Innholdsfortegnelse for 23-Jul-2016 i Amateur Photographer

Today’s photographers are obsessed with sharpness in a way that we never used to be. Browse a collection of classic photos and you’ll discover that few are as critically sharp as we’d expect nowadays; indeed, Henri Cartier-Bresson once said ‘sharpness is a bourgeois concept’. Does that make them less great? No. But years of digital innovation, in which sensor resolution went from being inferior to film to leapfrogging it, have raised our expectations – along with parallel improvements in optics and processing software. High-resolution sensors, combined with modern lenses, enable us to produce more detailed images than ever before, outside of the larger film formats. But achieving them requires more knowledge than it used to. This week’s issue is dedicated to sharpness and how to maximise it: camera tips, software…

I bought The Americans (Robert Frank,1958) because I'd seen one or two shots in a number of anthologies of photography and wanted to view the whole thing for myself. By looking at the giants of photography, you can begin to see a direction of travel for what was once considered contemporary. Of course, any anthology is a curated presentation that restricts the reader to a limited range of work. Nonetheless, there had been a growing restlessness in purely artistic and abstract works, with the likes of Lewis Hine, Paul Strand, Eugène Atget, Brassaï, André Kertész, Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans and Henri Cartier-Bresson capturing images that focused principally on the person and his/her context. Of course, not every photographer pursued art for the sake of it. Hine was an activist documenting…

MOST blurred pictures are caused by camera shake. Even when a picture looks sharp to the naked eye, when magnified on an LCD (or computer) screen you will often find that the edges are not clearly defined or that key areas lack fine detail. In truth, there is little point in investing hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds on high-resolution cameras and pin-sharp lenses, and then throwing away all this technology by failing to keep the camera steady at the point of capture. To make the most of this hi-tech wizardry, you need to support it properly. If you don’t have a tripod or other firm support, use the following tips to increase your chances of a steady shot. Stand properly It may sound obvious, but make sure that you…

EVERY lens has a ‘sweet spot’ – the aperture at which it performs best – and it’s usually a few stops down from the widest aperture. Here’s how to hit the sweet spot every time. Smaller isn’t better Don't assume that stopping the lens down will produce the sharpest image. Diffraction can be a problem at small apertures, where light rays get slightly bent as they pass through, slightly softening the image. The narrower the aperture, the more pronounced diffraction becomes. How to test for it To find the sweet spot on a lens, attach your camera to a tripod, switch it to aperture priority, compose your image and take a picture at the widest aperture. Now reduce the aperture by one stop and repeat the exercise. Keep going until…

I'm writing about Terry O'Neill's picture of the Rolling Stones titled ‘Soho, London, 17 January 1964', which appeared in AP 11 June (see right). I was amazed when I recognised the person in the background: the balding chap standing on the back of the lorry outside the Tesco warehouse. That picture took me back to when I joined Tesco as a 23-year-old lorry driver in 1967. The chap's first name was Ron, but I can't remember his surname. This picture is very relevant to me because it was around this time that I first became interested in photography. I remember my first camera being a Halina that I managed to get caught in my car door after a shoot at a Tesco football match, thus rendering it useless; I then…

WHILE the first sensor-based stabilisation systems only corrected movements in two planes, the most recent systems from Olympus, Pentax and Sony work across five, but what are they? PITCH This is an up-and-down tilting or rotational movement as the camera pivots in the hands. It’s most apparent at the farthest end of the lens. It’s a common form of movement with large, heavy lenses, especially after they’ve been held for a long time and the arm muscles start to tire. YAW This movement is similar to pitch but it’s a rotational side-to-side shift. Again, lens length and weight are factors. Strong winds can also increase the likelihood of yawing with long lenses. ROLL A rotational movement around the sensor. It can be caused by pressing the shutter release and can…

1 Sourcing insects Thanks to his ongoing relationship with the entomologists at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, Levon makes a choice of subjects based on a combination of the scientific significance of an insect and his more artistic, creative viewpoint as to how the subjects look and how they will photograph. 2 Pinning Levon asks the scientists to pin the insects in a specific way. ‘Usually a pin would go straight through the body,' he explains. ‘Sometimes it was actually hidden within the body. Then I attach that to another pin on a right angle, which goes on putty and hangs the insect in front of my camera.' 3 Studio set-up Levon has a tabletop set-up that is lit depending on the insect being shot and the part…

Adding a graduated sky THIS picture from Kyle Bonallo highlights one of the biggest problems when shooting in JPEG mode. The photograph was taken using a Canon EOS 550D, which is capable of capturing a decent dynamic range providing you shoot in raw. The photograph was shot late in the evening, and the setting sun is just visible in the distance. However, because the exposure was set for the foreground, the sky detail is lost. I suppose one could add a separate sky image, but I didn't want to tamper much with the scene. The next best thing was to add a Graduated Filter adjustment that both darkened the sky slightly and added a warm tint. One of the key things here is the ability to brush-edit Graduated and Radial…

It is almost impossible not to laugh when you look at this picture. First, there’s the wonderful way in which the arm of the real wrestler on the right matches almost perfectly with the painted arm on the right-hand gate. Second, there’s the contrast between the massive figures painted on the gates and the altogether less massive physiques of the human wrestlers. Third, the poses of the real wrestlers do not look particularly martial. In fact, you could be forgiven for thinking that the man in the red trunks is tickling the man in the yellow trunks. Maybe he is: that ghostly blurred hand on the taller man’s chest, just below the nipple, is presumably his, though it seems a bit bigger than you would expect. There are interesting details,…

TWO amateur photographers are among contestants from across Europe competing for a € 150,000 top prize in a TV talent show called Master of Photography. This programme, which is the first European TV talent show for photographers, will be broadcast on Sky Arts in the UK, Italy and Germany, and boasts the ‘biggest prize ever offered in a European photography competition'. The first episode, due to be screened on 21 July, adopts ‘the beauty of Rome' theme. For the latest news visit www.amateurphotographer.co.uk…

WE all know that the main purpose of a tripod is to keep your equipment still, but there are other, less obvious, benefits to using a three-legged support. First, it tends to slow you down: when you have to release leg locks, extend poles, and make sure that the camera is level, you often take more time over your compositions. Second, with the help of an additional arm or clamp, you can use the tripod as an assistant, holding a reflector or diffuser in place. There are hundreds of tripods on the market (for a round-up, see pages 46-49) each differing in weight, construction, height, folded length and weight-bearing capacity. Before you decide what to buy you need to bear a few things in mind. Check the weight-bearing capacity The…

You answered… A 0% 23% B 1-49% 43% C 50-99% 30% D 100% 4% What you said ‘About 75% of my photographic equipment was bought second-hand as I don’t have much money. I tend to think of my Canon EOS 40D as my “new” camera, but was staggered to realise that it’s nearly nine years old! However, it still works faultlessly and takes great pictures, so I see no reason to change.’ ‘Nearly all of it!’ ‘I have a lot of second-hand film cameras and lenses, but they are hardly used now. Digital ones are mainly new, although I usually wait until the new model comes out and pick up a reduced-price old model. The lenses I’ve bought to replace the kit ones are generally second-hand.’ ‘About 10%. I prefer…

DISCOVER your safe handholding shutter speed with and without image stabilisation by shooting a subject and gradually reducing the shutter speed, following these steps: 1 Find a suitable target that has lots of fine detail (a sheet of newspaper stuck to a wall is ideal) and photograph it from the typical distance that you would use for the mounted focal length. Begin with the stabilisation system turned off and use a shutter speed that's one second divided by the focal length: for example, 1/100sec with a 100mm lens on a full-frame camera, or 1/160sec on an APS-C format model. 2 Shoot ten images. Most of them (if not all) should be perfectly sharp. 3 Reduce the shutter speed by 1/3EV and shoot another ten images before reducing the shutter speed…

Sharpening is an essential step in the editing workflow, as the actual image recorded by your camera is not necessarily the sharpest result you’ll be able to achieve. However good your technique or lens, nearly all digital images will benefit from some sharpening in software. Put simply, sharpening works by slightly blurring a version of the original image to create a mask, which is then subtracted away from the original image to detect the presence of edges. By increasing the contrast along these edges, you can achieve a sharper final image. When correctly applied, sharpening can really benefit your image, but the trick is to know how much of it to apply. Less is often more here. It may be tempting to oversharpen your image, but telltale halos can appear…

Brian Duffy, Hertfordshire While Brian's photography is quite an eclectic mix, including landscapes and sports, we've focused on his street photography – a genre he identifies as one of his favourites. ‘I quite enjoy watching the world go by and observing the weird and wonderful. I guess my street photography is an extension of this,' says Brian. He would like to make the switch to pro in the next three to five years, and has recently been contributing to his local newspaper. www.brianduffy.co.uk The Reader Portfolio winner chosen every week will receive a Manfrotto PIXI EVO tripod worth £44.95. Visit www.manfrotto.co.uk Lightweight and portable, the Manfrotto PIXI EVO boasts two different leg angles with a sliding selector enabling you to shoot ground-level images. It’s adjustable, with two-section legs featuring five…

1 Fujifilm X-Pro2 and Fuji X-T1 With their superb colour accuracy, beautiful sensors and excellent image quality, these are my tools. After 23 years of using Canon, I now use the Fujis for most of my commercial work, and I couldn’t be happier. Superb performance and my kit bag is lighter! 2 Fujinon XF 35mm f/1.4 R This is my standard lens, and it has a multitude of uses. I use it for full figure, fashion portraiture and even beauty shots. It’s a fantastic all-rounder with a good, fast aperture and great optics. A new 35mm f/2 has just come out, which I’m keen to try. 3 Fujinon XF 56mm f/1.2 R This particular Fujinon has to be one of my favourite lenses. It’s an amazing piece of glass, with…

SONY has revealed a premium standard prime for its Alpha 7 series cameras. The Sony Zeiss Planar T* FE 50mm f/1.4 ZA is due out in July at an estimated price of £1,500. The lens employs 12 elements in nine groups, including one advanced aspheric element promising sharper images from centre to corner, one conventional aspheric element and one ED glass element for superior contrast and reduced chromatic aberration. Autofocus is driven by a ring-drive SSM. Weighing in at 778g and measuring 83.5mm in diameter and 108mm in length, this is a distinctly large and heavy lens for its type. An 11-blade circular aperture aims to give attractively defocused backgrounds, and the lens has an aperture ring with a switch to set clicked or clickless operation. Subscribe to Amateur Photographer…

MOST cameras now offer both manual and automatic focusing. There will always be times when manual focus is preferable – when faced with a low-contrast scene or when shooting in low light, for example – but it can often be difficult to tell when key areas are entirely sharp. This is why some cameras offer focus peaking. Contrast detection When you focus the lens manually, the camera measures subject contrast. It lets you know which areas are showing the greatest contrast (appear the sharpest) by marking them with a highlight or colour. Increase in highlights This highlight or colour increases as the subject is brought into focus, until typically the subject is covered in the markings. At this point the subject is deemed to be in focus. Easy!…

A‘normal’ working day for Levon Biss would usually see this talented photographer shooting portraits of actors or a commercial campaign for a sports-clothing manufacturer – but he hasn’t had too many normal days recently. The reason for this is his current obsession with shooting microscopic portraits of insects in his home studio, a project that sits nicely under the banner ‘Microsculptures’. ‘Outside of my commercial work I’ve always got personal projects on the go, but I don’t put those out there,’ says Levon. ‘It’s a tricky one, because you get pigeonholed – my pigeonholes are sports, portraits and celebrity. If you throw work out there that is off at a completely different angle, it just confuses clients, because people come to me for a specific type of image.’ This personal…

Suitable head Whether you buy a ball-and-socket or a pan-and-tilt head for your tripod or monopod, make sure it’s easy to use and flexible. Maximum load Make sure your chosen support can bear the combined weight of your heaviest camera and lens. Folded length If space is an issue, check the folded length of your support, or remove the filling from a beanbag and refill it at your destination. Versatile feet Tripods and monopods can slip on unstable ground; if you’re likely to be shooting on sand, mud or gravel look for a model with spiked feet. 3 Legged Thing Equinox Winston Carbon Fibre Tripod System • £379 • www.3leggedthing.com MADE from eight layers of tightly woven carbon, the Equinox Winston tripod is as tough and sure-footed as its famous…

‘Google has initiated a new move to change the formats of web images’ I was recently involved in a discussion about the relative merits of raw and JPEG file formats. In some sense, this relates to the old photography question of whether one would keep the negatives or not. The JPEG file is essentially a processed version of the raw file, so everything that is in a JPEG file can be recreated from the raw file. However, if the perceived quality of the JPEG file is brought about by some special and unreleased magic in the JPEG processing, it might not be so easy to reproduce it, whatever the theory. I have written before about my friend Iain and his fondness for his Leica X camera. Iain's preferred workflow has…