As is typical taking such a series with a moving subject (the sea gulls, the waves and even the swans themselves) I was expecting ghosting. However looking at the final result the waves and seagulls and swan on the right are all nice and sharp and just as they where in the first photo. Even though Almalence, the creators of the HDR camera app, claim the correct handling of moving objects and de-ghosting I do find this pretty amazing.
For PhotoFriday‘s Topic Wide Angle
I’m sure something like this must have has already been tried. Here I have used 4 photos taken on my android cameraphone, stitched them with Microsoft Research's ICE software and uploaded the resulting image to Microsoft Research's Photosythn. Zoom in with your mouse and look around, not bad resolution for a cameraphone. The big drawback in this image however is the horizon is a very wobbly line.
This video is from a paper being given at SIGgraph Asia 2011 by Kevin Karsch, Varsha Hedau, David Forsyth, Derek Hoiem called Rendering Synthetic Objects into Legacy Photographs.
Unlike the photoshopping and fiddling with blemish stuff that is giving photo manipulation such a dubiously bad reputation, some of the work with augmented reality and object rendering is really based on sound understanding of the theory. In Kevin’s case above clearly the process is following the source of light and shadows in a truly natural way. I am all for this type of technical improvement but we may have to tolerate more public scepticism of good “photographic” methods as this and similar techniques become tools of the less ethical fakers.
By the way, incorrect shadows and lighting on a subject are the easiest way to detect shoddy photoshoped heads on the wrong bodies etc. Now it is our job, as honest photographers to be open with the methods we apply (and I’m certain the above methods have some very great legitimate application), whilst at the same time helping to detect and expose the low-lives who are out to deceive us?
The one sour note was I could not figure out how to share multiple images with the blogger share button now in flickr. Seems you have to do one photo at a time.b So it was over to the share button in flickr and grab the html code, then do a little tweaking of the image size in microsoft’s live writer
The Australian Bull Ant may look little but it packs a mighty bite and is also very strong (here it is uprooting a dead grass looking for the succulent root). It is widely discussed, (it may be an urban myth) that australian aboriginals still use the bull ant’s powerful nippers as a form of bush suture. The hold the ants so they bite on both side of a deep flesh wound and then break off the body leaving the head firmly attached. A dozen or so ants and you have very satisfactory stitches. (ouch! think I’d rather wait for the flying doctor)
Someone asked me earlier in the week which was my favourite lens and they where surprise when I pointed to my Sigma DL Macro 70-300mm zoom. This was used to take the above photo, I just slide the switch on the barrel to macro and it let me get “close” but at the same time “safely” about 2m away. I have seen a lot of disdain and tut-tuts in some of the camera, press, clubs and podcasts for sigma lens, but I reckon they are good value for money and seem to survive my “field” treatment, ok except the ones with plastic mounts)
You are sure to have noticed the plus one buttons popping up all over the place on the web (and this blog). This is a google initiative to take back a little of the hype from the like button on facebook. It is really a crowd sourcing exercise that will give a little extra ways in which google can refine search results. At the simplest level when you click on the 1+ button you are publically recommended that item across the web.
It never rains but it pours.Often opposites make an interesting photo pair.
The simple feature found in almost all image processing software normally called cropping, givens every camera owner access to a digital zoom. Like the much maligned in camera digital zoom feature there are limits. If you zoom in too far your image becomes blocky, noisy and fuzzy, The digital camera will probably have an interpolation built into it6s functions that tries to smooth out and sharpen the image as you zoom in. It will also possibly resize the interpolated output. Another common image processing tool sharpen might help extend the zoom range just a little on your cropped image. However don’t go overboard with sharpening (it can introduce unfortunate edge effects at contrast boundaries in the image)
The clouds this afternoon where dramatic, but on a much larger scale than a normal photo captures. An obvious application for multi-image stitched panorama, This time I have used the panorama stitched within Windows Live Photo Gallery, rather than my favourite autostich.
One interesting, and seeming not often discussed, feature of smartphones with cameras is that you are not really just limited to the capabilities of the camera application it was shipped with. You can easily download and run other apps (applications) that will either replace the camera application altogether, give you different controls or allow you to tweak the photos in phone, Here is a selection of free apps that I have found to be worthwhile downloads.
 | |||
| HDR Camera | Camera Advance Lite | Little Photo | Camera Fun Free |
| You’ll be amazed at the quality of images you can get out of this. It takes 3 exposures and uses HDRi techniques to extend dynamic range. The free version has ad banners | This adds some extra features to your camera and has some nice OS (On Screen Aids) to help you take better photos. | Simple camera with a timer, and a lots of special effect and edit features | It does photo effects as you take the photo, a lot of fun. There is a paid version that give you more effects |
 | |||
Adobe Photoshop Express | Photo Effects | PhotoFunia | Pixlr-o-matic |
| Simple easy to use basic editing options, a few special effects from Adobe (Photoshop & Lightroom folk) | Claims to turn your photos into art with amazing photo effects, similar to Instagram | Put your face on billboards, in art galleries, magazines. Lots of Fun. Needs web access | The retro finishes and filters are well done and fun. from Autodesk (autocad folk) |
I assume a lot of these apps will also be available from the Iphone app store, I have only tested them on an android (2.2.1) phone.
This is simply a copy of David’s idea. All you need is a suitable sized nut, that fits your tripod adaptors screw. The nut I used cost just 6 cents. I glued this onto the back of a piece of 3mm thick craft wood that I use as a portable drawing board. Voila! Instant easel.
The next step was dreaming of a way to attached my palette and dipping water jar on the side. I even got as far as sketching up a a “super” drawing board with and old paint palette pivoted underneath, so it could swing out as you painted. Unfortunately I spotted one serious design flaw before I tried to make it. I had made up a wider drawing board I sometimes used on windy days which held both my sketch book and portable paint palette with normal bulldog clips. The problem I had with this was gravity, as I 
tilted the board I ran the risk of any liquid in the paint palette running out (and potentially across my painting). This was relatively easily fixed on my handheld board by using the hinged nature of the portable palette and putting a bit blob of blu-tack under the lower palette tray to keep it roughly horizontal and just doing my wash mixes in this lower tray.
independent of the drawing/painting surface. realising that meant I look for an independent way to attach these to the tripod, Most tripods that can have their heads raise and lowered have a crank mechanism that runs inside a tube at the top of the tripod. A small U-bolt (normally sold as a way to attach things like TV antenna to a pipe, or as a method to secure off a loop in wire rope) can easily be used here to attach a simple arm on which the palette can be mounted. My prototype used a spare bit of wood that in retrospect is a little heavy. However the new multi-function easel works like a charm. By the way the U-bolt at approx $4.00 is a little more expensive than the nut.
So where to now.? I think the next obvious improvement is to make the arm out of extruded aluminium, making sure that it also fits with my tripod carry bag. Also I will change the conventional nuts to wing nuts (which are much easier to tighter by hand).
the world (unless you specifically choose to do so). I have my phone set so it only connects to the internet when I am connected to WiFi (so I avoid the high costs of uploading photos incurs on GSM). One missing feature that does surprise me is in editing, There is no option to run Picnik (since Google now own Picnik) or even swap across to Picasa web and run Picnik there?
Perhaps even better might be to have picnic as an add in to Google+ on the phone or as an android app of its own. I’m not the first to notice this by the way.
You don’t need to believe my advice that camera phones are now quiet adequate for taking most photos. Test out how good you are at picking whether a photo has been taken on a Smart Phone or a SLR in this CNN quiz
