My 2014 Weekly Photos - Part 4

[Geoff F]

Week 43

I see that with all this rain and overcast skies I am starting to fall behind now.

Anyway, a nice clear sunny day for a change so I decided to visit a little town along the coast. Kingswear - somewhere that I haven't been for many years. Because of the geography, it isn't a straightforward journey.

Started walking along some old narrow streets towards the coast path and soon encountered a path closed notice. And the diversion - up the steps!



Eventually, after a few pauses to catch my breath, I reached the top and continued along another road towards the cliff path. But steps, in one form or another, were with me all the way; with very little easy walking areas.



Most of the view was hidden by the trees, or high fences. It didn't seem to be a particularly welcoming area. But eventually, I found a spot where some trees had fallen down and I was able to clearly see Dartmouth Castle on the left and Kingswear Castle on the right.



7D with Canon 24-105 lens. 1/125 F 11 Iso 200

And a closer view.



Back in the town, the ferries which connect Dartmouth and Kingswear.



1/250 F11 Iso 400.

Because of the extreme light requirements ranging between heavy shadow and bright low angle sunshine, with subject movement causing problems which prevented using multiple exposures, these all merges of different conversion settings from a Raw shot.

[deetheturk]

Very good Geoff, and well worth all the climbing of the various stairs-steps!

[Cantab]

Geoff, this is a really wonderful set of photos - thanks for posting them. I was intrigued by the "ferry". It looks like a small barge with a tug. Or am I missing something?

[Geoff F]

That is it Bruce. Nothing complicated with that ferry. Just a floating platform and a small tug tied alongside.

When going in the other direction it reverses a little way then the tug swings itself around so it faces the other way for the river crossing. Which means the vehicles are always facing the right direction to drive off.

It only takes 6 to 8 vehicles, plus a few foot passengers, so in the summer there is always a long queue. Which is why I drove around the long way via the nearest bridge, but that means about 10 or 12 miles in each direction.

The other ferry, which is just passengers, is another strange looking craft with a square bow, looking like an oversized dory type craft.

Like many of our south coast towns, most of the waterfront properties are now owned by seriously rich people who just live there occasionally. There are Private Property and Keep Out notices everywhere. I even saw one which said 'Residents and Tradesmen Only'.

[bnnrcn]

Nice series Geoff

[IzzieK]

I like the light at the top of the steps in #2, Geoff. The curve going to the right is the mystery there ... You have to an interesting journey in these shots...different, I should say...

[Geoff F]

Yes, that is what I was attempting to achieve with those steps shots. A sense of perspective as the steps lead towards the sky and with uncertainty over what is coming next!

Week 44 - Local History Society Meeting

'Bring your camera to the next meeting' I was told. That always means there is a tricky job coming.

'Take some photos for a article in the local newspaper'. Well that sounds fine, but what to do? I find that being a 'photo journalist' always means working for free!

Tried some without flash but even with a fairly wide aperture and Iso 1000 still only produced a shutter speed of 1/20 and had a lot of noise in the background. So flash was the only option.

But this tends to mean a darkish background and/or a risk of an over bright foreground. So shooting in manual camera mode with variable flash, just like I do for insectlife, was my only option.

Exchanging information and memories about images projected onto a screen



7D with Tamron 24-70. 1/160 F8 Iso 400. Flash then quite a bit of editing with layers and masks to reduce hotspots and selectively apply noise reduction and sharpening. I wanted to have some depth to the scene to show the number of people attending.



Closely examining some old photographs





I do have a few more shots to edit, but think that these nicely sum up the event.

[dje]

Looks like a good night was had by all ! Well captured Geoff.

Dave

[Cantab]

Geoff, these turned out well. I'm curious exactly what you did in, for example, the first shot. You set the camera's aperture and shutter speed manually, let the flash unit do whatever it thought best, and then did selective adjustments in PS? This may seem a stupid question!

[Geoff F]

Yes that is correct, Bruce.

Using flash in Tv mode selects a wide open aperture while using Av often gives an excessively long shutter speed. So set the camera to suit the scene and flash in ETTL mode plus a little bit of flash output compensation. Used in a similar manner to exposure compensation. However, there will always be some exposure problems when using flash on this sort of scene.

Being rather close to the foreground I would use a little bit of negative compensation. But that will tend to make the background a little dark and noisy. However, it is easier to recover dark shadows in the background than over exposed highlights in the foreground.

I often do noise reduction on a duplicate layer then edit with a mask to selectively apply the effect.

With the first image, I actually started by creating two conversions from the Raw file, with different settings, and combined them with a mask.

[IzzieK]

I enjoyed those shots, Geoff, particularly the inspection of old photographs.

[Cantab]

Geoff, thank you for your comment. I've printed it off and will have a go at editing a family photo which has the problem you faced, bright at the front and dark at the rear.

[Geoff F]

Week 45 - Dry Stone Wall & Windswept Hedge

Saw this scene when returning from photographing fungi and had a go at shooting it. Tried various angles but nothing quite captured what I had in mind with regard to showing the ruggedness of the location. These are the only two keepers.



7D with Tamron 24-70 lens. 1/500 F11 Iso 400. I wanted to have a reasonably fast shutter to avoid wind movement on the twigs, but in hindsight I could probably have got away with a slightly lower Iso setting.



1/250 F11 Iso 400.

[Donald]

Week 44 - Local History Society Meeting

Sorry for being so late, but I did not want to miss on simply commenting what a good set of images these are. Very much capture the mood of what I know these sort of events to be like.

[Shadowman]

Nicely captured Stone Wall.

[Geoff F]

Thanks for comments.

To be honest, Donald, I'm always happier when wandering around on my own photographing wildlife and landscapes than having to 'become inconspicuous' when shooting actual events, with real live people! Particularly where flash has to be used and I'm feeling under stress.

So I tend to regard these 'assignments' as being an alternative form of wildlife photography.

[bnnrcn]

Very nice Stone Wall shots, I especially like #1

[Brownbear]

Hi Geoff,

I'm especially fond of the landscape images in Week 43 and also the creativity of the stone staircase image.

[Geoff F]

Thanks for the comments. Starting to catch up on postings now but still need to upload two a week to make my full quota by the end of this year.

Week 46 - Looking under the bridge.

Sunny day at last, although a little on the cool side, so I decided to walk along an old railway line which has been turned into a footpath. Not a lot of any photographic merit though.

Looked at this old bridge from several angles then gave up and walked on. When returning, the light angle was a little bit better so I had a go at it. But realised it was something of a no hope task. Anyway this is the only possible keeper from several different angles. Plus a merge of two conversions with different settings from the same Raw file.



7D with Tamron 24-70 lens. 1/30 F8 Iso 400 on a tripod.

[Geoff F]

Slight problem yesterday. Trying to get something, of very little weight, out of a cupboard meant bending and twisting; and yes, I pulled my back again. Nothing serious but I'm been taking things easy for a couple of days.

Today started as one of those bright sunny days with no wind (probably not many of these left for this year) so I had to try something, but went for a spot without much walking or carrying of heavy gear.

Week 47 - Another Day - Another Bridge

Across an estuary creek this time.



7D with Tamron 24-70 lens. 1/320 F11 Iso 200

Most of the time I was trying to avoid having vehicles crossing the bridge but thought I would have a go at this bus. No thinking time though; just point, click and hope for the best!



1/250 F11 Iso 200.

Tried a few shots as bracketed exposures but kept getting the settings wrong. Failure to click on the final Set dial was my commonest error. Also switching off the camera between shots and not resetting before starting to shoot again. So I kept getting 3 identical shots!

This is a technique which I don't use very often. But in all fairness, putting on my glasses for a closer look at what I was doing would probably have helped.

So for most of my shots I reverted to my normal practice of making two different conversions from the same Raw file.

Took a few other subjects around the creek which I will process and upload later.