Volvo V50 - play with a car rig.

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Volvo V50 Car Photography Rig mounting Hague Manfrotto poles

Nikon D800 f10 1/30th ISO800 (multiple flash exposure)

I know that we are all guilty of this, i purchased some camera kit, and it has just sat there for months unused... (this is just me? - yeah right)

And so it was time to have a play. I purchased some car rig - mounting equipment. For making the movement shots you see in magazines.

Volvo V50 Car Photography Rig mounting Hague Manfrotto

Nikon D800 f5 1/13th ISO 800

Here is a final shot, with using a slower shutter speed to give the sense of movement, i would of been blurred in the shot, and so inside the car is a strobe light, set to rear curtain sync to give a pop of light to freeze me, and make me sharper. 

I triggered the camera and flash using pocket wizard 3's. I find these work a treat. I have one in my hand, and when i press the button the camera fires, and the flash. 

Volvo V50 Car, Photography Rig mounting Hague Manfrotto poles motion

Nikon D800 f3.2 1/15th ISO 400

A Shot of the mounting system attached to the bonnet. 

Volvo V50 Car Photography Rig mounting Hague Manfrotto poles motion car photography

Nikon D800 f5 1/13th ISO800

Added another pole to extend the reach of the camera. I felt the camera was too heavy for this though, as the poles were worryingly bending, and so only a very slow speed was used when driving.

Here is a short Video of the top image, being taken and processed. 

Thanks

Lee

Blackpool on a Shitty Afternoon.

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Blackpool Seasside Lancashire Lee Ramsden bad weather long exposure

Nikon D800 61sec F14 ISO 100

Hi all and Happy New year.

Apologise for the tittle to this post, but i am climbing the walls to do a shoot and so headed out this afternoon. Not much going on but thought that was kind cool.

Sorry I'm no good at making flamboyant arty titles up like most, there seems to be more thought gone into the title then the image in a lot of cases.

I aim to head up to the lakes at the end of the week if i have not returned to Scotland for my day job.

Hope you are well.

Lee

Metal Prints. Loxley Colour.

Hi all,

Hope that you are all set and ready for the festive period about to kick in.

If not...... good luck.

Just a quick one today, thought id Share an image of a print i have recently had made for me by the guys over at

Loxley Colour. 

Loxley, Loxley Colour, Alumini Print, Aluminium, Shard, London, Photography, buy, order, contact

I decided on ordering a metal print, to really make this print shine. I am truly speechless, the quality is fantastic. The turn around from order to your front door is also really impressive.

I was never a fan of the metal prints, but maybe it is just i have never seen the right image displayed. A landscape or a high saturated image really shines and looks impressive, a blurred HDR picture from your iPhone of your dog or selective colour will not benefit being printed on metal, never.....

This is Loxley's largest metal print size, 60x40 inch. I sent them an image with a size of 30x20 and they managed to double the size perfectly.

This is not a cheap print though, but i feel it is worth every penny. You certainly pay for quality.

This photo of me stood with it does it no justice what so ever...

Something you really have to see in person!

I had made some framed prints for clients and am very impressed.

We will certainly be sticking with Loxley Colour now for all our professional prints.

Have a great festive holiday and hope to see you in the new year.

Lee

IRATA rope access training course.

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IRATA rope access ropes climbing Blackpool Training TALLON TALON NDT Harness offshore oil and gas north sea 02

Big apologies for not having a post for some time now, 

with work, the new house and the baby, my hands are pretty busy, 

but i couldn't be happier. 

I am planning a trip to the Brecon Beacons in the near future, which i am super excited about,

Here are some images i snapped on a recent rope access course. I was refreshing my IRATA Level 3's ticket and so was in for a weeks beasting!!

IRATA industrial rope access ropes climbing Blackpool Training TALLON TALON NDT Harness offshore oil and gas north sea 01

I can highly recommended the training over at

C&J training in Blackpool. The training centre comes under the Talon umbrella and John is a great trainer there. 

IRATA, rope access, ropes, climbing, Blackpool, Training, TALLON, TALON, NDT, Lee Ramsden, Photography, Harness, offshore, oil and gas, north sea 05

It was an informative week. I understand a few of you are photographers. This post has no relevance to you? 

But ask your self - How many times are you at work, and at height? up step ladders? on roofs? hanging out of a window? I know even you wedding photographers are guilty of this. This course is not for you, but take some time and look at the working at height guidelines. Hurting yourself is just not worth it. no work - no cash right?

Say your assistant takes a tumble, your insurance will turn their back if nothing is in place. Say good bye to your business, once you pay out the court fee's and the settlement. 

Here is what the HSE say about it. Thanks for reading. 

IRATA, rope access, ropes, climbing, Blackpool, Training, TALLON, TALON, NDT, Lee Ramsden, Photography, Harness, offshore, oil and gas, north sea 03
IRATA, rope access, ropes, climbing, Blackpool, Training, TALLON, TALON, NDT, Lee Ramsden, Photography, Harness, offshore, oil and gas, north sea 04

A subtle technique, but goes a long way..

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Hello, here is a little tip which i have recently picked up and thought id share as it makes such a lovely difference.

When working on images of buildings here is how i now add contrast.

Rather then use contrast adjustment layer, i created two levels layers, one darker and one lighter - both with black layer masks.

Now take your time, and paint in, where the face of a building is lighter, make it lighter and the dark side darker. It takes a little time, but certainly gives your image much more depth and a 3D feel to them.

Tutorial Photoshop dodge burning layer

 This image has the effect turned off. 

The extra layer you can see is a contrast adjustment layer to the lighter layer.

Tutorial Photoshop how to make your image look more professional

Here is the final image with the contrast technique added. 

Subtle but certainly makes a lot of difference to the image.

canary wharf London Photography Train line Long Exposure light trails


Canary Wharf London.

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London river Thames canary wharf ponoramic iPhone photography

With recently spending some time at the in-laws waiting for the baby to arrive, i have used the time to head out and about at sunrise 

Above is an iPhone image of my location on the Thames. 

Alarm call for 02:15hrs - and headed out, just a shame the weather did not really play ball, but thats landscape photography for you. 

Below is the image created by the d-slr.

This is certainly a location ill revisit to try and capture an image of more what i had in my mind. 

Thanks

Lee

Canary Wharf London Isle of dogs Thames financial

15 minute exposure using Lee filters big stopper and circular polariser. 

Polarising Filter.

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 Hi,

Today is just a quick post, but wanted to try and show the importance of using a circular polarising filter. Here you can see from a shot of London from the View at the Shard, i had to shoot through a window.

With out a polarising filter

This image you can see the reflections in the glass from inside of the building. 

With a polarising filter fitted

By using a polarising filter, it is not perfect, but seriously cuts out the reflections and so saves you much more time having to edit less.

Like always if you have any questions please feel free to post in the comments. 

Hope that you enjoy the rest of your Sunday... 

 

London view at the Shard gallery London Uk Tower Bridge HMS Belfast

The above image would not have been able to been created so clean without a polarising filter. 

 

 

Please feel free to share this post on your social media, giving credit to the photographer Lee Ramsden www.leeramsden.com

 

Thanks

The view from the Shard London HDR image break down.

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Hi, hope your keeping well and have had a good weekend. 

Here are some images from the previous London landscape image that i have posted. 

I wanted to show the images used to create the final image. 

I clamped the camera down to the handrail using the Manfrotto Magic arm and using a cable release i rattled a few bracketed frames. 

I have included the metadata on each image, but other then converting to jpg, they are straight from the camera and in the order the camera took them and i added to Nik softwares HDR efex pro 2.

London Shard The View HDR image Photography tutorial Nikon D800 award winning

Here is the first base image. In face i quite like this exposure but i personally prefer having the extra range to play with. 

And finally this is the out put from the software. As you can see it has little punch, no halos. or even much contrast going on. But the key is to get a nice base to start with, and then bring this into photoshop and make it your own.

I have tried many different HDR software on the market and not one will you be able to click process- done.

But i do think that this is a good thing, no 2 images will ever be processed the same and so this way it makes you take your time and make something unique and more realistic.

london View from the Shard HMS Belfast river Thames Tower Bridge

Here is the final image. 

Thanks.

Lee

The View at The Shard London photography tips.

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Hi, how are you? 

I hope that you are well, while I'm stuck out at work on the rig for a month....

mobile, iphone, Lee, Ramsden, London, The View From The Shad, Landscape, Photography, Lancashire, HDR

Last week I took a trip to the new viewing platform in the Shard building- London.

72 floors high you get an incredible view of London.

You have to book in advance and pick your time slot, I was particular in that I wanted the sunset to dark.

After googling the timings I was happy that we would catch the setting sun, but just had to have our fingers crossed for the weather :0)

london View from the Shard HMS Belfast river Thames Tower Bridge

As you can see, we were so very lucky in the weather front, after so much snow and bad weather recently.

I wanted to give a couple of tips that i found so handy while shooting here.

and these tips will not only help if you fancy going up the Shard but I'm guessing 99.9% of tourist locations.

Tip 1

- The venue Tripod ban...

A lot of tourist venues have a tripod ban and so you are not allowed to enter with / or use one.

Manfrotto G clamp

As you can see i over came this by using a Manfrotto magic arm, and super clamp. 

The security observed me using this and did not bother in the slightest. 

While using the clamp and magic arm, i treated it like a tripod and so was using my cable release to gain much longer shutter speeds. 

Tip 2

- Don't for get your polariser filter.

To try and reduce the reflections you gain shooting through the glass, a circular polariser filter is not perfect, but cuts down the problem loads. 

Nothing will stop the other members of public and their point and shoots, using the flash - still amazed at what they recon the on camera flash will light up. 

That its, i can really recommend the Shard, it was a fantastic experience. 

Keep in touch in the comments bar bellow...

Thanks 

Lee

Amsterdam canal by boat.

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Amsterdam canal boat ride

As followers of this blog will know i head over to Amsterdam at least twice a year,

It is such an amazing city, spilling out at the seams with art and design. 

My favourite way to view this city has to be on the canals by boat. Im very lucky that my cousin and her fella have their own boat. 

Grab some beers, head out and enjoy the diverse and interesting sites of Amsterdam!

Amsterdam views by boat
Amsterdam canal boat captain
Sexy Amsterdam
Amsterdam red light district girls in the windows

Long exposure using Lee Filters.

With recently purchasing some

Lee filters

i wanted to get out and have a play.

My mate Phil and i, headed out to London, i wanted try a show movement of people, and rush hour in London is ideal as its full of hustle and bustle.

Phil Richardson Yellowmelen tutorial workshop Long exposure london optimist tshirt

These images were shot at f16 with a 5 second shutter delay. Using ND filters they help you to achieve the long shutter speeds required for a shot like this. 

Phil Richardson Yellowmelen long exposure in London

I used a .09 ND filter for these images but i do also own the Lee 10 stop Big stopper. Which is an amazing filter used to achieve really really slow shutter speeds.  

 

 

Many thanks

Lee

Facial Hair.

As a lot of you guys will know, i have just turned 30 yrs old. 

While i was away offshore with work it dawned on me that since i have started shaving (from about the age of 6!) i have never gone longer then 4 days without being clean shaven.  With spending a month away at work i decided that i would not shave. 

Here are a couple of images of me playing around with some face hair.  

Lee Ramsden with a beard and clean shaven

 

Here is me going from a hairy creature to a clean suited individual.