Tips needed on composition

PlasticSpanner · May 10, 2005

Just getting started in photography with an old 35mm SLR and I'd appreciate any tips you all may have however honest!

1st pic is a wheel hub on a lathe. Taken with a 50mm lens at F16 and 1/60 sec exposure with flash at 0.5 meters. The motion of the workpiece had to be added with PS as the shutter was too fast. Any tips on how to make the composition better and more interesting? Both were scanned in colour and converted to B&W in PS with a plugin.

2nd is the engineer doing the work. With a 70-210mm zoom at about 80mm on F16 and 1/60 second exposure with flash at 2 meters. How can I compose a pic like this whilst avoiding picking up the scruffy walls and minimising the shadow behind the engineer? (he has a big nose so that doesn't help either!)

Any help and opinions appreciated!

JonMikal · May 10, 2005

i think you answered your own question when you said you used PS to convert. alter the walls and shadow in PS. i assume you know how?

by the way, your conversion is awesome. would you be willing to share the settings?

Shan · May 10, 2005

JonMikal said:
i think you answered your own question when you said you used PS to convert. alter the walls and shadow in PS. i assume you know how?

by the way, your conversion is awesome. would you be willing to share the settings?

I want to know the settings too~~~plz??? :mrgreen:

PlasticSpanner · May 11, 2005

To get the settings for the B&W Conversion I just kept adjusting the sliders untill I was happy with the result! I think I took out too much yellow from the 2nd one but when I try to add a tiny bit back in it messes it up again! Both pics are adjusted sepeately and differently though so there's not just one setting that has worked. Sorry!

PlasticSpanner · May 11, 2005

I'm not sure if the plugin is a common one but I can e-mail it or something if anyone is interested? It's a 121 kb zip file and freeware.

thebeginning · May 11, 2005

i like the second one alot better. do you have a bounce flash? the shadow might not have been so prominent if you were to bounce the light off the ceiling (around 45 degrees maybe). the bw conversion is great!

PlasticSpanner · May 11, 2005

My flash is just forward looking. If I used a bounce flash how much would I have to adjust my app/exp by to get the same lighting? With my flash I used the chart as accurately as I could.

Apart from lens corrections and colour conversions I don't want to use PS if I can help it! I'd rather know I have got the photograph right with the camera & not the computer!

I'm pleasantly suprised you all think the B&W Conversion is OK! It's the first time I've tried it but I did spend ages adjusting it until I was happy with it!