How to take great summer photos - Tip 5

The Pier in Naples, Florida

SUNSETS!

Sunsets have a magical power over us, making us stop we are doing and just gaze at the sky, feeling calm, romantic (?) and at peace with the world. We want to freeze and keep that moment forever so we get our cameras out - but often the pictures never seem to capture what we saw with our eyes and what we felt.

Sunsets are tricky - the bright orb in the sky fools the camera sensor, often making the foreground too dark as it over compensates for the bright sky. Or if we focus on something dark in the foreground the sky comes out too bright on our photograph. Ideally you should master things like Exposure Lock or Manual Exposure to get the picture you want but if you haven't got to grips with the techie stuff or your camera doesn't offer them, then there are some easy ways to still get a hot shot!

• Use the sunset scene mode - it uses the appropriate settings and will enhance the colours of the sky and the wispy clouds. Try a shot with and without it to see the difference.
• Wait until the sun is quite low in the sky otherwise it's just too bright. And then be quick as it sinks really quickly!
• Often the best colours appear in the sky when it's just gone below the horizon so don't stop shooting.
• Remember the rule of thirds for your composition (see Tip 4) and get your horizon straight.

Shot at Pickmere Lake Cheshire with sunset mode on a compact camera

• To create a silhouette make sure you're focusing on a bright area in the sky - this is when ideally you need to know a bit more about things like Exposure Lock to really control the results but you can get lucky.
• Silhouettes can give your sunset a story or a point of focus too. In the shot above, I was waiting for the water skier to come into the shot, when the dog ran up and paused for a second to watch - thank you, doggy!
• Don't be afraid to play with your photos in simple editing programmes  to increase contrast and warm up your shot like I did with the one below:

Arnside, South Lakes - photographers' dream

And sometimes it's nice to put the camera down and just watch the sun set with a G&T!

By Jane Burkinshaw. Share this post by clicking on one of the Share buttons on the right hand side. I'd love to hear your comments too!

How to take great summer photos - TIP 4 (Cheshire photography course with Jane Burkinshaw)

We've done a fair bit on taking photographs of people in the sunshine, so let's look now at

HOW TO TAKE GREAT PICTURES OF LANDSCAPES

Now I'll freely admit landscape photography isn't really my bag - I can capture a half decent picture on holiday but I take my hat off to the true landscape photographer greats - like Joe Cornish, one of my favourites. They devote an enormous amount of time to searching out great shots and planning the best time to photograph them, even going back time and again to get it just right.

But for us mere mortals there's some simple ways to make our landscape photos look better and here's one:

THE RULE OF THIRDS

Imagine your picture (the one you're going to take) is divided into thirds, horizontally and vertically and put the horizon on one of the horizontal thirds. This gives a much better composition than if you put the horizon across the centre.

 You can decide whether you have more sky or more land, depending on which has more interest.

On many cameras you can get a grid to display on the LCD screen to help you divide the scene into thirds. This also helps make sure your horizon is level!

Also - see whether your shot looks better as a portrait or landscape orientation - take both to compare.

So whilst the sun continues to shine have a practise! Tomorrow I might skip ahead to sunsets as we're getting such beautiful ones at the moment!

By Jane Burkinshaw. Share this post by clicking on one of the Share buttons on the right hand side. I'd love to hear your comments too!

A trip to Crosby Beach with Big Boy

After endless days of rain over Christmas we were desperate to get out somewhere - me particularly so as I had only been able to use my new Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 lens once since Christmas Day!

This is a real Big Boy of a lens - extremely sharp, focuses almost instantly and silently, is image stabilised and has a wide aperture of f/2.8 at every focal length. Basically it's great for making sure moving subjects are really sharp even when the light isn't great.


I first got my hands on one at a pet photography course in December and it went straight to the top of my list for Santa (I did help Santa out a bit with the cost!). I couldn't get this shot of a spaniel in flight with my best zoom lens - it just wouldn't focus fast enough nor let enough light in to achieve the amount of blurred background I wanted.

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On Christmas morning I barely had time to get one shot of our puppy, Ferb, before the holiday monsoon set in. It was well into the New Year before a free day and good weather came together at the same time. The beach seemed like a great idea, especially as Ferb hadn't been to the seaside before.

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Nic's wanted to see Antony  Gormley's "Another Place" art installation at Crosby Beach for a while (once he explained it was those naked statues of men staring out to see we were a bit more enthusiastic!).

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Conditions were perfect for an uplifting frolic across the sand and for getting used to Big Boy - bright, low sunshine, clear, flat light. At any other time of year the sun would have been too high and direct, causing harsh contrasts but it was perfect that day. The sun was at the right angle and bright enough to create silhouettes and I was able to get an amusing picture of Abi assessing one of the figures - we all know what she was looking at! Works well in black and white as it emphasises the contrast.

OK, so the naked statues weren't exactly going anywhere and I wanted some practice shooting moving subjects. The kids and puppy duly obliged by dashing around on the beach, somewhat complicated by the fact that Ferb was on a 30 metre long lead! To keep them in focus I used the AI Servo focusing mode, which I'll admit I've largely steered clear of, but it performed perfectly. You just have to remember to keep tracking your subject with the lens and it looks after the focusing. Takes a bit of practise but well worth it.

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It's not often we see Nic in full flight - he's renowned for falling over, so this is a rare sight indeed! I love Ferb in this one too!

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And freeze framing the kids kicking water around worked well too. (Spot the full frontal statue in the background!)

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Nic had made that fatal mistake of forgetting to put a memory card in his camera so we nipped into Crosby to buy one and to refuel. When we got back to the beach around 3pm the sun was lower in the sky, the light had changed significantly and the tide was in. I would have loved to have got a proper sunset shot of the statues being immersed in the sea but cold, bored kids and wet dog were clamouring to go home. So I made do with this shot instead and felt very jealous of the increasing numbers of people appearing with cameras and tripods.

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By Jane Burkinshaw. Share this post by clicking on one of the Share buttons on the right hand side. I'd love to hear your comments too!

Northwich Woodlands

This is definitely becoming my favourite place to walk the dog. I know I've gone on about it before but it really does offer such variety of scenery & wildlife & it's so accessible - free parking unless you start out at Marbury Park or the Anderton Boat Lift. I usually set off from Witton car park behind the tip - sounds lovely I know - or at the layby with the bacon van. The advantage of the latter is having a hot bacon & egg butty at either end of the walk (but not both!). Daisy is well known there now & has her usual order of crispy bacon fat. I've been to the Woodlands 3 or 4 times in the last week & can really see signs that Spring is just around the corner. Even today with an arctic wind blasting us, the sun was warm on our faces & many of the trees are sprouting fat buds. The water in the Flashes was a milky turquoise colour today, caused probably by the lime beds, but it's quite rare to see it such a vivid shade.

Another favourite section of the Woodland for me is the Anderton Nature Park. I usually approach it from Witton Mill, along the river Weaver. The sandy (slightly muddy at the moment) path snakes through the woodland & then alongside the river. The kids love this path with its steps down to landing stages for the anglers & the little bridges, which are fun on foot & hilarious on bikes. I can't wait to go again on a warm Summer's day when there'll be butterflies & dragonflies darting around. This last week I've made do with the occasional glimpse of a heron & the clarity of view that crisp, clear blue skies, low light and cold air combine to make. The Anderton Boat Lift and the Northwich Saltmine industrial buildings stand out in stark but beautiful contrast in this landscape. I don't think my photos do it full justice - they are quick snaps with dog in tow, but I have resolved to use the area as a location for some photo shoots as it is so rich in interesting backdrops & there's plenty to keep the kids interested.

By Jane Burkinshaw. Share this post by clicking on one of the Share buttons on the right hand side. I'd love to hear your comments too!