♥/work.'s blog

Awesome!

I am going to have some (10-12) of my photos exposed on a small culture- and art-festival, taking place in Wilhelmshaven on January 17 (in the "Junges Theater", check out www.myspace.com/kontrastprogrammkultur for more information (in German) on that!!).

The main topic is "Contrasts", I already picked some photographs that might match that critorion but I am not completely satisfied yet. So I thought I'd ask you to chose some pictures out of my photostream that you think are "contrastive" in any way :)

I am really looking forward to your suggestions!

Thanks in advance and take care,
dan.

hey there,

as one might already have noticed by looking at my recent pictures I just bought myself a new toy:

Tamron

Tamrom SP Di 90mm 1:2.8 Macro

Currently I am still trying to get used to it. The depth of field is something between 1 and 3 mm at largest magnification and an aperture of f8 and I guess I'll have to add a better tripod to my wishlist for my K10D's shake reduction somehow isn't able to make me hold the camera steady for 2 seconds ;)

Any hints on something more or less lightweight, carryable and (most important!) stable up to 150 euros are hereby rellay appreciated! The height of it is not that important to me but I should be able to use it at (near) ground level. Did anyone try the Joby Gorillapod SLR Zoom with macros yet? And what about its durability? Is it still stable after more than a year?

Hugs,
dan.

UPDATE:

Meanwhile I am a proud owner of a Manfrotto 055xProB with a 486RC2 ballhead and a Metz 48 AF flashlight. Thanks again for all your hints...this new stuff is just...awesome! :D

Wow...more than 5 months have passed since my last entry and beside that I even haven't uploaded as many photographs as I would have liked to. Been pretty busy with my studies and my job during the holidays and my camera had to be repaired because of something damaged in the focus-unit...However I am going to cultivate this small collection of mine during the next days and add some pictures from London, Venice and other interesting places I've visited the last couple of weeks...

Take care,
dan.

Today I published version 1.01 of a Wordpress plugin called "Liperbox".

With that plugin you're able to automatically add thumbnails from an album at iperny.com to your Wordpress-blog. These thumbnails are clickable and open as enlarged pictures in a Slimbox-popup that also includes the original link to the file at ipernity.com. You may see how it works here for example.

Visit its Download - section for further information and please let me know about bugs and suggestions.

Just stumpled across this little idea. I haven't tested it yet but even now I would suggest to take a more stable piece of string:

www.metacafe.com/watch/1041948/1_image_stabilizer_for_any_camera_lose_the_tripod

Video taken at the reunion-show in Sayreville, NJ.

 

<3 <3 <3 Simply awesome!

Hey there, happy new year to all of you and thanks a lot for all those nice recent comments!

As I am going to move to a new flat I won't be able to upload any new photos during the next weeks until I get an internet access. I'm really looking forward to see you and your photographs again next month! :)

Take care,

dan.

Funny thing...did you know taping a simple magnifying glass in front of a UV-filter can give your lenses basic macro-abilities? Be sure to attach it reasonably centered.

Self-made Macroadapter

This very quickly duct-taped adapter-thingy reduced the focus-distance of my 18-55 kit-lens from 82cm to around 4 cm. Quality is good enough to play around, I'd say :)

This bitter Pill...

Try yourself and take care,

dan.

Being too stingy (well...say "poor") to buy one, I just built my own remote control. Till now I was only able to test it here at home with a Pentax K10D and a K100D but it should work on almost every camera with a 2,5"-remote-connection.

Remote Control

Materials: 2 Buttons, 1 Switch, one 2,5" plug, an old stereo-cable and a casing of any kind.

Costs: 6 - 8 Euro (depends on what items you already own...most expensive one was the casing with 3 Euro)

Time afford: I required about 1 hour. Installing the buttons/switch was a bit difficult because the casing consists of two parts so you might be faster if you use a different one.

 

 

Howto?

Unfourtunately the idea of posting this came to me just after mounting the case, so there's no step-by-step description...but cabling is really easy.

There are 3 seperate wires in the stereo-cable: a red one, a white one and an uncoated one (the ground connection). The ground connection has to be soldered to one connector of each button and the switch. As there are only two connectors on each button/switch you are free to chose which one you take but be sure that you connect the ground connection to every button and the switch (you may split the wire into 3 pieces to achieve that). Now the other two wires (the white and the red one) need to be soldered to the 2 remaining buttons. Try out which one is for focussing and which one triggers the shutter. If you want to use Bulb you also have to solder the "shutter-wire" to the second connector of the switch.

Ground, white and red wire have to be attached to the 2,5" plug at the other end of the cable, too of course! :)

Anyway, here's a quick drawing:

remote

Ask me for questions. Enjoy and take care!

dan.

Thanks everyone!

Asleep

Take care,

dan.

edit:

 

and a second one :)

 

Hi,


aaaaaalso, das allerallerwichtigste ist, dass du in RAW fotografierst, damit du später noch die Belichtung und den Weißabgleich nachregeln kannst.
Dann solltest du die mittenbetonte Lichtmessung (oder Spot) wählen und die Belichtung an den AF koppeln (oder, falls du manuell fokussieren willst/musst: nach dem Fokussieren den Belichtungsspeicherknopf drücken), da die Automatik sonst verrückt spielt, wenn sich das Licht oft ändert. Das FA35 ist schon bei Offenblende n Knaller, also kannst du ruhigen Gewissens Blende 2.0 oder auch 2.4 nehmen. Der größte Qualitätsfaktor ist der ISO-Wert: je niedriger, desto besser. Wichtig ist,dass die Belichtungszeit nicht unter 1/15 kommt, alles drüber kannst du durch Bewegungsunschärfe eigentlich meist vergessen. Kommt natürlich auf die Bewegungsfreude der Band an. Evtl. geht's noch langsamer (bei ruhigen, sitzenden Musikern) und wenn du Pech hast ist schon bei 1/90 Schluss.

Bessere Zeiten und/oder ISO-Werte bekommst du, wenn du mit Absicht eine halbe oder ganze Blende unterbelichtest (und das dann später zuhause korrigierst). Hmm, was noch?Ah ja: rotes Licht ist meistens supermies und lieber ein bisschen an den Einstellungen feilen als 300 Fotos auf gut Glück zu schießen...dann hast du auch noch was vom Konzert

Hier noch die (gekürzten) EXIFs zu den 4 Bildern:

The Gaslight Anthem III

Camera: PENTAX K10D - PENTAX Corporation
Exposure: 0.033 sec. (1/30)
Aperture: f/2.0
Focal Length: 35.0mm (35mm equivalent: 52.0mm)
Flash: Off
Exposure Compensation 0
ISO 1600

Nikola Sarcevic

Camera: PENTAX K10D - PENTAX Corporation
Exposure: 0.05 sec. (1/20)
Aperture: f/2.8
Focal Length: 50.0mm (35mm equivalent: 75.0mm)
Flash: Off
Exposure Compensation 0
ISO 800

Weltraumraketenabschussbasis

Camera: PENTAX K10D - PENTAX Corporation
Exposure: 0.011 sec. (1/90)
Aperture: f/2.0
Focal Length: 35.0mm (35mm equivalent: 52.0mm)
Flash: Off
Exposure Compensation -5/2
ISO 100 (auch das geht ab und zu mal!)

Nikola Sarcevic

Camera: PENTAX K10D - PENTAX Corporation
Exposure: 0.022 sec. (1/45)
Aperture: f/1.7
Focal Length: 50.0mm (35mm equivalent: 75.0mm)
Flash: Off
Exposure Compensation 0
ISO 400

2 und 4 sind mit dem A50/1.7 geschossen, die halbe Blende Unterschied sollte sich aber nicht allzusehr auswirken.

Das ist erstmal alles, was mir einfällt...wenn du noch Fragen hast (oder am Sonntag nach dem Konzert) meld dich einfach. Bin auch mal auf die Bilder gespannt!

Schöne Grüße,
dan.

I just stumbled over a comparison in image quality between Ipernity and Flickr and wondered if anyone else can confirm these huge differences between this doc and this one being an issue of the Iper-uploader.

And if so, is it a well-known problem that the Iper-Team is already working on and/or are there any workarounds or something?

I noticed loss in quality and sometimes jpeg-artifacts when uploading but as I don't have a Flickr-account anymore I can't really compare but I always had the feeling that the pictures could look a bit better :-/

Take care,

dan.

 

A self-tuning guitar...looks awesome and you can even install that system in your own guitar!

 

more (in German) -> www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/spielzeug/0,1518,517579,00.html

Can anybody tell me, if it's possible to create a bootable DVD or USB-stick that starts Windows XP with a few chosen applications and drivers installed?!

I'd like the idea of having a complete setup (basically a very simple Windows XP with Ableton Live, Guitar Rig, ASIO drivers and some templates) ready when using my laptop at shows or during band rehearsels without a second partition on my HD etc...like Ubuntu's live-DVDs for example.

Take care,

dan.

When I was a lot younger (well...say 10-11 years ago or so), me and my friends bought loads of vinyl records (mostly hardcore and punkrock - stuff). We always did mass-orders at our favourite mailorder or checked the local dealer for new records after school. There was a (rather silly) golden rule that was something like: "Never buy a record that some of your friends already owns" and as there was no such thing as mp3 or (affordable) CD-R we nearly had to put every album on cassettes and exchanged them with each-other. A rather time-expensive work but I remember myself having a different access to music back in these days: you really had to deal with an album. Hearing your favourite song was nothing like today's "click and hear it" as you always had to wind the tape forward or backward first. The supreme discipline in recording was doing a mixtape: basically a collection of hits, one song from each band. Sounds simple but keeping in mind that you could not simply skip a track that you did not like, you had to create a climax to keep the mixtape interesting through all its 90 minutes. You had to design the casing, cut and paste a tracklist (in the most verbatim sense), put photos in it etc.There were guys that just were not able to achieve that and listening to their tapes was often no fun at all. Luckily there also were extraordinary good ones and a couple of weeks ago I discovered some old cassettes and realized that my tapedeck was no longer working. We somehow/someday switched over to recording CD-R but that was nothing like before: it was a soulless massproduction, repeatable and nothing special at all. The worst thing (at least to me) is that if you don't like the song-order, you can just change it with a few clicks and reburn the CD-R.

I nowadays sometimes create unicum-like CD-Rs by recording them and tinkering a cover, but as that does not change the "skip-able" tracklist, I tried something different today and here is the first version of my new "Digital Mixtape" - Series: Dear you... I : Borrowed Lights.

Twenty songs, merged together in 2 x 45 minutes. There also seem to be (small) accidental changes of tempo in the files that I personally like because they somehow sound analogue :)

Well...print the cover, put the songs on tape or just listen to them online if you like.

Create your own mixtapes and let's exchange them in the new group "Digital Mixtape-Club".

Ask me for technical questions or just call me a nerd.

 

Greetings,

dan.

Hey there,

can anyone of you recommend an affordable (60-80 euros) Wacom-pad to me? Size (as always) doesn't matter, DIN-A6 would be enough to me as I only need it to do some casual photo-retouche from time to time and do not plan to start drawing :)

respects,

dan.

 

*update*

a couple of days ago my brandnew Wacom Bamboo A6 arrived and after playing around a lot (!) with it, i definitely would recommend it to anyone who is looking for a small, robust and PRECISE widescreen-tablet. the din-a6-size is big enough for my purposes and you can easily program the 4 shortcut-buttons with nearly every function you'll ever need.

As a i already mentioned before, manual focussing with most new digital SLR's viewfinders is (at least to me) a difficult thing to do in low light situations. My Pentax K10D's viewfinder is said to be comparable bright and big but at certain concerts i just wasn't able to get the focus right. Especially when musicians keep moving all the time and/or your (C-) autofocus does not work fast enough because of the little available light shooting often becomes a trial and error.

I have to mention that I almost never use a flash and so I have to use small apertures (=small DOF) so my chances to hit tend to be very small (as you can see on most of my concert-photographs,hehe).

One and half a week ago i discovered an ebay-dealer from China who sells focussing screens that fit into the K10D (and K100D/Ds) and due to the fact that 25 Euro were not that much money i ordered one. It arrived today and after inserting it and doing some testshots I have to say that it seems to work flawlessly!

The dealer offers screens for other cameras as well. I'm not sure if advertising him here is allowed, so just drop me line or just search for "Mattscheibe" and your camera-type at ebay.de and find out by yourself.

Oh, in case you're wondering what I'm talking about:

www.praktica-collector.de/images/BX_focussing_screen.jpg

Furthermore I just created a new group called "Everyday's Beauty".

Here's the description:

"Are you tired of photographs from far places that you might never ever see in your real life?

Well...I'm not, but I'd like to remind you that there is beauty in everyday day life, too.

This group is for extraordinary pictures of ordinary things everyone of us might see or use everyday.

No cats/pets/skys/whatever...please!"

Look here, if you are interested!

dan.

it's been nearly a month since i discovered ipernity and ever since all of you have been very nice to me. now i even won the first little weekly contest of my life and i'd like to thank all of you for your patience and reception!

dan.