Sunday 29 June 2008

Photography, bokeh and punches

The biggest problem on being a scrapbooker is that there are so many ways to get sidetracked. Some get into cards, some into altered art or ATC or circle journals or, worse, into blog-hopping... I am particular vulnerable to the last one :-), photography being the other one.

I am still very much a beginner, getting a good photo is still more a matter of good luck than skills, but I am spending more and more time trying to learn about my camera and master the manual more of my DSLR.

That's how I came across the term bokeh, which seems to refer to the blurry bits of your photo. Trivial? Google it and you find out how many people are obsessed about it.

I was thinking, right, but at the moment I am more worried about the bits that SHOULD be in focus but are not, thank you. Then I found out that you can trick your camera to make cute shaped bokehs.

Look at this photo of my Maneki Neko:



{ wanna know what is a maneki neco? check mella's blog }

Don't you love the cute hearts behind the cat? How did I do it? Look here.

You can cut out your heart (or whatever else) manually but I used a small heart shaped punch.

There's a bit of trial and error before you get a satisfactory result. The easiest way to get an array of heart shaped images in your photo is to use fairy lights. Test taking some photos of them (without the hood), you're after a nice round blurry light, just like here:



When you get the result above, put your hood on and take a photo with the same settings. Enjoy!

6 comments:

Sabrina said...

Hmm, need some time to follow all those links, but I'll be back this afternoon. It's a great photo, and I think I know what you've done but I still want to read about it!
If you've got some spare time left, have a look at blipfoto.com.

Di's Dooodles said...

Great pics Elisa & thanks for the tips.
Thank you also for all your lovely comments on my blog

eva birdthistle said...

Oh I love this technique but never tried it out. Now I've seen yours I will defo give it a go. Thanks Elisa :)

Tigger's rambling said...

Oh very interesting...must give that a go...thanks for sharing :-)

JACKIE M said...

Elisa I have left you an award on my blog =0)

Anonymous said...

I like your neko! I have so far collected a maneki neko purse, pencil-case, keyring and t-shirt!

Anyway that's beside the point, your bokeh effects are nice and twinkly :)