The Photography Thread

[MartyG]

Looks to have worked to me

Re: Picasa

There's a "Link to this photo" url on the right-hand side which uncovers a panel. Select medium from the drop down list and copy the "HTML to embed in website" - the A HREF and IMG tags need changing to the forum URL and IMG codes but the actual references should be fine.

[Alastair]

[bangaio]

Lovely shots as usual gents - this summer has been so rubbish for photography - I'm not sure what has gone on!

MonkeySteve try experimenting with exposure compensation or even bracketing your shots as your sky is blown out - there is too much light.

I seriously need to get back into shooting asap. What I have been working on is a web site - you can all now see it at........

https://www.digitallime.com

follow on to the photos section although it is work in progress at the moment.

[MonkeySteve]

Really like that top one Alastair.

MonkeySteve try experimenting with exposure compensation or even bracketing your shots as your sky is blown out - there is too much light.

Yeah, I should have cropped most of the sky out - might go back and do that. What's this 'exposure compensation' that you speak of - is it something that can be done whilst taking the shot, or when I'm processing it afterwards?

[Magnakai]

Alastair, those are quite interesting. The composition for both indicates levels of layers. The surrounding wall, the shadow-covered part of the image and then the lit part of the image are in a really nice balance. The detail on the door is excellent. There's also something about the curves of those arches that I really like. Really nice work there.

Steve, those are lovely. I really like them both. The beautiful out of focus background of the first one is the perfect backdrop for the flower. The second one's also very pretty. I like how you've captured the horizon at the midpoint, giving the reflection equal weight.

Stop me if you already know this:
The over-exposure on the sky is because cameras have a limited dynamic range. What that means is that they can only capture so much of the space between dark and light. Wedding photographers have a notoriously hard time of it, trying to capture both the detail in a brilliant white wedding dress with the wrinkles in a matt black suit.

If you expose to capture detail in the shadow, like Alastair did in the above picture of the arches, you'll lose a bit of detail in the highlights. With the one of the door, he's exposed slightly more for the highlights, which is why you get such nice detail around the door. The trade-off is a slight loss of detail in the deeper shadows.
Now, this isn't a bad thing. If photos didn't do this, they'd end up looking rather flat. Still, you'll usually probably want to try and retain as much detail as possible.

Generally, I try to underexpose about 1/3rd - 2/3rds of a stop. This means getting the exposure meter a couple of notches to the left of center. This is because it's usually easier and less destructive to slightly brighten an underexposed photo and get detail out of the shadows than to darken a too-bright image and get detail out of the highlights. Obviously there are degrees of subtlety here, and you'll have to use experience and intuition to guide you.
If you've got Photoshop, try playing with the Shadow/Highlights tool. It's under Image>Adjustments. Subtle use can be quite rewarding, especially on skies.

Hope that was some help. Apologies for the ridiculous length and any patronising tone incurred! I tend to ramble once I get started.

[MonkeySteve]

No, that is really helpful mate, thanks! I'm just starting out so any advice is very much welcome.

I'm currently using the Nikon Picture Project software to process my shots; it's ok for the basics, but very limited. I've downloaded a PS Elements trial, and will probably get the full version afterwards. I'd like CS3, but a) it's expensive and b) it will probably confuse the hell out of me at the moment!

[bangaio]

Get lightroom and shoot raw. Lightroom is first rate and lets you control things like highlight recovery so you could have rescued some of that blown out sky although the sun would have been too much! You can get a 30 day trial but I can't over emphasise shooting raw and how much processing control you get before you move into photoshop.

[Magnakai]

^ What he said.
I haven't tried Lightroom myself, but I've only heard good things. It's basically Photoshop, but streamlined for processing photos.
And shooting RAW is definitely worthwhile, especially when it's something you really want to come out right. It's the image data the the camera takes before it processes it, does noise reduction, adds sharpening, adjusts the colours and compresses it as a JPEG. It's a bit more work to process, but you can often do better work than the camera. Plus, relevant to this discussion, you get around a full stop of extra dynamics to play with.

[Gareth C]

I have recently started using Capture One. Its great, has a nice simple workflow and is cheap (at least the LE edition). Not sure how it really stacks up against Lightroom as I never used that much but its worth checking out if you are on a budget.

[saif]

This should work, but I cannot link it to the big version. Oh well.

[MonkeySteve]

Noticed that the sky was looking nice and cloudy this afternoon, so took a few snapshots and messed about with them; these are probably my favourites

[RobRoy]

Just trying out a few things at the moment while i wait to start my course

[VR46]

Was emailed a great (3mb) video over the weekend

They have developed a small videocamera in Japan which shoots at 2000 frames per second. It is a high-resolution, full color, videocam which does not need a lot of light as most high speed cameras do. In the attached demo movie, a yellow balloon has been filled with water and is then pierced with a pin. Take a look and be amazed.

PM me your email if interested and I'll send it over.

[Magnakai]

I doubt it's the same thing, but Casio have announced a compact digicam that can record video at 300fps.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0708/07083101casio300fps.asp

[Extra Terrestrial]

I've just been away for a short time and come back to see some excellent photos in the last half-dozen or so pages; well done all!

I have a small query to ask:

I'm in several groups after being invited by others yet I haven't the faintest idea how to add my photos to the group or the 'pool' so it is called. How?

Thanks.