Positive Film mode of GRD IV: Kids around town

Book on the left is the brand new release by Mookio.

So I admit the book written by Mookio I’ve only read about 85 pages (total 340+ pages). She convinced me to go shoot with one of her favorite modes – Positive Film. By default the vividness of the setting is a bit too high, good thing is that it allows me to tune down the vividness. I had mine set at 2. The photos would look bleached, without turning your entire photo to the ‘Underworld movie’ type of mood like in the Bleach Bypass mode. I had been only extensively using My Setting and the B&W modes. I’m open to possibilities!!

The book not only providing the basic camera guides, know-hows, operation advices. It also feature interviews+photos from some hardcore GRD lovers/photographers (Taiwanese/Hong Kongese/Chinese). And yes, she even interviewed the Japan Ricoh photo contest award winner Polly, bares the mind of a simple mom documenting her boy.

Anyone who loves the GRD should grab a copy of this book, unfortunately it’s in chinese only.

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Tonight I couldn’t wait to try out the Positive Film mode on my GRD. A few standout shots have kids in it. I shot them with high ISO. You can call it low grade, ugly, bad quality. I’m still very happy in what I got tonight. There were warm messages in them which it’s not easily to be captured in a busy city.

Her paradise. It looks clean at ISO 2500 with the default image size in Flickr.

Baby is thinking for mom who to call “Call dad, ma!”

I’d taken shots of man pushing trolley with goods, but never taken one with ‘kids’. It happened so quick that I had no time to take off my GW-2 (was doing a few 21mm). I should have gone closer and be there for it (where’s my ‘fear not!’ attitude again, oh god).. Have to work on my techniques and timing on this thing. In general, shooting with GW-2 on the streets are not practical unless for scenic.

Alright, more reading and experimenting!!

High ISO in colors with Ricoh GRD IV: The People of Sheung Wan & Central – After work

Photography

Another day of my Ricoh GRDMy thought on the high ISO had always directed my attention to black & white. And recently I had been liking street photos in colors. So can we fuse high ISO and colors together with a tiny help of post processing?

Answer is subjective: Yes, Why not!?

ISO 1600

Many of us thought the high ISO causes lost of colors, saturation and more. Yes but the current technology is doing its best with the high noise level in images. It’s still giving us colors at very least.

ISO 3200

Simply adjusting the contrast, hi/mid/lo brightness and sharpening, the photos became some of my keepers even initially were crappy..really crappy when unprocessed. Thanksfully, I did have my customized “My Setting” image filter to pre-process the photos in the camera while shooting.

ISO 3200
I’m very fond of working with high ISO photos even on a compact camera i’m using – Ricoh GRD IV. Black and white would still work great with the digital noise (grainy). I’m more fascinated at the moment with the grainy color photos. It gives a ‘raw’ look and feel. Just like a painter doing a sketch on the go. It’s truly reflecting what this busy city is going on. I’ll continue to carry on in this method in the coming days. Hope you’d enjoy too!