Photography Competitions

Recently, I have participated in two major photography contests. One was Lift-Off Levin Photo Competition, and another was NZ Amateur Photographer of the Year. I have submitted the following pictures ;

Picture that I submitted for Lift Off Levin Competition

The one for NZ Amateur Photographer of the Year.

The results for both came out last two weeks. Alhamdulillah, for Lift-Off Levin competition, I won the first place. The prizes are two flight tickets for the Lift Off Levin Festival next year, a certificate and also two prints of my winning picture courtesy of Kodak Express Levin. The total up of these worth NZD400.

Unfortunately, for NZ Amateur Photographer of the Year, I didn't win anything although my image was listed as one of the finalists. Well, I'll try again next time in the other competitions as well :)

Just arrived this morning.

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Steelfort Engineering | Fieldtrip

The purpose of this fieldtrip is to get some rough ideas on opportunities of waste minimisation and also to implement the Life Cycle Assessment method on the operating system of the factory.

Due this Friday, and I'm off for the study weeks.

Final Exam + Bersatu 11' + Tumblr

Hey guys,

Final Exam Sem 1 2011

Final exam for this semester will be around 4 weeks from now. As I'm writing this entry, I'm actually struggling to finish off assignments and lab reports which is actually a good thing since it can be used as the preparation for the exam.

I don't know what/how to comment, but this time I will take two exam on the same day, for two days consecutively. One in the morning, and another one in the afternoon. From the positive side of course I'm going to finish off early this exam season while from the bad side, it's gonna be disastrous if I'm not sufficiently prepared.

Let's pray for the best then.

Bersatu 2011 Games, Otago.

For your information, the Bersatu Games this year will be held from 1st to 5th of July at University of Otago, Dunedin. I'm going this time, but not as the participant. I'm going to make the coverage for our MUMSA team. Hopefully, we're going to repeat our best achievement last two years. And finally, we have our jersey already ;

I'm not the one who designed this jersey. Thanks to them.

Tumblr

I'm not really sure what advantages does Tumblr has, but for sure it might be a great medium for quick updates compared to blogspot. So, I've created mine called "The Circle of Confusion". What does it mean? Well, if you read through the macro photography then you will know what the meaning behind the lines. Huhu.

You can have a visit, and hopefully can follow it HERE.

Cheers.

World In Infrared

I've been searching for IR filter from early this year, but had no luck. Luckily I managed to get one recently, but it's 850nm IR filter which resulting in B&W image.

What I did before taking shoots in IR is to make the WB preset. In the beginning I'm doing the preset with the filter unattached, which I found later as a mistake, resulting in the purple 'ish images. So a day after I made the correction of the step which to attach the filter during the preset. All shots were done during afternoon ; the best time for infrared photography since the main source of the IR light comes from sunlight / heat.

Before taking any shots, I did pre compose the picture first, making it in focus before turn to the manual focusing and attaching the filter. Then, there's the tricky part where I have to try n error with the settings to get the correct exposure. I used slow shutter speed around 10-13 second and ISO 400-800, plus f/8 all time.

Post processing was done with Nikon Capture NX2 (adjusting contrast and exposure compensation) and Adobe Photoshop CS5. Since there is not much change between red and blue channel (in channel mixer in photoshop) during swapping, I have skipped this part and proceed with selective colour menu and made some adjustment, mostly with black slider. Also not to forget, adjustment were being done using level and curve. And lastly, I used Noiseware Pro to reduce the amount of noise due to the high ISO and long exposure used. And these picture are what I got :

Manawatu Riverside in Infrared

Rose Garden, Esplanade in Infrared

Manawatu River in Infrared

The Centennial Lake, Hokowhitu in Infrared

Fitzherbert Bridge in Infrared

I'm still looking forward to find and using R72 filter, which can produce colored IR images. But that one is not easy to find here. Or even better, buy an old Nikon DSLR and modify it into fully IR camera.