Google Suggested User Circles–are what you are seeing at this point in the setup process.

Adding a couple of the Google+ Suggested User groupings to your new stream is a great way to find some of the top-posters who share one of your passions. For someone like me, adding the Google Suggested Photographers Circle is a great place to start.

Step 4: Add A Headshot

Now it is time to choose your profile photo and fill in a little bit of information about who you are. You can add much more detailed personal information later, but your smiling face is important here.

My advice is to start out with a nice friendly headshot. Don’t be surprised if no one wants to connect with you if you choose a headshot that is too weird, too generic or blatantly offensive.

Success! Your Google+ account is active once you can see your homepage. There is still more work to do, but once can you see this screen you have successfully logged into the Google+ network.

Add Additional Biographical Information To Your Profile

Now that you have completed the basic account setup please take ten more minutes and add more personal information to your Google+ Profile. Add enough biographical information so that other Google+ users will believe that you are a real person. Do not share anything too personal like your home address or cell phone number, but the Tagline field is particularly important.

Fill in your Tagline with a very short description of who you are and what you do. You don’t need to fill in every one of the other fields, but I suggest adding something to the Introduction field, too. Leave as many of the other fields as you want blank, but if you are going to claim that you are a professional photographer, then you need to add something like your employment history, a link to your website, or a business name so that your claim sounds credible.

For photographers, the cover photo is extremely important since it will be displayed everywhere that your name appears. Google+ is doing serious photographers like me a great favor here. Google is giving me the chance to display my name, my job title / specialty (the Tagline), and my cover photo to an audience of millions.

Please upload a great cover photo because this is your chance to show off your favorite photograph whenever someone mentions your name! A great cover photo and a nice smiling headshot will help you create a lot of new connections.

Turn Off The “What’s Hot And Recommended” Stream

The Google+ engineers didn’t want your homepage to be appear empty and lifeless. So that everyone would see something on their homepage all new users are automatically subscribed to the “What’s Hot and Recommended” news stream. The trouble is that “what’s hot and recommended” is usually pointless and trivial. Fortunately, it is easy to unsubscribe yourself from this silly stream of pop nonsense.

Dragging the “What’s Hot and Recommended” frequency slider all the way to the left will unsubscribe you from future updates to this news stream. The existing posts will not immediately disappear from your homepage, but over time they will slip away as new posts from people you care about get added to your homepage news feed.

Controlling Email / SMS Notifications

Unfortunately, what most of us first experience when we set up a new Google+ account is a slew of unwanted emails or text messages. The following steps will show you how to eliminate these unnecessary notifications and remove some of the clutter from your email inbox.

Step 1: Open Up The Google+ Settings Menu

Did you notice that little gear below your headshot near the upper right side of the screen? Clicking on that little gear symbol will open up an important Google+ Settings menu. (There is also a “take a tour” button in this menu that might interest new Google+ users.)

Step 2: Turn Off All The Excess Notifications

The Google+ designers don’t want you to miss anything. From the factory, this social sharing tool is set to immediately email or text message you about everything that happens online that involves you. While I respect the designer’s goal–that you should be keenly aware of everything that is happening online–the results are completely overwhelming.

My advice is to disable the email / text notification feature for all but the most important activities. To protect my reputation, I want immediate notification whenever somebody mentions me in a Google+ post. If somebody says something nice about me in their post, then I want to say thank you. If they say something nasty about me, then I want to know so I can respond appropriately or report the post as offensive material.

In addition, I want to be notified whenever someone tries to tag me in their photographs. I want to know if someone is posting a photo and claiming that I am in it, but I don’t need to get an email just because someone added me to one of their circles. Notification about things like mentions or tags are important so I can protect my privacy, but I really don’t want an email or a text message every time that a stranger tries to invites me to their goofy online event.

So many notifications, but only a few that are actually useful.

Step 3: More Privacy Preferences

The last set of switches in the Google+ settings menu are about privacy. Google+ is a social platform that encourages public information sharing, but not everything is meant to be shared publicly. Some of the switches at the bottom of the Google+ settings menu help you control what is and what is not available to the public.

My choices and your choices may differ here. For the type of photography that I teach, I have no problem sharing information about exactly where I shot my photos. I love the way that Google+ takes the GPS data that I have embedded in my images and uses that metadata to display my image’s location on a Google Map.

I find the integration of my photography and Google Maps fascinating. I believe that sharing GPS data along side my images supports my mission as a landscape photography educator, but this not the choice is not appropriate for everyone else.

If I photographed sensitive wildlife nesting sites, rare archaeological digs, or houses of the rich and famous, then I definitely would not want to make this type of GPS information available to the public.

Likewise, be cautious with the Enable Location Sharing preference switch. Do you really want to broadcast your whereabouts to everyone who follows you on Google+ or is this type of information something that should automatically remain private?

Now Connect With More People

Google+ is all about social connections. The Google Suggested User circles are a good start, but only a handful of the top-posters make those list. Now it is time to use the Find People button to connect with friends, family and others who share your interests. Google+ will use the data that you entered into your profile and the list of people who you have already circled to help you find new contacts.

Learn More About Google+

I hope that you found this step-by-step guide useful. Again, there are no rights and wrongs here. The important part is to get your account setup, to protect your privacy and to find some new sources of inspiration.

If you liked this article please click here to find me on Google+.

Additional Resources

• Introduction to Google+
• Connecting Adobe Photoshop Lightroom with Google+
• What The Plus! Google+ for the Rest of Us
• Google+ For Photographers

I will be teaching several sessions of our Lightroom for Photographers workshop in 2013. I’d love to have you join me in one of these locations:

Lightroom for Photographers – San Antonio, Texas (5/9—5/12)
Lightroom for Photographers – Oklahoma City, Oklahoma (5/30—6/2)
Lightroom for Photographers – Chicago, Illinois (6/6—6/9)
Lightroom for Photographers – Cedar Rapids, Iowa (7/25—7/28)
Lightroom for Photographers – Nashville, Tennessee (8/1—8/4)
Lightroom for Photographers – Wichita, Kansas (8/8—8/11)
Lightroom for Photographers – Duluth, Minnesota (9/5—9/8)