The Photography Thread

[Ginger Tosser]

Icarus0, you take some nice pics.

I like the first one because of its spookiness (word?), it looks like the kind of picture you get with infra-red film. Did you camera have this setting or is a photoshop conversion?

Beautiful green in the 2nd and 3rd pics and i love the stream shot. I did a few of them a while ago when i started in photography. I'll try to find the negs so i can scan them.

[icarus0]

Thanks for the comments.

Yep, the first shot was taken using a Hoya infra-red filter - I believe that most digital cameras have the ability to take IR photos using a filter. A tripod is essential though because of the slow shutter speeds required (usually 1 sec or slower).

[Ginger Tosser]

I cant take Infra-Red film with my canon eos kit (35mm) as the film sensor causes fogging on the image. Wasn't aware of filters to do it though, i'll have to investigate.

[Paleface]

Just skimming through this; I'm trying to scrape together the money for a dSLR as I really miss my manual SLR, and find the low-equivalent ISO of my Nikon Coolpix (not to mention the lens, and the shutterlag, and the lack of manual controls) quite frustrating.

Your first photo, Pete: the sky is great, but the tonal range of the rest of it leaves a bit to be desired - the sea and the beach merge into each other. From a composition standpoint, it's fine, but it could do with some darkroom work. Just something as simple as exposing above/below the horizon seperately - for instance, burning the lower half in a bit more in Photoshop. I tend to think of working on B&W as I did in a real darkroom, it's just it's a hell of a lot easier in PS. Also, I believe the Eos 350D lets you place "virtual" coloured filters over the lens in B&W mode, and choosing "yellow" or "orange" might have bumped the contrast a little.

Anyhow, some of my favourite ones which I have online:

http://flickr.com/photos/infovore/519493/ (here, the sea upward was processed seperately to the people and the sand).

http://flickr.com/photos/infovore/27642927/

http://flickr.com/photos/infovore/26627520/

http://flickr.com/photos/infovore/11745324/

http://flickr.com/photos/infovore/11743963/

http://flickr.com/photos/infovore/11667361/

All taken with my little Coolpix 3100.

Pete - how have you found the 350D, in particularly, its diminutive size? I'm tempted, but almost moreso by the Nikon D50.

[Ginger Tosser]

I found it small compared to my Eos50E thats why i want the Eos20D. I would like the money for it as well.

Thought i'd scan one of my favourite pictures taken using my brother's 2 ton Chinon (Dixons own brand) SLR and 200mm lens. I can't remember the date but back in 1982 this flew over birmingham and i took the day off to get the best view.

http://www.scphoto.co.uk/pages/piggyback.html

I need to find the negative to get a better scan.

[PeteJ]

icarus0 - love the colours you are getting. Is that field in the second shot touched up in photoshop? The green is so vivid, looks like the Windows XP background

Thanks for the comments Paleface - I thought the same about the first shot I posted. It hasn't had any post-production work done to it. May touch it up tonight to see if I can get better results. I always use the digital filters on the 350d (also on 20d), usually Red as it does wonders for a dull sky. I did take some cool shots using the built in Sepea filter, but being a numpty I cleared them off by mistake.

I find the 350d to be a wonderful piece of kit, and I don't regret for a minute busting my budget out of the water. I was very tempted to get the 20d but the cost was just too high. I owned a EOS 300V before this so it was an obvious upgrade.

Ginger - you can have all the skill in the world, but nothing beats being at the right place at the right time Good shot!

[icarus0]

Pete - yeah, it was touched up a bit in Photoshop. Sometimes a photo I've taken will appear really washed out despite the original scene looking really vibrant so I usually adjust the contrast, levels and colour balance in Photoshop to compensate.

The day the 2nd pic was taken was really stormy anyway so everything had a really vibrant and unnatural tint to it. I just wish I'd taken a few more shots before it started pissing it down...

[JU!]

I feel like I hit a brick wall on skill development about 17 months back and I'm just repeating the same old stuff.

I felt the same about my Japanese learning. My Japanese teacher said i was prob still learning stuff as you are in photography, it's just not as apparent as when i first started as eveything was new. Have a look at the first pictures you did and some of your old work and you can see how much you have moved on.

[Dezm0nd]

weirdly enough when i was at V Fest this weekend just gone and decided to mess about with my camera. My Bro is getting into making semi decent photos so i thought i'd give it a shot.. after a few tried i came up with.....

My brother...



I wouldnt mind giving it more of a go, but it'll probably fade away soon enough
Do like a bit of funky photoshooting.

[Shimmyhill]

Oooo i love me photography i do !

Here is a link to my DA Gallery with some pics :

http://shimmyhill.deviantart.com/gallery/

[MartyG]

I want to learn to judge the exposure myself without relying on the camera

Why would you want to guess exposure settings? You'll likely just end up with a load of duff pictures - not so bad if you're working on digital, but on film it's expensive. Or did you mean you're relying on the program modes where everything is worked out for you?

Metering in cameras is really pretty decent these days, I find it very difficult to fault my two F90X cameras or even my F50. If you don't like camera metering you could always get a seperate unit like this. I tend to work mostly in apature priority mode, as it allows me to work on composition and not have to worry too much about exposure length, just let the camera work that out.

Bracketing is a very useful way of getting the same shot at different exposure settings, I use to do this with film, but then I'd get through a 36 in a matter of minutes. I'm pretty wasteful anyway, I'll be happy with maybe 1 or 2 shots from a roll of film - I really need to get myself a digital SLR.

Anyway, some nice pics here

[Gareth C]

Why would you want to guess exposure settings?

Because then you learn how to actually get th eresults that you want.

[Rsdio]

As Gareth C says. I don't feel there's any great degree of skill in using the program mode or aperture/shutter speed priority modes and I'd rather learn to do it myself, first with a decent meter and then without. There's no satisfaction for me in letting the camera do all the work, and if that's what I'm doing I'd rather use my Yashica P+S. It's basically the difference between tracing something and drawing it for yourself, that's the way I look at it anyway.

I'm pretty wasteful anyway, I'll be happy with maybe 1 or 2 shots from a roll of film - I really need to get myself a digital SLR.

I think you're probably doing well there, most of the big names seem say they're delighted if they get one or two good shots out of a roll. Then again, they can probably afford to waste film more than any of us .

[MartyG]

I'd say there's plenty of skill in it - you can do all the manual guess work you like and still have terrible composition. I definitely wouldn't see it as the difference between tracing and drawing. You can still meter to see what lighting is like, and adjust manual settings for the different aspects you're trying to capture - but I wouldn't want to waste that much film from guessed exposures.

[Rsdio]

But after you've done it enough it ceases to be guessing. And whatever film you've used isn't wasted if it's taught you something in the end.

Besides, it takes a fair bit to mess up the exposure to the point where it can't be rescued to a great degree in the darkroom. And if I'm only getting a couple of shots in a roll I'm happy with anyway, even the worst case scenario is no immense loss.