Transcription
A big thanks to Sennheiser for sponsoring this week's video.
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Morning everybody! Fantastic to see you all again. As you can see, Pebbles is back. I am out in my favorite woodland, scouting for what is definitely one of my favorite times of the year, and that is autumn. I just thought it'd be useful to bring you along and explain some of the things I'm looking for, maybe a month before the better colors are coming along.
Some of these tips as well aren't just for woodland; they're for vistas as well. So if you're not into shooting woodlands, then stick around because there's lots of tips for you as well. It is just a peaceful, lovely morning. It's quite overcast. Well, there's no better place to be in the morning than a woodland like this.
Come on, Pebs!
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I found a scene here that Pebbles is exploring. This is a beech tree. I think it's a beech tree. It is a beech tree, which will look fantastic sort of late autumn. So yeah, I'm just thinking about this. I'm just going to take a video of where Pebbles is. Do you like it in there, Pebbles? Is it good?
I think it's cooler when she runs around. George gets really hot, don't you? Hey, you get really hot and you just want to cool down because you've got so furry.
So yeah, this is a really lovely beech tree, and it's got a really nice shape to it. This is a good example of something that if I came across in autumn, I'd look at it and think it looks colorful. But it's good to sort of look at this now where I don't have to worry too much about getting a shot.
I've seen already that there are a few issues. One of the issues is that these roots, although they look nice, I think this mud will just be very dominant in the scene. I think that the canopy is really nice and the tree's really nice, but from where I need to shoot, which is probably there where you are now, there's quite a lot of sky in the image, and I think that'll make it difficult.
So it'll have to be quite foggy. I'll probably note down this as an interesting tree to maybe check out as I'm going to another composition. But you know, be aware of that foreground so I don't spend time messing about. I can just have a quick look and then move on.
Level screw up here.
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So you can see that I'm right at the edge of the woodland now. One of the things that you probably don't realize in woodland photography is the position and location of the sun is really, really important.
So here, if I just look at my compass, I know that the sun pretty much rises in the east at this time of year. I mean, it does change quite a lot over October, so it's worth checking photo pills. But if I look at my compass now, I can see the sunrise is predominantly going to be from over in that direction, and obviously the sunset is going to be in that direction.
The woodland's all in that direction, and then the other edge of it is obviously over there. So I think it's really important to realize that this side of the woodland is probably best at sunrise. If I find any trees down here, they're probably not going to be as good to shoot at sunset.
So even if it's overcast or foggy, you're still going to get more light in this direction at sunrise than you are at sunset. So yeah, think about that. Think about the direction of the sunlight because it does make a really big difference, and that'll help you as well when you're in the woodland.
So if I go a little bit further in, just thinking if I found a composition, where's the sunrise going to be? I don't want to shoot in direct light, but that warmth is going to come from a certain direction, and you need to know where that's going to be.
Right, Pebs, where are we going now? Let's go up here.
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Here, okay. I said I was going to just walk past this tree, but it'd be rude not to take a photo. So I've actually found a slightly different composition. It was probably a good idea to stop.
You can see if I just record in here. Yeah, so you can see that I usually do this in a landscape composition, but I just thought actually there's not a lot of sky showing through up here, and it's quite interesting, the branches up here.
So I've put it in portrait composition, and this fern just so the front looks really good as well. Depending on what the fern condition is, I think this potentially could look okay in autumn in this composition.
So it was a good idea to come back and just walk past it again. I mean, I've walked past this probably two or three hundred times, and I've not seen this portrait composition, which is just from a little bit further back.
So yeah, I think it'll work. I've still got this nice branch in here, and yeah, it's well worth doing.
Right, on to the next tip, which we'll just walk down here a little bit, and I'll talk to you a little bit more about that.
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One of the most important things I think—oh, you're tired, don't you, Pepsi?
So yeah, one of the most important things I think in autumn is just understanding how things change over time. This is going to be different all over the world. Obviously, we've got these amazing red berries of the rowan tree here, and you know that coincides a little bit with the very start of autumn.
Then we go into the birch trees; their leaves start to change, which I'm just above virtually where my camera is now, and I can see that they're just starting to change. Then there's various trees going through to the end of October, to the beech trees and then the oak trees.
I think understanding that—like understanding when the ferns might change—they're going to change probably more in different parts of the woodland as well. Just noticing that over the seasons will definitely improve your appreciation of woodland, but also your ability to find compositions.
So think about that. Think about what is changing in your own woodland, and maybe you can start to look at that now for this season that might help you next season. But yeah, the ferns here are definitely just starting to change, I think, and these berries just look amazing.
Where's Pebbles gone? Right, gotta get back up this hill now.
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So I'm always looking for interesting, characterful trees like this old oak here and then the environment that that tree's set in. That environment's really important. You can see that there's some silver birch here. We've got this old oak tree here, and it's quite a nice background as well.
I was originally, when I was walking through the woods, I hadn't been to this part of it because it's pretty huge, this woods before, and I was originally quite attracted to this. I thought actually this might work quite well.
These ferns will change color, but one of the problems is that I don't think it's got limbs low enough down. So I'm going to have to get more of the sky in the picture and less of the lower part of the picture, which I think is more interesting.
Then the other thing is that there's quite a lot of open ground around me here, and that open ground is quite distracting, I think, as well. So what I'm trying to do is find a characterful tree—something. It doesn't have to be a character tree, but that's what I'm going to look out for today—that's surrounded and in an environment that is conducive to taking a good photo.
I don't think this is quite there yet, although it is pretty nice. The silver birch are definitely changing the color of their leaves already. By the end of September, they're usually all gone. Well, they're not all gone; it depends where you are, but a lot of the silver birch leaves will have gone.
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So it's probably worth noting as I walk through this sort of area here to avoid places that are really messy like this, where there's a lot of debris on the floor. You know, there's lots of spindly branches like this and this one.
What you want to try and do is create some sort of order out of the chaos. You want to keep a little bit of that chaos because that's what the woodland's about, but you know, this just doesn't quite work.
There's a lot of mess on the floor here. There are lots of branches that sort of don't work together, and then this big tree in the background is the attractive thing. It'll probably look good and colorful, but I don't think all these other messy branches around it will work.
So it's trying to find, as I said before, a scene—something that fits together. It's not easy, but that's half the fun.
Come on, Pebs!
Oh no, Pebbles! Oh, Pebbles got in the mud. That's not good.
Oh, Pebbles! Well, as you can probably see, I've not got a very muddy dog—not a white one anymore. In fact, I don't know where she's gone. She's gone off in disgrace.
But I wanted to talk about this tree. I found this tree here, which is an old, wooden dead tree. You know, there's some nice foliage around it. This tree is quite nice as well, and there's a nice background as well.
So I think it's a potential one to come back and just quickly look at in autumn. I do feel though it's just a bit unconnected. I feel like this tree might just be a really nice wooden tree in some of the trees rather than, you know, connected a little bit.
I feel like it'd be good to shoot it from this direction so I can see the light just on the bark where the barks come off. But in that direction, the woodland's not great.
But I'll take a photo and maybe want to come back too. I feel like I'm not quite in the right direction. I thought it'd be worth just explaining that. I'll share the photo.
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So I actually like it a lot more than I thought, but I still feel like it's almost like a portrait of this tree. For that to work, I think the lighting and the leaves around it just need to be perfect. So wait to see what it looks like in autumn.
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So this fantastic old tree here is the scene of one of my favorite shots, actually, which is called "Wise." It's a good time to show you this because it's a good example of when you're scouting, you just need to open your mind a little bit.
You can see there's a big blanket of fern here, and that at the moment doesn't look great because it's all green. But you change that into multiple colors, and suddenly that big area becomes something a little bit more interesting.
Also, there's an old tree there, and when the ferns die down a little bit, that tree becomes visible. So it's just good to look out for things and think about how things may change. I did spot this in the summer a few years ago, so it's not like a scene that I found in autumn.
The background as well has quite a lot of different types of trees, so again, it's going to look really good in autumn because those colors are going to be very different, and we're going to differentiate the different trees behind, which at the moment are sort of a blanket of green.
In a bit of fog, it's going to cover any sort of white bits in the background. So I really like this tree. I like the twist in the trunk, which is really nice, which is why I was attracted to it in the first place.
Right, let's go and see if we can actually find a new shot.
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So it's the next day now, and well, first of all, I forgot my hat, and I've also forgotten Pebbles. Now, I haven't forgotten her; she's not here. But I've come to a slightly different woods, a little bit further away from where I live, but one that I've come to a lot before.
A lot of the photos from this woodland are in the woodlands, and it is an amazing woods, but I still feel like I've just touched the surface of it. So I've come here to try and find something. I didn't find anything in the woods closer to me apart from that vertical composition, which I think will work.
But I quite like this scene here, and you can see at the moment the light is pretty spectacular. This is a good example of a scene that's good at sunset. It's sunset at the moment; the sun sets over there, and that golden light is just going to get in here.
But sunrise will be over there. It's not going to be a great sunrise location, which is a shame—not that it's not a sunrise location, but it's a shame because I'd love to shoot this with some fog, and I don't think you get that at sunset too often in the UK.
Anyway, I'm going to go and take this once the sun's out. I'm ideally looking for just a little—not strong sun—just the sun as it's just coming through a cloud to try and sort of disperse it a little bit and create a more soft light.
But yeah, this is beautiful. Just to tell you about the scene a little bit, I've got this main tree here, and then there are a few other trees—really old silver birch there, another silver birch over here.
And yes, what's not to like about this? This is all about character and placement of the trees. Right, let me get the shot before the sun goes because it looks pretty good at the moment.
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So I've just come to the edge of the forest just to tell you a little bit about this week's sponsor, and that is Sennheiser. You've probably noticed—hopefully you've noticed—that in my videos, sound is really important to me.
Whether it's the water lapping on a beach or the wind rustling through the trees or me just walking, all those sounds are just so important, and they make the video really. I have always used Sennheiser microphones, and when they reached out to me and said, "Do you want to sponsor a video?" then I jumped at the chance.
They've actually got a new microphone out at the moment, which is a fantastic microphone if you just want to improve your sound quality. So if you just want to go from just using your camera sound quality, which can get interfered with by the wind and just never sounds as good, to something just a little bit more professional, this is the MKE 400.
I've got to say, I used it all the time in my last video. I used it in Iceland a huge amount, and it made a really big difference. So I'm vlogging this for the windiest spot I can find in Iceland, on top of a peninsula by the sea.
As you can see, it's windy. I've got the MKE 400 on top of my Z62, and although there's a little bit of wind noise, nothing's going to stop this compared with what it's like without it, which is like this.
I also use this lapel microphone quite a lot. You see me walking around, and I use that lapel microphone. I've also got Sennheiser microphones for my studio as well when I do voiceovers.
So go and take a look at the MKE 400, and thanks to Sennheiser for sponsoring this week's video.
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I love this time of evening when the sun's just sort of dropping down, and it's a blue sky like this because you get a lot of really beautiful reflected light that's really nice and warm. You can see that here on the bark of this tree.
Anyway, I found a really nice but intimate composition here, and I'm not sure whether I'll even mark this, to be honest, because it's not like an engineered sort of composition I've put together. It's more like I saw this tree; it looked good.
I really like the tree coming out to your left and these trees here, and there's some nice background trees. The thing I've got to really worry about is these ferns are moving around so much, so I've upped the ISO to 400.
All I'm bothered about is getting the ferns and the tree sharp. The background can drop out of focus a little bit. This is good. I didn't think I was going to get any good shots tonight, but I enjoy woodland photography.
It's my favorite type of photography. I just love it for relaxation. It just relaxes me so much. Everyone else probably says it stresses them because they can't find anything, but I can't find anything, and something just pops right.
I better get this shot before the sun completely goes because I'm not taking it yet.
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And this, everybody, is why you always need to look behind you. Because look at the scene I'm studying at the moment. I completely missed this. I was walking back to my car. I just thought I'll just see what's behind me, and I turned up on this amazing scene.
I love the graduation of lightness to darkness across the scene. It looks really, really good. So I've taken a shot of this, and that definitely will be my final shot and my final tip: look behind you.
Wow, that worked!
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