This assignment requires the production of a set of photographs that demonstrate that the student can pre-visualise how their digital camera 'sees' a scene. All the photographs are shot in high quality JPEG with no post-processing. There two parts to this work: Part one which requires 12 images - three for each of the models chosen - and Part two where on of the models is re shot to make the scenes low contrast.
Part One
1 Backlit scenes
P530: f4.5 @ 1/1250 ISO 200 -1exp. 35mm AWB |
I like the result, the small figure in the picture draws the eye in and I can live with the small amount of clipping.
P531: f8 @ 1/125 ISO 1600 28mm AWB |
I used spot metering for this image and focused on the lighter early morning sky. The reading came out as 1/125 @ F8 and I took the image at this setting.
Is there any other way you could have metered the light
to get a guaranteed silhouette of the statue?
I chose to have the row of military flags leading up to the statute of the Marine offset by the everyday street lights lit to the right i.e. the calling offset by the reason for it...The final image came out darker than I saw it which was what I was expecting given the angle of light ( low and off to the right ) but lighter than I reckoned the camera would actually reproduce it. I did not expect to be able to see the colours of the flag.
Why do you think this might be?
P532: f14 @ 1/100 ISO 400 -0.7exp. 38mm Daylight WB |
focusing on the off white stone work and sky with the light coming in from the right. It metered at 1/400 @ F11 which I altered to f14 to achieve a little more detail and then reduced the exposure by -0.7 to darken the stonework. The image has not been processed other than being cropped to improve the composition. Again I was expecting the camera to see the image darker than it actually did as you can see some detail below the dome which I did not expect to be visible to the extent it is.
Why do you think the camera produces a lighter image
than you were expecting?
That said, I think the light and dark shadow contrast on the dome does enhance the detail of the dome which was what I was looking for. 2 Early morning
P 535: f7.1 @ 1/400 ISO 100 -1exp. 27mm Daylight WB |
The Millennium Tower in Portsmouth is very much an iconic landmark at Gunwharf Quays. It towers above the quayside, a dazzling white image against the sky. Here I wanted to catch the effect of the sun rising here i.e. any change in colour and gradually the colour of the tower changed from a grey white to a very faint pink to this golden white colour. Again I used spot metering focused on the highlight area of the tower as a starting point. Seeing this to be 1/400 @ f5, I decided to shoot the picture one stop underexposed. To heighten the dramatic nature of the building, I chose to shoot the tower from below looking up and diagonally across the frame - a diagonal emphasised by the shadow of a flag at the bottom right. I hoped that the camera would reproduce a dramatic contrast of colour and in fact, the sensor renders it darker than I was expecting but for all that I feel pleased with the end result. The shadows emphasise the architectural design and line well.
P536: f22 @ 1/5 ISO 100 -1exp. 49mm Daylight WB |
For this image I used the spot meter focused on the sky with the sun rising behind and to the side of the lighthouse. The reading came out at 1/40 @ f5.6 with some clipping. I wanted to have the lighthouse stand out as almost a silhouette to emphasise the colour of the sunrise so I reduced the exposure by one stop to darken the image. The final image produced by the camera had a darker blue for the sky than I saw when looking at the scene with the naked eye though this did enhance the sunrise oranges. Image was cropped.
P537: f9 @ 1/400 ISO 100 18mm AWB Cropped |
3 Dappled scenes
P533: f6.3 @ 1/80 ISO 100 55mm Daylight WB Cropped |
P542 : f4 @ 1/125 ISO 100 -1 exp. 5mm WB Daylight |
P541: f 18 @ 1/25 ISO 100 +0.3exp. 46mm WB Daylight |
The result was darker than the scene I saw with the naked eye and a little darker that I thought the camera would produce it following the changed settings.
4 Street scene
P538: f5.6 @ 1/1000 ISO 100 +0.3exp. 30mm AWB Cropped |
P540: f13 @ 1/80 ISO 400 -1exp. 21mm WB Daylight |
It was quite a challenge to photograph scenes in the area of The Lanes in Brighton. At midday the narrow passages were a very dark contrast to the bright sky above and the scene constantly changed as people wandered through window shopping. I tried spot metering at first but found it difficult to get a setting that produced the right balance between dark and light with enough detail to make the image interesting. I opted for partial metering in the end given the various areas of differing light . Based on a reading of f9 @ 1/80, I then dropped the exposure by one stop to avoid too bright an image for what I needed here.
The end result is near to what I was seeing but perhaps a shade darker and still had some highlight clipping. I like the figure looking out towards the camera in the pool of sunlight which draws the eye in and the light catching the flint wall but try as I might I could not quite capture the intrigue of the Lanes suggested by the play of light and dark shadows and open patches of sunlight in the passageways.
P539: f10 @ 1/200 ISO400 -0.3exp. 18mm WB Daylight Cropped |
In P539, I used pattern metering to provide a reading. This came out as F8 1/200 and I reduced the exposure by -0.3 stop to counteract the bright light flooding down into the passage way as I wanted to reduce the shadow sufficiently to see the activity in front of me. I cropped the image to provide a more intimate composition. I like the compositional contrast between hurrying shoppers and the still couple looking into the interior of the pub obviously sizing it up for lunch...
Part 2
For this part of the assignment I chose to return to the early morning images taken along Portsmouth's shoreline. The idea here being to reduce the contrast or maybe even make hem low contrast scenes. Thinking about the variables over which I might have some control e.g. the weather, I decided that maybe cloudy or rainy weather could be helpful here since changing the lighting of the composition by moving around the subjects was restricted by their location. I went out on a very wet, gusty morning with the high winds whipping the dark clouds across the sky at a rapid rate.
Millennium Tower
I was not surprised that this image came out almost devoid of colour as there was actually very little colour in the scene. The sky was almost uniformly a white grey - whiter than the tower. The spot meter reading of the sky came out as 1/160 @f/9. I used bracketing for the first three images and then opened the aperture to f16 ( too dark ) and then reduced to f10. The final result is a flatter more bland image with little crisp shadow definition - less contrast than the image taken in early morning sunshine where the shadow lends to the dramatic thrust of the building.
Lighthouse
This image was taken in the pouring rain with a cloudy bright sky. The meter reading came out as 1/60 @ F7.1 but while this produced less contrast, the picture was dark without the enhancement of a sunrise to provide interest. Changing the setting slightly kept the reduced contrast but added in some detail i.e the various shades of stone and brickwork but to my mind the result is a flat picture. I prefer the previous picture which while backlit by the sunrise ( i.e. no detail of the brickwork ) gives a crisper image.
Jetty
Still raining here at the jetty with a cloudy sky as a backdrop. The colours are more muted here with more detail being revealed on the jetty with the terracotta pot being visible and the colour of the high rise flats more prominent. I prefer again the image with the crisp shadows and silhouette. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and having now reworked three of my original images using weather conditions to help reduce the level of contrast, I realise that this was not as successful as I had imagined. Had I had more time, I think I would have revisited the three sites in similar weather to the original pictures to see how adjusting the composition might have worked better.
No comments:
Post a Comment