Summer is coming, the warm weather is here and the sun is shining. Great picture weather - well, minus the harsh shadows of mid-day sun at least. Still, evenings are warm and the "Golden Hour" stretches much longer for those of us in the northern half of the northern hemisphere. What is the "Golden Hour"? It is that hour, just after sunrise, or just before sunset when the sun's light is softer, redder and lower in the sky, making contrasts more appealing as shaddows strike the sides of objects and show their contours, and hues softer as the colour temperature dips ever closer to the warmer red hues.
In the northern hemisphere, the sun stays closer to the horizon for longer periods of time in the summer, so our "Golden Hour" gets stretched out to almost two hours - of course the opposite is true in the winter when days are short and the sun sets quickly, making the "hour" very short.
So get out and take advantage of the great lighting just before sunset, or get up early in the morning and take advantage of it then. Either way, enjoy the extended shooting time - because, in the end, who wants to go out in the harsh Canadian winters anyway...
4 Week Challenge
Our four week challenge is about encouraging us to reach further and expand our skills and creativity. Each four weeks, we have a new challenge, and an opportunity to share our pictures with each other. The photos have to be new and shot within those four weeks. We encourage you to take as many as you like (It's a digital world) and pick a few of your best, then bring them to our group on a media stick. We will display them and give a quick review for the benefit of all.
The Last Challenge
Our last challenge was about natural light portraits. No flash, only the light around you.
As always, there were some good images to share. Roy was impressed with the way the lighting seemed to remove the freckles from his model's face. The key though was about getting enough light to highlight the contours of the face without either washing out the image or throwing it into total darkness. The way that was accomplished was to use a large white card as a reflector to give some back lighting and lift the shaddows from the face.
Brett managed to change things up significantly as he cropped his image in an unusual and interesting way. He managed to make a very good self-portrait using only the natural light from a window. The image is intreaguing, making you want to look around the corner to see the rest of the image, and subtle as the slightly higher light on the arm tends to draw you back towards his face.
Rachel took a little more traditional approach, as she filled the frame to a larger degree than the rest of us. This tended to make the automatic exposure work better as the overall exposure was more neutral. The lighting from the window highlighted her subject, and a white board helped to fill in the lighting on the darker side of the face.
Finally, Gary's image was also more traditional, with a very technical approach. The image attempted to crop out the natural light source froma nearby window. A white card was used to gave a subtle lift to the hair line, though admittedly, it could have been a little stronger, and an exposure drop of one stop helped to loose the background and prevent blowout of the subject's face.
Our New Challenge: Macro Photography
Making little things big. Macro photography is about taking pictures of very small objects and blowing them up in the image to make them appear larger than life. Macro photography gives a completely different perspective of our world and the things within it.
So the challenge this time, is to take a picture of something very small. There will be challenges with getting your focal length and depth of field set properly, within millimeters, so take your time and be patient. Here are some great sites to check out for tips and instructions:
http://photo.net/learn/macro/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macro_photography
http://photoclub.canadiangeographic.ca/blogs/tutorials/archive/2008/06/20/macro-photography.aspx
and some beautiful examples:
Mid-way Shoot-Out
The first of our Mid-Way Shoot-Out's has been planned. We're going to the Library! Besides the possibility of picking up some great books on photography, we'll be taking some pictures in and around the creative spaces in the Queen Square and Hespler libraries. At Queen's Square, there are lots of architectural features, and at Hespler, the unique glass exterior should make for some interesting images. Thanks to Brett for making the arrangements.
Meet at Queen's Square at 2:00pm. We'll be travelling to Hespler between 3:00 and 3:30pm and finishing up around 4:30. You are welcome to bring tripods.
Freebie of the week
We took some portraits last time... now it's time to clean them up. Use this simple, free utility to make skin look clearer. It doesn't remove all blemishes, but it definitely makes your portraits look cleaner while maintaining the detail of eyes and mouth - and it's relatively fast! Click the image to go to the website.Enjoy!
Our next meeting: June 14th, 2009
Join us June 14th, 6:30pm to 8:30pm at the usual location (contact the blogger for details), and don't forget the mid-way shoot-out at the Library. Bring your friends and your cameras.
