Photography can be so frustrating!

Lol999 · Dec 20, 2005

Last week I'm out and about on the prowl with my gear. End up at the local canal and surrounded by a horde of swans and geese. This is the first time I've photographed birds and their heads whip round like fire hoses! Focussing manually it's a real effort to capture the little "darlings".

I move on and drop into my local tattoist/piercer. This guy did some work for me this year and I really wanted to photograph him due to his facial tattoos. When I get there he's closed, late opening up, so I have to hang around another half an hour. When I get in he's busy tattooing so I approach the piercer, a girl called Samantha (Sam). She's a bit suprised by my request to photograph her but up for it, easy to talk to and keen to please. The photographing experience went well with good feedback from my model. Finally my tattooist is free and is cool about bewing photographed. It's as natural to him as breathing and happy to pose pretty much how I want. Trouble is he's really difficult to work with! he's a really nice guy but, for want of a better phrase, emotionally dead. There's no connection with the guy. When it came down to it it was really hard since I'm trying to capture the human emotion when he's about as emotionally giving as a dead haddock!

A wek later and I get my film developed. Not happy! I had used a roll of Fuji Pro 800 ASA through my camera. man, the grain! A few of my bird headshots come out acceptably in focus etc but the grain ruins everything. I've been trying this as a "suit all" and it just doesn't happen, least not for me. looks like a switch to a fine grain colour for my landscape-y, portrait type stuff and I'll switch to XP2 or something similar for my street/reportage stuff. Which means buying another body since I only have one!!

I know it's been 18 years since I last photographed with intent, but I don't remember it being as frustrating as this!

Lol

hobbes28 · Dec 20, 2005

I am a golfer. I like to think of photography like golf. (those other golfers among us may already know where I'm going with this.) When you play golf, you spend a good part of your day out on the course chasing down your ball. There are eighteen holes and a good "average" golfer will score around 110. That just means it took 110 hits of the ball total to put it in the eighteen different holes. Out of that 110 shots, you will have quite a bit of aweful, uncontrolled, short, long, bad aimed, etc. shots. That's not what keeps people playing the game. It's that one shot that looks like something you would see on television. It magically erases every bad shot you took for the entire round. It brings out all the joy of being outside, walking (or riding) the course, being with friends.

Long story short: In that roll, you probably had at least one shot that you really liked...and that's the one that will keep you coming back for more.

Lol999 · Dec 21, 2005

Yeah, your'e right. I looked long and hard at the results again last night and there's at least one I like, or that I consider to be acceptable. Perhaps I'm being too hard on myself, it's only the second roll of film in a long time and I'm getting used to a new camera system at the same time, and I've learned from the film regarding technique. I think a little more speed and less haste with a bit more evaluation of each shot before hitting the button will go a long way. It's a bit like riding a bike. Years ago I could ride no hands and pull wheelies, now I have all on to keep from falling off! Hope you newbs are reading this :mrgreen:

Rob · Dec 21, 2005

Fuji 800 is nasty stuff IMO the colours are all wrong and the grain is nasty. I try not to shoot anything but 100 which makes indoor photography damn tricky. If I'm going to have grain I go right for the TMAX 3200 massive stuff so you know it's grainy.

I hear what you're saying about the day though - don't lose heart as we all have those days. Then there are the days when 98% of your shots are keepers. And the days when the lab screw them up! Keep plugging away and it all gets easier again.

Rob

Lol999 · Dec 21, 2005

I once saw someone reccommend Fuji 800 for weddings! If my wedding photos exhibited the grain I did then the photographer would have been handed a thrashing! I can feel this 800 being sold on E-Bay, shame to throw it in the bin :grumpy:

I definitely want to get another body and do the black and white for street stuff. I don't mind grain in black and white but not when it looks like an impressionists nightmare in colour. Ah well, off to Jessops (my only camera store that stocks the stuff before anyone bemoans their non-refrigeration policy) to try a roll of Reala. if it's cool I can feel some e-purchasing coming over me:mrgreen:

JTHphoto · Dec 21, 2005

i tried a few rolls of 800 a few years back and was highly disappointed in the amount of grain, i was kind of like, why bother. so like rob, i just tried to stick with 100 and use a tripod whenever possible. and if i don't have a tripod and there isn't enough light to handhold with 100, i just remind myself that the shot would have looked terrible with 800 anyway. stick with it, its all worth it!