Barrenjoey Lighthouse, NSW

At the end of September 2013, we watch on the news as fire broke out at the Barrenjoey Headland in the northern beaches of Sydney. For those not familiar with this area, the beach and the lighthouse doubles as a Summer Bay in the popular Australian TV series, Home and Away.

One week later, we visited the site to witness the aftermath of the fire. It is amazing that the lighthouse and cottages remain intact while the bushland around it was ravaged. Here is the link to the ABC site for some photos during the fire outbreak.

Here are some photos I took using the Nokia Lumia 920.

The National Park rangers and volunteers are looking for volunteers to assist at the end of October beginning of November 2013. If you're in the area or want to volunteer, please contact the rangers.

Photos from Bathurst

These are some photos taken at Bathurst, NSW. I am very impressed with the clarity and detail captured by the Nokia Lumia 920.

Shark beach, Nielsen Park, Sydney Australia

WP 20130120 001 from pureviewphotography on Vimeo.

It always amazes me our beach culture. On an overcast day, there are still people at the beach.

TIP: Mastering exposure compensation

One of the coolest feature of a windows phone is the ability to change settings. You can change a whole host of features including:

• Scenes
• ISO
• Exposure value (EV)
• White Balance
• Aspect Ratio
• Focus Assist.

A setting you should get use to playing with is the exposure value (EV). This setting allows you to compensate for difficult exposure condition.

Exposure compensation allows you to fine tune your camera's metering system.

When you take a photo, the camera sets the shutter speed based on the aperture and metering system.

The metering system of a camera can be tricked under two types of conditions.

The first is in a scene with the majority of it being black. Good examples include a portraits where the subject wears black. The camera would over exposure this scene as the camera increases the exposure to make the scene neutral grey.

The second type of scene is with the majority of it is white. White wedding dresses often cause underexposure of the image as the camera tries to make it neutral grey.

Exposure compensation addresses this issue by forcing the camera to decrease or increase an exposure value (EV). +/-1 EV is one exposure stop (+/-). e.g. If EV0 (the default exposure calculated by the camera) is 1/20s, EV1 forces the exposure to be 1/10 (1-stop slower). On the opposite end EV-1 forces the exposure to be 1/40s (1-stop quicker).

On a recent trip to Jenolan caves, the default metering would result in overexposure. This is due to the white subject matter and the lights used to light a cave feature. To compensate, I set the exposure value to -2.0 EV, to compensate. The result is shown below.

EV0 the default camera exposure blows out all the detail in the minaret. EV of -2.0 preserves the detail and results in the correct exposure for the scene. 

TIP: Autofocus

There are two ways to engage the autofocus (AF) on a windows phone device. You can either:

1. Use the shutter release button. Press the shutter half-way. This will utilise the center AF area. Once on focus you will hear a beep to indicate that you can reframe your shot. The press down on the shutter button to take the shot.
2. Tap on the subject you want to focus on. This will cause the camera phone to utilise a smaller AF area. It also takes the shot once focusing is complete.

One thing I have noticed with the AF system is that the tap to autofocus is much less reliable than the shutter button method. Here are two shots taken at the same time. You can clearly see the difference.

Tap AF used to take this frame. The focus point was the eyes.

Center AF used to focus. Once focused the frame was composed and shot taken.

100% crops comparing the two AF modes.

Sometimes it is about the camera!

I obtained the yellow Nokia Lumia 920 as soon as it was released in Australia. Prior to this, I owned an Android based phone which at the time of purchasing was one of the phones with the highest mega pixels rating at 8 mega pixels. This was at a time when most phones were at 5 mega pixels.

Choosing a phone that can capture good quality photos is important to me. Because let's face it, sometimes it is about the camera!

My two main reasons: family and travelling.

 My phone doesn't just allow me to communicate with my family and friends. The visual quality and richness in my interactions through video-calling, MMS texting and posting photos to share is important. The ability to instantly share a moment is important.

I enjoy roadtrips and travelling. Being a solo traveller, I am mindful of the weight I carry around with me. For my recent trip, I purchased a point and shoot camera which has picture quality of a DSLR. While I do own a DSLR, I find that it is not always convenient to carry one around. My phone is always with me.

We have set a challenge for ourselves to bring forward the idea that Nokia Lumia 920 phone camera has a place in photography, mindful of it's limitations, but also it's place in everyday life. My focus is in the everyday life and how well I can marry up my interest in photography with the one item I carry around with me.

 These were the photos taken last night while walking around the Sydney foreshores.


Taken near my cousins place while walking on the boardwalk. I enjoy the drama in this photo.

Taken looking at the lights on the bridge as Sydney prepares for New Years Eve

Taken near Luna park. Looking at the Bridge and Opera House

 I did wonder when I took this shot whether a tripod for phones would ever become available!

Food and the Nokia Lumia 920

So by now we have seen how the Nokia Lumia 920 measures up against a SLR when it comes to landscape and High Definition Range (HDR) and also as a "point and shoot camera". But how does the Nokia Lumia 920 perform as a camera to capture food? As a lover of cooking and food I am a keen food photographer and have always used a SLR to capture these kind of shots. However, it is not always easy to carry a SLR around to restaurants or eateries. Most foodies or serious food bloggers will indeed use a SLR to capture their shots. This is because they want to capture the essence of a dish or ingredient and be artistic at the same time.

There are a couple of things needed to take good photographs of food:

1. The ability to get close to be able to capture enough detail to highlight the dish/food/ingredient.
2. An eye for detail and angle. What part of the dish is to be the star of the shot?
3. Depth of field.
4. Clarity, sharpness and correct colour output (blurry, discouloured pictures do not do justice to the dish/food/ingredient). The point of food photography is to entice the viewer to try the dish (eating or cooking it). This is clearly seen in most cooking magazines and cookbooks.

I have done some preliminary testing with the Nokia Lumia 920 to see if it can be used to photograph food. Below is an example (with more to come in future posts):

Homemade Vietnamese spring rolls with Nuc Nam dipping sauce.
 

The above shot was edited using the phone's autofix app. A vignette was also added using Thumba Photo Editor and the picture was cropped slightly. The shot is sharp, the colours are vibrant and the phone's F2.0 lens allows for a shallow depth of field showing enough detail to draw the viewer to the focus of the picture, the delicious, golden and crunchy spring roll.

The Nokia Lumia 920 therefore accomplished the mission of food photography = I want to eat the dish photographed!

More to come, stay tuned....