Love Sketch

 Spent another weekend at my brother's home and while relaxing on the sofa where my wife and sister-in-law were chatting, my niece was doing some sketches. I would like to share one of her sketches which I took a photo of that I really admire. It's very simple yet it has this loud appeal to it. Hope you like it as well as much as I do.

I entitled the photo I took as "Love Sketch".

Simple!

Flash Experiment

I had to do it - experiment with flash as I need to learn more how to use it properly but first let's take a look at the photo below and try to determine what kind of flash was used.

 

Have you figured it out? Oh well, it's just my built-in pop-up flash on my rebel. I was just trying out what will be the outcome if I tried to funnel the flash that's firing from the built-in pop-up flash and bounce it on a white surface.

I created for this experiment a rectangular funnel or pipe that would cover the built-in pop-up flash and direct all it's power on a white board and bounce it to have an effect of a bounced flash from a speedlite. In my opinion, I think the experiment turned out well. Too bad, the funnel would be to hard to use in reality as it does not fit properly on the built-in pop-up flash.

Anyway, I'm happy with the outcome. I guess I'll have to try to use it more.

Lovin' The Nifty-fifty

Over the weekend I was able to spend a little time exploring my new lens - the nifty-fifty. Well, it's really fast and sharp. Here's a sample of my exploration of this new lens:

Will be needing a little more time to explore the strengths of this fantastic lens but so far, I'm really lovin' this lens for it's speed and sharpness.

Cheers!

Overly Drooling For A Speedlite

Most of the time when my family and I go to Las Pinas (LP), where I grew up, I would be lugging along my camera bag. Yesterday, we were off to LP to have some time with my parents, my older brother, who is in the country for a short vacation as he works abroad, and his family.

My older brother is also into photography as well as my neice -- my older brother's eldest daughter. By the way, my eldest daughter, who is only turning four this year is somewhat into photography too. I guess it's in the blood. Actually, my dad was also into photography in his earlier years and an uncle -- my father's brother, of mine too is into photography. They even once had a studio.

Anyway, to cut all the introductions, we were at my brother's house for dinner. As usual, my brother and I exchanged some conversation about photography until he let me borrow his speedlite. I don't know much about speedlites but I have been reading a lot about flash photography. With his speedlite on my camera, I clicked once, twice, and I said to myself, "Wow!". On my third click, I took a photo of my youngest daughter and I said to myself, "sluuurp!". I was mentally drooling over the photo I just took.

Take a look at the photo below! My pop-up flash can't deliver anything close to it. Kit lens + 580EX II = wOw!

Oh well, it's drooling time for the 580EX II.

Deprived Of Sleep

The past three days/nights, I've been deprived of a good night's sleep.. can't just stop figuring out the new router. Finally, this morning at around 2:00 AM, I finally hammered the nail in and figured it out. Woohoo!

The Internet was really a big place to get information on how to get things done but on this case it wasn't. Being sleepiness and careless solved the problem. I accidentally clicked on something and viola!, it worked.

Testing it right now. Hope all is well now or else I have to return this piece of sleep depriving thing machine where I bought it.

Cheers!

Happy Or Sad?

The title might be a little misleading but in anyway, I guess I have to say that I am very happy with the presents that I was able to receive from very good friends abroad. I have now a battery grip for my Canon Rebel DSLR and now I feel the camera fits my hand better -- better ergonomics and grip. I was also blessed with what most photographers call as nifty-fifty. Yes, I was able to get a Canon EF 50mm f/1.8.

Of course, news toys means new things to tinker with. Alright, I'm now armed with my new toys, here are some of the shots I was able to make with the short time I had with it.

Here's my wife and daughters' shitzu -- "Chewy". I guess she's feeling sad about her haircut. (Only color saturation was edited here).

 

 This was her a few months ago... taken with my kit lens Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS. (Sharpness and saturation were edited here)

 

Are they the same dog? Oh well, I guess that was the sad part.

Moreover, I just started my bokeh project recently and I tested the bokeh of the new lens and was after the pentagonal bokeh of this lens. Out of curiosity here's what I mean by the pentagonal bokeh.

As you will see the out-of-focus points of light in the above photo is pentagonal in shape rather than the simple circular bokeh. I guess that's the trademark of the Canon EF 50mm f/1.8.

I'm out to explore the possible uses of this nifty-fifty on my gear.

Goin' Bananas

Well, not really goin' bananas or crazy.. It's just that the cake/bread is made of bananas. My mom bakes banana cakes/breads very well as she makes them all-natural as much as possible. I believe there's no extenders or whatsoever. Her best banana cakes/bread are those made of cavendish bananas -- it's very tasteful and very aromatic. For new year, she baked us a loaf. Of course, I cannot resist again to experiment and explore more on the area of food photography. Much more I can't resist as I just made myself another lightbox. I had to try and use it. To cut the long story short and feast on the delicious banana cake/bread my dear mom baked. Too bad you're only gonna see some photos. I just do hope that the photos give justice to the cake/bread.

Thanks mom for the banana cake/bread!

An Unusual Passenger

Last year, December 31, 2009, while we were waiting at a parking lot at a deli, we saw an unusual passenger riding the car beside ours. It's not a very common to see a passenger like this here in the Metro.

Woof! Woof!