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Cross posted from my monthly photo challenge for human groups:
Today was a photo-intense day for me. I just got my new Pentax k-x, which I'm LOVING. I took a picture for the Pentax World SyncSnap where Pentaxians all over the world were planning on taking a picture at exactly 12:00am GMT Saturday October 17th. Since it was a worldwide event, I decided to kill several birds with one stone: test new k-m, take group picture of people, and take a picture at 7:00PM CDT. I decided to do this from the 103rd floor of the Sears Tower. Check the SyncSnap link for my other photo under devorama.
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So I'm in a bit of a quandary right now. Earlier today I was at Abt Electronics playing with the new Sony P&S cameras. Specifically the DSC-WX1 and DSC-TX1. There are reviews all over for them, but the main point is this: They have kick-ass performance in low light. They both have this "Twilight" mode that has nothing to do with sexy vampires. Rather, it utilizes its super fast 10fps (!) shooting speed to take 6 pictures and average them together to reduce noise. The results are spectacularly good in terms of luminance and chroma noise for a P&S.
I bought my Lumix LX3 because I wanted a manual control camera and something that was great in low-light. The LX3 has been eclipsed (no pun intended) by the new Sony cams in the low-light department. And for manual shots, I use my dslr now. So I'm thinking of selling my LX3 to fund the purchase of one of these Sony cameras. Did I mention the Sony cameras are like half the size of the LX3?
The downsides are:
Sony cams have no manual modes or any direct way to control aperture or shutter speed.
Memory Stick instead of SD card.
The LX3 is such a cool iconic photographer's camera. And I'd be selling it for a very mainstream P&S
What to do? Also, I should act soon. Canon is about to release the S90 which is probably going to outperform the LX3 at what the LX3 does.Current Mood:  confused |
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So a bunch of us took a weekend in Michigan last weekend. I'm just getting to sifting through my pics. Check them out on flickr.
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Yay! I have a tilt lens now!
It's great for controlling depth of field, selective focus, fake miniatures, and more! I'm still working on my fake miniature technique, but the learning is part of the fun!
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| » Camera geekery |
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Sorry to those that already saw this, but I was having some camera geek fun earlier. 100 geek points to whomever can tell me what's unusual about this photo and how I did it. There was no post-processing done and no in-camera editing or filters applied.
Click to see bigger versions.
Sep. 1st, 2009 @ 02:26 am
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| » Tourist or Terrorist? |
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I just posted this in the photographers LJ community, but I'm also posting it here.
I was in downtown Chicago earlier today taking pictures for the monthly photo challenge. It's unusual for me to be coming home with my photo gear in tow, so I took the opportunity to take some photographs of Union Station and other places I passed along the way. After I got off the L (our nickname for the eLevated train), I took this picture of the train station.
I took this picture with my Panasonic LX3 with a fisheye adaptor. Moments after I took the photo, the conductor shouted out to me, "Do you have a CTA permit for that?"
( Read more... )
Aug. 20th, 2009 @ 08:44 pm
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| » Wedding Bells |
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So ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) djzack67 and I were lucky enough to attend johneide and doonda's wedding in Iowa this last weekend. Being the budding photographer that I am, I jumped at the chance to take a bunch of pictures. I really need to remember to have people wearing glasses turn so the flash or sun does not reflect into the camera! Full set on flickr.
Aug. 9th, 2009 @ 02:25 am
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| » This month's challenge... |
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This month's photo challenge is juxtaposition. I'm not sure everyone really understood the challenge, because a lot of them don't read as juxtaposition to me. This is my entry. I posted more pics from this photoshoot on flickr. Click the pic below to see.
Jul. 18th, 2009 @ 12:18 am
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| » I have a fish in my eye |
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So I've been buying lots of cool gear for my LX3 lately. I thought it would be fun, so I bought a fisheye addon lens that fits my LX3 (with an adapter) and my DSLR. The image quality is meh, but it's fun to look at its distorted perspective. A couple more pics on flickr.
Jul. 15th, 2009 @ 08:45 pm
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| » Furr pics are up |
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So last saturday was Furr. I brought along my new LX3 and slave flash and snapped a few pics. BEHOLD!
Click the picture for the whole flickr set.
It was a fun night but I had just a bit too much to drink. It's hard to say no to a jaegerbomb someone hands you, ya know?
Jun. 22nd, 2009 @ 12:29 am
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| » Sunrise pictures |
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This is somewhat crossposted in the photographers community, but now with more exposition!
So I took some early morning pictures for this month's LJ photo challenge. You can see them below. The first is my actual submission.
This month's photo challenge really challenged me. I knew I wanted to take a picture like this, showing the sunrise through my glasses. But I realized with this composition, it was difficult to get the sun visible through the lenses. I ended up having to shoot this with a telephoto at about 150mm (225mm equivalent) to get the distance I need away from the glasses. Otherwise I won't be able to get a similar enough angle between the single camera lens, both lenses of the glasses, and the sun. I also took another one with my friend Simon. I considered using this as the submission, but I think I like the one of the glasses alone better. Here's that photo too:
I had to do some heavy post processing to remove lens flares for the first picture. I'm not used to having the sun in frame in my shots! Also, the first picture is really a HDR composite picture. I blended together two shots that were about 2 stops apart. And I had to clone out a blurry seagull that flew into the shot. And clone out some sand on the lens. The shoot was rather fast paced because you have so little time before the sun is too high in the sky. If I had to do it over, I'd experiment with my polarizing filter for the water and also try to hit the hyperfocal distance to get the glasses and all the water in focus. But overall I'm pleased with the results.
Jun. 19th, 2009 @ 11:20 am
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| » Andy Warhol, eat your heart out! |
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Ooh, I learned how to use a GIMP channel mixer!
Jun. 18th, 2009 @ 10:16 pm
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| » Midsommarfest |
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So we went to Andersonville's Midsommarfest this year. Both days in fact! I took a few pics with my new LX3. Click the pic for the flickr link.
I also posted a few early LX3 pictures here:
Jun. 18th, 2009 @ 12:58 am
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| » Camera geekery |
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So I've been really into photography lately. I was very stoked to get my recent Panasonic LX3 camera. I still need to post some of those pics. I also recently learned a lot about post-processing and GIMP. This last weekend, my friend Simon and I got up before the sun to take some sunrise pictures. I'll be posting my picture on friday.
The sunrise photo shoot was a blast! Anyone who knows me knows I'm never up at 4:15am on a sunday! I would more likely still be up from the night before. But It was great fun. My composition required me to be inches off the ground, hence the photo of me you see here. Yes my hair is uncombed and I'm wearing white socks with black shoes. But that's why I was on that side of the lens! I didn't know Simon was taking pictures of me while I was working. It was all a big rush too to get my picture done before the sun got too high.
Also, I'm really looking forward to this week's LJ photo contest. The one sunrise picture I took required a lot of post processing to get it to where I needed it to be. Because the sun was in frame, I got a bunch of lens flares on my somewhat cheap lens. I had to use my cheaper telephoto because I needed a long focal length for my composition. I have a hood, but they're useless when the light source is in-frame. So I had to remove those as well as a blurry bird that flew into my shot. I also decided to create a HDR type composite so I'd have better shadow detail. A lot of this is till new to me, so I'm really learning a lot. I know some people frown on excessive post-processing, but sometimes it's necessary just to get past limitations of the camera. Like the limited dynamic range or unavoidable lens flares.
Jun. 17th, 2009 @ 12:58 am
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| » LX3 in the hiz-ouse! |
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Hooray! My new Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3 finally arrived today! I have to say I'm really impressed with it so far. The fast lens is amazing. The number of manual controls is impressive. And it does macro really well!
Jun. 12th, 2009 @ 07:18 pm
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| » This just in... |
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I found more House on the Rock pictures from my P&S camera. Click the pic for more.
Jun. 9th, 2009 @ 09:58 pm
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| » House on the Rizock! |
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So I went with djzack67 and his mom and aunt to House on the Rock this last weekend. The house was okay and the infinity room was pretty cool to photograph. I do like repeating geometric patterns after all.
But besides the HotR house, there are all these other "attractions." I had no idea what I was in for. Besides the collections of crowns, guns, armor, robot musicians, mugs, and Asian artifacts, I was treated to some of the most outlandish, over-the-top sights I've ever seen. There were these... rooms I guess you'd say. They were filled with almost only red light. Dim red light at that. And creepy music. And weird random stuff like stuffed tigers. And other rooms that look like a dream Tim Burton might have. But as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. Click on this picture to see the set.
Jun. 9th, 2009 @ 12:10 am
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| » Culture! |
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Did I mention I recently went to the Art Institute? I took my camera with and took a few shots.
Click HERE for flickr pics...
Jun. 5th, 2009 @ 12:47 am
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creative