Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape

Story behind the photo – The drizzle in Sevenoaks

by Marc Horner March 19, 2015 Comments4

Long exposure of Chipstead, Sevenoaks, Kent

I’ve worked with professional landscape photographer Paul Sanders on various projects and he knows about my recent falling in love with landscape photography. I saw this image by him on his Facebook wall and had to learn more about it because I was completely blown away by it.

One quick email later and Paul told me everything I needed to know:

Photography for me is emotional, it is a reflection of my state of mind and the reaction I have to a certain place at a certain time.

These trees sit in a boating lake near my home in Kent, it’s a place that is surrounded by the M25, A25 a bustling village and noisy schools. However when I go there I hear none of the bustle of the world.

I had this image in my mind last year, so it has been a long time coming to fruition. I rarely plan my shoots but having revisited this location a number of times I knew exactly what I wanted and the conditions that would make it work.

The weather was drizzle, mist and gloomy. Strangely it largely reflected my state of mind! On the off chance that the mist and drizzle would continue I headed down to the boating lake and stood listening to the birds.

The drizzle intensified and the mist thickened a little over the lake, perfect for me, ideal for my island of trees.

To get the image I had in my head I used the Fuji X-T1 and XF50-140 lens, shooting upright which I’m starting to do more of, but I still find challenging.

I wanted the trees to be virtual silhouettes against the mist, sort of isolated but stark.

For this shot I exposed for the darkest part of the island, this intentionally overexposed the back ground exaggerating the misty feeling, shooting at F9 on telephoto also helps by utilising the shallower depth of field the 50-140 has over a wide angle lens.

Of course the joy of using the X-T1 is that the EVF means I can pretty much see the exact image I have in my head at the time of shooting, making the whole process more about the final image than the camera and the technical aspects of photography.

I didn’t want hard reflections on the water and the choppy conditions combined with the an exposure of 2 minutes rendered them as I hoped. There was very little in the sky so I added a .75 soft grad to hold the tone. I used a Lee Big Stopper increase the exposure to two minutes from 1/8th of a second.

The first shot I took was the one that nailed it for me, I did a second one but forget to release the remote until about 5 minutes later I was so lost in watching the mist moved over the lake! I often get lost in the moment and totally forget why I am there.

Once I got home, I loaded the image into Lightroom, converted it to monochrome in through Silver Efex, selecting to develop it with an blue filter to increase the tone in the trees in the foreground, increased the contrast marginally added a platinum tone from the finishing menu and saved it – five minutes of post processing!

With every picture I create it’s all about pre-visualisation and connecting my emotions with the landscape and feeling the photograph.

—

About Paul Sanders

Paul will be speaking at The Photography Show on Monday 23rd March at 17:00 in the “Behind the lens” theatre.

You can see more of Paul’s amazing work on his website, or following him on social media.
Paul Sanders’ Official website
@wiggys on Twitter
@wiggys on Instagram
Paul Sanders Photography Ltd on Facebook

Filed under Be Inspired Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape

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

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

HOW TO: Photograph Fog

by Ben Cherry December 17, 2014 Comments12

As winter starts to set in, photographers are looking for ways to capture this cold season. For me, winter is best covered in the morning. This is a personal preference but in the mornings you have frost, a reasonable hour for sunrise and (if you’re lucky) fog or mist.

There are three types of fog, so you need to decide what you are looking for and this will depend on your location:

Ground fog – In mountainous/hilly areas and cold patches you can get ground fog collecting in valleys. After a rainy night or over wet ground you can get shallow precipitation fog.
Sea fog – Also called advection fog, this is where warm air passes over cold sea water.
Sea/River smoke – Where the air is colder than the water, creating a generally shallow level of fog, this is generally restricted to water areas, hence river smoke.

When trying to photograph fog you need to use the weather forecast to understand what the evening will be like in your desired location. I was fortunate enough to visit Curbar Edge in the Peak District the afternoon before my first morning I was there to scout the location. It was just before sunset and the fog was forming in the valley below and at that point I decided to try it out the following morning to see how it would look.

The weather for my first morning at Curbar was drizzling and there was a thick layer of cloud, which meant it was pretty unlikely I’d witness much golden light, I thought I’d set out and give it a go. I am so happy I did! This was my first real experience of photographing mist and it is incredible how quickly the spectacle evolves in front of your eyes. I one point I was photographing down one end of the valley, taking some long exposures, only to look over my shoulder and see that it had dramatically changed down the other end of the valley!

I used the X-T1 and the XF18-135mm lens for my main set up. As it was a wet morning the weather-sealed kit meant that I could stop worrying about the system and focus on the spectacle. As well as offering weather sealing, the XF18-135mm meant that I had great versatility, meaning that I didn’t have to worry about changing lenses the entire time. However, I also ended up using a neutral density filter to reduce the amount of light reaching the sensor to further extend the shutter speed. This was great but because I was using a filter set instead of screw in filters it meant that the front element was exposed to the conditions. Long exposures and rain drops do not mix! Thankfully a little umbrella tucked away in my bag helped to shelter the filter.

Generally I was not bothered about using a fast/moderate shutter speed so I set up the system on a tripod and used ISO 200 (the lowest RAW compatible ISO) and generally around F8. The addition of the ND filter, which was a 10-stop filter, meant that the shutter speed required was dramatically decreased. This results in the mist smoothing out, giving quite an interesting effect. See the comparisons below (note that despite the fact the ND filter is meant to be neutral it has put a distinct colour cast on the images).

The ND filter extended the shutter speed so much that I had to use the bulb setting, as the required shutter speed was longer than 30 seconds. For this I used the remote trigger that allowed me to hold down the trigger (lockable) to keep the shutter open for as long as required. The X-T1 shows the length of the shutter speed on the back screen, this is very helpful. There is something to consider thought when using long exposures: the processing time. As soon as you go beyond 30 seconds, the processing time dramatically increases from seconds into minutes, this isn’t a problem but is something to be aware of when trying to photograph a scene that is evolving constantly.

To make sure I didn’t miss any moments while the X-T1 was processing and to get some different shots, I used the X100s with ISO 1600 to produce a fast enough shutter speed to allow me to use the camera one handed. Picture the scene: a wonderful valley filled with fog unfolding in front of me, one camera on a tripod; my left hand sheltering it with an umbrella; photographing the scene with the X100s in my right hand at the same time! Who says photographers can’t look cool…

The three above photos were taken with the X100s using the monochrome + red filter jpeg preset.

The reason I chose Curbar Edge is because it provides a high vantage point. This is really important to optimise your chances for good mist photography. It generally means that you should be hit by the early morning light and so should warm up faster! This is a valid point to consider on crisp winter mornings, not that it happened this time around. A high vantage point allows you to see for a greater distance, hopefully providing you with a greater number of layers to your picture. At the top of a valley, Curbar Edge allowed me to see for miles along the valley, which offered both valley fog and river smoke. The ability to then use a telephoto lens to zoom in on particular areas can result in some quite striking shots.

But also having the ability to instantly zoom wide was a great asset to try and obtain a variety of photographs.

The colour photos were all taken with the X-T1 and I used the Classic Chrome camera calibration in Lightroom which produced wonderful colours in my opinion. I have only just started using this camera calibration and I love it.

Though on this occasion the sun didn’t break through the thick cloud cover, the spectacle was nevertheless remarkable and I can only imagine what it would have looked like if sun rays had broken through.

The second morning

Despite being very happy with the previous morning I decided to give it another go as the forecast suggested there was a better chance of a proper sunrise. This time round I decided to not focus too much on lengthy shutter speeds, but instead the details in the fog. What I didn’t expect was the amount of fog!

The range of the 18-135mm meant that I could capture the grand scale of the fog at 18mm, with the car in the first of these pictures giving a sense of scale. Then using the longer end of the lens I pulled out particular parts of the landscape, such as the little cottage that looks like it should be in Harry Potter and the hilltops surrounded by a sea of fog, turning them into islands. As well as the incredible amount of fog, the sun did make a bit of an appearance too. Despite this it was a very cold morning, producing a wonderful frost. I was very happy to have packed a hat and pair of gloves.

I positioned myself so part of the hilltop was between me and the rising sun, creating a backlighting effect on Curbar Edge, which brings the fog alive.

Because of the brighter sky this time round I needed to use a ND gradual filter, where unlike the filter I used during the first morning, this one changes from one end to the other, as the name suggests. At one end it is darker (you can buy filters at different stops, depending on how dark you want to make part of the image), while at the other it has no effect on the light. I use these when I am photographing something with a sky that is much brighter than the ground below. With the above image I used a filter which didn’t stop down the light enough to correctly expose the sky but I like it nevertheless because of the frost (it get particularly difficult to expose correctly when the sun is in the image). While the picture below is a slightly better example of a ND gradual filter in use.

I hope this has proved helpful and now it is your turn to get out there and photograph the wintery conditions. Let us know how you get on.

Filed under Landscape / Cityscape / Seascape Tutorials

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