Saturday, November 19, 2011

X100 & Shadows


Hey X100 lovers, 


I have noticed lately that I have been shooting a lot of subjects that either appear completely as shadows or have a strong, usually very contrasty, shadow element. This is of course a pretty conventional aspect of photography and far from original. What I have noticed though, and find interesting from a point of view of my own style, is that I am now actively looking for shadows everywhere. Just like when you are looking for a new car, camera or whatever, you start to notice them everywhere because its at the forefront your mind.




So how does this relate to photography and the X100 in particular? Well, there are a few observations that I wanted to make if anyone is interested in this as a simple project or subject they might want to explore.


First up, I have found that the more I use the X100 the more I have become completely at home with the focal length and camera controls and set-up. I remember reading a very nice piece by Thorsten Overgaard on the Leica Digilux 2 where it became very clear that much of his affinity with the camera was down to how comfortable he had become with its simple controls, focal lengths and operation, to the extent that the camera was 'out of the way' and he had industrialized his photograph taking workflow to such an extent that the subject or topic gets explored without conscious thought for the camera. I am not sure that I have reached this ultimate state of enlightenment ( he has been using it for a very long time) but I would say that I have become entirely comfortable with how I use the X100 and this helps a lot when these kind of opportunities come along. I find that I look for shadows all of the time now and as soon as I see something interesting I slip the aperture to f8 (there is usually loads of light) compose and shoot. I have found that the X100 meter is extremely reliable for shadow shooting and only occasionally have I had to tweak the exposure comp dial.




Secondly, remember this style is all about contrast. Generally, the more contrasty and stark you can make the shadow then the more impact the shot will have. One thing that noticed on my recent trip to Chiang Mai is that a polarizer can help a lot with this kind of shooting and in particular where you have white walls. I wouldn't normally have bothered with this but I lost my X100 lens cap and wanted to protect the lens a bit while I wandered around so I slipped an ancient 49mm polarizer that I had onto the camera. As rule I wouldn't recommend this as I don't like anything that goes in front of a lens as its likely to degrade the image in some way through either dirt, flare or by simply slowing the lens as is the case with this polarizer. However, as there was loads of very bright light around this wasn't an issue in this case.




The third aspect of this style for me is the editing of the resulting images where its essential to bring out the contrast. Regular readers will know that I am on a Snapseed trip just now and I think it does a very nice job for this style. Some may think its over done, and I have to confess to being pretty conservative as a rule, but I like the exaggerated contrast and, as long as the photo structure is simple enough, the results can be very effective.



I find that the Snapseed drama tones do a very nice job of brining out grainy detail and this makes what could be bland subject matter that little bit more interesting and causes the eye and mind to linger a little longer on the shot.




It needn't all be black and white of course and sometimes a nice streak of color can liven the shot. Again, it might be worth trying a polarizer if you have enough light as it will definitely help with the contrast and tones.


I hope that this was interesting to you guys and here is a final image to close. I have used this before in the blog but make no apology for using it again, it has become my favorite shot from the Chiang Mai trip.




See you all soon,


Steel

Monday, November 14, 2011

X100 Goes to Chiang Mai (pt 2)


Hey X100 lovers, I am still updating from Chiang Mai and here are some of my latest shots and experiences with the X100. 


Before I do that, more bad news.....the X100 has gone from being fully pimped up to totally stripped down !!!!! I have now lost all of the accessories that I bought except the leather case (and I guess if loose that the camera is gone !!) Gone are the thumbs up, soft release red shutter button and the lens hood. These add-ons are simply not up to the stress of travel photography and I am shocked at how easily they were gone :( Lesson is; by all means buy them to make the camera look good for city cruising but don't put it to work..... I will replace the lens hood because I need that to protect the lens (I don't like filters) so the hood is essential and it also does a great job with flare.


Here is a fond memory of how it looked fully tarted up.




Enough of this, lets get back to Chiang Mai and the X100 shooting experience. Here is a shot I like a lot from the huge night market in the centre of the town. This guy pops through a window in his wooden stall where he sells silver jewelry and I managed to time the shot perfectly as he picked up a ring to show a customer. I spoke about this in a previous blog around waiting for the moment and not shooting indiscriminately. This is an important aspect of X100 shooting due to its relatively slow operation, however, in a strange way it also helps to improve your composition, framing and timing. I have heard this said about shooting film and imagine the experience to be similar. The discrete appearance and silent operation of the X100 all add to this of course.




For shooting at the market I found ISO auto with 1600 limit and min 1/60 to be perfect and I didn't loose a single shot to blur. The editing for this one was the dark drama toning in Snapseed which regular readers will know I have been using to edit on the fly when traveling and in my opinion it brings out the jewelry and wood grain in a very dramatic way.




No trip to Thailand or Chiang Mai would be complete without shooting the temples and monks. I found on this trip that the monks were a little camera shy and I put that down to the sheer volume of tourists that were there for the Loi Krathong festival. Still, with the unobtrusive X100 and its silent use, its possible to quietly blend in and not disturb people while you shoot. I keep raving about this aspect of the X100 but don't underestimate the value of not being noticed and I can speak from experience here. I know that the clatter of my D3 shutter would have made this monk look up and be uncomfortable.




On a different aspect of travel photography, I normally love shooting black & white but haven't been doing so much with the X100. I intend to correct that and will shoot a lot more with this in mind for a future blog on the subject. In the meantime here is one that I really like, this was shot with a cheapo polarizer which helped with the contrast. I can highy recommend the use of a polarizer on the X100, it's 49 mm thread is easy and cheap to source and light to carry. The effect on contrast is always welcome and, with the bright light from the golden and white buildings, helped to tame the reflections a bit. Normally the contrast of a monks orange robes would make a photo like this but I prefer the B&W. Here is a color version from the same scene taken shortly after - what do you guys think?




Both work for me but for different reasons :) This was a horrendous exposure but I preferred to preserve the monk detail this time around at the expense of some of the building detail.




Here is another instance where the polarizer made a huge difference and brought out the texture in these silver medallions which, incidentally, were hand made in the temple compound by the guy below.




You can see in the background the intricate frame that he made for the photo of Thailand's highly revered King and Queen.



Here is another example of the silver work shaped into leaves and hung like a tree, gorgeous stuff and perfectly metered by the X100.




Back to the monks again and a quick comment about the 35mm lens equivalent on the X100. This focal length is perfect for travel subject and context shooting, and its always a good idea to take the context shot first in case the subject moves. This is the same monk at the window from the 3rd photo in this post and I shot this as my initial subject and environment shot to make sure I had it in the bag. 



Here's another nice context example, I particularly like to shoot against the light and the clock and calendar in the corner were for me and important part of the story and rather nicely fill the frame.


Finally, I mentioned in part 1 about the great coffee from the Republic Coffee orange (had to be this color for Chiang Mai !!!) van, we became firm friends with the owner due to our frequent visits during the trip and here is a closing shot of it in action. 





Cheers until next time,


Steel



Tuesday, November 8, 2011

X100 Goes to Chiang Mai


Hey X100 lovers, I am up in Chiang Mai in Thailand on a photo trip with Singapore Trekkers and wanted to post some early experiences and shots. Firstly a bit of bad news and word to the wise. I was raving previously about the thumbs up hotshoe grip enhancer and soft release button attachments that I bought for the X100, well both are lost :( none of these expensive add ons fit securely for travel photography - you have been warned, don't waste your money.

Anyway, enough of this doom & gloom and back to the shooting. Chiang Mai is a cultural centre in Northern Thailand and is a bit of mixture of old and new, temples, shops and markets. All of this makes for very interesting subject matter and I will post a series from this location over the next few weeks or so.


Street shooting opportunities abound and I have found that there are a couple of ways of approaching these. One is to find an interesting backdrop and wait for the right subject (as in this case) or to find the right subject and wait until he, she or it is in the location you want.


Both of these shots fall into the former camp and I find that this is an approach that works well here due to the number of great locations that exist and, with a bit of patience, the right subject usually comes along. One thing that regular X100 shooters will be aware of is that its no speed shooter so, as with film cameras, you have to take the shot at the decisive moment and sometimes this requires very good timing. It all boils down to a sense of anticipation at the end of the day, waiting until the composition looks exactly as you want it - and then, and only then, taking the shot.


Another thing that I noticed is that some of the temples get lit quite nicely and if you catch them at dusk it's possible to get a very nice ambient background light and loads of contrast. Incidentally, I never use a tripod with the X100 and these are shot hand held on auto ISO which I currently have set for 1600 max and a min shutter speed of 1/40 th which is plenty of headroom for steady shooting due to the very soft release and lack of mirror slap.


As with many places in Thailand, temples are everywhere and they are all very interesting and social centres in their own right. There is usually open access and as long as decent manners are observed, no problem with shooting in them.

As I said, this is just a quick starter on this trip and I will update as the week progresses. Just to finish, here is a snap of this lovely guy who has a little converted van from which he sells the best coffee around. It's called Republic Coffee, keep an eye open for him if you go here, you wont be disappointed with the delicious lattes :) Its very obvious that this guy loves his work and it shows through in the quality of his coffee and the lovely ambiance around his van.


Well, that's it for a kick-off from Thaialnd, keep viewing and I will update in a few days.

Cheers,

Steel

Sunday, October 30, 2011

X100 at the Botanic Gardens and some Snapseed v's Lightroom Comparisons


I gotta say, I am having lots of fun this week with the X100. Its so versatile and easy to carry around and the results are just awesome, what a great piece of kit. I took it out and around on a photo shoot with some friends to the Botanic Gardens in Singapore and then on to Esplanade for sunset. I felt so unburdened at carrying this tiny pocket battleship while everyone else labored with bags and tripods :) Admittedly, the X100 is a bit limited in the macro front so its not ideal for true macro work however it does allow you to get in close and the focus is sharp if you are careful, as ever, the colors are delightful. 


I am not very big on macro close ups but I am a big fan of against the light shooting and trying to get a little flare into the corner of the shot. I have mentioned before how flare resistant the X100 Fujinon lens is but it can be done with careful positioning.




This shot just looks so bright and summery and the fresh droplets after the rain give it a nice dreamy look. The above shot was edited in Snapseed which followers of the blog will know I am using a lot just now. The files are not very hi res but this allows for easy uploading and they will stand up well to smallish sized prints. By way of comparison and just for fun, I also edited a similar shot in Lightroom which is my favorite, main management and editing tool. I simply hate processing and editing, I would so much rather be shooting !!! Anyway, I have a workflow that is very quick and allows for minimal time at the desk and the following photo got the basic treatment. It's richer and more detailed but to be honest I prefer the Snapseed version in this case.




Here is another comparison of one of the shooters Riyanti who took a few minutes out to pose these shots for me.




This is the Lightroom version with a little bit of tonal contrast adjustment in Nik Colorefexpro which is again, a very simple and fast tool that, like all Nik products, delivers fantastic results.


And now the Snapseed efforts which got the drama tone 1 effect which to my eyes gives a delightfully contrasty and somehow, modern feel and look to the images.



Same effect again, and I have commented before how well this effect works with Asian skin tones. These are all in natural light by the way but I would have liked to have had my trusty reflector (which I had stupidly left at home) handy to get a bit of catchlight into the eyes and brighten the face a little.



I wouldn't say that these are necessarily better than the Lightroom processed shot but they were a darn site simpler to produce and were done on the fly in Starbies !!! I am a sucker for the drama tone 1 & 2 effects, I simply delight in the way they deal with tonal contrast.


Let's get back to the flower shooting which to be honest doesn't do much for me but I did like messing around to see what the X100 could do.




One thing that more experienced flower shooters than me will I am sure advise, is to take a reflector or something to give you a plain white or black background depending on the flower color and contrast. I usually carry a smallish 5 in 1 reflector with me everywhere but as I was traveling so light I had left it behind :( I did manage to find a large cream cloth however and held it behind this gorgeous black orchid. This is a truly stunning flower and I am afraid that I have done it little justice with getting the DoF wrong but, as I said, flower shooting is not my game.




Here are the final two plant shots and as mentioned I was finding it a real challenge to find a suitably dark and clear background to frame the shots with in the absence of an artificial backdrop.


Going close in on some of the wonderful foliage on display took care of the background issue and the patterns and textures came out beautifully in the X100's rich files.




A nice simple B&W shot to close the Orchid garden section. This is one lovely place to visit and I am sure any dedicated macro photographer would be in seventh heaven here. For me, it was a fun place to visit and mess around with the X100, I always feel I learn something that benefits me in my more normal shooting when I try something new such as the flowers and close ups here.



A quick word on workflow with these images and some closing shots from my favorite haunt at Marina Bay. I bought a simple little SD card reader for the Ipad and can literally load and edit on the move with Snapseed and I can't wait to try it out on my upcoming photo trip to Chiang Mai with the cool guys at  Singapore Trekker . I am sure the iphone and techy guys on the trip will have a good laugh at how behind the times I am with editing on the go and will be showing off the latest apps. I am a bit of a traditionalist in some ways though and only adopt something once I am sure it has the benefits I need and I guess in some ways that's why I love the X100's quirky and unique blend of old and new.





Well, that;s it for this weekend and I am very interested in any views or experiences with regards to the snapseed v's Lightroom comparison, drop me a note or leave a comment. Here's a nice, if very cliched shot of the Fullarton Hotel as dusk falls, what a stunning setting Marina Bay and Esplanade is.


Hope all you X100 fans had as good a shooting weekend as I did,


Steel

Saturday, October 29, 2011

X100 A Stroll Around Singapore

Hey fellow X100 shooters. 

I was strolling around the Esplanade area in Singapore the other day when it occurred to me to comment on an aspect of the X100 that disappoints me when using the camera. This is the optical viewfinder. When I bought the camera originally I was so excited about having the frame lines and being able to compose within them while still seeing the whole scene. This in mind would lead to lovely tight rangefinder style shots that locked the eye into the scene. Well I have to say it didn't work out that way and I have found it to be so unreliable that I have stopped using it completely in favor of the electronic finder that I simply find much more accurate.


Fortunately, I am a lover of wider angles and think nothing of shooting all day with a 24 mm lens on my Nikon D3. This is of course a fair bit wider than the X100's 35 mm equivalent so I find it easy to frame tightly and have no qualms about going close to subjects. I would strongly urge anyone who enjoys street-shooting with the X100 to try shooting wider angle for a few weeks and you will feel like the X100 is a telephoto !!!! 
I noticed that when I first started in photography I rarely had people in my shots and if I did it was taken from a distance or discreetly. It took a while but I managed to work my way out of this and I read a lovely quote in a book where a photographer stated that he took the point of view that everyone interesting that he came across deserved to be photographed by him. This somehow helped my state of mind when photographing people and I developed the mind set that I was somehow doing them a favor by capturing and sharing something about their life. I also read a piece by the wonderful Thorsten Overgaard where he said that he always strives to show something good about the people he photographs and never takes a shot that would ridicule or show them in a way that they would be unhappy with. Again, somehow that helped resolve something in my mind that gives me the courage now to get in close and get the shot. Incidentally, Although Thorsten is a huge Leica fan, his writings and essays will resonate completely with the X100 shooter and I would urge you to read his marvelous essays on the love of shooting.



Anyway, back to the theme of the article and the optical viewfinder. As I said, I have stopped using it because I found that when I get tight to people as per above, both the framing and focus was all over the place. I am very interested to hear from anyone who has found a way of mastering this but for me the electronic finder, once I got used to it, is fine and I can concentrate on the composition, get in tight at F2 or 2.8 and shoot. Although it can be laborious, I always try to manually shift the focus point to be where I think the focus will be required before I step in close to shoot. I do this as a bit of insurance because I tend to shoot at the widest apertures and its possible to loose focus when you are in close if you recompose all of the time.



By adhering to the principles of everyone deserving to be shot by me and trying to show them in a positive aspect, I managed to get in very close to these lovely old gentlemen who, although practicing Falun Gong were aware of my presence. I am no lover of politics and wish to play no part in it however, I couldn't help but be persuaded by the concepts that these people could change things trough positive and truthful thought. How nice that would be. I like to think that the above photo shows a little of the strength and completeness that this practice instills in them. This is very typical of the way I use the X100 and I don't think this shot would have worked so well with the optical finder as the framing and focus at f2 had to be spot on.


Here's a bit of a fun evening shot taken at the end of my stroll that didn't involve getting in close and was shot at either F8 or F11, its a shot of the lovely Singapore skyline for the Esplanade side and the light is very nice over there when there is some cloud in the sky and the lights are just coming on. 



As I said, interested to hear from anyone who can advise on better use of the optical viewfinder and enjoy your X100 this weekend.


Steel

Friday, October 28, 2011

X100 in Ubud Pt 2


 Hey fellow X100 lovers. Welcome to the second part of my recent trip with the X100 to Ubud on the lovely island of Bali.



In this section on the trip I decided to focus (excuse the pun) mainly on some close focus near - macro shots that I took and one or two photos from my walkabout around the town and surrounding area.




The above two Lotus shots were taken at the aptly named Lotus Pond restaurant on Ubud main street. The light here is lovely around mid morning and the lotus flowers deliciously colored. The Lotus Pond is a temple setting and in the evenings they have marvelous traditional Balinese dance and music shows, well worth a visit.



This one didn't quite come off unfortunately. I tried some fill flash from the tiny on camera unit in the X100 and set - 2 compensation to darken the sky a bit. The problem was that I nearly fell into the Lotus pond while trying to get a decent angle below the flower!!!! I gave up after this one effort :) The onboard flash on the X100 is extraordinarily good at close range for providing a little bit of fill or catch light. Use it sparingly on a low setting and the metering balances things out very nicely. See Ken Rockwell's  review for more detail on this. 




Here is my final shot from the Lotus Pond and its a shoot through of one of the colorful umbrellas that are on either side of the temple entrance. These umbrellas are everywhere in Bali and come in varieties of yellows, black & white and red. They make great subjects on their own or as a backdrop.




We also stopped and chatted to these very nice kids who were cleaning this theatre in preparation for there traditional Balinese dance lessons. I would like to have stuck around to shoot the lessons but didn't have the time to wait around. Maybe next time. It's possible to get very nice reflections on the tile floors of these temples and theaters, usually best in the earlier morning and with a bit of friendliness the kids or locals are usually happy to pose and see the photos in review.




The final few shots are of local people at work. The first above was preparing wood for a temple renovation project and he was nicely backlit with a little bit of flare. It's worth noting that this just needed a simple +1 compensation and its not so easy to get the flare effect with the Fujinon lens, especially with the hood on.




Finally, this very nice guy scurried up a coconut tree and chopped us down some fresh green coconuts so that we could drink the lovely, fresh, sweet milk. What nice people.




All of the images in this post were edited on the fly using the amazing Snapseed App. I am not usually that keen on these kind of things but this one is so simple and effective that I was able to quickly edit on the go without the hassle of a major selection and edit exercise in Lightroom when I got home. The final shot was a bit of fun with the 'vintage' filter and I felt it suited the subject quite nicely.


Hope this was at least a little entertaining and informative. Don't hesitate to drop me a note if you need any more info on the location or techniques used here.


Happy X100 shooting,


Steel