Frankfurt Luminale is an event based around light that takes place every two years. I went there and brought my Canon 600D to capture some of the atmosphere and to see how its video mode fared under low-light conditions. It cannot compete with a 5D, but the results came out quite well. Check out the short Youtube video.
Since the Canon EOS 600D supports HD video, I went out and picked up a new SD card (full HD often uses around 300 MB for one minute of video). For more flexibility, I got a SanDisk Mobile Ultra micro-SD 16GB card with an SD adapter, so that I could use it in my cell phone or tablet. However, while recording was fine mostly, it would sometimes stop, the camera displaying the message "recording has been stopped automatically". Despite being a class 6 card, it seemed to slow. I picked up a SanDisk Extreme class 10 card instead, and I have had no problems since.
I got the ASK 731SP SmartPad about a year ago, and a recent trip to Hong Kong enabled me to get my paws on a more recent device. The Gemei G9 show just how much has happened on the Android tablet market the last year - for about the same price, you now get a much faster and cooler-looking unit. Read on for more.
This one was quite fun to shoot. The setup is similar to a typical "splash shot" - that is, you fill a small bag with water (I used a juice carton with screw cap) which gives you a stream of drops at a steady rate. With the camera mounted on a tripod and using an external flash with reflector card, I regulated the flow of water so that it was nearly pouring, but still dripping, making perfect timing less of an issue. The lens was a vintage 55mm Pentax with a 25mm extension tube. Aperture f/8 and shutter speed 1/200th and some of trial and error gave nice results.
Topic of the week was "dream", so I figured I could try out something I saw Bryan Peterson do here, namely spinning while shooting up, creating a weird, dream-like effect. Without a filter, I could not go slower that around 1/25 shutter speed, but the effect is still obvious. My hand, of course, spun along with the rest of me and stayed unblurred. Desaturated, bumped the contrast and voila! In-camera effects are the best. :)
Last week, Fotosöndag.se arranged a "photo marathon" - one topic was published every hour starting from 9 am, for a total of six topics. The files were to be uploaded latest 5 pm on the same day, so time was really of the essence. Just found out I'm not among the winners, but it was a fun experience nonetheless. If there is another marathon next year, I will definitely participate. Find my submissions in the Image Gallery.
Having some time to kill, and being fresh out of ideas, I set up a mini-site for idea sharing. The principle is simple: Post ideas, and comment and rate other people's ideas. But keep it short - Twitter style! If it sounds like your thing, check it out.
I have used the Canon EOS 1000D for quite some time now, and felt it was time for an upgrade. Since I already have a few lenses, I decided to continue down the Canon path. The 600D - AKA Rebel T3i, or Kiss X5, depending on where you live - caught my eye, looking very similar but fixing some of the problems of the 1000D, like lack of video recording, low ISO sensitivity, and low quality LCD. Read on for a comparison between the two.
This week's theme left a lot of room for interpretation. I was first planning to do something with two bubble levels I have, but taking photos at home seemed lazy. Instead, I got out for a photo walk and was lucky enough to get a shot of this crowded but somehow empty looking shopping mall. The open vertical architecture matches the theme good enough. Taken with the 600D + kit lens using the automatic depth of field setting, keeping things in focus all the way up.
Just picked up a brand new DSLR a few days ago, the 600D. It looks very similar to the 1000D, but has a few nice tricks up its sleeve, like a flippy-tilty screen, faster ISO, and video recording in full HD. I'm still playing around with it and will post a review soon where I compare it to the 1000D.
I recently set up a simple web page using the "click-and-play" CMS Jimdo recently, but realized today that the URL I chose for my site could have been better. I decided to set up another page with a new URL and redirect to it from the first site.
As a first attempt, I tried a simple Javascript approach, using a random test URL which pointed to nothing:
<script type="text/javascript">
This worked. However, Jimdo is a quite WYSIWYG-oriented CMS, and needs to show the web page in order to edit it. Trying to edit the original page now sent me directly to the test URL instead! Disabling Javascript did not help either, since it broke the CMS interface. Nice catch-22. I was stuck with a broken page.
document.location = "http://example.com";
</script>
The solution: RequestPolicy! This Firefox plugin warns you when a site attempts a Javascript redirect and lets you prevent it from happening, without breaking any other Javascript code. After installation, I just opened the page, the redirect was prevented, and I could edit the page again - like correcting the URL.
That said, a Javascript redirect is less than ideal. If you can, use a 301 redirect (Google it) whenever possible.
Flash umbrellas are really cool. Except from making you look like a full-time pro, they spread and soften light, which makes them ideal for portrait photography. They are also very portable, just like regular umbrellas. But there is very little magic involved, and there are not too many differences between a flash umbrella and a regular one. So why not try to use your umbrella for something more interesting than rain?
Theme of this week was "Lit", and my submission is shown to the left. I simply put the plastic penguin on top of the light bulb and shot it using fill flash. At first, I was not particularly satisfied with the results, but after some playing around with the colors in GIMP using layer masks, it looked much more appealing. Read on for some tips on how to use layer masks to make dark areas brighter, and bright areas darker - a sort of HDR, you could say.
I've thinking about doing this for some time, and this week I finally had an excuse for it. I filled the balloon with water and placed it on a black blanket in a water-tolerant place. With the camera on a tripod and using an external flash, I set the shutter speed to 1/200th of a second. I then dropped the knife on the balloon and tried to capture the decisive moment. It took a few tries to get it right. Using a small aperture like f/11 turned out to be important to get both the water and the knife in focus.
Theme of last week was "Film noir", which got me really excited. High contrast black and white basically makes everything look cool and stylish so nothing can go wrong. A hat-owning friend of mine was helpful enough to model for me, so we went to a dark back alley at the evening to get some shots. The large shadow was created by placing my external flash - a Nissin Di622 - on the ground a few meters away from the subject and firing it remotely.
With christmas coming up, you might be looking for a gift for that hooked-on-photography brother of yours, or maybe you just want to treat yourself to something. Either way, if you are looking for photo related stuff but don't want want to break the bank (too much), let me suggest three items that might interest you.
Been taking a break from participating lately, but decided to give it a go this weekend. I was out walking when I saw this Korean Air Airbus A380 shortly after takeoff. With my Tamron at 270mm, it filled up the frame nicely. Desaturated, bumped up the contrast and added some vignetting.
Just came back from a trip to Menorca, Spain. The island is situated close to Mallorca, but is significantly more quiet. We had a relaxing week with lots of sunshine. For some pictures, go to the Image Gallery.
The old design was getting old, so I changed it a bit. Hope you like it. :)
This week's theme being "Illusion", I decided to retry something I did a few years ago - building an impossible 3D triangle. I found instructions here and got busy. Once done, the thing looked nothing like a triangle; the trick is to look at it from just the right angle, preferably with one eye. The camera makes it almost look real.
