During my trip back to the UK at Christmas, I was showing my cousin some photos of Koh Samui which he was quite impressed with. This was quite a compliment from him as he is a semi-professional photographer and a couple of days later, he turned up at my mum's house with a bag with an old Sony SLR in it. It was one of his very old cameras and suggested I bring it back to Thailand and see how I get on. It was a kind offer although I was somewhat reticent, I just point my phone which is always in my pocket and press the button. It's simple. Like me! So how would I get on with a fiddly, SLR and 18-270 lens which weighs a ton?
Finally last week, on a trip up to Bangkok, I got find out!
All these photos are untouched, they come straight from the camera which was set to RAW/JPEG. I was most looking forward to using the zoom lense, my only complaint about using my phone is that its messy to zoom in and the results aren't always great. I did have a read of the handbook before getting it out of the bag but I'm too long in the tooth for reading fat instruction manuals so skimmed through the menus and settings on the camera itself.
I did note, however, that as my eyes are so bad, I couldn't really tell by looking through the eyepiece on the camera if a picture was in focus or not. Looking at the poor-quality screen at the rear instead was even less of a help and I would guess, that the autofocus on this lens/camera combo isn't fast and I was sometimes too quick in fully depressing the shutter.
Anyway, we were staying in Rangsit at the Asia Airport Hotel, built over the Zeer IT mall and I started out by having a go at their market and walking street...
This picture, I was quite impressed with. I like the colours and the clarity and it was a simple point-and-shoot job.
Now this had all the potential to be a good shot, but it's very messy and apart from the foreground, it's all a bit of a blur lol I'm guessing that's something to do with the aperture setting. I'm going to tag a couple of SLR users at the end to try and get their advice. I do however love the natural expressions on the peoples faces which only come from zooming and catching them unawares. This is a point where a decent SLR and lens is going to score highly.
The girls at the nail bar was a good idea and would benefit from some cropping but it just doesn't get the colours right somehow.
Again, this could have made a nice photo. I love the warmth of the colours but the depth of field could have done with a bit of fiddling with, once more.
This picture I do like, simply because it captures what I feel about the scene, it's on zoom and when I pushed the zoom in further...
...and for me, this caught the essence of a Thai market; surely, that's the whole point of photography. To allow someone else to not just see a representation, but also be able to let them use all five senses to immerse themselves in the atmosphere, remotely.
This came out quite well I guess but I am not sure I couldn't have got the same on my phone.
This photo was too gaudy and could have been improved with some editing but I'd have no idea how where to begin!
And so to the monkeys, and this was disappointing!
Driving back to Samui, we stopped in Prachuap Khiri Khan for a break, mainly because as there is at any temple on a hill by the sea in Thailand, there will be monkeys, and I wanted to get some close-up monkey shots with my new toy!
Monkey sacs, there aren't enough of them on Hive but the picture. Not too bad I guess but not really happy with the result.
This wasn't bad. Quite sharp but the colours are dreadful. Perhaps because the monkeys are a very similar colour to their surroundings!
And this shot. It was sunset, hence the light but again, the whole thing seemed to meld together into a mushy mess.
Very disappointing overall.
Would I use the SLR again? Well, probably. I need to practise and I'm sure it's capable of much more than I've managed at my first attempt but photography, like anything worth doing takes practice and patience. There might be times when I take it out for a specific reason, but for day-to-day shots. My phone is much better...or perhaps, like my food, I'm far too used to overprocessed crap that's now become the norm!
