Lesson one: What's in the bag?

2011-12-09T17:53:00.000-08:00

First up is the camera bag. Just like cell phones I am never completely happy with any bag I have ever owned, I have came close. But there is always another one that would work better. A camera bag is a very personal choice. All in all I rarely buy a new one. If I find one that serves my purpose I stick with it until either I out grow it or wear it out. My current camera bag, a Lowpro 250 backpack, has been put through some rough treatment. Once floating out on the surf at Jekyll Island. But I still have it and it serves my purpose well.

One reason I rarely change is that I think it is important to have a well organized bag. One where I know where everything is and I can use in the dark and on the fly. One I am use to. You would think that when you were shooting a landscape, a static image, that you would have all the time in the world but the opposite is true. When you are dealing with a sunrise or sunset you are dealing with only a few seconds. Lighting and elements change quickly and being able to change or clean lens and filters in a hurry is a must. That's why I like a well organized bag. Many times I work in the dark being able to reach in the bag and grab what I need helps.
Ahh, The camera. I currently am using a Sony a77. After years of shooting Olympus I have moved to Sony. As far as lenses my main lens is a Sony 18-55mm. What most photographers would call a walk around lens. A good purpose shoot almost anything lens. If I could I could get by with this lens and never use another one. But most landscape photographers sooner or later will add a wide lens to the bag. My wide lens is a Sony 11-18mm. It gets use about 50% of the time to be honest.

Next the Coking grad filter system. The one single tool that has really improved my images. The Cokin grad filter increases the dynamic range of my DSLR by one to three stops by reducing the light of the sky while keeping the foreground bright. You can put the Cokin filter holder on different size lenses with just the cost of the right size adapter ring. Also unlike threaded filter I can adjust the gradient by sliding the filter up or down and even rotate it. I have even used them upside down when shooting a night scene when I was trying to reduce the light in the foreground instead of the sky. I highly recommend a Cokin grad. I know many photographers that had rather make HDRs but I am a firm believer in getting things right in the field and not taking chances on something I am not sure of. With a little patience and practice there is almost no need for an HDR 90% of the time. I do the biggest part of my work with a two stop grad. I could really live without the others.

I have two filter holders. One for a wide angle lens. Shorter to prevent vignetting and a standard Cokin holder that can hold up to three filters for filter stacking. I very rarely stack filters.
Other than that the only thing left I carry, a wireless shutter release for self portraits but more important to fire the shutter without camera shake. Most of the time I will just set the two second timer. I'll get more into that when we get out in the field.

A wireless flash. A dummy flash with a wireless remote trigger. I use these along with colored gels for night time shooting. But i'll get into how I use the flashes later.
Gloves with the tips of the thumbs and index finger cut out. Flashlight, batteries, memory cards a cellphone with a GPS and pain relievers.
There you have it. My landscape kit. Next a lesson in landscaping.

Introduction

2011-12-04T18:34:00.000-08:00

Hi, My name is Greg McCary. I am a maintenance tech/amateur photographer and Olympus Moderator at photographyreview.com. I have been taking and studying landscape and street photography for about five years. Most of what I have learned was from the great photographers at Photography Review, Internet photographers and books. Oh, I am 52 years old if that matters.
When I first got serious with photography I put myself on a five year plan to get where I wanted to be. To develop my style, be comfortable with what I was doing and enjoy photography with a deeper understanding. I came up with the figure five because one of my biggest inspirations, Gary Heller from New York, had started five years before me and was one of the most influential landscape, urban, photographers I had seen on Photography Review or even the Internet for that matter.
Because of all the help that I have recieved over the years and that lately people have been asking me "How do you do that?" I thought that I would create a blog and answer some of those questions and also do the same for others as Gary and a few others have done for me. But be for warned that you have to have thick skin and a keen mind to live through the hard nose critiques and be able to pick out what is helpful and what is not. But I certainly advise joining a forum with photographers you admire and joining in some friendly critiques. It is one of the best things you can do and will shorten the learning process by many years. But also be warned not all photographers are going to share with you all of their tricks. They are liken to magicians with a bag of magic. Don't be surprised if they never show you their out of camera pre PhotoShop images.
I would name all of my inspirations but they are many, some of them I only know by there Internet name and sure as I did I would forget one or two.

So what am I going to do here in this blog? Well I am going to take you through the process, my process, right or wrong I will show you first hand how I make a picture. Make, because there is a lot more to it than just taking a picture. The story is not over when you take it. I will go from packing the bag, picking a subject and how I approach it, shoot it and then bring the RAW file home and process it on the computer, display it on the Internet and share it.

The first Lesson will be. "What's in the Bag,?" I will go though what equipment I have and why I use it. I am going to show you with no holding back what's in my bag of magic. I hope you enjoy the course.

Landscape Photography 101

Lesson one: What's in the bag?

Introduction