Tips for Improving Your Wildflower Photography

Canon 5DMKIII, 100mmL macro @ f/71., 1/320th second shutter, ISO 100, Lexar Digital Media. Hite's Cove, Merced River Canyon, California

Well spring has most certainly sprung here in the foothills of central California. Our hills are alive with our state flower – the golden poppy! There are also a plethora of other wildflowers that have begun to make their annual appearance.

I have just returned for co-instructing Gary Hart’s Spring Yosemite workshop. Neither of us could remember a year where the poppies were this bountiful, and as an extra bonus, Gary scheduled three sessions for participants to capture these lovely flowers! I had shot a bit on my way to Yosemite via the Merced River Canyon on Highway 140, so I really had four straight days photographing everything from grand view to macro! All this shooting reminded me of some of the difficulties with flower photography  – not the studio variety in which photographers control the scene, but in the actual field.

Here are some tips to help you as you venture out this spring:

1.) Part of the beauty with shooting poppies is that they need full sunlight in order for the petals to open. Generally this is the time of day when most serious landscape photographers are not in the field because the lighting is too harsh. Quite the opposite for flower photography. The key is in paying attention to the direction of the light. For the image above, I positioned myself literally inches off the ground (I have no center column with my tripod allowing me to flatten the legs). I also made sure that the poppies were backlit so the petals looked translucent. I also positioned the poppies against a non-distracting background (a shaded hill and the sky). Anytime I can eliminate the background, or soften it to be non-competing, I have succeeded. My viewer’s attention will be directed to the flowers! I used a macro lens at f/7.1 that allowed for a 1/320th second shutter and just timed a lull in the wind. Patience is the optimum word.

2.) The time of day one chooses to shoot flowers is also important. Though the above image was captured around 3:oo in the afternoon on a clear day, I would rather shoot in the morning. This is the time of the day when conditions are most calm. As the sun warms the ground, small updrafts (called thermals) begin the rear their ugly head (due the the heating of the ground) and the flowers begin to bob and weave. Tough condition if you are shooting macro.

3.) If the wind is moving the flowers around, you must use a faster shutter. What speed? That’s impossible to say as motion is a factor of both focal length, subject distance, and wind speed. There is no magic bullet formula I can pass on. Thankfully, we have LCD’s to immediately preview our results. With macro photography, I am shooting wide open. That means an aperture of f/2.8  for all of my lenses, but even f/4 would be fine. This should allow for a range of shutter speeds between 1/125th and 1/500th. Again, you are trying to soften the background as much as possible.

4.) Types of light. If you are faced with a blue sky day, then try as best you can to shoot backlit. If you have overcast (clouds or fog) then you are in luck. Generally the wind will be less of an issue regardless of the time of day, and also, contrast range will not be much of an issue so all the tones will record on your sensor. Indirect light (shooting in the shadows) also works. Soft light is your friend!

Dancing Sunflowers. Canon 1DsMKIII, 300mmL @f/5.6, 1/13th second shutter, ISO 200, Singh-Ray Circular Polarizer, Lexar Digital Media.

5.) If you can’t beat em – join em! I had spotted this field of sunflowers (not actually a spring flower) near my home a few years back and decided to try freezing them against the blue sky. Problem was, I was faced with a relentless stiff wind. Instead of getting frustrated, I decided to go with the wind and spent the next hour simply playing with various slower shutter speeds allowing my flowers to dance. Moral of the story: if the conditions aren’t cooperating, go with what is dealt! Don’t get mad, get creative!

Lupine Against Poppies - Merced River Canyon. Canon 5DMKIII, 70-200mmL @ f/4, 1/200th second shutter, ISO 100, Singh Ray Circular Polarizer, Lexar Digital Media.

6.) Look for complimentary colors in nature. I found this lupine amongst a field of poppies and isolated it with a 200mm focal length. I froze the lupine by using a relatively short shutter speed of 1/200th. The purple-blue color palette contrasted nicely against the softer warm hues of the out-of-focus poppies. The other key was that the focus was strictly on the foreground lupine allowing for all the other poppies to be non-distracting. Also, a cloud cover had moved over allowing for the scene’s contrast range to fit nicely with what my camera’s limited dynamic range sensor could handle.

Backlit Echiums, Pacific Grove, California. Canon 5DMKIII, 70-200mmL @ f/5.6, 1/250th second shutter, Lexar Digital Media.

7.) If the sun is relatively low in the sky, position the flower so it is backlit and allow the sun to add a rim light to each flower. I found these Echium candicans near the ocean in Pacific Grove and allowed the low afternoon sun to add this rim light, essentially adding a pop to each.

8.) Get low to the ground to allow for the flowers to look larger in your scene. This is specially the case if you use a wide angle lens and get close to a flower. The change in perspective along with a close focused flower can make even the tiniest of flowers appear larger than they really are – sort of an optical illusion.

So that’s it. Hopefully these tips help to make your next flower shooting session a success!

Canon 5DMKIII – High ISO Tests

Stars Over Big Sur Coast. Canon 5DMKIII, 24mmL @ f.2.0, 20-second timed exposure, 1600 ISO, Lexar Digital Media.

This week I finally got to do some real-world night photography with my new Canon 5DMKIII utilizing the much touted high ISO settings. I’ve seen lots of sample shoots on the internet but I needed to know what would work with my workflow.  Can I shoot high ISO files and submit them to my agency, Getty Images, without having the images rejected for excessive noise? Here is a summary of my tests.

I can comfortably say that images captured up to 1600 ISO can be processed with little or no worries of noise being a issue. BTW – all of my RAW files were prepped in Canon’s Digital Photo Professional, my only way of converting these images until Adobe Camera Raw puts out an update – which I hope will be soon! Once I did some basic adjustment with DPP, I opened the files into Photoshop CS5 and followed my standard workflow. BTW – If you wish to read more about my workflow, please read my blog article that I wrote for Nik Software. Note that I always apply a noise reduction layer after coming out of the RAW converter.

UPDATE: Since writing this blog, I have installed the Release Candidate of Adobe Camera Raw v.6.7. Initial tests seem normal and Raw images open fine!

In the image above, I was with some clients. We were not certain if we were going to get out of the fog as a persistent wall of the soup locked onto much of the coastline. As we climbed up to Hurricane Point, we realized we were above the fog and quickly got setup. What immediately caught my attention was the warm color the camera was picking up from the ambient light of Carmel – color that our eyes simply could not see. The brighter white you see is a car’s headlights illuminating the fog from underneath as it climbed up Highway 1 – pretty cool! The stars were crisp and sharp and the camera easily focused on the crescent moon that was off to my left (not included in frame). I also tried focusing of both Venus and Jupiter to test the autofocus sensitivity and it worked flawlessly. I have not yet had time to fine-tune my focus choices in my menu so this was all done with the camera’s default setting.

Sobranes Point, Garapatta State Park, Big Sur coast, Canon 5DMKIII, 16-35mmL @ f2.8, 30-second timed exposure, 3200 ISO, Lexar Digital Media.

Next I wanted to test some frames at 3200 ISO. The image above was a bit underexposed and taught me that I should perhaps leave the camera in its auto LCD brightness setting when shooting at night. I had placed it into standard mode on the prior day. The LCD is so bright that it gave me a somewhat brighter view than the image you see here. More tests will be needed with both settings. Getting back to the noise, luminance (contrast) noise was visible but very little color noise at 3200. After opening into PSCS5, I immediately applied a noise reduction layer using Nik DFine and it easily got rid of the noise without affecting much sharpness. As you can see, the fog had pushed in even deeper and was indeed covering the moon when I captured this frame, thus, the landscape had very little light. We had sent my friend Mike Hall down the trail about 60 yards and had him hold up a headlamp that we were all able to focus on. He in turn was able to focus on a car’s headlights on nearby Highway 1.

Sobranes Point, Garapatta State Park, Big Sur coast, Canon 5DMKIII, 16-35mmL @ f2.8, 30-second timed exposure, 6400 ISO, Lexar Digital Media.

Here is a scene looking a bit more towards the south to pick up more of the headlands. The only change I made was to bump the ISO up a full stop to 6400. This did bring out some of the features on the headlands and did add a bit of color noise to the frame. Fortunately, Nik DFine was able to deal with it just fine.

I should mention that all these images were sharpened for the web using Nik Sharpener Pro 3.0 and by using Color Range, I removed sharpening of the sky, fog, and water. I only sharpened the landmass.

As with any new camera, one night of testing does not answer all questions. In my opinion, I would not hesitate shooting at 1600 ISO and would even comfortably use 3200 for most of my night work. Fortunately most of my lenses that I use for my night work are f/2.8  or faster. Should I ever feel the need to push to ISO 6400, I would, but would also realize that I will have some noise issues but not too extreme.

I did not add images with 100% crop magnifications. As I said, there are plenty of web sites that are offering that sort of analysis. For me, it was more about what I felt would work and meet the high tolerances of my editors at Getty. This camera will more than meet my needs and will take my night photography to the next level!

Canon 5DMKIII – First Impressions

Spring Hills, Diablo Range, Southern Santa Clara Valley, California.
Canon 5DMKIII, 16-35mmIIL, f/16, 1/10th second, 400 ISO, In-Camera HDR +3/-3 brackets. Click Image for Larger View.

After months of anticipation, I finally received my new Canon 5DMKIII yesterday afternoon. More than anything, I was excited by the high ISO test images I had seen on the web. Coupled with the fact that this camera would be replacing my 4-year-old Canon 1DsMKIII, and well, I just couldn’t wait to get going! The camera arrived mid-afternoon, and after getting a battery charged and spending close to two hours with my head buried in the instruction manual, I decided it was time to take my new toy  for a test drive!

I drove to one of my favorite places near my home, Lone Tree Road, in San Benito County outside of Hollister, California. Within 15 minutes I was viewing lush oak-lined rolling hills. As a bonus, there were some interesting storm clouds hanging around. New camera, peaceful setting, what more could one ask for? The goal of the shoot was to test not only the camera, but also some high ISO frames. What I wasn’t planning on was testing the new in-camera HDR feature. I have to admit that I have had an ongoing love/hate relationship with HDR. Trying to make a living as a landscape stock photographer and workshop instructor means I have to be fluent with the plethora of software out there, but what fits into my workflow can be quite different. Gaudy looking HDR’s simply don’t cut it in the world of stock photography. Thus I would spend hours trying to get natural looking images. Sometimes this would be the result of HDR programs, but more often it would involve complicated layer and masking in Photoshop. I am also a big fan of graduated neutral density filters and employ them quite often, but not all scenes fit for these filters. Now I had an opportunity to see what in-camera HDR was all about. This, to the best of my knowledge, was a first for Canon.

Click Image for a Larger View.

With in-camera HDR, the 5DMKIII fires three frames (the user has the option of retaining these frames or discarding them), one frame to the exposure indicated by the camera, then one frame under and one frame over. The user has the option of setting Auto, +-1, +-2, or +-3. I found myself using the latter two settings as I was working within the last hour through sunset. The image leading off this article was a +-3 setting captured in manual mode. I metered the sky as a starting point and the camera nailed it on the first try. I confirmed this by checking all three color channels in my histogram. I was working in RAW+Large JPEG mode and opted on most of my HDR captures to not save the bracketed frames. The resulting HDR is saved in JPEG format only. The image here is straight out of the camera with only a quick Curves adjustment to set highlight/shadow points. One also has a choice of 5 processing affects: Natural, Art Standard, Art Vivid, Art Bold, and Art Embossed. I randomly chose Art Vivid for my captures as I did not have time to consult the manual. In retrospect, it appears that Art Standard will best preserve the highlight/shadow areas though the resulting image will be a bit flatter. Not a problem as I would bump the contrast back in during post. I’ll have to test this further.

Here is another HDR from a scene containing dark shadows and bright highlights. This image has not been processed beyond what the camera gave me other than a Curves adjustment to again set highlight/shadow points (remember these files appear a bit flat). This again was captured at +-3 and Art Vivid.

Canon 5DMKIII, HDR +-3, Art Vivid. Click Image for a Larger View.

While having fun shooting these amazing in-camera HDR’s, I realized that I had yet to test the camera’s improved ISO performance, and as the sun lowered below the horizon, I found some isolated poppies that had closed their petals for the day. I placed my Canon 100mmL macro on my the 5DMKIII and got low to the ground. I played with numerous settings but this was the frame I liked best and was captured at an amazing 6400 ISO!

Canon 5DMKIII, f/8, 1/32th shutter, ISO 6400, RAW converted with with Canon Digital Photo Professional converter. Click Image for Larger View.

High ISO shooting will open-up entirely different ways of working in the field. Flower photography will be made easier with a slight wind as I would not hesitate to dial-up my ISO to get a faster shutter. Moreover, night photography should be a blast! I will be attempting some night work starting early next week!

So what were my first impressions? Suffice it to say I was texting and calling my colleagues with giddy excitement. The new DIGIC 5+ processor yielded images of outstanding quality. Moreover, this camera had the pro focusing system that one will find in the new Canon 1DX (a first for a D-series camera)! It offers a ISO range of 100-25,600 (though my initial tests show that 6400 may be the limit that I will use – more testing is needed). The menu interface will take me a bit of time but useful items such as Mirror Lockup are easy to find!

Here are the key features of the Canon 5DMKIII:

I will be posting more as I put the camera through its paces in the coming weeks – stay tuned!

A Simplified Workflow Using Nik Software

Sunrise, Tower of the Virgins, Zion National Park, Utah Canon 1DsMKIII, 24-70mmL @ f/11, 0.4 second shutter, ISO 100, Singh-Ray LB Polarizer

In the latest Nik Software blog post, I have written a piece about a new workflow that I have been testing – a combination of Adobe Camera RAW and Nik Filters. The beauty of the workflow is that it speeds up the process of working with RAW files. I have refined it to the point that I can now process a RAW image, start-to-finish, in under 10 minutes for most images!  I’m certainly not advocating that this workflow is the only one that I use as I still process some images the more traditional method in Photoshop; nonetheless,  it can be considered a viable add-0n to your bag of tricks!

To read more about this method, please read: A Simplified Workflow Using Nik Software.

Pay Attention to Your Emotional Tugs

Crepuscular Rays Over Vineyard, San Benito County, California

Finding scenes worth photographing in nature can sometimes be a challenge. No matter how often I go out with our camera, there are those days when the images just don’t seem to materialize. Then there are times when I begin photographing a scene, invest quite a bit of time, only to realize the picture is just not there. How do we avoid this? Is it simply a matter of luck? I don’t have all the answers, I can only tell you what works for me.

One of the key connections with a scene that I pay attention to is to turn inward and ask myself, am I feeling an emotional connection with this scene?

In other words, is there something about what I am pointing my camera at that is stirring something inside of me. If the answer is no, then I have learned to move on. If the scene I want to photograph is not moving me, then I simply cannot expect it to move anyone else. If on the other hand the answer is “yes,” then I need to figure out what it is that is moving me. I have a list of items that I share with my workshop students as to what I like to look for when I am out photographing nature. It ranges from quality light and vibrant color, to atmosphere and connections between lines and shapes. There is more on my list and I use it often, especially when I feel visually stuck. The key, is to feel something!

With today’s image, I was on one of my drives where I just go out and try to follow the light. This image was captured back in April 2005 after a late-afternoon storm began to clear near my home in coastal Santa Clara Valley. I decided to head towards the southern vineyards of Almaden and see if I could find an image. I saw an opening in the clouds and hoped that as the sun lowered towards the horizon that I would get some crepuscular rays. After a 30-minute wait my light began to arrive! Believe me, my emotional tug was strong. I had pretty much previsualized my composition and now it was just a matter of executing my craft. I did so with the help of a Singh-Ray 3-stop soft graduated neutral density filter to hold back the sky and allow the vineyards to open up.

What I was feeling was a sense of radiant energy. The vineyard and spring hills of the Gabilan Range were extremely verdant and I wanted that to come through also. Yet the key element was in capturing the rays. It was the wonderful light from the heavens that was moving me. I felt strongly moved with the beauty and wanted to share that emotion through my image. Hopefully I succeeded!

The key is to feel – feel something. I then ask myself what it is I am feeling and that is what I try to capture. If this scene did not stir something within me I would not have put the camera to my eye.

Unexpected Moments – Is There a Camera Nearby?

Crepuscular Rays Over Santa Clara Valley, San Jose, California.

I absolutely love unexpected moments when an amazing scene develops right in front of me. I’m sure you have had the same experience. I was told by my photojournalism professor way back when in my college days, to always have a camera with you. Back then that meant traveling everywhere with my 35mm bag and a host of lenses. He went through a list of famous images, moments in history, where a person was fortunate enough to have had a camera with them and got the moment on film. I was fanatical all throughout my 20′s to heed his advice. Then, marriage, kids, and more responsibility came along and, well, the camera eventually was relegated to the trunk, then eventually never finding its way to the car at all unless I was on assignment!

Nowadays I do have a camera with me at all times – my trusty iPhone! Seriously, the camera is pretty awesome and the apps are what can bring the image to life – no more missed moments! But that is not really what I wanted to address with this blog; instead, I would like to discuss where we might find these unexpected moments, and truthfully, they can be just about anywhere. The image accompanying this blog was captured back in April, 2005. I was on my way to cover a NHL game in San Jose and spotted this scene developing in south San Jose looking west towards the Gabilan Mountain range from the 101 Freeway. It was late afternoon (around 4:30 pm) when these incredible crepuscular rays started materializing through the broken storm clouds. I knew I had to get my car off the freeway and immediately took the next exit ramp, grabbed my camera and a 70-200mm lens and braced the camera against the roof of my car (I did not have a tripod with me).

To the best of my recollection, I fired off about 5-8 frames and moved on. I didn’t think much about the image but then realized during processing that the front rays appeared with a silver tinge while the distant ray recorded with a more warmish tone. I simply allowed the mountains to go to silhouette as this image was really about the incredible god beams emanating from the heavens.

Perhaps the moral of the story would be that if I did not have a camera with me I would have never made the image. Would that have been a tragedy? Not at all. I would have still been able to enjoy the beautiful light, and believe me I did. Back when I made this image the iPhone, or smartphones in general, did not exist. The first iPhone did not hit the market until January 2007 and sported a 2 MP camera. Fast forward to today and the 4s comes equipped with an 8 MP! No optical zoom you say? Well there are third-party lenses available. Regardless, the point I am trying to make is that we are really never without a camera as long as we have a phone, and we really can find landscape images everywhere if we just keep our eyes open to the possibilities.

I did not have to travel to Big Sur or Yosemite or Zion to capture this frame. It was captured just south of a major city.

So keep your eyes open when you are out. Look for those cool moments that just randomly seem to appear, and most importantly, have some form of a camera with you. And if you don’t, just enjoy the moment. Besides, isn’t that really what entices us in the fist place?

“Define the Moment, or the Moment Will Define You!”

Oak Creek at Red Rock Crossing, Sedona, Arizona

I’m a huge movie buff. Perhaps it has to do with my affinity towards visual excitement; regardless, I just love watching movies. Every once in a while, there will be a line from a movie that gets stuck in my head, similar to how a song gets stuck at times. I always try to reason why the line resonates with me and often-times I find it relates more to my career as a photographer. I wish I could say that only cerebral movies do the trick, but every once in a while a line comes from a less-than-stellar flick. Last night I awoke with that movie philosopher, Tin Cup (a.k.a. Roy McAvoy – played by Kevin Costner), who utters the line trying to explain why he hit a nearly impossible shot to his caddie (Romeo – played by Cheech Marin). Costner, I mean McAvoy quips, It was a defining moment, and when a defining moment comes along, you either define the moment or the moment will define you.

I got thinking back on many of my successful shoots and images. What made them successful? Why do they resonate? Well part of that answer lies in recognizing that you are facing a defining moment. Perhaps it is a moment when the light is just right, perhaps it is a lucky circumstance like a rainbow materializing. Many events can lead to a defining moment. The key is in taking advantage of that moment. Can you work quickly enough to take advantage of what is in front of you? Can you find an awesome composition? Can you find a way for all your elements in your scene to work in a cohesive manner? Can you find a pleasing perspective? Do you know what lens you need? Can you make the correct exposure? The list goes on and on, usually at warped speed. I find at this moment a real rush of excitement. I know it is adrenaline, but responding in a calm manner is essential. In fact, learning to calm one’s mind at a moment like this takes practice. Miss a step in the process and the image could be ruined. Remember, great light waits for no one!

These defining moments don’t come along all that often. We can up the ante for possibly witnessing these moments based on the time of day we choose to work and the weather we choose to work in. Early and late in the day is when I choose to be out, and if the weather turns bad – that ups my chances of something unique. Lastly, one must be fully comfortable with one’s camera. It must come as second-nature as to where to access all your controls. This is why I choose to shoot in manual mode. I really long for the days when cameras were as simple as offering: ISO, aperture (I realize this is on lens), and shutter. Today’s computerized multifunctional devices can only add to our confusion unless we work with them on a regular basis. Also, as landscape photographers, we are out at crazy hours. Sleep is a luxury and is usually in short supply. So we generally are not at our sharpest, but still we must think clearly and make proper choices.

The image of Oak Creek at Red Rock Crossing in Sedona, Arizona was certainly a defining moment. I captured this frame while on a scouting trip back in 2008 for what is now included in my Northern Arizona Workshop. I had photographed this location many times in the past but never with dark storm clouds. As sunset neared, the light got warmer and more saturated on Cathedral Rocks and I positioned myself to capture not only their reflection, but also the sweep of the creek. The timing was imperative as I had no idea how long the light would last – it was certainly a defining moment! With this image, I can say I defined the moment; the moment did not define me. Had I missed the shot, I would have felt differently.

I have witnessed many amateurs over the years missing their defining moment for a plethora of reasons: they were too slow, unprepared, fumbling with equipment, not double-checking their settings, becoming too wrapped-up in the technical and forgetting the visual, getting too wrapped up in the visual and forgetting the technical. The list goes on. Every once in a while I see pros missing the moment, but it is rare. If one makes his/her living with a camera it is not by lucky chance. Generally it is because they have spent years honing their craft and are ready when their defining moment comes.

My advice for those of you who do miss your defining moment: Don’t beat yourself up. Learn from what went wrong and work hard to fix it so it doesn’t happen again. Beating yourself up only leads to negative thoughts and we don’t want those seeping into our minds when faced with our next defining moment. So be as prepared as possible. Use your camera on a regular basis to familiarize yourself with all the settings. Shoot regularly. Work on improving your vision skills. Lastly, and I have actually seen this happen, don’t try to work on a new technique when a defining moment is happening – stick with what you know best. Do this and I guarantee you will define your next great photographic moment!