When it all Goes Horribly Wrong ...
Derek Smith • 19 August 2020
When it all goes horribly wrong ...
I was tired.
I'd had a busy weekend in London, returning on Monday. Tuesday I was up early driving back from my young lady to Louth, working as a volunteer in the museum in the morning, taking some excellent photos of some artifacts, with my Olympus PEN, and macro lens.
After a quick lunch indoors, I packed all my photo gear to go on a shoot on a farm in Swineshead, the set was inside a touring caravan. I knew exactly the type of shot that I wanted, an atmospheric shot.
I was tired.
After a quick look around the caravan, which didn't take long, I set up my flash with the beauty dish on a light stand near one of the long seats. Next the camera, the Olympus OM-D E-M5 iii, fit the flash trigger for the off-camera flash, and set the controls on the camera. Now for a mirrorless camera the settings, and order of settings are very simple, and I've taught / demonstrated this method many times.
Step one set the ISO to base ISO, the lowest number, NOT extended or low. Step two set the Mode dial to Manual. Step three set aperture usually f/2 - f/4 for flash photography. Step four set the shutter speed until the rear display goes dim, usually around -2 EV, the shutter speed with High Speed Sync will normally be in the region 1/180 - 1/250. Remember that a camera without High Speed Sync will normally limit the shutter speed to 1/60 sec.
I was tired.
I thought that my camera wasn't going into High Speed Sync as I was only getting a shutter speed of 60 on the display, and I couldn't get the display to dim, blaming the camera. I set that camera aside, and brought out my backup Olympus PEN E-PL7, flustered though I forgot to set the base ISO, (when I was taking photos in the museum using LED lighting I had set the ISO to 400).
My photos for the afternoon were not of my usual standard, and it was a disappointing afternoon. Returning home, I tried the camera settings again, and realised that I had been turning the shutter control wheel the wrong way reducing the shutter speed to 60, yes, not 1/60 but 60 seconds!! A salutary lesson then.
I was tired.
I'd had a busy weekend in London, returning on Monday. Tuesday I was up early driving back from my young lady to Louth, working as a volunteer in the museum in the morning, taking some excellent photos of some artifacts, with my Olympus PEN, and macro lens.
After a quick lunch indoors, I packed all my photo gear to go on a shoot on a farm in Swineshead, the set was inside a touring caravan. I knew exactly the type of shot that I wanted, an atmospheric shot.
I was tired.
After a quick look around the caravan, which didn't take long, I set up my flash with the beauty dish on a light stand near one of the long seats. Next the camera, the Olympus OM-D E-M5 iii, fit the flash trigger for the off-camera flash, and set the controls on the camera. Now for a mirrorless camera the settings, and order of settings are very simple, and I've taught / demonstrated this method many times.
Step one set the ISO to base ISO, the lowest number, NOT extended or low. Step two set the Mode dial to Manual. Step three set aperture usually f/2 - f/4 for flash photography. Step four set the shutter speed until the rear display goes dim, usually around -2 EV, the shutter speed with High Speed Sync will normally be in the region 1/180 - 1/250. Remember that a camera without High Speed Sync will normally limit the shutter speed to 1/60 sec.
I was tired.
I thought that my camera wasn't going into High Speed Sync as I was only getting a shutter speed of 60 on the display, and I couldn't get the display to dim, blaming the camera. I set that camera aside, and brought out my backup Olympus PEN E-PL7, flustered though I forgot to set the base ISO, (when I was taking photos in the museum using LED lighting I had set the ISO to 400).
My photos for the afternoon were not of my usual standard, and it was a disappointing afternoon. Returning home, I tried the camera settings again, and realised that I had been turning the shutter control wheel the wrong way reducing the shutter speed to 60, yes, not 1/60 but 60 seconds!! A salutary lesson then.
I was tired.
Photo details: Olympus PEN E-PL7, Olympus M.Zuiko 45mm f/1.8 prime lens. ISO 400, f/10, 1/160. Godox AD200 flash with beauty dish.
Louth Photographic Society
Good Morning All Last week at the club we viewed the Lincolnshire photographic Associations mono group presentation, Dave Turner who goes to the group talked us through the evening with Chris Birchmore and Richard Hildred talking about their photographs. There is a blog on the evening on our website, but inspired by the evening I thought I had better try a few mono photographs myself. This week, Wednesday 10th December, we will hold our monthly print competition, with the categories of "People" and "Open", to be judged by Dane Butler from Dunholme. There are good number of entries so should be a very good competition. The following week, Wednesday 17th December, is our buffet and quiz night, for new members the buffet will be supplied and anyone who would like to donate a raffle prize please give it to Harry. The evening is for members only. Regards Graham
Last night members were treated to a showing of the LPA (Lincolnshire Photographic Association) Mono Group presentation. Three of our members, Dave Turner, Richard Hildred, and Chris Birchmore are members of the LPA Mono Group. Dave Turner excellently presented this showcase of the Mono Groups work, many of the images presented were stunning, and inspirational. A simple photo of a padlock on a gate took on a different dimension when presented in monochrome, and landscape photography becomes dramatic in monochrome, especially with a moody sky. It was a very interesting, and well attended evening. Thank you to Dave Turner for presenting, and Dave Mann for the refreshments.
Good Morning All Last week at the club we held a committee meeting, with all committee members in attendance. Harry will once again run the Christmas raffle on our buffet and quiz night, if any member wants to donate a prize, Harry can now accept them, obviously if it's a perishable prize then bringing it in on the night would be better. We are holding a 70th anniversary exhibition next year at the Louth Museum, if any member has local prints that they think may be suitable to put in the exhibition you can bring them to the club any time now. Derek has done a blog on the night with more information. This week, Wednesday 3rd December, we are viewing the LPA mono groups presentation, Dave Turner is a member of the group and will talk us through what the group do and if time allows show us some of his own mono prints. Don't forget to bring your prints along this week for the print competition, with the categories "People" and "Open", to be held the following week, email your titles to Dave Turner in advance please. Regards Graham
We held a Committee meeting last night in place of a regular meeting. The Committee meets twice a year to discuss items pertinent to effective, and smooth running of our Society. The Society celebrates 70 years of continuous operation next year, and we intend to show an exhibition of photographs taken over those years at the Louth Museum. The LPA Battles print competition will be held next year, and consists of 3 rounds held at photographic clubs throughout Lincolnshire, with a final round held at Nettleham. Louth has been drawn to meet with camera clubs in Grantham, and Axholme, and as you can understand this will entail a far amount of travelling. There is a proposal to the LPA which is currently under consideration which would reduce each club entry to 10 prints and for the whole competition to be held at Nettleham in 2027. Our current annual project is “Prime Time”, that is one photo for each month of the year taken with a fixed focal length lens, a prime lens, my choice for this year has been a 45mm lens, which is a full frame 90mm lens. Members show their annual project photos in the January of the following year. The Committee has decided on the project theme for next year as “Water”, which should give members a chance to demonstrate some creativity, as can be seen from the attached image. Our Christmas social event will be held on the 17th December, a buffet will be provided, there will be a quiz, and a raffle, the door entry charge will be £3 for the evening.
Good Morning All Last week at the club we held our PDI of the year, it was a well-attended event and thanks to Harry's organisation skills it all ran very well. Congratulations go to all the subject winners: Pictorial, Harry Kerman, Record, Dave Evans, Portrait, Derek Smith, Photojournalism, David Evans, Landscape, Dave Turner and Natural History, Graham Harrison. The overall winner was Harry Kerman. Well done Harry a great photograph of a White Cosmos. All the top three in each subject are on our website Competition page. Don't forget if you are entering the December print competition, with the categories of "People" and "Open" send your titles to Dave Turner please. The prints need bringing in a week on Wednesday. This week, Wednesday 26th November, we are holding a committee meeting, committee members only for this one please. For newer members we hold two committee meetings a year to organise events and the smooth running of the club. Regards Graham
Last night we held our PDIOTY (PDI of the Year) competition, our judge for the evening was Jorg Malinowski. These annual competitions are an opportunity for members to showcase their best images from the year, some of course from the monthly competitions, as such the competition entries were of an extremely high standard. Jorg performed an excellent job of judging the entries, and the results are all on the website Competition page. Congratulations to Harry Kerman for gaining the title of PDI of the Year with his White Cosmos image.
Good Morning All While we were away the other week we did have a walk around Blackpool. I only took my compact camera which I bought in 2011 but it still works ok and takes decent photographs. It is a Panasonic LX5 which fits in a pocket and is useful now and again. Last week we had mini lectures; photographs we had taken on this year's outings. Four members took part with Richard Hildred filling in with wedding photography from forty odd years ago, a very interesting look at how Richard went about photographing weddings, very different from today with far less photographs been taken. The outings did show we managed to photograph insects and birds on our walks around Red Hill and Rimac. I finished the evening with photographs taken in Somerset and Devon in 2020. This week, Wednesday 19th November, we hold our PDIOTY (PDI of the year) to be judged by Jorj Malinowski of Lincoln. It will be an evening of our best photography and we have just over fifty entries. The NEMPF exhibition acceptances have now been decided, well done to Dave Turner who had two accepted and I managed one acceptance myself. The standard for acceptance is very high, we had four members enter twenty nine PDI'S all together and only three acceptances . We had a lot of near misses, the score required was twelve and we had twelve elevens between us. You will see the exhibition at our club next year. Regards Graham
At our meeting last night members gave a series of mini lectures with 3 members showing images from the club outings to Red Hill, and Rimac. The meeting was completed by Richard Hildred showing some of his early slides. One of the principles of our Society is that we feature workshops, and outings into our annual programme, because the best way to learn photography is to work with other photographers to understand aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. In June at the Red Hill nature reserve the idea was to capture some macro images of the local insect life, and the orchids at this location. Laying, or kneeling in the grass to get close to the insects, or flowers, our members would begin to understand depth of field with using different apertures, each photographer will have his own method of achieving optimum exposure, and sharpness. Personally I tend to use aperture priority mode (A or Av on the mode dial), auto focus, and “rock” gently back and forwards to gain the focus on the subject. At Rimac, members had a lot more latitude to photograph some bird-life, or landscapes. These are some sample images from the Red Hill, and Rimac nature reserves.
Good Morning All A few more photographs from Sedbergh. Sedbergh has a tree that stands out, not quite as Sycamore gap was but on top of a hill with Crook Fell behind it. I did walk to the top of Crook Fell, got a bit wet but a dramatic sky. Last week at the club we had an excellent presentation from Mike Bennett LRPS DPAGB EFIAP BPE3* Mike showed us some of his latest photographs and as Derek's blog says, the sharpness and exposure accuracy of Mike's photographs was second to none. There is a full report on our blog. This week, Wednesday 12th November, we are holding a mini lecture night, camera club outings that we went to this year, which was Rimac and Red Hill. We have four members taking part plus Richard Hildred has offered to show us some more older transparencies. The four are Myself, Dave Turner, Chris and Paul Twomey. Don't forget to send your PDI of the year entries to Harry by midnight Wednesday (12th) Regards Graham
Our speaker last night was the highly talented Mike Bennett, he presented the club with some amazing photographs. For the first half of the presentation he showed many portraits, with the backgrounds skilfully changed, and several composited images. Included in this first half were many travel photos from Serbia, many of the buildings showing the scars of the civil war, photos from Budapest, and Austria. His wildlife photos of pelicans taken at Lake Kerkini in northern Greece were amazing, even though the weather wasn’t all that favourable, and that completed the first half of the evening. After the break, Mike showed us his wildlife photos from the game reserve in Eswatini, (bordering South Africa). The bird photos were very sharp, many of the species such as the Rollers, Vultures, and Ibis are only to be seen in Africa, Mike explained the four “F’s” of bird photography, Flying, Fighting, Feeding, and … yes you’ve guessed it being Friendly. Various other animals were shown, lions, crocodiles, rhino, elephants impala, and warthogs. It was interesting to see the extreme close-up photographs of the rhino, and elephants, as Mike explained those animals are big grey lumps, and sometimes a more interesting photo can be an extreme close-up detailing the skin texture. Mike related how their safari vehicle became held up by a herd of elephants on the track ahead, then a big bull elephant passed behind the vehicle close enough to touch, but of course the group of photographers had to sit absolutely still, until the herd of elephants passed. I was most struck by the photos of the cheetahs, with the photographers walking amongst them!! my favourite from this set was of the cheetah walking up the track pictured on a rise against the sky. The editing, sharpness, and colours from Mike’s photographs was very impressive, it was an extremely good presentation, many thanks Mike.
