Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2023 i PhotoPlus : The Canon Magazine

Photography is a wonderful art form that enables us to flex our creative muscles with our Canon EOS cameras. For many of us it’s simply a rewarding hobby that fits in with our lifestyles, while others have turned it into a full-time or part-time career that brings financial reward. In this extensive expert guide, we look at a range of diverse revenue streams available for photographers. We show you how to take the first steps from being an enthusiast photographer to even becoming semi-pro and, if you want to jack in the day job, run a successful business as a professional photographer. If you got into photography purely to make a quick buck then you’re doing it for the wrong reasons, but there are ways to make some extra cash…

Wedding photography has to be one of the most lucrative ways photographers can make money with their cameras, but they also come with large amounts of stress and responsibility – you can’t ask everyone to come back again to retake a shot if you mess it up! If you have an interest in wedding photography it’s worth finding a professional that will let you be an assistant or second shooter; even if this is free or low paid, the experience will be invaluable giving you an idea of the flow of events, responsibilities required, and you’ll have some shots for you portfolio, too. You’ll need to have top-quality people skills and the drive to market and sell your photography services before you think about making money. Word-of-mouth recommendations from friends…

YOUR FREE LOWEPRO ADVENTURA GO SH 160 BAG Ideal for small Canon EOS DSLR or EOS R cameras with a lens Or space for a mid-sized Canon EOS body, a standard zoom lens, and flash Durable fabric and a built-in belt loop and shoulder strap for comfy carrying Great reasons to subscribe today ● FREE Lowepro Adventura GO SH 160 camera bag ● SAVE Pay less than you would in the shops ● NEVER MISS AN ISSUE Get PhotoPlus delivered direct to your door or device every month ● NEW TIPS & INSPIRATION Subscribe to PhotoPlus for essential Canon techniques, tests and photography projects every month OPTION 1: SAVE 28% PRINT SUBSCRIPTION EVERY 6 MONTHS FROM £27.99* • 13 PhotoPlus print issues a year delivered to your door • Free…

Whether it’s a peasouper or morning mist, the magical thing about fog is how it can completely transform even the most mundane scene into something stunning. There are two main reasons why. First, it’s about the atmosphere. Fog creates a mood of its own. In visual terms it diffuses the light and mutes the colours, but on an emotional level it creates feelings of calmness, serenity or mystery. It allows you to create images that evoke a feeling. The second reason is purely visual. Mist and fog creates separation. As the scene recedes, the distant elements fade out to grey. This offers an opportunity not to be missed, as it means you can compose in a completely new way. A scene that, at other times, might be dismissed as being…

01 USE DENOISE The new Denoise command in Adobe Camera Raw and Lightroom can work wonders on image noise. With fog, you might notice graininess in the otherwise smooth areas of the image. If so, try using the Denoise button in the Detail Panel to improve it. It’s also worth sharpening the image here to enhance fine details. 02 TRY BLACK AND WHITE Fog and mist can desaturate colours, leaving scenes looking almost monochrome. Ask yourself whether the remaining colour is necessary. Removing it might lead to a stronger, simpler composition. The black and white profiles in Camera Raw/Lightroom offer easy, one-click mono conversions to try out. 03 TINTING TRICKS A tweak to the colours or a tinting effect can enhance the atmosphere of your misty scenes. The Curve command…

01 FIND SPOT METERING MODE On my Canon EOS RP, the Spot metering mode is found in the Quick menu. This metering mode is much more precise than the default Evaluative mode but it does need more care and attention when you use it. 02 THE SPOT METERING AREA On the EOS RP, the ‘spot’ is shown as a circle in the middle of the LCD (or EVF). It’s not always easy to see, but just remember it’s right in the centre. Spot mode is highly selective, so you’ll often need to apply EV compensation for light or dark-toned objects. 03 EXPOSURE LOCK To offset your subject, you can take a reading with the area in the centre then either half-press the shutter button to lock the exposure (though this…

IT’S BEST not to touch or forage fungi for consumption unless you’re experienced and know what you’re doing. Varieties like this Fly Agaric with its red cap and white spots make vibrant photos but are also poisonous, so be careful during the shoot. IF YOU’RE looking for the Fly Agaric mushrooms, look at online forums for nature reserves as members post when they’ve been spotted in the autumn. The Woodland Trust is a great source of information that is a good place to start.…

A MACRO lens has the ability to focus much closer than a standard optic, like a kit lens. A ‘true’ macro lens will be able to focus with a 1:1 reproduction ratio; this is also called lifesize because it means your subject will be caught at the same size as if it was directly laid across your cameras sensor. Some Canon optics are even more powerful, like the Canon RF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM, which can go to 1.4x lifesize and the legendary Canon MP-E 65mm f/2.8 1-5x, which can shoot at 5x lifesize. All of the macro shots in this feature were taken on our Tamron 90mm f/2.8 SP Di USD VC. STEP 1 GET SET UP Head to your local woods and look for mushrooms in dark,…

The Landscape Mixer tool is one of Adobe Photoshop CC’s new range of filters that uses Artificial Intelligence to automatically alter your photos. This filter takes elements from other landscape photos and mixes them in with yours. Here, the filter has mixed in a sunset mood from another photo and added a long exposure look to the sea to give the choppy waters a misty quality. Like most automated AI tools, the results are impressive, yet far from perfect. The huge leap in technology here is incredible; the ability to automatically recognize the different parts of a photo and splice in another landscape is genuinely impressive. But while marvelling at the technology, you’re also likely to notice plenty of dodgy patches. Aside from the result looking very low res and…

01 LOAD THE FILES INTO A STACK Open Affinity Photo and go to File>New Stack. Click Add and navigate to your set of photos. Ensure Automatically Align is checked to correct any slight misalignment and hit OK. Once loaded, go to the layers panel, right-click the stack and choose Ungroup. 02 ARRANGE YOUR LAYERS Each image will now occupy a separate layer. Identify your main image and drag it to the bottom of the stack. Highlight the layer above it, hold Shift and click on the top layer to highlight them all, then click the dot icon on the layers to hide all but the bottom layer. 03 ADD A BLACK MASK Reveal the layer directly above the bottom layer, then click the Mask icon in the layers panel to…

“This composite was part of a wider campaign for Fuller’s Brewery. It came about two years after an email I’d sent to contacts in the industry when I shared the work I’d done for Baileys. It was directed by the incredible art director Jonathan Sant of the creative design agency Cubo Drinks and ended up being displayed across all of London. We had to use innovative camera angles, and Canon lenses for the stills work.”…

I took all of these images at the Oulton Park race circuit in Cheshire, which I find to be very good for uninterrupted viewpoints. There are some areas where you have large fencing, but overall it’s pretty clear viewing at Oulton Park. I have a Canon EOS M5 and a Canon EF 70–200mm f/4 IS USM, which I use with the Canon EF-EOS M adapter to make it compatible. Because the EOS M5 has an APS-C sensor camera with a crop factor of 1.6x, my 70-200mm lens actually feels more telephoto – with a 112-320mm focal range – which is ideal for this track. I’m able to capture a variety of shots using it. I can also frame quite loosely, which means I have room to crop further in post-production…

Shift and bracket WHILE THE white balance presets can provide a convenient way to neutralise colour casts (or add them), they can’t address the nuances of light. Using White Balance Shift enables you to bias the colour balance towards blue, amber, green and magenta, in a similar way to adding a colour correction filter to the lens. You’ll find this under ‘WB Shift/Bkt.’ in the red Shooting menu. Tap the touchscreen or use the joystick or arrow keys to move the mark to your preferred position. The same control screen allows you to set White Balance Auto Bracketing. With this enabled, the camera will record three images for each shot, with three different colour tones applied. Custom settings IF YOU’RE shooting in mixed lighting, or you want to create a…

FOR ACCURATE colours when you’re using flash as the main light, select the Flash preset in the camera’s White Balance menu. When you’re mixing flash with other light sources however, you’ll need to weigh up how you’re going to deal with the different colour temperatures for the best results. Flash has a colour temperature similar to daylight, so if you’re using flash as a fill light outdoors during the day then the colours should be consistent in the parts of the scene illuminated by the flash and those lit by the ambient light. At sunset or in scenes lit by artificial light though, the difference can be jarring. The background can appear a different colour to the subject. You can fix this when you edit your photo by applying selective…

Photographers want to take great photos – and by the amount spent on camera gear, a lot of photographers seem to believe that new EOS cameras are the way to better pictures. The trouble is that they use the cameras in exactly the same way as their old ones. An old EOS camera may have been noisy at ISO1600, but a new one is very likely to be much better. So photographers should make use of tech updates to improve their photos. To raise the ISO, the electronics need to amplify the signal from the sensor. Modern sensors give much cleaner signals than older ones, but increasing the level of the signal still amplifies the noise. Comparing the results from an old EOS DSLR with a current DSLR at a…

When you’re going on a proper photographic outing, it often pays to take as much camera kit as you can manage, to cover every eventuality. But life doesn’t always pan out that way. We’re just as likely to be heading off somewhere with a partner, family or friends, for a grand day out or a weekend away. Shooting time will be relatively limited when you have other things on the agenda, and there’ll be more paraphernalia to pack for the journey. So it makes better sense to take just a camera body and a single lens or two. To cater to as many different photo opportunities as possible, that ‘single lens’ is most likely to be a superzoom. Naturally, this gives unrivalled versatility, enabling you to cover off everything from…

Measuring a mere 69x25mm and weighing in at just 120g, this is so obviously a lightweight lens that you’re probably wondering why it’s not included in the main test batch. The short answer is that Canon wasn’t able to supply us with a review sample in time for us to lab-test it, so we can’t really give it an official rating as yet. What we can say, based on hands-on experience, is that it’s unfeasibly small and well suited to candid street photography, or just when you want to keep your camera size to an absolute minimum. Image quality is impressive, and the lens also works well on APS-C format R-system bodies, where it has an effective focal length of about 45mm. Unrated…

Considering that this lens gives the same field of view as using either a 24-70mm or a 24-105mm zoom at their shortest focal length, why would you bother? Well, there are two standout reasons. First, for walkabout and travel photography, it’s compact and light at 74x63mm and 270g. Second, it has a much faster aperture rating of f/1.8, enabling faster shutter speeds under low lighting conditions for freezing motion, as well as delivering a much tighter depth of field for close-ups. Speaking of close-ups, the lens focuses right down to just 0.14m (as measured from the camera’s image sensor rather than from the front of the lens), so you can get up close and personal. That comes with a seriously useful 0.5x macro magnification. Not just worthy of consideration for…

What to look for Canon EOS camera ranges Canon splits its EOS range into mirrorless cameras and DSLRs. Its older DSLR line-up includes beginner, enthusiast and pro ranges; the EOS 4000D is the most basic, the 850D for intermediates, the 90D and full-frame 6D Mk II for advanced enthusiasts, and the full-frame pro-level 5D and 1D lines. Over the page are the two EOS mirrorless ranges: Canon’s smaller, older APS-C EOS M cameras, and Canon’s EOS R System APS-C and full-frame cameras that offer the very latest digital technology. The APS-C crop-sensor EOS R50, R10 and R7 are smaller, affordable entry-level options. While the EOS R8 up to the R6 Mark II, R5 and flagship R3 are full-frame for serious enthusiasts to professionals. Canon’s EOS R cameras are packed with…

Astrophotography in September: what to shoot in the night sky this month Everything you need to know about what’s happening in the night skies to take advantage of one of the best months of the year for astro photography. See DigitalCameraWorld.com via our quick link for more bit.ly/astro_sept Canon launches two new PIXMA printers, both offering inks on subscription! The new Canon PIXMA TS7650i and PIXMA TS7750i are 3-in-1 printers designed for compactness, usability and quality. Learn more Canon news at DigitalCameraWorld.com via our quick link at bit.ly/pixma_sept Best lenses for the Canon EOS R7 Right now, these are the best RF-S and RF lenses for the Canon EOS R7, Canon’s flagship APS-C mirrorless camera. Check out more of our great buyers guides on our website DigitalCameraWorld.com via the quick…

CANON PRO NAME: PAUL FOWLIE CAMERA: CANON EOS R5 PAUL HAS been a pro wildlife and landscape photographer since 2010. Based in Yorkshire, he runs photography workshops in the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales, Scotland and Scandinavia, and is also the author of A Year with Nature: A Photographic Guide to Wildlife. We met up with him in Yorkshire to visit some of his scenic bird and wildlife hides to see what wildlife we could shoot on an unusually rainy summer’s day! To book one of Paul’s hides or workshops and see his inspiring images, visit his website at www.paulfowliephotography.co.uk APPRENTICE NAME: TOM LECHTHALER CAMERA: CANON EOS R5 BASED IN Manchester, Tom has worked in the events industry for 25 years, although has currently taken a break to retrain as…

BEAR CUBS IN COTTON GRASS EVERY June and July in Finland is covered in cotton grass but I always seem to miss it. This year, however, was the first time I’d seen it and was able to catch two young bear cubs in it. GREAT GREY OWL THE great grey owl is the one owl in the world I wanted to photograph the most but had so far eluded me. I run workshops out in Finland and a contact tipped me off about the great grey owl sighting, shooting it was a dream come true for me! POLAR BEAR I PHOTOGRAPHED this polar bear from a Zodiac while on a trip to Svalbard. I love its piercing stare directly down the barrel of the lens – memories that will last…

Sending your favourite images to a magazine, website or entering a competition is a great way to get your name published when you’re trying to go semi-pro. It pays dividends to have a good sorting system in place to organize your shots. Adding the relevant copyright material, metadata and keywords in programs such as Lightroom can be a Godsend for editors looking for additional information when considering your pictures for publication. Make sure you only submit your very best images, ensure that the focal point is pin-sharp, the depth of field is adequate and your exposure is good before submitting your shots, otherwise you could stick out in an editor’s mind for the wrong reasons! Make it in magazines Getting featured in a magazine is a numbers game, so be…

It’s easier than ever to share your images with the world on social media, but the feeling you get from seeing your photos on physical media like a fine-art print is hard to beat. Luckily, there remains a strong demand for people looking to adorn their walls and office spaces with art. Decide whether you want to produce your own prints or have them made by a professional printer. Printing is somewhat of a dark art, requiring lots of equipment like screen and printer calibration tools to set up correctly, not to mention picking the right paper and inks, matte or glossy finishes and so on. If you want to produce prints larger than A3+ you’ll almost certainly want to consider outsourcing this to a reputable firm. There are a…

Welcombe Mouth, North Devon. 08:47pm. 13 April 2008 One of the things that eluded me in my early days of photography was a strong sense of drama. Although I live near Dartmoor, an epicentre of moody weather and complex photography, I could rarely get it all to align. You would routinely see me throwing rocks around or fist clenched shouting at the sky, as the ‘band of cloud’ brought me to a familiar conclusion. All I seemed to generate was a list of near-misses. Unlike today, where we are bombarded (and numbed) by the spectacular, online image success was a truly exciting experience. Social media was a happy place, helping to build my photography potential. I secured strong connections and new business contacts. Sadly, it was also where the post-rationalisation…

01 WHAT IS FOG? Fog is essentially a low-level cloud, formed of tiny, floating water droplets that originate from a body of water, like the sea mist here. There are several different kinds of fog. The sea fog here occurs when warm, moist air passes over cool water. If the wind is blowing towards land, it carries the fog with it. 02 DISTANCE AND CLARITY Think about the distance between the camera position, the subject, and the backdrop. If you’re far away from the subject then the fog will reduce clarity. So if you want something to stay sharp, keep fairly close to it. Here, the rocks in the foreground are bold and saturated, thanks to the sun breaking through the sea mist. 03 CONSIDER A TRIPOD As mist is…

NORMALLY the higher the air, the cooler it becomes. But sometimes a high layer of warm air can trap a cooler layer of air near the ground. In these conditions, a cloud inversion – a temperature inversion – can occur. It happens more often in autumn and winter when the longer nights allow for the air to be cooled by the ground. While difficult to predict, you can deduce the likelihood of a cloud inversion by checking the temperature at various elevations (the website/app Ventusky can help). We’re looking for warmer high air, and the dew point and air temperature must be close to one another for fog to form. There also needs to be little or no wind. If the numbers add up, head out early, get up high…

01 GO MACRO ON A BUDGET If a dedicated macro lens is too expensive you can use more budget-friendly accessories such as extension tubes (above) or close-up filters and reversing rings. These accessories give an ordinary lens macro capabilities, forcing it to focus much closer. 02 BEAUTIFUL BOKEH Bokeh is a Japanese word we that we use to describe the out-of-focus highlights in an image. Bokeh (and a shallow depth of field) is easier to achieve the closer you focus. The shape of your bokeh will also depend on how many blades your lens’ aperture is made of. 03 CHEAP FRILLS The frilly area on the underside of mushroom cap is called its gills and is a wonderful detail to look at closely with a macro lens. The caps are…

If you’ve learned how to water plants, you probably own some gorgeous flowers. For a long time, I killed every plant I bought. When I finally remembered to water, I was blessed with colour. I even rescued a dead-looking lemon verbena belonging to my late wife, which serves as a reminder each spring. Flowers don’t last all year, but you can do something that makes their memory last longer: shoot them and create prints. You’re not required to make colour copies; you could create fine-art versions, giving a unique twist, so hopefully you shot some flowers over the summer or have late bloomers. Shooting flowers is pretty straightforward. A macro lens can help and you can choose bright sunlight for a crisp light with deep shadows, or a diffuser for…

01 LANDSCAPE MIXER This AI-powered neural filter splices elements from other landscapes into your own by adding textures like snow, foliage or rocks to the surfaces in your original photo. Open up the Landscape.jpg start image from your download, or open up your own image and go to Filter>Neural Filters and turn on Landscape Mixer (if it’s your first time using it then you’ll need to download it). 02 CHOOSE A LANDSCAPE Here, you’ll find 15 thumbnails of preset landscape scenes. The results can differ, so click through them to find one that works for you. Here, we’ve used the bottom left preset, which – as a similarly watery scene – recognises the sea and adds a long exposure effect. You can fine-tune the results with the strength slider below…

AROUND 15 years ago, David Lund transitioned from graphic designer and art director to commercial photographer, using his extensive knowledge of creating concepts and advertising campaigns to work with brands at the highest level. Based in the UK but working internationally, David Lund Photography now offers stills and film work to clients like Baileys, Neptune Energy and Rolls-Royce. David crafts every element of a commercial shoot from the first pitch to the final delivery and will accept nothing short of excellence – with a level of experimentation and attention to detail that can take weeks or even months to realise. Starting with a Canon EOS 5D Mark III, he now uses a vast range of camera gear to offer his clients a complete service, whether that’s flying a drone, jumping…

Try displaying the RGB histogram when reviewing your shots on screen of scenes that contain strong colours. This graph shows you the spread of tones in the three individual colour channels – red, green and blue – that make up the image. If one of these colours is pushed up against the right of the graph, then that colour will be ‘clipped’ and over-saturated, which means you may lose some gradation and textural detail. If it’s pushed up against the left side, then that colour may be under-saturated and dark. The brightness histogram provides a good overall guide to brightness, but follows the shape of the green colour channel. It won’t show you if the red or blue channels are potentially clipped. Take a look at the RGB histogram shown…

RAW files give you the most flexibility when it comes to controlling colours. As well as being able to make global adjustments to white balance, colour saturation and tone, you can make selective adjustments to colours via the HSL panel of your RAW processing software. You can do the same with JPEGs too – it’s one of the few adjustments you can make if you open a JPEG in Canon’s Digital Photo Professional software, for example. The trouble is that you’re starting with an 8-bit file that already has the colour information locked in. RAW gives you the freedom to start from scratch with a higher quality source file. The HSL sliders enable you to selectively adjust the hue, saturation and luminosity of each colour, allowing you to create images…

01 CREATE YOUR UNIQUE PICTURE STYLE Open Picture Style Editor and drop one of your existing RAW images on to the window. Select a starting Picture Style (we used Fine Detail), then use the Six Color-Axes wheel to target specific hues. You can adjust the tones by moving the boundaries of the wheel segment. Save the Picture Style once you’re happy with the look. 02 INITIAL ADJUSTMENTS WITH DPP Open the image in DPP, and select the Picture Style created in the previous step. Clicking Auto under Gamma adjustment frequently helps to bring an image to life, yet avoids overprocessing. Don’t forget to look at White balance or the Fine-tune section. The side-by-side display shows how your changes are affecting the photo. 03 HUE AND SATURATION ADJUSTMENT Choose the Colour…

Even a cursory glance at the graph generated from our lab-test results shows that most RF and RF-S lenses in the group rely entirely on automatic in-camera correction for distortion. That’s especially true for wide-angle primes and zooms at their shortest focal length. Along with other camera manufacturers, Canon is now making use of in-camera corrections to enable a relatively compact and lightweight build for its lenses. Once corrections are applied (and nowadays, corrections often can’t be disabled), the lenses’ performance is very good in practice. Negative results show barrel distortion, positive indicates pincushion…

One of the joys of a camera like the EOS RP or the R8 is that it’s wonderfully compact and light for a full-frame body. The same can’t be said of many RF lenses, which put impeccable image quality before size and weight considerations. The RF 16mm redresses the balance with a featherweight 69x40mm, 165g construction. That’s pretty astonishing given its ultra-wide-angle 16mm focal length and fast f/2.8 aperture. Stepping motor-based autofocus is typically near-silent, and combines rapid performance for stills with smooth transitions for movie capture. With a minimum focus distance of just 0.13m, you can get in really close and exaggerate perspective effects, making full use of the short focal length. The lens is also great for capturing starry skies in astrophotography. Unlike some RF lenses, there’s no…

Most of the lenses in the group keep colour fringing to a minimum, right out to the edges and corners of the image frame. The RF-S 18-150mm and the older EF-S 18-135mm don’t fare quite as well, and colour fringing is actually pretty extreme with the RF-S 24-240mm. As with distortion, however, automatic in-camera correction can effectively take colour fringing out of the equation, so you can expect good performance in ‘real-world’ shooting. Lower values represent less fringing, and therefore better performance…

Choosing lenses Key factors to watch out for The main factors to consider in a lens are its focal length, maximum aperture, and if it’s full-frame compatible or not. We’ve categorized lenses by focal length range from wide-angle to telephoto. The larger a lens’s maximum aperture, the ‘faster’ it is. Zooms are more flexible than primes, but tend not to have such fast maximum apertures. Full-frame lenses will also work with ‘crop-sensor’ EOS DSLRs, but crop-sensor lenses aren’t compatible with full-frame cameras. For Canon EOS R mirrorless cameras the dedicated Canon RF lenses are best, but using Canon’s Mount Adapter EF-EOS R enables EF-S and EF lenses to be used on EOS R cameras. Contacts Canon www.canon.co.uk Peleng www.digitaltoyshop.co.uk Samyang www.samyang-lens.co.uk Schneider www.linhofstudio.com Sigma www.sigma-imaging-uk.com Tamron www.tamron.co.uk Tokina www.tokinalens.com Zeiss…

MANUAL MODE TOM SHOOTS in Manual mode when photographing his landscapes and Paul recommended he stayed in this mode for wildlife shots too. The weather was rainy and overcast so the light levels were fairly constant throughout the day. He suggested starting with an aperture of around f/8 for good sharpness with the owls and boosting the ISO until he had the desired shutter speed. Usually 1/2000 sec would be good for wildlife, but with more stationary subjects around 1/400 sec is usually fast enough. HIGH SPEED BURST FOR LANDSCAPES you usually have the luxury of taking your time and firing off just a single exposure. Wildlife photography can be a lot more fast-paced and frantic, so a high speed burst, such as the top 20fps continuous modes on both…

01 WINNER AMAZING POWER AND GRACE BY LANA POLYAKOVA By taking this working dog away from its usual environment of fields and swamps, Lana has been able to capture a magnificent action shot with lovely eye contact and dramatic water splashes. With the dog running directly towards her, she’s done a brilliant job of focusing on the eyes to make sure they’re pin-sharp and used a rapid shutter speed so that the action and water drops were frozen in time. A wide aperture has also helped turn the background into a vibrant wash of colour. Lens Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS III USM Exposure 1/1000 sec, f/3.5, ISO1600 02 PINE MARTEN BY DES GLYNN Des has taken a fab shot of this pine marten looking back over its shoulder on…

While stock photography takes a fair amount of time to set up, it can be lucrative for photographers in the long term, as it can just tick along making money in the background while you’re out shooting your next project. It’s very rare for a stock library to be the primary source of income for a professional photographer, particularly with the proliferation of images and low-cost ‘microstock’ sites. But they can still be a valuable addition to your overall income, especially if you’re doing workshops and selling prints at the same time. Your images will need to be popular and appeal to a wide range of customers, as you could have all manner of potential buyers looking to use your shots in anything from social media to annual reports. The…

01 HOW FOG FORMS Fog forms when the air temperature and dew point (the temperature at which water vapour turns to liquid) are close to one another. The air takes the moisture from the land, and becomes wet. It can occur if the air is cooled to the dew point temperature, or if water from the land evaporates into warm air. 02 CHECK THE PREDICTIONS Look out for damp days followed by windless mornings with warmer temps, or frost followed by clear warm skies. The websites Clear Outside and wr.no are useful for fog forecasts, as they helpfully list a percentage chance of fog as well as the dew point, air temperature and humidity. 03 HEAD OUT AT FIRST LIGHT While fog can occur at any time of day or…

01 CANON EOS CAMERA Any Canon EOS mirrorless or DSLR camera will be great for macro work. Non-essential but nice-to-have features would include a tiltable LCD screen so you can work low more easily, IBIS, focus peaking and also focus bracketing. 02 MACRO LENS A ‘true’ macro lens has a reproduction ratio of 1:1 so your subject can be captured at lifesize: the same size as if it was laid directly over your camera sensor. While a macro lens is ideal, there are cheaper alternatives (see over the page). 03 WATERPROOF CLOTHING For the best shots of plants and fungi you’ll often need to get down to their level for the best angle. This means a good set of hard-wearing and water-resistant clothes is recommended. We also bought a bin…

01 MINI TRIPOD Small miniature tripods like a GorillaPod or the LeoFoto LS-223C are great for getting down low. Just be sure to check the max load of your mini tripod, as full-frame camera bodies and macro lenses can be quite heavy. Resting your camera on a beanbag can help you get lower in a pinch. 02 INVERT THE CENTRE COLUMN Professional tripods might have a centre column that can be inverted to get lower to the ground; the only downside with this method is that your camera (and all of its controls) will be the wrong way up. But you can get adapters online which allow you to hang your camera off its hotshoe instead. 03 SHORT CENTRE COLUMN Some tripods might come with a short, stubby centre column.…

The multiplicity effect is a fun way to combine several different portraits into one. It’s a great one to try out with your own set of portraits, and the shooting technique is very simple. All you have to do is use a tripod to keep all the frames in alignment and capture your subject in different positions around the frame. Keep the camera settings, focus and light consistent throughout, and try out different poses. You can take it further by having your ‘clones’ interact with one another, or by experimenting with a shallow depth of field as we’ve done here, so that the figures behind our main portrait become more and more blurry. Begin by downloading the Affinity start files (multi01.jpg to multi06.jpg) and open them as a stack in…

This personalised 1-to-1 experience caters to all skill levels, tailored exclusively to your needs. Benefit from David’s extensive 23 years experience working with top global brands. The session can cover what you choose. Portfolio reviews, Q&A sessions, lighting techniques, pro secret tips, insights on attracting clients, to transform your photography. “I cannot express enough how profoundly David’s support has transformed my photography.” says Krzysztof Czernecki of www.christopher-photography.com As a special offer, using the code PhotoPlus23, you can take advantage of a 60-minute discussion for £180 (inc VAT). The usual price is £280. To receive an information package or book your Zoom session or phone call session, please email your enquiry to david@davidlundeducation.co.uk…

I am a university student with a passion for photography. I got into photography after seeing my dad’s inspiring wildlife photographs, just over four years ago. Since then, we’ve shared many sessions together, spending countless hours in hides, through all the laughs or boredom, waiting for animals and amazing moments. All these images were taken in the same week, on our photography travels around the country. I took the images of the red kite and kingfisher at a pond hide in Lincolnshire, where we had spent 24 hours observing and were lucky enough to photograph all these species. The landing kestrel shot was taken just down the road from me in Lincolnshire, in a nearby field. Finally, the two kestrels were photographed in Northamptonshire. I have always had a passion…

AS WELL as changing the colour tone on your images and movies, you’re able to change the colour tone of the rear display on your camera. If you’re using a mirrorless body, then you can do the same with the electronic viewfinder – and you can further adjust the EVF in a similar way to shifting the white balance using ‘Fine-tune VF color tone’. There are four preset options, with a standard option, a warm one and two ‘cool’ ones. Some photographers find that the first cool option gives them a more natural looking image. But unless your displays have an odd tint that you need to correct, it’s generally best to leave them in the standard settings to ensure you’re viewing the image correctly and as intended. PART 32…

“Why does exposure not automatically lock when I use Spot metering, but it does with Evaluative metering?” Alvin Watson, Chelmsford BRIAN SAYS… For many years, an automatic exposure lock was applied while using One-Shot AF and Evaluative metering. Any other metering patterns exposures do not automatically lock: it is necessary to use the AE-Lock button. When the EOS 6D was introduced, a new custom function was added that can enable the automatic lock with any of the metering patterns. Check your camera custom functions for ‘AE lock metering mode after focus’. It’s important to remember that Spot or Partial metering is only measured at the centre of the frame: it is not linked to the AF point position. With AI Servo / Servo AF, there is no automatic lock with…

It’s easy to get PhotoPlus for your iPad and iPhone Wherever you are in the world, you can get new issues when they go on sale in the UK! 1. GET THE APP Scan the QR code (left) or go to the App store on your Apple device and search for ‘photoplus’ and then install the app. Now you can open the app on your iPad and/or iPhone. Any issues you buy will be stored in My Library. 2. USE THE APP In the app you can then buy any single issues, preview the current issue, scroll to find and buy any previous issues, as well as buy a selection of our great camera and photo bookazines available. 3. START YOUR FREE TRIAL Tap Subscribe for a 30-day FREE trial…

To test real-world performance, we use lenses in all sorts of lighting conditions, for indoor and outdoor shooting scenarios. We check for good build quality and handling, smooth and precise operation of all controls, and we test the speed and accuracy of autofocus. We typically test full-frame compatible EF lenses on a range of full-frame and APS-C format bodies, whereas EF-S lenses that are designed specifically for APS-C format bodies are tested just on cameras like the EOS 90D and 7D Mark II. EF-M, RF and RF-S lenses are tested on respective EOS M and EOS R system bodies. In-camera corrections for chromatic aberrations, distortion and peripheral illumination are disabled, throughout lab-testing, to better reveal the true optical performance of each lens. In our lab, we test lenses under controlled…

FREE VIDEOS! In the next Canon Skills chapter… ◼ Edge lighting for portraits ◼ Autumn still life shots ◼ Playing with low perspectives in city scenes ◼ New Photoshop, Lightroom and Affinity Photo image-editing guides PLUS ALL THIS… ◼ PhotoPlus Apprentice: Take creative portraits in the studio with Canon pro photographer Russ Tierney ◼ Profile: James Musselwhite, portrait and commercial photographer ◼ Super Test: The best Canon RF zoom lenses for EOS R mirrorless cameras ISSUE 210 ON SALE 17 OCT 2023 * Content subject to change…

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 and save 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…

Letter of the Month I would class myself as an enthusiastic beginner when it comes to my Canon photography! I still have a lot to learn, but I’m always keen to get out with my Canon 6D Mk II and wide-angle lenses to try and photography the local sights in my local city. I’d never really understood what was meant by the golden hour, let alone the seemingly elusive blue hour, so it was great to read last issue’s PhotoPlus Apprentice article where the reader Kevin was being taught how to shoot around Glasgow by the pro Adam. I finally understand now that the blue hour is the brief period after sunset, but before the skies lose all their colour and become dark and black. So my next mission is…