Welcome to AdoramaTV,
my name is Marcin Lewandowski
and in this episode of The Viewfinder
I will share a few ideas that
you can mix and match when stuck inside
a hotel room.
Honing your photography
skills shouldn't stop
just because you're stationary.
Maybe we're sick or maybe the weather
is just too bad to
sway us into venturing out.
We've all had holidays
that were challenged by events
that were outside of our control.
When this happens our inner photographer
screams that we want to go outside
and explore while reality keeps us from
physically doing so.
Situations like this
is definitely a moment for thinking
outside the box
and getting creative with your camera.
To begin with
a view through the window
is usually new to us
and we can explore it in a number
of different ways,
even if it's not overlooking anything dramatic.
Early mornings can be magical in many ways.
Colors in the sky will guide us
into creating something different.
This can be a good moment to
play around with white balance settings.
We can experiment to see how the camera
behaves depending on which presets we use.
Early mornings can be quite rewarding
in terms of light quality,
however it is not the only time of the
day with dramatic changes.
The evening is
another interesting time of day,
especially when the
Sun starts hiding behind the horizon,
we might be given a beautiful blue hour
so we can mix the
natural beauty of the sky with the glow
of artificial lighting.
The night opens
up opportunities to use the Moon
as a visual anchor point
for our photographs.
Look for interesting objects behind the
window and see if the Moon will cross
anywhere close, and do the same for the
Sun in case you might see it.
I suggest
'The Photographer's Ephemeris'.
A handy tool that is easy
and free to use online.
When darkness begins to set in another
simple exercise that you can do to build
your photographic skill
is to practice
taking photos with a longer exposure.
You can try
capturing star trails and it's
simpler than you might think.
If you have
bulb mode on your camera,
then open your
shutter for five minutes
at around 400 ISO,
see what happens and adjust it
up or down depending on your
results. Don't worry if your view is
featureless, then maybe you can use the
window itself to frame your photograph.
If you don't have a bulb setting your
camera should still be able to do a
long exposure in one form or another
with 30 seconds as a standard limit.
Point it outside and see what is hiding
in the dark,
a couple of tips for long
exposure, especially if you didn't plan
for it on your trip.
If you don't have
remote control over your camera,
use the shutter timer
for a few seconds.
This will ensure that your camera is stable
at the moment of releasing the shutter.
So you didn't take your tripod as well
it was too much to add to your luggage?
Well then my second handy tip is to
use a pillow or simply stand it on a
table propping it at an angle that you
need. You could even use a coaster.
A view through the window is not limiting it's
quite the opposite. The window itself is
a feature that we can use creatively to
make some photographs. Are you stuck
because of the rain? Look at the droplets
on the window as elements to use in your
photograph. Focus on the droplets and
blur everything outside the window by
using your fastest aperture or go the
opposite way and try your highest
apertures setting to make features in
the background more recognizable.
I mentioned photographing
from your window
in one of my previous episodes.
You can check out
the link in the description
below for more ideas.
Now that we are
inside our room we can also use it as a
backdrop for our photographs as well.
New places usually look unfamiliar so our
imagination might try to help us add a
story to what we see.
Maybe you can use
it as a backdrop for some creative portraits.
Maybe it's a good moment to
wrestle a bit with some interior architecture
or maybe you can simply
explore its macro offerings and look
for interesting objects that you don't
expect to see every day.
As you can see being stuck in a hotel room
might not be
such a bad thing
especially when you
have a camera with you.
Constraints can
often force us to be much more creative.
I hope you enjoyed this episode
and I wish that your holidays
will always go as planned.