Drum Making - Part Two

Some more drum making images, taken at Pa Mok, Thailand. This is a small village which specialises in drum making. It is located about 100 km's North of Bangkok.

Cheers.

FujiFilm X100

The recently announced FujiFilm X100 is, for me, a pretty exciting new camera. I think that in the overall scheme of things, it's biggest innovation is the optical/electronic viewfinder (OVF/EVF). I think this will herald in a new breed of camera designs.

I am not going to try and explain anything technical here, so you can read up on it at :

http://www.fujifilm.com/news/n100920.html

A lot has been said on some of the camera forums, about the downside of the X100 having a fixed focal length lens. It has a 23 mm fixed focal length lens. In 35 mm camera terms, this equates to a focal length of 35 mm. Some state that this is very limiting. Well, depends what you want it for. I'm not quite sure what I want it for, but I do know I want it. Not as a primary camera, but certainly a secondary one.

I still have my FujiFilm GA645 (film) but haven't used it in a while. It takes simply superb images though. The GA645 has a fixed focal length equivalent to 37 mm. I've never found this an impediment. In fact, it forces me to make the shot, not just take it.

The X100 announcement spurred me on to get batteries for the GA645. I still have a lot of film in the fridge which I plan to get through in the next few weeks.

Anyway, I've started practicing shooting some stuff at 35 mm. The image below is from one of my current digitals, which has a much smaller sensor than the X100. Hence it has far greater DOF than the X100 will.

I'd like to say I have my better half's permission to post this here. Well, truth is I didn't ask. Still, I like the pic. I think she would also, at least I hope so.

Cheers.

Floods

The heavens opened up last night and we had torrential rain for about six hours. I wandered down to the main street a few hours after it finished, and this is how it still looked.

Thanon Dechanuchit is the street I live in. Fortunately, we are higher up the hill so no flooding. Many main street shops are flooded though.

Cheers.

FujiFilm F200 - EXR SN Mode

I've been playing around with EXR SN mode on my F200 EXR. When in SN mode the DR is 'capped' to DR 100%. This can mean that some highlight areas may 'blowout'.

One thing I have found is that if it is set to Astia (Soft) film simulation, and if the EV is set to - 0.33, or even better to - 0.67 EV, then the highlights can be controlled well, without totally blocking shadows.

The other benefit is that Chroma noise is better controlled than in other modes, and colour reproduction is better, especially at high ISO's.

I normally do all my editing work with Photoshop CS5. In this case, I decided just to do a simple play with the edit functions in Windows Live Photo Gallery. Basic, but it works.

Anyway, this is a set of images taken today and simply in chronological order. They were shot in SN mode, Astia, ISO 1600 (Auto), and apart from the first two (- 0.33 EV), they were all shot at - 0.67 EV.

Using ISO 1600 (Auto) allowed ISO to range from 200 to 1600. Exif details are intact if you wish to explore further.

Cheers.