rules of street photography

I had an interesting chat with a friend about photography this afternoon.

We spoke about why I chose to focus on street photography, the workshop that I am planning to do and the philosophy behind both these topics.

Then we discuss at great length about photography rules. And I resolve that there is only one rule in street photography:

THERE ARE NO RULES IN STREET PHOTOGRAPHY

Here are my reasoning:

Full frame, crop or rangefinder? 
Most younger generation photographers use full frame or crop sensor SLRs. Some of the more redefined or retro fans prefer rangefinders. But seriously, how many of us can afford a USD9,000 (RM28,000) Leica M?

Film or digital?
This is a bit tricky. I shoot mainly digital nowadays but I started out with films and I still shoot films. The only advantage between shooting digital and film is cost. The advent of digital cameras has turned the film market into something akin of a vintage car status. Films cost 3 times more expensive than they used to and only a handful studios still process them, so they dictate the prices.

Wide or telephoto?
While more experienced street photographers prefer the former, some equally good ones prefer the latter. Whichever your preference is, bear in mind there is a difference if you are using full frame vs crop sensor. Eg. if you are using a 50mm lens on a full frame sensor, you get 50mm. If you use the same lens on a 1.6 crop sensor body, you'll get 80mm equivalent on 35mm film.

High ISO or low ISO?
I toggle my ISO between 400 and 800 and I won't hesitate bumping it up to 1600. Why? Well I don't mind a bit of noise (and a bit of grain and some blurriness) in my pictures.

Aperture? Shutter speed?
If you are going for details, go with F/11 or F/16 although it can get a little tricky if you are shooting at night. I usually go with F/5.6 or sometimes a little wider.

Shutter speed-wise, well use Aperture Priority and let the camera decide the shutter speed for you. Personally I love to demonstrate the action so I usually set mine to 1/30. I tend to like some aspect of blurriness. Because life is not always as clear. You may see clearer amidst blurred scenes. I have, many a times.  

White balance?
I tend to prefer a little overcast, "cloudy" like settings.

So there you go. On the gear and technical requirements, there isn't any hard or fast rules. It is really, a matter of preference.

I'll share a bit on how to put these no-rules rules into practice next. Yes, I know I still owe you the post on camera bags :p

Before signing off this post, I'd like to share some update on the workshop. I'm glad that the idea is gaining traction and I have 2 other friends who have expressed interest in joining me. Both passionate about sharing knowledge and equally dumb :) as I am since they both agreed that our objective is not to make money!

Hopefully whatever we are planning here materialises. So please watch this space for more info. 

Thanks for reading!

vacation photos: it's pretty easy, I promise...

Ok, this is not about camera bags as I promised in the previous post but I suddenly had the urge to share something on vacation photos so here goes...

I love travelling and no trip is a good trip without packing my gear and making arrangements for an “absolute my own personal time” photography session. And I have quite a few interesting stories to share on this. But that’s for another day.

Today I want to talk about the joy of family and/or friends vacation pictures.

(A) 
These are the ingredients for a nice series of vacation shots:

• A few people: in a family and/or a group of buddies of course.

• A holiday destination: holiday means you are not on a working trip or something similar. You cannot be working on your vacation.The thing is your mind won’t rest if you bring your work along and if your mind can’t relax, you won’t have the urge to shoot nice pictures. Also if you are in a group guided trip, ditch the tour guide. He is only interested in making commissions from your purchases, your vacation and memories mean nothing to him. For this obvious reason, I always prefer to plan my own itinerary. That frees me with the time and flexibility to go anywhere and stay as long as I wish there.

• A camera: it may be your Canon 1DX or just a simple point and shoot or even your mobile phone camera sans the Internet connection that pushes emails through them…and of course, keeping the camera in your beach bag doesn't help. So always have it handy and ready for the shots.

(B)
Having checked the ingredients above, let’s look at the rules for some decent vacation pictures. As far as I’m concerned, there are only 2 rules:

• Shoot wide: use wide angle, prime lens where possible. Leave those bazooka-sized zooms at home unless you are training to be paparazzi. Photography is about learning something new in every new shot. To learn, you need to get close to your subjects. Simple logic.

• An eye for details: don’t just glance, always take a second look. It will make you focus twice or even stare into it for sometime…and I’m not talking about the braless chick in a white wet tee. I’m talking about things that are happening around you.

• Ok…maybe I’m forcing this 3^rd rule in: travel light, but travel for your photo-shoot even lighter since you’ll be doing a lot of walking.

Put (A) and (B) together and you’ll have some great memories captured to be shared (or maybe even bragged) with your family or buddies, depending who you left behind for the trip.

You can't run too far away from the beach in any vacation can't you?

Ok not when you're is a safari trip.

Reflections and shadows.

Over and under (exposure I mean...)

Fun in the sun.

Lonely.

My buddy shot this.

He is my son.

He is 10.

Samsara. 

These flags are massive.

I always wonder how people carry, let alone balance them.

Green mamba.

Innocence kills.

I mainly use this EF 50mm F/1.8 II lens for my street works, well for most of my work in fact. It is no doubt my ‘prime’ lens.

Not the smoothest and discreet lens but at RM290 (<USD90) a pop, dare I complain? Some toys are way more expensive that this ‘gem’ of a very affordable lens. I hasten to call it a ‘cheap’ lens as I think it will be an injustice to refer to it as such.

This lens is incredibly sharp and focuses very fast, for the price that is. I’ve seen some people comparing this with the L lens and I think those who do that sort of comparison are crap simply because they are going “out of focus” by choosing to compare this with a lens that costs 18 times more than the other. It’s worse when those doing such comparisons are professional photographers (or those who claim to be pros).

One fella commented in a popular forum saying, “it’s a good lens, but crappy construction, mine is full of dust inside…”

I think he should correct his comment to say, “it’s a good lens, but I’m a crappy photographer as mine is full of dust inside…”

Bro, your lens will be full of dust INSIDE if you do not have a clue how to use and take care of it. It has got nothing to do with the construction of the lens, regardless how crappy it may be.

Most of the pictures you see in this blog are shot using this ‘beggar’s gem’ of a lens.

Cheap good lens or good cheap lens? You decide :)

Verdict: this is a must in your camera bag!

And speaking of camera bag, look out for the next entry on camera bags!

(Product photos are property of Canon)

creative use of "props"

Today's quickie post is on creative use of "props"...in inverted commas because it can be difficult to tell between the actual props and the imaginary ones ;)

 Those are real almonds on the 'plate'.

The 'setting' was a page from Ikea's catalogue.

Almost surreal huh? ;p

 This is what I call a fluke shot.

I held a book up on my face and shot this with my mobile phone camera.

One attempt. 

That's all. 

Pure luck.
And for once, damn I'm good looking ;p

One of my favourites.

Scene was a painted billboard.

Models requested to have their pictures taken on these imaginary seats.

Creative little fellas :)

my first SLR...and the drama of how I came to own one

The previous 2 posts were a bit of a diversion from the originally promised upcoming post...so let's get back on track here...

Known as the Canon EOS 500N or New EOS Kiss in Japan and Rebel G in US, this was the very first SLR camera I owned. How I came into investing in this camera? Thanks for asking ;p

As a student back then, I used to commute in my trusty motorcycle (the folks here referred to one as ‘kapchai’) it’s a rather small Suzuki Best 110cc bike that made me looked like a performing circus bear when riding it as I’m rather huge.

What does this bike had to do with my eventual foray into owning my first SLR?

One evening, while resting at home, one of my students (I used to conduct private tuition to secondary school students to earn some extra income) came over to my place and asked to borrow my bike. He said his dad was involved in a traffic accident and he needs transport to get to the scene. I gave my keys to him without thinking twice.

Until very late that night, there was still no sight of this guy and my bike. Then I walked to his house which was just about 200m away from mine. To my surprise I saw his dad, and his car at home. So I asked his dad if he had been involved in any accidents and where the boy was. He replied in the negative and told me that they have had an argument earlier in the day and he ran off from house.

Reality set in. My bike has been stolen! Although technically I actually gave the keys to him…so in essence I was duped into parting with my bike.

I made a police report the next day and went shopping for a new bike a few days later because I was not confident that the police would eventually find it but within a month, the police had found the boy and my bike. By then I had already gotten myself a new (and bigger) bike, a Yamaha TZM 150.

When the bike was found, it was already heavily modified, probably to make it difficult for the police to identify it. Kid’s got great talent in modding bikes I must say. If not for the chassis number stamped on the engine, I would not have recognised my bike at all.

I brought it to the very shop I purchased it from…the same shop I had purchased my new bike to replace this one and I asked the owner of the shop to give me a good price for it. The owner said he’ll take it for RM1,400 (USD450 at current exchange rate). I took the offer and he paid me cash for it.

It was also during that time that I started surveying for a new camera, one that would be my official first SLR. There were not much of information on cameras on the Internet back then and couple that with my online search skills that was mostly limited to searching a certain types of pictures ;)

I had to resort to the shop owner’s recommendations, and the fact that he has a pretty assistant in the shop helps (for his business of course)…naïve young man meets pretty sales assistant with a cute smile = higher rate of securing sale! Simple equation.

He took out a Canon EOS 500N and a Minolta (can’t remember the exact model). I was immediately attracted to the Canon design. Now looks actually counts when it comes to product selection, at least to a novice who does not know what he’s buying.

He gave me some discounts and freebies in the form of a Canon camera bag, some 6 rolls of films, accessories such as cleaning kit, etc in a ‘starter kit’ bundle, all for RM1,400!

Coincidence? Perhaps.

I was now a proud owner of this EOS 500N. I was indeed a beauty of a camera, at least that’s how I thought of this camera. It comes with an 18-55mm EF kit lens to get a novice like me started in photography. I recently took this out from my store and tested in out and it still works! My habit of taking care and storing my stuff well contributed to this.

Click here for the complete specification of the 500N

http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/hardwares/classics/eos/eoscamera/EOS500nRebelGKiss2/eos500NrebelGspec.htm

I would later add a battery grip, a Canon Speedlite 380EX, a Canon EF 75-300mm f4/5.6 III USM lens and some pretty neat camera support to the kit :)

More on the upcoming posts ;)

Note: Product pictures shown here are from Google Images

photography journey so far...

how it all started...

I started taking pictures using my dad’s old trusty (and still working) Ricoh KR-5 when I was 13. 

This is a sturdy model, through-the-lens (TTL) viewfinder (which means no parallax error) 35mm camera with excellent built quality and a very nice weight ratio piece.

Basic specs of the KR-5:

Type:	35mm film SLR camera
Lens mount:	K bayonet mount
Lens:	Riconar 55mm f/2.2 prime, 4 elements in 4 groups
Shutter:	mechanically-controlled, vertical travel, focal plane shutter with metal curtains
Shutter speed:	1 to 1/500th of a second, B (bulb)
Flash X sync:	1/8th to 1/60th of a second
Viewfinder:	eye-level pentaprism viewfinder with exposure meter needle
Focusing screen:	diagonal split-image spot in microprism image band surrounded by Fresnel field
Exposure meter:	TTL full open metering for centre-weighted average light reading coupled to shutter speeds, film speeds and f-stops
Battery:	2 1.5V G13 silver oxide batteries
Weight:	approx. 680gms with lens and batteries

I had this camera stored in an air-tight container for many years when I switched to a different camera, my very first own SLR. 

Lately I took the KR-5 out and found that it is still very well kept. The condition inside is still almost as new and on the exterior, it only showed a little sign of wear and tear.

I decided to have it serviced and after spending a couple of weeks in the camera service centre, it is now back with me. I grabbed some Ilford 400 B&W films and I'm going to take it for a test drive soon…after more than 10 years not seeing action.

Back then, film cameras ruled and the biggest difference shooting films compared to the present digital media is, cost!

With films, I was always careful with my shots so as not to waste money on expensive films (yes, films price in Malaysia are expensive by our standards) and we pay separately for processing / development fees and, printing cost. 

Anyone shooting films can vouch for the fact that shots are more carefully planned as each frame of your film's exposures means a lot. With memory cards in the digital era, we can somehow afford to be a little shutter-happy.

My dad bought this amazing camera in Singapore as a family camera although it did nothing to spur my interest into the world of photography.

The camera feels heavy, built quality was like a tank, even the plastic parts felt like they’ll last 3 millenniums. It has been my trusted camera for many years and hopefully for many years to come.

I’m still puzzled why he bought the camera back then as he has no interest in photography whatsoever and what we needed actually was a simple point and shoot for our family events. But I owed it to him for introducing me to a world beyond what my usual eyes are able to see (and still seeing)…hmm…sounds a little philosophical (and freaky) huh?

A few years later, I actually began getting more interested in photography but yet I did not own a SLR until the late 1990s. 

The story of how I eventually owned my first SLR was a rather interesting one.

Next: my first SLR...

foto. quartzimodo.

quartzimodo, street photography

Hi guys!

I am Kenneth Ang. I was born and bred and currently based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and, I roam the streets on my free (sometimes odd) time for photo opportunities that tells a story. 

Photography is not my bills-paying job. I have a full-time good (ok, almost-enough) paying job that sort of settles that.

I'm just a dude who loves photography, both learning and sharing the art.

I am currently working on a couple of photo-projects and I'll share them here in forth-coming posts.

not my train...

foto. quartzimodo.

"quartzimodo" was a name I came up with 10 years ago. My other interest, besides photography is watches and the name quartzimodo was intended as an online business website for the supply of watch parts with my friend, Zami "Stratman"...yes, he plays the Strat and he is also a keen photographer :)

We never really used "quartzimodo" for our business but both of us loved the name so much that we had a tacit agreement on the usage of the name. Stratman was, at that time in the process of starting a blog on watches, he was allowed to use the name for his blog while I retain all "rights" to the name. 

I decided name this blog foto. quartzimodo. mainly because this name IS afterall, my alter-ego and it kinda rhymes :)

So you guessed it...this is a space where we talk about:

• Photography (in general);
• Street photography (the genre I love most); 
• Photography-related DIY stuff (yup, I hate paying a lot for my gear...hahaha)

Thanks for popping by and please do come back for more posts...

Next: photography journey so far: how it all started...