Making use of the background

I like clean images. This is not always the best way to shoot a subject and it certainly is never the only way to approach photography, but it is usually my overriding goal when taking a picture. I want the subject of my photo to be immediately clear. No ambiguity. I like my subjects to pop.

Each spring I wait patiently for the magnolia tree in my backyard to burst into bloom. The purple flowers are downright exciting to see after a long, cold and colourless winter. The dramatic break from white is welcome. (My oldest granddaughter screamed with delighted excitement on seeing the flowering magnolia for the first time.)

My favourite images of these magnolia flowers contain only one or two blooms but they are presented to the viewer in a dramatic fashion. This year I managed to capture quite the dramatic moment. I found the angle, the point of view, that placed a striking flower against a background of deep shadow. I found the deep shadow below the evergreens that blanket the hill.

A low shooting angle placed the bright, colourful bloom dramatically against the intense, black background. A recent rainfall decorated the petals with drops of beaded water and the overcast day supplied wonderful, colour-enhancing lighting. (With soft, diffuse light colour defines shape. On a bright day the highlights and shadows carry a much larger share of the visual load.)

To show you exactly what I did, I have included a photo of the entire magnolia tree as it looks in my backyard. Note the hill, the evergreens and the deep shadow behind. Whenever you are taking pictures, watch your background. In many cases, you can control the background by carefully choosing your camera angle.

One last thing in passing, note the colour of the blossom in the close-up and the colour of the blossoms in the overall shot of the tree. The blossoms appear more pink-red in the bottom image and definitely more magenta-purple in the close-up. The purplish flower is much closer to reality.

Digital cameras often have a difficult time accurately depicting colours in the red region of the spectrum. If colour is important, as it is here, taking an image into Photoshop, or another image enhancing program, is the answer. (You may be forced to select the colour in question and to fix the hue without degrading the rest of the image. Colour correction can be tricky.)

Problems with colour accuracy are not new. Photography was plagued with colour shift errors in the days of film. There was a reason that Paul Simon sang the praises of Kodachrome. Shooters loved the colour palette it brought to a scene.

Soft can work online but wilts when printed

Today was my granddaughter's first day of soccer. She was excited. She was up early and dressed for action before 9 a.m. This is not the usual way she starts a Saturday.

I tried to document her first day on the field but it was difficult with only a glorified point and shoot. There is a reason that working pros insist on using DSLR cameras with a strong 35mm heritage. Even when used in auto mode, these high-end cameras can be trusted to always deliver the goods.

The action shot, left, is a really nice picture moment. Sadly, it is out of focus. It works as a small image on the net, but it fails as a print. All too bad but excuses don't make a picture better.

Knowing how iffy it can be to grab a sharp action photo with my superzoom camera, a Fujifilm Finepix HS10, I shot lots. Another image, this one lacking action, shows a great smile that captures the mood of the day.


There are a number of lessons here:

• Shoot lots. This is always the right approach but in difficult picture-taking situations it is paramount.
• Try for action when action is the core of the activity but watch for other photo moments as well.
• Stay alert for pictures and you won't go home empty handed even if you come up blank when it comes to capturing the action.

Photoshop as an electronic darkroom

The electronic darkroom. It was a promise made in the past and kept and still being fulfilled today. Yet, the idea of a program like Photoshop being essentially an electronic darkroom has faded.

The Photoshop software is associated with manipulating photos and not simply printing images to bring out the best. Let me give you an example.

The other day we had lunch at a small, dark restaurant and the meal that I ordered looked photo-worthy. Sadly the room was dark, and worse, it was lit with old style tungsten lights. I took a picture despite all the problems.

The camera, a Canon S90, cleaned up the colours admirably. The mild amount of yellow cast was easily removed by Photoshop using Levels and the white eye dropper. Using Levels again, the white point was raised to brighten the overall image and give it some snap. Finally, the deepest shadows were selected and opened up just a little using Curves

I burned the edges to enhance the detail in the rice and, other than sharpening, nothing more was done. I didn't even have to saturate the colours. The camera and its software and hardware did that just as film once punched up colours. There was a reason Paul Simon sang the praises of Kodachrome.

Could the image be better? I think so. If I made another "print", I'd brighten the overall image in Curves. Back in the days of film and paper, chemicals and filters, I would have done essentially the same thing. Well not exactly the same. It would have taken longer, cost more, and been harder on the environment.

Photoshop and my home computer, a team that makes a true electronic darkroom.

Wide angle great for kids taking photos despite distortion

Fiona, 4, used a Canon PowerShot S90 set to wide angle to take this picture of her sister.

Wide angle lenses used to shoot almost full frame pictures of people can introduce apparent distortions, distortions that can be very distracting. This shot of my youngest granddaughter was shot with a Canon S90 with the lens set to 28mm. A mistake, sorta. (If you don't see the problem, look at the little girl's left forearm. Close to the camera, the arm is unnaturally large, almost deformed.)

Still, I say " a mistake, sorta" because the picture was taken by the baby's 4-year-old sister. A child using a camera has some very specific needs with a fast shutter speed being one of them. Little kids have a hard time holding a camera rock solid, even when that camera is a small point-and-shoot.

The Canon S90 has a program favouring the use of the f/2.0 aperture teamed with a corresponding faster shutter speed. The downside to this setting is that the file size is reduced. Still, it is a trade-off worth making. (If you don't have an f/2.0 aperture, you have yet another problem. Slow lenses make me want to scream.)

Even being wielded by a child, my PowerShot S90 was able to stop both camera shake and subject movement despite the low level of available light illuminating the subject.

Another problem faced by a child taking pictures is focus. Getting an image tightly focused has always been a challenge for photographers in certain situations. A wide angle lens and the attendant great depth of field can really help.

A poor image that is blur-free and sharp is still a poor image. Too much distortion is an image killer. Some distorted images can be saved with careful cropping but others will be lost. The flip side is that fewer images are lost to camera and subject movement or to unsharp focus. All in all I think the decision to use the wide angle in this situation was a good one.

Now, if you are an adult the story changes -- especially, if you have a DSLR with a fast 85mm lens. Go with the 85mm.

Have an eye

Good pictures occur constantly. Some we see, most we don't and almost all slip by uncaptured. It takes a photographer, a hunter of images, to bag a prize photo with a perfect shot.

Fiona, my granddaughter loves the park. There is one looped metal bar that she always likes to poke her head through when heading for the slides. Behind the looped bar there is a translucent sheet of bright blue plastic and a round, translucent, white window. Catch the little girl at just the right moment and you have a picture.

Composition and colour: First, the beautiful blue didn't just appear by accident. I picked the camera angle with the background in mind. Also, the arc of bright white in the lower right wasn't just happenstance. The only major colour that I did not control was the bright pink of Fiona's coat. It was perfect and it was luck.

Today's point and shoots take care of the focus and the f/stop and shutter speed. In this case, this loss of control posed no problem. In most cases, the photographer still controls the length of lens, unless the camera has a fixed lens rather than the more common zoom. Remember, portraits look best shot with an 85mm to a 105mm lens.

These numbers actually refer to lens used on 35mm cameras but with many point and shoots an adjustment is made to allow the use of 35mm lens size terminology. This photo of my granddaughter was shot at a slightly long lens setting which was comparable to an 85mm lens on a 35mm camera.

The camera set the sensitivity at ISO640, the shutter speed at 1/500th second and the aperture to f/5.6. I couldn't have done better if I'd done it myself.

If you want good pictures and your aren't getting them, don't blame your point and shoot. Blame yourself. You simply have to have an eye.

Kingsmill's department store closing, video at six

Paper covering the windows at Kingsmill's is removed prior to the store opening.

After 148 years the Kingsmill's department store in downtown London, Ontario, is closing its doors. This was big news in London and in the local media, both print and television.

I watched in amazement as one of the TV crews shot exterior shots for the on-air coverage. They shot a lot of their interior stuff before the store opened and then they left the store and crossed the street. Well away from any action they put their camera up on a tripod and grabbed some exterior shots.

It looked like they were capturing some pretty boring stuff. I shook my head with a mix of disgust and disbelief.

Years ago I got a degree in film from Ryerson in Toronto. I learned that one should shoot video for TV with some of the same goals as one would shoot a movie.

First, tell a story. Each shot should serve to advance the narrative. Next, strive for visual interest in each shot. Ideally, you are shooting fantastic stills at the rate of 24 frames per second. And don't overlook action.

For instance, when the paper was removed from the windows, that was a moment worth capturing. One would have to be quick to grab an overall shot, a medium shot and some quick close-ups of the action but it would be worth it. It would make a great little video moment.

The action of the store employees preparing for the opening could be contrasted with the patient waiting of the small crowd waiting for the doors to open. Done right, this would add a little tension to the piece.

Oh well, the television folk that I watched appeared to want nothing more than to shoot some on-air filler. Sad.

The number of shoppers swelled in the moments before the store opening.

Photos save memories

"Stop, grandma! There's a pin!"

I earned my living as a photographer. I documented the lives of others. Sadly, I was awful at documenting my own life. Of course, photography was a lot of trouble when I was young. Film and trips to the store for prints and oodles of expense. Still, none of that provides me with a good excuse.

Today's digital cameras have made all the above history. Today it is point, shoot and download. There are no excuses for not grabbing family photos. My granddaughter, Fiona, understands the value of photos. Images taken today jog one's memory tomorrow.

Recently Fiona helped her grandmother Judy sew some pajamas. Fiona watched for pins and told her grandmother when a pin had to be removed before it could possibly bend or break the needle. When it was time to reverse stitch, Fiona had her hand on the control.

There was one thing left to be done before the two finished the p.j.'s. Fiona had to get her grandfather, me, to take a picture of her sitting on grandma's knee while they completed the pajamas. Fiona said she wanted a picture so that when she was older she could take out the picture and remember the day.

The little kid understands the power of photography. Family photos jog the memory, encouraging us to recall pleasures from the past. (And, as one commenter very correctly pointed out, make a good print or two ASAP or risk losing the image in a disk drive malfunction. Save the image in multiple ways in multiple locations.)