Short and sweet

1. This small animal is a hyrax. I used a 500mm lens to take this, and it’s commonplace to use a large aperture and forget about depth of field when there is no background. But with shallow DOF, it’s easy to focus on the eyes and end up with the nose out of focus. Use at least f/11 to insure sufficient focus throughout. 2. As winter approaches, look for beautiful, abstract designs in ice. Make sure the back of the camera, i.e. the plane of the digital sensor, is parallel with the ice when you shoot. This helps maintain complete depth of field so the image is sharp edge to edge. You won’t be happy with anything less.

3. To expose for a subject with off-camera flash where the background is discernable, you have to take two light readings or two test exposures: One for the subject, and one for the bacckground. The ambient light exposure is done first to determine the f/stop. Then the flash exposure uses that f/stop. 4. The burn and dodge tools are extremely creative tools in creating drama in photographs. By highlighting certain areas with the dodge tool to make them light against the rest of the picture, and then to darken other areas creates visually compelling results. I usually use the tools at 50% opacity which gives better control. §

Patagonia Photo Tour

April 20 - May 1, 2023