Digital Photo - September 2016

DIGITAL PHOTO SEPTEMBER 2016 ISSUE 211

FREE 20 LIGHTROOM PRESETS VIDEO CD ONE-CLICK ENHANCEMENTS TO INSTANTLY TRANSFORM YOUR LANDSCAPE IMAGES

95 MINS OF EXPERT VIDEOS

Improve every shot you take

65

PROJECTS

TIPS & IDEAS TO TRY NOW!

LOOK INSIDE

NEW ADVENTURES IN LANDSCAPES

New adventures in

LANDSCAPES See the world in a fresh way with our expert tips

FREE LIGHTROOM PRESETS

COPING WITH CONTRAST HARSH LIGHT? NO PROBLEM!

COPING WITH CONTRAST

Shoot amazing holiday pics Get creative – whatever the weather

Master wildlife photography

Camera skills that really make a difference

Go big with a wide-angle lens

Sigma, Tamron & Tokina tested head-to-head

SEPTEMBER 2016 ISSUE 211 £4.99

PLUS WWW.DPMAG.CO.UK

Enhance shots in Lightroom

Create an adventure map

Experiment with composition

INSPIRING TECHNIQUES AND STUNNING IMAGES!

Add motion to make an impact Pro Photoshop secrets revealed

PLANET PHOTO Your fresh fix of inspiration from the world’s best photographers

A fast shutter speed of 1/800sec captured the action as the yacht cut through the choppy waves.

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ADVENTURES

Time and tide

Camera Nikon D3x &14-24mm lens Exposure 1/800sec @ f/4, ISO 200 Visit www.kurtarrigo.com

GET THIS SHOT Waterproof housing for DSLRs costs more than £1000. A cheaper option is to purchase an action camera, such as a GoPro, that comes complete with housing.

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KURT ARRIGO

Capturing a great image is hard enough on dry land, so you can appreciate the skill Kurt Arrigo needed to show when lining up this shot as the yacht rolled around on choppy waves. “The idea was to capture the spirit of the yacht, which had been built over the last seven years,” explains Kurt, who is based on the island of Malta.

The pro shooter wanted to show the feeling and flow of the boat close to the water and, as it was a rough sea, this meant protecting his camera in an Aquatec housing.

“As a sailor, these conditions are second nature to me so I had anticipated the challenges.”

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Our expert tips will help you capture well-known locations in a whole new way.

TIP 1

MIKE SHAW

VIEW THROUGH A CRYSTAL BALL

The world is full of amazing views, but when greeted with a scene that’s as wide as the eye can see, if can be difficult to capture the full location in one frame. One solution is to shoot a panorama, but what other options are there? Introducing a crystal ball to the scene provides a quirky element of foreground interest and, because of its convex shape, it acts in the same way as a wide-angle lens, capturing a vast view of the location in the glass. You can pick these crystal balls up for around a tenner from internet auction sites.

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New adventures in

LANDSCAPES

New adventures in

LANDSCAPES Landscape photography is a journey and once in a while it pays to step off the well-beaten path. Try these fresh techniques for stunning scenic shots… WORDS BY MATTY GRAHAM

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PHOTOSHOP GENIUS

ADD NATURAL FRAMES FOR IMPACT Focus a viewer’s attention by using selective duplication to create a frame that’s in context TECHNIQUE BY MATT HIGGS

• Software Photoshop or Elements • Image type You’ll need a portrait with a subject that’s set against a natural background

S

ometimes you take a photo that you love, but the background doesn’t complement the subject in quite the way you’d like. In this portrait a wild flowerbed was the ideal summer backdrop but, on review, it wasn’t dense enough to give the burst of colour originally envisioned. Thankfully with the magic of Photoshop, we can make the border more flourishing using selective duplication to mutiply its

flowers. In fact, we can go even further, and use the careful positioning of these new flowers to frame the subject perfectly, drawing the viewer into the image and adding context. The same simple-to-follow technique could be used to increase the number of birds in a sky, or perhaps the amount of bokeh in points of out-of-focus light, instantly increasing the sense of drama and impact in the final image. Here’s how it’s done...

The flowers behind the subject made an interesting backdrop, but were too few and far between to make the portrait really stand out.

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MATTY GRAHAM

Before

ADD A NATURAL FRAME

VIDEO LESSON ON THE CD

After With the wild flowers now duplicated and the photo brightened, the final image is much bolder and far more summery in its feel.

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HOW DID THEY DO THAT? A DIY approach to special effects helped created this stunning image.

“The crow and the dove” This image is part of a personal project that I’m working on to develop a more complex and finished story. Like most of my scale model projects, I tried to achieve the majority of the work in-camera, but with this shot I gave it a twist, combining a real life model – the boy – with a scale model – the boat. Both boy and boat were shot with the same light set-up, at the same angle and the same focal length, but a different distance. The fog effect was created with dry ice which was applied around the model boat as well as the boy. When working with people you have to be cautious as the dry ice is so cold that it burns the skin within seconds of any contact.

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SECRETS BEHIND THE SHOT

MINIATURE

MAGIC Felix Hernandez Rodriguez has an amazing ability to make conceptual visions a reality WORDS BY MATTY GRAHAM

T

he technical side of Photoshop is easy, the hard part is staying childish, foolish and dreaming up new ideas,” explains Felix, a pro photographer and digital artist based in Cancun, Mexico. The Photoshop expert creates conceptual masterpieces that mix scale model props with real people and real-life locations. Felix’s skill lies firmly – and impressively – in finding inspiration in everyday objects as well as his dreams. Combined with a talent at turning ordinary household products (you’ll be amazed what he can do with flour) into Hollywoodstyle special effects, it’s no surprise Felix’s portfolio site has been viewed over a million times! We asked the creative compositer to share the secrets behind his most famous images...

FELIX HERNANDEZ RODRIGUEZ

“

For the base shot of the boat Felix used a focus stacking technique. This involves shooting multiple images and merging them together to achieve maximum depth-of-field.

By combining three or four frames of the dry ice, it gave a layered effect to the fog, which looks more natural.

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GO ULTRA-WIDE! Want to capture more of a scene than ever before? Check out one of these three fantastic full-frame compatible wide-angle lenses…

TEST BY MATT HIGGS

W

ith their short focal lengths that produce expansive angles of view, ultra-wide lenses are the perfect tool for dramatic imagery. From sweeping landscape vistas to immersive in-situ portraiture, they open up opportunities for shots that simply couldn’t be captured in any other way. Helping to increase the impression of both depth and scale, their distinctive distortion gives photos a stylish edge that sets them apart from images taken at longer focal lengths. While some may see them as a specialist piece of equipment, there are very few genres of photography where the creative

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use of wide-angles hasn’t led to some of its most popular creations. With that in mind, everyone should consider investing in a wide-angle optic for their kitbag.

We reviewed three of the best third-party models available to discover which offered the best combination of performance, features and value. All three of our chosen optics are designed for full-frame sensors, but could be used with compatible APS-C bodies (albeit with the effect of sensor-crop which reduces their angle of view), making them a solid investment. Read on to find out which lens took our coveted gold award...

How we did the test All three lenses were attached to a full-frame camera body and taken out on location to capture a variety of real-life scenes, during which time we assessed their handling. The RAW files produced on location were then imported into Lightroom, where they were assessed side by side at 100%, with all lens correction and sharpening options turned off.

The optics were then tested once more at a range of apertures and focal lengths in our dedicated lab using specialist charts. This second batch of images was then also compared, before conclusions were reached.

ULTRA-WIDE GROUP TEST

WHAT TO LOOK FOR Focal length

Aperture range

Shorter lengths mean a wider angle of view can be captured.

Wider apertures produce shallower depths-of-field in shots and allow faster shutter speeds.

Stabilisation

Fit

In-built vibration compensation makes shake-free handheld shots easier to achieve.

These lenses are all available in a variety of mounts. Make sure that one of those available will fit your camera.

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