Scanography

Wow! Who knew you could even do this? Scanography has been called the poor man's large format style of photography. All it basically is, you "photograph" your object by placing it on a flatbed scanner and activate the scan via your editing program. Wow! I'm still excited at what you can achieve. Of course, my first subject is flowers... These are my first attempts at scanography. I really must read up a bit more on this. What I'm wondering though, is just what other unusual forms of photography are out there that I don't know about...

Book Review - "The Distant Hours" by Kate Morton

Photo: Adriana Glackin

It was with a little apprehension that I opened this book. This is the third novel by Kate Morton, a Brisbane based author. Her other two novels are “The Shifting Fog” and “The Forgotten Garden” and I thoroughly enjoyed reading both. So why the apprehension? Well it seems that authors tends to have a formula, a signature , to their writing and sometimes it can be so overpowering that it overtakes the story; so that all you see is the formula that’s been followed rather than the story or even the characters. Think of John Grisham and you’ll know what I’m talking about. I didn’t want to feel the disappointment I did when I read the third, almost identical Grisham novel.

Kate Morton’s style is to weave more than one story within the pages; she also has this wonderful knack of being able to take you back into the past, back to the present and then back to the present again over and over, the whole time weaving the stories and characters together. She does this so effortlessly, that although it’s been that way for all 3 of her novels the actual narratives and characters more than hold their own. This latest of hers, is another clever narrative, and my only regret is that I raced through it far too quickly – I simply needed to know what was going to happen next!

It was also with some disappointment that I closed the book for one last time. At 497 pages, the book seems long enough – and heavy enough when it falls on your nose when you’re up late in bed reading when you should be sleeping... But I feel a sense of sadness that I won’t hear any more of the tales of Saffy and Percy, two of the characters from the novel. There simply wasn’t the room in the book to squeeze anymore in, for that I’m certain and I think it is more a testament of the writing skills of the author that she is able to leave you with this feeling. Or, it might just be me being greedy and wanting to know more.

If you’ve read her previous two novels, then you’ll definitely enjoy The Distant Hours. If you haven’t read any of her novels and you enjoy your chick-lit with the modern day mixed with the early 20th century, full-bodied characters and clever twists, then give them a go. I know I haven't given anything away here - that would be spoiling it, now wouldn't it...

Kate, if you happen across this blog post, it would be really, really good if you could write a spin-off novella about Saffy and Percy. Such sweet dears, I would have loved to hear more of their stories.

What lens do you use when photographing waterfalls?

I tagged long with photographers Tatiana and Peter this past weekend and I thought I’d share some photographs I took of some waterfalls located in the Leura area.  I’m not certain of their name, but they are below the Bridal Veil Falls. Please feel free to leave me a comment if you happen to know the names of the waterfalls below.

I used three very different lenses: Sigma 10-20mm, the Lensbaby Composer (with Soft Focus Option) and 24mm Tilt-Shift Lens, borrowed from Peter who has a wonderful tutorial on tilt-shift lenses just a click away. You can see by the examples, that some very different results were obtained. I have included the camera and lens settings for you.

So, what lens do you like to use when you shoot landscapes such as waterfalls?

Canon 50D, Sigma 10-20mm @14mm, f11, ISO100, 30 seconds, Cokin ND filters x 2

Canon 50D, Sigma 10-20mm @ 11mm, f14, ISO100, 15 seconds, Cokin ND Filters x 2

Canon 50D, Lensbaby Composer, Soft Focus Optic, ISO100, 1 second,  Cokin ND Filters x 2, own textures added in PS

Canon 50D, Lensbaby Composer Soft Focus Optic, ISO100, 0.6 seconds, Cokin ND Filters x 2

Canon 50D, Lensbaby Composer Soft Focus Optic, ISO100, 1/13 seconds, Cokin ND Filters x 2,

Canon 50D, 24mm tilt-Shift Lens, f11, 1.3 seconds, no filters

The magical world in the upturned glass

the magical world in the upturned glass, originally uploaded by Adriana Glackin.

The challenge was set and the keyword was “glass”. It could be interpreted in any way, and having seen an early entry, I almost didn’t bother. How could I compete with that...and then I got to thinking - what’s the point of a challenge if I give up so easily? That wouldn’t be the spirit of it, so it was time to think hard and give it a go. Each day I would formulate an idea in my head whilst working out if I could pull it off, trying all the while to build the image in my head. In the end, I decided to pursue a dandelion idea as there was a perfect one in our lawn. Thanks to some butterfly stock over at Deviantart and quite a few adjustment layers, I’m happy with the result – a magical world in an upturned schooner glass!

Why shooting in RAW is worthwhile

Whale Beach afternoon , originally uploaded by Adriana Glackin.

Last week I met up with a fellow photographer friend of mine, Matt Penfold, and we spent a couple of hours clambering over the rocks at Whale Beach on Sydney’s northside. While it was more an exercise to check out a possible sunrise location, the tide was just right for some interesting seascape shots. The problem was the lighting, with the sun still being a little too bright and the shadows just that little bit too long and dark. Using ND filters certainly helped, but if you’re like me and you use Cokin filters, then you would have noticed the unsightly colour caste created when stacking two or more filters; a colour caste that does nothing for the image unfortunately.

This is where it’s really handy to shoot using RAW and not just jpeg. I actually shoot both; I use jpeg as my proof and I edit using the RAW file. The RAW file is considerably bigger and contains the complete image file as captured by the camera sensor and unedited by the camera software. I managed to “rescue” this seascape image from the trash thanks to having shot using RAW. Had I only shot using jpeg, I don’t know that I would have been able to rid the image of the murky muddy purple caste in the sky. Instead, using ACR and making adjustments to hue, saturation, colour temperature, levels and curves, I was able to eliminate the muddy purple hue in the sky and enhance the afternoon warmth instead.

One book that you might find handy is the Focus Guide Photoshop: Get More From RAW. I switched to RAW when I bought my first DSLR and I used this book to familiarise myself with ACR. Now, I do much of my editing in this format. The guide is easy to follow and is suitable for both PS and Elements versions. I’m not sure if this book is still available new, but it would certainly be available in second hand book stores and of course online.