Below is a mix of some of my photographs ranging from Istanbul travel pics to cars,landscapes and abstracts.
Kiz Kulesi
When you see an image of a tasty dish in a magazine you wish you had shot your self - keep in mind that a lot of planning must have gone behind that shot. If you wish to shoot similar images you too could get started with this article, Continue reading »
When youve hired a professional photographer to take photos of your little one, there are a few things you can do to make sure your child is well-prepared for the experience. As any parent already knows, sometimes it can be really difficult to get your child (or children) to stay still long enough to pose for one picture, let alone dozens. If you follow a few simple rules though, youll have happier child, better pictures and plenty of them!
1: For children under the age of 6, one of the most important things to do is to make sure theyve had a nap before the photo-shoot. Even if they dont normally sleep during the day, in this case, make an exception. A tired kid is usually an impatient and cranky kid. Difficult enough for a parent to deal with; nearly impossible for a photographer to manage.
2: Feed your child first and have food ready in case they need a snack during the photo-shoot. For kids of any age (and lots of adults too), a full stomach makes a lot of difference to improving a mood and improving the ability to focus for more than a minute or two.
3: Dont give your kid food or drinks that are proven hyper-energy boosters No sugar and no caffeine before or during the shoot! This means no pop, nothing with ketchup, no sugary cereals, no cookies and so on. Hyper kids are even more difficult to photograph than tired or cranky kids.
4: Be sure to explain clearly to your child about the photo-shoot before you even meet up with your photographer. Tell them the photographers name; explain what will be happening and why the pictures are being taken. Very important to explain, is that they need to listen to what the photographer is asking them to do. (Such as how to pose, or to look at the camera or to hold still, etc.)
5: Never, never, never leave your child unattended with a photographer, unless its someone you already know and trust. Other than the obvious safety reasons, its just common sense that a child in a strange or new situation should be accompanied at all times by a parent or guardian.
6: During the shoot, unless the photographer specifically asks you to, try not to direct your child too much. Although its instinctive that youll want to, it really is best to let the photographer be in charge of the situation as much as possible. Assuming youve hired someone with experience photographing children, you should be able to relax and trust that they know what theyre doing, and that includes how to direct your child for the best possible results.
7: Before your shoot, be sure to take a few minutes to let your child get comfortable being around the photographer before the camera comes out. Again, an experienced child photographer knows its important to establish a rapport with the little ones before starting the photo-session. Even ten minutes of your photographer talking to the child - or with very young children, just getting them used to the sound of a new voice will make a big difference in the quality and tone of your childs session.
8: Be sure to give your child a few breaks during the session. Bring a few of their favourite small toys with you. If youve booked more than half an hour (most sessions are 60 to 90 minutes at least), then take them for a 5 minute walk halfway through. If youre somewhere outdoors, let them run and play for a few minutes. If youre in your home, let them play in their room or in your yard for a short while. A good child photographer not only wont mind, theyll encourage you to do this. Again, a happy child is much easier to take pictures of than an unhappy one.
9: A simple thing but sometimes an overlooked one, is to be sure your child has gone to the washroom right before the shoot. And if they havent, then be sure to take at least one washroom break even if your child doesnt ask for one during your session. Many children are too shy to ask to go to the bathroom if theyre around a stranger or in a strange situation. If your child is still in diapers, make sure theyre clean and dry at all times during the shoot. If they need a diaper change, dont hesitate to take the time. Child photographers know to expect this, so dont worry about taking the time to do it.
10: If, despite all your best efforts, your child is in no mood for a photo-shoot and is fussy, or crying non-stop or just wont be still or calm, dont try to force the situation. Reschedule. Your photographer will still need to be compensated for their time, even if they cant take the photos you hired them for. The sooner you decide its better to reschedule, the less time youll need to pay the photographer for being in a situation where theyre unable to do their job. Although it might end up costing you a bit more than youd bargained for, if the photos of your child are important to you, rescheduling with the same photographer will be worth it.
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Tags: Professional Photographer, Sleep, Snack
Avi Roth asked:
Managing the challenge of narrow depth of field in highly reflective surface environment
By Avi Roth
In the field of commercial photography, be it in motion or static, every category presents a challenge of its own. With jewelry photography, an object of highly reflective surface (HRS), the challenge is amplified due to its relatively small size captured mostly in close-up environment with shallow depth of field, surface complexity (specular), and limited ways of lighting due to space restriction between the lens and the object. Jewelry photography demands knowledge and experience to overcome the compounded difficulty of controlling reflections and limited depth-of-field (perceived sharpness) in close-up jewelry photography.
In addition to the problems mentioned above, the success of reproducing and obtaining a high quality digital image of jewelry will depend on the equipment used in the reproduction process. There are basically three types of camera systems one can employ:
a. Digital SLRs like Canon, Nikon, Olympus, Sigma with good sensor resolution (6-14 MP)
b. Medium format cameras like Hassleblad, Rollei or Mamiya with a larger sensor digital back (11-39 MP)
c. Large format view cameras like Sinar or Toyo with live video studio solution (11-39 MP)
The purpose of this article is to discuss some of the principal challenges posed by the complexities of reflective surface reproduction, particularly in digital close-up photography. Below I will present some solution to these challenges from the lessons learned and experienced in my daily practice and from my own research as to what is the best, fastest, and simplest solution to an otherwise complex assignment of jewelry photography.
Jewelry surface (HRS)
The most difficult task of all HRS digital captures is jewelry. In essence all jewelry objects are built with reflective qualities of various degrees and can be compared to mirrors. Mirrors are objects with good specular or diffused reflection; that is, image forming qualities. Imagine pointing your lens towards a mirror at a close distance. What will you see? Exactly, yourself holding a camera and your surrounding area. Jewelry objects in essence embody three kinds of mirrors: flat, convex and concave determined at random by the jewelrys very shape. Curved mirrors magnify or shrink images therefore distort the reflected image. Most jewelry objects typify spherical mirrors structured in an interesting relationship of concave and convex surfaces.
Solutions:
Understanding the basic reflective properties of mirrors can be helpful in solving some basic problems related to jewelry photography because of their common reflective properties.
a. Jewelry reflection has no physical existence. Conceal the camera or choose a shooting angle for the jewelry to reflect a controlled surface such as a white board or soft box.
b. The location of the camera/lens matters in terms of how and what will the jewelry reflect. Use longer lenses to extend the working space between object and lens.
c. When light strikes the jewelry surface the angle of reflection equals the angle of in incidence. Place your light source indirectly to the angle of reflectance.
d. The reflection on the jewelry is half the size of the reflected image - the jewelry is always halfway between the reflected image and the reflection. Creating and placing the jewelry inside a large soft tent enables the application of various light sources to minimize and control unwanted reflections.
e. If the jewelry surface is flat and perfectly shiny, specular reflection will result. If the surface is rough, diffused or distorted reflection will result (bending) Place the jewelry in a light zone of several loosely arranged large white panels, and by modifying their position relevant to the object will enable the control of light source there by controlling unwanted reflection.
Overall Sharpness:
A narrow depth-of-field (DOF) can create spectacular effects when photographing insects, flowers, etc., but in jewelry photography if the entire image does not appear in full focus, the image becomes an unusable one. Unusable in the sense that some parts of a ring or bracelet needed to provide useful data for the purpose of presentation will be unacceptably less sharp than other parts. For example, the front part of a bracelet (focal plane of the lens) is in sharp focus; but as we move towards the back region the loss of sharpness becomes unacceptable (blurred). DOF and image sharpness changes with sensor size. Smaller digital sensors obtain maximum sharpness at wider apertures (f:8-f:11) while larger ones at (f:11-f:22). Capturing small objects like jewelry via close-up photography presents a problem since only a very narrow portion of the object relative to the focal plane will be acceptably in focus. One way to extend depth of field would be to take images using a narrow lens aperture. This solution has a serious disadvantage. Small apertures bring more light diffraction, degrading the image resolution. This is one reason why many consumer digital cameras (with very small sensors) won’t let you stop down past f:8, while studio solution sensors are often stopped down to f:32 and beyond.
Solution:
The application of double exposure solution or photo stitching in jewelry photography partially solves the limitations of shallow depth-of-field. The technique known as “focus stacking” is another. Using double exposure when limited depth-of-field is available is a powerful technique to help photograph and present jewelry.
Depth-of-field determines what part of the jewelry has the sharpest focus and its amount. Unfortunately, at larger apertures depth of field limits attention to a particular focal points i.e. the top of a ring, while minimizing details at the shank. A greater depth-of-field would presents all the elements of a ring sharp at once, relatively equally. Depth-of-field is determined by the following: lens aperture (-stop), lens focal length and your distance from the focal point. In jewelry photography, of these three the aperture has the most influence and the least modifiable. Therefore to increase depth-of-field and achieve total sharpness over the entire image, move farther away from the jewelry by using a longer lens.
1. Capture two images, first focus slightly below the ring top, then a second focused lower at the center.
2. Bring both images into two separate layers in Photoshop to combine the two into one sharp image.
There are of course other solutions such as the Helicon Focus. This program is designed to manage the shallow depth-of-field problem in close-up imaging. It also aligns the images that change their size and position from shot to shot. This function is especially important with closeup jewelry photography.
However, the most pragmatic answer to the depth-of-field challenge is the large format studio camera. These cameras such as Arca Swiss, Linhof, Sinar, Fuji, Calumet or Toyo have expandable bellows, tilt and swing capabilities, and are allowing the capture of high-quality images with extended depth-of-field beyond the optical limitations of the lens.
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