Jim Miotke - The BetterPhoto Guide to Photographing Light: Learn to Capture Stunning Light in any Situation

Copyright 2012 by Jim Miotke and Kerry Drager

All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Amphoto Books, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com

Amphoto Books and the Amphoto Books logo are trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Miotke, Jim.
The BetterPhoto guide to photographing light / Jim Miotke and Kerry Drager.
p. cm.
Includes index.
1. PhotographyLighting. I. Drager, Kerry. II. Betterphoto.com. III. Title. IV. Title: Guide to light.
TR590.M56 2011
778.76dc23
2011020988

Front cover photographs by Kerry Drager (top); Jim Miotke (center left); Donna Pagakis (center middle); Anne McKinnell (center right); Tony Sweet (bottom)

Ebook ISBN9780817425029

rh_3.1_c0_r1

Mont Blanc, at 15,782 feet, is the highest mountain in the Alps. It straddles the border between France and Italy. Photographer Stefania Barbier shot this scene from a cable car that crosses over the glaciers between the mountains summits. Note how light helped to shape things, with the late-afternoon sun catching the distant peak. This grand scene almost seems to engulf the hikers below, but while pictured small in the photo, they stand out due to the dark-against-white contrast.

Photo Stefania Barbier. 1/640 sec. at f/10, ISO 100, 2470mm lens at 54mm

This close wildlife encounter was captured in Namibia, Africaclose-up, with a wide-angle lens. The subject was behind a fence (which made the close camera position possible) and was snarling at another male leopard, recalls Jim Zuckerman. Also, the low-angled sunlight of late afternoon resulted in a beautiful warm-vs.-cool color contrast.

Photo Jim Zuckerman. 1/1250 sec. at f/16, ISO 1000, 24105mm lens at 24mm

An old truck and a metal sculpture came together for a fun country scene in the beautiful light just before sunset. I particularly liked the color contrast between the bold, warm tones of the truck and the skys cool blue. With my wide-angle lens, I moved physically close to the subjects in order to leave out surrounding distractions. I then tilted the camera to get a diagonal composition for additional visual vitality.

Photo Kerry Drager. 1/8 sec. at f/22, ISO 100, 1224mm lens at 22mm

(left to right) Seattle, Washington, is a great place to photograph, with a wealth of subjects! One early morning at Olympic Sculpture Park, the low-angled sunlight was bright and sharp, ideal for shooting shadows. For this scene, the row of chairs caught my eye, not only because of the shadows created by sidelighting but also due to the red-versus-green color contrast. I decided to include the concrete landscaping feature as a secondary design element.

Photo Kerry Drager. 1/90 sec. at f/16, ISO 200, 70300mm lens at 70mm

Late one afternoon at home, I zeroed in on the pattern of this colorful serape. Diffused indirect window light was the primary source of illumination. To retain brightness throughout the photo, I used a small reflectorjust outside the field of visionto emphasize the designs, lines, and textures. While not quite in extreme close-up range, I moved in really tight with my telephoto macro lens to fill up the picture frame with this pattern.

Photo Kerry Drager. 1/10 sec. at f/16, ISO 200, 105mm lens

I dont normally do much photographing at midday, when the overhead sunlight flattens out scenes and puts shadows in all the wrong places (think harsh facial shadows in portraits). For this scene, however, I was attracted by all the great contrast: the stark white railings set against the red brick wall and the contrasting shadow under the stairway that helped the white areas stand out in contrast.

Photo Jim Miotke. 1/600 sec. at f/5, ISO 200, 2470mm lens at 70mm

Photographer Donna Pagakis went out to this beach, along the Southern California coast, in hopes of capturing a stunning sunset. Things were looking especially good with the eye-catching cloud formations. I set up my tripod in the sand, she recalls. Then I saw this jogger coming into frame and pressed the shutter. I had my camera set on the 2-second timer, so I had to time it just right. With the exposure set for the background, the shadowed runner was rendered as a silhouette. To retain the colors pretty much as she saw them, Pagakis used a daylight white balance (covered in more detail in ).

Photo Donna Pagakis. 1/500 sec. at f/7.1, ISO 100, 1855mm lens at 18mm

Armed with a macro lens, photographer Rob Sheppard caught this little grasshopper at a native-plants garden in Los Angeles. While the bright green subject leaps out against the dark background, Sheppard emphasizes that there was no flash involved. This is actually sunlight, he says, but the light from the sun is intense next to a very dark shadow from an outbuilding in the garden.

Photo Rob Sheppard. 1/125 sec. at f/11, ISO 400, 50mm lens

We are very grateful to the many people who have helped us produce this book.

First, we would not be anywhere without Team BetterPhotothank you all for your incredible support.

Next, Jim would like to thank his familywife, business partner, and best friend, Denise, and children Julian, Alex, and Alinafor their loving support. He is also very grateful to Brian and Marti Hauf for their prayerful and practical support.

Kerry would like to thank his familywife and best friend, Mary, and his stepchildren, Dan and Kristinfor their great love and never-ending support.

A special thanks goes to the great team at AmphotoVictoria Craven, Julie Mazur, Autumn Kindelspire, and Stephen Brewer.

We feel deeply honored to work with the amazing photographers who teach at , there is a list of websites of all the BetterPhoto members and instructors who shared their wonderful images. We would like to say thank you to each of you.

We also would like to thank Art Wolfe, Dewitt Jones, Jack Hollingsworth, Dane Sanders, Rick Sammon, Bob Krist, Jack Warren, Ben Willmore, and Colin Smith; Kevin La Rue and Laurie Shupp at Nik Software; Gabriel Biderman, Tana Thomson, Jonathan Yudin, and Hershel Waldner at B&H Photo; Sam Perdue at Lensbaby; Neal Gold and Chris Washko at Photographers Edge; Gary Farber at Hunts Photo in Boston; Kathleen Davis at Popular Photography; the team at Singh-Ray Filters; and the team behind Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop.

Last, we extend our thanks to the dedicated members of BetterPhoto, who have helped make this enterprise such an awesome and joyful photographic community. Keep it up!

We dedicate this book to all photographers who dream of following their own creative vision and who strive to follow the light.