Different Cameras & Lenses, Same Point of View

This should be an interesting post to some of you, see that swing in the picture? I take pictures of my daughters ever year in the summer on this exact swing, where they spend the summer vacation time by the seaside. I wanted to make a comparison between the different pictures taken from the spot, with different cameras and lenses, over the years.What camera/lens combination would you say was used to capture the above picture? Just a quick note before...

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A Meaningless Experiment

I was setting up a few lights at home to shoot pictures of my daughters, and I took the picture you see above while testing the hair light, you can see it is quite hot (I ended up reducing it by one stop), and what you can't see, is that it is causing lens flare, because it was not gridded.While importing the pictures to lightroom, I decided to see if I could get any shadow detail out of the file, so I pushed the exposure by 4 stops, and pulled the...

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Hand-Holding vs Tripod

The SetupAs a follow-up to my previous tripod post, I wanted take a look for myself at practical uses of a tripod versus regular hand holding, especially with the modern image stabilization systems available today.The trigger for this post was a comment I read on one of the photography forums, the poster said that he would never consider shooting without a tripod, even in full daylight. This got me thinking, does a tripod really make a noticeable...

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Upcoming Posts

Here are some of the posts I will be working on this week and the next.MACRO LENS: I will be joining a group in trying to get photos of the El Segundo Blue Butterfly tomorrow.  I've tried shooting the elusive Blue Butterfly before but only with the Lumix LX-5.  For this occasion, I decided to rent a macro lens, Nikon's longest one (because the butterfly is easily spooked) -- the Nikkor 200 f/4 Micro AF-D.ULTRAWIDE COMPARISON: Tokina 11-16 vs. Sigma 10-20 f/3.5.  I've had the Tokina for a while but wanted a longer focal length for...

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Thank you for your support!

I just wanted to say thank you for supporting our blog through your readership and for clicking on our affiliate links!  100% of proceeds from this blog are donated to charity.  For June, the affiliate fees amounted to $36.96:That does not sound like a lot, but actually it goes a very long way, thanks to organizations such as Food for the Poor, Inc. Food for the Poor buys food in bulk for poor families, so that even as little as $3 can...

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Why I like ultra wide lenses

I got my first ultra wide lens (the Sigma 10-20 f/4-5.6) just over a year ago, and I had gotten it to use it only as a scene-setter and nothing more.  I had the idea to take a few establishing shots to show the location and then I could put it away.  However, I have since found that shooting with ultra wide lenses is fun and challenging.In the shot above, the shark looks like it is lunging at you, and that effect is intentional.  The...

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Going Crazy With Tripods

My Tabletop Tripod TrioI love tripods, I go all soft and wobbly when I see attractive looking ones, so here is my story with tripods, including the bit I hinted about in my travel to Poland post.SLIK MINI PRO III TABLE-TOP TRIPODThe first tripod I ever bought was my favorite Slik Mini Pro tripod shown below, it has a very nice ball head, it is very well made and sturdy, and can carry a much larger load than it looks capable of, this is my most used...

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Fireworks with a Theme

I like fireworks photos but in my view, what makes a fireworks photo memorable is not the fireworks themselves but capturing the fireworks with an interesting foreground that provides context.  During last week's Independence Day celebration, I wanted to get a shot of fireworks over the building above, called the Theme Building, one of the most famous buildings in Los Angeles.  The challenge is that the building is part of Los Angeles International...

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The OM-D Visits Europe - Part 2 (Poland)

Taking a stroll in Mielec, Olympus 45mm 1.8 @ f/2.8This is part two of my visit to Europe, in part one, I told you the story about my visit to Stockholm, I encourage you to read it if you like travel photography and stories. In this post I will show you lots of pictures from my visit to Poland.THE FLIGHT As I described in part one, I went to Europe on a business trip, I spent the first two days in Stockholm, then took a plane to Krakow on the third...

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