One of the things I always harp on in my seminars is that if something doesn’t add to an image it detracts from an image. Usually I am talking about the errant stick or hotspot in the background which when included within the frame distracts the viewer from the message of the photograph. But color can also be one of these distractions. When I created this image of Portland Head Lighthouse in Maine I was drawn to the texture, patterns, and subtle tones, in the foreground rock elements. As well as the contrast between the sharp lines and hard edges of the rocks with the soft puffy clouds in the sky above. By removing the color from the image I allow these elements to take center stage and really sing, without the distraction of all that flashy color.

Good Luck and good light

Steve

One of the first spring wildflowers to grace the woods here in Michigan are the Round-lobed Hepatica. This beautiful little flower ranges in color from white to magenta to a deep rich purple-blue. They can be found growing in hardwood forests more often than not on south facing hillsides. They face south in order to get maximum exposure to the warming sun at this time of year. They are also unusual in that they close down late every afternoon and only open up on sunny days when the temperature is above 50. I think this is likely to protect the delicate flowers from the colder temperatures at night this early in the spring.

The good news is that if you want to photograph Hepatica you get to sleep in! I usually head out about 10 AM on warmer days to give them a chance to open up. Remember these flowers only open up on sunny day. So if there are not some clouds up in the sky to cut the light you are going to want to bring along a diffuser to shade your subject. I usually get my shot all set up and wait for a passing cloud to soften the light or use my diffuser to shade the subject. By diffusing the harsh light we diminish the shadows and over all contrast in the image which lets the beautiful details of this tiny flower come through.

Good luck and good light

Steve

Image: Round-Lobed Hepatica & Tree Bark

One of the things I really enjoy about photographing wildlife is “the chess game”. What I mean by that is when I am photographing an animal I am always thinking a few moves ahead. So I can be sure to be in the right place at the right time. I try to get in the animals head, to figure out what its next move is going to be. This is why it is important to spend time with a subject. The more knowledge you have about an animal, the better you will be at anticipating its next move.

Many different behaviors and actions are preceded by visual cues. Some examples are. If a duck, goose, loon, or swan dips its head in the water and runs water down its back it is going to rear up and flap its wings. If a coyote or fox stares intently at the ground and turns its head side to side, it is likely getting ready to pounce on a vole. If a bird turns toward the wind and defecates it is more often than not going to fly away. During the rut a male deer, bighorn, elk, or pronghorn, will always do a lip-curl after it “checks” a female. Knowing your subject and paying attention to these visual cues will help you to anticipate the action and get some of these exciting action shots.

Good luck and good light

Steve

A late winter project that I like to do is to try and locate fox dens, which I can return to and photograph after the pups are born. This time of year the female fox is in a maternal state of mind. During the course of her daily travels she will often visit her den site. To check things out, do some digging, and other spring cleaning type chores. We just need to know where she is going in to find this den site.  In order to do this we must become one with the fox, we must follow her on her daily rounds. A tall order indeed, but as usual there is a trick.

The trick is to wait until there has been a fresh dusting of snow overnight. Then go out the following morning into some likely habitat and find some fox tracks. Surprisingly this is easier than it sounds. Fox tracks are roundish about the size of a fifty cent piece and go in virtually a straight line one foot directly in front of the other.  Once you find them follow along. Not only will you get to know a lot about fox and their habits but you will get some great exercise as well. It may also lead to some great photo opportunities too.

Be warned though, pay attention to where you are going. One morning, while following a fox I was pulled deep into an unfamiliar part of some state land. I foolishly assumed I would just retrace my own tracks back to my vehicle. Well as the day heated up the dusting of snow melted and I was left with no “trail of breadcrumbs” to follow home. 

Good luck and good light

Steve

After I have edited and rated the images it is time to rename and color correct. I shoot Nikon so my camera names each file with DSC and a 4 digit number ie DSC_1234. Which for many people would work fine, but if you shoot much eventually you are going to hit DSC_9999 and roll over back to DSC_0001, then you are going to have different images with the same file number.  A big problem! So once I have everything edited and rated I use the batch rename function to rename each of the images. My file name system is “my name_date file was made year/month/day_4 digit number from original DSC filename” or Gettle_120113_1234.tif. This is very easy to setup using batch rename and happens with just the click of the mouse. Now since I have added the date to the file name I will never have two files with the same name. Unless I shoot 10,000 images in one day, my record is 3,700 images in ten hours so I think I’m safe. Man that was a good day!

Next up color correction, I shoot raw so it is necessary that I color correct all of my images in order to get accurate colors. It is imperative that you do your color correction on a monitor that is calibrated to display accurate colors within industry standards. This ensures that anyone viewing your image that is also on a calibrated monitor will see your images exactly as you intended them to be seen. I do all of my color correction in adobe camera raw. This is also when I will do any dust spotting that might be required. My goal is to do this once and to never have to touch the image again for color correction. Once the images are color corrected I save them as DNGs, which is Adobe’s version of a raw file. I can very easily convert these to jpegs or tiffs as needed for different purposes.  As I save these color corrected images I have Adobe Camera Raw add an S. to the existing filename ie S.Gettle_120113_1234.dng, this way I know if there is an S in the file name I know it has been color corrected.  I save my image files as DNGs because it is an open file format, not proprietary like all the different camera’s versions of raw. My concern is that in 25 years will I still be able to open a Nikon D300 raw file. Very likely yes, but you can never be sure.

Next week I will talk about the key to the organization of the whole system, cataloging and keywording.

Good luck and good light

Steve

The next step is editing and rating. You should do both, ruthlessly! I do this in Adobe Bridge and will soon be switching over to Lightroom. Everyone should edit, the longer you shoot the more ruthless you become. But my rule is if I would not send it to my agent and I would never submit it to an editor myself for something I don’t want it and I trash it. In short if I don’t see me or anyone else using an image for something I don’t keep it. I don’t keep duplicates of digital files because there is no reason I have backups of everything and I can make as many exact copies as I need. If I make twenty images of a bird sitting on a branch I would keep the best one as well as a couple other head positions and loose the rest.

I edit and rate images on the same pass. I use a five star system of rating images. I pull up a day’s shoot in Bridge (soon to be Lightroom) with thumbnails running down one side of the screen and a large preview of the selected image filling most of the screen. Then I go through one image at a time and evaluate each for esthetic and technical merit and rate each image as follows. Five star images are something really special, a family jewel kind of image, I don’t have many of those probably one or two percent of my files. Four star images are again something special maybe a unique behavior or really special light, definitely an above average image these makeup maybe 5 to 8 percent of my files. Three star images are really the bread and butter of my files these are images that are technically well done and of a good subject in a good situation. Making up over 90% of my files I would not hesitate to send these off to an editor or my agent, for any purpose. Lastly I have some two star images these are images that I really probably should not keep and will never use or send out but for some reason I just can’t let go of. Maybe they are near misses of something I have put a lot of effort into or special moments that I want to have a memento of, these are less than two percent of my files. Any images that don’t get a star rating are deleted.

The beauty of having all my images rated like this is that if I am working on a slide program or calendar submission or other project and I just want to see the best of my files. I can just pull up all the four and five star images and see only the cream of my files.

Image: Violet-tailed Sylph, Ecuador  One of my five star images.

Happy New Year! If you are like many photographers it is very likely that one of your new year’s resolutions is to get your image files organized. So, for this next series of posts that is what I am going to write about. The fancy buzz word for this process is digital asset management or DAM. If you have tons of digital files and want to really set up a very detailed system I highly recommend a book called The DAM Book. For most of you though you just want to be able to find the image that you want quickly and easily, with a minimum of effort. The good news is that with digital files this is very easy to accomplish. The bad news is it takes some discipline and some effort to setup your system on the front end.

The first step on this journey to total organization is importing the images from your card onto your computer or hard drive (and backup hard drive). For this I use a program called Downloader Pro. It is made by Breeze Systems and I love it. Once I insert a card into my reader Downloader Pro opens up and asks me if I want to do what I always do when I insert a card into the reader. To which I reply yes and it does the following; in my master image file on my external hard drive it makes a new sub-folder with the date that any images were created (if there was three days worth of shooting on the card it would make three files with three different dates) Then it puts all the images made on each date into the appropriate file. It also adds all of my copyright and contact information to the metadata of each image file. Lastly it does exactly the same thing on my backup hard drive. So now I have two exact copies of all the images on two separate hard drives. You do backup all your image files don’t you? If you don’t backup your files, you’re just rolling the dice. Sorry but it’s true, storage is cheap, your images are irreplaceable you should backup. If your files aren’t backed up, stop reading right now and go buy a second hard drive. I even have a third hard drive that I update with any new work once a month. I keep this third drive in a separate location.

Ok I’m off the soapbox. The next step is editing and rating your images I will talk about this process next week until then… backup your files! (sorry couldn’t help myself):

Good luck and good light

Steve

Including the sun in your compositions can add impact and punch to your images. (Warning, to avoid damaging your vision, only look at the sun through your camera when it is very low in the sky). If the sun is a major part of your composition you will need to be sure not to stop down the lens down beyond f5.6, or else the shutter blades will distort the roundness of the sun in the final image. Flare can be a definite problem when shooting directly into the sun. Flare is caused by light shining into the lens and causing highlights on the internal elements of your lens, these highlights appear as aperture shaped highlights in your image. When shooting directly into the sun try to shade the front element of your lens to help cut down flare. Or line up your subject to block the sun and greatly reduce flare. Often times you can see the flare in the viewfinder prior to making the image. You could also embrace the flare and use at as a compositional element in your photo.

Lining up these shots can be frustrating I am always surprised at just how fast the sun is actually tracking across the sky when I try to make images like this. I find it easier to figure out the direction the sun is tracking, setup the shot just ahead of where it will soon be, and let the sun move into my composition.

T’was the night before Christmas, when all through the house.
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
in hopes that new photo gear soon would be there.

The photographers were nestled all snug in their beds,
while visions of great light danced  in their heads.
Dreaming of great images they soon would make,
pictures of animals, field, forest, and lake.

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
I grabbed my camera and snatched up my flash,
tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow,
made magic the light on the objects below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
but a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer.

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St Nick.
I must get this shot and I must be real quick,
I push down the shutter, but alas there’s no click!

I can’t believe the luck, my batteries are dead,
where is a spare set I think in my head.
I fresh set of lithiums I have in my bag,
If only I could get there, man what a drag!

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof,
the prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
I think to myself I know his next move,
down the chimney he’ll come, I really must move.

I grab the fresh batteries and say a few prayers,
I load up my camera as I dash down the stairs.
I hit the landing and stopped with great awe.
Standing before me I must relay what I saw.

He was dressed all in fur,from his head to his foot,
and his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot.
A bundle of new photo gear he had flung on his back,
all kinds of new gadgets filled out his great sack.

His eyes-how they twinkled! His dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
I stood there slack-jawed utterly dumbfounded,
my camera at my side, all my plans were confounded.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
and filled all the stockings, then turned with a jerk.
With a twinkle and a nod, up the chimney he rose.
I fired off the camera. All I got was his toes.

Once he was gone I snapped out of my trance.
I smiled as I realized I had missed my big chance.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
“Happy Christmas to all, good luck and good light!”

The method that I prefer is to use the manual metering mode and the spot meter of my camera. When using this method I look at the scene and try to decide what area of the scene I would like to appear as a mid-tone. In an image such as the silhouetted frog image a medium green. So I would place my spot meter on the leaf set my camera and make the image. In the case of a sunrise or sunset the spot I meter will become a medium orange color. Using the example of the mother and chick loon below I would place my spot meter on the area just over the top of the birds use this reading to set my camera and shoot the scene as metered this would place that color as a medium or mid-tone orange, rendering my subject as a dark featureless silhouette.

The correct exposure for a sunrise or sunset silhouette can be a very subjective thing; generally as long as your subject is rendered a dark featureless shade the background can be as light or as dark as you choose.

This series of tips as well as many others are posted on my facebook page

Good luck and good light

Steve