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The time has come for 'use and throw' items in India. = USE AND THROW= in india, it was and is still there to keep the thing preciously, what they purchased from the market or given by a friend even. they were not in the habit of USE AND THROW as is prevalent in many european countries. India was a very satisfied and cool country till 70s and 80s. then changes started coming. infosys technology opened new avenues but the attachment to old things remained as it is. even in 60s to 80s, anybody bought a watch, it will be presumed that it will go for generations. and secondly, the then companies(indian or foreign) were manufacturing the items in such a manner that they will last long and the person has no need to buy another.
one year back, i bought a digital camera but since it did not work to my satisfaction, i wanted to find out in the market and in friends that if anybody was interested for it. but to my surprise nobody was ready to purchase even in3/4th of price. after keeping for 6 months in a friends' shop, i hardly got 1/3rd of the value. so the conditions have so changed that if i buy a new camera in 10k, hardly i will get 3 to4k. otherwise the person will go for a new. so the most sold electronic item i.e. MOBILE has lost its resale value because of crores in production and daily a new model announced/a new feature added. and the prices have come down drastically with the cheapest of models providing many imp facilities in them. how many feature added stuff u take, the ultimate goal for a common man is to dial and hear the incoming calls only=the ultimate.
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COMPRESSION IN DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY.
many a photographers using DIGITAL cameras are unaware of the value of compression and i think, hundreds might not have heard 'what is compression'. in your camera settings, keeping the quality of compression at low level, u may get more photos on the same memory card, but by doing so your pic clarity will fall. the more u compress your photos(keepin at low level), greater chances are that some pix may contain spots, blurriness and/or noise.
keep the compression level at high,then u will necessarily make large files but the quality of your images will be outstanding, but lesser photographs on the same memory cards u will get.
CANON cameras offer compression levels as NORMAL, FINE AND SUPERFINE and in NIKON cameraS
u will set as BASIC, NORMAL, FINE and HIGH.
HOWEVER MOST MIDDLE SETTINGS OFFER a good compromise between quality and size. if you do a lots of post processing in a photo editor, use the HIGHEST quality setting. in this case avoid using a lowest setting at all, if possible. U can compress more later after the originals have been safely archived.
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..NATURE PHOTOGRAPHY - BACKGROUNDS........
the persons practising nature photography shd know that a background make or mar a photo. a flower photographed against a busy/fussy background get lost. if the background is OOF and soft, a sharp flower will stand against it. lucky enough that the depth of field in closeups can be shallow, so usually it is not a problem to make the b/g soft. u just open up a wide aperture e.g. f2,8, f3.5 and focus on the flower. anything behind flower will render soft. and better if it is more further away, more beneficial for the subject.
these were the natural backgrounds, but u can make grey colour cloth, not on the spot, but in PS as background. besides in market, there are different colour craft papers, those can be held as b/g. they will give u the best plain OOF background. only thing is that the more in contrast the b/g and the flower, there are better chances of getting good results. so good luck and try.
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LIGHTENING PHOTOGRAPHY
There are chances, when u will not be able to resist u from photographing the nature's alluring trick, creation of LIGHTENING. here in India it happems at onset or during rainy season, as happens everywhere. but to photograph the lightening is tricky. good and worth photographing lightening occurs seldomly and it is your luck that u are equipped with camera, tripod, cable release and a bit of patience. if it rains and heavy lightening occurs, then u need protection of your roof and be near the window. otherwise if it is lightening before rains, u can come out in the ground, rooftop in night when it is sufficiently dark to capture those wonderful streaks of light which make a good picture, if well caught.
keep the shutter on bulb setting and aperture to f16 i.e. minimum. still it is trial and error. also keep the lens cap or shade the lens with your palm. preview, the position of lightening and in darkness, when it lightens keep the aperture open and as soon as it finishes, close it. or bring next frame. if u want multiple lightenings, keep and shutter open as it lightens several times shadding it with lens cap when necessary.
sometimes, u wud like to include some monument to make the pic award winning, then select the dark dusk time and be on the spot one hour before, when it is already lightening and u want the chance to capture it. select the place and the direction of lightening. here will be some light so 4=5 seconds exposure won't overexpose the pic. and the natural light and the light thrown by lightening will shine the whole area and the lightenings still prominant, with clear or shadow of the monument. take care of the camera gear and have sufficient protection/clothing for them. however, during rains, use home windows only. still it is trial and error, even for the experienced. keep it original and don't colour it.
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STILL LIFE PHOTOGRAPHY
Still life photography is the creation of inanimate subjects. there are two values of the words 'STILL' means unmoveable and 'LIFE' means which vibrates with movement. so these words represent contradiction in themselves since their use 40/50 years ago.
in my time the words STILL LIFE took into account the inanimate objects (some 30 years ago). and in exhibition we used to receive entries in this category of objects which are lifeless, but well composed and well lit according to the number of objects and those b&w photographs were marked under this category. i do not know who gave the name of STILL LIFE, but that was one of the categories, like landscape, portraiture and were fine compositions, which also stretched on when colour photography was made common and the photographers were awarded for their creations..
those STILL LIFE subjects were the tutor of composition and lighting. and normally the 'rule of thirds' was in the minds of photographers, while composing STILL LIFE. cups, saucers, kitchenware, fruits,glasses etc were the main attractions for making STILL LIFE photographs, besides some bizzare objects when experimenting and the lighting was of the studio type. i too followed some books giving the meaning of STILL LIFE as photography of inanimate objects and still that can be found.
but as i saw and felt and experienced, as time changes, the meaning of STILL LIFE photography also came under the change. now under this category (leaving the purists), the flowers, landscapes, humans, single or couple, and who are still and show no movement in the photographs are included using the term STILL LIFE. THE TIME OF VETERANS HAS GONE AND THE EXPERIMENTING PHOTOGRAPGERS ARE MAKING THEIR OWN RULES in STILL LIFE photography. the photographers of date have even written books/articles on STILL LIFE of moving objects and there are scores of photographs depicting them. so i and you witness and welcome the changes as time permits.
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TO PHOTOGRAOH OT NOT TO PHOTOGRAPH;
is it a silly question,0r have some meaning. thousands of times, this question comes in the minds of photographers while holding the camera in hand. NO, IT IS A VERY CUTE QUESTION AND HAS A LOT OF MEANING. why this question occurs because of the strength/analysis of the subject. to spend time or not to spend. since i already told that this is a 'cute' question, the photographer shd not leave any opportunity to photograph such subjects which confuse. sometimes these photographs make great pix. i like my pic no.7791 of one shoe and dry coconut stem(in my "photo album")i.e. 'life abandoned.'
for example, i wud like to quote the example of Yousuf Karsh, the erstwhile great portrait photographer from Canada (as i know) when he was photographing the great portrait of Winston Churchil (the then UK War Minister during II world war in 1945 (as i know)). Mr Karsh set up lights etc and as Mr Churchil was having CIGAR in his mouth, the expression mr Karsh needed were not coming. then in a split of a second kARSH, snatched away the cigar from Mr Churchil's lips and before the expression of angryness cud vanish, he triggered the SHUTTER, and as luck wud have it, he got the pic he wanted, which immortalised both Churchil and Karsh.
so in ordinary situations/places some odd pictures happen, which we confuse to shoot or not to shoot. to avoid is dangerous because the opportunity once came is gone for ever. so to better shoot then use in any way, who knows it may immortalise u, or fed up, put it in your photo gallery/store or so bored, better delete it. so how strange it is for odd things to happen to lead u to new path. SOMETIMES BORING THINGS SAVE U FROM BOREDOM. enjoyed...................
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: A N G L E S:
There is as much variety of subjects to photograph .so is the variety of angles. whole hemisphere is the generator of angles in photography. everything on this planet is a subject or subjects. to handle/tackle them is the beauty of angles. suppose your subject is a mountain with lake below and sky above. the mountain is full of greenery. it is human nature that he sees anything as it comes before. thinking photographically is miles away. but a photographer, equipped with a camera and few extra lenses will start thinking how to shoot the subject in front with that much beauty that it may bring him laurels in the viewers eyes. he is standing on the ground from which he is unable to bring the lake more prominent. he may be seeing mountain, sky, clouds etc. but the angle of ground level is not satisfying him, otherwise he may take few photos in a normal way and go. but his creative brain is not allowing to move off from there until he snaps something worthwhile. so my photographer will try to find out some higher angle of hillock etc. to see the beauty of the lake. and lo, he finds a few meters away a small altitude which will satisfy his needs. so he climbs up a few meter high, and the scene is totally changed. he is enthralled to see the beauty of sky, clouds and the lovely mountain in the reflections of the lake as clear as a mirror. now he sets himself to capture the scene with different lenses, which indirectly work as a different angle. his happiness further increases when he sees few humans at the base of the mountain opposite. now his brain and cameras work together and after shooting from here, he climbs another hillock at the left angle. after satisfying from there, he calls a boatman perchance passed through in the lake. now the photographer will try low angles keeping the boat in the foreground and he does it successfully. now to above angle, he shoots some good cloudscapes. from below and from the hillock. now tired and sweating, he thinks to retire and wishes to go to his car. behold........before he comes down, he notices three carts passing nearby his car on the beautiful jungle road some half kilometer away from him. not to distort the pictures, he thinks to use tele for the low angle shots avoiding his car and the distant road carrying the carts with beautiful trees around and a long shadow of carts and oxen enhancing the beauty of the scene. so my photographer never dreamt of finding such a beautiful place to photograph, besides having the opportunity to use different ANGLES from the artery of his lenses keeping different perspectives in correct order while using wides. there is no dearth of subjects and angles to beautifully store the images on his camera sensor.
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DIGITAL V/S OPTICAL ZOOM.
When, i first thought of buying a digital camera, one attraction was the Digital zoom and i thought that being digital zoom, it will work better and has the extension range over optical zoom. 3x optical and 5x digital zoom. i wll enjoy the tele lens effect with these compacts/prosumers. but much later it was proved a mirage. the quality of digital zoom mixed with optical was below acceptance level. only optical means working in much confinement. but no alternative.
however later i came to know digital zoom is basically a digital crop within the camera. there it is not a true magnification. when i used d-zoom, i was effectively capturing part of an image with lower resolution.
optical zoom: optical zoom is a magnification created by a lens. this type of magnificaction is a 'true zoom' and shd not adversely affect image quality. lens optics are the only solution for giving u satisfaction whether they may be now 12x OPTICAL ZOOM.
STILL THE QUESTION REMAINS UNRESOLVED FOR ME, WHEN the mfg. companies gave/incorporated the digital zoom, cud they not think the photographer's dilemma of getting a lower resolution image and that too for what? lower image cannot be made higher. it was only boom to sell the products and allure the customers to make money. alas............
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