Vignettes on Photography

Ganapatiphule–The Konkan Coastal trip

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 07:18:00 +0000

I am back from another hiatus

This is about our trip to a place called Ganapatiphule. We went on this trip on 2nd of June 2011. The place is basically a beach with few resorts built on it along the Konkan coast. It is about 380 kms from Pune takes about 9.5 hrs to reach with halts.

We had heard about this place through friends and wanted to go there. It is famous for its virgin beaches with very little humanity. Both my wife and I love such secluded beaches.
So we booked a room at the resort called The Blue Ocean Resort.

"Indian 5-star hotels which keep only paper [and not water jets] in their toilets seem to think that every Indian who walks through their luxurious doors automatically turns into a western asshole." – Remo Fernandes (Indian Musician)

The reason why I wrote the above sentence is because that statement fits Blue Ocean resort perfectly. The blue ocean resort called themselves 5-Star and did not have simple things taken care of to back their claim.

Here is 8 point failure of the blue ocean resort. Don't get me wrong though, people were courteous and place was clean, but then you cannot claim to be a 5-Star and not take care of basic stuff which I would expect from even a local hotel.

The Blue Ocean Failure

You can’t call yourself a 5-Star just by owning a sexy website
You do not have water jets (health faucet) in the toilet and there is no bath tub.
Chef cannot even cook Indian food let alone continental. He had simple formula. If its South Indian food then make it sweet. If its north Indian then make it hot. If its pasta it has to be loaded with tomato sauce and also sweet. And if you complain something is too sweet, a tobasco sauce is readily made available.
The helper boys and the guards had only 2 states – either they are completely invisible when you needed them or they are in you face when you didn't need them!
Most employees at the resort did not speak or understand simple English! Whenever you spoke to someone they will nod their heads and you think they understood, then you realized (after about an hour) that they hadn't!
The female receptionist would probably win a prize for best smile, but when it came to understanding hospitality she would struggle against a street urchin.
No Local cuisine!!! I cannot believe that a resort which is located along Konkan coast, which is famous for one of the best seafood in the country, did not have anything local to offer!
And lastly – The whole resort which has over 25 villas, seemed to have just one wine opener in their inventory!!!

Enough of the rant… lets move on As I said, in spite of all this, the resort was not bad and the place is a definite beauty. We went just during the onset of monsoon, so it was even more breath-taking.

Day #1
On the way through Mahabaleshwar. Suni in front of strawberry stalls.
The Mahabaleshwar valley. Its breathtaking to say the least! This is HDR Processing. I didnt have ND filter, still got the details in HDR with single RAW.
This is the storm approaching on the valley
The Railway line cutting across fields. All these picture were taken while we were on the way to Ganapatiphule.
A lonely house in the middle of a storm. I love this. This is again HDR processing of single RAW converted into 5 JPGs with –2 to +2 EV stop
The Buddha statue at the hotel entrance . Despite all the issues have had with the hotel management, the resort itself was kept spic and span.
And it started pouring as soon as we stepped into the out room felt gloomy a bit, but then… I never went on a pouring vacation!
The wet bridge in the resort.
The Coconut groves on the way to the resort beach. PP – Just increased contrast & saturation. Hue slightly to the blueish green
Suni at the beach with umbrella…good they provided one! E-5…that crazy beautiful camera!
A lonely umbrella at the beach…
Day #2
Our breakfast chef… he made good continental scrambled eggs. We loved it. Suni and Adu loved the sunny-side-up!
Towards our villa (#21). The resort doesnt have rooms like a traditional hotel, instead it has over 25 one room villas. So there is privacy and more peace. We liked the setup.
The Buddha statue outside our villa.
Gapapatiphule is famous for the ganapati temple, on day 2 we visited this temple. Its located in a lovely place. I wish locals paid more attention to cleanliness, as they do in Goa, though.
Suni with her long lost brother
View from the backside of the temple. It is a beautiful place… A storm was approaching from the sea when we were there…
The side view of the temple.
The camel rides on the beach outside the temple.
Adu and I with our new hats Got cool hats at a very good price!
The hat seller. We had tough time making him smile. Do whatever you like, he had a perpetual glum look on his face. This must be his unique pic in his entire life!
This guy was the hat seller’s partner. He, on the other hand was a cheerful lad
On the way back from the temple we stopped at a eatery, which sold lovely “kanda bhajji” and “chai” Dont try looking for the bhajji in the pic, Suni finished it off before I could take my camera out
The place had lots of local souvenir shops that sold articles made out of shells and other stuff. Suni at one such shop.
Day #3
We decided to visit Ratnagiri, which is about 35Kms from Ganapatiphule. Ratnagiri is famous for Cashew, Mangoes and seafood! At the Breakfast table, Suni and Adu…
On the way to Ratnagiri. Soaking in the natural beauty. It was slightly drizzling, which made the environment even more sexy.. My little photographer with mommy!
The scenic view of villas…
A winding staircase near the sea.
Boats ready to weather the approaching storm…
In Ratnagiri. This is where we had our lunch. The served wonderful fish and prawns curry! Absolutely delicious!
Our next place of visit in Ratnagiri was the, almost forgotten, Thibaw Palace. I say “almost forgotten” because the palace is extremely well kept. However there are very few visitors. And the entry fee is Rs. 7. Which is about 7 cents!! If this was in any western country, then you can guarantee that it would be minting money like crazy. Such a beautiful piece of history, yet so few seem to know about it! Even we stumbled upon it accidently when we stopped to ask locals about places to visit! This picture tells the story about the palace. Just for your interest, $1 = Rs 50 So this palace was build at the cost of approximately $2500!! in the year 1906
The Majestic Thibaw Palace from the front
Another view of the palace.
The Canons which once adorned the palace.
The staircase leading to upper floor of the palace.
The symmetry inside the palace!
Wide angle view of the symmetry…
The view of inside the palace. The good caretaker started the fountain for my sake
My little photographer in front of the fountain inside the palace.
Outside the palace. A local park.
In the Ratnagiri Market. As I said, Ratnagiri is famous for mangoes, even the Superman loves it!!
On the way back, a serene beach! Most beaches in and around Ganapatiphule are serene like this. Very little human habitation! My kind of place
A boat…
At the resort back again. Another Buddha statue at the beach side of the resort.
Patterns on the beach
Suni in contemplative mood!
A couple building castle in sand as their driver takes pics. A storm is approaching in the background.
Final Day
The cool dude all ready for the journey back home
The journey back, through heavy rains…
We stopped over at a highway restaurant “Purna Bhrama” for lunch. This non descript restaurant served us the best seafood we had in 4 days. Simply Lovely!!
Hungry Adi and Suni….can wait to get their hands on the food!
The friendly proprietor of the restaurant. Please visit this restaurant on you way there. Its fantastic!
Continuing the journey… A woman carrying water. Taken from the moving car. I love the bloody E-5!
An young girl pumping water from the hand pump
On the Mahabaleshwar valley. The visibility was about 10 meters in rain and dense fog. We were literally crawling at about 15 kmph!
A view of Mahabaleshwar valley on the way back.

This was indeed a memorable trip. A must visit place!!

Ciao!!

Holi (festival of colors)–A photo blog

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 08:15:00 +0000

Holi is a spring religious festival celebrated by Hindus. its actually a 2 day festival. Bonfires are lit the on the eve of the festival, also known as Holika Dahan (burning of Holika, a demon in Hindu mythology) or Chhoti Holi (little Holi). The main day, Holi (Rang Panchami), also known as Dhuli Vandana in Sanskrit, is celebrated by people throwing coloured powder and coloured water at each other.

Ever since I took up digital photography (about 4 years ago), I always wanted to capture the holi festival because of its most colorful atmosphere. Also I had seen a very nice article on Pop Photography magazine, where the guy had used Canon 5D mk II to capture holi. I was impressed by a few thing

His ability to bring out the mood of the festival
The way the colors played out in the pictures
His gear – which allowed him to really go close to the the action

I always wanted to shoot Holi like that, I had very good body E-30 and great weather sealed lenses. However my body did not have weather sealing. I purchased Kata rain cover, but still it’s a little cumbersome to use for extended period, especially when you have change settings. I tried doing it last year, but was too scared to go too close to action because everything is so unpredictable and also the rain cover put me off.

This year I was prepared. I had purchased E-5 and I had the good weather sealed ZD lenses. So I knew I will be able to capture the holi as I wanted it.

I tried to capture the full gamut of the holi celebration, the holi eve, which Holika dahan and the rang panchami the other day. You be the judge if I was successful.

	Women performing pooja around the bonfire.

	Bonfire burning bright! Women go around bonfire pouring water and chanting a prayer. Its supposed to bring….well, no idea what its supposed to bring. Something good obviously!

	The decked up ladies for the pooja. They are pretty, aren't they?

	The bigger group!

	The colorful family!

	Next day morning… Children cant wait to fill their “pichkaris” (water guns) with colorful water!

	She was shivering like there is no tomorrow, and changed her clothes only about 20 times. but these small details didn’t stop her from doing anything she wanted that day

	The girls seems to be having a blast!

	My favourite in the groovy mood!!!

	The three musketeers… The fast friends… Aayush, Adu and Laasya…

	Always in the mood!! Adu at his best….

	Children getting their act together….holi the way it should be

	Can you recognize any them? No? neither can I… But I can assure you, at least 3 of them are in the pics above

	Men being men! oblivious of the surroundings

	Is there still some left?!

	You bet! Girls haven't finished yet

	Synchro!!!

	As they say….there is nobody to shoot the shooter….

	But Spare a thought for my E-5. I had to give her a shower…

My Gear

Camera Body	Olympus E-5
Lens	Zuiko Digital 14-54 f/2.8-3.5
Grip	HLD-4 vertical power grip
Verdict	Absolutely fantastic weather sealing. Amazingly fast and accurate AF acquisition. Most daylight photos above are shot in ISO 400 because I wanted faster shutter than normal to freeze certain action. Color rendition is very true. RAW development in Adobe Photoshop CS4 Camera RAW after converting to DNG.

Hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed shooting it

Ciao!!

Karmazari Wildlife Resort

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 17:04:00 +0000

Karmazari – Its lies smack in the middle of India, a part of Pench National Park (http://www.pench.net/). A protected wildlife area in central India. It is one of the few places in the world where you can still see tigers.

During the week of 30th Oct to 05th Nov 2010 we were in Nagpur for the Diwali. We (My Wife Suni, son Adu and I) and our friend (Swati, who is also an avid bird watcher and wildlife photographer) decided to go to on a wildlife safari in the Karmazari wildlife resort. We chose Karmazari because it is one of the closest wildlife resort around Nagpur. We were warned well before by the many people that spotting a tiger in Karmazari area is not guaranteed and you will be really lucky if you could spot one.

But since spotting tiger was not the only attraction we had in mind (which was only emphasized at the end of our trip), we decided to book a day at the Baaz resort (http://www.baazjungleresort.com/) and go on a safari tour (organized by the resort).

Although the resort is just 90Kms from Nagpur, and we had decided to do a day trip, we still booked a day at the resort guest house because we were advised that the safari will be a tiring experience. And it sure was very good advise. For we were tired after the morning safari and a couple of hours of rest and lunch rejuvenated us before next safari . We had booked 2 safaris, one in the morning and another in the afternoon.

On 2nd of Nov 2010, we packed our sandwiches and tea and left out friends home quite early in the morning @ 4AM.

A little bit about my gear here. I would have loved to have my E-30 but it was out of commission since my trip to Mauritius. It had been repaired but had not reached me from US. And I hadn’t yet bought my E-5. So I was left with my 2 cameras neither of which was suited for wildlife photography.

Cameras

E-P2 – This is not a good choice for wildlife because for photographing moving animals and and birds hidden in trees you need a precise AF and and a very fast AF. This camera offers none. But still a trusty companion because of the in body IS and good metering.
E-330. I took this because I knew attaching a big lens like 50-200 on E-P2 can be a challenge. However it is not suited for wildlife because even when the vehicle stops there are slight jerks which you get because someone is moving (and we had 3 kids, need I say more!). E-330 doesn't have in body IS. E-330 has bad metering system which tends to over-expose quickly which you need to be careful of.

Lenses

12-60 SWD for general purpose and wide angle shots
50-200 SWD for telephoto
EC-14 with 50-200 for greater reach.

My Friend had Canon 7D and 100-400 to go with it. Boy!! was I envious of her!! :-) It was fast to focus and good burst rate which neither of my cameras could match.

Coming back to where I was….

The road towards the Karmazari is not good though out the entire stretch. You will find patches of good road and patches of very bad road. So it took us about 2.5 hours to cover a distance of 90 kms and we reached the Baaz resort @ 6:40AM. Our morning safari was supposed to start @ 7AM.

Just at we reached the resort I took this photo of the morning mist in the pond inside the jungle, just outside the Baaz resort. Its a beautiful feeling to be just one with nature.


Morning mist surrounding the tree	Guard of Forest Rangers on duty at the entrance of the Jungle.

We did not even take our things out of the car, we just quickly used the restroom of our guesthouse and dumped all our bags directly in our safari vehicle which was waiting for us and we are on our way.

One thing I must tell you, when you go on a safari like this, you are simply in awe of the nature around you. You feel blessed that you can be part of it and you want to take in everything it has to offer.

At the entrance of the jungle safari, you had to make an entry and pay the fees for jungle entrance. At any point in time only 50 vehicles can will be allowed and not all on same routes. So if there are over 50 then you will have to wait.

Swati – Our friend, philosopher and guide. Getting the necessary paperwork done.
We wouldn’t have gone had she been not there.

An avid photographer herself, she is also deeply interested in bird watching. She is probably a member of almost all the local bird watching clubs :-) she loves photographing birds.

You can see some of her work here

Once Swati got the paperwork done we were on our way.

Shot just inside the jungle. The beautiful morning mist.
Jungle is surrounded by the villages, so its inevitable that there will be encroachments from both man and animals. The toughest task that the forest officials face is to educate the villagers on how important it is for them to maintain the balance and also controlling them when necessary.

As we moved along, we had a guide in our vehicle who was very friendly. He gave us a lot of insight on the jungle life.


Our Guide. They have a tough job. Most of them are poor and are locals. Most of them do it mainly because they love being where they are.	Our driver.

Kids in the safari vehicle. They thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience!
These safari vehicles are mostly used vehicles donated by the army and then modified.

The morning sun brings everybody out for breakfast, and if you are unlucky, you could be someone’s breakfast. :-)

A bare tree inside the jungle.


Couple of deer roaming around.	And this guy is busy sucking the morning nectar...

Morning Reflections in the pond. This is where tigers come to quench their thirst. We waited, waited and waited some more….not so lucky this time :-)

Long winding road in the jungle.
Nearby villagers are given access to designated areas in the jungle to collect dead wood for their homes which they use as fuel.
The fence that you see is used to hold weed grass from spreading to other parts of the jungle.

Villagers are allowed to gather wood from dead trees and fallen branches. But they are not allowed to touch anything else.

After roaming around for over 2 hours we came to a rest area where we had our breakfast of yummy peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. We also had nice paratha with pickle!

Kids enjoying the welcome break with a sandwich and a drink.

Suni and Swati being the perfect moms they are…

As soon as we finished the breakfast we were on our way back to the guest house..

We saw monkeys on the way back. Can you spot – A pilot, a co-pilot, passengers and a member of a crew? :-)

A wild fox lurking in the shadows…

When we reached the guest house (another 2.5 hr ride), we were hungry again. So we ordered our lunch (of chicken curry, roti (Indian bread), daal tadka and rice -- yummy!!) and again I and my friend went on shooting spree, this time the birds and butterflies.

That’s the entrance to the Baaz resort.

The way to our guest house was nice with a bridge and an old style lamp…Loved the surroundings!


A lovely butterfly!	Well, I wont lie, that's actually a moth! :-)

This is my beauty….


A pretty bird perched on the stump…	And a beautiful wild grass…

After we had our lunches, we were ready for one more safari. This time a different route than what we took last time because we wanted to increase our chances of spotting a tiger. But by this time we weren’t thinking too much of the tiger, if we spot it, it would only be a bonus. We were completely enjoying the safari for all its worth!

Until this time I had my 50-200 (which I was mostly using to shoot) was on my E-330 and 12-60 was on my E-P2. But for the afternoon/evening ride I switched them because I knew I would still be shooting telephoto and I will also need the in body IS as the light inside the jungle was fading fast.

On our second ride we saw quite a few characters…


The flycatcher..	This one is a hider, kept climbing up and up when I was trying to shoot it…


This guy wouldn't pose for the photographer…	This guy looks like he is heading back home after a long day…


The colorful one…Swati would know what it is :-)	Sambar deer…looking done for the day…

…And this is closest we came to seeing a tiger. These are fresh paw marks made by the tiger. Guide told us that these no more than 12 hrs old. So he was here somewhere.
You can judge the size of the tiger which did it by the height of these marks. They are well over 7ft….

This is Eurasian something-or-the-other ;-) Swati will surely know…
It was so well camouflaged that I couldn't spot it even after the guide pointed to me 3 times. Guide was trained to spot these things and he immediately spotted it.

This is the “ghost tree” – It changes colour 3 times a year and hence the name…

Long winding road back to the guest house…

Sunset in the jungle – Sayonara….

The jungle safari was one of a kind experience for me. It is one of the few things I will surely cherish in my life. We did not spot a single tiger, but that fact just became an insignificant statistic in the face of the vast and immeasurable beauty that we witnessed. The experience was as exhilarating as it was an eye-opener. Being in a city and doing 9 to 6 job, we don’t realize what’s out there and the how minor and unimportant we and our lives really are. It experiences like these that bring you closer to nature and make you think about your own existence.

“We live because of the jungle out there”

CIAO

In Love with E-P2 again…

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 13:39:00 +0000

(…thanks to Panasonic Lumix 45-200 f/4-5.6!)

I bought E-P2 in Dec-2009 thinking that I will have the same advantages of E-30 (my main DSLR at that time) with lot less weight. However I was not completely right in my expectations and here are the reasons why;

The Kit lens (14-42) was extremely slow in focusing, and in low light it pretty much gave up. I assumed that all Oly m4/3 lenses will be like that so never bought another one.
Recently I was at a safari and since I didn't have a DSLR (E-30 was out of commission), I relied on E-P2 to provide me the same service. But attaching 50-200 SWD on E-P2 is not same as attaching it on E-30. So it was not a very good experience to say the least. It was oddly bulky and hard to handle. Again I had the issue with slow focusing (on E-30, the 50-200 is pretty fast).
The in Body IS is not as effective in E-P2 as it is in E-30 or E-5. Because of the small size the the camera shake is lot more pronounced than in E-30 or E-5, when bigger lenses (especially 4/3 lenses)are attached.
Unreliable focusing, especially in low light, with kit lens and other 4/3 lenses

As a result my E-P2 was relegated to some dark corner in my cupboard….until…

Until I bought the Panasonic Lumix 45-200 f/4.0-5.6. Here is what I found it to be.

Extremely light weight, its like a feather in hand - you can hardly feel it.
Amazingly fast internal focusing AF, even in low-light.
Extremely reliable AF. With my 14-42, I can never be sure if it has really focused where I want it to, even when the camera has beeped. With Lumix 45-200, its fantastic experience to see it focus reliably without any effort.
Fantastic image quality. Beats my 14-42 in image quality definitely, which shows the optics used are far superior to Oly 14-42.
Fantastic MEGA OIS performance. In all the (un-scientific) tests I have done in low light using the MEGA OIS and E-P2 in body IS, I found that up until 1/15s both the IS perform well. However the MEGA OIS starts gaining advantage anything below 1/15s. Infact I could get reasonably sharp images even @ 1/1.6 with MEGA OIS where the in body IS image was completely unusable.
Lastly the cost – @ $250 i think its a steal when you see how it performs.

Here are some sample images which I took from the lens

ISO-2000, 1/1600, f/4.9 115mm. About 30% Cropped
Was trying to capture pigeons in flight so was using high ISO for fast shutter.

ISO-200, 1/40, f/5.6 200mm about 20% cropped.
Only Contrast adjusted in CS4. I love the clarity

ISO-200, 1/25, f/5.6 200mm No CROP.
Adjusted contrast in CS4. Lovely clarity at full ZOOM

ISO-1600, 1/25, f/4, 45mm No CROP.
Shot in available kitchen light
Adjusted contrast and vibrancy in CS4. Clarity is brilliant @ lowest end of the barrel as well!!

ISO-1600, 1/6, f/4.5, 84mm No CROP. SOOC. Soft Focus Art filter.
Shot under tungsten light in a room. Very very reliable focusing and amazing MEGA OIS

The Lens….

E-P2 with the lens…Looks big, but is light as a feather….

All I can say is that, this lens has made me fall in love with E-P2 all over again. In fact so much so, that I have now ordered LUMIX 100-300 f/4-5.6 :-)

Hope you enjoyed the pics!

CIAO!!

Visit to the winery – Chateau Indage, Narayangaon India

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 09:53:00 +0000

Note: I meant to write this blog a long time ago, but for some reason I kept postponing it. I had it saved in my draft so thought about posting it now!

Not many people know that India has a great wine making tradition. And many wineries are located in, near and around Nasik, which is a fertile belt ideal for growing grapes. One such winery in Chateau Indage (formerly Champagne Indage).

Chateau Indage was established in the year 1982 after collaboration with Champagne Technologies of France. Since then this winery has been producing exquisite wines for both local and international consumption.

We went there on 2nd October 2010 - a dry day! :-(
A dry day in India is a day when no liquor is sold or served and all liquor shops are closed. So our plan to have a nice afternoon lunch while sipping Chardonnay was crushed :-(

However the proprietor was very kind to us and he offered to sell us the wine with a condition that we don’t open the bottle at his premises :-) - to say the least. I was over the moon!! :-)

So we purchased 6 bottles of the finest wines the winery could offer.

The vineyard/winery had a nice restaurant where they served us a very nice lunch

	The IVY Restaurant @ the winery
	Adu all set for the lunch :-) Lovely cuisine!
	Something of interest to me :-)
	The restaurant from outside…
	The vineyard. Its a beautiful place!
	The Winery.
	The main gate, leading to the vineyard and winery. The Winery also has a guesthouse where you can book rooms and stay. You will be given a tour of wine making process and during the harvest period, they say, you can actually crush the grapes as well. Hmmmm… Sounds interesting. I will see if I can go then! :-)
	On the way to the winery, a colorful building! :-)
	On the way from back from Narayangaon, we took a halt at the place called Avasari Ghat. It had a nice trekking trail which went right inside the forest. Quite Amazing!! We halted here for few minutes. i will go there for a trek next time!

I will be back there soon!

All pics taken using Olympus E-330 and 25mm pancake. E-330 has this irritating quirk of overexposing and washing out longer wavelength colors (i.e. yellow, orange and reds). I did a mild HDR processing on the single RAW exposure to get the colors and exposure back.

I never had much faith in 25mm pancake before, but on E-300 its a perfect fit as it makes the system small and easy to carry.

CIAO

Olympus E-5 – First Impressions

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 16:47:00 +0000

Finally – I got my E-5 and how!

As many of you know, my E-30 is out of commission since my trip to Mauritius. The reason for that being I dropped during one of the boat rides (well, not in the water but inside the boat). I sent it to Olympus America (thank God I had taken 2 year extended warranty!) and they have repaired it. But the trouble is, its still with one of my friends who is going to get it for me. It should be with me sometime next week.

In the meantime, I leaned that another friend of mine is coming down to India. So I ordered E-5 and asked him to get it for me. Last Thursday, on my official trip to Hyderabad, I collected the camera from him :-)

Boy! was I glad to hold it! It was like holding my girl friend for the first time, that first touch, the first caress, the first…ok ok I know I am getting carried away.. ;-)

My first thought when I un-wrapped E-5– Man! this is a TANK! – I got the same absolutely SOLID and Rugged feeling that you get when you hold a ROCK. Just amazing build quality.

I had taken my charged spare BLM-1 battery and the trusty 12-60 with me. I slowly took it out of the wraps and inserted the battery and put the lens on. In the first few shots I could see that the performance was better than E-30 especially in low light. Blazingly fast and accurate AF.

I was doing all this in my office cubicle so didn’t have time to take any serious pics. But that 10 minute test was enough to make me realize that its a totally different beast I am dealing with, not E-30, not E-P2 something totally different and I was loving it!

I couldn’t wait to go back to my room and do a few test shots. In the evening I when I went back to the room, I did just that…

	A self shot. Very fast and accurate AF. Good Auto WB and a fantastic metering! Absolutely Lovely. I think the IS has also improved by a huge measure.
	The Dramatic filter
	Dramatic tone – I think I am in love with it! :-)
	Hyderabad Campus in the morning
	…and @ night!
	Amazing metering ! Just about blown me away…

Here are a few things I absolutely Love about E-5

Metering - A huge improvement over E-30. Metering was one of things I thought E-30 did not do best. As a result I had to a lot of adjustment to exposure and contrast in Photoshop. E-5 has solved this issue. Its amazingly accurate and also very true. Some people say there is highlight clipping., well I don't care if there is one. I would rather have my highlight clipped than a badly exposed pic, thank you!
Auto WB - A definite improvement over E-30 and E-P2. A very accurate colour temperature with auto WB. I used to adjust WB a lot in PP, now I don't think I need to.
IS - Just seems a little better than the E-30, but need to do a more thorough comparison as i could take sharp pics with upto 1/5s using 14-54 and 12-60.
The Screen - big improvement over E-30 and E-P2
ISO 1600 performance - Much better than E-P2 and huge improvement over E-30
ISO 3200 - Much more usable than E-P2
Low light AF acquisition - Much Much better than E-30 and very accurate even with slow lenses like 70-300.
Straight Out of Camera (SOOC) JPGs - Amazing SOOC image quality, I could never get one from E-30. E-P2 did do a better job, but E-5 absolutely takes the cake.
Color Fidelity - In low light, both E-30 and E-P2 messed up with colors, especially reds. E-5 has amazing color fidelity. In good light its even better,
Art Filters - Ability to apply filter in A/S/M modes. I never use art filters in E-30 or E-P2 as I don't like camera controlling the whole picture taking process. This for me a big improvement.
Live View - Much better LV and faster CDAF (Contrast Detection Auto Focus). LV in E-30 is barely usable. This is cool. You can also do PDAF (Phase Detection Auto Focus) in LV.

Lastly, the dramatic tone filter - I think I am in love with it :-)

Few tests below– I hope you will enjoy!

The Durga Pooja and the AMAZING 35-100

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 05:58:00 +0000

This is festival season in India, and what better place to test my 35-100 than the stage performances of beautiful dancers. This festival is called “Durga Pooja” in which the Hindus worship Goddess Durga (who symbolizes destroyer of evil).
Unfortunately my beautiful and fast E-30 is out of commission right now, but had my trusty, but slooooooooooooowwwwww E-P2.

This experience taught me 2 things
1. Why E-3/E-30 is an absolute essential for this kind of photography
2. Why 35-100 is best in business

E-P2 - The so called "High Speed Imager AF" or CD AF is not really high speed nor is it accurate. I had over 50% AF missed result in the entire shoot. It was frustrating to see the moment and miss it again and again. It has never happened to me with E-30.
However, the frustration with E-P2 was more than compensated by F/2 35-100. This lens is just AMAZING!! I don’t have words to praise it enough.

Having berated E-P2 so much, I must say that under normal lighting condition (eg. Landscape photography) the AF performs quite well. And the IQ is definitely one of the strong points. All pics have been shot between ISO 800 and ISO 1600. The IQ was very very good, although I applied minimum NR using Noiseware, I feel the IQ would have looked cool even without it.

I wanted to share this experience because I was extremely happy with my investment in 35-100. I LOVE IT!!

Here are some of the pics

One more thing I learnt from this experience was that how respectful people become when they see you walking with 35-100 on any camera :-D :-D

I hope you will enjoy the slide show

The Mauritius Trip

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 07:50:00 +0000

Recently Suni, Adu and I went to Mauritius. I was very excited because of the sheer photography opportunity it presented. And I was not disappointed. Mauritius is Landscape photographers heaven.

But to say that Mauritius trip was eventful was an understatement! But let me tell you what I carried and why, it may interest some of you guys.

1	E-30	My Main Camera.
2	E-330	Camera for Suni
3	E-P2	My Backup Camera (and boy was this of help!!!)
4	12-60	Primary Lens walkabout lens to go on my E-P2
5	7-14	Wide angle for landscape lens for E-30
6	14-54	Primary walkabout lens for E-330
7	35-100	Lens for special occasions,

So this was my gear as far as lens and cameras go. Apart from this I had other usual stuff like extra batteries, extra SD and CF cards, flash, diffusers, tripod (which I never used).

The walkabout lenses need to have 2 characteristics, first they should provide decent range in wide and telephot and second they should be fast enough in terms of focusing as well as aperture and there is not better lens the ZD 12-60 and in close second comes 14-54 both excellent and both very good.

Walkabout lenses are handy for quick shots like these

For wide-angle I specially ordered 7-14 from US. I knew I would be going to some exotic place this July, so I knew I needed a wide angle and 7-14 did not disappoint. Lovely lens.

The wide-angle is used for photos like these.

The Booking

We booked out trip through Kuoni Travels which is now SOTC. The experience was pretty cool. No hassles no surprises and no worries. We received the air tickets, insurance, hotel vouchers vi email. We were explained about the itinerary by the rep and was told that we will get more info on arrival. We had taken USD 1000 in cash for the trip. The Trip (4 nights Lodging, breakfast and 3 nights dinner, taxi to-from airport and sightseeing cab for 3 days) cost us Rs 108,000.00 for 3 of us.

Days #1 – The Landing

We landed in Mauritius @ around 7AM in the morning. @ Plaisance airport The immigration was a jiffy and smooth. Indians have no problems there. Its visa on arrival for us (a few countries who have this for Indians) so it cant have been better. We came out @ around 8ish after exchanging the USDs (always exchange in @ Airport, you will get best rates). The taxi with our name was waiting for us. The driver was helpful and very informative.

We arrived at the hotel @ around 9:30AM and were quickly checked in. The Casuarina Resort & Spa was a fantastic sight. It is situated in Trou aux Biches - North West Coast At 5 kms from Grand Bay and abt 1:15 hr from Plaisance Airport, with white sandy beach along the blue lagoon across a secondary road.

First day was entirely upto us. So after getting refreshed in the hotel we went to the beach. I shot a few pic obviously.

Casuarina Entrance

After roaming on the beach for couple of hours. We took boat out to sea to watch some marine life. It was a nice experience…

Some good looking creature above the water too! :-)

Adu went snorkeling! :-)

Day #2 – Parasailing and Ile aux Cerfs island tour

The Cab came for us @ around 9AM on Day-2. The night before the tour company person had left us a note on the time of pickup. The first stop was the parasailing @ a beach near-by (forgot the name of the beach). The parasailing experience was extremely exhilarating! They also have scuba scooter. We didn't take it tough.

On the way we met some things interesting….

The Ile aux Cerfs was a beautiful island.

Some pretty creatures on the beach

Here is where my E-30 broke down :-(

Last pic from my E-30

UPDATE: My E-30 has since been repaired by Oly. THANK GOD I had an 2year extended warranty for pro DSLR. So didn't have to pay a penny!

Day #3 – Submarine ride, Botanical Garden, Fort Adelaide and Port Louis market

The previous evening we had asked our guide to book our tickets for the submarine ride. It cost us around 7000 Mauritian rupees for 3 of us.

The Submarine ride was unique… Loved the creatures under the sea, but couldn’t get pics because of thick glass and also the very very low light. Here are some samples.

On the way to Submarine

Inside the submarine

Artificial reef under water…

Another submarine…

The Bubbles…

Next stop was Botanical Garden. its a lovely place! Pictures speak for themselves I believe!

The beautiful lady was our guide Gul :-) very helpful

The Fort Adelaide (aka La Citadelle) was cool, calm place. With a lot of opportunities for panoramic landscapes. \

Named after the Queen Adelaide, the fort has been built between 1834 and 1840, under the direction of William IV.

At 240 ft. above sea level, Fort Adelaide, also known as 'La Citadelle' has fulfilled the strategic purpose of guarding the harbor against enemy attacks and fires that broke in the city.

On the way back we saw the Church of St Marie which was

Next Stop was Port Louis Market

A Wonderful colorful Place :-)

A Road side vendor

Colorful Beads!

Some Wood art work

and the ubiquitous DODO :-)

Day #04 – Visit to Model Ship building factory (Curepipe), Trou aux Cerf dormant volcano crater, Ganga Talao (Grand Bassin), Chameral waterfall

Day 4 began with a visit to the Ship building factory, where they explained us how the models are made. It was very interesting. Apart from model ships, they had other arts as well as you will see below.

On the way to ship building factory

Model Ship

The Titanic

Other crafts

Trou aux Cerfs Volcano and the view of Curepipe town from above

View from the Crater Edge

Volcano

Ganga talao (Lake Ganga) aka Grand Bassin, it is place of Hindu religious deities. Very Nicely maintained and very picturesque.

I will again let the pictures do the talking

Mangal Mahadev - Shiva Statue 108 ft.

Another Lord Shiva

Hanuman

Ganapati and Laxmi

The Chamarel Waterfall and 7 coloured Earth. It was raining like crazy, luckily I had the rain cover to pull it off.

Chamerel Waterfall

Chamerel 7 colored Earth

Day #05 – Back to India, but not before one more visit to the beaches

Some beautiful faces tooo…

The lonely beaches

And some fun!

At the airport for departure to India.

I feel if you guys get a chance, you must visit the place. Its lovely, wonderful, ever scene breathtaking.

CIAO

A DOZEN pictures with a story to tell…

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 17:07:00 +0000

I have been quite busy lately with my office work, and have really not done too much of photography. I hope to change it this month though. Although I don't see my office pressure easing until next month :-(

In the meantime, as I am idling on a Sunday morning, I collected these photographs to showcase on this blog. The all have a short story to tell, some interesting…some not so….

I hope my readers will appreciate…

Pic#1: The Comic Book scene - This was taken from the kitchen window of my apartment in Pune. It was about 7:30 PM in the evening, and we were preparing dinner for our guests when I noticed that the night sky had become strange mixture of blue, purple, orange, grey and black! It looked something straight out of comic book night scene drawing! I was amazed by the tricks nature can play. It only strengthens my belief that nothing we imagine is not there in nature!

Tech Info: E-P2 F/4.5 1/2 secs handheld against the window grill for support. Kit lens 14-42. ISO-200

Pic#2 : Inside Infosys: This was taken inside the Infosys campus. Nothing extraordinary about the picture itself. However the story is interesting. In the Pune Infy campus in phase II, we have nice landscaping which they maintain diligently. You will see the 10 to 15 workers toiling over it all day long 7 days a week! When I joined Infy i used to think that they were just here for sometime and will go away once their job is done, but I was soooo wrong! They have been at it all of the 7 years I have spent in Infy and results are there to be seen – a pretty and well maintained landscape. Only minus point is, its hard to see a landscape in Infy without a laborer or 2 working on it. They have become inseparable part of the landscape itself! :-)

Tech Info: E-P2 F/2,8 1/250s pancake 25mm ISO-200

Pics #3 & #4 ; The other side of a flower: This is interesting, at least to me…I have always seen people photographing flowers from front/top. While looking al the flowers, you will see that back/bottom part is lot more interesting than most people would imagine. I also read in a book by a photographer who used unusual yet simple techniques to get pictures that get noticed. I tried to emulate his preaching in my own modest way. I was happy with the result :-)

Tech Info: #3 – ISO-800 indoors with side lighting from an open window F/3.4 1/50 ZD 50-200mm hand held. #4 – ISO-200 against the window f/5 50-200mm @ 1/320 hand held

Pic #5 : My Valentine: This was Valentines day :-). My wife gave me flowers and just the previous day I had bought a nice looking Berretta!!! Well, not the real one, its actually a cigarette lighter :-) but looks real enough! I couldn’t resist the temptation to shoot the clichéd “gun with flowers” scene! I loved the outcome. The streak of water was not intentional as the flowers were straight out of the vase. But they render a sinister yet sexy look to the scene, I feel :-)

Tech Info: E-P2 Indoor with light from the window. ISO-1600 f/3.5 @1/80 handheld

Pic #6 : The Movie Scene: The classic movie scene…or that's what I call it. :-) I saw this from my balcony one day and literally scampered for my camera. As you would probably know, once the sun is ready to set, it really goes down pretty quickly and it was, I remember, a race against time for me to get the camera and set it up quickly to get a few shots. There are couple of things I like about this pic (A) the sun looks like a BIG RED ball!! It was a fantastic site and (B) The electric tower in the fore ground. Together they provide a story of sun setting in the urban landscape, which, I felt, made a perfect picture.

Tech Info:E-30 f/3.5 on 50-200mm @ 1/800. This was one of the few instances I used the full Manual mode so that I can get the silhouette right.

Pic #7 : For your EYES only: This is my best candid so far. I had my pictures on display in an exhibition @ St. Joseph’s Art Fair. The stall next to mine was selling hand made soaps. And the owner of the stall was a girl who had one of the prettiest eyes I have ever seen !! I had my camera, as always, and I desperately wanted to shoot her (I mean take pictures of her eyes especially). So I sat down in my stall facing her and my camera on my lap with the Live View on. So nobody, including the girl, could tell that I was actually looking at her through my camera, because I was in upright position looking down at my camera screen. She was eating her lunch facing in my direction. I waited and waited for her to look in my direction so that I can get her eyes. Finally the moment came! I clicked at the absolutely the right moment and Voila! If you look at the picture, it looks as if she is deliberately staring at the camera with those beautiful eyes. But the fact is, I was at lease 20 feet away with my lens fully zoomed to 54mm (108mm of 35 mm equivalent) and the picture is cropped at least 30%, I was extremely happy with the live view. However, I had the focus locked on her all the while as I watched her, so there was no hunting by the cam when I released the shutter! The whole process took about 7 to 10 minutes, mostly the waiting time :-)

Tech Info: E-30 14-54mm, f/3.5 @ 1/40 with camera resting on my lap. ISO-800 indoors under hall lights, WB auto.

Pic #8 – The Perfect Storm: This was 19th Dec 2009. The day NJ was battered by one of the fiercest storm the state had ever seen. The storm left behind over 2 ft of snow in less than 18 hrs. The next day was completely white everything covered in the whitest snow I have ever seen. But the thing that fascinated me was the storm itself. It so intense that you could here the sound almost like in the movies. I was trying to take the mood of the storm, but couldn’t get it right with normal method of picture taking. I tried fast shutter, slow shutter different WB setting. But could not get one right. Finally I decided to do one trick I had never tried before – Zooming the lens as soon as the shutter is released. So I held the camera tightly in my had with my elbows tucked in and released the shutter and at the same time Zoomed the lens in. The result was the mood of the perfect storm as I saw it. I loved the outcome.

Tech Spec: E-P2 f/4.5 @ 1/2 sec. ISO 800

Pic #9 – Adi’s Eyes: I believe, my 6 year old son Adu has beautiful eyes. Well, I may be biased since he is my son, but I wanted to capture his naughty, smiling eyes which will tell us what's going on in his mind :-). I made him sit in front of our bedroom window and tried to catch his eyes in the camera. However I realized that his mouth and nose were too distracting (not that they are bad!!) and the message I wanted to convey was getting lost in them. In order to accentuate his eyes, I had to figure out how to shoot his eyes and eyes alone without having him cover his mouth and nose! I tried to use a towel as a veil but it didn’t work. I then noticed that he was fiddling with a straw which is shaped like a Japanese fan (courtesy, neighbor hood restaurant!). I asked him to hold it in front of his eyes and tried a few shots. The first few were blurred eyes because the fan was too far from his mouth and he was not smiling too (I had to use large aperture). This one was perfect for my liking! Smiling eyes seem to tell you about some naughty thoughts going on in his mind!

Tech Info: E-P2 25mm f/4 ISO-400 1/200

Pic #10 – I Love India: Another Candid! On the Indian republic day of 2010, I wanted to capture some of the essence of how Indians celebrate the republic day. After shooting the streets we went to a mall to eat at the McDonalds in Nerul, New Bombay. I was intrigued by the tattoo on the cheeks of this pretty lady. I wanted to shoot her, but as she was sitting in the next table, it was too close for me without making it obvious. So I hid placed my camera on the table and and waited for the right moment. When she at her most natural, I clicked. I loved the expression on her face…those beautiful eyes and luscious lips…I loved the outcome :-)

Tech Info: E-P2, ISO-2000, f/5.6 @ 1/8sec 42mm

Pic #11 – The Red Indian: This is in Plymouth plantation site. The native Indians live in their natural habitat in the Plymouth Plantation. I loved this guy, who was the chief its rude to call him that though!), with his cool head gear! I wanted to capture his expression as he was explaining us more about their lifestyle to our group. I waited and waited but and finally he turned toward me and I clicked :-) thanks to E-30 and 12-60mm the focusing speed was no problem at all! I love the way he carries himself! :-)

Tech Info: E-30, 12:60mm @ 55mm, f/4 @ 1/320s

Pic #12 – The Glowing Moon: Suni and were standing outside on our balcony one night and we noticed that the moon had this strange lovely glow around it. I was quite intrigued by it and I had to shoot it! I was afraid that the surreal glow would not be captured in the image. but was happy to see that it came out exactly as I saw it!

Tech Info: E-30 50-200mm @ 200mm, f/3.5 @ 1/50s

The Pot Sellers – A story in pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 04:20:00 +0000

On my way to office every day, I see everyday these pot sellers selling pots on the roadside. I am as fascinated by the the colorful pots as wither arrangements. Every evening I would vow that I will comeback during the weekend to shoot them and promptly forget or was so lazy that I didn't move out of my house.

Last weekend I decided, that come what may, I will go and shoot them. The sight is too beautiful to miss even for a lazy person like me.

I loath getting out of the house early in the mornings (although I know its the best time for photography). So by the time I was at the Pot Sellers, it was 1PM in the afternoon. And the afternoon sun in India means directly above head casting darkest shadows. Yes, I knew, if I didn't go that day then I would not go ever, I am that lazy!

I packed my gear – a simple one – E-30 with 14-54. Why 14-54? and not 12-60 for instance? No reason what-so-ever. I just felt like taking 14-54 although 12-60 is my favored! :-)

I had the circular polarizer on as well, in order to mellow the harsh sun. I thought of taking Cokin ND GRAD filters. But I didn't want myself to be bogged with trying to change filters at Pot Seller’s place when there may be customers around. Also I knew that I wont be shooting too many bright sky shots.

So I was all set with the gear.

We first went to this place. I loved the beautiful patterns and the colors depicted.

This was owned by one Dilip Kumar (below). A native from a small village in Bihar, he and his brother are work fulltime as wandering pot sellers. They go from city to city to sell pots. Sometimes they settle down in one place, like he has done.

He came across as all-savvy personality but with a sense of humility. He did not have the arrogance or the boneheaded-ness about him! He told me he worked in a MNC software company where he worked on computer. His was counting vehicles and creating a report in and out of the company. He was very proud of his new job!

And when he is away on his real-world job, his brother looks after the pot-selling business.

He was also quite knowledgeable in photography terms. When I was shooting in the sun, he asked me to shoot in the shade. He said the photos will come out good! He also told me to come back again in the evening when the light is better! I was amazed by his knowledge. So I asked him how come he know so many things about photography. He said another person from a local news paper had come a month earlier and he visited him in the evenings couple of times and this photographer told him about light conditions.

I told him I am too lazy :-) so I if I don't do it now then I will never do it!

He was also very proud to face the camera and wanted his pictures takes with different backgrounds

Just beside Dilip’s store, there was one more pot seller. His name was Deepak (below) and he was from Rajasthan. He gets all his pots from Rajasthan and he also makes statues such as parrots or cows.

He had a lovely 6 year old who was intrigued by my E-30! And very photogenic too!

These guys sell pots in the range of 100 to 1500 Indian rupees. That is about USD $2 to $35. But the bargaining is heavy. Generally they markup their prices by about 10% to 30% because they know people bargain anyway! and you can reduce the same if you are willing to spend time and negotiate.

Here are some of the most beautiful pots I have seen

Although I keep referring to them as pot sellers, they have wide range of home decor goods made of clay.

Here are the lovely Chimes

Here are the statues of Gods, god man, parrots cows…you name it!

They also sold some of the most beautiful lotus flowers….in a clay pot of course!

Some technical Info: As I mentioned, it was harsh over head sun. So I had to take care about the shadows and extreme over and under exposures. How I did it? Its simple

Had Polarizer on – This ensured that the harsh sun is mellowed a bit.
I took care not to have to dark and too bright areas in the same frame. I either shot in shade or in the sun, never mixed the two. This ensured I got perfect exposure across the whole frame.
I used spot metering and did not use EV compensation, because I feel sometime I over do the EV comp. I checked and re-checked my LCD for the exposure. If I felt that exposure is not good enough, I re-shot same picture. I must have shot every picture at least 2 times, some of them 4 or 5 times, before I was happy with the exposure.
I used large aperture, this ensure that even if the shots had over or underexposed areas, it was well out-of-focus.

Simple isn’t it? No Rocket science! :-)

Hope you enjoyed the shoot as much as I did

PS: Kudos to E-30. It was sweltering 43 deg out side and it performed like a breeze!

Cheers!

The Bombay Shootout!

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 15:38:00 +0000

I know a title like that will attract attention! I hope it attracts the right kind of attention though :-)

So, Suni, Adu and I toddled along to South Bombay last weekend – and the reason? Well, the goods we shipped from US is finally coming home! So we had to pay a visit to the shipping agents.

And that was an excuse enough to carry my camera, my favored E-P2. Not that I have stopped loving E-30, but as a carry along camera with quality images – E-P2 gives best of pro cameras a good run for their money!

And the lens? Well just the 14-42 (28-84 – 35mm equivalent) kit lens. Nothing flashy, just the bare basic gear – it was a first time for me. I generally carry E-30 with 12-60 and another wide angle and a zoom lens. This time I wanted to travel light. The reason being the heat – its crazy the breeze is cool enough in Bombay, but the humidity and sun kills you and I did not want to be bogged by too many things in my hand.

And I can say I am really glad I made that decision – because I am sure I would not have enjoyed shooting as much as I did with E-P2.

So we left home @ around 9:30 in the morning and the humidity was already oppressive. We took the first class ticket for the local train from Nerul (New Bombay) to VT (Victoria Terminus, now called CST Chattrapati Shivaji Terminus. I, though, prefer to call it by its old name) Station (South Bombay). The journey is about an hour. It being a Saturday, we didn't encounter crowd at all.

Some shots of Nerul Railway station

TECHNICAL INFO: Before I go further, I want to tell you something. In the morning, just before we left home. I accidentally brushed my finger on the image sensor (actually the filter in front of the image sensor) of E-P2! I was so livid at myself for doing that!. I did it while changing the lens, that goes to show how fragile the micro 4/3rd really is. The short flange distance coupled with absence of mirror really leaves very little room for such accidents. I was glad my finger didnt not press on the sensor too hard or I would have been carrying a very expensive junk. I could see my finger print on the sensor though.

IMPORTANT ADVICE– Be doubly, triply careful when changing lenses on micro 4/3rd bodies, you have very little room for errors!!

Although I could not see any problems in the test images I took soon after, I still wanted the sensor cleaned. And I didn't have the guts to do it myself (although I have sensor cleaning kit). So I googled to see where the Oly service center was located in South Bombay, and luckily it was very near to the place we were going and had my sensor cleaned at the service center cost me INR 1800 roughly US $40 :-( . But I am glad I got it cleaned, it gave me peace of mind!

I tested my camera inside the Oly service center to see the results and as usual…E-P2 was perfect

Now for some real shooting!

Our first visit was to Flora Fountain, as it was near the Oly service center. One of the landmarks of South Bombay. Its cool!

Here is an old building – very typical of South Bombay. I love the old Victorian architecture! (It says Insurance company of Canada!)

The Flora Fountain (unfortunately the fountain was turned off!)

Another shot of the Flora Fountain

A Statue near Flora Fountain. Not sure what it signifies though! Comments welcome!

TECHNICAL INFO: All these photos were taken between 1 and 4 PM when the Sun was over head and intense. So many of the structures were backlit, like in pic above. I used spot metering and it was spot ON!! The ESP and Center weighted were way too underexposed for my liking.

Here is another old Victorian building

Another typical Bombay view! in front of Flora Fountain

Form Flora Fountain we went to VT. On the was we stopped at the old Khadi house. A typical Indian store sells handmade clothing (Khadi). Very Old and very cool! Here is an inside view.

The interesting tile floor inside the Khadi House.

And we saw street vendors selling vada pav (a regional delicacy)….yummy!!

Stamp and old currency vendor

The Transport in Bombay - I still don’t understand how the city manages the kind of growth it has. Simply Amazing!

This is more than 100 year old building almost in ruins now

Now the VT – The Majestic VT

TECHNICAL INFO: As I mentioned, the lens I had was 14-42mm which in 35mm equivalent is 28-84mm. This by no means is wide-wide, its more a standard-wide zoom lens. So I had difficulty in getting the entire view of the VT Station and I knew this would be the case before hand so I was not disappointed. I would normally have taken a 9-18 (18-36 for 35mm), but I didn't on this occasion because I didn't want too many camera equipments on me. So if you want to capture wide structures then don't forget to take a wide angle lens at least 18mm (35mm format) or better still a Fish eye

I will tell you an amusing story - As I was shooting the gigantic VT Station in various angle, suddenly a car came and parked near me. A guy got out of the car with Nikon D300 and the biggest bazooka lens attached to it, it must be at least 70-300 (APS-C). And he started trying to shoot with the same angle as I was shooting and was clearly exasperated by his efforts! :-) Finally I finished and moved on as I couldn’t stand his predicament!.

The reason why I told you this story is this – You need to understand photography before you start buying the gear. “The bigger the better” mindset completely fails in photography if you don't know what you are doing. And you will only be burning your money on something you don’t know how to use. Hardware cannot replace or supplement your skills.

VT – Views

The Dome was undergoing maintenance, which was a shame really!

More angles

The Majestic BMC (Bombay Municipal Corporation), right in front of VT Station

The monument for the Martyrs of 1857 freedom movement.

And finally the Bombay Local train! The Ever Reliable!!!

You can also catch the Slide show here of the complete set

Evening and Night shots – My Experiments

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 06:51:00 +0000

I thought of writing this after I recently did a very brief photo-shoot from my 4th floor balcony one evening.

I was just fooling around with my camera when Suni pointed that there is a beautiful sunset outside. I had 12-60mm on camera and grabbed my 50-200mm (100-400mm 35 mm equivalent) as well, just in case. In the hindsight, it was a good decision!

This photo-shoot was also unique in the sense that this was the first time I experimented using full manual exposure mode.

This is one of the shots I took with 50-200. Before I took this one, I had taken a few more shots with in Aperture Priority Mode and matrix and center-weighted metering. I felt that that the camera was underexposing by at least 2 stops when I used Aperture priority with either of the metering modes. So I then put my camera in Spot metering mode and took the reading (shot couple of test shots) with direct focus on the sun. I found that the exposure was better, but I still felt that there was at least half a stop or 1 stop of under exposure. So I put the camera in manual mode and adjusted the aperture and shutter so that I compensated for half stop under exposure.

Here are the result. I think E-30 did the rest. I felt these are amazing result. I kept the white-balance in AUTO. The red of the sun is as perfect as I was looking at it with naked eye.

I also took few shots in various angles so that I can crop them as I want them to be. Here are the results. The wide ones are taken with 12-60mm. But the method used to arrive at the manual exposure values is same.

I then waited for sun to go down and shot the hill which looked hazy and surreal. I converted these into monochrome in Photoshop and added more grain [the noise on E-30 @ ISO200 is zero unfortunately! ;-)] to get the effect. I love the layered effect I got. These were shot in both aperture priority and manual mode and as you can see, there is some difference in the exposure values, however that is more due to the darkness falling rapidly than anything else. I could as well have shot these in A-priority. But for Sun in the picture, I needed to full manual control.

In the same vein, I tried this shot of the crescent moon with the buildings. I struggled a lot to get the exposure right. The moon was going behind the clouds rapidly, and I got this shot just in the nick of time.

Moreover this was 50-200mm handheld. I rested the barrel of the lens on the barrier of my balcony and hand held with IS-1 on and Live View On. I set the exposure manually based on the experiments in A-Priority mode.

These are just some of my experiments….Hope you enjoyed them.

CIAO!

Next Generation Olympus E-System DSLR – My “E-5” Wish list

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 08:50:00 +0000

There have been quite a few rumours of Oly releasing a new professional level DSLR for almost a year now, since it released the last semi-pro E-30 back in Mar-2009.

There have also been rumours about what Oly would call it. Some say its going to be E-5 or E-4 or E-40! Who knows!!?

I don't care what Oly calls it, as long as it meets my wish list.

So, here is the list of things I would Like to see in E-5 (lets call it that, since it sounds a logical nomenclature for E-System)

EVF or OVF – If its EVF then I would like it to be integrated in the body and should be either of same or better quality than that of E-P2 EVF. If its OVF then its got to be as good as E-3 at least. 100% view OVF will only make sense when you are talking of a pro-DSLR
High ISO noise – Although E-P2 is a definite improvement over E-30 in terms of noise management, its still leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to ISO beyond 3200. I would like to see 2 things as far as high ISO is concerned;
- I would like to have the ISO limit extended to 12800
- I would like the IQ (image quality) to be same as current ISO 1600 in E-P2 up until at least ISO 6400. This will be totally phenomenal if E-5 can deliver this.
Integrated Vertical Grip - Although HLD-4 for E-3 and E-30 is great, I still feel an integrated vertical grip would make it better in terms of handling and looks. Though is a low priority, I really won’t be disappointed if its not provided.
Dynamic Range – E-P2 senor + image processor provides a vast improvement on DR over E30. I feel E-30 is a great camera and has a good DR between ISO 200-400, but it decreases rapidly beyond that and also ISO 100 DR is not same a compared to E-P2. I found E-P2 has better DR even till ISO 1600. I would like to see an improved on this. It will be really cool to have a sensor and image processor with a DR better than E-P2
Auto Focus – While E-30 and E-3 have one of the fastest AF in business, but its tied to Oly’s HG & SHG lenses. I would still like to see an improvement in following areas;
- Increase in number of AF points and more zones.
- Faster AF performance with consumer grade lenses like 18-180 or 70-300.
- Better lowlight AF performance across all lens grades. E-30 sometimes struggles in low light.
- Better Continuous AF with tracking. Its a good idea introduced in E-P2, but C-AF + Track needs a lot of improvement if it has to be effective in real world, like race course for example.
Live View – This is simple. The E-30 LV is hardly usable. While E-P2 is a major milestone. However, if I can go back a little in the past, I think E-330 LV was fantastic, sexy and revolutionary! I am not saying I want one like that in E-5, but I would definitely like to see improvements in LV and LV + AF. The LV+AF in E-P2 is not what you would expect from even mid-range camera. Low light LV performance should be better than E-P2.
Image Stabilization (IS) – The IS in E-P2 and E-30 are fantastic. Not sure what more can be done to this. But miniaturization done for E-P2 would definitely help because IS in E-30 is a little noisy and the one in E-P2 is quiet as a feather. So E-5 should have the same (or better, if at all possible) IS performance as E-30 with reduced noise.
The Body – The body should have the following quality
- The body should have same or better ergonomic design as E-3 or E-30. Button placements should be logical as in E-30. Oly should change the button placements only if they can see at least 200% improvement over E-30 or E=3 otherwise they would be better off leaving it unchanged.
- Body should be same size as E-3 or E-30. It SHOULD NOT be smaller. That would be a real shame.
- Body should be weather sealed and dust proof. I should be able wash my E-5 after taking it to the beach!!:-)
- Should have 3-inch or bigger swivel LCD. LCD should have a higher resolution. I know Oly guys must have gone deaf hearing this request, but yes, it needs to have higher resolution. A touch screen would be nice ;-) but I wont mind if its not! :-)
HD Video – I am not a great fan of HD videos in DSLRs. However, since I have 6 year old, I find using E-P2 convenient because I can shoot photos and videos when needed with a twist of a wheel. I liked the idea of having a great quality still and video camera in the box. Also following the expectation from the users would be a good idea. So HD video with 1080p resolution. Also the AF in movie mode should be faster than E-P2.
FPS – Frames Per Second – While 5FPS of E-3 and E-30 is ok for me. I sometimes do miss the 8 to 10 FPS when shooting birds. I would like to see at least 8FPS on E-5. If E-5 happens to be mirror less with electronic shutter, then recent technological advances predict that 20FPS is also possible. But I would be happy even with 8 or 10 FPS.
RAW + TIFF – My E-330 has this option. Not sure why Oly removed this from there future E-bodies. This is great feature to have. I need this back.
Better in Camera RAW edit – I would like to see better RAW edit in camera. Like ability to crop after changing aspect ratio, or ability to change the Exposure in RAW, ability to apply all art filters etc. But this is lowest on the list. Ability to change the exposure and making copy into RAW would be very helpful though.
In Camera Time Lapse Photography – This would something I would love instead of having to shoot tethered. I know I can buy 3rd party remotes which do that. But I still would like this feature in camera, though low on list.
Better Customization – I would like to see the customization;
- Function button has improve drastically. It should be more intuitive and more customizable. I liked what old Canon EOS-30 had. I want to see something like that
- I would also would like my commonly used settings to be storable and retrievable easily.

Ok Oly guys! Now get to work! :-)

High ISO Shooting

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 05:14:00 +0000

First of all – Apologies for not writing for almost 2 months. As most of you know, I am now in India and the move was extremely hectic and overwhelming! I am now settled though, and hope to continue my blog as before!

So, coming to this blog. Lets first understand why HIGH ISO is even a topic and what ISO and high ISOs are.

As many of you would have noticed something labeled as ISO on your cameras. But most people I know have hardly used this feature because they either don’t know how to use it or don’t know what it means or both.

In simple terms – ISO is defined a film or the image sensor speed. It defines how fast or slow the film or image sensor is. In other words it is simply a measure of sensitivity of the film or the image sensor to light. So higher the ISO, greater is the sensitivity of the film or image sensor - which is what is called fast film or sensor. If the ISO is low then its the slow film or image sensor which is to say its less sensitive to light.

If you own a digital camera, then ISO speed are marked as 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200 and so on…

I will not touch upon the how the ISO affects the exposure stops as its much more involved subject. For the time being its enough for you to understand that the following

A low ISO say 100 or 200 will make your image sensor less sensitive to light. So you will need more exposure time to shoot a scene. Slower shutter speed.
A high ISO of say 800 or 1600 will make the image sensor more sensitive light. So you will need less exposure time to shoot the same scene. Faster shutter speed.
To be exact – every doubling of ISO speed, you double the sensitivity of the film or sensor. So you will need a faster shutter speeds as you increase the ISO (assuming your aperture or f-number is constant) to get the correct exposure.

So, when do you need high ISO? – In most daylight situations, an ISO of 100, 200 or 400 should be enough. But things change when you have following scenarios and that is when you need higher ISO

You cannot use or do not have a flash and you are shooting indoors under natural or artificial light
You want to use fast shutter speed to freeze an action.
You are in an aquarium or a museum. Now you may say you can use flash. But you will get horrible pics if you choose to use external flash in aquarium unless you do a professional setup. So I would rather go with high ISO to get faster shutter so that I reduce shake
Remember – as a general rule you should have the shutter speed which is at least reciprocal of the highest focal length of the lens. So if you lens is 50mm then you should have the minimum shutter of 1/50 so that you don’t get into camera shake effect. So increasing ISO in such a situation to get optimum shutter speed is desirable.

Now having said this, if you are shooting in a lowlight without tripod then you better have a very good reason for doing so. But like we all know, its not practical to have tripod every where you go, even if you have it, its not practical to set it up everywhere. High ISO will come to the rescue for you.

Those were the advantages and ways to use high ISO, of course as with everything else in life, all good things come with a price. So does high ISO.

A high ISO makes the image sensor very sensitive to light, which in turn introduces digital noise in the picture. As seen from the picture below, use of ISO-2000 has allowed me to use a shutter of 1/500 inside a mall. However it has lots of tiny specs. This is noise.

However there is way to get rid of digital noise during post processing. I use a software called Noiseware.

The corrected image in Photoshop and using Noiseware to reduce noise.

But such software have their limitations. They work best when your exposure is spot-on. If your picture is under exposed, then you are in trouble. The noise reduction software will do more harm then good.

This is because any image sensor/processor has a higher latitude for over exposure in low light than under exposure. So if you over expose your pic then you may be able salvage it even if it has lot of noise. But if you under expose, then you are definitely in trouble.

I will show you an example. Here are 2 pictures.

Both are shot @ ISO 3200. The first picture is terribly under exposed. So it had a lot of noise and even with a lot of post processing in Photoshop, I couldn't get the exposure right nor was the Noiseware able to remove the noise properly. The result – bad picture, terribly underexposed, no clarity what-so-ever, bad noise. You can see the noise even after processing with Noiseware.

Second picture was over exposed by 2 stops. I could salvage this picture in Photoshop and get almost correct exposure. I could also remove almost all noise and picture is perfectly clear. Although you do see some camera shake in it, that's because of slow shutter as a result of over exposure. Also there is some loss of details in the bright areas, but who cares….I got the subjects nice!

So, if you want to shoot in low light with high ISO, always remember to ensure your exposure is right. One way of ensuring this is to use SPOT metering on the subject and adjusting the EV (Exposure value) to get the appropriate exposure.

Remember over exposure is better than under exposure any day when shooting in lowlight.

Some High ISO examples

ISO-3200

ISO-2000

ISO-1600 for 1/8000 sec to freeze the bird. Broad daylight.

ISO-2000

Hope this was helpful!

E-P2 – The Test Drive!

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 01:54:00 +0000

Finally!!! I got my E-P2 yesterday evening!. Last night we went to the mall for the first test drive and today I took it to office in NYC for the second test drive! Boy am I surprised & pleased!!! The pics straight out of camera are pretty cool!
Most of the pics I have posted here are straight out of the camera taken as Small-Fine and Small-Super-Fine JPEGs. I have touched up only those pics which I took through thick glasses in my office or through train window.
I did shoot in RAW + JPEG, but i didn't have time to process RAW and couldn't wait to post the first test pics!

Verdict: Although not as powerful in terms of spec as my E-30, yet it packs an amazing punch. Its image quality combined with its small size is really something to kill for.
The Viewfinder is fantastic even in very very very low light, simply a great piece of engineering & design.
The LCD is unlike E-30's because on a very bright day I have difficulty using Live view as I cant see anything on E-30's LCD. but E-P2 LCD is fantastic.
The 3 FPS is pretty jiffy and doesn't lag much.
My first reaction is E-P2 has better dynamic range than E-30. But this is a non-scientific statement, its just what I concluded looking the pics.
IS is amazing! Al my office night shots are hand held @ 2 sec or 1.6 sec.
The focusing is not too bad if you are a patient man on standard grade lenses (better than my Evolt-330). Focusing is pretty fast on High Grade lenses like 14-54 and 12-60. For the kind of photography I do, I don't think I will have a problem with E-P2's focusing speed.
High ISO performance is fantastic. it clearly trumps E-30 here.
AF-tracking is ok - nothing extraordinary about it. probably will good for shooting small children.

White balance is amazing! I think its better than E-30’s WB,

Something I noticed: If the face-detect is on then the camera was not able to focus on close subjects if background had too many things, it always focused the things in the background. But without face-detect, I could pretty much get it to focus on any kind of subject.

Best features I liked - Dynamic range, View Finder, high ISO performance and IS

Features I would Like - A way to use flash and view finder! :-) well I knew it before I bought it, but still I would have like this feature.

Here they are!

You be the judge!

That's Me

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 02:00:00 +0000

That's Me, originally uploaded by Puru's Photos.

We were on our way to the beautiful Martha's Vineyard. While waiting for the bus to take us to the ferry, I got totally bored. I had all the gear but nothing to photograph!
Then Suni mentioned that I dont take too many family photos while we are on vacation!

So I turned around and shot this pic! It show me in Suni's eyes. Of course I did miss Adu, its still not a complete family pic!

Am I crazy? or Am I crazy!

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 02:25:00 +0000

…and that my dear friends is the question!

Well, why am I asking this question? Take a look at this

This, my dear friends, is the new E-P2. The newest micro 4/3rd digital camera. Remember, its not an SLR, its not a point and shoot….as Olympus calls it…its digital PEN!

Now, why am I saying all this? That’s because I have a serious desire to buy this, that’s why!

Everybody, including my beautiful wife ask me – Why do I need one more camera?

Today I was talking to my friend and when I told her I am waiting for E-P2 to be released she said “You are going crazy with your photography equipments, you are going over the top – seriously you should control!”

I was taken aback by this reproach and it got me thinking. This blog is an introspection as a result. What this blog is not – an excuse to buy this camera or other equipments.

I have an Olympus E-30 – top of the range DSLR and Evolt-330 – an armature DSLR as a supplementary camera.

Why on earth would I need E-P2 which looks like a point and shoot!

Before I answer that, let me tell you something.

Researching on photography equipments is my serious pastime. This does not mean, I buy anything I happen to like or afford or looks great. My photography gear includes (apart from camera bodies) 7 lenses from 9mm to 300mm range, 2 external flashes, 3 memory cards, filters, light meter, remote and cable release, diffusers, pro-tripod. All these are fruits of huge amount of research I have put in to really understand what I need for the kind of photography I am interested in. I am interested in landscape and indoor photography. So my gear is geared-up, so to say, for that kind of photography. What I don't own, I don't need – because I am not into other kinds of photography - like architecture, fashion, underwater etc.

I can list tons of equipments, which I don't own :-) which I know I don’t need.

Ok, now coming back to the question – Why on earth do I need E-P2? I have 2 DSLR bodies, why do I need this one which looks like another point and shoot.

To reveal the truth folks – This is not a point-and-shoot. It has almost the same spec as my E-30 (not quite, but almost).

But that doesn't answer the question, why do I need it?

Since I bought my second DSLR E-30, I have always felt the need for a very low profile high quality camera. But why? both my DSLRs (although E-330 is lot smaller) are quite big. I have found that this limits my desire and ability to carry them everywhere I want to. For example, I like to carry my camera when I am invited to somebody’s house for a party or when I go to a mall or when I go to my office during festive seasons and more - it gives me opportunity to shoot the moments. However the DSLRs are too “in-your-face” things and are not inconspicuous and I always end-up deciding against taking them with me. I always wanted something very small which I can carry anywhere without people noticing it.

You might say “Ok – that's all fine Puru, but why on earth you need a $1000 camera when you can buys a $200 point-and-shoot which looks the same?”

My reasons are as follows (fruits of my research :-))

I did not want a point-and-shoot – I wanted a camera with almost same kind of spec as my DSLRs, but will be so small that I can put it in my pocket.
I wanted a camera which will have huge image sensor, an in-body image stabilization and high-ISO capability because I will be shooting a lot in low light without tripod. Image sensor of E-P2 is at least 2 to 4 times normal point-and shoot. It has 6400 ISO capability and has an IS.
I needed a camera in which I can change lenses and which can make use of all my existing lenses so that I don't have invest in lenses.
A camera which will work with my flashes and cable release so that I don't have to buy them again.
A camera which can do everything and yet will be tiny enough.
A camera which will have same image quality as my DSLRs

Now I hear another question “Now we understand why you need E-P2, but the why on earth do you need your DSLRs then?”

Well, for the simple reason of control and extendibility– Its much easier to control the DSLR than to control E-P2 in various situations although E-P2 will give me almost same kind of control as DSLR. Second its easier to extend my DSLR to do various kinds of photography like fashion photography with multiple strobes and multiple flash groups or underwater photography with underwater housing or serious wildlife photography or very high-speed photography. E-P2 is a not meant to replace my DSLR nor can it. Its role will be to complement it in situations where DSLR is an over kill.

Now another question – Why did I take that reproach from a friend so seriously that I had to write a blog? Well, I am actually used it, my wife always says I buy too many things for my photography. I probably don’t take her too seriously because I know her too well and believe she, in her heart, understands why I need my equipments although she is worried about the money I spend.

When a friend told me I am going over the top, it actually got me thinking. Did my friend see something which I am not seeing?

Although I knew I was not going over the top, I had to prove I was not to myself. It gave me an opportunity to introspect and question my own judgments and my hobby as a whole. Is my hobby only as good as my equipments? I don’t think so, but that's for people to judge.

I believe my equipments will ultimately be key factors in the plans I have for the future. So in that sense, I feel I am ok! :-)

But I thank my friend for making me think! :-)

CIAO and take care!

How to choose your first DLSR?

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 02:17:00 +0000

Question: What is the the most embarrassing moment in your life?

Answer: Watching yourself talk on the TV!

Well, you may ask “How is this question and the answer is relevant and how is it related to the blog subject?”

Answer to that is – It is not relevant and it is not related to the blog subject :-)

Remember I told you guys in my last blog that I did an exhibition on 10th of October 09? Well, I forgot to mention a minor detail. It so happens that, in that exhibition a local TV crew were roaming about interviewing people. I did not notice them until they came to my stall and then came the most stressful moment for me. I was asked to say a few things about my art, in front of camera and with a mike in my hand! Well, I did say (or blurted out rather) something.

I had completely forgotten what I said and about that unfortunate incident until, that is, I happen to see the recording aired on the local TV station today (28th Oct 09)! Oh Man! That was the most embarrassing moment of my life - listening to myself talking in front of a camera with a mike in my hand!

Such, my dear folks, is life – sooner or later everything comes back to you!! :-)

Well, enough of nonsense - now for some serious stuff.

How to choose DLSR if you are the first time buyer?.

3 things most important while choosing a DSLR for the first time are.

Format i.e. 4/3rd (Olympus, Panasonic etc) or APS-C (Canon, Nikon)
Brand
Budget and Specs

FORMAT

A format in DSLR world is nothing but the size of the image sensor. Image Sensor is the Film of the DSLR or any digital camera and is the eye of the camera. There are number of Formats. Following figure illustrates the various formats available.

Image Source- Wikipedia

In DLSR the most popular formats are the Four Thirds and the APS-C. Once you select the format you will be married to it. Because all your lenses and accessories will be of that format. So once you choose a format, you will find it extremely expensive to switch to another format. So this will be your most important decision. All decisions from here on will be based on this one particular choice. I chose to go the four thirds way. Now whether that is a good choice or not I do not know. The reason why I chose 4/3rds format is for following reasons.

Its an Open format, it is not proprietary like APS-C (both Nikon and Canons are APS-C, however Nikon and Canon lenses cannot be interchanged, because as see in the above image, they implement APS format in their own respective standards so their image sensor sizes are different and hence lenses are different). This mean I can buy lenses from any manufacturer as long as it says 4/3rds without worrying about anything.
Secondly, its a format which closely resembles the aspect ratio of the physical photograph standard. So the there is lot less cropping.
Thirdly, the High Grade Pro Lenses are lot less expensive than the APS-C counterparts.

So choose the format carefully. Do research on the net. Read blogs and visit discussion forums. And once you have made up your mind, keep in mind that you will find it very expensive to change it.

BRAND

Brand decision will be born out of format decision. If you select 4/3rds then you will have to go with Olympus or Panasonic (micro four thirds (MFT) a variant of four thirds but all four thirds lenses will fit on MFT with an adapter).

If you select APS-C then Canon, Nikon, Pentax, Sony etc.

Again – Once you select the brand you will be married to it. You will find it cost prohibitive to change brands, especially if its APS-C brands. With 4/3rds or MFT you can at least switch between 2 brands dealing in 4/3rds lenses and bodies. I chose Olympus for the in-body image stabilization. Which I think is great!

BUDGET and SPECS

These 2 are directly related. More budget you have better DLSR body you can buy. But if you are a beginner what should be your budget?

IMHO (in my humble opinion) you should budget at least $700 to $800 (US dollars) for a decent body and at least 18-55mm and 70-300mm lenses (lens config may be different in different brands). Idea is that you should budget for DSLR body, and at 2 lenses – 1 wide angle zoom and one telephoto zoom. If you have more budget then you can invest in a good external flash.

Based on this you can research which spec of DLSR body fits your budget.

So the bottom Line is

Research on the format
Research on the Brand – Most important criteria is abundant availability of lenses and accessories in your country.
Choose the DSLR Body spec according to your budget with at least 2 lenses
Order of the choices should be as above – don't for example fix a budget and then go hunting for the DSLR. Because brand that you choose will decide the budget. You can fix a range on budget though, say from $600 to $800, something like that.
Do not be overwhelmed by the information.
Read both pros and cons on format and brands
You first DLSR will not be and need not be a pro or even advanced armature. You need to understand the basic DSLR beast before you can graduate to higher end models. You should not buy a higher end model unless you are convinced that you have out grown your current model.
Most importantly – You should know basic photographic techniques and photography basics, including but restricted to fundamental knowledge on – composition, aperture, shutter, manual control, exposure, white balance etc

I may do an edit on this post to add more – Keep watching!

In the meantime – Enjoy the Fall Colors

CIAO!!

Coming back – What was I doing?

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 02:13:00 +0000

Some of you may be wondering what the heck have I been doing. Why has this guy stopped disturbing us with his weekly mails?
Reasons are as follows

I entered into 2 competitions (I have already communicated about one to you). I had to do some preparation for those. I will tell you about these in a moment.

I then had to prepare for my exhibition at Barron Arts Fest. That exhibition was held today (10th Oct 2009) and I will tell you what I sold.

In between I also did couple of photo shoots, you can see them here
- St James’ Street Fair and Carnival
- Woodbridge River Watch Environmental Site

After coming back from vacations in early September, I had around 1000 pics to process. And this is what took away most of my time. I have already posted the Eastern Point and Mystic Seaport pictures. I will post Cape Cod pictures soon, I promise.

Many people ask – What do I mean by processing the pictures? Aren’t my pictures digital? So isn’t it already processed and I have the JPEGs ready to share straight from the camera?
Well folks, contrary to common assumption, some of you may be surprised to learn that none of the pictures that you see in any good site or magazine is straight from the camera. Almost all pictures need some form of processing (called post processing) in an image editor (such as Photoshop, Photomatix etc) in order to make it appealing or “presentable”. Some of the adjustment photographers do in post processing are;

White Balance – To get the proper color temperature for the image i.e to either warm or cool an image
Tone – To adjust color tones
Exposure – some times when looking into the LCD of you camera, you may not notice if the image is under or over exposed a bit. Photographers need to correct these if there is any issue with the exposure
Vibrancy and Saturation – To remove the dullness in color.
Fill light – To highlight dark areas
Contrast – To adjust the contrast between various colors in the image
Sharpness – To soften or sharpen an image or part of it
Noise – To reduce or increase noise in an image

This is not a complete list of post processing adjustments, however these are some of the crucial adjustments. In order to gain as much control over each of these adjustments as possible, seasoned photographers generally shoot their images in RAW format. This helps them in having better control over all the above adjustments and more, during post processing.
Post processing is a very time consuming job. And it requires a lot of patience.
Now coming to my competitions
The first competition was held at the New Brunswick Library in collaboration with Alfa Art Gallery. Photographers were required to submit 3 of their best pictures which were shot in New Brunswick. I submitted 3 of mine, but I forgot to read the crucial condition – photographs must be taken in New Brunswick! And none of my 3 photographs were shot in New Brunswick!
However I was not the only one who made the mistake. The judges selected 2 of my photographs to be in top 3!! But at the last moment had to give me just honorary mention for those 2 photographs because I failed to meet that criteria.
These are the 2 pics which one the honorary mention (I got a certificate for these - cool!)
Honorary mention #1

Honorary mention #2

The second competition was held in the Woodbridge town hall. The theme was similar. We were asked to provide 3 photographs taken in Woodbridge. This time I did not make any mistakes. I submitted the best 3 pics I had of Woodbridge. The following picture won the 3rd prize in the competition!

This was taken in the Woodbridge farmer’s market!
Now coming to Barron Arts Fest Exhibition. Well, I have been preparing for this for almost 4 weeks. The exhibition was on 10 Oct 09 between 10 AM to 4PM. But on the day of the exhibition, we had slight drizzle until 12PM :-( which meant people did not turn up until 1PM. Even then there were only a handful and many were just mid-day strollers! So a not so satisfying exhibition. I did manage to sell 5 photos and 2 calendars for about $120 , but I was not completely satisfied with the response to the exhibition itself.

BLOG UPDATE***: Pictures from Award Ceremony @ Alpha Art Gallery

Photographer & Copyright owner: Jim Roselli

Both my pictures on display @ Alpha Art Gallery

Suni and I listening to the Award presentation ceremony

One of my pictures being shown during the presentation ceremony (Presenter and coordinator: Ms. Kavita Pandey)

Receiving certificate for Award#1 :-)

Award #2 :-)

Signing the guest book.

HDR – An “ethical” question

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 00:17:00 +0000

This article will ask for your patience. I apologize for making this a non-photography article. But I feel its important for me answer your questions.

When I posted my first HDR link on flickr.com and sent to my blog group I got this reaction from almost everybody.

“The pics are great, but…”

I knew what was coming :-)

“…they don’t look natural” :-)

There is an ethical question behind this. But before I go into that, I would like to tell you a story. Its my story, as is yours I am sure.

Let me take you about 23 years back, late eighties. I remember I was still in school days. I was in India. I hadn’t yet seen any of the world that I have seen now. We had only one channel on the TV called Doordarshan or DD for short. On this DD channel a program used to be aired called “World This Week” (WTW). It used to be aired every Friday night at 10PM. I used to wait whole week for this program, because this was the only program which showed us (kids in India) the world as it happened. All other news we used to get on national TV was just Indian or what government wanted us see of the world. News was controlled and censored by the government. Although WTW aired on government owned channel and was heavily censored at that time, it still gave us a best possible peek that we could have had to the outside world.

This was also the time when compact discs (CD) were making a splash as storage media. One Friday night I was watching WTW and, I remember, there was a clip about how CDs can be used to store hundreds of songs as opposed to just 15 or 20 songs on a 2-sided cassette tape. A clip was shown how the CDs store information in 1’s and 0’s rather than continuous magnetic variations as in a tape. At the end of this particular news item, the anchor (Pranoy Roy) asked a question, which is still fresh in my mind “Is it as good as the cassette?” he answered himself “The future will tell”.

As you can see, magnetic tape is all but dead (doesn’t mean it was bad though). And the 1’s and 0’s have triumphed!

So how do I connect this to the HDR issue which I faced with my blog group?

I completely respect my blog group and their comments, for they have encouraged me so much. So I completely understand their predicament when they see an HDR enhanced image, which is;

“I was given a link for photographs, but I am looking at something which resembles painting. Where are the photographs?”

There is an ethical question behind this – which is “Should we use HDR technique to create something more than a mere photograph?”

Answer is – depends on choice, changes in tastes and trends. I grew up with a film camera, up to couple of years back, I completely detested digital cameras, because I could never get my photographs as well I could with a film camera (at least I thought so). Today – I swear by the DSLR and the four-thirds format (which takes me completely away from 35mm film camera). Trend does triumph in the end.

I posted the same flickr HDR link on my LinkedIn groups. One person, Eugene is her name, asked me about HDR technique and how it is done. Mind you, she did not comment at first, but contacted me privately. After I answered her back (privately of course) and explained her about HDR (as much as I know about it). She thanked me and also wrote a public comment on the group post which said;

“Puru very nice work, it has it's place in today's photo trends” and that my dear folks is your answer! :-)

HDR image -

Non-HDR Image

We decide what we want to like, until the trend hits us :-) !

CIAO!

Something for the Ladies (Suni’s Jewellery)

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 11:44:00 +0000

As some of you may already be knowing, my wife Suni is into making jewellery. This is one of her really serious passions, I should say. She has so many hobbies that we have lost count of them longtime ago :-)

The onus of photographing her jewellery, naturally lies with me. And since I can’t charge her for the work, I take my own sweet time before I get interested enough to shoot them. Often we end up fighting on how to photograph a particular jewellery. The “creative difference” arise especially on the background to use and angle to shoot from. :-) Sometimes the fights are so serious that we have to suspend the shooting sessions to finish the fight :-)

Here are some of the fruits of our fights!

I generally use two setups. A macro-box, which I made at home, to photograph the close-ups of jewellery using flash. About 90% of jewellery close-ups are shot using this macro-box. And the sunlight + diffuser setup. This gives the subjects a more natural look.

Here is the link of how to make the macro-box or light-box. I used the instructions in this blog to make my macro-box

http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/07/how-to-diy-10-macro-photo-studio.html

The Setup: Here are my 2 Setups

I use both FL-50R and FL-36R for when using the box. I use them in the wireless TTL mode, as can be seen. This means they are not connected in anyway to my E-30. The E-30’s built-in flash acts as a transmitter which triggers these flashes.
Picture shows the triggered flashes. The external flashes are extremely expensive. If you want a cheaper version of this setup, then you can also use 2 150W white lamps on either side, instead of flashes. They will be less than 1/10th of the price of flash.

The diffuser setup is cheap and easy. All you need is a window from which you get direct sunlight (morning or evening) and a diffuser. The big white, round thing in the picture is the diffuser - setup directly in the path of the sunlight.
The object is placed in front of the diffuser.
The diffuser softens the harsh sunlight so that the object gets illuminated evenly.
This is the cheapest form of setup (about $40 for 5-in-1 diffuser/reflectors set) for macro photography. But here you may not have the luxury of changing the direction of light as you wish.

Point to Ponder: What works best for jewellery photography

Always shoot from a low angle, this gives the jewellery you are shooting a perspective. Sometimes the top angle works, but I generally prefer low angle.
Jewellery items are not big subjects, so always try to get as close as possible without losing any part of the jewellery. The jewelry should should fill the frame. If it doesn’t then people may wonder “what the heck is the subject here?”
Shoot earrings in bunch – they not only help fill the frame, but they also make the picture interesting.
Add accents, items (such as a flower, twig etc) which enhance the effect of jewellery. Generally accents with contrasting colors work.
Choose a contrasting background which makes the jewellery stand out.
Shallow depth of field (small f-number) works best. It gives the jewellery an interesting tone. Always ensure that the front most part of the jewellery is in sharp focus. If you have the mid-section or the back part in focus then the whole picture will look odd and uninteresting.
Use post processing to enhance colors and contrasts.

NOTE: All designs are copyright of Sunita Purushottam

Click on the images to enlarge

	The Red necklace (“kundan”). This was taken in natural light using diffuser
	The kundan taken using the macro box.
	Kundan on the red box inside the macro-box
	The Pearl and gold bead necklace. Macro-box. Shot from top using tripod and 2 150W lamps.
	The black bead necklace inside the macro box. Using 2 flashes.
	Glass bead necklace
	Woven seed bead necklace
	Black glass bead necklace
	Assorted earrings + 1. Shot inside the macro-box.
The white pearl necklace.	The onyx bead necklace

What makes a good photograph?

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 20:12:00 +0000

Its not just one thing that makes a photo looks good, there are several reasons. Lets discuss in a layman’s language some of the aspects of taking a picture that makes it appealing. I am only delving into the aspects which I feel affect most. I am not touching many other aspects here which are also very important (such as exposure, white-balance, tones, gradation etc).

Framing

Framing is probably the most important factor in making a picture appealing to anybody. If the picture is framed well, then half the job is done.

A badly framed picture below left makes a beautiful scene look ordinary. Where as a slight change in framing makes a whole lot of difference on the right

While framing a picture one must always keep in mind a few things.

What you see with a naked eye may not be as appealing in a picture. This is because your eye has more than 180 degrees field of view (also called wide angle) and your view finder does not. So when you see a scene with a naked eye, its lot more appealing because of various interesting areas in the scene. However same cannot be framed using a camera view finder because it just isn’t wide enough. So while framing the scene though a view finder, just ask yourself- including what things in the frame would make it better?
Center composition/horizon in the center– These are some of the most common mistakes. Most people compose the picture with the subject dead in the center or horizon in the center. Picture on the left above has horizon dead in the center while the one on the right has horizon off center. And you can see the difference it makes. Sometime however center composition does makes sense (picture below of the flower left). But such instances are rare. So the best best is to have the subject off center (pic below on right).

Follow the rule of thirds to frame. – The rule of thirds is a compositional rule of thumb in visual arts such as painting, photography and design. The rule states that an image should be imagined as divided into nine equal parts by two equally-spaced horizontal lines and two equally-spaced vertical lines, and that important compositional elements should be placed along these lines or their intersections. Proponents of the technique claim that aligning a subject with these points creates more tension, energy and interest in the composition than simply centering the subject would. See the GIF below.

Source: Wikipedia

Author: User:Moondigger

Description: Animated image based on Image:Rivertree_1_md.jpg, demonstrating the rule of thirds

Refer to the sites below for detailed explanation. But don't over do it. Sometimes close-ups look better without the rule-of-thirds applied. Use your judgment.
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_thirds
- http://photoinf.com/General/KODAK/guidelines_for_better_photographic_composition_rule_of_thirds.html

Lighting

Lighting is the second most importing thing when taking a picture. When taking a picture, you must bear in mind no part of your picture is overexposed (i.e. where details are washed out) and no part is underexposed either (i.e. portions which are too dark). On top of this, you need to ensure that your subject is perfectly exposed. And that we all know is easier said than done.

Some of the simple ways of ensuring that you have good exposure is to check where the light is coming from. If the subject is backlit, for example (meaning light source is behind the subject), then its a good idea to use a flash to light up the subject. Or if the subject is under bright sunlight then its recommended that you use a diffuser so that shadow under chin are soft.

Most people think bright sunny day is the best time to photograph. But its the exact opposite – you need a good cloud cover for getting great photographs. And if you need blues skies in you pictures then the best time for taking pictures is early sunrise and late in the afternoon when sun is about couple of hours to set. That way you will get the best possible light for your pictures.

If you are photographing flowers or other subjects for close-ups– then always remember to use one of the following techniques

Using diffuser when shooting outside under bright sun
Shooting indoor under natural light (example near a window or in a flower conservatory)
Shooting the flowers indoor with a combination of natural light and flash (to enhance the lighting effects)
Shooting inside the close-up box (for details see here)

Hover mouse on these pics to see how they were shot.

Bokeh

Aperture setting will let you decide the Depth of Field (DoF). DoF is the background or foreground of the subject. Greater the DoF implies both the subject and background (or foreground, as the case may be) are in focus. Lower the DoF – implies that the subject is clear focus but the background if out of focus (the out of focus background is also “bokeh” – this word originate from the Japanese word “boke” - meaning haze or blur).

Depending on the situation you may want to blur the background or show higher DoF. As in the case of the Flower shots above the background is blurred while the flower itself is in perfect focus giving it a unique appearance. Where as in the shot above of the parasailers – the DoF is greater, so the parasailer in the background also appears sharp. For more details on how to use aperture – refer to my previous blog on related to this topic.

To get greater DoF (clearer background) – You should set the f-number to high on your camera - so f/18, for example, would give a clearer background than f/8
To get a bokeh – set the aperture/f-number as low as possible.

	With Bokeh – Shallow DoF (Aperture f/3.5)
	Greater DoF (no bokeh) (aperture f/8)

Freeze or Flow

Sometimes you may want to either freeze the action to give your picture a sense of motion. This is particularly affective in shooting children or sports.

Or sometimes you may want to show the flow. This is useful in shooting waterfalls.

To freeze the action set the shutter speed to fast.
To show the flow – set the shutter speed to as low as possible (without compromising exposure). For this you will have to set the Aperture small as possible. You would need a tripod to use slow shutter speed otherwise you would get blurred picture due to camera shake.

Pictures below show the examples of Freeze and flow

Finally – Do Not Hurry!

This is the most important aspect of photography. Most of us just point the camera and shoot. I blame this hurry on the most idiotic phrase ever coined - “point-and-shoot cameras”. Although most of our modern digital cameras (non-DSLRs) are small and allow you to take a pictures in a hurry, I feel “hurry” should be the last thing on your mind. Most modern digital cameras (non-DSLRs) are extremely versatile and have lot of features which you can use to get better control on your technique and on your results– sadly (for no apparent reason I can think of) these manually controllable features are not advertised properly by the makers (except in the manuals).

Also I have seen people with a good DSLRs using the Auto mode to shoot pictures. It doesn’t get worse than that. You WILL get bad pictures.

By hurrying, you are losing out on experimenting, framing, proper exposure, aperture settings, shutter speed settings etc. But if you take just couple of minutes to prepare and execute a frame, then chances are you will get a lot better result.

Remember – Camera is just an aid for taking pictures – Ultimately its the person behind the camera who has the canvas, brush and the colors. Use the tools properly and you will get good results.

See you again!

Shooting with the moon

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 01:25:00 +0000

Sometime ago, I wrote an article on “Shooting the Moon”. That article talked about photographing the moon as the sole subject. Actually shooting the moon alone is pretty simple – as simple as setting the shutter speed and using the proper zoom! After I published that article, I got a lot of queries from people asking for picture of scene with moon it in. They also wanted to know how to do it.

Although it looks pretty simple at first – it is not so.

This article will talk about how to shoot a scene with moon in it – as you will see this is a completely different proposition than shooting the moon.

There are 2 problems

Problem #1: Its almost impossible† to get moon and the scene in the same lighting condition. Moon is almost always bright and the scene around is almost always dark. So if you have long exposure then you run the risk of sacrificing the details on the moon and it appears as smudgy white blob. If you have the moon clear then the scene around appears totally dark.

Problem #2: This is the problem of proportion. As we all know, moon is a lot farther than all objects around you. So when you look at the scene with moon in it through your lens, it will appear tiny – although the same scene appears ok when seen with naked eye. This is because when you see the moon through naked eyes, information is actually processed by your brain. The brain’s algorithm takes into consideration the nearness of the scene around and the farness of the moon and presents a picture which is perfect. So it is not really WYSIWYG (What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get). But when you see it through the lens, this additional processing is not there. So you get a tiny moon in the scene.

Both these problems are clearly visible in the picture shot below.

Can we solve Problem#1?Its almost impossible to get a perfect exposure with the landscape properly illuminated and moon in detail. So using the conventional photographic techniques - Answer is NO!

And what about Problem#2? You may think that using a telephoto instead of a wide angle lens would solve the issue, however if you do that then most likely the scene around would no longer be in the field of view and you are still left with problem#1 anyway!

What is the solution then?

There are 2 solutions

Multiple Exposure – Taking 2 or more exposures on the same film or the same image. One exposure will be of the moon and second will be of the landscape (or vice-versa), without advancing the film (film SLR) or using the multiple exposure setting (using DSLR). Note – All DSLRs do not have multiple exposure setting. Olympus E-30 has and a neat one too. It is pretty handy if you want to do some cool stuff with multiple exposure.
Superimposition or Composite photograph – Combining 2 photographs to get one picture. You would need a decently sophisticated photo editing software like Photoshop CS3/CS4 or cheaper Photoshop Elements.

In the digital world the second option is cheaper and lot easier than the first because the first option needs you to be spot with both your exposures. With multiple exposure you have very little idea of where exactly you should place the second exposure (especially on a film camera). Today’s modern DLSRs allow easy multiple exposure. Olympus E-30 for example allows you to have the image exposed more than once and it also provides a handy overlay which tells you where your previous exposure was in the image.

However, I prefer the second method. If you have Photoshop or Photoshop Elements then 2nd option is a breeze.

Here is the picture using composite technique. Clearly much better than then the one above! :-) You can give dramatic effects by varying the size and shape of the moon.

Great thing about the composite technique is that, you don't even have to shoot the moon and the scene on the same day or same night!

Here is another example. I shot the below 2 pictures of Moon and the Church separately.

VOILA!! Here is the composite of the 2 pictures above. I might write the technical details on how I did this sometime.

Take care….

† – In some instance, you may be able to get a decent picture of both moon and the landscape. The best time for this is the early morning moon. This is the time when both moon and the landscape are illuminated by the sun almost with same lighting. This should give you a proper exposure. But this would mean being at the right time at the right place and on the right day. For most of us, its just too much! :-)

The “Climbing Tree”

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 12:19:00 +0000

There is tree near our house which the kids call – the climbing tree! Apparently because they can climb on it easily and jump from it too.

During the school days, these kids assemble near this “climbing tree” every afternoon and have a merry time, as you can see :-)

It is very amusing and satisfying to see these kids play on and around the tree. It brings back the kid in you.

Looks like Everybody’s here!

On the Roll!!!

Swinging Along!

The guys seem to be impressed by - what was christened as – the “Katrina Jump” :-)

The Katrina Jump – remake :-)

Still not done swinging!

Boys can’t have enough of the climbing tree!

The ladies seem to have had enough of it :-)

Definitely – I was tired of just watching these kids go at it on and on :-) But its always an absolute fun!

By the way – Have you noticed what a difference a cloudy day makes to the quality of pictures? Had it been sunny, I would had to deal with harsh shadows and bright spots on the subjects.

Old Buildings and Churches in NJ

noreply@blogger.com (Puru) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 02:08:00 +0000

Suni, Adi and I went on old building and church hunting one weekend in NJ. Here are the results

The First Presbyterian Church, Woodbridge
St. Luke’s Church, Metuchen
Barron Arts Center, Rahway
The First Presbyterian Church, Avenel
St. Andrews Church, Avenel
The First Presbyterian Church, Cranford
A Church on Main St., Metuchen
A Church on Lake Ave
Another church on Lake Av.
A Statue near Barren Arts Center