The Tao of Walking Ridge

I love convertibles.  I’ve owned a few over the years, but currently I am ragtop challenged.  My buddy Proto, proprieter of Proto’s Playhouse owns a sweet 1957 Porsche Speedster replica.  It is true to the original, only better (IMHO).  Built by Metal Craft, it has a tubular chassis that didn’t flex.  The ride was amazingly smooth, the open top great.  We couldn’t have had better weather for a run.  It was 74 degrees, and overcast.  A great way to start the day.

There has been a delay while I waited for some memory arrive for the Dell 7000 project.  The first memory I ordered did not fit.  I found a stick of 128 mb memory that fit for around $22 delivered on eBay.  It popped in and worked great.  The difference between 64 mb and 192 mb memory is BIG.

Xubuntu installed easily, though I used the alternate iso image, as this is less memory intensive and does not install an operating Linux prior to install.  I decided to put Dapper Drake on it, upgrading if that didn’t work.  So far, it works OK for an old machine.  I’ve yet to get the sound card working.  But really, this is just a word processor, web browser, and email unit in my eyes.  But the added memory let Xubuntu run nicely.  There is some delay while apps load, but overall quite useable.

Most cameras today have automatic settings.  So when a buddy recently got a camera that allowed him to set exposure manually, he asked “how do I know how to set it?”.  I’ve been using manual set cameras since I was a kid, so it seems natural.  But not only did I have to think about how to explain it, I accidently stumbled in to evidence of the trade off that is made to use high ISO settings.

Basically, for most photographs, I tend to use a priority like this:

If it is an action shot that I want to freeze, do what it takes to get high shutter speed (set ISO high, set F stop wide open, or one stop short of that) then set the shutter speed for correct exposure. The shutter speed will be as fast as it can be.

If it is a portrait or other typical shot, for the cleanest shots, I recommend setting the Fstop to desired setting (generally 2 stops from wide open is the sharpest setting for a lens if focus effects are not important, otherwise F8 is a nice starting point because the background will be pleasingly out of focus), set ISO at lowest setting that lets shutter speed be 1/60th second or greater (long telephotos might need higher speeds).

I’ve done a lot of shooting in extremely low light conditions.  Here, you set the ISO high and do the best you can.  I’m amazed what the digital SLRs can do compared to film of the same high ISO.  But shooting for an eBay auction, I took some pictures with the camera left at the ISO setting for the moon shots (1250).  For this jewelry, I needed clearn images, and was unhappy with the noise.  I reshot the piece at 200 ISO and the difference was much cleaner.

The theory of photo exposure can be a lot to absorb.  But F8, 1/60 second or faster, low ISO is a great starting point, then tweak as needed. A skilled photographer makes the right trade off between settings when the ideal is not possible (like very low light conditions).

I often think about where to go to take some interesting pictures.  Tonight it seems the pictures came to me while I watched TV and got caught up on some eBay business.  I looked up at the moon and saw some thin clouds drifting across it.  The longest lens I have is a 135mm MF lens I used to use on my Nikon FM2N.  Nikon made their digital cameras compatible with these old lenses, other than the metering.  So I just took many pictures of widely different exposures.  My favorite seemed far too dark on the camera display screen. Exposure was 1/50th of a second, F4, ISO 1250.

The photo was first tweaked in UFRaw, the exposure temperature lowered to improve white balance (near 4056 Kelvin). Then imported into Gimp and the exposure curves adjusted for pleasing detail and contrast.  (UFRaw and Gimp are Linux applications).

I was settling in to watch the evening news when I noticed one, then two, then three deer in the neighbor’s yard.  I thought about getting my telephoto, but figured they would be long gone before I switched lenses and took a picture.  Twenty minutes later, they had slowly grazed along to the top of a hill and the sun was so low that they seemed to pop off of the hill in the sunlight.  I was amazed that they remained another couple of minutes, allowing me the time to switch lenses and snap this picture before they wandered off.

A few years ago, I did a photo shoot for a buddy’s T-shirt business.  He scouted locations and found a great little alley with bricks and ambience.  We arrived early in the morning and the sun was still low in the sky and not yet shining on the bricks.  I quickly got the Harley Davidson set up, and posed the model and took this picture.  Minutes later, the sun rose higher, shined directly on the bricks, and the shot was no longer possible.

What I like about this picture is the play with shadows.  A reflector (low to the picture’s right) was used to fill in shadows on the model.  Because she was in the shadow of the wall, the reflector created a subtle shadow on the bricks to the picture’s left.  The sun is also to the picture’s left!  The lighting setup could not have been easier.  Existing light.  One reflector.  The hardest aspect was getting the timing right.

A friend asked how to light something to make a better photograph.  Lighting a photograph can get as complex as you want to get.  However, I’ve found I get better results with simple lighting applied well, than my attempts to have complex lighting I didn’t get quite right.

There is a simple lighting setup that anyone can use to make pictures that look better than your typical snapshot from a point and shoot camera (not that there is anything wrong with snapshots from point and shoot cameras)..

Unless you have dollars in gear and already know how to use it (in which case you already stopped reading this post I imagine) then the way to avoid point and shoot flash flat washed out pictures is not to use the flash.  That means finding a source of light.  Near a window but not direct sunlight is a great source.  I have had fun studying flash, and getting the mechanics of it down, but for my style of shooting, flash is less forgiving unless I’m shooting sports and I’m just trying to stop the action.

Bob Guccione, the founder of Penthouse magazine, created the look of the magazine with indirect light from windows because when he started he did not have enough money for studio lighting.  It worked so well, he kept the style even after he could afford lights.

Sidelighting from a window provides shadows to give the picture a more 3D feel than on camera flash.  The light from a window diffused, so the shadows will be softer and more pleasing than direct sunlight.  If the shadows created are too dark (usually they are for film or digital sensor, though not for the human eye), use a reflector to lighten them.  Folding reflectors are inexpensive by photographic equipment standards, but white foam boards can also be used.  This simple lighting arrangement is quite easy to set up, and is forgiving.  This lets you concentrate on the picture.