photography « The Blue Brick | Photography and Handcrafts by Shireen Nadir

Posts Tagged 'photography'

The Hunt for Winter

Published February 22, 2012 Photography , Travels 2 Comments
Tags: photography, travel, night photography, stars, Ontario, Northern Lights, aurora, parry sound

This is the winter that wasn’t. At least, here in TO it wasn’t. We’re not used to this total lack of winter and last weekend Tito and I drove out in search of ice and snow because, dammit, we miss it. We ended up heading north into Parry Sound – as a bonus the northern lights made a surprise appearance!

We passed a frozen lake covered in skidoo tracks. It reminded me of a cute story my dad told me about coming to Canada in 1972. He had worked in India as a motorcycle repairman, so when he moved to Ottawa he looked for the same kind of work. Finally he got his first job in Canada. He showed up on his first day and they took him to his first job and it was … a skidoo. He stared blankly at it for a few minutes before looking at his boss and saying “What the %@!* is that?”. The story always makes me laugh :)

What a great day for a road trip, the sky was that endless sort of blue that you feel you could fall up into.

At blue hour I took this shot – the 2 bright things in the sky are Venus (the lower one) and Jupiter.

We went northern light hunting at night without much hope of success – but then there they were. I remind myself that sometimes the shot you want happens when you least expect it. They were faint, true, and visible to the camera more than to our eyes, but they were there. This was a 15 minute long exposure.

This was a 20 minute long exposure, and yes we were cold ;) but it was worth it. The angle of everything was so perfect, I was able to get the tilt of the stars and the northern light glow into one shot. Reason enough to stand freezing out in the middle of the night. At least for crazy people. And photographers.

Then we did some star photography. Did I say we? My bad, I meant I. Tito, being more practical than me, was staying warm in the car ;)

What a perfect, clear night it was! This was all done just off the 400, north of a small town called Nobel, on a side road. The night sky was just stunning.

Thank you Tito – for doing all the driving and getting me out of town when I really needed it :) The star photography was just the icing on a really great day !

‘Photo-take-outter’ Friday – Issue #2 – The Vertical Panorama

Published February 17, 2012 Photo-Take-Outter Friday! , Photography 2 Comments
Tags: panorama, photography, photoshop, techniques, tutorial, vertical stitch

For Issue #2 I wanted to try out something a little more techy. I’ve been having to do a lot of architectural shooting lately, so this technique was on the front burner for me and I thought I’d share it :)

As an architectural photographer I often find myself needing to prepare vertical panoramas for marketing purposes. Generally folks want straight lines and lots of sky to work with, so I take my 4 shots to encompass everything from the ground to the sky. Easy, right?

The problem with a vertical panorama is that, unlike a horizontal one, sometimes the distortion can be so extreme that the algorithm Photoshop uses for PhotoMerge starts to choke and splutter like someone who’s just discovered the hard way that the milk went bad.

As an example of just how lousy this can look I give you a tragic example. Behold, the working files:

I ran these 4 through Photoshop’s PhotoMerge function, on the default settings, and this is what I got:

Yikes! I feel sick just looking at it. Incidentally yes, that is the French Maid, and yes I had very good reasons for taking pictures in front of it. Here is a neat little trick that will help you fix a shot like this one.

In Photoshop, go to your file menu > Scripts > Load files into stack

Choose your source files. This will load all of your images into separate layers on one PSD file.

Look at your layers palette. In my case the file on the top layer is the first shot I took – the one at ground level, where distortion is minimal.

I want to preserve the perspective on this shot – so in my layers palette I lock that layer.

Now I go back to my file menu Edit > Auto Align layers

And voila! The lock forces Photoshop to respect the perspective on the ground level photo, and it collects the distortion to the top instead of the bottom. Makes me wish I had a real life ‘respect my perspective’ button ;)

It doesn’t look quite right, so from here you go Edit > Auto Blend layers:

Much better…

It still looks like a bad trip, but with a little cropping and some work with the free transform tool you’re done!

And that’s how you prepare a file where you need to stitch shots that have a drastic perspective shift. Horizontal or vertical (it’s a more common problem with vertical) all you have to do is lock the layer that has the perspective you want to maintain and then align the layers. It’s simple and very handy :)

Did you guys enjoy this? Was it helpful? Too techy? Are you utterly uninterested in non-craft posts? Should I feature less technique and more artsy photography? Photo-take-outter Fridays is still in it’s infancy and I’d definitely value feedback on the posts so I can provide more of what folks are looking for!

‘Photo-take-outter’ Friday – Issue #1

Published February 10, 2012 Photo-Take-Outter Friday! , Photography 1 Comment
Tags: blue hour, Canon, canon 7d, night photography, photography, Tokina 12-24, toronto, wide angle lens

West Indians will never refer to taking a photo. They always say ‘take out the photo’ – implying that the photo is a thing somehow extracted from the camera via magic. I think they’re onto something. Oh, and of course I’m not a photographer, I’m a ‘Photo-take-outter’. =D

This week I realized that the thing I love the most is the thing I blog the least about – photography! To remedy this oversight I’d like to start a new section where I get to share more about my favourite craft – taking beautiful pictures. Every Friday from now on will feature a photograph – with detail on whatever techniques/software/equipment I used to get the shot. I’ll try to include mini-tutorials, references and product reviews where it makes sense, and maybe even a little bit about why that photo was special to me :)

HDR, Macro, Photoshop, false bokeh, lens reviews… it’s all coming to the Blue Brick for ‘Photo-take-outter’ Friday!

‘Photo-take-outter’ Friday – Issue #1

For photo 1 I decided to use a shot from my beautiful hometown, Toronto.

This photo was taken during my favourite time of day for shooting: the Blue Hour. The Blue Hour is that magical time when the sky turns a deep, saturated blue and architecture just shines. I usually shoot in tungsten mode for this – it amplifies the intensity of the blues and tones back any yellow lights in the shot.

I took this with my faithful Canon 7D, and the Tokina 12-24 mm wide angle lens. I’ve had that lens since 2008 and I absolutely love it. Not only has it stood the test of time beautifully, but it delivers an incredibly sharp image for a non-prime lens.

The shot was taken in 3 increments, for a 3 photo vertical stitch. Before taking the 3 shots I locked my exposure by pressing the little button labelled with an asterisk on the 7D. Most cameras have some equivalent, but if yours doesn’t then you might have to do a little exposure matching in Photoshop later. I also used a tripod, and a remote shutter release so even my hands wouldn’t shake the camera.

The stitch itself was easy. I used Photoshop’s photomerge function on the default settings and it looked a great. A little straightening using the free transform tool and I was done!

Camera review: Fuji FinePix XP30

Published February 8, 2012 Photography , Travels Leave a Comment
Tags: Fuji FinePix XP30, photography, product review, travel, underwater

Last Christmas I bought my mom a digital camera for our vacation. Because I knew there would be snorkelling trips, I chose the waterproof Fuji FinePix XP30. I chose it because I bought the XP10 before going to Hawaii, and for such an affordable little camera I was pleased with the results.

The idea of snorkelling without being able to take pictures was a horrible thought to me, but the waterproof casing for my 7D was, the last I checked, completely beyond my finances (>4000 ish). By comparison I bought my mom the XP30 for about $150 Canadian.

The little camera is dust proof, shock proof and apparently freeze proof, in addition to being waterproof up to 10 feet. It takes pretty decent photos above water as well – here is a pic of a little hermit crab that we intruded upon.

The main problem I found with the underwater photos is the strong green tint, but you can see that I’ve fixed that with a little tinkering on a levels adjustment layer. A little work in photoshop produces a dramatic effect. Without it though, the photos are pretty green and the bright colour of sea creatures are muted.

The camera can certainly take a beating. We dropped ours, soaked it and left it in the sun for a while and it took it all in stride.

The main area on this camera that I couldn’t groove on is the underwater video. The sound of the motor in the camera when you zoom in and out is very loud in the video. The zoom quality is not great and the video is harder to colour correct than the photos are. However, for the price, and the fact that underwater video is tough for many reasons (stability, white balance etc.) I’d say it’s pretty good value for the price.

These photos were taken in Hawaii with the camera’s predecessor, the XP 10 – you can see the shots are gorgeous, albeit not very high res.

All in all I’d recommend this little guy. Mom had a blast with it, and so did we!

Princess Cruise

Published February 1, 2012 Photography , Travels Leave a Comment
Tags: colours, cruise, photography, princess Ruby, travel, vacation

Last week my parents, Tito and I went on a family vacation – on the Ruby Princess for a week in the caribbean. It was mom’s call to do a cruise, and I never thought I would enjoy it. I love to backpack and I was worried that a cruise would be restrictive, crowded and boring. I couldn’t have been more wrong!

This boat had everything. Movie theatres, heated pools, a library, an art gallery, live performance venues, a spa, a gym, a bunch of restaurant and nightclub options, a few different bars, and even minigolf, (though I bet that would be frustrating, on a ship). There were 5000 folks or so on this boat with us and not once did we have to line up to get on or off the boat, to eat or to be served. No matter what kind of traveller you are, it’s hard not to enjoy being pampered so thoroughly. No matter what you like to do; quiet time with a book or mega party in the pool, this ship accommodates it.

My parents had so much fun that they’re already planning their next cruise. I think they’ve got the bug ;) This is my number one favourite pic of the vacation – they look so happy here, I love it!

Tito and I will be doing another one for sure as well – I think this is a great way to see places that otherwise might not be as easy to access – like Alaska. From a ship you can appreciate the beauty of glaciers and the arctic ocean – something I have always wanted to photograph. Not to mention northern lights….

We booked with Princess Cruises, and our ship was the Ruby Princess. Think of a hotel where everyone is positive and helpful, all the food is included, everyone is attending to your every tiny need and you wake up every day in a different paradise. Then you can really understand the appeal of cruising. We paid only for alcohol, shore activities, shopping and soda. We were amazed at how affordable the trip ended up being, for such a great and varied experience.

The gorgeous scenery inspired me to start putting colour pallets together again – not just for jewellery but (shhh!) I’m thinking of taking another crack at dying yarn! I’ll definitely post about my experiments, be they Kool-Aid or food colouring, or maybe I’ll brave the powdered dye kit I bought at the KW Fair 2 years ago….

The caribbean certainly offers no end of inspiration. Tomorrow I’ll share some of the wildlife we caught, on land and in the sea!

I’m going to the caribbean, but first I’ve got to find Northern Lights.

Published January 30, 2012 Photography , Travels Leave a Comment
Tags: Cheltenham badlands, photography, travel

Says a tired Tito to his friends. As if being tied to an insane photographer isn’t the best life ever! Well, I guess I can understand not wanting to drive up north, late at night, the same night that you’ve got a red-eye flight to Florida. pbbbtttthhhh.

We didn’t find them that night, but we did get some great shots nonetheless. We ended up driving to the Cheltenham Badlands for some midnight shooting.