Welcome
On this page, testers and reviewers can keep up-to-date on where the project is. Once the project is released, this page will tell readers how we expect them to make use of the information on the site.
Project News (September 18th, 2009)
Design
The nearly final design can be seen here in JPEG form. Click anywhere on the image to advance to the next comp.
http://www.grillogroup.com/dpbestflow/
More Videos
We've added a few more videos as we iron out production issues. The intros are still provisional until the final titles are created, and these are being served by Vimeo as a temporary host.
Assigning a profile to an untagged image
http://dpbestflow.contextsolutions.net/node/286#assign
Changing EXIF time
http://dpbestflow.contextsolutions.net/node/299#changing
Project News (September 16th, 2009)
We have started with video production. The intro, credits and music are all temporary and will be replaced once these have been finalized. Likewise, the hosting is done now by Vimeo, and will be provided by another source in the future.
Videos have been posted:
Color Profiles in 3-D - This one seems to be kind of slow to download. It's been uploaded in HD, but does not need to be this large.
Opening raw files into a working space - This video is shorter, and has the short intro.
Backup configurations: 1 computer system - This video is an "animated flow chart" showing how data can be backed up in different configurations, all based on a computer system with only one computer. The visuals in this video will be replaced with the finalized flow chart styles. (This video is not linked - it's labeled as Figure 4 on the page).
The Quick Reference is being finalized for the first printed version. we need people to take a look at this
The Glossary has been uploaded and is beginning to be linked.
Proofreading has begun, particularly in the color section
Some Design Questions
• Should movies be captioned as "Figures" or something different? Media? Movie? It would be simpler to caption all inline media as Figures.
• I have uploaded 2 images that have been captioned with a copyright notice. I've used grey Helvetica IT for the type. Should all inline figures have the caption, including screenshots and flowcharts? It's certainly possible that these will be downloaded and used. Should we put Creative Commons Symbols on the figures? Should we put CC notice on each page?
You can find the sample images a short scroll down from here:
http://dpbestflow.contextsolutions.net/node/286#common
Project News (August 27, 2009)
We have filled out the best practices page. This must be finalized for the printed publicity piece. Please look it over and provide any feedback.
Project News (August 26, 2009)
We have created the Workflow pages template, and filled in the first two:
These pages each describe an archetypal workflow - the batch process for the "must deliver a lot of images" job and Optimized for the "a few perfected images" jobs. Note that these are "generic" workflows - they are not mean to be "the one and only best practice". As a matter of fact, the reason to include multiple workflows is to make it clear that there are many ways to skin a cat.
Of course, the pages will really be driven by the movies, which have not been created yet.
See if you can grok the presentation (even though Grillo/Contextsolutions has not done its magic yet).
Feedback needed - Please check on this section to see important current questions.
How to Navigate the Site
The main content of the website is divided into several sections:
Site Overview are short descriptions of, well, best pratices of the digital photographer. Each of these will be linked to further information. The objective of this section is several-fold.
• We want an easy path into this complex material
• We want readers to see a concise collection of references to these ideas, in a way that lets them find out more about those that are foreign concepts.
• This set of recommendations will form the basis of a printed document to publicize the project.
Best Practices outlines every piece of terchnology that realtes to digital photography, from the camera to the archive. This section provides the technical underpinnings to the entire site. All our recommendations flow from an understanding of how imaging teechnology works.
The Technology section is set up in a series 10 "Subject Areas". Each one has an "Overview Page" that is describes the Subject Area in easy-to-understand terms. The overview provides an introduction to all the relevant concepts in the Subject Area.
In each of the Subject Areas, there are a series of Subject Pages that explore sub-topics in greater detail.
Both the Overview and Subject pages are combinations of text, images and movies.
Workflow describes how to string together workflow practices that are suited for a particular photographer's objectives.
There are three categories of workflow shown.
• Generic workflows - 3 variations showing end-to-end workflow
• Options - DIferent practices to add to the front or back of the workflow - Ingestion options, CMYK conversion, etc.
• Case Studies (may not have this for fall rollout - may be spring 2010) - specific implementations of particlar workflows or workflow components.
Workflow Examples will contain a flowcahrt of the steps involved, and a movie showing the steps in action. The copy on each Example page will link back to the Technology Overview or Subject page that fully describes the reasoning behind the recommendation of that step
Workflow Page Structure
We have created the page format for the workflow modules. The movie is at the top of the page, so it's easily found. We expect that people will want to watch the movie, and then read through and see how the workflow is constructed. We show the following components:
Objectives - What's the workflow involve? What's it good for?
"File Flow" - Workflow for file handling - this section has a description of how files are treated. This includes a flowchart of file handling
Equipent used - a picture and desactiption of the hardware setup used to perform the steps.
Software needed
Workflow Steps - is a lifecycle-oriented flowchart and a bulletted list of steps for the workflow. Each step has a link to the technology section providing background information for the step.
Downloadable checklist - a dpBestflow® branded checklist is available as a PDF file. This lists the procedures outlind in the Workflow Steps in a user-fill-in-able form.
Older news
Project News (August 19, 2009)
We're well over halfway done porting the material from Richard and Patti's Digital Photography Best Practice and Workflow Handbook and Peter's DAM Book
into the website. This material shows up in the Technologies section at
right. The most complete, both in terms of content and architectural
structure is the Color Section.
Link Format (Settled 8/26/09)
We are looking at several different ways to note internal links.
• A link to an anchor on the same page is a simple link, underlined and in a different color
The question we have is regarding links to different pages. Sometimes, links will be to the same "section", such as from Technology>Color>Color Management Overview to Technology>Color>Monitor Calibration and Profiling. The two options we have for that are:
Read more about monitor calibration in this section...
Read more about monitor calibration in Technology>Color>Monitor Calibration and Profiling
If we are talking you to another section, such as jumping from the Data Storage Overview to a page in data validation, here are two options for the link:
Read more about hard drive maintenance in the Data Validation section...
Read more about hard drive maintenance in Technology>Data Validation>General Data Validation...
You'll notice that the first option tells you what section you'll be going to - either "this section" or "the Data Validation section"
Option 2 gives you an absolute indication of where you are going, but does not let you know how that relates to where you are now. You are not warned that you are leaving the section, unless you know where you are at the moment.
I have made the links in both styles on the Data Storage Overview page, so you can see how they read on a real page.
Old Content - Replaced 090814
Table of Contents
We've started to build the site, beginning with the color management module. We'll use this as the template to design and build navigation from. At the moment, the text content is reasonably complete, and the screenshots are mostly done. Movies have not been made, and will be one of the last elements. Take a look at the Link styles listed below to understand what we are doing with navigation.
In this first phase, we want you to check out the color management module, and see if you like it. We're interested in:
• General Imprressions
• Ease of Navigation
• Is the content easy to understand?
• Is the content deep enough? Too deep?
Known Issues:
• Copy has not been proofread
• The menu navigation of all modules except color management is only provisional, and is likely to change.
• Design has not been done at all. THis is a simple port of the ASMP site for us to work in. This site will get its own skin and stylesheets.
We've divided the site into two main sections. The Technology section describes the tools and components in the digital photography ecosystem, and the Workflow section outlines how to put the parts together in the most appropriate way for your particular goals.
Technologies
In the technologies section, we have 11 chapters (soon to change). Each chapter page presents a discussion of that area of technology. We've written these with the hope that anyone can read it straight through and get a good understanding of how the parts fit together. Once you understand the ideas on the main chapter page, you may want to delve into a deeper discussion of the individual subjects. We've done a lot of cross-linking of subjects so that you can see how different components relate to each other.
Workflow
The workflow section describes how you can string your imaging tasks together, in order to create a safe and efficient workflow. The workflow section assumes that you are familiar with the subject matter covered in the technologies section.
The workflow section is organized first into a discussion of digital image lifecycle. We use this concept to evaluate what tasks to include, and how to set up a work-order. We then apply the principles of lifecycle management to several different common types of photography.
It's our goal that readers gain a good understanding of the entire digital photography ecosystem, and how to create a workflow that is best for them. While we present some specific workflow recommendations, it's always with the knowledge that everyone will likely do things differently, at least to some degree.
The main navigation is provided by the flyout menus on the left-hand column of the page as seen in Figure 1. Each item in a menu has its own page. Chapter pages, such as Color Management, present an overview. The "child" pages, such as Color Models and Color Profiles, provide a more in-depth discussion.
Figure 1 - Each menu item links to an individual page. Sunject matter is organized so that an overview "chapter" page, such as Color Management, provides a basic framework fro understanding the component pages, such as Color Space and Color Profiles.
This site contains a lot of interrelated subject matter. We've worked to cross link it together. There are several styles of links, each described below. Because we want to encourage you to read the chapter pages from top to bottom, we provide you with an indication of where any particular link will take you, so that you'll know when a link is about to take you to a different page.
Same page link - any link that is in green will jump you down or up the same page. These are particularly useful if you want to return to some subject that you've read about previously. (Note - neither of these link styles is set up yet)
Off-page link - Any link that takes you off to another page is in blue. This lets you know that it's going to interrupt the narrative flow of the information. These are useful if you want to refresh your understanding of a particular concept, or if you want to dive deeper in a subject. (Note - neither of these link styles is set up yet)
Link to Subject page - If we've created an entire page on a particular subject, the link will show this page icon. Use these links to go to very deep discussions of a particular topic. This links to the page itself for general overview, rather than linking to a specific article on the page, as the link below does.
Link to article on subject page.
Off-site link - We also link to pages that are entirely outside the dpBestflow® site, and marked these with the globe icon. The link is opened in a new window.
Same-page movie link - If a link points to a movie on the same page, the movie camera will be in green.
Pop-out movie - Movies from other pages launch as pop ups. We do it this way so that the reader won't lose his place on the page if he just wants to refresh his understanding of a subject.
