Stuck In Customs - Too Bad Really

Ah Trey Ratcliff, he was and actually still is a good photographer, tried his hands at something else and published a book that was a decent coffee table book, but fell short of most expectations. Some people (including me) voiced our opinion of the book and what does he do... well I tell you he comes out of the shadows and just disappointed. An artist (or anyone really) should take criticism as a tool, no matter what it is they should build on it and improve. What is truly the point of surrounding yourself with sheep that ooo, and ahhh everything you say. How do you grow if you actually think that what you have done is perfect? How do you better yourself? I do not understand? It is actually either a very insecure person who does this or just some one who's ego is so big that it will be there downfall. Seriously. Just too bad that he had to react that way and just display his immaturity. Well he has lost one "fan" and I am quite sure several more will follow after this last little show. Too bad really...

A Bulb? Really?

Here is a fun little rainy day project you can try. The best thing is that this gives a totally artistic photo and is relatively cheap to do. But please let me warn you that caution should be the main part of this project. You will have to handle broken glass, and electricity, in the dark! So please be careful...

Staging it:

- You will need a camera with a bulb or timer setting on a tripod

- Close up lens of some sorts

- A light

- Several 40w or so Bulbs

- A Zip lock bag

- A room that can be pitch black

- A remote trigger

Click and go! So in the comfort of light you will need to place a bulb in the zip lock bag and break the glass. So before you just start smashing things realise that you need the inside of the bulb to be completely intact. The filament and the glass need to still be functional. So you probably will break a couple of bulbs before you get a good one. The bag's only use is to limit the broken glass from flying every where. Now the light is unplugged and set to "OFF" screw in the "broken" bulb. Set the camera on a tripod and aim it at the filament. Try to keep the top part of the frame clear so that you can catch the "smoke". Plug in the light. The camera should be set either on bulb or say 10seconds or so. The room has to be pitch dark so the duration of the exposure is actually going to be irrelevant. You are only interested in capturing the bulb burning, so if you set the timer to 10 seconds just make sure that you can do it all in 10 seconds.

Now that your camera is ready, your bulb is screwed in, you are ready to go. Sit some where in between the light with the bulb and the camera and the main light switch. You really don't want to be fumbling in the dark to try to find all these things. With one hand on the camera trigger, turn off the room's light, trigger the camera, then turn the broken bulb light on.

You will see a flash and a puff of smoke, once you hear your camera's click turn the room light back on. Check to see framing.

Now you can try something else, you are going to put the camera on these settings: 1/640 - f4.0, iso 160 and continuous firing. This way you will get several shots of the burn/puff. Change the bulb, and do the same routine, this time right before you turn the bulb on depress your camera's trigger and keep taking pictures until the event is over. Now just play around adjusting your settings you will get some really cool shots. JUST BE CAREFULL!

Why not in Black and White?

As you have probably heard by now HDR (High Dynamic Range) is the newest biggest thing in modern photography. In a nutshell the human eye can look at a scene and "see" about 20-22 stops of light, a camera can "see"about 5 stops per exposure. HDR photography you try to mimic the eye and blend 5 different exposures so that you increase the stops from 5 to about 20 depending on how many exposures you blend. This is why when a HDR photo is properly done you can express a more natural looking picture. Too much is one of the biggest drawbacks! The colors are out of wak and you can create a weird looking halo around some objects. Like most new things (even some very useful tools) HDR in moderation and used as a tool can be a very cool addition to your portfolio. One instance it can come into play is when you would traditionally use a ND filter, but the scene seems to complicated. You don't only have a straight line, you have a tree in both areas of the picture. So for complicated or advanced situations yes go for it please. But do remember to not over saturate your colors and even if you can get a "painting look" try to see what it would look when you do a realistic one. You would be amazed by how subtle and eye catching that can be. Then a little trick, take it a step further and desaturate the image. And wow you will see a whole new world of possibilities. Black and White pictures taken in HDR have a new depth, they take on a whole new perspective. Give it a try you won't be disappointed.

OFF Camera Lighting - Basics

What does this mean? Well for starters this encompasses any situation where you are lighting a situation with something else than the flash "on" you camera. Because as you may have realized that isn't always the best lighting choice. So sure you could say that using ambient light or the sun or just a reflective surface.
But today we will focus on a controlled light, and to keep it simple we will be talking about small strobes (flashes).
Honestly you do need some gear:

- a Hot shoe flash
- a triggering system

The triggers:
As you can imagine you can find several types of triggers and flashes. The triggers can range from 30 bucks to several hundred. If you want to get professional level results, never missed pictures you probably should invest in a pocket wizard they are expensive but a must if you want to get serious.
So basically the triggers are a two element set. On one hand you have a transmitter, that is connected to your camera. The easiest is to set it on your camera hot shoe. Most of the more expensive DSR cameras will have another way or connection.
The second element is the receiver. This is connected to your flash. The simpler triggers like the phottix actually just have a hot shoe connector and you just slip the flash onto it. The pocket wizards require flashes that have a pc connector.

The flash:
This is where it can get interesting. You can go with a very effective and simple flash like the Vivitar.

These Flashes are very simple to use and the value is great. I would easily recommend buying two Vivitar at 90 bucks versus one Canon 580EXii at 400 bucks. Now don't get me wrong the Canon is feature rich and a great flash. But you can have a lot of fun with the simpler Vivitar! If you want to start this you can get into it for under 120 bucks. Seeing how much nicer your pictures will be and just the flexibility that will be available to you you might just be thank full when you do make the leap to off camera flashes.

Ok SO now you have made the leap... you bought every thing you need... you picked up a flash and a trigger. Set it all up... the best way to start it to set your flash to Auto exposure... your flash will "see" how far your subject is and adjust it's power to expose it right. The best thing is to set your camera to the same aperture as your flash. Set them both to say f4. Set your camera to manual, and set the aperture. Now look into it and adjust your shutter speed to expose your background. Then fire a shot... you might have to adjust your shutter speed to get the best result. Try this with something that is not moving... not an action shot. You will wonder why just set your aperture. You have to disconnect from your regular views now. Think of it thiis way: the pulse of light is at a set duration, so even if you set your shutter speed to 1 second the flash won't affect that, you are just delaying the available light.

Now you have to try and see... this is a new concept so you need to play with it... have fun experimenting... faster shutter speeds will blacken the background... add the sun in the back and you will separate your subject from your background.
Like I said have fun with it!

2pm Portrait

So I have been playing around with off camera triggers for a while now. I honestly if you haven't tried it you should. It gives you a whole new sense of what you can do with photography.

One day I found a great blog, strobist, I have to say the value on the content is just amazing. It's free and the knowledge you can get, the ideas, experience is just phenomenal.

You might be wondering how this is done. Well first off think of what you have to work with: the sun then either you just have access to a reflector (if nothing else helps it could be as simple as a person with a white shirt) or you can use a strobe.

Today we will be focusing on a light source. The best way as I was saying is to get your strobe off your camera; this will give you the best result. Ok so we are basically looking at a two light set up: your strobe and you guessed it the sun. For obvious reasons the only control you have on the sun is the way it hits your subject. You can' t change it's intensity (other than coming back later) so we are going to use it as a background light. Yes you will be shooting with the sun in front of you, behind your subject. By now you think I am crazy and remember the old saying that you should always shoot with the sun behind you. Yes it is true that if you just take your camera on auto ad snap a shot chances are you will get a nice silhouette. The sun and background will be blown out and your subject will be dark void of all detail. So how do we fix this...

It's all about placement. You will position your subject so that the sun is hitting your subject at an 45 degree angle. The light will bounce off your subject's hair and shoulders. Now opposite to the sun you will place your strobe. So basically this is what we call cross lighting.

Just like the diagram.

The key here is to balance your strobe with the ambient light. The picture was taken with a Canon 580EXii, in external metering mode. This is a manual mode that we will talk about later.

Turning our backs on each other

It’s been a while in the making; but I have realized that we are going down a road we really should be ashamed of. People are changing, I doubt I am the only one feeling this, but every body has lost trust. Every where you look some one is scamming, some rich entrepreneur is bleeding his company dry; making it difficult for people to earn a decent living and lead decent lives.

This pretty much all came to me when I was looking at my power bill and read that they wanted to launch a program to balance out my carbon foot print. All in all a great idea, I would only cost me a little under four dollars. Well worth it if I could make a little difference and help the planet. But the first thought that jumped into mind was : “ Are they really going to use this money for that? Or are they just going to use it for something else! ”
This is the general mood, I think as a people we have lost trust. We are no longer naive, some one has taken our innocence and just thrown it out. It is kind of sad... I can only wish that people in a whole are not as bad as I am starting to think they are.