Table of contents for September 2017 in Digital Camera Magazine

TO shoot raw or not to shoot raw? That is the question. Well, it’s one of the many questions that are addressed in this month’s fun and informative cover story. Our resident technical whizz and chief camera reviewer, Rod Lawton, has masterminded a tough and challenging quiz that will test your raw knowledge to the max. Whether you’re seasoned expert or a relative novice, I guarantee there’s something for everyone to learn here. I’d be interested to hear what you think of the quiz and how well you did. We will be following up on Facebook, so be sure to check in and join the discussion at www.facebook.com/digitalcameraworld That’s not all: the rest of the mag is full to the brim with inspirational stories and cool techniques to try too.…

Photography news from around the globe BOWENS has become the latest camera industry casualty, citing cheaper Chinese lighting products and more innovative solutions by its rivals as the key reasons for its demise. Calumet Photographic will be stepping in to continue offering a level of service to existing Bowens customers, although it’s not clear how long this relationship will continue. Calumet is also currently in talks with other studio lighting equipment manufacturers in order to fill the Bowens-shaped hole left in its product range. FLASHBACK Only last summer, Bowens was acquired by European investment firm Aurelius as a ‘peripheral activity’ together with Calumet. Aurelius subsequently acquired camera retailer Wex Photographic, and its strategic focus is now on expanding the retail business across Europe, rather than focusing on developing a studio…

Saramonic SR VRM1 compact linear PCM recorder This clicks into place on any XLR microphone to create a ‘roving’ mic, with the audio able to be synced to the video you capture during post-production. www.kenro.co.uk; £162 Meike MK420 flashgun This TTL flashgun, sold through Amazon, is available for Fujifilm and Sony cameras. Its li-ion battery is said to last for 300-2,500 flashes. www.mkgrip.com; £110 3 Legged Thing QR11 L bracket This universal L bracket comes in two colours and features triangular pads to maximise surface contact on the base. www.3leggedthing.com; £50/$50…

IN a bid to dominate the mobile photo editing market as it does the desktop one, Adobe has released some significant, arguably fundamental enhancements for Lightroom on iOS and Android. Finally, the iPhone and iPad versions get a Selective Brush, in addition to a new Details Tab which enables global control over sharpening and noise reduction. Meanwhile Lightroom for Android has also been redesigned from the ground up to provide a faster and more efficient editing process. https://blogs.adobe.com/lightroomjournal…

Nine summer challenges to push your photography in new directions USING a macro lens can get you close to flowers to reveal their wonderful colours, enthralling textures and tiny details. The process of freezing flowers is unpredictable, yet fascinating and surprising too – you never know where the bubble trails and wonderful icy patterns will develop in the block. Flowers are diverse and they can respond differently to the freezing process due to their thickness or density. Some flowers are changed little by the ice, while the petals of delicate blooms may take on a wonderful transparency. Just putting flowers into a tray of water and popping it into the freezer won’t work, as the flowers will float to the top and swirl around uncontrollably. So you need to anchor…

NEW GEAR / EXPERT TESTS / BUYING ADVICE 102 CANON 6D Mk ii How does Canon’s new entry-level full frame DSLR compare to the original? 108 ND GRADS We test out some of the latest ND Grad filters in our at-a-glance micro test 112 DROBO 5C This Drobo promises iron-clad protection and external storage of your precious files 114 TRAVEL CAMERAS Packing a lightweight camera gives you a flexible, accessible option while away 122 MONOPODS Continuing the easy-to-carry trend, these monopods are perfect for longer walks Also reviewed 106 Sony FE 12-24mm f/4 G Extreme wide-angle lens 107 Sony FE 16-35mm f/2.8 GM High-end G Master lens 111 Hähne l Modus 600 RT kit Fast wireless flashgun kit Reviews you can trust Digital Camera is brought to you by the…

£347/$349 (unit only, no drives) Data storage www.drobo.com SPECIFICATIONS Drive compatibility 3.5-inch internal SATA II/III (sold separately) Drive bays 5 Connectivity 1 x USB Type-C port Operating systems Windows 7, 8 or 10; macOS 10.10 or later File system options Windows, NTFS; macOS, HFS+ Software Drobo Dashboard 2.8.3 or later (included) Disk redundancy Single disk (default), dual disk (optional) Maximum capacity 64TB Power protection Internal battery Power AC power adaptor Dimensions 150 x 185 x 262mm Weight 3.9kg (without drives) Storage can be a real headache for photographers. You may already be at the stage when your image archive won’t fit on your computer’s internal disk drive. An external desktop drive is the obvious solution, but these have two drawbacks. First, they will eventually run out of storage capacity too.…

1 www.benroeu.com Benro Adventure MA D49A £53/$65 THIS is the heaviest leg here by over 200g, but it’s also the tallest. It manages not be especially long when packed, and the aluminium tubing is impressively rigid. Flip clamps make for speedy set-up; they’re a more streamlined shape than Manfrotto’s clamp design, and they can be user-maintained should they ever work loose. Another nice touch is the oversized 50mm-diameter foot: it offers unrivalled grip on flat surfaces and links to the leg via a manoeuvrable ball joint. If weight is an issue, a 620g carbon version is also available, albeit for well over twice the price. Material: Aluminium SECTIONS: Five Max load: 18kg Extended length: 191cm PAC KED LEN GTH: 54cm WEIGHT : 840g VERDICT 2 www.manfrotto.co.uk Gitzo Series 2 Traveler GM 2562T…

SOFTWARE Lightroom CC/6 GET IT FROM www.adobe.com GET START FILE FROM www.bit.ly/dc194files SEAN MCCORMACK Photographer and writer Sean McCormack is a photographer and writer based in Galway, Ireland. He’s the author of The Indispensable Guide to Lightroom CC. seanmcfoto.com FRECKLES: love them or loathe them, they’re a defining feature of many faces, especially redheads. Often they get hidden under layers of make-up – but set them free! With the sun out, there are plenty of people bursting forth with these beautiful spots of pigmentation in the skin. You can probably tell I love them. With a little bit of processing in Lightroom, you can really make them stand your subject’s freckles even more, especially in black and white. Reversing the main technique will allow you to reduce them, but really…

EVERY ISSUE WE BRING YOU MORE FREEBIES THAN ANY OTHER PHOTO MAGAZINE! FREE CARDS! Techniques and tricks at a glance The perfect companions to take on your next photo trip In these summer-themed collectable tips cards, learn all about manual focus and the Sunny 16 Rule in our pocket guides. We also help you with your creative shots, including suggested settings for shooting cute pet portraits, double exposures and reflections at dusk. You’ll never be without inspiration or technical advice again! Look for the cards after the magazine. 162-PAGE BUYERS’ GUIDE EBOOK If you’re after some new kit, you won’t want to miss your free Camera Shopper ebook, with the best buying advice around. Download the Camera Shopper PDF to your computer via www.bit.ly/cshopper17 WATCH VIDEO www.bit.ly/dc194video Download the video…

TASCHEN has launched a trio of new A4 paperbacks covering three photography giants. Edward Weston and Man Ray need no introduction, but commercial and art photographer Paul Outerbridge is perhaps less of a household name in the UK. Each concise monograph highlights some of the most celebrated images of the respected photographer alongside their lesser-known ones, and is fused with a smattering of insightful text commentary in multiple languages. www.taschen.com; £20 each…

RØDE VideoMic Pro+ This new shotgun mic automatically turns itself off when it’s removed from the camera and boasts a new built-in battery door as well as a rechargeable lithium-Ion battery. www.rode.com; £289/$TBC BenQ PD2500Q 25-inch monitor This 2K QHD (2,560 x 1440) screen uses an IPS display panel and is said to be factorycalibrated to 100% sRGB and Rec.709 standards. www.benq.com; £388/$TBC MPB Harrier carbon tripod legs Fancy a carbon-fibre set of legs but don’t want to pay through the nose? This four-section set weighs 1kg, but can support up to 13kg and packs down to a reasonable 43cm. www.mpb.com; £125/$158…

WHEN it comes to neutral-density filters, Lee Filters knows its onions. Now it’s launching a ProGlass IRND range for its Seven5, 100mm and 150mm systems. Originally designed for the film industry, the filters are free of colour casts and with precise stop values for exposure consistency. The filters block infrared pollution, and are manufactured from optically flat…

You can make your off-camera flash stand out with a home-made ‘gobo’ – which stands for ‘go-between object’. It’s a light modifier that goes between the light and your subject. It can block the light, diffuse it, or colour it. In this case we’re going to cut long rectangles in a cardboard sheet, then place it in front of the flashgun to give the illusion that the flash is behind a set of blinds in a film noir-inspired portrait. It mimics the blinds on a window, as if the subject is inside with the car headlights shining in from outside. Step 1 To make the gobo, you’ll need a large sheet of card. Measure out and mark long rectangles about 2.5cm high by 60cm long, and space them about 2.5cm…

There is a huge amount of planning that goes into a productive Milky Way shoot. It starts with making sure the forecast is clear with no moon between April and September, when the Milky Way is visible in the northern hemisphere. The other issue is light pollution, which can blot out large portions of the Milky Way and other stellar formations. Having found a dark spot (find them via www.darkskydiscovery.org.uk), you want a good foreground: a good shot needs an earthbound anchor such as abandoned buildings, trees or water. I chose the stark angularity of Manstone Rock in Shropshire for this shot. My Sky Guide app (www.fifthstarlabs.com) showed me that the galactic core would be visible after 11.30pm and almost rising due south. Step 1 Get on site in plenty…

KALALAU BEACH Name: Ludo Koos Location: Kalalau Beach, Hawaii KIT: Nikon D300S with 16-85mm lens EXPOS URE: 1/320 sec at f/9, ISO 200 Website: www.500px.com/ ludophotos Clever crops Ludo changed the orientation of his image while editing, creating a more immersive view. “It was originally taken in portrait format to catch all the scene to the top of the cliffs,” he explains. “I cropped the image as a landscape format in post-processing to bring more depth to the picture.” Happy human Ludo can’t remember if he saw the man standing in the frame at the time of shooting, but his lucky presence provides the viewer with a real sense of scale and joy. “He shows the size of the rocks. Thanks to the figure in the picture, people have an…

Our expert photo advisor is here to help EXASPERATED BY EXPOSURE SETTINGS? NONPLUSSED BY ND FILTERS? Send your question to digitalcamera@futurenet.com and let us provide you with a solution Adding depth Q :I used a telephoto for some landscapes, they lack a sense of depth. How can I change this? Donald French A :That is rather in the nature of a telephoto lens: it flattens the perspective and draws everything in so subject and background are less ‘separated.’ If you are shooting portraits, the background blur is perfect for making your subject stand out and this creates some sense of depth, but I know what you mean when it comes to telephoto landscapes. A wide-angle shot has more foreground interest, leading to the middle and then far distance so these…

T here’s a downpour as I say farewell to Runcorn. “We’ve had better days,” says a passing man as rain cascades off his umbrella. “Nice summer’s morning,” says a woman, sopping and laden with shopping bags. “Lovely day for a walk,” offers a passing dog walker. I do my best to see the funny side crossing the Runcorn-to-Widnes bridge as each passing truck covers me in a full body wave of muddy water. I detour inland from the Mersey to see the famous black-and-white architecture of Speke Hall. The gate is open but the curtains are down, the door is closed, and nobody’s about. I’m amused by the Tudor bragging above the entrance: ‘This worke 25 yards long was wholly built by Edw N Esq, Ano 1598’. I help myself…

www.cokin-filters.com Cokin Gradual ND Kit with Holder £47/$83 This kit consists of a holder and a trio of filters in the popular P Series (83 x 99mm) size. That’s large enough to just about cover an 82mm-diameter lens, though you can expect vignetting on wide-angle optics, and there isn’t much room for vertical adjustment to suit your horizon position. The filters vary in both density and transition. You get 1-stop and 2-stop grads, both with a hard transition, and the third filter is a 3-stopper with a soft transition. This lets you stack the two lighter filters to effectively create a 3-stop hard grad. price, exposure consistency between the filters in our kit only varied by 1/3 of a stop. OVERALL www.srb-photographic.co.uk SRB ND Hard Grad Filter Set £40/$52 Like the Cokin…

How do you choose the perfect camera for travel? Whether you’re embarking on an epic road trip, or cruising the seas, it’s good to travel light. But there is more than one type of ‘travel’ camera, and some tricky choices if you want to balance convenience and quality. First up are superzoom compact cameras, with built-in lenses that can take you from wide-angle to extreme telephoto focal lengths. For greater versatility, a lightweight interchangeable-lens camera (ILC) enables you to swap lenses to suit different shooting scenarios, while maintaining a traditional layout, and this can include both SLRs and mirrorless CSC (compact system cameras). For greater space-saving potential and a dash of style you can swap from the DSLR-type design to a rectangular ‘rangefinder’ style camera, which removes the viewfinder protrusion…

JAMES PATERSON Editor, Practical Photoshop With a decade as a working writer and photographer behind him, James knows exactly which Photoshop and Lightroom tools and techniques matter the most to you. SOFTWARE Photoshop CC GET IT FROM www.adobe.com GET START FILE FROM www.bit.ly/dc194files WATCH VIDEO www.bit.ly/dc194video DOWNLOAD THE VIDEO www.bit.ly/dc194bonus STEP BY STEP MAKE A SMILE Use the Liquify filter to create a beaming smile TOP TIP Because of the way the Liquify filter pushes and pulls pixels, it’s a ‘destructive’ tool. So it makes sense to convert your layer into a Smart Layer first. This keeps the effect non-destructive – endlessly editable. 1 OPEN LIQUIFY Open a portrait, then go to the Layers panel, right-click the layer and choose Convert To Smart Object. Next go to Filter > Liquify.…

SOFTWARE Photoshop CC GET IT FROM www.adobe.com GET START FILES FROM www.bit.ly/dc194files JAMES ABBOTT Photographer and journalist James is a professional photographer and journalist. He’s an advanced Photoshop user and has created hundreds of tutorials to help photographers improve their skills. jamesaphoto.co.uk All landscape photographers know that the best times to shoot are around sunrise and sunset, when the colour and quality of light are at their best. But despite following this simple rule, how many times have you got back to your computer to find that the colours you captured aren’t quite as vibrant as you remember them? Adding colour to an already vibrant and colourful sky may sound pointless or even feel like cheating – but when you’ve tried this technique, which is popular with professional landscape and…

SOFTWARE Photoshop CC GET IT FROM adobe.com GET START FILES FROM www.bit.ly/dc194files JAMES PATERSON Editor, Practical Photoshop With a decade as a working writer and photographer behind him, James knows which Photoshop and Lightroom tools and techniques matter the most to you. WATCH VIDEO www.bit.ly/dc194video DOWNLOAD THE VIDEO www.bit.ly/dc194bonus Speedy mono conversions A single Camera Raw tool can switch your pic Camera Raw’s Targeted Adjustment tool offers perhaps the quickest and easiest way to convert your images to monochrome and start tweaking contrast all at once. Simply grab the tool from the toolbar, rightclick and choose Grayscale Mix. This’ll remove the colour, and also means that you can immediately start dragging up or down over parts of the image to affect the colour ranges. Dragging down over the sky here darkens…

Read ANY ISSUE BY DOWNLOADING OUR DIGITAL EDITIONS Apple iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch Get the free Digital Camera app for your iPad or iPhone at www.bit.ly/DC_app (UK) or www.bit.ly/DCW_app (the rest of the world), then browse through our back issues or buy a subscription using the app. Android, PC or Mac Zinio: www.bit.ly/DCW_Zinio Google Play: www.bit.ly/DCW_GoogleP Other options Digital Camera is available for Kobo, Kindle, Nook, Windows 8 and more. Check out all of our partners in the column on the right of this page. The digital advantage Your digital magazines can travel with you – even if you delete them, they’re free to re-download at any time Binders for your print issues Prefer print? Keep your mags together with our binder, which neatly holds a year’s worth of…

IKON has confirmed the upcoming release of the D850, its latest high-res full-frame DSLR. Few details have been announced, with Nikon stating that it will be a “high-resolution, high-speed camera” with “a range of new technologies, features and performance enhancements that are a direct result of feedback from users over the years.” Nikon has released a promotional video on YouTube – Hercules Rising (www.bit.ly/dc194d850) – which was shot on the D850 itself. The maximum 2160p resolution of the video indicates that the new camera records in 4K, and the video explicitly states that the D850 is capable of 8K time-lapse recording. Further details will be confirmed “at a later time”. www.nikon.co.uk…

NIKON’S new AF-P Nikkor 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6E ED VR lens boasts a fast, quiet AF-P stepping motor and inherits the panningfriendly SPOR T VR mode from the company’s high-end telephotos. The latest incarnation of this classic full-frame zoom features a Vibration Reduction system that’s said to be good for up to 4.5 stops of shake compensation. It also includes A/M and M/A focus mode switches for control over the sensitivity of the lens’s manualfocus override. www.nikon.co.uk; £750/$750…

Citizen CY-02 photo printer This dye-sub printer can print three 6x8-inch prints per minute and uses continuous rolls of paper that produce up to 700 prints each – making it an option worth considering for event photographers. www.citizen.photo; £550/$710 Marumi Exus Solid protection filter Said to be up to seven times stronger than conventional filters, this tough cookie features a knurled, slim frame and is available in 13 sizes from 32-82mm. www.kenro.co.uk; From £54 Vanguard Veo 2 Vanguard’s second generation Veo travel tripods are available in carbon-fibre or aluminium leg variants, a choice of four or five leg sections and a choice of three colours (black, red and blue). www.vanguardworld. co.uk; From £110/$100…

t first glance, David Queenan’s abstract photographs look like modernist paintings. The deep blues marbled along the bottom of one image look as though they’ve been built up with layers of oil paint on a canvas. Contrasted with a crisp, uniform red line, you might wonder if the artist is making a statement with this precision. In another, indigo tree shapes appear like shadows against a deep, inky background, and are topped with verdigris fronds. In fact, these masterpieces are the hulls of fishing boats, captured on camera by chance. “Being a graphic designer (as well as a photographer), I enjoy the creative process of finding abstract art in what some might regard as mundane objects,” David explains. “It can also be a good way of passing the time while…

ENTER TODAY! www.photocrowd.com/a/current Closing date: 21st September 2017 It’s time to get your macro lenses out and to look at the world close up. Whatever and however you explore this theme, just make sure you take a creative approach. Anyone can get in close to a small object, but the real skill lies in noticing and drawing out the characteristics that make your chosen subject unique. A macro lens is like a magic microscope let loose into the wild, as it enables you to capture amazing details that you might not usually see. Great macro shots have shown us beautiful markings on insects that would leap off into the bushes if we held them that close to our eyes! Even plants gain an added dimension when seen through a macro…

Enzo Barracco Reportage, portrait and fashion photographer www.enzobarracco.com You can invite anyone to a dinner party – who do you choose? Sir Ranulph Fiennes. He wrote the foreword of my book. What’s your favourite place on Earth? The oceans. What’s on your memory card right now? Oops, I just formatted my card. But before, it was a series of portraits of Al Gore. What’s the shot you most regret not taking? I don’t. Sometimes it’s important to experience what is happening around you without a camera. Who would you most like to thank for getting you where you are today? Me, and my camera. What food do you take on a shoot? For me, photography is like sport physically. I eat a little bit before, and quite a lot after.…