Wedding pictures

Okay people, I have gotten permission to post all the photos... They can be found at:

http://albums.phanfare.com/heespharm

They turned out better than i thought they would.. But , always being hard on myself, I know I can do better... Gotta think more before I click the shutter... To my credit, however, these were all taken with my single back-up camera and ONE lens... Just shows that the gear doesn't matter... anyways here's some teasers!! (LMK if there are problems with the pictures displaying..)

Oh and if you want any pictures, I have allowed downloads on the site (check the right side of each picture)... Also check the slideshow... I love the song it's "Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World" by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole

Oh and there are NO pictures of me so don't ask... hahaha

Congrats

Congrats Billy and Mei Mei Kim....

Thanks for letting me take part in your special day!!!

Many more photos will be up soon once I get clearance from the happy couple!!

Haven't posted in almost a month!!!

Damn haven't posted anything in about a month... Haven't been doing much photography!!!! I have recently been just gearing up and reading alot... I realized that although I have all the gear I need to go back and get much more training!!!

I've split my time reading books on technique and books on photoshop skills (essential for all photographers). Photoshop is no longer a tool to just splice yourself into a picture of you and george bush shaking hands... It's become a digital darkroom of sorts. Anything that was previously done by the developer now must be done at home!! So taking pictures has now become the beginning of the process not the end of the process.

JS booked another wedding that I'm gonna help him shoot but it's a 10 hour wedding ON MY BIRTHDAY!! umm working on gaining more knowledge to parlay this photog thing into a part time job.. I have a real passion for wedding photography for some reason... Maybe it's my need to capture Kodak moments.. I dunno but I'm drawn to those types of pictures for some reason.

Got some time to work with JS studio lights... Had lots of fun with them... Christine and her sister was nice enough to be our subjects... I dunno about you, but I hate having my picture taken (ironic huh??? I also don't like taking medication) Some turned out great but I'm very very critical of my work so of course I think they need alot of improvement!! But here are some pictures.





Also been working alot... in the past 21 days, I've worked 20 of them!!!! If any of you follow my facebook wall you'd see that I worked 55 hours one week 66 hours the next and 52 hours this week (and its only thursday!!!) Sounds crazy I know!! I would say the money is nice but FICA and my 401k took most of it... And the other half was spent on fathers day, my brothers bday, and an upcoming wedding I'm involved in.

I have highly considered changing jobs to free up more weekends. One job opportunity has become available that would allow me to do just that. The offer is still on the table and I am first on the list of names, but it would be a substantial paycut!! We're talking about the 5 figure paycut!!! The only reason I'm considering it is to free up more sundays for church. My biggest regret, I guess, since I've started my career is all the church I've been missing. Work is important but God made me... I mean what can I say to rebutle that!!! We'll see what happens. Only God can show me the way... Either way I hope he grants me the courage/wisdom to make the decision He wants me to make!

Other side notes... Went to Vegas= lost alot of money... that's all I'm gonna say about that...

Well thanks for taking the time to read hopefully I will post more frequently from now on!!!

Toys I want: Canon G9, Canon 580exII, Canon 20d backup camera

Upcoming photography opportunities: BK/MT wedding, CC karate shots, Wanting to go to San Antonio to shoot for some reason... Anybody going or wanna go with me??

Follow me at: albums.phanfare.com/heespharm ; www.flickr.com/albums/aznpharm79

Wedding shot day of earthquake

Could you imagine it's your big day and then an earthquake strikes....

Check out this dude's Xanga page...

http://www.xanga.com/lelandwong/657607591/photographing-a-wedding-and-then-an-earthquake.html

HDR photography experiment

Hdr is a generally new/ highly evolving style of photography....

Basically what it does it increases the dynamic range (hdr=high dynamic range)

What does that mean really??? basically when you take a picture, if it's too bright you lose the detail in the highlights (turns too white) and if it's too dark you lose the detail in the shadows (turns all black)

So why don't you correctly expose the picture correctly??? well even if it's exposed correctly, you lose some details in both the shadows and highlights...

So HDR is basically setting your camera to take multiple exposures (one dark, one light, and one normal or any number of exposures in between). Then you can combine those pics in photoshop or a program called photomatix and make an HDR. They've been doing this in movies for years.. so you get an eerie sky but the main character is still visible and bright...

Now what they've found is not only do you get the lights and darks correct, but you get a higher selection of light and dark colors... so the people at photomatix have found a way to boost these colors to get that illustrated feel but obviously still a picture... Some people dont' like this at all (**cough cough john** cough) but I think it looks like an oil painting but with more detail! Great stuff!!

Here's my example below:




More examples here

Visit my Phanfare site: http://albums.phanfare.com/heespharm

Flickr alternative

Are you not happy with how flickr displays your pictures? Do you want a free alternative source???

www.phanfare.com is your answer....

It has a very organized and very user friendly structure for outside people to view your pictures. However, the user friendliness of the interface is not that great UNLESS you download the desktop program (which is free).

The real draw for me here is that the slideshows can have music to be added to it...

Check out the results here

albums.phanfare.com/heespharm

DIY: GF origami diffuser. 4 bucks!!!

So after recieving the Origami Diffuser and playing around with it a while... one of the side arms broke off... I thought great... now I have to spend 30 bucks replacing it right??? wrong!!!!

It got me thinking... What is this thing made of anyways and how can i mimic it so I don't have to buy a new one???? So I made a new one out of simple cheap materials...

Materials:

- Sticky velcro (2 bucks)
- 32 ounce CVS rubbing 70% alcohol (1 or 2 bucks) (the large size... tall and cylindrical)
- one rubberband (wide)
- Cut out of JPG (enclosed) in this post)
- scissors
- Goo gone (or anything that can help remove a sticky label... like rubbing alcohol maybe????)

Steps

1. Drain the alcohol bottle out completely

2. cut the top and bottom off then cut a line down from the top of the bottle to the bottom of your bottle, so your left with a sheet of opaque plastic

3. Take the label off with goo gone

4. Download picture below (yes you have my full permission to use it) and cut it out
- you need to cut on the outside of the black lines not the inside of the black lines...
- Don't cut on the dotted lines... those are fold lines
- fold on fold lines... use a ruler to help you get a straight line
- Make sure that the picture is 6 and 3/8 inches from top to bottom when printed out

5. take the sticky velcro soft side and measure around your speedlight so that you know you have enough velcro....

6. Remove only the part of the velcro backing so it can cover the center piece of the diffuser (see pic below)

7. Cut out a 2 inch strip of the hook side of the velcro and take the backing off and stick it to the end of the back side of the soft velcro... (see pic below)

8. Wrap rubber band around the top of your speed light..

9. Wrap the velcro around you speed light flash end...

10. Take pictures





Taken with the Gary Fong Origami

Taken with the DIY Diffuser