Hey I'm new here! Just bought my digital camera today...

All the gurus here... please comment! Want to improve. Thanks!

Pictures Collections:
.:: Macro + Random - 20 Apr 07::.
.:: Random + Macro - 22 Apr 07::.
.:: Post Processed Pics - 13 May 07::.
.:: Product Shooting Attempt - 18 May 07::.
.:: Paddy Field, Sekinchan - 27 May 07 ::.
.:: Monkey Business, Bukit Melawati - 27 May 07 ::.
.:: Historical Bukit Melawati 1 - 27 May 07 ::.
.:: DSLR Experimental Shots - 27 May 07 ::.
.:: Of Boats and Buoys - 27 May 07 ::.
.:: Melaka... Ah how I miss that place - 06 Sept 07 ::.
.:: Random Photos - 05 Oct 07 ::.
.:: DSLR Full Manual Attempt - 07 Oct 2007 ::.
.:: D80 Shots - 01 Nov 2007 ::.
.:: Some Random Shots - 06 Dec 2007 ::.
.:: Figurines - 23 Dec 2007 ::.
.:: Singapore - 10 Feb 2008 ::.
.:: First Panoramic Attempt - 21 Feb 2008 ::.

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This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: Jan 12 2009, 06:15 PM

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another 'want to improve' guy in here.. but then after 1 series, they all disappear...

First of all, I'm a girl not guy.

Secondly, who are you to say that I'll dissappear after the first series? True, I might not post as frequent as I share this camera with my sister so I won't have it with me all the time. Even so I might not have nice subjects to shoot every day. However I'll post at my own pace. So please leave f you don't have any contructive comments/criticisms to make.

diwant kena bomb

Too fast too soon there diwant ... go easy

Got one female photographer jor

Good head start there Aurora Boreali : At least you took efforts for outdoors and not shot your pet dog/cat or the most dreaded 'Lens Cover'! You made effort to compose, next you should move on to learning up your exposure to get 'what you see with your eye is what you should produce'. Most important thing for a newbie is : Dun play 'artist' with your shots and create your own 'style' when you're not even stable with the photography aspect yet.

Keep on shooting, practice makes perfect

Lens Cover? Lol my DC don't even have a lens cover to begin with... hehehe. It's a super cheaplak camera la... Guess what is it and how much I bought it for No $$ have to share with my sis.

I'm trying to save some battery... rechargable batts with my sis now. So perhaps I'll go and shoot somemore tmr. I hope the batts don't die on me so soon.

My cheaplak cam very hard to play with exposure leh. Can't even play with shutter speed and aperture. The only thing I can play with is ISO only... and exposure compensation. That's about it. Those pics were taken using Auto mode...

Even 'cheaplak' camera also take pic until like that, then what about branded ones? Most of the time I believe it's the effort being put in, dun believe me you can browse the rest of the gallery's here. Some are DSLR newbies and shot even WORST than you on the first day, some first week and just simply throw the images up for comment. I've kept this long in my heart and wanna mention this for a long time already, many of them just purely needing attention and not comments.

Kudos for making that effort.

Thank you thank you Will make more effort to take pictures. Sadly this desert Cyber don't have many things to take. Putrajaya hmm... I don't fancy Putrajaya. I'd like to go Melaka/Penang those old heritage places to take pictures. Plus I'm kinda restricted coz the only private transportation I have is bus number 11 (my own legs lah... ).. can't go places.

So probably won't be having that many pictures to post up lor. But whenever I have good pictures I'll post Don't think I'm only 1-series-newbie...

oh great! another photog from cyber i feel like reading essays in this forum. only saw diwant kena bomb let the pictures do the talking ya

your flowers are nice, but trees and lamp post look messy to me

ok may bad, sorry for that.. awal2 sudah kena bomb la...

welcome to the photography world (forum) and hope u can post more in the near future..

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Added on April 20, 2007, 9:07 pmStrong words from u for a long time, but somehow i agree with those words... good for spilling it out..

This post has been edited by diwant: Apr 20 2007, 09:07 PM

Meh... Thanks for the comment Yeah I kinda agree with you about the trees. But too many trees at that area, hard to find an angle where no other trees would interfere. Will work on my composition

For pictures 3 to 5 which are taken against the sky, do you think if I increase my EV it'll bring out the colour of the trees? If so roughly by how much, +1EV? Hopefully I can try it out tomorrow.

i like the 2nd last macro shot. good try & practice more

Basically I am a spiller and I am very straight. Many forum do not like ppl like me but I am sure many member will appreciate my thoughts becoz if you're not honest, you're a liar basically, it's a direct opposite. Letting out your honest thoughts is making good of the internet's free speech, not using it to bomb ppl without thinking and without sense

Any photographers here mind asnwering this?

For pictures 3 to 5 which are taken against the sky, do you think if I increase my EV it'll bring out the colour of the trees? If so roughly by how much, +1EV?

its quite hard to get a balanced exposure on different brightness (sky and the trees) unless u have a spot metering option.. if u +EV u might wash out the sky's detail, and if u meter the trees also, the sky will be washed out.. so i think a silhouetted trees under a well exposed sky is the best option for ur camera... correct me if i'm wrong..

more like ADDITIONAL. we have a few ladies with galleries here.

Aurora, you have to understand that you are shooting against the light source and you're at the shadow of the tree.

perhaps what you could do is try is at other time of the day, or other angles of the tree.

use the sunlight to help you, not work against you.

For your case, there is nothing much you can go becoz the camera is only taking the meter off only ONE spot at a time : Either you get a overblown sky or a underexposed tree. Digital photography is different, when you have an overblow spot there is not information and when you get otherwise you have no colour or worst, noise. This is where DSLRs coming and not ALL DSLRs mind you.

More advanced DSLRs have this thing call 'multi-spot non-AF linked' metering where the camera takes more than ONE spot to create an optimized exposure for you i.e you can take the meter off the sky AND the trees at the same time. The camera will automatically calculate the shutter speed and aperture for you BUT you have to be careful of very low shutter speed or insufficient f-stops.

Anyway, you camera cannot do all that so you will have make do with clear trees and overblown sky OR a clear sky and underexposed trees at the moment. Increasing your ISO or EV will help a little but there is nothing more that can be done. Concentrate on your compo for the time being, you will need a better camera to create better images soon.

Be patient, it's a photographer's virtue.

nice first week shoots...(better than my one )
hope u can improve further

let me know when u coming to pg
maybe can go photoshooting with u


ps: i can bring some 'sifus' from pg

Thank you both of you. Still have much to learn. So for now I'll concentrate on my composition as that is the main thing I can do with my camera now.

You can reduce the EV of the sky with a polarizer. The neat thing is that the tree and clouds' EV won't be affected by it. So, with reduced sky EV & unchanged tree EV, your camera sees a more balanced scene.. the extent of which depends on the time and the part of the sky you take at I doubt the tree will be interesting from beneath, though given that it's lit flatly.

You could do it the other way around, and instead flash the tree to bring up its EV.

aurora, try to relax and just have fun with it, after all, we take photographs just to satisfy ourselves, not others, so don't matter much what ppl say now, just play and experiences with it, i'd say don't take it way too seriously, that's how we all learn

The learning curve is always a pain no matter what we learn, from photography to maybe collecting stamps or sewing. It's good to have ppl tip you from time to time so you spend less precious hours performing trial-and-error and more time to improve instead.

its very nice...i personally likes pic no 3. is in cyberia isn't it. i can see most of ur pic a lil dark, maybe u wana try playing with ur iso. what kinda camera is it? DSLR? r just a normal DC? well, u began with the right foot here, i can tell that u know the rule of third n ur perspective well. all the best n will b waiting for more pics!!!!

If you can't tell whether ROT or perspective are being applied in the image, I doubt you know what they are as well am I right? ROT and perspective application is different in photography compared to like ID drawings or graphics design becoz you have other things to worry about like crop factor and optical distortion.

im like reading story here .... so many ppl comment hahahaha

welcome to LYN aurora

i think the very 1st thing have to learn is composition, this 1 very hard to help, have to develop yourself, see how other ppl compose lah

I don't think I'll be using a polarizer as my camera is only a PnS, unless you're telling me there's polarizer for PnS?

I personally prefer silhouette shots of the trees against blue sky rather than a washed-out sky with green leaves of the tree. Will try another shot at it tomorrow.

Yeah, will play with ISO coz that's the only thing i can adjust with the Fuji A610 now. Most of the shots were taken using Auto mode. It automatically bumped up my ISO to 400 (which is the max it has) for a shot taken outdoor today at 4pm after raining. If i were to use manual i would've just use ISO 100 or 200 coz i thought it wasn't too dark. Will upload the pic tomorrow.

I've been at LYN for a few months Will work on my composition.

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: Apr 21 2007, 08:42 PM

I don't use Rule of Thirds for all my pics... Sometimes I just shoot according to my feelings. Hehe

ahh. you should try it. it does wonders.

Yeah, I only use it occasionally. Most of the time the subject will be slightly out of focus because my cam only focuses in the middle?

Stay tuned for more pics tomorrow!

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: Apr 22 2007, 12:15 AM

AuroraB, what you can do is FOCUS on the object first. then hold your finger there, then only you move the camera around so that the subject is nicely composed.

also when you upload the shots, you don't necessarily have to upload the entire pictures.

you can just crop out a portion, resize and manipulate it's attributes.

Ahhh ... using The Force. Strong is the Force in you ... follow your feelings you must.

Macro/ Close-up Shots

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ISO 400, Exposure compensation +1 1/3EV (Subject under the shade.)

Random shots

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Focused on the tree before composing the picture. Like this better.

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ISO 400

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The background is kinda distracting but there was no way I could avoid the car.

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ISO400

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ISO 400, Exposure compensation +2/3 EV

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Won't be posting new shots in about a month coz it's my sister's turn to have the camera, plus I'll be having my finals soon. Will post after that!

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: Apr 22 2007, 05:52 PM

overall, not too bad.. about the last picture, u could try to squeeze the yellow handles to make it tighter and more linear by standing almost parallel to the handles line, and try to hold the camera higher, almost eye-level with the handle.. nice try

I thought of standing up too, but I didn't want to let the whole bus of strangers know I have a camera with me, scared kena robbed afterwards. You know these days people rob almost anything and everything... Not that my camera is a high end model but still, scared ><" Somemore I was travelling alone.

So what I did was sat down and zoomed in on the handles.

maybe u should try them other day, and if u plan to shoot outside, make sure u're not alone.. even guys have to be extremely aware of the surrounding, as snatch theft does not count on gender...

which is why i didn't hang around long for my KLCC Twin Tower shot.

i'm carrying my bag of goods, my wife carrying my bag of goods. gila man if kena robbed.

Don't feel safe anywhere now...

weee, a new member, learn more and you can be on par with this fella http://www.larajade.com

What 'goods' were you carrying? Brand clothes, shoes and jewelry-ah. If you're carrying lenses let us know ... WE come rob you

there were 2 cameras and 2 lenses there already. don't come rob rob ah. ok we stop spamming ppl thread la.

hmmm i think aurora u shud try the dramatic shots like focus on some bits r out of focus n some are in focus those stuff....like u press the shutter button halfway then move ur cam abit 2 make stuffs abit out of focus.....

hahha i gotta admit...u r a much better photographer than i am!!! keep up the good work!!! looking fwd for greater pics from u

Yeah I did, you can see the effects mostly on macro shots only. My cam is not SLR lah.. cannot achieve shallow depth of field, so can't get nice bokeh shots. ><

how much zoom you have on the camera?

if you know how to play with distance between camera and subject + camera and background, you CAN actually achieve that effect.

it may not be as nice as those you see here and there, but it can be done.

3x optical zoom. You mean by zooming in on say the flowers can actually achieve shallower DOF? If it is possible then I gotta try it out

oh 3x only. hrmm then i'm not sure already but you can give it a try.

might be difficult. lemme go and try with my 3x optical zoom P&S.

if i can achieve it then i'll let you know. hehe.

shud be able to aurora......but the 2 things must be quite far apart....ie....a flower n a blurred tree further behind....pns can do that.....kenot if taking 2 flowers from the same hedge.....thats 2 close 2 each other

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Added on April 25, 2007, 9:23 amhmmm aurora....u are talking bout the 3rd pic from the 1st page...i think althour aim is different....but i think its better to leave the trees that way.....

n yea shooting against a strong lightsource like the sun...its better 2 use flash....

exopure adjustments usually make the parts with light colors look abit fake....well tahts wat i feel tho...

This post has been edited by bhypp: Apr 25 2007, 09:23 AM

diwant has started complaining that I didn't update my gallery. So I shall present to you 3 post-processed pics. (No time for new pics la dude).

More pictures will be uploaded after my exams, which end 2 weeks later. In the mean time, hope you like these.

The sky is never THAT blue anywhere in the planet, honey ... hehe.

I know... just playing with the effect and I like that mah.

I'm a fan of over-saturated colours.

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 13 2007, 04:47 PM

if u like over-saturated colours, then the 1st pic is the most suitable pic to do that, because it shows mood and feel.. the other two is pretty normal i would say..

Yes thank you, diwant Have limited pictures to play with the mood, mostly not suitable.

Another pic which I deem suitable to play with these effects has got a very distracting car in the backgroud, spoil the mood only so I scraped it.

orang cyberia? hahah wanna photoshoot?

This post has been edited by kjin: May 13 2007, 05:32 PM

yeah that's what exactly u should do if u want to improve.. be critical of urself 1st, before asking ppl to comment on ur work. accept only the best that u had in a session. once u satisfied with it, then only u post for ppl to look at it..

since u are in cyberia, maybe u can try come to tennis & basket court in block C...
sometimes i see some people holding DC wandering around there,
but i have no idea what they shoot,
just wanna give u some ideas
maybe u can find something interesting to shoot there

gudluck

Chinese got a saying .. "Mau lalu mata orang lain, mesti mau lalu mata sendiri dulu". People will feel disgusted at times if you just main hantam post all your pics and ask "Please comment".

I'm pretty satisfied with those 3 Can't wait for my exams to be over coz there's one outing waiting for me!

Thanks for the suggestion. But I don't think there's anything I deem interesting to shoot there... shooting sports isn't my thing.

I hope you're not talking about me

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 13 2007, 06:51 PM

... or maybe make some friends, no harm there exchanging notes

That's a good peribahasa u got there... pretty much sums up about what's going around this forum?? not u aurora..

lari..

well i mean around there,
it's up to u, anyway..

PS : i'm not in photographic related field, but there's one time,
i was standing n looking at a basketball in the middle of the empty court
and the strong shadow that falls behind the ball,
the scene really gives some kind of emotion...
dont know how to describe it

sorry OOT

I see I see I'll go there next semester. Thanks!

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 18 2007, 09:31 PM

First attempt at product shooting. Hehe. Both the pictures are the same... although the first one was edited a little while the 2nd one is original (resized only). Pic 1 got "whitened" at the background at the bottom right. What to do... lighting not good enough.

the colours of the bottles are too weak i would say.. need to adjust the contrast, or shoot with a black background, i think it may work..

You mean the bottles or the cap? The bottles are transparent so I'm not quite sure how to bring out the colours of the bottles... Care to explain a little more on this?

A black background for product shooting should be velvety right? As in it doesn't reflect lights at all, otherwise the material will reflect light and the background won't look full black. I don't have any black thing to use as background, hehe. Closest I can think of is black sugar paper, which I think will reflect light. Ah simmy would know best about what to use as black background

And I know the cap almost dissapeared into the white background. Coz I upped my exposure compensation to +1 1/3. Any value lower than that, the background won't look full white, which is kinda ugly for product shooting. So I have to make do with "dissappearing" bottle caps.

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 18 2007, 10:21 PM

the red and the sparkling star colours are not strong enough to make it a stand out image.. maybe u can try to adjust the contrast level in photoshop.. if use blackground, the better dont use flash or use flash directly to the object.. just a couple of bulb light on each side of the subject.. it is kind of experimental shot/ mini studio shot... but the work will pay..

I see. I think that's because I upped my Exposure Compensation to a high value, making the colours washed out. If I don't, the backgorund won't be pure white, so it wouldn't look professional.

Will try out with black background one of these days.


This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 19 2007, 08:28 PM

Image adjusted in Photoshop using Auto Levels, Auto Colours and Auto Contrast Now this is the real colour of my nail polish.

Oh I did use 2 table lamps on the immediate left and right of the subjects. Just lacked one to shine down from the top.

do you really need it to be on white background?

you could choose a darker background and your items will stand out better.

and what kind of lights are on your table lamps?

Erm that's because I don't have a black background and 99% of the time products like these are taken against white background. So I thought of simulating these professional shots

These 2 lamps are not the same at all, one is IKEA standing lamp with Phillips light bulb, and another one is unbranded table lamp using the light tube that came with it. IKEA's one has a hood around the bulb, and the cheapo lamp is flat regtangular shine-on-your-table kind. Both of their shades are almost the same (well I can't the the difference) - Fluorescent Cool White.

Just had to make use of what I have there and then.

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 20 2007, 01:19 AM

i think that will depend on product la, now logically speaking the white covers won't look nice on white background.

True When I have time I'll go look for a nice black background and set-up properly. Plus that IKEA lamp is my roommate's, can only use it when she's not using it.

wait wait. notice i said DARKER background, not BLACK background.

you should choose a background color that
1. matches the product
2. enhances the product
3. does not distract

so generally, any color is darker than white so to speak. for your product, perhaps pink or light purple background. or even yellow if you want.

did u see the difference on the colours after doing some experiment and a little bit of post-precessing?? i see that in this picture. that's why i said a bit of thinking and experiment will eventually pays..

Sekinchan Paddy Field























This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 28 2007, 12:56 AM

you adjusted quite a lot of contrast?

Contrast just a little. Mainly I adjusted the colours using Channel Mixer. Well is it a bad thing? I like the colours because it's more vivid than the original ones which is kinda dull.

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 28 2007, 01:15 AM

Some out-takes









Me taking g88 taking some young photogs from a secondary school.

Good attempts there girl ... love the shots! Overall kind bright, high contrast and warm to my taste but it's personal preference. Love that bike that guy's using ... a real country classic! Check out his plate man ... only "BB" ... number pun tarak!

aiks. you and g88 are teachers from a school or something?

anyway back to the contrast, some of them look like it went a bit too far till it doesn't look natural.

overall good attempt. keep it up.

Thanks ac98 and goldfries. Yeah I only began to realise some are a bit unnatural but will take note Still I like the colours.

There're more to come.. Stay tuned for fishing village, bukit melawati and it's monkeys, and sunset at selangor river

you still haven't answer my Q on you and g88.

anyway yeah quite often it's preference, for me I try my best to snap pics so that I don't have to do adjustment.

like those in my gallery latest updates, out of the 46 shots only about 1/4 had some contrast correction (no color correction on my pics wan la) and that also very very very minimal. .......... hrmm i should state that.

Sorry got dc'ed when I was just about to reply to your Q

no g88 and I are not some teachers lol. It's an outing by LensaMalaysia members. So happened while shooting there's another bus load of secondary school kids came for their photography outing.

I don't know, my camera is very simple, only can control ISO and exposure compensation in manual mode, sometimes using auto is better than manual. Is it easy to do settings so that only minimal PP needed?

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: May 28 2007, 11:52 AM

don't underestimate AUTO - using them isn't bad at all, after snap just have a look. if the surroundings still fool your digicam then go manual.

nice sets.. u're going places now, which is a good thing if u really into improving.. i like ur composition of ur landscape shots, the other members definitely a bunch of helpful ppl..

Thanks diwant, hopefully there're more places I can go to for this kind of shooting.

Monkey Business 1

Monkey 1: OMG that monkey stole my food!


Monkey 2: Tee hee~ Come get it if you can


Mom: Those 2 psychopath... Wait, both of you wait till I get there and spank your butt.


Mom: Meh.... I better finish my food first.


Mom: Waddya lookin' at, punk? Never seen a monkey eat before?


Stay tuned for more monkey business

Monkey Business 2

Bradder... what do you have there?


Hmmph... peanuts again...?


Fine fine give me peanuts, if that's what you have.




Family time

love the last picture. cannonball monkeh!!

Yeah.. monkey, cannon, straits of malacca, pirates. (oops, one word links to another )

The last pic of the monkey in the cannon is what i define superb photography! Great work

Thanks travis

More pictures from the historical Melawati Hill. I'll try to explain some history alongside the photo, but I don't guarantee the accuracy of my history knowledge.

Staircase leading up the hill.


This muzium was closed on that day.


The backdoor of Muzium Permainan Rakyat.


Carvings on the side of the stairs.


Historical remains behind Muzium Permainan Rakyat.


The lighthouse and a small cannon set on the slope.


The lighthouse.


The hill overlooking the straits of Malacca.


One of the cannons pointing towards the mouth of Selangor river.


I'm not done yet, there're still a lot more pictures to come.

This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: Jun 21 2007, 09:03 PM

Walking down from the peak of Bukit Melawati, I arrived at the Batu Hampar site. Batu Hampar is believed to have been used as an execution site. I was too engrossed by the cannons near the Batu Hampar so I didn't have a single shot of the Batu... Sorry guys.


Cannons at the Batu Hampar site.


Stone steps at the Batu Hampar site. The whole site is built like a fort but I'm not sure if it's part of the Fort Altingburg. As far as I know (based on Standard 5 knowledge), Fort Altingburg is furthur in the hill.


The tree after which Bukit Melawati was named.


Walking down the hill, I encountered this. If I'm not mistaken, this is the Tangga Seratus, leading down to KS town.


The narrow winding road leading towards Fort Altingburg that I know. However, it's very quiet and I didn't dare venture into the Fort because there there was only another girl, accompanying me. No photos from the old Fort Altingburg...


This post has been edited by Aurora Boreali: Jun 21 2007, 09:05 PM

Walking past the road leading towards Altingburg Fort, I arrived at Makam Di-Raja Selangor. State emblem carved into the wall enclosing the cemetry.


The Makam was closed so I took these pictures by extending my arm through the gap in the fence.






Road leading down the hill.


Photo taken duing tram ride. The driver was driving the tram in circles.