About portraiture

When making a portrait of someone, you see yourself in that portrait, like looking into a mirror. I read something like that from an interview on American SuburbX (of Richard Avedon, maybe).

It's trust or doubt in the subject's eyes.

It's a cold or warm feeling toward the photographer.

It's not only the subject but your own interpretation of him/her. 

I've just created a blog, Faces @ http://you-me-n-myself.tumblr.com/. Not really a "portfolio", just a place I come to see the face of someone again, or just to see myself..

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Family portraits. Again.

I planned to write a post on some "existential questions" about photographs, but then decide not to, as you guys are probably bored with that topic already. Anyway, I saw the scenes of people laughing when looking back at their family photo album in the movie. It got me thinking - we don't do that often anymore, do we? Maybe because we have so many photos these days that make it hard to select, to print and keep in an album. Maybe a life of a photograph ends when it is posted on Facebook and will be forgotten completely in a year, or just a week.

These photos of my family were taken in only 30', just before I was leaving to the airport, back to Singapore. Strangely enough, it is the only time where I can have everyone gathered and a good lighting in the morning to shoot with.   

And they make me smile, happily.

Film: Kodak Portra NC 400 (discontinued)

Camera: Ricoh Diacord G 

Lens: 80mm f3.5

My sister

My sister too

My aunt

My mom

Mom & Dad

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Family portraits

I planned to make some portraits of my parents during a home visit last week. I thought it would be on film, medium-format, and by an old TLR camera to hopefully create an old look.

Choosing a time when they are most relaxed, I let my mom and dad sit by the window. One big and soft light source. And the curtains were used to control the light on the face and on the background. Pretty simple setting, I guess.

The difficult part comes in the communication. It's not a procedure of "1...2...3... smile" - to create something memorable. It takes time and practice to learn how to communicate, and I'm still very much in the learning phase. Though the photos are much closer to what I want to tell about my mom and dad, I still think there is rooms for improvement... Maybe even closer. Maybe better communication. Maybe next time.

Film: Kodak Ektacolor Pro 160

Camera: Ricoh Diacord G 

Lens: 80mm f3.5

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Some thoughts on a Saturday morning

(5DII Monochrome 1600, Zuiko 35mm f2.8, in Street Photography group)

I've been busy with other stuffs since early of this year. Less and less time with photography, especially with the post-processing of our pictures. Many shots, even in 2009, are still in the archived folders. That's the main reason why I decide to shoot in film recently (not so convincing right? :D). It has been good so far, but quite costly due to cost of buying and developing film.

Last week I tried to set the 5D Mark II to Monochrome (BnW) mode, push a contrast level from 5 to 7, and just shoot with it. It is quite surprising that the BW tonality I got from the OM Zuiko lens and recently the Sigma 50mm f1.4, is quite pleasing. Sometime it is just too clean in ISO 400 for a BnW look (named it 5DII Monochrome 400 if you don't mind), I prefer the 5DII Monochrome 1600 or even 6400.

This morning I do a short test with the Sigma. Shoot some portraits of Phuong for 15'. Blog for 20'. Here I'm done and gonna work on "other stuffs" again...

One more thing: since we move our Wedding thingy to a more official blog (http://a2nh-wedding.blogspot.com), I can now write freely anything related to photography here, yay :D

These two are my absolutely favorites...

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Portrait sessions at Singapore Botanic Garden

We decided to go to Botanic Garden for some portrait photos, as well as to test the Kodak Portra 400VC film on our camera. Our first session was in the late afternoon last Saturday. The sky was very cloudy, almost like it was gonna rain soon.

Somehow this shot becomes my fav...

The scene was getting dark pretty quick. We could only finish half of the roll and decided to go back. Here is the last shot of the day by Admiré. It is not a portrait as I'm too shy to be her model.

Our second session to finish the roll was on a beautiful, sunny and breezy Sunday morning. Couldn't ask for more as we really enjoyed it!

For me, the colors of the Kodak Portra are fine, vivid as its name (VC) suggests, but I'm more impressed by its sharpness. And it is pretty contrasty. If you haven't tried one, maybe you should ;)

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Ps: due to some other commitments, I will be away from this blog for a while. The blog won't be inactive though, if Admiré has something to post. Hope that I could get back here soon, when things are done :)...

Grayscale

One of the reasons I go back to film photography is to make BnW pictures on film, for real :)

I'm much inspired by those black and white (BnW) pictures from the past. There are some "mysterious" qualities in the photos: the tonality, the dynamic range and the film grain that are so pleasing to see. Reproducing such quality in digital photos has been a quest that I'm trying and has not yet "felt" it...

My first roll of BnW film, a Kodak T-Max 400, was mainly dedicated for some portraits of Phuong (Admiré). We spent one hour in the "studio" in our house, with a window light and one reflector. After sending the film to Fotohub lab for developing, I was really nervous about the outcome. Her birthday is coming and I don't want to disappoint her with all bad pictures... So when the lab called and told me that the photos were ready, my heart went fast and I ran immediately there.

Here are the results.

Somehow this one in the roll becomes one of my favorites, together with the first photo. Taken on a night we were going out. Not technically good at all, but...

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Ps: I think T-Max 400 is quite contrasty. Noted.

Self-dialogue

About a month ago...

A: What do you want do today?
A: Well, I'm thinking of a composite photo of me talking to myself


A: Where should we start?
A: Hmm... the corner with the bed & the TV seem to create a nice composition. Plus you have the curtain and the lamp.


A: And what should we pose?
A: Just like this, you talk and I listen!


A: ... and the light?
A: There is the lamp there and I like its yellow, warm color. So we put one light in that direction with full CTO. Then another light, with full green gel, will be put behind the curtain as it's getting dark now...


A: ok, shall we start?
A: yup, what are you waiting for? Go sit over there :D
...

Not so related, but this is the last photo of my self-portrait series :)

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(Photo taken using Olympus E620, Zuiko 12-60mm SWD)

The eyes

There is a saying that the eye is the window to one's soul. It is so true in portrait photography. When you look at a photo, if everything is perfect but the eyes are blurred or don't seem right, you may reject it eventually.

These are some of my photos with only the eyes as a main focus. Even the face is absent, you may still feel a connection with the person behind through his/her eyes.

Portraits of tourists drawn by artists in Montmartre, Paris

An advertisement of Acuvue TruEye in Paris metro station

Of course, all credits belong to the artists/photographer who had drawn/captured them successfully.

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(Photo taken using Olympus E620, Zuiko 12-60mm SWD & OM 50mm f1.8)

Hide and Seek

Continue from my previous work on some "dark" emotions

• In a darkened room
• Hide away

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(Photo taken using Olympus E620, Zuiko 12-60mm SWD)

Hide away

I'm sorry if you see me absent, 'cause I'm hiding away...

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(Photo taken using Olympus E620, Zuiko 12-60mm SWD)

In a darkened room

(Olympus E520, Zuiko 12-60mm. Self-timer)

The lighting is quite obvious: one FL50R on 60x60 (cm) softbox on cam-left, 1/16 power @ 12mm zoom. FL36R on cam-lelf, below, 1/32 power @ 42mm. Only directions of light matter here, to control the position of the shadow & the gradient in the background. Took me less than one hour of shooting.

The blue is created by setting the camera's color balance to 2300K. Quick post-processing since the RAW is pretty much what I want. By the way, this looks much better in AdobeRGB on my monitor. First time I see the colors change drastically when converting from AdobeRGB to sRGB profile for Web publishing. But no choice :(

Forgot to say, please take your time to view this photo in large (1600x600). Recommended :)!

Listen

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Having fun

The final photo is a lot different from my initial idea which was a scary/horror scene. Simply because I can't hide under the table as expected. So I switch to this fun idea (hah, my wife is not at home, coincidentally).

(Olympus E520, Zuiko 12-60mm. Self-timer)

The lighting is pretty simple. One light (FL-36R) behind the monitor, CTB, at full power. One light (FL-50R) on camera-left, snoot tight, CTO, at 1/8 power.

It took me one and a half hour (11pm to 0h30) for shooting. Couple of hours to process, mainly for cloning "unwanted items". Big lesson: you'd better get it right in-camera, especially the props, or wasting your time fixing it later.

Sometimes, it's just for fun & that's enough!

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A photograph

Model: Admiré @ Lourve Museum, Paris
Olympus E520, Zuiko 12-60mm

Just post here 'cause it's my fav :)

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Goodbye 2009

This is probably our last photo shoot of this year. We read this article on DIY photography on how to create your own bokeh and have always wanted to test it out. With Christmas coming, where has more beautiful lights than Singapore's Orchard road? You may say.

However, we went to Orchard earlier when the Christmas decoration had just been completed. The place was packed with people. There were big big trees on both sides of the road which blocked part of the decoration (not that I'm not a fan of trees because I am, just not in this case, they do not look good in pictures :D).
Luckily enough, we went to Dhoby Gaught 2 weeks ago and eureka, we found the perfect location with beautiful lights and clear view of the whole street for our shoot.

Before the shoot, hubby and I spent 2 nights drawing and cutting to create some bokeh shapes. It almost felt like primary school again. Eventually, we managed to make a Christmas tree shape, a heart shape, and a snowflake shape.

Our first test with the Christmas tree didn't look so good because the lights were too big and clustered. You can still see some of Christmas trees came out, can't you?

We figured the snowflake worked much much better with these lights.

The car light and the two people walking made the picture more dynamic

We need to make better snowflake next time though, it looks more like star to me now.

The heart shape was not used in the main street though. We found some beautiful lights in front of Cathay Cineplex (near Rendez vous Hotel). They were at the same, perfect size and colorful. It turned out to be soooo romantic.

There you go, this is our Christmas postcard to all of you. Thank you for visiting and leaving us encouraging comments through out this wonderful year. Wish you a Merry Christmas and the Best Year ahead ever!!!

(Canon 40D, Canon 85mm f1.8)

Admiré