Approaching Approaches...

Well, I'm not so sure how to describe this week. One thing for sure though: it is exhaustive. What a way to start the 33^rd year of my life. Sometimes I do wish if my birthday was not in summer. However, I've managed to do one experiment at least but it took me around one full week to work with the results, as I was trying to do the peeling effect again for the good ol' censer which I've used to photograph smoke before. I like this one censer specifically; lot of details, great color and design. This time, the effect is done solely by hand, or should I say, the blending of the different layers was all done manually, with no help from PTGui.

The shoot for this censer was done with the help of a speedlite (580EXII) which was fixed with a diffuser to the top of the censer. It was controlled in wireless since I was really, really, not in the mood for cables and wires hanging around. I didn't even use a literal arm to dangle the speedlite on top, but simply raised it up high on a regular tripod and put it extremely close to the tripod carrying the rotating plate.
As I've mentioned above, the process to blend the layers was done manually and took me the whole week but I have to say, I'm still not satisfied, and the whole matter is just as if it ia study for the technique itself.
After the shoot was over, the images were processed in DxO to correct for tilts and distortions (even though the 50mm shows minimum distortion, if any). Yet, it seemed that the tilt was there after all even after correction!

Approach Eins!

First Trial

In the first approach, I've tried to stitch only 180^o using shots at 45^o distances. The total was 5 images only to blend together. Easy, but not so accurate as the base was not coherent at all and showed the usual fan shape. I've tried to straighten the image by PTGui, but to no avail. Anyway, after seeing this, I've decided to work again, and this time using around 36 layers, composing a full range of 180^o.

Approach Zwei!

Second Trial

In the second approach, I've tried to blend layer by layer manually, starting from the far left portion of the censer. However, after working for some time, I've realized that the center of the censer is not exactly centered in that way, and it is more like if it is looking to the right, and I've figured that if I continue in that manner I might have just one large censer with a handle on the left. Not bad though, but I was planning on having double handles on both sides instead of one. After realizing this, I had to stop in the middle of the process and start all over again!

Approach Drei!

Third Approach

In the final approach, the look was relatively better but still it had lot of blending errors (or I would call them stitching errors as well). At this point, I've started with the middle portion of the sequence, which shows the frontal face of the censer, then worked my way with blending to the left all the way to the handle, and then the same thing was done to the right. I would say this is the best that could be done if only I could handle the blending more delicately. The base suffered some problems as well and I'm not sure if this because of the tilt or simply a bad blend. Lot of things to be learned still at this point, but I have to say that the 45^o approach (first one) sounds promising if it wasn't for the fan shape! Without perfecting this technique, I wouldn't be able to upload those into the stock sites.

Approach Geltani

The work with Geltani is slow, as usual. I've started now to assign phonetic values to the leading part of the alphabet and try to test it with some words. Reading into Turkish language and grammar made me formulate a lot of ideas and recall some things that I've forgot before. The Geltani phonetic system is going to be rich I suppose, which might be a bit frustrating. It would be a weird combination between Asian-typical sounds, and Indo-European sounds, with a bit of Semitics.
One of the critical things now is to add more to the vowel system and in fact, I've been assigning some consonants a vowel-value when it falls as a leading part. So far, the "D" would sound as "ü" (as in German or Turkish) if it is in the leading part of the syllable. I can't of course work all consonants in the same manner but it is just a beginning and more thoughts about this to come. The letter "C" was also done but it is so vivid in its phonetic values given in the leading part of the syllable, and at this point I've added Semitic sounds like Ayin [ع] and Chet [ح] (notice I'm using the Hebrew name but the equivalent Arabic letter for such sounds), and some few others were added as well.
Finishing the phonetic system is important at this point because without it, it's not possible to send a brief case about the conlang of Geltani to Omniglot for publishing. Later, we would have to talk a bit about the hard time doing a specific HTML for this conlang!

Approach Finale

Source: Amazon

Now, with the lack of new books, I've been going through some old books from here and there (including some old language books like the Turkish language book). I've been going through the Portrait photography book as well, since I didn't comprehend much of the info inside it back then because, unfortunately, most of the explanations lack visual aids. This is one the negative things about this book, and probably the new editions of it are better, I'm not sure. I'm still not into this field, but I thought having more stable feet when it comes to the formation of light, metering, poses and studio equipment would as well be useful for other fields of photography, as well as being prepared just in case I need to do this kind of photography for any occasion.
For the time being, I'm just dying while waiting for summer to be over. I don't care what people usually say about it - most of them here like it because it is the only time when they can travel (and in fact they do a good job in making my life calmer in summer). Yet, I'm so sick of the heat, and I do feel as if it is killing my brain slowly. Lately, I've been thinking of going back to poetry since I didn't write anything for such a long time but, as usual, there are some words but I can't find the proper stitching form between them. I do pass occasionally on some of my old writings and just wonder how did I write those?
My 33^rd year starts off with some hope inside me... but I'm cautious as well for the slaps of life...

In Failure We Trust...

Here we go, my new PC is finally online, and the process of keeping it up-to-date with the software arsenal is going on in fact. How much I'm relieved. I didn't feel such speed in ages!!
Because of the busy schedule (sleeping time is included in this statement) I couldn't do much work with my camera or with Geltani. Some mental work was involved here though. In a haste, anyway, I tried my luck with another peeling project which was not achieved as I wish (hence the title of this post!) but I got my lessons somehow.

Censer Censer Against The Wall

This week I've noticed that Mom had a small censer, other than the one that I've already used in a previous experiment to capture smoke. The new censer is small and thin and quite seductive to my eyes because of the curves it has, but all of that proved to be a real challenge later for the peeling work (which was never done right here up to this moment).

The previous censer.

The new censer.

This time, and because of the shape of the new censer, I've decided not to light the object from above like I did previously with the mug peeled mug shot. I've realized that if this is done, then the thicker top part will cast a shadow to the bottom. Hence, I've decided to use both of my speedlites (580EXII and 430EXII) on the left and right of the censer - a decision that I've regretted later.
One of the critical aspects of this object is its relative small size, and hence, any small offset from the center of the rotation was drastically apparent in the series of the shots taken (meaning the objects won't be rotating around its own axis, but it will move in a circle around a common center!). Another problem was, as usual, the tilt of the images taken which was not so obvious until the images were examined on PC.

One of the trials done for peeling.

As you can see above, the final stitch had many errors and mainly it became a fan-shaped stretch instead of (relatively) flat stitch. This is mainly because of off-center movement mentioned above which means the base would look nearer and further on different angles as the object rotates. This was also evident when the mug peeling effect (posted in previous posts) but the general size was larger and the offset did not show in a drastic way as in this experiment.
Notice also that the top portion (top right) of the stitch has broken lines and not a smooth stitch. In my mug experiment, when this happened, it meant that I need to narrow my crop or the slit from which PTGui should scan to make the connecting lines smoother. Here, however, this was not possible. The above example is stitched at -/+8^o from a common central point (picked by comparing the minimum and maximum extensions of the body to the left and right during its rotation), meaning the total angle was 16^o.

Cross-hair marks added on feature-less sides to help on stitching later.

Notice here that I've added cross-hair mark by pencil on the censer itself to aid the stitching process, but I have to say it didn't help much in this situation. Going lesser than 16^o for the crop caused much hassle an PTGui would miss a lot of the matching points. One of the ironic things is, why did I use 180^o in previous posts to measure the different in pixels, while I can measure the number of pixels for each degree simply by measuring the move in two successive shots of 5^o.
I've mentioned above that I've regretted using both speedlites on the left and the right of the censer. I've realized this fact while working on PC and comparing images to establish some control points. The thing is, the body is not unique in its shape and has many protruding features, which means shadows on the body itself. However I try to balance the lights from both directions it was almost impossible to eliminate the shadows completely. The problem of the shadows is, as the body rotates, the shape of the shadows will change eventually, making the stitching and matching control points even harder. Maybe I should have proceeded with speedlite from the top as I did before (or one from the bottom, but I would need a glass surface below the censer as it rotates).

Comparison between two shots few degrees away. Notice the change in the shadows and the light levels.

It wasn't till I've installed DxO Optics again when I fixed the tilt perfectly. DPP (Canon's software) was not much of a help and cumbersome when I tried it. Probably the less problematic stitch was achieved when the images were corrected with DxO.
As I was going on to find a solution to the problem, I've tried to make the crop literally by Photoshop. I'm lucky now that I have a faster Photoshop (32- and 64-bit) and what would take 30 minutes is done in the matter of 30 seconds or even less! Anyway, such method didn't work as well, and even blending in Photoshop didn't go much far away with the results than PTGui did. However, one interesting experiment in Photoshop yielded something of fractal-art quality I would say and I really liked the result and might upload it later to some stock sites as an abstract art.

Fractal Censer (blend of 72 images)

I'm not sure how the colors were produced in the image in that way, but I do appreciate abstract art anyway and I don't mind the extra colors!
I need to go further and study this matter further. I might try to do it later but one thing for sure: I need a new base for rotating, as the current one is not precise with its center of rotation.

Γλώσσες

As I've mentioned in the beginning, I didn't spend much time doing a practical examination for Geltani, but there were some mental notes, specially that I've started reading a book about learning Turkish. Well, I'm not intending to delve much deeper into the language itself as of to speak it, but it did give me some insight on some matters (mainly grammatical) that were absent from my mind even during the make of Ayvarith.
However, I'm not intending to copy-paste features from real Turkish into Geltani but it is worthwhile to think about some grammatical cases and special verbs. Turkish, being somehow similar to Arabic in some aspects, got a special features in its verbs to denote the verb that acts on itself, and the verb that acts on something else (sorry I don't know the exact name of this grammatical case). Just to explain, here is a simple example:

Arabic

Study: daras [درس] (someone studies on his or her own).

Teach: darras [درّس] (someone teaching or making someone study).

Turkish

Study (learn): öğrenmek.

Teach: öğretmek.

Notice that in English the two verbs are completely different, and this is how Ayvarith used to work. In Turkish and Arabic, despite the critical difference in roots, they do act according to some basic regulations to formulate verbs that act on their own, and those which act on something else. The question is now, how to implement this with Geltani? Leave Geltani; What about Bulughman - an artificial language that I've made it sound like a Turkic language?

In Geltani, the verbs are derived from the noun (mentioned that in previous posts). Hence, the noun "flight" is used with suffixes and prefixes to make the verb "fly". However, I don't have a clear idea yet of how to formulate a verb that expresses the action "made something fly". Would I have to introduce auxiliary verbs in such instances? How that would sound and look with the dilemma of the writing system already? Too much thought and my mind is so tired of thinking much into this matter for the time being. In hope that all this mental power will be boosted after Ramadhan.

Finale:

It was relatively a busy and a tiresome week that just passed me by. I just can't wait to get into the regular time-table. I think what really wears me off is that the whole community goes under a time shift making working in the usual way, for someone who is used to fasting, a hard task to do (with waiting).

Earlier this week, there was a meeting for photographers invited by HIPA of Dubai, to introduce and identify the HIPA reward in its third session. I tried to attend, but with the delay in the opening which was supposed to take place at around 9:00 p.m., and me being awake since 6:00 a.m. to pick up for dialysis and then back home to work on something else, made a 30 minutes of delay such a great displeasure. Thus, at around 9:30 a.m. I've left the scene, before the ceremony would even start.

However, during the waiting time, I've met a friend who was a member of the photography group I'm in, and left after some tensions with the management. As expected there was a chitchat about the quality and the functions of the group, but I have to say he had some points that I share, yet, I'm really so tired of all that tension between photographers in here. It is largely a talk of money-making, and how things are done, but I didn't hear much about the philosophy behind photography. This friend pointed out to some photographers and mentioned to me some names, and when I answered, simply, that I don't know any of these guys (who apparently are famous in their fields) he said "Whom do you know then if you don't know these?". I replied: I'm working with the camera since 2007 for my amusement and never made a contact with Kuwaiti photographers up till 2012 when I joined the group, and now I'm regretting that I've been social with other Kuwaiti photographers. No offense, not to say all are bad, but surely it is something that probably I should regret. I got myself into struggles and wrestles that I should not have been into. I can't remember when was the last time I talked with a Kuwaiti photographer about the art of photography or its philosophy and its meanings; It was mostly a talk dominated by money and gear, and nothing else. Useless talk if you ask me.

Next Saturday it is scheduled to have a meeting to sort out some images. I'm sure I'm going to have another batch of disappointments. The sorting process is aimed for Cyprus photography contest and I'm not sure how it works, but it is apparent that registration is for single photographers and not groups. What I've noticed that in most contests, the most renowned photos are those of exotic places and/or those of portraits and people shots. Now, how am I supposed to get into exotic places (specially with my situation being stuck now with Mom to care for her)? And am I supposed to do something I hate just to please the judge? Am I supposed to please the judges to get some good results in a contest, or am I supposed to do photography for my own sake? The answers to these questions lead me straight to the belief of the futility of such contests in my case and made me even less interested in them. I'm not supposed to take a burden just to have a photo. I'm supposed to please myself in the first place, despite all the criticism I'm receiving from the group.

Peace of mind is a precious thing, and simplicity, I reckon, should be in the core of my goals. Yet, I ask myself, would life allow me to do so? Would there be someone who would help me to be so? The view is blurred...

Xiŋwiñzaji!

A somehow idle week with iterative sleeping problems. Not sure though if the sleeping problems are related to my back and legs muscles pain, or are they related to my busy mind. Because of this, my activities were minimal and I didn't even head to work for some days (also because some painting job in my office). Yet, I was working on some ideas while in the meantime uploading more photos to some new stock sites which, unfortunately, seems not doing any good.

Glossa

I didn't work much on Geltani conlang this week and I doubt I would do much as well because of all these time-consuming "problems". However, I've done some trials to solve one problem that was buzzing my mind for a while, which is the ambiguous formation of words from Arabic into Geltani in which the short vowels are different but the main consonants are the same. Just to give out an example:

laħam [لَحَم]: (he) welded

laħm [لحْم]: meat

luħim [لُحِم]: welded (passive)

In Arabic, there are many examples of this kind. In one of my previous posts I gave out a similar example with the root [M-L-K], which is related to ownership and ruling.

However, since I've been making trials with verbs for some time right now and decided to derive verbs from nouns (mainly because nouns would vary significantly in their consonants), which solves the problem partially, I've decided now to derive nouns of professions and titles in a similar manner as I decided to do with verbs. Thus, The word for king would be derived from the noun kingdom. Just to show:

Kingdom

King

Kingdom: Xiŋwiñz'

King: Xiŋwiñzaji

"X" as "CH" in Loch,  "ŋ" as "ng" in English, "ñ" as a nasalized vowel, and " ' " as a schwa.

Of course this transliteration and vocal system is still not finished but let's call it a demo. I'm not sure if I'm happy with the "-ji" suffix because it sounds too Japanese and I'm trying to put something on the same line but would better sound differently. However, I'm not going to put much thought on this issue for the time being, as if I didn't find another suitable substitute then I'm going to accept it as it is. Notice that I've added a vowel "a" before "-ji" to merge it into the word, this is because "Z" has a schwa and not into a syllable itself. 

I've made up a special character for this characteristic syllable (or maybe I should call it the profession syllable), but a critical question come to my mind amid all of these fuss: what about the Queen?

In Geltani, unlike in Ayvarith, I've tried to strip the gender bases in formulating the words, but as time progresses, I find myself creating words for He and She or words for His and Her. It seems to me that however I try to step away from this issue it just pulls me back in and there is no escape but to create a special grammatical entity based on genders. This said, I might be inventing a special character for the profession in a feminine form (like in Queen), and probably the suffix would be simply "-jin". This is just the beginning but I'm willing to think it through and see if there is something around this problem. Another problem that is already prevalent somehow is the fact that with such method of deriving from nouns, the writing and pronunciation processes might be longer than normal. 

I might be the first to invent nounal verbs instead of verbal nouns? And then, what about adjectives? For the time being, I'm taking adjectives as they are, i.e. transform them directly from Arabic (in masculine form) without referring back to any idea about derivation from verbs or nouns. Might be a bit illogical in the context of the process, but hey, it's a language after all!

Smokes

I've been planning to take some pictures of smokes for a while since the time I've seen this lovely censer among Mom's possessions. It wasn't until last week though that I've finally began to do some experiments with this subject, and I've hardly done it.

Censer I
Tamron 70-300mm @124mm,
f/13, 250^-1sec,
ISO125.

There is a funny story about these images but I'm going to tell that in the next section of this post. When I decided to work with this censer, I've taken around 30 minutes or maybe more just trying to adjust (and search) for everything. It was late at night in the weekend which is the perfect time to work peacefully with no kids at home. In the beginning I had to take several test shots using only my 580EXII speedlite with a correcting gel (to balance the flash color temperature with the tungsten light in the room) affixed with a reflector and a panel for turning the reflector into a softbox - nice stuff from Expoimaging Rogue lighting kit.
I kept some white boards at hand and it proved very critical for some minute details, as I've used it to pour some light on the dark areas (and the dark areas would change with any slight change in the speedlite's orientation). 

Censer X
Tamron 70-300mm @124mm,
f/18, 250^-1sec,
ISO125.

The next hard part was to fix my other speedlite, 430EXII, to light smoke that comes out of the censer. I've used a spotlight setting (with honeycomb grids) to direct the light and make it spread as less as possible to other parts of the censer - but this specific detail was changed several times to see which setting was the best. Burning incense sticks was not successful enough, thus I had to resort to a more robust solution: burning tissues (Kleenex). With burning tissues, I had more smoke and could test my 430EXII and see if it is really working with the smoke. I put two gels on 430EXII just for fun and see the results. However, the result was like a mix of the two colors; naturally!

Censer XV
Tamron 70-300mm @300mm,
f/14, 250^-1sec,
ISO125.

After taking some shots for the whole body of the censer, I've decided to go deeper and get a closer look (since I'm using Tamron 70-300mm already and no need to move the tripod). The final result for the whole experiment was something close to100 shots, but after filtration and picking those special ones, with specific move in the smoke, a total of 21 images are left out. There was some editing in Photoshop as well to enhance the saturation and to darken the background completely, as the background I've used was not completely dark and it did reflect some light (probably from the room's spotlight rather than the speedlites), beside some unexpected additions to the scene that I didn't notice during the shooting session! I wanted to increase the shutter speed beyond 250^-1sec, which requires using High-Speed settings, to kill the ambient light completely (and darken the background even more) but unfortunately because of using the wireless function to control the speedlites I was not able to achieve this. This can be done with a cable or cord only (and some specific wireless controller or radio transfer probably). Such situations make me more eager to get a long soft cable rather than the helix-like cord that I have already (which hardly extends for more than 2 meters, i.e. around 6.6 ft). I made a mistake here though for not creating a sweep as a backdrop and I've simply placed a black board behind the censer, but checking the limits of the space itself, I think creating a sweep was also out of hand.

Jokes in Stocks

I've stated in my previous post that I'm looking forward to upload some of my images into other stock sites and try to increase the exposure. However, I'm quite aware of the fact that I'm not a commercial photographer and I don't deal much with tabletop photography, so far. Thus, my mission in this regard is not an easy one. Stock sites are not like fine art dealers nor like beauty lovers; they want something practical for usage in designs and ads. Nevertheless, some of their methods and ways in sorting out images are still funny to mention. I've realized that I've created a login in some of these websites long time ago and it was just a re-discovery from my side. Probably I know now why I didn't like the idea of uploading to them in the first place.
Dreamstime: In the beginning, they rejected most of my images and accepted only 2 (out of 10 or 20?). Now, I'm back again uploading to them. I've started to upload almost with the beginning of this week (including the 21 images of the censer) and so far, till the time of writing this blog post, no updates about the rejection status. Yes. I'm not that optimistic about accepting these files.

Depositphotos: This website has really good humor. My account was actually a buyer's account and I had to contact them to switch the login to a contributor. To be able to upload you need to fill in the tax form, and then upload 5 images as an examination to be able to upload to the website. All of my five images were rejected BUT hey! my tax form completion was done successfully! You can't imagine how happy I am. One more happy news here is that I can't put images for examination again till the passage of 10 days from the first examination.

123RF: All what I can say here is, stay away from this website. If Depositphotos rejected 5 photos from the examination sample, this website rejected 30 out of 33 images I've submitted, including ALL of the 21 images of the censer. You see, I'm not expecting all of the images of the censer specifically to be good - after all, the reason I've made several shots is to make different shapes of the smoke and also different zoom levels. For example, Canstockphotos did already rejected 11 and accepted 10 out of 21. When I checked closely, I've realized that reviewers on Canstockphotos did accept mainly images of the censer as a whole and rejected images of the censer in close-up. Here with 123RF, the whole set was rejected under the reason of "Poor lighting/Composition". OK, I understand the fact that I'm not a good photographer, but what kind of composition you are expecting for an isolate object in a tabletop photography? Or what kind of light you are expecting when I state in the file description Golden Censer lit partially? If they stated the reason as "Not marketable" I would quite understand that, but poor lighting and/or composition? That just doesn't add up. From some info bits in their website, I think the website is based in Dubai, and that thing specifically made me more optimistic about submitting to them but now, the whole game rules have changed.

FeaturePics: This is one agency that I do have some hopes for. They did reject some of my images and they did accept some others. One thing I don't understand here is the fact that I have to have 10 accepted images to be able to upload via FTP; my favorite method. So far, I didn't upload my censer images set onto this agency because I do prefer FTP for such large quantity of files. One thing I don't like here is the change in my images titles but to be fair, they did explain that already in their uploading tips, as they see poetic titles are not a good way for marketing and makes it hard for search engines to find the image, i.e. such titles would lessen the exposure to the public. They got a point somehow, even though I think in search engines routines it is usually the keywords that play the key role and not the title.

I'm still looking further but I can't get into any stock website I see. Canstockphotos and Mostphotos seem to be my dominant admirers for the time being.

Finale

There remains some experiments to be done yet but I didn't have the time this week, mainly because I need a model, and my model is, usually, my brother. Even though I did some tests and the results were fine so far, but I do need a good background.
I've notified the group about my inability to enroll in Redbull's contest and they expressed their disappointment. What's significant in their response is their reply: our participation is weak and we will disappoint them. When I asked about who was the initiator for such offer, turned out that the group was and Redbull's team didn't come to the group to ask for participation. I've blamed them (gently) for not checking on the preparations and the readiness of the group's members before involving the name of the group in such contest - specially that my own circumstances with my mother are well known and it is natural that I wouldn't have the full capabilities and time. Their response in fact, to some extent, did prove my point that they did have some heavy dependence on my shoulders which I didn't meet.
For the time being, it seems all I can do is concentrate more on tabletop photography and try to find new subjects to photograph with a twist. Probably this will have some marketable value as well. And they say don't carry the globe's load on your shoulders - how that is even possible?

R.I.P.

Tiresome and a sad week, and the dust made it worse. After struggling with time and having hardships to pick "my" street cat to the vet, just few minutes before writing this I got a phone call from the vet to tell me that he died, after vomiting blood all night. One more thing to lose in my life... he was an animal... but sort of listens to me humbly even though he didn't reply back or show emotions... but at the end he used to listen. He used to lick my toes all the time. I always wondered why...

R.I.P. Tiger

I will try to get over it. For now, I have to think of coming projects with my camera. I got one project done almost perfectly, that was the peeling of a seashell...

Peeled Seashell

I say almost perfect, because the bottom of the shell was not added here, and the shell was somehow awkwardly positioned on some clay to make it stand in a right angle. Almost. The merging process was a tiresome but not as much as before (the angle of rotation was set to 30 degrees here instead of 10 degrees like I did last time, making 12 images horizontally). For this reason I had to cut the bottom somehow to remove the yellow clay piece that was used to fix the shell. I think I should not have added the tops as well since I added the topmost part (as you can see on the top of the left side). Well, one more experiment to learn from. The non-uniform shape of the shell helped me I guess to merge the different angles with not much easy-to-see errors I would say. Right now I'm planning to do the same process with a more regular shape: my old lovely censer...

Luminositatis

Like the previous shell, I've fixed the angle of rotation on 30 degrees, but this time instead of using the regular 80W plain flood light, I used a blue flood light, on the top. My main point in the beginning, actually, was to take a single shot after all, trying to find some good contrast between the blue light and the reddish body of the censer (or purplish) and the red interior when the candle is on, but I think I made it better than I thought myself. I didn't have this effect in my mind. Despite that the above image is a HDR composed of only 2 images (at 0EV and -2EV), yet, the single shots did not differ much in shades. The only thing I made it into HDR here is to control the light of the candle and reduce its luminance solely without reducing the exposure of the image, and HDR-way is more convenient for controlling the luminance level. Will work soon on a peeling effect for this censer as well.
However, this was not my first trial to play with lights, or as some call it "light painting". I did try something but it was not successful as I wished, but after all an image was produced and some people liked it already.

The Swedish Shell
Svenska Snäcka

The image here is in fact a tone-mapped HDR, which I worked hard with Photoshop to enhance. Thus, I can't really call it "light painting". In light painting, you are supposed to work majorly in Bulb mode (that is opening the shutter and closing it as you wish). Here it was so hard to do that because of the time I did it in, and because of the strength of the yellow light was much greater than the blue one, and it needs very precise timing to turn off one light and light the other AND not overexposing the image. I got rid of all of that and simply worked in HDR format. Photoshop was needed to enhance the contrast and pronounce the faint blue color more, and to remove (by cloning out) the clay piece that was holding the shell stand still.
Light painting is an interesting art with the camera but surely needs lot of practice and sensing your own camera sensor. Most probably ND filters would be needed here to control the exposure and avoid overexposing your image like I did here. It's a long story I need to work with some time later. Light painting is not necessarily done in Bulb mode of course, but this is usually the way it is done because in Bulb mode you have infinite time to work with until you close the shutter by yourself, while other moods like (M)anual and (T)ime (v)alue would limit you to 30 seconds maximum for a single shot. I remember though in my old Canon 350D, the Bulb mode was integrated within the (M)anual mode, but in Canon EOS 7D, it is a separate mode.

Now and then I would get back to the images I took from the Scientific Center, and trying to get away with the noise level in most of them if not all. It is like an arsenal for me now after I stopped working with pictures from Ireland for some time now. Of course, not much HDR there to be done in these images but with ProPhoto color space (which unfortunately do not adhere to lot of websites like Photobucket and MostPhotos), a set of vivid colors can be extracted, with the noise of course. RAW file processing sounds fine when it comes to colors and contrast (but not always), but noise-wise, it's never enough, specially with a noise level of ISO12800. For this reason, not all images were (to me) applicable to be submitted online, excluding MostPhotos of course where you can upload almost anything above 5MP in resolution.
Nevertheless, RAW files got some nice features beside the color-related options, like Clarity. Clarity is an option that partially controls the sharpness of the image. Control this option carefully and you can have an amazing effect to your image. Notice that the sharpness here is not like the sharpness that would be fixed by dedicated plugins or by the RAW editor itself, but it is simply controlling the outer edges generally. You can make a "dreamy" effect by reducing the Clarity to some specific amount (depending on the image of course). One of the amazing things I've encountered while "playing" with this option while working on my Scientific Center images was this one...

The dotted fish
still looking after its official name!

In this image, increasing the clarity did literally increase the size of the black dots on this fish (which I don't recognize its name yet!), while reducing the clarity, the black dots became smaller (with the dreamy effect a bit). I decided to reduce the size of the black dots here to not make it "bulky" looking.
With these images from the aquarium, even when HDR was possible, I consider checking the RAW files and try to get something out of them. HDR is well-known for producing grains in the images even with low ISO (and sometimes it is hard to clean later even with dedicated noise filters). The thing after all is, what is your mood? Worry about the noise later on...

Abyss (RAW)

Abyss (HDR)

In the previous two images for the aquarium in the Scientific Center, I was really fluctuating between the two. I like them both. I like the RAW version for its mysterious look, and I like the HDR version for its vivid and enriched colors (and pronouncing more the sun rays in water). Notice that this (bracketed) image was taken at ISO12800, thus despite the smooth look in a small version like this, in large format it really... sucks big time.

Let's leave photography at this point though. I got lot of images that I've prepared but I can't put them all in here at the moment, but maybe when I need to talk about some specific topic. Working with these photos made me lazy about my Ayvarith project now. I completely forgot about it! The last thing I did was to simply make the Ayvarith transliteration of Alexander's story into the public (with sound examples only in the preface). On the other hand, I'm trying to dedicate some time to read this book I got last month and just started to read it, and typically, the only time I have is, at work (how ironic)!

The Playful Brain
reading on process!

The book is about solving puzzles to enhance various functions of the brain. Very interesting and amusing, and there are lot of practices or "training" to enhance various skills. So far, I'm still in the first part of the book which talks about Memory. There are some practices that I need to dedicate some time to do though, if I'm to be serious about my brain! Since when I was anyway? However, there is a nice website connected to this book: www.theplayfulbrain.com, which contains some amazing videos and news.
Time to post this for now, and have a moment of silence over the lovely cat that passed...

Indian Threadfish (Alectis indica). Local name: Udhaimy
عظيمي

Alexander 6, V5.

Been some days without putting some words here. Well, the natural thing with the holidays. I'm heading back to work by tomorrow after 3 days of holidays (neglecting the weekend, which makes it up to 5 days of holidays).
In this holiday I had some time to make up my own home-made light tent and softbox for my flash, and big thanks for my brother who has soft hands with the tools! I bought some tiny desk lights and fixed some energy-saving light bulbs to use as side lights for my light-tend.

 

My light box or light tent

 

My softbox for my flash head

One tiny problem happened after fixing the sides of the box, and that was the fact that the glue started to eat into the white surface. It is a problem but I don't think it would affect the snapping too much, since the object is going to be inside the box with lights out of the box. The main purpose of these wings on the sides (as I read in the main scheme) is that they serve as "reflectors." You can find the main scheme in this blog.
I didn't try the flash head so much, but I had some trials with the light tent a bit, trying out with my censer again. The first problem was to fix the box on a suitable surface on a suitable height. The table I used before for snapping the censer (and the turtle before) was not a suitable one because of its small surface area and hence, I wouldn't be able to put the desk lamps around (I would need other small tables to do this!). Anyway, after moving here and there, I fixed it over my suitcase (which still contains some stuff I got from Ireland and some books!). I've fixed the desk lamps around it but one problem occured then, and it was obvious in the pictures taken after, but I had no solution to that really. I could have fixed something below the box just to elevate it a little from one side, but the wax was already molten and I didn't want to shake the censer anymore fearing that something would drop down on the inside of the box. I kept it that way and made the censer body as straight as possible, with the molten wax being tilted to one side.
I took many shots in different modes (and sometimes in different WB) but the chain of pictures that I worked with most was a series of 9 pictures taken with constant aperture (f32) and changing shutter speed (time), making up a sequence of 9 exposures.

 

Photoshop composite and tone-mapping of 9 exposures

The good thing here is that the lighting was somehow good and controllable with 3 desk lamps fixed in positions surrounding the light-tent itself, but despite the fact that I used a narrow aperture (f32) as I usually do, to make sparkles of light reflected of the subject, here it did not show up. I'm guessing that I'm supposed to put a light source hitting forward to the censer instead of putting one to the top of the box. Yet, I had some fun merging different exposures.

  

3 exposures, tungsten white balance, merged and tone-mapped with photomatix .

The above image was taken in tungsten white balance, anyway it is not a big deal now with the white balance (in analog photography it was a big deal already, but with digital photography you can change that easily when you shoot in RAW). I called it "Frozen Censer." Despite the fact that I know clearly most of the stock sites won't like such images that got plenty of effects in them, but I put this one in Bigstockphoto.com.

Bigstockphoto had been kind enough to accept lately one or two of my images. Unlike Fotolia, who always refuse images either as "quality problems" or "aesthetic problem," Bigstockphoto does mention the problem exactly for you, and if you can, you would be able to fix the problem (when possible) and submit it again. Of course if there is no potential marketing for the picture itself that's another story. At least, they do mention something for you and don't leave you in the dark like Fotolia does. Lately, all the problems that I've encountered when my files are refused from Fotolia are under the "aesthetic" category, which makes me ask myself how this is fixed?

Anyway, back to the censer again, I made a go also with Exposure Fusion. Although I'm not so fond of this method but sometimes, it does some beauty to the images. I can't really tell what is the algorithm and the method used here, but your exposures are not combined to make one HDR image and then tone-mapped, but it sounds more like direct tone-mapping without passing the HDR phase.

 

Fusion of 9 exposures.

And finally, I tried out the fusion of several white balances extracted from a single image (the original was taken in tungsten WB);

 

Several WBs fused together.

Generally, the contrast is good despite the fact that I did not put a light source directly hitting into the body of the censer from the front. The flame inside has a sharp contrast and appears somehow "flamboyant" from the middle of the censer and the purple hue is dark, but can be shown with some saturation a bit. All the images anyway were not put directly but there was always some manipulation in Photoshop for increasing the contrast slightly or increasing the saturation and changing the hue little bit.

The thing that was missing from this, the sparkle that used to show up when I used the flash in a completely dark room. I have some experiment in my mind currently, and I shall get back to the censer again, I suppose!

Today, we have the 5th verse of Alexander VI; The last part of Alexander's story. The work with my transliteration has stopped as well during the holiday, but tomorrow is the working day, and I think I shall get back with my routine as usual (despite some pressing work in the labs).

__________
97. then Alexander asked about the secret
98. and the old man explained in few words
99. "secret of the lights after the lights in the Beginning"
100. thus, Alexander felt the burden of destiny
101. crushing down his shoulders from Heaven
102. and then he said with a shaking jaw
103. "how am I supposed to know the road,
104. if I never heard of your ancestors before?
105. and how I am supposed to reveal the secret
106. if I do not know what you are talking about?
107. help me O good old man in my task
108. may God help you to succeed in the good ways"
109. Náwi established his words with the praise of God
110. and said to Alexander: O young man, did God forget you before?
111. or did He give you a false promise before?
112. No! Thus you shall walk by His grace and mercy
113. like He made you a sun and moons to guide you
114. through the deserts He will never forget you
115. stay with us for three days and be prepared
116. then go on to your journey with your destiny
117. the prophecies there were made will not lie
118. go and fear nothing O Vuqurnún
119. thus Alexander decided to stay for three days
120. while the hermits prepared him for his journey

Alexander 6, V3.

Unfortunately, no pictures for today, although I made one experiment with my censer again. I can't say all the results were fine but I didn't try much to tone-map any. I made 2 versions (as far as I remember) and all saved in EXR, but I didn't go on further to tone-map and other stuff. The bad thing here is that I missed the sparkling effect of the flame, and the censer image was somehow... normal. Anyway, I might add them for tomorrow, as for the time being I'm a bit busy in re-making one of the panoramas for one of our labs, and also busy with... playing some games... YES!
__________
49. his heart was relieved and the smile got back
50. and then he asked the old man about his identity
51. who are they and why they asked him to come
52. the old man began his speech slowly
53. and said: I am the mortal son of immortals
53. I am the ancestor of the tribes
54. I am Náwi bir Nowayi Ayvárí
55. a son and grandson of the Ayvars
56. brought to Earth from the unknown
57. and I grew up with the nomads
58. until the Light brightened my soul and heart
59. then I married from the tribes of Earth
60. thus I am from and into the tribes
61. I am a branch of Eruvians and Huberians
62. and the Capallese and the Qalaqach
63. I am the father of Kharkhaz and Urev
64. and the grandfather of the Dulukh and Noahim
65. I am the son of Ayvars who lost his fathers
66. I lost the count of time and age
67. thus count my age as much as you like
68. and these are the chosen of my sons
69. and the chosen of their grandsons
70. and their chosen of their great grandsons
71. we are the root and the branch
72. from the seed that disappeared long time ago

Alexander 6, V2.

Dried tuna that turns into a sauce... not a pleasant thing to imagine, really. In fact, I didn't imagine it. I saw it!
I keep trying on snapping my censer, yet the experiments are always going astray from the way I intend to take! This time, I fixed the black background as usual, but I did not do the box just yet. Also, I used the halogen light that I bought some days ago and did not work on it before. The light was so strong and the room's lights were like they were on (in fact you wouldn't notice any differences whether they are on or off). The halogen wasa daylight type, thus it produced a yellowish. And despite the many trials, 2 images must come almost the same in exposure value. More to my agony, the violet hue of the censer's body was not obvious at all and I was not able to retain the color easily (if not impossible) without "painting" the HDR image.

Two-images, manual tone-mapped HDR.

Two-images, Photomatix tone-mapped HDR.

As you can see in the previous examples, the violet hue of the censer (if you saw previous posts) is not visible at all because of the yellowish hue from the halogen light. Another trial I would say, and to avoid the similar-exposure shots, is to use the method of changing the shutter speed (time). I am mainly using the Av (aperture priority) and for this, the maximum time for the shutter speed for some shots (if not all shots) is 30 seconds, and hence, with the static aperture value (f-number), the exposure is calculated to the same value always. It would be useful to do this with a FEB, but thinking about it, you have a changing shutter speed and a change in the Flash value, so if we settled to down on the number of shutter speeds that we are to use, then we will have mainly (number of speeds x 3) images. I would settled for 3 speeds too; 1 sec, 1/100 sec, 1/200 sec, although I'm not sure there would be much difference between the latter two. This said, I would settle with 9 images, and probably, going to merge them all together as one set! That would be with the flash, but another trial is worthy with halogen light as well. I need to find a tripod for this light, or I'm going to burn something in the room!

__________

25. while his supplies were going to finish
26. he decided to walk to the three sisters lake
27. the lake where he used to hunt and drink
28. away from Caqubdarius, his place
29. and on the way to there he passed by the hermits
30. some people who forgot life and its agonies
31. and he wondered could it be the Ayvars
32. he spent some time with them and they fed him
33. they gave him water and food like a guest
34. and after three days of hospitality they asked
35. about his story and his name and his destination
36. with some fear he answered hardly
37. and told them about his real identity
38. and to where he is heading
39. they stood with respect after hearing that
40. and amid the crowds came an old man
41. so old that his eyebrows fell on his eyes
42. and said with weak voice: welcome O Faithful
43. whose name is Alexander, Alexandarús, Vuqurnún
44. you are the bound between this world and the other
45. you are the promised in the book of Burhutiyyá
46. welcome amid your family
47. welcome amid your servants
48. and feel safe for no one shall hurt you

Alexander 6, V1.

Somehow, it was a tiresome and busy weekend. I didn't post anything yesterday (Saturday) as I promised myself but anyway, it was not much of importance I believe, except to put on with the first verse of Alexander VI.
I made some experiments again with my beloved golden turtle, and this time I used the FEB (Flash Exposure Bracketing) as a substitute, since I can't use it in a completely dark room;



The blue background is actually black. But with some fixes and because of the flash light striking it, it turned bright and blue. Combining the three shots was done with Photomatix (and some values of exposures were adjusted since softwares use certain numbers in the EXIF of the image, i.e. data attached to the image). Yet, tone-mapping was done manually with Photoshop (and also fixes) because the Photomatix version was hard to smooth out and equalize the proportions of light. The image you see was actually like split horizontally in the middle, with bright portion being up and the dark shadow being down. Such thing cannot be done with Photomatix, but rather done easily with Photoshop's adjustment layers and brushes. Hue and Saturation were also fixed to some extent and voila! here you go. As for the time being, I've been using Photomatix to merge the images together and save it as EXR, and then edit them (mostly) with Photoshop. Sometimes, I get them back to Photomatix after adjusting them and saving back again in EXR, because my skills with manual tone-mapping are just novice!
This is some of my summary about using Photoshop and Photomatix in HDR making and Tone-mapping; of course people who read some books don't need it, as these are just my thoughts after working a with them, and there are plenty of softwares out there that are good for things and bad for other things maybe and so on:

Photoshop:

 - Good stuff:

• Gives you the ability to adjust the HDR image in various ways with adjustment layers.
• When joining into HDR, a dialogue box appears with calculated exposure values and gives you a choice to tick-out any unwanted images into the sequence.
• Got instant 32-bit slider to view the image in various exposure settings instantly.
• For those who like to use their own hands with baking the HDR, tone-mapping here with Adaptive settings (and others) are fine.
• Plugins capability makes it easier to do noise reduction after tone-mapping directly, if needed.

 - Bad stuff:

• Memory consumer.
• Exposure values cannot be changed manually (only if the file is stripped out of its EXIF data).
• Does not have a tool to view a HDR historgram.
• Aligning, while processing the images to HDR is not, compared to Photomatix, good enough.

 Photomatix:

- Good stuff:

• Does not consume much memory.
• Exposure values can be fixed in case of some problems with calculations (and you get a dialog box even when the brackets of the exposures are not even or normal let's say).
• Got Exposure Fusion capability (which is not an HDR merging but useful at times).
• Can view a HDR histogram (and this is extremely important for me to check that there are no cut-offs in the exposures sequence; at tails mainly).
• Saves the HDR image in major formats as Radiance (.HDR) and OpenEXR (.EXR, ZIP and PIZ).
• Tone-mapping is semi-automatic, with pre-fixed schemes and the ability to adjust the sliders. This is good for none-experienced manual workers like me!
• Has 2 aligning algorithms embedded and can be used in two modes: normal and high (in case your tripod moves much because of the air or something). It is far better than Photoshop's.

- Bad Stuff:

• Once the sequence of the images is made, and when an error pops-up for some problems in the exposure values, you cannot tick-out some images, but only fix the exposure values.
• Generally, it is not an image editing program, thus, you can't do much to your HDR image before baking.
• Personally, I don't trust the "noise reduction" option that is applied to the images before being combined. After all, noise reduction is a must after tone-mapping.
• No plugins capability, thus, you can't work with plugins embedded in it like Photoshop; plugins like NeatImage are deemed useful.
• No instant 32-bit viewer or slider to move and check the various exposures. There is however an option for going up and down with exposure (F11 and F12 keys) which isn't exactly as flexible as in Photoshop.

The term "bake" and "baking" I'm using here, is a term that adapted (and I like it by the way) from Christian Bloch's book, in which he explains how to fix HDR images before tone-mapping, i.e. baking. I think he was hungry when he was writing that section but anyway, it works fine with me... 'cos I'm always hungry.

With points from here and there, it is, at least for me, hard to work with one program alone. I do have to work with both here and there. Yet, my main first step in the workflow, would begin with combining the images in Photomaix first and saving the HDR file. Sometimes, but not often, I do combine the images into HDR in Photoshop but it is rather to check if there is any difference or any enhancement, since the two softwares tend to give me different calculated exposures' values for the same set of images.
I've been trying to do the same FEB trials on my old censer as before, and this time with a black background (from the papers I purchased last week). I did not design a black box yet, but so far I'm putting the paper freely and bend it softly to make a background. In my experiment with the censer (which I did not make up images for it yet), I used the diffuser on the flash head. I did not use it before because, I just thought it is designed mainly for the wide-lens apparatus (as mentioned in the manual) and to avoid vignetting (darkening of edges) when using wide-lens with normal flash. The flash tends to concentrate in one spot then. However, I used it with my 18-55mm lens and it works fine on spreading the flash to a wider area and softening the strike on the body of the censer itself. Why I didn't think of this before? Damn it!
When the diffuser is pulled out, the flash automatically sets the zoom level to that of a wide-lens, and maybe that's why I didn't try to use it in that condition.
Everything was going fine, until it was the time for the third shot which is supposed to have a relative exposure value of +3, when it turned out with a level of "0". This is bad for combining the images later on, even if I fixed the values manually in Photomatix. I made other shots changing from Av (aperture priority) mode to Tv (time priority), but here, the results were not exactly what I want, with the flames of the candle inside were almost turned off and the aperture was set to f5 making a shallow depth and no sparkles (like in the image of the turtle above). It is hard to combine elements from the 2 experiments, but I'm trying still, or I should conduct a new experiment today, completely.
__________
1. thus Alexander decided to leave his people
2. and head to where he never been before
3. alone without any companions
4. weak without any weapons
5. except of his Charnagút
6. and he walked with his torn clothes
7. amid the deserts and mounts and valleys
8. and he stopped at the ruins of Taghlút
9. the capital of the khanate of Ghutan
10. where he crushed some idolaters
11. just like a grain of salt in the wind
12. and he stood upon the ruins of the tower
13. of the mighty castle he wrecked with iron and fire
14. and he meditated and remembered his golden age
15. and the tears could not be kept in his eyes long
16. and he raised his harsh hands up to heaven
17. and praised God and His mercy
18. then he knew for sure deep inside him
19. that nothing in this life remains
20. and like you take, you shall be taken
21. and like you own, you are owned
22. while this life is nothing for sure
23. but like a grain of salt or sand
24. to the wind shall fly away

Alexander 5, V1.

Spent this week with other experiments again, but this time, with something else other than the censer (as in the previous days). However, there was still some business that I did not finish with that censer yet. I gave out a new trial with two ways; one was with the change in aperture values, and one with changing the ISO. In both cases however, the flash was used but of course aiming in some other direction other than a direct hit.
I will forget talking about the second type, with changing the ISO value and combining the results in HDR. This image was horrific after HDR making, and I didn't dare even to minimize it and put it for view over the net! Too much noise and dark areas and the real colors of the censer were not obvious, but only the flame inside was obvious.
In the first trial however, with the change in aperture, I think the result was not bad, but it needs a little fix later on because with small apertures (high f-numbers) a sparkle is made from light sources, and putting these all together then you would end up with some how a weird looking shape and some abnormal color saturations in the areas of the sparkles.

As you can see, the middle area is occupied with a star with abnormal saturation because of the change in apertures. Anyway, I think this is an easy case to be fixed with cloning in Photoshop or even Spot-Heal tool. The flash was pointing up and bouncing from the ceiling. I couldn't do a good job with manual tone-mapping in Photoshop, thus Photomatix is used to produce more saturation and contrast as much as possible.

The other experiment was to snap a picture of my beloved golden turtle which was a gift from my sister in one of my old birthdays (I really can't remember which one was it but for sure I was younger than 26 I remember).
Anyway, the thing here, it doesn't have a flame inside, and the body is rigid and won't give a very strong reflections of the flash like the censer did. It has a Unique body color almost, thus the contrast bit is a bit resolved to some extent. My aim was just shoot and see what happens really, and while I'm writing this I've just reckoned that I was supposed to put on a small aperture (high f-number) in order to make some sparkling from the surface. Anyway, I guess this would be my aim next time.
The shooting was made in several changes of camera modes and some were bad and some were good relatively:

1. Bracketed shot. The normal procedure that I usually follow; Av mode, the room light was on, and 3 bracketed shots (-2,0,+2). Photomatix was used here as I SUCK with manual tone-mapping in Photoshop.

2. Changing Shutter: With Tv (Time-Value priority) mode on, and working with my flash, I started to take a picture in the darkness with almost one third of the time value each time, starting from 30 seconds. That would be make it like: 30 seconds, 10 seconds, 3 seconds and so on. I got many that way and most of the images exceeding the time of one second were almost similar and dark even with a flash (the limit is 1/200 when the flash is in the work).
The images were combined, but apparently because of the noise coming from the dark images mostly, there was some weird noise and spots that appeared even before the tone-mapping, but in this small version here, it is not so much obvious, but it was apparent in the mouth area mostly, as some pinkish and bluish lines. Tone-mapping was also carried by Photomatix as usual and I kept these settings almost the same for the previous image and the coming images as well.

3. Less of Shutters: After making the previous one and knowing that many dark images can corrupt and add more unpleasant noises, I've picked up 3 shots from the series and combined them, then manually tone-mapped it. Although I don't like this tone-mapping really because it is too bright, some people already said it is better than the one I did in Photomatix.

4. FEB: Flash Exposure Bracketing. I was really not sure that this method would work at all. Of course it was not an option if I was using the camera flash, but here I'm able to do the same thing (almost) with the camera auto-bracketing but in the flash itself and in a range from -3 to 3, in 3 shots. What I really like about it is the saturation (done in Photomatix of course) and the clean background. This thing really can save lives!

 

5. The Dim Light: Here, I didn't use the flash at all, but rather I used my flashlight and pointed it to the white ceiling and that gave out a very dim light over the turtle. I've fixed the camera on Tv mode and set it out for auto-bracketing, and the shot started for 30 seconds for each of the 3 shots. The result was not bad even though with a yellowish hue all over because of the flashlight itself but this all can be fixed with a proper tone-mapping; which I did manually and with Photomatix here.

 

Manually tone-mapped. I'm bad with this though and the shadow of the head looks faint.

 
 

Tone-mapped with Photomatix.

In general, and since I was shooting without an aim at mind, I didn't care much about the angle, which later on sounded not a good one here . I think lowering the tripod a bit would be more pleasant, if I should say. Also, most of these images were taken with a wide aperture (low f-number) and hence, they have a shallow depth of field. Can be an advantage OR a disadvantage, but I would prefer to make a low depth with a more close-up version, probably to the head.

I'm starting to use Photomatix more here not only for the tone-mapping, but also for its superiority in aligning images, and also for its HDR histogram option. It is important to check the HDR historgram to check that you wouldn't have a cut-out in the tails of the histogram, or in other words, a chop in shadows or highlights. It is really weird and strange that Photoshop still does not include such an option. Photoshop is favorable though, sometimes, for editing work in 32-bit mode just before tone-mapping. 

I sent a suggestion to Canstockphoto people, asking them if they are willing to allow people to upload HDR images. The response was positive I can say and who knows, they might be the first website I've ever known that allow upoads for HDR images. So far, I don't know of any website that does this. HDR images (and specially panoramas) are important for cases of Computer Graphics and making up an environment with good lighting.

Today I begin posting the 5th part of Alexander's story. Hope you enjoy reading it, if you will...

__________
1. and the hero moved out of the forest
2. with sadness filling his heart to the fullest
3. and he left some of his men to manage the forest
4. but now he has no power to fight or to war
5. for only one hundred men are left with him
6. and he wondered about his next direction
7. is it south or to the land of day and night
8. for he knew he will be back there one day
9. he decided to go south and pass on the middle land
10. and see what wonders might come or commands
11. while his one hundred men were his faithful and closest
12. then at night they camped in the wilderness like nomads
13. tired from all the troubles they tried and saw before
14. and the heaviness of metals broke their backs
15. at night time they slept and Alexander had a dream
16. weird it was and Alexander could not explain
17. he saw people like monks covering their heads
18. they were telling him to come down to them
19. because life is such an agony and wild
20. where no love remains and no soul
21. they asked him to come and see
22. the wonders of God that none did see
23. he then woke up with a fast heart beating
24. and spent the night awaken by the shock