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IMAGE DOCTOR
AUSTRALIAN PHOTOGRAPHY + DIGITAL SEPTEMBER 2015Stabilise your tripod
Jason McCosker says: “I borrowed a 75-300mm
lens – a 150-600mm equivalent on the Olympus
OMD E-M5 – to shoot some sports and some
friends said there were four-to-five-foot [waves]
down at Redhead Beach in Newcastle. I don’t
normally use tripods, but given the length of the
lens I thought it would be a good idea so I set up
on some rocks and ensured my shutter speed was
faster than 1/600s to freeze the motion and avoid
any vibration. I noticed a large container ship on
its way into the harbour and moved around to
capture it in the distance to give a sense of locality.
I left feeling the lens and small camera did its job
very well.”
You’ve planned well to get a dramatic sports
shot, and wisely used a much faster shutter speed
than the inverse of the focal length. You could
even go up to 1/4000s to ensure maximum
sharpness. The faster the better for fast-moving
subject matter! I’m not quite convinced you
needed the container ship and the “sense of
locality” as it does take attention away from the
main subject (the surfer) and your purpose was to
shoot sports. I think you also need to do something
about the colour, which has a pinkish tinge, most
noticeable in the blue water and the ship, but
also in the surfer. A bit more colour temperature
adjustment is needed to get the right balance.
SAIMA’S TIP: With long lenses, windy conditions
and action, a tripod needs to be as stable as possible
- maybe by weighting the centre post – to avoid
camera movement and loss of sharpness.
TITLE: Life is good
PHOTOGRAPHER: Jason McCosker
DETAILS: Olympus OMD E-M5 with 75-300mm
lens, 1/1000s @ f/6.7, ISO 200. Image processed
in Lightroom – colour, contrast and temperature
adjustments, cropped to portrait format.
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