Out and About in Charleston with my New Camera

Today was my first day out and about with my new camera!  Moving to such an advanced DSLR is going to be a major learning curve for me but I'm excited for the journey.  Here are my favorite images from the day.

I took this on the Battery in downtown Charleston.  The little guy was just hanging out letting me take pictures from about 5 feet away.

This is the infamous St. Philip's on Church Street.  The church is rumored to be haunted by the ghost of Susan Howard and the cemetery displays a sign that says "The only ghost at St. Philip's is the Holy Ghost."  If you're interested in the background and are ever in Charleston I recommend a ghost tour...or you can google it.

This is the fountain at Riverfront Park.  I was trying to practice using longer shutter speeds to get the silky effect of the water.  I'd say it worked out pretty well for a first attempt, especially considering I didn't have a tripod!

Caught this hungry fella when I was walking through the park on the Battery.

Gum covered utility pull... that's all I've got on this one.

Close up of wrought iron entry gates with a red door in the background at a church downtown.

Definitely my favorite picture of the day.  I took this flower and put it on a tombstone in the St. Philip's cemetery.  I think the shape of the cross worked out really well and the flower was absolutely beautiful.

Review: Light, Science and Magic: An Introduction to Photographic Lighting

Light--Science and Magic: An Introduction to Photographic Lighting is an incredibly in depth resource that will teach you the principles necessary to predict how light behaves and how to control it in your photos.  Let me say that this book is not intended for the casual reader.  It is a very detailed, textbook-like reference that will dig much deeper than 95% of the photography books you will ever run across.

The intent of the book isn't to teach you how to duplicate the photos it contains, it is to answer the "hows" and "whys" and be able to use that knowledge to produce pictures your own way.  Fil Hunter's, Steven Biver's and Paul Fuqua's claim is absolutely correct, "Light--Science & Magic does not go out of style because it was not, is not, and will never be based on style.  The book is based on the behavior of light and its principles will not change until the fundamental physics does."

So let's take a look at what you'll find in the book:

The main point of the book, in my opinion, is to teach you how light behaves when it reflects from a surface and how the material making the subject determines the appearance of that reflection.  The book doesn't necessarily teach you a lot of new information, afterall, we're used to seeing light and the way it behaves every waking minute of our lives.  This book just helps define what we see, and teaches us how to predict and control the behavior of light.

So to further simplify, the book discusses two things 1) what light does, and 2) how materials affect the behavior of light.

Regarding light, the book covers such topics as direct and diffuse transmission, absorption and reflection.  Here's a brief definition of each, so you know what I'm talking about:
Transmission - when light passes through a subject, like clear glass
Diffuse Transmission - when light hits a source like white glass or thin paper and scatters in many random, unpredictable directions
Absorption - when light is absorbed by a subject and never seen again, like black velvet
Reflection - when light strikes a subject and bounces off

Regarding materials, the book covers how light behaves on most common materials like metal, glass, paper, even human skin.  It discusses shiny and dull materials, different colors of material, etc. to teach you most of the common lighting situations you will face.

The book also has chapters dedicated to individual topics that are most often seen as difficult to shoot, like black-on-black, white-on-white, portraiture and situations with mixed lighting (like using a flash in a room with flourescent lights).

Things I Learned:
I won't even be able to begin to scratch the surface of things I learned in this space but here's a few highlights.

The Inverse Square Law - intensity is inversely proportional to the square of the distance.  Wow, that's a mouthful.  The inverse square law defines how bright a light is based upon how far away it is from what you are lighting.  The inverse square law tells you that if a light is 8 feet away from the subject and you move it to 4 feet away, the light will have 4 times the intensity, not 2 times the intensity (because it is based on the SQUARE of the distance).  Similarly, if a light is 3 feet away from a subject and you move it to 9 feet away (3x as far), the light will only have 1/9th the intensity (square of 3).

Granted, most photographers won't be standing behind their camera crunching numbers to determine how bright their lights will be, but knowing the principle is important.  For example, if you think a light needs to be twice as bright as you current setup, you can move the light closer and have a good idea of where you need to place it.

Family of Angles - determines where photographers should put their lights.  The family of angles is really easy to explain on paper, not so easy to describe in writing, but here's my best shot.  Imagine your eye is your camera lens and you're outside on your front lawn on a bright, sunny day.  Your friend has a small mirror and he uses it to shine light in your eyes from across the yard.  You can say that the sun (your light) filled the family of angles of the mirror.  So the family of angles is always describing the relationship between the camera, the subject (what you're taking a picture of) and your light source (whether it be a lamp, a flash or the sun).  If you were taking a picture of the mirror and wanted it to be fully lit, the sun would have to completely fill the family of angles.  If you were taking a picture of the mirror and you did not want it to be lit at all, the sun could be anywhere, except within the familiy of angles (at any angle where the light wouldn't be reflecting in your face).  If the sun only partially filled the family of angles your mirror would only be partially lit.  It's as simple as that (I swear).

Summary:
This book is fantastic and has certainly earned its unofficial title of being the #1 book in photographic lighting.  If you could master all of the techniques in this book there's no doubt that you'd have a long line of interested customers waiting at your door to pay you for the images you create.  It took me about a month to get through this book once and I imagine I will go through it several more times in the next few years.  I can see this book being by my side as a constant reference more than any book I've ever read.  If you're serious about the pictures you take and the way they are lit drop everything and order Light--Science and Magic now.  You won't regret it.


Ratings (out of 10):
Content - 10
Images (diagrams) - 7
Writing Style - 8
Overall - 8.5