Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2022 i PhotoPlus : The Canon Magazine

After the year we’ve all had, it’s nice to have Christmas to enjoy. A time for catching up with family and friends, for drinking and eating too much and, of course, spending too much! In our big guide this issue we have some great Canon gear ideas for Christmas presents, whether it’s for your own wish list, or for that special someone, we have 77 gifts and stocking-fillers for those not on the naughty list. There’s something for every budget with kit prices starting at less than £25, to more luxury items at over £500. See page 28. Sticking with the seasonal theme, we have essential tips for taking great festive family photos with Canon portrait photographer Taylor Brady (page 50), and how to create your own Christmas collage with…

STARTING SETTINGS TO BEGIN, Nick put Emily’s camera into Manual mode, so she could take full control of her Canon EOS M50. She also set the aperture to f/11 for decent sharpness and the ISO to 100 for best image quality and set up on her tripod to enable long exposures. She also turned on Raw shooting to capture more exposure data and switched on the 2-Sec Self-timer mode, ensuring that she wouldn’t knock the camera as she pressed the shutter button, which could cause camera-shake. CHECK THE HISTOGRAM NICK SHOWED Emily how he uses the histogram when composing his shots to make sure that all of the tones in his images come out perfectly. The white histogram shows an overall mixture of tones: bunched up on the left means…

01 OVERALL WINNER MORNING AT COUNTRYSIDE BY MARA LEITE Mara’s incredible woodland shot was the Overall Winner in this years’ Landscape Photographer of the Year competition. She told us, “Mill Lane is a famous footpath in Halnaker, West Sussex. I was looking for a different composition when I decided to turn the other way and saw this beautiful sight. I love the gate in the background and how the morning light is hitting the leaves and softly entering the tunnel.” We agree! It’s a beautiful sight, let alone capture on camera. Congratulations. Lens Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM Exposure 1/60 sec, f/10, ISO800 02 CLASSIC VIEW HIGHLY COMMENDED GOLDEN ROCKS BY JAMES EWER James was awarded Highly Commended in the Classic View category for his photo of Bat’s Head…

St Brelade's Bay, Jersey. 06:30pm. September 2014 Photography has taken me to some strange places over the last 20 years, but none so strange as a trip underground on the island of Jersey. On a whim, this exploration turned into an image that was truly magnificent, but on entering into this historical set, I literally had no idea what I was actually trying to achieve. Andy and I have been best mates for years, since my ‘non-workshops’ idea took off in 2007 (couch-surfing to wonderful places in exchange for free photographic tuition). The first day we met, at St Brelade's Bay, windsurf trainer Andy moved my unzipped camera bag and dropped the entire bag contents onto the soft sand. We can laugh about it now, but at the time it…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_1 01 TRIPOD Whether light painting a person or any other object you need to use an exposure that lasts at least a few seconds in order to give you time to move the torch through the scene. As such, a tripod is vital to keep the camera still throughout the exposure. 02 SELF TIMER Any stray light from the fibre-optic brush will show up in your exposure, so be in position with the brush on the face before you press the shutter. If you’re shooting this alone then use the camera’s self timer or a wireless release to trigger the shutter. 03 FIBRE-OPTIC BRUSH You can use any kind of torch for light painting, however a fibre-optic brush lets you create a wonderful array of glowing…

WHILE THE fibre-optic brush used in this project can give stunning results, it’s not an essential piece of kit for light painting. You can use any kind of glowing object you like. Chances are, you probably have items around the house that could be used to interesting effect. Here we used a twirling light stick, the kind of thing you can buy from a fairground or at a carnival. By waving the stick around both in front and behind our subject we created an array of glowing lines. Other items that could work equally well include fairy lights, glow sticks and toy light sabres. You could even try using a phone or tablet with a colourful display.…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_3 Christmas-themed portraits are a great way to create lovely memories of your family and friends celebrating this exciting time of year. With some key camera skills and a variety of props and decorations, your shoot can be fun for the whole family. They also make excellent gifts and Christmas cards for friends and relatives, too! The great thing about shooting portraits with a Christmas twist is that they’re really budget-friendly. You don’t need a professional studio kitted out with loads of lights: in this project I’m going to show you two lighting methods using a basic Canon flashgun and also, for even tighter budgets, how you can achieve great results with a simple natural window light and reflector setup. While Christmas props for your shoot can…

01 VINTAGE VIBES High-end lenses have become very adept at reducing fringing and some, like the Canon RF 50mm F1.2L USM, manage to prevent it almost completely. But older lenses, such as our Canon FD 50mm f/1.4, tend to be more prone to fringing. 02 LENS CORRECTIONS Both Adobe Camera Raw and Lightroom feature similar Lens Correction panels. The Remove Chromatic Aberration option automatically removes colour fringing, while the Defringe sliders in the Manual tab enable you to refine the effects further. 03 BIT OF A BLUR Open your image in Photoshop and hit Ctrl/Cmd+J to duplicate the ‘Background’ layer. Go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur to bring up the Gaussian Blur window. We set the Radius to 8.0 pixels, but this will depend on the size of your image. 04 THE…

Double-exposures are among the easiest of effects to try out on your photos. The act of blending two images into one is not only eye-catching, but also allows you to explore conceptual themes in your photography. Through your choice of photos, you can create conceptual images that spark ideas and pose questions. You could evoke an atmosphere of big-city melancholy like this, or juxtapose themes. The technique is simple in Affinity Photo, and offers an ideal introduction to several layer tools and tricks. We begin by copying one image on top of another, so that they each sit on their own layer. Once done, we can use a layer blending mode to merge them, so that the lighter parts of each image show through, like an old film camera double…

One of Vladimir’s reasons for using Canon prime lenses is to do with his creative style. “I like to shoot quite wide open, to create a cinematic look with a shallow depth of field,” he says. This portrait of Max Verstappen, of Aston Martin Red Bull Racing, is a prime example of this cinematic approach. Taken prior to the qualifying lap at the Bahrain Grand Prix in March 2019, Vlad used an EF 135mm f/2L USM on his EOS-1D X Mark II to frame the driver while he sat and waited inside his RB15. By focusing on the driver’s eyes and shooting at maximum aperture, any front or back depth of field is effectively removed, transforming the visor of Verstappen’s helmet to vertical bands of diffused colour. “I think it’s…

Camera movement can cause even the sharpest Canon lenses to deliver less-then stellar results. This is why the choice of shutter speed is such an important factor, particularly when it comes to shooting handheld. If you regularly shoot in Aperture Priority (Av) mode, then the camera will automatically set a shutter speed to complement the aperture that you’ve chosen. But this could be too slow to the prevent micromovements of the camera from softening the result, or freeze the movement of the subject. Not all scenes require pin-sharp details, of course, but we’re concerned with getting the best performance from a lens here. One option is to open the aperture to let more light into the camera, or to set a higher ISO. You can also set the ISO to…

Of course, to make the most of the sharpness of a lens, the image needs to be focused in the right place. The Canon EOS R cameras have raised the bar when it comes to autofocus performance, with the EOS R6, R5 and R3 in particular offering speed and precision with new AF technology. With their deep-learning artificial intelligence, they are able to detect and track a subject’s eyes, face, head and body, with the EOS R3’s Eye Control AF offering a rapid way to focus the camera in much quicker on your subject. Few of us can probably afford such high-tech cameras, but there are ways to ensure that your existing lenses focus quickly and accurately. The first is to pre-focus at roughly the correct distance, if possible, so…

MAKE LIGHTROOM WORK SMARTER Whichever EOS camera you decide to use, taking time to select the right camera settings and make suitable selections when adding your photos to Lightroom will save a lot of time. Remember that any Lightroom preset you use will speed up your workflow, but sometimes they will still need some fine adjustments. 01 RECOGNIZING & USING PICTURE STYLES EOS cameras use Picture Styles to define how images will look. When importing your images to Lightroom change the default develop settings from the Adobe default to the Camera defaults. This means that images captured with Standard, Portrait, Landscape, Neutral, Faithful and Monochrome styles will automatically have these camera profiles applied. 02 REDUCING NOISE FROM YOUR PHOTOS Lightroom does not apply noise reduction to photographs by default, leaving…

THE BEST camera straps are so much better than the ones that come free with your EOS camera. While you might be wondering why it’s worth spending extra money on a strap when you likely already have something that’s perfectly serviceable, the truth is that a better camera strap can be well worth the extra initial outlay. Think about your neck and shoulders. When you’re carrying a camera around, particularly with a heavy lens over long distances and extended periods of time. After all, if carrying your camera around your neck becomes uncomfortable, then you’re less likely to carry it around in the first place. We’ve included straps of all types, including some dual-camera harnesses, so all camera users should be able to find something that suits their own personal…

We set up and use lighting kits with all of their supplied accessories. The build quality and operation of all component parts are checked, along with all of the available features and functions. We test the complete power range of each flash head and LED panel, with a standard reflector fitted, measuring the intensity of output at a distance of one metre, using a Sekonic flash/incident light meter. The results are given in f-stops required for a correct exposure, using a sensitivity of ISO100, which also equates to the Gn (Guide number, metres/ISO100). For flash heads, we also measure the recycling speeds, at all major increments through the power range. TTL flash metering and HSS modes are tested, where available, using the flash kit supplier’s optional remote triggers. All lighting…

As well as removing the risk of a trailing sync cable trip hazard between your camera and a flash head, a wireless trigger typically enables you to alter the power output of one or more flash heads remotely. There’s even more versatility when using a Canon-dedicated remote trigger with one of the battery-powered flash kits on test. They enable TTL flash metering, so that power output is set automatically, just like when using a flashgun. High Speed Sync also becomes available, so that you can use fast shutter speeds exceeding the flash sync speed of your camera. This can often be necessary when shooting outdoors under bright sunlight. Preferred triggers are the Phottix Odin II TTL (£125/$180) for the Elinchrom ELB 500, the Interfit HSS TTL (£80/$110) for the Honey…

Location flash heads and LED panels generally have the same attachment sockets as studio flash heads, so they mount on traditional lighting stands. These range from cheap single and two-pack stands to high-quality items from the likes of Elinchrom. For example, the Elinchrom ClipLock Stand is adjustable between 85cm and 235cm, and weighs 1.45kg. Again, these are available individually or as a set of two, the latter including a padded soft case and costing around £112/$175. Given that the LED panels on test are ideal as lighting solutions for Zoom and other video meeting apps, a shorter, smaller-footprint tabletop stand can be a neat option. Some have a U-bracket clamp that can fasten to a table, whereas others are freestanding.…

UNDER £25 STOCKING FILLERS TO GET THE DAY UNDERWAY UNDER £50 MEMORY, FILTERS, A REMOTE AND BAGS OF FUN UNDER £100 COMPACT CANON CAMERA & PLENTY OF ACCESSORIES UNDER £150 SMART GIFTS THAT’LL KEEP ON GIVING UNDER £200 HIGH-END KIT AT REALLY KEEN PRICES UNDER £250 SERIOUSLY FUN LENSES, TRICK LIGHTING AND MORE UNDER £300 FABULOUS PHOTO GEAR FOR CANON ENTHUSIASTS UNDER £400 SMALL OBJECTS OF DESIRE AND THE BODY BEAUTIFUL UNDER £500 AMAZINGLY VERSATILE LENSES AND TOP GEAR OVER £500 PREMIUM KIT TO SATISFY THE SERIOUS ENTHUSIAST…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_1 LIGHT AND SHADE One of the challenges with light painting is in getting the right balance between light and shade. The dark areas will help bright lines and waves to stand out, so they’re just as important as the light areas. Just like regular portrait lighting, if you shine the light at the face from straight-on then it will be flat and dull, whereas if you shine at an angle from one side, above or behind the face, then you can create pockets of light and shade that add depth to the subject and enhance the effect. 01 TORCH AND BRUSH Our brush works in combination with a normal torch. The torch is attached to the end of the brush (we used a makeshift cardboard tube…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_2 We have a feeling Santa will be delivering his fair share of Lensbaby Spark 2.0 lenses this Christmas. The successor to the massively popular Lensbaby Spark isn’t your normal lens, as it gives you the ability to tilt your focal plane for incredible results. We’ve seen them at around the £150 price point, which could make it the perfect Christmas present for the photography-lover in your life – or yourself of course! This mini tiltable lens is manual focus only and features a flexible bellows-like design. You squeeze the lens in and out to adjust the focus, while tilting and rotating the optic moves the position of its sweet spot. Its aperture range is f/2.5 to f/22 and the included Lensbaby Sweet 50 (50mm) optic can…

01 CHRISTMAS PROPS We gave our Christmas portraits a festive theme by using props of small Christmas trees, fairy lights, Santa’s postbox and some tinsel. This may be stuff you already have at home, but stocking up on Christmas props doesn’t break the bank if you need some extra bits. 02 YOUR LITTLE SUBJECT Pose your children, or ask a friend or family member if you can borrow their little ones, to pose for a few pictures. Little Arlo was just seven months old and wasn’t crawling yet, so was happy to pose for us. We managed to get some big smiles out of him by jingling some of his favourite toys. 03 BRIGHT WINDOW LIGHT You can get great results with some basic window lighting at home, just set…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_5 Whether you prefer to send them through the post or online, a personalized Christmas card is a wonderful way to share both season’s greetings and cherished photos with friends and family. In this project we’ll look at how to create a Christmas wreath collage using a selection of photos. We’ll fill the shape of the wreath with our photos, then fine-tune the collage so that everything fits This involves fundamental layer skills, masking techniques and selections. We’ll begin with a wreath shape, which can be downloaded from pixabay.com (search for wreath_3005547). You can use this wreath shape as a base to add our own photos, then bring everything together with masks and text. Key to this effect is Photoshop’s Frame tool. This lets us make a…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_6 01 COPY AND BLEND Open our images or ones you’d like to use, copy one with Cmd/Ctrl+C, go to the other image and paste with Cmd/Ctrl+V. Go to the Layers panel, click the Blend Mode dropdown and change Normal to Screen. This combines the brightness values of each frame. 02 ADJUST THE POSITIONING With the top layer highlighted, grab the Move tool from the toolbar on the left. Drag the shot to change the positioning, and if you want to resize the image drag the corner of the bounding box. Tweak the placement until the images fit in a way that you like. 03 ADD A LAYER MASK The edges of the top layer here look messy, let’s hide them. Click the Layer Mask icon at…

Born and raised in Prague, Vladimir Rys started taking pictures at 15, and at 18 had joined the photo staff of Deník Sport, the largest Czech sports daily. Two years later, he became a staff photographer with the football magazine Hattrick, and in 2002 he moved to Germany and joined Getty Images where he remained until 2010. Since 2005, his main field has been Formula 1, where he is considered one of the sport’s most influential and awarded photographers. Vladimir’s awards include Photographer of the Year 2000 in the Czech Republic, Photographer of the Year 2010 in Germany, and F1 Photographer of the Year 2014, from the Italian Motorsport Federation, Confartigianato Motori. Vladimir is also a Canon Ambassador and F-stop Gear Ambassador, and when not on the road following Aston…

I’ve been taking photos of family and holidays for the best part of 40 years, but have only been taking it seriously for the past four. I attended a ‘DSLR for beginners’ workshop, joined my local camera club and have been bitten by the photography bug ever since! I love to enter photography contests and the feedback I receive is great for helping me to improve. A competition came up with the theme of travel, so I arranged to do a shoot with model Debbie Leema (@debbie_leema), as I admired her work and knew she was London based. I mentioned the travel theme and she had some great thoughts, so the collaboration worked well. We agreed that we should have the shoot at London’s King’s Cross station. This year has…

LENS HOODS perform two key duties. Not only do they shield the front element from stray light that can cause contrast-robbing flare and glare, they keep rain and snow off the glass too (which ultimately means less cleaning). More than that, they can help prevent the front of the lens being damaged, should you accidentally crack it into something. You might be able to make out the state of my lens hood. It’s more battered than Boba Fett’s helmet. Not all lenses come with hoods, and the ones available for telephoto lenses are generally much more effective than those for ultra-wide lenses. The design of the latter is always short in order to prevent it appearing at the edges of the picture, and you may need to block the sun…

WHEN YOU change lenses, there’s plenty of opportunity for dust and debris to enter the camera and settle on the low pass filter in front of the camera sensor. The end result? Dots and marks in the same position on every subsequent shot. To avoid this, angle the camera downwards when you attach the lens, and have the lens you want to use ready, so that you’re not exposing the inside of the camera for too long. Avoid doing it in windy conditions and switch the camera off before you remove and reattach a lens. You can attach the camera’s body and the lens’s rear cap together to make sure that their innards are clean when you put them back, but it’s always worth giving them a blast with bulb…

For a home-studio setup, or if you’re shooting indoors on location, there’s no beating the power and versatility of a conventional mains-powered flash kit. Prime options include the likes of the Elinchrom D-Lite and Interfit Honey Badger twin-head kits, which are fairly compact and easy to carry around, yet quick to set up and straightforward to use. The only real problem is if you want the versatility of being able to shoot outdoors, using a flash head to supplement natural daylight. Mains-powered kits won’t be much use if there’s nowhere to plug them in, but there’s a growing range of battery-powered flash heads that are as powerful as most studio heads, and vastly more so than flashguns. When supplementing the sun or even overpowering it to turn day into night,…

Taking its name from reputedly the world’s most fearless animal, Interfit’s Honey Badger head makes a bold entrance in bright yellow and black, and has a strong max power rating of 320Ws which isn’t far off the Elinchrom D-Lite kit on test. It’s a bit more noisy in operation because the small heads have cooling fans that run full-time, rather than just when the going gets hot. Various kits are available with one or two heads, and a choice of reflectors and brollies or pop-up softboxes. The softboxes are quick to set up but somewhat fiddly to fold down again. The kit on test is the dual head option with softboxes and a wireless remote. This enables you to adjust flash head settings and trigger them from the hotshoe mounting…

To adjust the power setting in conventional studio flash heads, you’re basically increasing or decreasing the voltage to which the capacitors are charged. When they discharge to give the flash output, greater levels of charge result in a brighter flash. A major advantage is that colour temperature should remain very constant throughout the entire (but relatively limited) power range. Battery-powered flash heads are increasingly adopting the alternative of IGBT (insulated-gate bipolar transistor) technology. As used in flashguns, this acts as an ultra-high-speed switch for turning power on and off. The capacitors are fully charged and the transistor controls the duration of the output. At the minimum power setting, the pulse of light will be very short. At the maximum power setting, IGBT remains inactive, enabling the full charge of the…

What to look for Canon EOS cameras Canon splits its EOS DSLR lineup into entry-level, enthusiast and pro ranges; the 4000D is the most basic, the 850D and 77D for intermediates, the 80D and full-frame 6D Mk II for more advanced enthusiasts, while the 7D, full-frame 5D and 1D lines have pro-level features. With more expensive models, expect greater handling, more robust build quality (weather-sealing and magnesium-alloy shells), more advanced features, and full-frame rather than APS-C image sensors. Over the page, we also have the full-frame EOS R mirrorless cameras, the EOS RP as an ‘entry-level’ and more affordable option, the EOS R and R5 for serious photographers. Plus not forgetting Canon’s smaller compact system (also mirrorless) APS-C EOS M camera range. DSLR CAMERAS PRICES QUOTED ARE BODY-ONLY UNLESS STATED…

Limited back issues of PhotoPlus: The Canon Magazine print editions are available on our new MagazinesDirect.com secure store at www.magazinesdirect.com/photoplus-magazine-single-issue But if you’ve got an iPad, Android, Kindle or Nook tablet, or iPhone or Android smartphone, you can download PhotoPlus back issues from the following digital edition options: • Got an Apple iPad or iPhone? Get the free PhotoPlus: The Canon Magazine app in the App Store or at bit.ly/photoplus_app then browse through our back issues or subscribe through the app. • Kindle Fire or Nook HD? Simply search for PhotoPlus on Amazon’s Newsstand or in B&N’s Nook store. • Windows or Mac? Use Zinio to read PhotoPlus on your laptop or desktop computer or via the app! Go to www.zinio.com and search for PhotoPlus where you can buy back…

Buying guide: the best Canon printers Looking for the best Canon printer? This guide will take you through the range, help you decide on the one for you, and find you the best available price right now on our popular site DigitalCameraWorld.com via quick link bit.ly/canon_printers Tom Stoddart 1953-2021: award-winning photojournalist in his own words One of the best photojournalists of his time, Tom Stoddart died aged 68. To remember his 50 years here’s an interview with Tom from earlier this year on DigitalCameraWorld.com via quick link bit.ly/tom_stoddart The best Christmas gifts for Canon photographers in 2021 We reveal our top picks for perfect presents and that won’t break the bank for Canon users (and yourself, of course!) this Christmas. Find out more on DigitalCameraWorld.com via quick link bit.ly/canongifts INSTAGRAM…

CANON PRO NAME: NICK HANSON CAMERA: CANON EOS R5 NICK HANSON is a Canon pro landscape photographer based in the Isle of Skye in Scotland. He leads photography workshops, tours for Skye Photo Academy and is an award-winning landscape photographer. This experience makes him the perfect person to give reader, Emily, some top tips and advice on how to shoot landscapes and waterfalls for our photoshoot in Dunkeld, Scotland. www.nickhanson.co.uk APPRENTICE NAME: EMILY NOAKES CAMERA: CANON EOS M50 EMILY IS a 70-year-old retired office manager from North East Fife who has recently upgraded to a mirrorless Canon EOS M50. She’s been taking pictures since 2004 and is the president and treasurer of St Andrews Photographic Society. She has a passion for shooting the beautiful coastline close to home but struggles…

ATOP THE HILL WHEN I first discovered the scene I envisaged a shot with it covered in snow and sheep underneath the trees, as on my first encounter they were there. After a decent overnight snowfall last winter my shot became a reality! CRAIGELLACHIE AUTUMN CRAIGELLACHIE NATURE Reserve in Aviemore always produces good images and on this outing I got something a bit more special… With soft light hitting the trees and grasses, creating an image that I can stare at for ages. QUIRAING FLOW LIVING SO close to the Quiraing on Skye I’ve captured shots from many different viewpoints, but this is one which I had never got an image from before, as the waterfall isn’t always flowing, so it’s extra special to me.…

Light painting isn’t a technique you’d normally associate with portraiture, but with a few simple skills you can create fantastically surreal people photos. You don’t need lots of gear for this either, just a tripod, a dark room, a willing subject, and a torch or other light-emitting device you can use to ‘paint’ with. When it comes to choosing a light source for your painting, there are all sorts of torches, light wands and dedicated tools out there. But one of the most interesting is a fibre-optic brush. This is a technique inspired by the portraits of Gunnar Heilmann, who uses a fibre-optic light brush to incredible effect. The fibres split the beam from a normal torch into lots of tiny points of light that look wonderful when brushed and…

01 TWEAK COLOURS You may find that afterwards the images have a heavy colour cast. It’s best to shoot in Raw, so you can change the white balance (and other settings) in post. You can also target and adjust the hue of individual colours using the Color Mixer panel in Camera Raw/Lightroom. 02 BLEND SEVERAL FRAMES Try combining the best parts from several photos into one. This isn’t difficult as long as the frames are in alignment. Select an area, copy (Cmd/Ctrl+C) and paste in place (Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+V). If you want just the light trails to show through, set the blend mode to Lighten or Screen. 03 INCREASE CLARITY If the trails initially look a bit weak then try increasing Clarity in Camera Raw/Lightroom. You can do this in the Basic…

01 SANTA BABY Choose a suitable Christmas decoration for your subject. We used an ornament of Santa in an aeroplane to complement the Spark 2.0’s ability to warp images. The directional blur would then make it look like Santa is zooming through the frame. 02 LET THERE BE LIGHTS Place the decoration on your Christmas tree, and make sure it’s surrounded by fairy lights and baubles. If your tree doesn’t fill the whole frame, place some more lights in the background to occupy the negative space for extra bokeh. 03 OPEN THE APERTURE Attach your Lensbaby Spark 2.0 to your camera making sure it’s the right fit for your EF or RF mount DSLR or mirrorless. The aperture is set on the attached ‘Sweet 50’, so we opened it to…

WATCH VIDEO ONLINE http://bit.ly/pp_186_4 Chromatic aberration (also known as colour fringing) occurs when different wavelengths of light are refracted at different angles as they pass through a lens element. This prevents the wavelengths from arriving at the same focal plane as the camera’s sensor, and since different wavelengths represent different colours, this results in the lurid fringes around areas of high contrast that we’d all rather avoid. This effect is amplified at both wider apertures and the longest or widest focal lengths of a zoom lens. Lens manufacturers work hard to avoid chromatic aberration and other distortions by using various mixes of lens elements and specialist aspherical and flourite lens elements, as well as coatings like Canon’s SWD (Subwavelength Structure Coating) and nano coatings. While subtle colour fringing might go…

01 DROP IN THE WREATH Go to File>New and choose an A4 template, then set Background contents: White and hit OK. Download the free wreath from pixabay.com (search 3005547). Drag it into the document and resize it to fit. Click the FX icon and choose Drop Shadow, use the settings shown. 02 MAKE A FRAME Grab the Frame tool from the Photoshop toolbar, then drag a box over part of the wreath as shown. Go to File >Properties to bring up the options for the frame tool. Click the Stroke colour box and pick white, set the Stroke width to about 8 pixels and hit Enter to apply. 03 BUILD THE TEMPLATE Get the Move tool, hold Alt and drag the frame to make a copy, reposition it beside the…

ON THE eve of the Russian Grand Prix, it’s raining in Sochi, and Vladimir Rys tells me the forecast is wet for the whole week. The timing of a pit stop to change tyres from ‘slicks’ to ‘wets’, may be the crucial difference in the tight Formula 1 race between reigning champion Lewis Hamilton and the current championship leader Max Verstappen. Only a handful of points separate the two front runners, with just seven rounds to follow this weekend’s round 15 race of the Formula 1 season. Furthermore, there is tension in the air following the spectacular crash between the two drivers in their previous meeting at Monza, home of the Italian Grand Prix. Hamilton was quick to denounce Verstappen for a manoeuvre that resulted in Verstappen’s Red Bull lifting…

I first got into photography at a young age through my love of animals. I started with a basic camera, but I now have a Canon EOS 4000D DSLR and telephoto lens, which makes it easier for me to take animal portraits. When I was at primary school I joined the camera club there and further developed my love for photography. My favourite thing to photograph has to be animals. They give me a chance to show some of the beauty that’s still left in the world. The animals are all so different and unique, which means I never get bored of them. My main goal with photography is to show that younger people can do things if they try. I like to think that, even though I’m 13 years…

I’ve always thought of myself as artistic, which is lucky as I taught art at GCSE level in a secondary school for more than 30 years! This made it difficult to do any sort of travelling, but in 2015 I retired and was able to fulfil a lifelong dream to visit Borneo and see the orangutans in the wild. I had a Canon EOS 5D Mark III at the time and I was frustrated with not knowing how to get the best pictures out of it. This inspired me to learn and advance my skills. To do this I continually practiced on masses of gulls and geese in my local park. I also joined a Facebook photography group, which was a great place to get some feedback and advice. We…

EVEN THE best lenses can suffer from problems that can’t be eliminated through optical design. To remedy this, there are digital lens ‘aberration’ corrections, which are available both in-camera and in post. Options vary according to the type of Canon EOS body you’re using. For example, the beginner-friendly EOS 4000D has a single ‘Peripheral illumination correction’ option. This brightens the darker corners of a picture that can be obvious when it’s shot with a large aperture. More advanced cameras have a ‘Lens aberration correction’ menu option, which opens up a sub menu of corrections. The Digital Lens Optimizer (DLO) option automatically applies a range of clever adjustments, making details appear crisper at the maximum aperture, combating diffraction and so on. With older Canon EF lenses, the DLO data for each…

One of the most valuable topics for photographers to study is light. The word ‘photography’ is derived from the Greek words for drawing with light, so surely an understanding of light is a fundamental skill that will make you a better photographer. I suggest you use the colder, darker winter time to study and experiment with light at home. There are three essential elements to consider about light, the amount, direction and quality. Amazingly, a lot of photographers only worry about enough light, letting their camera make settings in response to the quantity of light. Fortunately, cameras are pretty good at determining the amount of light and making sensible choices for shutter speed, aperture and ISO. For some, that’s all that matters. At this time of year you may see…

01 Canon RF 5.2mm f/2.8L Dual Fisheye Bringing 3D VR to your EOS R5 £2099/$1999 www.canon.co.uk THIS STEREOSCOPIC 180° VR lens for video and stills is aimed at everything from the healthcare and manufacturing industries to filmmakers and VR content creators. The EOS VR system features a pair of hyper-wide 190° field of view lenses, which project two circular equirectangular images onto a single camera sensor, creating perfect image alignment and synchronization. A pair of precisely synchronized electromagnetic diaphragm units control the aperture for each lens. However, compatibility is currently limited exclusively to the Canon EOS R5. 02 Canon Zoemini S2 Canon improves its instant camera/printer £159/$179 www.canon.co.uk A SUCCESSOR to the Zoemini S, the S2 is a minor upgrade on that camera’s basic formula. It’s still at heart an…

The two mains-powered kits will recycle in about half a second at the lowest power setting, and 1.3 seconds after a full-power flash. The battery powered flash kits recycle almost instantaneously at low power settings. At the top end of its range, the Elinchrom ELB 500 takes 2 seconds to recycle, although this stretches to 2.8 seconds in ‘eco’ mode. At the upper end of the range, the Honey Badger Unleashed recycles faster than the Profoto B10 Plus, but has a lower 250Ws.…

The stamina of the battery-powered flash heads in this test depends on the output power you’re using. For example, when driving a single Elinchrom ELB 500 TTL head at its minimum power setting, the power-pack will last for as many as 28,000 flashes before it dies. Turn it up to max output power, and the battery will run flat after about 400 flashes. It’s a more generous 430 flashes for the Honey Badger Unleashed (which has half the max power rating) and a more meagre 200 flashes for the Profoto B10 Plus. Naturally, you can buy extra batteries so you can swap them out. You can also run the ELB-500 and B10 Plus direct from the mains, although this option isn’t possible with the Honey Badger Unleashed.…

Given that LED lamps are nowhere near as powerful as flash heads, there’s a greater need to match the ambient lighting in which you’re shooting. Historically, this would mean using different lamps for shooting outdoors under daylight, and different for shooting indoors with artificial tungsten light. Alternatively, you could use gel filters to warm or cool the colour temperature of the lamp. The LED panels we test all have a matrix of LEDs that include daylight and tungsten colour temperature lamps. By shifting the balance between the two sets of LEDs, you can match the output to daylight or tungsten lighting, or any mix of the two.…

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