Any photographers in the house?

Yup. And the sneakers in the upper left corner don't add anything to the shot. It's a classic example of subject failure.

That was my fear this morning while I was going through them. I'll take a couple more spins through them.

Are the objects in this one also make it background fail?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thereal...

Edwin wrote:

Are the objects in this one also make it background fail?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thereal...

The chairs and the overhead light do. The other painting wouldn't be terrible if you opened up the aperture and pushed it out of your depth of field.

I was already at the biggest apeture the lens could do (f/3.5). Best I could do in that situation was to move and re-frame it without all the background stuff. I didn't notice it through the viewfinder and that's my fault. The LCD on the 20D is tiny so I didn't notice it upon review either. Thankfully though I just ordered a 50mm f/1.8 to help me next weekend when I go to the renfair. I hope this time things turn out better.

As for the set, I did some cropping and was more picky. I whittled down the images to 91 compared to 294. Some photos are just to share with others in my Meetup group that I was with so if I did remove those there would be even less.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thereal...

Is this a bit better? What else can I do to clean it up?

Just a few shots I've uploaded to flickr:

IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4020/4217153815_5f28d789e1.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4050/4217908056_8e0f269638.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2642/4019643398_04215f394f.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3510/3785567923_4dbd6ab313.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3467/3397984961_9b4e662db5.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3651/3398045285_1215296c42.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3156/2897867265_204f8b38b6.jpg)

IMAGE(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3096/2898722164_a2c004b5a4.jpg)

Paleocon wrote:
Edwin wrote:

Could you link to the instructions on how to make one?

Easy. Take a 50mm lens, get a screw on adapter, turn the lens backward and mount it. Instant macro lens.

it is that simple as it turns out. I didnt even bother with the mounting adapter. I just held it in place. Other than that the best results are to be had by zooming fully in with the lens attached to your camera, and have the reversed lens at its widest aperture setting.

one final word of advice, the focal length is really close to the lens, so if what you are trying to focus on is blurry, slowing get closer/move the object closer to your lens.

here is the set up I have been using:
IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4036/4259841767_794e5d7d6e.jpg)
not very high tech or anything, but with some patience it has worked out for me. here is a couple more shots I have managed:
IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4050/4260324122_4c05eabf41.jpg)
IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4057/4259555837_21582a2761.jpg)
IMAGE(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2533/4260314668_0c6edd0569.jpg)
some turn out the way you would expect, but others quite surprised me.

Edwin wrote:

As for the set, I did some cropping and was more picky. I whittled down the images to 91 compared to 294. Some photos are just to share with others in my Meetup group that I was with so if I did remove those there would be even less.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thereal...

Is this a bit better? What else can I do to clean it up?

I'd say it's much better! - there a few photos in the new set that I completely missed on my first look-through and I'd say they are amongst the highlights of the set - 1, 2 and 3 are all awesome. Just my thoughts on each: 1 - steampunk guns? who couldn't love that? Although it might help to crop that shadow on the left (it drags the eye away...). 2 was a nice "eye trick" it wasn't till i clicked through that I realized it's a painting, filling the frame completely really helped and 3 is really pleasing for the sense of scale and the spotlights adding a warm glow.

I hope this helps reinforce the earlier point I made - the more exacting your standards about what you post, the better the response to your photos.

Edwin wrote:

I was already at the biggest apeture the lens could do (f/3.5). Best I could do in that situation was to move and re-frame it without all the background stuff. I didn't notice it through the viewfinder and that's my fault. The LCD on the 20D is tiny so I didn't notice it upon review either. Thankfully though I just ordered a 50mm f/1.8 to help me next weekend when I go to the renfair. I hope this time things turn out better.

I'm going to mildly disagree with you there - now I don't have an intuitive understanding of the mechanics of DoF, but the composition and subject matter play a much bigger role than just how wide the lens will go. A few shots of mine for example - exhibit A and exhibit B: Both were shot at f/3.5 and I think you'll see that the DoF is more pronounced in B than in A. Exhibit C was shot at f/5 and the DoF is really pronounced here - and that has a lot to do with the angle at which I'm shooting and the "length" of the subject matter in the visual field. I hope this helps, I'm still very much a newbie in understanding how this works.

Edwin wrote:

I went to an art show yesterday hoping I could practice. Here are the results. Please feel free to destroy my noob attempts.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thereal...

I agree about keeping too many photos, I always whittle mine down first by subject matter, then by shot styles, and finally by what will 'make a lasting impression'. More pictures of the same subject mater will give the viewer a better understanding, but it also removes any mystery. It is fun for the viewer to think about the subject mater; to work through what they are seeing. Multiple angles or shots answers all that for them whether they like that or not.

If you are using flickr as online photo storage, then thats another story. Be picky about what you link people in that case, or use a web portal to limit their interaction to those you want them to see.

I use ihardlyknowher.com
my example
or this

its a super minimalist format that is great for showing a off a portfolio or some such.

avggeek whats your process for watermarking? well not actually water marking, I just mean applying your name to all your photos? I really need to decide on a font and method of crediting myself.

On the topic of DoF

DoF is something that can be really fun, but it can be over used. I treat it as infill or a focusing tool, not everything needs it. DoF wont make things better, but it is something that does need to be considered when you are dealing with multiple layers to your composition.

Now what I wish for is a way to widen the DoF on these type of shots:

IMAGE(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2774/4264571544_563bee847d.jpg)
IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4022/4263824783_5ed84b129a.jpg)

I am having a lot of fun with this macro photography, it is making me want to take this seriously and pick up some tool to do it a bit more proper than the set up I showed earlier. I love how I can 'pierce' the boundary of the DoF with the curvature of the water droplet.

Blotto The Clown wrote:

avggeek whats your process for watermarking? well not actually water marking, I just mean applying your name to all your photos? I really need to decide on a font and method of crediting myself.

Blotto - Here's what I do for crediting/applying my name to photos:

1. When I first import the photograph into Lightroom, my Import preset automatically applies a "© <My Name>" in the creator field. This happens for all photos.

2. Once I've picked out the photos I want to process further and display, I apply a 2nd preset - This adds my website URL and contact email ID to the photos

You can see the result from the 2 steps above in the EXIF data I publish - for example

3. When I export the photos for publishing to Flickr, I add the watermark (and do a resizing) using the plugin LR2/Mogrify. I use a font based on my handwriting to personalize it a little

4. The photos I will be publishing to Flickr get imported into another catalog where I add a title and description. During this import, I apply another metadata preset which amongst other things, adds the License terms I use and a link to the License (in my case CC-BY-NC-SA)

If you think all of the above is excessive, I still haven't talked about my tag structure, GPS tagging or Headline field-editing before export

Blotto The Clown wrote:

I love how I can 'pierce' the boundary of the DoF with the curvature of the water droplet.

Very nice work!

In general depth of field is determined by three factors:

1. The focal length of the lens (short lenses have more).

2. The size of the subject in the frame (when you focus closer to the object, thus making it larger, there is less depth of field).

3. The aperture of the lens. (brain fart, added this after the fact).

Therefore, shots taken from a long distance to the subject with short lenses (and thus usually having a wide field of view) have the most DOF. Shots taken close in with a longer lens (i.e. macro) have much shorter DOF.

This, BTW, is why the small digital point and shoot cameras have so much DOF. In order to get a field of view that looks like something normal for a 35mm film camera, you have to use a really really short lens, like 5-10mm. This is also why cropped sensor SLRs tend to have more DOF for the same field of view than "full frame" cameras... you are using a shorter lens to get the same field of view. The effect is subtle, but noticeable.

Heading back home in less than 48 hours to attend my sister-in-law's wedding. I'm going to be the "semi-official" "personal" photographer for the wedding. I'm borrowing a Nikon 18-200 lens (which I've used before) and a SB-800 flash (which I've never used), so I'm frantically reading up right now on how to use a external flash. This should be... interesting

avggeek wrote:
Blotto The Clown wrote:

avggeek whats your process for watermarking? well not actually water marking, I just mean applying your name to all your photos? I really need to decide on a font and method of crediting myself.

Blotto - Here's what I do for crediting/applying my name to photos:

1. When I first import the photograph into Lightroom, my Import preset automatically applies a "© <My Name>" in the creator field. This happens for all photos.

2. Once I've picked out the photos I want to process further and display, I apply a 2nd preset - This adds my website URL and contact email ID to the photos

You can see the result from the 2 steps above in the EXIF data I publish - for example

3. When I export the photos for publishing to Flickr, I add the watermark (and do a resizing) using the plugin LR2/Mogrify. I use a font based on my handwriting to personalize it a little

4. The photos I will be publishing to Flickr get imported into another catalog where I add a title and description. During this import, I apply another metadata preset which amongst other things, adds the License terms I use and a link to the License (in my case CC-BY-NC-SA)

If you think all of the above is excessive, I still haven't talked about my tag structure, GPS tagging or Headline field-editing before export

Blotto The Clown wrote:

I love how I can 'pierce' the boundary of the DoF with the curvature of the water droplet.

Very nice work!

thanks,

As far as excessive goes, i dont think you are close. I can see myself where you are in no time. I just havnt mastered the automation of this process. I (currently) dont mind uploading the full version of the photo, I am not exactly in a position where any of my photos are in high demand.

I was looking through your favorite set. I really love the curtain photo you took:
IMAGE(http://farm1.static.flickr.com/84/238196807_c4b7edc6ee.jpg)
you inspired me to reorganize the front page of my flickr. I use my account primarily to host photos on my blog for school so I sometimes fall into the 'excessive' posting category. Anyway, what I did was set up some collections off my main page that show a little more care than my standard process photos.

avggeek wrote:

Heading back home in less than 48 hours to attend my sister-in-law's wedding. I'm going to be the "semi-official" "personal" photographer for the wedding. I'm borrowing a Nikon 18-200 lens (which I've used before) and a SB-800 flash (which I've never used), so I'm frantically reading up right now on how to use a external flash. This should be... interesting :shock:

are you using a remote system for the flash? or are you just sticking it on the body?

avggeek wrote:

I'd say it's much better! - there a few photos in the new set that I completely missed on my first look-through and I'd say they are amongst the highlights of the set - 1, 2 and 3 are all awesome. Just my thoughts on each: 1 - steampunk guns? who couldn't love that? Although it might help to crop that shadow on the left (it drags the eye away...). 2 was a nice "eye trick" it wasn't till i clicked through that I realized it's a painting, filling the frame completely really helped and 3 is really pleasing for the sense of scale and the spotlights adding a warm glow.

I hope this helps reinforce the earlier point I made - the more exacting your standards about what you post, the better the response to your photos.

How's this? I love the fact that Flickr has a built in editor with Picnik. Very easy to do and no need to re-upload.

I'm going to mildly disagree with you there - now I don't have an intuitive understanding of the mechanics of DoF, but the composition and subject matter play a much bigger role than just how wide the lens will go. A few shots of mine for example - exhibit A and exhibit B: Both were shot at f/3.5 and I think you'll see that the DoF is more pronounced in B than in A. Exhibit C was shot at f/5 and the DoF is really pronounced here - and that has a lot to do with the angle at which I'm shooting and the "length" of the subject matter in the visual field. I hope this helps, I'm still very much a newbie in understanding how this works.

So all I had to do was move closer or farther away from the subject?

Blotto The Clown wrote:
Edwin wrote:

I went to an art show yesterday hoping I could practice. Here are the results. Please feel free to destroy my noob attempts.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thereal...

I agree about keeping too many photos, I always whittle mine down first by subject matter, then by shot styles, and finally by what will 'make a lasting impression'. More pictures of the same subject mater will give the viewer a better understanding, but it also removes any mystery. It is fun for the viewer to think about the subject mater; to work through what they are seeing. Multiple angles or shots answers all that for them whether they like that or not.

If you are using flickr as online photo storage, then thats another story. Be picky about what you link people in that case, or use a web portal to limit their interaction to those you want them to see.

I use ihardlyknowher.com
my example
or this

its a super minimalist format that is great for showing a off a portfolio or some such.

Thanks for that link! I love how it shows the metadata when you mouse over it.

http://ihardlyknowher.com/therealedw...

Edwin wrote:

So all I had to do was move closer or farther away from the subject?

Basically. To expand and illustrate upon what psu_13 said above, DOF is a combination of your aperture, focal length, and distance to subject. Each element in the equation, when manipulated, with yield a different DOF. The actual math equations aren't that clear if you're like me and not as mathematically inclined.

http://www.dofmaster.com/dofjs.html

Here we compare the calculated DOF for two different scenarios on two different lenses - 50mm and 200mm, focusing 10ft and 100ft. We leave the aperture alone and at the wide extreme since most everyone understands the relationship between aperture and DOF.

Leaving focal length and aperture the same - focusing on a closer subject will yield a shallower DOF, a farther subject a deeper DOF until you reach the hyperfocal length. Hyperfocal is where everything is considered in focus - out to infinity.

IMAGE(http://lh4.ggpht.com/_5PU69EU356k/S0tlgOFof3I/AAAAAAAAAJ0/G94HcxQ-C7I/s720/dof.gif)

So, when you say that all you have to do is move closer or further from the subject, yes. But if you moved away and zoomed in, the DOF would probably remain about the same.

I took some experiment shots at the various levels on my lens. One shot has focus on the phone while the other has the lamp base behind it. It's useful because you can just mouse over to see and compare.

http://ihardlyknowher.com/therealedw...

Edwin wrote:

I took some experiment shots at the various levels on my lens. One shot has focus on the phone while the other has the lamp base behind it. It's useful because you can just mouse over to see and compare.

http://ihardlyknowher.com/therealedw...

Another useful experiment is to keep your camera in the same place (tripod helps), put it on Aperture Priority mode, focus on the same objects (eg. the phone in your case) and take a series of shots in different aperture. You'll see the bokeh variation ranging from the most blurry background (largest lens opening, smallest f-stop number) to almost everything in focus (smallest lens opening, largest f-stop number, probably f/22)

BTW, I'm digging that first shot with the computers screens. I'd probably crop it tighter to just the monitors and the person's silhouette. Kind of like this: IMAGE(http://img205.yfrog.com/img205/4255/4186039839f25b10cb86.jpg)

Blotto The Clown wrote:

thanks,

As far as excessive goes, i dont think you are close. I can see myself where you are in no time. I just havnt mastered the automation of this process. I (currently) dont mind uploading the full version of the photo, I am not exactly in a position where any of my photos are in high demand.

I was looking through your favorite set. I really love the curtain photo you took:

you inspired me to reorganize the front page of my flickr. I use my account primarily to host photos on my blog for school so I sometimes fall into the 'excessive' posting category. Anyway, what I did was set up some collections off my main page that show a little more care than my standard process photos.

Yup, setting up an automated process for a lot of this can be quite a hassle. I actually spent a fair bit of time in Excel sketching out the workflow and collection/tag organization before I actually moved to Lightroom. I recommend you think through everything before starting off, once you are a few hundred photos in and realize the workflow isn't quite up to scratch - it can be very painful to go back.

Heh that curtain photo still makes me smile - I literally woke up, turned around and grabbed my camera :). That was amongst the shots that really made me go "aha, now I know what 'seeing' means"

Yup same here - my collections aren't obvious. I much prefer organizing by chronology and by subject matter

Blotto The Clown wrote:

are you using a remote system for the flash? or are you just sticking it on the body?

Sticking it on the body. Trying to juggle a flash remote in addition to everything else I'll be carrying (the kit lens, a 50mm prime, filters, memory cards, batteries and everything else), it feels like it would be too much

Edwin wrote:

How's this? I love the fact that Flickr has a built in editor with Picnik. Very easy to do and no need to re-upload.

To me, it definitely feels like that the shot is much tighter visually - the gun really is the focus now and I barely notice the line in the background. What do you think? Ninja edit: Large is even better I think

Novocain wrote:

BTW, I'm digging that first shot with the computers screens. I'd probably crop it tighter to just the monitors and the person's silhouette.

+1 - the tighter crop is very nice for sure.

avggeek wrote:

Sticking it on the body. Trying to juggle a flash remote in addition to everything else I'll be carrying (the kit lens, a 50mm prime, filters, memory cards, batteries and everything else), it feels like it would be too much.

i would grab one of those rigs that offset the flash from the camera a bit. I dont like how direct it is when on the body. People tend to squint and it sometimes creates shadows from the lens on close objects. Not imperative, but a consideration.

I've been trying to get some photos at my wife's roller derby practices lately. The lighting is a real pain in the ass. But on occasion I've managed to catch a decent shot or two.

IMAGE(http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4003/4267072415_b00cc9369a_o.jpg)
IMAGE(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2549/3965025210_b3ee4ac0ef_o.jpg)

I hung out on the floor one day at practice and set up the flash off camera with a cord I made from an old phone cord. This one captures the coach in his element, I think.
IMAGE(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2778/4110515551_0d1781e2c8_o.jpg)

fleabagmatt wrote:

I've been trying to get some photos at my wife's roller derby practices lately. The lighting is a real pain in the ass. But on occasion I've managed to catch a decent shot or two.

The last one is quite nice.

Looks like a good place to practice panning shots. And they do take some practice. I found it's helpful to pivot from the waist, not the shoulders - leave the upper body as level as you can.

Some from the NCAA Championships a few years back. Granted I had a lot better light to work in...
IMAGE(http://www.chronoclast.com/resources/pictures/web/DSC1640.jpg)

IMAGE(http://www.chronoclast.com/resources/pictures/web/DSC16411.jpg)

IMAGE(http://www.chronoclast.com/resources/pictures/web/DSC1604.jpg)

(in retrospect and on a different monitor, wow these need some color adjustment - too much blue)

I played around with panning a bit, but without much success. Any tips on it? What's a good shutter speed to use? Would shooting in manual work best for that, or would shutter priority work as well?

fleabagmatt wrote:

I played around with panning a bit, but without much success. Any tips on it? What's a good shutter speed to use? Would shooting in manual work best for that, or would shutter priority work as well?

  • Shutter speed - 1/30s - 1/50s. Anything faster and you'll start freezing the motion blur. Might experiment with some even slower just to see.
  • Use shutter priority mode, or full manual. With full manual, just take some test shots to get it set up how you like, then play around with the shutter speed to adjust the blur
  • Continuous focus mode - helps to have a fast focusing lens for this - something with a USM motor (even entry level zooms have these anymore). Screw-drive lenses will be too slow, especially if the subject is moving towards you. Some people might like to manually focus something like this, but I'm not that good unless I have a split focus screen.
  • Maybe continuous shooting mode - I actually found that single shots worked better for me . But try both and see what works best.
  • Get closer to the action. Actually from the shots you posted you're probably close enough. Being closer makes it easier to track through the viewfinder as well as get more motion blur.
  • Hold the center focus bracket on the face. Auto-focus is much, much better with the center bracket than any of the others due to sensor density. It's easy to spot and track in the viewfinder and anything where the face is in focus is a lot more compelling, even if the rest is fuzzy. Strategic cropping later can make the composition.
  • As mentioned above, turn with the waist, not your shoulders. At least for me this helped keep the camera a lot more steady.

So there's my intro tips. I'll check my pictures when I get home and see if there's any other tips I can get out of the meta data.

Damn, awesome advice Pirate Bob! I look forward to trying some of it out.

Interesting comment about the USM motor on the lens. All my derby shots are taken with the inexpensive Canon 50mm 1.8. Not sure what it has for a motor, but I'm pretty sure it's not USM. I shot a LOT of photos and the vast majority I missed the focus. I realize quite a bit has to do with my technique, but I have to wonder how much using a lens with faster autofocus might help me out? I've been kicking around the idea of picking up a new, longer lens sometime soon. I miss a lot of good stuff on the other side of the track.

Basically with Canon's 50 1.8, if your not talking about the glass, it's as bad as it gets. AF specifically is a big point against it. Makes me feel good because I love mine, and there's no where left to go but up

Okay, so looking through the set of ski pictures again. I was battling the lighting to get the shutter speed down - polarizer and f22 aperture and even then, midday on the snow the shots were 1/80s - 1/125s. Anything over 1/320s started to freeze the motion too much. However, even then I still got a lot of motion blur. A lot of this is just experimentation finding the right shutter for the speed of the subject. Some of these guys were crazy fast down the mountain.

I uploaded some of the sharpest to my picasa account with all the metadata.

As for that lens, I googled a bit and yeah, it's got a bit older, slower motor in it. The speed of the camera helps too - I think my new Nikon D90 is a bit faster on the same lenses, or at least more accurate than the old D70 so the hardware definitely helps. But, time and practice are more of it.

I got the 50mm f/1.8 today and just messed around with it. I'm finding my shots are coming out nicer in shutter priority mode than aperture priority mode.

http://bit.ly/6TwSdS

Edwin wrote:

I got the 50mm f/1.8 today and just messed around with it. I'm finding my shots are coming out nicer in shutter priority mode than aperture priority mode.

http://bit.ly/6TwSdS

The combination of the light and DoF in the first shot of Sprocket (nice name btw ) makes it really stand out for me.

I'm surprised that you feel shutter priority works better for the 50 - the prime when it's wide open lets it so much light that you should be getting very fast shutter speeds. When you pull off a shot at f/1.8 or f/2 that bokeh makes it all worth it.

If not in manual, shutter priority is my preference. Actually come to think of I typically shoot shutter over manual, and only switch to full manual if I feel its over compensating with the aperture.

Good shots with the dog, I like them. I just watched 'Boy A' and empty hallways and mute lighting keep bringing scenes of that movie to mind.

And I must say, there is not a more useful flickr tool than ihardlyknowher.com. I wish it loaded a bit faster though.