Macros......

The wonderfully beautiful world of insects and bugs..... Never expected the small world of insects would be so interesting! There are so many varieties of insects and each one of them have their own unique way of survival. The more I observe these wonderful creatures, the more fascinated I become by these mini-beauties :-)

Here is a collection of macro shots that I shot in the last 6 months. It would be great if someone could identify the names of these insects.

The first two shots are from the Theosophical society and the third one is from my trip to Coimbatore. For those who are interested in the gear and settings used, these were shot using a macro lens adapter called Raynox DCR-250. When mounted along with a zoom lens (I used a 75-300mm lens), this adapter gives some amazing magnification. The only flip side to this adapter is that you need to resort to complete manual focus and the shooting distance should be less than 10cm. Move a bit close or a bit far, the insects would no more be in focus. Getting this close to an insect almost always scares them away and hence a lot of patience is needed while using this combination.

Black & White

Black & white photography.... There is something magical about it that it never ceases to excite me. I am still in the process of learning the nuances of a good B&W edit and these are some of my attempts to learn that art. The first two pictures were taken before the start of the one-day international between India & Westindies that was held at Chepauk sometime ago. The last photo was taken during the first spell of incessant rains that lashed Chennai in the month of November. I wish the photo of the cyclist was a bit more sharp but this is the best that I could manage and had to be content with this. 

Mylai Festival

Last weekend, I had participated in the photowalk organized by PSM and what a wonderful experience it turned out to be. There were close to 35+ photographers who had come for the photoshoot and it was a great learning experience for me. I had the chance to meet it person so many people who I have only heard through emails and flickr ID's.

The theme that our group of four decided to take up was designs and I decided to extend it to 'Shapes' as well. The main idea behind shooting pictures with a theme is that it opens up our eyes and we start 'seeing' things much more clearly. It took me close to 30 minutes before my eyes could start seeing 'shapes'. Given below are some of the shapes that I captured. There are other snaps in which the theme was not met but I nevertheless went ahead and clicked lest I miss those opportunity.

Yelagiri Tour -- Macro World! (Part II)

Some more clicks from Yelagiri.... Canon 100mm Macro lens at work here.

Yelagiri Tour -- Macro World!

Thanks a ton to Guru for lending his 100mm Macro lens to me.... I had one of the best times with this lens.

Kancheepuram -- The Temple town of South

Here are the photos from our trip to Kancheepuram. It is a fascinating place and the architectural marvel of this place is something that needs to be seen to be appreciated. The Ekambareshwarar temple is where I usually find a lot of photographic subjects. The temple is so huge and you even get streaks of light if you go to the temple early in the morning.

Koyambedu Market -- Take Two

A few more shots from Koyambedu market.This person was aware that we were there with our cameras and I had to wait sometime before he could turn to face the camera. The rose flowers that he was selling, the soft light that was streaming through making him bathe in a rose light and the entire ambiance of the place was what made me click this shot. The red and green polythene covers in the right hand side corner not only blocked the harsh light but also helped in giving a balance to the composition. No post-processing (PP) has been done on this one except to resize the image for the blog.

Again, the light was the major factor why I clicked the shot. This seller was engrossed in a discussion with his fellow sellers and the silhouetted lady was busy buying some flowers. The scene seem to depict the mood of the place so well that I had to click it.

During PP, I first tried out a monochrome image and was quite satisfied with the way the light was brought on the face of the seller. Even after that, I kept playing in LightRoom and that is when I stumbled upon this idea of not completely de-saturating the image and adding just a small amount of color.

Koyambedu Market

Shot during my weekend photography trip to 'Koyambedu' market. It is a wonderful place for shooting pictures as there is excellent lighting that is available and the vendors there are so used to people taking photos of them that they almost ignore us.... (Well, if you don't consider the fact that some people do come and ask us to take their photos!!). Am planning to write a tour report but I am so lazy to do it.... Hopefully, I will get down to writing it this weekend.

Yelagiri Tour -- Photos

Pic #1: Hide the head competition

Pic #2: A back-lit plant & a few bokehs

Pic #3: Purple Sunbird Silhouette

Pic #4: Gateway to a red garden

Pic #5: Monkey tricks

That crazy thing called 'Bokeh'!!!

In photography, bokeh is the blur, or the aesthetic quality of the blur,in out-of-focus areas of an image, or "the way the lens renders out-of-focus points of light." Differences in lens aberrations and aperture shape cause some lens  designs to blur the image in a way that is pleasing to the eye, while others produce blurring that is unpleasant or distracting— "good" or "bad" bokeh, respectively. Bokeh occurs for parts of the scene that lie outside the depth of field. Photographers sometimes deliberately use a shallow focus technique to create images with prominent out-of-focus regions. (Source:Wikipedia)

I have become crazy about bokehs ever since I learned what that term means. It is such a beautiful thing and I can go on & on about this wonderful element in photography.Here are a few images that stand out for the way in which the bokeh has been rendered. These are not the best images in terms of composition and I am presenting them here as an example for what a bokeh means.

How to: One of the easiest ways to create an image with a wonderful looking bokeh is to shoot with a wide open aperture. I have used the 50mm prime lens with aperture set at f1.8 to get this effect. A wide open aperture, a nearby object as the primary subject and light (Or water) at a reasonable distance of 1 meter would give you the perfect bokeh. I am yet to experiment with multi-colored artificial light bokehs but trust me when I say those days are not far!!!

Child Labor -- A sad state of affairs

Had been to Besant Nagar beach last weekend and when I started shooting, I got this idea of covering children working in the beach. Somehow this is one area which has greatly affected me and I wanted to bring out that mood in my pictures. Here are a couple of those pictures which I clicked there. 

Wayanad Pictures -- Part II

Picture #1: The Wayanad magic continues with some stunning images from the Meenmutty falls. This is one of my favorite compositions with the sun rays cleanly starting from the right side top corner and hitting the mountains perfectly on the forest. Incidentally, that spot is where the 'Golden Rule' of composition would have been put! 

 Picture #2: The clouds form a beautiful canopy encompassing the forests below and giving the scene a surrealistic atmosphere.

Wayanad Pictures

Picture #1: Meenmutty falls at Wayanad at its splendid best during sunset. The sun was trying to hide behind the cloud from us photographers when I clicked this.

 

Picture #2: The amazingly beautiful Banasura Sagar dam. This location is just 500m from the dam and is a place that needs to be seen to appreciate the beauty of it. The calm river flowing in between the mountains nestled by tall trees is really spell-binding.

Picture #3:The sun decided to play nice guy with us and gave us a playful little peek and to provide us with his divine rays, enhancing the entire landscape and turning our photo-shoot into a really worthwhile effort.

Smoke Photography

I always had this desire to try out 'Smoke Photography' and I also had a clear idea inside my head on how the photo should come out. The smoke photography in my mind had an old man with a white beard smoking a cigarette as black & white composition. I got lucky when I went to my wife's office to shoot some pictures. Here was an old man working on something and when he took a break, he took it the way I had envisaged it. A couple of clicks and only this one came close to my 'vision'. I will sure keep trying till I get the right image, though.

Chennai Sangamam -- Part II

Lightroom is one cool Adobe tool and I am really happy that I started using it now. I would not call it as being as powerful as Photoshop but it is nevertheless a very handy tool and the tones that you get out of this software is just amazing. Also, it does not appear as intimidating as Photoshop & hence any user can learn the ropes very easily. One of the other things that I found to be super cool with Lightroom is the ability to use the 'Presets' feature. There are some 15 presets that come packed with the software and then there are a whole lot of presets that have been developed by people around the world that can be downloaded and used. Even though these presets may not a perfect fit for the photo you have, they will surely be a good starting point from where you can start tweaking around to get the tones you have in mind. Given below are a couple of photos that I took in Chennai Sangamam processed using Lightroom.

Week #2 of 52

 During the second week, my wife found a gift that she had with her as the subject for the 'Project 52' shoot. It was a bottle with a glass ship inside. The carving was so beautiful and I immediately knew that it would make a very good subject. We tried shooting it with the normal tube light illumination but the image that we got were very flat and did not impress us. Again my wife came with the brilliant idea of using candle lights for the lighting. It turned out to be a great choice and the resulting photos were pleasing for both us. The photo that I posted had the right amount of lights and shadows and hence made it to flickr.

The harder part of course was on making the choice for the posting. There were at least a couple of images that were good and the one above is something I loved a lot. The composition was spot on with the candle lights being placed in the corner showing the source of the lights and the shadows were also good. The reflection on the wall of the flame was the sore point and I felt it was distracting. Even Post Processing (PP) would not save those bokehs and hence the reason to reject this image.

Landscape Photography -- Tips & Tricks (Part #1)

Landscape photography is the supreme test of the photographer; and often the supreme disappointment – Ansel Adams

When Ansel Adams, The Master of landscape photography, talks about landscape photography in this fashion, it makes sense for all of us to take care of some basic aspects when taking landscape photos. Thankfully, taking care of a few aspects would make sure that the photos that we take are visually pleasing and compositionally brilliant. In the coming articles, we will look at these techniques to take small but significant steps towards becoming better landscape photographers.

Tip #1: Scout the spot for different angles

Our first instinct when we come across a picturesque location would be to start shooting without actually looking around for the perfect angle & composition. We would be better off if we can hold off our instincts for sometime to find an ideal location; a location where we can use the angle of light, patterns or textures, lines or curves for making our composition even better.

Tip #2: Make use of the golden hour

Early mornings (½ hour before sunrise & 1 hour after sunrise) and late evenings (1 hour before & ½ hour after) are the best times to capture the mood of the place. The light is not too harsh and offers great play of lights to be captured.

Tip #3: Always use a polarizer

Polarizers help in cutting down reflections and enhancing the colors. Sky colors are darkened and dark skies offer a great background for landscape shots. The usage of a polarizer filter is different from the other filters and the important point is that it needs to rotated, the frame checked for color enhancement and then the picture clicked. Not rotating the filter would leave the possibility of getting enhanced colors entirely to chance and not choice!

Tip #4: Carry a tripod around

The pains of carrying a tripod will vanish the moment you capture a stunning picture which would have been impossible to take without a tripod at hand. It is not only useful for taking photos without shake but also to expand the creative possibilities like slow shutter speed shots, panoramic shots or multiple exposure shots that are used in generating vibrant looking HDR’s.