Picture Doctor: 4 Ways to Tame Flare

PROBLEM SOLVER

Power play: You need to charge your digital camera's batteries (and maybe your laptop, and maybe your handheld GPS) before your next shoot…which you're about to drive to. For $20 (street) the Coleman Compact Power Inverter provides small devices with 90 watts of 120-volt AC current. It plugs into the cigarette lighter jack and features one standard AC outlet.

If you need more juice, Coleman offers a 200-watt model that fits in the cup holder for $30, and a 400-watt job for $50 (street prices). At outdoor stores such as Cabela's (www.cabelas.com).

-Jon Sienkiewicz

30 SECOND PHOTOSHOP

Fast color mix: Want to add words to your image but have no idea what color to use? You'll never go wrong with a shade sampled from your photo. While you're using the text tool, double-click the color box in the Options Bar at the top of the screen. Use the dropper to click and pick a color from your picture. The result? Instant design perfection.

FAKING IT

Problem: Full-tilt boogie. You have your usual wide-angle zoom on the camera and you're shooting a landmark building…but with a focal length to fill the frame with the building, you have to tilt the camera up, and now all the parallel lines converge! (And of course you don't have a $1,500 tilt-shift lens.)

Fake it! Zoom out to the widest focal length on your lens (that's right) and back up until the entire building will fit in the frame with the camera held level to the ground. Yes, you now have all that foreground at the bottom. Crop it out later, and no one will know you don't have a $1,500 tilt-shift lens.