Recently, a group of photographic pictures of "Trains Looking at China" have been widely forwarded on the Internet, and the works use the train windows as a "picture frame" to show the unique landscape and architectural humanities of the western region. In the picture, not only is there something to see outside the window, but the window is also full of tension of the scene narrative, and a cup of tea, a suitcase or an empty seat in front of the window, with soft light, all look unique.
"A lot of people wonder why I'm shooting through the window of a train, because I want to use a technology that's only possible now to present the unique scenery of China today." Photographer Chu Weimin told reporters, "Only in contemporary China can we see such a rich landscape through the railway, whether it is plateaus, rainforests, snow-capped mountains, lakes, water towns or huge urban agglomerations." ”
This set of pictures has received tens of thousands of turns, nearly 100,000 likes, and netizens have even launched a solitaire post to share the beauty of the journey they have taken.
I want to take the train to shoot it all over
"China outside the car window"
In an interview with reporters, Chu Weimin just photographed from the desert no man's land, and now he only stays at his home in Chongqing for three or four months a year, "In August last year, I took a train from Xining to run errands, and I felt the beautiful scenery of the northwest Gobi Desert outside the window along the road." Chu Weimin recalled that in addition to the natural scenery, he also noticed that there were many unique buildings along the line, such as construction sites, solar power plants, salt lake chemical plants, etc. "These buildings, like natural scenery, have unique features, and at the same time, there is also a characteristic of the times, I thought I could take pictures of the scenery outside the car window." In order to create, Chu Weimin made various attempts, and finally felt that the car window was also photographed, like a picture frame to put the outside scenery into it, and the picture inside the car was also rich in detail, luggage, seats, hot tea, bringing a lot of story sense."
Chu Weimin photographed the blue sky and sea outside the car window
Chu Weimin introduced: "China's train mileage is already the second longest in the world, the mileage of passenger railways is the world's longest, and the landscape of the motherland is so rich, through the train window, you can see basically all the landscapes that exist in the whole motherland, which I think is very representative." "The group of photos taken now presents only the series of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, and he believes that it is necessary to cut in from the subtleties, first in the process of shooting the Qinghai-Tibet Railway to accumulate their own visual presentation language, shooting skills and techniques, the future can be filmed all over the country."
Chu Weimin photographed the beautiful view outside the car window
"We usually travel by train, plane, car and other means of transport, often see the beautiful scenery outside the window, before it is time to gaze, it flashes by, I think photos can record this beautiful scenery, and there can be a lot of new insights when slowly recalling on the computer." Chu Weimin said that in one of the photos he took, a road construction worker was working on a balance car, "I saw it and felt that it had broken my inherent impression." It turns out that the current construction is so advanced, although it is also very hard, but it is not completely built by manpower as everyone imagines, but there are all kinds of advanced machinery and equipment, which is very scientific and technological. ”
A road builder works on a balance car
Photos of the inside and outside of the car are taken separately
15,000 shots were taken a year
Chu Weimin told reporters that the shooting skills of the photo he also shared with netizens, it was two shooting synthesis, "to really shoot, to face a lot of technical problems, such as train windows, the current window is very large, both sides are transparent, so it is particularly easy to reflect, I even tried to use a black cloth to cover, but the effect is not very good." "In addition to reflection, exposure is also a difficult point, if you take care of the scenery outside the car window, the details inside the car can not be richly presented, the exposure inside the car is accurate, and the outside of the car is overexposed." Chu Weimin also mentioned that the depth of field during shooting is also difficult to solve, and the close-up and long-range views are not easy to unify. After repeated research, he decided to take the pictures inside and outside the car in two parts, and later replaced the glass with the scenery outside the car window, which formed the current style in this way.
The view from the window taken by Chu Weimin
In many photos, Chu Weimin is also very concerned about details, will be on the window of the factory logo is also retained, in the future creation of he is also ready to restore some of the real reflections, traces, stains on the glass, so that the details are more plump, "this year or so I probably took more than 15,000 photos, and now the 15 photos presented, are carefully selected and then produced here." Chu Weimin said that in order to make the photos more realistic, he will not randomly piece together the photos inside and outside the car, but restore the real scene seen by the naked eye as much as possible. In terms of content, he tried to select as many elements as possible to appear in the photos, such as wind turbines, lakes next to the Qinghai-Tibet Line, and even some animals, such as yaks. He introduced that unlike the usual shooting scenery and a proper time to press the shutter, the train must press the shutter more, because there are many wonderful moments with naked eyes, the train drove past at once, and only in a large number of shots can we find out the special excitement.
Chu Weimin photographed yaks outside the car window
Light and scenery inside and outside the windows
We all have to look for unity
"The purpose of synthesis is to show this real scene, generally after taking pictures of the scenery outside the window, and then shooting the inside of the car, in fact, the biggest technical difficulty comes from outside the car window." The composite photos will basically not be spaced for too long, so as to ensure that there will be no difference in the direction of light and color temperature, it will not look like a sense of violation, and it is also guaranteed to restore the realism seen by the naked eye. Chu Weimin introduced, "Because taking pictures on the railway and the usual static scenery are different, we may not be able to see it with the naked eye, in fact, the scenery outside is in motion and changes rapidly." "Chu Weimin needs to use a high sensitivity and shutter speed to record the moments outside the window in the form of capture." In contrast, the shooting in the carriage is more relaxed, he observes the good prospect of the suitcase, or the dining table or sleeper, in the gap between passengers leaving to find opportunities to shoot. "Because I can't shoot people, I don't need to communicate, and I can capture according to my wishes."
The view taken by Chu Weimin from the car window
Chu Weimin believes that the scene in the carriage does not photograph people, but the luggage they left behind, the plastic bags and snacks they have eaten, and even a bowl of instant noodles there, which will actually leave more imagination space and metaphors. In one photo, the foreground is the trunk on the carriage aisle, and the staff is working on the highway construction site under construction outside the window. "The suitcase represents a lot, and there are people's expectations of going home or going out to work, but their journey is because of the construction of these working people outside, and now there is convenient transportation, so the scenery inside and outside the carriage has some echoes."
Netizens shoot "solitaire" with their hands
He is also the "big v" of 300,000 fans
Under Chu Weimin's post, many netizens have posted the beautiful scenery outside the car window they took during the trip, and opened the comments to see beautiful photos from all over the country, which makes people marvel at the magnificence of the motherland's scenery.
Chu Weimin told reporters that he carefully read the messages of each netizen, many of them commented on the reply, and there were many good photos that moved him, "I remember that there was a snowy mountain in western China taken on the plane, and then there was a netizen who seemed to be Qingdao, and the window of the bus looked out of the window was a blue sea, and the impression was very deep." ”
On the Internet, he is also a photography "big v", the video account has more than 300,000 fans, the shared photography tutorial has been updated for hundreds of issues, selflessly teaching netizens how to shoot scenery, "from 2016 onwards, I updated the photography tutorial every week, unconsciously insisted on a few years, I myself also changed from a photography white to a professional landscape photographer." I also often pass on some of the new shooting methods I have learned to everyone, which is a process of sharing. ”
Software engineer switched to photography
His work has won awards at the National Geographic Global Grand Prix
Chu Weimin once went to Singapore to study, and after graduating from university in 2014, he worked as a software engineer for three years, "At that time, he especially liked photography, and would post some photos on the Internet, many people thought that my photos were quite distinctive, and I got more and more attention." Around 2017, he gradually got some commercial shooting opportunities, so he began to become a professional landscape photographer, "because I have study abroad experience, so I used to shoot a lot abroad, in 2019, I won the National Geographic Global Competition, when I shot the ultimate scenery of Greenland' snow." In the same year, the photo of the Galaxy Arch Bridge in the Snow Mountain of Patagonia in South America won the second place in the starry sky category of the ipa photo contest. ”
After winning the award, he began to turn his attention to China, thinking about how to present the great rivers and mountains of the motherland, "My idea is to find a unique Chinese scenery and show the characteristics of the modern Chinese era." Until 2020, just because of the epidemic, he has been shooting in China and began to shoot trains to see China. Chu Weimin believes that this topic has rarely been filmed before, and the technical difficulty is also very high, which requires relatively strong post-processing capabilities.
For example, in 1990 and 2000, you could not take the train to photograph the scenery of the Qinghai-Tibet Line, and this year the Fuxing will sail on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and I am ready to shoot." It can also be seen from the photos that the interior of the train is also developing, and in another 10 or 20 years, looking back at the current photos, there will be another feeling. ”
"Technology stream" from satellite image contours
Find a scenic location
As a photographer from the "science and engineering" department, Chu Weimin said that his strength is post-processing, he often learns from some foreign photographers about post-production, and will also assist in shooting through various technical means. In a session of his own teaching, he introduced to netizens how he used the contour line on satellite pictures to find the location of the landscape pictures.
"Many landscape photos are regular, for example, the elements inside it are hierarchical, and the foreground, mid-view, and rear scene need some lines as a guide and connection, and finding an angle to skillfully combine these, sometimes requiring technical means." Chu Weimin introduced that he often chooses the snowy mountains as a vista, and there is a river in the middle of the scene that points to the snowy mountains, so that a combination will be more shocking. We would look for a continuous contour line on the map, determine the peaks, and then go to the river, so as to find a better shooting point, "We will also look at the direction of the sun, if the scenery is in the north-south direction, it is the best, we can find an angle from the side at sunrise or sunset." ”
Chu Weimin said that including taking photos on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, he will also use a lot of scientific and technological means to find out on the map where wind farms will pass, or where the train will pass through dense hills and where there will be meandering rivers, so that he can take a very unique picture on the train. In the shooting, he will also use the drone to determine the specific shooting location, see if there is a sea of flowers, woods as a foreground, by the way to survey the terrain, to determine whether it is convenient to reach here, "We can find a lot of potential shooting points through this kind of flat map, especially the contour map, such as WeChat map, we can find a lot of potential shooting points, using the current technology, can help us narrow down a lot of range." ”
Source: Purple Bull Headlines
Disclaimer: Wisdom Yantai published this article for the purpose of transmitting more information. If there is a source labeling error or infringement of your legitimate rights and interests, welcome to contact the private message to correct and delete, thank you.