2017 Project 52 - 1st Quarter by Mal Schulstad

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 2 Photo 4
Philippa taking her jump rather seriously by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

So I actually have a few more using the Tamron 18-300 before I move onto the next series. This is where scenes get challenging - the light starts dropping which is great for colours in theory, but it's still summer here so it's still a bit washed out unless enhanced with PP. The subject is moving fairly quickly and so you're having to balance out shutter speed vs noise... and don't get me started about trying to figure out what focus mode to use. Continuous is the obvious choice - especially when you are switching from one subject to another in a matter of milli-seconds. On the Nikon there's a mode that tracks multiple focus points but when I took this photo I was still struggling to get it to lock onto the subject that I wanted - I think it caught the leaves behind Philippa perfectly instead...

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 2 Photo 5
Hot Morning Rest Stop Conversations by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

Rest stops are a chance for me to try and actually get a photo right. This photo marks my switch from the Tamron travel lens to the my trusty Sigma 17-70 - which I've always found to be a great value lens for the money I paid for it (that and I'm very poor these days).

I had originally thought that the Tamron with it's long zoom range would be more flexible. However I found that I rarely needed to zoom in on a subject because you really lost the feel of what a rider was doing without a good chunk of the landscape in frame. There's still a bit of CR in some of the subjects in the back I think - but that's more to do with my PP I think - trying to make the sky a bit more blue than it actually was.

I guess my other thought with this photo is it's shot as a wide angle and almost gives a touch of a fish eye feel. I could correct this in Lightroom but I actually like the effect and feel it gives to a photo - so I don't

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 2 Photo 6
GCG_8279 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

I do like my B&W and Sepia style photos when the situation permits - which I guess technically is when you have a nice clean environment that you can see all of the contrasts nicely through. This is not the case with where I do the majority of my riding.

This photo may have not been the best subject for a sepia photo with all of its business, but it's a lot worse in colour. There was just something about it that said to me that it would be better in this finish though. I processed it without much thought - just more of a feel. Some heavy vignetting and gradients mostly.

I've just had the opportunity to look back at it though and I've just realised that the rider is actually framed by two rays of light and a tree, which are then subsequently framed by vignetting. I guess there's something to be said for intuition - at least if you like this sort of thing.

[joebranko]

Nice shot. It does capture the feel of the ride . Is there a purple cast in this shot? (#5) I am not great with colours so perhaps not.
#6. I really like the framing by the rays of light, and the sepia treatment. Great capture!

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 2 Photo 7
Waiting by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This was another test shot while I played around with settings before the group came roaring down behind me. I've actually closed the aperture down in this one to f9 - probably because of the brightness of the sun. At this point I had been sticking to around 1/500 to capture my subjects which seemed to be fast enough in most situations. About 8 riders came hurtling down the track a few seconds later....

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Nice shot. It does capture the feel of the ride . Is there a purple cast in this shot? (#5) I am not great with colours so perhaps not.

Yes there is - it's deliberately done by me, just something I do when I'm feeling a bit on the artistic side but in this case probably a bit over done. Like I said, sometimes I just get lazy...

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 1
Coming in hot by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This was the first of the photos where I began to think to myself that capturing someone just entering the frame could have a big impact on the scene if the other elements were right. This in itself is not necessarily an easy thing to accomplish well. For a start, the camera is rarely focused on towards the the extremities of the frame, nor are there the focus points to actually allow the camera to put target the subject there. Also, as the subject enters the extremities of the frame they are actually moving a lot faster relative to when they are in the centre of the frame (I'll have more examples of this in future photos) so it's hard to get them sharp without increasing the shutter speed which obviously impacts the lighting.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 2
Nemesis Conquered by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

So many things wrong with this photo - poor lighting from poor settings, poorly processed, not sharp, out of focus... etc etc. But, from a journey perspective this is one of those ones where I began to change the position of how I was taking the photo to create a more dramatic effect with the shot. I had previously taken photos of people jumping from a distance (Week 2 Photo 4 is a good example). However I found that by getting up close to the subject while they were in action and getting down low (I was laying on the ground) and having the lens set to a wide zoom it creates a visually dramatic subject (I think... I could be wrong!)

Despite not being a technically great shot, the subject was ecstatic with the outcome.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 3
Last jump at Wimps - Lovin' that air time! by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

Same subject, different angle and time of day. It was actually quite late in the day with not a whole lot of light. I ended up slowing the shutter down to 1/320, with the ISO still being quite high at 3200. The result was a photo that was not sharp and with quite a bit of noise (hence the B&W finish). However focusing on the angle of the shot - I was happy with this progression.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 4
When someone comes into the shot a bit faster than expected.... by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This is another example of the person entering on the extremities of the frame at speed resulting in a less than sharp subject. Shot at 1/500 I think it was after this ride I began to experiment with faster shutter speeds, but at the detriment of ISO.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 5
Introducing Louw to some of the updated trails by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This is a bit of a nothing image from my perspective. However, I wanted to post this one up because it was taken pretty much from the exact some place, and finished with the same PP as the Week 1 Photo 1 shot. I had several subjects ride through this area but I was unable to recreate the same feel as having my bike leaning on a tree which I found quite odd. I guess I took from this that some scenes lend themselves to stationary subjects while others are better for moving ones.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 6
Lost World Crossing Point by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

I had thought to make a splash (pun intended) with this shot but despite having several riders cross this section of water I feel I failed dismally in creating a photo with any dramatic effect or feeling. Part of this could have something to do with the limited positions I could take the photo from (trees and water were in the way) - but really I think I just couldn't get my head around how to capture this scene in a great way. The scene itself does have some challenges - poor light and limited areas to shoot from - but that's why I'd like to get this shot right... one day.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 3 Photo 7
Group Shot at the Bottom of Lost World by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

A self portrait... a less than ideal one actually. Firstly, I had managed to drip sweat onto the lens (welcome to the Australian summer!), and I had nothing that I could clean the lens with - which is why you'll see a weird hazing around parts of the photo. Secondly, I don't ride with a tripod (for weight reasons, but also for safety reasons - I actually crash a lot) so I had to find a random rock, without grass, that wouldn't tip my camera into the stream that I could run back to the group from without breaking my ankle. Other observations... well the people that stand at the edge of the group tend to be impacted most by the fish eye effect of the lens making them look fatter (that's me on the right) so I need to set myself in the middle next time. Also, I really should have used a greater DOF.

Finally, when shooting with a timer it's good practice to return your camera back to normal mode before putting it back in your bag because when you go to the next place to shoot photos, you'll start trying to take them and wonder why your camera is taking 10 seconds before actually taking the shot...

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 1
GCG_8549 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

Week 4 was the start of me joining other groups of mountain bike riders that I didn't really know to take photos of them. With even less time to get set up due to not wanting to hold up riders, and the need to quickly pack my camera gear and catch the group (they really don't wait too long for people sometimes) it meant that I had to be confident with picking a spot to shoot that would have interesting light and scenery, get my camera ready (you'd be amazed at how often pulling a camera out of a bag rapidly with gloves results in the dials moving and you shooting with the wrong settings!) and being fit enough to ride away from the group before shots, and catch up to them after the shots.

The other thing about shooting groups that you don't know really well, particularly this one (there were about 20 riders) is that you don't know when the last rider is through. This shot was an accidental capture - I was getting ready to pack up when I realised that there was actually one last rider. The lovely thing about wide angle shots is that the subject is usually in the frame if you point the camera in their general direction - and I think this particular photo shows that sometimes it's okay to do that because you just never know what you might capture.

If you're wondering, I did have the camera on an odd angle when I took the photo - I literally just pressed the button so I've no idea what the camera was actually focused on. To straighten it to a technically correct setting would have resulted in too much of the photo being cropped, so I did the opposite and exaggerated the tilt instead. With mountain bike riding photos, I find that odd angles helps to give a photo a better appreciation of depth - more on that later.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 2
Fat bikes can jump by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This is the type where I find photographing mountain bikes really can become exciting - and challenging. Firstly, this was shot about 15 minutes before sunset, so the light was becoming scarce which drove the ISO. Secondly, the subjects were fast moving as they were launching off a jump - I had the shutter at 1/1000 but I'm not convinced that was necessarily fast enough - particularly for when the subjects were at the extremities of the frame.

Even with the aperture almost wide open at 3.5 there's still a bit of noise in this photo which I didn't fully process out - it can be a challenge balancing detail vs being too artificially smooth. Having said that, for mountain bike riders that don't often have their photos taken capturing them while doing this style of riding - which makes it look fairly extreme - well, they're ecstatic when they can get their hands on this sort of shot of themselves.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 3
GCG_8567 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This one is of the rider that was following the guy in the above photo (Week 4 Photo 2). I thought it would be good to show you what the scene looked like in colour, with PP mainly gradients applied to the top and bottom (on a slight angle) and adjustments to white balance and saturation to what I felt would make an appealing image to the average person.

The other reason I posted this photo is I thought I'd touch on where I'm actually situated to capture these shots. I mentioned this earlier - Zooms are all well and good to capture action but you can lose some of the scenery so I've been focusing on shooting with a wideish setting (as wide as I can with my equipment anyway). Now, to catch the rider so that they appear on the large frame you obviously have to be very close. I've also found that getting low creates the best angle to capture the rider in - so I've found myself sitting or in this case laying on the ground, right beside the track, very close to where the riders ride through, or in this case land their bikes. I was actually so close to where this rider landed that he managed to kick up a bunch of stones onto me - hazards of our passion!

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 4
GCG_8580-Edit by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

I thought I'd talk about post processing as I default to Lightroom - and have done pretty much since I started my journey with CiC whereas I think a lot of people here use Photoshop. While I use Photoshop, it's mainly for advanced photo edits when I want to layer, or create something that's beyond the "normal" photo - like my Avatar.

Lightroom on the other hand, while it can clone objects, add colours and apply tints, can't actually create anything other than what's in the photo already - including the light and colour spectrum that's captured. The other thing that Lighroom does really well is catalogue lots of photos and apply non-destructive edits. Most of my edits focus around noise reduction, crops obviously, adjusting shadows and highlights, adjusting contrast, clarity and colour saturation, and applying gradients.

I'm not sure if anyone is interested in more detail about my pp in Lightroom, but I'm more than happy to discuss in greater detail if you are. What I wanted to say is that Lightroom itself does have limitations to the enhancements it can make to a photo. And then I discovered Google's Nik Collection

Nik Collection are a set of additional preset adjustable enhancements that work in both Photoshop and Lightroom that can be used to further enhance a photo without adding a whole lot of time to your workflow - provided you have a powerful enough computer! It can work on multiple photos at once (handy if you happen to take 20 photos of the same scene but with different subjects) and you like Lightroom you can save your own set of adjustments so you can easily apply them to future photos.

You can see the difference between this photo and the previous two using some of the Nik Collection enhancements (I hope).

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 5
DZ1_8621 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

This photo is one of those accidental captures that revealed to me another style of photo - one where the subject, while still being the focal point of the shot, is de-emphasized by having them taken far off in the distance. I took this one as a test shot and while it's not an overly interesting photo, it worked out better than most of the close ups that were taken in the same scene.

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 6a
DZ1_8618 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

Week 4 Photo 6b
DZ1_8630 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

These two photos are of the same area - a very steep, rocky and rutted track that can easily (and in my case almost has) throw you over the handebars. Trying to capture the steepness of this track in a photo is something I've found near impossible The first photo is the technically correct photo which makes the track seem quite tame. So with the second photo i tilted the camera rather aggressively - and although it's not technically correct and does make you want to make you tilt your head, I feel gives a much better feeling of a steep track - but I could be mistaken...

[Goldcoastgolfer]

Week 4 Photo 7
DZ1_8638 by Mal Schulstad, on Flickr

I think this is a nice example of a scene with strong lines and an emphasized subject that can grab your attention with a mountain bike photo. If you have a group of riders you'll sometimes be able to have them add even more to the scene wth the lines they form i the photo.

This is also another example of not having the focus right (I didn't have the focus points set to the left of the frame so the camera obviously centered the focus) and without enough DOF the left of the frame is out of focus.