Some of my first pictures

[davidfromoz]

I'd like to improve my photography by submitting these pictures for your comment. I'd like to know what you would have done to make it a better picture. These are not my best pictures, but in each case I was trying to capture a subject as best I could. Maybe I could have done it better. What would you have done differently?

The pachinko place down the street. I wanted to show the contrast with the ricefields surrounding it. I have a lot of trouble getting my pictures straight :-( I like the perspective but don't like the electricity pylon in the background.

The rice has all just been planted.

Dancing with Asimo. I think I should have been much closer and just got the kids and the robot.

Motegi speedway. I just liked the way the chairs looked.

Playing with flash photography. I couldn't make it look good with manual setting so I chose auto exposure. Normally I would crop the flash reflection out, but I left it in to show my (failed?) attempt at slave firing a flash.

You can view the pics here if you are interested in exposure details.
http://davidfromoz.smugmug.com/gallery/4881945_5S46K
http://davidfromoz.smugmug.com/gallery/4867059_eY9nk

I'm especially interested in feedback on style. eg, get closer, try a lower camera angle, crop it this way etc. I'm also intersted in post processing (haven't really started on any of that yet), exposure settings etc.

Thank you for your comments
cheers,
david

 

[flygning]

#1- I see what you're trying to do. I've always loved reflection shots, personally, so I would have a lot of fun with this. First off, try really hard to get your horizon straight. Some cameras will put grid lines up for you, and that has always helped me out. If your camera won't, try stepping back from the screen (I'm assuming you're using a camera with an LCD screen-- if not, I'm useless here) and leveling the horizon on the screen with the actual horizon. Second, if you're going for the contrast, I would zoom in more on the building itself and taking it from a lower angle, getting more rice field, more building, and a bit less sky.

#2- I absolutely love this! I love the colors and the reflection and pretty much everything about it. Just work on getting that horizon straight

#3- This would have been a lot of fun if you could get in closer, with a sort of low angle so you're at the little girl's level and looking up-ish at the robot. As far as this particular photo goes, perhaps you could crop it so you get just the girl in pink and the robot. It would draw your eyes to the main subject instead of the crowd.

I can't really tell you much about #4 and #5. I like the pattern of the chairs at the raceway and the simplicity of the shoes. I've never messed around with off camera flash, so I can't help you out with that. In general, I really like your ideas here and what you're trying to capture I hope my comments help a bit!

 

[Early]

1 or 2 taken a just before sundown with white balance set for daylight would have worked for me. Another would be a polarizer to darken the sky in #2.

 

[ferox femina]

I looooove number 2. I agree about the polarizer. I'm a freak over those.

 

[manaheim]

Hiya. I liked 4 a lot. I might try to brighten it a bit, but I think its neat the way it is.

Someone else commented on your horizons... I agree on that. I see you commented on it too. A post-processing trick for this is to drag a guide across roughly where your horizon is and then turn the pic until it lines up. Photoshop has this capability.

I think the colors on 2 were a bit out of whack... looks like too much red if I had to guess. Maybe tweak that a bit, and again I might brighten the shot a little bit.

That's the Honda robot, isn't it? I love Honda. If it's the Sony robot... well, I hate Sony.

The pic itself just seemed like a quick snapshot. I don't think you could have done too much to make it work out better... I think it may have just been that kind of scene. Sure, if you were like right behind the girl and could get an angle with her and the robot in the shot that might have been interesting...

 

[davidfromoz]

Thank you everybody for your comments. This is pretty much exactly what I was hoping for.

Looks like polarizer and working on keeping things straight are the main take aways. I'll have a crack at changing the color balance on the second one and see what happens.

Where I live its often hard to see the horizon and there are often false horizons like the edge of a ricefield or building like in the first two pictures that don't really have to be straight. My tripod does have a bubble level on it. I think I'll have a closer look at that.

The Honda robot is on display (permanently I think) at the Motegi Twin Ring race track in Motegi. Motegi is a small town in Tochigi prefecture an hour or two outside Tokyo. Honda has two really good museums there. One is for technology where they have a display of all their robotic efforts and then the Asimo stage show ever 1/2 hour or so. The other museum is a history of Honda's product and racetrack cars and motorcycles which is also good (even if your not into vehicles and racing, like me)

cheers,
david