Welcome Class #1

Thanks to everyone for attending today's class at Pittsburgh Filmmakers. I think we are going to have a lot of fun this semester. Favorite quote today, " Pittsburgh has two season's Winter and Rainy." The truth really hurts. Luckily for us digital photography works well with flat light. In addition to the basic housekeeping for a new semester including the syllabus and the facility tour we jumped right into the software. I do not want anyone to feel overwhelmed and it looks like a lot of heads were shaking affirmatively today so I think we are on the right course. I want everyone to know that by the end of the semester you will be throwing terms like Metadata and RAW files around so much your friends will be superbly impressed. Why not start tomorrow. The main topics covered today: Renaming, Metadata (EXIF and user data called IPTC), using Adobe Bridge to Rename and add Metadata as well as keywords. Creating a Metadata template. Link to a video tutorial here. Using Adobe Camera Raw plugin for Raw conversions. I currently use a file name schema using my initials, the download date and a machine generated four digit number. (RKP_090113_0001.CR2) Here is a link to renaming for Lightroom . We discussed that a sidecar file called an .xmp file is created in Bridge, Lightroom etc that adds text info to be used with the RAW file in software that can read both. Next week, remember to bring your camera and instruction manual.