Ya know, looking at my recent entries here, it would seem that this blog has developed into yet another here's-my-daily-life kinda blog. Added with photos. What the hell, that's not what I had in mind when I started blogging... I was hoping I could fill this blog with photos that can show my progress in photography learning. Ow hell, whatever, guess I will just have to settle with what I have now.
Ucok lighting his cig. Not sure if Sasha makes a good foreground, but I needed something to direct the gaze to the flame, so there you go. ;p Love the shape of the match's flame on that one.
Ian in his new coffee shop. Nothing fancy for now, but he's been wanting to open it for some time, so I guess he's pretty excited now that it's finally open. Congratulations dude! Wish you success with it. :)
So anyway, I hung out with some friends last Monday in Ambarukmo Plaza. Whoo, shiny place. Don't usually go to shopping malls, except somebody asked me to. Brought both the D50 and FM2 with me, which was actually not a really nifty thing to do... Placed the D50 in the shoulder bag, hung the FM2 on the other shoulder. God I must looked like a total camera geek back then. :O
Anyway.
Mita, in the basement parking lot. Yummy bokeh.
Sasha and Metty on the elevator. Sometimes 18mm is not even wide enough. Shooting this in a full frame camera, though, would have included Mita in the frame... which I think would make it nicer. Sorry Mit. ;)
We went to the plaza to watch movie. Must have been literally years for me since I last saw a movie in cinema, I usually just rent them. The 21 was pretty crowded, and the tickets for that hour soon ran out, while we're still thinking what movie to watch.
After a while it's decided we're gonna watch Deja Vu which was about half a hour later. To spend time we headed to the foodcourt... the girls' favorite. Oh, but not before taking this one:
Round faces, hehe.
I always got indecisive on what to eat in new places, so I asked Sasha for some recommendation, and it's.... Peking chicken!
The bowl's shape is nice, love the design. Nice interior too, I like the yellow-orange color scheme.
Finished eating, but still got some time before the movie started. Shot some more. Shooting with DSLRs isn't really nice though in malls like these. Attracts more attention than I wanted. I suppose some security guards actually saw me shooting and didn't like it, but I could get away since I was with my friends.
The movie itself was... well, I enjoyed it. I'm no moviegoers so I couldn't really make a decent review. A friend told me later on that there's some major plotholes in the movie, but I thought it's still an enjoyable one.
The next day went hunting with ADVY friends to search some objects for an assignment, but rain got in the way. Jogja has finally started raining heavily lately... limiting our chance of finding well-lit places outdoor during the day, though also opening another challenging opportunities if you're sensitive. Got this panning shot that I like that day:
Some people in FN commented how the boy's moment not frozen enough, while pointing the blur on his head. Can't help but smile on those comments. Cause I doubt they ever made a good enough panning of a running person to know the characteristics of human panning... no folks, it's different than panning a, say, car or motorcycle. Way different. ;)
A good photo doesn't always mean it's technically perfect. And even the term "good photo" is very subjective... a photo you love so much you could frame it and hang it on your bedroom wall, can mean trash for another people, vice versa. For example I got some of these technically faulty shots that I like anyway:
It was dark, and the auto-focus just gave up so I didn't have a choice but to manual focus. In those two frames above they're both off-focus, yet for me personally, they're actually better than any other portraits of Sukma and Ucok I've taken up until this day. The mood's so.... them.
That is all. Cheers!
PS. From now on I'm resizing down the photos, hopefully it'll be easier for you guys with shitty connection to view the photos!
So, in the end I decided to join the workshop. I registered on Thursday, after I wrote the last entry in this blog. The 'registration' turned out to be some kind of waiting list, where we write down our names and numbers, and then basically wait till the organizer call us... oh well. So I waited and waited. But the phone didn't ring. Not until half an hour before the workshop began. What the hell. When I came, they were already starting. A young lady from the organizer told me that the workshop was gonna be shorter, from the original 3 days to 2 days. But tell you what, I'm glad I joined. Cause it was good.
Fucking awesome, even.
For starter, Sigit Pamungkas is one badass photojournalist. I mean... The man's the real deal. He's been photographing lots of important events, seen lotsa shit, almost getting himself killed in different assignments (always a plus point, heh), knows other badass photographers in person (You guys seen Nachtwey's War Photographer documentary? When Nachtwey's photographing Kawah Ijen, he asked Sigit for reference... how friggin cool is that?), and basically being a great person to talk to about photojournalism in general. Just hearing him sharing his experiences got me excited.
There was also another photojournalist in the workshop, Antonius Riva Setiawan, who also knows his stuff. He's made features for local and international NGO projects, and also attended a workshop by VII Photo agency in 2004. He's a cool guy, really expressive and straight-forward, and also a nice person to talk to. We talked about street photography during a break, enlightened me with new insights and new ways of looking street photography. What wicked was... he brought a Leica M7, with a Summicron 35/2. Yup, last night was my first time holding a Leica. :D Before that I've only heard and read about that thing. But holding it yourself... it's a whole different experience. Dunno if it's just excitement, but the camera *is* really nice to handle. Gotta love how it focuses on objects.
Anyway, about the workshop itself... it's gonna be long to write down all the details, but to make it simple it deals with creating sharp contents within your photos. To me personally, this workshop really broadened and changed my whole view of photojournalism. In a good way. It made me realize how clueless and dumb I was in the subject. Looking back at my photos I made this far with the knowledge I got from the workshop, they all seem... well, trash. Damn.
One of these days I'm gonna try hanging out to Srengenge office, see if I can meet Riva again (well, he did invite me, and offered to show some books and films about Bresson... cool!) and talk more about the subjects. I still got some questions in mind.
For the time being, here's some trashy pics from a short street session I did several days ago, before the workshop.
Aaand... some composition play with lines:
Sadly I didn't take any photos during the workshop. I was too dumbfounded, I must say. Ciao for now!
I'm wondering if I should join a photostory workshop which will take place... tomorrow. I knew the news since last Monday, but been hesitating until now. Since it's tomorrow, I suppose today's the last day for registration. The workshop will be held for three days, from tomorrow to Sunday. What's holding me back is the entrance fee, which I think is kinda pricey... wonder if it's gonna worth it. But honestly, I want to come. Man, I'm such an indecisive bastard. ;P
The workshop is organized by Srengenge, which I hadn't heard before, but after further checking turned out to be an advertising agency. Kinda weird since the workshop is more about journalistic stuff... Anyway, check out their website here. The workshop will feature Sigit Pamungkas, the Indonesian contributor for Reuters. You can find some of his photos in Lapindo mud reportage in this month's edition of National Geographic Indonesia, though the photos in it are mostly Feri Latief's works, the original photographer assigned for the reportage.
So... what to do, what to do? I may have to decide that on the way to campus today.
