Psychedlic Smoke : First Attempt

Psychedlic Smoke
Originally uploaded by Mark1970Vintage

Bought some insence sticks at the wekeend to try this, inspired by the "tutorial" below.

www.flickr.com/photos/antsplan/1439859052/

Strobist. : 580EXII into Lumiquest "Ultrasoft" diffuser @1/4power camera right triggered with cactusV4's.

Bubbles @ Bathtime

http://www.flickr.com/photos/marklandon/4101016649/
Originally uploaded by Mark1970Vintage

I've not shot any portraits for a while so I thought I'd give this some special treatment practicsing a few Photoshop tricks I'd not done for a while.

In low light conditions if you shoot with flash in Av mode the camera tries to expose for "ambient" conditions by having a really long shuuter speed with the flash for "fill". You can compensate by nicreasing ISO to get a daster sutter speed but that introduces noise. In certain situations you can shoot in manual mode in which case the flash exposes for the subject completely vs acting as fill. (read a more complete article here)

http://photonotes.org/articles/eos-flash/index2.html

I bumped up the flash exposure compensation to +3EV to get a high key effect. The rest was done in Photoshop...

Converted to mono in using a gradient map with a layer mask to reveal the eyes which were further enhanced with a little saturation. A high pass filter used for sharpening with a vivid light blending mode, again with a layer mask to accentuate the eyes only. A few other features were slightly sharpened by painting away the mask with a lower opacity brush.

The image was reinported to Lightroom then exported to flickr using Jefrey Friedel's excellent plug in. I also used the "mogrify" plug in from Timothy Ames to add the graphical watermark. I really like the functionality of these two features.

Despite the amazing blue eyes I struggled for ages and failed to be able to print this out with the same effect... no matter what print setting I tried I was getting a sepia effect vs B&W and no blue in the eyes ?? I tried multiple different colour management profiles including "printer controls colour" and they all came out the same ?? not sure whats happening there. (didn't try to print any other phots to check though. May reboot and try again.

What Am I ? #2/10

What Am I ? #2/10
Originally uploaded by Mark1970Vintage

The game is simple, I take a macro shot of an object I find in the house. To make things more difficult to identify the shot is from a strange angle and has a narrow DOF. All you have to do is guess what it is by putting your idea in the comments section. I'll then tell you if you're right. No prizes, just for fun :-)

...and the best thing about this shot... not a dust spot in sight which means the "dry" sensor clean using my new "rocket blower" worked.

Here is the first "what am I shot". This series was inspired by the arrival of my 100mm macro lens..... which I'm still loving !!

www.flickr.com/photos/marklandon/3981876530/in/set-721576...

Noisy, Dusty, Badly lit, But I like it

Noisy, Dusty, Badly lit, But I like it
Originally uploaded by Mark1970Vintage

I'm not over happy with this image as I was just experimenting and was therfore lazy with the set up. I did learn alot though about how to do these shots and will revisiti them sometime soon to improve on my technique.

I've started fequenting "Digital Photography Shcool" website, I've been subscribed to the newsletters for a while but have now dipped into the forums too. Whilst I'm impressed with the tutorials and such the critiques are all very much "nice shot " "love it" even when the shots are less than mediocre. A few noteably examples are offering honest critiques so I'll stick around and see what happens.

Rain Stops Play on Star Trails and Kills Camera with Err 99

I thought I'd try some long exposures on "Bonfire Night" with the plan of stacking them together to form star trails with plane tracks accross and perhaps the odd firework if I was lucky.

Great plan ... but unbeknownst to me the weather had other ideas !!

My tripod was set up in the garden. Camera, lens (IS switched off, focus set to manual) and cable release were all ready and off we went. A series of 30 second exposures with the camera set on "burst" and the cable release locked down meant continuous shots.... so off I went to watch x factor. Planning to return in an hour or so to check on progress.

X factor over, out I went and was HORRIFIED to find it was raining.... and looked like it had been for a while. The camera (Canon EOS40D) worked fine to review the images I had but then started to do strange things and the dreaded "Err 99" appeared. Bugger !! I only get 14, 30 second exposures before it started to cloud over and then another 30 before it started to rain (there was no sign of any clouds when I started !!)

I looked up Err 99 on the web and got more nervous. Following the troubleshooting guides I removed the lens, still Err 99, replaced battery, still there. Removed CF card, still there. Got the hair dryer out, still there !! Finally I left the camera with everything detached and open overnight in a warm room... and thank god it worked in the morning. Lesson learned... don't

leave expensive gear unattended outside in the UK climate.

Now, onto the image. The individual shots were tacked together in photoshop with the great photoshop action below to form the Star Trails. Obviously I was hoping that they would have been longer with more plane tracks but you can clearly see the clouds starting to scud in. The orange glow is from the distant lights of Heathrow and London.

http://www.schursastrophotography.com/software/photoshop/startrails.html

Textured Red Acer

Shot a few weeks ago but only recently tweaked in photoshop by overlaying some textures. Sctratched metal is the main one.

This is the first blog post I've uploaded direct from lightroom using Timothy Ames' excellent plug in. http://www.photographers-toolbox.com/products/lr2blog.php

Test.... Upload

Just testing the upload feature direct from lightroom... needed to create a Picassa album to do it so just a quick test....