With autumn around the corner we want to be out enjoying photography in the mild weather. We don't want to be bent over our computers spending hours nursing 'dead' photos back to life - the work on the photos below took about 10 minutes.
When you read through the captions below the pictures you might get a sense of what was done to get this photo where I wanted it to be.
It started by coming upon this spot while hiking in Lynn Canyon which is in my home town of North Vancouver, B.C. When making photographs in the forest I follow intuitions and the promptings coming from my surroundings, which could be sounds, feelings or just the way the spirit of a certain place speaks to me. That's what was done here, I set up the equipment, watched and waited.
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Lynn Canyon, North Vancouver, B.C.
ISO 100 - F16 - 1.6 seconds
The photo above is shown with no post processing - the tripod was positioned here because the light coming through the canopy was gorgeous, although I wasn't sure exactly what was going to be done with the composition; something about stairways fascinates me, so seeing them in the forest evoked a magical feel and sense of mystery that attracted me. When I heard some people coming up the trail behind me, it felt like including them could bring something really different to the scene. In a split second it was clear exactly what this picture was going to say; we are never alone in these forests.
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Lynn Canyon, North Vancouver, B.C.
ISO 100 - F16 - 1.6 seconds
I waited until they were both on the stairway before beginning the exposure - 1.6 seconds gave the image exactly the desired degree of blur to convey the concept - the sense of spirit beings moving through the woods.
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SPIRIT WALK
Lynn Canyon, North Vancouver, B.C.
ISO 100 - F16 - 1.6 seconds
However, something about the previous version (#2) of this image didn't work for me. The tree to camera left, originally included for framing, felt like a distraction to me now. The new cropping (above) was intended to place the tree camera right to act as an asymmetrical anchor for the image whilst the 'spirits' walking diagonally across the frame towards the upper left created an upward energy vector i.e. movement in the photo. This gave a balanced dynamic that works for me.
The aspect ratio has been changed from 2x3 , native, to the classic 4x5 which somehow seems to add a contained feeling of volume and presence to some images. We feel like we could just walk into the scene. Changing an aspect ratio (the proportions of the frame) can have subtle effects on an image that aren't readily noticed until the photo is shown at a much larger size. After cropping in Lightroom 5, clarity, vibrance, vignetting and sharpening were added to further enhance the luminosity and presence of the picture.
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SPIRIT WALK
Lynn Canyon ,North Vancouver, B.C.
ISO 100 - F16 - 1.6 seconds
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After all the work described above was done I was happy with the image but felt like playing in NIK Analogue Efex 2 'just to see'. The result, above, shows what the scene might look like had it been photographed with warm film in a camera like a Polaroid or Kodak Instamatic. I like playing with images in NIK software, however, it can be overdone, so I use Analog Efex mainly for personal work, like these photos made during a recent trip home.
