This is the last of the shots taken at Holy Trinity Church, Buckfastleigh, Devon.

Eternal Reflection

In this shot, given that it's all about a church and cemetery, I wanted to include an obvious religious icon and turn the viewer's thoughts to reflection on their own mortality.

When all is said and done and your life has run its course, what will your legacy be—other than bones and a tombstone?

As always, comments / thoughts / critiques welcome :)

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This is the next shot from my visit to Buckfastleigh to make it out of the digital darkroom. I'm still at the church at the top of the hill.

Gravestones like silent sentinels

I've always had a fascination for this particular cemetery. When I used to go caving as a teenager in Bakers Pit, a cave a lot closer by this cemetery than you'd think, I learnt about the local folklore.

The tomb of the local landowner that inspired Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to write his Hound Of The Baskervilles is in this cemetery and, as locals would have it, the Devils Toe resides on the other side of the hedge, cut off in some epic battle for the souls of the village folk hereabouts.

In the cave, one of the main entrance chambers lies almost directly under the tomb and in the ceiling of the large chamber is a coffin shaped section of limestone. Great for adding a bit of drama for any newbie to a caving expedition!

I must also confess to having been responsible for a large depression opening up in the graveyard. With a mate, we spent around 18 months on a dig in Bakers Pit, pushing some collapsed passages and a chamber at the end of them. As we dug it out from underneath, as I found out a few years later, the vicar had been filling it in from the top. Oops!

There's more to the story about bones and the British Museum but I think we'll close the book at this point!

Comments / critique / feedback welcome as always :)

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I visited Buckfastleigh yesterday, a long over-due visit with my camera. I like the place and its surroundings, having spent many weekends camping there as a youth, pursuing my then hobby of caving.
On this visit I hung around the top of the hill above the village, where the now ruined church stands.

Old Chapel

The lighting was a bit harsh, even in the evening when this was taken. This sort of shot really deserves a blue sky, with some cloud cover to give uneven lighting and ideally some shafts of light.

But it was a cloudless day and this was the best of the four or five I shot of the chapel.

Feedback / comments / critique all welcomed as usual

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These two shots are fresh out of the digital darkroom but I can't decide right now which one I should run with.

Portrait merits

With the portrait version, attention is sharply on the boat. The ladder is falling into shot, giving access from the ...well, we cant quite see from where, although a visual clue is there. The light catching the weeds on the right gives what I think is a nice touch of additional interest.

Landscape merits

Much more context appears in this version and there's the additional macro contrast between neatly tended potted plants and the sludge of the leat. The other thing I like about this is the cascade of "weeds" along the top right of the leat wall and the way the sunlight was catching them. There's some lovely tones there as a result.

Over to you...

So which one would you choose?

All comments / suggestions welcome

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On second thoughts, I'm not so sure that's a good post title - still I'm a photographer so peeps should know that I don't imply I'm killing them!

Anyway, this is aimed at folks who don't have a studio or expensive studio lighting or, if you're like me and you're an opportunist photographer, you don't go everywhere armed with tripod, reflectors or any form of lighting other than a flash gun.

All you'll need -- a camera, a flash gun and an off-camera flash cable ( because you won't be wanting the flash mounted on the camera). And if your camera supports it, shoot in RAW mode for maximum exposure flexibility.

So how do you make the shot when the situation arises? Well here's one I made, following all the suggestions below.

Finished shot

This is how the shot of Bonnie, a Pomeranian, turned out. I'm pleased with the composition, the lighting, the texture of her fur and the sharp focus on her eyes. I did get a little softness, caused by movement blur, but it's at an acceptable level to my eye.

Tips to make the shot

Spend time getting to know and befriending the subject

They must be relaxed with both you and your camera (and the fill-in flash if you need to use it).

When they're relaxed with you, their inner character comes through and it's a a look that the owner will identify with.

So have the camera round your neck and stroke and talk to the pet. It's rather easy with our four-legged friends but needs a different approach with pet birds.

I'm not focusing on birds in this post, but I will say this about gaining a bird's confidence and befriending it. With birds, instead of stroking, you can offer food, talking to the bird gently and quietly the whole time. When the bird comes to take the food, blow very gently at the top of the neck and behind where you'd imagine the ear to be. Do this against the lie of the feathers, so your warm breath gently penetrates to the skin. They'll be a little unsure at first but will get to like it real quick.

Natural Lighting

Go for low ambient lighting, ideally on a bright day with light coming through a window and falling obliquely on the subject, but leaving the rest of the room quite dark. This will give shape and form to the animal's head and body and nice areas of highlight and shadow. It will also provide good texture in the animals coat.

I'll talk about fill-in flash below.

Background

Make sure the background is uncluttered. If they have a favourite dark blanket, then pose them on that. If not, use one you've taken with you (very unlikely in my case!) or get one from the owner. Obviously if it's the pet's favourite, it'll feel much more at ease on that, familiar smells etc.

Composition

Well, with no tripod you'll be hand-holding the camera. Unless you're an absolute whiz with a tripod, this gives you a lot more flexibility -- you'll be able to focus your energies on composition rather than have to keep moving a tripod around.

Think about whether you want just a head shot or whether and how much of the body to include. Make sure the animal isn't looking directly at the camera but off into the middle distance -- and make sure there's enough 'space' for it to look into.

Get down to their eye level. In our day-to-day lives, those who we're 'connecting' with are at our eye-level -- we're not looking down at them and we're not looking up to them. So to get this same connection in your photos, you have to be at their eye-level.

Drawing the viewer's attention where you want it to be. You can do this in many different ways. Positioning that point on one of the rule-of-thirds intersections is one. Another is by choosing a low depth of field -- or how much of the shot is in focus -- and then focusing your camera on the point where you want their attention. With a small aperture number, anywhere further away or closer than that point will then be blurry.

And where should that point of focus be? The eyes of course, as they're the doorway to the soul and will be where most of the character of the pet comes through. And it's ok if the nose isn't sharply in focus as that brings attention back to the eyes.

Fill-in Flash

With all this low light I'm recommending, you're going to be hard pushed to achieve a fast enough shutter speed to prevent blurring a) because the camera is hand-held and b) because the pet naturally moves, even if it's just a slight turn of the head.

Fill-in flash to the rescue - but never when mounted on your camera.

You're really using the flash for two purposes, one to freeze any movement (of the pet or your hand-held camera) and the other, to provide a light source that sculpts the features of the pet, head and body. This is why the flash mustn't be camera-mounted -- because sculpting light has to fall obliquely across the subject.

Don't be afraid to take plenty of shots, trying bounced light shots, if circumstances allow, or just by holding the flash at different angles and distances from the subject. The low ambient light will prevent harsh shadows, even if you point the flash fairly directly at the subject and from quite close.

And all this can be a tall order, holding a heavy-ish camera in one hand and a flash in the other, while still holding the camera steady enough that you don't get motion blur. Still, no one promised easy :)

Once in the Digital Darkroom

Just a quick covering of this area as I've covered this to enough depth in the postings about Hamish and Willow, Bonnie's pups.

What you're trying to do in the digi darkroom is to enhance the lighting, texture and composition.

So in a nutshell, here's the techniques used; pretty standard workflow for me:

• TLR Capture sharpening
• Copy of background layer for a touch of dodging the highlights and burning the mid-tones -- this to help the light sculpting and texture of the fur
• Convert to mono via the b/w filter and adjust colour sliders to get best conversion
• A v. slight increase in contrast: add a curves layer, unmodified, changed blending mode to overlay and backed off opacity to 9% -- btw, this is a brilliant technique for applying contrast
• Add a levels layer and give it a nudge to ensure I've got tones from deep black to pure white
• Add a subtle vignette to help bring attention to her face: new layer filled with black, change blend mode to soft light, use softest eraser (about 2/3rds size of image) and erase from corners to Bonnie's face, change layer opacity to around 50%
  
• Save, flatten layers, convert to jpeg, add a slight touch of sharpening using the unsharp mask
• Save as new file and upload to here.
  

Your turn

Well, if you find this useful I'd love to see your results. Drop off your links in the comments. If you've got any tips of your own that you want to pass on or to help me improve, please feel free :)

Learning, learning, every day a school day!

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This is a shot I overlooked from the pottery shoot the other day. Three pots are in the kiln (furnace) and are about to come out. This is their second and final firing.
The slip-resist coating on the one at the back right can be seen (drips / bumps around the rim).

They are all destined for finishing in a reducing (oxygen-starved) atmosphere. See previous posts for more details.

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Every so often when I update the main site, I feature a photo that I really enjoyed crafting. When it's time for the next, I move the current one here.

So here it is. A back lane in the Sutton area, looking towards Sutton Harbour and the Barbican. Shepherds Lane, Plymouth, 2008.


I was doing what I call an opportunist photo shoot - a walk around the areas close to where I live to see what turns up.

I'd seen this back lane many times (people including me have often used it as a cut-through during the rush-hour) but I'd never seen it looking down towards the Barbican and it looks totally different. Luckily we had fairly fast-moving broken, but angry clouds. This gave different lighting conditions by the minute as the clouds scudded across the sky.

Composing and making the capture

Composition was fairly straight forward, it was an obvious choice to go for a vertical format, to frame the whole lane and to give the emphasis to following the road/cobbles with the eye.

I made sure there was a diagonal lead in, using the kerb and the handy dog-leg at the bottom left.

Finally, I made sure that the place where the lane came to a point with the diminishing perspective, was close to one of the thirds' power points. I was happy the way this lead the eye on to the roofs of the Barbican beyond.

The ground was still damp after on-off light drizzle and you could see how reflective it was - so I knew I would get a high contrast shot (just as I like them).

Exposure, ISO etc.

I was using my trusty Canon EFS 17-85mm IS USM. It was a bit dark so I set my ISO to 400. This would give some noise in the sky but to get the wide depth of field I wanted (basically, from my feet to infinity), I needed to be at f9. I exposed for the darker right hand wall and ended up with 1/125 sec. If the light hadn't been changing so quickly, I might have dropped to ISO 200. But there you go...

Digital darkroom

Once it was in the digital darkroom, I treated it pretty much as standard for this sort of challenging shot (one with a wide dynamic range).

I combined three exposures (from the one RAW file) and worked on that. A bit of TLR capture sharpening first, convert to mono, paying particular attention to the overall interplay between the bushes, stone and sky, followed by some noise reduction in the sky.

A tweak on the curves to increase the contrast and a slight adjustment to the levels around the mid-tones and that was it.

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Pot number two out of the digital darkroom from the shoot at the potter's workshop. Again, as part of this glazing process, the pot is placed on a bed of wood shavings prior to sealing it all with an upturned metal bin.

This will allow the pot, glaze, smoke and reducing atmosphere to work their magic...

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This is the first one from Wednesday's photo shoot. The pot had just come out of the kiln and had been placed on a bed of wood shavings.



For the type of glaze being used, a reducing and carbon-rich atmosphere is needed. The heat from the pot ignites the shavings and an upturned metal dustbin over the pot seals everything in.

The free oxygen is quickly used up by the burning wood (hence the term "reducing"), producing mainly carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and free vaporised carbon, and this is the atmospheric mix in which the magic of the glaze occurs.

Of course, many, many other factors go towards the nature of the finish, for example using a slip as part of the process, like here. Look closely at the front surface of the pot, and you can see some of it peeling away and down.

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Well, regular readers and people who know my work will know I don't really do colour, and I don't usually do commissions.

...and those who know me real well will also know that I'm a firm believer in the axiom that the only reason that rules exist is so you think about it a bit before you break them.

So that took me to a potter's garage-studio yesterday to get some shots for his blog.

Trying circumstances... my camera kit all now smells of the smoke from the reducing wood shavings used.

So today I'm pulling the shots I got into the digital darkroom to see what I've got and to whittle them down to the one or two for his blog.

More later...

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A brief summary of Dodging and Burning

Here's a reply I gave to someone on Flickr asking what dodging and burning was all about

@ r0ckstarlette D&B is all about "adjusting the tonal interrelationships" in an area by simulating an increase or decrease of exposure, just for that area.

dodging

If a sign in shadow is a little too dark to read, and you want it to be read, dodge just the sign, and you will lighten it in comparison to the areas you didn't dodge.

burning

Has someone's face in a group shot got caught in bright sunlight (but the rest are normally exposed)? Burn the bright face to darken it.

Of course, with tools like Photoshop and others, you get a lot of control in applying those tools. Like being able just to burn the highlights, or just to dodge the shadows.

So in brief, that's it.

Of course, like anything, it can be used very creatively, if you know that using it in specific ways gives specific, predictable results.

making texture tactile

For example, I use it a lot in shots where I'm concentrating on texture as part of the overall feel. Remember, I'm really just simulating what the eye is capable of if it were there (which mine is and was!).

the eyes have it

We don't notice it, but as we look around, our eyes are continually adjusting exposure. Even in bright daylight, if we focus on a small patch of shadow, our irises open up a bit to let in more light - and we see the contrast between light and shade within the shadowy area - look away and the irises close down again in reaction to the brightness they're now looking into.

Still cameras can't do that, so we resort to d&b.

example

Have a look at this shot where I've used creative dodging and burning extensively in the grass - especially in the f/g. I concentrated on dodging just the highlights and when the mid-tones got too close to the highlights, I burned just the mid-tones back down again.

I did all this on a new overlay layer, filled with overlay-neutral grey. I dodged and burned on that layer and then adjusted the opacity to fine tune things. (and deleted the layer and tried again a few times till I was happy - you gotta 'speriment!)

The key to it as mentioned by others, is a small soft brush, a low strength and long sweeping movements. Never burn the highlights, and never dodge the shadows (and remember that the purpose of having rules, in the words of author Terry Pratchett, is so that you think before you break them).

Also, I'm not an expert (learning, learning, every day a schoolday!) but the above summarises what I've learned so far.

Everyone else, please free to correct me or comment. If you're interested in bw, use your flickr id to join my website via google friend connect - www.highton-ridley.co.uk

Hope that helps,
Mark

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Felixstowe visit over winter

Caught In The Surf

I was pleased with the way this shot turned out. Firstly, the sky was doing some wonderful things, with beams of sunlight breaking through the clouds. The surf looked good and I had a good, if unplanned subject. The lad was playing "chicken" with the surf and I knew there would be lots of opportunities if I was quick.

Because I was shooting into the sun, I knew that there would be a few challenges to overcome. Apart from catching the action, I knew lens flare could be a problem, even with the lens hood attached, and that exposure would have to be carefully controlled.

I shot in RAW, so I had leeway over the exposure and set aperture priority and a high f-number, so I woudn't have to worry about focus. Then, to get the exposure about right, I exposed for the sky and used exposure lock before re-composing for the lad, placing him close to one of the rule-of-thirds' power points.

In composing, I made sure I got the diagonal lead-in from the surf, taking the eye to the beach huts and headland. And then I took three or four shots, following the above plan each time.

It was all a bit quick, the lad was off somewhere else almost immediately, so I had to make do with what I'd captured. It had to wait until I got to the digital darkroom before I knew I'd got the shot - and only then after applying a graduated filter to the sky and tweaking the contrast and levels. (I did lose a couple through lens flare, and poor subject interaction / position.)

Ok, I admit it, it sounds like a 10 minute job, but actually I spent a couple of hours on it in the darkroom. Sad perfectionist that I am ;)

I was a bit put out that I got a few blown highlights, less detail around where the sun was breaking through. It's not too bad, though. What do you think?

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Inner Peace

Bagged another couple of shots driving back to Plymouth from Staines on the A303. The weather went from overcast to sunny to fog-bound to sunny again, all in the space of a handful of miles.

I kept pulling over into lay-bys and side roads whenever an opportunity seemed to be developing.

These are the first two out of the digital darkroom and I've still got another couple to process, when I can get some time.

Hope these cut the mustard for you :)

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Haystack and Tracks

A sister shot to the Hay303 Stacks. I tried to get a point of view that showed the Haystack plumb in the centre of the tracks but it looked a little strange to me. This one was better, with the tracks seeming to lead to the side of the haystack.
Overall I'm pleased with the results, with the short stumps of hay in the mown field glistening in the bright sun and the haystack cresting the hill against a good sky.

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Hay303 Stacks

Taken on a section of the A303 (not that far west of Salisbury), hence the pun...

[I wonder if that will amuse me in a few years - here's a note to that future me - did it amuse? If so, leave the answer here... Now that does amaze me - a sort of time travel! Here's me talking to a future me - and much later, that future me will come back here and reply. Weird!]

Anyway, back to the shot. I think this is another one of those "standard" shots that every photographer has in their portfolio - almost like a sampler that people learning needle-work do.

A few times recently I've travelled along the A303 route on my way back to Plymouth from Staines and I've seen rolls of hay, bales of hay and stacks like these, just itching to be captured through my camera lens.

On my most recent journey, I took a short detour close to West Knoyle to try and avoid some heavy congestion and where I rejoined the A303, this faced me in the field opposite. Perfect happenstance - I just had to grab my camera...

I guess, having not long passed by Stonehenge on the way back from my weekly commute, this particular viewpoint gave me echoes of those famous standing stones.

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Another hotel shot

I hummed and hawed about uploading this image, being worried about any possible copyright infringement of the hotel's logo. However, it's incidental to the shot and is partially obscured so I'm fairly comfortable about it.
I really like this shot - it took a lot of walking around the grounds of the hotel to find the pov that worked best and then for the sky conditions to be right. It's lucky I was staying there during the week for a few months!

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Another for Urban Ugliness vol II

This is one I took a few weeks back that I finally managed to push through the DDR. I've called it Rubble To Be. The general decay of the building appealed to me - roof tiles gone with just the skeletal frame remaining but there was something missing...

After a wander around, I found the complementary element to the shot that I was looking for - the pile of stones and beams up against the building.

It seemed to me that it was "winding up" the decaying building - almost taunting it by implying that very soon, it too would just be rubble.

I often do that, paint a little story inside my head, imagining the conversation that might be taking place if the objects were animate. Ok, so maybe I'm a little nuts ;)

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Digital darkroom

I got round to one that's been hanging around in the ddr for quite a while. It's another from Royal William Yard, a really rich vein for me. I've made many successful captures there, so people tell me. This one's simply called Swing Bridge Detail.

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Bredbury Hall Fordson Tractor

I spent quite a while crafting this one during the week. It's a Fordson Tractor, (Henry Ford and his son) - shipped in huge quantities to post-war Britain to help in the recovery.

I was puzzled at first by the metal pole leanng against the tractor, but after some digging, found out that it's one of the chimney's - I think there were two on the model N (which this is).

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More from the digital darkroom...

I managed to squeeze a couple more through the digital darkroom - they'll be uploaded to the mono gallery on the next update.


I really liked the way that Rope Knot turned out. It was a chance find while taking some of the shot of the bands during the Intern'tl Barbican Jazz and Blues Festival.

It was a shame about the ugliness that was the vip and hosts' temporary pavillion - it wasn't so bad from the front but from the sides and rear, it was a real spoiler. I called this one Cut Facet Façade

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...and another from Bredbury Hall Hotel

So I managed to squeeze another one out of the digital darkroom - I was exploring the possibilities in PhotoShop and one thing led to another. I was done before I knew it! Always nice when that happens :)

This one's called Wagon Wheels - I liked the texture of the wood, showing all the signs of long use a long time ago. Getting up close and in amongst it has really brought out and emphasised the features I hoped I'd captured.

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Dedication...

Despite the tight time scales to complete a piece of work for my new contract, I managed to squeeze in some time for one photo that was waiting in the digital darkroom... there's dedication for you!

It's called Two Milk Churns and is one of a few taken while staying at Bredbury Hall Hotel in Stockport.

The brickwork and facade from the original Bredbury Hall have been restored and is the first sight to greet you when you come down the drive.

I wanted to capture a rustic look and the milk churns were an important part of that - and at the same time I saw lots of opportunities in the various textures and patterns.

I like the way the sky defines the edge of the building, revealing a little of its shape and distinguishing architecture.

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Four more from the DDR

Managed to push another four images through the digital darkroom. I used HDR on two and treated the others normally.

It's difficult to choose a favourite, so I'll put up two. Stella Maris is beside the RNLI shop on the Barbican and Great Cabin Architecture is the front of the Tourist Information Centre, a couple of doors down.

It's not often you'll see me do colour shots in this phase of my photography, but Stella Maris was so close to mono and I liked the effect of the blues and the flowers.

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The DDR door creaks slowly open...

A couple more have come out of the digital darkroom - the one I'm most pleased with is Sutton Backlane. To me, I've managed to capture this lost space in all its old glory. These back lanes seem to me to be the last of the recognisable post-war parts of Plymouth - well, at least representing them.

With those learnt memories of times long-gone, it brings to mind that we're losing some values of those times that are starting to be missed by society. Values of respect, self-discipline and sense of community are some that come to mind.

Of course, we're all quite happy to see some aspects of the those times left in the past where they belong.

Anyway, I'm starting to ramble, now... things to do, (like upload the latest photos to my mono gallery.

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Flickr absorbs so much time!

I managed to get one photo through the digital darkroom - Boxing The Sky. Not really an homage to "Boxing Helena" - but I did do some cropping!

Aside from the usual curves, levels and vignette, I did some d&b around the window frames and structure, treating the sky separately (curves and levels).

Then it was onto Flikr to upload it and generally improve my profile. I joined some more groups, and spattered a few images across old and new alike. Took ages, though. Still, I've started to get some awards, which is nice :)

I tried Panoramio a few times but it was down. I'm off to try again now...

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A few photos more...

I managed to chunter through three images today... I'm really pleased with the way one turned out, Building Corner. Someone mentioned that it was from my "Ansel Adams" collection :) - nice to have had the comparison made - but fat chance!

There's one other with great potential - Ageing Together - but I need to tone down some over-enthusiastic dodging I did before I'll upload it properly.

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Photos from the 11th March

I eventually got to this folder in the digital darkroom - it was the result of an exploratory trip around Stonehouse and the back of Cattedown. I was really pleased with the number that have made it past first selection - 14 out of 42.

The first one out of the digital darkroom (opp) is a simple shot of the side door of a factory / industrial shed / workshop. I'm more pleased with it than I thought I would be. Of course, I still have to check it out in daylight...

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Digital darkroom

I've worked up a few more images in the digital darkroom - some that had been gathering dust. One or two might make it onto the site - Exhaust Louvres for sure. This is one I took when the lovely ladies from the BBC team were interviewing me for the Urban Ugliness feature article.

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