Cherry Blossoms...

One of the main thing that was on my mind while I was planning for my Korea trip was to see and click the beautiful cherry blossom flowers that are main characteristic of the Korean and Japanese islands... So here I am presenting some of the photos of them that I managed during that trip.

My first stop in Korea was Seoul and there I could not see any cheery blossoms at all.... And for which I was told that its little early for them to blossom and I should see some by next week.

So It was only when I reached Jinju , where my sister was staying,  that I could see some of it. And my first impression on seeing them was they are quite a smudgy flowers and as you can see in these photos , most of the petals are not sharp. Initially I thought it was my technique that was causing it but later on I checked some professional shots of it and they too looked the same.

The day I saw them , it was quite cloudy and was raining too in between , so I could not get bright and vibrant pictures but now when I see them then I find that the overcast  has added a nice white background to the close ups of the flowers.

Then at Jinju Castle we found the below trees which were laden with Cherry blossoms and as soon as the sun was out ,they turned pinkish.And everyone was so busy getting their pictures clicked underneath them.

Jinju Castle

 

Jineyang Lake, Jinju

The above pic was taken at Jineyang lake at Jinju and and this was one place where we found scores of Cherry blossom trees. As you can see in the below pic all the paths in and around the lake had these trees laden with flowers on both sides and it felt so beautiful to walk amids them.

Lastly I went to Busan, which owing to its proximity to Japan (It was during the Japanese rule over Korea that Japan introduced these trees to Korea which have originally being native to Japan only) was supposed to have more Cherry Blossom tree.  And although it did not disappoint but still I found the ones in Jinju more prominent.

Deoksugung Palace , Seoul

Guard Changing ceremony at Deoksugung Palace , Seoul.

Deoksugung Palace gate ...

Marching Guards ...

Once these guards take their place, visitors are allowed to go near and get their pictures clicked with the guards..

Deoksugung Palace

Happiest Day of my life...

Finally the day came for which I was eagerly waiting since so long, the happiest moment of my life. I bought my first DSLR yesterday :)

I wanted to share with you all on the day I ordered my Nikon D7000 but the first order got cancelled and I thought I should not jinx it :)

I can't tell you guys how much happy I am . Not only this is my first DSLR, its something for which I was waiting since last many years and something which will give the much needed purpose to my life.

Before I write further , I will like to thank my sister and parents for letting me buy such an expensive equipment. Especially my sister, if my parent brought me to this world, you have given me my life Didibhai. 

Upgrading from a Point & Shoot to a DSLR in itself should be a major improvement and that being D7000 itself takes me to a different world. (Its a mid level DSLR costing round 62K with lens)

I ordered it on Wednesday and was supposed to pick it by Saturday but could not stop myself and went there Thursday itself :) 

Just sharing some initial thoughts. I am yet to take it out in daylight as I picked it at around 7:30 in the evening yesterday . But I already took 300 shots while travelling back from store to my home(around one n half hour trip).

So since I have only shot at night and that too from a moving car with my less than novice technique, I din't have much keepers out of those 300. 

I bought it with 18-55 kit lens as any other lens was out of my budget and anyways the reviews of this kit lens were quite good. 

1. The first shot that I took after the shopkeeper handed me the cam was the below potrait of my dad and now when I checked on my laptop ,its something I could never take with my P&S, a potrait with just the person and rest all blurred.  (The below photo is the cropped version of that.)

2. After that I shot while travelling and that too in low light condition. Since I have never used a cam that could give me any kind of control on Aperture or Shutter , I shot first in Auto mode, which popped out the flash the moment I tried to click. 

Don't take it as a negative comment but I found it hunting a lot with me missing some shots. Actually the P&S would have clicked those irrespective of whether it could lock focus properly or not. I am not comparing the quality here, I am just saying that since it has way more IQ then a P&S, it is more choosy :). 

P&S would have clicked it irrespective of whether anything is in focus or anything is sharp or not. But the few keepers I had itself gave me the idea that if I had played around with the camera or had been stationary, it would have locked many more shots in near perfect way. 

3. Then I switched to Aperture mode and owing to lack of knowledge when I reduced the aperture to say till f22 it increased the shutter speed by quite a few seconds and owing to my constant motion and novice techniques all of them had blurred (although I could still see some interesting light patterns due to its long exposure :)) 

4. So next I moved to Shutter priority, and again due to my stupidity , I clicked it at fastest possible speed initially and as expected they all were blacked out. Then I reduced the speed and I clicked a series of photos where I can see the scene illuminating as I slowed the shutter. 

5. The Viewfinder is AWESOME. Man I din't even checked the live view till I reviewd my shutter priority mode photos and found them blacked out. The Viewfinder is something to die for and I don't think I am going to use live view ever when I have such an amazing view finder. 

6. The Camera is heavy but I found it quite sturdy and grip was amazing. 

7. Coming from a Canon P&S and with Canon being quite user friendly as far as button layouts is concerned, I found the buttons quite easy to use. And there are so many buttons at the back that I was just wondering if I am ever going to use them :-D 

8. Then I shot in without flash mode and man I was hugely impressed. The shots have come too good at times without flash in low light. By good I don't mean keepers but in that low light I never expected it to lock and capture so well and once my technique improves I think there will be many keepers. 

 

Below is my first attempt at Bokeh (about which I will definitely write a post once I get more hang of it)

If I have to summarize in one line then it will definitely be I'm Loving It :)

Since my Di is not here so the only muses that I have at present are my helpless Mom and Dad , who are going to be most frequent subject of my photography.

 

I just loved the above pic that I took of my Dad.


So guys be ready to start this new journey with me :)

Phool - III

Some more flower shots from my society garden....

Cockscumb Crested

Marigold I

Marigold Close up

Marigold II

Loved this shot...

The gardener has planted some sunflowers and they have now blossomed as spring is approaching....

Sunflower II

Sun Flower I

Another unknown flower that is growing in small pots in the garden...

And finally I got the name of this flower which I shared in my last post on flower which I liked a lot... This is Poppy and right now its growing in large number in my society and I plan to shoot more of it pretty soon.....

Poppy I

Poppy II

Poppy III

Poppy IV

To be continued ... :)

Some Macro shot of Show pieces..

Well I just tried few Macro shots at home of the various show pieces that were lying around , so just sharing those... 

Some small pottery jugs..

In case you are wondering what Macro Photography is then just to mention in layman terms , Macro photography is one in which you are quite close to the subject i.e. when the focal distance of the subject is quite less (less than 10mm). By close it does not always physically close, has you do have certain lenses which let you zoom in to an object far of and then magnify them just like macro.

This kind of photography is generally done for insects or tiny objects in order to magnify them. And also for flowers when you like to very closely show their pattern.

Needless to say, as you guys already know , its one of my favorite kind of photography ; mainly because it provides me the most sharpest photos that are possible from my camera and also because of the low depth of field which provides a blurry effect to the objects other then on which I am focusing.

My Sister has got some dolls as present which provide as quiet an interesting subjects for Macro photography

Below is a very cute couple and I have called them Simran and Raj aka Kajol & Sharukh Khan of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jaenge  as the guy depicts SRK playing the Mandolin....

You can see that in the left pic only the couple are in focus , rest all is kind of blurred. 

 

if you thought the above pic looked kind of creepy (at least it seems to me ) . check this macro of an insect..

This guy was quite a patient poser...he gave me ample opportunities to click it but somehow this was the best I could manage :(. If you enlarge then you can even see the hair or spikes on its leg..

As you got to know that I love this mode of photography so be prepared to see a lot more of these kind of photos from me...