some of my Non-DSLR pictures

sometime we really enjoy the view do not mean we need a good camera to capture it .. it is always good to enjoy the moment, view …. and even capture with a Point and shot camera, we will still happy to see it

I always bring my Panasonic Lumix LX5 around … and few of my simply snapshot while I am shootnig with my SLR

... Golden Punggur ... | by Lumix LX5

 

and just outside the place I stay

... a good Start ... | by Lumix LX5

 

so enjoy the shooting today ….

Simply Stars chasing Outing on 30 April – 1 May…

Let’s have fun to shoot some nightscape, stars, star trail ….

... the Dawn full with Stars ...

or you want to increase some of yours shutter … you may able to make this

... We are rotating ...

 

if Lucky, we should able to see this

Milky Way

 

or

the Milky with Finger method
I will disclosure the location to those confirm attend ,,,
the location should be ~2-2.5hours travel north from Kuala Lumpur
do drop me message or comment if you interest
1. liewwk
2. shunfa
3. Seesy
4. Carmen
5. Nick
6. Abah
7. Melvin
(due to the location stand place limit, will have some control of the number …. ~25 max)
what to bring …
1. camera
2. wide angle/kit len (widest aperture)
3. tripod
4. shutter release cable
5. small torch light
6. snack
*** special pririty given to www.photomalaysia.com member .. and please provide me yours nick

Pantai Sri Tujuh, Tumpat, Kelantan

one of the stop of my previous visit to East Coast for details click here

never been a place so beautiful before, saw a clear Milky way while I reach … and it is like total mirror when the light is out … nothing I want to capture except try to show the beautiful and perfect reflection (someone is walking in the river …so actually not so calm while I shoot this)

even I only spent ~2hours there… I would rate this one of the best Landscape Photography spot for Malaysia .. the calm sea water with perfect reflection with angle toward ~135 degree south toward North west …. can do perfect fisherman life shooting, sunrise, salt water reflection …. I am sure I will be there again very soon ……….

milky through nake eye

... another milky way ...

– was using black card method/finger to shoot this where share it here

and the beautiful of the reflection

... the mirror ...

and will share more Kelantan pictures here

How I correct WB

Even I trust my 5d very much where I could say the AWB (Auto White Balance) accuracy is much better than what other body I use before … but in certain light condition, filter effect, and to have much perfect WB… I still correct my WB using 2 method below

*** before I start, I only shoot raw so these methods only apply with RAW and Photoshop , lightroom … (other software should be same concept but different interface)

A. look for white point

1at some case, I do not have time to shoot 2 picture (1 with grey card and the other without) .. then I will try my best to look for white spot in the picture

Blue cast due to filter

 

2. click on the WB tool on top

WB Tool button

 

3. simply use the pen point to the white point

WB after simple correction

the color seem more normal but still need little more work to bring back original e.g. contrast, saturation, ….

sample of coversion

simple white WB correction

 

B. Grey card, look for grey

I prefer this method where this can be useful to correct WB and even correct most of the color cast … but this need shoot additional picture with the grey card or sypder cube (come with white, grey and total dark)

picture with the sypder cube

2. use the same WB tool as A2 above, but this time point to the Grey card or gray part of the spyder cube

– remember the temperature and tint value to apply on the actual picture

where to point and remember

3. the correction

final WB

.. again, due to the blue cast…. we need little more work to bring back the other colors .. e.g. contrast, saturation …..

 

do drop me a message if any part of this not clear ….

*** again the final output still need further tune up due to the bad blue cast …

 

Exposures Blending

While we shoot landscape, to get right exposures for both foreground and background (sky) .. it is just not too simple … as discussed previously , we can either

1. GND filter

2. black card method

3. HDR

4. Exposures blending (where we will discuss here)

 

e.g. of 2 pictures

exposures blending1
exposures blending2

– normally we refer same sky but just different exposures but for this example … I got same position but the cloud actually cover the Starry sky

– how I do Exposures Blending

i. normally I will shoot one foreground 1st with right iso, exposure and sometime with light painting

ii. continue shooting the sky or background

iii. use software masking or blending both picture together

Manual masking - exposures blending

***for how I mask the 2 pictures click old link here

another test used Photomatix “Exposures Fusion” option

Photomatix Blending

 

*** not much editing done on the post blending picture

How I shoot Landscape – black card method (use finger)

I actually want to share this “black card” quite some time ago .. but I always forget and not really able to get some good result to share … and while I am doing this , one of my gang actually notice me shaking my finger around the front len .. and she did ask what was I doing … 😀 and here you go ….

what is black card method and when will we use it ?

when we having different exposures, I normally do GND filter, exposures blending, black card, HDR …(we not going to discuss all here but share some sample)

 

A. GND filter

this is just like GND filter, most of the time we have big dynamic range/different between sky and foreground.. it normally have different from 2-9 stops …. e.g. for standard sunrise/sunset/magic hour environment, we face 2-4 stops different between foreground – sky… to resolve this we normally use GND to single frame picture have the correct exposure among foreground and sky e.g.

1. without GND

Magical moment - no GND

2. GND

... the magical moment ...

– the sky is ~4 stops different from the foreground…

– I use GND.9s for above picture and do some PP trick to make the right exposure

 

B. HDR (seldom do this …but think we still good to know this)

Cold Reflection

– why I choose HDR … this was shoot use my SIGMA12-24mm which cannot fit any filter

– it was too cold to think which method to choose so I simply shoot 7 exposures back 😀

 

3. black card

– seldom use this as I am not really experience

– filter much easy

– need a lot of try and error but the good light could be disappear any time

original shot without any filter, blending, black card

– why I choose black card, the environment was dark, not sure how/where to apply GND

– multiple exposures will take double or even more times for single shot

– the exposure different >3 stops

for me I know the area that make me concern as below

the over expose portion

– so what I did was, use my fingers block the over expose area

– allow only ~2-3 seconds exposure over 30 seconds exposure, so I block it until last few seconds and I remove my finger

 

so I get

... another milky way ...

 

most of the time we just need try and error, where some fail sample .. think only expose for ~1s

wrong timing to shake the black card/finger

I will discuss more on other method in future … but let’s try and error on black card 😀

 

Patient to wait …

it is always difficult to have what you wish to have in frame (except we make the story to capture ….)

A good example, I was looking at the beautiful reflection on beach

Kemasik Beach with reflection

*** above picture is ~1.5minutes after picture below but it look about same before too

and what I have with the “magic minute” moment

The wave "took" over the reflection role ....

with the wave, I have no choice to capture it as leading line instead what I original plan to have the beautiful reflection … so do not change yours position even something change but we make the change into our final output …..

 

**** it is always difficult but we still try our best to capture the beauty of the nature … enjoy ……

Milky Way again…

this is not first time I shoot Milky, but this is my very first time see it clearly … it was just above us and we can use our eye to see it … am happy able to make this outing [my East Coast visit | April 20100] and thanks for my friends going with me (Shunfa, Jason, Siah, Seesy, Xiao Yi, Ismail, Norhana & Lio) . We had wonderful trip … and could be most memorable trip for me ….

My very 1st Milky was post before here

and here was picture capture few steps out from the homestay …

Simply look up … the Milky Way

5dm2 + SIGMA24F1.8

# Exposure Time (1 / Shutter Speed) = 10/1 second ===> 10 second
# Lens F-Number / F-Stop = 18/10 ===> ƒ/1.8
# ISO Speed Ratings = 1600

how to capture this, simply same how I shoot stars which I share before here… except we need higher ISO to get it clearly ……….

Update later

… Milky Way …