Images of the World from Andrew Johnston

Andrew's Photography Pages

I've always had a strong interest in photography, both as a practical tool to record our experiences in life, and as an art form. I've also always had great admiration for those photographers whose work can really move the emotions, particularly the great landscape photographers like Ansel Adams. Taking good representational photographs is hard enough, but establishing a composition which can both emotionally inspire the viewer and satisfy the critics is even harder.

When I graduated to a Digital SLR I gained a fresh interest and started trying to raise the standard of my own photography. On these pages you'll find some examples of what I've done, plus some hints, tips and tools - hopefully passing on some knowledge I've learned the hard way.

Articles

I combine my love of photography with a love of travel. In recent years I've been lucky enough to visit and make images in a number of wonderful locations incuding Namibia, Myanmar Bhutan, Cuba, Morocco and Iceland. For more details, and to find links to the specific blogs and photo albums, please visit my travel page.

My kit has changed markedly over the years. If you're interested, please have a look at my camera history.

There's a bit of a dearth of information regarding how to create high-resolution 3D images for display on a suitable TV. I tell you how.

Problems correcting the colour balance of underwater photographs? Check out this article.

Similarly, if you're working with an infrared converted camera or filter, check out my guidance on infrared white balance.

For a bit more background on the tenset concept, look here.

I think camera manufacturers have to start delivering changes (many relatively simple software or mechanical fixes) to create better integrated picture managing tools. I wrote a long piece about what I want in 2010 in What I want in my next DSLR. After a couple of years I write a progress report but it was scary how many of these relatively simple demands were still outstanding... Finally 10 years on things are improving, so I'll update again when time permits.

Although I'm now fairly settled with Capture One, I've had some rough deals with previous RAW processors. In late 2008 Bibble abandoned support for their existing, excellent product when the new version was not yet viable, and then repeated themselves later with the "Aftershot" move. I wrote a short parable to express my frustration at this inexplicable decision, which bears the test of time even if the actual products and companies no longer exist.

It's maybe a bit out of date now, but if you want to capture geotagging information (the location from which you take each photograph), and don't want to invest in a proprietary solution for this, read my article on Low Cost Geotagging with Bibble.

Complete index of my photography articles

My Tenset

To give you an idea of whether my photography's the thing for you, here's my "Tenset" - ten of my favourite shots, which between them give you some idea of my preferred subjects and style. (Hover over the images for a bit more information, or click for a full-sized version.)

My Galleries

Please click through to my album to see more.

Hints, Tips and Tools

My plugin for the popular Bibble /Aftershot Pro image processing suite, CAQuest, manages chromatic aberration correction and a range of other settings. Although I no longer maintain the tool, it may still help someone. To find out more, visit www.andrewj.com/plugins.

You can also read my reviews of photographic books.

Links

The Online Photographer - A great daily blog by Mike Johnston (no relation, honestly!), on all matters related to photography.

The Visual Science Lab - another well-maintained blog by Kirk Tuck, a main who changes kit almost as often as his socks, but really gets why people do photography.

Earthbound Light - A site dedicated mainly to landscape photography in the Northwest USA, but with a great series of essays by Bob Johnson on kit, technique and editing.

Luminous Landscape - A site for all lovers of landscape photography, with some good portfolios, lots of technique guidance, and columns and essays by Michael Reichmann, Alain Briot and others.

Alain Briot also has his own page at Beautiful Landscape

I've been very inspired by the work of Bill La Brie, another photographer from the American West with a great gallery in Carmel, California.

Bob Kiss has some great mono shots. He's also an excellent tutor, if you happen to find yourself in need of photographic inspiration on Barbados!

For some more inspiring images, but a bit further north, you might also take a look at John Marriott's Site Wilderness Prints.

I've always been a keen "stitcher" of images, even in the days when I used a razor blade and sellotape on 6x4 prints. Digital makes this much easier, and I've become a great fan of digital panorama assembly. Max Lyons' Site has some very useful articles, and an extensive gallery of some of the best landscape and architecture images I've seen built this way.

And, for a laugh, you can't beat "What the Duck" - a cartoon celebrating the trials and triumphs of photography as profession or obsession. Sadly it's no longer updated daily, but it's still a great archive of comments on our activities. Enjoy!