Lessons in Learning Video

 

Whilst our newer cameras, and especially smartphones, are great at video. It is a large step from still photography, especially in the time taken (or maybe I think of it as time wasted) on editing the video. Streaming techniques that capture everything, mistakes and all, have a strong appeal compared with filming the clip, saving it to SD card transferring it to the computer for editing. Editing the clips together and rendering the final "cut". Time evaporates. This little clip was one take with minimal editing and just adding some music. I see it as a bit of a big step forward for me. 

My investigations so far have reinforced the need to get as much right in camera as possible and minimize the need for editing. This reminds me a lot of the film days and using slide film, which was very unforgiving of exposure and other mistakes. With the results that you were much more careful when taking the photo.

Looking for Superblack

I have been struggling with creating a DYI calibration card for photographing art work. Not so much in the theoretical mainly in the practical aspect of getting a true black on the card. then Today's "Here's a Thought" podcast by Brooks Jensen was on the very relevant Three Kinds of Blacks.

... then it struck me my inkjet printer doesn't do super black! (it doesn't do CMYK all at once just K)

I'll discuss how this calibration card can be used in a future post.The card itself does appear true black here because it was created in sRGB colour space (and black set to R:0 G:0 & B:0) and that is the colour space of your browser/monitor

If you art interested in a more art and philosophic perspective on photography I can highly recommend Brook's Lensworks podcasts.

Colour Composition - complimentary colours

Complimentary colours, those on opposite sides of the colour wheel generally make for an interesting composition.

Color Matters is an excellent site to brush on some of the basics of colour theory

Colour Compostion

To help you break the focus on leading lines and rule of thirds and other compositionaspects oversaold to photographers and free your mind for a little creativity. Pick up your camera and take a walk (might just be around the house or your back yard.

Look for strong colours. Maybe they might be complimentary colours (that bounce off each other, The red and blue pegs) or analugous (similar in hue, the sky and blue peg)

Ive spent more time than expected making a YouTube video. I suppose I learned a lot but I still have a lot to learn.

I did find something really neat. I was able to record mt phone sequence using zoom. I set up a private meeting logged in from my phone and shared the screen and pressed record meeting locally back on the host PC.  No exotic hardware or software required.

My Walk in Stop Motion

In Victoria we still have stricter Stay At Home conditions than other Australian states. However we have always been able to go outside and exercise and Jells Park is very popular, too much so. Thus I enjoy walking along the tracks less traveled. This was largely flooded a few days ago, so definitely has less folk on it today.  Nature is doing very well without us, by the way.

The flock of Cockatoos was at the end of my street. I pretty well find great things to photograph everyday, even if I only take a photo very 10-20 meters or so. 

Most importantly it was fun to play with stop motion again, not so sure about bloggers handling of the video.

The Surreal Painting

This time I am paying homage to a surrealist artist, Rene Magritte, whose man in the bowler hat was made popular again in the remake of The Thomas Crown Affair. I believe his canvas on the easel that disappears into the scene behind is called The Human Condition. The idea of being able to see through the current situation to the world outside appeals to me during the COVID-19 social isolation period.

To make this picture I took a couple of photos, one with a canvas and one with no canvas. I have a nifty remote control for my little Olympus so you can't see me triggering the shot with my right hand by my side.  Rather than try to do a blended image I used the cloning and context sensitive retouch tools in On1 instead, to cover the window frame and easel where the picture would been.

Artist with Idol

I know yet another self portrait, but this pays homage the the Post Impressionist Artist Gaugain and his "Self Portrait with Idol". I was trying to capture the mood and lighting rather than strict copy of the pose, and that required a fair bit of turning on and off the lights (all standard lights in my home) and shift the mask from New Guinea around a bit.

I don't have any dark walls so I had to live with the lighter background, which makes the mask standout a bit. more ominous and his cowrie shell eye stand out. I also did some double processing of my image in On1. First I took the RAW file and darkened it somewhat and lifted the contrast a little.Finally using a warm cinematic colour grading look (CG12 for the ON1 folk). I then saved this as a Tiff file (to keep the dynamic range). I reloaded that and added a vignette and a subtle canvas texture overlay before exporting to the final Jpeg.

Definitely not a master piece but fun to do. I guess this #StayAtHome project has morphed from surrealist portrait into #artinspired self-portraits, such is life during a "lockdown".