Lesson 1

[Ruth Hosterman]

This was shot in my dining room. Using two regular house hold lamps at night. Camera use was a Nikon D200 , setting for both pictures was an 18-300 1’3.5-5.6G lens, f/4.5, 1/60.

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Hi Ruth,

It looks like these are too big. Can you email the files? office@Photographyicon.com

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Actually, let me increase the file size limit and see if that helps you.

[Duncan Rawlinson]

I have bumped up the file size. Let me know if that works.

[Ruth Hosterman]

I will try it again!

Attachments:

You must be logged in to view attached files.

[Duncan Rawlinson]

It worked. High five! I’ll try to get this critique done today!

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Also, in the future please try to use the the new topic button when posting a new assignment under a specific lesson. Don’t worry about it too much though. If you put something in the wrong place I’ll move the whole thread for you. (I’m going to move this thread now) Thanks!

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Hi Ruth,

In case you’re getting emails about changes to this thread, I have moved it to here.

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Hi Ruth,

Thanks for submitting your assignment.

Let’s get right into it.

Here is the exif data for these images:

http://photographyicon.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/DSC_0025.jpg
Date Time Original: 2016:03:30 18:53:28
Exposure Time: 1/60
F Number: f / 4.50
Exposure Program: Manual
Metering Mode: Pattern
Flash: Flash did not fire
Focal Length: 18mm
White Balance: Manual white balance
Make: NIKON CORPORATION
Model: NIKON D200
Exif Version:
Flashpix Version:
Color Space: 1
Pixel X Dimension: 2592
Pixel Y Dimension: 3872
CompressedBitsPerPixel: 2
Maker Note: 4976
User Comment:
Date Time Digitized: 2016:03:30 18:53:28
Subsec Time: 41
Subsec Time Original: 41
Subsec Time Digitized: 41
Exposure Bias: 0.33
Max Aperture Value: 3.60
Light Source: Unknown
Sensing Method: One-chip color area sensor
File Source: DSC
Scene Type: Directly photographed
CFA Pattern: 32072
Custom Rendered: Normal process
Exposure Mode: 1
Digital Zoom Ration: 1
Focal Length In 35mm Film: 27mm
Scene Capture Type: Standard
Gain Control: High gain up
Contrast: Normal
Saturation: Normal
Sharpness: Normal
Subject Distance Range: Unknown
InteroperabilityIFDPointer: 32040
ExifIFDPointer: 2330
GPSInfoIFDPointer: 32090
Orientation: 1
YCbCr Positioning: 2
X Resolution: 300
Y Resolution: 300
Resolution Unit: 2
Date Time: 2016:03:31 08:46:12
Software: Microsoft Windows Photo Viewer 6.1.7600.16385

http://photographyicon.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/DSC_0028.jpg
Date Time Original: 2016:03:30 18:54:52
Exposure Time: 1/60
F Number: f / 4.50
Exposure Program: Manual
Metering Mode: Pattern
Flash: Flash did not fire
Focal Length: 30mm
White Balance: Manual white balance
Make: NIKON CORPORATION
Model: NIKON D200
Exif Version:
Flashpix Version:
Color Space: 1
Pixel X Dimension: 2592
Pixel Y Dimension: 3872
CompressedBitsPerPixel: 2
Maker Note: 4976
User Comment:
Date Time Digitized: 2016:03:30 18:54:52
Subsec Time: 32
Subsec Time Original: 32
Subsec Time Digitized: 32
Exposure Bias: 0.33
Max Aperture Value: 4.10
Light Source: Unknown
Sensing Method: One-chip color area sensor
File Source: DSC
Scene Type: Directly photographed
CFA Pattern: 28990
Custom Rendered: Normal process
Exposure Mode: 1
Digital Zoom Ration: 1
Focal Length In 35mm Film: 45mm
Scene Capture Type: Standard
Gain Control: High gain up
Contrast: Normal
Saturation: Normal
Sharpness: Normal
Subject Distance Range: Unknown
InteroperabilityIFDPointer: 28958
ExifIFDPointer: 2330
GPSInfoIFDPointer: 29006
Orientation: 1
YCbCr Positioning: 2
X Resolution: 300
Y Resolution: 300
Resolution Unit: 2
Date Time: 2016:03:31 08:46:29
Software: Microsoft Windows Photo Viewer 6.1.7600.16385

Before we begin I have a few questions for you. Maybe you can email me some responses or just reply here.

What would you like to do with your photography?
How long have you been shooting?
Is there anything stumping you right now?
Are you shooting RAW and do you know what that means?

Now the very first thing I noticed here is that you’re trying to do a few things. One is getting a little closer which is almost always good. The next is that you’ve added items to the frame that we’re not there before.

This is potentially a good idea to add interest and I like the experimentation.

There are a few things going on here.

You are shooting in a dark room so your camera is trying to compensate by bumping up it’s ISO to 3200. That is why the image looks kind of muddy/noisy in the dark areas of the frame.

When you shoot with such a high ISO (3200) bright areas can blow out easily. Meaning the bright part of your frame is completely white and has no information in it. This can be problematic if you try to make prints.

One thing to note here is that this room might not “feel” dark because your eyes have adjusted to it. But your camera is nowhere near as sophisticated as your eye and your brain.

Your camera was metering (trying to determine how much light there is) in pattern mode. This just means your camera evaluated the scene and tried to decide what settings to use.

It saw a relatively dark scene and tried it’s best to expose properly.

The reason this type of photo is very hard to achieve in one photo is that your camera’s dynamic range is not wide enough to capture it all. Dynamic range basically means how much information your camera can get in one photo from the darkest dark to the brightest bright parts. In this case that range is too wide. It can’t get all the detail in the bright parts and the dark parts.

Don’t worry if this feels confusing. All of this will make sense over time.

For now just understand what happened here. Your camera saw a dark scene and tried to do it’s best to shoot it. Also remember that dark in your mind is not the same as dark to a camera…

Another thing to take away here is you’ll want to understand how ISO works because this is what is making the image not work here. The ISO is so high that the noise in the photo is the main thing that doesn’t work here.

Here is a page on the topic of ISO.

In fact there are LOTS of pages on this site including this one for all the photography words and terminology.

Another thing here is that the color of the image feels a bit too warm and yellowish. This may be a mismatch with your white balance setting but I’m not exactly sure. Try to match your light environment to your white balance setting wherever possible. In this case it looks like Tungsten.

The absolute most important thing here is that you did really well in completing your first assignment here. You are experimenting and learning and that’s what’s important.

If anything is confusing now don’t worry, it will all become more and more intuitive and clear over time. Like everything, photography takes practice but you’re on the right track and you’re doing great.

Please email me any questions you have or just reply here!

Thanks.

[Author]

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