February 26th - A Celebration

Friday evening - Saturday morning has been ridiculous. To give our friend Jonny a blast before he gets shipped to Afghanistan, Tan, Hien, and Harvey decided to throw a house party for him. They decided to make the theme Black and Purple (I designed a flyer, and I'll post it here later). The colors worked very nicely with the photos, and I'm pleased with the results. The party itself was interesting; it was supposed to start at 11:00 PM, but we weren't even set up yet. Barely anyone came at first, and I thought it was going to bust. As it hit close to midnight, people were flooding through the entrance. That was great, except for one thing: my brother wasn't there yet. Since he had one of the speaker systems and 75% of the drinks, there wasn't much that can be done. He got here at around 12:40 and things really started kicking. Karen and I were the photographers of the party, so I got a handful of shots to keep this blog updated.

Week 8:

Clicking on this photo will direct you to my Flickr.

EXIF Data:
F-Stop: f/5.0
Exposure time: 1/60 sec.
ISO Speed - ISO 400
Focal length: 18mm
Exposure bias: 0.0

This was my favorite shot of the night. Everybody gave a toast to Jon after he gave his speech. The expressions are priceless. The photo was taken with the 18-55mm lens, with a flash unit attached on top of the camera, pointed at the ceiling.

Being a house party, there was alcohol (obviously, after seeing the picture above). I don't drink; I really dislike alcohol. So all Karen and I really did was take photos and watch the door the whole time. Maybe I'll tell more about that day some other time. I'm too tired now.

Good luck out there, Jon. We're all going to miss you. I hope you enjoyed the party! Oh yeah. Happy Birthday, buddy.

The Monstre! A Photomatix Attempt.

Since I haven't really posted much besides the weekly challenges, I decided to post up another version of the previous week's picture:

I started playing around with Photomatix. It's a very interesting program; it doesn't make any photo that runs through it automatically beautiful, but I really like the gritty, dark feel it gave. I would not call this an "HDR" image. I personally do not know too much about HDR photos, but they have a High Dynamic Range (hence, being called HDR), meaning they have a higher contrast than what cameras can provide. It's a large misconception that HDR photos look like the photo I have above, or unrealistic, tripped out photos of cars and whatnot.

I knew about this misconception before, but I didn't know much about High Dynamic Range at all. So of course did a little research. I found a very helpful article on what it really is, which helped me regurgitate the information above. You can check out the link here:

http://www.secondpicture.com/tutorials/photography/hdr_photography.html

This photo may be considered HDR, it may not. I'd rather just call this a piece of art that I really enjoyed working on.

Oh yeah, I'm also trying to think of a wittier title for this blog. So far, no luck. If you have any ideas, hit me up!

Double Whammy

So, I missed last week's post. I also missed this Saturday's. I technically failed the challenge. However..! I assure you that I actually had a photo for last week. To make it seem like I'm not just a lazy person (although there's some truth to that), here's a list of my excuses as to why I'm tardy:

• Valentine's Day was coming up.
• I have a ridiculous amount of homework. (Two long lab assignments, a Chemistry test to study for, and a Biology project to research.)
• Karen's birthday was on Friday (She's 19 now. Yaay!)
• Trying to get all of my homework out of the way ASAP to have a stress free day with Karen on her Birthday. I also didn't do homework on Valentine's day.
• I started playing Marvel vs. Capcom 3. This game is waay too addicting. If anyone wants to play with me, send me a message!

That last one's not a good excuse, but..  hey, I'm being honest!


I'm going post both last week's and this week's photo today.


Week 6:

Clicking on this photo will lead you to my Flickr.

EXIF Data:
F-Stop: f/3.5
Exposure time: 1/125 sec.
ISO Speed - ISO 400
Focal length: 50mm
Exposure bias: 0.0

This is a candid shot that I took at the Rec Center at the University. There was a lot of post processing, especially when it came to removing stray hairs.

Week 7:

Clicking on this photo will lead you to my Flickr.

EXIF Data:
F-Stop: f/8.0
Exposure time: 1/60 sec.
ISO Speed - ISO 400
Focal length: 50mm
Exposure bias: 0.0

Another shot taken at the University. You have to look at a larger version to do it justice (click on the photo). This is my favorite shot of that day. The stairs and the railing complement Dave and his air baby (that's what the freeze is called) very well.

Two flashes were used in this picture, both diffused by the shoot-through umbrellas.

Out of boredom, I decided to draw a diagram of how I set this up:

So for Karen's birthday, I took her to Fogo de Chão. The beef is delicious there! I'm not much of a beef guy, but the food was exceptional. We didn't take pictures of the main course, but we did take pictures of the desserts.

Flan

Creme Brulee

The waiter asked us if it was a special day, and I told him it was Karen's birthday. He decorated the Creme Brulee plate, and said it was on the house. Both the flan and creme brulee were the best I've eaten. Overall, it was a great experience. I'll definitely go there again.

I wasn't able to stay up through her whole birthday, and I knocked out at around 9:30. She even took a picture of me.

Me, taking up the whole bed.

Well, that's all I have. It's a big update this week. I'm also planning on recording my bboy sessions sometime. If I do, I'll probably post them here as well.