Wolsey Island, Abbey Meadows, Leicester

 b&w, film  1 Response »
Aug 182011
 

Wolsey Island, Abbey Meadows, Leicester

For a long time I’ve been trying to get “the shot” of this building that will stop me wanting to come back here and try again. To be fair I have a few that I quite like but it was only when this film came back from Ilford that I realised what I’d been missing – I was concentrating on the building all the time and I hadn’t noticed the obvious – the space.

What is missing is as important as what remains – the gaps where the rest of the shoe factory once stood and the word “WOLSEY” painted on the chimney – these are details I had missed until a change of camera and lens forced a different perspective on me.

Canon EOS 5, Canon 24mm f/2.8, ILFORD SFX200, Cokin P003

Ilford SFX200

 b&w, film, filters, tutorials  No Responses »
Jul 042011
 

Ilford SFX200Ilford SFX200

Images: left – SFX200 film with no filter, right – SFX200 film with Cokin P003 Red filter

Not too long ago, inspired by the work of others (and in order to plot another point on the Stages Of A Photographer graph) I picked up a second-hand Canon EOS film camera. I managed to get an EOS 5 from ebay for around £25 including postage – I had been wanting to pick up an EOS 3 but £100 seemed a little too extravagant. I could also have bought something more fashionable, but as a first tentative step into the world of film it seemed a sensible choice – I can use all my lenses and it works pretty much the same as my main camera, the 5D (although there are some inconvenient differences, such as the lack of dedicated Depth of Field preview button)

I put a couple of films through it to see how I got on, and got them developed locally (and cheaply). Unfortunately the results were pretty poor – lots of scratched prints – but it also seemed that how I metered for digital wasn’t appropriate for film. There were some nice images though, so undeterred I decided to try again so I ordered 4 B&W films at random and it just so happened that one of these was a roll of Ilford SFX200.

I hadn’t really read anything about the film when buying it but whilst casually researching the films before they arrived I noticed that it had “extended red sensitivity” and “using a deep red filter skies can be rendered almost black and most green vegetation almost white”. Reading a bit more about the film I couldn’t really find out any solid facts about using it – although had I found the flickr group earlier I could probably have got my questions answered – so I decided to document my limited experimentation with it so far here.

Kit used:
Canon EOS 5
Canon 24mm f/2.8 lens
58mm filter adapter – as the lens has a 58mm filter thread
Cokin P Series Wide Angle Filter Holder (BPW400A) – I could have used the standard 3 slot one but as I was going to be using film and not digital I didn’t want to be relying on the need to crop the edges if the adapter was visible. (Because the viewfinder isn’t 100% there is always the chance that you don’t see the filter holder through the viewfinder but that it is visible in the shots)
Cokin P003 Red Filter

Notes:
I was using the square Cokin P-Series filters because I already had them. Kood also produce the filter accessories (adaptor, holder), which are generally cheaper than the Cokin ones.
A screw-in Red 29 filter will perform the same function. (A Red 25 filter may also be used but the effect will be slightly less strong)

Without filter/With filter comparison:
The images at the top of this page were shot at the same time (well, within less than a minute of each other) in identical lighting conditions – bright sunlight. Ok – the composition is slightly different, which doesn’t make it a 100% accurate comparison, but my slight change of position will have made only minimal difference to the exposure.

TTL metering was used for both images, metering set to Evaluative. The Red filter has a filter factor of 8, meaning that it absorbs 3 stops of light, so bright sunlight really is necessary for taking shots hand-held. Normally when using the red filter with digital I would shoot at ISO400 but as I was using this film for the first time I decided to use it as its rated speed. ISO400 obviously gives a bit of extra leeway with the aperture setting and I found that I was shooting at f/8 and f/5.6 at less than 1/100s here. Even though statistically 1/50s should be fine with the 24mm lens I still like to shoot a bit faster, so I was expecting a few blurred shots from the roll (but was happily surprised when they were all ok)

As you can see from the images above (left, SFX200 film with no filter – right, SFX200 film with Cokin P003 Red filter) there is a marked difference in the tones when using the red filter. It’s not quite true Infrared as a) the red filter still lets a lot of visible light through and b) the film doesn’t record far into the infrared spectrum, but it’s quite a strikingly different look and one which I far prefer to the 650nm digital conversion that I have.

For a more authentic Infrared effect you could use an IR72/R72/Cokin P007 filter – however this is a very dark filter and it’s virtually (if not) impossible to compose and focus with the filter on. For the time being I’ll be sticking with the red filter as the film camera is a relatively inexpensive thing of fun for me – I’m not quite ready to stick it on a tripod and take it seriously.

Sunrise at Cossington South Lakes

 filters, sunrises  No Responses »
Oct 312010
 

Another evening by the water in Cossington

The morning I took this photograph was the first time I’d managed to get over the stumbling block of getting up really early to take photographs. Winter isn’t so bad – getting up at 6:30am in order to be ready for 7:30 sunrise seemed hard at the time, but when your alarm goes off at 3:30 it’s a bit of a shock. This morning though I had a reason to get up – I’d had some Lee Filters on order for nearly 3 months and they had finally arrived so I was keen to try them out.

The old Cokin set I’d used previously weren’t a great deal of use on my new lens – the filter holder was visible right up to 24mm and I’d become too aware of (and fed up of working around) the purple colour cast they produced.

Anyway, luckily for me I was treated to a pretty sunrise that day – if it had been overcast I might never have bothered again, and I would have missed so many relaxing mornings wandering about in the countryside. Now it seems to be an addiction.

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Sunrise Over The Lake

 landscape, sunrises  No Responses »
Jul 062010
 

Sunrise Over The Lake, Cossington South Lakes

One of the most boring and time consuming tasks that comes with any serious amount of photography seems to be dealing with the large amount of files (and the amount of disc space that they take up). I try to keep two backups of all my images – at the moment I’m finally archiving them all to DVD, chronologically, but I’m also taking the opportunity to get rid of some rubbish and duplicates.

Often I’ll take a couple of shots of something and then notice a distraction in the frame, or I’ll increase the exposure time to get a little more light into a scene. At about 15MB a time all these extra shots add up and despite going against the “never delete your raws” mantra, hanging on to all these extra versions doesn’t really serve any great purpose, other than helping Western Digital stay in business.

The above image is from January 2010 (I’m about 6 months behind with my tidy up at the moment and my progress is constantly hampered by the arrival of new images which I’ll briefly scan for favourites and then ignore for a few months) and was taken on a frosty morning out with John Houghton

This was one of the last shots that I took with my Canon 450D and despite having been back since with my other camera, this was my favourite sunrise shot from this location – mainly due to the good fortune of the cloud picking up the pink glow of the rising sun, which is then also reflected in the ice.

Technical info: ISO100, f/16, 11mm, 1.3s, Cokin ND4 soft grad

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Brocks Hill Country Park

 landscape, trees  No Responses »
Feb 072010
 

Brocks Hill Country Park

A couple of old shots again today, as I continue working though last year’s images with a view to making some of the better ones available as prints (and just generally sharing some of the others that had been languishing on my hard drive).

These were both taken on an overcast afternoon on a footpath just outside Brocks Hill Country Park in Oadby, a few days after I’d got my Sigma 10-20 wide angle lens. I find it hard to ignore the combination of crops, tractor tracks and trees and many of my images from this time were similar to this, as I tried to find a composition I liked (and I imagine there will be a few this year also).

 

Brocks Hill Country Park

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Why I love my ND grad filters

 filters, tutorials  No Responses »
Oct 202009
 

There, I’ve said it. It’s probably incredibly unfashionable in this age of digital – in fact I often see people on forums etc discussing selling their grad filters because they have abandoned them in favour of exposure blending – but they are currently my preferred method of attempting to balance exposures.

An ND (Neutral Density) grad (Graduated) filter is basically just a piece of plastic that is dark at one end and clear at the other – the dark part of the filter is positioned over the lighter portion of the scene, reducing the light variation (dynamic range) of the scene so that it can be captured without any loss of detail.

Drawbacks

As with other methods used to make your camera faithfully reproduce a scene with a wider dynamic range than it is capable of, ND grads certainly have their drawbacks:-

  • The line between the clear and dark parts of the filter is a straight one (albeit with a slight fade/graduation to make it less noticeable). Rarely will a scene have a simple, straight line transition between dark and light so you end up having to compromise and perhaps hide the transition somewhere you hope the viewer won’t notice it
  • Getting the gradient to start in the correct place takes a bit of practice – if it starts too low some of the foreground with appear slightly darker – if it starts too late the brightness of the sky might appear uneven.
  • Like all lenses and filters they need to be kept clean – and as I swap them around between filter holders I have a tendency to drop them :(

With so many negative points, why use them?

Other methods of exposure balancing (such as exposure blending or HDR) require multiple exposures of the same scene, which realistically means using a tripod. I have a tripod, and I use it a lot, but I don’t always carry it – when I’m out with the family it’s an unnecessary burden – and sometimes I make the decision not to use it at all as constantly relying on it can lead to a lack of invention. A set of grads takes up very little room in my camera bag.

Processing time. Other techniques may only take a matter of minutes when you are skilled at them but if I’m taking an afternoon’s worth of casual shots I want them all to look their best with minimal editing.

An Example

These two shots, taken at sunset in Bradgate Park show the subtle but pleasing effect of using the Cokin P121M (ND4) grad. The first shot was taken without the filter. As you can see, the foreground is quite dark.

Old John, Bradgate Park, Leicestershire

Technical info: ISO100, 18mm, f/22, 0.5s

The second shot (below), with the filter in place produces a much more even result.

Old John, Bradgate Park, Leicestershire

Technical info: ISO100, 18mm, f/22, 0.6s

No further processing has been done to either image. As you can see from the technical info, the second shot was exposed for slightly longer (0.1s) which allowed more light from the foreground to be picked up by the camera sensor, resulting in a more even looking photograph.

Boat on Cropston Reservoir

 sunrises, water  2 Responses »
Oct 112009
 

Boat on Cropston Reservoir

With Cropston Reservoir being the location of my first sunset shot, it seems fitting that it was also the first place I sat with my camera and waited for the sun to rise.

I’m not really very good at getting up in the morning, but with the sun rising a little later now (7:22am on the morning this was taken) I figured now was as good a time as any, before Autumn turns into Winter and it becomes too cold to use the camera without gloves.

I took a few shots before this one, with just the ND4 grad on, but the foreground was too dark – I wanted the sunlight to be casting a night glow on the boat. I popped to my bag to get the rest of my filters but unfortunately I’d left my filter wallet open and they were all covered in condensation. I had a frantic couple of minutes trying to get the ND8 grad dry and smear free before the run rose too high in the sky.

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Technical info : Sigma 18-200 lens at 21mm, 1/20s, f11.0, ISO100, ND4 and ND8 grads

Cossington South Lakes

 landscape, sunsets  2 Responses »
Sep 262009
 

Cossington South Lakes, Leicestershire

Purchase print at RedBubble | imagekind

The day before I took this I noticed just how red the clouds were as the sun disappeared beyond the horizon. Keeping an eye on the weather over the course of the next day I thought it looked like there was a good chance conditions might be the same so I popped out an hour before sunset to explore some local lakes that I’ve ridden and driven past many times but never walked around.

The major challenge when attempting shots like this (for me at least) is getting the exposure just right. Even though the sun has disappeared below the horizon the sky is still bright enough to completely overpower the rest of the scene. I’m sure the camera could have dealt with this in one of its automatic modes in conjunction with evaluative metering and auto white balance, but from experience I doubt I would have been that happy with the results. The shot would either have contained a properly exposed sky and little else, or more light in the rest of the shot with blown highlights in the sky.

In order to maintain an even level of light in the sky and in the reflection on the water I used my trusty Cokin ND8 (P121) grad *. It’s ideal for shots of this type where there is a nice straight, dark line across the image where the start of the graduation can be placed. Using this filter allows a longer exposure time so that we can pick up more of the light elsewhere in the shot, such as the faint light on the reeds in the foregound. Once the grad is in place it’s always a good idea to double check its positioning with the DOF preview button if you’re using a small aperture as fine adjustments can make all the difference.

Before I put the grad in I’ll usually spot meter what I think is the brightest part of the scene and set it so that it exposes at just below +2EV – I do this manually by adjusting the shutter speed (but if you are using AV you can just used the exposure compensation control to achieve the same results). Once the grad is in place I’ll then adjust the shutter speed to compensate for change in light – so if I’d settled on 1/100s before the grad I’ll change it to 1/25s (even though the ND8 makes a 3 stop difference I won’t usually adjust by 3 stops initially).

Then it’s just a case of taking a test shot and checking the composition and the histogram (and keeping an eye out for blinkies). If there are blown highlights (blinkies) then the shutter speed needs to be faster – if the histogram doesn’t look right (usually not containing data in the right-hand 5th) then the shutter speed needs to be slower **.

* It’s worth noting that the Cokin P121 does give a pink/purple colour cast so it’s not really ideal for use during the day, unless you are prepared to attempt to correct the problem either by using Auto White Balance or by fixing it later in post-production. It is however great for shooting towards the sun at this time of day

** If the shutter speed can’t be slower – because there is too much movement in the shot – then compromises will have to be made with aperture size or ISO setting. A brief explanation of exposure control and stops can be found here – http://www.andystafford.co.uk/exposure-control-stops/

Boat in Mevagissey Harbour

 landscape  No Responses »
Aug 102009
 

Boat in Mevagissey Harbour

Another image from our holiday in Cornwall earlier in the year. I’ve always loved the rich dark colours of this shot and the gentle ripples in the water, which looks almost like black treacle.

The sun was low in the sky to my right when this was taken, casting a warm glow across the harbour.

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Swan On Swithland Reservoir

 sunsets  No Responses »
Jun 182009
 

Swan On Swithland Reservoir

The light just after the sun has gone down can make for some really remarkable shots – Ok, sunset shots can be a bit cliched, but searching around (or waiting) for a bit of foreground interest can make all the difference.

If you are lucky and have a steady hand (or a lens with optical stabilising) you can get good shots at a low ISO without having to bother with a tripod (although using a tripod is recommended for sharper images). This shot was hand held as that is just how I prefer to take photos – I like to feel like I’m involved, rather than controlling a piece of machinery :)

I like this location as the expanse of water makes for a great reflection on a still day but despite the colours being pretty it really needed something extra. Fortunately after about 5 minutes a swan started to come towards the shore.

Technical details:- Cokin P121 ND4 Grad, ISO200, 1/15s, f/16.0, 20 mm

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