Innholdsfortegnelse for 26-Nov-2016 i Amateur Photographer

What’s the first thing you do after you’ve unpacked a new camera and attached the strap? A lot of photographers treat the camera as they would a TV, tending to turn it on and forget about how it works once they’re happy it can do the essentials. However, they’re missing a trick. Modern cameras are highly customisable, and it’s not just about basic stuff like turning off the focusing beep – you can exert a lot of control over exposure, shooting and image-review options, fine-tuning the camera so it’s an even more powerful tool. The options can be bewildering, though, so if you’re worried about accidentally fouling things up, check out our new series on camera customisation on pages 28-30. We guarantee it will get you working faster and smarter.…

GOPRO has issued a recall notice on all its Karma drones, after multiple reports have appeared of them losing power mid-flight and plummeting to earth for unknown reasons. The action-cam company has stressed that there has been no property or personal damage caused by incidents so far, although in the weeks since the release of the drone a number of videos have appeared on the internet of power failures featuring some rather near misses. While it has not yet been established what the problem with the Karma is, GoPro has said it intends to resume sales once appropriate fixes are made. Drones are one of the photography world's fastest-growing markets. Announced at Photokina this year, the Karma was GoPro's first drone, and no doubt intended to be a contender against…

Chris Weston Chris became a professional wildlife photographer in 2001 after leaving his job in IT to follow his passion. His clients include the BBC, ITV, The Times, The Sunday Times, The Daily Telegraph,TheIndependent,The Guardian and National Geographic. To see more visit www.chrisweston. photography While shooting an assignment about a year after turning professional, I had a light-bulb moment. I was in Tanzania photographing the annual wildebeest migration as it passed across the Grumeti River. It was a slow day and photographic opportunities were few and far between. I don’t know if you’ve ever paid attention to wildebeest, but they’re not Africa’s most alluring creatures. Africans often describe them as ‘the animal God created out of the leftover parts of other animals’. Don’t get me wrong, I like wildebeest, it’s just…

You answered… What you said ‘The reasons photographers are put off taking portraits are the progressive adverse attitudes now prevalent in society.’ ‘I love taking candid portraits but hate the idea of getting “caught” doing so. Nowadays I get my fix of candid portraiture by attending events where people expect to end up in pictures, such as 1940s days, parades, folk events and the like.’ ‘I’ve never enjoyed portraiture for the sake of it. I remind myself of the old portrait painter who used to do portraits for money so he could paint landscapes.’ ‘Most of my photography is devoted to selling stock, and portraits don’t sell unless the subject is infamous or famous or doing something of wider interest.’ Join the debate on the AP forum This week we…

It's been another great year for the Amateur Photographer of the Year competition, sponsored by Sigma. We're proud to say that the quality of entries has got stronger with each passing year, almost to the point that placing some of our entries side by side with the work of professionals has caused us something of a double-take. And nowhere is this more apparent than in our black & white round, which perhaps stands as our most popular. Black & white photography is as popular as ever. The depth of expression that monochrome allows is unparalleled, as demonstrated over the following pages. But as always there is only one winner, and in this final round it is Adele Spencer from Dublin, Ireland. Adele takes home a Sigma 24-105mm f/4 DG OS…

Magnum Photos: Poster Book (Icons) • www.thamesandhudson.com • £19.96 MAGNUM is arguably the world's most famous photo agency and some of the most iconic images are featured in this beautifully produced poster book. With 20 detachable poster-sized prints on heavyweight paper from the likes of Henri Cartier-Bresson, Elliott Erwitt, Eve Arnold and Martine Franck, it's a great way to decorate your home with some fantastic photo art. The quality of reproduction is excellent, belying the bargain price. London Stereoscopic Company Owl virtual reality kit • www.londonstereo.com • £25 STEREOSCOPIC, or 3D photography, used to be the preserve of expensive specialist kit, but now it's accessible to anyone who owns a smartphone. It's easy both to shoot stereo pictures and to display them on your phone's screen. You'll still need…

‘Personally, I congratulate Canon on making the dual pixel raw available’ A few months ago I wrote about plenoptic cameras (AP 28 May), the most well-known example being the Lytro Light Field camera, which has recently been ‘put on steroids' and become a motion-picture camera providing remarkable facilities. These pertain mainly to the extra capabilities that editors have in post-processing, from changing the point of focus, through altering the apparent position of the camera to selecting a subject according to its distance from the camera and rendering that subject alone. As explained in the article, a plenoptic camera works by taking many images, each with a large depth of field and each from a slightly different position. In effect, each of the images captures the effects of a bundle of…

There are some areas of America that carry an almost mythic quality. Ansel Adams understood this. As a result, we now have a body of incredible work, the influence of which is felt to this day. Of similar pre-eminent influence is National Geographic, which has produced some of the most incredible photographic images, including many that were taken in the US. A new volume by Taschen, called The United States of America with National Geographic, is a great example of the imagery that has graced the publication's pages. Some of the colour-saturated vintage images are truly astonishing, such as this one showing a National Parks Service guide addressing visitors in Kentucky's Mammoth Cave, the world's longest cave system at 390 miles of known passageway. The large-format book is available now…

Something that's been on my mind recently is the idea of artist statements. These are those little pieces of information that arrive with a photographer's project. Anyone who's been through three years of a photography degree will know what I'm talking about. You spend your final year sweating over a collection of images that form a whole project, and then your tutors ask you to sum up the ‘meaning' of your work. Generally, they consist of the photographer ‘questioning, ‘challenging' and, more often than not, telling the viewer how they should feel when they look at the work. Basically, photographers are expected to tell you what a work is about because you're just not smart enough. However, it really shouldn't be this way. I had the great fortune to meet…

‘I’ve worked out what I like doing and developed something approaching a visual style’ My winning Take a view Landscape Photographer of the Year image is an event that I’ve wanted to witness for several years – the starling murmuration on Brighton beach (right). I travelled there last year with the intention of seeing it, but didn’t come away with much. Suffice to say, this year I was more prepared. I also took my parents with me because they hadn’t seen the murmurations before. The first thing that struck me as we stood on Brighton’s East Pier was the initial feeling of amazement as these birds flew around us – it’s a very 3D experience. One minute the birds are whooshing over your head and then a split second later…

Late one evening about a month or so ago, there was a knock on my front door. I opened it to find my next-door neighbour standing there, with a grin on his face, asking if I’d be keen to take on what was, in his words, a ‘photography challenge’. Having seen some of my photographs from a photo shoot with the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), and knowing how passionate I am about going all-out to capture unique shots, he thought I might be the best person to speak to for what would be a special moment for him and his family. As we began to discuss what he had in mind, he got my full attention when he mentioned the word ‘Spitfire’. It transpired that his father’s boyhood dream…

Lomo temporary tattoos www.lomography.com £5.90 Easy-to-apply temporary camera tattoos that come in a pack of five designs. Camera lens mug www.debenhams.com £15 Complete with a lens-hood lid that doubles as a coaster or biscuit holder. Camera tote bag shop.tate.org £15 Decorated with old film cameras to make shopping more bearable. Chocolate camera www.thechocolate workshop.co.uk £35 A full-size 35mm SLR made of chocolate. What’s not to like? Camera pencil sharpener www.npg.org.uk £16 A TLR-shaped sharpener with a built-in drawer to collect shavings. Camera USB stick www.amazon.co.uk £9 Carry your image files in style; available in lots of different designs. 35mm-film cufflinks www.amazon.co.uk £13 Look sharp and show your appreciation for film at the same time. Soft Shutter release from £5, www.ebay.co.uk Transform the feel of a threaded shutter button. Hama 2in1…

The overall winner will stay for three nights in the stunning Ngala Lodge and four nights in the Mandina Lodges in the Makasutu Forest where you’ll receive: • Guided forest walks • River trip by pirogue • Return flights from Gatwick • Half-board at the Mandina Lodges and b&b at the Ngala Lodge The overall winner will also be invited to photograph this dream trip and have their work featured in Lonely Planet Traveller and Amateur Photographer magazines. PLUS Each category winner will win a Fujifilm X-T10 camera worth £779. This compact mirrorless digital camera turns any trip, whether in everyday life or to the other side of the world, into the ultimate photo opportunity. Visit fuji.co.uk/x-t10.…

From 1981-82, Robert Desjarlais was a student in France. Thirty years later, by then a lecturer in anthropology in New York, he went back. As he puts it on his website (www.robertdesjarlais.net), ‘I felt like a ghost… photographing vestiges of my past.’ We can all project our own experiences, memories, hopes and fears on to this picture. Is the lone figure waiting for a train, or staring after one departed? Is it his last glimpse of somewhere before he leaves, or a reverie of his past? Where is he going? Where has he been? Many of the best pictures raise more questions than they answer. Raising questions is one of the major functions of art. There’s nothing wrong with pictures whose main purpose is to relieve the tedium of a…

Going underwater Fantasea has announced that its FRX100 IV underwater housing is fully compatible with the new Sony RX100 V, released only a few weeks ago. The housing, which comes with a full accessory range including wideangle and macro lenses, filters and lighting options, has a suggested retail price of $400. Visit www.fantasea.com. Flexible battery technology Panasonic has developed a flexible Lithium-ion battery that can withstand bending with no apparent loss of function. Only 0.55mm thick, the rechargeable battery appears to be aimed at smartcards and wearables, but with the potential for use in other technology. Introducing the Leica TL Leica Camera has unveiled the TL, a new camera that builds on the Leica T system that was first launched in 2014. New developments include the doubling of internal memory…

THERE are only a few days left to enter the Forces Mutual Genuine Moments competition, to be judged by a panel including AP Editor Nigel Atherton. The contest invites members of the wider Armed Forces family to submit photographs of everyday service life for a chance to win nearly £4,000 in prizes. It is designed to challenge the image of the military that the public are used to – with fewer parades and combat boots, and more insights into the lives of the people of the Armed Forces. Former military photographer and fellow judge Mike Laird told us: ‘Being able to represent a moment in a photograph is an art. We can all learn from studying the photos others take and consider how we might have captured the same moment.'…

My husband says I don't buy anything without first reading an AP review, which had me rather stymied when I needed a warm photographer's jacket, and that week you reviewed a men-only brand. Men have very narrow chests for the length of their arms and torsos, you know. Meanwhile, my neighbour, a keen photographer, was horrified that I subscribed to AP. In the 1970s and '80s, his father had subscribed, and he thought it should be kept on the newsagent's top shelf. So, did you hear me cheer when Tracy Calder included in her kit list a pair of women's Páramo Cascada II trousers (AP 12 November)? It's a small thing in a magazine in which women photographers are increasingly well represented, but it made me very happy. You have…

THE AVERAGE interchangeable-lens camera today is so advanced that many of the things it offers will never be called upon by the average photographer. Yet some of these lesser-known features could save you time and improve the way you handle your camera, ultimately leading to better pictures. In the first of a new series looking at ways to customise your camera, we look at the Canon custom menu, using a Canon EOS 5D Mark IV as our guide. (Some of the features described here may be different, or not appear at all, on models elsewhere in the line). MENU 1: EXPOSURE Exposure level increments Ordinarily, shutter speed, aperture, exposure compensation and a number of other features are set in 1/3-stop increments. If you find this too fine, you can alter…

I love the way that things flow and move underwater, so I am always attracted to images that show this. Water creates a lovely juxtaposition of movement within a still image, and gives a sense of weightlessness to the model. I decided to experiment with combining images of a model in water with a substance being poured into the water, and the logical choice was sand. The sand was shot in a large vase with a black backdrop behind it. I could only shoot a couple of images at a time before the water became cloudy and I had to empty it out and start again. I also had to consider that whatever lighting set-up I used, I needed to be able to reproduce it at a 90° angle for…