Camera Setup and More!

I'm not sure how I got into photography to start with, but I remember asking my mother if she would get me a camera, it was months before Christmas and I wanted one so bad, looking at these really expensive £900 cameras in the shops but knew I was never getting that as it was my first camera and I don't think I'll have more than £900's even next year or the year after, you don't need money or very good equipment to be a good photographer. 
Just look at 'DigitalRev' on YouTube, they have a great playlist called "Pro Photographer, Cheap Camera".
Here's the link - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7ECB90D96DF59DE5
It's worth a watch. 
One of the most enjoyable ones was the episode with Chase Jarvis, he gets challenged to take pictures with a Lego Camera. It's a long video but if you're interested in what cameras can potentially do then give it a watch.

So when Christmas came I received a Samsung WB100, my very first camera, it's a bridge camera with a 26x optical zoom and 16.4 MP. It was a good camera and I had it for about 2 years before getting another camera, my mother and father told me she would get me a better camera had I used the Samsung one enough.
I was hooked, took it around wherever we went on holidays, never really took it out when I went out with friends though, although I did take a few pictures of skating with it and took about 400 pictures of a wedding with it. That's when I knew I wanted to do something with photography.

The camera I then had on Christmas of 2014 was a Canon 700D, I've now had this camera for a year and a month, this was one of the first pictures taken with it. 

With the Canon I had I also had the 18-55mm lens, which came with it, I still have this and use it constantly, I then bought the Canon EF Zoom Lens 75-300mm, here are my lenses.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Opteka-Aspherical-Fisheye-Digital-Cameras-black/dp/B002MR0L9Y (LEFT)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Canon-Digital-Camera-3-5-5-6-Sensor/dp/B00BYOY9AS  (MIDDLE... PLUS THE CAMERA BODY, YOU CAN GET THE LENS ON ITS OWN OR THE CAMERA BODY ON ITS OWN ALSO)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Canon-75-300mm-4-0-5-6-III-Lens/dp/B00005K47Y/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1454268628&sr=8-1&keywords=cannon+ef+75-300  (RIGHT) 

This Christmas I also received the lens on the left, which is the Opteka 6.5mm Fish Eye lens, I have planned that I am going to mainly use this for filming skating videos. Many filmers use fisheye lenses if they are filming with DSLR's, they also use handles which stabalize the videos too, which makes it easier to film with, I also have one of these, I purchased it cheap online, most things I have bought are from amazon.co.uk

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Camera-Camcorder-Stabilizing-Stabilizer-Handle/dp/B00GOMRVQE/ref=sr_1_5?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1454268847&sr=1-5&keywords=camera+handle+grip 


You can get these for very cheap and it's worth it to try them out, mine is very good and seems quite durable although I haven't used it loads yet.

This is the rest of my things, including the camera body, as I said it's a Canon 700D, another thing which I've also bought is a battery grip too, it was also cheap and is very well, it holds two batteries and therefore lasts 2x as long with double the battery power in it, and it also acts as a grip, with a shutter button on it too, this makes it easier to take pictures portrait.


Here's the link for one - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Neewer%C2%AE-Battery-Replacement-Batteries-Digital/dp/B00PJUJYU8/ref=sr_1_6?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1454269222&sr=1-6&keywords=battery+grip
The other things in this picture are another battery, you can't have enough batteries for just in case.
A spare 16GB SD card which I've yet to open.
And also a remote, remotes are used mainly for wanting to take a photo while also wanting to keep the camera still, when it's on a tripod etc.

I also have a tripod which I had about a year ago, you can also find them online for pretty cheap, you never really need expensive things, as long as you have necessary things for what you wanna do then it's all you should need.
When a camera is on a tripod you may want to be taking a long exposure shot of a river or the stars in the sky, if you press in the shutter button there will always be a shakiness or blur in the image, no matter how careful you are, this is why a remote shutter button is necessary for things like that, you won't have to harm the image that you're about to take. I've tried taking photos of the stars once or twice, the outcome wasn't the greatest but my camera didn't get shake from it as I was using the remote button.

I'll show examples of photos I've taken where I have needed longer exposures for more light, including the stars image I attempted, no matter how bad they look, it's always somewhere you have to start. 

Thanks for reading my post, make sure to share it if you liked it, bye! 

And also make sure to follow my blog account on Twitter if you want :) 

https://twitter.com/StreetShots_ds

Shout out to my mate Twm, that also makes blogs, if you like movies, wanna see reviews and quick news then follow his blog!! (and his twitter)

http://criticalcinemareviews.blogspot.co.uk/

https://twitter.com/critical_cinema  

Second Shoot - MORE PICTURES AND FUTURE PLANS

This post is a carry on from my other "2nd shoot" posts. I will also be talking about the future of this blog and maybe the future of my photography also. In other blogs I will be speaking about my skating and my photography, as I'll be skating more when the weather gets better, there will be more skating on here, still the street aspect of it though.
When I do go out and shoot different things like nature, abandoned houses etc. then I will still put them onto here as it shows that doing other subjects is better than just sticking to one, I'm going out next weekend to hopefully get a nice shoot in an abandoned house near where I live.

This was a continuous shot of Seekio skating down the path, we tried this a few times, using different balances to create different effects, this was probably my favourite one as it made a more yellow effect and you could see the lights more better. And also what you have to watch with taking photos that seem symmetrical or have repetition such as this shot  is that the framing is centre with the lights as they sort of are here, they aren't perfect here but you can see I was getting them as centre as I possibly could. 

The only time I think you would make it off centred or tilted was if you were trying to create a different meaning. for example I'll show a picture of Seekio skating down the same path and my camera was tilted (by accident) and it seems as though I'm on a level framing with the skater and not the floor, as if I'm tilted with the skater, see for yourself.

As you can see the framing isn't level with the surroundings of the skater but it's tilted on the same way as the skater.
The last few shots are not going to add up to 35 or more, it's not the full shoot but like I said, most of it was experimenting with the white balance and trying to get different effect so you won't see all of the second shoot.
On times I may post 3-5 random photos that I've taken, or post 5 favourite photos each month, this is just me quickly brainstorming although it sounds like a solid idea.
These are the images, a continuous shot of seekio angrily smashing his board onto the floor.

I like these shots a lot as you can see the emotion in the way he steps forward for the slam, you can't really see his face but you can see how he puts force into the slam as the last shot shows his left foot up in the air, using a faster shutter speed and a higher ISO may have been better though. 

So, for my future plans, I haven't thought about it much, I'm definitely going to show my camera set up and keep posting my shoots, when I start researching different photographers and place my shoots into my project journal I will take pictures of that and post my progression on here too, I will also post my finished creations of my Media Studies magazine covers which need to be completed within the next week or two. 

What's hard about A-levels is that I have to revise for a mock exam next week or for the week after, AND finish the photoshop work for media, plus I need to watch films and analyse them and learn actors and directors just for extensive knowledge. While doing all that I need to also complete 15 shoots for photography, do research on photographers, old, current and welsh. This is a lot for me I won't lie, it's a huge step form GCSE and this is my first year in A-level, while tying it up it sounds very fun in my opinion but it's just a lot in a small space of time.


The photographers I'm doing for my research are Henri Cartier-Bresson (old photographer), Bill Cunningham (current photographer) and Graham Kidd (Welsh photographer). I think Graham is Kidd is amateur, as I couldn't find a professional Welsh photographer I found someone that makes blogs or just sells pictures, and he sells images.

Other plans for the future are to just make people that read my blogs happy, it would be nice if you shared this post or my page if you enjoy the posts I've made so far, if you think I should post other things to do with photography or have any ideas for me then tell me, I'm open to ideas. My next post will be my camera set up, tomorrow around 9pm GMT.

Thanks for reading, bye :) 

A few images in my second shoot

Instead of creating one post for a full shoot I thought I'd split it into different posts so they don't seem too long, this post will be going through some pictures I took on my second shoot.
We went to a carpark which has an overhead roof as it was raining we had nowhere else to go.
A few of these photos were just quite random, I pulled my camera out and took a picture of whatever was in front of me. 

I don't really like this image as it looks too 'grungy', like something that would be on Tumblr with some quote in the top left corner, although I had to take this photo as I had the chance too. Maybe it could have turned out better.
Settings:
ISO - 800
Aperture - f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance 
Flash on.

This photo may have been better if I had used flash.
In my last post you saw my experiment with the white balance which I will use more, by taking a picture normally and then use a different white balance, although the best photos are the ones that you have to capture at the right moment, or photos that have a lot of thought put into them, these pictures don't have pure thought. The only thing I think about is what sort of thing I'm going for before I start shooting.
Settings:
ISO - 800
Aperture - f5.6
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance 
Flash on

This was a random picture of my friend skating, next time I'd like to take my tripod and capture a slow shutter speed image of a skater as it would make a very nice blurry effect which I think would look cool, the only way to find out is for me to do it and then see what happens.
Settings:
ISO - 1600
Aperture - f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance
Flash on

The other pictures that look similar I don't really like, but this one seems different, it seems completely natural and not set up at all, which it wasn't. I took this photo and then thought about the others to which I asked him (seekio) if he would pose in a certain way which probably made me dislike the other pictures more.
But i do like this picture more, and personally I like pictures with a blurry background which is why I use an aperture of around f5.6 or f.35 quite often.
Settings:
ISO - 800
Aperture - f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto White balance
Flash on

This is also one of those pictures I don't fully like, although I could have still taken a better image, bye not using flash and raising the ISO maybe, or just not using the flash anyway and keeping the ISO the same. The hand is very exposed to the light and I was probably too close, I will take one similar next time without the cigarette and probably not the hand either.
Settings: 
ISO - 3200
Aperture -  f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance 
Flash on

In this picture I thought it would be necessary to paint over the number plates just in case. I like this picture as I'm catching him without him knowing and it's pretty natural. And without trying to defeat the idea of a stereotypical skater, it doesn't seem like something a skater would do, a stereotypical one anyway.
What I mean by that is the fact that people that don't skate, mainly older people which think it's disrespectful have an attitude towards us/them which makes them think we do drugs or get up to no good, which is partially correct as that's what a lot of teenagers do anyway. But this seems different as he's just drinking juice. 
Settings: 
ISO - 800
Aperture - f5.6
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance 
Flash on

After seeing this it looked very cool, my friend spotted this, giving it a viewing before taking a picture, then I took one and it just looked too bland, I think adding the skater into it then it makes it looks more active as well as being pretty cool. 
Settings:
ISO - 6400
Aperture - f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance
Flash off

7 shots seems fair out of the 35+ I've taken, many of them were mostly experiments on the white balance so I won't add them to the next post, I'll post another 7-10 images from my second shoot and also post my camera set up on Sunday at around 9 ish. Thanks for reading and if you want to ask any questions then feel free.

Few pictures from my second shoot.

Today I've been quite busy, no blog about my shoots as I've been to college and then when I finished I went straight out to take another shoot, this one wasn't planned and only happened because I had my camera on me. A Friend took me home after college so I could grab skate shoes and my board, I saw my camera on my desk and just naturally picked it up. Which brings me to say that whatever you're doing, wherever you're going, take your camera. Even if you aren't planning on taking pictures, I wasn't planning on it as I'm doing a shoot next Monday, maybe Tuesday (which I've planned).But today I was skating and then thought about some cool pictures I could possibly take and then I could try them out and experiment as I had my camera, it also counts as a shoot for my photography too. Not to sound lazy in any way but if something goes bad on Monday which ruins my plans totally then I can still say I've done a shoot already. I have to do a shoot once a week for the next few months but making them twice maybe three times a week for a few weeks can really give me a chance to analyse them more deeply and extend my own knowledge and improve myself to my full capability.I will show a couple of pictures taking in today's shoot but will talk about them more after finishing up some coursework.I will also show my camera set-up in another blog in a day or two, to show you guys what I use and what lenses I have. 

I like this image as it was taken quite randomly, well I faced my camera towards them to get a picture but saw he (Robin) was setting up for a trick and just thought it would be nice if I caught the trick (which I timed wrong, could have been better).
This was taking with the flash on so a continuous wasn't really something I could do, I'm actually unsure if other cameras can take very fast continuous shots with the flash on, mine is very slow.
(if anyone knows how to help in anyway or if all cameras do it then feel free to let me know)
There is a lot of action going on at once which is why I like it, there's arms swinging around which would catch your eyes and there's also a long strip of lights on the right which may direct your eye down the road into the two speed limit signs which caught my flash.
Settings:
ISO - 800
Aperture - f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/100
Auto white balance used.
Flash used. 

To make this effect I played around with the white balance which made a more yellow effect on the lights, I used the shade effect on the white balance option. If you compare the light shades on this image and the lights on the image posted with 3 people skating then there is an obvious difference on the lights, I very much like how this has been captured, although after further inspection the skaters trousers are the same colour as the floor, and his t shirt is the same colour as most of the light, to make the skater stand out I may get him to wear brighter shoes or a wrist band which will make him catch you eye.
Although the lights may drag your eyes down towards his head anyway.
Settings:
ISO - 1600
Aperture - f3.5
Shutter Speed - 1/125
White balance - Shade

This one was also taken with the Shade option on the white balance. Only difference is that the aperture is 5.6 and not 3.5.
5.6 has a smaller hole than 3.5 which means it's letting in less light now as the hole has gotten smaller as the shutter speed has stayed the same. I prefer how it'd darker as the skater stands out more because his t shirt is one of the brightest things in the picture, although you can't see his board which would have looked nicer if you could.
Settings:
ISO - 1600
Aperture - f5.6
Shutter Speed - 1/125
White balance - Shade

Tomorrow when I'm free I will show most of my second shoot, I may not put it all into one post like my first shoot as it seems like too much, so I could potentially create my shoots into about 3 posts. Please leave some feedback as it would mean a lot to me.
Also, I've made a Twitter page for StreetShots which would mean a lot if you followed :)

https://twitter.com/StreetShots_ds

First Photography Shoot

For the next 3 months I have a project for my A-Level Photography. 

I have to take at least 15 shoots (shoots are 35-50 images) of my chosen subject, which is street photography. 

This will branch off into skating culture, some nice building architect and structures that I see, and maybe the people in the areas that I am located, I've seen a lot of photographs of homeless people which are surrounded by the ignorant passers-by which I would like to re-create myself also.

This image taken of the Cardiff Library looks very modern and sharp, the only thing I don't like about it is the over hang at the top of the building, if there were no overhang then it would look much cleaner, which tells me I need to find better buildings.

This project has already started and I have already taken 1 shoot in Cardiff, UK. 
I will post around 35 images although I took over 100, and I will include some of my personal favourites which were taken in the shoot and analyse them in minor detail.

I find this picture quite satisfying if it wasn't for the street lamp. Although if the street lamp was in the very centre of the building shot (in the black line) then it may look nice too. But I do like this photo as if all reflects off the bus really nicely.

In this image, I like the repetition of the lights, not happy about how non-straight the framing is though, I'm not sure how it was so tilted, whenever I go back I can get a nicer shot of it and maybe get an eye level shot of the lights too. Also, my eyes go directly towards the lights, then follow the lights outside into the brighter part of the image. 

As we were walking through the old arcades of Cardiff I had to zig-zag my way through the crowd and had my camera on ready for any opportunity, I lifted it up and took a quick shot of the light in front of me, if there were less people around me I could have taken a nicer, sharper image of this light, you can see that it's slightly blurry but I do like how my eyes follow all of the arcade and towards the very end.

We walked into RouteOne to look at some clothes, having a PlayStation 3 built into the wall with Skate 3 on, we stayed for much longer than expected, why not? I was on my camera and turned it towards my friends without even looking, snapped this, I like how everything in this image has got quite a bland, nude colour palette which sort of makes the controller stand out.
 However you want to look at it, this photo is polysemic which means that it can have different meanings. I thought of the new generation that we are in, showing no faces it still shows the type of generation we are, the gamepad standing out in all blue, the next things your eyes could lead to is the bright blurry hand on the right of it, holding a mobile. To me it can sum up a lot of this generation, although to other people it can mean a completely different thing.

This one the only picture I could capture with homeless mixed with working class (and higher) people. Overall the shot isn't good at all but it includes a homeless guy in what may be his normal day sleeping area, he's next to a very posh restaurant.
I want to capture someone receiving money or getting ignored, both shots would speak meaning. Even though it's already been created before, it's still something I would like to experience and capture myself.

This shot is taken from the other side of the road, my first time taking a picture of a homeless person while they're looking straight at me, kinda felt awkward and hard to just aim the camera at him. But this shot shows both man and dog struggling, bottle of water and a dogs bowl on the dogs side, then a duffel bag on the man's side. If you look at the woman in the image she seems to be looking away from the guy, maybe this shows guilt that she can't even look him in the eye at all?
I've also thought a bit more deeply about this, on the left side there is a grey sort of feeling and colour including the cold, grey, metal fence, then over the other side of the image shows more light, yellows, greens, two people not including the homeless guy, and a red 'Spar' reflection, this has a more positive side. Which got me thinking that the homeless guy is sitting over the brighter sight, without even realising it, it just seems like a cool thing to think about.
(I also gave him some money has he's now on my camera)

This is the last photo I'm analysing, I haven't analysed anything extremely deep, only the stories behind what the photos could tell, I'm going to go straight in and say that this is one of my friends sitting down outside the Premier Inn (Cardiff). This is similar to what I would hope to capture, it's not just homeless people I want to capture, it's the mix between different classes right in front of your eyes, Precariat (is a social class, look it up), working class and the established working class.

Reviewing my whole shoot, I guess it was pretty successful, but pretty normal compared to the pictures I've taken before, for me to get a nicer looking shoot I will play around with the white balance to get different looking shots, I'm not sure when I'm at Cardiff next, my next shoot may be in a different location but I will definitely be going back there.

Thanks for reading if you got to the very bottom, comment any constructive criticism that you feel I may need.