Robert Sinclaire » Photography

The Crew

Robert — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:23:03 +0000

Which DSLR to buy? Any thoughts?

Robert — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 14:57:48 +0000

Let’s say you have about $800 to $900 to spend on camera equipment. Let’s also say you have no other camera equipment to speak of, and no ties to any specific brand (anymore), other than a little experience.

What would you buy? Here is what I’m debating.

a. The new Rebel XSi camera kit. (coming in April) I noticed the standard 18-55 now has image stabilizer. That’s really nice, but it’s still just an entry level lens, right?. = $900ish

b. The Rebel XTi body only with a decent lens, such as Sigma’s 17-70mm f2.8-4.5 which seems to be getting good reviews. = $900ish

c. Or, since I have no more ties to Canon, make a complete switch to another brand such as Nikon. This scares me a bit since I have no experience with them, but you can’t argue with their reputation.

Decisions, decisions, decisions…

Basking in the….snow?

Robert — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 19:53:50 +0000

It was 70 degrees out Wednesday. The sun was shining, birds were chirping. Needless to say, my spring fever had kicked into high gear.

This was taken last night.

/sigh

Oh well, back to reality. Gotta love New England.

Crazy Duck

Robert — Fri, 24 Nov 2006 03:10:51 +0000

First of all, HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

This year we had a very small Thanksgiving, especially for a very large family. It was just my father, step-mother, step-sister, and me. It was nice, and the food was incredible, but without the rest of the family there, we had to entertain ourselves.

Christina and I were sitting on the couch watching videos on Youtube. Specifically, we were watching videos created using stop motion photography. We were cracking up. Then we realized, we could make our own stop motion video. So we did. And seven hours later, here it is.

Don’t be too critical though, it’s the first feature film of Sinzzo Productions. Enjoy.

The dead city of Pripyat

Robert — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 17:50:46 +0000

Today is the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. I was unaware of this until I heard it this morning on the radio while driving to work. Completely by coincident, a friend of mine and I were looking at pictures of the dead city of Pripyat yesterday, a city in northern Ukraine. Pripyat was evacuated back in 1986 due to high radiation levels caused by the reactor meltdown at Chernobyl. The population at the time was estimated at 45,000 people.

My friend and I were discussing photographers who take pictures of abandon objects and forgotten worlds. He had me do a search for the dead city of Pripyat. A wave of sadness came over me as he showed me the images of a place that was once home to thousands of families — now it’s nothing but a ghost town. Twenty years ago, the people of Pripyat collected what posessions they could and left their homes forever. I can’t imagine how sad that must have been.

Click on any of these images below to see the sites they came from.

camera + flickr + blog = fun

Robert — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 21:14:20 +0000

So I bought a new camera last week. It was a toss up between a few cameras, but I finally settled on the Canon Powershot A620. I specifically bought this camera for quantity, not quality. Let me splain. I own 2 really nice Canons, a 10D (dslr) and an Elan 7 (slr). I love them both, but they are ginormous. Try rollerblading with a toaster oven strapped around your neck and you’ll have an idea of what I’m talking about.

Enter my new camera. The plan is to keep this camera with me at all times. I’m also going to focus less on getting the perfect shot, and more on just getting the shot. If I want to take a portrait of someone, or if have the time to use my tripod, then yes, I’ll whip out one of my big guns. But for everyday use, this camera is perfect.

I also created a new flickr account. This will be the heart and soul of my photoblog. Every picture I take with this little camera will be uploaded to flickr for all to see. I’m not claiming that these pictures will be all that exciting, some of them may be down right boring. Okay, most of them, but that’s not the point! The point is that they will be there in chronological order from now until I die in 2097. You’ll be able to sort them by tags, groups, dates, or photosets (albums).

On the right sidebar you will always see the latest (or random) pictures I’ve uploaded to my flickr account. I can change the photostream by changing the tag associated with it. For example, if I use the tag “friends”, the photostream will only show the last pictures I’ve uploaded which I’ve tagged “friends”. Right now there is no tag associated with the photostream so it will show all of my pictures regardless of what I tagged them. But that’s neither here nor there.

You can view my entire photostream anytime by clicking on this icon located at the bottom of the sidebar. You can also just click one of the thumbnails also located on the sidebar. And that’s that. Exciting huh? Where are you going?

Let the fun begin…

In the interest of avoiding copyright infringement, I should mention that these four pictures were taken by the very creative and talented Cameron Ann. Yes, including the self portrait. Like I said, she’s very creative.

Photoshop :: Converting color to black and white

Robert — Sun, 13 Nov 2005 02:45:03 +0000

This is probably my most used Photoshop technique. I’ve always been a huge fan of black & white photography. In Photoshop, the two most common ways of converting to black & white are by converting the image to grayscale or by completely desaturing the image. These two methods unfortunately lack contrast and tonal control. The following technique will give you control over both.

With your image loaded into Photoshop create a new adjustment layer. Click on Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Hue/Saturation. Then just click OK, and then OK again. We’ll come back to this layer again later.

We are now going to repeat most of step one. Click on Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Hue/Saturation. Click OK once. Grab the slider for Saturation and drag it all the way to the left (-100) to completely desaturate the image.

Now we need to change the blend mode of first Hue/Saturation adjustment layer. Using the Layers palette, target the first Hue/Saturation adjustment layer (Hue/Saturation 1) you created by clicking on the layer. This will select the layer. Change the blending mode for the layer from Normal to Color by using the drop down menu on the top of the Layers palette. By the way, if you can’t find your Layers palette simply click on Windows > Layers.

Now double-click on the Hue/Saturation 1 thumbnail to open the adjustment dialog box.

Move the Hue slider to adjust the grayscale values of the image. Move the Saturation slider to control the finer details of the image. In short, move the Hue slider for major changes and the Saturation slider for minor changes.

For even more detail you can adjust individual colors. On the top of the adjustment dialog box click the drop down menu and choose a color to manipulate it. For example, you would choose blue to adjust the color of the sky. Adjusting the blue color channel shouldn’t have an effect on skin tones or hair color of people in the photograph. Unless of course you’re a smurf. Likewise, adjusting the green channel will effect the tones and contrast of grass and trees but shouldn’t have an effect on the sky.

And there you have it. Pretty easy huh? What’s great about this technique is the flexibility and control it gives you over the photograph. There are other, even more complex and sophisticated ways of converting color to black & white, but this is a good starting place. Give it a whirl.

Photoshop :: Straightening the horizon

Robert — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 17:52:35 +0000

One of my first lessons in photography was “keep the horizon straight“. Unfortunately this is not always as easy as it sounds. But never fear, Photoshop is here. Here is a quick and easy fix I learned for straightening the horizon in your photos. I believe it will work for all the latest versions of Photoshop and Photoshop Elements.

First load your crooked picture into Photoshop. (duh!)

Select the Measure Tool. This can be found under the eyedropper tool in the toolbox.

Select a point on the horizon and then, while holding down the mouse key, drag the cursor across the image to the other side of the horizon. This line will obviously be slanted since your horizon is slanted. By the way, the horizon can be anything. In my case it was the top edge of a wall.

On the top menu bar go to Image > Rotate Canvas > Arbitrary.

You will see the rotate canvas dialog box appear with a number already filled in. This is the correct number. Click O.K.

You will see that the image is rotated and the horizon is now level. The last step is to select the Crop Tool and crop the image to trim away the white edges.

And that’s that. Stay tuned for more exciting Photoshop tips right here on skyecade online. However, I don’t think you can actually stay tuned to a website. How about, check back for more exciting and useful Photoshop tips right here on skyecade online!! Yeah, that’s nice.

I’ll post’m as I learn’m.