Skin Retouching via Frequency Separation

How to manipulate your images in an intuitive way by using Puppet Warp

This is one of the very powerful tools in Photoshop. I like perspective warp but my version doesn't support unless I subscribe to CC.



Click here for a written script on this topic.

How to change colour in photo

I think this is a good video tutorial on a few tricks to change color in a photo.

Content Aware Transformation in Photoshop

Ultimate Hair Edge Masking Technique in Photoshop

This is quite a useful video whereby you get to learn of a few techniques in extracting humans from background. Note that this is probably not applicable in lots of cases but the technique used in blending background onto human body is quite good.

Creating Realistic Shadow in Photoshop

A video to show how to create a realistic shadow in Photoshop....

This presenter is among the best I have seen! Clear, straight to the point and speaking clear English.

Calibrating Your System - Skin

If you have 40 minutes to spare in order to learn something about photography, click on the link below and enjoy!

Red Skin correction in Photoshop

This is a very useful tutorial on how to modify skin colour. In this case, it is red skin.

Brian & Phoebe Wedding 29 June 2013

Last weekend, 29-Jun-2013, our church member Brian and Pheobe got married!

You may see some of the photos I took here.

Basic Lighting Technique for Studio Portraiture

Direction of Light in Portrait Photography

By Neil van Niekerk 
The video doesn’t just focus on studio light, it also explains how to manipulate and use natural light to its full advantage by thinking the shot through. Since you can’t exactly move the direction of the sunlight, you can change the way it affects your photograph by repositioning your subjects so they are in a more flattering light.
Watch:

Fluid Mask 3 - Working with the Forced Edge Tool

Although I don't use this facility, I shared it here just in case you need it.

Colour Correct Skin Tone on Photoshop

Skin Tone correction has always been a challenge. One of the issue is the colour display we have which is not calibrated or whatever reason you may have. This tutorial by Lynda shows how to adjust the CMYK numbers to make color corrections to skin... enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=eJiM-fsvQXE

As a general starting point, yellow would be a little bit higher than magenta, cyan is between 1/5 to 1/3 of magenta and yellow. For darker skin, the values would be higher.
Use info panel (F8) and click on the skin area to be analysed using the eyedropper tool (I) and check the values of CMYK. To change the value, use a curve adjustment layer.

Another video similar to the above: Whitening Skin for "High Key look"
Editing a Tan

Tips on Photoshop/Camera etc

Just some nice link/collection:

44 essential digital camera tips and tricks
225 tips from famous photographers

99 Common Photography problems (and how to solved them):

1. General Photography Problems
2. Using lenses
3. Digital camera accessories
4. Digital camera settings and controls
5. Camera exposure
6. Using flash
7. Photography technique

If you want to improve your photo composition, read this article:
10 rules of photo composition

Photoshop:
20 things you need to know about Photoshop CS6: Click Here
6 photo editing steps every photographer should know

D600 Resource page

D600 resource page:
http://betterfamilyphotos.blogspot.com/p/nikon-d600-review-and-resource-page.html

D600 Review
http://www.btobey.com/nikon/d600-review.php

Nikon shutter count
http://www.nikonshuttercount.com/

Pre-wedding photography

Butterfly photography

I personally found that it is very difficult to take nice photos of insect because they never stay still. The major problem is that they keep moving or they fly away very easily.

I was pleasantly surprised that butterfly stays still during mating. I can approached them until I was only 1 foot away.
The above photo was taken using my 200mm macro lens, aperture F/36, shutter 1/60s, ISO-400 using my Nikon D600.
A back light was used in the above photo. This means that I used my off camera SB910 flashgun almost directly opposite the camera.
Click on the photo above to view a much larger image.

How to Shoot Firework Photo

In view of the new year countdown, and the beautiful firework display, below is a guideline on how to shoot firework.

1. Use a tripod
2. Be on site early to secure a good spot
3. You may use landscape or portrait format. The choice is really yours
4. Exposure setting:
   For digital compact, use firework mode if there is one
   
   For DSLR: Use B mode if available. Shutter will remain open as long as the shutter release button remain pressed. A good way is to use a black card to cover the lens. When firework goes off, take off the card and put it back on as appropriate.
   
   Set Aperture between 8 to 16.
5. Use the lowest ISO available
6. Focus - use manual mode.

After a few practice, I hope you get good pictures. Otherwise, fine tune the setting.
eg, if too bright, set Aperture to a higher value

Photo reconstruction

Recently I was given a black and white and a colour photo to be made into a memorial style image to be printed. The reconstructed black and white photo is as below.

The finished photo is as below.

By the way, if you have photos which you like to be done like above, please do contact me by e-mail (williamting @ hotmail.com (remove space)) or phone (+60123020178).

Graduation Photography

Recently my friend's daughter graduated from Curtin. I was privileged to be able to take just a few of their pictures to celebrate this extremely important event and also marking a major milestone in life.
Below, you see just two of the photos.

The photos were taken just outside the graduation hall. I have to turn this into "studio style" shooting, perhaps with the hope that the result is even better than those taken in studio.

Nikon D3, F/5.6, 1/160sec, ISO-1000, Metering: Pattern