Six quick tips for taking better photos in dull weather

This time of year can both awesome and awful as far as landscape photography goes. On one hand you’ve got the amazing autumn colour that can make the most ordinary scene become something incredible, whilst in some parts of the world snow is almost a guarantee, bringing it’s own brand of landscape-transforming properties. Unfortunately, once the leaves have fallen off the trees and until the first snowflakes make an appearance, the weather can be uninspiring to say the least – murky, misty, wet fields can make your images seem pretty manky (hey an alliteration!)

It’s quite easy during November to February to be a tad depressed as a landscaper, especially if you’re craving dramatic lighting and assuming you’re not lucky enough to be in the right place when storm clouds roll in or you just don’t happen to get any notable sunrises/sunsets to speak of, the temptation might be to stay indoors and go into photo ‘hibernation’ until spring shows up. This is a shame though, since there are definitely photo opportunities to be had on those murky days if you know what to look for and how to make the most of the lighting you’re presented with. Some of the tricks you can employ to get around the uninspiring lighting are pretty obvious when you think about it (though so often we find we haven’t thought about it, which is kind of amusing!) Here are some of those simple techniques…

1.       Cut out the sky:

Probably the most obvious one (I thought this was a good place to begin) is to consider your framing carefully – which focal length is the best under your restricting conditions? What crop ratio works best? On those occasions where you’re shooting in a wide open space and your sky is that dreary washed-out white that you often find on misty/drizzly days, the last thing you want to do is include a huge area of it in your photos by using an ultra-wide lens. In these cases zooming in a bit tighter than you usually might will cut out all but a sliver of mind-numbing white sky and will help balance your shot, so there aren’t large expanses of distracting empty space. Try using a middle range ‘standard’ focal length of between 30mm and 50mm as this will be inclusive without over doing it as far as empty space goes.

 

 

Secondly, you might try cropping at the post processing stage, the advantage of this being that you get to choose your composition whilst looking at a much larger image than the one on the back of your camera, allowing multiple possibilities from each shot you take. Be mindful of the extent of your cropping however; remember that cropping means deleting pixels, so unless you’re working on a raw file in Lightroom etc. where you can revert to the original image, be sure to watch the resolution of your photo. Try a long format like 16:9 for starters or even 6x12 or 6x17 if you have pixels to spare, all of which will limit the amount of visible sky.

 

 

 

       2.       Use a hard grad filter:

In many cases a soft ND grad filter is enough to hold back detail in your sky, but on dull days, where contrast is low and lighting flat (i.e. boring) you want drama. A 3-stop hard grad (aka. ND8/O.9 ND) will darken an otherwise bright white mess from top to horizon, allowing cloud detail to show through. As always when using a hard-edged filter, look out for objects breaking your horizon line as these will be artificially darkened and look ugly. One thing you might want to consider is applying a grad filter virtually in Photoshop and using this to add a little colour at the same time. The problem with simply darkening a dull sky is that it’s still dull, just…well….darker! Injecting a subtle tint that matches the tone of your scene (i.e. cool hues if you’re shooting a snowy scene) can bring your shot to life. Do this using the Graduated Filter in ACR or Lightroom or applying a colour gradient in mainstream Photoshop.

 

 

3.       Think outside the box:

The extreme side of ‘enhancing’ the sky might be to replace it completely using layers in Photoshop, but in doing so you’d have to be ultra-careful to choose a replacement that fits well with the lighting you have in the scene. In many cases we’re talking about very flat ambient lighting and so this severely limits your options for possible skies to swap in. A far easier option and arguably more “honest” if you’re of the opinion that Photoshopping = cheating (which I don’t by the way) is to think more creatively about how you use the conditions at hand. Instead of trying to take in the whole landscape, pick out the details which you feel best sum up your location and focus in on those. Dull, overcast lighting might not be great for wide landscapes, but it’s a dream for enhancing colour saturation and creating soft, subtle shadows. For the shot you see here I simply chose to use the cloudy sky as a gigantic softbox and use the diffused light to make an evenly-lit study of this seaweed. This way I turned the less-than-ideal conditions into an asset and came away with shots that wouldn’t have been possible under summer lighting.

 

 

4.       Think outside the box part 2:

The other option might be to use a bright, featureless sky as a feature itself. Instead of trying every trick under the (non-existent) sun, approach things from the opposite direction and think about how you can use your lighting effectively. Position yourself down close to the ground and try shooting flowers/plants using the sky as your backdrop. If your subject is brightly coloured or very dark, the contrast with the white sky will create a very graphic look and almost appear to have been shot under studio lighting. Try using positive exposure compensation to ensure the background is totally blown-out to maximize this high key style.

 

5.       Go for the extremes – don’t sit in the middle

When we’re presented with a scene containing subtle tones, like a misty landscape, you have to decide if you want to attempt to counteract conditions by creating a ‘false atmosphere’ i.e. using Photoshop to adjust the atmosphere to how you’d like it to be, or work to enhance the ambient conditions. Don’t do both at the same time! Let’s say you’re shooting a woodland scene like the one shown here. There’s mist in the air and it’s clear this will make a good subject. The important thing to note is it’s the low key, low contrast lighting that is the baseline for this whole image, so make sure you don’t obliterate it by bumping up the contrast or saturation at the editing stage, as it’s so often tempting to do. Attempt this and you’ve got a slightly misty-looking image, with colours far more saturated than we’d expect in real life: in essence the worst of both worlds! Go for one look or the other, don’t combine them. Not here…

 

 

 

6.       Go abstract

Lastly, if you want to spice things up a bit, try using long exposures to add movement and energy to a lifeless landscape. Winter is actually the perfect time for long exposure photography as the short days mean longer periods of low light, whilst dull, overcast days allow you to use extended shutter speeds in the middle of the day and without seeing bright ‘hotspots’ from dappled sunlight- an exposure nightmare. Even if it’s drizzly, this won’t show up in a 20 second exposure, whilst 30 seconds or more can hide any slight camera movement induced by irritating winds (as seen in the shot of Bamburgh Castle on a wet, stormy morning.)

 

 

 

So there you have it folks, 6 quick tips for squeezing images out of dull, grey wintery days. Just remember the basics: always dress appropriately for low temperatures, keep an eye on the weather if shooting in remote highland/exposed locations and if you venture off, let someone know where you are. Oh and look after your gear too- take a rain sleeve and allow your kit to come to temperature on your return home, to avoid moisture damaging the electronics of your cameras and lenses.

If you have any questions feel free to drop me a line on here or visit my website, twitter or Google+

Hope you like this and if you did don’t forget to share it!

Happy shooting this winter!

Peter x

Oh and don't forget to check out ShutterLogic Magazine Issue 1. It's full of handy tips on how to think about your photographs and adjust your attitude to make better images. Just hit the button on the top right of this blog, go to www.shutterlogic.webs.com or follow this LINK


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The compact rules once more...

I've lost track of how many times I hear someone mention that It's the photographer, not the camera, that makes the image. I think people have got a little overly used to hearing this too and it's a saying that might be in danger of loosing it's impact. However you'll have to excuse me for preaching this once again!





Without my tiny compact camera I'd have missed more shots as cool as this

This week my 17-85mm lens packed in: aperture flex ribbon problem - something that EF-S lenses seem to be plagued with. My heart sank as I've got quite a bit of travelling coming up and the 17-85 is on my must-have list for going away. I have since got the lens repaired (for a reasonable fee of £45 from APM Camera repairs in Newcastle) but during the week or so I was without it the North of England was blessed with some pretty awesome sunsets/rises, some of which were more spectacular than I've seen before (typical!) Since the 17-85 is also my go-to lens for shooting autumn woodland scenes I was fairly hacked to put it mildly. My 10-20 is too wide for everyday use and the 70-200 too long (plus about 1.5kg too heavy.)

As such my G12 was abused considerably. As usual it was a case of me treating the little gem like a measure of last resort, which considering I'm surprised by the quality it can spit out time after time, is unfair...and it put me in my place once again.

Over the last 10 days, the majority of my shots were made on the G12 and I've been more than happy with it taking over the role of my main workhorse camera. In fact it's not too much to say that I might even have produced some of my favourite images to date!

I guess the message here is (wait for it...) it's your mind that matters, not the camera you have in your hands. All it takes is a little faith and a willingness to drop your obsession with absolute quality: sure there is a bit more grain than I'm used to with my 7D and the slower burst rate meant I needed to rely on a surface in order to shoot images that overlap for exposure blending, but instead of thinking of your compact or even your smartphone as the "inferior camera you're stuck with" just use it as your camera..! You're a photographer, so go and make pictures using whatever means you can.

Once again the G12 showed up my "gear freak" tendencies and surpassed my expectations.

Have a good one folks and hope you're enjoying autumn as much as me! :)

ShutterLogic Issue 1 is here!

I'm very proud to present the first issue of Shutter\Logic, a brand new free online photography magazine of which I'm now editor!

Here's how we describe it's philosophy:

"So many magazines discuss the ins and outs of HOW photographers made an image. ShutterLogic is all about WHY…


 The magazine explores the mind of photographers to explain the motivation behind the picture. If we can better understand what we were thinking when we made an image, we can better understand why it was a success (and therefore repeat this) or why it didn’t work out so well, so as to try things differently next time…

  SL is a brand new, quarterly online publication with a focus on our attitudes towards the world of photography, both positive and negative, and how these influence the photos we take, how we take them and the gear we choose to create them.     

   Featuring awesome photography from all the key genres, we hope ShutterLogic will inspire creativity, boost confidence and above all encourage you to reassess the way you think about the  art of crafting light…  "

Read the magazine here: https://t.co/bIAtrs7gDP
 
and remember to visit our site at: http://shutterlogic.webs.com/

also follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShutterLogicMag

I hope you like what you see. Don't forget to spread the word and help us build a community!

Many thanks,

Peter  x

See my images in 2015 Calendars

If you were hoping that title meant you'll find images of me in print, I'm no pin-up guy, so curb your excitement ;)

However if you are living in the North East my work is featured in two calendars, both produced by Carousel Calendars for next year. I'm Mr May in both and Mr November in one. I have to say I really rate Carousel for their design and quality; the prints are very well produced and certainly do justice to the effort put in by their photographers. The links are found below...

North East A4 calendar

Tyne and Wear A4 calendar


I finally finished my Biology degree so hopefully I'll have more blogging time available. Sorry again for the huge gaps. I'll make more of an effort!

That's all she wrote for today.

Have a good one

P x

My top 10 tips for awesome autumn images!

Last year I outlined my favourite techniques for capturing autumnal landscapes. Since that time of year is nearly upon us again I thought I'd pass on a few reminders...

Like most landscape photographers I would imagine, I love being out and about enjoying fantastic autumnal colours and the endless picture opportunities they offer. Last year was a particularly colourful one and I hoping for an equally impressive display of seasonal hues in the next few months.
       Whilst I’m no pro I thought it might be quite nice to put together a list of what I think to be the best ways of getting great autumn shots, making sure we get the most out of what nature is offering us. Below are my ‘Top Ten’ techniques for creating images to be proud of- get out and use them before all the leaves are gone and/or keep this page in your favourites until next year!

10) Try showing movement: I feel a little mean sticking this right down at number 10 as it can really be a great trick for producing abstract images with an extra ‘something’, but it may not be to everyone’s taste so here it is! Try using a slower shutter speed to introduce some movement into your shots. Since you’ll more than likely find yourself shooting trees, using a slower shutter value will show up any movement in the branches caused by wind. An exposure of around 1/30^th sec will give you a slight blur to the leaves (depending on wind strength) while 1 sec or more and you can get some really abstract streaks of colour. This works if you haven’t got anything interesting in the scene before you to make you’re subject- focus solely on those autumn hues! 

 9) Shoot on dull days: A way of making use of whatever light you happen to be faced with. Whilst it’s lovely to have nice beams of strong autumn sunlight streaming into your shot, shooting on an overcast day, with the low contrast, can be a fantastic route to saturated colours. If the sky seems uninspiring, focus on the little details and shoot some leaves in close-up. Try adding a burst of flash to create a little contrast and a bit of sparkle to your subject.  

8) Shoot at dawn or dusk: the key to any great landscape photo, if not a little limiting on the number if images you are able to produce through the season (not everyone has time to do this often). If you have the opportunity, shooting at these times will give you those rich golds, reds and browns along with a dreamy glow, all caused by the directional light of the low sun. I love to photograph back-lit leaves at these times, which will give intense colour and great detail of the leaf structure. If you can make dawn or dusk, try early(ish) morning (on your way to work/school/university etc.) or late afternoon. That’s the brilliant thing about this time of year- the light is good for most of the day, with dawn fairly late and sunset early. Try combining this with no. 7…

7) Shoot into the light: aiming your camera into the sun gives amazing back and rim-lighting effects and doing this helps you get the most out of the directional light in no. 8 above. Obviously don’t look at the sun in your viewfinder (spare a thought for your eyes) or leave the lens pointing at it for too long (this can burn your shutter.) These sort of go without saying. Oh and watch out for flare- invest in a skylight or UV filter, pronto.

6) Use a warm-up filter: either on your lens or when in the digital dark room. These do what they say on the box- give your image a warmer tone, which works great with the already warm colours of the season. In Photoshop go to Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Photo Filter and select one of the warming filters. I usually use the 81 or 85 filters.

5) Even better than that- use your White Balance to get it right in-camera: this is one area where you don’t want to rely on your camera’s auto WB as all those reds and yellows will get it totally confused and you won’t get the look you’re after. Use the ‘Shade’ or ‘Cloudy’ presets depending on how warm you want your image to be. This is works well as it complements the naturally low kelvin values of autumn scenes. If you’re shooting film you’ll have to resort to no. 6.

4) Underexpose: I’m not getting into the on-going debate about whether in digital photography it’s better to under- or overexpose, because in this case it is absolutely a nice idea to under expose slightly, as this will give you nice saturated colours (as well as prevent blown-out highlights.) Don’t go crazy; try starting with -1/3 EV using your exposure compensation control (in P, Av and Tv modes) and working from there.

3) Without doubt, use a polarizer: Ok so we’re onto the top 3. Firstly you definitely want to be using a circular polarizing filter to reduce glare on leaves and give your precious colours a lift. This filter is a no-brainer for landscape photographers and should be in everyone’s kit bag; this case is no exception. Oh and it will cut the light entering your camera by about 2 stops, allowing you to blur water and branches with longer exposures, which is no bad thing as long as you have a good tripod.

2) Know your location: in at number 2 we have something I truly believe in- know the good spots from which to shoot. If you have a good idea of what might make some good autumnal photos before the colour shows itself you’re in for a better chance of getting the pics you want. Preparation is everything. Those stunning colours aren’t around for long so plan your images and get them while you can!

1) DON’T JUST MAKE THE COLOUR THE SUBJECT! : I think this merits 1^st place- avoid the shots all the ‘happy snappers’ out there are getting and don’t make the sole focus of your image the autumnal colours themselves. A brightly coloured tree doesn't necessarily make a good photo in its own right. It might of course but there are likely to be other possibilities. Look for something, anything to photograph in the colourful surroundings. Even if it’s a little stream, or a person walking into the shot to show scale, or an animal interacting with the environment. Anything. It’s easy to get carried away with all that colour and start snapping at everything, but get a clear idea of what you want in your mind and I can guarantee you images with impact! [Unless you’re a dog or an octopus or a fungus, in which case you probably won’t be able to hold the camera properly or indeed understand anything I’ve written here. Hey life’s difficult, get over it… : )]

I’d like to hear if you have any comments on the above list: do you agree with my ‘Top Ten’? Contact me by commenting here, or by leaving a message on my website, Flickr page, or 500px site (see right for the links.)

Happy shooting this autumn!

Peter  x

Thinking small...

I’m just not even going to comment on the inactivity of this blog this time. I’ll just say I’ve been busy and leave it at that! Sorry…

When shooting landscapes it’s very easy to be tempted by the ‘big picture’ and miss the little details. Recently I’ve been making a conscious effort to home in on the smaller elements of the scenes I’m shooting in the hope of creating a more intimate view of my local landscapes. I’ve visited the Mediterranean twice this year, once to Crete and once to Malta (images will show up eventually!) and as beautiful as these places were it made me want to spend more time finding what it is about the places closer to home that I really love. It’s quite amusing really; when you haven’t been abroad for a while and you’ve been flicking through a few travel photography magazines you can find yourself feeling frustrated with the photo opportunities you have available to you at home. Then when you jet off to somewhere exotic you’re still frustrated with landscape back home because you realise how much potential it has, but for some reason you haven’t been able to make the most of it! I really love the British coastline and want to show this in my images. So we’re ‘thinking small’ for two reasons now; 1) we’re forgetting the temptation to travel abroad to find inspiration, concentrating on what we have at home, because we’ve realised how impressive it is and 2) we’re looking closer at the landscape to find what makes it impressive to us, in the hope of portraying an intimate picture to people from other places. Looking for the little details…

Recently I was shooting the coastline at Whitburn, Tyne and Wear. This about 15 or so miles from my home in Chester-le-Street yet to be honest it is a totally foreign landscape; I hadn’t been until about a month ago! It was another of those “how did I miss this?” moments because I was genuinely impressed with the shape of the tide-worn geology. The first visit consisted mostly of ‘sketching’ with my Powershot G12; exploring the possibilities without lugging all of my gear around with me. As luck would have it though the light on this day was far better than the two subsequent visits. When I finally took my ‘proper’ gear with me it was very overcast and the land looked very flat. Rather than being disheartened though I chose to focus closely on the luminescent green seaweed that I’d previously noticed coating the rocks on the shoreline. I love the way the seaweed seems to flow over the rock like the water that sculpted it and left it that way on the previous tide. After a few minutes of wandering I found the line of rocks you see in the images here.

I didn’t place them like that; the scene was all arranged by the sea. The placement was perfect and just screamed to be photographed. It took me a while to find a composition I liked but I think I’m happy with the end results. If the sun had been out, managing the exposures would have been far trickier and the light wouldn’t have been as soft and flattering. I think shots like these are quite literally portraits of a landscape and the overcast sky in this case provided our softbox quality light.

Images such as this are about what you leave out of the frame and for me this set tells a far better story about the location than if I’d taken a series of wider views. You don’t always need dramatic lighting because you don’t always need to create an epic picture; delicate and understated are qualities just as admirable; another reason to ‘think small.’     

Let’s leave it there because I’m starting to get philosophical and when that happens people tend to fall asleep! I like looking for little details (I’ve even created a new gallery on my website under the name.) Travelling abroad is great fun but sometimes it’s nice to think about what makes home, home, what you love about it and to communicate these through images…

Have a good week,

Peter :)

Ultimate challenge of the week: survive without a computer!

My laptop died this week. HDD problem apparently. Luckily, I'm obsessed with backing things up, as many photographers are, I imagine, so I didn't really lose anything of importance, but the whole thing has got me thinking (which is an irregular occurrence.) Are we all too reliant on technology?

This isn't a new argument of course but I'm not talking about the threat of having the country's accumulated wealth deleted or the unsettling thought that we're often driven 40 thousand feet into the air by a piece of software. I'm talking about us, people, in our daily lives and how almost everything we do these days revolves around a collection of circuits - and more importantly how we're held ransom when those circuits decide to burn out!

I can't believe how lost I feel without my laptop. I realised that practically my entire life has come to a stand still for the simple reason that virtually everything I do is…well...virtual! My uni work, my photographic projects and assignments, my music, my connection to friends, all is accessed and controlled my digital companion.

Now I of all people appreciate the advantages today's technology brings; I can't imagine a world without Photoshop, even though I know photographers coped just fine without it for over a century, but I wonder if life was somehow more simple back then. After all the laws of chemistry don't change - if something didn't go right in the darkroom and an image was ruined there was only a limited set of possible reasons why, one of the major ones being human error. In 2013 however we're working with far more complex equipment and a passing knowledge of how it functions probably won't help you very much; I for one use IT every day but can't say I'm an expert in every aspect of how it works. I suspect most people aren't, which is why we, in this 'Golden Age' of hyper complex systems are unable to carry out even some of the most basic tasks when it all goes !*%$ up!

Furthermore (I could go on about this all day) stuff these days has remarkably limited longevity with technology becoming obsolete in a matter of months. Actually I think it's rather amusing how we react when faced with older gadgets that at one time we thought were awesome but now realise are nothing better than paper-weights! I'll provide you with a suitably relevant example; I'm writing this on my old laptop from about 6 or 7 years ago. It's not-so-quietly chugging away in the background and seemingly every time I hit a key it emits an alarming whirr. When we bought it for me to do my GCSE work on it was perfectly suitable, but now I've got to tell you it's a heap of junk! Seriously when we went to pick it up at PC World the shop assistant swung the deal by promising us a "free, complimentary sack of coal" whilst the wealthy gentleman beside us, purchasing the latest and up-to-date model had to wait for his 'purple-shirt' to nip out to the warehouse to fetch his bike and dynamo.

Anyway I think I've made my point so I'll stop there. It's been a knackering day of photography with me shooting quite literally from dawn to dusk. I started out with a couple of hours back up on Waldridge Fell and slowly but surely made my way to Lumley Castle and the woods behind. I can no longer feel my extremities but I think the images made it worthwhile, although I can't be sure and won't be until next week when I get my laptop back!

No really I must stop: this old clanger of a machine is running low on solid fuel...and I left the shovel out in the snow!

See ya :)     

Photo BTS Tuesday!

This post is basically my way of escaping revision! I'm sat in my room (where I've been for what seems like days...without leaving) surrounded by lecture notes. Luckily for you (depending on how lucky you feel about reading a random blog post) my general disinterest in aquatic vertebrate respiratory systems has brought you another Photo BTS.

I took this image a little while back at Trow Point, South Shields on the North East Coast. The shot was made a short while after the sun came up, which gave that lovely soft and wrapping light along with the tell tale vibrant colours of dawn. I was really attracted to the light on the water this morning, especially in the shallows right at the water's edge. One thing I love about this bay is the textured rocks that vary in size and form and look great through the mistiness of moving waves.

Framing this image took some thought as I felt placing the horizon directly on a third lent a slightly unbalanced feeling to the picture; it gave me a fairly blank and distracting area of blue sky at the very top of the frame and I lost some foreground interest in the yellow rock. I opted to lower the camera slightly, putting the horizon a little more towards the centre

 As seems to be the way with my “golden hour” shoots, something was bound to go wrong. Everything was going swimmingly (not literally I’m thankful to say) until a random group of school lads turned up out of nowhere and began hurling rocks at each other on the platform. We’re talking 6am here people, most 14 year olds would I had presumed have still been in bed, rationing every blissful second of unconsciousness before a day at school (it was a Monday If I remember) and yet here they were, quite happily dodging missiles right where I didn’t want them; in the middle of my viewfinder… I managed to grab a few shots in between feigned screams of pain (hence the image you see here) and then with as little subtlety as I could possible I moved forward to the waterline and waited for either a sharp blow to the back of the head with one of those wonderfully textured rocks or for them to get the message. Thankfully they got the message!

Post processing

Very little was done to this image in Photoshop. I manually merged 2 of the bracketed exposures to increase detail in the highlights and worked on the foreground almost entirely in Camera Raw. Firstly I used ACR’s Grad Filter tool to brighten the foreground rocks by around half a stop and then used the Adjustment Brush to add some localised contrast and clarity. As with all my images the first step was to add an automatic camera/lens profile within ACR. This made the raw file look far better in a single click. I also added some slight sharpening, utilizing a high value on the Masking slider to avoid bringing out noise in the flat tones such as the surface of the water.

To merge the exposures I simply opened both images in Photoshop, copying the ‘sky’ file on top of the exposure for the foreground (Ctrl (Command for Mac) + A and then Ctrl + V) I then used the Quick Selection Tool to select the sky and headed to the ‘Refine Edge’ control, where I checked the ‘Smart Radius’ box and moved the slider to around 3 pixels. This gave me a smoother blend of the two images. Adding a layer mask immediately ‘masked-in’ the foreground image and that was it; I had a merge of the sky exposure and the brighter file for the ground.  I guess I could have tone mapped the files but didn’t feel HDR would give me the look I was after in this case; I wanted something more subtle.

 

So there you are – a quick lesson in manual image blending and how to avoid being stoned to death by feral children at dawn. Afterwards they just sat down and watched the sun rise, which considering their chavvy nature seemed a little out of character to me!  Awww….

Check back next time J

See ya  

Photo BTS Sunday!!

This blog has been criminally neglected of late, for which I apologise profusely. In an effort to keep things active here I’m going to try a new approach, in the shape of Photo BTS (behind-the-scenes) post. These will (hopefully) be posted at least weekly and will just be a quick walk through of the story behind on of my images; what the conditions were like, what challenges there were and any silly little anecdotes that seem appropriate at the time. I’m not saying that’s all I’ll post from now one but it’s something that should keep the cobwebs at bay J

So here’s the first of the series. This image was shot only a couple of weeks ago in the Lake District, near Ullswater. The hill is actually known as Round How and forms one of the shores of Ullswater itself. I was standing in a field near the entrance to the path leading to the waterfall Aira Force, which is the main thing we’d come to see. I took some images in this direction on the way in but none were exceptionally awe inspiring. After visiting the waterfall however, when we passed the same spot I noticed that the light was significantly warmer and that there was a slight mist hanging over the valley. Since the plan was to head home (we had a long drive ahead!) I didn’t really have much time to set everything up again and so had to commit to the cringe-worthy task of resting the camera on a wall, which was far from stable. I had my tripod with me but it had walked off along with a family member and was already half way back to the car! I shot a quick series of images, varying the focal length as I went. I immediately knew that the tree in the foreground had to be part of the composition and by using the long end of my 17-85mm zoom (which works out as 136mm in 35mm terms) perspective was compressed slightly which firmly placed that tree into the scene, providing a sense of depth. The rain clouds were rolling in which gave that biblical sky and the mist picked up the colour of the light, bathing the landscape in a golden glow. The painful thing was I could foresee things getting even more dramatic in the following 30 minutes or so, by which time I knew I’d be back in the car and driving away from it all! However, after about 10 minutes the light started to fade and that rain became the dominant feature of the scene, which acted as a strong motivation to pack up and move on.

I had my camera set to Cloudy White Balance but when reviewing them later the colours didn’t seem as warm as I remembered them so I increased Colour temperature in Camera Raw and added a little Magenta using the Tint slider.

This shot was more about luck than careful planning. Where possible I love to be able to plan everything before a shoot, but I think that’s more to do with peace of mind; sometimes a scene just presents itself and you have to work quickly to catch ‘the moment.’ Looking at this picture you’d think the light was a gift from heaven but it was actually very short-lived and we barely made it to the car without getting soaked. As always say, the Lakes isn’t the Lakes for nothing…all that water had to come from somewhere!

Camera: Canon EOS 7D

Lens: 17-85mm

Filters:  Polarizer, ND Grad

 

Ok so there you have it, the first Photo BTS (which, I admit, does sound a little like a fungal infection) and hopefully I’ll keep on track and rack out a few more over the next little while.

 

Stay tuned J   

My recent publications

Sorry for yet another absence but things have been sort of hectic! My aim is to get a few more posts rolled out before I head back to Uni so lets just keep our fingers crossed :)

If you want to read more about my photography I've been featured in a couple of publications this month. Firstly several of my images have featured in Amateur Photographer Magazine this week (wk beginning 25.08.2012) where I gained the Editor's Choice in the Reader Spotlight pages. This is the third time I've been in the Spotlight so it's nice see my shots there again.

Also I've written a short landscape photography masterclass for North East Life Magazine (http://northeast.greatbritishlife.co.uk) in their September issue. Here I just cover the basics from composition and lighting to recommended camera settings and selected, freely available software. If you're new to photography and live in or around the NE of England, you might want to pick up a copy. You also get to see a wonderful mug-shot of me looking like death itself on an early morning coastal shoot!

So yeah, I'll truly make an effort to put some Time aside for the sole purpose of blogging ")

Peter

Heyy...I'm still alive! (from Scotland)

Ok so first of all I’d like to apologise for my absence of late; I’ve just been crazy busy with just about everything! I’m pretty sure I promised a post about my Farne Islands visit about two years ago but I will get there eventually (even though nobody cares now…including me)

Anyway, I’m away from home at the moment (I’m currently sat writing this in a small cottage about a stone’s throw from the England/ Scotland Border.) I’m staring out of my bedroom window at a wonderful, beautiful, wet, stunningly secluded, miserable, relaxing, depressing view of our private garden and wishing either the weather would improve, or the world would just go ahead and end as it’s been promising to do for weeks! 

I’m determined not to let the rain and wind (and lighting and flooding and mudslides!) stop my picture-taking however; I think it’ll be good practise to shoot in less-than-ideal conditions…damn my optimistic nature J I did manage to grab some nice (warm) shots the other evening when there was a dusk to speak of, so at least I got them in the bag early on (see below.)

I’m certainly not travelling light though; the relative closeness to home provided too many gear temptations and I can’t think of anything I’ve left behind! I’ve got both EOS digital bodies with me (my 450D and 7D) as well as my 10-20, 17-85, 70-200, 50 and 35-70mm lenses, plus a flash, radio triggers etc. and I’m hauling it all around in my Lowepro Vertex 200AW. I’m hoping to go back to the Edinburgh Botanic Gardens before we head home and we’re here ‘till Saturday so hopefully I’ll come back with some “Keepers.”

I’ll keep you all posted when possible…J   

Peter x

Shooting the blossom

First of all I’d just like to apologise for my recent absence, but I have been kinda’ snowed under with work, so…sorry! Unfortunately, the aforementioned work has also prevented me from getting out much with my camera, although I made a real effort the other day to make it up to the University Botanic Gardens, Durham to shoot another seasonal must…the blossom. I pretty much missed it last year and almost did again; a lot of the stuff had already fallen, no thanks to the recent spell of rain and wind we’ve experienced in Britain of late. There was just enough left on the trees to capture some reasonable, colourful close-ups. There’s a lovely area of these gardens called the Japanese Friendship Garden that’s surrounded by blossom at this time of year and while the trees weren’t as full as they might have been a week or so back, this was the first place I headed.

I had intended to shoot some wide-angle images, taking in a broad expanse of the garden, with the vibrant pinks and reds as the focal point. However, the slightly bare-looking trees didn’t seem to make a wide focal length appropriate. I therefore shot all afternoon on my 70-200mm optic, concentrating on isolating individual flowers and branches. Most of these shots were made racked-out at 200mm and wide-open at f/2.8 to throw the backgrounds out-of-focus. The large aperture also allowed me to handhold the shots, which although not ideal, was necessary due to my tripod not extending tall enough to shoot the hanging branches straight on. I composed these examples so that the backgrounds consisted of bold colours to compliment and/or contrast with the blossom. Most of the time I arranged the shots so that other blossom-filled trees were visible as a blur of complimenting colour. For the final shot here, I was shooting from a kneeling position, near the ground, with the bright blue sky behind. Ironically this image was taken in the car park, before driving away; the others were carefully framed and well thought-through, while this was basically a snapshot…click and go! It also happens to be one of my favourites from the shoot. 

f there’s one bit of advice I can convey about shooting boldly-coloured plant life such as blossom, it’s to do so under overcast lighting; sun spots and dappled light just ruin the atmosphere completely. The diffused light from the cloudy sky is perfectly soft and ‘wrap-around’, and is nature’s very own soft-box, studio light. The colours will be far more saturated than under direct sunlight to, but without looking false; they’ll be natural! I also like to underexpose slightly in these circumstances, which did here buy about 1 stop, as this further adds the “punchiness” of the tones.     

That’s all folks...!

I’ll try and post a bit more regularly than once every decade from now on J

Peter  x

Adobe announces Photoshop CS6 Beta!

Big news! Adobe finally launched the beta version of the brand new Photoshop CS6. It was expected to be released this year and it proves not be a disappointment! I guess there’s always going to be a lot of hype when Adobe launch a new product, but Photoshop seems to be the software people like to see new versions of the most- after all it’s  for designers as much as photographers. After CS5 was released I kinda’ wondered what more Adobe could do with the program, it appeared to have had a complete overhaul from CS4; new lens correction feature, superlative selection tools, crazy awesome Photomerge, brand new built-in HDR tool complete with one of my favourites, HDR toning etc., etc. Well I went ahead and downloaded the beta version of CS6 to see what it has on offer over its predecessor- and knowing Adobe, they’ll completely destroy my doubts about the limited scope for improvements! Let’s take a look…

Brand-new, totally awesome Camera Raw

Since I learned how to use it properly I’ve fallen in love with ACR! I never thought it possible, but with version 6 I could virtually edit from start to finish right inside that window without leaving and diving into ‘proper’ Photoshop. The range of sliders and adjustments was really very impressive and now in the new Camera Raw 7 things have gone even further. When you open up an un-edited RAW file (or one that has been edited in version 6 but run through Photoshop’s update algorithm) you’ll see a same-but-different window. Some sliders you’ll recognise, others are totally new. Basically what Adobe has done is take the new Develop module out of Lightroom 4 and placed it here; after all, the Develop window is Camera Raw in all but naming. What they’ve done is slightly rearrange the sliders into a more usable order and add new sliders such as Highlights, Shadows and Whites that control the shadows, highlights and mid-tones independently. Noticeably many of the sliders are now set to the middle by default, so you can dial in a negative number, which wasn’t possible in ACR6. The Clarity, Vibrance and Saturation sliders are all still in the same place but can I just say that the way Clarity now works is great. This is by far my favourite tool in ACR anyway, but the look it gives your photos here is far more natural and much less ‘processed.’ Having given shunting it all the way to 100 a try I’m happy to report that in many cases this will be a more-than- acceptable practise.

Another thing I’m loving (terrible grammar I know!)is the re-designed adjustment brush. Now you can easily make selective applications of Noise Reduction and even White Balance/Tint! This is gonna prove unbelievably useful for so many people is so many situations that I think it will become a favourite amongst photographers who, for example, are dealing with varying lighting conditions out on location. The NR option is huge for me as someone who has been shooting a lot of HDR images of interiors for commercial uses; HDR inevitably produces noise and the ability to apply selective NR to flat areas when editing the original tone-mapped TIFFs, without opening two documents in regular PS is a real time and effort saver. These sliders are also available through the Graduated filter, which means reducing noise in the flat tones of a sky whilst simultaneously darkening it, kills two birds with one stone. All good J

Content Aware Patch

It was only a matter of time before they grouped these two tools together. The patch tool works great a lot of the time, but by making it content-aware improves the overall integration of the patched area, making it far less noticeable. Again this will make it easier to patch in tricky areas with complex patterns etc. It works in exactly the same way as the regular patch tool of Photoshops past but is just that bit more reliable; a predictable but useful addition.

New 3D- less clunky and equally useless for most folk!

Ok that’s a bit unfair, but let’s face it- most photographers won’t be using the 3D features in any version of PS. For designers and the like though the new 3D functionality will make your lives less complicated; less complex panels, a new slick look and no more slightly suggestive French words that nobody understands! Corey Barker will know what I mean J There’s also a new dedicated ‘Type’ tab on the main menu that makes accessing the type tools and creating paragraphs etc. quicker. You can extrude a 3D mesh from this menu too.

'Edge Smoothing’ in HDR Pro

Nothing huge but something I’m quite keen on at first glance- this adds a smoothing effect whilst boosting the detail in the image. This gives a fancy ethereal look that I’m not sure is intentional but can be cool. I need to spend more time with this one…

Live brush size/hardness preview!

I punched the air when I came across this one… you can change the brush settings using Control>click (Command>click for Mac users) and a dialogue stays live for the duration telling you your current settings. It’s not a massive alteration but one that makes the whole shortcut more useful. I always like to know my current brush status, particularly the hardness, as a value and before I had to pop up to the brush panel at the top of the screen, which personally I found a bit maddening. No more!

Content Aware move tool

Probably won’t be using this in a hurry but someone will. It works using the regular Content Aware function to allow you to move elements of your image whilst filling in the space left behind. I plan to have a play around with it and see what it’s capable of…

Live crop tool dimensions

Handily it is now possible to alter the dimensions that you want to crop your photos to, whilst looking at the changes live; you can choose a set of dimensions from the drop-down as usual and select a new setting at any point, without having to commit to the current settings and undo if you’re unhappy. Also, as a great composition aid you can select an overly showing not just the Rule of Thirds but also the Golden Ratio/Golden Spiral illustration for accurate post-capture framing.

…To name but a few! These aren’t necessarily the biggest updates Adobe is touting, but they are the ones that mean the most to me. I’ll be interested to see if anything else is added before the final version of CS6 ships later this year J

Disclaimer: I am aware that this blog is named Young, Keen and Penniless and so many of you may be thinking “How can he afford such an expensive piece of software?” Well the truth is I can’t, but I am a student and so through Student Expressware, bought CS5 Extended for 80% off! I’m therefore able to upgrade to CS6 when it becomes fully available. Thought you ought to know!