Posts by nigelgoldsmith

Panoramic photography with an iPhone

The iPhone panoramic photography feature can produce amazing images if used with care. If it is a process you would like to explore further, you should practice test it in with a range of situations and subjects.

Before you start, you need to consider where the light is coming from to avoid lens flare. You should also decide what your main subject will be and where it will appear in the final composition. If there are rapidly moving subjects in the scene, these may appear squashed or stretched so you may need to wait until they have passed before you start the shot.

While natural scenes containing distant buildings, trees and countryside can stitch together reasonably well, modern buildings or interiors shot from closeup can cause problems.

For natural scenes, open the camera app, switch to the ‘Pano’ option and you will see a horizontal bar with a large arrow on it. The phone detects the angle you are pointing it in and the arrow tells you if you are tilting it up or down. When you click the shutter button, you then rotate the phone while trying to keep the large arrow on the line in the middle of the bar. If you deviate too far from the line, the camera won’t be able to create a smoothly stitched image.

iPhone pano display showing how to use the feature

iPhone pano display

Once complete, press the shutter button again to finish the panorama. The phone will then process the data and show you a finished panoramic image. These can be very large files compared to standard images and will rapidly use up space on your device.

Panoramic photography iPhone

Image captured with Pano option iPhone

Subjects containing strong lines close to the camera may challenge the cameras software and there may be issues where lines don’t stitch together very well. You may need to change the way you hold and rotate the phone to reduce this. Rather than holding the phone out and rotating around your hips, you could try rotating the camera around itself and the centre of the phone becomes the point of rotation, this is known as its ‘nodal point’. This is harder than it sounds. For serious panoramic photographers, there are special camera supports which rotate the camera around the nodal point.

Panoramic photography is just one part of my short iPhone photography workshop. If you would like a mobile phone photography workshop for your course, company or for personal development, do let me know.

Mobile phone photography and video – staff development activity

iPhone photography workshop

Our short, mobile phone workshop is an enjoyable and valuable staff development activity. The workshop explains a number of tips and tricks to help people take better pictures with their mobile phones.

Once the essential topics have been covered, the session can be more tailored to meet the needs of the attendees.

Topics might include.

  • Portraiture
  • Lighting
  • Product photography
  • Apps and Special effects
  • Taking images for social media, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn,
  • Flash lighting
    Iphone pano tool

    Iphone panoramic image

     

iPhone video capture workshop

In addition to the smartphone photography workshop, we also offer a video capture workshop. This can be run as a separate, standalone session or in addition to the photography workshop. The session will cover skills required to produce a high quality crowd funding video for platforms such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo.

The session includes;

  • Planning a video shoot
  • Recording high quality sound
  • Time lapse
  • Slow motion
  • stabilising your phone

If you would like to know more, please contact mail@nigelgoldsmith.co.uk for more information.

This can be delivered to individual learners or to groups of up to 100.

The session was informative and interactive, Nigel was friendly, approachable, encouraged questions, and gave time for experimenting.  Numerous times throughout the evening, one or another member could be heard saying “I had no idea my phone could do that!”.  We have no hesitation in recommending Nigel as a speaker to any group, large or small. Arwen Beaton, Brislington WI

The workshop has been delivered at a range of organisations including; Linguarama, Microsoft, WI, University of Bath and the Royal Photographic Society and for the 24 Hours in Bristol photomorathon

Iphone photography workshop

Iphone photography workshop

Mug shot

Image of shipping containers printed onto mug. Coffee in mug is another widely consumed commodity where there is a huge imbalance between the price the growers are paid and what the customer pays.

Container ship mug

Container ship mug

$1 Million toll to pass through new Panama Canal

Containership Pays Nearly $1 Million Toll to Cross the Expanded Panama Canal

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MOL Benefactor transits the expanded Panama Canal, July 1, 2016. Photo: Panama Canal Authority
MOL Benefactor transits the expanded Panama Canal, July 1, 2016. Photo: Panama Canal Authority

With the opening of the Panama Canal expansion in June, it was to be expected that the waterway would shatter all sorts of cargo volume records, but with the canal’s added capacity one figure in particular stands out: $829,468.

That’s the staggering toll a containership previously too big to use the Panama Canal just paid to pass through it.

MOL Benefactor in the new locks of the expanded Panama Canal. Photo: MOL
MOL Benefactor in the new locks of the expanded Panama Canal. Photo: MOL

The toll was paid by the Mitsui O.S.K. Lines-operated MOL Benefactor for a northbound transit of the canal on July 1, 2016, the Panama Canal Authority has confirmed. The previous toll record was paid by the COSCO Shipping Panama for its inaugural transit of expanded locks to the tune of $575,545.

In fact, the 10,000 TEU MOL Benefactor was actually the first neopanamax containership to use the new locks since commercial operations began June 27, so the transit offers a glimpse of what is likely to come in terms of toll revenue.

The ACP said as of June 30 a total a total of 174 vessel has booked slots to transit the Panama Canal’s neopanamax locks, although it did not disclose how many of those were specifically neopanamax containerships.

The ACP sets tolls for containerships based on vessel size and TEUs, so assuming containerships with a cargo capacity of up to 13,000 TEU begin using the canal as expected, it seems like it’s only a matter of time before we see the first million dollar transit of the Panama Canal.

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