Photography News Issue 30

Photography News Issue 30 absolutephoto.com

News

Nikon goes underground

Over months, Nikon has hosted a series of free #DiscoverDifferent events with the last one in February at a location in central London. We went along to see what they were all about. The location was the defunct Aldwych Tube station off the Strand and there were three separate groups of photographers attending, in the morning, early afternoon and late afternoon. The events were promoted throughNikon’s#DiscoverDifferent website asking for photographers keen to push their creativity further to apply. Attendees were selected randomly due to the huge interest and the limited spaces available. We went along to the mid- afternoon session. Joining instructions were provided well in advance of the day, so we turned up with cameras, cards and batteries ready and suitably attired. It was a dusty location and stout shoes or boots were suggested. Nikon gave everyone a branded warm jacket. The bigger group was divided into three smallermoremanageable groups (five in ours) and these would rotate to each of the three photo opportunities spending around 40 minutes at each one. the past few

After a health & safety briefing from TFL staff it was onto the serious business of the day. Our photographic hosts were experts from the Nikon School team, led by training manager Neil Freeman. Portable flash portraits was in the ticket area, there was light painting on one platform and a location portrait session on a disused Tube train on another. Our first session started with a briefing from Nikon training specialist Mark Higgins on how to set the cameras up to use the Nikon SB-910 Speedlights wirelessly in TTL mode and how to deal with low levels of light. Everyone had different model cameras so this took a few minutes but soon we all took turns shooting our model, Florence. There was plenty of time for everyone to take a variety of shots, not just with the flash but also using available light. The next location was shooting portraits on the platform and the train. Here, Neil went through the details of camera set-up, but as we had just set up for wireless flash our group was more or less ready to start shooting. Plenty of advice was provided, not just on camera and flash set-

up but also where to place lights, dealing with ambient light and advice on composition. Our last session of the day was light painting led byArtur Teixeira, Nikon Professional Services team member and EmilyMudie, training coordinator, using home-made LED light bars. Our group wasn’t experienced in this so camera set- up, using tripods provided, took a few minutes. The idea was that Artur and Emily would walk, with the main lights switched off, down the platform and where the tracks used to be with their LED sticks as we recorded the streaks. It was definitely different standing where trains used to run in almost complete darkness while shooting light trails – but tremendous fun, too. After a couple of tries, the whole group got great images and our light painters tried more compositions and patterns. Soon we headed back upstairs and into the fresh air, where the next group were already gathering. It was a great (free!) experience so well worth attending. Look out for announcements for future events on Nikon’s Facebook page.

Images Nikon’s last #DiscoverDifferent event saw photographers shooting in the closed Aldwych Tube station.

nikon.co.uk

Super Lee

Lens from Laowa Alensbrandnot sowell known in the UK at the moment is Laowa, but awareness will surely build thanks to lenses like the new 105mm f/2 STF lens. STF stands for Smooth Trans Focus, a special optical system designed to give smooth transitions between crisp in-focus areas to creamy defocused foreground and backgrounds This is a manual focus lens featuring 11 elements in 8 groups and a 14 blade iris. It uses an integrated apodisation filter to give superior bokeh, making it well suited to shooting portraits and is full-frame compatible. The 105mm f/2 STF has a guide price of £649.99 and there are fittings in Canon, Nikon, Pentax, Sony A and Sony E available.

Lee Filters' Big Stopper 10EV ND proved a hugely popular filter among scenic photographers. It was soon joined by the 6EV ND Little Stopper and now we have the Super Stopper, a 15EV extreme ND filter. A straight one- second exposure is turned into 16 minutes with the Big Stopper – and that becomes a staggering 8.5 hours with the Super Stopper. You may wonder why you would need such an extreme ND, but it has huge potential, not just because it allows very long exposures when the light levels are high, but also because it gives you more aperture control. You don’t always want massive depth-of-field so using the Super Stopper means you can avoid the smallest lens apertures where diffraction can also have a significant impact on image quality. The Super Stopper is said to have a very good white-balance even when used with the camera’s auto white-balance feature and any colour cast will be slight and easily removed. The Super Stopper will be available for Lee’s Seven5, 100mm and SW150 systems at £70.45, £103.82 and £132 respectively. The official launch is 19 March, the first day of The Photography Show, so make sure you check it out. See page 95 for a detailed review of the Super Stopper.

venuslens.net

Above The Super Stopper makes shooting long exposures on very bright days easy. This 1/125sec at f/11 scene became a 4mins at f/11 shot. It was done in AWB so the Super Stopper is very neutral too.

leefilters.com