Wednesday 31 October 2018
Recovering From Disasters During Photo Sessions
As a photographer who captures rare and priceless moments, you can’t afford to have disasters during photo sessions. However, sometimes things go wrong regardless.
If you have a recovery plan in action before anything goes wrong, you’ll never have to freeze up and panic at that moment. You’ll never have to fear a photo session getting ruined.
If you psychologically prepare yourself for disasters in advance and rehearse the crisis in your mind, then you can switch to autopilot when it happens.
Let me walk you through what to do when cameras fail, families fight, or photos fall short of your vision.
Knowing that you are prepared for any disaster will allow you to banish your worry and focus on the moment.
1. Technology
If you show up to a session with only one camera and one lens, you’re asking for a disaster to happen. You should always have a backup camera with you. Even if you have no intention of using it during the session, you need to have something to fall back on.
I heard of a wedding photographer who showed up with one camera and one dead battery. The wedding was delayed for an hour while she searched around for somebody to help her find a battery. Don’t let that be you!
Instead, bring two cameras and two lenses to every photo gig (along with spare batteries). I bring a Fuji camera with a 56mm lens. It’s the only camera and lens I’m interested in using.
However, I keep a Nikon with an ultra-wide 10-24mm lens tucked in my camera bag (from before I switched to Fuji). It’s there in case I want a unique wide-angle photo. It’s also there in case of disaster.
This is the sort of photo that I would take with my spare Nikon camera and wide angle lens. A couple of nice wide angle photos like this balance out the look of the photos taken with the portrait lens.
Last spring, I timed a maternity session for the golden hour. If you’ve ever photographed during the golden hour, then you know how quickly the time passes. When the family arrived, I pulled out my camera, dialed in my settings, and then noticed with surprise that the battery was dead. ‘That’s strange; I always charge my batteries,’ I thought. I reached into my camera bag to pull out a spare battery and panicked when I realized I hadn’t brought any!
Decide right now what you’ll do when your camera stops working, or you make a foolish mistake as I did. Decide right now what your backup plan is so that when it happens, you can switch to autopilot and get the job done.
Most likely, you’ll reach for your second camera. That’s what I did.
I had no choice but to shoot the whole session with an ultra wide angle lens! It’s the last lens I would ever choose to photograph portraits.
All of the photos in this article are from the photo session with the ultra-wide lens. You can let a family down with your mistakes, or you can rise above and make whatever you’ve got work. I’ve seen enough episodes of “Pro Photographer, Cheap Camera” to know that beautiful photos can be made with nearly any camera and lens.
During one session, I was waist deep in a river. There was one camera around my neck and one in my hand. After a few minutes, I realized I had been dunking the camera around my neck into the water. Panic rushed through my head and chest – I just drowned a $2000 camera. But I calmly walked ashore, packed away the camera and got back to work. Nobody knew but me. I allowed the need to capture memories to overcome the panic I was feeling in the moment. I could deal with the camera later, there was a family counting on me. Decide in advance not to let your negative feelings rule you.
I’m more concerned about the people I’m photographing than the gear I’m using. Personality knows nothing about cameras and lenses, it shines whenever it wants to.
2. People
Beyond technology, other disasters can happen during your photo session.
How about a family that arrives at the photo session in miserable moods and arguing? They probably found it stressful getting ready for the photo session.
It’s uncomfortable for the photographer and might even lead to the family completely blowing up at each other.
You can get upset and stressed out (how dare they treat me like this as a professional photographer?), or you can diffuse the situation.
These scenarios can be tricky to figure out. Try to get them focusing on something else by asking questions and bringing up topics they love. Focus more on the kids first. If you can cheer them up, their excitement becomes contagious. You’ll find the moment that the tension is released, the scene turns to laughter.
Laughter is so contagious. My wife always comments that I come home from photo sessions in a better mood. It’s because there is so much laughter.
Challenging Kids
Once in a while, families bring me very challenging kids. One mom came with her non-verbal child. He didn’t take direction at all, and immediately ran off into the woods! All of the photos from that session were candid because the child didn’t sit long enough to pose. It wasn’t until he rested with exhaustion that I finally got a photo of him and his mom.
It was the first session where I thought I had failed. However, upon reviewing the photos, I discovered many wonderful moments, and the mom loved them.
You need to begin every tough situation by telling yourself, ‘there is a way.’ I now know that completely candid photo sessions are possible.
As a photographer, I prefer candid moments over posed ones. Even when posing a photo, I wait for the candid moment to appear.
Terrified Kids
I remember one little guy who was terrified of cameras. Just the sight of one sent him into hysterical tears. Beginning with the phrase, ‘there is a way,’ I built a trusting relationship with the child. It naturally led to smiles and no fear of my camera. It took a while, but it worked.
3. Photos that Fall Short of Your Vision
Every master was once a disaster – T. Harv Eker
You may feel like some photo sessions were a disaster because you weren’t happy with how the photos turned out. It is perfectly reasonable for creative photographers struggling with their vision. It’s part of how you grow as a photographer. Allow that dissatisfaction to push you harder next time. Learn from your mistakes and let them prepare you to avoid future disasters.
In the end, I learned that an ultra wide angle lens can lead to nice photos. I broke my dependency on my favorite lens. It makes me wonder what other disasters will help me grow as a photographer.
What is Your Biggest Fear?
Technology, people, and our lack of creativity threaten our photo sessions all the time. But if you create and rehearse your backup plan in advance, you’ve got much less to actually worry about.
What’s your biggest fear about a photo session going wrong? Let me know in the comments and see if we can figure out your backup plan in advance.
The post Recovering From Disasters During Photo Sessions appeared first on Digital Photography School.
from Digital Photography School https://digital-photography-school.com/recovering-from-disasters-during-photo-sessions/
A Recipe for a Little Red Riding Hood Photo Shoot
For most kids, deciding what to wear for Halloween is an exciting time to make a yearly memory. This is no different for my own daughter. However, this year, she received her costume from a neighbor as a hand-me-down. The joy on her face was priceless! Now that she had her costume, it was my job as her father and photographer to make her look epic.
The outfit reminded me of an Adorama TV feature that Gave Hoey did years ago that also included the character of Red Riding Hood:
As I wanted to use this video as inspiration, but not copy, I choose not to simply review this photo rather than the entire video. This allowed me to make it my own style and look. In keeping with the season of yummy treats, I thought I would write this article in the style of a recipe. Enjoy!
Ingredients
Being a portrait photographer I had all the items I needed for this shoot. Which include:
Body: Canon 5D Mark III
Lens: Canon 85L 1.4IS
Speedlight: Canon 600ex-rt
Trigger: Canon ST-E3-RT
Modifier: Westcott 26″ Rapid box with beauty dish
Stand: Cheetah C10
Filter: Tiffin 6 Stop ND filter
Additional: Sand bags for support
Most importantly: One super cute and excited 7 year old ready to live a fantasy as Little Red Riding Hood.
Location
Living in the city, a nearby forest was hard come by. What I did have though was a city park with a line of trees rich in autumn. The shoot began 30 minutes before civil twilight which helped give a soft glow to the trees in the background. The ambient light was a bit bright when I opened up the lens completely so I used a 6 stop Neutral Density (ND) to compensate.
Oven Settings
I realize settings are dependent on the conditions and therefore will not apply to all circumstances, but you can use them as a guide. After all, you don’t want to over-cook your treat!
ISO: 100
Aperture: f1.6
Speed: 1/80th of a second (Image Stabilizer on)
Flash: Powered at 1/32 power about 4 to 6 feet away
Tip: As long as your ambient exposure is 1 to 3 stops underexposed and you compensate with flash power, you should be able to get the desired look. It’s really that simple!
Presentation
Honestly, I don’t watch a bunch of cooking shows, but I do know a great portrait has good composition. As you can see from one image above, soccer goal posts would have ruined the look. Thus, I placed my daughter in a line of trees that would give the viewer a sense that Little Red was in the woods off to grandmother’s house. My daughter, who loves posing and play acting took over and began to have fun. For a little extra flare my wife through some leaves into the shot.
Final Touches
I took the RAW images which were mostly complete into LightRoom. I added a pinch of dehaze, a bit of an S in curves and then some highlighting and shadowing to taste. The result Is one very happy and very excited little girl, “Daddy I look magical, I love them thank you!”
I hope this inspires you to go out and have fun. As photographers, we have the opportunity to make a child’s dreams and fantasies come true.
About the author: Christopher Buschelman is a 35-year-old fine art and portrait photographer based in Papillion, Nebraska. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author. You can find more of Buschelman’s work on his website, Instagram, portrait Instagram, and Facebook.
from PetaPixel https://petapixel.com/2018/10/31/a-recipe-for-a-little-red-riding-hood-photo-shoot/
How to Use Your Camera to Calculate the Speed of Earth’s Spin
Earth is spinning… and fast! It was during my first nights in astrophotography that it became very concrete for me. By taking pictures of the stars, one quickly obtains a change of star physiognomy that confirms the rotation of the earth. In this article, I describe how to use this phenomenon to measure the rotational speed of the earth with a simple camera.
To capture the maximum of light from the sky, the astrophotographer seeks to increase the exposure time to the maximum. By doing this, you quickly find that the appearance of the stars turns into a dash, depending on the focal length it takes few seconds of exposure to have this easily observable.
The principle is simple, the stars are very distant celestial objects, they are located at distances expressed in light-years. A light year is the distance traveled by light in one year, and when we remember that the light travels about 186,282mi/300,000km per second, we are quickly dizzy on the distances that this represents. As a result of all this, the stars are so far away that we can consider them fixed in the sky.
As we have observed, taking a picture of the sky in very slow pause or taking a succession of several photos of the sky, we clearly see the relative position of the stars change. We have just seen it, we consider the stars fixed in the sky, so their apparent movement characterizes very well the speed of rotation of the earth.
Without going into too much detail, the earth rotates along a North-South axis. In the northern hemisphere, this axis passes approximately through the polar star. Thus, the polar star is fixed and the stars around it trace a circular apparent path around it. That’s what we will measure.
By knowing the duration of observation (the duration of exposure of a photo or accumulation of several photos in sequence) and by measuring the angular distance traced by a star, I can easily calculate the speed of rotation of the earth.
To facilitate the measurement of the angle, I limit myself to a sequence of a few tens of minutes. As in the previous image, the dashes drawn by the stars are then very apparent.
Everyone will have his method and his favorite software, personally, I used an iOS application which has a tool to display the angle of a line. To better locate the polar star, I draw a circle centered on the latter.
The measured angle is 4.1 °, 0.072rad for a duration of 975 seconds. This gives us a rotation speed of 7.33×10-5 rad/sec. A quick search on the Internet tells us that the precise speed of rotation of the earth is 7.29×10-5 rad/sec. The difference is less than 1%.
Conclusion
Here, I showed you how to measure the rotation speed of the earth with an error less than 1% using a simple camera. This result is very interesting, especially since it can be improved by taking more care in measuring the angle.
For my part, I am all the more satisfied with the result that the method applies with standard photographic equipment (there’s no need for advanced scientific equipment) and that it allows us to apprehend this scientific truth: the Earth turns, truth otherwise difficult to perceive concretely with our senses.
About the author: Panhobby is the photographer behind PhotoPlanet360, a website dedicated to panoramic and 360-degree photos. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author. You can find more of his work on his website, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. This article was also published here.
from PetaPixel https://petapixel.com/2018/10/31/how-to-use-your-camera-to-calculate-the-speed-of-earths-spin/
Nikon Z7 Teardown: ‘The Best Built Mirrorless Full-Frame Camera…’
After disassembling a Canon EOS R, Roger Cicala over at LensRentals just did a teardown of the Nikon Z7. What he found was one of the best-built cameras on the market today.
You can read Cicala’s full Nikon Z7 teardown article over on the LensRentals blog. We also shared a different teardown of the Z7 by Kolari Vision earlier this month, so be sure to check that one out too if you’re interested in more looks and thoughts on the Z7’s build.
The $3,545 Z7 is Nikon’s top of the line full-frame mirrorless camera while the $2,299 EOS R is Canon’s mid-level one — it will be announcing its pro-grade full-frame mirrorless sometime in 2019 — so it’s not quite fair to directly compare the builds of the Z7 and EOS R. But it’s an interesting look, nevertheless.
One of Cicala’s main findings in his teardown is that Nikon has ultra-weather-sealed the Z7 — there are weather-resisting gaskets everywhere you look, and finer sealing in certain parts than the EOS R and the Sony a7R III.
“In many places the plastic shell doesn’t just interlock; it overlaps, screws together and then is covered with rubber grip and adhesive,” Cicala writes. “That should not only give a superior weather seal, but it’s also probably giving some added strength to the assembly.”
There was similarly great sealing everywhere Cicala looked.
“If there’s an edge, there’s a weather seal,” Cicala says.
“This is not marketing department weather resistance. This is engineering department weather resistance,” Cicala concludes. “[T]his is as robustly weather sealed a camera as we’ve ever disassembled.
“I don’t believe in weather resistance myself. I believe like life; water will find a way. I believe in plastic baggies and rubber bands. I am, however, a great believer in the idea that if you claim to do something, then damn well do it right. This is done right.
“I’m just here to say this is a damn well-built camera, the best built mirrorless full-frame camera we’ve taken apart.”
from PetaPixel https://petapixel.com/2018/10/31/nikon-z7-teardown-the-best-built-mirrorless-full-frame-camera/
5 Tips for Using Continuous Lights in Your Photography
Lighting is an essential building block of photography. Learning how to use light to your advantage can transform an ordinary photo into an extraordinary one. Many photographers begin their journey working with natural light and I firmly believe this is is a great place to start. But depending on the circumstance, artificial light may be needed.
When it comes to artificial light, there are many options to choose from. Speedlights, strobe lights and continuous lights are all at your disposal, not to mention the various light modifiers. But while it’s nice to have this variety, trying to work out which light source is best for your shoot can become overwhelming.
The Difference Between Speedlights, Strobe Lights and Continuous Lights
Speedlights are portable, battery operated lights that can attach to most cameras through the hot shoe mount. They can also be used off-camera by attaching them to a light stand and then activating them via wireless triggers.
Strobes are larger (and typically more powerful) lights that are attached to light stands and activated through wireless triggers. Both speedlights and strobe lights emit a powerful burst of light when fired.
Continuous lights emit light the entire time you have them on. Years ago these lights were commonly used in video production. After using them they’d be physically hot, and you had to wear special gloves to break them down. (I remember those days.)
Thankfully, continuous lights are now more powerful, more portable, and cool to the touch.
When to Use Continuous Lights
Continuous lights are often overlooked in the world of photography. But sometimes they’re the best choice. If you’re an event photographer, you may find yourself shooting in a venue that doesn’t allow flash photography. In these cases, continuous lights may be permitted. Even if flash photography is allowed, you may still opt for continuous lights to avoid being a distraction. If it’s a sensitive event, setting continuous lights and leaving them on may be a better option.
Continuous lights are also a viable option for portrait photography, especially for beginners. When using strobe lights, you can’t truly evaluate your lighting situation until they’re fired. Because of this, they often take more time to set up and adjust. (You need to keep taking photos of your subject and adjusting the lights until they’re right.)
With continuous lights, you can see the lighting situation in real time, which helps you learn to see the best lighting situations and achieve your aesthetic goal. They generally emit an even stream of light onto your subject, allowing you to set them up once and then forget them.
And many strobe lights need a moment to power up between shoots. Those few seconds could bethe difference between a perfect shot and a mediocre one. If you’re taking photos of a subject that might move around a lot such as children or pets, continuous lights may be the answer.
Here are five photography tips to make using continuous lights easier and more effective.
1. Get stronger lights
Because of their design, continuous lights generally aren’t as powerful as strobe lights. To ensure you get a nice light source, opt for more powerful lights. I recommend an LED with at least 1000 bulbs. If it’s too strong, you can always dial it back. Better to have more than you need in these situations.
2. Soften the light
We want a soft light on our subject to avoid unwanted harsh shadows. Continuous lighting is no different. Use light modifiers to soften your light as much as possible, especially if you’re taking portraits. Whether you use softboxes or umbrellas is up to you. (I like using softboxes or scrims.)
3. Check the color temperature
Unlike most photography lights, some continuous lights let you change color temperature. In most cases you’ll want to make sure they’re set to daylight (around 5600k), which will give you the most natural look. Check your lights to make sure they’re set to the right color temperature.
4. Turn off all other available lighting
Because color temperature is so important, chances are the current lighting in the space will interfere and mix the color temperatures. Turn off all other light sources in the space to ensure the only light your camera is working with is the light you’ve provided.
5. Use a three-point light system
If you’re taking portrait, I suggest using a three-point light system, especially with continuous lights as they aren’t as powerful. The two front lights will be your key and fill, while the back light can serve as a hair light or be used to separate your subject from the background.
Ready to Try Continuous Lights?
I hope you consider using continuous lights next time you’re in the studio. The results may surprise you.
The post 5 Tips for Using Continuous Lights in Your Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School.
from Digital Photography School https://digital-photography-school.com/continuous-lights-tips/
Tuesday 30 October 2018
Making Photoshop Luminosity Masks Easy with Lumenzia
As you advance with your photography, you may want to edit your photographs with more precise control. In this article, I discuss how to use Lumenzia Luminosity Masking Panel to easily edit sections of your image using Luminosity Masks in Adobe Photoshop.
These masks allow you to control different aspects of your image without affecting others. You can manually create these luminosity masks, or you can use a product such as Lumenzia to make them for you automatically, as well as applying many commonly used adjustment layers in Adobe Photoshop.
Hoar Frost on a River Stone after Using Luminosity Masks
Lumenzia is a luminosity masking panel that is an add-on application that works within Adobe Photoshop. It allows you to quickly create and efficiently use a wide range of luminosity masks for your image editing. To understand how Lumenzia works, because it is a little technical, you need to understand how Photoshop layers work.
Lumenzia, in its most basic terms, is used within Adobe Photoshop to allow you to manipulate images with layer masks. For this article, all the references and images are for Lumenzia V6.0. Lumenzia appears as a panel within Photoshop.
Lumenzia Panel
Luminosity Masks
Luminosity masks, also known as Luminescence masks, are a way of making advanced selections in Photoshop based on luminosity values. This method is particularly useful for images with a high dynamic range.
For example, let’s say we are looking at the hoar frost ice ball image. It is a bright object on a dark background, where the exposure is likely to have been selected for the darker areas rather than the ice ball, making the ice ball more gray than white. The image is uneven because the white section (the ice ball) is underexposed. We could make a second exposure, this time exposing to account for the ice ball and then smoothly blend the area of the ice into the darker background.
Underexposed Original Hoar Frost Ice Ball
There are many ways to make selections in Photoshop, but in this particular example, Luminosity Masks would allow us to select the over-exposed area because it targets luminosity values (i.e., the brightness of an area), and smoothly blend in the darker exposure. The image below shows the luminosity histogram for this image.
Ice ball histogram
Luminosity masks are incredibly powerful because you can manipulate specific parts of your image. As with all masks, the key to remember is that white reveals and black conceals. There are multiple uses for these types of masks including fine-tuning images, highlight recovery, HDR images, black and white imagery, and general masking uses.
Lumenzia is an add-on product for Photoshop CC that allows for the automation of using Luminosity Masks. The limits of what you use this tool for is related to your imagination and how far you want to manipulate images.
Bonavista Harbour at Night – High Dynamic Range
What is a Luminosity Mask?
In general, there are two fundamental characteristics of the data contained in the photographic information in digital form: Chromatic (color, hue, and tint) and Luminosity (brightness). Luminosity masks focus on using the brightness of the information contained in the image data to allow you to manipulate portions of the image selectively.
There are some other great articles on dPS regarding Luminosity Masks. This being a fairly advanced concept, understanding how layers work in Photoshop is vital, or you may not understand much of this article.
Why use Luminosity Masks?
In times past and to this day, many photographers use techniques such as a white seamless background behind a portrait subject to allow for the background to be changed in post-production. Some other photographers use color to allow the background to replaced.
Cute Puppy on White Seamless Background
The distinction between the two backgrounds is that the white background has different luminosity levels, making it easier to mask out the background manually. Colored backgrounds can create problems due to the color of the clothing worn and color from the background affecting the edges of the subject in the foreground. The lighting on the subject can also affect this. The colored background is a chromatic mask rather than a luminosity mask. Luminosity masks are used to solve this issue.
Again, layer masks always work on the premise that white reveals and black conceals.
Let’s look at three masks for the Ice Ball image:
- ‘Lights’ (L2) Mask (just from the high end)
- ‘Mid-tone’ Mask (just from the middle)
- ‘Darks’ mask (just from the darker end)
It’s the same image using the different masks. By using these masks, you can modify the image in those specific areas. The white areas are the selected areas of the histogram and the further you get from the selection, the darker the mask is. For the ‘Highlights,’ only the light values are white. For the ‘Mid-tone’ selection, only the mid-range values are white, making the highlights dark as well as the dark range. Finally, the ‘Darks’ selection shows the dark range in white.
Lights 2 Mask
Mids 2 Mask
Darks 2 Mask
How do you create Luminosity masks?
There are three ways to create luminosity masks. Firstly, you could create your own (time-consuming) and then automate this process. Secondly, you could purchase Lightroom or Photoshop presets that have someone else create an automated process for you. The third way is an add-in product that works within Photoshop. Lumenzia is an add-in product that works well.
There are two issues with the first two methods of generating Luminosity Masks; the time it takes to set up and automate them and the size of the files that have them applied with layer masks. Using presets or actions to generate Layer Masks can significantly increase the size of the files within Photoshop because each layer is effectively an image. This process takes up hard drive space and can place extra processing power on your computer.
Lumenzia uses Vector Masks instead of Layer Masks to rapidly create the Luminosity Masks. It allows for the rapid manipulation of images and discarding of masks is easy. All while keeping the image size smaller and more flexible.
How does Lumenzia work?
Lumenzia is an exciting product on its own as it allows you to efficiently control and automate many tasks related to Luminosity Masks. It integrates into Photoshop CC as a panel with simple button commands – many of which have instructions as you hover over them.
It is a powerful tool, and while the initial concepts are simple, the learning curve for using the product efficiently may be steep for some. Luckily, there are also integrated video tutorials that are launched from within Photoshop directly from the panel (you require an internet connection for these to function). The purpose of this review is to give you a bit of an overview of how it works so you can see if it’s right for you.
The Lumenzia Panel
The majority of the panel shows the selections of the luminosity ranges you need – once you understand how to select the various luminosity levels. To illustrate, consider a standard histogram for an image.
The RGB histogram shows the distribution of all the luminosity levels from pure black on the far left and pure white on the far right. The Lumenzia panel is divided up into sections. The top portion of the panel is the luminosity mask selection and preview area that allows you to see what you have selected.
Selection Portion of Lumenzia Panel
This top section divides up the luminosity ranges based on the ranges you are looking to use. Visually, the buttons give you a clear idea of the luminosity range that the buttons select. The buttons can be combined and inverted.
Once you press a selected range, a temporary selection appears and the layer buttons show.
Look at the luminosity histogram and notice the buttons visually show (on the same horizontal line) an approximate distribution of the luminescence values being selected.
The line of numbers (0-10), just above the bottom, is the zone values that Ansel Adams made famous as part of his processing technique.
Once you select a range, a preview appears with a set of orange tabs. These are just temporary to show you how the mask looks.
Orange Preview Tabs
The second section is the ‘Apply Panel.’ This panel allows you to use the mask on a common set of adjustment layer commands within Photoshop, such as curves, levels, contrast, brightness, HSL, and selective color. It applies the masks you have selected by creating an adjustment layer with the layer controls set up from the mask. The properties of the adjustment layer can then be modified.
Lumenzia Apply Panel
The third section is the ‘Refine Panel’ for refining the mask you have selected. It allows you to group and combine your selections as well as work with edge refinement. This section of the Lumenzia panel is suited for more advanced users.
Refine Panel
Conclusion
Once you get familiar with Lumenzia, creating adjustment layers that work on your images with precision is fantastic. The online tutorials provide a wide array of examples of how to control all aspects of your images. The panels mentioned come with the full add-in program ($39.99 US), but there is also a basic free panel that helps you get a feel for how it works. The Lumenzia website can be found here.
Using Lumenzia to control your images can help you produce dynamic results for your images. Happy processing!
Have you tried Lumenzia? What results have you had with it? Please share with us in the comments below.
Wansford Bridge
The post Making Photoshop Luminosity Masks Easy with Lumenzia appeared first on Digital Photography School.
from Digital Photography School https://digital-photography-school.com/luminosity-masks-with-lumenzia/