Category: Techniques

Photographic techniques with a camera

The On-line Lighting Diagram Creator

 Gavin   Techniques, Tips

Lighting Diagram Tool

The On-line Lighting Diagram Creator, brought to you by QH Photography, is a great tool and very easy to use too.

Use the library of built in shapes to quickly and easily sketch your lighting set-up. Whenever I use this tool I always follow this workflow:

  1. Place the background in the scene
  2. Add the subject and camera, rotating as required
  3. Next place your key light and modifier into the scene
  4. Add any secondary and fill lights, again with the correct modifiers
  5. Lastly, add your background lights and modifiers

Rotate and scale all the items in your set so they’re Continue reading The On-line Lighting Diagram Creator »

Darkness visible? Very Low Light Photography

 Gavin   Available Light, Digital Darkroom, Equipment, Lightroom, Low Light, Techniques

Very Low Light Photography on the Canon 5DmkII

5DmkII ISO25600 Pre Noise Reduction
5DmkII ISO25600 Pre Noise Reduction

Earlier this week I had the pleasure of photographing a really cool jazz band at the Electric Theatre in Guildford. During the shoot I spotted (or rather almost spotted) one of the band members sitting in one of the seats in the auditorium. I say almost spotted because with only the stage lights on the auditorium was very dark, only being lit by the reflected lit from the stage. It was such a low light that I could hardly see him with the naked eye. This was a great opportunity to see what the 5DmkII could really do at it’s highest ISO setting. In most situations I photograph in I don’t normally take the ISO much above 1600. Every now and then the environment calls for something different and the extreme low light of the auditorium at the Electric Theatre was a good example.

With the camera on manual mode I metered the scene and dialed in an exposure of 1/50th, f/3.5, ISO25600. Apart from a very slight white balance tweak the image above is straight off the camera. Continue reading Darkness visible? Very Low Light Photography »

Cameras don’t take pictures…

 Gavin   Journey, Musings, Techniques

That really resonated with me. It’s the first half of a quote the other evening by Bambi Cantrell (amazing photographer, go check her out then come back and read this). I heard it yesterday evening but it’s the second half that holds the true meaning.

Cameras don’t take pictures. People take pictures. Click to Tweet

I think it goes a bit deeper than that though and here’s why… Continue reading Cameras don’t take pictures… »