Browsing the archives for the Photography Tips category

Online Camera Shops based in the Philippines

Shopping at online camera stores is a great option for people who are in the market to buy a DSLR or compact camera. Several online camera shops based in the Philippines have sprung up in recent years.

Prices are generally competitive. Many digital cameras and photo accessories cost the same or, at times, cheaper than the camera stores in Hidalgo Quiapo. Definitely, much cheaper than the bloated prices at the malls.

What’s great about these stores is that you can check the current prices instantly. No need to canvass from store to store at Hidalgo. In case you’d want to buy in Hidalgo, at least you already have an idea how much your desired unit costs.

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Landscape Photography Lightroom Preset; My “One Click Fix”

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I’ve always planned on giving photography tips on this blog so as I start, I thought of sharing my simple workflow to come up with nice looking landscape photos. I used to do all my post processing work in Adobe Photoshop but now, I almost entirely use Adobe Lightroom for most of my post processing needs. I only use Photoshop for selected photos because it takes so much time tinkering with its interface. I’ve been there and I understand how daunting Photoshop could be for beginners. At the other end of the spectrum, I just love how easy, fast, and fun it is to edit batches upon batches of photos in Lightroom. It only takes a few clicks to turn my photos into the works that you’ve seen in my blog. If you’ve been curious to know my photography workflow, here’s how I usually do my post processing.

“Before and after” photos of the scenic Capones Island, Zambales using my customized develop preset for Adobe Lightroom

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My First PyroMusical Experience; Fireworks Photography Tips

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5529070031 4b14b3d49f My First PyroMusical Experience; Fireworks Photography Tips

It’s always an exciting endeavor for every photo enthusiast to try shooting the perfect fireworks photos. I’ve had my practice runs every Dinagyang Festival back home in Iloilo, where a big nationwide fireworks display competition is held (that aside from fireworks shows on almost every major celebration). Now it’s time for the big leagues, the most celebrated pyrotechnic competition in the Philippines and among the World’s grandest, the Philippine International PyroMusical Competition 2011 staged at the SM Mall of Asia in Metro Manila.

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Hidalgo St. Quiapo – cheap camera shops in the Philippines

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If you’re wondering where you can buy dSLR cameras and other photographic equipment in the Philippines for the cheapest/lowest prices, then it’s in Hidalgo, Quiapo. I know Hidalgo Quiapo, in general, is notorious as one of Manila’s shabby and crime infested areas (full of pirated CDs/DVDs, counterfeit electronics, snatchers, garbage).

I was surprised myself after finding out that it’s highly recommended by other photographers in the Philippines as a place to find a wider range of photographic/videographic equipment at a cheaper price than in malls. I bought my first camera, a Canon Powershot A700, in Hidalgo Quiapo when I was in college and a Nikon D40 last year.

I have nothing to complain about the quality of my purchases there.

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Easy-to-do and Cheap Paperclip Magnet DIY Photo Wall

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Photographers always have this feeling of exhibiting their photos either for other people or even for their own viewing pleasure. For me sharing my photos is a way of getting my perspective out, and letting other people know more about my life and my perspective. I’ve already done spreading my photos all over the internet and on some print media, and this time, I was thinking of doing something a bit more personal. So I decided to make this cheap and easy-to-do photo wall for my room.

3967816138 58bc9ccb23 Easy to do and Cheap Paperclip Magnet DIY Photo Wall

Photo Wall Ideas

While searching online, I came across two interesting ideas, which included magnets and metals as the core materials. The first one, included painting the wall with a metallic paint and then laying over magnet/s on top of the photos to suspend them. The second used several pieces of colored metallic strings draped across the wall instead of the metallic paint. I scrapped the metallic paint idea since it is quite expensive and labrious to cover a whole wall of metallic paint.

I’m not sure if there are colored strings available in our local hardware/craft stores but the first thing that popped into my head when I started thinking about improvising, is using paper clips. Perfect! because they are cheap and easy to find.

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Adobe Lightroom – Improve your photographs with the touch of a button

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Lightroom is one of my most used tools in my arsenal photo-editing softwares. I’m not the most technical kind of photographer when it comes to taking photos (in-camera), so most of the time, I have to edit the photos I take before uploading them in the internet. At certain times, I have hundreds of photos that I want to upload in a short span of time. Lightroom to saves me a hell of a lot of time and effort unlike editing the photos one by one in photoshop.

Lightroom works like Picasa but is much more powerful. I like that it’s able to edit RAW photos since I now exclusively shoot in RAW format. Another thing I like about Lightroom is that you can apply “preset effects” to a photo, which means you can edit/enhance batches of photos with just one click.

Example

3525666435 9889b5e1fe Adobe Lightroom Improve your photographs with the touch of a button

This is an unedited photo I took during a recent trip to Taklong Island in Guimaras. Due to the undesirable settings I had and the bad lighting conditions, the colors turned out too dull, which doesn’t give justice to the beautiful sight in real life. I wanted to emphasize the vibrant colors of the boat and the scenery so I had to brighten the photo, and increase the saturation and contrast. Though … before achieving the the image I had in my head, I wanted to tryout some other effects. Using the preset option, I came up with these:

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