September Newsletter

Every outing with your camera is a journey, a new adventure. This is the case even when you have planned the outing.

When I go out with my camera, I have a plan of where I am going and what I am going to photograph. Most times I will be able to follow through with my plan, but, regardless of whether or not I get the photograph that I wanted, from the moment that I get out the car, I am looking for any other shots that might become apparent. 

Whatever the genre you have chosen for that day, whether it be landscape, wildlife, architecture, street photography or a sunrise or sunset, you will find other, unexpected shots just waiting to be taken. Recently, I went out with two specific ideas on two separate days. The first was an evening of trying to improve my skill at tracking swallows in flight. As I walked round the field with the dogs, I started to get shots of the birds, these were coming in waves as the birds followed the insects that they were feeding on. In one of the lulls, I turned to find Tilly sitting watching me. I was able to take a really nice portrait of her simply because I was open to taking a shot that came up unexpectedly.

Today I went into Dunfermline to take some shots for my Park Life Project. I find that the best way to do this is to leave my car somewhere and just walk. I thought that it would be a good idea to have a look at the Abbey to see if the sun was in the correct position to show up the stained-glass windows, then enter the park at the Abbey Gate. The sun was in the wrong place, but as I walked through the park, I got this wonderful silhouette of a squirrel posing on a stone.

I got a few shots for my project, but nothing special; however, on my way back to the car, I found a busker who was very happy to have his photo taken and managed to get a couple of really special shots for my Street Photography, (Black & White), project. This more than made up for the lack of good subjects in the park.

My whole journey took me less than an hour, but in that time, I managed to achieve two special shots, a few reasonable ones and one extra special image. The shots that turned out as reasonable were the only ones that were in the plan. The others were purely because I was open to taking opportunities that arose. I wasn’t looking for these other shots, but, when I have a camera, I am constantly looking out for opportunities and am prepared to take them, if they come along.

Going out purely focussed on your plan is a sure way to miss shots, any of which, could turn out to be the best shot of the day. This does not mean that you have to walk along at a snail’s pace, looking under every bush for the special shot. It simply means be prepared and, if you see something that might be a good shot, take the shot. I tend to take the time, when I am in the light that I’ll be shooting in, to roughly set up the camera exposure. This means that I can quickly catch a shot without having to waste time setting up. I will usually set the exposure on the dark side by setting my shutter speed too fast. If I then have to take the shot without changing the shutter speed, I have a slightly dark image, which I can correct when I edit. Remember, a dark image retains all the information that you will need to correct it, whereas an overly bright image will lose a lot of information, especially if the highlights are burnt out. The four images below show this clearly. No 1. is straight from the camera slightly dark, No 2. is the same image after editing and No 3. is an image I took with my settings over exposing the image, No 4. is the edited version of the over exposed image, where so much information had been lost that I could not improve the image.

Normally I would take the time to set the exposure correctly, but, in this case I wanted to illustrate the point, that it is possible to rescue a good image, even if the exposure is slightly dark.