Finally had my camera clicking again. After all the gigs these past few weeks its good to be returning back to my favorite disicpline – portraitures. The session was held last Sunday and the day began with brunch (or more like late brunch) at Vic’s place. With our tummy’s filled, we headed to the only place I could think for a portraiture session that’s nearby AND that I would know, no one would be bothering us – Lake Garden. While I don’t remember much about Lake Garden as a kid but I did grew up going to Lake Club for swimming. I’m no longer a member there but I do head there some time for lunch with colleagues – p/s: they have delicious banana fritters!
So I picked a spot which would turn out to be the only spot for the day which was in a shade, surrounded by big trees, blanketed my dried leaves and rather comfy I would say. As I attempt to set up my umbrella set, I realized that the umbrella adapter which I had borrowed from Mado was too small for the umbrella set that I had. Oh well, it was natural light all the way then.
My first few shots were in color. *Nope*… just didn’t had the mood for it. Switched to monochrome…ah…much much better. A reader questioned, isn’t it better to first shoot in color and then only convert it to B&W later? Yep, that’s definitely right. But the only reason I was shooting monochrome right from the camera was due to sheer laziness of editing it later on. lol. By right, I should be shooting in Raw format and then converting it during post-processing. Firstly, I barely shoot on Raw ever since I switched to the D300 (the files are huge compared to the D70s I had before) and secondly I find it easier to pick my photos in the format of its end result – i.e. I know I wanted the photos to be B&W and hence photo selections were much easier for me if the photos are in B&W rather than in color. Am I making any sense here? I hope so.
Very nice ! I love the mood in these photos
And the leaf textures feel very crisp.
So these weren’t post-processed at all ? Hebat la the onboard conversion.
Hafiz. The pictures are post-processed; they’re just not converted from full-color.
Post processing for my B&W photos involve adjusting the exposure, black levels, dodging, burning and sharpening.
Ahh, that explains the quality. Was wondering how involved are you in your subjects’ pose ? Both body and expression wise ?
Also im just now following you on twitter. Still new to it.
ahhh thanks for answering my question
i get you i get you!
its the laziness factor =) haha dont worry i have it too
and i seem to be following ur example of getting monochrome straight off the camera, less hassle!
but it kinda lacks the contrast i want, any postprocessing tips?
btw this set is awesome, especially like the pic with the cloth straight across the photo, something special