10 Reasons …

May 20, 2012 Leave a Comment Equipment, Musings, Whimsical
X-Pro1 + lenses

10 reasons why I sold my Leica M9 and bought a Fuji X-Pro 1 (In no particular order as the Leica deficiencies were all equally annoying to me at times) Sensor cleaning: The X-Pro 1 has ultrasonic vibration cleaning of their sensor while the M9 dust-magnet sensor has… none. I suppose Leica does include an Adobe Lightroom license in the (very high) price, so maybe they think the spot healing brush constitutes dust removal of sorts! As most serious photographers would already have a copy of Lightroom and/or Photoshop though, this doesn’t count. Viewfinder: A hybrid multifinder is … [Continue reading]

Equipment, Musings, Whimsical

A Short History

May 18, 2012 Leave a Comment Equipment, Whimsical
Swan Diptych, Hadrian's Wall, England. Nikon F90X, AF Micro 200mm, Kodak T-Max 3200.

The "old days" weren't necessarily the good ones but they were a lot simpler in many ways, not least because you had less choice. These days though, maybe we are all literally "spoilt" for choice. I was wandering down memory lane briefly the other day (not something I do very often) recalling some of my favourite cameras and lenses, then decided to elaborate and try to remember all the cameras and lenses I have bought and sold over the years. I think I may have missed a few things here and there though... It also gives me the chance to show a few digitised film photos that I haven't shown … [Continue reading]

Equipment, Whimsical

What Is Creativity?

May 15, 2012 Leave a Comment Musings
Smelter #3

Not an easy one to answer, but not all questions require an answer, so I thought I would just begin by exploring the question in more detail. With this kind of contemplation I find it useful to first define and eliminate what we are not discussing. To start with though I would state that I am not actually claiming to be "creative". I would like to think that I am, but that doesn't mean it's true and the images I have included are not there because I think they are creative although they may illustrate a point. We will just have to draw our own conclusions in the end. Creativity often gets … [Continue reading]

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The Elements – Part 4

May 14, 2012 Leave a Comment Informative, Musings
Ice Sculpture

Space Space, as I refer to it, is the relationship within space of two or more picture elements and thus is a sort of glue that binds colour, form and line together that all bask in the glow of the light (sorry to wax poetical but this is visual poetry!). It can also be the space between an object and the image boundary and is emphasised by having nothing in it. "Empty" space is empty only of objects, not of colour or texture, darkness or light, and thus not at all empty of purpose or meaning. The Japanese term ma is also applicable here as it implies an interval in time as well as … [Continue reading]

Informative, Musings

The Elements – Part 3

May 13, 2012 Leave a Comment Informative, Musings
Punta de Campomoro

Form and Light As an element, form is hard to separate from light so I am going to combine the two together in this brief essay. It’s true that without light we couldn’t have photography or for that matter sight, but the light I’m talking about is a quality rather than a quantity and form is particularly entwined with it. The colour or line of a subject can be similar to the background and under certain lighting conditions it will fade into obscurity. This is particularly true of highly textured or intricately shaped subject matter where side lighting will highlight the contours … [Continue reading]

Informative, Musings

The Elements – Part 2

May 11, 2012 Leave a Comment Informative, Musings
Blue Door

Colour Colour may seem obvious to most people, but there are more subtle, subconscious effects that colour can have than just the bright hues we generally think of as colour. In fact colour can be divided into hue, saturation and luminosity, the HSL values you can adjust in image editing software. Each has a different effect on the colours and their interaction between each other so that even a monochromatic image can have many shades of the same colour because they all have differing hue, saturation and/or luminosity. When different colours are juxtaposed, they can create a form … [Continue reading]

Informative, Musings

The Elements – Part 1

May 10, 2012 Leave a Comment Informative, Musings
Bowing Out

Line In photography, as in all visual arts, there is no sound, no smell, no touch. It is therefore left to the sense of sight to convey the subject experienced by the photographer - one’s own particular portrayal of the elements of line, colour, form, light, space. These intrinsic qualities and their interplay with each other help determine our visual perception of the world, particularly in an aesthetic sense, and can dramatically influence how an image is interpreted. Line is the simplest but in some ways the most quintessential of the five. Line on its own is purely abstract … [Continue reading]

Informative, Musings

The Travelling Photographer – Part 4

May 9, 2012 Leave a Comment Equipment, Informative, Travel
The Old Forest

You gotta carry it all ... Everything has to be carried of course and your choice of camera bag can make the difference between an enjoyable trip and an uncomfortable one. Your decision is of course, dependent upon the amount of equipment you intend to take (and carry) and the way in which you prefer to access that equipment. The number one priority must be access. If you can’t access your equipment easily, chances are you won’t, and you will therefore miss opportunities that may hold more potential than you first thought. Comfort is next on my list of priorities for a bag - but if … [Continue reading]

Equipment, Informative, Travel
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