Your autofocus on your camera is not working for your shot.  What do you do?  No problem.  Most cameras, except the most basic, have a manual override feature you can choose.  Read your manual (or go to the manufacturer online) to find out how to do it.

Try your manual focus if:

• You’re shooting through a window or there is an obstacle in the way.
• You want fine details in a close up shot.
• Your autofocus is confused by design elements e.g. complex architecture.
• Your subject is high contrast or sharply contrasting.
• There is no contrast e.g. white on white. My Canon DSLR stumbles on this regularly.
• You have a prominent subject e.g. person in the foreground, and your camera focuses on the background.
• You are shooting at night.

If your camera has a manual focus option, experiment with it.  And let me know about it.

Edgy and vibrant, Streets of Hope welcomes you to the current life of two South African townships.

Photography profits  from this exhibit (and from my website) benefit Friends of Alexandra, a non-profit working with kids, many of who I met and photographed. Buy a book and/or photo and help a child!  At the end of this show, I’d like to move Streets of Hope to another venue.  If you have contacts for that, let me know.

If you’d like to read more about my South Africa trip, visit our Winos to Rhinos blog

Want to keep up with Seaver Photography thoughts and events?  Like me on Facebook

Streets of Hope is a glimpse into the townships of Alexandra and Soweto in South Africa.

My new photography exhibit will surprise many of my long time collectors, and possibly open my work to others.   Streets of Hope: Soweto and Alexandra Townships opens August 20, 2011 at the Marin Museum of Contemporary Art in Novato, CA.  Venturing into the genre of street photography provided me with some exciting new images,  lingering insights, an exhibit and a book.  These photos were shot on October 6, 2010 while touring the townships with the extraordinary Robin Binckes, Spear of the Nation Tours. What began as a strong interest in the SA struggle history and apartheid, turned into a true passion.

All profits from sales of the book and photos will go the Friends of Alexandra (www.friendsofalex.org.za).

If you’d like to read more about my South Africa trip, visit our Winos to Rhinos blog

Want to keep up with Seaver Photography thoughts and events?  Like me on Facebook

Like me on Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SeaverPhotography

ZED A:  An Abecedarium of Southern Africa is the first book to emerge from our trip to southern Africa in Fall 2010.  If you haven’t yet, check out the blog (www.winostorhinos.wordpress.com) that we continue to post to.  There you’ll find more intimate details of our Africa adventure as well as a wealth of history of the people.  This book was created, written and edited by Julie Cason with photography by me and and the four other Winos to Rhinos.  As a photographer I focused my camera on everything!  My passions on this trip were the people and the struggle history.  But it was difficult not to drift to my love of abstraction.  I hope you enjoy this!  This is the second edition of Julie’s book.

Well, in today’s world of Point ‘n Shoots (compact digital cameras), everyone has a full toolbox available to them.  You might not know that your camera (not smartphone, but real camera) has a set of tools called ‘scene’ or ‘shooting’ modes.

These come in a variety of names like:  Portrait, Soft Skin, Self Portrait, Scenery, Panorama Assist, Sports, Night Portrait, Night Scenery, Food, Party, Candlelight, Baby, Pet, Sunset, Starry Sky, Fireworks, Beach, Snow, Aerial Photo.  Some other tools, often available,  allow more sophisticated changes:  illustration, sepia, monochrome, saturation, pastel.

For the most part these tend to be underutilized, if even known, by most casual shooters.  It usually requires the user to explore their camera and read the manual.  Not likely in today’s instant gratification culture.

So what are ‘scene’ modes?

They are sophisticated preprogrammed exposure/shutter speed combinations that allow the shooter to do what I learned in 3 years of photography school and 40 years of shooting!! Imagine that!

For example, choose sunset and it automatically increases the color saturation, opens the aperture, lowers the ISO sensitivity, and increases the shutter speed.  The sports mode attempts to freeze fast moving subjects by increasing the shutter speed, sometimes activating continuous shooting mode and implementing a fast focus tracking.

The sepia mode creates a digital image in brown tones, while monochrome creates a black and white image, just like I did in the darkroom too many years ago. You could do any of these manually (which I usually do on my DSLR but not on my compact cameras) but why bother when an algorithm has been created to do it.

So get your camera and look at the control dial or menu for a ‘best shot’ mode and start exploring them.  Let me know your results.

Square Mats & Frames, Matting & Framing Picture with Square & Rectangular Window

Get Squared Away at Documounts. (www.documounts.com – Thank you Documounts for being so square!)

We’ve noticed that many customers are going back to square one when ordering framing materials.  If you like the look of square presentations there are several options.

The Bigger Picture – Squares on Display.

Think beyond the single image to how your square presentations will look in a gallery or on the wall of your booth.  You can group squares together to create bigger squares, ie. squares within a square .

They can also be arranged in a linear fashion to create lines and paths of art that lead a viewer throughout the gallery.  And for full impact, imagine a wall full of same- size squares!

Think of squares as an opportunity to step beyond the commonplace and change it up a bit.

Because, you know, It’s Hip to be Square (sorry, we had to say it).

500 Palm Dr. at Novato Arts Center in Hamilton, Novato CA 94949

www.marinmoca.org  415-506-0137

Private Eyes:  Artists’ Visions, a national juried exhibition, opens with a big reception on June 19, 2010 from 5 – 7 pm. at Marin Museum of Contemporary Art.  I have one of my new grids based on tulips, RENEWAL, juried into the show by well-known gallerist/art consultant, Andrea Schwartz of San Francisco.  I met Andrea about 25 years ago at the shop of my framer.  Unfortunately I never kept up the connection and I’ve wanted to get my art in front of her ever since.  I’m a bit shy about marketing my own work.  It’s probably my Achilles heel, actually.  So here we all are now, two decades later.  Older.  Wiser perhaps. Or not.

1.2.2012  UPDATE:  After searches and queries, this badge has been identified as a 1975 (and possibly to 1980) Jeep Cherokee.  Thank you all for your great research and interest!  I am greatly relieved!!

What car does this belong to???

Photography and Glass for Gifts or Home

All Hanging Art on Sale!

This Saturday and Sunday May 8-9 will be the final two days for the Seaver Photography + KMW Glass Art Open Studio.  And we want you!  I have my largest sale on – OFF THE WALL SALE – ever!  If you buy a framed piece, you’ll take home the second framed piece at a whopping 40% discount.  And if you visit my facebook fan page – Keven Seaver Photography – you might get a little better deal.  You never know.  this is the one time a year that you can see the biggest body of my art in one location.  Same for Kathleen’s glass.  We love Open Studios!  We had about a hundred the first weekend;  expect another hundred or so this weekend.  But it’s almost the end.  Glass and photography – very exciting and dynamic together!!  We’re open from 11 – 5pm on Saturday and Sunday at the home studio of Keven Seaver Photography.  Address is:  68 Sotelo Way Novato CA 94945.