Roads in Nature (LO 1,2,3)
1/80s, f/6.3, ISO 100, zoom lens 24-70mm, f/2.8S, Mallorca
I have been inspired by Robert Adams and his photography selection “The Place We Live”. I have already wrote about Adams in my previous blog People and The Environment. For over four decades Robert Adams has photographed the changing landscape of the American West, finding there a fragile beauty. His photographs are distinguished not only by their economy and lucidity, but also by their mixture of grief and hope. I especially took inspiration in the following photographs where he captured roads.
“Making photographs has to be, then, a personal matter; when it is not, the results are not persuasive.”
In this blog my aim is to portray roads as part of our environment, how they shape and influence our surroundings.
Some are naturally created over the years and some are built for purpose. Sometimes they might be disturbing. It depends on the bigger picture.
I captured the following images in Surrey. I used my camera Nikon Z6, zoom lens 24-70mm, f/2.8S, wide angle lens 14-30mm, f/4S and sometimes my tripod. All images are edited in Lightroom.
1/200s, f/11.0, ISO 250, wide angle lens 14-30mm, f/4S
It is quite a busy picture with a lot of information about the landscape. I used a narrower aperture f/11.0 to have more in focus. The wide angle lens helped me to get wider frame of landscape. I like the road as the leading line in this image all the way towards the layers of Surrey hills.
1/10s, f/11.0, ISO 100, zoom lens 24-70mm, f/2.8S
This relates to my previous image. I wanted to capture the movement of cars to enhance the contrast and feeling of a busy road in the middle of seemingly calm nature in a village. The road goes vertically across the image. I used a slow shutter speed 1/10s to have “blurry” cars and again a narrow depth of field.
1/60s, f/10.0, ISO 400, zoom lens 24-70mm, f/2.8S
I took this picture in late afternoon so I had to increase ISO to 400 as I wanted to shoot with the aperture f/10.0. Higher ISO helped me to balance the amount of light going into my camera.
1/60s, f/8.0, ISO 400, zoom lens 24-70mm, f/2.8S
This picture shows how the land is structured and divided by bushes and trees. The road initially shows the way but the the bush takes the leading line across the picture. I also find the cables in the air as a compositionally interesting element. I took this image in late afternoon and so I increased ISO again to compensate the light.
1/50s, f/2.8, ISO 160, zoom lens 24-70mm, f/2.8S
I used an open wide aperture f/2.8 to draw focus to the road and its immediate surrounding - nature. I like the leading lines, repetitions and low angle view. I like shooting from a low point, it allows me a sort of a presence in the picture.
Image 1: 8s, f/16.0, ISO 100; image 2: 8s, f/20.0, ISO 100; wide angle lens 14-30mm, f/4S
I found this as a great example how roads are disrupting nature. The trees are surrounded by roads, highways, cars, pollution and noise.
To capture these images I set up a shutter speed for 8 seconds and put my camera on a tripod. The tripod is a must when shooting with long exposure. The slow shutter speed also let me to get more light into the camera, especially in the dark so I kept the ISO 100.
Slow shutter speed and light painting technique
My aim was to create an image corresponding with the theme “People and the Environment” using the light painting technique. In general, the exposure for light painting is around 8 seconds and longer (even minutes) depending on the part of the day, the aperture, the selection of ISO and if any filters are used (as described by Bryan Peterson in book “Understanding exposure”).
The image was taken during the day in woods. As I was alone and didn’t have anybody around to help me I created the following image by merging two images into one. Below is the description how I did it.
Image 1
I set up a slow shutter speed 8s. I wanted to “ghost” my hands. I also set up a time delay of 10s that allowed me to walk into my position behind the tree. After couple of seconds (5-6s) I moved out of the picture. I used a tripod.
Image 2
I left my tripod on the same spot, kept the same shutter speed (8s) and used my mobile phone light to draw images (hearts) pointing towards the camera.
Later on I merged Image 1 and Image 2 and got a final picture shown above. Next time I will try the same image in the darker environment. I will involve more people in it so I can have more “hands” and light paintings on the picture.
Duane Michals (born 1932)
Duane Michals is an American photographer who creates narratives within a series of images. Michals began to address literary and philosophical ideas about death, gender, and sexuality. He usually staged scenes to be photographed and worked with multiple exposures, sequences, and series. He is well known for blending images with text in a format similar to cinematic sequences.
I found this interesting video with Duane Michals where he is describing his motivation, desires, intention and his projects. You can watch it bellow.
Source: Course materials; lensculture.com; youtube; essay Truth in Landscape from Beauty in Photography by R.Adams; book The Photographer’s Eye by M.Freeman; book Understanding Exposure by B.Peterson
