"How 2" - Smoke / Particle Photography

Since I published my smoke photos I have had many people ask about how I photograph particles and smoke. Because of this, I decided more than any other photo, this should be my first in detail ‘how 2’ post. I love photographing smoke as its random nature means that you will never capture the same image twice.

 

Smoke Example

The Kit:

Essentials:
DSLR
Speedlight or strobe with remote triggers
A Black Background (I use A1 black card)
A particle emitter (I use incense sticks for smoke)

Optional:
Softbox (I used my homemade one)
Black card or other light canceller (I used the black side of a popup reflector)
Tripod
Adobe Photoshop (to colour/ invert the smoke)

Method

Lighting Setup (Top down)

Due to the smell of the incense sticks I use to create the smoke, I decided to take my photos in the utility room at my girlfriends. This meant I could use a worktop as well as to not smell the house out. First I Whitetack my background card to the wall behind the worktop. I then placed the incense on wood to stop it burning the worktop. Placing the incense as far from the background as possible will make the lighting easier just so long as the background still fills the frame. I used a tripod for my camera as autofocus will never really work on the smoke (I just focus on the incense and lock the focus). You can also work handheld but a tripod will stop you having to re-focus. The hard bit about photographing smoke is the lighting. You need to light the smoke without lighting the background this is why having your incense/smoke as far from the background as possible will help. Left is my lighting diagram and below a zoomed out photo of my set.  I used my homemade soft box here to better control where my light falls as my soft box has a band around the front edge. I also used a black popup light canceler as the flash was reflecting from the white wall and lighting the background.

My Quick Setup

 

I believe my Speedlight was set at about ¼ power but flash setting and camera aperture will need a little trial and error. When lighting anything with a Speedlight like this remember that your flash becomes your shutter and will freeze the motion of the smoke. Your cameras shutter speed will also only affect the exposure of areas not lit by the flash. Because we need our background black its best to set your camera shutter speed at your fastest sync speed that on my kit is 1/200 of a second.

Post Production

After you have captured your images, pictures like this allow you to get creative. I would try inverting your image colours so the smoke appears black on a white background. This can be done by selecting Image-adjustments-invert on Adobe Photoshop. I would also try creating a solid colour layer (colour of your choice) above your smoke layer and then going through the layer blending modes and see how it colours your smoke.

 

Hope this helped

AlexAndrews

Cokin filter sets, yay or nay? 5 reasons why it’s a good investment and my modification

Cokin Filter Set

I have always loved Cokin filters, the high quality of the products and a mount that fits all sizes of lens makes it a great investment for all photographers who regularly use filters. The reason for this article is due to a conversation I had with The University of Winchester lecturer Richard Trebilcock who is always an interesting man to talk to about anything related to cameras, due to his experience in this field. Anyway, we began talking about filters and if there is a need for them with all the post process filters and gradients. To some extent I agree with this as colour and effects filters can usually be applied in post with more control and the ability to turn them off ( that’s always nice) BUT I tend to only really use ND, polarizing and UV filters that apart from a few stops of exposure cannot easily be mimicked in post. After this conversation I decided I would create a list of why my Cokin filter set is still a valuable addition to my kit.

1.       Control over sky exposure using ND (neutral density) filters has to be the No.1 reason for me to reach for my filter set. Tip 1 is to try pushing a standard ND filter halfway into the holder, this creates a better contrast line for your horizon (this will only work for some photos e.g. Seascapes but try it out as you never know till you try)

2.       Daytime Long exposures. Some if not all my favourite photos of rivers and the sea use long exposures to create that fluffy look. When shooting in the day this look is almost impossible to achieve without an ND filter. The Cokin filter set allows you to invest in one good filter and use it on every lens you own.

3.       fit all my lenses

4.       Custom mount. As you may know I do a lot of experimental photography and some of which requires me to mount things such as Custom Bokeh shapes to the front of my lens. I simply cut the shapes out of card and side them into the Cokin filter holder.

 

5.       Fits all my old round Filters?!?! Filter adapter!!

Universal Round Filter Mod

Yep you heard me! Before I invested in the Cokin filter set I used standard round filters and as I already had polarizing filters never got the Cokin one. Anyway I had a car shoot planned and suddenly realized my polarizing filter for that thread size was damaged. This is when I had a stroke of genius and realized that I could just mount them to my Cokin holder.

 What you need:

·         I round filter (bigger size the better)
·         The Cokin holder with the mounting ring for the lens you want to use
·         The Cokin mounting ring for the tread size of the filter

 

Universal Round Filter Mod

What to do:
Simply mount the holder on the lens then screw the round filter onto the other mounting ring. Next just slide the round filter with the mounting ring into the holder and you are ready to go with no damage to any of the products. If you own Cokin mounting rings for all your lenses the chances are you have a mounting ring for your round filter size anyway.

If you are new to Cokin filters I recommend looking at the 3rd party sets like this one. They are very affordable and a good stepping stone to professional filters.

24pcs Square Full + Graduated Filter Set + 9 Size Adapter Ring for Cokin P LF78

hope this helps everyone interested.

AlexAndrews

Prime Time - Why Shoot Prime Lens/Lenses

What is a Prime lens?

Unlike a Zoom lens, prime lens are fixed at a focal length so do not zoom. It’s really as simple as that!

So why use a prime lens?

Creativity

I truly believe that prime lenses force photographers to be more creative. The problem with a Zoom lens is that is allows the photographer to be lazy and learn little about focal length and perspective. Remember photography is an art! Shortcuts just stop us exploring our creativity and learning new skills.  A fixed focal length means you actually have to move your camera to frame your subject and because of this it also encourages the photographer to look at the world from new angles. This along with aperture (that I talk about in a minute) encourages and photographer to introduce the idea of depth into an image.

Bang for your buck



Nikon 50mm f/1.8

Due to having no zoom, prime lenses have far fewer lens elements and moving parts, this makes prime lenses relatively cheap. Here is where I have to mention aperture/speed if you don’t know. A lenses speed has nothing to do with how fast they focus (this trips up most amateurs) but is actually talking about maximum aperture diameter, or minimum f-number. A fast lens has a large maximum aperture diameter, that allows for more depth of field and better performance in low light, as more light can be captured. This along with glass quality is what you tend to pay for in the professional lenses. So back to prime lenses. Because of the simplistic nature of fixed focal length lenses, prime lenses tend to be fast and often have an aperture as wide as F/1.8 or F/1.4 and some even go as wide as F/1.2.

Let’s put this into perspective

A cheap, standard 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lens at 50mm has an aperture of about f/5.0 and costs around £150.

A more professional lens for example a Nikon 17-35mm f/2.8 can cost around £1000.

In contrast I got my first professional prime lens, the Nikon 50mm f/1.8 for just £95.

What I think

Don’t think that the contrast in price makes the prime lenses anything less on a good professional choice. Prime lenses are an amazing option for anyone looking to produce better professional work. I believe professional, affordable, fast lenses like this are a vital part of my kit. I would recommend to everyone with a DSLR to invest in a prime lens.
Canon EF 50 mm f/1.8 II Lens
Nikon AF NIKKOR 50mm f/1.8D Lens



AlexAndrews

Aperture Shape & Custom Bokeh blur

Have you ever looked at the out-of-focus areas in an image and wondered why all objects and more notably objects like a lights blur in a round shape?  Playing with my Camera Obscura got me thinking about aperture shape and Bokeh blur.  I think it is important to know that the out-of-focus parts of an image actually acquire the shape of the aperture. This got me thinking about creating a custom aperture shape. As I don’t fancy opening a lens up, its possible to mound an aperture modification to the front of a lens much like a filter, just so long as the new aperture is smaller than the original aperture in the lens(if not the shape is clipped by the old aperture). The only real problem is that once the new aperture is mounted, the original aperture becomes obsolete, so control over the aperture is lost. It’s also important to remember the max aperture will be stopped down a few (depending on the size of your shape) as this is now your new aperture. This becomes annoying as this whole project is about creating Depth of Field and out of focus areas.

So where to start?

I wanted to start simple, so just used some card that I cut to the size of my Cokin filters. This way I was able to mount them easily. In the center for each card, I cut my new aperture shapes and then could just slide them into my Cokin Filter Holder.

Bokeh Filter and Standard Bokeh Shape

Let’s Take Some Shots

I found that my 50mm f/1.8 was the best choice of lens and simply whacked it out-of-focus and took some photos of some old Christmas lights.

What I Found

1.       The more out-of-focus an image is, the larger the shape shows. This allows you to control the size, but only when none of your image needs to be focused. Obviously ,when shooting with part of your image in-focus, depth of field controls/limits this

2.       Using a Cokin filter holder is a good way to mount the aperture filters

3.       As the filter becomes your new aperture exposure and DoF will be affected

4.       It’s worthwhile to make nice filters once and keep them in your bag

While searching online I also came across some pre made “creative aperture kits” like this one below. I Have not had a chance to try them yet but defiantly worth a look.
Lensbaby Creative Aperture Kit

AlexAndrews

Hobby Craft A1 Foam Core for Studio Backgrounds & reflector



Teddy Taken on the Red Background

Had what feels like the longest week ever but over the weekend managed to make it to Hobby Craft that’s always good for anyone creative. While there I picked up some A1 sheets of Foam Core board that I am using for product shot backgrounds. I also picked up a bit that is reflective silver on one side and white one the other that makes for a perfect bounce card reflector for the studio, they also sell a gold one. Being rigid also makes it easy for a model to hold it when shooting clamshell light portraits. All in all well worth the trip, here are 3 photos I took to test my backdrops out.








If you are new to using reflectors you really need to have a go, as manipulating natural light is a cheap and easy way to improve your photos and learn the basics of light. There is also nothing wrong with cheaper reflectors like this one. 43" Collapsible Disc Reflector for Studio or On-Site Use 

I use reflectors like this all the time and having zip on Silver, gold, white and black panels make it perfect for most situations. A transparent centre also makes it an easy flash diffuser when other options are unavailable.

AlexAndrews

Coke Taken on the Black Background

Milk Splash



Coronet Ambassador Digital Camera Obscura

Self-Portrait With
Coronet Ambassador

After my last post I thought I would add a little about how I took digital photos with the Coronet Ambassador. Basically for these I cheated as I used a focus screen mounted on the back of the camera at the same distance from lens as the film would be. I then opened the shutter and the upside-down projection of the room was projected on the glass. I then photographed the image and rotated it in post. Yeah I know a massive cheat but what it proves is that if a digital sensor was mounted at the same point as the focus screen an in focus image would be created.

AlexAndrews
 



My Room With
Coronet Ambassador

Coronet Ambassador

Product Shot
Coronet Ambassador

When I see a vintage camera like this for only £4 I could not help but buy it. The Coronet Ambassador was created in England around 1955 and is made from metal and Bakelite. It shoots on 120 film and uses a fixed focus and small aperture to create a focus image. The only controls are a normal of bulb mode for the shutter and a green filter to enhance black and white photos.  I am yet to test this with film but when I do I will show you my results. This is the camera that inspired me to create a Camera Obscura and even if I never use it in anger it just nice owning a little of photography history.
One thing I did try was adding a digital sensor to this camera and using it like a Camera Obscura the results were interesting but need fine tuning.

AlexAndrews



Home-Made Softbox

think all photographers need to have an inventive attitude and the ability to create solutions to any problem. I have always liked making things and I am sure you will discover just how much as I develop this blog. Anyway my Uni room is small, like really small and setting up big studio equipment for little photos is a little pointless in such a small space.

Home-made Softbox

What I wanted was a small softbox for a speedlight that I could use for small product shoots. I decided I would use the same card as my Camera Obscura as it was dense and has a white side. This would be ideal for the softbox as it would reflect all usable light. I cut the card into 4 parts to make each side of my softbox and joined them using cable ties like little stiches. I them taped the joints using gaffa tape to remove light leeks. At the bottom of my softbox I left a whole that the head of my SB-900 would fit into. As a diffuser panel I used white cotton and added hooks to each corner so I could clip it to the front of my softbox. The whole product only took about an hour.

I am really happy about how this turned out and it works well as a quick light modifier when working in small spaces. Hope this helps anyone who was looking to make a softbox and please comment and link me some photos of your examples.

AlexAndrews

A Camera Is My Canvas

West Downs In The Fog

It is oftens said that a camera is a photographers’ paintbrush. This is believed to be misleading! I don’t care what other say, my camera is my canvas and light is my paint! A camera never creates an image like a brush and so blank before being painted. As light is my paint, a light source is my brush and the art is in the creation and controlling of light. Creating and determining what light is captured on my canvas is the art I will spend a lifetime learning.

 

AlexAndrews

David hobby Inspired Youth Image

Even Alone - Always Connected

As part of my university course studying digital media design I was asked to create an image of a contemporary youth. There are many aspects of youth life that I could have focused on but if I am honest they have been done to death. For me the thing that stands out about youth today is how they are always connected even when alone they are always online talking to friends. My idea was to create a David Hobby style image of a youth sat in bed on Facebook on a laptop.

My lighting setup

I used all artificial studio lighting, I used 2 studio strobes in large soft boxes as fill light and artificial Ambient light to allow me to have more control than standard lights. Next I used a Speedlight laying on the laptop keys pointing to a white bounce card over the screen. This reflects what looks like a laptop glow into the models face with a shadow on the wall behind.

What do I think?

I really enjoyed taking this image and experimenting with the flash setups and really think people should give it a go. Also go and check out David Hobby, his work and blog.

AlexAndrews

Camera Obscura

I guess there is only one place to really start my blog on photography… Yes the Camera Obscura. Don’t you find it odd that the modern camera uses the same basic principles as technology invented around 2500 years ago? I know the Camera Obscura has no real commercial uses today but I think we can all learn something from creating one for ourselves and for the little geek that is inside all photographers, it’s pretty awesome too.  

 My Background With Camera Obscura

I think my first really experience of a Camera Obscura was during the 1999 total solar eclipse where we used them to protect our eyes as we could look at a projection of the sun. It’s odd that I would remember the little pinhole Cameras we used as I was only about 8 years old. However for some reason it stuck and I locked this knowledge away. The next time I really thought about the idea of a Camera Obscura was with my Dad. I guess my Dad will come up a lot in this blog as I have to put my creative and experimental attitude to life down to his influence not forgetting why I can get so OCD about my projects. My Dad is the kind of Dad who seems to be able to make anything and as I grew up there where very few weekends went by were we were not making something.  Despite me being the only one to really push photography my Dad seems to love playing with optics and equipment like that. I guess working as a surveyor meant he is always using cool kit too. He has also made his own telescope that sadly, being at Uni, I have not had a chance to play on the latest generation of. Anyway back to the point… One day he decided to convert our living room into a large Camera Obscura and the results were quite cool.

My Attempt With Camera Obscura

My Camera Obscura setup and results

So that leads us to now and I was in town looking at some boot sale style deal and found a box camera that uses a fixed focus but a small aperture to create an in focus image. This triggered my memory and I began to think about creating pinhole cameras and try a camera Obscura again. In my dad's’attempt we came across a few problems one being that my living room at home was a pain is the ass to make light proof, the other being that it would have been nice to have a way to quickly adjust the aperture to test how it changes the image. The light leaks for my attempt were no problem as a search in the attic uncovered a huge piece of cardboard that would cover my window in one go and then a min with some gaffa tape and job done. For the aperture adjust problem I found a solution that I was frankly quite proud of. I borrowed a lens from a photo enlarger and unscrewed all the glass. This left me with nothing but a fully manual aperture ring. I cut a hole in my card and screwed this into place.  The 3 images show my setup and results. I don’t really need to go into much detail about the science behind this as there is loads online about how it works but I hope that some of you will give it a go.

AlexAndrews