simple doesn't mean easy

lol a friend told me that he didn't understand a single thing that i wrote with the photo design thingy, so here's another after/before comparison (a simple-looking one this time) and i won't even bother explaining it - enough to say that it was just as complicated to do, masking and all.

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experiment in photo design (last part)

(continued from previous entry)
this is the finished product of this experiment, and for comparison, here is the original:



am not sure if i achieved anything in the final version, but i sure learned a lot.

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experiment in photo design (part 3)

(continued from previous entry)
details. after seeing that the general light composition is as i wanted it, i added them back in, still proportional to the lighting designed. i started with the couple farthest to the sitting girl and their immediate surrounding, and made sure i didn't add more than 30% of the details of the originally cleaned up file. the idea was to create a diagonal visual link between the girl and the heart painting without letting the couple distract this link even tho they're positioned along this link.



next was adding details to the middle couple - i decided this was enough detail for the entire background so i added it to the rest of the image except for the first couple. i know there isn't a very pronounced difference, especially at this size of the photo, but it's there. i also added a general brightness to the whole thing as it was getting a bit too gloomy.



next was the couple closest to the camera - making sure to make them not too dark as to grab too much focus on them. i then added details to the girls, a little bit more clean-up (removed throw pillows behind the sitting girl, on the far couch), adjusted levels, then the finished product.

(to be continued)


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experiment in photo design (part 2)

(continued from previous entry)
fun part starts with a blank canvas. i added a simple circular gradient as a lighting guide, roughly following the thirds rule, to better bring attention to the main subject (the girl sitting by herself)



i then added partial luminosity of the cleaned up image in amounts following the lighting guide (20% of the couple closest to the subject, 35% of the middle couple, 50% of foreground couple, etc.)



a slight addition of the colors to check that they don't radically change the desired lighting.

(to be continued)


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experiment in photo design (part 1)

here's a bit of an experiment, brought on by a hastily taken photo - my excuse being that it was taken in a photo event where one is given about 15 minutes to compose, light and execute the photo. i guess you can say it's more a photo rescue job than anything, but i thought, what if i take it a bit further? after all by doing an experiment - you achieve something just by going thru the process - so no effort lost.

what i wanted to do was to see what it would be like if you approach a photo like you would a painting, i.e. do an additive process thereby ensuring control over the elements that go in the photo and the lighting relationships between them.



as per usual, i began by doing my typical clean-up edit. corrected perspective, toned it so that colors are not all over the place, replaced copyrighted content (painting on the wall), removed distracting elements (bit of balcony, upper right corner, and sloping window frame on the other side), etc.



right after "correcting" (there was nothing wrong with it, it just wasn't the perspective i wanted) the perspective tho, and before cleaning up, i had to do the masking. it's just one of those things that one has to do when working extensively on a photo. better have it done with as early on as possible to make full use of it. everything else after masking is child's play.

(to be continued)

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omg! my calves are so pretty!

 © Joselito Briones

haha! i got one of 'em harem shorts from i.t. very comfy indeedy. i'm wondering if the thing balloons up when i fart.

off to have beans for lunch. not that i need help in that department. just hoping for even just a slight lift off.

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denise on a storefront display

© Joselito Briones

We were shopping in San Francisco today when I spotted this photo I took of Denise on a store front of a fragrance shop :).


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vetta

screen capture of istockphoto's vetta page

one of the photos i took of dan got featured in istockphoto's vetta splash page. makes it worth all the trouble :)


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bestest goto ever!

© Joselito Briones
this morning omar and i drove a couple of blocks to ate uding's apartment to pick up this goto (rice porridge with entrails) that she made. she's basically been cooking filipino food the past few days, always very good. the other day she made pochero. saging na saba and all.


© Joselito Briones
and how handy is it that there's a kalamansi tree in the backyard?


© Joselito Briones
and as if that isn't enough, the goto came with sweetened saging na saba (very similar to plantain) wrapped in spring roll pastry then deep-fried. it's usually called turon in the philippines, but where i came from we call it sagimes.


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Video of the Week! WOOOOOOT!!!!

screenshot of iStockphoto site

i don't know where i've been, it took 2 full days before i found out that one of my video clips has just been featured as video of the week. woo hoo!!


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Hampstead Heath

© Joselito Briones

LIfe's been easy... most weekends Jerome and Ronnie would invite us for a drive somewhere nice for a weekend (they bought a brand new volvo). This time the destination was Hampstead Heath, within London. The area we set up picnic in is called "Kite Hill" or "Parliament Hill". Needless to say, there was plenty of food and wine, and picnic necessities (plates, cutleries, wine glasses) willingly lent to us by Waitrose. Pictured above are (L-R) Mati, Ronnie, Jerome, Gaudi, Mickael.


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an outsider in the inside

© Joselito Briones

as i'm sure you know by now, i'm back. and what time to be here, this place is just full of happenings. on international scale there's the u.s. open (isn't del potro just so cute?), on a more local level there's broadway-on-broadway, and of course there's fashion week in bryant park.

i was difficult to miss the massive tents in the park when i came out of the 7 subway station so i checked it out. at the entrance was a crowd of fashion fans and wannabe's and photographers. i climbed and stood on a podium on the side, but i didn't even bother taking out my own camera as there didn't seem to be anything interesting happening. what did catch my eye was an old man in a blue jacket who was just taking pictures in the perimeter of the crowd, generally ignored. i watched him for a while and saw how smoothly he navigated the crowd, his quick scan of everything around him, taking pictures of what seemed to be nothing in particular (he was in general looking below eye level, so it was obvious he was not interested in taking photos of faces). when i saw him load and reload his camera with an old-fashioned film roll, i took out my camera, took photos of him (circled, above) climbed down the podium, and followed him :)



© Joselito Briones

it was just amazing how fast he looked at things, decisively taking pictures of the few things that interested him, but quickly dismissing everything else. it was clear that the man has been doing this forever. i pictured myself doing the same when i get older :) there's this man who clearly could be someplace comfortable taking it easy and yet his passion brought him here.



© Joselito Briones

the more i followed him tho, it became clear that "becoming like him" is something one can only dream of. the man went up the stairs, was greeted and waved through by the event guards, and entered the tents. without showing an i.d., or badge, or an invitation that was required of everybody else. when he came out it was with people who seemed to be v.i.p.'s of the event (points to you if you can identify whom he's being chummy with in the photo above).

having taken numerous photos of him, i asked one of the guards who he is, and was told that he's a new york times photographer who regularly does a fashion feature. when i got back to jane's here in jackson heights the first thing i did was google him.

BILL CUNNINGHAM.


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markus pimping his watch

screenshot of madetobeunique's design

a photo i did of markus was used in this online bling store.


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Coordinated

>

take 2 - i don't know what happened this time, the photo got posted but not the text that i wrote with it.

we met up with the jonescheits tonight and it was the cutest thing that they showed up clothes coordinated - jeans and white shirt and khaki jacket and summer coat. zoë also had a hairpin on her barely-there hair :) the photo, again was taken by the iphone. i'd have taken a proper photo too, only it was already getting dark when we met up that i didn't even bother bringing a proper camera.


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Luisenpark

>
Luisenpark is in mannheim. We're here until friday, then off to
stuttgart to attend frieder's wedding.
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me and my mini wini

© Joselito Briones

this week is junk food week. why? because. :)

i decided to eat whatever's on the shelves and in the fridge - i find that often i buy things and they end up expired and uneaten. this is food storage purge week. two days ago i had nacho chips for breakfast. and two boiled corn cobs for lunch. also, as the idea is to not go to the grocery to buy stuff while there's plenty of edible stuff at home, i've also been munching on kellogs honey nut cereal without milk (soya milk usually), for dinner. cantuccini and marinated herring for lunch.

the champ tho has been the miniwini's. they're just so lovely and uncomplicated. they're right up there with cheez whiz and spam. they're tiny wieners basically (hence the name), extra crunchy skin, and can be eaten straight from the jar.


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happy hour

© Joselito Briones

this is a stillframe from one of the videos that i've been working on, taken last tuesday, in the dining room that i made up to look like an office space. it's supposed to be friday afternoon happy hour at work, of course - and anyway the beer i gave them is alcohol-free.

i managed to upload a few of them already, but they won't get inspected until after about a month.

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yashica in veronica

katja was sooo kind to alert me on this use of one of my photos, in the popular dutch tv magazine "veronica". this one was taken in brooklyn late last year, the model is yashica.


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the latest harry potter movie - rather boring and uneventful that i'm just putting the whole blog entry in the title field.

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new shoot

© Joselito Briones

i did a shoot today with joel and (mostly) a friend of his, dan (photo, above), a language teacher from L.A. so far i've been lucky this summer to work with nice guys. and so far they all fit in my clothes that no expensive purchase of wardrobe for the shoots has been necessary.

today's shoot was also a challenge. i've pretty much covered the dress-up kind (for now) so i thought i'd do something more stocky. guys at work, working and doing other stuff. that's not the challenging part tho, they both did well and were very professional - it's the dressing up of the set that killed me. it's a short-notice shoot, so there was no time to scout for a real office location (and it's not like i can afford to rent one right now), so i made one up at home. the home office we have is kinda all over the place and not very photogenic (because it's a real working office - ha!) so i decided to dress up the dining area to make it look like an office. it took me all day yesterday, until the wee hours of the morning, to redress the space and i think it did look like a genuine office in the end. i haven't got the energy anymore to put it back to how it was after the shoot, so i'm spending all day tomorrow to do just that (sooo not looking forward to it).

is it worth it? that i saw it was possible (i knew it was possible, of course - just had to actually see it) was good. photography/stock wise probably not. i spent way too much time arranging the set that by the time it was time to shoot i was exhausted and with very little sleep. i ended up shooting only a small variety of set-ups, and in most cases my eyes were too tired to be sharply focusing on what i was doing. i think i'm too old to be doing the one-man-kick-all (to borrow a chinese expression) kind of thing. i don't really have any choice tho. it's not like i'm getting enough from stock photography to afford hiring a team. i did that a few months ago in miami and, well, my projection based on my average sales for those photos is that it's gonna take me at least a year to recover the money i spent on the shoots - hopefully they'll get downloaded beyond their first year so i can get something for my time and effort. it's always been comforting to think that i'm enjoying the challenge and getting whatever fun i get out of it, but to think of it in practical terms (as stock photographers were advised, soundly, at one point - to think of it as a business decision) - it really is downright depressing.


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infectious drive

© Joselito Briones

more photo of Joel. i didn't really have anything in mind for the kind of photos to take of him, but he seemed determined to do a shoot, his drive kinda infectious. besides it's not like i'm busy doing much else.

yesterday i finally got enough of the same drive to travel all the way across the street to the doctor's office. mati's been constantly reminding me that i have to go get some vaccinations, can't remember what kind, it's all written in the yellow card that all germans keep with them, and i've since been issued one from autumn last year when i got myself a flu vaccination. anyway, doctor said i don't need anything right now, and to come back after september, when it's time to get another flu shot. not to waste the energy i spent getting out of the apartment, crossing the street, and going up the elevator to his clinic, i asked him if i could use his office as a photoshoot background, to which he said he doesn't mind, but not now. come back after september. what is it with this doctor and after september? downstairs from the doctor's clinic is a drugstore. well i was already there so i thought i might as well ask them about using their place of business as a photoshoot set, too. the owner was reluctant (she seemed shy, if anything) so i left her my card and asked that she think about it.


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catalog photos, iphone delivery

© Joselito Briones

i've finished some of the photos from the shoot with louis. basically i tried to make them as simple as possible and catalog-like, with blank (so whoever downloads the photos can put their own design) and plain-colored t-shirts and mix-and-match clothing items.


***
the postman's ringing of the doorbell woke me up today. i had to hurry up to put something on (not easy when you're still half asleep) because they usually leave in about half a minute after ringing the bell. he's here to deliver the new iphone - mati's gonna use it and i'll be using mati's, but it's registered under my name, so he asked for my i.d. i couldn't be arsed to look for my passport, so i showed him my nyc driver's license which was just in my wallet, in my pocket. he looked at it for sometime, then said it won't do (you'd think once he saw that it's a driver's license and if a license won't do, that he'd just straight away say that no, he has to see the passport - but no, he scrutinized the license). he asked to see my passport. so. fine. still half-asleep i rummaged through my drawers to find it. couldn't find it for sometime so i phoned mati to ask if he's seen it, but couldn't reach him. all this time the postman was scanning and rescanning the package (maybe he's hoping to get different results each time). finally i found my passport and handed it to him. he actually read through all the pages - when all he had to do is look at the first page where my info is. after a while he said, "your name in passport is (first name + middle name + last name), the iphone order is for (first name + last name), sorry you'll have to reorder". at which point i really can't be bothered anymore, so i said ok. he just stood there tho, like he's expecting me to argue with him or something. i mean what more does he want? that i produce another passport that satisfies his requirement? he just stood there. i didn't want to close the door on him so i just started to walk away, giving him a chance to re-scan the package if he wished, at which point he saw that i wanted nothing to do with him anymore, so he left. i closed the door and went back to bed.


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