PicStream

McWay Falls

2012-09-16T22:21:00.001-07:00

Goldman Sachs Bldg.

2012-02-25T22:42:00.003-08:00

[F 1.2, 1/100sec, ISO:100, 2011-02-23]

Statue of Liberty

2012-02-25T22:41:00.000-08:00

[F 1.2, 1/30s, ISO:100, 2012-02-23]

Taj Mahal

2012-01-16T18:21:00.000-08:00

[F 10, 1/400sec, ISO:100, 2011-10-10]

ऐसे मधु के दीवानों को आज बुलाती मधुशाला

2011-11-01T19:39:00.000-07:00

[F 2.8, 1/30sec, ISO:100, 2011-09-22]

Eye in the Sky

2011-10-29T18:34:00.000-07:00

Double Rainbow over NYC

2011-06-19T06:20:00.000-07:00

[F 6.3, 1/320sec, ISO:100, 2011-06-17]

Golden City Behind Bars

2011-06-04T19:38:00.000-07:00

[F 7.1, 1/125sec, ISO:100, 2011-06-02]

Financial District

2011-04-24T10:10:00.000-07:00

[F 9, 20sec, ISO:100, 2011-04-17]

~Sin City

2011-03-19T20:45:00.000-07:00

Yes, approximately !
“Las Vegas is sort of like how God would do it if he had money.” - Steve Wynn

The only Eiffel Tower

[F 2.8, 1/15sec, ISO:400, 2011-03-10]

The Strip at the time when the whole city sleeps !

[F 8, 1/200sec, ISO:100, 2011-03-09]

Up in the Air

[F 8, 1/320sec, ISO:100, 2011-03-09]

Treasure Street

[F 8, 1/400sec, ISO:100, 2010-03-09]

Let it snow...

2011-02-21T15:57:00.000-08:00

From wikipedia - ""Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!", also known as "Let It Snow", is a song written by lyricist Sammy Cahn and composer Jule Styne in 1945. It was written in July 1945 in Hollywood, California during one of the hottest days on record."

This probably is one of the last snows of the season, but as many many other things that's completely unpredictable - enjoy while it lasts.

From my window through the lens to digital celluloid....

B & W

[F 5.6, 1/250sec, ISO:100, 2010-02-21]

Reserved !

[F 8, 1/100sec, ISO:100, 2010-02-21]

Silver

[F 9, 1/100sec, ISO:100, 2010-02-21]

Lake George - Fall Foliage

2010-10-12T20:17:00.000-07:00

Fall is definitely the season for great landscape photography. The colors are amazing ! Couple of things that you might want to consider:

With sun, blue skies, water and all bright surroundings - a polarizing filter will help cut some reflections.
A fill in flash can help fill in strong shadows and may bring out some bright colors thereby adding vibrance.

Here's the stream from Lake George, NY:

[F 10, 1/100sec, ISO:100, 2010-10-10]

[F 8, 1/250sec, ISO:100, 2010-10-10]

[F 8, 1/100sec, ISO:100, 2010-10-10]

[F 8, 1/160sec, ISO:100, 2010-10-10]

[F 7.1, 1/160sec, ISO:100, 2010-10-10]

[F 2.8, 1/2000sec, ISO:100, 2010-10-10]

A Disoriented Visitor

2010-09-29T19:17:00.000-07:00

More macro fun.
Also found out that Drupal guys have a theme dedicated to this visitor.

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/1000sec, ISO:320, 2010-08-21]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 4.5, 1/250sec, ISO:320, 2010-08-21]

Fire in the Building

2010-09-27T21:40:00.000-07:00

This place is definitely full of surprises ! Fire on the 10th floor, building evacuated, smell and smoke all over - and there was me with my camera.

When fire is cried and danger is neigh,
"God and the firemen" is the people's cry;

But when 'tis out and all things righted,

God is forgotten and the firemen slighted.

~Author unknown, from The Fireman's Journal, 18 Oct 1879

The Truck

[Canon EOS 40D, F 5, 1/60sec, ISO:400, 2010-09-26]

The Men

[Canon EOS 40D, F 5, 1/60sec, ISO:400, 2010-09-26]

Men at Work

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/125sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

The worried Residents

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/60sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

Don't cross the line

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/100sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

The Mechanics

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/200sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

Almost done

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/200sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

Wrapping up

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/100sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

All done, party time

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/100sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

The Beasts ! Ready to leave

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/80sec, ISO:400, 2010-09-26]

The Queue

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/80sec, ISO:400, 2010-09-26]

The Gear

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/80sec, ISO:200, 2010-09-26]

The End !

Speed Boat Race, NYC Hudson - Sep'12, 2010

2010-09-12T18:02:00.000-07:00

Another surprise from the window. Time for some high speed action !

It's an overcast morning. No sun at all. Fast shutter speed, on a non IS lens (24-70 mm 2.8 L) - most of the photographs were shot with shutter wide open. I couldn't really go high on ISO, anything above ISO 400 was producing visible noise in the clouds. Enjoy !

[Canon EOS 40D, F 7.1, 1/500sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 5, 1/1000sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 5.6, 1/1000sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 5, 1/1000sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 3.5, 1/2000sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 4, 1/2000sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 3.5, 1/2000sec, ISO:320, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 3.5, 1/1250sec, ISO:100, 2010-09-12]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/2500sec, ISO:100, 2010-09-12]

As an added bonus, I was able to shoot a ~4 min video of the race. It's an old non HD camcorder - still not a bad watch at 480p.

The Fin

2010-08-12T19:52:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/15sec, ISO:800, 2010-08-08]

The joys of wide aperture and narrow depth of field. The picture is shot inside an aquarium.

If you haven't been there yet - Mystic Aquarium, CT is a fun place to be in.

A Clear Cloudy Night

2010-07-28T17:50:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 10, 3.2 sec, ISO:100, 2010-07-23]

Jul'4, 2010 - NYC Fireworks

2010-07-15T22:14:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 4, 1.0 sec, ISO:200, 2010-07-04]

Here's a lesson ...

Always, always take time to explore your subject/place before getting on to actual shoot. It is all the more important for landscape photography where light along with time of the day plays a major role in the quality of output that you may get. Look out for other similar photographs on the subject at various sites to get some more perspective.

What I have got here is the side view of fireworks going out from six parallel barges and that too from quite a distance. I probably would have enjoyed more if I was shooting it from somewhere in front of them.

Anyways, here are few more pics in this stream...

[Canon EOS 40D, F 3.2, 0.6 sec, ISO:100, 2010-07-04]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 11, 2 sec, ISO:100, 2010-07-04]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 14, 8 sec, ISO:200, 2010-07-04]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 8, 1 sec, ISO:200, 2010-07-04]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 8, 2 sec, ISO:200, 2010-07-04]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 14, 8 sec, ISO:200, 2010-07-04]

Cheers !

2010-07-14T23:20:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/10 sec, ISO:200, 2010-07-09]

Perrier in a glass. Not much to say. All indoor room lighting, no flash. Wide open aperture provided high DoF. Monochromed/Sepia

NYC Fireworks - June'27, 2010

2010-06-27T21:24:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 16, 6.0 sec, ISO:100, 2010-6-27]

Today evening, I was surprised to see some fantastic fireworks from my window. The view was simply amazing. Normally, I would be prepared to shoot an event like this - I would have read what kind of lens settings I need, what effect a larger or a smaller aperture would have on the image. At the very least I would have chosen the location, setup my tripod etc ... But not today, I turned around and the magic had already started.

I had to quickly choose the window from my house, setup the tripod, put my Canon 24-70mm lens and had few seconds to think about the settings. I imagined these shots to be of longer duration(4 - 15 sec), given there is plenty of city light in the background, I did not want to over-expose the shot by opening the aperture wide. Since there is already plenty of light generated by the fireworks itself a smaller ISO number(100-200) is good enough to avoid extra noise in the picture.

[Canon EOS 40D, F 16, 6.0 sec, ISO:100, 2010-6-27]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 13, 6.0 sec, ISO:100, 2010-6-27]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 13, 6.0 sec, ISO:200, 2010-6-27]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 13, 8.0 sec, ISO:200, 2010-6-27]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 16, 10.0 sec, ISO:200, 2010-6-27]

[Canon EOS 40D, F 16, 6.0 sec, ISO:100, 2010-6-27]

Had a good practice, learned what works. I am so looking forward to July 4th now.

Push Pins

2010-06-27T17:38:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 2.8, 1/800.0, ISO:400, 2010-6-26]

Yesterday was the first time I tried out Macro Photography. Yesterday was also the first time I tried out product photography. I made a lightbox at home using the method mentioned here. This works great, but you really need good light source, not having a consistent light setup at home - I decided to use the natural light. Overcast day actually helped the cause by eliminating any harsh shadows.

Equipment:

Canon 40D
Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM Lens
Tripod
White Posterboard

Subject:

Translucent push pins. Approximate dimensions are - 12mm base, 12mm steel pin and 6mm lower end diameter.

The camera was set on Aperture priority with most of the pics on 2.8; It was a windy day - in the given light conditions, to get really sharp images I wanted to get the highest shutter speed possible. Moreover, least F-stop also offers a good play with Depth-of-field.

Lessons Learned

1. Highest shutter speed does not always get you a sharp picture. Have a good look at the above picture, most of the translucent part of red pin is in focus but the edge along with the steel pin is not as sharp as it could have been. Diffraction at lower f-stops come into play here. Lens sharpness varies with the Aperture. If you are interested to know more, this is a really good read. As a general rule, avoid using the larger apertures (lower F-stop value) wherever you can. You can also read more about selecting the sharpest aperture for your lens here.

2. Let's talk a bit about DoF. Have a look at the following four pics:

Green Pin: Front Focus

Green Pin: Back focus

All Pins: F.2.8

All Pins: F8

Remember the dimensions of a pin. The first two pictures of green pin above are shot at 2.8. In the first picture of the green pin, I have tried to focus on the tip of the pin. See how the back portion is completely out of focus. You can see the same affect in the second picture where the focus is on the back of the pin.

Let's move on the next two pics of all pins. The last picture is shot at F8, see how everything( back and front) are still in focus and it's as sharp as it could get, without any lens diffraction.

3. Back button Auto-Focus - While trying to take these pictures, one of the hardest things was to get the lens AF working. It was just impossible to keep the focus on the tip of the pin. Most of the modern cameras have this nice feature called back-button AF. This was quite helpful to lock the focus and not let the camera try to focus again while taking the shot. You can configure the setting of this button using the custom settings function. More on this here.

4. Custom White balance - I did not really do this for this pictures, but realized later that the pictures could have been improved by letting the camera know what white is beforehand. This probably would have resulted in actual white background(real color of the poster board) on all the pictures, rather than shades of grey.

The Canon 100mm 2.8 macro is a fantastic lens, it opens up a new world of photography. I would highly recommend to try it out, if you haven't already. Here are some more shots:

Dream House

2010-06-12T11:48:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 5.6, 1/1000, ISO:200, 2008-8-9]

As I browse through many of my older pics, I have learned that wherever possible use a faster shutter speed, the chances of getting a picture that you will like because it's sharp are much higher that way.

Ofcourse, there's lot more that goes in to make a picture like-able, sharpness is just one aspect:)

This photograph shot at a place called Kehrsiten, Luzern. If you happen to be in Switzerland during summers, I would highly recommend the Luzern lake boat ride.

Picasaweb & Blogger

2010-06-06T08:05:00.000-07:00

I started this blog to play around with Google Data APIs. pic-stream is auto-generated (almost) from my picasaweb pics.

I usually upload my full-size photographs to picasaweb, the script provided at the end of this blog uses Picasa Web Album data APIs to get the details of the pics and then publishes a smaller sized pic along with some of the EXIF data to blogger using Blogger APIs. A little more details:

Requirements:

You will need to enter some more details before you can use the code:

your gmail id
Run the script in a shell - it will prompt for your password
blog-id

This script creates a draft post so that you can make any changes you want before hitting the publish button.

I know you can do something similar directly from Picasa client too, but now you have the freedom to display whatever EXIF data you want in the format you want.

#!/usr/bin/python2.5

import gdata.photos.service
import gdata.media
import gdata.geo
import gdata.blogger.client
import gdata.client
import atom.data
import getopt
import getpass
import os
import sys
import time

from gdata import service

class PicasaData(object):

  def  __init__(self, username, pw):
    """ Initializes Picasa data."""
    self.picasa_client = gdata.photos.service.PhotosService()
    self.picasa_client.source = 'API'
    self.picasa_client.ssl = False
    self.picasa_client.email = username
    self.picasa_client.password = pw
    self.picasa_client.ProgrammaticLogin()
    self.photo_name = ''
  
  def GetAlbumName(self):
    """ Get the name of the picasa album""" 
    albums = self.picasa_client.GetUserFeed(user=self.picasa_client.email)
    i = 0
    albumidlist = []
    for album in albums.entry:
      i+=1
      albumidlist.append(album)
      print '%d  %s (%s)' % (i, album.title.text, album.numphotos.text)
     
    album_choice = int(raw_input('Choose Album Name:'))
    self.album = albumidlist[album_choice-1]
    #print 'You choose: %s' %(self.album.title.text)
    return self.album.title.text
        
  def GetPicName(self):
    """ Get the name of the pic for which details are required."""
    i = 0 
    photo_id_list = []
    photos = self.picasa_client.GetFeed(
        '/data/feed/api/user/%s/albumid/%s?kind=photo&amp;imgmax=640u' % 
        (self.picasa_client.email, self.album.gphoto_id.text))
    
    for photo in photos.entry:
      i+=1
      photo_id_list.append(photo)
      print '%d %s:' %(i, photo.title.text)
      
    pic_choice = int(raw_input('Choose Pic Name:'))
    self.photo = photo_id_list[pic_choice-1]
    return self.photo.title.text
    

  def GetPicMetadata(self):
    """ Get Metadata for the chosen pic."""
    
    meta_data = {}
    if self.photo.exif.model:
      camera = self.photo.exif.model.text
    else:
      camera = 'unknown'
      
    src = self.photo.content.src
    first_thumbnail = self.photo.media.thumbnail[0].url
    second_thumbnail = self.photo.media.thumbnail[1].url
    third_thumbnail = self.photo.media.thumbnail[2].url
    distance = self.photo.exif.distance
    if self.photo.exif.exposure:
      exposure = 1/float(self.photo.exif.exposure.text)
    else:
      exposure = 'Unknown' 
    
    if self.photo.exif.focallength:
      focallength = self.photo.exif.focallength.text
    else:
      focallength = 'Unknown'
    
    if self.photo.exif.fstop:      
      aperture = self.photo.exif.fstop.text
    else:
      aperture = 'Unknown'
      
    if self.photo.exif.iso:
      iso = self.photo.exif.iso.text
    else:
      iso = 'Unknown'
      
    if self.photo.exif.time:
      t = float(self.photo.exif.time.text)/1000
      t = str("%s-%s-%s" %(time.gmtime(t).tm_year, time.gmtime(t).tm_mon, time.gmtime(t).tm_mday))
    else:
      t = 'Unknown'
      
    if self.photo.geo:
      location = str(self.photo.geo.Point.pos.text)
    else:
      location = 'Unknown'
    
    meta_data = {'Camera': camera,
                 'Source': src,
                 'Exposure': exposure,
                 'Focallength': focallength,
                 'Aperture': aperture,
                 'ISO': iso,
                 'Time': t,
                 'Coordinates': location}
    return meta_data             
    
class BloggerData:

  def __init__(self, username, pw):
    """Initialize blogger data."""
    
    self.blogger_client = gdata.blogger.client.BloggerClient()
    
    self.blogger_client.service = 'blogger'    
    self.blogger_client.source = 'python script'
    self.blogger_client.account_type = 'GOOGLE'
    self.blogger_client.server = 'www.blogger.com'
    self.blogger_client.email = username
    self.blogger_client.password = pw
    self.blogger_client.ClientLogin(username, pw, self.blogger_client.source)
    
    # Get the blog ID for the first blog.
    self.feed = self.blogger_client.get_blogs()
    self.blog_id = self.feed.entry[0].get_blog_id()
    
  def PrintUserBlogTitles(self):
    
    self.feed = self.blogger_client.get_blogs()  
 
    for entry in self.feed.entry:
      print '%s %s' %(entry.title.text, entry.get_blog_id())
      
  def CreatePost(self, title, content, is_draft):
    blog_id = 'XXX' # Put your blog-id here, it was a 20 digit number for me
    print 'Creating Draft %s' %(title)
    return self.blogger_client.add_post(blog_id, title, content, draft=is_draft)
  
def main():
  username = 'XXX' # Put you gmail id(without '@gmail.com') here
  pw = getpass.unix_getpass("Enter your password:")
  #pw = os.environ['PASSWD']
  
  run_picasa = PicasaData(username, pw)
  album_name = run_picasa.GetAlbumName()
  photo_name = run_picasa.GetPicName()
  meta_data = run_picasa.GetPicMetadata()
  
  blogger_title = photo_name
  blogger_content = """&lt;center&gt;&lt;img src="%s"&gt;&lt;/img&gt;&lt;/center&gt;&lt;br&gt;
                       &lt;div style="text-align: center; font-family: 'Yanone Kaffeesatz';"&gt;                      
                       &lt;i&gt;
                          [%s, F %s, 1/%s, ISO:%s, %s]&lt;br&gt;
                          Coordinates: %s
                       &lt;/i&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
                       """ %(meta_data['Source'],
                             meta_data['Camera'],
                             meta_data['Aperture'],
                             meta_data['Exposure'],
                             meta_data['ISO'],
                             meta_data['Time'],
                             meta_data['Coordinates'])
  
  run_blogger = BloggerData(username, pw)
  run_blogger.CreatePost(blogger_title, blogger_content, True)

if __name__ == '__main__':
  main()

Across Hudson

2010-06-06T05:48:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 4.0, 1.3s, ISO:100, 2010-2-12]
Coordinates: 40.726658 -74.034828

Perfect Models ! For a 1.3 sec shot, there's hardly any movement in pigeons. Perhaps the cold winter evening kept them still.

Brooklyn Bridge Tower

2010-05-31T15:38:00.000-07:00

[Canon EOS 40D, F 7.025, 1/793.650793651, ISO:100, 2010-5-1]

For a Canon 40D, the exposure values mentioned doesn't make much sense. This picture was shot RAW and then tone-mapped to produce a High Dynamic Range pic. I have been playing around with HDR for a while - exaggerated contrast and artistic effects are the most common artifacts of this technique.

Another way of looking at using this is if done right, HDR can sometimes bring life to regular boring photographs.