#1 Learn How to See the Lights

See the color of light, see the direction of light, see the quality of light. Look for the shadows and contrast in the scene, that way you can set your exposure accordingly. I have my digital Rebel XTI set in the AV mode and I’m going to use my exposure compensation feature to open up a third of the stop so I can see into the shadows. So remember, learn how to see the light.

#2 Try to Create a Sense of Depth and Dimension

We see the world in three dimensions; height, width and depth. Our cameras only see two dimensions; height and width. It’s our job to try and create a sense of depth. One way to do that is to use a foreground element when we compose in a scene like this a landscape.

So we have that rock in the foreground, we have these mid ground rocks and we have these beautiful rocks in the background. That’s my composition. To get everything in the scene in focus, what I’m actually going to do is use the focus lock on my camera one third into the scene and then recompose and I shot. So remember, try to create a sense of depth and dimension in your pictures.

#3 Take a Hike

Actually, take a walk. When you get on location take your time and walk around the subject. Look for all the different photo angles. There are a lot of different photo angles here. I found the best. So remember, when you get on location take a walk and take your time.

#4 Always Look Down, Back and Up

So many people miss great picture opportunities because they are in such a hurry to get to the final location that they miss what’s going on around them. Always look down, always look back and always look up.

#5 Tell the Whole Story

Take the wide angle shots, take the medium shots, take vertical shots, take horizontal shots and look for details. Shoot close ups like these beautiful carvings on the rocks. If you have a lot of pictures you can tell the whole story. As photographers we are story tellers. We need a wide variety of pictures to tell the whole story.

#6 Frame It!

Our camera man will be shooting through the opening in the rocks. This will make it a much more interesting picture than if I was just positioned flat against the rocks. When you are photographing someone look for a doorway or look for a window to frame the person. Look for some branches and you’ll get a much more interesting picture, good enough for framing.

#7 Be Aware of the Background

The background can make or break a picture. I tell my camera men this all the time. I don’t want some object sticking out of my head. Remember, always be aware of the background.

#8 Fill the Frame

I’m here at Elephant Rock, one of the most spectacular rock formations in the Valley of Fire. I want to share my picture with my family and friends. What I’ve done is zoomed in and moved in tight so I’ve cropped out the dead space in the sky and the rocks down below that don’t add anything to my picture. So remember, the name of the game is to fill the frame.

Bonus Tip: All rules are meant to be broken. You’re in charge, be creative with your photography. In this situation for example, say you’re doing the school newsletter and you want to send an electronic postcard to someone. You want to tell people in one image where you are. What you could do is leave that dead space on the top and bottom for type, which you could put in the digital document. In general, the name of the game is to fill the frame.

#9 RAW Rules!

When you shoot a jpg file and open that file on your computer, a lot of the information is thrown away, especially in the highlight areas like the sky. When you shoot a raw file, the file retains all the information. If you want to get the most out of your pictures, remember, RAW rules.

#10 Always Envision the End Result

For me, photography is a fifty/fifty deal. Fifty percent image capture and fifty percent digital darkroom work. Take this scene for example, I can turn this into a beautiful black and white. I can warm up the picture to make it look like I was out here early in the morning or later in the day.

I can pull it off to make it look like it was taken at midnight and perhaps best of all, if there’s a subject in the scene that I don’t want, I can take it out! So always envision the end result.

The task ended up as a group effort between me and my kids.  I asked my son to take the pictures, while me and my daughter filtered through the loose pictures and albums.

I was not feeling up to it, but as there was some need for urgency, I had to plow through.  We did have fun though.  And my son did learn a thing or two about taking pictures of pictures.  Truth is, given the time, I would have opted for a scan of the pictures.  But my scanner is a ten year old machine which doesn’t scan fast enough.  Hence the only alternative was to take pictures.

My son started out with the pictures on the desk and him hovering above the pictures.  Problem was the lighting.  We were just using the regular room lights.  No use for flash as that would wash out the picture.  He had to move to where there was brighter lighting.  After a while he was still slowly edging his way through his task.  He was holding the camera and not using the tripod.  This resulted in blurred pictures, besides taking a long time doing and redoing the pictures.

At that point I substituted for him, in as much as we were already done through choosing which pictures to shoot.  I got the tripod out, experimented a bit with the distance, and started shooting away.  I wasn’t able to shoot all the pictures we chose.  This was because of various reasons, including the contrast of the photos, the glare from the lights, some folding of the pictures, and the slight but very discernible slant for most of the pictures. But I was able to shoot the pictures almost like an assembly line manner:  set the picture, set the aperture, shoot, and cycle.

It was a good drill all in all.  But I guess I should really start on that project of scanning all the pictures using the negatives, if possible.  That would have to be for another day.

It’s a great place to take pictures, specially if the weather is cooperating.  And, in fact, even if the weather was not cooperating, or specially if there’s bad weather moving in, the panoramic shots would have been incredibly dramatic.

To describe the view, there’s an airport about five miles to the southwest and a mountain range south of that, the bay is about five miles west, a lake five miles to east and beyond that there’s another mountain range going north to south.  Any dark clouds with rain moving from one end of the horizon to the next could be easily tracked.  And the view of the financial district is clear all around.

There wouldn’t be any real problems with the shots.  Panoramic shots would be simple enough to do, with a good wide angle to work with.  You only need a tripod with the camera.  The sunset is spectacular, but you would need some luck to catch it in its best light.  This is due to the smog and haze.  Better to take sunset shots after some heavy rain in the afternoon.

Neutral filters on top of a polarizer would do well in this environment.  The neutral filters would give the shot more contrast.  And the polarizer would help with the haze, making the sky darker.  A bright sunny morning would work.  Or late afternoon after some heavy downpour.  It could also be a good platform for taking pictures of the night skyline.  What with the first class hotels nearby and the tourist district on one end while the commercial district is on the other end.  And yes, lots of the buildings have full lights on deep into the night.

Really, the possibilities are endless.

On top of those, it also has an 16:9 HD mode with 1920×1080 pixels picture size, and an AF Assist Lamp which enables picture taking in dim light without any flash.

But that’s not what’s innovative about this camera.  BenQ had made the 3.0 inch touch screen display a whole lot more useful.  Various movements on the touch screen replace button functions on other cameras.  The touch interface assigns movements on the touch-screen to shoot pictures, zoom in on a subject and to view the pictures on the camera.

The “Tap to Shoot” function allows users to take a picture by tapping on the touch-screen display, instead of pressing on the shutter button.  You can also follow the subject on the touchscreen with your finger.  This focuses the camera on the moving subject, and letting go of the touchscreen captures the image.

To zoom in on the picture, draw a circle with the fingertip.  The camera will zoom in on the area up to (up to 3x optical zoom or 12x digital zoom).  Cropping can also be done by the same movements, and the cropped picture will be saved as a new file.

While browsing pictures on the touchscreen, swiping the display will move to the next picture.  Much like the movements on the iTouch or the iPod Touch.  Swiping also works for as controls while watching video.

Note taking can also be done with a “scribbling” feature, where you can write your comments or notes about the picture in real time.

The touchscreen features is a very intuitive approach, and does away with most of the buttons of the camera.  This surely puts the point-and-shoot back to a gentler learning curve for beginners.  And as anyone familiar with rich touchscreen controls, these features are a more fun than playing with the buttons.

BenQ, like a lot of electronics manufacturers have dabbled into photography because of the synergistic opportunities it provides.  They already have the manufacturing equipment, the parts and the software, and distribution network.  With the E1050t, BenQ is maximizing it’s leverage on technologies, and proposing a new way of using the camera.  It may not necessarily be better, but it is a different way to access the pictures and camera functions.

Definitely, with less buttons, it would be less intimidating to newbies and a lot easier to learn how to use.  At the same time, it has a novelty factor to it for early adopters and those who like touchscreen controls.  10 megapixels is not too shabby either, and the 3x optical zoom is about par for the market.

And since the cameras are designed to create posterized shots, these are not good for realistic renditions.  Lomography is more surreal and based on the feeling of the moment rather than the technical aspect of standard photography.

I may be biased, but I have not gone into lomography yet.  My current direction is in digital still photography.  However, I do understand the spontaneity being spoused by both cell phone cameras and lomography.  I do have the tendency to shoot candid or stolen shots of people and of landscapes as well.

The candid shots do need a lot to setup.  The first thing I do is to hide the fact that I am going to take a picture, all the while keeping the camera in the open where everyone can see. I try to get as many shots in the open, and with permission.  This allows the people around to see that I’m taking pictures and they can relax and pose as they like.  It breaks the ice, somewhat, and would expect to have their picture taken as well.  If they don’t want to be included in any of the pictures, I would know immediately.

It would help a lot if there was no need for flash.  But that’s an option which I don’t have much choice. And I would rather go with manual focus.  Though auto-focus with a timer has work fine for me, assuming I know what would happen in 10 seconds.  The reason I would rather go manual or aperture-priority automatic is for me to set the focusing distance, and shoot without any other preparation.  Look through the viewfinder in that direction, set all parameters, and then turn and shoot the subject.  It’s a nice exercise.

The spontaneous landscape shots don’t take much preparation.  I usually do it while I’m on a moving vehicle and shooting out the window.  The subject could be anything, sunset or sunrise, billboards, some hills or mountains in the horizon, or a river.  To begin with, there’s not enough time to prepare, as the vehicle would be running with no regard for any picture I take.  I usually focus on a distant object, with no auto-focus, and a fast shutter, with as wide an aperture as possible.  And the lens should be a wide-angle, thoug a prime of 50mm works fine as well.  Long lenses don’t usually work well; zooming in on a subject while on a moving vehicle does not make a good picture.  You’d get more blurs.

I usually don’t have time for a light meter reading.  The shutter speed may or may not be automatic.  So far, I have had shoddy success, but the pictures are an aid to memory of my trips.

Now, there’s a growing list of digital still cameras which are HD-video capable and there are now video cameras capable of good sized digital pictures.  The only limitation of HD videos from still cameras is the file size.  Since the videos are stored in flash drives, the maximum file size is only 4GB.  For HD videos this translates to about 10 minutes of continuous shooting.  There are some who would say that this is a significant limitation seeing that most amateur videos are not edited.  Also, since this is HD, video editing needs a powerful computer (upwards of 2GB RAM with HD video editing software) which is not normally found in the home setup.

However, a new company called Red has merged high resolution still photography with really high definition video.  The Red One, their breakthrough camera can capture HD video in something called 4K mode.  which is four times the resolution of most other HD video cameras.  This is due to the 12MP sensor size. This is big for a video camera.

Another advantage of the Red One camera is that is can use Nikon or Canon lenses with lens mount adapters.  This is significant as not all HD cameras have interchangeable lenses.  Video cameras which have interchangeable lens capability can be counted with the fingers of one hand.  And to be able to use Nikon or Canon mounts is even more surprising.

For a video camera, it’s a whole lot better to use older lenses - those without an auto-focus feature.  While video the auto-focus function is not necessary; it’s a bother to have the shot blurring and focusing whenever you move the camera.

Given the hardware, the math of frame size and frame rate yields some interesting numbers.  At 60fps, the Red One can shoot at 3k size frames (3072 x 1536 pixels).  This is equivalent to an exposure time of 1/60 second for a comparable still camera.  Extracting the stills from the video is done with software from Red (the company).  The camera also comes with an HD video editing software.  But, of course, you can use any other video editing software capable of 4k-sized frames.  With this size HD-video, the computer has to be really powerful indeed.

The camera is a rugged and bulky machine.  The Red One does not come cheap at the price of $17,000 without any accessories.  But for this size video, it’s about four-times less expensive than other 4K video cameras.

HD video is a growing trend and it will take a while for the equipment and costs to be within reach of consumers.  There is that one other necessary piece of equipment which is not mentioned, or mentioned only in passing when HD video editing is mentioned, and that’s the computer and the video-editing software.  Might as well, as amateur digital video camera users typically don’t bother to edit their video.

Turns out that there were several problems, mainly from trying to make the job go faster.  I scanned the images to TIFF, and as part of the scan process, I also did some post-processing. During the scan process, I had multiple pictures laid on the scanning glass.  This allowed me to scan multiple pictures at the same time.  Unfortunately, not all of the pictures were set at right angles and I had to adjust the scans by rotating the pictures by several degrees.

Though not a very common occurence, it does happen that sometimes when taking pictures, the shot is not leveled.  This usually happens when the photographer is not paying attention and frames the picture at an angle.  Admittedly, there are some pictures which look better when skewed.  In fact, some purposely take skewed pictures.  But on the whole, a skewed picture does not make a good picture.

Making sure the picture is leveled is a simple matter of paying attention.  A beach scene for instance, or shooting a sunset are examples of pictures which focus is a level horizon.  In the case of a skewed picture, the eye notices that the picture is degree off by as little as a degree or two.  It’s enough to ruin a perfectly good picture.

He’s not really a basketball player, but is into sports, like bowling, badminton, swimming and mountain bike riding.  He’s also a techie for a major computer company.  Besides, that one of his hobbies is photography, he’s had a digital camera since the late 1990’s.

He goes to the event with his whole family and starts using his digital camera.  Shoots with the flash and takes some videos of the events.  And when the NBA players come along the worst thing happens.  He runs out of battery charge.  He checks out his camera bag and he’s got no spares.  He never did explain if he forgot to charge the batteries but he was not very happy.  He didn’t have anyone to blame as this was solely his fault.  The event was set and they’ve planned to be there, and he wanted to take pictures.  Unfortunately, due to an oversight on his part, that didn’t happen.  He went home dejected because he had no pictures of NBA stars.

This just goes to show that even for guys who have been taking pictures for a long, long time, it’s still possible to screw up because of batteries.

For photography in general, it’s a cardinal rule to check the equipment before going anywhere.  In the case film cameras, check that the flash is in good working order and the batteries charge the flash in an acceptable time, typically about 5 seconds.  If it takes longer than 10 seconds, it’s time to change batteries.  It would be pre-emptive to replace batteries at this point, unless you’re willing to wait until the batteries are fully depleted, and in the case of flash units, if it takes longer than 10 or 12 seconds, then the flash might be too weak to light up the picture.  In which case, you would end up with a picture which has uneven lighting (strong at the center and shadowy at the edges) or an underexposed shot, or just a black film.

And whether it’s a film camera or a digital one, it’s always best to bring along spare batteries.  There’s always that feeling that the best shot is the one which was not taken (something like the fish that got away).

For rechargeable batteries, the normal recharging time is 6 hours.  But there are chargers which can fully charge batteries within one and a half hours.

Additionally, it’s better to have lithium-ion batteries rather than nickel-metal hydride (NiMh) batteries.  The older technology NiMh batteries have what’s called battery memory or charging memory.  With these, the battery charge has to be fully depleted before being recharged.  Otherwise, if this keeps happening, the battery will slowly lose recharging capacity.

With today’s electronic devices, with no battery charge, it just doesn’t work.  The alternative would be to plug in the camera to a wall outlet.  Though not every camera can operate while plugged in in this manner.

I have not had the opportunity to take a look at the place.  On the daily commute to the office, I saw the mall’s construction almost daily.  And relative to other malls by the same developer, this was relatively small.  It did have a lot of things going for it, including the full support of the city government.  The mall construction was incumbent on the construction of another bridge to ease the expected traffic.

By chance I went to that mall just this past week because the utility company moved their customer support office from a third mall, to this one.  And I was impressed and very much surprised by what I saw.  It was very bright.  Though I knew it was going to be well-lit, as I pass by the building every evening on my way home.  It’s practically blazing at night, even without any neon lighting.

I went into the building just before noon, and from the glare of the direct sunlight to the lobby, there was only a slight diminishing of the light.  The lobby was glass-fronted to the roof.  And with the wide lobby, this resulted in sunlight streaming in full force.  And along the main hallway running perpendicular to the lobby, one end was also a glass wall.

To capture how bright the building was, we planned to take pictures of the lobby from the top floor, this should show the sunlight streaming inside the building.  Another shot of the lobby would be from the ground floor, shooting upwards at an angle to capture the whole wall of glass and the big metal pipes which support it.  Wide-angle and quite close shooting upwards and from the side would show the vanishing of the glass and metal structure.  Unlike the concrete walls, the glass is set at an angle where the top has a slight overhang.  The close wide-angle shot would show the angle to its advantage.

Other shots of the building would be from several vantage points outside it. There’s the pedestrian overpass as one vantage point.  Shooting from there would also show the river and another mall across the river.  Another angled shot would be from the bridge.  This would frame the mall and the overpass.

some other shots from across the river would give it a good perspective.  Another good photo would be one where the train is crossing the river, with the mall as background.  But this would have to taken from the second bridge, and about two hundred meters distant.

Pictures of malls can give a false sense of perspective unless there are other buildings or structures within the frame, or there are people in the picture.  The other buildings would give more perspective and comparison in terms of size.  While the people would give the picture some sense of dynamics.

We’ll have to reschedule another time as the weather did not cooperate today.

Though in terms of opportunities, underwater photography should be more common, there’s not too many who would want to go through the cost of a camera or a casing for underwater use.  There are alternatives, of course.

One no-brainer alternative is to use a disposable camera with underwater capability.  These point and shoot film cameras don’t have much depth to them but they are workable and well worth it, provided you know how to advance the film.  That’s because the film advance lever is it’s main disadvantage.  Most underwater disposable cameras do not advance the film far enough.  And when that happens, you can’t take the next shot.

Another alternative to an underwater camera is a camera casing for underwater use.  For the most part, these camera casings are quite expensive and are designed for a particular camera and lens unit.  Some water-proof camera casings are almost as expensive as the camera body.  The advantage of the camera casings is that they are rated to go deeper than point-and-shoot disposables.

These camera casings are not without their own set of problems, specially for beginners.  You have to test the seals once you enclose the camera.  And after testing the seals, only then should you go take the camera to deep water.  Unfortunately, it’s the testing which is crucial.  If the case was not closed properly, the seals won’t work, and the camera would get wet.  There’s no two ways about it.  And with a digital SLR, that’s a ruined camera right there.

For a really cool low-tech solution with partial results try a glass-bottomed tube or an aquarium.  These solutions are not costly, and could be done on the work bench.  These two solutions give different results.  The glass-bottomed tube is much like underwater photography on a glass-bottomed boat.  You’ve got a long cylinder with a wide diameter, with a glass or clear-plastic seal at one end.  To take pictures, you submerge one end of the tube into the water and you hold the camera at the other end.  There’s not much flexibility in terms of the shots, but you should be able to see the bottom, up to ten or 15 feet down.

The aquarium solution is different because you can have a different effect when taking pictures using it.  You don’t take pictures with the camera pointing down.  Instead the camera is pointed horizontally.  This allows shots of the waves as it touches the glass sides, as well as pictures with one part above the water and the other part under the water.

These low-tech solutions may not look like much.  But if you take into account the cost of an underwater camera or even a waterproof camera, the successful shots are well worth it.