RSS
 

Getting to Grips with Fill Light in Portrait Photography

08 Oct

The post Getting to Grips with Fill Light in Portrait Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by John McIntire.

Image: Using fill light is an essential skill that will allow you complete control over the contrast...

Using fill light is an essential skill that will allow you complete control over the contrast and tonality in your images in any type of lighting situation.

It should be no secret to any photographer that one light is all you need to achieve great results. While one light setups (in this context, specifically those that don’t involve the use of a reflector) are both well discussed and incredibly useful, sometimes it’s good (or even essential) to go beyond the basics. The next step in your progression is probably going to be to add fill lighting.

Fill light is one of those essential skills that every photographer should have a good grasp of no matter what type of light they are using.

Image: One light setups are powerful, and the results can be great. However, sometimes it’s us...

One light setups are powerful, and the results can be great. However, sometimes it’s useful to be able to take even more control over the contrast in your images.

This article will help to get you started with two types of fill lighting. The first of these is the use of the humble reflector. The other is to use a second dedicated light source. Both of these methods are very different in how they are implemented and what they can achieve. Mastering both will give you a more complete skill set with which to use in your photography.

What is fill lighting and what does it achieve?

Image: In the image on the left, the lack of fill lighting has left most of the details in the back...

In the image on the left, the lack of fill lighting has left most of the details in the back of the subject’s dress as pure black. Adding fill light (right) has brought those details back.

The concept of fill lighting is quite simple.

The idea is that you use it to light the shadows in your frame. What this does is:

  • Brings up the exposure of the shadow areas in your image.
  • Reduces overall contrast in your frame (much like landscape photographers use graduated ND filters to reduce contrast in their images).
  • Brings your final images more in line with how the eye sees the world, rather than the limited range of your camera’s sensor.

While really dark and contrasty images definitely have their place (I love them myself), images (especially portraits for clients) will benefit from a more even contrast ratio. I once heard it described (I’m sorry, I don’t remember where) that in lighting for TV and cinema, the shadows are always lit. This was a lightbulb moment for me as I had always wondered how cinematographers seemed to show a lot detail while still retaining a good amount of contrast. The answer was controlled fill lighting.

Two types

Reflectors

Image: Reflectors are a powerful and versatile tool that allows you to be as subtle or as bold as yo...

Reflectors are a powerful and versatile tool that allows you to be as subtle or as bold as you like with your fill lighting.

The most basic type of fill lighting is that provided by the ever so basic, yet powerful, reflector. You probably have at least one of these already (or you’ve made a few). Reflectors provide fill light by reflecting light (go figure) from your key back into the shadows of your frame. In a lot of cases, reflectors will be your first foray into fill lighting. However, they will also be one of your most-used pieces of kit altogether.

Secondary lights

Image: Using a secondary light source as fill is going to be your most versatile option.

Using a secondary light source as fill is going to be your most versatile option.

You can also use a second light (or third and beyond) as your fill light. A dedicated fill light will do the same basic job as a reflector, but it is infinitely more controllable. You can fine-tune the exposure and shape of your fill light with a precision that reflectors just don’t allow.

Contrast ratios – The very basics

Image: Left: The shadows are filled heavily and the fill light is metered one-stop below key. This r...

Left: The shadows are filled heavily and the fill light is metered one-stop below key. This results in a low contrast image with shadows retained. Right: the fill here is four stops below key. The contrast is high and the shadows are deep, but all of the detail is present.

The very concept of a contrast ratio can seem technical and daunting, I know. However, it is not at all that difficult of a concept and it’s just not that technical. At the most basic level, a contrast ratio simply tells you how bright one light is in relation to one another in terms of the aperture of your camera.

If your key light is metering at f/8, that means that if you set your camera to f/8 and an appropriate shutter speed (lower than your camera’s max sync speed) you will achieve a correct (subjective) exposure in-camera.

Fill lighting will always be underexposed in relation to your key light. If it’s even to your key light, you will get flat, no-contrast images as a result. For a contrast ratio that provides low contrast, you will want your fill light to be at least one stop darker than your key light. Since our hypothetical key light is f/8, that means the key light in this instance needs to meter f/5.6. This is a ratio of 2:1 (which is more advanced and you definitely don’t need to know to get started).

In short, if you want less contrast, your fill light should be one to two stops under your key light. If you want more contrast, try three to four stops.

Metering

If you want to be as precise as possible with these ratios, you will want to consider a light meter. That way you can measure any light falling on the scene with the press of a couple of buttons. This is the easiest way to go about it and works in the studio and natural light. You can also meter the light bouncing off a reflector.

Image: A light meter is the easiest and most accurate way to read what your light is doing. However,...

A light meter is the easiest and most accurate way to read what your light is doing. However, they don’t tend to be cheap.

That does not at all mean that you have to use a light meter, though. While more difficult (especially if you’re new to lighting like this), you can do it with your histogram on the back of your camera. Take a test shot with just your key light on. Now take one with only your fill light on. (Note: you won’t be able to do this if you are using a reflector.) Because fill lighting should be raising the exposures on your shadows, the shadow area of the histogram of your fill light test shot should be further to the right than that of your key light test shot.  If the shadow areas on both histograms line up, you need to increase the exposure of your fill light. If the shadow areas of your fill light’s histogram line up with the mid-tones or highlights of your key light’s histogram, you need to decrease the exposure of your fill light. (I did say it was trickier.)

Image: Left: Without fill light, you can see the shadows are underexposed. Right: With subtle fill l...

Left: Without fill light, you can see the shadows are underexposed. Right: With subtle fill light, you can see the shadows are brought up quite a lot.

Of course, you don’t have to do either of these things. You can always eyeball the whole setup and try to adjust things on the go. I would say this is perfectly fine with experience, but as you start out, I encourage you to at least have a go with the previous methods. It will drastically reduce the amount of time it takes you to get to grips with the technique and fully understand what is going on with your light. The more you understand, the easier you will find it to adjust things on the fly. You will also be able to learn new techniques faster.

Fill light with reflectors

Image: Reflectors can be subtle or bold when used as fill and are pretty versatile for what they are...

Reflectors can be subtle or bold when used as fill and are pretty versatile for what they are.

Reflectors are:

  • Cheap
  • Easy to setup
  • Easy to use
  • Very effective

Getting started with reflectors as fill lighting

Image: Reflectors are powerful, yet accessible, tools for fill lighting.

Reflectors are powerful, yet accessible, tools for fill lighting.

Before you start to think about fill, you will want to decide what your key light (main light source) is going to do. Set up your key light so that it is shaping and lighting your subject the way that you want. Meter so that you have the exposure settings that you desire.

Image: A small(ish) softbox placed in front of and above the subject creates soft light with shadows...

A small(ish) softbox placed in front of and above the subject creates soft light with shadows underneath the subject’s features.

Now, evaluate the shadow areas that your key light is creating. If you’re using natural light, or strobes fitted with modeling lights, you can do this by eye. Alternatively, you can take a test shot and review it on the back of the camera.

Image: Here you can see that while the light is soft, the shadows are a prominent part of the image.

Here you can see that while the light is soft, the shadows are a prominent part of the image.

Place your reflector so that it is roughly opposite your key light. Evaluate what the reflector is doing (either by eye or test shot again).

Image: Adding a reflector beneath the key light serves to raise the exposure in the shadow areas of...

Adding a reflector beneath the key light serves to raise the exposure in the shadow areas of the image.

What you are aiming for is for you shadows to be brought up in exposure, but not eliminated altogether. If you want low contrast, bring your reflector in as close as possible. If you want more contrast, move it away.

Image: With the reflector used as fill, the shadows are still present, but the overall contrast in t...

With the reflector used as fill, the shadows are still present, but the overall contrast in the image has been reduced.

It can take quite a lot of practice before you learn to see the subtle changes a white reflector provides. The key is to get as much practice in as possible.

Set up an object and light it. Put your reflector wherever you want and start taking shots, being sure to move the reflector into different positions each time. Review each shot and try to notice the behavior of the light in each instance. This exercise will give you a pretty good idea of how a reflector is going to behave in any given situation. Do this exercise often and you will find you can see even the most subtle shifts in light where it was difficult before.

Another quick tip to help you see the difference in contrast in a scene is to squint. It sounds ridiculous, but squinting reduces your vision to blocks of value and you will be able to see the contrast in the scene more easily.

A second light

Image: A second strobe serving as fill gives you the most control over how you manipulate your shado...

A second strobe serving as fill gives you the most control over how you manipulate your shadows.

Like reflectors, using extra lights as fill is a fundamental skill, albeit one with a slightly steeper learning curve. That said, unlike reflectors, using a dedicated light source allows you full control over the power output, making it much easier than a reflector to control how the light is going to behave.

Image: Varying degrees of contrast between your shadow and highlight tones are possible just by adju...

Varying degrees of contrast between your shadow and highlight tones are possible just by adjusting the power of your fill light.

To get started using a dedicated fill light, place your key light in your desired position and set the power for your desired aperture. Let’s return to that hypothetical of f/8.

Image: Here, a softbox is placed at 45 degrees to the subject.

Here, a softbox is placed at 45 degrees to the subject.

Knowing your aperture, place your fill light where it will affect the shadows in the manner you would like and set the power output so that it will be underexposed in relation to your aperture. How much you underexpose for is entirely up to you. If you want, say, two stops of fill in this scenario, then you will want your fill light to meter at f/4.

Image: A 7′ parabolic umbrella with diffusion was added about 10-feet away to serve as fill. I...

A 7′ parabolic umbrella with diffusion was added about 10-feet away to serve as fill. It was set to meter 2-stops under the key light.

Take a test shot and see if you have your desired effect. Adjust as required and there you go.

Image: In this before (left) and after (right) you can see how the shadows on the right side of the...

In this before (left) and after (right) you can see how the shadows on the right side of the image are lifted and filled in with the fill light.

Taking it further

Image: You can design fill lighting however you like. Feel free to use multiple sources of different...

You can design fill lighting however you like. Feel free to use multiple sources of different sizes and shapes if it works.

Of course, you are not limited to a single fill light. You can have multiple fill lights lighting your subjects from both sides. You can also mix lights and reflectors for different strengths of fill lighting from various angles. You can pretty much do whatever you want in terms of designing a light set-up. You are only limited by the equipment you have at hand and what you can dream up.

Image: Using multiple fill lights allows you to control every aspect of contrast in your images.

Using multiple fill lights allows you to control every aspect of contrast in your images.

An idea is only crazy if it might work and you don’t try it.

Tips for fill lighting

1) It’s often better to retain the shadows rather than fill them in completely. This is not a rule, but images that retain some amount of contrast are often more natural and pleasing to the eye.

2) Pay attention to the catchlights in portraits – Extra light sources mean extra catchlights. When you are setting up your lights (reflectors included), be sure to watch the catchlights in your subjects’ eyes. Catchlights can make or break a portrait, so make sure you are controlling them as much as you are the lighting itself.

3) Big light sources at a distance work very well as fill light.

Image: This is by no means a rule, but big light sources (like the 7′ umbrella to camera right...

This is by no means a rule, but big light sources (like the 7′ umbrella to camera right) from a distance work really well as fill lighting.

4) Don’t be a slave to the ratios – While using the ratios as a starting point can, and will, be a useful springboard, that doesn’t mean you should adhere to them rigidly. If something isn’t right, adjust as you see fit. Nobody cares in the end if your ratios are exactly 4:1, but they do care if your photos look right. Use your best judgment and change things up if you need to. Sometimes only the tiniest of power adjustments will completely change the end result.

5) Think outside the box – Any light source can be your key and your fill. You’re probably aware that you can use flash to fill-in shadows in natural light, but you can also use natural light as fill where your main lighting is provided by flash.

Image: Here, the key light is a large window to the camera right. The fill light is provided by a st...

Here, the key light is a large window to the camera right. The fill light is provided by a strobe. You can mix light sources however you want to achieve your fill lighting.

That’s it

Hopefully, that’s served as a primer to get you started and demystify fill lighting. Being able to control the contrast in your images with lighting is a fundamental skill that you will be able to use across multiple disciplines. It will allow you to bring a new level of depth to your images straight out of the camera.

Get out and practice, start simple and go slow, and you will master the basics in no time at all.

Try out some of these tips, and share your photos with us in the comments!

 

fill-light-in-portrait-photography

The post Getting to Grips with Fill Light in Portrait Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by John McIntire.


Digital Photography School

 
Comments Off on Getting to Grips with Fill Light in Portrait Photography

Posted in Photography

 

Anduril’s Anvil is a drone-bashing machine designed to take out UAVs mid-flight

08 Oct

Palmer Luckey has moved on after being ousted from Facebook. His second act as a founder is California-based manufacturer, Anduril. Based in Irvine, the upstart has raised over $ 41 million since 2014. They’ve developed the Anvil, a quadcopter designed for short, fast flights up to 100 mph. The Anvil is equipped with sensors to identify, track, and intercept targets.

According to Luckey, the best way to respond to the threat of a drone illegally entering unauthorized airspace, especially military bases, is to physically smash into and disable it. ‘All the soft kill systems are a waste of time,’ Luckey told Bloomberg in an interview, referring to a spate of anti-drone technologies that have recently surfaced.

Equipped with electro-optical and infrared sensors, that are effective both in daylight and at nighttime, rotors on the bottom, and strategically-placed flight-critical parts, the Anvil takes out hostile drones from below. An operator can authorize an attack through a handheld remote while viewing a live feed. One main issue is the damage sustained to the Anvil as a result of a high-speed impact. Luckey believes in their durability and is not too concerned.

Anduril is already working on larger, faster versions of the Anvil that will target a small aircraft, helicopters, and even cruise missiles. It remains to be seen if crashing into rogue unmanned vehicles will be an effective solution to securing airspace. Said Luckey, via Twitter, ‘the best way to kill fast drones piloted by hostile humans is with even faster drones piloted by AI. The United States cannot allow the skies of the world to turn into the Wild West, our ability to take out aerial threats in a matter of seconds is part of the solution.’

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
Comments Off on Anduril’s Anvil is a drone-bashing machine designed to take out UAVs mid-flight

Posted in Uncategorized

 

Hipstamatic returns with new free app and updated analog camera styles

08 Oct

Hipstamatic, the once-popular image filter app that was largely eclipsed by Instagram, has returned as the Hipstamatic X analog camera app. The new app is free to download for iOS devices, offering users access to image filters that imitate the look of many retro analog cameras.

Unlike Instagram, which requires users to manually apply and edit filters, Hipstamatic functions more like a camera, which means the filter and adjustments are automatically applied when the user snaps an image. ‘This camera brings all the joy, quirk, and randomness of analog film photography to your pocket,’ the Hipstamatic team explains on the App Store.

Hipstamatic offers a number of camera options, including Fisheye, Art House, Classic Toy, Tintype, Disposable, K-PRO X, Instant, and Pinhole. All films and lenses previously purchased for the Hipstamatic Classic app are supported by Hipstamatic X.

Though the app is now free, users can sign up for the Hipstamatic Makers Club at $ 2/month for access to the app’s full preset library, all cameras offered by the app, as well as more than 100 lenses and films released by the company over the past decade. Using these, mobile photographers are able to ‘build’ their own analog camera styles to get the effects they want.

The company plans to release additional camera styles in the future; Hipstamatic Makers Club members will get early access to these offerings ‘several times per year.’

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
Comments Off on Hipstamatic returns with new free app and updated analog camera styles

Posted in Uncategorized

 

When fast-ish is fast enough: in praise of F1.8 lenses

07 Oct

Going back decades, well-heeled amateur and hobbyist photographers have lusted after fast prime lenses. Partly this is just human nature. In the days when most cameras shipped with standard 50mm F1.8 or F2 lenses, it was inevitable that such photographers would long for something a little more exotic. A little faster, more expensive, and more ‘professional’. For photography obsessives that grew up idolizing the famous LIFE magazine shooters of the late 20th Century, it was natural to aspire to own those kinds of lenses, despite their price.

There is still a demand for F1.4 and faster lenses, but that’s not the same thing as saying that there is a need for them

Partly though, the appeal of fast lenses is practical – regardless of your ability level or income. They let in more light, and more light, even today, is always good. In the film days though, you really needed every stop. For a long time, anything above ISO 400 was considered ‘fast’, and shooting so-called ‘high speed’ film involved compromises, in color rendition, grain and contrast. For photographers that needed to work in changing conditions, an F1.4 or even F1.2 lens was valuable insurance against missed opportunities created by a lack of light. Never mind that many of the F1.4 and F1.2 lenses of the film era were pretty soft wide open – a slightly hazy photo is better than no photo at all.

But today, two decades into the ‘Digital Century’, is there still a need for ultra-fast lenses?

One of the ultimate drool-worthy lenses, the Leica Summilux 35mm F1.4 (this example is from the 1970s) is the most compact F1.4 lens that Leica ever made for its M-series rangefinders. Its small size, light weight, and the premium attached to F1.4 means that it has long been a favorite of professionals and wealthy amateurs.

Never mind the fact that at it can’t focus closer than 1 meter, can’t accept normal filters and doesn’t really get sharp until F2.

Fast lenses continue to sell, and technically of course, the F1.4 and F1.2 (and faster) primes of today are far superior to the designs that came before. Standout examples of the current state-of-the-art include Canon’s superb RF 50mm F1.2 and EF 35mm F1.4L II, Sony’s GM 24mm F1.4, and Sigma’s 35mm F1.2 ‘Art’ among many others. Tamron’s new 35mm F1.4 is another stunning lens, and don’t let a Pentax fan catch you suggesting that the FA* 50mm F1.4 SDM AW is anything less than perfect. Technically speaking, all of the lenses I just mentioned are among the best of their type that you can buy.

Canon’s EF 35mm F1.4L II USM is a stunning lens – in fact arguably the best 35mm prime on the market. If you’re a Canon shooter, and you’re one of those people that really needs F1.4, this is the lens to get. But for most of us, it might be overkill.

Clearly, then, and partly for that reason, there is still a demand for F1.4 and faster lenses, but that’s not quite the same thing as saying that most photographers still have a need for them. I suggest that these days, with the modern BSI-CMOS sensors inside most full-frame interchangeable lens cameras, the average full-frame photographer will be fine with F1.8. And might actually be better off.

To explain why I think that, I’ll break down the three traditional arguments in favor of fast lenses:

1: Faster lenses let in more light, and more light is always good.

This is a fact. More light is never a bad thing, and the 2/3 of a stop which demarks an F1.4 lens from an F1.8 lens is not insignificant.*

Consider the practical implications of shooting at F1.4 versus F1.8: First, you’ll be able to shoot at faster (shorter duration) shutter speeds. Assuming a constant ISO sensitivity, an increase in 2/3 of a stop of aperture means the difference between shooting at a shutter speed of 1/25th of a second and shooting at 1/15th.

That’s potentially quite handy if, for example, you’re shooting with a 28mm lens. Without any form of stabilization, you’ll probably be able to hand-hold your shot at 1/25th, but you might struggle at 1/15th. So in marginal light, shooting at F1.4 will give you a little bit more peace of mind.

This portrait of everyone’s favorite dog was shot wide open, on the Nikon Z 50mm F1.8 S. Belvedere is sharp, there’s no CA anywhere, and foreground and background are pleasantly blurred. The high performance of the Nikon Z6’s BSI-CMOS sensor means that even at ISO 1,400, noise is barely an issue (and could be reduced even further with a little more NR in Adobe Camera Raw).
ISO 1400 | 1/250 sec | F1.8

The second practical implication is that more light coming in through the lens means that assuming a fixed shutter speed, you can shoot at lower ISO sensitivity settings. Two thirds of a stop is the difference between ISO 640 and ISO 400.

But do you care these days about the difference between shooting at ISO 640 and ISO 400? Or ISO 1,600 and ISO 1,000? Or even 160 and 100? The increased performance of modern sensors at high ISO sensitivity settings means that the days when you really needed to keep your ISO ultra-low for acceptable results are (fortunately) over. As such, when it comes to light gathering, the advantage of an F1.4 lens is less important now than ever before. That’s assuming you’re shooting with one of the new generation of BSI-CMOS sensors, of course, with dual-gain architectures.

2: Faster lenses make for more attractive images

But of course you know all about F-stops, and the reason you’re interested in an F1.4 lens is not for its technical advantages when it comes to pushing your exposure envelope, but for its aesthetic advantages. Specifically, shallower depth of field and blurrier backgrounds at maximum aperture.

This is fair enough – if you consider two lenses of the same focal length, one an F1.4 and one an F1.8, the F1.4 lens will deliver blurrier backgrounds, assuming a constant camera to subject distance. Physics again.

F1.8

F1.4

However, the difference between the appearance of background blur at F1.4 vs. F1.8 isn’t as great as all that. It’s highly dependent on camera to subject distance of course, but in general, I’ll bet that most people, if they saw a photograph shot at either F stop setting in isolation, would be unable to identify the aperture setting you used.

Look at the example above. The image on the left was shot at F1.8, the image on the right was shot at F1.4. The crop is from an area just to the left (her left) of our model’s head.

The two images look different, certainly. But are they that different? Meanwhile, the marginal increase in depth of field at F1.8 over F1.4 may actually be advantageous for some photographic situations – especially portraits like this, where even a slight sharpness difference between your subject’s eyes can be distracting.

3: A faster lens stopped down is sharper than a slower one is wide open

Traditionally, this is true. No lens is technically at its best when shot at its maximum aperture. Stopping down a touch is good practice if you want to achieve better overall sharpness, cut down vignetting, minimize some common aberrations, and you don’t mind losing a tiny bit of background blur in return.

This portrait was shot straight into the sun, on Nikon’s Z7 with a new Z 85mm F1.8 S attached. Wide open, this image is sharp across the frame, contrasty, and while there is some flare in evidence, you really have to go looking for it. This is not the kind of performance that we would traditionally associate with an 85mm F1.8.
ISO 64 | 1/2000 sec | F1.8

Again though, these days, you may find that the difference between an F1.4 lens stopped down to F1.8 and a good F1.8 lens wide open is minimal. Looking at the best of today’s crop of F1.8 primes their performance wide open is extraordinary. When examining images from the Nikon Z 85mm or 50mm F1.8 S or the Sony Sonnar T* FE 55mm F1.8 ZA, its obvious that compared to the ‘kit’ primes of the old days, they’re in a different league. Some of this is down to the increased design flexibility that mirrorless technology brings in terms of automatic software corrections, but not all.

At the end of the day, an F1.8 prime that is sharp and contrasty across the frame, which offers pleasant bokeh and lacks significant fringing when shot wide open is – I would argue – a much better value proposition than a more expensive F1.4 or F1.2 lens which needs to be shot at F1.8 or F2 for optimal results.

Disadvantages of ultra-fast lenses

Hopefully I’ve challenged some of the conventionally accepted advantages of faster lenses, but to further bolster my case I want to look at their outright disadvantages.

There are three: size, weight, and cost.

Lenses with a maximum aperture of F1.4 or faster are typically larger, heavier and as I’ve hinted at above, more costly than F1.8 or slower equivalents. The image below, showing Canon’s EF 50mm F1.8 STM next to the RF 50mm F1.2L USM is an extreme example, but nevertheless, if you see a 50mm F1.2 (or F1.4) and a 50mm F1.8 in a particular company’s lineup, you can bet that the F1.8 will be the lighter, smaller and cheaper of the pair.

I don’t want to pick out (or pick on) particular brands here, but Nikon’s Z-mount prime lens range is worth looking at in the context of this discussion because it currently only consists of F1.8 options (pending the arrival of the manual focus 58mm F0.95 Noct, which is a bit of a special case).

Two lenses, both made by Canon, one for DSLRs on the left, and one for mirrorless, on the right. The biggest reason for the size difference between these two is their maximum aperture. The lens on the left is the EF 50mm F1.8 STM, while the lens on the right is the RF 50mm F1.2L USM. The RF lens is one stop brighter than the EF lens. One stop brighter, and a whole lot heftier.

Of Nikon’s three currently available Z-mount lenses, the Z 50mm F1.8 S and Z 85mm F1.8 S are, in my opinion, optically outstanding in almost every way that a photographer should care about. The Z 35mm F1.8 S isn’t quite in the same league when it comes to CA suppression, but it’s still excellent. The combined cost of all three of these lenses is $ 2,250 (not inclusive of tax). That’s only $ 150 more than the MSRP of Canon’s admittedly stunning, but undeniably massive RF 50mm F1.2L, shown above. Meanwhile the combined weight of the three Nikon lenses comes in at only 300g more than the Canon 50mm on its own. And around 800g (about 1.7lb) less than the expected weight of one Nikon Noct, (pictured at the top of this article) if you’re playing that game. We don’t know how much the Noct will cost yet, but let’s assume it will be significantly more than $ 2,250…

If you want a really fast, flagship prime lens, be prepared to pay for it, in more ways than one

Clearly this is an imperfect comparison, drawn only to make a point. But hopefully you do get my point: If you want a really fast, flagship prime lens, be prepared to pay for it, in more ways than one. And ask yourself first – how much do you really need that extra stop or two of light?

Just one more thing…

Speaking of price brings me to a flaw in my argument – or at least to a caveat: The fact that all other things being equal, an F1.8 lens is likely to be cheaper and smaller than an F1.4 or F1.2 equivalent is unsurprising, and in itself proves nothing. What has proved surprising to some of our readers is that fact that the best of today’s crop of F1.8 primes for mirrorless systems are more costly than their D/SLR-era F1.8 equivalents. In fact, in some cases they’re more costly than their F1.4 D/SLR-era equivalents.

Nikon’s Z 85mm f1.8 S, for example, costs almost exactly twice as much as the still-current AF-S 85mm f1.8G. Meanwhile, the AF-S 50mm F1.4G is a fine lens, and still available new for around $ 400 – that’s 2/3 of the cost of the Z 50mm F1.8 S. Sony’s new FE 35mm F1.8 costs $ 750 – that’s more than Sigma’s 35mm F1.4 ‘Art’ – still one of our favorite fast prime lenses, even seven years after its introduction.

Sharp and free of distracting flare even when shot almost wide open, Sony’s new FE 35mm F1.8 is one of the most useful lenses for Sony’s mirrorless interchangeable lens system.
ISO 100 | 1/400 sec | F2.2
Photo by RIshi Sanyal

Why is this so? The reasons are various. There’s the the overall loss of value in the digital photography industry which has seen volume at the low end of the market disappear, driving the prices of high-end products up. The need to recoup some of the R&D costs of developing entirely new mirrorless mounts, the fluctuation in the value of the Japanese Yen over the past decade or so, and other factors.

$ 800 spent now on one of the current crop of state-of-the-art mirrorless lenses buys you more than $ 800 ever has

But let’s not lose sight of a really important fact, independent of all that: The newer lenses mentioned above tend to be superior to equivalents that came before. While $ 800 is clearly a lot more cash than $ 400, $ 800 spent now on one of the current crop of state-of-the-art mirrorless lenses buys you more than $ 800 ever has. As such – especially if you’re a Nikon Z or Sony FE mirrorless shooter – I would argue that it’s time to leave behind the old idea that faster always equals better and take this opportunity to downsize.

Look out for part 2 to this article, if I ever get time to write it – ‘Hey Canon and Sigma, how about some more compact, high-performance F1.8 primes?’

Interested in reading some lens reviews? Click here

* In fact, 2/3EV is the difference between APS-C and full-frame.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
Comments Off on When fast-ish is fast enough: in praise of F1.8 lenses

Posted in Uncategorized

 

Just Dew It – Fun with Macro Dewdrop Photography

06 Oct

The post Just Dew It – Fun with Macro Dewdrop Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Rick Ohnsman.

Some things are practically guaranteed to make great photo subjects – dewdrops in the grass sparkling like diamonds in the morning sun, flowers and foliage wet with the rain, a closeup of dewdrops suspended in spiderweb-like pearls on a string or the crystal-ball look of a drop with a refracted image inside.  You can seek out such scenes in nature, or you can create your own miniature macro world.  However you do it, dewdrop photography will test your skills plus give you the reward of pleasing images, not everyone can make.  So let’s take a look at what, where, and how to “dew it.”

Image: When the morning light hits the dew-covered lawn it can be like searching for diamonds in the...

When the morning light hits the dew-covered lawn it can be like searching for diamonds in the grass.

Going natural

I’ve spent more than a few mornings lying in the grass with a macro lens mounted on my camera searching for the perfect dewdrop. I’ve also been out after the rain, looking for images where the drops have added a clean, fresh look with increased saturation to a subject. While often the subjects are found in nature, drops beaded on the surface of a freshly waxed car and other human-made objects can make for some great shots too.

Image: Many leaves will naturally bead water like the raindrops on this daylily. Raindrop photograph...

Many leaves will naturally bead water like the raindrops on this daylily. Raindrop photography is the “larger cousin” of dewdrop photography with no macro lens needed .

Image: A little spritz with a sprayer makes this rose look fresh and adds interest.

A little spritz with a sprayer makes this rose look fresh and adds interest.

Image: The fine hairs on a lupine leaf naturally beaded the water sprayed with a garden hose. 1/160...

The fine hairs on a lupine leaf naturally beaded the water sprayed with a garden hose. 1/160 sec. f/3.5 ISO100 with Tamron 90mm macro.

Image: Just add water to take a nice photo to the next level. Raindrops on the hood of this freshly-...

Just add water to take a nice photo to the next level. Raindrops on the hood of this freshly-waxed Jaguar add some extra pizzaz.

Hunting for such subjects is fun.  Like much of photography, it’s a matter of getting out with your camera when the conditions are right, often early in the morning in the case of dew or right after a rain shower.  Sometimes you’ll find some great subjects where the drops, the light, and the subject all come together.  I’ve not yet made the classic dew-drop-festooned-spider-web shot, but I’m still looking.  Luck plays a certain part in getting such shots. The fun is in the search. But sometimes when you want to leave it less to chance, that could be the time to…

Fake it to make it

You realize in those great movie rain scenes it wasn’t really raining when filming took place, right? So is it cheating when we as artistic photographers “enhance” our shots with the addition of raindrops or dewdrops? I think not. I guarantee the photographer created the vast majority of great dewdrop photos you’ve seen. Take two otherwise identical flower photos; the only difference being one is covered with dewdrops. The wet one will win the prize almost every time.

Drops sparkle, shimmer, refract light in interesting ways, and can take an image from “meh” to “wow!”  So if you haven’t already done so, consider adding a little spray bottle to your camera kit with some “magic juice” inside.

“Magic Juice?”

You can often use plain water to enhance your shot. If you’re simulating raindrops that might work okay. Spraying the foliage with the garden hose often works too. But when you want smaller, more rounded beads that hang where you place them and stay for a longer time without moving or evaporating, get some glycerine.

Image: Here’s the special ingredient for making photographer’s “Magic Juice....

Here’s the special ingredient for making photographer’s “Magic Juice.”

Often found in the baking section of the grocery store, glycerin is very transparent, much thicker than water, and just plain works better for photography. Use it straight from the bottle and apply where you like with an eyedropper, or mix one-part glycerine to two parts water for use in a spray bottle.

You can enhance the look of flowers and foliage, simulate condensation on glassware or other objects, give subjects a wet-look, enhance your food photography or even simulate sweat on human subjects if you need that look. Great stuff!

Image: Using the Live View mode of your camera can really help in getting critical focus.

Using the Live View mode of your camera can really help in getting critical focus.

Equipment needs

For more distant shots of things like raindrops, you might get by with standard, close-focusing lenses and also be able to work hand-held.  But dewdrops are tiny. When it’s time to get close, closer, and ultra-close, you’ll be entering the world of macro photography.  You will definitely need a tripod and one of several ways to get up close to your tiny subject:

Image: Here all three Kenko extension tubes (Canon, Nikon, Sony), plus a Canon 25mm tube, are all co...

Here all three Kenko extension tubes (Canon, Nikon, Sony), plus a Canon 25mm tube, are all combined with a Canon “nifty fifty” 50mm f/1.8 lens.  This gives 93mm of extension.  You can combine tubes in any sequence or combination depending on how close you need to get to your subject and how much magnification you’re seeking.

Standard Macro Lenses

Many lenses may state they have macro capability, but to truly be a macro lens, they should be able to create a 1:1 image. That means the image rendered on the camera sensor is the same size as the physical object or bigger. Full-frame cameras are called that because their sensor size is roughly equivalent to a full-frame of 35mm film, (24mm X 36mm), so if the lens you’re using can fill the frame with an object that’s about 35mm wide, it’s a true macro.

Here’s a quick test you can try: a U.S. quarter is 24.26mm in diameter. So, if you can focus on and fill the frame top to bottom with an uncropped shot of a quarter, you have a macro lens. On a crop sensor camera where the sensor is 14.9×22.2mm (Canon), a 1:1 shot of a quarter would more than fill the frame.

Image: Catching the light source in the drops with a small aperture produced a star effect. 3 tubes...

Catching the light source in the drops with a small aperture produced a star effect. 3 tubes plus Tamron 90mm macro. 1.6 sec. f/16, ISO 800

Extension Tubes/Bellows

Increasing the distance between your lens and camera sensor will have the effect of allowing you to focus closer than with the lens alone and thus appear to magnify the image.  Stacking multiple tubes or making the bellows longer will get you in even closer.  You can also get into macro territory with something simple like a 50mm prime lens plus an extension tube set.  Much less money than a dedicated macro lens!

Image: You can just see the end of the reversed Vivitar 28-105 zoom in this shot. Note how close I...

You can just see the end of the reversed Vivitar 28-105 zoom in this shot. Note how close I’m able to get the lens to my subject.

Image: Here’s what the reversed lens zoomed out to 28mm produced. Thinking backward helps here...

Here’s what the reversed lens zoomed out to 28mm produced. Thinking backward helps here – Wider zoom settings allow closer focusing than more zoomed settings.

Reversed lenses

Mount a lens backward on your camera and you will be able to get in much, much closer than you would otherwise.  I did a whole article on this technique which allows you to use even inexpensive old film camera lenses for great macro effects.

Image: A focusing rail like this simple Neewer unit can be especially helpful when working to get go...

A focusing rail like this simple Neewer unit can be especially helpful when working to get good focus with sliver-thin depth of field. It’s also excellent for making focus-stacked images where you take a shot, adjust focus slightly, make another shot, and repeat getting multiple focus points on the subject which are later combined to get more depth of field than is possible with a single shot.

Focusing rail

Working with tiny subjects and macro lens techniques, you will quickly find your depth of field is sliver-thin, sometimes only a few millimeters. Often rather than trying to focus as usual, (and forget about using auto-focus when making shots like this), physically moving the camera forward or back is the way to focus.

A focusing rail is a finely-geared device which, with the use of knobs, allows you to move the camera in and out in tiny increments. Like most camera gear, you can spend a lot on the sophisticated rails, and there are even computer-controlled versions for doing macros that focus-stack.

If you’re just entering the world of macro however, very serviceable versions can be had for under $ 50.00 US.

Image: With a depth of field only a few millimeters, sometimes focus stacking will be required to ge...

With a depth of field only a few millimeters, sometimes focus stacking will be required to get what you want in focus. This shot is a 5-image stack.

Lighting

With your lens so close to your subject, you will often be in your own light, and shading your subject. There are many ways to light macro subjects and no single “right” way. It’s simply a matter of what works.

Do you know that things like extension tubes and bellows reduce the light reaching the sensor? Most often, you will be stopping down your lens, seeking more depth of field. Adding more light or increasing the exposure time will often be required. One advantage of the latter is that a several second exposure can sometimes allow you to “light-paint” your subject.

I did many of the really close-up images in this article that way. I light-painted during the exposure with a simple LED flashlight.

macro-dewdrop-photography

Note the difference aperture makes. The shot at left is at f/22 while the one on the right is at f/5.6. The background is affected more that the refracted image in the drops.

In practice – a look at some samples

The following images show a tabletop session with glycerin “dewdrops” hanging from a strand of sewing thread. I used a combination of a macro lens (a Tamron AF 90mm f/2.8 Di mounted on a Canon 6D camera), as well as a combination of extension tubes and a reversed old Vivitar 28-105mm zoom from my old Pentax ME Super film camera.

Some of the images used a combination of those devices stacked together in a quest to see just how close I could get. 

macro-dewdrop-photography

This is about as close as the Tamron 90mm macro alone could focus. The drops are tiny, so this probably is the 1:1 ratio the lens is capable of.

Image: Using this combination allowed the three-drop shot below.

Using this combination allowed the three-drop shot below.

Image: 3 extension tubes plus the Tamron Macro. 1.6 sec. f/16 ISO 800

3 extension tubes plus the Tamron Macro. 1.6 sec. f/16 ISO 800

Image: Combining the Tamron 90mm macro with all three extension tubes (for a total of 68mm of extens...

Combining the Tamron 90mm macro with all three extension tubes (for a total of 68mm of extension).

macro-dewdrop-photography

The reversed Vivitar film lens plus a 36mm extension tube focused close enough to fill the frame with two drops. The long exposure also allowed time to light-paint the sunflower. 15 seconds, f/22, ISO 100.

Bear in mind that the drops in the shot are really tiny, around 2-3mm, so filling the frame with a single drop was way more than a 1:1 magnification ratio.  If calculating the magnification factor is your bag, there are places with calculation tools to do that.  For example, for one image I used all my extension tubes, (a Kenko set with 12, 20, and 36mm tubes plus a Canon 25mm tube = total 93mm extension) and a Canon 50mm f/1.8 “nifty 50” prime.  Per the calculator, that produced about a 2:1 magnification ratio, filling the frame with about 3 of the drops.  I achieved the closest shot (below), with the reversed Vivitar at 28mm with the three Kenko tubes attached.  I figure it’s over 3:1, uncropped and almost filling the frame with a single drop.

macro-dewdrop-photography

To get this close with no cropping took all three (12mm, 20mm, and 36mm) extension tubes combined with the reversed Vivitar film lens at 28mm. The drop is only about 2mm wide.  This is also a 2-image focus stack, one for the drop and the other for the flower inside.

Take note of how in the images the drop acts like a tiny lens, refracting and inverting the image inside it.  If you want the image inside to be right-side-up, be sure to invert the real physical object before you snap the shot.  Also, with such limited depth of field, even a small aperture may not give you the range of focus you need.  Making shots like this will also give you a reason to learn focus-stacking techniques.

The captions on the shots reveal what I used to achieve each dewdrop photography image.  So, see what you can learn here, get your camera, maybe buy some entry-level macro gear and then… just go “dew” it!

Share the images you make with us in the comments section!

 

macro-dewdrop-photography

The post Just Dew It – Fun with Macro Dewdrop Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Rick Ohnsman.


Digital Photography School

 
Comments Off on Just Dew It – Fun with Macro Dewdrop Photography

Posted in Photography

 

Landscape photography with a drone: the advantages – part 3

06 Oct

In the previous articles in this series, I elaborated about the advantages of the drone, specifically that the drone offers more compositional opportunities, is cheap to run, portable, available anywhere and able to hover in place.

In this article I’d like to conclude the discussion of the drone’s advantages by mentioning its ability to hover in place and its most fun facet: its fearlessness in the face of danger.

Ability to hover

The ability to effortlessly hover in place is unique to the drone. True, good helicopter pilots can hover efficiently, but neither with the same GPS-controlled accuracy as the drone, nor with its ability to go near the subject. In terms of stability, a drone can only be compared to a tripod in the sky, which in turn means that it allows three things: relatively long exposures, parking abilities and immaculate precision.

Long exposures can be useful when the photographer wants to convey a sense of motion in an image. For example, an exposure of half a second or more can smear moving water, creating pleasing lines and a clear feel in an image. Under sufficiently still weather, a modern drone can shoot sharp images at half a second, a second or even more. Multiple attempts can result in a sharp shot even when shooting a several second long exposure – an unprecedented achievement for any aerial shooing (that doesn’t use a heavy, expensive gyro-stabilizer).

A long exposure of Fossa waterfall, Faroe Islands. If I had an ND filter handy, I could’ve extended the exposure even more.
DJI Mavic II Pro, 1/2 sec, F11, ISO 100.

I’ll explain and demonstrate what I mean by ‘parking abilities’ with an image I took earlier this year. I was shooting the total solar eclipse over lake Cuesta Del Viento, in the San Juan province of Argentina. Totality lasted for a mere 2 minutes (which seemed more like 45 seconds), during which I tried to shoot a wide-angle focus-stack, a telephoto closeup of the corona, and an aerial of the eclipse reflecting in the lake above the badlands. Naturally, I had set up my wide angle and telephoto compositions beforehand, but the point here is that the drone allowed me to set up my aerial composition as well.

A wide angle focus-stack of the eclipse above the badlands A telephoto closeup of the corona

I composed the shot about 5 or 10 minutes before the totality, and left the drone hovering in place. Once I was done with the two DSLR shots, I took the remote to find the aerial composition exactly how I had left it. This saved me precious time and allowed me to take all three shots in a very narrow time frame. The drone reflection shot, more than anything, is a true once-in-a-lifetime shot.

The drone aerial I took after the two DSLR shots.
DJI Mavic II Pro, 1/10 sec, F2.8, ISO 100. Lago Cuesta Del Viento, San Juan Province, Argentina

Finally, the controls of a modern drone allow for unprecedented precision. The drone can move very delicately (some drones offer a ‘tripod mode’ for extra delicate movement) and enables the photographer to create and capture a balanced image. This is especially important when shooting in close distances to certain subjects.

The window of showing the boat in the middle of the arch was very small. Delicate movements of the drone allowed me to get the shot with ease.
DJI Phantom 4 Pro, 1/40 sec, F5.6, ISO 200. Disko Bay, Greenland

Fearlessness in the face of danger

A major advantage of the drone is the fact that you can endanger it with little consequence. As a nature photographer who lives and breathes extreme environments, I can’t stress enough how overwhelming it is.

A drone doesn’t care about breathing toxic gases. A drone doesn’t care about being uncomfortable, hot, cold, breathless or tired. A drone is a robot, a slave to your will and it will go wherever you tell it to go. It will scream if the battery is about to run out, it will quietly protest if you try to fly in windy weather, its sensors will avoid contact with close-by objects, it won’t let you fly near airports (thank goodness). But other than that, it will obey the commands of its master, however stupid or dangerous… which gives the photographer a perfect opportunity to be as daring as he wishes.

This shot is hazy because it’s taken from within a caldera filled with toxic gasses.
DJI Mavic II Pro, 1/25 sec, F6.3, ISO 100. Kawah Ijen, East Java, Indonesia

Please note that I’m only legitimizing risking the drone, not people’s health. I will cover drone etiquette in a future article, but for now, let me stress that I’m talking about flying both legally and (even more importantly) morally, where there are no chances of people or the environment being harmed by the drone. Luckily, as a nature photographer, it’s easy to stay on the right side of legality and morality, simply because I do most of my shooting alone in the wild, without people or buildings around me. The worst thing that can happen to me is losing the drone (that has happened, of course, a tale which will be told in the future).

No person, and no manned aircraft for that matter, would dream of flying meters above an active volcano. Only uninformed people would go near an ice-arch, which can collapse at any moment with tragic consequences. But a drone can, and will do so happily. This fact opens a myriad of options which simply aren’t there without a drone. Let’s see some examples and explore the dangerous side of landscape photography.

Lava flows in the shape of a double-headed dragon. During this shoot I flew my drone so close to the lava that the camera was molten (!). Needless to say, I wouldn’t get this close myself.
DJI Phantom 4 Pro, 1/8 sec, F6.3, ISO 400. Taken outside of Volcanoes NP, Island of Hawaii.

I wrote extensively about my Hawaii volcano photography in a previous article, but I’ll mention here that it was an amazing shoot during which I flew my drone very close to the lava, closer than I’d ever venture myself. The red-hot lava was so hot that it melted my drone camera, the perfect example of the drone going where no man would, and coming back in one piece (if damaged).

The shoot was more than worth losing the drone, both financially (the images and videos sold for many times what I paid to fix the drone) and in the images I got from it. It was a once-in-a-lifetime event, and I risked the drone knowing very well I could lose it at any moment. Actually, it was the very fact that I melted the drone camera, rather than the unique images I got, that made this series go viral, and got me a front-page National Geographic website feature and interview.

The point where the lava burst out of the mountain side was extremely hot.
DJI Phantom 4 Pro, 1/100 sec, f/6.3, ISO 400. Taken outside of Volcanoes NP, Island of Hawaii.

From lava to ice. It is well known that large icebergs can be extremely dangerous. They can not only collapse catastrophically, but they can flip over, and both these scenarios involve dislocation of a huge amount of ice and water, creating high waves and endangering everyone sailing within a substantial radius. But again, a drone doesn’t care. It will fly under close-to-collapsing arches, hover meters away from gigantic icebergs and go where no man would dare.

To get the composition I wanted with the faraway iceberg and lenticular clouds framed inside the hole in the closer iceberg, I had to get very close to the ice. Needless to say, this would have been impossible in any other way, as I wouldn’t step on this iceberg, and no manned aircraft would fly this close to it.
DJI Mavic II Pro, 1/30 sec, f/8, ISO 200, vertical stitch. Uummannaq, Greenland

There are even more advantages to using a drone. The more you use it, the easier it is to use and the more freedom it gives you. Other points I won’t elaborate on are:

  • The drone, unlike a manned aircraft, doesn’t pose any obstacle to shooting. Manned aircraft have rotors (in helicopters), wings or beams blocking your view. The windows in light planes can also limit your range of motion.
  • Your carbon footprint is significantly lower with a drone compared to manned aircraft.
  • It’s a good conversation starter.
  • It’s so much fun to fly.

In the next article in the series, I’ll discuss the other side of things: the disadvantages and limitations of the drone.

Erez Marom is a professional nature photographer, photography guide and traveler based in Israel. You can follow Erez’s work on Instagram and Facebook, and subscribe to his mailing list for updates.

If you’d like to experience and shoot some of the world’s most fascinating landscapes with Erez as your guide, take a look at his unique photography workshops in The Lofoten Islands, Greenland, Namibia, the Argentinean Puna, the Faroe Islands and Ethiopia.

Erez offers video tutorials discussing his images and explaining how he achieved them.

More in This Series:

  • Landscape Photography with a Drone – Part 1: Forward / What is a Drone?
  • Landscape Photography with a Drone – Part 2: Advantages of the Drone (i)
  • Landscape Photography with a Drone – Part 3: Advantages of the Drone (ii)

Selected Articles by Erez Marom:

  • Parallelism in Landscape Photography
  • Winds of Change: Shooting changing landscapes
  • Behind the Shot: Dark Matter
  • On the Importance of Naming Images
  • On Causality in Landscape Photography
  • Shooting K?lauea Volcano, Part 1: How to melt a drone
  • The Art of the Unforeground
  • Whatever it Doesn’t Take
  • Almost human: photographing critically endangered mountain gorillas

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
Comments Off on Landscape photography with a drone: the advantages – part 3

Posted in Uncategorized

 

Tips & Tricks: A Survey of Iconic Family Lifestyle Photography

06 Oct

Family lifestyle photography is a unique and incredibly exciting subsection of the photographic field. This is a method that is widely practiced, though to be done right, one needs to properly understand its history, its limitations, its necessities, and how it can be executed to get the most incredible and poignant photos possible. First, defining lifestyle photography is imperative: here, Continue Reading

The post Tips & Tricks: A Survey of Iconic Family Lifestyle Photography appeared first on Photodoto.


Photodoto

 
Comments Off on Tips & Tricks: A Survey of Iconic Family Lifestyle Photography

Posted in Photography

 

Review of PhotoWorks: a Fresh and Fast Photo Editor for PC

06 Oct

The post Review of PhotoWorks: a Fresh and Fast Photo Editor for PC appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Glenn Harper.

PhotoWorks is an image editor with a fresh, clean interface and a set of tools that work intelligently to get the best from your photos. It helps you turn drab files into spectacular pictures within a few clicks – sometimes only one! The software’s Portrait Magic technology uses face recognition to add expert retouching edits to your photos. A host of other handy features make the PhotoWorks photo editor for PC an enticing proposition.

PhotoWorks interface

The histogram is a constant when you edit in PhotoWorks. It’s good to see a program that knows its value.

Who’s it for?

Automatic photo editing is the forte of PhotoWorks, but the software doesn’t do everything. It doesn’t offer the huge toolbox that many other programs do, with so much thrown in that you have to rummage endlessly to find what you want. It’s designed for ease of use and speed, which will appeal to beginners and casual photographers but might catch the eye of a few veterans, too.

photoworks-photo-editor-for-pc

The clean, minimalistic interface of PhotoWorks. All edits are memorized by the software, so they’re non-destructive.

In this review, I’ll look at everything PhotoWorks has to offer. I feel like I’ll enjoy it because this photo editing software for PC isn’t an unwieldy monster with innumerable needless features. PhotoWorks seems knowable from the first time you open it. You can jump in without facing a steep learning curve, though there are good tutorials available online if you need help. Let’s see what it can do.

Opening raw files

Raw files are always an obvious place to start when reviewing a photo editor for PC. Can PhotoWorks handle them? It’s not billed as a raw processor, but it does open most proprietary raw files in addition to Adobe’s standard DNG files.

When you open raw files in PhotoWorks, you have the option of applying one of six profiles to them: Default, Auto Enhancement, Landscape, Portrait, Sunny Day or Black & White. With the Default profile, all the settings in PhotoWorks are zeroed when you open the file, whereas the others are Presets with adjusted sliders.

photoworks-photo-editor-for-pc - raw conversion

You’re presented with six starting points when opening raw files. The default conversion opens automatically on the page.

PhotoWorks is really a pixel editor. It converts individual raw files quickly and the quality is okay – good, even – but problems like chromatic aberration (CA) and chroma noise are present if you examine images at 100%. Should you view images at 100%? Only if you’re creating big prints or trying to impress third parties with technical quality. And if you’re doing that, you may not belong to the target market for this software, though PhotoWorks has potentially wide appeal.

chomatic abberation - CA

PhotoWorks does not currently fix chromatic aberration or purple fringing. If you’re the type of photographer who scrutinizes image quality and needs impeccable files, you could run them through a dedicated raw converter first.

By pairing PhotoWorks with a separate raw processor (e.g. RawTherapee, Darktable), “serious” photographers could have the basis of an efficient workflow. That’d be good for, say, wedding photographers, who would also benefit from the software’s intelligent retouching capabilities. We’ll look at those in more detail later, but for now, it suffices to say they’re good.

Saving the PhotoWorks way

Not long after firing up PhotoWorks, you’ll notice there’s no way to close images. This is unusual, to say the least, but it’s another form of streamlining. You can save edited files and move onto the next image. Your edits are stored, even if you move on without saving, and you have the option of resuming them or starting afresh when you go back to the file. This is true even if you close the program. Edits are non-destructive.

Both Save and Fast Export let you export a separate copy of the edited file in the format of your choice, the main difference being that you choose the format beforehand with Fast Export. You can select from JPEG, TIFF (8-bit compressed), PNG and BMP.

Enhancement

The Enhancement tab is where you make changes to color and tone in your image. It includes an Auto Correction feature that aims to transform your photos in a single click, but you can alter its effect if you want. For instance, let’s say you’re already happy with the tonal range but would like more color, you could switch off the dynamic range and add vibrance to Auto Correction. Plus, there’s a slider that adjusts the strength of the auto effect.

PhotoWorks image enhancement

PhotoWorks includes a blue sky enhancement, which makes it easy to deepen the blue of the sky whilst also warming the photo up. Those two edits are normally at odds with each other.

Most of the color and tone sliders you’d expect to find in top-end software are in the Enhancement section of PhotoWorks under the Main tab. They give you as much manual control as you want. The workspace is so tidily laid out that it puts some established photo-editing brands to shame. The design is thoughtful and user-friendly, and it makes you want to linger. You even get to suggest features you’d like to see.

Two more tabs under Enhancement are Colors and Sharpness. The first lets you adjust hue, saturation, lightness (HSL) and color balance. The Sharpen tool is basically an unsharp mask, and there’s a blur section where you could create dreamy soft-focus effects or counteract over-sharpening. It’s all useful stuff, and the confusing terminology is notably left out.

photoworks-photo-editor-for-pc-sharpening-the-blur-tool

A slightly de-sharpened image focuses attention on form rather than detail. That’s where the PhotoWorks Blur tool is useful. It works well with busy compositions.

Tools

Move along to the Tools tab in PhotoWorks and a carefully selected set of powerful tools reveals itself to the right of the screen. There are not a hundred little tool icons as with complex programs. Some of the tools, like Curves or Tone Mapping, offer an alternative and perhaps more advanced way of working with your pictures. Seasoned photographers will be familiar with these features.

Crop

The PhotoWorks crop tool includes a modern set of aspect ratio presets that fit today’s devices or social media pages perfectly. Of course, you can also use the original aspect ratio, choose a different ratio or crop the photo freely. There’s nothing much missing here. You can rotate the picture, which helps get horizons level or to achieve the most effective composition.

AMS Software, the creator of PhotoWorks, also offers a choice of grid overlays to assist you with composition when cropping. For example, you can choose a Rule of Thirds or Golden Ratio grid to help you decide what to include and where. My only slight gripe here is that the grid lines are often a little hard to see: maybe a different color or opacity control would help.

the golden spiral crop composition

The Golden Spiral crop grid in PhotoWorks.

Geometry (correcting perspective and distortion)

You can correct the perspective of architectural photos using the Geometry tools in PhotoWorks. Like in most photo editors for computers, there’s no auto adjustment, so you have to alter the vertical and/or horizontal perspective yourself using the sliders, but this is generally an easy task.

correcting lens distortion

In this pic, you can clearly see the effects of lens distortion on the window frame. In the inset, I’ve corrected it using the distortion slider.

Correcting optical aberrations such as pincushion or barrel distortion is also possible in this section. Some programs will do this for you with the help of lens profiles, but you can do it easily yourself with the assistance of the included grid and distortion slider.

Change background

PhotoWorks makes it easy to change the background of your photo, so if you want to transplant a better sky or create a composite picture, you can. The process of separating the subject from its background is simple. You draw a green line with the object brush, a red line with the background brush, and then you let the software work its magic. Typically, you need to refine the edge a bit using the same brushes, which could become labor-intensive with intricate subjects. For many photos, the process works fine. There’s even a choice of free-to-use pictures you can add as backgrounds, or you can upload your own.

PhotoWorks - change background

The Change Background feature in PhotoWorks separates subjects from their background with ridiculous ease. I’m not sure there’s enough finesse for complex selections (e.g. fur or fine strands of hair), but there’s a lot of fun to be had.

Vignetting

The vignetting tool lets you correct vignetting that occurs naturally with your lens. You can brighten edges and corners for even exposure. It also lets you add a vignette as a creative effect, focusing the viewer’s attention more on the subject of the picture. This photo editor for PC provides all the controls you need to fine-tune this edit.

3D LUT Color Correction

Color LUTs might just as accurately be called “special effects” since they remap the color of your photos to create a different look. PhotoWorks offers a nice built-in selection of them as well as letting you upload your own in the form of cube files. You can’t save your own LUTs within the software, hence you can’t preview them either, but I’m glad to see this feature in PhotoWorks.

PhotoWorks review - color LUTs

This is the “Drama” color LUT. Interestingly, it compresses the tonal range. In doing so, maybe it makes the viewer feel more hemmed in and on edge.

Tone Mapping & Curves

PhotoWorks includes tone mapping and curves tools for controlling color and tone. Tone mapping lets you overlay a color or texture. You could apply a color to a black-and-white image here for a duotone effect. The curves tool adjusts contrast, changes color temperature, and tint and even corrects color if you use the individual RGB curves.

PhotoWorks - tone mapping

A black & white photo turned into a duotone (i.e. a mix of black and blue) using the Tone Mapping tool in PhotoWorks.

Noise Reduction and Grain

There are tools for reducing digital noise or adding film-like grain in PhotoWorks. This photo editing software for PC doesn’t separate color noise from luminance noise, which would be a nice feature for more advanced photographers. But it will smooth and improve the look of high ISO photos.

The film-grain effect is generally better looking than digital noise in photos. You can add that to give your photos an authentic retro look from the days of analog photography.

Retouch

Some of the headlining features of PhotoWorks fall under its Retouch section. The software harnesses the power of face recognition technology to automatically enhance portraits. You can use its Portrait Magic or Face Sculpt technology to retouch faces and show your subjects at their best.

Portrait Magic

A remarkable feature of PhotoWorks is its Portrait Magic feature, which lets you automatically or manually remove blemishes and enhance portraits. Its toolset includes the following:

  • Skin smoothing
  • Control over redness (improve blotchy skin)
  • Skin tone
  • Eyes (sharpness, contrast, remove dark circles)
  • Eyebrows (sharpness, contrast)
  • Lips (sharpness, contrast, hue, saturation, luminance & glare)
  • Teeth (whiteness)
PhotoWorks portrait magic

It may be hard to see the difference here, but Portrait Magic is good at damping down glare on the skin (aka “face shine”). There are many quick fixes to choose from as well as full manual control. (Image: Pexels)

Even if you know how to fix these things already, this technology saves time. It’s easy to imagine it being useful to pro portrait and wedding photographers. The best results are achieved by addressing issues one-by-one, but there’s a set of quick-fix buttons available to speed things up. You have to be careful with it because the software isn’t infallible. For instance, a pair of glasses get in the way of removing dark circles accurately.

Portrait Magic is so good that you could buy this software for that alone. It’s a great photo editor app for pc or laptop.

Face Sculpt

Just when you thought you’d seen amazing things with Portrait Magic, along comes Face Sculpt. Move a slider and watch the software identify and alter a specific part of the face. You can do these things manually in Photoshop using warp tools and the like, but boy is it easy with PhotoWorks: a deft picture editor and retoucher in one.

PhotoWorks - face sculpt

I’ve done nothing to this photo except turn a hint of a smile into a stronger hint. Like Portrait Magic, Face Sculpt is a powerful tool that can totally transform a portrait. The technology behind it is remarkably precise. Subtle edits often work best. (Original image: Pixabay)

Maybe we should all just accept the way we look, but contrary to popular belief, the camera does lie. It’s easy to take an unflattering portrait because of technical reasons, whether it’s an unflattering camera angle, harsh lighting, poor timing or lens distortion. PhotoWorks lets you remedy such problems.

Face Sculpt enables you to reshape or resize eyes, noses, mouths, eyebrows, and the face itself. You can even turn a frown into a smile. Used subtly, it creates different versions of the truth rather than outright lies. And if it helps the subject feel good about themselves, that can’t be a bad thing.

Healing and Cloning Tools

Healing and Cloning tools in PhotoWorks are also first rate. The clone stamp auto-samples from a similar area and gives you the option of changing the sample location. It’s quick and efficient, and no intervention is usually necessary. The Healing Brush is even faster for fixing small blemishes (e.g. dust spots).

Adjustment Brush

There aren’t any layers in PhotoWorks, but you can carry out local edits with the adjustment brush. Users of Lightroom will be familiar with the concept. Color, tone, and sharpness can all be selectively adjusted anywhere on the image. You can also deal with chromatic aberration by brushing neatly over edges and turning Saturation down, though a dedicated tool would be better.

PhotoWorks - adjustment brush

It’s out of fashion, I know, but here’s a quick demo of selective coloring with the Adjustment Brush on PhotoWorks. This Lightroom-style feature offers infinite possibilities without being as daunting to beginners as layers are.

Graduated Filter and Radial Filter

The Graduated Filter and Radial Filter offer alternative ways of making local adjustments to one or more parts of an image. Whether it’s tone, color or sharpness you’re adjusting, these retouching tools make it easy to emphasize your subject. You can also even up your exposures (e.g. the classic dark foreground and bright sky) and bring out shadow detail. Characteristically, these features are neatly designed and easy to use in PhotoWorks.

graduated filters post processing

Two graduated filters are in play here – one to brighten and warm up the lower half of the photo and another to reduce exposure in the sky a little.

Special Effects

With over 150 special effects to choose from, PhotoWorks gives you plenty of ways to interpret each photo. In the Special Effects section of the software, you can add any effect you like and then adapt it to suit your tastes if you want. Hitting the “Apply” button takes you over to the Enhancements area of the software, where you can tweak color, tone, and sharpness.

Image: A quite pleasing special effect to my eye (Faded Photo -1) and one of over 150 special effect...

A quite pleasing special effect to my eye (Faded Photo -1) and one of over 150 special effects available in PhotoWorks.

I personally like adding textures to photos, so it was good to find a few textured effects among the collection. There is also a Quick Enhancements selection, which gives further opportunity for one-click fixing. You can favorite effects so they’re easy to find later on.

A Photographic Films section attempts to replicate the look of various classic films. It’s fun to play around with these effects, which you could find yourself using again and again in some cases.

Captions (add text and stickers)

Whatever you normally do with your photos, there might come a time when you want to add text to them. Maybe you’re making a Christmas card or designing a flyer. You could be creating memes for social media and entertaining your friends. PhotoWorks photo editor app for PC includes a versatile set of tools to help you create the text you want in the font, color, and style of your choice. A sticker collection lets you add cartoon-like captioning for extra fun.

Review of PhotoWorks: a Fresh and Fast Photo Editor for PC

Conclusion

Beneath the minimalistic surface, PhotoWorks offers a powerful set of tools that are easy to use regardless of your level. The way the software exploits face recognition technology is magical, indeed.

There are a few nuts-and-bolts things I would like to see in PhotoWorks, such as chromatic aberration removal, more nuanced noise reduction and an exposure warning to help with histogram adjustments (aka levels). The ability to export 16-bit TIFFs would be nice. At some point, though, if you keep adding stuff, the program ends up complex like many others and loses its streamlined appeal.

Design-wise, PhotoWorks positively gleams. It has a beautifully clean interface, uses simple terminology that everyone can understand, and gets a lot of work done with minimal effort. Whether you use it alone or alongside other photo editors for PC, it’s definitely worth a look.

You can download a free trial version and explore the features of the program yourself. Or use the exclusive coupon for dPS readers to purchase PhotoWorks at a 50% discount now!

Disclaimer: PhotoWorks is a paid dPS partner.

 

dps-photoworks-photo-editing-for-pc

The post Review of PhotoWorks: a Fresh and Fast Photo Editor for PC appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Glenn Harper.


Digital Photography School

 
Comments Off on Review of PhotoWorks: a Fresh and Fast Photo Editor for PC

Posted in Photography

 

CHASING DORY is a portable, affordable underwater drone with 1080p video

06 Oct

If there’s one omnipresent trend in the drone industry, it’s this: manufacturers are thinking smaller. Companies are aiming to make unmanned aerial vehicles more compact while inserting as many premium features, found in their larger counterparts, as possible. The CHASING DORY underwater drone, which is currently in the midst of a successful crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter, is no exception.

Presumably named after the daffy but lovable fish from the movie Finding Nemo, at 18.8cm (7.4in) wide, the drone is smaller than a standard sheet of paper. It is the follow up to Shenzhen-based company CHASING’s GLADIUS MINI drone whose 2017 Indiegogo campaign ended with 1629% funding and a 100% delivery rate to backers. DORY is 56% lighter and 65% smaller than its predecessor which weighed 2.5kg (5.5 pounds).

An algorithm ensures photos remain vivid in all conditions.

DORY’s camera has an F1.6 lens with 1/2.9″ CMOS sensor capable of recording at 1080p, a 100° field of view, and a ±45° Tilt-Lock mode that allows you to scan the floor of a body of water or view its surface above. Two 250-lumen lights placed on the front of drone illuminate the area where its operating without overwhelming underwater inhabitants. CHASING’s color-restore algorithm keeps photos vivid in all conditions. 8 GB of internal memory means you don’t have to worry about losing any footage.

The lowest possible pledge available on Kickstarter will get you a DORY underwater drone, Wi-Fi buoy, tether, and charger. The Wi-Fi buoy helps your mobile device stay connected up to 15 meters (49 feet) away with the wired tether. An Anti-lost Warning is there to prevent any chance of getting disconnected. Depth Lock helps the drone remain stable so it doesn’t get tossed around. The charger takes two hours to power a 4800 mAh battery which will give you one hour of operating time. Unlike other underwater drones that require multiple components to be charged, only the drone needs it with the DORY.

DORY doesn’t come with a remote. Instead, a smartphone is all that is needed, along with the CHASING DORY app (available for iOS and Android), to control the drone. You can customize imagery with 19 different filters, share footage on social networks including Facebook and Instagram, and even stream live. The app also features Co-Play which enables one person to maneuver the drone while the other controls the camera.

As of this writing, there are 17 days left to back DORY on Kickstarter. The campaign has already raised over $ 120,000 of its initial $ 30,000 goal. If underwater exploration is your interest, this portable, affordable drone is an option worth considering.

Disclaimer: Remember to do your research with any crowdfunding project. DPReview does its best to share only the projects that look legitimate and come from reliable creators, but as with any crowdfunded campaign, there’s always the risk of the product or service never coming to fruition.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
Comments Off on CHASING DORY is a portable, affordable underwater drone with 1080p video

Posted in Uncategorized

 

The a9 II is the camera Sony had to make – but they didn’t make it for you

06 Oct

A lot of things are set to happen in 2020. It’s a presidential election year here in the US (actually it’s a presidential election year in lots of countries), Japan is hoping to establish a moon base*, and the UK will definitely, very likely, maybe have left the EU by he time Jan 1 rolls around. My money is on the moon base being ready long before the current British government gets its act together but we’ll see.

In addition to the aforementioned lunar exploits, Japan is also gearing up for the 2020 Olympic Games, to be held next year in late summer, here on Earth. We’ve yet to find out which countries will go home with the most gold medals (although knowing how hot Japan gets in late July I don’t fancy Team GB’s chances) but we do know that every jump that is jumped, every leap that is leapt, every shot that is put (putted?) and every hamstring that is torn will be captured by banks of television and stills cameras.

For this reason, Olympic years are big years for the camera industry. Traditionally, Canon and Nikon maintain a huge presence at these kinds of events, complete with large support staff, professional service centers, and stockrooms chock-full of cameras and lenses ready to be put into action by professional photographers from all over the world. Typically, we also see both companies announcing major new professional cameras either early in an Olympic year, or late the year before. Beijing 2008 saw photographers shooting with the Nikon D3 and Canon EOS-1D III, at London 2012 it was the then-new D4 and the EOS-1D X, and so on.

When the a9 was released about two and a half years ago, it was clear that Sony had its sights set on professional users

Sony is still learning how to be a ‘pro’ stills camera brand, but the company is moving extremely quickly. Sony has invested a lot in recent years in professional support, and these days has a large Pro Service presence at many major sporting events. When the a9 was released about two and a half years ago, it was clear that Sony had its sights set on professional users, and the expansion of professional support since then (as well as the release of some seriously impressive telephoto lenses) is further evidence that its leadership is very serious indeed about joining Canon and Nikon on the sidelines.

The new a9 II is, in effect, Sony’s 2020 Olympic camera. Announced fairly quietly today, without the usual Sony fanfare, the a9 II is a camera that the average DPReview reader will probably neither need nor buy. And Sony knows it. The upgrades compared to the a9 (which will continue in the lineup) are, for the most part, targeted at a small segment of the professional photographer user base. And even more specifically, towards photographers that shoot major sporting events.

A ten times increase in data transfer speed over LAN, the addition of 5GHz wireless connectivity, and the option to wirelessly send files from the camera when it’s turned off are valuable features for those times when you’re running around trying to send huge numbers of files to a remote editing station, but very few people ever need to actually do that. Likewise the ability to save up to ten sets of FTP settings to an SD card, or add 60-second voice memos to photographs, which can then be converted to text and appended automatically to EXIF using an app. Very cool, but not essential for most use-cases.

As an everyday machine for taking photographs, the a9 II is almost – but not quite – identical to the a9. Inside you’ll find the same 24MP full-frame sensor, the same autofocus system, albeit improved, the same 3.7 million-dot OLED viewfinder and broadly the same core feature set.

There are a few useful refinements though, some of which are courtesy of the new Bionz X processor: autofocus speed and precision have been improved, likewise face detection, and EVF responsiveness. A new mechanical shutter with a rated lifespan of 500,000 cycles brings faster mechanical shutter shooting (now up to 10fps), and the a9 II benefits from the ergonomic tweaks and improved weather-sealing introduced in the a7R IV. Image stabilization performance has also been slightly increased, from 5EV in the a9 to 5.5EV, and battery life has increased by around 6% (CIPA).

The a9 II’s video feature set is virtually unchanged over the a9, and shares its limitations (for some reason there’s still no Log option), but Sony has added real-time tracking.

Thanks to a series of firmware updates, the a9 is as competitive now as it ever was

You know what I think, but what’s your opinion? Should you buy one? After all, even if you’re just an amateur sports photographer, the increase in continuous shooting rate in mechanical shutter mode might make a big difference (specifically if the venue/s you shoot in use LED lighting or advertising panels) and the beefed-up weather-sealing could be essential for some situations.

For most people reading this article though, I suspect that the additions in the a9 II will prove to be of little or no interest compared to the original a9 which has been on the market for more than two years. Thanks to a series of firmware updates, the a9 is as competitive now as it ever was, and with the a9 II now at the top of the lineup, the older model is likely to get more affordable over the next few months.

Meanwhile, Sony can get the a9 II into the hands of the people that really need it – the pro sports shooters gearing up for next summer’s major sporting events. On the moon, or wherever.

* Yes, I know the cited article is from almost a decade ago, and since then the target date for Japan’s lunar base has been pushed back by at least a few years, but I’ll level with you – I was looking for a quick way to set up a cheap Brexit gag.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
Comments Off on The a9 II is the camera Sony had to make – but they didn’t make it for you

Posted in Uncategorized

 
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »