[Take 3] Plus, a piece of her

ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/15s l ISO 200 l 1.26m l Program AE

Portraits are often referred to as photos that record face as you guys konw. Shots of oneself taken by others are clearly different from the ones I take on my own. The fact that I know myself better than anyone must have naturally led to the birth of self-portraits. It’s totally my thought,haha :))

If you think you know yourself, let’s take a closer look at your face or your body today. Everyone has a favorite spot when it comes to your body or your face. Interestingly enough, people tell stories using their eyes, lips or feets through the lens of the camera.

Among portraits, CLOSE UP is the frame that effectively captures mysteriousness and vivid expressions. Today, let’s try close up to highlight the most attractive part of your body. It’s gonna be stunning works!!

 * Step-by-step guide to self-portrait close-up.

1. The most basic thing to do before doing a close-up on face is to find the right location! Today, I won’t travel far. It’s not necessary. Let’s try taking a photo in front of the mirror. Mirror is a must for self-portrait. Clean it for a clearer outcome :]

2. In principle, set the camera at Auto macro but if you have a severe handshake problem, Dual IS mode is a safer way out.

3. Using the mirror as a 2nd lens, draw in on each area as closely as you can. With ST550(TL225), you can use the front LCD for a clearer view of the object.

ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/15s l ISO 320 l 1.26m l Program AE

ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/10s l ISO 400 l 1.26m l Program AE

4. When taking a shot around the eye area, you need to be careful of where you are watching. If you stare too intently to one side, it will make your blood vessels stick out. :P So unless you are going for a horror scene, use artificial tears to make your eyes appear moist…

 ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/15s l ISO 320 l 4.9mm l Multi-segment/Program AE

ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/10s l ISO 400 l 4.9mm l Spot/Program AE l classic mode

5. When taking a shot of your nose at the center of the face, your angle has to change depending on the length of your nose and shape of the rounded sides of your noise. Here, I recommend a full shot that captures the whole face and blank space. Look down to make your noise appear shorter, or lift your head up to highlight your beautiful nose. Of course, all shots from the side angle!!!

6. Last but not least, capture your lips, neck line, back, hands, feet and other parts of your body.

ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/15s l ISO 240 l 4.9mm l Spot/Program AE

ST550(TL225) 3.5F l 1/15s l ISO 320 l 4.9mm l Multi-segment/Program AE

Close up instills life to your photo. Discover the inner beauty that you were not aware of and invite it into your frame. Next time, I will take you through how to find the best angle from high angle vs. low angle.

 

Made for self shots, Samsung Digital Imaging ST550(TL225)

Opening a new world of digital cameras

The common thing of Dual LCD phone, Dual core and Dual CPU which were innovative is the successful reversion from single to dual and more convenience and effectiveness. Recently, Samsung Digital Imaging (www.samsungcamera.com) has released the Dual LCD (Front 1.5” and Back 3.5”) digital camera ST550(TL225). The 1.5” front LCD upgrades the convenience of self shots in the ST10(CL50). Moreover, the high glossy material on the front, 18.6mm slim design, 1,1520,000 pixels 3.5” LCD, and gesture functions for file management provides a new direction of digital cameras. We need to see if this trial is going to be successful. Let’s take a look at the probability.

Elegant black and high glossy material

The color of cameras has been black for a long time. DSLR cameras are still black, because it’s for professionals. The color of cameras has been more various, because makers think of main customers as new generations, but this product is basically black like DSLR cameras. However, the thick color lines from the left side of the body to the top and right below create its own identity. Based on the stable black, stable and elegant design has been made with this colorful line.

Samsung Electronics has been successful with the high glossy material on the frame of the LCD TV. This design has also been applied to LCD monitors and welcomed. As if following this, the front of the ST550(TL225) is coated with high glossy material. It leaves a trace as a Samsung product in design. And the black color adds more elegant design. Due to high glossy coated material on the front, it looks likes there’s no auxiliary LCD. This intended to reduce the disharmony caused by the new auxiliary LCD.

Self shots become important by the advent of mini hompi and blog, so a lot of functions making a face more beautiful have been added, but not in the convenience. Except the swivel mirror of the ST10(CL50), most of them tried it with the rotation of the LCD. And this was not for self shot, but for the convenience of adjustment of shot angles.

Front LCD communicating with human

The ST550(TL225) has 1.5” LCD on the left side of the lens. This can prevent malfunction and inconvenience caused by the rotation of LCD. Furthermore, the auxiliary LCD makes it more convenient and fun to use. Turning on the ST550(TL225) and tapping the front LCD, you can see yourself from the LCD. The front LCD is 230K pixels, so the quality is not as good as the LCD on the back, but it’s very useful. Through this idea, they have made the trend of this generation more emotional like interaction between human and machine.

If you have children, I’m sure that you have an experience to take their pictures. The ST550(TL225) can play a funny animation drawing their attention through the front LCD. And when setting a timer, it shows the countdown.

Talking with touch, Gesture

The fun expression of the ST550(TL225) has also been made with software. When playing photos, by drawing gestures with your fingertips, you can execute the functions such as turn, delete, rotation, and move. Moreover, by tilting the body about 15 degree to left/right, it turns to the next/previous picture. Gesture and tilting could be difficult to beginners, but it’s more intuitive and easier than the LCD button once you get used to it.

Smart Auto for beginners

Unlike 11 scene modes from the ST10(CL50) or ST50(TL100), the ST550(TL225) supports 16 scene modes such as Scenery, Background, Night Scenery, Backlight portrait, Portrait, Macro, Macro Character, Sunset, Blue Sky and so on. Through these modes, the camera is optimized to take a shot. This is not as good as the custom mode, but very convenient for beginners.

Another present for self shot, Smart Face Recognition

It’s not easy to take a self shot, so this function is really convenient. Selecting the self shot mode by tapping the front LCD, it automatically recognizes faces and displays the Face Recognition frame. To set a focus on certain persons, you can register these faces earlier. Up to 20 people can be registered, and this also supports priority set.

No more hand blur! Dual IS (Dual Image Stabilization)

The ST550(TL225) supports both IS functions optical and digital. The optical IS detects the shake of camera or lens and compensates it. When the optical IS is not enough, digital IS can also be used together.

1,152,000 pixels 3.5” wide LCD

The ratio change from 4:3 to 16:9 has been spread with digital TVs. Digital cameras also can take 16:9 pictures, but the display is still 4:3. The ST550(TL225) can take 16:9 pictures with 1920×1080 and 3840×2160 resolutions. The pictures taken can be checked from the 1,152,000 pixels 3.5” WVGA LCD in original version. Considering that other digital compact cameras adopt QVGA LCD, the ST550(TL225) delivers about 4 times better quality.

12.2M pixels CCD, 27mm wide angle lens // ISO 3200

The ST550(TL225) has adopted 12.2M pixels 1/2.33” CCD. The pixel is like other high pixel compact digital cameras. It has 27mm wide angle lens. This wide angle lens allows more usage to the ST550(TL225). And the Schneider lens keeps the vividness of quality.

ISO 3200

From ISO 80 to 200, there’s no noise and color variation. At ISO 400, some noise appears, but not much. At ISO 800, a little bit big noise and color variation appear. At ISO 1600 and 3200, strong noise appears, so does color variation. I recommend ISO 200 for beginners.

HD video and HDMI

The ST550(TL225) can record 1280×720 30 fps HD videos. It’s stored in H.264 format, so you can save 2 times more storage than MPEG, and 4 times more than MP4. You also can use zoom while recording, so you can make more various videos. To watch these videos in HDTV, HDMI is supported.

Opening a new world with the front LCD

Compact digital cameras keep losing their position between DSLR and cell phone cameras. Now, it’s time to find something new. DSLR cameras are getting more attention from users with great quality, and the cameras of cell phones are also getting better. In this situation, the ST550(TL225) prepares a new war with the front LCD. I’m looking forward to seeing the next step of the ST550(TL225).

Morning

For people in the modern world, morning refers to the time from when you wake up to when you begin work. Although the bulk of the time is spent doing mechanical technical, automated and limited activities, just like anything else in the world, there are different vintage points to one phenomenon.

The romanticists recommend ‘Morning, the starting point of a day’, which gives a clear analysis of the morning time to beginners and ‘Morning, five minutes for a happier life’ for professionals which takes a more macro view. Documentary DVDs such as ‘Breakfast and happy day’ have also been very popular among the younger segment – or that is what they argue.

The skeptic circle, on the other hand, completely denies this - they are even speculating that the DVD mentioned above was bundled with cereal boxes for kids – and recommends the classic ‘Going to work? Go to hell’ as a must-read to the absent-minded people of today. They also issued a statement avidly supporting the recently launched movie ‘Hangover, heartburn and credit card receipt’, praising how aptly the work illustrates the pathos of morning.

In this tense conflict that can be compared to the Soviet Union and the U.S. during the cold era, the Unification circle is throwing shocking waves throughout. Their simple slogan - ‘weekend breakfast’ – is sending small but strong wave in the two circles.

The romanticists published ‘Theory of depression’, an excellent work describing how one becomes depressed from the morning of Sunday thinking that tomorrow is Monday, while the skeptic circle’s paper of ‘Occasionally idle morning’ that says ‘Isn’t Saturday morning still pleasant’, sparking a fierce debate. (In particular, the reaction from the hawkers, the weekend workers, is known to have been especially fierce.)

However, the dominant view is that the analysis by Unification doesn’t deserve serious attention because it fails to catch the essence as it is exposed to a very limited situation.
As such, there is still a long way to go before establishing a ‘Unified Theory of Morning’, but we still have hopes as signs of convergence are being witnessed, especially among the younger scholars.

Samsung ST1000 awarded for outstanding technology

Photo-Facts has awarded the Samsung ST1000(CL65) with their first-ever award for outstanding technologies. Whereas other sites focus on in-depth tests, Photo-Facts solely focuses on the implanted technology.

The Samsung ST1000(CL65), which features WiFi, Bluetooth 2.0 and GPS launched in August, along with the edge-cutting Samsung ST550(TL225)/ST500(TL220).

Rod Lawton, the editor of the site, especially praised the camera’s function to communicate over Bluetooth, with other mobile devices.
Concluding this article with the word’s, that a camera doesn’t necessarily has to feature cutting edge functions, when it’s useful, simple and working.

ST1000 Drawing

29th Independence Day of Vanuatu

July 30^th marks the 29^th Independence Day of Vanuatu.
Vanuatu has a sad history.
I heard that the painful 100 years of colonial rule by the United Kingdom and France were beyond description.
I still vividly remember how depressed I got when I heard that the white sand beach had turned red with blood and the dead bodies during WW2.
In commemoration of the 29^th Independence Day, a ceremony was held at the Vanuatu Independence Park. Unfortunately, the event got cancelled midway due to the intermittent rain.
There were no particularly exciting events this year, though.
Three shots of blank cartridge in front of the President like the previous year was the only ceremony that grabbed the people’s attention.

The official name of the ceremony is this:

<Trooping the color & Flag raising ceremony by the Vanuatu mobile force on the 29^th anniversary of independence>

Quite long, huh?

Let me share with you the video clip of the ceremony.

I felt proud that a mere blogger could participate in the independence ceremony of a nation and record the whole thing. The police was controlling the traffic around the park. I always introduce myself as a photographer and drive my way in. Vanuatu police are very collaborative when it comes to photo shooting.

Anyways… The ceremony had already started when I arrived at the site.

You can see diplomatic mission of various countries.

“Present arms!”, the command given in blaring voice.

The President and officials make a salute.

They march at their best efforts despite the rain.

Vanuatu citizens watching the scene.

Highlight of the day – Blank cartridge shots to celebrate the day. Three shots fired into the air above the stage where the President and the guests from home and abroad are seated. This scene puzzles me. Shots right in front of the President?

Isn’t it better to shoot fire facing the other side? I guess this is cultural difference.

Nevertheless, the shots left the Vanuatu people happy.

The shots are followed by a hymn of celebration before the flag hoisting ceremony.

The national anthem of Vanuatu fills the air and the flag hoisting ceremony begins.

The leaders of Vanuatu pay respect..

The commemorative speech by the Prime Minister. Although Vanuatu adopts a presidential system, the Prime Minister is in charge of running the country.

The speech turned out to be a bit boring because it was too long and a woman solider who was not feeling that well fainted.

I hope she doesn’t get punished.

I spotted some handsome soldiers while taking the pictures. The Vanuatu solider wearing the beret looks like Jean-Claude Van Damme, while the navy wearing the white uniform looks like the guy in the movie ‘Leon’. I don’t know if you remember him J

After the ceremony, the high-ranking officials of Vanuatu, the Defense Adviser South Pacific and other officials line up for a photo.

Many thanks to the Vanuatu soldier and the police for their best efforts despite the rain. And congratulations to Vanuatu for its 29^th anniversary!!

A Night at the Park

Hi, there!

I love night shots. Setting my camera to Manual and playing with light and movement. Night photography is always challenging for both photographer and camera.
Here are a set of photos I took in my last visit to the theme park.

The flying chairs

[Samsung WB1000(TL320) 1/20ㅣf/2.8 ㅣISO 400ㅣ4.3mm]

Stop that car!!!

[Samsung WB1000(TL320) 1/15ㅣf/2.8 ㅣISO 200ㅣ4.3mm]

Superman & Daily Mirror

[Samsung WB1000(TL320) 1/6ㅣf/2.8 ㅣISO 200ㅣ4.3mm]

Light and water

[Samsung WB1000(TL320) 2.000ㅣf/2.8 ㅣISO 100ㅣ4.3mm]