Showing posts with label photography tricks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label photography tricks. Show all posts

Monday, June 20, 2016

35mm or 50MM ?


When I started working on creating digital images, I had the basic kit lens with my DSLR. That is nothing but other than the 18-55mm lens. It was that time I had no Idea of the digital DSLRs. The only thing I knew was bigger the lens better you can Zoom. I never had any clue about the artistic side of the DSLRS other than taking pics of dogs, cats and peoples faces.

After spending two year's and clicking 50k pics and hanging out with like minded fellow image makers, doing research in Youtube and reading famous advertorials, l figured out the best ways of taking images. Thanks to Epyc In UAE for lntroducing me to those who are pioneers in this field.
Later on the run i realised the need of prime lens, because of the endless possibilities and wide ranges of creative scope. I am not a full time photographer or a full time artist. But I would like to spend my time on this photography as an enthusiast. At the same time experimenting and taking up small projects. The question was If I should have 24mm, 50mm, 35mm or 100 mm after realizing certain facts.
After going through 1000's of Images and comparing the prices of the lens, I found a cheap & best option. l found used 50mm from online and bought it for some trials.



The wide apreture was more than enough for Bokehs and the sharpness on the narrow focal length was pretty amazing. Everybody loved their portraits which was taken with that lens. It was perfect for portraits. l still wonder why people spend hundreds and thousands of dollars lf they can buy one of these tiny little smart ones. May be the small lens is not looking good for a pro photographer Carrying a DSLR . l have seen people carrying heavy 70-200mm multimillion dollar lens. ofcourse it looks cooler but Its heavy.

Alright,  after playing around for 5-6 months with that 50 mm, I wanted to see how other prime lens are doing and what lam missing. That curiosity lead me to rent a 24mm, 35 mm and 100mm.
l started trials with each of these. 24mm was perfect in the sense of wide angle. But what I will do with that wide angle and wide aperture ? lt is going to be the prefect lens for close portraits. At that wide apreture, This lens would be an advantage for shooting party at night. still the distortion would make the people face look like a beaten frog. And if we want to use that lens for taking cityscapes, we would be never using that wide apreture. i would rather use my kit lens 18 - 55 for those purposes. Probably we will need some smaller apreture to get those buildings and scapes in a very sharp edges. I decided to not to spend for that 24mm lens just because i can take awsome portarits with that.

The 100 mm f1.8 was absolutelyamazing lens for portraits. It will completly isolate the face of people from any dirty backgrounds and gives that wonder full blurry background. The only problem is that the minimum distance between the subject and the photographer is bit longer.  And this lens is suitable for those who are working in a controlled studio environment shooting prewedding and post wedding shoots. Price wise i would say if you have 50 mm better stay with it. I mean i dont mind getting little closer to the subject when shooting portraits and products.

The real change i felt was while using the 35 mm on this crop sensor DSLR. The angles were perfect as it shows the exact view of a first person perspective. Not too wide. Not too narrow. It will help you to picture the scene exactly as you are seeing it. If you are a traveller or normal guy who love to take pics of the life around you. 35 mm F1.8 would be the perfect choice of lens.

Apreture wide enough to get bokehlesious background with out killing the story of the image. You can see bits of story thats behind the subject which is in other way contributing to your travelouge or documentry. Take portraits with out much distortion of the subject, even you can take selfie with that angle. I would say its the best focal length if you want to tell a story. Its very small in size and lightweight as well. One point i would like to share that this pretty little small lense will not scare your subject while you are on the street capturing local scene. I have personally experienced that of you go to some ones face with that big bazookas, the chances of saying no from the people is very high.  At the same time with this small one,  people don't feel that much hostile.

The other advantage of this 35 mm focal length is while taking videos. We will get a touch of that real movies scenes. The quality and the vibrance as well. i would recommend you, if you have a DSLR, get a 35 mm prime lens.  Or a 50 mm. feel the difference. 

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Trip to Jabel Jais - Highest peak in UAE

jabel jais

Jabel Hafeet in Al ain is taking all the credits for the best mountain roads ever in UAE. Well that not true. you may need to reconsider the place called Jabel Jais, situated in the Ras al Khaima emirate near to the border of Oman, also another destination into your trip dairy.

Monday, May 26, 2014

Meteor shower 2014 - How to take star trail photography



Once again guys thanks for visiting my ungky dugly random blog of a expat living in dubai. The time was passing by and the meteor shower of the decade came at last. We - I mean a group of like minded photographic enthusiast went on a Trip to Kalba desert for capturing the guest who are visiting once in a decade.

We set up our camera and kept clicking. finally around the midnight few meteors showed up but didn't meet our expectations. I kept my camera in time interval shooting mode after focusing it around the north pole. Expecting that the meteor shower may happen in that direction.

Unfortunately the meteor shower didn't caught up in ny shot of the camera. But I managed to make a star trail photography. Anyway that did payoff the efforts I guess. :) cheers.

How to do a star trail photography.

Step : 1 - Scout the area the day before.

You are probably going to take a star trail in the middle of night where there is no absolute no light around. The light pollution from the city scape building and street light create light pollution and you will not be able to take any good picture. The light from the surrounding will be scattered all over the atmosphere. You will not get any stars. So scout the area in a day time. understand the good position for you so that in the night you will not be taking much time to get settle down.

Before picking the day for the star trail, go through the weather reports. Sky should be cool with no clouds. There should not be moonlight because it will scatter all the sky and you will be able to spot a single star.
Less dust pollution and dry windy air are the best time to go.

Step : 2 - Gather your gears.

a) DSLR
b) Wide angle lens - 18 mm will do fine. Lesser the better area you can cover.
c) Tripod. - A good one. Without and loose ends.
d) Shutter release cable / remote
e) Additional battery - if needed.
f) A flashlight - small one will do fine

other things you can take along with you is
a) Picnic chair
b) Snaks & Drinks

Step : 3- Set up your camera

Make sure the tripod is fixed firmly on the ground. If it moves you entire night could get spoiled. Connect your camera and select the camera in manual mode. Put the focal length on the minimum and put the focus point at infinity/ near infinity. Please note that certain lens can go even beyond infinity also. Just make sure by taking some sample shot and zoom in to see the star and clear cut pixelated and not blurred.

Normal setting i do for star trail is

ISO : 800/1600
Shutter speed : 30 sec
Aperture : less than f4.5

Once you set the focus of the lens. Connect the shutter release cable if needed.

Step 4 : Start Clicking

If you have time interval shooting mode available. You can enable that mode. The you don't have to keep clicking all the time. The camera will take the picture and you can continue relaxing with your snacks or talk.

Step 5: Composing the images in photoshop

The ultimate aim is to get a series of continues images. Like 100 or 200 images without changing the position of the camera from the tripod. Once we collect all these pictures from your camera in your computer, we will have to do stacking procedures in photoshop.

Open photoshop. Click File - Scripts - load files into stack.

It will open a window named load layers. Click Browse and Select all the images and press OK
It will take some time to process all the images into layers.

Once it is loaded. you have goto the layers menu and convert each layer to lighten mode. as shown below. You have to convert each and every layers.

then you will see the image like a star trails. Once 'lighten' is done to all layers. right click the layers and click flatten image.

This will create a single image which shows all the trails together. 
Now you can adjust contrast, brightness, hue, saturation, curves etc. as you like. This will be our final image. 
And that s how we do post processing in star trails photography

Please add you comments. Share or suggest modifications. Thank you for your time. 
If you would like to have a look at my photography blog please go to http://shafisgraphics.blogspot.com 




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