Photo Walk

Time: February 15th, 2020, 12-3pm
Place: Granville Island Concrete Plant

Assignment Review

Last weeks assignment was to carry your camera and observe your immediate environment, when you noticed something of interest to take a picture. The three images you emailed should give us some idea of what sort of things you are interested in photographing.

• What drew you in to make this photograph?
• Do you see any similarities between the three images? (such as subject, framing, patterns, colour, etc?)

Questions from Last Week:

What is DRO?

DRO stands for Dynamic Range Optimizer and it is a acronym used by Sony, to describe a setting that attempts to extent the dynamic range of a camera. It is intended to adjust JPEG and TIFF files. It should have not impact on your RAW files. Traditional HDR (High Dynamic Range) images are not created this way they are created by merging three RAW files shot at different exposure values.

Cameras Specifications

• Sony Alpha SLT A33: Manual and Firmware
• Canon EOS R: Manual and Firmware
• Olympus OM-D E-M1 MkII: Manual and Firmware
• X-T30: Manual and Firmware. Processing Software
• Canon T5 Rebel: Manual and Firmware

Quote: Arresting Life and New Eyes

WILLIAM FAULKNER

The aim of every artist is to arrest motion, which is life, by artificial means and hold it fixed so that a hundred years later, when a stranger looks at it, it moves again since it is life.  — William Faulkner

MARCEL PROUST

Mystery is not about travelling to new places but about looking with new eyes.  — Marcel Proust

Photographer: Stan Douglas

Stan Douglas is a Vancouver photographer who is considered to be part of the “Vancouver School.” His photographs are often about history of a location, and he often creates large photographic images. His works are now represented by David Zwirner in New York and Victoria Miro Gallery in London.

Shutter Speed (exposure time)

Shutter speed is the time the shutter is open and light is pouring onto the cameras sensor. The faster the speed the less light falls on the sensor and the slower the speed the more light. Shutter speeds are measured in seconds and fractions of a second. If you are shooting with a shutter speed of 1/100 this means the shutter is open for 0.01 seconds. Most cameras will have on the shutter dial something called “Bulb Mode.” “Bulb Mode” allows you to manually open and close the shutter for very long exposures.

Freezing Motion

Water is an excellent subject matter to workout what speeds to use when freezing motion or blurring motion. Mike Mander’s study of water in Hawaii might should give you some idea of what different speeds do to motion. Image below courtesy of Mike Mander.

Shooting a Still Life: Focus Point

Let’s arrange a still life with three objects and practice where we place focus point. Think about where you want to place the focal point in the composition. In the following three examples the same camera, lens, and exposure settings were used but the focal points are different. Each shot focuses on the logo or lettering on one of the three objects. You can see from the e

You may may want to experiment with separating the objects, the ones in the example were position very close to each other.

Camera Operation: Using Speed Priority

Camera Shake

If you are not using a tripod and want to hand hold a camera with a 50mm lens, then you are going to want to choose a speed higher that 1/60. Otherwise you will get camera shake at lower speed, it can very from large distortions at very low speeds or at 1/60 of a second a slightly blur to the image.

To avoid camera shake you must also consider the focal length you are using; if you are above 50mm then the recommended minimum shutter speed is 1/focal length. If you have a 200mm lens on the camera, the minimum speed should be 1/200. If you are using a cropped sensor, then you should be converting your focal length to its 35mm equivalent. So if you have a 200mm lens on an APSC cropped sensor, then it is actually equivalent to a 300mm lens (200 x 1.5). So you would need a speed of 1/300  for a hand held shot (4/3 sensor multiply by x2; APSC seniors multiply by 1.5).

Speed Priority Exercise

Set your ISO to automatic, and leave your aperture to float by setting your camera to Speed (Tv) priority. What you should find is, as you adjust your speed, is the camera will automatically change the aperture or ISO, until it reaches a point where the maximum or minimum aperture setting or the maximum ISO is reached. At this point the aperture number will display a warning that the camera can not adjust the aperture any longer and the exposure will be incorrect. This might mean the aperture number flashes or goes red.

Have someone stand in front of the camera and wave their hands while you take a series of pictures. Take a picture of the person including the hand at 1/8, 1/15, 1/125, 1/250 and 1/500. Review the images and look for three things, at what speed are the images of person in each photograph less sharp and at what speeds are the movements in the photograph frozen. When did your camera adjust the aperture and when did it adjust the ISO. This will give two pieces of useful information, first at what speed does your camera freeze small movements and large movements. Second how does the cameras automatic ISO and Aperture adjust.

Lens Field of View and Camera Shake

The field of view on APSC cameras is written as if the lens was mounted on FF camera, but it will have a different field of view when placed on a APSC camera. The table below shows you the multiplier (crop factor), to understand the actual field of view if the lens is not on a 35mm camera. It also shows provides a comparison based on a 24-105 zoom lens.

The illustration below shows you how a field of view change when using the same lens on both and APSC and 35mm camera.

If you are curious about the difference in size between and 35mm camera and and APSC camera, the chart below illustrates this difference.

Further Field Testing of Speed Setting

Here is an experiment you can do over coffee. Locate a sidewalk cafe at a busy intersection with lots of traffic and pedestrians. Settle in at one of the outdoor tables with your coffee. Place your camera on the table creating an ad hoc tripod system and set your timer to 10 seconds. Set your lens to a specific field of view; try 50mm (or 35mm for APSC) first. Make sure that the camera can see both pedestrians and vehicles then using the timer and take photographs of the scene at 1/8, 1/15, 1/125, 1/250 and 1/500.

Review the images and look for two things. First, are the non-moving objects in the image sharp? If they are not, it may be that the table is not steady or something else has disturbed the camera. If this is the case you need to find a more stable place for the camera. The second thing to look for is the speed at which the various objects or people blur or freeze. This should give you a good idea of what speeds you may wish to use when photographing moving objects in the world around us.

It might be useful then to use a telephoto setting, perhaps 75mm or 80mm (or 55mm for APSC) and repeat the experiment, and make note of the differences.

You might want to carry a pocket size notebook to record field notes. A lot of photographers keep these small notebooks in their camera bag for reference. They are invaluable when problem solving.

Camera Artistry: Golden Hour and Light

Photography about how you capture light or reflected light. During the day the quality of natural light varies a great deal. The following images from Cambridgeincolour.com gives you some idea of the differences.

Golden hour is the period of time just after sunrise or before sunset when the light is softer and more colourful. Here are three shots taken during golden hour. The first one is facing into the light, the second is taken with my camera at right angles to the sunset, and the third shot is taken with my back to the sunset. You can see by the three shots that more depth of colour can be drawn out of the landscape when the sun is at right angles or behind you. 

Light Quality What to Look For

• How dark is the shadow?
• How a shadow transitions into midtone or highlight?
• How bright are your highlights?
• In what direction do the shadows fall?
• What subject are you exposing for?
• At what angle is the camera lens from the light source?

Dynamic Range.

If you are using a mirrorless camera you can see see your exposure in the viewfinder, if you are using a SLR then you will have to look at the photograph after you have taken it to see the exposure. You may notice when you are shooting in bright sunlight that the image you capture is different from what you saw with your eyes, the sky may have gone all white when it is actually blue, or the dark coloured areas may have gone black with a loss of detail. This is because a camera has a less dynamic range than your eyes. Your eyes have a range of 20 to 30 stops although at any given they may only be seeing 10 stops of light. Cameras typically have a fixed dynamic range of between 12 and 15 stops. 

Protecting Your Highlights

Protecting your highlights are important as highlights once lost can not be recovered unlike the darker areas of you image. There are a number of ways to avoid clipping your highlights.

1. Check your histogram.
2. Use your highlight warning feature which is called various things: Highlight Alert, Highlight Mode, Highlight Alert or Zebra Setting.
3. Bracket your shots.
4. Underexpose using exposure compensation.
5. Expose for the highlights, set exposure and recompose.
6. Compose images with sun to your right or behind you
7. Shoot during golden hour.
8. Use a Neutral Density Filter
9. Bracket and use an HDR function to merge images
10. Polarizer

Camera Filters

• Polarizing filters: Cut glare and reflection and you can’t fix that in Photoshop. However the polarizing creates an irreversible change your photo in an unnatural way. There are legitimate uses for a polarizing filter but like everything it has a downs side by removing glare it also removes the shininess of an object and can make water look a little unnatural.
• Neutral Density filter can blur water producing a nice smoothing effect. However it creates a very long expose that exposes you camera to potential camera shake, decreased sharpness from the additional glass layer of the filter, noise from the length of the exposure, you have to focus before attaching and it is difficult to use. A similar effect can be created by taking multiple shots very quickly and combining them in Photoshop. The resulting image will have less noise and likely sharper.
• UV filter as often suggested to protect your lens as cameras these days do filter for UV light. This adds an extra piece of glass that might degrade your image quality by reducing sharpness and potentially introducing more flare. Your lens hood is the best way to protect your lens.

Photography Events of Interest

Assignment

Keep in mind your experience last week where you were capturing images of things you felt caught your attention. In this golden hour exercise try and capture those things that draw your attention. Remember to move around in the area looking and photographing it from different angles, move closer and further away as well.

Find a location you photograph during Golden hour take various photographs from various angles from the sun, try into the sunset, at 90 degrees and 180 degrees but concentrate most of your captures between 90 to 180. If you can take the same photographs during the day time and compare you’re results. 

Select three golden hour images for next week, please submit the images two days before the class.

Alternative Assignment

The alternative assignment is to experiment with Speed Priority (Tv for Canon cameras). This could even be done from the window of a coffee shop if the weather is particularly difficult. Locate a place near a busy intersection place your camera on the table creating an ad hoc tripod system and set your timer to 10 seconds. You could also do this anywhere out of doors by using your tripod, or on any level firm surface.
Set your lens to a specific field of view; try 50mm (or 35mm for APSC cameras for those who do not have full frame cameras) first. Make sure that the camera can see both pedestrians and vehicles then using the timer take photographs of the scene at speeds of 8, 15, 30, 60, 125, 250, 500 and 1000 (each of these speed numbers is altering the exposure by a full stop of light). If you see 8” rather than 8 on your display 8” means the camera will shoot an eight second exposure rather than 1/8 of second, which is indicated by 8.

Review the images and look for two things. First, are the non-moving objects in the image sharp? If they are not, it may be that the table is not steady or something else has disturbed the camera. If this is the case you need to find a more stable place for the camera. 

The second thing to look for is the speed at which the various objects or people blur or freeze. This should give you a good idea of what speeds you may wish to use when photographing moving objects in the world around you.

It might be useful to repeat this experiment using a telephoto setting on your lens, perhaps 75mm or 80mm (or 55mm for APSC) make note of the differences. You will want to record some of your observations in your notebook, especially what speeds achieve what effect and these observations in your notebook may prove helpful in the future to remember your own personal speed preferences. If you have the time try this experiment with your lens set to wide angle, this would be 24mm or 18mm for APSC cameras.

Select three shots that illustrate your preferred settings for future capturing of moving objects, please have them submitted to me two days before the next class.

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