WMYAE? - Shooting the Shit with RiskyBryzness
19Hello Mehtizens!
Welcome to our very first installment of What Makes You An Expert?! While today’s WMYAE is penned by one of our CS team @RiskyBryzness, we will be featuring WMYAE’s from community members as well.
(If you love/hate/want to make a WMYAE, hit up @thumperchick via support email or whisper.)
My installment of WMYAE is on photography.
TLDR, PHOTOGRAPHY IS COOL. SCIENCE IS AWESOME. GO OUT AND TAKE PICTURES AND SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT.
Film:
I began shooting around 10 years ago. My first camera was a Pentax K100, I later switched between that and the Canon AE-1 Program. I originally started with color film:
- Port Townsend, Downtown Seattle, Cherry Blossoms at the UW
and then I ended up in a community college class developing black and white film: - The EMP in Seattle, Pike Place, Ballard Locks Art, Cactus, Seattle Center
Fast forward to the past few years, my awesome boyfriend and I started developing our own film at home using coffee. This process is more commonly referred to as Caffenol. It develops roughly the same as it would with the normal chemicals, only it is way cooler to say you developed your film with Folgers. There’s a large community for this as well, so there’s different techniques, like using wine instead of coffee. If you are interested in processing, I would recommend checking out http://www.caffenol.org/ for a few recipes that work with different films and ISO’s. The Caffenol only works with Black and White film though.
There’s a few examples that I’ve processed are here: A bar sign in Denton, TX, Mini Bike Race this particular shot didn’t get the proper disbursement for the initial run through so it left what looks like a giant burn on the top, Sticker bomb in Denton, Street Art in Deep Ellum, TX.
The history of film itself and the science behind it is fascinating and it goes back further than people truly give it credit for. I wish there was more research in one place regarding this topic. I’ve read that slugs were originally the inspiration behind it because the trail left changed colors. I’ve also read that around the 1100’s is when silver nitrates came into play for various uses.
Digital:
To me digital is disposable. It’s easier, it’s faster, and of course it’s far more convenient. That doesn’t mean it has any loss of value when it comes to art–but film does provide a different style that digital would never be able to duplicate 100%.
Over time, I’ve ended up in 3 portrait studios (I have a few stories.) There’s been a couple art shindigs and my photography has been in a few cafes between here and Seattle. 100% of this is now a hobby, whenever I have time, energy or a cool thing to shoot.
A few examples of my work with digital:
- Street: Deep Ellum Graffiti, Clown in Ft.Worth, Bike Jumps, Austin Graffiti Wall, Obey
- Photojournalism: Make love, Not War, Police, On Duty, Walking Home, Reflection. I enjoy aiming for things that aren’t the main focus, things that people overlook.
- Pet, Action, Other: Freyja, Wheelie, Paint Drip
Techniques:
A few of my favorite techniques are lens whacking or lens bending, using prisms and various other “tricks.” It usually adds a cool twist to the photo, or it’s a disaster and I end up waving a prism around like I’ve gone off my rocker. Lens bending/whacking is pretty neat. It’s where you break your lens and you shoot with the lens and the camera body separate, allowing for light leaks and manipulation of the image. It doesn’t have to be a good lens, it could be any type–pick it up at a pawnshop, thrift store, attic, whatever. There is a really great article on that here.
- Lens Bending Example 1, Lens Bending Example 2Lens Bending Example 3, Lens Bending Example 4
- Shooting through something like a scarf, pony beads, even Saran Wrap gives you a different approach to what you’re taking a photo of.
- Another option is also using different lenses like Lensbaby, this lets you have that dreamy background with the bokeh.
- If you like the manipulation before processing, there are different lens filters you can pop on your regular camera as well like this.
Just in general, a few of my favorite artists are Shepard Fairey, Ed Templeton, Sam Hurd, Vivian Maier and of course, Ansel Adams.
Moral of this post, I’m not an expert by any means, I’ve learned by failing ( a lot), experimenting and by reading. If anyone has any questions they can throw at me, I can bullshit my way with compositions, brands, DIY options, techniques and fun ideas. I hope this post inspires someone to shoot something new, think outside the box and challenge mainstream photography.
Also, these photos do not represent the company in anyway.
- 20 comments, 46 replies
- Comment
@humper - I think you’ll like this one.
I’ve heard that one should not frame their subject directly in the center of a picture. Why do you suppose that is?
@therealjrn
Rule of Thirds
@lichme I didn’t ask YOU Lisa!
@therealjrn You didn’t not ask me, I don’t see a tag in your post.
@lichme I was asking the expert, obviously.
@lichme Now I have to think of another question–thanks Lisa!
@therealjrn That’s a great question! There’s a couple of things like Fibonacci and rule of thirds. It depends on the subject that you are shooting. This image here is pretty much centered, however this one here is not. In this second shot, I wanted to get as much of the wall as I could and still keep the subject as the focus so I used negative space to draw your attention towards the artist. Rule of thirds is a basic guideline that is based on where your eyes fall with the image and using that negative space to your advantage to emphasize the subject. Sometimes a lot can be said with less. It may not always be as noticeable, the subject may be closer to center, however the majority of the subject is in the distance, pushing that focus to that rule of thirds. This is actually a perfect example of that. Freyjas back half is out of focus, but her face is in focus–sure it’s the picture of her entire body, but her face is the main focus.
@riskybryzness Thank you! That was SO MUCH better than copy/pasting some shit off the internet like some people do!
@therealjrn Umm did you get up on the wrong side of bed? Why the animosity?
@Kidsandliz Keep reading on down threadcop. There is absolutely no animosity betwixt @lichme and me. He was just being bratty and I was being irritable.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It’s all good and all very meh. Move along, nothing to see here…
I love taking pictures. I mostly just point and shoot. I am using a Canon D40 when I plan ahead or cellphone because it is likely with me.
I like finding angles and colors that appeal to me. My favorite subjects are animals and landscapes. I include people sometimes but prefer to watch mother nature at work. I should plan more fun time to go out and play. There are many places close to me that catch my eye for pictures.
How do you organize your photos? I do not print most of my pictures. I have used exclusively digital in more years than I want to admit. I like film photography and had some fun with it but cost at that time was more than I could afford.
Do you keep all your digital work? I tend to take many to find THE one that I was trying to get. I end up seeing something I like especially if I did not get that perfect shot. Someday I will practice with digital editing so I can do some of the fancy effects.
TLDR: I like photography too.
@speediedelivery That’s awesome! And definitely take more photos, you can never have to many!
As far as organizing photos, this is actually uh…not my strong suit. I have them on a google drive and backed up on a hard drive. But please do not ask me to find something because I will have folders ASDF, ASDFF, ASDFG, CAT, cat, catter, kittens, a wedding, wedding, a wed, wed wed finals, jesus christ why do you do this.
I go through and pick which ones are my favorites–I used to be TERRIBLE about keeping all of my images, so I have probably millions of photos on various hard drives. Now though, I’ve gotten better about deleting the images I’m not going to keep and edit. If it’s blurry, ya gone sorry.
What do I do if I’m not good at anything
@woodhouse Try photography.
This question is for the expert only, not the peanut gallery: So @RiskyBrysness, why is it that B&W photos appear so dramatic sometimes. What is it about the human eye that makes us think B&W pics are so dramatic?
@therealjrn Is that a brightly-colored clump of play-doh on the floor or just another dog turd? With b&w photos, anything is possible!
@therealjrn I think part of it is seeing the world in color and then seeing something in black and white that can capture the full essence of color and then provide emotion, is what traps us in the greyscale world. You have to work harder with black and white, you want the light, you want the contrast.
This or the same scene seconds apart here. To me the black and white tells the story without the distraction of color.
@riskybryzness In that example, B&W only serves to trick the viewer into thinking the photo is older than it is.
@medz Honestly that’s one of my favorite photos because of that.
@riskybryzness #fakenews
@medz @riskybryzness also sometimes the colors clash black and white can fix that
@RiskyBrysness Would you agree that B&W photos can appear more dramatic, because without color, there is less of a distraction, allowing one to focus purely on the subject matter and emotions in the image.
@lichme Fucker. lol. I’m out.
@lichme
Do you have any tips on how to take better photos when lighting is not in your control?
@lichme This is me not jumping into the expert’s answer, I guess I could go Google some shit and post it back to you like you’re an idiot. But no, I’m going to wait patiently for the expert to answer because I like the human touch.
But if I were to, I’d say fuck with your film’s speed setting and your fucking exposure times.
@lichme Lighting is a turd. It depends on what you’re dealing with. A lot of times you can compensate by bumping your ISO up and adjusting your shutter accordingly, but you run into grain and blurry subjects. If you’re outside shooting a still object, get a tripod, if you’re inside and it’s poorly light–you can adjust your white balance to cope for the mean time and work on finding the sweet spot with the ISO and shutter.
@riskybryzness
I took photography in high school. It was right when digital started to boom. I was using my mom’s old film camera from the 70s or 80s. Was interesting trying to learn something that I’m not good at. I really enjoyed developing film. The next year I took digital photography which turned out to just be a PhotoShop lesson. I already had been using an illegal copy of PS for years by then so the class didn’t teach me much, if anything.
When I bought my current cellphone, I just needed a phone quick because my last phone completely died. I didn’t do much research, just bought the cheapest Samsung that was available because I was waiting for the newest HTC or pixel to come out. I didn’t realize how terrible the camera was. (Didn’t think my five year old phone could of ever been better) I take a stupid amount of photos on my phone, and my photos have probably been curbed by 70% because it’s so bad. The photos make me sad.
Now I’m just rambling, sorry.
@RiotDemon I used to have the Microsoft phone, the Nokia 1040–it claimed to have something wild like a 40megapixel camera. It was a lot of fun but I like my S7 a lot more performance wise. My boyfriend has the s8 I think? It lets him shoot in RAW and allows you to edit. It’s crazy how far technology has come.
@riskybryzness I’m honestly surprised that no one followed the footsteps of that Nokia camera. Maybe the 40mp wasn’t entirely accurate? I know my old HTC took pretty good photos and reading about all the new phones coming out and seeing their test photos, I’m just blown away. I doubt I’ll ever be a great photographer, but I can’t wait to at least take better everyday photos. (Turns out a lot of people jumped ship from HTC to build the newest pixel, so I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the way I end up going.)
I wish I could find some of my weird photography projects from HS. I got a good grade, but I don’t think my photos were any good.
@RiotDemon Me too, and I don’t think it was–it was good but not as good as the iphones that have been put out recently. One of my favorite photographers does 90% of his work with an iphone, he just travels all year and shoots everything, his photos are drop dead gorgeous. To take better photos you just have to keep taking pictures–you’ll get in a good groove that fits your style 100%. This weird thing has been floating around social media for a while–it’s absolutely bonkers but it’s cool to see them coming up with new stuff.
@riskybryzness only around $2000? So much technology in such a little thing.
I watched the movie Unsane. Shot entirely on an iPhone. Watched it in the theatre. The quality was a little odd, but I was still amazed that they could show it on such a huge screen. They wanted a gritty look. They got it.
I took these photos with my phone when in Florence in June that I’m pretty proud of, but I’m far from an expert. I’d love to hear constructive criticism you have about focus and composition!
@riskybryzness
@Kawa First off, jealous that you’ve been to Florence, I’ve always wanted to go! It’s tricky with cell phones to get night shots, it depends on the kind that you have–but I think that top one there, you did a great job of getting that sunset! I now when you go to shoot sunsets, it’s give or take–you either get the sunset in the background or the buildings and everything in the front. The color is great!
I like that statue, I know shooting anything from below is a challenge. The only thing I may have done was just get as much as I could at the top included–it would definitely be interesting to see that in black and white! It reminds me of the Lady Rainier statue in Seattle. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Lady_Rainier
Really awesome @riskybryzness
@riskybryzness Have you ever taken those weird pictures where the cars, trucks and buildings look like toys?
@therealjrn Tilt shift! I have not–those lenses run a pretty penny. I do have a lensbaby lens though and it sort of replicates tilt shift in that it blurs the majority of the image to focus where you want. But not quite the same as tilt shift.
@riskybryzness @therealjrn Very disapointing results with the Photoshop Tilt Shift filter. Maybe because I really don’t know really what I’m doing, maybe because my original photos were crap, but I always wind up with what resembles a normal photo with blurry bands at the top and bottom.
TBH, the most appealing tilt shift images to me tend to have lots of color. Not sure why this is.
@ruouttaurmind @therealjrn I haven’t really messed within in photoshop yet, but I can see how it would do that. Tilt shift is pretty unique when you shoot it so it’s hard to replicate in processing. I agree about the color, when they are saturated they definitely pop the most.
Way back when I was in 6-8th grade, my best friend’s dad had a photo darkroom in their basement. He taught us the basics, so we could develop our own (B&W) film. I used my dad’s old mechanical camera from the 60s and my buddy had a new Canon AE-1 (we both coveted the top-of-the-line A-1). We took a LOT of pictures.
When I graduated from HS, my folks bought me a Pentax MEsuper (which I still have these 35+ years later). I took a photography class at the community college that summer - I didn’t really learn that much new, but the assignments really forced me to go out and shoot, really working to develop an eye for finding/recognizing the topic at hand. About 6 years ago I bought a Kodak ‘bridge’ camera (my biggest $$ Woot item by far) - not quite a DSLR, but with several nice digital features. I took a 2-day photo course (80% off Groupon) and shot probably 250 (?) pictures.
It is now obvious that without the enforced discipline of an assignment, I quickly get lazy; I almost never carry a ‘dedicated’ camera around just to take random pics (my phone camera is fine for snapshots, but hasn’t been very satisfying for more sophisticated photos).
TL;DR: I have a long, on-again-off-again personal relationship with photography, and I might be a camera snob.
@compunaut I still have the A-1 I bought around 1980. It has been undisturbed in a drawer for many years.
@compunaut Pentax put out solid cameras, the K1000 was my favorite because it’s all manual. It’s what I learned on–technically it’s my moms camera and she let me “borrow it” growing up.
I definitely understand the on-again-off-again relationship, it’s been love/hate since I’ve started. To get the creative juices going I usually have a couple beers beforehand and suddenly I’m an artistic genius if I’m in a rut. If you’re wanting to have some goals with photography, maybe we could do a forum post as a follow up with this and do a daily or weekly shot contest to encourage others who may feel the same?
@compunaut What I did in a somewhat similar situation was buy a really good point & shoot, because I knew I wanted a good camera, but couldn’t be bothered with the lens changing and such (mostly because it’s a pain if you’re not traveling alone, and because I didn’t really do it).
I’d recommend something like the Sony RX-100 series- very compact, great specs, and fun to use.
Ok Instagram. I take pictures I put up on Instagram. Usually just things like flowers and boats. For Instagram in particular any tricks? When to use what filters? Or just Clarendon all the things?
@CaptAmehrican I honestly don’t really recommend the ones on Instagram except maybe Inkwell. If the photo is good the way it is, I wouldn’t edit it. If you are looking to tweak it, I would download VSCO, it’s a pretty cool and easy editing app that allows you to do a lot more than what Instagram does. They also have presets for Lightroom too. Also adding the tag #SOOC for straight out of camera and #vsco is good to group your images into.
If you’re looking for a following, Instagram is something I’ve never really mastered. I know you can have up to 30 hashtags–the hardest thing is picking the right ones, or ones that have a large and engaging community and not looking spammy. For instance, #boatsboatsboats this has about 46.1k posts under it so it looks like an active community. If you type that into the tags on Instagram, it’ll also give you suggestions of other tags you can add to see what market you want to aim your photos towards. If you’re shooting flowers #naturephotography. 99% of growing a following is having engagement on the page otherwise followers don’t see your posts. It’s something that when I do everything right, I notice a few people here and there, but I’ve been slacking on it.
I know first hand how awesome your photography is and lucky to have such great photos of my doggos to cherish forever. This post is awesome - great advice and tips
now to go take some photos of my dogs for a change …
@cardiganb Puppy is pretty damn cute.
Is there anyway to save a thread? If not, I’ll just screenshot the sucker but I’d love to not have to do that.
@mehbee Kind of. You can right click the page on most browsers and do “Save As” to download an html page. Some stuff, like images probably won’t work, but the main content will be there.
@lichme Thank you so much!
@riskybryzness is mirrorless really worth it? i’m looking to get a full frame (actually, just need to upgrade in general) and was eyeing the nikon Z6. but, i’m also hoping the price might drop a bit on the D850 when the Z6/7 are released. camera weight isn’t really a concern for me.
@carl669
That’s a really great question–it’s actually something that’s been buzzing around the photography community for a while. Sony dropped the A7III which has everyone obsessed, I want to say that’s the one that gets brought up the most. Mirrorless has opened a few doors to the tech side of photography and it’s interesting to see where it’s going.
The past few days though, I have seen a few people already preordering both of the Nikon ones. I’m excited to see how they’ve done, especially since Sony has kind of mastered the market with mirrorless. I have heard a lot of really good things about the D850 in the past, even the D750 which people still rave on about. I don’t think you can go wrong with any of the options.
I personally shoot with a Canon M3, which is a mirrorless camera. It’s perfect for what I do–I tend to borrow the dudes camera if I want to shoot some hockey or something fast. It’s perfect for portraits, landscape, and street photography–which is what I’m all about. I am absolutely in love with that camera, and I even have the adapter so I can use my old DSLR lenses.
Honestly what my recommendation always is, wait and see until you can hold it and see what you’re comfortable with. It sounds ridiculous, but that was my make it or break it between why I went with Canon, I didn’t like the way Nikon sounded. I used to work at a studio that used an Olympus digital–and that…that was not fun. Also, compare the statistics, megapixels, full frame, speed, lens compatibility and card options.
I, currently, am using my phone but I hate, hate, hate the delay between touching the button and the picture being actually taken. And the loss of control. I had an early point and shoot digital that I used (this after having an Olympus OM1 and a bunch of lenses and a couple of filters - speaking of which where is the best place to try to sell that pile of stuff?) and the resolution sucks on that. I need a decent, digital non-point and shoot with interchangeable lenses but that is not in budget. I really miss what you can do with that.
One of my favorite of goat cat I have posted before: from my phone and then cropped. I maybe should have cropped the bottom a bit more.
Although I prefer doing landscapes rather than people. This was after an ice storm when I lived in northern Idaho - my ancient digital camera
.
And looking for eagles (100’s stop there) in November in northern Idaho - my ancient digital camera
@Kidsandliz Your photos are gorgeous! I’m from Washington and I definitely miss that kind of scenery.
If you’re wanting to sell it, I would check around Facebook to see if there are any local to your area buy/sell/trade for film cameras. The OM1 looks pretty solid and you might be able to get a few bucks off of it. There’s a lot of collectors out there that may be interested. I know here in DFW we have a film B/T/S weekend normally once or twice a year.
I would also check into places like HSN and QVC to see if they have any decent DSLRS on the Flexpay plans–might be a good way to ease into getting a new camera if you’re wanting to look around.
@riskybryzness
Thanks for the complement!
Thanks for the suggestions on where to sell it. Likely not much around here (rural farming area). I’d appreciate it if you’d ask around too with the people you deal with. I had no idea how to sell this other than ebay and I didn’t want to go that route if I didn’t need to.
I have a 50mm (with the better of the two speeds), 30?mm, 70-210mm/macro lens (the first two are Olympus, the zoom brand I’d have to go look but it was one of the better ones - starts with a Z maybe?), two flashes and the thingy to attach them, several filters, two different mirrors. Last I knew it was light tight BUT there is a small piece of dust in there I can see and likely it would be prudent to replace the light seals. All lenses and the camera have their original leather cases, I think I have the OM1 manual in there too. There is also, I think, a small tripod, a thingy on a cord to take the photo that way (I am blanking on what you call that) and probably a few other minor items I have forgotten (this is from memory, not looking). There are just about zero scratches, however one of the lens hoods is ever so slightly out of round - not enough to prevent screwing on the filters though. Have the straps for the camera. Oh body is black and silver (primarily black). Lenses have always been covered by a neutral filter so no scratches on the lenses. All lenses still have their original lens covers on both ends. Can’t think of anything else plus or negative.
Any idea of prices? You can whisper me for contact info or if you are allowed you can go poking in my customer file for that.
@therealjrn Yeah I realized that is what she meant on a second read and then it was too late to edit a second time. Oops. (Case, no doubt of, hope springs eternal and/or wishful thinking
). Thanks for checking ebay for me. As I am moving before the end of the month (found that out yesterday) and I figured I’d deal with it after the move when I have, theoretically, more time - although it isn’t packed yet so I could sell it now.
@Kidsandliz Well, it’s like money in a sock then for when you get settled.
I deleted my post because I didn’t want to butt in like some people do. lol
Ah, I get it. Shooting the shit like shooting pictures.
/giphy clever girl
@medz
My knowledge of tanking in World of Warcraft shall make a fine thread
and the follow up: how to crash your server’s economy
@riskybryzness Have you ever tried infrared photography? The shots I’ve seen have been really cool and have sort of an alien look to them. I briefly tried doing it with an infrared filter on the camera, but I couldn’t get the hang of the post-processing bit that actually makes it work.
@dashcloud I haven’t! I’ve always been fascinated with it though.