Posts
1) remember to take the usb cord that connects my Epson 2000 to the laptop so I can burn DVD's - ended up with only a single copy of 1500 images - did get them home safely but hardly an ideal situation. A checklist is mandatory.
2) At the airport I thought I might have trouble with weight - my camera bag now weighs close to 30 lb. and the announced limit was 22 - fortunately they didn't think to weigh it but I might have to consolidate my lenses next trip (see prev. comments about not using the 300 much).
3) shipping my tripod I remove the centre column and pack both parts in my duffle bag (a lot handier than regular luggage) and pad the tripod with shoes and jackets.
4) Don't forget to put prominent numbers or letters on CF cards so you never have to wonder whether the one in your left hand is the one just out of the camera or the one that is ready to go in. I had two new ones purchased just before I went and didn't get round to labelling them.
5) Carry extra lens caps - I left one in my other jacket at one point - it was so easy to just reach in and grab an extra one.
6) Despite best intentions, occasionally lens caps fall off in the bag and without a uv filter you risk damaging your lens - I have finally broken down and invested in UV filters for my two expensive zooms.
7) I have the camera set up for sequential numbering of pictures since I bought the camera - but I have noticed that several times my Canon 1Ds2 forgets where it was and uses a completely erronious and previously used number for the picture - which means that when all the images were dumped into the same folder from this one trip, there were duplicates - I had to know this so I would not lose the non identical duplicates - which were from a different part of the shoot - have no idea how this came to be and not happy about it - just be aware that when copying the images to your hard drive, if it warns you about already being there - it may not be that you copied that folder already, it may in fact be two different images with the same sequence number.
8) One problem I haven't found a solution for other than being methodical and careful - when images are stored on the CF cards, the card holds a folder which holds a folder which holds the images - don't really see why this is necessary but is there some painless way to fetch the images without going through all those subfolders? I fear I will miss one folder in the process of transferring things over (I did and only noticed it by checking the continuity of sequence numbers on the images - there was a sudden jump and I found an entire folder of 100 images I'd missed. There has to be a better way - perhaps that is something that Lightroom or Aperture will address, or maybe I only have the problem because I'm too cheap to buy cataloguing software.
9) Zooms aren't just handy, they are essential if you want to avoid cropping.
10) having learned by hard experience, always zip up your backpack camera bag after changing lenses, that way when several minutes later and you quickly grab the backpack to move camera positions, you don't end up having the lenses roll out. It also keeps the interior of the bag cleaner, free from salt spray, etc.
11) the least speck of dust on my 17-40 front element shows up in the picture either as a spot or as flare (the joys of lots of depth of field and a wide view that is prone to flare) so every time you mount the lens, check for dust and clean as needed.
12) when cleaning, never ever use any kind of compressed gas - they all sometimes spray gunk on your lenses or even worse your sensors - for lenses use a brush and if need be lens cleaning tissue, for sensors, the spinning sensor brush.
13) Never assume the weather isn't right for pictures - it can change, either by location (cars can move faster than clouds sometimes) or simply over the time it takes you to drive or hike to the location. Remember that for every time you go out and just before the shot the weather goes wrong, there are other times it finally turns right. Seems like most cities claim they have the fastest changing weather. Sometimes it works FOR you.
14) the little things that slightly spoil an image and you think maybe it will be ok - trust me - it won't - anything that is slightly noticeable through the viewfinder is a gobsmacker in print - move on.
15) the harder I have to work to make a picture, the less likely the picture is worth taking. I don't want this to be an excuse for laziness, but looking back at 1500 pictures, the ones where I went wow, then spent 10 minutes to show it to best advantage, turned out a lot better than the ones where I worked really hard to put a bunch of elements in themselves less than exciting into a pattern which was somehow supposed to make up for the lack of wow-factor in the first place - it never does - makes me wonder why I keep trying. There's a reason you had to work so hard, you had so little to start with.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
First Efforts From Vancouver Island
The first two images take advanage of my 90 ts-e lens to tilt for change of the plane of focus to correspond to the scene, thus ensuring adequate depth.
The third image used a 9 image blend run through Helicon Focus to get adequate depth of field as there was no single plane of focus that even if I could have tilted the right way would have worked. In fact the nearest part of the stum was about six inches from the lens, the furthest about four feet. While Helicon Focus doesn't always work (at least without laborious editing of the masks, in this case it worked absolutely perfectly right 'out of the box'. No other technique would have worked at all, never mind as well.
Monday, October 09, 2006
On Flying And Photographing
Had a chance to charter a float plane from which to photograph. It was a mixed experience and in the end probably not worth the expence - I'd do things a little differently in the future - keep in mind this is after photographing from a balloon in the past with a fair amount of success.
I decded beforehand that I'd use the 70-200 2.8 IS lens. They offered to remove the door for me or alternatively I could open the window (hinges at top and the wind holds it open). I opted for the latter because the float blocked my view downwards so having the door off didn't seem worth the trouble to me - probably a good decision though it does raise the limitations of using a float plane at all as I couldn't shoot straight down - I guess I could have had the pilot loop round again and bank steeply at the appropriate moment but I couldn't even see straight down never mind shoot so one would have to anticpate something worth shooting - I'm not that clever.
For the kind of work I do - patterns, shapes, lines, shooting down was sorely missed - shooting into the distance meant the images didn't have that graphic look I like to achieve.
After takeoff I popped open the window, stuck out my camera and found out I could not keep the lens hood on - catches the wind too much - this turned out to be a bit of a problem since half the time we seemed to be flying into the sun (the joys of spending the other half flying the other direction and wanting to get home again) (going 90 degrees wasn't an option since that would have taken us out over the ocean).
Though I haven't had a chance to look at the images - just checking with the LCD on the camera and max. magnify seems to indicate the images are sharp enough - actually very impressive considering the hand holding, low ei (I chose 200 as a compromise between shadow noise on my 1Ds2 and adequate shutter speed).
I had the camera on program mode exposure and somehow managed several times to change the exposure compensation - I thought changes were made deliberately hard to make on the 1Ds2 - anyway something to watch for in the future. No time to check historgrams when you are flying.
At one point I actually had the lens fall off the camera - fortunately I was able to hold onto it - but a bit of a scare - seems I was gripping the lens close to the camera body and had accidentally pressed the lens release buttton on the body with the palm of my hand - never done that before and hardly the time to start doing it.
Focal length selection on the 70-200 was just about ideal for flying. The one really cool thing to see (flying over a glacier) happened just as I filled my first CF card and had to reach back to the camera bag for the next one - which then had to be formatted - right next time have the next card preformatted and in a handy but safe pocket. This might be the one time that a really large CF card makes sense (I was using 2 GB cards - not wanting all my eggs in one basket normally).
Fortunately the pilot obligingly went round again for me and I might have a good image.
The flight was an hour long, cost me $500 and was of the right length. The strut coming up from the body of the plane to the wing overhead cut into my view a little but wasn't in fact as much trouble as I had anticipated beforehand as it's in front of the door.
Looking through the images, there are no obvious winners and a few that might make something worth while - probably not a good investment in hind sight. It would have been better if there had been a specific shot I wanted that I knew would work if only I could capture it - as it was it was 'a fishing expedition' all be it in the air - we simply flew over the scenic points - mountains, shore line, islands, surf - and hoped for a worthwhile image. As this was what I'd done ballooning I had similar hopes here and came away a bit disappointed - perhaps i was luckier ballooning than I had realized - can't tell since have only done it once.
I remember taking the harbour tour by boat in Vancouver knowing as I went ashore that I had two really good images - no such luck this time.
I decded beforehand that I'd use the 70-200 2.8 IS lens. They offered to remove the door for me or alternatively I could open the window (hinges at top and the wind holds it open). I opted for the latter because the float blocked my view downwards so having the door off didn't seem worth the trouble to me - probably a good decision though it does raise the limitations of using a float plane at all as I couldn't shoot straight down - I guess I could have had the pilot loop round again and bank steeply at the appropriate moment but I couldn't even see straight down never mind shoot so one would have to anticpate something worth shooting - I'm not that clever.
For the kind of work I do - patterns, shapes, lines, shooting down was sorely missed - shooting into the distance meant the images didn't have that graphic look I like to achieve.
After takeoff I popped open the window, stuck out my camera and found out I could not keep the lens hood on - catches the wind too much - this turned out to be a bit of a problem since half the time we seemed to be flying into the sun (the joys of spending the other half flying the other direction and wanting to get home again) (going 90 degrees wasn't an option since that would have taken us out over the ocean).
Though I haven't had a chance to look at the images - just checking with the LCD on the camera and max. magnify seems to indicate the images are sharp enough - actually very impressive considering the hand holding, low ei (I chose 200 as a compromise between shadow noise on my 1Ds2 and adequate shutter speed).
I had the camera on program mode exposure and somehow managed several times to change the exposure compensation - I thought changes were made deliberately hard to make on the 1Ds2 - anyway something to watch for in the future. No time to check historgrams when you are flying.
At one point I actually had the lens fall off the camera - fortunately I was able to hold onto it - but a bit of a scare - seems I was gripping the lens close to the camera body and had accidentally pressed the lens release buttton on the body with the palm of my hand - never done that before and hardly the time to start doing it.
Focal length selection on the 70-200 was just about ideal for flying. The one really cool thing to see (flying over a glacier) happened just as I filled my first CF card and had to reach back to the camera bag for the next one - which then had to be formatted - right next time have the next card preformatted and in a handy but safe pocket. This might be the one time that a really large CF card makes sense (I was using 2 GB cards - not wanting all my eggs in one basket normally).
Fortunately the pilot obligingly went round again for me and I might have a good image.
The flight was an hour long, cost me $500 and was of the right length. The strut coming up from the body of the plane to the wing overhead cut into my view a little but wasn't in fact as much trouble as I had anticipated beforehand as it's in front of the door.
Looking through the images, there are no obvious winners and a few that might make something worth while - probably not a good investment in hind sight. It would have been better if there had been a specific shot I wanted that I knew would work if only I could capture it - as it was it was 'a fishing expedition' all be it in the air - we simply flew over the scenic points - mountains, shore line, islands, surf - and hoped for a worthwhile image. As this was what I'd done ballooning I had similar hopes here and came away a bit disappointed - perhaps i was luckier ballooning than I had realized - can't tell since have only done it once.
I remember taking the harbour tour by boat in Vancouver knowing as I went ashore that I had two really good images - no such luck this time.
Last Day Of Holidays-Finally Internet Access
If I hold the computer up just so and keep my knees crossed, I can mostly get wireless connected. Have been shooting every day - thumbing though the images on my Epson 2000 (forgot to pack the connector for the 2000 to the computer so most of the images exist only on the portable drive - sigh and hope...
If only I could skip all the crap images and concentrate on the few out of hundreds of images which are winners - then I could shoot with an 8X10 - but I know me - if I were slowed down that much, I'd spend all my time working on marginal images trying to make them work - moving the camera around, changing lenses, tilting, shifting, rotating the back, hoping for better light, for a miracle.
It would mean I'd never get to the few keepers I have managed to find. As it is most have been shot with my new 24-70 or less often the 70-200 (a reverse of my usual lens use) and a fair number have been taken with my 90 ts-e.
I could really have used a 45 ts-e and can see purchasing that at some point in the future.
Here's a breakdown of my lenses I carried and how much I used them on this trip to the west coast of Vancouver Island then on to Hornby Island on the other side of Vancouver island (no surf, incredible rocks).
17-24 - now only used at 17 since i have the sharper 24-70 - used it a dozen or so times - definitely still useful - but since I only use the 17 would make sense to replace it some day with a sharper lens.
24-70 - shot about 1/2 of the images, relying on stopping down to f16 for adequate depth of field at the wide end and shooting multiple images with changing focus for future blending at the longer focal lengths (either manually or with Helicon Focus).
90 ts-e - used about 1/5 of the time - often as a three image stitch using both tilt and shift left and right for a square image of 25 MP.
70-200 - about 1/5 of the time - just the nature of the kind of scenery I was photographing and problems of getting adequate depth of field - at the coast things are near to far - not uniformly medium distance.
300 - took a few snapshots of the surf but basically didn't need it - would remove it in the future - perhaps even sell it - but it's so darn sharp - we'll see.
Lenses I wish I'd had - just the other two ts-e tilt and shift lenses - or an 8X10 camera - or if I ever win the lottery, a medium format view camera and medium format digital back - hey I can dream can't I?
If only I could skip all the crap images and concentrate on the few out of hundreds of images which are winners - then I could shoot with an 8X10 - but I know me - if I were slowed down that much, I'd spend all my time working on marginal images trying to make them work - moving the camera around, changing lenses, tilting, shifting, rotating the back, hoping for better light, for a miracle.
It would mean I'd never get to the few keepers I have managed to find. As it is most have been shot with my new 24-70 or less often the 70-200 (a reverse of my usual lens use) and a fair number have been taken with my 90 ts-e.
I could really have used a 45 ts-e and can see purchasing that at some point in the future.
Here's a breakdown of my lenses I carried and how much I used them on this trip to the west coast of Vancouver Island then on to Hornby Island on the other side of Vancouver island (no surf, incredible rocks).
17-24 - now only used at 17 since i have the sharper 24-70 - used it a dozen or so times - definitely still useful - but since I only use the 17 would make sense to replace it some day with a sharper lens.
24-70 - shot about 1/2 of the images, relying on stopping down to f16 for adequate depth of field at the wide end and shooting multiple images with changing focus for future blending at the longer focal lengths (either manually or with Helicon Focus).
90 ts-e - used about 1/5 of the time - often as a three image stitch using both tilt and shift left and right for a square image of 25 MP.
70-200 - about 1/5 of the time - just the nature of the kind of scenery I was photographing and problems of getting adequate depth of field - at the coast things are near to far - not uniformly medium distance.
300 - took a few snapshots of the surf but basically didn't need it - would remove it in the future - perhaps even sell it - but it's so darn sharp - we'll see.
Lenses I wish I'd had - just the other two ts-e tilt and shift lenses - or an 8X10 camera - or if I ever win the lottery, a medium format view camera and medium format digital back - hey I can dream can't I?
Friday, September 29, 2006
Midday In The Forest
Arrived on Vancouver Island this morning and this afternoon stopped at Cathedral Grove - a preserved old grown forest with trees 12 feet in diameter, ferns below and decaying stumps lying around. It was midday and the sun was pouring through the canopy and for the most part made things way too contrasty - at one point I was exposing for 30 seconds at f16 - fortunately for a burned stump in the shade, but the sunlit ferns needed f16 at 1/60 - 11 stops difference.
My plan is to go back this evening if convenient to my wife or very early tomorrow morning before breakfast.
Cheers.
My plan is to go back this evening if convenient to my wife or very early tomorrow morning before breakfast.
Cheers.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Photo Excursion
I'm off to Tofino to photograph for 10 days. Not sure what connection if any there will be for updating the web blog but will certainly try.
Tofino is located half way up the Pacific Ocean facing outside edge of Vancouver Island, north of Seattle, west of Vancouver, home of miles of unspoiled beach, first growth forrest, whales, fishing villiages and other interesting photo subjects - besides it isn't near work!
Take care and good shooting till I get back to you.
Decided For Good Zooms Over Primes After All
It was no easy decision but I finally went for the 70-200 2.8 L IS
Reasons included:
I rented one last year for Vancouver Harbour and am hoping to photograph from small plane while in Tofino, also poss. whale watching, etc. where IS would be helpful. Tests suggested that it is significantly sharper than the 70-200 f4 in the corners and in fact is quite decent wide open (which the f 4 never was).
I quite often find myself in positions that I simply cannot move forward or backwards to crop by position so using a series of fixed focal length lenses is necessarily going to involve up to 20% cropping and will more than use up any sharpness advantage of primes. For when the focal length is spot on - well I guess I'll miss the prime, but I have to consider the total use pattern.
Anything that slows down the photography is going to cost me lost shots - contrary to the generally accepted view of landscapes taking time - I often have seconds to get a shot.
I remember all too well changing and rechanging lenses trying to find the ideal composition - that's a waste of time and increases dust exposure with each change.
I have found that very frequently that when I see a really good composition, that turns out to be absolutely the exact right spot to shoot from and any close or further while possible more often than not does not result in as good an image. Zooms let me nail that first shot, then I can move around looking to improve the shot if I have time, light, wind, etc. to do so.
I could certainly have purchased several primes for what I paid for the 70-200 2.8 L IS so we will have to see whether I made the right choice over time. It may even be that with the next generation 1D camera at 22 MP+ that only primes will be able to take advanage of its resolution, but I can't afford to replace my camera so it's a moot point for the forseeable future.
I sell my photographs and I have made good money with the lenses I already have, including the f4 70-200 which I will now send to Canon to have checked. I note that something rattles in it - nothing rattles in the new lens, hmmm...
I also settled on the 24-70 2.8 - I wanted the sexier IS 24-105 with it's better focal length range but at enough different focal lengths the 24-70 was significantly better than the 24-105 (including 85 and 105 compared to the 70-200)that it did not make sense for me. I'm going to miss that IS for handheld work - how often do I hand hold? - well there was that shot three years ago I think...
Picked up a 10 stop ND filter for these two lenses for my trip to the coast - one could argue that lots of people have done time exposures of the waves - but I haven't and I might still come up with a unique picture - and besides - I have always liked that etherial look so what the hell - I mostly photograph for myself.
Reasons included:
I rented one last year for Vancouver Harbour and am hoping to photograph from small plane while in Tofino, also poss. whale watching, etc. where IS would be helpful. Tests suggested that it is significantly sharper than the 70-200 f4 in the corners and in fact is quite decent wide open (which the f 4 never was).
I quite often find myself in positions that I simply cannot move forward or backwards to crop by position so using a series of fixed focal length lenses is necessarily going to involve up to 20% cropping and will more than use up any sharpness advantage of primes. For when the focal length is spot on - well I guess I'll miss the prime, but I have to consider the total use pattern.
Anything that slows down the photography is going to cost me lost shots - contrary to the generally accepted view of landscapes taking time - I often have seconds to get a shot.
I remember all too well changing and rechanging lenses trying to find the ideal composition - that's a waste of time and increases dust exposure with each change.
I have found that very frequently that when I see a really good composition, that turns out to be absolutely the exact right spot to shoot from and any close or further while possible more often than not does not result in as good an image. Zooms let me nail that first shot, then I can move around looking to improve the shot if I have time, light, wind, etc. to do so.
I could certainly have purchased several primes for what I paid for the 70-200 2.8 L IS so we will have to see whether I made the right choice over time. It may even be that with the next generation 1D camera at 22 MP+ that only primes will be able to take advanage of its resolution, but I can't afford to replace my camera so it's a moot point for the forseeable future.
I sell my photographs and I have made good money with the lenses I already have, including the f4 70-200 which I will now send to Canon to have checked. I note that something rattles in it - nothing rattles in the new lens, hmmm...
I also settled on the 24-70 2.8 - I wanted the sexier IS 24-105 with it's better focal length range but at enough different focal lengths the 24-70 was significantly better than the 24-105 (including 85 and 105 compared to the 70-200)that it did not make sense for me. I'm going to miss that IS for handheld work - how often do I hand hold? - well there was that shot three years ago I think...
Picked up a 10 stop ND filter for these two lenses for my trip to the coast - one could argue that lots of people have done time exposures of the waves - but I haven't and I might still come up with a unique picture - and besides - I have always liked that etherial look so what the hell - I mostly photograph for myself.
Amazing Canon Lens Test Site
Have visited The Digital Picture before for the text reviews and comments on resolution, but check out the ansi test chart image comparisions, you get to pick two lenses, set the focal length (if a zoom) and the fstop and by running your mouse over the image it changes from the test image from the left selection to that of the right - incredible.
As a landscape photographer I have almost no use for wide apertures - all my shots are done at f11 if I can get away with it and more often f16 as the greatest depth of field without running into ruinous diffractio problems. Finally I can test this - guess what I found.
Even at f16, almost all the L primes are better than the L zooms - enough so in many cases to make me rethink my lens purchases. I was almost ready to get one of the 70-200 L zooms to replace my dropped one - but maybe I'd be better off with a 135 and 200 mm. lens, a 1.4 extender to replace my 300 that doesn't get used often. If I'm shooting from a balloon though, IS and zoom sure are handy - and I hope to do some flying while in Tofino - zoom would be useful there too - sigh - no perfect answer - but at least the website above answers my questions better than any site I have visited so far. Highly recommended.
As a landscape photographer I have almost no use for wide apertures - all my shots are done at f11 if I can get away with it and more often f16 as the greatest depth of field without running into ruinous diffractio problems. Finally I can test this - guess what I found.
Even at f16, almost all the L primes are better than the L zooms - enough so in many cases to make me rethink my lens purchases. I was almost ready to get one of the 70-200 L zooms to replace my dropped one - but maybe I'd be better off with a 135 and 200 mm. lens, a 1.4 extender to replace my 300 that doesn't get used often. If I'm shooting from a balloon though, IS and zoom sure are handy - and I hope to do some flying while in Tofino - zoom would be useful there too - sigh - no perfect answer - but at least the website above answers my questions better than any site I have visited so far. Highly recommended.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Zoom Or Prime?
Upper left corner, 17-40 L Canon @ f16
Do you struggle to decide whether to go the convenience of zooms or the sharpness of single focal lengths. According to some articles, the war has been won by the zooms and resolution stopped down is now so close to good primes that the only reason for primes is if you shoot low light or sports.
For some time I have been unhappy with the corners of my images - reviews describe the corners as sharp, or slightly soft, I'd describe them as downright terrible. Oddly most disappointing has been my 70-200 Lf4 - though I have to confess I dropped it.
One defect of the current rage of backpack camera bags is that when you pick them up, the stuff automatically falls out. Unfortunately I happened to be standing on the concrete abuttment of a railway bridge over water at the time. Fortunately it rolled out of the bag as I picked it up, hitting the concrete but not actually smashing - in fact apparently no damage at all - and most importantly as it rolled to the edge of the concrete, I stopped it first. At that time I was shooting 10D and since then have graduated to full frame and notice that corners just aren't all that sharp - is this a feature of the lens (not shown by the frame cropping of the 10D, or did the lens not quite survive the fall. Oddly it's still plenty sharp at the centre and all four corners seem equally fuzzy so things still seem aligned.
Of concern is that what if the lens isn't damaged and this is just what it provides and everyone else is oohing and ahing about centre resolution or even edges but not corners - not sure I buy this arguement - some review specifically test the corners (eg SLRGear ) and that isn't what they are seeing.
Had a good look at the canon published mtf curves at Canon and the MTF curve for the 17-40 shows exactly what I was seeing - great centre resolution - terrible corner resolution - suggesting that the MTF curves could in fact be used for useful comparison.
In case you don't do a lot of MTF peeking, on Canon's site, the heavy solid blue line represents contrast at low frequency stopped down to f8 - and probably is your best guide to overall resolution. The heavy black line represents contrast wide open. The other lines refer to resolution (measured as MTF contrast in other directions of measurement - frankly I can't remember which is sagital and which radial and frankly it doesn't really matter. The ideal lens would be a perfect straight line across at 1 for all the lines. If you look at the MTF for the 135 you see just how close you can get to that. MTF curves don't measure at f16 so say absolutely nothing about problems of diffraction. My own experience is that resolution at f16 is a touch down from f8 and can be mostly hidden by a touch extra sharpening. The same cannot be said for smaller f stops on my full frame camera.
Testing the 17-40 has shown me that corners never get sharp and though I had indicated I could live with fuzzy corners because of cropping or stitching - some recent work where I needed the full 17 mm. wide meant I couldn't throw away the corners.
Anyway, I now have a 17-40 with fuzzy corners (and great central resolution), a probably defective 70-200.
I am in the process of figuring out what to do to replace the lenses. I tested a 135 f2 - very sharp but it's main characteristic is that it is sharp right from f2 - which as a landscape photographer I don't have any use for. I also tested the 24-70 - significantly fuzzy corners at 24 mm. but decent at 35 mm. and just plain excellent at 50 and 70 mm.
I'm wondering about the 70-200 f4L IS when it comes out in November - again I really don't need f.8 shooting landscapes- but a couple of times could have used the IS -= Vancouver Harbour and ballooning. I'm off on a major excursion on Friday though so have to come up with a solution this week - sigh.
I carry a beautifully sharp 300 f4L lens but seldom use it and only once have used it with a 1.4 extender - hardly worth the trouble of carrying it. The 70-300 is unaceptably fuzzy in the corners from examples I have seen so that isn't an option. Everyone raves about the 70-200 f2.8 L IS - but perhaps everyone isn't as fussy as me. Still, worth a test and I'm going to do so tomorrow.
Just to complicate matters it's been suggested that I test three different lenses to see which is sharpest - that's a bit scary, for a $2000 lens.
By the way - the f8 corner was even fuzzier - even though depth of field should not have been an issue at 17 mm.
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Eventually I'll Get It Right
More images from Jura Canyon - I'm convinced this place is going to produce a really gorgeous image, but so far technical problems plague my efforts. I need huge depth of field and have been using Helicon focus with mixed results - as things stand I can make a simple edit to the opcacity mask in Photoshop but as you no longer see the image, it's less than ideal and without edited masks it isn't doing a great blend. (if this comment makes no sense, see prev. reports on Helicon Focus). My 17-40 with it's soft corners was giving me grief so I have borrowed a 24-70 - not ideal testing circumstances since the corners are so much nearer you can't comment about sharpness - will test properly this week.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
On Choosing A Format
As someone who has struggled over the years to figure out the ideal format with which to shoot black and white landscapes, perhaps there's a lesson here.
First, this is a wonderful time to try a different format of film camera - medium and large format cameras can be had at very reasonable prices and where in the past converting a darkroom to handle larger film was often prohibitively expensive, now you can get 4X5 enlargers for a song. The other day I was offered a horizontal 8X10 enlarger for free - mind you it needed a large room and weighed several hundred pounds and would need an army to move, but still...
Medium Format
There are huge choices of cameras, from 645 to 6X6 to 6X7 and 6X9 cm. Film is still readily available, processing is simple and the quality jump from 35 mm. is huge and well worth the trouble. Medium format can be scanned well with a relatively inexpensive flat bed scanner such as the Epson 4990.
Downsides are the relative lack of zooms and if you insist on Hasselblad lenses, the expense. Let me recommend the Bronica SQ-A as a lovely 6X6 camera with an excellent series of lenses while being reasonably priced on e-bay. Even if you are not enamoured of the square format, the business of flopping the camera over on its side for vertical images is a pain and I would still recommend the 6X6 camera.
You have lots of choice - rangefinder, folding, compact, slr, rotating back, bellows, waist level etc., developing tanks can still handle multiple reels. The majority of my good work over the years has been medium format, starting with the folding Zeiss Ikonta to Yashicamat 124, Mamiya Press, Hasselblad, and Bronica.
Personally I detest rangefinder cameras for landscape - the framing just isn't accurate enough for me. Others really appreciate the reduced weight and bulk of these cameras and certainly the Mamiya 6 and 7 probably have the sharpest lenses available.
Large Format
I got my start by borrowing the local newspaper's Crown Graphic 4X5 they weren't using any more. While its tempting to reject it for the lack of movements and lack of rotating back, truth is that for the majority of landscape work it is all you really need. Forward lens tilt happened when you depressed the bed of the camera (which by the way works better than tilting the lens as it keeps the image circle closer to centred on the film meaning you need less coverage. To my surprise the littly 135 mm. Optar was in fact quite a sharp lens if you didn't use the shift. The camera is solidly made, very light and by folding within itself, well protected for tossing in a backpack. I had a tele-xenar 360 with compound shutter which was quite sharp - it did need a good lenshood to protect it from flare but at 1/5 the price of other telephoto lenses...
I found the Angulon 90 mm. wide angle very disappointing - edge sharpness is terrible - and I had one of the Technica supposedly pick of the litter ones.
In my time I have owned Toyo C - plastic standards actually move and stay out of alignment - Wisner Traditional - sloppy fit so that it doesn't set up square either - buy boy, it sure was pretty - original Zone VI (Tachihara? or Wista) that I unaffectionately referred to as 'old shakey' - a variety of Technikas - and my all time favourite, my 1950's Color Kardan (see my review on Large Format Photography).
People say they like the slow contemplative style of large format, frankkly I never understood - I am very slow with my DSLR and couldn't work fast enough with my view camera - landscape lighting often changes and the ideal light is fleeting. Wind which was non existent as you stopped the car, comes up just as you pull out the dark slide. I always aimed for a large format system that was the most comfortable and natural working and had no vices which slowed me down.
The real reason to go for large format is either you need tilts or you need a the biggest damn negative you can afford and carry equipment for. If you are printing wet , then you might also want it to correct verticals, if scanning and printing inkjet, then I'd correct verticals in Photoshop. Of course there is an image associated with being a large format photographer - people take you more seriously - you get to work with cool equipment and do arcane things, strangers stop to talk to you (whether you want them to or not).
First, this is a wonderful time to try a different format of film camera - medium and large format cameras can be had at very reasonable prices and where in the past converting a darkroom to handle larger film was often prohibitively expensive, now you can get 4X5 enlargers for a song. The other day I was offered a horizontal 8X10 enlarger for free - mind you it needed a large room and weighed several hundred pounds and would need an army to move, but still...
Medium Format
There are huge choices of cameras, from 645 to 6X6 to 6X7 and 6X9 cm. Film is still readily available, processing is simple and the quality jump from 35 mm. is huge and well worth the trouble. Medium format can be scanned well with a relatively inexpensive flat bed scanner such as the Epson 4990.
Downsides are the relative lack of zooms and if you insist on Hasselblad lenses, the expense. Let me recommend the Bronica SQ-A as a lovely 6X6 camera with an excellent series of lenses while being reasonably priced on e-bay. Even if you are not enamoured of the square format, the business of flopping the camera over on its side for vertical images is a pain and I would still recommend the 6X6 camera.
You have lots of choice - rangefinder, folding, compact, slr, rotating back, bellows, waist level etc., developing tanks can still handle multiple reels. The majority of my good work over the years has been medium format, starting with the folding Zeiss Ikonta to Yashicamat 124, Mamiya Press, Hasselblad, and Bronica.
Personally I detest rangefinder cameras for landscape - the framing just isn't accurate enough for me. Others really appreciate the reduced weight and bulk of these cameras and certainly the Mamiya 6 and 7 probably have the sharpest lenses available.
Large Format
I got my start by borrowing the local newspaper's Crown Graphic 4X5 they weren't using any more. While its tempting to reject it for the lack of movements and lack of rotating back, truth is that for the majority of landscape work it is all you really need. Forward lens tilt happened when you depressed the bed of the camera (which by the way works better than tilting the lens as it keeps the image circle closer to centred on the film meaning you need less coverage. To my surprise the littly 135 mm. Optar was in fact quite a sharp lens if you didn't use the shift. The camera is solidly made, very light and by folding within itself, well protected for tossing in a backpack. I had a tele-xenar 360 with compound shutter which was quite sharp - it did need a good lenshood to protect it from flare but at 1/5 the price of other telephoto lenses...
I found the Angulon 90 mm. wide angle very disappointing - edge sharpness is terrible - and I had one of the Technica supposedly pick of the litter ones.
In my time I have owned Toyo C - plastic standards actually move and stay out of alignment - Wisner Traditional - sloppy fit so that it doesn't set up square either - buy boy, it sure was pretty - original Zone VI (Tachihara? or Wista) that I unaffectionately referred to as 'old shakey' - a variety of Technikas - and my all time favourite, my 1950's Color Kardan (see my review on Large Format Photography).
People say they like the slow contemplative style of large format, frankkly I never understood - I am very slow with my DSLR and couldn't work fast enough with my view camera - landscape lighting often changes and the ideal light is fleeting. Wind which was non existent as you stopped the car, comes up just as you pull out the dark slide. I always aimed for a large format system that was the most comfortable and natural working and had no vices which slowed me down.
The real reason to go for large format is either you need tilts or you need a the biggest damn negative you can afford and carry equipment for. If you are printing wet , then you might also want it to correct verticals, if scanning and printing inkjet, then I'd correct verticals in Photoshop. Of course there is an image associated with being a large format photographer - people take you more seriously - you get to work with cool equipment and do arcane things, strangers stop to talk to you (whether you want them to or not).
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Scouting Old Files
From 2003 - four images stitched, Banff, Alberta, Bow River, Akvis Enhancer toned down to about 20 percent of the effect. This can be done either immediately after using fade under the edit menu in Photoshop, or it can be done by duplicating the image in anoher layer, applying Enhancer to the upper layer, then decreasing opcacity of that layer, or even creating a mask so it can be toned down locally. The latter method has the advantage of being adjustable later on - fade only works immediately after the filter is applied and cannot be adjusted once applied. Fortunately it comes with a slider so you can select the amount you want.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Failures Beyond Our Control
OK, so last time I emphasized the failures that are technical or at least subject to some fairly simple do's and don'ts. What about the bigger frustration of you go out for a shoot, you do your best, you don't make any mistakes, yet what you come home with is crap?
Perhaps this hasn't happened to you but over the years it sure has happened to me - though it happens less often than it used to so perhaps I can offer some useful thoughts.
The first thing is that photographic excursions do sometimes result in crap. If you are photographing 2 or 3 times a month, the occaional complete failure isn't a big deal - if you only get out 5 times a year, you 'need' every trip to be successful - this is probably unrealistic, so if you are frustrated it may simply be that you are giving yourself too few opportunities.
The second problem is that sometimes we really force it - we're desperate to get out and photograph, yet perhaps we're tired, stressed, distracted and definitely not inspired. We go 'cruzen fer snaps' in the vain hope that inspiration will strike somewhere down the backroads. Without a specific project or destination in mind, the odds of success are not great and it is a recipe for frustration. Of course, even knowing that nothing has inspired us, we take out our cameras at every hint of an opportunity and ignoring all the reasons the pictures won't be great, blast away, or spend hours lining up a basically mediocre shot. Is is a surprise that when we review the proof sheets (digital or real), we are disappointed?
The solution here is either to only photograph at interesting places or to give yourself an assignment - say a portfolio of 12 images of XXX, whatever XXX might be - it could be back alleys, garbage cans, insects, cutlery, 11 year olds, hockey or whatever. Having given yourself an assignment, the ojbect is to photogrpah the subject the best way possible, not to create a 'great work of art' and I think it takes some of the pressure off.
What about the times that the subject matter is interesting, something you care about, even get excited about, but the results are disappointing? It could be that the excitement itself is actually interfering with your discriminatory skills - it's so good how could you take a bad photograph of it - trust me, it's easy. Perhaps it's so good others have been there before you and the pressure is to say something different about it. Sometimes it's worth getting the 'classic' shot out of the way first, then work on saying something new.
One of the 'techniques' I have developed since going digital is to 'overkill' the site. Instead of finding the few good shots and spending an hour setting up the view camera, I will work the scene. Everytime I take a picture, I then see if I can't improve on it. You might ask why not find the best position first then take a single image, but that just hasn't worked for me. In the field I often have multiple choices which seem equally good and I'm simply not sure which is going to work better in the print. Once the images are in the computer however, it's obvious that most of the shots aren't nearly as good as one or two and I realize that had I quit after the first 'good' image, I would have come home with nothing.
This is not to say that we should shot gun away - I carry round my neck a 2X3 cutout in plastic that I use as a framing device. I check to see if there is a better position than my first one. That said, I'm surprised at how often the thing that grabbed me is only or best photographed from exactly the position at which I first saw the image. Uusally I will shoot from that first position and then move on to improve it if possible.
It pays to analyse the scene. What makes it worth photographing - is the colour, the shapes, the receding lines, is it age, texture, opposites, or balance. Is there a way to photograph it to take what caught your attention and emphasize it?
After all that, there is still a good chance that what you saw didn't translate into a great photograph - we need to be prepared to deal with disappointment. Some shoots just don't work out. Some things which look wonderful in the real world don't translate to photographs - you really 'had to be there'. So you remind yourself you enjoyed being there, and you move on.
Perhaps this hasn't happened to you but over the years it sure has happened to me - though it happens less often than it used to so perhaps I can offer some useful thoughts.
The first thing is that photographic excursions do sometimes result in crap. If you are photographing 2 or 3 times a month, the occaional complete failure isn't a big deal - if you only get out 5 times a year, you 'need' every trip to be successful - this is probably unrealistic, so if you are frustrated it may simply be that you are giving yourself too few opportunities.
The second problem is that sometimes we really force it - we're desperate to get out and photograph, yet perhaps we're tired, stressed, distracted and definitely not inspired. We go 'cruzen fer snaps' in the vain hope that inspiration will strike somewhere down the backroads. Without a specific project or destination in mind, the odds of success are not great and it is a recipe for frustration. Of course, even knowing that nothing has inspired us, we take out our cameras at every hint of an opportunity and ignoring all the reasons the pictures won't be great, blast away, or spend hours lining up a basically mediocre shot. Is is a surprise that when we review the proof sheets (digital or real), we are disappointed?
The solution here is either to only photograph at interesting places or to give yourself an assignment - say a portfolio of 12 images of XXX, whatever XXX might be - it could be back alleys, garbage cans, insects, cutlery, 11 year olds, hockey or whatever. Having given yourself an assignment, the ojbect is to photogrpah the subject the best way possible, not to create a 'great work of art' and I think it takes some of the pressure off.
What about the times that the subject matter is interesting, something you care about, even get excited about, but the results are disappointing? It could be that the excitement itself is actually interfering with your discriminatory skills - it's so good how could you take a bad photograph of it - trust me, it's easy. Perhaps it's so good others have been there before you and the pressure is to say something different about it. Sometimes it's worth getting the 'classic' shot out of the way first, then work on saying something new.
One of the 'techniques' I have developed since going digital is to 'overkill' the site. Instead of finding the few good shots and spending an hour setting up the view camera, I will work the scene. Everytime I take a picture, I then see if I can't improve on it. You might ask why not find the best position first then take a single image, but that just hasn't worked for me. In the field I often have multiple choices which seem equally good and I'm simply not sure which is going to work better in the print. Once the images are in the computer however, it's obvious that most of the shots aren't nearly as good as one or two and I realize that had I quit after the first 'good' image, I would have come home with nothing.
This is not to say that we should shot gun away - I carry round my neck a 2X3 cutout in plastic that I use as a framing device. I check to see if there is a better position than my first one. That said, I'm surprised at how often the thing that grabbed me is only or best photographed from exactly the position at which I first saw the image. Uusally I will shoot from that first position and then move on to improve it if possible.
It pays to analyse the scene. What makes it worth photographing - is the colour, the shapes, the receding lines, is it age, texture, opposites, or balance. Is there a way to photograph it to take what caught your attention and emphasize it?
After all that, there is still a good chance that what you saw didn't translate into a great photograph - we need to be prepared to deal with disappointment. Some shoots just don't work out. Some things which look wonderful in the real world don't translate to photographs - you really 'had to be there'. So you remind yourself you enjoyed being there, and you move on.
Monday, September 18, 2006
Dealing With Failure
I think it's a given that we are going to fail at times, in fact often, nay regularly. Failure is the norm - All great photographers shoot more lemons than prizes. Perhaps though we can have a look at the kind of failures we have and learn something from it.
There are technical failures - of focussing, exposure, camera steadiness, forgetting to reset the ISO back to normal after doing a basketball game, etc.
There are equipment failures - lenses that aren't sharp into the corners, or suffer barrel distortion or cameras with not enough pixels, too much noise, etc., etc..
There are compositional errors (I don't mean you didn't compose a great picture, I mean the simple errors like the tree out of someone's head, the white against white so shapes don't show, the overlap of things that would have been better almost overlapping but not quite, the fact of not considering that in black and white two obviously different things won't separate because it's their colour that separates them.
There are processing errors - whether it be poor technique in the darkroom or careless backups resulting in erasing a cf card you hadn't stored yet.
The above are mistakes - they shouldn't happen but they do - a good photographer minimizes them. There are also failures which simply happen because despite your best efforts, it just doesn't quite work. Perhaps it was worth trying, maybe you should have realized it wasn't going to work - but predicting the great images is extremely difficult and no photographer ever got it right even 10% of the time.
It can be rewarding to look at the proofs of some of the great photographers - occasionally you see them published in magazines - some of their 'other shots' the ones that didn't become famous, are real dogs. Oh, they were properly exposed and focused and well developed, but you wouldn't thank them for a print.
The other day I had an assignment to photograph a particularly ugly new building for the local college. I took 177 images and from those selected about 8 to show them - but of course that wasn't good enough - they wanted to see all my images - even though I had selected the ones that were clearly the best. But they want to make their own choices. I didn't like the idea of them seeing all the images and heaven forbid they should select one of the ones that I was least pleased with.
I was out shooting at Jura canyon with a friend. I noted at the time that he seemed overly optimistic about his depth of field and subsequently he called to say that none of the images had turned out - all of them lacked enough depth of field.
This is a fairly easy fix - I found a depth of field calculator for him (there are lots of them on the net) and it clearly showed that he couldn't do what he was trying to do - not with that lens, not at f11, and not from that position. This is the kind of mistake we all make once, but there isn't really any good reason to continue making it. There are too many other mistakes we can make instead to double up on the same one.
So:
Lesson 1) lean from your mistakes - do something so the same mistakes are unlikely.
Lesson 2) Accept that despite perfect technique and a 'good eye' you are going to take a lot more throw aways than keepers.
Next time I'm going to address the more difficult subject of how to handle the second kind of failures - is it possible to minimize the failures - does it even matter (if you can afford the film or cf cards?
There are technical failures - of focussing, exposure, camera steadiness, forgetting to reset the ISO back to normal after doing a basketball game, etc.
There are equipment failures - lenses that aren't sharp into the corners, or suffer barrel distortion or cameras with not enough pixels, too much noise, etc., etc..
There are compositional errors (I don't mean you didn't compose a great picture, I mean the simple errors like the tree out of someone's head, the white against white so shapes don't show, the overlap of things that would have been better almost overlapping but not quite, the fact of not considering that in black and white two obviously different things won't separate because it's their colour that separates them.
There are processing errors - whether it be poor technique in the darkroom or careless backups resulting in erasing a cf card you hadn't stored yet.
The above are mistakes - they shouldn't happen but they do - a good photographer minimizes them. There are also failures which simply happen because despite your best efforts, it just doesn't quite work. Perhaps it was worth trying, maybe you should have realized it wasn't going to work - but predicting the great images is extremely difficult and no photographer ever got it right even 10% of the time.
It can be rewarding to look at the proofs of some of the great photographers - occasionally you see them published in magazines - some of their 'other shots' the ones that didn't become famous, are real dogs. Oh, they were properly exposed and focused and well developed, but you wouldn't thank them for a print.
The other day I had an assignment to photograph a particularly ugly new building for the local college. I took 177 images and from those selected about 8 to show them - but of course that wasn't good enough - they wanted to see all my images - even though I had selected the ones that were clearly the best. But they want to make their own choices. I didn't like the idea of them seeing all the images and heaven forbid they should select one of the ones that I was least pleased with.
I was out shooting at Jura canyon with a friend. I noted at the time that he seemed overly optimistic about his depth of field and subsequently he called to say that none of the images had turned out - all of them lacked enough depth of field.
This is a fairly easy fix - I found a depth of field calculator for him (there are lots of them on the net) and it clearly showed that he couldn't do what he was trying to do - not with that lens, not at f11, and not from that position. This is the kind of mistake we all make once, but there isn't really any good reason to continue making it. There are too many other mistakes we can make instead to double up on the same one.
So:
Lesson 1) lean from your mistakes - do something so the same mistakes are unlikely.
Lesson 2) Accept that despite perfect technique and a 'good eye' you are going to take a lot more throw aways than keepers.
Next time I'm going to address the more difficult subject of how to handle the second kind of failures - is it possible to minimize the failures - does it even matter (if you can afford the film or cf cards?
True Confessions - I Don't Photograph Every Day
one reads that dedicated photographers 'keep in practice' by using their cameras every day. I don't. Does this make me a) lazy, b) incompetent, c) less talented, or d) take substandard photographs?
I hope the answer is e) none of the above, but I don't really know. I suspect that I'm like a lot of photographers who have busy lives and other competing interests. Ansel was married, Edward had several wives, as well as lovers. Both had commercial work to complete much of which couldn't have done much to improve their skills as a photographer - I hear from commercial photographers that 90+% of their 'work' is selling themselves and only 10% at best is photographing. Some recent printing projects have certainly held that to be true for me so I suspect that in fact a very few people shoot every day and that fortunately the fact that I'm not one of them doesn't really penalize me.
It might be that this is more true for landscape work than for say street photography where fast reflexes and assured technique are essential.
Of course, the fact that I have photographed for 45 years doesn't hurt either. I would guess that the newer you are to photography the more often you need to shoot.
Consider though that a day not handling a camera isn't necessarily a day not seeing. I have found over the years that I often look at things photographically - for example, when out walking the dog, or driving the car.
And this doesn't take into consideration the hours I spend pouring over photographs, from magazines, books, on the net and elsewhere - even ads can be a learning experience. Occasionally movie camerammen have superb eyes for an image and would make top notch still photographers so even your TV watching could be argued as helpful.
I do think, though; that the photographer who only photographs on workshops or only on holidays or special trips and thus photographs no more often than half a dozen times a year, is handicapping him or herself.
I hope the answer is e) none of the above, but I don't really know. I suspect that I'm like a lot of photographers who have busy lives and other competing interests. Ansel was married, Edward had several wives, as well as lovers. Both had commercial work to complete much of which couldn't have done much to improve their skills as a photographer - I hear from commercial photographers that 90+% of their 'work' is selling themselves and only 10% at best is photographing. Some recent printing projects have certainly held that to be true for me so I suspect that in fact a very few people shoot every day and that fortunately the fact that I'm not one of them doesn't really penalize me.
It might be that this is more true for landscape work than for say street photography where fast reflexes and assured technique are essential.
Of course, the fact that I have photographed for 45 years doesn't hurt either. I would guess that the newer you are to photography the more often you need to shoot.
Consider though that a day not handling a camera isn't necessarily a day not seeing. I have found over the years that I often look at things photographically - for example, when out walking the dog, or driving the car.
And this doesn't take into consideration the hours I spend pouring over photographs, from magazines, books, on the net and elsewhere - even ads can be a learning experience. Occasionally movie camerammen have superb eyes for an image and would make top notch still photographers so even your TV watching could be argued as helpful.
I do think, though; that the photographer who only photographs on workshops or only on holidays or special trips and thus photographs no more often than half a dozen times a year, is handicapping him or herself.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
More From Dorothy, Alberta
In Photoshop I used Helicon Focus to combine two differently focused images (the near post is only a foot away), and for optimum results used the updated Akvis Enhancer 4.2 for optimum results. Oddly in saving for the net, the advantage of Enhancer didn't reproduce so I can only suggest you experiment with it - no more crashes which was my only previous reservation - definitely a useful additional tool.
Midday Shooting
All the rules (and some of my previous comments) suggest that you should shoot early or late in the day. This was shot after I lost the good light and on my way home from Dorothy, now about 11 in the morning.
The image needs the strong shadows of midday light to work. In colour it was too obviously just a picture of a feedmill, in black and white it's an exercise in shapes, shadows and composition.
Friday, September 15, 2006
Recropping
New Crop
Old Crop
Who's to say that the first attempt at cropping an image i necessarily the best one. Was thumbing through my images looking for something worthwhile that I might have overlooked previously (occasionally a rewarding search) and I noted the full image of this shot included the car at the bottom. Here's both versions, the new crop and after it the old.
The bottom (original crop) image is more graphic and simple - but perhaps too simple as it hasn't been a particularly popular image even though I like it. The top image (the new crop) isn't as symetrical with the bare pavement in the lower left but the leaves on the car hood and the reflection of clouds off the windshield are interesting - hmmm...
Your thoughts?
Old Crop
Who's to say that the first attempt at cropping an image i necessarily the best one. Was thumbing through my images looking for something worthwhile that I might have overlooked previously (occasionally a rewarding search) and I noted the full image of this shot included the car at the bottom. Here's both versions, the new crop and after it the old.
The bottom (original crop) image is more graphic and simple - but perhaps too simple as it hasn't been a particularly popular image even though I like it. The top image (the new crop) isn't as symetrical with the bare pavement in the lower left but the leaves on the car hood and the reflection of clouds off the windshield are interesting - hmmm...
Your thoughts?
Thursday, September 14, 2006
If You Like Your Whiskey
Sad news, these are the empties. They do however have 300,000 barrels of whiskey aging (nicely tucked away indoors and safely locked). Shot early last Spring. For you purists, though, this is grain whiskey - not Scotch - no malted barley here.
Pentax K10D - Awesome Specs
Pretty exciting news for all of us with the announceent today of the Pentax K10D - 10 MP, waterproof body, image stabilization for every pentax lens ever made, sensor cleaning, but get this, price to be about $900 U.S. - incredible. This has to shake up the industry. Amongst other things (like forcing prices down on other makes of camera), this implies that money can be made at this level of camera. What will this do to prices of cameras like the D200 from Nikon and 5D from Canon? Pretty exciting times. What will Canon and Nikon do to respond?
These are really practical features to add - not frills like you see on some cameras - impressive looking but not really useful - who wouldn't love a sensor that was easy to clean, image stabilization without buying it in every single lens, or forking out big bucks for a robust camera that can take the beach, stream, snow storm or rain.
That said, landscape photographers almost universally use a tripod (image stabilization not helpful), no sensor has enough pixels to keep landscape photographers happy, and 10 MP makes prints only 30% bigger than 6 MP (square root of 10 divided by 6) - say the diffference between an 8X10 and 11X14 (almost). Of course, landscape photographers also shoot friends weddings, grand children, flowers, sports, etc. so still pretty handy features.
These are really practical features to add - not frills like you see on some cameras - impressive looking but not really useful - who wouldn't love a sensor that was easy to clean, image stabilization without buying it in every single lens, or forking out big bucks for a robust camera that can take the beach, stream, snow storm or rain.
That said, landscape photographers almost universally use a tripod (image stabilization not helpful), no sensor has enough pixels to keep landscape photographers happy, and 10 MP makes prints only 30% bigger than 6 MP (square root of 10 divided by 6) - say the diffference between an 8X10 and 11X14 (almost). Of course, landscape photographers also shoot friends weddings, grand children, flowers, sports, etc. so still pretty handy features.
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Beauty In The Oddest Things
There's something about the way the elements of this picture work together that more than cancels the 'yuck' factor.
Last Night's Image
I was lucky to get this image as the government is now paranoid, not about terrorists, just bitchy neighbours who keep an eye on the Turner Valley Gas Plant Historic Site and report every imaginary and real violation they can come up with. Convinced this long since cleaned up site is continuing to polute the Sheep River (despite water tests to the contrary) they have forced closed this site so that even with special permission one cannot go in. Natural gas comes out of the ground on it's own and has done so for centuries and will continue to do so long after we leave this earth.
Anyway, the image:
Scott was right in his comments, we are looking at scsi water at the bottom of not a pipe but a 40 foot wide water tank, long since abandoned, yet with about a foot of water in the bottom and abundant growth. The lines are shadows of reinforcing beams across the top - it's photographed at noon so the sun is about as high as it gets in Alberta and most of the tank is well lit. The sides are of course rusted and made of welded sheet steel. There's even an old plastic ball in the bottom (gold coloured). It was shot with my 17-40 on the 10D so about 28 mm. equivalent for 35 mm.
Anyway, the image:
Scott was right in his comments, we are looking at scsi water at the bottom of not a pipe but a 40 foot wide water tank, long since abandoned, yet with about a foot of water in the bottom and abundant growth. The lines are shadows of reinforcing beams across the top - it's photographed at noon so the sun is about as high as it gets in Alberta and most of the tank is well lit. The sides are of course rusted and made of welded sheet steel. There's even an old plastic ball in the bottom (gold coloured). It was shot with my 17-40 on the 10D so about 28 mm. equivalent for 35 mm.
Monday, September 11, 2006
I'm Pooped!
The building my office is in has made us move for the third time in 15 years, two of the moves at their expense, one, for $100,000 at our expense. Each time the mall is bought by new people, they stir things up - I'm fed up designing and suprervising and building and finally moving into a new office. Spent the day lugging 200 lb. examining tables and assorted other fun items.
Anyway, you don't need to hear me gripe, I'm off for a bath and bed and tomorrow the work is lighter and Wednesday we start seeing patients again (it was supposed to be tomorrow but you know construction goes).
So, back to photography, the picture above should make you think a little. It's not new and doesn't sell well, but I do get lots of comments on it. Answer to what it is next time.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
How Big Does A Print Really Need To Be?
There are two possible answers - the first is 'as big as the customer is willing to pay for', and the second simple answer is 'as big as I can afford to frame.
Assuming you are doing enough commercial work to pay for any equipment needed to make big images, then it's a simple business decision. If however, you are not selling enough work to pay for itself, then how large should you plan on?
Lets make sure we appreciate the full cost of making larger prints. Larger prints need more pixels (in most cases), bigger printers (exc. panoramas, so consider that as an option), faster computers, more hard disk space and better backups. Consider too that larger prints which are to be displayed require much more expensive frames and require wall space you may or may not have (or can negotiate with your significant other). Larger prints are harder to keep flat so unless you plan on stretching canvas, they may need dry mounted - more expense.
What if money were no object and the only consideration was what size looks best? Prints look best without any glass in front and gloss and semi gloss papers look best when you can angle them to eliminate relfections and bronzing (which shows at the same angle). To me this is a strong message for the hand holdable print. I would argue that the largest print that is practical to hand hold and view the whole image is 13X19 paper with a suitably smaller image (see an earlier blog for comments about white border sizes). There are however some images that just beg to be made really large and therefore wall mounted. My Columbia Ice Fields image looked really nice when I printed it big at 17X40 paper size but now that I have been asked to sell larger versions (and reprocessed the raw files with better software) I now print it 24X72 - and damn it looks nice (and the 17X40 looks puny).
I am getting ready for a show in Toronto and they require even bigger prints so I will get those done commercially. I just can't justify the cost of a bigger printer unless I can guarantee a return on my money - so I will wait and see how the first batch of really big prints sells.
If we only occasionally make really big prints, it makes more sense to oursource them. If only the occasional print is big, we don't really need the newest fastest computer available. It would be nice if every image was recorded with as many pixels as possible, but it is an option sometimes to plan to stitch so you can make a big image. That happened with my 'Horseshoe Canyon Before Storm' image. It just wowed me and I knew I wanted to make really big prints so I shot it as a total of 19 images with my 10D.
An option to consider for a dramatic effect while keeping costs down is to create an image as four separate pictures not overlapped and frame them separately using inexpensive frames and mount them on the wall together. This is sometimes done with paintings and there's no reason not to do it with a photograph. Not all images will conveniently let you divide them down the middle, but many will.
The standard size image I print is 13X19 - even the very first time. This is hardly efficient as I go through an awful lot of paper getting images just right (not to mention expensive ink).I really should print small to start with but as the standard size I sell is 13X19, I need to know the image works at that size. If you don't have a really good excuse, why not standardize on 8.5X11 - think how much less storage it will take up (if nothing else).
Subject matter determines size and I'd love to tell you I have the formula for figuring out which type of prints go to what size - unfortunately my experience is there is no logic - there are macro shots that look good huge and landscapes that look better small, go figure... Some photographers deliberately print an image in a series of sizes to figure out which is right - and then only sell the image at that size. Want it smaller or bigger and willing to pay - too bad, it is what it is. Maybe I'm greedy but I'm certainly willing to be more flexible than that.
Partly size is determined by whether or not there is anything worth seeing close up in a larger print - partly this is a matter of how many pixels and their quality and the resolution of the lens, but it is also a function of the subject matter. Although I have never seen a 3 foot high print of Pepper # 30, I can't imagine I'd see anything other than minor flaws in the pepper - enough is enough.
Finely detailed landscapes in which you can see more nose on print look good big if the detail is there and horrible if it isn't.
Assuming you are doing enough commercial work to pay for any equipment needed to make big images, then it's a simple business decision. If however, you are not selling enough work to pay for itself, then how large should you plan on?
Lets make sure we appreciate the full cost of making larger prints. Larger prints need more pixels (in most cases), bigger printers (exc. panoramas, so consider that as an option), faster computers, more hard disk space and better backups. Consider too that larger prints which are to be displayed require much more expensive frames and require wall space you may or may not have (or can negotiate with your significant other). Larger prints are harder to keep flat so unless you plan on stretching canvas, they may need dry mounted - more expense.
What if money were no object and the only consideration was what size looks best? Prints look best without any glass in front and gloss and semi gloss papers look best when you can angle them to eliminate relfections and bronzing (which shows at the same angle). To me this is a strong message for the hand holdable print. I would argue that the largest print that is practical to hand hold and view the whole image is 13X19 paper with a suitably smaller image (see an earlier blog for comments about white border sizes). There are however some images that just beg to be made really large and therefore wall mounted. My Columbia Ice Fields image looked really nice when I printed it big at 17X40 paper size but now that I have been asked to sell larger versions (and reprocessed the raw files with better software) I now print it 24X72 - and damn it looks nice (and the 17X40 looks puny).
I am getting ready for a show in Toronto and they require even bigger prints so I will get those done commercially. I just can't justify the cost of a bigger printer unless I can guarantee a return on my money - so I will wait and see how the first batch of really big prints sells.
If we only occasionally make really big prints, it makes more sense to oursource them. If only the occasional print is big, we don't really need the newest fastest computer available. It would be nice if every image was recorded with as many pixels as possible, but it is an option sometimes to plan to stitch so you can make a big image. That happened with my 'Horseshoe Canyon Before Storm' image. It just wowed me and I knew I wanted to make really big prints so I shot it as a total of 19 images with my 10D.
An option to consider for a dramatic effect while keeping costs down is to create an image as four separate pictures not overlapped and frame them separately using inexpensive frames and mount them on the wall together. This is sometimes done with paintings and there's no reason not to do it with a photograph. Not all images will conveniently let you divide them down the middle, but many will.
The standard size image I print is 13X19 - even the very first time. This is hardly efficient as I go through an awful lot of paper getting images just right (not to mention expensive ink).I really should print small to start with but as the standard size I sell is 13X19, I need to know the image works at that size. If you don't have a really good excuse, why not standardize on 8.5X11 - think how much less storage it will take up (if nothing else).
Subject matter determines size and I'd love to tell you I have the formula for figuring out which type of prints go to what size - unfortunately my experience is there is no logic - there are macro shots that look good huge and landscapes that look better small, go figure... Some photographers deliberately print an image in a series of sizes to figure out which is right - and then only sell the image at that size. Want it smaller or bigger and willing to pay - too bad, it is what it is. Maybe I'm greedy but I'm certainly willing to be more flexible than that.
Partly size is determined by whether or not there is anything worth seeing close up in a larger print - partly this is a matter of how many pixels and their quality and the resolution of the lens, but it is also a function of the subject matter. Although I have never seen a 3 foot high print of Pepper # 30, I can't imagine I'd see anything other than minor flaws in the pepper - enough is enough.
Finely detailed landscapes in which you can see more nose on print look good big if the detail is there and horrible if it isn't.
Friday, September 08, 2006
Triptych
(click to get enlarged image)It's common to hang a group of prints that are related to each other, but how about creating a set of images which need and complement each other, to be printed as one long print of four images or possibly separate prints which could be hung in a number of ways. They need to tie in not just because they have the same theme - the patterns, colours, textures should work together. I'd love to claim I knew this when I took the shots but truth is none worked well enough on their own to hold up, yet when put together, I think they work quite well (not that I'm biased or anything...)
Depth Of Field
After pouring through a forum request at Luminous Landscape for an explanation of the different depth of field with small sensors (it's more which didn't make sense to the questioner since he knew he had to 'enlarge' the image from the small sensor more), and encountering more wrong answers and irrelevent side tracks, here's my answer which is based on optical formulae, not guesses, assumptions or 'experience'.
Depth of field is simple. The mathematical formula for final sharpness in the print has depth of field inversely proportional to magnification from sensor to print (you make bigger prints, you have less depth of field, you use smaller sensor to make same size print, you have less depth of field), BUT, depth of field is inversely proportional to the SQUARE of the focal length, thus changes in the focal length of the lens used (the actual focal length, not some fudged 35 mm. equivalrent) have a much larger effect on depth of field.
This applies no matter what sensor size you have, whether it's film or digital, contact print or enlargement, sharpness fanatic or prebyopic baby boomer who's lost his reading glasses.
Next time I will show you the formula for hyperfocal distance - that distance you set your camera to have everything in focus from half that distance to infinity - still useful even in these days of digital, autofocus and no distance scales on some lenses.
Depth of field is simple. The mathematical formula for final sharpness in the print has depth of field inversely proportional to magnification from sensor to print (you make bigger prints, you have less depth of field, you use smaller sensor to make same size print, you have less depth of field), BUT, depth of field is inversely proportional to the SQUARE of the focal length, thus changes in the focal length of the lens used (the actual focal length, not some fudged 35 mm. equivalrent) have a much larger effect on depth of field.
This applies no matter what sensor size you have, whether it's film or digital, contact print or enlargement, sharpness fanatic or prebyopic baby boomer who's lost his reading glasses.
Next time I will show you the formula for hyperfocal distance - that distance you set your camera to have everything in focus from half that distance to infinity - still useful even in these days of digital, autofocus and no distance scales on some lenses.
Monday, September 04, 2006
Fall Is Coming!
With the end of the Labour Day long weekend here in North America, we have to start thinking of Fall. The obvious is to shoot leaves in colour, but here's an example of a late fall image in black and white which might get you thinking about what you can do about Fall in mono.
Sunday, September 03, 2006
An Answer To Scot - and perhaps lots of others
Just received this comment from Scott and thought it deserved a more public response than simply posting another comment. Also, when you post a comment, I am unable to capture your email so cannot send a response directly - for better or worse so I normally simply add another comment below yours. Not in this case though.
Hi George,
Enjoying your newly found blog. Learned about it by revisiting your site after seeing your pictures again in B&W magazine. I see that you are a fan of PhotoKit Sharpener too. I love it, but why are you using something different for a capture sharpening? Also why are you RAW processing at one step up in resolution rather than using the native resolution of your capture.
Thanks for any comments.
Scott
Right Scott, and the rest of you. Paraphrasing the questions that Scott asked:
1) Why, when you already use Photokit Sharpener for your output sharpening, don't you use Capture Sharpener from the same company? I found that I got a more agressive sharpen with Smart Sharpen than with Capture Sharpener, without creating sharpening artifacts. Also, Capture sharpener tended to add a graininess to some pictures I didn't like. This was true, whether I used one size up on Camera Raw or not.
2) Why 'uprez' in Camera Raw when in other places you have railed against the virtues of uprezing to produce oversized pictures? For better or worse, once I was selling my photographs it quickly became apparent that people wanted large images and more importantly were prepared to pay a premium for them. It was for this reason that I purchased my 7600 and for an upcoming show am going to have to go 'outside' to have some 3 X 3 foot prints made.
This of course assumed that I had images which would print this large. In some cased I have had to tell clients that I was not comfortable with the quality of larger prints and so no, much as they wanted to shower me with money, I'd have to turn it down. Of course, it also meant trying very hard to reach optimum quality in my larger prints. I have commented earlier that with new raw processing and new sharpening algorithms I have been able to double the size of my prints at the same level of quality - all in a 3 year span. It's simply that I have found that if the original image is sharp throughout (not a given), that I could uprez in Camera Raw by one notch, use smart sharpen a bit more agressively (300, 1.1) and get a nice sharp image at 100% on screen. Further output sharpened for 300 ppi and then printed to 70-80 percent size, this meant a nice size image witth decent border on 13X19 paper. It also meant that I could make larger prints as needed. I recently told my gallery that no, they couldn't have Athabasca Falls # 1 at 3 foot square, but ran a test anyway to be sure, and to my surprise, even though on screen it looked grainy as all getout - in print it was sharp and smooth and didn't reek of oversharpening. I can't even remember now my technique to get the original 12X12 image though I know it was two shots from my 10D stitched. That would have made it about 3000X3000 pixels without 'uprezing'. To make the 3 foot square print, I doubled the size (4X the pixels) with Resample smoother in Photoshop, resharpened it and made the print. Other images have been complete disasters so go figure.
To summarize a long somewhat distracted answer - I chose to output in Camera Raw one size up because I thought the ultimate result allowed larger prints.
Hi George,
Enjoying your newly found blog. Learned about it by revisiting your site after seeing your pictures again in B&W magazine. I see that you are a fan of PhotoKit Sharpener too. I love it, but why are you using something different for a capture sharpening? Also why are you RAW processing at one step up in resolution rather than using the native resolution of your capture.
Thanks for any comments.
Scott
Right Scott, and the rest of you. Paraphrasing the questions that Scott asked:
1) Why, when you already use Photokit Sharpener for your output sharpening, don't you use Capture Sharpener from the same company? I found that I got a more agressive sharpen with Smart Sharpen than with Capture Sharpener, without creating sharpening artifacts. Also, Capture sharpener tended to add a graininess to some pictures I didn't like. This was true, whether I used one size up on Camera Raw or not.
2) Why 'uprez' in Camera Raw when in other places you have railed against the virtues of uprezing to produce oversized pictures? For better or worse, once I was selling my photographs it quickly became apparent that people wanted large images and more importantly were prepared to pay a premium for them. It was for this reason that I purchased my 7600 and for an upcoming show am going to have to go 'outside' to have some 3 X 3 foot prints made.
This of course assumed that I had images which would print this large. In some cased I have had to tell clients that I was not comfortable with the quality of larger prints and so no, much as they wanted to shower me with money, I'd have to turn it down. Of course, it also meant trying very hard to reach optimum quality in my larger prints. I have commented earlier that with new raw processing and new sharpening algorithms I have been able to double the size of my prints at the same level of quality - all in a 3 year span. It's simply that I have found that if the original image is sharp throughout (not a given), that I could uprez in Camera Raw by one notch, use smart sharpen a bit more agressively (300, 1.1) and get a nice sharp image at 100% on screen. Further output sharpened for 300 ppi and then printed to 70-80 percent size, this meant a nice size image witth decent border on 13X19 paper. It also meant that I could make larger prints as needed. I recently told my gallery that no, they couldn't have Athabasca Falls # 1 at 3 foot square, but ran a test anyway to be sure, and to my surprise, even though on screen it looked grainy as all getout - in print it was sharp and smooth and didn't reek of oversharpening. I can't even remember now my technique to get the original 12X12 image though I know it was two shots from my 10D stitched. That would have made it about 3000X3000 pixels without 'uprezing'. To make the 3 foot square print, I doubled the size (4X the pixels) with Resample smoother in Photoshop, resharpened it and made the print. Other images have been complete disasters so go figure.
To summarize a long somewhat distracted answer - I chose to output in Camera Raw one size up because I thought the ultimate result allowed larger prints.
Saturday, September 02, 2006
Return To Jura Canyon
Its one thing to return to a spot to rephotograph - perhaps in a better light, with a better light, with better technique or in a different season. The other issue is what about hoping for more pictures which don't repeat what is already done. This morning I returned to Jura Canyon in thge hope of finding different pictures. In that I was moderately successful, finding interesting compositions that I had not seen on the first trip. That said, I was drawn to rephotograph the most striking shots of the first trip. I did have my new Nodal Slider from ReallyRightStuff so I could do more stitching and those images will be processed over the next few weeks. In the mean time, here's a couple of images, one which is quite different from the previous shots, the other somewhat derivative, but I like it.
Friday, September 01, 2006
Pass Creek, Waterton, 2005
If you take a pony treck in Waterton, you ford the river just below this point. With a bit of care, you can wade across, water just above the knees and get to the beach. In theory you could climb down to the beach from the same side but I'm not going to guarantee you'd get back up again. Two images stitched with PTMac, output as multiimage TIFF and brought into Photoshop. The left image was added to the right as a separate layer, a white mask created and then with 80 percent sharpness of the brush, I painted black into the white mask to reveal the underneath right image, being careful to blend the images so no seams would show. In theory this should not be needed and you could let PTMac do the blend but unless you rotate the lens exactly around the nodal point, this can create trouble and I confess I have simply been rotating around the lens collar and not using my slider (the clamp points the wrong way for the lens collar).
Once I have the two images blended, I flatten the image, trim excess and work on it as I would any other image.
In this case, I warmed the image a bit with a colour balance layer, used a selective colour layer to redden the yellow ever so slightly, did some curves layers with masking to affect particular parts of the image, used Akvis Enhancer to bring out texture and open the shadows, used smart sharpen then Photokit output sharpener and printed it.
The images were shot on the 1Ds2, my 70-200 f4L lens, the final image size is approx. 7000X6000 pixels (I uprezed one notch in Camera Raw - 25 meg. output instead of 16, before doing the stitching on the tiff files output from Camera Raw).
PTMac loses the colourspace information so it's imprortant to assign the image ProPhoto Colourspace. The change in colour is dramatic and is back to what you saw with Camera Raw.
Note that I didn't get round to doing anything with image till more than a year later - one of the downsides of stitching, until you put the images together you don't know what you have. I do occasionally put the images together with Photohops stitching routine but it isn't accurate or useable and doesn't save that much time over the new automated matching point routines of PTMac.
Images In Both B&W and Colour
Just 4 images which have not appeared in the blog before but are amongst my favourites.
This is the roof of a cave (all be it a very short one) in Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta. It was shot with 4X5 and required forward tilt of the back - an unusual situation. It often is mistaken for a pencil sketch, no matter what contrast it's printed at - simply the nature of the rock.
This is two images stitched, using my Canon 10D, 70-200 @ 200 mm. and with some tricky blending to deal with the high wind and the fact that the clouds move significantly between images and didn't match up any more.
There's something about the age represented by this image, the crumbling yet still supporting foundation despite the apparent massive weight of the sagging structure above. A single cropped image from my 10D, shot at Turner Valley Gas Plant Historic Site.
This broken window was in one of the original 1914 buildings at the Coleman Colliery below the town of Coleman in the Crows Nest Pass in south west Alberta. A sunlit red brick building in the back created the warm colour, the blue sky the reflection in the glass. Shot with Canon 1Ds2, two images stitched.
This is the roof of a cave (all be it a very short one) in Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta. It was shot with 4X5 and required forward tilt of the back - an unusual situation. It often is mistaken for a pencil sketch, no matter what contrast it's printed at - simply the nature of the rock.
This is two images stitched, using my Canon 10D, 70-200 @ 200 mm. and with some tricky blending to deal with the high wind and the fact that the clouds move significantly between images and didn't match up any more.
There's something about the age represented by this image, the crumbling yet still supporting foundation despite the apparent massive weight of the sagging structure above. A single cropped image from my 10D, shot at Turner Valley Gas Plant Historic Site.
This broken window was in one of the original 1914 buildings at the Coleman Colliery below the town of Coleman in the Crows Nest Pass in south west Alberta. A sunlit red brick building in the back created the warm colour, the blue sky the reflection in the glass. Shot with Canon 1Ds2, two images stitched.
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Shooting Both Black and White and Colour
traditional wisdom has photographers working in black and white or colour but generally not both. Most websites you visit, colour far exceeds black and white or else there is no colour at all.
You may note that I shoot both colour and black and white which makes me a bit of an oddity (ok, no cheap comments, that's what my wife is for).
Why do people polarize so strongly and does it have any message for me and more importantly for you?
It's my impression that colour photographers occasionally dabble in black and white but black and white photographers never dabble in colour. they seem to save colour for family snapshots.
SO the questions I might consider asking myself are:
1) Am I compromising my skills by doing both - ie. is my black and white weaker for the time I spend doing colour - or are the skills largely transferrable so time spent on colour isn't wasted?
2) Is any given photograher only talented or skilled in one medium and therefore am I wasting my time trying to express myself in both?
3) Is a certain medium suited to particular personalities or traits and does this mean I have psychiatric problems? (see prev. comment about wife)
4) Is it actually possible that creating in both colour and black and white is not only not detrimental but actually productive, helpful, and useful to strengthen skills in one's primary medium?
If we look to the art world for direction, I think we can be fairly reassured - painters, writers and musicians often change their 'medium'. They change from drawings to lithographs to oil, and acrylic, they change styles of painting over time. Musicians in the symphony orchestra quite commonly belong to a jazz band or play modern music. Writers switch to short stories or write screenplays, they sometimes drastically change their style - but they will use a pseudonym - hmmn... there's an idea - perhaps I need a nom de camera for my colour work.
It's true that painters don't work in black and white - unless you consider their charcoal work and pencil drawings, gee, I guess they do work in black and white as well as colour.
I admit I am having trouble thinking of a single famous (read well respected) photographer who routinely shoots in both black and white and colour. Howard Schatz does (16 books to his credit - twice in Lenswork, most recently for his black and white portraits of character actors but perhaps more famous for his colour work under water with dancers. Ansel dabbled in colour though isn't known for it and you rarely see it and what I remember didn't really say anything profound. Even Edward Weston got a chance to shoot some colour before his Parkinsons laid him low.
Addressing the specific questions. It seems to me that 90% of the skills used to create colour photographs are directly transferrable to black and white. While the luminous black and white print does not perhaps have a corrolary in colour, once one has learned to make quality black and white prints, it's not going to atrophy just because you do a bit of colour work. Arguably the real message here is the more photography you do, the better you get and by shooting situations that suit both, it increases your opportunities. Perhaps even more important, the success rate of a shoot goes up and thus enthusiasm increases which drives us to do more.
Arguably if one is attuned to seeing the world in black and white - it might take away from that vision to start paying attention to colour. For myself, I was a black and white only photographer for 35 years and relied on my monochrome filter to help me visualize the world in black and white (as did Ansel). On the contrary, black and white photographers have to be very aware of colour if only to recognize when a bold colour which spoils a composition in black and white, can blend in in black and white (perhaps with the aid of filtration), or for that matter, made more bold. All this does is make me more aware of the colours of things and how colour affects composition.
As to whether a particular personality is better suited, I think it has more to do with the way we started rather than inherently being suited to a particular medium - for slide shooters of family travels, it's a natural progression to taking more care and making better photographs in colour. Had we been influenced by Ansel's work growing up (I sure was), then we look down our noses at colour and insist on black and white as being the only 'pure' art. Of course, many of us, converting to digital, have colour forced on us whether or not we like and one thing leads to another. I would predict in the future that we will see more crossovers because of the technology. Even the process of making prints can be done with the same pigment inkjet printer with a bit of effort so there is no reason not to try 'the other medium'.
Could shooting both actually be good for us - I think so. I don't lie awake at night worrying that my dual habit is a sin, should be hidden like a dirty book, and only conversed about in seedy bars. I'm bi and I'm proud! (well, at least photographically)
You may note that I shoot both colour and black and white which makes me a bit of an oddity (ok, no cheap comments, that's what my wife is for).
Why do people polarize so strongly and does it have any message for me and more importantly for you?
It's my impression that colour photographers occasionally dabble in black and white but black and white photographers never dabble in colour. they seem to save colour for family snapshots.
SO the questions I might consider asking myself are:
1) Am I compromising my skills by doing both - ie. is my black and white weaker for the time I spend doing colour - or are the skills largely transferrable so time spent on colour isn't wasted?
2) Is any given photograher only talented or skilled in one medium and therefore am I wasting my time trying to express myself in both?
3) Is a certain medium suited to particular personalities or traits and does this mean I have psychiatric problems? (see prev. comment about wife)
4) Is it actually possible that creating in both colour and black and white is not only not detrimental but actually productive, helpful, and useful to strengthen skills in one's primary medium?
If we look to the art world for direction, I think we can be fairly reassured - painters, writers and musicians often change their 'medium'. They change from drawings to lithographs to oil, and acrylic, they change styles of painting over time. Musicians in the symphony orchestra quite commonly belong to a jazz band or play modern music. Writers switch to short stories or write screenplays, they sometimes drastically change their style - but they will use a pseudonym - hmmn... there's an idea - perhaps I need a nom de camera for my colour work.
It's true that painters don't work in black and white - unless you consider their charcoal work and pencil drawings, gee, I guess they do work in black and white as well as colour.
I admit I am having trouble thinking of a single famous (read well respected) photographer who routinely shoots in both black and white and colour. Howard Schatz does (16 books to his credit - twice in Lenswork, most recently for his black and white portraits of character actors but perhaps more famous for his colour work under water with dancers. Ansel dabbled in colour though isn't known for it and you rarely see it and what I remember didn't really say anything profound. Even Edward Weston got a chance to shoot some colour before his Parkinsons laid him low.
Addressing the specific questions. It seems to me that 90% of the skills used to create colour photographs are directly transferrable to black and white. While the luminous black and white print does not perhaps have a corrolary in colour, once one has learned to make quality black and white prints, it's not going to atrophy just because you do a bit of colour work. Arguably the real message here is the more photography you do, the better you get and by shooting situations that suit both, it increases your opportunities. Perhaps even more important, the success rate of a shoot goes up and thus enthusiasm increases which drives us to do more.
Arguably if one is attuned to seeing the world in black and white - it might take away from that vision to start paying attention to colour. For myself, I was a black and white only photographer for 35 years and relied on my monochrome filter to help me visualize the world in black and white (as did Ansel). On the contrary, black and white photographers have to be very aware of colour if only to recognize when a bold colour which spoils a composition in black and white, can blend in in black and white (perhaps with the aid of filtration), or for that matter, made more bold. All this does is make me more aware of the colours of things and how colour affects composition.
As to whether a particular personality is better suited, I think it has more to do with the way we started rather than inherently being suited to a particular medium - for slide shooters of family travels, it's a natural progression to taking more care and making better photographs in colour. Had we been influenced by Ansel's work growing up (I sure was), then we look down our noses at colour and insist on black and white as being the only 'pure' art. Of course, many of us, converting to digital, have colour forced on us whether or not we like and one thing leads to another. I would predict in the future that we will see more crossovers because of the technology. Even the process of making prints can be done with the same pigment inkjet printer with a bit of effort so there is no reason not to try 'the other medium'.
Could shooting both actually be good for us - I think so. I don't lie awake at night worrying that my dual habit is a sin, should be hidden like a dirty book, and only conversed about in seedy bars. I'm bi and I'm proud! (well, at least photographically)
Sunday, August 27, 2006
On Composing A Picture
I've discussed in the past the process of scouting out a picture but I'm going to try and take it a step further and discuss the actual 'puting the picture together'
Lets say for example that you have found a rusting old truck in a farm yard. The truck is the 'centre' of the image, though it doesn't have to be positioned that way. Lets say that you have decided to photograph the truck in it's environment rather than coming in close and photographing curves, shadows, rust patterns etc.
You have a choice of photographing the truck surrounded by farm buildings, or with a harvested grain field in the background. Which you choose will determine the character of the image but lets say that for now you have no particular 'statement' to make, you are 'cruzin fer snaps' and will take any nice picture you can.
So, you wander around the truck, looking for the best angle to photograph the truck and for what is in the background. Unless you want the junkyard look (and you might) you are going to try and simplify both background and foreground to help focus on the truck. Modern buildings or objects are not going to work well with the truck - can you find an angle from which the truck works well with the background. Let's say that despite your best efforts, the backgrounds are all absolutely terrible - you can't get a clear shot of fhe field due to telephone wires, there isn't a nice weathered barn against which you can photograph the truck.
This is working the scene, and yes, it is actually work.
Right, what are our options. We could accept the cluttered look and perhapd deliberately emphasize it to represent many old farm yards that act as mechanical grave yards and unintentional museums.
What about getting really low, belly on the grass, and using the sky as a simple background.
Perhaps you should shoot from the inside of the truck. There was an article on Luminous Landscape which deals with photographing inside a vehicle.
Could you photograph the truck as reflected in the side mirrors?
What if you were to leave the doors propped open - better shape, worse?
If the background is cluttered, what about photographing from high up - could you come back with a step ladder (or borrow one) or find something you can climb on (with permission)? Is there a barn with hay loft from which you can shoot?
Since you don't have a political agenda, you are looking for positions for the truck in which it makes interesting patterns or shapes with foreground and background objects. It might be the S bend in a dirt track, something in the background that repeats a shape found in the truck, perhaps you can compose the truck with something so obviously new and shiny that it provides a nice contrast to the abandoned truck. Perhaps the shadow of the truck can be part of the composition.
Photographing with a wide angle will necessarily include more background objects in the image, a longer lens fewer. Rather than think lenses at this early stage, I'd simply walk round the truck in smaller and smaller circles till you see what you want.
You could look for something to frame the truck - but keep in mind that anomalous branches coming from nowhere don't work in landscape pictures, the same is going to hold true in this image. Perhaps though you could use the end of a buliding or another vehicle as one side of the image. You might have depth of field problems but if shooting digitally, you could shoot two images, one focused on the truck, the other on the building and blend the images. Such a simple blend could easily be done by hand in Photoshop as the near focused image will be slightly larger.
Perhaps you always, shoot colour, or always black and white, but having invested this much energy into the picture, give some thought as to which would be better.
You have found the best position, the best height and best distance from the truck, stop and give some thought as to how you might print it - ok previsualize it. Maybe the subject still isn't going to work as the tone of the truck blends with the tone of the barn behind, perhaps filtering can help, or if shooting digitally you can filter after the fact.
You line up your camera, aiming at the car. Woops, not ready yet, not if you want a really good image.
You still have to refine the framing of the shot for the strongest image.
At this point you have your spot, your direction and your height from the ground. The choice of lens will determine how much you include. If you have fixed focal length lenses you hope you can move back and forth enough to frame just right. With zooms you don't have to compromise your ideal spot.
Your last task is to figure out just where to place the four sides of the frame. I find my trusty plastic with a cutout the format of my camera, hanging round my neck on a shoelace. I know roughly what I want to include but the question is exactly where to place the edges. I start with the left edge. I can have things meet in the corner, or I can create interesting shapes with the side of the image and either something in the image or even a dark area in the image (eg. shadow). I do the same on the right. This now gives me my focal length, though I still have to decide whether to shoot vertical or horizontal format. That's determined by the strongest composition with upper and lower sides. If I have to crop significantly, it's a message to consider stitching, which I might do anyway just to get a higher resolution image.
That pretty much does it - I'm in the right location, right height, pointing in the right direction with the right lens. I expose to keep detail in all the important areas (or shoot more than one exposure if I can't) and I have done everything I can to ensure a good image.
All I have to do now is repeat this 99 more times and the odds are fairly good that one of the images will be a keeper.
Lets say for example that you have found a rusting old truck in a farm yard. The truck is the 'centre' of the image, though it doesn't have to be positioned that way. Lets say that you have decided to photograph the truck in it's environment rather than coming in close and photographing curves, shadows, rust patterns etc.
You have a choice of photographing the truck surrounded by farm buildings, or with a harvested grain field in the background. Which you choose will determine the character of the image but lets say that for now you have no particular 'statement' to make, you are 'cruzin fer snaps' and will take any nice picture you can.
So, you wander around the truck, looking for the best angle to photograph the truck and for what is in the background. Unless you want the junkyard look (and you might) you are going to try and simplify both background and foreground to help focus on the truck. Modern buildings or objects are not going to work well with the truck - can you find an angle from which the truck works well with the background. Let's say that despite your best efforts, the backgrounds are all absolutely terrible - you can't get a clear shot of fhe field due to telephone wires, there isn't a nice weathered barn against which you can photograph the truck.
This is working the scene, and yes, it is actually work.
Right, what are our options. We could accept the cluttered look and perhapd deliberately emphasize it to represent many old farm yards that act as mechanical grave yards and unintentional museums.
What about getting really low, belly on the grass, and using the sky as a simple background.
Perhaps you should shoot from the inside of the truck. There was an article on Luminous Landscape which deals with photographing inside a vehicle.
Could you photograph the truck as reflected in the side mirrors?
What if you were to leave the doors propped open - better shape, worse?
If the background is cluttered, what about photographing from high up - could you come back with a step ladder (or borrow one) or find something you can climb on (with permission)? Is there a barn with hay loft from which you can shoot?
Since you don't have a political agenda, you are looking for positions for the truck in which it makes interesting patterns or shapes with foreground and background objects. It might be the S bend in a dirt track, something in the background that repeats a shape found in the truck, perhaps you can compose the truck with something so obviously new and shiny that it provides a nice contrast to the abandoned truck. Perhaps the shadow of the truck can be part of the composition.
Photographing with a wide angle will necessarily include more background objects in the image, a longer lens fewer. Rather than think lenses at this early stage, I'd simply walk round the truck in smaller and smaller circles till you see what you want.
You could look for something to frame the truck - but keep in mind that anomalous branches coming from nowhere don't work in landscape pictures, the same is going to hold true in this image. Perhaps though you could use the end of a buliding or another vehicle as one side of the image. You might have depth of field problems but if shooting digitally, you could shoot two images, one focused on the truck, the other on the building and blend the images. Such a simple blend could easily be done by hand in Photoshop as the near focused image will be slightly larger.
Perhaps you always, shoot colour, or always black and white, but having invested this much energy into the picture, give some thought as to which would be better.
You have found the best position, the best height and best distance from the truck, stop and give some thought as to how you might print it - ok previsualize it. Maybe the subject still isn't going to work as the tone of the truck blends with the tone of the barn behind, perhaps filtering can help, or if shooting digitally you can filter after the fact.
You line up your camera, aiming at the car. Woops, not ready yet, not if you want a really good image.
You still have to refine the framing of the shot for the strongest image.
At this point you have your spot, your direction and your height from the ground. The choice of lens will determine how much you include. If you have fixed focal length lenses you hope you can move back and forth enough to frame just right. With zooms you don't have to compromise your ideal spot.
Your last task is to figure out just where to place the four sides of the frame. I find my trusty plastic with a cutout the format of my camera, hanging round my neck on a shoelace. I know roughly what I want to include but the question is exactly where to place the edges. I start with the left edge. I can have things meet in the corner, or I can create interesting shapes with the side of the image and either something in the image or even a dark area in the image (eg. shadow). I do the same on the right. This now gives me my focal length, though I still have to decide whether to shoot vertical or horizontal format. That's determined by the strongest composition with upper and lower sides. If I have to crop significantly, it's a message to consider stitching, which I might do anyway just to get a higher resolution image.
That pretty much does it - I'm in the right location, right height, pointing in the right direction with the right lens. I expose to keep detail in all the important areas (or shoot more than one exposure if I can't) and I have done everything I can to ensure a good image.
All I have to do now is repeat this 99 more times and the odds are fairly good that one of the images will be a keeper.
Friday, August 25, 2006
Winch, Atlas Coal Tipple
And the original file is below. Actually again I shot multiple images and used Helicon Focus to blend 5 images to give full depth of field. I cropped the image to concentrate on equipment and not surround, I used the clone tool to take out the errant blade of grass which was distracting (not easy with the braided wire behind), adjusted saturation then used the Russell Brown method of converting to black and white with filtering to increase the contrast of the textures in the metal.
Some final dodging and burning and voila...
I'm not sure I have created the optimum cropping - I would have preferred more of the lower winch drum to show, yet found the grass in the bottom right distracting and the closer to square crop seemed stronger. I may well have another go at cropping - perhaps had I converted to black and white first then cropped I might have come up with an entirely different crop. No, I've just tried it and the above is the best.
Horseshoe Canyon, Alberta
From a couple of years ago - two images, canon 10D, 70-200 f4L @ 109 mm., stitched with PTMac, shot raw, processed with Camera Raw V. 3, output from PTMac two tiff images brought into Photoshop as two layers, white mask into which I painted black to reveal the underneath part of the image (for some reason doing it the opposite way (black mask into which you paint white) leaves a faint seam visible. I use 80% edge definition of the round brush for painting into the mask. Sharpening is with smart sharpen in Photoshop, raw output on this 6 MP camera was set for 11 MP (ie. one size up) so sharpening settings were 300 1.3 and the pixel size of the final image is 5000X4000 pixels for a 17X13.5 inch print at 300 ppi.
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Blairmore Cole Tipple
Looking like a Greek ruin, this was in fact a long abandoned coal tipple in the Crows Nest Pass in southern Alberta> this area continues to ship coal in 100 car long trains to the west coast and onto Japan and other points.
Record Distance Travelled
woke up, light pouring in, liked the shapes, grabbed camera, head resting on pillow, fire shot, distance travelled zero (pick your units of distance).
Getting Published
I'm uncomfortable tooting my own horn but it's not possible to talk about getting published without saying that I've been in Lenswork, Black and white Photography, Black and White, Focus, and Outdoor Photographer (the British one).
The following suggestions may be of help in upping the odds of success.
My first publishing forray was in Black and White Photographer from Britain and I deliberately chose my images from the badlands. Badlands photograph very well in black and white, they are completely unavailable in Britain and you don't see a lot of good published images. I provided a consistent theme for the images even though they were shot on 4X5 and digital.
I don't think presentation of the prints is a big issue - they should be clean, flat, corners not bashed, consistent in tone and surface but an expensive portfolio box is not needed.
My next success was with the industrial images to Lenswork - again a consitent theme and not your typical waterfall pictures (trust me, they see thousands of them and the odds of you coming up with a new and better way of looking at a waterfall that will interest them is close to zero.
For Black and White's portfolio constest I actually sent two entries, one industrial and the other landcape. The landscape had the theme of weather - showing clouds, ice, and snow. Focus magazine was again industrial but this time in colour (different images).
For the most part my images don't look like those from any well known photographer - fortunately I have admired so many good photographers that I now have my own style. You have to ask yourself if in fact you have a style and is it any different from hundreds of other photographers also submitting their pictures. Clearly you want to submit the ones with 'your' style, not the ones that are so typical of the genre (no matter how well done).
Catchy titles and detailed explanations of how hard you worked to get the image are totally irrelevent.
Brooks Jensen of Lenswork has had some excellent editorials about submitting work for publication and I suggest you check his website and pick up some of the back issues that address the subject.
Of course, it's a given that you have a good idea of the kind of work a magazine is likely to publish. That said, if lots of people think them good, send them anyway, maybe this is the different that is exactly what the editor is looking for.
in general, I have not sent any bio until asked - if they like the images, the'll ask, if they don't save your breath (fingers).
I had a fair idea that my work was decent going in - after attending a workshop and seeing what other people produced and comparing my work to the instructors and factoring in the comments from both instructors and attendees, I figured I was ready. I would encourage you to seek similar feedback before considering submitting. It's all very well asking friends and family but you really need an independent appraisal before sending off your work.
Good luck in your submissions, It may seem hopeless but remember that without our submissions these magazines couldn't function.
The following suggestions may be of help in upping the odds of success.
My first publishing forray was in Black and White Photographer from Britain and I deliberately chose my images from the badlands. Badlands photograph very well in black and white, they are completely unavailable in Britain and you don't see a lot of good published images. I provided a consistent theme for the images even though they were shot on 4X5 and digital.
I don't think presentation of the prints is a big issue - they should be clean, flat, corners not bashed, consistent in tone and surface but an expensive portfolio box is not needed.
My next success was with the industrial images to Lenswork - again a consitent theme and not your typical waterfall pictures (trust me, they see thousands of them and the odds of you coming up with a new and better way of looking at a waterfall that will interest them is close to zero.
For Black and White's portfolio constest I actually sent two entries, one industrial and the other landcape. The landscape had the theme of weather - showing clouds, ice, and snow. Focus magazine was again industrial but this time in colour (different images).
For the most part my images don't look like those from any well known photographer - fortunately I have admired so many good photographers that I now have my own style. You have to ask yourself if in fact you have a style and is it any different from hundreds of other photographers also submitting their pictures. Clearly you want to submit the ones with 'your' style, not the ones that are so typical of the genre (no matter how well done).
Catchy titles and detailed explanations of how hard you worked to get the image are totally irrelevent.
Brooks Jensen of Lenswork has had some excellent editorials about submitting work for publication and I suggest you check his website and pick up some of the back issues that address the subject.
Of course, it's a given that you have a good idea of the kind of work a magazine is likely to publish. That said, if lots of people think them good, send them anyway, maybe this is the different that is exactly what the editor is looking for.
in general, I have not sent any bio until asked - if they like the images, the'll ask, if they don't save your breath (fingers).
I had a fair idea that my work was decent going in - after attending a workshop and seeing what other people produced and comparing my work to the instructors and factoring in the comments from both instructors and attendees, I figured I was ready. I would encourage you to seek similar feedback before considering submitting. It's all very well asking friends and family but you really need an independent appraisal before sending off your work.
Good luck in your submissions, It may seem hopeless but remember that without our submissions these magazines couldn't function.
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Massive Tree, 1978
This image was shot while on holiday on Vancouver Island, at Cathedral Grove, a preserve of giant trees, both fir and cedar. The image was shot with a Zeiss Ikonta, a 6X6 cm. folding camera, 75 mm. Tessar lens. The camera was made in approximately 1938, the lens uncoated, it slips in a pocket and takes very nice pictures.
My camera (actually my Dad's) was destroyed very shortly after this picture was taken when I fell at a waterfall, managed to prevent the camera from hitting the ground, but lost the camera when the tripod socket ripped out of the bottom of the camera and the camera went bouncing down the rocks.
I picked up a replacement in excellent condition a few years ago on ebay and while I now shoot digital, I do love the camera and have occasionally shot with it.
my next medium format camera was the twin lens reflex Yashicamat 124G - a very nice camera who's only fault was a weak shutter release mechanism which didn't stand up to the wear of using a cable release and a part eventually failed one time too many to be bent back. It had a tack sharp lens, stopped down to f32 and made some very nice pictures which one of these days i will get round to scanning for you.
Why Images Work # 6 - Paul Strand
right click (or control click on a Mac) to access this group portrat image, known as Family Luzarra and move the window so you can see both the comments and the photograph.
Paul Stand had a long photographic carreer and photographed many subjects from landcapes to industrial but of all his images, this family group portrait is my favourite.
With an image like this, we HAVE to start with the non technical aspects. The expressions on the faces, the body postures and the positions that the family members line themselves up and the direction of their gaze tells us a huge amount about these people. Whether such conclusions is accurate is irrelevent, this image makes us feel we know these people. No "say cheese please' for Paul.
Note the position of the heads. Can you imagine if all the heads were at the same height - yuk!
The textured but fairly simple wall provides an excellent background - brick just wouldn't have been the same.
Look at the bottom and you note that all the feet have something to stand on - it might be tempting to crop to the feet but this way there is a unity to the image by provinding a common base running across the bottom of the image.
The choice of clothing says something about the people too.
The bicycle provides a specular highlight but also tells a story - it's quite a modern bicycle for 1953, the year of the shot, it's in excellent condition with white wall tires and a headlight - someone had some money. The large dark area of the doorway is broken by the mirror or window within but giving a sense that the doorway leads somewhere.
Little details like the incredible beat up drain pipe, the arch above the door and the worn through wall on the left give the image character.
But, this image is really all about the people and the story the picture tells, the story may be fiction, but there's nothing wrong with fiction.
Paul Stand had a long photographic carreer and photographed many subjects from landcapes to industrial but of all his images, this family group portrait is my favourite.
With an image like this, we HAVE to start with the non technical aspects. The expressions on the faces, the body postures and the positions that the family members line themselves up and the direction of their gaze tells us a huge amount about these people. Whether such conclusions is accurate is irrelevent, this image makes us feel we know these people. No "say cheese please' for Paul.
Note the position of the heads. Can you imagine if all the heads were at the same height - yuk!
The textured but fairly simple wall provides an excellent background - brick just wouldn't have been the same.
Look at the bottom and you note that all the feet have something to stand on - it might be tempting to crop to the feet but this way there is a unity to the image by provinding a common base running across the bottom of the image.
The choice of clothing says something about the people too.
The bicycle provides a specular highlight but also tells a story - it's quite a modern bicycle for 1953, the year of the shot, it's in excellent condition with white wall tires and a headlight - someone had some money. The large dark area of the doorway is broken by the mirror or window within but giving a sense that the doorway leads somewhere.
Little details like the incredible beat up drain pipe, the arch above the door and the worn through wall on the left give the image character.
But, this image is really all about the people and the story the picture tells, the story may be fiction, but there's nothing wrong with fiction.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Same Old, Same Old...
Thinking a lot of your pictures look pretty much the same - time to break out of a rut?
The obvious thing to do is change subject matter but lets say that you like photographing mushrooms and what you really want is a different way to photograph them. You could resort to tricks - prism filters and the like but it might be better to analyse your current style and see how you might change it.
First a list of possible characteristics of a photograph.
Contrast
Darkness
subject centering
subject positioning
camera alignment
focal length
height of the camera
lighting conditions
subject surround
Have a good look at the prints you have now that you think are too similar. Perhaps its because they are all mushroom pictures but maybe its the similarity of the above listed image characteristics.
Last weekend I noted that the photographer shooting with me quickly set up his tripod at a convenient height and spent no time at all checking higher or lower, left or right before pointing the camera and taking his picture. I suggested he have a look from the lowest position on his tripod and he was quite pleased with the change in perspective.
Getting back to our mushroom example, perhaps it's your style to look down on the mushroom and focus closely so that the mushroom fills the frame. You might consider getting down on your stomach with a mini tripod and looking up to the mushroom, or backing off and including some of the surround, or go the other way and have the mushroom fill the frame entirely so there is no edge visible and the image is no longer obviously a mushroom - more of an abstract - no harm in letting your viewers use their brains and wonder what you are photographing.
Perhaps you pride yourself on a nicely balanced print with good spread of light and dark tones - what about deliberately printing really dark, or really light - this doesn't mean simply lightening or darkening the print - you don't want a muddy dark print, you want a richly dark print - not at all the same thing, the latter requiring careful handling of the highlights and the right contrast for the darker areas.
You could bring along a card to bounce a little light into the shadows, or maybe you should get out really early in the morning when there is still dew, or frost. If not in a national park, what about taking some mushrooms home to photograph in a 'studio'. Hell, you could even copy Edward Weston and photograph it in an old tin funnel.
Go back to the list of image characteristics and see if there isn't a way to shake up your photography style, while not compromising the quality of your images.
The obvious thing to do is change subject matter but lets say that you like photographing mushrooms and what you really want is a different way to photograph them. You could resort to tricks - prism filters and the like but it might be better to analyse your current style and see how you might change it.
First a list of possible characteristics of a photograph.
Contrast
Darkness
subject centering
subject positioning
camera alignment
focal length
height of the camera
lighting conditions
subject surround
Have a good look at the prints you have now that you think are too similar. Perhaps its because they are all mushroom pictures but maybe its the similarity of the above listed image characteristics.
Last weekend I noted that the photographer shooting with me quickly set up his tripod at a convenient height and spent no time at all checking higher or lower, left or right before pointing the camera and taking his picture. I suggested he have a look from the lowest position on his tripod and he was quite pleased with the change in perspective.
Getting back to our mushroom example, perhaps it's your style to look down on the mushroom and focus closely so that the mushroom fills the frame. You might consider getting down on your stomach with a mini tripod and looking up to the mushroom, or backing off and including some of the surround, or go the other way and have the mushroom fill the frame entirely so there is no edge visible and the image is no longer obviously a mushroom - more of an abstract - no harm in letting your viewers use their brains and wonder what you are photographing.
Perhaps you pride yourself on a nicely balanced print with good spread of light and dark tones - what about deliberately printing really dark, or really light - this doesn't mean simply lightening or darkening the print - you don't want a muddy dark print, you want a richly dark print - not at all the same thing, the latter requiring careful handling of the highlights and the right contrast for the darker areas.
You could bring along a card to bounce a little light into the shadows, or maybe you should get out really early in the morning when there is still dew, or frost. If not in a national park, what about taking some mushrooms home to photograph in a 'studio'. Hell, you could even copy Edward Weston and photograph it in an old tin funnel.
Go back to the list of image characteristics and see if there isn't a way to shake up your photography style, while not compromising the quality of your images.
Maximize Sharpness!
having discussed sharpness and resolution, here's my formula for maximizing both.
1) use the most pixels you can. Stitch where possible, make sure that you frame carefully so you don't have to crop both dimensions. This of course requires an accurate viewfinder - often with less expensive cameras the lcd is accurate but the viewfinder is not so you can shoot and double check that you got it right. Know your minimum f stop for maximum depth of field without adding so much diffraction loss that you don't gain - for me and the full frame 1Ds2 this is f 16, for a consumer grade digital point and shoot this is probably f8, for a 4X5 it's f32. If you don't need the depth of field, then use a wider apperture.
2) use a decent tripod. Use as little centre column raise as you can get away with, normally none.
3) balance the weight of the camera and lens over the tripod head. For longer lenses this means using a lens collar - technically my 70-200 f4 lens doesn't need one but I get sharper pictures when I use one.
4) consider using an L bracket. When you flop the camera over on it's side you basically create a tuning fork - something sticking out to vibrate.
5) Use mirror lock if you have it - arguably it's most advantageous from about 1/30 second to 1/2 second but I use it for every shot - given Canon's awkward way to access mirror lock, it's easier to leave it on permanently.
6) Use your lens shade and shade it from direct sun with a hat or even your hand (not touching).
7) make sure that your foot isn't an inch away from the tripod foot and actually moving the ground. Consider standing upwind to block the wind or even better using an umbrella to block the wind. Keep in mind the wind will play on large camera straps and increase vibration.
8) make sure that all settings are locked down on the tripod and that there is no movement - if there is, track it down and fix or replace the offending part. I had a lovely Berlebach tripod which worked well in almost every way exc. the join between the centre column and the camera base which had a little play. If I attached the camera directly to it, all was well, if I had a tall ball head, there was enough leverage to create sig. movement. This raises another point. Lots of heads have cork or rubber surfaces but that inherently creates more movement. Remove this where possible - better you scratch the bottom of the camera than you have blurred pictures.
9) in windy conditions consider actually puting your hand on the camera (or lens if a longer one). This doesn't work with 2 second exposures but works quite nicely with 1/30 second exposures and a 300 mm. lens. Here I'd shoot several frames to give myself a choice.
10) Use a cable release and use it in a way that puts the least strain on the camera if you wiggle the cable release. I'm fortunate in one way that the Canon cable release is electronic and therefore very flexible and long so transmitting vibration isn't all that likely. On the other hand, it's long enough to get wrapped round tripod fittings so I still need to be careful.
A poor man's cable release of course is the self timer. I prefer a cable release so that I don't have to worry that all vibration is gone by two seconds, and also because when photographing in gusty winds, I want to shoot at the optimum stillness. It's not uncommon for me to let the 30 seconds activation time for the mirror lock to expire because the wind didn't settle and I just do it again.
11) In processing the image, use a good sharpening algorithm - mine is to raw process one size larger than native, use smart sharpen 300 1.1 and then do an output sharpen with photokit sharpener matched with the dpi of the image.
1) use the most pixels you can. Stitch where possible, make sure that you frame carefully so you don't have to crop both dimensions. This of course requires an accurate viewfinder - often with less expensive cameras the lcd is accurate but the viewfinder is not so you can shoot and double check that you got it right. Know your minimum f stop for maximum depth of field without adding so much diffraction loss that you don't gain - for me and the full frame 1Ds2 this is f 16, for a consumer grade digital point and shoot this is probably f8, for a 4X5 it's f32. If you don't need the depth of field, then use a wider apperture.
2) use a decent tripod. Use as little centre column raise as you can get away with, normally none.
3) balance the weight of the camera and lens over the tripod head. For longer lenses this means using a lens collar - technically my 70-200 f4 lens doesn't need one but I get sharper pictures when I use one.
4) consider using an L bracket. When you flop the camera over on it's side you basically create a tuning fork - something sticking out to vibrate.
5) Use mirror lock if you have it - arguably it's most advantageous from about 1/30 second to 1/2 second but I use it for every shot - given Canon's awkward way to access mirror lock, it's easier to leave it on permanently.
6) Use your lens shade and shade it from direct sun with a hat or even your hand (not touching).
7) make sure that your foot isn't an inch away from the tripod foot and actually moving the ground. Consider standing upwind to block the wind or even better using an umbrella to block the wind. Keep in mind the wind will play on large camera straps and increase vibration.
8) make sure that all settings are locked down on the tripod and that there is no movement - if there is, track it down and fix or replace the offending part. I had a lovely Berlebach tripod which worked well in almost every way exc. the join between the centre column and the camera base which had a little play. If I attached the camera directly to it, all was well, if I had a tall ball head, there was enough leverage to create sig. movement. This raises another point. Lots of heads have cork or rubber surfaces but that inherently creates more movement. Remove this where possible - better you scratch the bottom of the camera than you have blurred pictures.
9) in windy conditions consider actually puting your hand on the camera (or lens if a longer one). This doesn't work with 2 second exposures but works quite nicely with 1/30 second exposures and a 300 mm. lens. Here I'd shoot several frames to give myself a choice.
10) Use a cable release and use it in a way that puts the least strain on the camera if you wiggle the cable release. I'm fortunate in one way that the Canon cable release is electronic and therefore very flexible and long so transmitting vibration isn't all that likely. On the other hand, it's long enough to get wrapped round tripod fittings so I still need to be careful.
A poor man's cable release of course is the self timer. I prefer a cable release so that I don't have to worry that all vibration is gone by two seconds, and also because when photographing in gusty winds, I want to shoot at the optimum stillness. It's not uncommon for me to let the 30 seconds activation time for the mirror lock to expire because the wind didn't settle and I just do it again.
11) In processing the image, use a good sharpening algorithm - mine is to raw process one size larger than native, use smart sharpen 300 1.1 and then do an output sharpen with photokit sharpener matched with the dpi of the image.
The Sharp Print
For 150 years photographers lusted over sharp prints (exc. the pictorialists of the early 20th century and some portrait photographers who got it in the ear from their (mostly female) clients about wrinkles and face fuzz.
Sharpness is a far more complex subject than we might think at first.
For example, think of a 35 mm. tri-x image, 11X14 - the grain is tack sharp, the image isn't super sharp, but because the grain is, the image is perceived to be sharp.
Someone takes a picture at a football game with a long lens - framing the upper half of a single player. The print is huge and sharp and looks great at 20X24 from a 6 MP camera. Someone else takes the same model of camera and shoots a landscape showing a field of grass receding into the distance. he attempts to make a print half the size and the grass just doesn't look quite right.
It would be tempting to blame this on technique or lenses or various other equipment related issues but the reality is that what's important in the two images is completely different. The sports picture requres sharpness. There are no really fine details. As long as the shirt logo, the outline of the helmet and the eyes appear sharp, the photographer has a winner. What he's actually looking for is good edges - that is clean, well defined junctions between one colour and another, or between a dark and light area. If the picture doesn't resolve the threads of the shirt, it doesn't matter - the image looks sharp.
The poor landscape photographer however needs the grass to look like grass and beyond a certain size, he just can't do it. Better sharpening algorithms help somewhat but mush is mush. It isn't helped when you take into consideration dot gain of the inkjet print (ie. spread of the dye on the paper), the fuzzy filter in the camera (designed to prevent resolving patterns enough to make the bayer algorithm that translates rgb coloured pixels into a full colour image from going wild and creating moire patterns.
Unfortunately we seem to be in an era of customers wanting (and willing to pay for) large images. 24X36 is hardly big enough. It's all very well intending them to inspect such large prints from a distance, but truth is, they get within 8 inches of such prints and squint to check the finest details - so customers are definitly not to be fooled. Various uprezing tricks help to some degree but bottom line is there is a limit to how far you can go from a particular format or film or pixel count.
I'm getting ready for a show in Toronto and they want BIG! prints and recently sent me a list of images. I had already warned them that not all would make 3 foot prints so they asked me for the maximum size each print would go.
Knowing they want big prints, it is really tempting to stretch the maximum size but I know that I'll regret it when it comes time to make the prints and I need to be happy with the images I make. So I sent some pretty realistic sizes for them - I think they are going to be disappointed that their favourites can't make giant prints.
I could of course have shot all these images on 4X5 or larger - but its very clear to me that I wouldn't have - somee required quick setup, others long lenses, others still multiple images to get adequate depth of field or dynamic range, all of which would have been considerably or impossibly harder with film.
Even Christopher Burkett (who shoots lovely landscape images with an 8X10), also uses a medium format camera when in a hurry or when he needs longer lenses. I'm curious though about how he carries all this equipment - I'd be afraid that if I were carrying the 8X10, I'd see nothing but long lens images, or I'd be carrying the medium format camera and see detail images that I would know would have been better suited to the 8X10.
In determining the maxium size of prints for the upcoming show, the subject matter determined the size every bit as much as the pixel count. Tree Reflection (my upside down tree image) makes a lovely 3 foot square image, but others have had to be restricted to 10X15 inches, from the same camera.
Sharpness is a far more complex subject than we might think at first.
For example, think of a 35 mm. tri-x image, 11X14 - the grain is tack sharp, the image isn't super sharp, but because the grain is, the image is perceived to be sharp.
Someone takes a picture at a football game with a long lens - framing the upper half of a single player. The print is huge and sharp and looks great at 20X24 from a 6 MP camera. Someone else takes the same model of camera and shoots a landscape showing a field of grass receding into the distance. he attempts to make a print half the size and the grass just doesn't look quite right.
It would be tempting to blame this on technique or lenses or various other equipment related issues but the reality is that what's important in the two images is completely different. The sports picture requres sharpness. There are no really fine details. As long as the shirt logo, the outline of the helmet and the eyes appear sharp, the photographer has a winner. What he's actually looking for is good edges - that is clean, well defined junctions between one colour and another, or between a dark and light area. If the picture doesn't resolve the threads of the shirt, it doesn't matter - the image looks sharp.
The poor landscape photographer however needs the grass to look like grass and beyond a certain size, he just can't do it. Better sharpening algorithms help somewhat but mush is mush. It isn't helped when you take into consideration dot gain of the inkjet print (ie. spread of the dye on the paper), the fuzzy filter in the camera (designed to prevent resolving patterns enough to make the bayer algorithm that translates rgb coloured pixels into a full colour image from going wild and creating moire patterns.
Unfortunately we seem to be in an era of customers wanting (and willing to pay for) large images. 24X36 is hardly big enough. It's all very well intending them to inspect such large prints from a distance, but truth is, they get within 8 inches of such prints and squint to check the finest details - so customers are definitly not to be fooled. Various uprezing tricks help to some degree but bottom line is there is a limit to how far you can go from a particular format or film or pixel count.
I'm getting ready for a show in Toronto and they want BIG! prints and recently sent me a list of images. I had already warned them that not all would make 3 foot prints so they asked me for the maximum size each print would go.
Knowing they want big prints, it is really tempting to stretch the maximum size but I know that I'll regret it when it comes time to make the prints and I need to be happy with the images I make. So I sent some pretty realistic sizes for them - I think they are going to be disappointed that their favourites can't make giant prints.
I could of course have shot all these images on 4X5 or larger - but its very clear to me that I wouldn't have - somee required quick setup, others long lenses, others still multiple images to get adequate depth of field or dynamic range, all of which would have been considerably or impossibly harder with film.
Even Christopher Burkett (who shoots lovely landscape images with an 8X10), also uses a medium format camera when in a hurry or when he needs longer lenses. I'm curious though about how he carries all this equipment - I'd be afraid that if I were carrying the 8X10, I'd see nothing but long lens images, or I'd be carrying the medium format camera and see detail images that I would know would have been better suited to the 8X10.
In determining the maxium size of prints for the upcoming show, the subject matter determined the size every bit as much as the pixel count. Tree Reflection (my upside down tree image) makes a lovely 3 foot square image, but others have had to be restricted to 10X15 inches, from the same camera.
Monday, August 21, 2006
Sunday, August 20, 2006
Too Blue For You?
Lit only by brilliantly clear blue sky, the raw files are much more blue than this image - the same thing would happen with unfiltered film - so the question is, since once you are in the canyon your eyes quite quickly adapt the blueness of the light - how much blue is it reasonable to retain. In this image I have toned down the blue considerably yet it is still more blue than I remember. That said, I prefer this image to one which is auto coloured to remove all the blue.
What's your thought on taking advantage of the light? One might argue that the warm evening light of a low sun should be filtered till it looks like broad daylight but we seem more accepting of that.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
If I Could Have Any Wish...
What if Fuji redid their huge GX 680 iii into a 645 version. It would be half the size and weight - it would have a rotating back, tilt and shift, built in macro. Lets have it take any digital back via adaptors. We'd need some good way to focus accurately for the tilt and shift - though come to think of it - electronic focusing aids would be ideal - forget auto focus, just let us have focusing sensors near the corners so we'd know when we are sharp.
This would be an absolutely awesome landscape, studio, fashion, architectural and product camera. It's not much of a stretch over current technology. It would have most of the flexibility of the view camera with almost the speed of the current 645 cameras. It would be a bit bulkier but nothing like a view camera. You wouldn't need a sliding back or dark cloth and you wouldn't have to flip the camera onto it's side!
Right, it's only two months to Photokina - a bit late for ramping up - so my wish would be that they started on this project two years ago and will be announcing it at Photokina. Don't want much, do I?
This would be an absolutely awesome landscape, studio, fashion, architectural and product camera. It's not much of a stretch over current technology. It would have most of the flexibility of the view camera with almost the speed of the current 645 cameras. It would be a bit bulkier but nothing like a view camera. You wouldn't need a sliding back or dark cloth and you wouldn't have to flip the camera onto it's side!
Right, it's only two months to Photokina - a bit late for ramping up - so my wish would be that they started on this project two years ago and will be announcing it at Photokina. Don't want much, do I?
Friday, August 18, 2006
Black and White From Jura Canyon
The first few images didn't seem to work in black and white even though the colour was minimal - this one seems to work just fine in black and white. A manual blend of two images for depth of field (left rock is very near) and shot with the 17-40 at 29 mm.
I've been thinking that I should really switch to fixed focal length lenses for resolution, but truth is, not only are the zooms handy, often I'm in a position where there is only one right camera position and you therefore have to use focal length adjustments to compose. Any attempt to use fixed focal length lenses would result in significant cropping which would probably cancel the increased quality from the lens.
I see that my ReallyRightStuff nodal slider has arrived at the post office so one option would be to do more stitching - so instead of cropping to adjust composition, I'd actually add pixels. Of course, stitching becomes a real pain when you have to shoot multiple exposures to handle increased dynamic range or for depth of field.
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