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} | 842 | Basic Staging Principles (part 2)
Staging is such a subjective area that it's really hard to talk about - there's really no "right" or wrong way to stage anything, as long as the action and emotions are clear to the audience.
So when I'm trying to figure out the best way to stage a scene, I try to find the staging that best expresses the feeling you want to put across. How are the characters feeling and what staging puts that emotion over the best way?
I remember when I was working on "Home on the Range" I ran into a tough problem in that regard. The jackrabbit character in the movie was acting as a guide for the three cows in the movie. He claimed to the cows that he knew where he was going...but at one point he became lost and didn't know which way to go. The difficulty was that he couldn't tell the cows he was lost because he didn't want them to know. So there was no dialogue solution to make the idea clear. Also he had no prop that would help - if he had a map he could look at in a confused way, or a compass that he could look at in a puzzled manner, that would help clarify the idea. But I had none of those things to rely on. So I found the best solution I could think of - I staged it like this:
You start on a closeup of the rabbit glancing left and right, looking puzzled and confused. Then you cut back to see his surroundings all look the same, and as you pull back, he ends up looking very small in the midst of the large and overwhelming environment. These two shots together were the best way I could think of to say, visually, that he was lost.
That was a 2D movie, of course, and I suppose in a 3D movie maybe I would have tried a different approach, maybe like the camera circling around him as he looked around, puzzled and confused.
That scene isn't in the final movie, by the way.
When a character is supposed to feel lost, abandoned, or alone, a wide shot with a lot of empty space around them is always effective. Here are a couple more examples: a Norman Rockwell painting of a lonely salesman on the road, playing solitaire in a hotel room by himself, and one by Vance Gerry from "The Rescuers" of the orphan Penny, alone by herself in the orphanage bedroom.
Things that are staged in a very flat way (where the action is perpendicular or parallel to the camera) feel very comedic, by their flat nature. Use this to your advantage when staging scenes that are meant to be funny.
Here are some examples from Steven MacLeod's Framefilter blog that illustrate this theory. Just look how funny these pictures look, even without knowing their context within the story.
Some of them are very symmetrical as well. We usually try to avoid symmetry because it flattens out a picture, but in these examples, where flatness is helpful to the funny moment, it was used purposefully.
The same action, when staged in depth, becomes dramatic and exciting.
Here are some examples from different live action movies that show how dramatic a picture can be when it has depth.
These are from "The Illusion of Life" and they are a great example of how to improve the staging of a scene. Here are two examples of how to stage Bernard slipping down into a hole.
The first one (on the the left) has many weaknesses that are improved in the second example (on the right). The one on the left is very flat - the wall that Bernard is clinging to is flat onto the camera. Also the lines that describe the wall are parallel to the edges of the frame so the whole shot feels very flat, which would be more appropriate for a comedic scene. Laying out the scene this way makes the animator's job tough, because you can see how awkwardly Bernard is looking over his shoulder to look at the danger beneath him and we can't really see his expression all that way. Also the composition has him too close to the bottom of the frame, for my tastes, because there's no negative space beneath him to make it feel like he could fall down into the abyss.
The second one is better in many ways. The best part about it is that you can easily see his scared expression clearly and also see the peril beneath him at the same time without having to twist his head around awkwardly (like it was in the first example). Being able to see the danger in the scene as well as how he feels about it make for a great choice for staging. Also the sense of depth in the second shot makes for a much more dramatic scene, instead of the flat first example. Also this staging allows diagonal lines through the composition which add more drama too. | http://comicscommentaries.blogspot.com/2009/11/basic-staging-principles-part-2.html | robots: classic
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The Cinematography of "The Incredibles" Part 2
See Part 1 here.
Continuing with my case study of the shot compositions from Pixar's film "The Incredibles". All images used here are ©Disney/Pixar (unless otherwise stated).
Composition in film includes many different aspects; color, shape, line, contrast, positioning, cropping, viewpoint, rhythm, perspective, proportion, geometry, and many more.
The dinner table sequence is a nice one that showcases how well you can move the camera around depending on which character(s) you want to make as the focus of the shot. With 5 characters all facing inwards, turning their heads left an right according to which other person they are talking to, you create scenario that can have a million different ways you can shoot this scene from. With endless possibilities of angles,
A 2 shot. Looking over mom's shoulder makes it seem like your almost seeing the baby through mom's eyes.
Warm colors, warm lighting, all conveying a comfortable family environment. Vehicles, furniture and other props all evoke a design sense of post-modern 1960s. Basically the 60s vision of the future is The Incredibles' entire design theme.
Well shot and beautifully executed, the audience always knows where all the characters are, her with Helen and Dash looking at Bob, it motivates the camera to cut (to see what they are seeing).
Center Bob, he's the focus, the secondary focal points are the kids acting awkward around the fact Bob's had enough and leaves the dinner table because Helen just mentioned something that was obviously a touchy subject with Bob. Triangular composition and the rule of thirds keeps appearing in the cinematography.
Characters are never blending into the background too much, color tones and shape (silhouettes) are always clear to make the image fast and easy to read.
A low angle to catch mom's reaction/disapproval as Dash starts to pin around the table.
Moments like this make it more apparent how each character's personalities are reflected in the super powers that they have. The mom is pulled in many directions at once, any mother of 3 kids must be flexible. Bob is the typical protective Dad, a symbol of strength and sturdiness, but deep down he's just a big teddy bear. Violet (as in shrinking violet) is timid, introverted, shy. Her powers are turning invisible and force fields, all elements to protect herself and to stay hidden.
Notice below how everyone's facial expressions are clearly readable.
This moment personifies their family in a nutshell. As many family arguments can easily grow into a bigger conflict especially when individuals may have had a bad day, tensions rise and conflict emerges from what started off as a normal dinner conversation. Turmoil isn't the idea here, but that when push comes to shove they stick together, at the sound of the door knock, they get right back in their seats, nearly all their powers were being used at that moment, and they've rehearsed many times how they must keep them secret, so they all quickly get back into position and become 'normal'.
Seeing the whole family in one room reminds me of how very carefully and deliberately the character designs were made, complimenting their personality and their powers.
The design of all characters in this film not only tells us a lot about who they are, their personalities, and their purpose, but they themselves are also main compositional elements. Not only does their body language and performance obviously convey what they are feeling and most importantly everything they do (and how they do it), but it also helps to push the story forward.
The actual shapes of their bodies, the silhouettes they create, even by just standing there, taking up screen space, usually being the focal point of the shot, and contributing to the scene's composition.
Courtesy of:
Here's some concept art and sculptures for the characters designs from the Art of The Incredibles book.
© Preston Blair
See how their designs obviously played a big role in how the compositions would be created for the shots they were in. The character's scale, proportions, silhouette, all factors that affect the staging of the shot.
Since in most cases, the characters are the main focus of the shots, they need to be posed and positioned according to what is going on in the sequence, show what their intentions are, what their thoughts are, and they express this through their body language. But the shapes and form their bodies create in the frame are themselves strong compositional elements.
Composition is all about the way a viewer's eye moves through the image. Cinematography is the art of controlling eye movement. Deciding on the composition of a shot, is deciding which direction to lead the eye, what to stop on, and where to go to next.
Nice over the shoulder shot, shows his point of view, camera is tilted down then tilts up to follow dash back to his seat. A sense of depth is always trying to be achieved in every shot.
Nicely laid out, screen geography for this whole dinning room sequence is flawless, even when we crossed the axis to introduce a new character (Frozone) the viewers are never lost as to where the characters are in proximity to each other, we always know where the characters are, who they are communicating with and their body language remains clear and concise.
I keep referring to the "axis line" -- this is when you have two characters talking, imagine an invisible border line between them. Now the rule states that you need to keep the camera on one side of that line and never cross over to the other side. But of course in filmmaking rules are often made to be broken, in this case there are many ways to cross the axis line and still not disorient the viewers. It is a solid principle to follow when scene planning.
Here's some notes from Storyboard Artist Mark Kennedy's blog (Temple of the Seven Golden Camels):
You can put the camera anywhere you want as long as you don't cross the line to the other side of the two characters. This way, no matter what shots you have, you can cut them together in any order and the green character will always stay on the right side of the frame and the blue character will always stay on the left.
If you break this rule and shoot one shot from the other side of the line, the characters will be flopped: the blue guy is now on the right and the green guy is on the left.
This can confuse the audience because, for example, if the characters look similar, they may start to get the two people mixed up. Or they may think that the characters switched places between cuts, or they may think it's a time jump to a different location at a later time or something. It can cause unnecessary confusion in the audience's mind, and we always want to avoid that.
The problem becomes even more apparent when you're doing a scene where people are in action. For example, when a character is running, you want to consider the path they're traveling along as the line that you don't want to cross. Obviously, if you shoot from the other side the line, the character will look like he's going the opposite direction.
If you start to cut these two different shots together you will create a lot of confusion: did the character turn around and start running back the other way? Or is it two characters running towards each other and they're going to collide?
That's why you'll notice that - especially in animated movies - a destination is always kept to one side of the screen or the other and the character is always traveling that way.
Art by Eric Goldberg
Camera pulls out from the close-up of the radio, not all establishing shots start with an extreme wide shot, sometimes they start up close and truck out (or cut wide) to reveal the characters in their setting.
Rule of Thirds is everywhere.
In this sequence the camera orbits around Bob, slowly changing his screen location from being screen right to screen left. The camera gradually swings around them while they sit in the car, Bob wipes the screen by going left and settling into the position you se in the frame below.
This whole bit is up close and intimate, we want the audience to relate to their old war stories, reflecting on their past lives. The acting is all in their facial actions and reactions, the cinematography needs to compliment this part of the storytelling with simple angles.
The composition here needs to make it seem like we are spying on them along with this onlooker. So the camera is placed in the car with the character as we watch the car driving off.
The camera dives right into the fire, placing us directly into the chaos of this burning building with our heroes.
Our heroes bust through the wall, the angles don't want to give us any hints as to where they are until the audience clues in at the same time as our characters.
We establish Bob on screen right and Frozone on screen left. Revealing that they are in a jewlery store.
A quick shot to show the audience where the characters are in their environment, the exit and the hole the busted through are visible.
Establish the exterior, with a police car in view.
The axis is flipped here in order to reveal a new character.
Camera pans over to show the audience what the character sees.
Camera follows Frozone's hand, building tension as the officer follows the action as well with his eyes and handgun.
Awesome shot. The office is framed by Frozone's arm, almost foreshadowing the fact he's about to be a target now that Samuel Jackson is getting recharged!
To show how tense the officer is, he has his head tilted, forced perspective, and a slight up shot to tell us he's in control (or at least he thinks he is).
The action here is fast, so the composition needs to read very clearly, nice depth, you know where all the characters are in relation to each other.
Backup police officers burst in fast. The look around, asses the situation...
For the sake of the following gag to work there is a nice "cheat" happening here. The gag being this new police officer doesn't notice his frozen friend until he turns around to have the camera dramatically reveal him, where the first police officer had come through the front door and the backup team come in through the same door but magically don't notice their frozen comrade.
The effect would have been lost if the cops had walked right into the statue-version of their friend. But with clever camera work you don't even
This simple but effective techniques for visual storytelling reminds me of the book "Directing The Story" by veteran Disney storyboard artist Francis Glebas. In the book he teaches artists a structural approach to clearly and dramatically presenting visual stories. By reading through you learn fundamental concepts like how to convey meaning with images and directing the viewer's eye. Glebas also teaches how to spot potential problems before they cost time and money, and he offers creative solutions on how to solve them at the storyboarding stage.
Character screen spacing, character position and screen direction are all fundamentals to the designing of shots and sequences in filmmaking. Many of these principles are based around the 180 rule mentioned earlier. Here are storyboarding notes from Hat Lieberman regarding the importance in not losing your audience in terms of where your characters are within their environment.
There are no "right" or "wrongs" with storyboarding, only methods that work better than others. Figure out what you want to convey in a scene, and find the best way to present those ideas to your audience.
Maintaining Screen Side:
Maintaining Screen Direction:
This is a similar theory to the above scenes, however involves more characters and objects moving in and out of frame.
As long as you continue to establish any new screen spacing or direction, the sequence should maintain a certain level of continuity that will allow the audience to follow along quite easily.
The following sequence is nicely laid out. We follow Bob sneaking back in to his own house. He's what up late "bowling" with his friend, he's done this many times, so he knows he'll get in trouble if his wife suspects him of doing any 'covert hero work'.
A layout like this with a light source in the room creates nice and simple visual balance to the overall composition. Similar to these samples from the film Se7ev. Off-centered subjects near the Rule of Thirds, plus a light source in the background to help add balance to the image.
The moulding on the back wall running behind his head through his eyes is no accident, it leads your eyes to the focal point.
Below is a classic use of shot progression, cutting back and forth between the characters, each time the framing gets closer and closer on the characters to help intensify the argument escalating between them. This has to do with framing and cutting more so than fancy cinematography, but as the story, dialogue and action grows in intensity, the shots get closer and closer on the subject until there's a breaking point, in this case, when dash zips by to listen in.
The argument is broken once they realize the kids are listening in. The the shots calm down again with wider framing, less angular perspectives.
We end on the extreme wide of the street they live on. Reinforcing the idea they are a regular family living in a regular house, having typical marital/family struggles and inner-conflicts.
Brad Bird chose these shots, storyboard artists may have sketched out a dozen different ways this escalating argument might be shot, but ultimately the scene evolved from initial drawings and concepts to the final pictures you see here.
It reminds me of this great clip where David Fincher discusses cinematography:
The following sequence is one of my favorites in the film. Once he arrives in his boss's office the camera stays on axis line the whole time as the camera flips back and forth 180 degrees, until we introduce the 3rd character (the mugger in the street) then a new axis line is established and a new camera setup is made.
Establishing shots, an extreme close-up and then a close-up of the pencil where they go after being sharpened, then a shot of his boss, almost building up a bit of anticipation while the shots also get us to know what Bob is in for as far as his boss's personality. Obsessive/compulsive, cold, dry, pale, muted color scheme, sterile, clean, immaculate, and precise environment. The post-modern, upper-class, corporate look and style is evident by the layout an demeanour of the of the boss character.
The central compositions are different than what we've been seeing thus fr in the film, to have so many shots demanding our attention, to first show Bob's total disinterest in his job, zero respect for his greedy boss, and the fact he's so bored with his life he really doesn't care why he's been called to his employer's office to be chewed out.
SO here's the setup so far. The camera flops back and forth staying on the first redline stageline, the camera nay tilt up or down, looking down at the boss or up at Bob slightly, but it's a 180 degree turn everytime the camera cu
He paces back and forth while lecturing him, you clearly see Bob's face, drained of life and doesn't care about what he's saying.
The ceiling light going through his eyes (behind his head in the background) is no coincidence, purposefully done to lead your eyes to the focal point (his eyes) and how bored, uniterested and annoyed he is with his boss.
Basic shapes + flat composition + simple forms with contrasting scales and values all help the image to read more clearly.
With Bob dead center, uninterested in this exchange, it leaves the boss free to walk around as the audiences' eyes follow him around, the boss is trying his best to appear and be as dominant as possible.
The expression on the boss's face is sort of subtle as he struggles to contain his "nooooo" answer. Staying reserved so he can blow up a bit 5 shots later, his frustration is building as Bob has an answer for all his questions.
Bob is finally interested in the lecture as he debates with his boss a bit since he doesn't agree with his ethics.
The angles shift according to how important the boss's body language is to what and how he's talking and reacting to Bob's comments.
Some nice shot progression happening afterwards, the scene builds up a bit in tension, eventhough Bob still isn't very interested in what the boss has to say, the framing gets tighter, the director wants to show specific things up close, clearly, in detail, to do this you make the frame tighter on the sunject.
The action cues the cut, we want to see what Bob looks down at. So we cut to his point of view of the letter on his desk.
For the first time we break away from the 180 degree flopping camera pattern. Why? because we're about to introduce a new character, allowing us to break away from this camera setup and go over to a new stageline.
The boss steps to one side to get into frame, well silhouetted on the white background, extreme close-up on Bob, great foreground/background depth.
This small character suddenly and undoubtedly tales control of the situation and the scene entirely with his sudden threat.
We show this shift in dominance with a powerful up shot.
You can't get a much bigger contrast in scale than this, you see the boss's body language despite how small he is on screen, seeing Bob's anger on his face was important.
He closes the door, wipes the screen.
The camera is low to show the nice profile and silhouette shape of the tapping foot. A condescending action to help build up the tension in the scene.
Close-up to show the anger boiling up.
Camera tilts up as he walks towards him.
We zoom in on the mugger, to see what Bob sees, it's a fast truck in to give a bit of a sense of urgency and anxiety since Bob was so eager to go and help the pedestrian, but was pulled away.
A clear silhouette is needed, since the robbery had to happen in shadow anyways, and to make it obvious that the act is done and the guy is getting a way with it.
Close-up to show the frustration in his face. Just before he snaps!
This whole sequence builds up to this, and you can't help but laugh as the boss is about to get what he deserves. It's the climax to this whole scene and we have the boss hurtling through the wall landing into a wall of filing cabinets.
Notice how the character poses are all different, leaning twisted, to add variety and rhythm to the image, with slight variations to the angles of the postures to each person.
As the camera tilts to reveal the damage done, we see the layers of punched-through walls, the tunnel effect, along with incidental characters peeking their heads through, all points to Bob.
A nicer finisher to this sequence, close shot on him to show the regret in his action. Realizing he's screwed up.
How every shot was designed in this film is impeccable, as I write this I notice more and more, and I will undoubtedly notice more in the future upon further viewings.
Mark Kennedy explores here some samples from classic Disney films, illustration, comics, and storyboards to describe some tips on staging and layout.
In The Incredibles, the use of shapes, lines, contrasting forms and values are always apparent.
The Incredibles used all these examples in its cinematography.
A view-through, placing the audience into the scene as if you're peaking into the room that the boss is recovering in.
The lines of action are nice here, Bob's depression and guilt, the agent showing his age with his posture and feeling compassion for Bob's situation.
There's so many ways to shoot this sequence, but the way they ended up shooting these angles conveys the character's emotions well, it had to be played as simple, the consequences to Bob's actions had to be shown and the characters' dialogue explains a lot as to what Bob has been doing the last 15 years.
Some great angles and lightning displayed in his home office. With only the light source of the lamp on his desk and later on the blue light from the tablet device, it forces the viewer to only look at certain areas of the picture, usually his face. We want to clearly see what the character is thinking and feeling through out the sequence, and the lighting helps to accomplish that.
Great camera work, showing Bob cautiously approaching the device on the floor, the camera acts as the character's point of view, slowly getting closer, the camera spirals in towards the device.
Great angles going back and forth from over Bob's shoulder, to showing the expression on his face, to showing the tablet, and back again. All for the purpose of showing how he's anxiously trying to write down the information, take in
This is my favorite expression in the whole film. Totally dumbfounded over what just happened.
The camera swings around and for the first time you see the reverse angle of his room, the memories of Bob back in his hay day, fighting crime and saving innocent people, the joy in his face over the possibility of him regaining his former glory is juxtaposed (fancy art school term meaning 'side by side') by the imagery of the framed clippings on the wall.
Warm colors makes it inviting, comforting, homely, you feel his emotions as you can tell how much he desperately misses being a hero in the spotlight.
When I first saw this film I was wondering if we would ever see his wall of memorabilia or if it was only going to be shown in the amazing teaser trailer they had released a year before the film.
When angles and perspective shots are used, they are not random, they are all setup with a purpose, to develop the characters to enhance and progress the story and to engage the audience, make them feel something.
He swings his chair around as the camera pans and trucks in, making an over-the-shoulder shot to see what Bob is looking at.
The use of camera angles in The Incredibles is dynamic and energetic when it needs to be, and most importantly, it's always appropriate.
I found these storyboarding tips by Giancarlo Volpe, it relates to many of the principles mentioned here so far, but it makes it clear the importance of planning the action in three-dimensional space. These are nice and simple fundamentals for displaying camera work and other technical aspects of scene planning.
I keep referring to the storyboarding process, because in animation, these storyboard artists are essentially the cameramen and cinematographers for the film.
This is an insert shot, used to break up the flow of shots around it and usually a close up to show some information to the audience.
Slick, modern, clean, simply design elements, hi-tech gadgets while still feeling like retro 50s/60s all present. Now the cool blue lighting helps to keep the focus on their faces. Thanks to the simple patterns of 1 shot, 2 shot, Over the Shoulder angles and profile shots for both of them, you're never bored even though they are just talking about technical stuff, you feel engaged, curious about the mission and the subtle flirting happening between them.
Shots like this and many others take full advantage of the wide aspect ratio, characters can be pushed quite fat to the sides, but given the other elements on screen, the compositions are still well balanced and carefully planned.
The translucent holographic grid/map between them acts as a nice added compositional element, the details of it were carefully placed to make it seem all high tech but still doesn't get a way of the characters' faces.
More inserts, quick shots of him getting ready, suiting up, staying close like this keeps information from the audience until the gag is revealed that's he's too big for the pod.
In the bonus features of the DVD, they made a montage of all the button-pushing shots in the film, you'd be very surprised how many there was, it's crazy!
Great foreground/background technique happening, the angle is flat yet we still have some great depth happening as well.
Great viewpoints, these are difficult camera angles to pull off, and to make them work well I'm sure took some experimenting. The camera moves and the camera angles never want to draw attention to them selves, they have to feel natural and they never make the audience wonder where they are, and the viewer never feels confused as to the geography of the scene and where all the character are situated.
Continue on to the epic conclusion in Part 3.
Max said...
That's just amazing. Can't wait for the third part.
Thank you SO much for all these.
Jonah Sidhom said...
Thank you so much for taking the time to put these together, so much great info.
BTW, I believe those last few pages of storyboarding tips are by Giancarlo Volpe.
Ron said...
Thanks Jonah!
Anonymous said...
By the way, it took me a long time to realize that the talk about triangles people make is as opposed to straight lines. I kept thinking that it'd be pretty logical for three people talking to form a triangle.
Arun Chandrasekaran said...
Thanks for a great writeup.
iqbal maulana said...
This Is SO AMAZING, Bookmarked !
Gayathri Jeaks said...
Thank you so much for your hard work. Eternally grateful.
tsoka said...
Great Work! Thx from Siberya, cant wait for third part
power3d said...
thank you again for all these information
Alexander Kuprijanow said...
Dear Ron,
this is one of the best cinematic-related posts on the entire internet. There is so much to learn from your comments and your thorough analysis of the...hell, EVERYTHING - more than an entire university course could convey.
Thank you for your dedication and your will to share your insights with others.
p.s.: Now the posting should work ;)
Megan said...
FANTASTIC collection of sources to supplement your excellent analysis! Really a wonderful, instructive read--looking forward to part 3!
bianres said...
THANK YOU! Amazing analysis. Now I will watch movies with more atention trying visualize everything I've learned from this post. I watched to The Incredibles a million times when I was younger, but reading this is like watching all over again for the first time. So much impressing things we don't realise. Thanks again!
Misha Petrik said...
Hello Ron, i translate, and remake all images your second post on Russian language, for russian auditory, i hope you like it too —
Ron said...
Wow, thanks Misha! it looks very nice!
Paulo Mosca said...
I can't believe this awesome analysis. Just thanks.
Nate Kan said...
Lost count of how many times I've come back here for reference and guidance.
Thanks for much for all the thought and effort you put into this!
Corporate Films said...
Corporate Films said...
Amal Clooney said...
Thank you very very very very very good information for taking the time to put xxx apps them together. | http://floobynooby.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-cinematography-of-incredibles-part-2.html?showComment=1388889304286 | robots: classic
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} | 3,809 | Welcome to the first installment of our ongoing series, Highsnobiety Film School. In this series, we’ll use popular YouTube channels to teach you fundamental lessons about filmmaking, and then put their lessons in context to show you how to direct a movie and help you get started making films of your own.
For those who are just becoming passionate about the filmmaking process, the best thing you can do is pick up a camera and start working. But, as you start out with little more than some friends and a DIY attitude, there are some ideas you can consider that can help take your filmmaking to the next level.
Whether you prefer drama, comedy, horror or experimental fare, these five concepts should help you sharpen your directorial eye and improve your work.
Building Tension in a Film
The job of a director is to bring the words in the script to life with action. One of the most important ways this is done is through building tension – the emotional strain that the audience feels as the film builds to a particular moment.
Alfred Hitchcock is the master of suspense and tension. He has a particularly easy and digestible concept, “Bomb Theory,” as it relates to that state of anxiousness and excitement you feel when watching a film.
The idea is this: if you simply set off a bomb, there is no suspense. But if you set a five-minute timer for a bomb and let the audience be aware it’s there, but perhaps have one or more characters be out of the the loop, then that is suspense. Tension, then, could be understood as how the director spends that five minutes, ramping up the sense of danger as the time ticks down to zero.
Spielberg is a master of building tension through suspense. For Spielberg, tension isn’t about cheap shocks or scares. It is about point of view. What action are we seeing? Who is seeing it? These are the key questions when creating tension. This video shows how he deploys point of view to create tension.
In Jaws, Spielberg alternates between objective and subjective points of view. This means that first we see what the character sees (subjective), and then we see what the character cannot see (objective). The two don’t match up, of course, until it is too late.
In The Color Purple, Spielberg creates tension by refusing to shift point of view. The video shows a scene of a young girl shaving a man on a porch. We linger on the girl’s point of view, following each stroke she takes with the razor, often without cutting. When we do cut away, it is to a close-up of a razor, rather than a reverse angle on the man she’s shaving. This draws our attention to the knife, her hand, and the delicate act she is performing. We see every potential stroke as a moment of violence because we follow the hand through each motion, refusing to look away.
This analysis of a scene from Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario shows how Hitchcock’s “Bomb Theory” can be deployed in concert with point of view. In this clip, the Cinefix team breaks down the various uses of tension in one of the film’s key scenes.
Before the sequence, we are told that the most dangerous location for our heroes is the U.S.-Mexico border. The one thing they don’t want to do is stop at the border, but that’s exactly what they have to do. Instead of Hitchcock’s bomb, we have Villeneuve’s “sea of cars.”
As in the Spielberg sequences, we switch back and forth from objective point of view (the sea of cars) to a subjective point of view (the Agents stuck in the sea of cars). For much of the sequence, we are confined to the subjective point of view of Kate (Emily Blunt), an agent new to the drug war.
When we leave her point of view, it is because of the threat of violence. We leave her to look at cartel workers and crooked cops who are at the border crossing or the agents who draw guns on them. The cutting shifts so rapidly, from a rolling down window to a cartel member preparing to exit his car to Alejandro’s (Benicio Del Toro) gun and back to Kate, you don’t even realize that there are only nine seconds of actual violence in the sequence. The shots vary in length and shift point of view to build maximum tension as we wait for the exciting finale of the scene.
Your Turn
How could you put these ideas to work in your own film? Let’s say you’re filming a scene in one location. First identify your “bomb.” Is it a hostage crisis or is it a big secret that is going to be revealed during Thanksgiving dinner? Then, think about each character’s point of view. At each moment of the scene, whose POV is most interesting, most dramatic? Keep that in mind as you think about your shot list, building the tension of the scene as the “bomb” is about to go off.
How to Shoot a Comedy Scene
If we’re going to talk about building tension, we should also talk about relieving tension. The best way to release tension on film is by making the audience laugh.
While many would assume that deriving laughter stems from the screenplay itself, the directing is of equal importance and actually involves using the same tools that go into drama. The only difference is the feel of the payoff.
Edgar Wright is among of the best in the world at directing visual comedy, as Every Frame A Painting demonstrates.
The video argues that one of Edgar Wright’s great strengths is shooting things in an unexpected way. For example, the standard “moving from one city to another” sequence, is usually shot with a mix of road signs, car b-roll and helicopter shots.
In Hot Fuzz, Wright makes the mundane travel from point a to point b seem dangerous, mocking the ho-hum nature of everyday life. For this narrator, filming comedy is about “finding simple mundane scenes, and finding new ways to do them.”
As the above clip discusses, a simple example of this principle is demonstrated in one of the most beloved scenes in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Lancelot (John Cleese) is charging a castle. He is a dedicated and able warrior, so we think he’ll storm the castle in no time. However, it is much farther away than we or the the character expect, so it takes him forever to get there. This sequence is even funnier because of the lazy guards who watch him as he “storms” the castle, stupidly awaiting their certain demise.
Every Frame a Painting also explored how action is directed for comedy in Jackie Chan’s films. When you think of great comic minds, you may not first think of Jackie Chan, but maybe you should.
In this video, you can see how the basic idea of finding new approaches to familiar ideas plays out on a micro level in Chan’s work. You expect to see Jackie fighting the bad guys. You don’t expect him to use picture frames, dresses, and refrigerators to beat them. While most action stars’ egos won’t allow them to show pain onscreen, Chan uses pain to humanize his characters and draw humor from scenes. Chan’s career has been far longer and more successful than many action stars and directors because he knows how to deliver the unexpected.
Thor: Ragnarok director, Taika Waititi, is also a brilliant comedic mind. While much of Edgar Wright and Jackie Chan’s comedy comes from juxtaposing action and comedy in unexpected ways, Waititi is a master of combining happiness and sadness for unexpected laughs.
In the beginning of this clip, we see Ricky’s (Julian Dennison) birthday party in Hunt for the Wilderpeople. A boy’s birthday is supposed to be joyful, but the grimness of this celebration in a dark room with a busted toy piano is unexpected and hilarious. This isn’t a wasted scene by any means. It illuminates the given circumstances of our main character. Though his new mother and father care about him very much, he is isolated and bored. This clip goes onto explain these same principles at work in the films Waititi made earlier in his career including Wilderpeople, Boy, and Eagle vs. Shark. In each of his films, Waititi finds humor in the unexpected contours or life’s dark moments.
Your Turn
You may not have the gift for activating the mundane that Edgar Wright has. You may not have Jackie Chan’s martial arts expertise. You may not quite grasp Taika Waititi’s ability to wrestle humor from sadness. But, you can start to think about the principle that unites all of their work. Once again, it is about “finding simple mundane scenes, and finding new ways to do them.” One of the best jokes in Blazing Saddles didn’t cost any money. It didn’t require a huge stunt budget. Mel Brooks simply had the foresight to write and cast a black sheriff in an Old West town.
This allowed Brooks to examine the contradictions of the Western genre, and America at the time he was making the film.
Write the funniest script you can. Cast the funniest actors you can. Find the funniest collaborators you can. Once you’ve done that, look at your project and ask yourself what new and inventive ways in which you can tell this story. Don’t shoot your first draft. Do go with your first visual gag. Laughs are earned, and they are about delivering unexpected surprises.
Character Motivation in Film: Dominance
According to Russian actor Konstantin Stanislavski (of which the Stanislavski acting method is named for), acting is about motivation and exploring what a character wants. For a director, his/her job is to show who is getting what they want at a given moment of a scene, or, more simply put, who holds the power.
There are a number of ways that a director can demonstrate dominance in a scene. In this scene from Citizen Kane, Mr. Thatcher (George Coulouris) comes to take young Charlie (Buddy Swan) away from his simple rural childhood and into the life of immeasurable wealth that will be his undoing. The short scene is legendary because of how director Orson Welles uses camera movement and blocking to establish dominance.
As Thatcher explains what’s happening to the boy, Charlie’s parents (Agnes Moorehead and Harry Shannon) behave very differently. His father, shocked and unsure about the boy’s fate, stays still in the back of the shot. His mother, Mary, coldly confident that the boy should leave their home for a new life, walks with the camera, landing front and center in a medium shot. With each step, Dad is left smaller in the background while Mom increases her dominance. The only person with less power in the scene is young Charlie, who we can see through the window in the distance playing in the snow. We can barely see him as his future is being signed away.
You can see how similar principles are applied in a longer scene in this clip from the Alfred Hitchcock film, Vertigo. Without spoiling too much, in this scene Gavin (Tom Helmore) is luring Scottie (Jimmy Stewart) into the film’s central deception.
A scene in an office allows for an easy measure dominance: who is sitting and who is standing? Who is behind the desk and who is on the other side of it? As the narrator of this clip points out, at first Scottie, who is standing, stalking around the office, is dominant. As the power shifts, Scottie sits and Gavin stands. This is a simple, but effective way to show how the tables have turned. The scene ends with both characters standing on the same level, looking eye to eye. Gavin wants to convince his patsy that he is on Scottie’s level, and gives up his dominance in order to demonstrate that.
There is another element of the scene’s blocking that further emphasizes dominance. Hitchcock had the set built so that the conference area was physically a few steps higher than the office. At the height of Gavin’s power in the scene, Hitchcock has him in the conference area, literally higher up than Scottie. He looms over his prey before coming back down to Scottie’s level.
You might ask, “How do I establish dominance if I don’t have a ton of room for blocking?” Think about the same principles we just discussed. How do you convey a sense of power? One possibility is with the camera. You can create the same feeling of one character looming over another through the shots you choose. You could shoot one character from high angles (looking down at them), making them look small and weak, while you shoot another from a low angle, making them look powerful and mysterious. Quentin Tarantino loves using a low angle shot to show power. Often characters shot this way are looking at a corpse or a character they’ve beat up. If that’s not holding power over someone, I don’t know what is.
Stanley Kubrick liked to use lighting to establish dominance. He often did this through the use of practical lights (a light that “exists” in the film, like a candle, car headlights, or a chandelier). The benefit of practical light is it is easy for a character to walk in and out of the light from a practical source. In this video, there are a number of scenes where two characters are speaking, and a character can exhibit power by leaning into the light. As the narrator points out when describing a clip from The Killing, with practical lighting, a character could step out of the light and “disappear.”
Dominance can even be shown through costume design. If one character is wearing darker colors, more expensive clothing, or more formal clothing than a counterpart, that too can establish dominance.
Your Turn
As a director, you have a number of tools at your disposal when it comes to establishing dominance. First, think about blocking in your scene. Is one character sitting and another standing? Is one character closer to the camera than the other? Is one physically standing on a higher plane? Once you’ve thought through the blocking, think about what other ways you can convey dominance in the scene. Do you want to shoot the boss at a low angle? Do you want to give the spy more light than the man she’s deceiving? Do you want to show a powerful general in full regalia, while the private is caught in his undershirt?
There are myriad ways to establish a power dynamic on screen. As a director it is your job to demonstrate these dynamics.
How Costume Design Works
Costumes can tell us a great deal about character and can convey important information efficiently. If you’re able, you should use a costume designer, but to best leverage their skills, you’ll have to be able to describe to them what you want. Costumes can convey so much about character, the world, tone, and emotion, but you have to know what you want to say.
This video interviewing costume designers from BAFTA is a nice primer on what a director should consider when first thinking about how costume design works. One designer describes themselves as a “psychologist.” Another talks about working with actors to draw out character in their designs.
Let’s talk a bit about the various choices the director and costume designer partner to make. In this round-up of some of the best costumes in film history, you can see some of the ways that wardrobe can be used in storytelling.
Color alone can convey so much. This video discusses Hero by Zhang Yimou, and how the costume colors of various segments of the story convey the film’s emotional tones. The bold colors in the film situate story that is rooted in Chinese culture in terms that are readily understandable to a global audience. They amount to a simple visual language. In Hero, the various vignettes are divided into different colors. The passionate first vignette shows us characters dressed in red. The triumphant final vignette features actors clad in white. Pretty much any scene from the film offers a study in the use of color in storytelling.
Costumes can also help us differentiate characters from one another. In the video above, the Cinefix team picks Royal Tenenbaums as an example of just how much deeply costumes can convey character. We get a keen sense of who the three siblings are just from what they are wearing. Margot’s (Gwyneth Paltrow) coat is at once a hipster fashion statement and a nod to her old money roots. Chas (Ben Stiller) wears a vintage track suit that reminds us of his arrested development. Richie (Luke Wilson) hides behind long hair and aviators, rejecting his identity and his family’s odd legacy; but the fact the he continues to wear a tennis headband shows that he is still wrestling with his past.
Because costumes can both convey character and tone, they are essential if you are trying to familiarize the audience with a story. Star Wars illustrates how this can be done. The clip points out that Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher), while from another world, has traditionally royal aspects to her outfit. The done-up hair, the flowing outfit, and the white costume: all of this serves to frame her as a princess, even if she is extraterrestrial royalty.
Your Turn
What can you do in terms of costumes if you have a limited budget? First, think about your characters. Who are they? What is their job? Are they rich? Are they flashy? Do they follow the rules? Next, think of how that character exists in relation to other characters. Reservoir Dogs is so memorable largely because all the characters are dressed the same. Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) in Legally Blonde immediately sticks in our minds because she is dressed differently from the other characters.
Now, think about the world of your film. What do people look like in this world? Is this world like our own? Is there crucial information you can provide that will make the world more clear to your audience? Finally, think about emotions and tone. What feelings to do you want to convey with the costumes in the film?
Your characters (usually) have to wear something. Make it count.
Close-Up Shots in Film
The close-up is the most basic shot in cinema; you shoot the character’s face. As a result of this seeming simplicity, many directors take the close-up shot for granted. Many young directors obscure the face, shoot it at an odd angle, or complicate the shot in some other way. Before you complicate the close-up, you have to master its fundamentals.
A close-up, first and foremost, is a moment of emphasis on a particular character’s emotion.
This video discusses the essential use of the close-up, and how to use discretion in creating a close-up, by looking at the work of classic director Howard Hawkes. In Rio Bravo, Howard Hawkes only uses five close-ups in the entire film. This is not how films are made today, but in exploring his choices, you can see the kind of meaning close-ups can carry. Each one of them emphasizes a dramatic moment: a gunshot, a bloody glass, a tough decision. The argument that the narrator makes is that you shouldn’t use the close-up if you aren’t emphasizing something.
What sort of emphasis can a close-up provide? This video dives into the many virtues of the close-up.
Of course, we get a great sense of emotional expression in a close-up. We see eyes darting, eye brows raised, lips pursed, nostrils flaring. Here we see a variety of examples of what can be expressed in a close-up simply by looking at an actor’s face.
This brief clip of students reacting the assistant principal (Paul Gleason) chewing them out in The Breakfast Club demonstrates the variety of emotional responses that can be shown in close-up.
Close-ups can also help build tension and rhythm in film. For example, by cutting to tighter and tighter close-ups, you can heighten tension. A close-up on a character at an unexpected moment can have a similar effect.
This immortal stand-off sequence from Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly is a perfect example of how close-ups can be used to build tension.
When using close-ups, the audience is impacted both by what you show and when you show it. Towards the end of that first clip, you’ll hear a quote from David Fincher, who puts it succinctly, “Every time you go to a close-up, the audience knows, ‘Look at this. This is important.’ You have to be cautious and careful about when you choose to do it.”
How do you make sure that your close-ups are worth using? In this video, Edgar Wright makes a great argument for close-ups as punctuation in a scene’s visual language.
Wright is known for close-up and inserts (close-ups of objects) that are incredibly memorable: from the mundane cop montages in Shaun of the Dead to the otherworldly end of the bar crawl in The World’s End. This is because Wright often plans them outside of his standard shooting of a scene. Many close-ups are part of the broader coverage in a scene. Coverage means the different shots you shoot when filming a scene: often an establishing shot of the space, medium shot of the characters, then close-ups. Wright shoots some close-ups separate from his scenes, making them that much more unique and memorable. Though Wright puts many close-ups in his films, this approach of shooting close-ups out of sequence allows him to think through and emphasize the particular motivations behind each of his close-ups.
Your Turn
There are several things you can do in your next film to give more thought and weight to your close-ups. You should always have a shot list. Know what you want to shoot before you shoot it. While you won’t have time to shoot every close-up as a separate set-up, you can pick some punctuating close-ups that you could shoot out of sequence.
Once you get to the editing room, consider how the way deploy close-ups effects rhythm, tension, and tone. What would happen if there were fewer close-ups? How would the scene change if you were close-up on a different character? Consider these possibilities as you cut the film.
Regardless of what choices you make, the important thing is to think about the close-up as just one tool in your toolbox, and understand that when you go to close-up, and who you show a close-up of, will change the way the audience interprets a particular moment.
That’s all for our Highsnobiety Film School on the basics of how to direct a movie. Look for our next installments in the series, when we’ll talk about cinematography, screenwriting, and more.
• Featured & Main Image: Keystone / Getty Images
• Words:: Brenden Gallagher
Words by Contributor
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} | 4,927 | Mise en scène can seem foreign, even to filmmakers, film critics, and movie buffs. Why is it important? How do you pronounce it? And what is mise en scène anyway. Grasping mise en scène is critical for anyone who makes or seriously watches any kind of visual content. For directors and producers, mise en scène in film and the script breakdown go hand in hand.
In this article, we’ll let you know what mise en scène is and how you can use it — both as a filmmaker and as a savvy viewer. We will define 20 key mise en scène elements and provide practical mise en scène examples. By the end of this piece you’ll be a mise en scène master, and you’ll know how to break down a script with greater insight.
Watch: What is Mise en scene?
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mise en scène in film
Mise en scène definition
Mise en scène means everything that has to happen to make the finished image look the way it looks, which in turns helps your content feel the way you need.
Mise en scène refers to the visuals of a film.
It’s what we see onscreen — all the elements that appear on camera, how they are arranged, and the overall look and feel they combine to convey.
For the record, it’s pronounced meez-on-senn. Let move on to an essential question: How do you define mise en scène in film?
What is mise en scène?
Mise en scène is the arrangement of scenery and stage properties in a play. Translated from French, it means "setting the stage" but, in film analysis, the term mise en scene refers to everything in front of the camera, including the set design, lighting, and actors. Mise en scene in film is the overall effect of how it all comes together for the audience.
Mise en scene elements include:
• Sets
• Props
• Lighting
• Costumes
• Actor blocking
• Shot composition
Importantly, producers, directors, writers, along with sometimes hundreds of craftspeople, artists, and technicians all work in unison to present one picture. Mise en scène includes, quite simply, everything that goes into the production.
Everything in the frame. All that a viewer sees, hears, and feels. The total design of a film.
Consider Tim Burton's insanely creative and evocative production design. Each frame is bursting with style and personality, including his set, costume, and make-up designs.
Tim Burton Production Design • Subscribe on YouTube
Keeping track of it all can be daunting, but if you’re a filmmaker you can make it easy to divvy up and break down every element of your story, from props and wardrobe to talent and locations.
How is this done? By breaking down your script. Determining your budget. Tagging your elements.
Designing your production is a tall task. That’s why using an intuitive script breakdown and production management software makes it easier to manage. You’ll want to focus on details and logistics, but not lose sight of the art.
The big picture. That’s where a good breakdown comes in.
The mise en scène elements in this guide, combined with script breakdown tools, will empower you to better manage your filmmaking workflow. You’ll be able to track and control your project’s mise en scène throughout the process.
1. How location affects your scene
Here’s a veteran filmmaker tip: If you have a two-person dialogue scene and think any location will do the trick, think again. The difference between a conversation in McDonald's as opposed to a church can be extreme. Location says a lot about characters, intentions, obstacles, and themes.
What’s the difference if a conversation takes place in a synagogue or mosque? At Disneyland? What about in a schoolroom, a confessional … or how about in the trunk of a car?
Mise en scène in film • Out of Sight
When choosing a location, the budget often plays a role. Take a deeper dive into film budgeting during your script breakdown phase.
This will give you real-world parameters you can apply to every subsequent element of your mise en scène.
Start hammering out locations with your script breakdown.
MISE EN SCÈNE elements
2. Pick the right color
Filmmakers who think of color as something secondary, the exclusive domain of the production designer or post supervisor, do so at their own peril.
Color in film is a massive element of mise en scene that permeates every other visual element. The use of color is malleable and subjective.
Its role in creating mood or effect — indeed, its function in art of any kind — cannot be overestimated. Here's a look at Kubrick's use of color in mise en scene — notice how immediate and powerful his color choices are.
Kubrick's Color Palette • Subscribe on YouTube
For instance, in the film O Brother, Where Art Thou?, the Coen brothers set the story during a “dust bowl-era” south.
Elements of film - cinematographer Roger Deakins and Cinesite work on color
Anyone who’s ever been to the south in the middle of summer knows that it is lush and green. Not especially dusty.
Color is a primary tool for filmmakers. You must appreciate its power. Especially in the post-technicolor film world, color not be considered an afterthought. It is a vital means of artistic expression.
What are the major elements of cinematic design? Color always comes at the top of the list. Need convincing? Consider Akira Kurosawa's color palette. For a complete guide to using color in film, download our E-book that covers color palettes and color schemes in cinema that have been used to great effect.
Free downloadable bonus
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How to Use Color in Film
Hue, saturation, brightness — the three elements of color that make all the difference. In this book, we'll explain the aesthetic qualities and psychology effects of using color in your images. Topics include color schemes like analogous and triadic colors and how color palettes can tell stories of their own.
How to Use Color in Film - Ebook Preview - StudioBinder - Hero
The more you know about color, the stronger your script breakdown will be and your mise en scene will follow suit.
MISE EN SCÈNE examples
3. Your set establishes your world
Mise en scène translation? It effectively means “staging.”
Since the earliest days of motion pictures, setting the stage has been crucial for creating worlds.
Something that can be as simple as a bench, like in Forrest Gump, or as grandiose as the fantasy settings of the Harry Potter film series, can do so much to establish the world and anchor the characters.
There is a reason most art departments are such a large part of any film budget.
Why? Half the battle of creating the world of the film can be won by giving attention to the set.
Check out the storyboard view of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, in StudioBinder's Shot List feature.
If Harry Potter’s school of wizarding had been set in an American public school, it would be a very different film.
Mise En Scene Mean Girls Mise En Scene Examples StudioBinder
Mean girls wondering what’s up with the new wizard kid
Key mise en scène examples relating to set include the Harry Potter films and Titanic. In both cases, the set actively informs time, place, and story.
Tracking and managing set requirements early in your production process is integral to controlling your film’s mise en scène.
MISE EN SCÈNE analysis
4. Props importance
The use of props as a component of mise en scène is often lumped in with set or wardrobe. This makes sense on a certain level, but props deserve separate consideration.
Whether a tiny item of large importance — think the Heart of the Ocean diamond in Titanic — or action-driving glittery articles like Dorothy’s ruby slippers in The Wizard of Oz, a prop (derived from the term “theatrical property”) may even be the focus of the entire film.
Mise En Scene Titanic Mise En Scene Examples StudioBinder
Mise en scene stealer? The blue diamond in Titanic
Imagine if Dorothy is being chased through Oz … for a pair of Jordans or penny loafers instead of her magical kicks. Different movie altogether, all because of props.
The objects in your frame are interacting with every other element of your mise en scene all the time. Whether the filmmaker recognizes this or not, the audience sure does.
Even if a character is not directly lifting, donning, tripping over, or smashing a prop — if it’s in frame, it’s part of your story.
Let’s look at an example: Creed.
We’ll spend some time in Adrian’s restaurant with Rocky and Adonis. We’ll identify and tag all the elements for each department for your script breakdown.
Mise en scene elements in Creed • Subscribe on YouTube
Props have power. They’re vital elements of film. Any mise en scene definition must include them. Any script breakdown must tag them.
wear MISE EN SCÈNE on your sleeve
5. Costumes make the difference
The costume, or wardrobe, is another key part of the filmmaking arsenal when composing mise en scène.
What characters wear says much about the world they inhabit, who they are within the world, how they feel, and how they carry themselves.
Keeping track of wardrobe can be a tricky task from the outset. Breakdown your script with robust software that makes your film’s costumes easier to track. You can use StudioBinder's script breakdown feature to do it.
Script Breakdown Software • Subscribe on YouTube
With the intuitive drag and drop menu, highlight the particular wardrobe piece, you need, and simply tag it as "costumes."
Furthermore, costumes bring together every other part of the mise en scène. The costume grounds the character in the world created.
Look at any film and you’ll see proof that costumes are one of the most important elements of mise en scene. Costume gives the audience unmissable information about each character.
In Gone with the Wind, wardrobe contributes to our understanding of the story’s time period, social structure, action, and scene composition. It also defines (or belies) characters in straightforward, instantly felt ways.
The clothes in The Breakfast Club serve as key elements of film. Wardrobe in the story conveys a variety of universal high school archetypes while also managing to provide each character with his or her own unique personality.
Costumes tell us a lot about both the big picture and the particulars.
why is MISE EN SCÈNE important?
6. Hair and Makeup
Costumes extend and bind all the elements of mise en scène. This is also true of hair and makeup, with intimate connection to talent.
Alice In Wonderland, Marie Antoinette, and The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy showcase hair and makeup’s significance in creating character.
By magnifying and externalizing character traits, hair and makeup contributes to the elements of film in even the most complex worlds.
Mise En Scene close ups film techniques StudioBinder
Alright, mise en scene, I’m ready for my close up.
Hair and makeup can revitalize familiar characters, dispel preconceived notions about them, and make them relevant right now. Such is the case with the Joker in The Dark Knight Trilogy.
When it was announced that the character of the Joker would be rebooted in the new Batman series, many scoffed at the idea of recreating a character that Jack Nicholson had made so iconic for Tim Burton.
A similar adjustment was made for Todd Phillips' Joker as well. Here's a breakdown of how that character was realized in each iteration.
How Costume Changes Character • Subscribe on YouTube
With a radically different approach to the character’s hair and makeup, the new iteration of the Joker dispelled memories of the original and helped win Heath Ledger an Oscar.
MISE EN SCÈNE spotlight
7. Lighting sets the tone
Film techniques seen and unseen contribute to your mise en scène. Lighting techniques exemplify this “seen and unseen” quality. Just ask a cinematographer.
Lighting is one of the key elements of film. It’s the pièce de résistance in completing your mise en scène. Here's one of today's premiere DPs, Roger Deakins, discussing his relationship and approach to lighting.
Lighting is one of the essential mise en scene elements • Subscribe on YouTube
Lighting, like all the elements of mise en scène explored on this list, is best considered early in Pre-Production, during the script breakdown phase.
We find a striking example of lighting the Film Noir genre. The Film Noir style characteristically has strong contrast in color or shade with a prevalence of chiaroscuro lighting. This isn’t only because a lot of classic Film Noir movies are shot in black and white: it’s also achieved through lighting.
A good use of these film lighting techniques in a film outside the Film Noir genre is found in Schindler’s List.
Mise En Scene film Schindlers List StudioBinder
A solid mise en scene list must include Schindler’s List.
The contrast of stark blacks to ethereal whites, the moody lighting, the highlights seen and unseen all combine. They inform us of the theme of this period piece and the characters’ places in the world.
But a film does not have to use drastic lighting to set mood, tone, or theme.
8. The medium — film vs. video
You’re making a film, right? Film is the material that records moving images. It’s also the movie you make with those moving images.
Different kinds of film and processing techniques lead to different kinds of mise en scene. And between film, chemicals, digital, software, apps, and other tools, the possibilities are vast.
Film is a thin plastic strip coated with light-sensitive cellulose for exposure in a camera, used to produce moving pictures.
The size and uses of film vary. A film strip can be as small as 8mm and as large as 70mm. Film can be processed with chemicals such as tungsten to achieve a variety of effects.
This simple definition spawned an entire universe of artistic expression.
The variety of film that has been generated by Kodak or Fuji, to name only a couple, is truly astounding. It is hard to believe that there was once only one kind of black and white film.
That’s right, once upon a time filmmakers had a small selection of black and white film available. Today, the choices are abundant, beginning with size: 8mm, 16mm, Super 16mm, 35mm, 65mm and so on.
Then there is black and white or color, as well as stock and speed. Choosing a film stock is important for creating the look of your scene. One more obvious thing about film. It no longer has to be film. It can, and more than likely will be, digital.
Mise En Scene Film Techniques Shot on Four Camcorders StudioBinder
Mise en scene in video: the film Timecode was shot on four camcorders
Film or digital is now the ultimate question when it comes to making a choice for your project’s mise en scene. Check out test footage for the best 4K video cameras. Talk to other filmmakers. Do your research.
Which leads us to the next section.
elements of film
9. Picking the camera
Your camera does more than simply record your mise en scène. It actively shapes it. If the mise en scene translation comes out to “staging” or “putting on stage,” then what kind of camera you use makes a difference.
Your choice of camera is an essential element of mise en scène. It can paint as distinct and unique a picture as any other element.
At the heart of filmmaking is manipulating and capturing light to produce a picture. What you use to capture that light, simple or advanced, has an effect.
For instance, filmmaker John Cassavetes hated the artifice that was so common in the early years of filmmaking. He leaned towards improvisation in performance and Cinéma Vérité as a rule for mise en scène.
Cinéma vérité is a genre and style of filmmaking characterized by realism in all aspects of mise en scène. Using simple equipment and often improvised story and structure, the style lends itself to independent filmmaking. It has given rise to subsequent film movements such as Dogme 95.
Cassavetes grabbed the nearest Bolex 16mm camera he could find and hit the streets to make his masterpiece. Paul Thomas Anderson did almost the polar opposite in his film The Master.
He used a 65mm camera that insured that the subjects in his frame would be seen in a much higher resolution, as part of a literally wider world.
But one need not use a 65mm camera to achieve these effects.
Mise En Scene Film Techniques Panavision 65mm StudioBinder
Panavision 65mm - it’s as if 4k and 16mm had a mise en scene love child
The scope of the film and whether or not it is digital plays a large role here. There are now digital versions of 16mm, Super 16mm, and so on.
Every cinematographer can consider a wide array of camera choices to benefit your particular story.
MISE EN SCÈNE in motion
10. Camera placement
Where you choose to put your camera is just as important as what kind of camera you use. No viewer will be thinking of where you put camera if you place it correctly. Here we cannot overstate the importance of a shot list.
Camera Angles Explained • Subscribe on YouTube
Whether at a high angle above the subject or a hundred feet away, where the camera is and what it captures should be determined before you arrive on set.
Make a shot list. Start tagging your elements. Stay organized. Be prepared.
You’ll make a better film.
speed of MISE EN SCÈNE
11. Speeding up or slowing down film
As a filmmaker, you can shape and bend your created world like a wizard. Time can stand still, it can move at a fraction of normal speed or be sped up into a blur. This all comes down to frame rate. Here's our guide to frame rate and the options filmmakers have to manipulate their mise en scene.
Ultimate Guide to Frame Rate • Subscribe on YouTube
You can also change the tempo of your world and your characters with fast or slow motion. You, as a filmmaker, are a master of time and space, all contributing to mise en scene.
Many filmmakers have used the speed of the scene to accentuate every element of mise en scène. Whether fast motion or slow motion, you can become a master of time and space by controlling your elements of film.
The Matrix - to learn mise en scene techniques, take the red pill
Chariots of Fire, Raging Bull, Any Given Sunday and pretty much every other sports movie ever offered from Hollywood would not be complete without a slow-motion finish for the victor.
The speed of the scene is an easily accomplished film technique that is a cornerstone of filmmaking.
MISE EN SCÈNE on the scene
12. Comprehending composition
Composition is an element of mise en scène that has infinite possibilities. There are rules of composition many image-makers use when framing their subjects. These can be obeyed or broken depending on your intent for the shot but how you frame your shot is massively important in bring all of these mise en scene elements together.
Ultimately, characters and action should suggest the layout of the image, the placement of elements within it. Good composition guides a viewer’s eye and leads a viewer’s focus within the frame.
The Rule of Thirds is one way filmmakers can imbue their frame and scene with the focus they desire.
Mise en scene elements • The Rule of Thirds
Unless it reads a certain way in the script, where everything is placed does allow for creative liberties. But be careful that something you place flippantly will not lend itself to an unintended, confusing, or ulterior meaning.
You’ll really want your composition and placement to be intentional.
film techniques on display
13. Form and Frame
Bring it all together.
If you’ve done everything else right, you won’t want to leave these “unseeable” aspects of mise en scène to chance. Every beautiful picture deserves a spectacular form and a well-thought-out frame.
The form is the twin of composition. It’s not the who, what, where, or when.
Form is the how. How is your mise en scene communicated?
Animation? Puppets? Stop motion? Live action? A combination? How are the elements woven together in a symbiotic relationship?
Wes Anderson is a fan stop motion, miniatures, and live action. These forms set the tone for the entire mise en scène in films like Isle of Dogs.
Mise En Scene Film Elements Isle of Dogs StudioBinder
Form and frame: elements of film in Isle of Dogs.
Now for frame. Your picture’s almost done. How do you want to frame it? An example of how framing makes the scene in The Shawshank Redemption.
MIse En Scene Film Elements The Shawshank Redemption StudioBinder
Framing and mise en scene elements in The Shawshank Redemption
To say that the framing in the scene of the discovery of the escape is masterful is no hyperbole. Here, the warden is literally framed by the tunnel that will be his undoing.
Framing takes composition to the next level. When you frame your film, you’re doing so with the understanding that your created world functions within the real world. Where will you set the parameters for your viewers?
Camera Framing • Subscribe on YouTube
You’re deciding where the form of your story ends and the real world begins. You’re putting a border around your film — or artistically suggesting that the border doesn’t exist at all.
Frame is as crucial as any of the other mise en scene elements on our list.
focus on MISE EN SCÈNE
14. Depth of Field
Depth of field is one of the subtler elements of film, but a measurable one. How you use it contributes meaningfully to your work’s mise en scène. We've seen other mise en scene elements designed to draw the audience's attention. And using the camera is yet another tool to achieve the same effect, oftentimes in combination with other elements such as color or lighting.
With a light touch, a filmmaker can play with peripheral elements while keeping the primary focus in the viewer’s sights. Here's our ultimate guide to camera focus and how filmmakers can use techniques like deep depth of field, shallow depth of field, and the rack focus.
Mise en scene elements & camera focus • Subscribe on YouTube
Ask yourself, what draws attention first, then second, and even third? What’s the order of importance to what’s being shown, and why?
One of the most effective film techniques to master focus: depth of field.
listen to your MISE EN SCÈNE
15. Sound design
Sound design is one of the elements of film that often gets neglected by fledgling filmmakers.
Rest assured, effective use of audio is the single easiest way to heighten a lackluster scene — or ruin a great one.
Whether you are using diegetic or non-diegetic sound, music, and sound effects, it is critical that you think of what is heard as essential to your mise en scene elements.
In this video, we examine how Quentin Tarantino uses sound to modulate the tone of his violence. When he wants a scene to be disturbing or when he wants it to be fun, sound design plays a major role.
Tarantino's Sounds of Violence • Subscribe on YouTube
Sound is so high on the list of film techniques that it has not one, but two Academy Award categories. Here are our favorite Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing winners.
Think hard about how you use sound, and don’t let it fall by the wayside in your creative project. No mise en scene definition would be complete without sound.
16. Music
The importance of music in film cannot be overstated when it comes to completing your mise en scène.
Ask anyone what comes to mind when they think of movie music, and odds are you’ll hear mention of Star Wars and Indiana Jones, maybe Jaws and the James Bond theme.
And what about films like American Graffiti, Dazed and Confused, and Pulp Fiction? Their well-curated popular songs infuse and reflect every single one of the other mise en scene elements.
Not to mention films with music, and musicians, at their core: Straight Outta Compton, Amadeus, Bohemian Rhapsody, What’s Love Got to Do with It.
The list goes on. And then there’s musicals! What do these films and their music have in common?
Music mise en scene examples • The Empire Strikes Back
The music becomes a character in the film itself. The leitmotif and the character are synonymous.
The rhythm, tempo, and texture of mise en scene is tied to the music.
When we think of “The Raiders March” (“Indiana Jones Theme”) we can’t help but envision Harrison Ford in character as Indiana Jones, wearing his hat and running from a boulder, or wielding his whip and leaping off a cliff.
Music, or the lack thereof, can be effective in painting a full picture. Music also is a way for the filmmaker to communicate to the audience. The filmmaker can inform and enrich the what, when, why, and how of a story’s moment-by-moment emotional resonance.
essential film techniques
17. Know the talent
Your actors are one of the most essential mise en scène elements.
Many directors feel that if you cast correctly, that is to say appropriately for the characters, story, and overall vision, then half the battle is already won.
Actors’ strengths and weaknesses can be exploited when they are the central focus of a scene.
Some actors are chosen for the melodramatic or overacting quality of their performance. Think Jim Carrey in 80 percent of the roles he’s played.
Jim Carrey literally chews the mise en scene.
Jim Carrey would be out of place in a Merchant Ivory film. The term “chew the scenery” can be used as a positive or a negative, depending on the scene and the intention.
The look and ability of your actors articulates your film’s mise en scene definition. For directors, working with cast on performance is quite possibly the most dominant way to shape mise en scene.
block by block
18. Blocking actors
Just as camera placement and movement are essential, so are placement and movement of talent.
Blocking takes all the mise en scene elements directly to the cast.
Attack the block - blocking mise en scene examples
Where an actor is arranged, and if, when, and how an actor moves in the scene, all highlight the reason for the scene itself.
Blocking organizes the action, the business of the moment. It flavors what’s going on, both on the surface and underneath.
Does an actor take a step, scratch an itch, put on a hat, do a jumping jack, bite into a sandwich? Does an actor do this before, after, or in the middle of speaking? Why? It can all have a major effect on the dynamics of the scene.
Blocking and Staging • Subscribe on YouTube
Consider what your actors do and how the action reads to your audience. Put yourself in the theater — how would you interpret it?
The term “What’s my motivation?” was coined by an actor given blocking direction that had nothing to do with the scene they were in.
Be prepared to explain and justify your blocking choices to collaborators, especially to your on-screen talent.
Your mise en scene depends on it.
elements of film in motion
19. Action in the background
The main action in any given moment is what your mise en scene all comes down to. What’s the conflict, the desire, the intention? How does it unfold? Where do your characters start in a scene, and where do they end?
Not just physically, but emotionally. How do they change?
Background action, seemingly throwaway action, and any action that is secondary to that in primary focus can be memorable and valuable as part of your mise en scène.
In Midsommar, director Ari Aster uses the wide open spaces of his daylight rural setting to create an extra layer of foreshadowing and suspense.
Mise en scene in action • Midsommar's background
This is a specific use of action in the background to complete the story. Remember that lack of action is still a form of action.
Even if characters do nothing, inaction becomes their action. Mise en scene depends on what’s being done.
20. Post-Production
The final step to completing your mise en scène is often the final step in locking your film.
Post-production and/or, more specifically, CGI or Computer Generated Imagery, can be the icing on the cake for your completed film.
You want to minimize surprises in executing your mise en scène by starting with a solid script breakdown during pre-production.
The script breakdown phase is also where you’ll want to determine what you’ll aim to accomplish during the post-production step. Unforeseen fixes and tweaks will very likely arise, and post is an ideal place to address these — but you’ll want to keep “major repairs” to a minimum.
The rapid growth of CGI can create mega-worlds of wizards and superheroes. This translates to the ability of filmmakers to add many critical mise en scène elements with computers.
up Next
Wes Anderson’s Mise en Scène
Mise en scène elements can be as simple as an actor in front of a camera. It can be as elaborate as a thousand-person crew and twelve visual effects teams. Wes Anderson has mastered all the mise en scène elements and crafted his own style. Find out how right now.
UP NEXT: Wes Anderson’s Mise en Scène →
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} | 8,502 | Glossary of Essential Film Terms
A Useful Film Techniques Glossary
Above the Line: The above the line credits (or ATL) refer to the major creative talent. The film jobs that are always above the line include the director, executive producer(s), screenwriter(s), main actors, and casting director(s). Depending on notoriety, occasionally the director of photography (DP) is placed on the above the line costs for a film.
Aerial Shot: An aerial shot is a camera angle filmed from overhead at an elevated point of view. The aerial shot is captured from a drone, helicopter, plane, blimp, or jetpack! A helicopter shot is a moving shot, often used as an establishing shot taken from a bird’s eye view. It is generally taken from a helicopter, allowing it to weave through a landscape.
Ambient Light: Natural illumination present within a particular location. This may be used to gauge how a crew might approach photographing a scene.
Angle: A space in-between two intersections. These spaces might be used by a filmmaking crew to position a camera.
Animation: An illusion of movement. Movements, as such, might be used as a tool in narratives such as cartoons or more.
Anime: A style of japanese animation. Akira is our favorite, what’s yours?
Antagonist: A character that might hold goals that oppose a protagonist. These characters might directly conflict with a story's plot by default.
Anthology Film: A collection of varying stories. They may be interrelated but potentially not always.
Anti-Hero: Protagonist defined by their own interest. In certain cases, they may be a character with questionable attributes to varying audiences, yet could hold virtuous qualities that push them into favor for other observers of a story.
Aperture: An opening in a camera lens that determines amounts of light contacting a camera’s sensor or lens in photography. In photographically exposing images, controlling levels of luminance may be key.
Apple Box: A wooden tool that could be multi-purposeful for a production crew. In appearance, these might be cubic or rectangular in nature. They can have a variety of uses from propping someone up, to being used for different grip purposes.
Arc Shot: A circulating camera shot that may utilize a subject as its point of reference. Varieties of genres or scenes could work to use this creative technique.
Archetype: A characterization or personification. In narratives, this could be used to offer a dynamic element to a plot.
Art Director: Designer of a production set. These creatives could be proposed as an additional lead and creative member to a department.
Aspect Ratio: A length and width to a photographic image in cinematography. Certain implications or symbolism might be used with contracted or stretched aspect ratios, such as 4:3, 16:9, 2.35:1, or more.
Assembly: A primary step in audio and video editing. Before splicing footage, arranging or organizing material may be one’s first consideration.
Asynchronous: Material, be it audio and visuals, that are out of sync with one another in movie production. This could be jarring to audiences, yet might also create unique impacts.
Audio: Sound within a movie production. This could range from effects, music, or more.
Audio Bridge: Sound that carries from one scene to another. In clip transition, this might be a tool to consider.
Audition: Actor’s interview in which they would potentially read from a script. These performers could be requested for additional readings.
Auteur: Author in french. This may be referred to directors or creatives that might be heads of departments.
Available Light: Ambient illumination that might be used to potentially photograph a scene. This could also be used in pre-production of films to gauge how a scene may be designed.
Avant-Garde: An artistic movement. Often this might be characterized as an abstract or experimental phase.
Axis of Action: An imaginary line that runs between one or two characters in a scene. When staging a moment in a narrative, it could be of use to ensure events are occurring within a consistent direction, in perspective to a viewing audience member.
Backdrop: Backings or paintings placed behind action. These may be used to set design.
Background: Items within a rear dimension or plane of action. When staging, consideration to this area could assist in formulating three-dimensionality.
Background Artist: A visual designer for a movie. Matte artists might be used as part of an overall creative team.
Background Music: Score heard within a scene. This audio may enhance a mood or sentiment of a moment in a narrative.
Backlighting: Illumination that forms separation from one plane to another. This technique could be utilized by designers, cinematographers, or other creatives.
Back Lot: An enclosed area for recording a scene. Spaces, as such for filming, might also be proposed for environments that require specificities, such as open land.
Back Projection: A photography technique that allows for placement of a particular backing in a later time phase. This may help to supplement budgetary needs.
Backstory: Exposition or story that began before an audience-witnessed narrative. These portions of a film might assist in educating an audience.
Barn Doors: Foldings that may be found around a light source or bulb. In directing illumination, this tool could be of assistance.
Below the Line: Production costs. These expenses might include salaries of laborers, publicity, or more.
Best Boy: Technical assistants for gaffers. In certain cases, they could be utilized to create convenient filmmaking processes.
Blockbuster: A successful film project monetarily and socially. These productions could accumulate over $100 million U.S.D. or more, depending on a region’s currency system.
Blocking a Shot: Determination of positioning for select elements in a creative production. These decisions might be left to a director or project lead.
Blooper: Mistakes during a filmmaking process. These could be recorded and potentially used later for comic reliefs.
Blue Screen: Monochromatic partitions that could be used to add special effects. These might also need to be evenly lit and positioned behind courses of action in a scene.
Body Double: A replacement actor. In scenes where much physical risk may be involved or due to a performer's specifications, these actors might step in for a cinematic moment.
Bookends: Complementary beginning and ending scenes in a narrative. These could often add intrigue to an overall project.
Boom Shot: Scenes in which a camera in a film production could be rigged to a crane, jib, or more. “Russian Arms” might be brought in for these moments, actions such as car chases. Feel free to view Netflix’s Point Blank (2019) where our very own from SICKBOAT assisted in filming.
Bounce Board: A light reflector for potential photography purposes. These could construct or enhance lighting schemes, such as three-point strategies.
Bracketing: Repetitive shooting of a scene at varying f-stops. This could result in a collection of exposure levels for one cinematic moment that might be selected during a post-production process.
Bumper: Portions or segments of a film before any photographic narrative is seen. Examples might include a brand’s logo, which precedes a show.
Butterfly: Large material that could be used to spread light. In visually designing a motion picture, it may be of use to control large pools of spill or illumination from within areas a camera records.
Call Sheet: Schedules offered to film production crews. These may assist in informing and organizing duties performed in a single day of recording a movie or project.
Cameo: Appearances from a notable celebrity or relatively known individual. Moments such as these could help promote a movie or draw awareness.
Camera: A tool to photograph a film or project. Overtime, filmmakers could operate digital, film, or analogue devices to record their art.
Camera Angle: Points of view of a photographic device. In certain cases, these could be used to create visual mood or tension.
Camera Movement: A technique to capture a subject in motion or form visual intrigue. Moving video recording devices around, away, towards, or more could all potentially form suspense for a scene.
Camera Operator: Professionals who activate, calibrate, or handle a photographic device during a production. These skilled talents may also rely on assistants to ensure convenient days of shooting.
Caption: Translations that could be posted as graphics upon a screen during films or movies. This written information may assist in communicating ideas to an audience.
Cash Cow: Film projects that could be garnered as having a probability of success financially after initial release. References, as such, could be placed on a project with specific expectations. Think of the Marvel franchise.
Cast: A collective of performers on a project. This may more directly refer to actors or those that could be seen in camera footage.
Catchphrase: Expressions, in a film project, that could draw notoriety with an audience. In certain contexts, these could be scripted lines in a movie that help promote it outside of theaters to attract more moviegoers. “We’re not in Kansas anymore” or “Luke, I’m your father” are good places to start.
Cel: A sheet containing hand drawings for formation of a cartoon. In a development phase of animated work, utilizing this tool could help structure pieces.
C.G.I.: An acronym for “Computer Generated Images ''. For narratives demanding use of surreal ideas, these visuals might assist in that overall goal.
Character: An individual in a narrative. Whether containing condemned or virtuous qualities, these players act.
Chimera (Soft Box): A tool that softens hard specular lighting sources. In other terms, these tools could act as necessary diffusion.
Cinéma Vérité: “True Film en français. These films may provide perspective into daily lives of characters as they act out a narrative.
Cinematographer: A chief or director of photography in a film crew. These professionals could, in collaboration with a project’s director, capture moments, shape light, and more.
CinemaScope: A cinematic aspect ratio of 2:35:1. It may be characterized as filling a screen horizontally and vertically.
Cinerama: A photographic strategy in which a filmmaking team attains an expansive view of a frame. A process such as this might require 3 cameras and 3 projectors to accomplish a task.
Clamps: Tools that hold grip and lighting equipment to specific items or surfaces. One might refer to these as C47’s, Cardellinis, or more.
Clapperboard: Informational slates. These could often be written on with dry-erase markers and potentially handled by a camera assistant.
Claymation: A form of animation. Putty, plasticine or other amorphous material that creators might use to form characters for a cinematic scene.
Cliffhanger: A moment in a cinematic piece where a primary conflict is not resolved. Cinematic television shows or other content could make use of these to prolong seasons or leave audiences desiring more.
Climax: Moments with large amounts of tension. A protagonist might confront a task that enhances plots within a narrative.
Close-Up: An image that is captured within a relatively close distance to a subject. Tension in a scene could be increased as a frame’s size begins to condense its field of view.
Color Correction: A process in which an image's gamma and gamut range are condensed or stretched. In coordination with potential directors of photography, colorists could begin designing a look to a movie with photographic references or with help from other creative leaders.
Comic Relief: A moment in which a character issues comedic expressions into a cinematic piece. This might break moments of tension or simply add further intrigue to a film project.
Composer: A musician that implements a score to a film. Enhancement of a movie’s overall experience could be done with a well-crafted musical composition
Composition: An arraignment, which could be of characters, set pieces, or more. In certain cases, this might be performed during moments of staging actors or curating a project.
Continuity: Consistency from one scene to another in a filmmaking production. A supervisor might be in charge of ensuring an arrangement of set pieces, actors, or more remain continuous from one shot to another with reasonable changes as a narrative progresses.
Contrast: A difference, be it in light, shadow, color, or more. This could be a golden necessity depending on creative directions.
Coverage: A collection of photography that might encompass select angles, resevese angles, or others. In collecting this, filmmakers could ensure a narrative or scene has been shot with multiple images to choose from in a post-production setting.
Crane Shot: A photographic angle that might be captured from an aerial device. This could be used to follow characters in flight or potentially in an action sequence.
Credits: Textual details of creative members that participated in working on a project. These might be placed after a movie has commenced.
Crew: Individuals involved with constructing and composing a creative piece. This group could range in experience yet all work cohesively to develop a story.
Critic: An analytic professional that assesses a film or movie. They may have experience in filmmaking or a related field to work they analyze, while also potentially influencing a project's success.
Cross-Cutting: Alternated action sequences that might be viewed by audiences. Post-production professionals may implement this practice with assistance from other creatives. Scenes with this technique could preview two contrasting moments that seemingly occur at a similar time within an audience member's mind.
Cross-Fade: A creative transition from one moment to another. When an image gradually turns from black and then into another recognizable image, this might be considered a subtle change that keeps an audience engaged.
Cross-Over: Films segmenting for one particular demographic. This might rely on marketing research and how a movie might align to a specific audience, yet this could ensure a narrative reaches those that a creative deems needs their story.
Crowd Shot: Large groups of extra actors that are captured by a camera during a filmmaking production. These might provide viewing audiences a sense of space or congestion in a given area where a scene takes place.
C-Stand: A light stand. This might be proposed to hold other items such as sound recording equipment, with use of proper clamps, or other grip equipment for a filmmaking production.
Cucoloris: A type of flag that cuts light. Special tools, as such, might be able to form unique patterns of shadows or illumination for creative purposes.
Cue: A signal for an actor to begin a performance. Filmmaking procedures may require that cast and crew members are alerted to a scene’s commencement.
Cue Card: A device used to assist in recollection of script for a performer. In times of script changes between preproduction and production, it could be of use to use this tool to help with any potential difficulties.
Cutaway Shot: Creative moments where a scene is interrupted with another sequence of action to draw upon an idea. This could result in primary and secondary sequences.
Cyclorama: A backdrop placed within a scene’s background. These help with exterior moments of a creative project that must be captured inside of a closed set.
Dailies: Reviewed footage from a prior day of recording a film. These frames could help task a crew with needed coverage in time ahead of them.
Day-for-Night Shot: A scene recorded during daytimes with techniques to create a night appearance. Production schedules might be enhanced or reduced to modify a project in-progress.
Deadpan: Expressionless deliveries by a performer. This might add creative comic relief or intrigue to an overall project.
Deep Focus Shot: A visual illusion showcasing an expansive depth of field in a given moment of action. Cinematographer’s might create this to ensure subjects within foregrounds, midgrounds, and backgrounds are in a sharp focus.
Depth of field: A range of a camera focus during a captured moment. Film photographers might use this to clarify and intensify pieces of a frame.
Depth of Focus: A visual technique that displays an expansive depth of field. Unlike one shot, this might be a strategy a creator uses throughout an entire project or scene.
Diegetic sound: Audio within a cinematic moment. In certain cases, these effects might assist in forming realism for an audience member.
Diffusion: A spread of specular light’s beam thus creating a soft quality to a back, fill, key or other positioned source. Creatives might rely on this for close-up photography or to complement a narrative.
Digital Production: Electronically recorded movies that do not rely on analog film cameras. Although there may be distinct qualities to traditional mediums, digitally captured narratives might work to create ergonomic budgets for agencies. Additionally, cost in celluloid rolls might require precious care and expenses which one might need to prepare for in advance.
Directing the Eye: Direction of attention formed through elements that are positioned in a frame. Cinematographers could utilize this technique to guide viewers to actions or necessary visual information.
Director: A lead creative of a film. This artist could be held responsible for all duties pertaining to a production from planning to execution.
Director's Cut: A version of a film that is not influenced in content or length by a studio. In certain cases, these pieces could reveal a story to viewers that introduces further dimensions.
Dissolve: Gradual superimpositions of varying images that could work as a visual transition. This technique might be relied upon to segue a cinematic moment to another.
Dolby Stereo: A type of audio quality created through a laboratory for cinematic purposes. Depending on sizes of film, a series of audio tracks might be applied forming a potentially unique aural experience.
Dolly Shot: Alteration of a frame’s background thus creating a visual illusion. Rigged photographic devices might be in movement that allow it to track subjects in-motion.
Double Exposure: A developing image is showcased to light twice to form a dissolve-effect. One could form visual illusions, such as transitions or experimental looks in a video.
Dub: Audio added to a film after production to potentially enhance a narrative. In cases where dialogue might be difficult to hear, an extra in-sync recording could be supplemented during post-production processes.
Dutch Angle: Canted positioning of a camera. Photographic devices might be rolled left or right to supply tension to a frame.
Epilogue: Scenes that wrap a motion picture. These could be moments of reflection.
Establishing Shot: A moment captured from a distance that might offer a view of a location or set. It could be vital in varying pieces of a narrative to place these images into a viewer's mind to instill where actions may be taking place or to insinuate a tenor.
Executive Producer: A chief financier that oversees a film project. From a business perspective, these key professionals could be accountable for dividend decisions, investments decisions, or more with an understanding of a motion picure’s liquidity of assets entering and exiting productions.
Exposition: Delivery of information that might be placed early within a movie. These scenes of expository material could help ensure audiences are understanding events that influenced other actions in a narrative.
Extra: A performer who may not have dialogue or noticable attention during a production. These actors might be viewed briefly in crowded scenes full of people.
Extreme Close-Up: Captured moments that allow viewers to see a subject from a small proximity in distance. Visual detail could be apparent with a unique frame size.
Eyeline Match: A sequence of frames that are cut and placed next to one another to place a connection into an audience's mind. For instance, a clip may contain a subject gazing into a distance, while moments later another clip of an object could be previewed on screen to showcase a relationship amongst both photographs. Staging during production might be vital to successfully edit this into a film.
Fade: A change in decibels or intensity of audio. This could work to transition amongst music tracks or to alter scenes.
Fast-Cutting: An edited sequence of clips that are rapid in succession. Audiences could be impacted psychologically by this technique that might be assembled within post-production stages.
Favor On: A queue to focus a camera's optics onto a particular subject. This could assist in drawing attention to a character or item.
Film Grain: A portion of illumination sensitive material that might be housed upon a celluloid strip. Large amounts of exposure could be suitable and could require analogue cameras. For digital cameras, this may be considered noise that results from over or under exposure.
Film Noir: Translates roughly to black movies in french. These might be characterized by their fast lighting ratios from dark to light. Detective cinema might also be a close distinction to these forms of motion picutres.
Film Stock: Speed or size of celluloid strips. In certain cases, this could influence exposure requirements during productions or also color temperatures, as certain stocks may be cooler or warmer than others when recording.
Filter: Items or substances that are placed around a camera's lens that impact an overall look. This might persuade how an audience interprets a motion picture’s appearance, thus offering a tenor.
Fish-Eye Lens: A wide angle optical illusion. Select camera applications could be attached in front of a camera sensor to present this perspective.
Flag: A cloth that blocks light. Duvetine might be used and may work to absorb illumination or control spill.
Flashback: A moment in a narrative that refers to a past action. To singal this, a post-production professional might implement visual effects or sequencing that drives a desired impact.
Flash-Forward: A section in a story in which a future event is previewed. This could be opposed to flashbacks that alter a motion picture’s time differently.
Focus: This might be described as sharpness or unsharpness in an image’s quality. Furthermore, bokeh could be described as undefinable pieces within a frame.
Foley Artist: A creative that might be defined as a professional that works with post-production specialists to add audio to a motion picture. These artists could add sound effects that enhance a film’s realism or overall experience aurally.
Footage: A portion of film or media that might be used to record a narrative. If recordings had already been performed then it may be reviewed as dailies.
Foreground: A plane closest to a camera. When staging, certain director’s might place important subjects in this area to draw immediate attention.
Foreshadowing: A hint that might preview a future event. This literary device might be used to keep an audience intrigued.
Fourth Wall: A psychological plane that might describe where an audience occupies when they view a motion picture. In other terms, this may characterize a spectator point of view that a moviegoer might take when receiving a story.
Frame: This might be defined as a single image. In viewing rectangular images a perspective could be assessed as events unfold in front of a camera’s lens.
Frame Rate: A speed in which celluloid strips might pass through a camera. Similar processes may also take place within digital photography. Nonetheless, these rates could impact motion of events as they take place.
Fresnel: An illumination source that may be often characterized for its specular beam and work in defining textures of subjects. These sources could be positioned to articuticulating sets or characters, while also working in an overall scheme of designing a motion picture.
Gaffer: This may be a chief electrician for a film crew. These professionals could work to mitigate electricity usage for a production.
Gaffer Tape: A removal adhesive that could often be managed by electricians or other film professionals. Tools, such as this, may be useful when there is a need to bind items together or for other related purposes.
Gate: A tool that holds film in place. This could be inspected to ensure clean celluloid is being consistently exposed. For digital cameras, one may analyze a sensor that might need to be inspected for dust or unwanted particles.
Gel: A colorful fiter. These may enhance a film’s appearance by strengthening an appearance of hues.
General Release: Distribution of a movie. From a studio perspective, when a motion picture is exhibited to an open public this could be a chance to measure box office sales or overall success.
Genre: Translates to “kind” in french. One could form a project that has varying types of characteristics to it in its overall nature. For example, there may be a sci-fi and romcom mix or a thriller-detective story.
Greenlight: A project that has been approved for production. This could allow for a chance for a narrative to be released to a general public.
Grip: Production crew responsible for running maintenance for camera equipment, such as dolly’s or more. These professionals might be best used to ensure a team can successfully record complex shots.
Gross: A cumulative amount of box office sales. Retail earnings may not be factored into this total.
Guerrilla Film: A project that may be moderately seeded or underfunded. These might be executed with non-union actors, however they could work to promote narratives outside of major sponsorships.
Handheld Shot: Unstable camera footage. Camera operators' hands might be a primary tool for stabilization of photographic devices.
Head-On Shot: Action approaching a camera. In certain cases, a crew might utilize this filming to draw attention to a message or idea as events unfold.
High Angle Shot: Action recorded above a scene. By implementing this seemingly omniscient perspective, one might be able to evoke a meaning or add variety to their collection of camera footage.
High Definition: A type of image resolution that might be claimed to equate to clarity of a picture. 16 by 9 may be a standard ratio one could refer to when describing this particular visual presentation.
Hitting a Mark: Reference points for cast and crew to coalesce towards that could be queued by a director or other creative leader. This might be of assistance in case a scene requires precise timing of an event.
HMI: A specular lighting source. This could replicate appearances of a sun or other motivating figure in regards to illumination.
Homage: A tribute to a person or item. In displaying appreciation for a certain idea, one could place a moment of gratitude within their project to offer deference.
Horror: A narrative genre that might be found entertaining to audiences. Certain characteristics of these films might be those that intend to horrify or scare their audience.
Iconography: Utilization of a symbol in a film or motion picture. This might be placed to assist in driving a theme for a project.
IMAX: A large film format for potential visual display. Formats such as this could be larger than standard 35mm or other narrower sizes.
In-Camera Editing: A potential production technique in which camera footage is collected in a sequence that would replicate how a final picture might be released to an audience. When saving time for post-production processes, it could be worth trying this idea to accommodate time-sensitive content.
Insert Shot: Camera footage that might be cut towards later in edited sequences. These clips could be used to briefly transition from establishing or wide shots.
Intercut Shots: A possible editing technique in which an idea that simultaneous actions are occurring. Split-screen action might help to achieve this or consistent alternating transitions may be of use.
Interlude: A potentially brief moment in a narrative. In certain cases, this might not relate to a plot completely.
Jump Cut: A device that interrupts a present action. Discontinuity might be artistically dersiered, hence a potential use of this tool.
Juxtaposition: A possible difference in two items or ideas. This could be used to convey a message.
Key Light: A primarily source of illumination for a subject capture on camera. Positioning and angling could help curate an appearance or look in a scene .
Kino Flo: A potential set of fluorescent lights. In scenarios where diffused sources are needed, this tool could become of use.
Landmark Film: A project seemingly deemed reputable by select audiences. These may be characterized as legendary.
Lavalier: A microphone that might be used to discreetly record dialogue. Sizes of these electronic devices could be placed upon performers in select areas.
L-Cut: Asynchronous audio and video that might work to transition from one moment in a narrative to another. This may directly describe appearances of edited media in post-production software, such as Adobe Premiere Pro or Davinci Resolve.
Leitmotif: A motif that could remind an audience of an idea in a film or motion picture. These might clarify a message to audience members, taking an appearance of any auditory and visible element in a narrative.
Lens: An optic utilized to pass light to a camera’s digital sensor or film. These might be placed upon photographic devices to ensure illumination is focused and manipulated to curate an image.
Letterboxing: A potential adjustment to a film’s ratio, in which a bottom and top portion cover an image. This aesthetic might be suitable depending on content recorded. For example, it may be necessary to adjust a frame as it may complement long or wide subjects recorded during a day of shooting.
Library Shot: A possible stock image that could help establish visual space. These frames might be pulled from generic collections of photography.
Lighting: Illumination within a cinematic moment. Light may model subjects from varying angles and directions. This element could also be measured in f-stops.
Line Producer: A production member that might assist in on-location procedures. These professionals might mitigate expenses and monitor daily processes.
Lip Sync: A synchronization of audio and movement of one’s mouth. When dubbing a scene, it could be of use to ensure a soundtrack of dialogue matches a pace or rhythm to images viewed on screen.
Location: Possible places of spaces utilized to record a scene. Set designers and other creatives might rely on areas to develop a mis-en-scène for a cinematic moment.
Location Sound: Ambient audio that might be recorded during an actual production. In establishing aural realism, an audience member may be further immersed within a narrative.
Long Shot: A photograph of a scene taken from a relatively far distance from a subject. These frames may help establish a sense of space and allow a viewer to visually inspect a set.
Looping: A potential re-recording of a performer’s dialogue during post-production of a motion picture. In certain instances, this may help clarify select scripts.
Low Angle Shot: Framing of a subject from a relatively low perspective. Psychologically, characters could be viewed as superior or powerful from this point of view.
Magic Hour: A time during a sun’s cycle, in which golden hues are emitted and ambient light is diffused. Illumination from this moment could also be referred to as “Golden Hours '' and make for a visually pleasant scene.
Mask: Obstruction of view of a camera’s frame with opaqueness, weather created digitally or physically during a production. Subjective camera scenes or clips may utilize masks to recreate unique points-of-view.
Master Shot: A captured frame that displays all actions from one photographic perspective. After a scene has been recorded from this wider set-up, tighter-sized frammings on subjects might be captured to extract vital detail of actions for a given moment.
Match Cut: A transition that ties together unrelated clips or moments. These cuts might be of use to move an audience from one point in a narrative to another. Similar actions or motions could be needed from each piece of media that one would like to unify to formulate a settling sequence.
Medium Shot: Photographic frammings that capture subjects from their wait to their heads, if applicable. These frames may place senses of intimacy or tension to a scene’s tenor.
Melodrama: A narrative with intense emotions. These pieces might center on pusrading viewers through forms of psychological pathos with rigorous plots full of tension.
Miniature: Photography of subjects that enlarge their physical structure. Visually stories may require that character’s sizes are embellished or over emphasized.
Mise-en-Scène: A word in french that may refer to an “arrangement of scenery” for a given scene. When blocking or orchestrating a cinematic moment, an idea could be extracted by an audience that could be promoted as visually pleasuring.
Mixing: Combining audio tracks for a media project that requires a soundtrack or other purposes. These could also pull varying sounds that drive a message or idea.
Mockumentary: A genre of content that appears as a documentary, yet withholds humor and references to a realistic person, place, or idea. In certain cases, this could be used to clarify or intensify a message.
Money Shot: A moment that offers a realization of value for an audience member. Media projects might contain an element that drives audience satisfaction.
Montage: An assemblage of clips for a sequence. These orderings of content could work to drive and implant ideas in an audience’s mind.
Motif: A repetition of an idea or symbol. Thematic elements such as these could work to formulate messages for viewers and those that take in a piece of media.
M.P.A.A.: An acronym standing for Motion Picture Association of America. This organization works to collect and mitigate studio interest, while also deliberating rankings for films.
Narration: Informative audio that may be voiced by a performer to provide clarity to a story. This could be done by a character or an all-wise presence.
New Wave: A form of filmmaking in which improvisation and creative routes of producing stories were released. Its style looked to have been championed by artists navigating away from a traditional format of structuring stories.
Off Book: A performer that has recalled all of their script and could execute their role. Professionals might work without aids to guide them.
180-Degree Rule: A framework for directing placement of a camera. This could be an axis that is in relation to a subject's direction of action that a cinematographer could work to stay away from in order to deter crossing that path. In essence, staying on one side of a subject or room could assist in maintaining a suspension of disbelief for an audience viewing your media. .
One-Liner: An inserted piece of script for potential comedic impact. These areas of dialogue might be used to maintain an entertaining sentiment throughout a media project.
Overcranking: Frame rate that overpasses 24 frames per second. For example, a clip recorded at 60 F.P.S. may result in an overcranked image. Certain creators might use this technique to later retard a clip’s speed later in post-production.
Overexposed: An image revealed to light to an extensive amount. Combining this strategy with lenses and certain filtrations may also form helation glows in photographs, drawing unique attention to highlights of clips.
Overhead Shot: Frames in which a camera is positioned above recorded action. A bird’s eye view could be used to offer perspective to an image.
Over-the-Shoulder Shot: A frame composed with a medium sized subject in view and from behind. Framing characters in this matter might create three-dimensionality to a scene.
Overture: A media project’s opening or closing credits. Audio may be accompanied in these portions of a picture.
P.A.: An acronym for “Production Assistant. These professionals might work cross-functionally with varying departments often as an aid to other ranked crew members.
Pace: A tempo to an action or idea. Utilization of this tool might be established through audio, dialogue or more.
Pan: A rotation of a photographic device. This could direct attention or allow viewers to expand their visual understanding of a scene’s landscape.
Paradox: An idea that may be false and true simultaneously. Devices, as such, might work as psychological tools to implement an idea to an audience member’s mind.
Parenthetical: A potential suggestion for how one could consider a section of written work. In scripts, these portions might be used to guide performers in their delivery.
Pipeline: A project in development. Media creators could have either one or more pieces progressing on a path to release for massive audiences.
P.O.V. Shot: A scene displayed from a character's perspective. In these unique scenes, ideas and outlooks could be presented that may drive messages to a potential audience.
Post-Credits Sequence: An epilogue for a project. Audiences may view this as a closing of a narrative.
Pre-Production: A possible planning stage for media projects. This phase allows creators to assess what tools that may further develop their story once it has been approved by stakeholders, such as a client or studio.
Prequel: An event that supposedly took place before another narrative. These portions of a project might further inculcate a viewing audience about events that might have an impact on future actions.
Pre-Screen: A viewing of a project before a larger release. Select audiences might be able to offer producers or other attached creatives a perception of how a piece may perform in grander box offices.
Principal Photography: A phase in which a project has been significantly recorded. A director of photography from a 1st unit may be present to complete this task, while 2nd units of a camera department may arrive later to finish portions of a narrative that were logistically inconvenient to capture.
Producer: A senior professional of a project’s production. These liaisons might coordinate between crews and financers to solve budget, narrative, or more issues.
Production Design: A creative that potentially orchestrates an appearance to a project. They might also work in tandem with an art department to drive a style to a piece.
Production Value: A project’s perceived quality. In these terms, media might be evaluated by select criteria such as through costumes, design, or more.
Prologue: A moment that arrives before an engaging piece of a narrative. Specifically, a plot might not be introduced yet or main characters might be missing from a story.
Protagonist: A character with a clear goal that audience’s may recognize and hopefully support. These players may also be valued for progressing a story through events and to a conclusion.
Pull Back: A frame travels away from a subject. This visual movement might enhance any present three-dimensionality to an overall image, while also drawing distance from a particular item.
Push In: A frame that approaches a subject. In this scenario, items might enlarge and become a focal point of attention.
Racking Focus: An optical illusion in which a focal plane alters. Attention of a viewer might drive from one object to another through manipulation of a camera’s lens in a media clip.
Reaction Shot: A frame that may preview a response from a character or subject. These moments might also provide psychological cues for how an audience reacts to a given action.
Real Time: A potential timespan of a narrative’s plot. This could contrast how viewers experience a project.
Rear Screen Projection: A recording or a scene, in which a backdrop may be placed in at a later moment. This could allow for an addition of visual effects to a media project, such as for driving scenes or more.
Redlight: A project in turnaround that might be halted from production. These pieces might be permanently or temporarily stalled.
Reel: In cinema, this may be a winding spool to hold rolls of celluloid strips. Associatively, this may also refer to a highlight of a creator's work.
Reverse Angle Shot: A diverse perspective of a frame that may relate to a previously recorded clip as its opposite point of view. This may allow for more of an inventory of clips to choose from in a later post-production process.
Rotoscoping: A tracing of frames by animators. Creators may formulate a scene through this technology.
Rough Cut: A draft of an edited project. Media creators might be able to try varying effects and styles at this phase of their process and preview it to others.
Satire: A potential mocking of an institution for a symbolic impact. Certain narratives may take on this form to make comments towards a select aspect of their society.
Score: Musical audio within an overall soundtrack of a project. Media may require that sound is carefully orchestrated to complement a piece.
Screen (A Single and Double): A frame that blocks or cuts light. These tools may become effective when a certain lighting set-up requires shielding from possible illumination.
Screen Direction: A potential pathway in which characters might move throughout a scene. Director’ might orchestrate this to formulate a structure to a scene.
Screen Test: An pre-examination of a varying element within a project. Actors and more may be requested to review how they may appear or work within an actual production.
Screenplay: A possible script. Screenwriters might be responsible for developing a narrative that could be turned into an visal project.
Screenwriter: A potential individual that formulates a screenplay. These creatives might be accountable for how a story begins and ends.
Second Unit Photography: An additional crew that may record what other units of a camera department might have missed. These professionals could be responsible for continuing work comlpeted by a director of photography in a 1st unit.
Sequel: A potential narrative that continues a story from another released project. These may help develop a following of a series by audiences.
Setting: A possible place and time that a project ocurres. In detailing information through dialogue, a narrative might also be positioned in a viewer’s minds through scenery.
Shot, Scene, and Sequence: Potential ideas that structure a narrative. One could develop a project through these concepts to progress a story for an audience.
Shot List: A possible itemized record of needed photography for a production day for a crew reference. These may contain pieces of an overall scene that would have to be recorded to maintain a schedule.
Showrunner: A potential professional that holds much influence over a project. These individuals might be writers or more.
Shutter Speed: A time in which potential frames are exposed to illumination. Shutters may rotate or flicker to disrupt an image.
Slate: A possible digital board that may contain vital information. Details such as crew members, titles, or more could be placed upon these boards to assist post-production professionals with organization of film or media, without viewing an entire clip once having ingested material.
Slow Motion: Film or media that might playback at a quick rate. This optical illusion could influence ways in which viewers experience a cinematic moment.
Soft Focus: A possible visual effect in which sharpness of a lens is reduced. A cinematographer might utilize this optical technique to alter appearances of a select frame.
Sound: A potential audio piece to a media project. This could be measured in decibels to accurately assess intensity or loudness.
Soundstage: A possible soundproofed room. These spaces might alter how audio travels and is recorded.
Soundtrack: An optical audio section of a motion picture. Furthermore, media projects might utilize this aural tool to enhance a mood to a scene.
S.O.T.: A possible acronym for “Sound On Tape” to those working with media projects. This could assist with evaluating whether a crew may have to record more audio after a production, dub a scene, or more.
Spec Script: A potentially non-commissioned script. These might be sent by screen-writers to secure employment or more. Writers may draft work that is inspired by an existing project in this case.
Special Effects: Possible optical illusions that are formed outside of traditional means of production. In certain cases where a visual element is not present on a day of recording a scene, a crew may implement a creative substitute to form an alternative of their own. Computer generated images might also be useful in this process as well.
Spin-Off: A possible prequel or sequel project that derived from an existing one. These might enhance a previously released story.
Split-Screen: A potential optical illusion that displays two or more actions next to each other on one screen. This could offer a psychological idea to a viewer that multiple occurrences are taking place simultaneously.
Split Screen Film Mattes: A design asset for content creators of all kinds to easily create the split screen aesthetic. Also called, Split Screen Matte and Split Screen Matte Overlays.
Spoiler: Information about a narrative that might reduce psychological tension for a viewer. In select cases, first-time viewers to a certain media project might need to be oblivious to ideas pertaining to a story in advance of witnessing it.
Static Shot: A frame that is stationary. Cameras might abstain from movement to form a desired effect.
Steadicam: A handheld photographic device. Cinematographers could resort to this tool to record a scene from an unstable point of view.
Still: A static camera recording that may often capture one moment in time, rather than a series of photos per second. This could also be referred to as an immobile image.
Stinger: An unexpected selection of footage that might be placed in a narrative’s conclusion. Media creators might place these moments in a project to add an intriguing ending to their works.
Stinger: A potential extension cord for electricity purposes. Crew might utilize this tool to ensure power could be supplied to a given piece of equipment.
Stock Footage: A possible selection of pre-recording. These images might be historical in nature or reference common visual elements, such as landscapes.
Stop Motion: A potential animation technique to assist in forming a story. Certain creators might utilize models or more to formulate unique creations.
Storyboard: A possible sketch of a narrative from one moment to another. To sequence a scene, creatives could utilize this tool to pre-visualize their plans for recording a cinematic piece.
Subtitles: Text that could be placed in a lower portion of a frame. Creatives might utilize this tool to translate dialogue or apply descriptors to a visual image that one might see.
Surrealism: Ideas that may resonate with one’s subconscious. This form of cinema might also utilize fantastical or unrealistic themes within its overall works.
Swish Pan: A rapidly turned camera, that while recording, could direct a viewer's attention.Tripods and other stabilization devices might help to formulate this movement of swiveling from left or right.
Symmetry: Ideas that might resemble one another. This could be an image or shape that is captured on video to formulate a unique visual dimension within an overall image.
Symbolism: An object or a word that inspires an idea. Media projects may contain characters or other creative elements that represent an abstraction.
Tagline: A potential summation of a narrative to an audience. Creatives might present a hint about a plot through this tool.
Take: A continuously recorded scene that may run during a production day. Cinematographers might be asked to record a few rounds of one moment for creative purposes.
Technicolor: A development process for possible film or celluloid strips that might have been used to record a scene. Three strip color processes might enhance an image's gamut or range in chrominance.
Telephoto Lens: A photographic accessory that might be used to formulate compression of space within an image. These tools might be long in focal length with narrow angles of view.
Theme: A potential message of a narrative. In certain cases, these messages might also assist critics with assessing value to projects.
Three Shot: A possible frame that might contain two and plus one more character. These framings might be wide in nature.
Tight On: Frames that might be close in proximity to recorded action or light in negative space within an overall image. Notice in detail might certainly be viewed as potentially subtle movements become clarified to characters.
Tilt Shot: Frames in which there may be an imbalance in horizontal symmetry of an image. A camera might be canted or rolled to one side.
Time Lapse: Images that might be recorded at a slower speed than potentially 24 frames per second. This could display a passage of time or how events change in a given moment.
Tint: A possible strategy to adjust hues within a given image. Project’s might be altered during recordings on sets or in post-production phases.
Tracking Shot: A frame that may follow a moving subject. These images could also require a great amount of coordination with a crew to construct, yet this may also offer viewers a more immersive perspective as they engage with a project.
Treatment: A summarization of a film or media project. Pre-production processes might require this document to plan narratives and prepare for production.
24 Frames Per Second: A frame rate that might be garnered as a standard for recording a scene. Creatives, such as cinematographers, might manually set this function within cameras.
Two Shot: A frame that might include more than one subject. Photographic devices could be in close proximity to characters during recordings depending on chosen focal lengths for capturing that moment. Additionally, this image might also be used for dialogue scenes.
Undercranking: A process in which a frame rate is retarded in speed. Images might be previewed with quick motions from subjects.
Underexposure: An image that might be offered less light or luminance. This technique might be referred to as an opposite to overexposing. Lastly, depending on recording formats, such as those that might be found within a digital camera, a lessening of exposure to light might be required to craft a desired image.
Vertigo Effect: A possible video capturing technique that requires an operator to zoom and dolly a photographic device simultaneously. Certain creatives might be able to achieve this effect through post-production editing. Nonetheless, on set, operators might expand their field of view with a variable focal length lens, while also pushing a camera towards a recorded action. That procedure could also be done in reverse, forming what others may refer to as a dolly zoom.
Vignette: A section within a narrative that might be able to be independent from other pieces of a story. Viewers may reference these portions out of an entire project.
Visual Effects: Additions to media projects that might be computer generated or included with special techniques. Post-production specialists may complete these tasks and build on to stories by enhancing a visual feature or space
Voice-Over: Select dialogue that might be recorded. Performers might narrate these pieces to increase comprehension of a story or more.
Walk-Through: A possible rehearsal that could be done on a day of production. Camera’s might not record action, however blocking and practice of running a scene may be done in tandem with a director’s command.
Wardrobe: A potential reference to a costume division. This title might also be placed on a leading creative or material that could be worn by performers.
White Balance: A technique that a camera operator might use to establish a relative standard for hues that may be captured in a scene. This process might also ensure that discoloration is avoided.
Wide Angle Shot: Frames that might be recorded with an expansive field of view. An amplification of space might be previewed or seen that could intrigue viewers.
Widescreen: An expansive aspect ratio, which could be used to display a film or project. Frames may be wider than 1:33:1 in size. Movies may display wide landscapes that impress viewers.
Wipe: A visual transition that might be used to to move from one scene to another. This may take an appearance of one image moving horizontally away from a viewer while another comes in to replace it.
Wrap: A possible completion of recording a film or media project. In certain cases, this might be used to signal that a piece has finished a phase, such as production, post-production, or more.
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Love film but don't know how to analyse or discuss it? In this Guide, we give you the toolkit to identify and discuss those must know film techniques.
All about the Film Techniques Toolkit
Films take us on journeys; we become immersed in worlds beyond our own. The best films lead us to ask questions about our world as well as ourselves. However, sometimes it can be difficult to translate our reactions to film into meaningful English analysis.
When filmmakers construct their films, they combine multiple techniques together to develop meaning. Film combines visual elements with auditory elements to develop meaning.
To understand how the various techniques combine to create meaning, watch the following video we have put together that lists the techniques employed in various film scenes.
The list below provides some of the key film techniques for writing about cinematic texts.
Important Film Techniques
Go to technique:
There are a huge number of techniques that are used in films to convey meaning. Below are some of the must-know techniques that are included in the glossaries of Matrix English Theory Books.
Camera angles refer to the tilt of the camera in relation to the scene and the characters. Unusual camera angles can emphasise an action sequence, disorientate the audience, and suggest the relationship between characters.
The main angles are:
• Low – Establishes the power of the character or object
• Eye-Level – Allows the audience to get personal with the character(s)
• High – Presents the subject as vulnerable or lacking in power
• Worm’s Eye – Presents the figure as very large and/or powerful
• Canted (also known as a Dutch Angle)- Develops psychological unease or tension.
• Bird’s Eye – Often used to establish a shot and characters’ relationship to it
Analyse a Cinematic Text Angle Types
Examples of various shot angles
Bridging Shot
A shot that marks the passage of time in a film. This is sometimes a series of newspaper headlines, a calendar, tress going through seasonal changes, or the hands turning on a clock.
Animated GIF: This bridging shot marks the passing of evening. Note the fast turning of the clock hands and rapid melting of the candle.
Colour, especially the choice of colour palette or scheme, can reflect the mood of the piece. Colour in a scene can also be enhanced through lighting.
For example, in The Great Gatsby (2013), the use of a vibrant colour scheme reflects the opulent lifestyle of New York elites in the 1920s.
You can learn more about colour symbolism at Studio Binder.
Colour Palette Analysis by Movies in Color of Baz Lurman’s The Great Gatsby (Warner Bros. 2013), Cinematographer: Simon Duggan
Cucoloris is a lighting technique where an object is placed between the light source and the subject in order to create a patterned shadow. A staple of film noir.
Filter used for Cucloris. Image and device by Henry Nelson.
Is an editing technique where actions are established as occurring at the same time. The camera will cut away from one action to another action elsewhere to suggest these things are occurring at the same moment.
A conversation between two characters is called dialogue. Written by scriptwriters to convey the film’s plot, dialogue is also useful in conveying character.
A transition that moves between one shot and another by overlaying one shot and fading the first image out while strengthening the second shot. This can denote daydreams, memories, the passing of time, or signify phone conversations and long-distance communication.
Consider this example from Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice (2014):
Animated GIF: In this dissolve, we are taken to one of Larry “Doc” Sportello’s memories that are triggered during a phone call.
Dolly Shot
A dolly is a wheeled cart that the camera and operator are seated on. A dolly shot is a shot where the dolly is pushed along to move with the action. This is similar to a tracking shot, but without the tracks so that the camera can have a broader range of motion.
The video below discusses the difference between dolly shots and zooms and how they can be used (or even combined) to create effects and meaning.
Editing Sequence
The order of each shot and how they have been put together to create a scene. This is usually based upon the storyboard used by the director.
However, some directors such as Werner Herzog refused to use storyboards, and shoot many scenes which they edit together by trial and error.
Editing Wipes
In editing, wipes are used to transition between scenes in a variety of ways rather than just cutting. Types of wipes include:
• Horizontal wipe – the wipe moves horizontally across the screen
• Vertical wipe – The wipe moves vertically across the screen
• Diagonal wipe – The wipe moves diagonally across the screen
• Star wipe – The wipe is the shape of an expanding star to demonstrate something special happening
• Heart Wipe – The wipe takes the shape of a heart expanding or contracting to illustrate romance or friendship
• Clock Wipe – The wipe is a circular motion like a clock arm to illustrate the passage of time
• Matrix wipe – a patterned transition between scenes
Establishing Shot
A type of extreme long-shot that establish the context – time and setting – of a scene or film. Often establishing shots use famous landmarks or places, like the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Eyeline Match
A type of cut where the shot of a character looking at something cuts to a shot of the thing they were looking at the same level. This type of cut is used to show the audience what they were looking at.
Fade In/Out
An editing technique where the shot fades out from one shot going to black before fading into a new shot.
Images that refer to previous events in the characters` lives. Flashbacks can be used to foreshadow future events.
Text which is printed on a background and placed between filmed scenes through editing. In silent films, intertitles can convey dialogue and exposition.
Intertitle from Metropolis Dir. Fritz Lang (1927)
Similar to other editing wipes, this is a type of transition where the screen irises closed around a particular thing on screen. These can be used to signify daydreams, provide a dramatic transition, or signify the end of a scene.
Jump Cut
A cut that moves fractionally forward in time. These shots focus on the same subject but either use a different angle or have the subject in a different position to illustrate that time has moved forward in time. Jump cuts are usually used to show time passing forward.
Lighting contributes to the mood of a film and suggests interpretations of a character. Are they good? Are they nefarious?
Low key lighting emphasises the shadows in a shot, while lighting from above or below can suggest that a character possesses sinister qualities.
Analyse a Cinematic Text lighting from below
An example of a sinister cat lit from below.
Analyse a Cinematic Text Low Key lighting
An example of shadows from Low Key Lighting.
Long Take
Also called a sequence shot (and occasionally referred to as a one-shot)
Match Cut
Jumps from one shot to another similar shot that matches the composition of the first shot.
Mise en scène
Mise en scène translates as ‘what is put into a scene’. This French expression refers to the composition of a scene, including placement of characters, costume, makeup and setting.
A montage is a type of editing sequence where a series of shots play rapidly to create a narrative. Often a montage will be accompanied by a unifying piece of music to convey the dominant mood connected with the sequence.
Analyse a Cinematic Text Montage
Animated GIF: A montage from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927)
Mood refers to the feelings suggested by the combination of all the elements on the screen and the accompanying sound. Another way to refer to the mood is to discuss atmosphere.
Music can convey the theme, mood and atmosphere. There are different types of music in films.
• The score is extra-diegetic music composed for the film, designed to evoke the film’s desired mood for the audience.
• Music heard by the characters in the film is called diegetic music.
Over the Shoulder (OTS)
A type of sequence shot or tracking shot where the camera follows a character by following them and shooting over their shoulder. Like a Point of View shot, an over the shoulder shot focalises (that is, focuses in on) on the characters experience.
Also referred to as a Long Take or Sequence Shot. A one-shot is actually a type of long-take or sequence shot where the effect of being one shot is created through editing. For example, Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s 2014 film, Birdman uses careful editing to give the appearance of a single take.
In some cases, a one-shot is used to refer to whole films made in one take, such as the 2015 film German film, Victoria.
Panning Shot
A shot where the camera swivels horizontally around a fixed point to follow the subject.
Point Of View Shot (POV)
A shot that is taken from a character’s point of view, like a first-person video game. Point of View shots focalise (that is, focus in on) a character’s experience.
Rack Shot
A shot where the camera shifts the focus while holding the same shot to bring another object into focus. Rack shots change the depth of the shot.
The example below is from the TV series Sherlock. In it, the focus shifts from Sherlock to Watson.
Animated GIF: In this rack shot, the focus shifts from Sherlock in the foreground to Watson in the background.
A unit of narrative used to divide up a dramatic text or film. A scene usually takes place in a single location and focuses on a single action in one moment of varying length.
The place where the action of the film occurs.
Sequence Shot
A sequence shot is a single long take shows a series of actions happening one after another within the same shot. Sequence shots are occasionally called long takes and one-shots. Sequence shots are very hard to do and can develop quite a lot of meaning.
A famous example is Martin Scorses’s Copacabana shot from his 1990 film, Goodfellas.
This shot illustrates the Henry Hills’ wealth and connections while he shows off to his date. This take combines over the shoulder and point of view perspectives.
Shot type
Shot types indicate how close or far the camera is from the characters. Shot types range from Extreme Long Shot (XLS), where the characters may be very small and embedded in a landscape, to Extreme Close Up (XCU), where part of the character’s face makes up the whole shot.
The shots are:
• Extreme Long Shot (XLS)
• Long Shot (LS)
• Medium Long Shot (MLS)
• Medium Shot (MS)
• Medium Close Up (MCU)
• Close Up (CU)
• Super Close Up (SCU)
• Extreme Close Up (XCU)
Analyse a Cinematic Text Shot Types
Image: Examples of various shot types
The sound of a film helps to create atmosphere – this can include:
Like music, sound can be divided into:
• Diegetic: occurring in the world of the film
• Extra-diegetic (occurring outside the world of the film)
An object used to suggest ideas in addition to, or beyond, their literal sense. For example, the glass slipper in Cinderella symbolises the opportunity that Cinderella has to live a different life. Watch films carefully to spot symbols and their potential meaning to the plot. If a symbol recurs throughout the film it is a motif.
Analyse a-Cinematic-Text-Symbolism
Animated GIF: This GIF is from Sam Mendes’ American Beauty (1999). The dancing plastic bag symbolises how beauty is found in things that are often discarded. The bag is rubbish to many, but its dance in the wind is beautiful.
Steady Cam
A type of camera that is used in action sequences. A steady cam rig allows the camera to be worn by the operator so they can follow an action sequence without the shot become overly jerky.
A way to transition between shots. Transitions involve cuts, fades, and wipes (see above for specific definitions).
This is a good video that explains these various techniques.
When the camera tilts in shot to show the subject away from the horizontal axis.
Title Card
See intertitle
Tracking Shot
A shot that follows a subject as they move.
Two Shot
A shot that features two characters and is used to establish or develop their relationship.
The camera zooms in or out to focus on an object or to show how far away it is. Zooms can be used for dramatic effect or can be used to show objects in relation to each other for scale.
See Dolly Shot above for a video discussing the difference between Zooms and Dolly shots.
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Some of the terminology that a film editor uses includes:
Close-up (CU): A shot showing a detail only (ex., face only or hands only).
Cross-cutting: Cutting back and forth between two or more events or actions that are taking place at the same time but in different places. Cross-cutting is used to build suspense or to show how different pieces of the action are related.
Cut: An abrupt transition from one shot to another.
Cutaways: A cut away from the primary subject to something the filmmaker has decided is equally or more relevant at that time. Often cutaways consist of shots showing the reaction of one character to another. This is often used to compress time in what appears to be a seamless manner.
Dissolve: An overlapping transition between scenes where one image fades out as another fades in. Editors often use this to indicate a change in time and/or location.
Establishing Shot: A shot, usually taken from a distance, which establishes for the viewer where the action is to occur and the spatial relationship of the characters and their setting.
Extreme Close-Up (ECU): A detail of a close-up (eyes or mouth only, etc.).
Fade In: A shot that starts in darkness and gradually lightens to full exposure.
Fade Out: A shot that starts at full exposure and gradually fades to black.
Freeze-Frame: At a chosen point in a scene, a particular frame is printed repeatedly, given the effect of halting or "freezing" the action.
Jump Cut: A cut where two spliced shots do not match in terms of time or place. A jump cut gives the effect that the camera is literally jumping around.
Long Shot (LS): A shot taken at a considerable distance from the subject. A long shot of a person is one in which the entire body is in frame.
Medium Shot (MS): A shot framing a subject at a medium range, usually a shot from the waist up.
Reverse cutting: A technique alternating over-the-shoulder shots showing different characters speaking. This is generally used in conversation scenes.
Sequence Shot: An entire scene or sequence that is one continuous camera shot. There is no editing.
Film Editing: Manipulating Time and Space
PDF Downloads
Complete Film Editing Activities Guide (PDF)
Activity 1: Film Editing Terminology
Activity 2: Writing with Images
Activity 3: Creating Meaning
Activity 4: Learning from the Best
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Film Glossary
Bird's eye view. A shot in which the camera photographs a scene from directly
Close-up, Close shot. A detailed view of a person or object, usually without much
context provided.
Continuity. The kind of logic implied in the association of ideas between edited
shots. "Cutting to continuity" emphasizes smooth transitions between shots, in
which space and time are unobtrusively condensed. "Classical cutting" emphasizes
dramatic or emotional logic between shots rather than one based strictly on
considerations of time and space. In "thematic montage" the continuity is based
entirely on ideas, irrespective of literal time and space. In some instances,
"continuity" refers to the space-time continuum of reality before it is photographed.
Crane shot. A shot taken from a special device called a crane, which resembles a
huge mechanical arm. The crane carries the camera and cameraman, and can move
in virtually any direction.
Cross cutting. The alternating of shots from two sequences, often in different
locales, to suggest the sequences are taking place simultaneously.
Deep focus. A technique of photography which permits all distance planes to
remain clearly in focus, from close-up range to infinity.
Dissolve, lap dissolve. These terms refer to the slow fading out of one shot and the
Dolly shot, tracking shot, trucking shot. A shot taken from a moving vehicle.
Originally tracks were laid on the set to permit a smoother movement of the
camera. Today even a smooth hand-held traveling shot is considered a variation of
the dolly shot.
Editing. The joining of one shot (strip of film) with another. The shots can picture
events and objects in different places at different times. Editing is also called
Establishing shot. Usually an extreme long or long shot offered at the beginning
of a scene or sequence providing the viewer with the context of the subsequent
closer shots.
Extreme close-up. A minutely detailed view of an object or a person. An extreme
close-up of an actor generally includes only his eyes, or his mouth.
Extreme long shot. A panoramic view of an exterior location, photographed from
a great distance, often as far as a quarter-mile away.
Eye-level shot. The placement of the camera approximately 5 to 6 feet from the
ground corresponding to the height of an observer on the scene.
Fish-eye lens. An extreme wide angle lens, which distorts the image so radically
that the edges seem wrapped into a sphere.
Flash-editing, flash-cutting. Editing sequences so that the durations of the shots
are very brief.
Full shot. A type of long shot which includes the human body in full, with the head
High angle shot. A shot in which the subject is photographed from above.
Long shot. Includes an amount of picture within the frame which roughly
corresponds to the audience's view of the area within the proscenium arch of the
legitimate theater.
Long take. A shot of lengthy duration.
Loose framing. Usually in longer shots. The mise-en-scne is so spaciously
distributed that the subject photographed has considerable latitude of movement.
Low angle shot. A shot in which the subject is photographed from below.
Master shot. A single uninterrupted shot, usually taken from a long or full shot
range, which contains an entire scene. Later, the closer shots are photographed, and
an edited sequence, composed of a variety of different shots, is subsequently
constructed on the editor's bench.
Medium shot. A relatively close shot, revealing a moderate amount of detail. A
medium shot of a figure generally includes the body from the knees or waist up.
Mise-en-scne. The arrangement of volumes and movements within a given space.
In the cinema, the space is defined by the frame; in the legitimate theater, usually
by the proscenium arch.
from Andrew Sarris:
As I wrote some years ago, I would suggest a definition of mise-en-scne that
includes all the means available to a director to express his attitude toward his
and their placement in the decor, the angle and distance of the camera, and even the
content of the shot. Mise-en-scne as an attitude tends to accept the cinema as it is
Montage. Transitional sequences of rapidly edited images, used to suggest the
lapse of time or the passing of events. Often employs dissolves and multiple
exposures. In Europe "montage" means editing.
Oblique angle. A shot which is photographed by a tilted camera. When the image
is projected on the screen, the subject itself seems to be tilted on its side.
Open forms. Used primarily by realist film directors, these techniques are likely to
be subtle and unobtrusive, with an emphasis on informal compositions and
apparently haphazard designs. The frame generally is exploited to suggest a
temporary masking which arbitrarily cuts off part of the action.
Over-the-shoulder shot. A medium shot, useful in dialogue scenes, in which one
actor is photographed head-on from over the shoulder of another actor.
Point-of-view shot. Any shot which is taken from the vantage point of a character
in the film. Also known as the first person camera.
Pull-back dolly. A technique used to surprise the viewer by withdrawing from a
scene to reveal an object or character that was previously out of the frame.
Rack focusing, selective focusing. The blurring of focal planes in sequence,
forcing the viewer's eye to "travel" with those areas of an image that remain in
sharp focus.
Reaction shot. A cut to a shot of a character's reaction to the contents of the
preceding shot.
Reverse angle shot. A shot taken from an angle 180 opposed to the previous shot
-- that is, the camera is placed opposite its previous position.
Scene. A unit of film composed of a number of interrelated shots, unified usually
by a central concern -- a location, an incident, or a minor dramatic climax.
Set-up. The positioning of the camera and lights for a specific shot.
Shot. Those images which are recorded continuously from the time the camera
starts to the time it stops. That is, an unedited, uncut strip of film.
Sub-text. A term used in drama and film to signify the dramatic implications
beneath the language of a play or movie. Often the sub-text concerns ideas and
emotions that are totally independent of the language of a text.
Telephoto lens, long lens. A lens which acts as a telescope, magnifying the size of
objects at a great distance. A significant side effect is tendency to flatten
Three-shot. A medium shot, featuring three actors.
Tight framing. Usually in close shots. The mise-en-scne is so carefully balanced
and harmonized that the subject photographed has little or no freedom of
Two-shot. A medium shot, featuring two actors.
Wide angle lens, short lens. A lens which permits the camera to photograph a
wider area than a normal lens. A significant side effect is its tendency to exaggerate
perspective. Also used for deep-focus photography.
Wipe. And editing device, usually a line which travels across the screen, "pushing
off" one image and revealing another.
Zoom lens. A lens of variable focal length which permits the cameraman to change
from wide angle to telephoto shots (and vice versa) in one continuous movement.
Zoom shot. A shot taken with the aid of a zoom lens. The lens changes focal length
during the shot so that a dolly or crane shot is suggested. | https://id.scribd.com/document/332237799/Shots | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2019-35
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Cinematography theory and practice 2nd edition - Brough to you by Mohamed Roshdy, the egyptian filmmaker.
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Topics include:
. Concepts of filmmaking
. Language of the lens
. Cinematic continuity
. Lighting for film, digital, and HD
. Exposure
. HD cinematography and shooting
. Shooting in HD
. Image control and filters
. Bleach bypass processes
. Lighting as storytelling
. Shooting special effects
. Set procedures and other issues
Brought to you by Mohamed Roshdy, the Egyptian Filmmaker.
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• 1. cinematography theory and practice imagemaking for cinematographers & directors second edition
• 2. This page intentionally left blank
• 3. cinematography theory and practice imagemaking for cinematographers and directors second edition blain brown
• 4. Focal Press is an imprint of Elsevier 225 Wyman Street, Waltham, MA 02451, USA The Boulevard, Langford Lane, Kidlington, Oxford, OX5 1GB, UK © 2012 ELSEVIER INC. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Details on how to seek permission, further information about the Publisher’s permissions policies and our arrangements with organizations such as the Copyright Clearance Center and the Copyright Licensing Agency, can be found at our website: This book and the individual contributions contained in it are protected under copyright by the Publisher (other than as may be noted herein). Notices Knowledge and best practice in this field are constantly changing. As new research and experience broaden our understanding, changes in research methods, professional practices, or medical treatment may become necessary. Practitioners and researchers must always rely on their own experience and knowledge in evaluating and using any information, methods, compounds, or experiments described herein. In using such information or methods they should be mindful of their own safety and the safety of others, including parties for whom they have a professional responsibility. To the fullest extent of the law, neither the Publisher nor the authors, contributors, or editors, assume any liability for any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a matter of products liability, negligence or otherwise, or from any use or operation of any methods, products, instructions, or ideas contained in the material herein. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Brown, Blain. Cinematography : theory and practice : image making for cinematographers and directors / Blain Brown. p. cm. ISBN 978-0-240-81209-0 1. Cinematography. I. Title. TR850.B7598 2012 778.5--dc22 2011010755 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. For information on all Focal Press publications visit our website at 11 12 13 14 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the China
• 5. contents Introduction The Scope of this Book Titles and Terminology writing with motion Writing with Motion Building a Visual World The [Conceptual] Tools of Cinematography The Frame The Lens Light and Color Texture Movement Establishing Point-of-View Putting It All Together xiii xiv xiv 1 2 2 4 4 6 8 9 10 10 10 11 shooting methods 13 visual language 37 language of the lens 53 What Is Cinematic? A Question of Perception Visual Subtext and Visual Metaphor The Frame Static Frame Cinema as a Language The Shots: Building Blocks of a Scene Establishing the Geography Character Shots Invisible Technique The Shooting Methods The Master Scene Method Coverage Overlapping or Triple-Take Method In-One Freeform Method Montage Involving The Audience: POV More Than Just a Picture Design Principles The Three-Dimensional Field Forces Of Visual Organization Movement in the Visual Field The Rule of Thirds Miscellaneous Rules of Composition Basic Composition Rules for People The Lens and the Frame Foreground/Midground/Background Lens Perspective Deep Focus Selective Focus Image Control at the Lens Lens Height Dutch Tilt 14 14 14 15 15 16 17 18 20 27 27 27 28 29 30 30 32 33 38 39 41 45 51 51 51 52 54 54 54 56 61 63 64 66 cinematography v
• 6. visual storytelling 67 cinematic continuity 77 Visual Metaphor Telling Stories with Pictures Lighting As Storytelling Film Noir Light As Visual Metaphor Light and Shadow / Good and Evil Fading Flashbulbs Visual Poetry Shooting For Editing Thinking about Continuity Types of continuity The Prime Directive Screen Direction Turnaround Cheating the Turnaround Planning Coverage Cuttability The 20% and 30 Degree Rules Other Issues In Continuity Introductions Other Editorial Issues In Shooting Jump Cuts The Six Types Of Cuts The Content Cut The Action Cut The POV Cut The Match Cut The Conceptual Cut The Zero Cut lighting basics The Fundamentals of Lighting What are the Goals of Good Lighting? Exposure and Lighting Some Lighting Terminology Aspects Of Light Hard Light and Soft Light Direction Intensity Texture Color Basic Lighting Techniques Back Cross Keys Ambient Plus Accents Lighting with Practicals Lighting through the Window Available Natural Light Motivated Light Day Exteriors Fill Silks and Diffusion Open Shade and Garage Door Light Sun as Backlight Lighting For High Def Video vi 68 68 69 69 70 71 72 75 78 78 78 81 81 85 87 87 88 88 89 95 96 96 98 98 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 104 107 108 110 110 113 114 115 115 116 116 117 117 118 118 120 124 124 124 124 125 126
• 7. lighting sources 129 HD cinematography 147 The Tools of Lighting Daylight Sources HMI Units Xenons LED Lights Tungsten Lights Fresnels PARs HMI PARs Soft Lights Barger Baglights Color-Correct Fluorescents Other Types of Units Softsun Cycs, Strips, Nooks and Broads Chinese Lanterns and Spacelights Self-Contained Crane Rigs Ellipsoidal Reflector Spots Balloon Lights Handheld Units Day Exteriors Controlling Light with Grip Equipment For More Information On Lighting High Def and Standard Def Analog and Digital Video Analog Digital Video Types of Video Sensors Three-Chip vs Bayer Filter Sensors Digital Video Standard Def High Def Shooting Formats 2K, 4K and Higher Resolution Formats Digital Compression RAW Monitoring On the set The Waveform Monitor and Vectorscope Waveform Monitors The Vectorscope Video Latitude Clipping Video Noise and Grain The Digital Intermediate (DI) The Video Signal Interlace Video Progressive Video NTSC and ATSC Colorspace SDI Setting Up A Color Monitor Monitor Setup Procedure Camera White Balance 130 130 130 135 136 136 136 138 140 140 141 142 142 142 143 143 144 144 145 145 145 145 146 148 148 148 149 150 150 151 151 151 152 152 152 154 155 156 156 156 157 158 159 159 160 160 160 160 161 162 162 162 164 cinematography vii
• 8. Digital Video Encoding Is It Broadcast Quality? Do It in the Camera or in Post? The Decision Matrix 10 Things to Remember When Shooting HD Timecode and Edgecode Video Frame Rate Drop-Frame and Non-Drop-Frame 29.97 Video How Drop Frame Solves the Problem To Drop or Not to Drop? Timecode Slating Tapeless Production Metadata Tapeless Workflows Digital File Types Container Files: Quicktime and MXF Compression and Codecs Intra-frame versus Interframe Compression Bit Depth MPEG Other Codecs The Curve Controlling the HD Image Gain/ISO Gamma Black Gamma/Black Stretch Knee Color Saturation Matrix Color Balance exposure Exposure: the Easy Way What Do We Want Exposure to Do for Us? Controlling Exposure The Four Elements of Exposure The Bottom Line How Film and Video Are Different Two Types of Exposure Light As Energy F/Stops Exposure, ISO, and Lighting Relationships Inverse Square Law and Cosine Law ISO/ASA Light and Film The Latent Image Chemical Processing Color Negative Film’s Response to Light Densitometry The Log E Axis Brightness Perception Contrast “Correct” Exposure Higher Brightness Range in the Scene Determining Exposure viii 165 166 166 167 167 168 168 168 169 170 170 170 171 171 171 172 172 173 173 173 174 176 177 179 180 180 180 180 180 180 180 181 182 182 182 183 185 185 185 186 186 186 187 187 188 189 189 190 190 191 193 194 194 197 198 198
• 9. Video Exposure The Tools The Incident Meter The Reflectance Meter The Zone System Zones in a Scene The Gray Scale Why 18%? Place and Fall Reading Exposure with Ultraviolet Exposure and the Camera Shutter Speed versus Shutter Angle camera movement Motivation and Invisible Technique Basic Technique Types Of Moves Pan Tilt Move In / Move Out Zoom Punch-in Moving Shots Tracking Countermove Reveal Circle Track Moves Crane Moves Rolling Shot Camera Mounting Handheld Camera Head Fluid Head Geared Head Remote Head Underslung Heads Dutch Head The Tripod High-Hat Rocker Plate Tilt Plate The Crab Dolly Dolly Terminology Dance Floor Extension Plate Low Mode Front Porch Side Boards Risers Steering Bar or Push Bar Cranes Crane/Jib Arm Crane Operation Non-booming Platforms Camera on a Ladder Remote on Cranes Technocrane Cranes on Top of Cranes Car Shots 198 199 199 200 200 203 203 203 205 207 207 208 209 210 211 212 212 212 212 213 214 214 214 214 214 215 215 216 216 216 216 216 216 216 216 217 217 217 217 218 218 218 219 219 219 220 220 220 220 220 221 221 222 222 222 222 222 223 cinematography ix
• 10. Camera Positions for Car Shots Vehicle to Vehicle Shooting Aerial Shots Mini-Helicopters Cable-Cam Other Types Of Camera Mounts Rickshaw, Wheelchair and Garfield Steadicam Low-Mode Prism Crash Cams Splash Boxes Underwater Housings Motion Control 223 223 224 224 224 224 224 225 225 225 225 226 226 color 227 image control 245 Color In Visual Storytelling The Nature of Light The Tristimulus Theory Functions of the Eye Light and Color Basic Qualities of Color The Color Wheel Color Models Controlling Color Color Temperature Color Balance with Gels and Filters Light Balancing Gels Conversion Gels Light Balancing Gels Color Correction Gels Correcting Off-Color Lights Stylistic Choices in Color Control Color Printing Controlling Color and Contrast In the Lab Bleach-Bypass and Other Processes LookUp Tables 1D LUTs 3D LUTs Camera Filter Types Diffusion and Effects Filters Contrast Filters Effects Filters and Grads Color Temperature and Filtration Conversion Filters Warming and Cooling Filters Contrast Control In Black-and-White Polarizers Density Filters IR Filters Controlling The Look Of Your Project Image Control With The Camera Frame Rate Shutter Angle Time Lapse x 228 228 228 229 230 231 232 232 235 235 238 238 239 241 241 244 244 246 247 247 248 254 255 256 256 256 258 258 259 261 262 262 263 263 264 264 266 266 267 268
• 11. optics & focus 269 set operations 287 technical issues 307 Physical Basis Of Optics Refraction Focus Mental Focus Circle of Confusion Depth-of-field Depth-of-Field Calculations How Not to Get More Depth-of-Field Zooms and Depth-of-Field Macrophotography Close-Up Tools Lens Care Lens adapters for Video The Shot List The Director Of Photography The Team Camera Crew Operator First AC Second AC Loader Data Wrangler DIT Slating Technique TimeCode Slates Camera Reports Electricians Grips Other Units Coordinating with Other Departments Set Procedures Flicker Filming Practical Monitors Monitors and MOS Shooting Shooting Process Photography Greenscreen/Bluescreen Lighting for Bluescreen/Greenscreen Dimmers Working With Strobes High-Speed Photography Lighting For Extreme Close-Up Underwater Filming Measures of Image Quality Effects Time-Lapse Photography Time Slicing Sun Location With A Compass Transferring Film To Video Prepping for Telecine Shooting a Gray Card Reference Framing Charts 270 270 272 274 275 275 276 277 279 281 283 285 285 289 289 291 291 291 291 293 294 294 294 295 296 297 299 300 302 303 305 308 310 311 312 312 313 314 317 319 319 320 320 321 326 327 328 331 331 332 334 cinematography xi
• 12. film formats 335 acknowledgments the cinematography website bibliography index 343 343 344 347 Aspect Ratios Academy Aperture 1.66:1 and 1.85:1 Wide Screen Alternatives to Anamorphic 3-Perf 2-Perf Techniscope 16mm xii 336 336 336 336 337 338 338 340
• 13. INTRODUCTION To a great extent the knowledge base of the cinematographer overlaps with the knowledge base of the director. The cinematographer must have a solid familiarity with the terms and concepts of directing, and the more a director knows about cinematography the more he or she will be able to utilize these tools and especially be better equipped to fully utilize the knowledge and talent of a good DP (Director of Photography). Any successful director will tell you that one of the real secrets of directing is being able to recognize and maximize what every member of the team can contribute. The DP has some duties that are entirely technical, and the director has responsibilities with the script and the actors, but in between those two extremes they are both involved with the same basic task: storytelling with the camera — this is what makes the creative collaboration between them so important. In that regard, one of the main purposes of this book is to discuss “what directors need to know about the camera” and “what cinematographers need to know about directing,” with the goal of improving communication between them and fostering a more common language for their collaborative efforts. The primary purpose of this book is to introduce cinematography/ filmmaking as we practice it on a professional level, whether it be on film, video, digital, High Def or any other imaging format. Storytelling is storytelling and shooting is shooting, no matter what medium you work in. Except for two specific sections that relate to motion picture emulsions and the laboratory, the information here is universal to any form of shooting — film, video, or digital. The first three chapters are a basic introduction to the essential concepts of visual storytelling. It is absolutely essential to understand that a cinematographer or videographer cannot be just a technician who sets up “good shots.” Directors vary in how much input they want from a DP in selecting and setting up shots; but the DP must understand the methods of visual storytelling in either case. Cinema is a language and within it are the specific vocabularies and sublanguages of the lens, composition, visual design, lighting, image control, continuity, movement, and point-of-view. Learning these languages and vocabularies is a never-ending and a fascinating lifelong study. As with any language, you can use it to compose clear and informative prose or to create visual poetry. While wielding these tools to fully utilize the language of cinema, there are, of course, rigorous technical requirements; it is up the DP to ensure that these requirements are met and that everything works properly. Those requirements are covered here as well, as not only are they an integral part of the job, but many seemingly mechanical requirements can also be used as forms of visual expression as well. This is why it is important for the director to have at least a passing knowledge of these technical issues. Another reason is that less experienced directors can get themselves into trouble by asking for something that is not a good idea in terms of time, budget, equipment, or crew resources. This is not to suggest that a director should ever demand less than the best or settle for less than their vision. The point is that by knowing more about what is involved on the technical side, the director can make better choices and work with their DP to think of solutions that are better suited to the situation. cinematography xiii
• 14. We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Rules It is a well-worn saying that you should “know the rules before you break them.” This is certainly true in filmmaking. Newcomers often try to do things “the way it’s never been done before.” Sometimes (rarely) the results are brilliant, even visionary. In film, however, reshooting is extremely expensive and sometimes impossible. All of the basic rules of filmmaking exist for good reasons: they are the result of over 100 years of practical experience and experimentation. Can you break the rules? Absolutely! Great filmmakers do it all the time. Once you not only know the rules but understand why they exist, it is possible to use a violation of them as a powerful tool. Our emphasis here is to not only explain the rules but also the underlying reasons that they exist. The Scope of this Book What does the cinematographer need to know about filmmaking in order to do the job properly? Almost everything. The knowledge base encompasses lenses, exposure, composition, continuity, editorial needs, lighting, grip, color, the language of the camera, even the basic elements of story structure. The job is storytelling with the camera, and the more you know about the elements of that art the better you will be able to assist the director in accomplishing those goals. The DP need not command all these techniques at the level of detail of the editor, the writer, or the key grip, but there must be a firm understanding of the basics and more importantly the possibilities — the tools and their potential to serve the storytelling and the vision of the director. This is especially true as the task of directing is more and more accessible to writers, actors, and others who may not have as broad a background in physical production and the visual side of storytelling. In this situation, being a DP who has a thorough command of the entire scope of filmmaking but is able and willing to work as a collaborator without trying to impose their own vision in place of the director’s is a strong asset. By the same token, to have a reputation as a director who can utilize the talents of their creative team and get the best from everybody is also a goal to aim for. In this book we cover the storytelling issues, continuity, and providing what the editor needs as well as optics, special effects, exposure, composition, filters, color control, and all the other aspects of cinematography that go into the job — all of them approached from the point of view of their value as storytelling tools. The craft of lighting is included here, but for a much more in-depth and thorough discussion of lighting, see the first book, Motion Picture and Video Lighting. It is also important to note that if you are dedicated to the idea of using the medium of cinema to its fullest extent and employing every tool of the art form to serve your story, then lighting for video or High Def is not essentially different from lighting for film. Titles and Terminology Cinematographer refers to someone who shoots film or video. Director of Photography refers to a cinematographer on any type of project. Cameraman/camerawoman/cameraperson is interchangeable with either of the above. Although a great deal of production is now done on High Def (HD) video, and HD is clearly the wave of the future, it has become common practice to still refer to it as film and filmmaking. xiv
• 15. writing with motion © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50001-4
• 16. WRITING WITH MOTION The term cinematography is from the Greek roots meaning “writing with motion.” At the heart of it, filmmaking is shooting — but cinematography is more than the mere act of photography. It is the process of taking ideas, words, actions, emotional subtext, tone, and all other forms of nonverbal communication and rendering them in visual terms. As we will use the term here, cinematic technique is the entire range of methods and techniques that we use to add layers of meaning and subtext to the “content” of the film — the dialog and action. The tools of cinematic technique are used by both the director and DP, either working together or in doing their individual jobs. As mentioned, cinematography is far more than just “photographing” what is in front of the camera — the tools, the techniques and the variations are wide ranging in scope; this is at the heart of the symbiosis of the DP and the director. Figure 1.1. (previous page). A young Orson Welles in preparation. cinematography 2 Building a Visual World When we create a film project, one of our primary tasks is to create a visual world for the characters to inhabit. This visual world is an important part of how the audience will perceive the story; how they will understand the characters and their motivations. Think of great films like On the Waterfront, Apocalypse Now, or The Big Sleep. They all have a definite, identifiable universe in which they exist: it consists of the locations, the sets, the wardrobe, even the sounds, but to a large extent these visual worlds are created though the cinematography. All these elements work together, of course — everything in visual storytelling is interrelated: the sets might be fantastic, but if the lighting is terrible, then the end result will be substandard. Let’s look at this sequence from early in Blade Runner: (Figures 1.2, through 1.5) Without a single line of dialog, we know it is a hightech, futuristic world; giant electric signs and flying cars tell us this. The extravagant skyscrapers and squalid street life tell us a great deal about the social structure. In addition, it always seems to be raining, hinting at dramatic climate change. Picked up by the police, Deckard (the Harrison Ford character) is taken by flying car to police headquarters, landing on the roof. Once inside, there is a sudden shift: the interior is not futuristic at all; in fact it is the inside of the Los Angeles train station — it is Mission Revival in its architectural style. Why an 18th-century looking building as a location choice? One thing you will learn as a filmmaker is that everything has to be for a reason — for every choice you make, whether in the story, the location, the props, whatever. Random choices do not help you tell your story. These choices may not always be conscious decisions (although all the major ones should be), but to simply “let things happen” will almost never result in a coherent, smooth flowing story that conveys your original intentions in the way you wanted. The camera cranes down to the roof of an office and we discover... trash. The camera continues down and we find ourselves in the captain’s office. Again, its style and set dressing seems completely anachronistic and odd: wood filing cabinets, a desk fan, an old TV. Why is this? Then Deckard enters and his trench coat with the upturned collar provides the final clue: this could easily be a scene from a film noir detective story. The director is sending us a simple message: this may be the future with flying cars and replicants, but at the heart
• 17. Figures 1.2 through 1.5. Visual elements carry the story in this early scene from Blade Runner, but they also supply important visual cues about the subtext and tone of the narrative. This is the essence of visual storytelling: to convey meaning to the viewer in ways other than words — to add levels of meaning in addition to the dialog and action of it, this is an old-fashioned detective story with the hard-boiled sleuth and the femme fatale — and all of this is communicated entirely through visual means. So how do we do it? As cinematographers, directors, production designers, and editors, how do we accomplish these aims? What are the essential elements we work with and manipulate to create this visual world? If cinema is a language, then we must ask: what is the structure of that language? What is vocabulary, what are the rules of grammar, the structure of this cinematic language? What are the tools of cinematography and filmmaking — the essential techniques, methods, and elements that we can use to tell our story visually? writing with motion 3
• 18. Figure 1.6. Strong visual elements tell us a great deal of the situation of the character in the opening frame of Punch Drunk Love. THE [CONCEPTUAL] TOOLS OF CINEMATOGRAPHY What we’re talking about here is not the physical tools of filmmaking: the camera, dolly, the lights, cranes and camera mounts, we are talking about the conceptual tools of the trade. So what are they? What are the conceptual tools of visual storytelling that we employ in all forms of visual storytelling? There are many, but we can roughly classify them into some general categories. The Frame Selecting the frame is the fundamental act of filmmaking; as filmmakers we must direct the audience’s attention: “look here, now look at this, now over here...” Choosing the frame is a matter of conveying the story, but it is also a question of composition, rhythm, and perspective. Take this opening frame from Punch Drunk Love (Figure 1.6). It gives us a great deal of information about the situation and the main character. Instantly, we know he is isolated, cut off from most of the world. The wide and distant shot emphasizes his isolation and loneliness reinforced by the color scheme and the lack of wall decoration. The dull shapeless overhead fluorescent lighting underscores the mood and tone of the scene. Finally, the negative space on the right not only plays into the isolation and loneliness but into the possibility of something about to happen. The strong lines of perspective, both horizontal and vertical, converge on him, “pinning” him in his hunched-over position. Without a word being said, we know a great deal about this person, his world, and social situation, all of which are fundamental to the story. This frame from a beach scene in Angel Heart (Figure 1.7) also communicates a great deal: something is odd, out-of-balance. In unconventional framing, most of the frame is sky: negative space, we barely see the beach at all. One man is bundled in a coat, the other in cinematography 4
• 19. a T-shirt, even though it hardly seems like good tanning conditions. The viewpoint is distant, observational. We know this is going to and you would normally expect the director to go in for close-ups, the camera hangs back, reinforcing the strangeness of the situation. In this scene from The Verdict (Figures 1.8 and 1.9) the entire story is at a climactic point: the trial has reached the end, the lawyer (Paul Newman) has had his entire case thrown out, witnesses disqualified, evidence excluded. He has nothing left but his final summation and he is surrounded by empty space: isolated and alone visually, this Figure 1.7. (top) A frame from Angel Heart. Figures 1.8 and 1.9. (middle and bottom) This scene from The Verdict starts with a wide shot, then pushes in to a close-up. writing with motion 5
• 20. Figure 1.10. (top) The compression of space created by a very long lens establishes the visual impression of a trap, a spider’s web in the final scene of Seven — an excellent example of visual metaphor in cinematography. Figure 1.11. (bottom) An extremely wide lens creates distortion for comic effect in City of Lost Children. reflects his situation — he is utterly on his own at this point. Strong lines of perspective cut him off and lead the eye constantly back to him. A lamp hangs over his head like the sword of Damocles as if it might come crashing down any instant. All eyes are turned toward him at the almost exact center of the frame; clearly the weight of the that this is his do-or-die moment — that everything about the case, and indeed about his entire life, depends on what he is about to say. As the scene builds in a continuous shot, the camera slowly pushes in to a medium shot, thus excluding nearly everything else in the courtroom and focusing the viewer’s attention on him alone: other people still in the shot are out of focus. The Lens Again, we are not talking about the physical lens, what concerns us here is how various lenses render images in different ways. This is a powerful tool of visual storytelling — the ability of optics to alter — a flavor and an inflection it adds to the image. There are many cinematography 6
• 21. factors involved: contrast and sharpness, for example, but by far the most influential aspect of a lens is the focal length: how wide or long it is. A short focal length lens has a wide field of view, and a long focal length lens is like a telescope or binoculars; it has a narrow field of view. compresses space and a wide lens expands and distorts space. Look at this frame from Seven (Figure 1.10): at the climactic ending of the film, the detectives are taking John Doe to a place only he knows; as a part of their deal they are kept in the dark. The extremely long lens compresses the space and makes the transmission towers seem like they are right on top of each other: the visual metaphor it establishes is a spider’s web, a trap — which is exactly what it turns out to be. It is a powerfully graphic and arresting image that precisely reinforces the story point at that moment. We see the opposite effect in the frame from City of Lost Children (Figure 1.11). Here an extremely wide lens, a visual constant in the films of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, expands our perception of space and distorts the face — it has an effect that is both comedic and ominous. Figure 1.12. (top) Lighting is not only a strong compositional element in Apocalypse Now, it also conveys a great deal of emotional tone and tells us something about the mental state of the character. Figure 1.13. (bottom) A man trapped in a high-tech world, hunted and ensnared: lighting tells the story in this frame from Blade Runner. writing with motion 7
• 22. Figure 1.14. (top) Desaturated sepia-toned color is the key texture element in O Brother, Where Art Thou. Figure 1.15. (bottom) Color and shadows in addition to makeup effects are central to this music video Come To Daddy (Aphex Twin) by Chris Cunningham. cinematography 8 Light and Color Light and color are some of the most powerful tools in the cinematographers arsenal. Lighting and controlling color are what takes up most of the director of photographer’s time on most sets and for good reason. They also have a special power that is shared only by a very few art forms such as music and dance: they have the ability to reach people at a gut, emotional level. This is the very definition of cinematic language as we use the term here: visual tools that add additional layers of meaning to the content of the story. In this frame from Apocalypse Now (Figure 1.12), the single shaft of light powerfully communicates the idea of a man alone, isolated in his madness. In a climactic frame from Blade Runner (Figure 1.13), the stabbing shafts of light and silhouetted bars on the window instantly communicate a man ensnared in a high-tech nightmare world from which there is no escape.
• 23. Texture These days, we rarely shoot anything “straight” — meaning a scene where we merely record reality and attempt to reproduce it exactly as it appears in life. In most cases — particularly in feature films, commercials, and certainly in music videos — we manipulate the image in some way, we add some visual texture to it; this is not to be confused with the surface texture of objects. There are many devices we use to accomplish this: changing the color and contrast of the picture, desaturating the color of the image, filters, fog and smoke effects, rain, using unusual film stocks, various printing techniques, and of course the whole range of image manipulation that can be accomplished with digital images on the computer — the list goes on and on. Some of these image manipulations are done with the camera, some are done with lighting, some are mechanical efx, and some are done in post production. A particularly dramatic example is O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Figure 1.14). Cinematographer Roger Deakins experimented with many camera and filter techniques to create the faded postcard sepia-toned look that he and the director envisioned. None of them proved satisfactory and in the end, he turned to an entirely new process: the digital intermediate (DI). The DI employs the best of both worlds: the original images are shot on film and ultimately will be projected on film in theaters. But in the intermediate stages, the image is manipulated electronically, in the digital world, with all the vast array of tools for image making that computers afford us — and there are many. Some similar techniques are used in this music video Come to Daddy Figure 1.16. This shot from Angel Heart is an insert — a tighter shot of a detail from the larger scene. Here it is an informational insert, it establishes some point of information that the filmmaker needs the audience to know, in this case, that the private detective has many different fake identities at the ready. for Aphex Twin. In this video, Cunningham uses a wide variety of visual texture devices, including making film look like bad video, frame are the shadowy lighting, contrasty look and the green/cyan shift of the entire image, all of which reinforce the ghastly, surrealistic imagery of the content. writing with motion 9
• 24. Movement of the few art forms that employ motion and time; dance obviously being another one. This opening sequence from Working Girl (Figures 1.17 through 1.23) is an excellent example of exciting, dynamic motion that serves an important storytelling purpose. It is a kinetic, whirling helicopter shot that begins by circling the head of the Statue of Liberty, then picks up the Staten Island ferry, and then ultimately goes inside (in a dissolve that simulates continuing the single moving This is far more than just a powerfully dynamic motion; it is also a clear visual metaphor: the story is about the main characters transition from a working girl secretary trapped in a dreary existence where every day starts with a ride on the ferry; on this day her birthday is celebrated with a single candle in a cupcake. By the end of the film she is transformed into a strong, independent woman with a good haircut who stands proud and tall, not unlike the Statue of Liberty — the image that opens the film. Establishing tion; think of it as a visual equivalent of exposition, which in verbal storytelling means conveying important information or background to the audience. It is really at the heart of telling a story visually — letting the camera reveal information is usually a more cinematic way of getting information across to the audience than is dialog or a voice-over narrator. In this frame from Angel Heart (Figure 1.16), a vital story information without words: clearly he carries fake IDs to assist him in his slightly sleazy work as a cut-rate private detective. the lens, but it can also be done with lighting that conceals or reveals certain details of the scene. Figures 1.17 through 1.23. This opening scene from Working Girl is not only a dynamic helicopter move, it is also a powerful visual metaphor that introduces us to two main characters, establishes the tone and some key ideas of the film, some of the backstory, and even hints at some of the aspirations and destiny of the main character. cinematography 10 Point-of-View Point-of-view (POV) is a key tool of visual storytelling. We use the term in many different ways on a film set, but the most often used meaning is to have the camera see something in much the same way as one of the characters would see it: to view the scene from that character’s point-of-view. The importance of this concept can be seen in Figure 1.1. A young Orson Welles has drawn a simple diagram: “eye = I” — the camera essentially becomes the perception of the viewer. This is fundamental to cinema: the camera is the “eye” of the audience; how the camera takes in the scene is how the audience will perceive it. To a great extent, cinematography consists of showing the audience what we want them to know about the story; POV shots tend to make the audience more involved in the story for the simple reason that what they see and what the character sees are momentarily the same thing — in a sense, the audience inhabits the character’s brain and experiences the world as that character is experiencing it. There are many ways POV is used in filmmaking, and those will be discussed later, but these frames from Chinatown show a basic use of the method. In Figures 1.24 through 1.26, we see over-the-shoulder as Jake Gittes follows someone he has been hired to investigate. Parking facing away from the subject to remain unseen, he glances into his rear-view mirror. The scene cuts to what he sees in the mirror — his subjective POV.
• 25. Figure 1.24. (top) This scene from Chinatown employs POV to establish plot elements. The first shot is an over-the-shoulder which establishes the scene and the relationship between the two cars. Figures 1.25. (middle) We see the detective looking; this establishes that what we see next will be his point-of-view. Figure 1.26. (bottom) We see his subjective POV of what he sees in the mirror; this is the payoff of what has been established in the previous two shots. Chinatown employs another layer of POV as well — called detective POV. A narrative device that is used in novels and stories as well, it simply means that the audience does not know something until the detective know it — we only discover clues when he discovers them. This means that the viewer is even more involved in how the main character is experiencing the events of the story. Polanksi is a master of taking this story technique and he makes it truly visual. For example a very large number of shots in the film are over-theshoulders of Jake Gittes, the detective played by Jack Nicholson. PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER Filmmaking is a strange and mysterious enterprise — it involves mixing and coordinating many different elements, some of them artistic, some of them technical and businesslike. In particular, the cinematographer must be able to bridge that gap — to understand the practical side of dealing with the camera, lenses, digital aspects, file types, workflow, and so on, but also have their minds firmly planted in the artistic side of creating a visual world, visual metaphor, and storytelling. There is a third aspect as well: being an amateur psychologist. On a film set, there is no more fundamental collaboration than that of the cinematographer and director. either verbally or with drawings, metaphors, or photographic references. Some directors are not good at this — they have a visual writing with motion 11
• 26. concept, but they are not able to communicate it well to their collaborators. In other cases, the director does not have a strong vision and needs help in developing one. In these instances, it is really up to the cinematographer to reach into the director’s head and try to understand what it is he or she is trying to accomplish; if there are missing pieces in the visual puzzle that is a film project, then it is up to the DP to fill in those blank spots with artistic inspiration, collaboration, and leadership. Sometimes this bring into play another role the cinematographer must play: diplomat, which may call for a great deal of delicacy and being very careful about how one phrases a suggestion. In any case, it is up to the cinematographer to make the director’s vision come alive. We in the camera department are in the business of making things happen — taking artistic ideas and implementing them in the real world of the film set. Our job is to make dreams come alive, and it is a challenging and satisfying undertaking. cinematography 12
• 27. Film is a dream — but whose? Bruce Kawin shooting methods © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50002-6
• 28. WHAT IS CINEMATIC? It’s easy to think of filmmaking as not much more than “We’ll put the actors on the set and roll the camera.” Obviously there is much more involved, but it’s important to understand that even if all you do is record what is in front of the camera, you are still making definite decisions about how the audience is going to perceive the scene. This is the crucial point: ultimately, filmmaking is about what the audience “gets” from each scene, not only intellectually (such as the plot) but also emotionally. Perhaps just as important, at the end of each scene are they still asking themselves, “I wonder what happens next?” In other words, are they still interested in the story? A Question of Perception First of all, we have to recognize that how we perceive the world in a film is fundamentally different from how we perceive the world with our eyes and ears. Film only presents the illusion of the reality. What do we mean when we say something is cinematic? Most of the time, people use the word to mean that a novel or play is fast-paced and visual. Here, we use it in a different way; in this discussion we use the term to mean all the techniques and methods of filmmaking that we use to add layers of meaning to the content. Content means the things we are recording – the sets, the actors, the dialog, the props, and so on. In the theater, there is nothing between the eyes and ears of the audience and what is happening in front of them. In film, we have many methods of altering their perception of that reality. How It’s Different from Theater In the early days of cinema, many practitioners were theatrical people. When they first saw the movie camera, they conceived it as a tool to extend their audience: they just put the camera where the audience would be and used it to record a performance. The upshot of this is that the entire performance is viewed from a single point of view, which is how a theatergoer sees a play. As a result, in early films the camera did not move, there were no close-ups, no shifting point-of-view, and so forth — in other words, practically none of the tools and techniques of cinema as we know them now. In short, these early films depend almost entirely on their content, just as theater does, but they lack the immediacy and personal experience of a live theater performance. The history of cinema can easily be studied as the introduction and addition of various techniques and methods that we call “cinematic” — in other words, the conceptual tools we referred to in the previous chapter: the frame, the lens, light and color, texture, movement, establishing, and point-of-view. In this chapter we will deal primarily with the frame and another important tool: editing. While editing is not the cinematographer’s job, it is critical to understand that the job of the cinematographer and director working on the set is to provide the editor with footage that he or she can use creatively and effectively. Figure 2.1. (previous page) The Lady from Shanghai. cinematography 14 Visual Subtext and Visual Metaphor So cinematography has many purposes, some of them far beyond the simple act of “photographing” the action. In fact, if you are a filmmaker who only wants the camera to record “reality,” you are ignoring some of the most powerful jobs cinematography can do for you. Many of these methods are all about adding visual subtext to your scenes. In addition to visual subtext, visual metaphor can be a powerful tool as well.
• 29. Figure 2.2. To convey the sense of the rigid, hierarchical social structure of 18th century Europe, Stanley Kubrick uses formal, geometric composition throughout most of Barry Lyndon. Deconstructing Reality and Putting It Back Together Let’s say we have a typical scene: two people sitting at a table talking and having coffee. We do a wide shoot, of course, but we also get close-ups of the two characters, a tight shot of the coffee cups, a close shot of the clock on the wall, perhaps a shot of the waitress as she pours, and so on. Think of it this way: every time we do a shot we are taking a slice, a piece of that scene — we are dividing up the scene into small parts; to use a fancy term, we are deconstructing it. We have taken the “real reality” (the actors, the set, the props, the dialog) and broken it up into pieces: the shots that are “in the can.” Now comes the second step: we put it back together. This is editing. The magic is that we can reassemble this reality in a any way we choose. We can move things around in time and in physical relation to each other: changing the pace, the tone, the mood, even the events. We create a new reality which can be a fairly accurate representation of what really happened or can be very different — in the viewer’s perception. THE FRAME Setting the frame is a series of choices that decide what the viewer will see and not see. The first of these decisions is where to place the camera in relation to the scene. After that, there are choices concerning the field of vision and movement, all of which work together to influence how the audience will perceive the shot: both in outright content and in emotional undercurrent and subtext to the action and the dialog. Static Frame A static frame is a proscenium. The action of the scene is presented as a stage show: we are a third person observer. There is a proscenium wall between us and the action. This is especially true if everything else about the frame is also normal — that is, level, normal lens, no movement, and so on. This does not mean, however, that a static frame is not without value. It can be a useful tool that carries its own baggage and implications of POV and world view. In Stanley Kubrick’s film Barry Lyndon, the fixed, well-composed, balanced frames reflect the static, hierarchical society of the time (Figure 2.2). Everyone has his place, every social interaction is governed by well-defined rules. The actors move within this frame without being able to alter it. It is a reflection of the world they live in, and while it strongly implies a sense of order and tranquility, it also carries an overpowering lack of mobility: both social and physishooting methods 15
• 30. Figure 2.3. The perspectival apparatus from Peter Greenaway’s The Draughtsman’s Contract — the fundamental idea of selecting a viewpoint and defining a frame. cal. The world is static: the characters try to find their place in it. Each scene is played out completely within this fixed frame: without movement, cuts, or changes in perspective. This use of the frame conveys a wealth of information independent of the script or the actions of the characters. It adds layers of meaning. A similar use of the static frame is the Swedish film Songs from the Second Floor (Figure 2.24) which also plays out every scene, with one exception, as a single long take within a completely immobile frame. Jim Jarmusch used the same technique in his second film, Stranger Than Paradise. Jarmusch claims that shooting scenes as a single shot was done to save film, but it is also an important stylistic element of the film. In both the examples, the distancing nature of the frame is used for its own purpose. The filmmakers are deliberately putting the audience in the position of the impersonal observer. This can either lend an observational, judgmental tone or much like objects in the foreground of the frame, make the audience work harder to put themselves into the scene, or a combination of both. As with almost all cinematic techniques they can be used in reverse to achieve a completely different effect than normal. CINEMA AS A LANGUAGE You have probably heard interviews with directors where at some point they lean forward with great gravitas and pronounce, “You know, cinema is a language.” The first time you hear this your reaction might was likely, “Wow, what an insight. That’s deep.” Perhaps sometime later you hear an interview with a different director who also announces solemnly, “Cinema is a language all it’s own,” and the reaction might be “Hey, he’s hip to it too.” By the time you hear the fifth or sixth filmmaker grandly say, “Film is a language,” your response might be “Yeah, yeah, I know that… now tell me something I can use." What is the structure of this language? What is the vocabulary, the syntax, how does it work?” This is why it is important to study cinematography as more than merely the technical aspects of motion picture photography. cinematography 16
• 31. The Shots: Building Blocks of a Scene It is useful to think of “building” a scene. Since we make scenes one shot at a time, we can consider that we are assembling the elements that will make the scene. If we think of a language of cinema, these shots are the vocabulary; how we edit them together would be the syntax of this language. These are the visual aspects of the language of film; there are, of course, other properties of this language that relate more to plot structure and narrative, but here we are concerned only with the visual side of this subject. There are a number of shots that are basic building blocks of film grammar (Figure 2.14). In a by no means exhaustive list, they are: With a few exceptions, most of these shots apply to the human form, but the terminology carries over to any subject. As they appear in the script they are called stage directions. Let’s look at them individually. As with many film terms, the definitions are somewhat loose and different people have slight variations in how they apply them, particularly as you travel from city to city or work in another country; they are just general guidelines. It is only when you are lining it up through the lens that the exact frame can be decided on and all the factors that go into a shot can be fully assessed. As they appear in the script, stage directions are completely nonbinding — it is entirely up to the director to decide what shots will be used to put the scene together. The screenwriter really has no say over what shots will be used, but they are helpful in visualizing the story as you read the script — especially if you are giving the script to people in order to secure financing for the project or to actors so they can decide if they want to be involved. These shots are the basic vocabulary we deal with — both in terms of editing and also trying to do. These basic elements and how they are combined in editorial continuity are the grammar of cinema. Wide Shot The wide shot is any frame that encompasses the entire scene. This makes it all relative to the subject. For example, if the script says “Wide shot — the English Countryside” we are clearly talking about a big panoramic scene done with a short focal length lens taking in all the eye can see. On the other hand, if the description is “Wide shot — Leo’s room” this is clearly a much smaller shot but it still encompasses all or most of the room. shooting methods 17
• 32. Figure 2.4. An establishing shot from The Shining. It gives a great deal of information about the size, location and layout of the hotel — which is essentially a main character in the film. This is also an example of a wide shot. Establishing Shots The establishing shot is usually a wide shot. It is the opening shot of a scene that tells us where we are. A typical one might be “Establishing shot — Helen’s office.” This might consist of a wide shot of an office building, so when we cut to a shot of Helen at her desk, we know where we are: in her office building. We’ve seen that it is a big, modern building, very upscale and expensive and that it is located in midtown Manhattan, and the bustling activity of streets indicate it’s another hectic workday in New York. The establishing shot has given us a great deal of information. Laying Out the Scene — Establishing the Geography A phrase that is often used is that we have to “establish the geography.” In other words we have to give the audience some idea of where they are, what kind of place it is, where objects and people are in relation to each other. Other aspects of this are discussed in the chapter Cinematic Continuity. Establishing the geography is helpful to the audience to let them know the “lay of the land” within a scene. It helps them orient themselves and prevents confusion that might divert their attention from the story. There are times when you want to keep the layout a mystery, of course. As we will see throughout the discussion of film grammar and editing, one of the primary purposes is to not confuse the audience. There will be times of course where you will want to confuse them, but if you don’t give them information and they have to spend time trying to figure something out, however subconsciously, you have taken their minds away from the characters and the story. Kurosawa is a master of this type of establishing, as in these shots from Seven Samurai (Figures 2.5 and 2.6). He uses it as a way to make abstract ideas concrete and visible. An establishing shot, such as our office building example, might also include a tilt up to an upper floor. This indicates to the audience that we are not just seeing an office building, but that we are going cinematography 18
• 33. Figures 2.5 and 2.6. Ever the master of making the abstract concrete, in this scene from Seven Samurai, Kurosawa cuts directly from the map of the village to a shot of the samurai walking in the location he was pointing to. inside. A further variation is to end with a zoom in to a particular window, a more obvious cue as to where we are headed. Shots of this type are sometimes considered old-fashioned and prosaic, but they can still be effective. Even though they do give us a good deal of information, they are still a complete stop in the dramatic action. Many filmmakers consider it more effective if the establishing shot can be combined with a piece of the story. One example: say we are looking down that same bustling street and our character Helen comes into view, rushing frantically and holding a big stack of documents; we pan or dolly with her as she runs into the lobby and dashes to catch a departing elevator. The same information has been conveyed, but we have told a piece of the story as well. Something is up with Helen; all those documents are obviously something important that has put her under a great deal of stress. Of course, in the story, Helen may already be in her office. One of the classic solutions has been to combine a bit of foreground action with the establishing shot. For example, we start with a medium shot of a sidewalk newsstand. An anonymous man buys a paper and building. What we have done here is keep the audience in the story and combined it with showing the building and the context. shooting methods 19
• 34. In a sense it is a bit of distraction such as a stage magician might use, but in another sense it does convey some useful information. Certainly it’s a lot better than just cutting to Helen and have her do some hackneyed “on the nose” dialog such as, “Oh my god, what am I going to do about the big financial scandal?” Of course, there is one more level you can add: the guy who buys the newspaper is not an anonymous man, but turns out to be the reporter who is going to uncover the real story. These are just examples, of course, but the point is to convey the location information in combination with a piece of the story or something that conveys a visual idea, a sound track inflection or anything that increases our understanding of the place, the mood, or anything that is useful to you as the storyteller. A more elaborate, but effective establishing sequence is this one from Goldfinger (Figures 2.8 to 2.13). The opening shot is a flying banner that tells the audience they are in Miami Beach, and the helicopter shot closes in on a beach hotel and then into a tighter shot of a diver. We follow him down into the water and then cut to under the water where he swims away. A crossing female swimmer carries us back in the opposite direction where we discover Felix Leiter, who walks away to find... Bond, James Bond. The sequence elegantly establishes not only the location and circumstance but carries us in a continuous sweep of motion and action. Character Shots There are a number of terms for different shots of a single character. Most movies and short films are about people, so shots of people are one of the fundamental building blocks of cinema. The same applies to most commercials and even many music videos. For illustrations of all types of character shots, see Figure 2.14. Full Shot Full shot indicates that we see the character from head to toe. It can refer to objects as well: a full shot of a car includes all of the car. A shot that only includes the door and the driver would be more of a medium shot. A variation on this is the cowboy, which is from the top of the head to midthigh, originally in order to see the six-guns on his belt. In non-English speaking countries, terms such as plán americain or plano americano refers to a shot framed from mid-leg up. Two Shot The two shot is any frame that includes two characters. The interaction between two characters in a scene is one of the most fundamental pieces of storytelling; thus the two shot is one you will use frequently. The two characters don’t have to be arranged symmetrically in the frame. They might be facing each other, both facing forward, both facing away from the camera, and so on, but the methods you use for dealing with this type of scene will be the same in any case. You might also occasionally hear the term three-shot for a shot of three characters. Medium Shot The medium shot, like the wide shot, is relative to the subject. Obviously, it is closer than a full shot. Medium shots might be people at a table in a restaurant, or someone buying a soda, shown from the waist up. By being closer in to the action, we can see people’s expressions, details of how they are dressed, and so on. We thus become more involved in what they are saying and doing, without focusing on one specific character or any particular detail. cinematography 20
• 35. Close-ups Close-ups are one of the most important shots in the vocabulary. There are a number of variations: a medium close-up would generally be considered as something like from top of head to waist or something in that area. A close-up (CU) would generally be from the top of the head to somewhere just below the shirt pockets. If the shot is cut just above the shirt pocket area, it is often called a head and shoulders. A choker would be from the top of the head down to just below the chin. A tight close-up would be slightly less: losing some of the forehead and perhaps some of the chin, framing the eyes, nose, and mouth. An extreme close-up or ECU might include the eyes only; this is sometimes called a Sergio Leone after the Italian director who used it fre- Figure 2.7. A classic medium shot from Shanghai Express. Note also how the lighting is very specific for this shot and for her pose. If her head were not in just the right position, the lighting would not achieve such an elegant and powerful effect. Figures 2.8 through 2.13. (opposite page) An establishing sequence from Goldfinger. This series of shots tells the viewer what city they are in, what hotel, where Bond is situated, and by following a swimmer from the diving board to an underwater view and pan over to find Felix Lighter, it introduces a key character. on a desktop, a watch, and so on. Any shot that includes only one character is called a single. Terminology for close-ups includes: Medium CU. Midchest up. Choker: from the throat up. Big Head CU giving a bit of “haircut.” That is cutting off just a little bit of the head. ECU: Varies, but usually just mouth and eyes. A close-up, medium or full shot might also be called a clean single whenever it’s a shot of one actor alone. If we are shooting someone’s clean single. If we do include a little bit of the actor in front, it’s often called a dirty single. This is not to be confused with an over-the-shoulder (see below), which includes more of the foreground actor. shooting methods 21
• 36. Full shot or head-to-toe. Cowboy. Outside the US, sometimes called the American shot. Medium. Also, any shot that shows a person alone is a single. Three T’s or Medium Close-up. Close-up or head and shoulders. Choker or big head close-up. Extreme close-up (ECU). It’s OK to give them a “haircut.” Two shot. Any shot of two people is a Three shot. ‘nuff said. two shot. A 50-50. Don’t use it as a cheap substitute for getting proper coverage. An over-the-shoulder (OTS). A very important shot in filmmaking. The answering shot for the OTS at left. Figure 2.14. There is a fairly standard repertoire of shots that are commonly used in film. You are not by any means limited to these shot. It’s just that these are the most common ones that have names. There are some variations in the names from place to place, but overall they are fairly consistent. cinematography 22
• 37. Figure 2.15. (above) An atmospheric cutaway from Nine and 1/2 Weeks. Figure 2.16. (left) A 50-50 shot from Casablanca. Over-the-Shoulder A variation of the close-up is the over-the-shoulder or OTS, looking It ties the two characters together and helps put us in the position of the person being addressed. The OTS is a useful part of the vocabulary of narrative filmmaking. Even when we are in close shot of the person talking, the OTS keeps the other actor in the scene. An OTS contains more of the foreground actor than a dirty single and their position in the frame is more deliberate. Cutaways A cutaway is any shot of some person or thing in the scene other than the main characters we are covering but that is still related to the scene. The definition of a cutaway is that it is something we did not see previously in the scene, particularly in the master or any wide shots. Examples would be a cutaway to a view out the window or to the cat sleeping on the floor. Cutaways may emphasize some action in the scene, provide additional information, or be something that the character looks at or points to. If it is a shot of an entirely different location or something unrelated to the scene, then it is not a cutaway, but is a different scene and should have its own scene number in the script. An important use of cutaways is as safeties for the editor. If the editor is somehow having trouble cutting the scene, a cutaway to something else can be used to solve the problem. A good rule of thumb is in almost every scene you shoot, get some cutaways as editorial safety, even if they are not called for in the script or essential to the scene — a cutaway might save the scene in editing. Reaction Shots A specific type of close-up or medium is the reaction shot. Something happens or a character says something and we cut to another person reacting to what happened or what was said; it can be the other person in the dialog or someone elsewhere in the scene. Generally, the term refers to a facial expression or body language, not dialog. A reaction shot is a good way to get a safety cutaway for the editor. Sometimes the term just refers to the other side of the dialog, which is part of our normal coverage. Reaction shots are very important and many beginning filmmakers fail to shoot enough of them. Silent films shooting methods 23
• 38. Figures 2.17 through 2.19. An elegantly executed triple reveal from High Noon. In one shot, the bad guys ride into town; as the horse rears up we see the sign that reads Marshal. The bad guys ride on and then from behind we see the sign that reads Justice of the Peace, and the camera pulls back to show the marshal in the process of getting “hitched.” This shot also clearly tells us where we are (in town outside the marshal’s office) and starts to establish the geography of the place. It also establishes the main characters and conflicts. were the apex of reaction shots as a method: you can only watch so much of someone talking without hearing them; even with title cards, it doesn’t tell the whole story. It is when you see the facial and body language reactions of the listener that you get the entire emotional content of the scene. Reaction shots may not seem important when you are shooting the scene, but they are invaluable in editing. cinematography 24
• 39. Inserts An insert is an isolated, self-contained piece of a larger scene. To be an insert instead of a cutaway, it has to be something we saw in the wider shots. Example: she is reading a book. We could just shoot the book over her shoulder, but it is usually hard to read from that dis- Figure 2.20. (top) A moody atmospheric cutaway from Angel Heart. Figure 2.21. (bottom) An insert from Groundhog Day. inserts will not be of any help to the editor. The reason for this is that since an insert is a closer shot of the larger scene, its continuity must match the overall action. For example, if we see a wide shot of the cowboy going for his gun, a tight insert of the gun coming out the holster must match the action and timing of the wider shot; this means it can be used only in one place in the scene and won’t help the editor if they need to solve a problem elsewhere in the scene. shooting methods 25
• 40. There is no need to be specific about the terminology when setting up a shot; it’s enough to just say, “let’s get an insert of that” however, inserts tend to fit into a few general categories: Informational inserts. A shot of a clock on the wall is a practical insert, as is reading the headlines on the newspaper or the name of the file being pulled from the drawer. These are mostly about giving the audience some essential piece of information we want them to know. Emphasis inserts: the tires skid to a halt. The coffee cup jolts as he pounds the table. The windows rattle in the wind. Emphasis inserts are usually closely connected to the main action but not absolutely essential to it. Atmosphere inserts: these are little touches that contribute to the mood, pacing, or tone of a scene (Figures 2.15 and 2.20). Atmosphere inserts may have almost no connection to the scene other than mood, tone, or a sort of symbolism or visual allegory. They are generally reserved for more stylized filmmaking. They should be used with caution; such shots can easily be arch, heavyhanded and obvious. Figure 2.22. Basic elements of the Master Scene Method. Top is the master shot. Second from the top is a loose over-the-shoulder of her. Third down is a tighter medium over-the-shoulder. Fourth down is her close-up — in this case a choker. When you turn around to get the coverage on him, these are the answering shots. It is very important that the answering shots match the coverage on her as closely as possible. Using the same focal length lens and the same focus distance will ensure that they are both the same image size, which will make the edits much smoother and less jarring. cinematography 26 Connecting Shots Most scenes involving two people can be adequately edited with singles of each person; whether are talking to each other or one is viewing the other from a distance, such as a shot of a sniper taking aim at someone. This is sometimes called separation. There is always a danger, however, that it will seem a bit cheap and easy and the fact that it is an editing trick might somehow undermine the scene. Any time the scene includes people or objects that cannot be framed in the same shot at some point in the scene, a connecting shot is called for. This applies especially to point-of-view shots where the character looks at something, then in a separate shot, we see what she is looking at; but it also applies to any scene where two or more people are in the same general space, whether they are aware of each other or not. A connecting shot is one that shows both of the characters in one shot, often it is in the form of an over-the-shoulder or wide angle that includes both of them (Figure 6.57). Connecting shots just make a scene feel more complete and whole. The fragmentation of doing it all with POVs and reaction shots is after all a cheat that calls upon movie magic to piece together the whole scene. It works, but may not be as involving or emotionally satisfying to the audience, especially if overused. A connecting shot is a way to tie things together in a way that clarifies and emphasizes the physical, which are usually story relationships as well — clearly, one of the prime objectives of good directing and good shooting is to have the visual elements reinforce the narrative elements. Pickups A pickup can be any type of shot, master or coverage, where you are starting in middle of the scene (different from previous takes where you started at the beginning as it is written in the script). You can pick it up only if you are sure you have coverage to cut to along the PU is added to the scene number on the slate so the editor will know why they don’t have a complete take of the shot. Another use of the term is a pickup day. This is one or several days of shooting after the film is already in editing. At this point the director and editor may realize that there are just a few shots here and there that they have absolutely must have in order to make a good edit.
• 41. Figure 2.23. A master shot from Ronin. Once the master has established the basic layout of the scene and the physical relationships of the characters, the editor can easily cut to medium shots, over-the-shoulders, close-ups, reaction shots, and so on without confusing the audience. Transitional Shots Some shots are not parts of a scene themselves but instead serve to connect two scenes together. We can think of these as transitional shots. They might come at the end of a scene, at the beginning, or between scenes. Some are simple cutaways: a scene ends, cut to a shot of a sunset and then into the next scene. There are many other types of transitional shots as well, they are a sort of visual code to the audience that the scene is ending. Scenes of the city or landscape are frequently used as transitional devices as they also add to the mood or pace and are generically visual — meaning they don’t need to make a specific point in order to be interesting. Invisible Technique In almost all cases, we want our methods to be transparent — we don’t want the audience to be aware of them. We are striving for invisible technique. THE SHOOTING METHODS There are many different ways to shoot a scene, but some basic methods are used most often. The following summaries are some of the most fundamental and frequently used techniques for shooting a scene. The master scene method is by far the most frequently used method of shooting a scene, especially for dialog scenes. Actions sequences are an exception to this. It seldom makes sense to use the master scene method for these, as it depends entirely on repeating the action of the scene many times. The Master Scene Method In principal, the master scene method is quite simple: first you shoot the entire scene as one shot from beginning to end — this is the master. Once you have the master, you move on to the coverage. Except in rare cases, it is always best to shoot the master first, as all the rest of the shots must match what was done in the master. Not shooting the master first will frequently lead to continuity problems. The master does not have to be a wide shot but it usually is. Nor does it have to be static; a moving master is fine too. The important thing is that it is the entire scene from beginning to end. For complex scenes, we sometimes break it into mini-masters within the scene , just use common sense to plan how to best get the scene covered. shooting methods 27
• 42. Figure 2.24. Plan-scene, an in-one or developing master all mean the same thing: an entire scene played out in one continuous shot. These scenes can be shot with a panning camera, dolly shot, Steadicam or hand-held but in the case of Songs from the Second Floor (above) every scene in the film plays out as a static single shot. In some countries this method of shooting a scene is called a plansequence. Coverage The coverage consists of the over-the-shoulders, medium shots and close-ups that will be used to complete the scene. Think of the master as a framework for the whole scene — coverage is the pieces that fit into that framework to make it all work together. This is why you should always shoot the master first. It establishes the continuity for the scene — everything you shoot after that has to match what was established in the master. After you have shot the master you will have to pick one side (one of the actors) to begin with. It is important to do all of their shots before you turn around and do the coverage of the other actor, because changing the camera position from one side to another often involves changing the lighting and moving other equipment. It is a huge waste of time to do some shots of one side, move to the other side and then come back to the original side. The shots you do on the second actor are called the answering shots, and it is important for editing that they match the coverage of the first actor in their lens size and focus distance: this is to keep them a consistent size as you cut back and forth between them. Some basic common sense principals apply when shooting with the master scene method: first; if you try to shoot coverage first and the master later, it will likely cause problems in continuity. clean frame and have them enter. frame. Continue to shoot for a beat after that. the scene. of the scene. This is called shooting out that side. If you know you are going to use mostly the coverage when you edit, you may be able to live with some minor mistakes in a master. It is easy to get carried away with dozens of takes of the master. cinematography 28
• 43. Overlapping or Triple-Take Method The overlapping method is also called the triple-take method. Say you are filming the manufacture of a large axle on a big industrial lathe. It’s a real factory and you are doing an industrial video for the company. The metal piece is expensive and they are only making one today. The point is that you are not going to be able to repeat the action. You can ask the machinist to pause for a few minutes but there is no going back to repeat. On the other hand, you don’t want to show a 5 or 10-minute process all from the same angle — that would be incredibly boring. You need different angles. If you were using the master scene method, you would film the scene from one angle, then set up the camera for a different angle and repeat the scene, and so on for over-theshoulders, close-ups, and so on. The triple-take method is useful for scenes where the action cannot be repeated. Figure 2.25. (top) Examples of Hitchcock’s rule in Touch of Evil. Hitchcock said that the size of an object in the frame should equal its importance in the story. In this frame and in Figure 2.26, the gun is what is important at that moment in the story. Figure 2.26. (above) A similar example from The Lady from Shanghai. Overlapping So here’s what we do: as they bring in the metal piece to be cut, you shoot that in a wide shot to establish the scene; at that point you ask the workmen to pause for a moment. Then as they put the piece on the lathe, you quickly move in for a close-up. The machinists back up a few steps and bring the metal piece in again and carry on with the action, all the way up to securing it in the lathe. You then quickly move to another angle and get more of the action. In the end you will different angles that should cut together smoothly. Let’s take another example: a lecturer walks into a room, sets his notes on the lectern, then pulls up a chair and sits down. This is where the overlapping part comes in. You could get a wide shot of him coming in, then ask him to freeze while you set up for a closer shot of him putting the notes on the lectern, then have him freeze again while you set up another shot of him pulling up the chair. shooting methods 29
• 44. What you will discover is that the shots probably won’t cut together smoothly. The chance of finding a good, clean cutting point is a long shot. It is the overlapping that helps you find smooth cut points. Here is what will work much better: you get a wide shot of him walking in and let him take the action all the way through to putting the notes on the lectern. Then set up a different angle and ask the actor to back up a few steps. Once you roll the camera, the actor comes up to the lectern again (repeating the last part of his walk). You then shoot the action all the way through to pulling up the chair. Again you halt to set up a different angle, and have the actor back up from the lectern, and repeat the action of putting down the notes and then carrying it on through to the end of the scene. All this overlappping will enable you to cut the action together smoothly with good continuity cuts. The most important principal to take from this is to always overlap all action, no matter what shooting method you are using. Giving the editor some extra overlap at the beginning or end of any shot will prevent many potential problems when editing the scene. In-One Of all the methods of shooting a scene, by far the simplest is the in-one, sometimes called a oner or a developing master, or the French term plan-scene or plan-sequence. This just means the entire scene in one continuous shot. A scene might be simple as “she picks up the phone and talks” in which case a single shot is probably plenty. Some in-ones can be vastly more complicated: such as the famous fourminute opening shot of Touch of Evil or the long Steadicam shot of entering the Copacabana in Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas. A caution, however: when these shots work, they can be magnificent, but if they don’t work — for example, if you find in editing that the scene drags on much too slowly — your choices are limited. If all you did was several takes of the long in-one, you really don’t have much choice in editing. Play it safe — shoot some coverage and cutaways just in case. Freeform Method Many scenes theses days (and even entire movies) are shot in what is commonly called documentary style. Think of movies like Cloverfield or The Hurt Locker; the camera is handheld, loose, and the actor’s movements don’t seem preplanned. It seems like documentary style but it is not really. When shooting a real documentary, we can almost never do second takes, or have them repeat an action. Our aim in shooting fiction scenes like this is to make it seem like a documentary. In most cases, scenes like this are shot several times with the actors repeating the scene for several takes. Since the camera is hand-held, the camera operator usually does their best to follow the dialog: they pan the camera back and forth to always be on the person who is speaking. This can be a disaster for the editor. Imagine that you shoot a scene three times like this. You end up with three takes that are almost the same and the camera is only on the actor who is talking. Imagine trying to edit these three takes together — almost impossible. What you really have are three takes that are mostly the same, which is a nightmare for editors. Editing is all about having different angles to cut to. If all you have is three very similar takes, there are not really any different angles to cut to. Also, you have no reaction shots of the person listening; as we discussed before, reaction shots are important to the storytelling and the editing. So what to do? cinematography 30
• 45. Shooting the Freeform Method Here’s a method that works well; we call it the freeform method: the actor who is speaking. This is the dialog pass. who is not talking. This will give you lots of good reaction shots, which are important. It will also give the editor lots of things to cut away to. This is the reaction pass. improvise: follow the dialog sometimes, go to the nonspeaking actor sometimes, occasionally back up to get a wide shots — whatever seems appropriate. This is the freeform pass. All these together will give you a scene you can cut together smoothly and give the editor lots of flexibility to cut the scene in various ways and to tighten up parts that seem to be dragging. Figures 2.27 and 2.28. Point of View (POV) is a powerful tool, especially in the hands of a master like Kubrick. Here, Wendy's POV of the typewritten pages is the final confirmation that Jack has gone utterly insane. As shown in the first shot (top), POVs must nearly always be set up by showing the person “looking.” This establishes that the following shot is indeed a POV and leaves no doubt as to whose POV it is. Both parts of this POV are important: her look and what she sees. shooting methods 31
• 46. Figure 2.29. (top) The Lady in the Lake is one of the very rare examples of truly subjective point of view sustained throughout the entire film. Although the entire film is seen through the detective's subjective POV, the director cheats a bit to get a few shots of the detective as in this mirror shot. It's a cheat because that is not how the scene would actually appear to the character as he is looking in a mirror. Figure 2.30. (bottom) The reaction shot of the crowd as the detective enters is very awkward because all of the actors need to look directly into the lens, which makes the audience aware of the camera. Montage There is a special form of editing used in dramatic narrative filmmaking that does not aim for continuity at all; this is called montage. A montage is simply a series of shots related by theme. Say the theme is “Springtime in the city” — you might have a series of shots of the flowers blooming, gentle rain showers, the sun breaking through the clouds, that sort of thing. Some kinds of montage advance the story but without linear continuity. For example, Rocky prepares for the big fight: we see him working out, punching the bag, running on the streets of Philly, then finally running up the stairs to triumph. It is not real-time continuity — it takes place over months — but we see the story develop. It’s a series of related shots, not scenes with linear continuity. All of these methods share one common goal: to be invisible. We don’t want the audience to be aware they are a movie because this would distract them from the story. There are some exceptions to this of course, such as when Ferris Bueller addresses the audience directly; at times such as this all conventions of fiction are tossed aside, generally for comic effect (Figure 2.31). cinematography 32
• 47. INVOLVING THE AUDIENCE: POV Recall the three forms of literary voice: first person, second person, and third person. In first person storytelling (whether in a short story, novel, or in film), a character in the story is describing the events. He can only describe things that he himself sees. First person speaks as “I.” Such as “I went to the zoo.” Second person speaks as “you,” as in “You went to the zoo.” It is someone who is not the speaker but who is part of the conversation. Third person, on the other hand, speaks about “they,” as in “They go to the zoo sometimes.” Third person is completely objective, and first person is completely subjective. In this context, objective means merely showing or stating what is happening without getting involved. Imagine we are watching some people arguing from 20 feet away. In this case we are just watching “those people over there” and we can see them arguing — there is not much motivation for us to get deeply involved physically or emotionally. The complete opposite is when we are one of the people involved in the argument: we are completely engaged in every way. Second person is somewhere in between. Let’s think of it as if we are standing right behind one of the people arguing, right over their shoulder. We are not directly in the argument, but clearly it is much more involving and engaging than viewing it from a distance. There are few clear-cut lines of delineation between subjective and objective — only gradations. We have previously talked about giving the scene a point-of-view (or even several points-of-view). Each camera angle has a point-of-view as well, and there are several variations to that meaning. Our two people are talking; the camera stands off to one side of them. The camera is essentially part of the scene, since it sees the people but it is not involved in the scene in any way. It is a neutral observer. It is completely objective — third person (Figure 2.38). This is like the omniscient narrator in a novel or story. An omniscient narrator or POV is a voice that tells the story but is not a character in the story and can “see” everything that is going on. The voice can tell us what each and every character is doing at any time. What is a completely subjective shot? It is when the camera takes the place of one of the characters. In the case of our two people talking, if the other character is talking, she would look directly into the lens as if she were looking into the eyes of the man. In actual practice this is almost never done in narrative filmmaking, although it is used Figure 2.31. Ferris Buehler's Day Off contains several examples of breaking the fourth wall as the character looks straight into the lens to address the audience directly. In most films, this technique is used as a comic device. shooting methods 33
• 48. Figure 2.32. (top) In 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick establishes that the astronauts are safe from being overheard by the ship's computer HAL. Figure 2.33. (middle)The close-of HAL’s red eye establishes that the next shot will be his POV. Figure 2.34. (bottom) Kubrick then uses a POV shot to show that HAL can read lips; a dramatic and chilling moment. cinematography 34
• 49. More subjective More objective More subjective More objective on very rare occasions. Probably the most famous example is the noir film The Lady in the Lake (Figures 2.29 and 2.30). In this case the story is seen in an entirely first person, purely subjective fashion as if the camera is the detective. When other characters speak to the detective they look directly into the lens. As a result we can never see the detective because the camera is the detective — the lens becomes his eyes. The only time we see him is when he looks into a mirror. A fascinating and very successful modern variation of this is a film titled 84 Charlie Mopic, a Vietnam war film (Figure 2.40). The premise is that a cameraman along with a journalist/interviewer are sent along with a long-range reconnaissance team to record everything they do. Throughout the entire film everything we see is only what is photographed by Mopic’s camera. It’s a terrific conceit and is executed beautifully. We see Mopic only three time in the entire film. At the very end they are under fire and are being evacuated by helicopter. Mopic is just about to get into the chopper and he is shot. He tosses the camera into the chopper and it lands on the floor facing him. It records his death as the chopper takes off without him. The fact that his death affects us so much illustrates the power of subjective POV as a device to involve the audience both visually and emotionally. Similar devices have been used in Cloverfield and a number of other films. Other forms of POV are things like doggie cam. If there is a dog in the scene and the camera is placed low to the ground and moves along in a fashion resembling how a dog moves, we are seeing the scene from a dog’s point of view. Figure 2.35. (top) An over-theshoulder medium shot. The Fourth Wall and POV Subjective POV is often used to represent someone observing a Figure 2.36. (middle) When moving to a tighter shot, the same angle will scene from hiding, however, it is rarely carried all the way through. seem too far off axis and the eyeline For example, if the “victim” were to see the stalker and walk over will seem wrong. to confront him, logically he would look directly into the camera. Figure 2.37. (bottom) As the camera coverage, the There are two problems with this. First it would break the illusion moves in for tighter to the eyeline lens must be closer of the film. The audience would be made jarringly aware that they axis. are watching the movie. In the theater it would be called breaking Figure 2.38. (above, left) In general, the fourth wall. This is when an actor in the play talks directly to the the closer the camera gets to the performer’s perspective, the more audience (Figures 2.30 and 2.31). To take it to its most extreme and subjective the shot becomes. The ridiculous logical end, if the man were to ask the stalker a question ultimate example of this is a subjective POV where the camera becomes and he agreed, we would have to nod the camera up and down. the eyes of the character; this puts The most frequently used type of character POV is the POV look. the audience into the character's head. An example of this is when we see someone looks up, and then the next shot is a view of an airplane (Figure 6.57) The proper execution is discussed in more detail in the chapter Cinematic Continuity. It is often used as a device to cheat a location or establish a physical relashooting methods 35
• 50. Figure 2.39 (above). Top: eyeline too far from the lens. Middle: correct eyeline. Bottom: eyeline on wrong side of lens. Figure 2.40. (above, right) Even the titles are cleverly done in POV style in 84 Charlie Mopic: here they are written in the sand with a knife. cinematography 36 tionship that didn’t really exist on the set or location. For example if we want to establish that the character has a view of the city, but the location you are using doesn’t really have one, it is a simple matter to get a shot of the character looking and then cut to a long shot of the city. To take it to the next step, it would also be possible to take the actor (or even a stand-in) to another location and get an overthe-shoulder of a view of the city. This is a cheated connecting shot and only requires that the two windows (or at least what they see of them) match visually. In their book Film Art —An Introduction tin Thomson call this the Kuleshov effect. This is named for Lev Kuleshov, one of the early Russian formalist filmmakers in the 1920’s. He performed an experiment in which is used the same shot of a famous Russian actor with a completely neutral look intercut (at various times) with shots of nature, some soup, a baby and, a dead woman. When asked about what emotions the actor was expressing, the audience said he was either showing tranquility, hunger, joy, or great sorrow. This illustrates the storytelling power of simply putting two shots together. When we show someone tilt his head up and his eyes turn toward something off-screen, then cut to a clock tower or an airplane, the audience will always make the connection that our character is looking at that tower or plane. This demonstrates not only the usefulness of subjective POVs for storytelling and emotional subtext, but also hints at the importance of the off-screen space as part of our narrative. It also reminds us that we are almost never doing shots that will be used in isolation: ultimately shots are used in combination with other shots. This is really the essence of filmmaking: doing shots that are good on their own is important, but in the end what really counts is how the shots work when they are put together in editing.
• 51. visual language © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50003-8
• 52. Figure 3.1. (previous page) A visually strong and expressive frame from The Conformist, shot by Vittorio Storaro. Figure 3.2. (above) This frame from the finale of The Big Combo is not only graphically strong in composition, but the many visual elements all work together to reinforce and add subtext to the story content of the scene. cinematography 38 MORE THAN JUST A PICTURE Let’s think of the frame as more than just a picture — it is information. Clearly some parts of the information are more important than others, and we want this information to be perceived by the viewer in a certain order — we want the information organized in a particular way. Composition (and lighting, which can be part of composition) is how this is accomplished. Through composition we are telling the audience where to look, what to look at and in what order to look at it. The frame is fundamentally two-dimensional design. 2-D design is about guiding the eye and directing the attention of the viewer in an organized manner that conveys the meaning that you wish to impart. It is how we impose a point of view on the material that may be different from how others see it. If all we did was simply photograph what is there in exactly the same way everyone else sees it, the job could be done by a robot camera; there would be no need for the cinematographer or editor. An image should convey meaning, mode, tone, atmosphere, and subtext on its own — without regard to voice-over, dialog, audio, or other explanation. This was in its purest essence in silent film, but the principle still applies: the images must stand on their own. Good composition reinforces the way in which the mind organizes information. In some cases it may deliberately run counter to how the eye/brain combination works in order to add a new layer of meaning or ironic comment. Composition selects and emphasizes elements such as size, shape, order, dominance, hierarchy, pattern, resonance, and discordance in ways that give meaning to the things being photographed that goes beyond the simple: “here they are.” We will start with the very basic rules of visual organization then move on to more sophisticated concepts of design and visual language. The principles of design and visual communication are a vast subject; here we will just touch on the basics in order to lay the foundation for discussion.
• 53. Figure 3.3. (top) Balance plays a role in this film noir frame. Figure 3.4. (bottom) Visual rhythm with an ironic twist in this shot from Stanley Kubrick’s Killer’s Kiss, his first feature. Design Principles Certain basic principles pertain to all types of visual design, whether in film, photography, painting, or drawing. These principles work interactively in various combinations to add depth, movement, and visual force to the elements of the frame. Unity contained and complete. This is true even if it is a deliberately chaotic or unorganized composition. In Figure 3.2, this climactic final shot from The Big Combo uses frame-within-a-frame composition to tell the story visually: having defeated the bad guys, the hero and femme fatal emerge from the darkness into the light of morning. visual language 39
• 54. Figure 3.5. Lighting, perspective, choice of lens, and camera position combine to give this Gregg Toland shot tremendous depth and threedimensionality in The Long Voyage Home. Balance sition. Every element in a visual composition has a visual weight. These may be organized into a balanced or unbalanced composition. The visual weight of an object is primarily determined by its size but is also affected by its position in the frame, its color, movement, and the subject matter itself. Visual Tension The interplay of balanced and unbalanced elements and their placement in the frame can create visual tension, which is important in any composition that seeks to avoid boring complacency. Rhythm - very subtle way as in Figures 3.4, a frame from Killer’s Kiss. Proportion Classical Greek philosophy expressed the idea that mathematics was the controlling force of the universe and that it was expressed in visual forces in the Golden Mean. The Golden Mean is just one way of looking at proportion and size relationships in general. Contrast We know a thing by its opposite. Contrast is a function of the light/ dark value, the color and texture of the objects in the frame and the lighting. It is an important visual component in defining depth, spatial relationships, and of course carries considerable emotional and storytelling weight as well. cinematography 40
• 55. Texture Figure 3.6. Visual texture in a scene - from The Conformist. tors, texture gives perceptual clues. Texture be can a function of the objects themselves, but usually requires lighting to bring it out, as in Figure 3.6. We also add texture in many different ways in filmmaking; see the chapter Lighting Basics where we will discuss adding visual texture to lighting as a way of shaping the light. Directionality One of the most fundamental of visual principles is directionality. With a few exceptions, everything has some element of directionality. This directionality is a key element of its visual weight, which determines how it will act in a visual field and how it will affect other elements. Anything that is not symmetrical is directional. The Three-Dimensional Field In any form of photography, we are taking a three-dimensional world and projecting it onto a two-dimensional frame (although this is less true of 3-D filmmaking). A very big part of our work in directing and shooting visual stories is this essential idea of creating a three-dimensional world out of two-dimensional images. It calls into play a vast array of techniques and methods, not all of them purely design oriented: the lens, blocking of actors, lighting, and camera movement all come into play. In reality, 3-D filmmaking is still two-dimensional, it just has an extra feature that makes it appear to be three-dimensional — all the basic design principals still apply whether you are shooting 2-D or 3-D. There are, of course, times when we wish to make the frame more two-dimensional, even replicating the flat space of an animated cartoon, for example; in that case the same visual design principles apply, they are just used in a different fashion to create that visual effect. Many visual forces contribute to the illusion of depth and dimension. For the most part, they relate to how the human eye/ brain combination perceive space, but some of them are cultural and historical as well — as film viewers we all have a long history of visual education from everything we have seen before. visual language 41
• 56. Figure 3.7. Overlap in a composition from the noir film classic The Big Combo. Depth In working toward establishing this sense of depth and three-dimensionality, there are a number of ways to create the illusion: Figure 3.5 is a deep focus shot from The Long Voyage Home, photographed by Gregg Toland; it shows a great sense of depth in a visual field. In terms of the editing, it is useful to view a scene from more than one angle — shooting a scene entirely from a single angle creates what we call flat space. Elements that create a sense of visual depth include: Overlap Overlap clearly establishes front/back relationships; something “in front of ” another thing is clearly closer to the observer; as in this frame from the noir classic The Big Combo (Figure 3.7). Relative Size Although the eye can be fooled, the relative size of an object is an component of many optical illusions and a key compositional element in manipulating the viewer’s perception of the subject; it can be used to focus the viewers attention on important elements. There are many ways to manipulate relative size in the frame, using position or different lenses. Vertical Location Gravity is a factor is visual organization; the relative vertical position of objects is a depth cue. This is particularly important in the art of Asia, which has not traditionally relied on linear perspective Lens Language for an example of how Kurosawa translates this concept in his use of lenses distinctive to the visual tradition in which he operated. cinematography 42
• 57. Left/Right Largely a result of cultural conditioning, the eye tends to scan from left to right. This has an ordering effect on the visual weight of elements in the field. It is also critical to how the eye scans a frame and thus the order of perception and movement in the composition. It can also relate to the staging of actors within the frame. In theater the downstage (nearest the audience) right corner is considered to be the “hot” area of the stage. Figure 3.8. (top) Relative size is key in this shot from High Noon, but clearly linear perspective and overlap also play a role. Figure 3.9. (bottom) Kubrick uses linear perspective to convey a sense of the rigid military and social structure in Paths of Glory. visual language 43
• 58. Figure 3.10. Chiaroscuro lighting uses light and shadow to create depth and focus the attention of the audience, such as this frame from Apocalypse Now. Linear Perspective Linear perspective chi. In film and video photography, it is not necessary to know the rules of perspective, but it is important to recognize its importance the rigid nature of French society in Figure 3.9, a frame from Paths of Glory; he uses similar geometry in Barry Lyndon (Figure 2.2) and Dr. Strangelove (Figure 3.21) for similar storytelling purposes. Foreshortening Foreshortening that are closer to the eye appear larger than those farther away, when part of an object is much closer than the rest of it, the visual distortion gives us clues as to depth and size. Chiaroscuro Italian for light (chiara) and shadow (scouro, same Latin root as obscure), chiaroscuro, or gradations of light and dark (Figure 3.10), with lighting is one of our major tasks, this is an important consideration in our work. Figure 3.10 is a shot from Apocalypse Now. See also Figure 5.1 at the beginning of the chapter Visual Storytelling: a masterpiece by the painter Caravaggio, one of the great old masters of chiaroscuro. Atmospheric Perspective Atmospheric perspective (sometimes called aerial perspective) is something of a special case as it is an entirely “real world” phenomhis paintings. Objects that are a great distance away will have less detail, less saturated colors, and generally be less defined than those that are closer. This is a result of the image being filtered through long (warmer) wavelengths, leaving more of the shorter, bluer wavelengths. It can be recreated on set with haze effects, scrims and lighting (Figure 3.11). cinematography 44
• 59. FORCES OF VISUAL ORGANIZATION All of these basic elements can then be deployed in various combinations to create a hierarchy of perception: they can create an organization of the visual field that makes the composition coherent and guides the eye and the brain as it puts the information together. The visual elements that help the eye/brain combination organize the scene include: Figure 3.11. Atmospheric perspective in the form of a heavy fog effect is an important element of this shot from City of Lost Children; not only for the sense of sadness and isolation but also because it is a set built in a studio. Without the sense of atmospheric perspective added by the smoke and backlight, it is doubtful the illusion would hold up so well. The Line The line, either explicit or implied, is a constant in visual design. It is powerful in effect and multifaceted in its use. Just a few simple lines can organize a two-dimensional space in a way that is comprehensible by the eye/brain. The Sinuous Line The sinuous line, which is sometimes referred to as the reverse S, (Figure 3.12) was used extensively as a compositional principle by own, as seen in these examples from The Black Stallion and Seven Samurai (Figures 3.15 and 3.16). Compositional Triangles Triangles are a powerful compositional tool. Once you start looking for them, you will see compositional triangles everywhere. Figure 3.17 is a frame from Citizen Kane, an outstanding example of the strong visuals in filmmaking. The compositional triangles keep the frame active even through a fairly long expositional scene. Horizontals, Verticals and Diagonals The basic lines are always a factor in almost any type of compositions. Nearly infinite in variety, they always come back to the basics: horizontal, vertical, and diagonal. Lines may be explicit, as in these shots from Seven Samurai (Figures 3.14) and The Conformist (Figures 3.1 and 3.18) or implied in the arrangement of objects and spaces. 3.12. (top) The sinuous reverse S; a specialized type of line that has a long history in visual art. Figure 3.13. (bottom) Even a few simple lines can imply linear perspective. visual language 45
• 60. Figure 3.14. (top) Line as form and movement in this frame from Seven Samurai. Figure 3.15. (bottom) The classic sinuous S in this shot from The Black Stallion. The Horizon Line and Vanishing Point Our innate understanding of perspective lends a special association to lines that are perceived as horizon lines, lines of perspective and, vanishing point. Figure 3.13 shows how ingrained the horizon line is in our perception: three simple lines on white space are enough to suggest it. The Power of the Edge: the Frame As we visually identify an object or group of objects in a frame, we are also subconsciously aware of the frame itself. The four edges of the frame have a visual force all their own. Objects that are close to the frame are visually associated with it and viewed in relation to it more than if they are farther away. The frame also plays an important role in making us aware of those spaces off-frame: left/right, cinematography 46
• 61. Figure 3.16. (top) The sinuous S and its use in Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai. Figure 3.17. (bottom) Compositional triangles in Citizen Kane. visual language 47
• 62. Figure 3.18. (above) Strong diagonal lines are crucial to this shot from The Conformist and also in Figure 3.1 at the beginning of this chapter. Figure 3.19. (right, middle) Diagonals in the noir film Out Of The Past. Figure 3.20. (right, bottom) Verticals and horizontals in this shot from JFK are especially strong given the widescreen aspect ratio. Notice also how the unbalanced frame and negative space on the right side are especially important to the composition. Imagine if they had framed only the important elements on the left. It would not be nearly as strong a composition and would not work nearly so well for wide screen. up/down, and even the space behind the camera — all part of the filmspace of the entire composition and crucial to making the visual experience more three-dimensional. This power of the frame itself is also important in our choice of aspect ratio — which is shape of the frame. It has changed over the history of film, generally from an almost square shape (Figure 3.19) to a wider, more horizontal rectangle (Figure 3.18) to an extreme wide frame as in this frame from JFK (Figure 3.20). cinematography 48
• 63. Open and Closed Frame An open frame is one in which one or more of the elements either pushes the edge or actually crosses the edge (Figure 3.21). A closed frame is one in which the elements are comfortably contained within the frame (Figure 3.22), which is associated with more formal composition. Although we look at the frames here as still photographs, most frames of a motion picture are dynamic, even to the point of Figure 3.21. (top) An open frame composition from Seven Samurai. Figure 3.22. (bottom) A closed frame composition from Dr. Strangelove. normally don’t perceive the blurring but it affects our perception. visual language 49
• 64. Figure 3.23. (above) Negative space and unbalanced composition in The Black Stallion. Figure 3.24. (right) Frame within a frame in the Kubrick film Killer’s Kiss. Frame within a Frame the aspect ratio of the film. A solution is to use a frame within a frame — which means using framing elements within the shot. Figure 3.24 is an example from Kubrick’s Killer’s Kiss. It is particularly useful with very widescreen formats. Frame within a frame can be used not only to alter the aspect ratio of the shot but also to focus attention on important story elements. Balanced and Unbalanced Frame We touched on balance before; now let’s look at it in the context of the frame. Any composition may be balanced or unbalanced. This shot from Dr. Strangelove (Figure 3.22) is both a closed frame and also position of the frame to comment on social structure is a constant JFK (Figure 3.20) is also an unbalanced frame. This is more than just composition: the graphic design of the frame also conveys story information about the situation. cinematography 50
• 65. Figure 3.25. (above) The rule of thirds is a means of helping you organize any visual field (such as a film or video frame). Figure 3.26. (left) Strong visual movement in the frame reinforces character relationships and subtext in this shot from Seven Samurai. Positive and Negative Space The visual weight of objects or lines of force can create positive space, but their absence can create negative space, as in this frame from The Black Stallion (Figure 3.23). The elements that are “not there” have a visual weight as well. It is important to remember that the space off-screen can be important also, especially if the character looks offscreen to the left, right, up, down, or even past the camera. Movement in the Visual Field All of these forces work in combination, of course — in ways that interact to create a sense of movement in the visual field. These factors combine to create a visual movement (eye scan) from front to back in a circular fashion (Figure 3.26). This movement in the frame is important not only for the composition but also plays an important role in what order the viewer perceives and assimilates the subjects in the frame. This influences their perception of content. In analyzing frames in this way, remember that we are talking about the movement of the eye, not movement of the camera or movement of the actor or object within a shot. The Rule of Thirds The rule of thirds starts by dividing the frame into thirds (Figure 3.25). The rule of thirds proposes that a useful approximate starting point for any compositional grouping is to place major points of interest in the scene on any of the four intersections of the interior lines. It is a simple but effective rough guideline for any frame composition. The rule of thirds has been used by artists for centuries. MISCELLANEOUS RULES OF COMPOSITION If ever there were rules made to be broken, they are the rules of composition, but it is important to understand them before deviating or using them in a contrary style. Don’t cut off their feet. Generally, a frame should end somewhere around the knees or include the feet. Cutting them off at the ankles will look awkward; likewise, don’t cut off their hands at the wrist. Naturally, a character’s hand will often dart in and out of the frame as the actor moves and gestures, but for a long static shot, they should be clearly in or out. Watch out for TV Safe — as video is currently broadcast, there is considerable variation in the size of the picture on the home screen. For this reason, most ground glass markings visual language 51
• 66. Figure 3.27. (top) Too much headroom. Figure 3.28. (middle) Too little headroom. Figure 3.29. (bottom) About the right amount of headroom. Figure 3.30. (above, near right) Not enough noseroom. Figure 3.31. (above, far right) Enough noseroom. When framing for our important foreground subjects, whether or not to include the heads of background people is a judgment call. If they are prominent enough, it is best to include them compositionally. If there is enough emphasis on the foreground subjects and the background people are strictly incidental or perhaps largely out of focus, it is OK to cut them off wherever is necessary. If the situation does call for not showing their heads, you will probably want to avoid cutting through their heads at nose level. For example, in a scene where two people are dining, if the waiter approaches and asks them a question, you clearly want to show all of the waiter. If the waiter is not a speaking role and he is merely pouring some water, it would be acceptable just to show him from the shoulders down, as the action with his arm and hands is what is relevant to the scene. Basic Composition Rules for People When it comes to people there are some other framing principals that are important to observe. Headroom Certain principles apply particularly to photographing people, particularly in a medium shot or close-up. First is headroom — the amount of space above the head. Too much headroom makes the wasted compositionally as it is often just sky or empty wall. It adds no information to the shot and may draw the eye away from the central subject. The convention is to leave the least amount of headroom that doesn’t make the head seem to be crammed against the top of the frame (Figure 3.29). As the close-up gets bigger, it becomes permissible to leave even less headroom. Once the shot becomes a choker, you can even give the character a “haircut,” and bring the top of the frame down to the forehead but not as in Figure 3.28, which is too wide a shot for a haircut. The idea is simply that the forehead and hair convey less information than the lower part of the face and neck. A head shot cut off above the eyebrows seems perfectly normal. A shot that shows the top of the head but cuts off the chin and mouth would seem very odd. Noseroom Next is noseroom, also called looking room (Figures 3.30 and 3.31). If a character is turned to the side, it’s as if the gaze has a certain visual weight. As a result, we rarely position the head in the exact middle of the frame, except when the actor is looking more or less straight toward or away from the camera. Generally, the more the head is turned to the side, the more noseroom is allowed. Think of it this way: the look has visual weight, which must be balanced. cinematography 52
• 67. language of the lens © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50004-X
• 68. Figure 4.1. (previous page) Deliberately flaring the lens is an essential element of this shot from Nine and 1/2 Weeks. Figure 4.2. (right) A well-composed, balanced frame from Barry Lyndon implies static formalism. The static camera position and the centered “head on” viewpoint all add up to reinforce the story content of a rigid social structure and a highly formalized social milieu in which the story takes place. THE LENS AND THE FRAME As we use the term in this book, cinematic technique means the methods and practices we use to add additional layers of meaning, nuance, and emotional context to shots and scenes in addition to their objective content. The lens is one of the prime tools in achieving these means. Together with selecting the frame, it is also the area of cinematography in which the director is most heavily involved. Foreground/Midground/Background As we discussed in Shooting Methods, one of the key elements of film is that we are projecting 3-dimensional space onto a 2-dimensional plane. Except where we want this flatness, it is a goal to recreate the depth that existed in the scene. A big part of this is to create shots with a foreground, midground, and background. In the book Hitchcock/Truffaut, Hitchcock makes the point that a basic rule of camera position and staging is that the importance of an object in the story should equal its size in frame. We see that principle employed in the shots from Lady from Shanghai (Figure 2.26) and Touch of Evil (Figure 2.25). The gun is what is important in the scene, so Welles uses a low camera angle and positioning to feature it prominently in the frame — the choice of lens is also important. Lens Perspective As we discussed in the previous chapters, the fundamental aspect of the frame is that it constitutes a selection of what the audience is going to see. Some things are included and some are excluded. The first decision is always where the camera goes in relation to the subject. But this is only half of the job. Once the camera position is set, there is still a decision to be made as to how much of that view is to be included. This is the job of lens selection. Human vision, including peripheral, extends to around 180°. Foveal (or central) vision, which is more able to perceive detail, is around 40°. In 35mm film, the 50mm is generally considered the normal lens. In fact, something around a 40mm is closer to typical vision. In video, the “normal” lens varies depending on the size of the video receptor. A normal lens is considered to be one where the focal length equals the diagonal of the receptor. The focal length is significant in another way in addition to its field of view. Remember that all optics (including the human eye) work by projecting the three-dimensional world onto a two-dimensional plane. Lenses in the normal range portray the depth relationships of objects in a way fairly close to human vision. cinematography 54
• 69. Figure 4.3. The wide lens creates a palpable space between the characters in this climactic scene in The Lady from Shanghai; he is heading out toward the light and she is in complete silhouette, all of which precisely underpin the story point at this moment in the film. Wide Lenses and Expansion of Space With a wider than normal lens, depth perception is exaggerated: objects appear to be farther apart (front to back) than they are in reality. This exaggerated sense of depth has psychological implications. The perception of movement towards or away from the lens is heightened; space is expanded and distant objects become much smaller. All this can give the viewer a greater sense of presence —a greater feeling of being in the scene — which is often a goal of the filmmaker. As the lens gets even wider, there is distortion of objects, particularly those near the lens. This is the fundamental reason why a longer focal length lens is considered essential for a portrait or head shot. It’s a simple matter of perspective. If you are shooting a closeup and you want to fill the frame, the wider the lens, the closer the camera will have to be. As the camera gets closer, the percentage difference in distance from the nose to the eyes increases dramatically, which causes distortion. For example, if the tip of the nose is 30 cm (centimeters) from the lens, then the eyes may be at 33 cm, a 10% difference. With a wide lens, this is enough to cause a mismatch in size: the nose is exaggerated in size compared to the face at the plane of the eyes. With a longer than normal lens, the camera will be much farther back to achieve the same image size. In this case, the tip of the nose might be at 300 cm, with the eyes at 303 cm. This is a percentage difference of only 1%: the nose would appear normal in relation to the rest of the face. The same fundamental principle applies to the perception of all objects with very wide lenses (Figure 1.11). Another aspect of wide lenses is that at a given distance and f/stop, they have greater depth-of-field. Not to get too technical here (we’ll do that in the chapter Optics & Focus), but suffice it to say that the depth-of-field of a lens is inversely proportional to the square of its focal length. We’ll get into the details in later chapters, but perceptual ramifications are very much a part of the psychology of the lens. This greater depth-of-field allows more of the scene to be in focus. This was used to great effect by master cinematographers of the 30’s and 40’s such as Gregg Toland, who used it to develop an entire look called deep focus, such as in the frame from The Long Voyage Home (Figure 3.5 in Visual Language). In this film and in other films he shot in this period (such as Wuthering Heights) Toland perfected deep focus as a visual system that he later introduced to Orson Welles (Figures 4.3 and 4.4) when they worked together on Citize Kane, which was Welles’ first film. lens language 55
• 70. Figure 4.4. A deep focus shot from Citizen Kane. Three levels of the story are shown in the same frame. Deep Focus The high point of deep focus as a storytelling tool is Citizen Kane. According to David Cook in A History of Narrative Film, “Welles planned to construct the film as a series of long takes, or sequence shots, scrupulously composed in depth to eliminate the necessity for narrative cutting within major dramatic scenes. To accomplish this, Toland developed for Welles a method of deep focus photography capable of achieving an unprecedented depth-of-field.” This deep focus facilitates composition in depth to an unprecedented degree. Throughout the film we see action in the background that complements and amplifies what we are seeing in the foreground. For example, early in the film we see Mrs. Kane in the foreground, signing the agreement for Mr. Thatcher to be the young Charles Foster Kane’s guardian. Throughout the scene, we see the young man through a window, playing outside with his sled even as his future is being decided (Figure 4.4). Welles also uses the distortion of wide angle lenses for psychological effect. Frequently in the film we see Kane looming like a giant in the foreground, dwarfing other characters in the scene — a metaphor for his powerful, overbearing personality. Later, Welles uses the exaggerated distances of wide lenses to separate Kane from other characters in the scene, thus emphasizing his alienation (Figure 14.8). Compression of Space At the other end of this spectrum are long focal length lenses, which you might hear referred to as telephoto lenses. They have effects that are opposite of wide lenses: they compress space, have less depth-offield and de-emphasize movement away from or toward the camera. This compression of space can be used for many perceptual purposes: claustrophobic tightness of space, making distant objects seem closer and heightening the intensity of action and movement. Their ability to decrease apparent distance has many uses both in composition but also in creating the psychological space. The effect of having objects seem closer together is often used for the very practical purpose of making stunts and fight scenes appear more dramatic and dangerous than they really are. With careful camera placement and a long lens, a speeding bus can seem to miss a child on a bicycle by inches, when in fact, there is a comfortably safe distance between them, a trick frequently used to enhance stunt cinematography 56
• 71. shots and action sequences. The limited depth-of-field can be used to isolate a character in space. Even though foreground and background objects may seem closer, if they are drastically out of focus, the sense of separation is the same. This can result in a very detached, third-person point of view for the shot. This detachment is reinforced by the fact that the compression of space makes more tangible the feeling that the real world is being projected onto a flat space. We perceive it more as a two-dimensional representation — more abstract; this is used very effectively in Figure 4.5. Another use of long lenses for compression of space is for beauty. Most faces are more attractive with longer lenses. This is why the 105mm and the 135mm lenses (long focal lengths) are known as portrait lenses for still photographers who do beauty and fashion or portraiture. Movement toward us with a long lens is not as dynamic Figure 4.5. (top) Very long lens perspective makes this shot from Rain Man abstract. It is reduced to the simple idea of beginning a journey into the unknown future; the road seems to rise up into their unknown future. It is no accident that this frame is used on the poster for the film; it elegantly expresses the basic story of the film. Figure 4.6. (bottom) A wide lens is essential to this shot from a later scene in Rain Man. Trapped in the car with his extremely annoying brother, the wide shot in the emptiness of the prairie emphasizes how the car is like a lifeboat from which there is no escape. lens language 57
• 72. Figure 4.7. (top) This wide master from The Lady from Shanghai shows a normal perspective. Figure 4.8. (bottom) In the closeups, Welles uses projections of the fish at ten times their normal size to introduce menace and a feeling of strangeness to the otherwise pleasant setting of the aquarium. The huge fish and the rippling motivated lighting from the water all work together to suggest that the character is “in over his head and out of his depth.” and therefore is abstracted. It is more of a presentation of the idea of movement than perceived as actual movement of the subject. This is especially effective with shots of the actors running directly toward the camera; as they run toward us, there is very little change in their image size. We would normally think of this as decreasing the sense of movement, but in a way, it has the opposite effect. The same is true of slow motion. Although shooting at a high frame rate actually slows the movement down, our perceptual conditioning tells us that the people or objects are actually moving very fast — so fast that only high-speed shooting can capture them on film. Thus shooting something in slow motion and with a long lens has the ultimate effect of making the moving seem faster and more exaggerated than it really is. The brain interprets it in a way that contradicts the visual evidence. This is an excellent example of cultural conditioning as a factor in film perception. The convention to show someone running very fast to shoot with a long lens and in slow motion. If you showed a long lens, slow motion shot of someone running to a person who had never seen film or video before, they might not understand at all that the person is running fast. More likely they would perceive the person as almost frozen in time through some sort of magic. cinematography 58
• 73. Manipulating Perspective There are many other tricks that can be used to alter the audience’s perception of space. In The Lady from Shanghai (Figures 4.7 and 4.8), Welles uses a subtle and very clever trick to add subtext to the scene. In the film, Welles plays an ordinary seaman who is seduced into an affair and a murder plot by Rita Hayworth. There are double and triple crosses, and the Welles character is in way over his head. This scene is a meeting between him and the beautiful woman who is at the bottom of all the schemes and machinations. She asks him to meet her in an out-of-the-way public place: the aquarium. On the face of it, this seems like a perfect place for them to meet without attracting attention. In fact, she has a darker purpose. The staging also seems perfectly straightforward. They meet and then talk while they stroll in front of the glass windows of the aquarium. Welles uses subtle tricks to make this happy, innocent Figure 4.9. (top) This wide shot comes at the end of a chase scene in Nine and 1/2 Weeks; out on the town, the characters have been chased by a gang of violent thugs. Figure 4.10. (bottom) At the moment they realize they have lost their attacker, a severe lens change punches in to the scene. It is a highenergy cut that gets us closer so that we are experiencing the scene along with the characters rather than as an abstract, at-a-distance chase scene. We are drawn into their excitement and identify with their exuberance. The sudden loss of depth-of-field isolates them in the landscape and gives our attention nowhere else to go. The punch-in changes the visual texture to match the mood. lens language 59
• 74. Figure 4.11. (top) A visually powerful punch-in from Gladiator, as the main characters rise into the arena from the underground space in a wide shot. Figure 4.12. (bottom) The switch to a very long lens (the punch-in) punctuates the moment and intensifies the drama as well as simply being dramatic and visually striking. cinematography 60 place mysterious and foreboding. First, the motivated light from the aquarium backlights them dramatically in a classic film noir fashion. As the Welles character begins to realize the danger of the situation he is in, they move to a spot where they are completely in silhouette. When he goes in for coverage, Welles doesn’t chicken out. The motivated lighting is also a water effect so the ripples play across their faces. These devices subtly suggest that the character is out of his depth, underwater, which is exactly the point of the scene. The third trick is even more clever. In the wide shots, we see the fish in the aquarium: ordinary fish and turtles of one or two feet in length. In the close-ups, however, Welles had film of the fish backprojected at a greatly enlarged size. As a result, the fish are now gigantic. Although just barely seen behind their heads, the effect is mysterious and a little frightening. In combination with the silhouette and the rippling water effects, the subtext is clear: the character is out of his depth, his head is underwater, and he may not survive. It is a masterful stroke that is completely unnoticed by most of the audience. Like all the best techniques, it is seamless and invisible. Kurosawa uses very long lenses in a way that is stylistically distinctive. See Figure 4.14 for an example of how he uses lenses to achieve certain compositional perspectives and character relationships. Another example of lens use is the punch-in, shown in Figures 4.11 and 4.12.
• 75. Selective Focus The characteristic of relative lack of depth-of-field can be used for selective focus shots. As discussed above, shallow depth-of-field can isolate the subject. The essential point is that focus is a storytelling tool. This is a drawback of 16mm film and some High Def cameras. Because they often have smaller sensors, they have far more depthof-field than 35mm film, thus making it more difficult to use focus in this way; however many HD cameras now have sensors that are the same size as a 35mm film frame or even larger. Depth-of-field is a product of the sensor size, not whether it is film or video. See the chapter Optics & Focus for more on selective focus. If you want to reduce depth-of-field on a camera with a smaller sensor, some people will say “pull back and use a longer lens” or “shoot wide open.” These are not always options, especially on a tight location. Focus can also be shifted during the shot, thus leading the eye and the attention of the viewer. The term for the classic use of this is rack focus, in which the focus is on an object in the foreground, for example, and then, on cue, the camera assistant radically changes the focus so that it shifts dramatically to another subject either in front of or behind the original subject. Not all shots lend themselves to the technique, especially when there is not enough of a focus change to make the effect noticeable. A downside of rack focusing is that some lenses breathe when changing focus; this means they appear to change focal length while shifting focus. Also with tracking shots that are very tight and close, we can watch as objects come into view, then slowly come into focus, then go soft again. Selective focus and out-of-focus can also be highly subjective visual metaphors for the influence of drugs or madness, as well. The bottom line is that focus is an important storytelling tool as well as being crucial to the overall look of a particular production. Figure 4.13. (above) Japanese and Chinese traditional art do not employ linear perspective but instead they rely on above/below relationships to convey depth. Figure 4.14. (top) Akira Kurosawa almost always used very long lenses and in this case a slightly elevated points of view to render a compressed space. In this shot from Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, we clearly see the influence of composition and perspective from Japanese prints and the same sense of space as in Figure 4.13. lens language 61
• 76. Figure 4.15. (top) A normal lens keeps the background in focus; it can be distracting. Figure 4.16. (bottom) A very long lens throws the background out of focus and the viewer’s entire attention is drawn to the character. Figure 4.17. (above, right) Deliberate lens flare is an essential part of the look of this scene from Nine and 1/2 Weeks. cinematography 62 Another issue in selective focus is when two or more players are in the same shot but at different distances. If you don’t have enough light to set the lens to a higher f/stop (and thus you don’t have much depth-of-field), it may be necessary for the focus-puller to choose one or the other to be in focus. This is up to the DP or director to decide, and they should consult before the shot — and don’t forget to let the focus puller know. A few basic rules of thumb: focus back and forth as they speak. in the frame. emotional moment. This may countermand the principal of focusing on the person speaking. tants put the focus on the actor who has the lower number on the call sheet. This may sound frivolous but, it’s not. Call sheets list the actors in numbered order of their characters. The lead is actor #1, and so on. If you are playing it on the fly, the safe bet is to go with the actor with the lower number on the call sheet. If they are close enough, the AC may split the focus between them (if there is enough depth-of-field to keep both of them acceptable sharp) or by very subtly racking back and forth. Major focus racks need to be discussed in advance and rehearsed. This is true of all camera moves that are motivated by dialog or action. If the AC and the operator haven’t seen what the actors are going to do, it is difficult to anticipate the move just enough to time it correctly. Rehearsal is a time saver, as it usually reduces the number of blown takes. It is interesting to note that older books on cinematography barely mention focus at all. There is a reason for this. Until the 60’s, it was the established orthodoxy that pretty much everything important in the frame should be in focus. The idea of having key elements in the frame that are deliberately out of focus really didn’t fully take hold until it was popularized by fashion photographers in the 80’s. It is now recognized by filmmakers as a key tool and is the reason that when evaluating and using HD cameras, a great deal of attention is paid to the size of the video sensor. There is more discussion of the other factors that affect focus and depth of field in the Optics & Focus, later in this book.
• 77. IMAGE CONTROL AT THE LENS Some techniques with the lens are discussed in the chapter on Image Control; in this chapter we deal with altering the image quality with the lens and shutter only as they are relevant to this discussion of visual storytelling with the lens. There is a huge variety of visual effects that can be achieved with just the selection of lenses, filters, flare, and similar effects, many of which are difficult or impossible to achieve in other ways. Figure 4.18. A high-angle shot along with a dramatic shaft of light and shadows creates a graphic composition in Sin City. Filtration Modern lenses are remarkably sharp. For the most part this is what we want. In some cases, however, we are looking for a softer image. The most frequent reason is beauty. A softer image, especially of a woman’s face, will generally be prettier. A soft image may also be more romantic, dreamlike, or, in a subjective shot, may translate to a state of mind less in touch with reality. Some cinematographers tend to think only of diffusion filters but a softer image can be achieved in many different ways. More on this in the chapter Image Control. Soft Lenses Some shooters use older lenses for an image that is subtly soft in a way that is difficult to achieve with filters. Soft lenses can give a slightly greater apparent depth-of-field. This is because the fall-off from critical sharpness is somewhat masked by the softness. Besides not being made with the latest computer-aided optical design and manufacturing, older lenses also have less sophisticated optical coatings. The coating on lenses is there primarily to prevent internal flares and reflections, which slightly degrade and soften the image. This can be seen clearly if the sun or other strong light source directly hits the lens. The internal flares and reflections are very apparent in an old lens as compared to a modern one. Certainly the best-known recent use of this technique was the film Saving Private Ryan, where the filmmakers asked the Panavision camera company to remove the modern coatings off a set of lenses so that they would more closely resemble the types of lenses that were used in actual World War II combat photography. lens language 63
• 78. Figure 4.19. This god’s eye shot (a type of high angle shot that is either directly overhead or nearly so) from Kill Bill dramatically portrays the situation of the character — utterly surrounded. In filmmaking, everything must have a reason — it’s not enough to do something just because “it’s a cool shot.” Flare/Glare A direct, specular beam of light that hits the lens will create a flare that creates veiling glare, which appears as a sort of milky whiteness over the whole image. This is why so much attention is paid to the matte box or lens shade and why the grips are often asked to set lensers — flags that keep direct light sources from hitting the lens. There are exceptions, such as in Figures 4.1 and 4.17, where deliberate flare is used as a photographic technique, generally as a device to set a certain tone or mood for the shot. Lens Height Variations in lens height can also be an effective tool for adding subtext to a shot. As a general rule, dialog and most ordinary people shots are done at the eye level of the actors involved. Some filmmakers attempt to avoid using many straight-on eye-level shots, as they consider them boring. Variations from eye level have filmspace implications, psychological undertones and are useful as a strictly compositional device. Variations from eye level are not to be done casually, especially with dialog or reaction shots. Keep in mind that deviations from eyelevel are asking the viewer to participate in the scene in a mode that is very different from normal, so be sure that there is a good reason for it and that it is contributing in a way that helps the scene. High Angle When the camera is above eye height, we seem to dominate the subject. The subject is reduced in stature and perhaps in importance. Its importance is not, however, diminished if the high angle reveals it to be a massive, extensive structure, for example. This reminds us that high angles looking down on the subject reveal overall layout and scope in the case of landscape, streets, or buildings. This is useful if the intent is an establishing or expository shot where it is important for the audience to know something about the layout. As with subjective and objective camera views on the lateral plane, we can see camera angles that diverge from eye level as increasingly objective, more third person in terms of our literary analogy. This applies especially to higher angles. A very high angle is called a god’s eye shot (Figure 4.19), suggesting its omniscient, removed point-ofview: distant, separate from the scene, a world view, philosophical and contemplative. We see all parts of the scene, all interacting forces equally without particularly identifying with any of them. cinematography 64
• 79. Low Angle A low-angle shot can make a character seem ominous and foreboding, as in Dr. Strangelove (Figure 4.20). When a character is approaching something as seen from a low angle, little is revealed beyond what the character might see himself: we share the character’s surprise or sense of mystery. If the shots of the character are low angle, we share his apprehension. If these are then combined with high-angle shots that reveal what the character does not know, for example, we are aware of whatever surprise or ambush or revelation awaits him: this is the true nature of suspense. As Hitchcock brilliantly observed, there can be no real suspense unless the audience knows what is going to happen. His famous example is the bomb under the table. If two characters sit at a table and suddenly a bomb goes off, we have a moment of surprise that is quickly over, a cheap shock at best. If the audience knows that the bomb is under the table and is aware that the timer is clicking steadily towards exploding, then there is true suspense that engages and involves the audience in a way that simple shock never can. If the audience is on the edge of their seats knowing that the time on the clock is growing shorter, then the fact that the two characters seated at the table are nattering on amiably about the weather is both maddening and engaging. Although any time we get away from human eye level we are decreasing our subjective identification with the characters, low angles can become more subjective in other ways. Clearly a very low angle can be a dog’s eye view, especially if it is cut in right after a shot of the dog and then the very low angle moves somewhat erratically and in the manner of a dog. This type of doggie POV is practically required for werewolf movies, of course. With low angles, the subject tends to dominate us. If the subject is a character, that actor will seem more powerful and dominant. Any time the actor being viewed is meant to be menacing or frightening to the character we are associating the POV with, a low angle is often appropriate. Figure 4.20. Kubrick is a master of choosing the right angle and lens to tell the story powerfully. In this shot, the lens height and angle make a clear statement about the state of mind of the character (Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb). lens language 65
• 80. Figures 4.21 (above, left) and 4.22 (above, right). Director Orson Welles uses shifting dutch tilt from dutch left to dutch right to make the crazy house sequence in Lady from Shanghai an almost psychedelic feeling. cinematography 66 Dutch Tilt In most shooting we strive for the camera to be perfectly level. It is the job of the camera assistant and the dolly grip to recheck every time the camera is moved and ensure that it is still “on the bubble.” This refers to the bulls-eye or transverse bubble levels that are standard on all camera mounts, heads and dollies. This is crucial because human perception is much more sensitive to off-level verticals than to off-level horizontals. If the camera is even a little off, walls, doorways, telephone poles, any vertical feature will be immediately seen as out of plumb. There are instances, however, where we want the visual tension of this off-level condition to work for us to create anxiety, paranoia, subjugation, or mystery. The term for this is “dutch tilt” or “dutch angle.” This is used extremely well in the mystery/suspense film The Third Man, where a great many shots are done with the camera off-level. Orson Welles also uses it very effectively in The Lady from Shanghai. In this example, he is trapped in the carnival crazy house at the end of the film. He is also still under the influence of the pills he took as part of his escape from the courthouse. In this shot, the camera is tilted radically right as he enters in the distance. Then, as he crosses frame and goes through a door to a second room, the camera, instead of tracking, tilts to the opposite angle and ends with a hard left tilt (Figures 4.21 and 4.22). This of course is entirely in keeping with the surrealistic atmosphere of the crazy house and of his deranged, drugged state of mind, but it has another advantage as well. Tracking shots that move past walls are not at all unusual. In this type of shot we track along with the character who walks through a door into the next room. The camera passes through the wall and what we see is usually a black vertical line that represents the edge of the wall that we are magically transversing.
• 81. visual storytelling © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50005-1
• 82. VISUAL METAPHOR One of our most important tools as filmmakers is visual metaphor, which is the ability of images to convey a meaning in addition to their straightforward reality. Think of it as “reading between the lines” visually. In some films, things are simply what they are. In others, however, many images carry an implied meaning that can be a powerful storytelling tool. A couple of examples: in Memento, the extended flashback (which moves forward in time) is shown in black-and-white and the present (which moves backward in time) is told in color. Essentially, it is two parts of the same story with one part moving forwards and the other part told backward. At the point in time where they intersect, the black-and-white slowly changes to color. Director Christopher Nolan accomplishes this in a subtle and elegant way by showing a Polaroid develop (Figure 5.2). Figure 5.2. The transition from black-and-white to color in the film Memento is a visual metaphor for transitioning from the past (black-and-white) to the present (color). (top) The character picks up a developing Polaroid. (middle) His POV as the Polaroid develops and starts to show color. (bottom) Back on him, the scene has transitioned to color. Figure 5.1. (previous page) Caravaggio’s The Calling of St. Matthew. The lighting carries a great deal of the storytelling power of the image. cinematography 68 Telling Stories with Pictures In other chapters we talk about the technical and practical aspects of lighting. In this chapter we look at lighting and other aspects of the visual image as key elements of storytelling. Let’s divert our attention from film for a moment and look at a painting. Studying classical art is useful in that the painter must tell the whole story in a single frame (not to mention without dialog or subtitles). Thus, the painter must employ every aspect of visual language to tell the story of the painting as well as layer it with subtext, symbolism, and emotional content. As with the films of Kubrick, Welles, and Kurosawa, it is also useful to study the visual design because nothing in the frame is accidental. Every element, every color, every shadow is there for a purpose, and its part in the visual and storytelling scheme has been carefully thought out. First, let’s look at this beautiful painting that opens this chapter, The Calling of St. Matthew by Caravaggio (Figure 5.1, previous page). Light has a great power to form space. In this case, the single source forms a pool of space that envelops the students. Outside it is another space, sharply delineated. Within this pool of light is knowledge and outside is darkness — ignorance. As Newton said, “What we know is a drop; what we don’t know is an ocean.” Clearly the light represents knowledge, the illuminating power of the great mystery of the universe, but it is not just a symbol — it is also a crucial part of the design. It carries a major portion of the storytelling as well. H.W. Janson discusses the painting in his book The History of Art: “Most decisive is the strong beam of light above Christ that illuminates his face and hand in the gloomy interior, thus carrying his call across to Matthew. Without this light, so natural yet so charged with symbolic meaning, the picture would lose its magic, its power to make us aware of the divine presence.” The lighting is chiaroscuro at its best; not only does it create strong contrasts and clearly delineate the characters in sharp relief but the figures almost jump out at us. The strong directionality of the light guides the eye and unifies the composition. What is unimportant falls into shadow and thus does not distract the eye. “In Baroque painting, light is an aggressive liberating force. A small amount of it is enough to reveal the spiritual opportunities that lie hidden.” (Edmund Burke Feldman in Varieties of Visual Experience). Here the strong beam of sunlight is the hand of God itself, reaching into the dusky tavern to pluck Matthew out of the darkness. The light coming from outside is clearly the presence of divine truth; it
• 83. penetrates the dusty darkness of ignorance in the tavern, so the shadows are equally important — ignorance, lethargy, and wasted lives. As we discussed in Visual Language, they also form negative spaces that are important compositionally. It is a powerful painting that carries depths of meaning and content far beyond its mere visual beauty — the kind of thing we strive for every day on the set. All that is missing is a producer in the background saying, “It’s awfully dark; couldn’t we add some fill light?” LIGHTING AS STORYTELLING In visual storytelling, few elements are as effective and as powerful as light and color (which is discussed more fully in later chapters). They have the ability to reach viewers at a purely emotion gut level. This gives them the added advantage of being able to affect the audience on one level, while their conscious brain is interpreting the story at an entirely different plane of consciousness. Film Noir Certainly, one of the highlights of lighting as storytelling is the era of film noir: American films of the forties and fifties, primarily in the mystery, suspense, and detective genres, nearly all of them in black-and-white. The noir genre is best known for its low-key lighting style: side light, chiaroscuro, shadowy (Figure 5.6). This was, of course, only one of the various elements of visual style: they also used angle, composition, lighting, montage, depth, and movement in expressive new ways. Many factors came together to influence this style: technical innovations such as more sensitive, finer-grained black-and-white negative film stock; lenses better suited to darker shooting conditions; smaller, more mobile camera dollies, cameras light enough to hand-hold, and portable power supplies, all perfected during World War II, alleviated many of the logistical problems previously connected with location filming. These enabled filmmakers to get out to the dark, mean streets of the city with its shadowy alleys fraught with unknown dangers, blinking neon lights reflected on rain-soaked pavement, and all of the mystery and menace of the city after dark. Beyond just the gritty reality and groundedness that come with actual locations, the challenges and various difficulties of lighting in and around real structures tend to force cinematographers to experiment and be bolder with their lighting; there is less of a tendency to just do it the same old way it’s always been done back in the studio. But all of this is more than just visual style: it is inherently a part of the storytelling, an integral narrative device. “A side-lit close-up may reveal a face, half in shadow, half in light, at the precise moment of indecision.” (Silver and Ward). Beyond narrative, it becomes part of character as well. Noir was the birth of the protagonist who is not so clearly defined as purely good or evil. As with Walter Neff in Double Indemnity or Johnny Clay in The Killing and so many others, they are characters full of contradiction and alienation. In their very being they may be pulled between good and evil, light and dark, illumination and shadow. This reflects the confusion and sense of lost ideals that returned with the veterans and survivors of the war. It also reflects the “zeitgeist” of the times: the growing undercurrent that not all things can be known, “...the impossibility of a single, stable point of view, and thus the limits to all seeing and knowing.” ( J.P. Tellotte, Voices in the Dark) — that what is unseen in the shadows may be as significant as what is seen in the light. Figure 5.3. (top) The Black Maria, developed by Edison and Dickson, the first method of controlling lighting for filmmaking. Figure 5.4. (bottom) D.W. Griffith and his cameraman Billy Bitzer examine a piece of negative in front of some Cooper-Hewitt tubes, one of the earliest artificial lighting sources. For a more extensive discussion of the history of film lighting see Motion Picture and Video Lighting, by the same author, also published by Focal Press. visual storytelling 69
• 84. Figure 5.5. Although not strictly a noir film, Citizen Kane is of the same era and employs the same techniques of visual storytelling with lighting that is expressive, visually striking, and makes specific story points. Here the reporter has come to the vault where Kane’s memoirs are kept. As the guard brings forward the sacred book that we hope will contain the ultimate secrets, the single beam of light represents knowledge reaching into the darkened space in much the same way that it does in the Caravaggio (Figure 5.1). Being a backlight with no fill, it leaves the characters in complete silhouette, perhaps representing their ignorance of the knowledge. cinematography 70 LIGHT AS VISUAL METAPHOR Let’s turn now to a more recent example, a film that uses light as a metaphor and as storytelling perhaps better than any other of the modern era: Barry Levinson’s The Natural. Masterfully photographed by Caleb Deschanel, the film is so visually unified and well thought out that it would be possible to comment on the metaphoric or narrative use of lighting in almost every scene; here we will examine only the high points. In the opening shot we see the title character alone, dejected and older, sitting at a railroad station. He is half in light and half in shadow, a metaphor for his uncertain future and his dark, unclear past. The train arrives and blacks out the screen. He gets on. End of title sequence. It is mysterious, suggestive, and supremely simple (Figure 5.7). The Natural is the tale of a talented young baseball player Roy Hobbes (Robert Redford) who is diverted from his career by a chance encounter with a dark and mysterious young lady, but makes a comeback years later as he simultaneously finds love with his longlost childhood sweetheart. It is a story of good versus evil in the classic sense, and Levinson and Deschanel use a wide variety of cinematic and narrative devices to tell it. More than anything, they use light as a visual metaphor — a key part of the visual storytelling. As the story begins, Roy is a young farm boy full of energy, talent, promise, and infatuation for his sweetheart Iris (Glenn Close), who always wears white. This section is shot in bright afternoon sunlight: the vibrant energy of nature with just a hint of a soft filter. It is backlit with the sun, and everything is warm and golden. His father dies of a heart attack in the shade of a tree, and that night there is a ferocious storm: inky blue punctuated with stabs of violent lightning. A bolt splits the tree, and Roy uses the heart of the
• 85. Figure 5.6. The black-and-white film noir period is one of the highest achievements of film lighting as a story element. This frame is from Mildred Pierce. tree to make his own bat, which he inscribes with a lightning bolt: a symbol of the power of nature — light in its most intense, primitive, and pure form. He gets a call from the majors and asks Iris out for a last meeting. They are silhouetted on a ridge against a glowing blue sky that represents night and the temptations of eros (Figure 5.9). If you look closely, it is completely unnatural (it’s day-for-night with a blue filter) but beautiful and perfectly portrays their mental state. In the barn, as they make love they are engulfed in stripes of moonlight alternating with darkness. It is a radiant moment, but there are hints of danger (we will learn much later in the film that she is made pregnant by this encounter). As he boards a train to travel to his major league tryout, things darken a bit. The only light source is the relatively small windows of the train, and while they admit plenty of light, it is low angle and somewhat shadowy and malevolent. Light and Shadow / Good and Evil It is here that he first sees the woman who is to bring evil and temptation into his life — the Lady in Black (Figure. 5.10 ), who we first see in silhouette and from the back. Usually portrayed backlit or in shadow, as befits her evil nature, she invites him to her hotel room, shoots him, and then jumps to her death, ending his baseball hopes. Figure 5.7. The opening shot from The Natural — a faceless character lost somewhere in the light and the dark, suspended in time: the past is uncertain and the future is unclear. This purgatory of being caught between them establishes the mood and tone of uncertainty and conflict between two worlds that is carried through the rest of the film. visual storytelling 71
• 86. Figure 5.8. (above) After years of foundering in the narrow darkness of obscurity, Roy emerges into the light of the one thing that gives him power — the bright sunny open space of a baseball field. Figure 5.9. (top) Early in the film, Roy and his sweetheart Iris are young and innocent, but their purity is disrupted when they meet in the blue moonlight and make love. We will only find out at nearly the end of the film that this loss of innocence leads to a son, which Roy does not know about until he is redeemed and recovers this purity that is represented by the golden sunlight of a wheat field where he plays catch with his newly discovered son. Figure 5.10. (bottom) The Lady in Black — the temptation that leads to Roy’s downfall. She is always lit dimly and is somewhat shadowy — an ephemeral figure; in this shot underlit for a mysterious look. DP Caleb Deschanel gave this scene a special treatment by bi-packing a slightly out-of-focus black-and-white negative with the color negative. cinematography 72 Sixteen years later, we see him arrive at the stadium of the New York Knights. He is in total darkness as he walks up the ramp, then emerges into sunlight as he enters the ballpark: he is home, where he belongs (Figure 5.8). Given his first chance to play, the sequence opens with a shot of what will become an important symbol: the lighting towers of the field. They are dark and silhouetted against black storm clouds. It is twilight, halfway between day and night. As he literally “knocks the cover off the ball,” there is a bolt of lightning and it begins to rain. Lightning, the most powerful form of light, is a recurring symbol throughout the film — light as pure energy, bringing the power of nature. Coming back into the dugout, we are introduced to a second visual theme: the flashbulbs of news photographers (Figures 5.13, 5.14, and 5.15). As one of his teammates adopts the lightning bolt as a shoulder insignia, the team takes off — a symbol of the power of light and energy that Roy has brought to the squad. They are on a hot streak. Now we meet the Judge, half owner of the team. Slimy and evil, his office is completely dark, lit only by the dim light that seeps through the closed venetian blinds (Figure 5.11). His face is obscured in shadow. After the Judge tries to get him to lose so he can buy the team, Roy rebuffs him, and on his way out he defiantly flips the room lights on. Then the bookie emerges from the shadows. Their attempt at bribery having failed, they contrive to set him up with Memo (Kim Basinger, who always wears black) at a fancy restaurant, where the only illumination is the table lamps that cast an ominous underlight on the characters, although fill is added for Roy (purity) and Memo (raw beauty). She takes him to the beach and in a reprise of the love scene between Roy and Iris they are bathed in blue moonlight. But this is a slightly different moonlight than we saw with his boyhood girl: colder and harsher; sensuous, but not romantic (Figure 5.12). Fading Flashbulbs Next comes a montage sequence of flashbulbs popping, symbolizing fame, celebrity, glamour, and the seduction of the fast life that will distract him from baseball. To emphasize the idea that fame and success have a corrupting influence on his focus on the game and his nightlife and partying with Memo, many of the flashbulbs go
• 87. Figure 5.11. (top) The Judge, the most elemental evil in the film, claims to abhor sunlight — he stays always in the dark; only a few meager slits of light manage to seep into his darkened den. Figure 5.12. (bottom) As Roy begins to fall victim to the temptations of fame and the glamour of the big city, he once again is silhouetted in dark blue - even the car headlights seem to be glowering at him as he falls for the seductive Memo Paris. off right in his face, thus affecting his vision — a perfect metaphor for the blinding influence of celebrity. Roy descends into a slump, bringing the team down with him. In his decline, the flashbulbs still go off, but in marvelous subtlety we see them in slow motion at the end of their burn cycle as they fade out. Iris comes to a game to watch, unbeknownst to Roy. As the team is losing and Roy is striking out, Iris stands up (Figure 5.18). Her translucent white hat is backlit by a single shaft of sunlight, making her appear angelic. Roy hits a home run that breaks the stadium clock — stopping time. Photographers’ flashbulbs go off, and as Roy peers into the crowd looking for Iris, he is blinded by them and can’t see her (Figure 5.16). Later, they meet and go for a walk. As he tells her the story of his dark past, they are in complete silhouette, in darkness even though it is midday. As he ends his confession they emerge into full daylight. Later, the silver bullet that has been in his stomach since the Lady in Black shot him sends him to the hospital. Figure 5.13. (below, left) Throughout the film, flashbulbs represent the glare of fame, fortune, and celebrity. For Roy, as the new hero of the team, the newspaper photographers and flashbulbs are everywhere. Figure 5.14. (below, top) They quickly become the flashbulbs of the paparazzi as he paints the town red with his glamorous girlfriend Memo. Figure 5.15. (below, bottom) As the nonstop nightlife hurts Roy’s performance on the field, a slowmo shot of a flashbulb fading to black represents Roy’s loss of power — the dimming of his light. visual storytelling 73
• 88. Figure 5.16. (above) His long-lost love Iris comes to a game. Roy seems to sense her presence, but as he turns to look for her, he is blinded by the glare of the photographer’s flashes. Figure 5.17. (right, top) As Roy’s success on the field promises to rescue the team and spoil the Judge’s plans, he watches from his shadowy lair. Figure 5.18. (right) As Roy is faltering on the field, near defeat, Iris stands up, and a single beam of light illuminates her so that she is visible in the crowd. It gives Roy the power to hit a home run and win the game. The angelic glow makes her hat a halo to supplement the white dress and the standing pose. To reinforce the lighting effect, she is surrounded by men, all in dark clothes and hats. Figure 5.19. (below) As a reporter comes close to uncovering Roy’s dark secret, he sneaks onto the field to photograph him at batting practice. To stop him, Roy hits a ball with perfect aim that breaks the reporter’s camera; the flashbulb fires as it falls to the ground: the glare of disclosure, of secrets being brought to light, is prevented by Roy’s sheer talent with the bat. Figure 5.20. (right) As Roy lays ill in the hospital before the playoffs, the Judge comes to offer him a bribe. Rather than rendering the Judge in shadow as might be the obvious choice, Deschanel arranges for the warm glow of the otherwise benevolent hospital lamps to glare on the Judge’s glasses — thus the light itself manages to obscure his eyes and partly disguise his evil. This is appropriate as he appears here not as the intimidating force of evil but as a silky-voiced cajoler. cinematography 74 Against doctor’s orders, he tries to practice in secret, but the reporter attempts to take a picture of him. Roy hits a ball that smashes his camera, which falls to the ground, and the flashbulb fires as it breaks: he is striking back at the glare of publicity that has nearly destroyed him (Figure 5.19). The final climactic game is at night, and the stadium tower lights burn brightly. The Judge and the bookie watch the game from his skybox, which we see from below as just a pale yellow glow on the partially closed blinds: an image of evil and corruption hovering over the game (Figure 5.17). Roy is struggling as his injury plagues him, and it all comes down to one final pitch that will win or lose the pennant. Having it all rest on the final pitch is, of course, a given in any baseball movie, but the cinematography and the metaphor of lighting and lightning together with the mystical glow of the dying sparks, strongly reminiscent of triumphal fireworks, gives this scene a magical quality that makes it one of the most memorable final scenes in American cinema and visually one of the most moving.
• 89. Figure 5.21. (above) The moment before the do-or-die climactic pitch is thrown, lightning (which has always brought the power of good to Roy) strikes the light towers of the baseball field. Figure 5.22. (left, top) As Roy connects powerfully with the ball, he is framed so that the lights of the field (representing the ennobling power of baseball) are in the shot with him. Figure 5.23. (left, bottom) Roy’s home run strikes the lights of the field; one shatters, short-circuiting them all, and they explode in a shower of fireworks. Visual Poetry It all comes down to a 3-2 count and the last pitch — the ultimate moment. The pitch is thrown in slow motion; Roy swings and slams a home run right into the stadium lights (Figure 5.22), which shatter and short-circuit, sending a shower of sparks onto the field (Figures 5.23 and 5.24). This is a masterful touch, as drama, as storytelling, and as a truly motivated lighting effect. In one of the truly great images of contemporary cinema, as he rounds the bases in slowmotion triumph, Roy and his celebrating teammates are enveloped in these glowing fireworks, as if miniature stars of glory are raining on them. A soft, golden glow of light personified engulfs Roy and the entire team as the film ends. It is the light of pure good; Roy and the power of his raw talent as symbolized by the bat carved from the tree struck by lightning have transformed them and invigorated them with all that is good about baseball and all that it symbolizes about American democracy. The firefly-like glow comes from the exploding lights of the field (the illuminating spirit of baseball), shattered by Roy’s home run (his talent) that have just been struck by a bolt of lightning — the same lightning that has brought Roy the power of his unsullied talent when it struck the tree under which his father died and from which he took the wood to carve his almost magical bat. These are symbols and they work, but there is a more subtle visual metaphor at work and it is what makes the shot so hauntingly evocative. What is magical about this shot is that the light is everywhere: it is an omnipresent bathing glow, it is all around them, it almost seems to emanate from within them as they bask in the beauty of a pure and simple moment of triumph in baseball and the triumph of right over the insidious attempts of the Judge to infect and degrade baseball with his greed. With this elegantly simple but visceral and expressive visual image system, Levinson and Deschanel make the most of and add extra visual storytelling 75
• 90. Figure 5.24. As Roy rounds the bases, the sparks from the exploding bulbs surround him and his jubilant teammates in a soft gentle wash of light. They are enveloped in an omnipresent glow of the power of good triumphant over evil — one of the most haunting images in modern cinema. The light is all around them, part of them, within them. cinematography 76 layers of meaning to a great story, a great script, and a superlative cast. In this particular film, light is used as a metaphor in a very clear and sustained way. In most films, lighting is a part of storytelling in more limited and less overtly metaphorical ways, but it can always be a factor in underlying story points, character, and particularly the perception of time and space. Filmmakers who take a dismissive attitude toward lighting are depriving themselves of one of the most important, subtle, and powerful tools of visual storytelling.
• 91. cinematic continuity © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50006-3
• 92. SHOOTING FOR EDITING Filming is ultimately shooting for editorial. The primary purpose of shooting is not merely to get some “great shots” — in the end it must serve the purpose of the film by giving the editor and the director what they need to actually piece together completed scenes and sequences that add up to a finished product that makes sense, has emotional impact, and accomplishes its purpose. Thinking about Continuity Movies get made one scene at a time, and scenes get made one shot at a time. No matter how large and complex a production is, you are always still doing it one shot at a time. As you do each shot you have to keep the overall purpose in mind: that this shot must fit in with all the other shots that will make up the final scene. Continuity is a big issue in filmmaking. It’s something we have to be aware of at all times. Continuity mistakes can easily render several hours of shooting worthless or can create huge problems in editing. So what is continuity? Basically, continuity means a logical consistency of the story, dialog, and picture so that it presents the appearance of reality. Here’s a simple example: in a wide shot, he is not wearing a hat. Then we immediately cut to a close-up and he is wearing a hat. It appears to the viewer as if a magic hat suddenly appeared on his head. This would be a serious continuity error — the audience would surely notice it. When the audience is aware of continuity errors, it makes them aware they are watching a movie, it breaks the illusion. Types of continuity There are several categories of continuity: Continuity Of Content Continuity of content applies to anything visible in the scene: wardrobe, hairstyle, props, the actors, cars in the background, the time set on the clock. As discussed in the chapter Set Operations, it is the script supervisor in conjunction with the various department heads who must ensure that all of these items match from shot to shot. These kinds of problems extend from the very obvious — she was wearing a red hat in the master, but now it is a green hat in the closeup — to the very subtle — he was smoking a cigar that was almost finished when he entered and now he has a cigar that is just started. While the script supervisor, on-set wardrobe, and prop master are the first line of defense in these matters, it is still up to the director and camera person to always be watchful for problems. As with almost anything in film there is a certain amount of cheating that is possible; the audience can be very accepting of minor glitches. Absolutely perfect continuity is never possible and there is a large gray area. Figure 6.1. (previous page) A continuity sequence from High Noon. The geography is very clear and well established. It is possible to be a bit looser about some of the rules of continuity, and in fact the editor does so a few times in this scene. cinematography 78 Continuity of Movement Anything that is moving in a shot must have a movement in the next shot that is a seamless continuation of what was begun. Whether it be opening a door, picking up a book, or parking a car, the movement must have no gaps from one shot to the next. This is where it is so critical to be aware of how the shots might be cut together.
• 93. As discussed in Shooting Methods, to play it safe in shooting any type of movement and be sure that the editor is not constricted in choices, it is important to overlap all movement. Even if the script calls for the scene to cut away before she fully opens the door, for example, it is best to go ahead and let the camera roll for a few seconds until the action is complete. Never start a shot exactly at the beginning of a movement — back up a bit and roll into it, then let it run out at the end. One prime example of this is the rock in. Say you shot a master of a character walking up to the bank teller. He is there and is talking to the teller in the master. You then set up for a close-up of him. You may know that the edit will pick up with the character already in place, but the safe way to do it is to have the character do the final step or two of walking up as shot in the close-up OTS position. There are times, however, when focus or position is critical. It is difficult to guarantee that the actor will hit the mark with the precision necessary to get the shot in focus. In this case a “rock in” is the way to go. The technique is simple: instead of actually taking a full step back, the actor keeps one foot firmly planted and steps back with the other: then when action is called, he can hit his mark again with great precision. The most important aspect of continuity of movement is screen direction, which is discussed in more detail later. Figure 6.2. Occasionally continuity of time can be reinforced by cutting to the clock, but this cannot be the primary means of keeping the audience aware of when they are. Continuity of Position that are used in the scene are going to be moved in almost every take. Everyone must watch that they start and end in the same place, or it can be an editor's nightmare. This is often the dividing line between a thoroughly professional performer and a beginner: it is up to the actor to use the props and place them exactly the same in every take. If, for some reason, there is a mismatch in placement of a prop between the master and a element of coverage, it is up to the director to either reshoot one or the other or to do some sort of repair coverage that will allow the editor to solve the problem. This can be done in a variety of ways. One simple example: if the actor put the glass down on the left side of the table in the master, but it is one the right side in the medium, one solution is to do a shot where the actor slides it across the table. This solves the problem, but there is one drawback: the editor has to use that shot. This may end up creating more problems than it solves. Continuity of Time This does not refer to the problem of resetting the clock so that it always reads the same time (that is prop continuity and comes under continuity of content), rather it has to do with the flow of time within a scene. For example, if Dave North is walking away from Sam South in the wide shot, then you cut to a close-up of Sam South; by the time you cut back to Dave North, his action must be logical time wise. That is, if the close-up of Sam South was for two seconds, when cutting back to the wide shot, Dave North can’t have walked fifty yards away, (there wasn’t enough time for that). Within the scene, certain conventions help maintain pacing and flow, particularly in cases where a character moves within a scene. The action or background at the beginning of the move may be important, as they may be important at the end of the scene (otherwise why are they being shot?) The middle part of the move, however, is often not important information. If the character has to cross a wide room or walk up a flight of stairs, it may be helpful to skip cinematic continuity 79
• 94. Figure 6.3. (above) The position of the viewer (or camera) establishes the line, sometimes called the 180° line or the action axis. The woman at top (A) will see the car moving to her left (Figure 6.4, above, right) Figure 6.5. (right) The woman at the bottom (B) will see the car moving to her right. Figure 6.6. (below) If both of the women are viewing the car from the same side of its movement of direction, then they will both see it moving in the same direction. Figure 6.7, (below, right) This is the basic principle of screen direction. If we cross over to the other side of the line of action, it will reverse the screen direction. cinematography 80
• 95. over some of that move. To just skip it would be, of course, a jump cut and an error in continuity, but there are several work-arounds. The simplest is to let the character exit frame, then enter frame in the next shot. This is a simple form of an elliptical cut (when the cut between two shots spans a substantial amount of time), and a good deal of movement time can be left out without disturbing continuity. This is a culturally conditioned film convention that audiences worldwide have come to accept. To preserve movement continuity and screen direction, if the actor exits the left side of frame, she must enter the next frame on the right side (Figure 6.26). In The Technique of Film and Video Editing, Ken Dancyger points out another device used by Kurosawa in Seven Samurai, by Kubrick in Paths of Glory, and, of course, in many other films: a tight close-up of the character that tracks or pans as the character moves. As long as the direction, action, and speed match that of the wide shot, the movement of the character can be longer or shorter than the real time move would take. If the character changes direction in the shot, this must be preserved when cutting back to a wider shot. Figure 6.8. Screen direction plays a major role in David Lean’s directing of Lawrence of Arabia. To emphasize the inevitability of Lawrence’s fate, all movement in the film is from left to right. THE PRIME DIRECTIVE Most of these techniques and rules are based on one principle: to not create confusion in the mind of the audience and thus distract them from the story or annoy and frustrate them. Let’s take a fundamental example (Figures 6.3 through 6.7). Two women are standing on opposite sides of the street. Woman A sees the car going left. Woman B sees the car going right. If we move them to the same side of the street, they will both see the car going in the same direction in relation to their own sense of orientation (left/right): their perception of the car will be the same. The movement of the car establishes direction, but there is another aspect: where the women are viewing the movement from is also important; this is defined by the line, sometimes called the 180° line. These two establish the spatial orientation of the scene and are the basis of screen direction. SCREEN DIRECTION Anybody standing on the same side of a scene will see things from the same orientation, as in Figures 6.3 through 6.7, as long as they are on the same side of the line. Let’s take this simple two shot (Figure 6.10). From our first camera position, the woman Lucy is on the left and the man Ralph is on the right. Then, in C, the camera position cinematic continuity 81
• 96. Figure 6.9. (above) Where the camera can go without creating this jump in directional relationships is defined by a 180° semicircle on one or the other side of the line. The camera can go anywhere in that 180° arc and screen direction is maintained. The camera can go closer or farther away, higher or lower as long as it stays on the same side of the line. Figure 6.10. (top, left) When starting a scene, which side of the line the camera is on establishes screen direction. Figure 6.11. (top, right) With the camera on one side of them, the woman will be on the left and the man will be on the right. Figure 6.12. (bottom, left) If the camera is shifted to the other side of the line, their positions are reversed. Figure 6.13. (bottom, right) The man is now on the left and the woman is on the right — the screen direction is reversed. These two shots could not be cut together without creating a jarring effect. is shifted to the other side of the line. In D, the audience will see, for no reason they can understand, that Ralph is on the left side facing right and Lucy is on the right side facing left. It will confuse the audience: they won't be able to readily understand and assimilate the information. While their brains try to sort it out, their attention will be drawn away from the story. Not only will they be distracted from what the characters are saying, but if it happens often enough, it will annoy and frustrate them. What is it that delineates where we can put the camera to maintain continuity and where we can’t? The Action Axis There is an imaginary axis between these two characters. In our first example of the car, the movement direction of the car establishes what we call the line. In all of these diagrams, it is represented by the large dashed line. The line is referred to by several terms; some people call it the action axis or the action line. If we stay on one side of it for all our shots — everything cuts together perfectly (Figure 6.10). If we cross over to the other side — the characters will jump to opposite sides of the screen. Safe locations for the camera are symbolized by the 180° half circle (Figure 6.9). This semicircle is a symbol only; in practice the camera can go nearer or farther, higher and lower, in relation to the subjects; the lens focal length can change, and so on — what is important is that by keeping the camera on the same side of the line, the screen direction does not change. These Are the Rules — but Why? The basic rules of not crossing the line are well known to all working filmmakers, but many do not stop to consider the fundamental theory and perceptual issues that underlie this principle. It is important to understand it at a deeper level if you are to be able to solve the trickier issues that do not conveniently fall into one of the basic categories of this system. More importantly, it is only when we understand the whole theoretical system that we can truly understand when it is permissible to break the rules. First, we have to consider directionality. What do we mean by that? What is something that’s not directional? Not much, really. A featureless cylinder or a globe painted all the same color are non- cinematography 82
• 97. Figure 6.14. The line established by clear and easily understood geography. The action line is practically visible itself in this shot from High Noon. Interestingly, the filmmakers actually purposely violate the line a few times in this scene, but since the geography is so strong, these violations do not create a continuity problem. directional, but just about everything else is. A woman looking at a building is directional. More importantly, her look is directional. Movement is also directional. Say we took that featureless globe and rolled down the sidewalk. Its line of movement is the line. If we see it from one side of the line, its going to our left, and if we see it from the other side of the line, it is going right. The imaginary line exists between any two objects that have some sort of relationship — even between a book and a telephone sitting on a table. What Establishes the Line? The line is established by the first view of the scene the audience sees; once the physical relationship of the scene has been established, it must remain consistent in order to avoid confusing the audience. Is the line always there? No, the line only exists once it has been created by something in the scene. As we saw in the example of the two women and the car, your first camera setup in the series of shots establishes the line, but it works in conjunction with specific visual elements of the scene itself. Several things can establish the line for a particular scene. They are: The Purpose of Screen Direction Screen direction serves two important purposes: it gives the audience clues about the story and it helps keep the audience from getting confused about where someone is or what they are doing. Avoiding confusion is the fundamental reason for all film continuity. Figure 6.15. (left) In this sequence from High Noon, leaving town is clearly established as going left. Figure 6.16. (right) When the marshall decides he must stand and fight, we clearly see him turn the carriage around and head back the other way. When the carriage is moving to the right, we know that they are going back toward town. cinematic continuity 83
• 98. Figure 6.17. Early films, such as the Great Train Robbery, which treated cinema as a “filmed play,” maintained a static frame and constant, unchanging left/right relationships as viewed by the audience. Since the camera never moves, it never changes the directional relationships of the actors or the set. Figure 6.18. (below, top) An example of a true reverse from Seven Samurai. The camera jumps cleanly and completely to the other side of the line (Figure 6.19, bottom). Directional Conventions The classic example of this is in low-budget cowboy movies of the fifties. In these films it was always well established that one direction on screen was towards town and the opposite direction was away from town (Figures 6.15 and 6.16). Once we knew that we could tell if the good guys or the bad guys were heading toward town or away, any deviation from this would have been very confusing. Another convention applies to trains, planes, and automobiles. If someone is leaving the east and going to the west, the plane or vehicle should be traveling left in the frame and vice versa. This is derived from the fact that nearly all maps have north at the top, so west is left and east is right. Deliberately Breaking the Rules One of the aims of editing is to not confuse the audience. If a character is walking towards the left of the screen in one shot and without explanation in the next shot he is walking toward the right, the audience will (even if only subconsciously) wonder why he changed. Their attention will be momentarily drawn away from the story as they try to sort it out. This is the basic principle of all continuity in film shooting and editing. For example, she was just wearing a red dress outside the restaurant, but once she stepped through the door she is wearing a blue dress. Is this a different day? A dream sequence? What happened? Of course, a filmmaker can use this as a storytelling device. Citizen Kane. In three seamlessly cut together shots we see Charles Foster Kane and his wife at the same dining table in the same room. We only know that time is progressing because they are wearing different clothes and makeup in each shot. Through this simple device the deterioration of their marriage is told with great efficiency. Most famously, in the payoff shot she is reading a newspaper put out by a rival publisher: we know the marriage is doomed. Similar devices can indicate we’ve gone into a fantasy sequence or flashback. They can be quite subtle (a small change in makeup or hair) or dramatic: the little match girl on the street is suddenly in a gorgeous ball gown. Exceptions to the Rule There are several important exceptions to the 180° rule and the line. in the shot, then we understand that things have changed position. If a car is moving right in the shot, and then we see it turn around so that it’s going left, then there’s no problem (Figure 6.16). during the shot. cut back, you can change the line. tral axis shot, then go back to either side of the line. A neutral shot is one where the movement is either directly towards or away from the camera (Figures 6.20). In cases where the camera moves during the shot, in essence, the line itself has moved. Some people tend to think of the line as very rigid and static, that once the line is established it can never move the whole rest of the time you are shooting the scene, but actually it is fluid and can change throughout the scene, as we will see later. There is another exception, although it must be applied with caution. Remember, the whole point of the rule is to not confuse the cinematography 84
• 99. audience. That is its only reason for being; it is not a carved in stone dictum that exists independently. That means that if we can cross the line without confusing the audience, then we’re still OK. Example — a courtroom. It’s layout is very clear and visually strong. At the front of the room is the bench, a large identifiable object with the judge sitting at it. On one side is the jury, and facing the judge are the counsel tables. It is familiar and understandable. In a situation like this you have a great deal of leeway in crossing the line without creating confusion. Another example would be rock climbers ascending a cliff. You can jump to the other side and no one is going to misunderstand what happened. Reverse Another case of crossing the line is when you deliberately go to the other side for a reason. Say two people are seated on a sofa and we do extensive coverage of them from in front of the sofa, the most logical place to shoot from (Figure 6.22). Clearly the line has been well established. But now there is another important action. A new character has to enter through the door and have a conversation with the two people on the sofa. It always better to show a character entering the room rather than just having them enter frame, when we don’t know where they came from. Second, we wouldn’t really know where the door is and that he is entering the same room. Since they have not seen the door before, for all the audience knows, we have gone to a completely new scene and this man is entering another room somewhere. What we would really like to do is put the camera in the back of the room behind the sofa, so we see them in the foreground and see him entering, but that would be crossing the line, so we can't do it, right? Yes, you can do it. It’s called a reverse, but you can’t just do it willynilly. You can’t do it on a close-up; that would be just crossing the line. The important thing is that we still see the two people in the foreground, but we see the new character and the door in the background. There is motivation for being on the other side; there is an understandable reason. Another factor in a successful reverse is how big a difference it is. Just crossing the line slightly would probably not work. It is when you definitively and unquestionably are on the other side of the line that a reverse is understandable. The audience does have to do some mental reorientation, but given the proper clues they can do so easily and it is not distracting to the viewers. Another way to cross the line is to see the camera move to the other side of the line, as in a dolly move. Then there is no confusion. TURNAROUND You would never do the over-the-shoulder on one actor, then move the camera to do the OTS on the other actor, then go back to the first for the close-up, and so on. This would be very inefficient and time consuming. So naturally you do all the coverage on one side, then move the camera and reset the lighting. The term for this is that you shoot out one side before you move to the other side, which is called the turnaround. The group of OTS’s and close-ups that match the ones done on the first actor are called the answering shots. Every shot you do in the first setup should have an answering shot. After window and door matching, the turnaround is the other major area where cheating is employed, such as in cases where some physical obstacle precludes a good camera position for the turnaround, or perhaps the sun is at a bad angle, or maybe it’s a complex lighting setup and there simply isn't time to relight for the answering shot. Figure 6.20. Cutting to a neutral angle such as a car coming directly toward you can help transition from one side of the line to the other. cinematic continuity 85
• 100. Figure 6.21. Sometimes it is necessary to cheat a turnaround. If for some reason there is no time to set up and light a real turnaround, or if the new background is somehow unuseable, then it is possible to cheat the shot by merely spinning the actors around (middle two frames). However, if you only spin them, the camera ends up being over the “wrong” shoulder. Based on the shot in the top right frame, the answering shot should be over her right ear. In the middle frames, we see it is over her left ear. In the bottom two frames we see it done correctly: the actors are reversed in their postions, but the camera is shifted to camera left so that it is now over the correct shoulder for the cheated shot. cinematography 86
• 101. Figure 6.22. In this scene of a couple sitting on a couch (A), the action line is clearly established. We can do any shots we want as long as we stay on the correct side of the line. A new character enters (B), and we would like to include him in a shot that shows all three. Doing so puts the camera definitely on the wrong side of the line, as in C. Even though it is technically an error, the shot works fine because it is done boldly and the sofa helps the viewers orient themselves (D). A B C D Cheating the Turnaround In any of these cases, it is possible to leave the camera and lights where they are and just move the actors. This is a last-ditch measure and is only used in cases where the background for one part of the coverage is not usable or there is an emergency in terms of the schedule — if for example, if the sun is going down. The theory is that once we are in tight shots on the coverage, we really don’t see much of the background. It is not correct, however, to just have them switch places. In our sample scene, we are over the shoulder of Jennifer, looking at Dave. In the OTS of Dave, we are seeing over Jennifer’s right shoulder. If we did a real turnaround, we would be over Dave’s left shoulder (Figure 6.21). In this illustration we see two cases: in #1 we rotate the camera 180°. This is a real turnaround. In case #2 we just spin the actors and leave the camera where it is. You can see the problem: the camera is over the wrong shoulder. In cheating a turnaround, you have to either move the camera a couple of feet, or even better, just slide the foreground actor over so you are over the correct shoulder. (Fortunately, moving the foreground actor seldom involves any substantial relighting.) The key to a successful cheat is that the background either be neutral or similar for both actors as established in any previous wide shots. In some cases, moving props can help establish the cheat. PLANNING COVERAGE Which brings us to another key point that is easily overlooked: whenever you are setting up a master, take a moment to think about the coverage. Make sure that there is some way to position the camera more dramatic or more crucial to the story than the other, it is very cinematic continuity 87
• 102. Figures 6.23 (left) and 6.24 (right). Maintaining the same direction while going through a door is usually desirable, but not always necessary. There is a continuity error in this scene. Can you spot it? See the text for the answer. easy to get yourself backed into a corner or up against an obstruction that makes it difficult or impossible to position the camera for a proper answering shot. An answering shot should be the same focal length, focus distance, and angle as the shot it is paired with. In a pinch, if you can’t get quite far back enough (or close enough), you can cheat a bit with a different focal length to end up with the same image size, which is by far the most important issue. As with all issues of continuity, anything that the audience won’t notice is OK. Cuttability So that’s the 180° rule and we can shoot anywhere in the 180° circle, right? Well, not quite. First let’s define what makes shots cuttable. When we put a sequence together, it is important that when one shot follows another, it does so smoothly, not jarringly. An example: our two people are on the sofa. We are doing a shot from the side that includes both of them and the arms of the sofa. Then we move in just a bit and get a similar shot of the two of them but without the sofa arms. How would it look if we cut these two together? Suddenly the image size changes just slightly, as if maybe the film broke and some frames are missing — sometimes called a jump cut. For two shots to be cuttable, there needs to be a more substantial change. If instead of moving in just slightly, for example, we moved in a lot so that the shot is just a close-up shot of one of the characters. Then the two shots would be cuttable. The 20% and 30 Degree Rules How do we know how much we have to change to make two similar shots cuttable? It’s called the 20% rule. In general, a shot must change by at least 20% to be cuttable (Figure 6.25). That can be a 20% change in angle, in lens size, or camera position. It’s a very rough guideline, of course. Many people find that 20% just isn’t enough of a change for a smooth cut. At best, it is an absolute minimum — it is wise to make more of a change to ensure a good edit. Another rough guideline is the 30° rule. This is just a variation of the 20% rule (Figure 6.25). Let’s go back to our 180° circle. Without changing the lens, or moving closer or farther away, and as long as we move 30° to the left or right along that circle, we're OK (sort of ). With lens changes, it is more subjective. Depending on other factors in the shot, moving up or down one prime lens size — say from a 50mm to a 35mm, may or may not be enough. Frequently, it is necessary to change two lens sizes: say, from a 50mm to a 25mm. In the end it comes down to a judgment call. cinematography 88
• 103. Figure 6.25. The 20% rule and the 30° rule are pretty much the same thing. What is important is not some exact figure, but the crucial element is that the two shots appear different enough to the audience so that they cut together smoothly. You should consider these guidelines an absolute minimum. Often they are not enough of a change. It is best to combine the 30° move with another change, such as a different focal length to ensure cuttability. 30° OTHER ISSUES IN CONTINUITY Other general principles apply when the subjects are in motion or for groups larger than a two shot. Moving Shots Two types of shots predominate in moving shots: the driving shot, and walk and talk. The same rules apply to both. At first glance we would think that the direction of the car or the walk is the major axis, but in fact it is only a secondary axis. The major axis for screen direction is between the two people, not the direction of their walk or the movement of the car. Going Through a Door There are two schools of thought on door entrances and exits. Some will say that if a character goes through a door going to the right (in an exterior shot), they have to emerge on the other side, also going right (in the interior shot). Others maintain that once someone goes through a door it is a new deal, and anything goes. Again, it is a subjective call. If there is a very clear connection between the two, and the directionality and continuity of movement is very strong, then it is a good idea to maintain directional continuity between the two. If there is a great deal of difference between the interior and exterior and there is a greater change in angle, camera position, or lens size between the two, it is possible to go to the other side when the character comes through other side of the door (Figures 6.23 and 6.24). However, there is a small continuity problem in this scene when Bogie enters the off. Can you spot the mistake? Take a very close look before you read the next paragraph. He is using a different hand opening the door: right hand in the hallway shot and left hand on the shot inside the office. Similarly, when a character takes a turn around a building, if the camera cuts when the character disappears around the corner, when we pick him up on the other side, the screen direction should be maintained. Entering and Exiting Frame As we noted before, exiting frame establishes screen direction, since it shows the character taking a definite direction of travel. Once a character exits either frame left or right, they should enter the next from the opposite side (Figures 6.26). You can think of it as an imaginary pan. As the character exits frame, you mentally pan with her: cinematic continuity 89
• 104. this positions you correctly for the next shot of entering frame. Of course, there will be times when you do an actual pan as characters pass the camera, but there are just as many occasions when you will want to cut, either because the pan is awkward, would reveal parts of the location you don’t want to see, or even when the two shots are in very different locations even though you want the audience to perceive the two parts of the walk to be in the same place. This is called location stitching (for an example see Figures 6.52 through 6.54). As with all continuity sequences, if something else comes in between the exit and the entrance, anything goes. Figure 6.26. (above) When a character exits the frame, this establishes a direction that must be observed when the character reenters. Think of it as if you were panning the camera. Figures 6.27 and 6.28. (above, right and far right) To be truly neutral, the object or character must be angled to exit the top or bottom of the frame. Neutral Axis to Exit Frame If the character or a moving vehicle exits the frame on a completely neutral axis, then you are free to go anywhere you want on the next cut. For something to exit on a truly neutral axis, however, it has to exit either above or below the frame (Figures 6.27 and 6.28). A neutral axis resets screen direction; once you go to a neutral axis shot of any type, you are free to come back to the scene with a new screen direction established for the scene. This can be used as an editorial device and also as a way to save the scene in editing, just as you would with a cutaway. Three Shots Screen direction is basically the same in three shots (or when there are more characters in the scene), but one thing to watch out for is overlapping the person in the center. If you break it up as a pair of two shots, the person in the center will appear in both shots and there will be unavoidable problems. The center character will “pop” as you cut from shot to shot (Figures 6.29 through 6.31). Keep the Nose Out For the same reason it is important to avoid getting a part of the foreground person in the shot when doing a clean single over the shoulder of the second character. When two characters are fairly close to each other in the master, it is often difficult to completely frame the second person out, especially if they move around a lot. Often their nose, or a hand, or some small piece of them will creep into the single. This is not only compositionally annoying but will cause continuity problems. It will often be necessary to shift the offscreen character back a bit so they don’t creep in. You don’t want to do it so much that you “miss” his presence in the coverage. If there is a large shift, be sure to set a new eyeline for the on-screen character so that their head doesn’t shift too much from the master. It may be necessary for the actor to look at a mark rather than at the other actor, which is something to avoid, as it does make it difficult for the performer. cinematography 90
• 105. Prop Continuity in Coverage The principle of overlapping applies to foreground props as well as three shots. If, for example, there is a candlestick on the table between two characters, you need to pay attention to its continuity as well as that of the actors: this is where having a good continuity supervisor really pays off. Although all types of continuity are ultimately the responsibility of the director, keeping an eye on such things is the primary job of the script supervisor (another name for the continuity person, although on sets they are often referred to as scripty the cinematographer is not also functioning as the operator) has to keep an eye on such things. Since the operator is constantly scanning all parts of the scene, it is often the operator who picks up on small mistakes in continuity, screen direction, and eyelines. If it is left in its position from the master, it will seem to jump back and forth as you cut from medium shot on one actor to medium on the other. Your choices are to cheat it out of the mediums altogether (the safest) or cheating it back and forth for each medium, which is a bit riskier. Mistakes in prop continuity are easy to make, especially on small productions where you may not have a full prop crew on the set or when you don’t have an experienced continuity supervisor. It is important to stay vigilant for even the smallest details, as bad continuity is something that will mark your project as “amateurish.” On the other hand there is such a thing as “too much continuity.” Sometimes, fledgling script supervisors can become so obsessed with tiny details that won’t really be apparent to the audience that they can start to get in the way of the production. It is important to find a balance; only being on the set and then watching the finished production with an audience provides that experience. Figure 6.29. (left) A three shot with a character in the middle. Figures 6.30 and 6.31. (middle and right) If coverage is not clean singles, then you need to be sure that hand and head continuity match for the character that appears on both sides of the coverage. In this example we see that he is gesturing with different hands. This will drive your editor crazy. The safe way to shoot a scene like this is to shoot each actor as clean singles. Even if you shoot it as shown here, shooting clean singles in addition will provide safety coverage if you need it. Eye Sweeps When an off-screen character walks behind the camera, the on-screen character may follow with her eyes. Many inexperienced directors are reluctant to do this, as they think it won’t work. It’s perfectly OK as long as the eye sweep is slightly above or below the lens. As always, it is important that the actor not look directly into the lens, even for just a moment. The most important thing about eye sweeps is that they match the direction and speed of the crossing character. This means that the on-screen actor will move their head in the opposite direction of the movement of the crossing, since we are essentially crossing the line in a reverse. If you are shooting the eye sweep first, it may be desirable to shoot a few different speeds because when the crossing is shot later, the speed may not match. cinematic continuity 91
• 106. A B C D E F Figure 6.32. This master from Ronin (A) establishes the main group and their places around the table. The next cut (B) reveals the woman at the head of the table (separate from the group) in a way that shows her relationship to them; it orients us to the overall arrangement. This is a reverse. This cut to a three shot maintains the screen direction established in the master (A). This is a good example of how seeing a piece of the table helps to keep us grounded in the scene. If it wasn’t there, we would definitely miss it. (B) This over-the-shoulder of the girl is on the opposite side of the line from (D); it is outside the group. However, since the previous sequence of shots has clearly established all the relationships, there is no problem. (E) This single on the man in the suit also benefits from seeing a piece of the table. If it was necessary to move the table to get the shot, the set dressers will often have something smaller that can stand in for it. (F) This shot is from the POV of the man in the suit, but we don’t see any of him in the foreground. In this case we are said to be “inside” him — not inside his body, but inside his field of vision. Group Shots Scenes with more than three characters generally require a good deal of coverage. If there is a dominant direction to the arrangement of the group, that will most likely dictate a screen direction line based on where you shoot the master from. In practice it may be possible to shoot from almost anywhere as long as you get the proper answering shots and coverage. However, it may be better to pick a line and stick to it. This will reduce confusion in the audience’s perceptions. If there is a dominant character standing apart from the group, this will often establish the line. These frames from a group scene in Ronin illustrates some of these principles (Figure 6.32). Notice in particular the slight difference between B and F. Both are shots down the middle of the axis; B, however, is an over-the-shoulder past the man in the suit, while F Chase Scenes Chase scenes can be problematic for screen direction. As a general rule of thumb you want to maintain an overall direction within the scene, but there is considerable room for variation. When the chase itself changes direction, your screen direction may change as well. For car chases especially, some directors prefer to mix it up more to slightly disorient the audience and emphasize the kinetic nature of the chase; the same applies to fight scenes or other types of action. Cutaway Eyeline Continuity Since cutaways are not part of the main scene but are physically related to it, directional continuity must be maintained between the location of the scene and the cutaway element. This is especially important for cutaways that involve a look from the additional character, which they often do (Figures 6.33 and 6.34). Since you are moving away from the main scene and it is usually for a quick pickup shot, often you will be up against limitations of the set or other problems that will make it necessary for you to cheat the additional character a bit. In this case, it is important to be careful about the eyelines. Because the audience is acutely aware of where an actor’s eyes are directed, wrong eyelines are something they will always be aware of. Careful attention must be paid to eyelines: it is very easy to get them wrong. cinematography 92
• 107. Look Establishes New Line In a related issue, let’s focus on the couple at the table. In our scene of a couple in a restaurant, the conversation between the couple has its own line. When she turns to look at the gangster, that establishes a new line that must be respected in all shots that involve the couple at the table and the gangster (Figures 6.35 through 6.37). It does not replace the line established by the couple's conversation, which must still be used for any coverage at their table. Eyelines in Over-the-Shoulder Coverage When shooting over-the-shoulder coverage, the camera height will generally be at eye level for the characters. If the two performers are of unequal height, some modification is usually necessary. In this case, the camera height will approximately match that of the character over whose shoulder you are shooting. Eyelines for a Seated Character The same principle applies when one or more of the characters is seated or on the floor, but with an important exception. Since shooting over the shoulder of the standing character might be an extreme angle, it also works to keep the camera at the eye-level of the seated performer, which makes it sort of a past the hips shot, (not an official term, by the way, but maybe it should be). In situations like this, for the clean singles, when there is a difference in height or level of the characters in coverage, the eyelines may also need some adjustment. This does not apply to over-the-shoulders, as we can see the off-screen performer’s head and thus we know the actual eye-level. In this case the eyeline of the seated characters should be slightly above the lens, and the eyeline of the standing character should be slightly below the lens. Be careful not to overdo this. As with all eyelines and cheats, the final judgment should be made while looking through the lens. How it looks and how it will work in editing always trumps a rote rule: the goal is workable editing, not merely formal technique. Figure 6.33. (left) This master establishes the background group and that the man with the mustache is looking to the left of the camera. Figure 6.34. (right) In the cutaway to the background group, the directional relationships are maintained and most importantly the man with the mustache is still looking to camera left. There can be no question but that he is looking toward the foreground group. Figure 6.35 (left) Two people at a table establishes a strong action line. Figure 6.36. (middle) If one of them looks off-screen to something else, this establishes a new line beween the two, as in Figure 6.37 (right). cinematic continuity 93
• 108. Figure 6.38. (top) The opening frame of a very long, slow, deliberate zoom out from Barry Lyndon. Figure 6.39. (bottom) The last frame from that same zoom. Kubrick uses this type of slow disclosure thematically throughout the film, always ending in a perfectly balanced formal composition, often based on a painting of the period. The slow zoom out works on many levels, both visually and storywise. OTS and Inserts Inserts generally are not critical in terms of screen direction except in a general way. One instance where they are important is reading inserts. This type of insert is quite common as the master scene, or even an over-the-shoulder is usually not tight enough to allow the audience to actually read what the character is looking at. In these cases, it is important to conform to the eyeline and screen direction of the character reading the material, even if they are not holding it. Moving Action Once you thoroughly understand the underlying principles and the cognitive reasons for the these rules, it is easier to see when there are exceptions and flexibility. It is important to remember that “the line” is not some physical thing that has an independent existence on the set. The line is only in relation to where you have first established the scene by the camera placement of the first shot that appears on screen. Also, the line moves, as we saw in the example of the couple and the gangster in the restaurant (Figures 6.35 through 6.37). Most importantly, in a scene with moving action, such as a fight scene, the line will be shifting constantly. In highly frenetic fight scenes photographed with lots of angles and cuts to be edited in a rapid fire sequence, the director and editor might want to ignore the line altogether to add a sense of action and disorientation to the scene. In general, however, it is good to observe screen direction rules — especially if the two people fighting are not physically distinct in look or wardrobe. Otherwise the audience might end up rooting for the wrong guy. cinematography 94
• 109. INTRODUCTIONS When you are bringing the viewer into a scene, you can think of it much the same as bringing a stranger into a party. Some of the concepts have been mentioned before, but now let’s consider them in the context of narrative continuity. There are four basic introductions that need to be made: place, time, geography, and the main characters. Many aspects of introductions and transitions are functions of the script, but they must be actualized by the director and the cinematographer on the set. Some are improvised at the time of shooting because they may be based on some prop or aspect of the set or location that has not been apparent before, such as a perfect full moon just above the scene. The Place We need to let the audience know where they are. Establishing shots and variations are discussed in the chapter Shooting Methods. There is an important exception to this called slow disclosure. In this technique, instead of opening with a wide shot, the scene begins with a tight shot of a character or another scene element. Only as the scene progresses does the camera pull back to reveal where we are and what is going on. This is a variation of the basic reveal where the camera starts on something that either moves or the camera moves past it to show some other scene element. Not only a master formalist but also a great visualist (he started his career as a still photographer for Look magazine), Stanley Kubrick uses slow disclosure masterfully in Barry Lyndon (Figures 6.38 and 6.39). Throughout the film, one of the key formal devices is the very long, very slow zoom back. He starts with a telling detail of the scene and then very deliberately pulls back to reveal more and more. As with so many other aspects of the film (its perfectly composed fixed frames based on paintings of the period, the emphasis on formal geometry, and the slow pacing of action and editing) this slow pull back underlines the rigid formalism of society and culture at that time as well as the inevitability of Lyndon’s decline. These long pullbacks also serve as editorial punctuation between sequences and contribute to the overall pace of the film. For these Figure 6.40. (top) Devices to convey a short passage of time are often more difficult than demonstrating a long passage of time between cuts. In Ronin, the director uses the fact that the Christmas tree is being decorated in one shot. The bellhops enter with a box of decorations for the tree. Figure 6.41. (bottom) In the next shot, the tree is fully decorated. It is very subtle but, the audience will subconsciously register that some short amount of time has passed between the two shots. T/9 24-480mm. Famously, he also had an ultra-fast Zeiss F/0.7 still photo lens converted for motion picture use on this film to use with the candle-lit scenes. The Time Beyond establishing where we are, the viewer must know when we are. Internally within the scene, this is either a function of a transition shot or other types of temporal clues. In these two frames from Ronin (Figures 6.40 and 6.41) the director needed to find a way to establish that fifteen or twenty minutes had passed. This can be much more difficult than conveying that days have passed or that it was summer and now it’s winter — that can be accomplished by a simple exterior shot of the green trees which dissolves to a shot of the same tree barren of leaves and a layer of newfallen snow on the ground. Here he has done something very subtle. In the first shot we see the bellboys starting to put decorations on a tree in the hotel lobby. In the second shot, as the camera pans to follow the character’s exit, we see that the decorations have been completed. For the audience, this is completely subconscious, but it conveys the passage of time in a subliminal way. cinematic continuity 95
• 110. The Geography This was discussed previously, but it deserves mention here as there are several aspects to establishing the geography that relate to actual shooting on the set. Establishing the place usually just serves the purpose of showing us where the scene will take place. This is just called the establishing shot. Establishing the geography is a bit different than just letting the viewer know where the action takes place. Where an establishing shot is generally an exterior view of the building, establishing the geography relates to the scene itself, particularly, but not exclusively, the interiors. It is not enough that the audience knows the general location of the scene, but it is also important that they have a general comprehension of the layout of the place — the overall geography. This prevents confusion as characters move around or as the camera cuts to other viewpoints within the scene. Figures 6.42 (top), 6.43 (middle), and 6.44 (bottom). A simple and purely visual establishing sequence opens The Maltese Falcon. It starts on the Golden Gate bridge, so we know we’re in San Francisco; pulls back to reveal the window and sign, so we know we’re in an office, and then down to the shadow on the floor that introduces the name of detective agency and the name of the main character. It is an elegant visual introduction. The Characters Introducing the characters is of course mostly a function of the script and the actors, but a general principle is to introduce key characters in some way that visually underlines some aspect of their importance, their nature, and their story function. Also, making this introduction visually interesting helps the audience remember the character: a form of visual punctuation. For the entire first half of High Noon, we have been waiting for the arrival of the bad guy on the noon train. He has been discussed, feared, even run away from. When we finally meet him (Figures 6.45 through 6.47), Zinnemann handles his introduction cleverly. As he first gets off the train, we do not see his face. Then for an entire sequence of shots, we see him being greeted, strapping on his guns, and still we do not see his face. Finally, his former lover is getting onto the train; she is leaving town only because he has come back. She turns to look at him, and it is only then that we first see his face. It is a dramatic and distinctive way to introduce him. OTHER EDITORIAL ISSUES IN SHOOTING In the course of shooting the scene, it is important to not be so focused on the essential action and storytelling that there is no thought of the small shots that will help the editor put the scene together in a way that is seamless, logical, and also suits the tone, pacing, and mood of the sequence. These include cutaways, inserts, and character shots that contribute to the overall ambiance. Jump Cuts Disruptions of continuity can result in a jump cut. Although clearly an error in methodology, jump cuts can be used as editorial technique. Truffaut and others of the nouvelle vague in France in the early sixties were among the first to employ jump cuts effectively. According to Ken Dancyger, in his discussion of The 400 Blows: “How did the stylistic equivalent of the personal story translate into editing choices? The moving camera was used to avoid editing. In addition, the jump cut was used to challenge continuity editing and all that it implied. The jump cut itself is nothing more than the joining of two noncontinuous shots. Whether the two shots recognized a change in direction, focus on an unexpected action, or simply don't show the action in one shot that prepares the viewer for the content of the next shot, the result of the jump cut is to focus on discontinuity. Not only does the jump cut remind viewers that they are watching a film, it is also jarring. The jump cut asks viewers to tolerate the admission that we are watching a film or to temporarily suspend belief in the film." (Ken Dancyger, The Technique of Film and Video cinematography 96
• 111. Figures 6.45. (top) A dramatic and suspenseful introduction of the main bad guy in High Noon. His arrival has been talked about and dreaded for the entire movie up until this point, but when he arrives on the noon train, the director delays showing his face until the most dramatic story moment. As he gets off the train, we see him only from the back. Figure 6.46. (middle) As his former girlfriend is boarding the train to escape the coming violence, she turns to see him and their eyes meet. Figure 6.47. (bottom) Our first view of him is both a dramatic reveal and her subjective POV: it makes for a powerful moment. Notice how their eyelines match; if they did not, it would not seem like they were looking at each other. In order to match, they need to be opposite: she is looking toward the left of the frame and he is looking toward the right side of frame. Editing). Jump cuts as a stylistic device stem from Jean Luc Goddard’s first feature, Breathless. Film lore is that he just shot the scenes in such a way that they could not be edited conventionally ( such as running simply had to come up with a stylish way of covering up his error. True or not, it made jump cuts a stylistic device, which just goes to show, if you play it right, even your mistakes can become legendary. cinematic continuity 97
• 112. Figure 6.48. (right) We see the Sheriff turn his head and look, which sets up the subjective POV (High Noon). Figure 6.49. (left) His subjective POV of the clock. From an editorial point of view three things are important: the POV is properly set up, the screen direction is consistent between the two shots, and his eyeline is correct. He is looking up and to the left and the clock is on the wall and facing right. THE SIX TYPES OF CUTS Some aspects of editing are beyond the scope of what we deal with in day-to-day production on the set, but directors and cinematographers must know most of the major concepts of editorial cutting in order to avoid mistakes and to provide the editor with the material she needs to not only cut the film together seamlessly, but also to control pacing and flow, delineate overall structure, and give the scenes and the whole piece unity and cohesion. There are six basic types of cuts, some of which have been discussed. They are: The Content Cut The content cut applies to whenever we cut to a new shot within a scene only to add new information or carry the story forward. In its simplest form, content cutting is used in the coverage of a conversation. We cut from the master, to the over-the-shoulder, to the close-up. Nothing changes in these shots except the content. We were seeing both of them, and now we see one of them, and so on. The content cut is just a part of the overall forward progression of the narrative. As with all cuts, it must obey the basic rules of the line and the 20% rule in order to be cuttable. The Action Cut The action cut, sometimes called a continuity cut or a movement cut, is employed whenever action is started in one shot and finished in the next. For example, in the first shot we see him opening the door, and in the next shot we see him emerging from the other side of the door. Or she reaches across the table, then cut to her hand picking up the cup of coffee. Shooting for the action cut must be done properly if it is to work in editing. First of all, you should always overlap the action. In this example, it would be a mistake to have her reach for the cup of coffee, then call “cut” as soon as her arm extends, then proceed to a close-up of her arm coming in to pick up the shot. There is a grave danger that there will be a piece missing, which will result in a jump cut. In this case, if her arm extends only to the edge of the table in the first shot, but when we see it in the next shot it is all the way to the middle of the table, that missing part will be very noticeable. cinematography 98
• 113. As discussed in Shooting Methods, shooting the overlap also gives the editor the choice of exactly when to time the cut. If the editor has some freedom to time the cut, small problems in movement can be smoothed over. In this small example, the overlapping action is fairly small. In the case of entering and exiting doors, getting in and out of vehicles, and so on, fairly substantial overlaps should be shot. This is especially true if there is important action or dialog going on during the move. In that case, the editor needs the ability to adjust for performance and narrative flow as well as simple continuity. In shooting close shots that continue the action in a larger shot, it is also important to match the speed of the action. In the case of picking up coffee, the actor may have been in the middle of a big speech as she reached for the coffee and thus did it slowly and deliberately. If a good deal of time has passed between shooting the wide shot and picking up an insert of the hand picking up the coffee, it is possible that she will not be doing the dialog, and all she is doing is sticking her hand in the frame to grab the cup. In this case, it is very easy for her to forget the pacing of the original shot and think of this as something new. The urge is to just stick her hand in and grab it. Cutting on Action While shooting for an action cut it is important to always be aware of the possibilities of the cut point. It is always best to cut “on the action.” If someone is seated at a desk and rises to go to the door, you want to shoot while he is rising from the chair. If the phone rings, you want to cut to the next shot while he is reaching for the phone, and so on. Cutting on action makes for a smoother cut and a more invisible one. The audience is a bit distracted by the action and less likely to notice the cut. Take the example of answering the phone: in the medium shot, the phone rings, he picks it up and starts talking. Then we cut to a close-up of him talking. In this case, it is critical that his head be in exactly the same position and that he is holding the phone in exactly the same way. If any of these fails, it will be bad continuity and will be distracting. Cutting as he reaches for the phone helps avoids these problems. The POV Cut it in Shooting Methods. It is one of the most fundamental building blocks of continuity and is especially valuable in cheating shots and off-screen in the first shot motivates a view of something in the next shot (Figure 6.50). The simplest case: There will be no question in the mind of the viewer that we are seeing the tower as he would see it — that is, from his point-of-view. he has to look up. Further, he must look up at approximately the right angle. If his gaze only rises about 10°, for example, and the clock tower is ten stories high, it won’t work. Similarly, if we have seen in a wide shot that the clock tower is on his right side, then his look must go to the right as well. logical relationship to where the viewer is. If we have seen that he is standing on the plaza right under the tower, then we cannot cut in a shot of it as seen from a hundred yards away over the trees. cinematic continuity 99
• 114. our story is based on him seeing a murder in the building opposite him, but unfortunately, the building opposite our location is ing across the street will sell the concept that he can see the murder. As discussed in the chapter on Shooting Methods, it is easy to over to the extent that it makes the scenes artificial and empty. It is always best to get a connecting shot that ties it all together if at all possible. Like with cutaways and inserts, shooting a connecting shot is a good safety. Even if the script doesn’t call for one, it is one of those things that the editor may thank you for later. Safety first — one the most amateurish mistakes a director can make is to wrap a scene without getting all the coverage that the editor will need to cut it smoothly. Executing a Subjective POV you must establish the person looking, or the audience will not Secondly, it is usually necessary to see that person “look” — often this is done by showing them turn their head or in some other way appear obviously appear to be looking at something. This part of the setup is essential in letting the audience know that the next shot will ing at. Generally this needs to be a somewhat normal lens because an extremely long lens or very wide lens would not represent normal human vision and wouldn’t look like someone’s point of view. To finish it off, many editors also use the shot of the character returning Figure 6.50. A subjective POV or the look. (top) We see him turn his head. Second from the top: his eyeline is set, so we know where he is looking. Third from the top: his subjective POV of the airplane. Its position matches his eyeline. In the bottom frame is a connecting shot that shows us both and clearly establishes his relationship to the airplane. A connecting shot is not absolutely necessary but it is helpful. cinematography 100 not absolutely essential. The Match Cut The match cut is often used as a transitional device between scenes. An example from a western: the telegrapher sends the message that the governor has not granted a pardon; the hanging will go on as scheduled. From the telegrapher, we go to a shot of the telegraph pole (probably with an audio cut of the clicking of the telegraph). Then from the shot of the telegraph pole we cut to a shot of the gallows: a vertical pole approximately the same size, shape, and in the same position as the telegraph pole. One image exactly replaces the other on screen. One of the most effective uses of a match cut is in Apocalypse Now, where Coppola cuts from the spinning blades of the ceiling fan in the Saigon hotel room to the spinning blades of a helicopter deep in the combat zone. Great care must be taken in shooting both sides of a match cut. It is not enough that the objects be similar in shape: the screen size (as determined by focal length) and the position in the frame must also match. One method is to have a video of the previously shot scene and play it back on the director’s monitor. For precision work, a monitor with an A/B switch allows the image to be quickly switched back and forth from the freeze frame of the video to the live picture from the monitor. As an additional guide, a grease pencil or china marker can be used to outline the object on the monitor.
• 115. Figure 6.51 (top). In 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick uses an edit that is both a conceptual cut and a match cut. In the first frame (top) the ape has discovered the bone as a weapon and tool and throws it into the air. In the next frame (middle) we see the bone traveling through the air. Then there is a match cut (bottom) to a spaceship. Kubrick has not only communicated that the original tool (a bone) has led to a world where space travel is possible, but he has also moved the story forward from the past to the future in an elegant way; no need for a clumsy title card that says “10,000 Years Later” or some other device — the conceptual cut says it all. The Conceptual Cut A conceptual cut is one that depends on the content of the ideas of two different shots more than on the visual content. A famous example of a conceptual cut and also a match cut is at the beginning of Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey: the cut that spans tens of thousands of years is used to transition from prehistoric times to the era of space travel (Figure 6.51). This is a match cut because the direction, movement, shape, and screen size of the bone almost exactly matches that of the spacecraft. It is also a conceptual cut, however, in that Kubrick is using the bone as a metaphor for human’s very first use of a tool. The spacecraft then is the ultimate result of the first use of tools—a tool that can carry humans into space. These types of cuts are usually spelled out in the script as they require a good deal of preparation. What is relevant for the cinematographer and the director working on the set is that these shots must be previsualized, planned, and executed with an eye toward their final purpose. There are other types of conceptual cuts that are not match cuts, meaning that the visual contents of the two shots are not at all related. For example, in a war film, the general might say, “We’ll bomb ‘em back to the stone age,” and slam his fist down on the table. This cuts cinematic continuity 101
• 116. Figures 6.52 (left), 6.53 (middle), and 6.54. This scene from Ronin appears to be one continuous pan, but in fact when a passing pedestrian wipes the frame, there is a cut that enables the filmmaker to use two entirely different locations as the beginning and end of the same shot. This is called location stiching or location splicing. immediately to a shot of an explosion. The cut is carried over by the action, by the idea, and by the sound edit (fist slamming and explosion). Audio often plays a role in conceptual cuts. One of the most elegant examples is from Citizen Kane. Mr. Thatcher stands next to a Christmas tree hovering over a fifteen year-old Charles Kane and says “Merry Christmas...” and the next shot is years later. The audio continues with “...and a Happy New Year.” The soundtrack completes the continuity even though the subject of the second shot is a different location and years later. It is an elegant jump over years. This is also an elliptical cut — meaning an edit that skips over a period of time. Good editing is as much about what you leave out as it is about what you leave in or the how you arrange it. The Zero Cut The zero cut is a type of match cut that rarely gets mentioned in discussions of shooting and editing. A variation of this technique is used by John Frankenheimer in Ronin (Figures 6.52 through 6.54). In this case, the camera tracks with a man as he walks down a street. An extra wipes the frame (blocking it entirely for a frame or two) and the character walks on. There is nothing especially remarkable about the shot. The trick is that it is actually two shots that were done thousands of miles and weeks apart. The first part of the shot was done on location in Europe, and the second part of the shot is on a studio lot in Los Angeles. This gives the director the opportunity to use the strong points of two locations combined into one continuous shot. This is actually a form of location stitching (also called location splicing) where footage shot in two or more locations is edited to make it look like the whole scene was filmed in one place. This technique is the same one Hitchcock used in his “one shot” film Rope. It is what made it possible for him to shoot the entire film so it appears to be one long continuous take, even though a roll of film in the camera lasts only 11 minutes. Although Rope gives the impression of one long take, it is a myth that there are no cuts at all; in fact, there are a few, most of them at the reel changes. cinematography 102
• 117. lighting basics © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50007-5
• 118. THE FUNDAMENTALS OF LIGHTING I’m sure you’ve heard this, “If you light it right...” or “With good lighting, the scene will...” What does that mean? What is “good” lighting? Lighting has nearly infinite permutations and variations. There is certainly no one “right” way to light a scene. As a result, there is no chance that we can just make a simple list of “proper” lighting techniques. What we can do, however, is try to identify what it is we want lighting to do for us. What jobs does it perform for us? What do we expect of “good” lighting? Starting this way, we have a better chance of evaluating when lighting is working or us and when it is falling short. Naturally, these are generalizations. There are always exceptions, as there are in all aspects of filmmaking — staging, use of the lens, exposure, continuity, editorial, and so on. What are the Goals of Good Lighting? So what is it we want lighting to do for us? There are many jobs, and they include creating an image that has: Full Range of Tones In most cases, we want an image to have a full range of tones from black to white (tonal range is always discussed in terms of grayscale, without regard to color). There are exceptions to this, of course, but in general, an image that has a broad range of tones, with subtle gradations all along the way, is going to be more pleasing to the eye, more realistic, and have more impact. the camera to achieve this — to make sure that your camera setup will allow you to capture a full range of tones in your image. This means that your black will be truly black and your white truly white and also that there is a smooth transition throughout the grayscale range with every nuance of gray tone represented. Naturally, this may not be the final image structure you are aiming for. It’s not meant to be — it’s a reference that you can reliably return to time after time and a standard from which to judge the contrast and range of your camera setup and thus your scene lighting. From there you have a known starting point for beginning to create the image structure that is right for the scene you are shooting. Color Control and Color Balance There are two sides of use of color in lighting and use of the camera. Figure 7.1. (previous page) Dramatic shafts of light through rain and smoke make this frame from Nine and 1/2 Weeks a powerful and striking visual. cinematography 104 conditions (or in film selecting the right film stock or using the correct filter), while color control refers to altering the lighting through the use of different lighting units or putting gels on the lights. First, (unless you are going for a specific effect), the lighting itself must be color balanced. The two most common standards are daylight balance (5500K) and tungsten balance (3200K), but other balances are possible either using a gray card or a test chart or by white balancing
• 119. to a neutral card. This would likely be the most desirable route with lighting you can’t control, such as in an office with fluorescent lighting you can’t change. Up until the eighties, it was conventional to precisely color balance all lighting sources in a scene. Now with constantly improving video cameras, better film stocks, and most of all, changing visual tastes, it is common to mix slightly, even radically, different color sources in a scene (see the chapter Color for examples). In making these decisions you will need to pay close attention to exposure, color balance, filtration, correct processing (for film), and also important in the mood and tone of a scene (Figure 7.3). Shape Flat front lighting (Figure 7.11) does not reveal the shape and form of the subject. It tends to flatten everything out, to make the subject almost a cartoon cutout: two-dimensional. Lighting from the side or back tends to reveal the shape of an object — its external structure and geometric form. This is important not only for the overall depth of the shot, but it also can reveal character, emotional values, and other clues that may have story importance. Naturally, it also makes the image more real, more palpable, more recognizable; this is important not only for each subject in the frame, but to the overall picture as well. Separation By separation, we mean making the main subjects “stand out” from the background. A frequently used method for doing this is a backlight. Another way to do it is to make the area behind the main subjects significantly darker or brighter than the subject. In our quest to make an image as three-dimensional as possible, we usually try to create a foreground, midground, and background in a shot; separation is an important part of this. Figure 7.2. (top) Color plays a major role in imagemaking: issues of color balance in relation to camera white balance are crucial to achieving the image you want. If the camera and monitor are not properly calibrated, your task is going to be much more difficult. Figure 7.3. (above) Out of the ordinary color is frequently appropriate for sci-fi, horror, or fantasy sequences. lighting basics 105
• 120. Figure 7.4. Two devices are used to add visual texture to this light: a 4x4 cuculoris (also called a cookie) and a heavy smoke effect. Depth cinematographers, and directors, a big part of our job is trying to make this flat art appear as three-dimensional as possible — to give it depth and shape and perspective, to bring it alive as a real world as much as possible. Lighting plays a huge roll in this. Use of the lens, blocking, camera movement, set design, color, and other techniques play a role as well, but lighting is our key player in this endeavor. This is a big part of why “flat” lighting is so frequently the enemy. Flat lighting is light that comes from very near the camera, like the flash mounted on a consumer still camera: it is on axis with the lens. As a result it just flatly illuminates the entire subject evenly. It erases the natural three-dimensional quality of the subject. Texture As with shape, light from the axis of the lens (flat lighting) tends to obscure surface texture of materials. The reason is simple: we know texture of the subject from the shadows. Light that comes from near the camera creates no shadows. The more that light comes from the side, the more it creates shadows, which is what reveals texture. Texture can also be present in the lighting itself (Figure 7.4). Mood and Tone Let’s recall our discussion of the word “cinematic.” Used in conversation, it is often used to describe something that is “movie-like.” For example, someone might say a particular novel is cinematic if it has fast-moving action, lots of description, and very little exposition. That is not how we will use the term here. In this context, we will use the term cinematic to describe all the tools, techniques, and methods we use to add layers of meaning, emotion, tone, and mood to the content. As every good camera and lighting person knows, we can take any particular scene and make it look scary or beautiful or ominous or whatever the story calls for, in conjunction with use of lens and color, framing, use of lens, frame rate, handheld or mounted camera — indeed everything we can do with camera and lighting can be used to affect the audience’s perception of the scene. cinematography 106
• 121. Figure 7.5. (top) Lighting can create depth and three-dimensionality in a scene. Here, the actress is lit only with a soft key; the scene is flat, twodimensional and doesn’t seem real. In Figure 7.6 (bottom) the addition of a backlight, a practical lamp, and lighting through the window and in the hallway makes the scene more three-dimensional and realistic. Exposure and Lighting Lighting does many jobs for us, but none of them matter if you don’t get the exposure right: incorrect exposure can ruin whatever else you have done. In terms of lighting, just getting enough light into a scene to get an exposure is usually not difficult. What is critical is correct exposure. gain, and shutter angle) but don’t forget to think of it as an impornominally “correct” exposure (see the chapter Exposure). It is important to remember in this context that exposure is about and tone is obvious, but there are other considerations as well. For example, proper exposure and camera settings are critical to color saturation and achieving a full range of grayscale tones. There are really two ways in which you have to think about exposure. One is the overall exposure of the scene; this is controlled by the iris, the shutter speed, gain and neutral density filters. All of this neutral density filters (called grads), there is no chance to be selective about a certain part of the frame. Another aspect of exposure is balance within the frame. As is discussed in the chapter on exposure, film and video can only accommodate a certain brightness range. Keeping the brightness range within the limits of your particular film or video camera is mostly the job of lighting. Again, it’s not merely a technical job of conforming your lighting to the available latitude: the lighting balance can also affect the mood, tone, style, and overall look of the scene. lighting basics 107
• 122. Figure 7.7. Strong, simple primary colors can be a powerful element in any image. SOME LIGHTING TERMINOLOGY Key light: The dominant light on people or objects. The “main” light on a scene. Fill light: Light that fills in the shadows not lit by the key light. Lighting is sometimes described in terms of the key/fill ratio. Backlight: Light that hits a person or objects from behind and above. A rim/edge light might be added to separate a dark side of a face or object from the background or make up for a lack of fill on that side. Frequently, back light can be overexposed and still record well on tape or film. Also sometimes called a hair light or shoulder light. Kicker: A kicker is a light from behind that grazes along an actor’s cheek on the fill side (the side opposite the key light). Often a kicker defines the face well enough that a fill is not even necessary. It should not be confused with a backlight, which generally covers both sides equally. Sidelight: A light comes from the side, relative to the actor. Usually dramatic and creates great chiaroscuro (if there is little or no fill light), but may be a bit too harsh for close-ups, where some adjustment or slight fill might be needed. Topper: Light directly from above. The word can also refer to a flag that cuts off the upper part of a light (see chapter Tools of Lighting). Hard light: Light from the sun or small lighting source such as 10K is still only a small source in relation to the subject being lit. cinematography 108
• 123. Soft light: Light from a large source that creates soft, ill-defined shadows or (if soft enough), no shadows at all. Skylight on an overcast day is from many directions and is very soft. Ambient light: There are two uses of this term. One means the light that just happens to be in a location. The second use of the term is soft, overhead light that is just sort of “there.” Practicals: Actual working prop lights — table lamps, floor lamps, sconces, and so on. It is essential that all practical lamps have a dimmer on them for fine-tuning control; small dimmers for this purpose are called hand squeezers. Upstage: Part of the scene on the other side of the actors, opposite the side the camera is on. Downstage is the side the camera Figure 7.8. Lighting is your primary tool in establishing mood and tone, which add layers of meaning to the content. This shot is lit with a Mighty Mole bouncing off the concrete floor. upstage was the part farthest away from the audience. High key: Lighting that is bright and fairly shadowless with lots of fill light; often used for fashion and beauty commercials. Low key: Lighting that is dark and shadowy with little or no fill Bounce light: Light that is reflected off something — a wall, the ceiling, a white or neutral surface, a silk, or just about anything else. Available light: Whatever light already exists at the location. lights, overhead fluorescents, etc). Motivated lighting: Where light in the scene appears to have a source such as a window, a lamp, a fireplace, and so on. In some cases the light will come from a source visible in the scene; in some cases, it will only appear to come from a source that is visible in the scene. lighting basics 109
• 124. Figure 7.9. (top) Hard light creates sharp, well-defined shadows. Figure 7.10. (bottom) Soft light creates soft shadows that fall off gradually. ASPECTS OF LIGHT What are the variables when we work with light? Given its nearly infinite possibilities, the number of factors are surprisingly few: Although understanding light is a study that lasts a lifetime and there are nearly infinite ways to light a scene, when we boil it down to the basics, there are really only a few variables that we deal with in lighting. These are the aspects of light that we work with as we work on a scene. Hard Light and Soft Light What makes hard light hard? What makes soft light soft? How do we distinguish between them? There are many ways to light any scene; the variations are endless. The styles and techniques of lighting are nearly infinite. Oddly, there are really only two types of light (in terms of what we are calling quality of light) when you really boil it down to the basics: hard light and soft light. There are all sorts of subtle gradations, and variations between completely hard and fully soft, but in the end there are just these two types that exist at opposite ends of a continuum. cinematography 110
• 125. Figure 7.11. (top) Flat front lighting creates no depth, no sense of threedimensionality. It looks fake and “lit” — something we try to avoid. Figure 7.12. (bottom) Light from the sides or back (anything other than flat front lighting) creates depth, dimension, a more realistic feel. Hard Light Hard light is also called specular light. It is light that casts a clear, sharp shadow. It does this because the light rays are traveling parallel, like a laser. What creates a beam of light with the rays pretty much parallel? A very small light source. The smaller the source, the harder the light will be. This is an absolutely crucial point: how hard or soft a light appears is a function of the size of the source. Outside on a clear, sunny day, take a look at your shadow: it will be that it appears as a small object in the sky — which makes it a fairly hard light. Soft Light Soft light is the opposite; it is light that casts only a fuzzy, indistinct shadow; sometimes no shadow at all. What makes light soft? A very large source. Go outside on a cloudy day and you will have little or no shadow at all. This is because instead of a small, hard source ( just the sun), the entire sky is now the light source — it’s enormous. See Figures 7.9 and 7.10 for examples of hard and soft light. How do we make soft light on the set? There are two ways. One is we bounce a light off a large white object. Typically we use things like foamcore (a lightweight artist board often used for temporary signs or mounting photographs). The bigger the bounce is, the softer the light will be. You can use almost anything light-colored as a bounce: a white wall, an umbrella, a piece of white styrofoam building insulation (also called bead board). For larger applications, there are several materials that come in sizes from 4’x4’ up to as large as 20’x40’ and lighting basics 111
• 126. Figure 7.13. (top) Upstage is on the other side of the actors, away from the camera. Light from the upstage side (the side away from camera) gives pleasant shadows and is flattering to the face. Figure 7.14. (bottom) Downstage is on the same side of the actors as the camera. Lighting from the downstage side is unpleasant for the face, puts the shadows in the wrong place, and more flat front lighting. cinematography 112 sometimes even larger. On the film Memoirs of a Geisha, for example, very large silks were used to cover virtually the entire set, which was several acres in size. Another way is to direct the light through diffusion. In the past, photographers used things like thick white tracing paper or white shower curtains as diffusion. Nowadays, there are many types of diffusion available in wide rolls and sheets. It is amazing for its ability to withstand the intense heat of being put right in front of a powerful barn doors of a light or held in a frame in front of the light, or attached to a window, etc.
• 127. — from very light, almost translucent up to very heavy diffusion. A popular light diffusion is opal; it is so thin you can almost see through it. This doesn’t make the light very soft, but sometimes we want a very subtle effect. Heavier diffusion is much thicker, and it makes the light much softer. About the heaviest, softest diffusion we normally use on the set is a cotton cloth called muslin. Figure 7.15. A powerful backlight and a bounce off the book create a look that perfectly reinforces the character of Col. Kurtz and his mental state of isolation and insanity in this scene from Apocalypse Now. Direction The direction from which the key light comes at the actors is one of the most critical aspects of lighting. The most commonly used terminology is front, 3/4 front, side, 3/4 back, and backlight. The direction of the light is a major determinant not only of the shadows, but it is also an important factor in the mood and emotional tone of a shot. If most of the light comes from the side or back, the scene will tend to be “darker,” more mysterious, more dramatic. This is especially important if you are trying to make a scene appear underlit, such as a moody scene where you want the audience to perceive the scene as very dark. It is rarely a good idea to try to accomplish this effect by radically underexposing: a scene lit mostly from the back will appear dark without underexposing. Avoid Flat Front Lighting Flat front lighting occurs when the key light is very close to the camera. The result is an image with few if any shadows and very little depth or dimension. The result is an image that is very flat and without shape. Also, the subject is rarely separated from the background or other objects in the frame. This reminds us that one of the key jobs of lighting is to direct the eye and “pick out” key elements of the frame, usually the actors. There are exceptions, of course, but as a general rule, flat front lighting is shapeless, dull, and boring. See Figure 7.11: the lighting is hardly better than the average driver’s license photo. In Figure 7.12, the light has moved to the side and a backlight plus kicker is added. As a general principle, the more your key light comes from the sides or back, the more it is going to give the subject depth and dimension and serves as a positive element in the composition. lighting basics 113
• 128. Light from the Upstage Side Particularly when lighting a dialog scene, it is almost always a good idea to light the actors from the upstage side. Upstage means the side away from the camera. If a key light is on the same side of the actors as the camera, it is downstage. It is not always possible, but whenever possible it is best to light from the upstage side. See Figures 7.13 and 7.14 for examples. Figure 7.16. (top) This rig by Tony Nako for X-Men uses dozens of KinoFlo units to create a soft overhead ambient light to suggest an overcast winter day. Figure 7.17. (above) Overhead ambient light created with handmade soft boxes. In this case the soft ambient is supplemented with hard light keys and other units for emphasis and shape. cinematography 114 Backlight and Kicker Two lights that by definition come from the back are backlights and kickers. Backlight is sometimes referred to as a hair light or shoulder light (Figure 7.12). It outlines the subject, separates them from the background, and gives the subject more shape and depth. A kicker is a light that comes from 3/4 back and brushes along the cheek of the subject. It is an extremely useful light. Once you start looking for them, you will see kickers everywhere, even on simple interview shots. As cinematographers take advantage of the higher into the shadows, there is a tendency to use less and less fill light on subjects. The kicker can be useful to define the shadow side of the kicker, while a soft kicker frequently works better for women. Intensity How bright or intense a light is clearly affects exposure, but remember that no matter how bright or dark the overall light of a scene is (within limits), we can adjust it by exposing correctly with the iris, shutter, or neutral density filters. What is important here is the relative intensity of different lights within a scene, the relative balance of the various lights. These are really two completely different ways to think about the intensity and exposure of lighting in a scene: the
• 129. Figure 7.18. Blown out windows and strong contrast in the film Domino. All effects of this type depend on some smoke to make the light rays visible. overall lighting level and then the comparative difference between lights in a scene — which is usually referred to as the contrast ratio between the key and fill. Take a look at Figure 7.18 — the windows are completely blown out try to control the windows so they are not overexposed and thus without detail and visually distracting in the frame. Occasionally the out the windows. In this scene from Domino, the windows are not only blown out, but it is hard light and the slight haze in the room creates defined shafts. Texture Texture occurs in several ways. One is the inherent texture of the subject itself, but the one that concerns us here is texture of the light itself. This is done by putting things in front of the light to break it up and add some variation of light and shadow. Things you put in front of the light are called gobos, and a particular type of gobo is the cuculoris or cookie, which comes in two types. Hard cookies are plywood with irregular cutouts (Figure 7.4). Soft cookies are wire mesh with a subtle pattern of translucent plastic. Other tricks include putting a shadow-casting object in front of the light; traditionally these include things such as vertical Charlie bars — vertical wooden bars used to create shadows. This effect can also be accomplished with strips of tape on an empty frame. Another method is to put lace in a frame and place it in front of the light. Color chapter to the subject. There are several aspects to the subject of color as we use it in filmmaking: images. context of color. One of the best references on this topic is If It’s Purple, Someone’s Gonna’ Die, by Patti Bellatoni, a fascinating and practical look at using color in filmmaking. video camera setup) and in terms of controlling color at the light source, which involves both using color-balancing gels and the choice of the proper lighting instruments, which come in both daylight balance and tungsten balance. lighting basics 115
• 130. Figure 7.19. (top) This scene from Kill Bill is primarily lit from the practical source in the table. Figure 7.20. (above) A practical table lamp used as a key in this scene from The Big Combo. Practical lamps figure prominently in the film noir genre. BASIC LIGHTING TECHNIQUES Lighting is a vast and complex subject; we don’t have space here to go into great depth but, we can review some basic concepts. For a more comprehensive discussion of lighting, grip, and electrical distribution, see Motion Picture and Video Lighting by the same author, also a Focal Press book. There are, of course, dozens of very different ways to light a scene. The incredible variety of lighting styles and techniques is what makes it a lifelong learning experience. First, some basic principals: and back are usually the way to accomplish this. Any time a light is right beside or behind the camera, that is a warning sign of possible flat, featureless lighting. lights to separate the actors from the backgrounds, accentuate the actor’s features, and create a three-dimensional image. some cinematographers say that “...the lights you don’t turn on are as important as the ones you do turn on.” scene — this must take into account both the reflectances of the scene and the intensity of the lighting you put on them. cookies, and other methods. Back Cross Keys One of the most useful and commonly used techniques is back cross keys. It’s simple, straightforward, and fast but also very effective. Take a look at the next ten dialog scenes you see in feature films, commercials, or television: there’s a good chance that most or even all of them will be lit with this technique. (Figures 7.21 and 7.22) The idea is simplicity itself. For a two-person dialog scene (which constitutes a large majority of scenes in most films), one upstage light serves as one actor’s key light and also the second actor’s backlight. A second light does the opposite: it is the second actor’s key light and the first actor’s backlight. That’s all there is to it, but you may want to add some fill, backlights, or whatever else the scene calls for. cinematography 116
• 131. Ambient Plus Accents every corner of the set with many different hard or soft light units. It is often better to establish an ambient base — which means to simply fill the set with a soft, featureless overhead light. This gives you a basic exposure for the entire set, but it is usually somewhat bland and low in contrast. For some scenes, this might be the desired effect, such as this scene in a frozen landscape (Figures 7.16). In most cases, however, you will want to add some accents to feature actors or Figure 7.21 and 7.22. Two sides of scene lit with back cross keys: one light on each side is one actor’s key and the other actor’s backlight. Both lights are from the upstage side. In this case, the woman’s key is coming through a window and some lace to add texture. His key is hard without any softening or texture. See the DVD or website for more on this lighting technique. ambient base can be accomplished in a number of ways: overhead silk Chicken coops, space lights, or softboxes Lighting with Practicals This is a method that may be used by itself or in conjunction with other methods. A practical is something that works — whether it be a table lamp or a refrigerator. Here, we are only talking about lights, whether they be table lamps, sconces, floor lamps, or whatever. Practical lamps play a part in almost any scene they are in, particularly if it is a night scene. The film noir genre in particular constantly used practical lamps as a major element in the frame as a lighting source. One of the few absolute rules in lighting is that every practical must be on a dimmer of some sort. In most cases this will be a hand squeezer, a small hand-held dimmer that is usually made from an ordinary wall dimmer. The reason for this is obvious — with most kinds of lights, we can control the intensity with scrims, grip nets, neutral density gels, and flooding/spotting. With practical lamps we don’t have these methods of control, so a dimmer is the quickest and most precise way to control the brightness. One possible way to control a practical lamp is to precisely cut neutral density gel and fit it into the lampshade. This works, but it is time-consuming and crude. Given that these lamps appear in the frame, it is essential to be able to control them much more precisely than that, so hand squeezers are essential. We want them to appear bright, or the lamp won’t look like it’s on. This means they are right on the edge — too bright and they will burn out, which means they are not only overexposed and without detail but they may also be a distraction in the composition. lighting basics 117
• 132. Figure 7.23. Natural window light is extremely soft as long as there are no direct rays of the sun. It is not merely the light from the sky (a huge wrapping source), it is also the light bouncing off the ground, nearby buildings, and so on. Lighting through the Window In the old studio days, sets were commonly lit from the grid (overhead pipes). This is still done, but these days, locations are used as frequently as sets built in studios. On locations, it may be possible to rig a temporary grid of some sort through the use of various grip equipment such as wall spreaders or other means. Also, locations are lit from the floor, meaning that lights are placed on stands. This works, but it has disadvantages, among them that the working area can be cluttered with stands, grip stands, and cable. For window, doors, skylights, etc. This also has a naturalistic look almost by default; most rooms with windows naturally get a great deal of their light from the windows. Some cinematographers and gaffers go so far as to say always light from outside, although clearly there will be situations where this is not possible. This method also means that the set will be less crowded, so moving from setup to setup is quicker and easier and also gives the director much greater freedom in selecting their frame. Available Natural Light The term available light is used in two ways on film sets. One of them means whatever light is there in a location; usually an exterior location but it can refer to rooms that have windows, skylights, or ordinary room lighting as well. In general, the term “available light” means working with the existing lighting on the location. There is a third, less serious use of the term. Some might say that a particular available on the truck.” cinematography 118
• 133. Available Light Windows Window light can be some of the most beautiful light of all, if you use it right (Figure 7.23). Windows can be disastrous — for example, if you place an actor against a window and the camera is placed so that the actor is in front with the view out the window behind them. In normal daylight conditions, this will produce a very high-contrast situation, and you have to choose between having the outside view properly exposed and the actor in complete silhouette or exposing for the actor and having the window view overexposed and blown Figure 7.24. This dark, moody scene is lit primarily from the window with four MaxiBrutes through a 12x12 Hilight diffusion, supplemented by the library lamps on the table. A very slight smoke effect is added for atmosphere. There are work arounds, of course. One is to use a big light on the actor to bring up their exposure. This generally requires a very large unit and it can be difficult to make it look natural; also, the light has to be daylight balance. The other alternative is to bring down the exposure of the window. The easiest way to do this is to gel the window with ND (neutral density gel), which can reduce the light coming through the window by one, two, three, or even four stops If you want to use tungsten balance lights inside the room, you can also add 85 gel, which converts daylight (5600K) to tungsten balance (3200K). Or you can use gel that combines them: 85N3, 85N6, etc. But there is another alternative: change the shot. This not only makes lighting easier, but it will generally produce a better-looking shot. If the director is flexible about the staging, you’ll get a better image by placing the camera so that the actor is beside the window and the background of the shot is no longer the view out the window, but rather something inside the room. This not only solves the exposure imbalance, but it also gives the actor soft window light from the side. This can be some of the most beautiful lighting there is. What makes window light so beautifully soft? We have to distinguish between window light, sky light, and sunlight Sky light is the light coming from the sky itself, which is a huge radiating source and thus very soft. Also coming through a window might be sun bounced off neighboring buildings, the ground, clouds, etc. lighting basics 119
• 134. Figure 7.25. (top) For this re-creation of a noir look, his key is just a bounce off the paper in the typewriter. Figure 7.26. (bottom) The overall setup is very simple: a Tweenie bounces off the typing paper, a Betweenie gives him a backlight/ kicker, and another Betweenie adds a slight glow to the map. The practical lamps have very little influence on the scene; they are mostly just props. cinematography 120 MOTIVATED LIGHT Light in a scene may come from many sources, including lights that are actually in the frame such as practicals, windows, skylights, signs, and so on. In some cases, these sources are visible but do not provide enough output for proper exposure. In this case, the sources may only serve to motivate additional lighting that is off-screen. Some cinematographers and directors prefer that most or all lighting in a scene be motivated in this way — that the viewer somehow understands where the light is coming from. In these frames from Honeydripper (Figures 7.29 and 7.30), the light is motivated by the lamps, but the actual illumination comes from sources not shown in the frame.
• 135. Carrying a Lamp Often we want the lamp to appear to be lighting the subject, but for some reason, it just won’t do it. If we turn the lamp’s brightness up enough to light the actor, then the shade will be completely blown out; or it might be that the actor just isn’t close enough to be properly lit by the lamps. In this case, we use a technique called carrying the lamp. To do this we set a small lamp in a place where it will hit Figure 7.27. (top) Her only source is the practical lamp itself. A very small source adds a catchlight in the eyes. Figure 7.28. (bottom) The lamp works for her even when she leans back, but only in a fairly narrow range of distance from the practical. lighting basics 121
• 136. Figure 7.29. (top) In the establishing shot from Honeydripper the oil lamps are clearly shown to be the motivation for the direction, color, and softness of the light, which is then used to great effect in this two-shot. Figure 7.30. (bottom) Once the sources have been established in the wide shot, the lighting of the mediums and close-ups makes sense and seems appropriate. This is an example of both motivated lighting and carrying a lamp. cinematography 122 the actor from the same direction as the light from the lamp. It also needs to be the same quality of hard or soft and the same color; table lamps tend to be on the warm side, often about 2800K or warmer. Figures 7.25 and 7.26 show a modern take on a film noir look that employs a different method of carrying a lamp. Here the lighting is actually very simple: it’s a Betweenie (300 watt Fresnel) that is bouncing off the piece of paper in the typewriter. Another Betweenie gives the actor a backlight, and a third one puts a small splash on the map behind him. The typing paper bounce gives him a moody look appropriate for the scene and doesn’t create problematic shadows like a hidden light from below would. If we try to light the actor with the practical
• 137. Figure 7.31. (top) If the practical is set high enough to give proper exposure to the subject, the lamp itself is completely blown out. Figure 7.32. (middle) When the practical lamp is set to a level that gives it the proper exposure, then the subject is underexposed. Figure 7.33. (bottom) A separate source is added to “carry” the lamp. It comes from the same direction as the lamp and gives the illusion that the practical lamp is lighting the actor. The source in this case is a MolePar in a snoot box with a dimmer. lighting basics 123
• 138. lamp as in Figure 7.31, the lamp is totally blown out. If we dim it down enough to see the lamp (Figure 7.32), then the actor gets lost. The solution was to have a light just out of frame on the left and below the table level. With this rig on a dimmer, it was possible to achieve the correct balance between the practical light and the actor’s key. The key to this technique is to make sure the light you are using to carry the practical is hitting the actor from the same angle as would the light from the practical lamp. It needs to be the same color and quality (in terms of hard versus soft) as well. DAY EXTERIORS Working with daylight can be a lot trickier than people think. Some producer and directors believe that working with available daylight will always be faster and easier. Sometimes, but not always. If it’s an overcast day (soft light), then nothing could be simpler. If you are dealing with direct sun, however, controlling it can require constant attention and adjustment. When dealing with actors in direct sun, you have several choices: diffusion of the harsh sun, filling and balancing the shadows, finding a better location or angle for the shots, or moving the shot into open shade. See video examples on Fill You can use bounceboards or lights to fill in the shadows and reduce the contrast. Grip reflector boards (Figure 7.34) have a hard side and a soft side and yokes with brakes so they can be set and will stay as positioned. The sun moves quickly, however, and it is almost always necessary to shake them up before each take. For this reason, a grip has to be stationed beside each board to re-aim it for each take. It is also important to table them if there is a break in filming. This means adjust the reflector to a horizontal position so it doesn’t catch the wind and blow over. Be sure to secure them heavily with sandbags. Between scenes, they should be laid on the ground on their sides so as not to damage the surfaces. strategy is to aim the hard side through medium diffusion (like 216) or the soft side through light diffusion (such as Opal), which just smooths it out a bit. Silks and Diffusion Another choice is to make the sunlight softer and less contrasty. For tight shots, a 4x4 frame with diffusion can soften the light and can be held by a grip stand, with plenty of sandbags, of course. For larger shots, frames with silk or diffusion are made in many sizes: 6’x6’, 8’x8’, 12’x12’, 20’x20’ and even 20’x40’. These larger sizes require solid rigging and should only be done if you have an adequate grip crew who know what they are doing: a 12’x12’ silk has enough area to drive a sailboat at 10 knots, meaning it can really do some damage if it gets away from you in a wind. Open Shade and Garage Door Light The simplest and often most beautiful solution to working with harsh direct sun is simply to get out of the sun entirely. If the director is flexible about the scene, it is usually not only faster but also better lighting to move the scene to a shady spot; best of all is open shade, which is the shady side of a building, trees, and so on, but open to the sky. Here the subject is lit by the soft light of the radiating sky dome, reflection off the rest of the terrain and so on. The only cinematography 124
• 139. danger here is your background: since the exposure will be a couple of stops down, it is critical that you not frame the shot so that the hot background behind the actor will be in direct sun and thus severely overexposed. (Figures 7.36 and 7.37). A variation on this is garage door light (Figure 7.38). This is open shade with the darker interior as a background. It can be both beautiful and dramatic. It doesn’t have to be an actual garage door, of course; the key is that it is open shade with a darker background such as you would have with an actor positioned right in a large open entrance such as a garage door. Also, a good deal of the light on the actor is being bounced off the surrounding landscape or buildings and also the ground level surface in front of them, which gives them a nice underlit fill. All of these methods are simply ways of dealing with the fact that sunlight is often too harsh and contrasty. Figure 7.34. This grip is standing by to shake up the reflector board. This means he re-aims it for every shot. The sun moves surprisingly fast and it is usually necessary to re-aim the reflector for nearly every take. This reflector board also has a layer of CTO gel on it to warm up the backlight. Sun as Backlight If all other options are unavailable, an alternative is to turn the shot so that the actor has their back to the sun. This does two things: first of all the actor is lit by the bounce off the surroundings. In most cases this is not quite enough, but the addition of a simple bounce board (foamcore, beadboard, or a folding silk reflector) helps. This involves working with the director to adjust the shot. Remember that shots rarely exist on their own; they are usually part of an entire scene. This means that thinking it through and planning for the sun angles must be done before starting to shoot the scene. Once you have shot the master for a scene, it is often not possible to cheat the actors around to take advantage of the sun’s position, although for some close-ups it may be possible. It is also important to think ahead about the sun’s movement, especially if the scene is going to take a long time to shoot or there is a lunch break during filming. lighting basics 125
• 140. Figure 7.35. The grips are Hollywooding a light silk to move with the actors for the dolly shot. Hollywooding is a term for handholding a silk, light, or flag. LIGHTING FOR HIGH DEF VIDEO are still differences. It tends to see into the shadows more than film, and it sees detail much more than film. This means that shadows you would expect to go black or nearly black in film are still visible in departments must be especially on their toes. Tiny imperfections of sets and props can suddenly become obtrusive where on film they were more than acceptable. This is a big part of the “video look,” if not dealt with properly. This problem is more complex than just detail resolution: it can be partially dealt with by using diffusion filusing diffusion filters where you don’t want to. intensity of lighting. This means that you can use a 5K where a 10K might have been necessary for film lighting. How many lights you use is based on shaping the light, accenting certain elements, and so on. Between film and video, the number of lights seldom changes, but their size often does. This is because high-definition video sees into the shadows a great deal more and thus give the impression of being faster than film. This is much the same as happened with the introduction of high-speed lenses and high-speed film in the 80’s and 90’s. Overenthusiastic supporters claimed that fewer people would be needed on the crew and fewer lights. None of this is true in the cinematography 126
• 141. Figure 7.36. (top) Direct sunlight is harsh, contrasty, and unflattering. If you do have to shoot in direct sun, try not to do so during the middle part of the day. Sunlight is softer and at a lower, more flattering angle early in the day or late in the afternoon. Figure 7.37. (bottom) Here we just have the actor back up a few feet so he is under the awning of the building. This is open shade; it is softer and less contrasty. larger sense, of course — not if you really care about the quality of your lighting. At best, you need a smaller generator and lighter gauge distribution cable and slightly smaller lights. Think of it this way — say you light a scene beautifully with four lights: a 12K creating a beautiful shaft of light through the window, a 10K raking down the hallway, a 2K bounce for a key on the scene, and a baby-junior for a backlight. Let’s now assume that the speed of your video camera doubles that you all of a sudden need fewer lights? Not unless you want to do less lighting — that is, give up something important. You still need four lights to accomplish what you did before. The only difference is that instead of a 12K you need speed is a giant leap technologically, but in terms of exposure and lights? Of course you can. But as a cinematographer or director, if you are willing to say that just getting an exposure is your only goal lighting basics 127
• 142. Figure 7.38. An example of garage door light. The subject is just inside the door, which puts her in open shade. The sun is still hitting the ground, buildings and the rest of the background behind the camera, which results in a soft bounce on the actress. cinematography 128 in lighting, then you don’t need to be reading books like this one. It is true that there are more and more cases where you can shoot purely with available light — that is, where you can get visually interesting, even beautiful scenes only with the light that already exists at a location. However, this is not a high def or even a video phenomenon, the same is true with film stock, which has improved vastly in the last few years. For example, look at the movie Lost in Translation, in which nearly all of the night exteriors of Tokyo were shot purely with available light.
• 143. lighting sources © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50008-7
• 144. THE TOOLS OF LIGHTING Cinematographers do not need to know all the details of how each piece of lighting equipment works, but it is essential that they know the capabilities and possibilities of each unit, as well as its limitations. A great deal of time can be wasted by using a light or piece of grip equipment that is inappropriate for the job. One of the DPs most important functions is ordering the right lighting equipment for the job and using it appropriately. Motion picture lights fall into seven general categories: HMIs, tungsten Fresnels, tungsten open face lights, fluorescents, xenons, practicals, LED lights, and sunguns. DAYLIGHT SOURCES Lighting units can generally be divided into those that output daylight balance or tungsten balance light. Several types of light are daylight balance: HMIs and color correct fluorescents and LED units among them. Figure 8.2. (above) A 12K HMI Fresnel. Figure 8.1. (previous page) An Airstar balloon light used for a large night exterior. Color Rendering Index Lights are classified according to Color Rendering Index (CRI), which is a measure of the ability of a light source to reproduce the colors of various objects faithfully in comparison with a natural light source. This means that a light with a low CRI will not render colors accurately. A CRI of 90 or above (on a scale of 0 to 100) is considered necessary for film and video work (and also still photography). The CRI is especially important when judging fluorescent and other gas discharge sources. For most HMIs and color-correct fluorescents, LEDs, and other units designed for film work, the color rendering index is greater than 90. HMI Units HMIs generate three to four times the light of tungsten halogen, but consume up to 75% less energy for the same output. When a tungsten bulb is color-corrected to match daylight, the advantage increases to seven times because a great deal of the spectrum is absorbed by the blue gel (color temperature blue or CTB). See the chapter Color). Because HMIs (Figure 8.2) are more efficient in converting power to light, they generate less heat than a tungsten lamp with the same output. HMI stands for the basic components: H is from the Latin symbol for mercury (Hg), which is used primarily to create the lamp voltage. M is for medium-arc. I stands for iodine and bromine, which are halogen compounds. The halogen serves much the same function as in a tungsten halogen lamp in prolonging the useful life of the bulb and ensures that the rare earth metals remain concentrated in the hot zone of the arc. HMI lamps have two electrodes made from tungsten, which project into a discharge chamber. Unlike tungsten bulbs, which have a continuous filament of tungsten wire, HMIs create an electrical arc that jumps from one electrode to another and generate light and heat in the process. Color temperature (see the chapter Color) as it is measured for tungsten bulbs or sunlight does not technically apply to HMIs (or to other types of discharge lighting such as fluorescents) because they produce a quasi-continuous spectrum. In actual practice, though, the same measurements and color temperature meters are used for all types of video and motion picture lighting sources. Our eyes are unreliable in judging color because our brain adjusts and compensates; it will tell us that a wide variety of colors are “white.” A color meter or vectorscope is a far more dependable ways of judging color; however, they do not measure CRI. cinematography 130
• 145. Ballasts All HMIs require a ballast, which acts as a current limiter. The reason for this is simple: an arc is basically a dead short; if the current were allowed to flow freely, the circuit would overload and either blow the fuse or burn up. Early ballasts for HMIs were extremely heavy and bulky (200 pounds or more) because they contained current limiters that consisted of heavy copper wire wound in a coil like a transformer. Fortunately, few of these remain in use. The invention of the smaller and lighter electronic ballast was a major improvement. Electronic ballasts also allow the unit to operate on a square-wave (unlike the sine wave of normal alternating current electricity). The most significant new development in HMIs is the new flickerfree ballasts, which use square-wave technology to provide flickerless shooting at any frame rate. With some units there is a penalty paid for flicker-free shooting at frame rates other than sync sound speed: it results in a significantly higher noise level. If the ballasts can be placed outside or shooting is MOS, this is not a problem. It is not usually an issue as high-speed shooting rarely involves recording audio. For a more detailed discussion of flicker and how to avoid it, see the chapter Technical Issues. Header cables are the power connection from the ballast to the light head itself. Many larger HMIs can only take two header cables; a third header will usually result in a voltage loss too great to get the lamp to fire up. Square-wave refers to the shape of the sine wave of the alternating current after it has been reshaped by the electronics of the ballast. Flicker is discussed in more detail in the chapter on Figure 8.3. A combination of Kino Flo and tungsten units on a bluescreen efx set. (Photo courtesy of Kino Flo.) lighting sources 131
• 146. Figure 8.4. (above) The ballast acts as a transformer to provide operating voltage and also starting voltage, which can be as high as 20,000 volts. It is also a current limiter. Figure 8.5. (right) An 18K HMI with a Chimera softbox in use on a day exterior location. Technical Issues, but suffice it to say here that the normal sine wave of AC current leaves too many “gaps” in the light output that become visible if the camera shutter is not synchronized to its rhythm. By squaring the wave, these gaps are minimized and there is less chance of flicker. This is especially important if you are shooting at anything other than normal speed; high-speed photography in particular will create problems. It is important to note that flicker can be a problem in video also, just as with film cameras. Voltages as high as 12,000 V (volts AC) or more are needed to AC start the arc, which is provided by a separate ignitor circuit in the ballast. This creates the power needed for the electric current to jump across the gap between the two electrodes. The typical operating voltage is around 200V. When a lamp is already hot, much higher voltages are needed in order to ionize the pressurized gap between the electrodes. This can be from 20 kV to more than 65 kV (kiloVolt). For this reason, some HMIs can not be restruck while they are hot — which means you may have to wait for the light to cool before you can start it again. This can be a major hindrance when the whole film crew is waiting on it. Hot restrike, which generates a higher voltage to overcome this resistance, is a feature on most newer HMIs. HMI bulbs can change color temperature as they age. It is important to check the color temperature of HMI bulbs periodically with a color meter to see if they need correcting gels to keep them consistent with other lighting units in use on the project. 18K and 12K HMI The 18K and the 12K HMIs are the most powerful fresnel lights currently available. Like all HMIs they are extremely efficient in light output per watt of input power. They produce a sharp, clean light, which is the result of having a very small source (the gas arc) which is focused through a very large lens (Figure 8.2). These large lights are invaluable where very large areas are being covered or there is a need for high light levels for high-speed shooting. They are also a natural for sunlight effects such as sunbeams through a window or any other situation where a strong welldefined beam is needed. They are also among the few sources (along with HMI PARs) that will balance daylight and fill in the shadows sufficiently to permit shooting in the bare sun without silks or reflec- cinematography 132
• 147. Figure 8.6. Larry Mole Parker of Mole-Richardson does a side-byside test of a carbon arc light and a 12K HMI PAR. tors. The fact that they burn approximately “daylight blue” (5500 degrees kelvin) is a tremendous advantage in these situations: no light is lost to filters. Often when a 12K or 18K is used to fill in sunlight, it is the only unit operating on a generator. If it was drawing on one leg only, the load would be impossible to balance and might very well damage the generator. In this case a ghost load on the other legs is necessary. Most 12 and 18Ks are 220 volt lights, but some are 110 volt units which can make load balancing difficult. Lights that run on 220 volts require three-phase power. Most power available on a movie set, or in most buildings, is 110 volts in the United States. In Europe, Great Britain, and most of the rest of the world, 220 volt power is the standard. For more on electricity and power supplies for lighting, see Motion Picture and Video Lighting, also from Focal Press. As with any large light, coordinate with the gennie (generator) operator before firing it up or shutting it down. The power surge when they start up can be a significant strain on the power supply. Don’t start up all the large lights at the same time. Be sure to clarify with the rental house what type of power connectors are used on the lights when you are placing your lighting and grip order for the job. 6K & 8K 6K and 8K HMIs can handle many of the same jobs as the bigger lights, particularly where the area covered is smaller. Although they generally have a smaller lens, they still produce a sharp, clean beam with good spread. In many applications they perform admirably as the main light: serving as key, window light, sun balance, and so on. Some 6Ks and 8Ks accept 110 volt input and, some require a 220 volt power supply. They may require a variety of connectors or a set of Siamese splitters, (called Y-cords in Great Britain). When ordering any large lamp, it is crucial to ask these questions and be sure the rental house will provide the appropriate distribution equipment or adapters — remember, if you don’t order it, it won’t be there. You must be very thorough when placing an order. Failure to do so may result in the light not being functional. Some makes of HMIs provide for head balancing. This is accomplished by sliding the yoke support backwards or forwards on the head. This is a useful feature when adding or subtracting barn doors, frames, or other items that alter the balance of light. lighting sources 133
• 148. Figure 8.7. Lite Panel LED lights mounted in a car and also as a fill light on the camera. This type of camera mounted fill light is called an Obie, named for actress Merle Oberon, for whom it was invented. Due to their light weight, compact size and, ability to run off batteries, LED units are very popular as camera mounted lights. (Photo courtesy of Litepanels.) 4K and 2.5K The smaller HMIs, the 4K and 2.5K, are general purpose lights, doing much of the work that used to be assigned to 5K and 10K tungsten lights. Slightly smaller than the bigger HMIs, they can be easily flown and rigged and will fit in some fairly tight spots. 1.2K and Smaller Units The smallest lamps, the 1.2K, 575, 400, and 200 watt HMIs, are versatile units. Lightweight and fairly compact, they can be used in a variety of situations. The electronics ballasts for the small units have become portable enough to be hidden in places where larger units might be visible. They can also be wall-plugged, which means no generator or other supplemental power supply is needed on location. HMI PAR Units Some of the most powerful, intense lights available are HMI PARs; they have the high output of HMIs and the tightly focused beam of the PAR reflector. The largest units are 12K and 18K, but HMI PARS are made in smaller sizes as well, down to 125 watts. Arri Lighting (part of the Arriflex group) makes a popular unit called the Pocket PAR in these smaller sizes. One particularly versatile unit is the 1.2K HMI PAR, made by several manufacturers. What makes it special is that it is small enough (in wattage) to be plugged into a 20 amp household circuit, but being PARs they have a healthy output, which in conjunction with their daylight balance means they have a wide variety of uses in daylight situations: fill when bounced or through diffusion or for a small shaft of light through a window. Rules for Using HMI Units by measuring the voltage between the stand and any ground. There will usually be a few volts, but anything above 10 or 15 volts indicates a potential problem. mats or other insulation material. skin will degrade the glass and create a potential failure point. Many lamps come provided with a special cleaning cloth. cinematography 134
• 149. the holder. Contamination will increase resistance and impair proper cooling. or there is a risk of a cold spot developing inside the discharge chamber. affects the output and may result in the lamp not firing. lamp below its operating temperature, which can result in a light with a high color temperature and inferior CRI. Potential Problems HMIs (or any light with a ballast) may sometimes fail to function properly. Be sure to have a few extra header cables on hand: they are the most common cause of malfunctions. The safety switch on the lens can also cause trouble. Never try to bypass it, however; it serves an important function. HMIs should never be operated without the glass lens, which filters out harmful ultraviolet radiation that can damage someone’s eyes. When they do fail to fire: one breaker. After killing the power, open the lens and check the microswitch that contacts the lens housing. Make sure it is operating properly and making contact. Wiggle it, but don’t be violent — the light won’t operate without it. than one header to a light, disconnect and try each one individually. Look for broken pins, dirt in the receptacle, etc. erally they need at least 108 volts to fire. Some have a voltage switch (110, 120, 220); be sure it’s in the right position. XENONS Xenons are similar to HMIs since they are a gas discharge arc with a ballast. They feature a polished parabolic reflector that gives them amazing throw and almost laser-like beam collimation. At full spot they can project a tight beam several blocks with a relatively small amount of spread. Xenons are very efficient with the highest lumens per watt output of any light. Xenons currently come in five sizes: a 1K, 2K, 4K, 7K and 10K. There is also a 75 watt sun-gun unit. The 1K and 2K units come in 110 and 220 volt models, some of which can be wall-plugged. This produces a high-output light that can be plugged into a wall outlet or a small portable generator. Larger xenons are extremely powerful, and must be used cautiously: they can quickly crack a window. Just one example of their power: with ASA 320 film stock and the light set at full spot, a 4K delivers f/64 at 40 feet from the light, considerably more than you would get with a 4K HMI or equivalent tungsten lamp. The current supplied by the ballast to the bulb is pulsed DC; as a result, flicker is not a problem for xenons, and they can be used for high-speed filming up to 10,000 fps. Xenons do, however, have some disadvantages: all xenons are expensive to rent and have a cooling fan that makes them very difficult to use in sound filming. Also, Figure 8.8. A 20K Fresnel tungsten. (Photo courtesy of Cinemills.) Figure 8.9. A Mole-Richardson Baby Baby 1K. This is a 1,000 watt tungsten Fresnel. It is a “baby” for two reasons: a 1K Fresnel is called a baby, but this is also the baby version of that as it is smaller than a studio 1K. Figure 8.10. A scrim set for a Betweenie. Most lights come with a scrim set to control intensity. A double (red rim) reduces the output by one stop, and a single (green rim) reduces it by one-half stop. Also included are a half-double and a half-single. This is called a Hollywood scrim set because it includes two doubles. lighting sources 135
• 150. because of the bulb placement and reflector design, there is always a hole in the middle of the round beam, which can be minimized but never entirely eliminated. Due to the parabolic reflectors, flagging and cutting are difficult close to the light: flags cast bizarre symmetrical shadows. Also, the extremely high and concentrated output means that they burn through gel very quickly. Many people try to compensate by placing the gel as far as possible from the light. This is a mistake — the safest place to gel is actually right on the face of the light. Seventy-five watt xenon sunguns were developed for the Navy. They are excellent for flashlight effects. They come in both AC and DC configurations. Most have motorized flood /spot controls that can be operated during the shot. As with larger xenons, there is a hole or a hot spot in the center of the beam (depending on the focus) that cannot be eliminated. Xenon bulbs do not shift in temperature as they age or as voltage shifts. LED Lights A new and very popular source is LED lights (Figure 8.7), which are small and extremely energy efficient, which also means that they produce much less heat than tungsten lights (where the electricity produces 90% heat and only 10% light). LEDs have been incorporated into all types of units, although few of them have the long reach of a PAR or a fresnel. For lighting fairly close to the scene, however, they have many advantages. Their compact size means they can be hidden in many places on the set and also makes them easier to handle and rig on location. There are also many LED lights that run on batteries — these can be very useful for handheld work, camera mounting and other conditions where AC power may not be available or it is just not practical to run and AC power cord. Certainly a hand-held camera operator is not going to want to be dragging a power cable around all the time. TUNGSTEN LIGHTS Tungsten lamps are just bigger versions of ordinary household bulbs; they all have a filament of tungsten wire just as invented by Thomas Edison. There are two types of tungsten fresnels: studio and baby. The studio light is the full-size unit, and the baby is a smaller housing and lens, making it more compact for location use (Figure 8.9). As a rule, the baby version is the studio housing of the next smaller size (the body of a baby 5K is similar to the body of a studio 2K). In most countries outside the United States, the electrical supply is 220 volts; different bulbs are used that are suited to the appropriate voltage. Figure 8.11. (top) The Mole-Richardson open face 2K or Mighty Mole. Figure 8.12. (middle) A 1K MolePar. Figure 8.13. (bottom) A Big Eye 10K, so called because it has a lens that is larger than a standard studio 10K. Fresnels Fresnel units are lights with lenses. Most film lights employ the stepped Fresnel type lens, with a few exceptions that use a simpler plano-convex lens such as a Dedo or an ellipsoidal (Leko). A Fresnel lens is a stepped ring design that reduces the thickness of the lens to save on cost and also prevent heat buildup in the glass, which can cause cracking. Twenty The biggest tungsten light now in use is the 20K. It is a large unit with tremendous output. Many jobs that were formerly done by the 10K are now done with this light. Most 20K units use bulbs that run at 220 volts (which may require special electrical distribution), and several models come with a built-in dimmer (Figure 8.8). cinematography 136
• 151. Tenners The 10K tungsten Fresnel comes in three basic versions: compact, easily transportable unit with a 14-inch Fresnel lens. 20-inch Fresnel. Big Eye tenner, which has a 24-inch lens. The Big Eye is a very special light with quality all its own. The DTY (10K) bulb provides a fairly small source, while the extremely large fresnel is a large radiator. The result is a sharp, hard light with real bite but with a wraparound quality that gives it almost a soft light quality on subjects close to the light. This is a characteristic of all very big lights that gives them a unique quality. It is important to never use a 20K, 10K, or a 5K pointing straight up (this applies to large HMIs and xenons as well). The lens blocks proper ventilation and the unit will overheat. Also, the filament will not be properly supported and will sag and possibly touch the glass. Figure 8.14. (above) The Dino, or in this illustration, Mole-Richardson’s Moleeno, consists of 36 1K PAR bulbs. (Photo courtesy of Mole-Richardson.) Figure 8.15. (top) Skypans rigged for a large set by lighting director Tony Nako and gaffer Michael Gallart. Skypans are very simple lights — just a socket for the bulb and a pan reflector. They can use 5K, 10K or 20K bulbs. Also on the trusses are 5K Fresnels and space lights. (Photo by Michael Gallart). Senior/5K Although it is available in both versions, the baby 5K is far more popular than the larger unit. It can work as a general purpose big light and a fill used against a 10K. The 5K is also called a senior. Junior/2K The 2K Fresnel is also known as a deuce or a junior. It has enough power to bring a single subject or actor up to a reasonable exposure, even with diffusion in front of the lens. Juniors are also useful as backlights, rims, and kickers. Baby juniors (called BJs) are the more compact and an extraordinarily versatile unit. lighting sources 137
• 152. Baby/1K Thousand watt units are known as 1Ks (one K) or babies. The 1K is used as a key light, a splash on the wall, a small back light, a hard fill, and for dozens of other uses. The baby can use either a 750 watt bulb (EGR) or a 1,000 watt bulb (EGT). Most are now used with the 1K quartz bulb, but are still called 750s. The Baby 1K, also called a Baby Baby, is the small size version. Because of its smaller lens and box, it has a wider spread than the studio baby. Figure 8.16. (left) The Ruby Seven, a PAR based unit that offers additional controllability. (Photo courtesy of Luminaria.) Figure 8.17. (above) Two Mole FAY lights boxed in with some 4x8 floppies for control. Tweenie /650 The Tweenie is “between” the 1K and the Inky. With the new highspeed films, the Tweenie is often just the right light for the small jobs a baby used to do, even as a key light. It is very useful for a number of small jobs, easily hidden, and can function as a quick accent or an eyesight. Betweenie, InBetweenie, Inky and Pepper These are similar to Tweenies but smaller. The Betweenie is a 300 watt unit and the InBetweenie uses a 200 watt bulb and is often used instead of an Inky (also 200 watts). At 100, 200, or 300 watts (depending on the bulb and size of the housing), the Pepper is a smaller unit, but up close it can deliver a surprising amount of light. The Inky at 200 watts is great for a tiny spritz of light on the set, as an eye light, a small fill, or for an emergency last-minute light to just raise the exposure a bit on a small area. Open Face Some 2K, 1K, and 650 units are available as open face lights — that is, they have no lenses, but they do have some spot/flood focusing. Their light is raw and can be uneven, but they do have a tremendous output for their size. They are good for bounce or shooting through diffusion (Figure 8.11). They are a good source when all you need is raw power and the control that a Fresnel affords isn’t necessary. PARS PAR stands for parabolic aluminized reflector. A parabola is an ideal shape to collect all of the light rays and projects them out in the same direction. It is the shape of reflector that is going to give the narrowest, most concentrated beam. In conjunction with this, all PAR units have a lens, which functions primarily to concentrate or spread the beam. Tungsten parts generally come with a fixed lens that is part of the unit: they are pretty much the same as a car headlight. HMI PARs always come with a set of interchangeable lenses: these cinematography 138
• 153. go from a very wide beam to a very narrow beam. The disadvantage of PARs is that the beam generally covers only a very small area and is not a very complimentary light for actors because it tends to be uneven and raw; nor is it easily controllable, but it is useful for many purposes that call for just raw light power. PARs come in two basic varieties: film versions come in a solid rotatable housing such as Mole-Richardson’s MolePar (Figure 8.12), which feature barn doors and scrim holders, and in a flimsier theatrical version called a PAR can. Theatrical lights are not generally as sturdily built because they are generally hung in a theater and then left alone. They don’t get the rough treatment and adverse conditions that film and video lights do. PARs (especially the very concentrated NSP bulbs) can quickly burn through even the toughest gels, melt bead board, and set muslin diffusion on fire. PARs with a dichroic coating have an output that is very close to daylight (blue) balance. Small PAR 48s and 36s are also available at lower voltages, as well as 110 volt. Nearly all types of bulbs are also available in 220 volts. As single units, they may be used in units such as the PARcan or MolePAR. PARcans are used extensively in concert lighting; they are lightweight and inexpensive. The MolePAR is more rugged and better suited to work on a film set. PAR Groups PARs are also made in groups, one of the best known being the Maxi Brute, a powerful unit with tremendous punch and throw. They are used in large night exteriors and in large-scale interior applications: aircraft hangars, arenas, and so on. They can also be used directly or through gel, muslin, and so on, when very high light levels are needed to get through heavy diffusion. All PARs generate very intense and concentrated heat; use caution when setting them up — they can crack windows and char wood and other materials. Figure 8.18. (above) A Mole-Richardson 2K Zip Softlight. Zip means it is more compact than a regular softlight. It is mounted on a set hanger (also called wall hanger). 2K Zips are very popular for just this sort of use: they fit into small spaces and when put up near the ceilling of a set or location, they don’t hang down so far that they interfere with the shot. Figure 8.19. (top) A complex rig supporting a variety of lights. The middle ring holds 108 lights from LED units to strobes to Mole 5K tungsten Fresnels. Also hanging from this rig are space lights including one very large space light — see Figure 8.24. (Photo by Michael Gallart.) lighting sources 139
• 154. Figure 8.20. A Mole-Richardson 6K HMI PAR unit. MaxiBrutes and Dinos are similar in design but different in size. Maxi’s come in configurations of 6, 9, or 12 x PAR 64 lamps, the most common being the 9 lamp head. A Dino or Moleeno is 36 x PAR 64 lamps. Other variations of this design exist as well (Figure 8.14). Fay lights are clusters of 650 watt PAR 36s and come in configurations up to 9 or 12 lamps. Wendy lights, developed by cinematographer David Watkin, come in large panels with the same PAR 36 lamps (usually DWE). Vittorio Storaro has also developed a series of lights that use 28 volt ACL bulbs (Aircraft Landing Lights). All the bulbs on most multi-PARs are individually switchable, which makes for very simple intensity control. All PAR group lights allow for spot, medium, and flood bulbs to be interchanged for different coverages. The FAY bulbs are dichroic daylight bulbs; tungsten bulbs (FCX) can also be used. They can be used as daylight fill in place of HMIs. They are not exactly daylight balance but are very close to and can be corrected with gels if necessary. Most people refer to any PAR 36 dichroic bulb as a FAY, but in fact there are several types. FAY is the ANSI code for a 650 watt PAR36 dichroic daylight bulb with ferrule contacts. If the bulb has screw terminals, it is an FBE/FGK. With diffusion these units can be used as a large-source soft light (Figure 8.17). The Ruby Multi-PAR units are an outstanding source of raw firepower. They provide a lot of output per watt that can be concentrated into a small area or flooded with some degree of precision. Multi-PAR units also tend to be less expensive to rent than large Fresnel lights. Although with some units you can swivel the outside banks of lights inward or outward, it is not possible to truly spot them. The Ruby Seven solves this with a mechanism that tilts the outer ring in or out, moving on the axis of the center bulb (Figure 8.16). HMI PARs HMI PARs are available from 18K and 12K down to 1.2K, 575s, 200s, and even smaller. The larger units are extremely powerful. The smaller ones can be moved easily, where moving a scaffold and heavy light is a major operation. HMI PARs are different from tungsten units in that they have changeable lenses that can be added to make a narrow spot, a medium flood, wide flood, and an extra-wide flood. Every HMI PAR will come with its own set of lenses. As with tungsten PARs, the beam is oval and the separate lenses can be rotated to orient the pattern. SOFT LIGHTS Studio soft lights consist of one or more 1,000 watt or 1,500 watt bulbs directed into a clamshell white painted reflector that bounces light in a random pattern, making a light which is apparently as large as the front opening. They vary from the 1K studio soft (the Baby soft, also known as a 750 soft) up to the powerful 8K Studio Soft, which has eight individually switchable bulbs. All soft lights have certain basic problems: they are extremely inefficient in light output; they are bulky and hard to transport; and like all soft sources, they are difficult to control. While the large reflector does make the light “soft,” the random bounce pattern makes the light still somewhat raw and unpleasant. As a result of this rawness, some people put some diffusion over the soft light for any close-up work. Big studio softs through a large frame of 216 is a quick way to create a large soft source in the studio. Often cinematography 140
• 155. Figure 8.21. (top) Barger Baglights with Chimera softboxes in use on a hair product commercial. The reason there are so many lights is that they are dimmed up and down for different shots or when the model moves. Also, since this is a hair commercial, light coming from any directions makes for more reflections and sheen on the hair so it looks its best. This is a key advantage of tungsten lights: they can be controlled from a dimmer board. In comparison to a 5K with a Chimera, the Bargers have wider, more even throw and take up less real estate on the set. Figure 8.22. (bottom) A reverse angle of the scene; DP Tom Denove is taking an incident reading at the model’s position and using his other hand to shield the backlights from influencing the reading: this is correct procedure for taking an incident reading, which is the reading that determines what f/stop the lens will be set at. In most cases you don’t want the backlight to influence that reading. used with the studio is the egg-crate, which minimizes side spill and does make the beam a bit more controllable. Soft lights see most of their use in television studios where they provide a soft source without additional rigging. However, tungsten softlights in television news studios have been almost entirely replaced by Kino Flo units for one simple reason: to save on air conditioning costs. The colorcorrect fluorescent lights generate substantially less heat, which can be a real problem for studios, where they might be in use 24 hours a day. Since they are more or less permanently flown, their bulkiness is not a problem. Small compact versions of the 2K and 1K soft lights are called zip lights (Figure 8.18). They have the same width but half the height of a soft light of similar wattage. Because of their compactness, zips are great for slipping into tight spaces. Barger Baglights Barger makes a type of softlight that is compact and efficient; it consists of several 1K tubular bulbs in a housing. It is always used with a Chimera, which is a self-contained softbox that fits on the front of the light. This has many advantages. Normally to make a light soft, it is necessary to put a diffusion frame in front of it; then to control the spill, several flags are needed. This means there might be as many lighting sources 141
• 156. as six stands. This becomes a real problem when you need to move the light quickly. A softbox such as a Chimera makes the entire unit fit on one stand. They are often used with a soft eggcrate on the front, which helps control the spill. Figures 8.21 and 8.22 show Barger Baglights in use on a commercial with DP Tom Denove. The reason there are so many lights on the shot is that the model is constantly in motion. Every light is on a dimmer, and they were constantly being dimmed up and down for different shots. The Fresnels were controlled by a dimmer board, but the Barger Baglights were controlled by turning switches on and off, which is a real advantage of the Barger. Each bulb inside has its own switch on the back of the unit, making intensity control quick and easy. Figure 8.23. An extra-large space light (suspended from the same circular truss shown in Figure 8.20) in a lighting rig designed and executed by gaffer Michael Gallart and lighting director Tony Nako. (Photo courtesy of Michael Gallart.) Figure 8.24. A China ball suspended from a C-stand. These are a cheap and extremely lightweight source of softlight and are easily rigged. Figure 8.25. The Softsun 100K by Lightning Strikes, currently the most powerful light available. cinematography 142 COLOR-CORRECT FLUORESCENTS Color-correct fluorescent tubes have gained enormous popularity in recent years. Pioneered by the Kino Flo company, they are extremely lightweight, compact, and portable sources. Achieving a truly soft light can be difficult and time consuming. Whether it’s done by bouncing off a large white surface or by punching big lights through heavy diffusion. Either way takes up a lot of room and calls for a lot of flagging to control it. Kino Flos had their origin in 1987. While working on the film Barfly, DP Robby Mueller was shooting in a cramped interior that didn’t leave much room for a conventional bounce or diffusion soft source. His gaffer Frieder Hochheim came up with an answer: they constructed high-frequency fluorescent lights. By using remote ballasts, the fixtures were maneuverable enough to be taped to walls, and mounted behind the bar. Kino Flos were born (Figure 8.27). Unlike conventional fluorescent ballasts, which can be quite noisy, especially as they age, their ballasts were dead quiet and their light was flicker-free due to the higher than normal frequency. There are now several companies that make these types of lights, including Mole-Richardson. The ballasts are high-frequency, that eliminates the potential problem of flicker which is always present with fluorescent type sources. Second, the bulbs are truly color-correct. Colored bulbs are also available for various effects, as well as for greenscreen, bluescreen or redscreen. Kino makes a variety of extremely large rigs that can either frontlight or backlight an effects screen. An added bonus of color-correct, high-frequency fluorescents is that they generate considerably less heat than either tungsten or HMI, which is a great advantage in small locations. For example, they are extremely popular in television newsrooms, which often have lights on 24 hours a day. OTHER TYPES OF UNITS Besides Fresnels, open face, LED, and fluorescent sources, there are a number of other kinds of lights that are commonly used for film and video lighting. Softsun Lightning Strikes makes the Softsun series of lights in a variety of sizes from 3.3K to an amazing 100K (Figure 8.25). SoftSuns require no warmup time. They achieve maximum power and proper color temperature the moment they are turned on. SoftSuns are also the only daylight color temperature light source that can be dimmed with minimal shift in color temperature.
• 157. Cycs, Strips, Nooks and Broads When just plain output is needed, broad lights are strictly no-frills, utilitarian lights. They are just a box with a double-ended bulb. As simple as it is, the broad light has an important place in film history. In classical Hollywood hardlighting, the fill near the camera was generally a broad light with a diffuser. The distinctive feature of the broad light is its rectangular beam pattern, which makes blending them on a flat wall or cyc much easier: imagine how difficult if would to be smoothly combine the round, spotty beams of Mighties or Fresnel lights. The smallest version of the broad is the nook, which, as its name implies, is designed for fitting into nooks and crannies. The nook light is a compact, raw-light unit, usually fitted with an FCM or FHM 1000 watt bulb. The nook is just a bulb holder with a reflector. Although barn doors are usually available, nooks aren’t generally called on for much subtlety, but they are an efficient and versatile source for box light rigs, large silk overhead lights, and for large arrays to punch through frames. A number of units are specifically designed for illuminating cycs and large backdrops. For the most part they are open face 1K and 1.5K units in small boxes; these are call cycs, cyc strips, or Far Cycs (which create a more even distribution up and down the background). Figure 8.26. Balloon lights require minimal rigging. The museum would have not permitted installation of a heavy-duty lighting grid above the Egyptian temple. In this setup, the balloons have black skirts, which contain and control the spill. (Photo courtesy of Sourcemaker.) Chinese Lanterns and Spacelights Chinese lanterns (China balls) are the ordinary paper globe lamps available at houseware stores (Figure 8.24). A socket is suspended inside that holds either a medium-base bulb (household, ECA, ECT, BBA, BCA, etc.) or a 1K or 2K bipost. Just about any rig is possible if the lantern is large enough to keep the paper a safe distance from the hot lighting sources 143
• 158. Figure 8.27. Color-correct fluorescents by Kino Flo. Their light weight makes rigging them easier and quicker. Notice how the large window at left rear has been blacked out with a large solid of black duvetyne. A pipe has been rigged to the ceiling to support some of the lights. Note also the snoot boxes on the two tungsten zip lights. (Photo courtesy of Kino Flo.) bulb. Control is accomplished by painting the paper or taping gel or diffusion to it. Similar in principle are spacelights (Figure 8.23), which are basically big silk bags with 1, 2, 6, or 12 1K nook lights inside. For establishing an even overall base level on a set, they can be quite useful. When cabling, you will want to separate them into different circuits to give you some degree of control over the level. China balls are inexpensive and very easy to rig. Self-Contained Crane Rigs There are a number of units that consist of several large HMIs rigged on a crane (Figures 8.28 and 8.29). Most also carry their own generator. Musco was the first of these, but now there are several to choose from. These units can provide workable illumination up to a half mile away and are used for moonlight effects and broad illumination of large areas. The main Musco unit comes with its own 1,000 amp generator, which is typical of this type of unit. The 6K heads are individually aimable by a handheld remote control. Ellipsoidal Reflector Spots The ellipsoidal reflector spot (ERS) is a theatrical light, but it is used as a small effects light because of its precise beam control by the blades. Called lekos in the theater, on a film set you will frequently hear them referred to as Source Fours. (Source Fours is manufactured by Electronic Theater Controls (ETC).) Because the blades and gobo holder are located at the focal point of the lens, the beam can be focused sharply and patterned gobos can be inserted to give sharply detailed shadow effects. These lights come in a size defined by their beam angle. The longer the focal length, the narrower the beam. They also make a unit that has a zoom. Some ERS spots have a gobo slot that will hold a metal disk that will project a pattern. These patterns come in a vast array of designs. cinematography 144
• 159. Figure 8.28. (above) A Mini Musco in use at the Universal Studios backlot. Figure 8.29. (right) A self-contained crane rig on Wall Street. (Photo by Michael Gallart.) Balloon Lights Balloon lights provide a powerful and flexible new tool for night exteriors (Figures 8.1 and 8.26). They can be either HMI or tungsten sources. They generate a soft, general fill light for large areas. Perhaps their greatest advantage is that they are much easier to hide than a crane or scaffolding. They are also faster to set up and to move. The disadvantage is that they can be very time consuming and expensive to gel. Wind is a factor when flying balloon lights. The smaller the balloon, the lower the acceptable wind speeds. A good reference is to observe flags: if they’re flapping straight out, it’s too windy. This introduces an element of uncertainty into their use. Larger balloon lights usually come with an operator. Handheld Units Portable handheld, battery-operated units are generally called sunguns. There are two basic types: tungsten and HMI. Tungsten sunguns are either 12 volt or 30 volt and powered from battery belts. Some are designed as sunguns, but some are 120 volt lights converted by changing the bulb and power cable. Typically, a tungsten sungun will run for about fifteen minutes. Sunguns with HMI bulbs are daylight balance and more efficient in output than tungsten units. DAY EXTERIORS Day exteriors can be approached in three ways: filling with large daylight balance units such as a Brute Arc or HMI, bouncing the existing light with reflectors, or covering the scene with a large silk to control the contrast. Sometimes it is some combination of several of these techniques (Figure 8.30.) Controlling Light with Grip Equipment Once you have a light working, you have to control it. As soon as you get beyond what can be done with the barn doors, it becomes the province of the grip department. Grip equipment is wide and varied, but in relation to lighting control it falls into three basic categories: reduction, shadow casting, and diffusion. Reducing the amount of light without altering the quality is done with nets, which are frames covered with a netting material; the purpose is the same as a metal scrim on a light: it reduces intensity without changing the color or hard/soft quality of the light. Just as lighting sources 145
• 160. Figures 8.30. A day exterior with negative fill (the black 12x12 solid that creates a shadow side) and shiny board reflectors that are aimed through 4x4 frames with diffusion. The fill is an 8x8 frame with Ultrabounce, a reflective material. This setup reverses the direction of the light source (the sun). The shiny boards are necessary in order to raise the level of the actors so that they are not significantly darker than the background, which would otherwise be seriously overexposed. with metal scrims, a single (color coded green) reduces the light by one-half stop and a double (color coded red) reduces the light by a full stop. The same frames used for nets can be covered with white silk-like material that is a medium heavy diffusion. When they are covered with black duvetyne, they are flags or cutters, which can control spill, cast shadows, or block off flares from the lens. The same silk-like material or solid black duvetyne (a fire-resistant cloth) also comes in larger sizes for butterflies and overheads. These come in various sizes, denoted in feet: 4x4, 6x6, 8x8, 12x12, and 20x20. (Figure 8.30). FOR MORE INFORMATION ON LIGHTING Lighting is a vast subject; here we have room only to cover the basics. For more on lighting techniques, photometric data, grip equipment and methods, electrical distribution, bulbs, and scene lighting examples, see Motion Picture and Video Lighting by the same author, also published by Focal Press. cinematography 146
• 161. HD cinematography © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50009-9
• 162. HIGH DEF AND STANDARD DEF Standard Def video (SD) is video as it has been since the invention of television. In the United States, this meant NTSC video (National Television Standards Committee) and in Europe, Asia, and many other areas, PAL (Phase Alternating Line). Secam is another format used in France and the former USSR. NTSC consists of 525 scan lines from top to bottom in each frame and approximately 30 frames per second. PAL is 625 lines per frame and 50 frames per second. Officially, NTSC is now being replaced as a broadcast standard in the United States, Mexico, and Canada by ATSC (Advanced Television Standards Committee). Standard Def video will soon be part of history as it is gradually giving way to High-definition (HD or High Def) video that varies from 720 lines from top to bottom up to 1080 lines measured vertically as lines. These are display standards for television monitors. For shooting, some cameras now offer even higher resolutions (sometimes called Super High Def) and even though they have to be downconverted for viewing on a home TV or in a theater, they still result in better images. High Def video comes in many formats, including HDCAM, HDCAM-SR, DVCPRO HD, D5, XDCAM HD, HDV, AVCHD, and also 2K and 4K and others, which will be discussed in more detail later in this chapter. ANALOG AND DIGITAL VIDEO Digital cinematography is a form of video, but not all video is digital; before digital video there was analog video. Although it didn’t make much of an impact at the time, there was even analog High Def video as far back as the late 70s. High Def did not really take off as a recording medium for professional production until it became digital High Def. Most of what we will discuss about video applies equally to Standard Def and High Def and other formats. SD video can be analog or digital. Digital Video is used in DV, DVCam, and MiniDV. DigiBeta is a very high-quality SD digital video format. Figure 9.1. High-definition color bars, used for camera and monitor testing and calibration. cinematography 148 Analog Although analog video is on its way out, a little history will help us understand how video works in the digital age. For most of the last 50 years since its invention, video was in analog form. Before computers were invented, even before things like transistors and integrated circuits, video was done with vacuum tubes, which understand voltage — variations in electrical potential. Except for the very beginning when it was mechanical, all early television/video was based on this principle. Voltage from the video sensor (chip or tube) goes up and down in response to variations in brightness in the picture. If we look at a representation of the changes in voltage of a video signal, it looks like this: we measure it as going from zero (no voltage at all) representing pure black, up to .7 (700 millivolts — pure white). Analog means “something that represents something else.” An example: the hands of a clock are not “time” — they are an analog representation of time. In analog video, we represent a picture as variations in voltage. It works, but there is a problem: every time you make a copy of an analog video, it gets worse. Just like when you make a photocopy, it is never as good as the original. There’s another problem — computers can’t work with analog, which means all those great things we can do with computers won’t work on analog video.
• 163. Figure 9.2. An analog signal is a variation in voltage over time. 100 Highlights Brightness 75 50 25 10 Shadows 0 0 75 25 50 10 100 25 Measured value at each point in time 50 0 Digital Video A digital video signal is composed of a series of values that represent a stream of information that can be reproduced as an image. The conversion to digital video has wide-ranging implications, not only for image acquisition but for editing, image manipulation, storage, theater projection, and broadcast transmission as well. What is digital? It means converting an image into a form that a computer can read: zeros and ones. As the image is projected by the lens onto the image plane, it is still fundamentally an analog image. If it’s not one’s and zeros, the computer simply can’t understand it. Figure 9.2 shows a typical video signal in analog form. Along the bottom axis, we measure the signal at regular intervals; every time we measure it, we get a specific value from 0 to 100. For the example in Figure 9.2, the values would be: 0 75 25 50 10 100 and so on. It’s easy to convert this to a binary form the computer can understand, which would be: 0=0 75 = 1001011 25 = 11001 50 = 110010 10 = 1010 100 =1100100 For digital video, some form of an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) is part of the camera and outputs the digital signal. In its simplest form, an ADC reads the variations in voltage of a continuous analog signal and translates that into binary output. It does this by sampling the analog signal at regular time intervals, which is the sampling rate. The sampling rate or sampling frequency defines the number of samples per second taken from a continuous signal. It is normally measured in hertz (Hz), which is frequency or cycles-per-second. HD cinematography 149
• 164. Red Sensor Green Sensor Dichroic filter Blue Sensor Figure 9.3. (top) The prism block of a 3-chip camera. Figure 9.4. (above) A Bayer filter sensor, which is used in single-chip video design. Note that there are twice as many green pixels as their are blue or red pixels. TYPES OF VIDEO SENSORS Digital video requires something that serves the same function as film, which is, after all, just a medium that records and reproduces the patterns of light and dark that are focused on it by the lens. In digital video, electronic sensors perform this function. Two types of video sensors are widely used: CCD (Charge-Coupled Device) and CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor). Each type has its advantages and disadvantages. A CCD consists of a photo-voltaic region containing capacitors which convert light energy to an electrical charge. As with the silver based grains in motion picture film emulsion, a minimum number of photons are necessary to cause a change. Tiny lenses focus the light onto each of the millions of capacitors on the light sensing layer. CCDs are most often referred to my how many pixel elements (the capacitors) they have — measured in megapixels, or millions of pixels. This has become a shorthand for the quality of an image sensor, but there are other factors that determine image quality as well. CMOS sensors have the advantage of high noise immunity and relatively low power consumption. Three-Chip vs Bayer Filter Sensors There are two methods used to record the images: three-chip and Bayer filters. Increasingly, high-end pro digital HD cameras often use a single sensor (similar to digital still-photo cameras), with dimensions about the same size as a 35mm film frame or even larger. An image can be projected onto a single large sensor exactly the same way it can be projected onto a film frame, so cameras with this design can be made with PL (Arriflex type mount), PV (Panavision type mount), and similar systems of attaching lenses. This means that a large range of extremely high-quality motion picture lenses can now be used on these HD cameras. In a single-chip design, clearly there has to be a way to record the three channels of color (red, green, blue). One way to do this is with a Bayer filter, which is an array, or mosaic, of color filters that sits on top of the video sensor. The pattern is G, R, G, B, which means that half of the filters are green, which is the dominant color in human perception. Using this method requires a process of deBayering and demosaicing before it begins to look like a useable image. Since depth-of-field is largely dependent on the size of the frame at the image plane, the larger sensors also let these cameras achieve the same shallow depth of field as 35mm motion picture film cameras, which is important because many cinematographers consider selective focus an essential visual tool. Three-Chip Design Three-chip cameras typically use three 1/3-inch, 1/2-inch or 2/3inch sensors in conjunction with a prism block that separates the incoming image into its primary colors, with a separate sensor capturing each color. Three-chip designs have advantages in terms of color reproduction, but they have optical design problems that make it difficult to use traditional prime lenses (although some specially designed prime lenses have been built for these cameras) and are incapable of achieving 35mm depth-of-field unless used with optical adaptors that permit the use of lenses designed for 35mm; however, these adapters result in a loss of image sharpness and a substantial loss of light. cinematography 150
• 165. DIGITAL VIDEO Digital video exists in many forms: DigiBeta, DV, DVCam, DVCPro, HDV and MiniDV and the many varieties of High Def. These differ in methods of compression, recording formats, tape speed, and tape cassette size, but all are similar in that they take an analog signal from their video sensors and convert it to digital. As with all things digital, the equipment available changes almost on a daily basis; as you decide what to use for your project, sideby-side comparisons will be most helpful. Naturally the producer will be most concerned about the cost/benefit ratio of the various formats and different HD cameras, which can vary widely in their rental prices. These are the producer’s concerns, but it is your job as the cinematographer or director to make sure that the cost concerns are balanced with both the visual quality the system can produce and what its other capabilities are. Since HD technology is changing so rapidly, unless you are shooting with a camera you know well, a comparison test of the cameras you are considering is a good idea. Most camera rental facilities will be glad to arrange some testing time for you. A downside of having such rapid progress in the quality and engineering of video camera formats is that cameras and other gear tend to become obsolete relatively soon. Some cinematographers own 16mm or 35mm cameras that are decades old but still take as good a picture as the day they were made: better even, as the film stocks constantly improve. Many cameras offer interchangeable lenses, and the quality of video lenses is improving; many cameras also have mounts that will accommodate film-style lenses. The size and quality of the video sensor is also important, not only for image quality but for focus — the smaller the sensor the greater the depth-of-field (see the chapter Optics). At first glance this might seem like a good thing, but remember that depth-of-field is an important storytelling tool; too much depth-of-field restricts the possibility of using this important tool. Standard Def Standard Definition video can be recorded on several types of cameras: BetaCam, DigiBeta, DV, VHS, and so on (there are many). Some of these are analog and some are digital. There is no question but that the days of analog and standard def video are coming to an end: digital HD simply offers far too many advantages. DV (digital video) cameras, and DigiBeta (a high-end digital pro format) are SD video recorded digitally. Standard Def is 525 lines (in the NTSC system) or 625 lines (in the European-based PAL system), although not all lines are actually displayed on a typical monitor; some are outside the viewable area. High Def So what is High Def ? Basically, HD is anything that is more than 525 lines/625 lines (NTSC or PAL). There is 720 HD, which is 720 lines in each frame. This can be 720P (progressive) or 720I (interlaced). In interlaced video, the lines of video are scanned on the monitor in an alternating fashion: first all of the odd lines and then all of the even lines. In progressive video, the video lines are written from top to bottom for each frame. Many HD cameras shoot 1080 lines, which can also be progressive or interlace. Most HD cameras can also shoot at 24FPS or 25FPS (Europe and elsewhere) for a more film-like look or 30FPS which has long been the video standard. HD cinematography 151
• 166. Figure 9.5. Pixels on a screen. They are enlarged here to see detail. The term pixel is derived from picture element. All digital imaging is based on pixels. SHOOTING FORMATS Digital formats are defined either by how many horizontal and vertical lines (or lines of pixels) they are composed of (such as 1080x1920 or 720x1280 — usually classified as 1080 or 720) or by their resolution as expressed in how many horizontal lines of pixels there are (such as 2K or 4K). What’s in a “K”? 2K and 4K capture are rapidly becoming the standard for HD acquisition in professional work. A 2K image is one that measures 2048 (2K or 2x1024) pixels across horizontally. A 4K image measures 4096 pixels across or 4x1024. By comparison, HDCam (a Sony format) is most frequently shot at 1080. 2K is slightly more resolution than 1080 and 4K is four times the resolution. The vertical measure of pixels may vary somewhat as not all frames or camera sensors share the same aspect ratio. “K” refers to kilo (one thousand) and 1024 is derived from binary code, the same as a kilobyte. A “K” is increments of 1024 pixels measured horizontally. 2K, 4K and Higher Resolution Formats These types of video that offer higher resolution than the 1080 standard are referred to as 2K, 4K, 5K, 8K and so on. Some people call these higher-resolution formats Super High Def. It is important to remember that this is a different way of describing a video format. 720 and 1080 refers to the number of video lines measured vertically. (This is described in more detail later in this chapter after we talk about formats.) For more detail on formats and aspect ratio, see the chapter Professional Formats. The term format can refer to either the type of camera (HD, DV, film, etc.) or the shape of the frame, which is aspect ratio; many HD video cameras can shoot in several different aspect ratios. DIGITAL COMPRESSION Digital cinema cameras are capable of generating extremely large amounts of data up to hundreds of megabytes per second. To help manage this huge data flow, nearly all cameras and the recording hardware designed to be used with them utilize some form of compression. Prosumer cameras typically use high compression to make the video files more compact for recording and storage. While this allows footage to be comfortably handled even on smaller, less powerful computers, the convenience comes at the expense of image quality. The software is also constantly improving in its ability to high resolutions. cinematography 152
• 167. Lossy and Lossless Compression A lossless compression system is one that is capable of reducing the size of digital data in a way that allows the original data to be completely restored, byte for byte. This is done by removing redundant information. For example, if an area of the image is all pure white, where normally the digital code would be a long list of zeros, the compression might write a code that means “there is a row of 5000 zeros,” which will use only a few bits of data instead of thousands. Much higher compression ratios (lower data rates) can be achieved with lossy compression. With lossy compression, information is discarded to create a simpler signal. These methods take into account the limits of human perception: they try to lose only information that won’t be missed by the eye — at least that’s the theory. Lossy compression may be invisible to the eye but can have a negative effect on post-production and later generations of duplication. Chroma Subsampling Many cameras use chroma subsampling as a basic form of compression. In this technology, the luminance (black-and-white brightness) is sampled at a different rate than the chrominance (color). It is based on the idea that a real RGB signal (such as you might get from gathering independent signals from the red, green, and blue sensors in a threechip camera), contains redundant information: in essence, each of the channels contains a duplicate black-and-white image. An RGB signal has potentially the richest color depth and highest resolution, but requires enormous bandwidth and processing power. With chroma subsampling, there might be twice as many samples of the luminance as for the chrominance. This would be expressed as 4:2:2, where the first digit is the luminance channel and the next two digits are the chroma channels — they are sampled at half the rate of the luminance channel. Video that is 4:4:4, has the same chroma sampling for color channels as for luminance. There are other variations — for example, Sony’s HDCam cameras sample at 3:1:1. You may occasionally see a fourth digit, such as 4:4:4:4; in this case the fourth number is the alpha channel, which contains transparency information. Because the human visual system is much more sensitive to luminance than to color, lower-resolution color information can be overlaid with higher-resolution luma (brightness) information, to create an image that looks very similar to one in which both color and luma information are sampled at full resolution. 1080P HD 1080 Scan Lines 2K HD 2048 Pixels Figure 9.6. Different methods for defining the resolution of an HD format. Resolutions such as 720 or 1080 refers to the number if scan lines measured vertically. 2K and 4K refer to the number of pixels measured horizontally. In this case a 2K frame is 2048 pixels across. MPEG and JPEG Other types of compression are MPEG and JPEG. MPEG stands for Motion Picture Experts Group, and JPEG is an acronym for Joint Photographic Experts Group. Various forms of MPEG are used for both video and audio. Both MPEG and JPEG are types of codecs: which means compressor—decompressor. Some compression systems compress footage one frame at a time, interpreting the video as a series of still frames; this is called intraframe compression. Interframe compression systems can further compress data by eliminating redundancy between frames. This leads to higher compression ratios, but can sometimes put a bigger processing load on the editing system. As with HD cameras, codecs and editing software and hardware are constantly improving. It is usually possible to transcode older formats into whatever codec you want, but there is almost always some loss of quality in the process. HD cinematography 153
• 168. RAW With most HD cameras and recording systems, the scene information is compressed and is processed by the camera electronics according to choices made by the cinematographer, and these choices are baked in – they cannot be changed later. Cameras that record in the RAW format do minimal processing to the image: they record the raw data that came out of the video sensors. RAW images are also produced by many digital still cameras and are considered superior because they are not compressed, which can reduce quality. The kinds of choices the cinematographer can make are described later in this chapter. Digital Negative Think of RAW as a digital negative. What does this change? The basic idea of RAW is to simply record all of the data that comes off the sensors, essentially unchanged. Metadata is recorded at the same time; this is a file “about” the image, such as any camera settings, and so on. RAW image files can in essence fill the same role as film negatives in traditional film-based photography: that is, the negative is not directly usable as an image, but has all of the information needed to create a final, viewable image. The process of converting a RAW image file into a viewable format is sometimes called developing the image, in that it is analogous with the motion picture film process that converts exposed negative film into a projectable print. Like a traditional negative, a RAW digital image may have a wider dynamic range (latitude) or wider color gamut than the eventual final image format can show. Gamut defines the limits of color reproduction in a particular colorspace. The selection of the final choice of image rendering is part of the process of white balancing and color grading, which is exactly the same as making two very different looks by printing differently from the same negative. RAW images have high image quality, finer control of parameters, and 12 or 14 bits of information recorded for each pixel. With a motion picture negative, you can always go back to the original. If you shot the negative right to begin with, you can do anything you want with it, now or in the future. If five years from now, you decide you want to make the look of the film entirely different, you can. You can do the same with RAW; it is archival and non-destructive, and you can manipulate the image later. There are many types of RAW files — different camera companies use variations on the idea. RAW files must be interpreted and processed before they can be edited or viewed. The software used to do this depends on which camera they were shot with. Also, RAW files shot with a Bayer-filter camera must be demosaiced (the mosaic pattern imposed on the image by the Bayer filter must be interpreted), but this is a standard part of the processing that converts the RAW images to more universal JPEG or TIFF files. Bitrate Video compression systems are often characterized by their bitrates. Bitrate describes how much data (computer bits) is required to represent one second of media. One cannot directly use bitrate as a measure of quality, because different compression algorithms perform differently. More advanced compression algorithms at a lower bitrate may deliver the same quality as a less advanced algorithm at a higher bitrate. Bitrate is especially important when you get to output for DVDs or Internet delivery, which may have limits on how much bitrate they can handle. cinematography 154
• 169. Figure 9.7. (top) SMPTE 75% color bars as they are seen on a video monitor. The primary and secondary colors are arranged in order of brightness. On the far left top is a 75% gray patch. In the bottom row, second patch from the right is a 100% white patch. (bottom) The color bars as seen on a waveform monitor, which measures the voltage of the video signal. Also on the lower row at the right on the color bars is the PLUGE, which can be clearly seen on the waveform signal. MONITORING ON THE SET When shooting digitally, recorded scenes can be played back instantly, either by rolling back the tape or, in a file-based system (video recorded on hard drives or flash memory), selecting individual takes — in a file-based system, every take is an individual data file and can be accessed randomly. This means a cinematographer can have a much better understanding how the final image will look. This assumes that there is a goodquality monitor on the set, that its viewing conditions are good (all excess light screened off ), and ideally, the cinematographer has access to a waveform monitor/vectorscope (discussed in the next section). In some cases, a separate DIT (Digital Imaging Technician) monitors the signal with the waveform/vectorscope and a high quality monitor. The DIT works with the cinematographer to control the image. With a properly calibrated high-definition display, on the set monitoring, in conjunction with data displays such as histograms, waveforms, RGB parades, and various types of focus assist, can give the cinematographer a far more accurate picture of what is being captured. However, all of this equipment may not be possible in shooting situations. It is critical that a working cinematographer be able to work without monitors and other displays. HD cinematography 155
• 170. Figure 9.8. SMPTE 75% color bars as displayed on the vectorscope. As a check on system alignment, each primary and secondary color is placed in boxes. If they are not in their boxes, then something is wrong. The vectorscope is really just the color wheel (see Figure 12.1 in the chapter Color) represented electronically: around the circle is hue and how far away from the center is chroma saturation. If the camera is photographing a black-and-white scene (zero saturation), then the vectorscope will display only a dot in the center. THE WAVEFORM MONITOR AND VECTORSCOPE To see the various elements of the video signal, two special test oscilloscopes are used: the waveform monitor and the vectorscope (Figures 9.7 and 9.8). Usually combined into one unit, these tools are invaluable; it is essential to understand what they are telling you. On a video shoot, the waveform monitor is your light meter and the vectorscope is your color meter. Color monitors, even sophisticated ones, can be unreliable, but information for the waveform and vectorscope can almost always be trusted. Waveform Monitors The waveform monitor displays the luminance video signal information. It allows you to analyze the information from an entire frame or from just one line of video. The waveform monitor displays the signal on a scale seen in Figure 9.7. The scale is from zero to one hundred or in milivots. It can be measured in IRE units (International Radio Engineers) or as percentage, which is generally used in HD video. The waveform is merely measuring the voltage of each part of the video picture: voltage represents the brightness of the image. Zero represents pure black, and one hundred represents pure white. It is possible for the video signal to go below zero or above one hundred, but the final image will still only show pure black at zero and one hundred will still be pure white. The Vectorscope Used in conjunction with the waveform monitor, the vectorscope measures the chrominance (color) of the video signal (Figure 9.8). The scale of the vectorscope is a circle overlaid with the color amplitude and phase relationship of the three primary colors (red, green, and blue). The vectorscope displays color information only; there is no information about exposure — although you can see the effects of over or under exposure in how they affect color saturation. The vectorscope screen for calibration shows a display of a SMPTE color bars test signal with all of the dots in their boxes and the color burst correctly placed on the horizontal axis. Chroma phase error translates as “the color is off,” as shown in Figure 9.9. Notice how color is conceptualized as a circle and we rotate the circle around its center to adjust the hue (phase). How far it is from the center indicated chroma saturation. At zero saturation (black-and-white) the display is just a dot in the center. cinematography 156
• 171. 104° Red 61° Magenta 167° Yellow 0° 347° Blue 241° Green 284° Cyan All vectorscope graticules are designed to work with a color bars signal. Remember, the color bars signal consists of brightness information (luminance) and color information (chrominance or chroma). Each bar of the color bars signal creates a dot on the vectorscope’s display (it’s a dot because they are pure colors). The position of these dots relative to the boxes, or targets, on the graticule and the phase are the major indicators of the color signal. Proper white balance of a video camera is indicated by dot centered on the vectorscope display when the target or signal being displayed is a white or neutral gray object. If the camera white balance is off, the spot will be shifted off-center. VIDEO LATITUDE Video, whether standard def or high def, has historically had a problem with latitude (dynamic range). The sensors in most highend digital video cameras have had considerably less exposure latitude than modern motion picture film stocks. They tend to “blow out” highlights, losing detail in brightest parts of the image (Figure 9.13). If highlight detail is lost, it is impossible to recapture in postproduction. Cinematographers can learn how to adjust for this type of response using techniques similar to those used when shooting on reversal (transparency/positive) film, which has a limited latitude especially in the highlights. For this reason, highlights are frequently a problem in HD, because digital sensors inevitably clip them very sharply (Figure 9.13), whereas film produces a softer roll-off effect in the brighter areas of the image. Camera companies have made great strides in giving video more latitude, and they continue to improve. Many cameras incorporate a knee function in their controls, and it is essential that you understand what it does and how to use it. The knee region (called the shoulder in film, as discussed in the chapter Exposure) represents the highlight areas. The knee function allows you to control how these brighter areas are handled in image processing. It is imperative that you learn how to operate the knee function on any video camera you use. Use of the knee control on HD cameras is discussed later in this chapter. One advantage of digital imaging is that these cameras tend to have excellent low-light response and Figure 9.9. (top) Hue (phase) error; notice how the color is shifted clockwise — the dots indicating the key hues are not in their proper boxes. (Photo courtesy of Tektronix.) Figure 9.10. (middle) Vectorscope showing correct phase. The dots are in their boxes and also are not too far from or too near the center, indicating correct levels of chroma. (Photo courtesy of Tektronix.) Figure 9.11. (above, left)The position of primary and secondary colors on the vectorscope. As you can see, it is the color wheel. Video phase (hue) is represented as measured in degrees around the circle, starting at the three o’clock position. HD cinematography 157
• 172. Figure 9.12 (left) Normal exposure on an HD camera. Below it is the same frame on a waveform monitor. Notice the proper skin tones, the correct color saturation in the chart, and how all segments are shown on the gray scale. These images are from a latitude test on an HD camera. Figure 9.13. (right) At just two stops overexposed, the skin tone is blown out, the color saturation is severely reduced and there is no separation visible in the lighter tones on the gray scale. Clipping of the highlights appears on the waveform monitor as a flatline at the top of the signal. This is at only plus two stops of exposure and already it has exceeded the latitude (dynamic range) of the HD camera. cinematography 158 can really see into the shadows. This also tends to bring out shadow detail, which can give the impression that they are far more sensitive to light (i.e., they have a higher ISO) than they really do. This can sometimes lead a cinematographer to be daring and shoot scenes in extraordinarily low lighting levels. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t; the results can sometimes be unacceptably noisy, especially if gain is used. Gain boosts image brightness by adding voltage to the signal, which also adds video noise. Beware, this noise may not always be visible on a preview monitor, or you may see it but deem it acceptable, only to be disappointed when you see it on a larger monitor. Clipping An important aspect of video latitude is clipping, which is what happens when the brightness of an object in the scene exceeds the maximum brightness level the camera is capable of. Clipped highlights show as a flat line on the waveform monitor (Figures 9.13 and 9.33). In general, clipping is to be avoided at all costs; once the signal flatlines at the top, there is no information at all; it is just dead flat white, no detail, no separation. Nothing can be done to fix it; the complete lack of information makes saving it impossible; it can never be anything other than dead flat white or featureless gray. This is one of the major differences between how film and video respond to highlights. Film has the ability to gently “roll off ” the overexposed highlights. One of the most important uses of the waveform monitor on the set is to watch for instances of clipping due to overexposure.
• 173. Video Noise and Grain Motion picture film has a characteristic grain structure (although modern, low-speed film stocks are remarkably low in grain). Some filmmakers add artificial grain to their HD projects, to match intercut film footage or to make it look old or just to create a “look.” Digitally recorded footage does not have a characteristic grain structure but it can have video noise (especially if the gain is turned up) which looks different. If you want your scene to have the look of film grain, it is better to add it in post rather than trying to convince yourself that video noise looks like film grain. Color Bars and Test Charts There are several types of reference color bars. In High Def especially, there are many different types. On the waveform monitor NTSC SMPTE color bars appear as in Figure 9.7. There are many types of color bars, some different ones are shown at the beginning of this chapter in Figure 9.1. Color bars are used for monitor adjustment and for camera testing and adjustment. For monitor adjustment, they are electronically generated by the camera and are recorded at the beginning of every tape; for camera adjustment they are a physical test chart that is photographed by the camera. These test charts need to be very precise, and the best of them can cost a thousand dollars or more. These test charts are used for testing for adjusting the camera in the field. Proper setup of the test chart is critical. It should be evenly illuminated with no glare. The standard method is to use two lights at 45°. THE DIGITAL INTERMEDIATE (DI) Digital Intermediates are a way of combining the best of both worlds. Although it is a part of shooting on motion picture film, it is discussed here because it involves all of the image controls that are covered in this chapter: the DI is way of utilizing the digital techniques and computer magic that are an inherent part of digital High Def. When using a DI, you shoot on film, then do your post-production and image manipulation in the digital world, with all the amazing options we have in that realm, and then you produce a film print that can be shown almost anywhere in the world. Although it is rapidly changing, the world has long been standardized on projecting 35mm film. Theaters with 35mm projectors are found in every nation. A movie printed on film in London can be projected in Kyoto or Karachi without any adaptation or special equipment. For films that do employ the DI process, there is a crucial choice: whether to do image manipulation in the camera or in post. However, for overall color cast and altering the contrast of scene, it probably makes sense to do these in post as doing them on the set can be costly and time consuming. The first film to use DI was O Brother, Where Art Thou shot by Roger Deakins (see Figure 1.14). He knew he wanted a particular look for the film: a desaturated sepia-toned look. The film was shot in Alabama in the summer, meaning that the vegetation was bright green. Deakins experimented with a variety of methods to get the look he wanted — none of which produced the results he wanted. He found that a digital intermediate allowed him to create exactly the look he was going for. HD cinematography 159
• 174. THE VIDEO SIGNAL Even if you shoot mostly on film, it is essential to know the basics of video. Today, nearly all editing and most postproduction are done in video, even for projects shot on film, and we can envision a time in the near future when virtually 100% of it will be. No matter how well designed and goofproof a piece of video equipment is, it is still not a matter of point and shoot. Even if certain systems are automated, this automation may have unwanted consequences down the line. To understand video, it is necessary to have an overview of the history of the basic video signal. Black-andwhite television broadcasts began in 1936 in Britain and in 1939 in the United States television had a 4:3 aspect ratio. This matched the standard film projection frame of the time. Interlace Video In standard-def TV, this electron beam scans 525 lines (in the North American system). Standard-def video is usually interlaced (Figure 9.14). The odd-numbered lines are a field and the even-numbered lines are a field. This means that every frame of interlace video consists of two fields. Interlace video is not nearly as common as it once was, as most modern equipment is progressive. Progressive Video Most of the time you will be shooting progressive. In progressive video, the beam starts at the top and scans down line by line (1,2, 3, 4, and so on). Progressive has higher vertical resolution than interlace, but the main reason we use it is that it looks more film-like. Dramatic narrative productions (films with a story and actors) are usually shot 24P, meaning that it is progressive video at 24 frames per second; 24 frames per second being the frame rate of film cameras. NTSC and ATSC NTSC is the standard-def television system used in the United States and some other countries almost since the beginning of television. It stands for National Television Standards Committee. It is now being replaced by High Def digital television. In NTSC, each frame is made up of 481 horizontal lines that are visible, plus another 44 lines that are blanked. These lines are blanked because they occur while the scanner beam is traveling back up to the starting point at the top left of the screen. This makes a total of 525 lines for each video frame. ATSC (Advanced Television Standards Committee) is the stanFigure 9.14. Interlaced video con- dard for digital High Def television wide screen 16:9 images up sists of two sets of alternating scan lines. Each set of scan lines is called to 1920×1080 pixels in size — six times the display resolution of a video “field.” NTSC However, aspect ratios other than 16x9 are also supported. Interlaced video (I) Odd Field cinematography 160 Even Field Both fields interlaced
• 175. Figure 9.15. Component outputs on the camera: Y, Pr, Pb. Colorspace Cameras can render the colors of a scene differently. One of the primary factors is the colorspace being used. Colorspace is a video standard that defines how the colors will be handled — different colorspaces render the colors of a scene slightly differently. Some cameras are capable of using any one of a number of different colorspace configurations; these can be selected in the camera menus. There is no agreed upon standard, but Rec 709 (a colorspace defined by SMPTE) is frequently used in HD. Measuring Color Space on the Vectorscope There are many different colorspace systems and notations used to derive and define color video, as we discussed earlier in this chapter. Figures 9.22 and 9.23 show the same test chart in two different colorspaces. You can see how a different colorspace changes color rendition of the image. Color Difference Signals: B-Y and R-Y Processing all information as R, G, B is inefficient because each separate channel contains both color information and grayscale (luminance) information, which is redundant. As we recall from the chapter on color, black-and-white (grayscale) actually conveys the great majority of information about an image. Engineers realized that there was no need to repeat the black-and-white information for every channel. For this reason, most video systems distill the chroma information into color difference signals. Luminance is notated as Y, since B already stands for blue. There are many systems in use, but basically, color difference is derived by taking the blue component and subtracting the luminance (grayscale) information: B-Y (blue minus luminance) and for the red channel, luminance is subtracted from red: R-Y. This is called component video. This is abbreviated in various ways; on the camera in Figure 9.15, it is Y, PB, PR. Encoded Color One characteristic of human vision is we can’t see fine detail nearly as well for changes in color as we can for changes in luminance. In other words, the picture won’t suffer very much if we reduce the bandwidth of the color components, provided we can maintain essentially full bandwidth of the luminance signal (bandwidth is the rate of information flow). Even a full bandwidth luminance signal doesn’t have very much energy in the upper end of its spectrum; the higher-frequency signals are quite a bit lower amplitude almost all the time. HD cinematography 161
• 176. Figure 9.16. HD SDI outputs, as well as composite, timecode, and other connections on a Miranda downconverter. SDI SDI stands for Serial Digital Interface and is becoming the standard for HD camera output (HD SDI). There is also standard-def SDI (SD SDI). Where component video employs three cables, SDI runs on a single BNC cable. Component video is analog, but SDI is digital. It also contains digitally encoded audio, timecode, and ancillary data such as embedded audio, closed captions, and other sorts of metadata. Some systems employ dual link SDI, which doubles the data flow. SETTING UP A COLOR MONITOR The most important thing you can learn about video is how to properly set up a color monitor. Even with other equipment such as a waveform monitor and vectorscope on hand, the monitor is still a crucial part of previewing and judging the picture. As we’ll see in the chapter Color, there is no exact correlation between the mathematical representation of color and the human perception of it. Color bars are an artificial electronic pattern produced by a signal generator, which may be in a video camera (most professional video cameras have a bars setting) or a separate piece of equipment on the set or as a standard piece of equipment in any video post-production facility, be it telecine, editing, or duplication. Color bars are recorded at the head of every videotape to provide a consistent reference in postproduction. They are also used for matching the output of two cameras in a multicamera shoot and to set up a video monitor. On top on the left is a gray bar: it is 80 IRE units. Monitor Setup Procedure To set up a monitor, start with the following steps: are always important with monitors). color bars are shades of black-and-white. Now you are ready to adjust the brightness with the PLUGE. cinematography 162
• 177. Figure 9.17. Blue-only color bars shown in black-and-white for clarity. Notice that the bands are of equal intensity, and in the upper portion the large and small bars are equally gray or black. This indicates correct phase and saturation. The PLUGE Notice the three narrow bars labeled 3.5, 7.5, and 11.5 on the bottom right (Figure 9.17). These are the PLUGE, which stands for Picture Lineup Generating Equipment. The PLUGE was developed at the BBC in London. It was generated at a central location in their facility and sent by wire to each studio. This way all of the equipment could be calibrated conveniently and consistently. This was the PLUGE alone, not combined with the color bars. Figure 9.18. Incorrect luminance; how all three The middle black bar is set at 7.5 IRE, (or in the digital realm, 16, notice the lower right of the PLUGE bars in are visible. 16, 16). The first bar on the left, superblack, is set at about 2.5 IRE below black, and the third bar, dark gray, is set at 3.5 IRE above black. None of these really work to adjust a monitor to properly display 0 IRE black, so the following procedure is standard. Learning to calibrate a monitor is an essential skill. PLUGE bar is not quite visible. The lightest bar on the right (11.5 units) should be barely visible. If it’s not visible, turn the brightness up until it becomes visible. difference between the left bar (3.5 units) and the middle bar (7.5 units). There should be no dividing line between these two bars. The only division you should see is between 11.5 and 7.5. This same technique is used in setting the black-and-white viewfinder on a video camera. level. To do so, turn the contrast all the way up. The white (100 unit) bar will bloom and flare. Now turn the contrast down until this white bar just begins to respond. Adjusting Color It is possible to eyeball the yellow and magenta. This is the down and dirty method and should only be used if other methods are not practical. The yellow should be a lemon yellow without orange or green. And the magenta should not be red or purple. This quickie method is not recommended except in emergencies; it is much better to do it the professional way. If you do eyeball a monitor, don’t put too much faith in it for color reference or brightness. Monitors vary widely in color reproduction, especially in less than ideal viewing conditions on location. Figure 9.19. Correct monitor setup, shown here in black-and-white. Figure 9.20. (above, left) SMPTE 75% color bars. See also Figure 9.1 on the opening page of this chapter. It is typical of the kind of color bars that will be generated by many highend HD cameras. 75% refers to color saturation; this is considered to be more reliable to measure than 100% saturation, but 100% color bars do exist and you need to be sure what type you are working with. HD cinematography 163
• 178. Blue-Only Adjustment Professional monitors have a blue-only switch. This turns off the red and green, leaving only the blue (Figure 9.17). If your monitor does not have a blue-only switch, you can use a piece of blue gel (full CTB) or a Kodak Wratten #47. View the monitor through the gel. If you see any of the red, green, or yellow colors, double the blue gel over to increase the blue effect. By using the blue-only switch or a piece of blue gel, you have removed the red and green elements of the picture. Only the blue remains. If the hue is correct, you should see alternating bars of equal intensity. turn the chroma or color until the gray bar at the far left and the blue bar at the far right are of equal brightness. You can also match either the gray or blue bars with their sub-bars. of equal brightness. You can also match either of them with their sub-bars. Now the four bars — gray, blue, cyan, and magenta, should be of equal intensity. The yellow, green and red should be completely black. See Figures 9.17 through 9.19 for monitor views of this procedure. Once you have set up your monitor, leave it alone until you move to another location or viewing conditions change. Unless you have a waveform and vectorscope, it’s the only instrument you have to see how accurate your video is. CAMERA WHITE BALANCE Just as we use film stocks of different color balance and camera filtration to adjust film shooting to different color conditions (daylight or tungsten), in video, the white balance function compensates for variations in the color range of the source lighting. White balance is accomplished by aiming the camera at a color neutral surface and selecting the white balance function on the camera. The internal electronics compensate for variations in color. Naturally, it is essential that the light illuminating the white card be the same as is in the scene, just as the light on a gray reference card in film must be the same as is on the scene. This means just the lighting, not any use of color gels for effect. If you are lighting the scene with tungsten lights and plan to use green gels on the lights, you will use a pure tungsten light for the color balance. If you color balance with the green gels on the lights, the camera will remove the green. Some people use a piece of white paper as a neutral reference, but this is not reliable. “White” paper can vary widely in color. More reliable is a standardized photo gray card or a white card made specially for this process. Using a white wall or a piece of paper to white balance should be for emergencies only — it is approximate at best. If you are using filters on the camera to alter the color, this must be removed for white balance or their effect will be erased by the white balance. The white balance can also be used to fool the camera. For example, if you want the overall color balance to be warm in tone, you can put a cooling filter (blue) over the lens while doing color balance. The circuitry will compensate and when you remove the filter over the lens, the image will then be warm. Special tools are made for this purpose; the most commonly available are called warm cards. These are cards that are slightly blue in varying degrees and thus cause the camera to correct the picture to slightly warm. An example of incorrect color balance is shown in Figure 9.43. cinematography 164
• 179. Figure 9.21. (above) The Chroma du Monde test chart from DSC labs: an 11 stop gray scale surrounded by color patches of the primary and secondary colors. Figure 9.22. (left, top) The Chroma du Monde on the vectorscope in Rec 709 color space. Figure 9.23. (left, bottom) The same chart rendered in a different color space — in this case, NTSC. Analog/Digital Conversion Conversion of the video signal from analog to digital occurs in three parts; signal preparation, sampling, and quantization (digitizing). There are two types of component signals; Red, Green, and Blue (RGB), and Y, R-Y, B-Y, but it is the latter that is by far the most widely used in digital video. R-Y and B-Y, the color difference signals, carry the color information, while Y represents the luminance. Cameras, telecine, and so on, generally produce RGB signals at the sensors, but it is almost always converted to another format before output because an RGB signal is far too much information for recording. DIGITAL VIDEO ENCODING Digital video is fundamentally different from NTSC and PAL video in the way it is encoded and processed. Various types of processing equipment manage the digital video in different ways. These are classified by the way in which they encode the information. 4:2:2 This is a set of frequencies in the ratio 4:2:2, used to digitize the luminance and color difference components (Y, R-Y, B-Y) of a video signal. For every four luminance digital samples, there are two digital samples of each color difference channel. The human eye is not as sensitive to color as to luminance detail, enabling this form HD cinematography 165
• 180. of compression. RGB video is usually represented with an equal number of bits for each of the three color component channels, but RGB is not normally transmitted and bandwidth is not as big a factor when dealing with a connection between the computer and display device. The four represents 13.5 MHz, the sampling frequency of the Y channel, and the twos each 6.75 MHz for both the R-Y, B-Y channels. D-1, D-5, Digital Betacam, and most digital disk recorders use 4:2:2 digitizing. 4:1:1 This is a set of frequencies in the ratio 4:1:1, that is used to digitize the luminance and color difference components (Y, R-Y, B-Y) of a video signal. The 4 represents 13.5 MHz, the sampling frequency of the Y (luminance) channel, and the 1s each represent 3.75 MHz for the R-Y and B-Y chrominance channels. 4:2:0 This is a set of frequencies in the ratio 4:2:0, that is used to digitize the luminance and color difference components (Y, R-Y, B-Y) of a video signal. 4:2:0 is used in PAL DV and DVCam, DVDs and a few other formats. The 4 represents 13.5 MHz, the sampling frequency of the Y channel, while both the R-Y and B-Y are sampled at 6.75 MHz. In 4:2:0, 3/4 of the chrominance values have been deleted. YUV YUV is another way of indicating chroma subsampling. Y is still luminance; U and V are the chrominance channels. YUV = four Y samples, four U samples, and four V samples per unit of time. IS IT BROADCAST QUALITY? Broadcast quality is a term that frequently gets misused. It does not mean, as many people think, a “good-quality” picture or merely a certain level of resolution. Broadcast quality is actually a complex set of technical standards for the timing, synchronization, and levels of the video signal. It is something that can only be measured with sophisticated test equipment. It is largely the province of video engineers, but it is important to understand the concept, particulary as it is used to refer to cameras. DO IT IN THE CAMERA OR IN POST? One question that comes up frequently in digital shooting is, “should we fix the look in the camera or shoot it ‘straight’ and fix it in post?” Some people take a traditional purist approach and insist on doing everything in the camera. In HD, this is referred to as being “baked in,” meaning that alterations to the video signal (such as color balance, gamma, knee compression, and so on) are recorded and may be difficult to change later on. That is a fine approach, but it ignores the incredible tools that are available for image manipulation in post production. Sometimes cinematographers feel that the only way that can retain control of the image is to do everything in camera, but increasingly, it is important to be involved in the post process as well. When shooting in the RAW format, however, nothing is actually baked in and all final decisions are always still possible in postproduction. What can be altered is the LUT (Look Up Table)used for viewing; this LUT can also be used to serve as a guide in postproduction. See the chapter Image Control for more on LUTs. cinematography 166
• 181. The Decision Matrix Here’s an organized way to think about the problem: quality monitor is absolutely essential, and a waveform monitor and vectorscope are necessary if you are doing anything extreme, particularly with gamma or exposure. are going for and you’re sure it’s the approach you want to take? Especially important for any extreme look that you may later want to back off from. process and are you sure your views will be listened to? In some cases it is better to do it on the set so there are no surprises later. This ensures that your lighting and exposure (and maybe the director’s choice of shots) will fit in with the look you are creating. Otherwise, if you are seeing a “plain vanilla” image on the monitor, you are taking a risk that some things may not be lit or exposed properly for the look you plan to do later. The 50% Rule Some DPs use the 50% Rule and take any look half the way there on the set, the rest of the way in post. This is especially important if you are doing something in the camera that may cause problems later on. One example is very high color saturation. This may exceed the gamut limits and may also introduce excessive noise into the image. By going to 50% of the look, you keep your options open should you want take it back to a less radical image in post or if the more extreme look causes problems (such as noise) with the video signal. A Different Approach There is a third way that combines the best of both worlds: metadata. In cameras that shoot in the RAW format, alterations to the video signal are recorded in the metadata that accompanies each video file. This means that you have them if you want them, but are not bound by them: they are there for viewing and post-production but not baked in, which means you have great freedom to alter the look of the image later on, even years later — or you can keep it the way you decided on set. 10 Things to Remember When Shooting HD Here are some tips specific to lighting for HD and shooting with High Definition cameras: underexposure, not overexposure. 29.97 fps is usually preferred for sports. problem with full frame HD cameras as they are roughly the same DOF as 35mm film cameras. makeup, sets, and wardrobe. audio sync. There are times when you will need to shoot actual 24 or 30 fps; consult with your editor. HD cinematography 167
• 182. TIMECODE AND EDGECODE In editing, it is important to be able to identify each clip and individual frames. The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) formalized timecode as a method of giving each frame a unique address. This code is an eight-digit number, based on the 24-hour clock and the video frame rate. Timecode measures time in Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Frames. Since most tapes are one hour or less, the first segment (Hours) is often used to designate the roll number of the tape. This is important in postproduction as it prevents duplication of timecodes when using more than one tape, which is important, since all but the shortest of productions involve multiple tapes — keeping track of your footage is an important job. The values range from 00:00:00:00, to the largest number supported by this format; 23:59:59:29, or, no more than 23 hours, no minutes or seconds greater than 59, and no frames above the highest allowed by the rate being used (29 in this case for 30 frames/sec). This format represents actual clock time — the duration of scene or program material, and makes time calculations easy and direct. There are two ways to do timecode in the course of shooting. In the first method, each tape is cued up to the beginning and the timecode is set to start at all zeros, except for the hours, which designates tape number. In the second method, the timecode is left to run free, based on clock time. This gives each tape unique numbers, unless you shoot more than 24 hours, but this is generally not a problem. Video Frame Rate The frame is the smallest unit of measure within SMPTE timecode. Some timecode readers display a small blip or other symbol at the end to indicate odd or even field (on interlaced video, where there are two fields per frame), but there is no number designation for it. The frame rate is the number of times per second pictures are displayed to provide motion. There are four standard frame rates (frames/sec) that apply to SMPTE: 24, 25, 30, and 30 Drop-Frame. video, also known as SMPTE EBU (PAL/SECAM color and b&w) 30 frame Non-drop) Remember that 24 fps can either mean actual 24 frames or it can mean the variant 23.98; the same applies to 30 fps, which is discussed following. The frames figure advances one count for every frame of film or video, allowing the user to time events down to 1/24th, 1/25th, or 1/30th of a second. Unless you have an application that specifically calls out one of the above frame rates, it doesn’t matter which timecode is used as long it is consistent. Most SMPTE applications outside of broadcast video use the 30 frame non-drop rate because it matches real clock time. Drop-Frame and Non-Drop-Frame 29.97 video can be written in either drop-frame or non-drop-frame format. The difference between the two is that with drop-frame format the frame address is periodically adjusted (once every minute) so that it exactly matches real time (at the 10-minute mark), while with non-drop-frame format the frame address is never adjusted and gets progressively further away from real time. See the following section for an explanation of drop-frame numbering. cinematography 168
• 183. Figure 9.24. (top) The timecode panel on a Sony F900. Figure 9.25. (bottom) Most cameras offer the choice of free run timecode (F-Run), where timecode runs continuously even when the camera is not running, or record run (R-Run) where the timecode advances only when the camera is recording. On this camera, in between the two is the Set function, which is used to set the timecode. For identification of tapes, the hour (first two digits of the timecode) is set to correspond to the number of the tape. 29.97 Video Before the introduction of color, video ran at a true 30 frames per second (fps). When the color portion of the signal was added, video engineers were forced to slow the rate down to 29.97 fps. The reason for this is to prevent interference with the color subcarrier, which is the part of the video signal that carries color information. This slight slowdown of video playback leads to disagreement in the measurement of video versus real time; one second is not evenly divisible by 29.97. A frame rate of 29.97 fps is 99.9% as fast as 30 fps. It is 0.1% (or one-thousandth) slower: 29.97 fps / 30 fps = .999 (or 99.9%). This means that a frame rate of 30 fps is 0.1% (or onethousandth) faster than 29.97: 30 fps / 29.97 fps = 1.001 (or 100.1%). If it were running at precisely 30 fps, one hour of video would contain exactly 108,000 frames. 30 frames x 3600 seconds = 108,000 frames total. However, since video does not actually run at 30 fps, playing back 108,000 frames of video will take longer than one hour to play because: (108,000 frames) / (29.97 frames/sec) = 3,603.6 seconds = 1 hour and 3.6 seconds. In timecode this is written as 01:00:03:18. All of this means that after an hour, the playback is 108 frames too long. Once again, we see the relationship of 108 frames out of 108,000, or 1/1000th. Sixty seconds of 30 fps video contains 1800 frames. One-thousandth of that is 1.8. Therefore, by the end HD cinematography 169
• 184. of one minute you are off by 1.8 frames. You cannot adjust by 1.8 frames per minute, because you cannot adjust by a fraction of a frame, but you can adjust by 18 full frames per 10 minutes. Two frames in 2000 accumulates 18 frames in 18,000, and there are 18,000 frames in 10 minutes. Figure 9.26. A timecode slate (smart slate) in use on a film set. As shown here, it can be set up to display the date for a couple of frames after slating. How Drop Frame Solves the Problem Because 10 minutes is not evenly divisible by 18 frames, we use drop-frame timecode and drop two frame numbers every minute; by the ninth minute, you have dropped all 18 frame numbers. No frames need to be dropped the tenth minute because actual frames and timecode frames are once again in agreement. Thus the formula for the correcting scheme is: drop frame numbers 00:00 and 00:01 at the start of every minute except the tenth. (This also translates to dropping two frame numbers every 66 2/3 seconds.) This sequence repeats after exactly ten minutes. This is a consequence of the ratios of the numbers: Two frames in 2000 accumulates 18 frames in 18,000, and there are 18,000 frames in 10 minutes (30 frames, times 60 seconds, times 10 minutes. Also, 10 minutes of NTSC video contains an exact number of frames (17,982 frames), so every tenth minute ends on an exact frame boundary. This is how drop-frame timecode manages to get exactly one hour of video to read as exactly one hour of timecode. To Drop or Not to Drop? It is not necessary to use drop-frame timecode in all instances. Dropframe is most important in applications where exact time is critical, such as broadcast television. For short pieces that are not going to be broadcast, standard timecode is acceptable; the slight mismatch will be of no consequence. In 25 Hz video (all countries that don’t use NTSC), such as in 625/50 video systems, and in 24 Hz film, there is an exact number of frames in each second. As a result, drop-frame is not necessary. There is no drop-frame in 24P High Def video which helps to simplify things. TIMECODE SLATING When slating with timecode on tape-based cameras, always pre-roll audio and timecode for at least five seconds. This is critical for syncing up the dailies in telecine. Tape-based timecode-driven equipment (which includes the telecine and audio syncing decks, as well as playback and edit decks) takes at least five seconds to come up to speed and lock. Not having good pre-roll can definitely cause problems. Pre-roll is handled by the sound recordist. Where in the old days, the AD would call “roll sound” and the mixer would only call “speed” when the old tape decks finally lumbered up to the correct speed, the mixer now waits the appropriate time for pre-roll to lay down before calling “speed.” This is not necessary with cameras that record to a hard drive or flash memory (file-based cameras). In telecine there is an offset that occurs. Sometimes the smart slate numbers and the sound don’t line up. This must be dealt with at some point down the line. There is a valuable additional feature with the Denecke timecode slate. As the clap stick is help open, the timecode rolls freely so that it can be checked. On some slates when the clapper is brought down, the timecode freezes momentarily, which makes it easier for the editor to read it without searching for the exact frame that matches the clap; after that, the date appears momentarily. cinematography 170
• 185. TAPELESS PRODUCTION One advantage (in some cases a disadvantage) of digital cinematography is that there are many options for the actual recording, transport, postproduction and archiving. All the options can be a bit confusing sometimes and almost always require some research and testing. It is important to test your workflow at the beginning of the project. The results of your tests may affect what camera you choose, how you archive the data, and so on. It is now clear that the future is tapeless cameras, which record directly to digital media such as hard drives, Panasonic’s P2 cards, even directly to laptop computer. Tapeless cameras shoot as file-based, which means that each individual shot is a separate computer file that can be randomly accessed. These files are like any computer file: they can be quickly copied, transferred, or backed up. Metadata Metadata means “data about data.” Digital files from tapeless cameras can have identifying information attached to them, which makes them more useful and vastly easier to keep track of, sort, and classify. They contain metadata that can be searched just as one would search for a specific file on a computer. Metadata can contain a myriad of information: timecode, date and time, length of shot, which camera and lens was used, and in some cases (with GPS) even where the shot was taken. As discussed elsewhere, metadata is an important part of shooting and working with RAW video files. With film and tape cameras, it is often the custom to bump a slate: shoot the slate as a separate shot. Don’t do this with a tapeless camera, because you will just end up with a disconnected shot that may have no relation to the scene it is slating. Some of the characteristics of tapeless/file-based workflow are: sive dedicated tape decks, and so on. - Tapeless Workflows Tapeless, file-based workflow is substantially different from working off recorded tape. The advantages are numerous, but there are some pitfalls you need to steer clear of, one being loss of data. There are many ways to approach tapeless workflow, and each editor generally fine tunes the method to suit their equipment, work style, and type of job. With tape, it is rare to lose the footage or have it be unplayable (although it can happen); in a tapeless workflow, every individual shot is a separate computer file recorded at high speed onto a hard drive or flash memory. It is easy for data to become corrupted or be lost in a hard drive failure, or to simply have the unit lost, damaged or, destroyed. It is also easy to misplace or erase video files. Hard drives are highly unreliable as a form of video storage; always be sure to back up to at least two hard drives — three is better. To guard against these catastrophic losses, many productions employ a data wrangler, whose only job is to download the footage from the camera, put it in the right location, and above all — back it up! The data wrangler replaces and does mostly the same job as a loader on a film shoot. HD cinematography 171
• 186. Some important things to remember when handling video and audio data files on the set: you have a separate download capability (such as a card reader), you will need to use the camera to download files. This means the camera will be out of commission. It may take longer than you might think to download full cards. some are Firewire, HDMI, eSata, and other interfaces. entire investment in money, time, and creative effort. Things can go wrong; don’t assume that they are safe and/or all playable. Files get corrupted all the time. Hard drives crash frequently! properly labeled. eras record the “essence” (actual video files) separately from the metadata and pointer files. Don’t try to only drag the video files to a separate hard drive. have failed and those that are going to fail. panies video files. Timecode is the most obvious example, but there are many others such as date and time of recording, take length, and file size. Investigate metadata, it can be very helpful in post. type) before you shoot. Most camera files need to be converted in some way before they are editable. Some files are “native” to particular editing systems; some are not. DPX, TIFF, RAW, ProRes HQ, H.264, .r3d, MPEG, DNX, and so on. hardware you will be using, and the hard drives you will be using. Test the entire workflow of your project, all the way through to delivery. deliverables — the video and audio standards required by the person or organization you will be sending the finished product to. DIGITAL FILE TYPES Container Files: Quicktime and MXF Quicktime is a wrapper or framework format. It functions as a container for many different types of video and audio in a variety of codecs. These video types are referred to as essence files. MXF is also a container format; it is an acronym for Material Exchange Format. It is a wrapper file format designed for interchange of material between systems and across platforms. It records the actual video, audio, or data as “essence” accompanied by metadata. Wrapper files come in many forms, so just saying that “it’s a Quicktime file” doesn’t tell you the whole story. cinematography 172
• 187. Cineon and DPX Files Originally created for scanned images, the pixel data in Cineon files (.cin) correlates directly to the image as it would appear on projection print film. It was originally designed to function as part of a postproduction workflow. DPX (Digital Picture Exchange) is a file type used for digital intermediate (DI) and was originally derived from the Cineon format. Like Cineon files it is designed to closely reproduce the density of each channel from the scanned original negative. DPX was designed to transport images on a file-per-frame basis. It includes many builtin information fields, organized into functionally separated headers. This structure allows a wide variety of different image types to be carried while providing support for rapid, efficient reading and processing of a received file. COMPRESSION AND CODECS As previously discussed, the term codec stands for compressor-decompressor or coder-decoder. As with HD cameras, editing systems and other hardware, they are always in flux as new technologies, hardware and software improve their performance. It is generally possible to convert any particular codec into another one (transcoding) but there is almost always some loss of quality in the process. Intra-frame versus Interframe Compression The term intra-frame coding refers to the fact that the various lossless and lossy compression techniques are performed only within the current frame, and not relative to any other frame in the video sequence. In other words, no temporal processing is performed outside of the current picture or frame. Inter-frame compression works with blocks of frames, known as a GOP or Group of Pictures. It works by comparing the similarities and differences between the images within the GOP. Within the group there are I, B, and P frames. I frames are basically the reference and don’t need additional information to be decoded. P frames are predicted based on information from other frames. B frames are bi-directionally predicted from other frames. Wavelet Compression Wavelet compression can be either lossy or lossless. It is a mathematically based compression that is well suited to reducing large video files to a very compact size. It is used in JPEG 2000 and Redcode among other implementations. Bit Depth Digital video defines each pixels brightness and color as a computer word comprised of bits (zeros and ones). In the simplest example, a pure black-and-white image (with no gray at all) would only need a zero (black) or a one (white) to represent every pixel in the image. In a color image, every pixel is formed through a combination of the three primary colors: red, green, and blue. Each primary color is often referred to as a color channel. The bit depth for each primary color is termed the bits per channel. The greater the number of bits per channel, the more subtle the range of colors. For example, a system that records 8 bits per channel can use a total of eight 0’s and 1’s for each pixel. This allows for 28 or 256 different combinations — 256 different intensity values for each primary color. When all three primary colors are combined at each pixel, this allows for as many as 28x3 or 16,777,216 different colors. HD cinematography 173
• 188. Figure 9.27. (left) A gradient grayscale with normal gamma (contrast). Figure 9.28. (center) The same gray scale with low gamma (low contrast). Nothing reaches true white and the shape of the curve changes drastically. Figure 9.29. (right) Increased gamma (high contrast). This results in a much steeper curve. Notice how the white areas clip and the dark areas are crushed down to zero. In 8-bit video, these values range from 0 to 255. In 10-bit video, these values range from 0 to 1023. In both cases, 0 represents the absence of something, either white or a color, while either 255 or 1023 represents the maximum amount of a color. An 8-bit grayscale is essentially sufficient to smoothly represent all the shades of gray our eye can perceive but 8-bit color shows banding — clear divisions between different shades of color. To avoid banding, color needs to be stored in 10-bit files. This provides smaller differences between color values, which prevents banding, but results in much larger files; however, keep in mind that 10-bit video has four times as much color information as 8-bit. Some systems employ 12-bit, 14-bit, and even 16-bit imaging. MPEG An acronym for Motion Picture Experts Group, which developed the standard, MPEG is by far the most widely used codec in various types of video. There are several variations of the MPEG standard currently in use. MPEG-1 was used primarily for compact discs. It is not high enough quality for DVD. MPEG-2 was chosen as the compression method for digital TV and DVD video. MPEG-4 AVC is a more efficient method of coding video. H.264 is also known as MPEG-4 Part 10. It is also widely used for DSLRs (digital single lens reflex cameras) — still photo cameras, many of which have the capability to record good 1080P HD video. Because it delivers good quality video at very low bit rates, it is also widely used as the codec for video on the Internet. AVC-Intra/MPEG-4/H.264 AVC-Intra was developed by Panasonic and is compliant with MPEG-4/H.264 standards. It is now used in some cameras made by other companies. It is 10-bit intra-frame compression. It is an intra-frame codec, meaning that the compression happens within each frame as opposed to interframe compression schemes where the compression of each frame may depend on other frames with the GOP (group of pictures). MPEG-4 is also the compression scheme chosen for Blu-Ray high definition video discs. For recording camera video, H.264 is used in some cameras because of its ability to compress large amounts of cinematography 174
• 189. Figure 9.30. (top) A gradient grayscale on the waveform monitor and black gamma (left-hand part of the curve representing the shadow areas) at normal. Figure 9.31. (center) Black gamma at minus 99 at 35%. This means that the dark areas that are at 35% brightness and below are made darker. On the camera in this illustration, black gamma is selectable from 0 to minus 99 and at 50% (everything from middle gray down), 35%, 25%, and 15%. Figure 9.32. (bottom) Black gamma at minus 50 at 15%; only the very darkest areas of the frame are affected. data reasonably well; however there is definitely a price to be paid in picture quality, as is true of all heavy compression schemes. Another problem is that it can be difficult for editing systems to deal with H.264. For this reason, the footage is usually transcoded to another codec before being ingested into the non-linear editing application. Plug-ins for various editing applications are usually available from the camera manufacturers, as is free-standing conversion software for most codecs. HD cinematography 175
• 190. Figure 9.33. (top) In this frame the knee (brightest part of the grayscale at far right on the curve) is clipped: the curve flatlines at 108%. Figure 9.34. (bottom) The same grayscale, and same exposure, but knee control is dialed down. This keeps the brightest parts of the shot from clipping with changing the rest of the picture. Clipping Other Codecs TIFF is Tagged Image File Format. It can be a container for either lossy or lossless image data. Some post processes deal with the video files as a series of TIFF images that can be very large but also very high quality. JPEG (Joint Photography Experts Group) is another file type usually associated with still cameras and computer graphics but also used in video. JPEG is a lossy format but can reputedly achieve compression ratios of as high as 10:1 without noticeable loss of visual quality but if overused can result in very poor picture quality. Motion JPEG renders the video as a series of lossy JPEG images. Each frame is compressed separately (intra-frame) and is thus not as efficient as inter-frame codecs, however, it imposes less of a load on the processing power of the computer. With inter-frame codecs, the computer needs to constantly refer to other frames as it displays each individual frames. JPEG2000 is a more complex and computationally intense codec that is wavelet based. OpenEXR is a high dynamic range (HDR) file format. High dynamic range means that it can handle images with greater latitude/brightness ration/dynamic range (see the chapter on Exposure for a discussion of latitude and dynamic range). It supports 16 bits per channel and has an extraordinary dynamic range of 30 stops. It can be used as either a lossy or lossless codec. cinematography 176
• 191. Figure 9.35. (top) Shot on the camera, this curve shows the gamma at normal, which is .45 on this camera. Figure 9.36. (bottom) With the camera set at a high gamma, the picture becomes very contrasty, which we can see represented as a much steeper curve. THE CURVE The video signal is largely the same as film’s response to light and the curve as seen on a waveform monitor is the same as the Hurter and Driffield or D log E curve that is discussed in the chapter Exposure. Different terminology is used for video: in film densitometry, the highlights are called the shoulder, and the dark areas are called the toe. In video the brightest areas are called the knee, and the darkest areas of the frame are simply called the shadow areas. In the illustrations in this chapter, a gray gradient from black on the left to pure white on the right was shot with an HD camera and the waveform monitor was photographed. This gives a more readable representation of how the various controls of knee, gamma and black gamma change the image. These controls apply to all types of video except RAW, which records the image without any alterations; however, it is critiHD cinematography 177
• 192. Figure 9.37. (top) The external switches on a typical HD camera. The second switch is H, M, L, which means high, medium, or low gain. In the operations menus, you can select what values each one represents. Many operators choose minus 3dB, 0dB and plus 3dB gain for the high, medium and low values. The third switch (Output) can select colors bars as the output (bottom position) or set the camera for normal operation (middle position) or top position for automatic knee control (DCC or Dynamic Contrast Control). The last switch can select preset, which means that the camera cannot be white balanced; instead, the color balance is controlled only by the built-in color filters (see Figures 9.38). All the way on the left is a switch that actuates auto black balance (sets the black level to zero IRE) and auto white balance, which adjusts the color balance when the camera is aimed at a neutral white or neutral gray target. Figure 9.38. (middle) On the left are two wheels that control neutral density (the numbers) and color filters (letters). Sony provides a chart that shows what each setting of the wheels does. Other cameras use different schemes for these controls. Figure 9.39. (bottom) A typical top menu on an HD camera, it provides access to the various submenus. The two most frequently used are Operation and Paint. The Operation menu only controls how you use the camera (setting values of the gain switch, for example). The Paint menu is where you control the look of the picture. Other cameras will have different menu structures and terminology, but the basic controls of the look are the same. cal for a cinematographer to understand how these controls affect the image even if they are shooting with a RAW camera. The curves for film and video are important sources of information and it is important to understand what they mean and what they can tell you about each film stock or video camera setup. In addition to viewing the curves to show what different controls have done to the image, most color correction software also includes curves that you can alter directly — Photoshop has curves as well. By altering them directly, we mean that you can push or pull on various parts of the curve to alter the slope in different parts of the image. Recall that changing the slope affects the gamma (contrast) for that region of the curve. These curves can be used to alter the overall luma (brightness) or color balance of individual regions of the image. cinematography 178
• 193. CONTROLLING THE HD IMAGE Certain basic controls are available on nearly all HD cameras and in post; these are the primary tools used to create a “look.” In some HD cameras these can be controlled in the camera and are baked in to the recorded image. They become a permanent alteration to the video signal and can be difficult or impossible to alter later. In any case, cinematographers will always want to have some control over their images, whether on the set or in postproduction. In cameras that shoot RAW, changing these parameters on the camera doesn’t actually alter the image, they only alter how the image appears on the monitor. As will be discussed in the chapter Image Control, LUTs are used to control the monitor display. The available image controls on most cameras include: Figure 9.40. (top) A test shot with the RED camera at ISO 200. Figure 9.41. (bottom) A test shot at ISO 2000. Although the results are surprisingly good, there is noticeable noise. With these basic controls it is possible to “create your own filmstock” and change an image in an amazing variety of ways. HD cinematography 179
• 194. Gain/ISO On some HD cameras, the control of sensitivity to light is called gain. Gain is measure in decibels (dB). Increasing the gain is electronic amplification. The trade-off is electronic noise. On some HD cameras, sensitivity is rated in ISO. Figure 9.40 shows frames from an HD camera rated at ISO 200 and Figure 9.41 is ISO 2000. The results are quite good, but there is always a price to pay for increased ISO or gain — more noise. Many cinematographers set cameras at minus 3dB to reduce noise, but others disagree with this practice. Gamma Gamma is contrast or, more precisely, the slope of the curve (specifically the middle part of the curve). Overall contrast is one of the most basic components of a visual image, and many DPs make this the first adjustment they make. A typical normal gamma is .45; raising this number makes the image more contrasty and lowering it makes the image less contrasty ( Figures 9.33 and 9.34). Black Gamma/Black Stretch Black gamma is the contrast of the shadow regions. It is an extremely Figure 9.42. (top) Correct color bal- useful tool in shaping the image. On most cameras, you can choose ance is achieved by either balancing how much of the shadow region you want to affect, either only the to a white card or gray card. very darkest shadows or all the way up to from middle gray down to Figure 9.43. (bottom) Incorrect color balance happens when you pure black. Black stretch is reducing the contrast of the shadows, thus either don’t white balance or use the reducing the overall contrast of the image and allowing the camera wrong filter (some HD cameras have to see into the shadows a bit more (Figures 9.30 through 9.32). built-in filters for tungsten or daylight balance; some do it electronically). In this case, the tungsten balance filter on the camera was used in daylight, resulting in a blue cast on the entire image. Knee The knee is brightest parts of the scene — the highlights. Even with slight overexposure of the highlights, video will usually clip. Film has a much better ability to roll off the highlights more gradually. For this reason control of the knee is critical. Knee controls are generally in two parts: point and slope. Point is a measure of where on the curve this parameter starts to take effect. Slope is the relative gamma of the knee regions. See Figures 9.33 and 9.34 for a more visual example of the knee. Many cameras also have automatic knee control. Color Saturation Chroma (color) saturation is simply how much color you have — how much saturation there is. Zero saturation is a black-and-white image. Oversaturation means that the image is recorded with more chroma than was present in the actual scene. Matrix No, you don’t have to decide between the red pill or the blue pill. The matrix allows fine-tuning control of color. The matrix includes color space; there are several HD color spaces defined by SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers). See the chapter on Color for an explaination of color space. See Figures 9.22 and 9.23 for examples. Color Balance Some people think of color balance (often called white balance) as simply adjusting the camera to daylight or tungsten balance. In fact, altering the color balance is one of the easiest and most accessible image controls. In Figures 9.42 and 9.43, the image manipulation is as simple as it can get: this camera has built-in color balance filters for daylight and tungsten; here the camera is set on the “wrong” color filter. Using warm cards and gels to adjust the color balance was discussed earlier in this chapter. cinematography 180
• 195. exposure © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 10.1016/B978-0-240-81209-0.50010-5
• 196. EXPOSURE: THE EASY WAY Frankly, exposure can get pretty technical, so it’s important to grasp the basic concepts first before we plunge into the world of H&D curves, the Zone System, and the mathematics of densitometry. Let’s take a look at exposure the easy way. This introduction is a bit simplified, but it will provide a working understanding of exposure that is useful without being too technical. First of all, there is one notion that has to be put away right now. Some people think of exposure as nothing more than “it’s too dark” or “it’s too light.” There are many more crucial aspects to exposure that are important to understand. What Do We Want Exposure to Do for Us? What is it we want from exposure? More precisely, what is “good” exposure and what is “bad” exposure. Let’s take a typical scene, an average one. It will have something in the frame that is very dark, almost completely black. It will also have something that is almost completely white, maybe a white lace tablecloth with sun falling on it. In between, it will have the whole range of dark to light values — the middle grays, some very dark grays, some very light grays and, some right in the middle — halfway between black and white. When we shoot this scene, we want it to be reproduced on film or video exactly as it appeared in real life — with the black areas being reproduced as black in the finished product, the white areas reproduced as white, and the middle grays reproduced as middle grays. Now of course, there will be times when you want to deliberately under or overexpose for artistic purposes, and that is fine. In this discussion we are only talking about theoretically ideal exposure, but that is what we are trying to do in the vast majority of cases anyway. So how do we do that? How do we get the film or video to exactly reproduce the scene in front of it? Let’s look at the factors involved. The Bucket Let’s talk about the recording medium itself. In film shooting it is the raw film stock; in video it is the sensor chip, which takes the light that falls on it and converts it to electronic signals. For our purposes here, they are both the same: exposure principles apply equally to both film and video, with only a few differences. They both do the same job: recording and storing an image that is formed by patterns of light and shadow that are focused on them by the lens. For convenience here, we’ll refer to it as film but, it’s the same either way. Think of film as a bucket that needs to be filled with water. It can hold exactly a certain amount of water, no more, no less. If you don’t put in enough water, it’s not filled up (underexposure). Too much and water it slops over the sides and creates a mess (overexposure). What we want to do is give that bucket the exact right amount of water, not too much, not too little — that is ideal exposure. So how do we control how much light reaches the film? Figure 10.1. (previous page) The basics of exposure: a source and a light meter. (Photo by author.) cinematography 182 Controlling Exposure We have several ways of regulating how much light reaches the film. The first is the iris or aperture, which is nothing more than a light control valve inside the lens. Obviously, when the iris is closed down to a smaller opening (Figure 10.2), it lets less light through than when it is opened up to a larger opening (Figure 10.3). How open or closed the iris is set for is measured in f/stops (we’ll talk about that in more detail later). Remember, the film or sensor wants only so much light, no more no less. If our scene in reality is in the bright sun, we can
• 197. close down the iris to a small opening to let less of that light through. If our scene is dark, we can open up the iris to a wider opening to let in all the light we can get — but sometimes this will not be enough. There are other things that control how much light reaches the image plane (the surface of the film or video sensor). One of these is shutter speed, which is a measure of how long the light reaches the film during each frame. Most of the time when we are shooting at 24 frames-per-second (FPS), then our shutter speed is 1/48th of a second. In each frame, the light is falling on the film or sensor for 1/48th of a second. If we have way too much light for the iris to help us with, then if we expose each frame for a much shorter time, then there will be less exposure in every frame — problem solved. Figure 10.2. (left) The aperture (iris) closed down. Figure 10.3. (right) The iris wide open; the lowest f/stop the lens is capable of. Lenses are described in two ways: the focal length and the maximum f/stop. For example, this is an f/2 50mm lens. Change the Bucket There is another, more basic way to change the exposure: use a different bucket. Every type of film has a certain sensitivity to light; the same is true of every video sensor. This means that some are more sensitive to light and some are less sensitive. It is rated in ASA or ISO, which generally ranges from about ISO 50 (low sensitivity) to ISO 500 (high sensitivity). A film with a low sensitivity needs lots of light to make a good image. Typically films that are ISO 50 or thereabouts are only good for outdoor shooting, where the sun provides tons of light. High ISO films (such as ISO 500) will give you a good image even with very little light, as do HD cameras with higher ISOs. A high-speed film is like using a smaller bucket — you don’t need as much to fill it up. A low-speed film is like a larger bucket — it takes more to fill it up, but on the other hand we have more water. In the case of film and video images this means that we have more picture information, which in the end results in a better image. The Four Elements of Exposure So we have four elements to contend with in exposure: reaches the film or sensor. but it involves a penalty: faster films tend to be grainier and have less resolution than low-speed films. This applies to digital cameras as well — using a higher ISO will result in more image noise. exposure 183
• 198. Figure 10.4. (top, left) An overexposed image. Notice how the highlights are burned out — they have no detail. Figure 10.5. (below, left): The same image “fixed” — it’s better, but the highlights are still burned out. There is no process that can bring back burned-out highlights; that information is lost forever. Figure 10.6. (top, right) An underexposed image. Figure 10.7. (below, right) The underexposed image “fixed,” almost back to normal but very grainy and flat. We’ll Fix It in Post One thing you will hear sometimes, especially on a set is “don’t worry, we’ll fix it in post.” There is nothing wrong with making an image better in postproduction: there are many incredible tools you can use to improve the look of your footage. What you don’t want to do is take the attitude that you can be sloppy and careless on the set because “everything can be fixed in post.” It’s simply not true. When it comes to exposure, fixing it in post generally means scrambling to come up with an image that is merely acceptable. Improving or fine-tuning an image in post is a part of the process. It always has been, but now with all the great digital tools we have available (including things we can do in post-production on film projects), we have even wider latitude to adjust the image. However, this is not to be confused with “fixing” a mistake, which almost never results in a better image. Whether we shoot film or video, we always make some adjustments in the post-production process, slight changes in color and exposure. Mostly this is done to ensure consistency within a scene and consistency across the whole project. The key to this is that they are slight adjustments. If you start trying to repair problems caused by mistakes made during shooting, there are almost always negative consequences. Here are some examples: Figure 10.4 is a badly overexposed image and Figure 10.6 is a badly underexposed image. Once you “fix” the overexposed frame, some parts of it (the middle tones and shadows) are OK, but what is still not good are the highlights — they are still blown out, they have no detail, no tone, no color. Fixing the underexposed frame is different: the highlights are OK, but in the shadows there is a huge amount of video noise. This one was fixed digitally; on film the result would be similar, except in film it is increased film grain. In the “fixed” underexposed frame, it’s flat and dull and low in contrast and the color is flat. cinematography 184
• 199. The Bottom Line Here’s the key point: exposure is about much more than just it’s “too dark” or “too light,” Exposure affects many things: it’s also about whether or not a image will be noisy or grainy, it’s about the overall contrast of the image, and it’s about whether or not we will see detail and subtleties in the shadows and in the highlights. It’s also about color saturation and contrast — the colors in the scene will only be full and rich and reproduced accurately when the exposure is correct. Overexposure and underexposure will severely desaturate the color of the scene; this is particularly important in greenscreen and bluescreen (see the chapter Technical Issues). In these situations, we want the background to be as green (or blue) as possible, in order to get a good matte. This is the main reason we have to be so careful about exposure when shooting greenscreen or bluescreen. As explained in Technical Issues, checking exposure of the background is critical when shooting any form of chroma key, the generic name for greenscreen and bluescreen composite matte shooting. The bottom line is this: you will get the best image possible only when your exposure is correct. This is true of still photos on film, motion picture film, digital photography, Standard Def (SD) video, (including DV) and all forms of High Def (HD). How Film and Video Are Different There is one crucial way in which film and High Def video are different. With HD, it is absolutely critical that you not overexpose the image. This is not as critical with film. Film stock is fairly tolerant of overexposure and doesn’t do as well with underexposure; HD on the other hand is very good with underexposure, but remember, you will always get a better picture with exposure that is right on the money: this is the crucial thing to remember about exposure. We should note however, that what we said about film applies only to negative film (which is what we almost always shoot on commercials, music videos, feature films, and short films). There is another type of film called reversal film (also known as transparency or positive film). This is just like slides or transparencies in still film: the same film that ran through the camera comes back from the lab with correct colors, not reversed like negative film. Reversal film reacts the same way as HD video: overexposing it is disastrous, but it’s pretty good with underexposure. Two Types of Exposure There are really two ways to think about exposure: overall exposure and balance within the frame. So far we’ve been talking about overall exposure of the entire frame; this is what you can control with the iris and shutter speed (and some other tools and methods we’ll talk about later, such as neutral density filters). You also have to think about balance of exposure within the frame. If you have a scene that has something very bright in the frame and also something that is very dark in the frame, you may be able to expose the whole frame properly for one or the other of them, but not both. This is not something you can fix with the iris, aperture, changing ASA/ISO, or anything else with the camera or lens. This is a problem that can only be fixed with lighting and grip equipment; in other words, you have to change the scene. In the next section, we’ll move on to a more technical and in-depth discussion of exposure and densitometry (the science of measuring exposure): it’s exposure the hard way. I won’t kid you, it gets a little complicated, but bear with it, this is important material to know. exposure 185
• 200. LIGHT AS ENERGY Human eyes are sensitive to a small portion of that spectrum that includes the visible colors from the longest visible wavelengths of light (red) to the shortest wavelengths (blue). or in lux (in metric countries). A foot-candle (fc) equals about 10.08 lux (or, for a rough conversion, multiply foot-candles by 10 to get lux). A foot-candle is the light from a standard candle at a distance of one foot. One lux is the illumination produced by one standard candle at a distance of 1 meter. When a film is exposed for 1 second to a standard candle 1 meter distance, it receives 1 lux of exposure. What’s a standard candle? It’s like the standard horse in horsepower, it just is. To provide some points of reference: (32,000 to 100,000 lux ) The f/stop is covered in more detail in the chapter on Optics, but for our discussion here it is important to know how it fits into the exposure system. F/stop and lighting calculations apply equally to both film and all forms of video, as does most of the information in this chapter. Figure 10.8. The aperture or iris at various f/stops. F/STOPS Most lenses have a means of controlling the amount of light they pass through to the film or video sensor; this is called the aperture or iris. The f/stop is the mathematical relationship of overall size of the lens to the size of the aperture. Stop is a short term for f/stop. A stop is a unit of light measurement. An increase in the amount of light by one stop means there is twice as much light. A decrease of one stop means there is half as much light. The f/stop is the ratio of the focal length of a lens to the diameter of the entrance pupil, as shown in Figure 10.8. This works out to each f/stop being greater than the previous by the square root of 2. F/stop is derived from the simple formula: f = F/D f/stop = focal length/diameter of lens opening If the brightest point in the scene has 128 times more luminance than the darkest point (seven stops), then we say it has a seven stop scene brightness ratio. EXPOSURE, ISO, AND LIGHTING RELATIONSHIPS The units we deal with in exposure are: It turns out that all of these can be arranged in analogous ways. They all follow the same basic mathematical pattern. Remember that f/stop numbers are fractions: the relationship of the aperture diameter to the focal length of the lens. For example, f/8 really means 1/8; the diameter is 1/8 the focal length. F/11 is 1/11, which is obviously a smaller fraction than 1/8. Each time we open the aperture cinematography 186
• 201. one whole f/stop, we double the quantity of light reaching the film; each time we close it one stop, we halve the light reaching the film. The relative f/stop scale (Table 10.1) is tiered to show that the same relationships that apply to whole f/numbers, such as f/8 and f/11, apply to intervals between them. So the difference between f/9 and f/13 is one whole stop, and so on. Modern digital meters measure in 1/10ths of a stop. This is helpful for calculations and comparisons, but for most practical purposes, this level of accuracy is not necessary. One-third of a stop is the practical limit of precision, given the vagaries of optics, lab chemistry, sensor sensitivity, and telecine transfer. This is not to say that accurate exposure is not important, only that the degree of precision in the overall process has limits. Inverse Square Law and Cosine Law As light emanates from a source, it does not drop off in intensity at a linear rate. For example, if the lamp is 11 feet from the | http://www.slideshare.net/DirMoe/cinematography-theory-and-practice-2nd-edition-brough-to-you-by-mohamed-roshdy-the-egyptian-filmmaker | robots: classic
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Ley de reciprocidad - CasanovaFotoBlog. Hoy vamos a explicar un concepto que tiene un nombre muy pedante pero que en realidad es bastante sencillo, la ley de la reciprocidad.
Ley de reciprocidad - CasanovaFotoBlog
En el vídeo os lo explicamos gráficamente, tomando como ejemplo una jarra de agua y un vaso. Os lo contamos aquí también, para complementar la explicación. Guía Detallada: Cómo Calibrar tu Monitor Para La Fotografía. Desde que llegó la era digital al ámbito de la fotografía, el monitor del ordenador se ha vuelto una de las piezas fundamentales a la hora de procesar nuestro trabajo fotográfico.
Guía Detallada: Cómo Calibrar tu Monitor Para La Fotografía
Ya sea para visualizar, editar y hasta compartir nuestras fotografías, el paso por un ordenador es casi obligatorio. Distancia focal de brida. No confundir con distancia focal.
Distancia focal de brida
Diagrama ilustrando la distancia focal de brida en una cámara SLR y en una no SLR. Lista de tipos de montura según su distancia focal de brida[editar] History of photographic lens design. Cutaway drawing of an early photographic lens design, the Petzval Portrait The invention of the camera in the early 19th century has led to a large array of lens designs intended for photography.
History of photographic lens design
Monitor/EVF Holder. Untitled. History of photographic lens design. Spherical aberration. Not to be confused with barrel distortion, in which the image appears to be warped onto a sphere.
Spherical aberration
The bottom example depicts a real lens with spherical surfaces, which produces spherical aberration: The different rays do not meet after the lens in one focal point. The further the rays are from the optical axis, the closer to the lens they intersect the optical axis (positive spherical aberration). (Drawing is exaggerated.) What is the Aspect Ratio? (4:3, 16:9, 21:9) A TV's (and every other image's) aspect ratio is the proportion between the width and the height of a picture.
It is often expressed in the W:H format, where W is the width and H the height. For example, a 16:9 aspect ratio means that for a width of 16 units, the height must be 9 units. The most common aspect ratios in the video industry. Most televisions and computer monitors currently available have an aspect ratio of 16:9, which offers a perfect fit for high definition television shows. However, movies are usually filmed with a ratio of 21:9, which will result in black bars at the top and bottom of the picture when it is displayed on the average TV.
In theaters, this is why the screen widens at the beginning of a movie. Everything You Wanted To Know About Rolling Shutter. Rolling Shutter is the way that most DSLR are shooting video.
Everything You Wanted To Know About Rolling Shutter
(and point and shoots and iPhones too). For 95% of the time it does not really matter what type of shutter is used for capturing video, in the other 5% it matters a lot. Following is a break down and explanation of what is Rolling Shutter why it is being used and what are its quarks. Rolling Shutter vs. Total Shutter. La temperatura de color: cómo conseguir el ambiente ideal con lámparas LED.
Temperatura de color. A Tedious Explanation of the f/stop. By Matthew Cole Photographers set their exposure using a combination of shutter speeds and f/stops to get the correct amount of light on the sensor (or film).
A Tedious Explanation of the f/stop
The shutter speed regulates how long the sensor is exposed to light coming through the lens. The f/stop regulates how much light is allowed through the lens by varying the size of the hole the light comes through. For any given film speed (ISO) and lighting combination there is one correct amount of light to properly expose the image. Photography and Math. Photography and Math Copyright 2004, 2010, Mark D.
Photography and Math
Martin, All rights reserved [This article was originally a study guide written for 7th and 8th grade math students for a mini unit on photography and math. It incorporates many concepts taught in middle school math including some basic algebra, fractions, decimals, ratios, sequences, area of a circle, metric measurement, and measuring angles. Students had been taught all of these concepts before the unit. This unit helped them apply that knowledge to a real world setting. I. Everything You Wanted To Know About Rolling Shutter. Confused About Codecs? This Video Tutorial Will Teach You What You Need to Know.
Codecs are complicated.
They're also an extremely important aspect of image quality, so having a basic understanding of how they work can be beneficial. Unfortunately, for young and old filmmakers alike, trying to unravel and decipher some of the engineering concepts behind how video encoding actually works can be a bit like trying to paint a barn with a toothbrush. Complex questions abound. Director de fotografía. 70 mm film. Faded vintage 70 mm positive film with 4 magnetic strips containing 6-channel stereo sound History[edit] Films formatted with a width of 70 mm have existed since the early days of the motion picture industry. The first 70 mm format film was most likely footage of the Henley Regatta, which was projected in 1896 and 1897, but may have been filmed as early as 1894. Everything You Wanted To Know About Rolling Shutter.
COLORES ADITIVOS Y SUSTRACTIVOS. Los colores se dividen en dos grandes ramas, los colores aditivos y los colores sustractivos. El color aditivo es un fenómeno en el que al adicionar mas colores se obtiene más luz, más luminosidad. Usualmente al color aditivo se le suele llamarcolor luz, los soportes en los que los colores aditivos se producen son en sí muy contemporáneos.
(La pantalla del computador, la pantalla del televisor, etc.) Los tonos primarios del color aditivo son: Azul, verde, rojo. Desde ellos se obtienen todos los colores de la naturaleza, también les son llamados RGB. Patrón de Moiré. En óptica, un patrón de Moiré (pronunciado /muaré/ [mwa.ˈʀe]) es un patrón de interferencia que se forma cuando se superponen dos rejillas de líneas con un cierto ángulo, o cuando tales rejillas tienen tamaños ligeramente diferentes. Un patrón de Moiré, formado por dos conjuntos de líneas paralelas, un conjunto inclinado en un ángulo de 5 grados respecto al otro. No Film School. Technical Articles. Lenguajes Metz. B) Thefrugalfilmmaker. Make a PVC Table Dolly for Under $20. Fig rig. $15 DIY DSLR Steadicam "The Silver Flyer" Stabilizer. SLR Lenses. Sitio Web Oficial de GoPro: la cámara más versátil del mundo. 6 Incredibly Awesome Uses Of Camera Rigs.
It’s hard to get excited about something as technical as that thing that makes cameras not fall down on film sets, especially these days, when you can make a successful film without even going through the effort of picking up a camera at all. Even if you are shooting a live action film, thanks to the realism of CGI, computers are now able to put a lens wherever you need it to be – this is why I think we need to take a second to celebrate some of the hard working pieces of lightweight metal that were behind a few of the more bitchin’ shots out there. These rigs got the shot done, computers be damned!
6. Motion Control Split Screen in The Rules Of Attraction Motion control has been around a while now – but what made this shot so impressive wasn’t the rig, but how rig was used, observe: Pretty damn slick, right? It did prove to be a little difficult on the actors, whose actions, dialogue, and even line of sight had to be coordinated exactly with not only each other, but the rig as well. 5. Indie Filmmaker Buying Guide: Top Camcorders From $2000 - $6000. These days, calling yourself a "budget" or "indie" filmmaker can mean a wide variety of things. Many indie film productions operate on multimillion dollar budgets, but many people who attempt to finance their own movies can only dream about having that kind of cash.
It's true, lots of "budget" films are really "no-budget" films, and the list of movies made for less than $10,000 is growing every year. dedicated to the Art of Film Sound Design & Film Sound Theory. The Great Camera Shootout 2011: Episode 1 ~ "The Tipping Point"
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Cinematography: Wikis
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cinematography (from Greek: kinema - κίνημα "movement" and graphein - γράφειν "to record"), is the making of lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for the cinema. It is closely related to the art of still photography. Many additional issues arise when both the camera and elements of the scene may be in motion, though this also greatly increases the creative possibilities of the process.
For more details, see History of film.
Roundhay Garden Scene directed by the world's first filmmaker, Louis Le Prince, in 1888.
The first attempt at cinematography can be traced back to the world's first motion picture film, Roundhay Garden Scene.[citation needed] It was a sequence directed by Louis Le Prince, French inventor and showman, on October 14 1888 in the garden at Oakwood Grange in Roundhay, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.[citation needed] This groundbreaking event happened seven years before the Lumière Brothers' Sortie de l'usine Lumière à Lyon made the first paid exhibition on December 28, 1895 at Le Grand Café, in Paris, France.[citation needed]. This date is known as the birth of cinema since it was the first time the cycle of production-distribution-exhibition happened. The European city soon became the motion picture capital of the world.
Cinematography is an art form unique to motion pictures. Although the exposing of images on light-sensitive elements dates back to the late 1600s[citation needed], motion pictures demanded a new form of photography and new aesthetic techniques.
Cinematography was key during the silent movie era - no sound apart from background music, no dialogue - the films depended on lighting, acting and set.
The ASC defines cinematography as
Aspects of cinematography
Numerous aspects contribute to the art of cinematography. They are :
Film stock
Cinematography can begin with rolls of film or a digital imaging sensor. Advancements in film emulsion and grain structure have led to a wide range of film stocks available to cinematographers. The selection of a film stock is one of the first decisions they must make during any film production.
In the realm of digital imaging, various film stocks are no longer applicable, but the cameras themselves feature image adjustment capabilities that go far beyond the abilities of one particular film stock. The cameras can be adjusted to varying degrees of color sensitivity, image contrast, light sensitivity and so on. One camera can achieve all the various looks of different emulsions, although it is heavily argued as to which method of capturing an image is the "best" method. It should be mentioned that the digital method of image adjustments (ISO, contrast etc) are executed by estimating the same adjustments that would take place if actual film were in use and are thus vulnerable to the cameras sensor designers perceptions of various film stocks and image adjustment parameters. Sensors generally have an optimal ISO rating past which faster speeds will result in noticeable increases in image noise, thus compromising the quality.
The techniques used by the film laboratory to process the film stock can also offer a considerable variance in the image produced. By controlling the temperature and varying the duration in which the film is soaked in the development chemicals and by skipping certain chemical processes (or partially skipping them), cinematographers can achieve very different looks from a single film stock in the laboratory. Some techniques that can be used are push processing, bleach bypass and cross processing.
Filters are used to dramatically tint the film gold in the opening titles of Wall Street, evoking an atmosphere of money, capitalism and greed.
Focal length
The camera does what a human eye does. That is, it creates perspective and spatial relations with the rest of the world. However, unlike one's eye, a cinematographer can select different lenses for different purposes. Variation in focal length is one of the chief benefits of such an advantage. The focal length of the lens in particular, determines the angle of view and, therefore, the field of view. Cinematographers can choose between a range of wide angle lenses, "normal" lenses and telephoto lenses, as well as macro lenses and other special effect lens systems such as borescope lenses. Wide-angle lenses have short focal lengths and make spatial distances more obvious. A person in the distance is shown as much smaller while someone in the front will loom large. On the other hand, telephoto lenses reduce such exaggerations, depicting far-off objects as seemingly close together and flattening perspective. The differences between the perspective rendering is actually not due to the focal length by itself, but by the distance between the subjects and the camera. Therefore, the use of different focal lengths in combination with different camera to subject distances creates these different rendering. Changing the focal length only while keeping the same camera position doesn't affect perspective but the angle of view only. A Zoom lens allows a camera operator to change their focal length within a shot or quickly between setups for shots. As prime lenses offer greater optical quality and are "faster" (larger aperture openings, usable in less light) than zoom lenses, they are often employed in professional cinematography over zoom lenses. Certain scenes or even types of filmmaking, however, may require the use of zooms for speed or ease of use, as well as shots involving a zoom move.
Diaphragm aperture
Like in photography, the control of the exposed image is done in the lens with the control of the diaphragm aperture. As to properly expose, the cinematographer needs that all lenses be engraved with T-Stop, not f-stop, so that the eventual light loss due to the glass doesn't affect the exposure control when setting it using the usual meters. The choice of the aperture also affects image quality (aberrations) and depth of field (see below).
Depth of field and focus
Focal length and diaphragm aperture affect the depth of field of a scene — that is, how much the background, mid-ground and foreground will be rendered in "acceptable focus" (only one exact plane of the image is in precise focus) on the film or video target. Depth of field (not to be confused with depth of focus) is determined by the aperture size and the focal distance. A large or deep depth of field is generated with a very small iris aperture and focusing on a point in the distance, whereas a shallow depth of field will be achieved with a large (open) iris aperture and focusing closer to the lens. Depth of field is also governed by the format size. 70 mm film has much more depth of field for the same focal length lens than does 35 mm. 16 mm has even less and most digital video cameras have less depth of field than 16 mm. But if one considers the field of view and angle of view, the smaller the image is, the shorter the focal length should be, as to keep the same field of view. Then, the smaller the image is, the more depth of field is obtained, for the same field of view. Therefore, 70mm has less depth of field than 35mm for a given field of view, 16mm more than 35mm, and video cameras even more depth of field than 16mm. As videographers try to emulate the look of 35 mm film with digital cameras, this is one issue of frustration - excessive depth of field with digital cameras and using additional optical devices to reduce that depth of field.
Aspect ratio and framing
The aspect ratio of an image is the ratio of its width to its height. This can be expressed either as a ratio of 2 integers, such as 4:3, or in a decimal format, such as 1.33:1 or simply 1.33.
Different ratios provide different aesthetic effects. Standards for aspect ratio have varied significantly over time.
During the silent era, aspect ratios varied widely, from square 1:1, all the way up to the extreme widescreen 4:1 Polyvision. However, from the 1910s, silent motion pictures generally settled on the ratio of 4:3 (1.33). The introduction of sound-on-film briefly narrowed the aspect ratio, to allow room for a sound stripe. In 1932 a new standard was introduced, the Academy ratio of 1.37, by means of thickening the frame line.
For years, mainstream cinematographers were limited to using the Academy ratio, but in the 1950s, thanks to the popularity of Cinerama, widescreen ratios were introduced in an effort to pull audiences back into the theater and away from their home television sets. These new widescreen formats provided cinematographers a wider frame within which to compose their images.
Many different proprietary photographic systems were invented and utilized in the 1950s to create widescreen movies, but one dominates film today: the anamorphic process, which optically squeezes the image to photograph twice the horizontal area to the same size vertical as standard "spherical" lenses.
The first commonly used anamorphic format was CinemaScope, which used a 2.35 aspect ratio, although it was originally 2.55. CinemaScope was used from 1953 to 1967, but due to technical flaws in the design and its ownership by Fox, several third-party companies, led by Panavision's technical improvements in the 1950s, now dominate the anamorphic cine lens market.
Changes to SMPTE projection standards altered the projected ratio from 2.35 to 2.39 in 1970, although this did not change anything regarding the photographic anamorphic standards; all changes in respect to the aspect ratio of anamorphic 35 mm photography are specific to camera or projector gate sizes, not the optical system.
After the "widescreen wars" of the 1950s, the motion-picture industry settled into 1.85 as a standard for theatrical projection in the United States and the United Kingdom. This is a cropped version of 1.37. Europe and Asia opted for 1.66 at first, although 1.85 has largely permeated these markets in recent decades. Certain "epic" or adventure movies utilized the anamorphic 2.39.
In the 1990s, with the advent of high-definition video, television engineers created the 1.78 (16:9) ratio as a mathematical compromise between the theatrical standard of 1.85 and television's 1.33, as it was not practical to produce a traditional CRT television tube with a width of 1.85. Until that point, nothing had ever been originated in 1.78. Today, this is a standard for high-definition video and for widescreen television. Some cinema films are now shot using HDTV cameras.
Camera movement
One aspect of cinematography that strongly separates it from still photography (aside from having a moving subject) is the ability to move the camera, which represents the audience's viewpoint or perspective, during the course of filming. This movement plays a considerable role in the emotional language of film images and the audience's emotional reaction to the action on the screen. Techniques range from the most basic movements of panning (horizontal shift in viewpoint from a fixed position; like turning your head side-to-side) and tilting (vertical shift in viewpoint from a fixed position; like tipping your head back to look at the sky or down to look at the ground) to dollying (placing the camera on a moving platform to move it closer or farther from the subject), tracking (placing the camera on a moving platform to move it to the left or right), craning (moving the camera in a vertical position; being able to lift it off the ground as well as swing it side-to-side from a fixed base position), and combinations of the above.
Cameras have been mounted to nearly every imaginable form of transportation.
Special effects
Frame rate selection
Motion picture images are presented to an audience at a constant speed. In the theater, it is 24 frames per second, in NTSC (US) Television, it is 30 frames per second (29.97 to be exact), in PAL (Europe) television it is 25 frames per second. This speed of presentation does not vary.
Role of the cinematographer
In the film industry, the cinematographer is responsible for the technical aspects of the images (lighting, lens choices, composition, exposure, filtration, film selection), but works closely with the director to ensure that the artistic aesthetics are supporting the director's vision of the story being told. The cinematographers are the heads of the camera, grip and lighting crew on a set, and for this reason they are often called directors of photography or DPs.
Evolution of technology: new definitions
1. ^ (John Hora, The American Cinematographer Manual, 9th Edition.)
See also
External links
Up to date as of January 23, 2010
(Redirected to Category:MMM:cinematography article)
From Wikibooks, the open-content textbooks collection
This category is part of the Movie Making Manual
Books or Pages
F cont.
M cont.
Simple English
Cinematography (from the Greek words kinema - κίνημα, meaning "movement" and graphein - γράφειν "to record"), is the art of making lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for the cinema. It is similar to the art of still photography.
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} | 581 | 35mm cameras are still used today by expert and apprentice users
Before the technology of today's digital cameras and high mega pixel resolutions, their was a time when film production was more of an art and talent that very few had the skill for. Film production companies, the film industry and even local photographers were highly respected and needed. But now with today's instant everything and cellphones with cameras....anyone can "snap a picture" and post it on the internet through their facebook page or on the highly popular video sharing website youtube. This new age of microprocessors and integrated circuits that could fit a vast amount of technolgy / information on the head of a pencil eraser. This type of revolutionary advanced developments have made the once highly valued photographer, more of a victim of his own trade....a "snap shoot frozen in time"Â Â Â Â
SLR Cameras. This camera uses the 35mm film and even accepts lenses that are inter-changeable. The Single lens reflex cameras were the most expensive of the three non digital cameras dicussed here. They were named such because it is a single lens is what brings the identical image to the film and so to the user as he / she looks through the viewfinder. With ease of use the user only needs to focus the lens, this camera has exposures that are controlled by the built in light meter. Â
Cassette and disc cameras, are suitable units for snapshots they are cheap and easy to operate. These cameras use disc film or 110 film cassettes that drop inside the camera. The type of lenses are normally fixed to focus from 4 feet to infinity. Some of them give you limited control over the settings for exposure.
The point and shoot cameras during their release were somewhat more expensive than cassette cameras. These cameras were great as they produced wonderful slides or prints using 35mm film. Because of the built in light meter aperture and shutter speed are set automatically.
Skilled photographers are knowledged of how film and film speed are interpret as this was a necessary knowledge-base of the user for the cameras of years ago. A film's speed ability to respond to light is indicated by the ISO (or Asa) this number is indicated on the box or roll. The variations of film would be slow from, ISO25 to 100 this is for light and activity to ISO200 to 1000 this is for fast action and or low lighting.
Selecting the proper Camera lenses is essential. It is true that photographic lenses vary from as simple as a single piece of polished plastic in some of the cheapest cameras to a dozen or more carefully ground and coated glass elements. The SLR cameras normally come with a 50mm focal-length lens that produces pictures with a "normal" 47 degree angle of view (this is an angle that is very similar to what the human eye detects). The lenses are interchangeable that range from a fish-eye 8mm and gives a 180 degree panorama to a 1000mm telephoto and takes in about 2.5 degrees and brings in subjects from the distance.   Â
These older style cameras are still used today for some jobs and by photographers although the cameras of today are indeed faster and more effective for some tasks. Even some of the professional digital cameras are lacking some of the abilities of cameras of earlier years. Many people believe that a digital slr camera could be competitive to that of a analog or standard 35mm camera.     | http://www.infobarrel.com/Photographer_what_photographer_older_cameras_35mm_of_years_past_ | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2020-16
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The gentle meter could be very efficient in setting the publicity accurately, whereas the camera’s small dimension allows carrying it with you wherever. Moreover, the quality of the pictures I’ve taken with the QL17 makes it worthy of the best 35mm film cameras from Leica. The gentle images have a moody impact and make the mannequin’s face and eyes look vigorous and deep.
As digital camera a lens expertise developed and wide aperture lenses grew to become extra frequent, rangefinder cameras have been launched to make focusing more exact. Early rangefinders had two separate viewfinder windows, considered one of which is linked to the focusing mechanisms and moved proper or left because the focusing ring is turned.
Some motorised cameras haven’t got this at all, and as an alternative deal with rewinding your movie all by itself, or have a switch to do it. Focusing of those plate cameras was by way of a floor glass screen at the point of focus. When focus and composition were satisfactory, the bottom glass display screen was eliminated and a sensitised plate put in its place protected by a dark slide. To make the publicity, the dark slide was rigorously slid out and the shutter opened and then closed and the darkish slide changed. When the shutter is released, the mirror swings up and away permitting the publicity of the photographic medium and immediately returns after the exposure.
The unique box Brownie fashions had a small reflex viewfinder mounted on the highest of the digicam and had no aperture or focusing controls and only a easy shutter. Later models such because the Brownie 127 had larger direct view optical viewfinders together with a curved film path to reduce the impact of deficiencies within the lens. Twin-lens reflex cameras used a pair of almost identical lenses, one to kind the image and one as a viewfinder.
I’ve also seen pictures from cell phones that look better. I’m undecided why taking pictures with movie cameras with lessor IQ is so interesting. Far from being ‘charming’ they simply seem to me to indicate how poorly the camera has faired over time. The photographs seem to have a low high quality and the movie colours are a disappointment. There is also a curiosity in the vignetting across the highest and backside of the frame.
When focus is obtained (normally by some indication in the viewfinder, or probably by an annoying beeping sound), then the digicam is ready to take a shot. Fortunately, most (most likely all) auto-focus cameras have automatic exposure as nicely, which implies that you could safely ignore the next step about setting publicity. A smaller aperture will let much less gentle onto the film, and give extra depth of area.
The Digic 8 Image Processor functions well in low-mild circumstances whereas sustaining low noise ranges, even with high ISO settings. The 9-level AF System tracks subjects and retains them in focus, which is ideal for motion photographs. Of course, the function du jour is 4K video, which this digicam can do at as much as 24fps and 120Mbps (megabytes per second), and the constructed-in picture stabilization and time-lapse features are a bonus. Aperture settings are usually set on a ring around the digicam lens, while shutter speeds could be discovered on the highest plate dial (the alternative is the case in digital photography).
The nonetheless picture digital camera is the principle instrument within the art of photography and captured photographs could also be reproduced later as part of the process of photography, digital imaging, photographic printing. The comparable inventive fields within the moving image digital camera domain are movie, videography, and cinematography. While a basic model might need a single mounted aperture/focus lens, a greater model may need three or 4 lenses of differing apertures and focal lengths on a rotating turret.
Then, body your shots and shoot usually until the camera refuses to wind or winding becomes very tough. Rewind the film and get it developed, or develop it yourself.
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The first thing we budding photographers had to learn was a sequence of f-stops (aperture sizes) – f2.8, f4, f5.6, f8, f11, f16, etc – and that each was twice/half the size of its neighbour, with f2.8 being the largest, and f16 the smallest. Similarly, the shutter speeds were 30th, 60th, 125th, and 250th (on my camera anyway), and each was twice/half the speed of its neighbour. The final bit of information came with the film; a slip of paper that said something like this (for 100 ASA film):
1/125th and f/16 on a sunny day with distinct shadows
1/125th and f/11 on a slightly overcast day with soft shadows
1/125th and f/8 on an overcast day with shadows barely visible
1/125th and f/5.6 on a heavily overcast day with no shadows
1/125th and f/4 on in open shade or at sunset
All the camera settings were guesswork, and some shots would inevitably be incorrectly exposed, or blurry. The solution was to learn from mistakes (give it a bit more/less exposure in certain conditions) and gain more knowledge via and understanding of aperture/shutter speed combinations, and depth of field.
The correct exposure setting can be maintained by corresponding adjustments of shutter speed and aperture choices. For example 1/125th at f/8 is the same as 1/60th at f/16, and the same as 1/250th at f/5.6, and so on. The most obvious application is using a higher shutter speed with a larger aperture is elimination of motion blur.
Depth of field (hyper-focus) is the distance over which all objects are acceptably sharply in focus. Many cameras had a handy scale of the lens that illustrated the depth of field for each aperture setting. The concept to be grasped was that large apertures have a small depth of field (only the subject might be in focus), while small apertures have a large depth of field (the foreground, subject and background could also be in focus). As distances had to be guessed, the best method of ensuring good focus was to use smaller apertures. However, good photography demands that differing apertures should be deliberately selected to expand or compress depth of field, so that backgrounds can be intentionally sharp, or blurred.
This was the point at which I moved up to a new camera to eliminate some of the guesswork: an accurately focus-able SLR, which dispensed with the need to hyper-focus, and allowed a more creative use of shutter speed/aperture combinations and depth of field. My camera didn’t have a built-in exposure meter, so I had to get a hand-held.
Taking a picture took a long time (composition aside). You had to take a light reading and transfer settings to the camera, think about the relative importance of freezing action and controlling depth of field, and adjust accordingly. Then the sun would go behind a cloud and you’d have to start over again.
Life was much easier when I moved-up to a camera with an integrated exposure meter. One of the joys of a simple viewfinder match needle metering system was that you could continually monitor the quality of the light, and easily make exposure compensations to over or under expose when necessary by not matching the needle pointer (when you knew better than the meter).
Better yet, the next development was shutter or aperture priority auto exposure (most cameras featured one or the other, but not both), where the user had to make one selection, and the other would follow automatically. While you still had to apply the same thought processes, there were a lot less knobs to twiddle, and most systems could be made to work backwards (e.g. manually changing a shutter speed would force a preferred aperture selection).
Automation started to get a grip on camera design, and not all of it was good. For example, exposure compensation might require changing the ASA setting to force a different exposure, or twiddling a dedicated exposure compensation dial. It wasn’t really progress, and it didn’t make operation easier. I was just a different way of doing things.
I guess increasing camera automation was largely aimed at new photographers. It allowed them to use the tool without knowing about shutter speeds, apertures, and depth of field, but for those of us who had started with a simple wholly mechanical camera, it felt like creative control was being lost.
The next big development was auto-focus. This was a very attractive proposition, since a necessary task could be performed by the camera freeing-up concentration on creative control. However, auto-focus came with auto everything else. Cameras had become the high-tech version of the point and shoot I started with in the 1960s.
My first auto-focus camera was a Pentax MZ-5n. This camera had various program modes, which essential addressed set-up decisions for the type of subject I was trying to photograph. Instead of thinking about shutter speed, aperture, and depth of field, I had to think about navigating menus to tell the camera what I was photographing so it could affect an appropriate set-up on my behalf. It wasn’t easier to use; it wasn’t better; it was just a different way of doing things.
My interest in photography (as opposed to operating a camera in the same way one might operate a washing machine or any other bit of electrical equipment) faded once I’d acquired the MZ-5n. I think it only ever had one film passed through it. More than that, film photography was dealt a death sentence shortly after when digital cameras came of age.
My next camera was actually a digital, and I easily acclimatized to the fact that it does everything for me, but I use it in a very different way. The digital camera is a tool in a multimedia age. I use it to captures images in a way that is factual, and unemotional. To be creative, I still reach for one of my old film cameras, and put some effort into capturing the moment. | http://luckypatcherapkhub.com/collecting-classic-cameras.html | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2021-10
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} | 4,606 | Friday, November 26, 2010
Photography Basics
Drive and disclaimer:
• I had time for blogging and I couldn't think of anything better to blog.
• People started bugging me with same set of questions "What is Shutter Speed?", "How big should the aperture set for a portrait photograph?", "What is the ISO I have to use on a bright day?", "What white balance setting I must use?" etc. etc.
• I've tried to explain whatever I know and in the easiest way I can think of, if you still can't understand you are either dyslexic or you're not meant to be a photographer :) Contact me for more comprehensive explanations to help you. sachin [dot] cas [at] gmail [dot] com
• I'm planning to use some photographs of mine to give certain examples, but this is just a plan when I started the article and I don't promise that at the end of it. (Update: No am not doing it...instead I'm stealing some informative diagrams and photographs from internet. None of the diagrams/photographs I've used here are mine.)
• This article is not a bible for beginners and it won't make you a good photographer, it may just make you aware of few of the techniques and terminologies and probably you'll be in a position to decide what parameters to use for a particular shot.
• There are lots of resources on the web, few of which I'm gonna scribble at the end of the article.
• Anyway this article is potpourri of my experiences and loads of stuff collated from various resources.
• Remember! The best way to learn is to keep clicking more photographs and keep seeing more photographs.
• Remember again! I am an amateur photographer and a Canonian (digital only). My knowledge about other camera systems is very nominal, the article will be biased towards Canon system.
A dangerously brief history of photography:
• Camera Obscura: The light from the scene passing through a pin hole and reflected by the mirror is projected onto a paper where the scene is traced. 10th Century.
• Joseph Nicéphore Niépce produced the first permanent photograph by projecting on pewter plate coated with bitumen of Judea, exposing it for 8 long hours. 1825-27.
• Louis Daguerre invented Daguerreotype and was able develop photos with just half hour exposure and found that by immersing in salt, the permanency could be maintained. 1833-39.
• William Henry Fox Talbot invented Calotype, where in an negatives were made and could be used for reproducing prints. 1839-40.
• George Eastman created film. 1884.
• Kodak invented sensor (CCD) with mega pixels for recording images. 1986.
Daguerrotype of Boulevard du Temple in Paris, 1838 by Louis Daguerre
Types of Cameras:
• Based on type of medium: Film, Digital
• Based on size of the medium: Large format, Medium Format, 35mm, APS-C
• Based on mechanism: Point and shoot (P&S), Single Lens Reflex (SLR), Twin Lens Reflex (TLR), Rangefinders,
• Miscellaneous types: Single use cameras, Lomos, Panoramic etc.
Large format cameras are the ones which uses media larger than 4x5 inches. Most of the Polaroid cameras, view cameras come under this genre. If you see a person clicking a photograph with a cloth on his head using a machine with bellows, that's a large format camera. Large format cameras are generally bulky and cumbersome to use, hence it cannot be used for sports photography or any other photography genre which requires faster foucssing/clicking. Ansel Adams' greatest black & white landscapes have been shot using large format cameras.
View cameras a.k.a Large format cameras
Medium format cameras are less bulkier than large format ones...their media size is larger than 35mm film and smaller than 4x5 inches. They're more popular than large format ones and is mainly used by landscape and fashion photographers. Hasselblad and Mamiya are known for their medium format cameras. The digital ones bear a price tag that requires you to sell your dad's house along with his car and still ending up taking loan from the bank.
Hasselblad CM system (Medium format camera)
Most SLRs and film based P&S cameras in the market are 35mm cameras. The actual size of the 35mm medium is 24x36mm. The ubiquitous film rolls that you see in the market are all 35mm ones.
Pentax 35mm film camera
If your D-SLR is not a full frame (35mm) one, then it's most likely APS-C or APS-H sized sensor. To make things easy, read APS-C or APS-H size as a size slightly smaller than 35mm. You might come across terms 1.8x crop factor...which would simply mean the size of your camera's sensor is 1.8 times smaller than that of 35mm.
Sensor size comparison
Crop factor
Point-&-Shoot, sometime back, were simple consumer cameras with fixed focus point, fixed focal length...all you need to do is point and shoot. The recent digital ones come with variable focal length (zoom), advanced focus mechanisms, adjustable ISO and host of other features which can almost be called a fixed-lens-SLR.
An SLR like Point-&-shoot camera
SLR cameras, these days, are probably the most widely used cameras by amateur and professional photographers. It's easy to use, less bulkier than view cameras and it's usability is greatly extended by interchangeable lenses. The light entering through the lens hits the mirror inside the camera body, placed at 45 degrees inclination. The mirror reflects the incoming light vertically up to a pentaprism, which throws the light out of viewfinder. That's how when you see through a viewfinder, you see the live image and not an electronically processed one like on a digital P&S. These bulleted points below which I effortlessly flicked from, very easily describes the working of an SLR (Thanks to Philip Greenspun from whom I've learnt ABCs of photography).
Suppose that the photographer has chosen an exposure of f/8 and 1/125th of a second. Here is how most SLRs work during exposure:
• lens is kept open to maximum aperture (e.g., f/2.8) for ease of viewing and metering
• when the user presses the shutter release, the lens aperture is stopped down to the taking aperture of f/8. On old-style camera/lens interfaces (e.g., Nikon, Hasselblad), this is accomplished by moving a lever. With camera/lens interfaces designed in the 1980s (e.g., Canon, Rollei), this is accomplished by sending an electrical signal to a solenoid in the lens.
• the mirror is flipped up out of the way of the light (and parked flat up against the prism)
• now that the lens is stopped down and the mirror is up, the viewfinder blacks out, the shutter opens and light begins to strike the film
• as soon as the shutter is fully open, the camera signals an electronic flash, if attached to fire
• when 1/125th of a second has elapsed, the shutter is closed
• the mirror is pushed back down to viewing position
• the lens aperture is reopened to its widest setting
How SLR works?
Twin Lens Reflex (TLR) cameras work pretty much on the same lines of SLR but just that it'll have two lens of the same focal length, one for capturing the photograph and other for the viewfinder (waist-level viewfinder). Since there are two separate lenses there need not be a mirror-swinging action to actually capture the photograph which reduces the shutter-lag and also it won't black out the view-finder unlike SLR. This is particularly useful in long exposure shot wherein the photographer can keep seeing the viewfinder. The most famous TLR in the market is the German Rolleiflex TLRs, as far as my knowledge goes there is no digital TLR yet.
Rolleiflex TLR
Rangefinder cameras are something I've never seen or used, so I wouldn't write much about it except that they're known for their precise, tack sharp focussing systems. Read about it on its wiki page: Rangefinder cameras. My greatest inspiration in the field of photography, Mr. Henri Cartier Bresson used 35mm Leica rangefinder camera with 50mm lens.
Leica's latest Rangefinder in market
Exposure: Shutter Speed, Aperture, ISO:
Exposure is the measure of light falling on the media, be it film or CCD. It's controlled by three factors namely shutter speed (denoted by S or Tv), aperture (denoted by A or Av) and sensitivity of the sensor (ISO). Let me try to explain each of these to a greater detail.
Shutter Speed is the amount of time the shutter screen remains open, in other words, it is the duration for which the light hits the media. Shutter speed is the feature of the camera and not the lens. Faster the shutter speed, lesser the duration for which light hits the sensor, so lesser amount of light is captured.
The shutter speeds range from 1/4000th of a second (1/8000 on a pro camera) to 30seconds, with a special "B" (bulb) mode wherein the shutter could be kept open as long as the photographer wishes (of course, constrained by battery).
The shutter speed controls another most important aspect - freezing the subject in time. Simply stated, you shoot a speeding car with slow shutter speed, you tend to see the trails of the car resulting from motion blur. On the other hand you shoot the same car with higher shutter speeds, the car will appear as though its stationary. In case you're wondering what magic, the photographer has done to capture those long trail of lights, the answer is simple: he would have just kept the shutter open long enough to capture the trails.
When you're shooting with slower shutter speeds (under 1/100th of a second) holding the camera, it is highly likely that you end up with a blurred photograph. Why? It's obvious that when you're shooting at lower speeds, even the slightest camera shake will contribute to the blurring of the photograph. Solution for this problem is to mount the camera on a tripod or try to find a platform nearby to place the camera and shoot in case you're lazy to carry a tripod.
The answer for the question "What shutter shutter speed to use for a particular shot?" is "It entirely depends on the kind of shot and it can't be generalized". If you're shooting birds, wildlife, sports, street shots etc. which require the moment to be captured tack sharp use high shutter speeds. Night shots, trail capture, abstract photographs, light painting, milky waterfall photographs etc. require slow shutter speeds.
Shutter speed Vs Aperture
Aperture is the feature of the lens and has nothing to do with the camera, except that the aperture values are set/controlled by the camera. As the name itself suggests, aperture is an "opening" at the rear end of lens through which the light enters the camera. Earlier days, the lens barrel had an aperture ring to set the required aperture values, but these days the aperture could be controlled by the knobs on the camera.
The maximum and minimum value of aperture depends, as mentioned earlier, on the lens and not on the camera. You may find lens with aperture as big as f1 or f1.4 or as small as f45 or f64. I'm sure your immediate response to the stimulus is "What the 'f'???" f doesn't have too much significance, aperture is measured in terms of f-stops and hence the f. It's notated f/1.8 or f/5.6 as well. As you can see the size of the aperture is inverse to the value of f-stop, higher the f-stop smaller the aperture, smaller the f-stops bigger the aperture. So at f1.8 the light received by the medium will be more than f5.6; least light will be received at the smallest aperture say F22 of F45 or whatever your lens supports.
Like shutter speed, aperture also controls one other aspect, apart from the amount of light, it's called Depth of Field (DOF). You maybe confused by amateur photographers who are fond of terms like DOF, Bokeh, Hyperfocal distance etc. Just remember this rule of thumb & don't get lost in the jargon: Bigger the aperture, smaller (shallower DOF) the region of focus; smaller the aperture larger (deeper DOF) the region of focus. You may, therefore, want to open up the aperture for a portrait shot wherein you want a tack sharp face and blurred background & close down the aperture for a landscape shot wherein you want the entire landscape to be focused. Also in macro shots, the amount of DOF is very critical since the available DOF is very less. DOF is made use sometimes to give artistic effects to the photographs.
Portraits would come out well with bigger apertures (smaller f-stops) for it makes the subject really sharp against a background of soft bokeh, Also night shots usually require bigger apertures which would allow lot of light to enter.
Landscapes need smaller apertures (bigger f-stops) for most times it wouldn't have a specific focus point. Smaller apertures help on a very bright day to cut-off excess light entering (of course this could be controlled by shutter speed too).
Aperture Sizes
ISO is the measure of sensitivity of the media and is a camera dependent feature. ISO values are typically in the range of 100 to 3200 (on a pro camera it have extended range from 50-102400!!!)
When the ISO is set to 100 the sensor is least sensitive, it can sense less light; when it's set to 1600 or 3200, the sensor can sense a lot more light. Which means for a given condition if ISO 100 gives a standard exposure with F8.0 & 1/250th of a second, ISO 1600 may give a standard exposure at F8.0 & 1/1000th of a second. As one can infer from the above, ISO comes very handy while shooting hand-held under low light conditions, it gives an advantage slightly faster shutter speeds which helps you in avoiding blur.
An obvious question may arise to a novice, "Why should I shoot at low ISO when higher ISO gives an advantage of faster shutter speed?" Though ISO seems to be such a cool feature, it carries with it something very undesirable - NOISE. Higher the ISO, higher the noise.
Brighter the ambience smaller the ISO (unless you want grainy effect), darker the ambience higher the ISO.
Noise comparison
Focussing: Focal Length, Zoom/Prime, Focus Types:
Focal Length: is very much an attribute of lens. Let me not become a physics lecturer here giving you the basics of optics using diagrams, instead let me try to explain it in layman terms. Shorter the focal length wider the area you can cover, longer the focal length lesser the area you cover. In other words, shorter the focal length smaller the objects appear and longer the focal length bigger the objects appear. Focal length may vary from 5mm all the way upto 1200mm or more. So as per the definition, lenses in the range 10-24mm would cover whole lot of area and hence will be used for landscape and architecture shots and are called wide-angle lenses; similarly lenses in the range 200-800mm could be used for shooting something far e.g. a dog at the end of the road or bird on the tree or cricket ball striking the bat or a cheetah pouncing on deer and are called telephoto lenses. Lenses in the range 24-135mm could be considered as mid-range lenses.
Focal length demonstration
Zoom/Prime: Most novices (the ones with no knowledge of SLR cameras) ask me a very typical question, "Saar what's the zoom of your camera?" So if you're one of those who asked that question, I'll make sure you won't ask such a question next time if you read this section.
Zoom is nothing but the ratio of minimum to maximum focal length. E.g. Canon Powershot SD4000 comes with a 28-105mm lens, so zoom = 105/28 = 3.75x. Nikon Coolpix P7000 has a 28-200mm, zoom = 200/28 = 7.14x. SLR cameras won't have any zoom associated with them coz it's the lens that you mount on the camera that determines the zoom. So if you've loaded your camera with a 70-200/4L lens the zoom is about 3x, but it's not so significant. SLR lens buyers don't have to bother too much about zoom but sheer optical quality and the purpose of the lens, zoom is a factor that is more worried about while buying a point-&-shoot camera.
Now a small question: what is the zoom if I plug a 100mm lens?
Those kinda lens are called Prime lenses. Prime lenses are fixed focal length lenses like 50mm/f1.8 or 100mm/f2.8 macro or 800mm super telephoto etc. These lenses won't have any zoom ring to rotate for zooming-in or zooming-out, so if you really have to change zoom the only way out is either you or your subject has to move back/front.
If this is the case then why do we need the prime lens at all?
Prime lenses are very easy to construct and are optically much superior than the zoom lenses. If you see Canon's high end lenses like 600 or 800mm L lenses, it becomes extremely difficult to construct zoom lenses at that range and they end up constructing optically very superior prime lenses which costs a fortune. I have two prime lenses 50mm/f1.8 a dirt cheap lens which works wonders and a 100mm/f2.8 macro which gives tack sharp images, I just love shooting with these two lenses.
Zoom demonstration
Focus types: You can either use automatic focussing or manual focussing, each of it has their own pros and cons which we discuss here.
Automatic focussing is a hassle-free mechanism where-in you leave the focussing decision for the camera. It could be in fully auto-focus mode where the camera even selects its own focus points when you half-press the shutter-release button. Here both the auto-focussing mechanism of the camera and the lens motor plays important role, high-end cameras are equipped with better focussing mechanisms than the entry-level ones. Auto focussing is especially useful in sports photography and wild-life photography where the subjects are moving at high speeds (though this requires predictive or artificial-intelligence focussing to be enabled). The other form of auto focus mechanism is focus-point selection, the photographer can choose one of the available focus points that's visible in the view-finder, this option gives better accuracy of the region of focus.
The flip side of auto-focus is "hunting". Sometimes when there are too many distracting elements or if the light is too low or while shooting macro, you might have observed that your lens makes lot of noise and fails to focus, this is called hunting and this happens when you let the camera to focus. The camera gets confused due to too much or too less contrast differences as to what to focus. Also the other problem of auto focus is the camera may not really focus the region which you intend to focus.
Manual focussing mechanism is when you set the AF-MF switch on the lens to MF. Once this setting is done, the camera's inbuilt auto-focus system is completely disabled and the photographer has to use the focus ring on the lens to achieve the desired focus. This definitely gives greater control to the photographer and comes especially handy in the scenarios mentioned in the cons of auto-focussing. I particularly use manual-focussing while I'm shooting macro.
Cons of manual focussing is the speed. Photographer has to see through the view finder, decide on the region of focus, turn the focus ring and click, by this time a cheetah would have completely devoured the deer and left or the best-goal would already be kicked. Manual focussing is hard to use for elusive or high-speed photography like sports, wild-life, street etc.
AF-MF selection switch on lens
Metering: This is often the most confused topic. Depending on the camera it may support any of spot-metering, evaluative metering, partial metering, center-weighted average, 3D colour matrix, multi-zone metering etc. I'm not gonna explain all of them, I'll explain spot metering which is the simplest of all.
When you see the exposure meter of your camera either through the viewfinder or on LCD, you see the exposure indicator moves when you change any of the exposure parameters. How would the camera know what exposure to set? It would have some presets in the memory against which it compares the incoming light and sets the exposure. Now, metering mode determines light from which part of the composed frame is used for comparing; our common sense says that each of the metering mode will result in different exposure values depending on the light emitted by the subject.
Metering modes explained
Coming to spot metering, imagine a scenario wherein you're clicking a full moon on clear cloudless night with, say, a 200mm lens. Since the overall scene is predominantly dark except for the moon, if you use multi-zone metering and shoot the moon will get over-exposed. Because the camera picks up light from the entire frame and the light entering is very less and it tries to set an exposure to compensate for the darkness which washes out the moon. To overcome this problem, set your metering mode to "spot-metering", usually denoted by a frame with a dark spot in the center. What this would do is, it measures the amount of light entering only through the central circle of the viewfinder. So place the moon at the dead center of your composition, underexpose by a couple of steps and shoot, you see all the details of the moon. That's because the camera would now consider the light coming only from moon and ignore the darker sources and meter it aptly.
Canon Viewfinder
Resolution - Mega pixel (MP), Size:
Time to get our fundas correct first. Lets take an example of my camera, 20D. It's an 8.2MP camera, what does it mean?
1MP = 1 million pixels
The biggest image size it produces is 3504 x 2336 pixels.
So multiplying these two you get 3504 * 2336 = 8185344 pixels ≈ 8.2MP
You might have heard of the term DPI in printing jargon, DPI stands for Dots Per Inch and 300DPI is the minimum required for photo printing on magazines/books.
To get the dimension of the print size:
3504/300 = 11.68 inches
2336/300 = 7.78 inches
So with my camera I can get the biggest print of 11 x 8 inches.
If we want bigger prints and ready to lose out on quality (still decent enough to frame and hang) we just need to reduce DPI. For example,
3504/200 = 17.52 inches
2336/200 = 11.68 inches
With a little reduction in quality you can get a photo as big as 18x12 inches. Mind you: further reduction in DPI will pixelate the image, stop at 200DPI. 300DPI is true photo-quality prints.
Now to drool over a bit, lets take the case of Hasselblad H4D-60 medium format:
8956 pixels x 6708 pixels = 60MP
8956/300 = 29.8 inches
6708/300 = 22.36 inches
So you get a photo of size 30 x 24 inches for shelling out about 20 lakhs!!!
Megapixel chart (Figures in box indicate DPI)
White Balance, Colour temperature:
Have you ever come across a situation in which you've felt that your camera is not actually capturing the colours the way you're seeing, especially when you shoot under a florescent lamp or with a flash or on a overcast day? White balance is creating problem here. Lets try to see what's it and what's gone wrong!
Let's start off by seeing what's colour temperature, wikipedia says "The color temperature of a light source is the temperature of an ideal black-body radiator that radiates light of comparable hue to that light source. The temperature is conventionally stated in units of absolute temperature, kelvin [K]. Color temperature is related to Planck's law and to Wien's displacement law."
Kinda intimidating isn't it? I know! That's why don't go by theoretical definitions of stuff. Let me put the above statement in laymen terms - "Bluer your image cooler it is, browner your image warmer it is". So if you shoot your photograph under florescent lamp it's gonna be cooler, if you shoot it during sunset it's gonna be warmer. The camera usually gives multiple WB options viz. tungsten, fluorescent, cloudy, flash etc. but most times AWB (Automatic White Balance) setting works perfectly well, but at times the camera may fail to capture the right temperature. The only way to fix this is by post-processing.
My Tip: Shooting raw particularly helps in playing around with WB settings.
Colour temperatures
A bit about lens and filters:
All of us agree that the lens play a major role in photography - it is the eye that actually sees the subject!
Lenses could be classified by various parameters:
Focussing types: Auto focus & manual focus (already discussed)
Aperture: Slow lens, fast lens (aperture bigger than f/2.8)
Focal length: Ultra wide angle, wide angle, mid-range, telephoto, super-telephoto
Motion compensation: IS, non-IS (IS: Image stabilization or VR: Vibration Reduction, a technology in which the lens contains a motion sensor that compensates for slight camera shakes)
Others: Macro (special lens used for extreme close up), tilt-shift (special lens used for architecture photographs), fish-eye (extreme wide angle lens resulting in hemispherical image)
Depending on what you shoot, you choose your lenses, it's always better to have one mid-range (E.g.24-105mm) that comes very handy during travels. Longer the focal length, bulkier the lens gets, complicated the construction becomes, higher the cost goes. Parameters to look for are optical quality, build quality, focussing speeds, low light performance and portability. Also one has to really decide if he wants a fast lens or he can make do with a slow lens, the reason is, Canon 70-200/4L costs about $400+ while 70-200/2.8L costs a whopping $1200+.
Filters are of various types:
• Neutral Density (ND) filters are the dark glasses which cuts the light entering the lens. You may shoot back, "I can anyway control the light by 3 exposure parameters that you've already talked about, why do I need a ND filter?" Think of a situation where you want to capture a beautiful waterfall with a nice milky fall effect on a bright day - with aperture closed down to F/45 and ISO at 50 it may still give you a shutter speed of 1/60 which is not enough to get the desired effect, you would need 1/5th of 1/2 a second of shutter speed and if you shoot with that setting it washes out the waterfall. So under such situations one has to artificially cut down the light and ND filters come very handy.
ND Filter
• Graduated Neutral Density (GND) filters are partially darkened and are useful in sunset/sunrise shots wherein the sky needs to be underexposed and land needs to be overexposed.
GND filters
• Color filters are mainly used in B&W photography to enhance the contrast. For example, a blue filter makes the blue sky brighter, a red filter darkens the sky and brightens skin tones.
Colour filters
• IR filters are the special filters sensitive only to IR light. IR photographs look very surreal and snowy.
How an IR photograph looks
• Polarizing filters are used in colour photography mainly for two reasons. Primarily it cuts down harsh reflections and secondly it makes the color pleasantly warm and saturated. It does exactly the same what a polarizing sun-glass does to your eyes.
Reducing reflections
• UV filters serves the purpose of reducing the haze and protecting the lens from harmful UV rays.
My equipment:
Canon EOS 20D
Canon 17-40/4L for landscapes
Canon 70-200/4L for street and not-so-far subjects
Canon 100mm/f2.8 macro for macros and portraits
Canon 50mm/f1.8 for portraits
Canon Speedlite 430EX II flash
I post-process all my RAWs (usually colour-&-contrast corrections, cropping, vignetting, noise reduction, sharpness) using Apple Aperture 3.1 on MacBookPro running Mac OS X 10.6
This one's nothing but a collection of my bookmarks which I had collected over many years, some tutorials, some galleries, some forums etc.
Mother of all photography websites with loads of resources -
Reliable lens reviews:
My inspiration, Henri Cartier-Bresson:
EOS Beginner's FAQ -
Loads of f-number arithmetic stuff could be found here -
Some good articles here -
DOF calculator:
Camera archive at pbase:
George Steinmetz:
Best of Photojournalism:
Paul Liebhardt:
Lovely landscapes by Lidka and Marcin:
Miscellaneous photography resources:
Ansel Adams:
Parc Photography:
Landscapes by Elizabeth Carmel:
Vincent Laforet:
Joel Sartore:
Steve Winter:
Steve McCurry:
James Nachtwey:
Bob Atkin's Canon resources:
Kalyan Varma photography:
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A bit about lenses.
Hello again, I was asked over the weekend for some advice on which lenses to buy and if I would review a few. So I will share with you a bit of what I personally think would be good starting lenses.
I use Canon cameras and always have and so can only give my advice on these lenses but I am sure other manufacturers have very similar lenses.
First off I would say that in my humble opinion the lens is more important than the camera it is attached to. Always buy the most expensive lens you can afford.
Now I am aware not everybody can justify throwing loads of money at lenses and your camera probably came with a kit lens. The best thing you can do is to trade that kit lens in straight away for something better.
Here are a few choices that I would certainly consider in the mid price range.
The nifty fifty 50mm f1.8, This is pretty much a given for anybody really. About £90.00 new £50.00 -£60.00 this is a fast lens, by fast I am referring to the f-stop of 1.8 meaning you can take photographs in difficult low light levels and you can get quite creative with very shallow depth of field it can achieve. With the crop factor of none pro camera bodies this lens is actually around a 75mm lens in old money making it a perfect lens for portraits.
For a general purpose zoom lens I use a 17-85mm f4-5.6 macro lens. Weighing in at around £340.00 it is not cheap but it is Image stabilised and the macro function works well. The f-stops are the smallest at either end of the zoom range so you can achieve f4 at the widest point and f5.6 on full zoom. Obviously you can use bigger f-stops. This lens pretty much lives on my camera and really is a lovely piece of glass covering a zoom range that I feel is more than enough for most general photography from landscapes to portraits and for getting that bit closer on distant subjects.
If you are wanting to get that bit closer then a larger zoom lens is going to be on the shopping list. I use a 100-400 IS L at £1200.00+ but really for most people this kind of expenditure isn’t necessary,
A 70-300mm f4-5.6 is probably going to be more than adequate for most needs and the £390.00 price tag is a bit more user friendly.
Whilst some of the lenses mentioned above are probably around the same price as a prosumer body I feel that they really are worth the money. You really do get what you pay for with lenses.
I hope this little guide has been of help Lou, lol :)
Wednesday, 19 March 2014
Shutter Speed.
Shutter speed.
Sorry for the delay in writing this bit up, been sidetracked lol. Ok so how does shutter speed affect your photography.
In photography, shutter speed or exposure time is the length of time a camera's shutter is open when taking a photograph. The amount of light that reaches the film or image sensor is proportional to the exposure time.
Sometimes people have asked me why their photographs are never quite sharp or are always a little blurry.
Sometimes this is due to incorrect shutter speed, using a shutter speed that is too slow.
As a general rule of thumb you should use a shutter speed that is equal to the focal length of the lens, E.G. 100mm lens would require a shutter speed of 1/100th of a second minimum, whilst a 400mm lens would require 1/400th minimum to prevent blurry pictures.
Image stabilised lenses allow for lower speeds to be used but this is just a general rule of thumb.
Shutter speed works in conjunction with aperture and iso to give you your exposure value or EV. As I explained in the previous posts about the aperture and iso they effect one another in a linear manner, as one value goes up or down then the other values also change to give the correct EV.
Changing your shutter speed can be useful for things like sports photography or photographs of fast moving objects, using a fast shutter speed to freeze the motion.
Other times a slow shutter speed can be used (as well as a tripod) to capture flowing water in a motion blur etc.
Usually a shutter speed of around 1 or 2 seconds is needed and a good sturdy tripod for this type of shot.
Well that's the three basics of exposure covered, any questions please feel free to drop me a message or on the blog.
Happy snapping :)
Tuesday, 4 March 2014
Understanding ISO/ASA
What is this ISO and ASA stuff that I can see on camera’s and film boxes etc and how does it affect my photography?
Well quite simply ASA stands for American Standards Association and ISO stands for International Standards Organisation.
It is a method of standardising film speed or digital sensor reactivity to light.
The method of measuring them is different but from our point of view they are effectively the same. 100 ASA is the film equivalent of 100 ISO.
What it all boils down to is the sensitivity to light of film or your camera sensor.
If you are taking photographs in very light daylight settings with few shadows you will be able to use a low ISO/ASA setting whilst maintaining a relatively high shutter speed so that you do not need to use a tripod.
If you are taking photographs in dark situation, dim light shadows night time etc, to maintain a shutter speed that does not require long exposures on tripods etc you will need a high ISO/ASA rating.
Seems simple enough but there is a trade off for using the higher settings. The higher ISO/ASA settings introduce what is called noise in digital images or grain if you are using film.
This can be used in a creative manner at times but for the most part it is an unwanted necessity.
There is software that can help reduce the effect on digital images post processing but I find it better to keep it as clean as possible in camera.
Modern DSLR camera sensors are getting very good at handling noise and I have personally seen a big difference in the years I have been using digital cameras.
Below are a few 100% crops taken at different ISO levels using a mid range DSLR camera the Canon EOS 7D.
The top image was taken at 100 ISO next 800 ISO and the bottom image was taken at 12800
ISO/ASA is the second part of learning about exposure and if we look back to the previous post about aperture we can see how they can effect each other.
If you up the ISO/ASA then it makes the sensor/film more sensitive, therefore we can lower the aperture size (select a bigger fstop) to maintain a larger depth of field at any given shutter speed.
If you are struggling to grasp this re read the sentence and go back to read how apertures work. The most confusing thing is the way the bigger the fstop the smaller the hole in the lens but eventually you will remember this automatically ;)
The next installment we will deal with the final part of the exposure triangle so we can put it all together and hopefully I will have written it all in a manner everybody understands instead of how many books and articles write. lol
Cheers Happy Shooting
Saturday, 1 March 2014
Understanding depth of field DOF.(Aperture)
Understanding depth of field.
Ok, so what exactly is depth of field and how do we use it and manipulate it to get better photographic results.
Below are three images taken using different aperture settings on the camera.
The aperture is the size of the hole that the light travels through in the lens to hit the film/sensor. These holes are measured in f-stops.
From left to right the aperture settings were
f5.6 at 1/20th of a second
f11 at ¼ of a second
f22 at 1 second.
The camera was focused on the rock behind the shell. As you can see as the f stop number increases the DOF also increases but here’s the catch.
If we look at the numbers again the smaller the f stop the shorter the exposure time. This is because the smaller the f stop the larger the hole or aperture is that lets the light in. This is the offset between shutter speed and aperture.
So a large fstop number is actually a smaller hole but you will get a greater DOF.
Now when you set your aperture on your camera you will not see the DOF change as for large fstop numbers the hole would be so small you would hardly be able to see the image. The camera stops the lens down to the required aperture a fraction of a second before the photograph is taken.
Some old film cameras had a DOF preview button which would stop the lens down without taking a photograph but I don’t think many digital cameras have this facility.
The following is an example of a photograph taken with a shallow depth of field, f5.6 | http://gbcfineartprints.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/ | robots: classic
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All art forms have their techniques, which should be learnt, but photography is probably unique in the amount of technical expertise that is required to achieve good results. Some of this technique involves the use of additional equipment, such as flash, strobes and filters, but before any of this equipment is used, the basics must first be mastered. Despite the obvious differences, film and digital photography have much in common and while the method of capture has changed, the terminology is equally applicable, even the ISO or ASA.
Film and Sensor Sensitivity
Red Grouse
In the days of film, film was categorised by its American Standards Authority (ASA) sensitivity, which later was reclassified by the International Standards Organisation (ISO); it is this latter designation that has been passed on to the digital age. It was often referred to as the speed of the film, because the higher ISO ratings allowed higher shutter speeds to capture faster motion. The slowest film in general use was ISO 25, but the most commonly used film was ISO 100, which was ideal for everyday use in a variety of conditions. Digital cameras typically start at ISO 100 or ISO 200 and some can go as high as ISO 12,800, something that was unheard of in the days of film, although some slide film could be “pushed” quite high, as much as two stops above its rated ISO in some films. The amount of noise (assuming equal noise reduction algorithms) is dependent on sensor pixel density. The more pixels in a given area, the greater the resolution, but the greater the noise characteristics. The smaller sensor size of compact cameras, is therefore more likely to produce high levels of noise, due to higher pixel density, when compared to DSLR cameras with the same megapixel resolution.
Each time the ISO doubles, it lets in twice as much light and is the equivalent to a full stop by that definition. However, higher speed films tended to have larger grains, giving a grainier appearance in the resultant prints. Likewise, increasing the ISO of a digital sensor increases the noise that is present. The combination of increased noise and higher levels of noise reduction, either in camera or in post production can soften the detail in an image. The amount to which this matters, depends on the subject matter, the more detail there is in an image, the more important it is to preserve the detail. An example would be the fine textures in bird feathers, where detail is vital.
The aperture is measured as a function of the focal length of the lens; it is inversely proportional, so is usually defined by f/x, where f is the focal length and x is a number which represents the aperture size. Because it is an inverse, increasing the f number actually decreases the size of the aperture, so f/2.8 is wider than f/5.6. Aperture has a very important effect on the image and when used correctly, can be the make or break of an image. It can also be used to good creative effect. Each full stop allows twice the amount of light in as the previous aperture. Many modern cameras can be adjusted by a third of a stop. The full stops most commonly encountered are f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16 and f/22. There are narrower and wider apertures, but they are only available on certain lenses.
The size of the aperture has a big effect on the depth of field, this is the amount of the image that is in sharp focus, from the foreground to the background. A narrow depth of field results in a very small amount of the image being in sharp focus, while a deep depth of field results in most of the image being in sharp focus.
Wide apertures (such as f/2.8) are very good for portrait and wildlife photography. This is because they result in a narrow depth of field, which throws the background out of focus, helping to isolate the subject from an otherwise distracting background. Conversely, narrow apertures, such as f/16 result in a deep depth of field, which is an effect that is needed in landscape and architectural photography, so that as much of the image as possible is in focus.
Caution should be exercised though. Lenses are generally less sharp, especially at the corners, at their widest aperture, so often it is better to “stop down”. This is the practice of closing the aperture slightly. At the other end of the scale, with narrow apertures, you start to see the physical limitation called diffraction, this is where the light is bent as it passes through a narrow aperture and is a function of physics and not the lens. The resultant side effect of diffraction is again image softness. Some lenses start to exhibit the effects of diffraction earlier than others and natively sharp lenses are still able to produce sharp images at apertures affected on other lenses. Generally, diffraction sets in from around f/11, but it isn’t usually until beyond f/16, where the effects start to visibly affect sharpness. Sometimes, a scene is so expansive, that a very deep depth of field from a narrow aperture counteracts the diffraction to a great enough degree to make it worthwhile, but it is best not to go any narrower than f/16 unless absolutely necessary.
Just to complicate matters further, it isn’t just aperture size that affects the depth of field. Sensor size also has a role to play, the larger the sensor, the narrower the apparent depth of field for the same field of view (because you have to get closer ot the subject with larger sensor cameras). Compact cameras have a much deeper depth of field for a given field of view, which makes it much harder to produce background blur, but does make keeping the whole landscape in focus easier. At the other end of the scale, full frame cameras (cameras with a sensor size equivalent to traditional 35mm film) have a much narrower depth of field, so much more care needs to be taken when preparing landscape shots. So-called cropped sensor DSLR cameras are somewhere in the middle, as they have a smaller sensor than full frame, but a much larger one than compacts. In addition, lens focal length is important, the longer the focal length of a lens, the narrower the apparent depth of field, as the increased focal length compresses the scene, making it easier to throw the background out of focus. Just to muddy the waters, if you set three cameras at the same point with the same focal length lens (i.e. a compact, a crop sensor DSLR and a full frame DSLR), then the full frame actually has the greatest depth of field in reality.
Shutterspeed controls the speed at which the shutter flips up and down, letting light onto the film or sensor. The longer the shutterspeed, the greater the amount of light that enters the sensor or film. Each full stop shutterspeed allows twice as much light as the next fastest. Like aperture, modern cameras are usually able to be adjusted by a third of a stop. Examples of full stops include 1/15 sec, 1/30 sec, 1/60 sec, 1/125 sec, 1/250 sec and so on. As can be seen, it is much easier to predict the effect on light, just by looking, than with the aperture. For example, 1/250 sec is twice the shutterspeed as 1/125 sec, so therefore will let in half the light. Faster shutter speeds allow the capture of fast motion, so are ideal for sports and wildlife. Slow shutterspeeds allow for motion blur, so are ideal for creating the silky effects of water in some landscapes.
Putting it all Together
Loch Pootiel near Meanish Pier
The key to a good photograph though, is to get all the different aspects right and to do that, you need to understand how they interact. To get the right exposure, you need to get adequate light into the camera and it is how you control the different aspects, that determines the exposure. If you increase the shutterspeed by a full stop, you are halving the amount of light, therefore to compensate, you must either open the aperture by a full stop or increase the ISO. So for example, if you change the shutterspeed from 1/125 sec to 1/250 sec, you must open the aperture from f/5.6 to f/4 or increase the ISO from 100 to 200. Likewise, if you close the aperture from f/8 to f/11 to get more depth of field, you must decrease the shutterspeed, say from 1/30 sec to 1/15 sec or increase the ISO. It all sounds pretty complicated and it is to a degree, but the key is to practice; eventually it all comes together. Also, there are ways you can reduce the amount you have to think about each time, by using either aperture (Av) or shutter priority (Tv). By using these modes, you can set the camera, so that only one of either the aperture or shutterspeed respectively is varied by you. In aperture priority mode, you control the aperture and the camera adjusts the shutterspeed accordingly, if you need a faster shutterspeed, you can increase the ISO. The same principle applies with shutter priority. The more you practice, the easier it is to remember and eventually deliberately change things to get different effects, adding creativity. You’ll make mistakes to start with, probably alot of them, but it will come and remember, even the most seasoned of photographers make mistakes, they just don’t show them to people.
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} | 1,992 | I am a beginner in photography and I don't have the right understanding for some things. As I understand, with the ISO the camera is more or less sensitive light, with a darker image, a higher ISO (Also changes the noise in the image)
Then we have aperture and shutter speed. More aperture, more light (and changes the deep perception) and more shutter speed, less light (also captures better the movement)
Can we not change shutter speed and aperture to capture better photos with different light, instead of the ISO? If its dark, we can make a wider aperture and/or change the shutter speed, if there is too much light we can close it and make the shutter faster
Why the ISO then? Is it only for the cases that we want an specific aperture for an specific deep perception? Or because with long time shutter speed we need something to make it the camera stable and not be blurry? Don't we add noise increasing the ISO? What am I missing?
The Question: Why use ISO instead of Aperture and Shutter speed?
• 1
Well there are reasons your aperture can not be too large or small, and exposure too long or short. Adjusting ISO gives you more flexibility. – user3528438 Sep 28 '17 at 20:03
• I believe history is a relevant factor as well. With any given film, ISO is fixed, so if you want to change ISO speed, you need to choose a different film, which would be a different chemistry and bring along other differences as well. Only in the digital era has ISO become adjustable with clearly defined, often irrelevant side effects (noise). In this context, it's natural to think about ISO differently than shutter speed and aperture. – Reid Sep 29 '17 at 14:10
All three have different uses and different .
- by closing your aperture you're increasing depth of field and sacrificing light
- by opening your aperture you're decreasing depth of field, blurring the background and gathering more light
Shutter speed
- using faster speed you can freeze subject motion and camera shake (if any), but you're decreasing amount of light your sensor receives
- using longer speed you usually make scenes dreamy, with blurred motion and you're prone camera shake. You also increase amount of gathered light.
- by using higher iso you're increasing gain, which allows you to shoot with faster shutter speeds or smaller apertures, while sacrificing image quality (depends on the sensor, to some extent it's usually not visible) and increasing noise, because you're not getting more light, you're just amplifying the signal. It's similar to what happens to sound when you crank up the volume - it gets too distorted if you turn the knob too much
Let's say you want to shoot with high shutter speed (e.g. 1/400) to freeze motion and have a fairly small aperture like f/16, but it's getting dark. You can only use higher ISO to match these requirements. To what extent this will be possible depends on the used sensor. Some are way too noisy at 800-1600, so that can limit your ability to capture the image you want. If you have a better low light performing sensor (like in some full frame camera), you can easily shoot at 3200-6400 ISO and still get acceptable image quality with barely any noise.
The best rule about ISO is usually this: shoot with the lowest possible ISO to get the image you want.
• 1
So whe only change the ISO when we really need specific settings on the aperture and the shutter speed. Thanks for the answer! – Ivan Sep 28 '17 at 14:45
• Astrophotography would be one place where you're likely to have to change the ISO. Depending on where you are, and your camera settings, there's a maximum amount of time that you could open your shutter without turning a single star into star streaks. So if you want your final image to have a single star, and say your shutter is limited to around 8 seconds, and you're at wide-open aperture, then you're forced to bump ISO to get the exposure you want. – Calyth Sep 28 '17 at 17:25
• @Calyth For anything other than star trails (which typically involve wide angle lenses and hour + exposures) planets (you want something more like high speed video here) or the most casual use; astrophotographers deal with very faint objects by taking lots of short exposures and stacking them in post-processing. I've only ever done it with imaging setups that someone else configured but believe you'd want to use a low ISO. The dedicated astrocam I used in school ~15 years ago operated such that its RAW data was an approximate count of the number of photons each pixel detected. – Dan Neely Sep 28 '17 at 18:33
• Oh cool. TIL :) – Calyth Sep 28 '17 at 18:34
• Thanks for this explanation. I come from a film background, where ISO speed actually meant something concrete (more or less). ISO for digital cameras didn't make sense until now. – Pete Becker Sep 28 '17 at 20:51
You should use aperture and shutter speed to get the correct exposure based on how you want the photo to look (aperture for depth of field if it’s important, shutter speed if capturing or freezing movement is important). Use the lowest ISO setting you can, only increasing it if you still can’t get the correct exposure within the limits of the other settings.
It is quite a common situation to be in where you have set your aperture to the widest setting possible, and you have set your shutter speed to the slowest setting that allows you to capture a shot without blur, and the scene is still too dark to get a good exposure without increasing your ISO significantly.
When you are hand-holding a camera, you can't use too slow a shutter speed before your photo will be ruined by camera movement during the exposure. An often-repeated rule-of-thumb is that you shouldn't use a shutter speed slower than (1 / LensFocalLength). (It's just a guideline, and won't work for every scenario.)
Maybe you are taking photos of moving subjects in a dark environment - you will need a faster shutter speed, so being able to compensate with a higher ISO is necessary.
Maybe you need to capture deep depth-of-field in a dark scene - you will need a smaller aperture, so it helps to be able to compensate with a higher ISO.
Basically, there are lots of scenarios where you need to make use of a high ISO setting to get a good exposure, because of other constraints on the aperture and shutter speed.
ISO (International Standards Origination) is a numeric value that specifies how sensitive the imaging chip is. As a rule-of-thumb we generally choose a low ISO setting because image quality gradually deteriorates as we go to higher and higher setting. If we choose a super high setting the image likely will show some granularity. This is akin to what is called “grain” in conventional film photography. The granularity seen in digital photography is called “noise”. It is analogous to static in an audio system. As the ISO is turned up, the image signal is amplified. This amplifies the good signal however immingled is some bad signal that also gets amplified. Modern digitals sport noise suppression so likely you will not see any ill effect except when the ISO is set very high.
As to exposure: Good exposure is the key to this kingdom. Too much exposure and the resulting image will be washed out (too light or even white). Too little exposure and the results are dark, perhaps even black.
Now the old box cameras of past (Kodak Browne and similar), sported no user settings. The camera was pre-set to a small aperture diameter and the shutter was set just fast enough to allow the camera to be hand-held. The focus distance is also pre-set for these cameras. Because the aperture setting is tiny (as to diameter), the zone of acceptable focus called depth-of-field is from about 4 feet to as far as the eye can see (infinity symbol ∞). Billions and billions of acceptable pictures were taken but picture taking opportunities were restricted to bright sunlit vistas.
To expand the picture taking opportunities to twilight or indoor etc. it is necessary to provide the user with options that allow more light into the camera during the exposure. Now we are talking, adjustable aperture diameter. Because the lens acts like a funnel, we can open up its diameter to allow more light to enter. This is a wonderful approach however; larger working diameters deliver a shallower zone of depth-of-field. Once we open up the aperture, we are forced to provide the user a focusing apparatus. In other words, adjustable aperture expands the range of picture taking but now we must focus the camera.
The old Brownie’s shutter was pre-set to about 1/25 of a second. At this shutter speed, lots of light plays on the film (now digital image sensor). Now you need to know that the exposing light accumulates all the time the shutter is open. A long exposure time accrues light. The downside is, we must hold the camera super steady and we must tell our subjects not to move. Once we provide an adjustable faster shutter, we need not be too concerned with camera of subject motion. This is a give and take. A fast shutter reduces light accumulation. The countermeasure is to open up the lens aperture. The added light gathering now affords a fast shutter.
What I am trying to tell you is: We have at our disposal, adjustments that allow us to expand the picture taking opportunity. We have a. ISO b. shutter speed c. aperture. We even have a fourth solution, we can supply artificial light. The idea is to expand the picture taking opportunity. The thing you need to know is, all of these adjustments are intertwined. We can adjusts just one or two at a time or all.
You need to study the mechanism of exposure. In the vascular of photography, this subject is called the “exposure triangle” a. ISO b. shutter speed c. aperture. If all this is too confusing, you need only to set your new camera on automatic. In this mode, the camera will make all these selections for you and the outcome will be OK. If you are serious about your new hobby, then you need to study the “exposure triangle”.
Generally for two reasons, which can be linked together.
1. You don't want to open the aperture because you want to maintain a certain (perceived) depth of field - most often in landscape type of photos.
2. You can't afford to lower the shutter speed (because you've hit either the limit at which you can hand hold the camera and have an acceptably sharp result or because you have moving subjects).
Mind you, some cameras will favour a higher ISO setting (as opposed to a lower setting that would result in an underexposed shot). Other cameras would give you about the same result for a properly exposed image at a higher ISO and an underexposed image that's later "pushed" up - these are commonly referred to as "ISOless" cameras, this is usually mentioned in reviews.
Yes, you can, but you might not want to. Opening the aperture reduces depth of field, which you might not want. Or, you might already be shooting at the widest aperture available and still not have enough light to get a good exposure at your chosen shutter speed. You can choose to add light (e.g. with a flash), or you could settle for a longer exposure time, or you can bump up the ISO.
Why the ISO then?
It's just another exposure parameter with its own set of tradeoffs. You can increase exposure by increasing exposure duration or using a larger aperture or adding light or increasing sensitivity. Which option(s) you choose depend on how you want to affect the image.
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Introduction to Photography: Exposure
SF apartment
I purchased a DSLR earlier this week, and I’ve been having a blast with it as you can see by all the pictures I’ve been taking around San Francisco.
Since I am a baby photographer, I’m learning all the basics and figured it would be a good idea to jot down the important bits that I learn so that I can teach myself in my own voice when I need a refresher. If you see anything off or just flat out wrong, I’d love to know.
Every “introduction to photography” article that I’ve found through the Googles starts by going over exposure. Exposure is how much the light gets through to the image sensor, which is the component of the camera that converts light into the electrical signals that make up the photograph. Basically, exposure determines how bright or how dark your photograph is.
When thinking about exposure, you need to keep three major factors in mind: aperture, shutter speed, and ISO sensitivity.
The aperture is the hole that the light passes through right after going through the lens. You can adjust how large or small the opening is, and that in turn will let in more or less light. It’s expressed as an “f-number” such as f/4, f/5.6, f/8, etc. The important thing to keep in mind is that the higher the f-number (e.g. f/32), the smaller the aperture, which means that less light will get through. The lower the f-number (e.g f/1.4), the larger the aperture, which means more light will get through.
Aperture also determines depth of field, which is how much distance in front of and behind the focus point appears to be in focus. A small aperture (high f-number) will produce a long depth of field which will make most of your photograph appear to be in focus. This is great for landscape shots. A high aperture (low f-number) will produce a short depth of field which will make parts of the photograph outside of the focus point appear out of focus. This is great for producing a blurry background when you’re taking a portrait shot.
Shutter speed
Unlike aperture with its fancy f-numbers, shutter speed is expressed in seconds and is easy to understand. The shutter speed controls how long the shutter in front of the image sensor is kept open, which affects how much the image sensor is exposed to light. The slower the shutter speed (e.g. 1/6 of a second), the more light gets through. The faster the shutter speed (e.g. 1/250 of a second), the less light gets through. Pretty simple.
Shutter speed also controls how motion is captured in the photograph. If you have a fast shutter speed, any movement will be frozen in time. On the other hand, you might actually want to suggest a lot of movement using motion blur in which case you should use a slower shutter speed.
ISO sensitivity
ISO sensitivity measures how well the camera is able to capture light. ISO determines how much the electrical signals are amplified. Doubling ISO will double the electrical signals which means you’ll need half the light needed to get the same exposure. For example, if you need to double your shutter speed and want to keep the same aperture, you can double your ISO number to get the same exposure.
Be warned though, because a high ISO will add a lot of noise into your photograph which you don’t want. You want to use a higher ISO only when you need to in dark places and stick to lower ones otherwise.
Exposure is controlled by aperture, shutter speed, and ISO sensitivity.
Small aperture (high f-number) = less light + long depth of field Large aperture (low f-number) = more light + short depth of field
Faster shutter speed = less light + less movement Slower shutter speed = more light + more movement
Low ISO = less light + less noise High ISO = more light + more noise | http://dskang.com/photography-intro/ | robots: classic
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Understanding Exposure Part 1: Moving your camera into Manual mode
Modern cameras with their built-in modes for every anticipated photo situation from macro to landscapes have actually made it more difficult to learn camera basics by separating the photographer from the essential elements that make up a correct exposure. The purpose of this lesson is to break down camera exposure into three basic elements -- what I will be calling "speeds" -- and show how each of these elements relates to the others. From there you will find that it is easy to determine the correct exposure in any situation and that mastering control over exposure is what will provide you with creative control over your photograph.
Most cameras meters will read a scene and try to average it out to a neutral exposure. In situations like this the photographer must determine in advance what is important and adjust the exposure to obtain the proper results. Here, setting the exposure for the face of the statue rendered the deep background shadows a dramatic black in contrast.
Only a knowledge of camera exposure will allow a photographer to capture a scene such as this. The interior of the barn shows detail while the exterior if over-exposed. Knowing where to place the exposure made all the difference in this image.
The Three Speeds:
There are three elements that affect the amount of light hitting the camera sensor. We will refer to each of these elements as a "speed" in the sense that each controls in its own way how fast light is deposited on the sensor. The three speeds are: shutter speed, lens speed, and sensor sensitivity speed. the three need to be in harmony to produce a correct exposure. Sounds simple so far but gains in complexity as you realize that you can in fact make changes to any of these speeds (usually for aesthetic reasons) so long as you make an equal and opposite change in any of the other two speeds. Let's look at each speed separately and then see how they are related.
Shutter Speed:
Shutter speed is usually the easiest to understand. It simply refers to how long the camera shutter is open to allow light to pass on to the sensor. This is measured in seconds and fractions of seconds. The typical increments of shutter speeds starting from one second are:
1 second, 1/2 second, 1/4 second, 1/8 second, 1/15 second, 1/30 second, 1/60 second, 1/125 second, 1/250 second, 1/500 second, 1/1000 second, 1/2000 second.
Shutter speeds exist above and below these increments, but you will notice a trend in this list. Each shutter speed halves or doubles the speed of the shutter speed immediately before or after it. For instance, 1/125 second is twice as fast as 1/60 second and twice as slow as 1/250 second. Looked at another way, 1/125 second allows half the amount of light to pass as 1/60 second and twice the light as 1/250 second.
A very slow shutter speed of 1/4 second was necessary to allow the running water to blur. To keep the rest of the scene in sharp focus it was necessary to have the camera on a tripod.
In the past, full increments were the only shutter speeds cameras had. The advent of electronic shutters has allowed manufactures to create fractional shutter speeds. Adding to the confusing, the user can actually set the fractional increment in a menu option on most DSLR cameras. For now, it is important to grasp the basic shutter speed units listed above. The fact that they can be further divided into 1/3rd or 1/2 units won't alter the principle of inter-related speeds.
With a hand-held camera the photograph panned the camera from left to right as the taxi went by. This created some blur in the scene of New York's Times Square that accentuates the excitement of night time in the city.
There are, of course, reasons why you would want to select one shutter speed over another. Typically these reasons have to do with selecting a fast shutter speed that will freeze a particular action, or selecting a slow shutter speed because it will allow you to close the lens aperture further to increase the area of focus, called "depth of field". We will cover these creative reasons in more detail individually in a future lesson. For now, let us stick to how the three speeds are related on one another.
Lens Speed:
The speed of a lens is controlled by its aperture, and reflected in a number called the "f/stop". The aperture is a moving diaphragm inside the lens that changes in size. As it opens, it allows more light to pass through the lens to the sensor. As it closes, it cuts the amount of light passing on to the sensor. Here is a list of the common f/stop apertures found on camera lenses:
In situations where you want a very shallow depth of focus, the lens aperture needs to be very fast (i.e. open). For this photo an aperture of f/2 was used on a 135mm telephoto lens to pinpoint the focus on the shell while the little girl's face was completely out of focus.
As with shutter speeds, there are further aperture openings beyond this list, but this is the practical limit. Like shutter speeds, these apertures also half and double each other so that an aperture of f/4 allows half as much light to pass as f/2.8, and twice as much light at f/5.6. Also like shutter speeds, apertures can be further broken down into thirds or half units by setting the camera menu. For now we will stick to the full one-stop increments as an easier way of understanding exposure relationships.
Selecting a very slow lens aperture of f/16 and maintaining the native 100 ISO of the camera contributed to the overall sharpness and depth of focus in this image of dunes at Death Valley. Knowing this going in the photographer realized that the camera needed to be on a tripod to compensate for the very slow shutter speed of 1/15 second.
Sensor Speed:
Sensor speed is the speed at which the sensor captures light. It is measured in ISO. Most modern sensors have a base ISO of 100 or 200. From there sensors increase in speed in increments similar to the other two speeds, namely by doubling the light sensitivity of the prior speed as follows:
Each unit doubles or halves the nearest unit. For instance, ISO 400 has the sensor capturing light twice as fast as ISO 200 and half as fast as ISO 800. You might ask why not go for the highest available ISO? The answer is that any increase or decrease in ISO speed from the camera base unit (referred to as the "native ISO") degrades image quality by introducing noise (similar to "grain" in film) , and loses detail. So increasing (or decreasing) ISO speed from the norm is a trade off.
Many locations to not allow a tripod. This photograph of the interior of a mosque in Istanbul was achieved by increasing the ISO of the camera sensor to 1600 and selecting a fast, open aperture on the lens that allowed the camera shutter speed to be set high enough for it to be hand held.
As with the other speeds, ISO can be further broken down in 1/3rd increments. (e.g. 200, 250, 320, 400, etc.) For the purposes of our discussion, let's not confuse the issue and stick to the full units in all speeds.
Putting it all together:
A light meter is used to measure the amount of light falling on a scene. Modern DSLR cameras have a light meter built into them. Professional photographers will usually also have a hand held separate light meter to determine accurate readings of a scene and to record the differences between the shadows and highlights. For now, let's just work with the built-in camera meter.
When you look through the viewfinder of your DSLR you should be able to see the light meter scale. If you don't know where it is, consult your camera manual. Most scales have a center mark, usually a line, that marks when the exposure is correct. There should also be a plus (+) and minus (-) indicator on either side of the center line. In between there are usually marked scale increments. These may be given in thirds, halves, of full speed increments.
The correct exposure for any scene is measured by the central indicator of the exposure scale. There should also be a second moving element -- a line, dot, or light -- that indicates the manual setting of the camera as it relates to the correct exposure. Simply put, when your camera is in manual (M) mode and the center of the exposure scale is lined up with the moving element of the scale the camera is set for a correct exposure. If the moving part of the scale is on the minus (-) side of the scale, your camera setting is under-exposed and the picture will be too dark. If the moving part of the scale is on the plus (+) side of the scale, your picture is over-exposed and will come out too bright.
Deciding to have the cathedral in silhouette and the foreground lamp out of focus were creative decisions the photographer used in determining the exposure for this scene.
How to achieve a correct exposure in manual mode:
With your camera in manual (M) mode, you first need to select an ISO setting. This is usually done from either a menu option of a button or dial marked "ISO" on the camera body. Sensor speed (ISO) degrades image quality as it increases so you want to keep it set as close to the native ISO of the camera as you can. Circumstances will dictate what you can do. On a normal, sunny, or lightly overcast day, it is usually best to leave it at the native ISO setting of 100 or 200. Indoors or on an overcast day or deep shadow area, you will want to increase ISO. For this a range of ISO 400-800 will do the trick -- keeping in mind that lower is better. In very dimly lit situations, such as at night, in a darkened room or club, you will need to boost the ISO towards its maximum level - a range between 800-6400. As a rule of thumb, try not to boost the ISO beyond 1600. On most cameras image quality deteriorates dramatically above that.
Once you have set your ISO, open your lens aperture (f/stop speed) to its maximum opening. Next change the shutter speed until you zero out the exposure scale that is in your camera on the camera display. By "zero out", I mean move the needle, or whatever mark your camera has, until it coincides with the middle setting of the exposure scale. At this point, you have achieved a correct exposure setting . The next thing to understand is that there can be more than one correct exposure. Understanding this and how to make exposure changes is at the heart of why you would want to use the manual setting at all.
Relationship of the three speeds:
We have already seen that each of the three speeds -- shutter speed, lens speed (f/stop), and sensor speed (ISO) -- half and double the increment above and below it. That means that all three speeds are related in the same way. If you make a change in any one of them, you can equalize that change with a move in the opposite direction of one of the other speeds. Let's look at an example.
Suppose you have a correct exposure of ISO 200, f/2.8, and 1/500 second, but instead of f/2.8, you want to have an aperture of f/5.6. f/5.6 is two steps away from f/2.8 (f/2.8 to f/4 to f/5.6). To compensate for that move you have to make an opposite move with one of the other speeds. For instance, you could decrease the shutter speed to 1/125 second (1/500 to 1/250 to 1/125 equals a move of two increments). Alternatively, you could increase the sensor speed from ISO 200 to ISO 800 (ISO 200 to ISO 400 to ISO 800 is two speed increments). Instead of either of these moves you could have decided to make one incremental change in the ISO from ISO 200 to ISO 400, and one shutter speed change from 1/500 second to 1/250 second. That also would have equaled a two stop speed change to equalize the 2-stop change you made to the aperture.
Most cameras set to automatic would darken this image and yield the background more in focus. Creative control over the aperture and knowledge of exposure was necessary to arrive at a light and airy image with a soft, out-of-focus background.
The question all this raises is "why" you would want to have control over your exposure speed settings. The answer to this is that selection of aperture, shutter speed, and to some extent ISO is a creative decision. There are specific reasons why you would want a slow or fast shutter speed or why you would want to select an open or closed aperture. There are practical reasons also.
Sometimes exposure alone can completely alter the outcome and interpretation of the image. These two photos were taken within minutes of each other. Creative choices of exposure and lens choice made the difference. Each is a different way of seeing the same scene. Knowledge of exposure and the ability to change it resulted in varying interpretations.
Knowing when and why to veer off of the "correct" exposure is what creative photography is all about. The next three lessons will cover each of the three speeds in depth and explain the practical and creative potential of each.
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Lighting: Using a pop-up flash
Outdoor fill flash:
Indoor flash fill:
Slow synch flash:
Flash softening aides:
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} | 6,944 | Basic Exposure — The Four Camera Controls
Webmasters: Please link to this page; do not copy the contents to another URL. This allows readers to get the latest version and protects my copyright.
I wrote this back in 2008 for another website which no longer exists (in its original incarnation); I've finally gotten around to putting it here. There were originally some photos as examples which were lost; I'll recreate them and add them as I get opportunities.
There are four basic camera controls: ISO speed/sensitivity, Shutter Speed, Aperture and White Balance. Most cameras, even the bottom end ones, allow you access to at least some of those. Film cameras don't have white balance (the color balance is locked in by the manufacturer), but they do have the other three. The bottom tier (i.e. easiest) of cameras may allow you only limited options, but at least you have something to work with.
White balance is NOT part of exposure per se, but it's important so I'll give it its own section at the end.
The other three camera controls: Sensitivity, Shutter Speed and Aperture, all deal with exposure.
All FOUR controls affect image quality. Image quality and exposure are NOT the same thing. You can have an image that's beautifully exposed but blurry, or out of focus, or full of noise, or whatever.
For each camera control I'm going to discuss how it affects Exposure and how it affects Image Quality as separate issues.
A quick comment about the three controls which affect exposure: They are all interlocked. Think of exposure as being a Triangle where there are three equally weighted factors: Sensitivity, Shutter Speed and Aperture. If things are "balanced," as in you have a good exposure, then if you change ONE of those things, you have to change at least one other (or both) to bring it back into balance again.
The balancing act, and how each one affects the others, isn't difficult. It just takes some getting used to.
So first up we're going to discuss ISO speeds because that's the easiest one to understand.
ISO is typically called a speed, but really it's SENSITIVITY. It's how sensitive your film or your sensor is to light. The more sensitive, the less light you need to get something. Let's say that you're photographing a model's face. With something that's got a low ISO speed, you would need a lot more light than something with a high ISO speed to get the same result.
In your travels you may come across mentions of ASA speeds. ASA and ISO speeds are interchangable. The standards body that creates the standard and blesses the results changed, so the name changed. But ASA 100 is the same as ISO 100, and so on.
ISO speeds are given as whole numbers. Theoretically, and a century ago when film was not very sensitive to light, ISO speeds could be very low indeed. The original Kodachrome was ISO 10, then later ISO 25 (with a version that was ISO 64). On modern cameras, the lowest ISO you go is typically 100. If you buy film from a grocery or a department store, the slowest you can find is ISO 100. So for our purposes, we're going to start with ISO 100.
The higher the number, the "faster" the speed. That means the less light you need to get a given result. Thus, ISO 200 is faster than 100, and 400 is faster than both of those.
Modern cameras and film usually top off around 1600 or 3200. My Canon 40D goes up to 1600.
When film is created at the lab, it's "speed" is rated on the package. You buy a single speed of each roll you shoot, so you set your camera to whatever ISO speed the film says it is, and that's it. You forget it.
On digital cameras, however, you can play around with the ISO setting of your sensor (if your camera allows it). My camera, for instance, allows me to set it to 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600 or AUTO. Auto means that the camera sets the speed on its own, based on what it thinks is best. Most people leave their ISO settings to AUTO.
ISO Speed's Effect on Exposure
ISO speed is one point of the triangle, and if you change it, you affect the other two parts of the triangle. If you use a higher ISO speed, that means you need less light to get a result. Higher ISO means more sensitive.
ISO Speed's Effect on Image Quality
So you ask yourself, why not crank that sucker up all the way, then? If I can get results with less light, isn't that a good thing? Well, yes and no.
Think of ISO as SENSITIVITY, and think of it like a radio. You're listening to the radio and you pick up a weak station far away. It's very soft and there's a lot of static, so you turn the volume way up. It amplifies the sound of the station, but it also amplifies the static. The same thing for recordings: you amplify the hiss, hum, or other gremlin-made noises that are in the background.
On film, the higher the ISO, the larger the grain. Grain is the chemical structure that makes the image. When grain is small, the image looks smooth. When grain is big, the image looks like a sand-painting. The higher the ISO, the larger (in general) the grain.
On digital, ISO amplifies "noise," which shows up as kind of a gunky mottling of color. It's like getting a hard look at some people's skin in bright light: what looked smooth and even at a distance suddenly looks clumpy and uneven. The higher the ISO, the more the noise becomes apparent.
Here's are examples, taken this afternoon with my camera. It's not great but it does the job (I think it would be more obvious if I were shooting in dimmer light). One is called ISO 100 and the other is ISO 1600. Look at them side by side, and in particular, look at the clear part of the sky. The ISO 100 looks comparatively even and clean; the ISO 1600 has a mottling to it. You don't notice it so much on its own, but look at vs. the 100 side by side and it becomes apparent.
There are two schools of thought on how to set your ISO. School #1 says you should choose the lowest ISO you can get away with so you get the least noise. School #2 says you should use the highest you can get away with and still get good results, because the advantages (in most cases) oughtweigh the disadvantages.
Personally I tend to go for #1. I set the ISO as low as I can and still hand-hold my camera. If I have to go above 400, I start thinking about using a tripod or monopod. But I'm also a sharpness freak.
What you should do: If your camera allows you to set the ISO yourself: do it. Try photos at different ISO speeds and look at them. Determine the highest number you can use and still get good results.
So what do the numbers mean:
this is the hardest but it's still pretty easy, but you have to learn a concept in exposure called the STOP.
In photographic exposure, everything is about DOUBLES and HALVES. Remember Doubles and Halves. We double the amount of light, we halve the amount of light. Most steps up and down the scale in photography are done in Doubles and Halves.
ISO 100 is our base. It's the least sensitive. Imagine we were taking a photo of a gray wall and it took 1,200 units of light to expose properly (the picture looks the proper shade of gray): that's our baseline for this example.
ISO 200 is TWICE as sensitive as ISO 100. So for our above example, we would only need 600 units of light to get the same shade of gray recorded.
ISO 400 is TWICE as sensitive as ISO 200 (this is a geometric scale). It is, therefore, 4 times as sensitive as ISO 100. So at ISO 400, we only need 300 units of light to get our gray wall.
ISO 800 is TWICE as sensitive as ISO 400. That makes it 4 times as sensitive as ISO 200, and 8x as sensitive as ISO 100. We only need 150 units of light this time.
ISO 1600 is TWICE as sensitive as ISO 800, 4x as 800, 8x as 200, and 16x as ISO 100. We only need 75 units of light for our wall.
Do you see the progression here? Every time you double the number, you're doubling the sensitivity, or halving the amount of light you need to get the same result.
This works backward from 100 as well, if you're using slow film. ISO 50 is HALF as sensitive as ISO 100. ISO 25 is HALF as sensitive as 50, and 1/4th as sensitive as ISO 100.
Now you're going to learn a new word called a STOP. In photography, a STOP represents a doubling or halving of light.
ISO 200 is ONE STOP more sensitive than ISO 100. ISO 400 is TWO STOPS more sensitive than ISO 100. It is ONE STOP more sensitive than ISO 200. ISO 1600 is 4 stops more sensitive than ISO 100. It is three stops more sensitive than 200, two stops more sensitive than 400, and one stop more sensitive than 800.
The same works in reverse. ISO 25 is two stops slower than ISO 100. It is 6 stops slower than 1600. Count it out on your fingers if you don't believe me: 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600. Six stops.
Remember the concept of stops, because we'll be applying it to both the other exposure controls. 1 stop is DOUBLE or HALF the light of whatever it's being compared against.
And that's the basics of ISO speed/sensitivity.
Shutter speed is easy because it's analogous to the real world—it's easy to visualize and think about. I think you'll find it the easiest one to use. It also pays off, since you can prevent some problems from occurring if you use the right shutter speed.
All film cameras have shutters. Many digital cameras have shutters, but some simply mimic the effect with the sensor.
A shutter is like a door. The door opens and closes completely. When it's open, light can strike the film or the digital sensor. When it's closed, light cannot reach it. So a shutter spends most of its time CLOSED.
A shutter's open time is measured in seconds. A shutter can be open for 1 second, say. That's called it's speed. On most cameras you can choose a shutter speed: a fast speed is a fraction of a second. A slow speed is longer.
Digital cameras without physical shutters can mimic this by simply reading the sensor for the length of time that the shutter is "open."
Film cameras typically have shutter speeds that run from around 1 second to 1/1000th of a second. Some can go longer or shorter, but that's the general spread. Digital cameras tend to top off around 1/4000th, but theoretically their longest time can be anything until the battery dies.
So imagine you're looking at a screen at an image projected from the outside world. The shutter is permanently open, so you can see movement as life goes by.
Imagine that the shutter is closed, but the flicks open for 1/1000th of a second, and the image on the screen is recorded. Because 1/1000th of a second is such a short time, you don't see movement on the screen. There was very little time for subjects to change. So you get a very "sharp" or still image.
Image you wipe it clean and do the same thing at 1/10th of a second. If you're shooting a still life, there's no movement and the image looks fine. But if you're shooting someone walking by, you'd get some subject blur, because the image was changing during that 1/10th of a second. The blur might not be much, but it's there. If you did the same thing at 1 full second, the blur would be more obvious. At 5 seconds it would be even more obvious.
The faster the shutter speed, the more it can freeze the action. So if you're shooting something that doesn't move—like the grand canyon, or someone sitting still, you can use a lower shutter speed. If you want to freeze action, like a dog jumping up to grab a frisbee, you want to use a fast shutter speed.
Subject Blur vs. Camera Shake
The example above, the dog jumping up to get a frisbee, or people walking by, is an example of subject blur, because it's the subject that's moving and creating blur. But there's also camera shake, which means the camera itself was moving when the image was taken. Usually you want to avoid camera blur as much as possible.
Camera blur most often happens when you're hand-holding the camera and the shutter speed is too slow. I've attached an example: I shot this Maneki Neko cat hand-holding the camera for 2 seconds. The Neko wasn't moving: the blur is my inability to hold the camera still for 2 seconds.
You can generally tell the difference between subject blur and camera shake by looking at the entire photo: subject blur is where only moving objects are blurry; camera shake makes *everything* blurry.
How to Determine Your Best Shutter Speed for Hand-Holding
The rule of thumb for 35mm cameras is that the slowest shutter speed to use is the same as the focal length of your lens. If you're using a 50mm lens, you can safely hand-hold down to 1/60th. If you're shooting at 200mm, you want to use 1/250th. With digital cameras, because focal lengths don't really translate the same, and because some cameras have Image Stabilization—all bets are off.
The best thing to do is to set your camera on manual, and shoot a series of photos at different speeds, then look at the results and see what's the slowest speed you're personally capable of hand-holding. If you have a zoom lens, you want to do this once with the zoom all the way out, again with it all the way in, and maybe another time with the zoom in the middle.
Shutter Speed's Effect on Image Quality
Determines the amount of image "blur" due to motion of either the camera or the subject.
Shutter Speed's Effect on Exposure
Shutter speed is one of the points on the triangle, so it directly affects the exposure of the image.
Shutter Speed Progression and Stops
So if you read the post on ISO speeds, you remember the part about Stops, and doubles and halves. Same thing happens with shutter speeds. On film cameras, shutter speeds always progress in doubles and halves, or 1-stop increments. 1/125th of a second, 1/250th of a second, 1/500th, 1/1000th, 1/2000th, etc. Going backward: 1/125th, 1/60th, 1/30th, 1/15th, 1/8th, 1/4th, 1/2, 1 full second. Doubles and halves.
I attached an image of the dial of a Nikon F4. Ignoring X, B and T, it runs from 1/8000th of a second to 4 full seconds, in 1-stop increments.
Digital cameras sometimes get complicated because they can choose shutter speeds "between" those I listed above. My Canon 40D is set to go in 1/2 stop increments, which means the progression would go 1/30th, 1/45, 1/60, 1/90, 1/125, 1/180, 1/250, 1/375, 1/500, 1/750, 1/1000 and so on. (A lot of rounding occurs). But you see the progression, right? Every doubling is 1 full stop.
You can connect this on the triangle directly to the ISO speed mentioned earlier. Let's say we're taking a photo of a cat and we like the result. The camera is set at f/8, 1/60th at ISO 100. f/8 is the aperture and we're going to leave that alone: for this example it will always be set at f/8.
Remember that ISO requires less light as the speed goes up, and it goes up in 1-stop increments. So if I raise the ISO to 200, I only need half the light, or 1-stop less light. So if I set the shutter speed to let in half the amount of light (1-stop less!), then I'll get the same result. So at ISO 200, the shutter speed of 1/125th will give me the same exposure that I got at ISO 100 with 1/60th
It will also be the same as 1/500th at ISO 400, or 1/1000th at ISO 800, or 1/2000th at ISO 1600.
You can see where cranking the ISO up becomes valuable. If you're taking photos of your kid breaking a board with his foot at karate class, and you want to freeze the action, you want a fast shutter. If the light isn't that bright, then using a high ISO will get you the shutter speed you need.
Shutter speeds work on fractions of a second, so you shouldn't have much trouble figuring out the difference between them. 1/30th of a second is twice as long as 1/60th of a second—it lets in twice as much light. There's TIME for twice as much light to pass. It's very intuitive.
A lot of cameras (both film and digital) have a semi-automatic mode called SHUTTER PRIORITY or Shutter Preferred. If you have that, you should switch to it and try it out. What Shutter Priority does is it lets you set the shutter speed and the camera will choose the aperture for you (and it should warn you if you want to use a shutter speed that won't get you a good exposure no matter which aperture the camera picks). So that's a good way to play around and see how it works: you choose the shutter speed, and the camera matches the proper aperture. (and yes, Aperture Priority does the same thing except in reverse. You choose the aperture, it picks the complimentary shutter speed).
I'm going to break this aperture thing into two parts because it's big. ISO is kind of straightforward and easy, and shutter speeds are common sense. But aperture is kind of like the knight in chess—it behaves completely differently than anything else around, and it's tougher to explain.
An aperture is a hole, or something that light can pass through. On 19th century cameras it used to be a hole that was bored into a metal plate and dropped in between lens elements. The hole was called a "stop," like valve stops in pipes. Later on, the holes were replaced with a diaphram of metal blades that can be turned so that the hole gets larger or smaller as needed. Your eye has a diaphram (the iris) which does the same thing: it's small when it's bright outside, and it's large when it's relatively dark. This diaphram is used as a way of regulating the amount of light that strikes the film.
ISO speed: the sensitivity of the film or sensor to light
Shutter speed: the amount of time that light is allowed to strike the film or sensor
Aperture: a restriction on the amount of light that can pass through the lens
Apertures are "sized" in f/numbers, more often called f/stops.
So What the Hell Do the Numbers Mean?
The f/stop is the ratio of the diameter of the aperture vs. the focal length of the lens.
That never really meant anything to me until my dad got a big Dobsonian telescope and the numbers were easy to understand. His telescope has an 8-inch primary mirror. There's nothing that further restricts the light, so in this case the aperture is the same as the diameter of the lens itself: 8-inches.
The mirror is ground so that the focal length is 64-inches.
64 divided by 8 is 8. So that's an f/8 telescope.
If he had the mirror re-ground to a focal lenth of 88 inches, he'd have an f/11 telescope. If the mirror were reground to a focal length of 32-inches, it would be an f/4 telescope. If he swapped out the mirror and got a 12-inch with a focal length of 64 inches, it would be f/5.3
Same thing happens with cameras, except you're usually dealing with milimeters instead of inches. If you have a lens that's 50mm focal length and the diameter of the aperture is 25mm, you're at f/2. If you made the diaphram smaller, say 12.5mm across, then you'd be at f/4. At 6.25mm you'd be at f/8. At 3.125mm in diameter, you'd be at f/16. And so on.
I think that's easy to understand, but if your eyes are glazing over, you want to remember that as the f/numbers get larger, the aperture gets smaller. f/22 is smaller than f/16, which is smaller than f/11, and all of them are much, much smaller than f/1.4
So Why Are We Using This F/Stop System Instead of Diameters And F*** the Math?
You talk about f/stops because it's a ratio that's independent of the physical size of the lens. As far as exposure is concerned, f/8 is f/8 is f/8. f/8 is the same on a Ansel Adams's Cooke Triple-Convertable Apalant lens as it is on a 50mm Nikkor camera lens, as it is on a cheap-shit Holga.
Imagine you're in a photographer's pool and you're all shooting a photo of the same thing. You're holding your Nikon D40, and Weegee's ghost is next to you holding a 1940 Speed Graphic with a 150mm Zeiss Planatar. He's getting good exposures. You ask him what he's shooting, and he says ISO 100, 1/125th at f/11. YOU could set your camera to ISO 100, 1/125th of a second at f/11, and get the same result.
That's why you can use one camera's light meter to set your own, or you can use a hand-held meter to set yours. Or use yours to set someone else's. F/stops are the same regardless of the lens you're using, because you're dealing with a RATIO, not actual, hard numbers.
All you really need to remember, though, is that low numbers mean BIG apertures, and high numbers mean SMALL apertures.
The 1-Stop Progression
It used to be real easy: some time in the early 20th century, camera and lens makers kind of standardized on certain f/stops. Basically they all agreed that f/11 was the main guy. f/11 shows up on nearly any lens you'll find.
So remember the thing about doubles and halves of amounts of light? And how 1 stop difference is DOUBLE or HALF something else? That there's a scale that you can go up and down like whole notes of music?
Here's the basic ISO scale again: 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200
Here's the same thing for aperture: f/1.0, 1.4, 2.0, 2.8, 4.0, 5.6, 8.0, 11, 16, 22
The difference between each one of those numbers is 1 full stop. The difference between f/11 and f/8 is 1 stop. The difference between f/11 and f/22 is 2 stops. And so on.
The Triangle is Complete
So now you have the third part of the triangle. Each scale has full stop differences, and a stop is a stop is a stop. So let's say you're shooting a photo of a dog running after a frisbee, and you start with this: ISO 100, f/8, 1/60th
You like the image—you think it looks good but the dog is blurry—you want to freeze the action. So you bump up the shutter speed 2 stops to 1/250th.
That means you're getting 2 stops LESS light than before. If you want to get the same exposure, you need to make it up somehow. You could bump up your ISO to ISO 400 (that's a 2-stop increase in sensitivity) and you'd be okay. OR you could open up your diaphram 2 stops to f/4. OR you could bump up your ISO 1 stop to ISO 200 AND open your diaphram up 1 stop to f/5.6. All of those would give you an equivalent exposure as what you'd started at.
Let's say your exposure is kind of dark and you decide you want to add 2 stops more light. You're starting with ISO 100, f/8, 1/60th. What do you do?
You could bump up your ISO speed two stops. Or you could slow down your shutter speed two stops. Or you could open up your aperture two stops. Or you could leave your ISO alone and slow your shutter speed 1 stop, and open your aperture 1 stop. Or some other combination that adds up to increasing your exposure 2 full stops.
But What's This Crapola On My Lens that Says It's f/3.5? Where's That On Your Scale?
It's not. You're right. That's an intermediate stop. f/3.5 is 1/3rd of a stop larger than f/4. A lot of cameras, like higher-end digitals, can be set to go in 1/3rd stop increments, rather than full stops. Some can go in 1/6th-stop increments. That doesn't change anything.
What Does the Front of My Lens Say?
The front (or side) of the lens should tell you the make and model, the focal length, and the LARGEST aperture the lens is capable of achieving. I've attached two examples. In Example 1, that's a Leitz Summicron, 50mm and the max aperture is f/2.
The second example is a Nikon 35mm-70mm zoom. It's max aperture is f/3.3 at 35mm, and f/4.5 at 70mm (because the focal length changes, the f/stop ratio changes!)
Okay, But I have a Zoom Lens that's Doesn't Change Its Max Aperture
Some high-end lenses have a max aperture that adjusts with the focal length so that the maximum aperture is the same at both zoom ends. Like a Sigma 70-210mm f/2.8 That's a maximum of f/2.8 at both ends.
Aperture size affects optical quality in two ways. One is the overall, general performance of the lens, and the other is about what appears in focus and what doesn't.
The first is fairly simple: we're talking about the general image as it's formed on the film or sensor. If you look at lens tests, just about every lens does its best work at the apertures in the middle of its range. That means if you have a lens that has an aperture range between f/3.5 and f/22, the lens will be sharpest and snappiest around f/8 or f/11. This is true at both the center of the image and the corners. As you work outward toward the extremes, the quality will fall off, particularly in the corners.
Will you notice the difference? Depends on how critical you are, whether you blow your images up high, and how good the lens is to begin with. But the point is this: if you're out and about and you have the luxury of choosing any aperture you want to use without any other concern—choose something in the middle of your camera's range, like f/11.
Now the focus part. This is kind of involved.
There's a concept in photography called Depth of Field. The "field" is what appears to be in focus. The "depth" part means your line of sight straight out from the lens. If one thing appears sharp and everything before and behind it looks blurry, that's a shallow DOF. If everything looks sharp at the same time, that's deep (or long) DOF.
I was thinking about this as I was driving home today. The guy ahead of me was about 8 car lengths and he was in focus. I *knew* that the instruments on my dashboard were out of focus, but it doesn't seem that way because my eyes can shift focus so rapidly that everything *seems* to be sharp everywhere at the same time. It's not—but it seems that way.
The camera can't do that. It can only focus on one thing at a time, so some things are going to be sharp (what you're focused on) and other things are going to be less sharp, or blurry.
Big apertures (small numbers) give you the shallowest DOF. Small aperture (big numbers) give you the largest DOF. So you can, to some extent, control what's sharp and what's blurry by selecting the aperture on your camera.
Here's an example.
Image you're on a beach in France. Far, far away there's blue sky, a few fluffy white clouds, sand and surf. In the middle distance (say about 20 feet away) is your wife (or husband, Jaques the cabana boy if you want). In the foreground, hidden from your wife behind an umbrella but fully visible to you, about 6 feet away, is Scarlet Johansson's body double, topless, and she enjoys being photographed by guys who will keep these photos in deep recesses on their hard drive where they'll never been seen by anyone but You and maybe a couple of your closest horndog friends.
First, we'll focus on the clouds way to hell and gone in the distance. We'll set our lens wide open to f/1.8, which is maximum on the lens we're using today. What do you see? The clouds and the distance appears sharp. Wifey looks blurry, and Scarlet is nothing but a haze.
Now we close the aperture (called stopping-down) to f/5.6, which is a middling size. The sky is sharp. Wifey looks soft but not bad. Scarlot is mostly a blob. This is the one you'll print out for Wifey later on.
Now we stop down to f/22, which is the smallest this lens can go. The sky is sharp. Wifey looks in focus. Scarlet's kind of soft but not bad.
Next: we refocus. This time on Wifey, who's in the middle distance, and we'll open back up to f/1.8.
At f/1.8, wifey is sharp, Scarlet and the background are both very blurry.
At f/5.6, wifey is sharp, Scarlet is fuzzy but recognizable, and the background looks pretty good.
At f/22, wifey is sharp, Scarlet is acceptable, and the background is sharp
Finally we refocus, this time on Come In Tokyo.
at f/1.8, Scarlet is sharp. Wifey is kind of a blob. The background is just a fog.
at f/5.6 Scarlet is sharp, Wifey is kind of soft but acceptable, the background looks good
at f/22, Scarlet is sharp, Wifey is sharp, background looks good
Large apertures tend to isolate what you've focused on from the background. Small apertures tend to render everything sharply.
In the 30s there used to be a group called f/64, and they were sharpness fanatics. They believed everything should be tack sharp from one end of the photo to the other, corner to corner, foreground to background. At f/64, you tend to be able to do that sort of thing.
You Can Bail Out Now If You Want To
but I'm going to add a couple of small kinks to what I've laid about above.
1. Imagine your depth of field as being like a rectangle with the long sides drawing away from you. You'd think your focal point would be in the center of the rectangle, and you'd have equal area of DOF in front of and behind your subject. Nope. Push your imaginary rectangle back so that your subject stands about 1/3rd back from the front edge. In other words, on any thing that you focus on, no matter how you set your aperture, the area that's in focus in front of your subject will be less than what's behind it.
2. The size of the rectangle also changes with how far away you're focused. If your subject is nearby, the rectangle will be relatively smaller than if your subject were farther away.
I'm going to make up the numbers, but this will illustrate what I've said:
Imagine you're shooting a photo of a model. The model is 6 feet away, and you're focused on her eyes.
At f/1.8, you can get a sharp image of anything up to 1 foot in front of her and 4 feet behind her
at f/5.6, you can get a sharp image of anyting up to 2 feet in front of her and 8 feet behind her
at f/22 you can get a sharp image of anyting up to 3 feet in front of her and 20 feet behind her
Now you move the model back to about 20 feet away and you focus on her eyes.
At f/1.8, you can get a sharp image of anything up to 3 feet in front of her and 10 feet behind her
at f/5.6, you can get a sharp image of anyting up to 5 feet in front of her and 20 feet behind her
at f/22 you can get a sharp image of anyting up to 10 feet in front of her and 50 feet behind her
Finally you move the model back to about 50 feet away and you focus on her eyes.
At f/1.8, you can get a sharp image of anything up to 5 feet in front of her and 40 feet behind her
at f/5.6, you can get a sharp image of anyting up to 10 feet in front of her and everything behind her
at f/22 you can get a sharp image of anyting up to 25 feet in front of her and everything behind her
So What's the Bottom Line?
If you want as much as you can see to be in focus as possible, focus on something relatively distant (like 30 feet) and use the smallest aperture you can.
If you want to isolate your subject from the foreground and background, use the largest aperture you can, and try to get the subject as close to the camera as you reasonably can.
Aperture Priority
In the part where I talked about shutter speeds, I said there was a semi-automatic mode on many cameras called Shutter Priority, where you tell the camera which shutter speed to use and it picks the aperture. APERTURE PRIORITY is the same thing in reverse: you pick the aperture and the camera picks the shutter speed. If you want to play around with aperture settings, try out Aperture Priority. It allows you the freedom to experiment, but lets the camera do the dirty work of figuring out the proper exposure.
White balance is the last of the major camera controls.
Imagine a thing called a Black Box. It's black—it reflects and emits no light whatsoever when it's cold (absolute 0-deg).
Now you begin to heat it, and as it warms up, it begins to emit light. The temperature is measured in Kelvin, which is identical to Celsius except that Kelvin begins counting from absolute zero (around -473 deg C). If you take the Celsius temperature and add 473, you'll get the equivalent Kelvin number.
Around 1000K (you usually don't see the degree symbol when you're looking at kelvin numbers) the box is a deep red. As you continue to heat it up, it gets brighter red, then orange, then (for our purposes) looks pretty white around 5000K. Then it starts to tint blue, then very blue, then deep, dark blue. By 20,000K it's indigo blue.
Real-world light sources (with a few exceptions) emit light that can be measured in degrees Kelvin, and the color temperature matches what we got off that black box. A standard household light bulb, for instance, is around 2500K. Tungsten lamps that are often used photography or theater lighting are around 3200K or 3400K. Bright sunlight, under normal conditions, is around 5500K. The electronic flash on your camera is usually around 5000 to 5500K, depending on what the manufacturer thought was best. Skylight, where the sun is not directly shining on something (i.e. you're in shade) is above 10,000K.
Here's an interesting chart that shows some color temp scales.Light Bulbs Direct.
A person's brain automatically balances the light you see. You look at something you know should be white, and if it appears pale blue—a minute later your brain will adjust everything and it will look white. Have you ever been indoors in the late afternoon when the lights are on, and everything looks normal? You look out a window and everything outside looks deep blue. You walk outside and after a few minutes, everything looks normal, but you look back through the window inside the house and everything is yellow-ish red. That's your eyes adjusting the color balance.
Film and digital sensors can't do that. Film comes from the factory "balanced" for a particular temperature. "Daylight" film thinks "white" is 5500K, which makes things look normal when you shoot in broad daylight or with flash. But if you shoot indoors without flash, everything looks red. "Tungsten" film looks normal indoors if you use tungsten lights, and only a little bit red if you shoot indoors without a flash: but it looks very blue if you shoot it outdoors under sunlight or with a camera flash.
For film cameras, you can correct this with optical filters. You find out (as well as you can) what color temperature the lights are and then select the proper filter(s) to correct it for the type of film you're using.
Digitals are way easier: you can correct it electronically. Most cameras have an "auto" setting, where the camera takes a reading and tries to guess what the color temperature is, and then it adjusts accordingly. This doesn't work very well. If you can, you really ought to experiment with setting the white balance yourself.
Even the low-end point-in-shoots usually have a few preset options for white balance. There's usually an "sun" setting, which is around 5500K, an "indoor" version, which is around 3000K, maybe a "shade" version which is around 10,000K, maybe a "flourescent," which is another thing entirely (I'll discuss this below).
More advanced cameras usually offer the ability to manually set the exact color temperature, which means you can tell it you want 4120K if you feel like it. Many also have a "custom" balance, where you photograph something that you know is white, and that tells the camera, "adjust this so it looks white."
If you do the custom route, you want to buy a standard white card or gray card from the camera store, because the color is printed specifically to reflect properly and won't mislead your camera. You can try it with other things, like a page of blank printer paper, but I can't guarantee it'll work properly. (I use a gray card)
Regardless, what you want to do is this. When you want to take a photo, be aware of your surroundings. If you're outdoors in bright sun, set your camera to daylight. If you're photographing someone or something that's illuminated only by the sky, try the Shade option. If you're indoors using flash, use the Flash setting (if you have one). If you're not using flash, use one of the indoor settings.
Take some test photos (this is the beauty of digital) and see how they look. If they're too red, choose a setting that's got a higher color temp, because that will cool it down. If it's too blue, warm it up by lowering the temperature. This is particularly easy if you can directly choose a color temp: i.e. in you're indoors and you're shooting by candle-light w/o flash. You start by setting the camera directly to 2000K. The image is too warm. You drop it to 1800K. Too cool. You move it to 1900K. That looks good.
You can do special effects this way. You want your photo to look particularly warm? Shooting someone at the beach and you want to fake the glow of a sunset? Raise the color temp on the camera and things will look "warmer." In the snow and you want things to look colder? Lower the color balance and you'll have a blue cast that will make the image look cool. A small amount is discreet, a large amount is obvious.
The thing about color balance is that's hard to fix it after the fact in Photoshop—it's better to try to get it right (or at least close) when you're taking the photo, and then you can play around with it in Photoshop later. So I always highly recommend that people turn the auto white balance OFF and play around with the options and learn how to do it manually. That way you get what you want.
Floursescent lights are proof that there is a Devil and he is walks the earth. Among other things. flourescents don't behave the same way as most other lights do in terms of color. Typically they throw a funky green cast that makes things look sea-sick green. If your camera has a Flourescent setting, try it whenever you're indoors with flourescent lights. If you shoot film, you might want a flourescent filter.
Another problem is that flourescents don't behave the same way from one to the next. Different manufacturers and types all throw different colors, so your flourescent filter or digital camera setting won't necessary work properly even though the light source is flourescent. The old standard bulbs are green, but some manufacturers sell tubes that have more pleasing color. If you know what kind of tube it is, you can usually Google it on the net and somewhere you'll find the color temperature and/or how to correct the color for it. But most people have no idea what type of tube they're using, and nobody wants to find out.
My advice is, again, take test shots. Shoot with the flourescent setting (if you have one) or filter and see how they look. Usually they're on the cool side, so if you want to bias things, try a color temperature around 6500K and see how it looks. Also be prepared to subtract green when you're in Photoshop.
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Follow Up Notes for People New to Serious Photography
I had a fun time with some cool newcomers to serious photography and two long time friends, arranged by Victor last evening. It's provided enough impetus to break my drought of writing on this blog - Google+ has been so absorbing that most times, that +Mike Elgan once predicted, it would sap away efforts to keep traditional blogs going.
So, opening with fundamentals. But not so much about Photography as Stuff about Life.
1. I use the phrase Serious Photography to mean photography where you take the time and effort to get set up the camera, control the photo result rather than let the modern camera or camera phone do its thang - I don't use it to mean Stuffed Shirt, Stiff Collar Photography or approaches to it. As I said to the group before the meeting, I've become quite irreverent these days.
2. There's often more than one way to do a thing, There's often more than one technique, camera brand, camera, lens, software product. What matters is the result - viewers of your images often see the product, the result, not how you did it. There will always be some dude to can pick the spots off a white wall, but don't let that dude spoil your satisfaction. Put some distance between yourself and those dudes.
3. Don't Sweat The Small Stuff - What matters is context and relative degrees of good and bad. For example, if someone tells you not to use f/22 because it loses sharpness and resolution, yes, that can be true but that doesn't mean you can't give it a burl or suck it and see yourself.
4. You've got to go out into the field and do it yourself. Reading information only, can be boring but more importantly can bullshit brains.
Camera Exposure Modes
On most cameras, there are the following:
• Green Auto or Auto or iAuto
• Scene Modes - Like Landscape, Night Scenes, Fireworks
• P / A / S / M or in Canon speak P / Av / Tv / M
Some people deprecate the Green Auto or Scene Modes and some obsessives want to eradicate that from all cameras - or often say "I'd give X dollars for a camera that doesn't have automatic modes". Should you use them? Or more importantly, Can you use them without the terrible burden of guilt?
Look. You paid money for the camera. And the camera has those features. If you want to use it for whatever reason, go ahead - it's not a betrayal or cowardice. Green Auto / Auto / iAuto is a brains off mode. You don't have to think. You could be on a blissful high and you don't want to spoil the moment with logical setup and thought. You could be real brain tired but still want to take the shot.
Bear in mind though
• some cameras automatically pop up that built in flash if the light is dim, making you look silly and spoiling the natural light nuances
• you may not be able to tweak the brightness of the shot. If you can tweak the brightness, the camera does not remember your choice for long so that it's not stuck in a rut.
• the camera saves only JPEG, not raw image files.
• you can't tune the shot to a somewhat blurred background, emphasizing the person in the portrait.
On some cameras, iAuto means the camera analyses the scene to figure out whether you're taking a photo of landscape or a person portrait or sports moving action. It's major innovation and it's getting better all the time as the cameras get more complex brains. But. If the scene light or the camera and lens body capability can't make a good photo, sheer camera intelligence can't overcome that.
Scene Modes
When you use Scene Modes, you are telling the camera the type if scene it is. in targeting the type of scene. They're sets of camera settings biased towards for example, landscape (sharp distant scenery, lush greens), person portraits, night scenes (increased ISO, fastest shutter speed given the dim light, largest f/no). Some people have so much success with Scene Modes that they want to reverse engineer the Scene Mode settings so that they can use it in M (Manual) or P A S modes. And get upset that the manufacturer does not document the secret recipe to each mode. Shrug - they're a secret recipe.
P / A / S / M Exposure Modes
Symbol Canon Symbol Officially What it means Exposure Compensation Additional Remarks
P P Programmed optimisation Camera chooses f/no and shutter speed You can darken/lighten the image brightness using the Exposure Compensation dial - the chosen pair of f/no and shutter speed will change. Ps - Program Shift is available - this allows the user to bias the Programmed choice towards a different recommendation of f/no and shutter speed, while keeping the image brightness the same. If using Auto ISO, this is one more factor the camera can adjust by itself
A Av Aperture Priority You choose f/no, camera chooses shutter speed You can darken/lighten the image brightness using the Exposure Compensation dial - the camera cannot change the f/no so it changes the shutter speed If ISO is set to Auto, this is one more factor the camera can adjust by itself
S Tv Shutter Priority You choose shutter speed, camera chooses f/no You can darken/lighten the image brightness using the Exposure Compensation dial - the camera cannot change the shutter speed so it changes the f/no If ISO is set to Auto, this is one more factor the camera can adjust by itself
M M Manual Exposure You choose both f/no and shutter speed Usually not meaningful Be alert to the use of Auto ISO - on various cameras, this overrides full control image brightness since the camera can vary the ISO
But which exposure mode one should you use? What do I use?
Use P when you aren't too concerned about whether a shot has extreme background blur (subject isolation) or motion stopping. Fans of P often say they can twirl a dial and get Ps - Program Shift - that is, bias the choice towards a a certain f/no or a certain shutter speed.
Use A when you tend to be concerned with landscapes, architecture, sunsets or person portraits. You directly set the f/no which controls Depth of Field.
Use S when you tend to be concerned with freezing moving subjects (sports etc...) or when you want to nominate a shutter speed that is really slow for smooth blurred waterfalls.
Use M with fixed ISO when you feel the camera's prediction is frequently confused. This could be that you're taking a photo of the moon and the camera doesn't understand. Or you taking photos of unevenly lit, dramatic scenes - as actor moves between spotlight and darkness, the camera doesn't get it either and always recommends wrong. One feature of modern cameras is that you have Liveview - either LCD on the back of the camera or Electronic View Finder. This makes M more easy to visualise - with emulation of scene brightness in Liveview, you can just point and twirl your f/no and/or shutter speed and/or ISO and you get a preview of the scene brightness before you click.
Let's take an analogy. Let's say you drive to work and you take a certain route. How did you come to pick up the route? Was it because it is the shortest? Was it because it is the cheapest (no road tolls)? Was it because you could do a pickup of the your partner or child along the way?
You can see that I'm heading the way that choice of Exposure Mode is a personal choice. For old timers choice depends on old habits. For example, in my days in the film era, the Minolta XE-1 only had A. There's also the facet that some have enough mindfulness to flex between Aperture Priority (when they want the emphasis on Depth of Field) and Shutter Priority (when they want to choose a shutter speed that is simply freezes motion). I don't enjoy that swapping and mostly stay on Aperture Priority because I don't have to deal with a different technique.
Whether you use P A S or M in the end, doesn't really matter if you can spot the challenge and get the shot successfully - the image file does not care about P A S or M. For most instances, you can make the shot regardless of whether you use P A S or M.
Parameters, Constraints - Managing and controlling them
P A S assist you in choosing parameters to achieve an image of relevant brightness - and clarity. Over time, you may want artistic renditions, conveying a sense of motion or subject isolation or sharpness or blur.
1. The Shutter Speed Parameter
Photography is about taking a moment in time, sampling the light from the scene and capturing it onto film or digital sensor. The moment in time is gated by the shutter speed. The shutter opens, light comes onto the sensor, then the shutter closes and the shot is captured. The Shutter Speed numbers run like 25 or 100 or 500 or 1000 - that's for simplicity of camera display - they are actually 1/25 or 1/1000 of a second. Each shutter speed, for example 1/100 sec, is designed to be the same across all cameras.
The Shutter Speed range runs into several constraints:
• There is a fastest speed limit each camera can do. For example 1/2000 of a second.
• There is slowest speed limit each camera can do. Maybe a few seconds. You may choose B which stands for Bulb - an old term - meaning the shutter will only close when you release pressure on the Shutter Release Button.
• For cameras with Focal Plane shutters there is a flash sync speed ceiling. Above that ceiling - called flash sync speed, photos with electronic flash will have parts blacked off.
2. The F/no (mostly known as the f/stop) Parameter
The f/no is a strange number. We often refer to this as Aperture. I prefer to call it f/no because people get confused with large aperture = small f/number and small aperture / large f/number.
(image "Aperture diagram" by Cbuckley at the English language Wikipedia.)
Notice that the camera shows these numbers as 2 or 8 when it is actually f/2 or f/8. Unlike the Shutter Speed where you have the numbers progress in a doubling, the f/no scale is best committed to memory instead of doing arithmetic in your head. A certain f/no for example, f/8 is designed to be similar across all lenses. (If someone tells you about the t stop, don't obsess over it)
The f/stop range hits the following constraints.
• the smallest f/no is a optical, weight, size, cost limit. If your lens is not very expensive, it may have a brightest of f/4 - and for inexpensive zooms, as you zoom in, the brightest f/no will reduce in brightness to f/5.6 or darker.
• the biggest f/no might be f/16 or f/22 - at this extreme, the aperture can be so small that edge diffraction effects happen - this reduces sharpness in the image. Don't obsess over this or anything else - sometimes you do want edge diffraction for sunburst effects in #chasingthesun. Know about it, but don't obsess about it. Try it once in a while.
• In terms of detail and sharpness, there is a sweet spot for a certain lens (or several sweet spots if the lens zooms). It's worth bearing in mind but don't obsess over it and avoid the wide open f/no.
3. The ISO parameter
In photography we have abbreviated the term ISO 12232:2006 Photography -- Digital still cameras -- Determination of exposure index, ISO speed ratings, standard output sensitivity, and recommended exposure index to "ISO". By this, we mean we have a scale across all digital cameras (regardless of size) that we can refer to, as to how sensitive the sensor is to light. For example, ISO 200 should be the same across all cameras so my camera, when set to ISO 200 will deliver the same image brightness as your camera for the same scene.
Digital Sensors are designed with a native ISO - the one on my camera is ISO 200. To allow the camera to offer a faster shutter speed and larger f/no even in dim light, the camera can amplify the sensitivity to 400, 800, 1600, 64000 and even higher. Extreme amplifications lead to increased digital noise (graininess in the image). Film, being based on photo chemistry was easy to make insensitive - we could have film that was ISO 25 or 32. Some digital sensors don't start so low, so manufacturers sometimes have a setting called Low which is a notch lower than the sensor's base sensitivity.
4. The Scene Exposure Value - is it a Constraint or Parameter?
You'll see references to the Exposure Triangle on the web. The three corners of the Triangle are of course Shutter Speed, F/No and ISO. I tend to say that a Triangle is missing one more axis. I prefer to call it a pyramid - the fourth tip of the triangular pyramid is Scene Exposure Value.
Normally, if we arrive at an outdoor scene, we have to accept the scene's actual brightness. So that's a constraint - i.e it could be a bright summer daylight scene (that's coded as EV 15 @ ISO 100) or an evening sunset scene (that's coded as EV 12 @ ISO 1OO).
Scene Light is something we accept as a Constraint. We could come back another time, or change our subject position relative to the sun - in which case it's a Parameter we can change. Some keen photographers carry strobe lights and fabric lighting modifiers to exercise control of light in person portrait shooting. Others carry graduated or full Neutral Density Filters. 2011 to 2014 showed a strong trend / fad to High Dynamic Range (HDR) techniques - taking a bracket of 3 or more shots of darker, middle, brighter shots and blending them on the computer in post process. Thankfully the fad of extreme toning is subsiding....
Why it's a Constraint
• If the scene is dark, (like EV 12 @ ISO 100) you can't attain the image brightness you want if you use f/8 and 1/1000 sec and ISO 200
• If the scene is bright (like EV 16 @ ISO 100) you can't attain the image brightness you want if you use f/8 10 secs and ISO 200.
How do you figure out these limits? Look at the Table of Camera Settings for Scene Exposure Values and the Table of Exposure Values.
Counting Stops / Twirling Dials
In this day and age with the ability to chimp on the DSLR LCD after the shot, or to preview before the shot (particularly in compact system cameras a.k.a. mirrorless) - you don't have to walk around with sheets of tables, cardboard circular calculators or separate hand held exposure meters. You could, but you don't have to.
What most people do is to use the power of being able to see the brightness and other characteristics of the image in the preview/review and twirl the dials in the right direction with confidence.
What's the right direction?
The most important thing to know is which end is low and which end is high. The second thing to know is how much to change - a third of a "stop" ? a full stop? more? Let's look an example scene and the scales.
1. The table below has several rows. Don't read any significance to the vertical arrangement of the cells - the table is to demonstrate the row wise adjustments.
2. Assume we have a Scene EV of 14 - that's a daylight hazy scene with soft shadows.
How To Play
• If we move the yellow box of the Scene EV to left by one cell, we have to move one of the yellow boxes on the other rows left one cell as well to maintain brightness.
• If we want to darken the image (using fixed ISO), we can move the yellow cell in Exposure Compensation (the purple row) to the left, for P A S Exposure Modes. For M Exposure Mode, the purple row does not operate and we have to move the yellow cell to the left in one of the other white rows.
As we adjust for image brightness, facets like clarity, motion blur, depth of field may also be affected.
Scene EVdark111213141516bright
Image / EV Compdarken-2.0-
Shutter Speedfreeze60125250500100030blur
f/nodeep depth of field45.6811162.8shallow depth of field
Further Topics to write about
• JPEG vs raw or both
• Should you / Do you need to post process your shots on the camera?
Further Reading
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Shooting Modes
The mode dial is the thing on the top of the camera that has a bunch of weird icons, and the following letters: P, A, S, and M. or P, av, Tv, and M if you’re a canon shooter.
Mode Dial on a Canon 5Dmk3
PASM is an abbreviation of 4 modes for controlling how the camera behaves.
Canon cameras have “PTVAVM”, or “MAVTVP”, either way it doesn’t roll off of the tounge as well. We will say ‘PASM’ to refer to the shooting modes.
Camera’s have two main ways to control how much light gets into a camera. Shutter Speed and Aperture.
We’ll talk about the third, ISO, later. Aperture and Shutter Speed affect not just exposure but the look of an image. ISO is not used to creatively affect the look of an image, so it isn’t as important to understand yet.
P for Program
P is the new auto mode. Now more green camera or A+ or green rectangle mode. It’s P mode for you from NOW ON. P mode handles getting the image to look right for you, but allows you to – if you want – control other settings.
Settings like focus modes, drive modes, Exposure Compensation, and more fancy-schmancy camera talk that we will get back to later.
S (or Tv) for Shutter priority
or Tv for “time-value”
This mode gives a new control for our camera, a dial (probably by the shutter button, on the top. Maybe on the back), that lets us control what the shutter speed is. How long the camera lets light in for. We’ll talk about shutter speed later. Just now that it is measured in seconds, a unit of time; and S mode gives us control over it.
Canon calls it “Tv”. Everybody Else just calls it “s”.
A (or Av) for Apeture priority
Or Av for Aperture-Value.
A stands for Aperture. This mode gives you total control over the size of the hole in the lens, and the camera adjusts everything else to get the shot right. Otherwise, it’s the same as P mode. We’ll be talking about what this means later, just know for now that A mode gives you more control.
M for Manual Mode
This mode lets us control both the aperture, and the shutter speed. Also the ISO, which We’ll get to later. Manual mode means the getting the “right” amount of light is up to us, and the camera won’t make any decisions.
This is often important when you want to shoot consistently – like when stitching images together – and the camera’s decisions can fluxuate slightly. It’s also super useful when we want to take photos that are too dark or too bright.
Later you’ll be out and about shooting in ONLY manual mode. We aren’t there yet. Relax. Everything is going to be okay.
Mode dial on a Canon 70D
Burn The Flower
No more flower (“macro”) mode. No more person-running (“sport”) mode, and no more mountain (“landscape”) mode. These are just variations of program mode that perform better in certain situations.
Sport mode, for example, shoots with a faster shutter speed so shot’s are less likely to be blurry. From now on, if you had to shoot a sporting event and didn’t want blurry shots, you’ll go into S mode and dial up the correct settings yourself.
This advanced control is important because while cameras are really really good at what they do, they’re still limited by many assumptions – the camera doesn’t know what it’s pointed at. Only you know what you are trying to capture and emphasize. It’s also important for learning how these things work!
Becoming a photographer means taking control over these decisions.
The Camera is a Calculator
Let’s go over how What The Camera Does is being changed by the different shooting modes.
So the camera measures the scene and comes to a conclusion about how much light we need. Let’s pretend this is some single unit number, (Perhaps we call this an “exposure Value) and let’s pretend that it arrives at the number 10. We need 9 light for the scene.
Let’s say the ISO gives us 3 units of exposure value, the aperture gets another 3, and the shutter speed gives us the final 3 to get to 9 imaginary units of light. These 3 elements of the camera all factor into how much light there is.
Now, in reality, these elements are probably being multiplied by each other. Like Shutter Speed x Aperture x ISO = Exposure Value. Just… shh. Relax. Relax. Everything is fine. Math is easy. This part doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that all three of these elements contribute to the exposure of the camera. Our camera, on P mode, does all of the math for us. It decides how many units of shutter speed, aperture, and ISO to combine together to get the exposure.
On program (p) mode, the camera does it all for us.
On Aperture-priority mode, (A or Av mode on the dial), we control the aperture. We say, okay. I want an f-stop of 1.8. I want an f-stop of 8. We are deciding this unit. Like a recipe, I’m going “I want this much butter no matter what” and the camera is taking the ISO and the Shutter speed (the flour and the salt?) and changing them so our equation works out, and we get the right exposure.
Shutter priority (time value) mode is the same thing, but we control the shutter speed, we lock in this one unit of our equation, and the camera controls the other units. It’s still trying to do the same thing, to get the right amount of light into the camera.
There is no ISO priority mode.
Manual mode, we control the shutter speed and the aperture and the ISO. Fun fact, is many cameras can have the ISO set to a specific number or on ‘AUTO’ on all of these modes. So we can have ISO+Aperture locked in on aperture-priority mode and the camera changes the shutter speed, or we can be in manual mode and putting in totally wrong settings with both the aperture and the shutter speed, but the images look okay because the camera is changing the ISO for us. Then we walk around like “aww yeah I’m shooting manual and I’m nailing the exposure every time” and that’s not really true, but I’m not going to take that from you. You can keep that little victory.
Why no ISO priority mode?
The first reason is because the ISO doesn’t really affect creative decisions. It doesn’t change how an image looks, other than grainyness or noisiness. The higher the ISO, the “worse” the image, but it’s otherwise the same. One always optimizes for a low ISO, and the camera will just do that for us.
So the first reason is because we don’t need one. It would be silly.
Besides, you can go to program (P) mode and still lock the ISO to a specific number on most cameras, which then is basically ISO-priority mode.
The second reason is because of film. Before digital cameras, ISO wasn’t something you could control with the camera at all. It came from what film you decided to buy, with different films rated to different ISO’s. Different films were more or less sensitive to light. You would tell the camera “Okay, I have ISO 400 film in here now” and the camera wen’t “okay” and then you uses your different shooting modes.
Digital cameras came around and we didn’t add an ISO shooting mode, we just added a control that let one change the ISO amounts, or set it to auto. Cameras still behave the same way, otherwise! Neat!
Exposure Essentials
Images are made with light captured from the world. We can consider (or “model”) light in many ways – as particles, waves, and so on. For photographers it’s most convenient to consider light as rays that travel in straight lines and bounce off of things. Simple enough.
Some rays may travel weakly, and some with great intensity. Consider this for brighter light sources and weaker ones. Light also gets weaker in brightness as it travels from a nearby light source.
As rays of light “travel”, a ray of light hitting an object for an instant and one that hits an object for a long time have different effects.
We need to absorb rays of light in order to capture an image. Lets consider the difficulty of focusing this light later, right now, think that if we don’t get enough light, we won’t be able to capture our image.
Remember those old glow-in-the-dark toys? They were greenish?
For one of these to be bright, they had to absorb enough light. If you didn’t leave the lights in the room on for long enough, they wouldn’t be able to glow; or they would glow very differently.
Picture an array of these stars, very densely packed together. If we shine a flashlight on them, but hold up shadow puppets in front of our light, then turn the light off, we will be left with an image – of sorts – of the shadow puppet. That’s…sort of… photography. Kinda. Making images by capturing light. Sure.
Film is made up of a shoot full of tiny little grains. A dense grid of them. These grains – similar to the phosphorescent stars – were sensitive to light. After we shined light at them, we then – through entirely different chemical processes than that with the phosphorescent rocks involving silver halide – we can “develop” the film, which makes the image that projected onto it permanent, no longer sensitive to light.
Then bunch of other things happen that we don’t need to talk about now, and we have an image.
In digital photography, we have image sensors made up of a bunch of little light sensors, each representing a pixel of an image.
In order for these little light sensors to show an image, we need to shoot enough rays of light at them, for a long enough period of time.
If we give them no light, it will be black. Like when you forget to take the lens cap off.
If you give it a lot of light, it will turn white.
Somewhere in-between, if we give it not too little, and not too much light, we can create an image that is grey. And one that is light grey. And one that is dark grey.
Get enough of these little light sensors reading various shades of grey, and you have an image! Images come out of contrasting elements. Dark next to light, and so on. Just like drawing. Blue ink can’t draw well blue paper. White pixels don’t show details next to other white pixels.
If they all were the same brightness of grey… we wouldn’t have an image. We wouldn’t if they were all black or if they were all white either.
Don’t worry. I’ve left my lens cap on enough times to thouroughly test the hypothethis that an all black image makes a good picture. It doesn’t. No need to test that yourself.
The key to getting an image to appear is that the bright parts of our image are not too bright (ie: not solid white), and the dark parts of the image are not too dark (ie: solid black).
Camera’s have a limited range of brightnesses that that they can capture. The range a camera can capture from the darkest point in the scene being just-barely black to the brightest point in the scene that can be not-quite-white is called the dynamic range. Nicer (usually newer, more expensive) cameras have larger dynamic ranges.
If we can capture our grey, detailed, image. Then that image can actually represent the world we pointed the camera at. We can do photography!
A major part of photography is adjusting three settings on the camera – the shutter speed, the aperture, and the ISO, which determine how much light gets into the camera.
The major technical goal of photography is to create an appropriate exposure. One that shows the scene with as much detail as possible: Not all black, not all white.
Exposure And Cameras
Make sure you understand your exposure essentials before reading this article.
Camera’s control how much light gets in by adjusting one of three things.
• How LONG the camera lets light in for.
• How MUCH the camera lets light in at a time.
• How SENSITIVE the camera is to light.
Shutter Speed, measured in seconds, is how long we let light into. One second? One Thousandth of a second? Less time, less light, and \(all else equal\) the darker the image. I know “speed” is a weird way to talk about “time” but, let it go. Just don’t worry about it. If it really bothers you, then be like Canon and call it “time value” if you want.
Aperture, measured with in “f-stops” \(whatever that means\), is an adjustable hole in the camera. This hole can get bigger or smaller. Basically, it lets the _lens_ get bigger – and let in more light, or smaller, and let in less light. These numbers often have a decimal in them. Like “5 point 6” or “2 point 8”, or just “8”.
ISO, measured in… nothing, it’s just ISO. ISO stands for “International Standards Organization”, the people who decided what numbers to use so that all camera and film manufacturers would agree. Thank’s ISO! It refers to how sensitive the camera is to light.
We call this relationship the Exposure Triangle
Getting The Exposure Correct
Let’s say you’re at a soda machine. You want to fill up your cup with the perfect amount of soda, right to the rim. Too much and it overflows and your hands get all sticky. Too little and you’re left thirsty and dissapointed.
The shutter speed would be how long you hold the cup against the lever, how much time we let the soda out of the machine.
The aperture would be the nozzle. Think about the difference between getting a soda vs. the little water lever. The water trickles out, or comes rushing out.
The ISO would be the size of the cup. How much soda do we need anyway? How much before we are overflowing? Overflowing for a small dixie cup isn’t overflowing for a KFC chicken bucket!
How these different settings work with each other and how they affect your image – we’ll come back to that. Let’s learn how to mess with these settings on our fancy cameras!
To change these settings in action, see he section on shooting modes.
Videos on Exposure
*editors note: wow lots of really long-winded video explanations of the exposure triangle exist. Sorry. Watch a few of these things, and absorb the information. It’s not that difficult.*
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Exposure Compensation
Exposure Compensation is an absolutely critical feature of the camera to understand.
Exposure Compensation is a way to brighten or darken the image being taken without adjusting any of the properties manually.
You are taking the camera’s measurments (light-metering) and saying “okay, that, but brighter” or “sure, that, but darker”.
The exposure compensation icon is universal. It looks like this:
Exposure Compensation Icon by Martin Chapman Fromm from the Noun Project
Exposure compensation doesn’t do anything in manual mode because we aren’t using the camera’s settings. This is why the exposure compensation button is also – while in manual mode – what often serves to toggle which setting your dial adjusts – shutter speed or aperture, in manual mode.
More Reading on Exposure Compensation
Videos on Exposure Compensation
Shooting Modes
The mode dial is the thing on the top of the camera that has a bunch of weird icons, and the following letters: P, A, S, and M. or P, av, Tv, and M if you’re a canon shooter.
Mode Dial on a Canon 5Dmk3
PASM is an abbreviation of 4 modes for controlling how the camera behaves.
Canon cameras have “PTVAVM”, or “MAVTVP”, either way it doesn’t roll off of the tounge as well. We will say ‘PASM’ to refer to the shooting modes.
Camera’s have two main ways to control how much light gets into a camera. Shutter Speed and Aperture.
We’ll talk about the third, ISO, later. Aperture and Shutter Speed affect not just exposure but the look of an image. ISO is not used to creatively affect the look of an image, so it isn’t as important to understand yet.
P for Program
P is the new auto mode. Now more green camera or A+ or green rectangle mode. It’s P mode for you from NOW ON. P mode handles getting the image to look right for you, but allows you to – if you want – control other settings.
Settings like focus modes, drive modes, Exposure Compensation, and more fancy-schmancy camera talk that we will get back to later.
S (or Tv) for Shutter priority
or Tv for “time-value”
This mode gives a new control for our camera, a dial (probably by the shutter button, on the top. Maybe on the back), that lets us control what the shutter speed is. How long the camera lets light in for. We’ll talk about shutter speed later. Just now that it is measured in seconds, a unit of time; and S mode gives us control over it.
Canon calls it “Tv”. Everybody Else just calls it “s”.
A (or Av) for Apeture priority
Or Av for Aperture-Value.
A stands for Aperture. This mode gives you total control over the size of the hole in the lens, and the camera adjusts everything else to get the shot right. Otherwise, it’s the same as P mode. We’ll be talking about what this means later, just know for now that A mode gives you more control.
M for Manual Mode
This mode lets us control both the aperture, and the shutter speed. Also the ISO, which We’ll get to later. Manual mode means the getting the “right” amount of light is up to us, and the camera won’t make any decisions.
This is often important when you want to shoot consistently – like when stitching images together – and the camera’s decisions can fluxuate slightly. It’s also super useful when we want to take photos that are too dark or too bright.
Later you’ll be out and about shooting in ONLY manual mode. We aren’t there yet. Relax. Everything is going to be okay.
Mode dial on a Canon 70D
Burn The Flower
No more flower (“macro”) mode. No more person-running (“sport”) mode, and no more mountain (“landscape”) mode. These are just variations of program mode that perform better in certain situations.
Sport mode, for example, shoots with a faster shutter speed so shot’s are less likely to be blurry. From now on, if you had to shoot a sporting event and didn’t want blurry shots, you’ll go into S mode and dial up the correct settings yourself.
This advanced control is important because while cameras are really really good at what they do, they’re still limited by many assumptions – the camera doesn’t know what it’s pointed at. Only you know what you are trying to capture and emphasize. It’s also important for learning how these things work!
Becoming a photographer means taking control over these decisions.
The Camera is a Calculator
Let’s go over how What The Camera Does is being changed by the different shooting modes.
So the camera measures the scene and comes to a conclusion about how much light we need. Let’s pretend this is some single unit number, (Perhaps we call this an “exposure Value) and let’s pretend that it arrives at the number 10. We need 9 light for the scene.
Let’s say the ISO gives us 3 units of exposure value, the aperture gets another 3, and the shutter speed gives us the final 3 to get to 9 imaginary units of light. These 3 elements of the camera all factor into how much light there is.
Now, in reality, these elements are probably being multiplied by each other. Like Shutter Speed x Aperture x ISO = Exposure Value. Just… shh. Relax. Relax. Everything is fine. Math is easy. This part doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that all three of these elements contribute to the exposure of the camera. Our camera, on P mode, does all of the math for us. It decides how many units of shutter speed, aperture, and ISO to combine together to get the exposure.
On program (p) mode, the camera does it all for us.
On Aperture-priority mode, (A or Av mode on the dial), we control the aperture. We say, okay. I want an f-stop of 1.8. I want an f-stop of 8. We are deciding this unit. Like a recipe, I’m going “I want this much butter no matter what” and the camera is taking the ISO and the Shutter speed (the flour and the salt?) and changing them so our equation works out, and we get the right exposure.
Shutter priority (time value) mode is the same thing, but we control the shutter speed, we lock in this one unit of our equation, and the camera controls the other units. It’s still trying to do the same thing, to get the right amount of light into the camera.
There is no ISO priority mode.
Manual mode, we control the shutter speed and the aperture and the ISO. Fun fact, is many cameras can have the ISO set to a specific number or on ‘AUTO’ on all of these modes. So we can have ISO+Aperture locked in on aperture-priority mode and the camera changes the shutter speed, or we can be in manual mode and putting in totally wrong settings with both the aperture and the shutter speed, but the images look okay because the camera is changing the ISO for us. Then we walk around like “aww yeah I’m shooting manual and I’m nailing the exposure every time” and that’s not really true, but I’m not going to take that from you. You can keep that little victory.
Why no ISO priority mode?
The first reason is because the ISO doesn’t really affect creative decisions. It doesn’t change how an image looks, other than grainyness or noisiness. The higher the ISO, the “worse” the image, but it’s otherwise the same. One always optimizes for a low ISO, and the camera will just do that for us.
So the first reason is because we don’t need one. It would be silly.
Besides, you can go to program (P) mode and still lock the ISO to a specific number on most cameras, which then is basically ISO-priority mode.
The second reason is because of film. Before digital cameras, ISO wasn’t something you could control with the camera at all. It came from what film you decided to buy, with different films rated to different ISO’s. Different films were more or less sensitive to light. You would tell the camera “Okay, I have ISO 400 film in here now” and the camera wen’t “okay” and then you uses your different shooting modes.
Digital cameras came around and we didn’t add an ISO shooting mode, we just added a control that let one change the ISO amounts, or set it to auto. Cameras still behave the same way, otherwise! Neat!
Exposure Essentials
Images are made with light captured from the world. We can consider (or “model”) light in many ways – as particles, waves, and so on. For photographers it’s most convenient to consider light as rays that travel in straight lines and bounce off of things. Simple enough.
Some rays may travel weakly, and some with great intensity. Consider this for brighter light sources and weaker ones. Light also gets weaker in brightness as it travels from a nearby light source.
As rays of light “travel”, a ray of light hitting an object for an instant and one that hits an object for a long time have different effects.
We need to absorb rays of light in order to capture an image. Lets consider the difficulty of focusing this light later, right now, think that if we don’t get enough light, we won’t be able to capture our image.
Remember those old glow-in-the-dark toys? They were greenish?
For one of these to be bright, they had to absorb enough light. If you didn’t leave the lights in the room on for long enough, they wouldn’t be able to glow; or they would glow very differently.
Picture an array of these stars, very densely packed together. If we shine a flashlight on them, but hold up shadow puppets in front of our light, then turn the light off, we will be left with an image – of sorts – of the shadow puppet. That’s…sort of… photography. Kinda. Making images by capturing light. Sure.
Film is made up of a shoot full of tiny little grains. A dense grid of them. These grains – similar to the phosphorescent stars – were sensitive to light. After we shined light at them, we then – through entirely different chemical processes than that with the phosphorescent rocks involving silver halide – we can “develop” the film, which makes the image that projected onto it permanent, no longer sensitive to light.
Then bunch of other things happen that we don’t need to talk about now, and we have an image.
In digital photography, we have image sensors made up of a bunch of little light sensors, each representing a pixel of an image.
In order for these little light sensors to show an image, we need to shoot enough rays of light at them, for a long enough period of time.
If we give them no light, it will be black. Like when you forget to take the lens cap off.
If you give it a lot of light, it will turn white.
Somewhere in-between, if we give it not too little, and not too much light, we can create an image that is grey. And one that is light grey. And one that is dark grey.
Get enough of these little light sensors reading various shades of grey, and you have an image! Images come out of contrasting elements. Dark next to light, and so on. Just like drawing. Blue ink can’t draw well blue paper. White pixels don’t show details next to other white pixels.
If they all were the same brightness of grey… we wouldn’t have an image. We wouldn’t if they were all black or if they were all white either.
Don’t worry. I’ve left my lens cap on enough times to thouroughly test the hypothethis that an all black image makes a good picture. It doesn’t. No need to test that yourself.
The key to getting an image to appear is that the bright parts of our image are not too bright (ie: not solid white), and the dark parts of the image are not too dark (ie: solid black).
Camera’s have a limited range of brightnesses that that they can capture. The range a camera can capture from the darkest point in the scene being just-barely black to the brightest point in the scene that can be not-quite-white is called the dynamic range. Nicer (usually newer, more expensive) cameras have larger dynamic ranges.
If we can capture our grey, detailed, image. Then that image can actually represent the world we pointed the camera at. We can do photography!
A major part of photography is adjusting three settings on the camera – the shutter speed, the aperture, and the ISO, which determine how much light gets into the camera.
The major technical goal of photography is to create an appropriate exposure. One that shows the scene with as much detail as possible: Not all black, not all white.
Exposure And Cameras
Make sure you understand your exposure essentials before reading this article.
Camera’s control how much light gets in by adjusting one of three things.
• How LONG the camera lets light in for.
• How MUCH the camera lets light in at a time.
• How SENSITIVE the camera is to light.
Shutter Speed, measured in seconds, is how long we let light into. One second? One Thousandth of a second? Less time, less light, and \(all else equal\) the darker the image. I know “speed” is a weird way to talk about “time” but, let it go. Just don’t worry about it. If it really bothers you, then be like Canon and call it “time value” if you want.
Aperture, measured with in “f-stops” \(whatever that means\), is an adjustable hole in the camera. This hole can get bigger or smaller. Basically, it lets the _lens_ get bigger – and let in more light, or smaller, and let in less light. These numbers often have a decimal in them. Like “5 point 6” or “2 point 8”, or just “8”.
ISO, measured in… nothing, it’s just ISO. ISO stands for “International Standards Organization”, the people who decided what numbers to use so that all camera and film manufacturers would agree. Thank’s ISO! It refers to how sensitive the camera is to light.
We call this relationship the Exposure Triangle
Getting The Exposure Correct
Let’s say you’re at a soda machine. You want to fill up your cup with the perfect amount of soda, right to the rim. Too much and it overflows and your hands get all sticky. Too little and you’re left thirsty and dissapointed.
The shutter speed would be how long you hold the cup against the lever, how much time we let the soda out of the machine.
The aperture would be the nozzle. Think about the difference between getting a soda vs. the little water lever. The water trickles out, or comes rushing out.
The ISO would be the size of the cup. How much soda do we need anyway? How much before we are overflowing? Overflowing for a small dixie cup isn’t overflowing for a KFC chicken bucket!
How these different settings work with each other and how they affect your image – we’ll come back to that. Let’s learn how to mess with these settings on our fancy cameras!
To change these settings in action, see he section on shooting modes.
Videos on Exposure
*editors note: wow lots of really long-winded video explanations of the exposure triangle exist. Sorry. Watch a few of these things, and absorb the information. It’s not that difficult.*
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Food Photography-Chapter 3-How Photography Works
How Photography Works
“Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst.” Henri Cartier-Bresson.
Henri Cartier-Bresson was right. Photography takes practice; it also takes knowledge of what makes it work before technique can be applied. It is both an art and a science.
The word photography comes from the Greek words photos, meaning of light and graphic, meaning brush and combined it means painting with light. Once upon a time the light would strike light sensitive chemicals (silver halides) and a latent image was formed. This latent image was then developed into a negative and then printed on paper. Now it is light hitting a sensor and the digital image is saved on a chip. That image is displayed on a computer or printed on paper. Sadly most pictures never make it off the chip.
So basically it all comes down to the light. All you have to determine how much of that light needs to hit the sensor and how it is focused. Well, composition is very important too. Your camera can do the first part automatically and there’s nothing wrong with allowing it to most of the time. It does help to know how and why things happen so you can manipulate the exposure, so let’s start with the basics.
Basic settings- The Trinity of exposure.
There are three elements that make up exposure and they are ISO, shutter and aperture. Change one and you have to change at least one of the other two. Let me explain each of them a bit and then I’ll explain how to make adjustments, and why you would want to.
Shutter- The shutter is a device that opens and closes in a camera to allow light to pass through the camera body to the imaging sensor or film. How long the light is allowed to hit the sensor is measured in fractions of a second. Standard settings are 1sec, 1/2, 1/4, 1/15, 1/30, 1/60, 1/125, 1/250, 1/500, 1/1000, 1/2000. Many cameras can go below or above these numbers and newer ones have points between the standard speeds. The faster shutter speeds stop action. This isn’t really an issue for the food photographer as the food rarely moves and if it does you may not want to eat it. I want to add a word on shutter speeds. To handhold the camera keep the shutter speed at 1/30th minimum to prevent camera shake from showing up. With a zoom lens I’d recommend no slower than 1/60th. Below that use a tripod and a remote shutter release, or the self-timer.
Aperture- The aperture is the opening inside the lens that can change in diameter to control the amount of light reaching a camera's sensor or film. The diameter is expressed in numbers called f/stops; the lower the number, the larger the aperture opening. The standard ones are f/1.4, f/2, f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16, and f/22. Modern cameras can also give half stops. The bigger openings, the smaller numbers, tend to give a shallow depth of field while the smaller openings, the bigger numbers, give greater depth of field. I’ll explain this later.
ISO- ISO is adjusting the light sensitivity of the sensor. The higher the ISO, the faster the setting and the less light needed. So why not simply use a higher ISO? Well, there is a tradeoff here as the faster settings have more noise. This used to be known as film speed with the lower ISO having a finer grain and the higher ISO having larger grain. It isn’t exactly the same here, noise is actually stray electrical impulses striking the sensor, but it’s close enough for our purposes. Try to use the lowest ISO you can get away with, or let the camera decide by setting the ISO to automatic. Some cameras let you set a range of ISO. Standard film speeds are 25, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600. ISO 400 needs half as much exposure as ISO 200 and twice as much as ISO 800. In digital there are points between.
Exposure- To put it all together exposure is made by a combination of ISO, shutter and aperture. Think of it this way. You have to get a whole bunch of people into a room and lined up against a wall. The ISO decides how many people need to come in. The higher the ISO, the less people have to get through the door and conversely the Lower the ISO, the more people have to get through. The aperture is the size of the door and the shutter is how long the door is open. If you have a really big door to the room it only needs to be open for a short time. If the door is small you have to leave it open longer. Each f/stop either doubles of halves the light, depending on which direction you go. Therefore 1/60th at f/4 is the same as 1/125th at f/2.8 and 1/250th at f/2. Well, sort of the same and you’ll se what I mean when we discuss depth of focus.
Megapixels- Essentially this is how many pixels the camera’s sensor can record. The first digital camera I ever held was in the early ‘80’s and it was a Canon RC-250 xapshot that looked more like a binocular than it did a camera. It held 50 images on a removable floppy disk. The resolution was a mere 1/3rd of a megapixel.
There are quite a few people who will say that anything above 5MP is adequate for a poster-sized enlargement. I’ve even read that 6MP can be used for a billboard. The reason? The larger the print the further back you have to stand to view it. I usually shoot at 10MP in JPEG format.
Depth of Field- This is the area from foreground to background that is in focus. A shallow depth of field may only have the subject in focus while the background is a blur. We use this a lot in food photography.
White Balance/ Color Temperature- Light has a temperature, or color, depending on its source. This affects the colors of your photographs. The temperatures I’ve shown below are from an old Eastman Kodak book. The best way to check is with a color meter but there really is no need for that.
Light Source
Temperature in Kelvin
Color tint
Candle flame
Sunrise or sunset
100-Watt Incandescent Lamp
Sunlight, Early Morning
Slight Warm Tint
Sunlight, Noon
Overcast Sky
Blue Tint
Winter Sunlight
This is why your indoor pictures without using a flash look a bit red and pictures on snow look a bit blue. Years ago film was predominately daylight film and balanced for about 5,000K. One added a blue filter to the lens to correct for indoor shooting and Tungsten film was available, balanced at 3,400K. Florescent lighting causes a nightmare of its own by being anywhere from yellow to green to even purple in hue. Now you know why some of the people in your portraits have green hair, and they’re not Goths. By the way, flash is daylight balanced so there’s no problem there, unless you try to mix flash, a light bulb and florescent lights.
The term White Balance is more of a video term and means to adjust to the lighting. All cameras can do this automatically and most will allow you to adjust as needed. I’ll let you in on a secret, for my DSLR I generally leave the white balance set on auto and it does a fine job. Once in a while I have to do a color correction to the image either in camera with the DSLR or on the computer.
JPEG or RAW?- JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group and is the standard for using images on the web. It is ready to use straight from the camera. RAW is more of a digital negative and requires a bit of work before it can be used, hence the name raw image. For most of the world I recommend JPEG since it is easier to use. If you know Photoshop, or a similar program, then by all means use RAW.
Camera Shooting Modes- There are a few ways to get the right exposure.
P Program- The camera sets both the shutter and the aperture. You can make some adjustments in this mode by using what is called program shift. Say the camera has set the exposure at 1/125th at f/8 and you want more depth of field. You shift to 1/60th at f/11 or 1/30th at f/16. Check your camera manual for how to do this, on mine I just spin the wheel on the back of the camera.
M Manual- You set both the shutter and the aperture. Here you have total control over the exposure. Generally you start by setting a shutter speed and find the aperture for correct exposure. It also works the other way around by setting the aperture and finding a corresponding shutter speed. The easier way is to use aperture priority or shutter priority.
A Aperture Priority- You set the aperture and the camera sets the proper shutter speed. Use this mode when depth of field is important. This is the mode I use most often.
S Shutter Priority- You set the shutter and the camera sets the proper aperture. Use this mode when you want to stop the action, or blur it.
Special Modes- In addition to the standard modes most modern cameras come equipped with a few modes for specific scenes. Some of these are; portrait, sports, close up, children and more. I have a compact camera that has a food mode on it, and the mode is basically worthless.
Now let’s take a look at the equipment and get you even more confused.
1. This is great since I'm teaching digital media this year and have been studying this information this summer!
2. Glad to be of help Karen. Feel free to use anything you need.
3. Thanks so much for doing this. I assume after the last lesson I should stop using my phone for pictures?
4. Thanks Joe. I'll talk about the iphone later, but a real camera is so much better. I have never had a restaurant take exception to my taking pictures and once you get used to bringing it in it gets easy.
1. Oh, and I like your blog Joe. I added it to my blogroll.
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Up your Photography Game NOW!
My name is Alex, I’m a Swede based in Switzerland and I have been the photographer and content creator for Lone Rider for the past 1.5 years. I first got into serious photography during early 2018 when my aim was to raise the quality of my own Instagram account.
This quickly evolved into a lot of my content being reposted by larger accounts, allowing a much greater reach on the platform. Soon after, I was contacted by Lone Rider, asking me if I was interested in a collaboration. And here we are today ;-)
About this blog article
Before we get started, please understand: this blog article should not be considered as the one and only way to achieve great photos!
Photography is an art and there are tons of different styles and ways to do it. I just want to share with you my style and how I achieve it through my work flow, as a lot of you have asked us to do this tutorial.
In this article, we'll cover the basics you’ll need to know to instantly up your photography game for 2021!
What we will cover
Let's get started!
1. File formats
As you might know, there are a ton of different file formats out there: JPEG, GIF, TIFF, PNG, etc. Some formats are better than others when it comes to photography, while other formats are more suitable when you for example need a part of the image to be transparent.
Let’s go through what’s most commonly used among photographers.
JPEG is by far the most common file format - it’s the default of almost every (smartphone) camera. JPEG is also the format of most pictures you see on the web.
But when your camera creates a JPEG file, a few things happen. First, your camera compresses the data so that the file size gets smaller and this is primarily done to save space. A JPEG will only contain around a quarter of the data that your camera initially captured, meaning that a large part of data is discarded.
Some of it is color data, which is done by reducing the number of available colors - even though there are still a lot of colors available in JPEGs. The biggest impact will be in the highlights and shadows, where a lot of detail may be lost.
In addition to this, your camera will add some background processing to the picture to make it look sharp and colorful. Subtle amounts of sharpness, contrast and saturation are added by the time the JPEG file is being created. This is of course something great if you don’t wish to go through the editing process yourself, but as a photographer you want to be in full control and this is where RAW files come in.
Actually, there isn’t a file format called RAW. Each camera has its own way of bundling the data that it receives from the image sensor to create its own file (.ARW for Sony, .NEF for Nikon, .CR2 for Canon, etc). Compared to JPEGs, RAW files are typically 3-4 times bigger as no data is discarded from the file.
Here is an example of how big the difference between JPEG and RAW-files is, all pictures were shot with my Sony A7iii:
JPEG picture - original
Underexposed original straight out of camera.
JPEG picture - corrected exposure
Picture adjusted by increasing the exposure and lifting the shadows.
You can clearly see how much the previously dark areas have started to fall apart when I increased the exposure in post editing.
RAW picture - original
Underexposed original straight out of camera.
RAW picture - corrected exposure
Picture adjusted by increasing the exposure and lifting the shadows.
Compared to the JPEG, a lot more data laid "hidden" in the darker parts.
As you can see, there is a lot more data “hidden” inside a RAW-file compared to a JPEG, and this makes RAW-files much more attractive to work with as you, for example, can brighten up darker areas without having the picture start to break apart.
2. Different cameras
Besides analogue cameras, there are basically four types of cameras for photography:
• Smartphone cameras
• Compact cameras
• DSLR's
• Mirrorless cameras
The two first types are the most user friendly as they are typical "point and shoot’s", while the two latter requires more practice and skill but can give you superior results.
Smartphone cameras
The last couple of years the quality of the built-in cameras and software in smartphones have become really impressive. In fact, even for a trained eye it’s sometimes really hard to tell the difference between an iPhone 11/12 photo and a DSLR-camera photo, given they were shot with the same settings.
General advantages:
• Lightweight and compact
• Easy to use
• Always accessible
• Editing possible directly in the phone
General disadvantages:
• You are more or less limited to the built-in lens(es)
• Limited possibilities to full manual control
• No optical zoom, making shots from a greater distance harder
• Small sensor
• Sometimes limited possibilities to shoot in RAW
Compact cameras
The market for compact cameras is gradually shrinking as smartphone cameras continue to improve in both hardware as well as in software. However, there are still a few things that make compact cameras better than smartphone cameras in general if you take photography a bit more seriously but don’t want to spend a small fortune.
General advantages:
• Optical zoom (physical zoom of the lens)
• Larger image sensor than smartphones
• Full control of manual settings
• Can shoot in RAW
General disadvantages:
• The lens is fixed to the camera body, not allowing you to swap to other lenses if needed
• As expensive as a smartphone
DSLR cameras
The first step towards professional photography is getting a DSLR-camera. DSLR stands for Digital Single Lens Reflex and is a common technology for more serious and professional shooters.
The system itself is completely modular, meaning that you combine a separate camera body with different lenses depending on what kind of photography you’re doing. Everything from macro (close up), wide-angle and telephoto (large optical zoom) is possible with this system.
A DSLR works like this: A mirror inside the camera body reflects light coming in through the lens up to a prism (or additional mirrors) and into the viewfinder so you can preview your shot. When you press the shutter button, the mirror flips up, the shutter opens and the light hits the image sensor, which captures the final image.
General advantages:
• Fully modular with lenses and flashes
• Better image quality
• Large sensor
• Full control of manual settings
• Shoots in RAW
General disadvantages:
• Bulky and heavy compared to smartphones and compact cameras
• Can be very expensive, a body+lens combination can cost up to $60’000
• Takes a lot of practice to learn, understand and master
Mirrorless cameras
Mirrorless cameras are what many professionals are using. They are much more compact and weigh less than a DSLR-camera.
In a mirrorless camera, light passes through the lens and right onto the image sensor, which captures a preview of the image to display on the rear screen - just as a smartphone camera does. Some models also offer a second screen via an electronic viewfinder (EVF) that you can hold up to your eye for a better view when you're in bright sunlight.
General advantages:
• Fully modular with lenses and flashes
• Better image quality
• Large sensor
• Full control of manual settings
• Possibilities to shoot in silent mode
• Shoots in RAW
General disadvantages:
• Takes a lot of practice to learn, understand and master
So, which one is most suitable for you?
In the end, it all comes down to how serious you wanna get with photography. If you’re happy with the quality your smartphone produces and don’t wanna spend around $1000 - $2000 worth of camera gear, then you probably should stay with it.
Depending on what smartphone you have, investigate the possibilities of shooting in RAW as this will help you greatly in the editing process. For example, Apple just released their own RAW format (ProRAW) together with their iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max.
But if you’re looking to step it up a level or two, consider investing in a dedicated camera. I personally shoot on the Sony A7iii (mirrorless) and the difference in picture quality between this one and my rather outdated iPhone 7 Plus is huge, it’s not even comparable to be honest.
My tip to you is to do some research on different cameras, YouTube is your best friend here. Canon and Sony are two great brands to start with. Find out what price range you’re prepared to step into and don’t forget to scan the second-hand market.
3. Shutter speed, Aperture & ISO
- Understanding and mastering them
These three tools for controlling the exposure (how bright or dark the picture is) are crucial in understanding how to make your photo look as good as possible.
Let’s dive deeper into what each one does.
Shutter speed
What is a “shutter”? The shutter is a small “curtain” in the camera that quickly rolls over the image sensor and allows light to shine onto the sensor for a short period of time. The longer the shutter allows light to shine onto the image sensor, the brighter the picture will be. The faster the shutter, the darker the picture - since less light is let into the sensor.
The duration that the shutter allows light onto the image sensor is called the shutter speed and is measured in fractions of a second. A shutter speed of 1/5th of a second will allow more light to touch the image sensor and will produce a brighter picture than a shutter speed of 1/500th of a second. So if you're taking a picture and it is too dark, you could use a slower shutter speed to allow the camera to gather more light.
The shutter speed is also principally responsible for controlling the amount of motion blur in a picture when you shoot moving subjects, the slower the shutter the more motion blur you will have.
A cool technique to practice is to go with a slow shutter speed setting, and then pan along with a moving subject. If you do it correctly, your subject will be in focus but the background will have lots motion blur to it. For this to work, you have to pan at the same speed that your subject is moving in your frame.
The aperture is a small set of blades in the lens that controls how much light will enter the camera. The blades create a "round" shape that can be widened or closed down to a small hole. If you shoot with the aperture wide open, more light is allowed into the camera than if the aperture is closed down to a tiny hole, allowing less light to enter the camera.
Aperture sizes are measured by f-stops. A high f-stop, like f/22, means that the aperture hole is very small and a low f-stop like for example f/1.4 means that the aperture is wide open. But, the size of the aperture controls more than just the brightness or darkness of the picture: it also controls the depth of field, or how much background blur (bokeh) your subject will have.
If you want to take a picture of a person with a blurry background, you should shoot as wide open as your lens allows (as low f-number as possible). If you want to take a picture of a landscape, you should use a small aperture size (high f-number) so that the entire scene is in sharp focus. But keep in mind that most lenses will lose some contrast and general sharpness if you max out the f-number, to, for example, f/22.
The ISO controls the exposure by using software in the camera to make it more sensitive to light. A high ISO, such as 2000, will produce a brighter picture than a lower ISO such as 100. The drawback to increasing the ISO is that it makes the picture more grainy.
You have probably noticed that a picture you took during nighttime with your smartphone contains a lot of grain if you zoom in a bit on it. That is because the camera tried to compensate for the dark scene by choosing a high ISO, which causes more grain.
My personal preference is to avoid shooting with an ISO higher than 1000, especially if I plan to crop my pictures in the editing process, which I do most of the time. Sometimes adding grain/noise to your picture is an artistic style, so depending how much grain you are willing to accept straight out of camera is ultimately up to you.
Bonus: Focal lengths
Focal length is the distance (measured in millimeters) between the point of convergence of your lens and the sensor on your camera. The focal length dictates how much of the scene your camera will be able to capture, lower numbers have a wider angle of view and show more of the scene, while higher numbers have a narrower angle of view.
Focal length impacts the look and quality of a photograph in several ways:
Field of view: Focal length determines how much of a scene is captured in an image. Shorter focal length lenses are called wide-angle lenses because they allow you to get a wider field of view in one image. Lenses with long focal lengths are called telephoto lenses, and have a smaller field of view.
Depth of field: Lenses with long focal lengths tend to have a shallow depth of field, which means they can focus in on small objects at specific distances. Meanwhile, lenses with short focal lengths have a deeper depth of field, which enables them to get a wider range of elements in focus.
Perspective: Focal length can also change the perspective and scale of your images. A lens with a shorter focal length “expands” perspective, giving the appearance of more space between the elements in your photo, while telephoto lenses tend to stack elements in the frame together to “compress” perspective and focus more on your subject.
The different groups of focal lengths
Ultra wide-angle (up to 24mm)
These lenses are sometimes called fisheye lenses, which have a very wide viewing area. Most of these lenses will also distort the sides of the picture, making straight lines look a bit bent.
Standard wide-angle (24mm - 35mm)
Smaller focal lengths and a wider angle can distort images. With a lens of this size, distortion is minimal and the image appears more natural.>
Standard lens (35mm - 70mm)
These versatile lenses are good for just about any type of photography, from portraits to landscapes. These all-in-one lenses render images roughly the way the human eye sees the world, and easily adjust to a shallow or deep depth of field, depending on aperture.
Telephoto lens (70mm - 200mm or more)
These lenses are ideal for picking out a distant subject, the way a telescope does. Great for compressing your subject and the background, which makes the background appear much closer to the subject, yet being very blurry. Telephoto lenses quite often have a shallow depth of field unless everything you’re shooting is far away.
4. Composition, Lighting & Camera settings
- How to nail your photos
What is Composition?
Composition is a way of guiding the viewer’s eye towards the important subject in your photo. Good composition can help make a great result, even if the content is not especially interesting. On the other hand, bad composition can ruin a photo completely, despite how interesting the subject may be. Poor composition is also not something you can usually fix in post-processing, unlike simple and common exposure errors.
My guide for a great composition:
1. Don’t be lazy. Always try to find new angles, whether it’s standing on your knees or climbing a hill. There’s nothing more boring than pictures shot only from eye level.
2. Always plan your shots with the “Rule of Thirds” in mind. This is a type of composition in which an image is divided evenly into thirds, both horizontally and vertically, and the subject of the image is placed at the intersection of those dividing lines, or along one of the lines itself. My personal favourite composition is “negative headspace”, meaning your subject has more space above it than below it.
3. Avoid having distracting elements behind your subject, always aim to have a clean background.
4. Always keep sufficient distance between your subject and the background. This will increase the depth in your picture, as the background will be more blurry, hence increasing the contrast between the background and your subject.
5. Shoot “through” stuff, meaning you have both foreground and background blur. Sometimes it’s enough to cover a bit of the lens with, for example, a glove, to create more depth in your photo.
This is a very important thing to consider - bad lighting can ruin a whole photo completely. Avoid shooting in direct mid-day sunlight as much as possible, as this light is very harsh and makes everything over-contrasty and hard to edit in post.
If you however want or have to shoot midday, try to find a spot with sufficient amount of shadows and keep in mind not to have sunlight or sunlit places as background, as these areas easily get “burned” when you compensate the camera settings for your darker subject.
The best time to get great shots is during the “golden hour”, which is the time around sunrise or sunset when the sun is low. Due to the low position of the sun, the light gets very warm and soft, making it easier for you to edit in post-production.
Here you can see the difference in contrast between direct mid-day sunlight and during the golden hour:
Camera settings
So what are the best camera settings? Well, it really depends on the situation and how you shoot.
As a rule of thumb, my priorities look like this:
1. ISO - as low as possible
2. Aperture - as low as my subject allows to
3. Shutter speed - last adjustment for perfect exposure
Firstly, I always want to keep the ISO as low as possible to avoid unnecessary grain in my pictures - my preference is to control this in post-editing.
Secondly, I keep the aperture (f-number) as open as possible (lowest f-number) if I’m shooting from a distance. This is because I want my subject to “pop” from the background.
Thirdly, I adjust the shutter speed to get a proper exposure of the overall picture. When shooting moving subjects, if you're not aiming to have motion blur in your background I wouldn't recommend a slower shutter speed than 1/800 to avoid the subject looking blurry or out of focus - but this only applies when you are panning along with the moving subject.
But, what if I’m at the lowest ISO, have a wide open aperture (lowest f-number possible), 1/800 shutter speed and the picture comes out underexposed (too dark)?
If you’re shooting a moving subject, now is the time to start raising your ISO. If you’re shooting a static subject, first lower the shutter speed. If you have a steady hand, 1/50 should be no problem without using a tripod. If you’re at around 1/100 shutter speed and the picture still is too dark, raise the ISO.
Something worth mentioning when shooting closeups with your subject in a 3D-angle, is to raise the f-number to around f/8. This is to avoid having the majority of the picture out of focus, if that's something you’re not aiming for, of course.
Have a look below:
5. The Editing Process
- Where the magic happens
There are numerous applications for picture editing out there, some are free and some will require either a one-time payment or a monthly subscription.
The software I use is Adobe Lightroom Classic for desktops. Adobe also has Lightroom CC which is a cloud-based version, where everything is shared automatically between your devices.
Personally, I prefer editing on my 27" iMac as the screen is way bigger than my iPhone or iPad, and I also prefer working with a mouse.
To in-depth describe and deep-dive into all the possibilities you have with Lightroom Classic would be a bit too much for this blog post, so I recommend that you watch the following YouTube video before I describe what tools I use to get great results:
Lightroom Tutorial Basics
My editing process
Now that you have a brief overview of what all the tools in Lightroom do, I thought I'd guide you through how I edited one of our most popular pictures on our Instagram channel so far this year, featuring the BMW R1250GS Adventure 40th Anniversary Edition. This picture got over 13 000 likes - thanks for the support!
Step 1 - Aspect ratio
The first thing I always do is to adjust the aspect ratio. For instagram, I use 3 different aspect ratios:
• 4x5 - Standard format (used here below)
• 1x1 - When 4x5 is not necessary or simply gives the subject to much negative headspace
• 9x16 - Full screen ratio for Stories
I never use Landscape format as the pictures get too zoomed out for my taste.
Step 2 - Basic tab
Unlike what was shown in the video above, I first make my picture look a bit more flat by lifting the Shadows and lowering the Highlights. I also increase the Contrast a bit while raising the Blacks.
Step 3 - Curves
Now it's time to introduce the contrast, and I do so for each color as well, as you can see, on the curves. The current look I have for the season has a dark, moody vibe to it so contrast is important here.
Step 4 - Hue, Saturation & Luminance for Colors
After Step 3, the image had way too strong and saturated colors. The first thing I do is to adjust the Hue by dragging green towards yellow and yellow towards orange, to make the colors look more like the current season (late winter).
The next step is to desaturate green, aqua, blue, purple and magenta, making the warmer colors more present.
Lastly I fine-tune the Luminance (brightness of each color) slightly to make the final minor but necessary adjustments.
Step 5 - Color Grading
The picture looks a bit warm for the season, doesn't it? We fix this under the Color Grading tab.
Here I make very subtle adjustments to Shadows and Highlights, dragging them both towards a blue tone, very carefully so as not to overdo it.
Step 6 - Detail & Calibration
I add small amounts of Sharpening to make the picture look just a bit more crisp.
In the tab Calibration, I increase the Hue and Saturation of the Reds about 10-15 steps, to make the image look more "golden".
Then, I increase the Hue of the Greens by about 30 while reducing the Saturation to around -30, making the greens look colder.
And a final touch to the Hue and Saturation of the Blues, both decreasing to around -15, giving the picture a subtle amount of "cold magenta".
Step 7 - Radial Filters & Adjustment Brush
My edits would never be what they are without these features. These tools are so vital to my editing process and can make a flat-looking picture really pop and come to life.
You can find these tools just above the Basics tab, where you select the Crop tool to change the aspect ratio.
Select the Radial Filter tool and drag a circle or an oval on top of your subject. From here, you can now adjust the exposure, highlights, shadows, saturation, temperature, tint, etc, of the highlighted area, making it very easy to brighten up darker parts without affecting the rest of your image.
Adjustments I made with the radial tool on this picture:
• Increased overall shadows on the bike only
• Increased exposure on the MiniBags and crash bars
• Increased clarity on the front tyre
• Increased saturation and adjusted the Hue on the Headlight Guard
• Increased saturation on the turning indicator daylights
• Adjusted the Hue of the hand protectors
• Decreased exposure of the ground below the bike
• Decreased Dehaze above the bike, making the light coming from above seem brighter and more hazy
By pressing the shortcut "O" while using the filter tools, the selection turns red (by default) making it easier to see what area is affected (see the front tyre on the image here). You can also control how harsh or soft the edge of the selection is going to be by adjusting the Feather, whereas 0 is very sharp and 100 is very faded.
And here you have the difference between the shot straight out of camera vs the same shot cropped & edited and ready for posting on social media:
That's it for me, I hope you enjoyed this article and that you learned a thing or two. Make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel where I'm going to upload more photo-related and behind-the-scenes content during the coming months.
Until then, I wish you a nice day and Ride Safe 👊😎
// Alex | Lone Rider Team | https://www.lonerider-motorcycle.de/blogs/loneriderblog/up-your-photography-game-now | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2022-33
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} | 7,718 | What is metering and which mode is best to use on my camera?
Question: I’ve heard the term metering but I don’t know what it does and why it’s important. Can you explain what it is?
Answer: When shooting in auto or the semiautomatic modes, your camera has to estimate one or more settings to give you the most balanced possible exposure. It does this by intelligently analysing the intensity of the light that comes down the lens and reaches the sensor. Metering is also active in manual mode, though this is purely to provide you with a lightmeter reading. The problem is, most scenes have a wide variety of light levels that go from deep shadows to bright highlights, so the camera often has a really difficult job producing an accurate overall exposure. Let’s imagine you’re shooting an indoor portrait against a bright window, for example.
The camera doesn’t know whether you want a perfectly exposed face with a blown out background or whether you’re actually going for a silhouette effect.
Understand metering modes
To help your camera make the most accurate possible exposures, all DSLRs, CSCs and serious compacts have several metering modes you can choose from to suit different shooting conditions. They work either by considering light from across the whole frame, or by placing greater or complete emphasis on one specific part. Once you know what these modes do, and when to use them, you’ll be able to get much more accurate exposures in any shooting situation. Let’s check out the four most common metering modes in more detail.
Metering modes - which one to use when...
This is usually the default metering mode for most cameras, taking light into account from across the whole frame. It places greater emphasis on the active focus point, as this is the area you’re most likely to want exposed correctly.
As with evaluative metering, the camera takes into account light from across the whole frame, but with more importance placed on the central area. The active AF point isn’t taken into account, so a bright or dark focal point is less likely to affect your exposure.
Partial metering is similar to spot, but takes into account around 10% of the frame area, ignoring the other 90%. The active area usually follows the active focus point. This mode is ideal for making sure the subject on your active AF point is correctly exposed.
This very precise mode takes readings from around 3% of the frame area, ignoring the other 97%. On most cameras, this area immediately surrounds the active AF point. Spot metering is often used for portraits, though its results are very unpredictable.
What is aperture?
Question: I’m buying a new lens. How does an aperture work and does the number of diaphragm blades matter?
Answer: The amount of light that passes through a lens and reaches the sensor is governed partly by the size of an opening in the centre of the lens barrel known as the aperture. By default, the aperture is completely closed off until you take a shot, when it opens for a certain period of time that we commonly call the shutter speed. The aperture itself is created by the movement of a set of blades that make up the diaphragm. In this illustration, the lens has five diaphragm blades, which is generally the minimum number found on mainstream lenses. So how exactly are the number of diaphragm blades significant? In terms of overall image quality, the impact is relatively minimal and not really worth worrying about.
However, the number of blades will impact on the appearance of the out-of-focus areas of your images, also known as the bokeh. It shows up most in the blurred highlights, which will take on the shape of the diaphragm opening. The difference is clear to see in the two images below. Most photographers prefer the look of more circular bokeh, which is created by lenses that have a larger number of blades. For this reason, most lens manufacturers also build their diaphragms with rounded blades (as in the illustration above), keeping the aperture opening as circular as possible. The quality of bokeh tends to be of most importance to portrait photographers, who shoot regularly at wide apertures for out-of-focus backgrounds.
How do I shoot photographs in black & white?
Question: My new camera has a setting to shoot in monochrome. Is it better to use this in-camera setting or convert to monochrome while post-processing?
Answer: Both methods have their pros and cons. Using your camera’s monochrome setting means that you can review images immediately in black & white. You can then make adjustments according to what your image looks like stripped of colour, such as changing your settings, adding filters or altering the composition. The danger is that if you shoot in JPEG mode, there’s no going back – your images will then remain in black & white forever. The safest option is to shoot in RAW and use the monochrome setting to review images on the LCD screen. As RAWs consist of the ‘raw’ data, they’ll hang on to the original colour too, so you have the choice of both colour and mono back at your computer. RAWs also retain a greater level of tones and detail. Whether you shoot JPEG or RAW, a camera’s monochrome mode is a great way to hone your eye and visualise the world in black & white.
In the adjustments on the right-hand side of the screen, click on Channel Mixer. This creates an Adjustment Layer and opens a Properties box. Tick the Monochrome option in the Properties box
Open your pic and click on Enhance>Convert to Black and White . Now select a style from the options that appear, adjust Red, Green, Blue and Contrast to suit your image, and click OK.
Import your pic and hit D to go into the Develop module. Then select Basic from the list of options on the right and select Black & White from the treatment options. Your image will convert to black & white.
Should I switch to shooting RAW?
Answer: Most cameras (with the exception of entry-level compacts, action cams and most smartphones) offer both JPEG and RAW functionality. In the majority of shooting situations, you probably won’t notice a huge amount of difference between the two, except that RAW files are much larger so write slower and fill up memory cards faster. This doesn’t mean RAWs have a higher resolution, but they do hold more image information, containing all of the ‘raw’ data from the sensor. JPEGs, on the other hand, are quite heavily compressed, so some of the information the sensor collects is simply discarded. In this way you might think of a RAW file as the equivalent of a negative, and a JPEG as the equivalent of a print.
So what information is actually lost during in-camera JPEG conversion? Well, most importantly JPEGs have a smaller dynamic range, so less image data is recorded in shadow and highlight areas. This means if you mis-expose an image at the time of shooting, you may struggle to correct it afterwards. In addition, JPEGs are converted to 8-bit from 12-bit or 14-bit, meaning significantly fewer shades of colour, which can be important when shooting blue skies or other large areas of similar colour. Other symptoms of JPEG compression can include a lack of control over white balance, ugly compression artefacts, oversharpening in-camera, and poor demosaic algorithms that reduce image sharpness.
Quality v Convenience
But while RAW is clearly a better quality format, JPEGs aren’t without their advantages. Their tiny file size allows faster burst shooting and takes up less storage space, and they offer a universal file type. JPEGs can be shared, edited or displayed anywhere without the compatibility issues of RAW. If you don’t process your shots on a computer, you might even prefer the look of JPEGs, which usually look a little punchier straight out of the camera owing to in-camera processing. RAWs offer top quality, but there are times when shooting JPEGs is more convenient.
What is the B mode on my camera for?
Question: I’m just getting to grips with my DSLR but can’t really figure out the B mode. What is this for?
Answer: The Bulb mode allows users to set a very slow shutter speed for long exposure photography. In all other modes, the longest available exposure time is usually 30 seconds, but in low light conditions this sometimes isn’t enough to achieve a properly exposed image. In Bulb, you can keep the shutter open for as long as required; for several minutes or even hours. Bulb mode is useful for fireworks, vehicle light trails and astro work. It’s usually used with a remote shutter release, as users would otherwise have to keep a finger pressed on the shutter button for the duration of the exposure, leading to camera shake. A sturdy tripod is also needed to keep the camera perfectly still. When shooting in daylight, a neutral density filter will be necessary in order to achieve very long exposures. On some cameras, Bulb is represented by B on the mode dial, but on others it’s accessed by changing the shutter speed setting to beyond 30 seconds.
Should I buy a hard or soft ND grad filter?
Question: I’m not sure which neutral density grad filter to buy. In what way are hard and soft grads different?
Answer: If you’ve ever shot around sunrise or sunset, you’ve probably noticed how difficult it can be to get the land and the sky exposed correctly in a single shot. This is because the range of light intensity is unusually large, and may even be outside of the camera’s dynamic range. Some parts of the image are simply recorded as pure black or pure white, devoid of any image information. To get around this problem, an ND grad can reduce the light intensity in the sky. ND grads are single sheets of glass or plastic that are tinted at one end, gradually changing to clear at the other end.
This effectively reduces the light intensity range in the scene. It’s the same principle as the tinted strip that you often get at the top of a car windscreen. ND grads are most frequently used by landscape photographers to control bright skies, allowing them to expose the sky and the land correctly within the same image. There are ND grads to suit different shooting situations, so before you invest, think about which you’d get most benefit from.
The first thing to consider is whether to buy a hard or a soft grad. This refers to how steep the gradient is between the tinted and non-tinted parts of the filter. In other words, how rapidly the tinted glass becomes clear. If you’re shooting landscapes with a very flat horizon, such as coastal scenes, a hard grad, where the gradient is very small, is ideal. On the other hand if you shoot mountain environments, where the horizon is not so flat, the wider gradient of a soft grad is better.
Choose the right strength
The second thing to consider is the density or ‘strength’ of the tint. Darker densities tend to suit sunrises and sunsets, whereas lighter densities tend to suit daytime conditions. If in doubt, invest in a grad kit with a range of densities and hardnesses. Cokin’s H250A ND grad kit is a good option, although as a P-size kit it won’t suit ultra-wide focal lengths.
No grad filter
No grad filter
Soft grad filter
Soft grad filter
Hard grad filter
Hard grad filter
How do I get a level horizon photograph?
Question: I’ve been really frustrated lately that all my landscapes seem to have a wonky horizon. What am I doing wrong?
Answer: A slightly slanted horizon is a common mistake in landscape photography, and a sure-fire way to make an image look unbalanced. One reason this can happen is severe lens distortion – but by far the most common cause is the camera not being totally level when the shot is taken. This isn’t always obvious through the viewfinder or even on the LCD, but once the pic is on a computer screen it can look seriously lop-sided. The problem is most noticeable on coastal landscape shots, where the horizon is perfectly flat, and not interrupted by mountains or trees. Here, even a tiny slant is very obvious.
Level up your camera
The good news is that this is a very easy problem to deal with. If you own a tripod, chances are that its plate, or the section immediately below the plate, has at least one built-in spirit level (a spirit level on the legs isn’t useful). Get this lined up, and you know your horizon will be perfectly straight. If your tripod doesn’t have this function, pick up an inexpensive plastic spirit level that slides onto the camera’s hotshoe. Alternatively, your camera may have a virtual horizon built in. You can check this by activating Live View, then pressing the Info button until you see the virtual horizon appear overlaid on the screen. Then simply adjust the angle of the camera until the line goes green.
Adjust with the crop tool
But what about images you’ve already taken? Don’t worry, you can achieve a straight horizon with a simple crop adjustment. Open your image in Photoshop, select the Crop Tool, then hover over any corner until you get a curved, double-ended arrow. Click and drag so the frame is ‘straight’ in relation to the horizon. You can do exactly the same in Elements and Lightroom.
Accessories to consider...
Hama 2-way spirit level
For tripods without a built-in spirit level, this affordable hotshoe mounted option is ideal. It can be used on any DSLR, and its small size means it will slide into any accessories pocket.
Vanguard VEO 235AB
This lightweight aluminium travel tripod has a spirit level just above the ball head. It’s perfect for travel, boasting a maximum height of 145cm and weight of 1.5kg, which makes it easier to carry over long distances.
Correct distortion for straight horizons
If you’re sure your camera is straight but the horizon still looks off-kilter, your problem may be caused by severe lens distortion. This is particularly common on budget wide-angles, where straight lines near to the edges of the frame appear bent. It’s very easy to remove distortion in post-processing software using the lens correction tools. Let’s take a look at how this is done in Lightroom, Photoshop and Elements
You’ll find Lightroom’s Lens Corrections panel on the right of the screen. Simply click the Profile tab, then check the Enable Profile Corrections box.
When opening a RAW file in Photoshop, you’ll first see the Adobe Camera Raw window, which has its own Lens Corrections tab. For JPEGs, which open straight into Photoshop, go to Filter>Lens Correction. In Elements, the Camera Raw window doesn’t have Lens Corrections, so click Open and go to Filter>Correct Camera Distortion.
What lens do I need for wildlife?
Question: I want to shoot more sports and wildlife but I only have a basic DSLR and kit lens. What lens do I really need to buy to get started?
Answer: Focusing in on a particular photographic genre usually requires an investment in specialist gear. This is especially true for sports and wildlife photography, where a long telephoto lens is often absolutely paramount to getting a decent shot. Unfortunately, high performance equipment doesn’t come cheap, making fast-action photography a more expensive hobby than shooting landscapes or portraits
Choose the right glass
As a general rule, the price of telephoto lenses increases with focal length, although the maximum aperture also has a big impact. Most professional sports and wildlife photographers own a 70-200mm for close-up work, such as shooting a tennis match, and then at least one lens of around 400-600mm. Traditionally, the exceptionally high cost of these longer lenses has put them out of the reach of enthusiasts, but recently both Sigma and Tamron have introduced budget models that have opened up wildlife photography to everyone. I would strongly recommend you consider one of these, or if you’re on a budget, a 2x teleconverter on a shorter lens will suffice. Any other similar option will cost you in excess of £4000. Here are some of the best budget lenses for fast-action shooting.
Three great wildlife lenses to consider...
Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3
Sigma has released two affordable 150-600mm lenses with excellent image quality. The cheaper version (designed for the Contemporary line) has a less complicated optical design, is smaller and lighter, and has no weather-sealing. Aside from a few differences, the lenses are very similar. The more expensive S lens belongs to Sigma’s Sports line.
Tamron 150-600mm f/5-6.3
Almost identical in spec to Sigma’s cheaper C-range 150-600mm lens, this budget telephoto with image stabilisation offers a very wide focal range, the equivalent of 225-900mm on an APS-C model. Advantages over the Sigma include wider zoom and focus rings and a slightly closer focusing distance.
Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6
This very well-priced full-frame (FX) compatible telephoto zoom comes with Nikon’s Vibration Reduction system built in, reducing the risk of camera shake when used handheld. Unlike the Sigma and Tamron models, the 200-500mm has an aperture of f/5.6 through the whole zoom range. Focusing is powered by Nikon’s Silent Wave Motor for virtually no noise.
Can I stop my lens fogging up?
Question: I shoot a lot of night sky photography but can’t stop my lens fogging up. What can I do to get around this?
Answer: Condensation on the front element is a real problem for astrophotographers, especially when there’s a heavy dew. It’s usually most severe on low ground or near water. In severe cases, a lens can be completely fogged up just five seconds after being wiped clean, making longer exposures almost impossible to achieve.
Fortunately, it is possible to alleviate the problem. The first thing to remember is that sudden changes in temperature can cause condensation to form, so allow your camera to acclimatise to the ambient temperature before you shoot.
The next step is to invest in anti-fog gel or wipes. I’d also recommend a battery-powered hand fan to keep a flow of air moving across the end of the lens. This discourages droplet formation. Serious astro shooters often use heat straps, which are battery-powered heating elements that stop dew from forming on the end of the lens. Hand warmers secured with elastic bands also work well as a budget alternative.
What is lens distortion?
Question: I’ve noticed that straight lines in my images appear to bend. Is this because of distortion? And if it is, what can I do about this problem?
Answer: There are two main types of distortion. The first is perspective distortion, where a distant object appears smaller than a closer object. This is commonly seen in architectural photography, where buildings appear to lean inwards when shot from ground-level. Perspective distortion can be corrected by using a tilt & shift lens, or with distortion correction software such as DxO’s Viewpoint 2.
The effect is most severe at wider focal lengths, and occurs irrespective of optical quality. The other type of distortion is optical distortion, which is reliant on the quality and design of the glass. It occurs because the shape and arrangement of the elements cause straight lines that run near to the edge of the frame to appear bent. Focal length has a huge impact on optical distortion, with wide-angle lenses producing barrel distortion (where straight lines bend outwards towards the edge) and telephoto lenses producing pincushion distortion (where straight lines bend inwards towards the centre).
Avoid distortion effects
The easiest way to avoid lens distortion is simply to correct it afterwards in editing software. Lightroom, for example, has lens correction profiles built-in, which do the job in a single click. You can also adjust manually. Some cameras have lens correction built-in, though this is only applied to JPEGs and not RAWs. As a general rule, the more expensive the lens, the less lens distortion you’ll get. Finally, at 50mm there’s hardly any distortion on any lens, so if possible shoot at this focal length by adjusting your position.
Three ways to remove unwanted distortion...
1. Photoshop
Open a RAW file into the Adobe Camera Raw window. Simply click the Lens Corrections icon, select the Profile tab, and check Enable Lens Profile Corrections. This automatically applies the profile for your lens. For JPEGs, go to Filter>Lens Correction . Again, Photoshop will apply the lens profile.
2. Elements
Open your image in Elements, and if it’s a RAW file, make any basic tweaks in the Camera Raw window before clicking OK. Go to Filter>Correct Camera Distortion. Unlike in Photoshop and Lightroom, this won’t automatically apply lens profiles for your particular make and model, so adjustments must be done manually. This is very straightforward – just tweak the Remove Distortion slider.
3. Lightroom
Import your image in Lightroom, then press D on your keyboard to enter the Develop module. On the right of the screen, scroll down through the control panels until you reach Lens Corrections. Click the Profile tab, and check the Enable Profile Corrections box. This will automatically select the right lens profile. If not, you can always adjust it manually using the Distortion slider.
What’s the difference between sensor and image stabilisation?
Question: I’m about to buy a new DSLR but I’m confused by the different image stabilisation systems. Could you advise which type is the best?
Answer: When shooting slower shutter speeds handheld, there’s always a risk of camera shake, where even a small amount of movement during the exposure can lead to a blurred image. But image stabilisation systems are designed to banish the blur.
Sensor v lens
There are two main types of IS on the market – sensor shift and lens shift. Both systems are extremely effective, typically granting sharp handheld results when shooting 4 stops slower than usual. Some advanced systems even have different modes to eliminate movement from just one axis, for smoother panning. So what’s the difference between the two main stabilisation types? In-lens stabilisation, which is used by both Canon and Nikon, is where one or more lens elements are moved by tiny motors to compensate for the movement of the camera. This means that by the time the light reaches the sensor, the stabilisation correction has already been applied. Sensor shift stabilisation differs in that it moves the sensor itself, rather than using any mechanism in the lens. Both types of IS have distinct advantages and disadvantages, though to the average user both systems are more or less identical in terms of effectiveness. Let’s take a look at the key advantages of the two systems.
Sensor shift stabilisation
• In-camera stabilisation means IS doesn’t have to be built into every lens, keeping lens cost, size and weight to a minimum.
• You can use in-body stabilisation on virtually any lens, including older or cheaper lenses that wouldn’t normally have IS built-in.
• Sensor stabilisation is generally quieter than lens stabilisation, so is better suited to videography or shooting in noise-sensitive environments like weddings.
Lens shift stabilisation
• In-lens stabilisation is more effective for longer telephoto lenses, so is better suited to sports and wildlife shooting.
• Lens shift stabilisation systems can be tailored perfectly to each individual lens, so tend to be more effective.
• On DSLRs you can see the stabilised image in real time through the viewfinder before you take the shot, unlike with in-camera IS.
What focal lengths do I need for different subjects?
Question: Could you tell me which focal lengths are best to work with for the different types of photography?
Answer: You’ve probably read or heard lots of advice about which lenses you should be using for a certain genre of photography. Often the advice is delivered as a hard and fast rule that must be followed if you want professional results. In fact, pro photographers regularly use a very wide range of focal lengths in virtually every genre. This gives them a varied and creative portfolio that can stand out from the crowd. For example, a landscape photographer who uses a 17mm lens to shoot every single image is going to end up with a very one-dimensional body of work. So they may sometimes use a telephoto lens instead.
All that said, there are some focal lengths that generally lend themselves best to certain types of shot, so you’re likely to use them more regularly. Head-and-shoulders portraits, for example, are usually taken at around 85mm (or 50mm on an APS-C camera) as it’s deemed that this gives the kindest perspective for the human face. Actually, the focal length doesn’t alter perspective, but it does dictate where you stand to get the best composition. It’s this changing distance between the camera and subject that has the effect. For this reason the majority of your head and shoulders portrait images, though by no means all, will look best if taken with an 85mm lens. To the right we examine the focal lengths that generally work best for a handful of popular genres.
Fit the focal length to your genre...
Most landscapes are shot wide-angle, which means around 15-25mm on a full-frame body or 10-18mm on APS-C. Longer telephoto lenses are also used to get a ‘compressed perspective’ look, which gives an attractive layered effect.
As previously mentioned, a classic portrait lens of 85mm (50mm on APS-C bodies) provides the most flattering perspective. 50mm is better for full-body shots. Wide-angle or even fisheye lenses can also be used to create really quirky results.
Wildlife and sports
Unless you can get very close to your subject, a long telephoto of at least 300mm is usually required. 600mm is ideal for very skittish subjects. If your camera is very near the subject, perhaps being fired remotely, any focal length can work.
Street and reportage
Most street shooters opt for a 35mm lens, or 24mm on an APS-C camera. This gives them a slightly wider field-of-view than the human eye. However, others like to work from a distance using a 70-200mm, ensuring their shots are completely candid.
What flashgun features do I really need?
Question: I want to invest in a flashgun as I’ve outgrown my camera’s pop-up flash. To be honest, I’m not sure what all the features do and which ones I’ll actually find useful. Please can you shed some light on it?
Answer: Your camera’s built-in flash is adequate for getting you out of a difficult situation, but it’s never going to give you very attractive results. Not only is the light extremely harsh and unflattering, but it always comes directly from the camera, so your creativity is limited. An external hotshoe-mounted flashgun, on the other hand, opens up all sorts of lighting possibilities, and can enable you to achieve very professional results. Before you invest in a new flashgun though, there are some important things you should consider.
Guide number
A flashgun’s guide number, often written as GN, describes its power output. It represents the maximum distance, in metres, at which you can correctly expose a subject, assuming a hypothetical aperture of f/1 and an ISO of 100. It’s important to understand that guide numbers are measured on a logarithmic scale, so if one flash has double the guide number of another, it kicks out 4x the light. Most pop-up flashes have a GN of around ten, whereas decent external units are more like 40-60. Some manufacturers like to muddy the waters a little by using feet instead of metres, and higher ISO settings, which of course results in an inflated guide number. Be aware of this and check the specifications carefully. Look for a flash with a guide number of at least 35.
Bounce flash
Most external flashguns have a tiltable head, allowing you to bounce the light upwards towards a white ceiling. This is then reflected back down onto the subject. Bounce flash is generally more flattering than direct flash, as it vastly increases the effective size of the light source for softer shadows. Light coming from above also mimics normal daylight so it looks very natural. Some more advanced flashguns have heads that tilt side to side as well, allowing you to bounce light off a wall.
Recycle time
When shooting at or around full power, it can take several seconds for some flashgun units to recharge for the next shot. Others can recycle in less than a second. If you’re shooting in a fast-paced environment, such as at a wedding, a very fast recycle time is important, so it’s worth checking the spec sheet before you buy.
Zoom ability
On most premium flashguns, the bulb is able to move backwards and forwards within the head to adjust the angle of the beam of light. For further away subjects, for example, the angle narrows so that all the light is concentrated on the subject. Most zoomable flashes have a zoom range of 24-105mm, and in TTL mode will actually adjust automatically to match the focal length of your lens. So if you’re shooting at 50mm, your flash will adjust to ensure no light is wasted. Some photographers use the zoom function manually for creative effect. By zooming in on the flash but using a wide focal length, you can achieve a spotlight effect.
Wireless control
Most flashguns won’t fire off-camera without the use of a cable or wireless triggers. But some have a built-in wireless control so you can fire it off-camera. This is especially useful for portraits, as it allows you to use more flattering lighting patterns. Some flashes can be fired in a slave mode, which means the flash has a sensor on it that will fire the flash when it detects another flash firing.
What settings do I need for DSLR video?
Question: I want to start making some movies of my family on my DSLR. Is there anything I need to know before I start?
Answer: Almost all modern DSLRs, CSCs and advanced compacts have Full HD video functionality built-in. The quality is so impressive that many leading video companies are using professional DSLR cameras for high-end TV productions, including 24 and House . So if you own a modern DSLR, you already have everything you need to start shoot professional looking video.
The basic principles of videography are the same as they are for stills photography, therefore so long as you understand that aperture, shutter speed and ISO work together to control exposure you’re already halfway there. You’ll be shooting in manual mode, but the shutter speed stays the same for most of the time, so it is actually more similar to working in aperture-priority mode. This means that you only have to worry about ISO and aperture when balancing your exposure.
Control audio
Your camera will have a built-in microphone, the sensitivity of which can be changed in the menu. You can buy higher quality external mics that plug into the audio-in port on the side of the camera. There may also be an audio-out port so that you can connect headphones and hear the audio as it’s recorded. Finally, take a quick look at the other video options in the menu, as there may be some useful features, such as wind reduction. Before you start shooting, follow these three steps to get your camera properly set up
Set your camera up for shooting quality movies
1. Set the resolution and frame rate
Put your DSLR in movie mode and select the highest video resolution from your camera’s menu, which on most is Full HD (1080p, not 1080i). Choose a 25fps frame rate, or 50fps if you think you’ll want to slow your footage down. Next change the mode dial to manual, and set a shutter speed of 1/50sec (or 1/100sec if you’re shooting at 50fps).
2. Balance your exposure
Select an ISO of 100 for minimal digital noise and adjust the aperture while looking at the lightmeter through the viewfinder until the exposure is at 0. If you’re shooting in dark conditions, you may need to use a higher ISO to balance the exposure, though this will introduce noise. Note that wide apertures may not be possible in particularly bright conditions.
3. Focus and stabilise
While most cameras can now autofocus during video recording, manual focusing is more accurate and much smoother than an autofocus motor jerking back and forth. So flick the switch on your lens from AF to MF. While you’re there, also turn on image stabilisation if it’s available, unless your camera is mounted on a tripod, in which case it’s best to leave it turned off.
What do the controls on my DSLR camera do?
Question: I bought a DSLR but it’s more complicated than I expected. Could you explain what the buttons and dials around it do?
Answer: Moving up from a basic compact camera or smartphone to a DSLR opens up a whole new range of photographic possibilities. Not only will a more advanced camera give you increased control over the settings you use, but with a little know-how you’ll be able to achieve creative effects such as long exposures and blurry backgrounds. Of course, this added functionality means extra buttons and dials that may seem pretty alien to you when you first pick up the camera...
Start in auto mode
Our advice is to start in full auto mode. Here, your camera will behave like a point-and-shoot compact and you won’t have to worry about settings. Next, move on to P mode, which is similar except you’ll be able to change the balance between shutter speed and aperture and turn off the flash. When you’re more familiar with the camera, you can move on to semi-automatic and manual. Let’s take a look at what some of the key buttons and dials dotted around your camera actually do.
1. Mode Dial: Here you can set your shooting mode, from fully automatic to manual.
2. Pop Up Flash: This injects light into the scene to help you get a sharp shot.
3. AF Assist Lamp: This light illuminates your subject in dark situations to assist AF.
4. Lens Release Lock: Hold this button down to release the lens before twisting it off your camera’s mount.
5. Command Dial: Flick this to adjust your shutter speed, aperture or ISO value.
6. Hotshoe: A camera’s hotshoe can hold a plethora of accessories, including flashguns, remote triggers and microphones.
7. Dioptre Setting: For short- and long-sighted photographers, dioptric adjustment gives a sharp viewfinder image without the need for glasses. When you first buy a camera, look through the viewfinder and fine-tune the dioptre for your eyes.
8. Video Button: Most DSLRs now shoot up to 30 minutes of continuous Full HD (1080p) video footage with a fast enough card. Video settings are accessed through the menu, and recording is started and stopped with this button.
9. Exposure Compensation: If your image is too bright or too dark, you can tweak exposure with this button – simply hold it in while turning the finger dial. A plus figure (+) will brighten the image and a minus figure (-) will darken it. Not available in auto modes.
10. Display Setting: Some beginner photographers prefer to have their settings permanently visible on the screen during shooting. The display button also brings up vital image information, such as a histogram, if pressed when reviewing images
11. ISO Speed Setting: The higher the ISO, the more sensitive the camera’s sensor. On the plus side this gives you fast shutter speeds, which eliminates blur, but it introduces digital noise. Always use the lowest ISO setting you can.
12. Drove Mode: If you’re shooting sports or wildlife, you may wish to take several shots in quick succession. With this button you can switch to burst mode, which is usually between 4fps and 8fps. You can also set self-timer here.
13. AF Operation Selection: If you want your DSLR to focus once when you halfpress the shutter, use single shot. If you want constant focusing to keep a moving subject sharp, select continuous. Some models also have AF tracking.
14. White Balance: This is how you tell your camera what it should consider pure white in order to remove colour casts. There is an auto white balance setting, but you may need manual settings in tricky lighting conditions.
15. Menu and Quick Menu: To save you trawling through the camera’s main menu system, the Quick menu only displays the most frequently changed settings, including exposure comp, ISO, white balance and metering mode. This gives you fast access to core camera settings.
16. LCD Screen: Digital cameras have an LCD screen that allows you to compose in Live View and also review your shots instantly. Use it to zoom in on them to make sure they’re pin-sharp.
How should I compose a landscape photograph?
Question: I haven’t shot landscapes for some time and really want to get back into it. I remember there being lots of compositional rules that help produce more interesting images. Can you give me a quick recap?
Answer: If it’s been a while since you photographed a landscape, and you feel a little rusty, recap with our seven compositional tips. Remember though, that these are guidelines rather than hard-and-fast rules, so don’t feel you have to stick to them if you have a good reason not to. And, of course, don’t attempt to include all seven at every single location. In reality, it’s likely that
you’ll only need two or three to get a strong and impacting composition.
1. Focal length
Traditionally, landscapes are shot on wide-angle lenses, which enable you to capture a large proportion of the scene from a close-up position, and help create a greater feeling of depth. But this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t sometimes consider other focal lengths that can give equally impressive results. A telephoto lens, for example, will encourage you to shoot from further away, producing a ‘compressed’ perspective where the relative scale of the foreground and background is closer to reality.
2. Rule-of-thirds
Divide the frame into nine imaginary rectangles, then compose the shot so that a well-defined section of the scene fills either three or six of those rectangles. You’ll get a more balanced result, for example, if the sky fills either one or two thirds of the frame, than if the horizon is positioned halfway up. You can also place a vertical subject, like a tree, on one of the two upright lines, or a small single image element, like a rock or a boat, on one of the four points where the vertical and horizontal lines intersect. These are often called powerpoints.
3. Foreground interest
When shooting landscapes it can be easy to get caught up in the vastness of it all and forget about the foreground. But having something of interest in the bottom third of the image can really help to anchor the eye and draw the viewer into the shot. It’s sometimes said that foreground interest is the last thing a photographer thinks about but the first thing a viewer sees.
4. Lead-in lines
Lead-in lines are a great way to draw your viewer into the scene and direct them towards the subject. You can use a fence, a path, a stream, or even a linear cloud formation, so long as whatever you choose directs the eye towards the centre of the frame. It’s generally accepted that lines emanating from the bottom right and left corners of the image are the most effective.
5. Negative space
If the area surrounding your subject is relatively devoid of detail, zoom out a little to include some of this empty space in your shot. Not only will this create a cleaner composition, it can also help you to portray a sense of scale or isolation. Negative space works best when there’s only one main subject, such as a single farmhouse nestled in the middle of a large field.
6. Rule-of-odds
A photograph will generally appear to have more balance and beauty with an odd number of image elements. So if you have an even number of, say, trees in your shot, it’s best to recompose slightly so there is an odd number instead.
7. Look for symmetry
If your landscape is very symmetrical, with one part of the scene strongly mirroring another, you have the opportunity to add balance and harmony to your shot. Compose so that a line of symmetry runs straight through the middle of the frame. This will mean you’ll need to abandon the rule-of-thirds, but this approach can produce a more eye-catching result.
Which focusing mode on my camera is best?
Question: Should I just shoot in my automatic autofocus mode or is it best to select a different one? Could you explain to me what they all do on my camera?
Answer: Getting your subject perfectly sharp is absolutely vital to the success of a shot. It’s most challenging when shooting with very wide apertures where the depth-of-field is extremely shallow, or with fast-moving subjects where the point of focus is constantly changing. Most DSLR focusing systems work slightly differently to those found on CSCs, but both are similar in that the frame is divided up into focus areas or focus points. These can range from nine on basic models, to over 200 on pro cameras. By choosing how you want these areas or points to behave, you can give yourself the best chance of achieving a sharp image. Or you might opt to turn them off entirely and focus manually for maximum accuracy. Here we take a look at the different focusing modes, and why they’re best for certain types of picture.
Understanding the four main camera focusing modes...
One-shot AF/Single Servo AF
The camera will acquire focus only once when the shutter button is half-pressed. Usually, this is using just one AF point, though some cameras allow a cluster of points to be used. Most photographers prefer to select this point themselves, which allows pin-point focusing ideal for portraits and landscapes. Alternatively, auto-area AF forces the camera to choose the point automatically, usually selecting the object closest to the camera.
AI Focus/Automatic AF
In this mode the camera automatically detects whether the subject is moving or stationary, and selects either AF-S (one-shot AF) or AF-C (AI servo). This is a good mode to use if your subject is mostly stationary, but might move unexpectedly, such as a deer or a child playing. If you’re not comfortable switching between the two main focusing modes, this is the best option to use to get started.
AI Servo/Continuous AF
With the shutter button half-pressed, the camera continually acquires focus, which is ideal for any subject that moves towards or away from the camera. In this mode you can either have just one active AF point, which will keep whatever covers this part of the frame sharp, or choose a larger group of points. You can also activate 3D tracking, which will keep your subject sharp wherever it moves within the frame.
Manual focus/MF
As fast and accurate as modern autofocus systems are, there are occasions when you’ll get more accurate results with it turned off. If you’re into night sky or macro photography, for example, you’ll work almost entirely in manual. For really accurate results, activate Live View, use the zoom buttons to enlarge a section of the image to 5x or 10x, then use the D-pad to choose the area of the frame you want to see in detail.
How do I clean my camera's sensor?
Question: I keep seeing lots of black spots on my images, especially when I shoot a clear blue sky. Are there any steps I can take to fix this issue.
Answer: There comes a time in every camera’s life when, despite your best efforts, the sensor surface picks up specks of dirt. This is more likely to be an issue if you regularly change your lenses outside, where dust, sand and water can easily get in. Even if you shoot primarily inside, such as in a studio, oil and grease from the inner workings of your camera can still splatter onto your sensor. You might find that you don’t even notice these little marks until you are shooting a clear and bright background that really shows just how dirty your sensor actually is. Some cameras have automatic sensor-cleaning systems, although they’re not always effective.
Cleaning your sensor
You may decide that getting your sensor cleaned professionally is the best option, but this can cost upwards of about £30. If you’re on a budget, why not try cleaning it yourself? While this might seem like a daunting task, if you work carefully you can’t go wrong. For instructions on how to do this, follow the three steps on the right. If you’re looking to invest in a decent budget sensor-cleaning kit, The Dust Patrol Sensor Cleaning Kit is a great option.
Prepare your camera
The first thing you need to do is get your camera’s mirror out of the way. If you own a CSC you won’t have this problem, so you can go straight onto Step 2. If you own a DSLR make sure your battery is fully charged, then turn your camera on and go into the Setup Menu. Click the ‘Lock mirror up for cleaning’ option and select Start. Once the mirror is out of the way, you can then remove the lens.
Now clean your sensor
With your sensor exposed, now use a manual air dust blower to remove the dust that is just sitting on the sensor. Ensure that you do not use any canned air or blow on the sensor yourself, as you will run the risk of making it worse. Once you have removed all of the dry dirt, you can try using a wet swab cleaner by following the instruction manual that will come with your cleaning kit.
Check the results
When you have finished cleaning your sensor, check that there are no marks that you have missed. Put your lens back on and turn off the camera in order to put your mirror back where it should be. Set your aperture to f/22, take a shot of a clear background and then check it on your computer. A clear blue sky works well for this, but a piece of white paper will also do the job. | https://www.practicalphotography.com/camera-advice/questions-and-answers | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2019-09
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} | 945 | What camera settings should I use for newborn photography? Top 10 Tips
newborn photographer
1. Use a Normal Lens (50mm or so)
While traditional portrait lenses (100mm and higher) can be more flattering to faces, they require a greater distance between the camera and subject. Since we are working in a relatively small area, 50mm gives us the best balance between image quality and ease of use.
Canon and Nikon both make affordable 50mm lenses which will dramatically improve the quality of your images over any kit lenses. Also keep in mind the crop factor which occurs on some digital SLR cameras. If you are using a non-full frame camera (e.g. a Canon Rebel or Nikon D60) the 50mm lens will act like an 80mm lens. You may want to look at a ~32mm lens to compensate for the additional magnification.
2. Use Large Apertures
A large aperture (small f number) lets in more light and reduces the depth of field. We typically work at f/2.8 to f/4.5 to help blur the background and keep the focus on our little subjects. The fact that larger apertures let in more light is an added bonus.
3. Consider Using a Macro Lens for Details
While the minimum focusing distance of a regular lens is usually around a foot or so, macro lenses let you get super close - an inch or so away - allowing you to fill the frame with the tiniest baby details. Nikon makes two: a 50mm and 105mm. The latest version of the 105 also includes their vibration reduction which isn’t as useful as you’d think. Also, keep in mind the depth of field on a macro lens is extremely shallow! You’ll want to seriously consider using a tripod since the slightest movement will blur your image.
newborn baby photography
4. Full-frame Sensor
If you can afford it, get a camera with a full-frame sensor. The bigger sensor lets in more light, gives your better detail and less noise at high ISOs and eliminates the crop factor found on cameras with smaller sensors. No only will a 50mm lens work as designed, but you'll get a bit more depth of field at a given aperture than you would with the same f-stop on a crop factor camera.
5. Use a Fast Shutter Speed
Try to keep the shutter speed at or above 1/250 of second. If you’re a steady shooter you can go lower, but since we're shooting almost entirely hand-held, 1/250 sec shutter speed is fast enough to eliminate any potential image blurring.
6. Don't Be Afraid of High ISO
You always want to keep your ISO as low as possible, but if you still don’t have enough light, consider raising your ISO value. Newer cameras can hit an ISO of 800 without even blinking, and the latest version of Lightroom/Camera Raw can work wonders on grainy files - they come out looking really great. We recommend raising your ISO before adjusting down my shutter speed because we'd rather have a sharp picture that's a little grainy than a blurry picture without any grain.
7. No Tripod
When shooting newborns, we're on their schedule and we need to be efficient shooters. Using a tripod gets in the way and can slows down a shoot. With careful attention to your focusing and shutter speed, you can get away without a tripod. Now, having said that, it can be useful for macro shots, but we would caution against it for everything else.
san diego newborn baby photographer
8. Set Your White Balance to Cloudy
We've talked about this on this blog before, but as a general rule, keep your white balance set to 'Cloudy' (Approx 5500° Kelvin) for nice warm skin tones. If it comes out too warm, you can always override, assuming you shoot in RAW mode...
9. Always shoot RAW
Always, always, always shoot raw. There’s no reason not to. You have complete control over sharpening, compression, white balance and it even gives you a little latitude if your exposure isn’t spot on. Lightroom, Camera Raw, Aperture and others can be tremendously useful to manage and tweak your raw files so they come out looking great with very little work.
10. Focus on the Eyes
When you’re dealing with a large aperture, the ‘focus and recompose’ method for framing your shot won't always work. Your depth of field can be so shallow that even small camera position adjustments can knock things out of focus. A better approach is to frame your shot, then move the camera's focus cursor over one of your subject’s eyes and take the shot.
BONUS: Use Manual or Spot Metering
If you're comfortable shooting in Manual mode, you can skip this one. If not, use spot metering instead of evaluative (check your camera's manual for information on how to switch the metering modes). This will let the camera meter off a small area (usually centered on your focus point) instead of trying to look at the whole scene to determine the proper exposure.
Keep in mind that if you’re shooting a newborn on a black background, the camera will try to turn your black background into middle gray, and ruin the image through overexposure. (the converse happens if you’re shooting on a white background). To minimize this, dial in exposure compensation. In other words, if you’re shooting on black, you can take the camera’s default exposure and add a -1ev to the camera. This will tell the camera to subtract a stop from what it thinks is the correct exposure.
To view more examples of these principles in action, click here to visit our newborn photography gallery. If you have any questions about any of these tips, leave a comment below. Good luck! | https://littlesproutphotography.com/blog/2010/07/what-camera-settings-should-i-use-for-newborn-photography-top-10-tips | robots: classic
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First Things First - Switch to Manual
Maybe the title of this post should actually be "Find Your Manual and Read it!" I know those things can be a little daunting but you can do it, I swear. Plus you are really going to need your manual because I am not going to know the setting and buttons for all the different cameras out there. So, go find that manual!
Okay, do you have it? Now you are going to get your camera off auto and switch it to manual. There should be a knob on top you can set at "M".
Something like this
Okay first why do you want to do this? Digital cameras are pretty advanced and pretty smart. But they aren't that smart. There are a lot of situations where the camera will choose to take a picture one way when you would choose another. Also you really want to stop using your flash. The flash that is on your camera makes pictures look bad. Really. Don't use the flash.
To shoot in manual you need to understand the exposure triangle - iso, aperture, and shutter speed.
1. ISO - the iso is a measure of how sensitive to light your sensor is. The lower the ISO the crisper your pictures will look. Higher ISO give you more "noise" - kind of a grainy look. So why would you ever set your ISO higher if it gives you :noise"? Well, sometimes you just don't have enough light and the only option is to increase your ISO. Sometimes you can reduce the appearance of noise in post processing. Sometimes you can make the noise look artistic...
2. Aperture - this is how big the opening is that lets light into your camera. The smaller the number the bigger the whole. (Confusing right?) The range of aperture you can get depend on what lens you have on your camera. Right now I have a 50mm 1.8 on my camera. So 1.8 is the lowest (or biggest whole) I can get. 22 is the smallest whole. The aperture affects your depth of field. This is how much of your picture will be in focus. Right now for portraits it is really en vogue to shoot at a low aperture (wide open) to get just the person or part of the person in focus and everything else blurry in the background. That is what they call bokeh.
3. Shutter Speed - is how long the shutter is open - the longer it is open the more light comes in. If you are shooting moving subjects (like kids) you want to have a faster shutter speed to freeze motion and get in focus pictures. Sometimes your own body shaking can cause your picture to get out of focus. So you want to set your shutter speed fast enough to compensate for that. I never shoot below 1/60 if I am hand holding my camera. But I am finding that I really need to shoot faster than that most of the time - especially with my kids.
How they all work together.
1. Decide what is most important to you in your scene. Do you need a fast shutter speed? Set it where you think you need it. Do you want a lot of bokeh? - select a low number aperture. Are you shooting a big group of people? - you probably want a higher aperture - so you can get more people in focus (we will go over this more later, too.) Set your ISO as low as you can.
2.You are going to look through your viewfinder and press the shutter half way down. This will let you know your exposure. You will see something that looks like this:
You want your arrow pointed towards the 0 or maybe towards +1 (but we will go over that later).
2. Okay so say you don't have enough light (your arrow is on the negative side). You have some choices. You can
a. increase your iso
b. decrease shutter speed
c. pick a wider aperture (lower number)
But say you can't have any lower shutter speed because then you will get camera shake or you don't want a wider aperture because you are worried about people being out of focus. So you would have to increase your ISO. It is all about trade-offs.
Okay, so that is it for now. So for the next few days, play around with your camera in manual mode. See how the exposure triangle works together. let me know if you have any questions and post any pictures that you take on our flickr site.
Make sure to include your shooting info - shutter speed, iso, aperture (or also called F-Stop), type of camera and lens.
**I just want to state that when you first start shooting in manual, most likely your pictures will not look as good. Just breathe. Learning how to take good pictures takes time.
1 comment:
1. I broke down and read my manual. Okay, well just two pages of it but it was the part on shooting manual. I survived. | http://heatherarnitaphotography.blogspot.com/2012/02/first-things-first-switch-to-manual.html | robots: classic
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Camera control knob
Manual Mode
Camera control knob
You know how your camera’s function wheel has all those pretty pictures and letters on it but you only use the “auto” mode? I understand, the manual mode sounds pretty daunting. No worries, I’m gonna give you the basics to be up and shooting manually in just a few minutes. So click that tiny wheel to the “M” and lets begin.
There are three settings that are arguably the most important:
1. ISO
2. Shutter Speed
3. Aperture
There are a number of other adjustments that can be made in manual mode (like white balance and highlights) but we will do an article about that down the road. Hold your horses, lets master these three first. So what in the world is ISO?
ISO is the measure of the camera sensors sensitivity to light. Adjust this up, higher number, and the camera is more sensitive to light and your pictures get more noisy (grainy if you will). The lower the ISO number the less sensitive your camera’s sensor is to light and your pictures will be less grainy. The trick is finding a good trade-off. A good time to adjust your ISO is in a dimly lit area where slowing the shutter speed or opening the aperture aren’t an option. Speaking of shutter speed…
Shutter speed is the amount of time your shutter stays open after you trigger your camera. The longer the shutter speed the more light you let in (this is how photographers make those cool photos of traffic with red lines blurring down the highway at night). Shutter speed will shop up on your camera looking like this: 1/30 or 1/500, the higher that bottom number (denominator for you math nuts) the faster your shutter speed and the less light that is allowed into your photo. A good rule of thumb to remember is once you get to around 1/60 your going to need to use a tripod or turn your ISO up so you can speed that shutter speed back up or your image with blur. Take note how your ISO is able to assist you in managing your shutter speed. Using ISO to manage shutter speed comes into play either your aperture will not adjust any further or you would like to keep your aperture right where it is to get the desired field of focus.
Aperture is the diameter of the lens opening when you snap your picture. The wider the aperture the more light you’re allowing into the sensor. Aperture is shown on your camera as an “f” number because it is called an “f stop.” Moving up or down an “f” number doubles or halves the size of the opening (called a stop). Interestingly if you move your aperture down one and your shutter speed up one they will cancel each other out. Moving the shutter speed up or down a stop doubles or halves the amount of light that gets in from one speed to another. Confused yet? Just remember that for every change you make with one you can either compensate with the other or move it even further with the other letting even more or less light in. In another post we talked about how adjusting your aperture can give you depth of field in your photos (making the background of what your focused on either blurry or crisp). The higher your “f” number the crisper your background image will be. Therefore, the lower the “f” number the more out of focus the background will become. Take note that when you want to let more light in your “f” number actually gets smaller not larger (f2 lets more light in than f22). So lets put all this together in an example…
You’re at the pool and you want to get an awesome picture of little Ricky jumping in and splashing that d-bag Jerry that put gum in Ricky’s hair last week. First thing we are going to do is speed up your shutter speed so that we can get a crisp picture of every drop of chlorinated water splashing into that little dickens eyes (the higher your shutter speed the darker the image will get so you may have to adjust your aperture to compensate). So it’s probably sunny out and speeding the shutter speed up did not keep enough light out. Next we need to close the aperture a little to let less light in so the picture isn’t a blown out mess (raise the “f” number), your better than that. You can put the ISO at 250, typically that is the money spot for a crisp clear photo. Now you may want to play with the adjustments and move the aperture or the shutter speed up one and take the same photo and down one for another photo so you can see which one you like better afterwords until you get used to shooting manually.
That is it! Now you can go take photos with your friends and look at them condescendingly when they pull out their thousand dollar camera and shoot in auto mode.
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photography 101
Hey photographers, here’s the second installment of our Photography 101 articles by Pepper Perfect. Today we’ll be covering the technical aspects of a digital SLR camera. There’s a lot of different settings on your camera, and it can be confusing to figure them all out on your own.
The simplest way to understand how all the different settings work is to remember this one thing: every setting will change only thing, how much light is let into the camera, or how bright or dark the image will come out. There’s 3 main settings that you’ll be changing, they all have their own pros and cons and side effects, and learning how to mesh them all together based on the look your going for will help you narrow down your vision into your photos.
Aperture will be the “Av” setting on your camera, which means Aperture priority. What this means is that you can manually choose the aperture, but all the other settings will be automatic to try and find the best setting to make your image come out right in terms of brightness. Aperture (also known as “F-stop”) changes how much light is let into the lens by changing the size of the opening from the aperture blades inside the lens. You can actually see this hole get bigger and smaller by looking into the lens while changing the aperture number.
The one thing that can be confusing about aperture is that a bigger number does not make the image brighter, but a smaller number does. An F-Stop of 1.8 is a very low number, and will let a significant amount of light into your camera, meaning you can take pictures in very low-light situations. A low f-stop has another effect besides just a brighter image though.
Another term you’ll need to remember is “Depth of Field” (commonly referred to as DoF). What DoF is is the difference in focus from your subject matter, and all the background material in your photo. Having a very low f-stop number set will cause your background material to be very blurry, while having the subject in focus. You can see an example of this with this picture of a turbo:
F-Stop: 4.0 Shutter Speed: 0.4 Second ISO: 100
Having a higher f-stop number will let your background remain somewhat more in focus while also keeping your subject matter in focus as well, such as this:
F-Stop: 10.0 Shutter Speed: 2 Seconds ISO: 100
The downfall of course to having a higher f-stop number is that your picture will be quite a bit more darker, which means you’ll have to mess with some other settings on your camera, such as the:
Shutter Speed
Shutter Speed (the Tv or Shutter Priority setting on your camera) is the camera setting which determines how long the shutter will remain open when you push the shutter button to take a picture. Whenever the shutter is open, your camera’s sensor is gathering every bit of light that is in front of your camera, and if the shutter remains open for a longer period, the more light that will come in making your picture brighter. The downside to this is that if there is any shake, or tiny movements of your camera because you’re not holding it in the exact same spot, the source of the light will be coming from different spots, which will cause a blurry image.
You need to practice different stances, holding techniques, and breathing tricks to help hold the camera steady with longer shutter speeds — or of course use a tripod (although this will really limit your mobility and possible angles, especially in a quick photo situation.) It’s easy to confuse a slightly blurry image with a slightly out of focus image, so it’s important to notice the shutter speed, if you’re pictures aren’t looking especially sharp. It’s very difficult to get a very sharp image handheld with a shutter speed of anything slower than 1/100th of a second. Here are some examples of the type of pictures you can expect at different shutter speeds:
F-Stop: 4.0 Shutter Speed: 1/200th Second ISO: 100
F-Stop: 4.0 Shutter Speed: 1/30th Second ISO: 100
F-Stop: 4.0 Shutter Speed: 0.3 Second ISO: 100
F-Stop: 4.0 Shutter Speed: 0.8 Second ISO: 100
The last main setting we’ll be covering is ISO, which is a purely digital setting, not having any real physical effect on what your camera does. Unlike the Aperture setting, the lower the ISO number, the darker the resulting image, and the higher the number the brighter. The resulting side effect from making your ISO number higher is a “grainy” image. Sometimes a grainy image can be cool, but only if it’s grain that’s added in in a program after the picture is taken, ISO causes “digital grain” which is different, and never looks cool.
Depending on your camera model, the higher you can go with your ISO number without getting a significant amount of grain because of more advanced technology. For these example pictures a Canon Rebel T1i is used, which doesn’t let you go past ISO 3,200, and is very grainy at 3,200.
F-Stop: 5.6 Shutter Speed: 1/4th Second ISO: 100
F-Stop: 4.0 Shutter Speed: 1/100th Second ISO: 3,200
As you can see, the second image has a very noticeable grain throughout because of the high ISO number.
Our next article will cover the basics behind framing and composition, and learning the different angles and perspectives you can take that will really make your pictures pop.
Thanks for reading and hope it helps, | https://www.secretentourage.com/entrepreneur/photography-101-technical-aspects/ | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2021-31
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} | 566 | Photography goes way beyond simply focusing a camera and shooting. The difference between a good photo and a great photo isn’t the device. The gadget in your hand could produce those stunning photos you desire if you explore the possibilities outside the comfortable auto settings. It will only take a few tweaks of the aperture, shutter speed and exposure to get started. Ready? Let’s roll.
Aperture Priority Mode
An aperture—similar to the eye’s pupil—controls the amount of light that is allowed into the lens. On auto mode, the camera picks what it feels will work in normal situations, but if you’re gunning for great, you want to give the camera clear instructions.
The bigger the aperture, the more light is allowed into the lens. So, it follows that for wide photos, wall art, or decoration, you’d want to use a higher aperture (around f16/22). You would select a lower aperture (usually between f1.2 and f4/5.6) for smaller objects or closer views. A lower aperture will allows more light in than a higher one.
Here what you get for a lower aperture.
To switch to Aperture Priority Mode, locate A or AV on the mode dial on the top of your DSLR or advanced point-and-shoot camera. Here’s a fun way to try this out. To take a photo of a person and make the distant landscape (or background) blurry, use a low Aperture of f0.4.
Shutter speed mode
Shutter speed mode locks your settings based on your selected shutter speed. The shutter speed is the time between when the shutter opens and closes. This mode is most helpful when you are trying to photograph moving objects or when your hands are shaky. In these conditions, selecting a fast shutter speed gives you a better shot at getting a still image. To change the shutter speed, use the dial at the front of the camera (for Canon) or the back (for Nikon).
Note that if you’re on shutter speed mode, the camera automatically adjusts the aperture and vice versa.
Using the shutter speed more with some imagination, you can shoot more creative photos.
Exposure compensation
We have covered the aperture and the shutter speed. Now we tackle the third factor, the ISO speed, which determines the camera’s exposure which in turn determines how light or dark photos will look. Many cameras like DSLRs have settings that measure, lock and compensate for inadequate exposures.
This setting is very helpful when you are locked on either aperture or shutter speed modes and you want to tweak things manually. A classic example is when you’re in a dark place; you may want to manually increase the exposure to make it appear lighter in the photo.
Earlier when we talked about taking a person’s photo and making the surrounding background blurry, that is called bokeh. Bokeh is the visual effect of an out-of-focus areas in a photo. Bokeh’s are great for images used for wall art and decorations. To get a perfect bokeh, take the following steps;
• Choose a large aperture (which means a lower F value). Aperture priority mode comes to mind.
• Get closer to your subject. Minimize the distance between you and your subject.
• Keep your subject farther away from the background you wish to blur
• Decrease the depth of field by using longer focal lengths
• For best results, use long and fast lens.
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Camera Basics
Camera Settings You Should Know for Starting Photography
It might be difficult for beginners to understand what camera settings to use for capturing the best photos. However, there are no hard and fast rules when it comes to photography. You have set a camera according to the type of photos you are taking. The different environment has different camera settings. In this article, we will provide you the information that helps you in understanding the fundamentals of the camera.
1. Camera shooting mode
There are four modes of the camera, which are auto-mode, aperture priority mode, shutter priority mode, and manual mode. In auto-mode, you have to do nothing, and your camera automatically adjusts the settings. You have no control over your camera. In aperture priority mode, the photographer can choose the aperture, and the camera will automatically select the shutter speed. Inversely in shutter priority mode, you can choose the shutter speed, and the camera will automatically select aperture. In manual mode, you do all the camera settings.
Auto-mode is simplest out of all, but it is the least recommended. However, if you are a beginner, then you can use aperture priority or shutter priority mode. Once you understand the settings well, then you can start using manual mode for the best effects.
• Metering mode
Your camera has a different metering mode like center-weighted metering, spot metering, and matrix/Evaluative metering. Don’t get confused; you can choose matrix/evaluative metering mode in most of the situations. This mode considers the whole scene and does an excellent job of exposing your subjects.
Camera Settings You Should Know
• Aperture
Aperture is the size of the opening of your camera so that the light can get through the camera’s sensor and create an image. You require to have a wide aperture in low-light and small aperture during day time. Aperture affects the sharpness and depth of field of the photograph. If you are shooting with a 35mm camera lens then f/1.8 is the widest aperture setting and f/5.6 its smallest aperture.
• Shutter speed
Shutter speeds determine how long the shutter stays open for capturing the image. The longer it stays open, the more light will gets through the camera sensor. Long aperture can create motion blur, which is not entirely a bad thing. Sometimes, the photographer uses the motion blur while shooting waterfalls and clouds. It gives a smooth effect. However, if you want to freeze movements and capture something like falling water drop, then use faster shutter speed. Here are some of the standard settings.
High ISO noise reduction: On
Image quality: Raw
Picture control/creative style/picture style: Standard
Long exposure noise reduction: On White balance: Auto
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9 pictures
Gizmag looks at the camera modes which could help you get out of Auto(Credit: Simon Crisp/Gizmag)
View gallery - 9 images
So you've got a new camera and are probably getting some great shots. But if your mode dial is still pointing at Auto, you probably have a pang of guilt that you're not making the most of your camera every time you press the shutter. Here we look at modes such as Shutter or Aperture Priority, along with the sometimes daunting Manual mode, to make getting out of auto that one bit easier.
First off, there's nothing wrong with using your camera in Automatic. A great photo is a great photo, irrespective of what mode the camera is set to. Would Steve McCurry's Afghan Girl be any less impressive if it had been shot on a camera with a mode dial pointing at a green square? Of course not – subject and composition are far more important than settings.
What we're saying is that if shooting in auto makes you feel more comfortable while you get the hang of a new camera, that's perfectly fine, and there's nothing to feel guilty about. Automatic modes can also be great if you are in need of a quick bit of point-and-shoot action, or if you are handing your camera to someone who isn't as au fait with photography as you.
However, the photograph you want to capture won't always be the same one as your camera would take in Automatic. For example, you might want to take a photo of a road at night, turning passing cars into a light trail. The chances are your camera, if left to its own devices, would use faster shutter speed and a higher ISO to freeze the action and give you a well-exposed picture.
If you want to be able to shoot the types of image you can imagine, getting to know how to use your other modes is important. As such, we're going to look at what those different modes are, whether accessed by a mode dial at the top of your camera, or in the menu system, and what they will let you control. In future articles we'll look in more detail at exactly what these settings are, and how they can be used to create different types of image.
While most cameras have access to modes which offer the same functions, they are sometimes represented by different icons or letters on different brands of camera. For example, while some cameras will say Auto on the mode dial, others will just have a green icon. Aperture and Shutter Priority are normally represented by an A or S, but some cameras use Av and Tv, even though the modes work in just the same way.
Automatic (Auto, green icon)
In this fully automatic mode, the camera will do most of the work for you. You simply point your camera in the direction of your subject button, zoom to compose your shot, and hit the shutter. The camera will do the rest, to the best of its ability, even popping up the flash if needed.
This means it will set the ISO, aperture and shutter speed to give you a well-exposed image. Many cameras also select the autofocus mode when in Automatic mode, with an increasing number prioritizing faces in the screen, and trying to select the best settings based on what sort of scene it thinks you're photographing. This mode is great if you don't have time for (or can't be bothered with) manual controls, or are handing your camera to a friend.
Automatic Scenes (Portrait, Sports, Macro...)
While a camera in full automatic mode has to make all the decisions about which settings should be used, automatic scene modes make it a bit easier on your tech. This can mean you are much more likely to get the sort of image you want, without having to know exactly what you are doing.
For example, dialling to Sports mode will tell the camera to use a faster shutter speed to freeze the action. Meanwhile, Landscape mode will select a smaller aperture for a greater depth of field, and a Snow setting will recognize the lighting conditions and still deliver a properly-exposed image.
Automatic scene modes are most commonly found on entry-level cameras, and can typically be accessed via a top mode dial, or in the main menu system. Other common scene modes include: Portrait, Macro, Night and Fireworks.
Program (P)
Program mode is something of a stepping stone between fully automatic and the modes where you have got more creative control as the photographer. While the camera will still automatically set the shutter speed and aperture, you are in charge of things like ISO, exposure compensation, autofocus modes, and flash.
This can be a good mode to use if you want to start taking control, and if you want to start understanding how settings impact the sort of images you are taking, while still having the safety net of some automatic settings. Program mode is often the most Automatic mode available on more advanced cameras.
Aperture Priority (A, Av)
From here on in you really start to have more control over the images you are taking than the camera does. In Aperture Priority you also gain control over aperture settings, allowing you to control the amount of light coming into the camera, and the depth of field of your shots. The camera then balances the shutter speed and other settings to give a good exposure.
This mode is handy when you want to have quick control over the depth of field, especially at times you know the automatic camera settings would get it wrong. This might be because you want a very shallow depth of field for a portrait, or deep enough to get two people sharp at the same time. You could also dial the aperture to give a very deep depth of field for detailed landscape images.
Shutter Priority (S, Tv)
In Aperture Priority, the camera took control of shutter speed while you managed aperture – this flips that around. This means users set the shutter speed, along with the ISO and focus mode, while the camera takes charge of aperture for a balanced image.
Being able to control shutter speed makes this mode good for times you need faster or slower exposures than your camera would automatically choose. This can be using a quick shutter speed to freeze fast-moving sport action, or a slower shutter speed when you want to capture motion blur, or let in more light when shooting on a tripod.
Manual (M)
If you've used, and mastered using, the above modes, then Manual mode is just a matter of putting it all together. You as the photographer are in ultimate control over all of the previously mentioned settings including ISO, shutter speed, and aperture. The camera will still measure and recommend an exposure, but you are free to act on this, or ignore it, as you want.
This setting will potentially let you shoot any image you want, within your camera's technical limits. It's probably where you want to get to as a photographer, as it means you can experiment and adjust for tricky lighting situations.
Hopefully this guide has given you a bit of an introduction to the modes of your camera, and the confidence to turn that dial away from the green icon when you feel ready. In future articles we'll look at settings like ISO, aperture and shutter speed in more detail, explaining exactly how they work, and what changing them can do to your images.
If you are yet to invest in a serious camera, you might want to check out our guide to choosing the right camera for you, and our explanation of what all those buttons and dials do.
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Editors Choice | http://newatlas.com/photography-camera-mode-guide/43935/ | robots: classic
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} | 774 | Digital Camera Settings - Manual Camera Settings
Whether you use a point and shoot digital camera, or a DSLR, you will quite often find yourself being disappointed with your photography results. This is because there is a limitation to what the camera can actually do. After all, cameras are only machines which have been programmed in certain ways. So, in order to take better pictures, the photographer must learn a few things about the camera they are using and also know how to over ride some default settings.
To over ride your camera settings, you will need to learn how to use your camera in manual or semi-manual mode. Most point and shoot cameras have this functionality as do all DSLR cameras.
The three settings that you will want to learn for more manual control are Aperture, Shutter speed and full manual control.
You should be warned that when you first start learning about these settings, it is likely to sound complicated. In fact, you may come to the realisation that photography can be a technical subject whether you are shooting digital or not. There can also be a certain amount of math involved as well. However, you do not have to learn complex formulas to take great pictures but you will need to have a rudimentary understanding of a few things.
Camera Aperture
Aperture, to put it simplistically, is the eye of your camera. Just as a human eye has a pupil which gets larger and smaller based on how much light is entering the eye, a camera aperture, which is actually the lens aperture, gets larger and smaller too. When your camera is in automatic mode, the aperture adjusts automatically based on the amount of light entering together with other settings that are in place on the camera. However, when you put it into full manual mode, you can set the aperture to your own specification.
Aperture settings start getting complicated because they are technically a fraction but are displayed on your camera as if they were a whole number. However, because it is a fraction, the larger the number displayed, the smaller your aperture opening will be. So an aperture of 3.5 is larger than an aperture of 6.7, and that is larger than an aperture of 11 and so on. The aperture choices you have will depend on the lens you are using if it is a DSLR camera, and it will depend on the capabilities of your camera if you are using a Point and Shoot.
Shutter Speed
This is the second manual control you will need to learn. The shutter is the "door" like item that closes inside the camera when you push the picture button. The button you push to take the picture is actually called the shutter button by the way.
Shutter speed is also normally referred to in fractions, and it is displayed as such on your camera. Those are fractions of a second. A shutter speed of 1/500 is quite fast where as 1/4 is fairly slow. Slower shutter speeds allow more light to come into the camera, so they are very useful when trying to take pictures at night or indoors where there is not as much light available.
Slower shutter speeds will blur motion so they are not advisable to use when taking action shots. This can become frustrating if you want to take a picture of cars racing at night or a football game on a dark cloudy day.
Both aperture and the shutter speed depend on each other to get a photo exposed properly and this is where the semi manual control comes in with digital cameras. You can choose to set your camera on shutter priority mode, or aperture priority mode. This allows you to control one while the camera automatically matches the correct setting of the other.
If you set your camera to shutter priority mode for instance, it will be in a semi manual mode that allows you to choose which shutter speed it should use. Your camera will choose the proper aperture setting to match the shutter setting that you have chosen.
Alternatively, you can set your camera to aperture priority mode, and this will allow you to choose the aperture you want to use. The camera will then choose the appropriate matching shutter speed automatically.
In full manual mode, you must choose both the shutter speed and the aperture value to use when taking each picture. The camera will indicate if it thinks you have the settings wrong, but it will not automatically adjust anything for you in full manual mode, so you have all the control. | http://www.hometechanswers.com/digital-photography/digital-camera-settings.html | robots: classic
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Shutter Priority Mode
Your camera has many automatic modes to make your life as a photographer a little easier. Each of these automatic modes was designed to isolate one or two of the many variables and settings you’ll encounter while taking pictures.
Shutter Priority Mode is an automatic mode that isolates the shutter speed setting. You can use this mode to take anything from sports action to images of flowing waterfalls.
You can get to shutter priority mode by twisting your camera’s top dial to the “S” or “Tv” setting. A few camera models might have it hidden away in the menu or it may be called something else so check your manual.
Just like the aperture priority mode allows you change the aperture settings, shutter priority mode allows you to change the shutter speed.
What is the shutter, and what is shutter speed?
Every camera works by temporarily exposing a light-sensitive surface to light from the outside world. The shutter determines the length of time the image sensor receives its light by opening and closing. Whether it’s a very tiny fraction of a second (1/500s), or it’s a much longer period of time (3 seconds), your shutter opens and closes every time you take a picture with your camera.
By changing your camera’s shutter speed, you’re either increasing or decreasing the length of time the image sensor is exposed to light. If the sensor is exposed to light for longer, the resulting image will be brighter. If it is exposed to light for less time, the resulting image will be darker. That is the first thing you will notice once you start taking images using shutter priority mode.
Freezing The Action
But there is another factor at work with shutter speeds. A shorter shutter speed can freeze action that would otherwise appear blurred if you were to use a longer shutter speed. That’s why shutter priority mode can come in handy when you’re shooting sports and or fast action photography. Just dial the shutter speed up to 1/500s, and the camera does the rest of the work. You get a nice freeze frame in the heat of the moment.
A longer shutter speed will allow you to add a motion blur to your images. The most popular use of this effect can be seen in images of flowing water like the one to the right. Because your camera’s shutter is open for longer, the water has a chance to move a little bit while the image sensor is being exposed to the light. Use a tripod to keep absolutely still and the rest of the image will stay still while the water appears somewhat blurred. The longer you leave your shutter open, the more blurred the water becomes.
How does shutter priority mode work?
Shutter priority mode is a semi-automatic mode, meaning it works by using your camera’s internal light meter, analysis the scene in front of you, and attempts to come up with an even and balanced exposure using the shutter speed you give it. Shutter priority mode attempts to make an image that isn’t too bright or too dark.
So, you choose the shutter speed, and the camera chooses everything else. One of the settings chosen by the camera is the aperture size. The aperture is the hole that light travels through to get to the image sensor. When it’s wide open, the image formed is much brighter. When it’s closed, the resulting image is darker.
When you shoot in shutter priority mode, the camera adjusts the aperture to give a balanced exposure. If the shutter speed is really fast, the camera picks a more wide open aperture to compensate for the lower amount of light hitting the sensor. If you have a really slow shutter speed, the camera picks a more closed aperture to effectively lower the amount of light coming through. Either way, it’s “trying” to get an image that is neither too bright nor too dark.
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} | 761 | Without a solid understanding of ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture –the Three Kings of Photography, also known as the “Exposure Triangle,” it is difficult to take good pictures. While most recent DSLRs have “Auto” settings that automatically pick the correct shutter speed, aperture, and even ISO for your exposure, using an Auto setting imposes limitations on what your camera will do. In many cases, by evaluating the amount of light passing through the lens, the camera has to guess what the right exposure should be. Through manually operating the lens, a thorough understanding of how ISO, shutter speed, and aperture operate together enables photographers to take full responsibility for the situation.
Shutter speed is attributed to the shutter–a curtain in front of the camera sensor which remains closed until the lens is shot. The shutter opens and completely reveals the camera sensor to the light passing through your window when the camera shoots. The shutter shuts directly after the detector absorbs the heat, preventing the beam from reaching the sensor. Often named “shutter” or “shutter key” is the device that activates the lens, because it causes the shutter to open and close.
Shutter speed is the time lens shutter is closed and the image detector is exposed to light. Essentially, it’s how long it takes your camera to take a picture. This has some important effects on how your pictures look.
You end up exposing the camera for a significant period of time when you use long shutter speed. It’s motion blur’s first big effect. If your shutter speed is high, moving objects look blurred along the direction of motion in your image. This effect is often used in car and motorcycle advertisements where a sense of speed and motion is communicated to the viewer by deliberately blurring the moving wheels.
How shutter speed is measured?
Typically, shutter speeds are measured in fractions of a second when they are less than a second. For eg, 1/4 implies a quarter of a second, while 1/250 means a second (or four milliseconds) of two hundred and fiftieth.
Some traditional DSLRs and mirrorless cameras are capable of handling shutter speeds up to 1/4000th of a second, while some are capable of handling even higher 1/8000th of a second rate. On the other hand, on most DSLRs or mirrorless cameras, the longest available shutter speed is typically 30 seconds. By using external remote controls, if needed, you can use longer shutter speed.
Fast and slow shutter speed:
Normally, fast shutter speed is what it takes to stop the activity. If you’re taking pictures of animals, it can be 1/1000th second and slower. Nevertheless, you may be able to take pictures at 1/200th second, 1/100th second, or even longer without adding motion blur, for general photography of slower-moving objects.
Usually, short shutter speeds are above 1 second–at which stage you need to use a tripod to get clear shots. For certain forms of low-light / night shooting, you would use long shutter speeds and deliberately catch motion. When you use long shutter speeds, if anything in the scene is moving, it will appear blurred.
How to set up shutter speed?
By definition, many cameras manage shutter speeds. The sensor selects the shutter speed without your feedback when the system is set to “Auto” mode (and so are the aperture and ISO). Nonetheless, if needed, you can still adjust the shutter speed manually: you choose the shutter speed by setting the camera to the “Shutter Priority” mode, and the camera selects the aperture automatically.
• You pick both shutter speed and aperture manually by switching the camera to “Manual” mode.
• You can choose to configure ISO manually or automatically in both of these modes.
How to find shutter speed?
If your lens doesn’t have a top LCD, like some entry-level DSLRs, you can see the shutter speed on the bottom-left side through the viewfinder. And if like many mirrorless lenses, the lens does not have either a top LCD or a viewfinder, you can see the shutter speed simply by looking at the back monitor. Shutter speed will not occur as a fraction of a second explicitly on most cameras–it will usually be a normal figure. You will see something like 1 “or 5” (with the quotation symbol to signify a full second) if the shutter speed is longer than or equivalent to one second.
Practice, trial and error are one of the key factors for knowing photography in general and shutter speed in particular, so go out and take some photos. Each time you try something different. Try long exposures, brief shows, shifting images, imagery of the day. | https://sbdigitalarts.com/2019/11/ | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2021-10
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} | 736 | Soru: How To See Camera Shutter Speed And Aperture On Photoshop?
How do I know my aperture and shutter speed?
Manually set your aperture to the same number as you wrote down, which should be the lowest number your camera lens will allow (in our example it is 3.5). Then set your shutter speed to the number you wrote down (in our example it is 125) and keep your ISO the same – 200.
How do I find the aperture of a photo?
How do you find the shutter speed on a picture?
If you still cannot find the shutter speed, set your camera to “Aperture Priority” mode, and make sure that you have turned “AUTO ISO” off. Then, start pointing around your camera from dark to bright areas. The number that changes will be your shutter speed.
You might be interested: Okuyucular soruyor: How To Make A Pinhole Camera With Film?
What is shutter speed examples?
Shutter Speed Examples
• Shutter Speed: 1/500 sec (freezing motion)
• Shutter Speed: 1/8 sec (blurring motion – creative)
• Underwater Shot in Samoa – 1/8000 sec (freezing motion)
• Wind Surfer – 1/2000 sec (action photography)
• Woman on a Horse – 1/2000 sec (moving portrait)
• Sunset – 1/2000 (long lens – stop camera shake)
What is a good shutter speed for portraits?
How do I view an ISO image?
Originally Answered: How do I know the ISO, aperture & shutter speed settings of a photo from PC? You need to right click on the picture go to properties then in details and you will get all the information you are looking for. You may have to scroll a bit to get all the information.
How do I find the ISO of an image?
To check the integrity of your local ISO file, generate its SHA256 sum and compare it with the sum present in sha256sum. txt. If you are using Windows follow the tutorial How to verify the ISO image on Windows. If the sums match, your ISO image was successfully downloaded.
IS F 4.0 A large aperture?
Minimum and Maximum Aperture of Lenses A lens that has a maximum aperture of f/1.4 or f/1.8 is considered to be a “fast” lens, because it can pass through more light than, for example, a lens with a “ slow” maximum aperture of f/4.0. That’s why lenses with large apertures usually cost more.
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What does F 2.8 mean in photography?
What is f-stop on a camera?
F-stop is the term used to denote aperture measurements on your camera. The aperture controls the amount of light that enters the camera lens, and it’s measured in f-stops.
What is shutter speed symbol?
Speeds faster than one second are shown as fractions (e.g.: …1/125, 1/160, 1/200, 1/250…). Some cameras may omit the numerator so that “1/125” becomes “125,” “1/250” becomes “250,” etc. Speeds slower than one second are shown by a double prime symbol following the value (e.g.: 1 ˝).
How do you explain shutter speed?
The faster the shutter speed, the shorter the time the image sensor is exposed to light; the slower the shutter speed, the longer the time the image sensor is exposed to light. If you are photographing a subject that is in motion, you will get different effects at different shutter speeds.
What is ISO and shutter speed?
The ISO controls the the amount of light by the sensitivity of the sensor. • The shutter speed controls the amount of light by the length of time. • The aperture (the size of the lens opening) controls the amount of light by the intensity via a series of different sized openings.
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Photography Basics
Susan Brannon
20 July 2011
How a Camera Works Made Simple
The word “photography” is French derived from the Greek language, in English it means “drawing from light”. Photography is really all about light and how the camera works.
In a camera, light travels from the object to the sensor in film cameras. The light goes through the lens to the sensor.
When you set your aperture inside the lens, that opens and closes depending on how you set it, little or lots of light will hit your sensor. The aperture is controlled by “f stops” f2.8 is wide and f/19 is small. The lower the number, the more light will be let in. (Remember this and it will be of great help!) Once the light hits your sensor, and is absorbed and transforms into pixels.
The image that the sensor picks up is upside down and then flips it.
The shutter is what controls how long the sensor is exposed, the longer the shutter is open the more light can be absorbed onto the sensor. There are numbers that represent the speed of the shutter, 1/1000 of a second is fast and 3 seconds is slow. Remember, the lower the number the less light will be let in. The amount of light absorbed by your sensor is called “exposure”. There are two things that control the exposure, the shutter speed and the aperture.
In addition, you have film that has sensitivity to light; in digitals, it is your sensor that is sensitive to light. The film speeds of the film (sensitivity) are called ISO. A low ISO speed required longer exposures; a high ISO speed requires less time to give the same exposure.
One might ask, “Why are there all these controls? Can’t we just use one control to tell the camera how much light to let it?” Well, The various controls allow you to control other aspects of an image. A shutter speed can help to freeze the subject in motion; the aperture controls the depth of field and what is focused in your image.
Complicated? All this means is that you must understand, how much light you need to expose to your film or sensor in order to generate the type of image that you desire.
*Tip: Remember:
Shutter Speed: The lower the number the less light
Aperture: The higher the number the less light
ISO: The higher the number the more sensitive the film or sensor is to light.
Related lessons:
Aperture and f/16 Rule
Shutter Speed Basics
Depth of Field
Focused Bracketing or Photo Stacking
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Be sure to check out the other DryReading features, including...
The Mugshot Machine
(Requires a web cam)
Any time we take a picture our camera allows light from the outside to be projected on the image sensor inside the camera. The sensor (most are of the CCD type) requires a certain amount of light to make a perfect exposure. If there is too little light the picture is underexposed (the picture is too dark), if there is too much the picture is overexposed (the picture is too light). The camera has two ways to regulate the amount of light that gets to the sensor.
First, the camera can change the amount of time the sensor is exposed to light. This is done with a shutter that opens and closes like a water valve. Typical shutter speeds range from 1/1000 of a second to 1/30 of a second. The longer the exposure the more chance there is that either the subject or the camera will move, blurring the picture. As you might expect, 1/30 of a second lets in twice as much light as 1/60 second, etc. Exposures longer than approximately 1/30 second might require a tripod to steady the camera.
The second way the camera can regulate the amount of light that gets to the sensor is by varying the size of the opening the light can pass through before it gets there. The wider the opening the more light gets through. The part of the camera that does this is called the diaphragm. The opening in the diaphragm is called the aperture. The way aperture sizes are described is with the f-stop number . While not critical to know, the f-stop number is the ratio between the distance from approximately the center of the lens to the sensor divided by the diameter of the aperture opening. The f-stop numbers tend to range from about f/11, which would be a small opening and would let little light in, to about f/2.8 which would let in quite a bit of light. Remember, a large f-stop number lets in less light than a smaller number. Sometimes you might hear a photographer saying they are "going to stop their lens down." This means that they are going to make the size of the aperture go down, not the f-stop number, which actually gets larger. Camera lenses vary in their minimum and maximum f-stop values.
After you press the shutter release the camera measures the amount of light in the location you have pointed it and sets the shutter speed and f/stop accordingly to make a perfect exposure.
A third way digital cameras can regulate exposure is by changing the sensitivity of the sensor. When the sensor is set to be less sensitive the picture has more detail and has a smoother tonal range. When the sensor is set to be more sensitive the pictures tend to less detailed and can have visible “noise.” The sensitivity number is called the ISO number and range from about 100 at low sensitivity to about 1600 or more for high sensitivity. This number was originally applied to film speeds, but it is also used today to refer to sensor sensitivity in digital cameras. Cameras that have larger sensors, like digital single lens reflex (SLR) cameras produce less noisy pictures at a given ISO than do cameras with smaller sensors, like the typical point and shoot. Cell phone cameras have really small sensors and produce horrible pictures, though many find this quality charming.
Check out the other stuff on DryReading | http://www.dryreading.com/camera/index.html | robots: classic
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depth of field (DOF): The amount of the picture that is in focus. A smaller aperture will create a larger depth of field, and a bigger aperture will create a bigger depth of field.
aperture: The opening that allows light into the camera. Most cameras can change the size of this opening.
exposure: How bright/dark a picture is. There are three ways of changing exposure, see this article for more information on this subject.
ISO: An ISO of 100 is normal. raising this value will cause the camera to artificially brighten the picture after the picture is taken. This is extremely useful when the camera is automatically trying to figure out the correct shutter speed or f-stop for a given scene. By raising the ISO, the camera knows it doesn’t need as high of a shutter speed, or as low of an f-stop to get a correct exposure. higher ISO values will result in more noise.
shutter speed: How long the shutter will be open. Longer shutter speeds will blur motion, and shorter shutter speeds will freeze motion.
f-stop: A Unit of measurement for the size of the aperture. A bigger f-stop corresponds to a smaller aperture. A big f-stop number will give you a smaller depth of field.
histogram: A chart that shows the amount of pixels at different brightness levels.
angle of view: The angle at which a camera captures light.
focal length: How far away the focal point is. This is changed by zooming in and out. A higher focal length will shorten the angle of view, and as such zooming in will give a different affect than walking closer to the subject. focal length is measured in mms. A focal length will give different results depending on the sensor size, and as such focal lengths are often given as the equivalent value if a 35mm sensor were to be used.
tungsten light: Lighting from incandescent light bulbs
ambient light: The natural lighting in a scene
color temperature: The warmth or coolness of a colors. color temperature is measured on a kelvin scale where each color corresponds to the temperature required to get radiation from a black body that is the same color as the color being measured.
color balance: The process of tuning the color temperature to get desired look. A normal color balance would represent what we perceive as white under the current lighting conditions as white in the picture.
burn/dodge: The process of selectively brightening (dodging) or darkening (burning) parts of an image.
noise/grain: A pixel or a small patch of pixels that differ from the actual value. Noise is more prominent in darker areas of a picture. The term grain is used instead of noise in film.
diffusion: The scattering of light that occurs with bigger apertures causing a picture to appear blurred.
fill light: Light that is used to fill in the darker side of an object.
framing: Composing an image so that an object encompasses the edges of the picture. Windows, door-frames, and tree branches are often used to frame a picture.
hyperfocal distance: The distance to the closest object that is in focus when the camera is focused at infinity.
high/low key: A high key image is bright, evenly lit, and has blown out highlights. A low key image is dark, and mostly obscured in shadows except for the main subject which is lit up.
macro lens: A lens designed for capturing close ups of tiny objects, or parts of a bigger object.
panning: The process of moving rotating the camera to keep a moving object in the same position within the viewfinder or LCD screen. This has the result of keeping the moving object in crisp focus, while blurring the background.
reflector: A material that is used to reflect light into the picture.
stepping down/up a stop: This is a phrase used to refer to changing the exposure by one stop. A stop of light is a unit of measurement for exposure.
prime lens: A lens that is fixed at a single focal length. It isn’t possible to zoom with a prime lens. A equally priced prime lens will be of better quality than a zoom lens.
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} | 2,146 | Photography Terms: The Essential Top-Ten
photographyterms“There are no bad pictures; that’s just the way your face looks sometimes.” This quote by Abraham Lincoln is guaranteed to get some laughs, but it probably won’t impress the modern archetype of professional photographers. Learning the proper vocabulary of a field is an essential growing pain; if you can’t speak the language, you’ll never be considered a native. The good news is that if you’re willing to log the hours, you can pick up photography terminology pretty quickly, starting with the guide below. Look on the bright side: photography is an awesome subject, and even learning vocabulary is going to be a pleasurable experience. Once you know the terms, learn how to use them with Tony Sweet’s photography workshop for visual literacy.
I chose to do ten terms because, frankly, these are the top terms that should get the attention they deserve. Whenever possible, I threw in additional relevant vocabulary, so the real count is probably closer to twenty or thirty. Following is a detailed and, for the most part, alphabetized list of the top ten terms in photography.
The aperture, which is adjustable, refers to the opening in the lens that allows light to pass into the camera (and subsequently, onto film). A certain degree of logic can be applied to apertures: a larger aperture allows more light to pass into the camera; a smaller aperture, less light. In photography, light is god. Thus, the aperture is of the utmost importance. If, after reading this post, you want to learn more about aperture, here is an awesome blog article on understanding aperture and controlling it manually.
The size of the aperture is referred to as an f-stop. F-stops are communicated in fractions, if you will, with “f” always taking the place of the numerator and a number taking the place of the denominator. For example, “f/1” or “f/32”. If this sounds confusing, don’t worry; it’s easy once you understand the standard scale and how the numbers relate to each other.
Theoretically, the numbers in f-stops can range from less than one (even though a number less than one would be very rare) to 128. Here is the most common representation of the f-stop scale:
There are really only two things you need to know to grasp an understanding of f-stops. The first is that a higher number represents a smaller aperture (less light); a smaller number, a larger aperture (more light). The second is that while you can often adjust the aperture to points between the scale numbers given above, those numbers are used because each number changes the amount of light by a factor of two. In other words, f/90 allows twice as much light to enter the camera as f/128. Similarly, f/1.4 allows half the light as f/1.
One of the most important qualities of f-stops is their ability to change the depth of field. So a smaller f-stop, which gives you more light, offers a narrower depth of field; a larger f-stop, which gives you less light, offers a wider depth of field.
Using the aperture to your advantage is photography 101 (in fact, you can get detailed advice on the subject with this introduction to the fundamentals of photography course). It’s a difficult skill to master, because so many factors affect which f-stop is most appropriate: shutter speed, lens type, lighting, desired effect, etc.
Depth of Field
This is a good follow up to “aperture.” Manipulating the depth of field allows you to determine which subjects are in focus and which are not. For example, you could photograph your daughter playing soccer, with just her in focus and the rest of the field blurred. Or you could take a wide landscape photograph in which everything is in crisp, clear focus.
As discussed in “aperture,” depth of field is largely determined by aperture. The larger/smaller the aperture, the narrower/wider the depth of field. The best way to get a handle on this is to practice. You will notice that other things affect depth of field, such as focal distance (the distance to your primary subject). Subjects that are farther away will naturally have a wider depth of field (and yes, closer subjects are naturally narrower). Again, practice will all of this easier to grasp, and you can get a head start with this becoming-a-photographer course (best part is, it applies to almost any camera).
Exposure is the amount of light captured by film. No doubt you have heard the terms “over-exposed’ and “under-exposed” before. This is what causes some pictures to be either too light or too dark. Of course, photographers can use exposure to their benefit depending on the kind of mood that want to communicate.
An incorrectly exposed image is a result of several things. If you’re aperture is too large and your shutter speed is too slow (meaning, a lot of light is entering the camera for a long time), then you’re going to get an over-exposed image. Conversely, if your aperture is too small and your shutter speed is too fast (a small amount of light for a short amount of time), then you’re image is going to be quite dark. Balancing aperture and shutter speed to attain the correct exposure is the sign of a good photographer. Of course, automatic cameras take care of these settings for you. For a comprehensive lighting lesson, check out this online course for lighting in photography (and the practice of “seeing”).
Everyone has fallen victim to a bright flash. A flash is a burst of light that coincides with the shutter opening. Generally, flashes are for indoor, low-lighting use, or for subjects who are nearby. But flashes can be tricky. Even automatic cameras aren’t always sure what to do with a flash. How many times have your pictures turned out looking like the sun exploded at the moment you took the picture? Still, a properly used flash is invaluable. Here are a few types of flashes:
• Built-In And Pop-Up: These are either built into the main frame of the camera or else pop-up from the top. The problem with these flashes is that usually fire from one angle, directly at the subject, which produces harsh contrast
• Dedicated Flash: This flash is a separate unit and attaches to your camera. You can do a number of things with dedicated flashed, including angling them to “bounce” light at your subject, or fire multiple flashes for optimum clarity and contrast.
• Macro Ringlight Flash: This is a ring that attached to the end of your lens. Macro flashes provide very nice, gentle lighting; you would use these for getting extremely close to your subject (which is what “macro” photography is; photographing flowers, food, insects, etc.). If you’re interested in macro, take a look at this blog tutorial on food photography for beginners.
Flash is deceptively difficult, but don’t stress: there’s a class just for you: master flash photography in just one day.
The lens is primarily responsible for controlling focus, although as I mentioned the aperture plays a role in this, as well. In focus = clear and crisp. Out of focus = smeared and blurry. Focus is adjusted by using the focus ring on the lens; this is what causes the lens to telescope. While focus has a wide range of error for smaller apertures, it can be incredibly delicate the closer you get to that “f/1” f-stop.
International Standards Organization (ISO) is expressed as a number (“ISO number”) and refers to light sensitivity. If you’ve ever heard a photographer talk about the “speed” of a film, he is talking about ISO. This is because ISO is a measure of how sensitive film is; a higher sensitivity means that more light is received by the film in a shorter period of time (thus, it has a higher speed). On digital camera, you can easily adjust the ISO, which is far more convenient than switching out film rolls. You might think a higher ISO is always better, but it’s not the case. Historically, higher ISOs offer inferior quality images, which makes sense if you think about it: it has less time to process the details. But sometimes, such as for photographing a track race, you need high speed film. You can also get a mini-lesson on ISO in this wedding photography article.
Everyone knows what the lens is, but not everyone is aware of its absolute importance. Nothing is more important than the quality of the lens. A good camera salesman will recommend a smaller, higher quality lens over a larger yet less precise lens any day of the year. We can learn a few other lens terms while we’re at it:
• SLR: Single Lens Reflex. This is a detachable-lens-camera, which are the standard for high quality cameras. “Reflex” is kind of like another word for “reflection”; it refers to the mirror inside the camera (not the lens) that allows you to look straight forward through the view-finder and truly see what the lens is seeing. There are electronic connection points that allow the camera to automatically adjust the focus and zoom, if that is so desired. SLR lenses are far and away the most commonly used among professional photographers.
• DSLR: Digital Single Lens Reflex. The digital version of an SLR. Pick up tips for using these lenses with this DSLR digital photography course for beginners.
• Lens Axis: This is a straight line (imaginary, mind you) that runs through the center of a lens.
• Lens Barrel: Literally, the barrel or tube of the lens that contains all of the lens’s components.
• Long Focus: A lens with a long focal length (these are the huge lenses you often see at sporting events). Long focal length = narrow angle of view.
• Slow Lens: A lens with a very narrow maximum aperture (f/16, possibly).
Shutter Speed
This is, as the name implies, the speed of the shutter. Adjusting shutter speed in turn adjusts how long the shutter stays open. Shutter speeds are typically given as fractions: 1/1 or 1/1,000, for example. This is a fraction of a second. So 1/1 would be one full second; an eternity when it comes to shutter speeds. 1/1000, or one-thousandth of a second, would be an extremely fast shutter speed, used for capturing quickly moving objects.
The slower the shutter speed, the more stabilized the camera must be. If the shutter is open and you move the camera, you are essentially changing the image in mid picture. This is what causes blurring. If the shutter is open for an entire second, you could literally spin in a complete circle and capture a wild, and wild blurred, panorama. But there’s a lot of cool stuff you do, such as those found in this long-exposure photography course. Tripods are often enlisted to aid with steadying cameras during long shutter speeds. You also have to take into account the fact that a longer shutter speed allows more light in, so the aperture will have to be adjusted accordingly.
White Balance
This one’s a little tricky. Think about it like this: when you look at a white object in plain light, you know it is white because your brain interprets it that way; if you were to move the object into orange lighting, you would still be able to recognize it as white, because you are aware of the orange influence. Cameras are not so smart, but you can help them out by adjusting the white balance, which takes into account the fact that not all light is “white.”
On the extreme end of the scale, you have black and white photography. But that’s another matter entirely. Dive head-first into the techniques of B&W with this course on the art of black and white photography.
I realize that “aberration” should have been first on this list, at least alphabetically, but I didn’t want to start with something too technical.
An aberration is when a lens fails to produce true images. Every lens has its weaknesses; by “weaknesses” I am referring to physical imperfections. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that a more expensive lens is going to have less aberrations. Take a look at the variety of aberrations below:
• Astigmatism: When a single point on the subject is divided into two rays of light, thus causing two sharp lines to appear.
• Chromatic Aberration: Results when light rays with different wavelengths come into focus at different distances. You’ve seen this effect when blue or red appears to “screen” the image.
• Coma: When you get a shooting-star type of blur from a subject outside the axis.
• Curvature of Field: Just like it sounds. When an object on a plane perpendicular to the lens axis causes the lens to focus on a curved surface instead of on a plane.
• Distortion: Similar, sometimes, in appearance to curvature of field. A distorted image occurs when subjects and shapes are not conveyed in their natural dimensions (a circle might be an oval, for example).
• Spherical Aberration: This occurs due to the spherical nature of a lens; basically, spherical aberration is when different focus points occur for the same image.
Now you’re equipped with the basics of photography terminology. If you think you’re ready to up your game, I’ve got just the thing for you: an easy DSLR photography course with advanced lessons. Happy shooting! | https://blog.udemy.com/photography-terms/ | robots: classic
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} | 1,092 | Depth of Field and Aperture Explained
This article provides a more detailed explanation of depth of field and aperture and how they influence photography.
by M. Yates
on May 10, 2018
A camera is a tool for a photographer to express his or her creativity. Like any other tool, the better you know it, the better the final results will be. Keep in mind that a camera is a complicated tool, and it will take time to master just one part of it. Of course, if you want to master the use of your camera, you need to know more about the fundamentals. Aperture and depth of field are considered to common camera specifications, and that's what we are going to cover in this article.
Depth of Field
Let's start with the very basics. Depth of field is the front-to-back zone of a photo in which the image is "sharp."
As an object falls out of this depth of field range, it begins to lose its sharpness. The rate in which this sharpness deteriorates accelerates as the object moves further and further away from the point of the optimum depth of field zone. Hence, keeping your subject in the optimum depth of field zone results to the sharpest image your camera is capable of. This specification is important when selecting the best vlogging camera, because you want your subject to be the center of focus in the video.
Depth of field is often described in terms of "deep" or "shallow." When you say that the depth of field is shallow, it means that the focus range is tighter or narrower. It could be in terms of few inches to a couple of feet. Using "deep" to describe a depth of field usually means several yards to infinity.
Keep in mind that the depth of field is a combination of three factors: the camera's f your camera, you need to know more about the fundamentals. Aperture and depth of field are considered to focal length, distance, and aperture size.
When a photographer tries to manipulate the depth of field to bring out the desired image result, he or she usually tinkers with the camera's aperture.
A camera's lens will come with a figurative "retractable curtain." Its primary job is to control the amount of light that is allowed to enter and hit the image sensor. This retractable curtain is also known as the aperture.
The opening of the aperture is measured in terms of f-stops. Keep in mind that f-stops work in inverse in a sense that small number would mean a wider aperture opening, while a large number translates to narrower aperture opening. Another essential thing to keep note is that the size of the aperture has a significant impact on the depth of field.
If you use a large aperture size, what happens is that the light coming into the sensor is also wider. Since it's wider, the light is "diffused" which means that the camera has to compensate. This forces the camera to only sharpen a narrower area of an image. If you see a photo in which the subject is sharp, while the background is blurred, this is the effect of using a wider aperture size.
On the other side of the spectrum is using an aperture size that is narrow. Because of the small aperture size, the light coming in is more focused. As a result, using a small aperture size will result in sharper foreground and background.
Keep in mind that there's no such thing as "bad" or "good" here. It all depends on the photographer's desired effect. If a photographer wants to draw the attention of the viewer to a certain part of the image, he or she can use a wider aperture to intentionally guide the viewer's eyes to focus on the sharp areas of the photo. Conversely, if a photographer wants a viewer to be "awed" by the background of the picture, a narrower aperture size is needed. Another thing that you need to understand about aperture size is that it works in ranges.
Aperture Ranges
Depending on your camera, the aperture size may come in "stops" like F/2, F/2.8, and F/22 while some will have F/2, F/3, F/4 and so on. The reason there are "stops" is that the f-number is a result of a mathematical equation that defines the amount of light coming in and hitting the sensor no matter the length and size of the lens.
Basically, you're free to use F/2.3 (if your camera allows it) as opposed to using the standard F/2 stop. However, with the F/2.3, the light coming in is not substantial enough to make a difference in the exposure when compared to F/2. It's the reason why F-stops are usually fixed in F/2, F/2.8, F/4 and so on.
Other Factors Relating to Depth of Field and Aperture
Most aspects of a camera are related to one another. This is especially true when it comes to exposure. If you want the right exposure, you usually have to balance the ISO sensitivity, aperture, and shutter speed.
For example, if you want to take a dramatic photo of your friend in which her face is sharp, and the background is blurred, then you will have to use a wider aperture size. However, you can't just blindly set the aperture size without adjusting ISO sensitivity and/or shutter speed and expect the exposure will be right.
In this example, since the aperture size is wider, which means more light is coming in, then you'll have to "desensitize" the ISO and/or increase the shutter speed to get the right exposure. In most cases, it's the shutter speed that is adjusted to compensate for the increased light that is coming into the camera.
As mentioned before, you can manipulate the depth of field by distance and focal length. When it comes to distance, the closer the object to the lens is, the shallower the depth of field will be. Conversely, the further the object from the lens, the depth of field will also be deeper. While it is true that you can manipulate the distance through distance, it's just not practical. The biggest reason for this is because moving the lens closer or further will generally result in compromising the integrity of the composition.
Another aspect that can influence the depth of field is the focal length. The downside of this method is that it's complicated to do.
Because of these reasons, most photographers will turn to the aperture setting in manipulating depth of field rather than choosing to tinker with focal length and distance. | https://www.expnet.com/article/depth-of-field-and-aperture | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2018-47
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ACD Systems Blog
Aperture, Speed & Sensitivity (Part 1)
2013-03-01 21:07:00 GMT
By ACDSee Guest Blogger & Professional Photographer Alexandra Pottier
In photography, three things matter: Aperture, speed and sensitivity. These three facts, when combined, make a good exposure.
About aperture in photography:
The diaphragm opening in a camera is composed of thin metal curtains that open or close in increasing sizes.
The aperture of the diaphragm corresponds at the size of the surface that will allow the light to come in and hit the sensor during the exposure. You can compare the diaphragm to a window, the bigger the size, the more light comes in and the room is more bright.
The size is expressed in f/stops where large numbers (f/22) are letting very little light in, which is useful when there is a lot of light, like a bright sunny day.
Whereas smaller numbers (f/2.8) allow a lot of light to come in when there isn’t much light around.
f/2.8 f/8 f/22
The numbers are proportional, if you increase one f/stop (from f/11 to f/8 for example) you double the size of the hole from which the light comes through. It is the same proportion if you decrease from one f/stop, (from f/8 to f/11) you let half of the light to come through.
The most common f/stops are f/2.8, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16 , f/22.
Usually, the biggest or the smallest aperture given by a lens depends on its focal length. The average lens with a focal length of 50mm, has a maximum aperture around f/2.8. A bigger zoom lens usually offers a smaller aperture, around f/5.6.
The more a lens opens wide, the more complex it is to build. The zoom lenses with a big focal length (200mm) and a wide aperture are usually very expensive.
The aperture also affects the depth-of-field (DOF), the sharpness of the different levels of the picture. In other words, the depth of the depth of field.
With a large aperture (f/2.8) the depth-of-field is small and, on the contrary, a small aperture (f/22) gives a large depth-of-field.
In Portrait photography, it is recommended to use a small depth-of-field, so everything that is behind the subject will have a nice artistic blur. Where in landscape photography, it is better to use a large DOF, and so a small aperture to have every level in the picture sharp.
The image on the left has a big aperture (f/2,8) and has a small depth of field
The image on the right has a small aperture (f/22) and has a large depth of field.
You can change the aperture by using the manual mode of your camera, or you can use the A or Av mode. When you do so, your priority is to set the aperture first, the other settings will follow.
Some cameras have a depth of field measurement where it shows you what is invisible. When you change your aperture while using this tool, you can see the depth of field changing through the lens. Very handy to compose a nice picture.
Now get your camera and practice!
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} | 921 | Photography Basics: Beginners Guide to Aperture
As part of our Photography Basics series we talked about Exposure already and this time we are going to cover the mystery of aperture. Aperture is probably the least understood setting of everything on your camera. While shutter settings are very easy to understand, to long of a shutter speed and you will get blurring, pretty simple stuff. Same with ISO, too high of ISO and you introduce digital noise. But learning how to use aperture properly can kill brain cells faster than a frat house kegger party.
What is this aperture thingy anyway?
Inside each lens is a diaphragm that can open and close, the size of the opening at any given setting is what we refer to as the aperture setting. On our cameras we refer to specific size settings as f-stops such as f/2.8, f/5.6, f/11, etc. While the obvious value of adjusting the aperture is to control how much light enters the camera, there is a secret hidden world beneath the hood that we will need to get a grasp of as well, but let’s start at the basics first.
For a given ISO setting and shutter speed we can adjust the amount of light entering the camera by adjusting the aperture, a smaller diameter (higher f-stop value) will allow less light in, while a larger aperture (smaller f-stop number) will allow more light it. If we refer to the Sunny 16 rule, we know that on a bright sunny day, if we are using ISO 200 and a shutter speed of 1/200th then we will get a good exposure at f/16. As the sun goes down and there is less light, we need to allow more light into the camera, we can do this by opening the aperture up (again, using a smaller number) to allow more light in. This sounds easy enough right?
Image showing relative sizes of aperture
If that is all there is to it, then this whole aperture thingy would be a piece of cake and life would be good. It is enough to get you going into how aperture plays a role in getting a good exposure, so it is certainly a lesson worth learning and understanding well.
Have you collimated your rays lately?
The opening of the diaphragm also will control cone angle of light coming into the camera and this is why adjusting the aperture can affect the depth of field. To see how this works use your thumb and pointer finger to make a big circle, with one eye closed look through that at a finger on your other hand held about 12″ away. This is going to simulate a large aperture, you will be able to focus on the finger but you will have far less focus on something across the room. Next, make the circle very small and look through it again (now simulating a small aperture), you will be able to focus on both your finger and something across the room equally well. The reason for this has to do with the angle of light coming into your eye, with the large circle, light is able to come in very straight which creates a shorter focal plane, with a smaller aperture opening the light comes in as a cone shape giving a longer focal plane. While this simple experiment has a very subtle effect (not everyone may even notice it working) in your camera it can have a dramatic effect on how your images look.
Factors that determine depth of field
There are three factors that will determine the amount of depth of field you will have in your image, and taking from a comment post from Photo Larry, this points out the different factors:
In a comment from an earlier post, Photo Larry provided this very simple guide:
• Distance from the subject (Close=shallow, Far=Deep)
• Focal Length (Short=Deep, Long=Shallow)
• Aperture (Small=Deep, Open=Shallow)
Aperture Setting
We have already covered this one, the larger the opening (smaller f-stop number) the shorter the depth of field will be.
Focal Length
The longer the focal length the shorter the depth of field will be. This is why you will get more blurring effect on telephoto lenses than you will with wide angle lenses. The most popular portrait lens is the 70-200 f /2.8 because as you back up from the subject and use the longer focal length with a large aperture the more the background will get blurred out.
Distance to Subject
The further you are away from the subject, the more depth of field you will have as well. This is much easier to see with a long telephoto lens, if you focus on something very close to you, much of the background will be blurry, as you focus on things further away less of the foreground and background will be blurry.
Two images with different aperture settings
Hopefully this will help you understand the basics of what your aperture setting can do for you and how to begin to use it to your advantage both in getting enough light into your camera and by being able to add some extra flair to your images using the depth of field.
Kerry Garrison is a wedding, portrait, and product photographer living in southern California. With 10 years of experience shooting products and 3 years of experience in the wedding industry, Kerry brings a good deal of technical know-how and can explain topics in easy-to-understand terms. Kerry's work can be found at and on Facebook at
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The Basics of Manual Settings–Part 3–Aperture
Now that we know ISO and Shutter Speed, it’s ready to move on to Aperture. Aperture can be confusing, but let me let you in on a secret, it’s only the jargon that is confusing. When you come right down to it, aperture is the size of the hole in your lens that is letting light through during a photo.
You know how your pupils get bigger or smaller depending on the ambient light? The aperture basically does the same thing. Only, instead of having your own super smart brain to do it automatically, you have to tell it what to do. We do this by setting F-stops.
What’s an F-stop. Well, it’s a mathematical calculation of the focal length divided by the diameter of the aperture opening, but you don’t need to know that right now. All you need to know, is the smaller the f-stop number, the bigger the hole and visa versa. F1.4 is a very big hole. F22 is a small hole. If you get into pinholes, sometimes those are F300, but that’s a whole other story.
So, what is the point of aperture? Well, obviously a bigger aperture (f1.4) will let in more light. This means you can shoot at a higher shutter speed and/or lower ISO than at f22. Example: if you are shooting at 200 ISO at f4 and your shutter speed is at 1/30th, but you need it at 1/60th, change to f2.8.
Now for the fun part of aperture, it controls your depth of field. Depth of field refers to the amount of stuff in a scene in front of or behind your focal point that will be in focus. When you shoot at a wide aperture, your depth of field will be really short.
In this photo, my dog’s eyes are in focus, her ears are sorta in focus, but the focus drops off at her nose and in the background.
This can be a nice feature because you can use depth of field to focus on a subject and blur out the background.
Or, on the other hand, you can shoot at a smaller aperture, such as f22 and get more depth of field. Or take it one step further and use a pinhole and achieve almost infinite depth of field.
This is my mailbox and street at f22.
Some other things of note about depth of field, the closer your subject, the shorter your depth of field.
Some of the older cameras even had depth of field guides on the focusing ring.
In this photo, the top 2 lines of numbers are focal distances, the 3rd line down shows where the focus is (orange line). It also shows, with the mirrored f-stop numbers, what distances would be in focus at that particular setting.
If the above settings were used at f22, everything from 1.5 to 10 meters would be in focus. At f 11, everything from 2 to 4.5 meters would be in focus and so on.
This can be handy for having complete control over depth of field. Do you want more in focus in front of your subject than behind it? Using the guide numbers, you might not actually focus on your subject to control where the depth of field lies.
Finally, depth of field is controlled by how much your focal subject fills the frame. If you zoom in (or get close), you will have a shorter depth of field than if you shoot at a wider angle.
Those are the basics of aperture! Now we can see how the 3 settings come together… tomorrow we’ll talk about stops… and there will be a handy craft project!!
Shasta Betty
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OK y'all, today is the FIRST day of a photo series. Are y'all excited yet? I am! Like I said in the first post I am no professional, but I do want to share what I have learned with all of you because I think that any information either it be from a professional or amateur helps a great deal.
Today, we are going to start off talking about APERTURE (F-stop) It is a VERY important part of photography and goes hand in hand with ISO and Shutter Speed, which we will talk about later on.
What is Aperture? Well, since y'all asked I guess I will tell. Aperture gives pictures those blurry backgrounds everybody loves...YES! I know I love me a nice fuzzy background. Aperture can bring everything in focus or add more dimension by focusing only on your subject. Think about it like a human eye. Our eyes dilate or shrink depending on the amount of light that passes through them. Aperture does the same thing! In photography it is represented by f-numbers (i.e. f/1.8, f/4.0, f/11) or f-stops. This is a way of telling us how large or small the aperture opening is. Unlike our normal value of numbers, though, a lower f-stop has a wider aperture (more light coming in ) and a higher f-stop has a smaller aperture (less light coming in). So, f/1.8 is larger than f/10 when talking about aperture. Confused yet? I hope not. Just stay with me. To help visualize this a little better I put together a chart for reference.
What is depth of field? Depth of field is the term used to describe which objects in your photograph are in focus. It is directly related with the size of your aperture (f-stop). A small f-stop number such as f/3.2 will focus more on your subject while making the background blurry (small depth of field) and a large f-stop number such as f/22 will bring your subject and the background all into focus (increased depth of field). Again, refer to the chart above!
NOW for an even more visualized idea of what I am talking about I employed the help of a few of my kiddos toys and some pretty fall foliage to show aperture in action.
SIDE NOTE: your aperture (f-stop) size will also vary by lens. For example, some lenses have a lower f-stop than others. My 50mm f/1.8 has and f-stop of 1.8, but if you look at a kit lens you will notice that the f-stop is only 3.5. Make sure to keep this in mind when purchasing a new lens.
Want some homework? Turn the dial on your DSLR to AV or A mode to practice using aperture. This setting allows you to only control the aperture with the ISO and Shutter Speed being automatic. So, go make some backgrounds blurry!
That pretty much rounds up day 1 of a photo series. What did you think? Did I explain everything in terms you could relate to? PLEASE, if you have any additional tips or information please leave them in the comment section below so we can all HELP each other. xo-ginny
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Photography Tips- What is Aperture?
The Aperture and Light:
If you look at your SLR camera lens you will most likely see two sets of numbers. The particular set we’re going to be talking about here in regards to aperture will have numbers in the sequence 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22, etc. These numbers are called your F-stops. If you’ve read my article on shutter speeds, I defined the term stop as a measure of exposure. Stop is more accurately used in regards to aperture, as it describes aperture size. Aperture is essentially the size of your lens opening. If you think about the pupil of your eye, you’ll recall that it expands and contracts in order to let in more or less light. The aperture is actually a ring within your lens that widens or contracts depending on the settings you choose (i.e. the ring with the f-stop numbers I mentioned). When you remove your lens from your SLR camera, you can actually see the ring that adjusts. If you like, you can adjust those numbers I mentioned while the lens is removed from your camera, and you will see the ring open and close. Here is an idea of what aperture looks like:
Copyright 2006-2008 © i Digital Photo
What do the F-Stop numbers mean?
If you remember my article on shutter speeds, I explained that the shutter speed measurements (100, 200, 400) are actually fractions of seconds (i.e. 1/100s, 1/200s, 1/400s), which means the higher the number, the FASTER the shutter. The same applies to F-Stops. F/22 is actually a measurement of 1/22 , which means the lens opening is going to be SMALLER. F/4 will actually be ¼ and therefore be a wider opening.
Why is aperture important?
Aperture controls two things: exposure and Depth of Field. Depth of Field is how much of your photograph is in focus, from foreground to background. With f-stops you can soften that background in a portrait or make that landscape you love in almost complete focus, but you have to know how to adjust aperture to your desired effect. Aperture controls exposure by allowing MORE light in on a lower f-stop setting, i.e. f/2.8. This is because the f-stop is actually a wider opening, since it’s a larger fraction. Makes sense, right? Well here’s where it can get backwards and confusing. This same setting of f/2.8, when compared to f/22, is actually going to give you a smaller depth of field, meaning only a small portion of your photograph is in focus. I will discuss Depth of field more, later. For now, here examples of how aperture affects depth of field:
So let’s recap:
-Aperture is a ring in your lens that contracts or widens based on the f-stop settings you choose.
-F-stop is a fraction that represents how large the opening is in your lens, which directly affects how much light is reaching the film/digital sensor.
- Aperture also controls depth of field, which is the area of your photograph that is in “acceptable” focus. “Acceptable” is a loose term, but essentially means how much of your photograph (from foreground to background) is in focus.
1. Anonymous11.6.10
I never knew this! That's so helfpul, thanks.
2. Anonymous11.6.10
I've been searching for a while now, trying to understand exposure better, this blog was REALLY informative, kudos!
3. Anonymous11.6.10
Have you considered using video or more visuals in your blogs?
4. Anonymous11.6.10
I thought the photos used were pretty good visuals, but I guess a video could be fun too!
5. I think a video could help, I'd like this topic to go a little deeper. Aperture is still a little confusing.
6. Anonymous11.6.10
I never knew that certain settings are what gives your photo that fuzzy romantic feeling. Thanks!
7. Anonymous11.6.10
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} | 814 | Quick Answer: How Are F Stops Counted?
What do f stops mean?
focal lengthWhat Are F-Stops.
It is represented using f-numbers.
The letter “f” stands for focal length of the lens..
What is better f/2.8 or f4?
The most obvious difference between an f/2.8 and an f/4 lens is in their “brightness”, i.e. in the maximum amount of light each lens allows to reach the sensor. … An f/2.8 lens would usually be capable of giving a more shallow depth of field (and therefore a bigger background bokeh) than an f/4 lens.
Are F stop and aperture the same?
F-stop (aka f-number) is the number that you see on your camera or lens as you adjust the size of your aperture. Since f-stops are fractions, an aperture of f/2 is much larger than an aperture of f/16. Just like the pupil in your eye, a large aperture lets in a lot of light.
Is F stop shutter speed?
Is 2.8 fast enough for low light?
Is a lower f stop better?
A low f-stop lens is faster and is also usually more expensive. The lower the f-stop number you use, the more light you let into your camera. The hole gets wider with every lowered f-stop. Having a wider opening creates a shallower depth of field which means it’s a very good idea for portraits.
Why is aperture measured in F stops?
F-stops and aperture Ugh. … The aperture opening is measured in f-stops, which are, in fact, a fraction. Specifically, an aperture opening is a fraction of the focal length of your lens. So, if you have a 100mm lens set to f/4, what you are really saying is that the aperture opening in the lens is 1/4th of 100mm.
What aperture is best for low light?
What does a higher F stop do?
Simply put: how sharp or blurry is the area behind your subject. The lower the f/stop—the larger the opening in the lens—the less depth of field—the blurrier the background. The higher the f/stop—the smaller the opening in the lens—the greater the depth of field—the sharper the background.
What F stop blurs background?
Choose a Wide Open F-Stop A very large part of a blurry background is caused by a wide f-stop like 1.8, 2.8 or as wide as your lens will go be it 3.5 or even 4. The wider your f-stop is, the smaller the depth of field will be. Depth of field is the amount of the photo that will be in focus.
What is the F on a camera?
What are the full f stops?
The full stop aperture settings that you are most like to encounter are: f/1.4, f/2, f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16, f/22 and f/32. Other settings such as f/3.5 and f/6.3 are fractions between these whole stops. F/3.5 could be thought of as f/2.8 and 2/3, for example, and f/6.3 as f/5.6 and 1/3.
How does f stop affect exposure?
Two controls affect the amount of light that comes into the camera and strikes the image sensor – aperture and shutter speed. The ISO affects how much light is needed to produce a correct exposure. … Lower f-stop settings (such as F5. 6) have a larger diaphragm opening, allowing more light through the lens.
What is the lowest f stop?
f/32Now, to answer you original question, because an f/stop is a ratio, it is theoretically speaking, infinite but obviously not practical. Therefore, on modern lenses suited for DSLRs, the lowest f/number you’re likely to find is f/32.
Which aperture is sharpest?
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} | 589 | Most photographers only think of f-stops in terms of depth-of field. When the aperture is open (smaller numbers, such as f2.8) the field-of-focus is relatively narrow. When the aperture is stopped-down (larger numbers, such as f16) the field-of-focus is relatively broad. To get a lot in focus, you stop-down . To isolate a subject with an out-of-focus foreground (and/or background) you open-up the aperture. Some lenses have scales inscribed on them to indicate the depth-of-field at selected f-stops, but many don't have this handy feature. For these lenses it's necessary to refer to a depth-of-field table or chart.
While depth-of-field is an important criteria to use in determining the appropriate aperture, there are other, perhaps more important considerations when selecting the aperture setting. One of these is lens aberrations. When most lenses are opened up, they are subjected to image-deteriorating conditions such as spherical and chromatic aberrations. Briefly, these mean that rays of light passing through different sections of the lens focus on different planes. The rays that happen to coincide with the film plane will to sharp, but any falling in front of or in back of the film plane will be out-of-focus. Stopping down the lens helps eliminate these aberrations since the rays of light are brought through the lens at the same place on the lens. However, stopping down the lens causes other aberrations to occur. Diffraction is the biggest image-degrader and gets worse as the f-stop gets smaller (larger numbers). The image actually is deteriorated by the edges of the diaphragm blades. When the lens is opened wide, this "edge effect" amount to a very small percentage of the total light that passes through the lens, but when the aperture is very small, the diffracted light is such a large proportion of the total light that the image is fuzzy.
As a result of these image deteriorating factors at both ends of the aperture scale, the optimum quality for most lenses occurs somewhere in the middle of the f-stop scale. The exact point differs with each lens design, but is usually one or two f-stops down from the maximum (wide open). For example, with a f2.8 lens, the best quality is most likely to occur around f4.0 or f5.6. It's fairly easy to determine the optimum f-stop for any lens. Select a fine-grained film and a high contrast subject such as a magazine or newspaper with both large and small print. Place the camera on a tripod, and place the subject at a distance equal to 50 times the focal length of the lens. (With a fixed focus lens, common on many subminiatures, set the subject to the fixed distance). For example, with a 25mm lens, place the newspaper about four feet from the camera. Take pictures at every f-stop setting and make enlargements from each negative. (Make sure you use the best enlarger lens aperture setting for the enlargements. Check out the DARKROOM for details) It will be easy to pick out the aperture setting with the least amount of aberration -- it's the one that's the sharpest! Don't be surprised if some of the settings give absolutely horrid results. This test will clearly show you which f-stops to use, which to avoid and which to select when you want the absolute best results.
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You can increase depth of field by using a shorter focal length, moving farther from the subject, and stopping the lens down. Here, a wide-angle lens stopped down to f/16 got everything from foreground to background sharp.
To minimize depth of field, use a long lens, move in close, and shoot at the lens's widest aperture. Here, focusing a wide-open 300mm f/4 lens nearby resulted in minimal depth of field.
Many SLRs have depth-of-field preview buttons that stop the lens down to the set aperture so you can see in the viewfinder the zone of sharpness.
If your camera doesn't have a depth-of-field preview, you can get a pretty good idea of how much depth of field you'll have at a given aperture and focusing distance from the lens' depth-of-field scale. This lens is focused at infinity, with the aperture set at f/8; depth of field at these settings runs from about 30 feet (10 meters) to infinity.
You can maximize depth of field for a given aperture by setting the lens to its hyperfocal distance: Set the focusing ring's infinity mark opposite the selected aperture mark on the depth-of-field scale, shown here at f/8. Depth of field will then run from half the focused distance to infinity (15 feet to infinity, in this case, with the lens at f/8 and focused at 30 feet).
A wide-angle lens takes in a wide angle of view—handy when you want to get a lot into the picture from a given camera position.
Move in close with a wide-angle lens, and foreground objects appear huge relative to more-distant ones: wide-angle "expansion."
Wide-angles are popular with landscape photographers (although they use normal and short-telephoto lenses, too).
One side benefit of wide-angle lenses is great depth of field. Even wide-open, they provide lots of depth of field; stop down, and you can record everything from foreground to background sharply.
Image Size & Perspective
There are two ways you can change the size of the subject's image on your film. First, you can move closer to the subject (to make it larger on the film) or move farther away (to make it smaller). Second, you can switch to a longer focal-length lens (to make the subject's image larger) or to a shorter focal length (to make it smaller). Each of these ways produces a specific effect.
Actually moving the camera closer to the subject will increase the size of the subject's image on the film, but will also change the subject's size relative to other objects in the scene (i.e., it will change the perspective of the image). Changing to a longer focal length lens will increase the size of everything in the scene equally; it will not change the perspective. The next time you're watching a movie or television show and wonder whether a particular "move-in" was done by zooming a zoom lens or by actually moving the camera closer, check the perspective. If the other objects in the scene retain their sizes relative to the main subject, it's a zoom; if the size relationship between elements of the scene changes, it's a camera move.
Perspective changes when the camera moves; changing focal lengths from a given camera position won't change perspective. The accompanying photos should make this clear.
The size of the aperture is controlled by the lens' aperture ring. This ring is calibrated in f-numbers. F-numbers represent ratios: the ratio between the diameter of the aperture and the focal length of the lens. When the aperture ring is set at 4 (known as f/4), the diameter of the opening is 1/4 the focal length of the lens. With a 100mm lens, the aperture is thus 25mm in diameter when the aperture ring is set to f/4. Diagram A shows the relative diameters of apertures from f/1.4 to f/16.
The aperture represented by each successive numerically larger f-number transmits half as much light as the previous number. For example, f/8 transmits half as much light as f/5.6. For another example, an aperture of f/2 transmits four times as much light as f/4, because its diameter is twice as large as f/4 and thus its opening is four times the area of f/4.
Since the f-number system is based on the ratio between the aperture diameter and the focal length of the lens, in theory a given f-number transmits the same amount of light on any focal-length lens. For example, f/8 on a 100mm lens theoretically transmits the same amount of light as f/8 on a 1000mm lens. (Of course, f/8 on the 1000mm lens means an aperture diameter of 125mm, while f/8 on the 100mm lens means a diameter of 12.5mm. That's one reason why you don't see long lenses with large maximum apertures: a 1000mm f/1.4 lens would need an effective aperture diameter of 714mm, or about 28 inches!)
Lenses with large maximum apertures are termed "fast": an 85mm f/1.4, or Canon's 50mm f/1.0, for example. Lenses with small maximum apertures are considered "slow": a 50mm f/3.5 macro lens, or a 500mm f/8 mirror lens, for example. Faster lenses provide brighter viewfinder images for easier focusing, and they permit shooting in dimmer light, but they are also more expensive, heavier and generally not as sharp at maximum aperture.
Depth of Field
One more thing: Depth of field is really an illusion. The point focused upon is "sharp"; as a subject moves closer or farther away, it becomes less sharp. Within depth-of-field limits, objects will appear acceptably sharp (because their circles of confusion will be sufficiently small), but for maximum sharpness, try to focus accurately.
Depth of field affects what appears to be in focus behind and in front of the focused subject, and should not be confused with depth of focus, which is the minute amount the film plane can move toward or away from the lens before the circles of confusion become large enough to noticeably affect image sharpness.
Interchangeable Lenses
One lens can't do it all. The lens that comes with the camera might be good for general everyday shooting, but isn't ideal for all shooting situations. Therefore, "serious" cameras offer interchangeable lenses—you can remove the lens that's on the camera and replace it with another that's better suited to the task at hand. Interchangeable lenses allow you to use normal lenses, wide-angle lenses, telephoto lenses (actually, the term "telephoto" refers to a specific type of lens design in which the physical length of the lens is shorter than its focal length, but all lenses longer than a camera's normal lens are generally referred to as "telephotos" today, so we'll do that, too), zoom lenses, macro lenses, perspective-control lenses, mirror lenses, soft-focus lenses, superfast lenses, fisheye lenses—whatever type of lens you need to get the image you want on your film.
Lenses whose focal length is close to the diagonal measurement of the image frame for a given camera format are considered "normal" lenses for that format. For example, a full-frame 35mm image measures 24x36mm, and has a 43mm diagonal. So 50mm lenses are considered "normal" for 35mm cameras, 50mm being the closest focal length to 43mm that most lens makers offer. Normal lenses see things pretty much as our eyes do, and are good for general picture-taking. There was a time when most SLR camera bodies were sold with a normal lens, but today, bodies are generally sold with short-range zoom lenses, such as 35-80mm.
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} | 1,187 | How I understand the Focal Length of a Lens (Part Two): Focal Lengths
In Part One we tried to get a simple understanding of what the focal length of a lens means. In this part, we’ll take this knowledge further, so you can make use of it practically.
Depth of field
Let’s look at the last picture again:
Different focal lengthsI’m not going into the detail of depth of field (DOF). There are enough articles on the subject.
If you want to see your foreground and background at the same time, you need depth in your lens. One way to achieve this is to stop down your lens (close your aperture). This isn’t always practical (because it needs tons of light), so the other ‘solution’ is to use a wide angle lens. A wide angle lens really does not change the depth of field. To know how this works, read this excellent article: Do wide angle lenses really have greater depth of field than telephoto?
Suffice to say, a wide angle lens gives the impression of greater depth of field, while a telephoto lens does not. We’re just suckers for it.
If you use my box analogy, the more blue you have, the greater the DOF, and the less blue you have, the lesser the DOF.
The idea of perspective
Look at this image:
Two Perspectives
What’s the difference between what the two people see? Location. They are physically located in a different place, and therefore, we say they have two different perspectives.
I had trouble remembering if, whether and when a perspective change happens with a change in focal length. Actually, the answer is quite simple: Any time you physically change the location of the camera, you are changing the perspective. Remember:
• Changing the focal length does not change perspective. It’s just a different slice of the same perspective.
• Changing the location of the camera changes perspective.
A change of perspective can also happen if you move a camera towards or away from an object. If one has never seen a lens or camera, one could argue that this is the same as changing the focal length. This argument can be met easily if one actually uses different lenses in the field.
By moving closer or further away from an object, you are also changing the object’s relationship (your viewpoint, not in reality) with other objects in the scene. This does not happen with a focal length change. It only happens with a change in location, i.e., perspective.
We saw in Part One that each focal length is a slice of the box:
Frame Slices
The angle from the back (the infinity point) to each slice doesn’t change at all. That’s perspective.
Angle of view
Now, look at it from your viewpoint (or the camera’s viewpoint):
Angle of View
Because you’re only getting a slice from the total possible view, the angle of view for each focal length is different. When you choose a focal length, you are also choosing a suitable angle of view for your scene.
Choosing a lens is part necessity and part art. As to the necessity part, read What lens to get? In it, I go into great detail about spaces and how that affects your choice of focal length.
Obviously, the size of the sensor determines to some extent what the angle of view is. To know more about this and the crop factor, read the Chapter on lenses in the Comprehensive Guide to Rigging ANY Camera.
Now we have enough information to tackle some of the complex terminology we saw in Part One:
• “higher or lower magnification” – means a different slice of the box.
• “wide or narrow angle of view” – means a different slice of the box.
• “high or low optical power” – means a different slice of the box.
• “distance from the lens to the film or sensor plane” – the technical definition of focal length.
• “focus on infinity” – the infinity point.
• “focal lengths in millimeters” – they are written as millimeters.
The art of choosing focal lengths
All said and done, lenses are simply tools that you use to tell a story. Just because a focal length is written in millimeters doesn’t mean you have to master science and math. They could be called anything, who cares?
Let’s see how lenses affect your ‘box’ (scene).
Super-wide and Fish-eye lenses
These lenses tend to distort the image simply due to the nature of optics. A special case of such lenses is the fish-eye lens:
Fisheye Example
These lenses are used when large expanses have to be covered (large buildings, planets, etc.) or when you want the ‘fish-eye’ effect. Either way, you need a solid reason for using them, and their use in cinema and video is rare.
Wide angle
The wide angle makes things in the scene look further apart:
Wide Example
The easiest way to know if a shot is a wide angle is to compare the foreground and background. In the above image, the foreground character is framed normally, but the background character appears smaller than usual. This gives the feeling of greater depth and distance between the two.
Wide angle lenses tend to distort objects as well, and sometimes this is used in the case of close-ups. Obviously, a person’s face distorted is rarely flattering!
Since wide angle lenses cover more of the scene, they are used for long shots, masters, mid shots and so on. Also note the greater ‘depth of field’.
Normal lens
A normal lens is somewhere in the region of 30mm to 50mm (35mm full frame equivalent). It gives a similar view (how objects are arranged according to our eyes) to the human eye:
Normal Example
This is probably the most used focal length range in the cinema or video world, because the ‘risk’ is less.
Portrait or short telephoto (85mm to 100mm)
A portrait lens is somewhere in the 85mm range (full frame equivalent):
50mm Example
You can see that this is no longer a ‘normal’ view, as objects are beginning to get compressed and closer to each other. But it’s still not off by much. Notice how the depth of field is reduced considerably under normal lighting conditions. To get more depth, Ozu would have had to completely stop down his lens.
Telephoto lenses
A telephoto lens compresses space:
Telephoto Example
You are no longer seeing a large scene, but only a small slice of the box. Everything (everyone) appears closer to each other, and relationships take on a different meaning. Characters far or near ‘share the same fate’, if you will. Compare it to the wide angle shot shown earlier.
This frame was stopped down and bucket loads of light was used, hence the greater depth of field.
There you have it. I hope I have given you enough ideas so you can get started thinking about lenses. Obviously, my goal with this article was to help you understand what the focal length of a lens means in practical terms.
What next? You could read a technical explanation of focal length, if you feel inclined. After a certain point, you will need to stop reading and start practicing with some real lenses. It’s only then that the art can begin.
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} | 2,677 | What Is Focal Length In Photography & Why It Matters?
| Last Updated On: June 8, 2021
what is the focal length of the lens
For anyone who is getting into photography, the one thing that I can tell you straight away is that there are going to be a lot of terms that will be thrown around, and more often than not, they can be confusing.
Even though the actual nature and meaning of these terms are as simple as they can get, people end up finding themselves confused in such situations to begin with.
For instance, you might be wondering just what focal length is?
A very simple concept in photography, but a lot of the time, people get confused. This is where we step in as the purpose of this article, and all our photography-related articles are to help the people who are not sure what needs to be done.
That is what this article is all about, too. Since we are focusing on almost every aspect of focal length that you might want to know.
What Is Focal Length?
Now, the thing that you need to understand about focal length is that it is a different thing in photography, and it is a different beast altogether in physics.
However, I’m not going to confuse you more than you already are, and that is why the things here are going to be simple and easy.
In photography, the focal length of the lens is an optical property of the lens, which measures the distance in millimeters between the optical center of the lens and the camera sensor or the film plane, for that matter. It is determined with the camera focused on infinity.
infographic of How the focal length works
To make things easier for the users, lenses are named by their focal length, and in almost every single case, you can find the information on the barrel of the lens.
For instance, a 50mm lens will have a focal length of 50mm, and it will be written on the lens, as well as the packaging material of the lens.
Now, you might be wondering what the optical centre of the lens is. Well, a lens is not made out of a single piece of glass; instead, it is a combination of lens elements and groups of elements.
These combinations are there to help focus light properly and curtail any distortion. The location where all the right rays converge to form a sharp image that you see is known as the optical centre of the lens.
Focal length happens to be a property of the lens and not the camera. This means a camera body cannot influence focal length.
However, certain camera bodies can increase the focal length because of a common term that is called “crop factor”, something we will discuss at a later stage.
Related reading: Vibrance vs Saturation In Photography
How Focal Length Influences Your Photos? Why Is It Important?
Now, when you are talking about focal length, it is important to understand that in most cases, you are going to be wondering just how does it influence a photo and why is it important.
After all, why can’t you use your 50mm lens and take photos that are all going to look the same?
image of different camera lens
Well, that is where things are different. Focal length influences your photos in more than one way, and for your understanding, we have explained how that works below.
• Field of View: The first thing is that focal length determines how much of a scene is captured in an image. Shorter focal lengths lenses are called wide-angle lenses because they give you a wider field of view in one image. Lenses with long focal lengths are called telephoto lenses and have a smaller field of view.
• Depth of Field: Long focal length lenses have a shallower depth of field, which means that they can focus on a small object with ease. At the same time, short focal length lenses have a larger depth of field, which enables to get a lot of elements in a single photo.
• Perspective: Perhaps the most influenced factor here happens to be the perspective. Focal length influences this the most. A focal length with a shorter focal length like 35mm is going to give you a cinematic look with every element of your photo, or your video is properly spaced. However, going to an 85mm lens is going to change the perspective and give you a much tighter perspective, with fewer elements in the view.
• Image Shake: If you are using a lens with a longer focal length, your camera becomes more sensitive to motion as there is very little space in the frame to compensate for it. This, however, can be controlled with in-body image stabilization or a tripod.
Recommended reading: How To Hold A Camera
Focal Length And Field of View
When you are buying a lens, the focal length is one thing that you will have to keep in mind. However, that is not the thing that most photographers will be looking at. The field of view of the lens is also important that you should be aware of.
Now, the field of view, as the name suggests the range of view that is captured within an image. So, a lens with a smaller focal length is going to have a larger field of view because it will be able to view and capture more elements in a photo.
black and white photo of a DSLR
So, for instance, if you are buying a 35mm lens, it should have a 63-degree field of view (diagonally) on a full-frame camera. 50mm lens is going to have a 47-degree field of view. The longer the focal length, the smaller the field of view becomes.
With that said, the field of view also is influenced by the crop factor, and that is all dependent on the crop factor of the specific camera you are using.
It is important to know that the field of view is going to affect the perspective a lot more than you might know, but at the end of the day, both the focal length and the field of view are important to understand.
Zoom Vs. Prime Lens
When you are in the market looking at a host of lenses that you can buy, you will be able to choose from several lenses. The most common debate that you are going to see is between zoom and prime lenses. Now, before I tell you the difference, it is important to know that these lenses have their use cases.
Prime lens vs zoom lens
Prime lenses are the lenses that come with a fixed focal length. This means that if you have a 35mm prime lens, it cannot increase or decrease the focal length and will stay at the range that it has.
On the other hand, as the name suggests, zoom lenses are the lenses that can increase or decrease their focal length based on the need of the photographer. Zoom lenses are more versatile, and in some cases, more expensive too.
However, 24-70mm is a common zoom lens that is considered to be a part of the holy trinity of lenses.
With this lens, you are getting multiple focal ranges all in one lens, and the results are great, too. Therefore, when choosing a lens, always keep this in mind.
Lens Focal Length Comparison
Now that we have looked at most of the information about focal lengths, we can start looking at the focal length comparison in which we will be exploring different focal lengths that you will find.
Wide-Angle Lens
The first lens that you are looking at is a wide-angle lens, these are a lot more common than one might want to think, and this lens can start from anywhere from 10mm and go as high as 35mm.
10 To 35mm Wide Angle-Lens
The lenses are available in a wide range of aperture options. You can always buy prime lenses that are wide-angle or get zoom lenses that are wider angle.
Standard Lens/Prime Lens
Next up, you are going to run into standard lenses that are also called prime lenses; these lenses are going to ship with fixed focal length. These can range from several focal lengths, with the most common one being 35mm, 50mm, and 85mm.
35 To 85mm Angle-Lens
These lenses are great for taking pictures that have a shallower depth of field, or they look dramatic. Therefore, having one of the prime lenses in your arsenal is going to go a long way. Just be sure that you are getting the right lens, and you would do just fine.
Super Telephoto Lens
We are now looking at super-telephoto lenses; these lenses usually start from the focal length that is 20mm or above. As you can guess, these are for specialized uses like wildlife photography or any form of photography in which you are far from the subject.
Image of Telephoto Lens
Normally, all the lenses that are super-telephoto start from 200mm and can go as high as 800mm. These are expensive, big, and heavy to carry. Therefore, make sure you want these lenses in the first place.
Telephoto Lens
A telephoto lens is generally any lens that has a focal range that can zoom. Whether you are looking at a 16-35mm, 24-70mm, or a 70-200mm. All these are telephoto lenses. These are commonly available in the market and are used for varying purposes ranging from wedding, portrait, sports, and wildlife photography.
image of a 200mm lens
Some of the higher-end telephoto lenses are often more expensive but, at the same time, do deliver a great photography experience. So, you can always have that in mind when buying a lens like that as it is important.
Macro Lens
A macro lens is one of the best types of lenses for photography in which you are getting up close to the subject; this is most commonly used in product photography in which you want to show the nuances of the product that you are photographing.
image of a person getting photo of rose
A macro lens is not determined by the focal length but by the minimum focusing distance of the lens. The shorter the distance, the more accurately it will be able to capture on a macro level.
You can commonly find macro lenses in 35, 50, and 100mm focal lengths, and they are, in most cases, fixed focal range lenses rather than being zoom lenses.
Portrait Lenses
Next up, we have the portrait lenses. These lenses are great if you are looking to take portraits. In the past, only prime lenses were considered portrait lenses.
However, any lens with a wide aperture and a good selection of focal length can be used as a portrait lens. At the end of the day, it is all about how you take the picture and handle the lens.
Landscape Lenses
Over the past couple of years, another common form of lenses that we have started seeing happens to be landscape lenses. As suggested, these lenses are a lot more common than one might think. But what exactly is a landscape lens?
image of multiple types of lens
Simply put, any lens that has a focal length that is short enough to fit the landscape, so a lot of elements of a scene can fit, is considered a landscape lens.
You can take great landscape shots with a 50mm, but normally, anything from 16 to 35mm is considered to be a great range for landscape photography.
More reading: Portrait Vs. Landscape
All-In-One Lenses
The last type of lens that we are looking at is an all-in-one lens. As the name suggests, these are general-purpose lenses. In the past, these lenses were not as good, but they have become a lot better.
Normally, these lenses are also called standard zoom lenses, and they offer some level of zoom.
image of Canon Zoom Lens
The purpose here is to cover several focal lengths in just a single lens and have a fixed aperture across the entire zoom length. For instance, the 16-35mm f/2.8 is a great example of an all-in-one lens. Then you have a 24-70mm lens as well.
Does Crop Factor Impact Focal Length?
When you are buying a lens or a camera, the one thing that you might come across very often is going to be called crop factor.
Now, a full-frame sensor has a 1.0x crop factor, which means that the sensor is 35mm, and whatever lens you put on to that camera, the focal length will be multiplied by the crop factor of the lens.
So, for instance, if you put a 50mm lens on a camera with a 1.0x crop factor, the resulting focal length will be 50mm. However, the same cannot be said for crop factor cameras. For instance, the APS-C (also called crop sensors) will have a crop factor of 1.6x on camera.
This means that the focal length of the lens will be multiplied by the 1.6 crop factor, and you will get the resulting focal length. So, a 50mm lens on a crop sensor would be equivalent to 80mm.
Therefore, be careful when you are choosing crop sensor camera bodies because they can have a massive influence on your photography.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
#Q1- What does the focal length mean?
Answer: In photography, the focal length of the lens is an optical property of the lens, which measures the distance in millimeters between the optical centre of the lens and the camera sensor or the film plane, for that matter. It is determined with the camera focused on infinity.
#Q2- What is the focal length of a lens?
Answer: The focal length of the lens is simply put the distance between the lens and the sensor when the subject is fully in focus. This is denoted by mm, and in the case of zoom lenses, both the minimum and maximum focal lengths are written to avoid confusion.
#Q3- What is the focal length in simple words?
Answer: In simpler words, the focal length is the distance between the lens and the sensor of the camera when you are completely focused on a subject. There are a lot of ways to explain what focal length is, and the more you read about it, the more difficult it is going to be for you to understand.
#Q4- How far can a 600mm lens see?
Answer: If you are wondering how far a 60mm lens can see, the minimum focusing distance of this lens is around 15 feet. This means that the objects that are 15 feet away will start appearing clearly. But the max focus distance is as far as the object can appear to the camera and how the focal length works.
#Q5- What focal length do I need?
Answer: This is an open question. You only need the focal length that is appropriate for your use. Normally, the photographer suggests that you start with three basic lenses; a 16-35mm, a 24-70mm, and a 70-200mm.
Within these ranges, you are getting every focal length that you could want. Just be sure that you are getting for a wider and possibly fixed aperture.
Understanding the focal length is a lot easier than you might think, to be honest. Granted, if you go into the actual definition of it and start looking at all the aspects of it in the light of physics, then it becomes a lot more difficult.
But then again, photography is largely based on physics, and some elements do trickle down here, as well.
Thankfully, the purpose of this article was to make it as easy as it could be humanly possible to explain vocal length to everyone so they do not find themselves confused as to what they should be doing and should not be doing.
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Understanding Lenses: What is Focal Length?
Caleb Ward
By Caleb Ward
Mastering focal length is the first step to understanding how a lens works.
The most important information to know when looking for a camera lens is the focal length. Focal length tells a photographer or videographer a lot about how the image is going to look. The shorter the focal length, the wider the angle of view and vice-versa. In the following article we will dissect (hopefully) everything you could ever want to know about focal length. If you have any questions or comments please share in the comments at the bottom of the page.
Lenses are often broken down into 3 different categories wide, telephoto, and standard. A wide angle lens is any lens that is 35mm or smaller. Lenses that are more wide than 24mm can be called ultra-wide angle lenses, but most photographers just call them fisheye lenses. Due to size exaggeration, wide angle lenses are great for shooting landscapes, real estate, and architecture.
Image shot on an Ultra-Wide Angle Lens
Telephoto lenses are any lens with a focal length of 85mm or higher. They are usually very long in length making them easy to identify. Telephoto lenses are generally used to shoot objects that are far away making them ideal for capturing weddings, wildlife, and events.
Telephoto lenses usually have more glass elements inside than wider lenses making them generally more expensive. In fact, you’ve probably seen an expensive telephoto lens at a sporting event. Telephoto lenses can be broken down into two further subtypes: medium telephoto (85-300mm) and super telephoto (300mm+). They usually create a very blurry background making them ideal for isolating your subject…we’ll dive into ‘depth of field’ in a future post.
Without a telephoto lens wildlife photography would be a challenge.
Standard lenses are any lens between 35mm and 85mm. The most commonly used standard lens is the 50mm prime or “nifty-fifty”, as it’s affectionately referred to by many photo pros. Standard lenses usually have a much cheaper base price than their wide and telephoto counterparts.
These lenses are the Goldilocks of lenses, not too wide, not too telephoto, making them perfect for shooting portraits, medium shots, and general photography. Technically speaking, a lens is considered standard or “normal” if it is close to the diagonal length of the camera sensor in millimeters.
Standard lenses are common among portrait photographers.
Zoom vs. Primes
Lenses with focal lengths that can change are called zoom lenses and those that remain fixed are called prime lenses. When comparing equally priced prime and zoom lenses, prime lenses usually will produce a better image. This is because zoom lenses require many moving parts that hinder light’s ability to move through the lens. Professional photographers do use zoom lenses for their work (like the Canon 70-200mm), but it’s more typical for high-end productions to use prime lenses, as they let in more light. Lenses that come with a camera (kit lenses) are usually zoom lenses.
What is Focal Length?
Focal Length is not…
• The length of the lens.
• Half the length of the lens.
• The diameter of the lens.
Focal length is the measurement (in millimeters) from the optical center of a camera lens to the camera’s sensor. The optical center is also known as the focal point. For all lenses (including primes) the focal length changes depending on what the lens is focusing on. For example a 50mm lens when focusing to infinity will have a focal length of 50mm, but when focusing on an object 1 meter away the focal length needs to be moved 2.6mm further away from the camera sensor to be in focus. Thus what you thought was a 50mm image is actually a 52mm image.
Crop Factor
Not to be confused with a 35mm lens, most high-end cameras have a camera sensor that is 35mm in length. A 35mm sensor is “full-frame“, meaning it uses the entire lens when capturing an image. This 35mm standard was designed to be identical to film cameras which used 35mm film to capture images. So a 50mm lens on a 35mm film camera will act very similarly to a 50mm on a 35mm “full frame” sensor.
However, if you are using a camera that has a smaller sensor than 35mm you are going to experience crop factor. If you’re in the photography or video world than you are probably well aware of crop factor, but for those who aren’t already acquainted, crop factor is a phenomenon in which a lens will act more telephoto than it actually is. So for example, a 100mm lens on a camera with a crop factor of 1.6x will have a similar field of view as a 160mm lens on a full frame camera.
When you read online about cropped sensors you will run across pages and pages talking about how cropped sensors have a focal length multiplication factor. This means that if a camera sensor has a multiplication factor of 1.5x than a 50mm lens will actually have a focal length of 75mm. This is actually somewhat false. As we’ve found out above, the only way for an image to be in focus is for the camera sensor to be a very specific distance away from the camera. If the focal length actually changed from 50mm to 75mm you would have an image that was completely out of focus. Instead, a crop factor is actually decreasing the of angle of view.
Focal length is physically similar but angle of view changes.
The market offers camera adapters that increase the angle of view of 35mm lenses to reduce crop factor. These adapters are called focal length reducers (but we know they actually mean ‘angle of view increasers’). Cameras with a cropped sensor can make shooting wide shots very difficult so be sure to take that into consideration before purchasing a lens.
Chromatic Aberration
Remember how we talked about the focal point inside of the lens? This point is the place in which light is directed, but unfortunately light doesn’t always bend perfectly. If you’ve ever shined a flashlight through a glass prism, or seen a Pink Floyd shirt for that matter, than you know that when bent, light will separate into different colors because color waves move at different speeds. This happens in camera lenses too, and most photographers consider it a bad thing. It’s called chromatic aberration. For a digital camera chromatic aberration occurs when blue, green, and red light separate across 3 separate focal points. The result is the skewing of colors around the edges of objects within your picture.
Chromatic aberration typically occurs in the red and blue channels.
Newer camera lenses have a lens element known as a ‘flint’ specifically designed to focus red, green, and blue light rays onto a single point…but older lenses typically do not. Good quality lenses are those which have minimal chromatic aberration.
Chromatic aberration is worse around the edges of an image frame, so when you are buying a new lens look around the edges in your image for color shifting or “purple fringing”. However, if you are intentionally trying to get a vintage look, try using an older lens with an adapter, you will find plenty of chromatic aberration!
The most important take away is focal length is directly related to the angle of view. There are many more technical things to learn about focal length but the topics discussed in this article are the most important for understanding how it plays into both photography and videography. If you’ve enjoyed this post and are interested in learning a little more about the science of focal length in photography check out the articles below.
Have any questions about focal length? Anything you would like to add? Share in the comments below. | http://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/understanding-lenses-what-is-focal-length/ | robots: classic
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} | 2,937 | Super Telephoto Zooms
We decipher the technobabble behind these nature photography mainstays
A long lens can "bring the subject to you," producing a larger image in the image frame and making long lenses particularly popular with wildlife and bird photographers. But they can also be useful to landscape shooters, as they allow you to zero in on more distant portions of a scene, and in so doing, flatten the perspective. (Note: It's the great distance, not the focal length, that compresses the perspective. If you shoot from the same spot with a shorter lens, then crop the resulting image to match the area shown in the longer-lens image, the perspective will be the same.)
Telephoto zooms offer additional benefits. First, as with any zoom, you get a whole range of focal lengths in a single package. That makes reframing much simpler (just rotate or push/pull the zoom ring, rather than physically change lenses) and minimizes dust on the image sensor by minimizing the number of lens changes in outdoor conditions. Telephoto zooms can take you out to 500mm for not much over $1,000, while a good 500mm prime lens can cost five to 10 times that. But a telephoto zoom offers another advantage over a single-focal-length lens. You can zoom back to the widest focal length to "find" your subject, which is convenient for wildlife and especially useful for birds in flight, then zoom in to frame, as desired. It can be hard to acquire a small or fast-moving subject with a long prime lens and its very narrow angle of view.
For our purposes here, "telephoto zoom" means one with its entire focal-length range in the longer-than-"normal" category: beginning at 70mm for full-frame cameras, at 50mm for APS-C cameras and at 35mm for Four Thirds DSLRs (Four Thirds System DSLRs are no longer in production, but some readers no doubt have one, and Four Thirds lenses can be used, via adapter, with Micro Four Thirds cameras).
What Does Telephoto Mean?
In general, lenses close in focal length to an image format's diagonal measurement are considered "normal" for that format. For example, a 35mm film frame (or a "full-frame" DSLR sensor) measures 36x24mm and has a diagonal measurement of 43.2mm. Lenses in the 40-55mm range are considered "normal" for this format.
Lenses shorter than the format's "normal" lens take in a wider angle of view and are called "wide-angles." Lenses longer than a format's normal lens take in a narrower angle of view, but instead of calling them "narrow-angle" lenses, most photographers (including us here at OP) tend to call them "telephotos." Actually, "telephoto" refers to a specific optical design in which the focal length is longer than the lens' physical length. But most of today's long lenses are indeed telephotos, which is kind of nice: It makes them less bulky. "Long-focus" is another term for these lenses.
Bottom line: A telephoto lens has a focal length longer than the "normal" focal length for a given format, producing a narrower angle of view and greater magnification.
This Article Features Photo Zoom
Maximum Aperture
The aperture is the opening in the lens that lets light in. The larger the aperture, the more light the lens can transmit to the image sensor, so you get a brighter viewfinder image for composing and focusing, and you can shoot at a faster shutter speed in a given light level. But the larger the maximum aperture, the bulkier the lens. Apertures are expressed as ƒ-numbers. An ƒ-number is simply the focal length of the lens divided by the diameter of the aperture (actually, the diameter of the effective aperture, which is what you see when you look into the front of the lens, rather than the diameter of the physical aperture itself). For example, ƒ/4 means the diameter of the effective aperture is 1⁄4 the focal length of the lens, or 25mm for a 100mm lens.
You can see from this why there aren't a lot of fast long lenses, and why the ones there are cost a bunch. A 500mm ƒ/2.8 lens (the fastest 500mm you can buy today) has an effective aperture diameter of 500/2.8 = 178.6mm (seven inches!) wide open. That means a big, heavy and costly front element (that Sigma 200-500mm ƒ/2.8 zoom has a street price of over $25,000 and weighs more than 30 pounds!). And, yes, the fastest 500mm lens available today is the long end of a zoom—not a prime lens—quite an engineering feat.
Zoom lenses generally aren't as sharp as prime lenses of equal focal length and price. That's because a prime lens must be corrected for only the one focal length, while a zoom must be corrected for a whole range of focal lengths. And corrections that help at one focal length can make things worse at another. Various aberrations and distortions tend to be more visible in zoom lenses.
That said, however, today's better zoom lenses are excellent, and for many—including working pros—the benefits outweigh the drawbacks.
Tamron SP 150-600mmF/5-6.3 Di VC USD
Tamron's new SP 150-600mm features the second-longest focal length in a current telezoom, yet it costs just $1,069—about $7,000 less than the only current zoom with a longer focal length (Sigma's 300-800mm). Think about that: A quality zoom that goes all the way to 600mm, for just over $1,000. And with built-in Vibration Compensation. And it covers full-frame sensors, as well as APS-C. We just received an evaluation lens from Tamron, and we'll report on our experience with it at Find the specs in the chart on page 5.
Variable Vs. Constant Aperture
Some zoom lenses (generally, the higher-priced ones) maintain a constant aperture throughout their zoom range. For example, a 70-200mm ƒ/2.8 zoom has a maximum aperture of ƒ/2.8 at 70mm and at 200mm, and everywhere in between. The aperture doesn't change as you zoom the lens. With variable-aperture zooms, the maximum aperture does change as you zoom, becoming "slower" at the longer focal lengths. For example, a 70-300mm ƒ/4-5.6 zoom has a maximum aperture of ƒ/4 at 70mm and a maximum aperture of ƒ/5.6 at 300mm. Just how quickly the aperture "slows" as you zoom varies from lens design to lens design; with most, you can assume halfway through the zoom range that the maximum aperture is close to the slower end of the range.
If you use the camera's built-in TTL exposure meter, it doesn't really matter which type of zoom you use. The TTL meter automatically will compensate for the change in aperture as you zoom. If you determine exposure manually with a handheld meter (or using the Sunny 16 Rule), you'll have to compensate manually for the slower apertures at the longer focal lengths.
This Article Features Photo Zoom
The variable-aperture designs are also more likely to shift focus as you change the focal length. If you're using AF, this doesn't matter, as the system will compensate automatically. But if you focus manually with a variable-aperture zoom, you'll have to focus at the focal length you'll be using for the shot. It's nice to zoom to the longest focal length to get a magnified image for focusing, then zoom back to the desired composition, but with lenses that shift focus as they zoom (which includes some constant-aperture zooms), you can't do this because the focus will shift when you change the focal lengths. Test your zoom(s) to see if focus shifts when you zoom. If in doubt, it's always safer to focus at the focal length you'll be using for the shot.
Angle Of View
Shorter focal lengths provide wider angles of view than longer ones. But just how wide or narrow a given lens' angle of view also depends on the format of the image sensor. Smaller sensors "see" less of the image produced by a given lens, producing a narrower angle of view. Larger sensors see more of the image, producing a wider angle of view. See the diagram at left.
Smaller DSLR sensors generally are assigned "crop factors" based on how their angles of view compare to that of a full-frame sensor (36x24mm, the size of a 35mm film image frame). In the early days of digital, this helped film shooters quickly understand what a given lens would do when used on a smaller-sensor camera (early digital SLRs had smaller APS-C sensors, so named because they were approximately the size of an Advanced Photo System "Classic-"format image frame). As mentioned earlier, a full-frame DSLR image sensor measures 36x24mm and has a diagonal of 43.2mm. An APS-C sensor measures around 23.6x15.6mm and has a diagonal of around 28.3mm. Since the full-frame diagonal is about 1.5X longer than the APS-C diagonal, a given lens on an APS-C camera produces the same field of view as a lens 1.5X longer on a full-frame camera. For example, a 200mm lens on an APS-C camera frames like a 300mm lens on a full-frame camera—great for telephoto fans. But a 28mm lens on an APS-C camera frames like a 42mm lens on a full-frame camera—not so good for wide-angle fans. That's why the kit zooms sold with APS-C cameras start at 18mm: An 18-55mm zoom on an APS-C camera frames like a 27-83mm on a full-frame camera.
Four Thirds System sensors measure 17.3x13.0mm, with a diagonal measurement of 21.6mm—half that of a full-frame sensor. So a given focal length on a Four Thirds System camera frames like a lens twice as long on a full-frame camera: A 200mm lens on a Four Thirds DSLR (or Micro Four Thirds mirrorless camera) frames like a 400mm lens on a full-frame DSLR.
Note that this is a crop factor, not truly a magnification. When focused at a given distance, a given focal length produces an image of a given subject as a given size at the focal plane. For example, a 100mm macro lens focused on a 20mm-high object at 1:2 produces an image of the object 10mm high at the image plane (sensor or film). This size doesn't change just because you put a larger or smaller sensor at the image plane. A smaller sensor just crops more tightly, so the object's 10mm image takes up more of the frame. For most practical purposes, it can be considered magnification, but in reality, it's not.
Several manufacturers offer lenses designed for full-frame cameras (these include 35mm SLR lenses) and lenses designed specifically for the smaller APS-C sensor. The full-frame lenses cover an image circle 43.2mm in diameter—the diagonal measurement of the full-frame sensor (or 35mm film frame). APS-C lenses cover an image circle of around 28.3mm—the diagonal measurement of an APS-C image sensor. If you use an APS-C lens on a full-frame camera, the image will vignette. Canon calls its APS-C lenses EF-S, and you can't even physically mount one on a full-frame camera. Nikon calls its APS-C lenses DX, and if you mount one on a full-frame Nikon DSLR, it will crop to the smaller DX format automatically. Sigma calls its APS-C lenses DC, Sony—DT, Tamron—Di II and Tokina—DX. (Pentax doesn't make full-frame DSLRs, so their DSLR lenses are APS-C.)
The advantages of APS-C lenses are that they can be designed to be smaller and perform better with smaller sensors. But if you intend to go full-frame some day, you'll be better off buying full-frame lenses now, even if you currently use an APS-C camera—you won't be able to use APS-C lenses on your new full-frame camera and take full advantage of its sensor's megapixels due to the crop factor.
Focal-Length "Breathing"
With many zoom lenses (especially those using internal focusing), the maximum focal length decreases as you focus closer—in some cases, a 70-200mm zoom winds up with a maximum focal length of maybe 140mm when set at 200mm and its closest focusing distance. For most purposes, this isn't a big deal. If you're at the lens' minimum focusing distance, a really long focal length isn't as important as with distant objects. If you do insect and flower photography, consider the minimum focusing distance and magnification: If your 70-200mm lens focuses down to 0.25X, it doesn't really matter if it's doing that at 200mm or 140mm; you're still getting 0.25X. (Of course, this focus breathing means you have less working distance—less space between you and the insect—but at these distances, that's not as critical as at true macro shooting distances.
Internal focusing offers its advantages. First, the lens doesn't change physical length during focusing, good for balance. Second, the front element doesn't rotate during focusing, so polarizers and graduated and other orientation-sensitive filters maintain their orientation. Note that while internal-focusing lenses don't rotate or extend as they focus, many do rotate and extend physically as they're zoomed.
Zoom Method
Most zooms today use a zoom ring, which you rotate to change focal lengths. But with some, you push or pull the zoom control rather than rotate it. The push-pull type is probably more prone to sucking dust into the lens, but we haven't found that to be a big problem. So, mostly, it's a matter of personal preference. Some photographers feel more comfortable with the rotating ring, others, with the push-pull control.
Exotic Elements
Most telephoto zoom lenses incorporate low-dispersion elements to minimize the effects of chromatic aberrations, improving image quality. They have designations such as LD, SLD, ED, ELD, HID, ULD and the like, depending on manufacturer and degree of correction. Fluorite elements are even more effective at compensating for chromatic aberrations, but also very costly, and are found only in some high-priced lenses. Lenses with low-dispersion elements are "better" than those without, but you should always test a telezoom before buying (you can rent many for a couple of days), rather than just depend on the presence and number of such elements.
Aspherical elements correct spherical aberration, which is more of a problem with wide-angle lenses, so they aren't often found in telezooms.
This Article Features Photo Zoom
Sigma 150-500mm F/5-6.3 APO DG OS HSM
This has been the go-to lens for wildlife photographers on a budget, the only telezoom with built-in stabilizer to go out to 500mm until the just-introduced Tamron 150-600mm. We know several bird photographers who use the Sigma 150-500mm lens with very good results, and we liked our test example when we tried it. A good stabilized zoom that goes out to 500mm for a bit over $1,000—very nice. If you're a wildlife photographer on a budget, we suggest that you check them both out.
If you use a Pentax or Sigma DSLR and need a long lens, this is your best option. Pentax's only lens longer than 300mm is a 560mm prime that costs thousands more, and the Tamron 150-600mm isn't available in Pentax or Sigma mounts.
AF Motor
Most newer telezooms incorporate AF motors. The best ones are quick, smooth and quiet: Canon's USM, Nikon's AF-S, Olympus' SWD, Pentax's SDM, Sigma's HSM, Sony's SSM II and Tamron's USD. The main thing to check regarding a telezoom's AF motor is whether you can change focus while in AF mode. If you're photographing a bird in flight, for example, and the AF system loses focus and focuses down to its minimum focusing distance, it's a lot quicker if you can just turn the focusing ring back to infinity and press the button to start AF again, rather than have to switch to manual focusing mode, reset focus, then re-enter AF mode. It's also helpful to be able to "ballpark"—focus on the flying bird manually before activating the AF system—something you can't do if the lens won't let you focus manually in AF mode. (With some lenses, rotating the focusing ring manually while in AF mode can damage the AF motor; you don't want this type of lens if you're photographing birds in flight.)
Built-In Stabilization
Many Canon, Nikon, Sigma and Tamron telephoto zooms come with built-in optical image stabilization (Canon's designation for this is IS, Nikon's is VR, Sigma's is OS and Tamron's is VC). This feature moves a group of lens elements as you shoot to minimize the effects of handheld camera shake. Olympus, Pentax and Sony DSLRs have built-in sensor-shift stabilization, which moves the image sensor rather than lens elements to compensate for camera shake. This has the advantage of being available with any lens you put on the camera, not just special stabilized ones. The drawback is that you don't see the stabilizing effect in the eye-level optical viewfinder. If you work handheld with a long lens, stabilization is a wonderful boon; if you work from a tripod, check the instructions for the lens or camera to see whether you should switch the stabilization off.
Each glass/air interface in a lens causes a loss of light due to reflections, and telezooms generally have lots of elements. So, manufacturers coat the surfaces of the elements to reduce reflections, minimizing this light loss. A telezoom with good coatings on all element surfaces can transmit a much greater percentage of the light than a lens with uncoated elements. The coatings also help to produce good color rendition. The newest coatings (found, naturally, on the newer lens designs) are even more effective than older coatings.
Just got an Olympus OM-D E-M10 and the image stabilization is very apparent through the viewfinder. Also just got a Sony A77II and the IS does not appear through the viewfinder. How does Olympus do it? And, why doesn’t Sony?
I’m a Nikon guy, but my understanding is that Sony’s VR is built into the body, making it less obvious, but none the less effective. If the VR is in the lens it just happens to appear more relevant.
Like most things in life, the proof is in the final product, in this case, the large print end of the photographic experience.
This is the land where counting pixels will only help you get to sleep at night, and brand names don’t mean squat.
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} | 694 | Focal length
From Antalya
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How much does your lens see
It is one of the defining parameters of the lens, but the number does not make so much sense. Technically it determines the field of view in a roundabout way. The larger the number, the smaller window will be projected on your sensor, magnifying it.
What does it all mean
Your lens will project the image onto the sensor/film of the camera. The focal length is the distance of this lens from your sensor. So when you talk about 35mm lens, the focusing lens is 3.5cm away. This also explains why zooms expand and grow as you change the focal length (the Nikon 200-500 for example needs to move 30cm to cover the zoom range.
When taking a picture, the focal length does not tell you too much, after all, you do not really care about the physics of the equipment, you just want a picture. The focal length directly determines the field of view how much of the scene is being projected on your sensor. The higher the focal length the smaller window you will capture.
Do longer focal lengths allow us to see further
Well yes and no. Technically you are just seeing a smaller portion of the scene on your sensor, so you can see this part in more detail. But anything that is between you and the object will still distort and disturb the image. Haze, fog and dust will be working against you. So unless you have very clear air you will not really see further, but magnify a small portion of your view including all its problems.
Full frame focal length Field of View Comment
20mm 82° very wide angle
35mm 54° standard lens
50mm 40° 35mm on an APS-C
100mm 19° long
200mm 10° very long
500mm way too long
What happens with APS-C
The focal length to field of view calculation is a pure geometric calculation. In an APS-C camera the sensor is smaller. So a lens with (say) 35mm focal length projects onto a sensor that is 1.5x smaller. Physically the focal length stays the same, but on an APS-C camera, a 35mm focal length results in a field of view that is the same as a lens with a focal length of 1.5x larger (roughly 50mm, or 52.5mm to be exact).
What is very annoying is that lenses made for APS-C cameras usually have the real focal length in APS-C, and lenses that work on both have the focal length expressed for full frame cameras. This is why Nikon 10-24, an APS-C lens, has it written as 10mm - 24mm although its field of view equals to a full frame lens of 15mm - 36mm, while the Nikon 200-500, has it the other way around, on an APS-C camera it has a field of view that would be like a 400mm - 750mm lens.
Some tips
• For shorter focal lengths, a small change makes a lot of difference. 20mm, 24mm, 28mm are quite different.
• Longer focal lengths, the difference is not that dramatic, 200mm, 300mm are not so different.
• By adjusting your distance to your subject, you can get the image to be the same size using different focal lengths. So you have many possibilities, to have (for example) a portrait. You get a more natural view with longer focal lengths.
• For a portrait, rule of thumb is to be 20x the focal length away. So 50mm lens 1m, 200mm lens 4m.
• Another rule of thumb is that you need at least an exposure time of 1/focal length you are using. So with a 50mm lens you need 1/50s exposure time. This will change form person to person, but the rule is good to keep in mind, especially if you are concerned about sharpness.
These pages are for Amateur Photographers and not really for seasoned photographers and professionals. I have no affiliation or commercial interest with any brand/make. I write from my own experience. I ended up using mainly Nikon, so I am more familiar with this brand than others. See price for notes on pricing as well as photography related links. | https://iis-projects.ee.ethz.ch/index.php?title=Focal_lengths | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2021-31
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} | 1,712 | Before the rush
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I'm looking at getting a second lens in addition to my Nikon D7000's kit lens.
I want to know if it's possible to use my 18m-105mm kit lens to get an idea of the focal length for a 35mm lens vs. a 50 mm lens. If I set the kit lens at 35 and 50, will that give me an accurate idea of the magnification and field of view I would get with these two lenses?
I wanted to make sure this was correct, because I know there is a crop factor with a DX camera and I’m not sure if that is taken into effect with the kit lens or not.
So will the 50mm lens, when on my D7000, produce images like when I have my kit lens on the body set to 50mm? And, the same for the 35mm?
share|improve this question
My $0.02: go with the 35mm lens. I had both a 50mm and and a 35mm on my previous APS-C camera and I used the 35mm 90% of the time. The 50mm is a bit "long" on an APS-C sensor, especially for indoor shots. It's great for portraits though. It ultimately depends what you will be using it for. – nuntz Dec 31 '10 at 5:59
I agree ~ I have an APS-C camera and the 35mm, and the 50mm would have been too long in my not-very-large house. – Sarah Haren Jan 1 '11 at 14:01
See also the answers to your question What is “angle of view” in photography? – mattdm Nov 14 '11 at 4:00
This question has gotten a lot of traffic, probably mostly because of interested in the original title, which was "Choosing a prime lens for APS-C: 50mm or 35mm?". However, that doesn't represent the actual question well. If you're interested in 35mm vs. 50mm, see What focal length gives a “normal” field-of-view on APS-C cameras?, Why is the 50mm prime lens the most standard?, and Why do people recommend 50mm or other prime lenses?. – mattdm Nov 14 '11 at 4:10
up vote 24 down vote accepted
Focal length is focal length, regardless of sensor size or whether the lens is a zoom lens. If you have tried your kit lens at 35mm and 50mm, then the framing will pretty much be the same with prime lenses of those focal lengths. Prime lenses will offer a couple things your zoom lens does not, however.
For one, they should offer better quality, as prime lenses can be constructed to perfectly project the clearest image possible for the given focal length. There are degrees of optical quality within a given prime focal length, as a higher end lens will usually use better materials and lens elements. Generally speaking, though, primes offer better quality.
Second, prime lenses usually provide much wider maximum apertures. A 50mm prime can come in anywhere from f/1.8 through f/1.2, and older manual focus lenses may even be found with maximum apertures as wide as f/0.95. Wider apertures can be more difficult to use at times (due to extremely thin DOF), but they can provide some truly fantastic bokeh.
Regarding focal lengths on a cropped sensor, there is a fairly nice correlation between the 35mm and 50mm lenses and ideal portrait focal lengths on full-frame sensors. Nikon cameras have a 1.5x sensor crop factor. That means that a 35mm lens on an APS-C body "behaves as" a 52mm lens would on a full-frame body, due to the difference in the field of view captured by the APS-C sensor. The 50mm lens on APS-C behaves as a 75mm lens would on full-frame. As an additional lens, 85mm lenses behave like a 134mm lens on APS-C. These focal lengths fit pretty well with the ideal portrait focal lengths on full frame cameras, which include 50mm, 85mm, and 135mm.
It should be noted that 50mm lenses on 35mm film/full frame sensor produces a field of view that is very similar to the field of view of the human eye. The actual focal range for that falls between 45mm and 55mm.
So, given all of can make the proper decision based on what you really want to capture. If you want to capture shots that have a relatively "normal" perspective similar to how the human eye sees, you might want to grab the 35mm lens. On a cropped sensor, it would behave like a 52mm lens. If you want a narrower field of view with smoother background blur, a 50mm or 85mm lens would give you that deeper DOF and narrower field, similar to 85mm and 135mm lenses on full frame, respectively. Finally, if you want to capture a wider field of view than the human eye, or want to get really close and capture a lot of perspective, you could get a 24mm lens, which, intriguingly, behaves like a 36mm lens on full frame.
The beauty of primes is their field of view, or effective focal lengths, are easy to translate between APS-C and Full Frame. If you take the common prime focal lengths of 14mm, 24mm, 35mm, 50mm, 85mm, and 135mm as used on full frame, you can pretty much simply "shift" them up by one place to arrive at the effective focal length ranges on APS-C. The exact focal lengths on APS-C, for reference, are: 21mm, 36mm, 52mm, 75mm, 134mm, 202mm. So long as you understand that about 50mm is the same field of view as "normal" perspective, it is fairly easy to determine which focal length to use to get the field of view/perspective you want in your photographs.
share|improve this answer
As usual, an excellent, in-depth answer! – seanmc Dec 29 '10 at 22:23
@seanmc: Thanks. I try. :) – jrista Dec 29 '10 at 23:44
The field of view on the same sensor will be the same for 35mm on a prime or 35mm on a zoom, that's not specifically related to the crop factor unless your talking different cameras as well which you're not.
As for buying a 35mm or a 50mm, I'm of the camp that every camera bag should have a "nifty fifty" in it. So, I would be going for the 50mm before a 35mm, but that's just a matter of personal preference.
share|improve this answer
I'll second that. And the D7000 has a screw focus, so you don't need the AF-S version. You can get the standard 50mm f/1.8 really cheap. If you find you need even more light / less DOF you can always trade it in for the f/1.4. But if you're starting out, you'll need to learn how to really use focus properly before you can get sharp images at f/1.4 anyway. – Scott Carroll Dec 29 '10 at 21:32
Why would you choose a 50 before a 35 on a crop sensor? The Nikon 50 f/1.8 is cheaper, but the 35 has a more normal, 52mm equivalent field of view. – Evan Krall Dec 29 '10 at 21:34
@EvanKrall - I'm just old school that way and, in my experience, lenses tend to hang around longer than cameras, so who knows in a few years time? – John Cavan Dec 29 '10 at 21:39
No, the crop factor is not taken into account. There will likely be a small amount of error on the focal length indicator, but it'll be accurate enough for comparison. Given your recent questions, though -- particularly, the emphasis on people photography -- you'll probably find the 50mm more to your liking than a 35mm lens, particularly since you can get a Nikkor 50mm/1.4 lens for about the same price as a 35mm/2.0 -- that's a stop faster, a lot more suitable for typical portrait framing, and capable of giving both narrower depth of field and faster shutter speeds at the same light level and ISO settings.
share|improve this answer
Yes, that's accurate, but instead of taking sample shots, why don't you analyze the shots you've already taken? Make a graph of all your favorite (i.e. the ones you've kept or uploaded or e-mailed) pictures (using the EXIF data embedded in each file), plotting focal length vs. count-of-focal length. Then just look for peaks. If the majority of your photos are at 18mm, splurge on an ultra-wide (10-22 or thereabouts) lens; if they're near 35, 50, or 85mm then buy the appropriate fast lens; if they're all at 105 then treat yourself to a 135/2.8. After all, if less than 5% of your favorite photos are in the 30-60mm range, you wouldn't want to buy a 35mm or 50mm lens: you'd never use it!
share|improve this answer
You can also consider 28mm as a standard prime lens for walkaround as it is closer to the "theoretical normal", however, it is not as good as 50mm for portraits. I have both 28mm 1.8 and 50mm 1.4. 28mm is my walkaround lens when I go on business trips or close quarter concert/club photography. As it is already a bit narrow for snapping a beautiful room or building, or even a group of people in a smaller room, I wouldn't want to use a 35mm as a walkaround. And to get yummy portraits where you can see the strands of hair and smooth creamy bokeh I use the 50mm 1.4. I wish they'd make a 18mm 1.8, too.
I feel no longing for a 35mm at all, as it is one step back with my 50mm or one step forward with my 28mm.
Take your kit lens and try it, and note how little difference it is from 28 to 35 and from 35 to 50 and then just take one step back and forth.
So yes, you can use your kit lens as reference to see how each prime would feel regarding the framing. Keep it at 28mm all day, see how that feels, next day try 35mm, next day 50mm, then maybe extend you test to 85mm .
share|improve this answer
Your Answer
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} | 2,214 | I've heard people call 50mm lenses "normal lenses".
For a lens to be considered normal, does it have to be exactly 50mm or is there some leeway? Does the normal focal length depend on crop factor of body used with lens? Are there any important relationships with other lens categories, such as wide, telephoto, prime, zoom, standard lenses?
First, there is nothing magical about the 50mm focal length. A 50mm is a "normal" lens only on the 135 format ("FX"), 24x36mm full frame. On a slightly smaller sensor like the APS-C format it is a short portrait "tele" (as used colloquially meaning a "long" lens, not in the exact technical sense of the word where the focal length is longer than the physical length), on a larger sensor like Hasselblad-style medium format film it will be a wide-angle. And on a tiny mobile phone sensor a 50mm lens would be a preposterously long ultratele that you wouldn't want to use without a heavy-duty tripod to keep it steady as a rock. Focal length must be viewed relative to sensor size.
The strict definition I've seen of a normal lens is that its focal length should be equal to the diagonal of the sensor... which obviously isn't quite true for a 50mm lens on 135-sized film. But never mind that, there is obviously some slop in the definition, anything from 45mm-ish to 60mm-ish has been marketed as the "normal" lens for various 135 film camera systems and there is nothing wrong with that I suppose. For that matter, a "50mm" lens isn't usually exactly exactly 50mm in the first place, it can just as well be 48.5 or 51.3mm if you look hard at it. The main point of a "normal" lens as I understand it is that it is a lens that is neither noticeably wide-angle nor noticeably tele; in other words a lens that sees the world pretty much as the eye sees it, so that a photo taken with it looks... normal. I used a Soviet SLR camera with a 58mm lens on it once, it gave a wonderful 1:1 magnification in the viewfinder so I could shoot with both eyes open without the least mismatch between what my left and right eye could see. Can it get more "normal" than that? (Of course, this depends on the exact magnification in the viewfinder as well as the lens!)
A normal lens is a prime lens, by definition. It can be made as a telephoto lens (in the technical sense) if the lens designer absolutely wants to, but there is usually no particularly good reason to make it one - unless one wants to make a pancake lens out of it I suppose. It is neither wide nor tele (in the non-technical sense), by definition.
Back in the day, before zooms became commonplace, most 135 SLR cameras were sold with a 50mm prime as the el cheapo kit lens, which made the 50mm the lens that everybody and their grandmother had. Many of the very popular fixed-lens rangefinders from the fifties through the seventies had 50mm lenses, although models with a slightly wide 40mm lens were also very common. Contax and Leica interchangeable lens rangefinder cameras, which go way back to the late twenties and early thirties, also came with 50mm lenses as the default choice and actually needed extra bolt-on viewfinders to be used with any other focal length. So it would not be very wrong to call the 50mm the "standard lens" throughout much of photographic history, at least for 135-format consumer cameras.
A cousin of the normal (prime) lens is the "normal zoom", which is the moderate-wide-angle to moderate-tele kind of zoom you usually get as a kit zoom. Typically 28-70mm-ish on full frame, 18-55ish on APS-C. The normal zoom covers the focal length that would be used for a normal (prime) lens and can zoom a bit wider and a bit longer than that.
A normal lens is one who's focal-length is equal to the diagonal of the sensor or film. This is said to give a natural perspective similar to that of a single human eye.
On a full-frame DSLR, it is usually a 50mm lens. On a cropped-sensor (APS-C) DSLR, a normal lens falls around 35mm but from 30 to 55mm, it would still be considered normal. For Four-Thirds and Micro Four-Thirds, you would use a 25mm. Usually most manufacturers make sure to have one bright prime that corresponds to the normal focal-length for the sensor-size.
• Why 35mm for APS-C? Isn't 28mm the size of the diagonal? (Or more like 27mm for Canon?)
– mattdm
Jan 18 '12 at 15:14
• 2
Measurements seem very loose when it comes to these things :) It is normally quoted as 35mm because 50mm / 1.5 = 33mm and 35mm is the closest common focal-length. If your calculation is correct, 50mm wont be the diagonal of a full-frame sensor either!
– Itai
Jan 18 '12 at 15:37
• 4
It isn't; it's closer to 43mm. Clearly there's some free range allowed. I've heard 40-55mm as the "normal range" on 35mm, which would correspond to about 26mm to 35mm on APS-C. I wonder what the standards are for older and larger formats.
– mattdm
Jan 18 '12 at 16:05
• 5
645 is actually 56×41.5, its diagonal is 69.7 mm and 75 mm normal lenses for this format are available. The Pentax 645D is 44×33, diagonal is 55 mm and its normal lens is actually a 55 mm. 6×6 is really 56×56, its diagonal is 79.2 mm and it commonly uses 80 mm as a normal focal length. Jan 19 '12 at 9:24
• 1
50mm was always long for a "normal" lens. On a 6x6 (56mm square), the normal was 80mm, 90mm was the "normal" on a Mamiya 6x7 (56mm x 70mm), on a 4x5 it was 150mm or 135mm (depending on the expected extension), and 210-300mm on 8x10. The common (and cheap) 2-inch cine lens was appropriated for use on the early 35s (like the Ur-Leica), and it just sort of stuck. Considering that the standard print was usually a 4x5 or an 8x10, a 38mm lens would have been more "normal" (and less available in the early days).
– user2719
Jan 20 '12 at 8:00
50mm was called a normal lens for 35mm films because the field of view was approximately that of the human eye.
Small digital sensors usually have a magnification factor applied so that their normal lenses would be somewhat smaller (some examples). I'm sure more experienced commenters can fill in more details but I think it's the field of view that would be important.
• 2
Really? The field of view of my vision seems much, much wider than that.
– mattdm
Jan 18 '12 at 15:19
• 1
Your total field of view is about 180 degrees, obtainable only with a fisheye lens on a camera! Most of it is peripheral vision though, which the brain doesn't "see" in any great detail.
– Staale S
Jan 18 '12 at 15:57
• 3
Let me quote Wikipedia on normal lens: “A lens with a focal length about equal to the diagonal size of the film or sensor format is known as a normal lens; its angle of view is similar to the angle subtended by a large-enough print viewed at a typical viewing distance equal to the print diagonal”. There is an interesting nuance here: it's not really the field of view of the human eye, but rather the field of view that feels comfortable for seeing a photographic print. Jan 19 '12 at 9:32
I have a couple of ancient 35mm. cameras which have what I believe to be "normal lenses". One is a Voiglander CLR rangefinder with a fixed 50 mm 2.8 and the other is a Nikkormat FTN SLR with a 50mm 1.4. With those old cameras, when I brought the veiwfinder up to my right eye, I could keep my left eye open and everything would be brought into focus without any double vision etc. Back in the day the viewfinders were 100% with a 1.0x magnification. What you saw is what you get. It is a pretty neat way to view and shoot things this way.
I cannot find any modern camera which allow me to do this (at least in the consumer range that I can afford). These days with the crop sensors and <1.0x viewfinder magnification and the need to fit additional digital information into the view finder, good luck trying to keep your left eye open while shooting. I get double vision and a headache.
In the context of the modern camera. for me a "normal" lens is more of a subjective personal choice based upon my perspective. When I see a scene with my naked eye, I want to take a picture from my perspective and I choose a focal length which produces a photo which bests matches up with what I saw with the naked eye. In other words, I want to use a focal length which does not require me to zoom in or out with either the lens or my feet. For me, on my crop sensor Canon Rebel, that focal length is usually within the approximate range of 24mm to 28mm, and sometimes 35mm. For a full frame 35mm, that would translate to (1.6 x) approximately 38mm to 45mm, up to 56 mm. This seems to be consistent with some articles which state that 43mm to 50mm is the normal perspective for a full frame. I personally prefer the wider end. It is always better to include more in the photo and crop later than vice versa.
I have been wanting to buy a 24 or 28 mm prime for my Rebel for the longest time, but could not justify spending the money. I am pretty excited about the upcoming Canon EF-S 24mm 2.8 which will retail for only about $150. If the IQ is good, I will finally pick up what for me would be the ideal lens.
No, it doesn't have to be exactly 50mm. I use a Voigt 40mm/F2 pancake lens instead of the 50mm. The 40mm is just perfect. Shot vertically it looks like a very slight wide angle shot with no field relevant distortion and critically sharp...
My understanding of a "normal" lens as a casual student dipping in and out of books and online courses is that 50mm lenses (as found on 35mm film cameras) replicates the same focused field of view as the human eye. Which also just happens to be approximately 50°. Though it is true that we see a much wider angle than that in our peripheral vision, how much of it is actually in focus? The thing about the 50mm "normal" lens theory, is that generally speaking, if you was to put a rectangular frame in front of you, showing only a 50° field of view, what you see is what you will capture on a camera with that lens focal length. No "compression", no "widening" and no "distortion". When it comes to different camera types, crop factor must be taken into account to achieve this "normal" effect. I have a Nikon D3300 with an APS-C sensor which has a crop factor of 1.5x meaning to get the equivalent 50mm effect, I must divide 50 by 1.5, giving me 35mm. Which just so happens to be the focal length of their prime (fixed length-non zoom) lens for "normal" photography. Digital street photographers will often use a 35mm (or equivalent conversion from 50mm depending on the crop factor of their sensor), so that no matter what distance the are from a subject, the picture will render true to life with no curving due to optical distortion of a wide angle lens etc. And a little leeway is fine :-) photography isn't a black and white science ;-)
• nitpick: 135 format film does not measure 135 mm. It's actually 35 mm film
– scottbb
Feb 2 '16 at 22:06
• @scottbb Thanks for pointing that out. Didn't realise I'd typed it as 135. Edited it back to 35 :-)
– aspman
Feb 2 '16 at 22:14
It is a common mistake to describe "normal" lenses by comparing focal distance to sensor or film diagonal - a normal lens shows the proportions like the human eye. Tele lenses compress them, and wide angle lenses expand them, as you take the proportions of far and near objects. 50mm is about the average for the human eye and it changes nothing if your camera crops or not. Don't mix up "normal" and "prime". It is the "prime" lens which changes as you change the image diagonal size. For a 6x6 reformat camera a 85mm is a prime, while for an APS-C it is about 35 mm and a phone it is about 1.5 cm or so. But "normal" is 50 mm where it draws distance proportions as a human eye.
• Really? So if I take an Olympus Stylus 9010 and zoom it to its maximum focal length of 50mm, the proportions and tele-compression will be the same as with a 50mm lens on my film camera, even though a 9mm focal length on the small-sensor compact digicam gives the same framing without moving my feet?
– mattdm
Jan 18 '12 at 19:50
• And are you saying that this isn't a prime lens? (85mm for APS-C.)
– mattdm
Jan 18 '12 at 19:56
• 5
common usage of the word "prime" refers to a fixed focal length lens, i.e. not a zoom lens.
– MikeW
Jan 19 '12 at 4:40
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Cree77 Jul 25, 2006 11:43 AM
I started a thread the other day about am I ready for SLR??
Decided I was and am still leaning towards the E500...
Since being only in the digital world I understand zoom... I do not understand all this lens stuff.. I know the E500 most often comes with the 14-45 and 40-150 lens kit. But I don't know what that means.
Can someone explain it to me in terms that might equal zoom on a digital for example??
You help is always appreciated..
Mikefellh Jul 25, 2006 12:22 PM
In digital when they say 10x zoom, actually that has very little meaning in real's only a marketing gimick to try and impress. The "X" factor only tells you how many times difference there is from the widest wide position to the closest tele could be an 18-180mm, 28-280mm, 38-380mm, 50-500mm, etc. What you need to learn about is 35mm film format equivalent to understand lenses.
In 35mm equiv. 50mm is called "standard" or "normal", equivalent to what the human eye sees. Anything less than 50mm is wider, and anything more than 50mm is closer.
Each camera can have different sensor sizes, and because of that they require different focal lengths to have the same equivalent focal length...that's why the 35mm film format is used to compare lenses (just so there's a common reference). I can have two 38-380mm equivalent cameras but one has the actual focal length of 5.9-59mm, while the other has a 6.3-63mm. Again both are 10x cameras, but you have to get used to not using that term.
Your Kodak DX6490 (you mentioned in another message) is the equivalent of 38-380mm BUT it has the actual focal length of 6.3-63.2mm. On the E-system (or 4/3 system) you have a 14-45mm lens but it has the equivalent of a 28-90mm film format lens (multiply the numbers on the lens by 2x).
You can gain a lot of knowledge from this website about 4/3:
One more thing, you won't be able to use your screw-on 1.7x's not good for lenses that have externally moving optics to have that much weight on the end of can wear out the gearing inside and burn out the motor that moves the optics.
Just a quick comparison, if you consider your 14-45mm and 40-150mm together, you get 14-150mm or more than 10x. BUT, there's also an 18-180mm lens (albeit softer image) from Olympus, and soon Sigma will be releasing a 50-500mm for the 4/3 system (but no review of it yet). Again these lenses are all 10x, which is why I said that term was meaningless.
stowaway7 Jul 26, 2006 5:43 AM
Since the E-500 sensor multiplies the lens by a factor of 2, the 14-45 lens becomes a 28-90mm (In 35mm film equivalent, a standard most camera makers refer to) and the 40-150 becomes an 80-300mm. This is very good coverage for a two lens set. For sports of wildlife you may want a longer telephoto, but for general purpose shooting this should suit most folks just fine. Using 50mm as the "normal eyesight" field of view, it gives you continuous wide to tele coverage across the range. I own the 40-150 and am impressed by it's sharpness and build, especially for a kit lens.
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In the specifications of Canon 550D, about the lens the following is mentioned
Lens Mount EF/EF-S
Focal Length Equivalent to 1.6x the focal length of the lens
Now this is really confusing. Why is the focal lenth 1.6 times the focal length of the lens?
I thought the focal length of the lens was the focal length of the lens!
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A very fair question indeed. I think others have answered better than I could. – AJ Finch May 16 '11 at 11:00
up vote 11 down vote accepted
This is just their ultra confusing way of dealing with a crop factor field of view. It just means that a lens mounted on the 550D will have a field of view equivalent to 1.6 times narrower than the field of view of the same lens on a full frame.
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Check for more information about crop factor on…. – rfusca May 16 '11 at 2:50
It's too bad that they word it so poorly. The US site, at…, says "35mm-equivalent focal length is approx. 1.6x the lens focal length", which is better (if still not great). – mattdm May 16 '11 at 2:55
@rfusca's answer is totally right. I just wanted to make this part completely clear. You say:
and in short, you are right and they are wrong, confused, and confusing. Canon's web page should be fixed.
The focal length of the lens is a physical property and can't be changed. The smaller-format sensor does reduce the field of view given by a lens of a focal length on a larger format — that's where "crop factor" comes in. See What is the difference between focal length and crop factor? for a bit more, and What is "angle of view" in photography? for a hands-on visual explanation of how this all works.
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So here's another way to look at it. A 50mm lens on a camera with this 1.6x situation looks like an 80mm lens on a camera without (like my old film SLR). So when you buy a Zoom that goes to 300mm it looks like 480mm on a traditional SLR. The CMOS is smaller on this "1.6" camera: .625 smaller than a 35mm size piece of film - which these lenses are typically sized for - a carry over from the old days.
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The markings on the lens are correct for a full-frame camera. So if you had a 5D, 5DMkII, or any of the 1x series cameras (or of course, a film SLR such as the EOS 3...) then a 50mm lens will indeed be a 50mm lens.
However with the advent of consumer digital SLR's, many of them have sensors that are smaller than the standard 35mm size. This means that it only 'sees' the central area of what the lens sees. Therefore is, in effect, magnified. This is where the magnification factor comes into play.
Hope that helps.
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I'm looking at a Canon 17-40 mm wide angle lens, and I don't understand why anyone would buy it. EFS18-55mm II is the standard Canon 18-55 mm lens that DSLRs come with, and it seems almost as wide – 18 mm vs. 17 mm. Does the wide angle lens have a feature I'm missing, or is that extra 1 mm worth it?
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You are assuming the only measurement of a lens is the focal length(measured in mm). That is not the case. See: What characteristics make a good lens good? – dpollitt Sep 13 '13 at 18:22
@dpollitt, that's not my reading. IMO, Vlad seems to be asking (in part) if the extra width is worthwhile. No need for dupe lawyering here. – Reid Sep 20 '13 at 19:14
@Reid - I believe you can see based on your rep that I didn't vote to close this as a duplicate. I was specifically replying to the piece that notes "I don't understand why anyone would buy it.". And the answer to that question is in the linked to question I provided. Clearly very few if any people buy a lens based on a 1mm difference, they buy it for the other reasons outlined in the linked to question. – dpollitt Sep 20 '13 at 21:59
@dpollitt: (a) If you were replying to a specific portion of the question, you should say so. (b) "Clearly" is in the eye of the beholder. A newbie might not know that 1mm isn't much different. (c) Do you genuinely expect me to waste time digging up whether you voted to close? How is that even relevant? – Reid Sep 21 '13 at 19:14
up vote 15 down vote accepted
I don't understand why anyone would buy it
Optical quality, build quality, and overall durability. The EF 17-40mm f/4L USM is an "L series" lens -- essentially professional grade, while the EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 is a consumer grade "kit" lens. L lenses are made with better materials, better designs, and more features. They're weather sealed to keep out moisture and dust. You'll notice that the maximum aperture for the 17-40mm is f/4 across the entire zoom range, whereas it varies between f/3.5 and f/5.6 on the 18-55mm. Most importantly, L lenses tend to have better optics -- sharper focus and fewer optical flaws such as chromatic aberration. Also, the "USM" designation on the 17-40mm stands for "ultrasonic motor", i.e. the autofocus motor is nearly silent yet very fast.
One other important difference is that the 18-55mm is an EF-S lens. The "-S" means "small image circle" -- lenses designated "EF-S" instead of "EF" produce a smaller image at the back end, inside the camera. For that reason, and also because EF-S lenses may project a bit further into the camera body, EF-S lenses only work on crop-sensor bodies (the Digital Rebel series, the x0D cameras, and the 7D. The smaller sensor doesn't require as large an image as larger sensors, and the smaller image in turn allows lenses to use smaller components. That means that EF-S lenses can be smaller, lighter, and less expensive than their EF counterparts. Note that the 18-55mm also includes image stabilization, while the 17-40mm doesn't.
To answer your title question, the difference between focal lengths of 17mm and 18mm is small enough that you could consider the two lenses to be about the same, focal-length-wise, when used on the same body. (On the other hand, 17mm on a full frame sensor is a lot wider than the same lens on a crop sensor. 17mm on a crop sensor gives the same effect as a 27mm lens on a full frame sensor.)
By the way, you might also want to compare the EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM to your kit lens. The focal range on that lens is almost exactly the same as the 18-55mm, neither lens is designated "L", both offer image stabilization, and yet the 17-55mm costs about the same (a little more, actually) than the 17-40mm. How can that be? It's pretty much the same answer -- despite some similar specs, they're different lenses. The 17-55mm has a constant f/2.8 aperture, so it needs larger lens elements that collect more light. More glass means a heavier, more expensive lens even though it's an EF-S lens. If you want a similar lens at f/2.8 on a full frame sensor you need even more light and bigger lens elements, so the closest equivalents would be one of the two EF 24-70mm f/2.8L lenses, at $1800 or $2300, respectively.
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Wow, thank you for a very thorough answer! Also thank you AJ Henderson and Patrick Hurley...this is a very helpful community! – Vlad the Impala Sep 13 '13 at 21:10
It doesn't make a huge difference as long as you remain within one ecosystem (Canon DSLRs, say) but it's worth noting that "crop sensor" is not some specific sensor size and thus crop factor (relative to some other sensor size). Canon APS-C sensor sizes lead to a 1.6× effective focal length increase in terms of relative projection size, I think Nikon's design gives you 1.5×, and other cameras may have yet other characteristics. "Crop sensor" here simply refers to the fact that the sensor is smaller than the traditional "small format" 24×36 mm film. – Michael Kjörling Sep 14 '13 at 10:01
The first thing worth mentioning is that the EF-s lens won't even work on a full frame camera, so it isn't an option for anyone using a 6d or up. The optical quality and barrel distortion are also far better on the L series lens. The build quality is more solid, it is a fixed volume lens, so it can be better weather sealed (or weather sealed at all for that matter). It has a fixed aperture range for the entire zoom range.
Overall, it is simply a better lens in addition to going 1mm wider. Focal length isn't the only factor and a large range of focal lengths isn't generally a strength. The 18-55 is basically a plastic toy with minimally capable optics while the 17-40 is a "real" lens, though I'll admit it is the lens I reach for least in my bag (preferring the much more expensive 24-70 f/2.8 II) but I do use it when I need those extra few mm of angle.
(Personal note, I own a 17-40 f/4L and have an old EF-s 18-55 from on my xTi, they don't even remotely compare in terms of quality.)
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Assuming you are using an APC crop, the difference from 18 to 17 is a 3° wider field of view on the horizontal. On a full frame it would be a little more.
But in this case you are also paying for better glass. The 17-40mm is going to be a lot sharper and has a constant aperture across its focal range (of course it is slightly slower at f/4 vs f/3.5 wide open). It also has better build quality and weather sealing (with a front filter).
It is also worth noting that us crazy photographers will pay a lot for a few mm of focal length and good quality, check out the price on the 14mm f/2.8.
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An even closer comparison is between the Canon EF-S 18-55 kit lens and the Canon 17-55 F2.8 lens. The kit lens sells for under $200, and the 17-55 F2.8 sells for about $1000. Five times the money, and nearly exactly the same zoom range.
Obviously, the price difference is not about the difference in zoom range.
For these specific lenses, the kit is much slower. While its rated at F3.5-5.6, its only F3.5 at the very end of its range, it quickly drops to F5.6. The difference between F5.6 and F2.8 is huge. The F2.8 lens has much more glass, and its much higher image quality.
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A very nice lens indeed! :) may work as a crop standard lens also ::)
Let's see how it compares to the Nikon 14-24 and the Canon 16-35...
Yeah when Tamron released their 24-70mm VC it was amazing. If this lens is anything like that they could easily be the best wide angle lens in the world.
Lenses / Re: Lenses in the 20mm range
« on: July 28, 2014, 12:58:17 PM »
I'm in the market for a new lens. I'm going to be using it indoors with and without a flash to capture room environments (places I take photos will probably call for portions of the room to be darker than others in some instances). Anyways, I need a lens that is at least 20mm wide (94 degree viewing angle) to capture an entire room from a corner.
I was hoping people who own lenses in the 20mm range could weigh in on the topic considering the specs I'm requiring of the lens and provide me with recommendations.
BTW I'm new here :)
There are only 6 lenses in the 20mm range that do not have serious image quality defects:
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Canon 11-22mm f/4.5-f/5.6 EF-M
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Zeiss 21mm f/2.8
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-f/5.6
Take your pick.
Lenses / Re: Sigma 35mm f/1.4 ART questions
« on: July 10, 2014, 09:39:32 AM »
Good day,
I'm planning to buy 35mm lense and my doubt is about Sigma's built quality. I know that this is a perfect lense, sharp and fast, but is it as unkillable as the canon 35mm 1.4?
The fact is I don't care much about dark corners, extreme sharpness etc, I think canon 35mm is as well extremely sharp. Vignetting can be creative also.
I heard that Sigma's autofocus is a mess sometimes, can this be the reason for choosing canon?
In other words, I like the picture made with Sigma (it's very NIKON-alike), but I'm afraid of some small things like micro adjustments and I don't wan't to buy some docstations.
The Canon 35mm f/1.4 L is 3 times less reliable than the Sigma 35mm f/1.4, so if you want the lens that will give you less problems go with the Sigma.
The Canon 35mm f/1.4 is one of the least reliable lenses ever made and one of the most prone to focus related problems. In fact Canon's 35mm has more autofocusing issues alone than Sigma's lens has issues in all categories combined according to historical reliability data.
« on: July 06, 2014, 08:14:32 PM »
Thought I made a decision. Went to the shop yesterday to buy the 16-35 f/4 and the 24-70 f/2.8.
The 16-35, yes. No doubts.
So, I didn't buy the 24-70.
Macro option, I don't care. IQ, I do.
IS, a nice option.
But how about the IQ?
I know I will use a tripod a lot. I am not a type that walks the streets for making photos. I am more the calculating type.
What is wisdom?
IS or not?
Breaking down a question like this into something as simple as "little difference in IQ" is a ludicrously bad way to compare lenses.
The 24-70mm F/4.0 IS could not be more different from the 24-70mm f/2.8 II, and other normal zoom lenses.
Now I could definitely see a photographer taking both lenses shooting off a brick wall and not seeing much of a difference, and if your clients do not care that much about the details (most clients don't) then there isn't that much of a difference in practice.
But factually speaking there is a huge difference:
Let's compare the current 4 best options for normal zoom lenses:
Sigma/Canon 24-105mm, Canon 24-70mm F/4.0 IS, Canon 24-70mm F/2.8 II, Tamron 24-70mm f/2.8
For the record I own 3 of these 4 lenses because each is so very different and each has their own usage scenario.
Let's go down the list:
Canon 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L
- This is a very nice lens at the extremes, the 24mm and 70mm focal lengths deliver world class pro sharpness.
- The bokeh is also world class at all focal lengths.
- This lens is also the world's worst 50mm lens for any dslr. Literally. It is very hard to make a sharp normal zoom due to the extreme complication of the design, so Canon had little room to improve upon the 24-105mm f/4.0 IS L. Instead of improving upon it, they made it way better at 24mm, a bit better at 70mm and much worse in-between. Most zoom lens users use lenses towards the extreme so is good in theory, but overall the 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L scores lower in sharpness than the 24-105mm f/4.0 IS when you average all of the points on the frame and all of the zoom range that crosses over. The 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L lens is really genuinely terrible in the middle of the focal range, but excellent at everything else.
Test Chart @ 50mm f/4.0 - Canon 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L
Test chart @ 50mm f/4.0 for Canon 28-300mm super zoom
Here's a comparison with one of Canon's worst zoom lenses.
Test chart @ 50mm f/4.5 Canon 18-55mm kit lens:
Here's a comparison to Canon's cheapest zoom lens, the crop kit lens.
The 24-70mm f/4.0 IS is one of Canon's best lenses ever made at the widest and longest end of it's focal range, and you will indeed see little difference between it and the more expensive 24-70mm f/2.8 L II. However in-between it is literally one of the worst zoom lenses ever made. It is really genuinely terrible at around 50mm.
Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 IS II
- This lens is as sharp , at all focal ranges and at f/2.8. It is one of the sharpest lenses in the world at any setting.
- This lens also has an apochromatic design, also known as APO, APO is an incredible feature that results in no purple fringing. All normal zoom lenses suffer immensely from purple fringing and it ruins a lot of photos. APO is a feature that is generally found only in the best and most expensive lenses in the world, the big white super telephoto lenses have it, and so do some of the more special zeiss lenses. Purple fringing cannot be removed completely by any computer program automatically unlike regular color fringing, and if it is above anything but a very small level it will always be obvious in photos with extremes of contrast.
Purple fringing looks like this from any zoom lens other than the 24-70mm f/2.8 II L. Again you cannot get rid of it without painstaking hand color correction and editors of major publications and stock photo agencies typically do not allow photos with purple fringing in it to be published, so this is a very important pro feature.
Another comparison:
You can see how one lens renders text more purple in this comparison.
The 24-70mm f/2.8 II is an amazing lens MORE SO because of it's apochromatic nature than anything else that it does.
The major problem with the 24-70mm f/2.8 II is that it has very poor contrast in areas that are out of focus. This is because Canon had to do some weird tricks to make the lens do what they wanted.
As you can see on the left images taken with the 24-70mm f/2.8 II have a glow that reduces contrast in the out of focus areas. Everything has this halo. This is a characteristic that is not found in any similar lens.
The result of this bokeh haze is that images will have different levels of contrast and saturation in the out of focus and in focus areas. You cannot simply boost the contrast and saturation to fix this. Because then your in focus areas will become over saturated and/or have a crunchy contrast.
The net effect then is that images taken with the 24-70mm f/2.8 II in certain situations can have an extremely muddy and weird looking background that reduces the pop of the image. I have had this negatively impact several shoots and require time consuming hours to fix in photoshop.
Tamron 24-70mm f/2.8 II
This lens has sharpness that is near perfect, and provides nice bokeh. It lacks the apochromatic features of the Canon version, but lacks the hazy bokeh. However in some situations it has the exact opposite problem as the Canon with bokeh, it's sometimes way too harsh making things look busy too textured in certain situations. Not all situations, but it can ruin photos and is a problem.
Canon 24-105mm/Sigma 24-105mm
These lenses are basically of the same design and very similar performance. The Sigma is a little better in every image quality dimension, but only a little. I think it's worth it to get the Sigma personally.
The 24-105mm f/4.0 (Sigma or Canon) are a lenes that lacks any major flaws but also do not impress at any focal length. Never flawed but always mediocre in other words.
So as you can see each lens has it's problems, limitations benefits and differences. All of these lenses are terrible at something incredibly important or just mediocre and you have to pick which problem is going to affect you the least.
And that's excluding the aperture and IS discussion, which makes it even more complex.
I've waited a long time for Nikon to recapture the lead on Nikon and their 36 mp camera. And now I read that Nikon will introduce an upgrade to the 800e in June. Why am I not jumping ship? I do have a lot of canon glass and have been a local customer. I own the mk III and 6d and I love the images .BUTT, COME ON ALREADY cCanon. Get your stuff together!
You do realize that there are only 6 lenses made in the world that can take advantage of more than 22.3 megapixels right? And then only when they are perfectly stopped down on a tripod.
Canon is not releasing a camera that has more than 22.3 megapixels because it is stupid to do so. It is like releasing a 8k TV when our content is barley HD, with a few 4k options, and a very small hand full of 8k options.
This is not a hard concept to understand. When your input for your device is around 10-25 megapixels in 99% of cases, having a much higher resolution is stupid.
If you still don't understand here's a photo with a Sigma 70mm Macro, taken on a tripod, this is one of the sharpest lenses in the world. One of the images is from a 5D Mark III, the other is from a D800. The 5D Mark III image has been scaled up to 36 megapixels.
100% crop
There is no difference.
If you are doing the kind of work that really does require 36 megapixels, and you have the technique and lenses to back it up then canon will soon be releasing a 40 megapixel specialty use camera for you, but for 99% of photographers anything more than 22 megapixels is a waste and a burden and makes your camera a worse tool.
Lenses / Re: Looking for an wideangle lens about 20mm
« on: June 09, 2014, 12:57:35 AM »
Here's the complete list:
Full Frame:
Zeiss 21mm f/2.8
Zeiss 18mm f/3.5
Canon 17mm f/4.0 TS-E L
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Canon 14mm f/2.8 II L
Samyang 14mm f/2.8
Canon 11-22mm f/4.0-5.6 EOS M
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6
All other ultra wide angle lenses have some sort of severe image quality flaw or flaws. Considering your aperture, focal length and price requirements this slightly narrows the list:
Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 (used)
Zeiss 18mm f/3.5
Canon 17mm f/4.0 TS-E L (used)
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Canon 11-22mm f/4.0-5.6 EOS M
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6
If you want good autofocus this narrows the list even more:
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6
EOS Bodies / Re: Can Canon deliver a FF sensor that is class leading?
« on: June 03, 2014, 06:58:44 PM »
Whilst we're going to have to wait a month to find out what the distortion is like on the 16-35/f4L, the MTF graphs and samples tend to suggest it is going to be a class leading lens. And how long have we had to wait for it?!
And if Canon can do that, can it finally deliver a FF sensor that is also class leading? By class leading, I'm referring to noise control and DR that is close to linear right through the ISO range and that matches or exceeds that of Sony sensors.
What's important about it being linear? At the moment Canon sensors have a DR function that is flat in the low ISO range as opposed to Sony's which is linear: below ISO 200 (or is it 400?) there is very little gain in DR from Canon sensors whereas Sony's deliver substantial gains the lower the ISO goes. I suspect that prior to Sony's sensors coming out, people thought that the "flat area" at the start of Canon's graphs looked good because there was no degradation. What people didn't realise is that there shouldn't be any flat spots, rather the DR (colour, noise, etc) response of the sensor should be close to having a linear relationship with ISO.
You do realize that the 5D3 1DX and 70D sensors are better than anything Sonikon makes in several categories right? Just because those aren't your favorite categories doesn't make them any worse.
Lenses / Re: purchasing 70-200 f4 IS now?
« on: June 02, 2014, 10:28:51 PM »
you may want to wait a bit longer, since it is said to be updated very soon.
I have it and also Sony Nikon 70-200mm f4G lenses and I compared them side by side many times, in absolute term the Canon f4LIS is still a good lens but it shows its age compared to the Sony and the Nikon,espeically to the Sony.
and imho, the Canon f4LIS and Nikon f4VR are overpriced compared to the excellent Sony 70-200mm f4 SSM , the Sony comes with tripod mount and it is about 100US cheaper than the optically inferior Canon f4 70-200mm and the Optically as good but heavier Nikon..
I tested them all on my A7R and see the differences, the Sony was clearly sharper than the other 2 at 70 , 100, 135mm wide open , but at 200mm end , the Nikon was the better lens at f4 , but stopping down to f6.3 , the Sony becomes better than the other 2 again. I also compared the build quality of the 3 lenses, to me the Sony seems better made lens but a bit bigger than the Canon, the biggest one is the Nikon f4 and it is a bit longer than the Canon and the Sony. But honestly I prefer the look of the Nikon lens since it is black and less conspicuous in public. but if do not care about the color of the lens, but only optical quality and AF accuracy , then the Sony wins hands down here. and after comparing the 3 , I am quite sure, the Sony and Nikon 70-200mm f4 are quite a bit better than the Canon one, and I am sure Canon must update it with better IS and better anti-flare coating very soon to be competitive. the Nikon has almost 5 stop effective VR , and it focuses very very close, so personally I do not buy the Canon f4 70-200mm IS lens now , and I do not need f2.8 any more in this range(I use the Zeiss 135mm f2 APO instead). So if I need the best 70-200mm f4 zoom now , I will go Sony or Nikon. If you can wait , wait a few months , I am quite sure we will see a new 70-200mm f4LIS lens from Canon at Photokina(it does not mean we can actually buy it very soon , though).
All that having said , the best 70-200mm zoom is the Canon 70-200mm f2.8LISMK2 USM lens.
Your post seems a bit off. There is a known issue with the A7R causing significant image quality degradation when lenses are adapted to it (ie not native FE mount). My guess is you are experiencing this issue seeing as you are comparing a native lens versus two adapted ones and finding some of the best lenses in the world to be noticeably worse than everyone else has measured them to be.
According to multiple sources the Canon 70-200mm f/4.0 IS is noticeably sharper wide open than the 70-200mm f4 designed for the A7R. So if you are seeing the opposite, it's a problem with your setup.
For example if you look at DXO mark's raw data, it shows that in their field map measurements the Canon is 13% sharper overall and 28% sharper in the mid frame than the s]Sony on average across the zoom range at F/4.0.
Anyways, the 70-200mm F4.0 IS worth getting. It is the most flawless EF mount zoom lens that is made at any focal length by any manufacturer period. To start off with it's one of the top 15 sharpest lenses that exist for average wide open sharpness. Nevermind zoom lenses, it competes with primes. It also has next to zero aberrations of any kind. It's big brother, for example is not parafocal which makes it a problem to use for video (you can't zoom while shooting without focus correction), it has noticeably worse and more busy bokeh transitions and less smoothness, more spherical aberrations, coma, field curvature, CA, loca, etc etc. You get the same sort of difference when comparing most other pro zoom lenses to the F4.0 IS. Most pro zoom lenses are good at being sharp and that's it, they have tons of other flaws. The 70-200mm f/4.0 IS is unlike almost any other zoom, in that it just doesn't have significant aberrations of any kind. That's a very rare trait.
I certainly read doubts about the AF, especially off the center point.
However, the effusive praise, perhaps well deserved, won't light a fire under Sigma to address the AF problems.
The AF problems are isolated meaning some lenses are perfect some are junk. This is much better than all lenses being slightly off. I don't mind buying multiple copies from multiple retailers (to ensure they come from different batches) and connecting them with multiple bodies if it means I will get a perfect setup.
Here's my take on it. Before today there were 3 wide angle zoom lenses that didn't have noticeable image quality problems, between all first and third party lenses (the 17-40mm did have a few exceptionally sharp copies, if you were lucky like the one tested by DXO but most were bad and all copies had really really crazy harsh bokeh, which was a serious flaw).
These 3 good wide angle zooms were the following:
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Canon 11-22mm f/4.5-5.6 STM IS (EOS M)
These were basically the only wide angle zooms worth getting if you didn't want seriously noticeable flaws in your photos. That's why I have a nikon 14-24mm on my 5D3, as do many other pros.
Now there is a fourth option, the Canon 16-35mm IS. The 11-22mm for the EOS M is still sharper than this new 16-35mm IS based on the MTF data (removing the mirror enables incredible improvements in image quality for wide angle lenses, seriously the 11-22mm STM is insanely good, better than any of Canon's other full frame options), and the Nikon 14-24mm is still king hands down, but Canon now actually has a wide angle zoom lens for full frame that isn't too bad.
For me personally I find the 50L unacceptably soft. If you can see a clear improvement in sharpness in 1024 px in uncropped frames like I can then there is a huge difference. I really don't know what else to say. You can also make the sigma images look just like the Canons @f/1.4 in the in focus areas, just by softening the sigma up, literally there are light room settings that make both indistinguishable for in focus areas but you can't create detail that was never recorded with the Canon. Logically speaking if you get a good copy and ignore the very minor difference between f/1.2 and f/1.4 the Sigma is better in every measurable and conceivable factor. I really don't get why this is so contentious.
I've mentioned this a few times and I'll mention this again:
- I've purchased 12 copies of modern Sigma lenses (revised 85mm design, 35mm 1.4 & 18-35mm 1.8 ), and I have not had one single focusing issue with them ever. I've done the same thing for Canon's primes, and purchased multiple copies of each and kept the best one and have had several Canon lenses with focusing issues.
- Statistically Canon non-supertelephoto primes lenses have to be sent out for repair more often on average for focusing problems by Lens Rentals than any of Sigma's new lenses. Sigma without question has more reliable focusing systems than Canon.
There are tons of threads everywhere about people with Canon lenses that won't focus properly, have developed erratic focusing, or have developed huge micro adjustments that cannot be corrected. Ignoring these issues while making negative comments about Sigma lenses that you have never owned is very backwards. Focusing is not a problem that only affects Sigma. It is annoying to constantly hear these arguments where people come up with reasons not to buy Sigma lenses that are even more severe in the lens they are buying as an alternative.
That's like someone thinking: "Man I sure hate car fires in Tesla's I'm going to make sure to buy that car marked "defective exploding pinto" at my local dealer"
The fact of the matter is that all manufacturers that make autofocusing lenses are releasing bad batches of lenses. Every time you buy a lens you are playing the lottery. I got 3 bad copies of the Canon 16-85mm in a row, that doesn't mean that there has never been a 16-85mm that was a good copy. Plenty of people have the 35mm Sigma, and plenty of people have reviewed the 50mm Sigma, yet only a small handful of people have problems with them. If these lenses really did have constant problems every review would say so. But no, top pros like the guys from f-stoppers have actually had better results from Sigma's new primes with focusing than Canon's primes. And they said that in their review.
If the majority of people are capable of getting Sigma lenses that have no issues whatsoever, then I bet that you can too.
Well, there's around a 13 month separation between the game-changing release of the 35A and the equally game-changing release of the 50A (relevancy?). So which lens is slated for next year? I'm hoping for the 85, though I suspect it will be a 24. 135 f/2 anyone?
Who would have thought just a few short years ago, that Sigma would become the preeminent AF lens manufacturer? Certainly not me...
24mm f/1.4 next please. Not impressed with the SamRokin 24mm, and the Canon is ungodly expensive.
Wouldn't this be a nice Sigma Roadmap ;D
35mm f/1.4 Art - $899
50mm f/1.4 Art - $950
24mm f/1.4 Art - $950
85mm f/1.4 Art - $799
135mm f/1.8 OS Art - $950
At the current rate, my bag will have nothing but Sigma primes and Tamron Zooms lol. Although if a 24mm & 85mm continue on Sigma's new level of quality, by the time a stabilized 135mm f/1.8 is released it should be priced at $2,000. Not that I want to pay that much (and probably wouldn't), but I'd like to see the new Sigma quality truly recognized, if that make sense.
Honestly I'm really wishing for this to happen, a whole line of world beating primes, would make me amazingly happy to have in my bag.
Plus the rumors of the 24-70mm f/2.0 and Sigma wide angle zoom have me even more excited. If Sigma is fast enough to the game, photographers in a few years might just shoot with their favorites first party bodies and nothing but Sigma lenses...
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Messages - Radiating
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A very nice lens indeed! :) may work as a crop standard lens also ::)
Let's see how it compares to the Nikon 14-24 and the Canon 16-35...
Yeah when Tamron released their 24-70mm VC it was amazing. If this lens is anything like that they could easily be the best wide angle lens in the world.
While very cool, I'm satisfied with the 16-35 f/4L already. Too late sigma. :P
The 16-35mm IS is excellent in a sea of wide angle zooms that are mediocre, with the Nikon 14-24mm, and 16-35mm VR being one of the few other good ones.
The thing is Sigma's 14-24mm might be even sharper than Canon's version and wider. That would be a killer lens. There's lots of room to improve quality in this segment. The 14-24mm could blow Canon out of the water, or just be slightly better in every way like the 24-105mm (though lacking weather sealing, and being much larger as the down side)
I'm very curious to see what the 24mm 1.4 is like, every major brand has tried to get the 24mm prime right, and most don't perform well above f/2.0.
I'm very hopeful of some serious improvements with these lenses. :)
Lenses / Re: Lenses in the 20mm range
« on: July 28, 2014, 12:58:17 PM »
I'm in the market for a new lens. I'm going to be using it indoors with and without a flash to capture room environments (places I take photos will probably call for portions of the room to be darker than others in some instances). Anyways, I need a lens that is at least 20mm wide (94 degree viewing angle) to capture an entire room from a corner.
I was hoping people who own lenses in the 20mm range could weigh in on the topic considering the specs I'm requiring of the lens and provide me with recommendations.
BTW I'm new here :)
There are only 6 lenses in the 20mm range that do not have serious image quality defects:
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Canon 11-22mm f/4.5-f/5.6 EF-M
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Zeiss 21mm f/2.8
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-f/5.6
Take your pick.
Lenses / Re: Sigma 35mm f/1.4 ART questions
« on: July 10, 2014, 09:39:32 AM »
Good day,
I'm planning to buy 35mm lense and my doubt is about Sigma's built quality. I know that this is a perfect lense, sharp and fast, but is it as unkillable as the canon 35mm 1.4?
The fact is I don't care much about dark corners, extreme sharpness etc, I think canon 35mm is as well extremely sharp. Vignetting can be creative also.
I heard that Sigma's autofocus is a mess sometimes, can this be the reason for choosing canon?
In other words, I like the picture made with Sigma (it's very NIKON-alike), but I'm afraid of some small things like micro adjustments and I don't wan't to buy some docstations.
The Canon 35mm f/1.4 L is 3 times less reliable than the Sigma 35mm f/1.4, so if you want the lens that will give you less problems go with the Sigma.
The Canon 35mm f/1.4 is one of the least reliable lenses ever made and one of the most prone to focus related problems. In fact Canon's 35mm has more autofocusing issues alone than Sigma's lens has issues in all categories combined according to historical reliability data.
Lenses / Re: Confused, 24-70 f/2.8 or f/4?
« on: July 06, 2014, 08:14:32 PM »
Thought I made a decision. Went to the shop yesterday to buy the 16-35 f/4 and the 24-70 f/2.8.
The 16-35, yes. No doubts.
But, I was told in the shop, that one of the assistants tested the f/2.8 and the f/4, and that there was hardly any difference in IQ. He works in the fashion world for years.
So, I didn't buy the 24-70.
Macro option, I don't care. IQ, I do.
IS, a nice option.
But how about the IQ?
I know I will use a tripod a lot. I am not a type that walks the streets for making photos. I am more the calculating type.
What is wisdom?
IS or not?
Breaking down a question like this into something as simple as "little difference in IQ" is a ludicrously bad way to compare lenses.
The 24-70mm F/4.0 IS could not be more different from the 24-70mm f/2.8 II, and other normal zoom lenses.
Now I could definitely see a photographer taking both lenses shooting off a brick wall and not seeing much of a difference, and if your clients do not care that much about the details (most clients don't) then there isn't that much of a difference in practice.
But factually speaking there is a huge difference:
Let's compare the current 4 best options for normal zoom lenses:
Sigma/Canon 24-105mm, Canon 24-70mm F/4.0 IS, Canon 24-70mm F/2.8 II, Tamron 24-70mm f/2.8
For the record I own 3 of these 4 lenses because each is so very different and each has their own usage scenario.
Let's go down the list:
Canon 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L
- This is a very nice lens at the extremes, the 24mm and 70mm focal lengths deliver world class pro sharpness.
- The bokeh is also world class at all focal lengths.
- This lens is also the world's worst 50mm lens for any dslr. Literally. It is very hard to make a sharp normal zoom due to the extreme complication of the design, so Canon had little room to improve upon the 24-105mm f/4.0 IS L. Instead of improving upon it, they made it way better at 24mm, a bit better at 70mm and much worse in-between. Most zoom lens users use lenses towards the extreme so is good in theory, but overall the 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L scores lower in sharpness than the 24-105mm f/4.0 IS when you average all of the points on the frame and all of the zoom range that crosses over. The 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L lens is really genuinely terrible in the middle of the focal range, but excellent at everything else.
Test Chart @ 50mm f/4.0 - Canon 24-70mm f/4.0 IS L
Test chart @ 50mm f/4.0 for Canon 28-300mm super zoom
Here's a comparison with one of Canon's worst zoom lenses.
Test chart @ 50mm f/4.5 Canon 18-55mm kit lens:
Here's a comparison to Canon's cheapest zoom lens, the crop kit lens.
The 24-70mm f/4.0 IS is one of Canon's best lenses ever made at the widest and longest end of it's focal range, and you will indeed see little difference between it and the more expensive 24-70mm f/2.8 L II. However in-between it is literally one of the worst zoom lenses ever made. It is really genuinely terrible at around 50mm.
Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 IS II
- This lens is as sharp , at all focal ranges and at f/2.8. It is one of the sharpest lenses in the world at any setting.
- This lens also has an apochromatic design, also known as APO, APO is an incredible feature that results in no purple fringing. All normal zoom lenses suffer immensely from purple fringing and it ruins a lot of photos. APO is a feature that is generally found only in the best and most expensive lenses in the world, the big white super telephoto lenses have it, and so do some of the more special zeiss lenses. Purple fringing cannot be removed completely by any computer program automatically unlike regular color fringing, and if it is above anything but a very small level it will always be obvious in photos with extremes of contrast.
Purple fringing looks like this from any zoom lens other than the 24-70mm f/2.8 II L. Again you cannot get rid of it without painstaking hand color correction and editors of major publications and stock photo agencies typically do not allow photos with purple fringing in it to be published, so this is a very important pro feature.
Another comparison:
You can see how one lens renders text more purple in this comparison.
The 24-70mm f/2.8 II is an amazing lens MORE SO because of it's apochromatic nature than anything else that it does.
The major problem with the 24-70mm f/2.8 II is that it has very poor contrast in areas that are out of focus. This is because Canon had to do some weird tricks to make the lens do what they wanted.
As you can see on the left images taken with the 24-70mm f/2.8 II have a glow that reduces contrast in the out of focus areas. Everything has this halo. This is a characteristic that is not found in any similar lens.
The result of this bokeh haze is that images will have different levels of contrast and saturation in the out of focus and in focus areas. You cannot simply boost the contrast and saturation to fix this. Because then your in focus areas will become over saturated and/or have a crunchy contrast.
The net effect then is that images taken with the 24-70mm f/2.8 II in certain situations can have an extremely muddy and weird looking background that reduces the pop of the image. I have had this negatively impact several shoots and require time consuming hours to fix in photoshop.
Tamron 24-70mm f/2.8 II
This lens has sharpness that is near perfect, and provides nice bokeh. It lacks the apochromatic features of the Canon version, but lacks the hazy bokeh. However in some situations it has the exact opposite problem as the Canon with bokeh, it's sometimes way too harsh making things look busy too textured in certain situations. Not all situations, but it can ruin photos and is a problem.
Canon 24-105mm/Sigma 24-105mm
These lenses are basically of the same design and very similar performance. The Sigma is a little better in every image quality dimension, but only a little. I think it's worth it to get the Sigma personally.
The 24-105mm f/4.0 (Sigma or Canon) are a lenes that lacks any major flaws but also do not impress at any focal length. Never flawed but always mediocre in other words.
So as you can see each lens has it's problems, limitations benefits and differences. All of these lenses are terrible at something incredibly important or just mediocre and you have to pick which problem is going to affect you the least.
And that's excluding the aperture and IS discussion, which makes it even more complex.
I've waited a long time for Nikon to recapture the lead on Nikon and their 36 mp camera. And now I read that Nikon will introduce an upgrade to the 800e in June. Why am I not jumping ship? I do have a lot of canon glass and have been a local customer. I own the mk III and 6d and I love the images .BUTT, COME ON ALREADY cCanon. Get your stuff together!
You do realize that there are only 6 lenses made in the world that can take advantage of more than 22.3 megapixels right? And then only when they are perfectly stopped down on a tripod.
Canon is not releasing a camera that has more than 22.3 megapixels because it is stupid to do so. It is like releasing a 8k TV when our content is barley HD, with a few 4k options, and a very small hand full of 8k options.
This is not a hard concept to understand. When your input for your device is around 10-25 megapixels in 99% of cases, having a much higher resolution is stupid.
If you still don't understand here's a photo with a Sigma 70mm Macro, taken on a tripod, this is one of the sharpest lenses in the world. One of the images is from a 5D Mark III, the other is from a D800. The 5D Mark III image has been scaled up to 36 megapixels.
100% crop
There is no difference.
If you are doing the kind of work that really does require 36 megapixels, and you have the technique and lenses to back it up then canon will soon be releasing a 40 megapixel specialty use camera for you, but for 99% of photographers anything more than 22 megapixels is a waste and a burden and makes your camera a worse tool.
Lenses / Re: Looking for an wideangle lens about 20mm
« on: June 09, 2014, 12:57:35 AM »
As far as ultra wide angle lenses go there are only a hand full from any manufacturer that aren't terrible.
Here's the complete list:
Full Frame:
Zeiss 21mm f/2.8
Zeiss 18mm f/3.5
Canon 17mm f/4.0 TS-E L
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Canon 14mm f/2.8 II L
Samyang 14mm f/2.8
Canon 11-22mm f/4.0-5.6 EOS M
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6
All other ultra wide angle lenses have some sort of severe image quality flaw or flaws. Considering your aperture, focal length and price requirements this slightly narrows the list:
Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 (used)
Zeiss 18mm f/3.5
Canon 17mm f/4.0 TS-E L (used)
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Canon 11-22mm f/4.0-5.6 EOS M
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6
If you want good autofocus this narrows the list even more:
Canon 16-35mm f/4.0 IS L
Sigma 8-16mm f/4.5-5.6
EOS Bodies / Re: Can Canon deliver a FF sensor that is class leading?
« on: June 03, 2014, 06:58:44 PM »
You do realize that the 5D3 1DX and 70D sensors are better than anything Sonikon makes in several categories right? Just because those aren't your favorite categories doesn't make them any worse.
Lenses / Re: purchasing 70-200 f4 IS now?
« on: June 02, 2014, 10:28:51 PM »
you may want to wait a bit longer, since it is said to be updated very soon.
I have it and also Sony Nikon 70-200mm f4G lenses and I compared them side by side many times, in absolute term the Canon f4LIS is still a good lens but it shows its age compared to the Sony and the Nikon,espeically to the Sony.
and imho, the Canon f4LIS and Nikon f4VR are overpriced compared to the excellent Sony 70-200mm f4 SSM , the Sony comes with tripod mount and it is about 100US cheaper than the optically inferior Canon f4 70-200mm and the Optically as good but heavier Nikon..
I tested them all on my A7R and see the differences, the Sony was clearly sharper than the other 2 at 70 , 100, 135mm wide open , but at 200mm end , the Nikon was the better lens at f4 , but stopping down to f6.3 , the Sony becomes better than the other 2 again. I also compared the build quality of the 3 lenses, to me the Sony seems better made lens but a bit bigger than the Canon, the biggest one is the Nikon f4 and it is a bit longer than the Canon and the Sony. But honestly I prefer the look of the Nikon lens since it is black and less conspicuous in public. but if do not care about the color of the lens, but only optical quality and AF accuracy , then the Sony wins hands down here. and after comparing the 3 , I am quite sure, the Sony and Nikon 70-200mm f4 are quite a bit better than the Canon one, and I am sure Canon must update it with better IS and better anti-flare coating very soon to be competitive. the Nikon has almost 5 stop effective VR , and it focuses very very close, so personally I do not buy the Canon f4 70-200mm IS lens now , and I do not need f2.8 any more in this range(I use the Zeiss 135mm f2 APO instead). So if I need the best 70-200mm f4 zoom now , I will go Sony or Nikon. If you can wait , wait a few months , I am quite sure we will see a new 70-200mm f4LIS lens from Canon at Photokina(it does not mean we can actually buy it very soon , though).
All that having said , the best 70-200mm zoom is the Canon 70-200mm f2.8LISMK2 USM lens.
Your post seems a bit off. There is a known issue with the A7R causing significant image quality degradation when lenses are adapted to it (ie not native FE mount). My guess is you are experiencing this issue seeing as you are comparing a native lens versus two adapted ones and finding some of the best lenses in the world to be noticeably worse than everyone else has measured them to be.
According to multiple sources the Canon 70-200mm f/4.0 IS is noticeably sharper wide open than the 70-200mm f4 designed for the A7R. So if you are seeing the opposite, it's a problem with your setup.
For example if you look at DXO mark's raw data, it shows that in their field map measurements the Canon is 13% sharper overall and 28% sharper in the mid frame than the s]Sony on average across the zoom range at F/4.0.
Anyways, the 70-200mm F4.0 IS worth getting. It is the most flawless EF mount zoom lens that is made at any focal length by any manufacturer period. To start off with it's one of the top 15 sharpest lenses that exist for average wide open sharpness. Nevermind zoom lenses, it competes with primes. It also has next to zero aberrations of any kind. It's big brother, for example is not parafocal which makes it a problem to use for video (you can't zoom while shooting without focus correction), it has noticeably worse and more busy bokeh transitions and less smoothness, more spherical aberrations, coma, field curvature, CA, loca, etc etc. You get the same sort of difference when comparing most other pro zoom lenses to the F4.0 IS. Most pro zoom lenses are good at being sharp and that's it, they have tons of other flaws. The 70-200mm f/4.0 IS is unlike almost any other zoom, in that it just doesn't have significant aberrations of any kind. That's a very rare trait.
I certainly read doubts about the AF, especially off the center point.
However, the effusive praise, perhaps well deserved, won't light a fire under Sigma to address the AF problems.
The AF problems are isolated meaning some lenses are perfect some are junk. This is much better than all lenses being slightly off. I don't mind buying multiple copies from multiple retailers (to ensure they come from different batches) and connecting them with multiple bodies if it means I will get a perfect setup.
Here's my take on it. Before today there were 3 wide angle zoom lenses that didn't have noticeable image quality problems, between all first and third party lenses (the 17-40mm did have a few exceptionally sharp copies, if you were lucky like the one tested by DXO but most were bad and all copies had really really crazy harsh bokeh, which was a serious flaw).
These 3 good wide angle zooms were the following:
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR
Canon 11-22mm f/4.5-5.6 STM IS (EOS M)
These were basically the only wide angle zooms worth getting if you didn't want seriously noticeable flaws in your photos. That's why I have a nikon 14-24mm on my 5D3, as do many other pros.
Now there is a fourth option, the Canon 16-35mm IS. The 11-22mm for the EOS M is still sharper than this new 16-35mm IS based on the MTF data (removing the mirror enables incredible improvements in image quality for wide angle lenses, seriously the 11-22mm STM is insanely good, better than any of Canon's other full frame options), and the Nikon 14-24mm is still king hands down, but Canon now actually has a wide angle zoom lens for full frame that isn't too bad.
For me personally I find the 50L unacceptably soft. If you can see a clear improvement in sharpness in 1024 px in uncropped frames like I can then there is a huge difference. I really don't know what else to say. You can also make the sigma images look just like the Canons @f/1.4 in the in focus areas, just by softening the sigma up, literally there are light room settings that make both indistinguishable for in focus areas but you can't create detail that was never recorded with the Canon. Logically speaking if you get a good copy and ignore the very minor difference between f/1.2 and f/1.4 the Sigma is better in every measurable and conceivable factor. I really don't get why this is so contentious.
I've mentioned this a few times and I'll mention this again:
- I've purchased 12 copies of modern Sigma lenses (revised 85mm design, 35mm 1.4 & 18-35mm 1.8 ), and I have not had one single focusing issue with them ever. I've done the same thing for Canon's primes, and purchased multiple copies of each and kept the best one and have had several Canon lenses with focusing issues.
- Statistically Canon non-supertelephoto primes lenses have to be sent out for repair more often on average for focusing problems by Lens Rentals than any of Sigma's new lenses. Sigma without question has more reliable focusing systems than Canon.
There are tons of threads everywhere about people with Canon lenses that won't focus properly, have developed erratic focusing, or have developed huge micro adjustments that cannot be corrected. Ignoring these issues while making negative comments about Sigma lenses that you have never owned is very backwards. Focusing is not a problem that only affects Sigma. It is annoying to constantly hear these arguments where people come up with reasons not to buy Sigma lenses that are even more severe in the lens they are buying as an alternative.
That's like someone thinking: "Man I sure hate car fires in Tesla's I'm going to make sure to buy that car marked "defective exploding pinto" at my local dealer"
The fact of the matter is that all manufacturers that make autofocusing lenses are releasing bad batches of lenses. Every time you buy a lens you are playing the lottery. I got 3 bad copies of the Canon 16-85mm in a row, that doesn't mean that there has never been a 16-85mm that was a good copy. Plenty of people have the 35mm Sigma, and plenty of people have reviewed the 50mm Sigma, yet only a small handful of people have problems with them. If these lenses really did have constant problems every review would say so. But no, top pros like the guys from f-stoppers have actually had better results from Sigma's new primes with focusing than Canon's primes. And they said that in their review.
If the majority of people are capable of getting Sigma lenses that have no issues whatsoever, then I bet that you can too.
Well, there's around a 13 month separation between the game-changing release of the 35A and the equally game-changing release of the 50A (relevancy?). So which lens is slated for next year? I'm hoping for the 85, though I suspect it will be a 24. 135 f/2 anyone?
Who would have thought just a few short years ago, that Sigma would become the preeminent AF lens manufacturer? Certainly not me...
24mm f/1.4 next please. Not impressed with the SamRokin 24mm, and the Canon is ungodly expensive.
Wouldn't this be a nice Sigma Roadmap ;D
35mm f/1.4 Art - $899
50mm f/1.4 Art - $950
24mm f/1.4 Art - $950
85mm f/1.4 Art - $799
135mm f/1.8 OS Art - $950
At the current rate, my bag will have nothing but Sigma primes and Tamron Zooms lol. Although if a 24mm & 85mm continue on Sigma's new level of quality, by the time a stabilized 135mm f/1.8 is released it should be priced at $2,000. Not that I want to pay that much (and probably wouldn't), but I'd like to see the new Sigma quality truly recognized, if that make sense.
Honestly I'm really wishing for this to happen, a whole line of world beating primes, would make me amazingly happy to have in my bag.
Plus the rumors of the 24-70mm f/2.0 and Sigma wide angle zoom have me even more excited. If Sigma is fast enough to the game, photographers in a few years might just shoot with their favorites first party bodies and nothing but Sigma lenses...
« on: April 17, 2014, 01:18:16 AM »
This is much the same as the 35L vs 35A debate..... If you want a sharper lens with harsher bokeh go with the Sigma Art Lenses... if you want an overall smoother rendered pic go with the Canon equivalent. Though the 35A is sharper (I owned it for a few months) the 35L rendered the better image to my eyes... Sharpness isn't everything.
I agree with your 35L vs 35A conclusion BUT honestly all this talk about the bokeh of the 50L being better seems like unfounded assumptions.
In every test I have seen the Sigma 50A outperforms the Canon 50L in bokeh. The Sigma lacks the aberrations and flaws, and business that the Canon shows while delivering the same punchy contrast in the background blur.
It's like somehow people have already decided that the Canon has better bokeh despite having evidence that seems to be to the contrary.
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I was reading this question and recalled how often I hear the advice "choose your lenses and then choose the body that matches" in the context of deciding on a camera platform (Nikon/Canon/Pentax/Sony, etc).
I shoot Nikon and so I study a lot about Nikon-compatible lenses. From what I see though, Canon seems to have an equivalent lens for most Nikon lenses. For example, there's the nifty fifties and the pro midrange zooms. On top of that, there's lots of lenses from 3rd-party manufacturers that come in versions for each system/mount.
I agree that lenses are a more important investment than a body; they have a huge impact on image quality and a longer product life cycle. And there's lots of variation between lenses within a platform's offering.
My question is: how much lens difference is there between the different platforms? Do you really pick the lens first and then pick the body that goes with it?
share|improve this question
There is also the point about availability of the lens lineups & platforms in general (accessories, the cameras themselves) across different platforms in many countries. In this regard, the big names like Canon, Nikon & to an extent Sony are quite ubiquitous, while brands like Pentax & Olympus may not be very easily available in some of the developing markets. – ab.aditya Mar 4 '11 at 3:53
10 Answers 10
up vote 106 down vote accepted
The lineups have a lot of overlap but there are considerable differences as well:
• Canon and Nikon have the most lenses by far, followed by Pentax, Sony, Olympus and Panasonic, in this order.
• Canon has the largest range of focal-lengths, from 8 to 800mm with Nikon a close second, going from 10 to 800mm. This is followed by Pentax with from 10 to 560mm and then Sony with from 10mm to 500mm. Olympus has the shortest lineup, covering 7 to 300mm only.
• Canon has the most weather-sealed lenses, the most stabilized primes and the most weather-sealed primes. Pentax has the most affordable weather-sealed lenses. Sony and Panasonic have both exactly two weather-sealed lenses, everyone else has more.
• Pentax has most of the smallest lenses and most of those are of extremely high-quality. Pentax lenses can save size and weight since they only need to be designed for cropped-sensors, although legacy lenses have full-frame coverage.
Specialty lenses:
Keep in mind that only Canon, Nikon and Panasonic need stabilized versions of their lenses, everyone else gets stabilization from the camera body.
share|improve this answer
+1 listing the specific differences. – Craig Walker Mar 1 '11 at 17:25
+1 This nice summary could save people a lot of research at the outset. – whuber Mar 1 '11 at 19:07
+1 The list, though, only touches on the primary providers. Some brand gaps will get covered by secondary options from companies like Sigma (such as going beyond 300mm on the Pentax mount). – John Cavan Mar 1 '11 at 20:37
@Philip - Yes, Canon covers a lot of ground. But it should not be about what you CAN do but about what you WANT to do. Weight is a serious concern for many and one reason people go with Pentax. Also, the stabilization issue is big. There are only 3 stabilized lenses apertures wider than F/2.8, if you shoot in extremely low light and you can shoot at F/1.4 with stabilization with Pentax and Sony (also Olympus and Panasonic with third-party lenses). – Itai Mar 1 '11 at 22:52
@Jerry - Tied for what? Pentax has a few more lenses, but a shorter range of focal-lengths (10-300 vs 11-500). On the other hand, they have a considerable number of weather-sealed lenses (Sony has zero). More than half of Sony's lenses are full-frame, which means heavy for a cropped-sensor camera ;) BTW, 55mm F1.4 is weather-sealed and super-sonic, while the 50mm F1/4 is neither. I sold the 50mm to fund half of the 55mm, so I know. – Itai Mar 2 '11 at 13:44
If you're looking at generalities — are there normal-range primes, are there wide zooms, are there telephoto zooms — everyone has it covered. But if you start looking at specifics, there are meaningful differences.
This comes out in three different ways:
1. Individual quirks of a certain brand's lineup
2. Availability of niche/special-purpose lenses
3. Lenses in different price brackets
Lineup Quirks
Pentax is the poster-child of a quirky lineup. Particularly, since they're very committed to APS-C rather than full-frame (steering you to the 645D if you want to go up), many typical lens types only exist in their 35mm-e field-of-view equivalents. For example, there's no 24-70mm / 70-200mm f/2.8 pro lens pair — instead, there's the DA★ 16-50mm and 50-135mm. There's no 85mm f/1.4 portrait lens — instead, there's the DA★ 55mm f/1.4. And the entire DA Limited and FA Limited series of jewel-like primes, with odd focal lengths and max apertures, pretty much trades on quirky.
(N.B. In 2015, Pentax announced that they _will_ introduce a full-frame model; we'll see what impact that has in the future and I will eventually update this answer. Also worth mentioning that lens prices are higher than they were four years ago, so the specific numbers below are off, although the general sentiment remains the same.)
Conversely, Canon does not offer very many non-entry-level lenses designed for APS-C, preferring to steer people who are interested in investing in lenses towards full frame. Nikon has put more effort into developing modern and interesting entry-level APS-C primes, but the nicer lenses are always full-frame.
Olympus and the Four-Thirds system is also somewhat quirky in the lens lineup, both for sensor-size reasons (there's no "nifty fifty", but there's the form-factor equivalent), and because it's an all-new designed-for-digital system with no legacy considerations (or legacy designs to fill gaps). That last means it's a rather small lineup overall.
And there are random "gaps" in the Big Two's offerings as well. Canon doesn't have a 12-24mm f/4, for example. (There's decent third-party offerings like Tokina's, though. A point, I should add, which also goes for 70-200mm on Pentax.) If some particular focal range or lens type is important to you, make sure to look for it.
Specialty and Niche Lenses
Then, there's the issue of niche lenses. Nikon has three tilt-shift offerings, while Canon has four (including a 17mm); there's nothing in Four-Thirds, and for Pentax or Sony, only third-party options are available. On the other hand, if you want a super-compact and lightweight autofocusing "pancake" style normal lens (which, objectivity disclaimer, is what I use on my camera 90% of the time), Canon hadn't one until 2012 and Nikon doesn't have any, so you need to turn to Pentax or Panasonic/Olympus.
Pricing and Lens Market Tiers
And finally, the price bracket distinction. Canon and Nikon have both the top and the bottom covered, from hundred-dollar 50mm f/1.8 lenses all the way up to the price of a new car.
Seriously — the Canon EF 800mm f/5.6L IS USM is $11,900 from B&H, and the Nikon AF-S Nikkor 600mm f/4G ED VR is $10,300. Both brands offer half a dozen lenses over $2000, and another dozen-and-a-half between one and two grand.
Pentax doesn't have anything like that — the most expensive lenses they have for sale at B&H are the DA★ 60-250mm f/4 ED and the DA★ 300mm f/4, both of which come in at $1200. (You can order pricer lenses from Pentax Japan, as special build-to-order, but that doesn't really count.) The next-most expensive is the FA 31mm f/1.8, at $965.
Sony is in-between here, with the 300mm f/2.8 G-Series at $6300, and then about a dozen lenses between $1000 and $2000. Olympus too.
At the bottom end, Nikon and Canon again have things covered — cheap primes and zooms for all occasions. Sony too, although the selection is smaller. Pentax doesn't really have that. With the exception of the new cheap-normal DA 35mm f/2.4, they've mostly let those lenses (like the FA 35mm f/2) drop from the lineup.
But that's not the complete story — what Pentax has is a bunch of very nice medium priced lenses, from $340 to $965. Some of these are almost legendary in their optical qualities (and not just among Pentax partisans), but they probably don't compete with the likes of the AF-S Nikkor 35mm f/1.4G. This may go back to "quirky lineup" overall, but basically they don't have super-cheap or super-expensive lenses, but the middle has some unique high-quality lenses.
I don't mean to slant this too personally (or to advocate my own choices for everyone), but on a personal note, lenses that cost over $1000 are nice to drool at, but practically speaking might as well not exist. If this is your bread and butter and those lenses cover your needs, though, definitely make sure not to choose Pentax. Conversely, if you're only going to pick up a few entry-level lenses and don't want to spend $500 for a single prime, Pentax might not be the best choice. Or, if you're just going with the kit lens plus maybe one telephoto zoom, they are fundamentally no different from any of the other major brands and it doesn't matter at all. (Unless you want to go all out collecting manual-focus legacy glass — a different story altogether....) For me, it fits my (saving up a bit!) budget, and I'm not compromising on quality. So, Pentax for me, specifically because their lens lineup is a great fit.
share|improve this answer
Good points about pricing. I do find that Sony and Pentax have a two-or-three grade system (good, better, best) while Canon seems to have at least 6 levels of price/quality compromises. Other brands are somewhere in between. – Itai Mar 1 '11 at 18:11
I picked a brand first.
I went and picked up several different cameras at a local store and compared them physically. Since each brand has technically similar lines, I decided that the ergonomics were a bigger factor than the technical aspects. For me, Canon bodies had a better feel. I have a friend that chose Nikon for the same reason.
I can see the argument for picking based on lenses, but that factor is negligible if you stay to larger brands (Canon, Nikon, and to some extent Pentax), as they all have an extensive lens selection.
share|improve this answer
To be honest, I think you've got the right answer - there's no substitute for holding something in your hands and seeing if it feels right. – AJ Finch Mar 2 '11 at 10:07
One thing to keep in mind, though, is that usability over a long time (such as the time for which one might own a camera!) are different from first-impressions of ergonomics. While there may be such a thing as love as first sight, it's also true that handing characteristics which seem awful (or great) initially may turn out to be no big deal after a month of use, and there may be wonderful little touches that improve your everyday use which you don't discover until later. – mattdm Mar 2 '11 at 19:38
@mattdm That might be true if it were his first SLR. I discovered a lot of nice things on my D90 since I bought it, but the decisive basics like first and foremost the body-handling, then the bright pentaprism-viewfinder, on-top-lcd and fast-access wheels stay more important than the good and bad I found out later. (Took me some weeks to finally decide.) – Leonidas Mar 3 '11 at 3:14
@Leonidas — I'm assuming that this will be read by a lot more people than the specific original questioner. And, arguably, those big, basic things you mention don't need handling to discover — you can get a good sense of that level of things simply by reading dpreview (or anywhere else that does that style of review). I'm thinking about, for example, Canon's weird big flat back wheel as opposed to the way Nikon and Pentax do it; for me, that's always been really really awkward — but I bet if someone gave me a 5D MkII I'd get used to it in a month or less. – mattdm Mar 3 '11 at 3:34
@Leonidas — We'll have to agree to disagree, then. My point isn't that hands-on experience isn't better than reviews, but rather that in order to really get a proper impression, you need to really use a camera for a while. That's a flaw shared by both handling the camera in a store for a while and the big tech-focused review sites. Ordering something and returning if it doesn't suit is a good approach. In the US, B&H has a policy like that, although the number of exposures you can take before returning is limited without a restocking fee (fair enough). – mattdm Mar 4 '11 at 2:25
If you're interested in older, manual focus lenses, and not just lenses that are still in production (either because you already have several or, like me, just think they're fun and don't mind that they're typically not as optically sharp as modern lenses):
• Canon's EOS mount only dates back to the mid-1980s; Nikon's mount and the M42 mount used by Pentax have much older lenses available. So there aren't a lot of old Canon lenses that you can just mount on your Canon camera; there are plenty of old Nikon lenses you can put on your Nikon camera and M42 lenses you can put on your Pentax.
• Canon's lenses sit closer to the sensor than M42 lenses, which are closer than Nikon lenses. This means that Nikon and M42 lenses can be used on Canon DSLRs with adapters without compromising optical quality or losing infinity focus.
• Micro four-thirds cameras have the shortest distance from lens sensor of all of them, and can (with mechanical adapters) use virtually any old manual focus lenses, including (I believe) rangefinder lenses.
share|improve this answer
if you're going to get into EVIL cameras (rather than actual SLRs) it's probably also worth mentioning that Sony's NEX cameras are pretty much the same as micro-four thirds in terms of short flange distance and being able to accept most lenses. NEX also uses a larger (APS-C) sensor. – Jerry Coffin Mar 2 '11 at 15:56
I have a Nikon F and a lot of lenses for it. While the Nikon F mount is the same since the beginning (I think late 50s or early 60s) the fact are that most of my old non-AI lenses will not mount on most modern Nikon bodies. My lenses have the "prong" that was used to couple the lens to the meter on Nikon bodies of the 60s into the mid-70s. The prong will not clear the pentaprism of many modern Nikon bodies. I keep seeing folks say that Nikons use all old F-mount lenses. Its just not true. Lenses made in the past 30 years work. Not all. – Pat Farrell Aug 24 '12 at 3:03
This is sort of a tangential answer, but I picked the platform first, then specific equipment.
Lenses are a huge part of the platform, to be sure. The lenses offered by the camera manufacturers themselves represent the bulk of this portfolio, but you've also got third-party lenses from Sigma, Tamron, and others. Out of this portfolio, you might find that certain lenses aren't going to work with certain bodies (EF vs. EF-S, or focus motors in lenses vs. bodies, etc.), so the portion of that portfolio that's really available to you might vary depending on your body choice.
But when I picked a platform, I was also aware of the features of the body I was looking at, as well as the potential upgrade path for that body. I bought a used Canon 30D knowing that I'd be able to start buying lenses, batteries, memory cards, etc., and I'd be able to use them with a 40D or a 50D later. That was an important part of my "platform" choice (I've since moved up to the 40D, btw).
The choice for me ended up being not just about the specific equipment I was buying on day 1, but more about how much flexibility I could see in my future options.
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With quality 3rd party lenses from Sigma and Tokina (mainly, there are a few Tamrons that aren't too bad either), you can cover most of the focal length range covered by the branded lenses using 3rd party lenses on any body almost (the ranges these brands offer on minor camera brands like Pentax and Olympus may be only a subset of their total lineup though, you'd have to check).
As to the smallest lineup of lenses for SLRs, that's probably Leica :)
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In addition to the variations in lens lineups, focal length ranges, and available features (for example image stabilization or weather sealing) that others have mentioned, there's a lot to be said for preferences of the look of the images that come from a lens. Lens designs can emphasize different elements of a photographic image that people might find appealing and can drive their purchasing decisions.
Some lenses deliver smoother out-of-focus areas than others; lenses transmit colors in all different ways; all lens designs are a variety of compromises in sharpness and resolution across the frame at varying apertures. People can care very much about these variations. For example, you'll find Leica aficionados that will be be able to discern the differences between the images from lenses from different eras of lens designers.
So in that respect, yes, if you're able to discern these differences in image rendering and like the look of one manufacturer over another, that could play a role in choosing one system over another.
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Having wanted to buy a DSLR since long, I chose a brand first. Nikon. Went with the most affordable (to my pocket) camera D3100 which came with a basic 18-55 lens kit.
This was 2 years back. I did not know anything about pro-bodies or lenses at the time.
Gradually, as I started investing more time into photography, I realized that lens lineups not only vary across different platforms, they vary on their own platform as well.
Last year, I wanted to upgrade my lens to a 1.8 aperture lens and found the 50mm 1.8D to be in the affordable range. However, this lens does not auto-focus on the entry-level Nikon camera bodies. It would fit, but with only manual focusing. The 50mm 1.8 AF-S (autofocus) lens which would work for my camera was more than twice the price.
This is because Nikon entry-level bodies do not offer an "in-camera auto focus motor" required to auto-focus older lenses. This feature is only available in mid-upper-to-pro-level-camera-bodies.
Manual focus is fine for object or table-top photography, but I myself did not find it useful elsewhere for my work.
Also, the 50mm lens was also better suited for a full-frame body and on my camera the effective focal range after mounting a 50mm would be 75mm due to the added 1.5x APS-C crop factor. Sounded Ok for portraits or tight-shots, but not for general everyday photography to me.
I ended up purchasing the 35mm 1.8 lens instead which auto-focuses on my camera and would give a 50mm equivalent focal range.
Comparatively, Canon does not have mount/auto-focus issues with their currently available entry-level or mid-level cameras and lenses. Canon also does not offer a "budget-range" 35mm lens (50mm equivalent) for the crop-sensor body. The current available Canon 50mm 1.8 lens would work, but with a focal length of 80mm due to the 1.6x APS-C crop. Other manufacturers or micro 4/3 cameras would have a 25mm lens with the body to achieve a similar focal range.
I also have a group of friends with Nikon cameras and share multiple different lenses from time to time.
Also, with entry-level-mid-level cameras, having luckily found the time and chance to use Nikon, Sony and Canon since past two years, the kit lenses 18-55, 18-135, 55-200, 55-250, etc. on all three platforms perform quite well based on the shooting technique.
I have also used the Nikon 105mm 2.8 macro and the 300mm F/4 on the Nikon D3100 camera body and the results are most exquisite just because of the lens quality. Similar lenses on other platforms would also perform equally well but in the end, you need to figure out your style of photography first.
To answer your first question, yes, there is a difference between platforms, but final image quality depends on your shooting style. Like, in printed images (such as magazines) or those which you see on the internet, you will have a hard time figuring out the manufacturer + lens make just by looking at a photograph. Wide/tele can be figured out - but how far was the final image cropped before publishing is still a question.
For the second question, you "can" pick the lens first and then the body but that would only be the case in which you have first figured out your photography style - portraits, wildlife, macro, sports, etc. If you have more than 2 different styles - like for example, you are a wedding as well as a wildlife photographer, then you need to choose a platform which provides a more extensive lens choice.
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Just a comment about your statement "Canon also does not offer a 35mm lens for the crop-sensor body.", which is wrong. Any Canon EF lens will work on a Canon crop-sensor body, and Canon currently sell two EF 35mm lenses. – Håkon K. Olafsen Dec 11 '13 at 12:27
@Håkon — fair point. However, Pentax, Nikon, and Sony all offer budget APS-C 35mm lenses, for under $200. Canon currently does not cater to this particular niche — basically a normal prime kit lens alternative. (Kind of related to the second part of this question.) – mattdm Dec 12 '13 at 12:34
Hello Hakon, I agree with you. I was referring to the budget-range lens for an APS-C camera. I have edited the post accordingly. Thank you mattdm for the explanation. – yadunandan Dec 13 '13 at 2:47
Well, the short answer is, that most camera brands have comparable lenses, but there are some differences.
Canon, from what I can tell, has the most lenses available of any of the major manufactures. Nikon has compatible lenses to most of Canon's, and has lenses that can cover the gap for the rest (Ie, Canon tends to have cheaper lenses, as well as the more expensive ones, Nikon tends to have only the more expensive ones.) Of course, one can find cases where the trends are reversed.
The third party lenses also cover much of the same space, but they tend to better cover the cheaper lens gaps, and not so much the more expensive lenses.
Sony/Pentax/etc tend to not have the top of the line lenses, but the typical lenses used by most people, they have. Just don't look for a 800mm lens for one of these camera brands.
As for what brand to choose, well, as they are all really about the same, it's best to find out what your friends use, and use it. There's really not much of an argument one way or another to be made, so...
Hope this helps!
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There's nothing wrong with Sony's lenses -- many of them out-resolve the equivalent Canon/Nikon lenses. The old Rokkor designs (with updated coatings and adapted for autofocus) tend to be of very high quality, and much of the line now is Zeiss. (I'll let other speak to Pentax quality.) You're right about the extreme telephotos -- but if you want a truly hand-holdable 500mm lens, something you can throw into your camera bag just in case, Sony's the only game in town. And if bokeh's your game, you're really missing out if you haven't tried the 135 SFT. – user2719 Mar 1 '11 at 16:54
All the brands typically have the lens basics covered: walkaround zooms, portrait primes, ultrawide zooms, telephoto zooms, etc. The differences tend to come in where the exotics reside, which may not matter to some people because of the expense, but might matter if that exotic just happens to be a lens you actually need.
There are a lot of individual holes along those lines. Canon has a 17mm tilt-shift; Nikon has a crop-body fisheye; Canon has f/5.6, f/4, and f/2.8 400mm primes, while Nikon only offers an f/2.8 400mm prime, the Canon MP-E 60 Macro does 5x magnification, the Nikkor 105 portrait lens does soft focus, etc. etc. etc. I think the only basic lens Canon is "missing" is a low-cost normal-on-a-crop lens (i.e., no $200 EF-S 35/1.8 USM to set against Nikon's AF-S 35/1.8 DX lens), but there are higher-cost full-frame lenses that can fill that function.
But to overgeneralize, I think Nikon has more offerings in wide lenses, and Canon has more in the supertelephoto range. And both have more offerings than the other three brands.
Sony is unique among the dSLR mounts in having autofocusing Zeiss lenses, which are designed specifically for A-mount and are not identical in optical design to the ZE/ZF/ZK manual-focus lenses for Canon, Nikon and Pentax (e.g., the ZA 135/1.8).
Pentax is unique in having a variety of pancake lenses to offer.
Olympus and Panasonic four-thirds offer Leica-designed lenses, the only f/2 zooms, and the lenses overall are smaller and lighter (although the four-thirds development seems to have halted in favor of μ4/3). And a 2x crop factor gives more "reach" than APS-C with a mere 300mm lens.
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Realizing that:
• no single brand or camera model is perfect,
• most DSLRs are "good enough" for most situations
• there is no single right answer to which camera should be purchased
...what are some things that should be considered when choosing a brand for a DSLR?
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Also, since lenses are one of the most important differences, you might want to go straight to How much do lens lineups vary across DSLR platforms? – mattdm May 1 '13 at 12:23
11 Answers 11
up vote 22 down vote accepted
I think the top consideration would be the lenses that you have available. If you already have lenses with Canon mount, and if you want to keep those lenses, then stick to Canon. In practice the investment is in lenses, not on the camera body. Lenses should drive your decision.
If you don't have any existing lenses try to review lenses before buying the camera that fits them so make a more informed choice. I can't really recommend any other way without getting into brand wars.
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+1, but I'd strengthen the last paragraph even further: buy one or two lenses by comparison, and then pick a camera that fits them. :) – Reid Jul 15 '10 at 20:55
you are right! if not it's a bit contradicting! thanks! :) – Rezlaj Jul 15 '10 at 21:03
Lenses already available is definitely #1. In the majority of applications, each mount really does not vary much in lenses available. The biggest difference is in specialty lenses and primes. After that, I would say the biggest difference between brands is ergonomics and perhaps accessories. Try to hold each brand (and not just at the level you are buying at, but upgrade paths), especially the lesser known POS brands (Pentax, Olympus and Sony :). – Eruditass Jul 28 '10 at 14:34
Agreed; now follow-up by reading How much do lens lineups vary across platforms? – mattdm Aug 30 '11 at 13:48
@Eruditass: I agree that ergonomics are important, but I think the "hold it at the store" advice is over-given. In order to really understand the ergonomics of a camera, you need to take a few thousand pictures with it. Some features which seem vital (or awful) on first impression may turn out to be inconsequential in real daily use; on the other hand, after serious use, there will be things you didn't notice at first which you find you can't live without — or are hard to live with. So don't worry too much if you can't find a camera you want in a local store. – mattdm Aug 30 '11 at 13:53
Consider what brand of camera/lenses are used by your close friends or associates who are also photographers. It can be helpful if you're able to borrow or share lenses, flashes, or other accessories with one's friends because you all have compatible gear.
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This is good advice. – reuscam Jul 15 '10 at 20:45
You can also borrow their cameras before buying and see how they feel when you hold them. – Josh Goldshlag Jul 15 '10 at 20:50
If you've got no current investment in a system, it's worth remembering that Pentax and Nikon both use lens mounts that allow you to use their old lenses without too many problems - if you're doing things "on the cheap" this may be a factor.
The older lenses (before the early 90s) tend to be manual focus, and often don't support full metering (leaving you with centre-weighted or spot), but this may not be an issue (for example, I do mostly landscape, so lack of AF hasn't been a huge problem). The quality of some of the old lenses can be very good for the price, too.
Ken Rockwell has a list of the compatibility issues with Nikon bodies & lenses, and Thom Hogan has another.
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Old lenses also have an aperture ring which is a feature only found in expensive lenses nowadays. – MJeffryes Nov 27 '10 at 21:05
While Nikon F and Pentax K can use old manual focus lenses natively, Canon EOS, with simple adapter rings, can adapt old manual focus lenses from Nikon F, Pentax K, M42, Contax/Yashica, Leica-R, and Olympus OM mounts. Nikon F cannot. Pentax K can only adapt Nikon F, Leica-R, and M42. And EOS dSLRs will retain focus to infinity and accurate stop-down focusing (which entry-level Nikons won't). – inkista May 10 at 16:23
If you plan to do off camera lighting with flashes, I think nikon has a leg up right now with their CLS. If money is no object, you can negative this difference with some radio transmitters. Otherwise both Nikon and Canon offer high and low end lens, high and low end bodies, and plenty of overpriced bags :)
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Canon also has remote controlled flash similar to CLS, but their flashes don't have all the Nikon features (such as optical slave, iirc). – che Jul 15 '10 at 21:17
Pentax, Sony, and Olympus also offer TTL-wireless remote, but also not as sophisticated as Nikon's (which gives you control of relative flash levels of different flash groups from the camera body, for example). – mattdm Apr 8 '11 at 11:24
It's important that the camera fit you, ergonomically and aesthetically. Otherwise you won't use it. So, it's very important to see/feel/touch a new camera in person, especially if you haven't used that brand before.
For example, I think the low-end Canon and Nikon offerings are just vile - they feel like cheap plastic toys to me. But you'd never get that from the fancy pictures online. Also, others might feel differently.
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this is more of a consideration of specific models of camera than of a you note, within Canon and Nikon their cameras feel very different depending on which model you purchase – ahockley Jul 15 '10 at 21:08
Does this really deserve a down-vote? Camera lines do have consistent ergonomics and usability from body to body. – Reid Jul 15 '10 at 21:09
on the other hand, when you're considering a brand, it may not be the best thing to stick for example to Olympus because you like how their entry level model feels in your hand. (It's more relevant if you don't plan to advance to other bodies in the system, though.) – che Jul 15 '10 at 21:19
See whether friends or family are using particular brands. If you have a common brand, it is easier to lend/borrow/swap lenses and related accessories.
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Agreed that lenses are a huge factor in the buying decision. The quality, diversity, price, and availability of primes were a large factor in my buying into Pentax. Ebay is a virtual candy store of quality, cheap old primes that will fit basically any modern Pentax body. Pentax also has probably the most diverse set of modern primes of any of the manufacturers. As for long zooms, the selection is so-so, unfortunately--the other manufacturers probably have a leg up here.
Also, to paraphrase a wise forum user somewhere on the net, it hardly matters which brand has the absolute best quality lenses, if you are unwilling to shell out several thousand dollars for a single top-of-the-line lens. Keep that in mind when shopping for a system.
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Agree with all of the above. Just another consideration to the mix:
Have some close friends (close as in people who live within a few miles) who own DSLR's? Buying the same brand can help knowing the camera, specially for newbies, and may even give a chance to borrow different lenses
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This is a hot topic of religious proportions. I discuss it in-depth in my "What DSLR should I buy article". In the end, you are buying into a system and those who are around you with gear in the same system has a benefit. Canon and Nikon both make excellent products and some even like Sony as a system, but personally I strongly advise you stick with one of the two big players. See my article for more details and as I say at the end of the article - do your own research and judge for yourself. Just realize you'll get a lot of heavily biased and usually heated responses from people on this topic.
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+1 Nice article. – alexandrul Jul 28 '10 at 5:18
He asked the questions: what things should you consider when choosing a brand<br> He did not ask the question what brand do you recommend or what DSLR should he buy. – labnut Sep 26 '10 at 18:04
Wow: "your buyers remorse is sure to be strong" if you buy Sony/Olympus/Pentax? You don't think that contributes to the "heavily biased and usually heated" atmosphere of these discussions? – coneslayer Apr 20 '11 at 14:46
I think its important to look into the photography culture of each brand. Each company's system works great for general photography but there are some strengths and weaknesses to each brand.
For example, I shoot Pentax, and it is known for lightweight pancake primes. If you are a photographer looking for a light set of primes whether for landscapes and street photography, Pentax is the way to go. For me, this means it's easy to go hiking with lightweight primes. I don't really need the full 24-70 + 70-200 range. Also, with the primes it's easy to be discrete, so you can carry the camera with you every day, if you are into street photography. Coupled with body IS it increases te flexibility of each Lens.
Ofcourse, we do not have as good of an Af system as the other brands, and many lenses still use screw drive which can be loud. Additionally we don't have the regular set of fast cheap primes like Canon's 85 f1.8, and we don't have Nikon's CLS system.
Nikon and Canon are both good options, but they aren't the only options!
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Consider the lens lineup of the manufacturer. For example, Canon and Nikon each have their own boutique lenses which may sway you to one brand or the other.
I am thinking of the Canon 85/1.2, Canon 200/1.8 (if you can find one) or Nikon 12-24/2.8. The latter actually has made me think about getting a dedicated Nikon body, strictly for wide shots. Canon has no such zoom, and its rectilinear wide range ends with the 14/2.8.
Both Nikon and Canon bodies are excellent. The best photographers in the world create beautiful work with either. The technology is not holding you back. However, the ergonomics will, as Nikon typically has more control surfaces on their bodies than Canon and you may find one model fits better into your hand than another.
At the moment, Nikon does not have a prosumer equivalent of the high-resolution 5D Mark II. If you want full-frame at 20+ Mpix on the cheap (relatively), then Canon is your obvious choice.
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RE: Migrations and Archive Fail
UPDATE: Finally, it works. Moving on then.
If you care, the fiction posts have been moved to another blog, Prismatic Angels. I think the separation can only be a good thing considering the differences in subject matter.
So my archive is broken. Just this blog's archive, mind. Google's customer support feels like it is in name only, even worse than India's. At least I can get a human to pretend to care about my concerns rather than just getting straight-up ignored. So until then, the blog will just have to do without. At least the rest of the blog works (for now).
Friday, September 10, 2010
[Done] Figure sales are posted!
UPDATE: The eBay listing fee promo is over; no more eBay listings for now. List of unsold items follows. Please contact me if interested.
Maburaho manga vol.2 (limited ed.)
Yours [defects, email for details]
Haruhi Suzumiya (Gothic Lolita ver,)Wai Fung
Saber (bikini ver.)
Kanu Unchou (ADESUGATA ver,)
Kasumi [defect, email for details]
Mizuho Kazami (pink wedding dress ver.)
Thursday, August 12, 2010
SLR Basics 4: Starter Lenses
So you found a brand that makes bodies with the features you want and the lenses you want, all at a price you can afford. So what to buy?
Beginners should start with these 3 lenses, for they are the cheapest available yet also among the sharpest. Micro 4/3 will have different focal lengths (mm) but have similar offerings.
1. Standard zoom: 18-55mm or similar (~$100, "kit lens" often sold with new entry-level cameras)
2. Telephoto zoom: 55-200mm or similar (~$200, often sold with the above as a premium option)
3. Fast prime: 50mm f/1.8 (~$100, sold separately) [m4/3 seems to lack this right now]
Cheap, light and good characterizes the beginner lenses. Every lens besides them will be "worse": they'll cost more, be bigger and heavier and possibly even be less sharp. (I'm simplifying, of course.) What the kit lenses excel in is accessibility--they are affordable enough and capable enough that you can shoot many types of photos with only them--truly ideal for a beginner. I suggest these 3 to start with if you have no idea what you are doing. You will be able to gain photographic experience without spending much money.
Manufacturers and retailers often bundle the first two zooms with a basic camera body in promotions. I would say that's the best value overall for camera + lenses.
Premium kit lenses (those sold with more expensive cameras) are variants of the standard one, typically expanding the focal range of the lens; the 18-55mm is only 3x after all. As implied, the premiums both cost more ($300-1000) and are heavier. "Superzooms" with extreme zoom ranges (e.g. 18-200mm, which is 11x) give up sharpness too. But you may wish to use a premium standard zoom and no telephoto zoom at all, so the choice is ultimately yours.
I would caution against using kit lenses intended for full frame cameras. These do not go wider than 24mm, and on an APS camera (i.e. most bodies under $2000) you will miss the 18-24mm range. (If you know better, then you know better. If you don't, just take my word for it.)
Some recommended accessories:
• At least two memory cards. SLRs use SD or CF, sometimes both. Sony models also take MS. I prefer 2 smaller cards over 1 larger card, even for the same total memory. This gives you backup--cards do occasionally malfunction, usually only temporarily but always with poor timing. If that was your only card, you're S.O.L. unless you reformat the card. But if you had a 2nd card, you can swap, keep shooting and recover the bad card on your PC later. (~$10-100)
• An extra battery. Same reason as memory cards. I prefer OEM (branded) batteries--a camera already comes with one and I only need two anyway. Others use 3rd party batteries, which are often cheaper with higher capacities. YMMV. (~$20-80)
• Bag. For travel and event shooting. Belt, shoulder or backpack, whichever you prefer. As long as you can easily remove equipment from it and find it comfortable to wear for hours at a time. Don't go overboard in capacity though--carrying too much slows you down and tires you out sooner. Neither helps your photography. (~$10-100)
• Tripod with 3 or 4 segment legs. For stars, landscapes and studio work. Get one tall enough to reach close to eye level without extending the center column. Shorter than that will force you to bend over a lot. (~$10-40)
• Remote control. Recommended for tripod. Touching the camera mounted on a tripod will make it vibrate, which can make images blurry. Remotes let you trigger the shutter without touching the camera, avoiding the problem. Corded remotes let you shoot "bulb", where you manually control how long the shutter is open. Wireless remotes let the photographer be in the picture, but cannot shoot bulb and are less convenient for tripod use since the wireless receiver is on the camera's front. (~$10-50)
• Lights. For studio use. A kit of two fluorescent lamps and a diffuser for each is sufficient, perhaps with an extra reflector as well. Homemade/DIY is a popular option here. Lets you shoot sale photos, portraits, still life and macro. Flash variants cost more. (~$20-200)
With photographic gear, the sky is the limit, so keep in mind that you can sink a lot of money without much effort. There is always something better out there. Don't go overboard.
Especially if on a budget, hold off on buying beyond your starter kit until you've shot a few thousand frames. After that, you should know what types of shooting you primarily do. You can then invest in equipment specially designed for your needs. Experience will let you make more informed and relevant choices about your future gear.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Reclamation of Table
A long time ago, I had a table in the corner of my room. I had no camera or lighting so I used it as a work surface. I put that table away when I needed space for boxes of stuff.
Things have changed. I have musume and a camera now. I will be buying a lighting setup sometime before Christmas to shoot Christmas cards. Also, eBay is offering free auction listings this month at any starting price--necessary since no way would I list a niche item for $0.99! So I have reinstated the table as a photo space. And am selling off figures that don't fit in my collection. Sales will go toward the lighting equipment and a new musume (soon to be discontinued).
I will be placing listings on eBay, posting a notice on classifieds, possibly craigslist (ick) and the Kawaii Kon message board, and posting a total list here. There's a LOT of figures on the auction block, all still with original packaging, with most never removed from their boxes at all.
I have spent several days compiling and photographing them. Everything (including the auctions themselves) should be up no later than Saturday.
Please look forward to it!
EDIT: Did near-final inventory of sale items. Almost 50 figures! Holy crap.
Friday, July 23, 2010
SLR Basics 3: Choosing a Brand
So you want an SLR after all. So what to buy?
First of all, any of the major brands will perform well. So while it may not exactly aid the decision process, rest assured that there is no "wrong" choice. You will be able to take great photos no matter what you buy. With the basics taken care of, the real competition in your brain will be about details.
This will be the longest entry by far, but you need not read all of it. I have ordered the sections roughly by how important I think that quality is, the most important being first. If one of the factors is enough to drive a decision, stop reading--that's your brand!
(Technically, I'm covering interchangeable lens cameras in general, not strictly SLRs. This means I will mention the new mirrorless models, which I think are similar enough to real SLRs as far as my intended audience is concerned.)
If the camera is uncomfortable to hold, you will avoid using it. If it is too big and heavy, you will avoid carrying it. If it is too hard to control, you will simply give up on it. There should be as few obstacles as possible to using the camera.
There is no substitute for physically holding an SLR in your hands. Go to a retail store and try several models out. Manufacturers generally design their cameras similarly, so if the latest model isn't on demo, try last year's model. The layout will be more similar than not.
Specific things to look for:
• Too small. Cheaper SLR bodies and mirrorless bodies usually have less switches, are made of plastic, and use a dimmer pentamirror. If you have large hands or weak eyes, you may find these bodies uncomfortable to handle.
• Too big. Upscale SLR bodies tend to be made of metal rather than plastic, have a top LCD, and a glass pentaprism. This makes them bigger and heavier all around. If you have small hands, are physically weak, or plan to travel long distances with the camera, you may find these tiring to hold.
• Switch placement. Can you reach all the buttons without having to shift your grip or removing your eye from the viewfinder? Is the wheel(s) comfortable to use?
• Viewfinder: Is it comfortable to see through? Is the shot information laid out to your liking? If you wear glasses, is the eyepoint far enough that you don't have to mash your face and glasses right up against the camera (too badly)?
In fact, ergonomics is so important that if you happen to find a brand that fits you like a glove, choose that and ignore the rest of the article.
Do you carry your equipment on a cushion of crushed velvet? Or do you drop them on the ground and kick vigorously just in case?
Impact and weather are the enemy. Bodies range from unsealed plastic to sealed magnesium alloy. If you are a typical tourist more interested in Disneyland than the Middle East, plastic will work just fine. When going on a desert adventure or to the tundra, you will probably benefit from dust and water resistance.
Every brand offers weather sealed bodies, but generally they are high end models. Pentax is an exception, as some of their cheaper bodies are sealed as well. But sealed bodies must be paired with sealed lenses, or the lens mount just becomes a giant leak.
Weather-sealed does not mean waterproof. Buy a dedicated waterproof camera or waterproof housing if that is what you are really after.
Did you know your friends and family may have already decided for you?
SLRs are most useful with a library of lenses to fit a shooting situation. Building from scratch even a modest collection of (hundred- to thousand-dollar) lenses can be quite expensive. So inheriting a system or knowing a photographer who would be willing to loan equipment is a very strong incentive to use the same brand. As long as you can stand that brand's ergonomics of course.
Sony E and micro 4/3 cameras do not have a mirror. This means they can omit the mirror assembly and optical viewfinder, which makes them slimmer and lighter. You will only have the LCD and/or electronic viewfinder for framing. The framing lag will make following action much more difficult. The backlit screen may not be bright enough to use in broad daylight. Conversely, its brightness may impair your night vision when operating in low or no light. (Also, try spotting a constellation on an LCD...) Whether the trade off is worth it is highly personal. I will simply say that SLRs are more all-purpose.
For speculation, Nikon will likely be releasing their own mirrorless line, which will likely need a new mount to deliver on smaller total size. Canon announced their own intention to release a small body of comparable size to mirrorless cameras, but avoided saying that their product would be mirrorless also. (Historical note: Canon once made APS film SLRs of similar size as modern mirrorless bodies.)
Anti-Shake Systems
Anti-shake systems are known by many names: Canon's IS, Nikon's VR, Sony's SteadyShot INSIDE, Panasonic's Mega OIS, Pentax's SR, etc. Such systems today are of two types: they either move part of the lens or move the camera's sensor.
• Canon, Nikon and Panasonic use lens systems. You will benefit from it only when using a specific lens designed with this feature, usually at extra cost. Kit lenses generally have this as standard. The optical viewfinder and autofocus system will both benefit from it, as the lens corrects the image before passing it to the rest of the camera.
• Sony, Olympus and Pentax use sensor shift systems. This is usually standard in their bodies. You will benefit from this when using any lens. However, because it is installed on the sensor, it only works when the sensor is in use. It will not stabilize the image for the viewfinder or autofocus system. Mirrorless cameras are an exception because they use the sensor full-time.
Lens Selection
Companies are not created equal. The systems they create are not equal either. Each manufacturer offers a slightly different selection of lenses to set their brand apart.
While I emphasize unique and distinctive lenses here, I will point out that these are niche lenses targeting enthusiasts and professionals. The far more popular and useful "general purpose" lenses are made by every manufacturer. This comparison is largely academic.
• Canon is the market leader. They offer one of the largest lens selections around, including specialty lenses such as the tilt-shift lenses, an extreme macro lens (1-5x life size!), a "budget professional" f/4 lens series, and the largest selection of super telephoto lenses (over 300mm focal length).
• Nikon is the other market leader. They offer the other one of the largest lens selections around, including their own tilt-shift lenses, an unequaled wide angle zoom lens (14-24mm), and a pair of unique portrait lenses ("DC" for distortion control). Among their discontinued fare is a dedicated astrophotgraphy lens and a macro zoom lens capable of 0.75x magnification.
• Sony is the new Minolta. Their selection is smaller than Canon & Nikon but is still large, notably including a compact autofocusing 500mm mirror lens and an even more unique portrait lens ("STF" for smooth transition focus). Sony recently released a mirrorless camera line to compete with micro 4/3. There are only 2 lenses so far fitting this new E-mount.
• Olympus and Panasonic share the 4/3 ("Four-Thirds") mount and thus can share lenses. They are focusing on their new mirrorless cameras, which use the micro 4/3 mount. Micro 4/3 lenses are more compact than SLR lenses. Both standard and micro 4/3 have a more limited lens selection than Sony A and Pentax.
• Pentax is owned by Hoya, a major optical glass manufacturer. Their lens selection is comparable to Sony's. They are known for weather sealing even low grade lenses (other manufacturers force you to buy the professional lenses) and their compact and well-built "limited" prime lenses, among them a few exceptionally thin "pancake" lenses.
Because of their physical design, mirrorless cameras can accept adapters for many lenses from other manufacturers, including those designed for long dead/outdated cameras. You will lose automated functionality, but for some applications (macro and video come to mind) this would still be acceptable. Old manual focus lenses might actually be preferable, as their focus mechanism is designed for hand focusing rather than compared to autofocus lenses.
Similarly, Canon cameras can be fitted with adapters for other manufacturers' lenses as well, though the selection is far less. But notably, Nikon lenses will fit. As with mirrorless cameras, you will lose automated functionality.
Except for their high end models, Pentax cameras accept AA batteries natively. Other brands use proprietary lithium ion batteries and need external camera grips to accept AA.
If you care about what the pros use, Canon and Nikon currently split the professional market and will likely continue to do so for the foreseeable future. This trickles down to the SLR market as a whole. Consequently, these brands' secondhand, rental and dealer markets are much larger and more accessible than the others.
So... got a brand or at least some candidates yet? How to choose specific models of equipment is next.
Monday, July 19, 2010
SLR Basics 2: System Mentality
You are not buying a camera. You are not buying megapixels, ISOs, autofocus points or even video recording. Buying an SLR is buying into a system and this is the biggest change from shopping for a compact.
Lenses are more important than the camera. Your camera takes no images without a lens painting one upon the sensor. Lenses determine the subject matter you can shoot and the conditions where/when you can shoot. Everything you do with the camera passes through the lens first.
Tripods are more important than the camera. The camera needs a stable platform, whether shooting still lifes in a studio, a grain of rice blown to more than life size, landscapes at dawn, birds in detail at 100 meters, stars under a clear sky or making mist out of moving water. Long shutter speeds, long focal lengths and the highest sharpness possible all require that camera movement be eliminated, stability that the human body simply cannot provide for more than a fraction of a second. Image stabilization helps at the borderline, but will not help past a second. A blurry photo is beyond saving.
Flashes and lighting are more important than the camera. ISO is no substitute for good light. Sometimes the light simply sucks and it is easier to just bring your own. Photoshop takes expertise and labor to do its magic. A homemade light tent and pair of 60W bulbs will do more for your eBay photos than an any SLR ever could. Learning how to manipulate the light is as important as learning how to shoot in every condition.
The camera body is a part of a system. It is an important part, but still only one part. Do not neglect the rest of the system, especially when starting from scratch with a limited budget. If you end up doing an hour of Photoshop to fix each photo, you may as well have stuck to a compact. Getting great results straight from the camera is a tricky and rewarding skill that requires a team effort from your whole system. Lenses especially should not be neglected, for they are the real core of an SLR system.
Stop thinking about camera specs. This works somewhat for compacts, but for SLRs it is an expensive distraction from more important issues. The camera cannot and will not do it all.
Friday, July 16, 2010
SLR Basics 1: Why an SLR?
Now for something a little different. This won't really describe anything new or rare as far as online info goes, but I felt like writing a tutorial and so a tutorial you will receive. (In explaining to others, you also explain to yourself.) Perhaps I can rephrase enough in ways that will help a few others "get it". This is a series.
SLRs are bulky and heavy. Their lenses are sold separately and can be prohibitively expensive. They are less forgiving of operator error. In fact, they will likely give worse results than a cheaper automatic camera for an unskilled user. So why bother with them at all?
• You want to learn more about the technical aspects of photography.
• You want to take specialized pictures, e.g. stars, small objects, formal portraits.
• You want to take pictures of moving things.
• You are willing to carry several pounds of camera to accomplish the above.
• You are willing to sink hundreds to thousands of dollars to accomplish the above.
If none of these describes you, save yourself a lot of hassle and just buy a compact, preferably with face detection and image stabilizer. It will be easier to use, lighter to carry and is usually cheaper. And to be honest, their images will be perfectly acceptable, especially for common web sizes (1600x1200 and smaller). Seriously. Camera tech is quite amazing at every price level.
Still interested? Because you have a long way to go. | http://www.joinmyharem.com/2010/ | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2020-16
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Ok I bought a dSLR now what?
I bought a digital SLR camera. . .
now what?
A few people have approached me lately with essentially the same question, some were asking about what kind of lenses they should buy others about what kind of software they should use. Thinking that these were probably fairly common questions I decided to write up a little guide outlining a few things you should consider. They are arranged roughly in the order you should consider them too ;)
What attachments/accessories/lenses should I buy?
This all depends on what you plan to do and your budget but here are a few suggestions:
UV Filter
Chances are good that if you bought your camera at any respectable shop they would have tried to sell you one of these right away. No it's not a con by the sales associates (mostly) the idea is that it if something is going to get scratched it'll be a $30 filter instead of a costly lens. If you're just starting out in photography you probably won't need a top of the line brand filter so don't let the sales person get carried away trying to upsell you there.
*Tip: One interesting quirk to watch out for is what you see in the image above. It happens if you're using filters when taking long exposures at night of northern lights. I won't get into the physics of it but it has to do with a certain wavelength of light and the two parallel faces of your lens and the filter.
I think that all photographers should have one of these in their bag. At around $10 you'd be crazy not to have one anyway. One one end is a retractable brush that is good for knocking loose dust and debris and on the other side protected by a cap is a slightly concave felt pad for getting more stubborn materials off your glass. Over time (and depending on usage) they should probably be replaced so you have a new felt tip, that being said I've had mine for years and see no need to change it yet.
• Tip: They also make lenspens for point and shoot cameras, they have a smaller triangular felt pad for cleaning the smaller lenses.
Carrying bag/Camera Backpack
You just dropped a lot of money on your new camera so you should spend a little cash in order to protect it. There is a plethora of options in this department, unfortunately once you're getting into dSLR size bags the price goes up because there is less demand for them.
Above are some choices from LowePro, a company that's been around for decades and is well respected among photographers. There are a variety of choices ranging from simple hip pouches to sling bags and full backpacks which even accommodate laptops.
*Tip: One word of advice is buy a slightly bigger one than you need so that if you pick up a few lenses later on you can still carry them.
Investing in a decent tripod would probably be next on the list for most people.
Why do I need a tripod? There are a number of reasons but mostly it allows you the luxury of shooting at slower shutter speeds without producing blurry pictures. If you read my guide on understanding lighting you'll already know that you always want to keep your ISO as low as possible (sensitivity to light) in order to get the sharpest photos, however if your available light is already quite low the only options are to increase your aperture and/or lower your shutter speed.
If you're wanting to do any of the following photography you'll need a tripod:
Landscapes, wildlife, macro, sports, lowlight/night photography (lightning, northern lights) and anytime you're using a telephoto zoom lens
The rule of thumb is that 1/60th of a second is the slowest shutter speed you can safely shoot handheld (though this is changing as image stabilization technology improves) but with a tripod you can have exposures lasting as long as minutes or even hours. As I mentioned above any time you're using a zoom lens you should be using a tripod, the reason is when you're zoomed in that far any small movement gets multiplied by your magnification X.
Good brands for tripods are Manfrotto, Slik, Gitzo, Velbon to name a few. Avoid tripod's designed for video cameras, they tend to be sloppier. When you're looking for a tripod you want one that is sturdy and won't allow your camera to move when all the adjustments are tightened up.
Tip: A monopod may be what you're after as well, they are good for sports photography because they don't take up much space . Keep in mind though that you can always use your tripod as a monopod simply by not splaying the legs out. I'd recommend starting with a good tripod and if you think you need a monopod later then go for it.
Extra lenses:
In short the best two lenses you can add to your kit are a zoom that compliments your kit lens and a nice fixed prime lens.
Zoom lenses:
Most dSLR's come with a general purpose standard lens, typically around 18-55mm. For most situations this is the best lens to use however sometimes you need a little extra zoom and that is where the telephoto lenses come into play. A good companion to say an 18-55mm kit lens would be something like a 70-200mm or a 70-300mm, this way you're not missing much range between the upper end of your 18-55mm and the lower end of your telephoto. If you find a good deal on a lens that will leave you with a gap don't rule it out though, it just means you'll have to keep this in mind when shooting and you may have to move back a little to get the same composition in your shot.
Depending on your camera manufacturer you might be able to find older lens used for a fraction of the cost of a new lens. For example Canon's EF lenses will work on their dSLRs but due to the fact most dSLR's have a smaller sensor the magnification factor will be larger and I'll explain this below in a bit. When in doubt call your local camera shop (Don's or Phase II for example) before purchasing a used lens to make sure it will work with your camera and if possible try it out on your camera first to make sure it fits and the auto-focus is compatible.
A note on cropped sensors:
If you have a dSLR camera and paid less than $3000 for it chances are good that your camera's sensor is what's referred to as a “cropped sensor” or “crop sensor”. This goes back to the days of 35mm film cameras, the film was the part that “sensed” the light and was 35mm diagonally across. The sensors in consumer grade dSLR's are smaller than that of the 35mm frame hence the term “cropped sensor”. What this means is that if you find an older used lens that was made for a film camera the zoom rating will not be accurate anymore. For example if you put a Canon 100-300mm EF lens on a Canon Digital Rebel dSLR which uses a 1.6x crop sensor your effective zoom will actually be 160mm-480mm.
1.3x – Canon EOS 1D/1D MkII
1.6x – Canon EOS 300D/400D/20D/30D
Here's a nice little reference table of standard zoom sizes and their effective zoom's on a crop sensor.
Full Frame 1.3 Crop 1.5 Crop 1.6 Crop
Don't let any of this dissuade you from saving some cash by picking up an older telephoto though as there is another advantage besides the extra zoom. All lenses suffer from some inaccuracies due to how the lenses are ground and what materials they are made from etc, this results in the center of the lens being sharper than the outer edges of it. When you put one of these older lenses on a crop sensor camera you dramatically improve the quality of the image because the sensor only uses the central portion of the lens thus discarding most of the area that is degraded.
As mentioned previously if you plan on shooting with a zoom lens you should really consider using a tripod, at higher zoom ranges any vibration or shakiness is multiplied dramatically and will result in blurry images.
One last thing to note is that when buying any lenses you typically pay a lot more if you want a larger aperture (aka a faster lens). Where a 70-300mm F5.6 lens may cost $250 the same lens capable of f2.0 may run in the thousands.
Prime Lenses
Before the days of variable zoom lenses they were all fixed zoom aka prime lenses. Why would anyone even consider a lens so limiting? Below are 3 very good reasons:
1. Image quality
Variable zoom lenses are made up of many more elements than a fixed prime lens, this means any errors in how each of these elements are ground will add up and therefore decrease the total optical quality of the lens. Due to this fixed lenses tend to be sharper across the entire image, not just the center. Other optical issues like barrel distortion, pincushion distortion, and chromatic aberration are reduced in prime lenses.
2. Speed
This term may be new to you but when someone refers to a lens as being “fast” they mean it takes in a lot of light allowing you to use a faster shutter speed. Due to how they are made they often are available with very wide apertures (1.2, 1.4, 1.8 etc) compared to the variable lenses. Why is this important? Photographers always run into the same problem: not having enough light. Say you're shooting indoors and want to avoid the use of a flash (at a wedding for example) and your camera tells you in order to get a proper exposure you need to shoot at 1/4h of a second at ISO 100 at f5.6. 1/4th of a second is going to result in a blurry shot even if you're using a tripod because the people will probably be moving a little. If you have an F1.4 prime lens available that would give you 4 more stops of light to play with letting you shoot at 1/60th of a second instead which is shoot-able handheld. In short it gives you options.
3. Shallow depth of field thanks to wider apertures
By using a very wide aperture (F1.4 or 1.8 etc) a very dreamy effect can be accomplished as backgrounds softly blur away allowing the viewer's eyes to be drawn to what matters.
So which focal length should you buy?
If you're going to pick up a prime lens I suggest going for a 50mm. The reason is that this is a very popular focal length for portraiture and therefore manufacturers make higher volumes resulting in lower prices. For both Canon and Nikon a 50mm prime can be found for under $150 and most likely other manufactures have similar prices to stay competitive.
Keep in mind though you may have to apply that multiplication factor to the focal length that we covered earlier in this article so your 50mm may end up working more like an 80mm if you're shooting a Canon. Don't get hung up on that though as generally “portrait” lenses are regarded as anything between 50-100mm.
Software Options
Here are a few options when it comes to image editing/library management. I highly recommend trying all of the free ones first as well as any trial downloads you can find before spending any cash at all.
Photoshop (CS4 is $1000, Elements Ver 8 is $129.99)
Now for image editing software Adobe Photoshop is the gold standard in the industry (CS4 is the current version), it’s the program that everyone uses. It is also ridiculously expensive which leads to a lot of pirating, there are tons of torrents available if that is the path you choose (I'm not condoning it). Another, more affordable option, is Adobe Photoshop Elements which is a "lite" version that sells for $129.99 as I write this at London Drugs. Check Adobe's website for downloadable trial versions before dropping any cash.
• Pros: It is the industry standard bar none.
• Cons: Pricey, A bit of a steep learning curve, I've used it for 8 years and am still learning new things every day.
GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) FREE!
GIMP has been around for years now and has come a long way, it is by far one of the most full featured photography programs second only to Photoshop and maybe a few others. The best part is that since it started out in Linux the software is FREE. I recommend downloading simply because it is free and trying it out, chances are it will do everything you need it to do. Realistically the stuff that Photoshop has that GIMP lacks is more for advanced users anyway. There are parts of GIMP that aren't very user friendly or just outright backwards if you're used to Photoshop but the price kinda makes up for that ;)
• Pros: Its FREE, full featured, and has an abundance of free tutorials and books online
• Cons: Steep learning curve, not user friendly in some instances, awkward if you're used to Photoshop
Picasa a FREE program made by Google
I'm a huge fan of FREE and often recommend this program. It's no Photoshop when it comes to features but it is very user friendly and covers all the basics like cropping, resizing, exposure correction, and some nifty filters for spiffing up your photos. Picasa also acts as a photo manager for organizing your pics and has other handy features like "email" that will re-size your photo and automatically place them in a new email for you to send (supports outlook, gmail, and a few others). Personally I don't like the photomanager portion of it but that's just me.
• Pros: It's FREE, covers most if not all of the “basics”, allows for fun projects like collages and slideshows
• Cons: Due to its easy to use nature more serious photographers may not like the lack of complete control.
Adobe Lightroom ($369.95)
It takes its name from the film days where photographer's would view their negatives on a light table etc. Essentially it is a workflow tool for organizing your photos and is also a feature rich "digital darkroom". It gives you a plethora of controls for developing your photos and most "pros" use this to import & tweak their images before editing them in Photoshop. This isn't really a tool for beginners but if you're shooting in RAW already you might want to look into it.
• Pros: Its fast becoming the industry standard for workflow and photo management, offers finer development control and Photoshop, great for processing RAW files
• Cons: Price, Semi-steep learning curve, really meant for serious photographers
Simran said...
Great blog to read !
Had a question regarding U.V filters. I bought the 550D with twin lens kit, will a 77mm screw in fiter work for both lenses?
jphphotography said...
You just have to look at your lenses and see if both are a 77mm filter. You should really have one for each of your lenses though, very cheap insurance against scratches compared to the cost of a new lens. I'm surprised the salesperson didn't convince you to buy two when you picked up the camera. | http://jph-photography.blogspot.com/2010/04/ok-i-bought-dslr-now-what.html | robots: classic
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How to Choose the Best DSLR Camera for Your Needs
As with other DSLR cameras, the Olympus E-5 requires that you only use lenses that will fit its lens mount. Olympus
If you're serious about your photography then, at some stage, you're going to want to upgrade to a DSLR camera. But so many different DSLRs are on the market that it can seem like a daunting task to the uninitiated to choose the best DSLR camera. Fear not! My DSLR buying guide will point you in the right direction, and help you learn how to choose the best DSLR camera for your needs.
Why Upgrade to a DSLR?
Compact, point and shoot digital cameras are so small and easy to pop in a pocket that you might wonder: What's the point of upgrading to a DSLR? Two major reasons exist for an upgrade -- image quality and versatility.
Not only can you use a variety of different lenses with your DSLR, but you can also take advantage of the huge number of accessories available (such as flashguns, battery grips, etc.). A DSLR is made from far higher quality components than a point and shoot camera, and it has a far greater number of controls.
While a compact might be able to hold its own in bright daylight against a DSLR, the DSLR really comes into its own in challenging lighting situations. You can shoot in low light, shoot at sunrise and sunset, capture fast moving objects, and choose your depth of field -- the list of advantages is nearly endless.
Think About What You Need
It can be somewhat daunting to decide what you want. First, your budget will make a big difference to what type of DSLR you buy. You'll need a bigger budget for a DSLR camera, as DSLRs start from around $500, while pro-quality cameras can cost anywhere from $3,500-$10,000!
Then there are the practical considerations. If weight is an issue, then one of the cheaper DSLR cameras will be a good option, as their bodies tend to be made from lightweight plastic. However, if you need a rugged camera that will stand up to a few knocks, you'll need to be spending more to get a magnesium body.
Another extremely important consideration is lenses. If you've come from a film background and already have a lot of one manufacturer's lenses, then it will make sense to buy a DSLR that matches that brand name. If you think you might want to build up your lens collection extensively, choose a manufacturer that has a wide range. Additionally, if you want to use specialized lenses (such as "Tilt and Shift" lenses for architecture), keep in mind that some DSLRs aren't compatible with them.
Ease of Use
If you're a complete beginner with DSLRs, you should look for a camera that won't baffle you with science! The best entry-level DSLRs are starting to introduce on-screen guides and intelligent auto modes to try to help beginners learn how to use their cameras.
Advanced Photography Modes
On high-end models, you can customize lots of features on your camera, automatically setting it up for a variety of situations. The customization that can be done allows for very fine tuning of the camera. However, these features are only really useful for those planning to make a living as a photographer.
Sensor Size
There are two main formats within the DSLR family: Full frame cameras and cropped frame cameras. You can read more about the differences in my article examining the full frame versus cropped frame formats. The main thing to understand, though, is that a full frame camera will have the same sensor size as a 35mm strip of film. A cropped frame camera's image sensor is a lot smaller.
Most of the cheaper cameras will be cropped frame, but this isn't a problem for a lot of people. However, it does alter the focal length of lenses and, if you already have a bag full of lenses from your film days, it could cause problems. Cropped frame cameras mean that you have to multiply the focal length of the lens by either 1.5 or 1.6 (depending on the manufacturer). Obviously, this is great for telephoto lenses, as it extends your range. But it will also mean that wide-angle lenses will no longer be wide, just becoming standard lenses. Keep in mind that manufacturers have designed cropped frame-only wide-angle lenses that negate this problem, and they usually are very reasonably priced. The flip side is that the quality of the glass is nowhere near as good as the more expensive "film" camera lenses.
Even the most basic DSLR will be faster than any point and shoot camera. Entry-level DSLR cameras normally let users take a burst of shots at about 3 to 4 frames per second, but this will normally only be in JPEG mode. The burst mode speed will be limited in RAW mode. This shouldn't be a problem for most users, but, if you plan to shoot a lot of fast-moving action -- such as sports or wildlife -- you'll need to move up a level to the semi-pro level. More expensive cameras have a burst rate of around 5 to 6 fps, often in both RAW and JPEG mode. Pro-level DSLR cameras can often shoot at around 12 fps.
Movie Mode
HD movie mode is common on DSLRs, and the quality is surprisingly good. Even if you're not an enthusiastic moviemaker, you'll probably find this feature fun and easy to use. Some DSLRs even offer 4K movie resolution. Different models have different features, so it's worth doing a bit of research to see which will suit you.
In Conclusion
Hopefully, following these suggestions will help to make buying the best DSLR slightly less daunting. All the manufacturers who make DSLRs offer different plus and minus points, and it will depend on what features are most important to you. Just bear in mind that it is often the quality of the optics in the lens that make a picture great, so do your research on which lenses will suit the kind of photography that you are interested in.
And, most importantly, enjoy your new toy! | https://www.lifewire.com/dslr-buying-guide-493008 | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2019-18
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} | 1,424 | Everything You Need to Know about a Good DSLR Camera
The right DSLR camera allows you to capture life’s greatest moments in stellar resolution. DSLRs are known for their high-quality images, various manual settings, and interchangeable lenses. Whether you are shopping for a DSLR as a beginner or as a professional, there are several features that you need to consider when selecting the right camera for your needs. In order to help you choose the best camera, we have created a guide to everything you need to know about DSLRs, covering both hardware and software components.
There are various factors to consider when choosing your camera’s body. Size and weight are important qualities, especially for those who shoot outdoors or on the go. Being able to test various cameras will give you a sense of whether or not you like how they feel in your hands, and whether you find the interfaces easy to use.
When it comes to choosing the right brand, you may want to consider investing in a leading manufacturer like Canon, Nikon, or Sony. This is because once you start buying accessories and lenses for your camera it may be difficult to find compatible parts if your camera is from a smaller manufacturer. Having to switch brands due to lack of compatible accessories can be rather expensive, which is why you may want to consider choosing a reputable manufacturer from the start.
Image Sensor
The image sensor is the part of your camera that captures light and digitally records your picture. The larger your camera’s sensor is, the more light and information about your image your camera will be able to record. Most DSLRs either come with a full-frame sensor or an APS-C sensor (also known as a crop sensor), both of which are capable of capturing highly detailed images. Depending on your photography needs and budget, one sensor may be a better choice for you. Below, we go into more detail about these sensors and the reasons why you might want to invest in each.
• Full-frame sensors: Full frame sensors are significantly larger than APS-C sensors, capable of capturing almost twice as much light, and can, therefore, produce higher quality images. These sensors are preferred amongst professional photographers because they are able to create sharper and cleaner photos, especially in low-light settings that require high ISO. These sensors are considered top of the line and are usually found in more expensive cameras. If you are looking for a top quality device in order to shoot professional level photography, you may want to consider investing in a full frame sensor.
• APS-C sensor: While APS-C sensors may not produce as highly detailed images as full-frame sensors, they still create beautiful images, as their large sizes allow almost 50 percent more light in than the average point and shoot camera. These sensors are often found in more affordable and user-friendly cameras, and can still produce exceptional images. For these reasons, an APS-C sensor is a great choice for beginner or intermediate photographers, as well as those on a budget.
Comparing megapixels across camera brands is difficult because not all megapixels store the same amount of information. Many who are new to photography experience confusion when they encounter expensive DSLR cameras that are listed as having as little as 12 megapixels. Today many phones and point and shoot cameras boast high megapixels as a testament to their high-quality image capabilities. However, a 12 megapixel DSLR will always produce a higher quality image than even a 40 megapixel phone camera. This is because each megapixel on a DSLR camera is larger and stores more information, whereas phone camera megapixels are smaller and are more prone to graininess and noise.
When you are shopping for a DSLR camera, you usually have the option of buying the body alone or as part of a kit that comes with a versatile general purpose lens. Buying your camera as part of a kit is a great option for those new to DSLRs, as it equips you with the basic tools to capture high-quality images. Further, since the product is sold as a bundle, you usually save more money buying your camera and lens as part of a kit, rather than separately. On the other hand, if you already own various lenses, you may be better off buying the body only and matching it with a lens you already have. Before buying a new camera body, make sure to check that your lenses are compatible with the new device.
• Kit lens: Most kits come with a standard 18–55mm zoom lens which is a perfect option for a broad range of shots. This lens is a high quality and practical choice for most everyday photography and can produce stunning results. However, while kit lenses can accomplish most everyday photography needs, there are certain limits to their optic abilities which require the photographer to purchase additional lenses.
• Telephoto lens: Telephoto lenses offer longer focal lengths and greater magnification capabilities. Common telephoto lenses are 200mm or 300mm. In addition to impressive zoom capabilities, these lenses are also useful when trying to achieve a high quality out of focus, or blurred, background effect.
• Wide-angle lens: A wide-angle lens offers a short focal length and a wide field of view. These lenses allow you to fit more of a scene into your frame; this is great for landscape photography and can often produce the effect of greater depth of field to your image. From wide to ultra-wide angle lenses, common options include 14mm, 20mm, 24mm, 28mm, and 35mm.
• Macro: Macro lenses are ideal for shooting up close. Some of these lenses are standard 50mm, but others are actually telephoto lenses.
Exposure Settings
The three major components of exposure are ISO sensitivity, aperture, and shutter speed.
• Shutter speed: Shutter speed affects how long the mechanism inside your camera is open and allowing light into the sensor. The effect of shutter speed is motion. Low shutter speed causes objects in motion to appear blurry, but can be useful in dark settings in order to let as much light in as possible and clearly capture still images. High shutter speeds, on the other hand, are useful when capturing things that are in motion at high speeds. Because the camera mechanism is only open for a minimal amount of time, it captures the image as a still frame.
• Aperture: Aperture affects the opening of your camera’s lens itself. Small aperture allows less light into the camera and high aperture allows more light in. However, unlike shutter speed, the effect of aperture adjustment is your image’s depth of field. Aperture is measured by f-stops; the higher the f-stop (for example f/22) the deeper your image’s depth of field will be, therefore producing a clearly focused photograph. Lower aperture settings (such as f/2.8) for example, allow you to focus on a certain point and achieve a blurred background effect.
• ISO sensitivity: ISO affects how sensitive your image sensor is to light. Using high ISO allows you to capture photos in low lighting conditions, but it can add unwanted noise (or graininess) to your image if you do not use it properly. In general, you should use the lowest possible ISO, while still allowing enough light sensitivity to capture your photo in the conditions you are working with.
When you are choosing a DSLR camera, it can be helpful to test out its various settings, including shutter speed priority, aperture priority, and manual mode.
High Dynamic Range (HDR)
HDR allow your camera to store multiple versions of the same image, using different exposure settings. Once the photo has been taken, your camera will combine the best features of each image version into one stunning photo. This setting is especially helpful for beginner and intermediate photographers.
Photo modes
DSLRs usually offers various photo modes a well, include burst mode which can be great for taking pictures of high actions scenes, time-lapse which allows you to show the progression of time, and self-timer mode.
Many DSLRs now offer scene-recognition or face-recognition software, and can automatically adjust the focus and exposure settings to capture the best quality image.
Another popular feature in new DSLRs is Wi-Fi capability, which allows you to connect your camera to your phone or computer for instant photo sharing to your iPhone 7.
Now that you have picked out your camera, you should have a look at the essential photography equipment that you should buy.
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Firstly, let’s define the setting you’re in so you know what gear to buy. It doesn’t matter what size, or type of show you are shooting. The show’s lighting is the most significant impact, and then the limitations of what you can shoot are the second. Often, you can only photograph during the first three songs, and you’re almost always not allowed to use a flash or strobe. I’m sure you can already see why your choice of equipment is essential.
What kind of camera should I buy?
There isn’t one answer for this. Firstly, get yourself a reliable DSLR camera. There are a lot of different cameras out there, but point and shoot cameras are not suitable because they don’t let you change lenses. Your photography would be pretty limited without being able to change your lens. Whether you choose Canon, Nikon, Fuji or something entirely different, it doesn’t matter. You’re going to need to grow to use the camera well, so it’s important that it feels good in your hands and you can reach all the settings. Every camera body is built differently, so naturally, it’s going to feel different in your hands. You’re also going to want choices, and the brand you choose is important because like Sega and Nintendo did back-in-the-day, only that brand’s lenses are going to be compatible with its body. Nikon and Canon are both prominent camera brands out now, but that doesn’t mean you have to choose a camera body produced by either of them.
Cameras with a crop sensor are generally less expensive than full-frame cameras. That doesn’t mean they are worthless, but there are a few downsides. Regardless, the disadvantages will only become evident after you’ve become a little more experienced. Crop sensor cameras have (yeah, you guessed it) smaller sensor sizes. Small sensor sizes produce noisier photos (tiny specks of grain) and capture less light. Noise often softens your image and can detract from the photo’s impact. I recommend you start out with a crop sensor and benefit from the cheaper cost, and workaround the additional noise in your editing software.
So what camera should I get for concert photography?
Full Frame
Canon 5D Mk III
Canon 6D
Nikon D810
Nikon D750
Crop Sensor
Canon 7D
Canon 7D Mk II
Nikon D500
Nikon D7500
What are the best concert photography lenses?
Kick it off with a prime
You can save some money by avoiding zoom lenses. Lenses with fixed focal lengths are called prime lenses. Prime lenses are great for learning how to frame subjects because you can’t rely on the zoom to fix your composition challenges.
Canon EF 35mm f/1.4
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8
Canon EF 85mm f/1.8
Nikon 35mm f/1.4
Nikon 50mm f/1.8G
Nikon 85mm f/1.8G
Want to know what I use?
The above is the answer you need, but it might not be the answer you want. Good equipment does not make you a good photographer. But if you’re dying to know what I use or how to get started with concert photography, I’ve written a 103-page guide that tells you everything you need to know. Including what gear I have in my camera bag. | https://mattwalterphoto.com/whats-the-best-beginner-music-photography-gear/ | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2019-09
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D5100 with Lens Versus D600/EOS 6D for Beginner
edited June 2013 Posted in » Nikon D5100 Forum
I'm newcomer when it comes to digital photography. I like to shoot photos but mainly with a point-and-shoot camera, and I would like to move to a DSLR type camera. I've done some research, tried my friend's camera and watched videos from experts.
My subjects would be mainly landscape, nature, portraits, and low-light shooting. My budget is around $2000 to $2500 (of course if I could spend less, that would be better).
Here are my choices using Amazon as my price reference:
* Nikon D600 Kit = $2,396.95
* Canon EOS 6D Kit = $2,399.00
* Nikon D5100 ($496.95 body-only) + Nikon 17-55mm f/2.8G ($1,424.00) = $1920.95
I've read reviews from dpreview, techradar, moose's (this site), and various sites. I saw the specs, user reviews, rants, etc.
I am planning in investing my $2000+ bucks here with the D5100 and the Nikon 17-55mm lens. Is this a wise move? My initial choice was the Nikon D600. Any reasons why I should go with either of them? My reason for not choosing the NikonD600 or the EOS 6D is I would need a much better lens in order to get better images with them.
Maybe another question here is if the Nikon D5100 with the lens is comparable with the D600 kit/6D kit. If they are comparable, then I might as well invest in those higher end models.
I'm aware that it's best to use different lenses depending on the occasion and environment. So in light of that I'm thinking maybe my choice of D5100 with lens is not a wise move either.
Any ideas?
• edited July 2013
First, when you say you're new to digital photography, I'm not sure if you have any film SLR experience or basic photography background (knowledge of aperture, shutter, and ISO relationships and their functions). I also won't speak towards the Canon, because there are more experienced people out there who can give you better information than I can regarding the 6D.
Assuming you have little or no prior experience with photography outside of point and shoot cameras, I would steer you away from a D600 right away for several reasons:
1) The D600 is a prosumer camera with advanced features, which would likely prove overwhelming for a DSLR newbie. Even a D7000/D7100 is likely too much camera for the inexperienced person, so I would highly recommend the D5100 (or D3100/D3200) for a newcomer because of its more entry-level features. The beauty of the D5100 over the D3XXX series is that it has enough advanced features for a new photographer to grow into, so you shouldn't be thinking about upgrading after a year or two. I had almost 30 years experience shooting film SLR's and there was some adjustment on my part learning the D5100 when I picked it up. You want a camera that doesn't intimidate you and you can start shooting and learning with right out of the box rather than something that you just put in Auto mode and have what is essentially an overblown point and shoot.
2) A D600 is an FX, or full-frame camera, so it's a much bulkier camera and glass is going to be much more expensive. There are many advantages of FX cameras over DX (crop-frame) cameras in terms of dynamic range, low light capabilities, wide angle, higher resolution, but in terms of cost and portability, DX cameras have it all over the FX cameras. You also get extra reach with the DX cameras. There's a 1.5X crop factor with Nikon DX (1.6X with Canon), so with a 300mm focal length, you're actually realizing a 450mm with a D5100. Of course, FX glass works very well with DX cameras and you can collect lenses for the day that you may decide to go full-frame.
3) As you've already figured out, save money on the box and get better glass. The D5100 takes outstanding images and the 16.2 MP sensor has excellent IQ and great DR. Whether a $1,500 lens is that much better than a comparable $500 piece of glass when you figure in cost versus quality versus being able to pick up additional lenses is up to you. Personally, I think the 17-55mm limits you quite a bit if that's going to be your only lens. I might suggest that you get a less expense wide-angle zoom and get a decent telephoto lens to give yourself more versatility.
The D600 is an outstanding camera and if budget wasn't a consideration, I would spring for one or even a D800/D800e in a heartbeat. But the D5100 is a serious camera that many professionals use as a backup or even their primary camera because it's that good.
• edited August 2013
Sorry, if this is a massively delayed response. I was having trouble finding this thread and the name of the forum. I knew the name was something like "Moose" but for some reason I couldn't find it in Google or maybe the keywords were wrong. I just remembered it when I got an email.
So far here are the updates:
I asked this question on June 12, 2013. On June 15 I ordered a Canon 6D instead of the Nikon D600 because I kept reading about an oil and dust issue with the D600. Although it's slightly better than the 6D, I can't afford to have a faulty, unreliable body.
Along with the Canon 6D, I've acquired a Canon 24-105L, Canon 100mm f/2.8L, Canon 70-300mm L, Canon 40mm STM, Canon 50mm f/1.4, and Canon 85mm f/1.8. I'd been actively posting to my Flickr account since then. Here's my Flickr account:
Oddly enough, two of my pictures have won the 6D Flickr user group picture of the week.
I know I still need some practice. On August 15, 2013, I'm celebrating my 2nd month in photography. I have still many things to learn though.
• edited October 2013
Personally, I think you have made a good set of choices with your camera and lenses. However (and I keep making this point on these forums), good equipment does not necessarily equal good pictures. Good pictures come from understanding exposure (ie. aperture, shutter speed and ISO), good composition and taking advantage of photographic opportunities. The last item will suffer if you are too busy deciding which lens you should have mounted.
Don't get the idea that this is sour grapes because I can't afford half of your equipment. I make these points based upon over 50 years in photography. In my younger days, I won competitions using a Kodak Brownie 127. I always refer to the work of the great Ansell Addams who also produced masterpieces using a box camera and black and white film and his adage that the most important part of a camera is the 12 inches behind it.
All that being said, welcome to the world of DSLR and the pages of these forums.
Best regards, PBked
• edited August 2013
Thanks for the response. I get what you mean. In fact one of my reason for getting a non L lens. To prove to my friends that it's not all about the lens. I'm about to get a Holga lens just to prove to some that it's not all about the lens.
However, let's look at it the other way around. I keep getting advise from various people that it's not about the lens. My only question is why do others assume just because you have such equipment that you're primarily relying on lenses alone? It's like seeing someone in high-end BMW and immediately thinking he must be a rich guy? Can't he be a guy who test drives those, or a guy who won it from a networking business?
I know you're not sour graping, but I can't help it wonder why some people wonder about others intentions. I have read about Ansel Adams. He's good and legendary, but I think comparing the present to the future, or vice versa, doesn't do us good in such a manner. It's not his fault he lived on that era. It isn't our fault we live in this era. Jordan was good in his time, as is Kobe. My grandpa can make fire from stones. My 5 year old cousin can speak multiple languages. We keep comparing past, present and future, but why? To prove that you don't need good gear to make good pictures? That's good. Why make new gear if they don't have any purpose? I mean we can argue it the other way, and argue it another way, but it's just endless discussion that doesn't lead to anything.
If I can prove that I can take good pictures with a simple iPhone, where does that put me? Or a simple Nokia phone? I hope you get my point.
• edited October 2013
Hi again,
You have produced some excellent counter-arguments to the points I raised and I am glad you took the time to do so. The whole reason for forums like this is to stimulate discussion.
The point I was really trying to make was that a knowledge of the principles of photography enables you to get the best out of your equipment whatever it may consist of. Some people I know get so bogged down in understanding their equipment they forget the basics. Thank you once again for your counter-views.
Best regards, PBked
• @smart - Sorry for joining the discussion so late. I wanted to throw my hat in the ring. The debate of gear versus skill comes up quite often. For me personally, I feel that a combination of good gear (camera, lenses, etc...), plus creativity, equal a higher percentage of quality images.
Yes, you can take wonderful shots with an iPhone, a vintage Kodak Brownie, heck even a GoPro which isn't even designed for images. Given the right type of light and the right composition/subject, a fantastic photo is possible with even the simplest of gear.
However, as we know we're not always presented with ideal lighting or amazing subjects/scenes. This is where the right gear can get you much further than simpler options.
Try shooting motocross with an iPhone or even a DSLR with a kit isn't easy. Attach a speedy 70-200mm f/2.8 and all of a sudden those snapshots start looking like something closer to a Sports Illustrated cover.
Obviously as your photographic skill develops, the trajectory of capturing awesome photos will rise as well. All the best and happy shooting!
• edited October 2013
Hi Moose, very well put.
Regards, PBked
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Discussion in 'Beginner Questions' started by lynn_h|1, Nov 9, 2017.
1. Lynn
Rather than a new body, think about the lens and other "stuff."
• Example1, I did a fair bit of night photography, so I needed a decent STABLE tripod and a remote release.
• Warning a GOOD tripod is surprisingly expensive. I think there is a saying about tripods; pick any TWO: light, sturdy, cheap. Cuz you can't get all three.
• Example2, my wife wanted to do close up of her plants, so I got a macro lens and 2-way focusing rail. She already had the tripod.
• Example3, I got a 35mm f/1.8, because I do indoor high school sports photography (volleyball, basketball, etc.). With the slow 18-140 lens, I have to shoot at ISO 12800; with the faster 35/1.8 lens, I can shoot at ISO 3200 or even 1600, for better image quality.
• Example4, I shoot a fair bit of events, where I need a flash, and all the 'stuff' that goes with a flash.
• Example5, I was processing some RAW files after my nephew's wedding, on my laptop. My laptop did not have enough processing power to process the photos, and it was painfully SLOW. So I just converted enough photos to give them something quickly, then went home where I could do the processing on my faster desktop computer. So, if you do not have a current or recent computer, the slow sold computer could hamper your work.
When you think about lenses, you should think about what you want to do, then design a complete kit, even if you do not get them all. This helps to plan the sequence of lenses, so you don't end up duplicating a lens by mistake, or getting a lens that you don't end up using much (been there, done that).
• Example1, a natural progression from the 18-55 is a 55-200 or a 70-300. Just make sure you get the VR version (VR = Vibration Reduction). Today it does NOT make sense to buy a tele zoom without VR.
• Example2, or going the opposite direction, for a WIDE lens, like a 12-24. Although that lens has significant overlap with your 18-55.
• Example3, or a macro lens, if you want to do very close up stuff.
BTW, I had a D70 that I bought in 2004. I used it for 12 years, and would still be using that camera, if it had not died. It did almost everything that I wanted it to. Today, it's only failure is a max ISO of 1600, that is too low for night and indoor sports. Everything else was just fine.
I believe in milking all you can out of the gear you have. Until you hit a block, that only a new gear can solve.
Though there is a point in between, where newer gear would make it easier to shoot. So you don't have to wait till you hit that wall.
jamieconway and Moving On like this.
2. I agree the other posters, stick with what U have until you know what U want
3. I have a strong opinion on this Panasonic LUMIX FZ1000 4K QFHD/HD 16X since I have been using for 5 months now. Have not invested much time into photography yet but somehow managed to buy this awesome piece back then. Now I have no other option left except photography. Well, It has got Relatively large sensor with good image quality. Lumix DMC-FZ1000 is a very impressive superzoom camera with an F2.8-4, 25-400mm lens and a 1" sensor. What more to say.
4. I agree with some above, that one should look at what is available used. D700 prices are pretty reasonable now, a little lower than when I bought mine two years ago.
But a D300 and another lens might also be a good use for $1000.
Used AI lens prices are very good, used AF lenses not all that bad, either.
5. The D700 (and D300) have distinct handling advantages over the current low-end Nikons, if you don't mind the weight. They do lack some recent niceties such as the touch screen. They do, also, have ancient sensors in terms of the amount of per-pixel detail that they can capture. Much as I loved my D700, I'd be hesitant to recommend one over many more recent options.
The FZ1000 has, I believe, pretty good reviews. Still, it's a compact - it would cost more to put equivalent lenses on a DSLR (although "equivalent" is the key point - that "400mm" f/4 end is f/7.1 in DX terms, and the 70-300mm f/3.5-6.3 AF-P isn't that expensive), but there are lenses you can put on a DSLR that are impossible with something like an FZ1000. It's a good and capable camera; is it a system from which you can grow as you can with a DSLR system? I'd argue otherwise, without in any way disparaging people who are using them.
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10 Reasons To Buy a DSLR 657
10 Reasons To Buy a DSLR
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• Go Digital SLR! (Score:5, Informative)
by BWJones ( 18351 ) * on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:41PM (#16760281) Homepage Journal
I can't agree with this article more. Since moving from film to digital SLRs my photography has really grown because shooting digital blows away all of the risk and gives you much more creative freedom when it comes to experimental exposures such as low light photography, action photography and more. I find myself taking far more pictures and experimenting more with digital and then simply throwing away the bad experiments than I did with film because of the costs associated with film. The other thing about Digital SLRs is that in addition to the higher quality optics, the actual imaging sensors on the CCD are physically larger leading to much higher quality images than are possible with point and shoots that may possess higher megapixel counts, but have smaller physical sensor sizes.
If you are going to make the move to a digital SLR, I also highly recommend the Canon 20d/30d cameras as a good system to begin exploring a variety of different photographic styles from outdoors to action to macro and still life. You really cannot go wrong with some of the other manufacturers like Nikon with their D70/D80 and Sony, but Canon, like Apple tends to build the entire widget from the glass to the camera to the imaging chips. Additionally, I tend to like the color representation from the Canon Digic imaging chips. If you are planning on shooting less outdoor work or in less rigorous environments, I'd suggest introducing yourself to digital SLRs with the lower end Rebel (or Nikon D50) series which is still pretty nice hardware, just not as ruggedly built. (I've also heard rumors that Nikon is going to introduce a new lower cost D40).
For a sample of some of the images possible with the Canon 20d/30d, almost all of the images on my blog [] that were taken by me have been captured with the Canon 20d and associated hardware. I also have a Canon hardware list at the top of my FAQ here [] that may be helpful for those that are interested in some of the lens options.
The negatives that the author of the linked article writes about are also true. Hauling around all of your camera gear to various spots on the globe does get a bit harder with more (and heavier) gear. I just got back from a trip to Argentina at the foot of the Andes (pics to be posted tomorrow morning) and it does take a bit more effort to pack everything you need to take with you. The gear addiction and associated costs do not stop at the camera body and lenses either. You will find yourself buying tripods, monopods, backpacks, filters, flashes, books, more books etc...etc...etc....
• Re:Go Digital SLR! (Score:5, Informative)
by sterno ( 16320 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:47PM (#16760353) Homepage
Agreed. I just upgraded from a Sony point and shoot digital to the Pentax K100D and have been totally thrilled. The Pentax is in the same realm as the entry level Nikon and Canon DSLR's but also has image stabilization incorporated into the CCD making low light photos better. Totally pleased with it so far.
The one caveat on the Pentax is finding good lenses for it is a bit more difficult. While you can use pretty much any lens ever made for a Pentax camera, I found that the selection of modern lenses for the canons and nikons is a bigger. Having said that, the lens it comes with is a good all purpose lense and I picked up a 50-200mm zoom that works really well.
• by guisar ( 69737 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @09:05PM (#16762083) Homepage
I also have a Pentax K100D and really like it's ability to use about every lens ever made. I wouldn't go back to a digicam. Just being able to adjust the depth of field and manually focus are huge advantages. It's really feel frustrated to use a point and shoot once you've used an SLR. This assumes of course that you are as infatuated with perfection and willing to read up, study and practice to perfection as I assume most readers of slashdot are.
One point I think the article skipped over though is the proprietary (RAW) format of most DSLRs. Unless you plan to take and save JPEGS, in which case you're better off using a digicam, you gotta use RAW. RAW's problem is it's a PITA to process. gphoto, etc for Linux sometimes deal with RAW, but others, like my model of the Pentax aren't even accomodated by Photoshop yet. So, beware you can't just take pictures out of these and upload them to flickr or do the other things you might be used to.
Good quality pictures, the sort of thing you see in the galleries of highly rated photos on, come from RAW photos that are processed in gphoto, GIMP, Photoshop, etc to bring out the best of the shot. It's not a quick process and you should aim more for the few good shots sort of scenario and leave the lot of candid photos to digicams or DSLRs on auto/jpeg mode.
The RAW format isn't the only proprietary trap of DSLRs. I bought a Pentax primarily because of the ease of lens interchange but it also uses standard old SD cards and regular AA batteries. I use rechargeables but the point is I don't have to buy those VERY expensive proprietary batteries or flavor of the month memory formats as you may if you don't watch out.
Check out Bibble and Bibblepro from Bibble Labs []. They're neither free nor Free, but they're reasonably-priced, excellent tools and they run on Windows, Mac and Linux (x86). I just looked and they support your camera []. You should get the 15-day trial and see what you think.
BTW, I have no affiliation with Bibble Labs, other than being a very satisfied customer.
• Re: (Score:3, Informative)
by loraksus ( 171574 )
Except that AA's - even rechargables - suck ass for powering cameras.I have a D50 and the kit battery lets me take somewhat in the area of 1700 pictur
• The Canon Digital Rebel XTi [] kind of makes even looking at the 30D pointless unless you just like how it feels in your hand better. That is the camera I would recommend to newcomers on the DSLR scene.
• Re:Go Digital SLR! (Score:5, Interesting)
by ScentCone ( 795499 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:56PM (#16760493)
Yes. I've been using film SLRs since the 1970s, and have burned through endless miles of film and paper. I became relatively conservative in my shooting because - never mind the cost - the sheer nuisance of getting the stuff processed was a hinderance (even if I let someone else digitize the negs). Yes, shooting film makes you a more thoughtful photographer. But...
Switching to a DSLR (in my case a Nikon D200) has completely altered my approach, entirely for the better. I'm still thoughtful about what I'm doing, but I experiment a lot more, and can adapt what I'm doing, based on the results, while my subject is still right in front me. I shoot gigabytes at a time and then trash the majority of it. The 6 fps and huge cache on the camera allow me to capture lots of things that a normal digicam or (not-insane) film SLR would never help me get, and I'm way ahead in productivity.
The added bonuses (like, Nikon's essentially miraculous, built-in remote strobe control stuff) still have me actually smiling everytime I contemplate a shoot.
But this stuff is NOT for the casual photographer - the digicams are just too good, and too reasonably priced, and too easy to use. A big ol' DSLR is not the right companion on a romantic hike or trip to a favorite restaurant. But I'm so happy to be able to put my collection of Nikon lenses to work on a new camera body, and to shoot stuff I simply never would have managed before. Seriously thinking about a D80 as a backup body (I tend to bang around in the field a lot).
• I got a D200 and D80, love 'em both.
I still shoot film though, at least when the image counts. I can still peg a digital Vs film print pretty quickly and the rigidity of the CMOS/CCD sensors used in digital bugs me.
• by EmbeddedJanitor ( 597831 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:00PM (#16760545)
I'll make a glaring assumption that we can take the Digital part of the equation. In other words, the comparison between a DSLR and DPAS (digital point and shoot) is about the same as between a 35mm SLR and PAS.
Since my teen years, I've had an SLR. For my wife's 30th bday I bought her a reasonable quality (Pentax) weatherproof aoto load auto focus auto flash PAS. Of course I turned my nose down and continued to use my SLR with clunky lenses and flash etc. So, often, my camera stayed at home in the closet while hers was handy in a pocket, handbag etc. I still have the SLR but I have not used it for over 8 years now.
About 4 years ago we decides digital was worth it. Got a Canon PAS + Zoom. It does a great job and is always handy. A DSLR would just get left behind.
The only time you want a DSLR is if you want to take professional pics. Professionals only account for a few % of the camera toting population.
• Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
by Cromac ( 610264 )
A P&S with you is better than the DSLR but if your pictures from a P&S look the same as those from a DSLR then you're better off with a P&S. People who are good with a camera will get a lot more out of a DSLR than can be done with any P&S.
If you just want snapshots get the point and shoot, if you want photographs get the DSLR.
• Re: (Score:3, Informative)
by Fred_A ( 10934 )
This is a common misconception. While it does of course depend on the camera, lots of compacts output very decent pictures.
What it *does* boil down to, is that the camera that you have with you is the one that gets the best pictures.
SLR cameras have a nu
• Re:Go Digital SLR! (Score:4, Insightful)
by Salvance ( 1014001 ) * on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:02PM (#16760573) Homepage Journal
For some people DSLR is definitely the right way to go ... but certainly not for the vast majority of people as the article would like us to believe. A $200 digital camera is quite an investment for most users, and the learning curve on these simple devices is quite steep for your average non-techie. But these $200 point-n-shoot cameras supply everything your average mom or dad want, while providing rather decent video and ample 'advanced' shooting modes.
Compare the point-n-shoot with what you consider an entry level camera (the Canon 20D) and we're looking at 2 completely different users. This $1000+ camera (after lenses, accessories, etc.) is far from simple to use, is less forgiving in automatic/autofocus mode, doesn't offer video, and could never fit in a pocket (or in most cases not even a backpack). It doesn't meet the needs of your average user ... who admittedly is not interested in taking professional level pictures (which yours appear to be, very nice BTW).
I have met so many average users who get sweeped into the marketing hype around DSLRs and then are highly disappointed. In the end, they often end up taking their point-n-shoot everywhere, while using the DSLR on a tripod for Christmas pictures. Hardly an effective use of $1000.
• Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
by honkycat ( 249849 )
I agree -- for most people, point and shoot is the way to go. I think the article author agrees also.
Personally, I think the question is not whether to have a P&S or a DSLR, it's whether to have just the P&S or a P&S *and* the DSLR. All those reasons that a P&S is more convenient for a casual photographer are just as true for a serious photographer when he's not on a shoot. He mentions in the article the idea that the photographer, not the camera, makes the picture. There's a corollary t
• Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
by crabpeople ( 720852 )
Apple builds intel processors? To me, apple always says less versatility - not more. You should maybe tone down the fanboism lest people get the wrong idea.
• by jeskandarian ( 408609 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:16PM (#16760779)
My D70 with a powerful Nikon flash on top takes kick ass pictures where a point-n-shoot just can't throw enuff light. Hot chick waaay across the room? No problem. The flash will throw enuff light and the camera will make it look like Ansel Adams took it. Right up in someone's grill? No prob. DSLRs handle the flash and won't have any bright spots. Essentially, it doesn't matter if you're totally clueless on how to use it you just get killer results.
Problem is that at any kind of event, as soon as you walk in with an SLR with a flash, you always get "Oh, the photographer is here" comments. You just can't be discrete toting one of those things around.
But, drunk girls at 3 frames per second never fails to yield interesting results. The 'model instinct' naturally comes out and nasty sh$t starts to happen....
• Re: (Score:3, Funny)
by Riktov ( 632 )
You just can't be discrete toting one of those things around.
You mean you just merge into one blob of flesh?
• Re: (Score:3, Funny)
by allanc ( 25681 )
Wait, what? The Nikon D70 will make a hot chick look like a national park?
• by Mal-2 ( 675116 )
If you were shooting film on a SLR before, didn't you already have the tripod, backpack, filters (maybe the wrong size, maybe not), and books, and maybe the flash as well? Those film SLR lenses will also serve well (after factoring in the +60% or so magnification factor) on the DSLR, though you are going to need specialized DSLR wide-angle lenses.
Personally I would like to get a digital back for my old manual-focus Canon A-1, but there aren't enough of us out there to get a product made. I prefer manual foc
• by BWJones ( 18351 ) *
I had to sell off all my 35mm gear for tuition money when I was an undergraduate. And even though I had one of the first digital cameras made for consumers, the Apple Quicktake 100, its not been until the last couple of years though that I've been getting back into photography seriously.
Those film SLR lenses will also serve well (after fa
• Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
by Mal-2 ( 675116 )
I once dropped my A-1 in a Mexican river while on this trip [], and although it was a quick dunk (no water in the film compartment) and it worked the rest of the day, I had to replace the shutter coil once it had dried out. I also had to get the lens cleaned as it got just enough moisture inside to grow stuff. (28-85mm f/4, it was well worth fixing.)
Since I was on a cruise ship and didn't really want to send my camera off for however long, I found a TV repair shop in Puerto Vallarta and bought a spool of coil
• Re:Go Digital SLR! (Score:5, Informative)
by dfghjk ( 711126 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:28PM (#16760941)
Apple makes the entire widget? That's new news. Canon is like Apple in that it has a rabid fan base, but (like Apple) its products aren't as differentiated as they would have you believe. Canon had a head start on sensor technology because it developed its sensors in-house and had the funding to do it. Nikon was nearly bankrupt at the start of the digital SLR revolution and couldn't fund development on its own. Canon's digital technology lead has largely evaporated though they certainly don't take a back seat to anybody.
"Additionally, I tend to like the color representation from the Canon Digic imaging chips."
Digic is the branding of Canon's image processing processor, not it's imaging chips. Color superiority is another aspect of the Canon lore in spite of the fact that, properly calibrated, color rendition between current SLR's is not that great. Superior color quality is something more generally attributed to Canon's L lenses although I feel that's also overblown.
Anyone interested in investing in a DSLR needs to realize that they are investing in a system and, over time, will tie up more money in lenses than digital camera bodies. Since lens families actually differ more that the DSLR's themselves at this point, it would behoove new buyers to consider how they intend to use their systems and read up on the various brands at serious photography sites. The choice between Canon and Nikon (or any other brand) is more properly made by understanding the system rather than considering comparisions to Apple or dubious statements about color rendition.
• Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
by drgonzo59 ( 747139 )
over time, will tie up more money in lenses than digital camera bodies. -- Amen to that!
Most photographers I talked to, told me if I ever wanted to buy a DSLR to buy the lens(es) _first_ then buy the body. A good lens will set you back a couple thousand...
I am actually a fan of Pentax and already pre-ordered the new K10D and ordered some lenses (I like my set of primes) and then I'll wait for the new set of zoom lenses coming in spring. Along with the macro and some wide angles I already have from the P
• Great to see a blog with nice pictures! Good job on all of them.
• Re: (Score:3, Informative)
by syousef ( 465911 )
The newer 400d has most of the features of the 30d at a much lower price (and a few of its own, like the anti-dust). If you're a beginner it's a better buy.
However if you're an absolute beginner or don't use your camera often and don't need the features of an SLR, the compacts have never been better value. What you won't get out of a compact is fast shutter speed (if you're shooting anything moving quickly like wildlife or sports, go for the DSLR), light sensititivity. With the DSLR you don't get movie mode
• by tverbeek ( 457094 ) * on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:43PM (#16760301) Homepage
1 - price
2 - price
3 - price
4 - price
5 - price
6 - price
7 - price
8 - size
9 - power requirements
10 - no Kodachrome or T-max 3200
Don't get me wrong: I'd love to have a DSLR (especially one compatible with my old K-mount SLR lenses), but so far, the reasons not to buy one have out weighed the reasons to buy one. I'm sticking to my compact battery-sipping 35mm SLR and my "prosumer" non-SLR digital for now.
• I'd like to refute points 8 and 9. My Rebel XT is just as small as any film SLR. The Battery lasts for several days of continuous shooting which is better then most point and shoots can say for themselves. Yes, a film SLR may last longer but what about having to change the stupid film every 20-30 shots?
• 11. You can't just point and shoot.
My brother has both, I got him a cheap point & shoot for £50 (post xmas, great time to buy), being a photo snob he later got himself an £N00 DSLR. Guess which gets by far most use. The point&shoot is tiny so its always there.
BTW, THE most important aspect of a digital camera is... battery life. There are loads of cameras with decent lenses, millions of pixels yada yada yada but they never tell you the battery is only going to last 20 minutes.
• D40 (Score:5, Insightful)
by nick_davison ( 217681 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:11PM (#16760707)
In answer to 1 through 8, wait a week. Rumor has it that Nikkon's about to anounce the D40 (leaked images all over - check out []).
By dropping the sensor resolution way down and ditching the bells and whistles you wouldn't find in similarly priced compacts either, they're looking at launching the first sub $500 DSLR.
For digital compact users who think DSLRs are too expensive - it's no around the price of a decent digital compact, no more.
For film SLR users who think DSLRs are too expensive, it's down to a few dozen rolls of film price difference and far less than the cost of a single great lens. Shoot clear of about a thousand shots, you'll save money with a DSLR.
As for power consumption, I'm not sure what's holding you back?
Batteries are rechargable so there's no real cost.
They last a reasonable length of time. A battery grip like the "big ED" holds a pair of batteries so it's down to one change every couple of hours.
Changing batteries is no more painful than changing film. If you shoot at any kind of speed you'll have to change rolls of film far more frequently than you'll have to change batteries. If you don't shoot that fast, your camera will go to idle mode and you'll get many hours of use out of a single battery.
Finally, yes, great film is still great. But, aside from its price, there are two main arguments against it:
1) No instant feedback. Say you're using ISO 3200 film to capture fast falling water droplets. Until you develop the film, you've no idea if you actually caught the instant. With digital, the proof's right there for review. It kind of sucks to finally develop film only to realize you didn't catch what you thought you did and have no way to practically recreate the shoot.
2) OK, you've loaded your camera with ISO 3200 film for a specific shot. The building rumbles, a plane has crashed outside. You spend the next couple of minutes trying to wind your film through, get it out without ruining your existing shots, searching for the ISO 200 that you didn't think to bring with you anyway. By the time you're ready to shoot, the drama of the once in a lifetime shot has long since past. Your buddy with a DSLR slides the dial to ISO 200, steps outside and gets the award winning shot. Sure, planes crashing are extreme examples - but life's filled with amazing unexpected moments that DSLRs let you get whilst changing film will miss many of them.
The world's moved on. Those arguments were fair enough for the first couple of generations of DSLRs. Honestly, it's now reached the point where it's like saying, "Steam gives better torque than internal combustion engines. I'm not going to buy one of those new fangled cars when my stanley steamer car works just fine." If you're determined to reinforce your preconceptions, you can probably just about find justification - but the rest of the world's moved on and for good reason.
• Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
by tverbeek ( 457094 ) *
As for power consumption, I'm not sure what's holding you back? ... They last a reasonable length of time. A battery grip like the "big ED" holds a pair of batteries so it's down to one change every couple of hours.
You sound like a Windows XP user bragging about how long he can go without rebooting. :)
I have a late-80's-vintage 35mm SLR that runs on a single button cell (i.e. no huge-ass "battery grip") for... hell, I can't even measure it in hours. Even when I was using it heavily, I'd go for months wit
• Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
by AK Marc ( 707885 )
If I'd owned a DSLR, it wouldn't even have been in the running, being heavier than both combined and requiring even more batteries.
Well, how many pictures were you planning on taking? If you were going to take 500 pictures, then you'd need 500/36 = about 13 rolls of film. My DSLR can take about 500 pictures on one battery. So, you'd need no extra batteries and no film. The weight between my SLR and DSLR is not significantly different. So, if you were to choose between a DSLR and an SLR, then for a tw
• Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
by moosesocks ( 264553 )
Although I'm going to agree with you on all of those points, I am going to chime in and say that T-Max is one of the biggest things I miss about film photography.
For one, shooting at ISO 3200 gives you razor-sharp results in almost any light conditions. Shooting digital at ISO 1600 in low-light produces noisy images, of which 3/4 are normally unusable. Film grain is preferable over sensor noise any day.
As far as films go, T-Max is pretty odd stuff. The range of light frequencies it responds to is quite d
• Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
by cdrudge ( 68377 )
But from the article: Price: DSLR cameras are practically affordable nowadays. The big two (Canon and Nikon) currently offer DSLRs for as low as $500-$600. I challenge you to find a good non-DSLR camera for under $600. Oh wait. Just about every non-DSLR camera is under $600. Nevermind.
• by furchin ( 240685 )
I agree about the price and size, but power?! I get 2,000 shots out of my D70's battery between charges. Yes, that's two thousand. Show me a digicam that can come even close. Shoot, show me a digicam which can get over 500 between charges.
• by Fordiman ( 689627 ) <fordiman@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:45PM (#16760323) Homepage Journal
This is all well and good, but can someone please tell me who the paranoid is that keeps tagging everything with 'itsatrap'?
• by Kufat ( 563166 ) <kufat&kufat,net> on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:47PM (#16760349) Homepage
DSLRs can't shoot video clips, because of the way they take pictures. (Regular digital cameras, meanwhile, are finally able to shoot some relatively decent video without being limited to a few seconds.)
• by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <> on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:51PM (#16760405) Homepage Journal
DSLRs could shoot video if they wanted to. What they couldn't let you do would be to look through the viewfinder while you're taping video, because the mirror would be in the wrong place for that. However, since they seem to all have screens on them, that's pretty much a non-issue. The real issue is that they don't even set them up to do video; they're designed to shoot stills exclusively. Even if they wanted to do video, they couldn't sample a 10MP sensor at 30 FPS and actually do something with the image data, so they'd have to read a subset of the pixels or something. This would of course produce a shit image without processing, which would take more CPU... It makes much more sense to just drop $500 on a cheapie MiniDV camcorder, you can get one with A/V passthrough for that even that can behave like a DV Bridge and convert analog video to DV or vice versa in realtime. Makes a nice gadget, and just a few years ago Sony used to sell a stereo component-sized unit that did the same thing for $500 :) (I have a DV Bridge, which sold for $200 I think.)
• The simple solution, as you say, is to lock the shutter up and then capture from the sensor just as a compact does (using a subset of pixels for bandwidth reasons).
There's another interesting technique that's been discussed - using a translucent mirror/prism that's locked in position with a separate shutter behind it. By doing so, x% of the light can be sent up to the eye piece while the other y% can be sent to the sensor.
If you then pull this out of the way and use the old method for stills, you still get
• If you want to shoot movies, why wouldn't you buy a video camera?
This is like saying "Don't buy screwdrivers because they don't drive nails very well."
• by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <> on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:47PM (#16760351) Homepage Journal
It will cost you at least $1000 to get a unit with decent dust-prevention equipment, maybe as much as $1200. That will get you a sexy 10MP DSLR, but I know that if I had that kind of money, I'd have more important places to spend it.
I recently looked at some Digital SLRs, and if anyone is considering buying a current-generation one for personal use, I'd say buy the cheap one (the Canon.) This is the third generation and they finally added a dust removal technology (to remove dust from the image sensor) ... and it's $200 cheaper than the competion.
• Sounds like you have had some serious problems with dust in the past. I'm just starting with DSLR and after 3,500 images I've not run into a dust problem yet. It may depend on where you shoot and how carfull you are when you change lenses. It's just not the issue some people think it is. The CCD is only exposed when the shutter is open and of course you would have a lens on the camera when the shutter is open.
I'd say the ONLY reason not to buy one (other then lack of funds, or no interrest in phot
• The inside of the camera creates its own dust. I've talked to numerous photographers who have bitched about this very issue. Canon is the latest arrival in this category, even. It only takes one spot of dust to piss me off, since you can't clean the sensor yourself. I don't want to be sending my camera in to the manufacturer for cleaning at $200 per visit, even if I only have to do it once in my lifetime. Besides, one of the joys of not having film is the ability to safely make a lens change any time, and o
• You need both (Score:5, Insightful)
by MightyYar ( 622222 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:48PM (#16760361)
Until lenses improve on cell phone cameras, you need both types of digicam if you are into photography. You need a pocket sized camera... no one would ever take an SLR camera on a serious hike, out to a bar, mountain biking, skiing, etc. On the other hand, only an SLR will give you the flexibility to express your artistic side.
It is better to have some slightly less snazzy snapshots of you and your friends with a compact camera then to miss out on photographing the occasion altogether because the camera is too big to lug around.
• You're right, no one takes them hiking. I wonder how all those nature photographers do it? Probably with a camera phone.
• by Lumpy ( 12016 )
really? I guess I am no-one then. because not only do I carry one of my Fuji S2 DSLR's on hikes on boats, even when I go skiing... But I have also carried a Canon XL1 $4500.00 video camera with a $1000.00 lens on it while riding backwards on a snomobile careening down a ski slope filming.. Oh, the camera also had $2500.00 worth of wireless audio recievers on it as well. No I am not a pro, yes this is my p
Jesus, of course they would. What, you think Ansel Adams had some mutant teleport power that he used to just *poof* himself into position to take his shots? No, he had to *hike* out to those locations, and he did it with a lot more than an SLR, he was hauling along oodles of medium and large-format stuff. People take photos up on Everest, and they don't do it with point-and-shoots.
It is better to have some
• A hike was just an example. I know some serious hikers... they buy light shoes to save a few ounces. They snap their stupid toothbrush in half to save the space. There is probably no room in their pack for a large P&S, let alone an SLR. Of course a more casual hiker or more dedicated photographer can find a way to get a camera up there... it was just an example :)
• Don't say "no one". Some people only go up mountains or onto the ski slope so they can capture the images they see there. I'm into underwater photography right now but I've hauled medium format systems and big tripods up moutians just for the shot.
The difference between a "photographer" and some one who just ownes a camera is the photographer thinks of the activity as "making images" and he just happens to be on a hike because that is how you get to the wildflowers or whatever his subject is. While the
• by setirw ( 854029 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:53PM (#16760427) Homepage
It's irrelevant, and it's not funny. I've been tagging similarly mistagged articles with "shutupwithitsatrap," and "!itsatrap."
The tag was already overused when it was remotely relevant, but today's usage is idiotic.
And yes, I acknowledge that this will be modded off-topic. I have some karma to spare.
• by caitsith01 ( 606117 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:53PM (#16760441) Journal
When the article contains remarks like this:
Most digicams are plastic, plastic, and more plastic. They feel flimsy and they're not all that hard to break. DSLRs are built to much higher standards
then you can tell that it is not particularly helpful at all. A great many 'digicams' are very nicely constructed. For example, the rather lovely Lumix [] range from Panasonic/Leica, one of which I am lucky enough to own, are extremely well constructed and are largely made from metals and special composites which do not feel 'plastic' in the least. They also have excellent ergonomics and performance. Many smaller cameras are also very nicely constructed, often from metal - the Canon Ixus [] range comes to mind.
I agree that DSLRs are nice, and I plan to acquire one myself. But it is not helpful to publish a list of 'reasons' which are little more than vague assertions that A is better than B, without taking into account either reality, or the very valid reasons why B might be preferable for many people.
• >> Most digicams...
the rather lovely Lumix range from Panasonic/Leica, one of which I am lucky enough to own
Leica have always been a quality based brand for the minority who appreciate them. They are not however, even close to common.
The statement remains true that, for the majority of consumer compact digital cameras, construction is generally cheap plastic that's liable to break if dropped or at least have zoom mechanisms lose alignment.
It is true to say, "Most people are not that well educated in
• CCD has better range and colors, then that of CMOS. Though top end of Canon's offering matches Nikon's.
1. Quality of images.
2. Better control of parameters
3. Choice of lenses for the variety of situations.
4. Speed - often point and shoots take a while to recylce the flash.
5. Ability to use professional flash.
6. Women like to pose for DSLR then to teensy point and shoot.
7. Batteries last longer, usually.
8. Speed of focus, at least on nikons it is excellent, so you don't loose the moment.
9. ...
10. ...
• Tell that to my Nikon D2x - it uses a CMOS sensor and does very well, thank you. The D200 (and D80/D70/D50) use a CCD sensor. Ask the Nikon engineers why. If you are obsessively technoid, you can come up with reasons for using one or the other but you end up in a Ford / Chevy argument. The latest offerings from Nikon and Canon (and pretty much everybody else) are typically more capable than the photographer.
You seem to be confuse the image sensor type (CCD vs CMOS) with the mirror / lens arrangement (S
• Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I'm sold!
• by bhmit1 ( 2270 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @06:54PM (#16760463) Homepage
I love my Nikon D70 (especially since I used hotel points to buy it), but for every shot I get that others don't have a chance because of shutter speed or ability to use another lens, there's one that I missed because I didn't consider lugging out my camera bag for some event. With compact cameras being as small as ipods these days, I'd recommend that you start with one of those first, and when you want to take it to the next level, get a second camera as a dslr.
Yeah, sorta. Guess it depends on your camera heritage, as it were. People who've been shooting a film SLR already have the size thing ironed out, and will be in the best position to leverage all of the fantastic stuff that a modern DSLR can do for them. Once you've experienced a camera like a recent Nikon DSLR, the spe
• In college, my high school girlfriend went to Miami (Florida) and I went to a school in Dallas TX; we spent all the breaks together, and other than that we didn't see eachother. Since this time was special to us, we took a lot of pictures. She owned a Casio Exlim camera basically a point and shoot the size of a credit card x 1cm thick, I a Canon Powershot A80 - about as big as three decks of playing cards stacked together. After the first day, the Powershot got left behind, and we ended up taking over a tho
• Much of your analysis is predicated on the existence of girlfriends, sometimes with hot friends. I'm afraid we'll have to take that bit of erroneous input into account as we mod your comment. Now, if you'd care to re-post your comment, substituting "mom" for "girlfriend," we'll all have a better baseline with which to work.
• Viewfinder (Score:3, Informative)
by stereoroid ( 234317 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:03PM (#16760593) Homepage Journal
Of the points raised in the article, I found the viewfinder the most convincing reason to get a DSLR. Live preview on a screen is not a replacement, especially in the dark, when a screen can kill your night vision. It's also very quick once you get used to it, and I've found the difference is particularly apparent with long lenses. Be aware, though, that not all DSLRs are equal in this respect: so far, of the established makers, Canon have been poor, Nikon average, and Pentax have really emphasised a good, bright viewfinder in their mainstream DSLRs. That may change, of course - the new Nikons are catching up.
Another key point is that you're not just buying a camera, you're buying in to a system, so the lens range needs to be taken in to account, in the long term. You're not going to be happy with the "kit lens" for very long.
• I wouldn't actually use it.
Seriously, I'm normally a gadget freak. I love anything I can tinker with, especially if it appeals to my creative side. But I somehow managed to call up enough restraint a few years ago to get the tiniest decent-quality camera I could find (a Minolta Dimage Xt, just a little larger than an Altoids tin), and I couldn't be happier. When I'm at a party, family event, wandering a random city on vacation, etc. I can just stick it in a shirt pocket, enjoy myself, and pull it out to tak
• Problem... (Score:3, Informative)
by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:07PM (#16760647) Homepage
the lens that comes with most DSLR's is utter crap. the Rebel comes with a lens that makes the point and shoots look bad, but it is complete crap compared to a $250.00 Prime lens.
Granted, the most expensive DSLR is cheap compared to a good lens, and that trap can bleed you dry on your new hobby.
But, if you get a DSLR I strongly reccomend that you get a 60mm prime (I reccomend a 1.8 or faster but most people cringe at a $600.00 or more lens) and see what your DSLR camera can really do.
• You are right to say "look at the lens". but not all "kit lenses are crap. For example the Nikon 18-55mm is quite good. The one that comes with the canon Rebel has th same specs is poor. Like anything else read the reviews and look at the total system.
• The real reason (Score:2, Informative)
by 3.14159265 ( 644043 )
Superior optics. Period. Everything else is a nice to have, e.g. take 1000+ fotos with a single battery (without flash)
Got a Nikon D70, absolutely astonishing pictures, even though they say it's not the camera, but the person behind it... :)
• by rdewalt ( 13105 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:22PM (#16760869) Homepage
I have looked at the other models, and right now, I don't see any that have told me "upgrade to me!" other than the "holy crap, 4k!" Nikon D2Xs.
Please, check out [] before you purchase a camera. No, seriously. When I was a salesdroid, I recommended -everyone- check that site at least once before spending $money on camera.
I saw the D80, and I looked at "What does it offer?" well, okay, its 10mp vs 6mp. But thats not enough to make me buy it. The D80 uses SD cards vs the CF/MD cards of the D70. No benefit there. I have $500 in microdrives. The extra resolution is nice, but not -by it self- enough. A 4x6 image only needs a "3mp" area to be displayed at "80% of humans will never discern it from film"
As a former salesman, you need to ask "What is my end result?" if the answer is "To send pics to grandma" Then -ANY- digital camera will do it. DSLR's bring forth the power of film cameras. If you don't need that power, you don't need a DSLR.
I have a half dozen lenses for my camera. But I'm a semi-pro photographer. A situation that inspires me to get a $400 lens, you might not feel the same on.
Go, Decide for yourself. I can lay out ten thousand reasons why I love my rig and gear. The will -NOT- apply to you. Such is art.
• by hahiss ( 696716 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:28PM (#16760929) Homepage
I probably won't buy one of these things until the attached cell phone works better. I mean, yeah, the pictures totally rock, but I can't exactly call anyone with them.
• SLRs in general are much, much more versatile for tacking pictures than point and shoot. The bit about creative control is definitely true. I loved the N8008 but the film and development cost started to add up. I tend to play around with the various camera settings as a way to learn so I tend to take a lot of pictures of the same scene, etc. The DSLR allows me to do that.
I do disagree with the author on a minor point. Not all DSLRs are built to the same quality. Even within the Nikon family the D80/70
• by Banner ( 17158 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @07:39PM (#16761067) Journal
I just bought a new Canon XTi like one HOUR before this article got published here. So now I'm afraid to go read it and find out what I screwed up!
Drat you slashdot!!! :-)
• by IronChef ( 164482 ) on Tuesday November 07, 2006 @08:13PM (#16761467)
dSLRs have MANY advantages as the article points out. But it glosses over the cost issue. Getting a dSLR with the same reach as a long-zoom "prosumer" camera can cost quite a bit.
Take for example the Nikon Coolpix 8800, or the Panasonic FZ30. They both have good glass: the 8800 has a zoom range of, in 35mm equivalence, 35-350mm. The Panasonic is 35-420mm. Both have optical image stabilization built in, and both can do macro photography too. You also get dSLR style complete manual control if you want it. (Lots of non-dSLRs have good controls, I think the article flops out a red herring there. You just have to do your homework.)
The 8800 isn't made anymore, but it was about $800-900 new, about as much as the original Nikon d70 with kit lens I think. The Panasonic must be on the way out, as it is now about $400. (It is speculated that these types of cameras are a lot less profitable than dSLRs and so are getting erased from the lineups. I dunno.)
So why would I have bought an 8800 instead of a d70? Easy. The cost of a Nikon LENS that can hit 300mm of zoom seems to be about $500--and it still won't let you do macro. When you buy that affordable dSLR kit camera, you aren't buying a complete solution... you are buying a starting point unless your only interests fall in that ~28-105mm range the kit lens covers.
I must grant that the dSLR is superior in many ways, particularly quality of the sensor. A bigger sensor is less prone to noise at high ISO, so your DSLR can shoot cleaner at 1600 than my 8800 can at 200. That is a big deal! But to take full advantage of that, you need to carry around a bag of lenses. (The article didn't mention battery life, another big win for DSLRs by the way.)
I'm not slamming dSLRs. No flames, please. I'm just saying that there is an argument for buying a camera that can do a good job on a little bit of everything, even if it isn't the BEST at any of it. Like any other complex gadget, do your homework--there are a lot of really good cameras available these days. And this is a complicated hobby so you won't get everything you need to know from one top-10 list article (or snarky forum post). Figure out what you want to shoot and the choice of camera will become more clear.
ok, here come the haters, I know it...
• by Magnus Pym ( 237274 ) on Wednesday November 08, 2006 @06:25AM (#16765461)
If you have never used an SLR before and have no investment in lenses etc, by all means, go ahead and buy a DSLR. You won't be disappointed by the image quality.
However, if you are a longtime film-SLR user and have an investment in SLR lenses for some platform, then watch out!
In a nutshell, most of the lenses in your collection will not be really usable with your shiny new DSLR! This is because most DSLR use an imaging sensor that has a different size than the 35 MM film size. What this means is that the effective focal lengths of all your lenses are going to be different from what they are when fixed to a film camera. Nikon has a multiplication factor of 1.5. Depending on the model, Canon has a multiplication factor of 1.5 or 1.6. [Some of Canon's Very Expensive cameras have a 35-mm size sensor and have no multiplication factor]
What this means is that your 50mm lens will have an effective focal length of75 mm, reducing its utility considerably. You will find that you will have to replace pretty much all your stock lenses with new "digital-ready" lenses, a pretty significant investment overall. I am surprised that the article did not mention it.
Why is this? The camera companies say that full-frame sensors are expensive, and that they don't contribute much to image quality anyway. The former might be true, but not something that investment and time won't fix. The latter is completely bogus. They said the same thing about the APS system, but the marketplace quickly figured out that this was not right and rejected the system.
Here is the real reason: Companies like Canon and Nikon make far more money on their lenses than they do on their cameras. They are always looking for ways to make you buy more lenses. If their old-line lenses could work with the new DSLRs, they have lost a huge profit opportunity! But they cannot change the format of the camera-lens connector without a huge backlash from the customers. So this is a way by which they can force the adoption of an entirely new line of lenses, at the same time maintaining plausible deniability.
If you regularly use an external flash, you will have to buy a new external flash as well. The flashes that used to work with film cameras are not fully compatible with the DSLRs.
• by theonetruekeebler ( 60888 ) on Wednesday November 08, 2006 @07:56AM (#16765947) Homepage Journal
Unless you're a professional, or even a dedicated amateur, a digital press-here-dummy camera is probably all you'll ever need:
1. Price: A midrange DPHD costs less than half what the most basic DSLR is going for.
2. Size: Most DPHDs will fit in your shirt pocket.
3. Weight: Big, clunky DSLRs are also heavy. Your hands get tired dealing with it, and your neck hurts from carrying it on a strap.
4. Single unit design: The whole camera is a single entity. No lenses to take on and off, no lens caps to lose, no equipment bags to lug around. The only accessory is a little cable you leave at home next to your laptop -- same as with the DSLR.
5. Ergonomic simplicity: A DPHD is designed for one-handed operation.
6. LCD viewfinder: You'll be amazed at how often you want to take a picture, but have no way to get your head in the right position to take a shot. The LCD lets you hold the camera away from you, to the side, wherever, just as long as you can see the display. Some even have flip-out displays so you can take pictures of things behind you.
7. Ease of use: Okay, DSLRs have pretty efficient automatic modes. But switching to manual mode is like turning off the autopilot on a fighter jet -- you better know what you're doing or everything goes to hell at once.
8. You can hand it to your kid: The entire instruction set is "look here and push this button."
9. You can hand it to a stranger: "Can you get a picture of me and my honey in front of the manatee tank? Just look through here and push this button."
10. Durability: Knock a DSLR and a DPHD off the patio table and see one bounces and which one turns to rubble.
11. You ain't that good: Probably one camera owner in ten is skilled enough -- or willing to take the time to become skilled enough -- that they can take advantage of the capabilities a DSLR has over a PHD camera. For the rest of us, the real magic of any digital camera is that you can play the odds: Take a dozen snaps at a time, without spending a dime on film, and see which one turns out right.
• Counter argument (Score:3, Informative)
by ItsIllak ( 95786 ) on Wednesday November 08, 2006 @08:41AM (#16766377) Homepage
I'm personally going the other way. Ideally I'd like a decent DSLR and a super-compact. The latter would live in my bag and the former would be for specific opportunities. In reality, what would happen is that the latter would be in my bag, and the DSLR would be in the cupboard.
DSLRs have lots of problems, even ignoring the technical ones (dust being the biggest). Pull one out in public and you'll get treated differently (usually negatively). Pull out a good quality compact and everyone will ignore you. The one above, they're just NOT everyday-portable.
I see his point, but just to rebuff some of them ..
Creative Control:
Not seen the Casio Z1000 or Z800, the Canon S70 or S80, the Panasonic LX1, LX2, the Leica Digilux 1 or 2 or many more then? There are quite a few very small cameras that give you lots of camera control.
Accessories Galore:
Plenty of cameras either have after-market add ons to give them a standard fitting, or even manufacturer add-ons. However, try getting a manageable underwater case for your new D80 - it'll cost a fortune and act as it's own personal float.
No Shutter Lag
Instant Startup
Sure, but there are plenty of the DSLRs that are pretty crap in this respect too. The latest generation are the first you can reasonably rely on.
Higher Build Quality
See above list for pretty well constructed, metal bodied cameras.
I'm not sure you'll get many Electronic View Finders in the smallest compacts, but there are increasing numbers as the size increases. Other than that, you often get reasonable rangefinders. Not SLR, but you get used to it very quickly
Seriously? It's not always better to have a huge luggable camera to hold.
Seriously? No really, SERIOUSLY? The price of the compacts is lower than the DSLRs. End of story.
• by cyberworm ( 710231 ) <.moc.liamg. .ta. .mrowrebyc.> on Wednesday November 08, 2006 @02:33PM (#16773159) Homepage
It's been a while since I've shot film, but if I remember correctly, White Balancing was never an issue. I've found that with my D50 I have to realllllllly keep track of how my camera is set in regards to white balancing (even on Auto... I use "Probably" aka Program and Manual unless I hand my camera off to someone so I can be in the photo).
The "auto" WB mode does ok for most stuff if I'm using a flash or outdoors. When I move inside though, it becomes apparent how poorly the camera recognizes Incandescent light bulbs or flourecent lighting. Granted when I go do post processing of the RAW images, I have the option to correct these, but if you're just an average guy taking family snaps you could really be disappointed that your 600$ super camera is making Aunt Helen look jaundiced, like an Ooompa Loompa, or a Smurf. With film, what you see has usually been what you get. With digital, it's been my experience that if you don't pay attention, you may not always get what you see.
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} | 7,985 | « The Panasonic G3 and the Olympus XZ-1 | Main | I Get to See the Mahvelous Fuji X-Pro1 »
Saturday, 27 October 2012
Um, the drawer-full of cool Pentax lenses I inherited from my Dad...
But seriously, “results” may not be a useful category. A key contributor to results is how likely you are to have the camera with you when the opportunity to get results occurs.
No. If the results were all that mattered, you would carry with you whatever camera you needed to, no matter how heavy or inconvenient. Consider William Henry Jackson packing hundreds of pounds of glass plates by mule into the High Sierra....
I don't see any poll or any link to said poll
I don't understand how a lens guy like you, Mike, is setting up a poll in which the available lenses don't contribute to "the result" but are a sort of warm & fuzzy feeling thing like buying the special limited edition silver version of your camera.
re: "choose cameras for reasons other than the results they yield—because of the system that's available for them, the lenses that are available for them"
I disable flash (Actually never installed it on this computer), and so the widget did not show up for me.
I find my Mac runs quieter (less fan noise), and longer on battery if I leave flash disabled, a yet I miss only a few things with it disabled.
Also, I presume this would not work it I were reading it on my iPhone or iPad (which I do sometimes), via RSS.
The widget does not work for me. Flash belongs in the dustbin of history, in any case.
I have a Canon 5DmkIII. Big bulky thing. I'd much rather shoot with my M9 or X-Pro 1, but for macros or fast action shots of the baby where continuous AF is necessary and a zoom helps, I will use the 5DIII.
Interesting post Mike, I think the advent of really good mirrorless cameras is causing a true paradigm shift.
I was always a "results trump everything" kinda guy, being an occasional second shooter for my father's Photography business and a keen amateur, so it was important to get the right results, bang on every time. As a pure hobby-ist I took the same view. Big canon, big glass, great results.
But, over the last year I was borrowing, pretty much all the time, a first gen. sony NEX5 from my office. The quality of shots from the wee pancake f2.8 lens were consistently pretty good, and of course crucially, it really could fit in a coat pocket.
Finally there truly was, for me, the combination of results that were "wow" enough, but I actually had something that I felt allowed me to live by the addage of the best camera being the one you have with you, with it actually being pretty damn close to the best camera full stop.
So, a few weeks ago, sold off all the big DSLR gear, and bought a NEX7. Have a 24mm zeiss on order, but loving using legacy lenses on it (50mm f1.2 AIS nikkor is my current fave!).
It's is taking some time to learn how to get the best results from it, the handling is awful compared to my old kit, but it is getting a lot more use, and the results are getting close to what I want. Fabulous.
Thanks. I just changed the language of the post to make that a little clearer.
can't see the poll widget. IPAD 2, IOS 6
I'm currently enjoying bird photography with an OM-D EM-5 and a Panasonic 100-300mm lens. Hardly the camera/lens combo for best results, but I wouldn't be able to afford (and wouldn't want to carry) a pro body SLR with a 500mm full frame prime lens. Even sliding down the scale to a top of the line APS-C and a 300mm prime would still be left at home more often than not. Now when I go out to walk to the dog I grab my camera bag and sling it over my shoulder. Or when I go to my in-laws place (with a great window that looks over a ravine with a river) I'll bring it along. I've gotten some really nice shots that way.
I "inherited" an early Canon DSLR and a couple of lenses, and I eventually sold that camera for a t2i and later sold the original lenses for a couple of Sigma lenses, including my favorite, the 30mm f / 1.4.
I'm a classic case of path dependence: had I realized that I'd sell all the original Canon gear I had, I probably would've bought a Sony A65. But because I didn't realize that, and because I'm financially constrained, I'm now using a t2i because of a decision one of my parents made about eight years ago and because of my failure to realize what kinds of things I most like to shoot and which lenses I most like to use.
I don't know how to answer. If a camera doesn't yield good pictures nothing else is important. But given that many cameras can make great photos, results do not trump all else. Handling, ease of use and reliability are important, but not equally important.
(OK, I'll having a few cameras I picked up just because they look cool, but those are more display objects than cameras.)
I originally picked Nikons because my friend had them. Having done that I never saw any reason to pick something else because fundamentally they do everything I need, and my iPhone now does everything else (used to carry a P&S too, but don't much anymore).
It depends on what you mean when you say "results." After all, "results" are more than just a matter of image quality.
Some cameras have poor ergonomics, so you end up fiddling with buttons while the guy next to you with a well designed camera gets the shot. Or you can't easily determine what your settings are and you end up shooting that daylight scene at ISO 1600 because you were thinking about composition, not checking the mishmash of numbers all over the screen. Or you miss the shot because you pressed on a dial instead of the shutter button because there are three "bumps" on top and they all feel the same to your finger. Or your camera is so "automatic" that you can't manage manual zone focusing, so you miss all those fast-moving street scenes because your autofocus is swimming all over the place while the guy next to you (who is zone focusing) nails it.
Does that count as "results?"
As I said on my "My DP1" blog a while back, when I decided not to get a DP1 because of the slow responsiveness, "getting the shot on a 1/1.7 sensor is better than missing the shot on an APS-C Foveon."
As others have said, I was sorry to see this was a flash based poll. I agree with the "dustbin of history" comment. I just happened to be reading this from my Mac Pro where I run Flashblock, so I enabled your poll for this instance. Normally I would have been on my iPad and it wouldn't have shown up, as others have commented.
As for camera selection, growing up I always dreamed of owning a top-of-the-line Nikon, but could never afford it. When digital came along, and I had some disposable income, I went with the Canon 10D. At the time, Canon was way ahead of Nikon in the DSLR game as far as I was concerned. I now shoot with a Canon 5D II, and while I envy, a bit, those shooting with a Nikon D800, I have way too much Canon L glass to consider switching.
Price has to be a consideration. If several camera systems give roughly equal (and all acceptable) results, then price matters.
I guess a history of rangefinders, and now a Fuji X100 puts me firmly in the second category. I would even sacrifice some of the image quality for something smaller and more immediate. Note that it would have to be both. There are plenty of smaller cameras, just as there are plenty of faster cameras. However, in a way this is still a striving for better results. The reason I don't get the results I want is that I don't bring the camera, and now with the smaller X100, if I bring it, it often isn't quick enough to capture the pictures I want.
I think there's a wide fuzzy area. For example, I could supply an African royal family with the cameras I have bought because they were a bit smaller and had a bit better sensors than the one from last year. So you could say the result drives that, but I also have a strong love for a Great Gadget.
I love great pictures, and I'm very proud of the ones of my own I really like. And I always dream of making even better ones, and think about how I can accomplish it. (Fast focus in the street for example.) But I also, now I'm better off than in my yoof, have a collection of cameras I never intended to use, mostly silver metal SLRs from the fifties through seventies. To me, a Pentax Spotmatic is a sculpture.
Results are, of course, important. Even the Lomo folks are consider their results important. But the process? The journey of what we do to get to those images on our screen? That for me is where the real fun lies.
I may not be schlepping a wagon load of wet plate chemicals and glass into the wilderness but given the looks my Rolleicord gets sometime you'd think I was. But in the end?
Good enough for me.
I fall into a couple of camps with this one...
My choice of Canon's Eos 1Ds DSLR was entirely driven by it being the only digital full frame with a 24mm Tilt/Shift lens at the time. I have always, and will probably continue to loathe the handling of the Eos System, but I'm now invested so heavily in the TS-E 17/24/45/90 set that I'm stuck with it. The 17 & 24II are both wonderful lenses though.
On the other hand my choice of film kit is purely aesthetic and tactile. The look of the Contax 159 and it's Zeiss lenses is almost perfect to my eye, what's more I can now afford some of them (though they are not cheap yet!)so I enjoy buying and selling them on the auction site, trying different lenses and slowly building a system.
Using an iPad... No widget visible...
Isn't your question a bit vague though?
Some could say "I put up with a Nikon 1 because I need the telephoto-reach and high framerate".
Others "I put up with a Lomo because that's the effect I need".
I myself put up with Sigmas DP cameras for the last couple of years, because I loved the images.
Now I got an EM5 and while I might not get the exact same image characteristics, it allows me to take pictures in very different ways than before.
So I could argue that I changed to the Olympus because those different results are everything that counts... :-)
Isn't the most important "result" that you're happy with a camera and you take it out to use it?
I can't find an answer that seems honest among those two.
Lots of the tradeoffs in equipment choice are between quality of the images captured, and probability of capturing the image I want. For those, I will favor probability of getting a usable image over quality of images that aren't what I wanted every time.
And also, it doesn't cover the other big limitation, money. Don't have a D4, don't have a D3s, even though they would clearly be better for the work I consider important. This falls in a somewhat different category from weight or liking for the UI or such.
I too think this might be a false distinction.
I answered results because I do tend to do what is necessary to get the results I want. That said, my camera is a small pocket camera (an LX3). Why? Because I don't have the money to buy an expensive camera, because I wanted a camera that I easily carry around with me. Because 'anything' is relative.
Can you spare us all the knee-jerk Flash hatred In the comments - people quickly forget (or never realized) how much that cross-platform, browser-agnostic technology pushed the boundaries of the Internet, and gave us not only dynamically-driven experimental and immersive websites, but also educational and gaming platforms, not to mention universal streaming video.
But no, my iPhone doesn't show the widget. Thanks Steve - we all know it was battery life you were worried about.
The two choices aren't really going to tell you much, Mike.
I'm sure that there are plenty of photographers who, given the opportunity, would choose to shoot with something like a Leica S2, or a medium format digital back, or a new Leica M, or a Nikon D4, but whose bank accounts only support a four year old pro-sumer DSLR and a couple of slow third party zooms...
Their hearts say choice #1, but their pockets say choice #2.
How should they answer the poll?
(BTW - I agree with the comments on Flash. It needs to go...)
Price, IQ, size, weight, primes
when I tried for the first time, the widget did not work (neither in Firefox, nor in Chrome). Now, on my second attempt it works.
Please stay away from Flash.
I choose cameras for their size mostly. I have large hands, so I'd rather have an SLR vs. a point-and-shoot any day. The poll works fine on my main PC, but I had to tap the widget on the NOOK in order to see it, and it appeared as if I couldn't post a message here using the NOOK. So, if there are two messages, please delete the other one.
To answer the poll, I thought of it like this: would I enjoy photography as much if I had camera which took wonderful photos in every situation, but I had to use the lcd on the back to take the shot? Nope, I'd rather use an SLR and look through the viewfinder, thank you very much.
I voted "other things are important to me," of course!
I voted, after some hesitation, for "results." But a lot of things like ergonomics and appropriateness fold into "results," right? And I've publicly admitted that I won't buy the new hot Olympus because of that fake pointy mirror housing on it. But all of that folds into "results." I think you take better pictures with a camera that you like, and that you handle naturally, and that becomes a friend.
I won't go on any extended rip on Leicas, but I've had both film and digital Leicas (the M8) and honest to God, when it came right down to results, with the M8, I couldn't see them...and that was ultimately the reason I got rid of it. I still can't see them, in examples I've seen from the M9. I really think Leicas are the cameras bought for "other" reasons; it's not the glass, not the results, it's the red dot and the prestige. (Although, there may be a very few photographers who are exceptions.)
Poll doesn't show for me. I'm on an iPad (about 1 year old) also if your widget is flash then off course it wouldnt work.
No poll on my iPad.
Everything that needs to be said about Flash has already been said, but I'd like to be a voice in the chorus: Flash eats CPU, crashes, and doesn't work on iOS. I've disabled it. Please don't use it.
"Why do you choose cameras?" You mean as opposed to, say, guns or model trains? I can't see the poll widget on my Linux system.
The answer to the question hinges on how you measure results. I could use a camera that would allow me to achieve technically "superior" results compared to what I actually use. But the format (aspect ratio) and viewfinder affect the way I see, and that affects my results much more directly. How would I answer this question, I'm a bit confused...?
That seems to be a rather 'arbitrary to the point of uselessness' distinction. Pretty much every non-larger format film photographers are making a compromise in terms of objective quality potential versus the ability to carry and use the camera, and process the images. By that standard, I didn't buy a small silent camera with extremely good high ISO performance because I like to take pictures of live performance in available dark and it seemed like the best camera available to get the results I wanted; I should have bought a view camera and paid to stage performances under high wattage lights so that I could get the absolute best image quality and was willing to do whatever it took to get it.
The two alternatives aren't really alternatives. There's no way to say that camera X - in a wide open comparison with all other cameras - gives you the best results without a consideration of the real world practicality of the camera, it's ecosystem, the conditions under which you'll be operating, and the results you want to achieve.
I voted to to abstain from voting since the question is wrong.
Results trump everything. However, results are a function of ease of use and lens selection (among other things) in addition to raw image quality.
I voted "results" but I assume this includes the handling, durability, focus speed etc because this is what can make the difference between the image and not the image.
Brand, prestige, looks etc are what I call "other things".
If a camera doesn't feel good, I'm not going to shoot it, no matter how clean its high ISO or wide its DR.
I'm amused at the current 50/50 split amongst voters; for no good reason I thought the result would be skewed towards "results at all cost".
I voted for results trump all.
BUT: That's in a broader sense. For example, I might pass on a camera that gives me better results for one kind of photo, but worse for others, even when that kind of photo is important to me.
My 1Ds, for example, gives a little better image quality for landscape than my K-5. But the K-5 travels with me a lot more often, so it gets more landscape pictures -- and so it might be said to get better results.
Nothing is simple, huh.
I've tried Safari, Firefox and Chrome, and it doesn't show-up on any of them!! I even enabled JavaScript, and it still doesn't work. BTW Flash is enabled.
Try a new widget.
To me, handling is just as important as IQ. And joy when using the camera is just as important as handling.
If I'm holding the best camera available but I have to dive in five levels of menus just to change the ISO setting, is not worth it.
I'm also not very comfortable with the all electronic feel of some cameras, I like the noise and mechanic of the bigger bodies. I'm 30 years old, but I guess I shoot like I'm 60.
No poll appearing here either, yet running latest Firefox with Flash & Javascript enabled (albeit sandboxed).
As for the question, I find it hard to believe that, today, there would be one single camera standing out from the crowd enough to be deemed the only means of achieving a certain type of result. In other words, and speaking for myself only, this kind of thinking appears to be something a photographer imposes on himself, and nothing else.
Over at ByThom he is talking about the lack of lenses for the Nikon DX format. One of the reasons I went with Nikon and the DX format back in 2007 is that I trusted Nikon to develop lenses for the DX format. They didn't. At least not what I am looking for.
For that reason I have only one additional lens besides the kit lens for my DX camera and I need to replace it but I will probably not select Nikon. Or I will wait until I need to replace my current Nikon camera and then chose another brand or at least keep an open mind when it comes to other brands.
Nope. No poll here, either.
Perhaps I'm being too literal, but if "Results trump everything else" wouldn't we all (or at least those of you who selected that option) be shooting with 20x24 view cameras? Truth is, we ALL sacrifice "image quality" for the sake of something else--be it ease of use, size, weight, cost, etc.
When voting I assumed you meant "sharpest lens, most pixels,that sort of pixel peeper measure. I'm more inclined to buy a camera that I like for its handling and size. That said I like a number of different cameras for different reasons and uses.
If we only cared about the end result, we'd all be lugging and shooting large format cameras.
For me results are all that matter, but getting the results I want depends on having a camera that has the mix of features that I can use to produce those results, which is why I seem to accumulate so many cameras.
If the question is would you use an ugly unfashionable camera if it did the job, or is looking like a proper photographer's camera part of the requirement, then I would go with the ugly unfashionable does the job camera.
Most of the fun to use aesthetically pleasing cameras I have owned produce so-so results. I would go as far as saying that generally the pleasure of using a camera is inversely proportional to the quality of the results. Of course there are plenty of counter examples.
Nothing to do with your widget but I want to give one answer at home and another at work.
No poll icon or other access shows for me
I wonder how many people who selected "results" are using m43 or smaller formats? A lot I would bet.
How could someone become accomplished as a photographer and yet hate cameras?
I wouldn't consider talking to a surgeon or an auto mechanic who bore an antagonistic relationship to the available instruments and tools.
If the tools don't get out of the way, if one is thinking about them to the point of hating them, then perhaps one's true calling is as an inventor.
I care about the way a camera "feels." I like the basic controls in a simple manner easily accessible for me to make my own decisions. This means that I want aperture control on the lens, and a shutter wheel on the top of the camera. And I also like a camera as a piece of well-crafted machinery.
My first camera was a Praktika with Zeiss Jena lens, then a Contax N1. I replaced the N1 with a Canon 5D as my first digital camera, which I sold for a Leica M8. I own quite a few cameras, but none have ever "felt" so right for me as a Leica, and I have never looked back.
No widget for me either....!
Results certainly trump aesthetic and ergonomic perfection, at least for me. I'm willing to heave 40 lbs. of gear including a pair of full frame D-SLR bodies, multiple lenses and a big tripod, because I've used all of it at one time or another to capture a treasured image a half mile hike from the car. This is not to say I enjoy being a pack mule, but the results are well worth it.
On the other hand, I confess an unseemly affection for the brutish weight and solidity of the Eos-1DSIII. It fits my large hands, that huge bright viewfinder suits my middle-age eyes, and the graceless lumpishness has grown on me. Those cute little mirror-less cameras seem too dainty.
I see an empty white box where the poll belongs.
(At a linux machine at work running Firefox 2.0.)
If you were to divide up the reasons with something like a pie chart, results would be the largest piece for me. I use a Mamiya 7 as my primary art photo/work camera because it allows me to carry around a lightweight camera that shoots large 6x7 negatives. The lenses are sharp and the camera is reliable. There's a growing amount of sentimental value attached to my camera body, given all that photographs I've taken with it that mean something to me.
I think many of us start mostly with results and end up overlapping more with other factors because of sentimental reasons, experience, hopes, ideas and so on.
No flash support on the iPad Mike. I use what I need to get results, for shooting sport it is my DSLR and heavy lenses. They rest of the time I am far more contented using my feather weight micro four thirds system. I feel it gives me better results shooting candid street and travel photos than i would get flashing a big DSLR.
I guess I *should* say that only the results matter, but if the camera 1) enables me to get the shots, 2) enhances my ability to get the shots, 3) improves the quality of my shots (e.g, low noise at high ISO), or 4) gets in the way of me getting the shots, then the *camera* matters. Otherwise, it's just a tool (however cool), just like a hammer. No one tells the carpenter "oh, what a great hammer you have" when looking at an award-winning house.
Results are the most important part when it comes to choosing a camera, of course, but I must confess aesthetics played a major role when it was time for me to choose my current camera, the Olympus E-P1. Although I'm quite new to photography, I had early exposure to photographic equipment through the 70's as an uncle of mine was a salesman for the portuguese Fujifilm and Minolta distributor. He actually sold my father a Minolta Hi-Matic 7S, which shaped my aesthetic preferences. I can say rangefinder-style cameras are my thing.
When I first saw an image of the E-P1, I fell in love instantly. I immediately decided I had to have one, but as I'm not frivolous I spent lots of time browsing the 'net in order to make sure it was a good camera before purchasing it. I wouldn't have bought it if I had found it wasn't a good camera, though: image quality is what matters the most. Yes, it tends to blow highlights and it has no viewfinder or provision for one, bar the little VF-1 - but it's the most gorgeous digital camera I've ever laid eyes on! As it stands, I have a very satisfying blend of aesthetics and image quality.
I guess I would like to have a "both" button. Like Softie wrote, I still use 8x10. Why? Because of the results obtained. That said, however, I love fondling my Leica M6's and the results here ain't bad either!
Results are very important, but in my estimation, results are more based on how you use the camera than what camera you use, assuming that the choices are similar in technical capability. Nikon? Canon? Pentax? Take your pick.Glass is comparable, features, usually similar. You make the photo, not the camera. In my case, 'other things' were dominant, once Exakta was no longer viable (I still miss the waist level finder for low level and macro work, and while I don't miss film, my Pentax 67 still is in occasional use). EXisting equipment, cost, ergonomics, and other factors make the choice for me, given a set of somewhat similar options.
There are people who like photography (I always think about Giacomelli and his old equipment for that category), and there are people who like cameras (any of us looking on DPreview). Must of us have a mix of that. I like to think I'm more on the side of photography, but I also love to watch and handle mi M3, even if I haven't shoot a single roll in it since 2006.
But I didn't define "image quality"; you just did. I only said to get the results you want. Which could be anything.
Re: The Poll Widget
I check in on an iPad a lot, and the poll widget is a large blank spot on the page. It must use Flash. It's not a problem, I'll check it when I'm on the Mac later.
I like results and I am getting more catholic in my camera usage with the more cameras I have. Leicas are my mainstay, but I too adore the shape of the Pentax Spotmatic and with the 55 Super Takumar I have taken some fine shots. One shot of my daughter, a favourite shot, I was convinced must have been from my M5 with the Zeiss C Sonnar, I learned later from filing the negatives was from my mother's old Zeiss Ikon with a scale focus 45mm Novar Anastigmat. I know pros with dependable Canon EOS's who nearly always use an M9 at the weekend. I often refer friends to your Letter to George, which helped me past the X-Pro 1 to the M9. I have not been disappointed. But I did go on and buy two more lenses.
Mike, I am constantly delighted by your erudition, your diversions, especially but not only on Sundays, and the high level of editing of your site. You have referred me to that extraordinary critic Vernon Hill, and I got in early on the Life Work offering and for these and other insights I am very grateful. This thread with its correspondents' classical allusions and quotations shows the company you are keeping, but you are not merely primus inter pares.
the poll you propose is far too simplistic.
i choose cameras due to a combination of several things. results are what it's all about ultimately, but the results are a synthesis of what I see, how a particular camera allows me make the exposure, and how a particular format and lens renders the light. ergonomics, responsiveness, feel ... all these things play into it. how a camera looks it probably one of the smaller factors but it plays here also—good looking tools that work the part make me feel good, and how i feel about the tools does affect how i work with them.
for me, there is no simple answer. i know what i like in a cameras, i can recognize it very quickly, but it cannot be articulated in such simple terms as you propose.
Vernon Lee that is. I can't find the thread on her now.
Option B, but only because when I have a camera that feels good in my hand and that I like using do I take photos that I'm happy with. I have an LX3 and a 645n and I take better photos with the 645. Yes, of course when I'm visiting Rome I don't have my Pentax with me, I have the LX3, which skews my results a little, but the process of taking the photo is about half of the enjoyment (the other half of course being the resulting image and the quality thereof
I find it telling that many think results=image quality. I guess that explains the fascination with "full frame" cameras and larger.
For me, results=a great photo. So yes, sometimes that means knockout IQ, but other times that means getting the shot without causing a stir, other times that means a camera with reflexes as quick as your own, and other times that simply means a camera that your willing to take with you to breakfast.
Instead of photo-bombing the comments section with what I think are suitable examples, I've expounded on this point further on my blog:
In theory form must follow function for me, but life is not so clear cut. The perfect balance for me was my OM4. I got great results from it, it was portable and Ijust loved the feel and heft of it.
At the moment I've got a substantial kit based on a couple of Canon dSLRs. The images that the lenses and cameras produce are great and for paid work it is what I use. The problem is that I hate the black jelly mould aesthetic. For my own work I much prefer my EP-2, it feels great in the hand, it is very portable and I'm able to get a very good A3+ print from it. I even use it for shooting video and happy with the results I get there. I also really like my Pentax 645, it takes a bit more effort to use, but again I like the feel of it and enjoy the experience of using it.
I didn't vote as I'm using my iPad and couldn't see the widget.
I'm accessing TOP on my (detested) iPhone, as my (despised) HP laptop died suddenly last week. I can't see a poll widget using either Safari or Opera. Just thought I'd let you know.
A new Asus arrives next week, but I'm stuck with Jobs' Revenge for a while yet...
Results used to be the only thing--everything. But, in the past few years, other considerations have become more important. For example, after trying numerous digital cameras with a smaller than 35mm size format, none ever had the results that met my standards. But with the advent of the Olympus EM-5, I found a camera that "mostly" meets my IQ standards but is lighter, smaller, more versatile and more fun. So, results slightly takes second place to convenience and ergonomics.
Still no widget!
I try my best not to let the camera get-in-my-way of doing something creative. Not always successful, but I do try.
Many famous photos have been slightly out-of-focus and unsharp, but they are still loved by many. Technically perfect pix that say nothing to me are not my cup of tea. Inspiration trumps technique/gear. Always.
I am inclined to believe that really great photographers don't care about either the equipment or the end results: They care about the process of seeing.
I am thinking of Vivian Mayer with her simple TLR and her thousand rolls of undeveloped film discovered after she died. Also, I know Freeman Paterson (now 75) has always used inexpensive 35 cameras, lenses and reversal film. When he was interviewed on the radio and asked about the difficulty of caring for his huge archive of slides, he answered that it didn't bother him, by the time he had released the shutter he had done everything he cared about; the physical slides were only of secondary importance.
Second time this year I've answered this question. The first time was when I sold off my Nikon gear to buy M43 gear.
Results are important - but only so far as they do not impinge upon my ability/willingness to actually schlep the gear.
"Results", well, I'd say digital cameras got solidly into the territory where I didn't have a prayer of getting limits-of-the-hardware results around the Pentax K20D.
Another couple generations of hardware and that might be true of everybody. (A few more and the camera will start arguing with you about composition.)
But, anyway -- if the limiting factor on the results is me, not the camera, picking the camera for the results is pretty silly.
I'm wrong again. Not only can't I predict how many comments a particular post will generate, but I thought this poll would be about 30 / 70 at best. Whoops!
Anyone want my picks for tomorrow's NFL slate?
Sometimes "other things" are necessary just to enable the chance to get the shot. My weatherproof E-5 will sure come in handy when out shooting Sandy. (Soon to be arriving hurricane for those not in the Northeast U.S.) I've got other gear, but there's only one rig I trust when out for hours in pouring rain or driving snow.
Hi Mike,
Sadly, the poll widget remains invisible to me. I'm on Windows 7, running Firefox 10.0.8, with NoScript and Adblock Plus. I've allowed the relevant widget, and the browser believes it to be present, but won't display it.
No poll here (UK based, W7 64 bit, no joy in Chrome or IE8)
My answer however is both (or should I say one of each).
Sometimes I need a truck, but for fun it's nice to have the 2 seater sportster as well. My DSLR is the truck and my CSC is the sports car.
For years, I've been held hostage by the 35mm Summicron v4 I've owned since 1984, and purchased used. I can't seem to separate myself from this lens, and it has resulted, in recent years, in my shooting with the M8, and now and then an M9 demo. What am I to do (that doesn't involve the expenditure of unreasonable amounts of cash)? Today I spent some time at the one local photo equipment emporium that is still extant [other than "big box" stores), quite prepared to pay our near 10% sales tax to support local business, and couldn't even imagine myself not shooting with gear that allows me to enjoy, and employ, the way this lens draws...Norm Snyder www.normsnyderphoto.com
The best results come from the camera that pleases you and is in your hands.
I could get better results with a full-frame and medium format digital. Or large format film. Instead I shoot APS-C and smaller formats. I have to like the the camera first and foremost. That doesn't mean I can use it more effectively, I just have to like using the damn thing.
The poll widget shows on my Safari browser.
Until recently, I purchased only Nikons, both for quality and because I had an investment in lenses, which I suppose puts me in the second category. But it's also true that the best camera in the world is the one you have with you when you see a picture you want to make. So, last month I purchased a Sony DSC-RX100. I'm still getting used to the lack of an OVF, but wherever I go, it goes, also.
FYI, my iPhone and iPad don't show the poll either...but my 2 cents worth: It's all about the results for me, BUT - my first camera was a Pentax SP500 (for 5 years or so). Next a Nikon FM2 (20 years or so). Then a Leica MP (last 12 years). I love the feel/action of the Leica. There is no Red Dot on this model. None of my friends are in to photography and no one I associate with knows its a "famous" brand. Looking over my photographs, since my first taken in the 1970's, no brand of camera stands out from the standpoint of "best photos". The Leica does feel the best, if you're into machinery (I am), but ultimately it's really all about that print in your hand.
Hate to pull a Bill Clinton, but I think we have to define what "results" means. If it is strictly about image quality then yes, I sacrifice results for other features. I could get better results (IQ) with a D800 than my current camera, but since I have no Nikon lenses I'd be in a bit of a pickle!
For me it's about getting the job done. IQ is generally good enough for me with most modern bodies, I think. I love my little x100, but when I need to shoot an assignment and nail the shots the hefty canon is the only option. But the little x100 is great for less serious work, and it's wonderful to hold - very satisfying - so it's got it's place as well.
Images are the final result and depending on what you do wih those images, and how you capture those images, you'll need different equipment. But all this is moot if you don't have a good idea, a goal, an eye and the desire to make work that matters. Nobody pixel peeps James Nachtwey photographs.
The problem is, your question lumped darn near everything except for image quality into the 'other than results' category;
"If you'll grant me that many people choose cameras for reasons other than the results they yield—because of the system that's available for them, the selection of lenses and accessories that you might buy one day, the way they handle, their technology, their recency (they want the latest thing), their capabilities (for instance, they want a camera with a certain package of features), their prestige, their looks, their history, who else used them, how handy they are, how pocketable they are, how pleasant or easy they are to use, how much their friends admire them..." (Emphasis mine).
So while you didn't explicitly say 'image quality' it was the only thing left on the table to describe 'results'. If you want to be inclusive of all factors, the question has no meaning. If I bought a camera for no other reason than the fact I like holding it and it makes me happy, and thus I actually use it and I'm perfectly happy with the output, then on what basis are we to parse, quantify and separate the purchase decision into for results/not for results categories? If 'results' is simply a case of being happy with the output, then 'results' is entirely subjective, and the answers are garbage from an informational POV because most people couldn't answer honestly even if they wanted to (because people can, and usually do, rationalize darn near any feature that they just happen to want in terms of how it will make their output better). So again, I think the question as structured isn't particularly illuminating.
I'd say that results are indeed all that matter, which is precisely why I voted for the other answer: because if I hated the camera, I'd most probably not carry it around at all times, and would then get far fewer results. Which are all that matter :)
(If I understand correctly your earlier reply to Tim Bray, you may disagree with this - but in that reply you used "inconvenient", whereas in the post you used "hate", which is something quite different, and which is what I'm referring to here. I will put up with inconveniences - not camera is without some, given that they're all designed by someone other than us - but if it is idiosyncratic enough that it will make me actively dislike using it, then, no.)
I don't see your widget using Google Chrome. However, although I suppose I could claim that I don't much care about the size of a camera if it will give me the results that I desire, until it was stolen I did for years use a Mamiya 7 instead of some larger camera.
Results trump everything for me, everything... except my girlfriend! I recently wanted to change from a Canon 5DII to the new Nikon 800D. In no uncertain terms she told me no, and I know I would have regretted it. I now have the 5DIII... but I still want that Nikon.
Can't see the poll with Firefox or Safari. Maybe it's a US only thing?
Can't see the poll on iPad, but you can put me down in the results column.
I shoot 8x10 as my main camera now. 4x5 and 2 na-quarter for snapshots. I would have to admit though, I do love my Hasselblad just for its own sake sometimes. It's a beautiful and well conceived photographic tool, even in this digital age. And also looking at the "viewfinder" on my big cameras!
I tend to use what ever camera is best suited for the job at hand, and sometimes the camera that best inspires me if that makes any sense. If I am shooting sports, its my Nikon D300 with a telephoto lens....if I am shooting my landscapes I tend to use my 4 x 5 view camera, although a digital camera would do just a well.
Results to me and my type of photography don't include the best technical image quality available in photography. In fact, I'd say that is down the list of important things.
So I will say the results, meaning being able to photograph what I want, the way I want, and that the camera is capable of recording that in an efficient manner, is probably most important.
To help me do that, it has to get out of my way, so function, ergonomics, and all that contribute to my being able to get the results I want. It also helps, that if I am buying a different brand, that I have lenses that I will be able to continue to use without much trouble and that I will not have to study and fight for a month to learn the new camera. (OK, the latter is a fantasy.)
Nowadays, politics also enters into my choice what while some of the discriminatory statements/criminal actions taken by certain camera company executives, and even the attempted censorship by a major camera company of a photographer at its own photographic exhibition. These are important to me 'cause I live right where that sort of stuff affects me (Japan), and I don't wanna hand any more of my cash over to such people than necessary.
But in the end, results as I defined above matter to me most. The other things contribute as they allow for those results.
If technical image quality were the most critical factor to me, I might carry around an 8X10 or the Hubble telescope, but if I get the results I want, I am not compromising.
Maybe I didn't understand the question.
Sometimes ergonomics equals results and sometimes it's portability that produces results. Or in another instance it could be resolution that produces the desired result, ect...
I imagine that those lucky few photographers who live without budget constraints still sometimes get the feeling that they left the right camera at home in the closet.
If it wasn't a combination of things we would all be shooting full or medium format, and our children would be shoeless because of our lens purchases.
Funny you should ask, because I've been pondering this question lately. The Olympus EPL1 that has been my personal general-use body for almost two years has become frustrating: I want a dial--preferably two--for faster adjustments in A mode and the option to shoot in full manual mode with all-auto lenses. And I wouldn't mind a stop more usable sensitivity, either.
I've thought about going back to DSLRs, both for the controls and the slightly better default image quality, but the idea of lugging around those chunky bodies and larger lenses, and losing compatibility with most of my lenses, are serious turn-offs. In other words, it seems that image processing and quality are close to sufficient for me, and that what I'm hankering for is better (for me) ergonomics.
On the other hand, the recently more affordable older Sigma DPs are intriguing, and those are all about results trumping usability and versatility.
Video is another complicating factor. I'd like video capability, but bodies designed for stills, despite what these cameras bring to the table in terms of IQ, are ergonomically horrible for shooting video in any serious way, so how much is that feature really worth? Here, again, it seems that factors other than results are important to me.
The comments to this entry are closed. | http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/10/why-do-you-choose-cameras.html | robots: classic
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} | 4,447 | Are we expecting miracles with the format?
Discussion in 'Open Discussion' started by Djarum, Jun 25, 2010.
1. Djarum
Djarum Super Moderator Subscribing Member
Dec 15, 2009
Huntsville, AL, USA
I do occasionly browse the dpreview forums, and there seems to be good bit of discontent with the format right now.
People who've moved up from P&S cameras are learning the same thing I had to. With some of the smaller P&S cameras, the lenses were faster so there wasn't worry about having to go up in ISO. But when you did, many pictures were unacceptable. Now the argument seems to be, that with the faster fixed lens 3x or 4x zoom lenses, that there doesn't seem to be any sort of advantage with the mFT system. I've personally ran into this myself. What I learned was that it is OK to go up in ISO. The other dissapointment, especially with the OLY cameras, is that the focusing is slower than the higher end P&S. There are people who've said that their Canon G9/10/11 camera gives just as good of pictures.
The crowd coming from the SLR world are wanting faster primes and faster focusing. People are dismissing the lenses such as the new OLY 14-150. Its too big, it misses the point of small and compact, its too slow. And then there are those wondering why Panny's new upcoming wide prime is only f2.5..not f1.7 like the 20mm.
So, I'm starting to wonder if people are expecting miracles out of the format?
I've never owned an SLR before, so I can't comment. I was slightly disappointed that when I had to go higher ISO with the PEN because of the slow lens, the images were not necessarily "cleaner" than a lower ISO image out of my P&S. I have found that in generall everyday good light shooting, the images from my PEN blow anything away I've taken with a P&S. This camera has also taught me many things about my own photography.
But aside from that, I think all the naysayers are missing the point. And that is flexibility. So what the 14-150 makes the camera large and isn't for everyone, it might be a good choice for many people. Many people don't want to use primes, but many do.
I will concede that Panny and Oly have been too slow for lens options to the format, but we should be celebrating what the format offers, and that is the flexibility and reduced size of the entire system, no matter whether primes are the lens of choice, or zooms are the lens of choice.
• Like Like x 4
2. OzRay
OzRay Mu-43 Legend
Jan 29, 2010
South Gippsland, Australia
Ray, not Oz
No camera will ever please everyone, some complain because they expect miracles, some because they don't know what they really want, some because they want everything, some just like complaining about anything and everything and DPR is a place where complaining has become a science.
Mostly, it's because people don't apply themseves and learn about photography and their equipment, moving from one format to another because they think it's the gear that makes all the difference.
• Like Like x 5
3. Brian S
Brian S Mu-43 Top Veteran
Apr 11, 2009
I guess it depends on how picky you are for a miracle.
The miracle that I get from this format is the small sensor-flange distance and the ability to use lenses from almost any system on it. Using my 1950s Nikkor lenses with the EP2 and its electronic view-finder is a pleasure.
• Like Like x 3
4. bilzmale
bilzmale Mu-43 All-Pro
I've come from the opposite direction to the OP (4/3 dslr) and am happy with the tradeoffs. I have a smaller, lighter and less 'obtrusive' kit that is getting more use. HD video is a bonus.
I miss the speed of my old system in both senses of the word. AF was better and the f range was faster overall. I also miss the reach I had (280mm vs 140mm) but have no intention of going back.
For me the balance sheet is showing a profit.
• Like Like x 1
5. Herman
Herman Mu-43 All-Pro
Feb 7, 2010
The Netherlands
No, I don't expect miracles from mft. I do even look forward to the new Nikon camera with even smaller sensor than mft. Got to agree that we need lenses from other manufacturers like Sigma, Tokina, etc.
• Like Like x 1
6. soundimageplus
soundimageplus Mu-43 Top Veteran
Feb 2, 2010
Well personally, over the last year, I have undergone a minor miracle in the way that I work due to m4/3. A little over 12 months ago I was still using big heavy DSLR's and monster lenses, with the consequent discomfort and difficulty associated with large and heavy gear.
Due to m4/3 and other small light formats I can now happily work all day knowing that I'm not going to end up swallowing pain-killers at the end of it!!
I come from the opposite end of the spectrum from you - moving "down" rather than moving "up" and to me the savings in bulk are really significant, and I think all of us that have done that will have much more positive feelings about the benefits of that move.
Photographers at all levels seem to agree, as the sales of these m4/3, hybrid, e.v.i.l cameras, call them what you will, are increasing rapidly. The people who "complain" on Dpreview are after all a very very small % of the people who have actually gone out and bought a m4/3 camera and are using it. With the larger sensor and with both Panasonic & Olympus aspiring to produce lenses that can stand comparison with anything from the DSLR market, the format is necessarily going to be slightly bigger than a point and shoot compact. For many, the quality obtained from cameras such as Canon G9/10/11 is perfectly adequate, but for many of us the limitations of the small sensor and lack of interchangeable lenses severely restricts us, and we find much more of what we want in m4/3 and other hybrid formats.
Both Panasonic and Olympus (finally) have come up with some decent, very useable zoom lenses, which are indeed compromises but in the case of the Lumix 14-45, Olympus 14-42, Lumix 14-140 very good compromises in my view, which offer us flexibility in a small light package. Olympus have just produced a 9-18mm zoom (18-36mm 35mm equivalent) that weighs 155 grms. For some of us that is approaching a miracle! The new 14-140 weighing in at 290g is hardly a monster either! Add in such lenses as the remarkable 20mm f1.7, the 7-14mm from Panasonic and the Leica designed 45mm f2.8 macro and you are starting to see a range of serious high quality lenses.
With a forum as large as Dpreview you are bound to get people who are constantly looking for their own bespoke camera that ticks all their boxes, aren't we all? We have all also got really impatient. "We want the world and we want it now!" However I suspect that there is a high degree of satisfaction with what Panasonic and Olympus are giving us. Am I 100% satisfied? no of course not, but I am impressed by the system as a whole and excited by its potential.
Finally I and my company are currently in the process of shooting a documentary with a pair of GH1's. When we view the footage on an HD TV we fall off our chairs! We are shooting with Leica, Zeiss and Nikon lenses but are also using Panasonic and Olympus lenses, including the kit zooms. To be able to shoot video with this kind of quality with cameras this small is indeed a miracle!
• Like Like x 8
7. JoepLX3
JoepLX3 Mu-43 Top Veteran
Jun 13, 2010
Everybody wants miracles and even when a miracle happens not everybody is going all-in. I have been stating here to wait for the GF2 with buildt-in EVF and hopefully better High ISO performance, as well as IBIS. But if all is not going to happen and instead Panasonic decides to also give away the EVF free with the 20 mm F1.7 GF1 kit, then I think I will become a M43 owner either way.
For the premium prices especially Panasonic is asking over entree DSLR's (larger, but for rest same performance), customers have to my opinion the right to ask miracles to happen!!!
- They will happen, the question is when...
PS: M43 is not making people spend more money on camera's. People buy best camera within their budget already for years and hobby is only allowed to cost over X% of monthly income. I hope that Panasonic and Olympus also want to sell primes to P&S-style of customer, but then they will have to lower prices (and given lower costs of manufactoring of smaller lenses this should be feasible). Or AF on non-native m43 lenses?
• Like Like x 2
8. pcake
pcake Mu-43 Regular
May 3, 2010
i've noticed several thread in the dpreview micro four thirds forum where the posters complain about blurry pics and it turns out they're using very shallow DOF, and the pic IS sharp... in one small area they didn't notice. in one, it turned out part of the poster's baby's foot was the in-focus sharp part of the pic, so he didn't notice ;)
then there are all the folks who manage to either have tons of motion blur in their pics or white balance issues. somehow it's all the camera's fault.
always good for a laugh :D
• Like Like x 2
9. goldenlight
goldenlight Mu-43 All-Pro
Jan 30, 2010
I think you've nailed it regarding some folk. "My results are c**p therefore it must be the camera - it couldn't possibly be me." A high level of camera automation is a double edged sword, it can almost guarantee a good picture but not quite, a small but essential ingredient for success is still only found between a photographer's ears.
Some of the disappointment experienced by moving "up" to :43: from a P&S is that the cameras do require more input from the operator. Most P&S cameras are optomized to provide a reasonable result with acceptable compromises in full auto, in most situations where the camera is likely to be used.
:43:, although it has all the automation, works best when the photographer takes control, either manually or knowing when to intervene in an auto mode. To do this successfully you need to have a thorough understanding of the basics of photography and be able to anticipate what the camera is doing, then ask the question "is it doing what I want it to do?"
It's sad that some folk seemingly spend their photographic lives nomadically wandering from one pasture to the next, which is always greener and just the other side of the hill. Sometimes it pays to become more familiar with your own territory before exploring further afield.
• Like Like x 2
10. Amin Sabet
Amin Sabet Administrator
Apr 10, 2009
Boston, MA (USA)
Those folks are spending their energy arguing and doing math. If they spent more time on the photography, they would realize as you do:
But this is the bottom line:
So many folks at DPR can't get their head around the fact that others' needs may vary from their own. For example, there is one engineer in the Canon forums who is always going on about how anything bigger than his pants pocket needs a bag, so it's all in the same size and weight class. He repetitively refers to Micro 4/3 as pointless every time someone brings it up because he is unable to grasp that his perceptions (eg, that a Canon 5D and 24-105mm zoom is more or less the same size/weight as a G1 and 14-45) may be different than someone else's.
Making the same narrow-minded point over and over again and disparaging others with different views is trolling. If DPR got a few mods together and started banning those trolls, it would be a much nicer place to spend time.
• Like Like x 1
11. soundimageplus
soundimageplus Mu-43 Top Veteran
Feb 2, 2010
Absolutely. The notion that just because all the m4/3 advantages can't be crammed into something the size of a credit card, so therefore it's a flawed concept, has always struck me as completely ridiculous.
That the system is so small and light is an achievement in itself. At the moment the technology doesn't exist that improves the size - quality equation to the levels some people would like.
There are also a significant number of people, myself included, who wouldn't use a really tiny camera because of handling and stability issues. My E-P2 is pretty close to my perfect camera in terms of handling, size and weight. I also have no desire to hide, or pretend I don't have, a camera. I often wonder how serious people are about photography if all they want to do is put their camera into a small pocket. People don't seem to be shy about carrying their mobile phones in full view. Are these people somehow ashamed that they carry a camera?
• Like Like x 1
12. goldenlight
goldenlight Mu-43 All-Pro
Jan 30, 2010
I hadn't thought about it like that before. Guess I'm just the opposite, I don't mind carrying a camera but if a phone won't slip almost unnoticed into a tiny pocket, forget it! :biggrin:
13. mauve
mauve Mu-43 Top Veteran
Mar 9, 2010
Paris, France
Plus there are factors on the manufacturers side that must be taken into account too. For instance, design-wise, Panasonic seems to value very much the ergonomics solutions of its industry partners (Leica and Olympus), even if they're building an identity of their own on top of those design clues, leaning a bit more on the electronic / technical design.
Leica, there's no need really to explain : they found their niche in the 40's, and since then, size, controls and ergonomics have been religiously preserved.
Olympus from the outlook is more 'wild', having launched themselves in varied endeavours since the 70's. But a bit of analysis brings you back to the same point over and over again : their star designer Maitani. He pretty much set by himself the design guides of all subsequent Olympus cameras, from the original Pen that lives now on in an electronic form, through the clamshell design he created with the XA we now find in the µ line, to the ergonomics of slrs (an e-450 being almost exactly the form factor of an OM body).
And scratching the surface of Maitani views, we close the circle again : he always publicly acknowledged the handling of his own Leica III prior to joining Olympus was a paramount design clue to set the size of a useful yet powerful cameras.
For the legendary focus on this story, I'd love to think the e-p1 was rushed out without EVF because Maitani was dying and Olympus wanted to release while he was still alive. I have of course no way to know if this is a figment of my imagination, but I hope someone brought him an e-pen before he passed away, so he knew his vision was living on.
As conclusion, we see the 3 main actors of µ4:3 are all drinking at the same source, the design of the Leica III. So it's no wonder the body shape and volume remains close to that 'ideal' size that served so many so well throughout half a century of imaging.
14. Djarum
Djarum Super Moderator Subscribing Member
Dec 15, 2009
Huntsville, AL, USA
To be fair, some of the one's wanting more primes over there have been on the forums for years and to some degree have contributed positively. The post I made was about legit compalints toward the system. If I was selling cameras, and a customer told me they were interested in the mFT but they just wanted to walk around with a kit lens, never expand their lens collections, and really were just after better dynamic range and higher ISO, I think there are high end P&S cameras that would satisfy. Looking at some of the results from the Samsugn TL500, I think this would be a good alternative.
I did not mind the size of the mFT system, I previously used a superzoom p&s, which doesn't fit into a pants pocket. But those sort of complaints were heard tirelessly when the PEN and GF1 came out.
I've seen posts here about the need for fast primes and other lenses are useless otherwise. Yet, the Oly ultrawide zoom lens looks fantastic. Both the Panny and Oly superzoom lenses, while not as sharp as primes or two seperate "kit" lenses are not as sharp, still offers acceptable results as Brians posted photos show.
I do agree that people should be using their equipment more instead of saying how bad it is. I've got my own quibbles about the system, but it sure as heck doesn't prevent me from taking photos.
15. Amin Sabet
Amin Sabet Administrator
Apr 10, 2009
Boston, MA (USA)
I wouldn't suggest otherwise. In fact, I am one of those people :smile:.
16. Pelao
Pelao Mu-43 Top Veteran
Feb 3, 2010
Ontario, Canada
This gels with my observations. To many, it's about the gear, not the photography. Perhaps they are in love with the idea of photography. There seems to be a sense that the equipment alone is responsible for amazing photographs.
There are wonderful images from camera phones, P&s, M4/3, DSLRs and 50 year old cameras.
I am not expecting miracles, but I am expecting a continued evolution in terms of image quality (especially dynamic range) and in lenses.
I have a DSLR that can, when the vegetable holding it gets his act together, produce amazing photographs. I have an M4/3 camera that can also produce amazing photographs. They have different strengths. I love both. Currently photographs with my DSLR are, for me, better than my M4/3. But that's because I am still learning the strengths and limitations of the latter.
These are extraordinary photographic tools.
The common factor is the photographer. A few miracles there would be deeply appreciated. :frown::rolleyes:
Since such miracles seem unlikely, I will just have to continue shooting, and when the photograph doesn't match what I had in mind, try to figure out why and move on.
• Like Like x 1
17. soundimageplus
soundimageplus Mu-43 Top Veteran
Feb 2, 2010
It depends what you want
It really depends what you want. I looked at a lot of images from the Samsung TL500/EX1 as it sounded like a good idea. However I was pretty underwhelmed by what I saw. However if people want to be able to take decent quality photographs on a small camera for their own personal "life record" then yes it could be ideal.
M4/3 is more than that though, and was always intended to be so from the statements that both Panasonic and Olympus have made. As mentioned above, Olympus have an appetite for camera history and style and it shows in their creations.
M4/3 is one of those photographic innovations that can have across the board appeal. It can be useful for anybody from a "snapshooter" to a full-time working photographer. But then much of 35mm was seen as an amateur format by many photographers when it came out. Kodak intoduced Kodachrome as an "amateur" film making various Ektachrome emulsions for professionals. But what happened was that all the professionals used Kodachome. National Geographic published nothing else for years.
There are issues with all camera systems. The Canon and Nikon forums are full of people complaining about the lack of this or that lens, and I'm sure that will always be so. We all have a choice and since its very rare that one manufacturer comes out with something that suits everyone, we can all decide what to use, usually based on the notion that we will use the system that gives us the closest to 100% of what we want.
There is a difference between photographic equipment forums and the customer base for photographic equipment. I suspect that the vast majority of people who own and use cameras go nowhere near these forums and they can give a misleading impression of whats important and whats not. If camera manufacturers made their decisions on the basis of these forums then they might be drawn into all sorts of blind alleys.
People are usually most concerned about "bang for their bucks" and tend to think in terms of getting the best they can to fit their budget. So-called "enthusiast" photographers have a different agenda, though still taking note of the prices of the equipment they desire.
This agenda can result in some strange, football supporter like behaviour, which usually stems from a desire to be seen to be making the right choice. Often fairly trivial issues get blown up out of all proportion to justify the choices people make. There are things that I would like to see m4/3 have and as I said before it's not 100% of what I want, but it offers me enough for me to have made a substantial investment in the system. I see no reason at present to change that.
• Like Like x 2
18. Mosca
Mosca Mu-43 Regular
May 27, 2010
It's all about which set of compromises pleases you, the user, the most. I started on this journey with point and shoots, and was unhappy with the image quality compromise that I got by accepting the small size. I then went to the DSLRs, and I was unhappy with the size compromise I made with them. I am now happy with the middle ground, giving up some in image quality, and getting back a lot (but not all) in smaller size and weight.
And anyone who doesn't think they are making a compromise on even something like image quality with a Canon 1D Mk 4, I ask that person; why no Hasselblad?
They are all compromises.
• Like Like x 2
19. JoepLX3
JoepLX3 Mu-43 Top Veteran
Jun 13, 2010
Customers expecting miracles is heaven for m43 companies like Panasonic and Olympus:
- The typical result of such market situation is premium prices for every minor improvement, despite still not meeting all obvious requirements (continous sales)
But in the end the market segment of people spending more then 500 Euro's per year on camera and lenses is to my understanding rather limited (life time of a camera being somewhere between 1 and 3-4 years). And for most of the potential customers it is near to impossible to compare performance of multiple cameras into sufficient the details to distinguish an affordable DSLR from m43 (nor know what perfect camera should look like).
At dPreview forum you mainly see the early adopters and hobby / professional with too much money, that is just a small part of the market, but the impact of such reviews should not be underestimated (many people surf on internet, but hardly post). Still this will not make "normal" people buy a full frame DSLR, just because it is better (much more expensive than m43 and probably well above their budget).
When I see Panasonic giving away the EVF icw GF1 kit with zoom lens, I read this move as follows: gaining market share only by being compact is already starting to become difficult at premium prices levels. For sure this is a result of Sony and Samsung entering the same segment as well as m43 not being new any more.
To become /stay a leader in the entry system camera's, I expect that next to compactness the price of semi-complete kit will again become (/stay) most important. And a dummy (or the less smart guy/lady in the shop trying to convince you to go for the more expensive camera) knows about an EVF being very nice to have as well as value of IS or IBIS. Also a decent lens selection is needed (otherwise the shops will advice DSLR for this reason only), but again most customers won't be willing to pay a big premium for compactness only.
Therefore I think Panasonic priority is currently at introducing GF2 with tiltable build-in EVF (exactly what I want, so maybe I am blind to see the real truth). Why is this most important for Panasonic? To reduce the cost to manufacture a complete & compact camera, to enable them to better compete on price with other companies in this market.
I am curious if Panasonice will also address out of camera JPG performance as well as High ISO performance of sensor, but for the one shot we can always do some RAW-based post-processing...
Myself, I also ike the idea of more, better (faster) native m43 primes. But when I am fair, the amount of lenses I am going to buy is more dependent on price than on performance (preferably the best of cheap :wink:). Compactness of these additional lenses for specific applications (party portraits iso walk around) is actually also not that important. If the non-m43 50 mm primes with F < 2 would have autofocus and IS then I would have never ever even have thought about the 45 mm F2.8 (although the later one might even be a better lens, but how do I know???).
More afordable m43 lenses (with AF and IS) will support sales of m43 bodies (as well as kit lenses) over DSLR.
Best regards,
PS: Korea just scored 1-1 against Uruguay!!!
20. squeegee
squeegee Mu-43 Veteran
Jan 26, 2010
Not all photographers are "serious" some of us just want to casually take photos so we just want a camera we can carry around with us anywhere and everywhere. P&S's fit most of the needs except image quality.
That's not entirely true either. There's definitely the crowd who owns iphones or previously blackberries who purposely make everyone around them know they have "that phone", but there's also people who walk around much more discretely and who's ring tones aren't loud and obnoxious.
Yes. Part of it comes from the attitude that a lot of "SLR" folks have. (Not all, but enough that it's a stereotype.) It's not even just owners but the elitist attitude even happens in stores. It's embarrassing enough and snobby enough that when I had my e410 I felt really really bad about being in public with the camera because I didn't want to be grouped in with "those guys". In the end, I think I took my e410 out of the house less than 10 times in a year.
I'm not saying all SLR owners are like this but I'm sure you've met SLR owners who think they're better than everyone else and thumbs their nose at you because of your gear etc... | https://www.mu-43.com/threads/are-we-expecting-miracles-with-the-format.3979/ | robots: classic
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} | 7,005 | « Two Tips: One for Fuji X-T1 Owners, One for Apple Laptop Buyers | Main | The Ten Best Gifts for Photographers »
Wednesday, 17 December 2014
I've now seen 10 and 9. I'm curious -- do you already know what the other eight are? I mean, do you already have a list? Or are you going to get down to the point where you only have three spaces left, but four cameras (like buttoning your shirt, starting with the wrong button hole?)
You led with my two biggest temptations... I have too many children for such a purchase at this time of year!
Interesting that we got two long overdue cult camera refreshes this year, Sony R1 > RX10 and Panasonic LC1 > LX100. What a time to be alive!
Hello, Mike,
Nice to see you writing about Pentax from time to time ;)
The DA 35mm f:2.8 macro Limited is definitely made by Pentax (now Ricoh Imaging), in their Hanoi factory. I have the old version, indeed a fantastic lens.
Tokina makes their own version, but wow, that thing is ugly! It's obvious those two can't possibly be made in the same factory ;)
Have fun,
I think there's a typo in the last sentence - "only one camera with you". I thought for a moment there was another mistake with "motley.".
I've never used it as a noun before, normally as an adjective to a noun "motley crew.", but I suppose it's preference.
These are the only two errors I've found in years of posts!
Incredible! (and delete this comment after if you want, no harm done, just wanted to say thanks for the great editing job you do)
Just want to point out that the B&H price for the Pentax K-3 also includes the BG-5 battery grip (which goes for $185) by itself.
I was happy with my current small bag of cameras and lenses. Then this morning's email brought news of the Phase One A Series.
Desirable. Like the Porsche I don't need but would buy if I could.
Regarding that Pentax gear, it's worth noting that the 20-40 limited is over 1/3rd off right now. Also B&H will throw in a $180 battery grip free when you order a K3 for $200 off. So if you want a battery grip thats nearly 1/3rd off the camera and grip. With the 20-40 as the "kit" lens, thats less than 1.5k for a fairly premium kit.
Are there rumors of impending replacement in the new year? Cause those seem like pretty good discounts to me.
The only thing holding me back from buying an LX100 is the fear that I'm becoming a gearhead. I've got an LX3, a GX7, and a pocketable Canon S110 - all perfectly good cameras that fit my needs. Still, that LX100 looks nice and could fill a niche, and we know it's going to come down in price. I mean, look at the great deals on the GX7 now . . .
Yay for no. 10 !
Hi Mike,
I don't see the optical viewfinder being listed as part of the package at B & H for the GR.
Michael Sheppler
I'm assuming this could never happen due to potential product line cannibalization on the Leica side but how awesome would an LX-40 be? The LX100 "body" with a fixed Leica 40/2. Given the form factor it could be a modern day CL. Bet it would have decent OOC B&W JPGs too. I'm assuming with a simpler fixed lens they could at least keep the price point the same or possibly even a bit lower.
Perchance to dream...
I support your review and reasons for rating the Leica S. It is a tad expensive. Let me know if anyone uses your link to purchase one or two.
Those Ricoh's (aw Pentax's)are like little tanks. I love my K-5iis. Thinking of adding the Real Ricoh (the GR)as a pocket camera. Yehaa!!
The best camera of 2014 for me is the Nikon Coolpix A, gotten recently via TOP. What a pleasant surprise this little camera has turned into. Build quality is beyond expectation, and image quality is like breathing fresh, clean air (after Sony.)
The GR+viewfinder deal ($566) is still active at Adorama... (12:47 EST)
Happy GAS!
Some previous-generation Pentax models are available at appealingly steep discounts right now too - the K 5IIs is in many ways most of the K 3, and is currently a lot less, and really the K 50 is most of the K 5(II(s)), and is currently ridiculously cheap for a two-dial pentaprism SLR at some of the major sellers.
I succumbed to the K 5IIs temptation not long ago, which I justified vs. the K 3 in part on the grounds that it put me ahead on being able to afford a DA Limited 35mm to go with it.
Re: the Ricoh GR. In mountaineering, the best camera is not just the one you have with you. It's the one that you have accessible at all times. And light (weight) is right. The Ricoh GR (like its film predecessors) shines in this regard. I carry mine in a MountainSmith "Cyber, small" (available from B&H ... through Mike's links) case that attaches to the shoulder straps of a backpack (it has vertical, rather than horizontal velcro flaps on its back). I like to have the case on my left shoulder strap (I'm right handed), above the sternum strap, so that my chest is unencumbered for staying close to the rock. I have a short loop of utility cord threaded through one of the eyelets of the camera. To avoid dropping the camera when in steep terrain, I clip a carabiner through a sling that I carry around a shoulder and through the loop on the camera before I pull the GR out of the pouch (the sling and carabiner are standard climbing equipment, so they serve double-duty). By having a short loop, rather than a long strap, there's little to snag on the camera itself, and also it fits neatly in the case. When in more horizontal situations, I put my middle finger through the loop for a bit of purchase. As many have written, the user interface on this camera is superb. I am looking forward to the next version which, I hope, will have IBIS and even better sensitivity.
I'd give a thumb's up for the LX100 as well. The camera just feels 'right.' It'd be nicer if it was smaller, or had more megapixels, or more zoom range, but everything is a compromise and Panasonic has made a really good one.
Saw that the Ricoh GR made the list and started lusting for it. Then I saw that the price at Adorama is 566 and change with the accessory viewfinder AND a 32 gb card. Had to have it. My Christmas present to myself. Thanks Mike. This camera will fit in my pocket.
I completely agree with Michael J. Perini that the needs of working pros are often overlooked in photo-website discussions of cameras. Very accurate inisght.
What's interesting to me is just how different the needs of working pros often are from amateurs or enthusiast photographers. This is best exemplified by how many amateurs/enthusiasts I still see shooting with large DSLRs, and how many pros that I know that want to MOVE AWAY from DSLRs. Or, actually have moved away, either with Fuji X, Olympus OM-D or the latest flavor of Sony Alpha.
What's amusing to me is reading how much griping about trivial things amatuers and enthusiasts engage in in forums, or the degree to which they get their panties in a bunch about something that pros never even think about, let alone worry about. ;-)
By way of example, in the Fuji X forums, a lot of folks presently have their panties in a twist that the forthcoming Fuji XF16-55/2.8 pro standard zoom will NOT have OIS. Merely absolutely superb image quality. "It's a deal-breaker!!!" Egads!
Never mind the fact that neither the equivalent Canon or Nikon 24-70/2.8 pro zoom have image stabilization, either. All those poor pros...not getting their work done.
"It's the end of the World as we know it...."–REM
Read the specs for the LX100 and went straight out and bought it. It has rejuvenated my photography - how long my EOS bodies and lenses will continue to wear down my shoulders and spine is a cause for thought - and a twilight walk around the city of Oxford (UK) has yielded so many images I must print one day. Trouble is, I keep using the camera at every opportunity so the printer is staying dormant!
The DSLR on the way out? When there is no other class of camera that offers more value for money these days? Right...
SLRs on the way out? I certainly hope not. Although I loved my Leicas, I also used my SLRs when I was shooting film. With digital, I've tried live view, electronic viewfinders and accessory optical viewfinders and I keep going back to SLRs as my main tool. They may be unexciting, dated and uncool but I can live with that. I'm pretty unexciting, dated and uncool myself. It's sorta a badge of honor.
I'm not aware of any pros, in the UK, moving away from DSLRs. I would guess that most of them have got too much money invested in one particular system to even contemplate it.
I had this very conversation, this morning, with an architectural photographer.
Also, if you're a press photographer, you tend to be very reliant on a decent, portable flash. The Sony A7, for instance, might be very appealing but where's the TTL flash for it? I asked a Sony rep this last week and he didn't have a very convincing reply. It's about systems....
BTW, regarding the X-T1, just yesterday Fujifilm just released firmware version 3.0 which adds 28 new features to this camera, not the least of which are the beautiful "Classic Chrome" film emulation, and the new Natural Live View feature, which makes the EVF perform even more like a true optical viewfinder. Brilliant, both literally and figuratively.
One little gem in the update is the "Phase detection AF support for Instant AF" mode, which is operated by pressing the AF-L button during manual focusing. The update enables the Phase Detection AF, providing faster focusing speeds. Pressing the AF-L locks focus, even when the lens focus ring is pulled back in the "manual" position (as on the Fuji XF14mm f/2.8 and XF 23mm f/1.4 lenses) and the photographer can then "touch up" focus using the manual focus ring. I used this feature last night, and it is really very cool.
This is now a considerably better camera than it was just two days ago.
Oh, and the firmware update was free.
No doubt you will be proved right about EVFs driving SLRs to the margins of the marketplace. More's law will work its magic on them while the cost of flipping mirrors and pentaprisms won't be getting any lower. The net result of that is likely to be what you predict.
However, despite the rush of joy over EVFs flooding the blogosphere, I wonder if they are all they're cracked up to be. In Sean Reid's review of the XT1 he decries the dynamic range of EVFs and claims they haven't been improving in that regard. Certainly the EVFs I have used weren't very good, though better than a rear screen on a bright day (I find those impossible to use outside).
I don't have convenient access to an XT1 to see for myself. Do you find the dynamic range of its viewfinder as good as a good pentaprism? If not do you find it good enough for what you do and therefore not a concern?
OK, OK. Can't stand the suspense.
#2 Leica T
#1 Sony A7 Mk2
Interesting mix of choices. None of them my choice. Of all the cameras that came onto the market in 2014, and all the ones I bought or sold this year, the only standout to me has been the Leica X typ 113. It's a "just right" sized simple camera with an excellent lens that makes beautiful photos. Not a lot of options, not a lot of features, but simple controls, simple menus, terrific lens and sensor is all I want.
Happy Holidays!
I'd love to know how suitable you think the X-T1 would be for someone (me) who manual focus's 100% of the time. Actually I'd love to see you write a whole post about it, because I'd like to see the responses of other readers of your blog.
Dear Fuji,
Whatever you do to improve on the X-T1, please DON'T follow Mike's advice to add a lock to the exposure compensation dial!
If on the other hand you could tighten the drive mode selector so that it doesn't budge every so often as I change ISO settings, that would be most appreciated.
The Sony RX100 is small, has decent build quality, and acceptable picture quality (in good light). When I saw one in person, I was duly impressed...for about 5 minutes.
That was how long it took for me to turn my head and see the Panasonic GM1 on the counter a few feet away. After that, the RX100 paled in comparison. This isn't a slight against the RX100, it is just that the GM1 (and the Panny GM5 even more so) is absolutely astonishing. Looking at pictures of the GM1/GM5 online doesn't prepare you at all for how small these cameras are in real life.
Take a look at this: http://camerasize.com/compare/#570,332
For all intents and purposes, the Sony RX100 and Panasonic GM5 are the same size. So what are the differences?
In the Sony's favor, it has a 24-70 mm-e zoom lens that is decently fast and as a package it is slightly smaller than the GM5, which of course needs a lens. It also has a small built-in flash.
In the GM5's favor, it has an always-available viewfinder, a considerably larger sensor (there may not be much of a difference between the two cameras in bright light, but the different in low light is immediately noticeable), a hot shoe and can accept interchangeable lenses, including the Panny 20mm f/1.7 pancake lens. Or one of the small m4/3s collapsing zoom lenses. Or a Sigma 60mm f/2.8. Or a telephoto lens. Or whatever.
I'm not a big believer that interchangeable lenses are necessarily superior. But I would much rather have the GM5 with a 20mm or 25mm lens than the RX100 Mk III with it's zoom. If it was impressive that Sony was able to squeeze a 1" sensor and bright zoom lens into a pocketable camera, then it is positively astonishing that Panasonic was able to do the same with a 4/3-size sensor and an interchangeable lens camera.
Best regards,
See here for the TTL flash for the A7: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/898312-REG/Sony_HVL_F60M_External_Flash.html
Best regards,
D. Hufford: For the Panasonics, disable "Exposure Meter". That's the one that displays the virtual Shutter Speed and Aperture and clutters up the viewfinder.
I find Sony the worst in that regard. Extremely busy and annoying viewfinder.
As you mentioned, putting an equivalent zoom lens on the Panasonic GM5 makes it much larger than the Sony RX100 III. Even the 20 and 25mm prime lenses add a lot of bulk to the camera, and take away a lot of the pocketability. Camera size comparison with lenses here:
FWIW, DPReview just posted it's review of the Nikon D750 and called it the "gold standard", writing "It's not often that we review a camera that does nearly everything right. The Nikon D750 is one of those cameras..."
Best regards,
P.S. I think it is remarkable (and wonderful) to see so many different cameras, from so many different manufacturers, and with so many different form-factors, on your Top-10 list.
You've got Pentax, Ricoh, Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, Panasonic, Leica and Olympus on the list. Unfortunately, the pessimistic side of me can't help but feel that this may well be the last time we will have such a broad array of designs and manufacturers. Enjoy this smorgasbord while you can! #buymorecamerasnow
P.P.S.: I assume "#buymorecamerasnow" isn't a real thing...I don't use Twitter. ;-)
I think Fuji really hit a major sweet spot with their clients with the firmware updates.
Even old models get some new features every once in a while, and that's something no other company does.
Olympus started the same way, but since I bought my EM5 all got was a firmware update that made the focus points smaller. A welcome addition, but far from groundbreaking.
Yes, we know which one is #1. Still we would like to read your reasoning. And hear what other people think.
"1. C'mon. Do I really have to tell you? You can't guess? Seriously, you already know, right?"
Well, the 645Z should be on this list and since it hasn't appeared yet, it must be the choice for #1.
Where's the Quattro? :)
@ted kelley: Regarding the EVF in the X-T1: if one sets the EVF brightness setting to +2 (you can only do this with the camera held to your eye to engage the EVF) AND if you set the #2 camera menu settings for Hightlight tone and Shadow tone to -2 for both settings, this will considerably flatten the default contrast curve of the EVF in the X-T1 and provide a more accurate view of the dynamic range of the scene on a bright or high contrast day. Mike has mentioned here numerous times the value of really getting to know your gear, and this is sound advice that really pays off in that respect.
But wait, there's more! ;-)
As I mentioned in my post about the Fujifilm fimware version 3.0 release, the new Natural Live View function that Fuji implemented three days ago directly addresses complaints about EVFs, and provides a MUCH more accurate contrast curve and dynamic range when using the EVF display shooting in very bright or high contrast use scenarios. It really does perform like an optical viewfinder.
Solid choice on the Olympus E-M1. It's a terrific camera, literally built like a tank, is quite fast and very responsive, and fun to shoot if you like the current DSLR control paradigm (the dual control lever really is very clever). It's fully capable of being a true pro workhorse, too. It's image quality is excellent, as well, and the files convert very nicely to black and white.
My only gripe about the camera is that the white balance functionality is poor. The Auto White balance is not at all accurate, and in artifical lighting (and sometimes even in daylight situations), I often have to select other white balance presets just to get an approximation of correct white balance. I am now quite spoiled by the uncannily and unerringly accurate Auto White Balance of Fuji X-cams, so having to correct almost very frame for white balance is a hassle.
Best regards,
Thanks, Adam. I wonder the Sony rep didn't mention it?
No 1 is an iPhone right?
I agree that the single lens reflex camera design seems to be heading to the camera museum. Personally, the last "dslr" I bought was my Canon 5DIII back when it was introduced (2 years ago?). And I've no designs to buy another.
But it's really a sad irony, isn't it? The dslr is just about a perfect generalist camera. There is nearly no photographic task that it cannot do, and generally do superbly well. It's been refined to near perfection and engineered to endure rough treatment and conditions. Perfect time for retirement, eh?
Still, I believe that the Sony A7-style of body is quickly evolving to meet and exceed the dslr standards. Having spent a year with the A7R, and now experiencing the smart engineering refinements of the A7II, I am extremely enthusiastic for this camera design to become the new standard-bearer for high-quality generalist.
I too abandoned DSLRs this year (Canon 5D3 and L glass) for the Oly EM-1. And it's not just the camera. I defy anyone to handle either of their Pro series lenses and not want one.
While not a perfect system (is there one?) the EM-1 and Pro lenses must be right up there with the most pleasurable cameras to use of all time.
I believe the electronic viewfinder is the best thing since sliced bread. The ability to see what will be on the photo exactly as it will be is incredible. I'd sell my soul to have it on my primary camera instead of an obsolete matte screen.
Mike, I just needed to add my two cents to the discussion. I have rented and used the Fuji XT1 series camera and really liked it. It was light, portable and easy to use. I tested and reviewed the files and compared them to my files from my OMD EM1 and could not see a difference. Maybe it was just me, and maybe I didn't want to see any difference, because I really love the little Oly camera. Especially when I attach the Panasonic 25 to its front. It is really all that I need to have a fun day of shooting. I took it on a major trip this summer and the whole kit including a 17mm lens, 25mm and a 12-40 lens weighed less than 4 lbs. That was less than my D800 with a 24-120 lens weighted. I have since added the 45mm and will take that kit with me from now on when I travel. Just wanted to put forth my opinion to the group discussion. Your blog is great, and the comments are always insightful and interesting, you have some great followers. Have a great Holiday and a Happy and successful New Year.
You've put yourself in quite a pickle, Mike, upsetting either the Sony A7 fans or the Pentax 645Z fans. Such is the nature of such a list though, isn't it? I've got a solution...a tie!
Why can't one of the camera companies make a "full frame" (24x36) camera that is as simple and elegant as the "best camera in the world". To my mind that would be a no-brainer for those of us who remember the simplicity of an old F1 or nikon F series camera. Replace all those annoying buttons and menus with a human brain that is fully engaged in the process of seeing and creating the picture. When I saw how clean the Leica S is, it gave me a case of camera lust that I haven't had in years. If they could do that at a reasonable pricepoint like $2000 I believe they could sell a ton of them.
Hooray for #1, the camera I have with me!! Or did the K-S1 finally get its due? :^p
I'm happy for Oly, long may they sell enough cameras to survive.
I continue to be amazed how many people there are who find a bulkier, heavier, more expensive camera better than the E-M5. Is that over sized grip that good for you/them?
I have what seems to have become a nest of µ4/3 lenses, that may be breeding, OM Pens, E-M5, GX7 and GM1 and can't for the life of me see the point of the E-M1. Had I some old, 4/3 lenses that need PD AF, sure.
As it is, it just adds some features unimportant to me at the cost of size, weight and $$.
I do hope the rumors of an E-M5 II are true. Especially if, like it's predecessor, it should usher in the next generation of sensor IQ. Or might Panny do that with a GX8?
In the meantime, I can assuage my GAS with other things. BTW, the Oly 9/8.0 lens cap fish eye is more fun and better quality than one might expect.
So you say we have to guess what No. 1 is? Then I say it's the camera we all have at this moment. After all what else have you got?
PS: After reading your post about the camera that got away I went out and purchased the lens I have been thinking about buying for some time. My problem is my plans to purchase a Fuji X system. But that may be anywhere from 6 months to a year away so I purchased the 16mm-85mm Nikkor zoom lens. I got it used at B&H. And a nice lens it is.
Happy holidays to all.
Predicting the future has always been a lot of fun, most people will not remember if you were right or wrong. Seems like most people would like a view finder but want the other functions more. It is not (IMHO) a race between the type of viewfinder so much as multiple efforts to reduce size and weight. My favorite example is the Canon (SL1), very small camera with standard SLR viewfinder. It will be some time before the electronic viewfinders meet or beat the SLR viewfinder. That said we the consumer are benefitting from the efforts to do so.
There are lots of critics out there that rave about the loss of weight etc. (next time you read this go look up the weights and dimensions for the items being discussed and calculate the percentage difference) Physics is not going to be modified by the camera maker getting rid of the SLR finder and replacing it with electronics.
IMO what is needed is a more efficient way to use smaller sensors (has to be some new disruptive technology) and smaller lenses. But in the end you still have to be able to hold and use the device, to small and people will not flock to your door.
Guess #1? Well it *should* be the GH4 Lumix, but I'm guessing you are going to go upscale to an unnecessarily-large sensor camera.
Let's hope the Camera of The Year doesn't start at $10,000.
Sony a7 if you don't go with the camera you already own - which I think you will - Merry Christmas
@Moose -- for me the value proposition of the E-M1 is in the EVF. Does any other m4/3 camera have as good of one?
Damn, thought the 45 megapixel 5D4 had been released earlier than scheduled!
People rave about the clarity and contrast of optical viewfinders, and they sure are pleasant to look through, but hey: What you see has little to do with what the sensor sees. It doesn't help that the VF has great contrast when the photo is overexposed and washed out and out of focus because the mirror was misaligned. If you are after optimum contrast and clarity you may as well look at the scene through a cardboard frame, because the viewfinder image doesn't translate into sharper photos.
With an EVF you see what the sensor itself sees. The OVF is easy to love and fetishize as a concept because it involves chunks of real optical glass, but it's not all that helpful on the end result.
Hi Mike,
For me the Sony A7s has to be the best camera of 2014. I am simply liking the results the camera produces, the file sizes too.
With a Zeiss ZM 35mm F1.4 the results are gorgeous. I have been using this combination for over a month, it is just a wonderful experience.
Best regards,
Sony has a wonderful system, it is called Konica, Minolta and Sony. I have learned so much about lenses, focal lengths and photography by using an inexpensive NEX body with older lenses. Can’t do that as well with a DSLR, at least on a budget. Sony may not be for pros, but who cares if you are not shooting as often as a pro.
Mike, you are spot on in your assessment that Sony needs to develop a more complete system. I do not think it is all bad that Sony has been concentrating on its cameras. After all, if someone buys a Sony camera, they are going to be looking to buy native lenses for it. Encouraging the use of legacy lenses with adaptors seems to be a bad business model, but think of the people who have been buying these E mount cameras so they can use their classic lenses on them. And when the new Sony/Zeiss lenses do finally arrive, I think that those people will be eager to buy some of them. As for flashes, apparently you do not need one for the A7s, right? Personally, I use the Sony flash that is as big as its name (HVL-F60M) on my A7. It's big, but it is easy to use, and works very well. I do look forward to a smaller flash, but it would also have to articulate and have a built-in diffuser and bounce card for me to buy it.
Perhaps you can start a pool on betting what new Sony FE mount lenses will be introduced and when. CES is coming up in January.
I bought the Ricoh GR and it came with the viewfinder and 32mb card. I bought mine on 12-12 14. The deal may have ended. I also bought a Sigma DP3M Merrill camera for $540! I couldn't believe it went that low. I've had the DP2M for over a year and love it. B&H Photo had some wonderful deals this year. I wish I jumped on the DP1M while they had it on sale.
OK, that works for you. I happen to be notoriously VF agnostic. When the Canon 300D/Rebel came out, I bought my first DSLR. Everyone derided the tiny, dim, tunnel of a VF.
Flipping between an OM-1 or 2 and the Canon, I could surely see the huge difference in size, brightness, etc. In the field, I just didn't notice, "seeing through" to the subject, perhaps; I do have exceptionally acute vision.
The E-M5 EVF does have particularly dull red/oranges, but the fall colors are still there in the image.
As to your specific question, I'm not the one to ask. I often use E-M5 and GX7 hanging around my neck together in the field, switching regularly between them; grabbing one or the other for different focal lengths. On paper, the GX7 EVF has a few more pixels than even an E-M1 and almost the same magnification - and I don't notice any difference. Probably there, if I looked for it.
I said: "Guess #1? Well it *should* be the GH4 Lumix, but I'm guessing you are going to go upscale to an unnecessarily-large sensor camera."
Ah, now that I see that the A7 won, still too large a sensor and a camera that is a minor upgrade of the previous model, instead of the camera that introduced 4k (which is going to change still photography when still photographers 'get it'), then I must say, Mike, that your choice was not only a touch too predictable, but suspiciously corrupted by the allure of how many click-to-buy associate commissions you will get! (kidding) Mike Sells Out! (kidding)
cheers, Arg
(and thanks for bringing us along for another year of your special take on our hobby)
I really thought you'd go for the 645z. To my mind, the Sony has two weaknesses, and you only mentioned one, the lack of a coherent system, which could be fixed, except for weakness number two: Sony's predilection for screwing things up. Sony should have dominated music players forever. They don't, and haven't, since the rise of the iPod. They should have dominated home movies since the Betamax; but they don't, and haven't. They should have dominated TV manufacturing since the Trinitron; they don't, and haven't. I'm not positive, but I suspect they'll screw up camera manufacturing as well, which is why I wouldn't spend a lot of money on a Sony system.
There's also a number Three. What happens when Pentax shrinks the cost and camera size of its 645 system, but keeps the sensor size the same, so that the whole system is no larger than the FF Nikons and Canons of yore? I think the FF aspect ratio will eventually die, because it's not a particularly usable shape, unless you're advancing film...Since FF cameras once cost $8,000, and a much better camera now costs about 1/4 of that (the 750), I would expect the cost savings to eventually reach the 645 market as well -- and give the really serious users lots more (and better) megapixels to work with...
Re: Sony and Kyocera-Contax system cameras
Kyocera is also an audio company making high-end, SOTA components. While Sony makes high-end audio components—its ES line—Sony is better known for mass-marketed compact system audio, e.g., boom boxes, surround audio-video, Walkman—whose recent incarnation is the "high-end" NWZ-ZX1.
I think Sony's "spaghetti" business model for its interchangeable lens cameras is derived from audio. In high end audio, it's OK to mix-and-match. High-end audio companies specializes in components, not systems. Sony is not a lens maker, just as Sony audio is definitely not a maker of speakers.
My fearless forecast is that Sony will upgrade the RX1 to a 5-axis IBIS model (R1?); and the RX10 to a full-frame 5-axis IBIS model with a wide-to-short telephoto zoom (R10?). To paraphrase Mike, what's not to like in a Sony fixed lens camera?
"Sony's happy throw-spaghetti-at-the-wall strategy—the opposite of the Camera System concept—is, however, keeping amateurs and enthusiasts delighted and entertained."
Delighted and entertained.
Hmmm, I dunno, maybe mystified and frustrated would be more accurate descriptions. Their strategy seesms so...haphazard.
Funny how we all have different requirements and value propositions. What really works for some just doesn't for others.
I handled the (original) A7 couple weeks ago at the Keeble & Schuchat special event in Palo Alto a few weeks ago. I know some folks really like this series of cameras, but personally, I don't get it, they just don't work for me (neither did the original RX100, which I own). The A7 felt, I'm sorry to say, cheaply made.
And the shutter shock was noticeable even holding it in hand. That and the whole loose lens mount kerfuffle really gives me pause. But what really gave me pause the most was reading the blog of a working pro who recently switched to an X-T1 because he had been shooting with an A7 for the better part of a year and had to send it in twice to Sony because it was literally falling apart (his words, not mine).
Speaking of Pentax, is there a reason why camera stores outside of New York City still do not sell Pentax cameras? Playing hard to get, or what?
I agree that Sony is giving us camera-gear nuts a h*ll of a great time. Interesting stuff coming from them.
I recently launched my Canon pro-level DSLR and L-glass zoom in favor of a Sony A6000 coupled with three Sigma DN. The size and weight of the Old Beast was getting to be too much for this aging old man. After a three hour studio/location shoot I was done for.
Why did I do such a seemingly rash thing? Because, in spite of what is said about the lack of lenses, I believe Sony understands the swiftly changing market and offers exactly what the market will consume. More importantly (to me, at least) they've integrated some tasty capabilities (networking, in-camera processing) into a very small, attractive package.
Few of users are working pros and image making "generalists" in that they _need_ to own the vast range of lenses Canon offers. If they need something specialized, go rent it.
For all the rest, what's wrong with the old three lens kit? 35/50/90(equiv) lens kit works great for the vast majority of the kinds of things I see people shooting.
Though I suppose if someone wanted to impress strangers with their economic status there's still a place for DSLRs and big standard focal length zoom lenses. You can't believe the number of very high-end cameras I see (I live in Paris) where the user mounts the lens shade backwards when shooting. Maybe it's so strangers (impressed or otherwise) can clearly see the rather expensive red/gold/blue ring?
"With an EVF you see what the sensor itself sees"
With reflex viewing, you see the reality of your subject in real time, using real light rays! You see your subject with infinite dynamic range and infinite resolution in real time. No tearing, smearing, false colors, limited range of contrasts and tonality, no delay.
With an EVF you don't see what the sensor sees, you see an electronic rendering with reduced output compared to a fine monitor or print. In short, you see a useful subset, a representation, an abstraction, of the actual result.
And that's fine. For decades people knew how to view and compose and expose and zone without having to see what film actually sees at that exact moment.
Some people prefer to be engaged with their subject directly, and not in an electronic digitization of a little tv screen.
That's why some people like reflex viewing.
It doesn't have to be an either-or. Only in the marketing world do you have to choose sides and desperately proclaim at this every opportunity that this or that technology shall take over the world.
Which is really great. It's a golden age of great choices we have, long may they all prosper.
Great list! Funny thing is, to this great lineup of past accomplishment, my immediate response is: "So what's next?"......Did they intend to get me thinking this way?, or is it an unitended consequence?
I think this is an excellent list with a lot of really nice cameras on it. My only quibble is, perhaps, a certain underestimation of the power of the price-to-performance ratio. For example, one can buy two E-M10 bodies (or an E-M10 and the 25 mm and 45 mm lenses) for about the price of one E-M1. While the latter certainly has advantages over the former, when the time came to vote with my credit card, I know which way I went...
Am I really the only person who finds the Sony so ugly they wouldn't want to be seen using it in public?
As to optical view finders vs. EVF. Convenience has always been the enemy of tradition. In my job as a camera sales representative, I feel "unclean" if I do not point out the many benefits of the EVF. Why would a new or hobbyist want to fly blind?
@Sarge: regarding your comment of Sony not being a maker of high-end speakers. Actually, they do. There is a small skunk works of passionate music lovers deep within the cooperate bowels of Sony that are making true, SOTA high-end audiophile speaker, not the least of which are the Sony SS-AR1 and SS-AR2 models [$27,000/pair and $20,000/pair respectively. —Ed.]. The cabinets are handcrafted by Japanese woodworking artisans, and they even use the wood from trees in northern Japan where is it much colder and results a denser wood that is used for the multi-layered front baffle as opposed to the less dense woods that are used for the sides of the cabinets. These efforts are led by Mitoyuki-San, who is a true and passionate lover of music. The SS-AR1 are amongst the finest loudspeakers I've heard at any price, and the most accurate transducers of piano music I've ever heard, which all audiophiles know is extremely difficult to reproduce accurately.
How this relates to cameras is that I think the guys at Fuji. that have been making the wonderful series of X-cameras and those gorgeous lenses represent a small skunkworks type of team at Fuji led by Imai-San that are just as passionate about photography as Mitoyukis-san's speaker designers are at Sony.
Now, if Sony could replicate that small, passionate skunk works approach for the mirror less cameras, and most importantly, lenses, they'd be one to something. Something that doesn't represent the spaghetti on the wall approach to strategy.
Couldn't be happier with my trusty X-T1.
35mm 1.4 lens, new classic chrome and a Nissin i40 flash, all set up for a merry christmas!
I have a friend now doing most of his professional work with a Sony A7r using his Canon lenses (including multiple tilt/shift). Nikon does now also have tilt-shift lenses in most of the same ranges (except the 17mm), but the cost of switching to Nikon has so far blocked him (he's investigated it several times; he doesn't like the 5D with various suffixes much, the AF is crappy though better than the Sony, etc.) But the ability to mount the Canon lenses on the Sony has him using it (and being annoyed at many things about it; but he needs the resolution it produces, his work is printed up to trade-show display size fairly often). Manual focus works fine, may even be necessary, for most of the things one needs tilt/shift lenses for.
How could you leave off the Pentax 645Z? That brought the top of the line MF CMOS sensor down into the grasp of non-pros. Clearly a watershed moment for digital cameras, and a sign of things to come. Just look how the prices on the Hasselblad 40MP has already come down.
With luck, when the tax refund rolls in, my camera of the year will be a E-PL5. A significant advance over my E-PL1 but leaving me with enough left over to also get an Olympus 25/1.8 to go with it.
Sure, I would love an E-M1 or a Fuji X-T1 and a 35/1.4 to go with it but even with a second job that's not going to happen anytime soon.
Still, with great used values out there on cameras that are only a year or two old, why should I worry? It won't be all that long and I _will_ be able to afford that OM-D or the Fuji. And in the meantime, I can do what I enjoy doing with an E-PL5 & a couple of really good yet inexpensive primes (I have a 17/2.8, plan to get the 25/1.8 & hope to get the 45/1.8 by next Christmas.).
I could quote Dickens (best of times/worst of times) but the reality is we photographers live in an era that is nothing but an embarrassment of riches.
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} | 2,361 | « Sony Announcement LIVE | Main | OT: What's New in SETI? »
Wednesday, 16 October 2013
i will be procuring which ever one turns out to play best with rangefinder wides. my current lens lineup for the camera will be the contax g 28/2.8 biogon, leica m 40/2 summicron, contax g 45/2 planar, jupiter-3 50/1.5 sonnar, and rokkor 58/1.2. will probably get a 50 lux asph, 75 summarit, nikkor s 85/2 sonnar, and either the newish cv 21/1.8 or the old contax g 21/2.8 for it as well. feels like christmas.
Judging from the photo, they should have used a larger mount (after all they are bringing out a new line of lenses anyway). Be interesting to see if there are any vignetting issues.
I suspect there are some very unhappy RX-1 and may be even M-E owners right now... Canikon probably aren't very happy either...
This camera might make a an interesting collectors item (first ff mirrorless interchangeable lens camera). From a practical point of view: the camera is rather small, but the lenses are certainly not Leica m-small. Seems like a quite front-heavy combination. The last sentence I read at dpreview before closing the browser tab (having lost all interest):
...though they certainly aren't made for stealth, as both have a rather noisy shutter.
Reducing the physical size of a camera while increasing (compared to a Sony RX1r) the audible noise level doesn't really help with letting the camera "disappear".
Generally, a very exciting product. With Zeiss in the boat, the lens front should prove increasingly adequate, too, and of course those cameras will see massive use of third party lenses with adapters. Will probably prove unbeatable for highest quality, contemplative work.
It's a pity, though, that they didn't include in-body stabilization (and probably never will, due to the extremely cramped E-mount). For shooting in low light/at lower shutter speeds, cameras like the Olympus E-M1 or Pentax K-3 are actually superior if you don't need the megapixels — they lose a stop or two in ISO capability, but gain three or four by means of the stabilizer. And those cameras are comparable in size and significantly cheaper.
(So there you go, Pentax, image-stabilized, full-frame mirrorless. You said you wanted to do something unique with full-frame — here's your chance!)
Just a little addition to my comment above: the IBIS argument is of course not at all directed against the A7 in particular. I'd much rather buy an A7r than a D800E, let alone any other full frame model. It's just another way of acknowledging that smaller-sensor offerings have in the recent years become serious competitors to the supposed top-of-the-line or "professional" models, and in some respects, even leapt ahead of them.
You know, I think anyone would jump at a full-frame, light and portable camera, but the cost of these seems prohibitive when you think that the only lenses that will fill the frame are so expensive - over 3000 dollars for the camera and a lens(or 3000 pounds sterling for us traditionalists, dollars and pounds seem to be the pretty much the same things when it comes to photography, regardless of the actual exchange rate) or, if you dont want to pay the extra for the lenses you can use your existing e-mount lenses on the new bodies at 10 or so megapixels...erm...what's the point in that?
And why is it that I have a 35mm film camera with perfectly reasonably sized lenses but modern 'digital full-frame' offerings are normally the size and weight of a medium-sized badger?
I must admit, I laughed when a guy pre-ordered this camera two days ago at my work...
Seems wonderful but a tad pricey (the camera not the glass) but this is admittedly not my "segment". I probably suffer from big camera bias. That said I wouldn't kick it out of my bag if it turned up there. :/
Ah the chance of using a Leica lens on a 35mm-format camera at an human price... O_o
A very impressive effort from Sony to differentiate itself from the big two, and at the same time trump their mirrorless competitors.
If they can crank a new lens range at a decent rate, it will do very well indeed.
Caveat for those thinking about replacing their Leica bodies at a third of the cost - it's highly unlikely that you'll get your Leica glass to perform as well as you expect*;
(*Not that this will stop the rush for second hand glass.)
I haven't been following the FF Sony stuff - will these lenses be usable on the APS sensored NEX stuff? That 55 is tempting on my NEX7, I'm used to a 35/75 on my RF and wouldn't mind doing the same with NEX.
Watcha doin' in Oz Mike?
[I wasn't in Australia. The announcement broadcast originated there. --Mike]
That large-diameter mount opening was way bigger than needed for the APS-C sensor, so in hindsight, we should have seen this coming.
A nice blast of competition for everyone, from high-end micro-fourthirds, to full frame dslr's. Perhaps this is why my EM1 order shipping day was changed last night from November 7th to October 17th.
Both my venerable old NEX-3 and newer NEX-6 have little silver α logos on them, so the "alpha" designation is not new. The bigger cams use the orange α. So, single digit and four digit "alphas" are E-mount, two digit "alphas" are A-mount? Just guessing ... it's all good for me. I love seeing the evolution of digital photography.
When I saw the first images of these cameras I hoped they were mere renderings, but they actually were the real thing. Oh well...
The A7R is ugly but very tempting. I have 5 Leica M lenses (21 Asph, 35 sum., 50 Sum., 90 Elm. and 135 Apo), but the Leica M is to expensive for me. As Andrea say, a chance to use Leica Lenses at FF and at a human price, great.
Bravo Sony for having the guts to bring out products like these.
Shame on Leica, Canon and Nikon.
To Mark Roberts: The NEX cameras were launched in 2010 under the Alpha brand, just look at the front of the original NEX-5 and you'll see the Alpha symbol on the top corner. I understand that the cameras divisions at Sony were merged and the new naming system reflects this. The NEX sub-brand is just being phased out. On the official Sony website, they refer to the Minolta AF mount as A-mount rather than Alpha mount. I'm not sure it was ever officially alpha-mount, rather Alpha cameras, Alpha lenses, Alpha system, but still A-mount. Even pre-NEX, it used to be called Minolta A-type mount.
Steve Jacob: The corner shading "problem", the NEX-VG900 showed that the size of the mount was not a problem. The throat of the E mount is 46.1 mm in diameter, compare this with Leica Thread Mount which has a throat diameter of 39 mm, or M mount with 44 mm. If it's not inappropriate, I'll link to a blog post I made about this "issue" a few months ago, http://www.dkloi.co.uk/?p=1086
Sebastian: Difficulty of IBIS due to "extremely cramped E-mount", sensor shift image stabilisation could easily work with the E mount since all the extra machinery goes on the back of the sensor, not in front of it. The 18mm flange-sensor distance is immaterial in this regard. I think there are other reasons why there aren't E-mount bodies with IBIS yet.
Ken Ford: FE mount lenses will work on APS-C E-mount cameras. APS-C E-mount lenses will mount on the A7(r) cameras and you have the choice of a cropped or full frame capture (with possible vignetting). The NEX 50mm/1.8 OSS is a nice lens. Why not that instead of the FE 55mm/1.8?
Not much here to look at, IMHO -- if I were to choose between these cameras and the competing Nikons, I'd go with the Nikons based on the availability of accessories and the optical viewfinders. The D800 is sharply more expensive than the Sony r model, but when you put the glass on the cameras -- the Zeiss glass on the Sonys -- I suspect the costs will be much closer, without much quality difference in the lenses.
Probably the biggest difference between the Nikon and Sonys is weight (once you get a lens on them, the difference in frontal area will not be particularly noticeable.) And the weight can be argued either way...you want a lighter system, or a well-balanced one? I prefer balance, when you're talking about a D800e-sized camera; if the choice were between a Sony and a humongous D4, I might be more inclined to go with the Sony...
Which sort of brings up the question...whatever happened to Canon?
I'd be more interested in this new system if Sony had announced a full set of non-zoom lenses for it. Not to be available at some future date but *at launch.* Given Sony's "throw a bunch of stuff at the wall and see what sticks" approach, who knows if that full set of lenses will ever materialize? What if sales don't meet expectations? In that case they'll likely just move on to yet something else. As for "full frame"...couldn't care less one way or the other.
I think Sony really, really needs to make the jump to producing glass. They've cranked out considerably more NEX bodies than lenses since the system launched, and that's a damnable imbalance. 10 more lenses by the end of 2014 would be a nice promise, but by the end of 2015? I really wish that camera manufacturers would stop putting the cart before the horse, so to speak. If they want to win over new customers, they need to give them reasons (glass) to want these cameras. This camera could be a game-changer, and if launched 4 or 6 months from now with 3 more lenses would have a better shot of being so. Instead, this system seems too consumer-minded, when this kind of product really needs to build professional support first and let the benefits float downstream.
It really makes me happy with my investment in Fuji, who in a shorter amount of time have made considerably more lenses than cameras, have filled out most of the essentials already, and who have yet to iterate on any of their camera hardware (soon to change, with the much-rumored XE-2), and instead have supported customers with new glass and by making their existing cameras better with firmware. Glass makes a system, and camera hardware is too poorly-utilized out of the box. Fuji, by making great lenses like crazy and improving the effectiveness of their cameras long after they hit market, are building a system right. I only hope Sony can take some lessons from their customer-first approaches. Because these new cameras *could* be the basis of a great system.
I have a drawer full of Contax glass that I have been holding on to for just such a camera, including the 35/2.8 and the very sweet 45/2.8 Tessar pancake. I know I am unlikely to get full res out of the 7R with some of these lenses but it will be a great starting point.
By the way Mike, the 35/2 ZF and ZE retain the contrast of the 35/2.8 CY but improve sharpness and color rendering. The richness of contrast and color rendering in this lens is breathtaking.
Bad looking camera with exciting specs. Would be a really nice smaller camera for high image quality applications that don't require the fastest AF (or Nikon or Canon native mount for that matter).
But a bit worrying that the Zeiss primes are pretty expensive -- I'd like to see a bit more explanation from Sony or Zeiss on what the advantages are compared to other lenses.
John Camp: "Which sort of brings up the question...whatever happened to Canon?"
EOS-M anyone?
In a sense I see Canon, and even Nikon, swaddled the same type of self-comforting bed of formerly successful ideas that Leica had snuggled into (and in which it's still pounding the snooze button). They seem to deny the self-evidence that the shutterbug world is (a) diminishing, and (b) largely clamoring for smaller, high-performance devices. The dslr has been refined to perfection. But it's rapidly becoming an artifact of an earlier generation.
Sony and, yes, Fujifilm are in the vanguard of photo tech pioneers today, each from different angles. Sony is delivering high-perf in form-follows-function dress while Fuji is delivering high-quality new products dressed like grandpa's shorts.
Meanwhile...we benefit!
As one of the "Australian Kids" Mike referred to (I'm the one on the right), I've been watching our video spread with a mix of delight and horror. We really just wanted to give the locals an idea of what to expect, but we seem to have inadvertently conducted a global launch event in our downstairs studio.
Almost makes me wish I had waited a year to get my D800E . . . except for the part about not having the D800E for the past year. Seriously, I love the D800E and the 24-70 f2.8 except for the size and horrendous weight, and this looks like the perfect substitute (I never shoot below f5.6). Plus, being able to dial in exposure compensation on the fly with an EVF is a treat, as I learned with the E-M5. If only I were made of money....
I have just sold my D800E and Zeiss ZF2s and ordered the A7r with a couple of lenses. Unlike John Camp the size and weight of the Nikon kit was simply too great to use it anything like as much as it deserved and so I just used my Fuji Xs. Even much of my Fuji X kit is looking at risk now. Shame the Sony is no looker though.
Daniel Oi: To be honest, I've not been hugely impressed with what I've seen out of the Sony SEL 50. It just seems rather... bland. I should pick one up and find out for myself before passing judgment, though.
The reason the new Sony/Zeiss 55 appeals more than the Sony 50 is that it might have more character and that it would be usable on a future FF body if I ever go that route. I'm concerned that SELs are an evolutionary dead end at this point, the same thing that holds me back from buying the Sony/Zeiss 24.
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} | 794 | Why are so many thinking so small?
Started Mar 7, 2011 | Discussions thread
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Why are so many thinking so small?
Mar 7, 2011
Seen a lot of threads and discussion over what Sony may or may not do with future DSLR offerings.
Many bemoan the demise of the OVF.
Others eagerly entertain the onset of an A77, a potential SLT-like successor to the A700.
I for one welcome Sony's bold decision. Mirrorbox smirrorbox.
We don't have LP's anymore. We play CD's and now an iPod. Sony decision to go EVF is following (or most likely leading) a charge. Panasonic showed that an EVF is viable. And while Panasonic has upped the ante with CDAF for the their Still/Video machines Sony took it one step further with a Pellicle approach that preserves the sure-fire phase detect on a constant basis permitting a whopping 10fps on a camera that goes for $800 (U.S.).
Some have already complained that the AF can't keep up with the shutter. And that the Pellicle causes ghosting. And that you lose a whole 1/3 stop. And that the dynamic range is compromised because of the mirror. Perhaps an A77 will address those issues even better. Already Sony's Bionz image processing seems to be in a league better than all previous engines producing relatively noise free images with little detail damage up to ISO 800 or 1600 from an increasingly crowded APS-C sensor (a level that was once unheard of in Sony land). A sensor of SONY design that the folks at Nikon and Pentax seized on for their own models. Maybe the next Pellicle will have better coatings for better glare control to deal with the ghosting issue (which, by the way, is limited to situations where a hot spot or reflection is slightly left in the middle of the upper right quadrant. Maybe the articulating LCD will surprise you. Maybe it will eventually have weather sealing like the A850.
EVF's will become even more detailed. They've made it possible to provide FF viewing in a tiny body. What's wrong with that?
The Zeiss lenses aren't going away. At least from what I can tell. The newest addition from those wonderful folks who brought you Google Earth imagery was NOT a 35mm f2 or f1.4 but, rather, a 24mm f2, already a performer whose reviews have topped all the charts with comments like "the best lens ever" and other platitudes. A lens that acts like a 36mm optic on APS-C no less. If that isn't an endorsement for a SLT version of the A700 what is?
As for the existing Zeiss? The 16-35mm f2.8, the 24-70mm f2.8 zooms and the short teles at 85mm and 135mm respectively, they still work well. But in the land of the APS-C clearly there's weakness in the ultra wide area where we'd love to see an offering go wider (although Sigma seems to be offering an impressive option here for APS-C).
But now to my real point. Why are so many thinking so small when if I were the Sony who led the way with CD's, DVD's, Betamax (which was a flop initially but found a whole new life with the professional crowd) and imaginative state-of-the-art video I can see that while the mirror box is still viable EVF may be the way to go. And Sony, for one, has the resources to push it. (Panasonic, too, as the other big player in the HDTV world who had already developed EVF's for their TV Cams and realized that that division might supply those wonderful little EVF's to the camera division who'd been plodding along with their various Leica-glassed offerings.)
Why not go all the way with an EVF? The big Kahuna. The Holy Grail. In short, FF.
I mean, save for the 16-80 f3.5 all those luscious Zeiss lenses in the Sony stable were originally designed for FF. And the 24mm while perfect for APS-C does not cut off at APS-C.
So what may Sony have up their Nipponese sleeves? My guess is an eventual SLT A88 or A99 that will totally rock the photo world with an EVF camera with FF capability. Perhaps at 30 MP perhaps a better 24 or 25. Weather sealed and with magnesium construction. All in a lighter (but still solid feeling) compact body that would make anyone considering a Canon or Nikon alternative think again.
Just some thoughts. Now bring on the rebuttals.
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} | 1,215 | a lot of pressure on Sony now ...
Started Jan 29, 2014 | Discussions thread
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nevercat Senior Member • Posts: 3,193
Re: a lot of pressure on Sony now ...
parallaxproblem wrote:
dynaxx wrote:
there may be camera makers out there that try to trump a popular offering from the competition. Sony certainly never has. They plough their own furrow as you can see from the introduction of the A900, the RXI, SLT, the Nex range and the A7000 They were groundbreakers but, sadly, groundbreaking doesn't always translate into profitability.
Sony are currently not being so innovative with the technologies they employ (the A7 has nothing new by itself... sensor and EVF are from A99 and many of the other components are from RX1) just the way they recombine existing components in order to create a new product.
Strange, the created the smallest and lightest Full Frame camera with interchangeble Auto Focus lenses and you call it not inovative. Just lets look at the other brands. Is the Nikon Df so innovative (nothing realy new in that camera, just a reboxed older Nikon camera with a relativly slow AF module. Can you show me how Canon is inovative when they put the same sensor, in a slightly changed body, without enything realy new? And how inovative was Nilkon with the D610, just a fix to the D600, nothning inovative there.
A camera can be inovative just by putting things together in a new way. Canon did that with the SL1, use all existing parts and put in a smaller body. It was inovation to...
The QX series is a perfect example where these lenses are basically re-packaged cybershot cameras
Well here again, you get a completly new way of taking pictures, a very inovative way, never done before. And according to Sony they are selling well...
Unfortunately Sony don't really recongnise the concept of a camera system and instead repackage what they have into something radically different to that which we currently have, in the hope that 'new' customers will buy the product, whatever the reaction of the older customers to the products
Eh? Look at the Nex 5 series: It did not change that much when you look at it. The AF had been made better, some extra functions (like Wifi, apps, etc) has been added and FW updates have been issued. Exactly what you want and now you complain....
The A7(r) and the A3000 are new cameras in their range of E-mount cameras, both with a specific target group (People wanting small FF with High IQ and people wanting very cheap) So yes Sony is trying to get more people buying their stuf, but they are not forgetting the old (look how nice the A5000 looks)
SLT was not necessarily a 'better' feature, it was a different one and Sony pretty quickly stopped giving their customers the option of the traditional OVF (before SLT had the time to offer OVF-level AF performance) and didn't really explain properly to their customers what the over-riding benefits of SLT were
Lets face it the A-mount DSLR was not selling that great. Sony was not a big player in the feild, so they had to try something new and different. The SLT was that step. They came with one last DSLR after the A55 and it was not selling that well, the A55 was selling a lot better. It is logical that Sony decided to stop the DSLR design, two lines of the same kind of camera is to expensive...
NEX was a fantastic product concept but Sony never bothered to make the lenses their customers wanted for it
Well in fact Sony did listen very well in this department. At first people asked for smaller lenses, so came the pancake zoom, the pancaker 20mm and the 35mm lens. People wanted better lenses, so came the Zeiss 24mm, the Zeiss zoom the 35 and 55mm lensesand the G zoom lens.
There is a very nice range of lenses for the E-mount camera at this moment, and more are comming
For the FF E-mount camera Sony listened again and came with the High quality lenses first.
as they simply didn't understand who was buying it, and then all of a sudden dropped the whole NEX name and range when they ran off to make an FF version and left us still wondering what is going to happen to this sector in the future (cue a hundred deranged fanboys and shills shrieking 'nothing has changed you .....')
Stop with the dropping of the Nex range, Sony is showing that they support5 the E-mount range very well. New APS cameras are comming... So they did not ran off to make the FF they did it together with developping the APS version of their cameras. And stop calling people who are not telling what you are telling shills or fanboys, these people were right up till now...
The Fuji releases throw into sharp relief the diffrence in customer awareness between these two companies: Fuji understand their customers and make products geared towards them. Sony neither understand their customers, nor make products that their customers want... the A7 is appealing mainly to non-NEX owners (not that many NEX owners seem to be buying them),
Well where did you get the numbers of the sales of the A7(r) Reading this forum a lot of Nex users here now have the A7(r) or are serious thinking to buy one in the future. So I think this is your wishfull thinking instead of it being based on real numbers. And again with the A7(r) Sony realy listend to the Nex users who wanted a FF camera that was smaller then any existing one...
and the A5000 is not intesting to anybody with a NEX-5 or better.
No it is the Nex 3n successor. It is the lower end camera in the E-mount range. It is not aimed at the Nex 5 users, sony official said that at the announcement of the camera. When Canon brings out the successor to the SL1 camera the users of the 70D will not be interested in it as replacement for their 70D...
We (ie. NEX owners) are all now sitting, waiting for the NEX-7 replacement as it appears to be all we have left...
Well what about the Nex 5t (and the successor that might come at the end of the year)? It is not launched that long ago. In the Past the Nex 5 range had a lifespan of 1 year....
and if it is dull and has a 'hump' then Fuji already has a better 'humped' camera waiting for us (if we are forced to accept 'humps') and a superior lens range to go with it
How do you know that the Fuji humped camera will be better then the Nex 7 successor? Have you information to char? Or is this just missinformation?
Stupid Sony....
Or stupid people who are looking for some sort of conspiricy?
-- hide signature --
DUMP the HUMP! Campaign for *REAL* NEX replacement bodies
Strange, you say that Sony must listen to their custommerrs, but there are custommers out there that want a hump. Maybe time to change your slogan?
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Wednesday, 21 September 2011
What an anti-climax - looks like something from the 70's and not in a good way. Ergonomics - poor, spec - poor, lens- ordinary. I am certainly not coming!
I must say my first reaction on the new Nikons was `Yawn'. Sure, I have no doubt they'll be excellent picture-takers (Thom Hogan went into the 2.7x crop factor a few weeks ago, here (scroll down to `Size Matters?'), but on the whole, this is just another small system that adds little to the market. Sizes seem to be roughly the same as M4/3, interface is the same as every other `semi-pro' Nikon compact, etc. No innovation here.
I can't help thinking it's a bit of a `me too' product, designed carefully to lock people into the Nikon system. (Note that the `new' sensor size makes it uninteresting for third-party developers to make their lenses in this mount, since the focal lengths will be unsuitable)
Disclaimer: I'm probably not the target market for this product, my mirrorless camera of choice is an M3...
It's ugly and I can't see any direct access to WB & ISO. There's no PASM on the mode dial (but it does have them). The only prime at this time is a 27mm-e f/2.8: everything else is f/dark zooms.It looks like there's no onboard flash for fill - external is available.
The smaller the sensor the harder it is to blur backgrounds.
It looks like it's made for the point 'n' poke market.
Thom Hogan predicted 2.7x back in July (http://bythom.com/2011%20Nikon%20News.htm Ctrl+F to search for "2.7")
Reading the press release, I suspect Nikon don't realise the people who read press releases aren't the sort of people they're aiming this camera at. Maybe I'm too cynical, but some of Nikon's claims:
"revolutionary" — for Nikon maybe. The Lumix G was revolutionary, this ain't.
"iconic" — huh? It's only been out a few hours!
"high image quality that only Nikon could create" — well, that's not really true, is it?
... wait for it...
"a simple to use conduit for creativity, seemingly anticipating a consumer's needs in any situation" — excuse me?
"the world is becoming one of visual conversation, which paves the way for the next chapter in image capture device" = "people just wanna stick photos on Facebook"
"completely original concept" — well, no, that was the Lumix G
"fully electronic lens system enables the camera to keep pace with an active lifestyle" — wow, sign me up!
"a device that lives in perfect accord with any lifestyle" — my K-7 just lives in a cupboard, poor thing.
"the colors are vibrant, creating a stylish accessory for every personality" — I'll have black please.
"complemented by fashionable, premium accessories tailored to perfectly fit a user's lifestyle" - what, beanie hats and Chucks? Handbags?
By the time I got to the bit where they told me the Nikon 1 was for enthusiasts, I decided this enthusiast would prefer a PEN.
Yes, the camera seems clearly oriented to consumers (no PASM dial anymore?) but the price does not. As far as I've read since the little beast has been introduced, the public response seems negative. Very negative in many cases, as a matter of fact...
Definite "meh" from me, except for two things that have potentially huge ramifications for their DSLRs:
1) They can drive data off the whole sensor at 60fps. The sensor is a lot smaller than DX/FX sensor, but if they can get even close to that on the DSLRs, that could be huge for having downsampled video using the whole sensor (and I know how much that means to you Mike :p). Also means they can probably partially drive it much faster, which will be good for CDAF.
2) Focal plane phase detect - I haven't been able to find much, will look more, but if this is PDAF sensors embedded in the imaging sensor, good bye microadjust and systematic AF error, and they will have nuked the SLT AF advantage. If it's been properly implemented, SLRs are a big step closer to being...suboptimal (I hestitate to say obsolete)
On a related note, DPReview seems to have removed the sensor pixel "density" metric they used to give for every camera. Which is a shame because it gave some common way to compare sensors of different aspect ratio and megapixel count.
Without a measurement of density people fall back to calling some sensors "small" when they may in fact have lower density than a "large" sensor.
(* trying not to make a value judgement either way..)
I don't think you are the only one who is going to be underwhelmed. Reckon you got this spot-on
Yawn. All we need is SADC (still another digital camera). And in still another sensor size, yet.
It's essentially a camera for 900$ with sensor size half way between 2/3inch and 4/3 and without even a hot-shoe. Like in other Nikons the most expensive thing in it is The Badge. Great deal! ;)
However I find it interesting that the biggest for now gap between the subsequent sensor sizes have just started to fill.
It is a very smart move. Reflex cameras still have another decade of life in them for professional use, but joe consumer has little use for them.
Two or three years from now, Nikon can introduce an FX (24mm x 36mm) format mirrorless system for professional use that can accept F mount lenses (like Oly/Pana did moving from 4/3 to micro 4/3). Then Nikon can then squeeze Sony, Panasonic and Samsung from the top with FX mirrorless and from the bottom with CX mirrorless.
Expect the D5 to come without a mirror. Don't worry, the F mount to micro F mount adapter will be included in the box.
The new Nikons with their 10-30mm f/3.5-5.6 lens have a similar clear aperture* to a Panasonic LX-5, with its 24-90mm (full frame equivalent) f/2.0-3.3 lens. That means the noise performance and depth of field isolation will be similar to the LX-5, which costs 40% less than the J1.
However it will probably be a commercial success since the target market seems to be compact camera upgraders who typically won't know the difference between an APS-C sensor and a 1" sensor. Having a smaller sensor means smaller lenses and lower production costs. Which means that Nikon can offer a "large sensor interchangable lens system camera" at a lower price than competitors, and in a smaller size, while making more gross profit, some of which can be thrown back as dealer margin to incentivise retailers to push the 1 System over technically superior competitors.
As a design engineer I hate it when marketing trumps engineering - but it does, most of the time.
* clear aperture is the diameter of the aperture opening. For a given angle of view (i.e. equivalent focal length) it determines the amount of light reachng the sensor.
Nikon just gave Sony a huge boost.
What I like: the integrated viewfinder in a housing that doesn't look like a wunderplastic DSLR.
What I don't like: oh, come on, Nikon, even Pentax Q has an F1.9 lens. It's not like you're the first in the market and cannot compare with anybody else.
What irritates me: Dear Nikon, couldn't you have spared us the marketing hyperbole? This is not revolutionary.
Ewww... unattractive AND class-trailing. Nikon bows at the throne of King Olympus and begs its humble, ugly and insignificant self leave to be in the same court. Who would have thought?
Mike, here are the MTF charts and diagrams for the new lenses.
I do not understand the idea of small sensor compact cameras with interchangeable lenses. Mount a lens, pack a few more and "compact" part is nowhere to be found anymore.
If compactness is the goal with solid image quality and full control over shooting parameters, then good small sensor coupled with a non-removable lens is the answer (like Olympus XZ-1, Panasonic LX5, Canon G12, or Fuji X10). Personally, I see no point in both Nikon 1 and Pentax Q systems.
Built in viewfinder good, but seriously, the stylists didn't really tax themselves over this one did they?
Would it be too much to ask for a camera to look good and not just like a slab?
The samples are good though.
It tempts me :)
But price is bad.
What's most amazing is that this MILF system – Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens Format – is the first new lens mount from Nikon since the Nikonos. That was launched in 1963, 48 years ago in full frame time; multiplied by 2.7 for its digital equivalent, it feels more like 129.6.
Mike, are you grumpy about the 4/3's standard or Nikons move away from it with this new series camera? Got to say Nikon is taking a mighty gamble with this format but seem to be placing the camera in the amateur area of the user market, although it is pricey. Conflicting signals here.
I'm sure Nikon lovers will enthuse over it but I am not convinced at this stage - not knocking Nikon as I have been a Nikon user since the mid 60's, still got a load as well.
Time will tell!
As expected, Nikon opted to create its own proprietary system rather than join the Micro 4/3 standard*.
You know, we wouldn't want to have people buy lenses from other manufacturers, right?
To me also this whole exercise is too much about protecting current market share and products, and not focussed on creating the ultimate pocketable system camera. Looking at how Panasonic and Olympus cannot make up their mind on whether they want to create a consumer or semi-pro camera, they could easily have created themselves a nice niche there. Or go directly the DX route, even giving people the possibility to use those DX lenses via an adapter.
I agree Nikon has always been more the enthousiast's and pro's camera, and this is absolutely not fitting. Oh well, at least it fits nicely with Nikon's ultimately uninspiring compact camera line-up.
I'll go back into my corner and play with my Nikon FM.
This new Nikon line looks like a competitor to larger sensor compacts like the Canon S95 and Panasonic LX5, but with the small sensor size is no way in the same league as the NEX or even the m43 offerings. But Nikon never was good at making decent P&S so this is not a surprise.
That is really sad, with all the formats coming up (maybe canon has a surprise also with it`s own format 2,4x???)
I teach basic photography courses and it`s a mess for newcomers to undestand what a crop factor is and what kind of camera does one have not to speak about noise at higher isos and megapixels ...
The industry should standardized on max 2-3 sensor sizes...
Yawn. WTF is up with Nikon?
I'm underwhelmed by this one. Why would anyone buy this thing? Too expensive for the fashionable snap-shooting set; inadequate (at least by specs) for anyone else.
ACIL? Who needs TV when we're surrounded by all this marketing? Highly entertaining.
Aside from all that, the system might be just right for a lot of users. If anything, in a web-based world, the 10 mpix may be overkill, 6 or 8 would have been fine. Better than a run-of-the-mill p&s digicam, but not cheap though, is it?
APS-C format:
Tamron 18-270mm F/3.5-6.3
Length: 90mm
Filter diameter: 62mm
Weight: 450g
35mm-equivalent max magnification ratio: 0.39x
Nikon CX format:
Nikkor 10-100mm F/4.5-5.6
Length: 95mm
Filter diameter: 72mm
Weight: 530g
35mm-equivalent max magnification ratio: 0.34x
I have nothing against smaller-format image sensors per se — the picture quality they deliver is often more than good enough, and the cameras tend to be lightweight and compact.
Nikon's sensor also has an area about 4.6x larger than the typical 1/2.5" sensor used in compact digital cameras, presumably benefiting low-light IQ.
Still, smallish-sensor cameras are supposed to have an advantage as far as the size and weight of tele lenses are concerned, but that benefit doesn't seem to have materialized with Nikon's latest offering…
But then again, the Nikkor 10-100mm might be a fairly expensive design with a much better optical performance than the Tamron 18-270mm.
I have a fondness for using tools for purposes other than they were intended, so I would like to put forth what I call the Canadian CX-DX Conversion Method: Just think of a CX focal length as a temperature in Celsius, and a field-of-view equivalent DX lens' focal length is the same temperature in degrees Fahrenheit above freezing. If you have a C/F converter, and can remember that water freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, or that the Nikkor brand was launched in 1932, you won't need to remember the crop factors.
The small sensor makes this camera DOA for me. Such a waste . . .
Advanced camera without P, Tv, Av and M on a dial and no dial for setting those values?
I'm dismissing it out of hand (personally, for me only), not for its sensor size (it could provide an interesting compromise between size & performance), but for the slow lenses. An f/2.8 pancake and f/5.6 zooms on a 2.7x crop sensor are just very slow lenses.
But I suspect that Nikon is targeting the same p&s upgraders that Sony targets with the 3/5 series of the NEX line and who knows - it may sell. Consumers don't realize that f/5.6 on a small sensor isn't as useful as f/5.6 on a large sensor, if they have any understanding of f/5.6 at all. (Personally, I think I'd rather the new Fuji X10).
And then there are the performance/tech aspects of the new system that are getting swept under the rug at the moment ... slo-mo video, high fps sequences, possibly excellent autofocus. These features could be genuinely fun for consumers and genuinely useful for some enthusiasts or even pros.
I'd have to see faster lenses to offset the smaller sensor before I'd have any interest, but I won't speculate further on it's future success ... I don't understand much of the market beyond traditional still photographers.
No comments till now...says a lot.
I think this is your new 'digicam'.
This is a pure marketing led product launch and has nothing to do with photography. And from that standpoint, it seems to be a good decision. The fact is that consumers "at large" are unaware of the sensor size, SNR and other image quality related parameters. Its a great brand, and that's what matters to people who want a better camera but not a slr.
The tiny sensor in a typical digicam is so tiny that cell phones are having it for breakfast, so something better, but not so better :) is needed, in order to revitalize the digicams market. So this is it. Better than a cell phone. And an affirmation that the digicam market is going to be dead in (not so near) future.
I think I'll keep my XZ-1.
>>So what do you think?<<
I think I'll hang on to my EVIL Olympus Pen.
Should watch bythom.com. It is not news as it was being predicted for quite a while now.
I still think that pancake or M lens plus APS-C is a better choice, probably not for general consumer. I am looking at Ricoh M module and Sony 7. If I have to go small, may be pentax Q keychain is better.
Really looking forward what your reader would say.
This is why the A55 was on the influential list. 4/3 did not jar the giants into action.
I truly regret the decision of manufacturers to develop their own mounts instead of joining forces. It's not only a waste of resources but also a way to irritate the poor adopters of freshly devised camera systems, who will be waiting for some lenses for ages.
However, as a m4/3 user I am delighted with Nikon's CX announcement and wish them good luck wholeheartedly.
Today may be remembered as the beginning of the end of the SLR era.
Ugly as home-made sin.
No mention of IS.
No teeny-tiny little "normal FL" high-speed prime lenses.
Hmmm I dunno. A big part of the romance of buying a new camera is how it looks. And this one, with the featureless evf hump, just looks like, meh. Why bother?
so it uses yet another new lens mount?
i guess it benefits the companies more than it benefits the users.
Reading some initial posts in the usual places (e.g., photo.net), it seems that this announcement is widely misunderstood. I don't think it means that all Nikon's mirrorless cameras will be CX. I think it means that their first is CX, and they are introducing the new CX class. Nothing at all keeps them from introducing a DX-class mirrorless in the future to replace the D3100 and to take F-mount lenses. But one thing at a time!
One thing i do like about the new CX format is the sensor has the same 3:2 aspect ratio as my Nikon DSLR.
I'm underwhelmed. I've been in the market for a mirrorless, interchangeable and have been waiting for Nikon to get in the game, but the sensor size spec is a big turnoff. And the lack of any command dial makes it feel more Coolpix than DSLR. It actually looks like it would be a PITA to use.
I'm intrigued by this thing. I bought a GF1 immediately upon release to free me from D3s when just roaming with family. I liked the idea of a large sensor, relatively speaking, in a small package. I'm interested in this Nikon because I like that they kept the mp count quite low, at 10mp. If this camera can produce good images at the higher iso's because of the lower mp, it could be interesting.
Here's where I see the problem. The M4/3 system already has a fair amount of decent lenses available. Serious enthusiasts already own some of those lenses. These are folks who are probably not going to sell off what they have to invest in a new system.
Add in the fact that adapted lenses are also a big part of the appeal and that leaves us with "who" is actually going to buy the new Nikon?
The most basic small sensor cameras are being replaced by camera phones, and those phones are increasingly going to take over more of the market. 1" sensors are a solid step up in image quality from anything that is going to fit in a phone any time soon and a solid step down in size from any CSC that exists now.
A nice flat little 35mm f/2 lens plus the existing 10mm f/2.8 could make for a truly pocketable two-lens combo. Lots of Nikon DSLR shooters would be interested, and so would I.
From BJP:
Both cameras also have a Smart Photo Selector feature, which, when selected, will shoot 20 full-resolution images in less than a few seconds. "You just press the shutter once and, utilising the pre and post capture technology, the camera starts to take the pictures before you've even fully depressed the button." The camera then automatically selects the best five shots, which are saved based on facial expression, composition and focus
My emphasis. It's come to this? Next self-propelled cameras that you can send out and wait for them to return with good pictures?
Hmmm. I do sometimes wish not to carry the lump of the D700 around, especially when travelling, but at this sensor size, and 10.2 mp, I am wondering why not just grab the lightest Nikon DSLR body that I bought her indoors a year ago and stick with that? Well, I guess this is cute and small and probably quieter (?) I must be missing something...
It's a small camera with a small sensor and a big price. I don't get it. I don't see anything in the specs or features that justifies the premium price.
I'd certainly have been happier for Nikon to join Micro Four Thirds, but I never really thought there was a snowball's chance in hell. However, I think M43 may turn out to be the way for the smaller players to combine to be competitive with Nikon and Canon in some areas, still.
Nikon is lagging in the consumer arena; arguably that's where they need to do something dramatic. Of course, yet another mirrorless system might not be sufficiently dramatic (though this one isn't DOA like the Pentax Q was).
The rumors sites (or at least NikonRumors.com, which I do follow some) did call this one exactly right, including the announcement date and the crop factor, some weeks ago. But they don't always, so I don't particularly think you're "making a mistake" not following them. I kind of enjoy watching their detective work; I'm not sure I would follow them just for the predictions.
I wonder how important it's going to be that 2.7x is hard to do in your head? I was glad I had Nikon DX rather than the smaller Canon DSLR sensors because 1.5x is easier than 1.6x :-) .
Okay, I forgot about the Pronea series of Nikon cameras; that makes the CX their first new lens mount in 76 digital year-equivalents. Perhaps their APS cameras might be a good parallel to the new format.
A smaller than micro 4/3rds sensor? Color me uninterested. And a proprietary, Nikon only, YAS (yet another standard)?
No, thanks.
Pass. (As if I need another camera anyway.) I've not read the whole product spiel but the camera has two features that immediately lose my interest for such a camera.
1. A smaller sensor than 4/3rds? Why? Fujifilm can engineer an APS-C sensor in such a camera (X100). Nikon's engineers must be drawn from the lower quartiles of their classes.
2. A center-positioned eyepiece? Don't these guys ever use cameras? Why not place it at the corner to prevent the camera from covering the shooter's face and enable shooters to see the scene with their left eye without dropping the camera? It's a fake viewfinder anyway so what the hell's the difference where it's placed? Must be the same dullard engineers, eh?
Big miss. My record at never having bought a Nikon camera seems unthreatened.
I guess I'm far from the target market for this system because I'm not interested at all. It seems like Sony has a substantial lead in putting large sensors in small bodies and making light compact primes for them at competitive prices. Why would anyone pay the same or more for something that is larger and heavier, but has a tiny sensor with much less DOF control and lower IQ? The only thing I saw that this MIGHT have over NX or NEX or MFT or GRX is faster AF and motion capture, which takes photos and video at the same time, although the horse sample on the website looks to have near zero shadow detail. Scratching my head in disappointment at yet another company refusing to innovate (unless a me too camera with a smaller sensor can be considered innovation.)
Good: It's small and light. An actual, if electronic, viewfinder. Looks reasonably ok, but a bit too sleek.
Bad: Seems too consumerish, modern. Not much of a grip. Possibly the sensor is too small for optimum image quality.
Wasn't the V1 those rockets Hitler fired on London in the final days of WWII? Kind of an inapt name, I think.
Will I buy one? Depends on image quality, functionality, ergonomics. Could be a good travel camera. I am somewhat disappointed.
Wow! The ugliest camera ever.
I wish there was more co-operation and interchangeability in lens mounts. What a mess having what, twelve or more COMMON mounts? Oh well.
I'm smitten by micro 4/3, I'm completely in love with the GF1+20mm pancake setup. I cant fathom the NEX system - its way out of balance with teeny cameras and Goliath lenses. Maybe Nikon will do something good with this mount, maybe not. Its all in the lenses of course... and since they invented a new wheel, unless they release something awesome (like the m4/3 20mm!) its going to be years before this mount is worth being interested in.
The sensor size may prove to be excellent, but until that's proven, I'm happy with m4/3 being perfection.
"No comments till now...says a lot."
It says "Mike has to sleep sometime." [g]
The cameras are interesting, though certainly not earth shattering. But I think the biggest disappointment is the lenses. Slow zooms and an f2.8 prime.
Surely it would have worth the extra costs (both in size and money) to at least make the prime an f2. As it stands it's not as fast or as wide as compacts like the Canon S90/95/100. Then on top of all that it costs a lot more than those compacts too.
Nothing against the sensor size but this could have been great. Instead, as many people have already said "meh"
Makes perfect sense to me. Smaller than m4/3 (which are not pocketable), and right between compacts and APS-C DSLRs. The lenses now announced are the obvious choices that accompany each new lens mount, I'm sure faster ones will follow. If only the design were a little less boring...
Oh wait, now I remember why m4/3 is great and this wont be.
1) Its SMALL (as a whole system, which duh, includes the lenses)
2) Image quality is excellent (optics, sensor, image processing, exposure controls wb/af/etc)
3) DOF control (biggest sensor and aperture you can get wins)
4) Excels in poor light (yay f1.7 pancake!, hooray for better sensitivity than early DSLR's!)
NEX loses on point 1, Nikon1 loses on point 3.
They've certainly handed Canon a gift. Adopting 4/3 or micro 4/3 would've made the statement that they're willing to compete on image quality and optics, or going with an APS-C sensor and F-mount would've made this a very interesting complement to a DSLR or "gateway" offering. Instead they sidestep the issue, left most folks scratching their heads, and are about to give Canon a ton of free market research.
Watch them sell ten million of them over the Holidays. It's a perfect gift, upscale enough to be significant better quality than their last crappy digicam or iPhone. It may displace D3100 sales but it may steal a lot of customers from other brands too. And since it must have a higher margin than the D3100, it doesn't hurt Nikon.
We're not the target. Nikon knows that eventually it will hook us for $1800 to get a pro-compact, that's the price point most serious amateurs will pay and give up their DSLRs. And why would they leave money on the table when they know we'll pay it for a really good camera?
Seems like they've crippled this system out of deference to their DSLRs. What, other than Nikon loyalty, would make you buy this over m4/3s? It's not winning on IQ, price, size, or lens assortment.
On the other hand, I'm sure this will make many retailers happy.
So, as it stand now, Pentax and Nikon seem to have articulated a similar approach to the market: Mirrorless interchangeable is important, but not so important that it should be in anyway a compelling alternative to a DSLR--even an entry-level DSLR. Call it the cute second camera approach.
Oly and Pani have said: DSLRs are soon to be a niche product for consumers. Entry level DSLRs are dead.
And Sony has said something similar, but it's putting some serious innovation in that niche. (And, notably, it's created a bridge between their two lens families from the get-go.)
The small pixel count seems like the best thing about it. If I was them I would go farther and make it eight rather than ten. Screw the megapixel wars. Maximize the ISO capability and you can still print 20x24 if the light is good.
The rest, meh. I see zero reason to give up my E-P1 and my wife would kill me if I tried to swap it for her S95.
Another dead-on-your-shelf-in-four-years exercise in design-by-marketing. Nikon could have broken new ground but decided to stay in the sand box. Yawn.
People are impatient with new systems. It took Oly 3 tries to really get the AF right on the Pen. I'd give Nikon a little time to get other things right on this. Eventually it might make an awesome little street/travel camera. One more thing--that AF system makes me wonder if we will see a larger sensor "2" system sooner or later. I would not be surprised.
What a pathetic sensor! Nikon can count me out.
I propose we label this new smaller sensor "Digital Disc."
Wow, every time I get ready to comment, there's another ten!*
I see two things:
1. This is meant for the post-cellphone crowd. iPhone cameras are getting too good for the P/S business. They might know exactly what kind of sensor Apple is prototyping, and the price point is designed for people who shell out for the latest iPhone. This is important,because it means they want to capture the most profitable corner of the future P/S business now.
2. This is also social signaling to the other camera companies. Remember, these guys all produce for their domestic market, and see themselves as competing directly with each other, inside their own culture. This is not GM vs. Toyota, this is GM vs. Ford. Nikon has just revealed a ton about what they can unleash on their competitors, any time they get out of line. On-sensor phase detect? That warns Sony that SLTs could become obsolete fast. Fast interleaved-with-stills video? That warns Canon that they can out-spec the 5DMarkWhatever.
*good work slogging through the word-mines, Mike.
ILTim, m4/3 loses point 3, and, interestingly enough, Samsung NX seems to meet all of those qualifications.
The cry for large sensor cameras is becoming almost a religious thing. If this is not aimed at you, don't buy it, but don't assume everyone wants the same thing you do.
I am interested in a digital camera for video. I could use a DSLR for that, of course, but it doesn't make sense to buy a camera just for video and then lose the use of the viewfinder. So, an EVF makes more sense. This camera seems aimed half at stills and half at video, so I'm interested and sorry for all you "mehs" and "yawns" out there. I'm interested in the Nex5n, too, but the video clicking flaw and lack of microphone input makes it less interesting.
I am a bit curious about why Nikon dropped 24p, as budding filmmakers cry for that the way many on the Internet cry for "full-frame" sensors. I guess 60i can be scaled down to 24p pretty easily.
Anyway, I'm waiting for the reviews before I get my torch and pitchfork and head to Nikon HQ to yell for a D4.
I simply don't see why anybody would get one, save for the Nikon badge on the front. And I say that as a happy D700 user.
Look at the major characteristics:
1) No smaller than micro 4/3 (at least the bodies and the kit lens).
2) No lighter than micro 4/3.
3) No cheaper than micro 4/3.
4) No better image quality than micro 4/3. At least, the smaller sensor and slow lenses make it extremely unlikely.
In the rush to avoid competing with their own lower-end DSLRs, they seem to have produced a product with no major selling points, other than the brand.
if amazon pre-orders are any indication, this new system is clearly not going to set the world on fire for enthusiasts.
as is, i don't think this system will even catch on with consumers. the kits are too expensive, and the sensor is only one step up from point & shoots. true, how much image quality do you really need for putting photos on the internet or flat-screen tv? but the small sensor and slow lenses won't make it much easier to take photos or video in low light or with shallow depth of field. the lenses also aren't small enough in a practical sense to gain an advantage over micro 4/3.
nikon may have shot themselves in the foot on this one.
Ashton Kutcher's gonna sell millions of these to people that don't read websites like TOP.
This makes the NEX-7 look even better. Sony must be over the moon today, Nikon have blown their chance.
The crop factor from DX to CX (Nikon APS to Nikon 1) is roughly 1.8. This means Nikon has a set of DX lenses that could be neatly repackaged with e new mount for the new system:
- 30mm f1.8 (80mm equiv) might make a nice "portrait prime".
- 40mm f2.8 (105mm equiv) might make a nice macro telephoto.
- 85mm f3.5 (230mm equiv) could serve as "the new legendary 200 f4 macro of old".
The lens design is done, the lens elements are probably sitting on some factory shelf already, so go ahead Nikon, just design a new lens barrel for the Nikon 1 system.
Dear Folks,
OK, I'm just musing here, and Thom (I hope) will correct me if I'm totally up the wrong tree on this one, but...
I'm guessing there's not a lot of money for the camera makers in bare camera bodies in the low-mid hundred dollar range. I suspect the margins, like for computers, are simply too small, given how fast the technology changes and new designs need to be engineered and introduced to keep up with the Joneses.
You can make some money on packages and all-in-ones. You can make some money selling good lenses. But most bare bodies? Not so much, unless you luck into a runaway best-seller. Which does happen, but about as frequently as with books.
Soooo... removes a certain incentive to join an existing mount system like m4/3. You can't guarantee that sales of your lenses will match those of the bodies, especially if someone else already has a hot lens in that range.
You'll sell lenses for other makers' bodies, to be sure, but then you're hitching your success to their star.
IOW, it's problematical to join the herd. Most 35mm camera makers didn't-- they favored incompatible mounts.
So, Mike? Thom? Does this reflect the business sense, or am I all wet?
pax / Ctein
One word: automation.
Plus another word: consumer.
Equals a camera that will make all your choices for you. Even if you don't want to let it, I suspect.
Matthew, yes! That's the acronym we want for this kind of camera - MILF. I petition the internets to accept it. :D
Is it any relation to the earlier V-1?
V-1 Flying Bomb
Remember the "Hitler rants" video about D3x on YouTube In response to the Nikon D3x $8000 price tag.
This is not as elaborate but does make the point well:
Click the picture for a 16 sec video.
Bob Mc
@Will: Is the electronic shutter in the J1 another warning, with a shutter speed of 1/16,000. But why cripple it with a 1/60 flash sync speed, when electronic shutters have allowed faster flash sync speeds in the past?
I've not used it, read about it much, seen any samples, know very little about camera sales, let alone camera sales in Japan, and am never going to buy anything like it. Apparently, I am therefore perfectly positioned to comment along the lines of "it's rubbish", "what were Nikon thinking?", "it's too expensive", "those lenses are slow", "where's the D4?" yada yada.
The hybrid phase-detect/contrast detect AF system is the one very interesting thing about this.
I can see that technology allowing them to make a mirrorless F-mount body with full time live view and video with fast AF, plus ditch the prism for a good quality EVF and the advantages they offer now that they can be made with good response times and resolution.
Wow! Great image quality... for a coolpix P&S.
Not interested.
The NEX-7 is looking like an incredible bargain next to this.
However, Sony needs some pro quality fast wide pancake primes.
Why does the EVF have to be positioned in the center? There is no way to take a shot without getting nose grease on the display screen.
I mean......C'mon Nikon...........pay attention to detail!
For me, it will be either this or the X10. If the X10 is cheaper I will go with Fujifilm.
Unlike most of the other poster's here, I'm not really concerned with the sensor size. I'm sure that a talented photographer can wring some excellent images out of this camera.
I am, however, concerned with two things: (i) the lack of direct aperture/shutter speed controls, and (ii) the overall size of the camera. With respect to (i), one could be forgiven for thinking that Nikon would take a lesson from the popularity of the Fuji X100. No professional or serious amateur wants to take their eye from the finder in order to fiddle around with menus. With respect to (ii), I recently had the opportunity to handle the Pentax Q, and feel that this camera is basically unusable for somebody with average-sized hands. Nikon's claims that the 1 is the world's "smallest mirrorless camera with a viewfinder." If that's true, and the 1 is smaller than the Pentax Q, it raises serious concerns about its usability.
"Is it any relation to the earlier V-1? V-1 Flying Bomb"
Careful. You know how nicknames sometimes tend to stick. [g]
Come on Nikon, the [original, 1948 —Ed.] Nikon I has 24mm x 32mm sensor and optical viewfinder and full manual control of course. Good to stick with 10mp though. And why not put the logo on the front of the Mount Fuji on the V1 that hides the EVF? Kind of make it a little bit reasonable for me...
I'm as puzzled as everyone. Looking at it, Nikon probably intended to create a snapshooter-oriented camera with good video capabilities. It looks as it's *the* tool for your average Asian snapshooter on vacation. Just look at the advertised features on their website: 10 (or 60) fps, shoot-everything, motion snapshot, "smart" photo selector, etc.
It has the worst designed camera logo I've seen in a long time, especially the separate "1". Besides, sensor smaller than 4/3!? And it is not just about image quality, assuming that Nikon miraculously managed to get better quality than from larger sensors, it is also about greater depth of field (i.e., conversely, the lack of shallow dof). I see it more as a competitor to p&s, than a "serious" camera.
I won't be getting one, or even considering it seriously, inless they add a wider prime lens. Something in the 20mm to 24mm equivalent range would have me looking with some interest, but for now, I'll pass and not even look back.
Count me in the grumpy club. Laaaame.
Well, at least this makes me even more happy about my Olympus Pen Lite.
Why this continuing sensor size proliferation? Simple, there are no longer adults in the room (film manufactures)to keep the kids in line. I'd bet on yet another format from Canon with their mirrorless offering.
Surely the camera is not so much a snap shooter camera with video capabilities as a video camera with amazing potential for snapshots.
It may be a game changer, much as the iPOD changed the way we listen to music.
All this handwringing puzzles me. The price is a little high right out of the gate, but say it comes down $100 or so to, say $700-$800. There are plenty of people who extol the virtues of Oly OZ-1 or Pany LX-5 digicams and they cost $500, for which an EVF is a $200 option.
So here's the Nikon 1 for only $200-$300 more, a digicam with a built-in EVF and whose sensor is BIG, compared with the ones in those "high-end" digicams. And as a bonus, you can buy another lens for it one day if you feel like it.
People should stop comparing the Nikon 1 to 4/3s or APS-C cameras, that's beside the point.
I actually think there is a market for this sensor size, but the packaging is wierd and the lenses too fat (and slow) to make it truly compact.
The controls are very far from enthusiast territory but this is obviously designed for the Japanese consumer market, not us folk. It has lots of "cool" accessories and funky colours.
In principle however I would be interested in a camera that is really pocket friendly and decent quality, but why are the 1 lenses so, er, enormous? Seems to defeat the whole object!
And is it just me or are there some really horrible aliasing artifacts in the samples?
And RAW support?
An enthusiast version though may be more interesting - especially with some really quick pancake glass - cant see that on the horizon though.
I've been casually looking for a step-down direct view digital to use when I don't feel like dragging a DSLR around or wearing my hair shirt (M6 + 35 Cron.) I was hoping this new Nikon mirrorless would be in the running, but no dice.
To be honest, of the currently available and announced cameras the Fuji X10 is shaping up to be the best choice for me. I just know that as soon as I buy one someone will come out with a m4/3 with a NEX7-style integrated OLED EVF.
Yawn, wake me up when they make a digital Nikon SP.
Oh, and speaking of design... forgot to add that the overall design, especially of the V1, and especially the viewfinder part (as seen from the front), has all the beauty and elegance of, say, Soviet industrial design. Lomo, anyone?
I see this as more of a marketing fail than a disappointment. Looking at it as a compact camera upgrade aimed at consumers:
Compared to all the other compact point and shoots, it's sensor is HUGE.
it's got different lens choice options!
the smaller sensor compared to SLR's and m4/3's, APS-C, etc means lots of depth of field so your pictures are all in focus!
Built in EVF, a first for a compact camera!
Way faster and more responsive than other compacts!
pick the right tool for the job. If I didn't already have a D300 and lots of glass as well as m4/3 and all the glass, I might consider this for a compact point and shooter, but I've spent too much on camera gear to buy into yet another system.
The comments to this entry are closed. | http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2011/09/mighty-nikon-joins-mirrorless-revolution.html | robots: classic
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} | 1,479 | The Hybrid Surge and the Nikon 1
Woody Sherman
More from Woody Sherman
Nikon 1 V1 hybrid camera
Nikon 1 V1 hybrid camera
Smoke, but no mirrors
Nikon set the digital imaging world abuzz recently with their first "mirrorless" interchangeable-lens cameras, the Nikon 1 V1 and Nikon 1 J1. These are some of the latest additions to what has become a very active segment of the digital imaging market.
If you've been following this world for longer than a day or two, you've probably become aware of a class of products often referred to as "hybrids."
These are cameras with a small body form factor and interchangeable lenses, which offer the convenience of a point-and-shoot, and many of the speedy, responsive features of DSLRs.
Nikon discourages the mirrorless label, saying mirrorless means a DSLR with the mirror removed. They prefer the term "Advanced-Camera with Interchangeable Lens (A-CIL)." That may be an apt description for the entire class.
I want my SUV
Here in North America, we've been a little slower to adopt this evolution of camera technology. We like our DSLRs. They're the SUVs of the camera world. Rugged and dependable, with all the features we demand on the road of life.
But face it, DSLRs can be inconvenient. They generally come with their own dedicated baggage. They have lots of fiddly knobs and menus that demand real, um, focus. They can weigh you down when you're fast on the move. And until you know your gear and have it "under your fingers", it's tough to be spontaneous and quick on the draw.
Hybrid vigor
Enter the hybrid. Panasonic, Olympus and Sony have been at the forefront of this mobility-friendly market, and have widely acclaimed models that have seen upgrades and revisions since their initial introductions. The product lines are now fragmenting, pursuing two different types of user:
• The compact, point-and-shoot fan, who's ready for the creative step-up that multiple lens choices can give. They don't want a lot of manual control, they're fine with an LCD display for photo composition, and they'd like some nice creative-filter and HD video shooting options. Essentially, they want a few creative steroids, but the same lightweight physical characteristics and simple controls they enjoy from compact cameras.
• The developing hobbyist / experienced enthusiast. They may already own a DSLR they love. But even they can't deny the allure of something as compact and nimble as a hybrid. They want a high image-quality camera that they can have at the ready for any opportunity, the so-called "street camera." So they demand a few things that the point-and-shoot graduates don't: Proper viewfinders (optical or electronic). Compatibility with a decent and versatile line of good lenses. Outboard flash compatibility. Manual control options. A bigger variety of video shooting formats. And, very often, larger image sensors.
Does size matter?
Popular sensor sizes compared
Popular sensor sizes compared
Well, unsurprisingly, the answer is: sometimes. Large sensor sizes make it easier to collect light, and they can make the most of a wide-aperture lens' short depth-of-field — that ability to isolate focus on a subject while making the foreground and background soft (bokeh).
Plus, if they're at the widely used Micro Four Thirds or APS-C sizes, the chances are increased that many lenses could either be compatible, or be adapted to be compatible.
But large sensors are not a guarantee of better picture quality. There are many factors that influence the fundamental physics that governs image acquisition. For the purposes of this article, we'll leave that statement as a given, and explore the fact that the manufacturers in this sector have made considered decisions about the type of sensors they have. Often, they've done their best to maximize image quality and not succumbed to the push for desirable numbers. After all, isn't it the final shot that counts? Everything else is just a tool. Wrench or pliers? Tell me what job you want to do first.
The current crop
Sony NEX-5N
Sony NEX-5N
Sony's NEX series of cameras is currently winning the "pure numbers" race among the hybrid clan, with large APS-C image sensors throughout the product line and a whopping 24.3 megapixels from the top-end model, the NEX-7. Early returns for the latest releases have been largely good, and there's some evidence that these cameras might have some appeal for the aspiring videographer that would have formerly bought a DSLR.
Interestingly, the NEX-5N, at 16 megapixels, might be a more intriguing video device than its NEX-7 cousin, as it has larger pixels on the same-size sensor, implying better low light performance and less information-processing load for the BIONZ™ processor (although the NEX-7's processor has been tweaked to compensate for the extra workload). Time and experience will tell whether this is true or not.
Large sensors often mean larger lenses, though, so some of the hybrid's portability appeal is blunted when these are used.
Panasonic DMC-GH2K
Panasonic DMC-GH2K
Panasonic and Olympus have committed their hybrid lines to the Micro Four Thirds sensor format. Four Thirds sensors, while smaller than APS, are still pretty beefy compared to the new Nikon and Pentax mirror-less sensors, and are very well supported in the optical arena. An impressive variety of lenses are compatible with these cameras, which draw their sensor/lens design inspiration from the video cameras of the past generation.
Pentax has released their new Q. It's playing the other end of the street from Sony. It features a compact size sensor (1/2.3", about one eighth the size of the M43 sensor) and of all the hybrids, it's the one that most legitimately can call itself a "pocket" camera, as it's seriously small for something with interchangeable lenses. Beyond the small size, a big hint about the market they wish to exploit is the announcement of two sub-$100 "toy camera" lenses for this model.
The build quality is solid, and though the sensor is small, everything about the design has been designed to get the maximum benefit from its size. While this really doesn't pretend to co-opt the DSLR market space, it does have its place as a camera that hearkens back to the elegant miniature cameras of the film era.
Fuji X-100
Fuji X-100
Fuji does not have an interchangeable lens hybrid, but it has two cameras that play in the same functional space, the X-10 and the X-100. These rangefinder-type cameras have generated a ton of buzz and favorable impressions. Now it is widely reported that Fuji will be introducing an interchangeable lens model soon, informed by their experience with the X-100 and the X-10.
The misunderstood Nikon 1 Series
Within 3 hours of the release of the V1 and J1 on the world stage, many enthusiasts had written this camera off, as it has a small sensor by comparison to the many hybrids, and makes a modest (by recent standards) 10 megapixels at its highest resolution. Why was Nikon, one of the world's most respected manufacturers, releasing something widely regarded by the enthusiast community as "underspec-ed" and "underpowered?" Why was the reaction so visceral? Was it because of the many reported colors that will become available for the J1? Is it the slightly surreal "Motion Snapshot" feature, that gives you a two-second HD slo-mo clip with music? Is it just the cute fluffy bunny of cameras, designed to give the casual Facebook picture poster some extra "oomph?"
Nikon J1 in red
Nikon J1 in red
I'm not sure I think so. It's got some unexpected talents. First of all, the image quality has held up well to initial testing. It'll do 10 fps with continuous auto-focus, equivalent to the Sony NEX-7 (although, to be fair, Sony's doing it with a big APS sensor at 24 megapixels — a lot more data). It has two sophisticated forms of autofocus that engage together (contrast detection and phase detection), and its release time is world-class. And while the idea of buying a camera in a color to match your old iPod® is pure Japan in a nutshell, I think there's a class of young, enthusiastic people world-wide, curious about extending their photographic vocabulary, for whom this camera might be a good fit.
Executives at Nikon have admitted publicly that their primary aims were for responsiveness, compactness, and ease of use in the service of image quality. They feel that this combination of megapixels and sensor will deliver the best consumer experience with regard to those aims. The key words here are "consumer experience." Nikon is casting a wider net for customers, keeping a compact form factor while promising image quality that rivals DSLRs. People would be advised to remember they have a decent track record delivering said quality. Time will tell whether they deliver what the public will buy. But it's definitely worth a good look. We'll be there with a review the moment we've had a chance to get one in our hands. | http://www.crutchfield.com/ISEO-rccbcspd/learn/nikon-1-series.html?showAll=N | robots: classic
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} | 1,414 | Companies that aren't Canon or Nikon have it rough in the digital camera market-particularly outside the cheap point-and-shoot area. Some band together for strength in numbers, creating cooperative standards like Panasonic, Olympus and Leica's new Micro Four Thirds system-a spec for smaller cameras with digital viewfinders like a compact, but interchangeable lenses, manual controls and higher performance like a DSLR. We tested Panasonic's 13-megapixel Lumix G1, paying close attention to the fact that it's the first contender in a totally new camera category and-like that other G1, the Android smartphone-it sets the stage for what's to come.
There is a single photo that you should think long and hard about before deciding whether to plunk down $800 for the G1. And oddly enough, it wasn't even shot with the camera itself. Want to see it?
Yeah, there it is-the G1 posing next to my Canon Rebel XT. As you can see, for all practical purposes, they are the same size and shape. The G1 is smaller by a hair, but unless you're carrying both at the exact same time, it's a difference you would never, ever think about. This seemingly small fact completely undermines the system's potential to set itself apart from the big boys' entry-level DSLRs, which are the G1's direct competitors whether Panasonic likes it or not. The G1 fails to deliver on Micro Four Thirds' potential to produce cameras with small, unique form factors-those Leica-style "digital rangefinders" we pined for when the system was announced-that could be very worthy of your consideration. For now, an entry level Canon or Nikon DSLR is a better bet, coming in with humongous lens and accessory systems and lower price tags.
The thing is, a Micro Four Thirds camera doesn't have to look like a conventional DSLR. There is no pentaprism, which allows for a direct through-the-lens viewfinder in a DSLR and is responsible for the traditional bulge up top. There is no long legacy of lenses and hardware that dictate how the camera body should be formed. But there the G1 is, with its faux prism bulge and totally traditional DSLR shape.
Panasonic apparently chose this route to drive home the fact that the G1 is a serious camera, not just a gussied-up point-and-shoot. I guess that makes some logical sense for a minute, but for people who buy an $800 camera based on more criteria than just the way the body looks (read: most), it will probably prove to be a fatal mistake. Which is too bad, because when form factor is ruled out, Micro Four Thirds' unique characteristics show a lot of potential for greatness. Let's look at those.
Live Viewfinder
When you look through the G1's viewfinder, you see a digital image of the sensor's live view output. Generally this is a really terrible way to compose a photograph, but the G1's is actually really usable. It's not jerky at all in good light (it does tend to slow down in low-light, though), and it's sharp, bright and clear for focusing thanks to a resolution of 1,440,000 dots. It's the best digital viewfinder I've ever used personally.
For auto focus, the G1 uses a 23-area contrast-based system, again because there is no mirror to reflect light to a dedicated AF sensor found in most DSLRs (contrast detection is also occasionally used by DSLRs when they're in live view or video capture mode). It tended to work well in good light and in bad. Manual focus is also possible, but a zoomed-in view PIP-style-like many DSLRs have-would have been nice.
There is a dedicated button for switching between the digital viewfinder and the LCD, which you can swivel out from the camera's back. There's a sensor next to the viewfinder that automatically switches between the two depending on where your face is.
The Sensor
Micro Four Thirds (like the Four Thirds true-DSLR system that came before it) gets its name from the 4:3 aspect ratio of its 13-megapixel "Live MOS" sensor. The sensor is basically a hybrid compact/DSLR type-the 4:3 aspect ratio is more common in compacts (although you can set the aspect ratio to the more traditional DSLR standard 3:2 easily), but the sensor's physical size is more on par with the APS-C sensors found in low-end DSLRs. That's a good thing, because a bigger sensor always equals less noise at high ISO sensitivities, more control over limited depth of field, and better image quality all around. That's why the prospect of a truly compact camera with a Micro Four Thirds sensor is so exciting.
As you can see, though, with the lens removed the sensor is directly exposed to the elements. If you have an industrial grade clean room in your house, I would advise changing lenses in there. Dust spots on your sensor are the worst.
Interchangeable Lenses
Right now there are only two Micro Four Thirds lenses: The 14-45mm/F3.5-5.6 kit lens and a 45-200mm/F4.0-5.6 telephoto zoom. Thankfully, you can mate the G1 with the larger selection of standard Four Thirds lenses via an adapter (which includes some nice high-end Leica glass). Here you see a Lumix/Leica 14-40mm mounted.
Controls and menus are generally well thought out. There's a bunch of flexibility built in here-from the customizable ISO intervals (full or 1/3 stop) to the handy Quick Menu-which lets you access just about all of the basic shooting functions from within the viewfinder without diving into a menu.
Mad props for the clickable main scroll wheel. I don't know if this is standard on Panasonic's other performance cameras, but it's incredibly helpful-a single press cycles between controlling the aperture or shutter speed (depending on your mode) to setting a quick exposure compensation or going between shutter and aperture in full manual mode, all with a single wheel. Nice.
I can easily live with the annoyances noted above, balanced as they are by the niceties I also mentioned. However, the G1 does have three drawbacks that, when considered with the baffling form factor decision, are dealbreakers:
ISO Noise
Noise levels are not great. Here you can see a progression of shots from ISO 100 to ISO 3200. As you can see, ISO 3200 is pretty useless:
And here, a quick and dirty crop comparison with a Rebel XT (which is three generations old, keep in mind) at ISO 1600 (the XT's max). Even my three-year-old Rebel does better at ISO 1600. The Micro Four Thirds sensor is large, but it's still smaller than APS-C and not as adept at handling noise as Canon or Nikon sensors, which get trickle-down sensor tech from noise-busting high-end cameras.
No Video
This makes absolutely no sense: The G1 does not have a video capture mode, even though all the challenges of recording video on a DSLR are completely non-existent here. Panasonic has said that its future Micro Four Thirds cams will have HD video. This is precisely where the system has a natural leg-up on entry-level DSLRs and it's a shame-perhaps a fatal omission-that the G1 couldn't take part.
Panasonic G1 with 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lens: $799
Canon EOS Rebel XSi with 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lens: $669
Nikon D60 with 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lens: $599
As long as that's the competitive landscape, the G1 has no chance.
I am optimistic about Micro Four Thirds, but there's just no reason anyone should buy a G1. Less money could get you a real DSLR that is, for all practical purposes, the same size. The G1's digital viewfinder is excellent, but it's no comparison to looking at the real world as you shoot. Factor in the G1's relatively poor high-ISO performance and tiny lens selection and it's a no brainer.
All is not lost for Micro Four Thirds. Remember Sigma's DP-1, the super-compact, rangefinder-looking point-and-shoot that packed a DSLR-sized sensor and manual controls? Micro Four Thirds could add to that paradigm a great electronic viewfinder and a system of interchangeable lenses. How about a Leica M-looking body with a few interchangeable prime (not zoom) lenses? What about using tons of legacy Leica lenses via a rumored M-mount adapter, in addition to the Leica (non-Micro) Four Thirds lenses that already exist? Sign me up for that any day. There is hope that a remedy is coming soon, as Olympus, Panasonic's partner in this endeavor, will unveil its Micro Four Thirds camera early next year. For now, though, it's back to the drawing board for Panasonic, and back to DSLRs for me.
Test Shots
All full-resolution shots straight from the camera with no cropping or processing. | http://gizmodo.com/5092126/panasonic-lumix-dmc-g1-review-worlds-first-micro-four-thirds-digicam | robots: classic
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} | 3,788 | Review: Sony NEX-C3
Sony merges good image quality and features with a tiny camera body. (July 31st, 2011)
Sony was a relative latecomer to mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras, but when it arrived with the NEX line, it shot back with very small designs which were barely larger than compact cameras, although they sometimes controlled like it, too. The NEX-C3 is a second generation and brings a new 16.2-megapixel sensor, overall better performance, and an even smaller design. We'll examine in our review of the NEX-C3 if it's worth trading up from a point-and-shoot or as an alternative to rivals from Olympus and Panasonic.
MacNN Rating:
Product Manufacturer: Sony
Price: $650 (18-55mm kit)
The Good
• Good image quality, including in some low light.
• Very compact but comfortable body.
• Attractive display with off-angle tilting.
• Responsive; fast relative to compacts.
• Simple menus with some power underneath.
• Better-placed stereo microphones.
• Capable kit lens.
• Solid battery life.
• Programmable buttons even on a 'rookie' camera.
• Sweep panorama, exposure bracketing, other multi-shot modes.
The Bad
• Control won't fully satisfy pros.
• JPEG tends to clip detail; RAW fixes it.
• Occasional odd white balance issues.
• Not always best value vs. DSLRs or some MFT cams.
• Slightly noisy 18-55mm kit lens.
Body: ergonomics and ports
The original NEX-3 and NEX-5 were designed from the start as 'graduation' cameras: designs for those who were ready to go beyond what everyday compact cameras could manage but felt overwhelmed by the controls and size of a DSLR. Far from bulking up, the NEX-C3 goes even further in that direction: the body is actually more compact than before, thanks to a three-panel main body that cuts out some of the bulk inside. The result is a design that really does feel small. It makes our everyday shooter, a supposedly small Canon G9, feel big by comparison. While made of plastic, it's a very solid feel. Don't drop it, but do feel confident it will stay solid over its lifetime.
And as on the earlier models, that creates an interesting weight shift problem given the swappable lenses. While the 16mm f2.8 pancake lens is a good fit, even the standard zoom 18-55mm, f3.5-5.6 lens moves the balance forward and requires a small amount of compensation with your hand. Although we didn't get to try it, we imagine the 18-200mm lens might almost be too long and heavy compared to the body behind it.
Mostly, however, the ergonomic changes are for the better. Apart from creating a more handsome body -- the two-tone look of the black model is slightly reminiscent of classic film cameras -- it actually holds more comfortably than the NEX-3, although we'd still like the deeper grip of the NEX-5. On our medium-sized hands, the buttons and jog wheel are all within easy reach. Ironically, the one thing that didn't fit was the textured thumb rest on the back; we ended up wrapping our hands around the top.
The design also includes an appreciated relocation of the microphones to the front. Making the simple change helps capture the audio more directly and, at least most of the time, leads to clearer audio. We'll touch on more of this later.
Those looking for quick-access dials will still be disappointed. The back has the familiar, point-and-shoot style directional pad and jog wheel combo and little else besides two contextual buttons. On the top are just the shutter, playback, movie record, and power. Sony's decisions don't kill the camera's appeal, but if you're a DSLR (or even semi-pro compact) veteran used to having dedicated dials, you'll be wanting more.
Most of the ports are what you'd expect. Along with a standard mini USB connector for direct transfers, the new NEX has a mini HDMI output for full-size previews. The battery is a typical NEX pack, and the card slot merges both Memory Stick Pro Duo and SD (up to SDXC) support.
What you won't find, though, is a built-in flash or a standard hot shoe. Other cameras in this class go without a built-in flash as well, but many of these have a hot shoe and in some cases bundle a flash, too. The C3 can take an add-on flash, as well as an external stereo mic, a viewfinder, and other extras, but they have to use Sony's proprietary port. Space is tight on the top; still, we'd have liked if Sony had disrupted the bevelled top to make room for accessories besides its own.
And as you'd expect, the new NEX is using Sony's own E-mount lens system, not the more universal Micro Four Thirds. As much as Sony says new lenses are coming, the truth is that selection is limited. Sony's own line is limited to the 16mm pancake, 18-55mm standard zoom, and 18-200mm long zoom glass. If you need a true macro, a telephoto, a fisheye, or some other more specialty lens, you'll be stuck. Given the target audience, it's not as glaring an issue, but it's something to consider if you have precise needs.
Interface and display
Anyone who's used the first-generation NEX cameras after their firmware update will be very familiar with the NEX-C3. The interface is a near carbon copy.
For beginners or those who seldom have to adjust settings mid-shot, this will mostly be a positive. Sony's focus with the interface is on demystifying much of the concepts that DSLR fans know but which might not register on someone used to shooting typical stand-in-front-of-the-building tourist shots. The menu system is very simple and has just six sections, including very blunt "image size" and "brightness/color" sections dedicated to some of the more common settings. If you're coming from compact cameras, these are not only fairly comforting but at times easier to understand. We've seen our share of 'simple' cameras with obtuse menus, so it's a relief to see this largely done right.
Sony's most distinctive trick here is a "photo creativity" mode. When switched over to Intelligent Auto, which normally auto-selects scenes, a center button hit will give you both common visual effects as well as simplified versions of more serious features. A "background defocus" option, for example, is really just controlling aperture but in a way a newcomer is more likely to understand. It's well executed and somewhat easier to understand than a comparable rival like Canon's Creative Auto, although we have a feeling most NEX-C3 buyers know enough about cameras to only spend a brief amount of time in this mode before moving on.
Veterans don't necessarily need to worry. Many of the detailed settings they'd expect from DSLRs and pro compacts, such as the drive mode, autofocus area and mode selections, exposure compensation, and metering are all tucked inside and fairly accessible. We also liked the amount of information visible on the display itself, including both a visual representation of the aperture and shutter speed as well as a live histogram to let you know if the shot might be off-balance. About the only quirk for most is a tendency for the menu to kick you back out to shooting mode every time you change a setting, which can slow you down if you want to make multiple changes in one go.
All the same, only a certain degree of concessions exist for pros in the control scheme. You can reprogram one of the two contextual buttons as well as what happens when you press the left, right, and center buttons on the directional pad. As such, if you're the sort to regularly change the ISO sensitivity levels, white balance, high dynamic range, or other elements, you don't need to wade through the menus to get to them. It's not as quick as in other systems, though: it requires first the button press and then thumbing through a menu. We'd ideally have a customizable dial or something akin to Canon's Q menu, where just hovering over an option and spinning the jog wheel is enough to change it on the spot.
The tilting display from the earlier NEX cameras makes a return appearance here, and as before it's a welcome addition. A very straightforward sliding mechanism lets you either face the display completely upwards or most of the way down. It's not a full-fledged swivelling display, but it can be very handy if you're shooting above the crowd in a concert or are taking a low to the ground photo of a flower or street scene. Whether or not you trust a $650 camera to a concert, or are allowed to take it into the venue, is another matter.
It's a beautiful screen to look at, most of the time. At three inches across and 921,000 pixels, the LCD's output is crisp enough to help you determine if the photo was properly in focus or if there was visible noise. Sony has chosen a widescreen display, which does crop some of the picture out when shooting at the 3:2 ratio of full-resolution photos but is also wonderful for shooting HD video or 16:9 aspect ratio photos.
Visibility is good in most lighting conditions. Bright sunlight does have a tendency to wash out the picture, although photos of the effect make it look worse than it is. The tilt screen does come in handy here by creating an impromptu shade. As a camera with no built-in viewfinder, this could nonetheless prove to be a minor problem.
Still image quality and performance
Even though it's supposed to be an entry-level camera, the NEX-C3 is a rare instance of a lower-cost model leapfrogging the higher end. At 16.2 megapixels, it's higher resolution than either the NEX-3 or the NEX-5. Sony touts it as a new CMOS-based Exmor sensor that should give it better performance in lower light and which won't produce more noise with the added resolution.
We were a bit worried that this would be an instance of taking a step sideways rather than up, but thankfully, the image quality is very good. Helped mostly by Sony's decision to use a full APS-C sized sensor, the same as what full DSLR cameras use, images are typically very detailed, sharp, and clean. We liked the color balance out of the box: it could capture subtler tones like the reds and greens of apples as we saw them just as well as it could get the bright colors of a purple flower or a neon-orange street meter, again without blowing it out of proportion. Skin tones looked realistic. There's a set of "creative style" filters such as "toy camera" (really, a Lomo camera) if you prefer to have the camera exaggerate the hues before the photo leaves the memory card.
JPEGs coming out of the camera are usually processed quite well, though there's also Sony's RAW format (which has support in newer Mac and Windows editing apps) if you so choose. We took some of our photos in RAW+JPEG mode and noticed that the JPEG processing was brighter but, like post-processed formats can, tended to clip the highlights and led to blown out highlights on very bright objects. RAW not only lets you recover more of that detail but gives you more control in the editing process. Be careful about shooting RAW+JPEG full-time. It not only consumes much more space but can slow down the camera during high speed shooting.
JPEG shot at top with blown highlights on the petals; RAW below with more detail
Regardless of how you shoot, one thing you'll very likely enjoy either as a newcomer or a pro is the shooting speed. It took just under two seconds to power up and have the first shot on the card; it's often ready before you are. The autofocusing system is very close to that of a DSLR, too, and in a well-lit environment will be ready to shoot again almost as soon as you've given the shutter a full press. We suspect that a Panasonic GF2/GF3 or one of Olympus' 2011 PEN cameras will beat it, but we had no real complaints; it's actually slightly addictive since it encourages you to snap off spontaneous photos.
Continuous shooting with the camera in normal situations is fairly slow compared to more modern DSLRs, even as it's quick compared to compacts. With continuous drive on but nothing else changed, we could get about three frames per second while keeping autofocus and autoexposure active. Sony claims up to 5.5 frames per second in a "speed priority" mode, but the truth is that it's fudging this figure by locking in exposure and focus taken during the first shot. It's good for sports shots from the bleachers, where the focal distance is likely to stay the same; we liked having autofocus for most other situations, and therefore it's more likely that you'll get the same speed as a basic DSLR, not the mid-tier that Sony implies.
Light sensitivity is quite good, too. Other than the JPEG default tending to produce that overexposed effect we didn't see in RAW, the camera was well-behaved from its ISO 200 minimum. In low light, ISO 1,600 or 3,200 is the practical ceiling with detail loss more visibly showing at 3,200. We'd recommend against ISO 6,400 or the maximum 12,800 altogether unless you you're desperate for a stable shot in the darkest of scenes and don't have a flash.
When noise does appear, it tends to be more of a film grain effect than the chromatic splotches you'll sometimes get. Detail was still fairly good for us when we increased the sensitivity to ISO 1,600 and 3,200. We should note that we had the noise reduction set to "weak" to reach a happy medium between lower noise and faithfulness to the original shot.
Quirks for us centered mostly on white balance. Occasionally, the white balance would skew towards blue when left in auto, seemingly with little reason within the scene itself. It's possible to dial this out through editing. Shooting in somewhat dim but not dark conditions seemed to require higher ISO levels than we're used to, often wanting 1,600 for a stable shot where we're used to 800. It may be an instance of differences between claimed and real sensitivity levels.
Special features on the C3 are very typical for the class and include the aforementioned automatic HDR mode, which composites multiple shots, as well as anti-blurring and exposure bracketing. We most appreciated the sweep panorama mode. Many cameras now have this, but Sony's mode actually requires tilting the camera on its side and gets the vertical resolution that most panorama modes miss. There's a 3D panorama mode that 'cheats' by pairing up shots to produce the stereoscopic effect.
Video recording and quality
Starting video capture is as simple as ever on the C3, much as it is on the NEX-3 or NEX-5. All three have a movie recording button that lets you start up in whatever settings you're using. Like with still images, starting video takes between one to two seconds to start, so a sudden moment won't catch you off-guard.
Output is relatively modest in resolution next to the latest wave of cameras. The C3 records in a 720p, AVCHD (H.264) format at 30 frames per second that, while opening on just about any computer or device, doesn't stack up well against the 1080p, 30FPS or 720p, 60FPS shooting we've seen lately. Even so, there was very little in the way of artifacting or ghosting, so as long as your computer or TV can properly show 720p, you'll be contented.
As we mentioned earlier, the front-facing stereo microphones produce better sound than some cameras in the class simply by pointing them in the right direction. There's none of the muffled or low-fidelity sound you'd get from either side-mounted mics or a mono microphone. A catch: because the microphones are in the front, they're more likely to pick up wind noise since they're less likely to be sheltered.
We noticed a slight instance of the "tower of Jell-O" effect from a rolling shutter, where the line-by-line sensor capture doesn't quite keep up with fast movement. It wasn't pronounced and should be acceptable in most shooting conditions. We also didn't mind the absence of continuous autofocusing during movies, since current-generation cameras that do it are usually slow enough to leave the intended subject out of focus for too long.
The weight bias between lenses and cameras may be the most glaring hiccup, though this is as much a virtue of sub-DSLR cameras as anything Sony might have done. Because you have to twist zoom and focus rings on a lens that's by far the biggest and heaviest part of the camera assembly, you often can't change your zoom or focus without wrecking the video: it wasn't uncommon to see the shot wobble as we tried to get a closer shot. Movie making is ironically an area where point-and-shoots often do better both through the sensor differences (many use traditional CCDs that reduce or scrap the rolling shutter effect) and because of their electrically powered zooming and focusing.
The 18-55mm lens and battery life
Our test unit came with what's no doubt the most popular option for a lens, the 18-55mm, f3.5-5.6 model. Despite the reputation of kit lenses -- especially one that costs just $300 by itself -- we were quite pleased with what Sony packs in. All of Sony's E-mount lenses are made of polished, silver-hued metal, so from the start it feels good in the hand and looks dignified regardless of the color scheme of the camera body.
The 18-55mm lens at minimum (top) and maximum (bottom) zoom
Performance with the lens is speedy. Focus was quick at either end of the aperture range and regardless of most light conditions; chromatic aberrations (the "purple fringing" sometimes seen in high-contrast scenes) were virtually absent. A minimum 10-inch focal distance won't let it work as a true macro lens, but it's good for most up-close shots and produces a nice, softened background near the f3.5 aperture. The 55mm zoom range, like on virtually every standard mirrorless interchangeable camera or DSLR, is good enough for most street photos and mostly hits the wall during concerts or wildlife photography, when you can't get any closer on foot.
Shutter noise is the only real reservation. Sony uses a very quiet autofocus motor; the actual photo capture has a high-pitched whine. Human ears won't have a problem since it's not grating, but animals and insects are likely to bolt away after the first shot if they're close enough.
The C3 brings an at least theoretically 20 percent higher battery life, or about 400 shots. Not having a NEX-3 to check, we couldn't vouch for the increase. That said, it's definitely a long-lasting camera. Capturing 1GB of photos and video only knocked the battery by about 20 percent It's entirely possible that mimicking this pattern could lead to three or four days of photography before a battery recharge becomes a wise idea.
Wrapping up
There's no question that the NEX-C3 won't replace a DSLR for some photographers. High-speed photography, rapid settings changes, and other tropes of pro (or serious amateur) work will work best with a bigger and not necessarily cheaper camera. Nikon's D3100 calls out as the most likely threat here, not the least of which is that Nikon and Sony often share sensors. The edge for Sony comes in the size: a NEX can fit in easily in a coat pocket or carry-on luggage where a D3100 or its peers might need a separate bag.
Sony's timing isn't ideal. We'd say the C3 is mostly safe against the Panasonic GF2 and GF3 given the NEX camera's newer sensor. Against the Olympus E-PL3 Lite shipping from September onwards, though, this latest NEX may face trouble. For a bit more, you get a tangibly faster camera with a more advanced autofocus system, more video options (including 60FPS shooting), and a lens system that's not confined to one vendor. Olympus even bundles in a hot shoe flash that Sony could really stand to include.
What might keep you at bay is your own development as a photographer. If you hope to go from novice to seasoned shooter with one camera body and lens system, you may stop early. It's not that the C3 can't handle some serious shooting, it's that there are cameras with more headroom. Should you decide you really like macro photography or you're tasked with covering the college sports team, the narrow choice of lenses and the speed limits could be significant. At least until there are more lenses available, the C3 works most effectively, and as a general-purpose street camera or a sidearm for when a DSLR is too big or equipped with a different lens.
And yet, with those limits in mind, we really liked shooting with the C3. As small as it is, the camera produces good quality with little adjustment. Whatever you might think about the speed of the interface, it's simple and does a good job of making photography accessible without leaving experienced photographers stranded by the side of the road. Most surprising was its tendency to punch above its weight class for noise. Many mirrorless interchangeables flounder past ISO 800, but the NEX-C3 has just enough extra performance to go a notch further.
We'd go so far as to call the C3 a fun camera: it encourages experimentation and casual shooting. We always wanted to take the C3 with us, and the size meant we could. The NEX-3 and NEX-5 were leaning in that direction but, through early quirks, larger sizes, and older sensors, felt like they were just short of a sweet spot. The C3, as much room as it may have for improvement, is now small enough and yet powerful enough that it can well be worth getting instead of a similarly-priced DSLR in some circumstances.
by Jon Fingas
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} | 2,002 | Sony Alpha 99 (SLT-A99V)
Sony Alpha 99 (SLT-A99V)
Editor Rating: Excellent (4.0)
Sony Alpha 99 (SLT-A99V) - Sony Alpha 99 (SLT-A99V)
US Street Price$2800.00
• Pros
• Cons
No optical viewfinder. Lacks built-in flash.
• Bottom Line
The Sony Alpha 99 ($2,799.99 direct, body only) is the company's top-end digital SLR camera. It sports a 24-megapixel full-frame image sensor, and like other Sony SLRs it uses a fixed mirror, which allows for fast autofocus in all shooting modes, and a seamless transition between its eye-level OLED EVF and rear LCD—but it omits the optical viewfinder that many pros expect from a high-end camera. It's an excellent choice for video, as it blows the competition away on focus speed and audio options, but it isn't as well-rounded, or inexpensive, as our Editors' Choice full-frame D-SLR, the Canon EOS 6D.
Design and Features
When it was introduced, the Alpha 99 was the smallest and lightest full-frame D-SLR on the market, but it has since lost that title to the slightly-smaller EOS 6D. The A99 measures 4.5 by 5.9 by 3.1 inches and weighs about 1.8 pounds; the 6D is 4.4 by 5.7 by 2.8 inches and 1.7 pounds. Its image sensor is the same size as a 35mm film frame, dwarfing the smaller APS-C sensor that is found in most D-SLRs. This is advantageous when using wide-angle lenses, as a smaller sensor leads to a narrower field of view, and also allows you to capture images with a shallower depth of field, so you can create more separation between subject and background.
Like Sony's other current D-SLRs, the Alpha 99 uses a fixed, semi-transparent mirror to bounce light to its phase detect autofocus sensors. The mirror doesn't reflect enough light to feed an optical viewfinder, so Sony installed an OLED EVF. We've praised the 2.5-megapixel OLED finder in other Sony cameras, including the Alpha 77, our Editors' Choice winner for high-end APS-C D-SLRs, because it offers a bigger, crisper view than the optical finders found in that level of camera. Things change when you increase the sensor size—the optical finders in traditional full-frame cameras like the Nikon D4 and Canon EOS 5D Mark III are larger than those in APS-C cameras.
SEE ALSO: Fujifilm X-T4
That said, the EVF is one of the best that I've used, and there are some inherent advantages to the design. When composing images what you see is exactly what you get—out-of-focus highlights appear as they will in the final image, which is not the case with optical finders. If you're shooting with a fast lens you'll see the actual depth of field at maximum aperture, while traditional optical focusing screens can only show you the depth at around f/2.8. Activating the Aperture Preview function shows you exactly how your final image will look, down to the exposure. As the camera is, essentially, always in Live View mode, there's a seamless transition between using the EVF and the rear LCD. Put your eye up to the viewfinder and the EVF is active, pull it away and the feed automatically switches to the rear LCD. You'll also be able to magnify a scene to confirm critical focus, while Focus Peaking highlights the in-focus areas of an image.
If you're moving up to the Alpha 99 from an APS-C Sony camera and would like to continue to use the APS-C lenses you own, you can do so—images are recorded at a reduced 10-megapixel resolution, as the sensor automatically crops to the smaller size, but apart from that, it's a seamless experience.
The 3-inch rear display features a sharp 1.228-million-dot resolution. It's sharper than the million-dot LCD found on the Canon EOS 6D, and sets itself apart from the crowd thanks to a hinge mechanism. You can adjust the rear display so it can be viewed from almost any angle, which is helpful when composing shots from low or otherwise difficult angles on a tripod, or shooting above your head at a crowded event.
In dim light, the Live View feed does get a bit choppy, which is not something that you'll have to deal with when using an optical finder and looking at a real-life image through the lens. Instead, you'll be looking at an image that is filtered through the image sensor and an electronic go-between, which has its merits. Whether you're happy with the EVF will come down to a matter of personal preference. For some shooters it will seem like a natural progression, but others will find it difficult to give up the more comfortable feel of a traditional D-SLR. If you let the camera switch automatically between the EVF and rear LCD, there is a slight delay turning on the EVF as you raise the A99 to your meet your eye when getting a quick shot. However, if you set the camera to manually switch between the two via the Finder/LCD button, the EVF will remain on when the camera is powered up—so you won't miss candid shots.
Every bit of control that you could ever want is easily accessible, without having to dive into menus. You can directly adjust the focus mode, ISO, Exposure Compensation, Drive Mode, White Balance, Exposure Lock, and other settings via buttons and dials. There's also a Function button on the rear of the camera that brings up an on-screen display with more advanced settings, giving you quick access to Meter settings, Flash Compensation, Object Tracking, the Autofocus Area, and others. One feature that is currently unique to the Alpha 99 is the ability to limit the amount of distance over which the autofocus system searches on the fly. There's an AF Range button that lets you dial in the distances over which focus will search—this is useful for macro photography, where you'll only want to try and focus close, or for shooting sports with a telephoto lens, where it's likely you'll only be interested in action in the distance.
Sony has included an integrated GPS radio. When enabled, location data is added automatically to photos, so you can later view where they were taken on a map—Lightroom, iPhoto, Aperture, Picasa, and other software applications support this, as do photo sharing sites like Flickr and Smugmug. Using the GPS does put some extra strain on the camera's battery, however.
Performance and Conclusions
The Alpha 99 starts and shoots in about 0.9-second, records a shutter lag that is less than 0.1-second, and can fire a burst of full-resolution photos at 5.7 frames per second. Its performance is on par with the the Canon 5D Mark III, which starts in 0.7-second, notches a 0.1-second shutter lag, and shoots a little faster at 5.9 frames per second. As there's no mirror movement during burst shooting, the camera is impressively quiet. In good light it requires about 0.4-second to bring an out of focus into crisp view and fire a shot, but slips to 1.6 seconds to do the same in very dim light. This equals the speed of the Canon EOS 6D—although the 6D's autofocus is much slower than the Alpha 99 when you switch to Live View mode.
We tested the burst shooting speed with a SanDisk 95MBps memory card. When recording Raw+JPG photos, the Alpha 99 managed to capture 9 photos before slowing down, and required 6 seconds to clear its buffer. Switching to Raw increased the number of shots in the burst to 12, and reduced the write time to 5.6 seconds. If you opt to shoot JPG, you can expect 13 shots with a 4.6-second write time. There's a low-resolution setting that records 4.3-megapixel JPG photos with a 1.5x sensor crop—you can fire off 30 shots in that mode at just a hair under 10 frames per second.
The Alpha 99 ships as a body only, so there's no standard lens with which to test sharpness. We did run several of Sony's top-end optics through Imatest, including the Carl Zeiss 24-70mm f/2.8 Zoom Lens, the 70-200mm f/2.8 Telephoto Zoom Lens, and the 50mm f/1.4 Lens, all of which proved to be quite sharp when paired with the Alpha 99.
In terms of image noise, which can make images appear grainy, the camera keeps it below 1.5 percent through ISO 6400, and a good job at keeping detail crisp at this setting. Though a side-by-side comparison shows that photos captured by the Canon EOS 6D are crisper in both JPG and Raw formats. The 6D also does a bit better than the A99 at ISO 12800, the top setting at which the Canon keeps noise below our 1.5-percent threshold. The Alpha 99 does provide in-body sensor-shift image stabilization, and there should be a less vibration when capturing a photo due to the stationary mirror; Canon shooters need to purchase special lenses in order to take advantage of image stabilization.
Video recording is one of the Alpha 99's strong points. The camera uses the AVCHD codec and supports 1080p60, 1080i60, and 1080p24 formats. Digital SteadyShot stabilization is supported, as is input from an external microphone. There's a standard unbalanced mic input, but if you're really serious about video, you can add the XLR-K1M Balanced Audio Adapter ($799.99) which plugs into the camera's hot shoe to add two balanced XLR inputs; the adapter includes a shotgun mic. There's also a headphone jack, so you can monitor audio while rolling footage.
The built-in mic is perfectly fine for more casual video use, although it does pick up the sound of the lens refocusing. The 1080p60 footage is crisp and sharp, and the camera is incredibly quick to refocus when rolling footage. Traditional D-SLRs rely on contrast detect focus when in Live View and when recording video, but the Alpha 99's fixed-mirror design allows faster phase detect to be active at all times, and it really shows when shooting video.
Interface ports include a mini HDMI output and a mini USB port, as well as a DC power input—great for studio shooters who don't have to worry about keeping a battery charged. There's a connector for a wired remote control, as well as a standard PC Sync socket for studio lights or off-camera flash. Sony has moved away from CompactFlash memory, opting for dual SD slots instead. Each slot supports the latest SDXC memory cards, and you can configure the camera to utilize them in numerous ways. You can write the same data to both slots for real time backup, write still images to one card and video to another, use one card for Raw images and the second for JPGs, or simply use the second card as overflow storage—it will only be used if the first card fills up in that mode.
Sony has managed to squeeze a lot of camera into the Alpha 99's body. Its autofocus system is fast, and runs circles around every other full-frame camera when you use the rear LCD to frame images. It doesn't do quite as well as our Editors' Choice Canon EOS 6D at the highest ISOs, but its image quality is still quite impressive, and it offers D-SLR videographers a number of unique features, including 1080p60 footage and balanced audio input, the latter via an adapter. The OLED EVF is likely to be remain a point of contention among photographers; some will embrace it for its advantages, but others won't give up the feeling that peering through a large, full-frame optical viewfinder provides. If you're a fan of the EVF experience, the Sony Alpha 99 is sure to tickle your fancy—it's loaded with features and its image quality is top-notch; but if you prefer an optical finder, consider the Canon EOS 6D or Nikon D600 as a lower-priced full-frame alternative—just be aware that Live View and video autofocus won't be as quick.
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Canon EOS 6D
• Pros
• Cons
• Bottom Line
Performance and ConclusionsCanon EOS 6D : Benchmark Tests
The 6D isn't as fast as higher-end models like the Nikon D4 or Canon EOS-1D X, but it isn't slow by any means. It starts and shoots in about 0.6-second and averages a 0.2-second shutter lag. Continuous shooting is possible at about 4.2 frames per second, but the number of shots you can capture before that slows varies based on file format and card speed. I was able to grab 8 Raw+JPG shots using a SanDisk 95MBps memory card, with 7.5 seconds required to fully clear the buffer after I stopped shooting. Shooting only Raw files extends the burst to 16 shots, but also lengthens the buffer clearing time to 10.5 seconds. If you shoot JPGs, there's no worry—the camera can keep shooting for as long as you'd like without any noticeable slowdown. The D600 is just a little bit faster—it starts and shoots in 0.4-second, records a 0.1-second shutter lag, and rattles off shots at 5.3 frames per second with similar limitations on the number of shots it can capture before slowing when shooting Raw files.
We tested focus speed using the EF 50mm f/1.2L lens. In good light, the camera is able to bring an out-of-focus image into crisp view in about 0.4-second, but slowed to 1.6 seconds to accomplish the same task in dim light. There are two types of Live View focus—one is the standard contrast-detection method, which displays a moveable square on the rear LCD that indicates the focus area. It requires 2.3 seconds to focus in good light and 2.7 seconds in dim light. The second focus mode is called Quick Focus—it disables Live View for just long enough to lock focus using the camera's faster phase detection system. It's a bit noisier, and obviously not appropriate for refocusing during video recording. The speed improvement is more dramatic in good light—it cuts the time to focus and fire to 0.9-second there—but it only cuts 0.4-second from the time to focus and fire in dim light, recording a 2.3-second delay.
I tested the EOS 6D body only—it's also available in a kit with the EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM AF zoom lens for $2,899—but we didn't have that zoom on hand to test for sharpness with Imatest. I did run resolution tests on a number of Canon prime lenses, including the EF 180mm f/3.5L Macro USM and the compact EF 28mm f/1.8 USM.
I used Imatest to measure the noise recorded by the 6D's 20-megapixel image sensor. It's a relatively low megapixel count for a full-frame design—of current models, only the 16-megapixel Nikon D4 packs fewer pixels. This is generally advantageous when it comes to performance at very high ISO settings. I tested the JPG output at default settings through the camera's top expanded ISO setting of 102400 and found the results to be more than impressive. The camera is able to keep noise below 1.5 percent through ISO 12800, and does so while still capturing a rich amount of detail. At ISO 25600, the top standard setting, noise increases to 2.1 percent, but despite increased graininess, fine details are crisp. I wouldn't hesitate to shoot at 25600 if required, although I'd recommend switching to Raw for shots, even if it isn't your typical workflow. That will allow you to apply noise reduction in Adobe Lightroom or a similar Raw converter, which gives you more control than the 6D's in-camera algorithm. Of the full-frame cameras that we've tested, only the D4 does better at the highest settings—it keeps noise under 1.5 percent through ISO 20000.
The 6D rolls QuickTime video footage at 1080p30, 1080p24 or 720p60 quality. Each format lets you choose between All-I and IPB compression, with the former resulting in much larger files. The footage looks sharp, but it does rely on the same autofocus system as the Live View mode during recording. Refocusing is a lengthy process that leads to occasional stutters as the camera locks down accurate focus. There isn't a way to enable continuous autofocus, instead you have to hold down the AF-ON button to refocus when recording—you'll likely get better, smoother results by focusing manually. The sound of the lens refocusing in autofocus mode is fairly loud, but there is a microphone input port. If you're interested in a full-frame SLR that has more user-friendly video focus, the Sony Alpha 99 is worth a look. Because of its design, which uses a fixed mirror for full time phase detect focus, the camera quickly locks onto and can track objects when recording video, just as it would when shooting stills. The downside to this system is that it necessitates the use of an electronic viewfinder rather than the more traditional optical finder found in the 6D.
In addition to the mic input port, there is a standard mini USB port, a mini HDMI port, and a port for a wired remote control. Some pro connections are missing—there's no PC Sync socket to connect to studio strobes (although a number of third-party solutions that slide into the hot shoes are available), and there's no CompactFlash memory card slot. Instead there's a single slot for SD, SDHC, and SDXC memory cards.
While the 6D doesn't have all of the pro features of its more expensive siblings, it represents a solid value for Canon shooters who want to take advantage of the benefits of a larger image sensor. If you use EF lenses on your APS-C Canon camera, you'll immediately benefit from a wider field of view when they are paired with a full-frame body. (Many were originally designed for use with 35mm film cameras, even if coatings and focus motors have been improved over the years to better pair with digital.) The larger sensor also leads to a bigger viewfinder, and its rather low pixel density helps the 6D excel at extremely high ISO settings, while full-frame also allows you to create a shallower depth of field at similar apertures.
If you're an advanced amateur or photographic enthusiast, there aren't a lot of faults to find with the 6D. It's focus system could be a bit faster, making the 5D Mark III or Nikon D800 a better option for those who shoot events. Although it would do nicely as a less-expensive backup camera for the 5D Mark III. The Canon EOS-1D X or the Nikon D4 are better choices for photojournalists and those who cover of the extremely fast action of sporting events, as both cameras deliver near-instant focus and extremely fast burst shooting. The 6D's video autofocus speed is par for the course for full-frame cameras—you'll have to move over to Sony's Alpha 99 to remedy that, but will sacrifice an optical viewfinder. The 6D doesn't shoot quite as fast as the Nikon D600—it's about one frame per second slower—but the addition of Wi-Fi and GPS and superior image quality at high ISO settings give Canon the edge. Because of this, the EOS 6D earns our Editors' Choice award for full-frame D-SLRs. It can't match the performance of our previous winner, the $6,000 Nikon D4, but unless you're on the sidelines of a pro football game, or earning thousands of dollars per wedding shoot, the 6D will likely be more camera than you need—in a much smaller and less-expensive form.
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} | 1,326 | Fujifilm FinePix F550EXR
• Pros
Built-in GPS. 1080p video capture. Solid low-light performance. Special Noise Reduction mode. Manual controls.
• Cons
Images are soft in the outer regions. Slower-than-average boot-up time.
• Bottom Line
Fujifilm's FinePix F550EXR is a feature-rich compact camera with a big 15x zoom lens. It even adds a few manual controls and goodies for photo enthusiasts—but its image quality is underwhelming, especially for the $350 price.
By PJ Jacobowitz
The 16-megapixel Fujifilm FinePix F550EXR ($349.95 list) is a traveler's dream digital camera. It's pocket-sized, but packs a 15x optical zoom lens, 1080p video capture, a sharp 3-inch LCD, and a GPS for geotagging your photos. For the advanced shooters, there's an option to switch to manual control, and Fuji's EXR image sensor includes noise reduction priority and dynamic range priority modes. While photos from the F550EXR look good, a discerning eye will see sharp centers and softer outer regions. Still, good-enough image quality coupled with the F550EXR's wide feature set should please most casual shooters.
Design and User Interface
The build of the compact, 2.5-by 4.1-by-1.3-inch (HWD) F500EXR is quite elegant, combining a glossy, gun-metal chassis with a glossy black face and a rubbery grip. The controls were designed with ergonomics in mind—the Mode dial on top of the camera is mounted on a slant so your thumb doesn't have to stretch much, and the dedicated Video-Recording button is flat against part of the body that already juts out, making it easy to press.
The 15x zoom lens in the F550EXR starts wide, and zooms long. The focal length starts at 24mm and ends at 360mm (35mm equivalent). To compare, the 14x optical zoom lens on the Canon PowerShot SX230 HS ($349.99, 4 stars) goes further, starting at 28mm and ending at 392mm. But if you're looking for the longest zoom lens you can get in a pocket camera, the Nikon Coolpix S9100 ($329.95, 4 stars) takes the cake: The 18x lens starts at 25mm and ends up all the way at 450mm.
The 3-inch LCD on the back of the camera is very sharp. Many lower-end compact cameras with 3-inch LCDs pack 230K dots, but the F550EXR doubles that number to 460K, for extra-sharp menus and playback. The Nikon S9100 kicks things up to a seriously sharp 921K dots. The display on the F550EXR is bright and easy to view indoors or out, but it did show some motion blur when subjects were moving quickly as I was framing my test shots.
Fuji's user interface is unchanged from previous models, but the sharp screen does much to make the dated, unattractive menu system better. For inexperienced users, there's a mode that offers automatic shooting with face detection, so you don't have to do much tweaking. If you want it, fully manually shooting is available—Program, Manual, Shutter Priority, and Aperture Priority modes—in which you can use the back scroll wheel to quickly control the shutter speed and lens aperture.
Speed performance from the F550EXR was odd: It's fast and slow at the same time. The camera takes an unimpressive 3.27 seconds, on average, to power up and shoot, but once it's on, it's speedy, averaging just 1.46 seconds of wait time between shots. Individual shots clocked in with a shutter lag of 0.5 second, which is a typical result. To compare, the Coolpix S9100 powers up in 2.33 seconds (almost a full second faster), but its wait time and shutter lag are very similar at 1.56 seconds and 0.5 second respectively.
In the PC Labs we use the Imatest suite to objectivity evaluate image quality. Among 50 spots measured in a test image, the F550EXR offered a center-weighted average of 1,587 lines per picture height, which is low for a camera in this price range. The overall score is dragged down by the outer regions. The center of the image averaged a very sharp 2,078 lines per picture height, but the outer region measured just 436 lines, which is a subpar score. The Coolpix S9100's center-weighted average was a more-acceptable 1,767.
If Imatest detects less than 1.5 percent noise in an image, it typically won't be visibly noisy or grainy—it's a measure of the camera's ability to take clear photos in various lighting conditions. The F550EXR can shoot up to ISO 1600 and stay under 1.5 percent, which is important if you're shooting in low light without a flash. The Coolpix S9100 was able to go up to ISO 3200 and stay within the acceptability threshold. Still, 1600 is still a very good score.
The F550EXR can shift its image sensor into modes optimized for Dynamic Range, Sharpness, or Noise Reduction. The camera's Super CCD EXR does this by grouping the photo-diodes together in pairs—image resolution is lower, but more light information can be collected. Imatest didn't measure any meaningful change in the Sharpness mode, but in the Noise Reduction mode, it did measure 20-30 percent less noise. If you're shooting in low light, it's worth tinkering with these modes to get the best possible images.
Video, GPS, and Conclusions
The F550EXR records sharp and smooth video at 1080p at 30 frames per second. It captures video as .MOV files, which can be directly uploaded to Facebook and YouTube. You have the option to use the optical zoom lens and continuously autofocus while recording, but either function will result in minor noise in your footage, which isn't out of the ordinary for a compact camera. Once again, though, the Coolpix S91000 stands out with its silent iris, which cuts the zoom and focus noise.
There's an integrated GPS radio, so every shot you take with the F550EXR gets geotagged, and programs like iPhoto and Picasa can show you your images plotted on a map. The camera can also periodically save your location to a log file on the memory card, which you can later use with the included software to plot out your trip on a map. This GPS has the same limitations as most—it requires a direct line of sight in order to lock on to your location, so it won't be able to tag your photos indoors. Only the Casio Exilim EX-H20G ($349.99, 3.5 stars) can geotag photos indoors—its GPS is assisted by a pedometer and accelerometer that work to calculate your position when a signal isn't available.
The F550EXR is equipped with a mini-HDMI port, so if you have a standard cable (there isn't one included) you'll be able to plug the camera right into your HDTV to play back your videos and images. The USB port, on the other hand, is proprietary, but Fuji includes a cable to connect the camera to your computer.
If you're looking for a superzoom camera with extras, the $350 Fujifilm FinePix F550EXR fits the bill. Its 15x zoom lens, 1080p30 video capture, sharp LCD, and unique modes should satisfy most, especially those who travel. Just know that with this camera, you're not getting the sharpest images. For better image quality with a long zoom and GPS, try the same-price PowerShot SX230. If you don't need the GPS, our Editors' Choice superzoom, the $330 Nikon Coolpix S9100, is a better choice.
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} | 2,023 | Fuji FinePix S20 Pro review
3.5 out of 5
PC sync socket, Firewire connection, bundled Hyper Utility HS-V2 software
4th Generation SuperCCD SR sensor, only has 3 megapixels, too expensive
The Fuji FinePix S20 Pro currently sits at the top of the Fuji compact digital camera lineup. It's aimed firmly at the professional photographer, with an SLR-style body, full manual control, external flash option via PC sync socket or hot-shoe, a Firewire connection and bundled Hyper Utility HS-V2 software which allows RAW file data to be fine tuned. The FinePix S20 Pro also features Fuji's new Super CCD SR sensor, which enables the user to capture highlight and shadow detail missed by conventional digital cameras, resulting in images of stunning quality. It is supposed to offer a four-fold increase in dynamic range when compared to other conventional digital cameras. So is the Fuji FinePix S20 Pro a viable option for the professional photographer that it's aimed at? Read my review to find out.
The FinePix S20 Pro has a 3.1 megapixel CCD that delivers more than 6.03 million recorded pixels. There are 4 image sizes available (2832 x 2128, 2048 x 1536, 1600 x 1200, 1280 x 960), which can be recorded as JPEGs or in the RAW format. The camera features a Super EBC Fujinon 6X optical zoom lens that is equivalent to a 35-210mm lens on a 35mm format camera. The xD-Picture Card and Microdrive memory card formats are supported via 2 different card slots (some CompactFlash cards can be used in the Microdrive slot).
This camera offers a full range of selectable exposure modes, with Programmed AE, Aperture Priority AE, Shutter Priority AE and Manual, as well as a number of scene modes (Portrait, Landscape, Sports, Night Scene). The FinePix S20 Pro has 3 exposure metering modes (64-zone TTL metering - multi, spot, average) and there are 3 different types of focusing available (TTL-contrast type, Auto focus, Manual focus). The aperture range is f2.8 - f11 and the shutter speed range is 30 sec. - 1/10000 sec in Manual mode. There are 2 macro modes available - Macro, which allows you to shoot approximately 10cm - 80cms away from your subject, and Super
Macro, which allows you to shoot approximately 1cm - 20cms away.
ISO speeds range from 160 to 1600. Unfortunately 160 is only available in Auto mode and 1600 is only available when the camera is set to record 1M files, and not for the larger image sizes. There are 10 different White Balance settings to choose from.
The FinePix S20 Pro has a continuous shooting mode with various options. Top 10 allows you to take 4.5 frames/sec. up to 10 frames and keep the first 10 frames of the sequence. Final 10 allows you to take 4.5 frames/sec. up to 10 frames and keep the last 10 frames of the sequence. Long-period continuous takes up to 40 shots at up to 1 frame per second, but only using the 1M file quality setting. The The FinePix S20 Pro features a self-timer which can be set to either a 2 or 10 second delay.
The built-in flash offers a range of different modes; Auto, Red-eye Reduction, Forced Flash, Suppressed Flash, Slow Synchro, Red-eye Reduction & Slow Synchro. The effective range at the wide angle lens setting is: 0.3m to 8.5m, and at the telephoto setting 0.9m to 7.9m. If the built-in flash doesn't meet your needs, there is a non-dedicated hot-shoe and a
PC sync socket for connection to studio and external flash systems.
The FinePix S20 Pro Zoom has a traditional threaded cable release socket which avoids the expense of having to use a proprietary cable release. It also sports both USB 2.0 and Firewire connections, allowing rapid transfer of images from camera to PC. Like most recent digital cameras the FinePix S20 Pro Zoom is PictBridge compatible.
To compose your images, you can use the LCD monitor or the electronic viewfinder. The FinePix S20 Pro has a 1.8 inch colour TFT LCD monitor which has 118,000 pixels. The electronic viewfinder is .44 inches in size, has 235,000 pixels and features built-in dioptre adjustment. The camera is powered by 4 x AA size alkaline batteries or 4 x Ni-MH rechargeable batteries.
The FinePix S20 Pro can record movies at 2 different settings; 640x480 pixels at 30 frames per second and 320x240 pixels at 30 frames per second. Both settings are recorded in the Motion JPEG format, a type of AVI format that can handle images and sound as a single file, and can be played back by QuickTime 3 or later. As well as recording movies with sound, the FinePix S20 Pro also doubles up as a voice recorder, allowing you to record 30-second long voice memos in the WAV format.
The camera's dimensions are 121mm (W) x 81.5mm (H) x 97mm (D), and it weighs approximately 500g without batteries and storage cards fitted.
Finally, the standard box kit contains a 16Mb xD-Picture Card, USB cable, Firewire (IEEE 1394) cable, AV cable, 4 x AA type alkaline batteries, shoulder strap, lens cap and holder, PC Sync socket cap, manuals, a CD-ROM containing various software and the HS-V2 Hyper Utility Software (worth £149.99). This is a a new software tool that enables you to fine-tune aspects of a image such as sharpness, colour balance, and the full extent of the camera's dynamic range. You will need to invest in a few more xD-Picture Cards to store your images on, as the supplied 16Mb can only store approximately 5 images at the default 6M Fine file quality setting. You will also have to budget for some rechargeable batteries and a recharger, as the supplied alkaline batteries don't last very long.
Ease of Use
The FinePix S20 Pro is virtually identical to the FinePix S7000 Zoom in terms of its design, so most of the comments that I made about the S7000 apply equally to the S20 Pro. It is definitely not in the pocketable category of digital cameras - you will need to carry it in a camera bag. What can only be described as the chunky hand-grip on the right of the camera makes it very comfortable to hold with just one hand, although you may want to use your left hand to steady things. The zoom buttons are very well positioned in a recessed area just where your right thumb naturally sits, with the exposure mode and aperture/shutter speed dials handily positioned above. The FinePix S20 Pro is one of the heavier digital cameras on the market, weighing 500g without batteries and storage cards fitted, but this I think this actually counts in its favour, as it has a reassuring balance to it without being too heavy. Although it's not the smallest or lightest camera around, the FinePix S20 Pro instantly feels intuitive to hold and use.
There are quite a lot number of external controls and buttons on the camera (around 20), but most of them are clearly labeled and common to most mid-range digital cameras. If you have never used a digital camera before, or you're upgrading from a more basic model, reading the manual before you start is a good idea. For more experienced users, a quick look through the manual for the few functions that are not so self-explanatory is all that's needed. There's a fairly traditional dial on the top of the camera that lets you select the different exposure modes; Program, Shutter Priority, Aperture Priority and Manual. This dial is a typical feature of SLR cameras, and enables you to quickly change between the various modes. Fuji have wisely integrated all of the scene modes (Portrait, Landscape, Sports, Night Scene) into one option on the dial, called SP. Choosing this brings up an on-screen menu, from which you can select a particular scene mode. The other two options are Movie and Set, which allows you to change various functional settings of the camera, such as date/time and whether RAW mode is on or off.
As with a lot of Fuji's other digital cameras, the FinePix S20 Pro has a Menu button on the rear of the camera which, as you would expect, gives you access to the software menu system. This lets you set various parameters including focusing, sharpness and white balance. There is also a small silver button with an F on it which opens the Photo Mode menu and allows you to control the file quality setting, ISO speed and colour settings (B&W, Chrome or Standard). I'm not really sure why these 3 settings alone should fall under the heading of Photo Mode, and things like white balance and sharpening are just part of the standard menu. And I'm undecided about whether it is a good idea or not. The F button does give quick access to certain features, but you do have to memorise what another button does.
One of the issues that I had with the FinePix S20 Pro is linked to the EVF and LCD displays. The camera makes a distinct mechanical noise when you move it around, as it tries to focus on whatever you are pointing it at, until it has locked on the subject. This noise is loud enough to catch someone's attention and spoil a candid moment at close quarters, although in most situations it will probably annoy you more than the subject! It's definitely one of the noisier auto-focusing systems that I've used and is especially annoying if you leave the camera turned on all the time.
On the whole the FinePix S20 Pro is a very well-built, easy to use digital camera that successfully mimics the feel of a 35mm film or digital SLR. The menu system is well-designed and very clear, perfect for both the beginners and more experienced photographers alike that will be interested in buying it. I would have no hesitation in highly recommending this camera from an ease-of-use point of view.
Overall Image Quality
The FinePix S20 Pro's new Super CCD HR sensor has delivered a slightly disappointing set of images. The bright sunny conditions of the review period have ensured that the sample photos have great colour, with deep blues in the sky. Unfortunately the same bright conditions have caused chromatic aberrations to appear, both where you would normally expect them and where you wouldn't. The 6M 2832 x 2128 pixel images can be printed up to A3 in size, although you will need to sharpen them first in Photoshop or set the sharpness option in-camera to "Hard". Noise is well controlled at the slowest ISO setting of 200, but starts to appear at ISO 400 and is very visible at ISO 800. I'm still not convinced about the 4th Generation CCD SR sensor, which doesn't seem to offer any great advantages over other digital cameras in terms of dynamic range. So overall only an average performance from the FinePix S20 Pro.
Just like the Fuji FinePix F700 Zoom, which also uses Fuji's new 4th Generation SuperCCD SR sensor, the FinePix S20 Pro has a number of innovations that potentially make it stand out from the crowd and which justify the much higher than average price tag for a 3 megapixel camera. Unfortunately none of those innovations are fully realized, such as the new CCD that promises increased dynamic range and the 6 megapixel file quality setting.
There are some other features which partly make up for this - the PC sync socket, Firewire connection and the excellent bundled Hyper Utility HS-V2 software are all plus points that aren't found on many more expensive cameras. But ultimately what we are left with is a well-designed, professional-level camera that effectively only has 3 megapixels and which most professionals will probably ignore in favour of a true DSLR. If you buy this camera because you want 6 megapixel images to make large prints or you want images that have noticeably greater shadow and highlight details than other digicams, I think you will be disappointed. On the other hand, if you buy it because you want an easy to use, well-built digital camera that will create good quality prints up to A4 in size, whilst offering full control over the photographic process, then you will be more than pleased. | http://www.pocket-lint.com/review/67747-fuji-finepix-s20-pro-camera-review | robots: classic
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} | 1,619 | Canon IXUS 285 HS
The Canon IXUS 285 HS offers 12x zoom and a 20 MP sensorCanon
Canon, famed for their EOS series of DSLRs, have two more product lines under which they make small sensor-cameras. One line is the PowerShot series, and the other is the IXUS, aimed at the kind of people for whom photography is about memories. The cameras are compact, require very little user input and include several features that make photography a breeze. It is one such camera we are reviewing — the Canon IXUS 285 HS.
The 285 HS is a tiny camera, small enough to hide away in someone's bag and light enough for one to easily forget that it's even there. It is, however, a little on the thicker side, measuring almost an inch in thickness. If you're the type to wear skinny jeans or slim-fit chinos, this camera doesn't quite feel at home in the pocket. The camera features a 1/ 2.3" sensor which clicks images at 20MP resolution, which is processed by a DIGIC 4+ processor — the same one found in Canon's new DSLR, the EOS 1300D.
The lens offers 12x magnification, zooming all the way from 4.5mm to 54mm. If you're a photo nerd, you'd be blow away when we say it offers a 35mm focal-length equivalent of 25 to 300mm. If the last sentence made no sense to you, just remember to bring this baby along if you're going bird-watching; it has massive zoom, which can be further extended to 24, which essentially translates to 600mm at the tight end. So when you go bird watching, remember to take a tripod along.
The image size ranges between large (5,184 x 3,888 pixels), medium 1 (3,648 x 2,736 pixels), medium 2 (2,048 x 1,536 pixels), medium (2,592 x 1,944 pixels) and small (640 x 480 pixels). Aspect ratios include the standard 4:3 picture format as well as 16:9, 1:1 and 3:2. It also shoots video at full-HD resolution, which can be brough down to 1,280 x 720 and 640 x 480.
The camera's ISO sensitivity ranges between 80 and 3,200. It has a maximum shutter speed of 1/2,000 sec and has an image stabilising system that works by moving the lens, much like the system found in Canon's DSLR lenses. Once you've clicked your pictures, you can view them on the 3" 461K-dot LCD screen. Social media enthusiasts will rejoice in the fact that the camera offers NFC and Wi-Fi support, allowing them to upload pictures to Facebook and Instagram on the fly.
Touch and feel
The camera measures roughly 4" by 2" and, like we mentioned before, is about an inch thick. The curved front and the flat back enable it to fit neatly in the hand when you're not shooting. And as it weighs less than 150g, holding it up for extended periods doesn't make you feel uncomfortable. With all the buttons restricted only to the right of the camera, it's definitely possible to operate it with one hand, but for those with frying pans for hands like that of the author, using the camera with two hands is advised if avoiding carpal tunnel syndrome is high on the list of priorities.
Around the front is the lens, the autofocus (AF) illuminator, the mic and the flash.
Around the back is the LCD screen, which is a total fingerprint magnet, and a total of nine buttons including a dedicated video recording button.
The top features the power button, the shutter and zoom controls as well as the shooting mode selector.
The bottom is where you'll find the 1/4" universal tripod socket and the battery/memory card access door. The side to the right of the lens houses the inbuilt speaker and to the left of the lens is the AV and HDMI out.
Shooting on the IXUS HS 285 is delight. The AF is responsive, the IS works well, the zoom is convenient and there is almost no shutter lag. The only gripe we have is the speed of the lens, by which we mean the widest aperture range. While fully zoomed out, the IXUS HS 285 has an F number of 3.6, which is about what one would find in Canon's 18-55mm DSLR kit lens, but when zoomed in, the aperture drops to F 7, which allows a lot less light in, translating to a slow shutter speed. Shooting in dimly-lit places like concerts, while fully zoomed in, does not result in good pictures. But, an easy fix we found was to raise the ISO, underexpose the picture by a stop at the least and brighten the image later.
The IXUS HS offers several shooting modes, including AUTO, Handheld Night Scene, Low Light and Fish-eye Effect, but we stuck to P mode and the creative shot mode. The P mode works much like auto, but allows users to decide whether they want the image to be overexposed or underexposed and what ISO they'd like to shoot at.
The creative shot mode, however, is a little cooler. Pressing the shutter down while in this mode captures one image on which the camera works its magic and presents five images that are artfully cropped and edited.
The next interesting feature is the high-speed burst mode. While the camera is good for about three shots on continuous shot mode, it can shoot upto 7.2 frames a second on high-speed burst mode, albeit at 5 megapixels.
Uploading the images could have been a little less complicated, but we guess that's a small price to pay if high-speed data transfer and not having to bring a laptop with you to transfer images every time you go on a trip is something you's want. The camera can be connected to smartphones, tablets, computers, Wi-Fi-enabled printers and web services.
Pairing with a smartphone or a tablet begins with an NFC authentication. If your device isn't NFC-enabled, you can connect to the camera by pressing the wireless button on the back and treating it like a Wi-Fi router. Once connected, the only way to transfer images wirelessly is via the Canon Camera Connect app, which not only allows users to view the images saved in the memory card, but also download them. Once they are saved, you're free to upload images/format the memory card and begin again.
Image Quality
We found that the IXUS 280 HS has a tendency to overexpose images just a tiny bit. Whether it was in a dark indoor concert hall or outdoors, the images, in our opinion, turned out looking better when adjusted slightly. This results in the colours appearing a little washed out, especially while shooting in the daytime, but it's quickly fixed by dialling back the exposure in the compensation setting.
The colours when, the camera does get the exposure right are vivid and pleasing.
The lens, by virtue of being relatively slow, is the main reason why you'd end up shooting at really high ISO sensitivity settings. The camera, as it is expected, shoots well at low ISOs and holds rather well up to ISO 800, but anything upwards of ISO 1600 and especially at ISO 3200 isn't really great to look at, but we do have to give it to Canon for controlling the noise levels.
The focus is fast, with the ability to track subjects, even giving priority to faces. Fully zoomed in, with the shutter half pressed, we were impressed with how well the camera was able to maintain focus on the bird (pictured above) despite the unavoidable zoom-induced shake.
The camera also has a pretty sweet macro mode. Fully zoomed in and switching the focus setting to macro yielded in basically no AF lock, but zoomed out, the camera was more than comfortable with shooting things right up to the lens' front element. Digging into the spec sheet, we found Canon saying that the minimum focusing distance is 1cm when the lens is zoomed out, which drastically drops to 1m when zoomed in. In macro mode, the focussing distance ranges between 1cm and 50cm and works only when fully zoomed out. The only sad part about the macro mode is that the image becomes soft as you move closer to the subject.
What we think
The Canon IXUS 258 HS is a delight to shoot with. It's compact and handy, and it takes almost no time to get used to the hardware. On the software front, the shooting menu can get a little fiddly, but it's still not something that really bothered us. Being really light, it's no big deal mounting this baby on a selfie stick and switching the timed shutter release to 2 seconds. Just remember to switch face detection on.
What we wish Canon could have addressed is definitely the connectivity option. That the camera needs an app to transfer files is a tad annoying. A second thing that bothered us was the wrist strap Canon had bundled with the camera. While it's definitely of use, it could have either been a tad bit longer, allowing users to loop it twice around their wrists, or at least come with something to tighten it around the wrist while shooting.
We were also a little unhappy with the battery performance, which lasted only about 260 shots, but according to Canon, the 800mAh battery only is good for about 180 shots, which goes up to 265 in Eco mode. Seeing that we didn't enable the setting that doesn't club baby seals over the head, we're not sure how to react.
Overall, we think the Canon IXUS 285 HS is a really good camera that's most at home in a bag or a purse. It's the kind of camera that accompanies you as you go about your life. | http://www.ibtimes.co.in/canon-ixus-285-hs-review-kind-camera-you-keep-you-676955 | robots: classic
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} | 2,133 | Can a DSLR ever replace a smartphone’s camera for simplicity and immediacy?
Canon thinks it can, hence the 1300D: a super-cheap lens-swapper aimed squarely at smartphone-savvy Instagram-addicts looking to level up. How do I know that’s the target audience? Well, despite a spec that’s so stripped back it might as well be naked, it arrives rocking NFC and Wi-Fi for easy connection/uploading and a dedicated Food mode. Q.E.D.
It really is cheap, too – at £280 it costs less than any other new DSLR and not much more than plenty of compacts. But at that price, compromises are inevitable.
Plastic, not fantastic
My first impressions of the 1300D aren't great. For starters, it’s really plasticky: you’ll find more metal on a 13-year-old American’s teeth. Nor is it a thing of beauty – set next to a charmingly retro snapper such as the Olympus OM-D E-M10 II or Fujifilm X-T10 it looks dull, dull, dull.
Maybe I shouldn't be surprised - after all, DSLR design in general has fallen way behind that of your average compact system camera. With the odd exception such as Nikon's pricey Df they all look much the same as they did 10 years ago. Is it really too much to ask for a bit of class?
Well no, it's not. Yes, the 1300D is a £280 camera but the original OM-D E-M10 is available for not much more and that's both made of metal and stylishly designed. It is possible, Canon (and Nikon, and Pentax).
On picking it up, though, I’m impressed: the 1300D is really nicely built, with a good, deep grip that helps it nestle nicely in the hand. The fact that it’s so plasticky means that it’s also super light but despite that it manages to feel fairly solid. There's no weatherproofing, but that's not common until you move much further up the price scale.
You also get plenty of controls where you need them - one definite advantage over most cheaper CSCs and compacts. I’m pleased to see dedicated buttons for the likes of ISO, white balance, autofocus and drive mode round the back, and there's even room for exposure compensation and a flash trigger switch. On top you get the main mode dial and there's two control dials, one on the front and one on the back. The selection is almost as comprehensive as it is on far more expensive cameras.
What’s missing? Well, the screen is neither flippable nor touch-sensitive. The latter seems like a glaring omission given the target audience, but I’m personally more bothered about the former – a swivelling screen has saved my bacon on countless occasions.
I can see why they’re not here given the price, but again it's an area where the 1300D loses out versus some CSCs, including once again the OM-D E-M10. Still, there is a built-in flash - not something you get on every camera.
Digging up the detail
Fortunately, the 1300D's picture quality is nowhere near as humdrum as its design. In fact it's very good.
That might surprise you a little when you look at its specs: inside it there's an 18-megapixel APS-C sensor and Digic-4+ processor, a combination which doesn't exactly jump up and scream cutting-edge at you.
Plenty of other DSLRs are kitted out with a greater number of pixels, including other budget efforts such as the Nikon D3300 and Canon's own 750D, both of which have 24MP sensors. The Digic-4+, meanwhile, is usually found in mid-range compacts; the 750D, by comparison, gets the latest Digic-6 processor.
But don't worry too much about all that, because 18MP is still more than enough for most people. On a weekend trip to the pub with the kids - hey, don't judge me, I've had a hard week - I snap away at the ducks in the pub garden and I’m instantly impressed with the detail in the shots.
Noise is well controlled right up to ISO 3200 and is barely visible at ISO 800, while the colours in the ducks’ feathers really stand out.
Obviously a camera with more megapixels or a bigger full-frame sensor will likely unearth even greater levels of detail, but the 1300D comfortably outperforms most compacts and smartphones, with their much smaller sensors. For stills at least, this is a really nice snapper.
Focus issues
I say 'for stills at least' because autofocus is one area where the 1300D really has been hamstrung.
Whereas the next-step-up Canon EOS 750D gets a 19-point system, the 1300D has to make do with a 9-point set-up. There are no clever autofocus modes either - no face-tracking, or focus zones or the like - just the ability to select one point or have the camera choose for you.
That said, it’s pretty speedy within its comfort zone of static or slow-moving subjects. Your choice of lens will obviously make a difference here too: we used an 18-135mm STM lens and a 50mm f1.8 prime and both snapped on very quickly indeed in the right conditions. But move outside that comfort zone and it's not so hot.
For instance, because its tracking abilities are limited it struggles to keep up with hyperactive cats and kids alike. Combine that with the fact that burst-shooting maxes out at a fairly rubbish 3fps and you have a camera that is to sports what Aston Villa is to football right now.
Busy scenes can also confuse it, so much so that you'll almost always find it best to manually set the focus point and use the focus-and-recompose method. Fair enough, busy scenes create problems for many cameras, but at least if you have a 19-point autofocus set up there's more chance that the camera will focus on the right subject.
I don't want to be harsh on what is after all a £280 camera. Autofocus is by no means terrible and I took plenty of great shots with the 1300D. But the percentage of keepers definitely dropped substantially with moving subjects and it's something to bear in mind.
Live View and video are potentially much bigger problem, although how important that is depends on how much you use them. Almost every other recent Canon camera, including the 750D and the now-just-as-cheap 100D, gets Canon’s nifty hybrid CMOS AF focusing, a system so smart it could probably beat me at chess. And I'm good at chess. That’s absent here, so there’s no automatic focusing in those modes.
With CMOS AF and a touch-sensitive flip screen, Live View becomes a genuinely useful feature and one that these days can rival standard through-the-viewfinder shooting; without them, it's not much use at all.
Video quality is fine, but there's no 4K or 60fps options: it maxes out at 1080p@30fps. And again, without the continuous autofocus that you get on other Canon cameras, it's not the easiest to use. Holding the shutter button will focus, but be prepared for plenty of hunting as it does so.
The hook up
If the 1300D is always lagging behind more expensive cameras for build quality, features and autofocus, there's one area in which it holds its own: connectivity.
But before we get to this story's happy ending we first have to endure the tedious scene-setting bit, AKA hooking it up for the first time.
With built-in Wi-Fi, hooking the camera up to a mobile should be a simple matter - but then in theory Boris Johnson should be a laughing stock. And so it proves. Connecting wirelessly for the first time is the usual mix of error messages and timeouts until I bash it into my forehead repeatedly (not really).
Still, eventually it does connect and in its defence it links up pretty swiftly on every subsequent occasion. If you have an NFC-equipped Android smartphone you'll find the process a little easier: one tap of the phone against the side of the 1300D was all it took for me to be taken straight into Canon’s Camera Connect app.
And there the news gets better still, because the app is one of the best I’ve used. I’m quickly viewing and downloading shots, and uploading them to Instagram or social media is then but a few clicks away.
Is it as quick as taking a photo on your phone and uploading it? Well no, it's obviously not. I know because I timed it - 30 seconds max for a phone upload, but about 90 seconds to get a picture from the Canon on to my feed. That's still quicker than it would be to take an SD card out of the camera, put it into a laptop then upload it though - and that's ignoring the fact that there's no desktop upload on Instagram.
Camera Connect also lets you control the 1300D for tripod-based fun, and again it does so very well. You get access to almost everything you'd need - exposure, aperture, ISO, autofocus mode and so on - and there's very little lag between pressing the shutter button on your phone and hearing the camera fire away. As a result, it works excellently for selfies and group shots when on a tripod or balanced on a wall, and it could also be put to good use for more specialist shooting situations such as macro photography, where the slightest movement of the camera can throw off the focus. Sadly, there's no timelapse option - a strange omission given the otherwise excellent options here.
So what else do you get?
There's not a lot else to the 1300D: it takes pictures and connects via Wi-Fi and that's about it.
The only other real 'features' are the creative shooting modes and built-in filters. As I already mentioned, one of these is 'Food mode', which joins the likes of Landscape, Portraits and Sports on the main Mode Dial. There's not much to know about it really - it just controls a few of the camera's settings, such as aperture, colour tone and shutter speed, to optimise them for snaps of your snacks.
It works well enough if you're a beginner and these modes can save you a little time if you regularly switch between landscapes and portraits, say, but frankly you'd be better off learning how the camera works in aperture, shutter-priority and manual modes and taking control yourself. It'll work out better in the long run.
The filters are the usual suspects: soft focus, fish-eye, B&W etc. Move along, nothing to see here. There's also a video snapshot feature, which combines several short video shots into one longer one. It work perfectly well but I can't personally ever imagine using it.
Canon EOS 1300D verdict
So what are we left with here? Well, let's make this clear: the Canon EOS 1300D is in many ways a lovely little camera. It can take excellent pictures within its comfort zone, is easy to use and arrives at a bargain price. If a friend bought one, I wouldn't laugh in their face.
What I would do, though, is tell them that they should have done a bit of research first. The elephant in the room here is Canon's own 100D, a camera which came out three years ago but which matches or beats the 1300D in nearly every respect and which can now be bought for an identical price. It's much smaller and lighter than the 1300D, has a touchscreen, better ISO range, faster burst shooting and will continuously focus in video and Live View modes. The only real reason to choose the 1300D over it is if you really value Wi-Fi.
In fact, an even bigger elephant in the room - it's a big room, alright - is Nikon's D3300, which has 24.2MP, 60fps video, 5fps burst shooting and can now be bought new for £250. Or you could save up a little for the far superior Canon 750D (£460), or spend about £50 more on the original Olympus OM-D E-M10. In short, you've got options.
Of course Canon itself pitches the 1300D as a camera that'll tear you away from your smartphone and it undoubtedly does a good job on that front. Connectivity is excellent and it'll improve your Instagram feed no end. I'm just not sure that's enough of a reason to buy it over the similarly priced competition.
Buy the Canon EOS 1300D here
Tech Specs
Focus points
ISO range
100-6400 (12800 in extended mode)
Pentamirror, 95% coverage, 0.8x magnification
Fixed 3in LCD TFT, 920k dot
Burst shooting
Max 3fps
Wi-Fi, NFC, USB, video-out, HDMI Mini-out
Approx 500 shots
129x101.3x77.6m; 485g
Stuff says...
Canon EOS 1300D review
It’s cheap as chips and takes great photos but the 1300D’s not quite the bargain it seems
Good Stuff
Great picture quality
Wi-Fi and app abilities
Low price
Bad Stuff
Hardly a looker
Video and Live View lack autofocus
Similarly priced rivals are better | https://www.stuff.tv/canon/eos-1300d/review | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2020-24
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The A6500 joins an already bustling series across the wider A6000 range, with several cameras at different specifications available at different price points. But if you want the latest and greatest then you'll have to pay for the pleasure. A now three-year-old A6000 costs around £400, an 18-month-old A6300 is around £680, while the A6500 is around £1,150 (down from its £1,500 launch price).
You're probably wondering why the A6500 is so much more expensive than the A6300. Well, for the extra cash you will get in-body-image-stabilisation (thumbs up), touchscreen control (hallelujah), a faster processor (thank you) and a slightly deeper grip (hand over the long lens). That's a fair specification for the money - so is the A6500 worth it?
Sony A6500 review: New touchscreen
• 3-inch, 921k-dot, tilt-angle LCD touchscreen
• 0.39-inch, 2,359k-dot, 0.7x (equiv) electronic viewfinder
Review after review of Sony A-series cameras has asked the question: "why no touchscreen?" Well, the A6500 finally answers, featuring a tilt-angle LCD touchscreen for the first time.
So has it been worth the wait? Well, yes and no. It's not the largest, brightest, sharpest or most comprehensive touchscreen around. But it's a step forward.
In shooting mode, the touchscreen is used only to select the AF point (Touch Panel). You cannot fire the shutter or select menus and shooting settings using the touchscreen like you can with, say, an Olympus or Panasonic mirrorless camera. You can swipe a finger to navigate and double tap to zoom, a bit like using a smartphone. The touch focus works well, it's just not as in-depth as some other systems.
In addition to touch focus, the screen offers Touch Pad AF. This mode caters for those using the built-in electronic viewfinder (EVF), as a means of selecting the AF point through the viewfinder display. That way, the touchscreen can still be used to select the AF point with EVF in use. There are three options for Touch Pad AF operation: the whole screen, right half and right quarter area. Limiting the Touch Pad AF area to the right-hand-side areas reduces the likelihood of accidentally moving the AF point. It's a fun idea, but doesn't work so well for left-eyed users.
Sony A6500 review: Durable build, solid performance
• Body weighs 453g
• 11fps burst mode
• 425-point phase-detection autofocus system
As one of the smaller mirrorless cameras on the market, the A6500 is a toughie. It's made from a weather-sealed and durable magnesium alloy and features a deep grip for a solid hold.
There's no thumbwheel on the front of the camera, however, which we feel would complement the one on the top of the camera and its control wheel to the rear. Making quick changes to aperture and exposure compensation is less fluid than they could be in our view.
It's a different story when it comes to speed of operation. The A6500 is ultra-fast across the board.
Although the maximum burst rate of 11 frames per second (11fps) remains at the same impressive level of its A6000 series cousins, the number of images that can be captured in a sequence is greater. In real-world use, the Alpha A6500 maxes out at 269 JPEGs, which is around 25 seconds of non-stop shooting. That's a whole lot of images - plus it's possible to carry on shooting or immediately go into a 100 per cent view in image playback without hesitation.
The high-speed performance is not just restricted to picture taking either. The A6500 has a fast start-up time and a claimed world's fastest 0.05 second auto-focus speed.
Sure, plenty of camera makers claim to have the fastest autofocus on the planet, but in this Sony it's believable. You would struggle to find a mirrorless camera at this level with quicker autofocus. And it's not just the initial focus in single-AF mode. The A6500's 425-point phase detection AF system is very capable of obtaining a sharp focus for fast-moving action, too.
Sony A6500 review: Battery life
• 350 shots per charge
• In-camera charging via USB
• Separate charger cradle sold separately
Sense a "but" coming to counter the greateness? Well, like most mirrorless cameras - including the Fujifilm X-T2 - battery life is a bit of a problem.
At 350 shots per charge, the A6500 provides around one third the shot-life that you'll get in a competitive DSLR. Therefore, we would typically factor in a couple of extra batteries to the cost of buying a camera like the A6500. Of course the pay-off is that the Alpha A6500 is significantly smaller and lighter than competitor DSLRs.
To compound the issues around battery life, a battery charger is not included with the A6500. Instead, the battery is charged through a USB connection to the camera, which renders the camera unusable while charging a battery. Such a connection also isn't as quick to charge as a wall-based solution either - fortunately you can buy one separately, which we suggest you do along with those extra batteries.
Sony A6500 review: In-body image stabilisation
• Built-in 5-axis image stabilisation
• Claims up to 5EV compensation
It's perhaps no surprise that battery life is limited with so many features on board though. The A6500 includes in-body image-stabilisation (IBIS), which is said to provide up to 5EV of stabilisation (that's quoted specifically when used in conjunction with Sony's 55mm lens).
In real-world terms, where you would typically be able to shoot sharp handheld images with said lens at 1/60sec, the 5EV stabilisation enables you use a shutter speed of 1/2sec and achieve the same sharpness. Or so the theory goes.
But here's a key point: the majority of Sony's compatible E-mount lenses feature Sony's in-lens stabilisation known as Optical Steady Shot (OSS), while a good 50 per cent of Sony's FE-mount lenses (full-frame) have this too. Many third party Sony E-mount lenses do not feature optical stabilisation. With a Sony OSS lens mounted to the A6500, thereofre, the camera passes on image stabilisation to the lens, so IBIS is only beneficial to those who use lenses lacking OSS.
We had the Zeiss 16-70mm f/4 OSS lens for this test of the A6500, so have been unable to test the camera's IBIS. Which leaves us with the question: will many users really get to enjoy the benefit of the A6500's IBIS? Especially considering it doesn't work in tandem with optical stabilisation, to provide even greater stabilisation. The class-leading Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II offers both in-body and lens-based stabilisation.
Interestingly the A6500 features both mechanical and electronic shutters. The mechanical shutter is limited to 1/4000sec and has a life expectancy up to 200,000 shots. The electronic shutter provides silent shooting with the same maximum 1/4000sec, so you can't get any higher shutter speed as per a Panasonic mirrorless camera.
Sony A6500 review: Image quality
• 24.2MP Exmor CMOS sensor
• APS-C format (1.5x crop)
• ISO 100-25,600 (51,200 extended)
A 24-million-pixel sensor is commonplace in today's APS-C cameras, including the A6500. It's the same sensor as found in the A6300, with native ISO 100-25,600 range which can be extended up to ISO 51,200.
And its results are rather good.
We've been shooting with automatic white balance most of the time, but a few of the in-camera Creative Style settings have been handy. The Neutral setting makes JPEG images that are spot on for skin tones; the Standard setting is ample enough for punchy landscapes, too, without the need to select Vivid.
Dynamic range in JPEG images is particularly impressive, with a wide retention of detail in shadow and highlight areas. Put your raw images through the editing suite to recover tonal detail and things get mighty impressive.
We've had many shooting situations that have tested the camera's capabilities - early morning sunrises, dark silhouettes and bright backgrounds, for example. In such raw files, shadows that appear black still hold much detail. Even brightening a frame by as much as +5EV reveals relatively clean detail, with only a little magenta chroma noise and relatively well controlled luminance noise.
Similar things can be said for treatment of highlights. What might appear to be blown-out white sky often holds detail. In this regard, it's well worth shooting in raw format - you could get exposures off by ±3EV and expect to recapture most of the missing tonal detail.
We would love to have the option of raw editing in-camera, especially with built-in Wi-Fi making editing and sharing your A6500 images while on the move possible. Maybe one day, eh?
Sony A6500 review: A videographer's dream
• 4K capture at 30/25/24p
• 1080p capture up to 120p
• 8bit 4:2:0 on SD card at 100Mbps; 4:2:2 available via clean HDMI out
• S-Log2 and S-Log3 gamma
• 3.5mm microphone socket; no headphones socket
There's also heaps of video capability, with top-spec features that'll have videographers frothing at the mouth.
The A6500 can capture 4K UHD video at 30/25/24p. It's high quality too, with 8-bit 4:2:0 captured internally to SD card at up to 100Mbps, while direct HMDI outputs at 4:2:2 for external recorder capture. There's a broad range of picture profiles, too, including S-Log2 and S-Log3 gamma curves.
With 25p and 24p 4k recording, information is taken from the full width of the sensor, without cropping. What you get is 1.56x oversampling in each dimension, resulting in very crisp video footage. All with continuous autofocus as you please too.
Slow and Quick (S&Q) video modes can be used when capturing Full HD 1080p to make creative videos like time-lapses and slow-motion. Frame-rates run down to 1p for time-lapse and up to 120p for slow-motion (at a 1.9x crop). Handily, these modes don't drain the battery particularly quickly.
For such a mean video-making machine, we did expect two SD card slots and a headphone jack for audio monitoring. But it's not to be: there's a 3.5mm microphone port, but that and the single SD card slot are all you get.
Another issue for video is that the LCD screen output dims when capturing 4K footage, presumably to avoid overheating and battery drain. The impact is significant enough to render the screen almost unviewable in bright daylight, however, which can make composition tricky. You might want to consider buying an accessory hood or similar.
Indeed, you'll struggle to find a mirrorless cameras with quicker autofocus. The A6500 is up there with the best-in-class in this regard, while its processor is hugely capable of backing up its 11fps burst mode figures - which is not something we have always been able to say about Sony Alpha cameras. Image quality is great, too, with dynamic range being especially standout.
Yes it costs a fair chunk of change, but given its array of features, the A6500 is an outstanding all-rounder. Just make sure you buy a spare battery and charger if you're going to take the plunge.
Also consider
Panasonic Lumix G80
It's more DSLR-styled, but the more affordable G80 offers many of the Sony's features without the bulging price tag.
Read the full article: Panasonic Lumix G80 review
Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II
Quite a different kettle of fish, given the considerable expense of this Olympus. However, with best-in-class image stabilisation, it's well worthy of consideration. That plus all its other top-notch features make it the most formidable Olympus camera ever made.
Read the full article: Olympus OM-D E-M1 MkII | https://www.pocket-lint.com/cameras/reviews/sony/139263-sony-a6500-review-a-mini-mirrorless-powerhouse | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2020-16
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} | 1,781 | Hands on: Sony Alpha a99 review
There's been a lot of talk about the Sony Alpha a99 for a long time now. The replacement for the full-frame a900 isn't a conventional DSLR, as was expected, which would suggest that Sony is done and dusted with the traditional optical-viewfinder, moving-mirror system.
Instead the a99's translucent mirror technology, as found across the entire current Alpha range, makes its way into a full-frame sensor model for the first time. Pocket-lint has been in Iceland with Sony to experiment with the latest Alpha. Stick a flake in that luv, we're going hands-on.
There's a *lot* of technology crammed into the Sony a99, so much so that it's difficult to know exactly where to start.
As this SLT incorporates an electronic viewfinder as part of its design, that seems the most sensible starting spot. The a99 utilises the very same 2,359k-dot OLED viewfinder panel as found in the NEX-7 and NEX-6 compact system camera models. That means its 0.71x magnification gives a screen measuring 0.5-inches diagonally - that kind of size is roughly the same as you'll find in any optical viewfinder system, including high-end DSLR cameras. But it's the electronic part that might see some traditionalists running for the hills: £2500 for an electronic viewfinder system… are you sold?
It's likely to split the pack; though we have got used to the electronic viewfinder and it works well. But it's not without issue: rapid movement can easily "smear" light sources, though the common lag associated with electronic 'finders is largely absent, even in low light. Failing to meet the viewfinder face-on can also cause the corners and edges to give a Gaussian-blur-like effect to the preview. Then there's the activation side of things: despite an eye-level sensor to pop the viewfinder on automatically as your face approaches, it's still not instant. It's close, but close might not be good enough for serious snappers. Of course, hit the Finder/LCD button and it's possible to keep one or the other permanently on to avoid this issue assuming the menu is set up to honour that setup.
As per any fair assessment, however, it's worth also highlighting the viewfinder's raft of positives too. The 100 per cent field of view is not only large, it's absolutely a "what you see is what you get" system. From white balance to bokeh and image effects right down to (at least to some degree) image noise all show up in the preview. There's an electronic level, full feedback of autofocus points and bright settings displayed with clarity. Arguably there are more pros than there are cons, and this firmly sits the a99 into a modern-day, technological camera position. To see if this is the right setup for you it's best to go take a look at an NEX-7 in a shop as that will replicate the a99's viewfinder experience almost exactly.
Another major new feature of the a99 is its dual autofocus system. The coupling of a 19-point phase-detection autofocus sensor (that uses reflected light from the translucent mirror) is paired with a new 102-point system on the sensor itself. It's the first time such a combination has appeared in a camera, and it promises a lot in the new AF-D - essentially Sony's brand new 3D tracking mode to keep focus on moving subjects - but it won't always deliver for the simple fact that not all Sony Alpha lenses are fully compatible.
In fact, at present, there are only six: the 24-70mm f/2.8 ZA, 70-400mm f/4-5.6 G, 50mm f/1.4, 28-75mm f/2.8, 500mm f/4 and 300mm f/2.8. All Alpha lenses (and, indeed Minolta glass) will still work, but can't make full use of the AF-D autofocus mode due to what Sony has called "issues with lens analysis".
We've used the 28-75mm f/2.8, the same lens released with the Alpha A77 kit, as well as the 70-300mm f/4-5.6 and both offered a reasonable experience, though it's not comparable to a Nikon D800 or Canon 5D mkIII in speed terms, when we thought it would be. The probably cause is that the final firmware hasn't been tweaked to make the most of the lens and body "chit chat" for quicker images.
But there are other small factors that we'd like to see fixed too. For example, in the selected focus point highlighted in black which, particularly when viewing into a dark background, is near impossible to see. Surely a brighter colour, such a red, would have made more sense? The arrangement of AF points is also very centralised rather than spread across a wide range - a probably shortcoming of the lesser amount of light available to the phase detection sensor's outer edges on account of the translucent mirror technology? We're not sure. All we know is that a wider array would be more versatile.
Think about the a99 as a competitor to the Nikon D800 and Canon EOS 5D mkIII and its autofocus system is very capable however. Of the 19 main focus points, 11 are cross-type for heightened sensitivity in both portrait and landscape orientation and the centre-point is sensitive to f/2.8. Speed-wise it can keep up no problems, but one or two blips with our pre-production model meant that autofocus was missed where contrast lacked (despite not using contrast-detection autofocus), particularly in dark areas.
As per other Alpha models the inclusion of a tele-zoom button on the rear allows for 1.4x and 2x digital zoom, but at limited cost to quality thanks to the sensor's huge 24.3-megapixel resolution. Morphing a 300mm lens into a 600mm equivalent at 12-megapixels has significant benefit too, and it's hard to spot any dip in quality. It's quick and easy to press the button, even if you're using the viewfinder.
Another cool new feature is the "AF Range" button which limits the focus range to a user-defined distance between the closest and furthest points. Let's say you're shooting an ice hockey match - or other similar sport - through protective glass that's not totally clear. The camera may get "confused" from time to time and try and focus on the closest point, even if that's not the desired subject. With the a99's AF Range one click of a button on the rear loads up a front-to-rear available focus and it's possible to then "close down" this distance using the front and rear thumbwheels. Should you choose to focus at 10-15m away, ignoring the 15-25mm background interference, than this camera can do that. It sticks to it rigidly too; we tested it through rain-smattered windows out on the Icelandic waters and all the prominent, contrasting spots of water were ignored in favour of the landscape behind. Undoubtedly a very useful feature to have.
Then there's image quality. Unfortunately Sony hasn't granted permission for us to use images in full - there are some illustrative examples in this piece at a small scale which is all we've been permitted to use - but from what we've already seen it's an impressive performer.
Any 24-megapixel sensor is going to have a dip at higher ISO levels, but the a99's full-frame status and new technologies means that shots between ISO 3200-6400 were still turning out plenty of detail. Glance on the LCD screen and it's clear to see that this camera isn't mucking around - the large sensor makes shallow depth of field easy to achieve, shadows are shown as rich blacks and shots just have that quality look and "feel" to them.
Speaking of the LCD screen, the a99 has adopted a vari-angle bracket that means the screen can be positioned to almost any angle. It's a two-part bracket that extends from the rear, and our only quibble with it is that some rotations are possible only in one direction rather than both. Also the 921k-dot resolution, while perfectly fine for a viewing experience, doesn't utilise Sony's latest "WhiteMagic" technology which includes a white pixel in addition to red, green and blue ones. Not so for the a99 though.
The camera's design isn't necessarily breaking any boundaries, but its a functional beast that feels right in the hand. There are a couple of small oversights, such as the position of the rear toggle (or "nipple" if you'd prefer) being too close to the thumb rest, which resulted in some accidental knocks that unwittingly moved to focus point.
Setting up bracketing, too, can be a bit of a trick: this requires the press of the continuous shooting button alongside the rotation of the front (and rear, depending on what's being adjusted within the mode) thumbwheel - something that's not possible with one hand. It's proper Twister-fingers to get that sorted, and then the top display screen won't show the aperture and shutter speed unless the shutter is half depressed.
Build quality is top notch though. The magnesium alloy body is not only light - the lightest full-frame camera out there in fact - but it's also tough and benefits from weather sealing. And we should know after a thorough soaking at sea off the coast of Iceland.
The choice to opt for a dual SD card slot (or MS+) is also a little unusual. The a900 used CompactFlash, so upgrade users will need a whole new set of cards to use in the a99. But perhaps the biggest surprise is Sony's omission of the XQD format. It's a Sony-made format, after all, but one that's only been picked up by the Nikon D4 so far.
But that's not all. The a99 has put just as much focus on its movie-capture abilities as it has with stills. The 1920x1080 Full HD AVCHD files can be shot at 50p or 25p (60/30p in the US as NTSC standard) at 28Mbps maximum. The quality is decent, and the autofocus system is generally good but, and just in the same way as stills capture, can occasionally falter and over- or under-focus prior to attaining sharp subject focus.
Our favourite movie-related feature is the silent mode dial though. Pictured below the rotational wheel and button glide like silk and are silent in operation. The button raises a menu that the toggle on the back of the camera (which is also very quiet) can then also select through while recording. Add audio levels and manual control and there's a lot of high-spec stuff here that'll grab the attention of video makers.
Just like we said, there's a lot of tech in this camera and a lot to think about. Overall the a99's got a whole lot right, but we can't help but feel that if a number of the minor blips outlined in this first review were to be ironed out this camera would be even more of a significant contender in the full-frame market.
It's bold, it's brave, it's got bags of new technology and, from what we've seen, it's one fine image and movie-making machine too. | http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/117196-sony-alpha-a99-pictures-and-hands-on-first-review | robots: classic
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My thoughts about the Sony NEX6
In mid 2012, Sony announced the RX100: a compact camera competing in size against the Panasonic LX5 and Canon S105 yet trumping them both in picture quality with a larger, 1-inch sensor. A few months later, they followed up with the announcement of the RX1: a "pocketable" camera with a high quality fixed focal length lens and a full-frame sensor. Unfortunately for me, its premium build and optics are matched by its equally premium price tag.
At the same time, Sony also announced the NEX6, a compact 16-50mm zoom *and* an ultra wide-angle 10-18mm zoom. At last, Sony's NEX system had matured into something meeting essentially all the criteria for my perfect camera system: a compact body with a high quality sensor and an ultra wide-angle zoom. As an added bonus, the NEX6 even has a view finder.
At that point, it suddenly occurred to me that Sony really "gets" enthusiast photographers.
Early this year, I could resist no more and using a European trip as the excuse, I ordered a NEX6 kit with 16-50mm lens and a 10-18mm ultra wide-angle. It's been a few months now and I have had the opportunity to give it a few workouts and can write down some of my thoughts.
My main reference point is the Nikon D90. I have been using the D90 with 16-85mm and 10-24mm Nikkor lenses for a few years now. The D90 was and still is an immensely competent camera. A whole five years after its introduction, its sensor captures pictures whose quality is still respectable even compared to those from current generation DSLRs. It is responsive enough that there is virtually no perceivable delay from pressing the shutter button to taking the photo.
In comparison, the NEX6 is far smaller and lighter. The NEX6 and 16-50mm together weigh less than just the Nikkor 10-24mm lens alone. When packing for a trip, the Nikon system takes up 2/3 of my carry-on luggage. The Sony takes up only a fraction of the space required for the Nikon.
Better still, it would appear that Sony have achieved this miniaturisation feat while making very few compromises. The sensor produces beautiful pictures. It is definitely no worse than what I would have expected from the Nikon and very likely better. I don't notice many ergonomic compromises either. The grip is comfortable and the important buttons fall within easy reach of my fingers and thumb. It even beats the Nikon with its tilting rear screen which makes it possible to see the screen whether I am taking a photo from near the ground or high above my head.
There are a few things I miss from the Nikon though. I prefer the two control dials split between the forefinger and the thumb. The Sony has both its dials on the back and on many occasions they have the same function. However, ergonomically I find little else to complain about.
The Sony on-camera software features feel light years ahead of the Nikon. It has a selection of cute modes including in-camera HDR, multi-shot noise reduction for low-light and stitched panoramas. Having an electronic view finder also means that you get to preview some of the filter effects before you take the photo. This is useful for black and white.
Yet there are some niggling annoyances about the Sony software. I often find that it takes too many button clicks and dial twirls to navigate through the layers of menus in order to do simple things such as "format SD card" or "set exposure bracketing". Also, I still do not understand why there are separate "stills playback" and "video playback" modes and why I have to manually switch between them.
Perhaps what annoys me the most about the software is that many of the fun in-camera processing features do not work with RAW files. You get to choose to record RAW files *or* use the in-camera processing feature, but not both. This means that if you find that an HDR photo did not come out as well as you expected, there is no way to recover the original three exposures. As an enthusiast, I hate having to make this "processing before or after" choice.
Finally, I would say that the 16-50mm and 10-18mm lenses are a huge step towards an enthusiast friendly system but they are still lacking compared to the Nikkor equivalents. I found that the extra zoom reach of the Nikkor 10-24mm was extremely convenient compared to the more limiting 10-18mm of the Sony. At 24mm, the perspective looks almost normal whereas at 18mm the perspective is still decidedly wide.
The 16-50mm zoom is compact because of its motorised folding and unfolding but this comes at the expense of responsiveness. When you switch on the camera, it takes an extra half second to unfold the lens. Also, when the camera sleeps to save power, the lens folds in, and when you wake it, the lens will unfold but only back to its widest zoom setting. It effectively loses whatever zoom setting you had carefully chosen before.
Conclusion: I would say that Sony definitely "gets" the *features* that enthusiast photographers want, however, Nikon still understands better how enthusiast photographers really *use* their cameras. | http://blog.chukhang.com/2013/ | robots: classic
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} | 4,056 | « Open Mike: The Life of an Artist / Artisan / Photographer | Main | Closing the Barn Door »
Monday, 11 June 2012
With a name starting with RX this device could well be a doctor's prescription.
Mind not having a viewfinder could be a problem on bright sunny days, as
Mike has suggested.
Downsides? I've never seen the camera, and haven't used it, but it will have no EVF available (significant because viewing-screen-only viewfinding can be tough in bright sunlight).
But - it will have a new type of LCD with white pixels for boosting visibility in bright sunlight (I guess it will come at a cost of color accuracy).
QUOTE It has a 1"-size sensor (8.8x13.2 mm) UNQUOTE
If the 1" designation means one inch, how can the sensor size be described so if its size is 8.8x13.2 mm?
Oh. This sort of reminds me of the feeling folks had when after all the buzz and build-up, the Segway was announced.
So, basically, some of us were looking for more substance than was really there -- more than we should have expected, really, given the source. He was making a big deal and acting secretive about a product that had already been announced, and acting like it was going to be an incredible breakthrough when it's really just a small-sensor digicam that's better than most.
I like the Freudian undertones in your remarks on the Nikon CX cameras: "to woo... female(s)... without going 'all the way'..."
"significant because viewing-screen-only viewfinding can be tough in bright sunlight"
I've read this complaint many times, but I don't experience this. I live in sunny Adelaide (South Australia) and use a Canon S95 without issue.
The RX100 is supposed to be a pocket-sized one-in-all camera ... OVF, EVF, hot shoe & vertical handgrips are *not* part of the form factor, IMHO. If you want that extra level of ergonomic goodness, buy something like the OM-D EM-5.
BTW, I'm very keen to see how good the Sony RX100 is. As much as I like the size and features of the S95, a step up in IQ would be welcome.
On a somewhat off-topic note, I think it would've been better phrased as "(mostly female) non-enthusiasts" than the other way around, to avoid any unfortunate implication.
Anyways, one thing you didn't mention is that the camera is just so... sexy. Subjective, I know, but it has always amazed me how Sony can make cameras that look classical and modern at the same time, something I also saw in the NEX-7 and A77. Sure, most of it is borrowed from the Canon S100, but there's myriad of differences in the details and in design, details do matter.
I'm baffled by the 1" of the sensor. For me 8.8 x 13.2 gives a diagonal of almost 15.9mm, nowhere near an inch.
I know sensor sizing is mysterious but this seems simply wrong!
Andrew from Addis
Christer and Andrew,
One interesting side effect of sunlight viewing using the screen of my Canon S95 - I can't see it at all in portrait orientation. Let me explain: it has a polarised cover (probably to keep those colours punchy) and I wear polarized shades. So sometimes, there is no viewfinding to be had at all. Took me ages to work it out, too.
Just ordered my RX100 through your site to B&H. I like my NEX7 so much that I want this for my shirt or coat pocket camera. The NEX7 and this new camera are the first cameras I have purchased sight unseen in my 50 years of being a equipment geek. I like Sony cameras and trust B&H to take it back if I feel differently upon handling and using this new model. Great Web Site Mike, keep up the great work. Don
I agree with Sven. Add-ons like EVFs aren't the point of this little camera. This is a small P&S for your pocket or purse that is considerably smaller than the smallest m4/3 setup. I may buy one for my wife.
I'd wish they give up the sensor type size that makes absolutely no sense and difficult to compare between them. A much better measure would simply be the surface in mm². Ex: 220mm². A good analogy is a car cylinder.
Otherwise the RX100 doesn't interest me too much. No EVF no buy. I'm getting old and I don't want to wear glasses just to take a picture.
And in a way they could make an even smaller camera with an EVF and a 2" LCD. The giant back LCD wouldn't be needed anymore and that would leave more space for real controls.
I had to stop wearing sunglasses for that reason - I shoot my S95 all the time. Apparently it happens with all LCDs, i.e., also the EVFs of the OM-D, NEX, and so on... No portrait format shooting in the summer...
This is what this sensor size makes sense for IMHO. The Nikon J1/V1 don't make sense to me, the RX100 does.
Can I infer from this that Sony thinks like me, or that I think like Sony?
And are either of these options something I should brag about?
Will I retire my Canon S90 in favour of the RX100? Maybe that's the next mystery TOP readers can solve.
I was NOT in the market for a $650 point & shoot, but I'm tempted to actually preorder (never done that before) this camera. I use a couple DSLRs, a Sony NEX kit and a pocket camera (a Sony HX5V). I find the NEX a lousy replacement for my DSLR and at the same time, not terribly portable and I find my portable has crummy IQ despite reviews saying it has decent IQ for a point & shoot. I'm half tempted to ditch the NEX kit altogether and get this. (Well, I'll keep NEX for video, I suppose). It competes with cameras like the LX5 and XZ1. With the tele end at f/4.9 and a still small sensor, I won't get shallow DOF, but I'll get no worse low light performance there than with the XZ1 and considerably better low light at the wide end at f/1.8. I've always like imaging-resources assessments of IQ based on prints and for this camera, they say:
up to ISO 400 - great 20x30" prints
"ISO 800 shots were soft enough at 20 x 30 that we preferred the 16 x 20-inch prints...(cut)"
ISO 1600 usable at 16x20 but they prefer 13x19
ISO 6400 looks good at 8x10
All that with a lens that's f/1.8 at 28mm equivalent and f/2.8 at around 35mm equivalent or so in a camera the size of the S100 is pretty amazing to me.
I grabbed my chest when I wrote the check for my S95 and now this comes along for $250 more?
For that kind of dough I could buy a D3200, dust off my bag of pre AI nikkors and have all kinds of sick fun.
"Looks like my readers are smarter than I am:"
A: flattery will get you ...
B: A generalizable truth about collective general knowledge vs. individual knowledge - even if you were much more knowledgeable than you are.
C: One of my pet peeves about contemporary culture - confusing knowledge, knowing facts, with intelligence, the ability to reason.
Seems to me that things have only gotten worse in our schools since my kids were in school. We have gone beyond simply conflating these two different things into elevating rote knowledge and devaluing actual "smartness".
From the Wikipedia article: "David Pogue of the New York Times states that "the actual sensor size is much smaller than what the camera companies publish – about one-third smaller"."
It's a guy thing.
Well, talk about anticlimax...
Clearly, there are at least two camps on LCDs and direct sunlight.
I am more than content with LCD alone, if it is well done. I would be happier with my Canon G11 without the extra size, weight and cost of the optical viewfinder. I'd guess I've looked through it maybe 3 or 4 times in over three years of regular use, just for curiosity. I don't recall using it to take a shot. Mostly, I simply forget it is there. Of course, the articulated screen makes finding a good angle easier.
In my experience and testing, the fixed LCD of the S100 is visible enough to easily see and frame the shot, with brightness turned up, at any angle but where the sun reflects directly off the surface of the protective cover. Then, the shade of my hand makes it work fine. It only takes one hand to take a shot with it, especially in bright sun, with the resultant high shutter speeds.
Obviously, there are those whose less than first rate vision will make an optical viewfinder of EVF necessary, or who will simply prefer them. I am bothered by those who complain about the need to hold an LCD at arm's length. That is a reflection of individual vision. Young people, with flexible lenses in their eyes, have no such problem. Old folks like me with good varifocal glasses shouldn't have a problem with holding them closer. Other folks like me with nearsightedness in their viewing eye can look over or under their glasses and see the LCD clearly very close up.
To generalize about LCD problems in the sun is too simplistic, and may mislead those who would be more than happy without other means of viewing/framing. To so comment, without qualification, starts to slip into the common reviewer's trap of falling back on a list of standard features, without consideration of their details and how they relate to the overall intent and usefulness of the camera.
An S100 with optical or EVF viewfinder would simply lose some of its most attractive qualities. The same is likely true of the RX100
The Pentax Q is almost as large as the RX100. Wow.
Sunlight viewing is to EVFs what low light viewing is to OVFs. Something you learn to live with. Bracing against your face is nice for long focal lengths though.
I'm interested to see if the 1" sensor finds its way into the superzoom segment (used to be 18x, now 35x zooms).
So you think the sentence "I've never seen the camera, and haven't used it, but it will have no EVF available (significant because viewing-screen-only viewfinding can be tough in bright sunlight)" needs still more qualification? That people can't deduce for themselves from that that the lack of an EVF only MIGHT be a problem?
I thought this was a serious site. After this post and your comments on the Nikon 1 I'm not so sure.
I'm not a girl and I really want a Nikon 1 V1.
Big build-up, lousy finish. But then if you're only trying to woo unenthusiastic females, then Bob's your uncle I guess.
Personally, as a female, I've become very enthusiastic about the Olympus OM-D just from reading your posts and the enticing comments from so many other readers.
Haven't taken a bite of that apple yet, but tempting, very tempting.
I'll take Mike Johnston and TOP readers' comments over Pogue any day as far as camera gear goes.
John K.,
'Sokay with me. Unlike some I don't see marketing to females as being a negative thing for us males...as I also don't see marketing to males as a negative thing for females. I used to be a big fan of the Contax Aria, and, like the Nikon 1's, it was developed for and marketed to females in Japan.
Those advanced compacts may be designed for "non-enthusiast females" but end up serving mainly enthusiast males (at least in Europe and North America they do). What a tragedy.
How disappointing that all of that was for another small camera without an optical viewfinder. I have about $1,500 to spend on a well-built, small digital camera that I can see through, but no camera manufacturer has one to sell me. The Fuji X100 comes close, but it's built quality is not worth the price in my opinion. The SONY NEX 7 is well-built, but I don't want to see the world through (or is it,on?) an EVF.
To Mike,
I was the way you stated it.
You'd think so, wouldn't you? And yet, as an active member of a busy photography mailing list and reader of (too much) photo blather on the web, I notice a lot of folks - who have not used a good contemporary LCD - making bald assertions that one can't see them in sunlight.
I believe that people make assumptions based on editorial decisions in the stuff they read. By choosing to mention lack of EVF vs. say, the trade-off of EVF for size, weight and cost or that the much higher pixel count partially offsets the larger sensor's potential for better high ISO performance and wider dynamic range, it is easy to create in some reader's minds the idea that the lack of an EVF is a bigger deal than other aspects not specifically mentioned.
I didn't mean to make a big fuss, just point out something I've noticed in the web-o-sphere. There will always be those few who saw an early, 1.5" LCD and will always believe that's all there is, and some of them will offer that opinion freely and often.
My old Canon S110 1.5" LCD was poor in bright light, the Fuji F10 LCD just unusable at some angles, the F30 much better. The AMOLED display on my Samsung WB650 is just amazingly good in direct sunlight, even better than the S100.
It just isn't true that lack of an EVF is a bad thing for all of us.
I would be very attracted to that RX100 if I was not already a Canon Powershot S Zen Master with my S95. The S90, and now the S95, has been my pocket camera since 2009. Because I call upon it to do damn near anything, usually unexpectedly, I devoted myself to really mastering its usage and attributes. This devotion has really paid dividends over the years. Today a significant number of the images I prize most highly would not exist if I'd not invested to time to master that terrific little camera.
So the Sony may have a bigger sensor in a similarly-sized package but I am not remotely tempted to jump on a new pocket platform without much more extraordinary provocation. (Gee, sounds like a statement that could easily be re-purposed with minor edits,eh?)
As much enticing as the camera is, the 28mm equivalent wide angle and the fact that it's a Sony puts me off.
Colour me intrigued: The benefits one gets from knowing a small sensor compact camera inside-out surely can't trump a larger sensor, can it? I'd like to see the difference.
By the way, as someone who has roundly criticized Sony for the really poor menu system on NEX (I dislike using my NEX-5 except in Auto mode) I was encouraged to see that Sony ditched that menu system and went to one similar to that used on the SLTs (my newest Sony, other than a compact, is the A700, but I've tried a couple of SLT models and find the menu systems similar and still quite good). And they've apparently made it quite customizable. It appears that either (a) Sony thinks more highly of RX100 buyers than NEX buyers or (b) they're finally listening to the criticism and maybe we'll see them dump the cell phone menu from NEX in the future. (Now if only they'd add the ability to set ISO to Auto in M mode).
Ken the Zen Master of the Canon S95:
Your comment are a huge tease: I sense a really interesting column for TOP on your techniques of mastering a P&S.
Dear Emmanuel,
I totally agree that the old video tube definitions are confusing in the extreme, which is why I never put them in my articles, but only refer to sensor linear dimension-- usually as scaled relative to full-frame 35mm, i.e., this is a 1/3-scale sensor.
This doesn't require extreme precision-- nobody really needs to know if it's 1/3.2 or 1/2.8 scale.
Describing sensors in terms of their areal dimension, though, is a bad idea because almost all metrics of image quality scale with the linear dimension, not the area. Using area as a measure exaggerates differences in a misleading way.
Regardless, I promise that you will never, ever see me referring to a '1"' or whatever sensor unless its physical dimension is 1". Should I fail to keep that promise, you have permission to bludgeon me severely.
pax / Ctein
Readers who are above the age of fifty would understand the annoyances with the lack of an EVF, no matter how good the LCD could be... We just don't seem to get long enough arms....
I look at this Sony sensor rather as the solution for the next generation Nikon 1 series .... If the IQ is of any indication, it would open up the door for the Nikon 1 to the "main stream" enthusiast camera....
Dpreview has published a preview of the RX100. Sample images are astonishingly poor even by Dpreview standards (where the photographer not the camera often comes up short), and they were made with a production model. The sample images appear uncharacteristically low in contrast and color saturation for typical Sony jpeg rendering aimpoints, and after taking a couple of files into PS5 to try additional color and tone corrections, I concluded the files need a lot of PP work to get even close to being OK on color and tone quality. Maybe RAW files will be a better starting point from this camera. Additionally, for a 20MP camera, fine details are real mush, so all in all, the hype on this new camera far exceeds the reality of the output quality as far as I can tell.
OK, I get that it is not for the enthusiast. But will the non-enthusiast actually see the difference? By definition they are non pixel peepers.
Now the enthusiasts will see the difference but much of the improvement in IQ is lost by holding it at arm's length and waving it around before shooting.
Lastly, if it has the wretched delay that all other P&S cameras have why bother?
As far as I can tell the users of these types of cameras never recall the instantaneous aspect of picture taking that was available with even the most humble of film cameras.
On the 1 inch sensor thing - I wish all of the camera companies would just dispense with all of that old time CCD referencing and just state dimensions in mm. That way anyone who actually would dare venture to a spec sheet could see what pieces of crap some of the point & shoots really are.
For this Sony, may be nice for my parents, but no hot shoe or sync terminal is an automatic lose for me. On the point & pray cameras, while I may not use them often, I do use them.
I use a Panasonic GF1, a Canon S95 and a trio of recent EOSs.
When the sun shines brightly, as it sometimes does in NE England, I fit the grainy accessory EVF to the GF1 out of necessity, not choice. The Canon S95 becomes useless with sunlight falling on the screen. The EOSs remain perfectly usable under all lighting.
These observations are based on the use of this equipment in a variety of conditions, shooting both professional and personal work. They are not simply assumptions based on editorial decisions in stuff I've read.
You could take away the rear LCD completely and I don't think I'd ever miss it if the camera had a decent OVF. I don't believe I ever missed a rear LCD when I was shooting film.
@ Jeff Wilson: "The Canon S95 becomes useless with sunlight falling on the screen."
Ah, you are but a grasshopper my son. You must learn to see what you cannot see.
-- S95 Z-Master
"Readers who are above the age of fifty ..."
Edwin, I of the "not everybody needs an EVF, especially me" posts am 68.
Ripe Moose
Ken the Zen Master,
I heartily agree. I am in the process of reaching for that state with my S100.
I don't know if this would be true of the different sensor and processor of the S95, but I have found that Focus Magic appears to have been made especially for the S100. Out Of Focus correction, radius two, even on the most perfectly focused images, is like a magic window cleaner, clarifying detail without side effects.
Am I the only one for which RX100 sounds like a Mazda sportscar or some hi-fi receiver model? (Google tells me it's actually a Yamaha motorcycle)
I own the LX5 which takes good pictures but in the end it is not truly pocketable ... and this is with a sensor about 4x the size .... amazing! However my beef about the LX5 is taking a photo this way . no good for me I'm afraid. An OVF/EVf is not part of the from factor but an articulating screen could be and for me thats fine as photos from the waist feel comfortable , are more stable and remind me of DLR .... so i await for someone to provide me with one !!!
Wow! You must have excellent eyesight! When I compose with the LCD, I have to hold it about 16" in front of my face in order to make out the major indicators, like focus confirmation. But I am never able to see the other settings when composing:- the exposure compensation, the aperture, and so on. I can compose alright, but I would not be able to make out the exact details, like if everyone in the group is looking forward. All I can do is to make sure the camera is straight, I have included everyone and then some room at the edges.....
I am still carrying my Nex5 around, but I know MY limitations and I'll never use it for the wrong situation, and there are still annoyances.
I admire you, Moose. I guess "everyone's mileage varies"....
@Kenneth Tanaka: "Ah, you are but a grasshopper my son. You must learn to see what you cannot see."
That sounds suspiciously like an admission that you can't see the screen in full sunlight. No thanks, I'll use a DSLR in those circumstances.
What is a 1" size sensor? Area? Length?
I'm with Ken Rockwell on this:
"Sony is deceptive when claiming a '1 inch' sensor. Its image area is only 8.8 x 13.2 millimeters (0.34" x 0.52"), so where is the FTC when you need them to stop this baloney?
"It's probably a great point-and-shoot, but Sony is being deliberately deceptive by representing anything about its sensor as being 'one inch.' The 'one inch' baloney comes from the 1940s when television engineers specified image pick-up tubes by the outside diameters of the much, much larger vacuum tubes which held the much, much smaller imagers. There aren't any tubes in the DSC-RX100.
"If the DSC-RX100 has a one-inch sensor, then I'm 18 feet tall."
Even though I have an DSLR, a m43 system, and an X10, I've pre-ordered this camera obviously sight unseen. The sample images I've downloaded (not the DPReview images), but real RAW files from TechRadar, as well as the samples from Sony's Japan, almost look like they could have come from a DSLR. And as I've learned from my D800, Sony really is the king right now for sensor technology. I expect the RX100 to have typically good DR and color depth. And I shoot a lot of video, so the manual video at 1080 60p (Progressive) with hopefully image stabilization that's on par with their excellent HX9v. Love my X10, but it's almost a camera bag P&S, while the RX100 can go with me everywhere. Great blog, that I read often.
Almost forgot, for shielding and LCD, Delkin makes an excellent pop-up sun shade/screen protector that I used on my GRD and it works wonders. Cheers.
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I've recently been borrowing my grandmother's Nikon D40, in order to take pictures at Microsoft's Imagine Cup US Finals. I'm not really a big photography guy, and I don't anticipate using most of the features offered by this camera. But I'm impressed because it's the first DSLR I've used. It's got several things I like:
• The images it creates aren't noisy (I guess this is due to the larger sensor)
• It produces useable images in low light scenarios
• Autofocus is pretty much instant
• Taking a picture is pretty much instant (rather than the delay usually there in Point and Shoots)
But two I don't:
• Turning off the flash is a pain Fixed.
• It's freaking huge! (But apparently small for a DSLR)
I don't use things like the aperture priority settings, shutter priority settings, any manual switch or do-dad, or anything like that. I'm not an artist -- I'm a programmer -- so it's unlikely that I'll be using this for anything too artsy anytime soon.
Therefore I'd like to find something that has some of the performance of the DSLR but which is a point and shoot (if such a thing exists).
How can I find such a thing if it exists?
share|improve this question
Can you elaborate on "turning off the flash is a pain"? That's probably model-specific. It's not something I've found to be a problem on any dSLR I've used. – mattdm Apr 10 '11 at 0:06
@mattdm: Figured it out -- basically, when you scroll through flash settings, no flash is not available as a setting. But if you close the flash itself, then it won't open itself automatically while in manual mode. – Billy ONeal Apr 10 '11 at 5:44
The Fuji X100 is a compact camera with retro styling that has an APS-C sensor giving it the low light and noise capabilities of DSLRs as well as their resolution. But auto-focusing is slower since it unavoidably uses contrast detection. If you have ever lusted for an affordable Leica this is the camera for you. – labnut Apr 10 '11 at 7:56
It may depend, to some extent, on the type of photography you want to do. For instance, compacts tend to do better at landscapes during the day (i.e. lots of light, and you want everything in focus), but generally suck at low light photography (lots of noise) or selective focus/blurring (you're usually stuck with most if not everything in focus). In general, the bigger the sensor, the fewer problems you'll have with the image quality aspects you mention. – drfrogsplat Jun 21 '11 at 1:40
6 Answers 6
up vote 13 down vote accepted
A few possibilities you might want to consider would be a high-end P&S, a micro 4/3rds, or a Sony NEX.
A higher-end P&S camera (e.g., Canon G-series) gets rid of (most of) the shutter lag common in the cheaper P&S cameras. Image quality can be pretty decent as long as you have lots of light, but like other P&S cameras it deteriorates very quickly in lower light. These also typically cost close to as much as a low-end dSLR that will generally produce considerably higher quality pictures.
A micro-4/3rds is more like an SLR -- they use an electronic viewfinder, but still have interchangeable lenses. They're smaller/lighter than an SLR, but still rather on the largish side for a P&S. The sensor size (and low-light performance) is similar to an SLR.
The Sony NEX are slightly different from micro-4/3rds -- they have a slightly larger sensor, and different lens mount. Otherwise, they have roughly the same tradeoffs; bigger than most P&S, but smaller than an SLR. Image quality is roughly on a par with an SLR -- better than many older SLRs, but not as good as a current higher-end SLR.
None of these addresses focusing speed though. SLRs using phase detection focusing, which is a large part of what lets them focus so fast. P&S cameras use contrast detection focusing which is almost unavoidably slower.
If you want the fast focusing of an SLR, about the only choice is an SLR. For small size/light weight with excellent quality, a Pentax would be a strong possibility.
share|improve this answer
Canon G-series are only marginally better than most point-and-shoot cameras in terms of image quality, so recommend removing those from your answer. Same goes for the Nikon P7000 which you did not mention. There are a few similar models with have bright lenses (Olympus ZX-1, Canon S90/S95) that give then another incremental advantage. Still, large sensors of 4/3rds size or more are the only ones to compare with DSLRs. – Itai Apr 9 '11 at 21:34
aren't these essentially high-end P&S cameras reasonably fast, when contrast autofocusing? i agree, not as fast as phase detection, but still, day-to-day usage fast? – JoséNunoFerreira Apr 10 '11 at 1:33
@JoséNunoFerreira: that's a bit hard to answer. They do focus faster than the low end cameras, but for pictures of children (for example) I'd consider them pretty marginal (at best). Then again, they can be a bit tough for many SLRs too... – Jerry Coffin Apr 10 '11 at 1:53
precisely. i'd go out on a limb and say that in most day to day situations, high end p&s cameras don't lag far behind entry level dslrs (their price range is similar),focus speed-wise. – JoséNunoFerreira Apr 10 '11 at 14:36
I've not used the latest generation of m4/3 cameras, but rumor has it that the autofocus is pretty fast now. Also, companies are coming out with PDAF on chip, which will work during live view. – Kaushik Ghose Sep 22 '13 at 2:42
In addition to the other cameras mentioned, The Sigma DP-1x and DP-2x cameras are compact cameras (can fit in a jeans pocket although quite tight) that contain APS-C sizes sensors, roughly about the same size as your D40, thus producing very little noise. They have fixed-focal length lenses with no ability to zoom, but using primes produces image sharpness on par with a good (or even great) DSLR lens.
Some full-size examples can be found here:
and here:
One of my example DP-1 shots showing both detail and low noise (click on "other sizes" for full size image):
enter image description here
The other cameras mentioned can also be good, though generally not as compact (especially with a good lens).
Both cameras have full manual controls so shots can be instant, though if you just stick with aperture priority and pre-focusing a lot of shots you have essentially no shutter lag even with a slower AF system (as another responder noted, all compacts have a somewhat slower AF system than you'll find on a DSLR).
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Sheer brute sensor size is the major difference when it comes to image quality. Point&shoots have fingernail-sized image sensors and pay for it with noise in low light. To get around this, look at the micro 4/3 cameras, Sony NEX, Fuji X100, Leica X1 type of camera, all have more-or-less DSLR sized sensors; five or ten times the size of a P&S image sensor or so. None of these cameras are exactly small - they will fit in a pocket if it's a big pocket, not otherwise :)
Autofocus remains a problem, though. Jerry Coffin covered this issue quite well in his reply. Fuji had a brainwave recently and put phase detection circuitry on the image sensor itself, we shall have to wait and see if this works well enough in practice.
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It does work well. The Fuji F300 EXR which uses the EXR sensor with phase-detection is the fastest focusing compact camera I have ever used: – Itai Apr 9 '11 at 21:29 That's an example of fingernail size sensor. Really tiny but stuffed with 7 megapixels. The photo is straight out from camera, no editing whatsoever. – Esa Paulasto Mar 7 '13 at 18:27
Aye, and look at all the image noise it shows at a mere ISO 200 :) My DSLR is way better in this respect and is almost ten years old now. – Staale S Mar 7 '13 at 18:39
I forgot to tell the size, it is 5.8x4.3mm (1/2,5") and it gives noise in all lighting, not only in low light. As is seen in my photo, and in all of my photos :( – Esa Paulasto Mar 7 '13 at 22:16
The new breed of P&S cameras that are coming out all use the same size sensor as your grandmother's D40. That is to say, they all use the APS-C size sensor.
In order of physical size some to look at are the Sony NEX-3/5, Leica X1, Fujifilm X100. All have "automatic" modes and come with built in (or attachable in the case of the NEX) flashes. The X1 is $1999 (MSRP) new, the X100 is $1199 (MSRP) but not available in the US yet, and the NEX-5 will run about $700 with the kit zoom. The NEX accommodates interchangeable lenses, the X1 has a zoom, and the X100 has a fixed-length lens. All can use the LCD screen on the back for composing and focusing but only the X100 has an integrated viewfinder. This allows for removing the prism (a big, heavy hunk of glass) and the mirror the DSLR must have and allows for a smaller form factor.
The 4/3rd and Micro 4/3rds cameras have a smaller sensor size then the D40 but offer excellent picture quality, small-ish form factors, and a wide selection of lenses.
I expect with the enthusiasm of the X100, though, that we will be seeing more cameras with integrated viewfinders, APS-C sized sensors... and interchangeable lenses. The rumor mills, in fact, point to an unconfirmed Nikon EVIL (electronic viewfinder, inter-changeable lens) camera and the Sony NEX-7 as possible products in that direction.
In full disclosure, I've owned the Leica D-Lux2, Panasonic L1 (4/3rds), Leica M8 and Nikon D3000 (both APS-C-esque), but am currently hooked on my Sony NEX-5 which is smaller by far than the others, has full-automatic and full-manual exposure and focusing modes, a detachable flash, a low buy-in dollar-wise (comparable to the D-Lux), and offers what I consider to be equal to superior image quality when compared to the other digitals I've owned.
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The industry at last has taken seriously the most important element for cameras: the lenses. And so we now have monsters such as the Canon PowerShot G15 (28–140mm equiv, f/1.8-2.8) and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX7 (24-90mm equiv, f/1.4-2.3) and DMC-FZ200 (25-600mm equiv, f/2.8 across the board).
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A 20X superzoom lens easily outperforming a 3x zoom on a DSLR:
Here's another:
Three-year old compact cameras beating the image quality of the latest DSLRs being made:
A handheld compact camera rivaling the image quality of a medium format Hasselblad. Even when the Hasselblad is securely locked on a tripod. Even when using a cable release, mirror lock-up, and a time-delay shutter-release for it too. The handheld compact camera still rivaled the images from the Hasselblad.
In fact, even my most favorite small-sensor camera from 2002 was beating the image quality of all the DSLRs being made that year. This is nothing new. The ONLY thing a larger sensor has going for it is better performance in lower-light levels. Nothing more. "Image Quality" is dependent on the optics more than the sensor.
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I'm not sure exactly where your last comment is coming from. It seem very negative. If you disagree, please contribute positively and make the site a better place. – mattdm Apr 12 '11 at 11:07
Also, from a Luminous Landscape article shortly after the one you link to: "As good as they can be, (see my G10 vs Medium Format article) these aren't really a replacement for a DSLR let alone a medium format camera when it comes to image quality. They're good, but not that good." — – mattdm Apr 12 '11 at 12:52
Personally, I think it's a little more helpful to understand the scenarios where handhelds do well, vs. those where they struggle. Having owned both, there are advantages for each. – D. Lambert Apr 12 '11 at 16:45
@The Truth Deleted: there's no reason you can't just make your (perfectly valid) point that modern sensor tech is so good that compact cameras provide top-notch image quality in a wide range of situations without being derisive of everyone else, or making personal attacks. This is a community site, and it works on basic rules of civilization and politeness. You have some strong opinions, and along with them, some valuable insight to share. Why not contribute in a positive way? – mattdm Apr 12 '11 at 16:52
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What are the major (and perhaps more subtle) differences between the newer Micro 4/3s format in comparison to the well-established DSLR cameras? What are the pros and cons of the Micro 4/3s format, the camera body and lens capabilities and offerings, size/weight, etc.
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Looks like we have a mess here now ;) We have expanded a question with an already accepted answer and there are answers for different halves of the question now, which will most likely confuse future readers. As @jrista pointed out, I now have two answers here and do not seem to have the 'merge' privilege or simply don't know how to do it :( – Itai Mar 15 '11 at 13:59
@Itai maybe the question should become "community wiki" and the accepted answer un-pinned – thomasrutter Mar 15 '11 at 22:41
@Itai: There is no merge feature for answers. You just gotta do it manually. – jrista Mar 15 '11 at 22:56
I guess this could be made CW, since its a merger of two questions. It probably should have been CW to begin with, given the nature of the question anyway. Naysayers? – jrista Mar 16 '11 at 2:35
For the record, I don't think this should be CW. – mattdm Sep 5 '11 at 2:22
14 Answers 14
up vote 25 down vote accepted
The first technical difference is the fact that the sensor is smaller than the most common DSLR sensor sizes (APS-C and larger), whilst it's going to be less optimal than an APS-C, full frame or medium format (very expensive) sensor, it's still going to be far better than compact sensors. Noise will be comparable to APS-C (1.6x), though probably not quite as good, but this is also dependent on the sensor technology.
The second technical difference is that almost all Micro 4/3rds cameras currently use an electronic viewfinder, not an optical viewfinder. This means there is no phase detect auto-focus which is much quicker than contrast based auto focus. Phase detect AF can take less than a second in good light, whereas contrast AF can typically take 3-4 seconds and most often takes this long in any conditions.
Another difference is that on a lot of Micro 4/3rds cameras, the manual controls for aperture, shutter speed and ISO aren't as accessible as an SLR camera. If you plan on shooting manual with a Micro 4/3rds camera you may have to look around for the one that won't hinder you. For example, Sony's NEX-5 (not Micro 4/3rds but similar) apparently are very fiddly and it's better to just use them in an automated mode like Program mode.
A major physical difference is the size. The camera body itself is typically no larger than a large compact. The problem with this though is that the lenses are still fairly large when it comes to portability. You probably wouldn't try putting one in your pocket unless you have both a large pocket and a very short lens attached.
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My mistake. Will correct that. – Nick Bedford Feb 3 '11 at 20:41
Smaller compared to what? the Micro 4:3 is actually the same size than a regular 4:3 (Panasonic and Olympus DSLR's), despite it's "micro" prefix. What is smaller is the distance from the focusing part of the lens to the sensor. – fortran Feb 3 '11 at 21:33
I was mostly talking about the most frequent DSLR sensor sizes which is APS-C, DX and larger. I've edited that for clarification. – Nick Bedford Feb 3 '11 at 22:38
Phase-detect AF isn't necessarily linked to an optical viewfinder. See the Fujifilm F300EXR. – mattdm Mar 15 '11 at 0:42
"almost all Micro 4/3rds cameras currently use an electronic viewfinder, not an optical viewfinder" You can remove the "almost". In Micro Four Thirds cameras, there is no space for a mirror. If you want a mirror and the same sensor size, then go for the Four Thirds system. Also, not that not all Micro Four Thirds do have the option to attach an electronic view finder, and only some do it have built-in. – feklee Apr 28 '13 at 12:47
There is a disadvantage due to the sensor size, everyone will say that. While true, it is actually quite minimal. Obviously, it varies between models but a recent m4/3 camera compares to a recent one with an APS-C within one stop in terms of noise, and it is rarely visible until ISO 800+. Here is how the differences looked last year. All these models had one successor since.
The only serious difference is actually speed. All the current m4/3 cameras use contrast-detect AF which is slower by a noticeable margin to phase-detect, which is used by DSLRs. There is a small but noticeable display lag as well because the LCD or EVF works electronically (not a the speed of light as with OVFs). With subjects that move slowly this is not a problem at all, but for action it can be.
There are obviously more differences but the remaining ones tend to be more specific to certain types of photography. Certain features are not available yet in m43 too, such as weather-sealing, sync-port, GPS, support for AAs, etc. You'll have to investigate which ones impact you depending on your photography style.
The number one advantage is reduced bulk, so a smaller and lighter total system. Micro Four-Thirds camera are smaller than DSLRs but the savings also translate to lenses. Each lens is smaller, so the size and weight you need to get a comparable feature set.
The fact that the lenses are smaller also lets them design lenses with a bigger maximum apertures. This applies to full-size Four-Thirds and Micro Four-Thirds. The best example if the two Olympus F/2 zooms, the 14-35 F/2 and 35-100 F/2. To use these on a Micro 4/3 camera you do need a small adapter.
Going back to Micro 4/3 specifically, the shorter distance of the mount to the sensor means that you can adapt much more lenses from other mounts to Micro 4/3 without losing focus at infinity. A particularly interesting adapter exists that also adds a shift or tilt mechanism between the mount and the lens (sorry, do not remember who does this).
The fact that those cameras were designed to show a live-image means that there is no cost to see a live-view compared to current DSLRs. As of today, no DSLR has a live-view that does not reduce its performance somehow (usually AF speed but Sony DSLRs compromise VF coverage instead). This is likely to disappear over time, but for now you can count on it.
Eye-level shooting of video is not possible with a DSLR since video requires a live-view feed. Several Micro 4/3 camera will provide this using an optional EVF.
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Since the sensor is about ²⁄₃ the size of Nikon/Pentax/Sony APS-C sensor (³⁄₄ for Canon), it makes sense that the difference is less than a stop. (For the difference to be a whole stop, the difference would have to be roughly half/double.) – mattdm Feb 3 '11 at 5:12
Just a clarification: the size of a Micro 4:3 sensor is the same as a normal 4:3 sensor (what changes is the distance from the focusing elements to the sensor plane). Of course the 4:3 itself is a little bit smaller than an APS-C, but not much.
enter image description here
So do not expect worse sensor performance than in any Olympus or Panasonic DSLR.
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Very interesting, thanks for sharing that - quite a good way to visualise the difference. Cheers. – Ciaocibai Feb 3 '11 at 21:49
I just linked the image from Wikipedia ^_^ – fortran Feb 4 '11 at 8:12
Nobody mentioned the fact that micro four thirds cameras are very good for experimenting with old manual lenses.
The micro 4/3 system is mirrorless, and has a very short falange distance (distance from sensor to lens), that allows it to use most lenses on the market, with an adapter (and there are lots of types of adapters).
the slow focusing speed is not an issue with manual lenses ;)
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I think the scenario is exactly the opposite, you can use Micro 4:3 lenses in other mounts with an adapter (silly thing because the greater crop factor anyway), but not the other way around. That's precisely because they are closer to the sensor, and while it's quite easy to put them further away (with an extension tube), you cannot bring them closer (OK, maybe sawing the shell XD)? Of course you can still mount a lens designed for a more distant focusing plane, but it is very inconvenient to loose the ability to focus at infinity. – fortran Feb 9 '11 at 10:55
i think you have it the other way around.. – JoséNunoFerreira Feb 9 '11 at 13:05
Hmmm... It seems that I was extrapolating from my Pentax K in Nikon EF and Canon EOS mounts adapters knowledge, where the extra flange distance difference comes from the lens itself, not the camera body. And of course, if the lens body is the same length, the extra distance needed can be added with the adapter. You were right :-) – fortran Feb 9 '11 at 13:49
Micro 4/3rds has a slightly smaller sensor than crop DSLRs, has slower autofocus, is more likely to get dust in the sensor, and depending on the camera, might not have a see-through lens. This would make taking picture outdoors very difficult.
With help from Wikipedia
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No m4/3 camera has an optical viewfinder that sees through the lens. I think that is what you meant by 'see-through lens'. There are optional EVFs and optical tunnel finders for specific focal-lengths though. – Itai Feb 3 '11 at 1:19
The lack of TTL optical viewfinder is not what makes taking pictures outdoors difficult, it's just the lack of a viewfinder at all. But many u4/3 cameras do have a built-in or optional electronic viewfinder, which work fine in daylight. – thomasrutter Mar 15 '11 at 1:09
About dust on the sensor: I've had much more issues with my Nikon D40 than my Olympus E-P2. Whether it is Olympus' dust removal system (my Nikon has no such thing) or the increased distance between infrared filter and sensor plane, dust gathers less and affects the image less on my Micro 4/3 camera. Granted I am comparing a 4 year old Nikon with a ~1 year old Olympus design - but nonetheless you can't say categorically that a Micro 4/3 is more susceptible to dust. – thomasrutter Mar 15 '11 at 6:46
Micro 4/3 often have a piece of quartz glass on top of the sensor. The glass vibrates ultrasonically to remove dust. – joeforker Apr 18 '13 at 16:47
Generally speaking, the smaller sensor is its biggest disadvantage. The smaller the sensor, the higher the noise. The smaller the sensor, the larger minimum DoF.
There's nothing "holy" in DSLR (FF or APS-C) form factor either. In terms of sensor size, these types are just two points in the continuum from digital medium format cameras to cellphone cameras. However, there is an expected level of attributes for each camera size. For example, DSLR's have optical viewfinder which sees "through the lens". No u4/3 has an optical viewfinder that sees TTL.
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The lack of a mirror kills TTL and, thus, any optical viewfinders that will see what the camera sees. – John Cavan Feb 3 '11 at 3:40
@John Cavan - That's right. Those that offer an optical viewfinder work in the "old" compact camera style, Dual Lens, where the viewfinder has its own objective lens. – ysap Feb 3 '11 at 4:00
Are there micro four-thirds with that configuration? I'm not aware of any, since that would seem to blow out the interchangeable lens concept, but since the style doesn't interest me, I haven't necessarily watched them closely. – John Cavan Feb 3 '11 at 4:10
@John Cavan - you mean a configuration w/ a viewfinder? I think there are, or at least it is an accessory you can mount on the hot shoe. Like you, I am not really interested in this style, so I am not sure, and am speaking from memory, but I can be wrong. – ysap Feb 3 '11 at 5:05
Olympus offers a hotshoe-mounted optical finder to match their 17mm f/2.8 pancake lens. See… – mattdm Feb 3 '11 at 5:08
Since this question was originally asked, the Micro Four-Thirds system has advanced and some of the earlier answers have become outdated. The latest generation of cameras has fast auto-focus although they still lag behind DSLRs for low-light and continuous tracking (eg birds in flight and sports) due to lack of phase-contrast autofocus. The lens selection is large although more fast zooms and long lenses would be welcome; see (incomplete) list at end of post.
The main technical differences from DSLRs are due to
• sensor size differences
• mirrorless differences (inc. electronic viewfinder)
• other camera system differences
The sensor size effect has been discussed in previous answers, although it should be noted that since fast lenses are easier to design for smaller sensors (see the f/0.95 lenses below) this counteracts the sensor size effects on IQ and DoF. Otherwise a smaller sensor generally means reduced image quality (ie signal-to-noise ratio) for a given exposure. However m43 images are fine for web/computer viewing and prints of typical size and even gallery-quality prints at low ISO. High-ISO quality is noticeably worse in comparison.
A smaller sensor also means increased depth of focus for a photo with the same angle of view, aperture and image size. Looking at portraits taken with the 75mm f/1.8 lens I find the depth of focus is shallow enough in practice but judge for yourself, look at photos on flickr.
The smaller m43 sensor means a smaller camera, smaller lenses and a system small enough to be pocketable or easy and light enough to carry in a small bag, but with reasonable image quality. This is the trade-off that some find attractive. I often carry a PEN camera with lens in a jacket pocket and a couple of other lenses in other pockets. A professional photographer may find lugging a DSLR system around all day causes back or wrist injuries.
Mirrorless cameras allow more optimal designs for wide-angle lenses, resulting in cheaper, smaller or higher quality lenses (compare the Rokinon 7.5mm to a 15mm 135-format SLR lens for example). The lack of mirror means no mirror lag between pressing the shutter and taking the picture, and no vibration or noise from mirror slap. There is still shutter lag and vibration (until electronic shutters are perfected). The short flange distance of mirrorless cameras mean most legacy lenses can be used with an adaptor (with manual focusing). There is no problem with front- or back-focusing since autofocus uses the actual image sensor.
Electronic viewfinders introduce a slight lag to the image, although they allow overlay of useful information such as histograms and blinkies for over/underexposure, and other effects such as zooming for critical focus, can automatically adapt to changing light levels, and can provide a real WYSIWYG image including in-camera filters. Some m43 cameras only have optional EVFs. I tend to compose pictures using a tilted viewscreen at waist level rather than hold the camera up to my eye, but screens can be difficult to see in bright sunlight. Optical viewfinders provide a real-time high-resolution image and optical aids such as a split-screen focusing.
There also tend to be significant differences between mirrorless and DSLR systems when there is no technical reason for this. Although traditional DSLR companies such as Nikon and Canon tend to have more cameras with "pro" features, they are quite conservative in design. If you want a tilting touchscreen and in-camera image stabilization for example they don't have that. Olympus has not officially released a "pro" camera for m43 yet, although they are promising to do so. Some professionals are finding the OM-D E-M5 has the features and quality they require and are switching to m43.
Native lens list taken from Note many legacy lenses can also be used with cheap adapters.
Pan. 7-14mm f/4
Pan. 8mm f/3.5
Oly. 9-18mm f/4.0-5.6
Oly. 12mm f/2.0
Pan. 12mm f/12 (3D stereo)
Pan. 12-35mm f/2.8
Oly. 12-50mm f/3.5-6.3
Pan. 14mm f/2.5
Oly. 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6
Oly. 14-150mm f/4-5.6
Tamron 14-150mm f/3.5-5.8
Olympus 15mm f/8 (MF lever)
Oly. 17mm f/1.8
Oly. 17mm f/2.8
Sigma 19mm f/2.8
Pan. 20mm f/1.7
Pan. 25mm f/1.4
Sigma 30mm f/2.8
Pan. 35-100mm f/2.8
Oly. 40-150mm f/4-5.6
Pan. 45-150mm f/4-5.6
Pan. 45-200mm f/4-5.6
Pan. 45mm f/2.8 macro
Oly. 45mm f/1.8
Oly. 60mm f/2.8 macro weather-sealed
Sigma 60mm f/2.8
Oly. 75mm f/1.8
Oly. 75-300mm f/4.8-6.7
Pan. 100-300mm f/4-5.6
manual focus:
Rokinon 7.5mm f/3.5
SLR Magic Nokton 12mm f/1.6
Cosina Voigtlander Nokton 17.5mm f/0.95
Cosina Voigtlander Nokton 25mm f/0.95
Cosina Voigtlander Nokton 42.5mm f/0.95
MS-Optical Sonnetar 25mm f/1.1
ShenyangZhongyi 35mm f/0.95
Jackar 35mm f/1.8
Zeiss Compact Prime CP.2 135mm/T2.1
Tokina 300mm f/6.3 mirror lens (0.5x macro)
due soon:
Schneider Kreuznach Super-Angulon 14mm f/2.0 due end of 2013
Schneider Kreuznach Xenon 30mm f/1.4 due end of 2013
Schneider Kreuznach Makro-Symmar 60mm f/2.4 due end of 2013
conversion lenses:
Olympus MCON-P01 Macro Converter - designed for M. Zuiko 14-42mm MkII/R, 14-150mm, and 40-150mm lenses
Olympus WCON-P01 Wide Angle Converter - converts M.Zuiko 14-42mm MkII kit lens into an 11mm ultrawide-angle lens
Olympus FCON-P01 Fisheye Converter - converts M.Zuiko 14-42mm MkII kit lens into a fisheye lens.
Panasonic DMW-GWC1 Wide Conversion Lens - converts 14mm to 11mm for use on 14mm f/2.5 and the LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 14-42mm
Panasonic DMW-GTC1 Tele Conversion Lens - 2x zoom - converts 42mm to 84mm for use on the LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 14-42mm
Panasonic DMW-GMC1 Macro Conversion Lens - for use on 14mm f/2.5 and the LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 14-42mm
Panasonic DMW-GFC1 Fisheye Conversion Lens - for use on 14mm f/2.5 and the LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 14-42mm
tilt-shift lenses and adapters:
B.I.G 15mm f/4.5 shift lens (based on the Voigtlander Heliar 15mm f/4.5)
GoShotCamera 50mm f/2.0 tilt shift lens
Fotodiox shift adapters – Canon FD, Minolta MD, Contarex
Adriano Lolli tilt adapters – most 35mm camera lenses
Flashpoint tilt adapter – Nikon lenses
Lens Baby tilt transformer (pdf) - converts any Nikon lens into a tilt lens
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Kirk Tuck has a couple of nice writeups that talk about his experiences with the Olympus E-PL2, a well-regarded Micro Four Thirds camera. The brief summary is: he found the smallness and stealth of the camera quite compelling (e.g., it helped him to appear to be a "hapless tourist" rather than a serious photographer), and the usability and IQ good enough (when compared to DSLRs).
I found these very helpful in understanding the tradeoffs.
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Can you summarize here, for posterity? – mattdm Mar 15 '11 at 0:43
E-PL2 is Olympus' most low-end micro four thirds model currently available. But it does have some impressive not-so-low-end features like remote flash triggering. – thomasrutter Mar 15 '11 at 1:15
@matt, sure; will edit. – Reid Mar 16 '11 at 15:20
One other potential issue with a m4/3 camera, is that's as large a sensor as you are ever going to be able to use. With other DSLR systems you can potentially buy very nice primes that also work on larger sensor or even full frame cameras with the same mount.
If you someday decide you really need a full-frame camera, you may also just be able to sell the lenses and systems you have and start from scratch, but it's something to consider.
m4/3 cameras are more compact so that's a great benefit to consider, especially when traveling.
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How is this a drawback to a DSLR? If you buy DX format lenses in Nikon you will won't be able to use those lenses full-frame - same with Canon equivalents. Unless you are referring to the fact that full-frame cameras can crop to the APS-C size when attaching such a lens, which isn't really an advantage but does give a bit of an upgrade path. Olympus/Panasonic are happy with 4/3 sensors even at pro level though. – thomasrutter Mar 15 '11 at 1:12
I'm just saying if you buy a camera with an m4/3 mount, you can't buy any lenses that will eventually also work on a full-frame version of the same camera (since by definition the 4/3 camera already has as large a sensor as can work with that smaller mount). – Kendall Helmstetter Gelner Mar 15 '11 at 1:41
Yep. But Olympus/Panasonic chose not to go down the "full frame" route at all - if you thought that was important you'd go Nikon or Canon. I personally would advise to get the camera that suits you best today, rather than one you hope to grow into later. The second hand market (especially for lenses) is healthy and makes switching systems not too painful. – thomasrutter Mar 15 '11 at 5:11
I strongly agree with the last point, it's not too hard to sell gear these days. I just wanted to present it as a possible issue to consider depending on where a person thinks they might go. – Kendall Helmstetter Gelner Mar 15 '11 at 5:53
It's definitely a consideration. To some extent, choosing µFT is making a bet that the image quality of small sensors will catch up with that of larger sensors within your lifetime. If larger sensors stay better, or even pull ahead, then µFT will be stuck with lower image quality forever. But if small sensors catch up, then the advantages of larger formats evaporate, and you're left with all the upsides of µFT and no downside. The trend to date (based on my reading of DxOMark data) has been for the gap to narrow. I won't try to predict where it will go next! – Tom Anderson Oct 12 '13 at 11:21
I would say it is moderately meaningful, at least from a print perspective. The difference between APS-C and FF is around 1.5-1.6x, while the difference between 4/3rds and FF is 2.0x. The relative difference between APS-C and 4/3rds is about 1.25x (an absolute difference of around 0.4x). Not hugely significant, but significant enough to think about.
I think more important than the difference in crop factor would be the format. There are fewer native papers that fit the 1.33 aspect ratio of a four thirds sensor (8x10"/8.5x11", 11x14", and 17x22" come to mind, although they are not ideal matches), while there are quite a few papers that exactly or nearly meet the 1.5 aspect ratio of APS-C sensors (which have a 3:2, rather than a 4:3, aspect ratio), which includes 2x3", 4x6, 11x16/11x17, 13x19, 34x22/36x24, as well as all the A-series papers, which have a sqrt(2) ratio of 1.414. (Although I guess A-series papers are only slightly closer to 3:2 than 4:3.) You would have to ask yourself if you are ok either printing on papers that don't directly match your image sizes, and cropping the paper...or cropping the images so they match the papers you wish to print on. I myself print on 13x19" most of the time, although I also print on 11x16" and occasionally 8x10" (although it is more of an ideal paper for 4:3 size images).
Here is a demonstration of print margin, if you print a 4:3 image at the same resolution and minimal cropping as a 3:2 image:
enter image description here
I think a 3:2 ratio image, on papers between 1.41 and 1.54 aspect ratio, tend to fit nicer and have nicer margins without any cropping of the original image. A 4:3 ratio, on the other hand, doesn't fit quite as nicely, as it has more of a square shape. You can either shrink it more so the margins lengthwise down the page fit better, however you end up with pretty fat margins along the opposite edges of the page.
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One point that hasn't been mentioned, but is worth noting, is that from a practical viewpoint a smaller sensor gives increased depth of field.
In theory, that's not really true -- depth of field depends on the aperture of the lens and the reproduction ratio on the sensor. From a practical viewpoint, however, if you maintain the same framing (as closely as you can given a different aspect ratio) you'll either be using a shorter lens or shooting from farther away with the MFT. Either way, you end up with a smaller reproduction ratio on the sensor, which increases your depth of field.
This can be either an advantage or a disadvantage. If you're using a large aperture for the sake of selective focus, you'll typically need to open it up another 1 1/3-1 1/2 stop on MFT to get about the same depth of field as you would with the same framing on a full-frame (135 size) sensor. If you're starting with a fast aperture (e.g. f/1.4 or f/1.2) on a full-frame, you may not even be able to find a lens for MFT that maintains the same depth of field.
On the other hand, if you're using a large aperture primarily to work in low light, you may like the fact that you can open it up without the depth of field getting razor thin.
Of course, that also needs to be balanced against the fact that (as others have mentioned) a larger sensor will generally have lower noise, so on a larger camera you may be able to get about the same effect by increasing the ISO instead.
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The weight difference between Micro 4/3s and DSLRs in general is huge. Look at this comparison table:
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In general the pro DSLRs are heaviest, followed by APS-C DSLR and then micro 4/3. But there is a lot of overlap: Sony Alpha A230 (DSLR) at 490g, while the largest Micro 4/3, the Olympus E-5 is 800g. Other 4/3 cameras are similar weight to a Nikon D3000 or Canon 550D – MikeW Feb 29 '12 at 4:25
@MikeW, the E-5 is a 4/3 camera, not a Micro 4/3. – Reid May 7 '12 at 3:16
Mirrorless as of the arrival of the Nikon 1 system, the V2 model can now out-perform top Nikon or canon "full frame" DSLRs in terms of:
• in C-AF mode can shoot 15 frames per second individually focused in RAW files for 40 shot buffer depth.
• can shoot at 30 or 60 fps in RAW file with focus & exposure locked at first frame, with 40 shot buffer.
This is by using a sensor with both phase detect and contrast detection capabilities. In high speed (above 15 fps) the camera uses a silent electronic shutter so is much quieter and avoids mirror slap of a DSLR.
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This is true and interesting, but doesn't really talk about micro four thirds cameras (which of course the Nikon 1 isn't). – mattdm Apr 28 '13 at 13:46
The existing answers has plenty of useful information. Still it is worth to take a look at the following too...
These smaller system cameras open up new ways to shoot, they allow you take DSLR quality with you anywhere, with excellent fast prime lenses. They allow you go relatively unnoticed should you wish, but most importantly they deliver the results, they give you image quality that up until recently you could only get with a DSLR!. Where you will notice a difference is in low light. M43 sensors are not the best in low light. They aren’t bad, but a larger sensored DSLR will serve you better if you have to shoot at ISO’s above 1600.
Other References
1. The First Micro Four Third Lenses You Should Buy
2. The Complete Micro 4/3 Lens List
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Your Answer
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} | 2,203 | Equivalence Schmalivance
Comparing the sizes of full frame, APSc and m4/3 cameras and lenses.
Internet forums are full of self-proclaimed experts spouting absolute crap about things they know nothing about. Unless you were hiding out in a cave with Osama Bin Laden or not visited the home of countless pointless photographic brand based crusades that is otherwise known as dpreview.com you maybe aware of this hot topic that has spawned a thousand fevered posts and countless character assassinations. If not it goes like this: equivalence is the idea that the size of the camera format effects focal length, depth of field, and exposure, and that when talking about equipment one should express this in terms relating to 35mm equivalents. These arguments became particularly prevalent when Olympus and Panasonic started to have some success with their micro four thirds format. The people express this idea most fervently are those who have sold two of their children and a kidney on Ebay to fund the purchase of a so-called full-frame dSLR and they want to let everyone who uses a smaller format that they are using an inferior product. Usually these arguments go like this:
m4/3 user: Hey I’ve just got my self a new lens, it’s the Olympus 45mm f1.9. It’s a lovely lens, wide open it produces very portraits wide open.
Full framer: It’s not a 45mm f1.8 it is a 90mm f3.8. It cannot render out of focus backgrounds and the smaller sensor needs more light and therefore longer exposures or higher ISO. A proper photographer would use an 85mm f1.2 on a full frame camera.
The argument will typically degenerate and lead to insults and other full frame users diving in to bolster the argument with lots of spurious mathematical equations, graphs and claims of mental deficiency on the part of any smaller format user and maybe even casting doubts on the mental faculties of their parents as well. So what is all this about then and why are people getting so hot under the collar?
Equivalence is not a new thing, it didn’t come with digital, it was a known fact back in the dim dark ages of film, and then funnily enough 35mm film was seen as the miniature inferior format. In those far off times a lot of professional work, and when I use the term professional I mean done for money, was shot using large format, the smallest was 5×4 inches and the largest practical was 10×8 inches. The next step down was medium format where a roll of film was used that was nominally 6cm wide, the popular sizes were 6×7, 6×6 and 6×4.5 cm. Small format, or miniature format was 35mm and smaller. It wasn’t until the advent of modern electronics and a significant breakthrough with tabular grain film in the 1980’s that 35mm really took off as a format. The ease of use that automation made with sharper finer grained films that made many professional photographers and advanced amateurs take up using 35mm and by the end of the 1990’s the larger formats had become niche products for specialised uses.
Professional photographers were well aware of equivalence. A 10×8 camera with a 300mm lens has the same angle of view as a 5×4 camera with 150mm, a 6x6cm camera with 80mm and a 35mm camera with a 50mm. As most working photographers ran more than one format and some three or more favourite angles of view would be duplicated across the systems. So for 5×4 a photographer may have a 90mm, a 150, and a 300. His/her 6×6 system would then have a 55, 80 and 150mm lenses, and the 35mm system 35, 50 and 100mm lens all giving roughly the same angles of view.
Factors that influence depth of field are:
• format size
• focal length
• distance to subject
• magnification
• lens aperture
From this we can, therefore assume that the larger the format size , the longer the focal length, the closer to the subject, the larger the lens aperture, and the greater the magnification the less the depth of field. So that is clear then. Well no because when we talk about depth of field it is also important to remember that what we are really talking about is acceptable sharpness because a lens can only render one single distance in focus (the plane of critical focus) and objects at other distances to the front and rear will have diminishing sharpness the further they are away from that point. The reality of this is that for most normal usage part of the scene will be acceptably sharp both in front of and behind the point of critical focus, and this zone will be formed that 1/3 of it is in front of the subject and 2/3 behind. This zone can be shallow with only a small part of the scene appearing to be sharp, or it can be deep with the apparent sharpness seemingly covering everything. Seems simple so far, well it gets more complicated because you can break these relationships. As magnification increases the depth of field decreases and the zone of apparent sharpness also shifts from the one-third in front and two-thirds to the rear to an equidistant amount front and rear. Also once you start playing with the plane of the lens in relation to the sensor and subject then everything can go a bit strange. Typically one of the problems that plagued large format shooters was that of getting enough depth of field. Large sensor, small depth of field, not much chop if you’re a landscape shooter. Well using the Scheimpflug rule you can place the plane of focus wherever you want in a scene by positioning the plane of the lens to be parallel with the plane of the subject by tilting the camera front, if that does not completely achieve what you want then you tilt the sensor plane as well so that the planes of the subject, lens and sensor form an intersecting point and this will mean that the subject plane will then be completely sharp while shooting wide open. Working the other way round you can diminish the zone of sharpness by swinging and tilting the camera front. This is not the sole prerogative of large format camera, tilt and shift lenses are available in medium format, 35mm, APS and even m4/3 . The other thing that throws a spanner in the works for depth of field is that the size of the output and viewing distance plays a big part. Simply put big print viewed at a distance and apparent sharpness is reduced.
12mm .v. 24mm
To test the theory I decided to print out an A3 sized lens resolution test chart and this was then set up on an easel in my garden. A tripod was then set up 1.8 metres away from the easel. The cameras tested were the Olympus EP-2 and the Canon EOS5d, both having roughly the same number of megapixels. Choosing lenses was somewhat problematic although I have a set of professional grade fast aperture constant zooms for my 5d I don’t for the EP-2. The lenses used were for the Canon an EF 24mm f2.8, a Sigma 105 f2.8 macro and an 75-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM. For the Olympus the lenses were a Zuiko 12-50mm f3.5-6.3, a Zuiko 60mm f2.8 macro, and a Zuiko 40-150mm f4-5.6. Each camera was mounted on the tripod in turn and set to shoot large quality jpegs in aperture priority, image stabilisation where appropriate was switched off and the self timer was used to prevent any camera shake. The lens was focused on the chart. None of the images have been processed in any way and the full-sized images can be seen by clicking on any of the composite shots below where you’ll be taken to my Flickr account. At the 24mm and equivalent view the DOF was pretty much equal, although I suspect that there maybe more apparent differences at apertures of f2 and wider, but I wasn’t able to test that. The comparison between the two short telephoto macro lenses highlighted the most difference and at wide open at f2.8 the Olympus manages to resolve some background detail while the Canon doesn’t at all. At the equivalent of 300mm at f5.6 there is very little discernible difference, but that changes at f8 and smaller where the m4/3 camera starts to resolve more detail.
Zuiko 60mm .v. Sigma 105mm
150mm .v. 300mm
So what happens to exposure. Doesn’t that change? The short answer is no. When I got my first medium format camera, a secondhand Mamiya C330 Professional , it had no built in metering and the handheld Weston meter that came with it had obviously been dropped and no longer worked properly so I used my Olympus OM1n as a meter and guess what? It worked! Much later when working in the studio with studio flash I determined the exposure with my flash meter and would often make exposures with different format cameras but the exposure value remained the same and the images were correctly exposed. Memory is a fine thing, but I wanted to make definitely sure so I decided to run a quick test comparing full frame, to APS-c, m4/3 and compact camera with a sensor measuring 8.07 x 5.56 mm. The test was simple each camera would use a lens of as near as possible field of view equivalent to 105mm on full frame. The ISO was set to 200, and the shutter speed was set to the maximum synch speed so as not to let ambient light interfere with the result. White balance was set to flash, and pictures settings were natural and the images recorded as fine jpegs. A Canon 550EX speedlite was mounted on a light stand, set on manual to 1/2 power and fired at the test scene through an umbrella diffuser and was triggered by a synch cord. The flash output was measured with my Minolta flash meter which is accurate to 1/10 of a stop, the aperture required for correct exposure was f7.7, each cameras lens was set to the nearest corresponding value which was f7.1. All images are straight out of the camera without any processing. Each cameras image was opened up large in Lightroom 3 and screen shot was taken of the image showing the histogram. Looking at the histogram shows that there’s barely any discernible difference between each cameras recording of the scene.
Canon EOS5d
Canon EOS550d
Olympus EP-2
Panasonic Lumix LX5
So what does all this mean? Well the full framer is right in that a 45mm lens on m4/3 does have an angle of view equal to a 90mm on a 35mm sensor. As to the inability to have shallow depth of field that is wrong, it is definitely possible to minimise depth of field but we are talking about subjective differences here as there is that nebulous term “acceptable sharpness” and then it depends on how big you print, and how close you are when you view it. Personally when I take a head and shoulders portrait of someone I like to have from the tip of the nose to the ears in focus as I like to be able to see who I’m looking at. Shooting at 85mm f1.2 the depth of field can be measured in millimetres and so the iris of the eye might be in focus but the rest is just blur. This is just a matter of taste. If you were shooting landscapes using wide-angle lenses then there is little to choose between m4/3s and full frame, and in fact I might go as far to say that the smaller camera has the advantage being smaller and lighter. As to the matter of the smaller format needing more light to form an image that is just plain wrong.
So is the 35mm dSLR superior to m4/3? Yes and no. Infuriating aren’t I! It all depends upon your photographic priorities. If you want to squeeze every last ounce of image quality out of a scene then 10×8 or whole plate large format film cameras either contact printed or drum scanned cannot be beat. Hopeless though for getting shots of the rug rats playing at the park, expensive to run, not very portable and definitely not conducive to spontaneity. Want something you take anywhere and be able to upload images to the web, well your phone cam is your best bet. My Olympus EP-2 is my favourite go anywhere camera. I can rig it up to be like a dSLR by adding its optional electronic viewfinder when I want to use a long lens, put on the 17mm f2.8 pancake lens and it fits in my jacket pocket, put on a mic, a loupe, put it in its cage or rig and its a great little video camera. It perfect for lightweight travel. Out walking the dog or shopping then chances are I’ve got my Panasonic LX-5. My Canon EOS5d is the original 13Mp version and I still keep for certain things and for certain lenses that I just don’t want to give up. There are no absolutes, pick your camera for what you need not what other people think that you should use. | https://paulamyes.com/tag/flash-exposure-meter/ | isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2021-10
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} | 1,058 | A number of readers of Henry’s site and the posts here have been photographers for some time. You may be looking for something more to expand your photographic horizons. Consider going to a larger sensor.
I don’t mean more megapixels on a 35mm sensor, I mean a physically larger sensor in a different camera entirely.
For years, medium format film cameras were seen as separating the pros from the talented amateurs. I never bought into that because the tools are very different. A medium format system has a look and a feel that you will not get from any 35mm full frame or smaller sensor.
Fujifilm's superb GFX-50S handles like a DSLR and is only marginally larger than a full-frame camera
Figure 1: Fujifilm’s superb GFX-50S handles like a DSLR and is only marginally larger than a full-frame camera
How Much Bigger is Bigger?
If we consider a full frame sensor, we are talking about something measuring 36mm by 24mm. In a full frame digital medium format, we are talking about 60mm by 45mm. That’s over 3x the surface area. While megapixel counts could be very close to the same, the photo receptors are larger, will often have more dynamic range and will be 16 bits deep instead of 14 bits in the best 35mm size sensors.
A single Red, Green or Blue channel in 14 bits, gives us an incredible 16,384 variants. Jump that to 16 bits and the colour depth moves to 65,536 variants per channel. Thus, while the megapixel count does not change, the colour depth does and does so significantly. This means a colour range of 281 quadrillion potential variants. Seems like enough.
Depth of Field is Different
A lens that is designed to cover a medium format image circle, is going to be a physically larger design with a different focal length to achieve a specific angle of view. Thus, focal lengths between medium format and a full frame DSLR cannot be compared linearly. For example, the default standard lens for the Hasselblad H6D-100 is an 80mm f/2.8. Because of the much larger image circle, that f/2.8 aperture has much less depth of field than a comparable f/2.8 aperture on a full frame DSLR. The equivalent lens on the DSLR would be a 50mm and the depth of field on the DSLR would be about 2’ 3” at f/2.8 for a subject at 10 feet, whereas the depth of field on the Hasselblad with an 80mm lens for the same field of view would be 1’ 3” at f/2.8 for a subject at 10 feet. That razor thin depth of field at the same viewing distance while maintaining the same field of view is a completely different look. This is why you will often see comments that medium format “looks different”. Because it actually does.
Lens Imaging
Another area where we will see the differences is in the entire feel of the image. A qualified observer will be able to see the difference between an image made on medium format and on full frame. It’s different, and whether that difference is appealing is a matter of personal taste, but there’s a reason that the top wedding and headshot photographers have standardized on medium format.
File Size and Speed
Consider all that extra data being collected. It means that the RAW files are going to be much larger than a traditional interchangeable lens camera. These larger files are going to take longer to write to the memory cards and thus a medium format camera is not going to be a speed demon, inadequate for sports, as an example. However, for subjects that are predominantly static, they will excel.
The lightweight and gorgeous Hasselblad X1D
Figure 2: The lightweight and gorgeous Hasselblad X1D
But They’re So Expensive, Aren’t They?
Digital medium format cameras have traditionally been extremely expensive pieces of kit, but a compression in pricing has occurred. The top of line Canons and Nikons have gone up substantially, whereas the mirrorless variants in medium format are much more affordable than some of the mirror using versions. Both Fujifilm’s GFX-50s and Hasselblad’s X-1D, while still more expensive than most high-end DSLRs or high-end mirrorless, are much more affordable than alternatives. Medium format cameras tend not to be replaced as frequently by manufacturers and will also hold value better than traditional consumer products. Medium format lenses are also more expensive, but again, will last a very long time. My old Mamiya RZ67s and glass still work perfectly, as does the old Hasselblad 500CM and 80mm Planar. Yes these are film cameras, and I no longer have access to transparency film, but they still excel for black and white work.
What to Shoot
Landscapes, portraits, groups, teams and macro images really show the step up when you shoot in medium format. If you really like doing black and white work, all that extra bit depth has a huge impact on your processing flexibility, and if you leverage the Zone System or my spot metering tutorial in your metering process, you will have even more to work with.
Medium format is a bit more work. Depth of field is shallower, you won’t have the same range of high shutter speeds and ISOs. You will work from a tripod more often and you will make fewer frames. The files will be larger and take longer to import and process. Even with all of these alleged negatives, the difference in the printed image is substantial and readily visible. If you are just shooting for Facebook, medium format isn’t for you. If, however, you are a serious photographer, looking for a step up in overall image capability and you will be printing, medium format may be exactly the next place that you are looking for. You will not find these cameras in the majority of Henry’s stores, but you can see them live at the 119 Church St location amongst some others.
Thanks for reading, and until next time, peace.
Ross Chevalier
Ross Chevalier
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} | 596 | I'm looking at getting a prime lens for my Nikon D50, I'm looking at the 50mm ƒ1.8 and the 35mm ƒ1.8 DX.
What I understand is that the 50mm will actually give me an equivalent focal length of 75mm, but am I right in thinking the focal length of the 35mm is 1.5x longer (52mm) even though it's a DX sensor?
Just wanting to understand this as best I can, don't want to spend out on a lens if it's longer than I imagined.
Many thanks!
You are correct on both accounts, the 50mm will effectively have a 75mm Field of View (FoV) and the 35mm will effectively have a 52mm FoV.
The DX just means that the lens should only be used on a DX body, not that its 'a 35mm FoV on a DX body'.
| improve this answer | |
You're mostly right. The 35mm will have an EFL of 52mm, just as your 50mm will have an EFL of 75mm. Everything gets multiplied by the 1.5x crop factor.
When "DX" is applied to the lens, it means that it's designed so that it only puts light onto an area the size of a DX sensor. That means that, if you put it on an FX (full-frame) sensor-bearing body, only portion of the photograph will have an actual picture on it; the rest will be dark.
In turn, many (all?) Nikon FX-based cameras have a "DX crop mode" where they shrink the size of the photo to avoid this. This effectively makes your camera a very expensive DX sensor, with the same crop factor/EFL/field of view.
Conversely, your 50mm non-DX lens is "wasting" light on a DX sensor. I don't think there's any real downside to this besides lens size/cost.
Don't let this influence you when deciding between these two lenses though. Think about what you're going to be shooting, and then perhaps cost. The 50mm is better for portraits; the 35mm will be better (IMO) for everything else due to its wider viewing angle. I find 35mm to be a good general-purpose length; 50mm often is too tight for anything but head shots. They're both fine lenses though.
| improve this answer | |
I got the 35mm for my D5000 just a few weeks ago. Best advice I received when I was trying to decide what I wanted was to restrict myself to each on the kit lens. Assuming you have the 18-55mm kit, restrict yourself for some period of time (say a week or two) to 35mm then switch to 50mm.
For me 50mm seemed a little bit tight for most of the shooting I do (I mostly wanted the option to shoot indoors in lower light situations than the kit lens was really capable of), so I got the 35mm. Some day I'll probably get the 50mm for portrait shooting, but in the mean time 35mm works fine for that purpose.
| improve this answer | |
Got me a 35mm f/2.0 Nikkor several years ago (before DSLRs), and I love it.
And one thing: there's no "equivalent focal length". It's still a 35mm, it's just a cropped image from a 35mm. So the image will look like an image taken by the same lens using any other camera, but cropped by about a third.
It's usually not a big difference, but things like DOF are impacted by this, as is telephoto compression (most important at more extreme focal lengths, obviously).
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I'm looking at getting a prime lens for my Nikon D50, I'm looking at the 50mm ƒ1.8 and the 35mm ƒ1.8 DX.
What I understand is that the 50mm will actually give me an equivalent focal length of 75mm, but am I right in thinking the focal length of the 35mm is 1.5x longer (52mm) even though it's a DX sensor?
Just wanting to understand this as best I can, don't want to spend out on a lens if it's longer than I imagined.
Many thanks!
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4 Answers
up vote 5 down vote accepted
You are correct on both accounts, the 50mm will effectively have a 75mm Field of View (FoV) and the 35mm will effectively have a 52mm FoV.
The DX just means that the lens should only be used on a DX body, not that its 'a 35mm FoV on a DX body'.
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Excellent, many thanks! – Ben Everard Feb 21 '11 at 22:06
You're mostly right. The 35mm will have an EFL of 52mm, just as your 50mm will have an EFL of 75mm. Everything gets multiplied by the 1.5x crop factor.
When "DX" is applied to the lens, it means that it's designed so that it only puts light onto an area the size of a DX sensor. That means that, if you put it on an FX (full-frame) sensor-bearing body, only portion of the photograph will have an actual picture on it; the rest will be dark.
In turn, many (all?) Nikon FX-based cameras have a "DX crop mode" where they shrink the size of the photo to avoid this. This effectively makes your camera a very expensive DX sensor, with the same crop factor/EFL/field of view.
Conversely, your 50mm non-DX lens is "wasting" light on a DX sensor. I don't think there's any real downside to this besides lens size/cost.
Don't let this influence you when deciding between these two lenses though. Think about what you're going to be shooting, and then perhaps cost. The 50mm is better for portraits; the 35mm will be better (IMO) for everything else due to its wider viewing angle. I find 35mm to be a good general-purpose length; 50mm often is too tight for anything but head shots. They're both fine lenses though.
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I got the 35mm for my D5000 just a few weeks ago. Best advice I received when I was trying to decide what I wanted was to restrict myself to each on the kit lens. Assuming you have the 18-55mm kit, restrict yourself for some period of time (say a week or two) to 35mm then switch to 50mm.
For me 50mm seemed a little bit tight for most of the shooting I do (I mostly wanted the option to shoot indoors in lower light situations than the kit lens was really capable of), so I got the 35mm. Some day I'll probably get the 50mm for portrait shooting, but in the mean time 35mm works fine for that purpose.
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Got me a 35mm f/2.0 Nikkor several years ago (before DSLRs), and I love it.
And one thing: there's no "equivalent focal length". It's still a 35mm, it's just a cropped image from a 35mm. So the image will look like an image taken by the same lens using any other camera, but cropped by about a third.
It's usually not a big difference, but things like DOF are impacted by this, as is telephoto compression (most important at more extreme focal lengths, obviously).
share|improve this answer
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} | 353 | Talk to me about focal length and Nex
Started Nov 10, 2012 | Discussions thread
Contributing MemberPosts: 969
Re: Talk to me about focal length and Nex
In reply to Tommygun45, Nov 10, 2012
Tommygun45 wrote:
iceccream wrote:
cwood wrote:
To get the equivalent of 16mm on a 35mm camera on a Nex you would need a Lens that Sony would label roughly 11mm?
yes! 16/1.5 = 10.66.
This would be the new 10-18 that Sony is releasing. The other way to think of the 35mm equivalent is what they would be on full frame cameras. So the 10/18 on the Nex system, and for that matter a D7000 or 7D or any other APS C sensor, would actually be, when used on a Nex, the same size as a 15-27mm lens on say, the 5d MKII.
The ideal 35mm lens on the Nex system is the 24mm Zeiss. This gives the 35 (well 36) mm range on a FF camera.
This is typically seen as a disadvantage but when using longer focal lengths the crop factor actually really helps in the APS-C range. For instance, a 300mm lens on a full frame camera will get you 300mm. However if you bought a 200mm lens for a Nex camera, it would equate to the 300mm full frame lens.(which would be more expensive)
Just recently I was reading a post from a guy on here who wanted to go FF but was reluctant to because he was used to the additional reach that crop factor was giving him on his Nex 7. It was upsetting to think that he would have to spend a good deal more money getting a more expensive lens to compensate for the 300mm lens he had been using that was giving him the 450mm equivalent reach.
I don't understand why people would consider FF to be a disadvantage based on lens length. I find it much harder to find good glass under 35mm than over 35mm.
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