New Year 2011

Date and time of writing: Jan 1, 2011 11:00 PM GMT +08:00

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Hi I'm Carl. This marks my first blog of my life. I'm into photography as a hobby and my business at the same time - serving as the reason of doing this blog. I've been studying stuff about photography for almost almost 2 years now and I have provided my services to not so many friends who needed a photographer for special events and I'm just here to blog about it.

Year 2011

Year 2010 has been great to me and my family, some got married, everyone has jobs, has good relationships and most of all healthy. But as for me I will start year 2011 taking pictures while my wife will review it.

Here in our town Metro Manila, people are carrying cameras almost all the time because of smart phones. Point-n-shoot camera is an essential gadget on every gathering. Iphones are even more popular because you can take pictures, edit it and post it right away on Facebook. People are happy with that even if the pictures are redundant in nature. For me there is nothing wrong with low resolution photos because of the medium used but I think people also should think about quality, content and the audience. They might not know about theories in photography but maybe while thinking of the three that I mentioned they may think twice before posting.

Quality
Quality of pictures is not about resolution but about answering the question, is it worth remembering?
Will you remember it right away what happened on that event or celebration when looking at the picture maybe  a year from now? If there is a party and you took a picture of yourself at the washroom of your friend's house, will you remember what happened on that party? Perhaps not. You can only remember that you're at the washroom - that is something you can forget and not remember at all.  Some of you might say, I just want to check if I look good, fine but keep it private on your facebook dont show it right away. If you  really are good looking try not too post every angle of your face in a series of similar clothes and similar background this promotes boredom you know. Taking pictures is about sharing it but try to filter those that are worth sharing.

Content
Content is about the subject and next in line is the background or foreground. When people travel and they don't have someone to take their pictures, the initial thought is to hold their camera pointing to their faces and then having the place as their background. Do that once and that will be fine but overdoing it will take away the interest of the viewer on the place you had your vacation. Here is the problem, when we hold the camera pointing to our faces and the background is the hotel where you stayed, your face covers most part of the frame. Your viewers can see the name of the hotel but they don't see the establishment's beauty at all and when you do it on several photos it may seem you are rubbing it into their faces that you can afford that vacation.  This is the trick, try to put your camera on a mini tripod and in timer mode, include the hotel as the main subject and stand somewhere the camera can see you and making sure you are just occupying below 20% of the frame and don't look at the camera. That will make photo candid and will not make to much of attention to you. There is more chance for your viewers to appreciate that compared to the dominant face.

Audience/Viewers
Since Facebook is becoming a norm these days and everybody uploads their photos on it, applying filters like everyone, friends, family or custom is really essential. If it is a family gathering perhaps not all your friends should see it. This is common sense so you will be the judge.


Those 3 that I mentioned are not about my idea of photography, it is more than that.  I hated pictures before I bought my first DSLR, I hated photos maybe because I dont see photos of photographers.

That's it for now. I may start taking pictures on Monday.