DIY Photoprojects - Sunset through the rain

Click the image to enlarge



When i saw the setting sun through the sliding glass door covered with rain drops on my patio, i could sense a wonderful photo op presenting itself. I would call this a photographer's delight in a week where the Southland is being soaked by series of heavy winter storms.

I've had several people appreciate this image so i figured I'll post a tutorial on creating this image without the main element 'rain' by replacing it with an alternate way to create the effect. Although i shot this image with my point and shoot Olympus C750UZ, I'm sure you'll get better results with an SLR or a DSLR.

Apart from a good view of the sunset, here is what you'll need:

SPRAY BOTTLE -fill it with a cup of water.
SMALL SHEET OF GLASS - preferably from any photo frame i e., if you don't have access to a glass window through which you could view the sunset, not forgetting the liberty to spray some water on it too :)

If you are using a glass sheet you may need to provide support so it stays vertical, try to keep wooden blocks or books to keep the balance. Do use a cling wrap to protect the book from water. Use the spray bottle and spray water on the other side of the glass sheet facing the sunset view and not your camera. Now align the frame on your cam's viewfinder so you could see the sunset through the glass sheet. I used "Macro" feature in my cam to shoot this image. Alternately, you could keep the point of focus on the foreground [in this case, water droplets] so the sunset which is in the background goes out of focus and you'll get the same effect as in the above image.
Another interesting aspect is, depending on the efficiency of your cam you may get a clear "flipped view" of the background [sunset] in each droplet. My low end cam was unable to capture the same but I'm sure you'll get better results with a DSLR.

Hope you find this post helpful. If you have any questions or if you give it a shot do leave a comment here with the link to your post, I'd love to view your version.


PS: Post Processing - Cropped and added "Texture" using Paint Shop Pro.

A day without my laptop..

I  was greeted with a blue screen when i powered my laptop yesterday morning. Needless to say it stayed non responsive to the repeated attempts to repair and i knew i had to make other plans to survive the day.

If you dont know me enough i spend most of my waking hours with my laptop, NO i don't work in the IT sector...wrong guess!  Ever since i got the laptop in 2004 most days the damned thing stays always ON so imagine my plight when it died on me yesterday!! I knew i 'stress tested' it all this while and it was bound to give up any day but it sucked to feel cut off from the virtual world and i hated it.

Anyways in no time i realized there wasn't much i could do about it [I'm technically challenged, u see.. ]  The next best thing [read as 'the only' thing] left to do was tell Iyaps to look into it. He was glad that he got another chance to talk me into getting an iMac for us [I'm a windows gal, not Mac] but he was kind enough to dedicate all the spare time he had to fix the issue and thanks to him, my laptop is back in action within a day!

Although i missed not having access to my laptop it turned out to be quite a blessing in disguise. Instead of staring at the 15.5 wide screen all day i got a chance to actually look around my house and complete some of the long pending chores.

* For the first time i realized 'holidays' were actually over and the decorations had started looking quite out-of-place. I removed all the decor and put them in storage.

* Next in the list was long pending loads of laundry which i finally got a chance to do. I know...not that i'm proud of it but did i tell you 'procrastination' is my middle name? ;)  

* Watered the plants, pruned the roses, planted two rose plants and a hibiscus in my patio garden.

* Dedicated sometime to review  Bar exam study materials i picked up from the library, worked on the assignments from study group.

*Took pics with some photo props to post on my photoblog. 

*  Cleaned the kitchen and hung a new frame on the wall, i gotta make sure i don't trun that space into a living room.

* Marked all the family & friends birthday on the Malayala Manorama calender i purchased from Kerala Store.

*  Cooked a new dish with cauliflower,pepper,and Maggie curry cubes in coconut milk. Recipe coming soon.

* By 5pm it started getting foggy outside and it was wonderful to view the park opposite to our home listening to IR's 80's tamil songs playing in the BG.

* Explored some of the Balance/Strength Training games on Wii Fit Plus, that was quite fun.

 By evening although i was dead tired, i got more things done than on any average day. Also i realized how much time i unnecessarily spend on the laptop and the need to prioritize things. 

Thanks to my non responsive laptop i have a clean house, fresh clothes in the closet, hot food on table and the satisfaction of dedicating time to study.The pleasure of finding warm crsip towels in the shower and to end the day by sinking into fragrant linens in bed is simply...priceless!

Whoever said  "A clean house is the sign of a broken computer", has quite a point!! :))

over & out

rosh