The best camera is the one you have with you

Imagine a cold March day in Northumberland on the north-east coast of England. There is a strong gale blowing that makes it difficult to stand up. Over to the east there is snow on the Cheviot hills. These poles mark the route back to the mainland should you get caught by the incoming tide along the Lindisfarne Causeway.

Not all photo opportunities are perfect, but the best place to take pictures is where you are. The best camera is the one you have with you.

I do a talk for Camera clubs and Photographic Societies in the UK called “Marvellous Monochrome” which is a series of before and after pictures that demonstrates the process of taking a raw colour file to an exhibition quality black and white print. I often joke that my prints have the look, smell and taste of a darkroom print. That description is actually correct because the Inkjet Paper I use is Fotospeed Platinum Baryta which has a Baryta coating as do all fibre based darkroom papers.

Here is where I started on that March day in 2009. You notice that I did not use the whole frame in the end but choose a 6×17 crop. The file in the camera was under exposed by 2 stops to cope with contrast in the highlights. I am using a 12mm lens probably about a foot from the post closest to me this increases the sense of depth back to front.

Particularly with landscape I often even-out the brightest contrast areas usually the sky to make it easier to deal with later.

On a different tack can anybody tell me if Elements 10 has a tool similar to the Patch Tool in Photoshop? I have been looking at videos on U Tube but can not tell for definite whether it does or does not. I am potentially thinking of using Elements 10 in place of CS4. I am feed up of being fleeced for £200 every 18 months by Adobe to upgrade Photoshop.

A big hello to the 10 new followers of my little blog who have joined in the past week or so, why not leave a comment?

(c) Andy Beel FRPS 2012

www.andybeelfrps.co.uk