I’ve always been primarily a natural light shooter. Lugging around massive amounts of equipment for a photo shoot isn’t really my style. Then I made a discovery. If you haven’t already joined the millions of people who have discovered the joys of shooting “Strobist” style I highly recommend that you check out the website. At the risk of sounding a little infomercial-esque, you really don’t want to miss this. Basically the idea is to use small, portable, hotshoe flash units off camera, in place of strobe units. It’s simple, portable, and really really cool.

 Ok, so anyway, I have this photo shoot this week, which I’ll talk more about in another post, but I’m hoping to do a really basic one flash (with an umbrella) and one reflector setup. I’ll post more about the shoot, complete with lighting setups later in the week (After some test shots) but while surfing the web for some examples of single-light setups I came across some flicker images that you just don’t want to miss. So here’s the link to those images for inspiration, and we’ll talk more about specifics in a day or two.

So in case you’ve missed the hoopla spreading like wildfire over the web, I’ve got two quick news updates for you:

·         Canon announces its much anticipated 5d Mark II- and well, I’m going to either have to work on the whole envy thing, or come up with an extra $2700. You can check out the full review and stats here but I will warn you, if you don’t have an extra three grand to spare you might not even want to look, because this is one sweet camera.

 

·         And also adding to every photographer’s wish/must have/ worth panhandling in the street for list Adobe is announcing the release of Creative Suite 4. If you haven’t already done so, be sure to sign up for Tuesdays Podcast here to catch the official announcement strait from Adobe.

Ok, that’s it for today, I’ll catch you tomorrow with some more interesting photo tidbits (can you tell I have no idea what tomorrow’s post is going to be about yet?) and in the meantime start saving your pennies, you’re going to need them!

In the last “be known for something” post we talked about the fun part- taking pictures! Today we’re going to talk about the hard part- editing those pictures. Editing is probably the bane of most photographers’ existence. First of all, it’s just not as much fun as shooting. I mean let’s face it, if we wanted to edit we’d be, well, editors. But we’re not, we’re photographers. Secondly, it’s hard. For those of us that tend to be especially hard on ourselves it can be discouraging. For those that tend to become emotionally attached to their images, it can be like discarding an old friend. And third, it tends to be very, very overwhelming. You may have been working on this project for months or even years, and that may mean hundreds or thousands of images. But alas, editing is a necessary evil so let’s go at it, make the best of it and maybe, just maybe you’ll actually discover that it’s not so bad.

To prepare for editing keyword, tag, label or in some way mark all of the images you shoot for your project. That’s the first step, and really it’s the only step you should take immediately after shooting. Everything else comes later. When editing you own work, there are two absolutely essential rules. The first is don’t edit right after shooting and the second is edit slowly and gradually. Follow these rules and editing will be more painless, and less daunting than you may expect.

It is essential that when editing your own work that you have a break between shooting and editing. As photographers, we become emotionally attached to our own work, or to the process of shooting that work. Let’s say you have two shots, one was the first frame you took when stopping the car to shoot. The second image is the result of a two hour hike through dirt and mud to get a different angle on the same subject. Maybe, just maybe that first “oops” shot is better than the image you spent hours trying to get. I almost guarantee you that right after shooting you will have a very difficult time editing out that second shot. You need time to see your worn work as objectively as possible.

The second rule is to view editing as a gradual process. One of the biggest mistake photographers make is to edit all at once, and just start throwing out images. Don’t sit down with a two hour windiw and expect your hundreds of images down to twenty final shots. Not only will it be exhausting, and frustrating, you won’t do a great job. Instead sit down, go through your images and edit out anything that jumps out at you as a mistake, or a bad shot, or not fitting in with the vision of the project. If you’re unsure leave it for now. When you’re done walk away until tomorrow, sit down and do the same thing with the remaining images. Do this for a couple days, and you’ll have a much more manageable number of photos to work with. Just a couple of minutes, and no judgement calls, if you can’t decide leave it for later. You’ll be amazed at how walking away from an undecided image and returning tomorrow will give you an all new perspective.

Now, as for my personal preference, I prefer to edit off of prints. I like to make a smallish (4x6) print of all of my images and edit from there for awhile. I know there are a bunch of you who think I’m crazy to edit off of an image that small, but just hear me out for a minute. I do not use this method to judge print quality- only content. I will either pull all crappy images firs, before making prints, or once I have a manageable number I’ll jump onto the computer and check out the actual files.

 But working off of prints offer a number of advantages: I can carry them with me and edit while in line at the bank or the post office. There is something to be said for the tactile quality of a print, it feels closer to the final images, and I am working with a physical object. Once I’ve been editing for awhile I can hand my stack of remaining images to friends or fellow photographers and ask for their cuts. Because it’s my project, I don’t’ immediately discard other people’s rejects, instead I tic mark the back of the print, one mark for every person who rejected that image. If I find that an image is repeatedly thrown out by others it gives me something to think about. And finally, when I get down to the last few prints, I can hang them up, somewhere I’ll see them regularly and live with them for awhile. That tends to help narrow down those last few stubborn cuts. Anyway, that’s my method, you’ll find your own, and please feel free to comment if you have found a method of editing that works for you.

Next time we’re going to look at sequencing our long-term project. I don’t do my final edit until that point, so if my final goal is to have 20 prints, I may only edit down to about 30-40 prints using the above process, and I let the sequence decide the final selection.

Here are two great resources for editing your own work:

Also check out the first three posts in this series:

Ok, so once you’ve chosen your topic it’s time to go shoot! That may seem like the easy part, especially at first, but it’s important to have a backup plan in place, you know, just in case you happen to start running low on ideas. Really there are a couple of important things to keep in mind when it comes to long term shooting.

First and foremost, don’t limit yourself. We’ll get to editing next week. This week we’re talking about shooting and shooting only. If something might, maybe, sort of fit your project then shoot it. How many pictures are enough- I don’t know, you tell me. Or maybe the answer is that there are never enough. Don’t edit in camera- this is a long term project, who knows where it’s going to end up, and you don’t want to be kicking yourself next year that you missed that perfect shot because it didn’t seem so perfect back then.

Which brings us to our next point- be flexible. We all have plans, I have great ideas for what I want to be doing next week, next year, in five years, and while goals are great life happens, things change, and it’s not any different in photography. So go with the flow, shoot anything that may be related, if your interest or directions change as you go, shoot that too!

We also need to look at time frame, how long should this project be going on? Well, once again, that depends. There are some projects that may have a clearly defined time frame (for example documenting a little league team- well I’m thinking you might have to be done once the season’s over), but for the rest of us, why limit it. I see photographers all the time say I’m going to shoot such and such for a year- well what a great goal! But tell me this, if 367 days later you see the perfect shot, it fits your project and it is just amazing, are you not going to include it (or worse yet, not shoot it)? A year is a great goal, but it’s just a start. Because odds are, if you’re willing to shoot something for an entire year, it’s a pretty good indication that you like shooting it, so why stop?

Ok, so now you may be wondering if there is ever going to be an end- well I don’t know, maybe not. What? How can that be, don’t I need to like display my work at the end of the project? Well sure, displaying work is a great thing, but who says it has to be at the end. When we get to the editing part next week, we’ll look at how to make images work as a group, but there is nothing to say that that group can’t be flexible either- when you have an opportunity to display your work do so, and the next time you have to opportunity, reedit with the new stuff. It’s all an evolving process, this shouldn’t be a static onetime thing.

Also, talk about your work. People know you’re a photographer (and if they don’t, that may be a good indicator that you’re not carrying your camera around enough), so let them know what you’re working on. If they’re other artists or photographers, they may want to take a look, and they may have good feedback. But most importantly if people know what you’re interested in, they may present you with opportunities to shoot. Maybe they know about something/somewhere you haven’t heard about, maybe they saw something that they think you may be interested in- you’ll be amazed how much of a help even non-artists can be when it comes to ideas and opportunities.

Oh, and read stuff. It doesn’t matter what your theme is, I’m sure that someone some where wrote/writes/is writing about something related. You may get ideas, follow current trends and philosophies, and follow the evolution of what people are thinking about the topic your are shooting. You also may get ideas on ways to branch out your project that you wouldn’t otherwise have thought of. Don’t limit yourself to text book style non-fictional factual stuff either, while that’s all well and good, it may get old really quick, so read fiction too, about anything related to you theme. See what’s out there, be inspired.

One last thing- this project shouldn’t be the only thing you shoot. I just said that you may end up shooting it forever, and that’s going to get really dull if you only shoot for this project. This should be more of a background thing, something you are always working on, looking for etc. You may have more than one of these projects, they may be related or not, some may be long term and some may be shorter term, the point is to get out there and shoot.

                                                                                                                                                                                  -John Berger

What do you think- do the traces of light onto the film or sensor capture make photography unique to any other art form? Is this what makes photography unique? Do you believe that photography even captures a trace of the image- or do you disagree altogether?  How does digital photography factor in, or does it?

This week's behind The Lens Series photographer is Lewis Wicks Hine. A documentary photographer in the early 19^th century Hine gave up a job in teaching to pursue photography, believing strongly in the power of images to bring about social change.

Hine’s photographs are wrought with emotion, as his subjects are poor, often children working in deplorable conditions, yet Hine has an innate ability to portray his subjects with strength and dignity. His photographs document the human condition in the age of industrialization with a quiet potency and remarkable accuracy. He gives his subjects a voice without attempting to beautify or downplay the inhumane conditions in which they are faced to live or work.

Hines work is not all negative however. After returning from Europe where he was commissioned by the American Red Cross to photograph the continent post WWI, Hines began a series of work in which he documented the interplay of man and machine as an undeniable reality of the world in which he now lived.

One of the changes documentary photographers face is how to accurately represent their subjects without dehumanizing them farther, or even exploiting them for personal gain. Hines work is prime examples that not only can it be done, but done beautifully.

This week’s catch light links are 4 fascinating reads, which are guaranteed to get you thinking. I highly recommend you wait until you have time to sit down and read before you dive in, because these articles deserve time, and thought.

All of the articles deal with the definition of art, what makes art, what art is and the relationship between art and photography. Check them out, give them some thought, and if you get a chance, feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you think.

1- Only Pretty, what a Pity

2- A photograph isn’t art… it just is

Love ‘em or hate ‘em blending modes should be part of every photographer’s Photoshop arsenal. Last week we introduced the idea of blending modes as a photo editing tool, this week we’re going to continue that line of thought and use the darkening group of blending modes to help correct an image that is over exposed and flat.

The blending modes menu is divided into 6 sections. This series is aimed at photographers, and there are a number of great blending modes that, while great for designers, really don’t have a lot of practical application in photo editing. Now I’m not a big fan of wasting time, yours or mine, so we’re going to skip over those and look at the modes that I deem most applicable. As such we’re going to jump to the second group of blending modes, the darkening modes, which is made up of darken, multiply, color burn, and liner burn. As the title implies all of the modes in this group will make your image darker.

Here’s our original image: as previously mentioned it’s flat and over exposed.  All of the blends we’ll be doing today are self blends, meaning we’re blending our original image with copies of its self.

 You’ll notice that we’re skipping over darken mode, although it does just what its name implies (technically speaking it looks at the pixels in each layer and displays whichever is darker) it’s really not all that useful in photo editing, and doesn’t work in a self blend.

Multiply Mode: Multiply compares the base layer and the blend layer and multiplies the colors. In multiply mode the resulting image is always darker than the original, although it is important to note that because the darkening effect is multiplied, the shadows will be affected more than the highlights.

 

Color Burn: Color burn darkens the image by adding contrast. The resulting image will be darker, more saturated, and have more contrast.

 

Liner Burn: Although liner burn is similar to color burn it increases darkness rather than saturation. The results will be similar to those of multiply, but more intense (it is often a happy medium when color burn is too much and multiply is not enough).

 

Even knowing and understanding what each blending mode does, the best way to get great results from them is to play. Combining blending modes with blurs, inverses, and other blending modes can create some fun images. The image below is created by blending the base layer with an inverse of its self (cmd/ctrl + I) using color burn.

 

 

Although it is a funky effect, it’s probably not one most photographers are going for. Combine it with two more blend layers however, and we’re starting to get somewhere. The image below is created using (from bottom to top) base layer, self blend with inversed color mode layer at 39% opacity+ self blend with regular color mode layer at 100% opacity + self blend with an overlay blending mode at 80% opacity.

 

Now’s the time to pull out some old, flat, underexposed images that you may have previously trashed, and play around with the darkening blending modes. You may get some fantastic “keepers” out of them after all.