After processing the monster pano in the last post doing single images seems somewhat dull! However I liked this one quite a bit.
This was taken shot was take shortly after smashing the back screen protection on my 550D. I placed the tripod on a piece of wood board (in the foreground) and stepped on it as I moved. Cue slow motion camera falling to the ground in this trash strewn room – watching the camera decend all I could think was – ‘NOT THE LENS’! Luckily thefell on its back screen cover which is easily replaceable and the rest of the camera remained unharmed. I’ve learnt my lesson here.
I had another issue recently where the Canon wouldn’t start at all – turn camera on, no display / but it would focus but there was no indication in the viewfinder of exposure or aperture. this prompted me to do a bit of research on the net. Thinking that I had bricked the Canon I had to format an SD card, make it bootable with EOSCard and reload the firmware, this did the trick. In my search I came across MAGIC LANTERN. This promised to turn my $800 camera into’ a $2000 Monster’! I had tried ML before but wasn’t able to get it to work.
ML is aimed more at shooting movies with HD compatible DSLrs, however it has a couple of trick uses. One is an interval timer – you can shoot a time lapse untethered. Another is having zebra stripes that obviously indicate under and over exposed areas of an image enabling a sweet spot to be found. The biggest bonus for a Canon HDR shooter is the ability to take 13 images in one go – yes no more dicking about with changing the exposure wheel to get 9 shots and jogging the tripod! There are two limitations – one is that the camera has to be used in P / Tv or Av mode – manual mode does not work and that it wont expose longer than the 30 seconds max exposure.
I was super keen to try this out so went out on Saturday and Sunday and it worked a treat. Extra exposures give greater flexibility in selection of bracket images and of course you can eat your Haribo while its doing its thing!
If you want to try this – make sure you have the right Canon firmware installed and install the correct version of Magic Lantern. Of course if you brick your camera – its not my fault!
Click on the image for the full gallery and a larger version
Fantastic shot, Mark! I know the feeling of watching your camera slowly topple over…not a fun experience.
Super Grunge, love that perilous camera angle and the VERY dodgy-looking stain in the bath. I also really like the hints of blue right across the photograph.
This is an astonishing image. As Viveca mentions, that stain in the tub… nevermind, I don’t want to know… I love how you’ve isolated areas of the image to bring to the forefront for the viewer, and relegated other areas to the back… really great composition here, Mark, and the processing is just marvelous! I love this.