Our model, Rachael, under overcast skies at the DPE Learning Weekend in Atlanta, GA
Overcast skies may be bad for landscape photography, but they are great for shooting portraits. When shooting under cloudy skies you’ve got a giant overhead softbox to work with. This creates soft light that wraps around your subject and makes it easy to capture a proper exposure without blown highlights or harsh shadows. This soft light is also a great base for adding off-camera flash.
A few tips for success on an overcast day:
•Set your white balance to ‘Cloudy’ to add a little warmth to your colors
•Don’t include the sky in your photos. Unless the clouds are very dramatic, an overcast sky doesn’t make a good background.
•Use off-camera flash (speedlights or strobes) to create more interesting or dramatic lighting. Use the ambient light as your fill and build the main light with your off-camera flash.
•You may need to bump up the contrast (I like to use a curves adjustment) in Lightroom or Photoshop.
Learn more about Rob, view his images and check out his workshops at his website.
Rick and Juan where teaching at the awesome Maui Photo Festival a few weeks back and we took a bit of time to record this quick and easy tip on creating great portrait shots in harsh light situations.
This summer, I traveled with my family on a camping trip to the Bandon area of the Oregon coast. It was cold and windy, which is not unusual there but it was a refreshing break from the heat where I live. On the first evening after setting up camp, we were eating dinner in town. A thick fog had rolled in along the Coquille River, and I noticed these pier pilings mysteriously appearing and disappearing in the mist. After dinner, I spent nearly an hour photographing these piers.
When composing this image, I wanted to show both the ethereal foggy mood and the depth of the posts fading out into the mist. I shuffled my camera position until I found a good rhythm of spaces between each line. This spacing accentuates the fascinating graphic structure because each space defines a post, and avoids the merging of that shape. For this image, I used the Singh Ray Vari-ND to lengthen the exposure. This technique does a great job of simplifying the overall image since the blurring “washes away” the textures of the water. To me, this heightens a feeling of the piers floating in space.
For the next two evenings, I was on the main Bandon beach, photographing in the wind and fog. Heaven! For some reason, very few others were enjoying the wintry conditions! I spent over one hour with my feet nearly freezing in the surf. In order to heighten the misty conditions, I had to get out into the surf wash for that “blurred water” effect. The wave action kept moving my camera, with the tripod feet sinking into the sand. I finally found a high spot where my tripod was relatively protected and my camera angle still included the surf. Since every wave picture is different, dependent on timing and action, I made dozens on frames to capture the best moment.
Rock formation and driftwood, Bandon, Oregon 2010
For the image above, I used a Singh Ray Vari-ND to get more blurring action. There were some subtle tones in the sky, but the monochrome evening lent itself to Black and White. I particularly enjoy the textures in the surf and rock formations in this image, but mostly importantly how this image conveys the mystical mood I felt on this beach. The subtleties are hard to see at a small scale, but a large print will bring out the delicate, high key qualities.
Even though I did not see spectacular clouds, or a dramatic sunset while at the beach, I made the best of what nature offered me. What did you do on your summer vacation?
In the short time I have been shooting video seriously I have very quickly learned that sound is often more important than the video itself.
To that end, I have talked to many folks about how to best record sound when shooting with a Video DSLR, and have experimented quite a bit as well. In this article I will share with you the system that I am now using and which I find is producing great results for me.
Let me first state that if you are serious about your videos, you should be serious about sound; and if you are serious about sound, you should NOT rely on the built-in sound recording capabilities of the current crop (as of Feb, 2010) of video DSLRs. This includes the Canon 5D Mark II, 7D & 1D Mark IV. Please note that I do not have first hand experience with the Nikons, but from what I have been told the situation is similar.
The reason you should not be relying on on the built-in recording capabilities of these video DSLRs, is because these cameras have what is called an Automatic Gain Control or AGC, feature. What this means is that the camera will dynamically and continuously adjust the sound recording level. What this means is that if you are recording in an environment where there is noise all around you, and you are using a lapel (or lavaliere) type microphone, the sound will vary wildly in your recording.
For an example of what I mean watch this video that I recorded in Dec, 2009.
Notice how the sound of the breaking waves in the background changes? Pretty annoying don’t you think? Well the way to get around this is to be able to control the audio recording sensitivity (or gain) and not have it fluctuate while you are recording.
To get good sound in any situation like the one in the video above, what you need to do is set the recording level, or gain, to a level where the voice would be clear, not too loud and not too soft. Wearing a lapel microphone, which is meant to pick up the voice of the speaker, the sound of the surf in the background would be very soft and hardly noticeable. This is both good and bad; good in that now you are able to hear the speaker clearly and at a consistent volume, but bad because sometimes it is nice to have some of the environmental background sounds to place the speaker.
This is easily remedied by recording a separate track, either at the same moment as you are recording the video or at another time. Then in your video editing software package you can mix the sound tracks while adjusting the volume independently.
This is not unlike what we photographers are doing when we shoot two images for later blending in photoshop; in one image we shoot for the highlights and the other for the shadows, we then mix to taste.
For an example of another video where I used this technique check out the video below.
Ok, so now let’s get to the gear. Obviously, if you can’t use the camera to record the audio you will need some sort of external recorder which provides you with much more control over gain levels and ideally provides you the capability to record multiple tracks. For the past few months I have been using a great portable recorder from a company called Zoom. The recorder I am using is the Zoom H4n. This recorder is incredibly versatile, it has a nice and big LCD with peak levels to help you set the right gain, it can record up to 4 channels simultaneously, and accepts just about every type of input you can throw at it. (Mini jack, 1/4″ jack, and XLR). Additionally it allows you to monitor the sound that is being recorded, important to make sure you confirm you are recording.
The H4n records on standard SD cards, and accepts AA batteries, therefore it fits easily with all your other photo accessories. The H4n runs about $300.
Next are the microphones. The Zoom H4n has a pair of GREAT microphones that will record in stereo. If you can get the unit within 5 feet or so of your subject you may be fine using the built in microphones. Also these built-in mics are great for recording environmental sounds, like the sound of the water rushing by on the gloves review video above.
However if you can’t get the Zoom in that close, you may have to resort to other kinds of Microphones, like shotgun or parabolic microphones.
Let’s talk about lapel, or lavs (short for lavaliere), microphones, these are those tiny microphones that you see all the news anchors on TV wearing. They are small and are designed to pick up the voice of the wearer while filtering out most of the ambient noise.
Lavs come either wired or wireless. It goes without saying that the wireless mics are much easier to deal with as you don’t have to worry about tripping over cables. However, traditionally, good wireless mics have been VERY expensive, in the order of $2,000 – $3,000 per receiver or transmitter. Yes you could get cheaper ones, but they where usually not that great. You could get much better sound from an inexpensive wired mic (less than $50) than an inexpensive ($300-$800) wireless system.
However like most other things on this space this has changed, and dramatically. In the past few years Sennheiser has released a series of relatively inexpensive ($500 – $600) wireless microphones that not only have GREAT sound quality, but hav switchable frequencies (important in case you encounter interference), are durable, and use AA batteries.
Late in 2009 I acquired a Sennheiser EW100 G3 wireless lapel microphone system that is incredible versatile, and sounds great.
However if your budget can’t afford the wireless stuff, I have had great results with this Audio Technica ATR-3350 Lavalier wired lapel microphone. You can easily connect this mic to the Zoom and record away!
Another accessory that is a MUST for the Zoom is a quality Windscreen. A windscreen is usually a piece of foam or similar material that you place over the microphone to reduce the noise of wind. The Zoom comes with a cheap foam windscreen that I think is pretty much useless. I use and can recommend to you the windscreens from Redheads Windscreens, these are incredibly effective at cutting down wind noise, plus you can get them in all sorts of fun colors.
I can hear you thinking…. how do I make all this stuff work together and how do I merge and sync my audio with the video…
I will cover that and more on the second installment of this article in a few days.
This post started out as just an observation: people all around the world paint their faces. In Brazil (bottom left), the Tarino Indians paint their faces so that when they go into the rain forest, the spirits recognize them and protect them, and help them with their hunt.
My point of that post was going to be that people are basically the same all over the planet – and that experiencing different cultures is a fascinating, rewarding and wonderful learning experience.
In looking at the photographs, however, I remembered that they all had something else in common: catch light in the eyes.
Catch light helps to draw our interest to the eyes. It makes the eyes “sparkle.”
We can add catch light with a reflector or a flash – or by carefully positioning the subject so that sunlight catches the eyes.
Now you know why I never leave home without a reflector or flash.
Explore the light,
Rick
See the diffusers, reflectors and other light modification tools in the OPG Store here.
Look for the direction of light (above: back light), the contrast range in a scene (above: medium), and the color of light (above: warm).
In the opening shot for this post, back light, which created beautiful rim light, makes the shot more than snapshot. The back light also adds a sense of depth to the image, much like a background light adds a sense of depth to a portrait.
Compare the light in the opening picture to the flat light in the photo below – which was taken in the shade.
Explore the light,
Rick
P.S. I took these pictures of the cute Bambie in my backyard this morning. Another tip: Always have a camera ready.
I am not much of a landscape photographer, I tend to concentrate more on wildlife, but sometimes the landscape is so majestic, as it is in the Grand Tetons, that it is hard to make a bad image. I made this image (MAKE SURE to click on it to enlarge it) last week during my Spring Yellowstone & Grand Tetons photo workshop. We had some pretty uncooperative weather the first few days we where there, but we had a few occasions during those rainy days where we had a pretty clear view of the mountains.
That morning, I took the opportunity to make a large HDR & stitched panorama. This image was made by taking 18 individual frames. Here is a quick rundown of the process to making an image such as this.
Level the base of your tripod as best as you can (having a bubble level on the tripod helps)
Level your camera as best as you can (use a bubble level on your cameras hot shoe)
For this panorama I kept my camera horizontally, but sometimes it makes sense to set the camera in a vertical orientation, and a good “L” bracket is a must for this.
Pan your camera from left to right while looking thru the viewfinder to make sure your camera is level.
While panning also make sure you are capturing all of the elements of the landscape you plan on including. In the image above, I had to make sure I had a wide enough lens to capture the top of the mountain and the foreground.
Set your camera on manual mode and manual focus.
Point your camera to the most important or prominent part of the landscape.
Focus and set your exposure appropriately.
Take a picture of your hand or create some other kind of marker to make it easier to spot your HDR and/or panoramas when you download your images.
Set the HDR bracket on your camera. In this case I used a 3 image bracket, -2, 0, +2 to capture the brightest part of the image as well as some of the darker parts.
Swing your camera all the way to the left (or to the right, it’s up to you).
Using a remote control or the timer on your camera take the first bracket set.
Swing your camera right (or left) while overlapping at least 1/3 of the image. What works for me is to peer thru my viewfinder, while fixating on an element of the landscape that is about 1/3 into the image from the right of the frame, then swing my camera right until that element is about 1/3 from the left of the frame.
Continue doing this until you you reach the end of your panorama.
Now you’ve completed half of the work, next up you need to process those images. In the case of the image above of the Grand Tetons, I ended up with a panorama that was 6 images wide, and since I created a 3 image bracket for each I ended up with a total of 18 images that I needed to work with. Keep in mind that the more images you create, the longer the processing is going to take and the more memory you will need on your computer to work with the image. Just to give you an idea, my final image file, after HDR, stitching and cropping came out to a 50MegaPixel image, at about 1GB in size!!!
Here is a basic workflow for creating the final HDR, stitched image:
Select the most important or prominent bracket set from all the images you took.
Bring those images into Photomatix and work the settings in Photomatix to create the look you want. There is no ONE right set of settings here; They will certainly vary depending on the subject, the bracket set, and your taste. In my case I prefer a more realistic look.
Once you have worked the settings in Photomatix to make the image the way you like it, save those settings as a “preset,” make sure to name it something that you’ll recall back in a few minutes.
Now go back into Photomatix and under the “Automate” menu select “Batch Processing…”
Here you want to provide Photomatix with all the files you took for this HDR stitched panorama, in my case all 18 images. Also you need to tell Photomatix how many images you had in each bracket set, again in my case 3, and then tell it which preset to use; the one you created in the step above.
Let Photomatix process all your images and when finished, the result will be one HDR processed image for each one of your bracket sets.
We are not done quite yet. Now you need to stitch the images together. In my case I use Photoshop to do the stitching but there are other excellent tools that also do a great job.
So bring those HDR images (in my case 6 of them) into your stitching program and let it go thru the images and merge them together into one image.
Now you are ready to do some of your final processing on the image. First make sure your horizon is level, crop the image as necessary or use the new content aware fill in Photoshop CS5 to fill in those empty spaces, and make all your contrast, color and sharpening adjustments you normally would do. Remember at this point you are dealing with a BIG file so make sure your computer is up to the task.
That is it! I hope you found this quick tutorial on HDR stitched panoramas useful. As always if you have any specific questions, feel free to post them in the comments below.
If you don’t own Photomatix and are interested in getting a copy, you can get a 15% discount when purchasing Photomatix, simply make sure to use this code upon checkout: “OPG15” to receive the discount.
Here are a few other articles on DPE on both HDR and Stitched panoramas that I thought you might find useful.
Last month my photography workshop brought us to the Sister’s Meal Festival in a remote area of China. It’s truly an amazing experience: hundreds of women get dressed in heavy silver and cloth outfits and perform a dance in the hope of attracting a husband.
The outfits weigh more than 40 pounds. Dancing in the hot sun for hours can’t be fun.
Anyway, the light was bad: harsh, direct sunlight. Adding to the challenge, the silver head dresses reflected the bright light, and the subject’s faces were shaded by the headdresses. Aaargh!
To remedy that situation, we used our flashes for daylight fill-in flash, and a reflector and a diffuser – accessories that compress the brightness range of a scene so that it can easily be recorded by a digital camera, without blown-out highlights and dark shadows.
Because we were prepared for the worst, we were able to get evenly exposed images like the one below.
To help capture and convey the excitement and size of the event, I used my 15mm full-frame fish-eye lens and held it above my head and tilted it downward for a unique viewpoint. This lens is great for capturing large groups, because it enhances the way a scene is recorded – capturing an extremely wide scene and exaggerating perspective.
The idea today was to “tell the whole story” of the festival. Telling the whole story can easily be accomplished simply by taking wide-angle shots and close-up shots – and everything in between. Everyone did a great job. More story-telling photos to come.
If you are interested in joining my 2011 China workshop, shoot me an email at email hidden; JavaScript is required. DPE’s Juan Pons will most likely join the fun!
Explore the light – and explore telling the whole story.
You may have noticed that when referring to the process of photographing something I use the verb “make” and not “take.” The use of the word “make” on my part is VERY deliberate. To me, “making” an image requires fore-thought, planing and skill. Yes we all get lucky from time to time and “take” a great image without much thought, but in order to consistently create great images you have to be disciplined, prepare, plan and pre-visualize.
Pre-visualization is a simple and effective technique that can help in providing direction and focus to your photography, whether that is wildlife, portrait, lifestyle or whatever other type of photography you are into.
All of us, wildlife photographers, have those destinations we dream about going to, whether it is Africa, Madagascar, Costa Rica, Yellowstone, Alaska, or wherever. Naturally we want to make the best of the time we are there, and be productive and effective at making pictures. This is were pre-visualization can help.
Pre-visualization is nothing more than creating, ahead of time, in your minds eye the images you want to create. In other words creating a mental list of those images that for you will constitute a successful shoot. This will provide you with focus and purpose when at your destination and hopefully ensures that your time is spent as efficiently as possible.
Let me give you an example using the image above. I had a very concrete idea of what I was looking to shoot, and in this case the location was not so much a factor. I have been fascinated by Luna moths since I first laid my eyes on one when I was about 12 years old at summer camp in New Hampshire. I learned about their behavior, their life cycles, their preferred foods (they only eat while in their caterpillar stage, as the moths do not have any functioning mouth parts), etc. Typically, Luna moths have 2 or 3 generations in a year, with one of those generations overwinter in their protective cocoons. I had noticed that those generations that overwinter had much more vibrant colors than those that only lived through the summer; and that in some cases the Luna moths around my home had a very vibrant purple band around the bottom edges of their wings, a vibrant purple that matched almost exactly the color of the blooming Redbud trees that are so prevalent around my home.
With that information I then pre-visualized this image of an overwintering Luna moth with the purple color resting on a Redbud branch. Without going into too much detail, I had to get very lucky to find a newly emerged Luna moth with the right colors during the brief period of time in the spring when the Redbud are blooming (the flowers last approximately 3 weeks). With this pre-visualization in my head I worked hard to find the right Luna at the right time for 3 consecutive springs. One year I got exceptionally lucky and got the image I had in my head all that time.
Where was this image taken? In my front yard! The only reason I was able to get this image was because I was prepared, I had studied this two species (Luna moth and Redbud tree), and pre-visualized the image I wanted to capture. This pre-visualization helped me persevere for more than 3 years to get the image I was looking for.
Here is another example. Having observed Carolina Chickadees for many years I had noticed that they appear to be very playful. So I set my mind to try and capture that playfulness. I had also noticed that when trying to perch on a thin, smooth branch they had a propensity to hanging upside down. I then proceeded to visualize this image of a chickadee hanging from a small flowering branch. I created a setup on one of my bird feeders trying to make this image. I captured lots of other great images, of many other bird species, but I kept at it looking to make that one image I had pre-visualized.
IAfter a few days of persistence I was rewarded with the image below:
Carolina Chickadee, Chatham County, NC
In summary, pre-visualization can help you in focusing your efforts, and make sure you make the most out of any shoot. Study your subjects, the location, and environment in order to help you conceive of compelling images.
As I like to say “Luck favors the prepared”
This article brings “Wildlife Week” to a conclusion. I hope you enjoyed these articles and that you got something from them!
No image, no matter how good, unique or special it may be, is worth stressing, endangering or otherwise harming wildlife. As wildlife photographers, we all need to be advocates for wildlife, after all, if we, who love to photograph them, are not, who will?
As wildlife photographers we need to set the example for others, we need to take responsibility for our actions and make every effort to lessen our impact on wildlife and the environment. There any number of organizations promote their own code of ethics for safe and respectful enjoyment of nature, and I will list a few of those at the end of this article.
Here is my basic set of guidelines that I follow. I’ve made these simple and to the point in an effort to make it easy to remember and stick to.
First do no harm – The foundation of the wildlife photographers ethic. You must always ask yourself if the next action you are about to take will bring any harm to wildlife. Sometimes it’s is very clear cut, sometimes it’s a little more difficult to discern what consequences your actions make have. In any case you should always be considering the welfare of your subject first and foremost.
Leave no trace behind – We have all heard this before. This means not to alter, modify disturb or destroy any habitat, food source or surroundings. Leave your location in the same state than you found it.
Never harass wildlife – This means never to never taunt, bait or force an action out of your subject. Be patient! The most beautiful wildlife photographs result from natural behavior. Never interfere with animals engaged in breeding, feeding, nesting, or caring for young. Learn the habits of your subjects; Respect and protect your subject, look for signs of stress. If you notice your subject is altering it’s behavior as a result of your actions, stop. Learn to recognize wildlife alarm signals for the safety of both wildlife and yourself.
Enjoy yourself – We all have to remember why we wake up early in the morning, endure mosquitoes, ticks, chiggers, leaches and whatever other nasties mother nature throws at us when we are sitting in a blind for hours on end. We are out there to enjoy wildlife, and if we are so lucky, we get to make some great images in the process. So enjoy yourself.
Wildlife Week: Respect Wildlife
Saturday, May 29th, 2010Pileated Woodpeckers, Chatham County, NC
No image, no matter how good, unique or special it may be, is worth stressing, endangering or otherwise harming wildlife. As wildlife photographers, we all need to be advocates for wildlife, after all, if we, who love to photograph them, are not, who will?
As wildlife photographers we need to set the example for others, we need to take responsibility for our actions and make every effort to lessen our impact on wildlife and the environment. There any number of organizations promote their own code of ethics for safe and respectful enjoyment of nature, and I will list a few of those at the end of this article.
Here is my basic set of guidelines that I follow. I’ve made these simple and to the point in an effort to make it easy to remember and stick to.
Eastern Bluebird Nest, Chatham County, NC
Keep up with Juan on The Digital Photo Experience and learn about Juan's workshops at Wild Nature Tours.
Tags: Conservation, Juan Pons, newsletter, Photo Tips, respect, Wildlife
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