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Posts Tagged ‘composition’

Event, Personal, Photography, Technology | 0 comment

Square Photo Sunday

©TimeLine Media - Duller Airport from Garage 1

Instagram has resurrected a trend in photography that has not been as popular since the medium format hey day. Medium format refers to the size of the film that was used in the camera. Comparatively, the 35mm film, the most popular in consumer cameras, was a small format compared in size to 120/220 film of medium format cameras. The film is 6cm in width – considerably larger than the 24 x 36mm size of 35mm film. Popular medium format cameras at the time used the 6×6 format when making images. Hasseblad, Bronica, Rolleiflex, produced a 6×6 image when using the 120 film.

©TimeLine Media - Duller Airport from Garage 1
©TimeLine Media – Duller Airport from Garage 1

There are some advantages to a square image in using these cameras. Due to the symmetrical format of the frame, there is no need to change the orientation of the camera. The photographer does not have to decide if the frame needs to be wider to show an expansive landscape, or taller to get more of a person’s body in the frame. With smartphones, this can be very helpful.

The Instagram app uses the bottom part of the screen for making options and editing decisions. The top part is cropped to a square to fit the image. With this setup, you do not have to move the smartphone screen to take your image – it is always correct with your finger over the button to take your image. Just like with the camera, you no longer have to switch orientations. Follow me on Instagram here if you would like to see my attempts at the square format. There is a mix of images taken with my DSLR, and some taken with my smartphone, but I try to keep them all square!

©TimeLine Media - Ms. Maryland 2013
©TimeLine Media – Ms. Maryland 2013

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Ballroom Dance, Photography, Technology | 2 Comments

White Balance for Skin Tones – Tech Thursday

©TimeLIne Media - people photo with a warmed white balance

Cool. Warm. These descriptive words for temperature is used widely in photography. From looking at other amateur photographers wanting to improve their photos, this is one of the first places I look at this time. Back in the film days, the color temperature of your images would have been built into the film and processing that was used in development of the negatives of slides. Today, however, the temperature of your photos can be set right in the camera, and changed as needed. In your camera settings, you look to the White Balance settings to set the color temp.

Post Processing

There are presets that manufacturers use to separate different light temperature. From cooler to warmer, the presets are usually Incandescent, Tungsten, Daylight, Flash, Cloudy, Shade, but the settings on yours may differ. In some cameras, there is also a “K” setting which stands for Kelvin temperature. With this setting you can finely tune the temperature by selecting the Kelvin setting of the light you are shooting. The scale will go from something in the 2500K range on the cool side, to 10000K on the warm side. Take some example photos, and you can see the changes as the temperature goes up in the frame. Skin tones are where you can see the changes the most:

White Balance Example

©TimeLIne Media - White balance for skin tones
©TimeLine Media – White balance for skin tones

The photo on the left is set to “Auto” in the White Balance setting. For me, the skin tones are too “cool” for my taste. Moreover for anyone that has ever been to a ballroom dance event knows that tanner is better for skin tones! The same is true when editing any portraits or group shots. Skin tones always look better warmer. This is an almost universal rule that I have learned in my photography. People look healthier, and more natural even if the skin tone does not exactly match the tone in real life.

The automatic settings in cameras or software may not give skin tones their best look. Comparatively, observe the variety of photos you come across on social media, or in your own collection, and see how they can magically be improved with adjusting one setting! Let me know how this works for you! Especially let me know if you have any other questions on how to set this on your own cameras or software. Although it is a quick fix in post, it can make a large difference!

©TimeLIne Media - people photo with a warmed white balance
©TimeLine Media – people photo with a warmed white balance

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Photography, Portrait, Sports | 0 comment

Youth Football Portraits

©TimeLIne Media - football player portrait

Recently, I had someone that was on my email list request that I make some portraits for her brother that plays youth football. It would be perfect for my project for making more sports portraits. I have plenty of action shots from players during games, or dancers during competition, but I want to expand my portfolio of setup portraits where I control more of the lighting, posing, and composition. It is no surprise that trying to get a clean image while the game is going on is difficult.

Football Field Set

Most sports photographers resort to heavy cropping to eliminate distracting backgrounds or other elements that take away from their main subject. When I photograph ballroom dancers, I use additional flashes in order to make the colors better, and to make the settings on my camera little less extreme, but the lighting has to cover a large area. It is not setup specifically for one spot, or subject, so it is much more flat overall. With “D”, the football player, we had an open, empty football field to use. It was a very bright, sunny afternoon, so I had to use an ND filter to knock down some of the light going into the camera to keep a shallower depth of field. Adding some flash to fill in helped to bring him out from the darker background making him stand out.

©TimeLIne Media - football player portrait
©TimeLIne Media – football player portrait

With all the light out there, it would seem to be easy to make this portrait, but bright sun makes for dark shadows. In order to bring some detail back into his face from under his helmet, I needed a flash to fill that in. A flash in a medium-size softbox placed just off camera left brought in enough light to fill in his face, and highlight more of the top of his uniform.

Background Setting

©TimeLIne Media - football player portrait
©TimeLIne Media – football player portrait

We did a few other poses, but this was another keeper for me. The afternoon sun was to camera left, so I used the flash through a softbox on the right to fill in his left side which was much darker. Had the aperture stopped down more than usual for a portrait since I wanted to keep their home field sign in focus. I am always looking for more portrait subjects, and like having the element of sports for props and settings so contact me if you would like to have some made!

©TimeLIne Media - football player portrait
©TimeLIne Media – football player portrait

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

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