2017 | Fixation

Jonny Helm Feature May 2, 2017October 6, 2023

Baja Peninsula

Mexico’s Baja Peninsula, home to the San Ignacio Lagoon, is one of the most remarkable places on earth according to Chris Breen, founder of The Natural Travel Collection.

Chris has been leading trips to Baja for four years with a specific goal in mind: to observe and photograph the thousands of grey whales that migrate down the peninsula and visit some key lagoons each spring.

[gdlr_quote align=”center” ]This is a place where the whales want to touch you and play with you, roll around for you, and open their mouths so you can rub their baleen

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“They blow bubbles for you and disappear to scratch their bellies on the under side of the boats or push on the stern of the boats to turn them round. It all seems to be such fun for them and it’s impossible to know who is enjoying it more, the whales or us.” says Chris.

We caught up with Chris to find out more about his recent trip, and to find out exactly why he keeps returning year after year.

You’re obviously very passionate about your photography. What sort of kit do you take with you on these kind of trips?

After having all my Canon gear stolen in South Africa a few years back I switched to Nikon which I love. I carry a D750 and a D700 with three Nikkor lenses – a 17-35mm ƒ/2.8, 24-70mm ƒ/2.8 and an 80-400mm ƒ/4.5-5.6. As I’m photographing from small boats and the whales are adept at getting everything wet I have two or three small towels in my pocket so I can regularly dry my kit if the whales are on form! I also take a GoPro Hero4 which is good for occasional underwater shots. Most importantly though, I don’t spend all my time behind the lens – the whales need attention too!

You’ve been a customer of ours for quite a while. How much do you rely on Fixation for your gear?

I was introduced to Fixation a few years back and rarely go anywhere else now. Regular camera servicing, sensor cleaning and of course buying good equipment (both used and new) all goes through Fixation.

Do you rent any equipment for your trips or do you prefer to own it outright?

I mostly use my own gear but the rental service is a lifesaver. Before going to Mexico I had the sensor on my D750 cleaned and you discovered that the camera body was damaged with no time to repair it before I went. The rental service came to my rescue with a D750 body in my camera bag within 24 hours – it’s hard to fault that!

What got you out to Baja California in the first place?

One of my friends had been telling me for years how good it was for wildlife, but as I was travelling quite a lot already I couldn’t really see how I could fit it into my schedule. Over a beer or two (it’s often the way!) we agreed to lead a trip together to the Pacific side of the Baja Peninsula with a view to seeing grey whales. It was a couple of years in the planning but we led two very successful trips in 2014… and that was it, the whales stole my heart! I returned home after two weeks of whale watching twice each day I told my wife how amazing it was and booked flights for my wife and kids to visit in 2015 (I already had a full trip for 2015 as well so I just stayed on for another wonderful week when my family went home!). It’s now an annual pilgrimage – and though it sounds strange, it is about as close as it’s possible to get to a religious experience.

Its obviously a lovely place but why do the grey whales go there?

Good question – well, the grey whales have the longest mammal migration of any mammal on earth and they swim 12,000 kilometres from the Chukchi Sea in the Arctic to arrive in the Pacific lagoons in mid to late December in order to breed and have their young. The males disappear northwards from about mid February but the females and their young stay in the lagoons until mid April. Its amazing because there is no food for them to eat here so the adult females are surviving for four or five months without food, feeding their young calves and travelling 24,000 kilometres as well – they are almost ‘super beings’!

But why do they want to play – this isn’t something that I have heard of before?

No one really knows, it is possible that they like the sound of the engines purring away in the water, or perhaps they are just bored of swimming length after length of the lagoon (which they need to do in order for the young ones to increase their strength to prepare for the long journey north) and are inquisitive about what is on the surface. Whatever the reason, they certainly make the most of it – and if the young ones are a little tentative to begin with, their mothers dive down and blow bubbles under them to push them up to the boats. Once they see how fun we can be they just keep coming back for more!

I thought it was unethical to touch wildlife…

Well I would agree everywhere else in the world except here. In simple terms we would never chase the whales, we wait to see if they want to play with us, and if they do then we will play. But, if they want to play with us and we don’t want to play with them, they will simply go to another boat that does want to play – and have all the fun they can!

Are there many boats in the lagoon then?

No not at all. The lagoon is mostly set aside for the whales – it is their private sanctuary. However there is a small part of the lagoon that is set aside as a whale-watching zone and 16 boats are allowed into it. The boats are only allowed in for 90 minutes and it is very strictly controlled.

You would obviously recommend this as a trip then!

Yes, it should be at the top of everyone’s list – it really is the most amazing wildlife trip possible on Planet Earth, and I certainly plan to return every year if at all possible. So far I have done nearly 200 hours of whale-watching in the coastal lagoon and its not nearly enough to get it out of my system!

Chris was talking to Tim Stavrinou. If you would like to join Chris on his next trip to Baja California and experience the amazing wildlife and wonderful photographic opportunities of the area, he is travelling to the region again in 2018, this time on a small vessel departing from San Diego and cruising down the entire Baja Peninsula. The trip is called Great Whales of Mexico’s Pacific Coast and it is aboard a 25 berth motor cruiser with a naturalist onboard.

Jonny Helm Feature, Review April 24, 2017February 7, 2024

Fuji GFX 50S | A Working Day With A New Camera System

Paul Stewart, Night Picture Editor at the Daily Express and documentary photojournalist, has worked in the imaging industry for over 45 years, both as a photographer and an editor. As soon as the first GFX’s arrived in our rental department, we were keen to see what working professional photographers really thought of the camera, and Paul was only too happy to oblige..

I was really interested to hear early rumours of the GFX 50S, as the idea of a mirrorless medium format camera was an exciting new development. Having swapped my full frame DSLR kit for the Fuji X Series and specifically the wonderful X-Pro2s, I knew that FujiFilm’s evolution of digital photography was well up there with their previous take on the medium and always considered FujiFilm to be people who develop their sensors with an eye to their great history as a film manufacturer. In fact, only Kodak, to my mind, produced high end pro digital kit with a similar quality of colour and detailed reproduction. Having seen the GFX 50S at Fixation’s FujiFilm Open Day I was delighted when they asked me to try the camera out.

When I was the editor of HotShoe International and indeed when I reviewed equipment for the British Journal of Photography, I had a strict policy of not doing or commissioning a review unless an actual photographer went out and shot a real job with the equipment (after all if you can’t earn a living with it, it’s not a lot of good to a pro).

The first thing I noticed about the GFX was the ergonomics which are superb. In comparison to my Phase One Mamiya 645AFD, it’s lighter (when used without the battery grip) and handles far more like a high end DSLR, making location use far easier, though it’s happy to sit rock solid on a tripod in the studio. The next thing I noticed was that the firmware, menus and ergonomics all take a big lead from the X Series cameras that I am already used to, which meant that integrating myself into the camera system was a doddle.

This is a really well thought out camera. The tri-axis tilt screen on the back means that you can shoot from almost any angle and still see what you are framing, making a “Hail Mary” more a matter of framing than prayer.

Likewise, the tilting view finder, which I originally thought was not going to be that interesting, turned out to be a godsend when shooting in bright light when wanting to shoot from a lower angle.

So what job did I decide to use it on? I was asked to be the host photographer for a Royal Visit by the Duke of Gloucester, who, of all things, was meeting three Virginia Indian Chiefs of the Powhatan People, all of whom were of the descendant tribes of Pocahontas and who were celebrating the 400th Anniversary of her leaving Brentford, where she lived, to return to America.

Sadly, she only got as far as Gravesend, where she died. The ceremonials were being held in Syon House, so I arrived a bit early to check out the light, which, although soft, was very low outside the venue. Inside, especially in the private green drawing room, it was abysmal but plunging on, I shot this job jpeg only to see just how good the dynamic range of this camera was. I expected it to be good. It was, in fact, exceptional. I shot some portraits of the various Chiefs and dignitaries with extreme highlights and shadow within them and the detail recovery was beyond that I expected.

The camera behaved faultlessly throughout the shoot. I never had to go onto the second battery that I had as a back up and was incredibly pleased with the results. Everything you see, including the grip and grin type PR shot of the Chiefs with Lord Watson of Richmond, were shot in a low level of available light. In fact the very first shot I shot with the camera in anger was the one of the marble statue in Syon’s Great Hall.

Looking at this just on the back of the screen made me realise just what a great camera this is. Although, like all medium format cameras it is expensive, when compared to Phase 1s and other makes, it’s well priced. The only down side to the camera that I have seen so far, is that FujiFilm went back to a Bayer Pattern rather than adopting their fabulous X-Trans sensor design as used in the X Series, which I find to be the best sensor I have ever used. It would have been nice to see a larger format version of this. However, in terms of colour rendition etc I find it hard to fault the GFX 50S.

I don’t feel that the Mamiya would have allowed me to do the location shooting that the Fuji allowed and the only downside is that I now have to try and sell my Mamiya 645 AFD/Phase One System so I can get a GFX!

You can see more of Paul’s work here

To get your hands on the Fuji GFX 50S, pop into our showroom for a demo, or contact our rental department and try one for yourself.

Jonny Helm News April 24, 2017October 3, 2023

Scottish news picture guru Jeff Mitchell captures the moment – again

The best landscape photographers will sit in a field for days just waiting for the right light. The best news photographers are blessed with similar patience – but they also need to be lucky.

Scotland-based photographer Jeff Mitchell has just picked up three more honours for his creaking mantlepiece at the annual UK Picture Editors’ Guild Awards.

The 47-year-old Getty Images photographer is a multi-award-winning professional whose work takes him across the globe in a relentless quest to ‘capture the moment’ for an insatiable news media.

Jeff’s compelling close-up photograph of an exhausted migrant father comforting a crying infant as he tries to get through a police line to his family in Croatia, won him the title ‘News Photographer of the Year’ sponsored by Fixation, and, following his win in the Photo Essay of the Year category with an additional series of unforgettable photos, judges awarded him the Shutterstock Press Photographer of the Year honour.

“I am lucky to have what I think is the best job in the world and it is a great honour to be recognised by my peers in this way’ he said. There is no question that 2016 was a very good year for news pictures – but you still have to be in the right place at the right time to capture them. My mantra is: Be there first, leave last and never give up.

I remember the great news photographer Ken Lennox once saying: “This is your time. Make your time the best time’ – that’s what I try to do each time I go out with a camera.”

He added: “The picture of the father and the little girl happened after many hours of waiting. The police were holding the migrants back and they were all exhausted and thirsty. I picked my moment – and sometimes you just know instinctively that you’ve got the shot.”

The UK Picture Editors’ Guild Awards judges agreed:

Said Chairman of the panel Ian Day: “What a brilliant set of images from one of the biggest news years ever.”

Fiona Shields (The Guardian) added: “The news category is one of the most difficult to judge as there are so many memorable pictures. They really prove the skill of the professional in telling the story, connecting with the viewer and in making sense of an often unpredictable or chaotic news situation in a single frame.”

Fixation General Manager Michele Channer said: “Fixation has been serving professional photographers, and particularly press photographers for almost thirty years and we shall continue to do so. The News category is our customer heartland so we are delighted to be able to support our customers and the Guild.”

[gdlr_quote align=”center” ]‘There has never been a greater need for news images and the harder I work the luckier I seem to get’ – multi-award-winning news photographer Jeff Mitchell

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She added: “Over 600 professional press photographers entered these awards in eleven categories, and over 3,000 pictures were judged by ten of the country’s leading experts in press photography. Over one hundred of the entries were submitted in the News Photographer of the Year grouping.”

Winner Jeff, who also picked up a total of £2,000 in cash, praised the Guild Awards organisation. “The Guild is the true benchmark in this discipline – and at Getty the team is used to working with Fixation who sponsored the news category. Whenever we have any issue with a piece of kit we just stick it in the post or drop it off at Fixation HQ. They understand the urgent nature of our work and they always get the job done quickly for us.”

Jonny Helm Feature April 24, 2017February 7, 2024

Crash Course | Introduction To Sound Recording

It’s very easy to focus on the visual side of video production, but sound recording plays a huge role in the quality of the finished piece.

We sat down with our Rental Manager, Rob Gardner, and asked his advice on the basics of location sound recording.

Can you give us an idea of the basic kit needed to record professional quality sound on location?

In essence all you need is a means of gathering the sound with the highest fidelity – a microphone – and a means of capturing that sound, a recording device. The tools and techniques vary but at core it is that simple.

Most video-capable DSLRs have built-in microphones. Some, like the Nikon D5600 pictured here, have stereo microphones.

Can’t I just use the built-in microphone on a DSLR?

Certainly in-built camera mics fit those criteria, but anyone who has used them will know that they produce poor results. The first problem they create is one of distance. In recording studios you see the singer inches away from the microphone. On set you’ll sometimes see boom swingers heroically hanging microphones in from over 10 meters away to capture sound as well as possible. Sound recordists go to great lengths hiding microphones in costumes and even wigs in order to get as close to the source as they can. The in-camera mic is often just too far away to be useable.
The next consideration is that the in-camera mics are just too small and too low quality to gather satisfactory sound quality. A top end microphone can cost thousands of pounds and the reason for this is the materials used, the research that went into their design and the expertise in their construction, the mics in cameras just can’t compete.

Recorders such as the Zoom H4n are perfect for location recording and offer a choice of microphone inputs alongside built-in XY mics.

My DSLR has an external microphone socket. Can I plug one in and record the sound directly to camera, or should I use an external recorder?

It will largely depend on your shooting conditions. An external recorder gives you more control over the recording but it is then an extra bit of kit to monitor and operate. If you are moving around this might prove problematic. In an ideal world you would have a dedicated sound recordist to take care of all of this, a lone operator may have to think about simplifying their approach.

On-camera microphones such as the Nikon ME-1 offer a better recording experience than built-in mics.

If I record the sound on an external recorder, what is the best way to sync it back to the footage?

Traditionally the clapper board at the top or end of a take was used to give a frame accurate sync point. A less professional but equally accurate technique is to have someone actually clap at the top of the take to give a sync point.
A more modern approach is to use embedded timecode generated by externally synced generators – again, this would normally fall under the auspices of a sound recordist.

Should I use auto or manual record levels?

If you are on your own you’ll almost definitely have to use the auto levels. Monitoring the image will be taking up too much of your focus. If you have an external recorder and someone to work it then manually ‘riding’ the levels is a more versatile approach.

How does a limiter work and what does it do?

Limiters are there to stop the analogue signal from overloading, thus corrupting the digital recording. They can also be used to set a lower limit to the sound recorded to avoid too much bass.

I’ve read about Directional and Omni-directional mics. Can you tell us the difference?

The names of these mics pretty well cover it. Omni-directional Mics are indiscriminate and pick up sound from all directions. Directional mics are designed to have a narrow ‘beam’ or corridor of sensitivity outside of which significantly less is picked up. For the majority of applications relating to AV recording, Directional mics would be the more appropriate tool.

Directional mics such as the Rode NTG-2 are perfect for location recording and can be mounted on a DSLR hotshoe (with a suspension mount) or on a boom with a wind-jammer if necessary.

Fixation’s rental department carries a wide range of microphones and recording equipment. For advice on your needs, speak to one of our advisors on 020 7582 3294 or email rental@www.fixationuk.com

Jon Stapley Close Up March 21, 2017October 11, 2023

Close up | Canon 5D Mark IV 4K specs for video

Canon’s EOS 5D Mark IV lists video recording as one of its main features – we take a look at what it offers the videographer.

The Canon 5D Mark IV

Resolution and frame rate

The Canon EOS 5D Mark IV is currently one of only a handful of DSLRs that records 4K quality video. This is captured in the DCI 4K format, which records at a resolution of 4096 x 2160 pixels (as opposed to the more common UHD 4K format that records at 3860 x 2160-pixel resolution).

The 5D Mark 4 RAW video setting is made possible thanks to the Dual Pixel photodiode innovation. But with double imaging comes double the usual file size of usual RAW.

The camera offers the user a choice of 24fps (23.98fps), 25fps and 30fps (29.97fps), when recording 4K footage in the PAL format. The camera also offers Full HD (1920×1080) and HD (1280×720) options, at up to 50fps.

High speed shooting at up to 100fps is also possible, and this output at 25fps (a quarter of the speed).

When set to NTSC, frame rates on offer are 30fps (29.97fps), 24 fps and 23.98fps, with an additional 60fps option when recording in Full HD. High-Speed footage, meanwhile, is captured at 119.97fps and output at 29.97fps.

Crop factor

To record DCI 4K footage without pixel binning, the camera only uses a central portion of the sensor. This requires a crop factor of 1.64x, relative to the full-frame. So, using a 28mm lens when recording 4K footage will give you an effective angle of view that’s closer to that provided by a 46mm lens.

When recording HD or Full HD footage, the camera uses the entire sensor (without a crop being applied, and so that angle of view of whatever lens you’re using will be maintained). This also means that if you find yourself limited while shooting in 4K by this, you have the option of switching to Full HD (obviously at the expense of high resolution).

The EOS 5D Mark IV records 4K video using a central portion of its 30.4MP sensor.

Aspect ratio

As the horizontal DCI 4K resolution is slightly higher than that of UHD 4K, the aspect ratio of recorded footage is approximately 17:9 rather than the more standard 16:9 ratio. This changes to 16:9 when recording in either Full HD or HD options.

Sensitivity

This Canon camera’s ISO range can be adjusted over a range of ISO 100-12,800 as standard when capturing 4K footage, and ISO 100-25,600 when capturing Full HD videos. In both cases this can be controlled in 1/3EV increments.

If you want the camera to automatically select higher ISOs, this needs to be enabled through the menu system beforehand. The options here allow you to set a range of ISO 100-Hi1 (51,200 equivalent) or ISO 200-Hi2 (102,400 equivalent).

This extended Lo setting, which is equivalent to ISO 50, is not available when recording 4K or HD footage. This means that in the particularly bright conditions in which you may want to use it, you will either need to stop down your aperture or use an ND filter.

The camera’s ISO can be directly controlled from a button on its top plate.

File formats

The camera records in both MOV and MP4 formats and is one of only a handful with built in GPS. When recording 4K footage it employs the Motion JPEG codec, which records at a bit rate of approximately 500Mbps. When recording HD or Full HD footage, however, you have the option of choosing ALL-I and IPB compression options, with a further IPB Light option if recording using the MP4 setting.

As there is no way to record 4K footage at a different level of compression, Canon recommends using a CompactFlash memory card rated to UDMA 7 with a write speed of 100Mbps or faster. It also states that UHS-I Class 3 SD-format cards can be used, although these only guarantee a transfer rate of of 30Mbps.

If you use a slower-than-recommended memory card to record video, the camera may display a five-bar indicator as the card fills up, eventually stopping video recording. The camera will also notify you if the sensor becomes too heated through prolonged use.

Card formats

As with the Canon EOS 5D Mark III, the model is designed with dual card slots: one for SDHC and SDXC media and one for CompactFlash. The SDHC/SDXC slot supports UHS-I cards (but not UHS-II) while the CompactFlash slot supports cards conforming to the UDMA 7 specifications.

The camera accepts both SDHC/SDXC and CompactFlash media.

Chroma subsampling

The camera records with YCbCr 4:2:2 chroma subsampling when shooting in 4K, and 4:2:0 when recording in HD and Full HD formats. When outputting HD footage via the HDMI output, this is set to 4:2:2.

Frame grabs

While it’s not possible to capture images while recording movies, the Canon EOS 5D Mark IV allows you to extract individual frames from 4K footage and save them as JPEG files in camera. This happens at a resolution of around 8.8MP – slightly higher than other 4K-enabled cameras on account of it recording in the DCI 4K format (rather then UHD 4K).

Touchscreen

The Canon EOS 5D Mark IV follows the EOS 1D-X Mark II in offering a touchscreen on its rear, and this can be used for a variety of purposes when recording video.

At a basic level this can be used to select options on the screen, such as ISO and the Q menu that brings up the audio recording level and volume for external monitoring although, perhaps more usefully, this can also be used for focusing (explained below).

The camera’s touchscreen can be used for a range of purposes, including shifting the focusing point while recording.

Autofocus

One of the advantages of the camera’s Dual Pixel CMOS AF system is that it can continue to focus using phase-detection AF (performed on the main imaging sensor) while recording videos. This also allows for continuous autofocus while recording, with control over tracking speed and sensitivity offered to better suit your subject.

The partnership of this technology with the camera’s touchscreen allows for two key things. First, you have the option of keying the subject on which you want the camera to focus on the screen, prior to recording. It has 61 AF points selectable distributed on the viewfinder. Here, it focuses it swiftly but fluidly, much more so than with a standard contrast-detect AF system. This also means that you can use it in live view while capturing stills.

Another benefit of this is that you can use this touchscreen functionality while the camera is recording videos, which means you can shift focus from one subject to another simply by touch. This means that you don’t need to physically pull focus using the lens.

Audio

The camera is equipped with a monaural microphone, which is positioned just beneath the camera’s name badge on the front plate, although any professional that wants to record sound at its best possible quality will no doubt use an external microphone. This can be connected to the camera though a 3.5mm stereo mic port at its side.

Both wind-cut and attenuator filters are selectable through the camera and control over audio levels can be set to manual (over 64 levels) or auto options. A headphone socket is also provided for monitoring audio, and the camera allows you to adjust volume here too.

The EOS 5D Mark IV is compatible with external stereo microphones such as Canon’s own DM-E1 model.

HDR movie function

A feature that appeared on the recent EOS 760D and EOS 80D is HDR Movie Recording, and this has made the cut here too. The Canon 5DMK4 video specs is designed for the same kinds of conditions as you would use it when shooting stills – ie. scenes with a naturally broad dynamic range, which may exceed the sensor’s capabilities. This option records at 60fps and outputs footage at 25fps (PAL) and 29.97fps (NTSC), although only at Full HD resolution.

HDMI out

The camera is equipped with a Type C, HDMI mini port around its side, and this allows you to output clean (uncompressed) footage to an external recorder. The only caveat here is that this is only possible at a maximum full HD resolution, as opposed to 4K.

The camera is fitted with a The Canon 5D Mark iv ports: The camera is fitted with a Type C HDMI mini port, along with USB 3.0, microphone, headphone and flash-sync sockets.

Time-lapse footage

You can also use the EOS 5D Mark IV to for time-lapse recording, with the individual frames stitched together in camera and output as Full HD files.

As with the HDR movie option, this is output at 25fps (PAL) and 29.97fps (NTSC), and control is provided over the interval between each frame and the number of images captured in total. Usefully, as the camera is stitching together the time-lapse video itself (rather than just capturing the individual images), it will also inform you of the length of time required and the length of the final movie in advance, as well as whether you have enough room on your card to achieve this.

Time limits

As with other DSLRs, the maximum length of footage than can be recorded without interruption is 29mins and 59 seconds. When using the camera’s High Frame Rate mode, this is reduced to 7 mins 29 seconds.

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