Vicky's Trip to Emerald Hill

Model: Vicky
Photographer: Kevin Ho

She's young, she's cute...she has basically all the right boxes ticked.
I'll let the photos speak for themselves...
So enjoy the pics & do drop some comments or critics =)

Have to thank Vicky for her hard work too~!
=)
































Do check out my official blog at Multiply...
http://khpc82.multiply.com
There, you will find more photos of Vicky...=)

Eline 翡翠山悠游

Model: Eline
Photographer: Kevin Ho

Eline, as usual, is looking gorgeous in white & green.
Great to have this chance to shoot her again.
Have to thank Li Ai, our organizer of course =)

Hope everyone will like this album.
Comments & critics are always welcome =)














Please head on over to my Multiply website for more photos of Eline =)
http://khpc82.multiply.com/

~ Hana 的阳光沙滩游 ~

Didn't know Penang had such nice beaches.
Will definitely want to revisit this place someday....probably with a big umbrella next time!
=)

Thank you, my dear for bringing me there & being my model, even though the sun was really really hot that morning.
I know our Bangkok / Pattaya trip was cancelled, but we'll have a better trip coming soon.... ^^

Location: Batu Ferringhi, Penang Island
Model: Hana
Gear: Canon EOS 40D, Tokina 11-16mm f2.8, Hoya CPL, Speedlite 580EXii

~Eline的美丽星期天~

感谢 Eline 做了我们当天的 model 和摄影伙伴~!
希望大家会喜欢~! =)

Model: Eline Lean
Location: Chinese Garden, Singapore
Gear: 50D, Tokina 11-16, Tamron 90mm, 580EXii

DIY Mini Studio

Had been doing some research on improving my indoor shots.

Previously, I just didn't have that special corner at home where I can shoot good shots.
Ended up with shots that were mostly normal & uninteresting.
And most of the backgrounds were either my bed, my pc, or my kitchen sink.
Not the best backgrounds and it totally makes your shots look badly clutterred.
Solution for this problem is pretty easy: a piece of white paper.

You can see that there is a slight yellowish hue to this image of a XFX GPU.

Reason? The wall where the flash bounced off was painted light yellow.

The above shot of my XFX GTS250 graphics card is taken with nothing more than a white piece of paper.
I simply laid it against the wall and placed the GPU on it.
Simple.
But there's a catch.
Your flash would have to bounce off the walls of your room.
If you had pure white walls, this should not be a big issue.
But I believe a lot of people do not have their houses painted pure white.
If you have a light green wall, your bounced flash will also be light green in color and this shows in your photos.
This means you have little control over your lighting (what if your walls were black, dark blue or dark brown?).


What I did, was to build this simple setup from nothing more than items you could find around the house.
And it only takes less than an hour to make.

Doesn't look like much, but it works =)

What you need are:
1) Cardboard box (recycled)
2) Binding tape ($0.80)
3) Mahjong paper/white paper ($0.50)
4) White & black manila cards ($1.50 each)
5) Cutter/knife/scissors
6) Paper clips


What you need to do is simply to cut out the sides of the cardboard box.
Cut out the mahjong paper according to the size of the holes on the cardboard box and tape them onto it.
Then clip the manila card onto the inside of the box. This will become your background for your shooting.
And by investing in more manila cards, you get to have different colored backgrounds.


And it's done!
Simple as that!


And here are some of the results!
Enjoy shooting indoors! =)

Read, Email, Do, Send, File, Faxed...

Mean machine...

Simplicity...

JS-Boy

Little things, simple things, can also be turned into art pieces...

Calibrating your display

A lot of people do not know, or do not care that their desktop or laptop displays (either CRT or LCD) are actually not showing the correct colors, brightness, contrast, etc.
Yes, I believe a lot of people are oblivious to the fact that your LCD or monitor needs to be calibrated for it to display all manner of pictures or movies correctly.

Is your monitor/LCD doing its job correctly?

(images above courtesy of Imaging Resources)

Be it a MacBook, CRT monitors or LCDs.
It might look pretty at 1st, but wait till you compare your display with the test charts, you would be amazed by how much difference it makes to simply take 5 minutes time to calibrate your display.
And for people like me, we need accurate colors, gamma, brightness and contrast to work with.

Photography is serious business! :p

Or else, there is the saying that "what you see, might not be what you get".


Hardware based calibrators

These calibrate and rectify color, gamma, contrast and brightness differences in your display with the help of a scanner that helps read the quality of your display and then make calculated corrections to your display parameters.
The famous & common ones are like Spyder & ColorMunki.
These comes in different packages for home use and also professionals.
Anyway, they cost in the range of hundreds of ringgit, which not all casual users are willing to fork out.
But if you are serious, this is definitely one of the best methods.


Software based calibrators

So here we have the "Hallelujah" FREE option.....
Download, install, run the application, follow the on screen guide, and you are well on your way to a better display.
This is the simplest and most cost effective way (actually there is no cost, but you get what I mean :P).
What's more, it can be done by everyone with a PC, if you just take the effort and roughly 5-10 minutes time to do it.

At this point of writing, even Windows 7 comes with its own monitor calibration settings.
So, for those who are using Windows 7, you can try it out.
You can find the calibration page by going to:

Control Panel -> Appearance & Personalization -> Display -> Calibrate color

Windows's very own calibration software, it works, but accuracy of colors might not be

that easy to achieve

But for me, this software called Calibrize is still the best after doing quite a bit of searching & researching online. It's quick, easy & user friendly. Pretty accurate also.

Follow the onscreen guide and you are minutes away from a better 

& more accurate display with Calibrize

Well, what are you waiting for?
Head over to the links and download the free software calibrator!
Enjoy breathing new life into your displays! =)




Relevant websites:

http://www.calibrize.com/
http://www.imaging-resource.com/ARTS/MONCAL/CALIBRATE.HTM
http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/

My DCM portfolio

Got featured on Digital Camera Magazine (DCM), February 2010 issue.

4-pages of my portfolio and photos, Canon EOS 50D grand prize...

Dream come true ^^

I know....my profile photo could've been much better....hahaha

And here are the photos which got featured on the mag. My personal collection of favorites from 2009. Locations range from Muar to Genting to Taiwan.

And this is the reason I got myself published on DCM...

This shot of the beautiful Eye on Melaka on the river banks of the Melaka River bagged me the DCM July'09 Shot of the Month, which later on won the DCM Hotshots Canon EOS 50D Grand Prize, beating 5 other Hotshot of the months.

Thank you DCM! =)