Category Archives: Photography

Macro 101

Today I did a little experiment. Based on my reading on the word wide web thanks to Google for guiding me where to look things up.

This is the normal view. Taken with Nikkor 18-55 Kits lens at 55mm. This shows how small the spider is. It is small.

This is when you reverse mount your 50mm prime lens. Nikkor 50mm 1.8D mount on reverse ring mount. This is actually a cheap but versatile lens. You can do potrait, now you can do macro too. Reverse ring mount should cost you between RM10 ~ RM30 depend on which shop.

This when things get interesting. Based on my reading, you can get better magnification when you put other lens in front of the lens. Particularly a prime lens with aperture wide open. So I put 50mm 1.8D at f/1.8 and put on reverse at the front of Nikkor 18-55 kit lens at 55mm. This is what I get. Better magnification. But you get the black round around the image because of 50mm lens barrel. You can easily crop it off.

Now I got Nikkor 70-300 VR lens too. This I try out at 100mm and 50mm 1.8d in front. Again, you get better magnification, shallow DOF and black round which you crop it off too.

This is the most interesting one. Nikkor 70-300 VR at 200mm with 50mm 1.8D in front. No Black round, very shallow DOF, very high magnification.

So now I need to a bit more research on how to attach the lens in front, maybe use rubber band, maybe use some sort of mount, I don’t know.  I also need to experiment more on what aperture suitable at 200mm since the one as picture is too shallow and not to say very hard to get things in focus.

Until then, happy photography :)

 

 

KLCC Vertorama

Ditangkap pada hari ini setalah mundar mandir sekitar kotaraya Kuala Lumpur cari parking tak jumpa – jumpa. Nak cari parking free sebenarnya, sebab tu tak jumpa. Parking berbayar mahal sangat la mak ngah!

Dari segi teknikal, ini ditangkap menggunakan Nikon D90, lens Nikkor 28-85mm f3.5-4.5 pada 28mm. 4 keping gambar ditangkap, berlainan shutter speed, dari yang atas puncak pada kelajuan 1/1250 saat sehingga yang bawah pada kelajuan 1/320 saat. Ketetapan yang sama untuk Aperture iaitu f/4.5 dan ISO 200.

Sangat mudah dengan menggunakan Photoshop CS5 untuk buat panorama atau vertorama seperti ini. Ini idea untuk video yang akan datang. Nantikan :)

 

Macro Shots

This is achieved by having Nikon Sb600 at the left side, control through commander mode in the Nikon D90 set to manual if not mistaken 1/32 (in the camera) (or could be 1/64) because the Exif does not have the flash information.

This is a very small plant. I thought it is a flower, but later informed by my mother it was not a flower. The plant is use to treat some sickness (I don’t know what). But it sure looks nice.

 

 

There will always be

 

This picture that I took at Taman Tasik Titiwangsa, KL always will be my inspiration. I think it as “There will always be light shine on you”. Shorten a bit, it become “There will always be”.

So many possibilities that could happen, there will always be new things to try out, every day, every second of our live.

Despite right now I am so down that I can’t even focus with what I am doing with my life, this picture give me strength that there is light in the end of the tunnel. There will always be a good ending for this misery right now.

Dear God, I beg for your forgiveness for that I did lots of stupid thing, lots of sin and please guide me to the right path. The path that lead to Al-Jannah.

Note: When people are in love they tend to forget God, they think they own the world. They don’t. I think I own the world. Truthfully I don’t and last night I learn the pain of truth.

Ensearch Photography Workshop

I know about this free workshop from PhotoMalaysia forum. I quickly send an email to reserve a place. I thought its gonna be full since its free and how expensive a normal photography workshop can be (around RM500++).

It was held at Faber Towers at Taman Desa. Free parking (maybe on Saturday and Sunday only – I dont know). Quite big hall to accommodate enough crowd.

At start I think it is better if Puan Susi (if not mistaken) do the introduction rather than playing slideshow with lots of text to read. I get bored with the slideshow. I know being NGO and such means they do not have enough fund to do nice video montage, just less text, more picture would be better for the introduction

slideshow.

Ok. It was not a fully featured workshop. More of talk. But a very informative one from the speaker Mr. Sanjitpaal Singh. There are few point that I take during the talk/experience sharing.

  • Photography is fun and an amazing thing to do.
  • Best way to improve photography is not to spend more time in front of laptop. Go out and shoot!
  • Aperture priority is the most popular choice among amateur. Recommended to use to enter the competition (Ensearch National Photography Competition 2011) also recommended to use small aperture number (big opening).
  • White balance determine how cold or warm your photo is. Cold refer to blue, Warm refer to red.
  • Try to mess around with White Balance, it’ll come out as slightly different color. Not for documentary since it need the natural looking.
  • Quick way to determine what White Balance to use is to turn on Live View and play around with White Balance see which one closest to pure white. [Referred as cheat way]
  • In the competition, judges look for beauty.
  • Beauty does not mean pretty.
  • Beauty can be interpret in many ways.
    • Colors.
    • Composition.
    • Action.
    • Surrounding.
    • Angle.
    • Subject.

And a few experience that I manage to jot down.

Mr. Sanjitpaal is on assignment on taking photo of Orang utan at Sepilok. When in forest, he saw Orang Utan at a big tree, very huge called Ironwood. Se he going up by ladder and onto the platform at around 300++ feet. Then he start taking photos with his Olympus 300mm with tele converter which translate to around 1200mm (I dont know what else is involved – Missed some part here) and weight around 13 kg. He spend about an hour taking picture when shutter make funny sound. Then shutter broke. Not working. He said, imagine I am deep in a forest with broken camera. Nothing to do, so pack the items and go to Kota Kinabalu and called the sponsor to update on what happen. The sponsor said no problem, go to this shop and get a replacement camera. Unfortunately it is weekend and the shop is closed. He had to wait for the shop to open to get replacement camera and continue with the assignment.

My take on this is shit happen, so best we prepared for it when it happen.

Never ever use flash to take Owl picture. There is a case where a guy take picture of an Owl with flash multiple times. The Owl got scared and fly away. Not far from that around 200m or so they found the Owl dead. [Something to do with Owl sensitive eyes being blind by the flash and who knows what happen - my add]

Same goes to frog, never use flash to take picture of it. Not even LED flashlight. The white light make them scared. Best to used the yellow bulb flashlight.

Overall I enjoy the workshop though it was kind of short. But what to expect from a free workshop. Also you got almost all the tips on how to enter and win the competition. The tips is direct from the judges of the competition. What more can you ask ?

Note to myself, next time bring name card (still not finish yet printing meh?) so we can exchange contact. Kinda hard to wrote down phone no and email.