A Woman in Red

I photographed Leah last summer.  She is beautiful and gorgeous. As you see, she was wearing eye catching red dress. Since the color of her dress is intense pure red, I requested her to stand in front of old back wall. That brings good contrast between pail wall and her, and she is more standing out in the image.

Now, a photographer have to work a little bit harder on the computer.  I wanted to enhance my inner imagination of kind of Gothic, like Gotham city in Tim Burton version of Batman. So added rusty “yogoshi” weathering effect on entire image.

I would be glad if you see the mood I saw in my imagination.

Please click the idea to view larger image.

Crocus – A messenger of the spring

Calgarians experienced extremely mild winter of 2015 to 2016. But still it is good to find a sign of spring arrived. I visited Drumheller and I found many crocuses blossoming in the badlands soil. Crocus would be a messenger telling us it is the end of long winter.

Snap with film – Grainy portraits

When going shooting, I still bring a film camera, even to serious sessions. These  images on film are for myself,…just for satisfying my artistic ego. When I have chances to “snap”, I tend to pull my film camera from a camera bag. So these photos may not be published forever; just sit in my photo album. A camera I take with me varies depends on my feeling. It can be Nikon F3 and expecting “thin line” sharp image, or old Minolta and expecting beautiful bokhe. Sometimes I expect very sharp images from medium format camera, Mamiya  645pro; some other days, I try pinhole with rangefinder camera to get ethereal feels. This time, I wanted to try very grainy images from  Ilford HP5 B&W film (Iso 400) pushed to 3200.

Although last time I tried the grainy photo from the same method was about 10 years ago. I am pretty satisfied the result this time. I used the telephoto lens made in early 1960’s. I like this lens for portraits because its contrast is not harshly high compared to modern lenses. I can get mild and gentle portraits but well balanced images. This character of the lens looks more distinguishable with film than digital. I often feel film is honest…..! So I have to be a little more serious while I snap.

My shadow by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Black and white portraits frm Arts hotel – 1 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Black and white portraits frm Arts hotel – 2 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Flash light in Landscape photographey.

I had a vacation this fall again. I visit Lake O’Hara and Jasper every year to pursue leaves changes. Although I had bad weather last two years, the sun was smiling at me most of the time this year in Lake O’Hara. However, it means light condition was a little harsh for photography. So I had to use HDR a lot in Lake O’Hara.

In Jasper, the weather was not as beautiful as when I had been in Lake O’Hara. But lighting condition at the golden time is usually difficult. I did not want to use HDR for this shot. Instead of the HDR, I tried off-camera flash light to the boats. I added tinge of colour with gels.

Rainy Evening in Japser, Alberta – 2 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Please click the photo for the larger size.

Evening with Large Format Cameras (2)

As I mentioned in my last blog, I would like to showcase Janice’s and my photo from the large format photo outing in May.  Although, for the location, we considered Big Hill Spring Park and Glenbow Ranche Provincial Park, we chose the Cochrane Ranche Historic site, which may be a least attractive location for photographing. The Glenbow Ranche park is usually windy and it may be hard to use large format cameras with bellows even though we could expect more attractive landscapes due to some iconic spots and open sky. The Big Hill Spring Park has many small waterfalls along with a trail. It must be great and maybe easier location for nature photography.  On the other hand,  Cochrane Ranche Historic site is located in the town of Cochrane.  If I wanted to include sky, houses came into a frame. The park does not have iconic spots or “keywords” like waterfalls.

I think Sam chose the difficult location since it is a truly good practice to create images in any situations and stimulate eyes. Furthermore, the cameras we used were 4×5 large format cameras, which requires expensive film and many adjustments before pressing a shutter-release. You can imagine how challenging it is. We have to really slow down and observe situation. I think this type of the practice is a good way to develop own styles, rather than just a being a technically good photographer.

I think of two abilities which photographer should pay attention at a scene (besides finding good subjects). The first one is reading lights. The second one would be knowing perspective of the lenses, which is related to composition. One good thing about large format cameras is we cannot use zoom lenses. Through my experience, prime lenses help us to understand how perspective works in composition. Also we have to compose and adjust bellows with an up-side-down image projected to a screen. This really force me to slow down and compose more carefully.

So first image is Janice’s image, which her very first experience of 4×5.

By the way only brightness has been adjusted and sharpening was applied to all the images since scanned images are usually degraded from originals. Some people may think the sky is overexposed, actually, she requested pushing 1 stop therefore the overall image is lit perfectly. Moreover, it is her own tone and her style. When analyzing photos by master-photographer’s from film age, I am sometimes impressed by their ability to CONTROL exposure. They selectively allow whiteout or blackout. You know they did not have histogram or screen at that time.

 

This is my image. I think I found a good subject and the light was so dramatic. But this image needs more proper cropping.

The last one is mine as well. I wanted to try something with the tree trunks, which seemed to have a lot of potentials. However, the sun quickly disappeared, and I lost the beautiful light. So I resorted to a gimmick which is the shallow depth of field in this case. Special effects are good if a final image is visualized in photographer’s mind. But I think this is just a rescue attempt to use up film for the day. I am afraid this is just interesting photo.

 

 

Play with shadow

At a location photo-session, I found the interesting wall decorated with some English writing  Beyond the SHADOW of a doubt, I had to use the wall. As I mentioned before, I almost always set a concept before starting shooting. This time I tried to play with shadow. Well… Idea was good but it took long time to figure out the lighting set-up to create the shadow effectively. I had to ask Janet to keep posing for long time. I wish I had an assistant.

Please click on the photos for larger images

While I was post-processing, I found this image looked like a music album cover, so I cropped to squire format.

The model was fabulous Janet Tran from Calgary.

Appeared podcast – Yeah! that’s big deal

I was kindly invited to podcast appearance by Al Del Degan and Andrew Bolton. I remember a note in a medical book, which says that a red face or nervousness was one of Japanese people national character. I am not exceptional, truly. What made me even more nervous was Al’s microphones, …3 microphones. I had imagined it would be recorded by iPhone or some sort of digital recorder. But his microphones were not even like ones used in Karaoke bars. They are condenser microphone used in music studios. Anyway, because of their welcome atmosphere, I had really fun time. But….I am still hoping everybody can understand what I am saying.

I met Al yesterday first time and I saw his wonderful portraits and nude photography in his room. I have known Andrew for quite some time. He is my type of photographer. He likes talking about Polaroid film or Yashica flex, rather than mega pixel or Canon 5D mk II. Please check out their interesting portraits in their websites. http://www.aduro.ca/ and ZOMBEI DARKROOM.

So I talked about why I started using range finder cameras and why I am keeping using them even for nature photography. The mystery has been solved. Then my strong opinion about HDR. The reason is found in my previous blog post about a tone in photography. However, this is also true that I like some photographers’ HDR works and I myself use HDR. Then I was FORCED to talk
about the photographer I admire. Being honest, I have to pick the photographer
since I wouldn’t have been interested nature photography if I had not attended
their SANP seminar 2 years ago. So who is the chosen one (or took me dark side)? Lastly, I talked about infrared photography which has became an important part of my photographic expressions. So regardless of my appearance, please take a look their podpost website, I am Aduro. Every show, Al and Andrew put so many interesting news and useful tips for photographers. Just find “Listen
Now” and hit Start mark in the webpage.

Since we talked about range finder cameras, I think I should place some street photos taken at the stampede 2011. So everybody, forget about “Numbers” like mega pixels or dynamic range. Attache ONE prime lens to your camera (ideally a film camera) and go happy shooting. Beautiful outside!

Cowboy boot – Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Through garbage box – Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

My Pose – Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Pairs – Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Polishing a shue – Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

A big circle in dusk – Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Stampede 2011 by Hiroaki Kobayashi

Stampede Wstern Gallery Show(3) – Photo finish “Direct Metal Print”

When having conversations with photographers, we tend to talk about equipments or photo editing software. But when I have chances to talk to professional or experienced photographers, I am often impressed by their care for photo finishing. Prints by major chain stores are fine for casual occasions. However, imagine if someone bought my photo and hang on a wall at their home, I would like to provide properly completed works. More importantly,  I believe photo finishing is still a part of artistic process. It is like chefs make delicious food but also serve on carefully selected plates and bowls.

For previous gallery shows, I printed on conventional Barayta or fiber based paper by my Epson photo R2400 printer. I really like their rich black and NATURALLY saturated color. But I wanted to try something else this time
for Stampede – Western photo gallery . After some researches, I found Quintaro
Imaging in Calgary, Alberta does “Direct Metal Print”. It is not metallic paper; an image is printed directly on an Aluminum metallic board. Quintaro has 3 types of finishes: white coated, white coated glossy and non-coated (brushed). I tried non-coated and brushed finish for my Infrared images.

Floating Root

Please note, I copied print images by taking picture of them by my digital camera so the quality is compromised. But you can see its uniqueness. Because of its shiny surface, intensity of high light changes depends on directions of illuminating light . This also changes impressions of image. You may understand if I would say…that it is like sun is moving behind the clouds. It is cool.

Enlarged image. Now hairlines of brushed surface are visible.

Possible downside of this photo finish you are thinking of now may be that the results of prints can not be predicated on Photoshop. However, it is not a problem since Quintaro provides free proof prints for a couple of times. Actually, I did not need 2nd proof prints for most of my entries.  Thank you very much, staff of Quintaro Imaging, for your wonderful services and professional suggestions.

Major advantage of the metal print is that I can print my images as large as possible since mats and a frame are not necessary. For the same reason, cost of the metal print is comparable with a framed photo. Now, I am just hoping viewers will like the displays.

One more info I have to mention, Samantha Chrysanthou and Darwin Wiggett‘s photos are exhibited at Baker Creak Chalets – Restaurant in Banff national park, Alberta. To be honest, I heard about direct metal prints first time in their lecture. (I admit I am a follower of them. I always find something new to learn in their blogs). Some of their display are metal prints as well, but their prints are white coated ones. So the photos have very different look from the non-coated brushed surface. Check them out if you have chance to visist Canadian Rockies.

Lastly,…I think it is okay to proud of myself… this image is the winning image in Stampede – Western Photo Competition in the nature category.  Next week of the same day, Calgary Stampede 2011 will have been opened. I am throbbing with excitement.

RELATED POST: Infrared Photography

Impact of Photography, and Tone – Lisa Mercer

Last week, I FOUND this image in a bunch of prints. It was a club print competition. When I came to this image I felt something weird. It was definitely an interesting image but not straight forward. Then I started analyzing the photo and I was thinking what kind of effects had been used on the horse. Eventually, I found out the image was upside-down. I was totally tricked. Then I started wondering “Is this Lisa’s image?”. Yes, it was. Now I would like to talk about two points from this experience.

Jazz, especially after be-bop age, seems to force some sort of training on listeners to get a point to appreciate the form of the music. “A love supreme” by John Coltrane may be so esoteric for some people if they have not already had some jazz albums in their CD collection. Now, think about Mozart’s Requiem (I think most of you know about this legendary piece through the movie “Amadeus”). It is a Requiem which is supposed to be dark, sad, and heavy. However, when I listen to the piece, I sometime feel heavenly and feathery, and it is beautiful.

Back to photography, when photographers Judge or critique some others’ photos, “beautiful”, “gorgeous”, and “Wow” images tend to get rated higher. So called “wow factor” is the one we are looking for. But wait a minute, why cannot it be “Hmmm” factor or “Ah-ha!” factor? Or even “Ewww” factor? It is not doubt
that everybody likes colorful sunrise landscape shots of the Rocky mountains by
PROFESSIONAL photographers. They are gorgeous. But think about a quality of some images appearing in my head and forcing me to think about the image before going to sleep. Don’t you think they are very successful images in terms of communication to viewers?  This photo by Lisa is one of them, really.

2nd point. This is good opportunity to talk about what I have been thinking about lately. I mentioned, in the first paragraph of this posting, that I could tell it was Lisa’s image; actually, I could tell both of her two images. So how can I do that because I can see her own tone in image (In this article, tone will be dealt differently from style). I like to call it “Signature Tone”. Possibly, it is similar to “touch” which painters refer to, or distinctive sounds which musician make from their musical instruments. When looking at master photographers’ works, which of course recorded on film, I am often impressed by their signature tones (To me, extreme examples are Daido Moriyama and Joseph Sudek). Now, in the digital age, what we can do on images on a computer are limitless. Nowadays, you can easily find so many HDR photos, and the technology, quite easily, allow us to achieve these outstanding HDR images. Most of times, what we have to do is find a preset of the tone mappings you like, and click the button. But can you say it is your signature tone? I am not saying HDR is an evil; actually I could not complete some of my images without the HDR method. I believe we, as artists, should try and experiment new techniques, and it is fine to publish the results on any occasions. But to make it your signature tone and style, we need further steps and time to digest the try and errors. To be honest, I cannot answer how to develop own tones of images. Often said that to develop own flow of processing leads to own tone and style, but I feel it is not that simple.

Anyway, I am glad to show you Lisa’s very artistic photo here and I AM honored she joined the members for the “Ethereal” Photographic gallery group show in fall. Here is her comment about her photo as well.

This photo was taken in May 2010 at the farm next door to my acreage.  There is a small wetland on the front pasture there, and I usually enjoy shooting various waterfowl, but the horses were walking around in it this day. This horse’s name is River, and I met him the day he was born, also next door – we are friends with the neighbours.  The horse will be 3 this coming July.

Lisa

My little one – Pika

Recently, I  have been quite busy for the gallery show and post processing for bunch of photos. But here is my cute animal portrait. This friendly pika was taken in my 2nd Lake O’Hara trip with a bunch of camera club members. I hope you like it.

Oh, one thing I can mention. Do not trust auto focus for these situation. Rather than chasing a target with auto focus, waiting an animal to come into a frame tends to result in more successful shots, in my experience.