Dave Ainscough’s Complete Novice Photography Portfolio
Documenting a starting point for my photography journey.
Portrait:
A traditional headshot portrait with controlled studio lighting.
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 85mm f1.8 @ 85mm, ISO125, 1/100sec shutter speed, f1.8
- Godox SL60W light with diffuser kit
- Ulanzi VL119 Handheld Light Wand – neutral light
Trying for a traditional headshot portrait of MBW, a light edit in Adobe Lightroom mobile to convert to black and white (which we decided prior to shooting), and trying for a key light and bounce light to provide some even lighting. The background is a little unplanned, but thought it provided a soft background look that helped with some negative space on the left of the photo.
A candid outdoor portrait capturing natural expressions
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 85mm f1.8 @ 85mm, ISO100, 1/4,000 sec shutter speed, f1.8
Really tried to put myself out of my comfort zone with a little portrait-focused street photography. This was at a recent event in Cleveland, a Freedom of Entry ceremony for the RAAF No. 95 wing being welcomed by the Queensland Police Service and Jos Mitchell, Mayor of Redlands City.
The subject was part of the event security team for the event, and he had such an intense, interesting look. Really pleased with how the Lumix S 85mm lens turned out some good-looking bokeh, happy with the framing and how the subject draws the eye, and how the reflection of his sunglasses adds a little visual interest to the scene (which otherwise doesn’t do very much to tell a wider narrative).
Honorable mentions:
From the same event as above – I like the implied story this photo tells more than the previous shot, but I like the overall look of this photo less. You can almost read the emotions this police officer is feeling as he watches the parade of Air Force personnel march by.
Another candid portrait I quite liked; an Air Force band musician in a moment of concentration mid-march.
A creative self-portrait that reveals your personality
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 85mm f1.8 @ 85mm, ISO640, 1/100sec shutter speed, f1.8
- Godox SL60W light with diffuser kit
- Ulanzi VL119 Handheld Light Wand – red highlights
I spent a lot of time thinking about what portrait would reveal something about my personality while also being a visually interesting photo and ultimately selected the above. One of my absolute favourite things in the world, and an indirect driver for my budding love of photography, is going on travel adventures to Japan with MBW. On our most recent trip to Kamakura, we found a tiny crafts shop off the main walk between the train station and the famous Kamakura Daibutsu (great Buddha) where an older Japanese man was hand-crafting hundreds of traditional wooden masks of Gods and yokai. The use of these two masks, the Mahakala (on the left, masculine protection) and Hannya (on the right, feminine jealousy), tries to highlight the many masks we wear every day, depending on the context we are performing in. I used a red LED highlight to bring a little visual interest to the shot, especially on the cheeks of all three faces.
Landscape:
A wide-angle landscape showcasing a natural vista (mountains, beach, forest, etc.)
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 20-60mm f3.5-5.6 @ 20mm, ISO100, 1/160 sec shutter speed, f4
This photo was one of the first I took with my new full-frame Panasonic Lumix S5 using the 20-60mm kit lens when visiting my parents at their new house on the Bay. I went for a solo walk along the Esplanade while MBW and her mother were getting ready to go out to meet my parents for lunch, and it was such a beautiful, peaceful day. I really like the contrast between the colourful and textured rocks in the foreground, the near glass-smooth water of the Bay and the subtle colours and clouds of the sky. I tried shooting at the widest angle I had access to at the time, and thought f4 gave a good mix of lots of the scene being in focus with a little bit of fall off towards the horizon.
Honourable mentions:
A shot from almost the same perspective, but showing more of the historic Urangan pier. While I like the colours of the water and sky more here, the shadows in the foreground rocks weren’t as interesting to me as the previous image. I look forward to learning more photo editing techniques (and thinking ahead to be shooting in RAW) to really achieve the look I’d like for photos like this one.
I really like the framing and colours of this photo, but wish I’d had more patience to wait for the people pictured to either leave the frame or do something interesting; if one had decided this is the moment to go down on a bended knee, how magical would that have been?
An urban landscape capturing the essence of a cityscape
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 20-60mm f3.5-5.6 @ 24mm, ISO1000, 1/60 sec shutter speed, f9
This photo was taken from my office window and is an attempt to tell a story with a city skyline. To the left, a modern office complex, looking like an overgrown shoebox, prioritising function over form. To the right, new construction popping up in advance of the Brisbane 2032 Olympics, with signs of a city skyline changing rapidly to more contemporary and daring designs. In the middle, the timeless elegance of our older buildings: the heritage-listed Harris Terrace building in the foreground, with the QLD parliament building and Old Parliament House further away.
I thought that trying to show all three of these aspects of the city would highlight a city with historical roots, a somewhat soulless present, but building towards a more exciting future. I did some light editing to try to highlight these elements, by de-saturating the colours in the middle of the image to look more like an old film photo and increasing the vibrancy to the right to try to highlight a brighter, more artificial future.
Still Life
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 14-28mm f4-5.6 Macro @ 16mm, ISO400, 13/10 sec shutter speed, f22
- Godox SL60W light with diffuser kit
- Ulanzi VL119 Handheld Light Wand – turqoise highlights
- Tripod
- Cable release
Might be an obvious choice, but what are everyday objects that would be fun to shoot as a still life? Camera gear! Tried to solve the tricky technical question of “how do I get my main camera in the shot while shooting on it” with some mirror trickery. Wanted everything in focus, with the interest coming from the reflections off the glass lens elements and the different sensor sizes, including the truly minuscule sensor on the Pentax Q10 (middle).
Honourable mention:
A spread prepared by MBW for some of her incredible stationary and art supplies collection. Used a blue LED to bring out some more interesting highlights and smooth off the shadows from the uni-directional lightbox.
A macro shot highlighting intricate details of a small subject
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 14-28mm f4-5.6 Macro @ 24mm, ISO200, 2/5 sec shutter speed, f9
- Godox SL60W light with diffuser kit
- Ulanzi VL119 Handheld Light Wand – red highlights
- Tripod
- Cable release
This is an attempt to use the promoted-but-not-amazing macro capabilities of the Lumix S 14-28 macro lens to shoot a miniature subject; in this case, the model of the Gaping Dragon from the Dark Souls board game. The red light was used to try to bring a more fleshy texture to the unpainted miniature, while also creating some more interesting contrasts between light and shadow, red and grey and black.
Bonus behind-the-scenes shots:
Architecture
An interior shot capturing the ambience of a space
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 14-28mm f4-5.6 Macro @ 14mm, ISO2500, 1/60 sec shutter speed, f4
- Ulanzi VL119 Handheld Light Wand – blue/purple highlights
A low wide-angle shot from the inside of one of my favourite places to relax, an isolation float chamber at City Cave. I was quite impressed at the S5’s ability to shoot in low-light situations, especially given the lens being used isn’t particularly fast. The soft glow of the water casting lights on the stone walls, the faint wood grain texture of the close bench, and the subtle highlights from the LED lighting wand came together to instil this image with some of the calm that being in this room brings me. I sincerely hope it will have some of this effect on others, even if they don’t have the pre-formed emotional connection to this specific space.
An exterior shot emphasising the lines and form of a building
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 14-28mm f4-5.6 Macro @ 14mm, ISO100, 1/200 sec shutter speed, f5
It might be a little cliched, but when I think about emphasising the lines of the building, the columns and clocktower of Brisbane town hall are my first thought. Not a lot to say about this one, I like how the lines of the building draw the eye from bottom to top and into the sky.
Honourable mentions:
Some architectural shots of skyscrapers at Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast, QLD.
Experimental
An abstract or experimental photo that demonstrates your creative approach
- Olympus PEN E-P7
- Olympus 9mm f8 fisheye lens @ 9mm, ISO12000, 1/2 sec shutter speed, f8
An image taken using my m4/3 PEN E-P7 camera, set to black and white using the creative profile settings, using a cheap f8 fisheye lens, taken from a moving taxi in Tokyo. Visually, this image is a mess – motion blur, reflections from the taxi window, lights and movement and chaos everywhere – I think I love it, it has such a raw feeling that immediately evokes being exhausted and heading back to a hotel, but also finding pure joy in the smallest of details of this amazing mega-metropolis.
A long-exposure shot that creates unique light trails or motion effects
- Panasonic Lumix S5
- Lumix S 50mm f1.8 @ 50mm, ISO100, 30 sec shutter speed, f11
- Ulanzi VL119 Handheld Light Wand – RGB strobe mode
- Tripod
My first ever session shooting in full manual mode; f11 for exposure and focus, low ISO for performance, and 30-second shutter to allow for time for light painting/for my movement through the frame to be too shift to capture in the resulting image. Light painting is a lot of fun, might have to arrange a time for some friends’ kids to run around like lunatics with torches.