Picture of the Day

[kwscore]

[BenchZowner]

[BenchZowner]

Put your hands up for Fort Lauderdale!

[hokiealumnus]

Man, there are some crazy good photos in here, especially BZ (love the night & light painting photos) & NeO. Great work by all. Unfortunately, it makes my meager contributions seem pretty sad in comparison. I'll still post them for some input though.

My equipment is as meager as my very much still developing skills.

Canon T3
Canon EF-S 18-55mm IS II (kit lens)
Canon EF-S 18-135mm IS (Ongoing lens review here. This one is pretty much all I carry since I've gotten it; no sense carrying the other lens when its entire focal length is duplicated with this one, which is one of the reasons I chose it)
Hoya MC UV Alpha UV filter for protection on the longer lens; it doesn't actually DO anything.



Excuse the watermarks, it's just the default on my resizing program. A couple are watermarked w/ my name, others with Overclockers. Depends on how lazy I was feeling at the time.

Yikes, I just checked the rules of the thread & saw we can only post one photo (hopefully the camera doesn't count, heh). That makes it a lot harder! Let's start with shot from a wedding late this summer.

f/4.5, ISO 100, 1/100 sec, 32 mm



FWIW, other than occasional brightness adjustment and/or cropping (both of which are rare), I don't edit anything. My wife is a reporter and like any journalist, thinks photos should stand on their own merits without alteration. I tend to agree with her for my stuff. That doesn't mean I don't like photos that have been manipulated any number of ways, as there is absolutely a place for that too, this is art after all. That's just what I prefer for the ones I take, so for my shots, what you see is what I took.

I'm wide open to criticism too, so please feel free to post some. As an amateur, everything can be improved about my technique. If you have a criticism or tip that could have made any give shot better, lay it on me!

[.::NeO::.]

Awesome pictures everyone.

I've been busy 'cause of work. A couple of days ago I took my gear out and went in Milan, just to enjoy some of the beautiful architectures and the great autumn colours. Weather wasn't that bad so I snapped a couple of pictures, here's one:


Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II di Marco88it, su Flickr


Volta di Marco88it, su Flickr

I was inside the so called Vittorio Emanuele II Gallery, which is basically a place full of very expensive restaurants and fashion boutiques (Prada, Louis Vuitton, Gucci and so on). Tipically I hate places like that, but it was an excuse to try my Sigma 10-20mm and D7100 combo and I really like the amount of details I was able to capture with that poor-men's wide angle lens

[hokiealumnus]

Beautiful shots NeO! It's definitely somewhere I wouldn't buy anything, but for photos like that, it's absolutely worth going in.

My shot of the day, from that same wedding.

f/5, ISO 100, 1/125 sec, 43mm, +/-0, No flash

[.::NeO::.]

Beautiful shots NeO! It's definitely somewhere I wouldn't buy anything, but for photos like that, it's absolutely worth going in.

My shot of the day, from that same wedding.

f/5, ISO 100, 1/125 sec, 43mm, +/-0, No flash
http://www.overclockers.com/wp-conte.../wedding01.jpg

Thanks

In the previous post you asked about some tips to improve your tecnique and photography skills. Well, I am a total noob at photography and I started to take this hobby on a more serious way 2 years ago so my experience is very very small and I am sure some pro guys here could give you better advices.

Anyway, if you'd like to hear my humble opinion here's a short list of things I'd try:

- I like your flower + glass picture. The composition is rather good but there are a couple of things that you could improve.

First: try to capture the whole subject entirely. In that picture, part of the bouquet is cutted (left side of the frame). I know it's a little thing but it can make quite a big difference. Also, part of that green apple on the right is missing. Try to include those subjects entirely or leave them entirely out of the frame.

Second: prospective of the shot. Even if it's not really happening much in a picture, you can still be able to capture a great shot of a static subject. Try to capture the same subject from different angles. The rules of the thirds can come in handy here. In that picture you're shooting at 32mm f/4.3 two static objects (flowers + glass) and you're aiming from top to bottom. Try to frame the shot with a different angle (you could try to shoot horizontally at the same level of the bouquet, so we can see less of that table and more of that blurry bokehlicious background), or try a wider focal lenght like 22mm or 18mm so you have the chance to place those two subjects in a context and allow whoever is looking at your photo to understand what was going on there at that moment. Or, you could aim from bottom to the top to give the bouquet flowers a more dramatic look.

Third: post-processing. This is a more subjective taste. Personally, I like to do some PP to my images. I don't like heavily post processed images and I don't like too much HDR effect neither. But I like to use some PP to bring out all the informations that are stored in a RAW file and that at a first glance you aren't able to see. For example: looking at that bouquet, some details are hiding in the shadows, especially on the leaves. Try to bring them out in PP, you'll see you can still recover a lot of details and informations from a raw file. Most of the time you'll see that recovering details from shadow or highlight areas and adding a bit of sharpening to your pictures can really give that wow factor.

This applies also at your second picture.

You can experiment some of this basic tips in the next pictures and see what you like and what you do not like. For more advanced suggestions you'll have to listen to better photographers than me



Annuncio di Marco88it, su Flickr

EDIT: p.s. for example, this shot is not exactly composed in the right way, as you can see part of the feet of that guy are missing

[BenchZowner]

@hokiealumnus , forget about the 1 pic per day limit.
Most of us aren't abiding by it, neither should you

I have 2 ( or 3... or 4... or more ) interesting books for you to read that will help you unleash the photographer you're hiding inside

pm me for detailz if you have the will to do some reading

[hokiealumnus]

Thanks for that detailed analysis NeO, that's exactly what I was looking for. I'll be sure to keep those tips in mind when composing in the future. Thanks for the offer BZ, I'll PM you too.

I'll tell you though, there is sooo much to keep straight with photography, I'm looking forward to the day it just comes naturally.

Heh, thanks for the offer to go with more than one photo too. If I have a few from one outing I'll post them in the future. For now, I don't have that many to share so I'll stretch them out.

This was my son playing his first ever chess game.

f/5.6, ISO 100, 1/100 sec, 55 mm, +/-0, no flash

[.::NeO::.]

Resistere di Marco88it, su Flickr

[hokiealumnus]

Love it. Plain, but it immediately made me wonder about your subject & what's happening with him (not to mention the other two guys). Was that just a candid shot of strangers or do you know him/them? I've always loved candid random people shots, but don't yet have the courage to actually shoot them. If you haven't already, you should follow Humans of New York on Facebook. His posts are great. He actually recently released a book that's doing very well. Anyway, here' the HONY web site: http://www.humansofnewyork.com/

I'll post two pics today, the first leads to the second. The photo of the bee isn't great, I'm certainly not proud of it, but I'm using it to give some scale to show how small a butterfly bush flower really is. Both of these were taken with the EF-S 18-55mm IS II kit lens.

f/5, ISO 100, 1/250 sec, 44 mm, +/-0, No Flash



The second is of one of the butterfly bush's flower bunches, which I like much better than the bee photo.

f/5.6, ISO 125, 1/80 sec, 55 mm, +/-0, No Flash



Side note - the forum is auto-resizing stuff down; if you right-click & open the image in a new tab, you'll see 1280px (or 1000px, depending on my whim on the day I did it) wide versions, which look much better.

[.::NeO::.]

Love it. Plain, but it immediately made me wonder about your subject & what's happening with him (not to mention the other two guys). Was that just a candid shot of strangers or do you know him/them? I've always loved candid random people shots, but don't yet have the courage to actually shoot them. If you haven't already, you should follow Humans of New York on Facebook. His posts are great. He actually recently released a book that's doing very well. Anyway, here' the HONY web site: http://www.humansofnewyork.com/

I'll post two pics today, the first leads to the second. The photo of the bee isn't great, I'm certainly not proud of it, but I'm using it to give some scale to show how small a butterfly bush flower really is. Both of these were taken with the EF-S 18-55mm IS II kit lens.

f/5, ISO 100, 1/250 sec, 44 mm, +/-0, No Flash
http://www.overclockers.com/wp-conte...013/10/bee.jpg

The second is of one of the butterfly bush's flower bunches, which I like much better than the bee photo.

f/5.6, ISO 125, 1/80 sec, 55 mm, +/-0, No Flash
http://www.overclockers.com/wp-conte...rflyflower.jpg

Side note - the forum is auto-resizing stuff down; if you right-click & open the image in a new tab, you'll see 1280px (or 1000px, depending on my whim on the day I did it) wide versions, which look much better.

Hi and sorry for the late reply. To answer your quesiton: no I did not know him.

Turned out that he was an ex-businessman who lost his job. He was on the left side of the so called "Duomo" (the principal cathedral in Milan) with two dogs (one small and one big) and he was just speaking, telling his story to everyone who was passing at that moment.

And well, some people stopped to talk to him, and to hear what he was saying. And so I did. I just stopped in front of him, took a couple of shots and in the meantime I was listening to his story.

He had a factory for like 16 years or so and he was a good guy, paying his employees and paying taxes and so on. Long story short, he had to close his factory because in Italy if you are a good business man who always pay all the taxes etc. etc. you can't endure. If you want to be competitive you don't have to pay taxes. He had to quit his business because he ended up paying 80% of taxes on a 100% profit... And with only 20% left he wasn't able to pay his employees, to invest in research to optimize the production and he became non-competitive.

And that's why I named that picture Resistere (= Endure), I liked that look on his face, almost melancholic


Anyway, back on topic. I generally took pictures of everything and everyone, but if I notice that the subject is angry or pissed off I then try to be a bit discrete and less "in yo face"

p.s. nice close up on those flowers, I like it and that bee looks huge on those flowers!

[kwscore]

Landscape by kwscore on Flickr

[[XC] Oj101]

Sunset with the Moon

[hokiealumnus]

Ok, with permission previously granted, I'm breaking the one photo rule. Hope this isn't too much.

We went to the Raleigh flea market for the first time this weekend and it was a wonderful time to get some photos of Americana. I wasn't the only one with a camera either. These are my favorite of the shots; they're not awe inspiring or anything, but they reflect the atmosphere pretty well.

This crazy lady wanted $10-25 each for these marbles. There was a book that verified pricing, but come on...they're marbles.

f/8, ISO 200, 1/100 sec, 67 mm, No flash



f/8, ISO 100, 1/250 sec, 62 mm, No flash



I just plain got lucky with the gemstone in this one.

f/8, ISO 100, 1/200 sec, 36 mm, No flash



f/8, ISO 100, 1/250 sec, 55 mm, No flash



f/7.1, ISO 200, 1/100 sec, 69 mm, No flash



f/7.1, ISO 640, 1/125 sec, 75 mm, No flash



f/7.1, ISO 100, 1/320 sec, 126 mm, No flash



f/8, ISO 100, 1/250 sec, 64 mm, No flash

[[XC] Oj101]

Canon 600D + Canon 50mm f/1.8, 1/50, f/1.8, ISO 800

I tried to replicate the look of an old ultra large format camera from 100+ years ago. I know the edges should be white, but this was a first attempt. I used Silver EfEx for the effect, intense vignetting and a black border to simulate lens falloff, upped the brightness for the legs in the middle, and added a fair amount of grain. I also adjusted the red curve to add a bit more detail to the wood.

[BeepBeep2]

@Oj101
I like it. Not sure about a large format camera, but it reminds me very much of the tonal curve of B&W film

[hokiealumnus]

@Oj101
I like it. Not sure about a large format camera, but it reminds me very much of the tonal curve of B&W film

+1. I don't have the experience to know what an old large format photo looks like, but I like your rendition of it.

[Soulburner]

My first attempt at shooting the moon.

1/500
f/8
ISO 1600
250mm

[BenchZowner]

My first attempt at shooting the moon.

1/500
f/8
ISO 1600
250mm

Repeat with:

ISO 100
1/150 - 1/200
f/9
250mm

Your processing seems ok

[Soulburner]

Yeah my ISO was way too high, plus it was overexposed. In LR I brought the exposure down .5, added NR, and cropped a large amount of black space off. The 24MP sensor on the D7100 gives me a lot to work with

[BenchZowner]

If unsure, underexpose, underexposed photos are flexible and fixable, overexposed allow a hell of a lot less maneuverability.
NR seems to be pretty good, I guess Dfine 2.0 or high pass

[Darakian]

Wow, that's quite good for iso 1600.

[Soulburner]

D7100 is very good at ISO 1600. About equal to or even a bit better than my D300 at ISO 800. One of the reasons I got it - I will be doing long exposure milky way shots at ISO 1600-3200.

[Soulburner]

If unsure, underexpose, underexposed photos are flexible and fixable, overexposed allow a hell of a lot less maneuverability.
NR seems to be pretty good, I guess Dfine 2.0 or high pass

I agree, but when shooting the moon at 250mm you can't rely on the camera to judge your exposure. The moon fills a 5% area in the center. Even the LCD is not completely accurate (and I had the brightness at -2). I got close and that's what mattered.

I plan on double checking with my spot meter next time. I had it set to a function button but in the moment I forgot all about it. I was using, for the first time a new tripod (Manfrotto 190CXPro3), ball head (Arcatech GV2), and camera (Nikon D7100), and I had never shot the moon before. So I guess I had my mind busy

NR was done in Lightroom 5. Luminance slider at 25 or so.