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X100s Awesome Image Power

I was out on Saturday night ~~partying~~ ~~playing poker with the guys~~ getting water in Alameda. I threw the X100s in last minute, anticipating a way cool sunset. Some nice colors started happening. I found a subject, grabbed the camera and realized I had no card in it. #doh #facepalm :roll: Thankfully there’s a wee smidgeon of internal memory available for potential customers to check the images in store morons like me to use. I took an exposure metered for balance and here it is:

Basic STD JPEG ISO 200 f/4 1/125 no corrections WB: Auto

Not too shabby. It’s metered for the sky and the structures go to mostly silhouette. I could meter for the building but then I’d lose the richness of the color of the sky. Or, I could use flash and illuminate the whole terminal. (Well, I could but that would be dumb). So the only other option is HDR, right? Layer several exposures together in software and get the shot. Well, not any more!

One of the other extremely awesome things about the X100s is the ability to take tonal control of the image. You can manually adjust the shadows, highlights, color and sharpness of any image before you take it. So, after reviewing the first one, I decided to hit the ol’ Q button and tweak away. Here’s the next image:

ISO 200 f/4 1/125 Velvia Film Shadow Tone: -1 WB: Auto

This image has got the Velvia Film simulation going plus -1 dialed into shadow tone, decreasing the shadow contrast. Look how much more detail is there from one simple adjustment! It’s awesome! But I wanted to push it one step further and here’s the final image:

ISO 200 f/4 1/125 Velvia Film Highlight Tone: -1 Shadow Tone: -2 Color: +1 Sharpness +1 WB: Fluorescent

There’s even more detail held with no sacrifice of color. I kicked it up a notch in camera. And, by switching to fluorescent white balance, I got a beautiful dusty rose tint to the image. That’s pure awesome!

These images are all straight out of camera JPEGS with exception of watermark and resize for web. The Fuji Rocks the Set. I rest my case.

Posted by schultzphotographic | May 13, 2013 | Categories: FujiFilm X100s, Landscape | Tags: Alameda, FujiFilm X100s, Highlight tone, I love the X100s, Image control, Image tweak, in camera, Landscape, Saskatchewan, Shadow tone, Sunset | Leave A Comment »

Ascension Concert

On Thursday, May 9th we celebrated the Good Lord Jesus’ Ascension back to heaven. And to do so, we had a concert with a couple of Angel voices! Jennifer Jade Kerr and Kelti Malone blessed our congregation in Oxbow with a sweet concert. They are AMAZINGLY talented singer songwriter types. I highly recommend you check ‘em out and buy all their records. As if that wasn’t good enough, we sweetened the whole deal and had an ice cream buffet afterwards. We had a really great turn out with lots of community members attending.

The the girls were kind enough to indulge my photo addiction and do some portraits with the D800. Musicians deserve moody lighting, at least, I think they do. I wanted to try some anyways so here’s what I came up with.

Jennifer Jade Kerr

For Jennifer, I envisioned her glorious red hair and decided that warm tones would be the ticket. I wanted to go with short lighting too for the utmost of flattery. Then I had the idea to put some candles in the bokeh to further play off the red/warm feel of the overall image. I also wanted a bit of guitar in the image, but not to let it dominate the scene. I was pleased because it turned out how I envisioned it.

Kelti Malone

Kelti has a way cool violin! I knew that I wanted to do some edgy stuff with it. So we did a pretty dramatic portrait of Kelti with some way cool profile lighting. And then, we decided to just shoot the violin – because it’s so darn cool!

Here’s some shots from the concert all taken with the FujiFilm X100s.

Posted by schultzphotographic | May 11, 2013 | Categories: Event Photography, Off Camera Flash, Portraits | Tags: Ascension, celebrities, Church, Concert, Ice Cream Buffet, Jennifer Jade Kerr, Jesus, Kelti Malone, Portraits, violin | Leave A Comment »

Holy Sync Speed Batman!

So I’m really liking the Fuji X100s. Leaf shutters are amazing creations, like hydraulics and GPS. Basically, it allows you to sync a flash at any speed. You don’t have to worry about 1/250 or 1/200. You can rock out at 1/1000s at f/2 in full sunshine and still sync a flash – at 1/8 power!!! It’s crazy! The flash photo options available with this camera are nearly limitless! I took a 1 light setup outside yesterday to try and see how the X100s does in full sunshine. I locked on the internal 3 stop ND filter and was able to underexpose the ambient at ISO 200, 1/1000s at f/2. That’s pure sweetness! In contrast, to do this with a DSLR, you’d need to drop your sync speed to 1/250 and crank your aperture to f/5.6 to get the same exposure (before an ND filter). But the Fuji nails the sweet bokehlicious backgrounds and, I can overpower the sun with a speedlight on 1/8th power!!!!!!! Like, what’s not to love?!

Here’s the results (JPEGs shot in Astia simulation mode)

Posted by schultzphotographic | May 9, 2013 | Categories: Cameras, FujiFilm X100s, Off Camera Flash, Pocket Wizard Plus X | Tags: 1/1000s, Astia, Bokeh, Bokehlicious, f/2, Fuji, hyper sync, leaf shutter, nuke the sun, over power ambient, sync speed, X100s | Leave A Comment »

Everybody Dance Now!

Back in April we had the big Dance Recital. It was great because my daughter was in it. And by that, I mean, I loved it even more because my daughter was in it. Miss Halynne did a totally rock star job with the kids, especially the littlest ones. It was neat to see all the different levels of experience. I know my daughter benefitted from seeing the older girls doing their hip hop moves as an encouragement to see what happens later in life with practice. I did the group photos the day before at the dress rehearsal and also did a quick session setup for anyone who wanted formals done. It was fast paced maniacal gong show! But it was loads o’ fun and everybody looked super cute.

Posted by schultzphotographic | May 8, 2013 | Categories: Event Photography, Group Photo, Kids, Portraits | Tags: arts, Ballet, Ballet Recital, Halynne Lamontagne, Oxbow, Saskatchewan | Leave A Comment »

Here comes the Fuji!

The Fuji in Action! f/2.8

Finally got a chance to use the X100s in a real world scenario. My good friend Susan from Susan Hill Photography had a wedding gig lined up and I asked if I could tag along as second shooter to really try out the Fuji. She graciously obliged. Not only was I using the X100s, I also got to try it out with my new pocket wizard plus x triggers. I’m happy to report that everything worked amazingly well. I confess though, that I’m naturally a telephoto-eyed shooter. So, I couldn’t leave my D800 at home. I had it with my 85mm f/1.8 on a black rapid strap as well as the Fuji. It truly was a dynamic duo as you get a pretty nice 35mm equivalent FOV from the Fuji and decent telephoto from the 85mm. And, the Fuji is so nice as a second camera because it is super lightweight. You can carry it around all day and not get played out. So all in all, it was a sweet mix. I just swapped the pocket wizard trigger back and forth from camera to camera as I needed to. I was using a simple one speedlight rig in a Photoflex octodome NXT XS on an ultralight LumoPro stand. It was a perfect on the move, versatile lighting setup.

X100s at f 2.8

I really wanted to push the Fuji on this gig. So I tried to use it as much as possible and it didn’t disappoint. Despite being a wide-ish angle lens, you can really get some nice subject isolation with it. The colour and skin tones are amazing. I shot everything in RAW and JPEG but the images on this blog entry are all JPEG – they are simply that good. And, they tweak very nicely in post.

D800 f/2.8

Some stuff though is just made for telephoto and I did find myself swapping in the D800. I still believe that people look best shot with telephoto focal lengths. But the variety of having both cameras and not having to change lenses (hence lugging around WAY less kit) is pure awesome.

X100s f/2.8 1/500, 3 stop ND filter on, full Pocket Wizard Sync. Boo ya!

This wedding session was all formals with some candids with the big family at the end. We setup in the Carnduff golf course because after all, it’s May and there is still snow lying around… shudder. But, we did our best. So we found this little tranquil spot and knew we could do something with it. When I got home and looked at the file, it struck me. This image looks fake! It looks like my 1985 kindergarten portrait studio backdrop! I think it’s attributed to the being able to nuke the sun with the deadly combo of the Fuji’s built in 3 stop ND filter and higher sync speed. This one was f/2.8 at 1/500 via Pocket Wizards. Sweet sassy! I’m gonna like that capability more and more me thinks.

X100s f/11 1/30

The other killer thing with a small, lightweight camera is that you can hand hold slow shutter speed shots no problem. There were a metric tonne of kidlets around for the big family photo and I thought, lets get them buzzing around the bride. With the ND filter still on, I cranked the aperture up to f/11 and dialled the shutter down to 1/30s. The bride is sharp handheld, the kids are pleasantly blurred. My only regret is not popping a wee bit o’ flash on the bride. It would have made for a stellar image. But one gets caught up in the moment.

All in all, it was a super fun 2 hours on duty with the Fuji. I love that it’s small, lightweight and ready for anything – like when all the kids in the family decide to start rolling down a goose crap encrusted golf course hill. It’s just there and ready to rock!

X100s f/2.8

D800 f/2.8

X100s f/2.8

D800 f/10

X100s f/2.8

X100s f/11

X100s f/2.8

Posted by schultzphotographic | May 6, 2013 | Categories: Cameras, Event Photography, FujiFilm X100s, Photography Gear, Wedding Photography | Tags: Carnduff, D800, Environmental Portraits, Formals, Fuji X100s for Wedding Photography, Light stand, LumoPro, One light, Photoflex Octodome NXT XS, Portraits, Saskatchewan, SB-900, Susan Hill Photography, Wedding | Leave A Comment »

OCF and the X100s

Not many people can say that they still get winter storms on the 30th of April. It’s because many more (sane) people don’t live in Saskatchewan. This winter just . . . won’t . . . die! But before the snow came, we had these amazing clouds and lots of rain. I grabbed my X100s, my sister in law, a black umbrella, my SB-900 and brand new Pocket Wizard Plus X triggers and headed out for some dramatic environmental portraits! When we found a cool spot with lots of great cloud structure, I got setup. It was then I realized that I forgot the PC cable for the Plus X. DOH!!! I have a lot to learn about radio triggers! So, rather than go back and risk missing the sky, I put the SB-900 into SU-4 mode and triggered it optically from the Fuji’s built in flash. It worked in a pinch, even though I wanted to try the Pocket Wizards out. Heheheh… I heightened the structure of the clouds in post, but I love the drama of the B&W.

I did a similar one using Nik Software’s Color Efex Pro and kept the colour, but on this, I prefer the black and white.

Posted by schultzphotographic | April 30, 2013 | Categories: Cameras, FujiFilm X100s, Off Camera Flash, Pocket Wizard Plus X | Tags: FujiFilm, Grenfell, Off Camera Flash, Optical Trigger, Plus X, Pocket Wizard, Saskatchewan, Sky, Storm, SU-4 mode, X100s | Leave A Comment »

X100s in the Dark

So grandma & grandpa bought the coolest birthday present ever. It wasn’t the new socks or garden tools, it was the “LED, light up, noise making, bubble-blowing gun of amazing times!” We killed off our ambient light via switching and this was the product! It was super cool to see the bubbles go lit up by the sparkling LED madness. I thought, “hey, this is a fine time to test how the FujiFilm X100s focuses in no light.” And, I tell you it was a challenge! A challenge for any camera, especially when your auto focus assist beam is off. But just the same, the fuji focused and nailed the shots – not every time mind you, I was focusing in AF-S (not continuous) and the kids weren’t sitting still. I was blown away that the X100s even could capture focus at all let alone produce some keepers. It’s just another testament to the absolute gem that Fuji has made in this camera.

Posted by schultzphotographic | April 28, 2013 | Categories: FujiFilm X100s, Kids | Tags: autofocus, bubble gun, capability, FujiFilm X100s, Kids, low light, X100s | 1 Comment »

And So This is Earth Day: A Photo Essay of Reality

Today is earth day. Nice green trees, fresh water streams, bumble bees going hither and thither. Not here! We’re still caught in the death grip of winter at the end of April for crying out loud! It’s insane. Riddle me this. Why don’t climate action groups ever hold their meetings in Oxbow?! Nope, it’s always Florida or Hawaii or someplace nice! Come here and get your global warming, it’s buried under 3 feet of snow! Read the rest of this page »

Posted by schultzphotographic | April 22, 2013 | Categories: FujiFilm X100s, Wildlife | Tags: Blood, Carcass, climate, Coyote, Dead Deer, Death, deer population, Earth Day, Farm Dogs, Guts, Kill, Nature, survival, Winter, X100s | Leave A Comment »

25 Little Dresses

Yesterday was the LWMLC “Spring” Renewal at our church. I say “spring” because it’s still cesspool of winter on the prairies and we had another snow storm whilst this thing was going on. The weather is diabolical. But anyways, it was a lovely renewal. The LWMLC stands for Lutheran Women’s Missionary League Canada. It’s a society that Lutheran women have been active in for quite some time and they have renewals or get togethers that include a bible study, some singing, lunch and a speaker on a topic. We were blessed to have Shelley Baldwin come and talk to the ladies about a local project she is doing called 25 Little Dresses. Shelley has had difficulties with her health and the dress project began as a way to reach out to others despite having her own cross to bear. She started out to see if she could make 25 little dresses for needy children in the developing world. And since the first one was made, over 3000 have been made with many more ladies joining in! It’s an incredible project that is helping little girls all over the globe have clothes to wear. And, the dresses are almost always delivered by hand to people who need them so they don’t get intercepted by pirates and sold on the black market. The dresses get to the girls who need them. This project fit in nicely with the overall them of the Renewal ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to Me.’” Matthew 25:40. Everyone in attendance had a great time and each got a hands on experience making dresses be it sewing, cutting, or ironing. It’s amazing to see what can be done and how the world can be changed for the good with these simple acts of love and kindness.

Posted by schultzphotographic | April 21, 2013 | Categories: Event Photography | Tags: 25 Little Dresses, Canada, clothing, developing world, Dresses, League, little, Lutheran, LWMLC, Matthew 25:40, Missionary, Oxbow, projects, Shelly Baldwin, Women's | Leave A Comment »

The Small Space Studio

Can you turn this into a studio?! Yep.

Most of the time we tend to think of photography studios as huge places of sprawling, ginormous, north facing window light. It’s luxurious and lovely. For full time working pros, it might even be a necessity. But for enthusiast types like me, I can’t justify the expense. I wanted to try and see if I could achieve studio results in a really, really small space. These photos were taken in my 9×10 office. A cheap black sheet for background, some inexpensive lighting setups and you’re good to go. The best thing is that this small little studio space is portable. I can take it with me so there’s literally no place I can’t achieve similar results. Here’s a location setup of the small studio. Move some furniture and you’re golden!