Thursday 27 February 2014

Positioning the horizon


7– Positioning the horizon

6 photographs placing the horizon at varying levels.

The first thing I notice as I look at these is that in not one have I put the horizon slap bang in the middle which surely I should have done.  I must also add that finding a clear horizon in London is tricky so I hope this suffices as 'unbroken and clear - although I fear it may not.

I have found this exercise tricky because I am not comfortable with any sort of landscape.  I cannot say if these are interesting photographs and although I like the colour of the water and the waves, they might not be something I'd spend time looking at if I'd not taken them myself for this exercise.

I do prefer the portrait versions at the bottom of the page.






Focal Lengths and different viewpoints


5–Focal lengths and different viewpoints
2 or more photographs of a scene/subject taken with different lenses but trying to achieve a similar structure by moving your own position – note the differences.

 ISO 400 70mm f5.6 1/250

This photo has a very different quality to the one below taken with a wider angle.  Here the bench opposite in the background seems related, mirroring but far away and much, much smaller.  It's impossible to get a straight line because the bench is slanted or the ground is slanted - nature.  I converted it to black & white because it suited it I thought.  The bench is very much part of the landscape.  I like how the trees mirror the legs.


ISO 400 24mm f5.6 1/250

I sort of preferred this when I first looked at both images even though it's overexposed in the sky - maybe that's ok (although I understand that printing overexposed photos is a problem).  The bench looks less uniform, less regular, more alive even.  The trees in the back look like they are dancing and there is no second bench mirroring this one here.   The bench feels much more imposing and nearer than the one above.  Maybe it seems to be relating to the viewer here whereas above the bench just is - above the bench does not seem to care whether the viewer sees it or not, it's part of something that will continue with or without the viewer. 

I like both photographs now, although I think I might be beginning to prefer the first one the more I look.  The second one feels more familiar - a bit messy, overexposed but present.  The first one seems somehow tentative, less noisy but perhaps sturdier? 

Wednesday 26 February 2014

Cropping


9 – Cropping

Find 3 earlier examples of work and crop to see if you can see different pictures within the photographs you have already taken

Cropped version of a photograph below that I hadn't done anything with, taken earlier this year.  I tried several crops but was most surprised and delighted by the one posted here.  I liked the abstract nature of it.  My eldest son took a photograph of the reflection of lights on water when he was 5 and it was a wonderful photograph (which we had printed but has sadly gone missing).  I also noticed Joel Meyerowitz (video posted by Richard Down on the OCA Facebook page) had a beautiful image which reminded me of my son's photograph.  The resolution is obviously lessened by cropping and I have cropped less and less as times has gone on.  I certainly don't tend to do dramatic crops and sometimes crop in-camera too close, cutting it fine and giving myself no room for manoeuvre.

I watched a video of Jared Polin (Fro Knows Photo) giving a lecture to some students and he was pretty anti cropping and I get why.  I also see that this exercise can help you to see things differently - change your expectations.

Photo: ISO 400 10mm f4 1/640


When I printed these I was most delighted by the print quality which was very poor as it was on A4 paper rather than photographic paper as I could only find small paper and the exercise asked for large prints.  I'm thinking we needed to do it on large paper to see if there was any loss of resolution and I guess there would be but it would depend how much you cropped by.  My mum uses her zoom lens and then crops the a small bit of detail so by the time she has her final image the resolution is really poor - but it makes her happy that her camera is so clever and can see things from so far away.  I think it might be an interesting project if the intention behind that was itself interesting as the poor quality could be something worth playing around with.  I've realised recently that intention is crucial.  Anyway, I liked the print quality of these prints  - it was as if it they been painted with these images in particular because of the colours.






ISO 200 20mm  f4.5 1/40

This image (3) was one from one if my very first baby shoots earlier this year although not one that was edited and sold  - I think I've done about 5/6 family shoots now.  I cropped into the sleeping face and don't think the crop does anything that another photo would have done better - I prefer the original at the bottom of the page. 



I've cropped right in and the hand looks almost plastic - on my screen you can clearly see the pixels.  It lacks any clarity and sharpness.


I prefer this out of these three examples because the point of the photo  is to see the whole vulnerable baby.  He's not even mine and I think 'aaaah!' when I see him lying there with his little monkey typical in baby pose.  We've evolved to be cute as infants so as to elicit feelings of protection, from what I understand, and this baby is fulfilling his evolutionary expectation in spades.



ISO 100 44mm f2.8 1/100

Dividing the fame

6– Dividing the frame
Find 6 or so images earlier examples of earlier work and try to find the balance in them.




This image may not be balanced at all!  I liked it because my three sons and dog create a unit which is separate to the other units in the photo.


⇓   ⚀           ⇓ 

                                                                      

 I think the second image is well balanced although diagonally rather than horizontally.

  ⚀       ⚀  

 



I think the balance here is pretty central and the shoes are balanced by their regular balanced shape and the  mirroring negative space around them


⇓      ⚀      ⇓

      


I think the two women balance each other out working together to bring the puppet alive and their positions and expressions reflect that, as does the shape of the image

⇓    ⚀    ⚀    ⚀    ⇓


              








This one is more difficult for me to work out.  The repeat pattern of vertical lines create a strength of structure and the way the lines converge at the top right hand corner seem to balance out the figure of the man at the bottom left hand corner.

⇓  ⚀        ⚀   ⇓


           

The woman is balanced by the pictures on the wall.  Her glasses are balanced by the shape at the bottom of the left hand side of the frame.


⇓  ⚀     ⚀  ⇓

     


Monday 24 February 2014

Exercise Focal Lengths


4–Focal lengths for cameras with variable focal lengths
3/10 photographs taken with different focal lengths

Looking through the photos I took for this exercise and the others I uploaded yesterday I have realised that I don't take the time to think, absorb and follow instructions clearly.  Instead I lurch rather frenetically from one place of being to another and hope for the best!  I suspect I've been doing this to a greater or lesser extent my whole life.   And I also suspect that one of the results of signing up for this course will be that it forces me to slow me down.  I really need to take more time - which isn't always easy, especially when feeling panicked and on high alert as one does sometimes when in charge of small children.

Anyway the result is I have four photos here, and I didn't take them at exactly the same position, and I am quite annoyed I didn't have the instructions clearly in my head because I may have got some better photos.  Too much haste!  (I actually drove elsewhere first to do another exercise and then realised when I got there I didn't have my money on me as I'd left my purse at home so couldn't park and stopped here on the way home to do this exercise instead so it wasn't a wasted journey... Really, I need to breath and slow down.)  

I have marked each photo by Position 1 or 2 (P1/P2).  I had moved several yards to the right in Position 2.  I am aware there is some lens distortion that I have struggled to rectify fully which is noticeable in the detailed images.


P1 ISO 200 24mm f8.0 1/125

P2 ISO 400 135mm f8 1/160

P2 ISO 400 300mm f8 1/160   





P1 ISO 400 300mm f8 1/160


I took a photo of this building site in July last year.  Click here  I noticed when looking at that photo today that I would have straightened it and probably processed it a bit differently now.  I titled it Reconstructing London because there is a great deal of reconstruction going on externally and internally in my life.  It's also taken from a position that I have often walked or cycled along especially when I was 'training' (I use that word loosely) for a bikeathon a few years ago.  The photos are taken from the south side of the river where I have always lived whilst in London and facing a place where someone I know is, and perhaps embarking on a massive reconstruction process, although that is not entirely clear. If I was stinking rich I'd love to live in a penthouse with massive windows overlooking the Thames along here - but definitely on the south side. 

Sunday 23 February 2014

Exercise: Vertical & Horizontal Frames


8 – Vertical and horizontal frames
20 photographs twice landscape and portrait.

ISO 80 F5 1/160

ISO 80 F6.3 1/125

ISO 80 F1.8 1/60

ISO F1.8 1/60

ISO 80 F1.8 1/60

ISO 80 F1.8 1/60

ISO 80 F1.8 1/60

ISO 80 F1.8 1/60

ISO 80 F2.8 1/125

ISO 80 F2.8 1/125

ISO 80 F2.8 1/125

ISO 80 F2.8 1/125

ISO 80 F1.8 1/125

ISO 80 F1.8 1/125

ISO 100 F2.8 1/80

ISO 100 F2.8 1/80

ISO 100 F2.8 1/80

ISO 100 F2.8 1/160

ISO 100 F3.5 1/160

ISO 100 F3.5 1/160

ISO 100 F2.8 1/160

ISO 100 F2.8 1/160

ISO 100 F2.8 1/160

ISO 100 F2.8 1/160

ISO 100 F2.8 1/125

ISO 100 F3.5 1/200

ISO 100 F2.8 1/60

ISO 100 F2.8 1/60

ISO 100 F3.5 1/200

ISO 100 F3.5 1/200

ISO 100 F2 1/100

ISO 100 F1.8 1/160

ISO 400 F2 1/40

ISO 400 F2 1/50

ISO 125 F3.5 1/100

ISO 125 F3.5 1/100

ISO 400 F2 1/80

ISO 400 F2 1/180

ISO 400 F2 1/80

ISO 400 F2 1/80

ISO 400 F2.8 1/320

ISO F2.8 1/320

I used my best friend's house for these photographs as I think she has an interesting home full of good things to photograph due to her habit of buying things from car boot sales and her aversion to anything new.  She's quite unlike me!  I also feel safe with her and while I don't want to live in her house I do miss some of the good things about living with her years ago.  When I visit her house we can for a short time revisit some of that.  

When I first started getting into photography someone I knew asked me to so some portraits.  I realised at the end of that exercise that portrait was called portrait for a reason as I had taken most photographs in landscape and felt like a bit of a twit.  

Last year I did lots of actor's head shots which were mostly taken in portrait as there is quite a prescribed style for Spotlight, the actor's directory, but we would also do some cheeky landscape portraits which I love doing - landscape seems to suit some faces more than portrait.   And you can get more context around your subject in landscape, which sometimes works well.

I read in one of the books (can't remember which - sorry, but I think it's one I downloaded) recommended by the course reading list that people tend to rely on landscape and forget about portrait.  I scoffed at this until I remembered my very first attempt at portraits - oh, yeah!

My right arm hurts after shoots now from holding the camera in portrait position.

Going through the value settings to include here, I think I am quite lazy.  Or perhaps distracted.  There are some settings where I wonder what I was thinking and why I didn't have a higher f stop or ISO for instance.  I was using a speedlight and to be honest have only recently started using it on manual so I think I must have had it set to TTL - although having just looked through I don't seem to have used it much at all.  Anyway, I don't think I thought about my values as much as I might have done and that's quite an interesting observation for me.

Finally - I'm afraid I cheated.  I took vertical and horizontal as I went rather than doing all horizontal followed by vertical.  I'm sure I lost something by doing it that way but I managed to complete the exercise in the time I had.