Innholdsfortegnelse for 17-may-2014 i Amateur Photographer

WHAT qualities are required to be a great photographer? Perhaps the most important, I have come to believe, is an empathy with the subject. Many of the best wildlife photographers have a background in zoology, and as Brian Smith points out in our interview this week (pages 36-39), to succeed in portraiture you need to be a people person. A photographer with good social skills will take better portraits on a phone than an aloof photographer will achieve with the most sophisticated equipment. It’s all about rapport. Conversely, if you had to guess at the profession of Andreas Levers, whose architectural images also grace this issue (pages 22-26), you may well correctly) surmise, as I did, that he’s a graphic designer. You can see in every frame his obsession with…

A RECENTLY blinded photographer may be able to experience his images in a whole new way following a successful fundraising campaign. After Clive Egginton lost his sight from cancer, his friend Stuart Anderson embarked on a campaign to raise money to produce a touchable Braille-alike version of one of Clive’s images. Stuart had been looking for ways to help Clive when he, by chance, came across the work of Juan Torre, a Spanish photographer who has 6% vision as a result of Behçet’s disease. Juan has developed Braille-style ‘tactile’ photographs that can be interpreted via touch, by having the image raised or lowered in accordance with areas of highlight and shadow. Stuart had the idea that this technique could be applied to one of Clive’s photos. ‘Up until then, at…

Democratic Desert: TheWar in Syria By Robert King, Schilt, £35, hardback, 256 pages, ISBN978-9-05330-818-9 ‘ASAPHOTOGRAPHER,’ says Robert King, ‘it is not my job to aspire towards aesthetically pleasing images of war that are palatable to the public or the photographic community.’ He is entirely correct, and in Democratic Desert, his photographic record of the ongoing Syrian Civil War, he demonstrates his commitment to his ideals. It is not, nor should it be, a pleasant read. The first truly shocking image arrives at about a quarter of the way through, and it is certainly not the last. The Syrian conflict is a tricky beast – it has been going on so long, to such complicated ends, that many people simply don’t want to know. By showing, unflinchingly, the brutality and the…

ON HUNDRED and fifty thousand – I’ve reached a significant point in my photo collection. So what to do next? Buy yet another hard drive or is it time to get ruthless and finally sort them out? My wife said to get rid of most of them, that no one else will ever be interested in them after I’ve gone, and that she has plenty of other jobs for me to do with my time. I want be able to pass on a good record to my children, but would they be pleased to have a vast amount of photos from their youth to rediscover, or angry with me for leaving them thousands to sort through when they want only a few good ones? So I enthusiastically started going through…

CLEAN, geometric lines slice through each image in Andreas Levers’ architectural photography series Modern World, creating angular pockets of shape and form that are both pleasing and intriguing to the eye. The effect is that the images resemble pieces of drawn graphic design rather than photographs of buildings. It’s an effect that is purposeful: self-taught Levers is a designer by trade and theminimalist approach is an extension of his aesthetic preference in his day job. ‘I work as a media designer and have a fondness for the Swiss style of graphic design, which has a clean and minimalist approach,’ reveals Levers. ‘When I arrange a building in the frame, I intuitively use techniques I learned for print layout, such as balance, alignment and rhythm. That said, he confesses that these…

THE FREUDIAN concept of the uncanny is an intriguing notion. Meaning quite literally the ‘opposite of what is familiar’, it describes that odd feeling we get when we see something we know we should recognise but, for some reason, it feels quite alien. It’s difficult not to feel that way when looking at Kim Keever’s painstakingly constructed landscapes. The uncanny feeling comes not only from the fact that his images are beautifully composed replicas of natural landscapes, but also from their apparent link to art history. The construction, lighting style and romantic vision that Keever invests in his images have their seed in the kinds of landscape work producedmany years before Keever even thought of picking up a camera. ‘On many occasions, people have referenced the romantic landscape painter JMW…

Pixapro Portable LED380 Video Light £119.99 www.essentialphoto.co.uk CONTINUOUS lighting is becoming an increasingly essential piece of kit, especially if you do video work, but finding great portable units that provide decent power at an affordable price is a big challenge. The Pixapro Portable LED 380 Video Light is a circularshaped light that can be connected to 12Vmains power, or used on location with 10xAA batteries, or with the additional high-capacity 3,200mAh lithium rechargeable battery, priced at £40. Consisting of 380 LED bulbs, this unit produces a colour temperature of 5,500K and operates via a dimmer, giving good manual control over the light intensity. I found that the LED380 is not quite powerful enough at distances beyond two metres, but for closer subjects, it is good for fill lighting or even…

Join us at Pinewood Studios, the home of British film, for a one-day DSLR video tuition seminar with leading filmmaker Victoria Grech, in association with Tiffen. The session is essential for amateur photographers wanting to learn the basics of film-making with a DSLR or compact system camera, and will cover everything you need to know to get more out of that red button on your camera. We will provide you with the technical and practical skills needed to start shooting high-quality video including: O Setting up your camera for optimum results O Essential shooting skills O The importance of good audio O Understanding the jargon O Putting your new skills into practice with a live shoot In addition, you’ll get the chance to try a Steadicam, sample video accessories and…

TRIGGER-VOLTAGEQUERY QI love my Fujifilm FinePix S3 Pro, even though it’s a bit slow and I find it infuriating to review images. It takes AA batteries and produces excellent JPEGs, so it was my first choice as a travel camera. I say ‘was’, because about a year ago I tried a couple of old Vivitars and a Sunpak flash on the Fuji. Bad move! I got the dreaded ‘ERR’ warning on the top-plate and the camera seemed to have died. I sent it to the service centre, which quoted a repair figure that was too expensive, so I asked them to return the camera to me and put it away. In April 2014, I had been bidding online for a replacement S3 (which I didn’t win) and in a rush…

MY ARTICLES in this series address the fascinating proposition that older photographic gear might just prove surprisingly capable in a digital photography context. Maybe you like the idea of breathing new life into bargain-basement purchases or relish the practical challenge of using obsolete gear. So far I’ve gone as far back as the late 1970s and early ’80s with lenses, and back more than 10 years with DSLR camera bodies. This time, I’m returning to the ’80s, to examine Tamron’s 70-210mm f/3.8-4 medium telephoto zoom lens. I was pleasantly surprised at how solid its performance was – especially as it cost me the princely sum of just £20, although it was lacking a case, lens hood and cap. To be more precise, the lens in question is a Tamron 70-210mm…

“Ilford Galerie photo inkjet paper set to make dramatic comeback” • 79-point AF system • APS-C sensor • £1,000 price tag SONY TARGETSALPHA77 II AT SERIOUS ENTHUSIASTS SONY engineers tested the Alpha 77 II’s impressive AF system at horse-racing, canoeing and baseball events, before showing it to AP ahead of the camera’s official unveiling on1May. AP’s first impressions suggest the camera’s 79-point AF system is very fast, and its burst rate is impressive. ‘This could be a fantastic camera for amateur wildlife and sports photographers,’ said AP technical writer CallumMcInerney-Riley after meeting with Sony technical marketing manager Shiori Katsumata. Sony claims that the Alpha 77 II can shoot 60 full-resolution JPEG fames at up to12 frames per second. The revamped 24.3-million-pixel Alpha 77 II now includes more AF points than…

A PHOTOGRAPHER who discovered previously unseen photos of Hollywood stars at the former home of celebrity photographer George Douglas expects to uncover many more treasures. The photos, which date from the1940s, include portraits of stars such as Audrey Hepburn, Peter Sellers and Gary Cooper. The negatives were found in a ‘dilapidated filing cabinet’ at Douglas’s home in Brighton by fellow photographer Roger Bamber, who inherited his house and archive when Douglas died in 2010. Another Brighton photographer, Nigel Swallow – who is setting up a studio there – is exploring the collection and has reprinted 30, largely unseen, images for an exhibition at the house as part of this month’s Brighton Artists Open Houses festival. A spokeswoman for the festival told AP: ‘This is the tip of the iceberg... They…

101 BEAUTIFUL SMALL TOWNS IN ITALY by Paolo Lazzarin, £15.10 A host of picturesque little Italian towns are now available in pocket-sized format thanks to this pictorial guide. Italy is a wonderfully varied place – whether you’re into art, architecture, scenic landscapes or just new and inventive ways to stuff your face, there is plenty to see, do and photograph. The 101 towns on offer cover a good spread, and it’s nice to see how willing the authors are to take things off the beaten track. ● AFRICAN HEROES: SAMBURU-MAASAI by Matteo Guzzini and Moreno Gentili, £34.95 Matteo Guzzini immersed himself in the culture and the dwellings of the Maasai, photographing their customs, day-to-day lives and the individual characters he encountered. It’s the latter photographs that draw you in themost…

BRINGING YOUESSENTIAL EXPERTADVICE EVERYWEEK AS A PHOTOGRAPHER you develop several instincts, whether that’s how to accurately assess an exposure, how to frame and compose a scene, or even what exactly can constitute a viable, engaging subject. This image is one such example. This simple shot of a folded bed was taken way back in 1995 during one of the rare opportunities my family and I get to take a holiday. We found some time to take a trip to France, taking in tow our daughter who was just six months old at the time. It was actually my first visit to France. Somehow I had just never taken the opportunity to travel there despite our little island being so close to its shores. Accommodation wasn’t an issue as we were…

LOCATED at the former border between West and East Germany in Berlin, the abandoned structure shown above was once a fuel station. ‘It shows the difference in architecture between the two former countries,’ says Levers. ‘In my perception, the architect spent time and dedication designing a functional structure that has a memorable visual quality. ‘I took this photo in the chill of an early Sunday morning, using my Olympus OM-D E-M1with12-40mm lens in aperture priority mode, at 1/200sec, f/5.6 and ISO 200. ‘When I reviewed the shot on the camera display, I knew that this one alone made the trip to the location worthwhile. The pale colours and slight decay add a sense of timelessness, while the low angle of the sunlight emphasises the volume of the building, and the…

AP publishesmore reader photographs than any other photography magazine Drama in theWood 1 The mist works well with the skeletal trees, giving the image a ghostly feeling of drama Sony Alpha 77, 28mm, 0.6sec at f/14, ISO 100, tripod Learning the Light 2 The figures in the corner of the frame add awonderful human element to this landscape Sony Alpha 77, 16-80mm, 1/30sec at f/11, ISO 100, tripod Barrow Hill 3 Andy handled this strong sunrise expertly, creating a beautiful shot with no flare Sony Alpha 77, 16-80mm, 1/30sec at f/11, ISO 100, tripod Andy Hough Oxfordshire What Andy thought would be just a mildly diverting hobby quickly turned into much more than that. ‘I realised that photography is not just about pointing and shooting, but is a blank canvas…

Richard Sibley Technical editor ‘WHAT is the best lens I can get for my camera?’ It is a simple question, and one that most photographers want to know, but the answer is complicated and depends entirely on your subject. As far as all-round performance and versatility go, however, you can’t go far wrong with a good 50mm optic. With a field of view said to closely match that of human vision, the 50mm focal length is suitable for a wide range of subjects, from portraits and travel to landscapes to documentary. It is no surprise that the 50mm lens is often the second optic that many entry-level photographers buy, especially with a 50mm f/1.8 lens costing as little as £85. In fact, 50mm lenses can become a little like a…

Quiet FoggyMorning Grace Montives CanonEOS450D, 17-85mm, 1/100sec at f/10, ISO 200 DAWN is usually a time of soft light and muted colours, not bold blues and yellows. Increasing colour saturation is very often the undoing of an image, not the making of it. When colours are stronger and more powerful than they should be, the viewer stops believing what we are telling them – and the work becomes fiction rather than fact. In this image from Grace, I have desaturated the colours, making the shades in the sky and the water more suggestive than attention-grabbing. I also wanted to lighten the image without losing the blacks, so I used Levels to anchor a deeper black, while at the same time lifting the midtones and introducing brighter highlights. All the action…

Different digital devices record and display colour differently. This means that colour management is a key part of photography, as it enables an image to pass through the digital pipeline – from the camera (or scanner) to the computer, and then into print or online – without dramatic shifts in its appearance. In the simplest sense, colour management works by applying a profile to a camera, scanner, monitor or printer. This profile describes the colour properties of the device, so as a digital image is passed from the camera to the computer, or from the computer to a printer, the colours can be ‘translated’ from the old device to the new one. In this way, the red that your camera recorded is displayed as the same red on your computer…

IWASon the ground, prostrate before the majestic presence of London’s St Paul’s Cathedral, when I realised I should no longer take pictures. I started 2014 with a resolution to do more with my photography – whether that meant making a bit of money or simply applying some focus and structure to what I shoot. After a failed attempt to corner the stock-photography market, I turned to the extreme weather events that have been dominating our news. My plan was to photograph a recognisable landmark every day to capture an iconic British location in all sorts of weather, so my images would stand a greater chance of selling the next time St Jude blows a storm our way. But as I scoured the grounds of St Paul’s in search of the…

Some so-called ‘pocket cameras’ actually required the user to carry them in the ‘poachers pocket’ of their coat, such was their bulk. Not so the ‘tiny’ Zeiss Ikon ‘Bobette’, which, when closed, measured 41⁄8x 21⁄8x 11⁄8in. APwas full of praise for the newcomer, which came as ‘old stagers’ reminisced of a bygone era ‘when amateur workers cheerily used half-plate stand cameras’. The journal’s In the Shop Window column added: ‘In this pretty little instrument, whichwill do goodwork, and is far frombeing a mere toy, the filmused is of the samewidth as standard cine filmand the picture is 22 x 31mm in size. Small, it is true, but those pictures, 11⁄4x 7⁄8 inch in size will yield fine enlargements with ease.’…

MARTIN PARR could be coming to a table near you. The renowned photographer is set to tour the nation documenting Britain’s eating habits. The photographer will be travelling the country to find suitable subjects as part of the Big Mealtime Audit – a study by frozen-food maker Birds Eye. Parr’s brief is to create a ‘unique snapshot’ of typical, modern eating habits in Britain. The photographer said: ‘Whether you eat with others or on your own, in an environment that is comfortable to you, each moment can tell a story and unravel a fascinating insight into people’s lives – one of the reasons I wanted to be involved in the Birds Eye project. ‘My aim is to understand how the nation now eats, encouraging others to appreciate our different and…

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 AN ENDANGERED SPECIES Let’s face it, the practice of photography is not cheap. I understand entirely the drive to find the lowest prices. It may at times be the only option. However, it’s not the only consideration; you could be missing out on a raft of benefits. I have come to value the many bonuses of buying from a small independent shop. Shopping at these places is thoroughly enjoyable and comes with the following benefits: The well-informed staff take obvious pleasure in giving advice tailored to individual needs. They will not tell you wrong. You get to see and feel the quality of a…

THISWEEK’S tutorial features a couple of tricks rolled into one. In the first few steps I show several different ways to remove spots and blemishes. When using Lightroom or Camera Raw, it is possible to do this directly to raw images. Also, when using the very latest versions of Lightroom and Camera Raw, you are no longer restricted to spot circles and can just simply brush away unwanted marks. Where an image contains lots of fine detailed blemishes, the quickest method to use is the Dust & Scratches filter in Photoshop. This broad-brush approach does have the downside of softening image detail. But you can overcome this by increasing the Threshold slider and through the selective use of the Lighten or Darken blend modes. The distressed border effect was achieved…

1MASTER YOUR GEAR You don’t necessarily have to spend more money on better gear in order to take better photos of architecture. There is a satisfaction to be had in mastering new gear, but a new lens or high-end DSLR will not necessarily change your point of view. 2LENS CHOICEWhile it is tempting to use ultra-wide lenses for a dramatic effect and to include everything, Levers recommends trying more ‘normal’ focal lengths. There is a lot of creative latitude in leaving things out rather than trying to include everything. 3LOCATION, LOCATION Visit a place over and over again. The place may not change much, but your view will, as you assume new perspectives and develop new ideas over time. Additionally, you can try unusual times or counter-intuitive weather to get…

HARD work pays off. Brian Smith knows it well. Starting out as a sports photographer for a small-town high school, he got his first break when he summoned the courage to show his work to a local newspaper sports editor, and soon found himself shooting several assignments a day for local papers. ‘Working for newspapers providedme with the best opportunity to develop as a photographer starting out, as it required me to shoot constantly onmany different assignments,’ he says. Several more papers and a degree later, Brian found himself at The Orange County Register in California, where he landed his first big opportunity in the form of the1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. As a local photographer for a small newspaper, Brian had none of the privileged access to athletes…

PERFECT Photo Suite 8 from onOne Software is available as a standalone version or as a plug-in for Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom, Elements and Apple Aperture. The suite has eight modules comprising Browse, Layers, Enhance, Portrait, Effects, B&W, Mask and Resize. Apart from being able to make basic adjustments, such as brightness, contrast, sharpness and colour, Perfect Photo Suite 8 includes a series of presets that can transform your photos into a stylised masterpiece. The included presets will save you hours of editing time in other photoediting applications. The Enhance module, showing larger presets on the left and Quick Fixes on the right. Below are sliders for precise control The Enhance module enabled the colours to be brought to life. A sepia tone and border were then added using the B&Wmodule…

FOTOSPEED has a new line of panoramic inkjet paper, giving the option to print letterbox-style images without the need for specialist roll media. This 210x594mm size of this paper means that panoramic images can be printed using most A4 printers that have a rear gravity feed, as well as larger-format printers. Before printing, your image has to be cropped to 210x594mm to produce the letterbox format, then rotated by 90˚. The print settings need to be set to Photoshop Manages Colours and the correct profile selected for the media in use. In the printer’s Print Settings, ensure that Off (no colour adjustment) is selected, as this prevents the printer from applying its own profile. For media size, click the User Defined button, enter the width of the paper as 210mm…

ON TEST PANASONIC LUMIXDMC-GH4 We test Panasonic’s most advanced CSC,with 4K video and 16.05-million-pixel Live MOS sensor SONYAWARDWINNERS RESULTS We reveal theamazingProfessional Categorywinners from the 2014 SonyWorld Photography Awards ON TEST NIKON1V3 Is Nikon’s latest system camera the perfect partner for your DSL Weput it to the test CLOSE ENCOUNTERS Will Burrard-Lucas explains howheuses remote-controlled devices to photograph wildlife in a newway…