Project 365

I decided that I would start my photo project again... this time Project 365 via the iPhone! Last year I decided to take on a similar project with my SLR, but I found that task to be extremely difficult given that my device is extremely massive and heavy to carry around.

When I saw Kristy share her first photo of 2012 in the Photo365 app on the iPhone, I immediately jumped on it. I am sharing my photos on Facebook here. So follow along if you wish :) It's not to late to log your photos since January 1st... If you are serious and want to start a 365 project for yourself, go to the iTunes store and look for the Photo365 app <<-- click on this link to go there. Happy snapping and stitching! :)

Today I snapped one of the swag that my awesome company gave us; Cardinal Path laptop bag and the Visual Miscellaneum, an awesome infographic/data visualization book.

New lens adapters making beautiful pictures!

A couple months ago, I came across a few cool lens adapters that essentially transform the regular image seen through the viewfinder into close-up macro, wide angle and fish-eye style images. It was more of an impulse buy than anything else so I ordered them (I got them from the Photojojo Store). They weren't very expensive, but you can go to the store and check them out yourself :)

The lenses were... Opteka...

• .45x AF Wide Angle (with Macro)
• .35x AF Fisheye (with Macro)

They are pretty sweet adapters! One thing that you absolutely need is the adapter ring. The ring goes in between your lens and the lens adapter. Without it, it won't fit into place. So maybe you get the right size! I made the mistake of ordering the wrong size and it took 4+ weeks before I got it (because it came, then went back because the address was written wrong during the purchase process, D'OH!). Anyways, I learned my lesson :)

Here are a couple quick shots I took with it tonight... what do you think?

This is my work desk... really messy right now, didn't have time to clean it up for this shot:

This is the .45x AF Wide Angle lens taken with the Macro:

I`ll get more shots in with these once I get some time freed up!

Saddened that Lytro does not ship to Canada

For those who don't know, Lytro is the first of its kind that allows you to reprocess a photo after it's already been taken. For example, if you increased your depth of field (DOF) and only focused on the foreground, you can later go into the settings of your camera and refocus the background to be in focus, taking the foreground out of focus... how cool is that!? It uses the light field technology to capture all the light in the space you're capturing... (it gets a bit technical, but remember that light is what creates beautiful pictures:). The camera is also f2 throughout, so it's mega sharp, but the DOF is also really big.

Here's what it looks like...

I'm saddened that Lytro is not shipping their products to Canada... as I signed up for their early bird notice... see the email I got below:

Here's a video and link to an article that illustrates how Lytro works (if you click on the link, click on one of the photos once to refocus the image... it's quick cool!):

Again... bummed out... but maybe in the next month they will change that... hopefully!

Weekend photos

This past weekend I decided to venture around downtown Ottawa with my heavy duty cam. I started in the OU campus where I saw a bunch of students playing, what it seemed to be, Quidditch. It was quite amusing... they were running around with a ball with a pole in between their legs. Each player took their turns and tried to steal the ball out of the other's hands (quite aggressively). You would think the girls might feel violated when she goes up against the guy, but I guess not, the game carried on. At that moment, I wished I had the 70-200mm f2.8... because that scene would have been perfect... mmm... someday...

On to the the photo taking now... walked around and in the OU campus area, I did find a spot with a bunch of leaves that had fallen from the trees. Here are some of my favourites after rendering them through Lightroom (why didn't I learn this program earlier!?):

Normally I render my photos in iPhoto and Photoshop CS5, but this past weekend I installed Lightroom 3 onto my desktop (Windows) computer, and so I decided I take a journey down its road. After a couple hours playing with the settings, it's quite intuitive. I'm happy that Lightroom opens NEF files (Nikon's RAW file types). I did all my editing in Lightroom and the both photos are ones that I rendered with a preset filter + some additional adjustments. And yes, I've started taking photos in RAW now, probably best if I'm going to take photography seriously now... well... still learning :)

Let me know what your thoughts are on the above photos :) thanks!

Oh! And check out this cool Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera - now know what I want for Christmas :)