Assignment 1: Smooth

Today I worked on the Smooth subject, par t of the smooth/rough contrast pair. It was mainly cloudy today, and fairly bright at times and so I decided to use the relatively diffuse daylight that falls onto our dining room table to light a few subjects. Here are the results, I've tried to be fairly abstract, concentrating on the lighting and smoothness:

Assignment 1: Still/Moving

I visited Hesketh farm this weekend with the family. It's just near the Devonshire Arms Country House Hotel (very, very nice place). The weather wasn't too brilliant, but I managed to use the low light and some filters to try some long exposure shots for the moving contrast. This first shot is 15 seconds and shows the paths of the children riding their tractors.
Next we have my in-laws sitting on a bench (still) whilst my wife is pushing our youngest on the swings. This was a 2 second exposure.
And finally, a crop of the above shot showing just the movement.

Assignment 1: Black

My first idea was to use a couple of, almost black, Nepalese containers. I put these in front of a plain black paper background and used a Maglite held by a clamp in a lighting stand for the directable, soft-ish light source (that was to the left, slightly behind the subjects), I also made use of daylight on the right hand side.

Sunset

After a few hours out taking pictures in afternoon and not being too happy with the results, my wife persuaded me to head out in the evening, the sky was looking good and there was still a little light around. I headed for the Pitstone/Ivinghoe, first I headed up towards the Beacon where I took this:

And eventually ended up in a field (with 2 other photographers) where I took a number of shots of the Windmill.

So now I need to figure out how they can be used in TAoP.
Assignment 1 - Diagonal?

Assignment 1: White

This is my first attempt to convey White. Clean, crisp, soft, simple.

Assignment 1: Straight

Yesterday, my little helper (William, our 3 year old son) and I went kite flying, and of course, I took my camera (with just a 17-40mm f/4.0L lens, no tripod, cable release etc). It was great weather for kites, one heck of a wind and nice and constant. The light was poor with a thick cover of clouds. On the way to the flying location, we passed a farmers field and my helper waited whilst I took a few shots. I think this shot works pretty well for straight. The lines lead you into the picture, and the lighting does the same, becoming brighter the further into the picture you get.

I have another shot which might work. It's a tree lined path in a local wood.

And then a third candidate is a wide, tree lined grass path leading from Ashridge monument to Ashridge College. I was fortunate to find a number of deer on the path the day I took this one.

Project 8: recording a sequence

I didn't really like this project, as I said earlier, I don't like the idea of walking around in amongst a crowd of people with a big camera pointing at them. I opted for the Zoo as a location and the flamingos in their surroundings as a subject. Here are the shots I took on the approach and closer in:

1. I could see the flamingos, too far away, walk in.

2. Still not close enough, walk in.

3. Still not close enough and there's William, my assistant.

4. The view of them is getting better, too much in the foreground and the sign is in view.

5. A little further and now we just have the plants, may be they could help frame the subject? A few more steps?

6. Looking a little better, nice reflection of the sky.

7. Let's try a portrait format. Oops, the sky is blown apart from that, the shot is pretty good,

8. A tighter view of the flamingos. Doesn't work so well. Let's walk around a bit further.

9. Not bad but still missing something.

10. Walk along, trying to keep one eye on William, another on the other visitors.

11. Not too bad, I want to try and work the reflection of the sky into the final shot.

12. A different view point. It doesn't work. Move along some more.

13. Okay, now I'm clear of most of the plants that were in the foreground. The reflection is nice. I think this is good. Let's see if we can get it any better. Walk some more.

14. Oops the sky is really blown (and cannot be recovered). I'm not too keen on this shot. Zoom in to see if there's a detail shot of the flamingos.

15. It's a bit dull. Nice contrast between the dark of the greenery anf the flamingos, but there's too much darkness.

16.Not too bad. Reflection is nice. Recompose.

17. That's nicer, I like the tree on the left (okay I like it's reflection).

18. Switch to portrait. Got some of the foreground foliage in the shot, not in focus and a little distracting because of this?

19. Recompose, check the exposure, that's better, wish I had my tripod so that I could stop down and sharpen the foreground.

20. Let's try a landscape from a few steps back. That's pretty good. I like the foreground, the blue in the reflection is hidden though.

I think 19 and 20 are the best of the selection.

Assignment 1: Still

I decided to use this photograph to depict Still; for me it shows the still of the morning, the tranquil sunrise - so still through mood rather than anything else.

Rounded

I think I'm going to use the granite ball for rounded; shot 1 in the last post. I've re-cropped the shot and I think it works better.

Assignment 1: curved, rounded, smooth

The following shots are my first attempt at these three contrasts.
Curved

1.	2.
3.	4.

These are all based on a granite ball in the garden, it sits on a circle of pebbles and in the summer water flows up through it and trickles down it's surfaces back into a reservoir below. I think that 1,2 and 3 work pretty well. 4's not so good. 3 might be too abstract, with only the edge of the curve being in focus. At the moment I'm thinking that 2 might be the best.

Rounded

1.	2.
3.	4.

These are all taken in the same areas of the garden as the above pictures. The granite sphere is used in shot 1. I think this shot works well. Shots 2, 3 and 4 are 2 Scottish cobbles that I stacked up. Out of these, I think I prefer 4.

Smooth

1.

2.

Same location for these shots. They you go, a less abstract view of the granite sphere in 2. I think that smoothness is conveyed more in 1. I should try turning on the water pump to see if a flow of water over the sphere helps better convey the smoothness of the granite.

Continuous

Continuous
Originally uploaded by Richard RP

This is a crop and rotate of the static ring. This works much better.

Assignment 1 - Continuous

I'm working on Assignment 1 - continuous today. I've gone for the age old symbol, a ring (my wedding ring) and have taken some shots on the table top studio in the lounge (the coffee table). I don't had a dedicated macro lens at the moment and so I'm using a Canon 17-40mm f/4.0L and I can fill a tiny bit of the frame with the ring, I could fit 80 or so on the frame! Here's the result of the first shoot:If I use one of the above, then I think I will use one with motion. The still shot is a bit too uninspiring. I particularly like the first shot, it's pretty abstract, almost like smoke. Maybe I should consider different lighting and backgrounds. More colour? Less contrast? I'll head out to the art shop later to get some different colours of paper, probably some pastels.

Project 15: cropping

Summary of the exercise: Select 3 photos, of different subjects. Produce various crops explaining why you chose them.

Tree

The Original

A different cropof the tree. I removed some of the sky and grass, these weren't particularly interesting. The panoramic style makes the eye travel in the horizontal and the viewer will naturally look to see what's in the distance.

The scenery in the distance. This is another pano, the brightness of the church is the first object to catch the eye, behind the village there are lots of outlines of trees. I picked this crop to show the detail that was in the original, it's a different picture altogther. (This might have been better had I cropped off the left 1/3rd of the frame).

The scenery in the background with a part of the tree and grass in the foreground. I kept part of the tree to add some forground interest. I kept the village church to act as a focal point in the background.

Canal scene

The Original

A close crop of the Lock. This removes much of the foreground that was in the original. This was selected to allow the viewer to concentrate on the action around the lock.

Dafs with the canal. I went for this to show off the dafs whilst keeping some of the key context. I like they way the reflection in the water shows a few chimneys. Not sure about the balance of this shot?

Just the dafs. Cropped in a very narrow portrait format to emphasise their height.

Windmill

The Original

I went for a square crop with much of the surroundings included. This allows the track to lead ones eye into the windmill, the square I think works with the centre placement of the windmill. i put the horrizon on the lower third line.

A very veryical crop. This was intended to keep the track to lead the eye, and then to allow the eye to work it's way up into the frame. I think the sky and clouds are worth including.

I selected this crop, putting the windmill on the lower left, it's on an rules of thirds intersection. I kept the bold blue sky to add to the contrast of the shot.

This shot shows the windmill and some of it's surroundings. I like the heavy looking clouds separated by patches of blue. The windmill in on the right hand 1/3rd vertical.

Project 13: the golden section

After reading the text in the folder, I still had gaps in my understanding of the Golden Section and so went searching for more information. Here's a resource I found useful: Apogee Photo Mag: Creativity and the Rule of Thirds and there's a useful Photoshop script to add a layer to images with the rule of thirds or golden section: GoldenRatio.zip and in addition there are lots of sites that talk about the Fibonacci series and how that relates to it. On with the task, six pictures which fit the rule: "A simple approximation of these proportions is the Rule of Thirds, i.e. if the frame is divided both horizontally and vertically into thirds, lines such as the horizon or important focal points can be placed on or near to the intersection of these divisions to achieve a balanced composition".

Does this fit the Golden Section? The horizon is on a line and the main subject is on an intersection. So Yes.

Does this fit the Golden Section? Top to bottom I think it does may be in the horizontal plane it doesn't.

Does this fit the Golden Section? The boats are on an arc which crosses two of the four intersections. So I think this does.

Does this fit the Golden Section? The orange area fits (just about) in a large rectangle, and in the smaller, diagonally opposite rectangle is the stem, so yes.

Does this fit the Golden Section? Eyes are on the intersections, so I think it does.

Does this fit the Golden Section? The horizon is on a line.

I think these pictures look balanced from a compositional perspective.

More EOS 5D Sensor Cleaning

I moved the posts about cleaning the sensor of my EOS 5D over to another blog, they were off topic.

Project 11: balance

I've been working on Balance this afternoon, here are my results:

In this shot, if you draw a line along a diagonal that runs through the knife then you have the line along which I have considered the picture. The black area on either side are the two large blocks on the see-saw and the knife sits on the centre. This shot is balanced.

In this picture of the glass, the objects considered for the purpose of balance were the glass and it's shadow. I think this shot is balanced.

This is a picture of some bark on which a sheep has caught some wool. When converting to BW I tried to ensure that there was a balance of tones. Light on the left, medium in the middle and dark on the right. I've put the light, dark and piece of wool on the see-saw. I think this shot is pretty much balanced.

The next shot is some trees at sunset (or slightly after). I considered light and dark areas, the light being the sky and the dark being the trees. (The ground was excluded since it is a dark band running from left to right and doesn't seem to impact the balance along this axis - although it does if you consider the balance vertically). As you can see from my sketch, I think the shot is balanced.

A shot of the local canal, it's the Grand Union Canal as it passes through Berkhamsted. There are plenty of individual items in this photo, but I went for areas; the dark area on the left (includes the building and dark trees/shrubs), the light willow tree and then the light area on the right (includes the pub, the cruiser and the lighter buildings above it). This is maybe a little unbalanced with the left side having more weight. I'm not altogether sure.

Now we are at Ivinghoe Beacon looking at a couple of sheep who are enjoying the scenery (honest). Here I'm not sure exactly how best to analyse the balance of the scene. I've just gone for sheep as the only object to consider, but maybe I should have also considered the grass??? So this is unbalanced.

Sunrise

I got out early this morning, by about 6.15am, hoping to catch the sunrise. I got in the car and headed over to Ivinghoe Beacon (Bucks) and the sun was already up! It was -1.5C according to the car, and there was no wind, just the sound of the birds. I headed down from the car park, through the gate and down towards the bottom of the Beacon, the light was very soft and there was a hint of mist. Here are a few of the shots: By 8.30am I'd completed a circuit taking in the top of the Beacon and made around 60 shots. I've put a selection of these on my home website.

Colour

I shoot with a Canon EOS 5D, whilst looking through the flickr groups I came across discussion on the 5D and colour, in the discussion was a description of how Johnny Blood adjusts colour. I'll have to give his approach a try. http://flickr.com/groups/canon5d/discuss/72157594509485029/72157594509682449/

Snow in April

Today I woke and outside was covered in a blanket of snow. It was about 7.20am and it was still snowing. After feeding the baby his milk, I was ready to head into the back garden armed with my tripod and camera. I took some shots of a spiders web which was holding snowflakes, daffodils bowing their heads and other flowers and objects. Here are a few:

and

A little later, I headed down to the canal where it was very peaceful, hardly anyone around. On my walk back to the car, I had a chance to think about the Contrasts assignment, I'd been trying to decide how best to depict Strong without using too obvious a subject, so I came to the conclusion that either a strong looking tree might do the trick or a photo which is lit with shafts of light (which might be difficult to make). Anyway, the tree idea would be easy and I already have a suitable picture: Strong I might try making shafts of light if I get a spare hour or two this week. Another option might be to cut out a shape (like the Chinese symbol for strength) and light through it; the shape on the wall/floor might work?

Great shots

I found some really excellent pictures at vidarnm's flickr site, quite stunning and something to aim for.

Open College of Arts - The Art of Photography

I started the course at the end of January 2008 and have been meaning to keep notes on what I've been doing - the logbook - however, thus far, my logbook has been kept to the bear minimum containing just project related notes and so I decided to keep a less tightly focused log in the form of this blog. I've completed most of the projects up to the first assignment, I've yet to complete: 8: Recording a sequence 11: Balance 13: The golden section 15: Cropping I'm collecting photos for each of these (apart from 8) as opportunities present themselves. I've also made a start on the first assignment, Contrasts, my progress can be seen on the flickr site. Here's a sample: That shot was taken at home in the lounge, a black umbrella formed the background, a clamp held the knife, and the camera was on a tripod. I played with the position of the knife until the light (daylight) caught it just right. The most recent work on the assignment was Curved. I decided to use the tracks left by car head/tail lights on a long exposure. Last evening I stood on a bridge over the A41 near Berkhamsted and waited for the light to fade. ISO 50, f/22 and 1 sec - that didn't yield the results I wanted, so wait some more. Whilst standing there, getting cold hands, along passed several police motorcycles with their blue lights flashing, their riders looked up at me :-(, thirty seconds later was another bike, and several unmarked cars escorted by a couple of regular police cars. After reading several articles in recent months about photographers being treated harshly by the police, I was a little concerned that I might get a visit on the bridge. Excuse the quality of the photo, I was trying for long exposures and didn't have the change to change the ISO (I was on 50) and exposure to the point where I might have gotten something sharper. Anyway, I didn't get a visit by the police and I'm still none the wiser regarding who was being escorted. I got a couple of nice shots out of the evenings work, this is "Curved" for my assignment:

And this is just the coloured sky through some trees - a pleasing silhouette.

Back to the projects, I've not really made a stab at project 8. The notes suggest going into the streets and taking 20-30 pictures showing how you approach and shoot a subject. You are to keep the camera to your eye whilst looking and developing the best shot, taking pictures as you proceed. Now, I'm a pretty introverted person, and getting out on the local high street with a camera clamped to my eye and taking pictures which include lots of people (who I've not asked permission from) does fill me with a certain amount of dread. I might do this at the local zoo, where people are expecting cameras.