Reign of Terroir Productions

Reign of Terroir Productions Reign of Terroir Productions is a photography and commercial film company based in Santa Cruz, Califo

In my experience, limited though it may be, there is one element most contemporary photographers fear: the 'Moment'. Dr...
04/03/2014

In my experience, limited though it may be, there is one element most contemporary photographers fear: the 'Moment'. Driven to excel by technological assistance alone, they are woefully unprepared for an instant, the spontaneous: a batted tear, an elusive smile, a revealing nod of the head. This, however, is what photography is all about…

A landscape can be grand or discrete. When the photo is sufficiently compelling, the viewer will not care provided one ...
03/28/2014

A landscape can be grand or discrete. When the photo is sufficiently compelling, the viewer will not care provided one simple rule is observed: Give your subject the respect it deserves. Observe it in all its detail.

The specifics: Canon EOS 5D, Mark lll, EF24-70mm, f/2.8L ll USM, ISO 160, 39mm, f/16, 1/1000 of a sec. Yes, the backlight was severe, so I set my 600EX-RT to minus 2 to compensate for the higher shutter speed.

Sometimes it is the small things… Here is a photo I took at sunset of a dog's ball left on the beach. A wave had carri...
03/20/2014

Sometimes it is the small things… Here is a photo I took at sunset of a dog's ball left on the beach. A wave had carried it in such a way as to leave a track in the sand. The photo would have been impossible without the use of a flash as I was shooting into the setting sun. The flash allowed me to shoot a fairly accurate f/stop of the sun while also bringing out the detail of the ball, a ball otherwise lit only from behind and, from my perspective, in complete shadow. Too much flash and its use could be too easily detected. I almost always shoot on the minus side to give just a 'kiss' to the object I wish to highlight.

As for particulars, it was shot at ISO 250, 24mm (with a Canon 24-70 f/2L ll USM), f/7.1, 1/160 sec. Flash was set, if memory serves, at -3.

As a practical matter, it sometimes happens that I don't know exactly what I am trying to achieve with a photograph. Th...
03/18/2014

As a practical matter, it sometimes happens that I don't know exactly what I am trying to achieve with a photograph. This pic is a fine example. It was taken at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk at sunset. What initially drew me to the composition was the extraordinarily 'busy' activity all around a few basic lines: 100s of visitors swarmed on the beach beyond (you can see the blue Lifeguard's station in the lower right), and inches below the frame line bounced the heads of energetic youth. But I loved the swoop to the tent, the color temperature of the dusk, and the contrasting pale blue of the station. So I spent long minutes attempting to find a successful frame excluding everything but the lines and colors I wanted. Just an experiment. Not a particularly successful image on its own. But keep in mind - my bit of advice today - that every scene is a photo opportunity, an invitation to new work, new ways of seeing. And so I tuck this photo into the archive, with many like it, to review for ideas to explore in the future.

I love to shoot with a wide angle lens, here a Canon 16-35mm f/2.8L ll. In this instance it helped provide movement to ...
03/15/2014

I love to shoot with a wide angle lens, here a Canon 16-35mm f/2.8L ll. In this instance it helped provide movement to an otherwise static shot. Composition matters, of course, which is why I framed in the corral gate. As for details, this photo was shot at 16mm, ISO 250, f/10, 1/60 with a 'kiss' from a 600 EX-RT flash. But beware of (unwanted) distortion when shooting at anything under 20mm !

Two angles of the same subject can, unsurprisingly, dramatically alter the viewer's perception. There are many reasons ...
03/14/2014

Two angles of the same subject can, unsurprisingly, dramatically alter the viewer's perception. There are many reasons for this, but perhaps most interesting, from a creative point of view, is the shared sophistication of what we might call the culture of sight. After decades of visual education - TV, movies, magazines - we all find ourselves with ready-made presuppositions as to how we are to read an image. Think of the intimacy of the close-up, the vastness created by the long shot, the situational distortion generated by the wide-angle lens. Photographers, no less that movie makers, understand this visual vocabulary, at least with respect to their own cultures. Though seemingly universal and fixed, it is not necessarily so. For there is an often stark divide between content creators and viewers, especially when the viewer 'shares' in the experience a photographer has captured in an image. Take these two photos of a hooded jacket snagged on a fence I took along the Texas-Mexico border. These images attempt to say something about hardship and risk for the general viewer who shares similar visual values. One image is intimate, detailed and 'in your face', so to speak; the second is more remote, generating a sense of merciless solitude and abandonment. But what if, as surely happens, select viewers of images like these have themselves attempted to illegally cross the border ? Then the meaning dramatically shifts from the general to the biographical. The point here is to see photographs as mediation between dominant cultural values and personal experience, frames with permeable boundaries of meaning.

Hello again from the good offices of Reign of Terroir Productions (my living room, essentially). A word about shooting ...
03/13/2014

Hello again from the good offices of Reign of Terroir Productions (my living room, essentially). A word about shooting jpeg vs Raw. If your camera provides you a choice, then ALWAYS shoot Raw. Simple enough; but why, you ask? Raw is not an acronym but means exactly that: it is the unprocessed (raw) output from each and every red, green and blue pixel on a camera's sensor. A jpeg, by contrast, passes through a series of filters, some of which a photographer has preselected and others which the camera's brain automatically chooses: white balance, saturation, contrast, sharpness, so-called 'Scenes' etc. All of these filters (or modifiers) FIX the image such that post-production becomes nearly impossible. If, for example, you had you camera set to 'Sunlight' and then you took a photo under artificial lights of a restaurant, your subject would have a distinctive green or orange cast, depending on the type of resto light. Now try to fix it so that the subject appears 'natural'. Good luck! The white balance can hardly be altered; and this is one of the reasons food shots often look so awful. Who'd want to eat that pale green chicken ?

Had you shot that same photo in RAW, you could easily change the white balance on your computer. Same with the contrast and the saturation. Indeed, you can increase or decrease your f/stop as well. Shooting in RAW simply gives you maximum flexibility to render on your computer the subject/location as accurately as you perceived it. Jpeg is largely a finished image. Nearly all the processing has already been performed within the camera itself.

Lastly, I almost always shoot on AWB (average white balance), though, strictly speaking, inasmuch as I shoot RAW, it really doesn't matter. However, if you have a client standing by or wish to enjoy the immediate gratification digital cameras provide, then shooting in AWB will guarantee a presentable image on your camera's LCD screen.

If your camera does not offer RAW, then shooting on AWB is the best you can do.

Hope this helps improve your shooting!

Let's take a moment to talk about copyright protection. First of all, though copyright is automatically bestowed upon a...
03/13/2014

Let's take a moment to talk about copyright protection. First of all, though copyright is automatically bestowed upon an original image, there are numerous caveats, the most important being enforcement. Proper protection can mean the difference between severely limited legal options and five-figure settlements. Though I do not know the procedures and methods of other countries, every US-based photographer (our laws are particularly robust) must do either of two things, preferably both: 1) Register images with the US Library of Congress, Copyright Office and ask for Form VA and/or 2) Mark each image with a copyright symbol: ©. On the flip side, subjects have rights too, as with the fellow in this photo. Though I was in Turkey and working in a journalistic capacity, I was nevertheless in his business space where he has the final say as to whether I can use his image for commercial remuneration. Inasmuch as I did not explicitly request he sign a release (I did not have one with me), I cannot, therefore, use his image for financial gain. Remember, in this digital era of open theft of intellectual property, it is important to remember that a photographer can hardly complain over unauthorized use of their image if they themselves openly exploit the good will of others. In other words, as your mother told you, honesty is the best policy.

12/17/2013

Good story, good photos (by yours truly). Away for a few months, I'll be back here shortly with more advice and commentary. Read on…

When shooting farmworkers, remember two things. They are challenged by a language barrier and have no idea how social m...
10/11/2013

When shooting farmworkers, remember two things. They are challenged by a language barrier and have no idea how social media works. Though I've secured releases, still I wonder...

Small barn
09/26/2013

Small barn

Sometimes you have only moments to frame and shoot, certainly if you work, as I do, in the journalism/documentary tradit...
09/12/2013

Sometimes you have only moments to frame and shoot, certainly if you work, as I do, in the journalism/documentary tradition. Beyond posing and passive subjects, capturing the real world's rush, the ever-changing pulse of life, that to me is the most rewarding kind of photography.

Here we have a farmworker, one of crew of 10, carrying a bucket of brussels sprouts to a tractor-trailer just behind me.

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