Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Skin & Hair

And nothing else!  A slighly long shot on this beauty, using Canon 1DsIII with EF 70-200/2.8L IS.  Lighting is a little more difficult on this shot to not to over-expose the skin while the definition of hair needs to be sharp and clear. The large Pro Foto reflector I often use was placed a little further away to keep the lighting ration on skin and hair closer, also to achieve sharper effect.

Rain Drops

Pocket digital camera today is so good, in fact, even those back in few years ago was already quite good.  This image, taken with an already aged, but still quite good Canon G9, in southern Thailand, in the garden of the restaurant I just had my dinner.  Walking back to the car, I walked pass a small pond, the reflection of the water drops on the dark green lotus leaf caught my eye, with a pocket camera on my hand, I turn on the flash of the Canon G9, and made this image.  Tip: shot such as this, trust yourself, turn to M mode.
People often ask me, how important is to have a camera always on hand?  I always reply "....then how important is photography to you?"

Monday, May 31, 2010

Nepal

Nepal, without double one of the most photogenic countries, and one of my most favorite. I made a recent trip back to Nepal in March, shoot many pictures during the trip - mostly focus on people, not that the nature is not great, it is, but unfortunately the weather is not nice and many of the splendid high mountain range is not visible.
This one, shot on the first day of the 8-days trip, in the famous Swayambhunath Stupa, or known as Monkey Temple, with Canon 1Ds III + EF 100/2.8L Macro IS. a perfect example of the people of this beautiful country, no shy of camera, and my recommendation - take you time for your shot, get close if you can.

Friday, May 14, 2010

Object of appreciation

Image produce for SK Jewelry, shot with Canon 1Ds III + EF 85/1.2L, one of my most often use lens for portrait such as this.  One might say the 85mm is more or less like a 50mm normal lens with a closer look, sometimes it does, but I like the look of 85mm particular for this kind of shot, close but not too close, away but not too much away.  
The object here is certainly the jewelry, but no jewelry will look better without a person to wear it.

Monday, May 10, 2010

Portrait

A portrait shot made for a cosmetic brand, USTAR, using Phase One P65+ on Hasselblad H2, with HC 150/3.2 lens, a common set up in my studio. Here I use 150mm lens rather than the HC 100/2.2 I normally use for a simple reason to get the feel of shot of a slightly longer distance, so the overall look is a little more glamours than friendly, which I usually shot a little closer.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Composition

Composition in digital capture and production went far above the film base capture. Composition still means the arrangement of elements inside the picture, whereas it is achieved by using certain focal length of lens, angle of camera, the object to camera distance, the use of right depth of field.....all account to composition. Of course, in a single shot base photography, it might also cover as how one puts elements into where it needed, or direct the talent to move to achieve the desired visual effect. In digital capture, it also means the final assembly of multiple captures of images, something like playing the Tamiya toys.
A single example here, the talents in this image displaying the lingerie in 3 different ways. The use of mirror helped to exhibit the details of the lingerie the talent wears, to reduce further complication of adding one more model in the image; so I can use single model to get an otherwise too-common final image.
The composition is not necessary the result of a shoot, rather, it can be a preparation in photographer's mind or vision, and the camera just do the work the photographer wants it to do. This image, composed of 2 single shots, by using Phase One P65+ back on Hasselblad H2 camera, with HC 100/2.2 lens.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Alina

One of the images recently shot, primary use Canon 1Ds III for still and the motion images were captured using Canon 5D II, which is a brief record of one of the set I did for the shoot.
Modern image making using the latest digital tools has increasingly blurred the line between still and motion pictures, which gives the lighting equipment a different challenge, or, the challenge for the still photographer or cinematographer to make use of the light source.
Something for sure, the general public is definitely benefitted.
A video scoop during the still work, captured using Canon 5D II.