atomicsparkle

Having an Epiphanie

My new Epiphanie Stella bag arrived today – and I’m freakin’ loving it! What’s not to love? Lush pink colour – check. Ample camera equipment room – check. Looks like a gorgeous designer bag – check. Cute metallic and diamante camera charm – check. AND IT’S PINK!

Ok, so after a few deep breaths, I collected myself again, and have taken some shots of it to show you the quality and detailing. It holds an SLR body, and has room for up to 6 six medium sized lenses / flash guns. With 2 front pockets, 2 side pockets, and a back pocket, there is plenty of space for batteries, smartphone, business cards, ipad mini etc.

I’m glad there are products geared directly towards the female photographer market, and this is definitely worth the investment. My only critique would be the white interior (I know I’m gonna get that grubby!), and I’d have preferred black or a deep grey, but hey – did I tell you how gorgeous it looks AND IT’S PINK?

You can grab yourself a Stella too from Epiphanie.

In a Haze – Atomic Tips

I get asked a lot ‘how do you get that hazy summer look to images?’… Here’s how to without post processing:

1. Forget all the usual rules about the light facing your subject.

2. Check when the sun is rising or going down – and get yourself out around 40 mins before that time.

3. Place your subject between the sun rise / sunset and yourself, with the sun behind the subject.

4. Play around with your settings to achieve the type of haze you want – the above image was taken around 20 mins before sunset in Paris, with a shutter speed of 1/125, and f5.0 and no flash. You could use flash to achieve a more halo effect around the subject, or increase your ISO to create a bright ethereal effect.

5. Have fun breaking the rules! Shoot using the settings YOU like the results from 🙂

Happy shooting!

Memory Lane…

I’ve not been getting much of a chance to log on to Second Life lately, let alone create any goodies on there… I came across this image from a feature of my work in Radar Magazine (skin, dress, and hairpiece all from Verve by AtomicSparkle Skytower)- and I’m almost tempted to shift my timetable and get creating again…. Skin or clothes?….

No light meter? No problem! – Atomic Tips

None of us like to carry lots of gear, so if you don’t have a light meter handy, fear not! It’s likely you can use your camera’s auto mode to gather a basic idea of the settings you need for a decent exposure. Take a shot in auto mode, and hit info to gather the shutter speed, ISO and aperture settings. Copy the settings into manual mode, and using the light metering indication (usually looks like the diagram below):

You can then shift individual elements like shutter speed, sensitivity, aperture etc. to get the aesthetic results you are after – negative on the exposure scale will yield darker moodier images, and positive on the scale will create brighter, lighter images.

Once you get a feel for your camera settings, and practice enough, you’ll start to be able to ‘read’ the light in your scene and will come to know which settings work for which types of end results.

Happy snapping!

Jazelz @ Asian Wedding Exhibition

I’ve been shooting for Jazelz girlswear for a number of years, and I was proud to be present at the very first Jazelz catwalk show at the Asian Wedding Exhibition @ Wembley Arena in London. I was also chuffed when designer Jaz Jutley asked my little daughter Lana to model for her also :

Girly camera bags!!!

Stylish and practical camera bags are far and few between – for years I’ve been making my own bag inserts and hiding my camera gear in oversized bags from M&S and Accessorize! But recently, there is more on the market for us gals who want to keep our gear safe, and be stylish at the same time.

Epiphanie (see the Lola bag in Turquoise above), and Jo Totes (see the Gracie bag in magenta below) in the USA are my favourites by far! They have gorgeous styles, and Cosy Cameras is a UK stockist offering lots of luscious designs from across the globe…

I ordered myself 2 bags today… Well c’mon, one wouldn’t be enough…

Atomik

Blog shlog by Umbar Shakir