Sunset is coming early in the day again, and while that marks the start of a grey season here, the beginning of fall makes for some glorious golden hours. Recently, Tech Editor Rishi Sanyal ventured out with the Sigma 24-35mm F2 Art for a sunset portrait session. Take a look at our expanded real-world samples. Read more
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Meet the New Polaroid Cube+
Polaroid’s action cam is all grown up and ready to play with others.
Like the classic Cube, Cube+ shoots HD vids and has a nifty magnetic mount. Plus it’s capable of syncing up to your phone.
Use your phone as a viewfinder and remote. When you’re done shooting, edit an upload on the go.
One little plus adds a lot!
See Cube+ Here
© Erin for Photojojo, 2015. |
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Kuba, Land meiner Kindheit
Ein Beitrag von: Gilberto Pérez Villacampa
Ich habe lange gebraucht, bis ich Kuba, das Land meiner Kindheit, fotografieren konnte. Im Juni 1991 kam ich nach Deutschland und erst nach fünf Jahren besuchte ich meine Eltern. Für die Familienfotos hatte ich eine Kompaktkamera und drei Farbfilme im Gepäck.
kwerfeldein – Fotografie Magazin | Fotocommunity -
New Spin: Rotating & Sliding Walls Turn 1-BR Apartment into 3
[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]
A combination of walls on wheels and sliding wall panels make this modular home infinitely adaptable, able to transform from a spacious single-family abode to a series of divisible spaces for guests on demand.
PKMN Architectures deployed this solution as part of their ongoing Little Big Houses initiative (Pequeñas Grandes Casas), a series of designs addressing usability in small spaces.
This particular home in Mexico serves a couple but is also made to accommodate visits from extended family, able to support three bedrooms that can be added in less than a minute.
While there are intended ways of using the modular components, the real beauty of the system is in its versatility – hanging partitions and thicker structural-and-storage walls can be combined in all kinds of configurations.
From the architects: “María José y Enrique viven en México pero viajan mucho a Europa. Querían una segunda casa en Asturias que pudiera ser un apartamento para la pareja y para toda la familia al mismo tiempo. A través de unos muebles giratorios los dos dormitorios de la casa pueden aparecer y desaparecer en un minuto. La casa tiene así tres posiciones, una casa con dos dormitorios, con un dormitorio o sin ninguno de ellos. Así la vivienda se convierte en un lugar para celebrar una gran fiesta para los más pequeños o un espacio tipo loft cuando María José y Enrique están solos. Es el lujo de tener un salón de casi 50m2 en una casa de 70m2.”
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[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]
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How to Create a Hollywood Film Noir Portrait
I have always had a soft spot for 1940s and 50s Film Noir, where there is always a gorgeous Femme Fatale, whose charms are most likely going to get you killed. The light in those movies is the key to the ambience of mystery and danger, and I love the way the scenes are composed with smoke, shadows, and the black and white high drama with dim light aesthetic.
These movies were mostly low-budget productions shot on location in city streets, with an abundance of night scenes, where crime is the main plot. Low-key lighting is the common thread of Film Noir, with harsh light that create deep shadows, resulting in a high contrast black and white.
As a photographer the actresses’ portraits that were used by the studios for promotion really fascinate me, and I guess it influences a lot of my portraiture work.
In this article I am going to follow the steps to create this image that is a recreation of a Hollywood Film Noir portrait, done with modern equipment, and digital post-production techniques.
Research
As for every photography work, it is always a good idea to do some research, and look for inspiration. Here I used references from one of my favorite movies of all time, “Touch of Evil”, directed by the great Orson Welles in 1958.
Camera and lens
The choice of equipment is an important starting point. In this particular case I used a Canon 5D III body with a Canon EF 85mm f/1.2L II USM lens. This is my favorite lens when it comes to portrait work, it offers the perfect combination of good sharpness and awesome bokeh.
Lighting equipment
These images were originally lit, in most cases, with incandescent high-power bulbs, and the quality and direction of the light was mostly controlled with barn doors and Fresnel spotlights.
I decided to use two Canon 600EX-RT Speedlites, controlled by a Canon ST-E3-RT Speedlite transmitter. This created a simple setup with a gridded softbox working as a hard key light on the model’s face, and a 20º grid as a hair light to separate the model from the background.
Exposure
Usually in studio portrait images, I try to decide the exposure based on the depth of field I want to create on the image. In this particular case, I chose to use f/8.0, as it gave me enough depth of field in the face area, with the 85mm focal length.
The shutter speed is the second important factor and I chose to use 1/125, as it blocked any possible ambient light, and only register the light from the flash.
The ISO 100 is enough for the flash power available, and offers me a clean and noiseless image.
Lighting diagram
Every time I have an idea for an image I try to put it on paper. Most of the time it is just doodles in my little black book, but it helps me to visualize the setup, and the light ambiance that I want to create. Here is the quick sketch I did for this image, which represents the lighting diagram and technical information for the photo shoot.
Light metering
After setting the starting point values for the camera, it’s time to calculate the light position and power, to create the desired effect.
The background was white so a distance to subject of seven feet was enough to turn it black, which works much better with a blonde model.
The idea was to have light on half of the model’s face, and a quick fall-off to the other side, creating a mysterious mood in the image. The gridded softbox was ideal for this effect. The 20º grid created a rim light on the hair and a ratio of 2:1 to the main light, so metering was f/8.0 for the main light and f/11 for the hair light.
The click time
Now that everything is set, it’s time to click. Even tough the final image was meant to be black and white, I captured it in color mode as it gives me better choices for conversion in post-production.
Post-production
There are many tools and plugins for black and white image conversion. In this case I used the Photoshop’s black and white tool which is a simple but effective solution.
Image > Adjustments > Black & White
A few adjustments to the red and yellow channel gave me the right contrast on the skin and overall image, creating the dramatic mood.
So, here is my approach to the Film Noir portrait. It sure was fun. If you give this technique a try, please share your results and images in the comments below.
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Cut It Art! Paper Cut-Outs Cut Landmarks Down To Size
[ By Steve in Art & Photography & Video. ]
An imaginative Instagram user’s unique way of capturing the world’s most famous landmarks for posterity involves a scissors, paper and a camera.
“I take photos with paper & sometimes without”, states Instagram user @paperboyo, but it’s safe to say those “with paper” have garnered him most of his nearly 70,000 followers. London-based Rich McCor (to use his given name) came up with his intriguing take on travel photography while brainstorming on how to make his photos more original and memorable.
Changing his POV was McCor’s number one priority. “I decided I would become a tourist in my own city,” he explained. “I wanted to see the London that I ignored, to explore the landmarks and the quirky history.” His first efforts depicted Big Ben transformed into a wristwatch (or vice-versa) and some graphic teasing of a lion outside St. Paul’s Cathedral. Nice kitty!
Positioning the various paper cut-outs takes much precision and no doubt McCor attracts a certain amount of attention during the process. No doubt there’s a certain degree of trail-and-error as well: what works well in one’s imagination doesn’t always pan out in reality. When everything goes right, well, that’s just the cherry on the sundae!
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Cut It Art Paper Cut Outs Cut Landmarks Down To Size
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5 Good Reasons You Should Get the Latest Lightroom Upgrade
If you’re a photo-fanatic, there is a lot to keep up with. New camera models are being announced way too often, firmware updates, fancy new lenses keep popping up, and on and on.
I didn’t even mention software yet but now that I have, let’s see what’s new with our old pal Lightroom (LR) and its latest upgrade.
Since this is the default program that you’re likely to find running on almost every photographer’s computer, it’s worth discussing what you might be missing (or not if you’re a minimalist post-processor) if you haven’t upgraded to the latest version – LR 6 or the Adobe Creative Cloud (CC).
If you are like me, you will be happy to hear that the general interface has survived untouched in the latest versions. That is to say, in many respects the program has retained the same look and features, and the tasks which you are accustomed to doing, are the same.
So what do you get for your $ 79 (that’s the price of upgrading from an earlier version) or what more do you get for your $ 149 if you haven’t yet jumped on the LR bandwagon? Let’s take a peek at some of the added features that may prove most useful.
If you are still clicking away on LR 4, the long list of reasons to upgrade is even more compelling than the jump from LR 5 to LR 6 – here are some good reasons to get the latest Lightroom upgrade.
Radial Filter
The Radial Filter reveals a new level of editing control.
Probably one of the most welcome features that LR users are grateful for (I know I am), is the Radial Filter (shift+m). This filter allows you a higher degree of flexibility in masking for dodging, burning, and the other adjustments available within the Adjustment Brush.
One handy way to increase the effectiveness of the Radial Filter is after making your initial adjustments, right click on the pin and duplicate the filter. Once it is duplicated you can then choose Invert Mask from the adjustment panel and make another set of changes – perhaps making opposing changes to further the effects you applied with the first filter (this invert selection feature is lusted after for LR’s adjustment brush).
Visualize Spots
The Visualize Spots filter helps you catch dust spots and other blemishes that you may otherwise overlook.
If you are a user of the Spot Removal tool, you are going to be psyched for a handy little addition called Visualize Spots. This little check box toggles between the normal view and an inverted black and white image which clearly highlights sensor dust or skin blemishes which you may want to eliminate (if you don’t see that option hit the T key to show the toolbar).
I find this feature quite handy when editing on my laptop, as it can be easy to overlook spots on the small screen, or because of glare. It may save you the hassle of having to toss out a big print because you overlooked spots.
Facial Recognition
LR’s new Facial Recognition feature can locate people throughout your entire collection.
Facial recognition has also been added to LR’s suite of updates. This is a feature that has existed in other software for some time (such as Picasa all the way back to 2009) so LR was a little behind the curve on this one – better late than never though.
Certainly this addition made many people happy, as it means one less keyword to have to enter into metadata. When activating this mode (keyboard shortcut O) LR searches selected photos for all recognizable faces and compiles a list. You can then plug in names for the different faces which LR can then use to search for in your entire catalog.
Furthermore, LR adds these names as a keyword in metadata and has created a new sub-menu for people within the Keywords panel.
Overlay Guide
The Overlay Guide is more flexible and less cluttered than the grid overlay.
A simple addition that I find handy is a new movable overlay guide.
All it does is give you a vertical and horizontal line, that create a sort of crosshairs, which you can move around for composition and alignment purposes. It is useful as a less cluttered guide, used in conjunction with transform lens corrections.
It would have been nice to just have this nested in with the crop overlays, instead you have to access it through: View>Loupe Overlay>Guides.
Smart Previews
Smart Previews allow you to make edits to offline photos.
Smart Previews are one of those features that I always wished LR had, and my wish finally came true.
This feature enables you to create compressed copies of images which can then be used to make offline edits. This works great if, like me, you store your original images on an external drive but want to be able to make edits on the go.
If edits are made to Smart Previews in LR, your original image will be updated with those new changes when it comes back online (when the external hard drive is reconnected).
You can set LR to automatically create Smart Previews for images upon import, otherwise you can create them manually for any images, folders or collections that you wish. To create Smart Previews, go to: Library>Preview>Build Smart Previews.
Conclusion
Naturally, this is not an exhaustive list of all of LR’s newer features. There are quite a few other sensational new additions such as HDR and Panorama Merge, Cure Pet Eye Effect, Slideshow improvements, new auto-cropping features, not to mention increased performance.
Have you recently upgraded? What are your favorite new features?
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1. November 2015
Das Bild des Tages von: Jannik Peters
Im Ausblick genießen wir heute den Blick auf die letzten Sonnenstrahlen über einem Krater.
kwerfeldein – Fotografie Magazin | Fotocommunity -
Die 5 Artikel des Monats
Liebe Leser*innen, Fotografieren ist nicht nur stumpfes Auslösen. Losgelöst vom vielbeschworenen „entscheidenden Augenblick“ eines Cartier-Bresson ist das Fotografieren insbesondere ein Akt gebündelter Intentionen, Lebensgeschichten und Prägungen, die in Fotoprojekten und -serien physikalische Form annehmen.
kwerfeldein – Fotografie Magazin | Fotocommunity -
Trashing the Dress: The anti-bridal wedding photography of John Michael Cooper
John Michael Cooper is not your standard wedding photographer. Credited with starting the ‘trash the dress’ trend, his portfolio of high-fashion bridal photography contains the standard bread-and-butter wedding portraiture alongside more experimental images. Read more