black n white photography

i've been doin some readin on some black n white photography the last few days, grayscale images has always inspired me, how they get all those all different black tones, just amazes me.



These photos are the first few ones i work on to get a feel what it was all about. maybe its abit dark :) but i like my black to be pure black and white to be white as possible. i guess i like contrast images. and i guess it all depends on how u want ur subject to be seen. maybe it gives more meaning to a less impressive image :)

The photos was taken with my D70 with a 50mm f1.8 lense. A SB-800 flash was used, bounced with the soft box on it. Selected shutter speed was 1/250s as it perfectly sync with my flash. Aperture set to 2.2 verses 1.8, to get more focus on both of his eyes. All photos were shot on RAW mode, as i wanted as much as detail on it and just incase i wanted to change my exposure.

I guess digital photography is all about post production nowadays. so here's some detail on how i got this result in CS2.
i corrected some miner changes to my exposure in the raw converter, disable the sharpenin feature on it, cause i didnt want any sharpenin on it yet. In PS, i used levels to adjust the colour and tones on it. i prefer curves to levels cause it gives u more control over ur image, but in this case i didnt want the image that fine tuned, i just wanted it to see my end result as soon as possible.
After i got a satisfying result onto it, i made a adjustment layer (hue/saturation), labelled as the filter layer. Then i made another copy of the filter layer. on the copy layered i made the saturation to -100, mode normal, this converts ur image to greyscale. On the filter layer i changed its mode to color and then i played around with the hue to get more tones to the final conversion. Its pretty powerful as u can played with each color channel on it and add colors with the eyedropper to give more tones to the selected color. Finally after i got a satisfying result onto my eyes, i flatten the image and did my sharpenin on it.

BlacknWhite conversion method was learned from
http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html

the kulhi II

just opposite to the kulhi to the main land. the place is crowded with snails and the crabs in many different colors come out when the tide is low.



a maakana on a dead coconut tree.

the kulhi

taken on the amazon forest in addu, kulhi / maldives :) its a nice place to video and photograph. This was taken while we were doin a self promotin video documentary on the kulhi. Had to be there around 5.30am to 7pm everyday for more than 7 days. Had our backpack and portable chairs hang around our back, ofcourse with lots of tuna cans, breads, water and sometimes noodles. there were 5 of us on the set. everyday we go to a different location on the kulhi.
The weather is very unpredictable, in the morning its starts to rain quite heavily just in seconds without much clouds on the sky. and if it starts, it doesnt stop for sometime cause theres hardly any breeze.

The first day , we didnt had any thing (sathari gadu) to protect our equipments, it nearly made it very costy when it started rainin suddenly. Had to cover our cameras and stuffs with the chairs we had, which was not fully waterproof, had to hold the chair like 20 minutes on them before it slow stopped. Luckily only thing which got abit damage was my mobile phone - nokia ngage. The phone was not workin for a couple of days, when it did, i wasnt able to use number '6' on it. I'm still usin it, who needs number '6' huh, 6 is hardly used by any game on it, except fifa 2005, which i dont play that much. :) and i dont need a mobile in nepal, i use it as a clock up here hehe :) and play some games when i'm bored or listen to some music.

city of bangkok

sculptures in bangkok

children have a tend to play anywhere / on anything

Taken in Dhaal atoll, was there photographing how the atoll had been effected by the tsunami.

this photo was taken just around 6pm, slow shutter with a higher iso.

addu kulhi 'wider veiw'

Nikkor 70-200mm f2.8 with VR

kathmandu / nepal

even monkeys bow down to their gods, maybe its just drinking holy water from the temple.

zoo birds

reflections

reflections are beautiful in the morning or late evening light.

abstract views

colours/contrast do really come out with higher ISO, ofcourse with abit of noise to hassle with.

Moju in addu.

nae with the glasses and ika behind him.

wildlife in kadihera

fishball :) thats what i call it, it was caught on our net when we were tryin to catch our lunch, the fishball was release after a few shots.

The Eels, eatin away the fish we threw off.

kadihera trip in addu

This is Hoga, a friend of mine living in addu.

The light is really cool for photography around
the atolls, maybe its cause of unpolluted air and clean environment.
Bottom: taken with the standard d70 kit lense.
Top: with the zoom lense 70-300mm f/4-5.6G

Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8D AF VR Zoom

This is Seytu, one of my friends, he is a free diver and a free man :)

The lense i used to shot this is an expensive one, which i borrowed from a friend of mine. its a heavy one, but the colours / contrast is very nice on it and ofcourse the focus was really fast and accurate. i had it for 2 days, i guess u would have to get used to the lense, with the VR and the fixed 2.8 aperture all the way (fast lense). nice cool lense, wish it was abit light and cheap :)

Would be posting more shots taken on this lense abit laterz.

Nikon D70
Both shots taken on f2.8, the close up was handheld with a shutter 1/40 with VR on (indoor).