Shots around Edinburgh

Venue
In and around central Edinburgh

Equipment
Casio Exilim 12.1mp Point and Shoot Camera

Time and Weather
Shots taken between 1100 - 1500 hrs; cloudy day with sun trying to break through

Comments
As I was travelling into Edinburgh on the train I decided not to take my DSLR as I wanted to travel light. I took my Casio point and shoot as it is versatile as well as being small and easy to fit into my pocket. Although the Casio has some manual setting it is shoots predominantly in AUTO mode so I tried to control as much as I could.

As Edinburgh has some amazing buildings I decided to focus my shoot mainly on the buildings to try and capture the historic feel of the city. I also took some shots of things that are typically Scottish, like the Bagpipers. I also tried to experiment with some of the things that I had read about recently like composition, perspective, silhouettes etc.

As I have been shooting in manual recently I found not having full control a little frustrating at times as I didn't have full control over the creative process. That being said I tried to use this limitation to my benefit by trying to bit more flexible in my approach to framing, composition etc.

The position of the sun trying to come through clouds seemed to hamper some of my shots as I wasn't able to position myself due to terrain so that the light was in a favourable position. This did lead to two good silhouettes (well I like them). After the session with Steve on the Rule of Thirds I tried to use this theory when positioning the items of interest in the picture. I feel that I have been able to do that to good effect on a number of the building shots.

Steve also spoke about using items in the photo to frame other things within the picture. I tried this on a couple of occasions and I like how it draws the eyes into the shot. I will be experimenting with this on future shoots. I also tried to use lead lines on a few of the shots to lead the viewer through the picture, hopefully to some success.

Overall, I had an enjoyable day around Edinburgh and loved how using a point and shoot camera made me think differently about my composition and style. I will look forward to returning to Edinburgh with my DSLR to see what I can do using manual settings.

To see the album to pictures from Edinburgh please click HERE.