Imsticking's Leica D-Lux 4 Blog

The Hand That Feeds

Prima 'paca

OK, so lets answer your first question first. They're Alpacas. They look a lot like the common dromedary camel because they share the same ancestor. I'll spare you the natural history lesson, mainly because I want to spare myself from the same. They're much smaller and better behaved than what we just refer to as a camel though, so quite popular. I didn't see a single one of them spit or foam at the mouth, and it's not as if they didn't notice me enough to get all riled up at the sight.

I've been threatening to post these images since my previous post "To Win a Bear" who's images were taken on the same day at a street fair in the town of Alton, Hampshire. "Where exactly were they?" I hear myself think one or two of you may ask. To the left of the war memorial in front of the Town Hall.

What you looking at?

Well, what you're looking at is the penultimate post here on imsticking.com. Don't get too excited, I'm not actually going to stop blogging about photography. I will reveal all about this in my next and final post here. I started this blog a little over 2 years ago purely as a personal extension to Twitter's 140 character limit, but soon became fascinated with the technical principals of photography, and even more so with visual composition. I find the ability to lead the viewer's eye through the art of composing and capturing moments in time, beyond my control, that can then be further developed before being presented to, or rather inflicted upon, an unsuspecting public, very satisfying. It's a wonderful way of implicitly defining your experiences in this world in a way that makes you feel as if your life has more meaning to you, than it does when reflecting on the often repetitive grind of daily life.

Burrow Down

Don't forget to get your entries in for the London Street Photography Festival's International Street Photography Award 2012. The deadline is Thursday 5th January 2012. The 1st prize includes an Olympus PEN camera and £2000 in cash. Oh and you get international recognition! Let's not forget that part, ha.

This will most likely be my last post of 2012, so I'd like to wish you all a very merry holiday season, and Christmas if you do celebrate, as well as a happy and healthy 2012. May we all live in peaceful times. Bloggin inspiration provided by the super talented Richard Marx with Christmas Spirit

The Self-Conscious Close-Up

Chasing The Hand That Feeds

Filed under // Hampshire Leica Street photography

December 23 2011

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To Win a Bear

Score Over One

I was heading to my local cafe on Sunday to work on the preparation of my iPhone app for submission to the App Store. And then things got a bit out of hand. It seems there was some sort of street carnival on. No one had told me, however. My usual parking spot was gone, I had to queue for a coffee and sit on what can only be described as a bar stool to drink it. Meh.

All was not lost, as I had my Leica D-Lux 4 camera with me. I really wasn't in the mood for shooting and I really, really wanted to get some work done. After throwing back my coffee I ventured out to see what was actually going on. It was mad! There was a blow-up slide thing taller than any building in the town. Double-story's as big as it gets I think, but still. A mini Disneyland, so small it's called Disney Cottage, and people as far as the eye can see. These images don't show the madness. Which in a way is quite cool.

It was chaos and taking photos in those conditions doesn't really grab me, but I found myself grabbing the opportunity. I have more images I'll post soon, once I've found time to process them. Some cool shots of Alpacas to come!

Hey Mickey!

Disney v0.01

Quality Time

Filed under // Hampshire Leica photography

December 5 2011

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Come Sundown

Come Sundown

I woke up this morning and was pleasantly surprised to find the weather making a mockery of the predictions for the area of Hampshire I live in. Fantastic because I really did think I would be spending 3 hours in the wet on my mountain biking today. I took these shots on my way home from a village called Binsted. I've discovered that buying a Leica camera means you have almost no need for Lightroom at all beyond image management. While trialling Lightroom 3, I've found the image adjustments to be of little use. So much so that this image above is just out of Capture One PRO after a white balancing and changing the colour profile to that of the Leica M9. Every change I tried using Lightroom simply made the image look unrealistic.

Today, December 3rd, 2011.

The one above was processed using Silver Efex Pro and bears little resemblance to what I saw. I guess hounds would disagree. There are some seriously old buildings around this area, and unfortunately they are not on public property or I'd love to take some images of them and send them back in time. Both of these images were taken with my Leica D-Lux 4.

Filed under // Hampshire Leica photography

December 3 2011

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Champagne Life

Champagne Garden

This is a series of images I wanted to share with my post entitled "How to Unwrap Christmas". They didn't quite fit with the colourful images of that blog post and I don't like overwhelming readers with bad images, so I thought I'd split them across two posts. As is typical with not blogging about images as soon as you're done importing and processing them, in my memory, scenes from the occasion seem to vanish which makes writing about them a challenge to put it mildly. This top image always makes me think of champagne and the styling is a deliberate attempt to hint at that, without shoving it in your face.

If Wishes Were Filthy Cars

So while viewing these images may well be the lowlight of your photography experience this week, I can at least point you to the highlight of mine. BBC 4 aired a documentary called "America in Pictures: The Story of Life Magazine" last night. It was hosted by Rankin and although I was skeptical before I started watching it, I was soon put at ease by the sight of a Leica camera. It was actually a very good documentary as Rankin tracked down some of the photographers who used to work for Life magazine and they were very candid and open about what it was like working in an era where getting a gig shooting film for Life magazine turned you into a celebrity. Some of the most iconic images of the 20th century were shot by photographers working for Life magazine, and I'd be lying if I said Life's black and white images of Marilyn Monroe weren't a strong influence in me picking up a camera and choosing to shoot black and white most of the time. There's something timeless about black and white. It removes some of the clues I guess.

Working Hard

Gramps

Filed under // Leica London Rankin photography

December 2 2011

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Show Me a Sign

Show Me a Sign

I went for a long ride on my mountain bike this afternoon. I usually try to get out every weekend. Just me and the country folk's exhaust fumes. Lovely. I ride for fitness and I like the rush of going 50kph downhill mixed in with the challenge of getting up some of the climbs in one piece. My heart rate averages out at about 160bpm over 2:30 - 3 hours of riding, so I don't generally stop to smell the flowers. Not that there are any at this time of year.

I often tweet from the road. Always while I'm not moving. The reasons for this were aptly demonstrated today when I'd just spent 15 minutes riding over some very muddy fields and had made my way back onto a tar road. I was greeted with the usual tee junction stop, but today was different. In an effort to avoid being mowed down by a convoy of cars I thought a u-turn would be a good idea, but unfortunately it was a little too sharp and my mud-caked front wheel slipped on a rather unforgiving concave storm drain cover and the next thing I knew I was in mid-air, parallel to the tar, watching my bike fly away from me. I'd gone forward over my right shoulder and the bike kicked back. Not my finest hour, but at least I didn't hear laughing and taunting from the convoy of cars. Luckily no-one stopped to ask if I was OK. I was just the idiot who fell off his bike at zero miles an hour. Go me.

Gaikowski Learns to Drive

The top image made me think of a classic song by Tesla called 'Signs' which I was introduced to by a bass played of a band I used to play drums for back when I was in my early 20's. Their album 'Five Man Acoustical Jam' has some real gems on it. There are quite a few covers on the album, but my favourite track would have to be 'Gettin' Better'. I absolutely love the slow intro and the emotion in it. All these image where shot with my Leica D-Lux 4 and processed with Capture One PRO 5 and Silver Efex Pro I.

Chawton Wood

Lucky Birds

Filed under // Hampshire Leica photography

November 27 2011

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Terminal Delay

5

You gotta love it when you drag yourself out of bed at 6am (after only falling asleep after 1am), get ready and up to the station by 7am just to discover that your service has been delayed. Oh what jolly good fun! It's time to bond with my fellow passengers, not. No one want's there photo taken at 8:30am while they quietly contemplate how to disable the security cameras without being seen, so they can go postal anon.

I like this shot, mainly because it's the least embarrassing of the handful I took this morning, but mainly because it's actually straight! I was shooting blind, hanging my arm over the rail. But seriously, I like it because we have someone deep in thought in the foreground and that's contrasted with that very empty train track disappearing into the morning fog. Taken with my Leica D-Lux 4, as always. You can find the Silver Efex Pro present for the above image, below.

Click here to download:

Platform 5.sep (3 KB)

Filed under // Hampshire Leica photography

November 22 2011

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How to Unwrap Christmas

The Somerset House Christmas Tree

OK so, how often have you read this blog and thought, "wow! that was really helpful!". Never right? That's because this isn't a "How To" blog. So you can relax, I'm not about to try and show you how to unwrap Christmas. Why the title you may ask? Well, I was out shooting on Thursday after seeing the Amazon exhibition at Somerset House and I came across workmen finishing off the installation of the ice-rink shacks. They were also busy putting up a grotto so they could sell you stuff you didn't know you needed. To me it just looked like they were unwrapping Christmas. I hung around for a bit because I wanted to show you the Christmas tree they'd installed. There was a security guard standing in front of it that bemused me. Maybe some of the baubles really are coated in real gold? Who knows. Perhaps they're hiding the crown jewels in that box? I was waiting for the muscle to move, and once he did, the sun came out. Very. Very. Briefly. I cannot impress this upon you more. 30 seconds and it was gone.

Dont' you just love the colours in this image? And it's all 'au naturale'. No photoshop required to get these tones. I simply swapped out the colour profile of my Leica D-Lux 4 for the Leica M9 profile in Capture One PRO and nudged one of the dark sliders in the histogram tool a few increments, and this is what you get.

Covent Garden Piazza

It presents the work of Sebastião Salgado and Per Anders Pettersson and some of it is really amazing. Black and white images taken in the Amazon. Huge arial shots of rivers weaving through the jungle beautifully composed. One of my favourites is an action shot of a native chasing a monkey through the trees and he's in mid-flight. A really incredible shot. It's not the first time I've seen an exhibition in one of the ground floor sections of Somerset House and as soon as I walked into the room my disappointment surfaced immediately. For all over every print on the wall was the reflection of the sun streaming through the windows. I've seen exhibitions at the Embankment level and it was nowhere near as bad (there are no windows, of course). You have to wonder if anyone working at Somerset House has ever viewed anything that's gone up on the walls. What a waste. It really did absolutely spoil the entire experience for me. Could you just imagine if Apple did photography exhibitions? I wish they did. They'd use their super cool glare-free screen material and we'd all get to see what we came for. Brilliant!

Vanity Glare

Filed under // Christmas Leica London photography

November 18 2011

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The Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2011

Friday Night Out + 1

I thought I'd get in early this year and go and see the finalists of the 2011 Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize at the National Portrait Gallery in it's first week of opening. I went on Friday after work and was pleasantly surprised this year. Last year I wasn't particularly thrilled by the finalists. My viewing is usually a 2 stage process. First I go through the exhibit and read every single writeup on every single portrait: it's context and the bio on the photographer. I have a look at the photo but I don't get wrapped up in the experience. I want to learn about the portraits and the photographers who took them. This often involves the very mischievous activity of photographing the writeup on the wall next to the portrait. You're not allowed to take photos but I allow myself the undeserved privilege of relaxing this rule for my own personal gain. Seriously, it's not my fault the print version of the exhibit only contains write-ups for the 5 grand finalists. What else, pray tell, am I to do? Let a golden opportunity to learn about some talented photographers, pass me by? Uh. No.

Strange Foreign Beauty

Once I've done my homework I circle the exhibition again. Yes, a lot like a vulture, sweeping in-between other viewers (with little or no exhibition etiquette - them, not me) and this is when I sense which portraits shake my soul. It's remarkable when it happens. The polite part of my mind says "move on so others can view the portrait". The guilt builds up, but "it's not an actual crime" I remind myself, and so the soul shaking continues. My take on the exhibit is interesting, mainly (for me) because some of the portraits I wouldn't post on this blog, never mind hang them in the National Portrait Gallery. Have a gander at the university portrait with the round frame and you'll understand the term "snap shot". Of course I'm sure the explanation that the subject was trying to re-experience his university days must have swayed the judges, but to me it was an instantly forgettable photograph. If only it really was. I circled a third time and then went up to the Victorian section because I enjoy walking around pretending that I own the place, and am nice enough to let the public in to view my private collection. I really could just move in to the gallery and never leave. #OccupyNPG anyone?

Hot Chef

Because I enjoy street photography and the challenge of capturing the lesser spotted homo sapien unawares, I do tend to find highly staged portraits too contrived to be taken seriously. So when a photographer has spent 6 months attempting to colour the subjects skin like porcelain or they've deliberately thrown a fluffy pink bunny rabbit onto the bed of a teenagers bedroom to make a point, I generally have to fight a gag reflex. No one said viewing photography would be pleasant or easy. Remember that as you fight your way to the front of a crowd only to discover freak photography. That rather popular attempt to win a photography competition by taking an unremarkable photograph of an unfortunate person who's suffered some physical disfigurement, and then passing it off as a great photograph. Would we be looking at this photograph if this woman's nose hadn't been ripped off her face? No. Personally I just see it as exploitation, and I don't think judges should be rewarding photographers for that.

Technicolor

If you've made it this far, well done! Millions haven't even seen this page on the internets. My favourite portrait of the exhibition? Tatiana and Belene from the series Venus & Furs by Yann Gross. I took these photos with my Leica D-Lux 4 across the road from the entrance to the National Portrait Gallery.

Filed under // Leica London National Portrait Gallery photography

November 16 2011

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On Remembrance Day

Our Glorious Dead

It was Remembrance Sunday in the UK today. I was on my way to a coffee shop when I saw people leaving a Remembrance service at the Alton Town Hall, and suddenly thought I'd dash back home for my D-Lux 4 and take a few photos of people taking some time out of their day to remember those in the armed services who gave their lives for this country. I took some time out myself to contemplate what such a brave and courageous sacrifice the men and woman of this country, and indeed others like it, made defending our nation when we most needed it.

It's hard to imagine being faced with the prospect of leaving these comfortable shores knowing that you may never return. For many men and women that was the last time. The last goodbye to their loving family, and the last group of friends they would ever make. I watched the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance on BBC 1 last night. Held at the Royal Albert Hall, it's a cold, hard soul that wouldn't feel moved seeing those service men and woman honoured for their bravery and service during the war. I've always thought war was such an extreme and ultimately unnecessary act of extreme violence, but sadly that's not how this world seems to work. We seem to get caught up in the will of others. For those who did, and left loved ones to mourn their loss, I think the Festival of Remembrance is a fitting tribute. It's a shame we don't have something similar for the men and woman who've made the ultimate sacrifice serving their country here at home too. You can however donate to the Police Memorial Trust and of course to the Royal British Legion itself.

The delightful Katherine Jenkins sung a powerful tribute towards the closing of the Festival with her song "A Flower Tells a Story". That link will take you to a video made, incredibly, by one of her fans for the song. It really is inspiring to see someone like Katherine, so unaffected by the life she's created for herself developing her incredible vocal abilities, showing such gratitude to those who, unlike most of us, sacrifice so much, so selflessly, time and time again.

I didn't grow up in the UK, but at the bottom of Africa. South Africa celebrated Poppy Day every year too. It was always an important time during the school year and I remember some seniors covering the front of their school blazers with poppies they'd bought in support. It's a lot more real when you live over here though, and see ex-servicemen and women in the community and sometimes even talk to them when you have the opportunity, leaves a lasting and deep sense of respect.

Katherine's not the only singer to record a song as a tribute to those fallen during the war. I grew up listening to Bryan Adams' "Remembrance Day". I think Bryan would probably have to tone it down to an acoustic ballad if I wider audience were to be considered. And that in itself would be a shame because I've always loved the emotion he put into the recording. Me, I love the fact that I now have 2 very different songs I can listen to when I feel like paying my own private respects.

Filed under // Alton Katherine Jenkins Leica Remembrance Day Royal British Legion photography

November 13 2011

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I Close My Eyes and Slowly Dream Away

The Reverend Eric Martin

Let's begin with the obvious! The colourful versions of some of my images of Mr Big from a gig they did in London recently. If you want to read my write up on the gig, check out my previous post entitled "Mr Big Time".

It's taken me a while but I found more motivation once I realised there was a new version of Color Efex Pro 4 to trial. It's awesome! I would buy it in a flash if I was shooting more often. In fact, it actually makes me want to shoot for colour more too (a lot in fact), which can only be a good thing. It's really easy to go overboard with CFX filters. I don't recall the ins and outs of CFX3 but I don't recall you being able to layer filters on top of one another in a single session. So to see this in CFX4 was a BIG deal for me. I'd usually resort to using another tool. It's been so long since I used it, I can't even remember the plug-ins name (might be PhotoTools Pro). But in the end I found I was only really using it to sharpen and cross process images. With CFX4 I just found there were so many options with regard to light editing, that you could spend hours not even touching the colours at all, and still come away with unbelievably cool images. In fact I'm almost done with an autumn shot I took on the weekend, making it look sinister. I lot like a still from a horror flick. That's what I was going for, and I'll post that image soon. Feel free to download the CFX4 preset zip, or recipes as Nik call them, for 4 of these images at the end of this post!

Memories Never Fade

I really love how this image above of the band came out in the end. I spent about an hour on it on the train home one evening and when you get into those long contemplative processing moods you can really get bogged down, or just lose hope entirely. It took about 6 filters and although it looks like a simple split tone, it isn't. The spotlights are actually shining bright red and green. It's really easy to bump up the saturation on an image and make it pop. But I like to try and make images pop for other reasons. Like getting as close to the realistic tones I was seeing at the time (not hard with Leica gear, admittedly), or using desaturation and light.

Bass Slapped

Enough about processing though, because I wanted to encourage other compact shooters to get to a Leica Store, in particular the store in Mayfair, London, because last week I went along to a M9 Interactive Workshop, run on the day, by Edmond Terakopian. Brett also does them, so there are plenty of opportunities to get out and shoot with a Leica M9! The workshops are free, so why not? It was a baptism of fire, but a necessary one. Looking at my results, I don't think I had any problems with the manual focus aspect of range finder shooting. It's really not that difficult. And I think once you've become familiar with the camera and the style of working to the point where some of it just becomes automatic, I think you would get awesome results, like the pros. I found that I was suddenly having to use my left hand, for almost everything besides pressing the shutter release. That was a big change from a little compact like the D-Lux's. Everything with a D-Lux I do with my right hand.

A Little Too Deep

You get to shoot with an M9 and a 35mm Summicron lens. I was relieved to find the M9 is a LOT lighter when you take the Noctilux f/0.95 off and bolt on a smaller lens. The first time I ever picked up an M9 was during Brett's excellent intro workshop to the M9 I did last year and it had a Noctilux on it. I'm not sure, but it felt like the lens was much heavier than the camera. Anyway, with a more conventional lens on the M9 it really is a small camera. It was much lighter than I expected an easily comparable to my D-Lux 4. I've held my brother's Canon 5D Mk I, and I can honestly say I'll never own a camera like that. 'Ridiculous' is the best word I can use to describe the 5D, and then 'insane'.

I Close My Eyes and Slowly Dream Away

I post it here and it sticks.

The Hand That Feeds

To Win a Bear

Come Sundown

Champagne Life

Show Me a Sign

Terminal Delay

How to Unwrap Christmas

The Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2011

On Remembrance Day

I Close My Eyes and Slowly Dream Away

Ray Scott

Photography

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