When does the “Decisive Moment” Happen?
Many great photographs were made in this manner, though not out of sheer luck. Usually, they’re pre-composed, i.e. the photographer was ready and waiting for the magic to happen. Whether a breaching whale or a baby staring directly at the camera, once you miss that fleeting moment, it’s gone forever. So important was the idea of the “Decisive Moment” that the great street photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson wrote an entire book describing it!

Anatomy of the “Jaws” Image
Note the determined look on the man’s face, which is not incongruous with the background image painted on the wall of the building. You’ll agree that this juxtaposition makes the photograph. Was it planned? Not at all. But I had to be ready for it if it happened! Therefore, for this kind of street photography to be a success, there’s obviously more involved than just being in the right place at the right time. You need to pick a location, a background or setting with which to work. Then you hope something magical happens.

I choose this mural and shot several images as people passed by. I got lucky with this particular guy, who looks so determined and in a hurry. The fact that his jaw resembles that of the mural skull was an added bonus! I shot the image from my car window with a Canon Rebel XT DSLR with a 28-135mm lens zoomed all the way out. The photo is uncropped. I decided ahead of time that I wanted the mural in focus rather than the passersby, since I didn’t necessarily want the people to be recognizable. Therefore I switched the lens to manual focus and preset it for the mural. (The fact that I was using a zoom forced me to use critical focusing, as a long zoom’s depth of field can be very shallow.) To further blur the person, I used a relatively slow shutter speed, 1/30 second.

Now, you can try just the opposite in your own experimentation with such photojournalistic street photography. Pre-focus on something closer in order to get the passersby crisp, which will cause the background to blur (assuming you’re using a zoom). Either is acceptable. If you’re shooting close to your subject (a la Gary Winogrand), perhaps you can just shoot with a wide angle lens. This way, everything from maybe four feet to infinity will be in focus.

Cartier-Bresson, Doisneau, and Brassai
Many great photographs were made by pre-composing a scene, then shooting at the decisive moment. For further illustration (and much better examples of the genre than I can provide), please see the works of master photographers Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Doisneau, and Brassai. As you look at their imagery, notice how much of the composition is provided by the background, as opposed to the supposed “subject.” Realize that a true artistic composition is just that, a whole composed of lesser parts. Would my photo of the walking man be of any interest at all if not for the background? Would the background hold its own as a still life? Probably not.

Finding Your Own Way To Shooting the “Decisive Moment”
The photographers mentioned above are famous for capturing street scenes in imaginative and highly artistic ways. Studying their work can help add a new dimension to your own photography.

Realize that while emulation may be a sincere form of praise, people who practice specific techniques (as these folks do a la Cartier-Bresson) may achieve sadly derivative results. It’s really best to study the masters then find your own way. It’s been said that photography is like writing. Everybody can do it, but almost nobody should. If you want something more than a snapshot, concentrate on composition. You’ll also notice that very few of the examples I’ve shown are in color. That’s because black and white adds artistic abstraction to almost any image; color tends to make almost everything look snapshoddy.

The Mid-sized Digital Camera

First of all, consider buying a mid-sized fixed-lens camera like the Olympus SP-560UZ 8MP or the Canon Powershot G9. The former is built like a half-size SLR; the latter like an overgrown pocket camera. Both can be used as point-and-shoots, while delivering photo quality far superior to most smaller pocket cameras. While you will most certainly get better results with a DSLR (e.g. the Nikon D40 ), once you connect a good (but bulky) lens to it, you’re lugging around al of weight. The problem with most small and cheap pocket cameras? Picture quality stinks and they’re usually not smart enough to give you good results under poor lighting conditions. The mid-sized cameras above are very high quality and have both have long image-stabilized zooms.

Basic Rules

Shoot with the sun at your back. This illuminates the subject. Otherwise, you get a silouette!

Shoot at the edges of the day. Early morning and late afternoon provide the most dramatic lighting and colors.

Know how to use the flash modes on your camera correctly. There’s nothing worse than missing your shot because you were in red-eye mode when you didn’t need to be!

Minimize distraction in your photos, especially when it comes to background.

Make your photos interesting by zooming in for detail or shooting at an odd angle (like the panorama beach scene of the happy family above). Otherwise your photos will just look like typical postcards.

Shooting a sunrise or sunset? Bracket your exposures. Set your +/-EV or Av a couple steps to the “-“ side. This will keep the bright sun from washing out your photo.

Trying to photograph someone against that sunset? Shoot with fill flash to light the foreground subject while keeping the sunset properly exposed.

Creativity

One of the best things about going away, anywhere, is that the new locale can spark creativity. Simply being in a new place makes things look more interesting than what you’re used to!

Shooting Scenery

Landscapes are generally shot horizontally, while most other images pack a bigger punch when shot vertically.

Shooting People

Practice not chopping off their heads (unless your intent is to protect their privacy!).

If shooting groups of people, make sure your camera has a wide enough angle lens to get everything in.

Although it’s tempting to photograph the native people, be respectful of their privacy.

Shooting Yourself

Want a shot of your family in front of that landmark? Don’t be so quick to hand your camera to a stranger. You might consider using the self-timer (or invest in an IR remote) so you can set up the camera up a few yards away, then get yourself back in the picture.

Speaking of Safety…

When getting off a subway train, keep the camera out of sight. A friend of mine had her camera strap cut and camera stolen just as she got off the train! Door closed, away went the camera. In fact, I had my first digital camera stolen at an outdoor rock concert. Had it hanging from my shoulder; next thing I knew, there it wasn’t!

Nothing provides new photographic opportunities better than a change of scenery. If you can’t afford a trip abroad, then a change of season will do. Springtime in the Northeastern United States is a good example. With azaleas, dogwoods, and cherry blossoms in bloom, the world just looks like a better place! And why not capture it in photographs?

Now, I know it’s very tempting to shoot the whole bush or tree to capture the grandeur in its entirety. But then you end up with something very snapshoddy like this photo at right. Instead, close in on some detail. Flowers are beautiful artistic creations in their own right. Consider using the camera to do more than document the obvious. Take the dogwoods above–their undersides were shot straight up with the sun illuminating the flowers from above!

Shooting in Macro Mode:

Following are some tips for shooting flowers. Since most are closeups, lets talk a little about the equipment required for this. It’s very simple: Point-and-shoot cameras work better than SLRs for close-up work. Their macro modes are usually so good you can usually get within an inch of your subject! The caveat is that depth of field is usually very shallow in macro mode. This makes your focus is very critical—the foreground may be sharp, but an object a few inches away will be blurred (like the flowers at left). The other thing to keep in mind is that most macro modes on point-and-shoots won’t work with the lens zoomed out, so keep it retracted. An alternative is to zoom in from a few feet away, but then you have camera shake to deal with. Either way, it’s a good idea to have image stabilization.

Tips for Shooting Flowers:

• Flowers are the one thing I shoot in color. Unless there’s a tremendous amount of contrast in the shades of the flower itself, or between the flower and its background (see the Black and White flowers above) – shapes, contrast, and compositional elements like the rule of thirds are all more critical when shooting black and white. (Notice the commanding presence offered by the larger flower in the right third of the frame.)
• Get close - Bees and bugs give scale to your flower. They also add an additional element of interest to your composition!
• Shoot up - Simply place your camera in macro mode and lay it in the grass facing up at the flowers. No, you don’t need to look through the viewfinder. Take a few shots at slightly different angles. (Make sure you keep the camera steady.) Review your work after a few shots and adjust your controls as necessary to get some cool shots.
• Shoot at the edges of the day. See how the sun creates shadows and adds depth to the dogwoods above? With a lot of contrast, you may have to play with your +/- Av or Ev setting here.
• As with any photograph, consider your background. It can add or detract from your composition. Occasionally, a curiously juxtaposed background or other picture element can really give your photo punch! (You don’t often see roses growing through razor wire.)

Finally…
Springtime can be breezy. Be aware of your camera’s shutter speed! On a windless day, you can shoot at slow speeds (though you’d need a small tripod for anything less than 1/60 second. Windy days are generally not good for flower shots. Consider plucking a few and putting them in a vase. Shoot them on your windowsill from inside your house!

The alien life form the girl is holding happens to be an Egyptian hairless cat (a breed made popular as “Mr. Bigglesworth,” Austin Powers’ cat). I happened to walk into a pet supply shop last summer (which will forever puzzle historians, as I do not own a pet) and saw this creature slinking around (the cat, that is, not the girl). Amber, an employee, offered to hold the cat so I could get a photo. Always carry your camera—you never know when an opportunity might present itself! We went outside in the sunlight so I could use a slow ISO for a sharper image. The image was captured with a Canon Rebel XT armed with a Canon image stabilized 28 – 135 mm zoom.

Why Pet Photography is Easy

• For the most part, animals don’t require model releases.

• We don’t perceive them to have a “good” side, like people do.

• Most pets are cute, and therefore photogenic. Try to catch them doing something cute (like this chihuahua drinking water), and the cuteness factor increases exponentially.

• Unusual pets make for unusual photographs. Imagine my surprise when I saw this cockatoo sitting on the side view mirror of a pickup truck parked in a convenience store parking lot! Pet owners are usually quite proud of their pets and are often flattered when you ask to photograph them. You might possibly offer to email the owner a copy of the photo as a JPEG as a gesture of good will. Many owners like to have photos of their pets.

Why Pet Photography is Difficult

• Unless you’re photographing a well-trained beast with its human handler by its side, you’re not going to be able to control your subject very much. That’s why you need to know how to use your gear correctly and quickly. Animals move without much warning!

• Some pets may try to eat you. You might need to befriend the animal’s owner before you can get the photo you desire. Still, be careful—don’t poke the bear.

• If you’re after more than a snapshot, creating an artistic composition requires more skill. The image at left depicts a cat with sutures–post-cancer surgery—and its loving owner. When creating a black and white image, it helps to have a subject with varying contrast. This photo would have had nowhere near the impact had the cat been totally black. Dark haired or dark skinned animals are more challenging to photograph; lighting becomes critical for bringing out detail.

All the images you see here were captured with existing light. Flash and studio lighting are topics unto themselves.

Someone said to me today, “Must be easy shooting statues–they don’t move.” While it’s true that they are immobile, this doesn’t necessarily make them easier to photograph than a hockey game. The character of statuary can change (or be made to change) dramatically with lighting, the seasons, and weather conditions. In fact, if you’ve shot the same statue once before, consider the fact that weathering and erosion can give statuary a whole new appeal, as will the presence of snow and rain.

Photographing Statuary

How do I Start?
Find a statue that interests you. While public parks, museums, and cemeteries are all good venues, I’ll restrict my writing to outdoor statuary, as indoor photography has its own set of challenges (most of which involve lighting and security personnel). By the way, did you know that back in the mid-1800s, there were no parks or museums in America? Around this time, the garden cemetery as sculpture garden came into being. Public parks, galleries, and museums came about later, due to the immense popularity of the Victorian garden cemetery as tourist destination!

Can I photograph any old statue or monument?
Well, not if it’s on private property. Sneaking a shot can be titillating, but if you’re not allowed to display or publish it, your excursion may have been a fool’s errand! If the statue is in a public area, it’s probably okay to shoot it. Also, do no harm. Don’t climb on the statue—you don’t want to break something and be arrested for vandalism. In an old abandoned cemetery, you wouldn’t think it would make a hill of beans difference. But this is not your hill, and these are not your beans.

What kind of camera should I use?
An SLR (whether it be film or digital) gives you the most flexibility, although you can use any camera. The operative phrase is that you know how to use the camera!

Should I use color or black and white?
Hey, Paul Simon was wrong! Everything do not look worse in black and white! In fact, if you’re just shooting the statue, black and white can give you some very interesting and abstract effects. Use this if you want to create a mood or make an artistic statement. Use color if you’re shooting snapshots.

How do I compose a meaningful image?
Okay, now we’re getting to the meat of the article. Allow time to compose and photograph your subject. Pick a good time of day if possible—shooting with the sun behind you provides better direct light on the statue than when it is directly overhead. Shooting at the edges of the day also provides you with nice shadow accents. So now let’s look at the art of composition.

Composing a Photograph

Whether you’re photographing statuary for documentation purposes, creating new art, using the statue as a backdrop for a family vacation photo, or simply because you think it’s cool, you probably don’t want your photo to look snap-shoddy. The famous French photographer Eugene Atget is best known for his artistic documentation of public statuary, which to me is just a series of good snapshots. So, regardless of the type of photo you’re shooting, there are two basic things to consider: lighting and composition.

Lighting
If you happen on a statue, your creativity will be somewhat constrained by the current lighting. Good photographers can make anything work, as long as they know how to operate the camera. Front lighting is best (sun behind you, the photographer); though a backlit statue can be dealt with too. The Eros and Psyche statue was front lit, with background in shadow. I exposed for (took a light meter reading off) the bright surface of the white marble statue, which grossly underexposed the background. This is the effect I wanted, as the background detail was distracting.

For a backlit statue, you have a wider variety of options:

• Expose for the bright areas of the scene and transform the statue into silhouette. Using your camera in Auto mode will normally give you this effect if most of the scene is bright.

• You can also expose for the darker statue and wash out the brighter background, which is what I did with the statue of the two angels at right.

• Another option is to illuminate your subject with fill flash, which will keep the background properly exposed and the statue properly illuminated.

Composition
When we talk about composition, we often forget that the lighting itself is a major compositional element! Both studio lighting and available light can create all kinds of moods. With outdoor statuary, we play the cards we’re dealt–you see the statue on vacation, you have 5 minutes to shoot it. So it’s lit from the side, deal with it. While the absence of light may be the absence of truth, shadows allow the viewer more latitude for their imagination.

How do I compose a meaningful image?

That’s really less subjective than you might think! Here are a few compositional pointers that apply to both snapshots as well as artistic photography:

• If you want your photo to be pretty as a postcard, stand farther back (or use a wide angle lens) and get some of the surrounding scenery in the frame. This also helps give a sense of scale to the statue.

• If you want to capture detail of the statue, get in closer. While you can always crop or enlarge a photo later, you image is generally of better quality if you shoot your original image the way you want the final print to be.

• Meter off the statue as a starting point, then for different effects, increase or decrease exposure to your liking.

• I shoot in Aperture Priority mode mostly, as I want to control my depth of field.

• Use Image Stabilization. Why bother? The statue isn’t moving. Well, no, but you are. Also consider using a tripod and slow exposure if you want a deep depth of field.

• Pick one: Line up a vertical element of the scene with the vertical frame in your viewfinder, or line up a horizontal element of the scene with the horizontal frame in your viewfinder. Either one will give your image the appearance of being “level.”

Don’t be a Fair-weather Photographer

In conclusion, if your attempt at statuary photography was less than stellar, consider coming back to it at a different time of day or under different lighting/weather conditions. The most mundane statue can be magically transformed into a work of art during a snowstorm!

What are the compositional elements of this photograph?

I made this image out the side window of my car while waiting for a light to change. The horizontal legs are part of a stationary statue, and these occupy the upper third of the frame. This helps us meet our compositional goal of the “Rule of Thirds.” The ladder truck and pedestrians helped balance the composition by placing themselves in the lower two-thirds of the frame! I happen to like the way the more distant pedestrian is slightly blurred—this gives a bit of depth to the image. Was there luck involved here? Of course. But you have to be well-practiced in the art of drive-by photography in order to take advantage of such situations.

What kind of camera do I need?

A fast one. Digitally, this means a DSLR rather than a point-and-shoot. The latter has too slow of a start-up and its shutter lag will cause you to miss many a shot. DSLRs are for the most part instant-on and have imperceptible shutter lag. I used a Canon Rebel XT DSLR with a Canon 28-135mm lens.

How about a long lens?

Well, yes, you’re doing candid photography so you want to be able to zoom in a bit. But be respectful of people. Privacy is not something that should be abused. See how the image above appears to be compressed? As if the objects in the scene are sandwiched on top of one another with little space between? This effect becomes more pronounced the longer the zoom. For drive-by shooting, you probably want something like a 80-200mm lens.

Shooting through glass

Auto focus is great when you need to shoot in a hurry (continuous auto focus is potentially better as it tracks the subject to keep it in focus as the camera or subject moves). However, auto focus systems will generally lock on to the object that’s closest to the camera. If you catch your car’s door frame in the viewfinder, that’s what will be in focus. If your windshield is dirty, it’ll focus on the dirt! One solution is to shoot out an open window. Another is to place your camera into “Mountain” mode, which is the sort of permanent landscape mode. This keeps the most distant objects in focus.

Safety First!

Don’t jeopardize the safety of your passenger(s), yourself, or anyone outside your vehicle. That said, you can always just shoot while waiting for a light or while pulled over to the side of the road.

What camera settings should I use?

Few cameras have a “Drive-By” choice as one of their automatic exposure settings. So what to use? I’ll typically use the highest ISO I can (given the amount of ambient light) so I can use a relatively fast shutter speed. If you shoot while driving, you probably want a shutter speed of at least 1/250 second. Subjects ahead of or behind you (moving in your direction) are easier to capture than subjects crossing in front of your camera. Note in the image above that the pedestrian moving away from the camera is more in focus than the one moving across my path. They may have been moving at the same speed, but their direction is key to freezing the action. I was shooting at a relatively slow shutter speed, as it wasn’t very bright out. My ISO was 1600, with the image-stabilized 28-135mm zoom fully extended.

Composing a Scene

They come at you fast and furious. Not only do you have to keep your camera set for the shot and within reach, but you have to be on the lookout for interesting subjects to photograph. Honestly, I shoot while I’m driving. Yeah, I know it’s unsafe, but great art comes from great pain, you know? I shot this at about 30 mph out a closed side window of my car, as I was driving over a bridge.

Practice!

You’ll shoot hundreds of images before you become adept at drive-by shooting. But you must practice with a familiar camera so that when a photo opportunity presents itself, you’re able to capture it!

Concert shots look so easy when you see them in magazines, don’t they? Try to take one and you’ll see what the artist Georgia O’Keefe meant when she said, “The cliffs over there, you look at it and it’s almost painted for you, you think until you try.”

If you walk away from this article with one thing let it be this: Cameras need light in order to record an image. The less light there is, the more difficult time the camera will have.

Getting a good concert shot is all about the lighting.

However, you must choose between flash and available light. Let’s explore both.

Flash photography at a concert

Let’s start by bursting your bubble: Even though using flash is the easier way to get the shot, there are a couple drawbacks:

• It may not be allowed in the room
• It destroys the mood created by all the stage lighting

Flash is good for freezing action, however. Most cameras automatically set a relatively fast shutter speed (perhaps 1/200 second) in flash mode.

Available light photography at a concert

Ok, first we must realize that most good published performance photographs are shot with available light. It captures the mood, and often the drama of the performance. Secondly we must realize that it is not that easy to make a successful concert photograph. However, here are a few pointers:

Try a test shot with your camera in auto mode.

You might get lucky. You can also try setting your camera for “theatre” or “party” mode, but chances are you’ll just get something that looks like this blurred orangy shot of Shonen Knife’s bass player. If your camera’s auto modes don’t magically give you what you want, you’ve got to go to the next level and start thinking about what you’re doing. The following steps are basic, yet very important for existing light photography.

• Use the highest ISO (light sensitivity) setting available on your camera.

For most digital point-and-shoots, this is ISO 400. For most DSLRs, this is 1600. The DSLR’s image sensor is much more light sensitive (can capture an image in dim light) that that of a digital point-and-shoot.

• Aperture wide — spotlights aren’t enough !
  

While spotlights appear to illuminate the performers intensely, the light is relatively dim compared to daylight. Therefore, you probably want to shoot with your camera’s aperture set wide open, to let in as much light as possible. For a typical digital camera lens, this might be f3.5. To complicate matters, spotlights create such a dramatic difference in light intensity between the performer and the rest of your scene that most auto exposure cameras tend to average the exposure, which washes out the brightly lit performer.

The Solution: Crank your camera’s +/- Av or Ev setting down to -2 and see what happens. Make a few test exposures and adjust accordingly.

• Shutter Speed

See the blur of the bass player’s guitar? This is due to the fact that the shutter speed was relatively slow (perhaps 1/8 second)–either I, the bass player, or both moved during the exposure! An 1/8 second may be the fastest you can shoot under a particular available light setting.

The Solution: Study the performers and try to catch them when they’re least likely to be moving. This could be between songs or while they’re catching their breath between song verses. This is what I did to get the B/W shot at the top of this page. (You may notice that the top of this photo is sharper than the bottom–this is because I was shooting up, focused on the woman’s face. A wide aperture causes a shallow depth of field, meaning fewer things in the flight path will be in focus.)

• Activate your camera’s image stabilization

Most people can effectively hand hold a 50 mm lens at a shutter speed of about 1/50 second. Concert light shutter speeds can be much slower than this! You risk blurring the image if you use a shutter speed less than 1/50 second. Image stabilization might allow you to hand hold the same shot at slower speeds, say 1/30 or even 1/15 of a second, but doesn’t guarantee a sharp image.

The major advantage of digital cameras is that they shorten the learning curve by giving you instant feedback! You can see immediately (in the playback viewfinder) whether or not you captured the image successfully. The trick is to know how to adjust your camera’s settings to get the best shot!

Happy Holidays! Christmas lights are very tempting to us photographers, aren’t they? Unless you have a “Xmas Lights” setting on your digital point-and-shoot, how are you going to make a photo like this?

First of all, you need to find a photo-worthy scene. This image was shot in Love Park (in front of City Hall) in Philadelphia. The Robert Indiana “Love” sculpture is a favorite destination photo site for tourists. Each year when they put up the 50-foot decorated tree behind it, the whole scene bursts into life! That is, at night. During the day it’s kind of mediocre. So how to photograph it at night?

Night Shooting with a Digital Camera

Try a test shot with your camera in auto mode. You might get lucky. Chances are, though, you’ll get something that looks like one of these:

Photo on Left: Too light. Camera’s auto exposure system set exposure for the scene’s average light intensity. This brings out shadow detail while burning out the highlights. How do you fix this? If you want to use the camera in auto mode, find the Ev or Av setting and drop it down to maybe -2 stops. Experiment with tricking the camera this way until you get the results you like.

Photo on Right: Too light and blurred. Same problem with the Ev/Av setting, but in addition, the camera moved during the exposure. How do you fix this? Find something to brace the camera on. A tripod works best, a friend less so. The exposure will likely be long (half a second or more), regardless of what fancy mode you use. Why? Because there just isn’t enough light! Activate your anti-shake or vibration reduction as well, but this is of marginal use in such low light conditions.

Cameras operate on the principle of light hitting some sort of light-sensitive recording medium, be it film or a digital image sensor. Light is key to this process. The less light you have, the more difficult a time the camera will have recording an image. Any camera can take a great picture on a sunny day at the beach. Most need some help from the user when shooting in less than optimal conditions.

Here are some general pointers for shooting Christmas lights:

1. Set the camera’s light sensitivity as high as possible. In most cases, this will be ISO 400 for digital point-and-shoots, ISO 1600 for DSLRs. The DSLR has the advantage here–its image sensor is just much faster, and therefore more light sensitive. DSLR images will be sharper and less noisy.

2. Use a tripod or other solid object on which to brace the camera, as the exposure will likely be long. Most people can effectively hand hold a 50 mm lens at a shutter speed of about 1/50 second. Xmas light shutter speeds can be much slower than this! You risk blurring the image if you use a shutter speed less than 1/50 second. Image stabilization might allow you to hand hold the same shot at slower speeds, say 1/30 or even 1/15 of a second, but it in no way guarantees a sharp image!

3. Turn your flash off.

4. Crank your +/-Ev or Av setting down to -2 stops in order to record only the bright lights, and not the shadow detail of the scene. Bump it up a little if the image is too dark.

The super cool thing about digital cameras is the instant feedback you get! You can see immediately (in the playback viewfinder) whether or not you captured the image successfully. The trick is to know how to adjust your camera’s settings when necessary!

Black and white? Who would ever want to photograph a richly colored Autumn leaf in black and white? (That’s a rhetorical question). There was something about the way this wet maple looked the other morning on the hood of my car that just screamed “Monochrome!”

For this photo, I used a Canon Rebel XT with a Canon 28-135 mm lens fully extended in manual focus, macro setting. Macro is tough to do with most DSLRs–they’re big and bulky compared to digital point-and-shoots. (Between you, me, and the lamp post, macro shots are far easier to get with a point-and-shoot!) Regardless of what camera you use, when your focusing distance is mere inches, focus becomes critical because depth of field becomes so shallow. Getting this just right without a tripod can be challenging. (They do sell, by the way, miniature tripods for just this purpose!)

THE TAO OF BLACK AND WHITE:

Shooting black and white forces you to “see” in monochrome, i.e., to visualize the scene sans color. In this scene, I “saw” the water as dark drops of luminescent, mercurial moisture on a white canvas. To me the scene looked far more interesting this way that it would have as a simple snap-shoddy color picture.

If you think “color” when you think “nature,” then think “Ansel Adams” instead. You get an entirely new perspective when you visualize everyday objects as abstract shapes and tones instead of the familiar colorful objects they are. Seem difficult? Too complicated? Not so. It’s actually easier to make a successful black and white photograph than it is to make a color one. In other words, BW is more about a visual idea than a literal one. No one can tell you the colors are off or its out of focus–a BW photographer can always get away with saying: “I meant for it to be that way.” Do that with color, and it just looks like a bad photo!

In all candor, color photography is too much like television—it leaves nothing to the imagination. Think about the cinematography of old black and white movies. They were truly more artistic than color movies. One had to pay very close attention to contrast and form to visually create drama. That said, some people prefer color to black and white. Is one better than the other? Is one Autumn leaf better than the other? Not really–it’s simply a personal artistic preference.

LEARN MORE ABOUT BLACK AND WHITE!

There’s a book I like that I’d recommend if you want to get an idea of the range of possibilities available with black and white photography. Its called “Black & White Camera Craft” by William Cheung. It was published in 2003, and deals mainly with film, not digital. But this is okay, since as I said, we’re only concerned with the possibilities of black and white. In 2004, Cheung published another book called “Switch to Digital,” which is an interesting account of one photographer’s conversion experience. However, the main reason I bring both books to your attention is for you to see the difference between digital and film BW photography. The purpose of most photo editing software is to help recreate in digital certain film effects we’re used to seeing, e.g. dodging, burning, and adding a grainy texture. Click here to go to my Flickr site, which has many examples of black and white photography!

Someone asked me the other day, “How can you get great contrast in a color photograph?” My answer was (and still is), “Sunny day and bright, fully saturated contrasting colors.” Short of that, you’re going to have to do a lot of work with a photo editing computer program.

It’s quite easy to get great contrast in a black and white photograph, provided the image is made up of mostly black blacks and white whites (not innumerable shades of grey between). Upping the contrast is generally very easy to do with photo editing software, your main concerns being 1) loss of shadow detail and 2) burning out the highlights. Color is a bit more difficult, what with there being all those, uh, colors. When you stop and think about it, its kind of unusual to see much naturally occurring contrasting color. Perhaps this is why we find deciduous leaves so much more interesting in the Fall than at other times of the year!

Personally, I find it difficult to create a colorful, contrasty image. I don’t want to be sitting at the computer making it better, or rather, making it look like I envisioned the image should have appeared initially. Therefore, I shoot mostly BW. However, when the rare color opportunity arises, I will dive on it.

Well, this past summer I found myself at the Whitney Museum of American Art in Manhattan and caught the exhibit Summer of Love: Art of the Psychedelic Era. As part of the exhibition, Janis Joplin’s Porsche (a 1965 model 356c) sat out in the sunny courtyard. You could walk around it, but not photograph it. The guard suggested I shoot it from above, where you could look down at it from the sidewalk in front of the museum entrance. Though I generally believe it’s far easier to get forgiveness than permission, I went outside and shot from above! Another reason to carry a zoom lens.

The photo was taken with a Canon Rebel XT with a Canon 28-135 mm lens. A 135mm focal length is not super long, but it was just right for this application (paired with a 28mm wide angle, it provides a good general-purpose lens package).

Though the graphic appears to have been designed by Peter Max, it was actually done by one of Janis’ roadies! (That’s the likeness of Janis and her band, Big Brother and the Holding Company, you see near the car’s tire.) Once the contrasting colors grab our attention, the detail of his graphics engage and hold our interest. A good lesson for all color photography, as far as I’m concerned. To learn more about contrasting colors, click here!