How I took that Shot by Finbarr O’Shea

Finbarr O’Shea came second in the recent ‘In Costume’ group competition with a beautiful shot of his granddaughter. This is how he took the shot:

“My entry to the costume competition was a picture of my granddaughter, Mikaela, at her Halloween party. She and her friends made a great effort with their costumes and face painting”.

Finbarr O'Shea

“They started with the snap apple game where the first person to bite the apple without using their hands wins. It was during this I got my picture. It was a fun night and a great time was had by all”.

“The shot was taken with a Canon 5D Mark 2 with a Canon EF24-70 2.8L at 42mm, 1/125 sec, f8 at ISO 400. I used an on-camera flash which I bounced off the ceiling. Post processing was done in Lightroom where I made adjustments to saturation and sharpening”.

Well done Finbarr and Mikaela.

Club Exchange with Ballincollig Camera Club 7/5/13

Photo 07-05-2013 20 21 51On Tuesday 7th May 2013, Ballincollig Camera Club came to The Midleton Park Hotel on the first in our calendar of club exchange nights for 2013. A strong contingent arrived lead by newly elected secretary, Graham Daly who was accompanied by Pierce Coady, Cian O’Mahony, Denis O’Driscoll, Ron Giesbers, Ilinka Drieu and Margaret Beaty.

Graham began by apologising on behalf of their Chairperson, Pascal Lee, who was unable to attend. He outlined the history of the Ballincollig club and how they filled their year with various activities and competitions. He spoke about their involvement in SACC events and how they were extremely happy with their recent placings in the inter club competition.

Graham then introduced the first of their group to display his images, newly crowned Photographer of the Year, Pierce Coady.

Pierce began by thanking ECCG for the invitation to come along and said he was a relative new-comer to photography but had developed a passion for portrait and street photography. He displayed a panel of 10 images that drew gasps from the audience, each of which was accompanied by a story as to how the images came about.

This lighthearted banter relaxed the group and questions soon began to flow. As the images were passed around, members remarked on the shallow depth of field with eyes pin sharp. We learned that Pierce’s favoured weapon is his Nikon D700 with a 50mm 1.4f prime lens attached. The high quality of the prints really enhanced the images, bringing out the detail in the shots. Pierce prints all his images on an Epson printer using Permajet Portrait White paper. He wrapped up by again, thanking the group for the chance to display his work and reiterated his love for photography.

Photo 07-05-2013 20 51 49Next up was Cian O’Mahony to show his successful L panel. Cian explained the concept of his panel and how he favoured the coast and landscapes of West Cork and Kerry to create his images, and how he was influenced by the style of John Hooton.

His images showed a range of pastel coloured seascapes dotted with close up detail, and wildlife images. He finished with a few shots taken on a recent trip to Iceland.

Graham finished their presentation with a wish that the two groups might again meet up before the end of the year. Tom Tattan, in reply, thanked the Ballincollig group for coming along especially on such a bad night, weather wise.

All adjourned for refreshments and a chat with some of the die-hards having to be evicted out of the bar to continue discussions!

Photos: Dave Edmunds

How I took that shot by Mervyn Daly

In the recent group competition, ‘In Costume’, Mervyn Daly ran out the deserved winner with his image with the ‘Tears of a Clown’ theme.

Mervyn Daly

Learn how Mervyn, who is becoming a fixture on the winner’s podium, put this shot together here:

“I had an idea of creating an image with a ‘Tears of a Clown’ theme. I convinced (bribed) my daughter, Tara , to model for me, telling her what I was trying to create and getting her ideas also”.

“I began by setting up a white backdrop which was lit by a 200w Elinchrom light at half power on the left, a 400w Elinchrom light at full power on the right. I metered and got a reading of 1/125sec @ f8, ISO200”.

“I got out the make-up from my wife and Tara’s stash and did the face painting and, when finished, I placed a folded sheet over her head and began shooting”.

“The image was cropped and levels and curves adjusted, I burned in a couple of spots on the background to remove some creases and then converted to b&w on a separate layer and selectively deleted around the mouth to expose the colour on original layer”.

“I shot with Nikon D300s, with sigma 17-70 2.8-4.5. @ 20mm. I used a reflective umbrella on the 200w head and a shoot through umbrella on the 400w head. Post processing was done in Photoshop CS2”.

Well done Mervyn and Tara on producing a wonderful shot.

‘In Costume’ Competition – April 2013

16 entries were submitted for the ‘In Costume’ competition at the Midleton Park Hotel on 23/4/13. Variety was in evidence as the members judged the projected images.

The members broke up into groups of 5 and looked through all the images quickly first so that everyone could get a flavour of the entries. They then went through them again slowly so each group could discuss the image and mark them out of 10 each on composition, lighting and creativity.

While scores were being totted up each photographer spoke about how they came to take their chosen image and how they lit the subject etc. With the scores tallied the winners were revealed: in 3rd place Vivian Lee with her image of a floating mask. In 2nd place Finbarr O’Shea with a photo of a child eating an apple, and in 1st place was  Mervyn Daly (February’s third place) with an image of his daughter dressed as a Heath Ledger-style clown.

View all the competition entries in the slideshow below. Mouse over to see the photographers’ details  and to use the controls.

[slideshow_deploy id=’591′]

Well done to all the competitors.

How I took that shot by Finbarr O’Shea

Full Moon Guileen.I took this shot last October, on one of my regular visits to Guileen – a small village located in south eastern coast of Ireland about 20 min. drive from Midleton and 5 min drive from Whitegate in Co. Cork. I was very lucky that day to see a beautiful sunset and full moon.

I used a Canon 5D mark 2 with a Canon EF16-35mm 2.8L lens. I also used a Cokin 121, 3 stops graduated neutral density filter to balance the contrast of the scene, a tripod, and shutter release cable. I locked up the mirror to reduce camera shake.

Camera was set on manual exposure at ISO 100 for 30 sec. at f8. Focal length was 35mm. The image was shot in RAW and processed in Lightroom 4 where I made slight adjustments to contrast, sharpening etc.