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Welcome to the 10th issue of PhotoFlash
Hi
I hope your holiday season is going great and all the preparations are wrapping up nicely.
Our Featured Photo by Drake Olmstead reminds us that even if it's cold, it could be colder. This one of 384 beautiful contest finalists from our November photo contest. See all of the gorgeous finalists at:
http://www.betterphoto.com/gallery/dynoGall2.asp?catID=2485
And in our countdown of top tips for photographing during the holidays, we are now on #7 and soon to be on #6... visit the following page each day to learn a new tip:
http://www.betterphoto.com/exploring/topten/holiday-photography-tips.asp
May your holidays be filled with harmony, the joy of gift-giving, and inspiring photo ideas.
To read the online version of PhotoFlash at our Web site, visit http://www.betterphoto.com/photoflashes/
Have a great month!
Jim Miotke
http://www.betterphoto.com/MG.asp?ID=124
In This Issue: Saturday, December 20, 2003
Featured Photo: Icy Wind and Waves
 Icy Wind and Waves Taken at South Haven Mi, Dec 2002, 1/6.4sec, F7.1, ASA 200 equiv., Sigma 200mm © Drake Olmstead Nikon D100 Digital... |
Featured Article: Polaroid Emulsion and Image Transfers
What would happen if one of your favorite pictures accidentally slipped into a pot of boiling water? Or what would happen if you could press the inks of your photo unto another surface such as watercolor paper. With Polaroids, the results could be something like the images in this month's featured gallery. And whether you shoot digital images, slides, or prints, you can transform them into beautiful and unique creations. Be sure to also check out the emulsion transfer gallery linked at the bottom. Both feature the inspiring work of one of our newest instructors, the great Kathleen Carr.
Read more...
Where in the World? To learn the correct answer to the last quiz - and see who came the closest, visit the previous Where in the World quiz. Join an Exciting Online PhotoCourse™ at BetterPhoto.com Each of our online photography classes are designed to teach you how to make great photos - whether you shoot with a digital camera, shoot with a conventional camera, use a Polaroid transfer system, or tinker with Photoshop. With eye-opening lessons, inspiring weekly assignments, and helpful critiques direct from the instructor, you just can't miss with an online photo course. Learn more... New Photo Discussions Lorie, Thanks for the comments and observation. The thunbnail looks like little robots in white hats. ahhh,guess I was out in the cold too long this morning. Hi Stephen, Carolyn, and Murry, Thanks for the comments. It really wasn't that bad this time. Nothing like the blizzards that we had last year. The worst of this was while it was actually snowing because we had a literal white out for hours on end. I don't even remember it being that hard to see when it was snowing during the blizzards. This snow came down hard and wet but was melted away in two days. Tomorrow though, we are expecting more and I'm not ready for it again this quickly!! Actually, several things are going on here: Try your PC monitor as a light box!! It works great. I just create a new image in my editing program at 1024X768 at 72dpi. That is what my monitor resolution is set at. Then I fill it with a texture fill or some other image. I then do a full screen view on the image so it fills my monitor completely. Set the glass vase up in front of it and take a long exposure at the highest F-stop you have. It's nice the 60mm Micro Nikkor goes up to F36, but I'm sure it would still work great with less than that. It's a cheap way to get a nice lightbox...although I wish I had a larger monitor...LOL. Interestingly, I did not realize at the time that photographing logos is not a great idea. So with Photoshop's Clone Stamp tool, I removed the Mac apple logo. The Next Step: Where to Go From Here
Can you guess where this picture was taken? If you think you have a clue, try offering a response.
© Kerry A. Drager
kerrydrager.com
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Improve your photographic skills while having a great time making stunningly pretty pictures.
New Photo Discussion 1: Soaring Heating Bills
Nice shot of an oxymoron. Good eye Donna. Like the way you caught the lines and shapes of he snow on them. Well done.
SOARING HEATING BILLS
Gas meters covered with towering snow . Shot in the morning light the day after y snow storm. Canon 70-200 L lens.
© Donna Rae
DonnaraePhotography.com
Canon EOS D60 Digi...
- Lori Ditlefsen
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Response 1:Just when I was trying to forget that snowstorm! Love the repetitive mountains of snow on each one. Well seen.
- Paul Coco
Response 2:Hi Paul, I agree, Just when we were prepared to forget about the snow, I popped this up, and now another snow storm is on it's way tomorrow. Thanks for the comments!
- Donna Rae
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Response 3:Good eye, design and image, Donna! You are the champ of foul weather photography!!
- Murry Grigsby
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Response 4:Good job making a good photo out of an ordinary scene.
- William Raco
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Response 5:William , I really got a laugh out of your comment. Men seem to have the heart of little boys in them no matter how old they are. I'll have to admit that these meters actually do look like little robots with white hats or maybe marching aliens. Who knows. Still laughing... Thanks Bill!!
- Donna Rae
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 2: The Eye of the Dragon
One word. 
The Eye of the Dragon
Experiment using a 28mm Wide Angel Lens in a reverse mount, F8, Shutter speed 1/60 sec to photograph a Juvenile Bearded Dragon eye. None of the camera features function with a reverse mount, so this was done in Manual Mode. Settings above were "best guess", but I'm not even sure if the aperture DOF function is accurate in the reverse position. Despite the PITA aspects of shooting in this fashion is that the magnification is huge, the ratio appears to be somewhere between 3 and 5 to
© Eric Highfield
StoneHorseStudios.com
Nikon D100 Digital...
Awesome.
I will have to look into reverse lense macro. I had heard of it, but never followed it up. Being familiar with the bearded dragon, I can really appreciate the result of your experiment.
- Phillip J. Martin
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Response 1:Cool image Eric.. great details!
- Susan Peek-Swint
Response 2:Hi Phillip and Susan. Thank you for your kind comments! I'm glad you enjoyed the photo. The reverse Mount trick is definitely not convenient, as you have to do all of the settings manually, but with some patience, it can yield some great photos. There are some limitations with it compared to a true Macro lens... First of all, you have to get really close to the subject, for this shot, my lens was less then 1/2 an inch from the Dragon's Eye to get proper focus! The second limitation is Depth of field. A true macro lens is capable of Aperture settings of F45 or even smaller. Most lenses suitable for Reverse mount are limited to about F22. If you are interested in this technique I encourage you to check out the work of Dr. Mark Plonsky. He is a master of Macro and the reverse mount, and has come up with a system of mounting a 50mm 1.4 Pentax lens on a Canon Powershot G3 which uses the built in camera lens & and reverse Pentax together for even higher reproduction ratios, and overcoming some of the weaknesses of the reverse mount by itself that I've mentioned earlier. A link to some of Mark's work is below... I also believe he has a tutorial somewhere as well. Here's the link.
- Eric Highfield
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 3: Coming Ashore, Maine
Wow, I love everything about this... is this Rockport?...
Coming ashore, Maine
© Brenda Tharp
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Travel Photog Course
- Wanda Judd
Response 1:YES! How could you tell? A boat in fog could be anwhere east coast...what gave it away or was it just a lucky guess since I teach there twice a year? :>))
- Brenda Tharp
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Beyond the Postcard: Travel Photography
Response 2:I love Rockport and Maine Workshops (as you know... one of my favorite classes was yours). I go to this site a lot when I'm there and the next time I go, I'm going to look for this guy...
- Wanda Judd
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 4: Frosted Garden 2
It's so pretty! What time of day was it?
Frosted Garden 2
55mm macro lens; Kodachrome 25
© Kerry A. Drager
kerrydrager.com
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Field Techniques Course
- Leslie widing
Response 1:Hi Leslie: Thanks for your comment ... I'm glad you like this photo! Also, a good question!
Again, Leslie, thanks for commenting!!
- Kerry A. Drager
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Response 2:How beautiful, Kerry! Thanks for sharing your tips.
- Linda Ann Murphy
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Response 3:Hi Linda: You're welcome, and thanks for your comments ... I appreciate it!
- Kerry A. Drager
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 5: Three Ballerinas
This is a beautiful image. All of your images are great, but this one really interests me. What camera, lens and film did you use? Is there a special finish used? Did you use a filter? If so, what kind/type? Thank you for sharing.
Three Ballerinas
© Vik Orenstein
Photographing Kids Course
Studio Lighting Course
- Joe
Response 1:Thanks for your interest! This shot was made with Fuji Reala film (160) and scanned to digital, where I played with it in Photoshop so much I don't remember what filter(s) I used. This was shot with just a regular old Nikon 8008 with a 35mm-105mm zoom.
- Vik Orenstein
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 6: Delightful Distortion
This is wonderful, Heather!!
Delightful Distortion
A cut glass vase with a swirled design placed in front of my PC monitor which I filled with a striped texture fill image and used it as a light box. 60mm Micro Nikkor, 10 seconds at F36.
© Heather K. McFarland
Nikon D1X Digital ...
- Colette M. Metcalf
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Response 1:Wonderfully creative, Heather. An eyecatching image and terrific abstract.
- Paul Coco
Response 2:Heather+Nikon Digital+Nikon Macro= Simply stunning imagery with incredible detail and colour! :-)
Cheers Adam
- Adam Bolt
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Response 3:Creativity; originality; WOW; Oh, my!
Stunning! WOW! Anything left?
Aloha,
Stan
- Stanley Contrades
Response 4:Wow... thank you for the kind comments folks. I wasn't sure if this would be too abstract for many folks. I'm glad you all liked it.
- Heather K. McFarland
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 7: Foggy Forest, Presidio, CA
I love this foggy forest!
Foggy Forest, Presidio, CA
Overexposed 2/3 stop from meter reading.
© Brenda Tharp
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Canon EOS 1N SLR C...
:) gy
- Gaby Cunha
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Response 1:Thanks so much, Gaby! It's a place I go to quite often when I think there's going to be fog - every picture turns out so different from a rather small place - it's amazing!
- Brenda Tharp
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Response 2:This photo almost looks like a screen saver image on my Mac computer, I like it very much. It is quite hard to come by shots like these in my area, everything is so wild unless you enter someone's private property.
- Alois Lazecky
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Response 3:Thanks, Alois! But remember you can always ask to get on to private property if you see something you like! Most people will say yes.
- Brenda Tharp
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 8: What Went Wrong?
My guess is the compact flash couldn't generate enough light for the distance especially since the right side of the group are all in dark tuxs and there nothing above our behind the group for the light to bounce from. A shot like this takes some real light power. There are some actions for Photoshop that will help under-exposed photos but I'm not sure about this particular one? Do a Goggle search on Photoshop underexposure actions or plugins. Good luck!
What went wrong
aperture was 16, lens Minolta zoom 28-80, probably at 80. About 7pm, used FugiNPH prof 400, with compact flash,haze filter
© Jessica J. Lueken
Minolta Maxxum 5 S...
- Murry Grigsby
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Response 1:Hey, Jessica, I think Murry is right on. You can see the line where the flash falls off about 3 feet in front of the group, and light falls off very fast as it travels out. You don't say what shutter speed (camera sync speed is probably 1/60 or 1/125?), but f16 is a pretty small aperture, though I think you might have been concerned about depth of field. Alternatives..? Try bunching the group together more by stacking rows and moving in closer with a wider angle lens. Get above the group on a stool, ladder, planter box...to shorten the depth of field plane allowing larger aperture. Mostly Murry hit it on the head...more light--strobes, monolights, floods, synced compact flashes, yard lights...whatever you have available. Also, a flash meter might give you better control (information) than if you rely on the camera's meter, or estimate by the guide number on your flash. Don't give up! Nice composition in this shot, and good use of the gazebo for prop. A group this big is a REAL challenge. Kudos to you for even trying! Good luck, and keep shooting.
- David H. Clukey
Response 2:Just my opinion from my bad experiences so here it goes. First off in a shot like this with them in a straight line you can use a more wide open DOF because everything across is on the same plane so only things in front of and behind will be out of focus. As far as the underexposure, the flash saw the white runner in the foreground and shut down before there was actually enough light to reach the people. As I am told there is no simple solution to this and no flash strong enough to compensate so you must remove the white runner from the start of your image. I hope this helps as this is how a very smart photo guy explained it to me.
- Cathy I. Barrows
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Response 3:Thank You Murry, David and Cathy. This is a difficult shot, hopefully when I attempt this same shot in the future it will come out better. I do rely on my camara's metering system, but maybe I shouldn't all the time. So I need to use a wider angle lens, open up the aperture more, maybe overexpose the picture, and use more portable lighting. The runner was permanent. Anything else? I can help this picture in photoshop, but I need to be able to create a better picture to begin with. Thank you so much for your remarks.
- Jessica J. Lueken
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Respond to this discussion New Photo Discussion 9: Green with Envy
How do you set up for such a deep black background? How is your light setup as well, please? Thanks
Green with Envy
Mouse washed in green light, using gels and studio lighting set-up.
© Jim Miotke
- Tracy Dat
Response 1:For this image, I used black seamless paper by Savage. I covered my studio heads with green gel filters.
- Jim at BetterPhoto.com
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Respond to this discussion
If you would like to be featured in PhotoFlash, we look for photo discussions that educate, inspire, and encourage BetterPhoto members. In the spirit of helping others become better photographers, we encourage you to share details, tips, and techniques in your discussions... after all, that is what BetterPhoto is all about - honest answers for budding photographers.
Until next time, thanks for reading and keep having fun with photography!
Jim Miotke
BetterPhoto.com, Inc.
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