iPhone Polariser
Handy little guide to building a polarizer for the iPhone
HDR Video
As much as I love HDR imagery there is always a fine line as to when it goes too far and makes shots look unreal.
For still images I think this can be a real problem as it makes the shot difficult to relate too and overall less accessible.
HDR video on the other hand makes the real look surreal, with bold colour and and odd tonal range. The key difference, for me at least, is that video is a format where is visual is constantly changing and there for provide the key elements needed to relate to the scene.
Well some very clever people over at sovietmontage have now managed to achieve this effect using a beam splitter and 2 Canon 5D MK 2 DSLRs.
http://www.sovietmontage.com/2010/09/09/hdr-video-a-reality/
Aerial Photography – Fancy a go?
The guys over at Photoship can build you an electric helicopter system with autopilot and microwave download – yes you read that correctly – for about $18000. Now that’s not that expensive when you consider what you are getting and it also represents the top end of their offerings with cut down versions much cheaper.
Cokin ND Filters – Not very Neutral – Colour Cast Problem
Recently I bought a starter set of graduated filters from Cokin in what they call they P series.
This consists of a holding mount to hold the filter plates, the filters themselves, and a adaptor ring – read more here
This weekend I went out to play with them and found that I was getting a horrible pink cast over my images when I was staking filters.
2x Cokin 4 stop ND Filter - 25 Sec
Below is a the same shot taken with just 1 ND 4 image and although the pink cast looks to have gone, at 100% you can still see a slight tint. This leave me to believe that with longer exposures the effective is cumulative.
1x Cokin 4 stop ND Filter - 8 Sec
At first I thought it was the white balance but even the raw images have come out like this. Now its possible to effectively remove the cast in Photoshop, but it is not the point. I wanted to spend less time in front the computer and getting more shots correct ‘in camera’.
After a quick search on Google I found this article on Flickr - http://www.flickr.com/photos/brentbat/2372603825/
It effectively tells me that the Cokin ND filters are, to be blunt, cheap and if the effect they give is not what you want (you bought a neutral density filter you expect it to be neutral) pretty useless.
Take a look at the sample picture below take from the post on Flickr and see what I mean.
ND Filter comparison - Cokin vs Singh Ray
Now I know the pink does sort or look nice in the example, but its not neutral and it certainly wasn’t what I wanted in the first example.
After reading the responses on Flickr and a few other sites it would appear that this is a know issue with the Cokin ND range and seems to stem from the fact that they let in to much Infra-Red light.
Based on this alone I am now looking to upgrade my filters to either Singh Ray or more likely to Lee Filters (http://www.leefilters.com/camera/) which are excellent. If it wasn’t for the cost I would have bought them in the first place, but as with all things in photography – it seems you only get what you pay for.
My New Niece
So this weekend my sister gave birth to her second child, a beautiful little girl called…. well they are still deciding on a name, but she is very cute either way.
EDIT - We have a name, so let me introduce you to Isabelle Olivia Carter.
Isabelle Olivia Carter
Alpha Q – DJ Shots
I was at my friends house the other day and while he was playing some records I decided to experiment with a very shallow depth of field using my new 24-70mm L.
Focusing on the record needle I wanted to use to the light from the turntables and his computer to provide a background with more interesting things going.
Alpha Q was quite happy as this was his first “DJ photo shoot”.
Tired: Slow Food. Wired: Slow Photography!
EXTERNAL TUTORIAL
We’ve seen slow versions of everything lately: slow food, slow travel, slow shopping, slow dentistry. (We might’ve made one of those up.)
But have you tried slow photography? It’s like a yoga class for your camera.
Long conversations with subjects, patient exposures, and delicate macros will lend your photos a new calmness and longevity — so vital in these rush-rush go-go slam-crash rock-and-roll times.
Join the Slow Photo movement, and soon you’ll be measuring exposures not in fractions of a second, but in fractions of an eon.
Canon 24-70mm f2.8 L USM – My First L Lense
Canon 24-70 f2.8 L USM
So today I am very excited!!! Today I picked up my first lens in the Canon professional range – a 24-70mm f2.8 L USM.
So for those who are not sure what all that means let break it down into sections…
Focal Length: 24-70mm
Aperture: 2.8 – constant across the focal range
L: means this lens is a member of the Canon Professional range (also denoted by the red ring around the end).
USM: Ultra Sonic Motor – for quick, silent, precise focusing
Description [taken from canon.co.uk]
“The EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM is a high-performance lens. It has been developed as a successor to the EF 28-70mm f/2.8L USM, but with a wider zoom range to meet the needs of photographers using certain digital cameras.
The EF 28-70mm f/2.8L USM has proven very popular with professional and advanced amateur photographers since it was introduced in 1995. However, the increasing use of digital cameras, most having sensors smaller than a 35mm film frame, has increased the demand for a high-performance standard zoom lens with a wider wide-angle setting. The EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM lens meets this need. The optical design is based on the previous lens, but incorporates new design features that allow the broader focal length range while maintaining the superb image quality. At the same time, the minimum focusing distance has been reduced from 0.5 metres to 0.38 metres.
Improved water and dust resistance ensure that it will become the leading standard zoom lens in the EOS system.”
Summary
I don’t know enough about lens construction and the how to test them to provide a good review, if you want that check out the-digital-picture.com.
From a personal point of a view the lens is very well constructed, its feels solid compared with my other lenses. The picture quality is very sharp with colour contrast and saturation all looking very true to life.
The lens BIG and not just slightly either. It dwarfs my 450D, but makes it look very cool as well – it now looks a little like a lens with a camera attached, rather than the other way round! 
I am extremely happy with it, so less time blogging, more time shooting – check back soon for some test shots.
The Malvern Hills
So this weekend I went to see a good friend of mine and his missus in Worcester (UK). He promised me that we could go for a walk across the Malvern hills, a small ridgeline of hills in the midlands of the England – more information on the Malverns – This had me excited as I knew the view point from there can be spectacular and it would give me a opportunity to photograph some other landscapes other than the South Downs, plus get some hiking in!
When we got there though I was not so impressed. This was not because of the view as I couldn’t see it due fog so thick you couldn’t see more than 10m! Still my friend assured me it would blow over, so off we set to the top of the hill to have a cup of tea and sandwich while we waited.
He was right and once it cleared there was some nice “holiday snap” style blue skies, but it was when the sun was setting that things got interesting.
Now I already know these images could have come out better, I needed some ND grads, but I didn’t know this at the time, so although not my best efforts I did learn something!!! In the absence of the grad filters I opted for some HDR or B&W shots.
Here’s what I got (also keep scrolling for some shot of Worcester Chathedel as well).
Everest Charity Trek – The return
So I just got back from my trip to Nepal, how was it you ask? AMAZING!
The scenery there is something that I could never get bored of, the people are so friendly and welcoming, the food is, well the food is food. Some of it great some not so great.
Enough of this though let talk photography!
So just before I left I bought my first DSLR – a Canon 450D – on the basis that I knew the scenery would probably be amazing and I didn’t think a point and shoot would be able to do the area justice. The question is, was I able to get the 450D to do any better?
Initial problems
Before I even left I knew that I would have to carry all my equipment needed for each day. This would include any camera equipment I wanted on the trail as I wouldn’t have access to my main rucksack between stops. So I needed to pick what I wanted to take based on situation and weight. First thing to go, don’t kill me, the tripod – its 1.5kg and a little bulky so I opted for a smaller table top one instead.
Upon arriving in Kathmandu I could see dust and wind were also going to be a problem that needed care to avoid ruining my optics on the trail. I also noticed what my friend had told me about increased haze at higher altitudes.
Also I couldn’t afford the 10-22mm lens I wanted to take due to money constraints – as luck would have it though my trek leader had one he was happy to lend for the entire trip!!
So my kit list ended up looking like this.
- Canon EOS 450D
- Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS
-
Canon EF 28mm f/2.8
- Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5
- Sigma 70-300mm f/4-5.6 APO DG Macro
- Panasonic Lumix TZ5
- Tech Trek – T-POD (http://www.trek-tech.com/products/tripods.html)
Now you could be thinking, “HEY! I thought weight was a problem?”, and you’d be right but the 18-55mm “kit lens” and the 28mm both weigh under 200g so its not as bad as it looks.
Taking Picture of mountains
It amazing that something you would have thought was quiet well documented actually wasn’t. There is plenty of information about peoples experiences but nothing in terms of what you would call a guide, until I spotted this - http://www.smashandpeas.com/how-to-photograph-mountains/.
Now I am not going to try and recreate a guide or even expand the above tutorial – its a great start and anything I would add is purely opinion.
What I want to do is share some things I found for my benefit, but please don’t take as a “do’s and don’t”.
Things I found that worked/helped
- UV filters - Not only great to help cut through some of the haze but with all the dirt and dust they are a great lens protector on the trail. Bought one for all my lenses and I’m glad I did.
- Shoot RAW – If you can shoot in RAW as there is more room to correct things after. I am a big fan of getting it right in the camera but when you are experimenting it not always that easy. Add to that, you are hiking large distances every day and you can’t stop for 20 minutes to play with some shots so you have use every advantage.
- Take LOADS of storage – I took 32gb of memory with me and it was only just enough. It sounds excessive and it probably was. I have just under 3500 shot to go through from a 3 week trip. I knew this would be the case before I went – see below
- Take LOADS of shots - because I was fully aware I have little to no idea what I was doing or what would work I opted to take the same shot many time on different setting. This way I may have binned 90% of the shots, but I know I captured the ones I wanted with nothing missed. It was also a great “learn on the job” experience.
- No Filters? Almost always exposed for the sky – Blow out can happen very easily at high altitudes and the contrast means you’ll hardly ever get a easy to meter scene. Because of this and because I had no filters to help compensate, I found that metering for the sky often left enough to recover the foreground with a bit of doge and burn. If you have filters, take them!
The photos!
Finally let look at some photos.
Here are some of my favourites from the trip but there are more available at http://www.flickr.com/photos/lampertron/sets/72157623479363094/
Also there is a trip blog and some more photos at http://www.galacoraleveresttrek.co.uk/
Two Sherpa carrying a heavy load - look closely its 7 crates of beer and box of biscuits!
Our camp site in front Mt Everest
Me on a hill in front of Mt Everest at sunset
Just in case you are wondering - I work for Gala Bingo hence the PR stunt!
I hope you enjoy these and of course and comments are welcome.
