Originally this started as a collection of photos I wanted to post. I was a novice photographer when I started this blog. Now I have learnt some of the tricks of the trade and can call myself an amateur. I will use this blog to highlight some of my works and also some tricks/tips which I think may be useful to others.
This week, I undertook an abstract project. The electric power was off, so I had lit a candle and placed in front of a photo-frame, containing photo's of my family. The warm light of the candle created an interesting mood in the room, and the photo-frame, accentuated by the low light looked absolutely beautiful. I was thinking about it for some time, but then my wife asked me to get the camera: and here are the results.
First: The candle
Second: The candle light falling on the framed picture of my son and me.
The photos were shot in low light and the second and third with very high ISO settings, making it grainy. I am still very proud of these shots, as I re-live the ambience every time I look at them. Let me know how do you feel about them.
Flower photography is probably the first step many people take, in their journey from becoming a trigger happy point and shoot, to an amateur photographer. Flowers are beautiful, and we can take stunning flower photographs quite easily. To have a good flower shoot, I would recommend using a camera with "aperture priority" (or full manual), so that you have more control on the depth of field.
Few small tips: however, be prepared to break them at your will.
Use a shallow depth of field This will make your flower stand out from its background, and also create interesting bokeh in the background
Take an unusual viewpoint If you shoot flowers at an angle in which we normally don't see them, it will create a stunning composition.
Shoot on a black background Black background will make your flowers more vivid and powerful. For example, you can hold a black cardboard or cloth in the background. Being a purist though, I do not follow this tip myself: if a black background is not available naturally, I shoot with the available background
Dew drops on flowers improve the beauty of the flower Again, though personally I have never created artificial dew, you can do it by spraying some water on the flower before you shoot
Now, some of my flower shots. In this photo I have broken the convention that a flower should be shot in color. In the original shot, the flower was white on a green background. Converting it to black and white has created more impact I believe.
I have shot this one with a black background. I framed the flowers against a black water tank.
I have shot this one against an overexposed sky as background, turning it into white. The depth of field is not very shallow, so the leaves are also in partial focus.
This was taken with a prosumer "point and shoot" camera. Olympus SP510UZ, which I used before buying my Sony A300 SLR.
One evening, after coming back from office, I was lazing and looking out of the window, when I saw the full moon rising. There was a cloud cover, and the sight was spectacular. I immediately got my camera and tripod, and started to shoot. For the first few shots, I noticed that I have been getting horrible camera shakes. I immediately figured out that it is my tripod and shutter assembly. I use a cheap Walmart brand tripod ($28 or so) which was not sturdy enough to support my heavy Alpha 300 camera and its 75-300 mm Zoom lens. The slight vibration I was getting from me pressing the shutter, was enough to blur out the photo at 300 mm Zoom. The tripod was not helping me either by damping out the vibrations.
I don't have a remote cable release, so I remembered a tip from one of the photographic books: (I don't remember the book, but I am thanking the author all the same, and I think will be a very useful tip to everyone who does not have a cable shutter release) I started to shoot with a 2 second self timer, so that the vibration arising from my pressing the shutter is dampened by the time the shutter opens. I got mixed results (curse my tripod which was not dampening the vibrations in 2 seconds). And finally I shot with a full 10 second self timer.
I ended up with 40 shots. (Including the ones with the camera shake). I tried various ISO and shutter speed combinations, keeping the aperature at F5.6 (Widest my lens has at 300 mm ). I was heavily biased towards ISO 100 though, being my favourite speed.
Finally the results I want to show. The first shot shows the moon riding the clouds. Buy prints from deviant Art
