Shooting Portraits Outdoors - Update 2

I've been really busy lately and am now working a daytime job... Photographers need a steady income too and so I had to resort to being a manager during the day. That's not so bad because now I am enjoying the little time I have for shooting even more.
This update is about my latest outdoor shoot with an extremely beautiful young model that seemed to like experimenting (with photography) just as much as I do. It's almost Christmas so I took her out for a warm cup of tea and pictures by the jolly holiday lights downtown. I didn't know what was going to happen so I told her in advance that this is purely an attempt at what could go with zero good photos in the end.

 

I won't lie, I did very little preparation before the shoot because I was going to be outside in the cold weather since the morning and spend the whole day through before the shoot running errands. I had to travel light so I just picked my 50mm prime lens and my trustworthy dSLR, checked the battery and the counter for remaining shots. So far, so good!

Here's my advice for this type of shots:

• Ask your model to avoid dark colors for such photos.
• The weather is cold so get a warm drink before the shoot.
• Make sure you have mounted wide aperture portrait lens (this will give you the needed shutter speed and wonderful bokeh at a lower ISO setting)
• Do not be afraid to use ISO between 400 and 800! Play around with the ISO if you feel the shutter speed is dropping below 1/45 (or 1/60 if your hands are shakey from the cold).
• Make sure you have a nice background and sufficient front light.

In this case if you manage to use your settings and location right you won't need a flash (just like I did not need one).
I guess the rest is just practice so please read my update one and the original first article on outdoor photography for more details and advice.

Happy holidays and keep shooting,

Kamen Kunchev

That Mirror Lens

I know such are no strangers to photographers who like to experiment and have no problem with darker and less sharp lenses. All the tech geeks that are into shooting with the sharpest and most expensive lenses should stop reading right now. This article is about taking photos with modest equipment, manual focus and old school hardcore photography.
Here's what you can't shoot with a long prime mirror lens:

• Weddings
• Fast moving objects
• Macro
• Panoramas

Also, don't expect to capture great photos (or any at all) in low light.
If you still want to continue reading, we are about to discuss how great long mirror lenses actually are and I have to say I am not selling mine even though I do not use it too often.
Mirror lenses are good for:

• Long far away shots
• Learning to actually focus manually and capturing the moment without hesitation
• Learning to properly frame the shot from a distance
• Learning to hold your camera really steady
• Taking amazing close-up shots of birds/wildlife (even though the sharpness will not be the same as a regular lens)
• Street photography
• Video (from a tough tripod)

Now that we know what we can do with a mirror lens let's go ahead and point out the pros:

• Price - lower class manual focus mirror lenses are extremely cheap!
• Weight - really light! I am talking just amazingly light compared to regular lenses.
• No blades or complex mechanics inside (hence the price)
• The bokeh is a WOW! Seriously, try taking a photo against a sparkly background and you'll see what I am talking about. The doughnut bokeh is just amazing.

My 500mm mirror lens does a really nice job when I want to get close to birds without scaring them away. Notice the doughnut bokeh caused by the lens' specifics.

This video was quickly put together having some moments shot with a 500mm mirror lens. The first, last, bus and seagull shots were taken with this lens mounted on a D90 camera. It gives a nice soft effect as well as the nice doughnut bokeh all over.
My advice, get one, study it and enjoy it for its low price, minimum weight and unique bokeh. I know I won't be selling mine.

All the best,

Kamen Kunchev

Whatever Happened To The Exciting APS-C Cameras?

Great APS-C (cropped sensor) cameras! What on earth happened to them?

We are going to talk about a certain trend in the industry (mostly the titans of the industry) concerning the latest APS-C cameras. First of all, I am really unhappy about how things are working out lately and let me tell you which APS-C cameras I find exciting in a few examples:

• Nikon D70
• Canon 40D (30D, 20D)
• Nikon D200 (D300, D300s)

What makes these exciting? They're old and produce lots more noise at higher ISO values... but those were the days...
All of these (and you may add more models to the list) had a secondary display on top to help you set the camera faster. All of these had a reasonable size and were built solid taking significant damage over the years going 'meh' after occasional bumps. All of these had 1/8000 max shutter speeds and the D70 had a flash sync speed of 1/500! So, we were getting solid, sturdy cameras with APS-C sensors that performed rather well (for their time) and were literally the quality of a full-frame camera. All the controls were there, all the settings. Nothing short of awesomeness.
I used to be a cruise ship photographer and took quite a few photos with a weathered D200 camera. This camera was built to last and probably another person is using it right now on the ship sailing in the Mediterranean. If only this camera could speak... I noticed it had everything, all the settings, all the controls, all the modes and it was just easy to get used to learn it all. It just worked. No software upgrades and updates. It was all there and a photographer would feel safe taking it out in harsh conditions.
When the Canon 60D first came out I was thrilled but then I took it in my hand and realized the disappointment. It was just plastic. All of it was plastic and it felt cheap. I've taken shots with 30D. I knew what a real dSLR was supposed to feel like and this wasn't quite the experience I was used to. Then I went to Nikon and got their D5000 for a spin. OMG, it was just another toy - light, plastic, no secondary display. What on earth happened to the line of cameras that were supposed to replace the ones I loved? Yes, the sensors were better but the experience of shooting went downhill for these cameras. Then I tried 1000D, 600D, 650D from Canon - no way Canon had produced those. Nikon went D3000, D3200, D5100 but I just couldn't believe how they had stopped making the line of cameras that felt like cameras and had replaced them with plastic toys. No secondary displays on any of the APS-C models, no full controls on the body... It all felt like enthusiast-class-look-at-me-I-own-a-girly-camera-plastic-toy thing.
I felt betrayed. I'll miss those cameras. They are slowly turning into the Beirette, Vilia and Smena of the old age. I hope Nikon and Canon will come up with a new generation of beloved APS-C ready-for-combat cameras soon so I won't miss them too much.

All the best,

Kamen Kunchev

Autumn Leaves

It's a beautiful autumn outside and it's hard not to wear your camera around your neck. Wonderful colors draw my attention from everywhere and the soft afternoon light makes this season the perfect time for outdoor photography (more on outdoor portraiture click here). Usually I go outside shooting female portraits but I also like mounting my 50mm prime for shooting dry leaves and all the beauty around without models and special setups.

Here's my advice on taking wonderful leaf photos in the autumn:

• Mount a wide aperture lens for the sake of shooting with a shallow depth of field and a higher shutter speed (it gets windy and you could be experiencing poorer light conditions)
• Make sure you have the proper white balance set on your camera. This will make the colors look realistic and the tones will be friendlier to the eye. The rest you can do in any image-editing software.
• Figure out a way to create contrast and what's in focus will pop out. I use 2 ways to do that. The first one, I try to have some sky in the photo which gives me a real color contrast between the blue sky and the warm colors of the leaves. The second, I look for a depth in the background that really makes the object pop and nail the attention.
• When you shoot try and follow the rule of the thirds. This will give more air in the photo and more emphasis on the object.
• Light is generally softer so don't restrain yourselves to shooting only in the late afternoon when you'll have a very small window of opportunity for taking many shots.
• If you do not like how things are in front of the camera go ahead and rearrange the leaves or whatever to make it look the way you think is cooler.
• Watch your exposure. The light coming through the branches and leaves could be deceiving so check your settings and results before and after every shot.

Got questions? Use the form below to post comments and I'll be more than happy to respond or extend the article.

For more info on shooting flowers and taking wonderful nature shots click here.

Now go and get those lenses dug deep in the autumn leaves. Who knows, a photo like this could be a contest winner.

All the best,

Kamen Kunchev

Concert Photographs

We want to take some great concert photos but what do we really need to know? 

First of all, forget about auto settings on your camera. You need to determine fast what the light conditions are. There's plenty of lights on stage and the performers are constantly changing position so make sure you set your camera fast for the available light.

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Second, forget about using flash. This will just destroy your photos and make them look like they were taken in your garage with a dull small camera on auto. You need to capture the available light and atmosphere of the event so stick to what the stage has to offer. Some performers will get easily annoyed if you use flash so... this is a big no-no.

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Mount a wide aperture lens that will capture lots of light for the sensor. If you haven't got the money to get your hands on a 2.8 vario lens then use a prime which will limit you in a way but will get you great results in terms of sharpness, focus and light.

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Use higher ISO settings. ISO100 just won't do you any good. All your shots will look dull and dark. Bring up the ISO to at least 600 and go higher if you have to. Remember that this is NOT shooting outdoors during the day and you need to make use of that high sensitivity of your sensor.

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If you were thinking about using a slower shutter to compensate for using ISO100 (or something like that) you were guessing wrong! The performers on stage will be moving constantly while interacting with the audience. They will not stop to strike a pose for the photographer. Set your shutter speed to 1/200 (you wanna go slower, don't go under 1/125) or higher if you want to capture the moment instead of turning up with blurry bigfoot-like creatures in your photos.

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Change your position (if you can) so you capture different angles and all the musicians on stage. This is very important when you really want to show what a great deal the show was.

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Take some photos of the audience. Lighters in the air, or shoot the stage through raised arms but don't overdo it and keep the camera pointed and the stage and performers 99% of the time.

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Sometimes the spotlight will hit the main performer so hard that their face might get overexposed so check quickly if this is so and change your settings to maintain proper exposure.

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Lights on stage have different colors to make the visual part of the show stronger and more interesting to the eye. So, how do we set our white balance? Sometimes we have blue lights hitting the front man and sometimes it's a red light on his face. Well, this is not to worry about because white balance is not a problem. If the face is blue-ish, or red-ish, then this is what the light was at the moment the shot was taken. That's just it and this is how it was. It's not your problem and it's not a problem at all. However, if you want to make the image stronger and not think about color, just change the photo to black and white and increase the contrast to a level that you personally think could be OK. I use automatic white balance and it turns out that the results are pretty good.

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Aperture. I would shoot stage performances with a wide open (F2-2.8 sometimes I'd go with 4 but that's not very often) for 2 reasons. First of all, I want to emphasize on the person on stage that I'm pointing the camera at and secondly I want to have more light so I can bring up the shutter speed to be able to really freeze the frame and make it look as if the performer was posing especially for me.

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Shoot raw files so you have more processing options.

Now go ahead and find yourself a concert to shoot!

All the best,

Kamen Kunchev