New acquisitions to satisfy my obsessions ;)

Firstly, the Fuji Instanx Mini 90. Consistently takes better exposures than my current Instanx Mini 7. The flash looks similar, but the metering seems more accurate and smarter. In addition, you can "over-ride" it slightly with the compensation. I was a little taken aback when I found out it runs on a proprietary battery, but I will accept it for the moment. There's a macro mode, but I don't find it useful since it's impossible to tell if I am at the correct distance at all ;(

Oh, and the Holga Fisheye for the 7 cannot be used on 90; I am still happy with 7 (especially the fact that I can use AA batteries) so I don't have issues with that yet. Boy, I just discovered that Holga has so much accessories now!


Secondly, the BigShot Camera. It's a DIY digital camera (more like self assembly) with educational intentions. Too easy, but since everything is electronic and IC-ed, I don't expect much work too (unlike the mechanical film ones). One issue is I don't have any idea when the battery is holding enough charge to be operated. I left it connected to the PC for one hour, but still cannot work it. In the end, I charged it with a charger and it works after 30 minutes.


Thirdly, the ParaShoot 2.1. Let's see how it will fare when I get it in December ;)
[Delivery of ParaShoot is postponed again to Feb 2014 ;\]

Happy Rabbit Working Festival

Hohoho. Just a lame joke.

Today is the so-called Mid-Autumn Festival, and as its name implies, marks the middle of the season. There are many stories and myths associated with this day, some of them disputed because they are probably distorted with the mouths that retold them... (in other words, several different versions)

Anyway, since I found a toy that is close to this festival, albeit the Japanese version (haa... why is there no Chinese or Korean version?), I went ahead and build it. As with my other toys, I took a picture after the build. Quite a simple and fast setup.

And the end product. The shadow is noticeable but I decided it is good enough.

Dead Space Marker Shot

Coming with a concept for this took quite a few days. Originally I wanted to shoot it in a tree environment since the base was "wooden".

However, after some research on google, I changed my mind. I shifted to placing it in a more artificial environment with a green eerie aura.

The idea of how the shot will look

The experiment took about an hour or more, with different placement of lights and camera elevations. Finally settled on the setup below.

Final shot. Didn't really achieve the effect I wanted but gotta have to settle for this ;(

Year-book assignment, sorta

The location? A Taekwando gym. I think it was a black belt presentation ceremony or something similar. The whites were placed on the mat to reduce the red reflections on the subject.

The catch? The belt and the name on it should be visible, and most of my clients were kids or teens. The routine: a single shot, a family shot and one with the instructors.

As my friend put it, this was not a particularly difficult assignment. Just that I don't really like working with people, and giving orders to pose people really isn't working with me. I like spontaneous, and would follow the subject.

Now that's where the problem lied. I missed at least 2 kids' names, and the height of the shortest kid actually caught me off guard, though luckily I think the shot would still pass. The whole session went very fast, so I didn't actually have the luxury of reviewing the shots (anyway I don't have the habit too). So if I missed it in the viewfinder, probably I will miss the shots.

So what now? Obviously back to the desktop to see if there are ways to patch: Photoshop! Luckily for me, it is still pretty workable and took me two nights. Hope I wouldn't have to work this anymore...

P.S. wonder how effective the mirror at the side is as a huge reflector?

A Slime draws near!

Intended as a parody ;) Been scouting a ideal setting for the shot, finally came across a candidate while walking back after a friend dropped me off after a drink. Good things just pop up unexpectedly, don't they?

A very easy shot, hardest part being walking to the location under the intense heat of the day. Crazy weather this time of the year.

Location is actually shot against a highway at the back, but luckily the trees managed to block everything and cars flashing by are not that obvious ;)

Only two shots were taken, this being the first. The light and the location was almost so perfect, I don't even have to use the reflector or the flash that I carried, though the polarizer was used. The only post-processing was just a minor horizon fix, some contrast push. The focal length was about 50mm; if I knew earlier, I would have brought the Lensbaby as well.

Next was to get the command boxes in. Copied them from a jpeg in wiki, a little copy and paste, cutting here and there, and tada, the end result at the top ;)

A planned shot for Vesak

Technically not a difficult shot, but getting that yellow glow the way I want was. What I thought could be fixed in 30 min took over an hour ;(

The setup: 1 flash with a golden yellow gel and another lean in close to the subject, zoomed at the tele end (probably 85 or 105mm). Triggered wireless, since I shot this on the D3.

Didn't notice that the washing machine was reflecting the yellow light until I took a picture of the setup! Maybe I should do it earlier next time as a check for other surprises...