Photographing junk - part 1

Beauty, they say, is in the eye of the beholder – well, I find old junk a constant source of inspiration.

Give me a barn full of old tat and I’m in heaven. Problem is, so many people just throw their old stuff out before I get around to photographing it. Fortunately there’s a retired farmer near my home in Galloway who still has a treasure chest of rusty old implements and tools in his barn. Hopefully he’ll never get rid of it and I’ll be able to keep going back to take pictures. I sometimes take my students there, but it’s best if they are on the same wavelength if they are to get the full benefit from the place.

There are old boats that haven’t seen the water since the 1960s, a road roller of similar vintage, farm implements hung on the walls and scattered around the floors, saws, spanners, you name it. There are colours, shapes, textures and heavy doses of nostalgia everywhere you I look.

When you are confronted with so many photo opportunities like this, it’s always best to take a good look around first and work through the place methodically with some outline plan about what you want to achieve. This way you won’t be stumbling around aimlessly trying to pick off pictures here and there. You’ll have a system.

I started just inside the doorway where I used the available natural light with the camera on my solid Benbo tripod. I photographed an old boat and the road roller. If possible, always walk all the way around the objects that catch your eye – ask yourself what it was about them that attracted you and then try to accentuate that aspect. Is it the colour, for instance, the texture, outline shape? Perhaps the object tells a story – like the wooden boat resting on the pram wheels. Whatever it is you must try to maximise it in order to bring impact to each picture.

There is no need to hurry in these situations. You can enjoy every minute, so take your time and consider each picture angle carefully. The light is unlikely to change dramatically, so again this will not put you under any pressure. Take a good big white reflector with you so that you can direct some light into the shadows, or even bounce your flash off it. There are endless possibilities once you get started.

Photograph 1 (top)
The the first thing I saw when walking through the barn door was this old roller. I explored it from all angles – walking round it several times and took lots of pictures, but it was the front view that really interested me. I moved right in to crop out all the surroundings. I also set my WB (White Balance) to Cloudy. This added more yellow and emphasized the orange paint and reddish rust of the subject

Photograph2
I also photographed the roller’s steering wheel and seat, but this time I used some flash to give harder, crisper lighting.

Photograph 3
As part of my exploration of this subject, I decided to use some flash off the camera. It’s harder, more direct light would add more shadows and impact to the picture. I shot several different angles. This time the shutter speed was speeded up to 1/3sec in order to cut down the daylight coming in through the door and the hole in the roof of the barn. I didn’t even connect the flash with a synch cable to the camera, I simple pressed the button and fired the flash immediately - while the shutter was open. This takes a bit of practise when using anything less than one second, but saves messing around with cables. Okay, so I’m lazy.

Photographing still life - part 2

If you really want to progress with you still life photography, set yourself tasks and projects – start off simply with one object and a plain background and work up from there. Try adding more objects and think carefully about the positioning of each, but remember that simple compositions are usually most effective. Photographing a vase of flowers or bowl of fruit presents lots of interesting challenges in light and composition… artists have been painting these things for centuries.

Vary the lighting, bearing in mind the different attributes of each object you are photographing – its texture, colour or shape. Move on to more challenging subjects – try photographing a glass decanter or wine glass; you might try doing this without any glaring reflections – you could fill the glass with a rich red Rioja to add colour - and then celebrate a successful image by drinking the prop. Cheers!

It is always best to start the composition very simply and add one thing at a time until you are happy with the result. For the top pictures, I just leaned a plank of old wood at the back of the bench placed the horse on the bench in front of it. I liked the combinations of subtle blue colours. Following the blue colour theme I then hung a coil of blue rope on the background to add another shape and colour – see lower picture. I prefer the simplicity of the first shot.

It’s a really useful idea to gather together a collection of still life props. Almost anything that attracts your eye might come in useful – a small piece of driftwood, a colourful pebble or two, dried flowers, a few different fabrics for background and foregrounds. Every one might be used at some time when you really get into still life photography.

Below is a photograph using one of the many props I have collected in my shed for still life photography. It is just a an old tea chest half-full of unglazed pot jugs. I have cut away two sides of the box to reveal the jugs inside and make it easier to

photograph them. The jugs can be arranged any way I prefer and all I have to do is turn the box around for the best light.

Photographing still life

Still life is definitely one of the best ways to make a start with creative photography. Even if you intend to spend all your time out photographing people or landscape, you can learn a very great deal right there at home even before you step outside your front door.

You will be able to work by yourself at your own pace, so you will be under no pressure. It can teach you so much – about light, composition, exposure, lens focal length and depth of field. And that’s just for starters. You can practise using simple backgrounds and combining different colours and textures; you will be able to hone your basic camera technique and get used to handling your camera and tripod to the point when it all becomes second nature. To top all this – it can produce some really beautiful photographs.

You do not need a studio with expensive lighting set-ups to produce interesting still life photographs. A kitchen table; spare room; a garage or even an old shed? Provided you’ve got enough room in there to put up a tripod, it will do just fine. Ideally the space will have a window that does not get direct sunlight, but even this can be softened to some degree by taping a couple of layers of net curtain or sheet of tissue paper over the window. Even an ordinary tungsten lamp can be used as your light source, but you will have to set your white balance to ‘Tungsten’ to correct any nasty orange colour casts from this low temperature light source.

In your makeshift ‘studio’ you will have total control of your subject, your composition and lighting. You will be able to choose your own backgrounds and decide on your own props. You will be able to mix and match colours and spend as much time as you feel you need to create the picture you want. The best way is to experiment and move your chosen objects around until you feel you have completely exhausted every last possibility.

The great joy of using digital is that you can review your results constantly and make adjustments as you go along. This means that your camera becomes a real learning tool and you can delete anything that is obviously not working.

Top photograph:

I’ve used a piece of wood and coil of blue rope to contrast with the elegant shape of a tall, unglazed vase. Positioning of the main object is crucial to the overall effect. It is off-centre and overlaps the rope. This helps the ‘layering’ effect of the objects and creates a sense of depth. This is also helped by the soft sidelight coming in through my shed window

Lower photograph:

This picture was spotted in a potter’s workshop. I did move a plastic bag that was in the background. I also pulled the bird on the right to hand side over the edge of the bench. This broke the otherwise straight line and created an illusion of depth. I was very careful not to disturb the layer of clay dust that covered the bench and the pot pheasants

Next – in part 2 - I’ll show you how I modified a few props to make my still life photography more effective

Photography Holidays

When I’m running the photography weekends and holidays here in Scotland and in Menorca, I don’t normally get much chance to take my own photographs. My priority is always to make sure that the photographers in the group are getting the pictures and the tuition they need. I do not carry an SLR while I am working with my students, just a small Canon Ixus so that I can demonstrate composition and the way I see things.

Still, I do take photographs at every opportunity, and I thought I’d just post a few that I took on the trip to Menorca in September last year. I love the colours of Menorca – they can be so rich and deep. Of course the sun gets to work on these colours and bleaches them into the most wonderful hues and tones. That ochre coloured wall with the street lamp and signs captures my attention every time I walk down that particular street. I must have photographed it a dozen times.

The door handle and that cracked green paint was found on an derelict military vehicle at one of the locations we visit regularly with the groups. This place is an old military barracks. It’s always a favourite and never fails to produce the most fantastic images.

The still life of the tomato and the water flask was a very quick shot taken while the group was photographing Pedro – I’ll show you some portraits of Pedro very soon. He has a wonderful face and loves being photographed by our group.
The picture of the horse was taken in a few spare moments while my group were practising their panning skills at the horse trotting races. I walked around to the stables and noticed the riders entering the stadium up this ramp past all the upturned trotting carts. I just waited a few moments until a rider came past in the right position. I posted some pictures of these races some weeks ago.