Monthly Archives: July 2013

How I Took That Shot – Anthony O’Connor

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Anthony O'Connor won our recent 'Reflections' competition with his wonderful night shot of Ballycotton Bay.

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Here's how it came about:

"The image was taken from Silver Strand. I had this image in my mind for a while since I had seen a similar shot on the ECCG website in the 2009 calendar. The conditions were perfect on the night so I hung around for a while and took several shots at different settings".

Camera:Canon 400D
Lens: 18-55mm Kit lens
Focal Length: 18mm
F5.6, shutter speed 13 secs, ISO 400.
Lens flare: I normally have a UV filter on the lens all the time but I took it off on the night. Also the moon was well up in the sky and well above the frame of the image so flare wasn't really an issue. The clouds probably helped reduce the brightness of the moon also.

I later adjusted the contrast (-1), saturation (+1) and colour tone (-1)."

See more from Anthony here.

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How I Took That Shot – Fidelma Read

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Fidelma Read tied for first place in our recent 'Reflections' competition and eventually took second after a count-back of 'possible scores' was done. Her touching shot was all the more remarkable when she revealed that she had taken it with her iPhone!

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"We were away for the weekend and my three-years-old daughter, Ryana, had her face painted a few hours previously so it was quite smudged at this stage. Back at the house, she wanted to go outside to see the ducks but it was raining. She put her face up to the window to look out at the rain, and I could just see the photo in front of me. As luck would have it, I had my iPhone in my hand so managed to capture the moment. Of course I was wishing I'd had my Canon in my hand at the time, but the phone didn't do a bad job and the moment wasn't lost."

iPhone 4S
Eyes darkened a little in Lightroom.

Fidelma isn't the only photographer who gives the DSLR a rest in favour of the iPhone. Click here for the story.

Like to get involved with ECCG? Click here.

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How I Took That Shot – Karen Fleming

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Karen Fleming came third in our recent 'Reflections' competition with this simple and elegant shot:

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This is how she captured it:
"I had taken a similar shot a while back but rather then just submit that one I took a new shot. So went to the local florist and bought some Tiger Lillies and put them in water until they opened out".

"I placed a black backdrop over a table and placed a mirror I had out of its frame on top of it. I broke one the Lillies off and clipped it onto a water spray bottle for support so that the flower was over the mirror to generate the reflection. I then covered the bottle with part of the back drop".

"To light the shot I used a constant light source at full power with a snoot attached positioned to the right hand side of the flower. The snoot contained the light so that only the flower was lit with no spill beyond it. I took the shot at a slight angle".

"Levels were slightly adjusted and I used the spot healing brush to remove specks off the black background. Finally, I put a white border round the image".

Equipment used:
Canon 5d
Sigma 105mm lens
Manual mode, F5 @ 1/50 of sec, ISO 400, Auto White Balance
Constant light source with snoot attached.

See more from Karen here
Would you like to get involved with ECCG? Click here.

 

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