Quirky portraits

click photo to enlarge
I used to take more portrait photographs than I do now. When our children were younger and lived with us they were very frequent subjects for my camera, as was my wife. Today I still take photographs of our children (and their significant others), and photographs of my wife are regular occurrences too, but in total numbers they are fewer than formerly. However, and perhaps understandably, our grand-daughter is the person I have photographed most in the past couple of years.

Good portrait photography has substance and value. And, though I appreciate and admire a well-done, insightful and inventive portrait, it's not a branch of photography that I've ever wanted to make a regular part of my photography: at least not to the extent of widening out beyond immediate family members. However, I do rather like constructing the occasional quirky portrait or self-portrait. This blog features more than a few of those - for example this one or perhaps this one, both of my wife, or this one of me. I suppose it's because I enjoy the creative challenge involved in imagining and constructing shots of this sort that I pursue them rather more than the formal portrait.

One recent morning I noticed the rising sun shining through the textured glass of our back door. Its deep orange yellow next to the blue of the sky were an appealing colour combination. So, when my wife returned from completing a chore outside, I asked her to pose on the other side of the glass, one hand resting on the door, and I took a  couple of shots. I'm quite pleased with the outcome. I like the colours and the way the glass transforms her into a generalised, impressionistic figure. When we moved into our house I wasn't particularly keen on the pattern of this glass. However, I've used it in photographs a couple of times so it clearly has its uses even if I still don't think it has much intrinsic appeal.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 55mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/60
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -1.00 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The poor man's Photoshop No.2

click photo to enlarge
Four years ago* I posted a piece entitled "The poor man's Photoshop". That particular post has always been one that receives a lot of hits, with the visitor invariably arriving through a search engine query. However, most of the people who alight on my page that describes a shot of a book cover taken through "Flemish" frosted glass quickly move on. They've clearly been looking for a cheap or no-cost alternative to Photoshop, the heavyweight photo-processing software of choice of enthusiast and professional photographers. Some stay and look at the image and read the text on my page, but mostly they don't. I suppose I ought to add to the page a link to GIMPshop, a version of GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program) that has been modified by the addition of a Photoshop-like interface. Or perhaps anyone searching for a cheap digital image editing program would benefit from knowing about Gizmo's Freeware, and particularly his page describing and linking to a selection of such programmes - Best Free Digital Image Editor. However, it's not my practice to amend an entry after I've posted it, so today I'm doing the next best thing by giving this post the same title (except designating it number 2), and featuring those useful sources. I hope this proves helpful to someone.

In fact, the subject of today's photograph warrants the title I've given it anyway. It shows me with the LX3 reflected in the textured glass of a door. Outside it is raining, and the door is giving a distorted reflection of not only me, but also the door and room behind. I liked the indistinct nature of this image and the way the colours of my clothes made the feather-like designs in the glass appear as though they formed part of my shape. It certainly has something of the feel of the sort of Photoshoppery that I don't indulge in but that many like, though in this instance there has been no computer manipulation at all.

* The opening sentence of this piece brought me up with a start. Have I really been posting images and rambling on for so long? It's maybe time for a change.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/30
ISO: 400
Exposure Compensation: -0.66EV
Image Stabilisation: On