Faces of British Soldiers Before, During and After Afghanistan

I love smart and clever ideas.

As I have said on many other occasions, the concept is king.

In the past couple of months I saw two different takes on the same idea.

What toll does conflict take on soldiers in war?

I saw a project by photographer Lalage Snow where she shot a series of portraits of soldiers before, during and after deployment to Afghanistan.

You can read a little more about her project here

I asked her about the portraits.

She came up with the idea as long ago as 2007.

When she was struck by the difference between soldiers prior to deployment and after deployment.

Often good ideas take a little time to mature.

In her own words she says the photo's 'aren't technically brilliant'

She used no lighting 'just ambience hence the vast difference in Afghanistan' and a small amount of post production.

'I had a black sheet I bought from John Lewis fabric dept but it blew away in the wind when a Chinook helicopter landed, so I improvised with black bin bags and gaffer tape which was tricky given the sheen on normal bin bags and perhaps is why some of the shots are in flatter light. but you do what you can in these situations and trust to hope it will be okay in the end'

Amen to that.

The lighting may not be as consistent as one would ideally wish but these were not ideal circumstances.

'Lally' really has told a story with these remarkable pictures.

A cracking idea.

I can't wait to see what she comes up with next.

Rodney Charters New Years Day Chat Part 3- Closing thoughts

So here its is, the third and final part of Lan Bui and I chatting to Rodney Charters, very affable DP of '24' and forthcoming 'Dallas' about the Canon C300 and other matters photographic.

He talks about the possibilities of shooting in stealth mode, without tripod and how good long focal length lenses can lend a different dimension to shooting cinema.

And reliability.

A camera, no matter how good, is nothing without reliability.

After the Gold Rush by Tomer Jacobson

Last week I received an email form Tomer Jacobson in Israel.

Tomer sent an image titled'After the Gold Rush'

It is part of a series he has just started which is based on his interpretation of songs that he likes .

This part is very important in my books as when we shoot anything we like, or love, it is always so much better for it.

Needless to say this one is his interpretation of the enigmatic Neil Young song.

Enigmatic in that I don't think Neil Young has ever revealed what the song is about, interestingly he has also never released any of his songs for use in commercials.

Tomer shot this image.....

So, a well executed and lit shot but the clever part for me is the concept.

In the world of 'Me too' coming up with a clever and original idea carries so much more weight and significance, in my eyes at least.

I suspect in the wider world too.

Tomer has posted BTS video of the shoot here.



Its in Hebrew so I can't understand the words, but really there is no need to, you see him getting on with it and doing a great job and working with the light not against it

He ended up using an image shot with available light, I'm not that surprised, smoke machine shots seem to work very well with available light...and a hint of flash

With a little help from my old friend the smoke machine.

Like myself, Tomer chose to buy sooner than rent to save money long term, so I suspect we will be seeing it again in the series.

I look forward to seeing what else Tomer comes up with.

The concept is king

What is yours going to be?

Fuji X-1-Pro, Please, Please, Please let the auto focus be up to the job

Rumors abounded last week that Kodak was seeking bankruptcy protection.

The Yellow box seems to be destined for the pine box in the long run.

Fuji also seemed to be wracked by inertia over the past decade, with the occasional glimmer of decent product raising the companies prospects from time to time.

That was until they came up with the X100.

A clever and beautiful camera.

Arguably, for the first time since the advent of digital photography they were leading the game and not playing catch up.

Anyone who has read my blog or indeed many of the others comments on the web that this camera has more than its fair share of quirks.

Hit and miss AF being the big one for me.

I often joke that on occasion, it can take a certain kind of out of focus image.

Like this.

Fly by wire manual focus is not the best, add to that a labyrinthine menu, slow write speed to card and a need to format the card every time you download photos, if you want the camera to start up in less than a minute and it can be deeply frustrating.

As Fuji themselves said in their promo material

'The Professionals choice'

Oh dear.

A year later we are hearing the 'P' word again from Fuji, only this time it is the name of their new X series camera, the X-Pro-1.

It looks quite lovely, with a very promising looking range of lenses too.

On the face of it a winner.

Tempting, very tempting.

But what about the autofocus?

I was going to write this piece without sniffing around on the net (I don't normally do this before I blog, but I made an exception on this occasion)

My initial finding gave me cause for optimism.

With the respected British Journal of Photography saying 'Fujifilm goes back to its professional roots'

Then I read a posting by Gizmodo Australia

'Fuji X-Pro-1 Hands-On:Intoxicatingly Simple'

Sounds good but upon further reading Fuji seem to have taken the whole keeping it simple a little too far by having a similar focusing system to the X-100.

'the autofocus isn’t going to be as snappy as it is on other cameras. Fuji says thats because that’s not what this camera is about. Fine, but it’s going to annoy the hell out of you if you’re used to a good point-and-shoot camera or DSLR'

Now I have not held let alone seen this camera and we cannot take Gizmodo Australia's word as gospel but it might be worth bearing in mind that these words are attributed to Fuji, not Gizmodo.

You can have all the jewel like interchangeable lenses, fantastic build quality in a pretty camera body but if the bloody thing won't focus as it should then it will alway be handicapped.

Fuji in all probability were locked into a research and development cycle which meant they had to retain the X100 like focusing system.

But I cannot help but think that they would have been better off postponing the launch and getting the AF right.

I cannot say they have got it wrong until I have tried the camera myself however.

I suspect when the photography history books are written that the X100 will be known as a beautiful camera with daft focusing which did quite well until another manufacturer came along and did something very similar aesthetically and the focusing worked.

Fuji have a great opportunity with this family, lets hope they do not squander it, I for one want them to have a bright future.

If they wonder what the consequences of getting it wrong are, all they need to do is to look at where Kodak is right now.

Rodney Charters New Years Day Chat Part 2

Here is part two of the chat Lan Bui and I had with DP of '24' Rodney Charters.

If you watched part one you will have some idea of what awaits. If not, it is well worth a watch in my opinion.


Rodney talks about the art of the possible and using the tools we have to make images.

Real world solutions for real world situations.

Wether you are into still or moving images.

Enjoy.

David Hobby joins the Phase One 'Club'

I see that David has finally taken the plunge and bought a Phase One camera and P25+ back.

I'm not really surprised.

Though I must admit I'm a little surprised and disappointed by some of the harsh comments on his blog.

But whatever your views it is after all just a camera, albeit a very good one.

But what I always say to anyone who is considering taking the plunge into the Phase One world, this camera system is not like so many others that seek to flatter and turn the average shooter into a talented photographer.

I refer to it as the ultimate blank canvas.

Yes, thats right.

A blank canvas.

The sweet spot of the big sensor removing some of the constraints that a DSLR user faces.

A really good pen was not the making of William Shakespeare.

Living life, loving, losing and struggling had more to do with it than the pen.

And so it is with photography.

You may have the best camera in the world but no amount of megapixels, gigabytes and frames per second are going to MAKE the photograph.

Do they help? Well they can but I sometimes think we forget about the end result and focus way too much on how we get there...

To this end I believe Nikon with the D4 and Canon with the 1DX have created two totally brilliant camera's which are aimed at a diminishing end of the market.

The sports and news shooters who need a trazillion frames a second, and autofocus which knows where the subject is going before the subject does.

How much R&D budget has been expended on these giants of the high speed world heaven only knows.

I'm not sure how much they will recoup either.

One can only speculate how much the timing of the release of these camera's has to do with the Olympics this summer.

Make no mistake, this camera is made for AP, Getty and the like, along with the wedding shooters who enslave themselves to an age of post production with 30,000 images from a single wedding...yes my friends they DO exist.

It is all about the right tool for the job.

David decided he did not need a digital chain gun, look at his photography.

In the same breath any sports shooter who sat on the touch line of a ball game with a Phase One might well be asking for trouble.

Very interested to hear he likes Capture One, it is a great piece of software which has matured into a real gem.

And all I was going to blog about was 'Turning Pro'

Next on my list.

Who on earth is Alan Roberts?

Alan Roberts is a name in all probability a name you will not be familiar with.

But he is important

Very Important.

Rewind a year or so and Canon had launched the XF series of video.

On the face of it, the XF series was another video camera offering which was good, but not really a player on the field against the mainstream players of Sony, Panasonic etc?

Right?

Wrong.

It did all seem rather unlikely with its unfashionably small sensor (I admit I scoffed at it at launch), but with its high 50mbs bit rate and super sharp optics in a very useable package it was very good.

Canon did at last have a video camera which matched in most area's, and outperformed in others, competitor offerings.


But how to communicate this to a sceptical broadcast world where other manufacturers seemed to have an unassailable grip on the market.

Enter Alan Roberts.

He is not a cameraman but in the words of the 'Guild of Television Cameramen' whom he won an award with in 2009

'A leading colour scientist, working for BBC research and development, he has not only contributed to the technology behind the camera, with a huge number of white papers, but has directly helped untold numbers of TV cameraman to get the best images out of modern digital and high definition camera's'

He has now retired form the BBC but his word clearly still carries much weight.

So imagine the impact of a very positive white paper he wrote on the Canon XF300 and XF305.

It made the BBC approved list of camera's for independent productions.

People sat up and took notice and it sold by the pallet load.

Fast forward to 2012 and Alan Roberts has written a report on the Canon C300, you can find the PDF of his report here

Will it have the same impact as his report on the XF300 and XF305?

Probably not, as the world and his wife are singing it's praises.

An important milestone all the same.