photography monthly magazine april 2011

7/29/2019 Photography Monthly Magazine April 2011

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EXPERIENCE LIFE - CAPTURE THE MOMENT ISSUE 120

APRIL 2011

26 PAGES OF PORTRAIT TIPS & TECHNIQUES

PORTRAITSHOW TO SHOOT THEM, LIGHT THEM, STYLE

THEM & CREATE THEM SUCCESSFULLY

W W W . P

H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H L Y . C

O M£3.99

PRO ZONE

WILD AT HEARTExclusive InterviewJonathan and Angela Scott

explain the secrets oftheir award-winning images

TEST ZONE

GET KITTED OUTYour essential laptop roundup,the Olympus E-5 toughs it out and

the Pentax K-5 reviewed

The magazine for people who love photography

PHOTO ZONE

GET LIGHT RIGHTThe 5 lies of photographingshadows revealed

THE MANIPULATORSThree of the best explain how tomaster post-production



‘‘GET OUT OF THE ORDINARY” “Like the shots it lets you take, the Lumix GF2 is a break from the ordinary. It does

everything conventional cameras can, but in a smaller, more compact body so youcan capture inspiration anywhere with ease. For photographers who like to look atthe world differently, it completely redefines what’s possible.”

Will Cooper-Mitchell uses the Panasonic Lumix GF2. D-SLR performance andinterchangeable lenses in a more compact body.

See more pictures taken by Will on the GF2 at panasonic.co.uk/acityexposed

Will Cooper-MitchellPhotographer



WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [3]

WELCOMEAPRIL 2011 | ISSUE 120

FROM THE EDITOR

EDITOR’S IMAGE | MATTHALSTEAD

THIS IMAGE | JONATHAN SCOTT

COVER IMAGE | PETER VERVER

THE LIVES OF

OURSELVES,FRIENDS AND

FAMILIES ARE

RECORDED

THROUGH A SERIES

OF PORTRAITS

TAKEN BY FRIENDS

AND RELATIVES

THROUGHOUT OUR

LIVES, BUT HOW MANY OF THE IMAGES

MAKE COMFORTABLE VIEWING?

And how many of them do we feel are

successful portraits which capture the

spirit of the person the photographer was

trying to portray? I know how I wouldanswer these questions and that is exactly

why this month we have decided to focus

on improving our and your portrait

photography. From dealing with shadows,

conquering lighting setups and improving

our compositional skills to learning how to

successfully master the art of image

manipulation, I really think that this month

we’ve got portraiture covered in a new and

fresh way. As always, we’ve asked some of

the world’s greatest photographers to share

their secrets and advice and I hope you

agree with me that what they say is both

informative and entertaining. Which is whatwe try to make the magazine every month.

But that’s enough from me; it’s time for my

close-up, Mr DeMille.

Grant Scott

Editor, Photography Monthly

PM



PHOTO MONTH

9-13 ESSENTIAL NEWS FROM THE WORLD

OF PHOTOGRAPHY, INCLUDING:

Our roundup of the best innovations from

Focus on Imaging 2011, including the Olympus

SZ-30MR and Vanguard’s Novello tripod for CSCs;

plus time is running out to get your entries in for

this year’s International Garden Photographer of

the Year and Nikon Foundation competitions.

PRO ZONE

27-32 MATT HUMPHREY

Photographer Matt Humphrey reveals to deputy

editor Sean Samuels how and why he embarked

on a journey to shoot 31 portraits of actors and

directors in as many days.

34-44 JONATHAN & ANGELA SCOTT

Jonathan and Angela Scott are wildlife

photographers based in Africa. They are best

known for their work on BBC television’s Big Cat

series. Tor McIntosh caught up with them to find

out more about the team.

L U I S B E L T R Á N / A N G E L A S C O T T / D R E W

S O U T H C O T T

MASTERCLASS49-53 NEIL TURNER

We decided to keep things simple this month for

our lighting master Neil Turner. Armed with just

a handful of reflectors and natural light we asked

him to find out how best to use these elements to

help you get the most from your portrait work.

74-75 FILM SCHOOL

John Campbell brings you the latest newsand kit, as well as inspiration from

the world of film making on your DSLR.

76-87 THE MANIPULATORS

We ask three of the best

post-production masters how they

create their stunning work.

88-93 LAPTOP ROUNDUP

Jessica Lamb takes a look at the

best laptops for photography on the

market, as well as protective cases.

96-97 READERS’ CHALLENGEWin great prizes by uploading your images

to the gallery. This month – portrait.

PHOTO ZONE56-61 MARTIN MIDDLEBROOK

This month Martin examines the five great

lies associated with shadows.

62-63 PETER DENCH

Peter shares his advice and experience so you

never have to fail at portraits again.

64-69 TED SABARESE

Professional photographer Ted shows you

how to use four simple lighting setups.

71 EMILY ANDERSENEmily discusses her experience of shooting a

commercial portrait project.

[4] PHOTOGRAPHY MONTHLY A P R I L 2 011

CONTENTS

O N T H E

C O V E R O N

T H E C O V E R

O N T H E

C O V E R O N

T H E C O V E R

O N T H E

C O V E R

WIN STUFF ON PAGES 12, 23, 73, 96



WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [7 ]

Jonathan and

Angela Scott

PhotographersAward-winning husband-and-wife

team Jonathan and Angela Scott

are best-known for their work on

the BBC television series, Big Cat

Diary , but they also travel the

world together to capture wild

animals in their natural habitats.

In Out of Africa on page 34 they

explain how their different

shooting styles complement each

other to help make great images.

Matt Humphrey

PhotographerWhen Matt Humphrey had the idea

of shooting 31 black-and-white

portraits of British actors and

directors in 31 days for charity, he

did not know the project would push

his creativity and also help to

develop his style. In Playing the Part

on page 27, he explains how to plan

a photography project, how to

connect with your subjects and how

to work with available light.

Ted Sabarese

PhotographerNew York-based photographer Ted

Sabarese shoots for a number of

advertising clients around the

world. His blog Guess the Lighting ,

where Ted tries to work out how

commercial images were lit, is an

internet phenomenon, so we asked

him to reveal the techniques behind

some of his own shots to help you

with lighting your subjects. Light Up

Your Life is on page64.

Peter Dench

PhotographerPeter Dench is an award-winning

photojournalist and regular

contributor to our sister title

Professional Photographer .

Over the years he has arranged

and shot numerous portraits

around the world, so we asked him

to share his invaluable expertise

and wisdom to help you make

successful portraits. Turn to page

62 for Never-Fail Portraits.

© Archant Specialist. Archant Specialist is part of Archant Ltd.

IWhilereasonablecare is takento ensurethe accuracy ofthe informationin Photography Monthly, thatinformationis obtained froma variety ofsourcesand neither thepublisher,the printers nor any distributor isresponsiblefor errorsor omissions.All pricesand data are accepted by usin good faithas being correctat the timeof going to press.Pound conversion ratescorrectat the timeof going topress.Advertisements are accepted for publication in Photography Monthly only uponArchantSpecialist’s standard TermsofAcceptance ofAdvertising,copies ofwhichareavailablefromtheadvertising department.All advertisements ofwhichthe content isin wholeor inpartthe workofArchantSpecialist remainthe copyrightof Archant Specialist.Reproductionin wholeor in partof any matter appearing inPhotography Monthly isforbidden exceptby expresspermissionof the publisher.

Competition terms and conditions: I The closing date for competitions/giveawaysis displayed alongside the competition/giveaway online.I Employees of Archant Specialist,and those

professionally connected withthe competition/giveaway,for example,employeesof the sponsor company, arenot eligibleto enter.I

Unlessotherwisestated,competitions/giveawaysare only opento UKresidents.I Prizesare as described and no alternativescan be given.I Theeditor’sdecision is final and no correspondence will beentered into.IArchantSpecialist may wishto contactyou inthe future, or pass your detailsto selected third parties,to introduce new productsand servicesto you.If you are sending your entry by textanddonot wish tobe contacted,please add the word ‘NO’ tothe end of your text message.If you aresending your entry by post,please ticktheappropriateboxes onthe entry form.

Photography Monthly is published by Archant Specialist, Archant House, Oriel Road, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL50 1BB www.photographymonthly.com

ABC certified circulation(Jan-Dec 2010): 17,324

www.photographymonthly.com | [email protected] | 01242 211096

GROUP BRAND EDITOR Grant Scott

[email protected]

DEPUTY EDITOR Sean Samuels

[email protected]

ART EDITOR Bob Cree

[email protected]

MANAGING EDITOR Simon Reynolds

[email protected]

FEATURES ASSISTANT Kelly [email protected]

EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Jessica Lamb

[email protected]

SPECIAL THANKS Mandy Pellatt

ADVERTISING DIRECTOR Eleanor Godwin

[email protected], 01242 211092

DEPUTY ADVERTISING MANAGER Nicola Crosta


SALES EXECUTIVE Leigh Barr


SALES EXECUTIVE Amy Pope


CLASSIFIED SALES EXECUTIVE Bianca Dufty

[email protected], 01242 211099GROUP COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER

Lucy Warren-Meeks, 01242 [email protected]

PRODUCTION MANAGER Susan Bozzard

REPROGRAPHICS MANAGER Neil Puttnam

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If you have difficulty obtaining a copy of Photography

Monthly contact Seymour, 86 Newman Street, London

W1T 3EX; 020 7396 8000

FRIENDSEach month we introduce you to the people we work with to produce Photography Monthly

MEET THE TEAM



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PHOTOMONTHAll you need to know from the world of photography

T E R R Y

O ’ N E I L L

THE WORK OF BRITISH PHOTOGRAPHER

Terry O’Neill will be on display in London this spring to

celebrate more than half a century of his work.

O’Neill captured many of the major personalities from the

world of 1960s cinema, rockand pop, theatre and fashion,

including Michael Caine, Audrey Hepburn, Paul Newman,

The Rolling Stones, Brigitte Bardotand The Beatles.

His photographs offer an intimate insight into the stars’

lives, both private and public.

The Chris Beetles exhibition features small vintage prints

and large modern ones, created by O’Neill from his original

negatives. Many have never been seen before, having been

discovered only during research of his archive. Key unseen

images include ones taken during the making of some of the

early Bond films, when O’Neill was able to shoot candidly.

Terry O’Neill: 50 Years at the Top is at the Chris Beetles

Gallery in London from 23 March to 23 April 2011.

www.chrisbeetlesfinephotographs.com

PM

SHOOTINGSTAR Clockwise, from top left: Lee Marvin on

the set of Pocket Money , Tucson, Arizona,

1971; Sean Connery on the set of

Diamonds Are Forever , 1971; Paul Newman

in costume for Pocket Money , Tucson,

Arizona, 1971; Goldie Hawn on the set of

There’s a Girl in My Soup, London, 1970;

Brigitte Bardot, Spain, 1971; The Beatles,

London, 1963; Britt Ekland, 1965.



[10] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY AP RI L 2 011

The Sweet 35 Optic from Lensbaby is

a 35mm, selective focus lens with a

12-blade adjustable aperture for

controlling creative focal points and

the amount of blur in your images.

This is the widest focal lengthavailable offering changes from f/2.5

through to f/22 The Sweet 35 Optic

is part of the Lensbaby Optic Swap

System and is compatible with the

Composer, Muse, Control Freak and

Scout lens bodies. It allows

photographers to focus anywhere

from 3in to 7.5in from the front of

the lens to the subject, depending

upon which lens body is being used.

Its wide 35mm focal length is

goodfor landscapes, events and

environmental portraits.

www.lensbaby.com

The Photography Monthly team was

out in force at Focus talking to

readers. We were joined by some of

the photographers who contribute to

PM : master of light Neil Turner and

regular columnist David Ward, who

answered questions and shared their

expertise with the crowds. PM Editor

Grant Scott (above) donned a head

mic to give a talk on the Nikon stand

which went down well with a crowd

eager to pick up tips and advice.

National Geographic has released a new

range of stylish bags for carrying your

camera and computer equipment as well

as enough personal items to cover the

length of your expedition, no matter

how long that may be. Designed for

travelling from city to city, the Africa

range is a sophisticated and subtle

collection, from shoulder bags to

rucksacks to large-sized duffle bags.

www.geographicbags.com

LENSBABY SWEET35 OPTIC

PM MEET & GREETTHE URBAN JUNGLE

We were really drawn to the innovation

and design behind these compact tripods

from Vanguard. Made with today’s CSCs in

mind, the Nivelo 204 is smaller and

lighter than the average travel tripod and

includes features such as shock-absorbing

rubber feet, twist-n-lock legs and a spirit

level on the pan head. A 360° rotating

head allows panoramic shots while

side-to-side tilting gives you a unique take

on the world. The Nivelo 204 is available

in black and silver, priced at £59.99.

We have one of these tripods to give away,

turn to page 96 to find out more.

www.vanguard.com

Photographers who like digiscoping should

take a look at the GH1720QR and

GH2720QR two ways fluid heads from Gitzo.

Featuring fluid cartridges, a single lock

system and ultra-precise inner mechanism,these pan-and-tilt heads give ultra-smooth

movement at very low speeds. Both are well

made and great for shooting stills and

video. The GH1720QR is priced £213.95 and

the GH2720QR is priced £254.95.

www.gitzo.com

VANGUARD’SNIVELO TRIPODFOR CSCs

GITZO TWO WAYSFLUID HEADS

Lowepro released three new series at

Focus on Imaging at Birmingham NEC –

the ILC Classic, CompuDay Photo and

Quick Case. We thought the ILC Classic

Series was particularly well-timed to

accompany the raft of interchangeable

lens cameras on the market. This new

streamlined shoulder bag series has a

padded, soft-brushed interior specially

designed to accommodate compact

cameras and accompanying lenses.

As you’d expect from Lowepro, the series

is sturdy and practical, with SlipLock

attachments, metal hardware and

adjustable straps. The ILC Classic 50 fits

a compact camera with its attached lens

kit and spare memory card, while the ILC

Classic 100 fits a camera plus lens, an

extra lens, a flash and two memory cards.

The CompuDay Photo Series can

accommodate both a laptop and a single

camera ineither a messenger bag or

backpack while the Quick Case series

features snugly-fitting, impact-resistant

covers for bridge and DSLR cameras.

Check your favourite retailer for prices.

www.lowepro.com

LOWEPRO ILC CLASSIC

SERIES

The Nivelo 204tripod is a lighterand smalleralternative forphotographerslooking to supporttheir CSC.

N I C K

S A R G E A N T



WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [ 1 1 ]

The society was back at Focus this year,

with a vast array of second-hand kit and

photography books on its stand.

There has been a resurgence of interest

in buying high-quality film cameras,

according to the society’s honorary life

president, Mike Birbeck, “It used to be

just students who came for the film

cameras but now we’re seeing a much

wider interest in them,” he said.

The Disabled Photographers’ Society

promotes photography for people with

disabilities, or their carers. For more

information about the society visit

www.disabledphotographers.co.uk

We love the sleek look of these compacts

from Olympus, available in black and

silver, which the company claims are the

first cameras able to capture movies

and 16-megapixel stills simultaneously.

The Olympus SZ-30MR features a

super-zoom (24x wide optical zoom) and

can record film in more than one mode,

in a variety of combinations; for

example, as a movie and digital stills or

two movies at once in wide angle and

close-up, or original and filtered, using

one of the seven magic filters. The new

multi-recording function, combined with

the photo with movie clip setting,

makes it possible to capture moving

footage before and after taking a single

photograph. Also on show was the

16-megapixel SZ-20, a slender camera

with 12.5x wide optical zoom. Among the

other benefits, both cameras feature a

smart panorama function, which allows

users to capture sweeping stills by

panning the camera, and a mode for

blur-free shooting at night time without

a tripod. Both cameras carry built-in

flash, in-camera manual, USB charging,

Eye-Fi compatibility and a 3D shooting

mode for still images, where the cameras

will capture two shots (automatically or

manually) of a scene from two different

angles to create an image that can be

viewed with the added realism of 3D

on a 3D compatible source.

The SZ-30MR is priced £299.99 and

the SZ-20MR is priced £199.99.

www.olympus.co.uk

DISABLEDPHOTOGRAPHERS’

SOCIETY

PHOTOMONTH

SPECIAL

We first spotted the LensPen people at

Photokina in Germany last September

and featured their handy camera lens

cleaning pens. This month they were

back at Focus on Imaging with a nifty

new product, the SideKick. Designed to

remove those unsightly marks from the

iPad’s supposedly fingerprint-resistant

screen, it uses the same carbon-based

cleaning compound as the award-winning

Lenspens. The SideKick comes with

one replaceable cleaning head that lasts

for 150 to 200 uses and costs £14.95;

it costs £10 for two replacement heads.

The SideKick will be available

from April in the UK from Jessops and

independent retailers.

www.lenspen.com

If you have ever knocked the end of your

lens then you’ll want to take a look at

this range of protectors from DeluxGear.

The Lens Guard can fit snugly over both

ends of your lens, making it good for

transporting kit as well. In addition to

providing impact protection, the covers

also safeguard against bumps, scrapes

and dented filter rings. They are

available in three sizes to fit most lenses

and are priced £19.95 each.

www.deluxgear.com

The Platinum shoulder support gives

easy access to all your camera functions

when shooting video. A moveable arm

can be placed to the side of the rig or to

the front of the support to help

counterbalance heavier lenses. It is

priced £120. www.cameraclean.co.uk

LENSPEN SIDEKICK

DELUX GUARDS

FOTON VIDEO PLATINIUMDSLR RIG

WHAT WE LOVED AT FOCUS

OLYMPIC GOLD

The Olympus SZ-30MR (above) and SZ-20MR camerascan take stills and video at the same time.

GOONLINE

We update the websitedaily to bring you news

as it happenswww.photography monthly.com



[12] PHOTOGRAPHY MONTHLY A P R I L 2 011

The Vanguard Alta Pro 283CT is an

award-winning, carbon fibre tripod and

we’ve got three to give away.

Flexible and stable, it incorporates clever

features that also make it extremely

versatile. The innovative Multi-Angle

Central Column (MACC) System lets you

move the central column from zero to

180° angles in variable vertical and

horizontal positions – so the tripod is

ideal for macro photography and

awkward, wide-angle shots.

The Instant Swivel Stop-n-Lock (ISSL)

System securely repositions the

central column in a simple movement

while maintaining the tripod’s

stability. It has advanced camera

vibration and shock control, a

hexagon-shaped central column

for extra stability, legs that adjust

to 25°, 50° and 80° angles,

quarter-twist leg locks and non-slip,

spiked rubber feet for varying

terrains. The suggested retail price

is £319.99 (including VAT).

www.vanguardworld.com

To be in with a chance of winning one of

these great tripods go online to our

Vanguard competition in the competition

section of www.photographymonthly.com

W I N

A Vanguard Alta Pro 283CT Tripod worth £319.99

The National Media Museum in

Bradford houses works from some of

the world’s greatest photographers

and while its images might be familiar

to us we don’t always know much

about those who took the pictures.

A new, free exhibition at the museum,The Lives of Great Photographers,

explores the lives of the men and

women behind the lens with images

and histories of the photographers

themselves as we’ve never seen or

heard them. The exhibition features a

variety of photographers dating back

to the early days of the medium;

portraits and work of legends such as

William Henry Fox Talbot and Edward

Steichen sit alongside images and

work of Weegee, Dorothea Lange and

Larry Burrows. Famous for shining a

light on how others live, each

photographer – none of whom is still

alive – is represented by a portrait,

some of their remarkable images and

intensely personal effects such as

notebooks. It’s a great insight into the

minds and motivation of those who

have changed how we see the world.

The Lives of Great Photographers,

Gallery One, National Media Museum,

Bradford, 15 April to4 September 2011.

www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk

THE LIVES OF OTHERS

Weegee in Coventry, 1963. ©

R I C H A R D S A D L E R F R P S ,

C O U R T E S Y O F T H E N A T I O N A L M E D I A M U S E U M

/ S S P L



C H A R L E S

N E E D L E

PHOTOMONTH

GOONLINE

We update the websitedaily to bring you news

as it happenswww.photography monthly.com

You can now go online to see the images

chosen for the finals of International

Garden Photographer of the Year 2010.

Now in its fourth year, the contest to

find the best images from the world of

botanical photography is open to

enthusiast and professional

photographers. The winner will be

announced on 3 May following a review

of the entries by a panel of industry

professionals, including representatives

from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew,

the National Trust and The Royal

Photographic Society. An exhibition of

the winning and finalist images will be

held outdoors in the grounds of the Royal

Botanic Gardens, Kew in May, before

embarking on a tour of other UK venues.

The competition follows the gardening

year from January through to November,

so you can enter images for a number

of different themes. The fifth annual

contest is now open, as is the first of

four seasonal competitions. Based on

specific themes, the first, entitled

Monochrome, invites creative

black-and-white garden images, up

until 31 March. The next theme, New

Mornings, is open for entries between

1 April through to 31 May.

www.igpoty.com

HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN

GROW?

Fantasea Line has released a new

underwater camera housing for the Nikon

Coolpix P7000 camera. The FP7000

(above) is depth rated to 200ft (60m) and

features fully functional, ergonomically

designed and clearly labelled controls, so

you can safely capture still and video

images when diving or snorkelling, or when

taking pictures at the beach or by the pool.

The housing is shock-resistant and protects

the camera from water, dust, sand, ice and

snow, so you can use it in most

environments where the elements could

cause damage. The housing is compatible

with wide-angle and macro lenses and a

variety of filters and lighting systems.

www.nikonhousings.com

DEEP SEA DIVER

Time is running out to enter this year’s

Nikon Foundation Competition. Aimed at

final year students studying photography

at higher education universities and

colleges, the competition carries a

three-month paid internship, £3,000 in

cash and £4,000 of high-end Nikon kit

as the top prize. The competition closes

on 31 March 2011, with the winners

announced in April. The three-month

placement with celebrity and fashion

photographer John Wright will begin in

June 2011. “I am delighted to be part of

the Nikon Foundation and am really keen

to support emerging photographers,”

said John. “I’m looking forward to seeing

the portfolios and interviewing the

finalists to find someone with raw talent

who is able to embrace a challenge and

appreciates that a career in photography

requires commercial awareness and drive,

and that succeeding is not just about

taking pictures.”

www.nikonfoundation.co.uk

THE APPRENTICE

Congratulations to Rory McDonald for hisimage Inside Dove Cottage which is thewinner of our March Readers’ Challenge.

W I N N E R READERS’CHALLENGE

Morning Splendour by Charles Needle, a finalist in the

Garden Views category of InternationalGarden Photographer of the Year 2010.





E D I T O R ’ S

C H O I C E

This is a strong, bold image where thephotographer has taken risks with the

position the model has adopted and

the styling of her clothes and make-up.

Everything works well together to

create an unconventional image which

perfectly reflects contemporary

fashion photography. And that’s not

an easy thing to do!

Grant Scott, Editor

IMAGE OF THE MONTH

GALLERYUpload your images to www.photographymonthly.com, we choose the best and publish them the following month

YOUR IMAGES

Berna V

Stacey in black Canon EOS400DCanon 18-55mm



[16] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY A P R I L 2 0 1 1

Yaman IbrahimMalay man

Nikon D3Nikkor 24-70mm

Richard Pardon Zebra

Canon EOS 5D MkIICanon 70-200mm

Charlotte JarmanEye can see youCanon EOS 50DCanon 90-300mm zoom



WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [17]WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [17]

READERS’ GALLERY

Barri ElfordCardiff Bay night

Nikon D700Sigma 24-135mm

Jon Howard Survived Canon EOS 450DCanon 55-250mm




Nick HomerMorning mist Nikon D80Nikkor 18-135mm

Damir Murseljevic Splash

Canon PowerShot S5 IS



WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [19]WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [19]

Leila MurseljevicCloseness

Canon PowerShot S1 IS

Drew SouthcottLoch MorlichCanon EOS 500DCanon 10-22mm

Bev HadlandButlers Wharf, Southwark

Canon EOS 1000DCanon 18-55mm

Sani MaikatangaCat

Nikon D9018-105mm

Declan Courell Strandhill surfersCanon EOS 5DCanon 70-200mm

READERS’ GALLERY




Ceri JonesWinter laneCanon EOS 30D

Canon 17-40mm

Chris OgdenMist in the valleys

Canon EOS 5D

Canon 24-105mm EF

Kieran Murray Arctic drive

Nikon D300s

Nikkor 55-200mm

Ryan StevensonRannoch moor Canon EOS 550D

Canon 18-55mm

READERS’ GALLERY



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Henry YauOverdrive

Nikon D7000Sigma 10-20mm

Kim RormarkTea fields

Nikon D300Nikkor 18-200mm




UPLOAD

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IF YOU WANT TO SEE YOUR IMAGES IN THE MAGAZINE and have the opportunity to winan 8GB Lexar Professional memory card and reader, visit www.photographymonthly.com andupload your favourite images. We will choose the best work uploaded each month for inclusionin the magazine, and the Editor’s Choice will win a card and reader. SD or CF, the choice is yours.

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WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [2 7 ]

PRO ZONE

Portrait special Matt Humphrey

Actor and writer Noel Clarke.

Shot with a single light sourceand no other visual distractions.

PLAYINGTHE PARTHaving an idea andseeing it to fruition can

be one of the biggestchallenges to developingyour photography, butalso the most rewarding.PhotographerMATT HUMPHREY hadthe idea of shooting 31portraits of actors anddirectors in as manydays. He stuck to it andtells SEAN SAMUELS

how and why he did.

HERE DID THE IDEA

FOR THIS COME FROM?

The idea behind the

project www.31thirtyone.com

originated from an earlier one

where my intention had simply

been to get out of the house

and photograph every day so I

could post the image I was

happiest with on a Facebook

group. I really liked the idea of

people making this a part of their

daily routine, as it were, logging

in every day to see the photo

I had taken. I like the formula.

A mention on a BBC 6 Radio

phone-in and within 10 minutes

I had 100 people following the

first project. Soon I was taking

more and more portraits while

working at the Old Vic Theatre,

W

M A T T H U M

P H R E Y



[28 ] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY A P R I L 2 011

Michelle Ryan.Matt wanted theimages of theBionic Woman andEastEnders star tohave a natural andand earthly look.

Lesley Manville.Lightcoming inthrough a nearbywindow was enoughto lightthis shot.

of artists with dressing rooms,

including playwright Tom

Stoppard. I thought it would be

good to do something similar to

my first 28 days, 28 photos idea,

but just with portraits. I thought

about the subjects I could get

involved with and started as closeto home as possible with people

in the theatre. I approached actor

and artistic director of the Old Vic

Kevin Spacey just after a table

tennis tournament we had been

having between cast and crew,

which he came down to watch.

I played him at table tennis and

then asked him if he would be

interested in being involved in the

project. He was. This gave me the

confidence to think the idea had

legs and I started asking other

actors I had worked with through

crewing at the Old Vic and got

a few names together. The more

people I approached the more

people they recommended I

approach and I started to get a few

bookings in the two months before

I planned to do the shoot in

August. But by the start of that

month I only had 11 people signed

up. This was nerve-wracking and it

was this side of things that was

probably the most difficult to deal

with – not knowing whether I’d get

my 31 in the 31 days. I realised it

was not going to be a one-a-day

job, but that on some days I ’d

have two or three or more and

then nothing for three days, or

something. This was an interesting

aspect of the project and kept me

on my toes. I really loved the

whole month for this excitement

and the planning of the shoot.

HOW DID YOU APPROACH THE

PORTRAIT SITTINGS?

Well, for example, with the

Michelle Ryan shot, I knew she

had done hundreds of shoots,

especially involving her role as

Bionic Woman over in the States.

Quite often these shoots were

glam-FHM style shoots, because

she is a pretty girl. She was in

EastEnders and quite lad-mag in

that respect, and I wanted to move

away from that and present her as

someone quite feminine, but also

naturally strong. So we moved

outside and at first she seemed

very guarded; it was the first

shoot and also the longest of the

31. So it took a while for her to

relax into it, which is what I

wanted from the outset – for all of

the photos to have a natural and

organic, earthly look to them.

The idea was there in the first

place, but really this shot evolved

out of that. We talked a lot before

I even got the camera out.

I thought it was important we felt

at ease with each other. That was

a general matter with a lot of

the sitters. I had not met a lot of

these people so it was important

they felt at ease and that I was

not intruding on them. We spoke,

relaxed, sat in the garden for a

little bit and talked about her work

and I quickly realised the portrait

had so much more to do with the

relationship between us than the

technical side of taking portraits,

that became all the more apparent

as the month went on.

Take the Noel Clarke image

(previous page); I watched a

couple of films he had been in

and realised it had been a big

breakthrough for him to step away

from the safer roles he had in Auf

Wiedersehen, Pet or Doctor Who

and to star in the film Kidulthood

[which he also wrote]. It was a very

different type of British film and I

really felt he was putting himself

out there and making a stance in

terms of the films he wanted to

make rather than the films other

people thought he might make.

So I saw him as an emerging talent

and wanted to portray him as such.

I had this idea of him coming in

from the side of the picture with

a single light source and no other

visual distractions in the

background. We set this up in

his kitchen; I just moved a few

Matt Humphrey isa documentary andportrait photographerbased in London. In the

past three years he has worked on andoff as one of the stage crew at the OldVic Theatre in London. Through thisconnection he has created a body ofwork focusing on the capital’s theatres.Before this he was a school teacher.

BIOGRAPHY

I STARTEDASKINGOTHERACTORS I HADWORKEDWITH

THROUGH CREWINGATTHEOLDVIC AND GOT A FEW

NAMESTOGETHER.”

www.matthumphreyimages.comwww.31thirtyone.com



WWW. PHOT OGRAPHYMONT HLY. COM [ 2 9 ]WWW. PHOT OGRAPHYMONT HLY. COM [29]


PRO ZONE


M A T T H U M

P H R E Y

“I FELTTHAT IF I

COULDMASTERNATURAL LIGHT,THEN I COULDBECOMEA BETTERPHOTOGRAPHER.



things around so there was nothing

in the background. He loved it and

said, ”It is exactly me, how I see

myself and how a lot of other

people see me.” It’s very simple.

It’s just him. To know where he was

coming from helped to produce

an uncomplicated portrait.

IS THIS WHY YOU CHOSE TO

SHOOT BLACK-AND-WHITE?

Since school when I got into

photography – black-and-white film

in the darkroom – I loved the

effects you could get very simply

by using light in black-and-white

photography. I didn’t want to

detract from the person at all or

the situation. I really wanted to

get it as raw as possible and for

that reason I didn’t want colour to

pull attention away from that. I like

the textures you get from

black-and-white; you are able to

focus a lot more on composition

and use of light, something I really

wanted to work on as well.

DO YOU THINK WORKING IN

THE THEATRE HAS

INFLUENCED YOUR

PHOTOGRAPHY?

Working in the theatre has

definitely informed my work.

One of the main benefits of

working backstage at a theatre

GET TO KNOW YOUR SUBJECT

If possible do this before the shoot. Read up,

research, watch videos; look at previous photos

of that person. This is the most important thing

you can do in preparation to get an idea of the

person you are shooting. It may spur

something on and generate an idea for the

shoot. The better you know your subject, the

better you can represent them and portray

them. When you meet, spend time talking and

relaxing into the situation and developing the

dynamic of you and them. The most important

thing is the relationship between you and the

sitter and that will show through over lighting,

composition etc in any natural portrait.

HAVE AN IDEA (OR SEVERAL) UP

YOUR SLEEVE

Even if you don't end up using the idea that

you've planned out, at least it will be a starting

point from which the shoot can develop. If it

does take its own path, don't fight it, because

the important thing is to come out with a shot

that is true to the situation, which both parties

can be happy with.

LOOK FOR THE LIGHT

If you are able to scout out the venue for the

shoot beforehand, that is obviously preferable,

as you can take some test shots, think about

positioning of any props or furniture, and work

out your shooting angle and camera settings.

When planning the recce, also think about the

time of day it is, as this might affect direction,

angle and intensity of the natural light source.

If, however, you are seeing the location for the

first time when you arrive for the shoot, then

the most important thing to look for is a good

light source that you can use to your

advantage. Obvious starting points are next to

windows or doorways, although be open to

other options.

THINK ABOUT THE BACKGROUND

Work out what it is you want to say with your

portrait and go for an appropriate background.

This will help dramatically with the composition

of the picture. I prefer uncluttered backgrounds

without any bold statements going on behind

the sitter. Use the surroundings to your

advantage and look for any complementary

shapes or lines.

TALK TO YOUR SITTER

Don’t be afraid to let them know how to sit,

where to position their head, eyes and hands.

This will help you to feel in control, as well as

let them feel as if they can relax into the

situation. Remember that the dialogue can also

feed into the sitting in terms of laughter and

facial expressions; as your sitter relaxes and

opens up by talking, you may see something

that cannot be missed. Dialogue also breaks up

the shoot and provides the off-moments, which

are sometimes the most interesting shots

you’ll get.

WORDS OF ADVICE

[30] P HOTOGR AP HY MONTHLY A P R I L 2 0 1 1



WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [3 1]


PRO ZONE

and being involved in the whole

production process of any play

being put together is that I have

witnessed extraordinary masters

of light and how they have used

different lights to light a scene to

bring out the poignant moments in

a play and to light a space which is

essentially a black box. I have

definitely learned a lot from that

time and so for the portraits I

wanted to focus on how to harness

the light that was there already.

If I could do this, that’s a large

part of your work done for you.

I felt that if I could master natural

light, then I could become a better

photographer and feel comfortable

to take the photograph I want to

take in any situation. That was the

focus and reason for me choosing

to shoot with available light.

HOW WAS IT WORKING IN

THIS WAY?

There were moments when I

arrived and there was not much

light; I had reflectors with me, but

never used them that much.

In most of the situations I went for

a single light source and only used

another light source if it was

absolutely necessary. I like the

Lesley Manville shot (previous

spread); I sat her next to a window.

It was a really overcast, wet and

cloudy day. The light wasn’t great,

but what was there was enough to

achieve what we wanted.

WHAT KIT DID YOU USE?

I shot everything with a Canon

EOS 5D and an 85mm f/1.8 lens.

I wanted to get everything right in

camera as much as possible. I shot

in colour RAW and then converted

to black-and-white.

HOW MUCH PREPARATION DID

YOU DO?

I hadn’t been to any of the places I

photographed in before I got there.

I was arranging the shoots to tie in

with the subjects’ own private

agendas so I wanted to make it as

easy for them as possible and a lot

of the shoots either happened in

their homes or where they were

working. Homes were not so bad

because these were going to be

somewhere they felt at ease and

they would come out of their shell,

as it were, but at work it was a lot

harder because the places they

were working in were not well lit.

It ranged from a trailer with

artificial light on a trailer set to

horrible neon lights in an

underground dressing room in a

theatre, which had no natural light

whatsoever. This was the case with

[American actress] Mercedes

Mercedes Ruehl.Matt shot theAmerican actressusing only a singlespotlight on thewall above her.

Cinema star andtheatre actorJeff Goldblum.

American actorChristianCamargo.

“I DIDN’TWANTTO GO IN BLIND, SO IWATCHEDTHE SUBJECTS’ SHOWS, FILMS ANDTELEVISION PROGRAMMES,AND MADE SURE IWAS CLUED UP ONTHEIR BACKGROUNDS.

Ruehl (facing page), which was one

of the hardest images to light. I

arrived late in the day and just had

to make use of the light there.

I turned off all light sources and

used a single spotlight on the wall

above her. That was the challenge,

which I loved – turning up and

thinking how I could use the light

there to make the shot I wanted.

HOW MUCH RESEARCH DID

YOU DO?

In the months running up to this, I

did a lot. I didn’t want to go in

blind, so I watched the subjects’

shows, films and television

programmes, and made sure I was

clued up on their backgrounds.

I enjoyed bringing in the research

side of things. This was something

I had picked up on from several

photographers’ books.

WHO DID YOU TURN TO FOR

INSPIRATION?

Irving Penn, Jane Bown, Edward

Steichen, Henri Cartier-Bresson,

Annie Leibovitz (I sat in on a shoot

of hers of Cate Blanchett a couple

of years ago).

HOW LONG DID YOU SPEND

WITH THE SUBJECTS?

Over the shoots I probably had on

average half an hour with the M A T T H U M

P H R E Y



[32 ] P H OTOGR AP H Y MON TH LY A P R I L 2 011

subject, but it really ranged from

as little as three minutes

up to an hour and a half.

DID THE FACT YOU WERE

SHOOTING FOR A CHARITY

[CROHN’S AND COLITIS UK]

MAKE IT EASIER TO COMPLETE

THE PROJECT?

At first I wasn’t sure it would be an

idea that would work, until I

started talking to people and got

them on board. I also knew that

approaching people would not be

easy without the charity angle.

In retrospect I don’t think it

mattered which charity it was.

I wasn’t that established as a

photographer so I felt that if I

could get this one big project

under my belt it would make things

easier. Other photographers had

done similar projects, but not as

concentrated as this.

WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNT

FROM THE PROJECT?

I learnt a lot personally in terms of

having an idea and not letting it go

until I had seen it through. I could

have given up a lot of times.

If other photographers have ideas

Matt Humphrey Portrait special

PRO ZONE

M A T T H U M

P H R E Y

Actor BenedictCumberbatch,

who takes thetitle role inBBC’s Sherlock .

GOONLINE

To see a shortvideo made about

the 31thirtyone

project andexhibition visit

http://bit.ly/i0G5up

similar to this, they should just go

for it. Consider the project and the

outcome as the end goal rather

than having these stumbling

blocks of thinking this is not going

to happen because of this or that.

Perseverance is essential to any

project like this. If you have an

idea and it is a good one, it will

work out, no matter what.

IN YOUR MIND WAS

ANY ONE FACTOR

FUNDAMENTAL TO

ITS SUCCESS?

Getting people

interested in the

project was the key to

its success. I did a lot

of PR through social

networking sites and

by keeping a blog on

the site itself. I like

the capability that

services such as

Twitter and Facebook give you to

be able to connect with people on

the other side of the world. I had

people getting in touch from

Japan, New Zealand and the

States and in that respect it was a

far-reaching project. I’d like my

next project to be similar to it

because I have now built up a base,

a method and a way of working not

just photographically, b ut a lso the

whole process that comes after

that. I am planning the next

31thirtyone, which will focus on

musicians, for early summer 2011.

I really like the formula, it’s a nice

and neat idea and even though I

am turning 32 this

year, I think I will keep

the 31. I have friends

who run a charity for

street children in Mali,

Africa, and I have

already started to call

musicians I have come

into contact with. It is

going to hold different

challenges. With the

actors I knew them or

had worked with

them. It was easier in

a way and is a whole

other world I have not really

stepped into, but interests me

nevertheless. I am thinking I

am going to start using light

differently and I want to

investigate other possibilities

for this project. PM

IFYOUHAVEAN IDEAAND IT IS A GOOD ONE,ITWILLWORK OUT, NOMATTERWHAT.”



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OUT OF

A N G E L A S

C O T T

Sunrise over Musiara Marsh, Maasai Mara,

Kenya. Topi and impala are silhouetted in themist as sacred ibis fly overhead. It pays to beup early to catch the best of the light.



WWW. PHOT OGRAPHYM ONT HLY. COM [35]

Photographing wildlife Jonathan and Angela Scott

PRO ZONE

Fans of the BBC’s Big Cat television series

will be familiar with the work of

professional photographers JONATHAN

and ANGELA SCOTT. Although a

close-knit husband-and-wife team, they

bring their individual approaches tophotographing wildlife. TOR McINTOSH

caught up with them to see how they work

together to capture animals in the wild.

HOTOGRAPHY DUOS HAVE ALWAYS

INTRIGUED ME. IN FACT, EVERY TIME I

SEE A PHOTOGRAPH CREDITED TO TWO

PEOPLE I’M SLIGHTLY PERPLEXED AS TO HOW

THE SYSTEM WORKS. Does one person focus and the

other one press the shutter release? Or do they

simultaneously do everything in a ridiculous confusion

of hands? I had no idea, but I’d always wanted to ask

them. So, when I was given the chance to interview

husband-and-wife photography duo Jonathan and

Angela Scott, I knew I would finally work out the

enigma surrounding the art of dual picture-taking.

Many will be familiar with Jonathan through his

television work, appearing on and presenting wildlife

programmes such as Nature Watch in the 1980s, Wild

Things in the 1990s and the BBC’s long-running and

hugely popular Big Cat series. In addition to his

broadcasting credentials, for the past two decades he

has been one half of a prolific partnership with his wife

that has seen them write numerous books, produce

many pen-and-ink drawings and travel around

the world as wildlife and travel photographers.

P

AFRICA




Through a slightly crackly

long-distance Skype call to their

home near Nairobi, capital of Kenya,

in East Africa, I launch straight in

and quiz them about the logistics of

working as a team. “I think that’s

the one thing that everybody is

fascinated by; and the fact that we

haven’t strangled each other yet,”

laughs Angela. Her husband chips

in: “It’s an extraordinary thing to

take two people who are very much

individuals and put them in a

confined space, which is often our

4WD vehicle, and expect them to

produce great photographs, when

photography is such a one-person

show most of the time. You don’t

really think of it as being something

that people can combine in doing

because, after all, only one person

can have their face behind the

camera and click the button.”

Well, that’s precisely my

confusion with his ’n’ hers photos

– how on earth can they both get a

credit on one image? Sensing my

bafflement, Angela continues by

explaining the intricacies of life in

the Scotts’4WD. “We seem to work

in incredible synchronicity and

harmony, because whenever Johnny

picks up one lens I’ll instinctively,

with no fuss or dilemma, pick up

the complementary lens to the one

he’s using. Also, if he sees that

I’m shooting some action he’ll get

the car into the perfect position for

me, rather than pick up a lens.

So even if I’ve pressed the button

we actually consider all our

photographs as ‘our’ shots because

Johnny has perhaps facilitated

the wildlife aspect and enabled me

to press the button in the perfect

position, or vice versa.”

The key advantage of working as

a duo is that there is always an

extra pair of hands and eyes, which

enables them to focus on a subject

in its entirety – quite a feat for an

individual photographer, especially

if the working environment is the

expansive African plains and the

subjects are unpredictable wild

animals. As husband and wife for

nearly 20 years Jonathan and

Angela also have the uncanny ability

– some would call it a sixth sense –

to silently read what the other

person is going to do. “It becomes

very intuitive after a while, as you

know what the other person is

thinking, which means you can

help in making life easier for them

when all panic lets loose,” explains

Jonathan. “There’s only so much

equipment one person can deal

with at a time, so the way it tends

to pan out is that one of us handles

the big lenses while the other

takes the wider view, which means

you can get really good coverage of

your subject.”

Photography is inherently a

selfish and competitive profession,

but what makes it easy for Jonathan

and Angela to work together is that

these traits aren’t part of the

way they work in the field, which is

in stark contrast to the pushy

and macho characteristics of some

photographers clamouring to

capture the moment. “At the end

of the day we love each other’s

photographs,” says Jonathan. “I get

as much pleasure out of looking at a

great shot that Angie has taken as I

do of my own shot; I’m just delighted

that she got it. Whether I took it or

not isn’t the point. And if I missed it

and she got it, boy am I happy!”

Perhaps only a doting husband can

take this attitude, nevertheless

Two young malelions stand proudon Paradise Plain,part of a powerfulcoalition of sixmales that

dominate the lionterritories in thispart of the Mara.


PRO ZONE

A N G E L A

S C O T T

ONE OFUS HANDLESTHE BIG

LENSESWHILETHE OTHER PERSON

TAKESTHEWIDERVIEW,WHICHMEANSYOUCANGET REALLY GOOD

COVERAGE OFYOUR SUBJECT.”



[38] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY A P R I L 2 011

it’s refreshing to hear one

photographer admire another

photographer’s work, especially

in an industry where many

photographers are too quick to

disparage a competitor’s work.

Until quite recently wildlife

photography has been a

male-dominated profession (in the

past 20 years Angela is one of

only three women to have been

awarded the top prize at the annual

international Wildlife Photographer

of the Year competition), so I

carefully broach the subject that

having Jonathan at her side has

perhaps helped Angela to succeed

in this macho field. Gently brushing

off Jonathan who, ironically, starts

to answer the question for her,

Angela agrees with my observation,

before adding: “Often female

photographers have asked me what

my best advice is to them, and I

often laugh and say, ‘Get yourself a

really great husband, especially one

who can help carry your kit!’”

And when your favourite piece of

gear is a hefty 800mm lens I can

understand Angela’s need for extra

muscle. However, she is quick to

point out that although Jonathan is

allowed to carry her prized lens

and set it up on the tripod, “other

Wildlife

photographers

Jonathan and

Angela Scott live

in Kenya, just

outside the

capital, Nairobi.

Big cats have been the focus of much of

their work, including three books

accompanying the BBC’s Big CatDiary

television series and its successors, which

Jonathan co-presents. Angela takes the

production stills for the series and is also a

game spotter. They have both won the

Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award.www.jonathanangelascott.com

BIOGRAPHY

Wildebeest plunge

into the Marariver on theirannual migrationthrough theMara-Serengetiin East Africa.The vast herds(numbering nearlytwo millionwildebeest) roaman area of 25,000sq km.

J O N A T H A N

S C O T T





PRO ZONE

The leopard is the

most elusive of allof Africa’s bigcats – to see oneis the icing on thecake for a safari.

Khali the lioness(a member of theMarsh Pride)stands watch overone of her four10-week-old cubs.The cubs werelater killed by newpride males whohad taken overthe Marsh Prideterritory.

than that I won’t let him have his

sticky paws on it!”

Jonathan is the first to admit that

compared to Angela, photography

was never his number one passion.

Although they both “messed around

at school with black-and-white film

and the fun of the darkroom,”

their paths to becoming wildlife

photographers differed greatly.

“My interest in photography was

actually because I wanted to record

animal behaviour; my prime

passion was wildlife, whereas

Angela’s passion has always been

photography,” explains Jonathan.

After completing a degree in A N G E L A S

C O T T

“I GET AS MUCHPLEASURE OUT OF LOOKINGAT A GREAT SHOTTHAT ANGIE HASTAKENASI DO OF MY OWN SHOT; I’M JUST DELIGHTEDTHAT SHE GOT IT.




zoology from Queen’s University in

Belfast, Jonathan spent four months

travelling overland from London to

South Africa – a trip that ended in

disaster when the lens he had

bought for his first proper camera

(a Canon EF) didn’t sync, resulting in

reels of blank film; he has not made

that mistake again. After spending

two years in Botswana he moved to

Kenya in 1977, where he has lived

ever since. In those early years he

worked as a guide and naturalist at

Mara River Camp on the north-west

boundary of the Maasai Mara

National Reserve, but his dream was

to become a wildlife artist – living

and working near such a wildlife

hotspot meant he was in the perfect

place to refine his skills as an

illustrator and he began to take

photos of the animals so he could

draw from them.

It was meeting Angela, a kindred

spirit who shared his love of Africa,

art and photography, in Kenya in

1990 (they married two years later)

that triggered the creative side of

Jonathan’s photography. “With my

wildlife background I had a clear

agenda with my photography, which

was to record animal behaviour.

In fact, I was a lazy photographer.

It was so easy for me living in this

amazing place to press the shutter

release and get a saleable picture,

but I wasn’t being creative and most

crucially, I didn’t understand light.

I would look at somebody else’s

picture and think it was amazing,

but I didn’t get that the reason it

was so beautiful was because the

photographer used light in an

interesting way – sidelight and

backlight were alien to me, I just

looked at where the sun was and put

it over my shoulder, which made for

some very dull photos!” It was

Angela’s open-minded and creative

approach to photography that

helped him to switch from having

the eye of a naturalist to one of a

photographer.

By the time the couple met in

1990 Jonathan had already had

several books published, presented

live television documentaries, and

been named the 1987 Prudential

Wildlife Photographer of the Year

for his photograph of a wild dog

catching a wildebeest. “I was quite

well-established when I met Angie

and although she’d been taking

pictures for many years, she hadn’t

had the opportunities or the

equipment that I’d accumulated,”

explains Jonathan. “However, I

remember this defining moment –

and this just shows how cocky one

can be at times – when we went to

visit friends in America and they

asked us to take some pictures of

their kids out in the garden, so we

both took some photos and I

remember looking at Angie’s and

thinking, ‘Wow! These are so much

better than mine!’”

Born in Alexandria, Egypt, Angela

spent her childhood in Tanzania and

it was there that her lifelong love

affair with photography began. As a

child she made her own darkroom

beneath the stairs of her parents’

house where she experimented with

black-and-white images and started

to develop her intimate and

imaginative style of photography.

The couple have both been inspired

by photographers such as Henri

Cartier-Bresson, Sebastião Salgado

and Steve McCurry, but for

Jonathan it’s clear that his greatest

inspiration is his wife. “Angie always

tries to be creative. I remember

Cape petrels swirlaround the footof an iceberg offAntarctica insearch of preystirred up by theocean currents.

A pair of emperorpenguins performtheir beautifulgreeting andcourtship ritual,Ross Sea,Antarctica.

A N G E L A

S C O T T





PRO ZONE

one particular day when the

wildebeest were streaming into the

Mara and I was thinking, ‘Okay let’s

photograph the wildebeest milling

around the plain’, but Angie saw

some cattle egret that were

jockeying for position on the backs

of the wildebeest, because they

were stirring up insects with their

feet, and she captured some

beautiful backlit images of these

egrets – it was a detail that I hadn’t

seen. Using lenses creatively she

manages to create a particular point

of view or sees a subject in an

interesting way.”

It was this unique way of seeing

that earned Angela the title of

British Gas Wildlife Photographer of

the Year in 2002 for her image

of an elephant family drinking in the

Luangwa river in Zambia. But it’s

amusing to learn that if she had

listened to her husband’s opinion

that day she might not have won

such a prestigious photography

award. “I can remember trying to

convince Angie as to where best to

photograph the elephants,” recalls

Jonathan. “I was sure a low-angle

shot was the way to do it, but she

just brushed me away like an

irritating fly and continued to use

her 500mm lens. Then she went

on to win with one of the shots she

had taken that day. When I looked

at my photos from that shoot they

were a joke compared to Angie’s

beautifully composed shots.”

However, not wanting to take all

the credit, Angela admits that

without Jonathan’s knowledge of

wildlife she wouldn’t have been able

to take many of her photographs.

“He is supreme in his understanding

of animal behaviour,” she

acknowledges. “For instance, if

there’s an eagle on the tree he’ll

clue me and say it’s just pooped so

it’s going to fly... now. Although I’ve

picked up a lot through osmosis

over the years, it’s nothing quite like

being with Johnny in the 4WD.

Because I come from a much more

bohemian and artistic background I

wouldn’t know that key information,

so for me it ups my game hugely

because he puts me in the right

position and gives me the clue at

the right time of exactly what

behaviour is going to happen.”

It’s their very different approach

to photography – and their different

personalities – that seems to help

them rub along so easily as a team.

“What I like is when it gets frantic –

when all hell breaks loose and

you’ve got to pick up your camera

at a moment’s notice and grab the

action or move the car or get into

position,” explains Jonathan.

“Whereas Angie likes to be away

from all the cars and people,

spending hours looking for the

perfect shot. Angie is a much

more centred and calm person;

I live more on the adrenalin side

of things. I like mayhem.”

It’s difficult not to place a gender

stereotype on their different

approaches, but even Angela agrees

with me when I tentatively point this

out. “I think we have very different

styles, but they’re also very

complementary. We’re so lucky to

get a portfolio of images that has

both a sense of the female and

Snow Hill Island in

the Weddell Sea,AntarcticPeninsula.Emperor penguinsraise a singlechick each year –if it survives theAntarctic winter.Adults recogniseeach other andtheir chicks bytheir voice andfeed only theirown offspring.Consequently oneof these chickswent hungry.

J O N A T H A N

S C O T T

“WHAT I LIKE ISWHEN

ITGETS FRANTIC –

WHENALL HELL

BREAKS LOOSE AND

YOU’VE GOTTO PICKUP

YOUR CAMERAATAMOMENT’S NOTICE AND

GRABTHEACTION...




Dead Vlei (Dead Marsh), Namibia,southern Africa. The baked earth ofSossusvlei (famous for its toweringsand dunes) is one of the harshestenvironments on the planet and alandscape photographer’s paradise.

ANGIE LIKESTO BREAKTHE RULES

WHEREAS I TENDTO BE A LOT MORE,

HOWWOULD I PUT IT, OBEDIENT.”

A N G E L A S

C O T T




PRO ZONE





PRO ZONE

GO ONLINEFor more

photographyadvice and to

order back issuesof the magazine,

including theUltimate 2011

Technique Guide,

visit the websitewww.photography monthly.com

the male within our pictures, so we

can offer a broad body of work.”

Intrigued by this, I ask if it’s

obvious when looking through their

portfolio who has taken particular

shots. “Yes, I think you can tell the

difference. Part of it will be because

a lot of the big lens shots will be

Angela’s – she uses big lenses to

create a more intimate photo – and

a lot of the wide-angle shots will be

mine, because I love the wider view

that takes in the whole landscape,”

explains Jonathan. Angela says:

“I tend to do things that will make

Johnny’s heart shatter, like chop

ears off and get terribly close into

the picture, which he would never

naturally do. I was actually editing

some of his pictures of giraffes

earlier today; there were about 12

giraffes and every single one was

perfectly placed, whereas I would’ve

probably gone in and chopped their

heads off.” “Basically, Angie likes to

break the rules, whereas I tend

to be a lot more, how would I put it,

obedient,” adds Jonathan.

While Africa is at the heart of

much of their work, they’ve travelled

widely over the years and have

visited all seven continents. And if

there was ever going to be a place

that stimulated both of them as

much as Africa, it was Antarctica.

“With the surname Scott I’ve always

felt a huge connection to Scott of

the Antarctic, but also to his son Sir

Peter Scott, who was one of the

founders of WWF [originally the

World Wildlife Fund], a wildlife artist,

a naturalist and a TV presenter.

In many ways he covered all the

fields that I wanted to do and has

inspired me greatly. Through him,

Antarctica was always somewhere

I wanted to visit, and also because

it was such a contrast – the colours,

the landscape and the wildlife – to

Africa,” says Jonathan.

It was in 1992 that he and Angela

made their first journey together to

Antarctica on the expedition cruise

ship MS Explorer , and since then

they’ve returned regularly, visiting

the Antarctic Peninsula, the

Falkland Islands, South Georgia and

the emperor penguin breeding

colony at Snow Hill Island in the

Weddell Sea. Their book Antarctica:

Journeys to a Fragile Eden,

published in 2007, celebrates this

wilderness of a continent that

they’ve fallen in love with over the

years. In stark contrast to the

mainly uninhabited continent of

Antarctica, India also ignites their

joy at being photographers.

“When we first started with our

photography in Africa, Angela was

doing some people photography,

but for me it was all wildlife.

But then we got incredibly involved

with the Maasai people who live in

the Mara and began photographing

them and the beautiful ceremonies.

So for us, travelling to India we

experienced the amazing colours,

the people and the wildlife; although

the emphasis in India is on the

people more than the wildlife.”

Jonathan and Angela’s success

as a photography duo reads like

any relationship between two

individuals, whether it’s personal or

professional; if there are strong

foundations, a willingness to make

compromises and utmost respect

for each other then there’s a high

chance of longevity. Few people

could, and would want to, work as

closely as they have over the

past two decades, but they’re

acutely aware that what they

have is a rare thing. As Jonathan

says to me at the end of our

conversation: “The combination

of the two of us sharing this

core thing, which is the love of life

in all its forms – its people, its wild

places and its wild animals – and

doing something together with it

creatively to make a living is an

incredible blessing. We are terribly,

terribly lucky.” PM

A family ofelephants slaketheir thirst in theLuangwa river,Zambia. Theelephants werefascinated by thearrival of a greyheron searchingfor fish, attractedto the spot by theripples of water.[The imageearned Angela the2002 WildlifePhotographer ofthe Year Award].

A N G E L A

S C O T T



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The Business of Photography is run in

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THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S GUIDE TO

TURNINGPROPHOTOGRAPHYWORLDOF




MASTERCLASS

Bouncing light with reflectors Neil Turner

REFLECTIONThis month we kept things simple for NEIL TURNER, our lighting master.

Using only natural light and just a few reflectors, we asked him to reveal the

secrets to this simple setup to help you to take successful portraits.

ITHOUT A DOUBT, REFLECTORS

ARE REALLY USEFUL THINGS TO

HAVE IN YOUR KIT BAG.

When I first discovered them I thought they

were the answer to all my lighting issues and

dreamed of owning dozens of them in different

sizes, shapes and colours. In my mind’s eye

I can still see my first reflector – it was a piece

of three-ply wood, 60cm x 40cm, painted

matte white on one side and with silver kitchen

foil glued to the other. As a very green

amateur photographer I used it a lot and

by the time I could afford to buy a reflector

I had repainted the white side a couple of

times and had at least four layers of aluminium

foil on the other.

Eventually my dream came true; now I own

a lot of reflectors and they are all sorts of

sizes, shapes and colours. Sadly, they are not

the answer to every lighting issue that I meet

daily, but they are a set of very valuable tools

that I use whenever the conditions are right.

MOMENTSOF

W

CANON EF 24-70MM F/2.8L USM LENS

HOW TO ANGLE A REFLECTOR

Some science lessons in school seemed to

bear no relation to my life or the real world.

There were, however, some glorious

exceptions. Back in the days when we shot film

I relied heavily on the simple tips a chemistry

teacher gave us on how to work out amounts

of chemicals in measuring cylinders. How light

is reflected and refracted was covered in

physics and information about the angles at

which light bounces off surfaces has also

proved useful. It is these memories that help

with getting reflectors in the right place.

Generally reflectors work best when they are

opposite the light source (right). This isn’t

always possible and the only proper way to

learn how to place and angle reflectors is

either to get out there and have a go or to

mess about with a small mirror, a Barbie doll

(Action Man will do as well) and a window.By sticking your model at different angles to

the light source you quickly learn where

to put the reflector (mirror in Barbie’s case)

and how to angle it.

Light source

Light source

Light source

Subject

Subject

Subject

Reflector

Reflector

Reflector placement and angle options LASTOLITE48IN SILVER/WHITEREFLECTOR

CALIFORNIA SUNBOUNCE LIGHTINGSTAND CLAMP

CALIFORNIA SUNBOUNCE MINIZEBRA GOLD/SILVER REFLECTOR

CALIFORNIA SUNBOUNCEMINI SILVER REFLECTOR

LASTOLITE48IN WHITEREFLECTOR/DIFFUSER

CANON EF 85MM F/1.8 USM LENS

CANON EOS 5D MKII BODY

MANFROTTO LIGHTING STANDS

WHAT’S IN YOUR KIT BAG?

WWW.PH OT OG R APH YM ON T H LY.COM [ 4 9]




On a dull January day I set out with Jonathan (Jonny)

Fleetwood, a young photographer who sometimes assists me

on jobs, to see just how much difference a good reflector can

make. We set up a very simple picture with a model using only

available light and the four

reflectors we were trying out.

This series of four frames

shot using the California

Sunbounce Mini with a silver

cover shows the progression from no reflector to getting the

maximum amount of light bouncing back in. My assistant is

holding the panel slightly below the bottom of the frame andangling it to get the desired effect (above).

Depending on your taste in pictures and the effect you are

looking for, you may not always want the maximum amount of

bounced light – I prefer the second frame along, where there is

just a small amount of fill, but you may think one of the others

is the best. The Mini reflector

used here is 3ft x4ft, which

allows you to get a lot of light

without having to get too close –

the bigger the reflector,

the more light you can get from a given distance.

We achieved very similar results with a silver Lastolite

reflector and also with a California Sunbounce Micro-Mini whenit was closer to the subject.

THE SIMPLE TEST

1 2

3 4

…THE BIGGERTHE REFLECTOR,THE MORE LIGHTYOU CANGETFROMA GIVEN DISTANCE.”

N E I L

T U R N E R




MASTERCLASS


There are three things to consider when talking

about the kind of light we get from reflectors:

The amount, the quality and the colour.

The amount of light is dictated by the size and

proximity of the reflector and what the surface

is made of. The most extreme (and efficient) flat

reflector would be a high-quality mirror, which

would reflect back almost 100% of the light that

hits it. Make the mirror convex and you could

give back effectively more than 100% because

it is focusing the light. The shinier the surface

(in photographic terms this means a metallic

silver) the more light you’ll get. The flatter the

surface (semi-matte white) the less you will get.

The quality of the light is pretty much

governed by the same factors as the amount.

Highly reflective surfaces will reflect harsh

sunlight in a harsh way, while duller surfaces will

reflect it in a more diffuse manner. If the

reflector bends, then it will have the ability to

alter dramatically the light it is reflecting.

Every manufacturer is keen to point out that

its reflectors are available in a range of colours.

White, silver and gold are the most common and

often come in a reversible combination of any

two of those colours – one on each side.

Increasingly, companies are combining colours

in stripes to give subtle colour shifts –

especially for those of us who like the idea of

warming tones a little in portraits, but who find

gold reflectors too warm. The most common

misconception is that silver reflectors give a

cold light; they don’t. If they are made properlythey will give exactly the same colour of light

that is shining on to them – exactly the same as

a white reflector would – it’s just they do it far

more efficiently. Most people find a subtle warm

tone is pleasing for portraits, which is why the

various gold/silver and gold/white striped

reflectors are becoming very popular. The image

above shows the California Sunbounce zebragold/silver finish.

THE COLOUR & QUALITY OF THE LIGHT

Studio photographers have always used flags or black reflectors to

‘subtract’ light. Many of them paint all of the surfaces in their studios black

too. In real terms black reflectors are incredibly useful when it comes to

making sure light isn’t reflected by shiny or light-coloured surfaces and

damages your shots. I use a couple of black Lastolites regularly in my work

to kill reflections and I often dress from head to toe in black clothing so I’m

not reflected myself. If you have a limited budget or more time you mightwant to consider buying a big piece of matte black fabric and using clips

and clamps to hold it in place to achieve much the same effect.

‘ANTI-MATTER’ OR BLACK REFLECTORS

When reflectors are required, Jonny sometimes assists me on jobs.

Since leaving the foundation degree course at the Arts University College

at Bournemouth, he has assisted quite a few photographers and

I thought it would be interesting to get his opinion about the different

reflectors on the market, given that he was the one handling the kit most

of the time. For this article we had four reflectors: Two 48in Lastolite

round ones and two of the smaller California Sunbounce models – a

Mini and a Micro-Mini. This piece was never meant to be an equipment

review but here is what Jonny (below) had to say:

LASTOLITE

“I’ve worked with just about every type of Lastolite, including a 6ft x

4ft monster. The thing I like about them is that you can bend and flex

them to focus the light almost on to exactly the right spot. Rigid and

semi-rigid reflectors just don’t have this flexibility. Attaching them to

stands is okay indoors or if there is no wind, but these larger folding

ones need to be handheld if there is a breeze.”

CALIFORNIA SUNBOUNCE

“These are a lot lighter than I expected. I really like the zebra effect

gold/silver covers – they seem to be more subtle than the straight

silver or gold. The accessory for attaching the frame to a lighting

stand is great; really solid and simple to use. I have found them easy to

hold steady too. The double bar that tensions the Mini size makes it

really easy to hold the reflector still. They take some getting used to

when it comes to assembly and putting them away, but I like the idea

that you can swap covers and they seem really well made.”

JONNY’S OPINION



MASTERCLASS



How often do we bother to ask the

subject of our pictures for their

opinion? Not very often would be my

answer but while we were shooting the

sample images for this piece our model,

Terry, regularly became uncomfortable

with the amount of light that the silver

reflectors were putting back into his

face, especially when it was coming

from almost directly behind him and

the silver reflector was just under the

lens. He started to squint and it made

for a very poor picture (left).

Shortly after the first squinting

incident the theme tune for the rest of

the afternoon became the Bruce

Springsteen song Blinded by the Light

(although these two 20-somethings

only knew it from a Johnny Depp film!)Sticking too much continuous light

into your subject’s face can be a real

issue both in terms of their comfort

and in the way the light looks.

Terry was far more comfortable

with a white reflector when the sun

came out (for about five minutes).

THE MODEL’S OPINION

If Photography Monthly had wanted me to

write about reflectors in a single

paragraph I would have restricted myself

to explaining when and where you could

and couldn’t use them. To be effective,

reflectors need to be held at exactly the

right angle in relation to the light source

and to the subject. A lot of the time there

is very little room for error and the

smaller the reflector in relation to the

subject, the harder it is to get it right.

If you also take into account that most

reflectors have a degree of flexibility

and that any bend in the reflector will

give you different qualities of light,

you are looking at some pretty tight

tolerances between useful and useless.

So how you hold a reflector suddenly

becomes almost as important as whatkind of reflector you have. The elephant

in the room is, however, the wind.

The slightest breeze will move a reflector,

and anything not held in place by

something 20 times its own weight is

going to act like a sail on a yacht and

blow away. This is a huge issue if you are

working outdoors but I’ve even seen

disasters occur indoors with a window

open or when a photographer using a

wind machine started it up for the first

time after carefully placing his lights and

reflectors. We all saw a couple of the

polystyrene boards being used as

reflectors or flags blow over and take a

light with them, and winced as we realised

how expensive this was going to be.

If, like me, you work with assistants

when you need to, you will have less to

worry about (below). These helpful people

can either be used as a human stand

holding the reflector or they can carry

the 20kg sandbags that you need to hold

a stand with a 1m diameter reflector

attached to it. If you read Jonny’s

thoughts on reflectors you will quicklyrealise that a good assistant doesn’t just

get the reflector in the right place – they

can also bend the reflector and actually

shape the light.

Of course, if there isn’t any breeze,

then there is no problem, but most of my

working life has been spent shooting

in the UK where you can never count on

shooting on a breezeless day.

The reason I love reflectors for certain

jobs is the effect they have on catchlights.

Every reflective surface and every light

source that is in the subject’s eyeline will

be reflected in the eyes. We are all familiarwith the shape of soft boxes and

umbrellas in models’ eyes from flash units

and we are all aware of how bad certain

lighting techniques can make the human

eye look, but a well-placed and large

reflector can add a lot of detail, feel and

even beauty to eyes. Large reflectors can

literally make a nice portrait a beautiful

one and in these Photoshop-obsessed

times using the right reflector can

save you hours of retouching by

lightening eyes and filling in

shadows that you might otherwise

have had to lose in post-production.I’m even brushing up on reflectors

myself – especially as we seem to be

in an era when photographers are being

asked to shoot video and my ‘go to’ way

of adding light – flash – is not an option

for moving images.

Over coffee at the end of the afternoon,

Jonny and I agreed that the real skill in

using reflectors was in knowing when they

weren’t the right things to use. Fill-flash

can achieve nice results and a flashgun is

not quite as much of a liability in the wind.

Umbrellas, soft boxes and reflectors all

share the same disadvantage – they areall close relatives of the sail (left)! PM

WORDS OF WISDOM

GOONLINE

To read moreof our masterclasses

visit the website

www.photography monthly.com



Lightscapes Photographic Workshops

“Many thanks for the fantastic Glencoe workshop. I feel I now

understand the use of ‘Manual’ mode. It was magical to get snow

on the mountain tops and along with the Autumn colours made

photography extra special.Watching how the light changes the

landscape made me appreciate the magical hours of just after

sunrise and just before sunset. I hope to book

another workshop soon.”

Moira Gardner - Glencoe 2010.

www.garygroucutt.com

WORKSHOPS 2011

MarchDo you want to go to the Isle of Skye but thought it too far?

Isle of Skye and Glencoe - Two location workshop

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at Gary’s studio, he will show you how to produce your favourite image from the workshop, upto 24” x 18”

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The home of creative photography


PHOTO ZONE

C I A R A N C

U N N I N G H A M

This outstanding image of a pair of horses on Ireland’s west coast was one

of two grand prize winners chosen by judges in the National Geographic

International Photography Contest 2010, sponsored by Bowmore Islay Single

Malt Scotch Whisky.

The team at Photography Monthly loves the moment of peace that

photographer Ciaran Cunningham has captured, and how the portrait appears

to reveal so much of the animals’ characters.

Monica Corcoran, senior photo editor at UK National Geographic Magazine

Online, described the image as “simply beautiful; it immediately transports the

viewer. You can almost feel the slight coastal breeze and hear the slow,

deliberate chewing of the horse. The composition, colours and tonal range

combine to make this a classic.”

Ciaran, who also took first place in the Nature category with the

picture, was driving through Connemara on the west coast of Ireland

when he spotted this lovely pair of horses at the side of the road.

He stopped his car, jumped out with his camera and captured

this image. “What stands out for me about this photograph are

the colours,” said fellow judge Cristina Creager.

“The colours of the horses are echoed in the background and

the detail in the animals makes for an outstanding photograph.”

More than 1,000 people from the UK, Ireland and Sweden submitted images to

the competition in the three categories: People, Places and Nature. Entries were

invited that “captured life from a personal or fresh angle”.

A stormy seascape by Andreas Edman from Nyhamnsläge in Sweden was the

second grand prize winner. Karen Gunn, editor-in-chief of the Nordic National

Geographic titles, described it as “a technically beautiful image with a great

atmosphere and depth”.

The winners each receive a trip for two to Islay, the southernmost island

of the Inner Hebrides, where they will stay for three nights at Bowmore

Cottages, which form part of the Bowmore Distillery, one of Scotland’s oldest

distilleries. The two winning images will also star in a future Bowmore Islay

Single Malt Whisky advertising campaign which will appear in National

Geographic magazine.

The National Geographic Society is one of the world’s largest non-profit

scientific and educational institutions. Founded in 1888 to “increase and

diffuse geographic knowledge”, the Society’s mission is to inspire

people to care about the planet.

The winning images and finalists from this competition are now

available to view online.

www.ipcuk2010.nationalgeographic.com

PM

GOONLINE

To enter competitionsand win fantastic

prizes visitwww.photography

monthly.com

WILDHORSES

“THE COLOURS OF

THE HORSES ARE

ECHOED IN THE

BACKGROUND

AND THE DETAIL

IN THE ANIMALS

MAKES FOR AN

OUTSTANDING

PHOTOGRAPH.




GREAT LIESOF

SHADOWShadows, shadows; where to

start, those pesky shadows!

When I was asked to write

about shadows I thought it was going

to be a stretch finding enough words

to say on the subject. So I did what

I usually do and sketched a basic

narrative from which I could fill in

the gaps. I soon realised that far from

being the poisoned chalice I had

feared, the topic of shadows was in

fact something replete with possibility.

I began to understand what

a significant role shadows played in

photography, in a way that, if I am

honest, I had never truly appreciated.

S

MARTIN MIDDLEBROOK is not content to hear the same old

comments being made about photography and this month he turns

his attention to the world of light and shade.




PHOTO ZONE

M A R T I N M

I D D L E B R O O K

5 great lies of shadows Martin Middlebrook

Shadows are curvaceous and harsh, they

are straight and soft, brutal and subtle,

but most of all they are ‘everything’.

We underestimate the value of shadows;

so often we don’t see them at all. What we

regard as form and tonality, however subtle

and reduced, are the result of light reaching

any surface in variation; variation caused

by the play of light across the rise and fall,

the three-dimensionality of any surface.

Shadows can be readily seen or not,

but their apparent absence or their

seemingly overbearing presence still

adds to that wonderful and key quality

of an image – reality!

The image (top) is such an obvious

example of this thesis that it hardly needs

stating. The shadow in this image can’t be

more than 1/1,000th of the whole image,

and yet its significance is more than the

sum of its rather insignificant parts.

Its jaunty angle sets the animation for

the scene. Suddenly the magpie is alive

and precipitous, ready to make that leap of

faith at any moment. It is in every sense

the essence of the image, the smallest and

yet most important part, and somehow

that oblique slash sets up a painterly

quality that mirrors the abstraction that

resonates throughout – this is an image

that isn’t so much photographed as

painted. And if we ever needed proof of the

shadow’s value, have a look at the same

image with the shadow removed (above)

and we see that, however small, it really

is the biggest part.

In the same way that the shadow from

the magpie’s tail animates that image, the

shadows in the image (top left) provide

a restful and sombre repose; they set the

featherbed inertia and in their entirety

invite us to slow down, stop and look a

while. In their dominance they subdue –

a paradox I love.

So shadows really are at the heart of

what we shoot; by their dominance they

paradoxically subdue, and in their apparent

absence they enliven.

In so many ways shadows are

photography and yet we seem to spend

so much time avoiding, eliminating and

masking them that we have somehow

missed a trick. Shadows are the visual

armature upon which we build form

through the use of light and shade.

Without shadow, in the broadest sense,

all our images would look like an 18%

grey card – not a stimulating thought.

So let’s unmask some truths, lay

to rest some lies, and bring shadow

back into vogue with my Five Great

Lies of Shadows in Photography!

SHADOWS ARE AN EVIL THING –

NO, THEY ARE THE FORM AND

STRUCTURE OF AN IMAGE!

“I BEGAN TO

UNDERSTAND WHAT A

SIGNIFICANT ROLE

SHADOWS PLAY IN

PHOTOGRAPHY.



Sometimes we need shadow for other

reasons than we might imagine. We might

need it to dominate, to darken everything

in our image, so light can fall upon just the

tiny part that is most important. We may

call it the ‘limelight’ if we wish, but an

actor spotlighted on stage only works

because everything else has succumbed to

the shadow’s presence – our subject is

brought into sharp focus by a lack of

intrusion. It is allowed the space to breathe

in its frame because it is alone.

It is such a standard visual metaphor

that maybe we are put off by it, but

TOO MUCH SHADOW DESTROYS AN IMAGE – NO, IN CONTRAST IT CAN THROW OUR SUBJECT INTO STARK RELIEF!

it is as effective as isolating the subject

through precise and narrow depth of

field, maybe more.

We talk often of shooting at f/4.5 so

the subject jumps off the page, but you

can shoot at f/16 and use shadow

carefully to achieve exactly the same

effect. It adds a drama that other

isolating mechanisms fail to match –

there is a punch and depth to the image.

The only technical consideration in

these circumstances is that the camera

frequently interprets the scene

incorrectly and overexposes. When you

use depth of field to isolate the subject,

overall tonality is usually ‘balanced’

so metering is comfortably within range.

However, when trying to isolate the

subject through use of shadow, the

camera will frequently overexpose.

It considers the overall scene to be

underexposed and compensates

accordingly, trying to make those dark

shadows 18% grey. Your subject will be

blown out. It’s something to be aware of,

but so long as you allow for it you can

create a perfectly isolated image simply

by using shadow as an enhancer.

THE KEY ISTHAT I HAVE BEENTRYINGTO PHOTOGRAPHA SHADOW, NOTTHE SUBJECT. IT’S A DIFFERENTWAY OFTHINKING.”




PHOTO ZONE

5 great lies of shadows Martin Middlebrook

It’s easy to see shadows as playing

only a minor role – “and the winner of

this year’s best supporting shadow is

‘slightly darker area’ in the F-Stop

Conspiracy .” I wouldn’t go and see it

and I don’t suppose you would either.

Sometimes, in fact very often, shadows

can be the whole picture. They are

not just additional information that

sets the time of day, the angle of the

sun and the prevailing weather

conditions; sometimes they are the

‘majority dimension’ of the image.

Shadows should be treated that way

and, most importantly, they should be

sought out that way. When I took the

photograph of the bullfighter (above),

I was absolutely trying to photograph

the perfect shadow. I was just waiting

for the right time of day, the perfect

alignment between rasateur and bull –

this was a previsualised shot. In fact,

I have tried to reproduce this shot

several times, but never with the same

success. The key is that I have been

trying to photograph a shadow, not the

subject. It’s a different way of thinking.

I saw a rather brilliant but simple

photograph the other day that

expresses this position with such

elemental beauty that it’s worth

relating. An open book, with a napkin

ring placed upon the book’s gutter, and

backlit. The napkin ring’s shadow

becomes the perfect loveheart as its

circular form unfolds into the book.

It may be clichéd but it was a wonderful

example of using one shape to make

another – this is shadow photography

at its best.

So when the light is right, go out and

photograph a shadow, not the subject;

it allows you to see three-dimensional

form in an entirely new way.

SHADOWS SHOULD PROVIDE

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION –

NO, SOMETIMES THE SHADOW IS

THE PHOTOGRAPH!

M A R T I N M

I D D L E B R O O K




ALL SHADOWS ARE THE SAME –

NO, EACH SHADOW HAS ITS OWN

QUALITIES!

Dictionary definition of a shadow – ‘an area

that is not or is only partially irradiated or

illuminated because of the interception of

radiation by an opaque object between the

area and the source of radiation’.

Definitions, by their nature, define the

generality of something. It may

encapsulate the essence of that thing, but

it can never capture the ‘nuance’ of it.

When we read the above definition we

could be forgiven for thinking that all

shadows have the same qualities, but of

course we know this not to be true.

Shadows come in every shape and form,

every degree of intensity. They change by

the second, become bigger and smaller,

softer and harder, brighter and darker.

A shadow that falls upon the surface of a

porcelain teacup will have an entirely

different quality to the shade from an oak

tree. I haven’t created a portfolio of

shadows, but after writing this article I am

minded to do so – my, what a breadth of

opportunity it would provide.

This simple texture (above) is made by

the soft, diffused, dappled nature of the

shadows – so subtle that you wouldn’t

notice it unless I pointed it out. Contrast it

to the image (below) where the shadows

are harsh and dominant, and succeed in

making the ‘highlights’ the pivotal centre

of the image. This is something that’s

worth considering: the value and nature of

shadows and how they affect the overall

quality of your images. When we look at the

sleeping man in a doorway, what strikes us

first are the shards of light that split the

door, cross the threshold and spill on to the

tiled floor. But they only exist as such

because the rest of the image is in shade.

It’s the nature of shadows that they affect

the overall ambient feel of the image.

Shadows allow us to see the difference,

the reverse; shadows allow us to see

negative space. And shadows change by

the minute, throughout the day; in the

same way that colour temperature is a

constantly shifting thing, shadows are on

the move. This is the wonder of shadows; if

you don’t like the one you have now, wait

10 minutes and a new one will come along.

Therefore the same object shot throughout

the day changes constantly, because

shadows shorten and lengthen as the sun

tracks across the sky and clouds impede

the potency of direct light.

To discuss every possibility of shadows

would be to labour the point, but glance

out of the window at a familiar object and

see how it constantly updates itself.

IT’STHE NATUREOF

SHADOWSTHAT

THEYAFFECTTHE

OVERALLAMBIENT

FEELOFTHE IMAGE.”




aking portraits can be easy; don’t

let the heavyweight protectors of

the genre tell you otherwise.

It’s as complicated as you want it to be.

To paraphrase Australian film director Baz

Luhrmann: Ladies and gentlemen of the

class of 2011, if I could offer you only

one tip on how to take never-fail portraits,

composition would be it.

Composition is the heartbeat before

releasing the shutter, a fraction of a second

where everything fits fleetingly, the final

piece of a journey that began the moment

you arranged to take the portrait. Even if it’s

a family member, lover or someone else you

know well, approach the sitting with a level

of professionalism. Perfect your routine;

think about why you want to photograph

them, what interests you about them and

what composition would enhance those

characteristics. A close-up of granny’s

lived-in face might work best or a full-length

to capture the glamour of a leggy aunt.

Get one safe portrait in the bag, then push

for the unexpected. Mix up the compositions

– animated, serious, seated, standing, close

and full length. Light one location for a

formal composition, then move the subject

into a more fluid environment. Get them

looking directly into the lens, then vary it.

Try to compose the picture in an

environment where the sitter feels

comfortable. If the surroundings are relevant

maximise them, don’t be afraid to cram

things in. Photographing explorer and writer

Redmond O’Hanlon at his home among

woodcarvings, skeletons and manuscripts

added to the charisma of the shot.

Personal objects in a composition can help

the sitter torelax and the viewer totake an

interest. Even the wallpaper or a pair of jazzy

curtains might make a good backdrop, but

remember it’s not an interiors shot. If the

surroundings are a problem you can always

blow them out with a minimum depth of field

and compose tightly.

For a triumph in composition, prepare to

be flexible. You can never be sure how the

NEVER-FAILPORTRAITS

T

Whenyouareworking asa professional portrait photographer youcannotafford tomiss

the shot. HerePETERDENCH takesa light-hearted lookathow towin every time.

Singer Tom Jones



PHOTO ZONE

P E T E R

D E

N C H

shoot will unfold. Take enough kit to be calm

and confident. If you’re a bit unsure ask a

friend along to help. Let them unpack the kit

while you have a conversation with your

sitter; show them respect but don’t be

overawed. A portrait is a two-way process,

take on board their ideas, and shoot some of

them to get them involved. If they are

relaxed and inspired it will ultimately help

you to achieve a good composition.

When all the elements have come

together, have faith in your ability. Let your

eye rove around the frame. Check the

corners, direct any diagonal lines towards

the subject, compose and shoot. Be aware

of perspective, symmetry and tone; work

with them. Shoot vertical and horizontal

(except if shooting square!). When the

momentum passes, change location.

Ladies and gentlemen of the class of 2011,

if I could offer you only one tip on how not to

take ‘never-fail’ portraits, composition would

be it. Composing a portrait can be a very

intimate and bonding experience, but try not

to confuse this with an invitation to flirt or

ask for a date. In my experience this has

never ended well. If, however, they ask you,

then by all means go for it.

Try not to have one locked idea about

the sort of composition you would like to

achieve. Mistakes I have made include

setting up for a tight headshot before a

jetlagged, cold-riddled, spotty individual

shuffled into the room. They simply said no!

Beware of having any preconceptions

about your subject (except perhaps if it’s

actor Danny Dyer). If your subject is an actor

do not quote one of their lines. If they are a

comedian, do not ask them to tell you a joke.

Do not tell them a joke. I asked hypnotist

Paul McKenna to “look into my lens, not

around the lens but straight into my lens”

before having released the shutter, which

meant the rest of the shoot was conducted

in relative silence. Don’t overwhelm the

subject immediately with suggestions.

Kit can be a burden; don’t shock your

subjects with too much. If you have bought

or hired it specifically for the shoot do not

feel obliged to use it. Match the kit to

the sitter. If you want to compose a

strong portrait what you use must

come as second nature.

Props included constructively

can enhance a composition,

but avoid burdening the sitter.

A detail or suggestion will be enough.

Handing a shotgun to footballer turned

actor Vinnie Jones helped to achieve

a strong composition in a portrait forGQ

magazine (I asked him if it was loaded;

he fired it over my head in confirmation).

Do not overshoot. If you think you have it

in the bag after 20 minutes or if the subject

becomes disengaged, wrap it up.

Above all, don’t get stressed, but have fun;

it’s only a portrait. As the American

photographer Edward Weston wisely

imparted – consulting the rules of

composition before taking a photograph is

like consulting the laws of gravity before

going for a walk. Rules are there to be

broken. Somehow as photographers, through

practice, you will learn to just know.

A final warning: If you are lucky enough to

be commissioned to take a professional

portrait it is likely to be in a hotel; a great

hotel; and great hotels have great bars.

Do not rack up an exuberant bill

before or after the shoot and then

bill it to the sitter’s room; it is

unlikely to be well-received.

Do not eat garlic. Both will

compromise your composition. PM

Composition Peter Dench Lifestyle advisor

Carole Caplin

Footballer turned actor Vinnie Jones

Hypnotist Paul McKenna

GOONLINE

For moretechniques andadvice visit the websitewww.photography

monthly.com


DO NOT OVERSHOOT. IF YOU THINK YOU HAVE IT

IN THE BAG AFTER 20 MINUTES OR IF THE SUBJECT

BECOMES DISENGAGED, WRAP IT UP.”




1 Profoto-7a 2400 power pack with

Profoto head

1 Elinchrom medium Octabank

1 Hasselblad H1 camera with 80mm lens

1 Leaf Aptus 75 digital back

Alternative lighting options: 1 Bowens Quad 2400 Studio Kit

(£2,419.99)

1 Bowens Octo 150 soft box (£590)

TECHNIQUE USED

Taken from my Evolution series, this

image demonstrates moderate

Rembrandt lighting where the model

is simply, yet dramatically, lit. I call it

‘moderate’ because there is a greater

amount of fill light than is traditionally

present. This is a popular lighting

technique because only one light

source is required to create a

compelling image that resembles the

singular, natural light of the sun.

For this shot, I placed a medium

Elinchrom Octabank high and about

6ft to camera left. A white V-Flat sits

just out of frame to camera right and

helps to fill the shadows on that side.

USING A SINGLE LIGHT SOURCE

ON A BUDGET?You don’t need to buy a white

reflector panel specificallydesigned for the job if you

want to start experimenting with reflective light. You

could start out by using whitepolystyrene ceiling panels

from a builders’ merchants orDIY store fixed to

some stiff card.

KIT USED

BIOGRAPHY

Have you ever looked at a portrait and wondered how it was lit? What lights and reflectors

were used and where they were positioned? For professional photographer TED SABARESE,

finding out the answers to these questions has become a constant obsession which

takes the form of his blog Guess the Lighting. Now he’s brought his limited drawing technique

and expert lighting knowledge to his own work exclusively for Photography Monthly.

T E D

S A B A

R E S E

White V-Flat

Elinchrom Octabank

LIGHTUPYOUR LIFE

Ted is based in New York

and his clients include

computer giant

Microsoft, toymaker

Hasbro and clothing

brand Nike. He is

also editor of the blog,

Guess the Lighting.

www.tedsabarese.com




PHOTO ZONE

“ONLY ONE LIGHT SOURCEIS REQUIRED TO CREATEA COMPELLING IMAGETHAT RESEMBLES THESINGULAR, NATURAL LIGHTOF THE SUN.”

GETTING THEPOSE RIGHT

By asking his subject to look

slightly to the right Ted hasbeen able to create a verythoughtful mood to the

portrait while also being ableto use the one light source

to illuminate the main areaof the face.

Lighting setups Ted Sabarese



“FOR MY HUNGER

PAINS SERIES,I WANTED PUNCHY

LIGHTING THAT

DREW THE EYEQUICKLY TO THE

MODEL, BUT ALSOFELT THEATRICAL.”

USING PROPSWhen using props such as thepodium Ted has chosen here,make sure to use strong andsimple shapes that enhance

the subject’s pose rather thandistract from the main focus

of the image. The propsand subject should feel and

look as one.




2 Profoto-7a 2400

power packs

with Profoto heads

1 Profoto white

beauty dish

1 Elinchrom large

striplight box

1 Hasselblad H1

camera with

80mm lens

1 Leaf Aptus 75

digital back

Alternative lightingoptions:

1 Broncolor Visatec

Solo 232

Monolight Flash 2

head kit

2400w (£2,358)

1 Broncolor

striplight box

USING TWO LIGHTS TOGETHER

KIT USED

T E D

S A B A R E S E

TECHNIQUE USED

White beauty dish

Striplight box

AD


PHOTO ZONE

WHY MEDIUM

FORMAT?Professional photographerschoose the right format forthe type of image they are

shooting, the type of locationthey are shooting in and how

the final image will be used.In this case Ted needed the

extra quality of the medium format.

ONA BUDGET?If you don’t have a striplightbox, you can always

experiment with using full-length reflective panelsto bounce even light on to

the model or using aflashgun on a stand ina full-length soft box.

Using fewer lights usually translates into

creating more drama. For my Hunger Pains

series, I wanted punchy lighting that drew the

eye quickly to the model, but also felt theatrical.

The soft, almost spot-lit key light places the

model and her clothes figuratively (and quite

literally) on display. I allowed the background

to go darker by moving the model away from it

and not throwing any additional light on to it.

My key light is a white beauty dish placed high

and 7ft to camera left. A large striplight box,

with its bottom half flagged off, sits similarly to

camera right for fill at two stops less than the

key. Just for the record, this was pre-Lady Gaga.




2 Profoto-7a 2400 power packs with

Profoto heads

1 Chimera medium striplight box

1 Profoto grid reflector with 20° grid

1 Hasselblad 503CW with 80mm lens

1 Kodak Ektachrome Epp100 colour slide

film

Alternative lighting options: 1 Elinchrom Digital 2400 RX pack and

digital A3000N head (£2,430)

1 Interfit SLBR39 30cm x 90cm

striplight box (£95)

1 Elinchrom grid reflector

1 Elinchrom 18cm 60° reflector and

20° honeycomb grid set (£41.99)

KIT USED

TECHNIQUE USED

USING TWO LIGHTS TOGETHER

BALANCINGLIGHT

There are few rules to lighting

a portrait and as you can seefrom this portrait,Ted hasbalanced his lights by

creating a series of reflectorswhich soften light and create

subtle highlights andshadows.

“THIS EFFECT HELPS TO SEPARATE THE SUBJECTFROM THE ENVIRONMENT IT IS CONTAINED IN.”

20° grid reflector

Medium striplight

Another great way to utilise a two-light setup

involves lighting the background as well as the

model. This effect helps to separate the

subject from the environment it is contained

in, in this case, black seamless paper. For this

image, I placed a medium striplight box nearly

perpendicular to the model, concentrating the

light, and the viewer’s attention, on her face

and nose. You can see the light fall off on the

back of her arm and head. To cut down on the

contrast, I did place a white V-Flat just out of

frame to camera left for fill. I then positioned

a reflector with a 20° grid behind her and by

aiming it at the background, I created

a glowing halo around her head

(bringing even more focus to her face).

White V-Flat





PHOTO ZONE

USING A SINGLE LIGHT AND THE SUN

1 Profoto-7b 1200 power pack with head

1 Profoto white beauty dish

1 Canon EOS-1Ds MkII body with 50mm lens

Alternative lighting options: 1 Elinchrom Style 1200 RX twin kit (£1,649)

1 Interfit SLBR39 30cm x 90cm striplight box

(£95)

1 Elinchrom 44cm silver beauty dish with

deflectors (£138.99)

T E D

S A B A R E S E

KIT USED

TECHNIQUE USED

THINK BIG!Ted’s concept here is big andso is his attention to detail,

and it is this attention to thecomposition that makes this

image so strong. But it isactually a simple idea simply

lit. It is also an image thatcould be created using a large

reflector and natural light.

“I LOVE THE DIFFERENT

EFFECTS YOU CAN

ACHIEVE BY BRINGING

STROBES OUTSIDE INTO

THE DAYLIGHT.”

White beauty dish

I love the different effects you can achieve by

bringing strobes outside into the daylight.

Depending on power levels you can add just

a touch of drama or even make day look like

night. Here I used a single, white beauty dish to

highlight my yoga practitioner and create a

focal point. The sun is behind everyone to

camera right, as you can see from the couple

sitting in the foreground. The beauty dish,

placed4ft to camera right, is a stop and a half

stronger than the sunlight falling on the rest of

the group. If I had increased its power, the

background models would be even darker. PM



Open College of the Arts

www.oca-uk.com

0800 731 2116

by OCA student Victoria Rahm

BA (Hons) Photography

Learn from home

In your own time

Start when you want

Study just one course

...or a full degree.



APRIL ISSUEISSUE PODCAST

The Editor of Photography Monthly , Grant Scott,

and deputy editor Sean Samuels speakabout what

caught their eye and the latest innovations from

Focus on Imaging 2011 at Birmingham NEC. Goes live

on 23 March 2011.

SPECIAL PODCASTNIKON MASTERMIND FINAL

The final contestants of our Mastermind quiz,

sponsored by Nikon, go head to head to see who

will win the Nikon D3s worth £ 4,200.

MARCH ISSUEISSUE PODCAST

Grant Scott and Sean Samuels speak to National

Geographic photographer Jim Richardson about his

wonderful landscape work made in the Hebrides.

They also discuss the latest news from the world

of photography.

FEBRUARY 2011ISSUE PODCAST

Grant and Sean discuss their time at the CES Show

in Las Vegas and reveal all their favourite things.

This book gives a stunning account ofpioneering ocean photography and modernportraiture. New commissions fromlifeboatman Nigel Millard and yachtsmanRick Tomlinson, both leading photographers,are shown alongside historic treasures fromthe world’s finest maritime collections.For your chance to win a copy, worth £30,enter our competition atwww.photographymonthly.com

WE’RE ONYOUR

WIN!

In case you missed them…

PODCAST

OCEAN PORTRAITS

SPECIAL ISSUETEST ZONE AWARDS SPECIAL PODCAST

Grant and Sean discuss the winners of this year’s

Test Zone Awards, as featured in the December

issue of the magazine.

JANUARY 2011MASTERS SPECIAL PODCAST

In this month’s masters special podcast, Sean

speaks to Steve Bloom about his creative

approach to photographing wildlife, his career

and the future of photography.

DECEMBER 2010ISSUE PODCAST

Grant and Sean speakto British professional

photographer Jake Chessum, who has shot many top

rockbands and celebrities, about his approach to

capturing group portraits. Jake shares his passion

and advice tohelp you take better photographs.

MASTERS SPECIAL PODCAST

In this month’s special podcast, Sean speaksto our

Lighting Master, Neil Turner, about how he uses

flashguns to add depth and atmosphere to family and

group portraits.

Thanks to everyone who has listened to our monthly podcastsover the past two years. In case you missed any, they are availablevia the website and can be downloaded from iTunes.

WAVELENGTH


TO FACE

THEBACK

CATALOGUEAll of our podcasts featuringphotographer interviews and

industry news specialsare available online.www.photography

monthly.com

FACE

NOVEMBERISSUE PODCAST

Grant and Sean speak to professional

photographer James Appleton and discover how

he captures extreme colour in his landscape

images. They also discuss their time at Photokina

2010 in Germany.

MASTERS SPECIAL PODCAST

In this month’s masters special podcast, Sean

speaks to C J Kale and Nick Selway, two Hawaiian

landscape photographers who have pioneered

a new way of shooting the world’s longest-running

volcano – from the surf into which it flows.

Find out how they risked their lives for the

opportunity to make some amazing shots. PM



This month, as even more cameras are launched with movingimage capabilities, JOHN CAMPBELL recommends some ofthe best films being created on DSLRs and keeps you informedabout how the world of still photography is merging withfilm to keep us updated from the political and social frontlinesaround the world.

CUTAND

ACTION...

[74] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY APRIL 2 011

HOLD THE FRONT PAGE

BIOGRAPHY

John Campbell received his MA in

film from the International Film

School, Wales. He won the

cinematography award at the

Bristol International Film Festival

for a short film called Blue Morning You in 1999.

He now works as a freelance film maker for

public bodies and arts organisations across the

UK and mainland Europe.

THE RUMOUR MILL

THE DOGS OF WARDanfung Dennis, a photojournalist turned film maker, has opened the door for allDSLR film makers after taking two top prizes in the documentary category of the

Sundance Film Festival in Utah, USA. His film Hell and Back Again, shot on a

Canon EOS 5D MkII, won the world cinema jury and cinematography awards.It follows a marine fighting in the Afghanistan war and his subsequent rehabilitation.

Danfung asks two fundamental questions: What does it mean to lead men into war

and what does it mean to come home? The trailer speaks far louder than any words.

www.danfungdennis.com

SHOW ME THE MONEYThat wasn’t the only Sundance DSLR news, because the indie movie Like Crazy ,

directed by Drake Doremus and shot on a Canon EOS 7D, was given the US

dramatic competition grand jury prize, with English actress Felicity Jones receivingthe special jury prize for her performance in the film. Like Crazy has since been

sold to Paramount Pictures for a whopping $4 million (£2.5 million).

www.photographymonthly.com/bv04

FROM THE FRONTLINEThe mass protests in North Africa have shown again that in places where political

unrest harbours fears of outside interference, the ability to shoot covertly or at

least subtly puts the DSLR into a class of its own. Sky News reporters used theCanon EOS 5D MkII again to film remarkable footage of the violence in Egypt.

Apparently, they used the Canon EF 24-105mm IS kit lens with no rig or Z-finder,

and the audio was recorded on a Tascam DR-100 recorder and a Sennheiser mic.www.photographymonthly.com/cr04

The Canon EOS 5D MkII– is the MkIII on the way?

The word is that Canon

is about to launch themuch-anticipated

EOS 5D MkIII or 6D, with

a suggested

24-megapixel sensor

and a dual DIGIC 4

processor. It may also

have an articulated LCD

screen with 1.04 million

dots, which will surelyinterest film makers,

and have the advantage

of being a touch screen,

making it the first full

frame camera to have

such technology.

According to the

rumour, it will be

released by the middleof the year, so watch

this space.




FILMS TO WATCH

Gale Tattersall is a world-renowned cinematographer whose cinema credits include The Commitments,

Ghost Ship, Pushing Tin, Wild Orchid , Tank Girl and The Addams Family . He is now director of photography

for the American TV series House, starring Hugh Laurie as the crotchety doctor. Gale recently shot a

whole episode of House on Canon EOS 5D MkII HDSLRs, which now reside permanently in his toolkit.

Gale has decided to share his knowledge and techniques with film makers, students and budding artists

in a series of live online workshops on Vimeo. Spaces are limited, so be quick. The workshops will takeplace over three Sundays in April, and cost $400 (£247) a session.

http://hddslrworkshops.com/sign-up/

Insider techniques to helpimprove your film making.

EVER WONDER HOW THEY FILMA MOVING BULLET?One of this month’s ‘Films to Watch’, Alex Roman’s

Above Everything Else, shows how manipulating

time is an important aspect of the philosophy of

the film-making language. The tip this month is to

help you on the road to controlling time.

As photographers, controlling shutter speed is

a basic requirement of producing great images.

Leave it open and you can capture an image over

a period of seconds, minutes or hours. For example,

keep your shutter open long enough and you will

capture the stars as they move across the night

sky,causing trails to appear on your final image.

Likewise, if you use a quick exposure, you will

capture a split-second of time.

But as you might have found when shooting film

on your DSLR, you’re pretty much stuck with 25frames per second – at least if you want to capture

motion in real time. If you wantto capture objects

in slow motion, you must increase the shutter

speed. It sounds counter-intuitive, but increasing

shutter speed allows you to play back your footage

in slow motion. If you were to shootat 50fps, then

your footage would be 50% slower when played

back at normal speed, which is 25fps. This is

because you have shot twice as many frames as

normal in a second.

The most important part of this tip is to work

only in multiples of 25, otherwise playback could

potentially result in mistiming; so if you have

planned images to sync up with other video or

audio, it will probably result in everything beingout of sync. This is the same way they shoot

fast-moving objects such as bullets: shooting with

an extremely fast shutter speed.

Also remember that the higher the shutter

speed, the more light you are going to need.

ZACUTO Z-FINDER PRO 2.5XZacuto’s Z-Finder Pro 2.5x is top of our price list at

£326.76. It has 2.5x focusable magnification (3x is

available), a40mm diameter Zacuto optical designed lens,an anti-fog coating protective cover, an eyecup preventing

extraneous light leakage, a diopter and a field of view

matched to 3in LCD screens. The diopter allows you to dialin the focus to match your eye. The Pro 2.5x is attached

via a mount that sits on the bottom of the camera, making

the viewfinder secure from bumps and knocks, which isessential if you are moving around in a frantic bid to get

footage. Zacuto is one of the leaders in producing

equipment designed for HDSLR film making and the

Pro 2.5x is excellent for the semi-pro film maker.You will wonder how you have ever managed without one.

http://store.zacuto.com/Z-Finder-Pro-2.5x.html

LCD VIEWFINDER 3/2My midprice choice is the LCD ViewFinder 3/2, which is

compatible with the Canon EOS 550D and 60D. At £96,

this is a good example of basic kit available for the HDSLRmarket. Even though this is a midrange viewfinder,

it packs a punch. The LCDVF 3/2 turns your video-enabled

DSLR LCD screen into a huge electronic viewfinder forprecise image evaluation – it’s like viewing a42in screen

from 55in (140cm).

www.videogear.co.uk/DSLR-Gear/LCDVF/LCDVF-3/2-

Loupe-for-550D-/-T2i-/-60D/prod_1142.html

CARRYSPEED VFINDERAt the lower price of around £50 (through Amazon or eBay

stores), the CarrySpeed Vfinder is a great choice for newfilm makers. Being magnetised, the viewfinder is prone to

being knocked off the camera if it is bumped with any force.

But as a starter piece of kit and considering what itprovides when it comes to shielding you from the sun,

I would rather have this than nothing at all.

www.carryspeed.com PM

KIT CHECKWhen it comes to recording video on yourDSLR, it is important to feel secure that

what you are seeing is what you aregetting, so a viewfinder for your screen isinvaluable. They block out excess lightand offer superb clarity. Using one meansyou’ll never miss a sequence again.

TIP OF THE MONTH

COURSE/EVENT

OUT OF A FORESTThe short film Out of a Forest is an

award-winning animation which is beautifulto look at and features great storytelling.

Director Tobias Gundorff Boesen shot the

5min 53sec film in the forests surroundingViborg, Denmark, and got his inspiration

from Victorian literature and the albumBoxer by US rock band the National. “It waspainful to finish, as shooting stop-motion in

the forest at night for long periods offered

a lot of problems. But i t was also great funand an adventure,” he says. This animation

just shows what can be achieved by utilising

the diversity of DSLR film making. It’s amust-see short whose visual approach will

inspire any budding film maker.

http://vimeo.com/9335203

SAY YESAlthough shot primarily with a Sony EX3with Letus lens adaptor and Nikon and Zeiss

primes, the film Say Yes, directed by Darren

Symonds, is a great example of howseamlessly a Canon EOS 5D MkII can cut it

alongside other HD cameras. Symonds

needed the 5D for this New Zealand-shotfilm because, as we are hearing increasingly,

it has an outstanding ability to shoot in low

light. Cinematographer Ben Ruffell, whoused the 5D mainly to shoot the night

scenes such as the bathtub and taxi

sequences, said: “I really like working with

both of these systems – and I often usethem together on the same shoot.”

http://vimeo.com/user1942955

ABOVE EVERYTHING ELSEFor all of you photographers and film

makers, understanding time is of the utmostimportance. After all, mastering the abilityto capture a moment in time is what

photography is about. Film making, though,

has the added ability to control time byeither speeding it up or slowing it down.

Above Everything Else, by Alex Roman,

shows the power of slowing down film.Underscored by music, it shows us what we

would not normally see in real time,

delivering a unique glimpse of the world

in all its microcosmic beauty. http://vimeo.com/user1337612

FILM SCHOOL

Shooting film on your DSLR John Campbell

To read more of John’s Film School columnsvisit www.photographymonthly.com



P E T E R

V E

R V E R


Dutchman Peter Verver is an image manipulatorand photographer, at the forefront of digitalphotography. Peter has a studio in Eindhoven,in the south of the Netherlands, but shoots on

location around the world.www.shootings.nl

BIOGRAPHY – PETER VERVER




Photo manipulation Post-production masters

THE PROJECTThis manipulation of St Peter’s Square in

Rome is another image I did for S-lec.

The company wanted to show famous

European places: Rome, London, Brussels,

St Petersburg and Berlin, with their

landmark buildings and a big glass

number 10. My brief was that the images

had to have a serene atmosphere,

in which the number 10 would fit well.

THE STARTThe main difficulty with this shoot was

that from 9am until sunset there were

just too many p eople in t he square.

As St Peter’s Square is made of shiny

stones it’s almost impossible to do what I

normally would – take lots of images and

combine the empty parts into one shot.

Instead I decided to take the main image

really early in the morning when there

were only a few people on the square, just

after the stones had had their daily clean

and were still a little wet and shiny.

As it was so early in the morning, I was

shooting in low light and big areas of

shadow were underexposed in my

photographs. To combat this I shot lots of

exposures from almost black (-5 stops) to

almost white (+5 stops), so I would be

This precise way of shooting is essential

for this kind of work and it makes life

much easier when it comes to actually

making the manipulation.

The next morning I shot the pictures

of the camels, Bedouin, sand dunes,

rocks, and all the other elements you see

in the picture. When you shoot ‘extra’pictures like this you need to be really

precise. For example, if you know that

a man is going to be put in the image on

the left side, take the picture of him

from the left side, not the middle.

I always make a rough combination of

the images while I’m on location to

see if they will work – not when I get

home and it’s too late.

CLEANINGTHE IMAGEBack home in my studio, I developed my

images from the shoot using Adobe’s

RAW converter, in Lightroom 3, and

created 16-bit PSD files. I then started

cleaning up the images, something that

is essential to do before combining them.

WORKING WITHLAYERS AND MASKSNext, I did all the necessary masking,

which I do in Photoshop using brushes,

colour range, Mask Pro, contrast layers

and channels. I never use the pre-set

tools in Photoshop, as I feel they are not

precise enough for high-resolution files.

All my masks have different outlines –

soft, feathered, very hard and

so on. I finalise all of these by hand.

MANIPULATINGTHE IMAGEMy next step was to reposition all the

different inputs on the main image,

so everything was in the position I

wanted and shot for. With this done, it

was time to put in the 3D part of the

image: the top of the pyramid. Using my

Exif data and the information I got from

the reflection ball I had photographed

when on location in Cairo, I was able to

create a really natural 3D image.

One of the nice things about Exif and

positioning data, which tells you where,

when and at what time you took the

image, is that I can put this data into

Cinema 4D and the software can then

create the precise shadow and light

combination, which you would have got

at that place and at the exact time

of day. I created a multi-layer file with

the glass top to put in my Photoshop

file. I repositioned it slightly and

brushed it in by hand, as the edges

always need some fine tuning.

GETTING THECOLOUR RIGHTFinally comes the trickiest part of the

manipulation: colour, contrast and

feeling. I find these elements are often

underestimated by a lot of people –

putting images together is quite easy,

but giving the image that special

feeling of reality is not. I again used

many tools to achieve the finished

image: curves, desaturation and an

extra black-and-white layer to get the

finished image right. I find that adding

an extra black-and-white layer on top of

your image, set to multiple with the

opacity brought back to 40%, gives a

really nice-looking, desaturated image.

PETER’S EQUIPMENT

Peter shoots with Hasselblad H3D-39, Canon

EOS-1Ds MkIII, Canon EOS 5D MkII and Canon EOS

7D cameras, with a range of lenses for both

systems. The vast majority of Peter’s images

are shot on location, where he lights with two

Hensel Porty 1200 power packs, four heads,Canon 580EX II Speedlites with PocketWizards

and an assortment of reflectors, umbrellas

and soft boxes.

On location Peter uses a 13in MacBook Pro.

For studio work and image manipulation he has

two Mac Pro computers with 16 gigabytes of

RAM, both with 24in Eiso monitors, 19in second

monitors and a Wacom A3+ tablet. Peter uses

Adobe Photoshop 5, Adobe Lightroom 3,

Cinema4D and Hasselblad’s Phocus software

with a range of third-party plug-ins, including

those from Topaz Mask Pro and Nik.

02




P E T E

R

V E R V E R

able to combine the images later and

have some detail left. I worked out the

right angle, focal length, height and

position I needed to shoot from, so it

would all work when merged.

FINDING THERIGHTSHOTI used a lot of layers with this image.

It’s so very important to put all the layers

in maps, giving each a name, so that you

keep an overview of the manipulation –

it’s crucial to work in an organised way in

Photoshop. I had a map with layers of the

main image, a map with different layers of

people, one with the new sky, one for

overall curves, colour correction and

desaturation etc. I did my manipulation

using exactly the same steps as the

pyramid image.

THE PROJECTI was commissioned to do this

manipulation for Mitsubishi Europe.

The film Ice Age 2 had just been

released and ‘ice is coming’ was the

concept behind this campaign.

The biggest problem I faced was that

it was the middle of summer and my

client had asked for an image of a

mammoth in a snowy street.

LOOKING FOR IMAGESI started to do internet research and soon

discovered that a ‘museum-mammoth’

was not an option, so we bought a stock

image of a mammoth, solely because of

the time of year.

Normally I shoot the most difficult part

of the end result first, but in this case I

had no choice but to resort to using

stock. Again, via the internet, I found that

there was a vacuum-sealed replica

mammoth, approximately four metres

high, in the Netherlands. So I arranged

for the mammoth to be placed on four

plateaus with wheels, so it could be

turned at any angle and direction in

which I wanted to shoot it, to fit it into

the background stock image I already

had. Using Phocus software I can put a

layer underneath the shooting layer,

which is what I did here. I shot the

mammoth tethered to my Mac Book, so I

was immediately able to see if it would

fit. I had to change angle and position a

couple of times to get the right result

against a white background. I used a

white screen as a background to get the

snowy reflection on the mammoth, so

it would eventually fit well into the

background of the final manipulation.

CUTTING OUTThe first thing I did was to mask the

mammoth. I used ReMask 2 and

third-party software from Topaz, as

masking by hand would be complicated

because of the mammoth’s fine fur.

COLOUR CORRECTIONWith good layer organisation and

handmade masks, the mammoth fitted

into the image well. The feeling, contrast

and ‘blending in’ were a matter of colour

corrections, desaturation, curves, and

softening and hardening of the masks.

BRINGING THEIMAGETO LIFEWith the mammoth now in place, I added

more snow as per my brief. Finally, I

sharpened the mammoth and increased

the contrast of its fur so much that it

looked almost frozen. I added grain all

over, so that the quality matched the high

ISO of the background stock image

I used. Right at the end I added more

grain all over the total shot, to combine

the images perfectly.

Jan Drenth worked alongside Peter on

the manipulations. www.jandrenth.com

PHOTO ZONE

03

“THE BIGGEST PROBLEM

I FACED WAS THAT

IT WAS THE MIDDLE

OF SUMMER AND MY

CLIENT HAD ASKED

FOR AN IMAGE OF A

MAMMOTH IN

A SNOWY STREET.



01[80] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY A P R I L 2 011

THEPROJECTI wanted to create an ocean scene, with

waves crashing against a harbour – this

simple idea was the beginning of the

manipulation. There was to be a huge

storm above a boat; but despite its

darkness, I wanted the image to maintain

optimism, hence the boat heading towards

the sunset. Before I started I knew I

wanted the image to have the feel of

a Victorian oil painting too.

TAKING THESHOTSShooting the images of the waves in the

bottom of the shot was the starting point

of this process. I shot about 50 to 60

images so that I could develop, in my mind,

the perfect wave. When shooting the waves,

I made sure that the exposures were good,

to provide the detail needed for me to be

more creative in post-production.

I had a very particular type of boat in

mind for this image and as a result I spent

a week in Cork, Ireland, scouring the

coastline for the perfect one. The boat I

finally chose to photograph had the right

scale, look and feel to enable this picture to

work. This shot took me about a month and

a half to put together. My work is very much

like putting a puzzle together.

HOW TO CREATE DREAM LANDSCAPES




A N D R E W

B R O O K S

PHOTO ZONE

CHOOSING THECOMPOSITIONAll the elements in this manipulation were

brought together as about 130 separate

layers. Through careful use of the transform

tool I was able to rotate the elements and

skew them, positioning the layers to work

with the other images. Using careful layer

mask selections, I was then able to slowly

bring all the photographic elements into one

full composition. At this point, the image was

still a crude jigsaw, in need of refining.

DRAWING OUTTHECOLOURSNext, I started to work on the different

parts of the scene, working to feather

sections, soften edges and draw out

different colours within each area of the

scene. I did this by feathering lassoed

selections and then using the feather tool

to soften the edges. I created the glow

of the sunset using about 30 feathered

selections, which enabled me to slowly

introduce warm colours into the shot.

By adding colour you can change the

atmosphere of the picture dramatically.

In this image it was about emphasising

the blue-green hues in the wave

against the warm tones of the sun.

ADDING IN THE DETAILSWith the composition roughly sorted and

colour introduced, I next added the fine

detail. I drew out colour that already

existed in the image and also made some

elements lighter and some darker, to make

them more vivid within the scene. I also

added more complex detail – for example,

I created the foam on the wave by inverting

the blackbirds to pure white.

BRINGING THE IMAGETO LIFEEmbedding the boat in the shot so it looks

real was important, so the viewer feels as if

they are in the scene. To do this I sampled

an area near the sunset by the birds and

pasted it on to the glass of the boat’s

window, to create a realistic reflection of

the sunset. I tried to visualise how much

colour would be reflected and as a result

had to really tone down the colour and light

to ensure it was realistic.


Andrew Brooks is a digital artist based inManchester who creates hyper-real manipulationsby stitching together hundreds of individualphotographs. Andrew’s shooting process is allabout collecting as much visual informationas possible from the real world and then building

this into his final pieces using Photoshop.www.andrewbrooksphotography.com

BIOGRAPHY – ANDREW BROOKS

ANDREW’S EQUIPMENT

Andrew shoots with a Nikon D700 and a variety

of lenses, from 22mm to 300mm. Andrew works

on a 27in Dual-Core iMac and exclusively in

Adobe Photoshop CS5, also using Adobe After

Effects CS5.

“EMBEDDING THE BOATIN THE SHOT SO ITLOOKS REAL WASIMPORTANT, SO THEVIEWER FEELS AS IFTHEY ARE IN THE SCENE.




THE PROJECTI was visiting Shanghai to get inspiration for

my work when I came across Nanjing Road,

one of the busiest places I’ve ever visited.

I decided to create an image that would

allow othersto feel as I did when I was there.

THEPROJECTThis image was developed over about five or

six minutes as I walked down the street and

shotabout80 frames. I knew I’d need a

range of exposures, for example, having

darker images of the sky and having cloud

detail available, so I bracketed my exposure.

CREATING THEBACKGROUNDI started this manipulation with the

background, which is a composite of about

five or sixphotos. As I knew the foreground

would be so detailed, I kept the background

fairly simple. The flag on the right was part

of the actual background, although the flag

in the child’s hand was an addition. The sun

was naturally above the building and, coming

down the street in this way, created flare in

the shot. I simply used a darker exposure to

retain the detail in the clouds.

CHOOSING THEFOREGROUNDI then got to work on the foreground.

By working with many different photos, I was

able to take the people in the best positions

and most interesting poses for my final

piece. Working in this way meant there were

about 150 photos creating about 75 layers.

FINDING THE FOCALPOINTI decided to have the child as the centre

point, with everyone else facing in another

direction. The child was one of the few

people looking back at me. I knew from the

moment the child looked into my lens, he

would be the centre pointof the image.

The flag in his hand was added and the red

made more vivid, to increase its prominence.

CHOOSING THE COLOURPALETTEI wanted to create a warm, golden feeling,

with the colours of the sun bringing a

sun-bleached, optimistic atmosphere, so I

used curves to inject more red and yellow.

GIVINGTHE IMAGEDEPTHAsyou can see, the centreof the image is

a little misty, to develop the feeling

02




PHOTO ZONE


of distance. I created this by painting the

area witha low-opacity whitewash.

THEPROJECTIn this image ofShanghai atnightI wanted to

capture the different layersof the city, from

the corporate area in the background tothe

bustling streetscene in the foreground.

GETTING THE SHOTSThis image is a composite shot, taken out of

the ninth-floor window of a hotel. Shooting at

night meantworking with long exposures of

about two or three seconds. I wanted to

capture the movement ofpeople, so I took

many exposures of the same section

ofstreet,to givemea choiceof people to

incorporate in the image.

CHOOSING THECOMPOSITIONI started by openingall the images and

arranging them next toeach other tosee

how they interacted. I selected a central

image,near thecluttered rooftops, to be

the start point, whichI would then build

on.Then I extended the canvas tocreate

room around it, toallow me space tobuild

in the additional detail I wanted toadd.

I did this by simply usingcopy and paste.

MAKINGTHE IMAGESWORKAs I added eachnew detail tothe piece, I

used the transform tool at a low opacity

toposition and overlapthe images. I then

used layer masks topaintout any detail not

required forthe final composition. After all

the imageswere incorporated, I flattened

the layerstocreateonecompositescene.

MAKINGTHE IMAGEGLOWI wanted the shotto havea neon look, with

vivid greens and purples lightingup the

scene, soI added this element.I did soby

making careful selections and feathering

edges,and later using curves toinject the

colours. Many of these tones actually existed

withinthe original photographs – I just made

an enhanced version. I added contrastby

making the whites lighter and the blacks

deeper, using Photoshop’sdodge and burn

tools. I also added a glow tothe neon colours

and lightened the sky togive it a daytime

brightness. The last stage was to increase

saturation to thecolours, creating an almost

science-fiction-like feel. A N D R

E W

B R O O K S

03



01

[84] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY AP RI L 2 011

THE PROJECT

I was walking in the small town of

Novelda, Spain, when a small tree with

lots of blossom caught my eye, so I took

several shots of it, exploring unusual

angles. When I reviewed my images at

home, I liked the image that I used for the

starting point of this manipulation, but it

didn’t really say anything to me. So I

started thinking about spring and had the

idea for the butterflies. With this in mind,

I set to work on the manipulation.

CHOOSING THE IMAGESAs my image of the tree already looked

good, I didn’t make any unnecessary

adjustments to it. I searched through my

image library to find a photograph of

a butterfly that would work well with the

tree. In Photoshop, I cut out the butterfly

using the pen tool, saved it out and then

copied and pasted it into my background

tree image. I decided to put the

butterfly in the centre of the image,

for a dramatic composition.

WORKING WITH THE

LIGHT AND COLOURSWhen I initially put both images together,

the butterfly didn’t look like part of

the image, so I added shadow below the

butterfly and to the left, to respect

the natural direction of the light and

make it look like it belonged. To add

the shadow, I selected a small area

to house the butterfly, in the background

image, with the lasso tool and modified

the levels to darken this selected area.

To get the vignette effect in the image,

I used the Colour Efex Pro filter from Nik

Software. I opened the plug-in and

selected the darken/lighten filter and

adjusted border luminosity. Next, I applied

another filter from Nik Software, called

Duplex, which allows you to create an

effect like Duotone, using only black and

one additional colour. You can make

several effects by moving the control of

this filter, but for this image the default

worked well.

ADDING TEXTURE TOTHE IMAGEI wanted to add some texture to the

image, so I selected a suitable texture

from my archive and copied and pasted it

into the image, changing the mode of the

layer to multiply. I did this because you

have to change the opacity mode to

multiply to make the ‘lights’ transparent.

BRINGING THE IMAGETO LIFEI had created the digital manipulation

I wanted, but it still needed some work to

make it look good. I wanted to increase

the image’s highlights and luminosity, so I

used a new levels layer to do so, boosting

the levels of highlights, by sliding the

white arrows to the left. Finally I modified

the colour balance by applying a balance

colour layer, selecting mid tones

and increasing the level of yellow.

HOW TO CREATE ABSTRACT LANDSCAPES

Spanish photographer Luis Beltrán uses his digitalmanipulations to tell the stories of his daydreams.Luis’s style is quietly seductive and his imagesall share the same dreamlike quality because oftheir deeply saturated and muted colour.Digital manipulation allows Luis to add theelements which are central to his finished pieces.www.luisbeltran.es

BIOGRAPHY - LUIS BELTRÁN

L U I S

B E L T R Á N

LUIS’S EQUIPMENT

Luis shoots with a Canon EOS400D and Nikon

D7000. He works on a 27in Apple iMac, which he

uses with a Wacom Intuos4 L tablet. Luis creates

his digital manipulations using Adobe Photoshop

and Nik Software plug-ins.

SO I STARTED THINKINGABOUT SPRING

AND HAD THE IDEA FORTHE BUTTERFLIES.WITH THIS IN MIND, ISET TO WORK ON THEMANIPULATION.”



PHOTO ZONE

“I DECIDED TO PUT

THE BUTTERFLY IN

THE CENTRE OFTHE IMAGE FOR A

DRAMATIC

COMPOSITION.





WORKING LIKE THISYOU NEED TO BECAREFUL WITH THE

PROPORTIONS –THEY HAVE TO BEREALISTIC, OR IT JUSTWON’T WORK.”




PHOTO ZONE


THE PROJECTI wanted to create something between

life and death, something mystical and

spiritual, so I went to the cemetery to

find inspiration. After taking several

photographs, I saw a good composition:

the dramatic angle you see in this

manipulation. While I was taking the

picture, I decided I was going to add a

little boy running toward the light. I then

knew exactly what I wanted to create.

CHOOSING THE IMAGESI found a photograph of a boy that I

wanted to use in my final image, cut him

out using the pen tool and then saved

this file. I copied and pasted the boy into

the cemetery image, putting him in the

centre and adjusted so that he was to

scale. When working like this you need to

be careful with the proportions – they

have to be realistic, or it just won’t work.

CHOOSING THECOLOUR PALETTENext, I decreased the colour of the boy,

to fit in with the rest of the image.

I created a new tone/saturation layer,

which I wanted to affect only the boy, so I

selected ‘create clipping mask’ from the

layers menu and made the adjustments

affect only this area.

ADDING GRAIN ANDTEXTURETo add a diffused, cool mood to the

image, as well as adding some grain and

a soft-focus effect, I applied the Monday

morning filter from Nik Software. To add

texture to my finished piece, I opened

the texture I wanted from my archive,

selected it, and copied and pasted it into

the image. I changed the mode to

multiply and then the opacity of this new

layer, so the texture could be seen.

BRINGING THE IMAGETO LIFEAt this point the image didn’t have any

pure whites and the image’s highlights

were missing, so I selected levels and

slid the highlights slider to the left,

increasing them to compensate for this

lack of luminosity. Finally, I created a

more dramatic, atmospheric effect by

modifying the ambient light. I selected

Nik Software’s darken/lighten filter and

increased the luminosity of the corners

and centre.

THE PROJECTWith this manipulation I simply wanted

to express the idea of family and what it

means to me.

PREPARING THEIMAGESTo begin with I created a new white

document. This manipulation is made

from four images – sheep, tree, sky and

grass – all of which I photographed

separately. I cut all of the elements from

their respective images, using the pen

tool. Next I copied the sky and grass

images and pasted them into the new

document to create my background

image. I copied and pasted in both the

tree and the sheep, so all the elements

were together. When working like this, I

always create a new layer mask to hide

any elements that I consider distracting.

CHOOSING THECOLOUR PALETTEWith this manipulation I chose to work

in black-and-white to give a dramatic

atmosphere. The next step was to create

a new black-and-white layer to convert

the image into greyscale. With this done,

I created a new adjustment layer and

adjusted the levels, darkening the overall

contrast of the image. Finally, I wanted

to darken the edges of the image and to

do this I again used Nik Software’s

darken/lighten filter, where you simply

use a slider to adjust. PM

L U I S

B E L T R Á N

02

03

For more techniques from the pros visit ourwebsite at www.photographymonthly.com




APPLE MACBOOK PRO 13inDimensions: Width: 32.5cm • Depth: 22.7cm • Height: 2.41cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 2.04kg • Screen size: 13in • Operating system: Snow Leopard • CPU: Intel

Core 2 Duo processor • Memory: 4GB • Storage: 250GB • Battery life: Up to 10 hours

With a bewildering range of laptops and notebooks on the market, JESSICA LAMB does all thehard work for you and chooses 12 of the best machines to meet the needs of today’s photographers.The ones selected here provide great power and functionality at prices to suit a range of budgets.

LAPOFTHE GODS

The 13in MacBook Pro features the latest 802.11n wireless

technology; its size and sleek aluminium design mean

that it will slot easily into most bags and cases, making it

ideal for photographers on the move. The MacBook Pro

comes with a 250GB hard drive as standard, but you can

upgrade to 500GB for an extra £123, giving you ample

space for photo libraries and files. The MacBook Pro

features a 1,066MHz high-speed memory with4GB as

standard but offers support for up to 8GB of RAM.

A new energy-efficient battery provides up to 10 hours’battery life when doing everyday tasks such as writing

and surfing the web. A seamless glass enclosure makes

the 13.3in display strong, ultra-thin and durable, while the

LED-backlit display with wide-angle viewing makes it

perfect for looking at images and watching movies.

MacBook Pros feature the new NVIDIA GeForce 320M

integrated graphics processor, giving you more options

for high-performance graphics, and is ideal for

developing RAW photos.

Pros: Slimline design, backlit keyboard and a fantastic

10-hour battery life mean that this is a perfect laptop for

using on the move.

Cons: If you needed the 500GB hard drive, then the

MacBook Pro could work out to be fairly expensive

compared with other laptops out there which have the

same specifications.

From £1,020 www.apple.com/uk

Laptop roundup Jessica Lamb




ACER ASPIRE ETHOS AS5943GFrom £999.99 www.acerdirect.co.ukThe Aspire Ethos AS5943G-5464G50Bnss has a4GB memory and 500GB hard drive, so there

is plenty of roomfor photo libraries; however, should you require a higher RAM, the

AS5943G-5466G64Bnss has 6GB of memory for an extra £199. There are 10 notebooks in the

Aspire Ethos range, each with a differentspecification. The 15.6in LCD screen has CineCrystal

display screen technology and an LED backlit display,great when editing photos or evenwatching films on the Blu-ray disc player. Weighing 3.3kg, this model isperfect for home office

use but also for photographers on the move. This particular model has a battery expectancy of

threehours and 20 minutes and comes with a year’s international traveller’s warranty.

Pros: LED CineCrystal backlit display perfect for viewing and editing images.

Cons: Slightly heavier and bigger than we would like for taking out and about.

DELL STUDIO XPS 16From £929 www.dell.co.ukDell’s XPSlaptops were designed with creative individuals in mind, people with a passion for

art, film and photography. Your media is brought to lifeon the 15.6in 1,080p Full HD RGBLED

LCD display,fantastic when viewing and editing photos. The Studio XPS 16 features Intel Core 2

Duo P8600 processors (2.4GHz) whichgive excellentperformance when running programs

simultaneously. Weighing 2.96kg, the XPS 16 laptop is greatfor travelling photographers and is

Skype-certified with a built-in HD webcam. This model in the XPS series has a backlitkeyboard

for working in poor light. The standard six-cell battery will provide around three hours’ battery

life, though you can upgrade to a nine-cell giving you almost fivehours’. This model features

facial recognition security software,which automatically locks your laptop when you step

away and unlocks it with a simple scan of your facewhen you get back. Dell provides the ‘Dell

design studio’ when you buy from them, which allows you to modify your laptop’s features and

appearance to meet your specific requirements and individual style.

TOSHIBA SATELLITE A660-1FMFrom £816 www.toshiba.co.uk

The Satellite series of Toshiba laptops is pitched at those wanting high performance at areasonable cost; there are seven satellite laptops in the range, all varying in specification and

price.The latest Intel i7 Core 1.73GHz processors ensure great performance and the ultra-fast

Wireless LAN technology can hook up to the internet at your favourite Wi-Fi hotspots in a

flash. The Toshiba Satellite A660-1FM features a 16in HD TFT NVIDIA screen. This model also

has a Blu-ray disc writer and an impressive audio system with Harman Kardon speakers and

Dolby Advanced Audio. The Satellite A660-1FM has 4GB of memory, with space for up to 8GB,

and a 500GB hard drive. Weighing just 2.6kg, it is handy for travel, though itonly guarantees

three hours, 20 minutes of battery life, which isn’t as good as some other laptops of a similar

spec on the market.

Pros: 1,080p display with excellentcolour and contrast, brilliantfor editing and viewing

photos or watching movies.

Cons: Low battery life; if you wanted to take the XPS 16 out and about, for workor leisure,

the battery life might let you down.

Pros: Great for entertainment with its HD screen and brilliantaudio system.

Cons: Short battery life, not as good as some on the market at a similar price and spec.

Dimensions: Width: 38cm • Depth: 26.9cm • Height: 3.94cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 3.3kg • Screen size: 15.6in • Operating system: Windows 7

Home premium • CPU: Intel Core i5 processor • Memory: 4GB • Storage: 500GB •

Battery life: Three hours, 20 minutes

Dimensions: Width: 38.5cm • Depth: 25.4cm • Height: 2.41cm front / 3.34cm back

Vital statistics: Weight: 2.96kg • Screen size: 15.6in • Operating system: Windows 7

Home Premium • CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo processor • Memory:4GB • Storage: 500GB •

Battery life: Approximately three hours

Dimensions: Width: 38cm • Depth: 25.4cm • Height: 2.8cm front / 3.56cm back

Vital statistics: Weight: 2.62kg • Screen size: 16in • Operating system: Windows 7

Home Premium • CPU: Intel Core i7processor • Memory: 4GB • Storage: 500GB •Battery life: Three hours, 20 minutes

PHOTO ZONE




DELL INSPIRON DUOFrom £449 www.dell.co.ukThe new Inspiron from Dell has a rotating screen, allowing you to

switch from touch to type in seconds. When closed, the Inspiron Duo

functions more like a Tablet, but with one swift flip of the screen

you can use it as you would any other laptop. A Broadcom Crystal HDMedia Accelerator allows you to view images in brilliant quality

on the 10.1in HD LCD screen. The Inspiron Duo transforms easily into

a digital picture frame, alarm clock or music player, with the

optional audio station featuring JBL speaker technology.

You can also read books on the Inspiron as you would on a Tablet.

This spec of the Inspiron Duo has 250GB storage but you are able

to upgrade this to 320GB.

Pros: For viewing your images and accessing emails

while on the move this is a nifty piece of kit, not to

mention great fun to use and at a great price.

Cons: Memory and hard drive aren’t fantastic but you can

always store larger media files on an external hard drive.

Dimensions: Width: 28.5cm • Depth: 19.45cm • Height:

2.62cm front / 2.87cm back

Vital statistics: Weight: 1.54kg • Screen size: 10.1in •

Operating system: Windows 7Home Premium •

CPU: Intel Atom processor • Memory: 2GB • Storage:

250GB • Battery life: Three hours

SONY VAIO S SERIES

Dimensions: Width: 32.9cm • Depth:

22.9cm • Height: 2.8cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 2kg • Screen size: 13.3in •

Operating system: Windows 7Professional • CPU:

Intel Core i5 processor • Memory:4GB • Storage:500GB • Battery life: Four hours,45 minutes

From £764 www.sony.co.ukThe tough Vaio S series from Sony is designed to

be easy to carry and enjoyable to use. It features

a multi-finger gesture touchpad, allowing you to

zoom in the same way you might on an iPad or

iPhone, which is brilliant for effortless browsing; the

keyboard is also backlit for easy use in poor light.

This particular model has a4GB memory but support

for up to 8GB. Sony’s S series Vaios feature an assist

button on the front just above the keyboard, which takes

you straight to VAIO Care, a new and powerful software

application that helps to maintain performance and

diagnose or troubleshoot problems. As well as this newfunction Sony’s S series now features fingerprint

recognition security for added peace of mind.

Pros: Great speed and functionality at a

competitive price.

Cons: Fairly uninspiring design

lets down this otherwise

great notebook.





PHOTO ZONE

SONY VAIO EC SERIES 17inFrom £799 www.sony.co.ukThe stylish Vaio EC series has a 17.3in screen, perfect for editing photos or when just

surfing the web, and selected models of the EC series have full HD resolution. The4GB

Vaio EC series has a maximum of 1TB of storage (2 x 500GB), so there’s plenty of room

to accommodate even the largest media libraries. When buying from Sony there areseveral options available to tailor the laptop to your requirements; with the Vaio EC

series 17.3in you can add an additional hard disk drive and a Blue-ray disc writer.

The Vaio EC series was designed for ease and comfort – the keyboard is generously

spaced for quick data entry and there is an assist button on the panel above the

keys to provide instant help with maintenance and troubleshooting. A handy web

button connects you to the internet within seconds, which is ideal for checking

emails in a hurry. Weighing 3.3kg, this laptop is perfect for a home office, but

with its sleek, slimline chassis it is still easily portable.

Pros: Up to a more than adequate 1TB of storage and

at a reasonable price.

Cons: Low battery life; not as great as others on the market.

Dimensions: Width: 27.3cm • Depth: 18cm • Height: 1.77cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 886g • Screen size: 10.1in •

Operating system: Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) • CPU: NVIDIA

Tegra 2 • Memory: 1GB • Storage: 16GB / 32GB / 64GB •Battery life: Tbc

Dimensions: Width:40.9cm • Depth: 27.3cm • Height: 3.1cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 3.3kg • Screen size: 17.3in •

Operating system: Windows 7Home Premium • CPU: Intel

Core i7processor • Memory:4GB • Storage: 1TB •

Battery life: Three hours

ASUS EEE PAD SLIDER£ Tbc (due out in May) www.asuslaptop.co.ukThe Eee Pad Slider features a 10.1in IPS touch screen and full QWERTY

slide-out keyboard neatly tucked underneath, making it the ultimate

travel companion. Perfect for anyone on the move, the Eee Pad

Slider is just 17.7mm thick, making it ideal for slipping into any

bag or briefcase. The Eee Pad Slider features cameras back

and front to allow easy video chat and digital photography.

The Android 3.0 operating system makes sharing photos by

internet, email and websites a breeze. The 1GB memory

means that this pad is not for storing your image files

and work on, but it’s fine as a sleek gadget giving you

everything you need while away from your office.

Pros: Sleek and compact in design, this laptop

can go everywhere with you.

Cons: 1GB memory isn’t ideal but for

such a compact piece of kit it

does the job




APPLEMACBOOK AIR 13inFrom £1,122 www.apple.comThe 13in MacBook Air has 2GB of memory with supportfor up to4GB for an extra £82.

It has 125GB of flash storage which again can be modified up to 256GB. The 13in

MacBook Air comes with a 1.86GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor or optional 2.13GHz

Intel Core 2 Duo processor, both with 6MB on-chip shared L2 cache. All specifications

are confirmed and chosen by you when buying from the Apple store. Apple provides

Mac OS X Snow Leopard software and iLife with its laptops, which gives functions and

programs such as iPhoto, Photo Booth, Safari and iTunes. The touch control pad makes

this model comfortable to use and attractive to the eye. MacBook Airs don’t have an

optical drive, so in order to instal new software or view anything from disc you would

need to link up to another machine or buy an external drive. Such changes mean

Apple has been able to produce its lightest, most portable laptops, weighing 1.32kg.

Pros: The smooth aluminium chassis and overall lightweight, elegant feel of the

MacBook Air make it a joy to use.

Cons: The lack of an optical drive means that if you do need to view something on

disc you would have to link up to another Mac or buy an external drive.

SAMSUNGSF310£749 www.samsung.comThe Samsung SF310 has a4GB memory and 320GB hard drive, more than ample

for everyday use. The 13in 720p high resolution, wide-screen and LED backlit

display makes it brilliant for viewing your media files. Sleekly designed, the SF310

has a curved outer chassis, and a brushed aluminium palm rest and surrounding

panels inside. In keeping with its smooth design there are a range of ports neatly

tucked away on the side, including an HDMI port. This model is N Wi-Fi ready

making it fast at finding networks across the country. The SF310 also features a

‘hot key’ just above the keyboard, allowing you to log on and off the internet

quickly and easily. This model is equipped with an Intel Core i5 processor, ensuring

great performance. With a battery life of around seven hours and the technology

packed into a compact size, this laptop is a clever choice of travel companion.

Pros: The low cost – this laptop offers great everyday performance at an

attractive price.

Cons: Although having a neat design, the SF310 is fairly heavy for a 13in laptop.

Dimensions: Width: 32.5cm • Depth: 22.7cm • Height: 1.7cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 1.32kg • Screen size: 13.3in • Operating system: Snow

Leopard • CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo processor • Memory: 2GB • Storage: 125GB •

Battery life: Up to seven hours

Dimensions: Width: 33.1cm • Depth: 23.4cm • Height: 2.7cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 2.06kg • Screen size: 13in • Operating system:

Windows 7Home Premium • CPU: Intel Core i5 processor • Memory:4GB •

Storage: 320GB • Battery life: Approximately seven hours

LAPTOP CASESIt is always a good idea toinvest in a protective laptopcase for when you are onthe move. Here are five ofthe best now on the market.

Built NY Laptop Sleeve 16in£34.99 Available in the UK fromwww.laptopstuff.co.uk

The Built NY sleeve is made from neoprene (the same

fabric as wetsuits) and ensures that your laptop stays

safe and dry while travelling. The curved design adds

extra cushioning and protection

to the case. While it’s not the

toughest laptop sleeve on the

market, it provides good

protection, is comfortable to hold

and will easily slot into rucksacks

and cases. Built NY has many

differentsizes in its range of

sleeves, and they are available invarious designs and colours.

Acme Made: The Smart Laptop SleeveFrom £25 www.acmemade.co.uk

Ideal for the style-conscious, the Smart Laptop Sleeve

is light and sleek in design. Made from ballistic nylon,

the outside is water-resistant, while the inside features

closed-cell foam padding to protect your laptop

from bumps and scratches.

The Smart Laptop

Sleeve is

available in three

designs and in

various sizes, and

also comes with a

detachableshoulder strap.





PHOTO ZONE

HPENVY 17 3D£1,560 www.hp.comThe HP Envy 17 3D laptop features a 17.3in 3D Ultra BrightView display; unlike

some of the other 3D laptops on the market (which make use of NVIDIA 3D Vision

tech) this one uses AMD’s 3D tech and comes with a pair of active shutter glasses.

As with a lot of manufacturers, HP allows you to modify the Envy to meet your

specific needs. This model comes with a4GB memory and 500GB hard drive for

storing all your digital and media files, and has support for up to 2TB in

hard drive capacity, but this comes at a cost. At 3.4kg, it is the heaviest of our

laptop choices, but if 3D is your bag, then this is the laptop for you.

Pros: 3D screen and Ultra BrightView display allows fantastic quality when

viewing images or watching films.

Cons: Slightly heavy and expensive compared with other laptops but there is

room for a 2TB hard drive – unlike any other laptops we have looked at.

TOSHIBASATELLITE R630-13TFrom £649 www.toshiba.co.ukThis particular model has support for up to 8GB of RAM and many more

modifications are possible, with seven models in this series covering a wide

range of needs. The Satellite R630-13T’s 13.3in screen features a 1,366 x 768pixel

resolution and has a Toshiba TruBrite HD High Brightness display with 16:9 aspect

ratio and LED backlighting. The Satellite series of laptops has a new cooling

system, ‘Airflow cooling technology’, which will be useful when you’re working

for long periods. Toshiba has also built in a sensor which protects the hard drive if

it’s knocked or dropped, handy if you are going to be using your laptop out and

about. The R630-13T features a host of ports, including two USBs and an HDMI port

for connecting your laptop to TVs etc. All of the laptops in the Satellite series have

backlit keyboards, making it excellent for working in poor light.

Pros: Brilliant battery life and weighing just 1.43kg, this laptop has all the power

you could need in a perfect travel package.

Cons: Relatively uninspiring design.

Dimensions: Width:41.6cm • Depth: 27.5cm • Height: 3.2cm

Vital statistics: Weight: 3.4kg • Screen size: 17.3in • Operating system:

Windows 7 • CPU: Intel Core i7processor • Memory:4GB • Storage: 500GB •

Battery life: Two hours, 30 minutes

Dimensions: Width: 31.6cm • Depth: 22.7cm • Height: 1.8cm front / 2.57cm back

Vital statistics: Weight: 1.43kg • Screen size: 13.3in • Operating system:

Windows 7 Home Premium • CPU: Choice of Intel Core i3 or i5 processor •

Memory:4GB • Storage: 320GB • Battery life: Up to nine hours

Aluminium Case Company£ Price on application www.aluminiumcases.com

The Aluminium Case Company creates bespoke cases to

give you something that little bit special. Made from

aluminium with a customisable

foam lining, these tough cases

protect your laptop from

impact and scratches.

The aluminium cases

are lightenough to

carry around all day

and are suitable

as hand

luggage whenflying. PM

Tech Air 1103£29.99 www.techair.co.uk

With a detachable shoulder strap the 1103 is versatile

and perfect for carrying from shoot to shoot.

It features a large inner pocket for documents and

several others for

accessories. The Tech Air

1103 is designed for 15.6in

laptops and conceals small

compressed air pockets

around the edges of the

case, absorbing shocks on

impact. All of Tech Air’s

laptop cases are backed bya lifetime warranty.

ZeroShock III Laptop Case 17in – Black£21.40 Available from www.gearzap.com

ZeroShock III cases are made from low-resilience

polyurethane to absorb shocks and the memory foam

interior adapts to the shape of your laptop for

a perfectfit. The water-resistantouter material

protects it from rain and

spillages and has reinforced

edges for added protection.

This case also features

a zipped outer pocket to

hold small accessories

or paperwork.



N INDOOR SHOOTING RANGE

on the outskirts of Las Vegas was

the location. A Remington

12-gauge shotgun with Winchester Xpert

Game Load Steel ammo (the kind used

for hunting big animals) the weapon of

choice. The ioSafe Rugged Portable the

target. Welcome to the Demo-lition.I first encountered the ioSafe range of

hard drives at the beginning of last year.

They came on the market as ‘the Hummers’

of storage and delivered on every level.

They were heavy, bolt-down, waterproof,

fireproof monsters of data and I loved them.

I made an immediate investment and two of

them now sit proudly on my studio desk –

easy to use and indestructible. But I knew

little about the company or why it had

decided to create its indestructible range,

so when I was contacted and asked to

come to Nevada and destroy their first

portable drive, I jumped at the invitation.

Since 2005, ioSafe has been making hard

drives that have the same logic behind

them as an aircraft black box, all because

its CEO, the California-based inventor,

engineer and demonstrator Robb Moore,

wanted to ensure his pictures of his children

were safe. A quick web search revealed

there was nothing on the market that met

Robb’s exacting personal requirements, so

after a number of particularly weird and

wonderful experiments he came up with his

own solution, ioSafe, a series of hard drives

that can be bolted to the floor, survive

a building collapse or be padlocked to

anything immovable.

Now Robb has applied the technology

and build quality to a portable version and

I’m going to see if I can kill it. Robb is a nice

guy and delivers his rundown on the ioSafe

Rugged Portable with an edge of military

precision and engineering confidence.

I’m not the only journalist at the shoot-out

and everyone else is both American and

comfortable with firearms. We will be using

live ammunition. But before we get a

chance to kill, Robb demonstrates the

Rugged Portable’s underwater capabilities

by immersing it in a fish tank and leaving it

on the gravel bed for a while; then he

retrieves it and plugs it straight into his

MacBook Pro after a quick puff of air

into the portable’s USB port. It works, no

problem. We are all impressed; I’m thinking

that this is the answer to spilt tea when I’m

working on long edits. Robb agrees.

It’s time to get serious. Robb attaches the

drive on to a pull mechanism that takes it

just above head height 30ft down the

shooting range. The first journalist loads up,

stands behind a Perspex wall with a

shooting hole cut in it and lets rip.

We are all wearing headphones

and protective glasses but, even

so, the sound of a shotgun going

off is explosive at close range.

He has also hit the drive.

Robb winds it back for us to look

at. The case is peppered with shot but

there does not seem to be any serious

damage. He plugs it in once more and

again it works. Five journalists repeat the

process and hit it every time. The case gets

increasingly damaged but will not die.

Every time it’s pulled back and plugged in,

it starts, no problem. Robb is not impressed;

he wants the hard drive to die and he wants

us to kill it. It’s time to change weapons.

Next up is a fully automatic M16 rifle

firing a 5.56mm calibre NATO bullet.

The journalist from Florida steps up to the

plate; a confident shooter, he puts it on to

solo round and takes off the back of the

drive in one shot. It has taken a

military-spec weapon to kill the hard

drive. Robb winds it back in and

examines the internal workings;

he is not confident it will work

but says they have done before

despite such damage. Sadly, it’s

a no-go and we’ve succeeded in

our mission. The hard drive is dead.

The Demo-lition is over and we are

impressed. The ioSafe Rugged Portable is

the toughest, meanest son of a bitch that

any of us have come across so far. I have

put in my order.

http://iosafe.com

PM

THE HARDDRIVE

MUST DIE!Youmight think thatyour external hard drive is tough, but haveyouever firedat itwitha shotgun?MIKEBLOOMFIELD has andhe lived to tell the tale.


A

The ioSafe Rugged Portable hard drive Demo-lition held at the American Shooters indoor range in Las Vegas.

GOONLINE

To see our films of theDemo-lition go towww.professional photographer.

co.uk

PHOTO ZONE

Hard drive demolition Mike Bloomfield

THEYWERE HEAVY, BOLT-DOWN,WATERPROOF,FIREPROOF MONSTERS OF DATA...”



FOR YOUR CHANCE TO WIN a Vanguard

Nivelo 204 tripod, worth £59.99, simply

upload your best portrait pictures to the

Photography Monthly gallery. This incredibly

light (1.32lb/0.6kg) and compact tripod has

been designed to accommodate the latest

compact system cameras. It is small enough

to tuck into a rucksack and the featuresinclude shock-absorbing rubber feet,

Twist-n-Lock legs and a spirit level on the

pan head. The 20mm-diameter legs

provide support at 23°, bringing stability

to this little tripod, which has a folded

height of just under 12in. The 360°

rotating head allows panoramic shots

and side-to-side tilting means you can

get a unique take on the world. To get

you started and inspired, we have

included some of your pictures andothers by the PM team, but we’re

sure you can do better than us!

Good luck and get shooting.

www.vanguardworld.com


READERS’ PICTURES

GRANTSCOTT — EDITOR

PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY

This image is of a band called The Go!

Team and was taken as part of a project

and exhibition I shot in Brighton. When the

band arrived at the location they had just

had a disagreement, so instead of tryingto cheer them up I went with their mood.

SEAN SAMUELS — DEPUTYEDITOR

PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY

I wanted this image to have a natural,

contemporary feel, so I asked Olivia, the

model, to wear a simple white shirt and

blue jeans, and placed her against a plain

background, in this case a white wall.I shot handheld with just natural light.

SIMON REYNOLDS— MANAGINGEDITOR

PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY

My wife and I were in the grounds of our

Cotswolds hotel when we noticed this

striking seat. The jazzy stripes stood out

against the green vegetation and was the

perfect spot for a portrait. The sun onChris’s yellow bag was a nice final touch.

W I N !

TAKING

PICTURES

Kaikala How we see

Berna V

With loveTo enter and for full terms and conditions, visit

www.photographymonthly.com

PM TEAM PICTURES



SOPHYKANT—DEPUTY EDITORTURNING PRO

This image was taken in the early evening

at the end of a canal boat holiday. We were

sitting on top of the boat enjoying the last

few hours of the weekend. The light was

low and I think this relaxed portrait reallycaptures the sense of the day.

KELLY WEECH— FEATURES ASSISTANTPHOTOGRAPHY MONTHLY

I love the retro appeal of this image;

although it was shot in colour I think

converting to black-and-white reinforces

the fact it was a 1960s-inspired photo

shoot. It was taken on a Canon EOS 20Dwith an 18-55mm lens in a studio. PM

ELEANOR O’KANE — DEPUTY EDITORPROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER

Having young nieces and nephews means

there’s always someone about who is

willing to pose for a portrait. I like the

simplicity of this image and the

asymmetric pose. It shows off Ellie’s joyful and gentle nature perfectly.

READERS’ CHALLENGE

Upload to our gallery to win prizes Portrait


Yaman Ibrahim Smoker 11

Dustin Spengler Abstract symmetry

Annie Pronovost Heidi is dreaming

Holly Moss Mother nature




TESTZONE ONLY THE VERY BEST KIT

THE STUFF OF LEGENDThe tripods bear the names of guitar legends from Britain and

the United States – a welcome change from the usual monikers

– in this case, the 3LTX2 Eddie is named after Eddie Van Halen.

FIRST IMPRESSIONSMade from a combination of carbon fibre and alloy, the tripod

is beautifully designed and constructed. The ballhead motion is

fluid, the top plate slick and the legs bear easy-to-use locking

collars that stay locked.

LIGHT AS A FEATHERAt just 1.3kg this tripod makes an ideal companion for all

occasions and for all types of photography.

FOR THE HIGHS AND LOWSA low operating height of 170mm is possible, with a maximum

of 1,660mm; alternatively the centre column can be removed

and reversed for more creative ground-level shots.

BUILT TO LASTTested in conditions up to -60°C, the 3LTX2 Eddie is rugged,

strong and versatile, and available in five colours.

TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONEThe 3LTX2 Eddie includes a built-in and detachable monopod.

ROUGH AND TOUGHThe load capacity is up to 12kg, which is more than enough for

most general requirements.

COMPACT SIZEThe tripod folds down small and comes with a sleek carry case

and strap, making it portable and compact.

Price: £279(including B3s ballhead)

www.3leggedthing.com

PM

6

8

7

5

4

3

2

1

3 LEGGEDTHING

TOPTIP!For more news and

reviews on the latestkit and technologyvisit the website atwww.photography monthly.com

Each month we bring you the reviews you need to make sure you buy the right equipment, for the right reasons

We recently got our hands on Eddie, the

heavyweight carbon fibre tripod from

British company 3 Legged Thing and

immediately fell in love with its design

and build. Here are the reasons why.

8REASONSTO BUY




1 SOLID BUILDMagnesium alloy body coupled

with weather-resistant seals

2 VARI-ANGLE SCREENHyperCrystal LCD 3in screen that can

be positioned to match your composition

3 FOCUSING ACCURACYFast and accurate focusing even under

poor lighting conditions

RISE OF THEOLYMPIAN

TOP 5 OLYMPUS E-5 DSLR FEATURES



TESTZONE

Camera review Olympus E-5

4 EASY TO USEThe basic custom menu is extremely

easy to use and quick to access

5 MEMORY COMPATIBILITYThe camera can store files on both

SD and CF card formats

WWW.PHOTOGRAPHYMONTHLY.COM [ 1 0 1 ]

S T E V E

P O P E

Steve Pope specialises in

sport, PR, conference and

events photography and is

the resident photographer

at the Celtic Manor Resort

in South Wales – venue for the 2010 Ryder Cup.

Steve has covered sporting events across

Europe, Africa, the US and Australia and was

the first photographer ever to be inducted

into the Welsh Sports Hall of Fame when

he was named joint Welsh Sports Journalist

of the Year in 2010.

www.fotowales.com

BIOGRAPHY

AS SOMEONE WHO HAS BEEN

FAITHFUL TO ONE MANUFACTURER

FOR NEARLY 20 YEARS I HAVEN’T

LOOKED AT ANOTHER CAMERA, LET

ALONE LAID MY HANDS ON ONE.

So getting to play with an Olympusfor a week and not feel guilty was a

strange experience.

Straight out of the box the magnesium

alloy body of the E-5 feels very solid.

It has controls laid out in a similar way

to a high-end pro body, with weather

and dust-resistant buttons that are

almost all self-explanatory and no dials

to wear out.

The 920k-dot HyperCrystal LCD 3in

screen gives a good preview with the

ability to zoom right in to check focus

and exposure. When used with live view

the vari-angle screen will be a real

bonus when taking low or high-angle

shots. I will occasionally photograph

a conference or dinner with a camera

attached to a light stand hoisted

up toward the ceiling. So for me the

vari-angle screen would be a great

benefit to help with composition.

I hope that when it becomes a feature

on all pro camera bodies that it is as

well integrated and solid as the one on

the E-5. Another great feature of

the screen is the auto image rotation

when you turn the camera on its side.

My iPhone does this, but my very

expensive camera doesn’t.

Over the few days that I had the E-5

I used it alongside my regular camera,

a Canon EOS-1D MkIV, on a variety of

jobs, inclu ding shooting a celebrity

portrait, a Christmas brochure, a rugby

match, a gymnast and a series of athlete

portraits. Once I had all the shots in the

bag taken with my own kit (that I am

“USED ON THE ROAD

IN A VARIETY OF

LOCATIONS AND

PHOTOGRAPHING AMIXTURE OF SUBJECTS,

THE E-5 PERFORMED

VERY WELL ON

ALL OCCASIONS.”

familiar with), I started to play with the

E-5. It was soon obvious that the

Olympus was more than up to the job.

The Zuiko digital ED 12-60mm f/2.4-4.0

SWD zoom lens supplied with the camera

(usually sold separately) was never going

to work at a rugby match. But on all

other assignments I was pleasantly

surprised by how well this kit performed.

Used on the road in a variety of

locations and photographing a mixture

of subjects, the E-5 performed very

well on all occasions. I was particularly

impressed by its focusing accuracy under

poor indoor light conditions. I was

commissioned to photograph a gymnast

with her medals in a sports hall.

Having the E-5 in my bag I asked one

of the other gymnasts to perform a few

jumps so I could test it out. I had three

Speedlights set up for the portrait




TECHNICAL SPEC: OLYMPUS E-5

IMAGE SENSOR TYPE Four Thirds Hi-Speed

Live MOS sensor

ASPECTRATIO & AREA 4:3 / 17.3mm x 13mm

IMAGE SENSOR PIXELS 13.1MP (full resolution)

ISO SENSITIVITY Auto ISO 200 to6,400

Manual ISO 100 to

6,400 in 1 ⁄ 3 or 1EVISO

steps

ENGINE TYPE TruePic V+

VIEWFINDER TYPE Eye-level Pentaprism

optical viewfinder

FOCUSING SYSTEM TTL phase difference

detection system;

11 points / fully biaxial,

AF and MF

FOCUS MODES Manual focus, single

AF, single AF and MF,

continuous AF,

continuous AF and MF

EXPOSURECOMPENSATION +/- 5 EV / 1 ⁄ 3EV, 1 ⁄ 2EV

or 1EV steps

EXPOSUREMODES Programme

automatic, aperture

priority, shutter

priority, manual

SHUTTER SPEED 1/8,000sec to 60sec

(in 1 ⁄ 3, 1 ⁄ 2, 1EV steps)

AUTO WB SYSTEM Hybrid detection

system with Hi-SpeedLive MOS sensor and

dedicated external

sensor

LCD MONITOR Size, 7.6 cm / 3.0in;

resolution, 920k dot

MOVIE MODE HD 1,280 x 720 (16:9)

/ SD 640 x 480 (4:3)

BATTERY BLM-5 Li-ion battery

(included)

WEIGHT 800g (body only)

PRICE £1,499.99

(body only)

1 1 6 . 5 m m

7 4 . 5 m m

( D e p t h )

TESTZONE

Camera review Olympus E-5

For more news and reviews visit our sitewww.photographymonthly.com

“THE CAMERA HAS TWO MEMORY CARD SLOTSFOR CF AND SD, AND A LITHIUM-ION BATTERY THATDOESN’T SEEM TO EVER NEED CHARGING.”

work, so quickly rearranged them

and attached a PocketWizard to theOlympus. I was pleasantly surprised by

how well it locked on using the centre of

its 11 focusing points, and with no

shutter delay caught the gymnast at the

top of her jump every time.

I didn’t have a manual for the camera

I was sent and I wasn’t able to sit down

and watch the supplied DVD, but I found

the basic custom menu extremely easy

to use and quick to access. I also found

switching between shooting, focus,

ISO and white balance modes very

straightforward and fast.

When shooting large Jpegs the

Olympus produces a healthy 39.9MB file

from its 13.1-megapixel sensor and,

of course it also shoots RAW, but you

need the included software to process

the files. Shooting modes are the normal

aperture, shutter, program and manual,

but there is also 1,280 x 720 HD ready

video. The camera has two memory

card slots for CF and SD, and a

lithium-ion battery that doesn’t seem

to ever need charging.

The white balance options on the

camera include sunlight, overcast,

shade, tungsten and three fluorescent

settings, which cover most lighting

scenarios. Personally I would have liked

to have a custom white balance and

kelvin colour temperature for greater

control and creativity.

As I mentioned earlier, the body is

very solid and does have a pro feel.

There are plenty of sockets to plug in

to: USB 2.0, video out (NTSC or PAL

selectable), infrared, DC input, synchro

socket and HDMI (mini connector

Type C). My only complaint is that

the screw-in dust covers for the

remote trigger and flash are

very small. They would

soon get lost in my bag.

Image quality is first class. The portraits

I shot produced accurate skin tones andagain sharp images were obtained using

the 12-60mm lens. At the lower end of

the ISO range images are free from

noise, with details in highlights and

shadows extremely well reproduced.

The image sensor is a 13.1-megapixel,

Four Thirds Hi-Speed Live MOS sensor

that can produce a maximum resolution

of 4,032 x 3,024. Images are processed

by the TruePic V+ processing engine

giving 5fps with shutter speeds ranging

from 1/8,000sec to 60sec and an ISO

range from 100 to 6,400. The built-in

pop-up flash has a guide number of 13

(ISO 100) with options such as red eye

reduction, slow sync and fill in.

Other features that may be of interest

include 10 art filters that enable some

creative effects in-camera. These include

pinhole, diorama, pop art, grainy film,

sepia and cross-process.

Although initial start-up, focusing,

frames per second and image processing

were never going to be as fast as I’m

used to, I shot everything in manual

using identical settings to my much

more expensive workhorse camera and,

in my opinion, it would take an expert

eye and close inspection to tell the

difference between the two sets of

images produced.

Priced at around £1,500 (body only)

the Olympus is up against some serious

opposition from Nikon and Canon in this

price bracket. It hasn’t tempted a

complete change of camera system, but

it does offer a genuine alternative to the

traditional big two with similar build and

definitely similar image

quality.

www.olympus.co.uk

PM

142.5mm



TOP 5 PENTAX K-5 DSLR FEATURES

The Pentax K-5 is aimed atadvanced photographerswith a love of the outdoors.SEAN SAMUELS found it tobe as tough as it looked, but

wondered if the camera mightbe a little too much functionover form.

[104] P H O T O G R A P H Y M O N T H LY MARCH 20 11

1 FAST WORKING7fps with a top shutter speed of1/8,000sec and upgraded focusing

2 GOOD IN LOW LIGHTThe ISO can be used as low as 80 or takenas high as 51,200

3 BUILD QUALITYStainless steel alloy frame and lightweightmagnesium steel alloy body with 77 seals

THE K-5 FROM PENTAX FELT

GREAT IN MY HANDS. FROM THE

MOMENT I PICKED IT UP I JUST

KNEW IT WAS A CAMERA THAT WAS

GOING TO GET THE JOB DONE. It felt

solid and capable of taking a few knocks

in all manner of harsh environments,

despite its diminutive size.

I say diminutive, but the K-5 is slightly

larger than many of the recent DSLRs

released to market. It is bigger than

the K-r, but not as big as the K-7 and has

a chunky contoured handgrip on the

right-hand side that is coated in a

rubberised compound which is reassuring

to the touch. Certainly the balance felt

right when holding the camera during

shooting, or by my side when not.

The K-5 is aimed at advanced

photographers looking to invest in a

robust and reliable camera. It has the

same build design as the K-7, with

a stainless steel alloy frame and

lightweight magnesium steel alloy body

that is dustproof, fully weather sealed

and cold-resistant. The shutter has been

designed for 100,000 releases and 77

special seals used throughout mean the

camera can operate at temperatures as

low as -10°C. On the back is a large 3in

LCD screen with a resolution of 920k

dots and wide viewing angle. It worked

well outdoors. I was out on a cold, wet

and grey day and felt secure the camera

would not let me down. Even the

standard 18-55mm kit lens felt solid and

more weatherproof than rival offerings.Its weather-resistant construction is

designed to minimise the threat of water

and moisture getting into the lens barrel

and it has a special coating which repels

dust, water and grease.

For those wanting to capture action,

the camera is fast at 7fps, with a top

shutter speed of 1/8,000sec and with

the upgraded 11-point SAFOX IX+ AF

system it is possible to achieve wider

coverage at a faster speed. Starting up

was also fast with the camera ready to

shoot in under a second.

The inside of the K-5 has a number of

interesting new features that will be of

interest to photographers who like to

shoot outdoors 24 hours a day. The most

notable is the greatly expanded ISO

range of 80-51,200. Image quality at the

lower end of the spectrum is pleasing,

but you will have to have a taste for

the noise produced when shooting at

the extremely high end of the scale.

Also new is full HD 1,080p video at

25fps, which is significant. It is believed

that this frame rate closely resembles

the speed at which the human eye

captures and processes information.

So footage viewed at this speed is

comfortable to watch.

There’s a built-in microphone for mono

recording and a socket for connecting an

external stereo microphone. It also has

an HDMI port for playback on an HD TV,

WELL DONE OR

OVERCOOKED?



TESTZONE

Camera review Pentax K-5

4 FULL HD 1,080P VIDEOCapture is available at 25fps, closelymatching the speed of the human eye

5 KIT LENSESThe lenses are as robust andweatherproof as the camera body


“IMAGE QUALITYAT

THE LOWER END OFTHE

SPECTRUM IS PLEASING,

BUTYOUWILL HAVETOHAVEATASTE FORTHE

NOISE PRODUCEDWHEN

SHOOTINGATTHE

EXTREMELY HIGH END

OFTHE SCALE.”



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using the industry-standard HDMI mini-out

connection. However, if you want to shoot

video, you have to turn the dial to moviemode, then press the ‘AF on’ or half-press

the shutter button to set the focus, then

press the shutter to begin recording –

and again to stop. You can’t take a still

shot while recording, neither can you

autofocus, which leads me to my only

real complaint with the camera.

I found the K-5 complicated to use.

The number of external controls is high,

with more than 25 in total, and a lot of

them have more than one function.

For example, after searching through the

menu options, that seemed to go on

forever, I realised the one thing I really

wanted to change – colour temperature

– was accessed by using a combination

of button holding and toggling at the

back of the camera. Once I had accessed

this option I then had to use the scroll

wheels to increase or decrease the kelvin

scale. This process simply takes too long,

even for someone with all the time in

the world to compose and take a shot.

The Pentax K-5 has a shooting mode dial


TECHNICAL SPEC: PENTAX K-5

IMAGE SENSOR SIZE 23.7mm x 15.7mm

LENS MOUNT PENTAX KAF2 bayonet

mount. PENTAX KAF3-,

KAF2-*, KAF- and

K-mount lenses

IMAGE SENSOR PIXELS Approx. 16.3MP

(effective)

ISO SENSITIVITY Auto, manual: ISO 100

to 12,800 (1 ⁄ 3EV, 1 ⁄ 2EV

or 1EV steps)

Extended sensitivity:

from ISO 80 to

51,200. Bulb mode:

up to ISO 1,600

FOCUSING TYPE SAFOX IX+ AF system

with TTL phase

matching detection

SCREEN TYPE 3inTFTcolour LCD with

AR coating and 170°

wide-angle viewing

SHUTTER SPEED Auto and manual :

1/8,000sec to 30sec

and bulb (1 ⁄ 3 or 1 ⁄ 2EV

steps)

FLASH TYPE Built-in retractable

P-TTL auto pop-up

flash

WEIGHT Body only,660g;

loaded and readywith Li-ion battery

and SD card, 740g

PRICE The Pentax K-5 is

available in three

kits: £1,199.99 with

the 18-55mm WR

lens; £1,299.99 with

the 18-55mm WR and

50-200mm WR

lenses; and

£1,699.99 with the

18-135mm WR lens

9 7 m m

7 3 m m

( D e p t h )

TESTZONE

Camera review Pentax K-5

For more news and reviews visit our sitewww.photographymonthly.com

“THE NUMBEROF EXTERNAL CONTROLS

ISHIGH,WITHMORETHAN 25 INTOTAL...”

131mm

on the top left of the camera, which

allows you to select modes. This wheel

can’t be turned without pressing a buttonat the centre of the dial. This is a good

thing or a bad thing depending on how

you transport and handle your camera.

I didn’t move the dial too often from its

manual setting, but I did find setting it in

the first place a little tricky and clumsy.

That said, all the options are available

including aperture priority and shutter

priority. It is also pleasing to know that

the scene modes, which are crammed

into so many camera releases these days,

are not present.

Pentax has instead chosen to add

a sensitivity priority option and a

combined shutter and aperture-priority

modes. The sensitivity priority option

automatically selects the best

combination of aperture and shutter

speed for your chosen ISO. This enables

you to select an ISO speed in rapidly

changing light. In shutter and

aperture-priority mode the camera

selects the most appropriate ISO for

a shutter speed and aperture

combination, allowing you to use ISO

sensitivity as a third factor in

determining the correct exposure.

For those wanting digital filters,

however, there are seven to choose from.

With these you can apply an effect to a

photo before taking it, although this

applies to Jpeg files only. For me this

further compounds the over-complexity

of the camera, especially as the filters

slow the camera down while it processes

the images. With image quality this good

I don’t see the need for these filters,

but I understand why they are there.

However, I would prefer to see these

stripped out and the number of functions

reduced. Pentax is aiming this camera at

advanced photographers who like to shoot

outdoors in all weathers,

but it seems to have

neglected the fact

that advanced

photographers

want more not less.

The K-5 is a great

camera. The form

is beautiful, but

what is needed

to complete

the package is

more simple

functionality.

www.pentax.co.uk

PM




This month KELLYWEECHanswers your questions

about kit to help youmake the right choices.

YOUR QUESTIONS

I use a Nikon D80 but want to

upgrade to a Nikon D300. I am not

interested in having an HD movie

function, but is the D300 now outdated oris it still a good buy?

The D300 was Nikon’s premium DX format

camera, but has now been superseded by the

D300s. However, as you do not want HD movie

capabilities, the D300 is still well worth

considering. It gives both professionals and

the most serious amateurs a full-sized,

high-speed, professional camera when

fitted with the vertical grip, or a

comparatively small and lightweight but

well-specified camera when used without.

It has many of the attributes of the

top-of-the-range Nikon D3, but at about a third

of the price. The D300 features a CMOS sensor

with 12.3 megapixels, a 51-point autofocus

sensor for better autofocus, metering and,

crucially, white balance, focus tracking by colour,

scene recognition, picture control presets,

6fps continuous shooting, a 3in 920,000-pixel

LCD monitor and HDMI video output.

The specifications are impressive, as are the

electronic benefits such as instant chromatic

aberration corrections in camera, which mean

that virtually every shot on most lenses is

sharper and crisper. Other electronic benefits

include Live View (with contrast detect AF), which

gives DSLR users both a rear

LCD Live View and a true

through-the-lens SLR

view. Basic alterations

can also be made

in-camera after

shooting, using

D-Lighting before

transferring images

to Photoshop.

How important this

will be to you depends

on what and why you

are shooting.

Finally, for those who

haven’t yet mastered

sensor cleaning, the D300 has

a self-cleaning one.

Being smaller, lighter and easier to carry than

other Nikon professional cameras, the D300 is

ideal for photographers on the move as well as

being less conspicuous when you’re out and

about. In terms of resolution, frames per second

and battery life with the vertical grip, it matches

the D2X. It does lack the latter’s robustness and

waterproofing, but if these particular qualities

are not a priority, the D300 is the best DX format

camera you can get.

Nikon surprised a lot of people by releasing this

camera, because many believed the manufacturer

Q

would stake its future on the

FX format for professionals. The

performance of this camera for its weight and price

amply justifies Nikon’s decision to continue to

innovate in this format.

I would like advice on which camera

backpack I should buy. I am torn

between the Lowepro Flipside400

AW and the Lowepro Pro Runner 350 AW. I like

both bags but am not sure which one is better.

Please help me out with some advice.

It comes down to personal preferences when

choosing camera accessories. Both bags are ideal

for the photographer on the move and are of a

robust design. A bag which is comfortable,

durable and functional is a sound long-term

investment if you make the right choice.

Weighing 1.6kg, the Flipside400 AW

(pictured) has a large capacity, and

provides security, comfort and

protection from the elements for

equipment. The bag’s unique

back-entry compartment gives

easy access to camera gear

when you’re setting up (keeping

the harness off the ground), as

well as providing extra security

for those on the move who need

to keep expensive gear securely

tucked away, yet close at hand to

capture the shot in a moment.

Other features include: a mesh-covered,

padded waistbelt, back pad and contoured straps

for added comfort and wicking away moisture;

a hideaway tripod holder to secure a tripod or

monopod to the backpack; built-in memory card

pockets on inside panel; front storage panels and

mesh pockets for storing additional gear; a

built-in All Weather Cover and silent zipper pulls.

On the other hand, the Pro Runner 350 AW

DSLR backpack’s compact and streamlined design

is aimed at photographers who carry their gear

through crowded urban areas such as busy

streets and airports. This feature-filled bag can

fit in a DSLR with attached lens, laptop, tripod

and multiple accessories, plus a few personal

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rainflap lids; SlipLock attachment loops;

mesh side pockets; discreet front pocket

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pockets on the inside lid; padded mesh

backpad; thickly padded shoulder straps

with five adjustment points; padded

waistbelt; webbing grab handle and zipped

document pocket.

At 2.1kg it is slightly heavier than the Flipside

400 AW and is able to carry a laptop.

This may be the deciding factor or perhaps

the back-entry compartment of the Flipside400

AW is more critical; either way I would advise

you to see each bag first-hand to evaluate which

will suit your needs and way of working.

The street price of the Flipside400 AW is £99

and the Pro Runner 350 AW is £120.

http://products.lowepro.com

I am looking for an external flash for

my Sony A200 on a budget of £200.

I mainly take pictures of portraits;

any thoughts?

The dedicated Sony flashgun is the Sony

HVL-F42AM, priced at £249.99 which is beyond

your budget. However, Sigma has a range of

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at a competitive price. The EF-530 DG ST (Sony

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It has a guide number of up to 53m at ISO 100

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The flash head can be tilted

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90° and can also be tilted down by

7°, making it ideal for close-up

shots. When used with the built-in Wide

Panel, the flash can cover the angle

of up to a 17mm ultra-wide-angle lens.

RRP: £163.47.

www.sigma-imaging-uk.com

PM

UPGRADE

Q

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Visit the World Heritage City of Bath -with its world-famous landmarks, hotels

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MELEN STUDIOS01582 840172 melencourses.co.uk

edding Photography

urseoduction to Wedding

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elenCourses wedding photography

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Incidentally, if any of you feel like becoming

budding Muybridges there’s now a free iPhone app

available called The Muybridgizer, commissioned by

Tate Britain. You capture a sequence of images with

the iPhone camera which the app allows you to

manipulate, frame by frame, and then treats the

images, applying a vintage style similar to

Muybridge’s work and animating them. You can see

a gallery of images generated by the app on the

museum’s microsite, http://muybridgizer.tate.org.uk

There were obviously inherent reasons for

Muybridge taking a series approach, but might

other photographers gain in a different way from

making a series rather than single images? Most of

us seem more concerned with capturing Henri

Cartier-Bresson’s decisive moment in a solitary

masterpiece, feeling that the concentration of a

subject’s essence into a lone frame is the

photographer’s ultimate goal and that such a feat is

the definitive expression of the consummate

photographer. In reality there are innumerable

‘decisive’ moments (rendering each a little less

significant than it might at first appear) and almost

as many ‘essences’. By placing the emphasis on

masterpieces, photography is following in the

footsteps of painting, where master craftsmen toil

over an extended period to make iconic images

(so perhaps it’s no coincidence that Cartier-Bresson

first trained as a painter). However, to place so

much stress on a single photographic frame can be

extremely misleading and shallow, on occasions.

Many of us already make what I call accidental

series, because we keep returning to subjects or

events and photographing them time and time again.

The crucial step that few of us make is identifying

such themes and actively developing them.


DAVID WARD

This month David discusses whycreating work as a series of imagescan make ordinary subjects and

ideas all the more powerful.

WHILE IDLY BROWSING THE INTERNET

RECENTLY I FOUND out about an exhibition of

images by Eadweard Muybridge that had just

closed at Tate Britain. It’s no understatement to say

that Muybridge’s work forever changed our

understanding and interpretation of the world. So to

have missed such an important exhibition was

extremely frustrating. But it did remind me

of a comedy TV sketch in which Rowan Atkinson

played a station announcer. “Anyone who can

hear this announcement has just missed the 17:27

train to Cardiff, calling at…”

At the very start of his motion studies project

Muybridge froze the movement of a galloping horse

in individual images, answering once and for all the

question of whether all four of its hooves were ever

off the ground at the same moment. This was in

itself a remarkable technical feat, calling for the

invention of the camera shutter and remote release,

as well as huge strides forward in film chemistry.

But the stringing together of the individual images

into a sequence produced something even

more remarkable than the individual frames.

Muybridge’s pioneering work led to the invention

of cinematography, or motion pictures, and has

influenced numerous artists in diverse fields, from

Marcel Duchamp’s painting Nude Descending

a Staircase to the blockbuster film The Matrix .

David is a professional photographer with morethan 20 years’ experience. He shoots large formatand is drawn to the abstract image.

To read more of David’s columns and formore advice from pros visit the websitewww.photographymonthly.com

D A V I D W A R D

FSTOP

Dalmore waves, Isle of Lewis

The most common way that we view such series is

as a photographic monologue presented in a book.

My editor, Eddie Ephraums, recently made a ‘blurb

book’ while on holiday. Working an area of rocky shore

in the Mediterranean he made a beguiling series of

abstracts that suggested sea creatures and skulls.

The series collectively reinforced the allusion that he

was striving for individually in each image. More often

than not, images in a book aren’t anchored in a single

time or place like this (though Andrew Nadolski’s End

of the Land , based around a single bay in Cornwall, is

one example). But they may be collected according to

stylistic or intellectual concerns, as a narrative, for

political propaganda (Walker Evans and James Agee’s

Let Us Now Praise Famous Men is a great example), or

simply as a record of the photographer’s career.

It actually matters little why they are collected

together. What is important is how sensitively the

images are arranged and how they speak to each

other on the page. Outstanding images can actually be

disruptive, as each photograph needs to support the

others and add to the narrative without shouting.

By carefully choosing which photographs sit next to

which in a book we create the possibility for a story,

though this needn’t be a literal narrative and may

simply be thematic.

Synergy is an overused word, but I would suggest

that the series is always capable of being more

powerful than any single image of the same subject,

no matter how masterfully realised it might be.

www.into-the-light.com

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THISWAS IN ITSELFA REMARKABLETECHNICAL FEAT,CALLING FORTHE INVENTION OFTHE CAMERASHUTTER AND REMOTE RELEASE,ASWELLAS HUGESTRIDES FORWARD IN FILMCHEMISTRY.”

photography monthly magazine april 2011

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