Oliur's Guide to Photography v1

OLIUR’S

GUIDE TO PHOTOGRAPHY

OLIUR RAHMAN

Introduction My first interest in photography came when my father purchased a flip phone with a camera on it. I don’t remember the exact make or model number but I remember being amazing that I could take pictures with a device that was so small. Fast forward a decade, 2010, I turn 17 and I start a blog called UltraLinx which many of you reading this will already know of.

dribbble.com/ultralinx @ultralinx

I became obsessed with using great photography to accom-

@ultralinx

pany many of the blog posts I wrote but at the time I couldn’t afford a professional camera. A year into running the blog I purchase a used GF2 with the 14mm f/2.5 lens from ebay, using cash that the blog had made. This is where it all really kicked off for me. I took pictures of anything and everything, trying to replicate shots and styles I had seen on sites like Flickr and 500px. I never looked up to any photographers in particular, I just tried to replicate any image I liked the look of.

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In June 2015 I moved into a studio/office after working from home for three years. I was now able to make a place look exactly the way I wanted. I started sharing pictures of the space and of products I use every day on Instagram. My Instagram profile started to gain traction with followers loving the pictures I was sharing so it spurred me on to sharing pictures consistently. I don’t do photography professionally but I see it as a great hobby that anyone can pick up as it doesn’t require a lot of money to start. I wanted to put together a book on my process as a whole and share with you what I have learned over the past few years. Hopefully you can learn something!

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Basic Stuff Before we get started let’s get some of the basic stuff out of the way.

Sensor Size Generally when it comes to cameras, the bigger the sensor, the better the images. But image quality can also be affected by the processor and tech behind the sensor, and the quality of glass in front of it. Sensor size can affect the size of the camera so you have to choose whether you prefer superior image quality or want something more portable. We’ll be covering depth of field later in the book but in general a larger sensor will give you a narrower depth of field. Various sensor sizes

I have always gone with Four Thirds as it’s a great medium between sensor size and camera size.

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Aperture

Shutter Speed

This is what determines how much light your lens lets in to

This determines how quickly your camera takes the picture.

the sensor. The lower the f-stop number the more light it will

When taking a picture of something that’s moving fast you

let in. Lowering the f-stop also gives you the ability to narrow

want a quicker shutter speed so that the subject isn’t blurry.

the depth of field, which gives you that nice ‘bokeh’ effect

It also works the other way. If you want a picture where you

where your subject is in focus and the foreground or back-

have light trails like you see in the picture to the right, you

ground are blurry.

want to have a longer shutter speed. This lets in light for a longer period,

Lower f-stop = more light

giving you a For example a lens that has an aperture of f/1.4 will give you

brighter im-

more light and a narrower depth of field. A lens with an aper-

age. However

ture of f/8 will give you less light and more of the picture will

in bright light

be in focus.

you’ll end up with a picture

Bokeh is the term for the quality of out of focus parts of the

that’s overex-

image. The way a lens is constructed and the quality of the

posed.

glass can affect bokeh.

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ISO This is what determines the sensitivity of your camera. A high ISO number lets you take pictures in the dark however it can also add grain to your image. I usually take all of my pictures in well lit situations so it’s not a problem for me. If you’re into taking pictures at night then it may be worth considering a camera with a high ISO setting. A low ISO will give you a cleaner image but you will need more light.

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I like to use the kit lens for landscape and architecture photog-

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Equipment

raphy due it’s much wider field of view.

In this section I’ll be covering the cameras, lenses, lighting and any other equipment I recommend.

Cameras & Lenses I’ve gone through a few cameras over the years including the GF2, GF6 and the EP5 from Olympus. My search for the smallest camera with the biggest punch has landed me with the GM1. It’s affordable and it’s tiny. It’s the setup I recommend to anyone starting out.

Affordable, small and versatile The camera itself is small enough to fit in the palm of your hand and when I’m on the go I can easily fit it into my jacket pocket. It’s also nowhere near as intrusive as a huge DSLR. I recommend getting the one with the 12-32mm kit lens. Usually people slate kit lenses but this one is probably one of the best I’ve ever used. It’s tiny, it offers a range of focal lengths and it’s surprisingly very sharp.

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At the time of writing this ebook the GM1 with the kit lens costs around £250. And the 20mm f/1.7 lens costs around £220. So you’re looking at a camera and two lenses for under £500, which I’d say is very affordable. If you have a bit more money to spend and don’t mind having a larger setup it may be worth looking at the Sony A series of cameras and the lenses on offer. Cameras like the Sony A7R II have full frame sensors and offer an amazing range of lenses but they’re very much catered towards professional use. My go to lens is the Panasonic LUMIX 20mm f/1.7 lens. It’s low f-stop number gives me the narrow depth of field and it produces some lovely bokeh. It’s also very sharp when the f-stop is 2.8 or greater. However it is not as fast as many other micro four thirds lenses out there. Due to the larger aperture and lower f-stop on the 20mm f/1.7 it allows for lots of light to enter the lens so it can be great in low-light situations. It’s also a pancake lens which means it’s really compact. When attached to the tiny body of the GM1 it’s amazing what the small combination can achieve.

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In the shot below I used artificial lighting to focus light on the

Lighting

headphones. The shot was taken in daylight but I wanted fo-

Lighting is of course very important when it comes to photog-

cus to be on the headphones so I pointed one light towards

raphy. I always recommend using natural light when possible.

the subject at an angle. You can see the light come from the

Most of the photos you’ll find on my Instagram were taken

bottom right of the image.

with natural light. It’s what gives them the natural look which is difficult to achieve with artificial lighting unless you really know what you’re doing.

Natural light is the best light I stay away from artificial lighting as much as I can I’d only recommend using it when you really do not have enough daylight available. Artificial lighting can be useful when you’re trying to shoot product photography or taking pictures of people. Focusing light on a specific subject will naturally draw attention to it.

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Here is an image of how I have the lighting setup. Those lights are usually called softboxes. The ones I’m using here are a generic brand picked up from Amazon. I would share the link for them but they don’t seem to be available on the site anymore. Usually any brand of softboxes under £100 are good enough. You can see I have one softbox pointed upwards to diffuse light across the room. Then I have the other softbox pointed towards the subject itself. This gives an even looking effect across the image.

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Most cameras come with a flash, the GM1 has a neat trick where you can point the flash upwards. It’s a great way to diffuse light and is also perfect for product photography - this technique works best if your walls are white, if they’re any other colour you might get a hue that isn’t suitable. It can be a great alternative to softboxes.

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Camera Settings I want light and depth of field to be a priority when taking pictures so I always shoot in Aperture priority at the lowest fstop possible. The camera then handles everything else. Most cameras allow you to set a custom photo style to change the look of your pictures. I have mine set up as followed: • Contrast -2 • Sharpness +2 • Saturation -2 • Noise Reduction 0

I always shoot in JPEG as it’s the most common file format for images. Your phone or computer shouldn’t have any trouble reading it. Everything else is set to auto. This gives me the ability to quickly turn on the camera and take a picture without having to spend time adjusting settings constantly.

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Bokeh As mentioned earlier in the book, bokeh is the term for the quality of out of focus parts of the image. I’m a big fan of bokeh as I like the general style and quality it can give an image.

‘Bokeh’ is the quality of the out of focus parts of the image Bokeh is achieved by having a shallow depth of field. The two main things that determine depth of field are the aperture of the lens and size of the sensor. Using a lens which has a low f-stop will enable you to have a shallower depth of field. However this is hugely affected by the size of the sensor - the larger the sensor size, the easier it is to achieve a shallow depth of field. A f/1.7 aperture on an iPhone won’t give you much depth of field but the same aperture on a full frame sensor can give you razor thin depth of field.

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My most popular pictures are always the ones that have an

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Environment & Composition

organised layout of items. The term for when items are laid out like this is “knolling”.

Knolling is when items are organised in a

I’m fortunate enough to have an office where I have the space and freedom to set up my shots. This already gives me the en-

neat or efficient manner

vironment I need to take the clean shots you see on my Instagram.

Knolling is something you see everyday and you’ll see it used

If you follow me on Instagram you will have noticed that I use

very well in shops because it makes products look more at-

a lot of white, blacks and greys. Whenever I include colour in

tractive. The Apple Store does this very well and you may not

my pictures I try to keep it to minimum. There will only be a

have even noticed it at first glance.

little bit of colour and those colours will usually be understated and natural looking. This is what helps keep the minimal style I strive for in my pictures.

Use natural looking colours. Composition isn’t something that can be learned overnight, it can take years of practice. It’s a natural process that you learn the more you shoot. I learned it by replicating other images that I loved. Humans tend to find patterns, alignment and symmetry visually pleasing and I usually try to achieve one of things things when taking my pictures. 13

Here is an example of a shot of my own where I used knolling.

You can also see there are objects both in the foreground and

All items were purposely placed to look very neat and organ-

background and I do this often. It fills the frame and gives the

ised. I pointed my camera at an angle down into the layout

picture more character.

making sure to keep the camera horizontally level. Using

When taking your pictures it is very important to keep your

depth of field I focused specifically in the centre of the frame.

camera horizontally level. The camera can be pointed straight,

I achieved both knolling and bokeh in one shot.

up or down but it’s very important to keep the camera level. Taking a picture which is not horizontally level can look amateur and does not look visually right. If you do end up taking a picture which is not level you can easily adjust it when editing the image. Most modern cameras like the Panasonic GM1 have a horizontal leveler inside which makes taking images much easier. It’s impossible to cover composition in a few pages so I recommend looking up examples of different compositions online. There are thousands of articles available which cover composition for every type of image.

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My favorites are A8, A9, HB1 and HB2. They’re fantastic mini-

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Editing

malist filters that aren’t overpowering like many others. They work great when you’re trying to achieve a clean and flat look.

I believe very much in ‘less is more’ so I hate editing my im-

If you are looking to enlarge or print your images I wouldn’t

ages heavily, I like keeping things simple and easy.

recommend using VSCO Cam as it will compress them. Instead edit your images on a computer in Lightroom and use

You may have noticed that my pictures are usually pretty

VSCO Film filters. This will make sure your images keep their

bright and this is done by simply over-exposing the image a

quality. That being said, VSCO Cam is perfect when simply

little. This can be done in camera and in all major photo edit-

sharing your shots on Instagram.

ing applications. Over-exposing my images helps me achieve the clean look I like to go for. It’s a fantastic way to give the illusion that there’s lots of light. I usually transfer my images straight to my phone using the GM1’s WiFi feature. Then I load it straight into VSCO Cam. VSCO Cam is my go-to editing app and it’s amazing what the developers have been able to do with the app. There’s a lot of useful features however I usually just use the exposure tool to bring up the exposure a little. I recommend buying all the filters that are in VSCO Cam because it’s great being able to experiment with various effects. 15

I like to keep a consistent and minimalist style across all of my images so I try to keep the number of filters I use to a select few. The four favourites I mentioned earlier all have very similar characteristics but are very versatile. The great thing about the filters that VSCO offers is that they have categories to fit just about any style of picture. I recommend experimenting with all the filters to find what you like the look of. On the next few pages I’ve included some examples of some before and after shots to give you an idea of how a filter can really transform an image.

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Thanks for reading If you’ve got this far I must thank you so much for buying my ebook. This is the first ebook I’ve ever written so please excuse any mistakes I may have made! I created this ebook to share with you how it can be easy and affordable to take great pictures. You don’t need a huge camera and lots of expensive equipment to get great shots. I’ve tried to cover as much as possible into what I think matters when taking my shots. However if you think I’ve missed something or need to go into more detail in a specific area let me know. I am always open to feedback, good or bad. So tweet me @ultralinx and let me know your thoughts. Tag your shots with #ultralinx on Instagram and let me know if you learned anything, I’d love to see how I’ve helped you.

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