Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2017 i PhotoPlus : The Canon Magazine

AMAZING ASTRO PHOTOGRAPHY Discover the pleasure of photographing the night sky with top Canon pro Alyn Wallace and our Apprentice this month on page 8 Have you ever photographed the stars at night? When you’re in a remote location, far from the maddening crowd and bright city lights, it’s incredible just how many stars come out at night. Astrophotography can be truly rewarding when you’re using the right Canon camera techniques to capture the starry sky and surrounding night scene. I was lucky enough to be part of our Apprentice article photoshoot this issue, with Canon pro and astro ace Alyn Wallace. When the clouds cleared for us just after midnight at Nash Point, on the south coast of Wales, a full blanket of stars, the Milky Way and even…

APPRENTICE NAME: THOMAS WINSTONE CAMERA: CANON EOS-1D X MK II THOMAS is a 39-year-old firefighter by day, and a keen amateur photographer by night. Originally from Hay-on-Wye, he now lives in Brynmawr in Wales. He enjoys all forms of photography including capturing night shots of flash-lit wildlife, and stormy landscape images. He also enjoys astrophotography, but needed our help to finesse his starry sky shots. CANON PRO NAME: ALYN WALLACE CAMERA: CANON EOS 6D ALYN Wallace is an astrophotographer based near the Brecon Beacons in Wales. It was the Perseids meteor shower of 2015 that convinced Alyn to purchase his first DSLR, a Canon EOS 100D. He has studied physics, astronomy, and engineering, with photography providing a creative outlet to channel his technical abilities in an artistic manner. He now…

This A to Z of Canon Photography explains the meanings of dozens of camera and photographic terms, from autofocus to zoom lens. Like any hobby or specialist field, photography has built up its own rich language of distinctive words, like photobomb and selfie. Our comprehensive A to Z addresses them all, providing easy-tounderstand definitions and helpful cross-referencing. You’ll find this A-to-Z guide useful in all sorts of situations. Buying a new lens and want to know what all the letters in its name actually mean? Maybe you’re aware that bokeh is something nice you want to achieve in your photos, but don’t actually know what is? It’s all here. Whether you’re well-versed in photographic jargon or are just starting to explore the language that helps to shape this brilliant artform,…

PROJECT 3 When composing a portrait, several key questions usually pop up: What should we include or exclude? How should we pose or arrange our subject? What is the light doing? How will our aperture and focal length influence the composition? Much of this happens on a subconscious level – after all, composing a picture is as much about intuition and feeling as it is about following the ‘rule of thirds’. But if we stop for a second and think about these points, we might just end up with a much better photo. In portrait photography, choice of camera angle is crucial, as not only do we have the freedom to move around our subject – perhaps ducking down, getting up high, or shifting left or right to get the…

PHOTOSHOP CC If you’ve ever thought to yourself ‘I wish this day would just end!’ then this effect will appeal. Using simple Photoshop skills we can transform a sunny daytime scene to deepest, darkest night. The purist would argue that this is a pointless exercise. Why not just go back after dark with a tripod and capture the scene? Of course, this would be the best thing to do (not only would it be more realistic, it would also probably take less time). But there could be any number of reasons why this wouldn’t be possible. Perhaps the scene is only accessible during the day – a quick stop off, much like the half-day I spent in Cuba’s wonderful town of Trinidad here. Whatever the reasons, shooting at night may…

In April 2012, for his award-winning God’s Ivory photo essay, Brent travelled to Bouba Ndjida National Park in northern Cameroon, where the largest mass killing of elephants had taken place just weeks before. Here, close to the border with Chad and the Central African Republic, a group of over 100 ivory poachers armed with AK47s, grenades and machine guns rode into the park on horseback and killed over 650 elephants over a two-month period. 340 carcasses had been located by the time Brent arrived. This picture shows a village ranger examining the corpses.…

01 NORTHERN CAPE Electric thunderstorm near Augrabie Falls along the Orange River Lens Canon EF 24-70mm f/4L IS USM Exposure 40 min, f/14, ISO800 In 2006 I switched from analogue photography – 6x7 Asahi Pentax film cameras, in fact – to a Canon DSLR. My large camera case was suddenly reduced to a rucksack, and so my camera started to come to more locations with me throughout South Africa. I’ve got many images (including these) that were taken ‘on the road’. One night, I found an old quarry near Augrabies. A great electric storm was bulging its muscles from the east as I settled in to watch. For the main shot, I left my camera open on a long exposure, letting each bolt of lightning burn itself on my Canon’s…

CAPTURE WILDLIFE Place your AF points Compose wide shots so that the animals are placed off-centre in the frame – use the AF points as a guide You don’t have to have a filthy great lens to take a cracking nature photo. On the contrary, frame-filling ‘trophy’ headshots get very dull very quickly, and you’ll often end up with a more interesting and expressive result if you show an animal in its environment. Composing wider wildlife shots means that the background and foreground will influence the exposure, so you may need to use exposure compensation to rectify any errors caused by especially bright or dark surroundings. If the scene includes a large expanse of sky, for example, then you’ll probably need to use some positive exposure compensation to avoid the…

THE SILENT continuous shooting option available as a drive mode on EOS DSLRs from the 80D upwards is a useful option for wildlife photography. It stifles the mechanical noise of the shutter operation when shooting through the viewfinder, which is an advantage when you’re looking to get close to skittish wildlife. But there are two significant drawbacks: it reduces top shooting speed, and increases the time lag between pressing the shutter button and the picture being taken. That being said, it really does effectively take the edge off the noise on my Canon EOS 5D Mark III and Mark IV bodies – and that can make a difference between birds and animals staying put or legging it. It also attracts less attention!…

WI-FI REMOTE CONTROL All the current Canon EOS camera models either have built-in Wi-Fi, or can work with accessories to provide a Wi-Fi connection. I’m often amazed at the number of photographers who haven’t used the technology for the benefit of their photos. You can download the free Canon Camera Connect app from both the Apple and Android app stores. Once installed, it’s relatively simple to set up the camera as a Wi-Fi hotspot to which you connect your phone or tablet. Run the app and you’re all set. The app has two main capabilities: it can view and download photos already stored on the memory cards, plus it can remotely control the camera with Live View. Downloading a whole shoot from large capacity memory cards to your phone or…

01 BenQ SW271 Display your Canon’s shots with uncompromising accuracy £1,067/$1,099 www.benq.co.uk BENQ’S latest photography-focussed display is all about colour accuracy, with new AQCOLOR technology that uses a combination of hardware calibration, BenQ’s Palette Master Elements software and Technicolor® Color Certification to ensure the monitor meets the strict industry standard colour accuracy requirements. The display consists of a 27-inch 4K IPS panel with true 10-bit colour plus 100% sRGB and 99% Adobe RGB coverage. 02 Broncolor Litepipe P Light shaping that’s big on diffusion yet packs small £940/$1,290 www.manfrotto.co.uk/broncolor THE Lightpipe is a compact and convenient alternative to a softbox for studio or location lighting, giving a wide beam of highly diffused illumination. Based around a roll-up diffusion sheet, it can be assembled in less than a minute to form…

Before we begin testing, we install the latest versions of drivers for each printer, then run nozzle checks. We then carry out print head alignment procedures to ensure optimum accuracy. Each printer manufacturers’ genuine, own-brand inks and papers are used throughout the entire testing procedure. We create test prints including landscapes, portraits, and black-and-white images using standard colour modes. We also use our own specially created test chart (pictured right) to reveal each printer’s accuracy in terms of colour reproduction, tonal range, and the ability to deliver smooth graduations between subtle colour variations.…

FEATURES Buying and replacing ink cartridges is the main pain of using an inkjet printer. Epson’s new solution comes in the shape of its ‘EcoTank’ printers, available in A4 and A3 formats. This A4 model is supplied with two high-capacity ink bottles, including a 140ml bottle of pigment black ink and 70ml bottles of cyan, magenta, yellow and black dye inks. That’s nearly a pint of ink, sufficient for up to 14,000 mono documents and 3,400 6x4-inch photos. However, even if you’re into high-volume printing, savings might be less than you imagine. With tanks located behind viewing windows in the front panel, ink levels are easy to keep track of. Canon adopts a similar philosophy in its PIXMA G-series or ‘MegaTank’ printers, but they’re only four-ink models without the additional…

It’s a family thing A long time ago, way back in the ’70s, I loved to take photos, but owing to life’s little curves that it throws at you, I found I had no course but to give it up. Moving on at nearly sixty, I felt the call again to pick up a camera, but being disabled with a family, price would be a major consideration. A few weeks passed and I had a Canon EOS 1100D and a couple of lenses, all secondhand. I was out and about snapping away. It was great. I suppose the saying ‘if you can’t beat them join them’ springs to mind because the wife got a camera followed by my daughter. So now we all go out and about once or twice…

BE OUR NEXT APPRENTICE Do you need some help to take your Canon photography to the next level? Let us know what you’d like help with and we could pair you up with a top pro for the day! Email photoplus@futurenet.com with ‘PhotoPlus Apprentice’ as the subject, and include your phone number and address. THOMAS’S COMMENT “For this shot, the clouds suddenly cleared and the night sky lit up in an amazing blanket of stars. Alyn was very quick to react and we raced around getting many different shots from different angles before it clouded over again. With the lighthouse behind us, Alyn instructed me to shoot in a southwesterly direction for the Milky Way in the sky behind. Shooting at 11mm on my full-frame 1D Mk II has allowed…

Win this lot of amazing Manfrotto gear and it’ll make your life easier and your photos better! The big prize bundle is worth over £800 and contains the following top kit: The high-quality Manfrotto 290 dual aluminium 3-section tripod comes with an 804 3-way head that holds your Canon DSLR rock-solid for sharper landscape shots. Shoot from new angles with the 90° column system that offers a full range of movement with four leg angle positions, while the 804 3-way head provides accurate framing for improved compositions. The LYKOS daylight LED is the brightest portable LED with 1600 lux at 1m (daylight). Thanks to new surfacemounted LEDs, you will have dimming and colour temperature control as well as excellent colour accuracy. The SPECTRA2 LED is a bright light in a…

PROJECT 1 QUICK TIP! Switching the White balance to Shade mode creates a warm colour cast that enhances golden tones The transitional period between summer and winter is an outdoor photographer’s dream. We all know autumn for its vibrant, warm colours and atmospheric sunlight, which makes it a splendid season to explore nature with your camera. Some projects require precision and concentration, but you can easily combine this one with a family day out. Why not get the kids involved too? Rather than nailing any timing or camera settings, they key for success here is to hone your creative eye and really consider the lighting in the environment. We’ll be taking an abstract approach, and focusing on the golden hues and shapes rather than taking standard wide-angle landscape shots. To…

PROJECT 4 Back in the good old days of film, if you had a gap in your camera body, light would leak in and tinge the film with colour casts across the frame. This exposure to light, or ‘light leaking’, was originally thought of as a problem. But it has also caught on as a creative technique that enhances images beyond their standard exposure. Light-leaking can be emulated in digital photography, and is usually applied in post-production software by overlaying an image of an actual light leak. However, there are still a few other ways you can introduce an intentional light leak in this digital era, with the result definitely looking more organic. Striking a match or igniting a lighter conjures up the warm orange flicker of fire, and in…

LIGHTROOM Editing photos of wildlife can be a heated topic. Making major changes to a shot brings the authenticity of an image into question, and it’s important not to deceive the viewer or misrepresent the reality of nature (unless it’s obvious that it’s for creative effect). It’s best to err on the side of caution when you’re working on animal photos in post-processing – official competitions have strict rules as to what can be done to change the image with software. That being said, most shots can benefit from a few edits. Adjustments to tone and contrast, dodging and burning, and noise reduction are all acceptable, and that’s what we’re going to cover here. In this example of a little harvest mouse, the Raw shot we had straight out of…

Professional photographers reveal their top six tools of the trade they couldn’t shoot without As a mountain landscape and adventure photographer, I spend a lot of time in cold and remote places – not the most conducive environments for photo gear. I can’t afford for my gear to fail, so I need to be prepared to keep it warm, have back-ups on hand, and have a comfortable way of carrying it. I also need high-performing outdoor clothing that keeps me warm and dry. My photography gear is essential to creating great images, and I stand by kit that performs well in the extreme conditions I put it under. Whether it’s in an Aquatech underwater housing under the ice of a frozen lake or high in the Canadian Rockies, I put…

WILDLIFE photography isn’t all about capturing big game through a lens the size of a cannon! Close-up shots of small critters can be just as satisfying and more technically challenging to accomplish. A macro lens isn’t essential, as a short telephoto lens fitted with a close-up filter or extension tubes can give you an acceptable degree of increased magnification, while an ultra-wide lens will allow you to focus up close and still pull in bags of the background – assuming you can get the lens close enough to your subject in the first place, of course. But there’s no denying the convenience of a macro lens. I rely on the Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM, as it’s pin-sharp, lightweight, and has an excellent hybrid image stabilizer. Focusing is…

DARREN SAYS… This shot was taken with a Canon EOS 6D and the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 Art lens. It was taken during a visit to Plumpton Rocks, not far from Knaresborough, North Yorkshire. As I walked around the lake I came across a door which lead to an old boat house, where I found this scene, and thought it would make an interesting photo. I shot the photo in Raw and lightly edited it in Photoshop, then added a filter from the Topaz Texture 2 plug-in for the final effect you see in the image. BRIAN SAYS… Looks like it was an interesting location. I’m inclined to mentally crop the photo on the right side to remove the sharp hard edge, and this would move the boat a little more…

A4 PRINTERS A3/A3+ PRINTERS When it comes to making highquality photo prints at home, the inkjet market has narrowed to a two-horse race. HP and Lexmark have become more oriented towards document printing, leaving Canon and Epson to slog it out in the photo arena. For printing up to A4 in size (8.5x11 inches in the USA), most recent models follow Canon’s lead of combining a pigment-based black ink for crisp document printing, with four or more dye-based inks for premium photo output on glossy paper. Moving up to larger format A3+ printing (13x19 inches), there’s a choice of printers based exclusively on dye or pigment inks. Dye inks are fully absorbed into the paper, and tend to give a smoother, more even finish on glossy, semi-gloss and lustre photo…

Ink for the Epson EcoTank printer is cheaper than for any other printer on test, and the ET-7700 comes supplied with two sets of bottles, enough to create 3,400 6x4-inch photo prints, or about 800 A4 photos. However, compared with the Canon TS6150, the Epson is much more expensive to buy. Even after printing the same high volume of 3,400/800 photo prints with both printers, the combined price for the printer, ink and photo paper works out pretty much the same in the UK. In the USA, the Epson will save you around 30 per cent, but only if you create that many prints. Another drawback is that you have to pay the full cost up-front, instead of paying as you go, buying cartridges over months or years.…

The molecules of dye that make up the colour in dye-based inks are incredibly small and sink beneath the outer layer of glossy photo paper. This makes them unbeatable for giving a smooth, uniform finish when printing on glossy, semi-gloss and lustre media. They’re also fully absorbed by matte photo paper and specialist media like canvas and photo rag for inkjet printing. By contrast, pigment molecules are much larger and lay on top of the paper. This gives a less uniform and less shiny look to glossy prints, as well as requiring more drying time. Pigment inks are more robust in terms of resistance to fading over decades, especially when hung on the wall, but are more prone to being scuffed or scraped off the paper.…

www.digitalcameraworld.com For the ultimate in glossy photo quality for both colour and black & white, and excellent results on wide-ranging media, the Pro-100S is the perfect choice. It’s reasonably priced for a large-format printer, both to buy and to run, and is much faster than competing pigment-based printers. If you need pigment ink for maximum anti-fade longevity, the Pro-10S wins out against the Epson P600, although the latter’s roll feeder is a bonus. If you’re happy with A4 as your maximum print size, the Canon PIXMA TS9150 wins out for its combination of high print quality, speed, a big touchscreen and easy connectivity. The PIXMA TS6150 is slower and lacks a few of the finer features, but is unbeatable value for money.…

01 THE GOOD LIFE BY DANIËL NELSON Grand title winner, Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year (Also winner of the 15-17 Years category) Daniëlmet Caco in the forest of Odzala National Park in the Republic of Congo, after a three-hour trek through dense vegetation with skilled trackers. In his compelling portrait of Caco – relaxed in his surroundings – Daniël captured the inextricable similarity between these wild apes and humans, and the importance of the forest on which they depend. Lens Sigma 50-500mmf/4.5-6.3 DG OS HSM Exposure 1/30 sec, f/6.3, ISO800 02 MEMORIAL TO A SPECIES BY BRENT STIRTON Grand title winner, Wildlife Photographer of the Year (Also winner of the Wildlife Photojournalist Award: Story) A black rhino bull lies dead in South Africa’s Hluhluwe–Imfolozi Park, shot less than eight…

Photoshop Elements 2018 is the latest version of Adobe’s beginner-friendly photo-editing app. It follows on from Elements 15 and brings several interesting new features, the headline being an ‘Open Closed Eyes’ tool that lets you replace blinking or closed eyes with an open pair. It’s clever, but results range from usable to laughable. You need to be careful with your choice of replacement eyes – ideally using a similar frame of the same person, with the face straight-on. We’ll explain how it works here, along with other key new features. Another new tool is Auto- Selection, designed to make it easier to select tricky shapes like people or animals. All you do is drag a rough selection with the Lasso tool, and then let the Auto-Selection tool do the rest.…

01 THE SPOILS OF WAR Much of Brent’s time is spent gaining the trust of his subject. In this case, a defector from the Lord’s Resistance Army. Lens Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM at 35mm Exposure 1/250 sec, f/16, ISO200 BRENT STIRTON is a hard man to track down. For at least nine months of the year he is away on assignment in some of the world’s most volatile locations, documenting issues ranging from the illegal wildlife trade to tribal conflicts and human rights abuses. When we speak, he is on a rare two-week break at his Californian home after several months away in Mongolia, Somalia and the Peruvian Amazon. Even then, Brent Stirton doesn’t get many days of complete rest: my call is one of six he’s taking…

01 ANGELA COPSON This world record holder, 70, crosses the line in gold medal position Lens Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM Exposure 1/1250 sec, f/4, ISO200 Growing old competitively Capturing the vitality of elite athletes who are still competing on the world stage in their 60s, 70s, 80s – and even 90s When I turned 60 eight years ago, I became aware that there just weren’t images of older sportsmen and women in the media. Images of older people all highlighted their passivity and physical frailty. As a sporty older woman myself, I set out to redress the balance by photographing competitive athletes in their 60s through to their 90s. Small problem: I knew nothing about photography and didn’t have a camera. Plus I’m no natural when it…

EXPLOITING AUTO ISO You’ll need fast shutter speeds for sharp wildlife shots, particularly when you’re working with telephoto lenses where every little movement will be magnified in the image. In order to let enough light into the camera and hit those fast shutter speeds you’ll typically have to set the lens to its maximum (largest) aperture, such as f/2.8 or f/4. Be prepared to increase the ISO sensitivity too, as wild animals are often most active at dawn and dusk when light levels are low; don’t be surprised if you find yourself working at ISO3200 or higher. The Auto option in the ISO menu automatically adjusts sensitivity to ensure a shutter speed fast enough to avoid camera shake when shooting in Aperture Priority. To prevent the ISO being pushed to…

FEATURES Power and stamina are key factors for any battery-driven location flash kit. Both get significant upgrades in Profoto’s new B1X kit, making it a worthy update over the popular B1. The kit comprises a flash head, mains charger, rechargeable Li-ion battery and carrying bag. The whole caboodle is small and lightweight at just 5kg, the head itself weighing 3kg. That’s complete with clip-on battery, which avoids the need for tethering the head to a separate power pack via a chunky cable. The powerful 500Ws head has a huge output range equivalent to nine f-stops, adjustable in 1/10thstop increments. There’s also an HSS (High Speed Sync) mode for using flash with fast shutter speeds, up to and including the fastest that your camera can muster. It’s great for overpowering the…

FEATURES Following Canon’s timehonoured tradition, the TS6150 combines a pigmentbased black ink for crisp document printing, with CMYK dye-based inks for highly effective photo printing. All inks are supplied in individual cartridges available in standard, XL or XXL capacities. The largest cartridges give the best value for money, as well as reducing the frequency with which you need to change them. Well connected, the printer has built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, and is fully compatible with Canon’s PIXMA Cloud based printing and scanning facilities, along with a remote printing app that you can install on your smartphone or tablet. For standalone control, there’s a neat and intuitive 3-inch touchscreen. A welcome addition is the rear paper input tray that holds plain paper in the front-loading cassette, and up to 20 sheets…

Much has been said about the price of ink being extortionate, but things aren’t generally that bad. The amount of ink you use to create a photo print can be a moveable feast. Light and airy, high-key images will require fairly little ink, whereas photos with large dark areas within a scene, or highly saturated colours, will cane the cartridges. Even so, there’s quite a variance when it comes to the price per millilitre of ink, as shown in our chart. Ink for the Epson EcoTank printer appears much less expensive, but it doesn’t necessarily work out that way, as you’ll see in ‘Cartridges or Bottles’ over the page.…

FEATURES Bucking the trend of combining pigment and dye-based black inks for document and photo printing, the XP-8500 is a more conventional ‘photo printer’. As such, it runs on six dye-based inks that include CMYK, plus photo cyan and photo magenta. While mono text looks faint and greyish, the Epson manages to produce smart looking documents. Ink prices are expensive in the UK, even if you buy XL cartridges. Ink costs about 12 times more than for the Epson EcoTank printer, although the XP-8500 is much less expensive to buy. Again, there’s a 2.7-inch colour LCD but this time it’s a touchscreen without the surrounding array of pushbutton controls. This makes standalone printing from memory cards and photocopying more intuitive, but the small touchscreen is a bit fiddly to use.…

Many of us will be content with an A4 printer that can quickly and easily create 6x4in, 7x5in, 10x8in and full A4 photo prints, complete with borderless options. For others, A3 printers are more appealing, and worth the extra cost and space to house a physically larger printer. A3 prints are the same size as two sheets of A4 paper laid next to each other, measuring 8.27×11.69in (210×297mm). It’s a more imposing size, especially if you want to hang photo prints on the wall, but the aspect ratio still isn’t ideal for the format of DSLR images. A3+ is both larger and a better fit, measuring 13x19in (329x483mm) and having an aspect ratio of 1.46, which comes closer to the 1.5 of your DSLR’s images and requires less cropping.…

Even A3+ prints can look small when hung on a wall. The next step up is to buy an A2 printer like the Canon imagePROGRAF Pro-1000 (£1,000/$1,300) or the Epson SureColor P800 (£950/$1,200). However, the economies of scale aren’t favourable unless you need to create large format prints in high volumes, or with a fast turnaround. A good online lab like Loxley Colour (www.loxleycolour.com) or Whitewall (www.whtewall.com) gives you greater freedom in print size, with a wealth of choices up to and including enormous poster prints of around 60x40 inches. Fully finished options typically include mounting and framing, plus acrylic and metal print options, boxed canvas prints and more besides.…

FREE VIDEOS! In the next Canon Skills chapter… Cross polarisation with Christmas decorations How to shoot classy product photography at home Photoshop CC, Elements & Lightroom tutorials Plus all this... The Apprentice: how to capture amazing portraits using only natural light and a 50mm prime lens Profile: 'Skyglow' team Harun Mehmedinovic and Gavin Heffernan Super Test: Canon DSLR upgrades Tasty food photos (see right) ISSUE 134 ON SALE 12 December…