Shutterfinger

Why This Post Has No Photo

It was just a week ago Saturday that I was at the PhotoPlus Expo in New York City. I was there mostly for face-time with photo industry people I know and like. The manufacturers and distributers were there showing off their wares. Photo enthusiasts were there fondling them (the wares, that is). It did not seem to matter that few of the toys on display were actually available, nor did any of the equipment junkies seem particularly concerned about the monster hurricane that was rolling up the Atlantic, headed dead for the Northeastern U.S.

The company reps were concerned though. Most of them lived and worked in the New York metropolitan area. They knew just how vulnerable a city surrounded by water could be. Most were planning to vacate the show as soon as it was over so that they could drive or fly home and prepare for the storm.

I did likewise. I drove home that afternoon, spent most of Sunday preparing, then all of Monday watching at Hurricane Sandy grew increasingly more intense. To my amazement, despite howling winds, the sounds of falling trees, and the glow from exploding power line transformers reflected from the clouds, I awoke Tuesday morning with full electric power, water, and Internet access. My house was unscathed. My street was unobstructed. Many of my friends, neighbors, and family members weren't so lucky. Some are still without power as nighttime temperatures dip into the low 40s. Others are still waiting for five-foot diameter trees to be removed from their streets and yards. Life is by no means back to normal and may not be for weeks.

So I guess this is all just a roundabout way of saying that I didn't really feel like showing off a few of my photos and explaining how they somehow exemplify Something More. The Something More this week is Mother Nature in all her glory and fury. Only those who have lived through an experience like this can understand what a poor job a photograph or even a photo essay does of conveying its depth and scope--or how useless a camera is to someone who is suddenly without food, electricity and a warm, dry place to sleep. To be blunt, I've got more important things on my mind these days than cameras and photography.

But don't worry--I'll return to the normal programming here on Shutterfinger in a week or so. Not today though; it's just too soon.

 

 

 

Learning Something New Every Day

  This is as close as I can get to the moment after the moment of contact. The ball is just starting to move, hence the blur. It's the moment just after this that I can't capture.

After more than 30 years of practicing street photography, I've become very good at capturing fleeting moments and gestures. I naturally assumed that this skill would apply to sports photography; specifically, my son's soccer games. Imagine my chagrin and puzzlement when this assumption was proven wrong.

What I was trying to capture was the moment just after my son had kicked a soccer ball; the moment when it has just left the tip of his foot and went flying into the air. It turns out that although I had no trouble capturing the moment his foot made contact with the ball, for the life of me, I couldn't capture what happened a split-second later, even when I set my camera set to its maximum continuous speed of 6 frames-per-second. The ball was apparently accellerating so fast after being kicked that 6 fps wasn't fast enough to catch what I was looking for. Maybe it takes a camera that can do 15 fps. Maybe it takes a camera with just a millisecond more shutter lag. I just don't know.

This is as close as I can get to the moment I've been looking for--which ain't bad, if I do say so myself. Just don't ask how many frames it took.

I'll tell you this though: Capturing peak action in sports photography is not as easy as it looks, assuming it looks easy at all. If any of you have any tips to pass along, please feel free. In the meantime I'll be trying to get my mind adjusted to the possibility that there might be some things I'm just not able to capture.

Smells Like Film Spirit

This is a typical fine-grain 35mm film look. Can you guess which one--or whether it was really shot on film at all?

Although there are a lot of reasons why digital photography has decimated the ranks of photographers who still use film, the “look” of digital is not necessarily one of them. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with how digital photographs look; it’s that there’s a general uniformity of image characteristics—so much so that some photographers make a special effort to post-process their own individual look onto their images. The irony is that this often makes their images look more digital rather than less—but again, there’s not necessarily anything wrong with that, as long as their viewers are generally appreciative and accepting. Even a good thing can be taken too far.

A color negative film can have high contrast and color saturation--if you pick the right one.

Others take a similar yet different approach: They use post-processing to make their digital photographs look as if they were shot on film or processed in in an old-school black-and-white darkroom. (Products such as DxO FilmPack 3 come to mind here.) Say what you will about film, it wasn’t lacking in variety, especially during its heyday. You could choose from at least a half-dozen B&W, color negative, and color transparency films, each with its own distinct look and feel.

A color negative film can also be soft and subtle.

The results of these post-processed film-looks can be quite convincing. Those that aren’t generally fall short because the person doing the processing lacks any real feel or appreciation for how film really looks, what film an experienced photographer would use for a particular subject, or how that photographer might print the resulting image. No surprise here. Cameras and software don’t come with good taste and experience; you have to supply that yourself.

Here's an example shot on one of the most famous color films of all. If you can't tell what it is, you definitely need to brush up.

For the sake of reference and discussion, I’ve included a few of my photos that I believe have a convincing “film look.” Were they actually shot on film? (Don’t try to guess from the EXIF data. That can be faked.) More importantly, do they stand on their own merits as photographs? Film or digital, that’s what matters most.

Why It's Been Quiet

I'm posting this photo for no reason other than I like it and it captures the meditative mood I'm in at the moment. I shot this years ago with a Leica M6. I can't remember what lens I used, but one thing is for sure: it was amazingly low on flare and veiling glare.

You may have noticed that it's been quieter than usual at Shutterfinger of late. I normally post once a week. It's been more than a week since my last post. Assuming you've noticed at all, this is not necessarily cause for alarm. Assuming you have noticed, here's why it's been so quiet: I've been reflecting on why I started this blog in the first place and whether these reasons are sufficient for continuing.

The main reason I started writing Shutterfinger was to see what it was like. I wanted to see how many people were interested in my photographs and what I wanted to write about. I wanted to see how long I could do it; whether it would be fun or a burden; whether others found any value in what I was sharing.

I didn't do it for the money. Although it's certainly possible to earn a living as a photo blogger, those who are most successful at it approach it as a full-time job. They also have to cater to what most photography enthusiasts are most comfortable and familiar with, that being cameras, lenses, and other photo equipment. I know this from personal experience. The posts I've written that consistently receive the most readers and comments are equipment reviews. I've observed the same phenomenon on other photo blogs as well. Some consist of little else.

I say this not to denigrate photo equipment or reviews. Lord knows I can be just as fascinated with new gear as the next guy. (Gals are generally less gear-fixated than guys--or maybe it's just that they are fixated on different gear.) All I'm saying is that I'm not all that interested in writing about new equipment in and of itself, even if that would attract more readers.

I'm also not interested in attracting advertisers. You've got to write about lots of equipment and provide lots of links to associated products, services, and businesses to do that. Again, there's nothing wrong with it; I'm just not particularly interested in going down that path.

Finally, like most of you, I have an active life outside of blogging. I'm married, have three school-age kids, a full-time job, and prefer to spend my leisure time outdoors instead of sitting in front of a computer. Since I have yet to receive a single comment asking why I don't post more often, I assume you're generally happy with what you get, when you get it--especially since the price is right.

Still, nothing lasts forever. Should the day come when I decide to put Shutterfinger to rest, the thing I will value the most from this experience will be the acquaintances I've made, the people I've met, and the amazing work and insights you've shared. It's a big world out there, folks. Just knowing you're out there and that you care enough to visit from time to time makes it feel smaller and more friendly.

Knowledge vs. Skill

What does it take to get an interesting photo of neon lights at night through a rain-covered window while using a cellphone camera? Is it knowledge, skill, or luck? Do you care?

A friend of mine once asked if I wouldn't mind him watching me print. This was back when printing involved arcane devices such as enlargers, safelights, chemicals, and trays. When he saw me focus by placing my grain magnifier on the easel, he felt compelled to recommend that I insert a sheet of exposed enlarging paper first, so that I would be focusing on the actual image plane.

It seems my friend had read in a magazine article somewhere that this was the right way to do it and was quite surprised I didn't know. He offered this recommendation despite the fact that I was using a glass negative carrier to prevent the negative from "popping" due to heat from the enlarging lamp, and that my prints are almost infallibly sharp, which was one of the reasons he wanted to watch me print in the first place. In other words, my friend had confused knowledge and information with skill. He thought that knowing the right way to do something (or thinking he knew) was the same as being able to do it.

In this respect he was a lot like guys I would spar with at various martial arts schools. They "knew" their style was superior to mine and that my style had serious flaws because this was what their teacher and fellow students had told them. You can imagine their frustration and discomfort when they discovered that what seemed so true and obvious in theory didn't always work so well in practice. In this case, it's not that what they knew was wrong, it was that they lacked the skill to pull it off.

I chose this as the topic of today's post for two reasons: First, because I make my living as an instructional designer. I train people how to do things. My goal is to do more than simply share knowledge; it's to provide opportunities to practice; to unlearn old skills and habits and learn new ones. The second reason is that photography forums and blog comments (Shutterfinger comments excepted) are full of strong opinions from people who claim to have a lot knowledge yet offer little evidence of any actual skill. In my world, knowledge and skill are both wonderful things to have. Combine them and you become a force to be recconed with; someone who often appears to be amazingly lucky.

The Importance of "Decisive Moments"

The elements you see in this photograph--the position of the man's head and hands, the girl exiting the restaurant, the reflection of the automobile--existed as you see them here for only a split second. The way to ready for moments like this begins with deciding to.

Good photography, especially good street and travel photography, involves not just one "decisive moment," but a series of them. They begin with your decision to carry a camera with you rather than leave it at home, in the office, or in the car.

You have to decide what and where to photograph. Will it be the beach or the forest; the upscale part of town or the ghetto?

Most of today's cameras are designed so that you don't have to decide what exposure to use. Although this is not necessarily a bad thing, it's still better to be more mindful about exposure rather than less.

The same applies to your choice of zoom or focal length. Whatever you decide to use will affect what you decide to photograph and how.

I took this image just as this gentleman was turning the corner to my right and riding past me. He was moving so fast I barely had time to raise the camera to my eye. When I did, he laughed and said "You missed!" as he pedaled past. As you can see, I did not miss.

Let's say you happen upon a possible subject. Now you have to decide whether to photograph it or not. This is a more important decision than many novice photographers realize. The combination of activity, subject, and lighting that catches your interest could disappear in a second. If this doesn't seem like a particularly challenging decision, imagine your subject is looking right at you and standing only a few feet away. Do you raise the camera to your eye and take the shot or do you avert your gaze and sulk away?

The ultimate, culminating decision is when to release the shutter. This is what most people mean when they refer to Henri Cartier-Bresson's "decisive moment"--the moment  you decide that everything fits together NOW, and maybe later too; you'll just have to wait and see.

So my tip for today is this: Be mindful, purposeful, and direct about the decisions that lead up to your photographs.

Even more static compositions like this involve important decisions, such as waiting for the sun and shadows to be in just the right place, or waiting for a diner in shadow to raise a coffee cup to his lips.

A Taste of Luxury

 

The EOS 5D Mark III is on the left, the EOS 1D X on the right. The Nikon V1 in the foreground is there to only provide a sense of scale. Although it does an excellent job for a camera of its size, have no doubt that Canon's cannons crush it when it comes to image quality.

By a fortuitous set of circumstances, Canon sent me their two best cameras, the EOS 5D Mark III and EOS 1D X, to use for a few weeks. It's been quite an experience.

Before I describe it, let me say that I have owned and used Canon cameras since the days of the Canon 7S rangefinder and continuing with practically every significant model they have introduced since. I had to slow my roll during the transition to digital, however. I simply couldn't afford to buy a new camera body every couple of years, especially since the full-frame 35mm versions were particularly pricey for an upper-middle income dad with a mortgage and three school-age children.

Even if I had the disposible income, my work is pretty much limited to street photography, travel, family, and portraiture these days. I don't need or want a full-sized pro camera, I prefer something small, lightweight, quiet, and unobtrusive.

These are not the first qualities that come to your mind when you think of the EOS 5D Mark III and 1D X. You think sturdy, fast, sophisticated, professional, and versatile. You think amazing image quality. You think, "I look serious as hell when I carry this thing around." If you actually are a pro on paid assignment--a wedding, advertising, or sports photographer for example--this is a good thing. For a street photographer like me, not so much.

This is a square crop of the original 2560 x 3840 pixel image. Even though I didn't bother to sharpen it, it will look much sharper if you click to open it in a new window.

Here is the same shot with an 800 x 800 crop in the center. Now you can easily tell what brand of surfboard they are holding.

Frankly, I've been amazed at how much attention I attract when I carry either of these rigs, especially the EOS 1D X. Typical comments (and my responses) include "Wow, that must be a really expensive camera!" (Compared to what?) "How much does it cost?" (You don't want to know.) "Are you a professional?" (Depends on what you mean by professional.) "How many frames-per-second can you shoot with that thing?" (Fourteen, if I'm not careful. But I'm always careful.) No one has asked if they shoot video. Perhaps that's simply taken for granted. 

One fellow asked about the gadget I had mounted on the 5D Mark III's hot shoe. When I explained that it was the new GP-E2 GPS Receiver, he gave me a pitying look and told me that this feature was already built into his iPhone; plus, he could carry his iPhone in his pocket. I was suitably humbled.

As serious a commitment as it is to carry around equipment that's so large, heavy, and attracts so much attention, I discovered it takes just as much commitment to process the files. Raw files from the 22 megapixel EOS 5D Mk III average 30MB each. Each raw file takes approximately 15 seconds just to open in Lightroom on my aging iMac. I shoot JPEGs when I'm using the 18mp EOS 1D X in continuous mode, yet at 14 fps, even JPEGs can fill up a card pretty quickly. These are not cameras for people with underpowered computers and mere gigabytes of disk space. Terrabytes are the order of the day.

I will say this though: Looking at a 22MP file shot with one of Canon's best lenses, on a monitor set to 1:1, leaves no doubt about what you're paying for. The resolution, tonality, and subtlety of color are awesome. It's so easy to get lost in just how pretty the files look, even at high ISOs, that the need to also have an interesting subject to look at seems unfair.

If I were a fullt-time or even part-time professional photographer there is no question that I'd want an EOS 5D Mark III in my bag. (The speed, size, and expense of the 1D X would be overkill, at least for me. The same applies to the 36mp files of the Nikon D800.) I'm not a paid professional any more though, so even though I may miss many of the copious advantages of these luxury rigs, I will return them when asked and go back to the humble yet adequate equipment that suits me best. That, as far as I'm concerned, is the true luxury.

The Black and White Esthetic

Maybe it’s because I’ve been enjoying looking at all the great black and white prints I’ve produced over the years. Maybe it’s because I’ve produced so many thousands of color images since the dawn of the digital age. Or maybe it’s because some images simply look better to me in black and white. Whatever the reason, I find myself converting a lot more color into B&W these days.

Anyone who’s tried this knows (or should know) there’s more to it than simply clicking the B&W button in Photoshop, Lightroom, or Aperture. If you want your B&W images to really sing then you’ve got to develop a feel for contrast and tonal separation. This encompasses not just which tones should be light and which should be dark, but how light, how dark, and where. Are you going for drama, or are you going for delicacy? Are you trying to make your images look as if they were shot with B&W film (ironic, yes?) or are you trying to enhance their “digitality?” These are the types of questions you might want to think about if you don’t already have the answers.

For me, this B&W phase is most likely the prelude to producing a photobook of my work. I know it’s possible to produce press-printed books that rival the quality of the best silver-based or inkjet prints. I know because I own a few of such books myself. What I’m wondering is how close I can come with today’s print-on-demand publishers. If any of you has first hand experience with a POD publisher who does excellent black-and-white printing, please let me and the rest of us know who that might be.

In the meantime, here are a few examples of why I’m so into B&W these days. Here's a tip: Typepad doesn't do them justice. They will all look a lot better if you click on them to open them in a separate browser window.

 

He Who Prints to Last Laughs Most

If you think this JPEG looks good, you should see the print. (And if you think it's easy photographing a black and white dog sitting on black and white upholstery without having any of the tones merge, you should try it sometime.)

I’ve been so busy with work lately that I haven’t had a lot of time for shooting. (I’m sure some of you reading this can relate.) When this happens I get my photography fix by browsing through my archive of photographs, deleting the crap, tagging good photos I hadn’t noticed before, and so on.

This time I decided to browse through my pre-digital work, most of which consists of hundreds of black and white prints I made myself. There is nothing particularly noteworthy about my having so many prints. Before the digital era the only ways to view your photos was either to shoot transparencies or to make prints from negatives. My choice was to run a darkroom and make my own prints.

Here’s the thing: I hadn’t looked at some of these prints for a few years, so I had forgotten—forgive me for the immodesty, but it’s true—how good a printer I was. Could some of them have been better if I had printed them digitally? For some of the more difficult negatives, sure. The rest were good enough that I would be proud to show them to whomever cared to look. The tones and resolution of a good print put LCD displays to shame. Better yet, prints are easy to show. Just hand someone a print in good light and they look at it; no computers or electricity necessary.

Another thing I noticed is that my prints were all in great condition, even the ones I printed on resin-coated papers and casually washed in a tray for a few minutes before letting them air-dry. RC papers that I framed under glass faired less well. Some have started showing a subtle “solarization” in the shadows, possibly caused by out-gassing of chemicals that become trapped and concentrated under the glass. This hasn’t happened with any of the fiber-based prints I’ve mounted.

Given how much time and energy it would take me to reprint the affected images, I’m glad I had the foresight to print and store them as archivally as possible, even if it didn’t seem worth the effort at the time. Imagine how it depressing it would be to have hundreds of photos that were deteriorating with every passing year.

The irony is that I don’t print much now, if ever. I had a printer at one time—an Epson Stylus Photo R800—but got sick of dealing with clogged print heads and the near-constant need to replace small and expensive ink cartridges. I’m well-aware that I could get excellent prints by buying a newer, larger, more expensive printer. I just can’t find the will to pull the trigger on one, yet I don’t want to waste time and money buying a less expensive, considerably less archival, dye-based alternative. I’m at the age now where I probably won’t be around to re-print my photos if they start fading in twenty years. If I print at all, I’ve got to print to last. You might want to do the same.

I can’t go on like this for much longer. Something has got to give. In the meantime, it sure is fun enjoying the prints I already have.

 

Keep Controls Under Control

This woman's hand was on the back of this chair for only three seconds. If I had been fumbling with controls I would have lost the shot. Fortunately, the camera was set up in such a way that I wouldn't have to. What about yours?

Eons ago, back before the dawn of digital history, all cameras had basically the same set of three controls: an aperture ring, a focusing ring (or bellows), and a shutter speed dial. Once someone came up with the brilliant idea of a built-in exposure meter, the designers had to add a new dial for setting the film speed and, shortly thereafter, exposure compensation. That brought the numbers of controls up to four or five.

 Then another well-intentioned designer thought to himself (and it’s almost always a he in these cases), “Since the camera has a built-in exposure meter, why not offer photographers  the ability to adjust the meter’s angle of coverage?” The result was a sixth control. Then came different exposure modes (PASM), and along with them a seventh control.

Flash forward to today when it would be difficult, if not impossible, to list every control available on today’s digital cameras. Even low-end point-and-shoot digicams aimed at snapshooters have controls for image size, white balance, movie frame rate, picture style… The list goes on and on.

Do the people who buy these cameras know or care that these controls exist? No. Would they use them even if they knew? It’s not likely, especially since these controls are, for the most part, tucked away in a series of obscure menu screens. These controls weren’t actually put there to be used, you see. They’re there so that the marketers and product managers can sing “Anything yours can do, mine can do better” to their competitive counterparts each day.

The result of all this “progress” for those of us whose primary desire is for camera controls to be simple and direct  is that every camera model has a slightly different control scheme from the next—even cameras made by the same company. Some cameras, such as the Sony NEX-7 or Nikon V1, may even controls that are completely unlike anything you’ve used before. The trick with this or any other camera is to find a way to use it that is as simple as possible while allowing the necessary control over image capture.

 My approach with the Nikon V1, which buries practically all of its controls in menus, is to set it up as follows:

• RAW format (to eliminate the need to monitor white balance while shooting)
• Single-frame mode (vs. continuous)
• Autofocus triggered by a half-press of the shutter button (there is no other option)
• Programmed auto exposure (which has a bias toward keeping the lens at whatever the maximum changes to as I zoom its 10-30mm kit lens)
• Exposure compensation adjusted when necessary by the single control dial on the back of the camera
• Auto ISO with a maximum of 800 (to eliminate the need to increase the ISO when light levels drop.)

Even though the V1 doesn’t indicate what the actual ISO is, I find it’s enough to simply monitor the shutter speed. If it drops below 1/15 second I manually increase the ISO. Because the kit zoom has vibration reduction I can get reasonably sharp shots at 1/15 second or even slower, as long as the subject isn’t moving.

With a more sophisticated camera, such as the Canon EOS 7D or Nikon D7000, I would use a slightly more refined setup:

• RAW format (to eliminate the need to monitor white balance while shooting)
• Single-frame mode (I hardly ever shoot sports or video)
• Autofocus triggered by a separate AF button on the back of the camera
• Aperture-preferred auto exposure (to take advantage of the wider range of apertures available on the fast, fixed-aperture lenses I like to use. When I’m shooting a paid assignment or in the studio I use manual exposure settings instead.)
• Fixed ISO (adjusted as necessary via control dial)
• Non-modal adjustment of aperture, shutter speed, and exposure compensation (so that, regardless of what exposure mode I use, one dial controls aperture and a separate dial controls shutter speed or exposure compensation. It doesn't matter much which dial it is, front or back, as long as it's the same dial every time.)

My goal during setup is to make adjusting each camera as quick, simple, and consistent as possible, regardless of where or what I’m shooting. That way I can concentrate on my subject instead of getting of getting whatever camera I’m using to behave itself.

Of course, what works for me won’t necessarily work for you. If you have a particular way of setting up a camera that is sufficiently different from my own that you think it’s worth sharing and explaining, please feel free to leave a comment. I’m always open to new ways of doing things.