More prospectus

There's nothing like a 'proper' job to get the creative juices flowing.

In the past couple of weeks I have been part of a small team taking photos for a college prospectus. Some of the locations were pretty dull, so we had to think quickly to get eye-catching shots.

And we had to work fast because the photos were needed by this weekend. But all went well, and I have learned useful techniques for shooting interior scenes without flash.

Light fantastic

I took this shot of my college for a new prospectus. Hopefully it will be used in the final version.

I was pleased with the way it turned out because I had never experimented before with light trails and it took a fair bit of experimentation to get it looking right.

My tutor showed me the best way to tackle it. And when I say that, I don't mean simply the exposure times and the art of getting smooth light trails. He also remembered to switch on all the lights in the college building and open all the blinds so that we didn't have to carry out hefty Photoshop work afterwards.

That's what I call covering all the bases. Incidentally, the picture was shot through a 10-20 wide angle lens, at an aperture of f22 (ensuring maximum sharpness throughout), with an ISO of 200 and an exposure time of six seconds.

Showtime

My project involving the steam railway museum is well advanced, but when I was compiling a book of photos I had taken there, I realised that I still needed three or four more shots. So I paid a brief extra visit today.

One thing I have learned during this exercise is that there is always something to learn! And on this occasion, despite going there loaded down with flash equipment and light stands, I realised that experimentation with very long shutter speeds could produce equally good results.

So I took some close-ups of steam engine boiler rivets with the shutter open for as long as 20 seconds and I employed a similar approach for abstract photos of engine wheels and drive shafts.

The picture above was also taken without flash, and with a long shutter speed. It is the inside of a Punch and Judy-type show and I wanted the characters to be largely silhouetted, but the sharpest part of the shot.

Workshop heaven

One enjoyable aspect of my photography course is being given the opportunity to photograph people and places not normally accessible to the general public.

Recently, I was able to access a workshop which is being closed down before developers move in. It was an amazing place, piled from floor to ceiling with every piece of equipment, memorabilia and junk imaginable. Not only did this make it difficult to walk around the place, but positioning a tripod became a logistical nightmare.

It's not easy to capture such a scenario on the camera, simply because there is so much 'stuff' available to picture. The lighting can also pose its own problems. This workshop was half lit by fluorescent lights and half by daylight streaming in through the large front doors. The photo above was shot in an area entirely lit by the artificial lighting, so white balance was not a problem in this case.

Punch and Judy

I have now visited the steam railway museum six times and there comes a point where ideas for shots are more difficult to come by.

But I like a challenge, and I think I need some practice in ideas generation. I do still sometimes behave like a rabbit caught in the headlights even when presented with a completely fresh scenario to photograph.

This part of the museum - a seaside mock-up featuring a Punch and Judy show and some fairground games - has proved notoriously difficult to photograph in the past, according to my tutor. So I thought that was a good starting point!

I had an idea to use my flash to add drama to the Punch and Judy tent, and shoot through a nearby archway to frame the tent and enhance the overall appeal for the viewer. A model helped to bring the shot to life.

I was quite pleased with the picture, although I am bothered by a sliver of black down the left-hand side of the archway, which spoils the smooth line.

Lessons learned

This shot was taken on my latest visit to the steam railway museum and was subjected to hefty Photoshop work to make it interesting enough to post on here.

The truth is, I screwed up with this particular scene and am going to have to do it all again. I had much better shots than this, taken from behind the chap at the desk, but it was only when I was tidying up the best of these images in Photoshop that I realised I had left some of my kit at the back of the shot.

There are so many things you have to remember as a photographer - and only a fraction of these things involve aperture and shutter settings. One of my weaker areas is remembering to tidy up the scene before shooting. If I had a pound for the number of times I had taken a picture, then spotted later on that there was a piece of rubbish in the background, I would be a very rich man.

Anyway, not too much damage has been done. I'm back at the museum again this coming week, so I'll get it right next time.

Back on track

My apologies to anyone interested in these posts for the long gap since the last entry. Sadly, my father passed away two weeks ago today, which meant my photography, my studies and pretty much everything else came to a shuddering halt.

But I was back behind the camera on Friday for the latest in a series of shoots at the railway museum and I focused on the engine Caerphilly Castle, which can be inspected from a pit running directly underneath it.

It allowed me to have some fun with flashes. I positioned them at the far end of the pit and asked two models to stand midway between them and the camera. I exposed for the ambient light and let the shutter stay open for about half a second.

I was pleased with the result, which captures some of the atmosphere of the place. I particularly liked the starburst effect of the flash.

What the picture doesn't show are the groups of schoolchildren and other visitors to the museum I had to dodge all morning before getting the shot I wanted. These visitors understandably take priority over photographic projects, but luck was not on my side when it came to the timing of their respective tours around the museum. I think they call it suffering for your art!

Ghosts from the past

Being a photography student sometimes has its advantages, one of which is being granted access to buildings not open to the general public.

Yesterday we were allowed to explore an old railway works that will soon be turned into a shopping complex. It was the second time we had been allowed inside and there was genuine excitement about being given two hours to capture the essence of the place.

Although the heavy machinery was removed years ago, the building still has remnants of the past. My favourite was an old blackboard that included managers' names in carefully painted white lettering.

There were banks of lockers, some still locked and with their contents emerging from gaps. Other lockers had messages scrawled on them and one set was numbered without a 13 ('12A' was used instead).

Steam: third visit

Our project to compile a series of photos for the local railway museum is now in full steam, if you pardon the pun. On our third visit to the facility I concentrated on taking photos of two subjects in particular - one of which was a display showing a woman working in the smoke box of a locomotive (above).

Anyone who saw my entry for September 28 will have read that the overall aim of the project is to produce images that convey the atmosphere of the museum. It's not an easy task photographically, but I thought that one way of doing this was to use flash to communicate drama.

That September 28 blog entry also included a series of pictures showing promising locations, one of which was the smoke box exhibit. As soon as I saw this engine, I had a picture in mind that made full use of my flashes. I'm glad to say the end result was pretty much what I had imagined.

I positioned one flash inside the smoke box directly behind the mannequin, pointing away from her. I placed a second flash on a light stand high to my right, with the flash pointing across the mannequin's face. Both were triggered using radio-controlled Pocket Wizards.

Steam Museum - first shots

The operation to take a series of shots for a new book for the local steam railway museum began in earnest yesterday. I concentrated on photographing the entrance to the museum - particularly a couple of scenes I highlighted in an earlier post.

I put my camera on a tripod and used long shutter speeds to capture visitors to the museum walking into the entrance area. I was using a Sigma 10-20mm lens - ultra wide angle - and this allowed me to capture the whole of the scene, including a number of television screens and the main welcome sign.

The slow shutter speed created motion blur as the visitors walked along - an effect I had been looking for mainly because it adds to the atmosphere. I had to experiment a little because if the shutter speed was set too low, the subjects almost disappeared entirely from the scene. The results are shown in the following shot:

However, I might have a further attempt on my next visit - not just because the man pictured is too static, but because I want to get the visitors' shadows on the facing wall.

Welcome to Steam

It’s always exciting when the opportunity comes along to carry out practical work - even more so when the work is for an outside client and will result in a book.

A local steam railway museum has asked the second year HND group of which I am a member to take photos that depict the atmosphere of the facility.

The museum has commissioned photography from the college in the past, but this previous work has had a different emphasis - focusing more on the minutiae of the exhibits. I think our task is particularly challenging because it demands creativity and a mastery of certain techniques to pull off effectively.

Today was our first visit to the museum, so we were given a look round and the opportunity to take test shots.

The pictures I have posted simply display scenarios I would like to explore further. I have in mind using off-camera flash and models, but today was not the day to experiment with these. Nevertheless, I was excited by the potential presented by some of the settings.