Photographic techniques
Posts which focus more on the techniques used in photography and editing than on the subjects of the photos
-
Gallery: seeing Lviv in black and white
When I visited Lviv in 2010 I described it on my Virtual Tourist page as a beautiful city ‘waiting in the wings’. By this I meant that it was ripe for tourism but hadn’t yet been discovered by the masses, nor did it yet have the infrastructure to deal with them. What it did have was beautiful churches with elaborate interiors; a lovely main square surrounded by historic townhouses; broad avenues and narrow winding streets; quirky cafés, a striking opera house and monuments of all kinds and styles.
-
Gallery: staring up at the steps
There have been many times when travelling that I’ve stared up at some steps. I’m not the best at climbing stairs, but the incentives to do so are often great. A wonderful view, an interesting building, a slice of history … Any of these is likely to entice me to climb.
-
Gallery: in the mood
It’s not too difficult to take a photograph of an object, person, animal or scene. Choose your subject, point your camera and press the shutter. A modern camera (or phone) will do all the work for you in terms of making sure the subject is in focus and well exposed. But how do you photograph a mood?
-
Gallery: backlighting to add drama and atmosphere
Lighting is everything in photography. It can make an ordinary subject look intriguing, while the lack of it can make an interesting one look dull. Light that falls on your subject from the front will make it look flat and two dimensional. Side lighting is more interesting, creating shadows and bringing out textures. The last option is backlighting, which can be beautiful and dramatic.
-
Gallery: it’s tricky!
If tricks are the practice of fools, where does that leave trick photography? The genre is nearly as old as photography itself. Did those early experimenters pave the way for today’s explosion of in-camera and post-editing trickery?
-
Gallery: monochrome portraits and street shots
It won’t come as a surprise to anyone who follows this blog that I enjoy street photography and also taking more formal portrait shots of some of the people I encounter on my travels. It will also be no surprise that I enjoy playing around with editing. I especially like experimenting with monochrome, which can work well with characterful faces.
-
Gallery: seeing Colombia in black and white
Colombia is one of the most colourful countries I’ve ever visited, possibly the most colourful. So it seems counter-intuitive to present it in black and white. Yet however colourful the destination there are always likely to be at least a few images that I feel merit experimentation. Ones in which form dominates the composition. Ones with strong contrasts and patterns.
-
Gallery: the roads I take
It’s only eighteen months since Anne asked us to define our ‘photography groove’. My answer then was travel photography, and now that John asks much the same question about our favourite style or genre, the road we most often take, my answer remains the same.
-
Gallery: soft orchids from Colombia
While a flower is transient, our images capture the memory of it forever. Maybe that’s why so many of us love to photograph them.
-
Gallery: blackness against the light
Silhouettes are a great way to create drama in an image. By eliminating details they evoke mystery and can be enigmatic. They take to extreme the balances in contrast that we all work with in our photography.
