Week Three ....

Firstly, I must think up some more original titles to each learning log entry otherwise its going to get very boring.

I did the final two exercises this week in the Introduction unit, both around photographing movement.

The first was around shutter speeds and since I was already in the Kings Drive area of Eastbourne where there was plenty of traffic, I decided to use cars as my moving object. I took a number of photographs at a fixed point of cars passing across the viewfinder starting at a shutter speed of 1/15 and progressing through a number of shots up to 1/5000 (all on the TV setting).

There is a considerable sense of movement at 1/15 - the car is just a blur. You can get a true sense of the wheels moving where there is some really interesting 'cross-hatching' of the hubcaps on the wheel as the wheels faster than the car does.

Shutter speed at 1/15 f/14

The exposure at 1/500 makes the car look stationery and has no sense of movement at all and this continues more or less throughout the the remaining shots with the exception that as the shutter speed increases, the photograph becomes darker so that at 1/5000 it is barely visible.

Shutter speed 1/500 f/4.0

Shutter speed 1/5000 f/4.0

The second project was more interesting and involved a little more skill and technique and that was around panning. Again, I took a number of photographs attempting to pan with the vehicles and blurring the background. It took quite a few shots to get the hang of the techniques (thanks Esther!) and I found generally, I was panning too slow. The speed of my body movement got better as I carried on and I soon realised that I needed to speed up to get the better pictures.

Overall, I was happy with the results especially with the motorbikes which added more interest. Even with the vehicle still in the photograph, there is still motion in the wheels.

Panning at 1/80 - keeping it rocking!

I tried panning at shutter speeds of 1/15, 1/30, 1/60, 1/80 and got the best results at 1/60 and at 1/80. At a shutter speed of 1/100 I got a photograph that didn't show any motion at all.

Most definitely the blurred background gives a strong sense of movement and my preference is for the background to be blurred rather than the subject.

Just one other thing - this exercise helped in overcoming the self-consciousness I mentioned last week. Many of the drivers were distracted by my photography (which was possibly a reckless thing on my part) and most smiled or even waved.

My other photographic news this week was that I got a Highly Commended certificate for my bluebell photograph in the Arlington Bluebell Walk competition I entered in the Spring - my first competition too! My photograph can be seen on the Gallery Page for 2010 in Class B on http://www.bluebellwalk.co.uk/ as can also one of my other photographs under 'Imaginative!'. You can imagine how delighted I was.

I'm looking forward to moving on to the next part of the course this coming week.

As a reminder, all my photographs for the projects can be seen in my Flikr account.

Week Two ....

The week started with the 'photoshoot' at the Middletons where I was practising taking portraits - the actual posing, which was what I was most concerned about, went reasonably well. The real problems were with getting the lighting right and getting the hang of the equipment. I had huge problems to start with around getting the right exposure - this was despite using virtually the same settings as I had done the week before at our house - but clearly the external lighting ie lighting coming in from outside the room etc was very different. I also had problems with shadows on the background - oddly, by taking the photos in RAW, those that came out under-exposed (mainly because the flash on my camera had not had time to recharge) were easier to correct later in Photoshop.

I've spent the week starting to process the photographs since last Sunday's shoot and, so far, there are around a dozen that look really presentable. (One of the books I was reading for ideas on poses would call them 'saleable' - I'm not so sure about that but will try and get some really good feedback from Jackie and Reg when I present  back the final portfolio in a couple of weeks time.)  I also intend to pull together some sort of feedback form and ask them to complete it as honestly as they can setting out what they thought went well, what didn't get so well and what they think I could improve upon.

I also did three projects for the course this week - the first was on 'Getting To Know Your Camera - Focal Length & Angle Of View'.  I took three pictures at our kitchen door of the back garden, mainly focussed on the summer house - one at 50mm ('standard'). one at 24mm ('wide angle') and the third at 105mm ('telephoto').  As instructed, I printed off the three photos and stood back at the door. The standard photo was about 18" away from my face when the print scene appeared the same size as the view of the real scene. The wide angle was less than 2-3" away! And the telephoto was so far away that I couldn't hold it but had to put it down and then stand back.

In terms of learning, I recognise that the camera can see/do things that I can't do with my eye in terms of reach/bringing things closer or making them look further away.

The second project was to 'Focus With A Set Aperture' - I went down the road away from our house for this and took pictures of railings adjacent to the local recreation ground and with the lens set at f/4 (the lowest f-stop on that particular lens which was my Canon EF 24-105m and the camera set in AV mode), I took three photos, the first focussed on the foreground, the second on the middle ground and the third on the background.

My initial reaction, looking at the LCD screen, was not very impressive. I couldn't see the depth of field - which was the whole point of the exercise - and I thought that perhaps I was using the wrong lens. However, when I got the camera home and lookd at the pictures again on the PC, it was better (but not brilliant). My preference was for the picture where the middle ground was in focus and the the rest of the picture 'fades' away into the background. I thnk this was partially because of the composition of the picture - the background was naturally darker anyway because of where I was and it creates some intrigue in the picture. Where the immediate foreground was out of focus, I felt that this led the eye into the centre of the picture where it was sharper and more focussed.

Focus on middleground

The thrd project was the one around 'Focus At Different Apertures'. For this, I went onto the Downs and looked for some trees or something suitably in line that would give me the row of things that would demonstrate the difference in picture at the different aperture settings on my lens (f/4, f/11 and f/22). The first set of shots were very disapointing  and particularly the photograpgh at f/11 which was blurred. This was despite using the tripod. There were two reasons for this, I think - the first was that the amount of light was much less than away from the woods. I should have thought of that. The second was that I think I rushed the exercise - to be honest, I was a little self-conscious standing there with my camera and tripod. This is something that I have to overcome as part of this course!

I repeated the exercise at the top of the hill outside of the woods and focussed on the row of cars parked opposite the golf club. I didn't use a tripod this time but focussed spcifically on the number plate of the car in the centre of the row each time. I can't see a huge difference in the photos - and maybe I haven't done the exercise properly, I'm not sure. Certainly the photograph at f/11 is much sharper than at f/4 and f/22 and the speed of the shutter which was automatically adjusted for each was significantly slower at f/22 (1/15) than at f/4 (1/500). The preference, if there was one, would be to go for the middle photograph at f/11 (with a shutter speed of 1/60).

f/11 at 1/60

This coming week, I want to move onto the motion exercises and start getting into the course proper.

Incdentally, I am starting to worry about the scheduled date for the fisrt assignment especially with my current workload but will keep an eye on this and let my tutor know soon if I think there is going to be a problem.

Week One ....

So, I've started my learning by doing the Introductory section of the course and am now ready to kick off this weekend with the various projects and finally the Assignment (in time!). I really thought through the notion that many people (including probably me in the past) take about the same time to compose a picture as they do to press the shutter release. I'm sure its a slight exaggeration but I get the point. Method is key but thinking that through and having the eye to do it seems very daunting at this moment in time. That is what the course is for!

I've started setting up lists of photographers to look at that are mentioned as well as thinking about collecting objects as well as ideas to photograph in the future. I will at this rate end up with lists - I need to make sure that they don't just stay like that. I also want to look at Edward Weston's day books to give me an idea of the style and the sorts of things that he wrote in them about the photographs that he took.

Also during this week I've been preparing for these two portrait sessions that I've gone and got myself bookings for. A little nerve-wracking to say the least especially when you start reading about the problems around lighting as well as just getting the subject to pose in such a way that is flattering to them as well as producing a good photo at the end.

Lots of books arrived this week - went a bit crazy on Amazon - but managed to get the three books recommended for the course and will start to look at these on next weeks travelling to the Netherlands.

Finally, Matthew and I had a good session last night with the alphabetti spaghetti - I've attached the final shot. It was just a bit of fun but the more important aspect was the siting up of everything and the trialling of different lenses to get the right exposure and one that we were both happy with. Lots of failures before we got to the final picture - including around the use of equipment such as tripods and where reflection of light was coming in from. But great fun all the same.

In this coming week, I'm putting my mind to getting some of the projects done and under my belt. It will help me feel better and that I will have really started the course.