Project #05 - Teaser

It has been awhile since my last post and I think its time to write again. Before I finish up the main post, I would just like to share this shot with you first! 

014_0528.jpg

I just did a photoshoot with a university race team and it was great fun setting up the shots and overcoming different problems throughout the shoot. So definitely keep an eye out for the main post coming soon! 

For the mean time, feel free to check out my portfolio, other blogposts or my online store while you are here!

Until next time!

Keep shooting!

Project #04 - Photographing Fireworks

It is almost Christmas and New Year and that means it is the time of the year where you can do take some firework photos. Last year I tried it for the first time and it was a great experience. I will start off by sharing my best photo from last year and then go into how you can take yours this coming holiday.

Getting a good fireworks photo really comes down to two important factors, preparation and luck. I don't think I need to elaborate on the luck part, so I will just focus on what preparation should be done to make sure you get the photo you want!

1. Research

Location

It is very important to do your research to find the vantage point you want, this shouldn't be too hard since everyone knows where are the popular spots around town, so just check those out online and see if you can find some photos that you like and that will be your starting point. This will be the most important part of your photo because your vantage point basically determines what your photos are going to look like. Check it out beforehand if you have time, if you don't, try to be there as early as possible. It is going to be a long wait, but it might be well worth it to get a great photo! 

2. Gear

As much as we photographers love to carry tons of gear to cover all possible situation, I would NOT recommend bringing too much because it is most likely going to be very crowded and you are just going to make it difficult for yourself. Bring only what you need! 

Camera & Lens

Last year I only have an 18-200 with a D300, so I didn't have much of a choice. With that being said, it still covered basically everything I need. I do prefer zoom for this occasion as it provides the flexibility as you probably will be stuck in a crowd at the end of the day. If you know exactly where the fireworks are going to be, bring the appropriate focal length for the best results, but if not, stay on the wider side to make sure you get more than you need, nothing worse than getting the exposure right but with half the fireworks cut off. 

Tripod

Tripod is a must! Bring your tallest and sturdiest tripod so you can shoot above everyone when you need to. Be careful not to take up walkways or create any tripping hazard for others, be considerate is the key (last thing you want is someone blocking your view because you pissed them off!).

Remote Shutter

A remote shutter, wired or wireless, will be very useful as you don't have to worry about any camera shake and it allows you to enjoy the fireworks a little bit more without the need to stay behind the camera!

Memory Cards & Batteries

Bring more than enough of these to make sure you won't run out! 

Food & Water & other important stuff

It is not just about camera gear! Bring a chair, some food and drinks and preferably a few friends to make the long wait more bearable! 

3. Settings

Knowing the right settings is the key to get the right picture and M mode is definitely the way to go for this one since your camera is no way smart enough to choose the right settings for you.

Shutter Speed

It is the most important part of the exposure triangle for fireworks. I personally prefer a relatively short shutter speed, varying between 4 to 6 seconds as it is about the length of one explosion. You can definitely go longer if you want more in your shot but I think it is more risky as the next explosion might make it better or worse (Stacking a few shots together might be a better option in my opinion). Besides, underexpose pictures can be saved easier that blown out ones, so I would recommend staying on the faster side.

Aperture

I have chosen f/14 to get a large depth of field to make sure all the fireworks are in focus. Vary this according to the situation, go smaller (f/22 or so) if the fireworks are far apart in terms of depth and go larger if you have foreground (eg. crowd of people) you want to blur out. 

ISO

ISO 100 is probably the way to go since you want minimal noise, but pump if up if the you need to depending on the situation.

There are numerous methods and techniques out there including using a black card. bulb mode and many others, they might work better but since I have yet to try them out, I won't go into those. It was my first time trying to photograph fireworks last year and it worked, so I will stick to my experience as I want you all to know what I have done and what are the results.

4. Shooting

Now that you have everything set up, you are ready to press the trigger and fire away! Fireworks is all about getting the right timing and based on my experience, press the trigger when the explosive is fired and that should give you a rough starting point. Unfortunately, you will probably need to check the first few photos and see if they are what you want before continuing until you get the hang of it. Some general suggestions I have learnt are as follows:

  • Keep shooting once you get the settings right, you won't have that much time, so shoot first and check later;
  • Check to make sure your horizon is level;
  • Vary the shutter speed a little to experiment and learn from the results;
  • Fireworks usually gets bigger and brighter towards the end, so close down your aperture or increase your shutter speed towards the end;
  • Smoke and clouds will be your worst enemies, but they are out of your control, so the first few minutes of the fireworks will be your best time to take that good picture before the smoke starts to show;
  • Change from landscape to portrait or wide angle to telephoto if you have the time to play around with it! Zooming in when you find the fireworks are getting boring to try something different;
  • ENJOY your time, it is new year's eve after all, spend it with your friends and family and have a great time, getting a good photo will be a great bonus on top, but enjoying your time will be most important!

5. Post Processing

This is going to depend on your pictures but I will try to give some general tips for you to start. Increasing the contrast and deceasing the blacks will make the sky less distracting; increasing the vibrance will make the colour stands out more; reducing the highlight and whites if the fireworks are overexposed; and change the white balance if you want to creating a different feeling to the photo. Below is an example of how I did my edits and as you can see, I really haven't done too much post processing, so it shouldn't be too hard for you to try it yourself!

I hope all of you enjoy my post and get out there to try it this holiday. Getting the shot is rewarding but enjoying a great holiday with your loved ones should be your priorities, so I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

If you have a minute or two, check out my other fireworks photo or my portfolio! I have recently started my online store, so please drop by and have a look. I am working on getting international shipping but for now, if you are in Australia and you like what you saw, you can support me by purchasing one of my photos or share it with your friends!

Until Next time, keep shooting!

Jonathan

Project #03 - Tiny Planet Photography

What do you think about this photo below? Not too bad?

Victoria Habour, Hong Kong

I think it is not a bad photo, but I want to make it looks even more interesting and with all those sky scrapers standing up like that, I think turning this into a planet will be very interesting. So, that's exactly what i did. 

If Hong Kong is a planet?

This is a great way to turn your old landscape or panorama photos into something new and cool and this is how I did it. I am sure there will be other ways to do this, but I hope this can get you started.

Method

1. Choosing the picture

First you will need a wide angle shot preferably one with foreground mid ground and background as they are going to turn into the sphere, the subject on the planet and the background respectively. In this case, I have chosen the sea as the foreground and the buildings as the mid ground and the sky as the background. The wider the picture the better because there will be less distortion when you wrap the picture around. After choosing the right picture, open it in Photoshop.

Import into Photoshop

2. Wrapping it around

Before you wrap the picture around, you need to check for a few things. The results will look the best if your picture has similar elements on the left and right which makes the transitions look smoother from one edge to another. You will need a level horizon so it becomes a perfect circle after you wrap it around. Once you have got those sorted out. It is just a few simple steps to turn it into a globe. 

First flip the image upside down (Image > Image Rotation > 180 degree). This step allow you to have your foreground be in the middle and the subject in the right orientation after. I have also attached an image at the end to show you the result if you didn't flip the picture upside down and I guess its is just another way to create something different. 

 

Then you need to go to Filter > Distort > Polar Coordinates > Rectangular to Polar.

Flip it around

Wrap it around

The resulting image should look like this as follow.

3. Final touches

In order to fix up the aspect ratio, go to Image > Image Size and change the height to the size of the width and your image should look like a perfect circle below. 

Now we are getting to hardest part. First crop the image to your desired aspect ratio eg. 1x1 or 2x3 depends on your own liking and your resulting image. Then you will need to use your clone tool, burn & dodge tool to smooth out the transition and this is really up to your own liking and your skills. As you can see, mine is still far from perfect but as long as there isn't a distinct transition, the image still looks pretty good. All you need to do now is just save as whatever format you prefer and its done. 

4. Final remarks

I think this is something fun you can do with photos you have lying around and if you have photoshop, why not give it a try. Also breaking the rules is important to bring something different and this is what the picture would look like if the starting image wasn't flipped and I think it is very interesting as well. 

I hope this post will give you a starting point to create some cool images and share it with your friends and family. 

If you have a minute or two, check out my portfolio or other part of my site. I would love to hear your thoughts about it. 

Until next time. Keep Shooting!

Jonathan

An alternate approach

Project #02 - Steelwool Photography Part 1

It has been a while since the teaser and there has definitely been some progress with this project. I think I will just start by sharing one of the few final shots with you. 

Final Image 1

It was very fun to shoot and there are a few things I want to share with you all so you can keep that in mind before you do your steelwool photography. 

1. Before the shoot

Just like any other photo shoot, you need to know what you will be photographing and what you will need to get that shot. I think making a check list of all the equipment you need is very important.

In terms of taking the photo, you will need the camera, lens and a tripod. Choosing which lens to use really depends on how you want the image to look at the end. This is my first time shooting outdoor so I really didn't know what to expect hence I used my standard zoom lens and shot at 24mm just to make sure I get the entire scene. I used a wired trigger as well just to make sure there won't be unnecessary camera shake but you can do without. 

In terms of the steelwool. I have chosen 0000 grade (very fine) steelwool as it produces finer sparks which I prefer, but feel free to experiment with different size and see how it affects the results. I have used a whisk with a string attached to the end of it and it seems to work fine. All you need to do is stuff the steelwool inside the whisk, light it up and starts spinning. You don't need to light the entire piece of steelwool on fire because the flame will get bigger as you start spinning. 

Location is also very important as you would like to do this at a remote location where pedestrian won't get accidentally hit by the ember flying out and make sure there are no flammable stuff like trees and bushes around.

Final Image 2

2. Taking the shots

Actually taking the shots is probably the easy part of the job in this case as it really all depends on the spinning. But with that being said, I will go through my settings and the reason behind them. In my opinion, how good a steelwool photos look really depends on how much sparks and how full the sparks are in a photo therefore shutter speed is the first thing I choose. Based on my test shots last time, I think 4 seconds is the optimal shutter speed to get the results I want. I have used f/5.6 as I want a larger depth of field to make sure the sparks flying forward and backward aren't going to be too out of focus. That leaves ISO and I have chosen ISO320 as that is the last piece to make up a correct exposure.

In terms of spinning the steelwool, you really can go wild with it. You can easily see some variations in my shots here and it really is up to you what you want it to look like. A few tips regarding this part is spin as fast as you can as you can get more sparks with a longer projectile. Keep the radius of the spin small to start with as it is easier to handle and make sure you have plenty of practice without fire before you start doing it with actual fire. It is preferable to have someone skilled to do the spinning and you only need to focus on the shooting, but unfortunately, I don't have that, so I did the spinning myself, but make sure safety first.

Final Image 3

3. Post Processing

I did find this series of photos quite easy to edits as they all look quite similar to the image I have in mind before. As you can see it looks quite similar before and after 

Before & After

Since there is quite a big difference in exposure between the burning sparks and the dark sky and foreground. I do think you can improve the picture by reducing some highlight and and increase the clarity and vibrance to bring the sparks out. I think another cool thing to experiment with is the white balance as you will be able to alter the colour of the sparks to your own liking. 

Changing the white balance

4. Final remarks

It really has been a fun experiment playing with some steelwool and getting some pretty good images on my first try, but there are also something worth noting when you are going to shoot your own. 

Safety: It is very important to be careful as the steelwool are burning hot and you should be wearing appropriate clothing, preferably something cotton and cover all your skins. Gloves should also be worn to make sure the rope will not cause any rope burnt on your hands when you spin it too quickly. Make sure you have friends around to keep an eyes out is always helpful. 

Setting up: There are definitely a number of variables associated, such as how the sparks fly and the wind direction and the background and many others, so I think it is important to keep trying and keep it simple each time to make sure you are improving from the last.

What's next: Now that I have already got the basic understanding, I definitely plan on getting more steelwool photographs done in the future. I think I am going to be adding in some flashes to light up the person and perhaps experiment with getting a silhouette, but we will just have to wait and see.

Thanks for reading and check out my portfolio if you have time! 

There will definitely be more to come, so stay tuned. Feel free to like and comment below! 

Until next time. Keep shooting!

Jonathan

Project #02 - Teaser

Hello everyone, 

Have you guys been wondering what to shoot lately? If you have, share yours latest photos with me!

I am currently testing out one of my new ideas but because it is still in the planning stage, unfortunately there aren't too much I can show you right now. With that being said, I can still show you guys a test shot, can you guess what this project is going to be about? 

This is a very exciting project and I can't wait to get that done and show you all what the final results are going to be!  

Hopefully you are enjoying my site and if you have any questions or comments for me, please feel free to contact me. Also check out my portfolio if you have a minute or two! 

Until next time, keep shooting!  

Jonathan