Textures: dltphoto

Recently I have had a little thing for textures. Inspiration came from shooting "letters" for the APAC Blog header.
Some shot with my Nikon 1 V1 and an assortment of Nikkor Lenses, others from my Android Phone

APAC Submissions, February 2013: dltphoto

For this Month I went all out. Super excited about these three images. However the more excited I am is how proportional to how disappointed I will be when the adjudicator scores them. this theory I have proved tonight. The scores were very erratic. Not in my favour but I still enjoyed my choices.

After my last epic fail in the Macro category I though I would attempt something more obviously macro. Its bright fun and pretty much right out of the camera. Just how I like it. Its early morning frost on my black tinted truck window. Oddly the rich blue is coming from the reflected blue sky of the early morning. The Depth of Field is dramatically short but that's what is to be expected when I am too lazy to get my tripod and I quite like it this way. The adjudicator did not see it my way, she wanted more depth, sharpness and maybe rule of thirds on this, meaning not having the focused part dead centre.

Macro, "Cool Blue", score 8

Instagram'd Version

 I did a square crop in instagram ("The Hive") which was very well "liked" I should mention.

This next image is your textbook "instagram" shot and it's right out of my phone!
 I put it in the architecture category which was probably a mistake. It's a funky church in Abbotsford, hence the title. It should probably be in the "Duncan's lost his mind" category... Sadly, My title was VERY common so it seems. Someone else put an image in with the same title which happened to show three images before mine. That didn't help I am sure.

Architecture, "stairway to heaven", score 7

Finally, we wrap up the night with the assigned topic "Psychedelic, or just Psycho". This is another phone shot with an SLR Macro filter in front of the lens. To help with the close up, since my phone is lousy at macro. I saturated it a little to give it more of a  Psychedelic look... more drug inducing!

Assigned (Psychedelic, or just Psycho), "L.S.C.D", Score 20 (out of 30)

The adjudicators scoring was very low for the assigned, but still mine was one of the lowest.

September 2012: Favourite Shot: dltphoto

This months shot was a simple Instagr.am shot. I just enjoy the composition and the lousy app'd finish of it. I am including the original phone capture so you can see how sometimes what you see isn't really what you end up with.

Instagram'd Version

Original, No Edit

APAC: Photoclub Submissions, June 2012:dltphoto

This months submissions caught me a little off balance, since I was enjoying some well earned vacation time with my family and I quickly grabbed three images in the folder of potential images for submission!

First up was the assigned topic, "my Community Landmark".

Since Abbotsford is fairly spread out I thought I would try a landmark which is always a landmark. Every now and again, these little crosses show up in a farmers field for everyone to see. It relates to someone's opinion regarding abortions etc of which I have no opinion, that's not what this post is about!

Anyways, this is a shot right out of Insta.gram (phone App)!!!! even still had the border on it. It scored a 22 which was right in the ball park, at least I chose an image for MY community and not some other community far far away, after all the challenge was "My Community Landmark"

Crossing the Field, (Score 22)

 Next up was an image from my "stigma" from Green Lake last summer. It was one of the few Sunsets I got during that holiday which worked out, the detail was really nice with the "pink wheat" in the foreground. Minimal editing done really, just converted it from the weird Sigma Raw.. This scored a surprising 8, of which being the top score of a Level 1 Rookie, meant I had to speak about it. Nothing to say really.

Sunset at Green Lake, (score 8)

 The final submission which a Fog shot from December I think, this one also happened to be from my Phone, didnt really mean to add another phone shot this time, I just grabbed the image that I saw first. Once again it scored a very pleasing  8 and I gave a quick talk about it, although I didn't mention that it was from my phone... duh!

Powering the Fog, (score 8)

December 2011, Favourite Shot: dltphoto

Here is my December effort. A long and busy December, very glad to see it done.

This has several cool elements for me, I love the back lighting with the light reflecting into the steam that was pouring off the wet wood. Also I like the fact the pattern within the deck fencing resembles beer bottles!
Shot with my Samsung Galaxy S, and added effect applied through mytubo.

"Backlit Macro Pro" you say....: dltphoto

Recently a friend of mine watched an upload on the mytubo site and instantly reported the image as being mine since he noticed it as being my style, which I later found out to be "backlit macro pro"... hahahahah
 "my Style?"... I dont see it! I think he's mad!

Mushrooms: dltphoto

Just Mushrooms. That's all. Carry on please.

Serious Fog,dltfogo: dltphoto

Pretty wicked fog hung over Abbotsford a short time ago. Not quite the same view as normal!

Camera vs Phone Camera: dltphoto

not really too much to compare against and not that anyone really cares...even I will admit that the phone does well, considering its a phone and sometimes its all I have on me!!

Seattle Images (film, Nikon F100): dltphoto

This trip was all about me getting to watch, for the first time live in an official regular season game, my Washington Redskins playing against the somewhat local Seattle Seahawks. Oddly, this weekend had so much going on... such as the CFL Grey Cup which featured our unbelievable BC Lions (eventual winners) playing against a decent Winnipeg Blue Bombers, Black Friday ( America's Biggest shopping day of the year), American Thanksgiving, Seattle Marathon, Seattle Tree Lighting ceremony and a bunch of other minor happenings! Wow... we never expected all of that!
Anyways I finally caught a break in Seattle and had some pretty decent weather to get out and shoot a little. I had a brief run-in with the Seattle Police Dept which saw me sitting on the front of a Police car whilst they checked me out....ooooop's but I had done nothing wrong, I just happened to be taking pics outside of the police dept ( unknown to me), they were just being overly cautious!
Anyways, enough with the waffling... picture time!

editing , good or bad? : dltphoto

Many people have been drawn into this amazing world of editing since it has become soooo easy using multiple software's now that are free and quite spectacular. Does over editing take away from the original image that the person captured, clearly when the original shot was taken the person unlikely "envisioned" the shot after editing at that time! We are all guilty of slapping a fancy filter or dramatic effect onto images. What would the original pioneers of photography thought of this capability? does this wreck the moment? after all that isn't what was in front of you.... hmmmm!
Many of the film pioneers where masters in the darkroom, that is where all the magic happened with dodging/ burning with filters for different contrast techniques ( an old skool photoshop in essence)...clearly the importance of getting the information on the film was paramount but many of the greats found ways to enhance their film format to create masterpieces...
Here are a few of my recent shots, the before and the after editing... did they need editing? maybe not but the Image has been changed dramatically to create a different mood... maybe that's good or maybe not... waffle waffle waffle

On a side note these are shot and edited on my phone. How lame am I? Just to let you know I am breaking out my Nikon F100 for some sweet film shots... hold your breath people, they will be epics!

When its what you have on you at that time!: dltphoto

As some of you may or may not know I have been anti cell phones for many years now but finally I got with the times and have a fancy Android smart phone... sadly the thing i use it for the least is ringing people. Actually I find myself shooting pictures with it almost emphatically.. here is a few from the amazing fall season we have been having, and remember these are straight out of a phone!

Mytubo App: Android Phone: dltphoto

So a friend and I have embarked on a voyage into the unknown... the new super world of Phone Photography. Mr Koopmans and I are swimming against the iPhone tide, with our Android phones and our Mytubo photo App, iPhone'rs are using the ever popular "insta'gram" app and this mytubo is our equivalent.
What is most appealing is the square format nature of the App which for me as a rectangle shooter for all these years is unique. The two of us have dedicated ourselves to use only our phones for this project... since others are clearly uploading images from their real cameras which is removing the instant creativity from the user with the phone and giving them a clear unfair advantage into image quality and compostion.
Its not really a social networking place, more a place where you can "like" images and leave comments, not nearly as involved personally as your common garden variety Facebook is.
Here are a random assortment of images I have used from my phone.. but if you want to see them all folks you'll have to get yourself an android and download the app and search me out!!!