Hooray! Lightroom 3 is finally released!

Oh, I am so excited, and all you dental photographers should be, too!  Adobe has finally released Photoshop Lightroom v.3, and I'm downloading it right now.  I can't wait to show you how wonderful this program is for us as dentists/photographers, because there are so many features here that you are going to LOVE, even if you're a real newbie to this game.  Now that we've successfully moved to our new Charlotte dental office, and we're getting things settled down a bit more, I finally have a little more time to do all the work for this site that I've been wanting to do. Since I'm adding a new orthodontic assistant full-time in July, it's time to develop some new and improved training materials so I can get my whole staff up-to-speed.....it's nice to have guinea pigs for something like this, you know?  LOL

Stay tuned!

More updates coming in June.....

My apologies to all for not having more information added recently; I've been a little distracted with the building of a new office for my SmilesbyPayet Dentistry practice, which should open in mid-May, after which I should have more time to FINALLY create the step-by-step videos for how to do a lot of the most common things in dental photography.  So if you can be patient just a teensy bit longer.....you won't be disappointed!

Scratch my mirrors and die....then buy me Starbucks for a week!

How to care for dental mirrors

Ok, so I can't take credit for the title or ANY of the following post, as it was copied verbatim from a post on a professional dental forum.  Fortunately my friend doesn't mind me copying and pasting as long as I paste his name really big right here.  LOL

Michael J. Melkers, DDS, FAGD

Visiting Faculty, The Spear Institute

www.MichaelMelkers.com

With no further ado.......here is how to take care of those really expensive dental mirrors:

========================================================================
OK-in the never ending battle, we bought some new mirrors this week and have come up with the following office policy:

The first person to scratch the new mirrors:
1-dies
2-buys the office Starbucks for a week...

I take alot of pics in the office and scratches drive me crazy-especially when they are projected or published...so I came up with this idea:

Step 1:  Buy new mirrors AND a box of microfiber photo cloths...I bought the cloths from Uline.com for about 35 bucks...




Unfold said cloths and tuck in mirros...



Fold the top to the bottom then the sides over the sides...


Bag 'em and run 'em through the sterilizer...



Mirrors stay safe, clean, sterilized, always have a cloth..keep em clean, keep the drops off in the autoclave...open the bag and the mirros stay on the cloth at all times.  The cloths can be washed as well.

Look for an upcoming interview!

Well, this was kind of fun!  Thanks to my friend, Dr. Lorne Lavine, and his blog The Digital Dentist, I was recently contacted by Kathy Kincade, the Editor-in-Chief of an online dental trade magazine, DrBicuspid.com, about doing an interview on why the Canon T2i DSLR will be such a great dental camera.  Not exactly sure when the article will be published, but I'll provide a link to it once it comes out.

Also, we just finished a full-mouth reconstruction case a couple weeks ago and saw the patient for a 2-week post-op checkup, and I'll show some different ways to showcase pictures like this for print and the web.  I'll use that to lead into my overdue post on how to manage/understand patient expectations in aesthetic cases by using digital photography, because how you showcase your other work can be both a powerful marketing tool and communications tool to understand just what it is your next patient wants.

New Canon 100mm f/2.8L macro lens

Canon recently announced upgrades to a number of their top lenses, and for pro photographers these should generally be welcome.  For dentists, however, there is one change that is not quite so good for one reason: the primary lens recommended for dentists and their teams, the Canon 100mm f/2.8 macro lens, has been updated to be an "L" glass (pros typically call their high-quality lenses "glass," not "lens;"  just a little FYI).  What does this mean?

For practical purposes in dentistry, there is only 1 downside to this update, and that is that the new lens is more expensive than the previous lens by about $400, but without any real benefit.  Sure, the image quality will be even higher, the lens will focus a bit faster, but the previous lens was completely adequate for everything we needed to do.

Click here to see the new lens.

Now, if you are a serious photographer outside the dental office, this lens does offer (to my mind) 1 truly significant improvement over the previous incarnation: it is waterproof or very water-resistant when combined with a Canon 7D, 5D Mark II, or any of the 1D series cameras.  It is not water-resistant with any of the EOS Rebel series.

Due to this update, I am re-considering my usual recommendation to purchase the Canon 100mm f/2.8 macro for dental offices, and for cost reasons, many of you may want to look at the Sigma 105mm f/2.8 macro instead.  If you can get your hands on one of the older versions (still available at some stores) or get a used one, then definitely go for it.

2 Extremely Useful Websites for Learning Digital Photography and Editing Software

Along the lines of my last post on recommended software for dentists to use for managing, cataloging, and editing their pictures, there are a couple websites that I have found extremely useful and well-done, because they both have enormous selections of online video tutorials:

Lynda.com 


KelbyTraining.com

Figured I ought to mention both of those.  :-)  Each does have a very reasonable subscription fee, whether you choose to sign up for a monthly or annual subscription.

Canon announced the EOS Rebel T2i/550D | The Digital Photo Experience

2010/02/08 Canon announced the EOS Rebel T2i/550D | The Digital Photo Experience

Well........I guess I have to take back my recommendation for the Canon DSLR that I most recommend for dental offices, as Canon has just announced the release of it's newest, the EOS Rebel T2i (or the 550D, as it's known outside the USA). With many of the features of their newest semi-pro DSLR, the Canon 7D, this new camera is truly a perfect fit for dental offices.

Lightweight, an incredible 18 megapixel sensor (still 1.6x crop of course), with genuine 1080i HD video recording capability (and I can tell you that the HD video I capture with my 7D is simply superb) for recording patient live testimonials, you really can't go wrong. And with the features it has, this would be a fantastic camera to take on vacation, to family outings, kids' sporting events, etc. Paired with a Canon 60mm f/2.8 macro or a Canon 100mm f/2.8 macro lens and the Canon MR-14EX ring flash, as discussed in a previous blog entry about Canon DSLR set-ups for dental offices, and you are set.

Cosmetic Dentistry Slideshow from Lightroom 3 beta

In keeping with the topic of my last post, and which should lead nicely back to the subject of managing patient expectations, I'd just like to show a MP4 slideshow that I created directly in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 (beta), along with the steps necessary, so anyone can see just how easy this will be once the real version is released:

 5 Steps to Create the Slideshow with Lightroom 3 beta:

1. In the Library module, use CTRL + left mouseclick to select all the photos you want to include.
2. Change to the Slideshow module.
3. Pick one of the templates provided by default or create your own using the Layout options on the right side of the screen.
4. Simply go through the Layout options one-by-one (extremely self-explanatory), including selecting a music track from iTunes.
5. In the lower left, choose "Export Movie."  
6. Let 'er rip.  :-)

Seriously......that's it.  OK, it did take a little time just to choose the colors I wanted and to type in the text for the Intro and Concluding slides, but altogether, the slideshow that you see here (linked from my photography website, although it can be done through any number of services, such as YouTube) took me less than 4 minutes to create.  While I had done some previous editing to add borders and my watermark, once LR 3 is released, they will supposedly be including an easy set of features to add borders and watermarks very easily.

Here you go:

Dental Imaging Software and Photo Storage - the Hows & Whys?

OK, I lied......before I talk about patient expectations, since I already started on the subject of software, I shall continue in that vein for a bit, as it seems to be right near the top of the poll in terms of "need-to-know".

Use PMS (Eaglesoft, Dentrix, etc) or Not?

Personally, I do not use, nor do I recommend using, the Imaging modules of the dental PM software that is currently on the market.  Why not?

1. Cost: While some include the Imaging Modules, most charge a premium for the versions with all the bells-and-whistles, and quite simply, NONE of them are remotely as good as the most popular photography software available outside dentistry, and ALL of them are a LOT more expensive.
2. Lack of Keyword Capability: In just about every photography program available today, including Google's free Picasa, you have the ability to use Keywords, or Tags.  These are descriptive terms to used to identify what is in the picture.  For example, in dentistry you might want to have keywords related to what lab you used, which adhesive, which composite or amalgam used, type of isolation, reason for treatment, etc.  This allows you the option of tracking your work over time.
3. Harder to find images you want: in dental PM software, you have to generally keep your images in each person's file; if it's years down the road and you want the pictures you took of, "Hey......what was that guy's name about 5 years ago we did the single anterior crown for?????"  Ummmmmmmm, not too easy to do, is it?  This ties in with the lack of Keywords/Tags, too.
4. Harder to Group images for specific purposes: Let's say you want to put together a nice collection of pictures of veneer cases, or Six-Month Braces, or CEREC crowns, or implant overdenture cases, you have to go through all of the patients, in most cases export the images individually to another folder (and they don't make this really easy IMO), THEN you can start working with them.
5. Limited Editing Capabilities: Especially in comparison to programs like Photoshop, or even Photoshop Elements, most dental PM software has extremely limited editing capabilities.  Of the ones I know, the best is Apteryx.  However, it is again more expensive than just about any photo software currently available, and it has the same limitations regarding Keywords, image searching, and image grouping.

OK, so what software do I use/recommend? 

Personally, I like Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, which is currently in version 2, and version 3 will be released sometime in spring 2010.  Here are some other programs you can choose, though, and then I'll cover more of why these programs are IMO far superior to dental PM software imaging modules.

• Photoshop Elements 8
• Google Picasa
• Aperture 2

5 Reasons Photoshop Lightroom Rocks for Dentists

1. Easy Folder Hierarchy: It's basically just like Windows Explorer, in that you can set up a folder structure in any way that you want.  Here's the way I have it set up: My Pictures > Year > Procedure Type > Patient Name > Date of Service.  It's easy to keep track of all pictures by calendar year, and by having procedure types (such as Basic Restorative, Cosmetic, Periodontal, Implant, etc), you can put like types of procedures together.
2. Easy Keyword Tagging:  This is really one of THE most powerful tools available with LR or the other programs.  By using Keywords, you can easily label pictures with any descriptor you want.  As some examples, here are some I use: Decay, Recurrent Decay, Chipped Porcelain, Acid Erosion, Gingival hypertrophy, Posterior Composite, Anterior Composite, Veneer, Feldspathic, Empress, Surpass, Preop, Portrait, Amalgam, and you can probably think of a gazillion more.  And here's where it gets useful: Tracking your work over time!  Let's suppose that, after 5 years of using a particular lab, always using Captek crowns and cementing with zinc phosphate, you want to pull up ALL of the pictures of ALL patients in the last 5 years who got Captek crowns from that lab and which were cemented with zinc phosphate so you can see how they hold up........type the Keywords into the search field, and BAM!  There you go!  OR........say you know that there was an amazing veneer case you did 8 years ago, but you can't remember the patient's name, no problem!  Just select the year you want, perhaps choose keywords "Veneer, Maxillary, XYXYX Lab" and BAM!  There you go, all the maxillary veneer cases from the year 2002 that you did with XYXYX Lab are right there, and you can easily identify the case you want.  This is just an incredible feature.
3. Creating Customized Galleries and Slideshows:  This is another superb feature for anyone who wants to easily showcase their work.  Lightroom has several features that allow you to create highly customized Web Galleries, Slideshows with music, and more; with plug-ins (most are free, some have a small fee), you can upload galleries to sites such as Flickr, Smugmug, Zenfolio, and others.  Google's Picasa has a built-in tool to let you upload pictures to your online Picasa galleries, from which you can create links, Flash slideshows, and more.  The marketing potential of these customizable photo groupings is tremendous.  The slideshow seen on the right of my Blog is linked from my SmugMug photography site, and all those pictures were uploaded directly in a large batch.  EASY.  And the upcoming release of Lightroom 3 will have even more of these features built in!
4. Easy-to-Use Editing Features: with most of these programs, the controls to do a ot of basic editing are right at your fingertips, such as Cropping, Correcting Red-eye, Correcting overexposed or underexposed pictures, adding borders, etc.  Therefore, the learning curve to use them is much faster and shallower.
5. NON-DESTRUCTIVE editing!  This is a wonderful benefit like you wouldn't believe, especially when you're new.  Essentially, Lightroom does not actually edit the image file; instead it writes the edits "on-top-of" the file in a set of instructions that are rendered onscreen.  NOT UNTIL you export the image in some way (online, printing, slideshow) will those edits be permanently part of the new file.  Even then, though, the ORIGINAL file remains untouched, and you can revert back to it at any point.

Hence my recommendation to use a non-dental software for cataloging and editing your pictures. Please post comments and questions or send me an email for further clarification. 

Smile Imaging - What Software and How to Manage Expectations

Here's a question I received from a colleague by email recently, and it's such a good one, it's the perfect opening for a blog entry.  Thanks to Rich M. for asking (and I do welcome questions and comments, so please......leave a comment or send a question by email.).

Q: "One question on my list is whether you use imaging software in your presentations so patients can view current and proposed/expected outcomes.  I've been warned this could be a tricky area to get into due to a gap in patient expectations and actual outcome.  What do you say and what software for this purpose do you use (if you do use any)?"

A:  What we have here is really 2 questions; the first is about software and a "How-To-Do......?" and the second is about patient expectations if you do a computerized smile mock-up to show them what you think the outcome will be.  Let's start with the software question first, because it's actually the easier question to answer, although the technical aspect of making it happen is a bit trickier.

Software: If you want to make this process really easy on yourself, there are several pretty good services available that will do the smile imaging for you; while I don't personally use them nowadays, I have used them in the past and gotten very good service:

• SmileVision Lab
• SmilePix 

This next service I have not used personally, but they are recommended by the DaVinci Lab, Dr. Woody Oaks, and others, so I figure they can do a good job, too.

• SmileArt

This next service is actually a relatively easy one to implement in your office; naturally, there is a learning curve, but they offer pretty good support to get you up and running.  If I were doing more cosmetic cases these days myself, I'd probably go back to using this one, but I'm having more fun doing a ton of 6MonthSmiles Adult Ortho and Laser Periodontal Therapy cases.

• Digital Dentist Cosmetic Imaging Service (The Lorin Berland Smile Style Guide/Library)

All these services have a very simplified set-up that you can implement very easily; the absolute easiest are the first 3, because all you have to do is take the pictures and email them; you usually get the completed Before/After Cosmetic Imaging back within 24-48 hours.  They offer a "Rush" option as well.

Here's another significant benefit to working with both SmileArt and SmileVision:  they are both part of full-service dental labs with a focus on esthetic dentistry.  Therefore, they can help not only do the Before/After Imaging, they can actually provide the crowns/veneers/bridges/etc. to bring the case to a successful conclusion.

That said, what software do I personally use nowadays?  Well, if anything, I use Adobe Photoshop CS4.  This is a program I use almost daily as a photographer, so it's what I'm most comfortable with, and I know how to do the things that most patients want to see imaged.  However.......for most dentists, unless you're really serious about this, I do NOT recommend you go this route, because it has a VERY steep learning curve.  It also does require the most time.

Since this post has already gotten a bit long, I'll answer Part 2 of Rich's question, about managing patient expectations, in my next posting.