Monday, March 31, 2008

Ray-Banter

Yep, I Had My Head In The Clouds

The response I received to the post Seeing The Light was very interesting. Several of the comments on the post - as well as a series of emails I received - asked how the photographs were taken. Well, as I mentioned earlier, I've been testing a couple of little Pentax cameras over the past fortnight. The shots of the Ray-Bans against a cloudy sky were taken with a Pentax Optio S10 - an ultra-compact, very slim camera that packs a lot of punch - 10 megapixels, no less.

Maybe it's my background in newspaper and magazine design/ layout, because I "saw" the image in my head before I started taking the shots. Often, that's half the battle when it comes to creativity. But because I knew precisely what I wanted, it was just a question of hitting the trigger.

In answer to your queries, I held the Ray-Bans aloft in my left hand and I had the camera in my right hand. When you think about it, that's a really interesting scenario, because it's not often that the camera and the object being photographed are actually up in the air and therefore subject to a certain degree of human unsteadiness.

I shot about 24 frames, then reviewed each of them on my computer so I could check the overall clarity. I wanted one image to show the clouds through the lenses of Ray-Bans and a second image along the same lines, except that I wanted the details of the glasses (gold frames and the little plastic nose pieces) in sharp focus.

Photography - like any branch of art - can be as complicated as you make it, or as simple as you make it. Simplicity gets my vote - every time.

2 comments:

Cath said...

Simplicity for me too!
You have really given me the bug again you know. That is a fantastic shot and your helpfulness in explaining little "tricks of the trade" are priceless.
I still have my old Canon AV-1 (my favourite camera) but I am too impatient now to wait for processing and it gets too expensive.
I'm going to have to look at decent digi cameras, but this megapixel thingy is high tech for me. There is so much on the market. I like simple, but adaptable. I like zoom I can zoom and focus I can focus and lighting meters I can adjust. (That is the sum total of my knowledge, before you get too excited!) The camera I use at the moment is my husband's - a kodak easyshare C310 what I call "tourist camera" with 4 megs. Better than my phone camera though. But it is a point and shoot.
Any recommendations? ;0)

Anonymous said...

Thank you for taking your time telling us how you took that great photos.
I now see you are someone with background on journalism and maybe photo journalism but let me tell you that I knew some who worked there without half of your skills.
I guess that maybe with my Nikon Coolpix I could try one like this ... not sure, because my skills are far beyond yours.