Back to the River #3 “The Lock”

May 8, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Back to my roots, HDR, Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography | Leave a comment

Hi,

Completing my trilogy of shots of the River Thames at East Molesey. I waited until the two Geese came into shot and then turned around at the closed lock gates and swam back. Still loving my one camera-one lens photography 🙂 . As per usual 5-frame handheld HDR, E-M1 and Lumix 20mm f/1.7 lens.

All the best

Leigh

Battery charging when travelling, better safe than sorry.

May 8, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, Photography, Photography equipment, Travel | 12 Comments

Hi everyone,

I’m pleased to say that my new USB battery chargers for my camera batteries and 18650 batteries performed very well during my recent trip having tested them out first before leaving home. Having USB charging for one’s devices and a good multi-port charging hub area a real boon. The hotel room, unlike some that I’ve stayed in, had two mains sockets, luxury!! 🙂 so there was still one free whilst charging my various batteries and devices. Being able to charge five USB devices simultaneously is such a great time saving feature.

It can be a really annoying waste of time plugging in and out multiple mains-powered battery chargers and sitting around waiting for batteries to charge, apart from their increased bulk and weight, I never leave any rechargeable batteries or devices with a built in rechargeable battery unattended whilst charging, especially Lithium Ion or Lithium Polymer (mobile phone) type batteries, also never attempt to charge a damaged battery, inspect your batteries for any signs of damage and, if found, dispose of safely.

Investing in good quality batteries and USB chargers for one’s batteries is a sound investment as is choosing a charger/s which will charge in the shortest but still safest time, cooking batteries is never a good idea for the batteries and one’s personal safety, if anything gets uncomfortably hot and/or you notice any other signs of malfunction, switch it off and unplug it straight away!. It might sound tempting to leave the batteries charging overnight or whilst going out for a meal etc. but, if anything goes wrong, I want to be there, wide awake.

When I’m at home, when in use, my USB battery charger/s or rechargeable devices with a built in battery sit inside a spacious, well ventilated, open top biscuit tin whilst charging. The metal acts as a heat sync (not that that’s a big factor) and, if anything should go wrong I’d rather the charger/device/battery was resting inside something metal than standing on a combustible surface. Treat your batteries and battery charging with respect, as the old saying goes “better safe than sorry”.

Kind regards

Leigh

“Weir Today, Gone Tomorrow”

May 7, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Back to my roots, HDR, Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Paintography, Photography | 4 Comments

Hiya,

“Weir Today, Gone Tomorrow”. Weir on the River Thames at East Molesey.

Kind regards

Leigh

“Herons are such posers!”

May 7, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Back to my roots, Leigh Kemp, Monochrome, Photography | Leave a comment

Riverbank, Richmond upon Thames, guy lying on the slipway photographing a Heron. 🙂

Best,

Leigh

“Back to the River #2”.

May 7, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Back to my roots, HDR, Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography | Leave a comment

Hiya,

River Thames, East Molesey.

All the best,

Leigh

“Carshalton Ponds – Revisited”

May 6, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Back to my roots, Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Paintography, panorama, panoramic, Photography | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

A painterly panoramic landscape work of Carshalton Ponds.

Best wishes,

Leigh

“Return to the River” #1

May 6, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Back to my roots, HDR, Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

I spent a couple of days on a short visit photographing some of my old haunts. River Thames at East. Molesey.

Kind regards

Leigh

The one lens I’d buy tomorrow if it existed.

May 1, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, Photography, Photography equipment | 4 Comments

Hi everyone,

I’m loving my Lumix 20mm f/1.7. I’d love to see a weather-sealed version of it or something similar at a fair price point. The current choice in terms of weather-sealing is nearly all PRO series zooms and equally expensive, bigger and heavier PRO series f/1.2 primes. I wish that they did a pancake design prime with weather sealing, I’m not expecting it to be given the design and in the least bit bothered about it being as fast as f/1.2. I can’t see how weather-sealing in itself adds that much size and weight to a lens. It’s the faster aperture and build quality that adds the size and weight. So, as things stand, in order to get the weather-sealing I’d be forced to buy a bigger, heavier, slightly faster and considerably more expensive lens and none of these things I want or need. Olympus PRO series f/1.4 20mm weather-sealed –

Dimensions 63mm diameter x 62 mm length
Weight 247g
Filter size 58mm

Lumix 20 mm f/1.7 Mk 1 pancake lens non-weather-sealed

Dimensions 63mm diameter x 25.5mm length. 👍
Weight 87g 💙💙💙💙💙 🙂
Filter size 46mm 👍

So the Olympus lens, although still a small lens by some standards and a bit faster is appreciatively longer and heavier and the price difference is even more drastic but it’s weather-sealed and arguably better built but not as inconspicuous and stealthy. I say arguably because I managed to drop my Lumix 20mm, without a lens hood attached, from about three feet as it spun from my hand, bouncing it off a wall before coming to rest on an albeit carpeted floor and it’s absolutely fine. Juggling lenses is not something I’m happy to say that I’m in the habit of doing but it’s nice to know all the same.

Kind regards

Leigh

Mildly Miffed of Bognor Regis :)

April 30, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Photography | 4 Comments

Hi everyone,

I was watching a youtube video by this chap, a very “old school” in all senses of the word, photographer in which he mentioned that he wasn’t a “photographic fraud”. The implications being that anyone who chooses to edit their shots was a fraud. I do wish people like him would keep their opinions on such things to themselves. As I said in the title of this post, and in true British fashion, I’m mildly miffed. 🙂 I’m not a documentary photographer, If I had the health, stamina, money, and importantly, transport to get to and wait for the perfect moment then I’d happily do so. Just as nobody has ever asked about which camera and lens I used in a shot they’ve never asked about what editing I might have done. If an image appeals to the viewer then such things have absolutely no importance whatsoever. Attitudes like this are the main reason why I never gelled with the R.P.S establishment. I’ll continue being, at least in some folks eyes, a photographic heretic. 🙂

Kind regards

Leigh

Rationalised travel kit.

April 29, 2023 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, Photography, Photography equipment, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

As I mentioned in my post yesterday I have paired-down and rationalised my travel kit. As I’ve recently done the same with my camera gear it would seem to make sense to do it with the other gear that I like to travel with. Gone are my USB power bank, USB torch and USB hard disk drive, in comes my new Nitecore air blower with its built in torch, same capacity USB pen drive and I’m going to use the power bank facility in my Ravpower travel router/SD Card backup device. In effect this means that when traveling with a small suitcase, I no longer loose such a significant percentage of its capacity and equally relevant weight allowance storing this gear in transit. As I think that most of you know I’m a big fan of USB charging including my camera batteries so my Anker 5-port USB charging hub is essential and will always be included. This solid little bit of kit has travelled with me absolutely everywhere since I got it in 2016 and is indispensable, it also fits nice and safely in one of my small watertight padded ABS plastic hard cases.

About 80% of my gear now has a USB-C type charging connection rather than the older Micro USB style. So as not to have to pack both types of cable I’ve cut down by having a few Micro USB female to USB type C male adapters and eventually I’ll have standardised on just the USB Type A to USB Type C style cables. The only thing that I want to do now is replace my USB camera battery charger of which I have two with a dual charger with type C connection and thus free up a USB port on my USB charging hub and more conveniently charge two batteries simultaneously when required with fewer cables and clutter.

Kind regards

Leigh

As I sit here looking at my modern digital cameras I’m reminded of my first camera and, in particular, the first photograph that I ever took. Nowadays we take cameras and camera technology pretty much for granted but when I was a child I can’t remember many photographs. The only time our camera saw the light of day, and it had to be the light of day, as there wasn’t a flash, was on a few family occasions, the usual thing, school sports days, birthdays, etc.. My interest in photography didn’t start until my grandfather “loaned” me his camera to take with me on a week-long school trip, sleeping under canvas, in Snowdonia, North Wales. It was a somewhat battered old twin-lens reflex camera in which one looked downwards in to the viewfinder when taking a photograph.

I remember being very excited at being entrusted with the family camera, film wasn’t cheap and I had very little to no idea how to use it. The experience must have made some kind of impression on me as, after all these years, I still remember taking my first photograph. The coach stopped en-route at Blenheim Palace, the ancestral home of Sir Winston Churchill and it became the subject of my first photograph. Although, sadly, like my other photographs from the trip, it has long since disappeared, however, I really don’t need the photograph to remind me as the experience is indelibly etched on my mind. I wonder if this is perhaps where my interest in landscape photography stems from but that’s probably too much of an assumption. As far as I remember I was the only kid on the trip to have a camera, that’s how different things were, nowadays, just about everyone has a camera of some sort built in to their mobile phones. It also taught me to be disciplined to the point of being frugal when taking photographs as the trip was for one week and I only had a 12 exposure black and white film in the camera.

Some years later I really got the photography bug and bought my first camera, an Olympus OM-1 35 mm film camera and I went on to own their OM-2 and OM-4ti cameras and a range of lenses. Film was still pretty expensive considering I earned about £20 a week in my first job so I got in to developing and printing my own black and white and, later, colour films to help keep the costs down and make things more affordable. Not only did this experience teach me an awful lot about image-making start to finish, many of the techniques and skills that I learned in my makeshift darkroom, a small room adorned with genuine World War 2 blackout curtains fitted to keep out the light, another hand-me-down from my grandfather, these skills would re-surface and be invaluable some years later when I started working on processing my digital images.

I put myself through University as a mature student and I badly needed the money so I had to very reluctantly part with all my photographic equipment, but needs must. After I graduated I bought my first digital camera, a small fixed lens Kodak compact camera, reduced in a sale. It had, by today’s standards, a laughably small maximum image resolution of 640×480 pixels or, to put it another way, a stunning 0.4 Megapixels!. For all of this and further equipped with screw on wide angle and telephoto lens attachments, it proved to be a fabulous little camera which I took all over the place with me. Put simply, digital photography was a revelation, to me, no requirement for film, no real running costs and a lot of image capacity on a small memory card which I found absolutely liberating.

A few years before that I had discovered some free graphics editing software on the cover disk of a computer magazine and that started off my real passion for working with graphics and, ultimately, photo processing. So I then had all the tools I required to develop, pun intended and further, my interest in digital photography. Processing is where the magic starts for me, I am totally absorbed in and fascinated by the range of options that digital processing affords me. It encourages me, if, that is, I ever need encouragement, to constantly experiment with new styles, new techniques and is such an important part of my enjoyment and interest in photography.

I went on to own several DSLRs but, as I got older I began to find that they were simply too heavy and bulky. I switched over back in 2013 to Micro Four Thirds cameras and lenses. My choice of MFT system was heavily influenced by my experiences with my Olympus film cameras, maybe it was, in truth, part based on nostalgia that I decided on their OM-D system. As a landscape/travel photographer I have to carry my gear around all day and the weight and bulk saving is highly significant. I’ve been very impressed with the image quality of my Micro Four Thirds equipment, it has traveled with me extensively, never let me down and I have never had cause to question my decision to go over to that format.

So my 50-plus year photographic adventure has led me from twin-lens reflex and single-lens reflex film cameras to digital cameras, from stumbling around in a dimly-lit darkroom to working with my images on my computer. I’ve heard it said on occasions, including a comment I read some while back by a very famous photographer, that cameras being so much an every-day item now and available in mobile phones etc. devalues photography. I feel quite the opposite, I firmly believe that it empowers everyone with affordable technology to take photographs and enjoy photography and that, in my opinion, is fantastic. Although I’ve very much enjoyed my personal photographic journey I do confess to feeling a slight tinge of regret that the technology wasn’t available when I started out but one can’t put the clock back and I intend to keep on embracing all these great technological advancements, experimenting and enjoying my work.

Cameras:

Olympus: OM-D E-M5 Mk II (titanium) & HLD-8G grip, OM-D E-M1 Mk I (black) & HDL-7 grip, OM-D EM-5 Mk I (silver) & HDL-6 grip, PEN EPL-5, PEN EP-5 (silver) +VF-4, PEN E-PL8 (Silver) +VF4, Tough TG-5 (red), PEN-F (silver), Canon Powershot G10, Nikon Coolpix A100

Lenses:

Olympus: M.Zuiko: 12 mm f/2, 17 mm f/1.8, 25 mm f/1.8, 45 mm f/1.8, 30 mm f/3.5 macro, 9 mm f/8 body cap fisheye, 15 mm f/8 body cap, 9-18 mm, 12-50 mm, 12-40 mm f/2.8 PRO, 14-150 mm II, 40-150 mm II, 12-45mm f/4 PRO, MCON-P02.

Sigma: ART 60 mm f/2.8.

Samyang: Manual focus 7.5 mm f/3.5 fisheye.

TT Artisan: Manual focus 17mm f/1.4, 23mm f/1.4, 35mm f/1.4.

Panasonic Lumix: 14 mm f/2.5, 20 mm f/1.7, 12-32 mm x2 (black and silver), 12-60 mm, 14-42 mm II, 35-100 mm, 45-150mm.

PEN E-P5, 9-18mm,12-32mm, 40-150mm II. A lightweight kit with virtually continuous coverage from 18mm wide angle to 300mm telephoto.

OM-D E-M1 I, 14-150mm II, 12-40mm PRO. . Heavier than my other kits but with complete weather-sealing. Coverage from 24mm wide angle to 300mm telephoto with some overlap for backup.

OM-D E-M5 II, 17mm, 35mm, 12-60mm. A balance of two fun manual focus lenses with a weather-sealed body and zoom lens.

PEN E-PL5, 9mm, 15mm, 25mm, 60mm, 12-50mm. Another lightweight fun kit with a zoom option.

TG-5, OM-D E-M5 mk1, 7.5mm, 12mm, 17mm, 45mm, 30mm macro. M-CON.

PEN-F, 14mm, 20mm, 12-32mm, 35-100mm. Probably my favourite lightweight day-to-day kit. Two fast primes and two zoom with almost continuous coverage from 24mm wide angle through to 200mm telephoto.

Software:

Corel: Paintshop Pro Elite 2020 & Video Studio 2019.

Skylum Software: Aurora HDR 2019, Luminar 4, Luminar AI and Luminar Neo.

DXO Labs: PhotoLab 5 Elite, Viewpoint 3, NIK Collection 6, Film Pack 5 and PureRAW.

Anthropics Technologies: Landscape Pro Studio 3 and Portrait Pro.

EyeQ: Perfectly Clear

Topaz Labs: Studio 2, Sharpen AI, A.I Gigapixel, AI Clear, AI Adjust, DeNoise AI and Various legacy plugins.

Adobe: Lightroom.

GreenScreenWizard Studio Pro.

Serif: Affinity Photo

Microsoft: Image Composite Editor (Free).

Darktable (Free).

Olympus: Olympus Capture, Olympus Workspace and Olympus Webcam (Free to Olympus owners).

Sony: Movie Studio Platinum.

Lighting Gear:

Godox TT350o flash, Godox X1T radio flash trigger, Godox Lux Junior flash, LED ring flash, GVM RGB LED light, Olympus MAL-1 Macro Arm Light. Two Godox LED36 lights, Godox Litemons LED6R light. Three Bowen studio flash heads, barndoors, honeycombes, umbrellas and flash meter.