It is essential to understand macro photography first before talking about its digital side of production. Macro photography is close-up shots of small things, where doing it means using the right camera and lens.

Digital macro photography is the same except the system is different. Again, digital photography will more or less involve computers in working with post product of the image.

Digital macro photography is an interesting specialization in photography because of the challenges at stake. It is may add more expense in terms of updating to the most recent products technology can offer. While eyes can’t still stretch to perceive and see detail of minute things, digital macro photography can make the merry wondering into reality.

If you are an avid fan of Discovery Channel or National Geographic, most of their documentary films indulge in macro photography whenever they shoot insects and small animals burrowing underneath the ground holes, and all other creatures almost unseen to the naked eye. Without macro photography, this world will only be associated with what our eyes can see. There is no way we may experience and grasp the texture of any insects’ hairy legs or underwater creature’s slimy skin.

The promise of full detail is the major work in digital macro photography. Currently, the answer to this promise is dependent on the resolution of the digital camera you are investing on. Lens, particularly for close-up called “diopter” must come along with the purchase, and basically it is a necessary requirement.

The next is the application of effective and proper lighting to get the most of the photography detail. A crisp image goes with the essential qualifications your digital camera can give.

To achieve a professional looking digital macro photography, the following points will help:

1. You must have skill in photography including the use of lenses, filters, lighting and related accessories.

2. For macro photography, you must shoot the subject as close as possible as the effective working distance. This is all about the right distance without disturbing the subject, if in case you are shooting small insects.

3. Trial and error practice with depth of field can be achieved by using manual lens setting until the image is sharp.

4. Use the smallest aperture and fill flash, taken in a bright day. Flash must either be indirect or diffused with reflectors for better results.

After you have achieved the good macro shots, it is time to go back to the computer and do minor editing of unwanted backgrounds, specks and if there is nothing to correct, then the image can be printed as is.

[techtags: San Antonio Photography, San Antonio Photographers, Senior Portraits, Family Portraits]

If you have ever wanted to improve your digital photography then you may want to consider learning about High Dynamic Range. If you have heard of this term in digital photography, but are not sure what it is, then keep reading because it will serious change the way you look at your digital photography images. What High Dynamic range does in your digital photography is simultaneously lighten your underexposed areas and darken your overexposed areas. Working with your Dynamic Range will aim to create digital photography images as your own eye would see them; even light all over the scene.

In the digital photography world Dynamic Range simply refers to the range of light (luminance) vales from the darkest to brightest. In the real world is really the range of dark to bright sections of light that you can see with the naked eye. This is transferred to digital photography and it given the name Dynamic Range. Digital Photography Dynamic Range is the range of light on your digital camera sensor that can be captured without having the higher light or lower light values altered or edited. In digital photography speak High Dynamic Range simply means a higher range of light values.

You will notice that after understanding Dynamic Range that your digital photography can be improved dramatically and, very fast. Digital photography Dynamic range can improve aspects of your image such as adding a sense of drama to your cloudy landscapes, giving detail to lines of colour, toning down some overexposed parts of light sections of a digital image.

You may find that when photographing things outdoors in your digital photography such as landscapes, beach and snowscapes etc, you have a lot of contrasting highlights that slow your progress down. To overcome sections of high contrast you can use ND filters, a polariser, exposure bracketing, post editing in Photoshop etc, etc, the list goes on what you can do in digital photography but really, to get a more accurate exposure working with your Dynamic Range will be more effective.

You can get a good idea of digital photography Dynamic when you go outside and look at the light. For example High Dynamic Range is the bright sunlight on a typical outdoor, sunlit scene. In saying that, a Low Dynamic Range may correspond to darker areas such as a dimly lit room.

Let?s take my Sony digital camera to use as an example. It has 6 stops of Dynamic Range. The Dynamic range?s objectives are to capture more dynamic range. While it?s easy to capture daylight scenes with the Sony, in some instances like landscapes, more Dynamic Range might be needed. So in this case producing my High Dynamic Range requires that I take some separate exposures. Then I place all of the brightness levels that I want in my final image that my Sony?s sensor can record properly. What this means is putting the darkest values no lower than in the mid-range of the sensors light sensitivity range.

In the wonderful Adobe Photoshop I may decide to take a handful of exposures to cover the complete dynamic range. In each photo exposure I keep the aperture the same (changing aperture changes the depth of field). My aim here is to create different photos making sure that in each I cover the available brightness levels in the landscape.

I take a collection of photos of my landscape at about 1 stop changes in each photo. I don?t do this by altering the f stop I do this via my shutter speed. To check whether I?ve got variation in my exposures I can check the histogram to see whether I have adequately captured the scenes brightness.

Once I have all my exposures in the camera I go home and check it out in Adobe Photoshop. What I should be able to do then is edit them and create a picture as my own eye would see; good lighting on the foreground and good lighting on the background, without over exposure of the sky or underexposure of darker parts of the land.

Have fun and happy shooting!

Amy Renfrey

[techtags: San Antonio Photography, San Antonio Photographers, Senior Portraits, Family Portraits]

This is the first in a series of profiles of photographers from various parts of the imaging spectrum. In the future we will shine the light on news photographers, commercial photographers, nature photographers and so on in order to give you the digital photographer some valuable insights to help make your images better.

Geraldine Allen is our first subject artist in the spot light. Initially trained in art history and graphic design in the UK; Geraldine gained valuable experience in aesthetics and design principles. Later in life she undertook study of Psychology and graduated with a Bachelor of Science Honors degree. However, Geraldine’s long time interest and passion for photography drew her back. Enthused by the possibilities brought about by Adobe Photoshop in its early days of development, she was soon absorbed by experimenting with digitized photographic collages. It was then she decided to return to Salisbury College in the UK to formalize her experience and update her knowledge of the visual media industry.

Geraldine studied Creative Digital Arts to familiarize herself with industry standard multimedia software, and wishing to focus on still imaging, then chose to complete her BA (Honors) in PhotoMedia (Photography). Whilst computer manipulation was becoming increasingly popular, she chose to experiment [and now favors] “in camera” effects.

When did your ?aha? moment arrive; the time when you knew that your affinity for photography could take you further regarding your creative and professional career? ?I took a candid shot of my teenage son one day when I just happened to be at an elevated height; the combination of height, the long lens, and the way I had composed his posture in the frame brought an interesting result and I thought then that there are so many variables and I would never get bored if I did this for a living. I had always enjoyed photography but I didn’t really learn much until digital came along. All of a sudden I learned so fast because the results were instant and I could relate which mistakes were associated with which controls.?

Do you prefer total control over your photographic subjects or do you sometimes shoot natural non-studio images? ?I don’t have a preference. I am so passionate about photography and there are so many different aspects that I find it impossible to hold favoritism. I have to separate photography into genres and I take a different approach according to that genre. For example, creative photos are pre-conceived in the mind of the photographer/artist, so it does require the subject to be set up and controlled - to a degree. Although studio controlled images dominate my light painted portfolio, I often leave people as subjects to position themselves. The picture aims to portray a little essence of their natural character. I do help them with ideas if they are stuck though, usually by distracting them with conversation and saying “hold it there” when I think a particular posture, expression or mannerism would work well for the picture.

For nature pictures I rarely control anything except perhaps using a little fill flash or a reflector in conjunction with the available light. I make a conscious effort not to interfere with a natural scene as I wish to document it as real and naturally as possible. Having said that I must confess I can’t help moving obtrusive litter, sticks or stones from the frame.?

Have you ever had a mentor who had an impact on your style and art? ?I received an awful lot of support from a wonderful tutor called Ian Smith at Salisbury College in the UK. Whilst I was given endless encouragement to experiment in whichever way I liked, I was also taught to question everything and to give that experimentation some decisive direction. I was to ask myself what my pictures were trying to communicate, and to plan them with specific intention and aims. In the final year at Salisbury College I reached the dreaded stage where I was forced to choose one field of specialization. God forbid, how was I to make a single choice when I loved all and sundry from traditional to completely abstract and contemporary? I remember actually struggling to hold back tears when it came to the point of my having to drop some genres. I was a cop-out really because I chose to stick with two fields instead of one; fine art and nature, and then I used a unifying concept to put them both in my final portfolio!

I was also privileged enough to work with landscape photographer Charlie Waite in his studio for some months. Although practicalities of work and business dominated our concerns, I observed his attitudes toward his projects and indeed within his natural day-to-day practicalities. If I had to choose one primary point that I will always remember, it would be how he would look at the sky and all around whenever he stepped outdoors. He would immediately and instinctively study the light and how it fell upon subjects in his immediate surroundings, no matter where he was or what he was doing. You could say he was obsessed with light! So, he taught me the most valuable lesson of all; to study the natural laws of light, how it naturally affected the world around and how different it looked according to the various conditions.?

Your best advice for budding digital photographers? ?Experiment, and then experiment some more! Make full use of manual controls instead of sticking with the safe Auto mode. Don’t just refer to the manual when you are stuck on how to operate a basic control, but read it all from front to back and then test out each and every advanced control. That way you get to know your camera thoroughly, and you may happen upon some interesting effects. Try different levels of fill flash, use the white balance, and test the effects of speed/aperture on depth of field. Oh, and look at possible uses for any mistakes! I have been known to use prior unintentional mistakes, as deliberate controlled effects at a later date.?

What kind of digital camera gear do you favor? ?Predominantly, I am a digital SLR user of the Canon variety. I just like the look, the feel and the performance of Canon. A Canon feels right in my hand so what more can I say?

Currently I am shooting with a Canon D60, which I was very happy to own when they were first released. Unfortunately 6 months down the line the 10D was released with a substantial drop in price to boot. Now of course there is the 20D too! Such are the agonies of being a die-hard techie fiend. I use only fixed focal length lenses, having found the ‘ever-practical’ zoom to let me down with zoom creep on long exposures.?

Currently Geraldine is using four lenses: a 15mm f/2.8 fisheye, a 35mm f/2, a 100m f/2.8 Macro, and a 200mm f/2.8 L - all Canon EF. Of course using these lenses on a DSLR mean the focal length is longer than using on a film SLR due to the size of the sensor, which is why the fisheye is not truly ‘fisheye’ but just very wide, and the 35mm is used as the standard workhorse lens - the equivalent of a 50mm. Shooting an awful lot of nature pictures, her 100mm macro lens has proved a wise investment, allowing her to gain that extra close distance both for macro work and longer distance shots.

Geraldine says ?I have never had much desire to shoot very long distance. I tried a 300mm ‘L’ glass once, but sold it within a fortnight. The thing was a monster, and at f5.6 widest aperture, it was just not fast enough coupled with the focal length and weight of the thing. I simply could not achieve sharp enough pictures. Rather than bring faraway subjects close to me, I prefer bringing tiny things into my visual plane, so that I can study each tiny little detail. I therefore have a natural affinity for Macro photography and Photomicrography. I use an IMXZ Microscope with a zoom factor from x10 - x40 for real tiny subjects, or when I want to reveal what the eye cannot normally see, but with an aperture of f0, I am inevitably dissatisfied with the lack of sharpness throughout. Quite often I will just use the ’sweet spot’ area and crop down afterward. I also have a bellows for an FD lens but I rarely achieve a satisfactory result owing to the lack of mobility and adaptability. I would really enjoy the more mobile MP-E65 but unfortunately it’s not within the budget at the present time.

I missed the medium format experience altogether, but what a great discovery it was to find out I could afford a large format system! I ended up with a 4×5 Toyo View camera with a monorail extension, dark cloth, lots of double dark slides, an Schneider Symmar-S 150mm f5.6, and two boxes of Fuji Provia RDP II, all for ?400!!! The film and processing costs have been adding up since, and the results still look plainly ‘LF novice’. ?

The only other shooting equipment I have are two strobes, a 1000 watt halogen lamp, a Canon Speedlite 550EX, softbox, reflectors and stands. These are not used very often, but are on standby for the odd studio request. Generally though I prefer natural light and natural settings.

Post shoot editing of course requires a digital darkroom. I use a fast processor Dell PC with tons of RAM, a Mac Powerbook G4, an Olympus Camedia Dye Sub printer, a Canon S9000 inkjet, and an Epson Perfection 4870 scanner for my 4×5 film. Let’s also not forget that king of king piece of software - Adobe Photoshop. I just upgraded to CS and I’m not disappointed. ooops… I forgot to mention my trusty set of three halogen torches for light painting…. nothing special or expensive, just normal household torches of various strength.” Says Ms Allen.

Geraldine has always been intrigued by the magical, unique and otherworldly qualities found in the work of photographers like Robert Damachy, Julia Margaret Cameron, Diane Arbus, and Sarah Moon. Specific influences on her photographic development with her light painting have been Berthold Steinhilber, Jorg Grundler, and Diana Thorneycroft.

If you visit her site you will see some of the wonderful macro photography Geraldine captures. Many of those are floral based subject matter. She says “for floral macros, I like to use extremely limited depth of field. This means I inevitably make use of a longer focal length [100mm], the closest shooting distance possible and a wide aperture [often f2]. This usually means the shutter speed is quite fast because there is plenty of light entering the lens. But, that does not mean I do not need a tripod in a natural setting. Often I like to have only the tiniest element in focus, which means handheld shooting is a definite no-no, as the plane of focus can slip at the slightest movement [in the camera or subject]. If the element to be focused on is flat, then generally it is easier to achieve sharpness where I want it. However if it is curved or rounded I try to make sure the camera is positioned at such an angle as to allow the element to be parallel with the back of the camera so that as much of the element as possible is on the same plane as the sensor or film back.”

You can see the portfolio of her fine art photography at her web site: www.photo-art-gallery.com

[techtags: San Antonio Photography, San Antonio Photographers, Senior Portraits, Family Portraits]