TAKING A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE

Taking a different perspective can significantly enhance the impact our images create. It helps us to make the common uncommon; the mundane insane. 

So what do I mean by a different perspective? I mean creating an image from other than eye level while standing up, which is the most common perspective from which most pictures are taken. It involves getting outside our comfort zone. It's easy; more comfortable to just stand there and take a picture.

I encourage you to simply look at life differently, from different heights and different angles. In other words, different perspectives. You will notice a big difference in your images. 

I might add that oftentimes, the viewer will know even realize that you took the shot from a different perspective other than eye level. Sometimes the effect is subtle. However, it will still have a stronger impact, regardless of whether your intentionally different perspective is evident or not. 

This is the perfect time to share my first example. This doesn't give any hint as to where I was when I created this image of the amazing Sangre De Cristo Mountains in Colorado. This mountain range has the same feel as the Grand Tetons in Wyoming. When I was there, I could barely see a small body of water midway into the scene. I wanted to see more of it so    I got on top of my vehicle, stood up, set up the tripod, and got this shot.

 I was with a camera club at a historic cemetery in Leadville, Colorado. I was demonstrating the use of perspective. In the middle of the cemetery was a giant depiction of Christ on the cross. The cross was black; Jesus was white. 

As I demonstrated, I placed my camera underneath Jesus' feet and shot straight up. The camera was so low I couldn't see what I was taking. I had to estimate. However, prior to the shot, I preset my settings: large f/stop (small opening to get lots of depth of field), set the focus point in the center of the viewfinder, and overexposed it slightly so the cross and Christ wouldn't turn out too dark. I picked up some flare in the upper left-hand corner. I could have deleted it, but I left it because it added a spiritual feel to the subject.  

This perspective gave me a more powerful view of Christ on the cross. It would not have had the same impact had I photographed it from a distance at eye level.  

This next example is also of Jesus on the cross, but the perspective is just the opposite-- a view of Christ on the cross, but looking straight down. 

This is actually one of 30 renditions included in my new book, Renditions of Famous Paintings. In the book, I go into detail about how I staged this shot and the complex computer software applications it took to create the final image. For this blog, however, I want to stress the idea and importance of taking photos from different perspectives. Get outside your comfort zone. 

Articulated screens on the back of some cameras can help with this, especially if it's difficult for you to get down on your knees or bend your knees to get a shot.

I was at the Oklahoma City bombing memorial--the memorial to the devastating 1995 bombing of the federal building in the city. It was quite emotional seeing 168 chairs that represented each of the victims. I let my emotions lead the way for me.

As hundreds, if not thousands, of people have done since 1995, I too took several photographs in and around the beautiful and touching memorial. After several minutes of taking photos, I wanted to create an image that better matched the feeling I was getting as    I walked around. I placed my camera on the grass and took this shot of the chairs.

I mentioned earlier that the viewer cannot always tell that you took a different perspective to create your image. Such is the case with this next example. I get a lot of positive feedback on this image, but never, never has anyone commented, "I like the perspective you took." 

I saw this beautiful grouping of varied colored tulips along Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado. I didn't want to take the shot looking down at the tulips, from eye level. I lowered my tripod to about 1.5-2 feet from the ground to get this shot. The point here is that a new perspective can make a big difference, even if no one knows you took a different perspective.

I took several photos of the table and table setting in this next example. I used a wide-angle lens for some to capture the entire room, or most of the room. Then it occurred to me to also take my camera and aim it facedown on the table. To do this, I extended my arms away from me and above head level to get this shot. 

If you don't have a lens with an image stabilizer feature, you might need to increase your ISO to get a faster shutter speed, in order to get a steady shot. Consider this simple technique for a variety of subjects.

There is a very unusual annual event in Nederland, Colorado. It's held in mid-winter, and it gets cold in Nederland! The event is called Frozen Dead Guy Days. It covers more than one day. The annual theme is "dead guys;" anything that has to do with death. They have a parade that includes folks competing for the best hearse, best coffins, etc. As I said, it's quite unique.

The event draws hundreds of people from a 45-mile radius, which includes Boulder and Denver. Because it draws a lot of people, it's hard to get a good shot of the parade. My solution is to raise my camera above my head, aim slightly down and start shooting. The resulting images look like I am 6'10" tall and shooting down at all the people around me. 

                                                                          

   

This last example is one of my favorites--a bit surreal. It involves another annual event, but this one is in Denver, Colorado. One of the most creative events I have ever attended is Denver's annual Chalk Art Festival. The city closes a four-block area in the LODO area (Lower Downtown) so artists can spend the weekend creating their chalk art on the paved streets. It is pretty amazing what the artists come up with. 

One year, I was capturing all the fun activities, including, of course, artists creating their art. After several minutes of shooting from eye level, I started shooting straight down at the artists as they created their art on the street. I leaned forward, with arms extended, and started shooting. This image looks like I was hovering above the piece he was painting.

So, I have shared several ways and techniques I use to get different perspectives. I hope they inspire you to get out of the habit of shooting everything at eye level while standing. 

There are so many different ways to look at life. And, by so doing, our images will reflect it. 

Have fun with it! Contact me if you need to.....

Eli

www.elivega.net 

 SEE WITH YOUR IMAGINATION

In my Right Brain Photography book, classes, and workshops, I stress the concept of "See with your imagination." If you can do that, you can see something before you see it.

This can be a difficult concept to grasp for some photographers, but here is a non-photography analogy that might help. Some people, and businesses, buy what, to us, are mundane, non-descript houses of negligible value. The reason they do that is because they see, using their imagination, what we don't see. They see the potential. They see how those houses might look if they "do this" or "do that" to them. 

I use that same visualization process when I look at scenes or subjects that have potential. They may not look like much, but I see the potential--if I "do this" or "do that" to them. If you are with me during those moments, you would ask, "What are you looking at? You're really thinking of photographing that? Why?" 

Below are "before" and "after" images that help explain what I mean. Maybe this will connect the dots for you.

This first image is of a scene that looked exactly as my eyes saw it. Pretty bland, huh? I look with my eyes; I see with my imagination. 

The more I looked at this scene the more my right brain, my imagination, took over. I could see how this scene might look if I came back at twilight, just after sunset, and "painted" those dead branches with my flashlight. I use a large off-road emergency LED flashlight for these occasions. I knew I was going to paint each of the three bush-like elements with the dead branches, then paint the alkaline sugar-like areas as well. 

I was with one of my former photography students and good friend that day. I told him what I had in mind and suggested we go out for dinner and come back later around sunset. We did.

It was dark by the time we got back. He wanted to take the same shot, so we both set up our tripods, almost side by side. With my instructions, we set our cameras on the BULB setting (research this on Youtube), set them for manual focus, f/stop at f/13, and composed our shots. I used my flashlight to light up the scene so we could both focus roughly one-third up from the bottom of our viewfinders--that's my go-to focusing point for scenes like this one. 

Once we had our composition, the right focus, and depth-of-field determined, we locked our shutters open and I started painting. I painted for about one minute and fifteen seconds. By the way, this is more art than science. I know that, except for rare occasions, I will need to bracket my shots. The length of each exposure will vary, depending on the scene, the subject, and the lighting. It's called bracketing.     I later decide which one is the best one to work with and fine-tune.
What I captured in-camera is what I envisioned in my imagination. Voila! 

One day I drove along a road in north central Arkansas before sunset. I happened to spot a really cool area to my right just as the sun was peeking along the horizon. I quickly stopped and walked to the top of a hill.

The valley below me was covered in a soothing, peaceful rolling fog. I knew I had to work fast. I took a couple of quick shots but wasn't satisfied with them. Then, within seconds, it occurred to me to change my White Balance to fluorescent to see if I could pick up what I was feeling, not what I was seeing. The moment felt serene; peaceful. This image gave me what I felt. 

The image below gave me what I saw, before I switched the White Balance. 
Big difference, right? 

Below is yet another example of what my eyes saw. 

You're probably thinking, "Okay." When you come across a scene like this, I urge you to stop, look, and see the potential. Don't just skim over the scene. To do so results in walking away, convincing yourself that there's nothing there to waste your time on. 

As I mentioned earlier, seeing with your imagination can be hard to grasp for some. 

So, you ask, what did I see? I kept scanning the middle of the pool, seeing some reflections of nice early spring budding colors. I also saw the water in the pool gyrating. It reminded me of an impressionistic painting. 

The more I stayed on that mental path, the more clearly I saw what I was going to extract from the larger scene. Once I honed it on it, it occurred to me to do something I am known to do-- create an image, knowing that I will show it; display it "upside down," or right-side up, depending on how you see things. So, I got the shot and later turned it 180 degrees in order to give me my impressionistic image--the image I had seen with my imagination. I used a fast shutter speed (1/250) in order to freeze the water gyrations in the pool. 

Why would anyone want to photograph an outside wall of a Taco Bell? Well, if you see with your imagination, you can look beyond what a Taco Bell building is and see the art it creates.

Such was the case one morning as I drove by a Taco Bell. I saw something from the corner of my eye that caught my eye. I turned around and drove closer to the 'Bell's structure and saw something I liked. I didn't see a Taco Bell. I saw color, shapes, and shadows. But the shadows were too short that early in the morning. So, I decided to keep shooting around town and go back in about an hour and revisit the art Taco Bell had given me that morning. I'm glad I did.

                                     

I'll leave you with one more example. Stay with me on this one. Below is what I saw one day as I was shooting in the Butterfly Pavilion in Colorado. What do you see?

Now, this is an extreme example of seeing with your imagination. I drew on my college art days and training for this one. Part of seeing with my imagination is that I don't see subjects. I see light, color, shapes, forms, lines, etc. In this case, I saw the color red on those ladybug decorations on the right. On the lower left, I saw those little pinkish flowers. You can barely see them in this photo. I could barely see them in real life.

This is where my imagination took me. Light pink would look good against a red backdrop. The flowers are pink. That one ladybug has a lot of red. What do I have to do to bring those two thoughts of color together? If you draw an imaginary straight line between the tiny flowers and the ladybugs, it gives you a good idea as to where my camera would need to be in order to see those two colors together.

So, that's what I did. I walked around those plants on the left and positioned myself about three feet from the ground and, getting close to the flowers, aimed my camera at the flowers, making sure I could see red in the background. I used a shallow depth of field to blur the red backdrop and get a "soft" feel--f/7.1, to be exact. Click.

I hope I have encouraged you to go out and force the use of your right brain hemisphere and imagine. Think outside the box that's outside the box. Think crazy. Think outside the confines and limitations of your programmed thinking. 

"The mind....birthplace of limitations," from the book What A Great Idea, by "Chic" Thompson. 

If you need additional help with this, feel free to e-mail me. We can schedule a ZOOM lesson.

    

 

     

  

 

   

THIS MONTH'S SUBJECT: CULTURE

Culture isn't just something we find only when we travel to a foreign country. Culture is all around us. 

Let's start with a definition, so we can all be on the same page. I searched several online definitions, but none of them seemed quite right for me. So, I combined a couple and came up with a composite that fits my needs for this blog. I have to admit that I sprinkled a couple of my own words into my final definition. By the way, my undergraduate was in sociology.

"The language, symbols, beliefs, values, mores, and folkways that are part of a group."
This definition allows for the inclusion of religion, race, ethnicity, gender, income groups, etc.

There are also what sociologists mistakenly call "subcultures"-- a group within a larger group.
I prefer the term "intra-cultures." They are part of a larger group. Sub implies under; below; less-than.  

With that operational definition, let me share a small segment of images I have taken throughout the years that depict various cultures, under the larger umbrella of U.S. citizens. 

New Orleans, Louisiana, aka, "Nawlins." While in the middle of the famous French Quarter, the sounds of a bass horn or tuba got my attention. As I got closer to the sounds, I saw this. Note the application of duct tape on his tuba! By the look of his cheeks, you know he's blowing. Can you hear it?

Several miles from New Orleans, several states northwest, is Boulder, Colorado. It is famous for Pearl Street Mall, an open concept shopping district that covers five blocks. It is always packed with activity, especially on weekends. On one of those weekends, there was a Mexican Independence dance troop displaying their Folklorico dances. They were so colorful and cheerful, with high-stepping Mariachi music as a backdrop. 

That day, in addition to photographing the beautiful young dancers, I also wanted to capture the essence of their dancing. In order to get what I call a "right brain" feel, I talked to my left brain and told it I needed a slow shutter speed, while I got on my knees and hand-held my camera, Click.Click.Click. Continuous shooting mode helps in these situations.

Let's stay with a Latin theme for a while. Let's head south from Boulder, Colorado. Let's go really south to the rich cultural city of San Antonio, which is now the second-largest city in Texas, second only to Houston. 

For the last several years, San Antonio has hosted its annual Conjunto Festival. A "conjunto" is a Tejano band normally consisting of a drummer, guitarist, bass player, Bajo sexto player (12-string guitar), and accordionist. Sometimes they add a separate singer to their repertoire, but most often the accordionist also serves as the lead singer.

I have attended two 'Festivals. During the several-hour festival, different conjuntos take the stage, adding variety and excitement to the evening's festivities. As I listened to the music during one of the festivals I attended, I started thinking, not of musicians per se, but the emotional and psychological color of the festival. I started shooting! 

This is a double exposure. The colorful "bubbles" is "flare" picked up by my lens--they added to the emotional color of the event.  

In Anadarko, Oklahoma, they have their awesome annual American Indian Exposition. There is so much to see in the town itself, which adds to the Expo. I have been to their exposition at least three times. Below are just a few samples of my interpretations.

I have spent hours absorbing this soul-to-the-earth indigenous culture in Anadarko during their Expos. I have seen historic shelters, magnificent outfits, plumage, tepees, dynamic dancing, drumming, and much more. On a side note, you might be interested in reading Chief Seattle's letter, "How Can You Buy or Sell The Earth?" I have it hanging on my wall in my home office.

          

I went to a Dragon Boat Festival in Denver one year and thoroughly enjoyed the sense of translucence throughout the festival. They had dragon boat races in the lake! It was awesome to watch, as boat teams competed for speed and awards. I saw people, food, signs, boats, team leaders, drumming, and even dragons. I photographed all that. However, the subjects I couldn't detach myself from were the delicately-designed parasols. I couldn't stop shooting. Here's why.

I think by now you can tell that, as a photo artist, what I shoot for (pun intended) is the essence of any culture. I'm not documenting the people; I am capturing their essence; their spirit. Color does a good job at that. It's no surprise I captured this next image during a Jewish Festival in Boulder, Colorado. Although I do take a lot of wide-angle shots that show several people in the scene, I prefer those "tight" shots. They take the viewer into the essence.

I'll leave you with one more. The Taos Pueblo is believed to be the longest continuously inhabited place in the United States. Below are two images from my many trips to Taos.

 

The time of year was perfect for the image on the left. The ground was covered with nature's own white sugar, as the snow-capped Sangre de Cristo mountains jockeyed for attention.

The image on the right shows a hint of a blue door overpowered by two adobe walls of nearby homes. By some accounts, blue, in some cultures, is supposed to keep away evil spirits.
A couple I know in Austin bought a second home in Taos. They chose this image to hang on their wall. 

So, next time you hear of a cultural event scheduled in your town or a nearby town, grab your camera and look for the essence of culture. Who knows, you might learn something new in the process.

Eli Vega, Photo Artist
www.elivega.net 

Eli Vega Photography on Facebook

   

 PHOTOGRAPHING FIREWORKS

For my tip this month, I am going to give you all the details upfront, then show you several examples of fireworks. It's easier than you think. And, if you have a good quality DSLR, you don't even need to shoot 'RAW'-- just set your camera for JPEG Large or Fine, and set your picture control on 'Vivid.' Read your camera manual to learn how to select those settings. 

Shooting fireworks is a lot of fun. When you're there, the display, the show, might last for 15, 20, or 30 minutes, but we can "capture" those split seconds of vibrant color, shapes, designs , and excitement to keep and store as forever memories. 

Okay, so now that I have shared my excitement, let me talk about the techniques I use to create my fireworks images. First, shake off the notion that you're going for perfection. No. This is more art than science. Some of the 'works will be outside your viewfinder's view; some will be a little too high; some a little too low; some to the left. That said, my first tip is shoot, shoot, and keep shooting. However, don't be amateurish and just throw spaghetti on the wall, hoping some of it will stick. I am going to show you how to be artistically calculated; as opposed to just random and wishful shooting. 

First, you need a tripod. Sorry, but you will need a good tripod. Not super expensive; just good-- not wobbly. It should extend four-five feet high, or higher, depending on your height. You need one that allows you to quickly adjust from vertical to horizontal, so you can vary your shots during the display. Most displays last from 15-20 minutes or so.  

CAMERA SETTINGS:
Cable Release. I strongly recommend a good, reliable, quick, cable (or remote) release.

Lens. I recommend a zoom lens so you can be zooming in and out as needed. Obviously, if you are far away from the action, you'll need a stronger focal length. I like to be close to the action, like across a lake. Throughout the evening, I use a range of roughly 18mm to 40mm, with an APS (cropped) sensor, as opposed to a full-frame.

F/Stop. I like to shoot with a range of f/8-f/11. Why? As carefully as I manually focus where     I think the 'works are going to explode, I'm never quite sure, so, that range of f/stop will assure me that everything will be nicely focused. For some of the shots I will share, I kept mine at f/11 throughout the display. F/11 also keeps a lot of the fireworks from being overexposed, i.e., it lets less light in during each burst.

 
Shutter Speed. I always use the BULB setting--that becomes my "shutter speed," as I'll explain later. 

Exposure. Again, the BULB setting also helps me with my "exposure." I will share later what else I do to get my exposures for each fireworks bursts. 

Image Format. Believe it or not, I have always shot all my firework displays in JPEG Large.    I set my Picture Control to VIVID (your camera might have a different designation).   

TECHNIQUE. Now that I have shared the left brain stuff, now let me share what I do once I have all the left brain stuff taken care of. I first wait until the first display--that gives me a hint as to where they have their equipment aimed, knowing that some will be off a little from that point. That is why I use wide focal lengths. I'd rather get a little more space than I need, and then crop my images later, if I need to. I vary my focal lengths, the position of my camera, and switch from horizontal to vertical shots during the evening. 

Now, you might ask, what about that BULB setting? I usually have an opaque piece of material-- a camera manual, folded copy paper, etc. The key point is to take something to use as an improvised "lens cap." I recommend roughly 5"x7" or larger. It needs to cover the lens in-between each fireworks burst, yet flexible enough to remove it quickly when the next burst comes up. Believe it or not, that piece of folded-up paper becomes my "shutter." 

Here is how I use that piece of paper as my "shutter." I place the piece of paper carefully in front of my lens, so it won't receive any light. THEN:
1) I see a beautiful display go up in the sky. I take the paper away from the front of the lens and trigger my cable release at the same time. Right before the display dissipates, I cover the lens again with my hand, BUT I don't let go of the cable release--thus the shutter in the camera is still open, but not receiving any light. I then see another colorful explosion. I take the paper away again, then cover my lens again when that second display begins to dissipate. Then I take my finger off my cable release. I have, in essence, created a double exposure, combining two displays! How fun is that? 
2) I repeat the above process, but this time I do it for three firework displays, just to be different. Now, I've created a triple exposure. I've combined three displays in the same image! 
3) I then repeat the above process, but just do it for one burst/display.

I go back and forth between steps 1-3 bursts, as described above, during the course of the evening, getting one, two, or three firework bursts in my images. It's fun, exciting, and can even be jaw-dropping.

Software fine-tuning. Most folks today call it "post processing." Actually, this process I follow requires only a little fine-tuning. All I do is crop (if necessary), burn, or dodge--darken some areas or lighten some areas of the images and maybe add some contrast.

As Forrest Gump once said, "Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get." 

So, with that, I hope you enjoy seeing samples of my previous fireworks. Have fun!
Most of these examples, unless otherwise designated, are from Estes Park, Colorado.

Estes Park, Colorado

Estes Park, Colorado

Grand Lake, Colorado

                                                                 Breckenridge, Colorado

Estes Park, Colorado

Estes Park, Colorado

Estes Park, Colorado 

Grand Lake, Colorado

Estes Park, Colorado

Branson, Missouri

So, research your nearest fireworks display on the 4th, keep my notes handy and have fun with it! Your friends will ask, "How did you do that?" It will remain our little secret. 

Contact me for my 1-on-1 ZOOM or in-the-field lessons on any photo topic of your choice: 
vegaphotoart@gmail.com   www.elivega.net 

Eli

ABANDONED BUILDINGS 

Abandoned buildings have captured my imagination since I first got interested in photography. They beg questions. Who lived there? What was their lifestyle? What did they talk about over dinner? Why was it abandoned, forgotten, or left to deteriorate? If the walls could talk, what stories would they tell? 

There is a difference between old buildings and abandoned buildings. There are old buildings that are still being used; then there are old buildings that are vacant. You can tell. They're abandoned. 

Before I photograph any abandoned building, I first study it. If I can, I will walk around it. I do that to get in touch with its essence, history, character, and photographic potential. I spend time waiting for it to "speak" to me. Spending time on this level helps me to get the best image I can of the structure. It helps me to determine which side is its good side; which aspects of it tell the best story.

From a photography and art perspective, I first decide what I am going to photograph--the exterior, the right exterior perspective, which room or rooms, from which angle, wide angle or tight shot, etc. I also determine what exposure will work best for each shot.

So, as you can see, I spend a lot of time studying, analyzing, getting in touch, and feeling the moment before I go "click."

Now, I'm going to share several images of abandoned buildings that grabbed my attention.

I'll start with my most recent one, an image I created just three weeks ago. I was on one of my many day (photo) trips when I came across this old 1920s-looking shack in the woods. It could have easily been a scene from a movie. As I walked up to it, I noticed that several yards behind it was an outhouse--still standing! I got closer to shack and walked around it, trying to find the best angle; the best perspective. I then turned my back to it and walked away, curious to see what it looked liked from a farther distance. To my pleasant surprise, as I walked away, I saw this huge bottle of whiskey. It was empty and sitting on a tree stump. It occurred to me to include the whiskey bottle as part of my composition. 

I took a photo with the bottle on the tree stump. It served as the foreground, with the old shack and outhouse as part of the background. When I opened the image at home and saw it on my computer screen, I thought it would look even more interesting and intriguing if I kept the color on the bottle, but convert everything in the background, and the tree stump, to a black & white image-- a sort of "Then & Now" theme. 

 

I found this near Victor, Colorado. At one time, I bet this was someone's very nice and elaborate living room, judging from the nature theme wallpaper and pronounced fireplace. Somebody got a bit artsy and painted pine trees with a yellow background on the fireplace. You can see a hint of other rooms through the doorway. It was a fairly good size house, for its time.    

This, too, was on the outskirts of Victor, an old mining town. Mining was good for the economy and good for the miners, or at least some miners. Who lived here? Maybe a superintendent at the mine and his family? Very efficient use of space, with a closet under the staircase. Very little is left of what must have been a nice banister that took the residents to the second floor.

The house was in such a weakened state I didn't dare go up to the second floor, for fear of falling through the floor, which happened to me once while photographing on the first floor of an abandoned house! That was scary. Luckily, the solid ground was only two feet below the floor.   

It was around Christmas time when I saw this old house on the prairie. Someone had placed a Christmas bow on the doorway, which added surrealism to the frail structure. Impermanence--someday, this house will not exist. 

This is nothing less than surreal. This house had obviously been abandoned years ago. For some strange reason, there was a vacuum cleaner in front of the house; right by the entrance! It was as if someone had been thinking of doing some spring cleaning, but procrastination set in. The message I heard when I saw this scene was, "It's a little too late for that...."

I would love to get into a time machine and walk into this general store and see local residents buying groceries and sundry items. I found this beauty in far southern Colorado, in the town of San Luis, close to the New Mexico state line. It's the oldest town in Colorado. Early Spanish explorations are evident throughout Colorado--San Luis, the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the town of Cortez, Zapata Falls, etc. 

Check out the Coca-Cola sign. The Coca-Cola company has been around since 1886. 

This old house does not exist at all now. I'm glad I photographed it before "progress" took it over. This house stood north of Denver, on 7381 Washington Street. This too must have been an elegant house back in the day. You can see the bay window in the dining room. They left behind the old Victrola in the living room. 

This is one of several images I created of the old then-luxurious Savoy Hotel, Hot Springs, Arkansas, built in 1910. Oh, if the walls could talk.  

And this is the house I grew up in, located about twenty miles west of Lubbock, Texas. Now abandoned. I am its walls, and I will be talking about my life story on Monday, May 23rd, 2022. It will be streamed live via the Garland County Library Facebook page (Hot Springs, Arkansas) at 6:00 pm. (CST). If you miss it, you can find it on Youtube--just search for "Born In A Railroad Boxcar."    

The part of the house to the left of that tree was added by the owner when I was seventeen years old. Prior to that, my parents, me, and my four siblings lived in the other part-- a two-bedroom, one-bath house. Prior to living in this house, we lived in a three-room shotgun house. 

So, go out and search for histories forgotten, in the shape of abandoned buildings. Listen to the walls--they can guide you with your photo-taking. Enjoy.

 

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                                       R
                                         SPECTIVE        

Made you look twice, huh? That's what my tip for this month is all about--looking twice, maybe three times in order to see things differently. It's about taking a different perspective before we go "click." 

There is a tendency to see the world; to put our camera to our eye as we are standing up. My suggestion for this month is to take a different perspective; take a different view; see life from other than eye level. 

I covered this topic about a year and a half ago, but it bears repeating. So much of what I see online, and through real-life observations, seems to be taken at eye level. So, let's see what life looks like when we don't.

For decades I have followed this idiom: In order to stand out, either photograph something no one else has, or photograph what others have, but in a different way.  

Here are some examples that will hopefully motivate you to break away from your habits or to get outside your comfort zone.

A simple morning table setting can trick the eye when seen from above. There are several ways of achieving this, but let me share my technique. I increase my ISO in order to get a fast enough shutter speed to hand-hold the camera without introducing hand movement. Obviously, having a lens with vibration reduction helps, but we still need to make sure we don't get any hand movement. In this case, I shot with a 17mm lens, ISO 800, with a shutter speed of 100--well within the limits of hand-holding a 17mm lens. The rule of thumb I use, when shooting without a tripod is: the shutter speed should be equal to, or greater than, the focal length I'm using. In this case, a shutter speed of 100 is definitely greater than 17. 

 

This image of picturesque Telluride, Colorado was taken from the side of a mountain, as thee the gondola went down toward town, almost right over my head. This has been used more than once in magazines because of its unique perspective. Yes, photos taken of Telluride from street level are nice, but this adds context to the town--it tells a story. You can see the context in which the mountain ski town was built. 

I placed the camera and tripod right up against the aspen on the left, looking straight up. I couldn't even see what I was getting. I was just estimating. But, with the lens set at 24mm, I knew I was going to cover a wide enough area. 

Let me share a warning regarding this type of scenario. When you are going to aim your camera toward the sky, as in this scene, assume that the bright sky is going to trick your built-in light meter and it will surely underexpose your image! So, make your adjustments in advance. For this shot, taken at Aperture Priority (f/25), I overexposed the image, prior to getting the shot, by +2 2/3 stops! Yes, that dramatic. As you can see, it worked. So, please be careful with situations like this one. 

License plates and wheels have one thing in common: travel. So, it occurred to me that I just had to include the two together in the same image. However, the perspective and juxtaposition of the bicycle wheel and license plates on a wall, coupled with a lamp and a window, gave me a surreal subject matter to play with. Now, you might be wondering, how is the bicycle wheel so high, in relationship to the window? Well, it was actually firmly and securely locked in atop someone's car. Perspective.

For this image, I'm looking up at part of a locomotive engine, instead of taking the photo straight on where I could see the entire engine. The warning above reads: "Keep off roof." 

Can you tell what you're looking at here? This is inside the Utah State Capitol dome. My tripod was about a foot from the floor aimed straight up. Those lights in a circle and the yellow light in the middle are part of a giant chandelier that hangs from the ceiling. When seen from below, it is totally out of context and thus creates a brain teaser. The brain cannot tell us what we're looking at. 

This might look like it was taken at eye level, but my camera on the tripod was roughly two feet from the ground. I placed it that low in order to pick up the wolf reflection in the small puddle. The wolf is actually part of a mural painted on one of the support beams under a downtown city bridge. Again, not at eye level. 

This is my last example of different perspectives. I was on the ground for this shot. I was capturing, not so much the dancers, but the essence of the dance as I took this shot from an uncomfortable position on the hard walkway during the event.  

So, again, get out of your comfort zone and see life from a different perspective. It will enhance your portfolio, add new tools to your toolbox, and will help you see a different side of life. Enjoy.

I am always available for one-on-one ZOOM lessons. Contact me if you're interested.   

Eli Vega, Photo Artist