Review Digital Camera World 07-19-2013

Digital Camera World

The black and white photographer's guide to light and contrast Jul 18th 2013, 23:01, by jmeyer Understanding the behaviour of light and the effects it creates makes a huge difference in black and white photography. But you still have to make sure the camera records it faithfully, and that's where an understanding of exposure theory and technique pays dividends. In this post we explain everything black and white photographers need to know about using light to create stunning monochrome images. The black and white photographers’ guide to lighting direction The direction of the light has a big impact on the appearance of a picture, but while the principles of lighting may appear complicated, they are actually quite straightfoward. If you follow the old-fashioned advice for snapshot photography, you stand with the sun behind you. This illuminates your subject evenly and produces clear, recognisable results with no incovenient shadows or exposure problems. Unfortunately, frontal lighting also produces pretty dull pictures. Backlighting is much more interesting. Here, the sun (or other light source) is behind the subject, so you're shooting into the light. Backlighting can produce striking silhouettes or very attractive 'rim-lighting' effects in portraits. But it also makes it much trickier to get the exposure right, and there's the risk of lens flare if the sun is in the frame or just outside it. Sidelighting is excellent at revealing texture, and works really well on surfaces like stone and wood, though less well on objects with more clearly-defined shapes. Sunny days are the best times to observe the effects of different lighting – you can see how it changes by walking around your subject or returning at different times. PAGE 1: The black and white photographer’s guide to lighting direction PAGE 2: The black and white photographer’s guide to light quality PAGE 3: Understanding point source lighting PAGE 4: Working with natural light in black and white PAGE 5: Metering tips for black and white photographers PAGE 6: Exposure tips for black and white photographers READ MORE 10 common exposure problems every photographer faces (and how to fix them) Black and white photography made easy: tips for pro-quality results from start to finish Master your camera’s autofocus: which AF points to use (and when to use them) See the light like a pro: everything you were afraid to ask about using natural light 10 landscape photography mistakes every photographer makes DIY Photography Hacks: make your own motorised time lapse slider Jul 18th 2013, 10:35, by crutter If you’ve ever watched time lapse movies of setting suns and blooming flowers but thought it was something you could only do on a budget like the BBC’s, well think again. Our technique editor Chris Rutter explains in our latest DIY Photography Hacks post how he built his own DIY version of a motorised slider to shoot amazing time lapse movies on a budget. Inspired by the tracking time lapse movies I’ve seen on many BBC productions, I thought I’d have a go at building my own DIY version of a motorised slider. The main requirement for a time lapse slider is that the camera needs to travel very slowly and smoothly along a glide rail. As your camera glides down the rail you will want to set it to take pictures about every 2 to 5 seconds. Click here for more on how to set up your camera to shoot time lapse photography After some failed attempts at making my own glide rail, I decided to buy one, which I purchased from Sevenoak, and then set about working out how I could add a simple continuous motor and drive unit. For simplicity I decided that a simple, continuous drive would be much easier to build than a stepper drive and controller. The motor and pulleys used mean that it takes around 20 minutes to travel the length of the rail, but the motor also has a speed control, so it can be slowed down to allow for even longer tracking shots. So, here are the parts that I used to construct the slider. Motor (cost around £35-40) I used a Celestron Astromaster Motor Drive, normally used to power telescopes. This has a built-in gearbox to produce the very low speeds that are needed for the slider. This is the large black box you can see at one end of the rail. Main pulley This is a 60 tooth aluminium pulley with a 5mm bore. This was attached to the drive shaft of the Celestron motor. Secondary pulley This 24 tooth aluminium pulley was attached using a shaft and bearing to the opposite end of the rail from the motor. Bearings for secondary pulley – pillow block bearing Drive belt MXL open length belt, 1/4 inch wide. This was attached to the camera platform, and around both pulleys until it was tight enough to transmit the drive from the motor reliably. The belts, pulleys and bearings cost around £35, and were all purchased from motionco. To see Chris’s slider in action and the type of footage you can capture on a fraction of what the BBC spends, click on the video below! READ MORE DIY Photography Hacks: make a light tent from three-ring binders to diffuse sunlight DIY Photography Hacks: why a blank CD case makes the perfect rain guard for your lens DIY Photography Hacks: how to make a tilt-shift lens from an ordinary optic 10 common exposure problems every photographer faces (and how to fix them) 10 reasons your photos aren’t sharp (and how to fix them)

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