Low Light Photography and Me

Are you suffering from blurry photos in restaurants? Photos that come out more orange than they look to the eye? Or maybe a camera that refuses to focus? Is this phenomenon occurring mostly past 6pm and around dinner time?

Well have no fear, we have the diagnosis! Your photography is probably suffering from a case of 'low light', where there's not enough natural or artificial light around your subject of choice. 

But what's the cure? 

Sure it would be nice to be able to set a tripod off and have a remote shutter trigger the camera at a longer exposure so that you didn't have to compromise as much…but it might be a bit inconvenient if you're at a restaurant. Your food would be cold by the time you got around to eating it and you might be getting rather cool stares from…well…everyone!

So what can you do? Aside from using the flash that is, which no one should ever do! (Check my photography etiquette post to see why!)

Everyone will have their own ways of handling low light in a restaurant, and by no means are all my methods perfect and I'm always tweaking them to suit the situation, and in some situations my photos still turn out fairly tragic. Whilst most of my tips are based off my own experience, which is using an SLR, I hope my tips still might give some of you who are looking for a way to combat this low light issue some ideas to try out!

Shoot to edit

Are you processing your photos before they hit the blog? In some sort of image manipulation program? Whatever your tool may be, Photoshop, Gimp, Lightroom, if you're planning to shoot your meal at a restaurant in the evening, you should plan to do some editing afterwards. So whilst you may not get the perfect photo on the preview screen, there are a couple of things to keep an eye out for and ways to prep the photo so that it is more optimal for editing later. 

In the photos in this post, I think I show exactly how much work goes into transforming a photo so that it's blog ready and (for me at least) how important editing is!

Settings

For me, I like photos that are relatively crisp, not blurry and with a focal point. So I prioritize these first when I'm shooting, as I know I can bring up brightness and get rid of some grain later. Which generally leads me to the following settings for my camera...

Shoot in RAW if you can! Sure your file sizes are bigger, and it's a bit of a hassle to open, but since the data hasn't been fully processed, you have a lot more wiggle room in adjusting the colour and brightness and not turning it into some random pop art thing. But there's nothing wrong with editing jpegs, I just prefer the range RAW gives me.

I personally almost never shoot at a shutterspeed lower than 1/60th of a second, at absolute most I'll lower it to 1/50th, as I find any lower and it's hard to control and avoid camera shake. Keeps your photo fairly sharp and not too blurry. Hopefully.

Okay, to give a brief reminder before I go into aperture, bigger f stop number (ie. f12) means a smaller aperture, therefore less light coming in, but more of photo in focus. Low f stop number (ie. f2.2) means bigger aperture, therefore more light coming in, but less of photo in focus and a shallower depth of field. I know, bit confusing, but it'll eventually sink in!

My aperture will very rarely go lower than f2.2. I like to keep it closer to f3.2, as I don't want to have my depth of field too shallow, as whilst some depth of field is nice, it's not so nice when only a pinpoint of the photo is clear. Most basic lenses won't go much lower than f3.5 anyway though!

I personally boost my ISO when it's dark. I'm not (too) afraid of it. Sure, my photos will develop grain, as ISO will boost the brightness of the photo, at the cost of the clearness and crispness of the photo, but these days, most digital SLRs and digital cameras handle ISO pretty well. And really, if it's just for blogging purposes, your photos aren't going to be scaled up very big, so noise is generally not that noticeable anyway. If a place is super dark, my ISO will sometimes go up to 2000 or 3200, although I try to cap it at 1250 or so and plan to boost up the brightness in an editing program later. 

To try and highlight what ISO does, and how an editing program can handle it, check out these few pictures.

This is a screen shot of an edited photo in Lightroom. It's kind of splotchy with some speckles on it right?

That's because this is going on up close...

This is what 'noise' sort of looks like, and the higher your ISO the more 'noise' you'll get. You'll lose definition in your photos and you can get a fairly intense graininess, depending on how your camera can handle it.

This is the photo after it's been exported out of Lightroom. If you compare it to the screen cap photo above, it's a lot smoother and generally more pleasing to look at. See why I love this program?

Editing

So you've boosted your ISO, taken your photos and are now crying a little bit on the inside because your photos are pretty darned dark. It's alright, we'll save them. Maybe.

I personally use Lightroom to edit my photos. I generally boost 'exposure' and 'fill light', as I find if you solely use exposure, a lot of the darker details, or details in shadow are often not brought out. So it's a bit of a balancing game between those two to make sure it doesn't look too bright, but is bright enough to see most of the details. 

I also usually like using 'contrast', although it's a bit of a photo by photo case, as dark and light tones are often fairly defined anyway, so you don't need to further emphasise this more. 'Clarity' is also nice to use just to bring out the detail, but I don't like to be heavy handed with it, as it can give this weird 'halo' effect if you're too happy with that slider!

Temperature. What? You can have a hot photo? Well, kind of y'know? The basic idea behind temperature is that incandescent light, so pretty much your average light bulb, a candle, fire, etc, will give off an orange coloured light, which is often why photos taken indoors at night can turn out pretty darned orangey or yellow. To counteract that, you can actually adjust the white balance on your camera and tell it that you are in an artificially lit room. In editing programs, you're looking to generally push up the amount of blue there is in a photo, whether it be with a temperature slider like in Lightroom, or through curves in Photoshop.

Don't forget to bring down your noise a bit too if you've pushed up your ISO. Lightroom handles this very nicely and does a good job of smoothing out the photo. 

Exposure, fill light, contrast and clarity, can all also be generally replicated in other image editing programs. In Photoshop you can turn to curves, brightness and levels to help on getting that exposure where you want it. 

To get the above food photo to look like what it does on the right, I've had to make the following changes in Lightroom. The left panel is what it exports into Lightroom as and is neutral, from there I've slipped the sliders around to get the result on the right.

And here's another example. Sure, the result isn't perfect, but it's a vast improvement from what it started as!

Other tips and shiny things 

Smart phones! Handy little things, not everyone likes doing this, but it can be pretty handy when you're in a bit of a stitch, as some restaurants are pretty darned dark. Use your phone as a light! I personally don't really like using the actual flash on camera, like a flashlight, but if turn up the brightness of your phone's screen and load a page that is pretty white (like Facebook) or yellow (like notes on the iPhone), it tends to give a nice diffused looking light. 

Watch where you're sitting! Sure, a dark restaurant is pretty dark, but there's usually somewhere you might be able to find with just a little more light on it, as there must be lights somewhere in there. Don't retreat in a corner, and be a little bit strategic, where permissible! And if your table has candles, or little battery operated lights (so romantic, I know), take advantage of that stuff and pop it next to your plates. It's only a little bit, but it might help!

At the end of the day, it's all going to come down to a bit of experimentation. One night out with Bryan, he showed me a technique he uses where he puts his aperture to something ridiculous like f 1.8, but then backs up away from the table, thus getting a slightly bigger area of focus and more light in the shot! I had never tried that before!

I honestly wish I could tell you exactly what I look for every time I edit a photo, and why I've pushed up the contrast on one photo and not another. I've tackled in my mind how I would, but then you guys would be reading a rather long (and probably boring) book! I'm already pretty scatterbrained and all over the place as is (sorry guys)! But I hope I've at least given you guys some ideas or at the very least, some insight into how I handle low light!

In future if you do see a photo on the blog and you're curious how much adjustment I've made, please do let me know and I'd only be happy to share!

Hungree Photography - Thoughts on Composition

Ah, I am terrible aren't I? After posting my last post on photography, which was in April this year, I had all intents on doing more photography posts…but then you keep eating out…and then you get caught in the undertow of a backlog of posts to get up. Then there's that life thing. 

But I shouldn't be making excuses! 

In my last photography related post, one question did come up about something I touched on very briefly, which I thought I might elaborate on a little more. What is the rule of thirds? Which I have decided to expand on, and talk about composition in general. 

 
(I loved shooting this concept but wish I had more sequins still...MOAR!)

A year or two ago, I did some portrait photography sessions, both as a model and a photographer and it was always interesting to see what photos people ended up with of the same subject, and how some stood out to me as being 'better' shots, even though the setup for the most part was the same. Of course 'better' is all pretty subjective, but hear me out here.

Whilst many elements are involved in making a good picture (light, colour etc.), one of my focuses is on composition. Composition is basically how you frame or arrange the subject of your image in the photo, ideally, this would be to make your photo look as appealing as possible to most people's eyes. Now I don't know all the science and why the magic grid I will discuss later works and stuff…but it just works. Y'know? And it's not just for food photography, or even just photography, but for all things that need to look visually pleasing.

I think for me, I've spent a lot of my life immersing myself in visual graphic stuff (as I've always just kind of assumed I'm not so academically gifted), so drawing, communication and multimedia design, and as such composition comes to me quite naturally. Some people will have a knack for it, but some will need to consciously take the time to practice until it becomes so natural. It's like driving, you don't have to think about how you drive a car, you just do it kind of subconsciously. 

So here a couple of points I would give if someone were to ask me for some tips. As I've always said, I'm no expert and I'm always personally trying to improve and feel like my photos tend to get a bit same same since I'm so comfortable in my formulas, but it's better to share than not right? 

I'll try to relate a couple of tips more specifically to food photos as well, although it really can be applied to anything, and I've tried to gather all sorts of pictures to demonstrate my points...although admittedly, it was kind of hard to look for or make 'bad' examples as I feel like I'm so naturally concious of it. Or maybe I'm just really not that modest. Or something. Y'know.

HAIL THE ALMIGHTY RULE OF THIRDS GRID

What is the rule of thirds? 

It's pretty simple.

Imagine a grid like the one on the image above, on your viewfinder or image, so that you have a 3x3 grid. Where the lines cross, should be where the feature or focal point of your photograph is, or at the very least, it should be sitting along one of the lines. As I said, I don't know exactly the science behind it, but it creates a more pleasant tension in the photo for the eye to follow. As a bit of an artsy fartsy person, I feel like it gives the photo more room to breathe, when a photo is dead centre, it often feels like it has nowhere to go and feels a bit stuffy. Of course there are exceptions to the rule and there are many beautiful shots which are dead centre, but the rule of thirds almost never fails when used. Or as far as I know...



Here's me attempting to make a bad example for you. Not the best example, but in the first shot, the bite in the burrito is centered. It's awkward. To me anyway. It wouldn't be sitting on any of the lines in the grid.  And I know to most of you, you're thinking "But you should put the whole burrito in the image!", but believe me, I've seen some people, that when shooting, are so focussed on one aspect that they tend to forget everything else in the photo. Boggles my mind.

But anyway, move the bite mark over a little bit...and there we go! Much easier to look at and more engaging with the viewer...and guess what, if I drew a grid on that, you'd find it be on one of the rule of third lines!



Again, not the best example and for some people, the top image may look better, but for me, I don't know which snail shell to look at. In the second picture, I'm immediately drawn to the one at the very front, since it's right in the intersection of two of the lines.

I DON'T CARE I WANT MY IMAGE IN THE MIDDLE! YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING HUNGREE ASHLEY! /ENDRAGE

Well okay, don't take my advice then! No one asked you to! I know you don't love me! ;____; 

Ahem. If you do want a photo where you're shooting the object right in the middle of the frame, I'd suggest playing up symmetry. It generally keeps the photo a lot neater and easier for the eye to follow and offers less distractions and interruptions.

CHOP CHOP!

I tend to shoot wide, so I have the option to crop the image (especially since I shoot in RAW), and make my composition later. Got to love the options that post-processing give you. But even when I do shoot wide, I'm still watching where everything's placed!

(The above two photos did not come from the same picture. But I hope you get what I mean anyway though.)

YOUR FOOD IS ALIVE. IT NEEDS TO BREATHE.

I touched on this on the rule of thirds, but let the food in your image 'breathe'. I like, personally adore negative space, which is just empty space or background, usually above the dish or to the side, which isn't filled with things for the eye to look at, which means the eye is more drawn to the main subject. It just opens up the photo overall.

There are many ways you can let your image 'breathe', and again, it relates back to the rule of thirds. Put the plate, or protein on your plate on one of the lines, and it will almost instantly have breathing room and generally be a bit softer and easier to look at.

As you can see for portrait type shots, I tend to let the dish sit on the lower third line. To me, it just generally seems more luxurious and soothing on the eyes. We naturally read pages from top to bottom, so why not images? You may as well finish the image on a sexy looking note, rather than starting with something nice and ending with nothing, no?



But having said that, you may as well try it out anyway and see what you like! I'm just giving you guys my preferences.  My photos tend to use the same formula, but it's hard to go past something that's worked so well for so long right?

GO WITH THE FLOW BRO

Once you've picked your focal point and found a nice spot for it, keep an eye out for flowing elements. When I'm eating out, this can be the cutlery, the sauce smear on a plate etc. You want it to all have a nice 'alignment' and if it can be aligned with the rule of thirds…even better!

I've developed a bit of a habit when shooting coffee cups, to make sure that the spoon is around the side of the cup, it gives it a nice angle rather than if it was behind the cup. (Refer to earlier coffee photo to see what I like...)

MAN, THAT'S LIKE DEEP Y'KNOW?

If you're using a DSLR and have a fondness for shallow apertures like me, don't get lazy with your focal point. Make sure that the point that is most focussed, is near an intersection of the grid of a third line. Otherwise it just has a tendency to look a bit messy. I love playing with this as it can change the mood of a photo completely!

BREAK THE MIRRORS

I'm a fan of asymmetry in general. It's actually pretty easy to do this using the rule of thirds grid too. 

Try this little exercise first actually. If I tell you to make a frame with your fingers, like you're an artist sizing up your model, you (should) instinctively put your fingers something like this...

Ta-dah! Frame! Grid! Admittedly not the best photo (which I haven't managed to take with proper composition), but I hope you get what you mean.

So just do the same with your photos. Look for frames in the objects you're shooting.





See here? Asymmetry, the areas I want people to focus on are opposite each other diagonally!

THE ONLY RULE IS...THERE ARE NO RULES

Wait, but didn't I say earlier something about obeying the magic rule of thirds...rule? 

Well yah, this is true, but you're never going to learn unless you try taking lots of photos in lots of different ways. If you have lots of angles and framings of the same subject, then you can get an idea of what works and what doesn't work. If you only stick to following the rules, you won't really see the flipside right? And again, what makes a 'good' photo is incredibly subjective, so build up your own style over time. 

I could really keep going on and find more examples and attempt to awkwardly explain how I frame my shots, but you're probably bored of reading my ramblings...so hurry up grab your camera and go shoot!

Anything else photography related you think I should talk about? Would love to hear your ideas!

Eating Out Photography Etiquette Tips

Amongst us bloggers we always joke about how annoyed people get with us and our camera-carrying ways.

Picture this. Out in a restaurant with a couple of friends, lovely banter, gorgeous interior….the ordered food hits the table.

"STOP!" a cry is heard, Mission Impossible theme plays, as the camera is swiped out of it's hiding space, cutlery is rearranged, food is pushed and pulled into appropriate positions….and by the time food is consumed it's all gone ghastly cold.

Hmm. Not so nice for everyone really hey? Whilst I certainly hope nobody is this bad, I do think bloggers can get a bit of a bad rap, even just in jest, for being nuisances and making everyone wait with rumbling bellies.

Picture from FOODPampering (That's me in the colouful stuff with a camera for a face)

I certainly don't call myself an expert in photography but I like to think I've got a couple of tips on how to be a polite camera-happy person at the table!

So in this first post of (hopefully) a series of photography posts, these are my tips on how to simply and politely take pictures while your'e out in a restaurant. Whilst most of my points are for DSLR's, as that is what I use, you can certainly adjust as nessecary for a point and shoot.

My tips will mainly cover two things, how to not be a pain to the restaurant, and how to make the experience more tolerable for your dining companions.

And I'll just throw in some old random pictures for general prettiness. Here we go!

- First and most obvious one, just to get it out of the way: No Flash!

C'mon, you don't want to really disturb the other diners in the restaurant, especially if it's a kinda dark place and you don't want to blind your friend/date/partner by continuously having an excessively bright light go off in their direction right?

To remedy not having a flash, bump up the ISO. Who's really going to care? A lot of my posts on this blog have shots with ISO 2500+ and because they generally are pretty small, it's hardly noticeable most of the time. Lightroom does a pretty darn good job with noise reduction too!

If you're on a DSLR, why not experiment with your shutter speed and apertures too? Bigger aperture, means it lets in more light, so your shutter speed may not have to be so low.

Or just hope you've got a really steady hand.

- Try to keep your camera fairly close to you

I find the less you have to keep reaching down for your camera, or scuffling through your bag, the less it interrupts the 'flow' of the evening. If your camera is in your lap, or on the table, it's a much smaller and easier movement to get to your camera and start shooting. You don't get pre-occupied with looking for your camera, so you can keep up whatever conversation you're having.

And on the note of talking…

- Keep talking to your dining companions, while taking photos!

I brought up with Brad the other night that I always find it funny that people have a tendency to stop talking once a camera comes out and someone is taking pictures of all the food. Brad's retort? "It's a well known fact that sound affects the quality of the pictures! After all, if too many air particles are vibrating it distorts the visual field". Look Ma! Science!

Yeah, I know. Almost convincing. This is what you get for dating someone smarter than you. Although I'm cuter.

But coming back to the point, I do tend to notice people stop chit chatting a bit, once the camera comes out. Because, y'know, clicking a button takes so much effort and focus, can't have anything else going on! To remedy this, the second I bust out my camera, I continue to carry on the conversation we were just having, as if there's nothing there. I think I've caught some people off guard doing this, but it always pleases me when they pick up the cue and just carry on talking. You've at least let them know you're not ignoring them (unless this is your intention) and keeps the conversation 'flow' going nicely. Sometimes the easiest thing to do is to just ask a question, so that your friend can do the talking, and all you have to do is listen, if multi-tasking is a bit too much for you!

- Turn off your auto-focus light

On DSLR's there are two ways to do this. Just turn it off, or learn to focus manually. Similar to the flash thing, those lights can be pretty bright and if you're somewhere dark, it's a bit distracting. On point-and-shoot's, I usually find the auto focus light isn't as distracting, although you'll just have to check your manual if there's a way to turn it off!

- Minimal Movement

Try not to move yourself, or the plates/cutlery around too much! I personally almost never move from my chair when I'm shooting, the most I usually do is lift myself up a bit, almost to a stand, but my feet don't shuffle! I understand we have to move glasses and stuff that might be in the way, or a bit distracting in the background, but ideally, limit yourself to how many things you move. It'll make you quicker.

- Be quick! (And learn to shoot manually!)

Taken from the last point. The faster you can get at taking pictures, the hotter everybody gets to have their food. This is just practice really. I've personally found that using manual focus and manual settings on my DSLR makes it much faster for the pictures to happen. The camera doesn't need to spend time thinking about how bright or dark it is and where the focal point is before taking the picture. Every click of my shutter release means I get a picture, literally, straight away, not two seconds later. If you shoot manually more frequently, you will start to learn how to figure out what settings you need faster, or have a base point to start from that you can adjust from pretty quickly. I usually have my camera set to 60 fps and f 3.2 and fluctuate the ISO depending on how dark it is, review my picture and adjust the iso and maybe aperture as needed.

I think I'm decently well known for being a pretty snappy snapper amongst the food bloggers, so I like to think that my methods have some logic behind them!

- Know your rule of thirds (or have a general idea about composition)

Know them by heart, so that you do them instinctively. At least then even your quickly taken photos will have pleasing composition, even if it is a little simple.

- Travel light

This is more directed to the DSLR owners. Whilst I know camera enthusiasts love their glass and that we all have our preferences, I personally think it's less intrusive if you've got a small prime lens, as opposed to a big fat zoom lens which takes up quite a lot of space! I personally usually go around with a 50mm and a 24mm, both of which are fairly compact looking lenses.

Although having said that, I know that some bloggers have bigger lens which produce ah-mazing results and I can see why they would want to have it out with them!

And there you have it!

I really do get a bit carried away with advice when asked for it...but I do hope my tips help you guys out, or at least get you thinking on how else you can include your dinner guests in your photography endeavours! I hope you guys enjoyed a little break from just talking about food (but really, who needs a break anyway?)!

Do you guys have any other tips on how to be a polite food-photographer while out? And no, not bringing a camera is not an option here!!

FOODelicious Photography Workshop

So I take a tiny break from my dining out experiences, to have a slightly more self indulgent post. It's my blog, I'll do what I like no? Hehe. :)

About two weeks ago, I was asked by FOOD Pampering to volunteer a little of my time to do a short presentation of food photography, as part of a food photography workshop they wanted to hold, to start off their 'FOODelicious Photo Competition'.

I was quite nervous leading up to it, since I only had a week to put a presentation together and figure out what I could possibly share, as a self taught photographer (although I still don't like using that term to refer to myself...I just take pictures!). I also certainly don't consider myself one of the best photography blogs, as I look up to so many other food bloggers and their gorgeous photos! Maybe I would not be good enough! :s

It was an interesting experience trying to put to words what I know, and at the same time, very satisfying when I could justify a lot of the stuff I was doing when it came to composition and lighting and all the other technical beauties of photography. There was method behind my madness!

I was still worried though, that everyone would already know everything I was going to say, that I wouldn't be able to explain anything that I wanted to.

Photo compliments of Bing Cheng and Radityo.

Somehow though, last Saturday at Pan Asian, with about 40-ish (maybe?) members from both photography clubs at Monash and Melbourne University, I got through my 30 minutes of very animated (or as I was later told 'perky') presentation. I can be quite chatty if you give me the right topic apparently and I do indeed flail my hands around like a loud, Italian man.

It really did end up being a lot more fun than I anticipated and afterwards, as Pan Asian produced plates of pretty food for everyone to try their cameras out on, I was absolutely flattered as people came up to tell me how much they had learnt, ask for feedback on photos or to ask me elaborate on points I had covered. It surprised me how much knowledge I could actually part with people and I had some lovely conversations with people afterwards.

I got a bit lazy with photo taking, since there were about another 30 digital SLR's going rampant, clicking away like crazy. I don't think I've ever seen so many digital SLR's in one room at the same time....it was inspiring to see everyone really get into it though and sharing their results with each other. Pan Asian spoiled us with a great mix of dishes including chicken 'macarons', a lovely prawn entree, pannacotta's, chilli chocolate brownies from Bees Knees Brownies (which were, so insanely delicious) and beef rendang, to provide a little challenge. I was actually really impressed with some of the curry photos I saw, as I normally hate shooting it myself!

It was quite funny watching as everyone descended around the plates of food as they were dished out! As one blogger might have said when I tweeted about it, '....like pigeons!!!'.

Photos compliments of Radityo and Michael King

All in all, it was a fabulous day. I think the attendees had a lot of fun, I certainly did, and I can only hope that I was able to share at least one thing new with most of them.

Thanks for having me FOOD Pampering!

So leading on from this, I'm thinking I might start doing a series of photography posts...maybe...if I find time (because I'm not a month behind in posts!)....just because I can and because I think it's always interesting to learn how everyone approaches photography a little differently...and hey, sharing is caring right?