Imsticking's Leica D-Lux 4 Blog

I post it here and it sticks.
 

Vampire Heart on a Dusty Street

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Vampire Heart on a Dusty Street - 5.1mm at f/4, ISO 80, Shutter speed 1/1000 sec

I thought I'd post something slightly different today. I really can't remember the last time I posted a color and black and white of the same photograph, so I figured that was one good reason to go for it today. But actually it's because I'm happy with the way this image turned out once process in both black and what and color. I don't often find colors that compliment one another well, or are of the hues I actually enjoy looking at. I simply couldn't post the black and white above without showing how cool the colors were before I stripped them out. You'd think it was quite an easy process to perform: stripping out the color and presenting something as monochrome, but I seem to just absolutely love monochrome photography. After working on this image in Silver Efex Pro, I think I have about 5 new presets that came as a result of processing this image. I'm just going to share the one that made the final cut for me. Once I've finished the redesign of my blog and moved in to my new online home, I plan to release the entire collection of my Silver Efex Pro presets as a thank you to everyone who reads the blog and is already downloading and going wild with the presets I release.

This photograph was taken over the weekend on a really hot Saturday in London's Camden Town. It made for some interesting shooting because there was just so much light and also so much shade amongst the stalls. If you want to improve your photography skills I highly recommend spending some time in Camden Town, and don't wimp out by putting your camera in to Aperture Priority mode.

As for the black and white processing, I used quite a high Structure setting, but they I do a lot of the time. I then applied a yellow filter and processed it with the Kodak 100 TMAX Pro film type and as for toning I used the Selenium 13 preset and the modified it to suit.
The cowboy will come soon.

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Click here to download:
Vampire Heart Kodak 100 TMAX Pro.sep (3 KB)

Filed under  //   Leica   London   blackandwhite   photography   street  
May 24 2010
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"If You Can See the Lights, Shout Out Where You'll Be"

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"If You Can See the Lights, Shout Out Where You'll Be" - 5.10mm at f/2, ISO 80, Shutter speed 1/400 sec

In my previous post I mentioned what an awesome photo walk I'd had after my day job on Friday. I mentioned picking up a new technique, in the comments of Steve Huff's awesome Leica site, that street photographers use and said I'd share some of my images with you in my next post. 

The technique is called shooting from the hip and it's quite difficult to do with a range finder camera, well it's at least more difficult to get good results because of the lack of autofocus on the lenses. Of course, I use a Leica D-Lux 4, for now, so I have the luxury of autofocus when I choose to use it. Friday was the first day I went out with "shoot from the hip" etched into my neural cortex, and I think I just got lucky. 

This is one of the shots I consider lucky. It was taken at the end of the evening as I'd crossed the street from the centre of Piccadilly Circus to the front of what we all remember as Tower Records. They're busy staring up at the lights, except for one of them of course. It all happened so quickly, and I only found myself in this position through sheer luck as the crowds met at the middle of the street I just ended up right on the right hand side of the pavement near the railing that they were standing behind gazing up at the electronic signs. None of them were actually completely stationary when I took this shot, and it could have been quite easy to catch her in mid sentence on the phone with her mouth in some unflattering position.

Will I go out and shoot from the hip next time? Well I did! The very next day at Camden Town. I will post some of those soon too, including a photograph of someone who isn't a big fan of having his photograph taken. If you are as curious as I was to know more about the t-shirt the woman is wearing you can read about it here

Blogging inspiration was provided by Simple Minds' See The Lights ♫

Filed under  //   Leica   London   blackandwhite   photography   street  
May 23 2010
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