The ones that got away

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Photographers are like fishermen: they dwell upon the ones that got away. I can still see the shot I missed when an enormous sheet of agricultural plastic, more than 100 feet long, blew past me and floated over a bungalow, twisting and turning in the air, a surrealistic sight that I came upon when I was without a camera. And the photographs that I've missed when driving along roads where stopping was dangerous or forbidden are too numerous to mention. However, the failure to get photographs on these occasions can be be easily forgiven; you simply feel that fate, circumstance - call it what you will - were against you. What's harder to deal with is when you see a shot, consider how to secure the best that it offers, and still don't end up with the photograph you wanted. Today's two images are examples of this phenomenon.

We were walking through some trees at Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire, when the tip of a beech tree branch hanging low against a background of foliage caught my eye. There was no light coming through the trees behind, so I knew there would be no circular highlights to detract from the serpentine line of the twig or the delicacy and fine colours of the leaves. I opened the aperture to f4.5 to blur the background and mounted the 70-300mm lens to provide a longer focal length to further increase the blur, then took the main shot at 141mm. The composition and the light through the leaves is just what I wanted. However, I could see from the LCD that the background could do with more blur. So, I took a second shot. For this one I increased the focal length to 300mm. Then, knowing that the depth of field would be very shallow, opened the aperture to f5.6 (hardly worth the change). I took my shot looking carefully at the background, and was very satisfied with it. However, when I came to look at both shots on the computer I realised that I'd missed my composition on the second shot even though I'd got my background as I wanted. If I'd been paying better attention I'd have got the composition of the main photograph with the background of the smaller one. My next chance of that particular confluence of details is probably next autumn!

photographs and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 141mm
F No: f4.5
Shutter Speed: 1/160
ISO: 1000
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

In praise of blur

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I've said elsewhere in this blog that the technical and technological side of photography doesn't interest me very much. In fact, I engage in it only to the extent that I have to in order to make the photographs that I require. The truth is that I pursue photography because I like making pictures.

I do, however, occasionally visit photography forums and one thing I have gleaned in my surfing is the extent to which many photographers value sharpness above all other qualities in a camera/lens combination. Consequently lens acuity as measured in lines per millimetre seem to be very important to many. Questions about new lenses or lenses that someone is considering buying often solicit forum members' evidence of sharpness. Colour rendition, bokeh, contrast, flare handling and all the other qualities that are desirable in a lens come well down the list of sought after features - if they are considered at all. Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate a sharp lens, and I also understand that a sharp lens can be manipulated to lose some of its sharpness whereas a lens that isn't very sharp is difficult to sharpen. But, sharpness isn't everything, and some subjects are the worse for it. Moreover, using your lens in ways other than to secure maximum detail is often the right thing to do.

I was thinking about this when I photographed a bed of coneflowers the other day. I took a shot of the blooms aiming for sharp examples in the foreground and blurred heads behind. But, as I looked through the viewfinder I found I preferred the out of focus flowers to the sharp examples. So I took a few shots, some that resolved great detail, and others - like the one above - where nothing was sharp. Out of all the images that I gathered it was the out of focus ones that I preferred for their hazy, indistinct, painterly qualities.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 300mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/320
ISO: 1250
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Shaking things up

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I haven't been especially happy with my recent photographic output. Competent is the best I can come up with to describe it. One or two, maybe, stand a little higher than that, but overall I think I'm on something of a plateau of "very averageness".

I've been here before. Inspiration is lacking, the eye doesn't see in the way that it did, and there is a dearth of shots with which you're very pleased. In fact, my typical output consists of a lot of OK stuff, a few dire shots, and a few that stand out for me. And it's those "stand outs" that keep you clicking, keep you searching for the next one. When you don't get them no amount of OK photographs can compensate. What to do? Well, my usual technique is to snap my way through the drought - keep photographing, and gradually things do pick up again. Something else I've tried is giving myself a challenge. For example, produce a good photograph from a particular subject, or work only in one way - such as, just black and white, only using a macro lens, or using a very shallow depth of field.

It was the last one that I turned to on this occasion, though I also decided to accentuate colour (thinking about the most recent post), and aimed for a semi-abstract effect. The subject I chose was a multicoloured, multi-flowered,  Mothers' Day bouquet that one of my sons bought for my wife. It isn't the greatest shot I've produced, but maybe it will shake things up and help me climb out of my photographic trough.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 100mm
F No: f4.5
Shutter Speed: 1/8
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: Off

All wrong is alright

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When it comes to making photographs I usually have very clear ideas of what I want the outcome to be. In fact I have usually "seen" the image before I raise the camera to my eye. After I've pressed the shutter I "chimp" to check the results, and if necessary, take one or more shots, varying the composition, point of focus, depth of field or exposure (usually using the EV facility), chimping each subsequent image to see if if matches my preconceived idea.

This relatively slow, measured, fairly painstaking method isn't everyone's way of taking photographs, but it suits me. I'd say that 95% of individual shots that I keep are secured in this way. That being the case, what about the other 5%? Well, these tend to be images where I visualise the final image but the camera has other ideas and offers me something that I didn't have in mind - but I like it anyway. Or it's where I take a shot speculatively, thinking to myself, "I wonder what kind of image this will produce". Then there are those where I get it all wrong, but end up with something that pleases me: the image above being a case in point.

On this one I wanted to take a photograph of the mix of fairly lurid colours in a variegated tulip I came across in a local park, and thought I'd try a shot that had the whole bloom in focus. But, I was distracted before I framed the shot, forgot to set the aperture to give me a big depth of field, forgot to set the ISO to 400, and reckoned without a gust of wind moving the flower head as I pressed the shutter. Consequently the image has blur from a shallow depth of field and motion blur. However, photography is one of those visual arts where it's occasionally possible to produce something that you like by accident, and that's what happened here. The image has a certain sticky sweets packed with colouring, sea-side rock, candyfloss, cheap plastic toy sort of charm. Sometimes, it seems, when you get it all wrong you can produce something that is alright.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 35mm macro (70mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f3.5
Shutter Speed: 1/20
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On