Richard & Caroline's Blog

At the big family get together today, I was asked for recommendations on what camera to buy for a complete beginner.

A very difficult question. They had pretty much already decided on a Canon SRL as that a ‘real’ camera.

I asked what they wanted to take pictures of but they had not really thought about that.

Choosing a camera should fit the purpose of what they want to photograph, but also needs to be a model that suits them.

I pointed them at the low end Canon and Nikon SLR’s but also suggested they take a look micro four thirds and the Sony Alpha Range.

I often see very expensive top of the range Leica’s, Hasselblad’s and Ebony Cameras for sale that have hardly been used. I sometimes think, someone walked into the shop and asked for ‘Best’ Camera money could buy, rather the the best camera that suits the sort of Photography they want to do, at a level they are currently competent in.

Unable to produce a half decent shot that even a Casio compact could excel at, they give up in disgust.

Back and White?

Colour?

I am always surprised by the strong views some people have.  Digital verses Film, Print verses Slide, Back & White verses colour.

Now that last one is a weird one to me.

To me an image either suits colour or suits Black & White.

I shoot a lot of Black & White, in fact once I shot nothing but Black & White for two whole years!

Now in the digital world its a lot easier for us, we can pick colour or black and white, and afterwards if we feel we have made the wrong decision then just switch (at least for us RAW shooters).

Often I ask myself, is colour adding anything to the picture, if not then take it out.

At this time of year, with the dreary weather we sometimes have then I often resort to black and white, as colour would add no interest.

Try some Black & White yourself, you might surprise yourself.

A trip into town for a coffee, was also a chance to shoot a few photographs. With the dull weather, I decided Black and White was the order of the day.

This was a quick snap converted to Black & White with the iPad’s SnapSeed App.

When I have some free time, and there is local model available, it’s great to spend a few hours in the Studio, just messing about with different lighting affects, brollies, soft boxes, snoots, barn-doors, naked bulbs and even coloured gels.

The other weekend I had some free time so it was off to a local studio to play.

I tried to replicated different lighting effects, from simple portrait setups, the famous page 3 setup (boring) to more adventurous techniques.

The one we had the most fun with, was trying to replicate the iTunes advert.

A white background heavily lit, but no lighting on the model. She then repeatedly jumped in the air, and I tripped the shutter. We got a number of great poses, and the background being a nice clean white, was then easy to photoshop a more colourful iTunes inspired background onto.