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In 2014, I started to get interested in Infrared Photography. Initially this was using an IR filter on my Canon 700D but found that very hit and miss, mostly miss, and so opted to have a browse on eBay looking for a converted compact camera.
My initial purchase, a Canon Powershot A3400 IS, is a standard 720nm conversion. The initial image from the camera shows brown skies and slightly cyan foliage, which after channel swapping in Photoshop gives you subdued blue/red(pink) images such as the image below.
Taken at Paradise Park, this is one of the "dinosaurs" in the garden - 720nm conversion.
Still on the lookout for something a little more "funky" I went shopping on eBay again and this time bought a Canon Powershot SX150 IS, fitted with what is commonly known as a Goldie Filter. This little beautie produces much more colourful images following the channel swapping technique such as the image below.
Again taken at Paradise Park in their indoor botanical garden - Goldie conversion.
This second camera works much better for landscapes than people, even with the other camera people can take on a somewhat unusual hue if left as a colour image as below:-
Me and Julia at the Steam & Transport Fest at the Historic Dockyard Chatham - 720nm conversion.
As you can see our skin has a somewhat blueish hue to it and dark glasses all but disappear, clothing looks different too, gone are the normal colourings and finally eyes become dark and "souless". Having said all that I do rather like this image!
What I will say about the Goldie is that trying to determine the exact filter within the camera is somewhat hit and miss. After a newer version of my beloved Goldie and in a somewhat more svelte body I went shopping again, back to Infraready which is where I now get my converted cameras from. My daughter was also in the market for a colourful infrared pocket camera too and so I bought what I believed would be another Goldie and she opted for the Super Colour. I have to say that her Super Colour was more like my old Goldie than the new one I'd bought. Straight out of the camera my new Goldie produces a blue/yellow combination whereas her Super Colour was the same cyan/brown but perhaps a little less vivid, especially the browns of the sky. The (nm) of the filters can be very close indeed and whilst I think my old Goldie is a 590nm, especially as the Super Colour was touted at 600nm, I suspect the new Goldie is quite different. The basic thing to remember is the lower the number (nm) the more colours will be retained.
These are the five conversions.
The Super Colour is left middle row, my old Goldie is top right. Not dissimilar. However the new Goldie is top left, a very marked difference!!! So much so that it prompted me to have to create new Lightroom Presets once again to cope with the different starting colours.
You can see that once you start reaching the 720nm, the red camera, the image contains barely any colour at all until you get all the way to the 850nm deep black and white which is the last, bottom camera.
This image is from my most recent purchase, an 850nm deep black and white infrared camera.
I LOVE this effect, much more than I expected to. It's a more traditional style of infrared I guess and makes more "sense" of things than the coloured versions.
If you are tempted by IR photography then the converted cameras are definitely the way to go, you can use them just like a normal camera, gone are the extended exposures that normally come with adding a filter to your lens, and it's a fun way to explore the IR world around us. Like I said clothes lose their colouring and how bright/dark an item is depends on that object's ability to absorb or reflect IR. Originally I used to opt for channel swapping in Photoshop but subsequently created a set of Lightroom presets for the cameras I own which produces a similar channel swap effect. You can of course just convert straight to black and white or sepia depending on the image subject matter. Failing that, some people like to see the funky colours straight out of the camera which can be pretty weird. I guess as in all photography it's a personal choice, kind of whatever floats your boat ;-)
Below is a short presentation on Infrared Photography I produced for our work's camera club. Feel free to take a look if you want to see more...
Infrared PhotographyIII.pptxFinally here's a short carousel of images taken recently with the first Goldie, which has been resurrected from the camera cupboard recently!
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