Thursday 26 January 2012

Whoa...!



This video has great stop motion, wonderful videography and a bunch of complete nutters all trying to get themselves killed. Take a look and you will see what I'm on about.

Tuesday 17 January 2012

I believe I can fly...


I Believe I can Fly ( flight of the frenchies). Trailer from sebastien montaz-rosset on Vimeo.

The above film is a trailer for a film which should be coming out this year and is being produced by Sebastien Montaz-Rosset, whose both a photographer and film maker.

The trailer is absolutely amazing and anyone who likes adventure sports is really going to appreciate this one.

After you've watched the video, head on over to Fstoppers where you will find some more in which he describes some of the techniques he uses to capture these wonderful images.

Monday 16 January 2012

Landscape tips... the Kai way...



Kai from DigitalRevTV gives us some of his invaluable Landscape Photography tips in his own unique style, viewers with a weaker disposition may want to give this one a miss ;-)

Sunday 15 January 2012

Über Bokeh Monster..


This lens has gained a bit of a cult status and is sort after by both still and video photographers. Its the Russian built Helios 40-2 m42 mount lens.

Originally designed to be used as an oscilloscope lens, I don't know who started to use it on a camera but what a discovery !

Its has an 85mm focal length with a minimum aperture of f1.5, yes, I'll say that again, f1.5 ! That makes it a really, really fast lens and the focal length is just perfect for portraits (for example). But really what is all the fuss about. Well, we arrive once again at something called 'bokeh', and the popular opinion is that this is one of the best. Bokeh really is a personal thing but this lens really does have some wonderful abilities.


Here are a couple of images to give you an idea, and what you will see is that depending on where the highlights are you will get one effect or another, from buttery smooth to crazy swirls.


You've probably guessed it already that the club has managed to get its hands on one of these fine lenses. However, lets get a few things straight, its manual focus, you have to set and 'activate' the aperture manually, and f1.5 means that depth of field can be measured millimetres at close distances, and it has an m42 mount which probably doesn't fit any of the camera's we own, and its heavy.

I know, I know, before you all start shouting at me for such a stupid purchase, we also have two converters for both Canon and Nikon mounts (now all the Nikonians can't start complaining theres no lens for them this year !). The Canon converter does have the advantage that the central focus point will flash when the lens is correctly focussed (neat no !?). The Nikon convertor doesn't have this (because I couldn't find this functionality anywhere), but it is specially built such that the lens can be focussed at infinity.

We are really lucky to have picked one up, and in such good condition, and personally I absolutely love it, I'm having a great time using it, you have to take your time and think a bit more, but the results are really worth the extra effort.

Canon's widest lens for Digital SLR's...

Having a APS-C sized sensor in your digital SLR always means your going to have difficulty finding a lens wide enough due to the crop factor. 

Enter the Canon EF-S 10-22mm f3.5-4.5 USM lens stage left. With the 1.6X factor of Canon camera's this gives an equivalent focal length of 16-35mm which is pretty wide by anyones standards.

Bear in mind though, that this is an EF-S lens and consequently will only fit on APS-C camera's made from 2003 onwards (the EF-S mount was actually introduced with the 300D). I don't think anyone in the club has such an old digital SLR, well with the exception of me :-(, so everyone else should be OK.

Why do I mention this... it's because the club now has one of these lens for all the Canon users to try out.


But what about image quality, well there are many reviews on the web and lens comes out favourably in all of them, and the image above gives you an idea of its abilities.

This lens is without a doubt a welcome edition to the equipment cabinet.

Thursday 12 January 2012

ESAC Photoclub Exhibition...


What had started as a chat over coffee early last year finally came to fruition today, as the club opened its first ever photographic exhibition.

The theme chosen was 'LandSeaSky' and has motivated 23 members of the club to present their images which they thought best represented this theme. The results is a great diversity of images from all over the world, both from above, and below sea level, and we all hope they will be of great interest to the rest of the community at ESAC.

The canteen was chosen to host the images as it is probably the only building where most of the site members visit throughout the week, thereby maximising the viewing potential of the exhibition.

Our idea is also to produce a small brochure detailing the images and linking them to the photographers, this will then be made available to everyone in one format or another.

We really hope this will be the first of many further events and we are really excited and proud with what we have achieved.

The club would also like to formally thank site services for all their help and their amazing ability to adapt to any situation that has appeared along the organisation of this event.

In closing, I would like to ask any visitors to the exhibition to feel free to use the blog and leave comments as it's always good to hear the opinions of everyone.

My final thank you goes out to all the club members who have participated and helped out with this event, without your enthusiasm and dedication this event would have been unattainable.

Making of 'The Protester'...



Here's a bit of a behind the scenes video of photographer Peter Hapak taking images for the TIME 'Person of the Year' issue.

He covered all the major protests worldwide in 2011 and his explanation of the stories behind each image are both eye opening and emotional charged.

As I always say its so enlightening to see a pro at work but even if you are not so bothered about the photographical details, as a current affairs study the video is well worth the watch !

Something to make you smile...

Wednesday 11 January 2012

Canon's little known super telephoto...

Super Telephoto lenses start at 400mm, there heavy, there big, they require beefy tripods with specialised heads and there damn expensive right... errrrrrr... well not always.

Here you see the Canon 400mm f5.6L lens, this is the slowest (and cheapest) of the three 400mm's but it doesn't skimp on image quality, which after all is said and done is the most import aspect of any lens.

Its not so heavy and its slim profile allows for 'easy' handholding making it a firm favourite with many Bird Photographers, especially those that enjoy taking pictures of them in flight.


The club is now in posession of one of these lenses, which should give all the Canon users the opportunity to try out this wonderful piece of equipment.

Monday 9 January 2012

Yearbook 2011 published...


Our fifth edition of the Yearbook has just been published and congratulations go to Nico for his photo of the Elbro delta, which was the most popular voted image on our gallery pages in 2011, and hence, graces the cover.

Considering that this image was presented in the last theme of the year and managed to hit the number 1 spot in just a few days is doubly impressive.

For those of you who haven't seen a print version, the 'Book Preview' above will hopefully give you a small taste of what to find inside.

I still think that each year we surpass the quality of the previous years edition and I am convinced we have done it again. A big thank you to all the members for once again putting in the time and effort to produce the images throughout the year. Without this, the club could not produce such a high quality product. Hats off to you all !