jpp daily photo

With the short heat wave these last 4 days, it reminds of the great (in terms of color) of the sunset on a hot day in California. Here's an example photo of the sunset thru the blinds of my room.

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JPP Daily Photo

Here are some of the first photos I've edited from my niece's cotillion last Saturday.

Photo Tips/settings: Except for the Court photos all the photos were taken in jpeg mode, not raw. I wanted to try shooting with jpeg and adjusting the White Balance and other settings on the fly.

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JPP Daily Photo

In anticipation of my niece's debut tomorrow, here's a photo of her and Alex (the dad) practicing on their musical instruments.

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JPP Daily Photo

Yesterday I made a new friend. While hanging out in the front yard early in the evening with my 2 nieces, we discovered a very friendly orange cat. No collar, no markings to indicate the cat had owners' or anything. Despite his rather unknown origins, he was quite the charming cat. As most of my friends know, I'm more of a dog person. However this cat really charmed me! Well, to be fair also both my 2 yr old and 9 yr old nieces. Including his great coloring, charming personality the cat also had very unusual colored eyes. Of course, I had to grab my camera and take a few shots before he left (which he didn't, he ended up staying for an hour). My older niece bequethed the name "Goldie" for obvious reasons on the cat. His coloring reminded me of Garfield, so thats how I refer the cat know. Yes I ended up giving him a nice bowl of milk. Perchance he will be in the frontyard again this evening....

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JPP Daily Photo

Today is supposed to be the weekly-hangout-at-Starbucks day but instead we ended up going to Central Computer in Santa Clara. Yea, Ian and I are a bit geekly (admitedly for myself!). Well when we pulled out of the parking lot, I saw this cool Audi. I've been an Audi owner in the past, so I'm still interested when I see one on the street. Well I had never seen this model. Ian, who is more of a car enthusiast than I'll ever be, told me it was the Audi R8. Supposedly they go for minimum six figures. Well this thing look cool enough to be side-by-side with a Ferrari or Lamborghini [sic]. Since I always carry my handy Nikon, I snapped a few shots after going around the parking lot to get a better angle. This car makes my Audi TT look like a Yugo!

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jpp daily photo

Here's some photos I took out of my car last month. Just trying a different perspective or technique with my photography.

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JPP Daily Photo

Here are a couple more from my recent model photoshoot. a color and B&W version. The color is very stylized, bold glamour look.

Photo settings/tip: Very photoshoped!

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Photography Product News

DPreview just posted a review on the new Nikon 50mm lens Just posted! Nikon 50mm F1.4G lens review. To sum it up, this lens is ideal for those Nikon users who have the D40, D50 and the latest D5000 which does not incorporate a built in auto focus in the body. This lens has the built in focus motor (designated as "AF-S" in Nikon speak) plus it has a very fast aperture of 1.4 which is ideal for low lighting shooting. The only caveat is you do have to pay the extra $$$ for the faster speed. In this case, the lens MSRP $485.00 US. I may upgrade to this lens from my older 50mm F1.8 lens just for the sheer lens quality.

Here's the Pros/Cons from the review:
Conclusion - ProsExtremely even image quality across the frame, even on FX Improved image quality over 50mm F1.4D at large apertures Exceptional image quality when stopped down Essentially no lateral chromatic aberration Near-silent AF-S focus with full-time manual override.

Conclusion - ConsSlightly soft at large apertures Somewhat susceptible to flare Longitudinal (bokeh) chromatic aberration, most visible at large apertures Vignetting at large apertures on full frame (essentially disappears by F2.8) Slower autofocus than the screw-drive AF-Nikkor 50mm F1.4D.

Check out this link DPreview's review for more detailed info and sample photos.

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jpp daily photo

Here are some photos of my niece wearing her formal dress for her cotillion (also called a debut).

Photo tips/settings: I took advantage of the late afternoon light and the big window as my main light in my sister's living room. Although the photos came out pretty much done with no photo corrections, I did use some actions to spice them up.

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JPP Daily Photo

So here's the photos I took of the completed DVD & cover of Emil & Barbara's 50th Wedding Anniversary DVD. The best part was hanging out at Starbucks with Ian. Nothing like a cold Izzy, taking photos and hanging out with a friend on a Wednesday afternoon. The weather was absolutely gorgeous and the temperate very cool. That's the life...!

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JPP Daily Photo

Here's some photos I took recently of a model i met thru ModelMayhem. For those who don't know, photographers and models usually setup a mutual photoshoot called "TFP" (acronym for Time for Prints) in lieu of payment for either party. This is a good way for the model to get nice portfolio photos as well as the photographer getting practice time with a model.

Photo settings/tip: These photos were strait out of the camera in RAW mode with converting from Lightroom 2.0 to jpeg.

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Cool Product for your Digital Camera or video

I'm always looking for inexpensive, portable lighting source for my DSLR. I found this product advertised on my ProPhoto magazine.

The Litepanels LPMICRO Micro LED Lite is a compact addition to the Litepanels LED family of lighting. This light will work for "on-camera" applications with small cameras offering a small size and an adjustable head.

The customer reviews on B&H aren't pretty good. The price is reasonable. I may purchase this to use as a daytime fill light. Sometimes my Nikon speedlight SB600 or S800 are too bright for fill lights still causing harsh shadows.

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JPP Daily Photo

im still pretty tired from yesterday's Yevnah graduation ceremony. Between taking the photos, editing them and uploading them today I need a break! Since I didn't get a chance to take any new fun photos, I'm uploading the other 2 senior photo collages for the daily photos.

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JPP Daily Photo

I was hanging out with my friend, Ian, whom I haven't seen in months. We were at the Los Gatos coffee place off the main street. Being the photographers that we are, we had our cameras with us. Here's some of the photos I took of the people and place.

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JPP Daily Photo

Ok. So I'm posting a lot of senior photos. Well, hello! I'm currently running a special promotion on my website and facebook. JK. So yea, you might be tired of all these senior photos but here's a few more. Basically I put together photos of the same person in a collage. I'd love to get some feedback on these photos.

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JPP Daily Photo

Here's a few photos of my nephew playing my favorite game ("Counter-strike: Source) on my computer. I took it so he can post these images on his facebook page. =)

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Helpful Tip

So I'm created a custom DVD label for one of my customer's photo DVD. To complete the ensemble, I want to print out a nice cover for the DVD holder. I found this great link that has a video on how to create a professional looking cover in photoshop. Just want to share it with all my photographer friends who may find themselves in the same situation in the near future.

http://www.bmyers.com/public/1299.cfm

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JPP Daily Photo

While driving thru Los Altos last week to visit some friends, there was your typically beautiful California sunset. Being the avid photographer and great driver that I am, I quickly snappeda few shots thru the front window of my Element. My only complaint is the constant power lines whereever you go in suburbia. You really cant take natural landscape shots without having to hike or go somewhere closer to nature.

Photo Settings/Tip: nothing special. Just usual raw conversion and minor PS4 tweaks to make it better.

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Two cool posts on 2 of Photographer Blogs I follow!

David Saffir's got a great post on how Quick Selective Sharpening Technique In Photoshop CS3/4
I'm gonna try the technique out on some of photos from this week.

http://davidsaffir.wordpress.com/

Kenna's got some great lightning shots on her blog. Check it out. I love lightning storms for the sheer quality of light (and lightning, of course) for photographers. However San Jose is not known for its stormy weather so I'm gonna have to just admire the ones I see on other photographers' photos. sigh.

http://beholden-to-nature.blogspot.com/

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JPP Daily Photo

While teaching my cousin to drive manual (or stick shift) in my Audi TT, we drove by this mosque near my neighborhood. I quickly snapped a few shots from the passenger window.

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JPP Daily Photo

As most my friends know, I'm a bit of a tree hugger and am definitely green. With that philosophy, I actively look to purchase items (however mundane) that are environmentally friendly. Or in the case of energy devices, green. When I was at REI last week, I decided to get an LED light for my biking. While going thru the selections of LEDs, I found one that was solar powered (see image). It was approximately 2-3x the cost of the battery operated LEDs but it was GREEN. The really cool thing is that 6 hours of solar charging is enough to power it for 12 hours. So I don't have to worry about replacing the batteries ever again. Second thought, I was talking with my mom about this topic. I was wondering if they can make an LED light that can be powered up by solar panels, why can't they make common household lights the same? Can you imagine not having to pay for everyday lights? What about your computer? tv? microwave? Hopefully the genius of the appliance industry are already one step ahead of my supposition. I mean, its the future if want a cheap, alternative power supply!

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p.s. All my good friends know im a flashlight geek. Ever since LEDs became mainstream, I literally have about a dozen different LED lights of various sizes. lol.

Random thoughts

Networking, networking, networking. When your your own sales/marketing/support/IT for your company, everything literally falls on shoulder. But it doesnt hurt to solicit and network to bring potential new clients. ive got a couple things going on which may get me some steady photo gigs. crossing my fingers and saying a prayer to the Good Lord for a little help...!

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JPP Daily Photo

I took these photos of one of niece's cotillion court members. Michelle, who is photogenic, and very pretty to boot!, was very fun to work with.

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JPP Daily Photo

Apologies for no updates yesterday as I had one shoot in the afternoon and then hanging out at a sushi bar for Ashley's Bday. I'm posting some of the photos from the bar that I finished. Had a great time. Food was good and the company awesome!

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JPP Daily Photo

Some cool group shots from the last day of senior photos of my niece's cotillion group. Ive been wanting to try this angle for longest time. Also added my hi-pass (bold) finish to both images. Actually im include the before and after.

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