The last month of my 20s. Day Twenty Four

[jhob]

4th January 2008

I decided on a lighter photograph tonight so I set up my lighting, put on some fun music (a John Peel compliation), drank some beer and jigged about a bit. I liked the idea of montage and here it is. Best seen large

 

[kyle]

I like that, has a feel-good, err, feel about it!

I find it hard to do self-portrait, mainly because I don't know whereabouts I am in the frame... how do you do it?

 

[dellipher]

Now that I think is one of the best!!

 

[jhob]

I like that, has a feel-good, err, feel about it!

I find it hard to do self-portrait, mainly because I don't know whereabouts I am in the frame... how do you do it?

I do it by shooting an awful lot of frames! Basically my method relies on digital - take a shot, remember where I was, look where I appeared in the frame, re-shoot. I also roughly set the focus for where I think I will be and use an aperture of at least f5.6/8. It takes a fair bit of time and a lot of patience!

 

[kyle]

Cool - so there is no easy way then!

I think my problem is that I don't use enough light and hence use a higher aperture - thus making focussing more difficult.

 

[jhob]

Cool - so there is no easy way then!

I think my problem is that I don't use enough light and hence use a higher aperture - thus making focussing more difficult.

Almost every flash lit shot is at 1/250 second (highest sync speed of my camera) and almost every indoors shot is flash lit for just this reason - there wouldn't be enough light otherwise and shutter speeds/iso would creep get too low/high respectively.

I had never done a self portrait before this project - best way to learn is just to get out there and do it! You'll work out your own techniques soon enough.