Valentine's Day, in light.

Any day is a good day to put an idea on paper, as it were. Today, the flashlight was my victim. Here is the result:



For those looking for an idea for Valentine's Day: it's more creative than a store bought card and your date/girlfriend/wife will love it because you created it. All you need is a little camera skill, a tripod and some patience. A dark room also helps (turn off the lights at night).

365/51 Pictures of Words/7

As a long time user of Macs, I rewarded my brand loyalty with a magazine subscription 4 years ago. Sure, I'm super-biased towards Apple products, but who can say they've stuck with a brand of computers for 20 years? Right.

Anyway, I went with SOOC for this photo. No sharpening applied, no color or brightness adjustments done. Color temperature manually set to 5400K in-camera. Default "neutral" settings for all in-camera JPEG processing options. You be the judge, but I'd say the camera does a pretty good job at JPEG processing with a proper exposure!

Lens and camera settings:

50mm f/2.0 @ f/2.0, 1/60 sec, ISO 100. Focus manually adjusted when the camera decided on focus settings I didn't like.

365/50 Pictures of Words/6

A little less creative than some other days I suppose, but hey, I saw a word, and I took a photo. It's the theme, isn't it?

Lens and camera settings:

50mm f/2.0 @ f/2.0, 1/160sec, ISO 100. Flash bounced "up" @ +1EV compensation.

365/49 Pictures of Words/5

A little present from my wife! She must have felt bad for my camera situation, so she replenished my ridiculously expensive body wash. And it's pretty much the perfect subject of this week's theme! I can't believe how clear the focus popped out of the frame! I guess my eyes got used to the small viewfinder, because this was all DOF work.

f/4.0 happened to be the perfect aperture to get just the word "Philosophy" in focus. That aperture, in combination with my new light setup (45" Westcott umbrella) makes this look great! I invite whoever actually follows this blog to browse back through this 365 project, I suspect there's some clear learning progress throughout the past 50-ish days, although I'm bad at judging this myself.

I would like some CC on this photo, maybe some pointers as to what I could have done better and/or different with the light or focus maybe?

Lens and camera settings:

50mm f/2.0 @ f/4.0, 1/160sec and ISO 100. Flash bounced into umbrella, 1/16th power.

365/48 Pictures of Words/4

:( My new E-3 is a dud camera. It takes wonderful photos, everything seems to be working perfectly, except for the LCD, which happens to be only partially functioning. The colors on it look like that of a 4-bit screen from back in the late 80's (those who owned a computer with a color screen back then know what I mean), not at all what I was supposed to see. Here is what I took for today's photo (with the E-3).

50mm f/2.0 @ f/4.0, 1/250sec, ISO 100. Flash bounced off the ceiling @ +1EV compensation.

365/47 Pictures of Words/3

No E-3 today, UPS decided that the measly 4" that fell was too much for them to do the job they get paid for, while the regular USPS actually made it here, no problems. I'm a little lost, creatively, today, so here's the best I could do with my wife's idea and my mood :P

Lens and camera settings:

50mm f/2.0 @ f/2.0, 1/25sec, ISO 100. Flash bounced off the ceiling @ +1EV compensation.

I tried for "ambient light" but ended up having to overcompensate with the flash to the point where no ambient light was left in the exposure.

365/46 Pictures of Words/2

The very last photo taken with my trusty E-500! I'm kind of sad, it's been with me through some rough times, and it's gotten me to where I am today as a photographer. Nevertheless, it's upgrade time, and so it's time to do what must be done.

Lens and camera settings:

50mm f/2.0 @ f/3.2, 1/160sec and ISO 100. Flash straight at the subject, +1EV compensation.

365/45 Pictures of Words/1

My trusty old Olympus OM-10, this time subject of the photo, rather than the instrument of it! Extra loaded with depth of field effects and contrast today. I love my little home made light tent, it really helps diffuse the light!

Lens and camera settings:

50mm f/2.0 @ f/3.2, 1/80sec and ISO 100. Flash fired into light tent @ 0EV compensation.

This is where the Zuiko Digital 50mm f/2.0 Macro really shines. Super crisp detail, strong contrast and bokeh galore!