Innehållsförteckning för No. 491 från Photography Week

Welcome to the world’s No.1 weekly digital photography magazine. If you’re already a reader, thanks for your continued support and involvement; if you’re new to Photography Week, you’ve come to the right place! In addition to expert advice, brilliant tips and step-by-step tutorials, every issue features interactive galleries of brilliant photos, how-to videos on essential shooting and editing techniques, and in-depth reviews of the latest camera kit. But that’s not the whole story. Photography Week is more than a magazine – it’s a community of like-minded people who are passionate about photography. To get involved, just follow any of the links below and share your shots and comments. JOIN THE PHOTOGRAPHY WEEK COMMUNITY AND START SHARING! FACEBOOK http://bit.ly/39py9lg TWITTER http://bit.ly/2vGadLP FLICKR http://bit.ly/2VIgsJO We’re more than just a magazine – read…

CAMERA SETTINGS Laurie says… My go-to settings are Manual mode, Raw, Centre-weighted metering and the desired white balance preset. I’ll use manual focus if the subject is still or Single-point AF and AF-C if it’s moving. Continuous-high is useful for sudden bursts of action and I’m not afraid to boost the ISO if needed. BALANCING ACT Laurie says… I work hard to get my images right incamera to minimize editing, and that means setting the white balance manually. Today Neil will be using presets such as Cloudy and Direct Sunlight, but I’ll even go so far as to dial in the Kelvin value myself to get the exact colour temperature that I require. ACCURATE EXPOSURE Laurie says… I always enable RGB Histogram and Highlights via the Playback Display Options in…

Laurie says… You’d be surprised how the tiniest movements can cause camera shake when shooting on a tripod at very slow shutter speeds. To help prevent this I always use Mirror-up mode (DSLR only). This flips the mirror up when you press the shutter button; the shutter fires when you either press the shutter button again or wait 30 seconds for the camera to do so automatically. Unless you wait for the latter a remote shutter release is essential to ensure you don’t create more vibrations by touching the camera. Turning VR off will also help to mitigate camera shake.…

LEARN ESSENTIAL EDITING SKILLS FAST! WATCH THE VIDEO https://bit.ly/3rma4Gk HOW TO… DOWNLOAD THE PROJECT FILES http://bit.ly/pho_131 ON A P C OR M AC Natural lens flare occurs when sunlight – or another source of strong, hard light – directly hits the front element of a camera lens. Photographers are usually at pains to prevent flare, either by using a lens hood, or by shielding the front of the lens with a hand. However, the slight softness, specular highlights and colour shifts that are characteristic of lens flare can be great for enhancing a scene. You don’t necessarily need to wait until the sun is in the perfect position in order to create intentional flares; by making use of a few simple techniques in Photoshop you can create your own gorgeous,…

THE WEEK’S TOP HEADLINES IN PHOTOGRAPHY Sigma has announced a new 20mm f/2 DG DN lens for full-frame L-mount and Sony E-mount cameras. This ultra-compact, wide-aperture prime is the fourth lens to join Sigma’s I Series lineup – a range of lenses designed for smaller and lighter modern mirrorless cameras. The Sigma 20mm f/2 DG DN is incredibly portable, weighing just 370g and measuring just 72.4mm in length. Not only is it perfect for carrying with you, it’s going to cost you considerably less than the Sony 20mm f/1.8 G, and you’re only losing 1/3 of an f-stop. Like the other I-Series lenses, the Sigma 20mm f/2 benefits from a sleek all-metal build which includes the signature I-Series magnetic lens cap, a manual aperture ring, a focus ring and a…

Laurie says… When you’re starting out as a wildlife photographer, be mindful that nature is all around you. We came across a patch of lichen and used it to demonstrate the close-focusing capabilities of Neil’s Sigma 18-50mm f/3.5-5.6 DC. He positioned his camera square-on to the flat slab of rock that housed the organism, so that the entire frame was on the same focal plane, and then focused manually while zoomed into Live View to ensure that the lichen was perfectly in focus. An aperture of f/11 was dialled in to roughly hit the lens’s sweet spot and mitigate distortions, and ISO100 was used to produce the best image quality. Mirror-up mode and a remote shutter release helped to prevent camera shake.…

1 BEANBAG BELT Laurie says… I’m never without my homemade beanbag. It provides more stability than operating handheld and is quicker to set up than a tripod – it’s a good middle ground. I designed it to clip around my waist like a belt when not in use, which is useful if I’m out stalking a subject. If there’s nowhere suitable to rest the beanbag, I’ll try balancing it on top of my tripod. 2 DUAL TRIPODS Laurie says… I tend to carry two Gitzo tripods around with me. The shorter one is useful for macro photography and the big one is sturdy enough to hold my big Nikon AF-S 500mm f/4E FL. Neither has a centre column, so you can get down really low if you need to, another…

THE BEST THING WE’VE SEEN THIS WEEK Wildlife Photographer of the Year has announced the results of its 2021 People’s Choice Award, with Italian photographer Cristiano Vendramin taking the top prize for his stunning image of willow trees reflected in a frozen lake. Vendramin’s photo was chosen by online vote from a shortlist of 25 finalists, which were selected by the Natural History Museum, London from some 50,000 images submitted to the main WPOTY competition. Four other finalists were highly commended. “I hope that my photography will encourage people to understand that the beauty of nature can be found everywhere around us, and we can be pleasantly surprised by the many landscapes so close to home,” Vendramin said of his award. Click the link to see more images from this…

EXPERT OPINION ON THE LATEST KIT www.nikon.co.uk £1,099/$1,099 The Nikkor Z 24-120mm f/4 S fills a small gap in Nikon’s lineup of T Z-mount standard zoom lenses, slotting in between the more compact Z 24-70mm f/4 S and the hefty Z 24-70mm f/2.8 S ‘trinity’ zoom. It’s sure to find favour with Nikon photographers shifting to mirrorless from a full-frame DSLR who have long enjoyed the versatile 5x zoom range of the AF-S 24-120mm f/4G ED VR. The F-mount edition is still highly popular, not just as a kit lens option with full-frame DSLRs like the D750 and the D780, but in its own right as a walkabout zoom. Compared with the F-mount lens, the new Z-mount counterpart ditches optical VR. That’s not really an issue for full-frame Nikon Z-series…

THE PRO LAURIE CAMPBELL CAMERA: NIKON D5 Laurie has spent his career documenting Scotland’s wildlife. He hails from Berwick-upon-Tweed and was bitten by the wildlife photography bug in 1972. In 1985 he turned pro, and has since amassed a library of close to 200,000 images. He’s authored and illustrated a variety of books, and has won a plethora of awards. To see Laurie’s work visit https://bit.ly/3umkN6R THE APPRENTICE NEIL WALLACE CAMERA: NIKON D7200 Scotland-based Neil comes from a farming background, but it was driving HGVs on the continent that prompted him to delve seriously into photography. He wanted an excuse to interact with nature again and was curious about the digital photography revolution, so he picked up his first DSLR and hasn’t looked back since.…

SLOW IT DOWN Laurie says… The motion blur will depend on both the length of your exposure and the speed your subject is moving, so it’s not an exact science. I like to start very slowly by attaching a polariser to remove a couple stops of light, shooting at ISO100 and dialling in a super-narrow aperture. FIND A FOCUS MARKER Laurie says… Using a dark filter on a dark day can confuse your AF system and cause it to hunt. You can get over this by finding a marker on the same focal plane as your subject and focusing on that either completely manually, or via AF first and then by switching to manual. EXPERIMENTATION Laurie says… Slowly increase your shutter speed as you shoot, and pay attention to what…

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ESSENTIAL PHOTO SKILLS MADE EASY 1 HOUR Ring lights have been used to produce distinctive-looking images for a long time, but they’ve become increasingly popular over the last couple of years as many of us took to video calling for chats and work meetings. A ring light eliminates shadows for simple, flattering lighting of faces. The 360 degrees of illumination helps to give skin a flawless look, fills out bags under eyes and reduces wrinkles. As such it’s a popular choice not only for Zoom meetings but also among YouTube vloggers and for fashion photography. In addition to the characteristic shadow-less illumination, ring lighting also creates wonderful circular catchlights in the subject’s eyes, and this makes it a great choice for pet photos, as eyes are such an important feature…