I am about to shoot a musi­cal group for their pub­lic­i­ty pho­tos and must final­ly address the issue of mod­el releas­es. When do you need a release? What about minors? How are the mod­els pro­tect­ed?

There are many arti­cles and opin­ions that cov­er mod­el releas­es along with forms and tem­plates on the net. As I find them, I’ll list arti­cles with clear explaina­tions and tem­plates for gener­ic forms here.

Under­stand­ing the Mod­el Release Form

This “eHow” post describes some basics such as what a release is, what is does and when to use it. There are links to tem­plates at the end of the arti­cle.

There are also a few tips on using the forms here and here.

Do you need a mod­el release when sell­ing pic­tures of your­self? Here is an intel­li­gent dis­cus­sion on the the sub­ject:
http://photo.net/business-photography-forum/00Tgga

More to come…

This is a test from our Flickr work­shop. Flickr prefers that you use this option (1) when embed­ding pho­tos in web sites. Click­ing the pho­to takes you to the pho­tog­ra­pher’s pho­to­stream.

This is option 2 using the straight URL which does not link back to Flickr.

I have been look­ing for a new com­put­er mon­i­tor and research­ing if any par­tic­u­lar LCD mon­i­tor is best for edit­ing dig­i­tal pho­tographs. The rec­om­men­da­tion is for mon­i­tors built with IPS pan­els, which of course are more expen­sive then the stan­dard mon­i­tors for sale that are made with TN pan­els. The one excep­tion seems to be the 2209WA mod­el by Dell which, as of this writ­ing, sells for $279.

I find that these mon­i­tors are dif­fi­cult to track down as the pan­el type is nor­mal­ly not list­ed in the spec­i­fi­ca­tions, but I found this list of rec­om­mend­ed mon­i­tors — http://www.pchardwarehelp.com/guides/s‑ips-lcd-list.php .

There is a note regard­ing the Dell 2007WFP mon­i­tor that states 2 dif­fer­ent type pan­els were used and what you may get is not guar­an­teed. They also state that the 2209WA that I list­ed above uses an e‑IPS pan­el, a cheap­er ver­sion of the S‑IPS pan­el found in the more expen­sive mod­els. The fact that it is even on this list and in my price range makes the 2209WA very attrac­tive.

IPS mon­i­tors gen­er­al­ly have wider view­ing angles, repro­duce col­or more accu­rate­ly and give a sharp­er image. The trade off is a rel­a­tive­ly slow­er response time. This is a con­sid­er­a­tion if you play fast mov­ing video games result­ing in blur­ring or ghost­ing.

If you use a Mac­in­tosh com­put­er with the 20” or larg­er Cin­e­ma Dis­play, lucky you. Accord­ing to this list you have an IPS mon­i­tor!

Want to read more about the dif­fer­ence in LCD mon­i­tor tech­nol­o­gy, try this page — http://www.pchardwarehelp.com/guides/lcd-panel-types.php -

Who knew? I love the inter­net. If and when I buy one, or dis­cov­er more infor­ma­tion, I’ll write about it.

Maybe the most unique and inspir­ing pho­to gallery on the inter­net is the col­lec­tion of pic­tures tak­en by the Hub­ble Space Tele­scope. View the phe­nom­e­nal num­ber of pic­tures of our uni­verse tak­en through this high fly­ing cam­era at:
http://hubblesite.org/gallery/album/

I found this arti­cle in the San Fran­cis­co Chron­i­cle (orig­i­nal sto­ry is here) and it sounds like a good pho­to oppor­tu­ni­ty. Remem­ber to get shots from all angles, inside and out. I am sure the peo­ple (car own­ers and spec­ta­tors alike) may be just as inter­est­ing. And while you are there, stop by Steam­er Lane for great shots of actu­al surfers, next to the Surfer Muse­um at Light­house Field State Beach!

Here is a gallery of pho­tos from last year.
http://www.santacruzwoodies.com/wow08/index.htm

Surf wag­ons to haul in at San­ta Cruz Wharf

No toy sto­ry — these wood­ies are the real thing

Nev­er mind that San­ta Cruz lost the offi­cial “Surf City” moniker to a South­ern Cal­i­for­nia city (which shall go unnamed here) … its munic­i­pal pier is the place to chan­nel your inner Jan and Dean next week­end. The 15th Annu­al Wood­ies on the Wharf, North­ern Cal­i­for­ni­a’s largest show of clas­sic surf wag­ons, brings in 200 gnarly, pre-1952 wood-pan­eled cars, some from as far away as the East Coast and Cana­da, that cry out for a load of surf­boards. The day also offers clowns, free bal­loons and face paint­ing for kids, while music, col­lectible T‑shirts and prize draw­ings — and the wharf itself, with local surfers show­ing their chops in sur­round­ing waves — will appeal to all.

Vitals: 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sat. Free. Munic­i­pal Wharf, San­ta Cruz. (831) 420‑5273, http://www.santacruzwharf.com/ or http://www.santacruzwoodies.com/.