DPP: Exercise 23: Alteration

In this last exercise in Part Four, we are asked to alter an image through the removal of an object.  The finished image should not reveal retouching to the average viewer seeing the image for the first time.

DPP: Exercise 20: Improvement or Interpretation?

This exercise is intended to explore alterations that fall somewhere between correction and enhancement.  The former are things like removing dust and lens flare, while the latter are efforts to improve (a word descriptive of the photographer's values) on optical and sensor technology.  Admittedly, the line between these two is not always clear.

DPP: Exercise 19: Correction

I am awaiting return of prints to do proper feedback assessment from Assignment 2.  My tutors says they are in the mail and that I shouldn't feel constrained to move on to exercises in part four.  

Moving on then.

Assignment Four: Applying Lighting Techniques

Introduction

I got stuck.

For weeks I fretted about how best to tackle this assignment.  I had whipped through the exercises in the course of a week’s vacation, but when I began to think about how to approach the assignment I was restrained by a lack of confidence.  I read books about lighting.  I watched videos about lighting.  But I never got any closer to actually doing the assignment. 

Exploring the possibilities - Assignment 4

I started building on a set-up for Assignment 4, which involves demonstrating a variety of lighting techniques, and shot a few preliminary images.  My idea is a series of self-portraits.  Ironically, a coursemate is considering working with skulls.

More images below the break. Click Read more>> below.

Exercise 36: Contrast and Shadow Fill

One more exercise today, this time using the same set-up as last with a few modifications.  As I alluded in the last exercise, what I needed to make a side-back lit photo better was a reflector on the opposite side of the object to bring some light onto the shadowy side of the face.  That's what we're doing here, experimenting with different types of fill.  

We start out above with two controls.  I needed one of the foam boards for a reflector for this exercise, so the one in back has been replaced by a white wall.  The light is about one meter to the right.

Exercise 35: The Lighting Angle

In this exercise we are asked to do a little still-life set-up and shoot a series of images using our newly built diffuser demonstrating light from a number of different angles.  The two images above waere taken with light in front of the object - left naked, right with diffuser.

Exercise 34: Softening the Light

I built my own diffuser from a sheet of foam board found at the nearby printer.  Half of it I saved to use as a reflector (and backdrop, as seen here).  The other half I cut out the middle, leaving a frame over which I taped tracing paper.  Voila!  Perhaps not a permanent solution, but a quick and inexpensive one.

Exercise 33: Outdoors at Night

I went to Satwa specifically to shoot the roundabout seen above.  I didn't expect to get this shot.  I visited all the surrounding commercial buildings hoping to get to a rooftop, but all were locked and the one security guard I could find seemed cooperative but my request was turned down by his superior who insisted I get permission from the building owner.

Exercise 31: Cloudy Weather and Rain

I thought it might be a while before I was able to shoot photos for this exercise.  If ever.  Dubai experiences only 25 days of precipitation per year, which on average - 2 days a month - doesn't seem so infrequent.   But look again at the amount of annual rainfall - 94mm - and you see how paltry rain actually is.  If you divide that annual average by the number of days, you get a daily average of less than 4mm. That's about the width of a wedding band.

In reality we seem to have a few days each year when we get a substantial downpour. For the others we have some clouds and a bit of drizzle.  You might not even know it rained until you saw a car, which is a great surface for showing the mess that results from water being splattered on a surface lightly coated with fine sand.  Like this:

Exercise 32: Tungsten & Fluorescent Lighting

With this exercise we examine three light sources:  natural daylight at sunset/dusk, tungsten lighting (that provided by typical light bulbs), and fluorescent.

Before shooting, we are asked to gaze out a window at sunset in a room lit with tungsten light.  After one minute, we look back into the room, then again back out the window to note the difference in lighting.  What I noted is the outside light was blue, inside orange.  The eyes quickly adjust to these changes as you move back and forth between light sources.

We were then to shoot a series of photos combining different types of light sources. The first set was shot about an hour before sunset and shows tungsten to have an orange cast, fluorescent blue-green.  

Exercise 30: Variety with Low Sun

The purpose of this exercise seems to be to capture, in one day, the variety of late afternoon sunlight by changing point of view.  There is no limit on the type or number of subjects, but I chose to limit myself for two reasons.  One, this is a huge object and the sun plays on it quite nicely at the end of the day.  Two, I didn't have much time to search out additional subjects.

The object in question is an industrial size air conditioning unit.  You can read more about the company here. As you can see from the photos, it is an isolated structure about five stories tall with nothing nearby to obstruct the afternoon sun.

My approach was simply to circle the object, shooting as much as possible. I shot entirely on auto.  As a result I had to correct on a couple images for exposure.

Frontal Lighting:  Sun at back

Exercise 29: Light Throughout the Day

"You are going to take a very detailed look at what happens to a view as the sun moves."

Indeed, I did.  I got up just after 05:00, made a pot of coffee, and carried my gear up to the roof.  I live in a 31 story building on Sheikh Zayed Road, the main thoroughfare through Dubai, the one you see in the marketing and promotional materials, the one with the long row of skyscrapers.  At 31 stories, though, our building is rather dwarfish.

I had the good fortune to work on the same day as the cleaners, a group of Bangladeshis rappelling down the face of the building with high pressure water guns, so there was a chance to chat and photograph something other than landscapes.

Scouting Location: Light Through the Day

The next exercise in Light is shooting on set-up hourly from sunrise to sunset.  When I told my wife about it, she said, "All day?"  Yes, all day.  And because this exercise is such a large commitment in time, it seems prudent to invest a little more scouting location and making sure you are ready to go when the day arrives.

Exercise 28: Judging Color Temperature

The purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate the effect of White Balance (WB) on color. Of the several definitions I found on the web, Ken Rockwell's seems the most straightforward:

Exercise 27: Higher and Lower Density

The purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate the trade off between high and low ISO settings. With high settings it is possible to capture just about anything hand-held, including moving objects in low light.  The price to pay is in grainy or "noisy" images.

Exercise 26: Measuring Exposure

The first exercise in Part 4 has to do with exposure and is much like this one, in which we were asked to shoot a scene with different exposures to demonstrate how light effects color.  In this exercise the idea seems to be getting the "right" exposure in relation to a number of elements in addition to color, such as preserving detail in shadowy corners, or conversely erasing detail to create deep pockets of black, as in silhouettes. 

Exercise: Different types of metering

Great feedback on Assignment 3 came in this morning, just as I am kicking off Part 4:  Lighting.  This exercise is not part of the course but something I thought useful to explore.  Freeman kicks off his discussion of light with a review of types of metering, so I headed out to see how types of metering manifest.  Here are results from scenes captured just out back, a 5 minute walk from the flat (which is actually pictured here).  The only post-processing on these images is lens correction and sharpening.