I’ve started up Picture of the Day again in an attempt to hone my photography skills.  Here are the last three entries - ending with the one for today.

During inaugural week I was in Hawaii.  Given how cold it was in the Balitmore/DC area that week, I can’t say I wasn’t happy to be there.  I stayed at the Embassy Suites Beach Walk in Waikiki and I cannot say enough good things about the hotel.  When we first checked in we were offered some tropical drinks both alcoholic and non-alcoholic.  The rooms were suite style and very well kept.  Every morning they had a whole bunch of complimentary breakfast food - including omlets made to order.  They also had a happy hour every night with free drinks and cheap snacks. Of course, I took my Canon 400D and Fujifilm A 345.  Overall I did pretty well.  Out of 800+ pictures only 63 were out of focus.  Also, for sake of mentioning it, 61 were of my wife.  That’s a new thing for me as we usually don’t take the usual tourist-y pictures.   Our first day were were still on Eastern Time so we got up at 0400 and went to watch the sun rise.

Some of these are the same as the previous two days, unsurprisingly.  But some are new to this list..

For quite some time I’ve been been struggling with the point of Adobe’s Lightroom.  Other than competing with Apple’s Aperture, it appears not to have a purpose.  Of course, right around the time Lightroom (LR) was hitting its stride, I stopped reading photography magazines.  The zine I loved the most was a British one published by the same company that puts out Linux Format Magazine.  Unfortunately, even with an exchange rate of $1:1 Britsh Pound (which isn’t the case), it’s still $90 per year.  So I may have missed lots of tutorial and explainer articles talking about why LR is such a great program.  My impression of it was of a Adobe Bridge and Camera Raw.  So I didn’t really see the point of paying $200 for that when those programs work just fine for me.  It also seemed to straddle some Photoshop territory and I just couldn’t figure it out.

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