Innholdsfortegnelse for January 4, 2014 i Amateur Photographer

AFTER the annual festival of gluttony and sloth that has just ended, it’s traditional to start thinking about New Year resolutions. Like most people, mine usually entail stepping away from the fridge and re-acquainting my lazy backside with the concept of cardiovascular exercise. Sometimes I manage to keep this up until Easter, but not often. However, my resolution for 2014 will be a pleasure, not a chore. This year marks the tenth anniversary of the last time I shot a roll of film. It was Fujichrome Velvia, and it was in Iceland. To be fair, I do have a good excuse for this lapse. As Editor of AP’s sister title What Digital Camera, there has been an endless merry-go-round of new digital cameras to try. But now that I am…

Revue By Eugenio Recuenco TeNeues, £70, hardback, 300 pages, ISBN 978-3-832-79728-7 ALTHOUGH Eugenio Recuenco has been a fashion photographer for a number of years (his work has appeared in various publications, including Vogue), Revue represents the first solo book of his images. It’s a large, luxurious collection, the grandiose bulk of which suits Recuenco’s larger-than-life style of photography. Fashion photography is not exactly prized for its subtlety or restraint, and Recuenco revels in the freedom this gives him to create ostentatious, absurd tableaux. Scenes are inspired by fairy tales, classic movies, murder scenes and, in one memorable case, a panoramic Greek frieze. Recuenco borrows, lifts and changes pictures and iconography from any and all sources as he chooses, producing dizzying and dreamlike images. You can call it ridiculous, you can…

IT’S THAT time of the year when families get together, eat too much, sleep too much and suffer the groans caused by Christmas cracker jokes. Like: ‘Why can’t Santa come down the chimney this year? Because he’s not had his flue jab!’ And, worse: ‘What do you give someone who has everything? Antibiotics!’ On a more serious note: What do you give a photographer who has everything, to make him change? Or, to turn it around: What should a photographer with everything do to make 2014 better? In my case, I’m determined, as a resolution, to sort out the post-picture situations I’ve been meaning to do but have left alone. First, I plan to back up everything quicker to my hard drive before I regret it. I know, people give…

AT FIRST glance, you could be forgiven for thinking that Mikko Lagerstedt’s images look more like the result of Photoshop than a skilled photographer’s work. However, as well as knowing how to make the most of today’s digital world, Mikko is a very talented photographer. While Mikko admits to using Lightroom, and occasionally Photoshop, he is a keen advocate of trying to find the right location first. The atmosphere, he says, comes from being in the right place at the right time. ‘The thing I search for is the right conditions,’ says Mikko. ‘I try to go out when there is fog and at night. I like dim light sources, and when there is fog even the street lights become these big light sources with diffusers. I also prefer to…

AS WELL as her trusty inexpensive flash unit, Dusica also has a host of other equipment that accompanies her on a shoot. ‘I use a Nikon D5000 camera, a kit lens, a Nikkor 55-200mm f/4-5.6, a Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 and a Nikkor 35mm f/1.8,’ she says. ‘I use a tripod, but only when I have to. What I like about the kit lens is that I can come really close to the subject – I shot my Round Five, Floral Still Life photo with it.’ The Nikon D5000 was a well-received camera on release, but it did draw some criticism for its relatively unimpressive ISO range – native 3200 expandable to just 6400, which wasn’t all that high even in 2009 when the camera was launched. However, as one of…

THE TIME Lapse Shot mode instantly caught my eye when I first flicked through the GM1’s specification list. Most cameras don’t have such a mode, so I was keen to see it in action. Essentially, the time-lapse mode makes use of a built-in intervalometer, which enables the user to shoot a sequence of images at intervals of between 1sec and 99mins 99secs, adjustable in 1sec increments. The number of shots can also be set to between 1 and 9,999. Once images have been captured, they are stored sequentially in a folder on the camera. These images can then be imported into programs such as Adobe After Effect, Adobe Lightroom, Adobe Premier or QuickTime Pro, and made into a video composition. I set up my time-lapse sequence to take 240 shots…

COMPARING PRINTERS Q I would like to buy a printer and favour either the Epson Stylus Photo R3000 or Epson Stylus Pro 3880 (pictured above), but how do the Canon printers compare with these two Epson models? Robin Law A There’s quite some difference between an A3+ printer (like the R3000) and an A2 model (such as the 3880). Regardless of make, an A2-format printer will take up more space (although not a great amount in this instance), and there are usually significant cost differences. With the two printers you’ve noted, the move from A3+ to A2 would immediately increase the purchase price by around £400 (the R3000’s RRP is £570.99 and the 3880’s is £974.18). The running costs of an A2 printer shouldn’t be underestimated, either. Each of the…

Man dies in quest for Snowdon sunset • Tribute to club man AMATEUR’S FALL FROM SNOWDON WAS ACCIDENT AN AMATEUR photographer died after a fall on Mount Snowdon in North Wales, where he had gone to take photographs, an inquest has heard. Gerry Coyle, 65, a member of Dunchurch Photographic Society in Warwickshire, went missing on Mount Snowdon on 25 October 2012. Gerry, pictured centre, reportedly fell 150ft from the Welsh mountain after trying to take photos of a sunset. ‘He had gone out to do some photography,’ Caernarfon Coroners Court confirmed to AP. The court heard that Gerry died from a fractured skull and that his body was found in a gulley, but not until 19 April 2013. Coroner Nicola Jones recorded a verdict of accidental death. The father…

• GERDA TARO: INVENTING ROBERT CAPA by Jane Rogoyska, £35 Jane Rogoyska sets out to prevent Robert Capa’s lover and partner Gerda Taro from becoming a ‘historical footnote’, and time will tell if she succeeds. Taro, herself a committed and talented photojournalist, was determined to escape the shadow of her famous partner, and it was in this endeavour that she was killed by a tank in 1937 at the age of just 26. Rogoyska does some good detective work and the result is an engaging, visually stimulating read. • PHOTOGRAPHER’S PUZZLE BOOK by Marcus Weeks, £6.99 Test your brain and your memory with this fun pocket book of puzzles of a photographic nature. Marcus Weeks has compiled a good mix of challenges, from long logic puzzles to short bouts of…

BRINGING YOU ESSENTIAL EXPERT ADVICE EVERY WEEK I HAVE been involved with children’s fashion and advertising photography for around 12 years. At the beginning of my career I was shooting a lot of family lifestyle imagery, but as time went on, at the suggestion of my agent, I gravitated more towards photographing children’s fashion. I put together a portfolio of images and took it to show Junior magazine, which is based in London. Right away, they gave me some work and everything fell into place. It’s now my speciality, and I understand the key differences between shooting adults and shooting kids. The first thing to remember when photographing children is to always plan ahead. If I’m shooting an advertising job, what’s important is that the client specifies exactly what it…

Sam Burton Londo When Sam was 12 years old, he and a friend set up a darkroom in a garden shed and from there a love for photography was born. Sam enjoys landscape and street photography. ‘I love getting up early to catch the best light and see people begin their daily lives,’ he says. As Sam lives in London, he feels he always has more places that he can explore, and in the future he is looking forward to getting back into film photography after acquiring some old 35mm cameras. To see more of his images, visit www.samburtonphoto.com. The winner of the Editor’s Choice picture of the week will receive a HelloCanvas 16x24in canvas print (including shipping) worth £36.95 The Editor’s Choice will be printed onto a high-quality canvas…

GJON Mili was one of photography’s great innovators. He combined visual artistry with technical excellence and was the first professional photographer to shoot using stroboscopic lighting. In a long and diverse career mainly working for Life magazine, he photographed flm stars, artists, musicians, dancers, politicians, sporting events and architecture. Mili was born in Albania in 1904 and grew up in Bucharest, Romania, before emigrating to the USA at the age of 18. He became an electrical engineering student at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and graduated in 1927. Afterwards, he worked on lighting research for the Westinghouse Lamp Company in Massachusetts to earn a living, but experimented with photography on an amateur basis. He was completely selftaught. ‘It was ten years before I was able to proft materially from my…

British Superbike Championship Samuel Hunt Fujifilm FinePix HS20EXR, focal length unknown, 1/250sec at f/5.6, ISO 320 THE MOMENT I saw this image as a thumbnail, I was fairly certain it was a British Superbike Championship round at the Brands Hatch racing circuit in Kent – and I may have been at the same race. What struck me was the unusual (for sports photographs) crop. The ‘letterbox’ works perfectly with the sweep of the bend, leading us into the image at the top left corner and drawing us diagonally across the frame (a ‘fast’ direction for the eye to travel in). You could argue that the right side of the frame is a little empty, but this seemingly dead space actually adds to the notion of danger and high-speed action. It…

SHOOTING in the raw file format produces the best results from a digital camera, but processing raw files can be time-consuming and arduous. DxO Labs has launched a new version of an application that helps process and enhance digital photos quickly. DxO Optics Pro 9 has several tools for automatically processing both raw and JPEG images, including optical and geometric corrections, intelligent optimisation of exposure and contrast, noise reduction, and preservation of colours and details. DxO Optics Pro 9 also includes a library of 30 presets that can be adapted to your personal preferences to bring out the best quality from your photos with a few clicks. When DxO Optics Pro 9 is launched, the interface opens in Organize mode. This is a hierarchy display of your computer’s folders. If…

AP GUIDE COMPOSITION Lee Frost explains why, by keeping things simple, your images can be far more effective ON TEST NIKON AW1 The 1-series line-up has been extended with the AW1, a fully waterproof interchangeable-lens camera. We find out how tough it is NELSON MANDELA PHOTOGRAPHING MANDELA Senior Magnum photographer Ian Berry talks about his time in South Africa and his experience of photographing Nelson Mandela AP EXPLAINS UNDERSTANDING COLOUR Professor Bob Newman tackles the subject of colour and colour rendition ON TEST SIX OF THE BEST We test six jackets that are perfect for the outdoor photographer…

LETTER OF THE WEEK Wins a great shockproof, waterproof and dustproof 5-Proof Technology 16GB Samsung SDHC Plus memory card offering up to 48MB/sec transfer speed. www.samsung.com/memorycard THANKS FOR THE INSPIRATION I started learning photography in 2009. Thanks to the internet, I was able to learn the basics by myself, and in 2010 I began taking a short photography course about ‘How to See’. After that course, my way of seeing the world changed. I began paying more attention to shapes, lines, textures and colours, and these now make up most of my photos. Unfortunately, most people I know don’t really understand what my photographs are. I always give constructive criticism and tips to others, but rarely show my own photographs because no one can give any comments about them. I…

THE PHOTOMERGE feature in Photoshop has evolved over the years to provide high-quality image stitches. The key to getting good results using the technique described here is to shoot with at least a 25% overlap between each exposure. When using wideangle lenses, an even bigger overlap will be necessary. If possible, it is a good idea to shoot using the same exposure setting for all the exposures. However, with some subjects it may be necessary to compensate for exposure differences between the ground and the sky. It is best to not have the exposure vary too much between exposures, though, as this may make it tricky to get the auto-blend step to work successfully. One of the hardest things when using Photomerge is to predict what the outcome will be,…

THE AMATEUR Photographer of the Year competition 2013 is all over. After ten rounds, thousands of entries and 500 images selected by our judges, all that’s left is dust, smoke and a handful of determined photographers whose images shone consistently and brightly enough to pull ahead of the pack. Yes, this year’s APOY has drawn to a close, and after a protracted battle, Dusica Paripovic of Bosnia and Herzegovina has emerged the winner. Dusica entered every APOY round, and the judges always looked forward to her interpretations of the briefs. There are many aspects of technique and style that make Dusica’s images undeniably hers – the sparse, creative use of lighting, effective simplicity in composition and colour –yet it was never possible to predict what she would enter for any…

WHILE compact cameras score over DSLRs with regard to portability, they can’t compare in terms of image quality. A mix of lightweight, compact design and decent image quality is therefore a balance that camera manufacturers are keen to get right, and it seems that Panasonic has made good progress towards achieving this. The company’s new Lumix DMC-GM1 is a tiny micro four thirds compact system camera with impressive specifications. Essentially, it is the redesigned inner workings of Panasonic’s top-end Lumix DMC-GX7 in a body that fits in the palm of your hand. The company has identified its target market as 22 to 40-year-old young (and not-so-young) professionals – the kind of people who want a camera they can keep with them all the time to photograph their lifestyle and the…

Lollipod Support Stand £29.99 www.lollipod.co.uk LOLLIPOD is a versatile support stand designed to be used as a boom arm, monopod or tripod. In construction, it is similar to a light stand and has three feet at the base. The main shaft consists of four telescopic sections that are bevelled to prevent them rotating. These sections have no locking mechanism, instead extending under tension that can support a maximum payload of 420g. Collapsed down, the Lollipod is just 32cm, but at full extension it stands 113cm tall. Weighing just 320g, the Lollipod is supplied with a carry case, which makes it very portable. A small tripod head at the top has full 360° rotation and can be adjusted to any position between horizontal and vertical, which allows a camera to be…

WITH a name like Sputnik, this three-eyed monster of a camera could only have come from the USSR. Lovers – and I use the term advisedly – of Soviet-era cameras will spot its origins immediately. It is clearly a Siamese twin version of the Lubitel 2, a workhorse budget twin-lens reflex, an updated version of which is still in production today. Many Russian cameras were in production for long periods. The Sputnik was introduced in 1955 and discontinued in 1974, and it was made in the Lomo factory in what is now St Petersburg. The original Lubitel was one of the first cameras I owned. I bought it new when I was at school in the 1970s for around £15, which was a lot cheaper than any other comparable mediumformat…