In close

I thought I'd try my 35 for a change in town today. As a rule I find it either too short or too long on the crop sensor. But I like to think I can work with what I've got. Why some people are obsessed with having perfect framing by using zooms is something I can't grasp. So much so that I'm getting a strong urge to cop for a Fuji X100 - despite the pixel-peepers finding fault without having used one. I read one comment saying it does the important things well but is let down by other things. Sounds okay to me. On the street all you need to do is set shutter speed or aperture. Most of the time you can live with a fixed ISO - like when using film. Judging by the real world samples from the camera that I have seen it manages damned well at ISO 2000. Ian Berry's shots in the June issue of Professional Photographer look good enough to me. It seems like a nice unobtrusive camera that does a simple job, simply. Very tempting, and it has a shutter release screw to use with a cable or bulb release - so it would be handy to take fishing. Time to offload some gear!

The thing with DSLRs is that, even small ones, are large. My old Pentax ME film camera is much less obvious. Even so one thing I discovered today is that the closer you are to people the less likely they are to assume you are taking their photo. Not many worked as well as I'd hoped but despite, or maybe because of, the cropping in the shot below I think it captures a mood. The B+W conversion keeps it simple, but the colour version works too. Mono has a timeless feel while colour is more contemporary. Even so digital still seems more clinical than film, which is why I boost the contrast in mono to slightly degrade the image. Suits me.

I like this second shot for inexplicable reasons. It's a 'nothing' image yet I think it has an atmosphere to it completely different to the youthful energy in the first photo, and the straps at either side give it a graphic element.

I like this sort of photography because there's always something to look for. If I hadn't just snapped up a used all-singing-all-dancing DSLR I think I'd be tracking down an X100. For the mean time the 24mm is going back on the D90 and the 35mm is going up for sale. Or maybe not...

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Inspiration

It makes me chuckle when I read posts on forums asking where to go in a particular town or area to take photos, or even saying something like "I have the day off tomorrow what can I shoot?" There's a good line over on Pixiq about inspiration - "There is plenty of subject matter, so why make the same images that are already out there or the same images that we have seen hundreds of times before?" If you take other people's suggestions it's likely you'll take pictures like theirs too.

I find inspiration comes simply from having a camera with me. It makes me look at the world in a photographic way. So much so that if I am supposed to be doing something else I can get engrossed in the picture taking to the point of distraction.

Even familiar places can yield surprises. Nothing stays the same forever. I've lived round here for 40 odd years now, and there are still new pictures to be made. Just this morning I took a camera with me on a walk to the Post Office and made some 20 exposures. Some were rubbish, some I messed up, the two here I kind of like. But the point is, I was inspired to take the shots, not by some magical location or cunning plan, but simply by looking. Then again I do like photographing the banal!

Oh yes, I only had the one 24mm lens with me too.

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War photography. Err...

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Telling a story in as few words as possible

Or in photographic terms, making as much use of the picture space as possible to set a scene.

This is the evolution of a photo for my fishing blog.

In the first shot all the elements are there - barrow, spod and marker rod, bivvy. However they're spread across the picture in a literal way.

Move to the left to compress the space and bring the elements closer together. Frame vertically. Better.

Try it in landscape. Still not right.

A lower viewpoint is more dramatic. But the whole barrow isn't required to show it's a barrow and it's still not tight enough.

Much better, and the reels are now against a plain background but the differential focus isn't good.

 

Frame a little tighter still and stop down to get more detail in the reels. Job done.

I could have rearranged things to show them more clearly - like separating the rods a bit so the reels were both fully visible - but that's not my style. I much prefer to work with things as they are.

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Bad info and a good lens

It's apparently not just fishing forums where advice is given by people who don't have a clue, it's photography forums too (and no doubt every other specialist hobby forum). Misinformation is the norm.

And asking for an opinion about something (a photo or equipment) only results in as many saying yea as nay. I really do wonder what the purpose of the forums is. More to the point why do I keep looking at them?!!

Funny how you sometimes take photos that work as pairs. Two from today, not my best efforts, that seem to share a sense of colour and composition.

Both photos taken with the 24mm lens that's hardly been off one of my bodies since I bought it about a month ago. It just seems to suit me (on a crop sensor) for all sorts of uses, not just wandering round town. Zooms are great for wildlife and anything where  the subject is active or when you are under pressure to get a shot, but they can make you lazy. I like the simplicity of primes and the way they make you think about composition. Primes seem to force you to look at subjects in a different, more intense, way.

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