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Hints of light and composition for photography of nature and adventure
Composition – composing is the strongest and most beautiful way of forming an image, and usually you can reach it by the simplest way. The photographer must organize the shapes despite all the confusion around him. Lots of photos are shy, with the main subject occupying a small area of the photographic field, lost amid lots of informations and distractive backgrounds. One of the ways of composing stronger images is filling the picture with the subject, getting closer to it, be it physically, or with the zoom lenses.
Everything moves in the world, every being on the whole planet. The photo freezes the moment, and for lacking movement, it’s necessary to use means that transmit this feeling. Check out some hints:
- overlapping of surfaces
- diagonal lines that cross the picture
- curved lines in diagonal
- accompaniment of the person’s or animal’s movement with obturator’s low speed, leaving the background blurred.
- Repetition of lines or shapes. This recourse confers rhythm to the photo, like the drums do to music, and rhythm induces to movement.
There are a few rules that theoretically guarantee an equilibrated photo. The most famous is the golden ratio, a finding of the Greeks that proportionates harmony, being even called divine ratio. In photography, this concept was applied through the thirds rule. Which splits the photographic field in 9 equal rectangles by 2 vertical lines and 2 horizontal lines. It’s suggested that the lines or main subjects of the images should be placed along those lines, and preferably over its intersection points. So, for example, on a picture of a boat on the sea, the horizon line could stay over the vertical line that occupies the third of the right.
Other useful hints for image composition:
- white, clear stains or light distract attention from the observer, specially if they are close to the edges, taking away the attention from the main subject
- diagonals direct the eyesight to the photo’s main theme
- High horizons give the idea of proximity, low horizon the inverse.
- When simpler is the photo’s contents, bigger will be the attention given to the central object
- Confusing and unorganized photos won’t please almost anyone’s senses
- Sometimes, a few steps back, a higher point of view, a focus deviation to the left, or an object on foreground, can make a lot of difference
- Naturally framing the photo, using, for example, logs, leaves or roots on the margin of the photographic field, the darkest possible, as if you were looking from an environment to the outside. This recourse takes our vision in the photo.
Most of the photos are taken horizontally, which is the most comfortable position to hold a camera and the closest way we see the world – binocular vision. Although it’s easier to photograph horizontally, it’s worth a try taking vertical pictures. It’s also interesting to take inclined pictures, which transmits dynamism, but if a lot of photos are inclined it becomes uncomfortable to watch them and it looks like a photographer’s defect.
Another question refers to the loss of the scale sensation, which isn’t able to transmit the size of a waterfall or a rock formation. A solution is to use a reference element, being the human being the most common. It’s recommended that by using a person on the landscape, it has to be done in a discreet and subtle way, so it can be recognized as a person, but not be recognized who the person is. Also, good scale references are animals, trees, boats, bicycles. Scale makes the photo to be recognized more easily, because it humanizes it, and brings the observer to feel himself in it.
Light – to confirm the importance that light has to photography, it’s enough to analyze the word itself that originates from the greek foto=light, grafia=drawing or writing. On open air photography, on which light is not totally on my command, I must first read what the light is writing and translate it on the photo produced. Observing how objects modify themselves as the light modifies itself is a great way of learning. We can’t talk about a right or wrong light, but a more adequate one, impactful or expressive. Shadows usually harm the details and make the scene confusing, but may be the attention focus or the reason of the photo itself.
Normally the best hours for photographing are the first in the morning or the afternoon’s final – the light is smoother, the shadows are longer, the tones more orange or yellow, the more active animal life, and the cleaner atmosphere. The sun’s incidence angle varies according to the season and the country’s region. On winter, the sun doesn’t actually reaches high, so when more to the south, the favorable hours to photographing are longer.
The twilight, brief period after the sunset and before nightfall can offer big surprises in terms of light and colors, always worth waiting a little more after sunset, before putting away the equipment.
The sun’s position relative to the photographer is also determinant. With the sun at the back, the light is frontal and flat, revealing few of the saliencies or depth, sometimes projecting the photographer’s shadow on the scene. Slightly altering the horizontal angle, in other words, letting the sun focus more sideways, highlighting more the textures and the volumes. With the sun in front of the photographer, big , dark areas appear but the plants become bright and colorful, creating beautiful effects. For the sun not to focus directly over the lenses creating feathering or internal reflections, use parasol or another shield, or just let a little sunshine appear between leaves and branches.
Inside the forests, choose the smooth light that comes from a cloudy, rainy day, or close to sunrise. In days of strong sunlight, the light that penetrates the jungle creates a confusion of big lights and shadows that interfere on the already confusing existing visual of plants and greens. It’s important the use of tripods since the expositions are long due to the lack of light going to the ground.
Just like jungles, rivers, waterfalls and water courses usually get better registered under the smooth light, since it provides the use of long exposures to create fog effects. With half speed or less, the water movement creates traces that evoke suavity, speed, time.
Although the popularity and admiration generalized by the sunset, in a general way this magical hour of the day is not well explored. People think that you must go to a totally open and tall place to capture the vastness of the moment, but if there is nothing attractive besides the sun, the image can become trivial and uninteresting. The most important thing is to find a good first plan, in other words, something that has a pretty shape in silhouette – normally there will be trees, palm trees, people, animals.
Fabio Colombini
The Ten Commandments of Nature Photography
1 - You shall have no other gods before Me – The first and most important of the commandments is also the root of nature photography. Having God as an author, origin, source of all creation, you see in nature the concrete manifestation of God, and you shall have it as precious and sacred, object of love, that must be the main motivator of every nature photographer. The concepts of beauty and kindness associate themselves and become synonyms – what is beautiful is good, and what is good is beautiful.
2 – You shall not use the moments in nature in vain – Valuing nature in all of its importance dedicating yourself on a conscious, thorough and attentive exploration. Nature is beautiful by itself, but this doesn’t actually automatically guarantee beautiful pictures. It’s necessary to have a consistent technical, biologic and artistic formation. Using the adequate equipments, searching for better lights, angles, frameworks, so that every image could be produced as if it were the most important.
3 – Thy shall keep the Sundays and the times of nature – Knowing and respecting the nature cycles allows you to be in the right places in the right moments. Nature has its Sundays, its pauses, its time to bloom and time to dry, time to reproduce and time to save. Actions in nature don’t accelerate its rhythm the way the man has been doing with his life through technology – the patience to observe and waiting for the right moment is a gift of the nature photographer.
4 – Honor the Nature – Recognizing the grandeur and importance of nature in our lives, and searching with photography awake the love through nature on the biggest number possible of people – know to love, love to know. Respect the animals, their territories, strengths and fragilities, not unnecessarily exposing yourself to risks for ambition and vanity matters. Cultivate goodness and silence.
5 – Do Not Kill – The photographer must promote life, and the search for the best picture must not exceed the barriers of security for yourself and for the animals. The excessive approach, the modification of the environment, the manipulation of nests, are attitudes that can stress and even kill sensitive species. As a former of public opinion, the photographer can use the power of persuading of the image to avoid actions that destroy and kill nature.
6 – Thy shall not commit adultery against nature – The nature photographer must be consistent in his attitudes, acting as an example of conscious citizen, with responsible and sustainable consume, incentivizing recycling, actions of preservations in the environment, not accepting partnerships with corporations that harm the environment.
7 – Thy shall not steal images – At every moment wonderful things happen in nature, the cycles of the days, of seasons and life repeat themselves, even though they appear as news. The photographer must integrate himself to nature, living with it, capturing images in the form of complicity, and not with the spirit of thieving, of non-authorized withdrawal. The human being is usually an intruder and unwanted in nature – that the photographer doesn’t steal the tranquility and the balance of the environment.
8 – Thy shall not raise fake testimonies – The truth is one of the main characteristics of nature photography. The modification of the elements of a photo, be it at the catching time, be it on digital manipulation with computer programs, can express lies in the scientific, documental or journalistic point of view. The search for aesthetic preciosity cannot surpass the limit of truth.
9 – Thy shall not desire the picture of another – Each photographer has his own moment, his formation, his capacity, his opportunities and limits. The most beautiful photos are conquered to be admired and praised, not coveting for with destructive feelings of envy. Every image has its importance and accomplishes a function, be it obtained by a child beginner or a worldwide renowned professional.
10 – Thy shall not desire the goods of another – Photography is an extremely healthy way of having nature with us without the necessity of appropriating it, like keeping exotic birds in cages or removing native orchids from nature. Another expression of wishing the things of others can be manifested by the wish of possessing the equipment or the virtues of other photographers, which is a grave form of sadness.
The seven capital sins of nature photography
Greediness – Nature photography requires physical preparation and flexibility to precarious situations. The excessive value to food is not consistent with the simplicity of feeding and efforts to which the photographer is submitted. With the observation of nature itself, you learn how to feed from the essential
Avarice – Nature is a good to mankind, and the gift to photography must be put in service of it. Therefore you must avoid the temptation of obtaining more and more photos only for your own delight or financial gain, but putting them in service of community for education and sharing of knowledge.
Lechery – Letting yourself get involved by the great quantity of sensory stimulations that nature offers, can disturb the objective of synthesis and communication that the photographer must express on his photographies. Sensibility, concentration and organization are factors for a clear and impactful message to be captured on the luxuriant (exuberant) nature.
Rage – It’s not advisable to get angry with the misfortunes that nature imposes us. The lost pictures, the unfavorable and punishing climatic conditions, the difficulty of finding certain animals and plants – we must face with challenges the inheriting difficulties by working with living beings.
Envy – It’s a virtue to get happy with your own work, thanking the possibility of being in nature, admiring and registering its beauties. The works developed by the other photographers must serve as inspiration, reference and motivation, in a positive way, never for wishing the other’s misfortune.
Laziness – Not letting yourself get dominated by laziness, to impose yourself the necessary effort to obtain images, waking up really early, walking for long distances, carrying heavy equipment, facing heat, cold, and annoying bugs. The best hours for nature photography occur when most people are waking up or finishing their work.
Pride – It’s important to keep an attitude of humility before the nature, respecting its power and not considering it always available for our will. Also avoid considering yourself superior to the other photographers, since fame and glory are ephemeral and conceit.
Text published on Folha do Meio Ambiente, September/2011
God in Photography
One of the images that I kept from my childhood was a butterfly that fell on my house’s backyard one day. I remember its colors – yellow, orange and black – and I asked my mom how can it be so beautiful and colorful like that! Should have had six years at the time, and today, almost 30 years later, I can already formulate some answers using scientific informations that talk about natural selection, evolution, use of colors as defense against predators, mimicry, etc. However, the same question remains in my mind - can they be so beautiful and colorful like that?
When I was a teenager, at Mondays, on the school where I studied, my colleagues gathered telling the adventures the lived during the weekend, always related to nightclubs, shows, videogames and girls. On the other hand, I described facts like a magical encounter with an owl butterfly that surrounded me 3 times, showing flashes of blue until it land static on a log, and revealing the perfect drawing of an eye on its wing. And I thought: - What artist draws such perfect eyes?
The familiarity with nature at the time ended up being fundamental for my future career. Just telling my family and friends what I saw wasn’t enough. I felt the need of registering these moments, and for that I found photography. It was the best way for me to express myself, since I had no gift for drawing, or for oratory, or for writing. I believe that it was a hereditary influence from my grandfather Ulysses, who also liked photography a lot.
For me, the great triumph for photography is the sharing. Being able to be close to the beautiful things of nature was really good, but even better, was being able to share what I saw with other people. Obviously this romantic side walked together with a deep and long personal effort of learning technique and aesthetics.
I completed the superior course of architecture and attended for less than a year the publicity and advertisement one. What’s interesting is that during these 5 years of college, I rarely opened a magazine of architecture, while I devoured the photography ones, being an assiduous frequenter of the zoology’s college library.
The familiarity with nature thanks to the photographer profession is something really rewarding, although photography is really different than walking. Photography requires high concentration and dedication, physical sacrifices by carrying heavy equipment in long treks, tolerating heat, cold, humidity, bug bites, crawling on the ground and living moments of tension in few minutes or even seconds that you have to register a scene for which you waited for hours or days, besides the money invested to be there.
The biggest reward for this contact with nature is being able to have a bigger proximity with God, because it is palpable source of His wonderful creator power. Besides, throughout the years, I lived some episodes that clearly showed me His presence. One of them was in Brejo da Cruz, on ParaĂba, in a really poor and dry region. Public transportation is scarce, being really common people asking for a ride along the road. I got a bit afraid of transportating someone I didn’t know in an also weird region, but by seeing a nun who asked for a ride, I stopped, since I trusted her figure. I took her to a farm where she was going to help a child that was really sick. She asked me to leave her on the road, at the entrance of the property, but since there was still 2 kilometers left to the headquarters, I made sure I would take her there. On the way there I saw a really beautiful rock formation, covered with xique xique cacti, composing a beautiful image of Brazil’s northeast region’s caatinga. After dropping her, I stopped to photograph the scene, which resulted in a fine picture, published numerous times. I took this fact as an example that a good action can result on an immediate reward. Another episode happened at the Cassino Beach, in Rio Grande do Sul. There is a rusty structure of a ship that went aground on that beach, and today it’s a touristic site, due to the poetic image that it provides. But this ship is 11 miles from the city, this stretch being traversed on the beach, crossing a lot of streams that flow into the sea. At the moment I began this route the tide was high, which made me get too close to a quagmire. The car fell on an extremely humid and soft sand, sinking to the engine. The sun was setting and the beach was completely deserted, for being a winter weekday. Seeing the difficult situation I was, I fervently asked God to send someone to help me. 20 minutes later He sent not one, but 12 fishermen (any resemblance with the 12 apostles can be mere coincidence). The situation on which my car was in was such, that twelve men pushing and a truck pulling had a lot of difficulty on taking it off the sand.
God has also sent me lots of great pictures. Once, at the Pantanal, walking in search of animals, I found a local villager and stopped to chat a little. He told me he just saw an anaconda next to a nearby house. I went there, but instead of getting good pictures of the anaconda, which was small (2 meters long), I got sensational photos of birds that started to surround the snake, in an attitude of attack. There were a lot of species like bem-te-vis, blackbirds, cardinals, anis, that arrived in groups, in the anxiety to drive off that being that represented danger for them and their nests, not caring about my presence. I positioned myself behind the snake, and while I accompanied its movements, registering the birds on a hardly attainable distance. It was the end of the afternoon and the light was perfect. At the end of the job in intense and precious minutes, I felt great happiness and thanked God for the opportunity.
Besides those, several other experiences already happened, be it on my professional life or my personal life. I know that He is always present, helping me with pictures or getting me out of trouble, even when I’m not even thinking about him. There is no bigger satisfaction than recognizing this presence in our lives and in nature. And by the way, He is the artist that draws the eyes on the wings of the butterflies
Animal Photography
I believe that the most frequent question a nature photographer must hear is: “What equipment do you use?” This indicates me that, to most people, the equipment is the most important item for obtaining a good photo. Following this same reasoning, we could ask a pianist what piano does he play, or a writer what pen does he use. From the curiosity point of view they are acceptable questions, but they don’t go to the core of the artistic work. About the cameras, I say “Pentax”, but it wouldn’t make any difference saying Canon, Nikon, Hasselblad, Olympus…
What really makes a good photo is whoever is behind the machine. Of course the equipment is also important. The pianist wouldn’t be able to demonstrate all his talent with a tuneless piano. The writer would lose his concentration if his pen failed suddenly. Likewise, the photographer needs reliable equipment, with precision, with optical quality. It is necessary that the model is a top line of a famous brand, or the machine with the biggest speed or the most functions, or the lens with the biggest aperture.
I suggest that the equipment evolves with the photographer. With time and experience the real needs for each kind of picture are discovered. You can feel the need of a motor-drive to concentrate yourself more on the photo, from a mirror lock to prevent shaking, to a fixed focal distance lens instead of a zoom, from a macro lens instead of an approximation lens.
When I started to photograph I had a Flexaret, machine of two objectives, just like a Roleiflex, models often used for marriage photos. The problem is that I really wanted to do macro photography with it. For such, I really juggled, adapting lens from a kit to assemble optical devices, predicting the focus and compensating the mistake of parallax with a ruler, and calculating the exposure with a photometer, all of this to photograph an alight firefly at night. The result? Great for that moment, bad for today, but fundamental for my development.
Just like how we get more skilled to deal with machines, lenses and diaphragms, our look also evolves, altering the perception about our own work. I considered my first photos really good, however throughout the years they looked worse and worse. At the same proportion, the pictures of great professionals looked better and better. That’s because since the beginning I always searched for inspiration at the works of the best brazilian photographers and specially foreign. And today still I search, but only with the grateful satisfaction to know my work has been serving as inspiration many that are beginning now. From great pictures, just like great paintings, you always learn a lesson. Even if we don’t understand them, we are sensitized and marked by it. The more we evolve visually, the more we can understand them and know how to use this understanding in our won works, but in a personal and original way.
Therefore, the most important is not the equipment, but how I see through it. The good photographer can see the world in a unique way. His mind is attentive, thorough, creative, searches beauty and balance.
It’s common to hear from great animal photographers that the preoccupation with photographic techniques are, for them, even more relegated to a second plan, while the priority stays with understanding nature. In other words, every photographer must be some kind of biologist. It will be decisive for the success of a work, knowing what is a determined animal’s favorite place, at which hour he’s the most active, what he eats, if he has good hearing or good vision, what attracts him and what scares him. You must know how to distinguish him from his place, once almost all the animals are camouflaged, disguised, hidden in nature. Every patch of grass can look like an anteater, every leaf can look like a long-horned grasshopper. Time and practice will help on eyesight training, just like the hearing one, also really useful to understand and identify the species.
Even with all the biologic knowledge acquired, it will be difficult to find the animals in the ideal situation for photography. This will require time, perseverance and PATIENCE, besides a lot of tolerance for failures. By waiting, for example, several hours for a toucan to get back to the nest, a few questions arise, like: - Is the toucan really coming back? Why won’t the mosquitoes go away? Is this photo that important? Isn’t it better for me to go back and change these wet shoes and take these ticks off my body? In case the photographer resisted to these discomforts and got the picture, there will be still the comments from friends about how good life is in nature photographing animals.
However, if the toucan from the previous example doesn’t come back, isn’t the presence of the photographer bothering him? Here comes the ethics of animal photography, which consists on knowing how to respect the limits that can put risk to their lives or yours. Birds can simply abandon their nests and their offsprings if they feel threatened. And any animal can be dangerous if followed and cornered. You must have in mind that almost all animals are scared of humans. After all they have been hunted for generations and generations. Only the ones that lived isolated for a long time, like in the Antarctic and oceanic islands, are tolerant to our presence. They still don’t know the destructive potential of humans.
To assist the achievement and evaluation of a great image of an animal, I consider that it must reunite the following items: *Precise focus and distinctness; *Harmonic, daring, creative framework; *Objectivity, organization, clarity of information; *Pleasant and natural light; *Subject in activity – eating, mating, hunting, jumping; *Pleasant background, that highlights the animal or inserts him in his surroundings: *Healthy, beautiful animal; *Expressivity on the look; *Harmony between the colors of the picture, accentuating a climate.
Remember that a good photo doesn’t need explanations or excuses, and that the most difficult picture to obtain is not always the best. In the end, the image must thrill, pull phrases like: - Such light! What luck! How did you get this scene!? Where do you find these animals!?
And even: - What beautiful picture! What equipment do you use?
Text published in Photo & Camera Explorer Magazine, feb/2000.
Lights, Camera and Sensibility
Observe and orchid flower. The petals, the strength of translucent colors produced by the sun, the curvature of the stalk, the bugs that look for it and the delicate relation of dependence between them. Everything is on our reach, graciously available. Even beings whose beauty is not so evident, like a grass flower, in its simplicity and perfection, keeps precious details, like the dew drops that get stuck on leaves and compose an unique and ephemeral. Inside all of us, mind, heart and sensibility align to investigate nature. The careful observation is the first step to notice the beauty. Happy is the one that doesn’t tire of getting enchanted by the details of life, gets thrilled with the growing of a bracken sprout, sees symphonies written on the wings of butterflies or feels little before the abilities of a dragonfly.
How can one stay impavid knowing the diversity and profusion of life inside a tropical forest? How not to be moved before a sea turtle, sole survivor among around 1000 offsprings, who many years later returns to the beach where it was born to spawn? How not to philosophize about life by encountering a creeping and almost blind being, that, after retiring inside a cocoon and having its body liquefied and reconstructed, gets reborn as a butterfly?
Photography exerts an important role in the revelation of this wonderful world, capturing and eternalizing cuts and moments. Behind the camera is the one who goes searching, studying, interpreting, putting all the sensibility and technique to frame and press the button at the right moment. The manner that you will be doing this is particular, like a reflex of perceptions, beliefs, thoughts, experiences, informations and influences received. My photography is like this, the pure reflex of how I see the world.
My life as a professional photographer began in 1988, but, before that, I already had ten years of precursor amateur incursions. I graduated in architecture by FAU-USP, and coursed a few years Publicity and Advertisement for ECA-USP. My favorite theme has always been macrophotography, which captures small details transforming them into grand pictures. The learning of photography came with numerous books of São Paulo city’s libraries, complemented by biology books – to understand with more depth the photographed subjects. I also learned a lot in the acquaintanceship with various professionals like biologists, ornithologists, photographers, field guides, photo agency directors, photography editors and iconographic, who accompanied me on the trek.
Along these 18 years of career I made numerous travels through Brazil – lots of treks in 21 states, 27 national parks and many other conservation units -, focusing most of our ecosystems. It was thousands of pictures produced, present today in more than 1400 books and available for on-line access. ***
In field work, it’s big the number of good images lost, especially when the focus are the animals. Where are they? Way before seeing them, a lot of them have already seen and smelled us, and so they run, fly, hide themselves. The fear of men is big and not without reason. Who doesn’t have patience and persistence soon gives up. Before a series of images from a travel, few know how many other were lost and how many were made and didn’t reach technical or aesthetical quality desired. Even the best photographers produce bad images, not due to lack of ability, but due to the difficulty and exigency degree that are attributed. It’s not enough to get the simple record of an animal; the photographer wants to get new angles, the best light, the most harmonic background, to register activities like feeding and reproduction, to surpass your own work.
Another question is the discomfort of the profession. The nature photographer is subject to the excessive heat and cold; uncomfortable attacks from all kinds of bugs; risk of contracting tropical diseases; attacks from dangerous and venomous animals; discomfort from wet clothes and shoes; cuts and scratches caused by thorns and rocks; the diverse non apparent conditions by admiring a picture, on which you have the impression that the photographer was relaxing in the paradise.
With this type of thorough and detailed photography, time and a lot of patience are required. I usually work alone, not tuning with the frantic rhythm and the interest of big excursionists groups. The knowledge and respect for nature makes the time to be a lot more enjoyed, since it directs the search for images to the time, place, hour and manners that are more adequate. Different from the conditions of light controlled by a studio, in nature it’s necessary to know how to take advantage of the existing conditions, which vary a lot through the day and the year. It’s even possible to predict the weather, but you can do nothing to modify it. Contrary to what you think, sunny days with blue skies are not always the best conditions for photography. In sunny or hot days, the best hours for photographing are the first of the morning and the last of the afternoon, which light is the most suave, the tones warmer; and the shadows highlight the textures and plains. Besides, birds and mammals usually concentrate activities on these periods. In the middle of the day, with the sun overhead, the lights are extremely harsh and contrasting, not causing a good visual effect in landscapes and living beings. In this period, insects and reptiles are more active, being easier to find them.
Cloudy days don’t usually produce good results in wider landscapes, like beaches and fields, but are ideal for inside the jungle, since the suave light highlights the shapes of the leaves and subtle nuances of the colors of the forest. They are also good days to photograph plants and animals, those being active during almost all the time.
The sunrise and sunset provide universally admirable scenes, however, the picture gets really interesting if there is any silhouette in the image, like an animal, a tree, palm trees, peculiar rock formations, or when they are reflected on the water of rivers, lakes or sea. Capturing this kind of image requires from the photographer the effort of getting out to the field at daybreak to be at the right place on which the sun rises.
Also in the case of macrophotography, it’s advisable to use natural light as much as possible, since nature lives under this light. When the sun is really strong, a light diffuser – it can even be a piece of tracing paper – softens and creates a suave atmosphere.
Knowing the climate of the region helps to plan the photographic expedition. So, there are better times of bug occurrence, of plants with more flowers, of construction of nests and bird reproduction. The rainy and dry seasons deeply determine the aspect of the landscape and the behavior of animals. At the Pantanal, for example, the dry season concentrates great quantities of birds at the lakes that are drying, and offers the spectacle of the ipes in blossom; on the other hand, at rainy seasons the activity of bugs explodes, and the landscapes get beautiful with the flooded lakes and fields.
Even with all the ability and experience of a professional photographer, if you can’t count on a good equipment, the job won’t have the same quality. On the other hand, the best and the most modern equipment doesn’t guarantee a good photograph.
Currently, there is a transition from conventional photography to the digital; and among the professionals there are still doubts, controversies and unresolved issues. The technology advances way too quickly, and the picture can change in a few time. As for the images of this book, 95% of them were produced originally in chromes of 35 mm or 6 x 7 cm; and the remaining 5% in digital.
The hints will be concentrated on the matter of the lenses, the soul of photographic quality.
To macrophotography, the ideal lens is the macro 100mm. The optical assembly is projected to render the maximum quality in this kind of picture; the focal distance allows the adequate zooming of the photographed subject, with the appropriate background normally very defocused and discrete. When bigger expansions are necessary, the capture details of butterfly wings or really small bugs, extension tubes or bellows, associated to a flash are essential.
Wide Angulars are adequate for landscapes, capture of the soil details and to give emphasis to the foreground against the background. A lens of 28mm will be convenient for most landscapes; the lenses of 15 or 16 mm can create interesting effects by exaggerating the perspective.
When you can’t get close to the subject, like birds, mammals and reptiles, the tele-objectives are mostly recommended. I consider the 400 mm lens ideal. The tele-objective of 600 mm eases the zooming in determined situations, however his weight, 7 kilos, added to another 7 kilos of the tripod, hampers movement and agility, being more adequate for waiting photos, like for example, in front of a nest.
Such values of focal distance refer to the format of 35 mm films. There are cameras which CDDs (charge-coupled device) are smaller than the film (photosensitive film) multiplying the value of the lens. So, a tele-objective of 400 mm can turn into a 600 mm one, being advantageous; and a wide angular of 24 mm into a 36 mm one, this not being so positive.
The zoom equipment works as if it was a lot of lenses into one, being really versatile and practical, but it doesn’t offer the same quality of the fixed lenses, being able to create unsatisfactory images for the more exigent professional. The maximum aperture of these lenses is also an important factor, since, when bigger, the brighter it is, and more possibilities of photos there are. Therefore, an objective of 300 mm f 2.8 is way brighter than a 300 mm f 5.6. On other hand, it’s way more expensive and heavy.
Tripod is primordial equipment for any kind of picture and lens. I estimate that only 20% of my production doesn’t use the tripod. It gives firmness impossible to reach with the hands only, and provides pictures under any light condition.
The flash can be really useful with bugs and small animals, however the light issued must be well controlled. When it’s pointed directly at the subject, it creates a frontal light relief, with harsh shadows and dark background. If it’s folded or softened, light will come in a soft way, steady and pleasant. For that end, I already built several disposable accessories with tracing paper, cardboard reflectors, also umbrellas and other gear. ***
The professional paths traversed until here were the result of several decisions and reflections, hits and misses. Ever since the beginning I recognize as fundamental the incentive and patronage of my parents, and also from my wife Edna, personal, professional and spiritual support. Materially speaking, our first years of work were difficult, being slow and gradual the process of formation and organization of the photographic collection, the conquest of clients and the solidification of the concept in the market. Above all I feel myself privileged to work with nature and observe the details, because in them I see the grandeur of God. His presence and His love involves us, gently like a breeze, in a constant enchanting and reenchanting for life.
Text published in the book Brazilian Nature in Detail, 2007.