FocusMeus » food

Week 39: Tomatoes

Els — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 20:28:52 +0000

Week 30: Milk

Els — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 21:59:46 +0000

The objective here was to show the steam coming off the boiling milk. I saw the steam, but the camera didn’t…
Still, it’s hot milk, pouring into a mug to make hot chocolate. I thought it was the appropriate drink to have while the kids rushed outside to enjoy the first snow of this winter :-)

Week 28: Quiche

Els — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 23:12:01 +0000

Quiche doesn’t need to have a quiche-dough-bottom. You can just as easily make the bottom out of slices of wholewheat bread with the crusts cut off.

Proof:

Recipe:

Week 24: Butternut

Els — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 21:24:03 +0000

It’s October, so I figured pumpkin for dinner was only appropriate. In Holland we call this one “flespompoen”, which means “bottle pumpkin”. Apparently the English word for it is butternut pumpkin or in North America, butternut squash. Doesn’t matter what it’s called though, as long as it tastes the same. In this photo it is cooked in oil with garlic and onion, just how I like it :-)

Week 22: Sweet Chilli Bugles on a Sunday afternoon

Els — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 08:12:49 +0000

15 minutes until the next train

Els — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 11:40:08 +0000

Grilling sweet pepper

Els — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 21:36:07 +0000

Day 364: Crumble

Els — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 21:59:55 +0000

Day 362: Boerenkool met worst

Els — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 21:30:41 +0000

Literally “farmer’s cabbage with sausage”, but more accurately it’s borecole mashed with potatoes and butter, and smoked sausage on top; a typically Dutch dish.

Day 352: With strawberry sauce

Els — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:40:01 +0000

Day 347: Anise cubes

Els — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 21:49:45 +0000

Not shown: the hot milk that these cubes were dissolved in directly after taking the photo :-)

Day 339: Grapes (eaten)

Els — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 22:59:18 +0000

So, why is this photo so blue? I used a blue-ish LED light – a tiny little keychain torch.
First, I had lit the same subject with my regular lamp light, but that causes a problem. It’s a problem I’ve been aware of for quite some time now (I think I first noticed it about half a year ago, when I started doing more indoors photos), but up till now I just edited it out in PhotoShop. It’s time I’d find out what causes it though, so I figured I’d show it and hopefully someone can tell me what is wrong.

Here’s a photo that shows the problem quite clearly:

From top left, all the way to top right, then curving down to bottom right, there is a red line in the image. Or rather, a double red line with white between the lines. At first I thought it was caused by the angle of the light coming into the lens. I’m using a fixed lens camera, and the lens is behind a rectangular opening (even though the outside looks round). The lamps I use indoors are in a red shade, so I figured that the red light coming in from a certain angle would sort of bounce off the rectangular opening and cause the extra red colour.

But.. I tested. I put the lamp on the other side – the line did not move to the other side of the photo. I put the camera sideways, and still, the line did not move from its place. No matter if I photograph directly into the light, or light the subject with the lamp behind my camera, the red line stays and does not move.

However, outdoor photos never show the red line. And as you can see in the first photo above, making sure there is no red light, also gets rid of it. (although, when playing in PhotoShop with curves and sliders, I can make a vague discolouration visible where the red line normally is).

Is this a problem with my lens? My sensor? Something else? Is it something that a new camera would fix, or would it simply be caused by the light I’m using and in reality there is no real problem with my camera? I’ve had this one for almost 6 years now (took my first photo with it on April 13, 2004), and my next one will surely be a DSLR, but if this is a problem that just occurs for regular reasons with some cameras, I’d like to know what it is so I can look out for it in a new camera, and avoid it.

So… anyone have an idea? Seen it before maybe?

Day 334: Chocolate sprinkle

Els — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 22:43:35 +0000

Day 328: Chocolate

Els — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 22:21:51 +0000

Proof: having plenty of chocolate, does not mean having inspiration for an original photo.

Day 322: Pancake Day

Els — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 21:25:36 +0000

Today is Shrove Tuesday, or Pancake Day.

The pancake in the photo is ‘decorated’ with blueberry jam.

Day 313: Coconut milk

Els — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 20:17:49 +0000

Day 311: Sweet colours

Els — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 21:39:58 +0000

I couldn’t manage to get the colours quite right in this one. The sweets are more colourful than in the picture, but if I try to process it with stronger colour, the whole picture becomes yellow, not only the yellow sweets. Probably a white balance setting I should have changed, as this was taken with lamp light. Maybe I’ll try it again in the weekend, with daylight. It might also help to put them on a darker or plain white surface, instead of on my yellow-ish wooden desk.

Day 288: Chinese cabbage

Els — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 21:46:27 +0000

Day 282: Sausages

Els — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 19:16:01 +0000

Day 263: Spicy prawn crackers

Els — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 22:45:42 +0000