photo-lifestyle.com

Organizing Photos – Windows Movie Maker

If you love to take photos, one of the challenges is what to do with them after you take them. Organizing photos isn’t easy. In the good old days of film photography, we had armloads of photo envelopes from the developer after every trip or event. You could pretty much tell someone’s basic personality by where those prints ended up. Some people just left them in the envelope. Others had great boxes full of happy jumbles of family events and stunning scenery, and the meticulous ones, like my mother had huge albums that could double as an effective weapon in case a burglar broke in. Each one was laboriously labeled with the year and/or subject matter.

Now that we have entered the digital age, the danger is to upload the photos onto the computer to free up space in the camera, and never look at them again. Especially if they aren’t prize winners. Here’s one fun solution. I took a pleasant trip with my daughter to an area all covered with interesting rocks, and explored a cave there as well. None of the photos were that great, but as a set they showed the feeling of the place quite well.

I chose the best ones and uploaded them into Windows Movie Maker. Windows Movie Maker makes it cut and paste simple to add effects, interesting fades from one photo to the next, and music as well. It took only about 10 min. to put together a quick movie that provides an experience much more like being there than one photo could have done. Next time you are ready to start organizing photos you might give Windows Movie Maker a try.

Photographing Fish Using an Underwater Camera

Woo Hoo! I was able to borrow an underwater camera when I went to Hawaii a few weeks ago! It was a Casio pocket camera with a waterproof feature up to three meters deep.

I couldn’t wait to go snorkeling and try my hand at photographing fish. In fact I planned the trip so we would get off the plane and drive straight to Shark’s Cove, a small natural marine reserve on the North Shore of Oaho.

It took a while to get the hang of taking a moving object while being tossed about by the waves myself. There was no chance of remaining stationary, but I discovered that the autofocus was able to compensate more effectively when I was drifting directly away from the fish, instead of moving off to the side.

After scores of unfocused shots of empty sea bottom (taken after the fish had darted away) I managed to capture this one. It’s not entirely in focus, but framed quite nicely in its rocky environment. My first actual success in photographing fish using an underwater camera.

A little while later the tide started going out, causing an undertow, and I drifted out a little further from shore than I had bargained on. To my delight, I discovered there were whole schools of the same fish out there, and the water was clearer as well. Using an underwater camera was much easier in these conditions.

Not bad for a first attempt. I’m hoping to take a trip to Okinawa later this year, where photographing fish using an underwater camera will be even more rewarding.

Why Do We Take Pictures?

Why do we take pictures? What is the reason for having a photo lifestyle?

I already have several hundred versions of your basic sunset photo on file, and since I love to hike, a good share of them are framed in trees, much like this one I took yesterday evening. So why, when the clouds start to turn color do I whip out my camera and start to look for the optimum angle? Do I need another sunset photo for some project or job I’m doing? Absolutely not. I have plenty in my files to choose from. Is there someone who needs to see this particular sky? Not really. On the surface it’s just a habit – a photo lifestyle.

Why do we take pictures? Perhaps part of the answer is in the home page introduction to this blog. We want to cheat time. To somehow save the feelings and experiences of this moment to enjoy later. We can’t save the entire experience, but we can preserve part of the visual image we see. I was having a particularly contemplative moment when I took this sunset photo. I was wondering why we think a pink or orange sky is more beautiful or exciting than a blue one. Perhaps, I thought, the sky changes color more often in Heaven, so it makes us feel happy to see the sky change? It was uplifting to think about Heaven in such specific terms, and I think perhaps I wanted to remember that feeling of hope when I got home and continued my photo lifestyle by uploaded my photos for the day.

Then again, perhaps I’m looking for that elusive perfect sunset photo. Maybe, just maybe the sunset photo I take today will be better than all the rest. Perhaps it will win a contest and end up in a magazine or on someone’s wall. I just might be taking sunset photo after sunset photo for the same reason Monet filled hundreds of canvases with water lilies.

I think the main answer to the question, why do we take pictures? lies in our respect for diversity. God has made every flower just a little bit different. No two snowflakes are alike, and each sunset is a new version of God’s love bidding us a peaceful day’s end. We show our respect for the individuality of each representation of beauty that we see by wanting to record and catalog it for ourselves and others to enjoy later.

At any rate, I have one more sunset photo now for whatever reason. It could be simply another involuntary example of my photo lifestyle, but I do hope you enjoy this one.

What Should I Photograph?

Sometimes I go out with my camera with no specific plans. The question “What Should I Photograph?” is largely unanswered, and I begin to wonder if I won’t have to start traveling in order to find something truly photo-worthy, especially if nature photography is my main goal.

I was feeling this way the other day, when a business partner sent me a link to the wildly popular blog: Cambridge in Colour. Over 10,000 people visit Cambridge in Colour every day to enjoy the photos and learn about photography. I instantly assumed the photographer was professional, and was surprised to learn he was simply a student who spent 3 and a half years working on his PHD in Chemical Engineering! The entire gallery is taken on campus in low light with time exposures, and yet it’s richness and diversity is so terrific it draws 10,000 viewers a day.

Granted, Cambridge is a large and beautiful place that many people visit simply to see the history and grandeur, but it’s definitely a finite theme. There is plenty right here in my city of Kurume to make an entire career in photography as well.  “What should I photograph?” becomes a moot question.

One of the natural blessings in our city is the birds. Magpies, which are endangered in most of the world, are everywhere, and there are dozens of varieties of herons and egrets. The blue heron above lives in the central city park, and is quite patient about having a camera pointed at him. I found another blue heron that lives in a pond at the base of the mountain, only 2 minutes drive from my house. Here he is in pre-dawn twilight just before he flew away to go find his breakfast.

It’s amazing how the blue heron and the egret have no problem co-habitating with humans. I remember a big row in Oregon about my grandmother’s farm. There was a colony of great blue herons living in the woods by the river, and the naturalists wanted to declare it a reserve and take the farm away from her so they wouldn’t be disturbed. I believe the blue heron in Japan is a smaller variety, but they live anywhere from the city parks to the rain ditches at the side of the highways.

Cambridge in Colour was a great inspiration to me.  The question in my mind, “What should I photograph?” was eloquently answered, and replaced with “How can I increase my skill and better express what I see here in Kurume?” Cambridge in Colour answers that question as well, as it provides a series of lessons as well as a forum. Go check it out. I’m off to look for a blue heron.

Photographing Unexpected Events

Photographing unexpected events is by definition something you don’t ever get a chance to plan for. If I had been planning to take photos of a fire in downtown Kurume in the evening twilight yesterday, I would have been carrying a proper SLR with a sturdy tripod and a good telephoto lens. As it was I had just parked my car and stepped out onto the street when I saw smoke billowing in the sky down the street. I abandoned my plans to check out a department store sale, and walked down the street to see what was burning, and whether the fire fighters had arrived.

All I had with me was my Casio Exilim 7.2 megapixel pocket camera. I hadn’t left home to start photographing unexpected events, but there was one of those unexpected events happening right in front of me. The street was quickly filling with onlookers, and I had no choice but to simply point and shoot. Fires in Japan are serious affairs, as the traditional architecture uses mainly paper and thin dry wood for building materials. One simple fire can quickly spread to consume whole sections of a city. Consequently, the fire department is very large and well financed. Studies have shown there are more than three times as many full time fire fighters in Japan than in the US. By the time I arrived there were at least a dozen fire trucks, with more arriving all the time, and the area was buzzing with fire fighters.

The evening twilight was getting darker by the second, and I only had a small window of time to take pictures. Also, there was so much going on, I wasn’t sure what to focus on, I had to stop a minute and ask myself what it was that I was trying to capture.
Tips for photographing unexpected events:

• Take pictures. It’s easy to forget about your camera and just stand there in horror. Sometimes it’s not easy to get out a camera because of the crowds, or you may not want to look like you don’t care what’s happening. Find a way to take pictures anyway. I noticed it looked more natural for people who had bigger cameras to be taking photos. With a camera that big, people assumed they were reporters, and stepped out of the way.
• Once you get a few basic shots of what’s happening, start focusing on details. This photo of the tangle of fire hoses is an example. Everyone else was looking up at the smoke, but there were interesting details in every direction. Sometimes the onlookers are more interesting than the event itself. I got great shot of a rustic looking homeless man staring at the fire.
• Don’t forget to try various lighting and framing techniques. The conditions won’t be optimum. In my case it was after sunset, and the evening twilight was a major challenge. You’ll have to be innovative to get a great shot.