Creative ISO

This is another accident... Had I not been at ISO 800 I could not have captured this combination of frozen motion and shallow depth of field. Normally I would have been at 100 or 200, and as my brain is still more or less set in the film world, I would not have considered the new variable - changing ISO.

Having made the mistake I'm now repeating it as often as possible! It is hardly an original observation, but adding sensitivity to the traditional exposure / aperture adjustments really opens up a new world of creative possibilities.

This DSLR stuff is just SO MUCH FUN!!!

Comeback

Nice to see that the online photo magazine, 28mm, has reappeared. No equipment, no endless reviews of stupid, endlessly identical little digital boxes, just excellent and well curated photography. Highly recommended.

Misty morning

I managed to do it again. This time I shot 18 pictures at ISO 400 when I could, and should have been at 100 or 200. Oh well. Hopefully I'll learn one day. Here's one of them, an alternative to the one I posted at myfourthirds.com today. This one has the boat in it. I'm not sure which I prefer. Neither is exactly great, anyway.

Lake Lugano, 9:30am today.

depression cure

I think I've been reading far to many photography magazines and far too many web sites, and getting depressed about the (low) quality of my photography. Somehow everybody composes photos better, has better colour, better sharpness, better subjects. And all this landscape stuff, finally it isn't very creative is it ?

But... so many people say that they find inspiring and interesting things just outside their door. So on Sunday I went out, just a little way, with no plan, and ended up near a small stream I'd never really noticed before, but which was transformed by the melting snow. I ended up with 80 photos (praise the Lord for digital cameras) some of which are quite nice.

I'm still pretty sure that I don't have much of a clue, but at least I enjoyed myself!

Honour thy mistake as a hidden intention

There's been a lot of talk about how Olympus should add instant histogram review in a future E-1 firmware upgrade. Actually, whilst I would not mind seeing this, I don't find the two-click approach need now terribly inconvenient.

What I do think is a problem is the lack of a permanent ISO speed display. Really it should be in the viewfinder. It is as important as aperture and exposure. Twice now I've shot a whole series of photos at the "wrong" ISO. although clearly I should realise that there is something amiss when I'm assuming I'm at ISO 100 and in fact am at 800! Instead I started thinking to myself that I should get an ND filter, and at least I'm not using a Nikon that only goes down to 200!

But... had I not made this error, I would have missed out on some quite nice photos, like the one below, where working at high ISO made me work at higher shutter speeds than I normally use for "water" shots - and the results are quite good.

Images online

Well I haven't posted here for a long time. Partly because I was away in Cannes, attending the 3GSM Conference - basically the most important 4 days of the year, work-wise. But also because I've been concentrating on web site updates. I've now completed revising my online photo galleries, and the E-1 now starts to make an appearance. Since I provide a "by camera" index, you can quickly see which E-1 photos I feel are suitable for display.

Let me know what you think!