NMP news

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2009-11-06T14:59:00.002Z

Hi subscribers

I've updated the site and as I'm using Wordpress now, you need to subscribe to a different feed. Please unsubscribe from this one and subscribe to http://nickminers.com/feed/ instead.

Thanks!

Nick

After the Lakes...

2009-10-14T18:51:00.002+01:00

This Saturday I'm heading to the Lake District with my friend Mark Casey for another By Camera week. I haven't decided yet, but I will probably use black and white again, as I did for the Svart/Hvit photos from Iceland in May. What's more, I've been working on a new look for the site these last few weeks, and it should be ready to launch, so I will launch the site with the Lake District photos when they're ready.

Thames Barrier

2009-10-02T21:11:00.004+01:00

It's been a while since I got my camera out, so I decided to take it in to work with me today. I was initially planning to visit Borough Market again, but I decided instead to head down to the Thames Barrier in East London after work. I got there just before sunset, so all these pictures were taken at ISO 1600 or 3200, as I was travelling light and didn't have my tripod with me.

Svart/Hvít (part 2)

2009-06-17T20:05:00.004+01:00

Svart/Hvít is Icelandic for 'black and white'. As I mentioned, I spent 23rd to 31st May with my family in Iceland (again!), only this time I shot exclusively in monochrome. I was going to say 'limited' myself but it didn't feel like a limitation - certainly, I had to think in a different way about the photos, but I enjoyed the new style of photography so much that I'm certain I'm going to try it again on future photo trips.

As there are about 60 pictures in this set, rather than present them in the traditional way on this web site, I've created a special gallery at this page.

Svart/Hvit

2009-06-03T20:54:00.001+01:00

I recently spent another week in Iceland with my family, and this time I forced myself to shoot exclusively in black and white. The landscape and light in Iceland suit this medium perfectly, and I was pleasantly surprised by the results. I haven't included the gallery on the site yet (61 photos is a bit of a stretch!) but you can view them on flickr at this link.

The Zone System

2009-05-09T10:55:00.009+01:00

A few months ago I mentioned that I had picked up on the benefits of the Zone System, and had applied it to most of my photography ever since. It may sound intimidating at first but it is really quite simple, and once you experience the benefits I think you'll find it hard to go back. What I'm going to try now is the first in a series of little lessons, where I'll show you some aspect of photography of which the average point-and-shoot snapper may not be aware. Hopefully if you put these lessons into practice you'll be able to achieve the sort of photographs you've always wanted to. Let me know if I sound too patronising; that's not my intention at all.

The zone system was developed by the American landscape photographer Ansel Adams, and the principle is simple. A camera can 'see' a more limited range of brightness than the human eye, so it needs to be adjusted to take into account lighting conditions. Most cameras try to render a scene so that the overall lightness is what's known as 18% grey, or exactly half way between pure black and pure white. If we number these brightnesses, 0 for pure black, 10 for pure white and 5 for 18% grey, then by filling in the numbers in between we have the 11 zones of the zone system. Each zone is 1 stop brighter than the previous one.

Most modern SLR cameras, digital or film, allow you to over- or underexpose by up to 2 stops in auto or semi-automatic mode, which can be limiting, so the first thing to do when using the zone system is to switch to full manual mode. The next thing to do is to set your camera to spot metering mode; refer to your camera's manual if you're not sure how to do this. You are now equipped to try the zone system.

Each zone has a description of what it represents:
0 - Pure black
1 - Near black, with slight tonality but no texture
2 - Textured black; the darkest part of the image in which slight detail is recorded
3 - Average dark materials and low values showing adequate texture
4 - Average dark foliage, dark stone, or landscape shadows
5 - Middle gray: clear north sky; dark skin, average weathered wood, grass
6 - Average Caucasian skin; light stone; shadows on snow in sunlit landscapes
7 - Very light skin; shadows in snow with acute side lighting
8 - Lightest tone with texture: textured snow
9 - Slight tone without texture; glaring snow
10 - Pure white: light sources and specular reflections
What you need to do to apply it is to find a key part of your photograph that you can assign a zone to, then set the exposure accordingly. In the illustration above, I have mapped the camera's exposure meter onto the middle 5 zones, but that does not mean you are limited to just these zones - by using full manual mode you can go beyond these zones but you need to count!

Now let's take an example. Suppose you are in a forest on a sunny day, where the grass on the floor is partly lit by sun and partly in shade. The most effective way of exposing such a scene is to meter on the sunlit grass, and the rest will take care of itself. Point your camera's spot metering zone at the grass so that the grass fills the metering zone, and adjust the exposure so that the camera says '0' - i.e. perfectly exposed (or zone 5). You can then recompose, and because the camera is on manual, the exposure will not be affected. The result will be something like this:

A camera set to full auto would have seen the silhouetted trees in the background and overexposed by a stop or two, to look something like this:

Note how the vivid green in the foreground in the first picture has been bleached out, and the stump is not as isolated as a feature as it was.

Generally you will be able to find a part of your picture that fits within zones 3-7 so you can see your camera showing you how far over- or underexposed you have made it. However if you want to venture further into the more extreme zones, here's where you need to count. To expose for zone 2, set the exposure to underexpose by 2 stops, then decrease the aperture or the shutter speed by 3 more clicks of the wheel (if your camera meters in 1/3 stop increments, as in the illustration above) or 2 more clicks (if 1/2 stop). For zone 1, use 6 or 4 clicks, and 9 or 6 for zone 0. To achieve a silhouette, for example, you should ensure the object you want to appear in silhouette is at zone 2 or below, but bear in mind that you may lose detail in the background if it is not bright enough, so take another reading from the background to ensure that you keep it in zone 5 or higher. If the contrast between the background and the object isn't great enough, you probably won't be able to achieve a perfect silhouette.

I hope this has all made sense; by all means look on the internet for more about the zone system and how a camera meters, but if you do get any good results using this system I'd love to hear from you.

The next lesson will be about using Neutral Density graduated filters to allow you to control the balance of the bright and dark areas of landscape photographs.

Northern Ireland by Camera

2009-05-05T07:12:00.003+01:00

I have just returned from a tour of Northern Ireland as part of the occasional, ongoing By Camera series of galleries, where I tour a location with some friends with the sole purpose of taking photographs. Until the others have picked their photos for the minisite, I have put up a selection of mine. Click here to view, or here to see a larger selection on flickr.

Rediscovered

2009-04-18T20:43:00.004+01:00

I recently had another look through my Iceland photos from our trip to Iceland in 2007, and found 10 more photos that I'd missed the first time round. It just goes to show that you should never throw photos away too readily...

More on the 4am project

2009-04-06T22:06:00.004+01:00

Having re-read my previous post, and subsequently read posts from other people who took part in the 4am project, I have to confess to feeling that my contribution was shamefully brief and didn't give the project the attention it deserved. So here is the 4am Project, the Director's Cut.

The 4am Project was the brainchild of Birmingham-based photographer Karen Strunks, who came up with the idea for people around the world to take a photograph of their local area at 4am, a particularly unusual time of day for photography when lack of people in otherwise busy places and the (in most cases) darkness would give a new perspective to otherwise familiar scenes. I decided to take part after seeing a gallery of photographs featured in the Guardian, and I admit to a certain fondness to early rising that makes me seem somewhat unorthodox to my friends.

So I set my alarm for 3:30 on Saturday (the key being that it was the 4th day of the 4th month) and after a strong cup of coffee and some breakfast to line my stomach, headed out to see what I could come up with. The sound of the car's engine sounded so much louder to me than usual, as I was painfully aware that most sane people were still trying to get over Friday night's excesses and wouldn't welcome being disturbed at this ungodly hour.

My first stop was a viewpoint on Old Redding, near the Grim's Dyke hotel made famous by the residency of WS Gilbert of Gilbert and Sullivan fame. The viewpoint has a large car park and there was a nagging concern that I'd stumble across a secret dogging location. Fortunately there were just three other cars, two of which appeared to be unoccupied, but the third had its engine running, and all the lights were out. I just kept my head down and got on with my photography. I couldn't see much with the naked eye - the view was all blackness punctuated by street lights, but the photos I captured (here and here) show a lot more detail, in the first of which you can clearly see the Kodak factory at the north end of Harrow, and the dark outline of Harrow-on-the-Hill against the sky.

This being 4am, the usually busy thoroughfare of Old Redding was empty, so I took the opportunity to grab a couple of shots from the middle of the road, having to make way at one point for a slow and silent milk float, by far the most frequent sight on the roads at that time of day. In this picture you can just make out the red glow of the tail lights in the vanishing point.

I headed back into Watford, passing two more milk floats on the way, to the railway arches outside Bushey station. These have recently been cleaned up and some fancy lighting has been installed. Concerned that it may have been switched off to save energy, I was relieved to find it still going strong at 4:30, so I took a sequence of shots showing how the colour fades from red, to pink, to blue over time. For good measure I took one last shot with the 16mm lens on which I think nicely juxtaposes the white light from the traffic bollard against the orange glow of the street lamp and the pink arch in the middle. This is one of Watford's busiest junctions, and it was very strange to see it so deserted.

I arrived back home just after 5am, and after uploading and tweeting my efforts, headed back to bed to wake again at a more 'normal' time of 10am!

4am on 4/4

2009-04-04T10:03:00.007+01:00

The 4 am project is a worldwide project to collect photographs taken between 4:00 and 4:59 (local time) on 4th April all round the world. I thought I'd give it a go, so I set my alarm early and headed off to a viewpoint near us with views over Harrow. I then stopped on the way back home to shoot the railway arches nearby which have recently been fitted with a lighting installation. It was quite unusual to be out at that time of the morning, but not an unpleasant experience, and I might have to give it a try later in the year when the dawn starts to light up the sky that early.

Click here to see my selection.

OT: Hillsborough; 20 years on

2009-03-27T12:52:00.005Z

On 15th April, 1989, thousands of Liverpool fans travelled to Sheffield Wedsnesday's Hillborough football stadium to watch the FA Cup Semi Final against Nottingham Forest. 96 of those fans never returned.

The Taylor Report into the disaster was unequivocal that the policing of the match was to blame for allowing far too many fans into the Leppings Lane end of the ground than could safely be accommodated, and yet today, almost 20 years to the day, nobody has been held to account for the deaths, and the Hillsborough Justice Campaign continues unabated.

In addition, the Sun newspaper infamously reported as 'The Truth' that Liverpool fans had, among other crimes, urinated on and stolen from the pockets of the deceased. Its editor at the time, Kelvin MacKenzie, has been unapologetic to the last for this unthinkable fabrication.

The club will be holding a service at Anfield on the afternoon of 15th April 2009, as it has done every year since the disaster, and a minute's silence will be observed at 3:06pm, to mark the time that the match was finally stopped when the authorities realised exactly how serious the situation had become.

It is because so many people died that top flight stadiums across the UK are now all-seater, and fans can enjoy watching the most high-profile of games without fear of losing their lives in a similar incident. We should never forget those 96 men, women and children who never got to watch their beloved red men play again.

Most striking of all, the first scarf that was tied to the Shankly Gates that day was blue.

A Little Wave

2009-02-27T12:35:00.002Z

Clark Little takes amazing photographs of tube waves. It's a shame that his watermark is so prominent on the photos; however with pictures this good it's probably a necessary evil as using someone else's photos on the internet is so easy.

Rye and Camber

2009-02-21T12:19:00.004Z

I'm spending the weekend with a friend down in Kent, and we visited the beautiful town of Rye, just over the border in East Sussex, before driving down to Camber Sands to watch the sunset. Click here to see the pictures.

DPReview looks at the 5D Mark II

2009-02-14T13:14:00.003Z

One of the most respected photography review sites on the internet has (finally) published its review of the 5D Mark II. Apparently it took so long as they had to wait for a review model from Canon that wasn't a pre-production model, and they also wanted to wait untli after the firmware update to get rid of the dreaded Black Spot problem.

Why Flickr still makes me uncomfortable

2009-02-12T13:12:00.002Z

The Guardian has a report of the BBC using a photograph they found on flickr for commercial purposes, in contravention of the Creative Commons terms under which it was published. Given that it was only pure conincidence that the photographer noticed this particular breach, it makes you wonder how often this sort of thing happens. Flickr is all well and good as a ready-made gallery site, but if you use it to store full resolution copies of your photographs, then no matter how restrictive a licence you apply to them, it would be very difficult to prevent unscrupulous or, to give the BBC the benefit of the doubt, careless use of the photographs for purposes specifically excluded by the CC or copyright terms, unless you make sure that you only allow friends and/or family to download the originals.

Barack's Big Day

2009-01-21T21:42:00.005Z

The Boston Globe has this astonishing collection of photographs from the inauguration of President Barack Obama. I found some of these pictures genuinely moving, but it's hard to know whether that's because of the context or the content (or both). Thanks to John Gruber for the link.

Haze

2009-01-18T20:02:00.003Z

I went for a walk today up Ivinghoe Beacon in Buckinghamshire, and it occurred to me how the problem of haze in long-distance telephoto shots can be effectively eliminated using a combination of the wider exposure latitude of modern digital sensors, and the tool available in post-processing software such as Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. Here is a picture I took today, the sort where the view looks spectacular but the haze gets in the way:

A quick fix to the contrast and black levels improves the photo somewhat, but it affects the foreground more than the background, leaving the windmill still in a bit of haze:

However here is where Lightroom really came into its own. The new graduated filter tool, available from version 2, allowed me to add an effect that is more pronounced at the top than at the bottom, so I applied a contrast adjustment and added a hint of yellow to counteract the blue cast from the haze:

Finally I used the clarity tool to add a bit of extra punch:

Of course, wherever possible I try to get the shot right in camera, but in situations like this where that just isn't possible, it's good to know that you can capture enough colour depth to be able to recover what might have been a lost photograph.

Mr President Elect

2009-01-14T19:01:00.001Z

Not wanting to gloat or anything, but check the EXIF data on the newly-release official portrait of Barack Obama.

The RE Bar

2009-01-12T14:28:00.001Z

A friend of mine runs a bar in Eastcote, west London, and asked me to create a website for him. He also wanted photographs of the bar, so this weekend I finally managed to find the time to pay the bar a visit and get some night and daytime shots. The website was also finalised, and is now online at re-bar.co.uk. I used Lightroom 2.2 to create the gallery of images.

Pick of the Pics

2009-01-02T14:55:00.001Z

The Guardian has an audio slide show of the best of their photographs from 2008. Well worth a look.

Into the MMIX

2008-12-31T11:29:00.005Z

Happy New Year to all (both?) of my readers (is there anyone there reading this? If so, please say 'Hi' in the comments)! Here are some end of the year pics from London; we were let out of work early so I brought my camera in for some late afternoon abstracts...

I hope 2009 brings everything you want and more.

Three legs bad?

2008-12-21T11:46:00.004Z

I went to Cambridge yesterday, primarily to hand over my old 5D to its new owner, but also to take some photos with the new Mark II as well as allowing my friend to try out his new toy at the same time. The vibrant colours of the market were a good source of photos, but we were both rather disappointed at the attitude of the university staff. While I was framing a photo (hand-held, I should add) outtide Kings College Chapel, I was told we weren't allowed to use tripods on the University Grounds. I pointed out I wasn't using the tripod, but as it was standing next to me, that counted as 'using' it apparently. When I asked why not, all we got was 'it's the rules'.

Something similar has happened to me before, next to the London Eye, where I concede that using a tripod could be construed as an obstruction given how busy it is there, but as we were pretty much the only people outside the chapel I can't for the life of me understand why such a restriction would be in place. Of course we both left the grounds immediately, pondering the increasingly suspicious attitude of people towards photographers in general.

Anyway if you want to see the pictures I did manage to take, with or without a tripod, click here.

Low light, low noise

2008-12-19T22:59:00.006Z

I'm thoroughly enjoying getting to know the new camera, and in conjunction with Sigma's increasingly impressive 105mm EX-DG Macro I am getting some very pleasing results. Here is a set of pictures taken at lunch time today at London's famous Borough Market, a food market selling fresh, high-quality and expensive food. Every single picture in this set was taken at ISO 3200, and the colours you see are just as the camera recorded them.

After returning from the shoot I had a message from Jacobs that my new battery grip had arrived. So, with today's release of the Camera Raw update for OS X, I now have everything in place for a complete EOS 5D Mark II workflow. All I need is to take some more pictures...

Mist

2008-12-14T11:58:00.005Z

First chance to take the 5D Mark II out this morning; live view came in very handy for some of the macro shots, as did the fantastic high ISO performance. Several of these shots were taken at ISO 800 or 1600. Click here to see the gallery.

Opening the box

2008-12-12T13:20:00.004Z

For those of you who like this sort of thing, there is a set of pictures of my new 5D Mark II being opened at flickr, here. I haven't put the camera through its paces yet, but to summarise my first impressions:

Very solidly built - the magnesium alloy body feels much more rugged than the 5D's, and it has a nice matte black finish to it

Superb screen on the back - coated to minimise reflections (this works well) and astonishingly clear, sharp and accurate compared to the old one

Live view is going to come in very handy, especially for macro work

Autofocus is, as expected, identical to that of its predecessor, which by today's standards means it's not great, especially compared to the Nikon D700

I needn't have worried about detail in the 21MP sensor - with my Sigma 105mm macro, even at f/2.8, the detail is pin-sharp. Looks like we haven't reached the limits of lens resolution just yet

I'll be taking it out properly this weekend - watch this space for the first shots.

Nikon Solutions

2008-12-10T19:43:00.004Z

Well today was interesting. I went with a friend to the Nikon Solutions expo at Kensington Olympia, west London, as it was free and I wanted to see what these things are like. I know, yes, it's a Nikon event, but I'm not precious about camera makes. The only reason I use Canon is because they were the only manufacturer who offered a full frame DSLR at the time I was looking for one, and now I have so many lenses it would be too expensive to switch. Not that I want to, though; as nice as the Nikon D700 is, I'm hoping the 5D Mark II will more than match it (of which more later).

Anyway, we attended a lecture by Paul Gallagher and the one and only Joe Cornish, one of my biggest inspirations, so that was a real privilege. They skipped all the technical stuff, mercifully, and spoke subjectively about how they approach landscape photography. For those who don't know, Paul Gallagher uses black and white exclusively, and Joe Cornish uses colour, but there is a lot of overlap in their approaches, which are still different enough to complement each other perfectly. The dynamic between the two pros was pitched perfectly (I suspect they are probably very good friends) and it was a very enjoyable and entertaining presentation.

Next up was a presentation about technique which also showcased the new Nikon Full Frame cameras, the D3 and D700, where a Chinese circus performer provided a very interesting subject for everyone to try out their photography. I stood there, the only Canon user in the room, with my Sigma 105mm lens and the camera set to 1000 ISO, and came up with this set of photographs, which I'm very pleased with.

On to the 5D Mark II now - please forgive me a little self-indulgent moaning. I was due to collect mine from Jacobs today, however when I got there their daily delivery had not turned up, and still hadn't arrived by the time they closed. They promised me it would arrive tomorrow, so I shall wait (im)patiently by my phone tomorrow waiting for that call. It still appears to be too good to be true at the moment...

Nikon hit back

2008-12-02T20:11:00.004Z

Nikon have attempted to steal some of Canon's thunder by announcing the D3X. This is their top-of-the-range model, the equivalent of Canon's 1Ds Mark III. It is certainly priced accordingly, coming in at a hefty £5499.

The feature list is available at dpreview.com but the thing that strikes me most is the maximum ISO - 1600 on standard settings, and 6400 (equivalent) with the extended range. First of all, it does seem odd, given the huge ISO range available on the 5D Mark II and indeed the D3, that Nikon haven't offered a similar range on the D3X. I know for a fact that several wedding photographers like to use available light for their pictures, and have tried out a 5D Mark 2 set to ISO 3200 or 6400 for all their shots (see here). So by limiting the upper range, aren't Nikon narrowing their target market?

One final point - I note that Nikon's sample photos are of a much higher standard, artistically, than the meagre offering from Canon.

5D Mark II - further frustration

2008-11-27T13:20:00.003Z

Having read of the first people getting hold of a 5D Mark II, it's now doubly frustrating knowing I still have to wait, as the body-only model has been delayed. Canon have not been forthcoming about what the cause of the delay is, so I've raised a support log with them via their UK website to see if I can get any more information out of them that way.

They may make great cameras, but I've not been impressed with the way Canon have handled this affair at all so far.

More In Pictures

2008-11-23T13:43:00.003Z

I've mentioned the Guardian's In Pictures page before; just wanted to bring it up again as there's a feed if you want to see the latest gallery added. And just to entice you, my favourite photo from the most recent set is here.

If anyone can't, Canon can't

2008-11-20T13:47:00.003Z

I'm a little annoyed with Canon now. Having heard various rumours about the first batch of 5D Mark IIs being delayed I called the shop where I'd pre-ordered who informed me that it will probably be mid-December rather than mid-November when I get my hands on the camera. They claimed it was down to a problem with the packaging, and there was an implication that it affected the body-only model. I'm still hoping to be one of the first in the country to get my hands on one, but it would be nice if it could happen before Christmas.

On an unrelated note, I picked up a Sigma 105mm Macro lens recently, as I was finding it tiresome trying to take 1:1 macro shots with the 50mm model which required getting too close to the subject to be practical (though I'm sure this will be less of an issue with the live view on the mythical 5D Mark 2). I am very, very impressed with this lens; it is unbelievably sharp, even at f/2.8, and being so fast means that I may end up using my Monster (Sigma 100-300mm f/4) less as it renders the 100mm end of that lens effectively redundant. I'm now seriously considering swapping the Monster for a Canon 300mm F/4, which will effectively be a couple of stops faster than the Monster due to the Image Stabilisation feature, and also considerably lighter (if not on the pocket). Better start saving...

Can(on)'t wait

2008-11-04T22:56:00.002Z

Here are some comments and sample pictures from a wedding shoot where a pre-production 5D Mark II was used. I am so totally blown away by the ISO6400 shots, I can't wait to get my mitts on mine now. Hurry up Canon!

Cornwall

2008-11-01T20:34:00.004Z

After Wales by Camera, I spent a week in Cornwall with my family and some friends. We got to see several of the famous fishing villages on the south coast, and some pictures are online in this gallery.

Wales by Camera

2008-10-25T17:29:00.004+01:00

The 'By Camera' series grows a little more, with the registration of the 'by-camera.com' domain (nothing uploaded there yet) and the addition of the new subdomain wales.by-camera.com. Jeff and I just spent a week in North Wales and our pictures are now online at the aforementioned link.

Canon speak out

2008-10-05T14:30:00.008+01:00

There's a very good interview with Canon's Director and Chief Executive of Image Communication Products Operations, Masaya Maeda, at dpreivew.com where they discuss, among other things, the directions the company will be going in in future models, and some of the shortcomings in existing cameras.

Some interesting points for me are his comments on the limits of megapixel count (in context he is referring to compacts but the argument can be extrapolated to DSLRs too): "To some extent I agree [that more megapixels does not necessarily mean better quality], which is why we're looking at the possibility of adding diversity to the G10, which would be the answer to those looking for something other than high megapixel count."

He was also asked whether the high specification of the EOS 5D Mark 2 would have annoyed people who'd spent twice as much on a 1Ds Mark III: "That's a very good question... The EOS 1Ds Mark III ... offers robust durability and long shutter life as the most important features for use in harsh studio conditions, we believe. However when it comes to image quality itself ... it's always the latest camera that is best. So things like ISO expansion range and dynamic range are in a sense better in the 5D Mark II."

When challenged on the 5D Mark 2's autofocus system being no improvement over the existing one in the 5D: "Firstly the market's evaluation of the 5D's AF system has been very positive; there have been no complaints from users, with everyone saying it's very good. Given that, to a certain extent, we think we shouldn't change it. And also there's some limitation with size; the AF sensor in the 50D is very big; the one in the 5D is much smaller. If we wanted to have all cross-sensors in the 5D Mark II, it would mean we might have to sacrifice the compactness of the body. It's all a question of balance of features and benefits."

This is where I think he's being a little disingenuous; just because there have been no complaints doesn't mean something can't or shouldn't be improved on. Nobody complained that the 5D needed more resolution, but that didn't stop them putting 22 megapixels in the Mark 2. It does make sense that they wanted to keep size and weight down, but was AF the only area where they could have compromised?

New look

2008-10-03T22:31:00.003+01:00

Hope you like the new look. Please let me know what you think via the comments.

5D Mark II reaction

2008-09-28T16:33:00.006+01:00

I wasn't the only person to be disappointed with the AF system, it seems. James Duncan Davidson is one of many people who also think that Canon could have done better; the reason they kept it unchanged for the Mark II, he suspects, was to keep enough of a differential between the 5D Mark II and their top-of-the-range 1Ds Mark III, which with the arrival of the new boy doesn't look like such a bargain any more (not that it ever did, at its original £6,000 or even its current £4700). He goes on to explain in a follow-up post why focus-and-recompose is not the solution many people think it is.

GIven that much of my photography is landscape and architecture work, where the subject is often at or close to infinity, I am unlikely to be affected by this as much as others. However with my macro work this would be an issue, but for the fact that I tend to focus manually, which is where the live view with 10x magnification on the Mark II will really come into its own.

One thing everyone should note: all comment is based on the pre-production Mark II. Nobody has had their hands on the final model yet.

More 5D Mark II madness

2008-09-23T21:36:00.005+01:00

Astonishing footage shot using a 5D Mark II with no post-processing, apart from DOWNscaling to fit into a smaller window. Have a look at the short film here.

Lancashire and Yorkshire

2008-09-22T18:42:00.007+01:00

I spent the past weekend at a friend's house in Burnley, taking photographs of the area around that part of the hilly north west. Once again I was putting the Zone system to the test, obtaining results that I simply wouldn't have been able to a month ago. I also took my new polariser with me, helping to remove the glare from the sun on the Saturday which was very summery, and deepen the clear blue skies. Click on the photo above to view the gallery.

My friend Leon's website is here.

5D Mark II sample pics

2008-09-22T09:41:00.005+01:00

Available now on DPReview. Very impressed with the high ISO performance up to about 3200 - beyond that it gets pretty noisy.

More on the new 5D Mark II

2008-09-17T13:04:00.005+01:00

The ever excellent website Digital Photography Review has a detailed preview of the features of the new 5D and I have to say I'm even more impressed. There are now three Custom modes on the mode dial (I currently use the only one available to me to select mirror lock-up in AV mode but need a second one now for my new found fondndess for Manual exposure) and you can set up a 'My Menu' where you can choose a selection of the most used settings on the camere (including custom functions - yes, that means mirror lock-up) to display on a single screen. Still no sample images yet - the official Canon site appears to be having problems, and even then there are only 2 images, both at ISO 100.

It's arrived...

2008-09-17T07:11:00.007+01:00

Canon have finally announced the details of their forthcoming Canon EOS 5D Mark II, which will be available at the end of November. Favourite bits:
1) 21 MP (I know it's not all about the megapixels but I'm easily pleased...)
2) 25600 ISO possible - this is very interesting - would like to see how they deal with noise at this speed
3) Live view (this will be VERY useful)
4) HD video - hot on the heels of the Nikon D90 - wonder who thought of it first?
5) 3" LCD with anti-reflective coating and 170° viewing angle

Not too happy about:
1) Still only 9 point AF
2) The UK price - £2,299 compared with the us $2,999 (which is about £1,700 in real money)
3) Have to wait until November. Aaaaargh!

Now to find some sample photos online somwhere.

New Moon

2008-09-15T16:05:00.003+01:00

The much rumoured replacement to the Canon EOS 5D is imminent, it would appear. Canon have been updating a mysterious website with a Moon on it, gradually increasing the amount by which the new camera is illuminated. All the signs point to an announcement in the next few days, though I suspect it will be too late for me to get my hands on one before I climb Pendle Hill in Lancashire this weekend...

Zoning in

2008-08-31T14:39:00.005+01:00

I'd heard about the Zone System a while ago but never really gave it much thought at the time. For a long time I've also been struggling to become better at exposure, and use the manual mode on the camera more, as I tend to stick to Aperture Priority and let the camera do the work, which is not very satisfying. Recently, however, a friend gave me a useful tip (grass = 18% grey) which whet my appetite, and then completely concidentally, I came across some iPod Touch software called PhotoCalc, which has (among many other useful tools) a (portable) explanation of how the Zone System works.

So with my camera set to Manual (at last!) and Spot Metering, I took my kit on holiday to France last week and spent much of the time playing with this new way of exposing photos, with surprisingly effective results. The weather was very sunny for much of the time, so I was fighting with high contrast lighting and some tricky conditions, but was able to come up with some effective pictures, many of which I would never have achieved by leaving the camera to work out what exposure I should use.

Anyway, see for yourself at the new France gallery just uploaded.

Coastal Textures

2008-07-28T07:11:00.005+01:00

We spent the weekend in the north west again, on the Wirral, a peninsula that juts out between the Dee and Mersey estuaries. On the Saturday we spent the day exploring the coast, starting at Parkgate where black and white timber framed buildings overlook the salt marshes where the Dee used to flow before being diverted to the Welsh side of the estuary, before heading north to Moreton with its weird concrete sea defences and view across to the wind farm out in Liverpool Bay. Driving through the Wallasey tunnel took us into central Liverpool from where we headed along the coast northwards towards Anthony Gormley's 'Another Place' exhibition on Crosby beach, where life-size iron mannequins stand staring out to sea, in various states of seaweed and rust, with the flat sand around them saturated by the incoming tide.

Finding Inspiration

2008-07-07T13:04:00.005+01:00

A post from Michael Clark on the Lightroom blog about finding inspiration. I totally agree with the two main ways to find inspiration described.

Liverpool hangover

2008-07-02T21:36:00.005+01:00

After a late night out on Saturday in Liverpool, I wandered the streets of Liverpool the next morning, to clear my hungover head. Near the abandoned warehouses in Chinatown, the Liverpool One development is taking shape. Many of the buildings are still under construction but there are some really nice modernist shapes and patterns, and I also bumped into a group of revellers who appeared to have been out all night and were desperate to have their photo taken.

Peak District by Camera

2008-06-15T17:56:00.003+01:00

The book of our adventures in Derbyshire is finally ready. You can order a copy, along with either of my other books, here. Leon's photos are online here, and Mark's are here. If you want to remind yourself of mine, click here.

Lightroom 2 beta - exciting stuff

2008-05-20T21:31:00.003+01:00

I am really looking forward to the full version of Lightroom2. The localised adjustments feature is just one of the fantastic new additions, as well as negative Clarity, which adds a dreamlike effect to some pictures (it also runs 64-bit native, too). Here's a before and after example of what you can do:

To get the effect on the right, I set the Clarity to -100, then used the Paint tool to bring the exposure down on the sky, before converting to greyscale and tinting the highlights yellow and lowlights blue. Now I just wish they'd take it out of beta!

Rickmansworth Festival

2008-05-18T18:29:00.005+01:00

Every year the small town of Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, celebrates its canal heritage at the Rickmansworth Festival. Narrowboats line the canal throughout the town and events are held all weekend. I went for the first time today, accompanied by my family, and tried to leave my comfort zone and take some photos in a style I don't normally use. You can see the pictures here.

Post Peak District Pics

2008-05-17T13:10:00.003+01:00

I haven't really done much photography since I got back from the Peak District in April, however I did spend an afternoon shooting some waterskiing action at a lake near where we live. Using my camera's continuous shooting mode, ISO 400 and Servo Autofocus, along with the Monster (Sigma 100-300mm f/4), I actually shot more photos in one day than I have so far with my digital camera (over 250)! I managed to pick a selection of my favourites and you can see them here.

I have also managed to collect 20 pics each from Leon and Mark, who came to Derbyshire with me, to put with my own favourite 20 and will have a book out within a week. There will of course be more on the book when I get my first copy. Once again, needless to say, the book will be published by Blurb.

Peak District by Camera

2008-04-14T18:52:00.003+01:00

The pictures are in, I've chosen my favourite 60 and they are online at the temporary Peak District by Camera minisite. Once Leon and Mark have sent me their favourites, I'll put up a new web site and will, of course, link to it here.

In April?!

2008-04-06T10:39:00.006+01:00

In preparation for the trip to Derbyshire on Thursday I bought some waterproof trousers yesterday. And this morning I had the perfect opportunity to try them out, as the world was under two or three inches of snow. In April. In England. After the hottest day of the year so far.

So out I went, with camera in hand, to see what I could find. Here are the results.

Lightroom 2 beta and Peak District by Camera

2008-04-04T20:55:00.004+01:00

Adobe have released a beta version of Lightroom 2, and having played with it for a few days I'm very impressed. The improved competition from Apple's Aperture can only be a good thing, and as long as they continue to play catchup with each other, everyone's a winner. The best things that I can see in Lr2 are the dual monitor support, which will come in handy at home when the MacBook Pro is plugged into the 20" Cinema display; and the metadata browser, which shows four customisable columns at the top of the screen in Grid view, from which you can select keywords, lenses, ISO speeds etc to narrow down your search for a particular image. I will continue to experiment and will post any further thoughts up here.

Next Thursday, I will be going with a group of friends up to the Peak District in Derbyshire, for another photography trip along the same lines as our Iceland trip last year. Early mornings, cold weather, and the prospect of some snow should result in some interesting landscapes, so fingers crossed...

Missing You

2008-03-24T00:08:00.001Z

Temptation

2008-03-22T13:55:00.002Z

I don't want to sound too much like a lapsed Catholic but I pulled myself back from the abyss of temptation today. The Canon EOS 1Ds MkIII is now available for £4,800 at most places instead of the original £6,000; now all I saw was the £1,200 price difference rather than the £4,800 hole in my pocket!

Instead, I'll wait to see whether Canon announce a successor to the still-excellent EOS 5D, which should have most of the features I'd like to see that are available in all of Canon's newest models (the 1Ds MkIII, 450D and 40D).

So anyway, I bought a new PSP instead; much cheaper.

Books for Sale

2008-02-29T07:00:00.004Z

Blurb have announced that their international bookstore is now online. What does this mean? It means that my two books, Digital Visions and Iceland by Camera are now both up for sale direct from the publisher. I have links to the shop at my site at this page. Iceland by Camera is also now up for sale at CheekyNaughty.com, a site promoting british design.

Lunar Eclipse

2008-02-21T06:51:00.006Z

Last night, at 3am GMT, the moon entered the shadow cast by the earth, creating a total lunar eclipse. I had set my alarm to wake me at about 2:15, so I could capture the various stages approaching totality, as the earth's shadow started to eat into the moon. I had purchased a 2x teleconverter specially for the job, so these shots were taken at 600mm, but since I couldn't open the aperure up above f/8 as a result, I was forced to use longer and longer exposures and higher and higher ISO settings to get the later pictures.

There was cloud cover initially so I had to be patient to get the first couple of shots, but as the cloud cleared there remained a thin mist, diffusing the image of the moon somewhat. By the time the moon reached totality, in the last of the sequence of shots, I was using ISO800 and a 15 second exposure, meaning that the moon blurred slightly as it moved across the sky within those 15 seconds.

Click on the picture above to view the sequence of shots.

Aperture 2: First Impressions

2008-02-14T19:54:00.002Z

I had a look around the features of Aperture 2 last night and while there are some excellent features, I'm not prepared to spend over £100 replacing my Lightroom workflow just yet, for a number of reasons. These are:

1. I have no way of exporting my adjustments from Lightroom to Aperture. I don't particularly blame either Apple or Adobe for this, but some industry standard way of recording adjustments would be useful here. If anyone knows of a way I can do this, please let me know.
2. The adjustment tools in Aperture 2, while an improvement on version 1, are still a long way short of what's available in Lightroom. I found no easy way to convert an image to monochrome, then tint the dark and light areas using the Split Toning tool, which I have used on several photos. Nor can I find a way to apply a virtual filter to B&W images so that, say, the blue in the sky is darkened without affecting the rest of the image. It may be that it's there, but it's far from obvious.
3. The interface is unfamiliar, without the distinct library, develop, slideshow, print and web stages you get in Lightroom. Again this is not a criticism, but it would take me a while to adjust my workflow to Aperture's interface
4. The 'click to zoom' feature of Lightroom is absent from Aperture; and when you press 'Z' (which is the equivalent command), the navigator window that appears is tiny, overlays the image, and cannot be resized.

In the interest of balance, however, some plus points:

1. I have two monitors at home, the laptop screen and a 20" Cinema Display, and Aperture allows me to take advantage of this; I can display panels and the loupe on one screen (the latter for dragging onto the preview when needed) without using up real estate for displaying the image on the other.
2. The Light Table feature is very nice, and I could see myself using that a lot were Aperture to become my main workflow tool.
3. The user interface, as with all Apple software, is wonderful.

So to conclude: I'll stick with Lightroom for now, as it still has many features that Aperture appears to lack, and because I am so familiar with its workflow that it would be too much effort to convert for relatively little return. Anyone else who has used both and who wishes to share their opinions, please let me know in the comments.

Aperture 2.0

2008-02-12T21:10:00.001Z

Apple have announced the release of Aperture 2.0, and from the look of some of the new features, it looks like for once Apple are playing catchup to the competition. I will remain objective however, and if a demo of Aperture v2 becomes available I'd be interested to see how it measures up to Lightroom (which is still version 1.3).

A weekend in Sussex

2008-02-11T12:35:00.000Z

We went down to Sussex this weekend for a walk and a trip to Brighton to try to catch the starlings flocking around the pier at dusk. I was too late to catch the starlings but there was a spectacular sunset, and earlier in the day we stopped at a pub that was hosting a convention of classic Morgan owners. Click the picture above to see the gallery.

New Year Photos

2008-01-18T22:02:00.000Z

Some random photographs taken around Christmas and New Year, from the south coast at Lancing, W Sussex, to the Chiltern Hills in Buckinghamshire.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-12T11:43:00.000Z

Well it's been a while; all that Christmas and New Year stuff has completely distracted me. Anyway I'm glad to report I had a very relaxing Christmas and New Year, and am fresh and ready for 2008. I hope.

I have two photo trips planned this year; in April, five of us are going to the Peak District, in Derbyshire, for four days, and later in the year (on an as yet undecided date) the three of us who went to Iceland will be heading off to Wales.

In the meantime, I will be making more effort to build up a portfolio of commercially viable photographs and will probably have to spend some more time in London with the camera to do this. I'll keep you posted with what I come up with.

It only remains for me to wish you all a Happy New Year!

Nick

Reviews

2007-12-16T18:51:00.000Z

Just a few reviews of some online services that I've used recently.

Blurb, as I've mentioned before, are an online publisher of books that you design yourself using their own downloadable layout software. The software is nice enough (a recent update added more options) but the real killer here is the quality of the books once they arrive. It takes about a week from uploading and ordering the book to delivery, and every book is individually wrapped in cellophane when it arrives, and printed to a very high standard on glossy paper. I cannot fault their service; recently they agreed to reprint, for free, a book I had ordered that had been lost in the post. All they need now is to sort out their international bookstore which will allow non-US residents to sell their books directly through the Blurb website, and their service will be complete.

Lulu offer a similar service to Blurb, but with a few notable differences. Lulu already have an online shop where you can sell your own books at a price you choose (the profits are automatically sent to you) but, disappointingly, the quality of print doesn't match Blurb's. They are slightly cheaper, but have a smaller range of sizes, and their tool for creating 'Photobooks', an online Flash based web page, is not nearly as flexible as Blurb's downloadable tool. In all honestly Lulu are probably aimed at a different market, as they tend to lean towards the written word, so for photo books I'd go with Blurb every time.

Moo are another company I have mentioned in the past. They offer small items like sticker books, greetings cards, postcards and what they call minicards (small business cards) with your own pictures on each. I have used them in the past for minicards and, more recently, postcards. The minicards are more of a novelty than anything else; being so small they won't stand out among 'proper' sized business cards, but are handy to leave around somewhere where people might find them. The post cards are very good quality, but the set I ordered had the wrong details printed on the back (advertising a wedding in Massachusetts instead of Icelandbycamera.com) so I sent them back with a promise of a reprint. However the reprint I received had no details on the back, so though not as useless as the Massachusetts cards, I can still use them for promotional purposes. I even received a third set a few days later, but as before there were no details on the back.

Dungeness

2007-11-26T20:24:00.001Z

Dungeness in Kent is one of the most unusual places I've visited in the UK. It reminds me of an Icelandic fishing village, with its randomly scattered, low rise houses and sense of isolation. The sky was also extremely surreal, only adding to the effect, and was a beautiful shade of orange near the horizon.

Launch Day

2007-11-21T12:36:00.000Z

A month and a day after we returned from Iceland, the new-look, branded Iceland by Camera site is live. The site has been designed to complement the book, in both appearance and content, and provides some more information about our trip, including a diary from each of us giving some information about what we got up to and what our impressions of the trip were. Admittedly the diary entries are not complete, but keep checking back for updates.

New Jessops ad

2007-11-14T10:01:00.000Z

There's a poster campaign by Jessops that I saw for the first time this morning at Euston underground station. It shows a ladybird on a blade of grass in a nice close-up shot, with the tagline 'It's not your garden. It's your studio'. It's a clever idea, and appeals to the 'everywhere is your studio' concept that I believe in. However, given what I've posted before about Jessops' woes, I do wonder whether using a picture of a seven spot ladybird, currently under threat from more a voracious species, was a particularly wise choice...

Sigur Rós

2007-11-11T14:01:00.000Z

This is a little off topic for a photography blog, but it has some relevance as you'll see. I've noticed lately than in the last few weeks and months, the Icelandic band Sigur Rós have become increasingly prominent. Their music will probably be familiar to many people who haven't heard their name (probably most clearly as the music on the trailers for the BBC's Planet Earth series).

Anyway with the recent release of their first film, Heima (Homeland), they are sure to become ever more ubiquitous. While in Iceland we had a CD with several albums burned from my copy of iTunes of which Takk..., Sigur Rós's most recent album, was played the most, and it was easy to see how the landscape has inspired their music. I can't think of anything more appropriate to be listening to as you drive round another bend to see another huge snow-covered mountain towering above you, with waterfalls cascading down the side.

The point I'm getting to, eventually, is that with me at least there seems to be a connection between my photography, Iceland and music, all of which have been significant influences in my life, certainly during the last 5 or 10 years. When all three came together as they did that week, I knew I was doing what I love doing, in a land and to a soundtrack that made it all the more perfect.

The Book is Unleashed

2007-11-10T20:42:00.000Z

I've ordered three copies of Iceland By Camera (the book); one for each of us who went. When it's arrived I'll post pictures up of the book, and there will be a link here to buy a copy. It's a 190 page, large format (13" x 11"), full colour hardback book. And should you need reminding of what pictures will be in it, allow me to link you up again:

Iceland by Camera

An apology

2007-11-07T20:53:00.000Z

I haven't been posting much recently as a lot has been happening in the background. Raof, Jeff and I have been working on an updated version of Iceland by Camera, which is only a temporary gallery until we get more information up there, and also on a book, published (possibly) through Blurb, whom you may remember from an earlier post. I have also had interest in my Iceland photos from a photo library, and separately have been contacted by someone interested in canvas prints of some of my London shots. In all the excitement I've rather neglected the blog, but I am still here, in case there is anyone out there reading this.

There are also plans afoot for another day or weekend of photography; this time, we're planning to go the Peak District in Derbyshire in the spring. There may be as many as five of us going. Keep coming back for more news.

Iceland by Camera - online

2007-10-21T11:41:00.000+01:00

Iceland by Camera is now up. The galleries are all Lightroom galleries but the site will be updated soon with more information about the trip and the photos. We travelled with a pair of Apple MacBook Pros so were able to review our images at the end of each day, and we agreed to choose 10 each per day to keep numbers to a reasonable size. I could only pick 5 good shots from the final day (weather was generally poor and we didn't stop as much) so I went and chose 5 more from previous days to ensure I ended up with 60 pictures.

2 days to go

2007-10-12T06:44:00.000+01:00

I know it's been quiet lately, but not that much has been happening, and I've been thinking about pretty much nothing else but the trip to Iceland, for which we leave on Sunday morning. I have managed to persuade Caroline that I needed a new laptop as I didn't have enough disk space (for all the photos) or processor power (to run Lightroom) on the old iBook, so I've picked up a 15" MacBook Pro which is just incredible. I shall try to post throughout the holiday, and you can see the pictures we've been coming up with at the site created specifically for this trip:

Iceland by Camera

Iceland by Camera (III)

2007-09-30T18:49:00.000+01:00

It's now only 2 weeks before we fly off to Iceland for our photographic tour of one of the most spectacular countries in Europe. I'm pretty much all kitted out now, with the purchase of a pair of fingerless gloves yesterday, but a more significant purchase was my new tripod, which arrived on Friday. I've picked up a Manfrotto 055XPROB, which is a brand new model that has a clever feature allowing you to flip the central column so that it is at right angles to the tripod body without having to detach it first. It wasn't until I went to Sussex (and saw what Jeff and Raof used) that I realised just how inadequate my old tripod was - I knew it was not very stable, particularly when the centre column was extended, but the new model is not only much more rigid but also so versatile, I'm amazed I put up with the old one for so long.

Book for Sale

2007-09-29T12:06:00.000+01:00

I've put the book up for sale now. If you'd like a copy, please go to the ordering page where you can choose the cover type (hardback or paperback) and pay by PayPal.

Blurb

2007-09-25T19:47:00.001+01:00

I ordered a book from Blurb last week, and it arrived today. It's note quite as high quality as I was expecting, but it's still very professionally presented and the colours are very good. You can't really tell properly from photos, but I'm posting them anyway!

Click here to have a look. If you'd like to buy a copy, please let me know.

Turning Semi-pro

2007-09-22T19:39:00.002+01:00

I've set up a separate web site for professional services. This site has a much smaller, higher quality portfolio (hopefully!) and is what I will use for any professional photography I do from now on. It's based on the existing site but in toned-down colours and uses a larger image format (600x400 pixels, with a copyright watermark, instead of 480x320) which I believe does justice to the pictures better than the old format. Please let me know what you think.

Nick Miners Professional

London by Camera

2007-09-15T21:21:00.000+01:00

Today was the first day of London Open House weekend, part of the nation-wide Open House event. I went into London with some of my photography friends, and ended up with a collection of semi-abstract pictures, which you can see here.

Images of Autumn

2007-09-13T19:17:00.000+01:00

Ok so it's not officially autumn (or fall as you Americans like to call it) until 21st but there are signs of it everywhere. On Sunday we went out to collect some autumn related artefacts from near our home for an activity my partner was planning for her school, and I took the opportunity to play around with the new flashes again. I've also included the picture of the leaf I posted last week.
Enjoy.

Photoshop Express

2007-09-11T16:07:00.000+01:00

News just in from Gizmodo that Adobe are working on a free online bit of software called Photoshop Express. Once it's online I'll give it a go and post up my thoughts.

In Pictures

2007-09-08T11:44:00.000+01:00

I recently linked to the Guardian's 24 hours in Pictures page, which is a showcase of the best press photography from the last 24 hours. However I have even more recently discovered In Pictures, which is a central hub for all the paper's photography collections. Go and have a look, and feast your eyes.

Flashing

2007-09-07T07:38:00.000+01:00

I had a bit of a play with the flashes last night. With the 580EX II mounted on camera (but set not to fire), and the 430EX behind the subject, I took this picture of a leaf turning to autumn colours, using my 50mm macro lens at f/45 to keep as much of the leaf in focus as possible. Such small apertures aren't usually practical with macro photography without using ridiculously long exposures, but the backlighting provided by the 430EX has allowed me to get this effect without using a tripod.

When Lighting (sic) Strikes Twice

2007-09-02T19:25:00.000+01:00

Having been impressed by the results Jeff obtained using wireless flash for macro photography on our recent Sussex trip, I've taken the plunge and ordered a couple of flash units for myself. I've often been frustrated at the lack of options available to me for indoor work, as I don't have a proper studio and until now have had no lighting of my own to use other than our energy saver light bulbs. So I'm looking forward to getting my hands on the Canon Speedlite 580EX II and Speedlite 430EX flashes which can operate as master and slave flashes wirelessly, and coupled with Canon's E-TTL metering should make it a lot easier to light and expose some more controlled shots. Watch this space for further news/images.

More from Sussex

2007-08-29T09:38:00.000+01:00

Jeff Hicks, who was with me on the Sussex tour on Sunday, has posted his pictures online too now. You can see them here. He has also used Lightroom to create the gallery, though appears to have been less than original with the gallery name and subtitle :)
UPDATE: Raof has also (finally) put his pictures online.

Sussex by camera

2007-08-28T10:01:00.000+01:00

Another Lightroom gallery, maily because I wanted to use larger images (600x400 rather than the 480x320 I usually use). This Bank Holiday weekend, I went to Sussex with two of the people who are coming to Iceland with me, so we could get to know each other a bit better. We drove from Devil's Dyke near Brighton to Rye via The Long Man at Wilmington, Beachy Head and Winchelsea.

I think we all learned quite a lot that day, I found out that there's still loads of expensive equipment that I'd like, and we all had a really great time. Oh, and we got some photographs too.

Click here to see the gallery.

Dust Update

2007-08-23T22:30:00.000+01:00

Remember my post about the Dust-Aid? Well I tried it tonight and am delighted to report that it has been a success! I'll need practice getting right to the very edges of the sensor but I'd say about 90% of the dust marks (and 100% of those that were touched by the Dust-Aid) have been removed completely. It's a huge relief to know that (a) my Monster lens isn't full of crap and (b) it's so easy to clean a sensor. A word of recommendation, too, for Just Ltd who sold the kit to me - very efficient order processing. Now if only I can work out a deal to get money from all these recommendations...

Like London Buses

2007-08-23T07:44:00.000+01:00

In the interest of being fair and balanced, I ought to point out that Nikon has also just announced two new DSLR Models, the D3 and the D300. What's interesting is that the D3 is Nikon's first ever full-frame DSLR, suggesting that the market for such cameras, which they had until now shunned, appears to be growing. It also features a 'DX mode' which lets you shoot with the magnification factor of using a smaller sensor, but at the cost of lower resolution as you'd expect, so it's basically just an in-camera crop.

The D3 appears to sit between the Canon EOS 5D and the 1Ds mark III in terms of features; it has a similar (12MP) resolution to the 5D and a feature set closer to the 1D series. At around £3400 its pricing would seem to reinforce this view. Whether the new features (dual CF slots, 'horizon' mode to assist in keeping the camera level) will force die-hard Canon users to switch is another issue altogether though.

Flash Git

2007-08-22T21:47:00.000+01:00

An experiment with a Lightroom Flash Gallery. Please let me know what you think.

Time to Start Saving

2007-08-20T16:09:00.000+01:00

Canon have just announced a new top-of-the-range full frame digital SLR, the EOS 1Ds mk III.

21 megapixels, 5fps shooting, wi-fi capability... and yours for around £6,000. Cripes.

I think I'll enter the lottery this weekend...

Update: As pointed out by Nick in the comments, they have also announced the 40D for people whose budget doesn't stretch quite that far. It's not clear yet but it will be interesting to see if they've fixed the one thing that bugs people about Canon SLRs - the Mirror Lock Up feature is buried in the Custom Functions menu.

Liverpool City Centre

2007-08-20T07:23:00.000+01:00

The first home game of the season at Anfield yesterday, and a dubious refereeing decision gave Chelsea... sorry, getting carried away there. Anyway, I took the opportunity to take my camera round the city in the hours before the match, giving my new ultra wide angle zoom a proper airing. The dull monochrome grey of the weather gave way to astonishing colour inside 'Paddy's Wigwam', the Catholic Metropolitan cathedral at one end of Hope Street, while at the other end, St James's Cemetery is overlooked by the equally modern but traditionally styled Anglican cathedral.

Click here or on the photo above to view the gallery.

Galleries Gone?

2007-08-12T20:55:00.000+01:00

I've recently felt that the site was getting a bit big, so I've removed the links to some of the older galleries. One day I'll get down to paring the site down to a much smaller selection of what I consider my best shots. But for now, the navigation bar down the left should be less daunting. The old galleries still exist, just not the direct links.

Ludicrously Lazy

2007-08-08T12:30:00.001+01:00

I'm sorry, but this is just plain laziness. Part of the skill of taking a photograph is choosing both the moment and the viewpoint to get the best lighting and composure. I've no doubt this is extremely clever, but where is the satisfaction in taking bad holiday snaps and then using other, better photographs to 'fix' them? You might as well come back with postcards and pass them off as your own. I'm so glad I don't use flickr if my photos would be at risk from being bastardised like this.

Damn Dust

2007-08-08T06:59:00.000+01:00

So it turns out that the dust I'd been seeing on my pictures using the 100-300mm lens at minimum aperture wasn't inside the lens after all. A few shots yesterday of a nearby windmill turned up dust in exactly the same places on the frame using my 16-35mm lens too - I just hadn't been using the other lenses stopped down as much. So what to do? Using the Canon-approved method of blowing with a bulb blower is worse than useless - that just moves the dust around inside the camera. So after a bit of research I find out about Dust-aid - I'll give this a go and once I've tried it I'll let you know how it did.

Until then, note to self - don't go lower than f/11!

More Moo

2007-08-05T08:51:00.000+01:00

As promised, here are the Moo minicards I ordered:

Lightroom Adventure is published

2007-07-31T19:06:00.000+01:00

The Photoshop Lightroom Adventure book has been published, and is available for purchase directly from O'Reilly. I am sorely tempted, but I'm afraid that if I buy it before we go on our own Icelandic adventure I'll just get depressed with how good the photos are. I think I'll wait until I get back, and will compare our own book, which we are planning to publish with the help of Blurb.com, with the finished product from O'Reilly.

Moo!

2007-07-30T19:13:00.000+01:00

Moo.com is a site that will let you create greeting cards, stickers and business cards with your own photographs. I've chosen a set of 10 fairly abstract pics from my Lighroom library, and have ordered one of their sets of 100 business cards to promote this site. It's something I can hand out to people when I'm out shooting if somebody looks curious. The site is a very friendly, easy to use place, and it's impressively cheap too. I'll post pictures of the finished products when they arrive.

More Assorted

2007-07-24T19:01:00.000+01:00

I've collected together a few recent photos with no obvious connection and put them at the bottom of a tidied-up Assorted section.

Iceland by Camera (II)

2007-07-19T17:48:00.001+01:00

Watch this space. Icelandbycamera.com has just been registered. It won't be available just yet but I hope to be able to put something online soon.

Our 'Farmhouses'

2007-07-06T16:29:00.000+01:00

I've received confirmation of the 'farmhouses' we'll be staying in during our Iceland tour in October. I use quotation marks as most of them, as you can see, are slightly more than farmhouses! I suppose the fact that it's low season means that we get the pick of the bunch of available accommodation, but for the price we're paying this is likely to be the cheapest trip to Iceland I've been on!

Dot com

2007-07-04T21:41:00.000+01:00

I've just moved my web site hosting to Dreamhost as I was getting fed up with the problems with my ISP. I won't name them as I'm generally happy with them, and since their hosting service is free I can't really expect a full level of service.

Anyway I've also made a change so that the site will appear as 'nickminers.com' as well as 'nickminers.co.uk' (and will make an effort to promote the .com now). Hopefully you won't notice any difference!

Lightroom 1.1

2007-06-27T09:31:00.000+01:00

Well the first update to Lightroom has arrived, and it contains enough features to justify a bigger increment in version number than 0.1. The details are here, and this is coming from someone who has been using the new version for months now (he needs to - he's written a book about it). I'm looking forward to playing with the new stuff.

24 hours

2007-06-25T19:22:00.000+01:00

The new-look Guardian website has an excellent 24 hours in pictures section which I think is wonderful. Go and have a look (note this link is specific to 25th June 2007 - visit the main site for a link to the latest gallery.)