Ben Cherry

Ben is an environmental photojournalist, zoologist and Fujifilm X-Photographer. His passion is showing the beauty and fragility of the natural world. Find more of his work at www.bencherryphotos.com

WARNING TCL-X100 causes more X100 series love

by Ben Cherry February 19, 2015 Comments3

I was lucky enough to receive the TCL-X100 for Christmas and have barely had it off my X100s since. My beloved X100s goes with me everywhere and this is why it is probably my favourite camera. Though the TCL does make it far less ‘pocketable’, it doesn’t detract from the enjoyable shooting experience. The jump from 35mm to 50mm equiv. doesn’t sound like much but it does change how you shoot with this camera. It is definitely better for portraits, where the narrower angle of view helps to isolate a subject.

TCL-3 — This isn’t the best example, but if this was taken without the TCL then you would see a lot more of the barn, which might distract from the dog. For some reason I seem to have used lots of dog pictures as examples!

In terms of how this affects image quality and auto focus, I haven’t really noticed any difference, the images are still coming out wonderfully and auto focus doesn’t seem to have been affected in real world situations.

What is nice about this converter is that it is so simple, no electronics, just a well made metal barrel filled with beautiful glass. This is nice as it doesn’t add anymore complexity to X100 series shooting, which is so wonderfully simple and intuitive. Combined with the WCL-X100, this gives you a lens set up option of 28mm, 35mm or 50mm equiv. focal length, giving this little package a whole lot of usage options.

Though the original joy of the X100 series is that it is a fixed lens, the ability to simply screw on an adapter for a wider or narrower lens option makes this a really flexible set up.

The XF35mm F1.4 is a gorgeous lens but the benefit of using the TCL-X100 over the 35mm for portraits, especially using lights, is the leaf shutter which gives me flash syncing up to 1/1000 second! Yes I lose a stop from F1.4-F2, but generally for low light situations when working I would have the XF23mm F1.4 and the XF56mm F1.2 because they are wonderfully fast and sharp. I’m sure there are people who will still prefer the XF35mm F1.4 over this converter but for me it is going to replace it.

Have you had a go with the TCL-X100? If so then let us know what you think of it. Any questions please don’t hesitate to ask.

Filed under Photography

X-Series Exploration

by Ben Cherry February 10, 2015 Comments3

My good friend Ismar Badzic and I decided to meet up early one morning and head out to one of my favourite places in the Peak District to put together a little video about me! Ismar and I have worked together for about two years now, from making snowboard films in Switzerland to live music events in Sheffield, our work has seen us cover all sorts of subjects. So it was particularly bizarre for me when Ismar turned his camera on me…

The video is the first of a series of videos that Ismar intends to create on people in and around Sheffield. Though a bizarre experience, it was great fun as I was basically allowed to go about my exploration, snapping away, but just having to remember that I was being filmed; so had to try and look vaguely normal.

Ismar wanted the short film to be about me and my photography, nowadays that means that the Fujifilm system is of course involved, as I no longer own another camera system. The joy of video is that it shows off the gear being used in all its glory, without my written, rambling waffle. Though just a taster, it shows a handful of the helpful features in action, from the wireless control function to the bulb setting. Thankfully though Ismar failed to capture the moment I fell into Padley Gorge, don’t worry, no cameras were injured in the making of this film, only my pride.

I hope that this video portrays the hardiness of the X-Series, on this morning they were tested in cold and wet conditions and passed with flying colours (just as well as X-Pro1 was Fujifilm UK’s and it was drenched!). I wholeheartedly trust this system to work, no matter the conditions, from the tropics of Borneo to freezing temperatures, it has never let me down. Anyway, enough of my intro, see the video below and let me know what you think.

Below the video are a handful of pictures I took during that outing.

The photos were taken with a mixture of the X-T1, X-Pro1 and X100s, using the 10-24mm, 18-135mm and 56mm.

Filed under Be Inspired Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape

Story behind the photo – Sheepish sunrise

by Ben Cherry February 5, 2015 Comments10

This story started out with a glance at the forecast the night before. With heavy fog and cold, mirky conditions on the table I had to at least try and get out in the early hours and capture these often photogenic conditions. Though Curbar Edge is very convenient for me to get to in the Peak District, I was beginning to feel like a one trick pony so decided to head over to a hill called Higgar Tor, which has lots of beautiful rock formations and a great view. Thankfully the main roads were well gritted and there is a car park very close to the hillside so my journey to the top of the hill was pretty straight forward, which is just as well as I arrived just the sun had come up, above the horizon… Funnily enough, there was hardly any fog and the sky was quickly clearing and it was turning into quite a spectacle.

I was not alone at the top of this seemingly lonely mountain though, there were two other photographer’s who were already there and in the prime positions for the sunrise. To avoid breaking the unwritten code of standing in front of another photographers shot, I had a little think to myself on how to approach the situation. While scouting around I came across a small herd of sheep, which seemed to have adapted well to the wintery conditions, as if their white coats were designed for this all along! As soon as I saw them I decided to use them as my main subjects for the morning.

Without a subject, I find it quite difficult to connect with landscape pictures, so having the sheep to focus on helped me focus on how to do the beautifully unravelling situation justice.

Since I had the Nissin i40 flash in my bag I decided to give it a go in the challenging conditions with the X-T1 and the 18-135mm lens. It quickly turned very bright and made the little flash work hard, which did result in relatively slow refresh times, but this could have been due to some slightly older batteries in it. What I wanted to do was to use the flash to give the sheep a tiny bit of definition in the part shaded from the sun. I deliberately moved so sheep were initially between me and the rising sun.

Now it may not look like the flash was used here, but if you look closely, particularly at the left front sheep’s eye then you can see a little glint. That was from the flash. I had the exposure compensation down a notch or two to try and retain a bit of the sky, otherwise it would have burnt out, as at that moment in time I wasn’t using any filters. The flash was on 0 exposure compensation and I attached the diffuser. Again, to reiterate I didn’t want the flash to be obvious in this picture, instead I wanted it to just give a little glint, to highlight the eye, which it did. What I liked about back lighting the sheep with the low sun is the wonderful warm glow given to their outlines.

The sheep then headed down the side of the hill to continue their grazing.

I decided to use the Velvia film simulation for much of the morning as it really gave a punchy finish to the photos, though sometimes the contrast was a little too high so I would sometimes change it to Provia.

Though the more I compare the above images, the more I lean towards the Velvia image as it is so attention grabbing. It is great having the options at your finger tips and being able to change the look of the image so easily and I haven’t even mentioned Classic Chrome yet!

As it was slippy under foot, I was very happy to have had the 18-135mm attached to the camera, as it gave me the versatility required to adapt to where I could move to and where the sheep moved! The first shot below was taken at 36.6mm, while the image after was at 135mm.

As the sun rose and the intensity of the colour faded I started using Classic Chrome more, to yet again change the look and feel of the pictures.

Though the sheep were seemingly trying to hide on occasion..

Using a longer focal length reduced the angle of view, which was helpful for this example as it gives focus on the sheep and the snow covered hill behind.

Though freezing conditions (literally), the gear performed flawlessly, even if the batteries suffered a little due to the cold. Certainly something to consider if spending a long time in cold conditions, having multiple batteries will save you from frustration.

Leaving the sheep to graze, I decided to test out the i40 flash in another filler situation. Using the 10-24mm and a tripod I set up the exposure compensation to capture the surrounding area how I wanted it to look and then adjusted the TTL function on the i40 to fill in the shaded area of the rocks.

This was the set up… The i40 looking the piece on top of the X-T1.

To change up my photos again I decided to use the same techniques as discussed in the previous Story behind the photo blog, using filters for long exposures. On the other side of the adjacent valley was a factory/power station of some description and it looked like it could look pretty cool if slowed down. This was a 28 second exposure.

What do you think to the photos? I hope it shows that the adaptability of the Fujifilm X-Series. Any questions please leave a comment below.

Until next time, go out, shoot and share your results with us!

Filed under Be Inspired Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape Wildlife

Story behind the photo – Strong Contrasts

by Ben Cherry January 22, 2015 Comments2

I thought I’d put together a blog on how I came about taking this image and the thought process I went through.

It was a grey and gloomy day, not overly inspiring for photography but I thought I’d bring my X100s with the TCL-X100 converter attached with me while I took my dogs out for a walk. Most of the walk was spent either trying to avoid slipping over in the thick, wet mud or turning my body to avoid having a face full of rain. I was shooting with the black and white + red filter preset as it worked well with the gloomy conditions for some moody shots. As I reached the top of the hill I was walking up, I noticed how quickly the clouds were moving across an adjacent hilltop and instantly decided to drive back to this location with my tripod and filters*.

I was imagining the image I want to produce while walking back down with the dogs. There was a strong contrast between the immovable trees and the blustery clouds so I wanted to exaggerate this.

Behind the shot-4 — What you can’t make out from this photo is the speed of the clouds moving from right to left. That is because the shutter speed used has frozen the clouds, so there is no sign of movement.

I decided to use the X-T1 and the XF18-135mm lens because it was very versatile and meant I could change my composition with minimal effort! I mounted the camera onto a tripod and attached a filter holder system. I have a collection of square filters, these are very helpful as you can use square filters with a variety of lenses with different filter thread sizes, all you need are different filter adapters. Though the systems are relatively expensive, in the long run they are more economical than circular filters. I also used a remote trigger which means I don’t have to touch the camera and introduce any unnecessary camera shake to take the picture, this is very helpful for long exposures.

If you look at the above photo you can see that I have a filter inserted into the filter holder. I decided to use a gradual neutral density filter as this allowed me to darken the sky while having less/little effect on the ground.

The left filter is a gradual neutral density filter, it isn’t square which means you can adjust how far down you want the gradient to affect your picture. The filter on the right is a neutral density filter, which is constant throughout. This particular one is a 10-stop filter hence why it is so dark as it cuts the amount of light passing through it by ten times, so slowing down shutter speeds drastically.

I put the gradual filter in first and set it up how I wanted it, set focus and then inserted the 10-stop filter. The reason why I set the focus first is the 10-stop filter can make auto-focus very difficult so it is better to have it all set beforehand. On this occasion the 10-stop filter didn’t take the shutter speed below 30 seconds, which means the camera is able to accurately read the exposure required. If a 30 second exposure is still too short once you’ve applied the filter, then you’ll need to refer to a chart that shows the difference.

Behind the shot-12 — This was taken with only the gradual filter so the shutter speed was still high enough to freeze the clouds.

Despite the fact that I’ve used a graduated neutral density filter, I’ve deliberately under exposed the picture to keep it dark and moody, hence why the ground is still dark. The slideshow below is a collection of images that used the 10-stop neutral density filter to slow down the shutter speed and as a result capture the cloud motion.

My photos are dominated by the sky – I deliberately kept the horizon low in the picture as the sky was the main subject for me. With the wider shots, I could have moved the horizon up more but the foreground content wasn’t particularly exciting, the sheep weren’t overly inspiring!

I hope this has been helpful and if you have any questions then please don’t hesitate to ask. There is one colour image above, I’d love to know which is your favourite out of the final four. For me it is the portrait orientated shot as I was lucky enough to capture the sun peering through the clouds.

*If you haven’t already seen my previous blog about photographing winter, then check it out here: https://fujifilm.blog/2014/12/31/capturing-winter/

Filed under Be Inspired Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape

Initial impressions of the Nissin i40

by Ben Cherry January 14, 2015 Comments2

Nissin kindly sent me one of their much talked-about flashes – the i40 – to test out. I plan to write a full review of the flash in mid-February but before then I just wanted to share my initial thoughts. This is only going to be brief as I wanted to get this up as soon as possible as I know a lot of people are interested in this Flash for the X-Series.

Unboxing

Straight out of the box it is very nicely presented, coming with a great little case, a stand and even a diffuser (not always the case with other manufacturers).

Usage

So what else is there to do when you get a new flash and live seemingly in the middle of nowhere…. Selfies obviously! I set up the X100s with the TCL-X100 attached on a tripod and had the i40 flash on a light stand with a little softbox attached. The camera and flash were connected by a TTL (through the lens metering) cable so allowing TTL. I moved the flash around a little bit and I’m pretty impressed with the flash (the same can’t be said for the model, what’s up with the constant smirk!).

The first image was taken with the camera exposure compensation set at 0ev. With the flash to the left of the camera and slightly higher.
The next two images were taken with the camera exposure compensation set at -1ev. You can see that the background is much darker compared to the above images.
For this image the flash was moved closer to the camera and a little higher so the flash was falling straight down onto my face.

Conclusion

As mentioned before, I will put together a more comprehensive review of the flash in mid-February once I am back from Romania, where I will be putting this little flash through it’s paces, photographing an Ice Hotel for Untravelled Paths.

Until then I have to say that I am very happy with this small but powerful flash. It looks a great addition to the X-Series with the flash balancing well with the cameras.

Where to buy

Click here to see retailers selling the Nissin i40 Fujifilm fit

Filed under Photography

Capturing winter

by Ben Cherry December 31, 2014 Comments11

Winter is a bit of a funny period in the UK, spring is full of life beginning and the promise of summer approaching, summer (when not raining) is probably our favourite time of year to be outside. Autumn has a charm about it as the leaves turn and forests transform into a vast palette of colours before winter takes over. The coldest and darkest season, many of us associate this with dark, damp days other than the Christmas period. For me though, I find that winter has a certain charm about it.

In this blog we’ll be looking at capturing winter in all its glory, from the more accessible sunrises to the magic of colder temperatures. Sunrise is my favourite time of day during the winter months, where the mornings are cold, often frosty and if you’re lucky misty. I prefer sunrise over sunset because generally you’ll have frost/mist to photograph (if the weather is suitable) which might have gone by sunset. The added bonus of winter sunrises is that they’re much more forgiving than other times of the year, an 8am start isn’t too disastrous! A few weeks ago I put together a blog on photographing fog. Check it out for a few hints and tips. As the day progresses and the sun gets higher (if you can see it!) the quality of light drops off somewhat, making wide landscape shots less dramatic. Two fun things to do if you’re out and about is: 1. Slow down – slowing down your shutter speed when doing big landscape shots can make an image really dynamic, even if the light isn’t bright and dramatic. One of the ways to exaggerate the length of your shutter speed is to use a neutral density filter to reduce the amount of light hitting the sensor and so extending your shutter speed. This shot was 125 seconds long. There is no detail left in the mist as it has moved so much in that 125 seconds, making the fog look a bit like a white ribbon. 2. Focus on detail – winter is a great time for capturing the details of nature. From the hard frost on the ground to the last leaves hanging on a tree, detail shots in conjunction with some other, wider shots can really help capture the essence of winter as part of a photoessay. All taken with the X100s + TCL-X100 (in love with this combo). For this walk I limited myself to only this combo so I focused on composing images for that focal length. This is a good way to try and improve creativity and compositional skills. As the day draws to a close then you can begin to take advantage of the “magic hour”. If I have a free afternoon then what I like to do is go on a walk and end up in a nice location for sunset. This is what I recently did in the Peak District, walking a circuit from Hathersage up to Stanage Edge and Higgar Torr before heading back down to Hathersage. This was wonderful, about 6 miles and a great way to spend an afternoon. As I went along I was watching how the light changed as the sun came lower and how this affected the dramatic scenes in front of me. It was very interesting to see how the landscape evolved with the setting sun. Now we have been lucky enough to have had some snow recently, this is wonderful for pictures. Snow can take a landscape that you might see everyday and turn it into something magical. However, snow can be a little difficult to meter. This is where using the EVFs on X-Series cameras can be really beneficial, as you can see exactly how your camera has metered and adjust the exposure compensation accordingly. Finally if you’re brave enough (I haven’t been so far) then you can get out on a cold winters night and try some star photography, especially since so much of the day is now dark. Remember that the most important things are to stay warm, be sensible, check roads and the forecast. Roads can be very dangerous so look after yourself especially if you’re going out in the early hours. I hope this has been interesting and given you a few ideas on how to photograph the great outdoors during the winter months. Why not share with us your results via Fujifilm UK’s Twitter and Facebook pages.

Filed under Be Inspired Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape Tutorials

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