July 31st, 2009 Rob Sheppard
Today I was up in the Santa Monica Mountains Recreation Area, which is a spectacular place very close to Los Angeles. I was hiking with a couple of friends up by Sandstone Peak. We were there at dawn and hiked through the morning. Some really stunning scenes, but I haven’t edited the shoot yet.
When we climbed up to Sandstone Peak, the highest point in the Santa Monica Mountains, we saw a great view all around us … and two empty, discarded water bottles. This is a sad thing that people cannot take their own bottles out. These things are not going to decompose, they degrade the environment and the experience. Plus cloning them out of a photo is annoying at best.
So I picked them up, crushed them and put them in a pocket. They had no weight so they had no effect on the rest of our 6-mile hike. Why they would be trouble for anyone to take back, I have no idea.
I often pick up trash found when I am out photographing. It is a shame we have to do that, but I hope you will give a thought to keeping our natural areas looking their best, too. I think I am going to put a small trash bag into my camera pack just for this purpose.
Posted in Nature, landscape photography, nature photography | 3 Comments »
July 29th, 2009 Rob Sheppard
Cropping is an interesting topic. Cropping can be used to clean up problems with a photo, but it can also change the meaning of an image just as much as using Photoshop might. There is a story from the 1950’s about a politician accused of being friendly with communists, and a photo was displayed showing him happily posing with a group of known communists. The person starting this rumor evidently figured no one knew this obscure photo. The problem with this shot was that it had been cropped to remove General Eisenhower on one side. It was only a casual snapshot after WWII, and cropping the photo turned it into a lie.
That’s a bit extreme. Most of the time cropping is used simply to tighten up a composition or to make it work in a specific location, such as on a page in a magazine where it could not fit if not cropped. Most of my images that fill a page or two pages in a book, for example, are cropped because the original format does not fit that page. The photo has to be cropped or else it will not fill the page properly. Some photographers do not like that, but as long as it does not destroy the original image, I have no problem with it. However, I do check layouts because sometimes a designer will over-crop an image, “removing Eisenhower” or some other important part of the image and I will bring that up with my editor. Usually, the crop is changed or a new photo used.
I don’t do a lot of cropping, and you will find that most pros don’t, either, but that is not a “moral” decision as some people would make it out to be. I think it is important to clearly see what is in front of you as you take the picture, to clearly see the image frame and its proportions, then to combine those in a fully used way. That means creating an image that fills the frame with important visual content.
Composition is not simply about where a subject is within the image area, but also about relationships, including relationships to the sides of the image. Those relationships are affected by the original frame and how you compose the image within that frame. The result is that a good composition fills that original frame with balance and unity so that the image seems right, that it communicates strongly within that frame. All of this is strongly affected by the choices you make when you squeeze the shutter. If you compose fully for the image area you see within your viewfinder, then your composition has a basic sort of integrity based on that specific frame. You can always do this with landscape and close-up photography because those subjects are not moving. The photo of the wild roses on Cape Cod is not cropped, but is the full size as originally shot with the camera. With practice, you can do this with wildlife and people action photography, too.
I will crop for four reasons:
- To get rid of junk. For example, I find that when I use my full-frame fisheye lens that it is so wide that it often picks up junk on the edges that I missed when shooting. This junk can be easy to miss because of the way this lens shows so much detail in the frame, detail hard to see well in the camera LCD.
- To get a specific print size.
- To work with a unique size, such as a panoramic frame or a square, for its own sake.
- To recompose the image to better define and present the subject. But I rarely do this not because the image is sacred, but because I have hopefully done my key composition work when I pressed the shutter. That is the only time that you can truly recompose a subject because at that point you can move around. Cropping can only get rid of stuff. Yet, like every photographer, sometimes I get excited about a subject and forget my training, so the subject gets too centered in the frame. I will usually crop such photos to get rid of the dullness that often comes from centered compositions.
Cropping is always subjective on one level. On the other hand, I think it is dangerous to start cropping based on “rules”, including specific dimensions. There are reasons for dealing with specific dimensions including a special use (such as a poster that is using a grid of images identically sized), printing for a specific size (especially for a frame or matte size), to fit a page in a publication, to fit a video format, and so forth. Then you need to frame the best you can for that size, both when taking the picture and when cropping.
Posted in Digital camera techniques, landscape photography, nature photography | 1 Comment »
July 23rd, 2009 Rob Sheppard
I rarely shoot anything but aperture priority. Occasionally I shoot manual when I need a specific sort of control (such as controlling ambient light with flash). Many sports shooters use aperture priority, too. Here’s how I use it:
- depth of field — choose an aperture for appropriate depth of field. This doesn’t mean automatically choosing the smallest apertures, such as f/16. I will use f/16 when I really need deep depth of field, but I will shoot f/8-f/11 for distant scenes where depth of field is unaffected by f-stop; f/8-f/11 tend to be the sharpest parts of most lenses. I will choose wide apertures such as f/2.8-f/4 for selective focus effects to keep subject sharp and background soft. I will typically shoot close ups at f/5.6-f/8 to gain some depth of field, but not too much (since it is difficult to get close-up backgrounds sharp anyway, I would prefer them more out of focus).
- action — choose the wide f-stops. A pro technique is to set the lens at its widest or maximum aperture, such as f/2.8-f/4. You are looking for the smallest number you can set with your lens. Then with aperture priority, you guarantee that you always will shoot with the fastest shutter speed possible for the conditions. You cannot do that with shutter speed priority. The wild turkey seen here, for example, was shot with aperture priority, max aperture, so that as the bird moved through different levels of light, I was always getting the fastest shutter speed possible for the conditions.
The only time I might consider shutter speed priority would be if I wanted to use a very specific shutter speed, such as a slow speed for a water blur.
Some photographers are very comfortable with manual exposure, which works fine, but some photographers use it because they think they “should” in order to be a “real” photographer. I used to feel that way many years ago. But honestly, modern auto exposure systems are so good that they are faster, more convenient, and can be just as accurate. They certainly require a lot less thought about technology! And with digital, you can quickly see if your exposure is right or not by using the LCD with highlight warnings and histogram.
Posted in Digital Photo Techniques, Digital camera techniques, nature photography | 4 Comments »
July 10th, 2009 Rob Sheppard
Light is critical to photography, obviously, for without it, we can’t do much as photographers. The look of light on a subject has a huge effect on both how the subject appears in the photo and what the photo looks like.
One challenge that I often see in photographers’ work in my classes is that they see the subject, but not always the light. Seeing the light is very important, but sometimes the way we see and look at a subject can overpower that light. Our eyes compensate for all sorts of things. The light and shadow on a dramatic natural scene, for example, can have highlights and shadows in places that obscure the look of the statue, yet our eyes will see the statue quite well. The camera will not. The camera will over-emphasize those problematic highlights and shadows so that the photo shows an obscured subject that is not dramatic at all.
To really see the light, I believe you have to get out and experience light. This can mean stepping outside of standard ways of thinking, i.e., that one is simply photographing a subject. Sometimes what you are looking for is the light first, not subjects first — that is a different way of thinking than most photographers do. Sometimes it is worth going out and spending some time just photographing light. You go out and search for interesting light, not subjects, and photograph it. That can really open you up to new ways of seeing the light.
Posted in Digital Photo Techniques, Digital camera techniques, landscape photography, nature photography | Comments Off
July 9th, 2009 Rob Sheppard
Chaparral at early light in Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.
HDR (high dynamic range) or other extended range photography techniques are deservedly very popular. This truely is giving us, as photographers, the chance to do new work that has not been constantly done by other photographers. Plus, for nature photographers, it gives us the chance to show off the world more closely to the way we see it as compared to showing it off based on limitations of camera technology.
HDR has many options and creative ways of working. In nature photography, I really prefer a natural look. Some folks do some amazing work in a more “fantastic” mode that has very little to do with reality. For example, the work by Dan Burkholder is truly amazing and a stunning way of interpreting the world.
Yet, what I am now seeing a lot is an overuse of HDR effects for photos that are supposed to look real, such as most nature photography. Typically, this comes from using the very popular Photomatix software as these photos typically have a Photomatix look. It is possible to get very natural looking Photomatix HDR (the blending mode works better for that than the default HDR), but it is also very easy to get unnatural looks and too many photographers accept that unnatural look when the photo is not supposed to be that type of image. Such photos, for example, will be rejected from most publications without any thought except “where is the form rejection letter?” I know that sounds harsh, but it is not an exaggeration, but a reality of today’s publication market.
I am a big fan of Lightroom 2, as noted in this blog many times. I really like LR/Enfuse for HDR effects (technically, it is a blending program, not true HDR, but it works very well) as it fits into Lightroom 2 as an export plug-in (which Photomatix has as a feature as well). But what I like about LR/Enfuse is that it gives, to me, very natural-looking blended photos from dark to light tones from the multiple exposures needed for HDR. I know, from experience, that the results from LR/Enfuse are also very acceptable to publications. You can find this program at www.photographers-toolbox.com.
I think there is great potential for extended range photos for all photographers that will only increase in the future. I have found, for example, that it is a phenomenal tool for photographing in the chaparral of Southern California, where otherwise, you would see only a fraction of the scene in a photo that you actually see with your eyes. The photo here is from the chaparral in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation area — there is no way you would be able to see the full range of tones from backlit clouds below to dark shrub-covered mountainsides without extended range techniques. A total of five exposures, one f-stop apart, was used for this shot. And it was done with LR/Enfuse.
Posted in Digital Photo Techniques, Lightroom, landscape photography, nature photography | 1 Comment »
July 3rd, 2009 Rob Sheppard
I was just in New England last month visiting some family there and doing some workshops at the NANPA Road Show in Rhode Island. I had decided to go to Cape Cod first after arriving in Boston — I had not been there for a long time. I only had a day … and it was raining. Then when I got to Maine, it was still raining! It had been raining before I got there, rained when I got there, and rained most of the time I was there. The photo here is of daisies in a field in Maine, and it was raining when I took the photo. Yet one thing I really like about the photo is all of the water drops.
For whatever reason, rain has rarely kept me from getting out and enjoying nature and even photographing in it. There is a beauty there that is definitely unlike sunny days. Sure, you get wet, but it can be worth it. Some things that are key for me in order to do this:
- Gore-Tex boots (these are truly a wonderful piece of gear and keep your feet dry without your feet sweating like a purely waterproof boot will do)
- Gore-Tex rain jacket and pants (I really love Gore-Tex fabrics — yes, it is expensive, but it is really worth it. You don’t sweat or feel clammy inside this clothing like you do with waterproof gear in summer conditions)
- A dry microfiber cloth (gear will get wet and a microfiber cloth will soak up the moisture. I found a whole bag of these at Sam’s Club — they were made for mechanics, but work great for all sorts of things and they were about $10 for a large bag of them)
- An umbrella (I have a small, highly portable umbrella that is not a problem to carry. You can hold it over your camera and tripod even in downpours, though it doesn’t work well in wind)
- A cover for the camera (you can get a very nice plastic cover made by OpTech designed specifically for cameras from many camera stores; another great cover is a shower cap that you pick up from your hotel room on your next trip)
Never keep your camera under a waterproof jacket (Gore-Tex is okay) — moisture builds up inside there and will get inside your camera, including lenses, which you don’t want to happen. Once you have been out in the rain, it is a good idea to completely dry off your camera when you go inside. In addition, leave your bag open to dry out as well.
You do have to be careful about this when it is hot and humid in the rain and you are in a location that is really keeping the air conditioning on too much so it is very cool there. Your camera can get cold like the room, then when you take it outside, the moisture will condense on and in the camera, which is not good. If you must keep your camera in such conditions, keep it either in a plastic bag until it warms up outdoors or keep your camera bag tightly closed until the gear has warmed up.
Rain can offer a quite, peaceful time to be outdoors. Plus, colors can be rich and interesting.
Posted in Digital camera techniques, Nature, nature photography | Comments Off
