Monthly Archives: October 2011

Star burst

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How do you create a star burst like this?

Fine Cuban (Photo: Michael Willems)

You may want to edge or window the sun or light – but the most important technique is very simple: use a small aperture (a high “f-number”). I used f/22 in this shot (and that gave me 1/50th second at 200 ISO).

Yet another little factoid to store away in your knowledge base.

Stick around with me and I promise many more – and for new readers, do consider reading the entire archive here – or quicker, come in for a course or coaching session. December is a great month, so that you can be ready for the holidays and all the wonderful family and event shots you will take. Remember: photography is time travel.

 

Evolution of an exposure

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To help you see how to expose something well, here’s a way – the thought process that might go through your head.

Of course the way to guarantee a right exposure is one of:

  1. Use a grey card and spot meter off that.
  2. Use an incident light meter.

But failing that, you can do it with the in camera meter, if you are willing to go through a little bit of a process. With experience this comes were quick indeed.

First, shoot:

Uh oh, too light. Oh yeah… plants are dark. But the camera does not know it is shooting plants, so they look “normally bright”.

The histogram for this shot shows this:

Yeah, a general “normal” exposure.

You could now stop and pull the exposure back in Lightroom alter, of course (exposing to the right, a good technique to get best quality and lowest noise), and that would be fine.

But let’s say you want to expose well in the camera. Then find the right exposure… say -1 to -2 stops of exposure compensation.

And that gives you a proper hedge row:

Proven by the now correct-for-the-scene histogram:

But the colour. Mmm. Wonder if switching to “cloudy” or “shade” might give you a less blue, more green plant?

Evidently yes. See the histogram: the blue is pulled back:

And so that is how you might make an exposure without a grey card or incident light meter. A little thought is all that is required – and the histogram helps!

 

Hallowe’en Challenges

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So. You want to go out and shoot pics of the kids trick-and-treating at Hallowe’en?

Challenges, challenges.

  1. It is dark. Backgrounds get very dark.
  2. Slow shutter speeds result.
  3. But bright bits are too bright.
  4. And flash can blow out everything.
  5. There is nothing to bounce that flash off.

There is no single answer, but there are strategies. And your strategies will centre around:

  • Avoiding blur. Fast lenses will help, as will correct exposure (if the picture is dark, you need to make it appear dark enough, which means faster shutter speeds.)
  • Being aware of the light. It is, and should look, dark.
  • But also, avoiding the bright parts of the images from getting overexposed.
  • Equalizing flash and ambient parts of the image.
  • Perhaps diffusing your flash.

So these tips will help:

  • Use high ISO: 800 or 1600.
  • If possible, fast lenses (low “f-numbers”).
  • And if possible, wide angle lenses – these are easier to focus and to use at slow shutter speeds.
  • You can use White Balance set to the “wrong”setting to get more eerie light (try “daylight” or even “cloudy”).
  • Expose to make the image dark (exposure compensation, minus, when most of the picture is dark, or manual exposure mode).
  • Consider using a monopod.
  • When using flash, considering turning that down (using flash exposure compensation, minus).
  • Consider using a gel on the flash – perhaps a slight CTO gel.
  • Consider turning your camera upside down and bouncing the flash off the ground, for ghoulish effect!

The good news: you have a few days to practice!

Michael

 

Angle for interest

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I don’t mean you requesting it – I mean you are creating it.

See this boring shot of an alley? No interest point, no interest.

I suppose we can wait for a street person and make it black and white. But perhaps we can add interest by making the composition more compelling?

Alley (Photo: Michael Willems)

Now we have a good off-centre composition, strong diagonals, and even better light (since more of the image is now dark, we can expose for that). I like my diagonals in the corners.

So in this case, as in many, tilting made the image better. Don’t always rely on it, but don’t ignore the possibility either!

 

 

 

Lightroom Top Tips #213

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Another Lightroom tip.

Imagine you have done a shoot with two cameras, but one was set to the wrong time – you forgot to set it to the right seasonal time, perhaps?

Easily solved.

  1. Go to the LIBRARY module. Select the folder or collection that contains the event you are talking about.
  2. Show the filter bar (press “\”) and using METADATA, select only those photos taken with that incorrectly set camera. In my example below, that was the Canon 7D.
  3. Select all of these (Apple-A or Control-A).
  4. Now go to METADATA in the menu, and within that select EDIT CAPTURE TIME:

Now you see the options:

Select SHIFT BY SET NUMBER OF HOURS, select the number of hours, and hey presto, all your images are set to the right time.

Is that cool, or what? Lightroom’s strengths majorly include the organizing features you may not have found yet, like this one. Have fun!

 

Stop!

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Before you take a picture outside, stop and think a moment.

You know you do not want a picture with your subjects squinting into the sun. So, turn subjects away from the sun.

But you also do not want this – a picture of the same people pointing the other way. In tis picture, my students on my photo walk on Sunday are no longer squinting, but they are too dark, and the background is too bright:

Students (Photo: Michael Willems)

Not bad.. but noise hides in the shadows, while bright pixels are sharp pixels.

Better:

  1. Reduce exposure of the background to two stops below ambient (-2 stops, e.g. by using exposure compensation, or by using manual settings for aperture, shutter and ISO);
  2. Use flash. Even a single flash on camera.
  3. Consider making that flash warmer by using a 1/4 Hol photo CTO Gel (set your white balance to “flash”).

You now get what you want: brighter people and yet, a darker, more saturated, background. We’ve turned things around!

Students (Photo: Michael Willems)

Better eh!

(Yes, I grant you, straight flash is sub-optimal, so off-camera flash or softboxes (or a combo) would be even better of course. If I had had it at hand, I would have put my Honl softbox on the flash. Or you can use the Fong Lightsphere perhaps. Or raise the flash with a bracket. Or set up two flashes, one left and one right, to get a little rim lighting, as in image one – but lit well. Or use a flash turned down a little using Flash Exposure Compensation. Flash really has no limits to how you can use it creatively.)

For sure, this one is acceptable.

Here’s another one using the same technique:

Stop! (Photo: Michael Willems)

Make this STOP sign your beginning: go make a picture exactly like mine. On a bright day, using on-camera flash.

 

Fuji X100 update

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Those of you who have a Fuji X100: the new 1.11 firmware is out. Download it from here.

Then upgrade, ignoring the Fuji instructions – you do not need the extra file. Just the FPUPDATE.DAT file. Once you have that:

  1. Insert a fully charged NP-95 battery into your X100.
  2. Format your SD card in your camera. (Backup your data first!)
  3. Connect the card to your computer.
  4. Copy the FPUPDATE.DAT file to the root directory of the SD card.
  5. Insert the SD card into your camera.
  6. Turn the camera on while holding down the [BACK] button to start the firmware update process, and follow the on screen instructions.

You will need to reset date/time and all custom fuctions.

And you will now have a camera with faster close-by AF.