Pic I took as a result of a challenge here has just won third prize in the Wex monthly photo challenge - netting me a £25 voucher to spend with them.
Was the carpark pic I took as part of our transport challenge. Also entered the light trails and the plane landing shot I also submitted here, which didn't trouble the judges!
Thank you to Kev particularly, who I think persuaded me to push the processing a bit on the carpark pic which definitely increased its impact.
Thursday, 22 August 2013
Thursday, 8 August 2013
Welsh Wi-fi'ing
Had a couple of days in rainy Wales start of the month, which confounded expectation by being gloriously sunny for the most part.
First time I've gone on holiday without tucking the Nikon into the back of the car, just in case, and relied entirely on the Samsung CSC.
Also first time I've tried sorting, editing and processing more or less on the fly - taking advantage of the Samsung's wi-fi capability.
Workflow:
Take pics (relatively pleased with the results, although still not comfortable enough with how the Samsung behaves to avoid quite a few focus and exposure errors along the way)
During quiet moments/waiting for Alice to poke round shops while I sat in the pub with Sam transferring images off camera and onto phone via wi-fi
Using Snapseed to process photos Uploading photos to G+ at the end of the day (or when I could find a free/BT wi-fi hotspot)
Limitations of the system:
Thumbnails you get to see while choosing which photos to transfer from the camera to the phone are tiny and pretty useless in assessing softness/exposure etc. Suspect I might have overlooked the best of a series of similar shots due to the hit and miss nature of this (using a tablet might be better).
Snapseed is pretty impressive, but obviously lacks some of the higher-end processing features which occasionally a photo needs - that said it's intuitive and easy to use and not gimmicky and reliant on silly filter effects like other photo apps.
Another limitation of Snapseed (and possibly Android) is the clunky photo organisation and resaving once you've processed. You have to load each photo in turn, process and then save - each time manually choosing a source and destination. Would be much better if snapseed included a gallery browser utility, like a mini CS Bridge, where you could select, load, process and save.
Some loss of resolution. Snapseed can only cope with a certain pic dimension, so resizes automatically. I've also not done enough testing to see if it causes any other compromises to quality (I need to be more consistent with my photography on the Samsung for one thing to eliminate the effect my cock-ups are having!)
File sizes. Takes a while to transfer from camera to phone and while it's downsizing slightly, the final files are still pretty big when you resave and take a while to upload, which is why I was only doing this over wi-fi, not burning through my data plan. Also eats up phone storage which is solvable by a) ordering a large capacity microSD card to slot in (which I've just done for next time) b) setting the phone to upload all photos to cloud storage when it's connected over wi-fi (which I already do to Dropbox) so you can delete regularly.
Burns through batteries - both in camera and phone due to wi-fi transfer and heavy processor/screen use by Snapseed. I'd packed spare batteries for both however, so not a huge problem.
Advantages:
Really quick turn around of photos, prevents backlog of sorting and processing which often can be delayed weeks after I've been aware.
Real immediacy while processing - actual scene still recent in memory, so seemed easier to try and recreate the feel of the photos.
Nice sharing - Alice really likes looking at photos on the day, but I've always been a bit precious about her seeing them on the back of the camera before I've got rid of the rubbish! This way could have a look through on the phone that evening.
Lightweight and very portable photo/processing solution - no need for laptop or expensive processing software, pretty impressive considering this is kit you could carry to the top of a remote hill with you! Link to one of the full Welsh albums below, all photos taken, processed and uploaded same day and without going back to the cottage.
One of full Welsh albums here
Take pics (relatively pleased with the results, although still not comfortable enough with how the Samsung behaves to avoid quite a few focus and exposure errors along the way)
During quiet moments/waiting for Alice to poke round shops while I sat in the pub with Sam transferring images off camera and onto phone via wi-fi
Using Snapseed to process photos Uploading photos to G+ at the end of the day (or when I could find a free/BT wi-fi hotspot)
Thumbnails you get to see while choosing which photos to transfer from the camera to the phone are tiny and pretty useless in assessing softness/exposure etc. Suspect I might have overlooked the best of a series of similar shots due to the hit and miss nature of this (using a tablet might be better).
Snapseed is pretty impressive, but obviously lacks some of the higher-end processing features which occasionally a photo needs - that said it's intuitive and easy to use and not gimmicky and reliant on silly filter effects like other photo apps.
Another limitation of Snapseed (and possibly Android) is the clunky photo organisation and resaving once you've processed. You have to load each photo in turn, process and then save - each time manually choosing a source and destination. Would be much better if snapseed included a gallery browser utility, like a mini CS Bridge, where you could select, load, process and save.
Some loss of resolution. Snapseed can only cope with a certain pic dimension, so resizes automatically. I've also not done enough testing to see if it causes any other compromises to quality (I need to be more consistent with my photography on the Samsung for one thing to eliminate the effect my cock-ups are having!)
File sizes. Takes a while to transfer from camera to phone and while it's downsizing slightly, the final files are still pretty big when you resave and take a while to upload, which is why I was only doing this over wi-fi, not burning through my data plan. Also eats up phone storage which is solvable by a) ordering a large capacity microSD card to slot in (which I've just done for next time) b) setting the phone to upload all photos to cloud storage when it's connected over wi-fi (which I already do to Dropbox) so you can delete regularly.
Burns through batteries - both in camera and phone due to wi-fi transfer and heavy processor/screen use by Snapseed. I'd packed spare batteries for both however, so not a huge problem.
Real immediacy while processing - actual scene still recent in memory, so seemed easier to try and recreate the feel of the photos.
Nice sharing - Alice really likes looking at photos on the day, but I've always been a bit precious about her seeing them on the back of the camera before I've got rid of the rubbish! This way could have a look through on the phone that evening.
Lightweight and very portable photo/processing solution - no need for laptop or expensive processing software, pretty impressive considering this is kit you could carry to the top of a remote hill with you! Link to one of the full Welsh albums below, all photos taken, processed and uploaded same day and without going back to the cottage.
One of full Welsh albums here
Monday, 6 May 2013
Nokia 808 Pureview, Part 3: Schoolboy Error!
Just noticed that Blogger has compressed all the images in the previous posts. Shows how long since I used this thing.
If there's any you really want to pixel-peep at, let me know and I'll see what I can do.
If there's any you really want to pixel-peep at, let me know and I'll see what I can do.
Sunday, 5 May 2013
Nokia 808 Pureview, Part 2: Croome Court
Took the phone out with me today in a situation where I'd normally take the DSLR. Wanted to see what it would do as a main camera.
Again, all straight out of the phone. Used the "Creative" mode for most of them: Pureview on, 5MP images, best quality JPEG. Pretty much everything else left automatic.
1. Croome Church. Reasonably well exposed. A little 'soft'. The 808 seems to use sharpening sparely, unlike most mobiles.
5. Decor. Indoor, no flash. Colours are good and true here. Unfortunately, at 1/35 second, a bit of camera shake.
Again, all straight out of the phone. Used the "Creative" mode for most of them: Pureview on, 5MP images, best quality JPEG. Pretty much everything else left automatic.
1. Croome Church. Reasonably well exposed. A little 'soft'. The 808 seems to use sharpening sparely, unlike most mobiles.
2. Statue. This I like.
3. Lake. This is a 34MP image. Well exposed, I think.
4. Tree. Wanted to see how well it did detail. OK, but some parts are out of focus. I could probably do a better job when I get more familiar with the interface.
5. Decor. Indoor, no flash. Colours are good and true here. Unfortunately, at 1/35 second, a bit of camera shake.
6. Flowers. Didn't blur this one.
7. Plaster. Would the flash reach the exposed brickwork? I think it did.
8. Light through window. Tricky to get exposure right. I'd probably fiddle a bit in PS with this one.
9. Sarah. Again a bit soft, blurred.
10. Verity.
11. Imogen
12. Sometimes you need a lens hood!
13. Indoor, no flash again. Worked better this time.
On the basis of this, I'm happy to use the 808 as "the camera I have with me". May not bother taking the DSLR to Spain this year.
So, what do you think?
Nokia 808 Pureview, Part 1: 41MP
Been quiet here for a while, hasn't it?
As you may know, I've been interested in the Nokia 808 Pureview for a while. The last Symbian phone with a ridiculous 41MP sensor. If you're not familiar with the technology read up on it. Suffice it to say, you're not supposed to take 41MP photos - it is there to give you lossless zoom and to reduce noise by oversampling.
Wasn't going to buy one (dead platform and all that) but given Nokia still haven't put this technology on a Windows Phone (and my old phone developed a fault) I decided to get one. Had it about a week.
What's it like? In what follows, all the phots are straight out of the camera (sorry, phone) without editing - unless noted.
Before getting into all the real photos, here's how you make people's jaw drop. Take a full resolution photo then zoom in on a small part. EG:
Pretty poor, really, you say. Then zoom all the way out:
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