RP 2022…

Well well well! Been 3 weeks I guess since I've posted something here? Things were a bit fussy. Busy a bit, tired a bit, and even sick a bit.
I've talked about making a post for my Arabic blog in my previous post, and I did that. But afterward, I fell sick a bit and I've been fasting for few days afterward which made me sleep most of the day and awake most of the night. No time to make much except to enjoy a bit of the silence of the night.
However, just in the past week I've managed to work a bit on some shots for the RP season, since it's February already; Retinitis Pigmentosa Awareness Month.

RP 2022

In the beginning, I wasn't quite sure what to shoot here. I've spent a considerable time making ideas and brainstorming. i got out with some good ideas (I guess?) but anyway, when thinking about the next steps on how to make these ideas happen, everything seemed clogged. I would either need some help, which I don't have, or need some special tools or props, and the like. For this reason, I had to play it down and be as simple as possible. 

RP Dilemma

So, the first idea that I came about to conclude is a shot that describes the dilemma that we, people with Retinitis Pigmentosa, face in various light and dark conditions and how there is no one solution that fits all situations. To shoot RP Dilemma, I've made use of the sun (using speedlites was an idea as well but I don't want to add complexity to the equation as it is already). Under the sun, I've placed an ND8 (3 stops) filter half-way on the lens and thus making the image half dark and half light. Honestly, working under the sun was such a pain and I couldn't figure out what I was shooting. I deemed all my photos useless and was going to delete them all, but until I went inside and viewed them clearly on LCD, I've realized that I've shot some usable images there. Well, one in fact out of don't-know-how-much. the final image needed some work of course in balancing the dark and light (dodge and burn) and few other things related to saturation and cropping. One thing I'm not satisfied with here though is the look and the direction of the eye which was supposed (as I was planning) to be direct and straight. 

Color My Life

Then I was up to another simple idea, and this time it did require few edits in Photoshop and not all done in-camera. The challenge, thought, with Color My Life is the framing of the image. In the shooting, I admit, I was working hastily as I wanted to finish with this shot as soon as possible and head to something else. I've done it after midnight when everyone was asleep.
Since I'm shooting in infrared, I needed an infrared source, and here comes my old arsenal of tungsten light bulbs (150W) which can be hard to find nowadays! I keep those for emergencies like this, even though I might use a speedlite as well but speedlites got its own problems (to name one: Focusing properly with infrared filter on lens).
The filter in use here was Neewer's IR720, which means the threshold here is 720nm. I could've also use my B+W 650nm infrared filter but I thought it might leak colors more than it should, as the aim here with shooting in infrared is to reflect the idea of low saturation. Higher threshold values would render the infrared image closer to a monochrome or B&W, while low threshold value would allow some color in. Thus, 720nm seemed a safe bet.
As stated already, the real challenge was framing. I had to test many crops till I landed on one that I deemed acceptable. The other challenge was merging the two images; The colored and the infrared. The challenge here was to select only the colored pencils and mask the rest. With my old version of Photoshop, such selecting tools are not the best out there and I had to spend a considerable time trying to do my best with the "marching ants". Yet, it's not perfect of course.
At the final stage, I've added extra sharpening to hands only to add more to the dramatic sense of the image, beside some bits of adjusting the lights in the image. 

The Caneman

However, probably the one in this series was the hardest. I was going to abandon the whole idea but I pushed myself to do it, despite the fact that I didn't quite like the place. I was aiming for some place with a black or dark background, and I don't have such a place anywhere at home, unfortunately.
The idea is, apparently as can be seen in The Caneman, a bit comical with a reflection on the hurdles of being a person with RP (the cane, the shades). Took me a while to adjust the power of the speedlite (and using the oval globe diffuser on the speedlite). But after all, I didn't like the shadow cast from my body (and it would make problems for me when merging the other shots later on) so I decided to take a shot for the scene without me to blend as a background.This bit, though, is not quite to my liking and I feel it popping out as "too unrealistic" even for a comical shot like this, but all in all, this is better than not doing anything at all. The rest of the work is, of course, some editing tricks in Photoshop (if I can call them so) and using the Radial Blur specifically to mimic the movements of the cane and the hand. As for the big head, it is taken from a separate shot of course, up close to the camera. Unlike the previous two shots where I used my favorite Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM lens, for The Caneman I've used the Sigma 12-24mm f/4.5. 

Finale

Up to the time of writing this text, there are still some ideas the cook at the back of my head and I'm not sure if I will be able to achieve them. February is still ongoing and seems I still have time. Of course, I can do them even after February but it would be nicer if I can finish these ideas related to Retinitis Pigmentosa during this month specifically.
Meanwhile, and looking back at what I would call a "resolution" for my retirement, about managing my time and setting some type of routine for me to do things around, all that seems to be falling apart for the time being, and I'm not sure if I can be up to the task with such turbulent sleeping schedule and tired body.
Now that I don't have to go to work, I'm yearning to go out and do some shooting specially at night, on the beach area, as I used to do in the old days, but driving my car gives me the shivers now. I heard about some people that had been fined for driving while they are registered as being "people with visual disability"; I don't want to be in that place. Yet, no one out there to help me out and tour me around. The national holidays are coming as well and typically it is a good occasion for some night-time shooting for all those decorations and light art. But I have to keep it all to myself for now. There are more pressing matters that I need to deal with and I think I would have some time to think about all of this when I'm over with those. Hopefully…

Visionary…

Well, I'm struggling here to keep my mood swings off the ground a bit till the time for my vacation arrives. I'm trying to squeeze my mind to extract some more ideas for the project of the month of May which is about colors. Yet, however, when I tried to do something, I've gone out with a completely different experience and experiment. The bad thing about it is that I had to work with high ISO here since I didn't want to use speedlites. Explanation for not using them will come shortly.

Visionary

I won't go over my original idea which was about colored sticks and a glass of water, but I'm going to move right away into the application of the second idea which came to live, even though it did not involve colors as I hoped so.

Vivid Dream I
Canon EF 100mm Macro, f/2.8, 400^-1s, ISO3200.

The idea was simply to display an eye image (ahem, my eye) on my tablet and cover the tablet with a lasagna glassware, then filling the glassware with water. The goal was to achieve some kind of movement, distraction, or any kind of action that could possible mimic the sense of a vivid dream with a fuzzy looking eye. However, to aid me with this, I had to add corn syrup (didn't have glycerine) to the water and use a milk frother to disturb the water and produce some action and bubbles. Any liquid works here I guess but I think anything else would add color and maybe unwanted level of foam (like soap for example); Thus, corn syrup was just about enough for me here.
In the beginning I did indeed use ND filter to lengthen the exposure time considerably, but that length in fact hid all the action; I guess I didn't learn my lesson from hunting clouds with long exposures yet! Thus, I've removed the ND and decided to shoot normally. The blur produced by the moving water did, in general, look like a motion blur of some unstable hand, which is not something I was aiming for. Meanwhile, I noticed how the bubbles were interesting enough to make some kind of vivacity in the scene. Capturing them needed some shutter speed (i.e. short timing). Not wanting to use Speedlites here because they might make the situation worse with refraction and highlight spots, I've decided to work with Tv mode, and set the ISO to Auto. A Kamikaze plan, I know. My little cropped Canon EOS 7D surely does not do well with high ISO and heat. However, so let it be.
I've shot most shots at 400^-1s shutter speed, but seems even that was somewhat slow and I needed something faster at some point (but didn't discover that until the examination of these images closely). The ISO here ranged from 2000 to 4000. A Catastrophe.

Turbulent Dream
Canon EF 100mm Macro, f/4, 30^-1s, ISO400.

By the end of this experiment, I was back again to try and shoot something with motion blur which I did, and produced something surreal of some sort after winding the ISO back to 400 (still high to my measures) as seen in Turbulent Dream. Not sure why I stopped at ISO400 and not ISO100, but probably it would make the exposure so long that all turbulence would simply disappear. In total, there were 8 shots, so here are the other 6:

Vivid Dream II

Vivid Dream III

Vivid Dream IV

Vivid Dream V

Vivid Dream VI

Vivid Dream VII

Of all in this series, only Vivid Dream VII undergone a special treatment somewhat as I applied Pinch filter to make the bubbles' circles seemingly more directed to the center of the image around the iris. The effect was slightly applied and not in extreme way, otherwise it would be more like a graphic surreal design instead of a surreal photo!
Now, the critique about these images was fine but with one problem here: the noise. For this reason I might need to do the experiment again, and this time I have to go with another risk: using speedlites. However, I'll try to make speedlites as diffused as possible, despite the fact that I'll be using HSS mode which will reduce the power of the single flash lighting significantly. Anyway, all that is on hold for now, since I have to get busy (really busy) with my colors project for the month of May, as the month is getting closer to its end and I didn't achieve a single proper photo yet!

Finale

Well, this was a short trip into what I've been doing lately. Too bad I didn't capture any further images with the colors project yet, otherwise I would have posted them here. Meanwhile, I'm looking for a good topic to write about in my other Arabic blog as I didn't post any articles in some time now. I'm thinking about talking about High Pass Sharpening method. Anyhow, I should start ASAP to be over with it by next Thursday. That means, also, I won't be posting in this blog next week.
Good news here: I have to get ready to start my own vacation during Ramadhan, as I've signed for one. Remembering the hell I used to go through last summer with traffic jams at work itself, all that, makes me freak out thinking how things would be this Ramadhan in this summer. They say this would be the last Ramadhan to arrive at summer and will not fall during summer again till after 26 years from now! Something to joy about I guess? The question is though, would I be able to use that time to work more with my camera, as well as some of the postponed projects? Till then…

Anatomy...

Finally... a vacation from work. Well, not a vacation from home unfortunately, but in hope that this would happen this year, after summer (i.e. after the holidays season). The schedule is, or should, be busy with activities specially with my camera, but I also hope not to forget my Geltani project which has been on hold for some time. On the schedule as well, a trip to Failaka and spend one night there, if possible.

Continuation

In the previous week I've been working with some panoramas and "panaglyphs" from around my workplace. I've stated some problems in my previous post about the failures that I've met for doing a "panaglyph," or a panorama anaglyph. I've continued the work and tried to do other projections this time and as expected, not much of a success either, but I'd say better results than other previously done stitches.

Planeta Caela

My next stop was the planet projection for the panorama. The image you see above is the left side of the tried panaglyph. This panorama should have been posted last week in fact but because of some technical problems with my internet I had to finish my previous post ASAP. Anyway, after tone-mapping this version of the panorama, and then tone-mapping the right side of the intended panaglyph, I tried to overlap them both and create a panaglyph. The geometry of the projection helped me with some trick to align both planets together.

Planeta Caela (3D)
WARNING: DO NOT STARE FOR A LONG TIME.

The trick here, was to align one corner of the globe and then place the rotation cross-hair to that position and use it as a center of rotation for the whole image. This allowed for a better alignment, but that does not mean there are no ghosting. It's just more fitting that way because of the geometry. Ghosting here can be a severe matter because with this geometry we might have, instead of left and right portions with red and cyan, we can have also in addition cyan and red in up and down direction; i.e. orthogonal to the direction of the human eye! This, of course, is not good. In addition of course, the skies have changed in between the shooting of each of these panoramas thus both of them won't coincide at any point, which produce such strange ghosts and halos when you see them with Red-Cyan 3D Glasses.

The Big Sweep

Doppeldimension

On the list there was the vertical panorama and the wide-view projection techniques, and each with a purpose and an effect of course. However, the vertical panorama, Doppeldimension, was a bit further experimental. If you compare Doppeldimension with The Big Sweep you would notice the drastic difference in the tones; and this is not something done by tone-mapping in fact, since the values used in Photomatix are almost the same. However, some simple trick done to Doppeldimension here and I loved how it looks. The matter was simply to use the Channel Mixer adjustment layer in Photoshop and swap the Blue and Red channels (like how it is usually done in Infrared images) and then blended in with the rest of image using Soft Light blend. The beauty here is that it almost suppresses all the tones to some degree, but pronounces the Greens more; in fact I had to use Hue/Saturation controls to reduce the Greens just tiny bit and avoid Bleeding. Bleeding is when the color or tone is so saturated that it looks like it spills out of its regional container into other adjacent areas (imagine it as if water is spilled over a paper with some ink).
I think with this, it's time to say it's over and start thinking about another panorama and another location. I'm not sure where it will be, but this time I think I should make it an interior panorama rather than an exterior one, just to avoid the change in the atmosphere as much as possible. Of course, if the place has windows there would be some change in the light level but the change won't be drastic as there are now shadows from the sun inside the place. I have to think of some place. Think, think, think...

Anatomy

This week was a week of lesser activity; just before the vacation. In hope that I will increase the pace in the coming few days. For this reason, continued experimenting with my flashes like I did last week but this time not for a portraiture; but rather macro eye shots. I remember the last time I did a macro shot for my eye was done using the Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 macro lens. This time, however, I've decided to use extension tubes to get even better results. But notice please that I DO NOT ADVISE ANYONE TO DO WHAT I DID.

Arabian Eye
Canon EF 50mm+20mm ET, f/22, 20^-1sec, ISO200.

With macro mode now, of course we do need some small apertures, i.e. high f-numbers, and consequently, high level of illumination. I literally had to stick the two flashes I have, 580EX II and 430EX II, so close to my face that I did feel the heat gushing out with every shot. Lighting is difficult in such situations not only because of the narrow distance, but because I'm doing it all myself for myself; in such situations it would be better that someone would guide and help - but I have none in my case.
Anyway, the main two modifiers used all the way here are the snoot (with honeycomb grid to narrow further the light beam), and the Bulb diffuser (and you can see their reflection on the iris of my eye above).

Split Eye
Canon EF 50mm+20mm ET, f/22, 20^-1sec, ISO200.

There were several good shots and the trick was to process them differently to give various impressions. In Arabian Eye for example, I've tried hard to make the light look gradient (it wasn't much of a gradient originally) to give the sense of mystery and power to the look, and also the noise reduction was done to some areas only and not to the whole image because it was too smooth to my desired look.
Seeing this problem with the gradient, I tried other shots using only the Bulb diffuser as in Split Eye, which still rendered it even in lighting somewhat and needed further processing. The reason this is called Split Eye is the fact it is not a colored image; but a black and white image and tone-splitting was applied which made it look like colored. Further Photoshop workout had to be done to improve the gradient effect here.

With Details

Just for fun here, I've picked one of the images and tried a crop for 100% close-up to the iris just to see the degree of the details. I have to say there were good enough, and this is only using a 20mm extension tube. This, in fact, encouraged me to shoot even higher: to shoot my eye with a greater zoom, using all my extension tubes (i.e. 68mm). But the task, of course, is not that easy at all. Mainly because of the position of the light sources relative to my eye, and my eye would be way too close to the front of the lens - way too close, more than it was already when using 20mm extension tube. After many trials, it was done even though not as clear as the ones done before...

More Details
Canon EF 50mm+68mm ET, f/22, 50^-1sec, ISO100.

As you can see, I've reduced the ISO back to 100 instead of 200, with some increase in the shutter speed. The reason for this is, after situating the flashes in proper positions to light the eye, I decided to reduce their power by the camera instead of controlling their own power - it's easier that way. The final image you see above was subjected to several processing trends (beside converting to black and white to kill the chromatic aberration). The rest was a struggle to show more details and to equalize the light over different areas - with layer masks of course. Surprisingly, more veins popped out with the processing!
Now to the mathematics little bit: This shot was taken using 50mm lens attached to 68mm extension tubes; thus according to the equation (m=ET/FL), to get the magnification factor, we would get 68/50 = 1.36, meaning the image of the object is magnified by x1.36 times. In percentage as well this would be 136%; 36% more than the normal size.

The difference here with the last shot is, the details are as they are - no cropped image at 100% view to get the details clear. Quite promising at this level and no need for EXTREME macro shots with lens-coupling!

Finale

Well well well... a vacation for two weeks. All I'm hoping for is to have the real "fun" I'm planning for. Some worries still chase me though, but I'm trying to have a full relaxation as much as possible - of course including long hours of sleep in the days when Mom has no dialysis to do.
Seems like two weeks are not enough, but this is the beginning. I have to break the circumstances around me. As one of my teachers put it for me last week: if you can't help yourself, you won't be able to help your mother. And the question remains, how am I supposed to help myself if I live in a helpless atmosphere; where even home, is not a home... ?

OCT?

OCT Results

Again, it is one of these times that I call "Wasted Weeks". I've spent the week going for the eyes examinations in the morning or afternoons and running chores. I did work a bit on some macro experiments trying to understand some aspects, yet though the set is cumbersome still, and with my physical exhaustion of everyday I do barely think of doing something with my camera. This week also, we had a flight show done by the Red Arrow, commemorating the historical visit of our Emir to the United Kingdom last year. Of course, I wasn't there to shoot. First, the show was on Tuesday, one of the days that I do have to pick Mom for dialysis and going in errands from and to my work place. A bad timing of traffic jams and exhaustive demeanor. Secondly, I don't have much of a zooming power with my Tamron 70-300mm broken. Everything that needs zooming power must put on hold for the time being. Thus, I barely had any chances to go to that show already.
Mainly, in the meantime, I'm trying to dig more information about visual aids since I reckoned that it is possible, to some degree, to help people with retinitis pigmentosa live somehow a regular life with their impairment. It is mainly for my eldest brother and one of my older sisters who suffer from RP severely. Who knows though, I might be next.
This week also, the 38^th annual book fair was established. Despite my short journey inside one of the wholes but I did pick up some queue of books that would be enough to keep me busy for some time until the next cargo of photography books later on. Typically, the fair is full of religious books or theological studies books, or for a change, political and political-related books. Thus, just for few rounds I realized I won't gain much. There was one particular book about the Ottoman Empire but it was way too thick, and in two parts, which made me re-think the possibility of reading it all. It was an analysis of the Ottoman state back then before its fall in 1924. I always hold the idea that there is a lot to learn about the past of this state, which ruled for around 700 years. Some people, however, do dream of getting this empire back. How, I don't know, but to me it doesn't sound a plausible idea.

However, for the time being, all I'm hoping for is more experiments and a bit of outdoors activity as winter is looming now and the night time is a refreshing and a relaxing time. Trying to forget the past jinxes of the past 3 months and working with a camera at night seems to be the good way to do it. All what I'm concerned about is getting in troubles again with some folks, in a time that I'm getting really sick of everyone in here, and of those around me.

If you are reading this and can offer some insight into the OCT report in the picture above (and apparently the technician didn't hear of PRINT command and used the PRINT SCREEN instead) I would really appreciate it. In the meantime, I'm going to TRY to have an appointment with the doctor, which left me sick already with the ridiculous attitude of the workers in Al-Bahar Eye Hospital.

Let's Play!

I'm not sure what kind of week is this, as I'm typing this in the middle of the week to be posted on Thursday. However, one problem with the car and the whole week seems to be like a disaster.
I didn't post a thing last week despite the simple material that was available just because I did need some vacation from writing here, and because of the hectic life pace and with such heat that already exceeds 40^oC at just 10:00 a.m. sometimes, my mind and brain were completely out of words and order and all what I was thinking of was sleep, sleep and sleep.
The material, however, was not much more than simply some floral shots that were taken around my work place just because I felt the need to work with my camera. I've done as I've done the 50mm challenge  before, when I would pick up my camera and the 50mm lens only and try to train my eyes to find something; the only difference here though is the fact that I've picked up my extension tubes with me.

New Born
Canon EF 50mm + tube, f/11, 30^-1sec, ISO400.

Working out without a tripod and extension tubes is certainly not a work for the faint heart! One particular scene that really got my interest and surprise is some tiny blooms in a bud beside my work place, just like the one in New Born. These tiny blooms were actually almost 1 cm in diameter when fully open; and when I saw them first day I was without tubes, and when I visited them next day with the tubes, they were all gone. Most of them died because of the heat and probably the petals flew away with the hot wind. I was lucky to find this one in New Born and I had to dangle my body and holding the camera with one hand while balancing myself with the other against some rail and with the help of the on-camera flash, I've barely managed to get some stability (but not completely stable) at 30^-1sec.

Floral Abstract
Canon EF 50mm + tube, f/22, 80^-1sec, ISO400.

Generally speaking, one should not try to do macro without a tripod, either using a macro lens or extension tubes. Kids, don't try this at home!
However, sometimes it just happens that you need to try. After all, we do photography for fun here and not for a serious paid job to do, and yet we get somehow extra happy to find one or two shots that went out OK despite the instability of the situation. The situation becomes harder when you have to use high f-number (smaller aperture). Maybe you've noticed that New Born was taken with f/11, and Floral Abstract with f/22 and both were taken at ISO400. This is one of the reasons that I had to use the on-camera flash even though it is not a good source of light specially in macro shots but playing around can do some achievements anyway. The core purpose of the whole thing is to go light and take whatever comes your way, thus no speedlites were taken along. The shutter can be increased a bit though if the object is under the sun as in Floral Abstract which was half lit by the sun. If I'm to take this shot again I would have done it differently, with more close-up approach, and, of course, a tripod!

3D Seeds

One of the interesting findings, if I should call it so, is when I've discovered two images for the core of a sunflower that are close to each other with some change in perspective, which ignited in me directly the desire to make an anaglyph, or a 3D image. The different thing about 3D Seeds is the fact that the two shots were not exactly different in point of view, but they are different little bit in focusing distance. However, some points did coincide (not completely), mainly those in the center of the focus region of course. I'm not sure if this is a good 3D effect in fact but with red-cyan viewing glasses, the composition looks fine and almost no ghosting appears! Maybe a trend for some new studies for 3D composing? Who knows!

Revolving

It had been some time since I did a brainstorming session but some times you don't really need it when some items are available at hand to give you some kind of an idea to do and work with. This is exactly what happened when I've found a small plastic globe that my older sister brought to teach my nephews (from another sister and my brother) about geography for some of their tests.
I thought tabletop photography is, relatively, something easy to do indoors but believe me if I say it is lot harder (and even harder when you have to move your equipments out of home!). Moving stuff from my room to the guest room where I usually shoot is not any easier task, and while there is a table that is good to use for such projects, yet I can't use it because it is in a small place and I can't move it often here and there to do my projects. Thus, all I got is one small place in one corner of the guest room.

Test Shot

My plan was to record the movement of the globe with somewhat a spot light effect from the side or from top, while having a background of some old map (I do have this already on size A2 from previous project, and yet not a good size!). Lot of technical problems were in play here, mainly the question of how to rotate the globe and have a long exposure - and in the same time how to make a coherent exposure with my speedlite. In the beginning, the speedlite has to be set on 2^nd shutter sync so that after the blur of the movement is recorded with the long exposure, the speedlite would freeze the motion to get a concrete image of the globe and its map at the END of the exposure. However, long exposure with an extra speedlite light meant possible overexposure, thus many test shots with varying exposure times were taken to make sure that the background is dark but not invisible while the globe is lit with the correct power from the speedlite (with honeycomb grid attached to it); a very delicate matter, and I was going to use some ND filters as well (as in the Test Shot above) but I've abandoned this idea later as the exposure was long enough just by switching off most of the lights in the room, and a double ND would tint the image magenta.

Welt im Wandel
Tamron 70-300mm @109mm, f/4, 4sec, ISO100.

However, despite the test shots, the whole game changed when the question of the motion came into play; mainly, how to do so?
After looking here and there, I've finally arrived to the idea to use my own vacuum cleaner which can be used to jet air from the other end as well as the regular vacuuming. It did achieve something in the beginning but I've realized that pointing the hose is not an easy task and the pointer should be precisely set (as I kept holding the hose with my own hand while putting the camera on timer to take the shot). However, this step rose many other problems, like the movement of the globe itself because of the power of the air (and to solve it I had to use lot of duct-taping skills!), and also, even though there was some blur movement but the freezing motion of the speedlite was dominant and the image appeared stable and not moving, thus probably requiring more exposure time and doing that I might screw the whole mathematics of the experiment! I think it was better to use one dominant light, like a desk lamp, instead of a speedlite here. Anyway, I had to satisfy myself with Welt im Wandel and few other experimental shots.

Revolving Australia
Tamron 70-300mm @109mm, f/4, 4sec, ISO100.

In one of the trial shots I was lucky to get something close to what I had in my mind, but it wasn't created with the effect of a spotlight from a speedlite, but rather by the sluggish movement of the globe as the air flow from the hose was not precise enough, but rotating the globe for a little then it would stop. The movement blur here is not quite strong and it might need more time, but with a speedlite I believe it would all stop completely and no motion blur would be obvious as well.

One point I'd like to mention here is a website that helped me now on keywording my images and I'd love to share it with you. I've mentioned some previous website in some previous post but this one now works better for me with its functionality. It belongs to Microstock, which is another photo stock website (but I didn't make up an account there yet).

It was such a long experimenting but the main part was to set and configure the gear around which consumed most of the time (and power). One of the major problems here as well even before working with the light and motion is the fact that the cable or cord from the camera to the speedlite was quite short and bulky to be dealt with - for this reason I had to keep close to the globe and bear with the reflections on the surface (but I've managed to clone some of it in Welt im Wandel). However, this problem will hopefully vanish soon with a new set of toys!

Let's Play!

What I didn't mention last week is the fact that I've placed a new order for some new stuff. Mainly light gear but one major bulky device that I've been waiting to have (and my hands got all itchy!).

Source: B&H

First item is the Sensei 48-58mm Filter Wrench which should be very useful when I deal with my IR filter and polarizer along with, probably, other attachments. It is probably more useful when attaching the IR filter and the polarizer together, since I had problems with these two before, specially in winter. I think in winter almost everything tends to jam a bit. These two wrenches will be useful in the near future.

Source: B&H

Next item is the Pearstone Onyx 30 Lens Case and this one is mainly to carry my dear Canon EF 15mm fisheye lens; my one and only lens that I usually use when creating panoramas (haven't done those in some long time now!). The cover or cap of this lens is easily removed and it doesn't click over the lens' front, thus I thought such a pocket is a better protection for it.

Source: B&H

Then we come to the fun part with the Rising Standard Pinhole; yes, pinhole. Just like in the old times. This one is specifically made for Canon mounts and I believe you can find it for other type of mounts. From what I gather, the larger the sensor/film, the better for the total sharpness of the image. The f-number for this pinhole is f/222 (but in the instructions manual it's f/223 for APS-C type cameras), so just imagine the depth of field (and the length of the exposure!). I'm still interested in the mathematics involved here though and who knows, I might be able to do my own pinhole measuring to something higher than f/222. Remember that Diameter (of aperture) = focal length / N; and from there we can start on manipulating stuff.

Source: B&H

And then comes the savior! The Vello Universal Duo TTL Off-Camera Flash Cord (33'), and by "(33')" it is meant to be 33 feet, approximately about 10 meters! Unfortunately, I've done the globe experiment above before the arrival of this cable (and till the moment of writing this, I didn't test the cable). This cable would and should push the limits of my speedlites significantly. One question hovers in my mind though: what would be the situation with High-Speed photography? I'm pretty sure there would be some time delay to transfer the signal (we are talking about microseconds here). In High-Speed photography, each single micro- or even nanosecond counts. We shall see about this matter in time.

Source: B&H

Finally, comes the one big toy that I should spend more and more time with. The X-Rite ColorMunki Photo Color Management Solution. Even though I do already have a ColorMunki device to calibrate my monitors (laptops and desktop), yet this device is here is far beyond calibrating monitors only (hence it costs more!). With this, I will be able, hopefully, to calibrate monitors, and make profiles from prints and analyze ambient light or even calibrate a projector! The perfect tool, I would say, for creating showrooms and proper digital darkrooms when needed. I'm thinking of installing this into my (old) desktop and my (new) laptop to make them ready for any task in the future. Just a point here about analyzing the ambient light; it is something important but unfortunately I don't see many people care about this tiny detail, at least in expos here in Kuwait. If you are a photographer and you really care about displaying your photos in printed form in a proper way as you envision them, it is not enough to calibrate your monitor to get the right colors. You have to get profiles for the printing but this is a matter that might be skipped for good in many cases (yet it is good to have profiles for various media). Then we arrive at the ambient light criteria. It is a good thing to know what kind of light and what color temperature the ambient light would be in the place where the photos are to be shown, because with this information, you would be able to examine the effect of such light on the colors of your photos on your (calibrated) monitor before even printing. Thus, you might think of making your photos more yellow-like to balance the extreme blue-colored light in a showroom or vice versa. It is all about taking care of the balance of colors and soft-proofing on your monitor before printing and displaying the photos.

Now with all these loads of new stuff, I think I do need an extra case to keep lot of these stuff and abandon that old small case (which was used for my old Canon 350D!). I'm thinking of getting one of those small traveling cases with wheels to keep my speedlites and related stuff in them. It is about time to organize some stuff (but not my room!).

Bücher

Source: Amazon

In the matter of books, I've finished my Lens Design book but in a fast rhythm. I've realized that such a book can't be read and completely digested without a tutor and without a practical workout. The many mathematical concepts involved are not so weird for me even though they include a high order of complexity, but in most times, many terms there within are familiar to me. However, in mathematics, at least with me, it never works without a practical workout and some tutor to walk step by step along the process. You'd think lot of the concepts here are relatively new but the fact is, most of such mathematical endeavor was developed long in the 18^th and 19^th centuries! Anyway, after passing through the pages quickly and read some articles, I've decided to look at some of my old books or even look into some books about optics in the library near by. That might help to achieve a better basic understanding for this topic.

Source: Amazon

I've started now reading the last book in the queue line, Handbook For Classical Research, in hope to flavor my mind with some archaeological spice. From the first few pages that I've read (and I didn't delve deep yet!) it seems that the whole book is about the Greco-Roman studies and culture. I was hoping for further expansion but anyway I still do think it is an interesting topic. The good thing about this book is that it is written by a single person, single author, and not scattered among various authors with an article or two for each. Such books with many authors involved are kind of scattered in thoughts and it's hard to keep a chain of thought going through the whole reading session. In linguistics and humanities, I've faced numerous books done in that manner and I have to say, it is kind of a waste of time to read but probably better be kept as a reference material when needed. I'm hoping this new book would give some amusement into my dull brain!

Unsettled Geltani

Maybe I didn't write much thoughts in my notebook about Geltani lately but nevertheless I was active in my mind. Yeah, I'm wondering why do I have a notebook anyway! However, I'm still planning slowly on assigning phonetic values and on the other hand I think I will abandon the newly-created system of possession articles. I think my problem was to create everything in idle and concise manner, but I think a language is more random than concise or systematic. Thus, I've decided to work on another method which might work as: pronoun-subject-suffix. For example, My Cat, would appear as: I-Cat-(suffix here). Development is slow naturally because of my stuffed schedule, and problems!

Finale

Scandinavian Eyes - Frida

Troubles on the home front keeps me busy and alert. I do say "front," yes. Because it seems that way; a game of dominance and reliance. There are moments that I do wish, and do imagine, how my life would be with another form of a family. They say you can't choose your family, but you can pick up your friends. However, under the current circumstances, it seems that I don't have the former, nor the latter. It feels like I'm floating with no support; not physically, nor emotionally. Mom is doing her best to keep me happy and I know it. I can see it in her eyes and actions. However, I'm the one who's supposed to keep her happy. I have a family that I can barely relate to.
Here and there, I'm keeping myself amused with some brush-up jobs with some photos from instagram users. It is something that I used to enjoy doing long before I take photography as a hobby. It might be just the desire to make something beautiful but trust me, if the original photo/person is not beautiful in the first place I would really have hard time creating the "uncreated". I think I do get satisfaction from the gratitude and happiness that those people show when I create some art with their pictures. I'm not a psychologist, but probably I'm projecting my needs outward - something that I've lost in my inner circle is satisfied with deeds to the outer world.
There had been some thoughts about resigning and chasing my own career but such thoughts are still cooking. It bears great responsibilities as well and even stepping into such realm should be done carefully without leaving the main job at once. However, with the current circumstances at work and the great disrespect that I face from the admins who think that my work place is something vain, I'm seriously getting sick of everyone around here and do wish to break free from all these master-slave relations. How, I don't know; but every good meal, needs a proper cooking...

Fertig!

A very busy and quick week to pass (but filled with bad luck ad bad events as well). However, much relief for now. I've finally managed to finish the report that I was helping my friend with. Now, I can get some space free in my mind to do other things, specially those regarding my photography projects.
Also, I'm taking this time and the free space in my mind as an opportunity to go on and complete the last part of my Alexander project: Chapter 6 vocalization. Chapter 6, however, is a long one and for sure this is going to be a long process, and if I was lucky to work on it daily, I might be over with it in about 40 days (but this won't happen for sure!).
However, I've recorded the first 5 verses of the chapter, and I've corrected some spelling mistakes as well. You can check the Ayvarith version with vocalization here. The English translation is here.

My activity with my camera had been minor, but I took the chance to further work with my new Macro lens (Canon 100mm f/2.8). This time I've connected the camera to the TV and I had to sit near by because the wire was short, and then tried to click some shots for my eye.

Auge (Eye)

Auge BW

Eclipse

Farbenfrohe Furcht (Colorful Fear)

The trend with me had been to name some of the images in German. I believe it gives some strength to the feelings. Of course, there was no chance to do HDR processing to the images, but the exposure for the images after all was fine with more or less editing for the RAW file. I think the Black and White theme fitted me well in this small series. In Eclipse, specifically, there was no need to do any manipulation to extract the lines of the eye; editing the Black and White levels was enough. Farbenfrohe Furcht on the other hand required some of the typical work I do with the eyes when I work with other people's pictures.
And yes, the eyeball veins and lines are true. Not edited.

On the other hand, I've printed the Failaka Folio, which for the time being I plan to make it a simple folio to show my work in a series form, and hopefully will start working soon with the other folio: Good Morning Kuwait. After printing the folio, I've laminated the prints for more of a glossy look, and for protection as well.

Failaka Folio

Now, I have to keep this folio for showing in some container or album. I have further plans with this folio but they are on hold for now. I better do some other things until I figure out the means to do this particular project with this folio.

I've started to fast now with the first day of Rajab (7th month of the lunar year) and in hope that I would continue this fast for the next month and attach it to Ramadhan later, making a 3 months of fasting. Sounds like torture in the beginning, but I think my body will benefit from this reduction in food and drinks consumption. It is a matter of adapting to the new condition and weather for the time being and I'm pretty sure that it will all sound normal later on.

Geltani is a name I shouldn't forget as well. I have to work with this along with Ayvarith projects. My powers are getting scattered I believe but this is mainly, as I believe, for my lack of time-management skills and the ability to stick to programs. Work, on the other hand, is another burden which sounds, sometimes, like a waste of my time...

Cerebrum Mysticum...

A mystic week of some sort. I've suddenly felt the urge to go on and read about mystics and occult. Well, I did have the urge for some time in my life and such things are really normal to strike in my head now and then, but this time I'm thinking of doing more to it into photography.
Now it is the time of the last week in Ramadhan and sort of the time is clogged (specially with my disturbed sleeping pattern) with many things to do. I'm also planning to register in a photography class for beginners after Ramadhan directly, by September 6th. Yes, for beginners. No matter how or what I did before or what advance level I might be in, it is always good to look back at small things that you did not know before. Despite my work so far, I still think I need to learn more about the basics of the camera and exposure. After that class I might take other levels as well (more expensive of course) but we'll see about that later on.

At work seems more busy days are coming on the way with new phases in our "little" experiment taking place now, thus I have to check that I need to type this blog entries as early as possible to be posted in time! Well, which means, in return, that I might have lesser contents to put in here. That is if... anyone cares anyway :)

Because of the disturbance this week, I couldn't put my mind into reciting the 4th chapter of Alexander's story. Well, I'll be frank. I was lazy and playing a game I like. Hope that doesn't count as a sin! But hopefully the engine will get to work by next week or so and more recordings on the way.
The lack of work on my Ayvarith projects, however, poured something on the other side. Ive finally had the mind (and courage) to write something down. But this time, since staring on the notepad on my monitor was not enough to gush out words, I referred to my old method; a paper and pencil/pen. I had the words for some time now but I didn't pin them down until I faced the pen and paper in my office, after working on that experiment. I called it No Superman.I've submitted this one to some websites, and in one website actually, some user notified me asking how did I write such a thing! Well, Thanks! I really don't think I'm good at all. It's just a gush of feelings to a certain matter that makes you spill it out.

I. Mysticis:

Seems my night on the roof last week under the full moon made me literally lunatic, or maybe inspired? Call it whatever you want to, it is just a weird feeling of seeking opportunities to take photos of anything in rhyme of Mystics. I will get back to that panorama taken from the roof after a while.
One of the first ideas to do something mystic kicked in when I finished reading the holy book.

Chapter of Mary (19)

There is a little story behind every aspect of this image. First of all, it was taken with a fisheye lens and hence, even with a high f-number I realized I might not be able to grab everything into sharp focus; so it was a call for focus stacking. However, I had a problem with the shadows' cast on the book itself thus, I had to turn off the light and use only one source of lighting (the usual old desktop lamp with power-saving light!).
I've fixed the WB value by using the custom K-value in camera. Since the power-saving light is bluish and I wanted to add a sense of antiquity to the book, I had to exaggerate a bit with the color temperature (K-value) and probably pushed it to something lesser a bit than 10,000K! Anyway, while working with these photos (taken with bracketed exposure for HDR merge) there was another story. Because when I was testing the different WBs before the final approach, I've realized that Tungsten makes some interesting hue, by turning the book blue and the red lines in it were glowing hard; so eye-capturing, but later on I had to give up this idea in favor of Daylight WB when I started to merge into HDR (you can change the WB before starting to merge into HDR in Photomatix).
Now, all the HDR slides, after merging, refer to different focus points. In total they were about 5, with each slide bringing a certain area of the open book into focus. I had a little problem merging first because I didn't use the alignment in Photoshop (I thought it's not needed because everything was relatively stable) but then, seems I was wrong and I used to correct for the broken lines. I made 3 versions of the HDR slides changing the WB from Daylight to Fluorescent to Tungsten BEFORE merging into HDR, but seems the desired look in my mind was in Daylight (the other WBs made some weird noise and hot pixels occurring here and there).
Maybe keeping the front portion of the book, where the title of the Surah lies, and blurring the background (the other page) was a nice effect, but because the name of John (first word in first line in second page) sounded a bit important to the whole story of the picture, I've decided to include it into a focus-stacking method as well. Cropping and rotating the image (it was originally in landscape orientation) was done later on after tone-mapping (Photomatix of course) and adjusting in Photoshop.
This was one trend of mystic (and I mean mystic not as mysterious only but also on a spiritual level) and in fact I was doing more work before that with long exposures (since I became a bit obsessed with the idea). Maybe working with clocks is not a mystic thing but the concept of time and using time was always an issue in my life (and probably of many around the world), hence, we can consider it a mystic concept of our lives, as we try hardly to catch upon life. More about it to come later.
Left to say one thing. The image above was rejected by Bigstockphoto because of some "copyrighted material" issues. Seriously? I'm going to ask God for a permission to take a photo of the holy book? Sorry dudes, that doesn't make sense...

II. A Treasure of Perspectives:

Since having a night with a full moon is not something you be able to catch every day, sorry, every night I mean, I've decided to mangle and go through the panorama again and again trying to extract more perspectives, and in return, more meanings from every picture I could make out of this (spherical) panorama. The first version, however, was a typical little planet form (posted previously):

The Lonely Planet

Well, I guess the name tells it all. I liked the effect myself and I went on trying to extract more from this panorama by changing the perspective. One of these changes makes up for almost a landscape orientation (or let's say a full-frame) image but with simple difference: everything is twirled.

Over There

It is not a panorama, but it is extracted from a full spherical panorama itself. After setting the stitching projection to "little planet" in PTGui, I started to play around with angles of Pitch and Roll trying to discover more perspectives. Until I've finally arrived to this angle which resembles the full moon at the end, in the horizon, like calling as it is a light at the end of a tunnel. A spark of hope in the middle of the night. I didn't mind the distortion in the surrounding structures, as I was reliant on the moon to grab the sights more than the surrounding structures. However, they do add some surrealism if you are up to that!
Before, I've stated that in long exposures at night, sometimes the stars that do not appear to the naked eye can be recorded, and they are here in this panorama, but they are usually erased with cleaning the noise and doing other techniques to smooth out the sky. Here, however, I decided to pick (some) stars and exaggerate their sparkle by using the regular brush in Photoshop. After all, I added some Photo Filter adjustment layer to put on a reddish wash on the whole scene to break its severe blue shade. Hmm, I think it adds a bit to the mysticity.
A vertical panorama was done as well, naturally (but I didn't think of it first!) and here I needed to move the central point to make some interesting perspective, of two skies, up and down. I didn't experience though how it would look if the skies met in the middle!

The Underworld

But I was taken more by the tunnel view for this panorama, which many people liked on MostPhotos...

To Another Universe

This perspective specifically was just an experiment to test how good it is to do a Twirl effect like in those Sci-Fi stuff. The problem with the Twirl effect is that it might smudge too much and not achieving the proper look I'm aiming for, and, you have to work in 8bit format, since it is disabled in Photoshop in 16bit format. In other words, you have to step down a bit with color's resolution.
The original work was stitched with 4000x4000 pixels. Usually I go for 8000x8000, which requires a lot of processing power and time. Since I was thinking it might be a failing experience after all, there is really no need to aim high and 4000x4000 is just enough.
The looks at the time of tone-mapping this tunnel-view was totally different and dull, despite the fact that the HDR slides were merged using ProPhoto color space. However, after tone-mapping and opening the image in Photoshop (which I've fixed on ProPhoto as a default color space) the image appeared as you see it above with cyan patches around the ground. Comparing the two looks, the Adobe 1998 and the ProPhoto, I thought the ProPhoto space is more adequate to the mystic and sci-fi look I'm seeking, and this is what you see above.
The twirl effect was done to the image on a separate layer and I made it carefully in a small amount to add curves but not diffuse the image totally. A twirl alone is not enough as a good effect and this is the reason why I made it on a separate layer, so that I can retain the position of the moon in the horizon back to its place by using layer masks (to erase the twirled moon and put on the original moon back in its position from the lower layer). The name is obvious I presume; did it take you to another universe!?

III. Tick Tocks and Blinks:

As I've stated earlier, I was (and still) obsessed a bit with the idea of long exposures, time, and, clocks. This obsession raises up from my interest to see things, slow things specifically, run fast. How would it be to take a long exposure of a moving snail, or a turtle, of a long night sleep...etc? Maybe my interest in night photography lead me to this point now, but however, it is not something new really. I've already created an image of a little long exposure before (and unfortunately rejected from major stock sites).

Busy Life

Maybe the above image was one of the best I've did so far. In fact, and because I used my Tamron lens raised up high above the watch, I didn't use here any ND filters to control the time. I don't have an adapter to fit my Cokins. However, this effect after all was not done by long exposure alone, but I had to take several shots over a period of around 6 minutes and then blend them together in Photoshop in layers (using Soft Light blend).
Same concept was done but with a more time-stretching aspect this time, taking shots at an interval of around 3 minutes and some few seconds for one of my watches. This time I've faced a problem with the proper WB, as I wanted to add some more luster to the golden patches in the watch itself but then there was a problem of being "over-average" with that effect.

Mixed-Up Schedule

The WB was fixed as the RAW files were opened in Photoshop and the effects were synchronized with all the slides. The reason for setting the time to 3 minutes AND few seconds is that I didn't want the seconds hand to end up in or around the same place with every shot taken at exactly 3 minutes, so I had to add few seconds (something like 10 or 15 seconds) to the interval between every two shots to give more chances of finding the seconds hand somewhere else, other than the previous position. Each image, in fact, was itself some sort of a long exposure (my room was partially dark) extending from 15 to 30 seconds each.


Still though, I didn't quite achieve the effect that I want, that is recording the seconds hand going over in a full circle around the clock face. Tried this already with my wall clock for which the seconds hand ticks continuously non-stopping in every second, but it goes smoothly all over the clock face. With the help of some ND filters, I've managed to get a long exposure of one hour. Despite the weird reddish shades that occurred in the final image (which might be related to the change in the sun's angle outside, because sun rays still pass with my curtains off, but I'm not sure yet), however it was not a big deal to fix the image and make it look normal, but it was a big issue with the noise. Anyway the image didn't achieve exactly the desired look I'm seeking.

Hurry Up!

The Median method was a companion all through the cleaning process (along with cloning to remove the brand mark, otherwise it won't be accepted in stock sites!). However, the small circle inside is formed by the seconds hand, but the seconds hand is larger than this and should, probably, made a bigger trace. Same thing for the minutes hand which appears blurred between 3 and 4. This is natural since the light is introduced (with the help of ND filters) slowly into the camera and to register the final movement just before the close of the shutter, the minutes (and seconds) hand will be in a certain place. The shutter then closes finalizing the image and the hands' movement all the way were not recorded except in a few portion of the clock face. In other words, to record the movement of the minutes hand across the full clock face, then we need an exposure time more than one hour. This will make things harder to do indeed.
The look of the blurry movement and the stable background of the clock face cannot be compensated by taking photos in intervals and layering them with a blend. The blur has its own taste and feel. I'm trying to find any website (official that is) related to the manufacturers of these watches and clocks just to seek my luck in asking for a permission to put an image of their products for sale. It is not possible to clone out the brand mark all the time!

That was the ticking part of this final portion. Comes then the blinking part. Just for fun I was running with my camera in the house taking pictures of my niece playing around (and getting on my nerves as well) when I decided then to take pictures of my brother's eye. This little experiment made me believe more than not ever overexposure is a bad thing and not every "bad" image is really bad. The image got accepted in some sites and rejected from some stock sites (for model release aspects). I have to give credit to my brother though because the poses (or looks) were his ideas in fact.

Photographer in The Eye

In case you wonder about the name, it is because my reflection is there, inside the pupil. This is one of my favorites, and it is not a tone-mapped HDR at all. Simply taken with a flash unit mounted on my camera and zooming into the eye with my EF-S 18-55mm Canon lens. Some adjustments were done later on of course in the RAW editor. The thing is, I didn't plan it. I merely took the image to see the details of the iris later on, but the whole image just happened to be awesome for me. More sharpening added a grunge look, which somehow might be not good looking for other images and concepts. See, overexposure is not a bad idea at all, to limits. I've printed this image on a white photo paper, which probably if mounted on a white wall (and erasing a bit of the edges in the image itself) would be an awesome effect on the wall! Surprise your fellows with an eye popping out of the wall!
The other two images were also done with the same lens but without flash, and the pose was also suggested by my brother. They are interesting, but don't beat the one above I believe.

Enlighten
looking at the ceiling.

The interesting thing about "Enlighten", beside the reflection in the eye, is the sharp eyelash line and eyebrow. I added even more sharpening (with noise cleaning) and also some change in saturation and hue to pop out the eye in between a dark skin (his skin isn't that dark really!).

Psycho

"Psycho" on the other hand was a good concept in color, but two reasons made me convert it into Black and White and try to increase the contrast from there to give a tougher feeling. The first reason is simply the idea of  a psycho, which I believe is represented better in Black and White instead of color. Remember that Black and White images tend to make the viewer concentrate on the concept and the composition instead of the color gradients in the image. The other reason was that a bluish streak around the eyes that I didn't know exactly how to remove properly, so along with the first reason I thought it is better to have the whole thing in Black and White. Maybe I should have done some skin smoothing (Median method again). Well, it might intensify the effect of a Psycho with such a skin!


Almost, this is what I have been doing this week. I'm still looking forward for more experiments to do but I need some planning. I took some photos for some instruments and devices in my work place, but I don't think I'm allowed to put those here. However, I think they are sort of boring, except for geeks of course!
T.G.I.T. Finally a day when I can't complain about my sleepless night, nor I have to wake up so early....