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Light - It gets everywhere

Dusk til Dawn - The golden hour

Whitstable Beach at sunset - sort of during the golden hour

Recap! 

I continue my journey into this new hobby full of expectation and verve. I am, however starting to realise that there is quite a bit more involved than I might have first considered. Before I crack on with today's subject, I want to take a minute to reflect on what I have assimilated so far.

I got a camera, you know that, and have started to learn what all the different buttons do. I know where everything is, but certainly haven't really figured out what to press when. Those pictures that aren't stinkers are more a product of luck than judgement at the moment, one suspects.

There is also the relationship between Aperture, shutter speed and ISO. Whilst the concept is understood, it is going to be a while before I understand what to use when... Thank God cameras these days are bright enough to figure most of it out for you. As for Depth of field, white balance and histograms.... *shiver*

Then we have to understand composition. This is probably one of the few vaguely comfortable aspects for me. I get the theory and have a bit of experience in design, which helps. There is just the need to apply said knowledge to camera work and then practise, practise and practise.  The rule of thirds, the effect of horizontal, vertical and (dramatic) diagonal lines all make sense to me. Even triangles, space and balance, is just a case of application and thought... right?

Finally, once you have got the hang of all those, you still have to go out and find something interesting, unusual or unique to shoot. As if the rest wasn't complicated enough. 

THEN your all done, right?

NO.

Oh no, THEN there is this little thing called "light"

Whitstable beach - About 35 minutes before sunset

Light; something that we all understand perfectly from the perspective that, without it we can't see, plants die and you bump into stuff when you try and go somewhere without it.

What the hell it has to do with photography is something else entirely. Let me share a photographers secret with you right now: 

Great light = potentially amazing photographs

You can absolutely nail all of the techniques, but if you don't have great light then your photo will be average.

How do you get great light? As far as I can tell, one of 2 ways. You fork out a bloody fortune on super expensive lighting equipment, then spend 10 years learning to use it; or you go outside and wait for great light to find you.

And here is where we have a problem. I am not sure I quite understand what constitutes great light. There are of course rules; there always are. Apparently the best light is soft light, harsh shadows are bad, bright whites are bad, midday sun, is not only bad for your skin but pretty unhelpful to a photo as well.

The ideal time to find the best light is actually quite specific. You have an hour or so after sunrise, or an hour or so before sun set.

Let me make this clear, again, as I might well have mentioned this before. The best time to do photography are the hours of the day in which Phil SHOULD be either happily asleep or happily in the pub. Yup, I didn't think this damn hobby through at all, did I!

Over the last week or so I have taken a couple of opportunities to get myself out walking during those times, "The golden hour" as they are called. I have been happily creating pictures that really are stinkers too. 

The photos featured in this article are some examples of those walks. I will be talking in more detail about my experiences in the next update. In the meantime, feel free to browse through the latest batch of uploads in my flickr Photostream.

London - Around 75 minutes after daybreak

San Francisco Prt 2: Shooting in the street

The second part of our photographic journey round San Francisco involved a bit of candid snapping of the local wildlife.  It seems there is even a technique for the simplest things when it comes to photography. 

The basic premise, is to walk the streets of the city snapping photographs of people going about their day, without them really knowing what you are up to. Easy you'd think,  well not when you only have a dirty great big SLR hung round your neck.

San Francisco – Pt.1 : Night Shooting

 Deserves a quiet night…

There are few things more spectacular than the golden gate bridge at night and I was extremely keen to use the excuse of being out in SF to have a first stab at night photography.  In hindsight, it might have been sensible to have a go somewhere a little more boring first, get used to the concept. Nah, jump right in the deep end and see what happens. I do that a lot.

Rain, Rain, Go away

In-Door shooting:

Spring has sprung in the UK, which means my new hobby has been somewhat put on hold. It has been decided, I am not yet keen enough to brave all this crappy weather. The good news (for me) at least is, tomorrow I will be on a plane heading to mean old 'frisco,  spending as much time as possible taking lots and lots of pics that stink!

The weekend was rather limited to studies of a more theoretical nature.  That is not to say that nothing was achieved. I actually used the time trying to get to grips with Adobe Lightroom.

Friday night is all about silliness and entertainment, last weekend was no exception. After much drinking and merriment we were back at my flat with friends whose patience are much appreciated. In-between shots of Polish vodka, they allowed me to snap away at them. The results were largely terrible, the drunker we got, the more I played with settings on the camera. Every button was played with, from fully auto (flash on) to fully manual. The thumb across lens was a moment one hopes to forget quickly.

First weekend

Auto off

So, what did I learn this weekend? Quite a lot actually, I am still processing a lot of it, but I did shoot my first pics that stink, with the camera in Manual mode; that was rather pleasing. Kind of like the first time you take the stabilisers off your bike and your dad shoves you down the road towards the canal.

Key learning's from the weekend coming up then:

BANG! You're (my wallet) is dead.

It's arrived!

Ordered on Monday night, arrived on Wednesday, excellent! 

The box sat next to my desk for all of 1/2 hour before curiosity got the better of me. After being egged on by Mike M I cracked open the box and had a looksy. I took a couple of photos with my iPhone, for the sake of history, of course.

At this point I put the battery into its neat little charger and went about my day, the book said 3(ish) hours to charge and who am I to argue.