May 2019 – Contribution to my 10,000 Hours Photography
Purpose of Journal
This Journal records my actual ten thousand hours learning the art of photography.
Hours 2,161 to 2,295
31 May 2019
Hours 2,291 to 2,295
First hour identifying my top Images of Spring 2019; second hour, organising these into Lightroom Collections and Flickr Album; third hour start drafting “Spring 2019 Review”; a fourth hours starting a draft of “Review at 2,500 Hours“.
Fifth hour creating a version of the Dystopian Future at the Barbican image below, for entry into PDI competition next season with a wide white border matching the the line down the centre like a conjoined diptych.
30 May 2019
Hours 2,287 to 2,290
First hour culling (from 102 to 21) and initially processing images from yesterday’s shoot at the “AI: Beyond Human” exhibition at the Barbican, London.
An hour creating the McNally Bot image to the right, which is a fun composite of a semi-humanoid robot and an image of a friend both shot at the AI exhibition yesterday.
An hour updating this journal with images from yesterday and organising the associated Lightroom collections and Flickr Album.
An hour finishing and publishing the “Composition – Thoughts at 2,000 Hours” post.
29 May 2019
Hours 2,285 to 2,286
First hour updating this journal, shooting at the AI Exhibition at the Barbican and updating my Instagram feed with further images from the weekend’s Instameet with Sean Tucker.
Second hour processing images shot today in Capture One and updating some of the general sections on this website.
28 May 2019
Hours 2,282 to 2,284
An hour working on the “Composition – Thoughts at 2,000 Hours” post.
[Off sorting out problems with the long-term time lapse project.]
An hour shooting and processing images from the time lapse project.
Two hours at the Stoke Poges Photographic Club – PDI Finals Set Subject – no entries personally.
27 May 2019
Hours 2,277 to 2,281
First hour updating my Instagram feed with some images from the Sean Tucker InstatMeet yesterday.
An hour creating the triptych to the right. Which later became “3:15 Triptych from Paddington”
Two hours organising yesterday’s images on Flickr and updating this journal.
An hour watching a selection of Nigel Danson and other photography YouTubes.
26 May 2019
Hours 2,280 to 2,286
An hour hanging out with Sean Tucker at his InstaMeet
An hour at the RPS Exhibition 161 at the Albert Hall.
An hour Street Photography on the Train, and up dating the “Composition – Thoughts at 2,000 Hours” post.
Four hours processing images shot today.
25 May 2019
Hour 2,269
An hour working on the tags and headings in my Flickr feed.
24 May 2019
Hours 2,264 to 2,268
Three hours working on the images of the last week and updating this journal. Particularly happy with the following:
An hour updating Instagram.
Another hour working on the week’s images, sorting on social media (Flickr) and updating this journal.
23 May 2019
Hours 2,260 to 2,363
Three hours processing images from yesterday; mainly creating the composites.
One hour watching photography YouTubes including The Art of Photography “Colour Matching in Adobe Lightroom“, and Mike Browne “Shoot professional Looking Head Shots at Home“.
22 May 2019
Hours 2,252 to 2,259
Two hours at the Tate Britain mainly the Van Gogh and Britain exhibition which covers both the three years Van Gogh spent in Britain and the influence he had, after his death through the Impressionist Exhibition of 1910 and later.
Most impressive works include:
- A Starry Night – Very striking colours; contrast of bright yellow and dark blue. Sculptural texture to the work, where the thick paint apparently requires the brush to be reloaded for each stroke.
- Sunflowers – the whole images is made almost entirely from shades of yellow. The textured yellow background is an almost pure gold, perhaps intended to be spiritual in nature (as it is in many religious works).
- Self Portrait at the Asylum towards the end of his life – textured dark blue background representing either pain or energy. I was struck by how realistic these look given the crude depiction. It occurred to me that the process of seeing is less reliant on detail than certain clues from which the brain identifies what it’s looking at. The power of a, particularly impressionist, image is the ability to abstract these key clues away from the detail.
The exhibition finishes with three large paintings by Francis Bacon interpreting works by Van Gogh in his own dramatic style which distils and amplifies the art.
Stumbled upon the following triptych whilst wandering around after the above exhibition, “Three Studies for Figures at the base of a Crucifixion” (1994) which Bacon apparently described as his first serious work.
An hours street photography in Paddington Station and along the South Bank.
An hour at the Dorothea Tanning exhibition at the Tate Modern. Tanning, as a surrealist make extensive use of doors as a portal to the unconscious, in one painting literally using part of a real door to separate the two halves of the painting.
Half an hour shooting potential composites in the Tate and half an hour updating this journal on the train home.
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Two hours watching YouTubes of Dorothea Tanning, Max Ernst and Francis Bacon.
An hour processing the day’s images.
21 May 2019
Hours 2,247 to 2,251
Woke up with the realisation that Nigel Danson’s 7 tips YouTube that I watched yesterday, which related to landscape photography, applied many ideas that are more common in other genres, such as street or portrait photography. I downloaded his book “7 Ways to use Composition to Improve Your Photography” (I paid £5 but you can pay what you want including nothing). Different list from yesterday:
- How to look for a composition
- Wander around for 10-15 minutes (no devices)
- Use smartphone or framing rectangle to help visualise the scene
- Shoot first without a tripod
- When you think you have a killer composition, make it on the tripod
- Move to a new location with camera handheld again.
F.L.I.C.S. : Focus, Light, Interest, Corners, Simplicity.
- Look for Patterns
Patterns, particularly in the foreground, create simplicity and harmony in an image. - Lines and Shapes
- Strong diagonals “Leading Lines” leading to the subject
- Use dominant lines to move the viewer around the image
- Strength of triangles
- Can use shapes to balance an image.
- Moving from 3D to 2D
Think about what separates foreground, midground and background. - Tell a Story
What is the mood or emotion you are trying to communicate?
Consider using one of:- dramatic tone
- B&W or
- a restricted colour palette (complementary colours, split complementary, analogous – see my post “Colour Theory – First Learnings“)
- Use Space Wisely
- Impact of negative space
- Have subject positioned well off centre
- Use a combination of negative space and strong lines.
- Simple, Simple, Simple
Often the best images are the simplest. What can we exclude? How can I zoom in to get a more impactful image?
Two hours reading the ebook, rewatching the YouTube and writing up, above and below.
An hour updating the “Composition – Thoughts at 2,000 Hours” post.
Two hours at the Stoke Poges Photographic Club – Open Print finals:
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Map to Sunrise 18 I suspect this didn’t do so well due to the prejudice against “somebody else’s art.” |
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Minimal Art Held back – 19 Print was criticised for having “perhaps a tad too much negative space on the right; bricks might benefit from being slightly lighter; and the print has a distracting line in the middle of the black space that you can’t see on the digital image.” |
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Walking Away from Labour 20 – but didn’t make the top 3. Broadly applauded – good crop, maybe could have been made even tidier around the edges. |
Congratulations to Ray for his fabulous portrait “Uncle”.
20 May 2019
Hours 2,244 to 2246
An hour on social media, discovered Matt Hall (“the13thSecond” on instagram) “Candid photography from the street of Cambridge UK”. Love this work and adding him to my list of top 100 photographers. A further hour researching him.
An hour watching YouTubes including Nigel Danson’s “7 PHOTOGRAPHY COMPOSITION TIPS to get BETTER PHOTOS now!” which were:
- Create Mood:
- Tone
- Colour – perhaps restricted colour palette
- Texture – controlled using shutter speed.
- Finding Diagonals
- Where possible, connect diagonals in different elements of the image
- Diagonals as leading lines
- Strong diagonal from bottom left, creates a positive image, complementing warm colours, etc.
- Powerful Triangles
Explicit or implied triangles add power to an image.
Try moving around so that the elements in the frame are arranged as a triangle rather than in a straight line. - Position of the Horizon (or implied horizon)
Add drama by moving this away from the centre – but think explicitly about what you are trying to achieve, what other element you are trying to emphasise. - Asymmetric Balance
Balancing the image with elements of equivalent “visual weight”. Step 1: we aware of the visual weight of the elements in the image. - Highlights and Shadows
Create high-key or low-key images. Not a grey combination of both. [Idea straight from portrait photography.] - Colour
Simplify the colour palette.
[Had a chest infection, so did not attend the APS print finals competition.]
19 May 2019
Hours 2,239 to 2,243
An hour on Instagram and tidying up my Lightroom.
An hour reading the RPS “Portfolio Three” particularly looking for inspiration on which to base an ARPS submission. I am currently very drawn to the multi-shot semi-abstract work that I’ve been shooting a lot of recently. Will produce some images over the summer and take advice at the start of the new photography club season..
Tried to shoot a black dog on a black background, using by 100mm macro lens and ring flash. Ring flash was a disaster giving only red-eye; ambient light and a higher ISO produced better images but slow shutter speed meant less than sharp images. f/5.6 on the 100mm lens also provided too shallow a depth of focus with the centre of focus on the eyes, the front of the nose was out very soft.
Half an hour watching the Sean Tucker YouTube “Shooting Portraits with One Speedlight” where he was using very similar kit to me (my kit). So, I switched the 100mm Macro lens for my faithful 24-70mm, and the ring flash for the big Godox light and softbox controlled by the X1T controller. Shake the treat tin and get the model back in position!
Results below. Still not great but the biggest issue is the reflection from the background which is getting too much light and is neither properly matt nor smooth.
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Colour temperature variation – demonstrates the need for my under utilised grey card.
3 hours in total.
18 May 2019
Hours 2,233 to 2,238
An hour updating this journal with images from yesterday and earlier in the week.
Two hours processing images shot in London yesterday.
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Two hours watching and writing up the following YouTubes:
- Nick Turpin: “5 Photographers making better Street Photographs than You” in which he introduces:
- Ellen Carey: “Back to the Future: The Avant-Garde is an Address” a reprise of yesterday’s lecture. Great stuff.
An hour doing a social media upload to Instagram.
17 May 2019
Hours 2,228 to 2,232
An hour reviewing the book “Dogs” by Tim Flack – another signed copy, dedicated to someone who lent it to a friend, who lent it to me, and I scarcely dare to open it. It is a beautiful and heart warming book. Also, on-line, looking at the work of Ellen Carey ahead of her lecture this afternoon.
An hour updating this journal.
An hour at the Photo London exhibition – main gallery.
An hour at a Photo London/ RPS lecture by Ellen Carey.
Final hour as a combination of updating the “Composition – Thoughts at 2,000 Hours” post (done on the train and street photography around London.
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16 May 2019
Hours 2,223 to 2,227
Three hours processing yesterday’s images from London including the following
Two hours at the PIC Group of the Amersham Photographic Society. Largely a Don McCullin themed evening with B&W images from Syria and portraits of the man himself.
15 May 2018
Hours 2,218 to 2,222
First attempt at producing a Pep Ventosa style images of the market stall on Slough High Street. I thought this had potential given the concentration of bold colours, particularly red, in the centre of the image. However, it’s a bit untidy as it stands – looking at it again, it’s growing on me.
An hour spend updating yesterday’s image from the Queensmere Centre, before uploading both images to this site.
Half an hour on the train working on the “Composition – Thoughts at 2,000 Hours” post; followed by half an hour street photography in Trafalgar Square shooting the exposure for a potential Ventosa-style composite of the National Gallery.
An hour at the Photo London talk: “The Curator’s Mind” with Pedro Slim, Artur Walther & Sofia de Maduro; where they posit that collecting is a creative act.
An hour’s street photography on the South Bank and the Tate Modern, shooting various potential Ventosa-style composites, including the following:
14 May 2019
Hours 2,215 to 2,217
An hours updating this journal particularly with reference to thoughts from yesterday’s APS Members Evening.
An hour shooting and another processing and experimenting with images from Slough. Again surprised and happy with the following composite composed from images shot in the Queensmere Centre (immediately prior to my being thrown out by a security guard).
[An hour preparing for the Stoke Poges AGM (Treasurer’s Report and accounts) , then two hours at the meeting. Whilst it was an extremely good meeting, this time doesn’t count towards my 10,000 hour project.]
13 May 2019
Hours 2,207 to 2,214
About an hour an a quarter shooting 111 exposures in the beautiful early morning light at Stoke Common. Two hours processing these images including making the straight/ ICM composite below and the Pep Ventosa style 360 composite from yesterday.
An hour practicing my presentation for this evening’s presentation to the Amersham Photographic Society. An hour updating the Instagram account – still experimenting with 4×5 aspect ratios with a 5% white boarder.
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Two hours at the Amersham Photographic Society – Members Evening: New Member, including presentation from me about this project.
Presentation from Sarah which is a taster for a full members’ evening presentation she will be giving next season, titled something like: “It’s not about ‘of’ but about ‘about'” – challenge of photographers to:
- convey meaning and emotion in their images
- keep something hidden so that the viewer has to workout what is happening [she didn’t actually say this]
- use cultural context to evoke generally accepted associations.
Discussion with Steve Brabner about Pep Ventosa. Steve experimented with Pep’s techniques a couple of years ago, including an image of Grand Central Station New York where he:
- took a series of images from a high view point using a tripod
- combined in photoshop but progressively “zoomed” by 2% per layer
- successively reduced the opacity of each layer from bottom to top
- [don’t know but guess] used something like a “darken” blend mode between the layers.
Struck me that I could try this with some of my images from the Tate Modern – Particularly those take from the 4th Floor bridge towards the Turbine Hall Entrance.
12 May 2019
Hours 2,204 to 2,206
Created the following version of the Pep Ventosa style composition of the monthly images from the “Third Post Big Field” taken last year.
An hour shooting Stoke Common and processing, including a series of image for a potential Pep Ventosa style 360 degree composite.
An hour rehearsing the Amersham presentation.
11 May 2019
Hour 2,203
Most of the day spent doing the accounts and wring the treasurer’s report of the Stoke Poges Photographic Club. However this is not time that counts towards this project.
One hour reviewing and practicing my presentation to the Amersham Photographic Society
10 May 2019
Hours 2,201 to 2,202
An hour working on alternative Pep Ventosa style interpretations of the “View from the Third Post” images I collected from the Big Field Stoke Poges throughout last year. All images were shot using the same lens, same aperture, same direction, just different times of year – one shot per month.
9 May 2019
Hours 2,316 to 2,320
Five hours working on my presentation to the Amersham Photographic Society for next Monday including the following summary of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s “Creativity” book.
Made the connection with the Institutional Theory of Art from George Dickie who was also at Chicago University.
and Mastery as recommended to me by Sean Tucker on the 8th July: InstaWalk last year.
8 May 2019
Hours 2,313 to 2,315
An hour each:
- Updating this journal
- Social media
- Working on my presentation to the Amersham Photographic Society for next Monday.
7 May 2019
Hours 2,188 to 2,192
Two hours processing images from Cambridge and updating this journal.
An hour updating social media sites – in particular trying to establish a routine for updating images on Instagram:
- Groups of 3 matching
- 5×4 aspect ratio recommended by Serge Ramelli’s YouTube watch on the 15th April – actually square format fits the medium better.
- Updates at least twice a week
- Appropriate hashtags.
Two hours at the Stoke Poges Photographic Club; set subject print finals.
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Shadows/ Silhouettes “Dude Leaving the Room” 18 Perhaps should have cropped the foreground – just a bit too much. Make it match the top of the picture. |
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Weather/ Clouds Clouds Over the City 18 Interesting angle – just not as good as other images. |
6 May 2019
Hours 2,181 to 2,187
Two hours shooting and processing the “First Monday of the Month Views of Hastings Meadow” as below:
| West | ….. | North | ….. | East | ….. | South |
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| 7am 16mm f/9 | 7am 16mm f/9 | 7am 16mm f/9 | 7am 16mm f/9 | |||
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| 7am 35mm f/9 | 7am 35mm f/9 | 7am 35mm f/9 | 7am 35mm f/9 | |||
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| 10am 16mm f/9 | 10am 16mm f/9 | 10am 16mm f/9 | 10am 16mm f/9 | |||
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| 10am 35mm f/9 | 10am 35mm f/9 | 10am 35mm f/9 | 10am 35mm f/9 | |||
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| 1pm 16mm f/9 | 1pm 16mm f/9 | 1pm 16mm f/9 | 1pm 16mm f/9 | |||
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| 1pm 35mm f/9 | 1pm 35mm f/9 | 1pm 35mm f/9 | 1pm 35mm f/9 | |||
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| 4pm 16mm f/9 | 4pm 16mm f/9 | 4pm 16mm f/9 | 4pm 16mm f/9 | |||
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| 4pm 35mm f/9 | 4pm 35mm f/9 | 4pm 35mm f/9 | 4pm 35mm f/9 | |||
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| 7pm 16mm f/9 | 7pm 16mm f/9 | 7pm 16mm f/9 | 7pm 16mm f/9 | |||
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| 7pm 35mm f/9 | 7pm 35mm f/9 | 7pm 35mm f/9 | 7pm 35mm f/9 |
An hour working on processing last year’s “View from the Third Post” images into a Pep Ventosa style composite.
An hour importing last week’s image from Cambridge into my Lightroom Classic CC catalogue on my main computer and social media sites.
An hour watching Simon Schama BBC Power of Art documentary on Mark Rothko, where he is presented as “The founder of Modern Art”.
An hour updating the “Second Revision: Workflow at 20,000 Hours” post to reflect how I actually import images from a Laptop when shooting away from home.
An hour creating the fun image to the right. A very quick job both shooting and compositing; will not win any prizes but should be enough to entertain his grandchildren!
5 May 2019
Hours 2,178 to 2,180
Two hours further refining the images from Cambridge and transfering from laptop to main desktop computer in line with my “Second Revision: Workflow at 2,000 Hours” post.
An hour working on my presentation about this project for the Amersham Photographic Society.
4 May 2019
Hours 2,176 to 2,177
Two hours working on some of yesterday’s composite images.
3 May 2019
Hours 2,171 to 2,175
An hour early morning shooting in Cambridge followed by another hour processing these images in Capture One Pro.
Half an hour photography on a punt cruise.
An hour and a half visiting the Cambridge Photography Club’s Annual Exhibition. Very interesting image “Tribute to Pep Ventosa” by Lynne Blount who I met at the show and is apparently interested in creative photography techniques as a member of a number of Facebook groups.
Final hour processing the day’s images and updating this journal.
2 May 2019
Hours 2,165 to 2,170
An hour and a half early morning street photography in Cambridge, 6:30am to 8. A further hour and half processing the 110 images shot in the morning.
Another hour shooting in Cambridge and processing images from a guided tour.
An hour at the Fitzwilliam Museum and Kettle’s Yard museums in Cambridge concentrating on 20th and 21st century painting and sculpture. some photography.
Final hour finishing processing the day’s images and updating this journal.
1 May 2019
Hours 2,161 to 2,164
An hour early morning shoot at Stoke Common; an hour processing those images; and an hour updating this journal, including all the new month admin.
Half an hour shooting natural and architectural abstracts in the Cambridge University Botanical Gardens. Then half an hour processing those images in Capture One Pro.
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