I Hate Those...

Not so brilliant week. Was fluctuating between being idle and tired and being busy and... tired. I didn't use my camera much this week, so not much to be posting about really, nor did I work with my Ayvarith project for some long time now (even before I go to Hajj). Just one experience with photography lately, in which I've used my flash, again.

Next

I like to think of it as the electrical chair effect. In this shot I was dangling the flash unit above the lazyboy, and I had to suffer from some awkward moments when the lateral extension would slide down each time I raise it up high.

Settings of the shot

I know. The room is a mess. Always been a mess. Anyway, in order to keep the flash this high, I had to hang some weights (dumbbell weight disks) on the lever. Maybe you can see some black circles in the image.
In the beginning I was trying to take this shot with my 18-55mm lens, but then I changed it to the 15mm fisheye lens to include more space (took the shot again with me sitting on the lazyboy and my foot didn't show with 18-55mm lens).

I'm thinking now of doing experiments with all my lenses to find the "sweet spot" as they call it sometimes, which is supposed to be the f-number at which the image is the sharpest (and this has nothing to do with the depth of field). It will be a long process somehow and eye-tiring one, but hopefully I will get some useful results from all of this. In the mean time, I do really need to work more with my camera. My mood swings are, sort of, getting out of control.

My car is not fixed yet. The parts, as the vendor people say, will come in two weeks. The expenses for this are higher than I expected. I hate cars. I hate cars more than I hate hell itself. The discount they offered is like 20%, so I'm flattered for such a generous offer. And please note the sarcasm...

Darkness, Mornings...

Maybe not one of these weeks that I would call "brilliant" but I had the chance, at least, to work out with my camera. It's weird when some times you feel the whole world against you and still, you survive.
On with the latest updates now, my car needs around 600KD at least (~$US 2100). This, alone, will make me delay a lot of plans I had in my mind. I will pay for this by credit card so I can make installments myself. I'm so sick of cars and so sick of driving this piece of junk specifically. It seems my luck with cars has never been friendly.
Lot of things now will get delayed as I said. A vacation plan, new orders of books and tools, but maybe the worst of all is that I won't be able to take the chance right now with such purchases, since the dollar is low against the dinar for the time being and it would be nice to order something right now. I don't think this status will last long.

I. Good Mornings:
Been trying to push myself to work a bit with my camera, specially with such an idle and boring weekend. My sleeping time was a bit disturbed and I used that to my benefit. It helped me out to rise up in the morning (well, stay awake until morning is more accurate) and rush to do some work by the seaside. This time though, I decided to go a relatively far away place from my home. My usual spot was around Burger King restaurant on the seaside, this time I picked McDonald's site. This site specifically was a point I remember very well when I took a shot with my very old Sony Cybershot W-30 (I hope the model number is correct though!!) which was 6MP only back then. Boy, wasn't I so happy when I first got it for around 89KD (~319 US$ in today's rate). It was a big deal of money back then. Now, I do wish if I can find a good deal for this amount of money!
The first trial on first day of weekend was lucky for me because of the clouds scattering in the sky, but one thing unfortunately was forgotten; a long exposure trial.

Good Morning Kuwait I

Good Morning Kuwait II

Good Morning Kuwait III

Good Morning Kuwait IV

Good Morning Kuwait V

Good Morning Kuwait VI

Patefacio Gazebo

I was working in a fast pace and changing my lenses as fast as I can because, as well-known by now, the sun would rise so fast above the horizon. Mainly I've used the 18-55mm lens @18mm with the first 4 shots, while the 5th and 6th were done using my relatively-new 8mm Rokinon fisheye lens. I think the 5th and 6th shots are nice in terms of depth (typical for such a fisheye lens) but I think I've screwed it up with my framing skills. Feels like the edges are not right.

The final shot, Patefacio Gazebo, was taken using Tamron 70-300mm @300mm plus vivitar's x2 extension, which makes it @600mm. If you look carefully at the previous shots, you will see that this gazebo-like structure was on the other side or shore, on the line of the horizon.

The main problem in all of that is the chromatic aberrations, specially using the 8mm Rokinon (even at f/8 or so) and using the Tamron. The images are, of course, HDR processed, and this helped me naturally in pronouncing the colors more and controlling the light of the scene, but however, the HDR pronounces these aberrations more severely that it is hard to remove them. Patefacio Gazebo was the hardest to deal with and yet in the original image you can still see cyan infringing lines around the edges. I tried to hide the cyan and magenta lines around the edges by using Hue/Saturation adjustment layers, which reduced the effect, but did not solve the problem.

On the next day, I ran with the same schedule. Been to the same location around the same time or a bit earlier even but I got struck with two major problems:

1. The azimuth (the place from which the sun rises, measured from the north direction) seems to have changed significantly the next day.
2. The sky was heavily loaded with clouds like one big mass instead of the scattering that was there the day before.

The reason I got back was in fact to try to take a long exposure (something more than 30 seconds in general) and with such a mass of clouds maybe the effect won't be pronounced very well. Not to say that I was planning (and did use) my 8mm Rokinon fisheye lens, and to work with the stops here you have to provide it by changing the aperture size and/or the ISO (for example). However, I made some trials by placing my Cokin filters held by hand in front of the lens and I got funny shots really.

Aurora Cuvaitum

Despite the heavy mass of clouds, I decided to go on with my trial for a long exposure. I did many 60 seconds (and one or two of 80 seconds) but the one above seemed more appealing than the others. The long exposure was somehow enough to record some movement and blur some parts of the sky because of the clouds' drag across the sky. It would be far more better with a scattered cloudscape but this one seemed fine It gave out an aurora-like formation (hence the name), and also of course, some chromatic aberrations. When dealing with long exposure it is after all one RAW file (or JPG, but not advised to work with JPGs) and no HDR technique can be used, theoretically. I can take maybe 3 images with 3 different exposures manually, but that would be impractical and time consuming (imagine taking 30, 60, 90 seconds). However, it is an interesting experiment to do one day specially with moving objects like the clouds.

II. Darkness Gush:

For the time being, I'm also enjoying doing some "darkness" work. Vampires, creatures or whatever you may call them. My brother had been helping me with these stuff too and in fact, he gave me a lot of advices concerning some features. I can tell though not many people like what I do here, as I received a lot of dislikes (and some were horrified indeed, but that kind of makes me happy!).

Der Höllesstreunender
The Hell Stray

Why I chose German to name this image is something beyond my own understanding even. I simply felt it fits there. I've received a comment about the hand; some people like it that way. My brother, however, made some comments about the looks in general, specially the fangs. I have to keep those in mind for any further work in this venture. I'm still trying to work on some of those images from that session. Too bad it got rejected from some stock websites (for technical reasons). The work was a heavy load of Liquify usage in Photoshop, beside some stretching and scaling process, and that of course caused some pixels to be "abnormal" and/or blurred.

After this week I'm sort of happy for getting into the winter mood and being able to catch something, even though sleeping is the price to be paid. I'm looking forward for more, and also some panoramas to be done, when feasible.
I'm still thinking about the project that I had to abandon. I'm somehow attached to it but... how to go on... this is another question, and definitely requires a periphery of different people other than those surrounding me right now...

Lurking...

Seems this winter will be over before I make a nice shot outside. This is how it feels for the time being, at least. I just hope this feeling won't extend further to the rest of this season.
I've been busy lately with chores here and there, and I'm relieved for now after finishing my car license renewal. Still though, the car is making me a headache with gear problems. I hate cars. I really do. I have to check this problem as soon as possible before something serious happens to the gear.

The skies are beautiful in the morning and for some time I used to pack my camera and tripod with me wherever I go just in hope to get something on the way, but with heavy sleeping and heavy clothes being needed now (yeah, I'm getting old), it is harder to do it. I don't take my camera with me everyday now. Despite the beautiful sky in winter wherever I go here (daily, as I go to work), it is harder to capture something because of the locations; cars, buildings on the way, unwanted trees... etc. It would be nice to take such shots with such skies in a cityscape format. For this reason, the only thing to think of is to get myself busy (with the camera) at home, for the time being.

What to do at home? Well, I've been experimenting little bit here and there, and since I allow myself some extra Photoshop editing unlike many other concrete or precise photographers that I've encountered so far, so I decided to take some snap shots and modify them later to suit my aim. My main assistant here is my younger brother, either as my model or as the cameraman when I'm in front of it. Yet, I guess one of the best shots that I've created for him so far (even he was surprised for the result himself) is when I turned him into a vampire. As simple as that!

Lurking

The image is not cropped. It was merely a concentration on one quarter of the face. In this shot I didn't use my flash unit, but instead, I've pointed my little LED light (key chain LED light in fact) to this portion of the face and taking the shot then. The idea was to take a shot of myself since I have longer canines (the longest in the house I think), but with him not being into cameras so much, it was hard to teach him how to zoom and focus and use the panhead (where you control the camera's direction with one and only one joystick or lever). Anyway, as a beginning, I asked to get in front of the camera and I will do the job.

In the beginning I was thinking of giving the picture a bit of a cold hue (slightly blue shade with slightly reddish lips), but I went along with the black and white version because I feel it gives more drama to the situation, and more of a sense of fear.
The "fangs" here were done simply with selection tool (I used the pen tool personally, anyway different situations require different techniques I guess) and, after selecting one of them solely, I used various transformations (wrap, skew, distort...etc) to elongate the teeth (a good idea is to copy the portion after selecting by Ctrl+J; this will move it to a new layer). Of course, some additions were required just to hide the width of the original tooth where it was required.

I'm tending now to take more pictures of this type. In fact I just did take some shots of myself and my brother (well, he took pictures of me of course) and I'm planning to retouch them in the same manner. My face is ugly already as it is without touching in fact, but well, I just want to mimic fantastical creatures when I touch! I was planning to put the pictures here today but unfortunately I couldn't because we shot late and such editing needs time (sometimes in days). I do think such tendency with my shots (or such way of thinking) do reflect something in me, and I do indeed look for answers for such tendencies about creating scary stuff.

I was talking for weeks now about a panorama? Well, still thinking of how to do it. As I said earlier, the chores and the bad sleeping times (mainly for totally exhausted body) render me motionless and mood-less for such work for now. I just hope things go as planned for the few weeks left of this year, and the car gets fixed with no problems... this is all what I'm wishing for myself with this year's end... no big hopes no big wishes, I just need these small stuff done. Projects await.

Run Away...

Here we go again, after one week of being off from this blog. I actually didn't have the material and still in fact don't, but maybe now I can put on some stuff.
Things are going complicated in my life lately. Ups and lot of downs I'd say but, I'm walking the tunnel. I had an idea of doing some kind of a project, related to places specifically related to us, Shiites, and doing some sort of a catalog out of these images with some information about these places. Unfortunately, a clash in the family seems to be holding me down for now. I don't know if I can do it in some other way or by means of another path; I'm trying to look for alternatives. It's hard to work with people who don't understand you.

In the mean time I've finished my 9th album for pictures from Ireland 2010 (Co. Tipperary). This album doesn't have a specific theme, but I did a mix of heavy Photoshop editing, and many RAW file editing only (no HDR).

Hore Mysticis (sketch-like editing)

Quodam Loco (Place in Between)

The image Hore Mysticis was heavily edited to make it look like a sketch, while the Quodam Loco was simply RAW editing (beside some enhancement in Photoshop for contrast and hue of course, but this is not a REAL editing I'd say). The pictures here don't bear any watermarks or signatures because the work was already established before I go to Hajj. My decision to put on watermarks, again, is actually considered when I got back from the Hajj.
Locally now, I don't have much of opportunities to snap some pictures. Either a busy schedule or simply a plain weather. We don't get much clouds even in winter. The only time to have some nice chances is early morning, and sunset times. However, I've noticed that around 12:00 p.m. and 2:00 p.m. there used to be some formation of clouds when I'm at my work place, but not everyday. I tried to do some long exposure with this situation in order to make an effect of blurred moving clouds and a static building. Anyway, my experiment was not done completely and I had to be satisfied with one shot (well, not completely satisfied let's say).

Cube from Heaven

It was merely one shot, and ironically I didn't notice the cubic shape that I've got here. My focus was set on the cloud and the way they move. It is only one shot with some RAW editing to enhance the highlight and shadows and also the saturation. Now back to the calculations, which I had some hard time doing it in time back then because I was going to leave my work place!
Using my Tamron 70-300mm, I didn't really need to zoom in much. The maximum f-number (smallest aperture) was f/32, and remember the f-number is in fact a ratio and not a size number (i.e. the ratio between the diameter of the aperture and the focal length in use, and sometimes in my Tamron lens it can reach up to f/45). Setting the value to f/32 and the Exposure Value (EV) to -2/3EV (with a good light in a sunny day, this is just to avoid overexposure, and we can work out in the RAW later on), that yielded a shutter speed of 1/60 seconds. At that time I didn't have time to get my calculator out and calculate really. However, after doing the calculations back at home, I realized it is somehow hard to do, or let's say, tedious work is waiting for me.
Using the formula T = S * 2^x, we can "easily" get the stops required for a, let's say, one minute exposure. Easily, if you are good with maths or at least with your calculator!

T = S * 2^x

1 min (60 sec) = (1/60 sec) * 2^x

3600 = 2^x

log 3600 / log 2 = x

x = 11.8 stops.

In this case now, I have two options to work with: a) work with my ND filters, which means putting more than one in successive order to make up for 11.8 stops (and I don't think I can reach this number of stops with what I have), or b) Use the welding glass which has a green tint to it and can give me up to 11.7 stops. A good deal, but unfortunately, I have to stand still holding it with my hands since I couldn't cut it down to the size of Cokin's filters, hence, I can't put it in my filter holder. After that day, simply NO CLOUDS ever showed up in the sky since then. I'm waiting though.

Using my welding glass for this experiment, as said before, it will give a green tint to the whole image and I'm not sure how useful it is to fix that tint with WB change in the RAW editor. I tried it before with a simple light situation, but not in a complex scene like this. Complex by means of the elements involved that is.

with tint

after adjusting the tint by WB

I mentioned before as well there is some idea for a panorama that I was thinking of before I go to Hajj even, and I'm still thinking of how to do it. The problem, as I've mentioned before as well, this idea needs some physical effort. I'm hesitating between the living room and the kitchen. The kitchen would be something new to me, although technically I have a problem because of the small space and the occupation of the place. The only time to do such a panorama is by late night when no visitors are expected!

That's for now. I'm off, and let's hope this week will pass with as little clashes as possible... lesser than last week. I need to run away with my camera to somewhere...

And here is just a little gift for SOME friends... haha!