Moonrise on New year's eve

Moonrise, originally uploaded by mukul.soman.

New year's eve was fun for me! Chugging long the D3s and a tripod, along with my 24-70 f2.8 lens, I was somewhere along the shorelines of Monterey bay. I jhad no clue where exactly it was though. Some location between Big Sur and Monterey is just about the closest I can guess. The reason for this act of crazziness was a desire to capture the blue moon rise, which happens only once every 3 years. It truly was worth all the hiking, when I witnessed this cosmic marvel. Posting the pic for you folks to enjoy.
Signing off,
Mukul Soman.

Nikon D3S review

Nikon D3S review, originally uploaded by mukul.soman.

Ever since Nikon entered the full frame game with the D3, low light photography took a different turn, now with the introduction of the D3S, Nikon claims to have provided "Night Vision" to their flagship model, the new D3S with an unbelievable ISO range of upto 12800, extendable to ISO 102,400. But does the camera truly live upto the hype that surrounds it?

Lets find out.

The body of the D3S is built like a tank, very sturdy, weather sealed and also quite lighter than what I expected. My D700 with a battery pack weighed more than the D3S's bigger body. Well a lot of that can be attributed to the extra battery that the D3s doesn't have to deal with. Yet the battery life of the D3S is a little over an amazing, 4000 photographs.

The buttons are well spaced and I tested the camera in very cold weather here, about 3 degrees, so had to use it while wearing thick gloves. Well, I must praise Nikon for the button alignment and size since I was comfortably able to use it wearing my gloves on, which is quite painstaking with many other cameras I have tried before, a pointer to the fact that this body is targeted towards professionals who might take it to extreme conditions.. The dedicated buttons, and battery opening knobs are all noticeably larger as.

Picture quality is immaculate, thanks to the re-engineered full frame sensor(12.1MP). Nikon has been quite clear in their approach of keeping pixels larger in size rather than larger in number, which I believe is a very smart decision. Their show stealing headline of ISO 12800 is amazingly noiseless at higher ISOs and at 12800,the camera truly lives up to all the hype surrounding it. This takes indoor event photography, night snaps at higher shutter speeds and action photography to new heights of convenience. A very usable image at ISO 12800 means, much more usable images at all ISOs lesser than it. Check out the sample test shots, click on them to get more info on the EXIF.
ISO 12800

ISO 12800

ISO 6400




Speed has been one of the highest points of the Nikon D3. The D3S is no exception. It can shoot at 9fps, and when in crop mode can go upto 11fps. Very handy for action work and wildlife. The D3s has seriously expanded the buffer size as compared to the D3, with twice the capacity of the D3. Now, 36 14bit Raw files can be shot consecutively with no delay, and 124 Jpegs in the same way. The super-quick MultiCAM-3500 AF system seems to have minor tweak as well, allegedly. The 51 point auto focusing system is precisely responsive and nails focus so fast that its quite impossible to miss your moving subject.

Nikon's proprietary D-Movie mode which is a major addition in this model, captures smooth 24fps video at 720P and saves files up to 5minutes long/2GB in size, as Motion-Jpegs (MJPEG) format. The inbuilt microphone is excellent though only mono, it might catch focusing noise given out by certain lenses, so an external mike attachable to the hotshoe will be a good idea for stereo sound recording. Also, it's possible to pull still images back out from these movie files too, though only at their native 1280x720 resolution of course. I wish this camera had Full HD 1080 though 720 P is perfectly usable HD footage. Nikon's argument is that that this was all down to file size. At 720p, with the compression the camera is using you will get five-minute bursts out of the allocated 2GB continuous shooting space. If the camera were to shoot Full HD then this would be significantly less.So in essence, the D3S is a stills camera that is to be the very best at ISO, and the movie feature is an extra functionality. But there has been some impressible upgrades as well. the much criticized rolling shutter issue is better controlled. Looks like the built in rolling shutter correction algorithm is doing its job, but yet the issue has not vanished.

What is impressive though is the 24 fps smooth playback and auto-focus feature that works while filming. That is a very useful feature. The D3S uses contrast detecting to ensure that the auto-focusing while shooting actually works. The dedicated Live video button is a blessing. Also, for those shooting under incandescent light there is also a flicker reduction mode, to reduce the irritating ‘flicker'.

The quiet shutter mode is an excellent add-on and a nice touch, especially useful to the wildlife photographer, to not break peace with a loud clank of the shutter.

At $5200, Nikon's flagship model is a very well engineered, well thought out, smart camera. A 4.8/5. If it had 1080p video(Yes I am greedy), the its a 5/5 from me! No regrets though

Exposure Blending

Hey folks, wassup? My lovely friend, wanted to know about exposure blending...and I thought, why not make it my blog post for the month..So here is a quick look at how to do basic exposure blending. I am held up with midterms...so a more elaborate post will be coming soon!

Black and white conversion

Yo! Wassup buddz? So this time I am in for something new! I have put together a tutorial that shows how to convert color images to black and white, in my typical dramatic, mystic style. Many of of my friends have been asking for this for quite some time. So here goes! Have fun trying this out!


Thats it from me for now, Signing off.
Mukul Soman.

Portrait stuff.

Wassup buddz? Ok its time for a little bit of info on how to shoot decent portraits, with err…well any camera! And I can guarantee you that you will end up with better shots of your friends, family and yeah that special someone( In case your life doesn’t suck as much as mine in that area…)

Just follow these few points that I have observed over a few years.

1)Choose the right background: A portrait photo is all about the object’s face. The most important part of the photo is the face. Choosing the right background can make sure the viewer is focused on the face. Pick a neutral background that does not attract attention. For example a soft solid color background is better than a busy street background. Avoid having people or moving objects in the background. For this image i chose a background that gives a sense of depth, with the road winding away into infinity and the diagonal lines on the road seem to lend some interest into the composition as well...almost make you wonder if there is a story behind the kid being there. By the way she's my niece, a lovely bubbly lil cutie pie!


And here is an example of a selectively colored photograph, note the busy background, and how the subject still retains attention.


2)Blur the background: In addition to choosing a neutral background you should further blur it. This will put even more emphasis on the object instead of its surroundings.
Blurring the background is best achieved by taking a photo using a shallow depth of field. This can be accomplished by using a zoom lens and shooting from a short distance or with a wide aperture manual setting. If your camera does not allow you to blur the photo by setting a shallow depth of field (for example it is hard to achieve such a depth of field with simple pocket cameras) you can always blur the background later using photo processing software on your computer.
In this image thats exactly what I have done. I chose an aperture of 1.8 on my 50mm prime lens and blurred out the background, laying focus on the subject. And by the way this too is my niece, the elder one of the two. But equally adorable!


3)Focus on the eyes: The center of a good portrait should be the object’s eyes. Before taking the photo look at the object eyes and try to figure out what story they tell. Depending on what you would like to capture in the portrait guide the object to look straight to the camera or maybe sideways focusing on some object. Adding a smile is also recommended unless you specifically want a face that does not smile in order to send some message to the viewer. This captures the innerness of the person. This is one example of the effect of a shot perfectly focused in the eye.


4)Use natural lighting: Natural lighting is necessary in order to capture the full color range and warmth of the skin. It is best to take portrait photos outdoors during the day. When shooting outdoors position the object in a way that the sun light hits it from the side. Never take a photo with the sun behind the object – results in shading – or right in front of the object – results in over exposing the face and distorting its natural colors. I love the evening light since thats when you get the best side on light and it is not too bright as well. On a bright afternoon, the shade is an awesome place to shoot, making the person face the bright side while standing in the shade.If some shades appear on the face use a soft fill-in flash to get rid of them. If you have to shoot indoors and use artificial lighting always use indirect light sources such as bounce flash or lights that illuminate the room instead of directly shining on the object.
A couple of evening light shots.
One o my friend Maira.


And another of my buddy Tomas.


Also here is an example of a shot taken at mid day, but in the shade with the subjects facing the light, but not in direct path of it.


4)Take many photos and experiment: I Now this the single most important bit. In the digital era the cost of taking another photo is zero. One of the best ways to shoot a great photo is simply by shooting many photos. In fact all professional photographers do that they keep on shooting more and more photos so don’t be shy about it. Experiment with different settings – lighting, object position, white balancing settings to get different color temperatures, exposures, depth of field and more. When you are done sit down and sort the photos until you choose the one that you like the best. It is common sense that the chances of finding that one great photo are much higher if you tried 500 photos than if you just shot a few.

Hope this really helps you all. Thats it for now, signing off!

I exist.

I exist., originally uploaded by mukul.soman.

This is my friend EC. EC came to the west coast with high hopes like many of us. But sadly life was not kind enough to him, and today he is on the streets of San Francisco....yes he is homeless. Every day when I walk on the streets of this city I see many people like EC who are less fortunate than us. When I look at them, I realize how selfish we all are. Walking besides these beings without even caring if they exist or not. After speaking with Ec for about 15 minutes, I bought him some lunch..and this photograph was taken right after that. He was confused and thankful, at the same time. He was really glad that I stopped by to ask him how he was doing and spent some time and gave him some attention. With tearful eyes he wished me a great day ahead and thanked me for giving him a bit of my time, and for the lunch.

Clicked the image with a 50mm prime lens. But what I again experienced was a sort of intense connection between me, the photographer and he my subject. The fact that I was in his space, and the fact that I interacted with him on a personal level brought out the much needed emotion entrapped between us into this image. An amazing learning curve my friends, an amazing learning curve.

Signing off,
Mukul.

Sharing energy space

Bird n grass, originally uploaded by mukul.soman.

Hey, wassup buddz? I have been really held up with my last week of the semester...so classes and exams kept me so busy! I had not touched my camera for over 2 weeks! Damn!

OK, I am now back taking pictures and also, back to my blogging ways. So what I want to share with all of you is, some thing that I learnt from one of the world's best documentary photographers, Colin Finlay, the joy of sharing energy space with your subject...be it an animal, a person or an inanimate object. Well after listening to his super charged talk at my university, thanks to BADA, I realized that it's a myth that only a long zoom lens can get you close ups of your subjects, the above pic is taken with nothing more than my 50mm prime lens which to me, was very satisfying. For those of you who are not too sure of what is a prime lens, well it is a lens that has no zoom. The only way to zoom in is..err move closer to your subject and to zoom out ..yeah you guessed it right, move back! OK brilliant, read on!
So when using a lens like the 50mm prime, which is so restrictive, it pushes me further and compels me to move in closer and closer to my subject, like how I shot the bird you saw in the above shot. I was at San Francisco Fisherman's Wharf, just lying down on the grass, relaxing. That's when i noticed this little bird walking on the grass, looking for grub. I just slowly got up on my knees, reached out for my camera and started moving close to it. I was very slow and calm in my movement, which probably made the little bird realize i was not out there to eat him or create trouble! I could feel the pleasure of it letting me share its energy space with me! And that positive energy has such an influence on the bird and on me - A while later the bird was literally on my hand...and mind you I had no food on me to attract it. The bird just did not seem to mind my presence at all, and once our energies were so positive, it felt so comfortable and even came and check out my camera! As a result I ended up with some really close shots with nothing more than my prime lens.

Now this is not just a one off incident. I have had a similar interactions with some other chaps as well. For instance, take this shot of a crab i clicked while i was lying on the rocky shoreline of the San Francisco pier...almost nosing the crab.

This crab image was also taken with nothing more than my 50mm prime lens. Usually crabs are very shy animals that quickly scamper across and hide into crevices once they sense human presence. I followed my same slow approach to get close to this guy and check out the results!

Also, this ground squirrel and the butterfly shot below it was shot with a lens with even shorter focal length! The 14-24mm wide lens.


This was clicked with my 50mm prime lens, i got incredibly close to the peacock, almost a meter away!!! Was amazing! It took time, almost an hour to get that close...i really now feel that the intensity of a shot is more when u r in the energy aura of your subject...rather than always rely on long zooms. In this case i entered the cage of the peacocks personal space and it let me too!(thanks to Finlay)

Here, this one with the mouth open, was giving out the famous loud peacock call when i took this shot inches away from it.

The experience of getting so close to these animals and taking these shots, just redefined photography for me. Its no more a "stay far and click close" game for me!

Well if its a tiger or a salt water crocodile that's my subject...err I would not be trying this out ..hehe, you see i need the most valuable asset of my camera in tact, yes you guessed it right, I cannot risk my head :) But I know one person who can come up with an incredible close up of either of these animals, Mr. Finlay. No wonder he inspires me.

Signing off,
Mukul Soman.