It Can Help Improve Your Technical Skills

In some ways, I’m a hoarder.

I have lots of “stuff” from my youth and earlier years stored away in boxes in the basement. The other day I was trying to locate an older photograph so was digging through a few cartons. I didn’t locate the photo, but I had another interesting find – this Memorandum.

	Users of early model “Kodaks” – as the early cameras were called – were encouraged to record their exposure data for each photograph in this small booklet.
Part of the booklet contains detailed guidelines for determining the proper exposure. In particular there are the STOPS – today we refer to these as the aperture and the TIME – the shutter speed. Depending on the lighting conditions and by following these guidelines, the photographer would be able to produce an acceptable photograph with the Kodak.
In the other pages of the the booklet, the photographer was to record the exact conditions and settings for each of the 100 exposures.
Take a look at the date! Yes, this booklet was published in the late 1800’s (click to enlarge the illustration). Might I suggest that this booklet is a predecessor to today’s EXIF metadata. Why was it so important to record the exposure data? In short – to minimize the cost of photography. …introduced in 1888 (No.2 Kodak) which had a built-in 100-exposure paper roll film costing $25, a huge amount. The box camera had to be sent back to the factory once all the exposures had been used. The customers got their cameras back with new film roll loaded into it, and the image prints. Historical information from Wikia

Back then, each photograph cost a very expensive 25 cents. So it was wise for the photographer to carefully review the prints and corresponding exposure information to improve subsequent photographs.

Today, the cost for an in-camera photograph is virtually free. But we can still improve our photography by reviewing the exif data – the information that is automatically recorded with each captured image. Most image editing software shows the exif data alongside the photograph. As a quick example, below you can see that the young child on the right is slightly out of focus. The exif data tells me that image was captured using an aperture of f/4.0. For the follow up photo, to insure that both children are in focus, I should use a smaller aperture e.g. f/5.6.

I frequently take this cue from the pioneer photographers of the 19th century and wisely use this metadata to improve my photography.

I’ll have more examples in a future article.

 

Written by Arnie Lee

 

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Having been involved with Flight Simulation software over the years, I’ve been taking pictures of aircraft for some time now. My collection includes thousands of aircraft photos and one of my favorite group are the pictures of Air Force One that I’ve captured.

Air Force One is the huge Boeing 747 that flies the President of the United States to various places around the world. It’s easily recognizable by its distinctive blue and while colors.
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January’s weather in West Michigan has reputation for being quite dreary – dark, cloudy and cold. It’s not the kind of weather that inspires me to pick up a camera to capture the moment. In fact, it’s the kind of weather that encourages me to plant myself indoors and sip on piping hot coffee.

Yet by the second week of January I had already sipped a winter’s worth of coffee. It was time that I move from my comfortable lounge chair and face the outdoors no matter what the weather.

I grabbed a simple point-and-shoot camera, donned my scarf and heavy coat, opened the door and carefully waded into the snow and 15 degree blowing wind. But I was on the lookout for photographic possibilities.

When the sun fails to shine you have to use whatever light is available to make your pictures shine. Look to the left, look to the right, look for the untouched, look for the obvious. There’s plenty of possibilities no matter what direction if you let your imagination wander.

These pictures were all taken with less than stellar lighting.

Yes, it’s true that the winter may hide the sun. But you can beat the blahs by showing up outdoors – if only for a few minutes at a time. And don’t leave your camera behind – there’s gold(en opportunities) in that snow!

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Written by Arnie Lee

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