Monthly Archives: April 2016

How I took that Shot – Finbarr O’Shea

14 - Easter Comp FOShea

No stranger to the winners’ enclosure, Finbarr O’Shea took first place in Grade A in our recent ‘Easter‘ competition with the comedic shot above. This is how he made it:

My shot for the Easter competition was taken in the Curragh Wood near Midleton. I bought a few bags of mini eggs and headed for the wood a few eggs lighter!

I placed them in different positions and shot a variety of images. Later, I processed a few in Lightroom, and picked one that i was happy with. In the meantime, following a club tutorial on compositing images, I gave it a try, dropping in a bird on to the main image, using Perfect Photo Suite 9.

The main picture was shot at F.8 1/10 sec ISO 100. The bird was shot at F.8 1/320 sec 400 ISO no flash.

 – Finbarr O’Shea

 

See also:
How I took that Shot – Zane Llewellyn
How I took that Shot – Eileen Upton
Competition Gallery
Competition Results and 2016 League Table 

How I took that Shot – Zane Llewellyn

07 - Easter Comp Zane Llewellyn

Zane Llewellyn took first place in Grade B as well as the overall highest score in our recent ‘Easter‘ competition with the striking shot above. This is how he made it:

I had hoped to base my Easter photo outside in a field of daffodils near my house, but they never came into bloom like other years, so that and the wet weekends meant I needed to come up with a Plan B.

 

I’d picked up a couple of fun Easter decorations in the weeks beforehand and in the run up to Easter I found some of the kids stickers, so the eggs came alive.

 

ZL how i took that shot 1

 

One morning, I swapped out one of the eggs with the chick before the kids got up to pretend that an egg had hatched, when the early morning sun beamed in across the room and suddenly my mind started clicking!

 

I grabbed my camera and took a few shots, but it was on a wooden table and it wasn’t popping. So I got a black mat for the table and put a black reflector behind, it instantly transformed the image. The colours really stood out. Next I played around with different compositions and depth of field.

 

The final image was taken at f8 @ 160/sec, ISO640 since it was handheld using natural light.

 

I used Lightroom to do the basic adjustments, and then Photoshop to remove the wicks from the egg candles which I thought were distracting and I ensured that the background was totally black (Priest socks black!). It was nearly there out of the camera, but I knew that any dark grey areas would show up brighter on the projected image.

 

ZL how i took that shot 2

 

I learned a great tip for checking if it was black. In Photoshop, I inverted the image, so any areas that aren’t totally black are much easier to spot.
In the inverted image below, you can make out the parts that aren’t white, these showed up as dark grey on the non-inverted image.

 

– Zane Llewellyn

See also:
How I took that Shot – Finbarr O’Shea
How I took that Shot – Eileen Upton
Competition Gallery
Competition Results and 2016 League Table 

How I took that Shot – Eileen Upton

10 - Easter Comp EUpton

Eileen Upton took first place in Grade C in our recent ‘Easter‘ competition with the humorous shot above. This is how she made the image:

I thought I would bring a little humour to the “Easter” themed Competition , so with a little help from the street sculpture in the Gooses Acre, Midleton, I created an Easter Egg Hunt with a difference!!

Using  Picasa tools I created a  border to  give the effect of a Postcard .  I used  Picasa  “Add/Edit Text”  tool to insert the caption.

Camera:            Canon EOS 1200D
Lens:                 10 – 18 mm
Aperture:            F 5.6
Focal Length:     18mm
Shutter Speed:   1/40
ISO:                    200

– Eileen Upton

See also:
How I took that Shot – Finbarr O’Shea
How I took that Shot – Zane Llewellyn
Competition Gallery
Competition Results and 2016 League Table 

Roches Point Lighthouse Shoot – 24/04/2016

Roches Pt 24-04-16 FOShea-2

For the second week in succession, an ECCG shoot has focused on a lighthouse. We travelled to Galley Head last week but this week we were much nearer to home at Roches Point at the entrance to Cork harbour.

Always a favourite spot for the group, Roches Point never fails to yield a decent photograph regardless of weather conditions. It was overcast on our recent visit with the clouds parting just enough in the west to give a hope of some bit of colour at sunset. Nevertheless, a private tour of a lighthouse will always bait the photographer so there was keen interest in this shoot.

Having exhausted the interior, we braved the cold and headed outside to the beach for the ‘blue hour’.

This was a really great and enjoyable shoot, right on our doorsteps. Thanks to all who made it possible.

See a gallery of images from the shoot here. Enjoy!

See more images here.

If you have an interest in photography and would like to find out more about East Cork Camera Group, click the ‘Contact Us’ link and leave us a message.

 

ECCG ‘Easter’ Competition – 19/04/2016

‘Easter’ was the theme of the thirdd internal competition of 2016 held at the Midleton Park Hotel on Tuesday 19/04/16. Following two viewings of the nineteen entries, marks were awarded which yielded one of the tightest competitions in the recent past, especially in Grade A where the leader board changed several times with just the last few scores. The results were as follows:

Easter Results

With only three points separating first and third, Finbarr O’Shea took first place in Grade A  while Trevor O’Connell and Denis Barry came second and third.

Zane Llewellyn was first in Grade B with Noelle Lowney and RJ Mani in second and third.

With continuing good form, Eileen Upton was first in Grade C with Magda Mani and Jim Curtin in second and third with only one point separating them.

In the overall high scores across all three Grades, Zane Llewellyn, Finbarr O’Shea and Trevor O’Connell took the honours.

Well done to all entrants, especially those new members entering for the first time, and congratulations to those who gained valuable points towards this year’s Photographer of the Year competition.

The image below is the overall highest scoring image by Zane Llewellyn. Click the image to see all the entries. Enjoy!

07 - Easter Comp Zane Llewellyn

See also:
How I took that Shot – Finbarr O’Shea
How I took that Shot – Zane Llewellyn
How I took that Shot – Eileen Upton
Competition Gallery
Competition Results and 2016 League Table