Project 52(late start!) by Gary (oldgreygary)

[Donald]

It gives a nice pattern and a sort of abstract feel to to the image.

I agree. As Geoff says, it's harder to make this sort of image work that at first looks to be the case.

Good one.

[oldgreygary]

Thanks Donald for your comments. I did move around the spiders web before taking the shot and this was the angle were the light worked best. Photography is working well for me as it is giving me a creative outlet which has been locked away for a long time, too long in fact!

Cheers for now

Gary

[oldgreygary]

This weekend the Tour of Britain (cycling race) came to town. As in the actual race, cyclists would only be briefly seen on the road. My thoughts were to try and capture the event. This image is one that actually shows them on their 'neutral lap' through the town. In effect they have a warm-up period before they start racing. Capturing an event like this is an interesting challenge. As what you think is the perfect position is soon swamped by spectators. So, you have to think on your feet and re-position yourself which leads to not necessarily having a great composition.

It still feels to me that the images I take are 80% good fortune and 20% skill on my behalf. I sort of feel that I'm not knowledgeable enough to execute and get the image that exists in my head. I guess that's a combination of my skill level and the camera I use. It's a bit of an odd feeling. There's a nagging feeling that the images taken are more in hope than expectation. Not sure why?

Anyway, here is one of the images.



Follow this link http://garypocklington.smugmug.com/E...5414358_wmsWmT to see further images from the day.

If you want to comment on any of the images then I would be interested to hear your thoughts.

Cheers for now

Gary

[Geoff F]

Just remember, Gary, 10 years ago your camera was considered to be an excellent and expensive piece of equipment.

With regard to this shot, I did consider cropping the top and right side to concentrate more on the riders. But in many ways having that woman standing on the street corner creates better balance and guides the viewer towards the cyclists.

This, I think, is an image which looks better at a larger size.

[oldgreygary]

Thanks for your reply Geoff. I set the ISO to 100 as it was a cloudy day and I wanted to give myself a chance of having more exposure choices. That's introduced a bit more noise than I usually get. I have tried adding some noise reduction in PP to offset that. Biggest issue was getting the WB correct which I started a discussion in another post which has some interesting thoughts. Ron Bigelow also has an informative piece on his website.

Yes, I agree it looks better larger.

In technology it seems that 10 minutes is a long time, yet alone 10 years!

Cheers for now

Gary

[oldgreygary]

Decided to try some more low light photography. This was taken pre-sunrise at the local railway station. Hand-held so not the sharpest image. Trying to balance getting a decent exposure with not too many blown higlights. This was at 1/4 sec and f/2.0. You have to accept that you will get these but it's how far you can push it without making it unusable. I think this was too underexposed and I had to 'fix' in PP but it's ok not great but ok.

Comment welcomed.

Cheers for now

Gary

[FrankMi]

Nice composition Gary! I see that the gates are down so I keep looking for the train. Methinks it might be that white dot in the distance.

I would definitely give this one another go on a tripod with multiple bracketed exposures. That should give you added sharpness and some additional latitude in selecting the best exposure for tricky situations like this.

[MilT0s]

Wonderful composition indeed Gary. Definitely you need to take more similar shots of this if you can as Frank suggested but even with this one you can try some foggy of other effects to create or enhance the mood.

[oldgreygary]

Miltos and Frank, thanks for your comments. It is nice to have this feedback as I wasn't certain about the composition. I agree that more shots are needed to explore this a bit more.

Yes, Frank, you are correct the white blob in the distance is the train. I did take another image when the train had stopped but I thought it was a bit over exposed. It would be interesting to see how the picture would differ if the gates were open and cars were going across. Or the train was moving towards me. Will have to re-visit.

Cheers for now

Gary

[oldgreygary]

Continuing with 'dabbling' with the low/night light theme. I was looking at ways of capturing the large dynamic range that can exist in this type of photography. So, after doing a bit of reading I found that there was a 'plugin' for Lightroom called Enfuse which blends multiple images. So, I decided to take multiple images indoors as I would be able to setup a 'controlled' situation to experiment. I had a desktop lamp that I thought would be provide the extreme highlight and a room with no lights on and curtains drawn would provide the dark extreme. I used F/8 and took a series of shoots from 1/250 to 15 secs. I initially chose several images to merge in Enfuse but also found that 3 images worked ok. I used the 1/250 for the highlights, 1/15 for the middle ground and 0.5 secs to get the shadows. The image below is the result. It seems to work pretty good to me. To use outdoors would obviously need a tripod but at least it shows a potential method for capturing those wide dynamicranges. What do you think?

Cheers for now

Gary

[FrankMi]

Hi Gary, I've not used Enfuse but although perfecting this kind of technique takes time and experimentation to see what you like best, it does look like you are well on your way.

Compositionally, I would lean toward simplifying the desktop and giving it a sense of purpose. Right now, the pencils are most prominent but there is an uneasy feeling that there isn’t a comfortable way to use them.

[oldgreygary]

Thanks Frank, yes, I would agree about composition. It needed more thought. My main focus was on getting the Enfuse side of things working so I will own up that in this case the composition was secondary in my thoughts.

Incidentally, Enfuse is described as a tool for blending images. Its open source so for a small donation (one-off payment) you get the full version. But you can also try a 'trial' versions which limits the size of the output. In Lightroom it is very easy to use and also gives the option of creating the 'Enfused' version in the Lightroom catalogue so you can work on it straightaway. All pretty neat stuff.

Cheers for now

Gary

[oldgreygary]

This week I thought I would try a different approach. Before the image I have attempted to do my own critique of the photograph. So, you can either read the critique then look at the image. Or the other way around. Or just look at the image and give your own opinion. Either way if you want to add your own comments then please do.


So, here goes my critique.


When I look at this photo it doesn't do a lot for me. It's interesting, but that's about it. I think the photo is more about being technically correct than conveying anything.

The exposure, focus, depth of field all seem to work well. The blurred background places the emphasis on the subject (dandelion head). Maybe, the lighting doesn't fully show off the form of the subject?

I think the crop works well although the subject is quite central it doesn't matter. Possibly, it would work better with a plain background. But, as is, it does place the subject in some sort of context.

I like the clarity, focus and sharpness of the dandelion. I also like the way that because of the blurred background the focus is fully on the subject.

Possibly by selecting a simpler background it might improve the image/composition. Lighting that highlights the shape more might also improve the image.

I think that this would work better if the subject matter made more of a connection. By choosing another subject with the same technique it could make the composition/image more connected.

[Geoff F]

Just a thought, Gary, but I find that brown stem on the left distracting and competing against the intended subject. Possibly a crop to 4 x 5 ratio which removed the left side problem would overcome most of your concerns.

Otherwise, it looks technically fine to me.

[oldgreygary]

Otherwise, it looks technically fine to me.

I think that is the problem I have with it Geoff. As you say technically its ok. But, it hasn't really worked as a subject for me anyway.

Cheers for now

Gary

[FrankMi]

I think that is the problem I have with it Geoff. As you say technically its ok. But, it hasn't really worked as a subject for me anyway.

Hi Gary, I think you are coming to a point where you can produce technically pretty darn good images. They may not be perfect and sometimes we really need to sharpen a skill for a particular kind of image that we haven't shot before but on the whole, we're not making any basic mistakes and do fairly well with most of the unusual situations we run into.

Once we get those technical basics under our belt it is time to concentrate on our 'vision', that which makes the image very desirable to look at and evokes an emotion in the viewer. Post # 166 demonstrates that you are well on your way to perfecting this as well but if you are like me it will take more practice to really envision the truely great compositions. The great benefit of this is that as your vision improves, your enjoyment of photography should also dramatically improve as well.

Keep on shooting my friend, you are doing well and I am looking forward to seeing many more enjoyable images from you!

[oldgreygary]

Once we get those technical basics under our belt it is time to concentrate on our 'vision', that which makes the image very desirable to look at and evokes an emotion in the viewer.

Thanks for your comments Frank. That is indeed the place I think that I now need to work on. I certainly can't profess to knowing all the technical side of things. But, when you have grasped the 'basics' you start to look beyond just having an image that is 'technically' correct. As with my last image posted while it fulfils that criteria if feels a little cold to me. So, if I feel that then I guess it is something that others will also find?

Cheers for now

Gary

[oldgreygary]

I was out for an early morning walk in a wooded area. The sun was just coming up and a strong shadow was being cast against the trees and myself. I took that image and then turned it upside down in PP which gives a very abstract feel to it. I'm not sure if it works but I thought I'd post it and guage reaction.

Cheers for now

Gary

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Gary,

I think the trees make this work - I have seen and shot similar shadows myself, but they've never really worked, this does.

[terrib]

I agree. With your shadow being framed by the tree shadows and also the colors, it's not just any old shadow pic. I think it works very well.