Fleeting Glimpse Images

"I want to see

you in Costa Rica!"

Fellow photographers, travelers, adventurers and fun seekers, we have set the date for the next Costa Rica Photo Adventure from Worldesigns Tours.  Come along with me as your instructor for Photography, Software and the Costa Rican experience. You've walked Balboa Park in San Diego and stalked Bourbon Street in New Orleans with me as your guide.  You might even have been with me on my last February's Costa Rica Adventure. You've watched me teach image editing at PowerPoint Live, CorelWorld, the upcoming CorelDraw Unleashed User's Conference and at various Camera Clubs throughout Minnesota.  You've read my photographic trials and travails on the blog network and you've seen my imagery at the Fleeting Glimpse web site. Now is the time to go with me on a real photographic adventure.
 

Costa Rica!

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FEBRUARY 19-26, 2009

 

Gallery from the 2008 Trip 

Our tours are limited in size to ensure that our photographic participants receive the individual attention, instruction and aide they require.  It doesn't matter whether you a pro with bazooka-sized lenses or a for-fun photographer with a point-n-shoot, we will tailor our training and activities to your needs.

The tour operator has authorized me to offer an early booking discount of $ 200.00 for those who sign up for a tour by June 30, 2008 for the February 2009 tour.  Take advantage of this by going to the Worldesigns Tours web site and signing up for this once-in-a-life time adventure.  I want to see you in Costa Rica!

Rikk Flohr © 2008

Multiple off-camera flash in action

"…incredible results to counter the
most severe of circumstances…"

If you followed my blog recently, you will know that I am hanging out at the Strobist's Blog. The Strobist advocates the simple use of off camera strobes, portable and relatively inexpensive, to create professional lighting results. Yesterday my B&H box arrived with several new strobe toys which allowed me to expand my lighting arsenal. I set up a self-portrait example to test equipment and technique.

F 11 @ 1/5 Second

I started with an aperture priority shot using the camera's metering.  The shot is both dark and light due to daylight coming in from the windows. A poor portrait at best.  Tungsten lights in the room were turned off to keep the light color variance to a minimum.

I think one of the things that distinguish professional-looking portraits from shots like this is the ability to show detail in those dark and bright areas. In other words the ability to see beyond the dynamic range of the light available.

F11 @ 1/250 Second

I used the outside as the basis for my exposure. I metered for the exterior and set my camera on manual to ensure I exposed the sky out my window correctly. This resulted in a too-dark image. Virtually no detail is left in the rest of the shot.

With a basis for exposure, I can start looking at my ambient light picture and selecting problem areas and build from there.  I began to set up off-camera flashes to light my room.

F11 @ 1/250 Second

I set up a Canon 580 EXII speedlite on full power to shoot through a Sto-Fen Omni-bounce to illuminate the room's interior. Trial and error placement resulted in a position just slightly ahead of my body in the room's center.

Notice how the ambient window light falling on my face is nearly neutralized. The window side of my face is now too dark and the area on my desk is in too much shadow for my taste. Adding a second off-camera flash seemed like the best course of action given the room's tight layout.  There was no place to set up a reflector.

F11 @ 1/250  Second

With a second speed-lite placed to the left side of the image, I was able to open up the shadows on the desktop and the right side of my body. This flash was set to Manual at 1/8th power. I now have a natural looking portrait lit entirely by portable, off-camera flash.

This shot is nicely lit but one element is missing-the monitor's image (see first image). Exposing the windows ( a huge distraction if over exposed, and lighting me correctly meant I had to sacrifice the image on the monitor. That is what image editing software is for. It is much easier to replace that monitor display than to expose for the display and try to fix the windows or the room interior.

Speedlite with Omni-bounce	Canon DSLR with ST-E2 Wireless Flash Controller	Speedlite set on desktop

Above were the three components used to create the portrait. Below I have photographed a wide angle shot to demonstrate the relative locations of each component used.

Final analysis: Off-camera flash give you a powerful edge in creating more professional and dynamic pictures. Adding a second flash and a few key pieces of equipment like wireless controls, flash accessories and a stand can give you incredible results to counter the most severe of circumstances.

With digital, you can experiment, meter, and achieve incredible results-even through trial and error. A little practice and these things will start to become second-nature.

Now, off to Big Woods State Park for a little off-camera multi-flash nature photography…

Rikk Flohr © 2008

"It's not what's in the mirror-it's what's left inside." ~ Stevie Nicks, Sometimes It's A Bitch

The lure of Image Editing Software is subtle, seductive and self-indulgent. Nothing reinforced this like the recent event of taking my own passport photo. The purpose of a passport photo is to give a reasonable likeness of yourself to identify you when traveling abroad or attempting to gain reentry to your homeland. After taking the photographs of my wife and I in the most flattering light I could find, the temptation to touch us up a bit was overwhelming.  Long story-short, I maintained control and did only the most minimal of retouching so that our photographs wouldn't be too far from the truth.

The following exercise is not as indicative of self control.

I took this self portrait while working out a lighting set up for an upcoming shoot.  I used a Canon 100 MM F2.8 Macro-a lens too sharp for traditional portrait work. I decided it was a little harsh and needed softening. I used some varied techniques to 'Hollywood Up' my image.

Most of my retouching skills were learned in books and seminars.  Katrin Eismann's book, Photoshop Restoration and Retouching is a great place to start. It has many techniques that can be applied to all image editing software packages. I used Corel PhotoPaint in today's exercise for example.

Here is the end result of my efforts. It is an example of self-indulgent over retouching. While I love the way I turned out in this retouch, I know, after letting it ruminate a few days that it was too much.  This is a problem with editing software. People don't step back and think about what they've done.

One of my latest workflow operations is to evaluate what I have done through the lens of time. I find that I am over exuberant in editing an image because I am caught up in the adrenaline rush of the process. After leaving it sit for an hour, a day, a week, and then revisiting the project, I find I can often dial back my editing a bit and achieve a more realistic and ultimately more pleasing result.

Here, I have overlaid the completely retouched image with the original file. By setting the transparency to 33% or, the opacity to 67 percent if you prefer, I can softly fade the retouch into the original yielding a more realistic, yet nicely retouched image.

I liked the image even though it was just a lighting test and my expression is a little wide-eyed.  One of the tricks Hollywood and tabloids us to make celebrities larger than life is to enlarge the eyes slightly-only a 102% or so. I had done this in my original retouch but forgotten to take it back when I did my final blend. So I did it again.

 
Split Screen showing retouching before and after.

You can see now the eyes are subdued and not as large as in the original retouch. I am happy with the final product and feel that it represents me well. It is what is inside but perhaps not what is in the mirror. After all, the goal of portraiture is to give the rendition we expect of our loved ones and ourselves.  If we have to sit on it a day or two and then dial it back to reality - the delay is worth the effort.

Final Image after Retouching and Partial Reversal

Rikk Flohr © 2008

One of the big mistakes most people make when taking pictures is they way they stand-or rather that they stand. Kodak taught us long ago to hold the camera to our eye and steady ourselves before snapping the picture. What resulted from this was a generation of photographers who learned to take pictures at 4.5 feet off the ground.

Just thumb through your picture albums and you will see that most pictures of children have the ground or the floor as the background because the parent is shooting down on them.  How much more engaging is a picture when we put ourselves in the perspective of the subject?

A child will always look better when photographed at eye level.  The same is true of many other objects. I was out shooting wildflowers at Big Woods State Park yesterday and this was on my mind.  Actually a lot of things were on my mind. Last week's article was about a different trip to Big Woods where I concentrated on using flash in bright daylight. This trip was the same except that I was concentrating on using flash that wasn't affixed to the camera.

This photograph is only possible when you have the flower at eye level. Unless your flower grows five feet tall or you have a convenient ditch in which to stand, you are going to have difficulty getting this perspective on a subject. I laid on my stomach for this shot but was propped up on my elbows so the camera saw about 12 inches from the ground. It matched the height of the blossom nicely.

Sometimes it is necessary to get even lower if your subject is particularly low or you are adjusting the placement of the background in your image.

This shot of an emerging bloom was taken from about 6 inches off the ground. In order to move the orange glow closer to the blossom and give the top of the frame a little more interest. From a little higher placement at capture, I would have moved the lower part of the background higher in the picture and lost some of that delicious orange color that makes the image for me.  A little off camera flash to the right lights the flower and leaves the background dark. Leaving me with a flower that pops and a background that compliments but does not compete.

Other times you dig down deep to get some foreground in shot. This can be particularly helpful in creating an artistic context to the shot.

In this shot, the camera is two inches off the ground and I am using the foreground grass as a diffusion element to give an impressionistic feel to the image. This flower was in total shade so I didn't use a flash , being satisfied with the soft light as it was. The shallow depth of field of the macro lens enhances the dream-like quality of the image and makes it softer and more painterly without having to resort to software.

Bottom line is get to the bottom. Go low to match your subject's perspective and you will be rewarded with pictures that look nothing like a snapshot.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

Spring is in the air-finally. Those of us in Minnesota saw our last snow melt a week ago. Those of us in Minnesota who are photographers are itching to get shooting. Today, in spite of the poor light (blue skies and mid-day sun), poor conditions (windy) and poor time of year (brown vegetation with sparse emerging plants), I went out to practice some manual flash techniques in preparation for the wildflower season.

Round-Lobed Hepatica

Having spent some time over at the Strobist's Blog, I have been eager to try out some less-than-automated flash photography.

Though armed with reflectors and sunlight my wildflower photos have been lacking something-some extra punch. I decided that maybe a little manual shooting like I did in the old days before Aperture Priority and Flash before ETTL, was in order.  This is a departure from my usual technique to use natural light and then do the remaining corrections in image editing software.

This close up shot of a solitary blossom shows potential. It has some nice backlighting by the 11:00 AM sun and though I was able to keep from blowing the highlights and plugging the shadows too much, the flower ended up being much darker than the background.  I was using a silver reflector on this shot.

"What a difference a little
well-placed flash can make!"

In the second shot, the same blossom was photographed with the Canon 580EX flash set to 1/16 +.3 EV  power at 90° with the bounce card deployed. As you can see, the flower is much more evenly illuminated. The background, while lighter, no longer dominates the flower. The nice backlighting provided by the sun is still present as are the shadows cast by the petals in the upper left. Overall this image is going to be much easier to work with in software.

The real difference in the images to those who like to use software like Photoshop, Photo-Paint, Paint Shop Pro and Elements, to enhance their images, can be seen by reviewing the histograms.

Comparing the histogram without flash on the left with the histogram from the flash photo on the right we can see that the images are going to be different animals when it comes to editing. Most of the pixels in the normal exposure are in the second darkest stop of the image where Fill Light adjustments are normally applied. In the flash exposure, more of the pixels are in the Exposure Range of the histogram.  Notice too, that the blacks are much heavier without the flash and actually plug on the blue channel. In the fill flash shot, the blacks are fewer and don't plug. This seems intuitive: more light = less blacks and darks.

Here's the rub: The highlights are actually better in the flash shot! The non-flash shot has plugged shadows in the blue channel and almost touches the wall on the left meaning highlights are approaching white. A little highlight recovery might be in order for the non-flash image.

What does it mean? The flash image has more to work with in areas that are going to lend themselves to editing. The non-flash image needs highlight recovery and black and fill light areas boosted. Those types of adjustments introduce noise and posterization if done too severely.  What a difference a little well-placed flash can make!

It all goes back to the adage: Get it right in the field and you will spend less time in the software at the desk. The choice of using a little fill flash on an image that I could likely have easily recovered means I don't have to do that bit of extra work. I can easily apply this technique to situations where I might have trouble doing it in software later.

In this flash shot, the flower above is backlit by the sun, the flower in the middle is in shadow of the blossom above and the blossom below is reflecting direct sunlight at the lens. A flash allows me to expose them all properly and control the brightness of my background at the same time!

So everyone, visit the Strobist Blog and then let's all go out and flash something.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

The Blog has hit the fans!

In this blog, I have covered photography, image editing software, presenting and a host of other topics. It is rare that I write on the phenomenon of blogging itself. I know little of blogging save my own experience and the scant absorption of infrequent visits to other blogs.

Bloggers have an intrinsic advantage when it comes to spouting opinions, pontificating authoritatively and creating an environment in which they are a respected and acknowledged as a legitimate voice in their arena of the blog-o-sphere. That advantage lies in the relative obscurity of the individual on the Internet and the quasi-anonymity offered by the nature of the blogging medium.

Taking it to the Streets!
Rikk Flohr on a Digital Photography Tour in Costa Rica
Photo Credit: Nicole Flohr

Some bloggers are very much like the people who shout (or shout down) opinions from the darkened recesses in the back of auditoriums. It is relatively easy to sit in the comfort of your home and attempt to influence the masses. It is harder to get off of your chair, leave your house and to out and meet the people who comprise the intended audience of your writing. Ultimately, it is far more rewarding.

I have taken this to heart. My blogging began in 2004 as a means to explore my writing, deal with grief, and connect with the kind of people who shared my interests, beliefs and needs. As my blog evolved, I found it to be a forum to share my knowledge, challenge my peers, and explore my worth as an mentor in a variety of fields. As my confidence grew through my blogging and other online activities, I found myself wanting to actually meet the kind of people with whom I have interacted online.

"There's no substitute for
'pressing of the flesh'."

Fast forward to 2008. My evenings are now full of meetings and sessions where I attend, offer opinions and conduct classes. Last night, I spent my evening with the wonderful folks at the Crosstown Camera Club teaching the basics of Waterfall Photography. As I gave my presentation, I found that I felt like I was blogging-in person-only better! This makes me wonder-is blogging really something new? Or, did it take the place of something valuable societal interaction? Or, in the right hands-administered properly, does blogging augment personal interaction?

Like purveyors of many disciplines, bloggers come from different camps. Some grew into prominence through their blog and others were in prominence and decided to blog as well. I am neither.

"There is no substitute for 'pressing the flesh'", Rick Altman of PowerPoint Live maintains. It is one of the reasons his conferences are so successful. A closer-knit community forms from the proximity and interaction that is inimitable in a virtual community. Shaking hands and connecting with people enhances the messages you share and the passion you seek to invoke.

Blogging was originally a way to express myself and work through my internal issues. It is now become a way of giving back by sharing my expertise in photography, image editing, computer use, and what little I have gleaned from life's lessons by living. I try to live my blog now and only report on it here.

Rikk Flohr © 2008 

I had the opportunity for epiphany today. That is a rare enough occurrence in and of itself. A phone call with a speaker coordinator prompted me to take a walk down semantics lane toward a destination I didn't expect.

The speaker: Do you teach Digital Photography?

Me: Yes, I do.

Inner Me: That was a dumb answer! You don't teach Digital Photography, you teach Photography, period.

Then the speaker asked: Do you teach Photoshop?

Here, I was on my toes. "I teach Image Editing in a variety of software packages." Then, I sought in vain to quickly name them. She didn't want to hear me. I taught Photoshop and Digital Photography and that was enough for her. I really teach Photography and Image Editing .

The mechanics of technique and the subtle art of photography are not altered dramatically by the media in which I shoot. There are subtle nuances to be considered but composition, exposure, color choice, and all the other things that go into making a good photograph are pretty much independent of the camera's method of capturing light.

The same is true of Image Editing software. The theory and practice of enhancing an image once it is converted (by camera or by scan)  to digital is pretty much the same - no matter which software package you choose. They all, pretty much, crop, adjust contrast and color. Each package may get there a little differently but the general idea is the same.

When we reduce photography to 'digital photography' and the 'other' we box ourselves in. When people ask if I am professional photographer, I don't correct them and say: "Yes, a professional digital photographer." I simply say, "Yes." I create images captured in essence from the world around me. I happen to do this digitally but they rarely ask how I do it - only that I do it and that I get paid for it.

The same thing happens with software. "Can I just photoshop out those telephone lines?" my student will ask.

I reply. "Yes, if you have Photoshop. If you don't you can do it in Paint Shop Pro, Photo Paint, Elements, and any other program which might be lurking on your hard drive.  Me, I would do it in Corel PhotoPaint - because I am a professional (I get paid) and  time is money. But I can teach the student how in the varied editors I have installed on my computers. That is my job. I teach Image Editing.

Now blow your nose with a kleenex while I go make a xerox. (Note how they are all small letters when used as a verb or a noun and not a trademarked name of a corporation.)

I teach Photography and Image Editing.  (Digitally-for the most part.)

Rikk Flohr © 2008

 

We've now reached the shameless promotion section of the blog.  July 9 - 12, 2008, the Corelians of the world will descend upon Phoenix to learn, yearn and earn. This conference, hosted by Foster Coburn is a chance to meet with some of the more prominent power users of the CorelDraw Graphics Suite as well as a select group of people from the Corel, related vendors and kindred spirits.

I have been fortunate to be selected by Foster to be one of your instructors at this year's event. In addition to teaching some sessions on image editing, I will be leading a field trip where those budding photographers can gain some real world field experience and have a lot of fun in the process.

My experience at seminars like this, including Corel-centric events in the past is that the contacts made, the access to manufacturer's staff, and the knowledge shared make the price a bargain. I would strongly urge you to attend this event and I hope to see you all there.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

The proverb "Don't put all of your eggs in one basket" is applicable to many things as most proverbs are. If you have read my post Data Backup Goes Awry, then you will know on a recent trip to Costa Rica, I lost a basket. I broke some other stuff and lost still more but this is the story of the basket.

In my former life as a film photographer, the prospect of losing a roll of film was devastating. Normally on a shoot, I would snap the shutter a few dozen times and the loss of a single roll might represent the loss, irretrievably, of a entire day's work and maybe opportunities which would never come again. And, there were times when you had to let that roll out of your custody and let some photo lab do its worst with your precious celluloid.

Memory Cards come in many sizes from
insignificant to critical-if you lose them.

Now, as a digital photographer, I am plagued and blessed by these film surrogates: memory cards. Memory cards aren't quite the same. They cost much more than film ever did and they can hold many more pictures but they offset this by being compact, processable and, most of all, reusable.

"I tend to prefer smaller cards
to spread the risk of
something 'bad' happening."

My errant card from Costa Rica arrived in the mail last week courtesy of Miguel at Target Car Rental in San Jose, CR. Thank you Miguel. He found it and shipped it back to me and when it arrived, there were 165 Images, intact, stored in the matchbook-sized device. The images represented the day of shooting from Breakfast at the Santa Maria Volcano Lodge to early evening at Arenal Volcano. I was shooting with two cameras so I was only missing bits and pieces of the day.

 

One of the Prodigal Images Returned

This shot of Mincho, the Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan, at the breakfast was among the missing shots. There were many shots of my daughter, churches and anything else taken with a wide angle lens during that eight hour span. This included a shot of my daughter with the toucan and other shots that I had no where else.

Nicole and Mincho

With film, it was difficult to put your eggs in one basket unless you lost the basket with all the rolls stored in it. This is provided you were foolish enough to store all your rolls in one film bag. Digital is another story. I carry 512 MB, 1 GB, 2 GB and 4 GB cards with me now. I use the bigger cards in the larger cameras with more Megapixels so that each camera has about the same 150 shots or so. It seems to work out.

The temptation is to buy bigger cards that allow me to shoot all day and the next and the next without ever having to change a card. A 16 GB card on my biggest camera would typically last me about 5 days in this environment. If I lost that card it would be devastating. Days of work and hundreds of pictures would be gone and I would be in tears.

But, you say, "Rikk, you would be extra careful with that bigger card wouldn't you?"

I would. But it could be stolen, malfunction, be dropped, lost, have coffee spilled on it-any number of tragedies. In those cases, I could still have a card but not my images. And images, after all, is where it is at if you are a photographer. That is why I tend to use smaller memory cards to spread the risk of something bad happening. They are cheaper and your eggs aren't in one basket. The bigger the basket, the more eggs are broken, and the bigger the omelette.

The Church at La Fortuna from the missing card

I was lucky. My basket came back. Next time, I might not be so fortunate.

Rikk Flohr © 2008

For those of you expecting a treatise on the use of "Software Filters" I must disappoint. This is about the old kind of filters-the ones made of glass that you stick on the front of a camera. Software filters never have been able to offer the kind of protection I am about to discuss.

Some consider it one of the great scams perpetrated by the sundry photography purveyors and others consider it a way to ensure you will have a lower quality image. Me? I kind of like them.

If you go to a photo retailer and purchase a lens, you will find, that in most instances, the sales person will haggle with you until you agree on a price with which you both can live. Then they start selling the extras. One of the first extras you will see offered is the UV Filter that screws on to the end of your lens. It has two purposes, (aside from increasing the retailer's profit on the sale) to cut UV haze as advertised on the packaging and the second to protect your lens. Me, I've never had a problem with UV haze but I do need to protect the end of my lens.

 
Yesterday's Boo Boo

I am a dropper. I am clumsy and my mind is often on the pursuit of creation rather than on the mechanics of gravity and grip. Since I was born-again digital, I have dropped many lenses. At least four times I have heard the sickening sound of shattering glass. So far, I have only broken filters.

Many of you may have seen my story on the set of mishaps which befell me in Costa Rica.  I broke a filter there. I also broke one in Badlands during my tenure as Artist in Residence in the Spring of 2007. I also broke one on the North Shore in a  predawn shooting orgy at Split Rock Lighthouse.

 
Split Rock Lighthouse the morning I broke the filter.

So far, I have had accidents with three different lenses, one of them being dropped twice. Some have been in the dark, some due to tripod malfunctions, some do to backpacks I thought were zipped but were not and some due to the carelessness of people passing me on the trail. In each case, the lens survived though the filter did not. For some reason, lenses like to land - Glass-Side-Down (just like Jelly Bread). The filter is a great crumple zone to absorb the impact and sometimes it will save you a lot of money.

I added up the cost of the lenses, had I been required to replace them and came to a figure of 3.259.00 at today's B&H Pricing for the lens mishaps. Even though I am insured on my equipment against such incidents, I prefer to pay the 126.00 for the four filters it took me to recover from the incident.  Of course, you must thoroughly inspect the lens sharpness, focus, and function before returning it to the shooting rotation.

There is, of course, a list of downsides to filter use.

1. Filters reduce image quality slightly
2. Filters enhance ghosting, flare and internal reflections
3. Filters (on wide-angle lenses exaggerate vignetting)
4. Filters add two surfaces to the mix which must be cleaned
5. Filters cost money

If your technique is good and the conditions are rough, filters can save you lenses in the long run. They offer a buffer between your expensive glass and the blowing sand, the swirling mist and the other flying debris of shooting locations. You just need to remember to take them off when shooting the sun, moon, or bright lights or you will see ghost images. 

Of course, the best practice is never to drop a lens, let the tripod blow over, anyone walk near you, etc. In 46 years, I have not learned to be that careful.

Rikk Flohr © 2008