Anna Saverimuttu's Photography Blog

What do you do with your photos once you've taken them?

Remember those things called photo albums?  I know my parents have stacks of them and from time to time, I love nothing better than settling down to have a good wallow in all those memories of family holidays, school trips and time spent with old friends; and aside from affording a nostalgic trip down memory lane, there are also endless hours of fun to be derived from all those old clothes and hairstyles.

Now, though, how many of us are guilty of leaving our pictures to languish on the hard drives of our computers, never to see the light of day again? We spend £££s on some fancy bit of kit, take our pictures, download them, and then file them away in some black hole in our computers. And even when we do look at them, somehow the prospect of settling down in front of a computer screen doesn't seem quite as enticing as leafing through an album, does it?

E-mailing pictures to friends and family is great, of course, but to my mind, nothing beats a traditional print on real photographic paper.

So next time you take some great shots on holiday or wherever, why not get them printed, or even framed?  Or have them made into photogifts, and give your favourites to friends and family for birthdays and Christmas. 

Flash sync speed - what is it?

There are two types of camera shutter:

1. Focal plane, where the shutter consists of two shutter curtains which travel across the camera's sensor during an exposure.  The difference in the length of the exposure depends on how soon after the first shutter curtain begins to travel across the sensor, the second one follows behind.
2. Inter-lens shutter.  This type of shutter is located in the lens rather than the camera, and is composed of a number of blades which overlap one another and are arranged in a circular fashion.  When an exposure is made, the blades all open outwards simultaneously, so there is no moment at which the sensor is partially covered.

To understand why flash sync speeds are important though, we only need to understand how a focal plane shutter works.

Previously, I've explained how your camera's shutter works when shooting in available light.  When you use your camera with a flash, however, there will be a maximum shutter speed (usually about 1/250 of a second) above which you won't be able to go - the flash sync speed.   This is because the burst of flash is of a uniform and very short duration, and so in order for your camera's sensor to be fully exposed to the light during this short period of time, the two shutter curtains must have opened fully at the moment when the exposure is being made.  So if the shutter speed is too fast, the two shutter curtains will still be in the process of moving across the sensor at the moment when the flash is fired; which means that only a part of the image will be recorded, and the rest will be black.

Situations in which you are most likely to encounter your camera's flash sync speed are when you are using it to fill in the existing light when shooting outdoors.  (See previous post about fill-in flash.)  For instance, if you're photographing someone on a bright sunny day and want to reduce the contrast on their face by introducing a little flash, when you take a meter reading for the background, it is likely that the indicated shutter speed will be faster than your camera's sync speed.

If you're using an automatic camera or have your flash-gun positioned on the hotshoe, the camera will prevent you from accidentally setting a shutter speed that is too high.

With inter-lens shutters, flash sync speeds can of course be much higher, since all the shutter blades are fully open at the same moment and the sensor is fully exposed for the complete duration of the flash.

What is fill-in flash?

Using flash outdoors may seem like rather a strange idea.  After all, why would you need even more light when you're already shooting outside? In certain circumstances, however, when taking portraits outdoors for instance, it's helpful to be able to introduce a little additional light into the shot.  For instance, if you're faced with shooting in bright sunlight which is causing harsh shadows to fall on your subject's face, then the results are going to be far from flattering.  Adding a little flash to the shot, however, will help to lift the shadows, thereby reducing the contrast; it will also introduce some catchlights into the subject's eyes, giving them an extra sparkle and bringing your shot to life. 

Alternatively, you may want to backlight your subject, by positioning them against the sun - we've all seen photos taken against a bright background, where the person's face is so under-exposed that they're reduced to a dark and featureless shape. You can, of course, use exposure compensation in this instance to ensure that their face isn't under-exposed because of the sunlight fooling your camera's internal meter, or again, you can balance out the light by using fill-in flash.

Even on an overcast day, a small amount of flash can help stop your portraits from looking dull.

So how do you do it?  There are several different methods for using fill-in flash, and the one you employ will depend on the type of camera and flash unit you are using.  

The whole idea of fill-in flash is not to overpower the existing light, but to create the right balance between it and the flash. So you want the flash to be weaker in intensity than the ambient light and thus not compete directly with it. Too much, and your pictures will have that "over-flashed" appearance which will just result in bleached out highlight areas lacking in any detail.

Ideally, you are aiming to set the flash to give between 1 and 2 stops less light than the reading that your camera's meter is indicating as correct for the background.

Method 1

If you're using an automatic camera, check your manual to see whether there is a fill-in flash option and use this in any tricky lighting conditions.

Method 2

If you own a separate flash-gun, take a meter reading for the background and set the appropriate shutter speed into your camera, making sure that it is not faster than your camera's flash sync speed (confused about sync speed?  I'll be covering this in another post soon!) Then adjust the ISO setting on your flash unit, so that it is faster than that set on your camera - for instance, if you're using ISO 100 on your camera, then set the flash-gun to ISO 200 or 400. This means that you are in effect fooling the flash into sending out a less intense burst of light.

Method 3

Dial a larger aperture setting into your flash unit.  For instance, if you want to shoot at f8, set your camera to f8 and your flash to between one and two stops less, i.e. f5.6 or f4.  Again, you are fooling the flash into thinking that you are shooting at a larger aperture, and so it doesn't need to provide as much light.

Method 4

If your flash unit has EV (Exposure Value) settings, turn these down to a minus setting (anything from, say, -1 to -3) to ensure that the flash doesn't overpower the existing light.

In order to ensure the right ratio of flash to existing light, remember that the brighter the overall lighting conditions, the more powerful the flash will need to be in order to help fill in the shadows, and the less intense the ambient light, the less flash power you'll need to balance things out.

Know your rights - where, what and who you can and can't photograph

As this is a current hot topic, and having been on the receiving end of an, admittedly, fairly mild case of interrogation as I went about my photographic business recently, I thought it might be useful to just outline a few of the things you can and can't do with your camera when out in a public place (this applies to the UK only). It is by no means a complete guide and if you're in doubt, you should consult an organisation such as the Bureau of Freelance Photographers who recently produced a rights card for all its members to carry.

Okay, so where can you take photographs? 

In any public place - not private property. Beware though, as lots of places like shopping centres and railway stations are classed as private property. If there are clear rules banning photography, such as in the vicinity of certain public buildings, or it is obvious that something private is taking place, then  you should respect those rules.  If in doubt, check first whether you need a special permit. And it goes without saying that you shouldn't harass people or invade their privacy.

What can you photograph?

Buildings, works of art and the like, situated in a public place are not protected by copyright, so photographing them is not a violation of copyright laws.

Who can you photograph? 

Although many might think so, no one in a public place in the UK has a right to privacy, and this includes children.  However, it is obviously in any photographer's interests to proceed with due caution and common sense, and if you are shooting for commercial gain, always make sure you obtain a signed model release.

Incidentally, a warrant is required if anyone in authority wants to seize photographic equipment, film, memory cards etc, or delete any images. 

Read what Austin Mitchell, MP has said about this subject.

White balance - what it is and what it does

Using white balance correctly is all about getting the most accurate colours in our photographs. To understand how to use the different white balance settings on our digital camera, as well as reading the manual :), we need to understand a little about colour temperature and how it varies depending on the light source we are using to take our photographs.

The colour temperature of a light source is measured on the Kelvin scale which measures the different wavelengths that go to make up the light.

For instance, daylight and electronic flash are higher in blue wavelengths and therefore have a higher colour temperature of 5500 degrees (K)elvin.The colour temperature of daylight will vary slightly, however, depending on the time of day.

A candle or a household bulb on the other hand are both richer in red and yellow wavelengths and have a lower colour temperature of between 1900 K and 2800 K. Our eyes and our brains are very adept at compensating for these differences in the colour of a light source. If we choose the wrong white balance setting, however, a strong and distracting colour cast will dominate our photos.

For instance, shooting in daylight with the camera set on Incandescent (i.e. the camera is optimised for a warm light-source, such as a lamp), will lend a strong bluish cast to a photograph, as shown in the quick still-life set-up below. Of course, sometimes choosing the "wrong" white balance setting can lead to more interesting results, and personally, I prefer the first picture to the second one, which was shot on the Flash setting, flash having approximately the same colour temperature as daylight.

Depending on the type of digital camera you use, you may be confronted with what, at first, will seem like a bewildering array of options.Looking through them though, it's easy to see that they are in fact fairly self-explanatory, and using them is just a matter of determining what the dominant light source is in your picture and the quality of that light.

Why the first photo you take won't always be the best

When you see a great picture in front of you, how many shots do you take?  Do you just snap once and then move on, or do you really stop to examine the image-making potential of the subject?  It's easy to think that you've bagged your best shot after the first click of the shutter but often, stopping to really study your subject can yield up several very different pictures. Think about what elements you can vary in order to create a different look.

For example:

Change your angle of view.  Most people shoot from eye-level and yet this seldom gives the most interesting results.  Try shooting from below or above instead.

Use different focal lengths.  If you own an SLR, use different focal length lenses or your zoom to alter both the angle of view and the perspective of your shot.  Using a wide-angle lens means you can include more of the scene in the shot; it will also exaggerate the distance between different elements in your picture. A longer lens on the other hand will allow you to get closer and will also create the illusion of flattened perspective, making objects positioned one behind the other appear as if they are stacked up close together.

Home in on the detail.  Once you've taken the main shot, look for details in your subject that would make good images in themselves and fill the frame with them.

 

Revisit your subject at different times of day

Take several shots of your subject at various times of day and also over the course of a year.  You may be surprised at how different it can look.

How to create a photographic silhouette

In this post, I talked about deliberately underexposing your shots in order to preserve detail in the subject and avoid the problem of blown-out highlights.  However, by taking things a step further, we can lose all the subject detail, thereby rendering them as a silhouette against a light background.

The key to creating a silhouette is to place your subject in front of a brightly-lit, plain background.  If you're outdoors, get the sun behind your subject with maybe a bright expanse of sky forming the background.   In this example taken indoors, the light is coming from the projector screen behind the speaker.  In either case, what you are looking to do is to trick your camera into exposing for the background rather than the main subject.

So instead of pointing your camera at the subject, point it at the background; now take a meter reading from the background.  If your camera has an exposure-hold button, you can keep this depressed and then recompose your shot and take the picture.  Alternatively, you can switch the camera to Manual mode and set the meter reading into your camera, and take the shot. Having exposed for the background, your main subject will now be massively underexposed, in effect blocking up all the shadows and reducing them to a silhouette.

My favourite black & white film

No, I don't mean Casablanca!

Despite the relentless march of digital, some photographers still like to shoot on film; they are not, as many would think, a bunch of Luddites, but simply appreciate the unique qualities that film can offer. So if you are a fan of black and white film, then can I recommend that you try Fuji's Neopan 1600.
 
At ISO 1600, it's certainly grainy, but in a really interesting way - the resulting shots somehow manage to be both grainy and smooth at the same time, an effect which works surprisingly well for portraits.  The pictures have a real "documentary" feel to them, and the film brings out the texture of fabrics and the subtle gradations of light and shadow really well.  Aah, those happy memories of the darkroom have all come flooding back...

Order yours at Speedgraphic, who also have a great range of other photographic products and provide a very speedy postal service.

Portrait lighting techniques - split-lighting

Especially effective for male portraits, split-lighting at its simplest involves using just one light at a 90-degree angle to the subject; this means that while one half of their face is lit from the side, the other half remains in shadow.

Split-lighting creates a much more moody look and can be used, as in this picture, to give an impression of power and authority.  As it is a much more dramatic form of lighting though, you need to choose your subject carefully.

Portrait lighting techniques - broad lighting

Whereas narrow lighting predominantly focuses the light on the small area of the face that is furthest away from the camera, broad lighting illuminates the side of the face that is nearest to the camera.  In other words, the subject is now turned slightly away from the principal light, instead of facing into it.

The effect of broad lighting is to widen a thin face whilst the contours and modelling of the face will not be as pronounced as they are with narrow lighting.