February 2023 – frederikboving

Review: The Unseen Saul Leiter by Margit Erb & Michael Parillo

In this book the authors Margit Erb and Michael Parillo have hand picked 76 images from Saul Leiters earlier work where he used slide film as the medium. The book presents the images on completely black pages, simulating that you sit in front of the projector and see Leiters work being cast onto the wall. It works really well, and IMO they have managed to capture the “feel” of slide film being projected to large scale format really well. The 160 pages book is a hardback and measures 22 cm across and 28 cm down.

The Unseen Saul Letier. Hardback. 160 pages approx.

Extraordinary

When Michael Parello writes that “Leiter was a keen observer as life unfolded before him, somehow finding a way to reliably pluck a sublime split-second out of a mundane moment”, it really resonated with me and how I see Leiters images. Leiter was truly able to make something extraordinary out of the ordinary. A talent that many of us that dream of travelling to the other side of the globe to capture something extraordinary (like a mountain or an iceberg) could benefit from being reminded of on a regular basis.

Further into the book Michael quotes Robert Benton for describing Leiters images: “[They] were like paintings in which the subject matter did not dominate the photograph but was only one element among swaths of color, abstract shapes and daring composition”. Again, this very precisely pinpoints another dimension to Leiters images that makes them stand out: the subject is not dominating, but serves (almost) as a prop in a bigger composition as one of many elements.

These quotes very well describe why I find Leiters work so extraordinary, and to this I will add that his use of out of focus elements sprinkles a bit of mystery to the scene. You may think that out of focus is harder than in focus, but actually getting the right amount of out of focus is the key here – so that the subject is still visible and recognisable, but hiding the finer details and only leave a shadow or an outline. His use of misted windows serves the same purpose.

Finally, his use of framing is simply mind blowing. Especially if you have just read a book about composition and all the classic compositional rules. Leiter breaks them all, and did so long before the text books were written! In some images the subject is only revealed as a small beam of light between solid objects completely dominating the frame. Or he shows 6 people in a frame where the heads of 4 of them are hidden. It makes me want to study the images even more!

Conclusion

If you like the work of Saul Leiter, I think you will enjoy this book. The hard back is solid quality and the images present themselves really well on the black pages. And each image has got the space and room it needs to work the best.

The book gives a little text about how the images have been collected and indexed, but the main focus of the book is to present Saul Leiters work. If you are after getting to know Saul Leiter better, then this may not be the book for you, but if you enjoy his work and want to see it as first hand as a book can offer, then this book comes highly recommended. But be warned that I am a Saul Leiter fan and my objectivity relative to reviewing this book is highly questionable.

Shopping link

Affiliate link to the book on Amazon.

Review: Vivian Maier by Christa Blümlinger, Ann Marks and Anne Morin

When photographer Vivian Maier passed away April 2009, she left behind more than 140.000 images, many of which had not been developed. As soon as Vivians work was shared on the internet, both her work and her story drew lots of attention.

Front page of the book Vivian Maier by Christa Blümlinger, Ann Marks and Anne Morin

This books gives both her story and presents a lot of her work. As interesting as her story is, I enjoy her work the most. For that reason I was happy to find that 200 of the 250 pages in this book is dedicated to presenting her work.

Vivian Maier — This images shows an example from the approx 30 pages in the beginning of the book – another section like this at the end of the book.

Of course I was aware that Vivians work would centre around street photography, but I has impressed with other sides of her work showing architecture, landscapes, self portraits, still life and even some surrealistic work reminding me of work done by Henrik Cartier-Bresson.

I am not aware of how large a share of her total body of work has been developed and used for this book, but even so I find Vivian to be a very complete photographer that uses composition, reflections, framing, etc in an effortless way that you – if you are into photography – can only admire. And in addition the street images portrait people in a way where the portraits are almost loving in the tender way they capture people sleeping, reading newspapers or just passing by.

So as you can probably guess, I can wholeheartedly recommend this book if you are into photography and want to study and seek inspiration from the work of one of the best photographers of all time. It really is a pleasure to study Vivians work.

Shopping link

Affiliate link to the book on Amazon.

What is exposure delay mode? (using Nikon as an example)

Camera shake is typically something you want to avoid if you want sharp images, and many landscape photographers use different techniques to avoid camera shake.

One classic tool is to put the camera on a tripod to secure the camera is held absolutely still during the exposure, but even when using a tripod, there are a few more factors that can contribute to camera shake, such as

the photographer pushing the shutter and hence moving the camera slightly
the mirror flicking (in a DSLR)

These small movements may – if you are striving for minimum camera shake – yield ever so slightly movements to the camera body. Here exposure delay comes to the rescue.

Exposure delay is pretty much what the name says: after you hit the shutter, there is a delay before the picture being taken. It is worth noticing however, that on a DSLR, the mirror is lifted as you hit the shutter, so the mirror movement does not yield any camera shake.

You can set up the duration of the exposure delay in the shooting/display menu that you find in the custom settings menu (also know as the pencil menu).

In the menu “d” for shooting/display, you will find the Exposure delay mode option.

What is exposure delay mode? (Nikon) — You find the exposure delay mode menu item in the shooting/display menu. Notice that the specific menu item ID may vary from camera to camera, so this is just an example.

Typically you can set the shooting delay mode from 0.2 seconds up until 3 seconds. I always use the longest option available.

Alternatives

The big advantage of using exposure delay is that it is a solution that is available, provided you have brought your Nikon along. You can also use a remote trigger (wired, radio controlled) to make sure you pushing the shutter does not give any camera shake, but of course the pre-condition is that (1) you have a remote trigger and (2) that you remembered to bring it along!

Also, there is an option to set the release mode to self-timer, in which you can shoot one or more images with an interval you select. But again, on a DSLR, the mirror flicks for each image and hence the exposure delay is a better option.

Manual exposure

Many find manual exposure a bit intimidating and stay with the automated mode or one of the semi automated modes like aperture priority or shutter priority. Good news is that manual exposure is not complicated at all and that you have a lot of room for making exposure mistakes and still be able to fix it in post, provided you shoot RAW, which I highly recommend. And you will understand your camera a lot better when you know how to operate in manual exposure mode.

You camera has a built in metering system, that constantly measures the available light. This system continues to work also when you set the camera in manual mode. Select the manual mode on by pushing the “mode” button top right on the Nikon D4 while turning the rear command dial to scroll through the PASM options.

The mode dial on the Nikon D4 sits right in front of the top LCD. Notice the “M” top left indicating manual mode and the bar below the “10” indicating that the image will be somewhat overexposed.

Once in manual mode, you will notice a little exposure indicator appearing, both in the viewfinder and in the top/rear LCD. This indicator will tell if the camera finds that the aperture, shutter speed and ISO settings will give a correctly exposed picture when you hit the shutter.

It is a good thing to keep an eye on the exposure indicator to make sure you get the exposure you are after. Sometimes you want deliberately to over- or underexpose your picture, and the exposure indicator is a good tool to make sure you get what you want.

exposure indicator guide — The exposure indicator shows if the picture will be over- or underexposed or correct exposed. Notice the difference between the viewfinder orientation and the rear LCD ditto. Credit: Nikon Z6ii manual.

Aperture and shutter speed

You control the aperture and the shutter speed by turning the front and rear command dials respectively.

As you do so, you will notice that the exposure indicator changes in accordance with the selected settings for the two.

If the camera flashes “FEE” in the top LCD when you mount the lens, it is probably because you have not locked the aperture on the lens to the highest f-stop number possible – the camera needs this setting to be so, in order for it to control the position of the aperture blades when shooting with AF, AF-D or AF-S lenses.

If your lens is an older model (say AI or AIS) where you have an aperture ring on the lens, it is not always possible to change the aperture with the front command dial – instead you will have to set the aperture on the lens. The top LCD will not show the aperture but just a “F–” to indicate it cannot “see” the chosen aperture. The metering indicator works fine still though.

ISO

On a digital camera, ISO is actually not part of the exposure. The sensor has the sensitivity it had when it left the factory and it cannot be changed.

By setting the ISO to other values than the base ISO 100, you apply a gain to the values read by the sensor. It is camera internal post processing that happens from the sensor has read the light and until the image sits on the memory card. Just like in the old days when you turned up the radio, you both amplified the signal and the noise – the original signal remains the same. ISO works the same way, so the price for turning up the ISO is more noise and grain.

The NikonD4 has a dedicated ISO button at the bottom left on the camera body. Press this one to change the ISO value selected.

Pushing the ISO button and at the same time turning the front and rear command dial, changes the ISO values. The front command dial switches between ISO and auto-ISO and the rear command dial shifts between ISO values, say from 200 to 400, and from 400 to 800, and so on.

When you have auto-ISO switched on, the camera will be in a – if not semi automatic – then quarter automatic mode. In other words, the camera will try to make the picture correctly exposed ALONE changing the ISO. So if you have a dark scene where the aperture is closed down and the shutter speed is fast, the camera will have to go to very high ISO values to compensate.

You can use auto-ISO to make sure you come home with images that show at least something, but be aware that grain and noise may be the price you pay for switching auto-ISO on. For starters, I would recommend that you have auto-ISO off, and keep an eye on the exposure indicator or the histogram to make sure the exposure is roughly right. Later, when you have some experience, auto-ISO can make you work faster.

Metering modes

The Nikon D4 has 3 metering modes. You can access these by pushing the metering mode button top left on the camera – the button the closest to the viewfinder – and at the same time turning the rear command dial.

The metering mode does NOT change the amount of available light, rather it changes how the camera meters the light that passes through the lens. I shoot almost entirely in the “matrix metering” mode as it is the most advanced one, that tries to take in the entire scene and find a good compromise.

Second option is centre weighted metering. This one is good if you shoot portraits where you don’t really care of the corners are exposed correct – the important is that the person in the frame is exposed correct. The manual also mentions this as a good mode if you shoot with filters.

The third option is spot metering (the logo is a small dot), where the focus point is where the metering is done entirely. This is a good option of you know that a particular point in the image needs to be correct exposed, but you do not care too much about the rest of the frame.

All of these modes may seem confusing, so my advice is to use matrix metering. If you shoot RAW, then there are plenty of options for adjusting the exposure in post and hence I find that these other options are more for backward compatibility with older DSLRs than anything else.

Month: February 2023

Review: The Unseen Saul Leiter by Margit Erb & Michael Parillo

Extraordinary

Conclusion

Further reading

Shopping link

Review: Vivian Maier by Christa Blümlinger, Ann Marks and Anne Morin

Related reading

Shopping link

What is exposure delay mode? (using Nikon as an example)

Alternatives

Related reading

Nikon D4: Manual exposure, how to

Manual exposure

Aperture and shutter speed

ISO

Metering modes

Related reading