Another depth of field example

The photos I showed on my previous post only had a stop difference of 3 so I thought it might be useful to show something of a wider gap so these two photographs were taken at f2.8 and f22 a 6 stop difference. Hopefully you can tell which was which!

Depth of field

I thought you might be interested in looking at how changing the aperture can affect depth of field. These two photographs were taken using my Olympus Pen micro four thirds camera with a 50mm macro prime lens.

For the first photograph I used the lens wide open at f2 and as you can see the background has hardly any detail at all emphasising the conker case. You might also be able to see that not all of the case is in focus just the area around the right hand spike. This is obviously the downside to using such a large aperture at such close range.

The second photograph was taken at f5.6 three stops smaller and you can see the marked difference on the background and on the conker itself with much more being in acceptable focus. I could have tried an even smaller aperture but the shutter speed was already down to 1/30 and as I was hand holding the camera I would probably have suffered from camera shake but the photos illustrate the difference you can create in a photo just by choosing a different aperture.

If you would like to learn more about this and other aspects of controlling the result in your photos have a look here - http://www.drphotography.biz/workshops/index.html

Workshops for winter

I have now put together some ideas for winter workshops, have a look here http://www.drphotography.biz/workshops/index.html and let me know if you are interested.

I'm more than happy to organise workshops to cover any other aspects of photography that you might want, please ask.

Apologies for lack of posts

Bad boy! I really should have added more posts before now but somehow the time just slips by.

As you may know we are away on our narrowboat and at the time of writing this have just left Chester and are heading for Middlewich.

My photography has not been as prolific as I had hoped mainly due to the weather but I'll try to add some shots of interest.

Firstly a couple of pictures illustrating the use of shutter speeds for both sharp photographs and creative results. You don't need a super expensive DSLR to take these sort of pictures. The first of the train was taken with my Olympus Pen -E1 with the exposure time set to 1/10 of a second and IS 400, letting the camera set the necessary aperture.

The blurred result gives a sensation of speed which would be lacking if I had used a very fast shutter speed to freeze the movement.

The second was taken with my Zorki 35mm film camera. This has no automatic controls and needs to be focused manually. If you have a digital camera which is a bit slow for getting the focus to lock on a moving subject then you could approach this sort of subject in the same way. You need to prefocus on the spot where you will be taking the picture (In this instance I watched a few laps first to decide where I was going to shoot the bike and rider) and then when the camera has focused change the setting to manual focus so that it will not alter when you depress the shutter button. Then to get the sense of speed, pan the camera with the subject. That is follow the subject in the camera viewfinder or screen and press the shutter release where you had decided to shoot and you should have this sort of result! Remember to follow through with the camera though. Don't suddenly stop as you release the shutter. The shutter speed was 1/1000

I'll post again shortly but if you would like to see a few more photos from our current trip our blog is at thehodmadod@blogspot.co.uk

On our travels

We have started off on our narrowboat for, hopefully, the summer and I hope to be able to add a selection of photographs as we go. Here are a few from the first week.

Lock gates at Watford staircase locks, taken from the stern of the narrowboat whilst the lock was filling

I thought this made an interesting composition from beside the towpath

Pumping station at Snaresbrook. Built in the late 19th C to pump fresh water to the village, built next to the canal and using and old mine shaft.

Bridge 40 Grand Union canal Leicester arm

This one sneaked in, its actually trees at the back of Bungay Golf course!

Apart from the last which was taken with my Zorki 35mm camera the other photographs were all taken with my Olympus Pen-E1. I have come equipped with 4 cameras The Pen, my Zorki 35mm film camera, my Bronica medium format film camera and a very old bellows folding camera which belonged to my father in law and which probably dates from the early 1930's. I've also brought my developing kit with me so hope to be able to develop the b & w films from the 3 film cameras and scan them in - brought that too! - watch this space! At least it will be something to do on days like today when the rain has been incessant. If you would like more photos and details of our trip have a look at http://thehodmadod.blogspot.co.uk/

More from my Zorki

I've just developed the second black and white film from my Zorki 35mm camera and am really finding it very satisfying to see the results appear as if by magic after development. I've now got the scanner functioning and have to say that the results for a flatbed scanner are pretty good. Once we get back next time from the boat I plan to send a few negatives for printing the old fashioned way to see what difference there is compared to an inkjet.

I was so pleased with the results that I have splashed out on a quite expensive lens for the Zorki, a 28mm wide angle lens, well, it is my birthday in a couple of days time....

 I did find that only having a 50mm focal length was a little restrictive so thought I'd try a wide angle lens. As the camera is a rangefinder you do not view the scene through the lens so having a different focal length also meant getting another viewfinder for the camera. This fits in the shoe on the top of the camera and you can swivel the turret round to get different focal lengths. I tried the lens on my digital pen this morning and the image looks really clean and crisp although as everything is manual the focusing on the Pen is tricky as one only has the rear screen to use and theres no way of enlarging the image as there is on the dedicated lenses.

Anyway here's a couple of photos from my latest roll of film.

The first from our last trip on the boat at bridge 40 Leicester Arm of the Grand Union Canal:

Trying still life again with the torches, a little trickier with the Zorki as there's no preview!

Some trees on Bungay Marshes at the back of the golf course:

Famous images

In an odd few minutes I've been surfing the net to look at some icon images of past photographs and thought that as a project it would be good fun and a great exercise to try to copy/emulate a few of them.

My first is an image by Andres Kertesz (1894 - 1985) There's plenty of examples of his work scattered around the web.

The Fork, or La Fourchette, was taken in 1928 and is one of Kertész's most famous works from this period.

So here it is and my interpretation.

It was interesting to recreate what is seemingly a simple composition but when you come to it it take more care and thought than might be imagined.

I'll let you decided who's is who's!

Water, water everywhere

There is a great article in this weeks Amateur Photographer about photographing water droplets and given the weather was very wet I thought I'd have a go.

The set up is simple really just a container with water in, the camera on a tripod and a flash unit, preferably off camera. The difficult part is timing the flash to go off at the moment of impact. In the AP article the photographer had all sorts of solenoids and electrical contacts. I tried trial and error! Well, the results are below from about 297 shots. The colours come from a yellow lever arch file standing behind the bowl, sometimes with a blue towel under the bowl and sometimes with white balance on tungsten. 

Have a go yourselves and see what you can come up with. Any more info you would like, drop me a line.

The wettest drought on record!

It was good to see the sun yesterday but back to miserable conditions today but for some reason I seemed to manage to capture a couple of atmospheric shots. These are on my Olympus Pen.

I've just finished another roll of B & W on the 35mm Zorki and will be processing it myself. I've managed to get most of the equipment together from e-bay (its all going very cheaply these days) and when the rain eases will be popping out to buy the chemicals. Then as soon as the changing bag I've just bought arrives I'll have a go at the developing. It must be over 50 years since I last did it but I don't suppose its changed that much, in principle anyway.

Film v digital

Is there a difference in the final result between shooting digitally and on film? Well, here are two photographs I took recently near Southwold one with my Olympus Pen-E1 1/1000sec f5.6 ISO 100 at 40mm which is 35mm equivilent of 80mm and one with my medium format Bronica using Fuji Velvia film ISO 50 1/125 f16 using a 150mm lens which is the 35mm equivalent of 100mm The faster shutter speed on the Pen was because I was handholding it. The Bronica was tripod mounted.

Both images are straight out of the camera with no post producion work at all.

A definite difference I think. Does anyone have a comment?

Fairweather photographers

Typical British summer weather her in the UK at the moment. I suppose it is correct as we are certainly having plenty of April showers but dont let that make you put your camera away there are plenty of opportunities to take interesting photographs in the rain. Given the dull conditions you may need to push your ISO rating up a bit but a grainy/noisy result, especially if you convert the shot to black and white, can be very effective.

This one was shot in Bungay on my Zorki 35mm camera with a B & W film which was rated at only ISO100.

Studio style portraiture without expensive equipment

Do you need expensive flashes and modifiers and backdrops to make studio style photos? No, is the short answer. It makes life easier of course but so does having all the latest technology in any field but it can be twice as much fun working round the issues without forking out the ££££'s.

Take this self portrait for example. The model came free (!!) and the lighting was from an LED hand torch balanced on  a book shelf 1/25 at f2.8 ISO400 The camera was on a tripod but even that could be dispensed with if you placed it on a table in which case it would be best to shoot using the mirror lock up devise which most DSLR's have (assuming you are using a DSLR)

The background is black purely because no light is falling on it but its best to avoid having anything too close to the subject in case you are getting any light spill.

Obviously low key photographs like this are ideal for some subjects (grizzly old men for example) but may not suit everyone so I'll come back and show how to do some high key portraits with simple equipment in another post.

First colour film from my Zorki 35mm camera

I was really delighted with the results from this camera. The colour depth is different from digital and although perhaps not quite so sharp the images do have a definite feel to "them"

All these photos are straight out of the camera apart from a slight crop on one or two - no photoshopping at all!

A quick update

It was Friday 13th yesterday and whilst I'm not superstitious it certainly lived up to its reputation. I wont bore you with the details suffice to say the satellite dish we bought for the boat came with the wrong type of plug so I couldn't set that up so that we could watch the Grand National and my new electric drill ceased to work and I cant recharge it and 2 fixings I was trying to put up both screws sheered off in the holes. At that point I gave up and took some photos instead!

This one of the venetian blind was shot in daylight but with the white balance set to Tungsten and the ISO rating was up at 1600 to give me a grainy effect,

Walking from the marina I took the dogs to the top of Crack Hill which is a "mound" which gives a great view over the surrounding Northampton countryside all be it one of radio aerials, large warehouses and industrial sites so I thought this was more rural.

Away on the Cut

We picked up our new narrowboat last Saturday and are getting to grips with her. If you would like to follow that story you can here: http://thehodmadod.blogspot.co.uk/

I'm hoping to have some great photos to show over the coming weeks but here's a couple that I've shot over the last week, all on my digital Olympus Pen -E1

As good a place to start I suppose is with my new camera. Having lugged around a full frame DSLR x 2 with large heavy lens I decided that retirement should bring some benefits and that I would reduce my load by changing systems. After much research I eventually decided on the four thirds style of camera and bought an old Olympus Pen -E1 on e-bay for £120 to test the waters. I really enjoy the camera but hate the fact that it doesn't have a viewfinder as in sunny conditions its virtually impossible to frame the image. So I started to think about upgrading it and was very taken with the new Olympus OM-D. However whilst thinking about that and trying to decide if I really wanted to spend £1000 on a camera that was going to be old technology in 6 months I a) bought myself a loupe so I could view the screen on my Pen in daylight and b) bought myself an old Russian 35mm camera called a Zorki which is basically a copy of a prewar Leica for the crippling price of £23.

I've also got my Bronica camera which is medium format and takes 120 film and think as I'm now doing this for pleasure I might stick to those and see where it takes me. Mind you the initial idea of reducing the weight I was going to be carrying around has gone out of the window as neither the Zorki or the Bronica are exactly light weights.

I've only just finished putting through the first film in the Zorki, a black and white Ilford and its interested to see how the rendering of the tones does differ from those taken digitally. Here's a few for you to have a look at. Let me know if you agree. They are not masterpieces but just taken to assess the camera was working.

Welcome

Hi

Life in the slow lane - a few hints tips and comments from a retired professional photographer who is about to set sail on a life on a narrowboat along the canals and rivers of England and Wales.

I'm starting over again with blogging as I did have one running whilst I had my studio but rather neglected it so hopefully I will be more diligent now that I supposedly have more time