Jim Zuckerman’s
PH OTO I N S I G HTS April 2014
• Landscape photography • Travel tips • Tamron 150-600mm • Opening the highlights • Student showcase • Photo tours 1
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Landscape photography Travel tips Opening the highlights Tamron 150-600mm What’s wrong with this picture? Short and sweet Ask Jim Student showcase Back issues
On the cover: Gray Lake, Torres de Paine, Patagonia, Chile
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ome photo instructors teach that using manual exposure mode is more creative than relying on one of the automatic exposure modes like program, aperture priority, and shutter priority.
I disagree. The fact is that in all of the exposure modes, including manual, you are using the camera’s built-in light meter to take a reading. If you weren’t depending on the camera’s meter, then the only other options you’d have to determine correct exposures would be to use a hand held light meter (and perhaps 1% of photographers use one) or develop a trained eye to look at a scene and know the exposure (which no one does). I used to do that when I shot film, but it’s unnecessary with today’s top-notch meters and the immediate feedback we get on the LCD monitor. Therefore, if you use manual exposure mode, the only thing you are doing differently is physically turning the shutter speed dial and the lens aperture to match what the meter is dictating. How is this more creative, or even more professional, than letting the camera do it? It’s not. In fact, you lose time when making these adjustments. In so many photographic situations, time is of the essence. A child’s changing expressions, a bird in flight, puppies playing, changing shadows on a landscape -- all of these picture opportunities have to be taken in split seconds before they are lost forever. Do you mean to tell me you want to mess around with the camera’s controls while you are missing great pictures? I don’t think so. photos@jimzuckerman.com www.jimzuckerman.com 3
LANDSCAPE
p h o t o g r a p h y W
hen I explain photographic concepts, I try to simplify a technique or a way of looking at something so it’s immediately understandable and easy to remember. A step by step itemization is helpful, I believe, in teasing apart a way of approaching a particular situation in photography. I like to eliminate unnecessary words and focus solely on the actions that need to be taken to obtain the desired result. I assume in every case the desired result is a stunning, fine art photograph. So, what follows is a listing of what I feel is important in taking successful landscape pictures of a particular style -- minus art theory and minus literary embellishment. The style I am referring to can be seen on the pages of this article. Landscapes can be shot using other methods, but for what I call the classic landscape technique you need to follow these steps. 1. Use a wide angle lens. The wider the lens, the more dramatic the image will
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be. For maximum drama, I would use a focal length of 14 to 16mm on a full frame sensor camera. A lens in the 18mm to 24mm range is good, too, but it’s not as dramatic. By ‘dramatic’ I am referring to the disproportionality of the foreground. Note in these pictures that the foreground elements, no matter what they might be, seem unrealistically large compared to the background. That’s what the wider angle lens does, and even though this isn’t what we see, from an artistic viewpoint it makes a very powerful visual statement. On cropped-sensor cameras, wide angle lenses in the 10 to 16mm range are good. For example, Canon’s 10-22mm and Nikon’s 12-24mm wide angle lenses will produce the kind of look I’m talking about. 2. Place the camera position close to the foreground -- i.e. three to five feet away. The closer the camera is positioned to the rocks,
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UPCOMING PHOTO WORKSHOPS Baby WildlifeWorkshop Hinckley, Minnesota June 13 - 15, 2014
Baby wolves, skunks, bobcats, lynx, foxes, bears, and more
Frog & Reptile Workshop Close-up encounters with poison dart frogs and exotic reptiles in St. Louis, MO.
Sept. 20 - 21, 2014
The Pantanal, Brazil: Jaguars at the river’s edge plus caiman, giant anteaters, monkeys, pink dolphins, and unbelievable birds.
November 8-20, 2014
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fallen log, wildflowers, or stream patterns, the 5. Use beautiful light. If you shoot a beautilarger they will appear in the frame. ful landscape in the middle of the day with direct sunlight, you’ll hate yourself in the morn3. Use a small lens aperture for complete depth ing. There are very few exceptions to this. of field. Virtually without exception, landscape There are three optimal lighting scenarios for photographs require that everything be tack landscape photography: sunrise, sunset, and sharp from the immediate foreground to the ele- overcast. That’s it. This is not rocket science. ments in the distant background. I recommend It’s very simple. If you shoot at other times of using f/22 or f/32 for this. the day when the sun is out, your pictures will most likely be disappointing. Of course, small lens apertures require longer shutter speeds, and that’s why you must . . . The only exception to this is when you are taking pictures of seascapes in tropical areas and 4. Use a tripod. Doing landscape photography you want to capture the intense aquamarine without a tripod is akin to shooting yourself in color of the water. Then you must shoot in the the foot. It doesn’t make much sense. I recom- middle of the day with a high overhead sun. It mend a carbon fiber model because it’s so much is the angle of the sun that brings out the color. lighter than metal tripods (and sturdier than plastic ones), and when you are hiking around 5. Use the mirror-lockup feature and a cable looking for compositions, you don’t want to car- release or self-timer to eliminate vibration. ry a lot of weight.
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TRAVEL TIPS
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espite recent snow storms in the eastern U.S., summer is around the corner. That means many people will be traveling in the next six months or so, and I thought I would offer some thoughts that may make your life easier when you travel. Whether you travel domestically or internationally, traveling is a complex process that requires a lot of forethought. Because I lead many photography tours every year, I take this subject very seriously. I try to avoid problems that can cause tremendous stress, cost a lot of money, and turn a vacation and photo adventure into a nightmare.
1. When you need to get a new passport or re-
new an old one, or when you need to get a visa for foreign travel, use a passport/visa service. This is very important. Don’t rely on or expect government offices to be responsive to you, to
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do their job in a timely manner, or to have your best interest at heart. They don’t. A service you pay has something to gain in helping you, namely your satisfaction with their company. Pay the extra money and get the job done so you can travel with the peace of mind knowing you’ll have your passport or visa in time for your trip. The service that I’ve used with confidence is rushmypassport.com (or rushmyvisa.com). It’s the same company.
2. Pack a medium to small piece of luggage.
Don’t burden yourself with a monster suitcase. It’s a royal pain in the neck to deal with. Most of the time when someone on one of my photo tours brings a huge piece of luggage -- against my advice -- they tell me at the end of the trip that they are sorry they did it. They say that
they could easily have managed with less clothes, less shoes, less everything. Don’t incur extra charges due to weight, and make your life easier by traveling with less stuff. If worst comes to worst, you can most likely buy what you didn’t bring at your destination. If you pack your tripod in your suitcase, take off the ballhead to make it shorter. That way your luggage doesn’t have to be as long. This goes a long way in allowing you to get away with a smaller checked piece of luggage.
3. Arrive a day early. This is especially important
5. Choose hotels with great views. Sometimes
well situated hotels with spectacular views cost more, but they can offer photographic opportunities you can’t find from other locations. A case in point is the great vantage on the ancient church converted to a mosque and now a museum, Hagia Sophia, above, in Istanbul. I took this from the terrace of the rooftop restaurant at my hotel.
when you are flying many hours to a destination where the time change is significant and you’re probably sleep-deprived. The extra day helps you get over jetlag, and you have more hours to adjust to the time differential. Instead of joining a group or going off on your own exhausted, you’ll be rested and refreshed. This allows you to Sometimes hotel lobbies offer incredible shots enjoy what you are seeing a lot more. as well. The remarkable Mariott Marquis Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia is an example, below. 4. Most people book their own flights now. This is one of the most photogenic lobbies I’ve When you are searching for airline reservations ever seen. online, keep in mind that they change constantly. The changes can be daily, by the hour, and even 6. For long flights as well as long trips on by the minute. Fares are usually more expenthe road, invest in noise cancelling headsive during the weekends, and the cheapest fares phones. They are worth their weight in gold. are often found after mid-night on Tuesday and The monotonous drone of the plane (or car) Wednesday. Get to know several ticketing sites so you can compare. Most of the time the same flight will be available for different prices on different websites. If you start shopping for fares well before departure, you have the time to become familiar with the prices offered. In this way, when the price dips, you can quickly grab it. You can literally save hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars doing this.
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is drowned out, and the travel experience is much more relaxing. When you listen to music or watch a movie, the sound track eclipses the remainder of the ambient noise. It’s like being in your own world, and the time passes faster and much more pleasantly. In addition, if you love movies, don’t rely on the films that the airline chooses. Bring ones that you’ve wanted to see or that you’d like to see again. I load at least a dozen films into my iPad for this purpose, and as soon as I’m seated I enter my private little theater. With all the traveling I do, this has been a wonderful way to spend so many endless hours in planes. You can also do this when spending hours on rough roads, such as in Namibia, Ethiopia, and gravel roads in the American Southwest.
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Be prepared to shoot out of the window
of the plane. Particularly when the sun is low in the sky, you can take some beautiful images like the clouds in the photo below and the 5pm sun reflecting on a serpentine river system over Missouri from 35,000 feet. When you take pictures out of an airplane window, make sure the lens axis is as perpendicular as possible to the plastic window. This will maintain maximum sharpness. The more you angle the lens to the window (for example
if you point the camera downward to shoot land forms on the ground) the more degraded the quality of the pictures will be due to the double layers of plastic used to seal the plane.
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Go through security more efficiently. Wear easy to remove shoes, don’t wear a belt if possible, and put everything from your pockets into a carry on. This will save you time before your stuff goes through the x-ray machine, and it will save time after the machine as you put yourself back together.
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If you are traveling independent of an organized tour and you haven’t planned every night’s stay, bring a laptop. From the comfort of one hotel you can go online and book the next one. Since you may not know where photography will take you -- because we photographers are so dependent on weather, light, and other factors -- you may not know where
you want to stay until the day before. Being able to make hotel reservations at the last minute allows you the most flexibility in your travel. If you are driving in a foreign country, you can get the address of the hotel online and then find it in the next city with your GPS.
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Use flash cards as a backup for your images. Instead of filling up a flash card and then copying it to a portable hard drive or laptop and erasing the card only to use it again, I recommend keeping it intact until you get home. You can certainly copy it to another device, but flash cards are small, light, and fairly inexpensive, and they are easy to store. Keep all your valuable pictures on them until you can copy all the shots onto your main hard drive at home.
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Try to coordinate your travel plans with a festival. Research online to find when and where an exciting festival is going to happen, and then base your itinerary around those dates if you 13
have that kind of flexibility.
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Bring cash for emergencies as well as for exchanging money at good rates. You will usually get better rates for the local currency with cash, and in addition to that, many countries demand new bills. If the paper money is damaged, if it has ink stamps or is wrinkled or torn, many money changes won’t accept them or they will give you a lesser exchange rate. I carry $2000 in cash. In the 90s I was stranded in Rio de Janeiro with no cash and a credit card that was full (I mistakenly brought the wrong one), and it wasn’t a good feeling. Yes, carrying cash is a security risk, but so is carrying thousands of dollars worth of camera gear. I like having the peace of mind that emergency cash is at my fingertips.
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When you are in crowded areas with a crush of people, stay in physical contact with your camera bag. Wear it on your back or, if you must put it on the ground, place one of your feet through the straps. If you are part of a group, for example a photography tour, and you are waiting in a large and crowded public building (like a train station or museum), place all of the camera backpacks inside the group of people. This makes it hard for a thief to walk off with someone’s camera gear. 15. Buy trip insurance. Unfortunate circumstances do occur, and sometimes we need to cancel a trip. With this kind of insurance, the tour cost you’ve already paid is protected should a family or medical emergency arise causing you to cancel your travel plans. §
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Opening the Highlights P
hotographs that come out of your digital camera are often not perfect. They need tweaking. I’m not talking about replacing a sky or cloning out power lines. I am referring to the basics: exposure, color saturation, and contrast. And it is the highlights that are so often overlooked in making a picture as good as it can be. Look at the picture below of the two white rhinos I photographed in Namibia. At first glance, it looks good. The exposure is correct, none of the lighter areas of the image are blown out, none of the shadows are black with a loss of detail, and the colors, while muted, look very close to what I saw in the dim light just after sunset. However, look at the screen capture of the picture’s histogram, upper right. The red arrow is pointing to the fact that the right-slider -- the highlight control -- is far away from the
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beginning of the graph on the right side. The highlights of the image are charted on the right side of the histogram, and therefore this tells you that this picture is devoid of highlights.
adjust the contrast, etc. at the time of shooting, but the problem is that you can’t see the results until you take the picture. By that time it may be too late if your subjects are moving.
The histogram also indicates that it is lacking in rich shadows, too. It’s the left hand-slider that’s the giveaway. It’s not touching the left side of the graph.
In addition, the adjustments you can make in the camera aren’t exacting. You are choosing presets designed by the camera manufacturer. If you tweak the images in Photoshop, Adobe Camera Raw, or Lightroom, you can see precisely what you’re getting on the computer screen. I would rather have that kind of control as opposed to blindly choosing a preset in-camera, hoping the manufacturer knew what they were doing in the artist realm.
In the histogram below right on the previous page, you can see that I moved both sliders inward. The result is the version below. Compare the original and the tweaked rendition and you can see a change that is subtle, but a change nevertheless. The photo below has slightly more contrast, and it seems to have additional visual impact. Was there any way to adjust the camera to make the highlights come out perfectly at the time of shooting? Many digital cameras do allow you to
As you move the highlight slider to the left to open up (i.e. brighten) the highlights, watch very carefully that you don’t lose detail in those highlights. If light areas of an image become solid white, that’s when you blow the highlights. In most cases, that’s the last thing you want. §
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A new Super long telephoto
T A M R O N 150-600mm
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any people who travel with me to Africa, Costa Rica, and Brazil ask me what telephoto lens they should buy or rent to take the best pictures of wildlife and birds. I have never liked answering that question because the choices have always been so few and so expensive. The latest generation of lenses from Canon and Nikon are obscenely expensive in my opinion, and I hate telling people they have to spend $10,000 to $12,000 or pay $1200 to rent a super telephoto for a couple of weeks in order to take closeup pictures of their favorite subjects. I don’t do equipment reviews, and I never write about new products as they are released. A lot of other people do that, and I’m more interested in talking about the artistry of photography. However, I want to bring to your attention a new incredible lens that opens up a whole new world to a lot of Canon, Nikon , and Sony photographers. I feel this is worth thinking about. Tamron come out with a super telephoto lens with an incredible range: 150 - 600mm. It is an f/5
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to f/6.3 lens, and of course that’s not as exciting as an f/4 aperture that the expensives lenses have. But . . . the price tag of this lens is only $1069! Wow!
pounds. In the Nikon line up, their 200400mm lens weighs 7.4 pounds, while their 500mm f/4 lens is 8.54 pounds. The Tamron lens, then, is lighter than its competition.
Ok, so now come the crucial questions.
3. The autofocus is pretty fast but not instantaneous like Canon and Nikon.
1. 2. 3. 4.
Is it sharp? Is it heavy? Is the autofocus fast? Does it have image stabilization?
1. It is sharp, but not as sharp as the Canon and Nikon equivalents especially at the longest focal range. The Tamron lens holds sharpness well at 500mm, but at the 600mm focal length some sharpness is lost. 2. The Tamron lens weighs 4.3 pounds, while the Canon 500mm f/4 weighs 7.03 pounds and the Canon 200-400mm lens weighs in at 7.98
4. The VC feature (vibration correction in Tamron’s language) is a very nice bonus in a lens with this price tag. It should be considered a 3-f/stop stabilizaiton feature. On my next safari tour to Africa (it will be Botswana/South Africa in June, 2015) I plan to buy this lens for my wife. With the ability to use high ISO settings and post-processing sharpening tools, I think this lens will be perfect for her. To be honest, it’s still hard to get my mind around the fact that the Tamron lens is $11,000 cheaper than the competition!
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OnLine Course:
LEARNING TO SEE by Jim Zuckerman
The ability to ‘see photographically’, to really grasp how your camera and lenses capture a subject or scene (which is different than how we see with our eyes) underlies successful picture taking. It is the bottom line that you’ve been looking for to take that quantum leap forward in your photography. When you register for this new course, you will be given download links to eight easy-to-understand lessons that look like beautiful mini ebooks. At your convenience, you can study the material and then upload your photos for a professional critique by Jim. Included in the course is a phone call once a week to discuss your submissions or any other aspect of photography you want -- what new equipment to buy, advice about airline travel, problems with flash, or anything else. This course can be purchased directly from Jim’s website by clicking RIGHT HERE. The great thing about online courses is that they can fit into any schedule. Life gets in the way at times, and Jim puts no limit on the time you can submit your work for his critiques. 20
LEARNING TO SEE online course The 8 lessons that comprise this course are: Graphic design, Backgrounds, Depth of field, Patterns, Natural light, Color, Composition, and Motion. These lessons are beautifully illustrated in the style of my ebooks and they full of concrete steps to dramatically improve your photography.
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What’s wrong with this picture?
I
made this portrait of an adorable seven year old girl during my recent carnival in Venice workshop, and I love the image. She is a lovely model, the lighting was soft and diffused, I kneeled down to shoot at eye-level which created a more intimate and compelling image, and the colors are beautiful. There is one thing that bothers me, though. My eye is pulled to the upper left side of the image because of that vertical line in the wall of a building. This doesn’t ruin the picture, but it’s distracting. I was concentrating on eliminating other people from the background, and I missed seeing this line as I was shooting quickly and concentrating mostly on the little girl’s expression. The subject matter, the costume, and the lighting of this picture remind me of a painting, and if you look at it in that light, a painter would never add that vertical
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line in the background. In photography, we can’t control every situation in the same way a painter controls a canvas, but now with Photoshop we can address many problematic issues to make a photograph perfect. Keep this in mind: Whenever there are defined vertical, horizontal, or diagonal lines behind a subject, and those lines are not part of the subject itself, they are almost always distracting. Ideally, background elements should not take attention away from the subject. Just the opposite. The background should complement the subject and direct our attention to it. To solve the problem of the unwanted vertical line, I used both the clone tool and the healing brush in Photoshop. In addition, I darkened the ground and the wall of the building a little, leaving nothing in this picture to look at except the subject. § 23
SHORT AND SWEET 1. Monochrome images can be made easily in Photo-
shop. First, choose Image > adjustments > hue/saturation, and move the saturation slider all the way to the left. This makes black and white. Then use Image > adjustments > color balance, and choose any color.
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Keep a lookout for great reflections in mirrored skyscrapers. I especially like the ‘old and the new’ concept, like this old gothic church reflected in a glass highrise at 6th and Commonwealth near downtown Los Angeles. It’s an afternoon shot when the sun illuminates the church.
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2. One of the advantages of photographing animals
and people outdoors when the sun is close to the horizon is that a natural catchlight reflects in the eye. In this portrait of a meerkat in Namibia, the sidelighting plus the catchlight created a beautiful look.
4. Texas bluebonnets will be in full bloom sometime in
April. The epicenter of this profusion of color is the Hill Country near Austin, Texas. Photograph the flowers in diffused light from a cloudy sky for best color and contrast. If the sun is out, wait until sunset to shoot. Avoid the wind if possible. §
Photography Tours 2014 - 2015 WHITE HORSES, FRANCE April, 2014
INDONESIA August, 2014
POLAR BEARS October, 2014
THE PANTANAL, BRAZIL November, 2014
CHINA January, 2015
JAPAN February, 2015
CARNIVAL IN VENICE February, 2015
MOROCCO March, 2015
PARIS/LONDON September, 2015
SCOTLAND/WALES April, 2015
BOTSWANA/SOUTH AFRICA June, 2015
CUBA October, 2015
Check out the itineraries and photo galleries from these and other tours: www.jimzuckerman.com.
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ASK JIM
Every month Jim will answer a question from his online students, from people who participate in his tours and workshops, or from subscribers to this magazine. If you have a question you’d like Jim to answer, please drop him a note at photos@jimzuckerman.com.
Q:
Jim ... I took this picture during the photo workshop with you in Venice last month, and I would like to know your opinion regarding the column behind the model on the right side of the image. Is it distracting? Should it be removed? Alex Decoster, Sao Paulo, Brazil
A
: First, let me say it is a sensational image. The glow in the sky adds a nice touch to this, and the light from flash looks very good. The arrangement of the models is also excellent. It has great mood as well, and the colors are harmonious together. Usually, it’s not good to have a pole, a tree, a column, or some other vertical object seemingly coming out of the head of the person you are shooting. However, in this case, I feel the large column is fine. It repeats another column supporting the medieval palace above, and it is not a narrow structure that would have looked bad. I would leave this picture as is. Let me say that in an ideal world, though, I would like to see the column moved to the right so it is not behind the model. But that is impossible to do in this situation, even for Photoshop. To be honest, if you did absolutely nothing to this picture, I would still consider it a great success, and I would be proud to have taken it. §
© Alex Decoster 2014
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Indonesia Photo Tour August 17 - 30, 2014
Balinese dancers • active volcanos • fashion festival
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Get professionalcritiques critiques of yourof work Get professional your work with Jim’s online courses with Jim’s online courses Betterphoto.com betterphoto.com Learn composition, exposure, Photoshop, beginning fundamentals, techniques in low light photography, flash, making money in photography, and more at your convenience and on your schedule.
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Student Showcase
Each month, Jim features one student who took beautiful and inspiring images on one of his photography tours or workshops. It’s really fascinating how photographers see and compose such different images even though we may go to the same place. Everyone gets great images on my trips.
Rodney Ee, Singapore, Carnival in Venice
Š 2014 Rodney Ee
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© 2014 Rodney Ee
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Student Showcase, continued Nancy Steele, Marietta, Georgia Carnival in Venice
Š 2014 Nancy Steele
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Š 2014 Nancy Steele
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For Sale
Lowepro Vertex 100 AW photo backpack. Brand new, never used. Original packaging. $170 + $10 shipping in the U.S.
Canon Ringflash MR-14EX Used twice, virtually brand new. All original packaging. $499 shipping included in the U.S.
If you would like to purchase either of these items, write Jim: photos@jimzuckerman.com
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PHOTOSHOP WORKSHOP in my home
Sat. & Sun., December 6 - 7, 2014
Photoshop is a photographer’s best friend, and the creative possibilities are absolutely endless. In a personal and ‘homey’ environment (I have a very cool classroom setup in my home), I start at the beginning -- assuming you know nothing -- but I quickly get into layers, cutting and pasting, plug-ins, using ‘grunge’ textures, modifying lighting, and a lot more. I promise to fill your head with so many great techniques that you won’t believe what you’ll be able to do. I go over each technique several times to make sure you understand it and can remember it.
creative ideas that will inspire you to produce amazing images with the pictures you’ve already taken.
Photoshop instructors approach teaching this program from different points of view. My approach is to be as expansive in my thinking as possible in creating unique, artistic, and compelling images. In addition to showing you how to use the various tools, pull down menus, layers, and so on, I spend a lot of time giving you
Contact me if you would like to participate in the workshop and I will tell you how to sign up (photos@jimzuckerman.com). All you need is a laptop and a lot of your pictures. If you don’t have a laptop, I have two Mac Book Pro laptops I can loan out for the duration of the workshop. §
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I live in the Nashville, Tennessee area, and if you fly into the airport (BNA) I will pick you up. If you drive, I’ll give you my address and you can find my home on Mapquest. For the $450 fee, I include one dinner in my home (prepared by my wife who is an amazing cook and hostess) and two lunches, plus shuttling you back and forth from my home to your nearby hotel.
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PHOTO INSIGHTS®
published by Jim Zuckerman, all rights reserved © Jim Zuckerman 2014 email: photos@jimzuckerman.com physical address: P.O. Box 7, Arrington, TN 37014 Peekaboo Gulch, Escalante, Arizona
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