A Fall Gift from Ingrid (Herring Cove, Nova Scotia)

When Ingrid asked if I'd be up for one more outdoor fall session, my first comment was "you know what temperature it is outside, right?" After some discussion (Scotland was mentioned, as we'd done some work there in near freezing temperatures), we agreed that we'd at least try the following morning, but everything would depend on the weather.

Digital Original

The weather-gods smiled us, and bright and early the next day, Ingrid and I were at the coast, working away. Any thought of working with vistas overlooking the ocean was nixed by the morning's brisk wind, but on the lee side of the hill the air was much more sedate, and we set to work. The space was somewhat limited in terms of spaces for Ingrid to work in, but the above rock proved to be a perfect space to make the first success of the session.

Digital original

After ten minutes or so at the coast, we packed up and headed a little inland, hoping for even less wind, and warmer temperatures; this turned out to be a little optimistic, but we did managed to find a beautiful twisted dead tree that was the perfect setting for a more dramatic pose - this time however, rather than photographing directly into the light, I opted to use the raking morning light to flood across Ingrid's body, and set it off against the surrounding bog.

Digital original

Towards the end of the session (as Ingrid actually began to admit she was getting a little cool), I made a series of images working with the low foliage that is so ever present on the Nova Scotia coast land; in the fall it turns a brilliant red. The best of these compositions was the portrait above, as much for the look on Ingrid's face as for the momentary magic of her hair being tossed by the increasingly brisk morning breeze.

Digital original

The last photos of the morning were made with the brightest leaves we could find; the irony about the session was that it actually fell on the far side of the best autumn colour - we'd hoped to find a riot of colour, but almost every tree was either bare or yellow. This one oak tree had the richest shade of red, so won the prize of being the last setting in which Ingrid posed in 2015!

An Afternoon Field Trip (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

By this time, most of the fall colours around Halifax are gone - only the occasional fallen leaf has any bright colour - in this case however, the right leaf was in the right place! I spent about 30 minutes working with this single scene, experimenting with shutter speed, focal length and point of view.

Digital original

The most fascinating thing about the leaves in water was how much the tone of the water changed depending on the angle of view; the first images takes most of its colour from the surrounding yellow trees, where the above image is only coloured by the blue sky above.

Digital original

The final image is more of a technical experiment than anything else; my new camera (a Canon 5DsR) is my first Canon with multiple exposure capability. The first obvious application of this is the Orton effect (when an out of focus image is blended with an in focus image). I am not sure how I feel about the result (to be honest, I'd be more interested in trying it with a Nude), but it was great to have something new to mess around with, technique-wise.

A Morning Field Trip (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

The Halifax skyline has been littered with construction cranes for the past year or two, and from time to time I have investigated them with a camera, but this is the best image I have made of them to date, primarily because of how well the intersecting lines work.

Digital original, 3 frame exposure blend

Part of the focus of this field trip was using the new Lightroom Photo Merge HDR process to deal with scenes of extreme contrast; the above image, of the rising sun back-lighting morning cloud, was a perfect scene to create an exposure blend, needing three different exposures to cover the full range of tones from highlight to shadows. Lightroom did a perfect job of blending them together.

Digital original

As I was walking back to my car from the field trip, I happened to walk past an Keith's Hall, an historic building which recently had its facade restored. As it was a Sunday morning, there was almost no traffic, so I was able to work with my camera in mid-street to make this classic elevation view of the porch.

A Waterfront Field Trip (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

One of the reasons I choose the morning to do field trips along the waterfront is because the lower, angular light in the morning creates great shadows, which help give birth to photographs like this.

Digital original

The three tortured street lamps are a waterfront sculpture. Usually I photograph them much closer with a wide lens to exaggerate the twisted forms, but I caught a glimpse of this vantage point, with all three lights intersecting, as I walked along the waterfront, and changed to a long lens to make this view.

Digital infrared original

I've been photographing the Emera Headquarters since before it was renovated, but with so much glass on the building face, it is so different from day to day.

A Tilt-Shift One-on-One (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original, 3 frame exposure blend

This past Spring was the first time I've taught a class on Architectural Photography, but much to my surprise, it turned out to be very popular. Recently, one of the students from that course acquired a tilt-shift lens, so this was a field trip to help demystify the lens.

Digital original, 3 frame exposure blend

The above image was made using a rise on the lens, moving it vertically upwards to permit the camera to stay level, and avoid convergence (when a building gets narrower at the top in a photograph).

Digital original, 3 frame exposure blend

The second image of the old Halifax Memorial Library (above) was made from the same camera position as the first (note the position of the poster pillar on the right, and the branch coming out of the building on the left), but this time, the camera was turned so it was parallel to the building (pointing towards the right corner, basically), and then the lens was shifted to the left, and up, to compose the image. Such is the magic of a tilt-shift lens.

Digital original, 6 frame exposure blend

Towards the end of the session, we shifted to photographing the new Halifax Library; as opposed to correcting the convergence inherent when a camera is pointed up at a building, I decided to over correct it, and point the camera downwards, and purposely introduce keystone distortion (when a building is larger at the top than the bottom) - the result was really pleasing, if a little wacky.

The other technique being used in the image is exposure blending - in this case, I was experimenting with the new HDR Photo Merge feature in Lightroom CC - it was less than pleasing in this case, as it lead to odd pink highlights in the sky (where clouds moved during the making of the 6 source exposures). Fortunately, I can do a similar thing by hand in Photoshop, avoiding the issue (I posted the result with the issue here more as an academic example than anything else).

A Shutter Speed Field Trip (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

The final, bright colours of fall make a lovely counterpoint to the soft flow of the small stream into which they have fallen.

Digital original

Ever since I picked up a camera, I've been fascinated with how motions looks in a photograph. In this case, I really enjoyed the delicate curve in the yellow leaf on the rock, and how the blurred water mirrors it.

Digital original

The magic of working with moving water is how different speeds of flow look different in the same image; on the extreme left of this image, the water was moving much faster than on the right, providing a nice mix of flow in the resulting image.

A Waterfront Field Trip (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital infrared original

This morning's field trip was spend walking along the Halifax water front - I made the above image in a children's play ground, made all the more magical for the capture being made in infrared.

Digital original

The three blue window panes caught my eye, but initially I was at a loss as to how to work them into a composition - then I realized if I waked back a little, I could break up the form of the window with the light post!

Digital original

As I was packing up my equipment for the day, I caught a glimpse of the evening sky, and immediately changed lenses and made this image - a lovely end to the day.

Three Women in Silks! (Halifax, Nova Scotia)

Digital original

This session was a real anomaly for me; after a recent session, I was discussing things with a model when she mentioned wanting photos of her performing with silks; always happy to help a model out with photo related things, I offered to make some photos...and after several weeks of planning, she and two of her friends met me at the silks studio, and we got under way.

Digital original

Fortunately, the studio was large enough for me to set up lighting, so I could use studio flash to light the performers; the back wall was mostly black, so it only took a small amount of post production to take the background down to almost black.

Digital original

I really enjoyed working with the silks performers; I couldn't help but see the potential in the medium for fine art nudes, but it is so far out of my regular approach and focus that it is likely never to be pursued. It was fun to do none-the-less!