Shoot, shoot, no wait, well sort of…no stop, no, shoot again

Good Wednesday from Prospect.

Canon EOS 5D, ISO 100, f/1.4, 1/500th with Sigma 50mm f1.4
Nice shallow DOF straight from the camera

This may sound a little repetitive to some but I'd like to talk about shooting non stop. You know what I'm referring to. Everyone and his dog on the net that even opens his or her mouth about photography says just shoot, don't stop. Hit that shutter as often as you can. They all say that's what makes a great photographer. But the one thing they don't explain is what the hell you should be shooting.

I do agree that the more you click that shutter the better you will get. About 70 percent of that statement is true. With time, if you experiment, you gain invaluable knowledge about your gear and your surroundings. With practice, accurate exposure and the use of DOF will become second nature.

But without purpose shooting is meaningless. Useless images with no thought are also just that, useless.

It is important to slow down and think before you press that shutter.

Sometimes going backwards sends us forwards, Shooting film is one way that gives us the thought process we are looking for. Using up a frame that we can't chimp right away makes us think about what's in front of us. Film, whether you scan on not is final. It's permanently fused for the future to see. No excuses and no photoshop will change that.

Now there is the argument that the ability to instantly see your mistakes allows you to learn and grow much quicker. except without direction we simply repeat past errors. I'm not referring to the beginner that is just learning what a camera is, beyond an automated point and shoot, but the photographer that's looking to grow. 

I mean do you really need to shoot your reflection in a mirrored elevator? Well it's not like it's been done before has it. And you wonder why you aren't progressing?

So called good photographers that don't have a clue about their gear are not good photographers, just lucky. You can't rely on them to deliver consistently. And what do they usually say about their technique? Ahh I'll fix that in photoshop, no one will know the difference. Or, hey it's art.

Yeah they will, shit in is shit out, period.

Take the time to think about what you're shooting, slow down and compose, following the rules you know will make a better image and you a better photographer. Start with a conceptual process of what you want to achieve. Goal making works in photography and real life, no really it does. Just in life it can be life altering. With a camera, not so much, but treat it as something important. You're not curing cancer with a camera but you may alter another individuals ideas about life in general. Photos can tell great stories.

I read today that the world is over flowing with more photographers than ever before with the accessibility to digital cameras. Everyone's a photographer. Well sorry to say only a few are ones that we want to see what they've shot.

Think about the value of what you're capturing and think about what you may learn from it. That will make you a better photographer than just snapping away. Spraying and preying gets you nothing but wasted time.

My first photography instructor in 1978 told me " Don't be afraid to press the shutter, it's only film" I add, "Just be afraid of what you might bring back". 

If great photographers are great problem solvers then find problems to solve and make your image. You'll chase your tail if you can't see the path to follow.

If I don't see it I don't shoot it. I mean here I sit writing this post and I have 2 frames of Provia in one film back and 4 frames of Ilford in another with shitty weather outside and no thought on what to shoot. Ahhhhh! If I just shoot them they'll just suck. Need to think.

Until next time, Enjoy, Derek

Accurate Metering for the right exposure.

Good Thursday from Prospect.

Today I want to extend a bit I touched on two posts ago. I'm referring to using an exterior meter to gain correct exposure.

You can see here what the correct exposure should be here.
All shots, except this one were shot with Canon EOS 5D mk1
with a Sigma 50mm f1.4 (best 50mm ever)

As I hinted, rather openly, incident light meters are the only way to accurately measure the light hitting your subject. Reflective meters, which reside inside todays cameras,  measure the light that has bounced back from your subject and assumes the brightest area is 18% grey. This is just the way these meters are engineered. Don't ask me why.

What then happens it compensates for that and setting that to white and usually over exposes the shot making it look like midday bright. When in fact the shot was taken late afternoon and overcast. The result may look pleasing but it's wrong.

So let me show you the difference between reflective meter readings and incident readings and their results. I have included a shot of my Sekonic L-398 studio meter with the resulting reading.

The camera gave me a reading of 2 stops brighter. I set the aperture and ISO in cement so the only change would be shutter speed. Film rules here.

Now my habit has always been to over expose by 1/2 to 1 stop for reversal film (I said usually, it goes back to film days when you couldn't chimp the shot and had to rely on your experience to get it right).

The shot of the meter shows my reading 20 feet away from the scene but is reading the available light reaching the subject.

Accurately exposed based on the environment
and time of day

You'll notice at ISO 50 we should be set at 1/3 stop open from 5.6 and 1/500th. The reflective meter gave me a setting of 1/125th for shutter.

Quick note here I've deliberately cemented the ISO at 50 to demonstrate the changes on a level playing field. ISO 50 is the slowest sensitivity I have ever shot film. As well my Hasselblad only has a max shutter speed of 1/500th which dictates I use slow film to stay inside the limitations of that shutter for outdoors. (It's great in the studio since, being a leaf shutter it syncs at all speeds).

The point here is, you may think the reflective meter shot seems okay but it's over exposed in relation to the true lighting of the scene. That shot left our grey in the foreground completely blown while the sekonic gave us a better balanced exposure we can use.

If you think this just isn't so then here's a challenge for you. Turn off your preview, stop chimpping, and just set your exposures manually by the built in meter in your camera and check them after you have shot all day. If you aren't upset with the results then let me know. Heck, even if you're unhappy with the days results let me know that too.

May look right but way too bright
for the time of day and lighting conditions.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Note: all the shots are as shot in camera as RAW, opened in photoshop camera raw, tags added and saved for web at 1920 px, long edge.

I hope this helps you make better shots. Enjoy, Derek

Aperture at f5.6,
underexposed but still usable.
It's easier to lighten the shadows then
recover blown high lights.

Letting Your Work Breath

Good Monday from Prospect.

My favourite of the set. Processed through Nik Silver Efex.

This one comes out of a long and frustrating winter for me. I'm not a fan of winter shooting so I tend to shoot indoors and spend time going back over the years work.

I also take the time to update myself on new gear and software. Honing the skill set is always a good thing.

What I want to address is all those images we keep that don't make our first cuts. 

As all photographers know we hold onto, no, protect, every image we ever shoot, unless of course they are pure black or white.

It's not that they totally suck but are rather just over looked in comparison to what we had in mind when shooting. Sometimes we just over look a few gems.

There is a value in allowing your work breath. Taking a moment to go back and search for those images you may have passed over.

For instance here's one that, although I thought was okay but not great, turned out to be a wonderful image. When I went back to the RAW files, yup the Raw ones, I realized how good and interesting it is.

If this had been just a jpeg and fully processed I never would have had the opportunity to reprocess and bring out what truly makes it good.

This is the original (as shot). (ISO 100, f6.7, 1/180sec at 35mm)

I thought it was okay but I was more interested in everything else

I shot that day to put it up front

I regularly shoot RAW + JPEG. The Jpeg allows me to quickly and effectively meet short deliveries (especially when I need an image for social sharing) or to discuss the final goal with my client. I can even set my jpeg small enough to email, right out of the box, then go to the RAW and process for high res delivery. Yes this may take a bit more space but compared to duplicating files for back-up it's minimal.

Learned my lesson in 2010 following the New7Wonders of Nature campaign, for the Bay of Fundy Tourism Partnership, advisory week events. Fortunately we made wifi stops on the road so I could process in the car until we arrived at an access point. But now I can shoot the jpeg, upload it to my ipad, attach a description and email from anywhere I have 3G. 

Slight HDR processing makes this a great colour shot,
but I think the B&W is best. Comment and tell me your choice.

Wish I had that when we were covering the event. To meet the on road demand I had to quickly update my laptop so I had enough power to process on the road and connect to the hotspots. I had a G4 Powerbook that just wasn't up to the task and ended up buying the last MacBook Pro available in Halifax and prep it over night to hit the road the next day (one of those last minute things).

I know it seems a bit much but you have to be prepared to meet the clients requests. Fortunately I was prepared for an upgrade, just not that one. I had just added an iMac (planned to process the images when I got back not on the road) and wanted to hold off on the laptop upgrade until I figured out what would fit best. Don't get me wrong, this macbook is great, just a little over kill. A mac air would have done as great a job beefed up to my needs and smaller to carry. Oh well, next one.

Any way, to get back on topic, here's what the original looked like. Not a wonder but has potential. I recently opened this up in Nik Silver Efex Pro and did a BW conversion. I don't know if you agree with me but what a difference. Diamond in the rough for sure.

So let your work breath. Go back over them during times of the year you're not shooting, like the dead of winter, and don't be afraid to experiment. Above all shhot those in RAW and you'll find you have a lot more to work with than you thought you did.

Enjoy, Derek

Calibrate Your Gear

Good Saturday from Prospect.

Today I'm going a little geeky. I'd like to share a little calibration exercise every photographer should do wether you are shooting film or digital. It's about knowing your gear.

A fitting layout for these guys. Remember them?

Recently I decided to put film back into my work flow, if for no other reason than self gratification.

Film has and always will have it's place. I'm not getting into all the reasons here in this post. It's been argued to death and this is purely a personal decision on my part to increase the quality of my work and make me a better photographer and designer.

To quote Zack Arias, I just want to suck-less every day.

Shooting film is about taking your time not shooting away and hoping you get a good shot. I will be the first to admit I fell into that digital trap early on and learned my lesson quickly. The trick to getting your work right starts with knowing your gear and planning your out comes.

The exercise before you is about aperture, shutter speed and multiple lenses in your kit, no matter what you shoot with.

Fortunately I have some great glass but every piece can have it's own little nuances that change the resulting final image. It's important to know what that is.

Here I'm setting up some interesting subjects in studio (a controlled environment) to judge those variances.

By taking the time to set-up (including using a proper light meter) a test environment like this we can judge on a common ground (good basis so to speak). 

I use Sekonic 398 and 358s depending if I'm inside or out. Although we have built in meters I have never truly trusted reflective variation in camera. I don't care what light is bouncing off a subject, I want to know what is lighting my subject. Incident meters do that. In camera meters don't, never have and never will.

Shot of my set-up

Anyway, as I said, I need to know what my gear does so I simply set-up and shoot adjusting aperture and shutter to simply see what the camera does compared to what my meters say. Then process the film and compare with the results I have for my digital gear. I've done this before with my digital gear but it was time to do it again, with everything.

My basic set-up was with two strobes. Main at 1/4 power (what you set your camera to) and the second at 1/8 power for fill (one stop difference f8 for main and f5.6 for fill). I usually shoot this way in studio or on location depending on the goal. Sometimes two umbrellas, sometimes, as you can see here, a softbox and an umbrella. Sometimes I go just for the one light (undetermined modifier) with an open strobe on the seamless to blow it out (one stop brighter).

The set-up is something that always changes and grows depending on the desired result. This one is my basic 45s so I know what it does.

This set-up let me start at my ISO, which is 100 (using Provia F100 in the Hassy and Velvia in the EOS 1V 35mm), sync at 1/200th and fstop at 8.0 shooting 1/3 increments to determine which suits my taste and accuracy on exposure. I chose 1/200 to kill the ambient and it's the fastest my Canon will sync, the Hassy goes to 1/500th but I want them as close as possible.

I've posted the digital resulting image, tweaked , to show what I've used to set the calibration, and a shot of my set-up in this post. I slowed my sync/shutter speed down to show you the overall set-up. 

Note: the test image contains all of what I want to test. Bright whites, deep blacks, shin tone, wood tone with grain, my calibration fan and background texture with primaries. I'll get everything from exposure, depth of field to detail and colour accuracy from this set-up. I don't need to pixel peep this to death, just understand the basic differences between my gear so I can compensate for it on set.

Another view with the shutter speed slowed down to let the ambient light in to show the set-up a bit better

You can make up what ever interests you just include the basics of what you shoot day to day.

Once I get the processed film back and can scan them I'll share those results.

Next post is about Letting your work breath (on Tuesday).

Enjoy. Derek

Halifax Public Gardens visit

Good Wednesday from Prospect.

At the front gates. Corner Spring Garden and South Park

This is the live band Gazebo in the centre of the park.
Live music is usually held on the weekends.

Last year you may recall, if you've been keeping up with this blog, I posted a piece on the Rock Camp here in Halifax

One of the many statues and floral arrangements you'll find in the Park

[LINK to previous post].

Well what I didn't mention is that we arrived a little early and went for a stroll through the Halifax Public Gardens. This is a space dedicated by the city as a Victorian era garden green space in the heart of the Halifax peninsula. It was founded in 1867 the year of Canadian Confederation and has been designated a National Historic site.

With the onslaught of Hurricane Juan in September 2003 it was all but completely decimated. But with the strength and determination, that the people of Halifax are known for, the Gardens once again blossom in the heart of this fair city.

Unfortunately the day was a wet one and just finished up a July shower when we arrived so the grounds were wet and still over cast. Colours were muted and a bit dark, not the best lighting for a garden shoot, hence the black & whites. 

Note: my favourite medium has always been b&w. 

As a favourite of tourists and newly wed couples on their wedding day, I can just imagine how many photos have been shot in this park over the last 146 years.

If you ever stop by Halifax take the time to stroll through these beautiful gardens. Here's hoping for good weather when you visit.

Enjoy, Derek

Street Photography in Ottawa ON, Canada

Good Monday From Prospect.

If the RibFest isn't on while you're there try the street side Poutine.
Ottawa is just across the river from Hull, Quebec. It's all good

Here are a couple of shots I took during a trip to Ottawa Canada in 2007. Great city for street photography, especially during June, festival time.

When I grabbed my gear I was just thinking of shooting the architecture of the parliament buildings, but as I turned onto Sparks Street the Rib Fest lay straight in front of me.

I was there for three days and loved every minute. Hope to go back this May/June. Maybe in time for the tulip festival, who knows.

This time I plan and getting up close with my subjects. May need to equip myself with something a little less obtrusive than a big honkin DSLR.

Enjoy, Derek

Even the posties take advantage of a great lunch opportunity.
Even if they don't look like they are looking forward to it.

Trolley on the Island part 2 (AKA, The Holiday Island Adventure)

Good Tuesday from Prospect.

For today I'm going to redirect you to my photo website blog (derekmasonphotography.com BLOG) instead of duplicating it here. It's more about the shoot than the time on the boat. You know, the deliverables part of the shoot. This is part two of the Holiday Island shoot, found here (Holiday Island Shoot).

Camera set-up ISO100, f8, 1/500th in vertical on a Manfrotto Pan Head

On Location on the Upper deck of the Holiday Island (ferry between Nova Scotia and PEI June 2011)

Enjoy, Derek