that 'cover' picture...

I was asked by some readers for the technical data and how this main landing page photo was taken.

ISO was set to 800, shutter speed at 1/100, pre-focussed with lens wide opened at f/4.0 giving me an approximate sharp focusing area of anything between 5ft and its surrounding area.

After setting my camera, all I had to do was to wait for the traffic to stop, walk across, bend down on one knee for that low angle, tilt the camera a little and took a few shots in quick succession.

At PP, I bumped up the contrast and saturation a bit and absolutely love the result.

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)