Fishy Valentine's Day Dinner

Happy Valentine's Day

I'm not a huge fan of sushi, but I am a huge fan of the sushi bar found at my local Harris Teeter grocery store. You can find all of your traditional sushi favorites freshly made daily. In addition to these yummy favorites, Eddie, manager of the sushi bar, creates his own custom sushi delights. He specifically specializes in creating sushi that is decorated with fresh fruit on top. Often times I order platters of sushi for special events and gathering. Eddie's sushi platters are always a BIG HIT!

Around this time last year, I ordered a platter of sushi which included sushi that was topped off with strawberries, mango, and bananas for my church's Middle School Super Bowl party. Eavesdropping on various conversations, I heard a number of compliments on how the fruit sushi was surprisingly really good. It made me feel great knowing that so many people enjoyed the same sushi I get to enjoy so often.

A few weeks later, stopping by the Harris Teeter sushi bar during my lunch break, I noticed a small platter of sushi arranged in a heart shaped box. It was a Valentine's Day sushi box! What will they think of next! Haha. I chatted with Eddie for a bit mentioning to him how I thought his idea for a Valentine's Day sushi box was pretty cool. Eddie is such a nice, polite, and very respectful man. He is most certainly a hard worker, he and prides himself on the quality of his work. Not only does he go out of his way to make delicious sushi, but he takes it an extra step by creating sushi that is very presentable and looks great. I didn't pick up one of the V-Day sushi boxes because the boxes were made for two, and I didn't have anyone to share with. Oh well. :/

Fast forward a year.  Since I moved to a location that is further away for this Harris Teeter, I haven't been able to eat sushi from Eddie's sushi bar as often.  However, this Valentine's Day I was able to pick up one the the delightful heart shaped sushi boxes. As you can see, this sushi box came with several tuna rolls, some mango rolls, and some strawberry rolls.  The heart in the middle is made of rice which is topped off with avocado.

A special guest dropped by, and I took some photos of the lovely sushi arrangement. My special friend and I had a very tasty dinner! lol

Super Heroes on a Small Planet

Its now after the holiday rush of 2012, and I realized I haven't taken the time to take pictures! Its now a new year, and I'm happy to throw up a new blog post. My first for post for 2013. Yay!

I'm always on the look out for strange and interesting photo projects.  As I was checking out different tutorials on how to take better group photos, I came across a bizarre looking group photo where the people were all lined up side by side around a small circle-looking planet.  From there I  Googled small planet photo effect.  It turns out that this effect is pretty simple to create.

If your curious, here's a list of each of the characters.

• Silver Surfer
• Hulk
•  Iron Man
• Dr. Doom
• Iron Man
• Thor
• Iron Fist
• Reptil
• Spider-Man
• Frost Gaint

Sigma 17-50mm f/2.8

Stop Motion Surprise

For a while now, I've been wanting to create a stop motion animation. Making a video for the fun of it with no purpose other than just to make a video is fine. However, many times an inspiration or motivation is needed to jump start creativity.

I've been blessed with two good friends who celebrated their two year wedding anniversary. As a demonstration of my gratitude toward them, I decided to put together a short stop motion animation for their enjoyment. A lot of my inspiration and learning came from a super cool pair of YouTubers called The Fu. You can checkout them out at their channel. --> The Fu <--

One of the biggest challenges I faced was picking the right song. Knowing both friends are heavily music minded people, I really took my time searching. After watching tons and tons of stop motion videos on YouTube, I decided to go with a folkish sounding song. By shear randomness, a Honda advertisement popped up during one of the videos I watched. Long story short, the ad was promoting a group called Monster Calling Home. Checkout the story behind the group here: Surprising Monsters Calling Home Their song, Fight to Keep, caught my attention. Once I heard this song and saw the music video and story behind it, I knew I had to use it. So after a couple of days searching for the right song, I purchased Fight to Keep. Get your own copy here. -->Fight to Keep <--

The more planning you put into a stop motion animation, the easier its going to be. Part of my planning phase included:

• breaking the song lyrics into different segments
• calculating how many frames are in each segment
• story boarding how each scene will look for each segment

After all the planning was done, I procrastinated a few weeks, but finally made myself get the 125+ still images I needed to complete the project. To take the pictures I used an affordable point and shoot camera because I wanted to show that a fancy DSLR camera isn't needed to make a nice looking video. Once I uploaded all the shots onto my computer, editing everything together onto the timeline in Final Cut was simple. I got most of it all done just before I had to go to my churches weekly prayer meeting.

All in all, it was definitely a fun project to do, and I really enjoyed showing the final result to my dear friends. I was actually very nervous while I was showing the video. Its been a long time since I've been nervous like that. Its always nerve wrecking not knowing how your art will be accepted. SDG



PowerShot ELPH 110 HS, Pink

Macro Toys

This Christmas I spent the weekend at my Mom's place in Richmond, VA with my sister and her family.  I had a blast from that past when my six year old nephew got a bag full of assorted toys from his dad's cousin.  To my surprise, the bag of toys included four miniature transformers that I had when I was a boy.  My family didn't have a lot of money growing up, so my parents rarely bought me any toys.  These four transformers came in a pack of four that only cost ten dollars if I remember correctly.  When other kids had large transforming Optimus Prime action figures that cost as much as fifty dollars, all I had were these four miniature transformers.

Plus, I just got a macro filter for my nifty-fifty lens.  So seeing these special little toys gave me a chance to try out my new macro filter.  It's a 10x macro filter that screws right onto the front of my 50mm f/1.8.  I love how sharp the images are when the lens is stopped down to f/18 or f/22.  With the small apertures, I also got a chance to play around with my flash too.

Flash @ 90 degrees

Flash @ 45 degrees

50mm f/1.8 w/10x macro filter

Just Another Slow Rainy Day

It was just another rainy day.  My manager told me to take the day off, and I gladly accepted because I really didn't feel like waiting in the rain for the bus.  So checkout some slow motion video that I shot!  My first attempt.

Cinematography to Cinemagraph

My first attempt at Cinemagraph

Tamron 28-75 f/2.8

High Speed Photography!

     A few months ago, I got a Canon 320EX speedlite.  I finally got a chance to really test it out.  When I first started out in photography, I told myself and others I'd never use artificial lights like flashes or studio strobes.  Looking back now, I can tell you that I just didn't understand enough about lighting and how it effects photography.  Great pictures have a lot to do with how great the shots lit.

     Since the passed few days have been in the 100s!  I decided to cool things down with some cool pictures of a cool drink.  I'm using my Canon 60D, a 50mm f/1.8, and a 320EX speedlite flash.  My camera was set on manual mode with the shutter speed at 1/250.  There's a white plastic-like table cloth as the backdrop, and I turned off all the lights in the room.  It's a pretty simple setup.

     First things first, I had to find a glass to use.  Opening up my sister's cabinets, I looked for the most interesting glass I could find.  Then I ran across this sexy glass.   As you can see, I used some plumb juice because I though it'd look like wine.  Turns out that the plumb juice was so dark and opaque, it didn't produce the effect I was looking for.  Plus it smelled nasty to me.  :(  Testing out a bottle that was laying around, I figured that I'd need a clear liquid.  And guess what fit the bill?  Hawaiian Punch!  Hawaiian Punch is just perfect for quenching your thirst, but it's perfect for late night photography experiments too. lol

Over Exposed

Better Exposed

     In the left picture, the glass is over exposed even though the flash was set at 1/64. To solve this problem, I simply moved the glass about 6" away from the light source. Abracadabra! A much nicer picture.  Now that the shot is looking good, time to push the flash to see what high speed shots I could get.

     If you've tired to drop a piece of ice into a narrow wine glass, then you probably know how frustrated I was trying to get a stupid piece of ice into this glass.  Trying to get the ice into the glass was one thing, but trying to snap a shot of it at the right time was doubly hard.  Really, I was the stupid one.  Now that I think about it, I should have used a glass with a wider opening.  Duh!

Canon 50mm f/1.8

Up Close and Personal with the Animals

I recently purchased my first Canon L series lens, the 70-200mm f/4. The Canon 70-200mm telephoto lenses are known for their outstanding sharpness, and it wasn't until I used one did I realize how sharp these lenses are. Canon's 50mm f/1.8 quickly became my favorite lens for its sharpness and price. However, this 70-200mm almost became my new favorite lens. If I had gotten the 2.8 constant aperture version, I would be virtually living a dream. Then again, I'd have to be dreaming if I was able to purchase the heavily prices 2.8 version.

Canon 70-200mm f/4

Spring is here, and I need to shape UP!

     Since the weather has been incredibly nice recently, one of the high school guys in my church youth group asked me to go play tennis with him after church last Sunday.  I always say how I can play any sport pretty good, but I can't play any sport really good.  So, after probably ten years, I'm stepping back on the tennis court to once again hit balls over the fence.
     Thanks to a good friend for giving me one of his tennis rackets.  Kinda jumping on the band wagon, I wanted to get into tennis because so many of the other people at my church play it.

     I met up with two of the high school guys at the tennis courts just behind our church after we ate lunch.  We were joined by another college student shortly after to start up some doubles.  It didn't take me by surprise at the skill level they were displaying. 

However, what did surprise me was how well I played.  Granted one out of every two tennis balls I hit flew outside the court, but on the hits that were good, I hit the ball with persion and accuratey.  Even though I didn't know where to hit it most of the time.  All and all, it was a great time with the guys, and a great time of getting out and running around.
     So thank you guys for making me feel good feeling sore for the rest of the week!

Canon 55-250mm f/4-5.6

To Photograph, or Not to Photograph

A few weeks ago, I was asked to photograph a funeral service for an elderly man who was part of my church.  In the past, I've taken pictures at emotionally charged sporting events, weddings, and various other social events, but never a funeral.  This won't be my first funeral service I've been to, so I kinda had an idea of what to expect in terms of how people and the family would be feeling.  In fact, I've taken part in my own father's funeral service which was a glorious example of how a truly Godly man can positively impact so many lives.  Going into this funeral, I had no idea what type of obstacles I'd be facing.

February 12, 2011

In general, I love to take pictures that capture people's emotions and have the picture convey the subject's feelings.  So I love getting shots of people smiling, being surprised, and making goofy faces.  On the flip side, a picture of someone sad or crying can be powerful too.  As I was looking for great shots of the family, I found myself torn.  Torn because I was seeing and feeling the pain the family was going through through the camera lens, especially the widow.  I reached a point where I had to physical step out of the building because I felt wrong freezing the moments someone is so deeply sadden.  Is it right to preserve these moments of intense pain and anguish, when someone is so vulnerable?


Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8

First Shot

Here's my first attempt at taking portraits.  My good friend, and co-worker, allowed me to shoot a couple of portraits of him.  Here's a few samples of how they turned out.  Special thanks to the Ang family for allowing me to use their guest room as a ghetto studio.

Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8

A Comic View

So I've been wanting to do more photo effects with the photos I take. Check out some to of the stuff I was able whip up.

Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8

Bokehlicious

As I was scrolling through my news feeds on Facebook, I came across a comment B&H made on one of their fan's picture that fan had posted up. At first I couldn't tell why it was special, but after examining the links they posted I realized what was different with that picture. Check it out DIY link here: DIY - Create Your Own Bokeh

Here's my Bokeh filter that I made with some paper my sister had laying around.

Canon 50mm f1.8

Jib Done & Tested

Finally I got around to finishing the DIY jib I started last month.  The only part of the jib I left unfinished was the counter weight which is a crucial part of any jib.  Also, I went ahead and added a swivel wheel on the end of the arm.

counter weight

swivel wheel

Check out the test video I shot.

Worship

The most powerful times of worship for me don't take place at a church, at a church meeting, or even with a live praise team.  The most powerful times of worship for me have been by myself, in my car, and with the radio tuned into the local Christian radio station.  (WGTS 91.9 Family Friendly)

Canon 50mm f1.8