Project 15: planning your portfolio

This project requires a photograph taken from the same location four times - once during each season.  The framing should be kept consistent.  The completed images are to be part of the final portfolio.

I have been researching possible locations for this project since the beginning of the course and have taken images at possible sites since January.  Already the difference is stunning.

I have included below images from the possible locations and will choose my final four when all images are captured.

With these two images I have successfully managed to achieve the same framing.  There is a marked difference in the seasons although I am not fond of the plain blue sky on the spring image.                

Here I have again achieved the same framing and again the difference in the seasons is marked.  Another plain blue sky in the right hand image, however.

Not quite the same framing in these two images but again a marked difference in seasons.  I was very lucky to have snow for my winter shots.

I am very pleases with these two shots.  I like both images, have the framing the same and there is again a marked difference in the seasons.









The framing is not quite the same here and I feel the spring image is a little bland despite having the hawthorn blossom.

I think that I have done reasonably well on the framing although I haven't placed myself in quite the same position.  A surprising difference here between the seasons I feel despite the trees being scots pines.

A very similar framing again and yet again another pleasing difference in the seasons.

Project 12: contrast and exposure

I think that the aim of this project is to examine the dynamic range of black and white and transparency film.  I remember the problems well from my film days but today, using digital cameras and raw capture it is not such a problem.  I think that digital cameras cope much better with high dynamic ranges anyway and raw conversion software enables us to compensate during post processing.  I use Adobe Lightroom where I am able to adjust the exposure and recover highlights as well as adding some fill light and recover the detail in the shadows.  It also enables me to adjust the brightness and contrast as well as the option of a built in ND grad to selectively reduce the exposure in the sky and recover detail.

For this project I selected an area of my local Nature reserve where an open area led into a woodland path providing areas of bright light and deep shadow.  I placed the camera on the tripod and set the expusre meter to spot metering mode.  I then took a reading from the shadow area which gave a reading of 1/25 @ f16.  The brightly lit grass gave a reading of 1/125 @ f16.  I then worked out the mid-range exposure at 1/60 @ f16.  I took two shots at this setting one black and white and one colour.  I gave them no post processing other than convert them to JPEGS. They are illustrated below.

 According to the histogram in Lightroom both images are slightly underexposed.  The sunlit area seems to me to be perfectly acceptable but both lack detail in the shadows.  At the time my eyes were able to see more detail in the shadows than the images show.  As the course notes suggest there does seem to be slightly more detail in the B&W image although, of course we are not looking at a negative.  It is marginal though.

This is my post processed colour image.  I have increased the exposure by half a stop and added some fill light to bring out the detail in the shadows.  I have also adjusted the blacks to help with this.  Finally I adjusted the colour temperature to warm the image up slightly.

Portfolio: spring

Over the last few weeks I have been giving thought to and taking images for the spring section of my final portfolio have completed my first assignment: the season on winter.  The following are some of the images I am considering.

 This shot of our local church, St Giles churchyard always looks wonderful in early spring with the carpet of snowdrops. I did initially have this image as a potential submission for my first assignment but eventually decided that it was more spring than winter.  I shot from a very low position with a wide angle lens and a very small aperture to secure a maximum depth of field.

To me spring means daffodils. There was the most magnificent display on the dual carriageway leading into town but I was looking for a more natural woodland setting as here.  Again I have shot from a very low position and used a wide angle and small aperture.

Another iconic image of spring in Lincolnshire is one with lambs.  I am not sure this shot has worked though; I would have liked to see more than the rear end of the nearest lamb.

Again I am not sure that this shot has worked.  I wanted to show the lambs as part of the rural scene but I feel that they are just too low in the frame.

Another image of spring for me is a wood thickly carpeted with bluebells which I have tried to show in this picture.  I wanted some flowers dominating the frame with a haze of blue in the background.  To this end I used an aperture of f8 to ensure sharpness in the near flowers but leaving the ones further back out of focus.

Again similar to the above but I chse a foreground with the rotting log.

I am considering one or two close ups for the portfolio and this white bluebell amongst all of the blues intrigued me.

I took this picture just off the edge of the Lincolnshire Wolds in a location I use for bird photography which has been very productive this spring.  I was interested in the herd of Lincoln Red cattle in this field with new spring grass showing and a field of oilseed rape in the background.  I took it with my 500 lens + 1.4 converter so the rape in the background is out of focus and I am not sure it works.  Is the rape too distracting?

Big Lincolnshire skies again with interest in the clouds.  Often the sky is either grey or too clear.  The bright green of the spring wheat and the oilseed rape flowers tell us it is spring.  The farm track lead the eye into the tree and the village in the distance.

I had seen this shot the evening before when I had been to a concert in this church so decided to return the next day.  The light was very contrasty and difficult to deal with and the church leans back so not sure it has worked.

Another icon of a Lincolnshire spring - blackthorn blossom.  The hedge and farm track lead the eye into the frame and give perspective but again I am not sure that it is strong enough.

I took this shot at a local nature reserve that I visit a lot to photograph insects especially dragonflies which it is noted for.  I had photographed this scene back in January as a candidate for Assignment 1 but didn't use it.  The feel is very different now with the green reeds appearing.  It will look different again in a few weeks time in the middle of summer.  This is a possible for Project 15.

Another shot at Messingham Sand Quarry Reserve.  I just liked the spring feel of this shot with fresh green leaves on the trees.  The path leads the eye into the frame and gives linear perspective.  Just up this path I was privileged to watch a swan's egg hatching.  Awesome.

Messingham again from the same spot as above.  I like the way the trees frame the shot and I love the reflection of the clouds in the lake.

Again spring daffodils planted on both sides of the road leading into a Wolds village.

Two shots of fields of oilseed rape, another icon of a Lincolnshire spring.  Here the farm track leads the eye into the frame underneath the lowering skies of a spring shower.

I liked the idea of these wheel marks leading the eye into the frame but the whole image looks dull and lifeless without that magic light.

A local Wolds woodland carpeted with wood anemones.  The path leads the eye into the frame encouraging us to walk along and discover what is round the corner.

Two more images with spring rape, this time featuring this old derelict gate.  I wonder how much longer the farmer will leave it in place.  I have photographed this gate on previous occasions and again it is a potential subject for Project 15.

The same gate.  My preference is for this shot as I like the intricate detail in the weathered wood and the rust red colouration of the hasp.  The rape tells us it is spring.  I am pleased with the threatening clouds in the shot.

Another bluebell shot from the Beesby Wood.  I am not as happy with this as the eralier shots.

I am pleased with this bluebell close up.  I carefully framed the shot so that the flower formed a diagonal across the frame.  Again I used f8.  This ensured that the near flower was sharp whilst the background ones were out of focus.  I used a 150mm macro lens.

Woodlands in spring are always attractive.  Here I have placed the primroses close to the viewer and used a low position with a wide angle and small aperture to achieve a good depth of field.  The woodland path leads the eye into the frame.

Two images of wood anemones in a wood very local to us.  I prefer the second shot as I think that showing the sky distracts the eye and detracts from the image.

I have photographed this church before and in fact used an image of it in my first assignment.  I wanted to show the new spring leaves on the trees with the rape fields in the Ancholme Valley beyond.  Although I like the view I was not happy with the lighting.

This is the same shot that I used in my first assignment.  Here though it is very definitely spring.  Again this is a candidate for Project 15.

The same view of Worlaby church with the rape fields in the Ancholme Valley beyond.  I wasn't happy with the lighting in the first two images so returned the next day under better conditions.  I like both of this shots but so far have no favourite.  This is a potential location for Project 13: throughout the day.

Project 11: the colour of daylight.

Interestingly this project appears to have no actual photography to carry out in order to complete it.  I find colour and its use in photography an interesting subject and have studied it on more than one occasion but there always seems to be more to learn.  I take 'Outdoor Photography' magazine every month and this month's edition includes an indepth article entitled 'Master the Power of Colour' written by regular contributor Pete Bridgewood.  Both this article and the course notes deal with the fact that white light is made up of the spectrum of colours, although Pete Bridgewood goes into more detail regarding how our eyes and brain actually perceive colour. I remember from school science and more latterly from Open University work the theory of the spectrum.  I love to find rainbows and a few years ago was delighted to be able to take this image of a stormy sky lit by sunlight from behind forming a magnificent rainbow, each individual raindrop acting as an individual prism to split the white light into its constituent colours.

Both the course material and the 'Outdoor Photography' article go into depth about colour temperature which I understand but the more one goes into it the less intuitive it becomes. Although the highest temperature of 7000K is for a clear blue sky, we tend to think of colours at this end as cool colours and, conversely, 3000K is the colour temperature of a sunset, the oranges and reds of which, we tend to refer to as warm colours.  This is made even more complicated with Raw conversion software such as Adobe Lightroom which I use.  When  the colour temperature slider is moved over to a lower colour temperature, more towards what we know as the temperature associated with more orange light - the image becomes more blue.  This is because the colour temperature slider is actually a colour temperature compensation slider.  So, when we move it to the left we are giving an instruction to the software to compensate for the fact that we were lighting the image with light of a low (orange) colour temperature.  The software then displays the image after giving a blue correction to compensate for the original orange light, eg tungsten.  I have had to deal with this in the reverse when responding to my tutor's comments on my first assignment.  It was felt that some of my images were too blue so I needed to move the slider to the right to 'warm' them up slightly.  Of course with digital cameras it is possible to set a white balance for the particular conditions experienced, although with Raw images the white balance can be corrected during post processing.

Measuring Light

In my early days of film cameras, when I owned a non metering Zenith, I remember using a light meter reflectively quite successfully.  I never got into the realms of taking incident light readings.  I am used, over many years now, to using built in metering with my cameras.  I work with canon 7D and 50D bodies and rarely if ever set them to auto.  I generally use aperture priority metering.  Both cameras have spot metering so if necessary I can fall back on this rather than my normal evaluative metering.  I tend to use spot metering in difficult light situations (perhaps very contrasty) when I want to ensure that the main part of the image is correctly exposed - a bird, insect of flower for instance.  I am also in the habit of employing exposure compensation in difficult lighting conditions - a snowy scene, perhaps, or a bird in flight against a bright sky both need some positive exposure compensation.  I 'normal' lighting conditions I routinely dial in 1/3 or 2/3 negative compensation to ensure rich saturated colours much as Galen Rowell used to underrate his Kodachrome films.  I do find it important, though, to regularly check the histogram and adjust the compensation accordingly.

Assignment 1: Response to Tutor's Comments

I submitted my first assignment with some trepidation.  I always find it  difficult to get a measure of the standard of my work until those first assignment comments come in.  I have to say I was delighted with the how my tutor found these first images.  The feedback was very thorough and constructive with useful comments on how the images might be improved.  I have been through the comments and reworked the images accordingly.  The results are included below.

The first image that could be improved was the first one of a sunrise behind the lake.  It was felt that I included too much foreground and could have tilted the camera a little to include less of that and more sky.  Obviously I am unable to do that but I have cropped to a more panoramic format and cut out some of the foreground reeds.  When I looked back at my original images I had taken one in vertical format and have included that here.  It does include less reeds and more sky.  Perhaps this would have been a better image to include in the first instance.

The second image that could be improved was of the mist in the Ancholme River Valley.  My tutor felt that it was rather too blue so I have warmed it up a little as seen below.

This image of the snowdrift was also felt to be too blue so I have adjusted this slightly and also cropped a little to the right and top as suggested.  I decided to keep in some of the grasses to the extreme right.

Again in this image of the ice covered lake below I have cropped to include less of the foreground reeds which it was felt overpowered the picture.  I like the circle of snow half way up to the right and so have cropped to still include this.

 It was felt that the two images below were too blue so I have again adjusted the white balance to alter this slightly.

 In the originals of the two images below it was felt that I had made the sky too dark.  In retrospect I was guilty of over filtration.  In both images I combined an ND grad with a polarizer.  I have been able to lighten the sky in Lightroom by using the inbuilt grad.

Another comment made was that I could perhaps be more self-critical, something I will work on.  I suppose I find this difficult, as by the time I submit image,s I have done the self analysis and settled on images that I am pleased with.  Can I submit images that I am criticising or should I not be submitting them at all?  This comment has been made to me before by another tutor so I must work harder to adopt a more self critical approach.