Holiday Perspective

Soldiers from the 341st PSYOP Co. from San Antonio, Texas visit the Fischer House at Lackland Air Force base to delivery toys and talk with children  about their jobs during Operation Toy Drop. This is the first year Operation Toy Drop will help children throughout the nation. To learn more visit www.optoydrop.net. (U.S. army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   If you haven't noticed it's December and that can only mean one thing! No, not Christmas. Toy Drop.

"Huh? What's Toy Drop?"

   Only the coolest thing the Army does all year; thousands of paratroopers donate thousands of toys for deserving kids. I'll refrain from comparing it to other toy collection drives; but needless to say this is pretty awesome.

"So, how do they drop the toys? And uh, why are we talking about this? This is a photography blog?"

   Well they don't drop the toys, they drop themselves, paratroopers with parachutes jump out of C-130's after donating toys. And we're talking about this because today's picture is about Toy Drop. [Assuming you read the caption...I'll wait...still waiting...oh hey there, welcome back]

   Now that I've gotten that plug out of the way, lets talk about this photo and how that has to do with perspective.

   Okay, clear subject(s) The kid and maybe the Soldier. What you probably don't know is the kid is sitting in the turret of a Humvee; the soldier down below is helping out. You don't get this shot from the ground, you can't. You have to get up high. So yes, I had to climb up on top of this Humvee to shoot the photograph. Yes, everyone thought I was crazy. I like the shot, hopefully you do too. But more to the point, I want you to start experimenting with your own perspective.

   As for the photograph itself; well the turret partially frames our subject(s) who are in points of interest. You could argue the eyes have leading lines. But really that's about it regarding this shot.

So, here's a bonus shot! Hey guess what, I had to climb up on top of a bench to get this shot. You guessed it, everyone looked at me like I was crazy.
 

One of thousands of toys donated by paratroopers for children during Operation Toy Drop 13 at at Fort Bragg, N.C.on December 9, 2010 (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres

 
   So one more thing to say about Toy drop; just because you don't live by Fort Bragg or jump out of airplanes for a living doesn't mean you can't be a part of toy drop. You can visit your local community, ...well anything really..., churches, shelters, orphanages [yes orphanages still exist] all get requests for toys during the Christmas season, you can help out and give a gift to a random child. I know I will.

   If this post inspires you to do anything, hopefully it's to give a gift to a child you've never met before, just like our Soldiers at Fort Bragg have been doing for the past 16 years.

It's all about the choices you make

Soldiers from the U.S. Army Civil Affairs & Psychological Operations Command (Airborne) prepare to conduct an night jump from Camp Mackall, N.C., on July 19, 2011 (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   Did you know that at night time it's dark? Crazy right? Also, you should know that I did desaturate this image a little to help with the noise.

   Taking photographs is all about making choices. What equipment to use, where to shoot from, how long should I wait for something to happen. Do I know what's going to happen?

   In this photo I knew what was going to happen and I was aware of my surroundings.  

   I shot this with at  f/1.8 @ 1/13th of a second and 3200 ISO  from a tripod. There isn't a whole lot of blur because there wasn't a whole lot of moving going on. Well, minus the propeller on the left, but I was looking for that motion blur.

   So why did I choose those settings? Well  I went with an ISO of 3200 because that was highest my camera would go without introducing an unacceptable amount of noise. The lower settings on the other hand just wouldn't give me enough light without a huge aperture.

   I knew the CASA is built in such a way that having more than one person on the ramp at the same time is dangerous; I knew those paratroopers would be standing around not moving very much as they loaded the aircraft one by one. But they would still be moving, so I couldn't go too slow or I'd have a blurry mess but I didn't have to go very fast either.

   Because I knew the limitations of my flash [just a few feet] I knew using one wasn't an option; it was just too far and the area too large an area to light everything up properly without a ridiculous amount of lighting. 

   I could have gotten closer but then I would have needed a a wider angle lens. Problem, because I didn't have a f/1.8 wide angle lens I would have needed an even longer shutter speed and/or upped my ISO.

When it's dark I need to get the shutter speed right, when it's bright outside I need to get my aperture right, then again when it involves motion shutter again is key, do I want blur or do I want to freeze something?

   Photography is all about decision making. I like to make my decisions as soon as I get to an area. Sometimes I make bad choices and have reconsider my plan of attack. Do I mount the Flash? What's the lowest ISO I can  get? What two lenses am I going to have on my cameras [yes, I like to shoot with two cameras] Should I be shooting in shutter priority, Aperture Priority, or do I need to worry about manual settings?

I dislike manual settings, I like to let my camera do the math, I worry about the composition.

   Did I just blow your mind? A photographer who hates manual shooting? Camera's are pretty smart nowadays, they get exposure right a lot of the time. When I used an underwater disposable camera to take photos I was at the complete mercy of the camera and the exposure came out just fine. When I do use manual settings I set it and forget it. At least until lighting conditions change.

   Yes, sometimes I am forced to use manual mode because my camera isn't as smart as me, but 99% of the time it knows what to do. A camera however, cannot compose.

   And that is why when I look at a photo the first thing I look at is composition. The second, third, fourth and fifth things I look at? Also, composition. 

I make my technical choices up front so that when my eye is in the viewfinder the only choices I'm making are about my subject.

ISO and you

Paratroopers from the 301st TPC conducted nighttime Airborne Operations leaving from San Diego, California and landing on Edwards Air Force Base on January 21, 2011. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   Believe it or not, there was a time when I disliked flash. "Why use flash? I'll just turn up my ISO!" "No one likes flash in their eyes," "It's more 'tactical' to use flash," "The flash seems to have a mind of its own," and a plethora of other excuses to not use flash.

   So, for those of you non-converted, what to do? I like ISO. No, I love ISO. [I love flash more...] Sensors get better every other month it seems and after playing with a NIKON D3s a couple years ago in pitch black conditions at 102,000 I was impressed. Yes, at 102,000 the noise is ridiculous, but that fact that I could shoot 1/60 at all and get something in those conditions blew my mind.

   But this wasn't shot with a D3S, it was shot with a t2i (an old canon entry level dslr) with an ISO1600 f/3.5 (not a very wide aperture) at 1/60th. You'll notice it's pretty noisy at 1600, but it gets the job done. It was sunset so I wanted to keep the oranges and I didn't have a gel with me to match the light of my flash with the light of the sunset.

   At least the higher ISO got the job done at dusk; good luck getting anything without a flash, tripod, or a much wider aperture after the sun goes down without cranking out your ISO way up. A tripod would have been nice to have, but even then I probably wouldn't have been able to capture this blur free even with a tripod, these soldiers where moving pretty quickly. A 1.8 lens would have been great to have here as well, which I did in fact have, but it wasn't the angle I wanted.

   My lens was as wide as it would go, and my shutter speed was as slow as I could hold it without blur. Which really left me with just one option, kick up the ISO.

   "If you love ISO much why is it your last option?"

  Because it saves the day. You can't always have the gear you want, but being able to quickly and easily make sacrifices in quality for improving your lighting is better than nothing. In the above case I wanted to use a wide angle lens, which only opened up to 3.5. I had a 50 mm lens that opened up to 1.8, but it wasn't the angle I wanted. I was able to keep the lens I wanted and still got the shot because I upped my ISO.

A few words about noise

   In the Halycon days of film increasing your ISO meant putting in a new roll of film and in exchange you got some fairly pleasing grain. Grain was a by product of the increased sensitivity. Nowadays uppping your ISO is as easy as a couple presses of a button, but the by product of increasing digital sensitivity is noise.

   It's like when you're listening to a low quality audio file and you turn your stereo to max volume; sure it's loud, but it's not very clear, that's noise. You're turning the volume on your camera with low quality light and the end result is a noisy photo. The colors are a little off sometimes, and you'll have a rouge pixels that are green, yellow, or red instead of blue.

Flash motion photography

Pfc. Amber Nolan, 450th Civil Affairs Bn., rucks across Fort Meade, Md. during the 352nd best warrior competition on April 2, 2012. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   Wow, it's been a busy couple of weeks for me personally. But it's time to get back on the photo bus. So lets get back to it shall we.

   I know, I know I've been extolling the virtues of flash for what seems like forever; I'll get off my flash horse after this post. I promise. [No, that's probably a lie, but I'll give it a rest for a bit!]

 

Points of interest. Check. Yellow road line leading to subject, check.
Orange/white line leading to subject, check. But those eyes, they just keep pulling me off the frame...sigh. 

   I'm not going to lie, I like this photo. It's not technically correct either, I mean, just look at those eyes pulling me off the frame. Yuck. Okay fine, clear subject, leading lines, subject is in points of interest. The exposure awesome. It's technically pretty good. Just not flawless.

   When I shot this however my concern was getting the patch included in the shot. As a public affairs soldier I was always looking to brand my images. I could go on an on about all the good stuff my unit does on a daily basis around the world, but we certainly don't have very much name brand recognition, at least not yet anyway. But lets get back to this shot.

   Unfortunately a side effect of using flash to get blur is, well, you get blur where the flash doesn't shine.

   [Bad pun. I know. I'm pretty sure you're here FOR the puns tho... right?]

   So the patch itself is a little blurrier than i would have liked it, and her eyes aren't looking over her shoulder, but that's uncontrolled action for you. Having a second flash to specifically light her her patch would have done the trick; [at least in my head it does, using just theory] as it stands there wasn't enough umph to get the black portions of the patch clear.

   

   Luckily her eyes and face are crisp and clean. The flash helped the colors [what little colors that are] on the subject really pop. And most importantly I captured motion.

   Yes, flash freezes motion [surprisingly I haven't done a post about how to use flash to freeze motion...don't worry I'll talk about some other subjects before I go back to flash] but with careful management of your shutter speed you can use it to mix and match both movement and the lack thereof. 

   What we're seeing here is 1/30 of a second [at f/22] which isn't a very long period at all, but it's twice as long as 1/60th of a second [What I normally shoot for blur free objects which are standing still] and it's glacially slow when compared to most sports shots which are shot in the high hundreds and even thousands. 

   So really, 1/30th of a second is a heck of a long time.

   Just not at night.

   In regards to light, specifically the light bouncing off our subject, the blur part you see around her is where she was at the beginning of the 1/30th [lets just call this the first half of the 1/30th of a second] and the crisp parts of here is where my flash went off, and captured her [lets call this the second half.]

   I used the "rear shutter" on my camera to ensure my flash went off at the end. This gives it some forward/upward motion. You'll have to open up your manual to find out how to make your camera use the flash on the rear shutter. If I had used the flash normally it would have given the effect of backward motion as the flash would have fired during the first half and then blur collecting during the second half; so the blur would have been in front of the crispy parts and not behind the crispy parts.

Which by the way is what happened with her sleeve. While her body was moving towards the camera her arm was going away from the camera, so the blurry part happens in the first half and the stop motion happens in the second half, causing blur in front.

Bounce Flash

Connie Almueti proudly displays her plaque and medal which inducts her into the Civil Affairs Hall of Fame at Fort Bragg, N.C., Sept. 25, 2012. Almueti has served seven commanding generals over 42 years as a Department of the Army civilian, and has been a critical contact for countless commanders in the field. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   In case you haven't been following along, I've kind of been gushing about Flash. I talked about flashing in the morning, Flashing  in the evening, and Flashing at Supertime.

[This is a reference to the  song"Sugartime" which I honestly have no idea how I know about this song, possibly I heard it in an ad? Moving on...]

   Needless to say, I'm a big fan of flash. In fact, a friend of mine said the other day,

"Appreciate natural light, but bring your own just in case."

   Okay, enough gushing. So lets talk about this photo. Connie was inducted to the Civil Affairs Hall of Fame, hence the medal and the plaque, and I was tasked with writing the story.

   Unfortunately administrative work doesn't exactly lend itself to very memorable photography, and really the big story was that she was becoming a member of the Civil Affairs Hall of Fame, a first for any woman. So I said to myself,

"Damn the torpedo's lets pose a photograph!" 

   This was also the second attempt, the results of the first weren't really up to snuff. Yes, I have had plenty of bad days photographing, luckily I was able to go back and try again.

I wanted soft light because it's just more flattering. My favorite method of getting soft light is to bounce it off the ceiling. I aim my flash straight up, crank it up to 11 and let it rip. The light actually bounces off the ceiling and cascades downwards like fairy dust.

You'll notice this isn't quite the exact same picture, I can't

find the one I posted. Regardless, it's pretty awesome, in my

opinion to have anything of mine hanging in the pentagon.

Note: High ceilings laugh at your attempts to bounce flash, many flash units just don't have the umph to launch light beams 10 feet up and 10 feet back down. Also some ceilings will absorb the light.

   The only real problem was that the glass on her plaque was the right height to just catch to tip of my flash. That's a big no no because it breaks the fourth wall. I didn't have access to any sort of off camera flash, not even a bracket, so I just had to work with what I had. I strongly considered removing in in post, but decided against it because editing anything in post is frowned upon in Army photographs, more so than posing. As such, it sits there mocking me.

Turns out, this photo is hanging on a wall in the Pentagon. The small photo shows it hanging out with some other photos. As far as I know it's the only photo of mien hanging in the Pentagon, which to be honest is probably more so because of the content (Connie is a pretty big deal) and no so much the awesomeness of the photo. Regardless, I think it's pretty cool.

If your interested in learning more about Connie you can read about the story I wrote here: http://www.dvidshub.net/news/95899/general-aid#.Ul4bWFA3v8k

Things I need: More Flash

Soldiers from the U.S Army Civil Affairs & Psychological Operations Soldiers prepare to hook up a load to a UH-0 Blackhawk during Pathfinder School at Fort Bragg N.C. on March 27, 2013. These soldiers where able to earn their Pathfinder Badge, thanks to the National Guard Warrior Training Center Mobile Training Team.

   In my dream world I'd have a big flat bed truck with a couple of spot lights and filters at my beck and call ready to provide fill light everywhere I went. Unfortunately for me, I don't have access to something like that. So, sometimes I have to use the power of Photoshop to add light.

Yes, adding light in post does in fact tear me apart inside.

   In this photo I did in fact use my flash. I channeled my inner Captain Kirk and screamed for more power, to which my flash responded, "I'm giving all she's got!"

   You can see that the flash was able to highlight the dust flying at me, but it kind of made it look like snow. It was also able to add a little bit of light to the cargo and the backs of the Soldiers. It also added a little bit of pop to those yellow strands. I would have liked this better if I had more power, because it would have brightened everything up. As it stands it's a shade dark in my opinion.

Step 1: ID Subjects Step 2: Wait for something cool 

Step 3: Press Shutter Button. Step 4: Blog about it.

   You can see that we had cloud cover, so the light was already diffused, there wasn't too much in the way of harsh shadows I really needed to fill.

   Also, the underbelly of the helicopter was dark; and even after some touch up in post is still is darker than I would have liked. But without that flat bed with spotlights there wasn't a whole lot I could have done about that. (I probably don't need a flat bed, a few well placed strobes connected via wireless would do the job as well, but that's a whole other discussion.)

   So how exactly did I find myself in this situation? Well I got a phone call from my Captain,

   "Do you want to go out and take photos tomorrow afternoon? I'm swamped, " she said.

   "Of?" I asked, knowing I didn't have much of a choice.

   "Oh, a bunch of our Soldiers are becoming Pathfinders and their going to be hooking up heavy loads to helicopters hovering over their heads?" She replied

   "Yes. Yes I do."

   I showed up expecting a wait; and wait I did. The students where learning how to communicate with the helicopter pilots and where practicing dropping supplies. Which looked cool, but it's hard to show a soldier on the ground and a helicopter a few hundred feet up in the air dropping supplies, visually it's hard to capture without a huge lens.

Note: A telephoto lens condenses space, so if you want to make it look like two things are closer than they actually are, use a telephoto lens and it'll look like they are much closer than they are.

The red arrow is where I wanted to be, on my back, with a 

super duper wide angle lens. I wanted the tips of the rotor,

the cargo and the soldier hooking up. If anyone gets this shot

after reading this and wins an award for it,  I fully expect a 

thank you card.

   Regardless, I stuck around waiting for this shot. Okay, I actually was thinking of a different shot, using a super wide lens from underneath the belly of the beast, but we didn't have a super wide. But I persisted.

   Luckily for me, this event happened about 10 times, giving me ample time to see what was happening, think about different angles, and fail a few times.

   The first time I stood back and just watched. I could see the wind from the rotors just whipping all sorts of dirt in the air. I knew from previous experiences it wasn't going to be fun. But I can't say I was entirely prepared to be just a few feet from the rotor wash.

   Lets just say, unless you're under the belly, it's not a fun time. I went out each and every time, experimenting with different angles and positions aka the 30-30 rule. I really wanted the faces of the soldiers and their unit patch because a big part of public affairs is showing off your "brand." But I realized getting everything in one shot probably wasn't going to happen. I decided the most compelling thing about this event was a 10,000 pound metal monster bearing down on a few soldiers.

So I got behind these soldiers, put them in my points of interest and just waited for the helicopter to get in my frame.

At the end of the day I can say I got a shot I liked. It wasn't the shot I wanted; I still would like to go back and try again, but I'm happy with it.

Interested in reading more about my adventures with flash? Check out: Felix and the technicolor dream coat, 

Flash, Huh, what is good for? Absolutely Everything, and Flashing at Night

Felix and the technicolor dream coat

Staff. Sgt. Israel Pou with the 402nd Civil Affairs Battalion checks his map in the dark during the Night Land Navigation portion of the Best Warrior Competition at NAS Pensacola on March 23, 2011. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

I can't for the life of me find the original of this image and the metadata has been stripped out of the copy I do have. Conspiracy? You be the judge.

   Regardless, this photo I like. No, it's not perfect but the colors I love. I know I just talked about how night time is a great time to use flash. And it is. But lets say you don't have a flash, what do you do then? Well, be lucky!

   Okay, well that's not entirely true. In this instance you can see my subject had a few sources of light, a fairly bright light from a near by parking lot, a yellow/orange light from a nearby building, and his big red flashlight.

Note 1: His red light is a great example of how light accumulates on a sensor/film.

His flashlight produces only red light, not white, or yellow or orange, just red.

   Why so many colors? Because as the light accumulates on your sensor or film it will eventually turn white. There is more light in the center of his beam and less light as you go outwards. So here, the colors represent brightness as well as color temperature.

Note 2: Do you see the purples and the blues? You can almost see where the light from the parking lamp (which produces cool blue light) mixes with the red light, making purple. Neat huh? I thought so.

Note 3: Do you see some yellow tint around to top part of the photo, top part of the solider and some of the grass area? That light came from a nearby building

Okay, so now that we know how we got all those neat colors lets talk about some technical aspects about this photograph. 

   I used a tripod to keep camera shake on my end out of the equation. However, as we discussed yesterday, if the subject moves we would get blur. I had to stay around the building/parking lot because as my major source of light (I didn't have a flash with me) I simply wasn't able to get any photos outside of that area that weren't nearly black.

   I wish I could tell you exactly how long I had the shutter open, but unfortunately I can't tell you how long this exposure lasted. I would guess it was longer than 1/2 second, you can see some motion were his head was moving but you'll notice it ends up just looking like a blur/smudge.

   I also wish I could tell you what my ISO was at, but it was probably over 400. How can I tell? Well even the sharp parts of this photo aren't very sharp, if you zoom way in you'll see noise [off color pixels]

Note 3: With film as you increase your ISO you increase your grain. Grain in film is like adding texture, which is different from noise which are digital aberrations. In digital  as you increase your ISO you'll produce noise, random colors appearing as tiny pixels. More noise, more random colored pixels.

Grain is kind of like having a sore throat. Noise is like losing your voice.

Example: My voice is raspy and has texture, its certainly not normal, but it's not terrible and some people might prefer it [that's another topic] Noise is like losing your voice. Every so often I squeak or go silent, there just isn't any consistency to it, that's similar noise.

So, back to this photo, I like it. It's not technically perfect but I enjoy the colors. Do I wish it was sharper? Yes. Do I wish I would have used Flash? Yes. But that is why we take pictures and look at them with a critical eye, to see how we can improve our technique.

Flashing at Night. Bonus: 30-30 rule

Spc. Sarah M. Wiita, 490th Civil Affairs Bn., plots her points in the dark during the night land navigation portion of the 350th Civil Affairs Command best warrior competition at Camp Bullis, Texas on March 25, 2012. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

Yesterday I said, "Flash is good. I promise." To which a co-worker of mine said, "It's not good for night land navigation." To which I say poppycock!

   Okay, I really do get his point. The problem with flash at night is that it can certainly temporarily blind you. But without it, getting an image of a moving object at night is hard. It's more luck and than anything else. Without flash you're hoping your subject won't move too much. If your subject moves too much your subject will be blurry and seem out of focus. You're also hoping you can stand still long enough without moving so that you don't cause unnecessary blur to your image.

The night time, is the right time, to use flash. 

   In the above photo we have a few things going on. First off, this soldier is mapping her route on a map with a pencil and a protractor. She is able to see thanks to her headlamp, because it's dark.

   I also want you to notice the orange light on her back/head, that is from a dim street lamp. The reason it's bright like that is because this was a fairly long exposure, (1.3 seconds according to my metadata) that means I capture 1.3 seconds of her moving and light bouncing off her. We talked a little about long exposures and it's effects on light during a post about leading lines. You can consider this a bit of continuation of that topic.

   In case you don't want to go back and read up, what's happening here is that I'm opening my shutter for 1.3 seconds, collecting light, it's not a lot because it's dark, and you can tell because most of my image is rather dark. I used rear shutter, which means at the last fraction of a second my flash went off and "froze" the action.

   You'll notice her head lamp is a little blurry and the general feeling is that we capture motion. You can tell she's doing something, even if you're not sure exactly what it is.

Also note that I didn't use my flash at full power.

   My intent was to add just enough to highlight my subject and not to overpower the other lights. I used an external flash unit, but even your built in pop-up flash probably has a setting which lets you either have it super bright, which I would use during day light with the sun in front of me, or less bright which I would use at night. Because I turned down the umph of the flash and because this soldier was using a bright head lamp anyway, and she was wearing a hat, I didn't blind her.

How did I know how much light to use? Well it's all about experimentation. You need to go out and play with your flash at various power levels at various times of day. The more you practice the more you'll understand when you need a lot of light and when you need just a touch.

"Felix, you could have used a Tripod!"

I could have and that would have eliminated any movement on my part from making the image blurry. But I had the shutter open for 1.3 seconds. The exposure time would have been longer if I didn't use flash. You can see how much she moved in the image. Unless you're controlling the action and telling your subject not to move, after 1.3 seconds you will get a blurry image.  

So how about the composition?

   I included the points of interest so you could think about it yourself, did I use any of the rules we've been talking about? You're welcome to leave a comment or two about what you think.

So why did I include three pictures if I wasn't going to talk about each one of them? Simple.

I want to talk about shooting in a sequence. 

   Now, if your familiar with video you probably just said, "Wait, sequence shooting is for video not photo."

   Yes, this is a video term, but I think it works for photographers as well.

   Sometimes we see something and it doesn't quite turn out how we thought it would. The key isn't to just walk away and see, "ugh, I can't take a good photo," the key is to move and take another photo until you get it right.

In video there is a rule called the 30-30 rule. 

   Which means you move around your subject at least 30 degrees from where you started and you also increase or decrease your subject size by 30 percent.

   This isn't the best example of a 30-30 sequence, especially not for video [in fact I broke a video rule but I won't bore you with more video rules.] However, you'll notice I took a photo, moved my body and took another photo. Same subject, same action, different point of view.

   Next time you go out shooting, remember 30-30. Keep the same subject and move around your subject, make your subject a bigger or smaller portion of your frame and take another photo. Take five or six more. Go crazy. But change it up every time. Doing things like that will help you improve your eye.

Teetering. Almost Balanced.

Sgt. Salvador Rodriguez braces himself as a UH-60 Blackhawk prepares to land less than 20 yards away from him on Camp Liberty, Iraq on June 23, 2009. The leaflets will be dispersed over specific locations in Baghdad in order to capture a known insurgent. Rodriquez is the administrative non commissioned officer for the 315th Tactical Psychological Operations Company from Upland, Calif. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   So far this week, we had asymmetrical balance, symmetrical balance with tiny subjects, and balance with a twist. Today we're trying to balance two disparately sized objects.

   So the thing about helicopters is that when they land on a dirt and rock helipad, dirt and rocks fly everywhere.

Helicopter in a point of interest. check. soldier in two points of interest. 

check. Leading line? Maybe. Balanced? Pretty close.

   Obviously you want to turn away like the soldier in the photo and probably close your eyes. I didn't do either because I wanted to get this shot. Luckily I had a decent sized camera in front of my face, and eye protection so I didn't really get anything in my eyes.

   Next problem, when helicopters land all the force they're generating to stay aloft is pushing you away from it. So I had to brace myself. Part of the reason this angle is a little low is that I my feet were pretty far apart of each other trying to get as solid of a base as possible. Luckily I'm not a small guy, so I had 230 pounds anchoring me too.

   I aimed my camera at my subject knowing he probably wasn't going to move too much and just waited for the helicopter to get in a point of interest. Timing is huge in a situation like this, and knowing what is about to happen is key, but luck is always helpful.

   Between leaning forward and my mass I was able to avoid getting thrown backwards.

   If you're a lighter person, I would recommend getting as low as possible so your center of gravity is low. You could lay down or try to find something to lean back against.

   So, is this balance? It's pretty close. Our soldier is a little bigger than the helicopter, so the balance could have been better, but it's not quite asymmetrical balance either. 

Leading to Balance

Sgt. Maj. Brian Card and Brig. Gen.Gary Beard take a moment to chat on Sicily Drop Zone on September 10, 2010. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   This might be a harder series for me to write about simply because I personally don't often see balance, except in in it's most basic forms. Balance in art and photography can refer to a number of different elements.

   However, if you haven't noticed I have a serious addiction to clearly defined subjects. And in my head when I'm looking for subjects I tend to single them out, this means that I have to deliberately seek out balance. The easiest way for me to add balance to my photos is to simply look for look for two subjects.

No, balance doesn't just mean having two subjects in your photographs. But it's probably the easiest way to understand balance.

   In the above picture there's an equal amount of ground and sky. That in and of itself is balance. A lot of times nature photography has at a minimum that balance.

Did I miss getting one of the soldiers fully in two points of interest? Yes. Are

there more than a few leading lines? Yes, from the sun to the invisible ones of 

eye contact. You could argue the horizon itself adds a line to our subjects as 

well.

   However, you notice my subject isn't, a soldier, but rather two soldiers. By virtue that it's two subjects the photo has balance. However not symmetrical balance. Had I put one soldier on the left point of interest and the other soldier on the right points of interest it would have been symmetrical.

   However, there is one more major element to this photograph  and that is the sun itself. It's tough to compete against the. Sun, it's a big ball of light with leading lines exploding from it. And as we discussed yesterday light naturally draws the eyes toward and away from it.

   Does it compete with our two soldiers? Yes. Does it add balance? Well, a big heavy object like the sun adds weight. Is it equal to our two soldiers? Not quite.

In many respects this photo has asymmetrical balance.

   What else does this photo have? Well invisible leading lines. The two soldiers are looking at each other, and the eyes naturally pull us to other parts of the frame, we want to see what those eyes are looking at.

So in one photo we've used balance, leading lines and paid attention to the rule of thirds. Does adding more elements make this photo better? Debatable. But when you're out and about the first things you should be thinking about are your subject and what element of composition your're going to pull out of your tool box.

Continue reading about balance in these posts:
"Balance with a twist"
"Beach Balance"
"Balancing Act: Light vs. Dark"

Leading Lines Part V: Night Vision

A UH-60 Blackhawk lands at Camp Liberty, Iraq on December 24, 2008. The Blackhawk and the 315th Tactical PSYOP Co. from Upland, Calif. will disseminate thousands of leaflets over specific areas of Baghdad, Iraq during the 4th Infantry Division's Operation Iron Blizzard. The leaflets are part of a greater effort to arrest and bring to trial suspected and known terrorists operating in Baghdad. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   If you're just joining us, we've covered blending leading lines with the rule of thirds, lines that add to your photo but were not necessarily intended, lines that lead us to our subject, and lines that, well, are the subject.

   Light, is a great leading line. This light emanates from our subject, [the most important part of the photograph] the helicopter, which pulls the viewers eye towards the landing zone; where our subject is heading. The viewers eye may follow the light back up to the helicopter, and might follow the natural line of the helicopter's fuselage back to the light on the helicopters tail.

The helicopter is clearly in a point of interest. The light starts

from a point of interest and  leads us towards another point

of interest. Also good. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   That's pretty much it for this photograph, it's a helicopter landing at night. I would have liked to have been much closer, with a much wider lens. At an 45 degree angle to give it some depth.

As it stands I feel this photo is just plain flat.

   The two things which makes this interesting, in my opinion at least, is that most people don't see helicopters landing too often; so there's the novelty factor. Also I used a night vision adapter which is another novelty.

   Regarding the night vision, it wasn't part of my kit until I arrived in Baghdad. Our team was doing an inventory of our Conex's and the Morovision Astroscope just so happened to pop up along with a Canon 5D. Unfortunately form me the Cannon only came with the body. Since I didn't have any Canon lenses with me the big beautiful full frame of the 5D had to sit in a box while I used my Nikon D200. Oh well.

   For the record, I don't particularly favor Canon or Nikon, they're both great companies and they make great products. I enjoy using both.

   So, with my new found toy my commander asked if I could take photos during night missions. Which is great because I had been spending 12-14 hours a day, 7 days a week doing graphics, so any opportunity to go out and shoot was a welcome one. The downside was that my days then increased to 14-16 hours since these night missions obviously happened after normal working hours. Oh well.

Ordinarily I would have liked to have gotten at least a part of the helicopter

in the photo to give the viewer a sense of  actually being there, but I just

couldn't get back far enough in the tight confines of the Blackhawk.
 (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   So, the Astroscope sits in between the camera body and the lens,

which turns even a stubby 5inch 35-70 into an very unwieldy 12 inch beast. 

Which, really was okay, but I found myself wishing I had a full frame body because I was constantly leaning back to adjust for those extra added inches.

This experience is why I dropped the 35-70mm from my list of preferred lenses. It just don't do anything well, certainly not on a camera body with a crop factor which makes it a 55mm to 105mm. Two bodies, one with a wide lens one with a long lens is the way to go in my opinion.

   Of course if I could find a 1.2 lens that had a range of 10mm to 300mm I would just take that, but I don't see that happening any time soon.
 

Pfc. Josephn Quakenboss poses with a UH-60 prior to a leaflet operation on December 24, 2008. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

Part of a UH-60 Blackhawk as it flies over Baghdad, Iraq  during a leaflet operation on December 24, 2008. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

Just the lines ma'am

Barbed wire along Utah Beach, Normandy, France. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   Today is going to be a short post because there's not a whole lot to say about these two photos. I saw the lines, put them in points of interest, I took the photo. Easy. I will point out, in the above example, the subject is the barbed wire, but specifically the sharp pointy part. [Yes, it's a little bit out of the point of interest for no apparent reason.] 

The line go from left to right and right to left and 

almost covers two points of interest. 

   So here we have two examples of leading lines themselves being subjects. If you've been following our discussions about leading lines here, here & here, you probably know that I like my lines to lead to a subject. If the line itself is the subject? I don't know, maybe? 

But lets not forget ultimately when you look in your viewfinder you should be asking yourself,

Road markings found on Lajes Air Field, Azores.

(U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres) 

 "Is my subject clear?" and "Am I using one of the rules of composition?" 

   The answer to both of these questions should be Yes.

Did I get three points of interest? Yes...maybe, almost? Ish. 

Night Lines, no wait. Leading Lines.

Sgt. Zackary Davis, 431st Civil Affairs Bn., prepares a Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio System (SINCGARS) to transmit a 9-line medical evacuation report during the warrior task portion of the 352nds best warrior competition at Fort Meade, Md. on April 2, 2012. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

I want to point out really quickly that this is what happens with you Mix light and set your flash to rear shutter. If you don't know what that is, don't worry I'll explain it.

So hopefully the first thing you saw was that green thing (the antenna) leading to the Soldier, my subject, and said, "Hey that's a leading line!" If you didn't that's okay too, we're still learning.

So this photo in my opinion is a better example of a leading line than yesterday's or the day before's. Weather or not this photo is better photo than the last two is completely subjective.

I do want to point out a few things before I talk about the lighting situation I promised to talk about.

First off, the eyes, I just missed the eyes being in a point of interest. Those pesky eyes are a boon when you get them right and a groan when you miss them.

   He's looking in a great direction, towards another point of interest. But the eyes themselves are just out of a point of interest. I think this would have been a stronger photo if I was able to get his eyes in a point of interest. As it stands now it's still a good shot in my estimation because it has leading lines. You don't need ALL the elements of composition in your photos, just one. Please, at least one, like the rule of thirds.

So maybe the first or second question you had was, "What's up with light Felix?"

Well a couple things actually. First I'm mixing colors [wiki link] because I have a few different light sources.

   First there's the [I'm guessing] florescent light (a cool color) inside the building in the background, then there is a soldier nearby who is shining a red light (a warm color) to assist the soldier messing with the radio, and then there is my flash without a gel, which is white.
 
   I also have my flash set to rear shutter. Setting my flash to rear shutter makes the flash fire during the the last possible fraction of a second before the shutter closes. This allows colors like red and green to collect on the sensor before the flash fires and captures the last bit of time.
 
   To the right of the soldier is a red ghosting effect, that's because when his head was over there my shutter had just opened, and the red light was bouncing off his head and onto my shutter. As time went on he tilted his head [about 4 or 5 inches I would guess] and a little bit of red light was caught bouncing off his hat to his left, then he moved his head about another inch or so. It was at that point at which point my flash fired. Then the shutter closed. So what you're seeing is 2.5 seconds [my shutter was set to 2.5] of light bouncing off this soldier. as he moved it from left to right.

   The reason why there is not much red on the soldiers face from the red light, is because my flash, for that last fraction of a second, far surpassed the brightness of red light, and "froze" my subject. Having your flash set to normal would have "frozen" his head so that it was tilted towards the right, and then you'd have light trails on his left.

   But if you look closely there is still some red tinge cast on his face. This is probably a result of not only there being some red light on his face in that last fraction of a second my light flashed, but also because as he moved his head, some red light was bouncing off his head and collecting on my sensor in the time before my flash went off.

   In the background the building didn't move, it just radiated it's light, over exposing that portion of my sensor, which is why the windows look white, while there is a greenish glow around the building. The flash didn't reach that far, so I didn't overpower the green light.

Leading lines lite. It's Story Time.

Chief Warrant Officer Five Tom Travis exits from a UH-60 Black Hawk over St. Mere Eglise at Fort Bragg, N.C. on July 13, 2011. Travis is jumping with the U.S. Army Civil Affairs Operations Command (Airborne) who are hosting the U.K.’s 4th Parachute Regiment in a Joint training mission. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)

   This is getting closer to what I would consider a good example of leading lines. But still not quite. The static line [the yellow cord] that connects from the helicopter to the paratroopers parachute is bright, yellow, in focus and certainly leading to the subject. But I can't honestly say I planned for it to be there. I just showed up on it's own, a product of the situation. The reason I'm pointing point this out is simply because I want to point out that leading lines are everywhere Sometimes those lines are invisible, but that's a post for another day.

   Today I want to get back into a little bit of story telling. I've spent a lot of time talking about composition and not so much time talking about the story behind those photos.

   You'll notice this is a similar perspective to my previous post (Yes, I'm afraid of heights) and in fact this shot was actually taken on the same day.

   I first want  to say that July 13th was one brutally hot day, everyone had beads of sweat rolling down thier faces. Especially  me, I'm practically a  snowman (the melting kind) I joke that I'm water cooled not air cooled because I sweat a lot during physical activity. Regardless the British had come all the way out from, well England, to conduct airborne operations so it was a great opportunity to get some joint operations photos.

   In fact, I was poised and ready to jump with them on this day. However, during final manifest [roll call] when I was asked to show my Military ID card [a required item for all airborne operations] I looked in my wallet and to my dismay found that I was missing my ID. I had left it in my card reader at home. I lived about 45 minutes away form the drop zone, so it wasn't really possible to go home and back and still be able to jump.

So, as they say in the Airborne community, I was scratched. 

   I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the biggest fan of jumping out of aircraft, and after seeing paratroopers dangling their feet from a Blackhawk prior to a jump, I can't say a helicopter would be my preferred method of insertion. A C-130 or a C-17 doesn't have nearly the view, but the skin of the aircraft acts like blinders on a horse. They help me focus on what's in front of me. Instead of, you know, thinking about my parachute not opening.

   People ask me how I can even jump out in the first place, I reply with, "It's easy, I'm supposed to be looking at the jump master until the very last second or two, by then I've got momentum and people behind me counting on me to follow through. So making those last few steps out of the door is probably the easiest part because I've already committed by then. It's those 4 second waiting for the canopy to open which are the most terrifying. Luckily for me, there isn't a whole lot I can do at that point but count."

   Anyway, back to this shot. So it's hot, I was supposed to be jumping, but I wasn't going to this day. Luckily I always keep my camera in my trunk. So, I called my supervisor to let him know I was just going to be taking pictures instead. He said great and I got to shooting.

   I had met CW5 Travis a few months earlier at Normandy and he liked my work, so when he saw me with my camera's he said, "Awesome you're taking photos today?"

   "Sure am Sir," I replied

   "Make sure you talk with the flight crew so you can go up and take pictures,"

   "Roger that Sir."

   So after a little bit of waiting the Blackhawk came in and I talked with the flight crew. They said I had one option, the crew seat. I said that would be fine. Then one of the Operations non comissioned officers came up to me as I was walking up to the Blackhawk and said,

   "Hey man, I heard you're going up?"

   "Yeah I'm in the gunner's seat"

   "Perfect, when you're strapped in you can lean way out, I've had my A** on the outside of the aircraft taking pictures, it was great!"

   "Okay, yeah, I'll try that," I replied, knowing there was no way my butt was getting anywhere near the outside of that helicopter. 

 
   So after strapping in, I thought I'd feel safe. Not really, the harnesses was tight but it's connected to a safety cable to allow for maximum mobility. The end effect is that I felt like I wasn't strapped in at all.

   I won't go too much over what I covered in Yes, I'm afraid of heights but this shot was about three things. One seeing it a few times before to get a feel for the timing and position of the subject. Two getting the widest angle I could [17mm on the lens, with crop factor a true 27mm] with my arm out as far as possible to give it a unique perspective. And three just being in a unique position to take this shot. I like to tell myself that I can make those most mundane things look amazing, but amazing things are amazing to look at.

   In retrospect this photo reminds me 1. Dummy, you forgot your ID card! 2. Sometimes when a door is closed another is opened. But most importantly 3. Always have your camera handy because you never know when a shot you take might get picked as one of the best DoD photos of the year [The main image isn't mine, it's the fourth one in the slideshow so you'll have to do some scrolling]

On the subject of Subjects.

I'm actually not sure what kind of plant this is, but it's part of a field. Yes, the specific stalk in question is dead center. No, don't shoot dead center. Ever. It's bad. Well, okay fine, some photos you can get away with dead center, if you frame it, or the subject fills the frame such that it's not really dead center. This photo illustrates a point, so I went for it. One could argue this counts as "Framing" because the rest of the plants create a frame around the stalk in question.  

   Probably the most important aspect of a photograph is having a clearly defined subject. All too often when I see a photo that's not as good as it could be I ask the photographer,

   "What is this a picture of?"

   "Um, well, it's...," and the person stumbles for a minute, "You know... I just I just wanted to get the whole scene, that's Pvt. Snuffy..."

   That really tiny spec?" I'll point out

   "Yeah! And that's a hanger and the sky was beautiful and..."

   You get the idea.

   Now, I'm not saying all those elements aren't important or can't make for a good photograph but it's important to understand that when you click the shutter, you should have a clear idea of what exactly it is you're taking a picture of.  Because if you don't know what you're looking at how is the person looking at it supposed to know?

You shouldn't have to explain a photograph. The photo should speak it's thousand words all by itself. 

   In the picture above, I think it's fairly clear the plant(s) is (are) the subject. I would be willing to bet, when most people come upon a big open field they probably notice something other then the actual stalks of wheat/barley/etc.  This was my attempt and not only picking an usual subject, but also isolating it as much of my subject as possible.

   Mind you, I don't think is a great photograph, but it illustrates that you need to have a very clear idea of what you're taking a picture of.

   Maybe there's a beautiful plant in your front yard that you tried to take a picture of. So you went outside looked at it and said, "Wow, this is going to be a great picture!" then you took the photo from say 5 feet back while standing up and looked at it and said,
 
   "Huh, it looks so fantastic, why does it look so blah in this photo?"

   So what's happening? Your eye naturally gravitated toward a specific element, probably the flowering portion, and within that probably the stigma inside the flower. What you didn't notice was that your eye was filtering out everything else. Kind of like when you're looking for your keys that are sitting on top of your desk, but you just can't see them because your eye is looking at the clutter, maybe an overdue bill or a photograph of your kids.

   Unfortunately your lens doesn't do the same thing. There's even a good chance with your eye firmly planted in the viewfinder, you where still looking at just the inside of the flower, and not paying attention to the entire frame.  All you where thinking was "wow, what a beautiful flower, I can't wait to show mom," without taking the time to think what made the flower beautiful to you in the first place. You probably even got distracted by those pesky settings, adjusting your exposure and getting your focus just right. But you forgot about your subject.

   Then when you showed your mom she said, "oh, that's nice dear." because that's what she's supposed to do. Then maybe you looked at the picture and said to yourself, "It looks much better in person, I guess I'm just not a good picture taker."

   Odds are there where other elements like the rest of the plant, the dirt underneath, the steps, the hose, the porch if you stood really far back, that where included in your photo. All those other elements took away from the subject you had seen so beautifully, that Stigma back dropped by the colorful petals.

   Auto Focus, Shutter and Aperture priority are friendly little tools that help you focus in on your subject. The camera can figure out what your settings should be (most of the time) but it can't figure out how to compose a photo.

   Composition is where you come in. I'll discuss more about composition in future posts. But for now when you go out and take a picture, I want you to ask yourself, "What exactly am I seeing? What exactly am I taking a picture of?" [Hint: it should be a single noun. i.e. "the clock" not "the clock tower and the city"]

   As your eye gets better at figuring out what exactly makes something pop, you'll be incorporate other elements into your photo without taking away what made something awesome to begin with.

Take your time, ask yourself "what is my subject" and focus in on that like a laser. A clear subject is essential for a good photograph. (Photo by Sgt. Felix R. Fimbres)