Ever since my flaming 1up mushroom picture went semi-famous I’ve been getting questions about how it was taken. I’ve found some good write-ups online that talk about it, but nowhere that shows the whole process, so here you go. I’m not really set up for video so excuse the less than stellar production value, but at any rate, I hope this helps! I’d love to hear from you if it does.
Check out William van der Steen’s DIY technique for shooting sliced fruit. This is definitely going on my to-do list.
A neutral density filter is a screw on attachment for your lens that blocks some portion of the incoming light without (hopefully) affecting the light in other ways. It’s kind of like having a pair of sunglasses for your camera. ND filters come in different strengths (according to the amount of light they let through), different sizes (depending on the lens you’re using), and different glass qualities (just like how some lenses are better than others.)
What do you do with an ND filter?
Primarily, the ND filter is used to increase the shutter speed without increasing your F-stop and/or overexposing the shot. Common examples are waterfalls with the cotton candy water look and shots with the misty looking waves around ocean rocks and piers. With some experimentation you’ll find more creative uses like taking a picture of busy places without having the people/traffic show up or shots of someone looking sharp in the midst of a sea of blurry people.
Which one should you get?
These things aren’t cheap so you’ll want to give some thought to the type of shooting you intend to do. I wanted to do very long exposures during the day using my 24-70mm so I went with a B&W 3.0 ND Filter. The 3.0 is a 10 stop filter, or said another way, lets in just .1% of the light (so it’s more like a welding mask instead of sunglasses.) With that filter I can easily get 5-10 minute exposures in daylight. The downside is that you can’t see anything through your viewfinder with the filter attached so I have to set up, compose the shot, and then put the filter on trying to be very careful not to mess up the framing/focus.
Note: There are some variable ND filters out there where you can rotate them to make them lighter/darker (two circular polarizers screwed together?), but I’ve not seen them in action and don’t know about their quality.
I was already looking forward to shooting some spring pictures, but after seeing these 50 Beautiful Examples of Flower Photography I’m inspired. Come on spring!
A few weeks ago a good friend invited me to DC for a photo walk around Monument Park. (Worst. Train. Ever… but that’s a post for a different blog.) Those that know me well enough probably get a chuckle at the thought of me walking around through throngs of people in DC. It’s not my element. I’d rather be in some seldom traveled nook of the world shooting some bit of nature that goes unnoticed. Well, on this trip that was right out so I started doing recon days ahead, checking Google Earth and Panoramio to get an idea of what I’d be seeing. After a bunch of browsing and pondering I had come up with a few ideas of the shots I wanted to take. Sweet.
It wasn’t until I was actually standing on the Mall that I realized I hadn’t considered the random tourists that would be everywhere, in every direction, doing everything they could to make it impossible to get the shots I had in mind. I was frustrated, but decided I would try to make the best of things. After all, it was my fault for not realizing what was going to happen from the start. Plus, I had rented a 14mm 2.8 for the trip and didn’t want to waste it. So I try a few of the shots I wanted (mostly HDR) and had mixed results. The random people were causing me problems so eventually I started shooting in the only direction that had no people. Up.
The architecture up there is impressive. I started playing around with the wide angle by aiming at the ceiling to see just how wide the field of view was. As a byproduct I quickly grabbed some shots that I found interesting. Newly inspired, I spent the remainder of the trip with my camera mostly pointed upward, removing the crowds and capturing my idealistic, quiet, calm, even (dare I say) enjoyable trip to DC. (Not the train, though. The train is dead to me.)
