Movement at Houhai

BeijinGX had another outing in January and this time our creative leader came up with the idea to prepare techniques and/or themes. We met at Houhai where lots of people would gather on a Saturday to go ice skating, ice biking, pick sledding or just stroll around and enjoy the atmosphere. Once we gathered at Starbucks for something hot our leader Nicholas distributed little pieces of paper with a theme on it. Love, laughter, freezing cold, panning, movement to mention just a few. My theme of the day was movement. My goal: capture moving objects and or people. To be very honest I ended up doing more panning than anything else.

To get around easier and not fall on my butt I rented an ice bike. This way I could also cover more of the lake and get some different shots. But before I did that I went to the ice skating part and took some shots of the skaters. It is not easy taking panning shots of them, but because of the speed when it does work properly you end up with some awesome pictures. The key is to follow one particular skater for a few rounds and get the movement just right. Follow him/her through your view finder making the same movement the skater is. Than set your Shutterspeed mode (TV) to a slow speed (I used 1/10 to 1/20). While folloing the skater take the picture and keep your camera moving until the picture has been taken. What happens is that your subject (the skater) is in focus while everything else is blurred. Just take a look at the pictures below.

After taking all these panning shots I focused on some other objects around that would show movement. I ended of focussing my camera on this cotton candy.

It is project time. Outside is cold and windy so I open my computer and go to DPS (digital photography school) for ideas. A few weeks ago I had seen an awesome picture and wanted to know what this photographer had done. Basically he had taken pictures of bubbles with a macro lens. Since I have no macro lens I'll have to settle with my zoom. Therefore my results will be different. I also tried the set up with umbrella flash, but the lighting in the bedroom was going to be enough.

So out to the store for straws. Back home put soap in a cup and blow bubbles. I had two cups set up, one with some water added and one with hardly any water added for different sizes in bubbles. Put a black t-shirt out for background and voila see the results below.

Vanvouver Canada

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Beijing wonderland

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Colourful Canada

Dear Reader,

In October of 2009 I visited a friend in Vancouver and brought my trusty Pentax camera with me. Living in Beijing makes me long for colours. Spring and fall are very short (2-3 weeks) and I feel colour deprived in the big city. I am from a country that has lots of green and my favourite seasons are spring and fall because of the range of coulrs you see around. It was my first time visiting Canada and I have heard many stories about the beautiful maple leaves in the fall, but I also realized I was not going to visit the east coast which is known for the maple leaves, but what I did not realize was that Vancouver is actually located in a rainforest. From the moment I got off the plane till the day I had to return to China I had my eyes open in amazement. The variety of colours is just stunning and although I tried to capture the variety it is just not the same as seeing it with your own eyes. In the pictures I attached below you will see I have tried to not limit my composition to one colour or tree. Instead of using my prefered 28-300mm lens I actually switched to my 18-50mm lens so I was able to get broader views and therefore more colour in one frame.

I hope you enjoy the beautiful vistas of the west.

A/M

The world under snow

Dear reader,

These next few pictures are not going to be remarkable at all. I am a snow lover and living in Beijing doesn't give me the opportunity to see a lot of it. Even when I lived at home (in The Netherlands) we were not blessed with a lot in general, but this year seems to have been crazy all over. Europe has been getting the biggest dump in forever and so has North America. Well Beijing is following. It may have been seeded it may not have been, who knows, but it doesn't take away the fact that there is a lot of white stuff out there now. Since It snowed heavily on Sunday and I have to get back to work on Monday I only had the time during my lunch break to go out. This means no nice, fancy, big pentax camera for me this time since it's too much lugging around, but my slim coolpix camera (nikon) that I acrry around in my purse for emergencies.


I hope you enjoy the snow as much as I do.