Introduction to Light Painting Photography Technique

Tutorial and video on how to make pictures using the light painting technique more here…

Lighting Up the Night

My other go to place for great photography is The Atlantic, another one you should bookmark for the future. This week they have images on the theme of Lighting up The Night

Around the world, people are using light to paint, perform, honor, work, and play. In villages and cities alike, lanterns and candles are used to celebrate and commemorate events. In Berlin, famous landmarks are currently being illuminated for the annual Festival of Lights. In Florida, a private spacecraft climbed into orbit atop a pillar of fire, and around the globe, dozens of buildings were bathed in pink for breast cancer awareness month. Gathered here is a handful of recent images of humans pushing back the dark and lighting up the night

Magician David Blaine performs his “Electrified: 1 Million Volts Always On” stunt in New York, on October 7, 2012. (Charles Sykes/Invision/AP)

Paper lanterns float on the Motoyasu River in front of the Atomic Bomb Dome (center) in Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 2012. Tens of thousands of people marked the 67th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, as a rising tide of anti-nuclear sentiment swells in post-Fukushima Japan. (Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images)

Runners and walkers wearing light emitting suits and holding light sticks make their way up Arthur’s Seat as part of a dress rehearsal of a mass participation public art piece called “Speed of Light” on August 8, 2012 in Edinburgh, Scotland. The piece which forms part of the annual Edinburgh Festival is set to illuminate the iconic natural monument as hundreds of people make their way up and around, creating streaks of light as they go. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Go here to see another 30 of these special images

1000 photography links, tutorials, photographers, new camera reviews – posts

Would you believe that in the last 20 months we have made 1,000 posts about photography, wow seems like it was only a few weeks ago we dipped our toes into the world of blogging. Urged on by our favourite music blogger The Recommender to get stuck in, to share our knowledge and passion about photography; to spread the word and to bring the best photographs, photographers, tutorials, camera reviews, information about exhibitions and the wonder of the world of photography to those who care, you. Since October 2010 we have had over 120,000 views, our highest day was 957, I guess we must be doing something right some of the time.

©Steve McCurry – this is probably The Great Steve’s most famous picture but you should go and see his other work start here

We have had a look at our stats and rather encouragingly find that there is as much interest from you in the fantastic photographers we have brought to your attention as there is in cameras and tutorials. A good healthy mix we think.

Here is a list of the top 12 posts the highest has got over 6,000 views

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/top-10-compact-cameras-2011/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2010/12/14/light-painting/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2012/03/14/photographer-nan-goldins-best-shots-from-the-guardian/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/07/27/duane-michals-sequences/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/12/06/best-superzoom-bridge-cameras-2011/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/04/14/15-digital-point-and-shoot-cameras-used-by-pro-photographers/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/nikon-d800-review/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/cecil-beaton-photographer/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/09/05/steve-mccurry-london-exhibition-07092011-24092011/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/11/04/20-free-photography-ebooks/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2011/01/24/9-crazy-cross-eye-3d-photography-images-and-how-to-make-them/

https://oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com/2012/04/25/google-photography-prize-winner-viktor-johansson/

The top aggregated photographer, that is the most views across all the posts we have made is Steve McCurry this link should get you to all the articles where we have mentioned Steve

The interesting thing we have found is how many of you are interested in the less obvious photographers, Duane Michals comes top for visits to a single post, Cecil Beaton, Nan Goldin and Dorothea Lange all feature heavily, I am sure you never thought you would see those 4 names in the same sentence.

Top camera before and after it’s release was the Nikon D800

The most viewed tutorial was on Light Painting

Our most favourite sources for finding the best photography on the web, and in no particular order are:

Lightstalking, fantastic for tutorials, tips, ideas, features

Digital-Photo-School similar to Lightstalking and also from Australia

Cambridge In Colour for the most sophisticated and intelligent tutorials

The Denver Post for some of the best photojournalism around

The Atlantic, same as The Denver Post, fantastic images from around the world

The British Journal of Photography, just the most complete magazine for photographers

The Pixelated Image blog, David DuChemin is just the man, what a photographer an eye with soul

Photo Tuts for Photoshop and Lightroom tutorials

DP Review, where you find out about cameras, the best review site

Steve’s Digicams, as DP Review a great place to find out about cameras

Tripwire Magazine, we like this for general articles on photography

Magnum, the world’s most famous photo agency, we love this bit Magnum In Motion

Photography Served, a place for finding new photographers with great work

Photography Now, such a beautiful site showcasing the works of the masters of photography

There are undoubtedly lots more we could include here but if you are a regular to our site you will know who we love as inspiration and as a source of great articles.

We have had such great response to the articles we post, the sharing is the thing, finding what is wonderful and putting it out there. We greatly appreciate hearing from you and would welcome more ‘finds’ from you, would consider articles or portfolios you may wish to share with the thousands of like minded people we reach. Here is to the next 1000 posts

Keith Barnes, Oxford School of Photography

35 Stunning Examples of Long Exposure Photographs

Most photography uses extremely fast shutter speeds, only allowing light into the camera for a fraction of a second, but when longer exposures are used there can be some remarkable results. Static objects are revealed in heightened detail, while anything moving becomes a blur.Long exposure photography entails using a long-duration shutter speed to sharply capture the stationary elements of images while blurring, smearing, or obscuring its moving elements.

The ability to take long exposures requires a user to use a tripod for optimum results (of course, some people prefer the hand shake look). The use of a tripod is essential because the inability for the human hand to stay still is truly remarkable. No matter how good you get, it will be very hard to hand hold a 1 second shutter release without very noticeable blur. As well as a tripod (or monopod in some cases could work), a photographer should make use of the timed shutter release. This will allow the user to set the shot up, and set a timer to release the shutter. Most cameras have the option of one or more timed shutter releases, for example my Canon 40D has a 2 second and 10 second wait. I usually use the 2 second release as this gives you just enough time to get your hands off the camera to not bump the shot. This is even more important on longer shutter times.

The technique of ‘light painting’ is the use of a long exposure while moving a light through a dark scene, recording the light source’s path, or shining light onto objects in the frame to highlight them. Enjoy the great examples below and get out their and experiment with your camera taking long exposures.  by Dustin Betonio ….…..more here

More Lightpainting examples

There are another 40 photographic artists showing their lightpainting work here

Light Painting Photography, 18 of the Worlds Best Artists Painting With Light

Light Painting Photography has been around since 1914 when Frank Gilbreth first use the form to study the motion of manufacturing and clerical workers. Light painting photography is also known as light painting, light drawing, light writing, light graffiti, light art, light art performance photography, LAPP, camera painting, and kinetic photography. All of these names are, in one form or another, long exposure photography. In Light Painting Photography the artist is leaving the shutter of the camera open for an extended period of time and using various lights to create color and design within the frame. Shutter speeds for light paintings can vary anywhere from 5 seconds up to 5 hours or more. To be a true light painting photograph the image must be created in one single frame without any post production manipulation whatsoever, a.k.a. NO PHOTOSHOP. Proper light painting photographs are known as SOOC or straight out of camera. This is a list of 18 of the worlds best light painting photographers.

Troy Paiva: Troy has been capturing his imagery since 1989 and is best known for his light painting work of abandon building and places that America has lost to time.

Dean Chamberlain: Dean began light painting in the late 70′s and has created stunning portraits of well known individuals such as David Bowie and Paul McCartney.

See the rest of the 18 here on the Tripwire Magazine site

Light Painting in Houston by Andy Hemingway

These photos were taken at an abandoned parking garage in downtown Houston.…more

Andy Hemingway’s Portfolio

Rune Guneriussen photography working with lights

Rune Guneriussen, born 1977, in Norway. Education from Surrey Institute of Art & Design in England. Live and work in eastern Norway. Is an artist working in the transition between installation and photography. As a conceptual artist he works site specific primarily in nature, but also with more manmade structures. The isolation of objects are turned in to installations, most of these are not seen by audience, but only photographed.

Unique urban and industry photography – Christian Stoll

“Since 1991 Chris­t­ian Stoll has been work­ing as a free­lance pho­tog­ra­pher, now shut­tling between the two worlds of New York city and Düs­sel­dorf, Ger­many. In past years Stoll’s pho­tog­ra­phy has been a major influ­ence on the cor­po­rate image of global com­pa­nies like Gen­eral Electrics, IBM and Microsoft. With­out being com­pelled to show great­ness, he nonethe­less suc­ceeds in mak­ing great­ness vis­i­ble with his archi­tec­tural set­tings and inte­rior shots. In his still life pho­tographs even the most banal objects undergo a meta­mor­pho­sis, which may be the result of inten­sive dig­i­tal pro­cess­ing, which trans­forms them into objects of desire. Chris­t­ian Stoll works for numer­ous global brands and com­pa­nies and for their net­work­ing com­pa­nies and cre­ative agencies.”

Yeah whatever his pictures are good though see more here

Tips for Light Painting

Light painting is one of the most searched topics on the blog, so any help I can give should be well received, here is a post with 10 tips to help you do it better plus a video if you prefer……..”Light painting is an incredibly fun technique in which photographers use flashlights, camera flashes, and spotlights to literally paint light into a scene.  It’s one of the most fun night photography techniques.  Many photographers have attempted it, but only a few have mastered it (and I’m admittedly NOT one who has mastered it).  Nevertheless, I want to share a few things that I have learned while trying out light painting.”……...more tips here

Here’s the daddy of all light painting images