a couple of days ago I was down at The Butchart Gardens with a client and this is the shot that I got and I was really happy with the shot
but I wasn't too happy with the video footage that I shot because it was so
busy it was very difficult to shoot video in there. People were walking past
and I was getting riled up and I was aware of the fact that I was a complete
nuisance. So I'm going back again today in the hopes that I can reshoot some of
that video and do a better job for you guys so that you can see how I captured
this shot. And also after I got that picture I sent it to my friend Warren
here and he said.... Bullsh*t, I can do better. So off we go we're gonna go back there right now and try and get some more killer shots because that was like
four or five days ago and the colors may have changed even more since then when I
was there some of the trees are turned red not quite all of them and there's
one in particular that I really love OMG this is fantastic! Turn the camera around this was turning out to be a spectacular misty morning and I had a good feeling that we'd capture some great shots. Now Warren picked me up this
morning in pretty rough accommodations What's this car? A Jag XKR. A Jaguar you know I'll put up with it for today but you know I
do prefer slightly more salubrious accommodations if you don't mind at this point in the video, I'd very much appreciate it if you could pretend not
to notice the now-famous stain on the windscreen partly because I'm somewhat
embarrassed that it hasn't been cleaned off yet but mostly because we're
actually supposed to be riding in Warren's Jag. But you already knew that
right? OK, so we're going to Butchart. How many times you've been? There this will be my eighth. Eight! You know the place back to front! Well I whenever I go there I always just go straight to the Japanese gardens the
rest of it is brilliant but for me it's all about the Japanese section. So I've
been there once in my life when I was probably 12 years old. I didn't know it
was like a big tourist trap Well it wouldn't have been when you were 12, that's like 70 years ago! This is one of the most gorgeous foggy mornings I have ever seen! just low-lying mist the Sun is up so
it's blasting in through trees and it's creating light rays oh it's just
fantastic with the Jag parked we hoofed it
straight to the Japanese section and even skipped coffee so back home on Vancouver Island and today I'm at The Butchart Gardens which
is a fantastic tropical garden and the place to come when you come here for me
as a photographer is straight to the Japanese section because look at these
colors and these shapes, it's absolutely magnificent! Now, shooting here especially in the morning in autumn is a bit of a nightmare
because technically it's very difficult you've got to get down low
you've gotta bracket your shots you've got a focus perfectly because you're
really close to the foreground but logistically it's also a bit of a
nightmare because, well I've got to be aware of the fact that I'm a bit of a
pest right, these are narrow passageways and I'm in the way with my
two tripods, so logistically it's a challenge too so you've got to balance
all of those things you've got the technical aspect and you've got the fact
that you're a bit of a pain to other people so it's quite difficult to shoot
here but if you've got the patience and the the will to keep going, you will get
fantastic shots. I can't recommend this place enough, for the photographer. so with this shot that's a little bit
technical I'm having to shoot at f/22 because the depth of field is crazy and
I'm so close to this foreground that need that front to back focus. But it's
not a problem because it's so bright there's so much sunlight that everything
is gonna be sharp. I'm not too worried about diffraction. What I'm loving though
with this shot is this reflected light here and that's what I love about these
types of gardens is you get what I call bounce light so the light is coming in
and it's hitting something on the ground which then illuminates an object higher
up so you get this this light coming from underneath which is
absolutely magical to me. And then you've got these beautiful ships that all pull
the eye into the foreground got this little bamboo fence here that's kind of
pulling your eye into the center of the shot. So all in all, this is like a super
easy composition it's a super easy shot to get this dead obvious as soon as I
walk past I saw the shot and I loved the way that the light is reflecting off of
these pools here. All in all, it's absolutely gorgeous scene had to take
this shot now this is one of those compositions is
not quite as easy to get. Everything is gorgeous, I'm seeing gorgeous reflections.
I'm seeing gorgeous colors but, to find a simple composition is very very
difficult. Everything's kind of a mess and a jumble so with the super wide it
may be just a little bit too wide. I might have to strap on a different
lengths of lens and get in a little bit tighter and isolate a detail that's
easier for the eye to to take on. Instead of this massive scene but I just love the way that that red color is reflected in this pond here it's so rich and
vibrant. So I'm going to try and capture it super wide first and then
I'll switch to the 24-105mm, zoom in to maybe 50 mm and maybe then the
shot I'll be a bit cleaner and a bit more obvious so this is the 18 mm very, very
wide scene on a full frame and I want to know what you prefer do you prefer this
wider bigger scene or do you prefer this shot which is at 32 mm on a
full frame. It's a much tighter more intimate scene so please leave a comment
let me know what you prefer and that gives me an indication as to the types
of shots that people like to see and that's really helpful for a photographer One of the things that I like to do with my
photography is to kind of set myself a bit of a challenge. I look at my
weaknesses as a photographer as an artist. And when I go to beautiful places
I have a habit and you might identify with this. I have a habit of just looking
for that grand epic scene that's super impressive. And I often forget to look
for those fine details. The details that you cannot walk past the things that you
have missed if you didn't go looking for them so today I'm gonna try and really
consciously make an effort to use a longer focal length, maybe I'll put on
the 55mm and get some shallow depth of field detail shots. And really spend a bit
of time looking for those gorgeous fine detail scenes, those almost like, miniature
scenes that I usually miss because I'm looking for that grand shot. See if I
can get something different from my portfolio. Because that's the hole in my
portfolio, gonna work really hard to try and get those today what a difference 4 days makes. So I
was here the other day and the light was completely different. Fair enough it was
about half an hour later but right now I'm loving this patchy bit of
light and that tree there the other day was almost yellow, so it's really changed
its color in just a few days. With this composition I've kind of gone a bit
simple. like I was talking earlier instead of the big wide scene, I'm using
it much longer focal length and I'm just taking out this this section here where
all that it's featuring in the shot is this gorgeous little path this lovely
s-shaped path the tree and the reflection. Dead simple dead pure very
easy to compose and when we've got full-frame cameras with super wide
lenses that the tendency is to shoot these big grand scenes where anything of
any interest in the middle it's very small. Often I see people that use crop
sensors or micro four-thirds and they have a much tighter focal length and it
may not look super impressive on the back of the camera but when you get it
on screen or in a print often those tighter longer focal lengths a far more
impressive than the big super wide scene and it's a lot more challenging to
compose so that's something I would always recommend is set yourself a
little bit of a challenge and try and use longer focal lengths than you're
used to and it's really gonna help you to refine your composition process now looking at this image you'd be
forgiven for thinking that I'd cranked the saturation slider all the way up to
11 but no I never touch the saturation slider. And this is just one of the
wonders of the Butchart Gardens on a bright sunny day. The colors can be eye
melting. so as you can see it's a lovely, tranquil serene almost silent, zen-like
scene here at Butchart Gardens. just kill me kill me now All right, before you get your under crackers in a twist. I do realize that I've got no more right to be there than anybody else. One of the things I love about living in BC is how when the Sun hits a wet surface you get what appears to be smoke which is just
steam, rising out of Timbers whether it's a fence whether it's a tree or a
gorgeous bridge like that I just love that about BC as predicted this was turning out to be
a really productive morning but we were both getting a little bit Hank Marvin so
it was time to go and find some scoff So I just bought this...... it's called a 'Chilli-hotdog' It seems ill advised. Is this like a Canadian thing? It's structural integrity..... it's falling apart as I'm eating it. A Chilli hotdog? I think it's a mistake. Let's see you try and eat it. Look at that, it's just falling apart. It's disintegrating. This is like food p0rn. What's next? Pizza with gravy and noodles??? So what did you get? Chicken Pot Pie. Well that's waaay more sensible. I wish I'd got that! I seriously regret my food choices. I'm eating a hotdog with a knife and fork. It dun't make sense. Crazy. typical bloody Yorkshireman. Unable to
comprehend North American food but I tell you what. I'd kill for a donar kebab
right about now whoa with our distended Shatner's bursting at
the seams it was time to get back to work. So with this shot I'm really testing the limits of my patience because I'm waiting for people to come in and go out so they can get a perfect shot of this
this tunnel of color so I'm just constantly shooting over and over and
over again and then I can blend exposures to get exactly what I want. And
I love this shot because I'm going for a much longer focal length than what I'm
used to. I'm used to shoot in sort of wide to sort of mid-range focal length this
is a much like I'm at about 70mm with this shot and I'm trying
to frame the shot so that there's as much color framing it in the top and
at the sides as possible and I love the way that the Sun is coming in is
lighting everything it's lighting the trees the canopy even the fence that you
see down the sides of the path the problem with Butchart Gardens is
it's so gorgeous that it's kind of become a victim of its
own success. I reckon in the last three hours
there's probably between six and seven hundred people gone through these doors
and they keep kind of coming through in waves so you've really got to time your
shot so they don't have a bunch of people walking into it so I think it's
time to find Warren find my ride home, and get out of here I swear to you that was not staged! well after searching high and low
I finally found Warren. He's got this gorgeous shot of this beautiful maple
reflected in this little waterfall here so, I'm pretty tired mate, how about you? I'm feeling like we should get going Oh I'm here for the night! Okay now I don't want you thinking that I'd forgotten all about that little assignment that I set for myself I was just waiting for the right subject to
reveal itself and here she was this little lady was working super hard at
creating this web or maybe she was just trying to get somewhere. Either way, I
couldn't resist this shot by the way if you fancy coming out and
shooting on location with me I'm leading a workshop in the Faroe Islands. We'll be
shooting spectacular waterfalls that pour off of dramatic cliffs into the ocean.
Coastal seascapes they're just gonna blow your mind Cultural, historic landmarks.
Endless mountain vistas. Surreal island landscapes with lots and lots of green
hope to see you there okay back to the video oh and like and subscribe if you
would. I think I'm done. I don't know if I can handle these crowds anymore. I was gonna stay here actually, get pictures of the people, hopefully I get a waterfall in the background. I'm feeling pretty done, you reckon we can leave? yeah okay. Thank God for that! well we gave it our best shot we got
loads of good pictures. Did you get some good pictures? Yeah I got some better ones
than you did. It usually is the case yeah we got loads of good shots managed
to actually this time shoot some tutorial videos so I think it's time to
get the hell out of here. The crowds are thronging. So Warren what was your first
vlogging experience like with Fototripper? aaah, I'm worried I come off
like a prick! Well you can't be any worse than me..... That's true. You're a lot worse prick than I am So with our memory cards brimming with digital nuggets of gold, we headed back to Warren's pimped out Golf Club chariot. it's time to rough it in Warren's wagon I mean it's a bit rough but I'll put up with this Jag for
now just for the way on home. Autumn is always a special time at the Butchart Gardens and I'm so glad you came along for the ride. I'll leave you with another look at
the shot that inspired this journey. I'm Gavin Hardcastle. Thanks for watching. Bye, bye :)
