Work long and hard to learn how to take pictures before addressing the business end or finding a niche. Understand that photography is an art form in which the quality of the equipment and the knowledge of the person handling it does count for a great deal. Taking pictures with a cell phone can be done by anyone. Replicating quality photographs under less than ideal conditions takes mastery. The two driving abstracts in photography are vision and technique. Without vision, you can't get out of the gate. You need to learn technique (technical stuff like aperture, shutter speed, ASA, color balance, post production digital work, etc.) in order to fulfill your vision. Your career should be a constant sharpining of your technique which, in turn, enhances and directs your vision which, in turn, demands learning more technique, etc. No matter what niche you jump into, you need to be prepared as the best technician with the best vision. You'll take the best pictures and get paid to do it.

If you're looking for a niche, hold still and pay close attention to humans. Like stars in the human constellation, passions twinkle all over the place. Everything from yachts to pickle ball are passions and, therefore, potential markets; but, don't fail to show up until you stand among the best photographers you know.

Each set of pictures I take are put into a folder named using the year, space, the month and two digit date, space, a brief description.

I use the following format: The year, space, The month and two digit date, space, a brief description, space, number
So, "2017 0715 Slidell 007" means July 15, 2017 pictures taken in Slidell, picture number 7.

In the import dialoge box, I choose the custom name field and name the files the same as the folder from which they're being imported. The file import feature of Lightroom automatically numbers the pictures. I also put "2017 0715 Slidell" into the keyword section of the import dialoge box.

Of course, what happens is that all my pictures are kept in folders that are automatically filed in chronological order. Each file is ordered by its specific file number, and all files are capable of being located and searched by date and subject matter. I fine tune keywords or use color tagging to distinguish pictures that I intend to publish. To date, I've not lost or failed to find a file that I've imported into Lightroom. Best of luck

I agree with you, but would indicate that 18% gray is one stop darker that skin tone.

Count me among the confused. I'm an old analog shooter. Knowing what kind of light you are shooting in seems much more important than post production color correction using a gray card. Eighteen percent gray cards are more valuable when exposing pictures because all light meters are calibrated to an eighteen percent gray card. Theoretically, if you place a gray card in the scene, meter from it, take the picture exactly as you should, develop the negative perfectly, and print using minimum time/maximum. Black standard, you should get a print in which the card is precisely eighteen percent. Color balance is easy, 5500 Kelvin for daylight, 3600 Kelvin for tungsten, 7300 for flourescent. Vary to taste. To me, the gray card is more pertinent to exposure than color balance.

By all means, I'd recommend shooting RAW, converting to DNG, and using Lightroom. You can do all of your color correction and output to JPEG, TIFF, and PNG. You can also choose which gamut to choose. If things fall apart, you can hit the reset button in Lightroom and you're back to square one. You can also softproof your images before printing so you can see how your image will look using various papers on your printer.

I agree. I've had a Slingshot for about ten years, and can't imagine anything better for travel and all-day comfort. I've taken it to Europe and across the USA and it has held up with virtually no wear or visible signs of aging. If you're in a tight place like a bus or cable car, you just swing it onto your lap and all your gear is right there in front of you ready for action. It allows for storing a DSLR with a long lens with plenty of space for your chargers, estra batteries and extra lens.

I think it's a kestrel.

I also use Photomatix although both lightroom and photoshop do a good job as well. Of course, it works best on static landscape images. Make sure you have a good tripod and a camera that will automatically bracket your shots. Use aperture priority to avoid variations in depth of field and you good to go.

My suggestion is to use your time for something less self indulgent lke tearing the wings off of flies.