Author: shawnmeanders

This article was written January 2-4, 2024

For day 29, I went for a walk in the city during the afternoon. I had to run an errand, so I figured I should use the travel time to take pictures. However, there were a lot of duds on that day.

Buildings

Prompted by my previous day’s venture, I was interested in taking more pictures of buildings.

I think some of these aren’t too bad, although I think I should have focused on the aperture instead of the shutter speed, maybe using f/8.0 or f/11.0. There was no reason to go for f/4.0 or f/5.6 here, since nothing needed to be “isolated”.
Otherwise, I think these aren’t too bad, albeit maybe a bit bland. I will say that I much prefer the darker exposure on these, making them feel a little more ominous against the looming gray sky.

I think this picture showcases an interesting aspect of framing I should take into consideration from now on. This specific picture doesn’t look “straight” to me, it looks askew. However, there are some elements that do appear fairly straight, such as the signs on the left. Then, why does this look so askew? I think it has to do with the “focus” of the picture (the central element). The thing that’s meant to draw the eye here would be the building in the back, taking center-place. And this building is not framed at a straight angle.

With this picture I tried to capture multiple buildings. However, I think I over-committed on the building in the top-left. Because it’s along an edge instead of the center, the top of the frame feels rather empty, with the sky taking most of the top-right. (And I didn’t even fully capture the building in question). I think there are two things I could have taken tried to improve this one:

• Framed the picture differently so that the building is in the center.
• Zoomed in a bit and lower the angle, such that the frame contains less of the sky. It’s ok to only partially capture the building (especially while in the background) and leave its potential height to the imagination.

There’s a lot I really like in this picture. I enjoy the reflections of another building, along with the exposure of the gray sky, granting this picture a darker atmosphere. However, while I thought I’d like the trees in this one, I’m not convinced about their role here, especially with their exposure. I’m also not sure about the framing itself. Despite how much I like this gray sky, I’m skeptical about its position in relation to the other elements. It might be worth trying to crop this image and see what can come out of it (In particular, the bottom and the left side are ripe for a good crop). Maybe the sky would feel better then, its proportion within the overall picture modified.

In person, I thought this one might be special, since the color of the building seemed such an interesting shade. However, the framing is not great, and once again, this gray sky is a little too bright. Also, that lamppost on the left really should be there, and I likely could have gotten rid of it simply by moving a little bit. It might be possible to rescue it with post-processing and cropping, but I haven’t started dabbling with those yet.

I think this one isn’t too bad, and I’m somewhat happy with the end result. I think the banners on the left make it look like an old webpage, with ad-banners and pop-up ads. It’s a different aesthetic, and I enjoy that.

I think these two pictures help showcase that sometimes, less is more. Despite the fact that the second picture technically contains the interesting aspects of the first one, I think the first one works much better. The side that’s not lit by incandescent lights feels very bland in comparison, and takes a bigger portion of the picture. Meanwhile, the first picture is very focused on that specific part of the building, and the atmosphere it provides. The bright pastel colors being de-saturated and the orange tint on the intermediate floors gives this what I consider an interesting vibe. My only gripe is, as usual, with the lights that are captured as part of the picture.

Reflections

I really enjoy this picture, though that’s in part because I find reflections in photographs rather interesting. I think the focus is reasonable, and I particularly like how the windows break the reflection and make it a little distorted. I also find that the bottom of the building brings an interesting contrast here. If there’s one thing I would change, it would probably be to remove the overexposed gray sky from the background.

There are a few things I enjoy about this picture. The reflection is really nice and highlights a dark evening. I also enjoy transition between the reflection and the office, which a gradual dimming of the reflection in favor of the indoor brightness. However, I do think the lights were overexposed here. I also probably should have tried to move aside and reframe this picture a bit in order to avoid some of those lights.

Figurines

At the end of the day, I saw a display of figurines for a creative composition. I figured that would make for great subjects. However, I unfortunately rushed through it, and thus, a lot of the pictures were duds, whether from the poor lighting, terrible focus, exposure issues, or just dirty tables. Here are some of the ones I liked.

I found this little one very cute and festive. I think there’s reasonable focus on the figurine, and the background is adequately unfocused. However, the background is uninteresting, yet draws attention away from the figurine. Maybe I should have carried a blank sheet of black paper with me to serve as a supplemental background (Although whether it would have been acceptable to do so in this scenario is questionable).

Let’s continue with this one, not because I particularly like it over the others, but because of the lighting. While the figurine itself might feel a little underexposed (although it still has decent contrast), I like how little the background is present, and how it affects this picture. It looks like a toy left in a somewhat dark room.

I really enjoy this guy, and the pose from the side gives me strong vibes of the “cool (anti-)hero” in video games or cartoons/anime, especially in the 90s. I also enjoy how much of a difference the two angles make, despite the fact the figurine itself did not change.

Another figurine I really enjoyed, the outside appearance reminiscent to a mythical Chinese creature, blended into a costume for this human character, and that confident/cocky smile. Great style! Once again, I’m happy with the differences the two angles bring to this picture. I also enjoy the reflection on the surface of the figurine’s stand.

Favorite Picture of the Day

Yup, on this day, the big reflection takes the cake, although one of the figurines got really close to getting the top spot.

Dishonorable Mentions

While successes are important, I think failures are equally, if not more, important when it comes to learning and progressing. Thus, here are some of the underwhelming pictures I took. Enjoy.

Nature in the City

While walking in the streets, I stumbled upon a nice area where there were a lot of trees in close proximity of buildings, and I liked this contrast. However, in most of these pictures, the plants aren’t really sharp, which diminishes the results. Also, the gray sky offers a really poor background here.

I think these two pictures suffer from my main issue in this section, a lack of sharpness in the vegetation. And it’s pretty disheartening! I think the framing here was pretty good, and I like how the building creeps up in the background. As a smaller-sized picture, I think it isn’t too bad, but the second you try to look closer, the sharpness takes away from these pictures.
*As an aside, you might notice that the second picture is less exposed than the first one, and might be wondering why. Looking at the numbers, I believe I realized that my shutter-speed wasn’t on a full-stop, but a half-stop (1/180sec instead of either 1/125sec or 1/250sec). Since I’m trying to limit myself to full-stops (at least at my current stage of learning), I probably opted to fix the shutter-speed, and go for under-exposure as opposed to over-exposure, thus lowering it to 1/250sec.

The exposure of the first picture isn’t too bad, although there’s a very bright electronic board at the bottom right. However, there is a definite issue with the sharpness of the trees. I think the first reason for this is my point of focus, it seems like I’m focus on the foreground and the street lights. Moreover, for some reasons, I was focusing on the shutter speed instead of the aperture, for no good reason. It’s not like there’s any important movement in the picture that I’d want to freeze, and even if there was wind, it wouldn’t be that bad. I should probably have gone for an aperture size of f1/8.0 or f1/11.0 instead, and adjusted the shutter speed accordingly.
The second picture, however, takes the cake. For some reason, I both increased the aperture size by half a stop, and lowered the shutter speed by a full stop. This means I increased the exposure by a stop and a half! When the exposure was already pretty good. And on top of the overexposure, the focus is pretty bad, with everything you’d want to pay attention to blurry.

Here, I spotted a nice bright-colored pattern on a building, juxtaposed with dark-green trees, and thought it might make for an interesting contrast. Unfortunately, it seems to really fall flat. I think part of it is the fact that I tried to fully capture the building and the trees, simultaneously capturing the gray sky. It might have worked much better with a blue sky providing an extra bright color. The other reason I believe this might be falling flat is that there’s nothing to draw the eyes to the contrast. There’s a building, and it’s partially obscured by trees. Maybe if I’d zoomed much more, losing the context of the building and the tree, things would have appeared more appealing visually.

If it weren’t for the overly bright cloudy sky, these two pictures wouldn’t look too bad as thumbnails. However, once you make them bigger, the lack of sharpness comes back in full swing, and negatively affects these pictures.

Once again, the tree isn’t sharp at all (Which is likely partially to blame on the extremely high ISO), and doesn’t look lively. However, in this case, I think it could have worked. It has a role to play in this context, juxtaposing a surreal feeling of nature with the busy life of the city. I also really enjoy the reflection effect from the windows on the right, and the people relaxing at the bottom, somewhat pushing the narrative of the nature helping escape the business of modern life.
However, while I did adjust the exposure between shots, and I think the second one is decent for the tree and the building on the right, the left building had way too much light coming from it, and is way over exposed. There’s also a similar issue with the ground-floor room on the right. Ideally, I could and should have fixed this by changing angles, moving aside and trying to frame the tree against a single building.

Amongst all of these pictures of nature juxtaposed against the city, I think the first one here has the most potential. The lack of sharpness from the trees in this frame, along with the distant building in the fog, play well against this city street. However, I think that a lower shutter speed might actually have been better here, giving the flag a sense of movement. Unfortunately, the street itself has a lot of noise, likely due to my use of ISO 6400, which I think is ridiculously high for daytime photography.
Between these two pictures, I honestly think I prefer the first one, and I think it’s important to look into it and try to figure out why. The first reason, I think, is that the second picture is too empty. The gray sky has too big of a presence. Next, I also think the building being closer to the center of the frame (yet still being on the left side, representing the “back” of this picture) helps focus things. Finally, as stated above, I do think the lack of sharpness in the first picture gives it a certain style and helps create a more significant contrast. On the second pictures, the trees are a little sharper, but not that sharp, and don’t look alive.

I took a lot more such pictures, but I think this should be sufficient to illustrate my points. I should probably eventually conduct more experiments to determine the real cause of these issues:

• A lack of proper focus with the lens?
• Too high of an ISO? (At least for my sensor)
• The aperture size used?
• The presence of a gray sky?
• The foggy air?

Exposure issues

I think these two images are perfect to showcase one of the woes I’ve had with exposure. In the first image, the top half of the picture, with the sky and the buildings, seem to have a reasonable exposure. However, the trees are definitely underexposed. Meanwhile, in the second picture, the trees have a good exposure, but the buildings and sky are overexposed.
One of the potential solutions for this would be, I believe, to use a graduated ND filter. However, I currently do not have one, and it seems like they might be expensive, so I likely won’t be getting one any time soon.

Here’s another example of this issue. I only changed the exposition by a full-stop (in this case the shutter speed). The trees and the building/sky can’t seem to simultaneously be properly exposed. While it’s not as drastic as the previous case, it’s still fairly bad. Unfortunately, due to the placement of the different elements, this isn’t something I could as easily fix with a graduated ND filter. Biting the bullet and accepting to use half-stops or third-stops might make it slightly more balanced, though it clearly wouldn’t fully fix it.

This article was written December 30/31 2023
While this post is for the 28th day, it is actually the first post I wrote.

For day 28, it was already 7pm when I decided to take pictures. Thus, it was already dark, so I decided to go back to a mall where I’d taken pictures on Day 03. However, as I was walking outside, I got distracted by a few Christmas decorations, and ended up only taking outdoor pictures instead.

Static Illuminated Buildings

To start with, a few pictures of illuminated buildings:

The first thing to notice about both of these images is that I had to use an extremely high ISO: 12800. My camera actually doesn’t offer it by default (I had to go through the settings to enable it). And despite this ISO, I still had to use a small aperture of f/5.6, and a fairly low (at least when not using a tripod) shutter speed (1/60sec). This is one of my main main challenges when taking pictures after dark, I either need to use a tripod for very low shutter speeds, or have more limited options.

Next, you might also notice that these images have a grainy texture to them. That seems to be fairly common with dark pictures on this camera. I have yet to determine whether it’s related to the high ISO, the camera’s sensor itself, or a property of such photographs (Although I have read that more modern cameras have lower noise on high ISO). This grainy texture will definitely be a common theme for this day.

Moving Traffic Against Static Building

I also tried to play with a lower shutter speed, capturing both a static background and some moving traffic. The lowest I was willing to go without a tripod (for this shot) was 1/30sec, so I went for this, and adjusted my ISO to be a little lower.

For the first two, I used an aperture of f/5.6, whereas for the last one, I tried an aperture of f/8.0, a “who cares” aperture as per Bryan Peterson in his book Understanding Exposure. Unfortunately, everything looks a little darker in this one, so I wonder if it might be underexposed (Although it could also be a matter of post-processing, which I haven’t started digging into yet). As is, I think my favorite is the second one, with the captured motion of the motorcycle, and the reflections in the mall’s glass windows. However, I do wish I would have captured more traffic, or maybe even had my tripod to get a longer exposure, maybe as high as 1sec.

Distant Buildings in the Dark

The highlight of this evening might have been to take pictures of buildings in the dark. Not something I’ve done much of before, in part due to the need for a slower shutter speed, and I tend to not be the steadiest of person. However, while I usually struggle at 1/30sec with my 18-55mm lens, it seemed to go fine this time.

Here, we can see a progression of clarity as I played with the ISO and the shutter speed. I did decide to hold an aperture of f/8.0 though. I’m relatively happy with the exposure of the last picture, although I’m not sure about the framing of the other two rooftops at the bottom. I was hoping it would make for an entertaining foreground, but I’m not convinced with the result.

Next, I captured these twin buildings.

With this second picture, I was hoping that adding the top of the other building with the tree would help bring some good contrast, but I honestly think the first one works much better. The focus is clear, and there’s a grandeur to it. While the framing isn’t perfect (With that other cropped building to the right), I do like the color of the sky in the background.
Meanwhile, the second picture has a bunch of glare from different light sources, along with a surreal one on the top right corner.

An extra burst of buildings. This time, I’ll skip the gradual exposure attempts.

For both of these pictures, I used a shutter speed of 1/15sec. I’m honestly shocked they came out as sharp as they did with such a slow shutter speed. My main complaint with both are the bright lights in some locations. For the first picture, I think if I’d framed it slightly higher, such that the bottom light wasn’t present, it would have been a much better picture (Cropping might yet save it).
For the second picture, I also tried to use an ISO of 6400 instead of 12800 to see if that would affect the graininess. I honestly cannot notice a difference. Otherwise, I think the building is unfortunately simultaneously too bright and too dark. The lights on the side are overexposed, and the front of the building is, in some places, underexposed. I think having a sensor that can handle more full-stops might be what I need to make such pictures viable.

This one is ok, but I do have a few qualms with it. Obviously, the lights at the top gave me some exposure grief. But I think my biggest concern is the asymmetry between both sides, especially apparent at the bottom of the picture. And while the viewfinder having a 95% coverage does complicate framing ever-so-slightly, this can still be double-checked on the display after taking a picture.
One unexpected aspect of the picture I enjoy are the contrasts between different levels being either lighted or not. I especially enjoy the one with the plants on it.

There are two differences between these pictures:

• The framing
• The Exposure exchanged Shutter Speed for ISO, keeping the same “light meter” reading (Both were changed by one full f-stop)

First, regarding the change in ISO, I now notice a clear difference in graininess, ISO 12800 definitely feels grainier here. Thus, I might need to start looking into using a smaller ISO when taking pictures at night, possibly carrying my tripod more often (although that’s quite the chore).

Next, regarding the framing. While I thought it would feel “cleaner” to align the building roughly with the frame of the picture in the second one, I think I prefer the first picture. There’s a better sense of symmetry, and the continuous sky helps elevate the sensation of vertigo, enhancing the perspective.

Decorations

These Christmas decorations looked cute, so I wanted to shoot them. Unfortunately, while in person they were nice looking, I don’t think the venue was conducive to good pictures, at least from this angle. The windows showing the inside of the building are a little underwhelming, and this background wall is a little drab when contrasted with such decorations. Everything else is also too bright to allow the decorations to shine through. There might be a way to deal with it for the photographer, but unfortunately, I currently cannot manage it.

I decided to try to isolate the reindeer, which I kind of like. Unfortunately, some of the problems are still present. I should probably have tried to take the picture from a higher angle, such that the window wouldn’t be in the frame.

I kind of like the charm of the first two pictures, where the background is almost completely dark, with just some very dark patterns in the background. However, not as much of a fan of the last two, where the background starts appearing, although it kind of still works. On the last one, however, I think the flare on the lights is becoming a little too distracting.

On these pictures, I tried to see the difference using the flash would make. I personally don’t like it at all with these light decorations. I think it completely ruins their magic. If I wanted them to have a brighter background, I should have gone for a longer exposure instead. (I really should have brought my tripod)

First of all, I’d like to point out that the last three pictures I took were all blurry. Just a reminder that sometimes, you get so focused on something that you miss out on the most important of details. I focused so much on the exposure that I missed something as simple as the focus.
Next, while the first picture might be considered less well exposed than the other ones, I think it’s still my favorite of the bunch. I think exposing for the street here is wrong. My impression is that a much darker street makes the decorations stand out more, which should definitely be my goal here. (Although I’m sure that’s something I could fix in post-processing with the other pictures). It’s also, for some reason, the picture I feel is best framed amongst the bunch. The only thing I would consider fixing on this picture would be to crop out the top of it, removing a chunk of the dark sky and the street lamp on the right. Although even then, I think I still enjoy the presence of this dark sky, showing how this warmth “pierces through the cold night”.

I kind of like this picture. I’m happy with the framing and relatively happy with the exposure. My main complaints would be:

• I think the focus isn’t that great, although that could be a personal stabilization issue, considering this was at a 1/30sec shutter speed. I probably should have used a larger aperture as well, either f/8 or f/11 (If I could afford to do it).
• The warmth of the picture changes from the left to the right, with the right side being colder. Maybe I should have used the Tungsten white balance instead of cloudy, though apparently that can be fixed in post-processing.
• That sign above the main reindeer is a little distracting, although at least it isn’t extremely overexposed.

Low traffic

For these pictures, we can see a progression towards the kind of effect I was looking for. On the first picture, I was not impressed with the exposure, so I adjusted it.

From the second picture onward, I’m generally happy with the exposure. I really like the effect it has on the trees for instance. Obviously, I’m disappointed about the store-fronts, but I’m a little limited on that front currently.

Then, from the second to the third picture, I kept the same level of exposure, but lowered the shutter speed (adjusting both the shutter speed and ISO by a full f-stop). The effect of movement from the vehicles is much more pronounced and satisfying now.

Finally, the third picture was poorly timed, with the moving vehicle barely in frame, whereas the last picture has it properly in the foreground.

Busy Street

Here, we have a busy street that I wanted to capture, to show the liveliness of Taipei. (An annoyance with these pictures is that I went in and manually tried to crop out license plates).

The first picture feels a little overexposed, which is fixed on subsequent pictures. Meanwhile, I was trying something “innovative” with the second picture, but that fell flat. I wanted to capture less of the immediate street, and more of the storefront and buildings. Unfortunately, that wasn’t really a good option considering the contrast in brightness.

I think my favorite of these is the fourth picture (the penultimate one). The traffic feels more linear and directed on this one. In the third picture, the scooter in the foreground, and the distance in traffic, break that continuity. Meanwhile, in the last picture, the foreground feels too vacant. I really feel like the fourth picture strikes a nice balance here.

Food

Finally, a few food-related pictures, from a street vendor selling duck. For our vegetarian and vegan friends, I apologize and suggest scrolling ahead.

While I didn’t add them here, a lot of my pictures had a focus issue. I think part of this is excitedly trying to get action live, and also the use of f/5.6 aperture. I should probably have gone for f/8.0 or f/11.0.

Now, the pictures I actually kept. First, I’m really happy with the pictures of the hanging ducks. I think there’s a really nice contrast and reflection to it, and the warmth is really nice. Though I definitely prefer the first of the two pictures.

The two pictures where the duck is being blow-torched are decent, though I think the second one is better exposed. I do like how the details of the flame are present here, in different colors. It might be worth cropping the second one to only show the duck and the flames.

The first picture is fairly standard with a clear framing. It might still be worth cropping it to drop unimportant details. As for the second picture, I feel like there’s too much verticality to it, both elements of focus being too spread apart. It’s also not really meant to exist in a vacuum, but as part of a continuation with the previous images, creating a “story”. But for any of you who enjoy this kind of food, I hope it’s making you hungry.

A final note about these picture, they do have an orange tint to them, likely due to the kind of White Balance I used. I personally like it, especially on the hanging ducks pictures. However, it might be more professional to change it, which should be doable in post-processing.

Favorite Picture of the Day

Amongst all of the pictures I’ve taken on this day, I think the above one might be my favorite. It might not be the best objectively or from a technical point of view, but I think it has a sense of serenity to it that I really enjoy.

Dishonorable Mentions

While successes are important, I think failures are equally, if not more, important when it comes to learning and progressing. Thus, here are some of the underwhelming pictures I took. Enjoy.

Illuminated trees

Around the beginning, there were a few illuminated trees I tried to photograph. Unfortunately, trying not to have their lights overexposed meant the trees they were attached to were underexposed, giving a less than desirable result.

The exposure on this one is awful. The trees are underexposed, and the background light is overexposed. Overall, fairly disappointing.

In this photo, the trees are once again underexposed, the starbucks logo overexposed, and the framing is bad. The left half of the frame serves no purpose.

This is probably the best picture of the bunch. The restaurant feels warm and the lights on the trees offer an interesting contrast. The main issue is with the framing. It should be more focused on the restaurant.

It seems like I noticed the framing issues and tried to adjust by going vertical. Unfortunately, even here there are framing issues. I should have pointed a little more to the left (Both to capture more of the window, and avoid the sign on the right), and the top part of the picture serves no purpose, distracting from the overall picture. Though I suppose this part could always be cropped.

This one has, in my opinion, too may bright spots to draw your attention, and yet a huge dark spot around the top. The street lamp is also undesirable. The framing should probably be more focused on the trees themselves, but even then, there are some overexposed lights behind the trees.

On this one, my timing with the lights was awful. These are dynamic lights meant to represent movement, and thus aren’t always on. Despite the 1/30sec shutter speed, I managed to barely get any light from them. But it’s an important reminder of the importance of timing with a picture.

This one once again had issues with overexposure, especially with the cars and storefronts. Too much bright light. However, the trees themselves have a nice exposure.

And the final picture of those illuminated trees. It’s a shame, this one has blur issues, because otherwise I think there’s a lot of good going for it. Though once again, there are a lot of bright spots.

And with this, I didn’t manage to get any picture of those trees that I was satisfied with.

Street Traffic

These pictures have clear light flares, which is not that great, but does give it a nightly-style. The first one in particular, with moving heads in the foreground has an interesting look to it. However, the framing isn’t great. There’s too much emptiness from the sky and dark buildings. And somehow, on that last picture, I decided to double down on it, presumably to give it a sense of grandeur. While it doesn’t work that well, I will admit that doubling down on it lends a better result, since there’s a clear purpose to that “emptiness”, now taking most of the picture, instead of just drawing the eye away. Proportions definitely have an impact on intent.

Traffic against distant building

First of all, let’s start with the first picture. It is clearly askew, which was somewhat corrected in the next two pictures. While holding the camera for a shot, I sometimes find it difficult to evaluate the angle, especially when going for a portrait orientation.
Beyond that, the exposure for this one is wrong. Not so much because a perfect exposure would exist, but the darker parts of the picture seem under-exposed, and the street itself has lights that are overexposed. Whereas for the car lights and street lamps, this feels almost artistic (a tad less exposed would be almost perfect), for the store fronts it feels all wrong. Unfortunately, I think I would need either a camera with a sensor offering a better dynamic range, or possibly a graduated ND filter, which would allow less light to go for some parts of the image, and not for others, hopefully resulting in a more even exposure. (My understanding is that this type of filter is usually used to help exposure when a bright sky is part of the photo, compensating for it’s added brightness. However, I don’t see why it couldn’t be used for the opposite effect, such as for this sort of picture.)

Building with tree

I think there’s a lot wrong with this picture. Everything is out of focus and the tree isn’t sharp. The lighting of the tree is also off. But if I’d zoomed in a little more to avoid the weird lighting of the tree, and properly focused on the building, I think this could have had potential.