jon-rista

Its been quite some time since I last hauled my camera out for anything more than a few shots of the moon. My time has been consumed by my day job and fixing up little things around my home (latest project involves sanding down my deck and refinishing it with new stain and seal. Not an easy job!)  But, fall is arriving, and the Elk Rut of 2011 is picking up steam. The bulls are huge this year in Rocky Mountain National Park. Some of them appear almost as large as a full grown bull Bison, which is rather startling. Its good to see a lot of healthy elk, though.

This past Labor Day weekend, I managed to capture a number of great shots of the elk, including some shots of the bulls bugling and herding their harems. In the middle of my quest to get better and closer shots of the elk, I also managed to capture a few shots of a coyote lounging and stretching under the setting sun. Foxes and coyotes have always seemed just out of reach and hidden in the grass, and this weekend presented the perfect opportunity to get some great keepers of at least one of those animals.

So, I hope you enjoy the new wildlife shots I'll be uploading over the next few days. Let me know what you think, and if you have the time, please offer a critique!

Earlier today, I went to submit a new piece of art, and encountered a popup asking me to agree to a new license agreement. The agreement was titled Submission Policy, and as I read Section 3, I become fairly concerned. The subitems in bold below are of most concern, as they essentially do the following:

1. In item B, Take the right to use MY work in any publication, in any media, known now or invented in the future...WITHOUT ROYALTY to me, the artist.
* While I understand the need for DA to protect themselves in relation to displaying my art on DeviantArt.com, I in no way intend to give them royalty-free right to use my work in ANY form of media, now known or yet invented, at their own whim. I don't mind giving DA license to use my work in various automatically generated sections of this site, such as the prints gallery page or any of the normal gallery pages. I find it despicable that they want me to grant them the right to use my work without compensation in any media, anywhere, for any purpose.

2. In item D, Takes the right to sublicense MY work to any other PERSON or COMPANY as they see fit.
* I do not see ANY reason why the normal operation of DeviantArt.com, the web site, requires the right to sublicense my work to anyone, for any reason, commercial or otherwise, ever.

3. In item D, Takes the right to prevent me from having any right, title, or even INTEREST in works created WITH MY WORK!
* I suppose this is a form of protecting DA and whoever they decide to sublicense my work to according to Item D from ME!?! Where is my right to be compensated for the use of my work here? If this stated "for the purposes of operating DeviantArt.com", I could understand...sometimes you have to farm work out to other companies to meet a deadline. The license does not state that the usage is specifically for the operation of the web site where I am uploading my work...they could use my work, and sublicense it to any organization, without compensation to me...for any reason. Again, despicable.

Farther down in the license, in section 5, they state that for any "commercial" uses, they will contact the artist before sublicencing any work. What happens when DA sublicenses my work for some supposed "non-commercial" purpose, and that entity sublicenses my work to someone else FOR commercial purposes?

I do not remember the DA license agreement being this heavy handed or overreaching before. I am not sure if any of my previously submitted work falls under this license or not, however so long as DA has a license agreement that allows them to sublicense MY work to other entities for ANY reason, without any compensation to me the artist, I will no longer be submitting work here. If I find that DA has used my work in any publication outside of the context of DeviantArt.com, the online website...in ANY medium (invented or yet to be invented), I will probably be removing my work and moving to other online artist sites.

I am extremely dismayed at the overarching, overreaching license and level of "rights" DA is trying to grab here. It is in extreme dis-service to the artist to take rights to their work, and protect themselves and their "sublicensees", from any kind of legal action the artist may try to take to protect their intellectual, artistic property. Shame, DA...Shame!



2.      Ownership. Artist at all times retains all right, title and interest in and to the Artist Materials provided by Artist hereunder (including, without limitation, the copyrights in and to the Artist Materials), subject to the non-exclusive rights in the licenses granted to deviantART under this Agreement. Artist is free to grant similar rights to others during and after the Term of this Agreement.

3.      License To Use Artist Materials. As and when Artist Materials are uploaded to the deviantART Site(s), Artist grants to deviantART a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license to do the following things during the Term:

a)      to prepare and encode Artist Materials or any part of them for digital or analog transmission, manipulation and exhibition in any format and by any means now known or not yet known or invented;

b)     to display, copy, reproduce, exhibit, publicly perform, broadcast, rebroadcast, transmit, retransmit, distribute through any electronic means (including analog and digital) or other means, and electronically or otherwise publish any or all of the Artist Materials, including any part of them, and to include them in compilations for publication, by any and all means and media now known or not yet known or invented ;

c)      to modify, adapt, change or otherwise alter the Artist Materials (e.g., change the size) and use the Artist Materials as described in Section 3(b); and

d)     the right to sublicense to any other person or company any of the licensed rights in the Artist Materials, or any part of them, subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement.

e)      Artist acknowledges that Artist will not have any right, title, or interest in any other materials with which Artist Materials may be combined or into which all or any portion of Artist Materials may be incorporated.

f)       During the Term, deviantART's licenses under this Agreement include the right to use any part of the Artist Materials in the promotion, advertising or marketing of the DeviantART Sites.

g)      As used in this Agreement, the term "Artist Materials" means any content uploaded to the deviantART Site(s) which may include without limitation Artist's name(s) (including professional names), trademarks, trade names, likenesses, photographs, biographical materials, audio-visual materials, artwork, liner notes, and other graphical, textual, video, film or audio materials and any and all "skins," computer-generated images or other artwork or images that Artist submits to deviantART in any medium or format whatsoever.






5.      Limitation Of Rights The rights and licenses granted to deviantART under sections 3 and 4 of this Agreement require deviantART to obtain Artist consent before deviantART makes any commercial agreement with anyone else to separately buy, license, re-sell or re-publish or commercially use any Artist Materials not in association with deviantART but as an individual work of art or as a group of works from a single Artist in isolation from any other works. No additional consent is required for any other licensed uses under this Agreement of Artist Materials either as part of the deviantART Site(s) or in connection with the distribution of content groups from the deviantART Site(s) and/or for uses of the Artist Materials made at the discretion of a visitor to the deviantART Site(s) or other users under agreements with deviantART. deviantART will contact Artist in writing about any individual commercial uses of Artist Materials instigated by deviantART.

I recently had the great pleasure of photographing the total lunar eclipse that occurred this solstice. I can remember seeing numerous partial eclipses, some that came close to totality but not fully total in the areas I've lived. It was pretty amazing seeing such a thing in person, and even more amazing to have the chance to photograph the event...and one occurring on the winter solstice, no less. (As I hear it, such a thing has not occurred here in the US for some 380 years!)

Just as amazing as it was to photograph the eclipse, I've been astounded by its reception here. In a matter of a couple days, it has become my most popular work here, with over a hundred favorites and many comments! I am very grateful for all the views, comments, and thanks you have all shown in my little lunar eclipse collage. I never expected it to become so popular, and most certainly not enough to make it to the second page of the most popular deviations. So, many thanks! I hope I can bring more photography in the future that evokes a similar response.

My one-year anniversary with this DA account is coming up soon (sometime around December 12th or 14th I think). I have not been nearly as active here as I hoped I'd be able to be, but I've made some good friends, and built up some exposure for my work, which is great. As I move towards that anniversary date, an encouraging little thing happened today: I got a sale! For a mouse pad with one of my landscape photos on it. I made a whopping TWO BUCKS! Yes, not a lot...I don't even think I'll be able to get a check until I hit at least $20 on my account...but still, a SALE! For a photographer who's been working hard trying to get some exposure on the net, its kind of exciting, even if it is a little mediocre.

Whoever it was, I thank you. A small but good start to what is hopefully a bright future selling my art online!

Alright, back to wading through the mudpit of my "Deviation Stacks"...all 10,111 of them. See ya...in a few years...or so.......

Fall is arriving here in Colorado, and I've been itching to get out into the mountains to get some shots. I finally had a chance to get out last weekend, and was able to bring home a couple good shots of Mount Evans and the surrounding area. It was a pretty satisfying weekend, and I am pretty pleased with the shots I was able to get. Getting a good shot, particularly a good landscape shot, is a difficult endeavor, especially when one is on the clock. One of the most difficult things about landscape photography is scouting the shot. Even when you live near one of the most amazing and beautiful landscape photographer playgrounds in the US, it can take a considerable amount of time to find a great place to set up and take a shot. Even more difficult is being in exactly that right place at the right time when the light goes your way.

With another weekend coming up, I'm looking to head up to the mountains again to find some more landscapes and light. This time, I hope to capture the fire of fall here in Colorado, as the Aspens are about to go up in yellow and orange leafy flames. In an effort to head off the wasteful process of finding good locations to capture some beautiful mountain scenery, I decided to use some online tools to help me pre-scout Rocky Mountain National Park for some ideal vantage points. I have long used Bing Maps (previously Live Maps) from Microsoft as my primary mapping tool. Microsoft has offered Virtual Earth, a 3D mapping system, for quite a number of years. I always thought it was an intriguing tool, and their city modeling and rendering is superb. I've found another use for it, however, as a photography tool. Their 3D mapping fully supports rendering fully textured, realistic landscapes, with road and label overlays, which makes it a powerful tool for finding the perfect spot to photograph the perfect landscape.



To get started using Bing Maps as a landscape photography location scouting tool, you'll need to download Virtual Earth. Start off by going to maps.bing.com, and let the mapping software load. To use the Virtual Earth 3D mapping, its best to use Internet Explorer for the smoothest performance and results. (I am an Opera fan myself, and I hate having to use IE for anything, however in this case, I think its worth it.) Once Bing Maps has loaded, look for the 3D button. It is on the mapping controls in the upper left corner of the map, as seen below.



When you click 3D for the first time, it will download and install Virtual Earth 3D. Let it do its thing, can take a few minutes on a high speed connection to maybe a half hour or more on slower connections. Once Virtual Earth is installed, you will not need to install it again. Any future attempts to use the 3D mapping software should be quick, and only require Virtual Earth to load (you'll see a big circular progress bar appear for a short while when you click it.) Once loaded, you should see the same map you were looking at before you switched, and it will look pretty much the same.



You have all the normal mapping options, including road mapping as well as aerial (or satellite) mapping, which provides rich textured mapping that overlays the landscape with photographs of the earths surface. Unlike your normal 2D mapping, you can hold down the control (CTRL) key along with the left mouse button, and change the angle of view. Intriguingly enough, you can put your vantage point right on the ground, and "see" your location on the map as if you were standing there (or good enough anyway.) It is this capability that turns Bing Maps 3D into an excellent landscape scouting tool.



To demonstrate the use of Bing Maps to scout photography shots, I'll use Bear Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, as a test case. As I intend to visit RMNP over the next couple of weekends, I figured it would be a great example, and I remember from years ago that bear lake had some GREAT vantage points. Starting from the location above, I've turned on Aerial mapping and positioned my vantage point in the bear lake parking lot.



After a little virtual scouting, you can see Hallatte peak in the distance over Bear Lake when right along the lakes edge, but it is largely obscured. To the south from the same vantage point, Longs Peak is a much better shot, and can easily be captured along with Bear Lake itself for a wonderful vista.



Further scouting provides even more vistas, including this one of Hallette and Flat Top Mountains from a high alpine lake, reachable by a trail from Bear Lake.





Many other vistas can be found as well. Below are a few of the Continental Divide as visible from Trail Ridge Road, a road that traverses and crosses right over the divide.





Once a vantage point has been found, you should mark the spot on your map. Bing allows you to add pins for a variety of reasons, label them, and eventually print them. Just right-click on a spot where you wish to add a pin, and select "Add a pushpin":



A dialog will appear that allows you to edit the push pin's details. Best to give it something descriptive, as your pins will show up in a numbered and labeled list, and having useful names makes them easier to find:



If you have a Bing, Live, or Hotmail account, you can save your push pins into custom lists for later reference, share them with friends, etc. Quite a handy little tool, and totally free to boot!