Day 6 - Side Lighting

Today I even brought the camera to school with us, but nothing was inspiring. Then I tried taking some pictures of the pineapple we had after dinner, but they were terrible. Because of the blue tile our house is covered in, everything ends up with a terrible blue cast to it, and blue pineapple is not something you want to see. It's just not very appetizing.

I've been reading Strobist, a wonderful lighting blog, if you're into that sort of thing, and I looked at my tripod, and saw the interesting shadow it was making. I shot it in RAW format, so I could choose my white balance later (no more blue cast).

Tomorrow I will shoot some street Thailand life, as I am sure you are all eagerly waiting for.

Day 5 - Oranges

Some oranges in Thailand are not orange, for some reason, they are green, even when ripe. I got out some candles tonight, turned out all the lights, and took some pictures.

Day 4 - Danger Cat!

Today we just hung out at home, so here are two shots of Mouse, and one I took through the louvered glass windows in the kitchen to create the light and dark stripes. Tomorrow I'll be more creative, I promise.

Day 3 - Revisiting the Garden

Went out into the garden today again. Managed to catch a snap of a butterfly and another picture of those red bushy flowers.

Day 2 - The Garden

I went shooting in my garden today, and I came up with a shot of my plumeria and this other flower that I have no idea what it is, but the tree out front is suddenly bursting with them.

The plumeria is overexposed, but I think that adds a delicateness. I shot both of these with my Canon 50 mm f/1.8.

I know I'm breaking the rule that says no white parts of the image should touch the edge (and I'm breaking it a lot), but that's what art is about, right? Breaking rules.

My New Lens, Baby

Evan, after two years of missing Christmas and birthdays, finally gave in, and bought me this lens. We had it shipped to my mother's house in California, and she brought it with her when she came most recently (thanks mom!).

Unlike most lenses, the Lensbaby doesn't focus on a plane, but rather on a spot. You can move the in-focus spot (the 'sweet spot') by tilting the lens, and then you have to focus manually on your subject. And to change the aperture you switch in and out little metal discs. The wider the aperture, the smaller the sweet spot, and the more blur you have in your photo.

I also sprung for the creative aperture kit, which has a couple blank aperture discs and one heart and one star. This makes all the out of focus light spots in your photo turn into hearts or stars, respectively.

This lens is difficult to focus, so it's hard to shoot moving subjects with, and a lot of times I settled for less than optimal focus while using it, but when you get a great shot, it's so worth it. It makes photography feel so creative. And Evan really likes to take the camera from me and shoot with it when I put this lens on.

Here are a few shots of downtown Siem Reap with the star aperture. I haven't edited them at all, and I don't think I would, except for maybe straightening the second one a little.