Foggy morning framegrabs.
 

It was pretty foggy around 5-6AM, and it was nice out, but a little wet, so I decided to go for a walk and I took my panasonic DV52 with me, just to see if I could get some cool stills from the framegrabs.

(Oh yeah, don't ask me why I had slippers on? heh)

Not too shabby for a $400 camcorder:

http://www.freewebs.com/harshmanner/crap/index2.htm

UPDATE -- Here's some more video framegrabs that I did at sunset, mostly cats and crap, because thats all thats around my backyard and stuff.

http://www.freewebs.com/alexknappenberger/index.htm

Why did you have slippers on, Alex?

Alex, a couple of nice pics there. Very nice in fact.

Remember the rule of 3's while framing though.

I've heard it called the rule of thirds. The idea is to draw an imaginary tic-tac-toe board that takes up the entire width and height of your frame, and line up important features along the lines and intersections. Ostensibly, this aesthetic dictum is to stave off the monotony of framing everything dead center.

It's useful for head shots and interviews. When it comes to artistic photography, it's a rule made to be broken.

<<<-- Originally posted by Robert Knecht Schmidt :

It's useful for head shots and interviews. When it comes to artistic photography, it's a rule made to be broken. -->>>

(shhhh... don't tell him that until he's learned it first)

And yes it's the rule of Thirds, unless you are typing sloppy in a real hurry, then it's just 3's. :) Thanks for clearing it up for me though.


Alex, learn if first. Try and make all your shots using this rule, then compare the improvement of the quality of your stuff. Then you can start breaking it and you'll have a better point of referencee as to what of your stuff works and what doesn't.

The mind subconciously seems to line things up naturally to the Rule of Thirds. Most of your pictures follow it already. In the first pics, you're eyes (assuming thats you) are lined up along an invisible horizontal line that runs across the top 1/3rd of the picture. Very easy to look at. Your landscape picture #16 and #15-2 don't follow this rule, and the horizon splits the frame in 1/2. If you had the horizon running along the top 1/3rd as you do in #13 and #14, or the bottom 1/3rd it would look more natural. For diagonal lines, you can run diagonal lines throug the intersect points the tic-tac-toe grid makes and line stuff up from there.

Now, I'm only being picky because I think these are easily the best photos you have submitted so far. If I didn't like them, I wouldn't say anything at all. The previous stuff you've put up has been OK, but mostly so-so stuff in terms of the photographic element (no offense). Some of these pics show potential. I think you should leave Photoshop alone for a while and concentrate on what goes into the camera. It looks like you might have some talent behind a lens.

Thanks for clearing that up and stuff, I know exactly what you guys are saying now. You haven't seen any of my videos, have you? I don't really want to post the links to the ones I have on the internet already, because they are pretty stupid, but people seem to like them. Actually the first video I made (it was really stupid) called "extreme animal hunt" got under the "highest rated clips" on singlereel.com like 2 months ago. The next video I make, I'll post for sure, it will have a electric scooter and someone getting shot in it.....heh.

they're flipflops....

Well, they technically aren't flipflops, because they dont go inbetween your toes. I guess you could call them sandles without a back portion, they just slip on. They are good for keeping by the door when you want to go outside to do some crap and don't feel like putting on your shoes. We used to have like 3 pairs of them, but one of my retarded cats chewed the other 2 up, completely to nothing, and the pair I still have are badly chewed up too. Stupid cat.

all the same...some phat shotz by the way

What the HELL is a flip flop?????

Are you talking about the Australian beach shoes, thongs?

Zac

Ha ha. I guess some words are not universal! A flip flop is a rubber soled sandel with a piece of rubber (usually rubber) that goes over the toes and between the big toe and second toe. When you walk, the back of the sole comes up and smacks you in the heel, hence the name "Flip-Flop".

We had a man (from NJ) who came to work in our office (in NC) a few years ago. We were talking about buying and selling tobaggons (with our logo) so people could keep their heads warm. He looked at us like were crazy and asked why would a sled keep someone warm?

Down south, a tobaggon is something you wear on your head, while up north it is a snow sled you ride.

I guess we don't need to get into beach music dances (shagging) do we? Oh the wonderful world of language!

Oh, by the way - nice pics, Alex and ditto on the thirds thing! I liked the one with the red light in the background and the red "thing" in the foreground.

yeah i finally got it,

What australians have been wearing for about 100 years to go to the beach, americans took and named underwear after them, then named the actual shoe after the sound... too strange

Whats next grey spelled like gray?

Zac

Absolutely! However, I can probably name some things I'm glad we DIDN'T name after the sound they make! ;D

Not tooting my own horn, but I am having a hard time believing this is a DV framegrab, even though I took it, escpecially from just a $350 DV camera:

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/212104/cat4.jpg

I did some more vertical framegrabs, i'll upload them soon. They are framed better. :D I enjoy doing video, but doing stills like that is pretty cool too, and you don't need lots of resources to do it. I'd buy a digital camera but then I couldn't take 30 pictures a second and select the best one. I'm honestly not too good with still cameras, my timing is off big time.

Here's another better exposed one:

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/212104/cat6.jpg

Yet another:

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/212104/cat7.jpg

Here's some more video framegrabs that I did at sunset, mostly cats and crap, because thats all thats around my backyard and stuff.

http://www.freewebs.com/alexknappenberger/index.htm

Alex. I have a challenge for you, here it is, in front of the forum:

Try going the whole summer without posting anything that's been colour corrected, or altered in post in any way. Only original stuff, as it's been captured by your camera.

Lots of people can take a so-so picture and make it interesting or better with a computer. Taking an awsome picture in the first place is much harder. Don't rely on the computer to fix stuff, it'll become a crutch long term.

What do you think?

Eh. I can't do that, heh, sorry. If I can make the stuff look better (atleast to me) then why not? Maybe I should post some side by side comparisions of the "corrected" stuff to the original framegrabs, and let you judge. I guess some people call that cheating...

What about people with the in-camera "S curve" adjustments on their DVX100's? Thats the same thing...

summers half over...besides...how can you turn down a challenge from a fellow countryman?

I went to an Epson printing seminar a few months ago (more digital stills than video) and the instructor worked quite a bit with Photoshop. He said that he used to believe computer manipulation was 'cheating' until he talked with an elderly photographer who had been in the business a long time and switched to digital.

The photog told him that using computer photo-editing wasn't really cheating because photographers that use film will also manipulate photographs in the dark room (more or less exposure in printing, more/less time in developer/stop, etc.). Therefore, manipulating a photo in a computer editor was no different. It made sense to pea-brain!

So, if it looks better, is it really cheating if you found the subject, framed the pic, snapped the pic and then made it look good in post?

I don't really know, but I will agree that as a learning tool, you should learn to take the best photos you can. I'm just not sure how good an unretouched still can be out of that Pany. By the way, I think that retouching photos to make them look better is not wrong, but I'm willing to listen to other opinions. I certainly may not have all the info!

There's a great thread in the "Anything Goes . . ." topic about photographer vs videographer or something like that. I do believe it helps you be a better videographer if you have that experience/talent for stills. When I was in the 8th grade I wanted to learn to take pics, so my dad (a pro news photog/camera man at a TV station) bought me an Argus C-3 - a very cheap range-finder camera with no meter and told me take pics and learn how to gauge light and speed. I was soooo mad that I didn't have an SLR or meter, but I found out later it taught me a lot!

The last pic of the cat has him seemingly saying either "Get that camera out of my face" or "Can't I even take a crap in peace?"!

Just random thoughts. Sorry for the ramble.

Using a computer isn't cheating, but it's a hell of alot easier than learning to take a better picture in the first place.

I had a math teacher once that wouldn't let us do any equations or formulas the easy way until we could prove that we could do it the hard way first. Taught me a valuable lesson about the real world. Build a solid foundation of skills to fall back on in case all your shortcuts fail.

Zac,

According to Webster:

"grey" - acceptable variant of GRAY

And while we're at it...Hemingway insisted on keeping the "e" before the suffix "-able" when the root word ended in an "e"...hence "A Moveable Feast."

What's that got to do with the price of tea in China? The message is...break the rules and you'll become a legend. That's why I jaywalk daily.

Oh, I agree that learning the fundamentals of photography is a very good thing. The more you can do with the camera, the less you have to do in post! But it is nice to be able to get that perfect adjustment in post, when needed.

I should state though, that I do not encourage the type of manipulation seen in mags where they take the 130 pound, female celebrity and make her pics look as if she is 105 (I think I saw that brought out on Leno one night)!

<<<-- Originally posted by John Locke : Zac,
And while we're at it...Hemingway insisted on keeping the "e" before the suffix "-able" when the root word ended in an "e"...hence "A Moveable Feast."

What's that got to do with the price of tea in China? The message is...break the rules and you'll become a legend. That's why I jaywalk daily. -->>>

Hemingway becam a legind cause he cuden't spel wurth shet? Dam, im gunno be famus sumday! i think mabe it was becus he was a relly good riter, not becus of hes speling, dont yoo?
Braking the rules dusent make yoo a legind, beeng reelly gud at somthing mite thoh.

As far as the use of computers in photography, if you don't have it to touch up your photos, then you are FORCED to improve your fundamental skills.

<<<-- Originally posted by Dylan Couper : As far as the use of computers in photography, if you don't have it to touch up your photos, then you are FORCED to improve your fundamental skills. -->>>

Seems logical to me.

Dylan, here's a few untouched framegrabs.

http://www.freewebs.com/alexknappenberger/untouched.htm If your wondering about the yellowish look, thats because I white balanced on the sky to take some of the blue away, it makes the greens and reds stand out more. Plus it was sunset.

If these were 35mm photos, and not digital camcorder photos, I wouldn't need to do much to them, to make them look how I wanted, such as mess with the color curves and bump up the saturation a little bit.

Also, you want your pictures to be as simple as possible right? So if that means taking out a stray object in the background, or something, in photoshop, then I don't see a problem with that either.

That's kind of what I was trying to say, but in a nice way!

If you had a NIKON Digital SLR, then it would take a much better pic than your Pany DV52, so less manipulation would be needed.

I see nothing with using post to make pics looks better - especially if the cam is letting you down. However I do agree with Dylan that one should learn all aspects in order to make themselves better.

Nice cat, by the way. Looks like the one I had before she, ummm, went to cat-heaven! But mine was fatter.

As soon as the National Park Service gives the "ok", I'll post some pics from my GL1 of the making of the Wright Brother's statue. Hopefully, they will be interesting.

Alex,
Going back to your first post with the frame grabs on a foggy/misty morning. You should have numbered them Dude to make it easier to address specific ones.... but anyway, here are my comments starting from the beginning or top: #7 interesting shot; #10 love the red in the foreground; #12 nice misty feel to this shot; #15 really good shot, could almost smell the dampness of the mist, maybe a little different framing; #16 loved this one and it would have been better, IMHO, if you were standing in the middle of the road with your back to the camera and perhaps your hands clasped behind your head.

I looked at each one to see if it told a story. Actually, each one could tell a story but I didn't get that feeling from all of them (to each his/her own).

They were all interesting but I had several favorites as listed above. Keep on working out Alex, and thanks for sharing. Nick

<<<-- Originally posted by Mark Moore :
Nice cat, by the way. Looks like the one I had before she, ummm, went to cat-heaven! But mine was fatter.
-->>>

Well, sadly that cat and many others (like 20 of them, that come around here) would probably be really unhealthy skinny, but my mom feeds them twice a day, and they "hang out" in our garage, even though they are all pretty much stray cats, and you can't even get close to them. We have to inside cats (simease and some other really retarded cat) and a african grey paret, and another paret that we took in from this lady that wanted rid of him (unfortunately, I wish we didn't, I can see why she didn't want him anymore).

Also, thanks for the comments and stuff.

I was pretty much just messing around with all them pictures, since my friends are lazy and have lost interest in doing videos, I am supposed to do a video with these dudes that I haven't seen in awhile though.

I am interested in saving up some money and buying a digital camera now. I was playing with a relatives Fuji S602Z earlyer, and it was a pretty interesting digital camera, felt good, and had lots of features, it's "only" 3MP though, even though you can interpolate that upto 6MP, plus I am pretty sure it's discontinued. Something like that would be nice. I could always pick up a 35mm SLR camera on ebay for pretty cheap, but I'd rather have a digital camera, to save money on film, developing, the ease of use, and the fact that you can take lots of pictures and just delete the ones you don't want.

I bought a 'cheap' SONY Malveica digital that uses a floppy disk, but the resolution isn't very good. I bought it for three reasons: (1) it was on sale for $199 and (2) for web photos; and (3) I didn't have to use USB - I could use a floppy to put them on the computer.

I would love to have a NIKON or CANON Digital SLR. The artist that is creating Wright Brother's statue has a brother that is a pro photog (shoots for TOPS baseball, NFL, PGA, NHL, etc.) and he has several CANON digital SLRs with huge photo cards (like 512 or something). I love photography and would love to have one of those!

Twenty cats, two birds . . . no dogs rodents or fish? You said you couldn't get near the cats - a couple of the pics looked like the cat was getting away from you and the camera!

if you can....try and get a digi SLR and the ability to change lenses....SLR makes a huge differnce between point-and-shoot digis.

my EOS-10D has a 1GB card....lots o' pics!

Trey, I'm 14, and even if I had a little petty job (like washing pans at pizza oven) I still wouldn't be able to save up the money needed for a camera like yours, I'd go nuts and break down and buy something else before I got enough to buy a DSLR. Hopefully when i'm older. :D

Regarding the rule of 3rds, it is true that it makes for a more pleasing composition however it isn't set in stone. You don't always have to shoot using this rule to get the best composition. I mean that in regards to Alex's 15_2, and 16 landscape shots. I see no reason why the horizon had to lie on a 3rd line for that particular shot. I actually thought the pic had good composition, with the large tree to the right breaking up the horizon.

When it comes to art it's really hard to hold any standing argument back and forth, after all it's mostly opinion. For example when I go to the Philadelphia Art Museum and see these huuuuge canvases with a few splashes of paint randomly smeared about (ie "abstract" art)I think it's no-talent garbage. Though they'll be a million people that'll disagree with me.

I've been an illustrator all my life (all 25 year of it, lol) and within the last 4 years or so been getting into the digital end of art including photography and videography. I should post some of my digital photography to have it critiqued. I better brace myself when I post them- Dylan can be brutal. :) Take care guys.

Alex mucho kudos! for being 14 you have a lot of ambition! hang in there and keep doing what you are doing, it will pay off in the long run!

p.s. ill match you kat for kat
look into my eyes!
http://visualstudios.org/10dpics/img_0099.jpg

Great pic, Trey. Those pupils look like the window to some far-away galaxy of stars!

<<<-- Originally posted by Trey Perrone : Alex mucho kudos! for being 14 you have a lot of ambition! hang in there and keep doing what you are doing, it will pay off in the long run!

] -->>>

Ditto man- when I was 14 I was spending all day on my SNES or at the arcade playing Street Fighter 2....oh those were the days. :)

If your this ambitous and have this good of an understanding of NLE already your bound to be great. You've got the talent and ambition all you need now is experience and your on your way to being sucessfull....if video is what you wanna do career'wise. Good luck- keep up the great work.

Thanks, actually thats really what I am probably best at, is editing, since it really just kind of blends in with my computer experience and stuff, i've been using computers since I was 7/8, and I've built and fixed many, many, many, many.

I just can't see doing anything with computers for a future job/career, sitting behind a desk all day or doing anything like that would be torture. Today, digital video and computers go together very well, you can't really do one without the other.

I'm waiting to shoot my next stupid little 4-6 minute video. I'll post it when it's done.

Trey, nice picture, the DOF with that lens and stuff on that camera is crazy, but I got you topped on funny cat pictures, here's one, nothing special, it was my webcam on www.rickandrak.com awhile ago, i'll post another one I got earlyer of this same cat that was pretty funny.

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-...1/webcam10.jpg

Ok I'm inspired- check out the other post on this forum- I just linked a bunch of pics of my own work. Go easy...I'm not a pro.

oh yeah...we just shaved one of our cats...hehehehe...took almost 3 hours and my dad almost lost a finger....problem is i have to find her to get a pic first...she saw me this morning and ran...i was the one who held her down. just wait my friends ill get one up in the next day or so...

Hahaha, Yeah, I want to shave one of our cats too, he is so hairy, I could make a whole outfit from all the hair if we shaved him.

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/169091/cat.jpg

Heh, he's so retarded.

does this kat look pissed off or what?
http://visualstudios.org/10dpics/stitches1.jpg

"in the jungle...."