Project 2013 - Weekly Photos

[Geoff F]

Week 13 - On the River Avon near Loddiswell

Looks like remaining dull with a chilly wind for the rest of this week so here are some shots from a slightly better day towards the end of last week when there were a few patches of weak sunshine.

Dipper - Cinclus cinculus



7D with Sigma 150-500 lens at 500 mm. 1/200 F8 Iso 800. on lightweight tripod.

These little birds (around 7 ins overall) hop around on the stones which makes focus rather tricky as they usually don't stay long enough in one place for me to manually focus. So I used the centre auto focus point.

The rather high Iso in tricky light has produced a little more noise than I would have liked; but I would also have preferred a fraction faster shutter speed and narrower aperture.

The bird was transporting nesting material to a riverbank site.

Dipper #2 with more nesting material



I managed to increase the shutter speed to 1/320 for this shot.

Scarlet Elf Cup



Switched to 24-105 lens for this shot of some brightly coloured Spring fungi; but found it difficult to get a good camera and light angle. 1/400 F11 Iso 400. Should have dropped to Iso 200; which I did for some shots, but eventually thought this was the best angle.

Weir on the river

I found there were few opportunities for clear landscape shots amongst the riverbank foliage clutter.



24-105 1/250 F8 Iso 800

Once again I would have liked to use a faster shutter speed and narrower aperture.

Old Pond



1/400 F11 Iso 400

Another tricky shot which didn't quite come out as hoped. This pond was created when the river was diverted to create a railway embankment in the 1880's. I thought it looked rather prehistoric with the broken and leaning trees; as though a dinosaur would pop its head out of the water at any moment.

I was standing in sticky mud so couldn't take the multiple exposures which were really needed to cope with the range of lighting conditions. The background foliage looks rather too confused in a two dimensional photograph.

Tried several angles but this was the most hopeful.

[Brownbear]

lovely photos. I especially like the first bird photo, the 4th and 5th photos.. thank you for always sharing your shooting details.

[Letrow]

Nice shots of that dipper Geoff. I can see you used center focus, the eye is slightly out of focus. Funny, but it remains the first thing you look at somehow. I like the way the water flows in that first shot.

[Geoff F]

Yes, Peter, the first dipper shot shown here isn't quite as sharp as some of the others; but I particularly liked the pose, especially with the nesting material.

Noise was becoming a bit of a problem when sharpening all these shots. I think I created a duplicate image layer and changed the layer blend mode to luminosity, and after sharpening, I selectively merged the sharpened layer with the background image.

Possibly it will take a fraction more sharpening. Although part of this may be due to resizing for upload then just adding a very slight general resharpen which was insufficient.

I underexposed slightly to avoid getting hot spots on some potentially problematic areas and slightly overdid the variation. Probably I would have been better taking some highlight spot readings then setting manually.

But the camera angle kept changing as the birds hopped around, and the light levels varied, in what was tricky lighting; and I knew I wasn't going to get many chances.

[Geoff F]

Week 14 - The Beetle Hunt

Went on an organised Beetle Hunt with an entomological association this week; although I normally prefer being on my own when photographing wildlife.

So I started an hour earlier and visited a nearby area where I have regularly found this species of large beetle.

Black Oil Beetle - Meloe proscarabaeus



7D with Sigma 180 macro lens plus 1.4x converter. 1/200 F14 Iso 200 on tripod. Flash used. Manual camera settings with variable ETTL flash output.

Another shot of the same species



Those sharply kinked antennae mean this is a male. They normally lurk amongst the grass so it is difficult to get a shot of the entire beetle.

And this was the intended quarry. Short-necked Oil Beetle - Meloe brevicollis which looks rather similar but is much rarer.



One member of the group found this beetle just a few yards along a popular public path and well away from the intended search area. Needless to say, this was the only one found that day!

I managed to discover a couple of more common beetles like this smaller but more brightly marked specimen hiding amongst the foliage.

Cymindis axillaris, I suspect.



This one was a bit of a struggle to photograph. Eventually I managed three shots, when it was standing still, taken at different focus points and merged together. But unfortunately it kept its head hidden.

Silpha atrata



These beetles feed on snails so are always welcomed by gardeners!

[Letrow]

Nice shots Geoff. Strange to see that blue in the legs and antennae of the first three.

[Geoff F]

Nice shots Geoff. Strange to see that blue in the legs and antennae of the first three.

The colour is rather variable depending on the light angle, Peter, and can be more violet on occasions. In fact there is another similar species which is known as the Violet Oil Beetle.

All these species are declining in numbers and some are restricted to just a few scattered sites now.

It didn't take long for the weather to become typically British again; grey and cool with drizzle in an easterly wind today.

[Brownbear]

Beautiful photos... that last photo is stunning, amazing detail and colour.

[Geoff F]

Week 15 - Fencing in the woods.

No, not dueling with swords!

Two volunteers erecting a new wire fence in the wildlife site.



7D with 24-105 L lens. 1/250 F11 Iso 400 flash used.

Grey day and this was amongst trees. Tried a couple of quick shots at Iso 800 but that still gave far too low a shutter speed so I quickly added a Speedlite flash and set the camera with manual settings. Took a couple of quick shots with different flash exposure compensation.

With more thinking time, I would have reduced the aperture to F8 with Iso 200. High speed flash would also have been worth trying to capture the action better.

This shot was the best angle, and I managed to shoot when there wasn't much movement with the post thumper.

[Brownbear]

Lovely photo Geoff!

As always thank you for posting your specs. However, I'm a little confused by them as I always use a higher iso to enable me to shoot with a faster shutter speed (for more light). How does using a higher iso force a lower shutter speed? I also thought using a flash limited one to a lower shutter speed? Thank you.

[Geoff F]

OK Christina, I have slightly altered my text to make things more obvious.

What I meant was 'Even when shooting at Iso 800 the shutter speed was too slow for the action'. Due to the lack of natural light; and Iso 800 being the maximum that I wanted to use under those gloomy conditions which would give 'noise' problems.

I think the actual readings were around 1/40 at F8 which is too slow for an action scene, even if I was able to catch a moment with less action.

Flash settings are something of an art all on their own.

Using flash in auto settings tends to default to 1/60 and a wide open aperture; but this is where you can get a little bit crafty and force most modern cameras to accept your personal settings instead.

Using shutter priority (subject to max speed around 1/200) gives you some control but still results in a wide open aperture, under normal use.

Aperture priority allows for a pre set aperture but can result in long shutter speeds. Which can sometimes be useful for a bit of fill flash on the foreground plus ambient light on the background.

Using manual controls allows modern cameras to automatically vary their flash output depending on the ambient light and chosen settings. But there are often some limitations such as maximum acceptable shutter speed (say 1/250) and using 'suitable apertures'.

This may be available with modern camera 'pop up' flashes but works better with larger external flash units.

I mostly use flash with manual camera settings then vary the flash exposure output to suit; working with the ETTL option. This should also be available with some modern pop up flashes.

And for faster action, I use the High Speed option on my Speedlight. For example shooting around 1/500 or a little faster, but there are some limitations.

Have a play around with your camera flash options shooting the same scene and see what works best. But it does take a little experience and experimentation to achieve the best results.

Then there is the full manual flash settings which some pro photographers use. But this really does require some experience. Can be very useful for 'studio lighting' etc particularly when shooting with reflectors or diffusers.

However, let's leave that for the real experts.

[Brownbear]

Thank you Geoff... Truly appreciated. Very informative with tons of new information for me to digest. I hardly ever use flash so its all new to me.

Looks like I'm using your project as a learning tool and making you a better teacher.

Thanks a million!

[Geoff F]

Part of the purpose behind these Project 52, and now 2013, posts was to regularly upload examples of day to day photography including potential problems which may be of use to other people.

So thinking about flash photo photography, I just took a couple of quick shots with little in the way of thinking beforehand. The sort of quick shots which many people attempt using just the camera pop up flash. Taken in a fairly dark room with just window light on a dull day.

The first with auto flash on the P setting which automated to 1/60 and F4. The second with manual settings of 1/200 and F8, and a little bit of flash output compensation.

Similar basic editing applied to both shots.





The model lives a couple of doors away but regularly visits my house.

Ideally, I wouldn't have shot quite like either of these photos but this is just to demonstrate the differences.

[Geoff F]

Last of the Bad Weather?

A couple of brighter days now and hopefully the start of some real Spring weather. These images show what I hope was the last of the wind and rain!



7D with 24-105 L lens. 1/800 F11 Iso 800 handheld. More Iso than I would have liked but I also wanted a fast shutter on the surf and plenty of focus depth. Although sharp focus was limited by the amount of moisture in the air; so I may have got away with F8 and a lower Iso.

I did vary the settings, but finally settled on what I thought to be the best composition. And you can't ask waves to do a replay for another shot!

For all these shots I spot metered on the brightest areas than used manual settings. Two Raw conversions with different exposures and noise reduction. Combined with masking.



A slightly brighter day so I was able to reduce the Iso to 400. Possibly a fraction too bright with the editing? I did a couple of different versions.



I managed to increase the shutter speed to 1/1250 for this shot.


Same scene as the previous image but a slightly different angle to show some sky differences. I can't really decide between them.

[Letrow]

I like the landscapes Geoff. I will be in the UK soon for a short holiday, so hope to get a few shots like these.

[Cantab]

Geoff, I liked all three -- but then I grew up near a similar coastline.

Of the three my preference is probably the third one, partly because of the different angle from the second shot and also because of the increased contrast. I tend to agree with your suggestion concerning #2; it's a tad on the bright side: this probably shows up most noticeably in the rocks closest to the viewer.

[Geoff F]

Thanks for the comments.

With #2, Bruce, the cliff edge, on the right, seemed a bit flat with my previous edit so I gave it a little bit of a brighten up. Probably need to keep the shadows a little darker while increasing contrast on the highlights.

Possibly one of those common occurrences where the result looks different between room lighting and real daylight. I will have another look under 'real light'.

[Geoff F]

Abandoned Roller

Found this very old abandoned farm roller and thought the background could create a potential scene. But there was obviously a problem with the varied lighting.

I thought about a bit of HDR shooting, and hand merging but there was some movement in the tree. Possibly I could have got away with it, but merging different sky tree and grass would prove difficult.

Eventually, I took some shots with exposure compromise variations then did a merge of two Raw conversions with different settings from the best shot.



7D with 24-105 L lens 1/200 F11 Iso 200 handheld.

The towing bar is distorted and had been repaired by welding in a strengthening bar of galvanised iron which just didn't look authentic.

I 'replaced' it with a strip of rusty wrought iron during editing. But it was clearly missing some bolts in the appropriate places. So I eventually decided to 'remove' the offending item and replace it with grass!

A closer shot of the roller.



1/640 F11 Iso 400.

Obviously, I should have reduced the Iso and used a slightly slower aperture. But after trying a variety of different angles, which required a higher Iso, I forgot to readjust the setting. But it doesn't make a lot of difference.

And while on a farming theme . . .

Let's go to South Sands and have a paddle in the sea!



1/250 F 22 Iso 400. I had been spot metering on various points to work out a good balance between black and white areas. I didn't need to go to F22; but I thought this was the best composition of several shots. Those rejected had better settings!

For some unexplained reason while walking across this field, a herd of bullocks decided to follow me, just a couple of paces behind and in single file. Everytime I stopped so did they, then they followed on as soon as I moved forward. This went on until I went through a gate at the far end of the field.

Then they collected together around the gate. I'm not sure that being irresistible to a herd of bullocks is something to brag about.

They probably thought there was food in my backpack, and possibly smelt a couple of chocolate biscuits.

Chatting to the neighbours across the wall.

Cattle from the next field also came over to see what was the attraction!

[Brownbear]

Beautiful photos Geoff. Of course my favourite is the 3rd with the cows but you made that piece of equipment look beautiful, too. I truly appreciate how your sharing the the how to process.

[Geoff F]

Week 18 - Insects

A couple of sunny days have eventually enabled a few more insects to appear.

Bee Fly - Bombylius major

I have taken a few photos of these flies feeding on primroses; but this shot shows how well camouflaged they are against the leaf litter.



7D with Sigma 180 macro lens plus 1.4x converter, Speedlite flash. 1/250 F14 Iso 200 on tripod. I manually set the camera then allowed the flash unit to find its own output level. But with a little bit of negative flash compensation.

Large Red Damselfly - Pyrrhosoma nymphula

The first damselfly of 2013. It has been a slow start to the season and I have yet to find any other damselfly or dragonfly this year.



Mating Bees

This pair were moving around too much for anything other than a quick snap. I slightly over exposed the scene but recovered what I could during editing. I suspect they are Andrena haemorrhoa but I couldn't get any suitable angles for a confirmed identification.



Possibly a tighter crop would lose some of the distracting background.

Pond Skater



There were several of these skating around on a muddy pond. This one appears to be eating a small fly.