TRANSITION

Quote:
When I have a camera in my hand, I know no fear.
Alfred Eisenstaedt


Has been a year,just one long and great year for me,,,that i decided after years of procrastination to jump in this enormous world of digital photography.
Last fall i purchased my first digital camera,,a very complicated beauty that open a new crazy world for me.
Ok i went to school with film,i learned to develop in dark room,and whatever was done,was just done,,,
How "lucky" we are now,I been making many mistakes,and then i come to my wonderful lightroom or photoshop and problems solved,,,not that easy but,,,could be worse...
For the past year i been reading,working,learning,reading,and reading...going to conventions,doing webseminars,workshops,,,but i didn't have to relearn my basic and true passion for what i do,SEE THROUGH MY CAMERA.

Visit to the ZOO!!

"Saturate yourself with your subject and the camera will all but take you by the hand.
Margaret Bourke-White




Any day could be a great day,a good or as simple as a day,,,
all depends:the weather humm,,not always;the company ,,maybe,,the place,,probably,or as simple the determination ,the desire to just have a great day,,I WANTED TO have a good one, well guess what i had a wonderful day...i didn't know if i should  take my camera because my 6 years old loves to run around,and is not easy to communicate with my photographs when they are asking me for ice cream or change to feed the giraffes,but I'm glad i did it,,after seeing people around me,,(to many for me,)with their cameras,i though how on earth can I go somewhere with out it?,,so here are some simple pics,,i like them ,do you?

I'm Back!!!

If I didn't have my camera to remind me constantly, I am here to do this, I would eventually have slipped away, I think. I would have forgotten my reason to exist.
Annie Leibovitz

Well I have to say that i have a good reason for been so disconnect to my blog and all my network,I'm back home after having the time of my life with the people I love and the place I belong.
I been living in to many places and every one has been my home;from all of them i have beautiful memories and not enough pictures shame on me,,but this time i connect my camera and heart.
I guess getting to technical is not for me so i will go with the flow and keep learning in the process..

Tengo que decir que tengo una buena razon para no haber publicado nada en mi blog o no estar tan actualizada con este mundo cibernetico.

Ya llegue de nuevo a casa luego de uno de esos viajes que abren las puertas de la inspiracion y como dice mi amigo Cerati "no hay nada mejor que casa",que la gente que uno ama y que la ciudad nos vio nacer.

Siempre he creido en los reencuentros son magicos pero sobre todo cuando en cada instante se sienten ganas de vivir;esta vez conecte mi camara a mi corazon para asegurarme que cada lugar quedara grabado en algo mas que la memoria y asi fue,asi que si hay algo que compartir ahora es lo que me quedo de este viaje...ganas de vivir,de volver,de fotografiar todo lo que da razon para existir...

EFFECTS OF SENSOR SIZE

A thing that you see in my pictures is that I was not afraid to fall in love with these people.
Annie Leibovitz

Effects of sensor size

Almost all digital cameras, and most digital SLRs, have sensors smaller than a 36 mm x 24 mm frame of 35 mm film. This affects aspects of the captured image and the way the camera is used. These effects include:

1. Increased depth of field;
2. Decreased light sensitivity and increased pixel noise;
3. For digital SLRs, cropping of the field of view when using lenses designed for 35 mm camera;
4. Lenses may be smaller because they only need to project their image onto a smaller area;
5. Increased degree of enlargement of the final image.

Depth of field at a given f number increases as the area of film or image sensor decreases. This may have advantages for compact digital cameras intended for taking snapshots; more of the image will be in focus than with a larger sensor and the autofocus system does not need to be as accurate to produce an acceptable image. Photographers often limit depth of field to create certain effects, such as isolating a subject from its background. Cameras with imaging areas smaller than 36 mm x 24 mm require a wider aperture on the lens to achieve the same degree of selective focusing.Depth of field can be minimized by use of large format cameras, which are rarely digital.

Light sensitivity and pixel noise are both related to pixel size, which is in turn related to sensor size and resolution. As the resolution of sensors increase, the size of the individual pixels has to decrease. This smaller pixel size means that each pixel collects less light and the resulting signal ratio must be amplified more to produce the final value. Noise is also amplified and the signal to noise decreases, and the higher noise floor means that less useful information is extracted from the darker parts of the image.

Some digital SLRs use lens mounts originally designed for film cameras. If the camera has a smaller imaging area than the lens' intended film frame, its field of view is cropped. This crop factor is often called a "focal length multiplier" because the effect can be calculated by multiplying the focal length of the lens. For lenses that are not designed for a smaller imaging area whilst using the 35 mm-compatible lens mount, this has the beneficial side effect of only using the centre part of the lens, where the image quality is in some aspects higher. Only expensive digital SLRs and very rarely expensive 'compacts' have 36mm × 24 mm sensors, eliminating depth of field and crop factor problems when compared to 35 mm film cameras.

The smaller sensor size of digital compact cameras means that prints are extreme enlargements of the original image, and that the lens must perform well in order to provide enough resolution to match the tiny pixels on the sensor. Most digital compacts have sensors that exceed the maximum resolution that the lens is capable of delivering. Increased sensor resolution may have affect the image resolution because of increased noise reduction.

LIGHT METERS

A picture must possess a real power to generate light and for a long time now I've been conscious of expressing myself through light or rather in light.
Henri Matisse

I been trying to make this transition with a lot of question,sometimes to many,last week with a couple of friends ,we tried to put some lights together and my mind went blank do I really do the same things i used to?? well the key of reading light in photography makes no difference,the light is the same with digital or film,but here is some info..

The earliest type of light meters were called extinction meters and contained a numbered or lettered row of neutral density filters of increasing density. The photographer would position the meter in front of their subject and note the filter with the greatest density that still allowed incident light to pass through. The letter or number corresponding to the filter was used as an index into a chart of appropriate aperture and shutter speed combination for a given film speed.Extinction meters suffered from the problem that they depended on the light sensitivity of the human eye (which can vary from person to person) and subjective interpretation.

Later meters removed the human element and relied on technologies incorporating selenium,Cds and silicon photo detectors. There are two general types of light meters: reflected-light and incident-light.

Reflected-light meters measure the light reflected by the scene to be photographed. All in-camera meters are reflected-light meters. Reflected-light meters are calibrated to show the appropriate exposure for “average” scenes. .

Incident-light meters which measure the amount of light falling on the subject using an integrating sphere (usually, a translucent hemispherical plastic dome is used to approximate this) placed on top of the light sensor. Because the incident-light reading is independent of the subject's reflectance, it is less likely to lead to incorrect exposures for subjects with unusual average reflectance. Taking an incident-light reading requires placing the meter at the subject's position and pointing it in the general direction of the camera, something not always achievable in practice, e.g., in landscape photography where the subject distance approaches infinity.

Spot metering as the name indicates only reads a small spot or portion of the overall image (usually 1% to 3%). This type of metering is useful in any situation where the lighting is extreme. Backlit subjects, macro shots, or even pictures of the moon can benefit from this type of metering. This type of metering is usually found on the more costly upper end cameras.

THE DIFFERENCE FILM VS DIGITAL

In the old days, if your camera (35mm of course) had a battery die on you in the middle of an important shoot, you still had options. I mean after all; the only thing you needed the battery for was the light meter, it’s not like your whole camera will shut down if you have no battery. Oh, I’m sorry . . . if you are using all digital that might have stung just a little bit.

The point was if your battery died, you still had a way to get a good picture. If you were using 100 speed film you could set your shutter speed to whatever the flash sync speed was (usually 1/60th or 1/125th of a second), set your f-stop to f-16, and bracket every shot. Besides the obvious dependency on batteries, there are other differences between film and digital cameras.
No doubt you heard the phrase: "35mm equivalent". This means that the optics are not exactly the same in a digital camera. Since the 35mm SLR camera has been the standard for so long, that’s what newer cameras are compared to. The difference between the two is a ratio of 1:1.4. Simply put, a 35-200 zoom on a digital camera would be like having a 49-280 zoom lens on a traditional 35mm camera.

The main reason the optics are different is because the sensor (the device that actually reads the light) is also a different size. Film cameras use film (sensitive to light) that is placed directly behind the lens. When the correct exposure is calculated, that image is literately burned into the film. Digital cameras use a sensor; that also sits behind the lens. This sensor is made up of millions of individual points that each represents 1 pixel. Once the sensor has gathered the information for each pixel it transfers that data to a digital media card (which can be used repeatedly.)

The sensor is the physical device that gathers information about the quality of light coming into the camera. The process of "how" the sensor goes about gathering information is referred to as "metering". The human eye can distinguish a range of about 16 different f-stops; camera meters only have a range of about 5 f-stops. This is why camera meters are calibrated for a "mid range" exposure of 18% gray, because 90% of the time that is as close as they can get to the human eye. It’s not the camera’s fault that it can not see as well as you do, it’s simply a fact of life.

A LITTLE BIT OF FUN,WORK,AND PACIENCE

To my husband who showed me how important is to do what you really love!!

Ruido en fotografia digital

“Sólo podemos dar una opinión imparcial sobre las cosas que no nos interesan, sin duda por eso mismo las opiniones imparciales carecen de valor.”

Oscar Wilde

La semana pasada actualize mi blog despues de llegar de un fin de semana en una ciudad llena de todo un poco,de trafico,gente,mucha gente,edificios,arte,restaurantes deliciosos por cierto,y ruido,,y al tomar unas cuantas fotas (como 200) me di cuenta que como enlos viejos tiempos mis fotos cuando carecen de luz o cuando la exposicion es "incorrecta" ,no tienen grano como en film,pero si tienen algo llamado ruido,claro esta que para tener ruido con una buena camara,algunas veces hay que culpar al fotografo jajaja.. Aqui va alguna informacion de ruido y unas fotillos de Chicago!!! Entra en mi pagina de facebook y veras fotos y cuentame si te gustan.

Ruido en la fotografia

El ruido digital es un problema técnico sin resolver en la fotografía digital. Se trata de un efecto comparable al grano en una fotografía analógica o fotoquímica.

Mientras que el grano fue ampliamente utilizado en la fotografía analógica como recurso artístico, en el campo de la fotografía digital es un aspecto discutible.

En situaciones normales, el ruido no suele ser apreciable. Se hace especialmente visible en fotografías oscuras o con un ajuste alto del ISO.

La cantidad de ruido en una fotografía digital depende en gran medida de la calidad de la cámara:

• Tamaño de los fotositos (cada fotosito equivale a un pixel), a menor tamaño mayor ruido. El tamaño de los fotositos depende de la densidad de integración del chip sensor, y/o del tamaño del sensor.
• Calidad de los componentes electrónicos, por ejemplo los conversores analógico-digitales.

Pero también de otros factores externos:

• Tiempo de exposición (fotografía).
• Iluminación insuficiente.
• Ajuste elevado de la sensibilidad (ISO)).
• Temperatura elevada del sensor.
• Gran ampliación de la imagen.
• Motivo.

NOISE AND GRAIN

Quote:
Action is the foundational key to all success.
Pablo Picasso

What is better than a nice trip where you can take your camera and feel like a kid in a candy store???that was my weekend in Chicago,I love buildings,noise,traffic,and art,a lot of art,on the streets ,museums,hotel,people;i took some pics everything in manual with my 35-75 nikon lens,what do you think??
And this is more important photography info:
Noise and grain
Thermal noise, produced by heat and manufacturing defects, degrades shadow areas of electronic images with random pixels of the incorrect colour. Film grain becomes obvious in areas of even and delicate tone. Grain and film sensitivity are linked, with more sensitive films having more obvious grain. Likewise, when used at high sensitivity settings, digital camera images show more image noise than those made at lower sensitivities.

Nearly all digital cameras apply noise reduction to long exposure photographs to counteract thermal noise. For very long exposures, the image sensor must be operated at low temperatures to prevent noise affecting the final image. Film grain is not affected by exposure time, although the apparent speed of the film changes with lengthy exposures, a phenomenon known as reciprocity failure

Digital Vs Pelicula

“Los ideales que iluminan mi camino y una y otra vez me han dado coraje para enfrentar la vida con alegría han sido: la amabilidad, la belleza y la verdad.” Albert Einstein.

Cuando decidi hacer un blog,tenia miles de ideas en la cabeza,asi que empezar por el conflicto me parece lo mas adecuado,,y el mio ha sido el reencuentro con la fotografia. Cuando fui a la Universidad a estudiar fotografia ya habia tenido una leve experiencia en el maravilloso mundo de el cuarto oscuro,y cuando decidi tomar la fotografia en serio y elegirla como mi carrera todo absolutamente todo era analogo,de hecho retocaba las fotos con pequeños marcadores especiales para retocar fotos blanco y negro. No tenia clases de photoshop,o de lightroom y diferencia entre camaras digitales, Y ahora que decido reiniciar mi carrera,Oh sorpresa ,me encuentro que lo poco o mucho que sabia tiene que tomar un nuevo rumbo,y reemplaze mi Nikon 8008,por una D90 que debo admitir es un belleza pero,me ha llevado por caminos de tortura a la hora de identificar el nuevo lenguaje en al fotografia,no se si mas complicado o simple,creo que simplemente diferente;asi que por mi parte seguire con mis dos camaras,mientras comparto lo que he estudiado,leido,y tratado de que me entre en mi cerebro aunque sea por osmosis. Pues aqui algo de informacion: La resolución de una imagen indica cuánto detalle puede observarse en esta. El término es comúnmente utilizado en relación a imágenes de fotografía digital, pero también se utiliza para describir cuán nítida (como antónimo de granular) es una imagen de fotografía convencional (o fotografía química). Tener mayor resolución se traduce en obtener una imagen con más detalle o calidad visual. Para las imágenes digitales almacenadas como mapa de bits, la convención es describir la resolución de la imagen con dos números enteros, donde el primero es la cantidad de filas de píxeles (cuántos píxeles tiene la imagen a lo ancho) y el segundo es la cantidad de filas de píxeles (cuántos píxeles tiene la imagen a lo alto). Es bueno señalar que si la imagen aparece como granular se le da el nombre de pixeleada ó pixelosa. La convención que le sigue en popularidad es describir el número total de píxeles en la imagen (usualmente expresado como la cantidad de megapíxeles), que puede ser calculado multiplicando la cantidad de columnas de píxeles por la cantidad de filas de píxeles. A continuación se presenta una ilustración sobre cómo se vería la misma imagen en diferentes resoluciones. Para saber cuál es la resolución de una cámara digital debemos conocer los píxeles de ancho x alto a los que es capaz de obtener una imagen. Así una cámara capaz de obtener una imagen de 1600 x 1200 píxeles tiene una resolución de 1600x1200=1.920.000 píxeles, es decir 1,92 megapíxeles. Además, hay que considerar la resolución de impresión, es decir, los puntos por pulgada (ppp) a los que se puede imprimir una imagen digital de calidad. A partir de 200 ppp podemos decir que la resolución de impresión es buena, y si queremos asegurarnos debemos alcanzar los 300 ppp porque muchas veces la óptica de la cámara, la limpieza de la lente o el procesador de imágenes de la cámara digital disminuyen la calidad. Para saber cual es la resolución de impresión máxima que permite una imagen digital hay que dividir el ancho de esa imagen (por ejemplo, 1600 entre la resolución de impresión 200, 1600/200 = 8 pulgadas). Esto significa que la máxima longitud de foto que se puede obtener en papel para una foto digital de 1600 píxeles de largo es de 8 pulgadas de largo en calidad 200 ppp (1600/300=5.33 pulgadas en el caso de una resolución de 300 ppp). Una pulgada equivale a 2,54 centímetros.

Film vs digital

Quote of the day:
"There are lots of things you could have been,could have done,could have seen,could have known,and could have experienced.Yet nothing compares to the wondrous places you'll go when you do what you know you CAN."

When i went to photography school some years ago,digital was just not there yet!! film,lab,and all kinds of working,i mean really working with lights,sun and the great dark room,was the way to learn to be a photographer,and then some years after i decided to get back on track and OMG,what happen? I found myself lost in the digital world,,pixel,megapixel,image sensor,,,scary!
Film and digital capture are completely different media. They are used for similar purposes, but they themselves are completely unrelated to each other.
I used to spent time a lot of time to take a pic,developed and then sometimes not even been 100%happy with the results and I just had to do it all over again.
Even worse when a see people looking at me like I'm a alien just because I still love film but i have to admit it,after my 8008 Nikon this D90 is a little princess!!
my old film camera will always be w me,and my dark room will be in my garage but i spend all my time now,reading post,articles,and manual for to improve my photography knowledge and to feel in the mood to just take pictures without feeling like a digital amateur,,I guess not matter how many years i spent in school or how many pics i took before i have to start all over again..and you know what?It is just OK...
So here i go some I will get some technical info.. I know is no fun but is helpful

Spatial resolution

The quality of digital photographs an be measured in several ways. Pixel count is presumed to correlate with spatial resolution. The quantity of picture elements (pixels) in the image sensor is usually counted in millions and called "megapixels". The resolution of film images depends upon the area of film used to record the image - 35 mm, Medium format or Large format - the speed of the film and the quality of lens fitted to the camera.

Digital cameras have a variable relationship between resolution and megapixel count;other factors are important in digital camera resolution, such as the number of pixels used to resolve the image, the effect of the Bayer pattern or other sensor filters on the digital sensor and the image processing algorithm used to interpolate sensor pixels to image pixels. Digital sensors are generally arranged in a rectangular grid pattern, making images susceptible to moire pattern artifacts, whereas film is not affected by this because of the random orientation of grains.

Estimates of a photograph's resolution taken with a 35 mm film camera vary. More information may be recorded if a fine-grain film, combined with a specially-formulated developer are used. Conversely, less resolution may be recorded with poor quality optics or with coarse-grained film. A 36 mm x 24 mm frame of ISO 100-speed film is estimated to contain the equivalent of 20 million pixels.

Many professional-quality film cameras use medium format or large format films. Because of the size of the imaging area, these can record higher resolution images than current top-of-the-range digital cameras. A medium format film image can record an equivalent of approximately 50 megapixels, while large format films can record around 200 megapixels (4 × 5 inch) which equates to around 800 megapixels on the largest common film format, 8 × 10 inches, without accounting for lens sharpness. A medium format DSLR provides from 42 to 50 megapixels, which is similar to medium format film quality.

The medium which will be used for display, and the viewing distance, should be taken into account. For instance, if a photograph will only be viewed on a television or computer display, which can resolve approximately .3 megapixels and 1-2 megapixels, respectively, or HD sets of 1080p that can display 2MP, the resolution provided by inexpensive digital cameras may be sufficient.

I'm terrified!!

Cuando el cambio es la unica solucion ,mi corazon solo se paraliza,realmente tengo k cruzar esta puerta tambien??? me he preguntando tantas veces,realmente el universo quiere k viva esta experiencia ya! sola,sin mirar atras????pero si realmente no estoy preparada?,nunca pense k la magia de la vida y el avanze tecnologico tuvieran tanto en comun;desde cuando la magia de estar con los k se ama se ha reemplazado por la independencia y el deseo de ser y estar por si solo,este modernismo solo afecta el alma,y asi mismo desde cuando podia fingir k el dia era soleado en mis fotografias solo con hacer un click en un "mouse" y gastar $500 es un programa k me complica y al mismo tiempo me soluciona mi vida?
La frialdad de la evolucion,la monotonia de la pertenencia,la soledad de la independencia hoy no hacen k el sol este por lo menos ni en mi corazon....

Sunday

No he vuelto no porque no he querido pero sabia que si regresaba lo mas probablemente no podria regresar a Florida ,y este pais ya se habia convertido en mi pais tambien ,despues de immigrar,llegue a un punto que realmente no sabia de donde era o queria ser,volver no era una opcion y vivir con lo que se tiene era un "must",asi que tenia que conformarme quedarme o volver a Colombia a un mundo que ya era desconocido,y si los amigos se han ido han cambiado y si me siento tan solo como aqui,,mi mente esta contaminada y volver no era una opcion al menos volver de el todo no lo fue!
Ahora he empezado la cuenta regresiva voy el 25 de Junio despues de haber llegado el 19 de septiembre 1999,han pasado muchos años,muchos cumpleaños,navidades,nacimientos,despedidas,y en ninguno de ellos he estado,despues de 10 años 5 meses y 1 dia por ahora no he vuelto ,no abrazo a mis hermanos,no conozco mis sobrinos,no hablo conmi familia ni me tomo un cafe con los k amo,no me rio de los chistes de mis hermanos,ni bailo en una fiesta en casa,no se lo k es el ruido de mi ciudad ,el desorden,el trafico y la delicia de pertenecer,,cuanto tiempo cuanto cosas,,,
Tal vez si hubiera planeado mi vida asi ,no hubiera tenido este resultado,,todo,todo,todo cambio y yo aqui voy I'M BACK!!!