Cardboard Hasselblad

Okay it's not -really- a Hasselblad....it's more like a pinhole camera shaped like a Hasselblad made from cardboard. Either way, this looks really spiffy and it'd be fun to try out. The only thing that bothers me about this is that their film's all dusty and kinda gross. But whatever, it still makes me do a double take. :3


http://www.kellyangood.co.uk/hasselblad.html

Dress Rehersal Dance Concert

On Wednesday, the Menlo dance program had their first public viewing of the annual Dance Concert. The show featured students from the middle school as well as the high school, ranging from beginners, to very advanced students. The lighting in Florence Moore Hall was not ideal, but here are some of the results I came out with.

HDR photography

One thing I came across earlier this month was a video my friend made while I was sitting at home on YouTube. I originally thought it was shot with the latest and greatest in either Canon or Sony video camera, but was surprised to find it was shot with the new Canon 7d DSLR. At 18 megapixels, this camera as you can see gives the video a very contrasty, and extremely detailed picture. Here is a link to a very extensive HDR photo blog, you can find pictures on everything from inside museums to rivers. Also, here is a tutorial on how to make a HDR photo of your own on photoshop. Make sure you have three pictures (one exposed regularly, one over, and one under) before you try and make one of your own.

Goodbye iPhoto?

At a conference in monterey in 2007, two new photo viewing softwares were introduced. The idea is a full page of an infinite amount of photos, and being able to zoom in and out to every word and detail of each photo. Developed my microsoft, this program is called dragon, and is available now. A strange concept on paper, but if you watch the conference presentation, it will make a lot more sense.

15 Ideas for Composition

Alain Briot provides a fresh and thought-provoking perspective on composing photographs in his "Fifteen Thoughts on Composition".

Infinite Zoom

For me, the hubble telescope is one of the most interesting and intriguing technologies the US has developed. Ever since the 90s, hubble has helped scientists understanding of the universe at large, revealing pictures of galaxies, universes, and stars we would otherwise would never see. Imagine if you had a camer with infinite zoom, where would you take it? What would you photograph?

The video about the telescope

Photography from the Goodyear Blimp

LA Times Photographer John W. Adkisson spent 6 hours on the Goodyear blimp in July 2010 photographing downtown LA. He brought a fisheye and a tilt-shift lens, which he had never used before. The photographs he took are really cool and he clearly figured out the tilt-shift quickly. Some of those photographs look like they are of miniature landscapes.

The blog post is here.

Here are some examples:

Nicolas Evariste

I found the high contrast in this artists work very effective in bringing out all of the detail in the fur, feathers, and different characteristics of animals. I think that the black backdrop also draws more attention to the subject, and makes everything in the picture pop.

Back to the Cemetery

At the start of this rotation, I began by looking through all the work I had done this far, dating back to the beginning of the year. After three days of searching and trying to piece together enough pieces of work for my mini exhibit, I had come up with only three photos, and had to come up with at least two more. The three photos I selected I had taken at a cemetery during my medium format rotation. In the interest of time, I took a DSLR and went back to the cemetery to see if I missed anything. I was only there a brief time before my camera battery died, but the two photos I decided to use, made for a great addition to the project.

Stop Motion Photography

To create these images, i had a sound trigger device that was wired to a flash to go off when the sound device was triggered. I had a lot of ideas, but with the time I had this is what I was able to produce. i like the images, because there is slight motion blur in all areas of the picture except the smallest cracks in the glass, drawing more attention to the details.

Rotation- Digital Photography

For this rotation I took candid and portrait photos using a digital set on RAW format. For the candid shots I went around school and asked permission to photograph people who were out on the quad or in the library. I worked with a small aperture in order to get a smaller range of focus. I really enjoyed working with portrait photography because we were able to set up the room like a real photo-shoot and even used similar lighting and equipment. I had a lot of fun with both however the portrait photography was a lot more fun because I was able to interact with my models, who were my closest friends Ashley and Erika.

Night Time Photography

While looking for ideas for working with digital photography I stumbled across a website called Hours of Darkness that has a whole gallery dedicated to really innovative and cool ideas on nighttime photography. I really like the simplicity of the last photo I feel like this image is very crisp and clean.

Yousuf Karsh: Portrait Photography

For my rotation I focused on candid and portrait photography using a digital camera. Working on this project made me curious about the techniques and works of other well known photographers. For this reason I decided to research a Yousuf Karsh, a well-known portrait photographer who's work really captivated me.

Brief Bio:

Yousuf Karsh became well known early on in his photography career however the major turning point to a more globally common name was when he photographed Winston Churchill. This image was a powerful symbol of how mighty and strong Britain was during the wartime. This image is one of his most well known works.

Image Highlights:

Yousuf's work was in black and white which also helped bring a dramatic quality to his images. To help add different textures to his pictures he played with a mixture of blacks, whites, and greys.

Bali Trip

For my Knight School I had the opportunity of traveling across the world to Bali, Indonesia. I spent a week and a half learning about the food, religion, and arts that made Bali so unique. Being able to eat some of the traditional Balinese dishes was definitely one of the highlight of my days in Bali. A traditional Balinese dishes that I enjoyed a lot was a dish called sate which is pieces of chicken put on skewers and dipped in a sauce. The dish that we enjoyed that day was had a peanut sauce and it definitly added so much flavor to the already succulent chicken. To get a feel of the Hindu practices in Bali we were able to visit many temples and practice the traditional blessings as well. One important rule we had to follow before entering any temple was that we had to wear a sarong which was the proper dress for entering a temple. In one of the images of the cliffs and beachside we were visiting a temple that does a special blessing when the tide goes down and we got the opportunity to trek across to be blessed. Though this blessing was special I really enjoyed our final blessing in which we had a priest and his wife do a private fair-well blessing for us as well.

If you've got some fiber optics...

DIY Ring Flash!
One of the sucky things about most DIY ring flashes is that they're only set at one brightness. However, since this is mooching from the built-in flash, you're able to compensate and adjust the power of the flash. If anyone has a lot of time on their hands......
http://hackaday.com/2011/03/03/diy-ring-light-takes-its-cues-from-fiber-optic-toys/

Photographing Former Soviet Republics

This article is about a photographer, Bruce Haley, who is photographing former Soviet Republics as they attempt to rebuild. The article with a sample of his really stark black and white photography is here. The article says, "Though some of the images are bleak, together they evoke a sense of hope, strength and beauty. There are lush landscapes, circus performers, young women gossiping and smiling, and proud mothers." I agree... though the images show destruction and decay of the physical landscape, the images don't convey a sense of hopelessness.

Here are some examples from the 16 photos the NYTimes published on their blog:

Modernist Cuisine

I love food AND I love photography. So artful photographs of food, like these of a new cookbook by scientist Nathan Myhrvold, combine the things I love.

Levitating Lady

Found this when reading on Gizmodo. This lady lives in Tokyo and takes a picture of herself levitating every day. Looks kind of spooky, but interesting stuff. I wonder if she just times her jumps really well or if someone helps her....
http://yowayowacamera.com/

Hipster Macro Phototography

I never really understood why I do nature photography. I'm not particularly an outdoorsy kind of person nor am I into horticulture. Nonetheless, enjoy some of my recent stuff!
PS All of this was done at Menlo. It'd be interesting if people could figure out where these were taken. :3

Example: Rephotography

An interesting idea Mr. Z posted a few weeks ago was that of rephotography, or photography through photography- how meta! (cue accusing cries of "Fithy hipster!")

I particularly enjoy the idea, because it gives a sense of a middleman, reminding us that photographs are not simply the image presented to us but that they are first captured and processed by cameras to provide us with a preservable image. It brings us closer to photography and almost seems to demystify the entire process by injecting science and engineering into it.

Here are a few examples of rephotography I shot with our darling view cameras as subjects.