Fleeting Glimpse Images : Visions in words ~ Sagas in light

In my article Anatomy of a Self Portrait, I showed you how to, among other things, fill every crevice with light using multiple off-camera flashes. Today, I felt like doing the opposite, namely: filling almost every crevice with darkness using multiple off-camera flashes.

The Setup: I decided to shoot an image of me at the piano. I don't really play but you don't know that. This shot was in Ambient light from the recessed tungsten bulbs over my shoulder and a small amount of blue light coming in from the window above the piano. There is also a lot of clutter in this room (it is a junk room) and architectural details in the background.  I need to eliminate these distractions.

Bad light and bad image. I turned to software in my time of need. The light was coming from the wrong direction and software has a difficult time with that. I decided to do what I could with off-the-shelf basic software.

Software Solution: Software used to be my salvation and still is when I can't reshoot or didn't shoot the image in the first place. Into my image editing package I go for a little targeted brightness adjustment to tone down the periphery and accent the items I choose. I wanted emphasis on my hands and face and just a hint of a piano.  My goal was  moody introspective look. The result was dismal.

To eliminate the light I couldn't control, I turned off the tungsten and the room lights (fluorescent) in the adjoining rooms. I also plugged the window with a blanket. Starting from scratch, now I was the light bringer.

Attempt 1: Using Two Flashes, I set one on top of the  piano with a Lumiquest Softbox. The other was set to at the end of the keyboard with a Lumiquest Snoot. I was happy with the keyboard lighting but the face light illuminated to much area. I can see the background again and the sheet music and t-shirt logo are too distracting. The mood was too wistful. I wanted drama.

Already I had a much more usable image than before and I could probably take this into an image editor and get a superior image to my earlier attempt but I decided to take another step by relighting the image. I liked the warmth of the light so I kept it in trying to invoke a little lamp or candle-lit feel.

Attempt 2: With a Speed Grid  from Honl replacing the Softbox, I was able to get the quality of light on my face I desired and eliminated the spill over as well. Now I had effectively created two spotlights in a sea of blackness. The mood is getting more serious-don't you think? I wasn't happy with placement or exposure yet but I am getting closer to my goal.

Light placement was off on my face but the hand was great. As long as I could remember the chord, I was set there.  I needed to adjust my 580EXII with the Speed Grid to give me a wider throw and a better aim. I moved it back and closer to the piano lid's edge and fired away.

Third Attempt: With everything set, I dialed back the Speed Grid light on my face to 1/4 power. I set the Snoot light on my fingers to 1/4 power also. The camera was set to manual with an ISO of 100, an F8 and a 1/60th of a second shutter fired on a 10 second timer.  All I had to do was pose with some modicum of emotion.

I was pretty happy with the results. The pose was better too. Had this been a real model, I think I could have evoked the drama necessary to pull off the look I was after.  Note that the sheet music visible in the Software Solution shot has vanished and the intruding Indezine logo on my shirt has faded into the shadows.

The Setup: Canon 20D on tripod with a ST-E2 trigger driving two EX580 flash units.  The flash unit on the Piano was set to Manual at 1/4 power with a Speed Grid attached. The flash below and to camera-right with a Lumi-quest Snoot also set to Manual at 1/4 power.

The setup photograph was taken with a Canon A550 with onboard flash. (as evidenced by the nice shiny door panel)

In a room full of bad light, you can fill it with light of your own. Sometimes,however, the photograph requires that you fill it with darkness of your own so that you can invoke emotion with carefully selected splashes of light. It depends upon the needs of the moment.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

In my post dated May 9th, 2008 I announced the date of my next Costa Rican Photography Expedition. The dates have changed slightly and the tour will be leaving two days earlier to enable an extra day in the Arenal Volcano Area.

The new tour date is:

February 17-24, 2009

Information regarding the tour can be found at the Worldesigns Tours web site.

Book a trip and come shooting in Costa Rica with me.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

Windows users have no doubt long noticed that the start button located on the task bar keeps a log of the usage statistics for each program initiated by clicking the Start Button  and then navigating through the Start Menu.

The most used applications are at the top in order of the number of launches. Here is my Taskbar captured by Snag-it from Techsmith.

You can "Pin" items to the top so they are always where you expect them to be.   These are the programs that sit above the gray line.

I have done this with Bitstream Font Navigator because I am often in a hurry when I need a font added. Character Map is invaluable for finding special characters like the © that appears at the bottom of my blog posts. Quicken is there for my wife so that she can find it.  Interestingly enough, MS puts IE, Outlook and Windows Mail into this self-important position as well.  Go figure.

The remaining applications are there by pure usage.

CorelDraw X3 is the big dog. I launch it more than any other program. I run a small design company specializing in CorelDraw so that makes sense. Even though X4 is out, I have been doing my client work through X3.  Now that SP1 is out for CorelDraw X4, I will likely see the X4 rise and the X3 eventually fall.

I also do web design so MS Expression Web is near the top. Web sites require a lot of updates.  MS Office Accounting is next because I diligently maintain books so I can get paid. The next one surprised me. MS Excel? I have no explanation. I must use it a lot. It is number 4 after all. Number crunching is not something I normally do. Perhaps closer evaluation is needed to determine its prominence. Lightroom is next. It would be higher but every time Adobe releases a new updated, it gives it a new executable file. The old are deleted and that is why Lightroom (1.41) is so low. Normally it would be third or second.

The bottom five tends to fluctuate more than the top five. Windows Live Writer (on which I am typing this post) is popular with me because I blog so fricking much. Notice that positions 6 and 8 are occupied by the same program in two different versions.  Corel PhotoPaint is my workhorse editor but I am starting to use the new version more than the old. When it falls off and I am satisfied that SP1 has shored up the application, I will likely eliminate X3.

Firefox is in position seven because I cross test web sites on various browsers.  SyncToy sits firmly in number nine position because I am a backup fanatic as some of you readers know. Sitting in number 10, just off the graphic is Snag-it which I used to grab the image for this post.

Surprises?

Photoshop didn't make the top 10. It is languishing in number 17. PSP X2 is sitting at number 18. Combine all four image editors and they are probably number 1. MS Word is sitting at number 13. Now that I blog in Live Writer, Word is sitting lonely and seldom used.

Video applications are lower than I expected as well. Camtasia IV and Studio are in the top twenty but lower than I thought they would be.

Where is PowerPoint? Oh yes, it is on a desktop shortcut. Maybe we better talk about that next.

Caveat:

If you launch via a desktop shortcut or a quick launch toolbar instead of the start menu, your statistics do not appear to affect this order.  I use Windows Media Player every day but it never appears on this list because I launch it from the quick launch bar.  Likewise with Outlook (I guess that is why MS pins it to the start menu) and IE (my browser of choice today) and other sundry items either placed by me or for me by installation routines.

I think our start menus tell us much about our software usage habits. I can tell where the bulk of my work lies quickly by looking at the order of the icons. I can also tell when a version is replacing its older counterpart by watching one slide up the line as the other descends. By right clicking from time to time and expanding the icon list to a ludicrously large number I can see how many programs are hitting occasionally.  Google Earth comes in at number 17. I could have sworn I played with that more often.

What does your start menu say about you?

Rikk Flohr © 2008

Using Lens Limitations to Your Advantage

Blog readers, I am still traveling out west. I haven't had much time to write or even do much shooting. For those of you waiting for news of my recovery from my last disastrous post, suffice it to say, I am ok and the gear is recovered.  On with the show.

The occasion of our visit out west put me at my nephew and God son's baseball game. Ever eager to try out new shooting opportunities, I looked upon cheering my nephew as a shooting opportunity.  Baseball is played in the late afternoon and evenings.  Light is constantly changing. In this game, we had bright sunlight,  a thunderstorm blocking the setting sun, twilight, artificial lights and everything in between.

Shutter speeds on my Canon 70-200 MM F2.8L IS Lens ranged from ISO 200 at 1/2000th of a second to ISO 500 at 1/320th of a second (all at F2.8). The failing light and the razor-thin depth of field kept me on my toes. 

The construct of the ballpark also tried my skills. It seems that ball parks are constructed of chain link fence. In my youth, chain link was limited to a tall behind-the-plate backstop and a waist high boundary down each foul line. Now, fences are much higher and surround the entire field.   The fence mesh openings are smaller than the primary of most telephoto lenses making for difficult photos-not to mention finicky auto-focus mechanisms.

There are few options for the budding sports photographer. The openings are typically limited to the dugout entrances and the outfield corners.  These views are limited in revealing most of the field and are often clogged with inbound and outbound players.  The outfield openings are simply too far away to make effective photos.

The view from the scorer's booth is safely above the fence but offers a less exciting view of the action and looks more like the shots taken from the stands than action at the player's eye-level.  It is also uncomfortable shooting over the scorer's table and the people who need to be there.

The winning solution to the dilemma is to take the tack of submarine captains everywhere and get inside the range of the torpedo before it can arm itself.  With a camera lens this means you must get inside the focus ability of your lens. The telephoto lens I was using focuses to roughly 1.5m on the close side. I was already limiting my aperture to the widest setting (yielding the least depth of field) for the purpose of faster shutter speeds.

By closing the distance from my lens to the fence I was able to shoot through the fence. I placed the center of my lens on the 'hole' in the links and moved it until my lens hood rested on the fence itself.  At this close range, the fence becomes all but invisible.  Long focal length, combined with wide-open aperture and close proximity to the fence render the steel barrier practically invisible.  The shot above of Mat sliding into first base was shot through the fence at relatively close range.

Ball games aren't the only place where getting inside the resolving limit of  your lens can be a benefit. Zoos, construction sites, highway bridges and many others are locations where mesh of one kind or another can be negated by judicious placement of your lens in proximity to your barrier. It is also much easier than trying to clone out fuzzy diamond-shaped  patterns.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

Those of you who know me well know that I am a fanatic about equipment redundancy and data back up. I have written about it many times in the past. Sometimes, the best laid plans and the most meticulous planning will result in a situation whence there is no recovery. Yes, I was caught with my pants down-again.

Mount Rushmore photographed with my
last line of defense-a cell phone camera.

Case in Point:

My late Spring-early Summer expedition West was in day two of twenty-one days. I had just finished setting up camp at Grizzly Bear Gulch near the Rushmore Memorial. Grizzly Bear Falls is the only South Dakota fall I have never photographed.  I grabbed my Canon 40D with the 17-40 MM F4L lens and the Canon 5D with the 70-200 MM F2.8L lens and set out on the trail of the elusive falls.

"Some ten or fifteen seconds of
floundering and I was extricated from
the very cold water of Grizzly Creek"

The trail was deceptive but I finally made my way to the falls. Before snapping a picture, I decided to scan the scene from a rock sticking over the pool below the waterfall.  Recent rainfalls in the area had removed layers of protective soil from beneath the boulder on which I stood. The rock gave way and slide me feet-first into the chest-deep water.

The 5D was over my right shoulder and went three feet under the water. The 40D was around my neck and though I tried to hold it above the water level but was unsuccessful. Some ten or fifteen seconds of floundering and I was extricated from the very cold water of Grizzly Creek.

Damage toll: 5D=Dead, 40D=Powers on but gives only errors, 70-200 Zoom: interior puddle that measures about 1/4 cup. 17-40: no apparent damage.  Signs of moisture on view screens and damp fog everywhere.

With 19 days to go out of 21 both my cameras were out of commission.  The first order of business was to remove batteries and memory cards to  minimize damage and hopefully save the few images on the cards. I hiked the mile back to the tent and sought dry clothing.

"Just my luck we would have
great light and wonderful fog!"

While I drove to Rapid City to purchase some emergency desiccant I called my wife to have my backup equipment air freighted to me. It was late and I would not see this equipment for three days.  My next call was to my my insurance agent.  I insure all my equipment and had no doubt I could get material replaced but would it be in time to save my shooting schedule?

Long story short, another trip to a camera store in Rapid City, SD to verify the mortality of the equipment, I had new gear on the way from B&H. It will arrive on day 8 of 21 saving the bulk of my shooting schedule from disaster.

Key Points:

1. Insure your gear
2. Keep an inventory list
3. Leave a backup camera in a safe place
4. Have your phone numbers and policy numbers available.
5. Keep your schedule flexible

As a result of having accidentally leaving my 20D backup behind at home, I was forced to live for three days with a 2 MP enV2 cell phone as my primary digital camera.  Just my luck we would have great light and wonderful fog! I had to cancel shooting the sculpture workshop at Mount Rushmore and rework my waterfall shooting schedule based on equipment arrival.

The fortunate items in this laundry list of disaster were that my phone and my key fob for my car were also dunked but were in a higher pocket and didn't get damaged. Otherwise, I would have been stranded with no phone (and no disaster camera).

This exercise proved to me that I cannot out-plan disaster but I can plan to cope with it should it strike. Now, if only I had brought that extra laptop…

Rikk Flohr © 2008