Thursday, February 05, 2009

PHOTOGRAPHING STEPS

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Running up that hill with no problem

Click to enlarge, and I do mean enlarge


Really very simple, no zooms telephoto lens or macros. No filters, hoods or tripods.  Just standing squarely in front of the subject. Close enough to keep everything in perspective as it should be, no concaving or tilting of the lines. For composition, depth and balance I have included a little of the promenade wall on the right hand side of the image. On the left a little space to see the stretch of beach leading towards Maughold. This also adds an extra dimension of layers or depth of field. The light was very poor, not dim but one of those horrible white light days which actually works well against the concrete and stonework. In keeping with natural images, shot as seen.  Tempting to up the contrast and bring out a silhouette of the steps, but then you would lose the texture of the stonework. I'd rather have the natural tone and see those textures. Plain and simple but a nice example of textures, using poor light and keeping subjects lines and form as seen not distorted.
 


I asked recently what you would like to see and so many of you asked for the swing bridge again. So the bridge at another jaunty angle will be up in the next few days.  I know it's been a while but I didn't want to overload you with it. Seems I was wrong. That and sunsets. You seem to like Poyll Dooey sunsets,  reflections and odd shots. Definitely odd shots. What do people want you to show more of on your own blog?

Babooshka/ramseydailyphoto/hhtp://dailyphotoisleofman.blogspot.com/

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32 comments:

Jane Hards Photography said...

Computer is behaving strangely again. No I have no idea why the gap. This is the first draft, not a copy and paste and only one image uploaded so it's not another image there. Oh well. Off to learn French. Au revoir.

marley said...

Nice, reall nice in B&W.

I'm not sure what people want to see on my blog, you tell me what you want!

Thanks for you very kind comment on yesterdays post over at Chelt DP :)

Anonymous said...

Babs, 73 comments about cats! I won't add another. Thank you for the large image. I understand your logic and will try but I just can't get my head round seeing the photo in the first instance like you.

Virginia said...

Simple to the point. Nice texture in the steps. Like it a lot B. Good commentary, a learning too.. Thanks,
V

Brian Miller said...

Nice. Love the B & W. Agree, good textures.

George said...

I really like this picture and I thank you for explaining some of the things you took into consideration when you took the picture. Thank you very much.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for sharing you tips. I learn and advance under your tutelage.

Marie-Noyale said...

I always enjoy the details you give about your photographs.
Hope you had a nice French class.

Lew said...

I love the detail in this one! It shows the age and wear on the steps. Silhouettes are striking sometimes, but I think this one needs the texture. I also keep checking for the 100 images of the swing bridge.

Tash said...

love the texture that B&W brings out on this photo - steps, lichen like stuff. Actually, I'd like to see these same steps in color (or do I, cuz you probably posted the most effective photo?)
After browsing thru my blog, my husband said I needed more people & animals. He is my only OPEN critic - which is OK by me. :)

magiceye said...

when you enlarge the pic and scroll it actually feels like running up the steps! superb!

Pat said...

Just a good old honest photo of steps I could easily run up and down several (or many!) times.

Hmmm....sometimes people write to me with a request for something in Belgrade, and I love fulfill their requests.

Anonymous said...

That works really well in B&W.

I think the only request I've had is for more architecture (when I was doing a mini-series on something non-architectural). Luckily Glasgow has plenty of stuff I could snap to oblige.

Anonymous said...

I love the steps. My favourite photos are the ones of textures. Thanks for your lessons as well. Always learning from you.
Never thought to ask what people want to see on my blog. Will put that question on my next post.

Anonymous said...

People but I know that's a chore for you. I am happy with everything you show us about your city island.

airplane5312 said...

Nice monochrome, and interesting composition.

Anonymous said...

I have had problems with gaps too..?

I totally understand why you want to leave a photo as it is.
I have tried only a few of mine to
edit auto adjust, was not impressed the only thing I do is crop....I am very much an amateur
at photography, but I know what I like, or prefer.
Your steps look lovely to me 3-D.
My last three post's I have not used Candles...lol...one or two have commented, so next week the candles will be back...:-)
It's all good fun....

Stevenson Q said...

With the black and white, you greatly emphasized its beautiful texture babooshka! I really like it!

God Bless you and Have a great Friday!

Steven^^

Z said...

If I only could...Haven't thought of Kate in a while, now I'll have to fire up one of her albums. :-)

Jim Klenke said...

Oh my knees already hurt. I need your help. I am trying to find that facebook badge to add to my site but cant find it. How did you get yours on your site?

alicesg said...

Different people like different things in my blog. I just blog on what photos I stumble into. Been fun just blogging and exchanging comments and looking at other blogs.

Anonymous said...

Fine by me

Small City Scenes said...

Cool shot. I like stairs and you shot them natural with depth. Good. Thanks for the lesson. MB

Rob said...

simple and effective. That's what makes an image. What would I like to see here? Maybe details of cityscapes, the local coffee shop, a table with dinnerware, perhaps food.

Jane Hards Photography said...

Dusty - If only I lived in a city. Ramsey is so small a town, but I will try an have a sneak peek.

Gerald (SK14) said...

Great picture showing how simple shots are often the best.

People seem to want me to show more people but I'm still quite diffident about that so in the main they don't get - they say they want to see more traffic but I don't venture out when it is busy in the main.

Knoxville Girl said...

thanks for the lesson! Your homework is to rewrite it in French. I think textures stand out more in monochrome because there's no color to distract the eye.
I enjoy whatever image you decide to post, I always learn something good. No one really has given me specific requests, tant pis.

Judy said...

I am glad I did enlarge it, as there are worlds of texture there to be seen.

Mojo said...

I know exactly the kind of light you mean. Dull gray monochromatic and not in the least appealing. I happened to be cursed with that very sort of light at one of the most colorful events I attended all last year. Even tinkering with the white balance didn't completely salvage things. And shooting it all in B&W would have been criminal (possibly even a capital offense in some less tolerant countries).

Fortunately here you have a subject that lends itself readily to black and white -- in any light. Though in certain conditions I'd have been tempted to employ a gradient ND filter (if I had one -- next thing on my to-get list I suppose). The promenade reminds me of the coal bins at Bethlehem Steel (or maybe they were ore bins, I really don't know... except they were huge and designed to dump something). In fact it wasn't until I embiggened the photo that I knew for sure I was looking at concrete.

And Magiceye's spot-on when he says scrolling the full size image from the bottom up actually does feel like climbing the stairs.

Just exactly what it should be. right to the point, true and unfiltered.

Mojo said...

Oh! I took a look at the page source where your "gap" is and found several div tags with nothing inside them. My best guess is that you'd started to say something and changed your mind, but the backspacing didn't take out the tags, just the text inside them. If you're using Blogger's WYSIWYG editor, it'll do that to you (which is why I never use it!). If you go into the Edit HTML window, you'll see the stuff I'm talking about. Delete that and your vertical gap should go away. (for whatever reason, even empty tags seem to generate a blank line in Blogger's templates, though there were a couple of < br / > tags in all that mess I found that will have to go to.) Basically you can go into the HTML editor and find the last few words of your first paragraph and delete everything between that and the first word of your second paragraph (all that div /div br / dreck that doesn't need to be there). Then publish it without going back into the "Compose" window (if you want to preview it, click the "Preview" link in the HTML editor).

Or you can just leave it... it really doesn't detract from the post at all.

And to answer your question, I don't really get people "making requests" per se on my blog. Then again, I've never really solicited any either so maybe that's why. Some stuff gets more commentary than other stuff, but nobody's really clamored for anything in particular.

Mojo said...

Oh! I took a look at the page source where your "gap" is and found several div tags with nothing inside them. My best guess is that you'd started to say something and changed your mind, but the backspacing didn't take out the tags, just the text inside them. If you're using Blogger's WYSIWYG editor, it'll do that to you (which is why I never use it!). If you go into the Edit HTML window, you'll see the stuff I'm talking about. Delete that and your vertical gap should go away. (for whatever reason, even empty tags seem to generate a blank line in Blogger's templates, though there were a couple of < br / > tags in all that mess I found that will have to go to.) Basically you can go into the HTML editor and find the last few words of your first paragraph and delete everything between that and the first word of your second paragraph (all that div /div br / dreck that doesn't need to be there). Then publish it without going back into the "Compose" window (if you want to preview it, click the "Preview" link in the HTML editor).

Or you can just leave it... it really doesn't detract from the post at all.

And to answer your question, I don't really get people "making requests" per se on my blog. Then again, I've never really solicited any either so maybe that's why. Some stuff gets more commentary than other stuff, but nobody's really clamored for anything in particular.

Unknown said...

Great composed and exposed picture, Babooshka.

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