Plum and lime Chrysanthemum arrangement (Click for larger)

Inspired by this post from the Cheap Shot man, Larry Becker, I decided to try and throw my own slant on the process and see where I ended up. So I swung by B&Q, grabbed this Rust-oleum direct to plastic paint, and a large sheet of clear perspex. I think I spent around £25 in total. Spraying the perspex was straight forward enough though it did take 3 coats to come even close to making it completely opaque. And before you ask, the shoes on the right are not mine and were black before I started – they were the first “paper weights” I put my hands on once I’d finished spraying…..

Spraying clear perspex black

Once I was satisifed with the finish I brought the perspex inside and placed it on a table. I hung a black cloth up for a backdrop and, for the flower shot above, set up a couple of shoot-through umbrellas either side. Gauging an exposure that would completely kill all the ambient light (1/125 @ F5.6 ISO200), I then began adding light via a couple of SB900s. I brought the umbrellas in as close as I could to the flowers to light them with as soft a light as possible.

Chrysanthemum set up with blackened perspex

I applied a similar technique to the wine bottle shot below, but just used one umbrella and a grid on the other strobe to give me a more controlled and concentrated light in order to better pick out the lines of the bottle and the glass.

Casablanca Valley Pinot Noir red wine with wine glass (Click to view larger)

Quite an interesting experiment and I learnt quite a lot about shadow in the process and controlling the strength of the reflection in the painted perspex. Definitely a technique that I could use in the future so the perspex is now safely tucked away behind the sofa in my office.

As usual, feel free to post in the comments if you’ve got any questions.

A successful example of pre-visualisation. Tyre by Neil Alexander

After watching Adam Barker’s new bio video, I got to thinking about pre-visualisation again, and what it actually means to me as a photographer, and how effectively I use it, or not as is sometimes the case. If you’re not sure what on earth I’m talking about then Juan Pons from over at the Digital Photo Experience does a really good outline here.

The renowned landscape photographer Galen Rowell puts the concept of pre-visualisation quite succinctly.

“Pre-visualisation does not necessarily mean that you have visited a location before, but that you pre-visualise the way the image will look on film before you take the photograph, instead of merely taking a snapshot with the naive expectation that the outcome will be like you see.”

What I get from this is that initially you see the scene through your normal visual methods (read eyes) before you picture how the scene will look in a print or on screen. It’s simply the way it is. However, for those that can “pre-visualise” an image in their mind, and then actively seek to reproduce a scene as they imagine it, the art of image making will inevitably take on a whole new level of accomplishment. For some it’s a gift that they’ve been granted. For others, it’s a technique that we have to work on, a lot.

So for me, pre-visualisation is hugely important. If I’m shooting a model for example, then more than likely I’ll have scouted the planned location at least once, I’ll have a good idea of what lighting I’ll be using, and I’ll have a feel for the model (metaphorically speaking). When I’m shooting landscapes, then it’s often a completely different kettle of fish. Living in suburbia, on the edge of a big city, I am lucky to have the glorious Peak District around 45 minutes from my doorstep. I’m also on the edge of the Cheshire plains and suffer all the delights of the North West weather conditions to go with it. But these are pretty vast areas, although also rather too familiar, and as Aesop once said “familiarity breeds contempt”. I am sufficiently over familiar with these areas, that I just can’t visualise anything of any note, and those that I can are so over familiar to me that my mind tells me there’s nothing to get there. As Confucius once said “Everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees it.”.

Lately though, as I mentioned I’ve given more time to the topic and realised that the procedure of trying to envisage how the final product will look doesn’t necessarily have to be restricted to the off location planning stage. Which is often what I do. I’ll think “Ok, I’ve got a window on Friday morning. Forecast looks interesting. Landscapes. Where Shall I go……..?” And I draw blanks because I am unable to immediately envisage a possible scene at a specific location. I’ll use all the tools at my disposal, maps, google earth, flickr world and drive to a place that’s new to me, or that I haven’t visited in such a long time, that I can’t really remember what it’s like anyway. Scout around and then shoot away.

Now though, it’s dawned on me that every time I click the shutter, I should be up on that pre-visualisation plane trying to imagine how I see the scene that stands before me looks in print. This requires you to understand how your focal length, aperture, shutter speed etc etc will affect what you see visually, and all those filters you have to hand, and even as far as how you’d like your scene to appear in post-processing. I guess past-masters of this skill can even “see” how a given frame will look in a red filtered black and white!

It’s rather like constructing a building with out a blueprint. Unless the Architect prepares the blueprint, and understands what his construction limitations are, how can anyone create anything with any modicum of success.

“There are things that U.S. soldiers are allowed to talk about with the press and others they are not. One of the things they are not allowed to voice is their political opinion, especially if it goes against their commander in chief. In the privacy of latrine stalls on military bases in Iraq and Kuwait, however, it is quite a different story.” – Check them out here

Berenice Abbott – Soap Bubbles, 1940s

Karl Blossfeldt – Poppy Seed Heads

Florence Henri – Composition with ball and mirror, 1930

I’m particularly impressed with the work of Florence Henri, and considering how long ago she made these and how many images since draw references from her work, they really are seminal works.

Finally a couple of news items.
If you’re a follower of Scott Kelby or any of the NAPP guys, then you can’t failed to have noticed that the PhotoShop World expo is on at the moment. Whilst there, Adobe have started teasers for the new CS4 suite. They’re going to do a special webcast on Tuesday 23rd September, and you can sign up here.
If you live up North (in the England), then “Ways Of Looking” – a new media festival kicks off in Bradford and Leeds this weekend coming. There’s a whole raft of shows scheduled to run right through to January next year – Check out the schedule here.

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Anyway, I saw this link titled “60 Incredible Aerial Photos You Must See” in the show notes for the PhotoNetCast podcast Episode 9 which is some fantastic aerial photography from Yann Arthus Bertrand. There are some stunning images on this page and these are definitely a must see.

Totally amazed, I then I did a bit of googling on the photographer and found his own site (Click here). This is a truly outstanding project he’s been running – he’s amazed over half a million aerial photographs taken in some 100 countries! There’s a whole host of environmental information on there and some other photography projects he’s been working on (which are also worth a view). I was totally overwhelmed by the content of this site – it has to be seen to be believed.

There’s also another site of his (link here) where there are 2000 aerial wallpapers to download complete with descriptive captions…. FOR FREE!

Truly an inspiration! Already googling helicopter hire…

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I stumbled across the sublime work of Steen Doessing over the weekend. He grew up in Denmark surrounded by water – rivers, lakes & oceans, and manages to produce the most tranquil, calm yet dramatic images. He nearly always uses long exposures, from several minutes to several hours and uses a full frame Canon DSLR and a Hasselblad. Check out his work here – www.steendoessing.com – it really is worth the click.

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