Fionas First Float

Fionas First Float
Originally uploaded by Mark1970Vintage

....alternative title suggested by my other daughter is "Wingardium Leviosa".

When I joined Flickr over 2 years ago one of the first photos I faved was this levitation shot by Miss Aniela http://www.flickr.com/photos/ndybisz/2915848831/in/faves-marklandon/

I'd told my girls about how I could make them "float in mid air" and so on rainy saturday evening we gave it a try and this is the result. Here's a basic overview of what you'll need to do

Set the camera to manual and dial in an appropriate shutter speed, aperture and ISO to get a well lit background. Using a tripod is critical to avoid movement between shots. A remote release is also useful or you could get by with the self timer. If using flash, also set that to maual too, so that the results are consistent. Take a shot of the background with no subject. This is the image that you will have at the bottom of the layer stack in photoshop, so that when you erase things later the background will show through.

Next introduce your subject and have them lie down on a chair or similar (in this case I was actually holding her up by lying underneath. Take a second shot with the subject and support in frame. You'll later remove the support in photoshop to create the illusion of levitation.

Load your images into photoshop and using a layer mask (allows for non destructive erasing) paint over the support area to allow the background to show through. You may have to do a bit of cloning to ensure that fabrics and hair appear normal vs creased/obscured and heh presto you have a levitiation shot.

I'll be doing more of these with the girls as they thought it was great fun.

Watching In Awe

Watching In Awe
Originally uploaded by Mark1970Vintage

This was one of many shots I got from yesterday evening at the Legoland Fireworkds display.

The others can be seen here. http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/album.php?id=542234067&aid=260216

To get decent shots of fireworks you need to use a tripod and use "bulb" mode, and ideally a remote release. I only had a small tripod which is really for a compact camera vs a big bulky 40D but it worked OK.

Mount your camera on the tripod. Turn image stabilisation and auto focus off. Using IS on a tripod is not necessary and can even create negative results as the camera tries to remove shake that isn't there. You need to use manual focus as the light levels are so low auto won;t work and your lens will "hunt" trying to lock focus. Manually focus on a distant object and check againt hat your lens is set to manual focus.

Set the camera to manual (or bulb if you have that setting) and dial up the shutter speed to 30sec ... the next click after this should be BULB. This means that the shutter will remain open for as long as you keep the shutter release pressed down... this could be 1 second or 1 minute.

Set the aperture to a noimal value of f/8 and ISO to 100. If you press the shutter release now you'll get pretty much a black frame as light levels are so low but a firework will have anough light to give a good exposure.

Set the widest angle you can (ulktrawide zooms would give a great creative effect but the max I have in my lens is 17mm) and create a composition for where you think the fireworks will go off. Connect your shutter/cable release if you have one.

When the fireworks start to go off use the cable release to start and end the exposure. the longer you leave the shutter open the more light trails you'll get. Experiment with differnt times until you get an effect you are pleased with.

Outdoor Autumn Portrait : Tutorial

Find a location that has some nice coloured foliage in the background.I used some stunning red acers in Windsor great park. The place where your subject is positioned should ideally be shaded from direct sun to give a more flattering/softer light. Use the aperture priority setting on your camera and set the Aperture as large as possible. The aperture is lens dependant. Remember a large f nmber = small aperture, so you want a small f number to have as large an aperture as possible. A large aperture lets in more light giving a faster shutter speed and creates a more limted depth of field. It's the limted depth of field which will give the bokeh/blurry background... and if you have chosen well you'll get some lovely colours blurring into each other.

Zoom in (the higher the level of zoom the more the background will blur) and compose your shot. Remember to position your main subject off centre rather than in the middle. Think of the rule of thirds and position key elements on or near intersecting points of the 1/3 lines.

Set your ISO as low as possible to maximise image quality but keep your eye on the shutter speed. In this case the shutter speed at ISO 100 was too low and would have resulted in camera shake ( I didn't have a tripod with me) so I ramped up the ISO to 400 to give a shutter speed of 1/80 allowing me to comfotably hand hold the shot.

Fire off a few shots and remember to keep the camera ready as you quite often get t he best shot when your subject thinks you've finished and relaxes. The most natural expressions, especially in kids can't be forced or requested, they just happen and you need to be ready.

With Spring rapidly springing all around there are a wealth of Photographic Opportunities. This little flower is a Grape Hyacinth from my garden, they're really cheery little flowers. I picked it, put it in a small glass, repositioned it to a shady spot out of the direct sun and made sure I had a nice uniform background. The background was a holly bush in the direct sun and the light glinting off the leaves has given the circular "bokeh" effect. To acheive a similar effect use a lens with a "long" focal length (say>50mm). Shoot in aperture priority mode with a wide aperture f/5.6 - f/2.8 or even f/1.8 if you have a lens that'll open that wide. Finally ensure that the camera - subject distance is << than subject to background distance. Having a background that has very bright specular highlights will give the best bokeh. The light in the shaded area was still sufficient to hand hold the shot without resorting to a tripod but if your shutter speed starts to drop below 1/focal lenth then think about using a tripod or resting your camera on a solid surface to avoid shake.



In terms of post processing. This was done entirely in Lightroom 2 as part of the raw conversion. I boosted the colours slightly with Vibrance and an increase in the blacks. Clarity was increased and then some further sharpening. I played with the tone curve to increase the highlights and lights and decrease the shadows and darks to give a further contrast boost. Exported to my flickr stream using Jeffry Friedl's excellent lightroom plug in (Jeffrey Friedl's Blog » Jeffrey’s Lightroom Goodies (Plugins and Tools)) and also using the LR2 Mogrify plug in from Timothy Armes to provide the borders and signature direct from ligthroom on export. Photographer's toolbox - Best Plugins and Web Engines for Adobe Lightroom