Drisyam 2008 (Photo Exhibition 26th - 29th Dec 2008 at Ernakulam Town Hall, Kochi, Kerala )

, is a group in Flickr that comprises photography enthusiasts Keralaits residing within Kerala and abroad. The group includes Amateur as well as Professional Photographers from different walks of life, having a common passion towards Photography.

A few brilliant members including JP, Sanju and few more conceived this Endeavour “Drisyam 2008” - A photography exhibition wherein members can showcase their photographs for the public.

End of an elaborate discussion, various members came forward to take up the various responsibilities and that gave way to this wonderful effort.


Each member had an opportunity to submit five photos from which the selected members did the job of screening. The selection of photos must have been a tough job for these members. My submission of five photos to Drisyam 2008 and this was selected ....

Drishyam 2008
Venue: Ernakulam Durbar Hall Art Gallery, Kerala Lalitha Kala Academy Kochi, Kerala, India
Date : 26th - 29th Dec 2008
Courtesy: abhijith. It it the moment of great joy to see my photo in an exhibition. My profound thanks to KeralaClick team for providing me such an opportunity to participate in this great event.
KeralaClicks Blog

Experment on Depth of Field

In simple term, Depth of Field can be described as the area or 'zone' of a photograph that is in focus. The decrease in sharpness is gradual on either side of the focused area in the photograph.

Dept of Field is not fixed. There are three main factors that determines its extent. First is the lens aperture - the samller the aperture, the greater the depth of field. Hence, a wide aperture (eg:-f2) will have an inherently shallow depth of field than a small aperture (eg:- f6).
The Second factor affecting Depth of Field is the lens focal length. Wide angle lens produce an inherently greater Depth of Field than normal or telephoto lenses.
The Third factor affecting Depth of Field is the focus distance of the subject.The further away you focus the lens from the camera the greater the resulting depth of field. Therefore, a lens focused at 1m from the camera will produce a shallower depth of field than the same lens, set at the same aperture, focused at just 3m from the camera.


Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/1250)
Aperture: f/3.5
Focal Length: 18 mm
ISO Speed: 100
Exposure Bias: -1 EV
YCbCr Positioning: Centered
Exposure Program: Aperture priority
Shutter Speed: 679936/65536
White Balance: Manual

My Second Lens

After a long wait, I've cautiously purchased my second lens - CANON EF-S 55-250 IS. I've spent a lot of time reading different articles, spent time discussing with a few friends about the pros and cons about different lens. I felt very difficult to decide if I can go with SIGMA or TAMRON or TOCINA or CANON. Different persons had different reason to justify their views.
Ultimately, I made a firm decision to go with CANON alone, and then starts my next dilemma - which lens to start with? Fixed Focus Lens , Tele, USM lens etc. Initially I felt to go with IF (Internal Focus) Lens and my eyes were locked on 70-200mm F/4.0 L USM. All reviews lead me to this lens as the preferred second lens and that made me to dream for it. Even though it was a bit heavy to my valet, I was almost sure to go with it. To make my valet comfortable, I even decided to sacrifise IS (Image Stabilizer)feature. Unfortunately, I had some personal reason due to which I have to shell out some of my extra money for unexpected reasons and that made me to look out for a less expensive lens.

My second option was always for EF-S 55-250mm IS lens. I started consoling myself as - for a beginner, there is no other lens better than this. The reasons to opt this lens - Less weight, relatively good fast AutoFocus, Less expensive & finally a few good review about this lens.

As expected, I could able to find good results from this lens.

Bokeh

By now I'm a great admirer of Bokey and get mesmerized watching beautiful art of Bokey by such a lot of talented photographers found in Flickr. Being a beginner in photography, I watch these wonderful work like a child watching the art performed by a Magician!!!! I always wonder how they would have achieved it... is there any technique being this.... I would like to attempt for this but how? I have done it once and felt satisfied, but after watching some other work, I realised my work was nowhere near it.
I kept a decorative golden-peacock on one of the sleek speaker of my home-theater music system and placed it near to my window. Next, I fixed my Camera on my tripod and adjusted the viewing angle to the desired way. The street-lights were my main source of bokey. Then I started adjusting my camera settings to generate a desirable Bohek and here is the result.....



Exposure: 0.125 sec (1/8)
Aperture: f/4
Focal Length: 27 mm
ISO Speed: 800
Exposure Bias: 1 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire
YCbCr Positioning: Co-Sited
Exposure Program: Shutter priority
Shutter Speed: 196608/65536
Focus Mode: One-shot AF
Canon Image Size: Large
Metering Mode: Evaluative
Focus Range: Manual
AE Setting: Normal AE
Image Stabilization: Off
Display Aperture: 24.8
Zoom Source Width: 65535
Zoom Target Width: 65535
Photo Effect: Off
Color Tone: 0
Scaled Focal Length: 13620
Measured LV: 0
Target Aperture: 1
Target Exposure Time: 2.6879700256073E-264
Exposure Compensation: 779.71875


Today I've come across a Bokeh by Victor Oliveira and he has reveled his technique which was amazing. It is a wonderful picutre to view.

Sue Zipkin is another artist I have come across and observed having an exceptionally wonderful work on Bokeh, it is worth visting her PhotoStream in Flickr.

Remembering Independence day

This is the 62nd anniversary of Indian Indepence Day and here is my remembrance of Indepence Day.




Materials used : a Crystal Globe, a Calendar with plain white at back of the sheet kept reversed on the table & A tiny Indian flag drew by my daughter using crayons.
I kept the flag upside down behing the Crystal and angled my Camera to get some part of the flat right below the Indian map on the crystal.

Exposure: 0.3 sec (3/10)
Aperture: f/14
Focal Length: 55 mm
ISO Speed: 1600
Exposure Bias: 1 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire
YCbCr Positioning: Centered
Exposure Program: Shutter priority
Shutter Speed: 106496/65536

Experiment on Water Drops

I have found that most of the photography enthusiast during their initial period of learning the art of Photography, attempts to take Photos of Water drops. Myself too, as part of taming my hands on new Camera, has ventured for such experiment. Objective was to understand the Shutter-speed, ISO & aperture.

I could find a useful and interesting blog from Flickr ( V1NZ Photography tricks ). There are a lot to learn about High-speed Photography and a few PhotoStreams related to this is available in Flickr. The result of my experiment is given below.



End of this experiment I have to admint that I need to sharpen my skills further more .....

August 8 2008 (08-08-08)

In Asia the number "8" stands for wealth and auspiciousness. For many people, 08.08.08 is not only a very exciting day because of the opening of the Olympic Games in Beijing, China. It is also a day where many couples get married to be reminded of this unique date for the rest of their lives.

Flickr has conducted a unique way of celebrating this day by inviting the participants to take snaps on 8th August 2008 and post in to Flickr888 Group. They have partnered with MOO to create unique Flickr 888 Postcards.
... and here is my post.

Basic Photographic Jargons

There are some Basic Photography jargons that are to be know.

1. SLR - Single Lens Reflex. Professional photographer use this type of Camera. It uses an automatic moving mirror system which permits the photographer to see exactly what will be captured by the film or digital imaging system. (More details are found here)

2. Aperture - the opening through which light is admitted. The aperture partly determine the amount of light that falls on a camera film or sensor. Aperture sizes are classified as f-stops or f-numbers.( More details are found here)

3. Shutter speed - the speed of shutting and re-opening of the camera shutter.( More details are found here )

4. Focal length -The distance between the centerpoint of the lens and the film when the lens is focused on infinity. On modern camera, it is measured in millimetre.(More details are found here)

5. F-number or F-stop - the size of the aperture. A smaller F-number denotes a larger aperture.( More to read here)

6. Depth of Field - the distance in front and behind a subject that remains sharp and in focus. A larger f-stop will result in a longer Depth of field. This simply means that a big f-stop numbers will result in a larger portion of the photo remaining sharp and in focus.(More to read here)

7. Panning- the action of moving the camera to follow the action.(more to read here)

8. ISO - ISO denotes how sensitive the image sensor is to the amount of light present. The higher the ISO, the more sensitive the image sensor and therefore the possibility to take pictures in low-light situations. ISO speed affects the shutter speed / aperture combinations you can use to obtain correct exposure.( To understand more about ISO, read PhotoXels OR Digital Photography School )

My new Camera - Canon EOS 450 D

After a long wait, I've decided to graduate from Point-and-Shoot to DSLR. Since I was already a Canon user, Canon EOS was my default option to go. By then I had a few Flickr'ian friends with whom I discussed about the available models and with their guidance I went ahead for EOS450D aka Digital Rebel XSi.