This weekend I spent some time on the streets of Edinburgh. On my Nikon D200, I had what I believe is the perfect walk-around lens, the Nikon 18-200mm VR f3.5-5.6. So I was all set, or so I thought.
I don’t do a lot of candid photography. Most of my images are taken at a much slower pace. I’ll setup and compose the image, usually on a tripod and I’ll take time to consider what camera settings I need for depth of field etc.
Well the setup I used this weekend had two wonderful pieces of technology that conspired against me.
Firstly Auto-ISO. This is one of my favourite features on the D200. Basically you fire in a maximum ISO setting that you are comfortable with, and then a minimum shutter speed. The camera will then automatically raise the ISO settings whenever it needs to, based on available light. It’s a great time saver, ensuring you are always using the lowest ISO possible at any given time.
Secondly VR - Vibration Reduction. The VR on my 18-200 is stunning - I’ve got sharp handheld shots at a 1/5th of a second. At 1/30th even on the 200mm telephoto end of the lens, images are nice and sharp. 1/60th is almost guaranteed.
So I was all set - switch on the Auto-ISO to max out at 800 ISO, set the minimum speed to 1/60th and leave the camera on Aperture priority so I could set my depth of field dependent on the situation. I was sorted. Or so I thought.
Candid street photography is fast - or rather the subject is fast - it tends to be moving. However, even the greatest Vibration Reduction system in the world won’t give you a sharp image of someone walking at a brisk pace down the street. Of the 100 or so shots I took, I had to immediately bin at least 30% for that very reason. How stupid was I. I let the technology sucker me in, make me lazy, and I forgot one of the the basic fundamentals of photography and why shutter speed is so important.
Fortunately I did manage to get some keepers that I ended up being happy with. Including the one above which I’ve titled “Eating Out”.
Here is one from the School of Incredibly Stupid Ideas - By now most fans of Flickr will have spotted that the site now supports the upload of 90 second video clips. Woop de effing do.
In my mind Flickr is Digital Photography 2.0 - it has helped revolutionise the whole industry and given the photography market, and particularly the DSLR market, a huge boost. It wasn’t that long ago that (film) SLR had almost been completely removed from high street shelves as the joe public preferred 35mm compacts.
With the birth of digital one might have assumed that the trend for smaller form factors would continue - and it did for a while. However, once affordable digital SLR’s like the Canon Digital Rebel and the Nikon D50 came along, things changed as people started to see the huge difference in quality these DSLR’s offered over their compact cousins. Flickr helped that revolution by showcasing photographers and clearly showing what cameras they were shooting on.
Now I’ve already seen some videos appearing in my Contacts photostreams - I am guessing this might break the link I have on my Apple TV.
On the first 10 of the 500 “photos” on the daily explore page, 2 of them were videos.
If this had happened a couple of month after Microsoft completed their proposed acquisition of Yahoo, I wouldn’t have been surprised. To see that it has happened even before Microsucks got their paws on it just exemplifies the sorry state that Yahoo seem to have got themselves in.
My Gran used to say to “always stick to your knitting” - what she meant by that was stick to what you are good at. Flickr should have stuck to photography and leave video to the likes of YouTube et al.
I predict a huge backlash from the photography community here - I hope I am right and that Flickr has a re-think. Please.
A couple of weeks back I posted an article about getting some of my photographs professionally printed and ready for entry into my local Camera Club’s Annual Print Competition.
I just joined the club this year and this was my first real experience of entering competitions.
Well my efforts were rewarded - as luck would have it I ended up winning 1st prize for my image “Suitcase 1519″. The competition was judged by Roy Robertson FRPS.
To say I was well chuffed was an understatement
Tom Hogarty of Adobe on the unfortunate recall of the Lightroom version 1.4 update:-
“One thing that we may consider is continuing the community approach we’ve taken in the past by releasing betas of our updates, so that they can get the broadest testing possible before they are certified as final.”
Today’s image is an “infrared” version of “River Spirit”.
“River Spirit” is a sculpture by the world-renowned Scottish artist Andy Scott. This sculpture was commissioned by Clackmannanshire Council and resides on the Collylands Roundabout between Alloa and Alva close to where I live.
Andy’s works of public art, which are made from individually welded pieces of metal, have appeared all over the world.
Andy has recently revamped his own website and I’m very proud to have an earlier photograph of his work included on the site ( click on “works”, “more works” and then the bottom right icon for “River Spirit” ).
This new “infrared” image was done using Gavin Seim’s Black and White presets collection - this is “Infrared Velvet Dark” and in my opinion, turns a colour image into what I believe is a striking monochrome photograph. It’s certainly a lot easier than buying an infrared filter and trying to do it in-camera (that’s assuming your camera is up to it - sadly the D200 has too strong a filter - the D50 is an ideal candidate for those that have one).