📸 Serious Photography Hobbyists?

Originally posted by @lifeintheslowlane

Oil pipelines I would think.

Ah yes, that would make sense, cheers, lifeintheslowlane; and thanks, too, for the camera advice.

1 Like

When I was about 12 I took a whole film of 24 photos on a day out with my finger partially over the shutter (or whatever you call it). Anyways, when I got the film developed and posted back to me, I was less than impressed with my work.

2 Likes

You mean the finger was out of focus…bummer. :slight_frown:

1 Like

These days I just take other peoples pictures of in focus fingers from the internet! :slight_smile:

2 Likes

This is great - almost a ‘steampunk’ like image :cool:

1 Like

Hey Spuds, switch off the autofocus :slight_smile:

1 Like

Hoping he serious photography hobbyists out there can help me.
I am really struggling with Windows 10 on my laptop and it’s Photo App. It’s beyond rubbish. All I want to do is find my photos and scroll through, delete and maybe make a few changes. But it just wont let me. I cannot go back to Photo Viewer as its a Windows 10 laptop. I don’t want to shell out for expensive programmes. Any suggestions?! Reading a lot of reviews that this is universally a rubbish app.

I have the full Photoshop software on my desktop and laptop so when I say this I’m not really speaking from personal experience. However there are a whole host of free online photo editing website that are supposedly easy to use. This one seems to fit with your requirements Niki…step by step instructions too: https://www.freeonlinephotoeditor.com/

If you just want to view your pictures just click on “Pictures” in Windows and click on “New Folder”…name the folder and drag and drop your pictures into that folder. I usually title the folder descriptively e.g. “Holiday 2018” Open the folder and you can just scroll though all your pictures…shown as medium size icons to the left and full size on the right of the screen. Then you can decide which ones you want to display on Social Media etc and upload and edit in the online editor.

Thanks. Have now moved all of the folders into Photos and seem to be now able to scroll through. Trying to open them in Microsoft Photo is very frustrating.

If you click on the Windows Icon, bottom left and scroll down to “Windows Accessories” and expand to show all the extras, open “Paint” and you can adjust and resize and a few other rudimentary adjustments. It’s a little irritating as after you’ve finished editing the picture and saved it you have to close “Paint” before you can open it again to load the next picture. Once you open “Paint” it’s best to right click on the “Paint” icon in the taskbar at the bottom of the screen and click “Pin to taskbar”…it’s then easier to relaunch.

1 Like

I had THOUSANDS of photos. I was incredibly anti Cloud storage so had back ups and back ups everywhere.
I even had a back up and restore version.
Then I had a laptop die on me, windows 10 came along, my back up photos restored in one lump with one new date absolute mess.
I took ages going back through them.
Then I lost my mobile phone. So all of those photos I thought were gone.
Amazingly when I replaced it, entered my never used gmail account, boom, they were all back again.
Like you I used Photo Editor before this new photo app (which is a crock of shit. Resizing to send Hi Res was so simple before.
But then I realised for my needs I can store medium res photos and they are way better then I will need as a memory keeper.
Now I manage with Google Pictures, share stuff, tidied them into albums from the filmstrips having tried all the other apps out there.
As a safeguard I also use one drive to back them as well with the free storage I get from work.
I have some good ones.

But my best ever photo?
This one

That is the busiest road in Dubai. This was 14th Jan 2015. I walked into the middle of the road, took this picture with my Canon Powershot point & shoot.

So far meh you cry.

George W Bush was visiting the City. Rains had caused accidents the day before so Authorities called a Public Holiday and closed the City down so Dubya could do a tour.
This photo took up the ENTIRE Front Page of the National Newspaper. They even used my headline “Dubai turns out to welcome Bush”

This was the Press Photo of the Year. I of course had to sign the rights to the paper so I was “Staff Photographer” I won nothing except a warm fuzzy feeling

2 Likes

Couple of B&Ws from this week’s break in North Yorkshire. First one in Saltburn-by- the-sea and the second in Whitby. No I didn’t ask permission for either picture. :lou_lol:

5 Likes

Did you take the selfie with a timer?

2 Likes

Yeah took advantage of the chair left in the street when the former user was rushed off to hospital. Keeping the seat warm I said when challenged.

1 Like

what set up is that or have you messed around own Photoshop… lens, f stop, speed ISO setting etc? Finally managed to join the DSLR … god £20 for my old Canon EOS600… and now have a nice Canon D80 :wink: old lenses work but need getting used to… and so many more features to try and get used to… so my bike in France is starting point :wink:

2 Likes

How do you make your B&W pop like that?

I’ve been a keen photographer for nearly 50 years and have gone through just about every format available.
In the end I’ve gone for good quality simplicity. I have a Sony A7 full frame mirrorless camera and one 24-105mm zoom lens. It’s perfect for me as a travel set-up, just sling it over your shoulder and you’re ready for most eventualities…street photography, landscape. close-ups, fast action, as I say pretty much everything.

I have Photoshop CC…rented for around £9.00 per month. Most photographers nowadays use Adobe Lightroom which is a cut-down Photoshop and much cheaper if you want to buy. My Photoshop CC rental gives me Lightroom as part of the package but I prefer Photoshop as that is what I was trained on 20 years ago.

I always shoot in “camera raw”…the highest resolution. In some circles it is considered overkill but it suits me as I can extract every detail in the pictures in seconds were traditional film used to take hours to get, even then inferior results. Shots like this are easy with camera raw…look at the detail in the shadow areas undter the jetty.

Generally add contrast Niki. It can be overdone because adding contrast can lose detail in the shadow areas. I use photoshop and you can lighten dark areas to retain detail and also lighten highlights to add a bit of sparkle.

3 Likes

Absolutely no artistic merit, but proves there are hidden parts of Dubrovnik that tourists don’t frequent (Fam. C_S excluded obvs)

3 Likes

Yeah that’s right Cobs even when I was there last year on a busy cruise ship day the side streets were quite quiet. It’s typical of tourist areas…they all stick to the main routes.

1 Like