Innehållsförteckning för No. 255 från Digital Photographer

Digital cameras are capable of producing images of such depth and realism today that it can be easy to make an unexpected oversight with our photography: ‘real’ isn’t always best. The latest high-resolution sensors can reveal astonishing levels of detail and wonderfully wide tonal ranges, but sometimes creativity must be set free from these technical shackles. Macro photography is often seen as a particularly formulaic genre, but there is still plenty of room for artistic licence. Explore the pages of our lead feature this issue (p22) to discover how to capture closeups with energy and character, courtesy of nature photographer Geraint Radford. Next, unleash your inner artist with our Composite Photography workshop. With help from the image editing experts, find out how to push the boundaries of your photography and…

DJI, one of the leading manufacturers in the drone and creative camera technology market, has unveiled three new products designed to help filmmakers and content creators bring their visions to life. There are two new gimbals, the DJI RS 3 and DJI RS 3 Pro, and a wireless video solution called the DJI Transmission. The two stabilisers bring improvements to the classic Ronin series, while the Transmission, DJI’s first independent wireless video solution, combines reception, control and recording in one device. DJI RS 3 The DJI RS 3 is designed to get filmmakers up and running quickly, with a new automated axes-locking system. By turning on the gimbal, the automated axis locks, releases and unfolds the gimbal, allowing the operator to get started within a few seconds. Tapping the power…

NiSi has released an updated version of its circular polariser filter and holder kit, which forms part of its square filter system. As with the V6 incarnation, the V7 circular polariser has its own slot at the back of the filter h`older and is rotated by a thumb-operated knob. The key difference is that, rather than having to first screw the polariser into the holder, it clips in, making it easier to fit or remove. The polariser features True Color optics, which NiSi claims to be colour-castfree. While only the new V7 polariser fits the V7 holder, there are three additional square filter slots, and the system is fully compatible with NiSi’s existing range of 100mm filters, plus 100mm-wide filters with 2mm thickness from other manufacturers. In addition to the…

Geraint Radford Growing up in the valleys of south Wales, Geraint discovered a deep love for and appreciation of nature and wildlife. Now a pro macro photographer and Olympus ambassador, he describes himself as “a vegan fella, Bourbon biscuit lover and an insect’s best friend”. www.geraintradford.com @geraintradfordmacro The world is full of fascinating creatures and plants that can capture our imagination and inspire us to spend more time exploring our natural environment, whether that’s local woodlands, a nature reserve or your back garden. There’s nothing quite like noticing a weevil upon a beautiful flower, a bee covered in raindrops, or an adorable wolf spider, dancing his heart out to impress a potential mate. Macro is an awesome genre of photography that allows us to develop some handy skills to improve…

Insects, plants, and fungi are such fascinating subjects that there is a temptation to magnify as much as possible and fill the frame – however, this may actually be limiting our creativity. Quite often, the environment and weather conditions can add a lot of narrative and atmosphere, enhancing our images. In many ways, including extra elements does indeed make things more challenging because we now have to consider the entire frame, paying attention to any potential distractions in the photograph. Yet I truly believe these considerations will only benefit our image-making. Macro lenses with long focal lengths can create fantastic out-of-focus backgrounds and while this can work to isolate our main subject, it creates opportunities to use colours, textures, and natural framing to create unique compositions. Look for complementary colours…

Compositing is actually not a new concept – it has been a part of the photo editing process since the days of film photography. In decades past, it was still possible to seamlessly blend image components together in the dark room, only this was done by physical means, rather than electronic. With the onset of digital imaging and photo-editing software such as Adobe Photoshop, the possibilities for believable image blends are more accessible than ever before. The potential uses are wide-reaching and in the modern marketplace, there is an almost insatiable appetite for photorealistic compositing work. From environmental portraiture to product photography, landscapes, advertising and property, it is a skill that finds uses in almost every line of contemporary genres. Compositing is a broad term, covering everything from simple sky…

Photoshop is used in many ways, but the one thing that comes in handy for any photographer is selecting and extracting. Making selections can be challenging, but it has to be done right otherwise, the whole emotion of the scene might not be credible and ruin the whole photo. Each detail is important. There are different ways to select your subject and extract them in Photoshop. In this example, I will show you the easiest and fastest way to do that. Photoshop has evolved so much that in a few clicks, you can do things that would have taken you hours before because it had to be done precisely, zoomed in, and it was not the most enjoyable part of retouching photos. So let me show you the most recent…

For photographers, an out-of-focus or blurred shot is generally a bad thing. We combat this by using fast shutter speeds to stop camera shake when handholding and also aim to reduce the amount of subject blur. But for action shots where your subject is speeding past, such as an animal, car or a motorbike, slowing the shutter speed down and tracking the subject at the same rate at which it’s travelling – atechnique called panning – can achieve amazing results. By tracking the motorbike at the same pace it’s travelling while you press the shutter button, the bike and rider are pin-sharp but the background is transformed into an amazing rush of movement. This looks much more impressive than a perfectly sharp shot. If your lens has multiple image stabilisation…

In their simplest form, Non-Fungible Tokens, or NFTs, are digital assets, such as photos, illustrations or even clips of music. NFTs have a limited edition quality, whether it’s one-of-akind or a batch of a select few. They work in a similar way to limited edition physical prints in so much as part of their value comes from their rarity. Another aspect of their value comes from how they work – NFTs are stored on the blockchain (a system that records all transactions made in cryptocurrency), so there’s a digital record showing the provenance of any asset. This means they can be traced back to the original owner or creator. While the NFT market is currently dominated by graphic design and digital avatars, such as The Bored Ape Yacht Club and…

WIN! SAMSUNG 256GB PRO PLUS MICRO SDXC MEMORY CARD WITH SD ADAPTER Every issue, one Digital Photographer reader wins a Samsung 256GB PRO Plus MicroSDXC memory card with SD adapter. Boasting up to 160MB/s and 120MB/s read/write speeds, the card is perfect for high-res stills and Ultra HD video. It is the go-to card for the modern content creator using mirrorless, smartphone, action cam and drone cameras. Find out more at samsung.com/uk/ memory-storage Photographer: Claudio Ciardi Title: Deep (yellow) purple Location: Copenhagen, Denmark www.claudiociardi-ph.com @claudiociardi_ph Tag us @dphotographermag for a chance to feature here Every issue, we’ll be sharing the best images from our Instagram community. Tag us on @dphotographermag for a chance to appear as our Shot of the Month.…

A ‘full macro’ lens with 1.0x or 1:1 magnification at its shortest focus setting will reproduce small objects at full lifesize on the image sensor. That might not sound like a big deal but, when you’re filling the whole image frame with something the size of a postage stamp, it enables massive enlargement when viewing shots on screen or in print. Indeed, with the mighty megapixel count of some of the latest full-frame mirrorless cameras, you can reveal nearmicroscopic levels of fine detail. But there’s a catch. Capturing such minute detail and texture places great demands on the optical quality of a macro lens, not to mention the photographer behind it. Shooting macro images demands a high level of precision. Depth-of-field can be wafer-thin, even when using fairly narrow apertures.…

Afew years ago, I found myself lucky enough to be travelling through Norway’s Lofoten Islands, and while I can’t tell you exactly where this was, I can tell you it wasn’t planned or expected. We were driving around the islands enjoying the stops through little towns and the big scenery that came with them. This was one of those times we stopped to check the GPS so we could try and find a hidden restaurant. I stepped out of the car and just a few yards off the road, I was greeted by this beautiful and playful bird. I stood mesmerised for a while, watching it catch the wind and fly so close to me that I thought it might land in my hands. That would have been quite some…

Photographer: Ekaterina Chernenko Instagram: @bella_natura_photo Image location: Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine Type of commission: Personal Shot details: Canon 1200D, 18-55mm lens, ƒ/5.6, 1/100s, ISO 400 About the shot: As creative people, many of the images we take on a daily basis are made purely for our own artistic satisfaction. While this is more than enough for many beginners, at some stage in their careers, it is not uncommon for photographers to want to find a meaningful use for their work, perhaps to give it a new direction and purpose. Occasionally, it is possible to find people whose images have had a genuine impact on the world. Sometimes this is at a global level, for example, highlighting the impacts of climate change, but it can also be…

Natural light can give us wonderful opportunities to capture creative macro images. My preferred shooting mode is aperture priority because I can quickly adapt to the changes in light by making adjustments to the exposure via the compensation dial. Mirrorless cameras with an electronic viewfinder allow us to see the exposure effects before we have pressed the shutter. This eliminates guesswork and in my opinion, helps to expand our creativity. As we increase magnifications and include extension tubes, we then become more reliant upon flash to achieve enough light. However, by blending flash with ambient lighting, we will have more creative control of our macro imagery. When we are working close to our subject, it is difficult to avoid bleached highlights and solid black backgrounds. So, a decent flash diffuser…

I believe that image processing is an art form in itself. We don’t need lots of fancy skills or have to spend hours changing the way an image looks, but it is where our individual, unique vision is imprinted on the file. Some people wish to do minimal adjustments while others enjoy using filters and effects to achieve their current way of seeing. It takes time to reach a place where we are settled with our own style. Personally, I don’t alter my images too much, although I did go through a nuclear HDR tone-mapping phase back in the day. Instead, I tend to make minimal adjustments and colour corrections within Lightroom and Photoshop, having already exposed the camera to hopefully achieve the best RAW file available for processing. I…

CONTROLLED MAIN LIGHT Match the direction, colour and softness of your main light to the expected lighting of the background for credible final lighting structure BACKGROUND LIGHTING Adjust shade by adding a light or switching this off. Generally even, two-light setups provide the most successful extractions FLOOR CONTRAST For full-length portraits ensure you can easily select the subject’s feet and shadows to believably place them in a new environment SUBJECT HEIGHT Relative angle to the camera can make or break the credibility of the composite. Use stools or boxes if extra height is needed. RIM LIGHT This adds a highlight to the edge of the subject providing a little extra contrast from the background for tighter selections CONTRASTING BACKGROUND A neutral or chroma background is different enough from the subject…

Once you have your image elements selected and extracted from their source files, it’s time to start blending them all together. This is often the stage when photographers new to high-level compositing make mistakes. For a composite image to truly work, each element must look as though it fits organically within the new setting, which can be a challenge even when you have attempted to achieve uniform light and colour at the shooting stage. One of the major improvement points is edge halos and colour spill. Light from the background can reflect onto the edge of your subject, outlining it with distractingly contrasting colour and tone. This makes it tricky to seamlessly blend the object into the surrounding detail. Halos can be reduced using the Decontaminate Colors option in the…

PHOTOSHOP TUTORIAL Meet the editing pro James Abbott is a professional photographer and photography journalist, specialising in shooting and editing techniques. He recently released his first book, covering professional image editing skills in both Adobe Photoshop and Affinity Photo. @jamesaphoto www.jamesaphoto.co.uk Making selections in Photoshop is an essential skill for performing a wide range of tasks. Get selections down to a fine art, alongside masking, and you have the foundations of many advanced techniques. There are lots of ways to make selections, but one that’s quick, easy and highly effective is to use Quickmask, where you paint in selections. What you’ll be using ● Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer ● Curves Adjustment Layer ● Default Palette colours ● Quick Mask Mode ● The Brush Tool 1 Set up Quick Mask Double click…

W elive in a world where millions of images and video content are uploaded to social media sites daily across the globe. On Facebook alone, over 300 million images are shared every day – and on Instagram, an average of 95 million photographs are uploaded to the platform daily. One of the greatest things about social media is having a worldwide audience right at your fingertips and the potential to connect with many millions of other users. However, with continuous input from multiple directions, it can be hard to stand out from the crowd and find a way to make an impact, particularly if you’re using these platforms in a professional capacity. So, to help you with your social media marketing, we’ve compiled a list of our top five tips.…

Premjith Narayanan Bahrain-based Premjith is an engineer by trade, but has been a keen photographer for 25 years, covering genres such as sports, landscapes and astro photography. He covers Formula 1 racing at the Bahrain International Circuit as well as skiing, golf and sailing. Taking pictures allows him to unwind from his day job working for a multinational company. To see more of Premjith’s work: www.premjithnarayanan.com @premjith_narayanan Hey Premjith! Where are you in the world and what are you working on right now? I’m an engineer, currently based in the Kingdom of Bahrain, and I’m working for a multinational company here. However, I have always loved photography too. I picked up a camera for the first time around 36 years ago, and I’ve never had a dull day since.…

For our latest competition in association with Photocrowd, we challenged you to submit your best smartphone success shots. After working through all the entries, the winners have been selected. Both crowd-voted and expert winners will win a licence to Affinity Photo professional editing software. Congratulations to all of the winners – as usual, the standard of submitted images was extremely high and it was a difficult task to pick out the best ones. 1 STPLACE WINNER Enjoying the sunset Photographer: mbphotography Our comment: What a dynamic image! We love the sense of depth created by the bird in the foreground and the setting sun behind it. The sunset and mountains aren’t the main subject, but serve as a background to further the story of the feathered posers! Inspired…

Now in its seventh year, the Bird POTY is the highlight of the bird photography calendar, and the latest competition saw over 20,000 entries from 115 different countries competing for the £5,000 prize and prestigious title. The finalist preview of ten images has been announced, and the overall winner will be selected from these on 8th September 2022. The shortlist is diverse, ranging from a Gentoo penguin dancing at sunset to a buzzard taking on a fox. This image of a black and yellow Broadbill was captured by Weng Keong Liew and entered into the Best Portrait category. “The courtship behaviour included a lot of noisy vocalisation and attention-seeking wing-spreading. The plumage colours and patterns are like those an artist would use to illustrate a cartoon bird, not a real…

Macro photography is fun, but no one said it was easy! Many of the mini-beasts we shoot are fast-moving and don’t often stay still in the sunlight, which presents a few distinct challenges. Cooler or overcast weather can be an advantage for focus stacking, but perhaps the trickiest aspect of capturing motion is finding the balance between the depth-of-field and shutter speed. Much like wildlife and portrait photography, the critical focus should be on the eyes (unless we’re getting creative) and usually, apertures of f/5.6 up to f/11 are required for single-frame images, depending on the light available. Bees are great subjects upon which to practice your techniques because not only are they pretty photogenic, but they are also large enough not to require extra magnification to capture images in…

One of the challenges of pro composite photography is knowing which elements should be captured first. Which works better – finding a subject to fit a background or a background to match your subject? In an ideal world, we would have a concept of what the final image will look like when shooting the elements, as this would ensure lighting and colour were aligned throughout the whole process. Though this isn’t always possible, we can optimise our working practises to make pulling content elements together as smooth as possible. Generally speaking, we should approach the image from the perspective of the subject first. Since this is where we want viewers to look, we should get this area right before building the environment around it. Compositing expert Brooke Shaden explains how…

How can I expand? I’m a landscape photographer who works part-time selling prints and cards, however, I’d really like to push my business and go full-time. Do you have any advice on how I could do this? Anonymous Landscape photography is a competitive industry that many people dream of entering. It’s not easy to make a decent income from the genre, however, that’s not to say you shouldn’t pursue your dreams and give it your all. The most obvious way to bring in additional income is to teach and run photography workshops. There are many hobbyist photographers who love to shoot in the landscape genre, so you already have a large target audience to which you can market yourself. Before you embark on running any workshops, we suggest spending time…

Sony World Photography Awards 2022 Founded in 2007 by CEO Scott Gray, the World Photography Organisation is a respected image hosting platform dedicated to the development and advancement of photographic culture. The Sony World Photography Awards has grown to become one the must-enter contests for serious photographers, with the annual competition now spanning multiple genres and enabling photographers of all skill levels to showcase their photographic works to a global audience. To see more images from this year’s competition and find out how to enter future rounds, visit worldphoto.org.…

96 Macro marvels For shooting macro photography, you need a lens with a high level of precision, accurate focusing and preferably some kind of stabilisation. We test four of the finest macro lenses from Canon, Nikon, Sigma and Sony. 104 DJI Mini 3 Pro DJI’s latest addition to its drone line-up is lightweight enough to avoid strict regulations, but how does it measure up in the skies? Angela Nicholson takes it for a test flight 108 Cokin NX Series Filter System Cokin has been making photographic filters since the late 1970s, but is its latest NX Series still relevant in the age of digital photography? 110 Lenses Every month, we take two professional optics out into the field and test their performance – this time it’s the Fujifilm XF 33mm…

The Mini 3 Pro is the latest arrival from DJI, the most widely-known drone manufacturer. It joins DJI’s Mini series of sub-250g drones, sitting above the Mini 2 in the line-up. That sub-250g weight is important because it means that the Mini 3 Pro avoids the restrictions imposed by the drone regulations on ones over 250g. In the UK, provided you have Flyer ID and Operator ID from the CAA, which can be obtained by a simple online process, you can fly the Mini 3 Pro in residential, recreational and industrial areas, and even overfly people (but not crowds). However, you must still keep clear of the flight restriction zones around places like airports, prisons and military bases. Naturally, keeping the drone to such a low weight means that the…

PRICE: £1,099/$899 FOCUS DISTANCE: 6.0m WEIGHT: 1260g Build and handling It might not be up to the standards of Canon’s top-flight L-Series pro telephotos but the RF 800mm f/11 IS STM still feels well-constructed, especially considering that keeping weight and cost down is the biggest remit of this fixed-aperture lens. The mount plate is still made from metal, although it is missing the full weather sealing of the likes of the RF 800MM F5.6L IS USM. The price difference makes this justifiable, however. The focus and control rings work precisely and the layout is well designed. The telescopic concept requires a little workflow adjustment to use efficiently, but just as with the RF 600mm f/11 IS STM, we fell into step with it eventually. Performance The image stabiliser…