To a photographer, the mood of the sun means everything. Natural light is temperamental — fluxing, fading, and shifting to an invisible rhythm. Working at the mercy of the elements means photographers often find themselves stuck in unsuitable situations, especially when it comes to lighting. Seasoned photographers Lindsay Adler and Erik Valind have developed a bag of tricks to get Continue Reading
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Es gibt immer wieder Fotografen, die mich begeistern. Einige davon verfolge ich dann über längere Zeit und merke, dass sie meine eigene Arbeit beeinflussen. Kennt Ihr das?
Georgia von Documenting Delight zum Beispiel fasziniert mich durch ihre natürlichen und lebensfrohen Fotos ihrer Kinder. Durch sie bin ich viel mutiger geworden und mache bei Familienshootings nicht nur einfache Portraits, sondern neige dazu, die Kinder mehr im Spiel zu begleiten.
Durch die wunderbare Kirsty Mitchell nehme ich mir mehr Zeit für die Konzeptentwicklung meiner Waldbilder. Neben spontanen Spaziergängen mit der Kamera führe ich, seit ich Kirsty kenne, ein kleines Notizbuch, in dem ich aufwändigere Ideen eintrage, die allein durch die Suche nach passenden Kleidern und Accessoires nicht direkt umsetzbar sind. Das hätte ich früher nie gemacht, ich bin ein schrecklich ungeduldiger Mensch.
Das Wort „Vorbild“ empfinde ich oft als schwierig, denn ich möchte diesen Fotografen nicht nacheifern, nicht dieselben Bilder machen. Aber ich habe durch sie gelernt und meine Bilder entwickeln sich weiter. Sie inspirieren mich und dafür danke ich ihnen.
Welche Fotografen inspirieren Euch und wie haben sie Eure Fotografien verändert? Erzählt und verlinkt sie. Wir sind gespannt.
kwerfeldein – Fotografie Magazin
Back in April we posted about the GSS C520 – a five-axis gyro stabilized 4K cinema system being used by Teton Gravity Research to shoot a feature film about skiing. If the preview footage is any indication, it’ll be pretty intense, putting the 4K rig to work in some impressive locations. The trailer is available online now – click through to see the preview footage in all its high-definition glory.
News: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Nikon has patented a technology that can adjust a camera’s low-pass (AA) filter based on the situation. By using an electronically controlled liquid crystal panel, the AA filter can either be turned on and off, or set to ‘normal’ or ‘high’ intensity. The first design would allow for a D800 that become a D800E at the push of a button. The second design would have a mild anti-aliasing effect for stills, and a stronger effect to reduce moiré in movies. More details on this exciting development after the link.
News: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
So much of what we do is defined by the elements that embody the concept. The three elements of the exposure triangle help us understand “proper” exposure. Every light source has three distinct qualities (color, quality, direction). Even the physical tools at our disposal can be broken down to a simple trifecta– light, lens, and camera. Being able to break something down into its components helps the beginner by giving them a road map– a series of steps that simplifies the process and makes it easier to understand. With enough repetition, that same road map becomes a mental checklist for the more advanced photographer. Over time, that checklist hopefully just becomes second nature. That photographer might not actually be thinking “foreground, subject, background” each time they compose an image in the viewfinder, but the elements are present, both in the planning and execution of the shot. Taking this concept of breaking down composition a step further, we can even break down the subjects in our images into distinct visual components.
SHAPE or OUTLINE
Perhaps one of the most fundamental of these components is shape. Regardless of whether we are photographing people, buildings, landscapes, or any of the other endless possibilities, every subject has shape. Definition. It can be subtle or dramatic, but everything we photograph is defined to a certain extent by its outline. The most graphic representation of shape comes from a back-lit silhouette or underexposure, either of which draws less attention to individual features and more to the overall shape of the subject. While this photo of a boxer is very brightly lit from the side, the high contrast lighting and black background combine to engage the viewer with a strong emphasis on the shape and outline of the subject. In a more classic silhouette, the sax player was lit completely from behind. The soft, wraparound quality of the light does bring out a bit of detail in the instrument, but the visual emphasis rests primarily on the shape and outline of the musician, creating an entirely different overall feel to the image.
Obviously, high contrast and silhouette are not the only ways to illustrate the shape of a subject. As noted, everything that comes in front of our camera has shape. How and to what extent you choose to highlight it relies on how you choose to place it in your frame. The photograph of the staircase was taken for an ABC project entirely because of its shape, while the radiator grill of the 1938 MG has multiple shapes and lines which draw the viewer’s eye into the photo from top to bottom.
COLOR & TONE
While color often grabs our attention first, sometimes we take the extra steps to actually plan for it. Bright and bold. Soft and muted. Contrasting or Complementing. In the portrait of the boy with the football helmet, the bright red obviously grabs your attention and draws you in. In the low-key portrait on the right, however, it was the darker tones and color palette that caught my interest.
FORM & TEXTURE
When we start introducing light and shading across a subject we produce various qualities of shape, shifting lines, and intensity of color. While our silhouette primarily emphasizes a subject’s two-dimensional shape, it is “form” that best describes the three-dimensional qualities of a subject. Form gives substance, depth, and definition to the silhouette– bringing it out of the shadows and into the foreground. Here is where the combination of light, color, and shadow combine to create texture in our images. In each of the images below, the form and textures are created and accentuated not only by the composition, but also by the way the light falls across the subject.
As is the case with things like the exposure triangle or characteristics of light, the extent to which each of these is emphasized in any given photo is going to rely heavily on the photographer and how they express their personal vision and individual style, as well as the mood they are trying to convey and the story they are trying to tell. In virtually every situation, however, one of these components plays a huge role in making a photographer stop in their tracks and say, “I need to photograph that.”
Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.
Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.
Anatomy of a Subject
[ By WebUrbanist in Gaming & Computing & Technology. ]
An elegant concept and beautifully executed, this thesis project strips away everything but the essentials from the process of printing, proposing a simple solution to reduce visual clutter in your office.
Dubbed Stack, an aptly short title for such a minimal machine, the design represents a thesis solution by Mugi Yamamoto. Aside from its small size and refreshingly spare appearance, its approach also circumvents a classic shortfall of typical printers: the size of the paper tray.
Instead of reloading frequently, you simply set Stack on top of a pile of blank sheets of paper and let it work its own way down, itself a lovely process that also lets you know how far you are through the printing job at hand.
A few points of concern, though, from a practical standpoint: it is hard to say how well the printer would remain stable as it progresses, or whether shifts in weight along the way would cause jams. It is also not entirely clear whether power cords would pose an problem, or how high the finished paper stack could go before potentially spilling off the sides. Still, as a concept, it is lovely, and at least some of these issues could be corrected by introducing elements like guides that flip down to keep the stack aligned below, or higher supports above to stabilize finished sheets.
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National Geographic sent photographer Stephen Alvarez to the beautiful American Southwest equipped with Nokia’s flagship Lumia 1020 smartphone. The results from the 1020’s 41 megapixel camera are pretty impressive – at least by mobile phone standards. You can evaluate the photos with your own eyes on our mobile photography site, connect.dpreview.com.
News: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
One of the easiest ways to start shooting portraits is to use natural light. There’s no added expense of buying speedlites or strobes, or even continuous lighting. You don’t have to decide where to put the lights, because let’s face it, nature has decided for you. There are still challenges however, and those challenges must be overcome to successfully pull off a natural light portrait. One of the biggest challenges is what to do when the natural light just is not pleasing. Maybe it’s midday sun and the light is too harsh, or maybe it’s later in the day and direct sun is shining right in your subject’s eyes. In my post “Sun Too Harsh? Modify it!”, I discussed ways to use reflectors and scrims to modify natural light to get a more pleasing look.
This image was taken on a bright sunny winter day, with snow on the ground. I didn’t have a reflector- the snow helped with that thankfully. But the sun was too harsh to put her directly in it. The solution was to go behind one of the nearby buildings and use that softer light to illuminate her face. EOS 5D Mark II, Ef 85mm f/1.2L II. 1/2000 at f/2.2, ISO 160.
But what happens if you don’t have a reflector or a scrim? Well then you have it made in the shade! Find some shade, and you’ll find some soft, indirect lighting that can help you create beautiful portraits. Look for a large tree with overhanging branches. Or a doorway. Or an overpass of some kind. Anything that gets you out of direct sun, and into indirect light. It does you no good if there’s no light getting to your subject, but once you find a place with indirect lighting, you’re all set.
Here, the subject was positioned under the overhang of a train station. Because it was an open overhang, the background is lit brightly, creating more depth. EOS-1D X, EF 85mm f/1.2L II. 1/1000, f/2.8 at ISO 640.
The light will be soft and even- and very pleasing. The background will likely go a little darker depending on where you found your shade, be it under a tree, where it might be brighter, or in a doorway or behind a building. Look around, see what you can make happen. And just because your subject is facing out towards the light, doesn’t mean you need to be. Walk around your subject- get that soft light hitting from the side, as well as the front. Just keep your subject positioned so the light is hitting the mask of the face, including the eyes. Just because the light is not pleasing doesn’t mean all is lost. Sometimes, all you need to do is find some shade.
This shot was taken in Central Park in New York City, near Strawberry Fields. There is a walking path that goes under a large footbridge, creating a tunnel. The day was a typical summer day, bright and hot. The sun was far too harsh. We moved to the opening of the tunnel and I let the light wash in on her face. I turned her slightly so the light came from the side a bit, creating some shadow on the left side of her face. EOS 5D Mark II, EF 70-200 f/2.8L IS II. ISO 800, 1/250, f/2.8.
Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.
Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.
Natural Light Portraits: Made In The Shade
[ By WebUrbanist in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]
These interior photos by Kai Fagerström depict wild forest inhabitants who have made derelict human-owned dwellings their own – domestic portraits-at-home with a undomesticated twist.
An abandoned series of small shacks and quaint cottages in Finland, slowly reclaimed by nature, show hints of slowly-invading of plant life, but the even faster introduction of woodland animals including squirrels, foxes, owls and more.
This surprising variety of crafty creatures have adopted and reshaped the existing spaces to suit their own needs, tunneling through vents and fireplaces, nesting and resting between walls and below floors.
Though this photography project started with a few quick shots in a set of cabins in the woods near the photographer’s summer home, the deserted spaces have turned out to be so rich in potential wildlife portraits that the results now populate an entire book of images (The House in the Woods).
Great patience is required to wait and take just the right desired shots, which are so well-composed you could almost imagine the animals posed to have their picture taken. “Deserted buildings are so full of contradictions [and] I am fascinated by the way nature reclaims spaces that were, essentially, only ever on loan to humans.”
Each image has a story, often elaborate, about how it was taken. About the last one above, for instance, from National Geographic: “On a summer night a family of badgers file into the kitchen from a tunnel they dug under the fireplace. It took four years before Fagerström finally caught the skittish, nocturnal weasels. For this shot he set his camera on a windowsill, then stood outside on a ladder for hours before pressing the shutter via remote control.”
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