CDA Photo

Prague Zoo

2012-01-16T17:20:00.002+02:00

From the wonders of Prague Zoo:

Prague Zoo 2011

Pentax (Samsung) debug mode - noise reduction fix

2011-06-24T15:25:00.025+03:00

I've finally found a way (about an year ago but I was too lazy to post it here) to disable the forced noise reduction of my Samsung Gx20 camera - that I'd mentioned here. Many thanks to the guys from Pentax-hack.

As they say on their site, basically you have to create a text file in the root of the memory card (called "MODSET.454" for GX20 v1.01, v1.03), and enter the proper commands in the file ([DEBUG_MODE EN] Enables debug mode; [DEBUG_MODE DIS] Disables debug mode).

You will also need SYSPARAM.TXT file, in which various internal parameters are set (among which the ones related to noise reduction ;) ).
Here are the setting that I use:

>MODSET.454
[DEBUG_MODE EN]

>SYSPARAM.TXT
[FORCENR] 0@[DISABLENR] 1@[DISABLEBLC] 1@

For more info see: http://www.pentax-hack.info/index.html

BMW Museum - Munich

2011-06-23T13:52:00.002+03:00

The BMW museum in Munich - got to love it !!!

View the entire album:

BMW Museum & Welt (Munich)

Bucegi

2011-06-21T18:00:00.001+03:00

Partial Solar Eclipse 4th of January 2011

2011-01-04T21:52:00.001+02:00

Nature vs Hut

2010-11-28T22:03:00.000+02:00

Before The Storm

2010-09-21T21:16:00.001+03:00

BMW ActiveHybrid 7

2010-09-19T23:33:00.002+03:00

Balea Lake Panoramas

2010-09-17T19:35:00.002+03:00

Some panoramic pictures taken at Balea Lake, at ~2000m altitude in the Făgăraş Mountains - Romania.

Otopeni Air Show 2010 - First Photos

2010-07-17T21:20:00.121+03:00

Photos from Otopeni Air Show 2010.Great air show at Henri Coanda International Airport near Bucharest, with aircrafts such as: ICA IS-28B gliders, Eurocopter SA 365 Dauphin 2, IAR 316B Alouette and IAR 330 Puma helicopters and planes from the Romanian Air Fleet - Antonov An-26 and C-27 J Spartan transport planes, Extra Flugzeugbau EA300, Ikarus C42 and Yakovlev Yak-52 acrobatics, IAR 99 Şoim (Hawk) and Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 Lancer jet planes. The special guest was Jurgis Kairys, with his personal made aircraft, called the "Juka".

Otopeni Air Show 2010

Pamukkale 360

2010-06-08T22:25:00.023+03:00

My first 360 panorama, taken in Turkey at Pamukkale / Hierapolis of Phrygia,
at a magnificent lake just below the travertines.

Cormorants

2010-05-04T19:37:00.002+03:00

Cormorants in the Danube Delta and on the seashores of the Black Sea. Probably Great Cormorant (Phalacrocorax carbo).

Pigeons

2010-05-01T12:05:00.002+03:00

White Stork

2010-04-29T19:20:00.002+03:00

The White Stork (Ciconia ciconia) - photos taken in August last year.

Hungry Chicks

2010-04-28T21:43:00.003+03:00

Common Tern (Sterna hirundo) chicks waiting for food on floating reed and water lilly leaves.

Soap Bubbles

2010-04-27T21:48:00.003+03:00

European Magpie (Pica Pica)

2010-04-26T20:52:00.003+03:00

European (or Common) Magpie (Pica pica) from the crow family.

UFB

2010-04-22T20:18:00.004+03:00

Unidentified flying bird. Seems some kind of (juvenile?) woodpecker, but I have no idea what species this could be. So if anybody knows please do leave a comment.
UPDATE: Eurasian Jay (Garrulus glandarius)

Egyptian Goose

2010-04-21T22:44:00.002+03:00

Egyptian Goose - Alopochen aegyptiacus.

Honey Bee And Pansy

2010-04-19T19:42:00.001+03:00

Pansies

2010-04-19T19:28:00.002+03:00

Rooks (Corvus frugilegus)

2010-04-18T20:31:00.003+03:00

Mute Swans Taking Off

2010-04-17T12:29:00.002+03:00

Mute/White Swans (Cygnus olor) taking off from one of the lakes in the Delta of Danube.

Green Woodpecker (Picus viridis)

2010-04-16T20:09:00.004+03:00

Green Woodpecker (Picus viridis) high up in the tree at dusk - helpful lighting given by my Metz flash.

Little Egret (Egretta garzetta)

2010-04-15T22:37:00.002+03:00

Little Egret (Egretta garzetta) in the Delta Of Danube Biosphere Reserve.

Female Blackbird

2010-04-14T19:55:00.003+03:00

Female Common/Eurasian Blackbird (Turdus merula), or at least this is my best guess. It is very similar to the Fieldfare (Turdus pilaris).

Spring Contrasts

2010-04-11T20:52:00.009+03:00

Spring flowering trees with
threatening storm clouds above.

Black & White

2010-04-10T15:55:00.002+03:00

Head and neck of a Black Swan (Cygnus atratus) and Mute Swan (Cygnus olor).

White Wagtail (Motacilla alba)

2010-04-09T23:30:00.002+03:00

White Wagtail (Motacilla alba) - most probably from the subspecies Motacilla alba alba.

Mallard Female

2010-04-08T22:29:00.003+03:00

Female Mallard wild duck (Anas platyrhynchos - "flat-billed duck").

Ruddy Shelduck (Tadorna ferruginea)

2010-04-07T19:56:00.008+03:00

Ruddy Shelduck (Tadorna ferruginea - known as Brahminy Duck in India) foraging, sleeping and swimming.

European Roller (Coracias garrulus)

2010-04-01T15:24:00.003+03:00

European Roller (Coracias garrulus), the only member of the roller family of birds to breed in Europe.

Great White Pelican (Pelecanus onocrotalus)

2010-03-31T19:04:00.004+03:00

Great White Pelican (Pelecanus onocrotalus), known also as Eastern White Pelican or White Pelican. Photos taken in the Danube Delta.

Common Shelduck (Tadorna tadorna)

2010-03-30T19:31:00.002+03:00

Common Shelduck (Tadorna tadorna) female on a lake.

Common Spoonbill (Platalea leucorodia)

2010-03-29T20:22:00.003+03:00

Eurasian Spoonbills [or Common Spoonbills (Platalea leucorodia)] in flight.

Cape Shelduck

2010-03-29T19:35:00.004+03:00

Cape Shelduck or South African Shelduck (Tadorna cana), from the Anatidae family.

Hooded Crow (Corvus cornix)

2010-03-28T10:24:00.003+03:00

Hooded Crow (or Hoodiecrow - Corvus cornix) in various places.

Domestic Ducks

2010-03-26T20:23:00.003+02:00

Domestic ducks on a lake in the Delta of Danube.

Male Blackbird

2010-03-25T21:00:00.003+02:00

Common Blackbird Male (Turdus Merula) - from the Thrushes family (Turdidae).

Remnants of the past

2010-03-24T19:23:00.001+02:00

Abandoned buildings dating from the communist era.

Moonrise

2010-03-23T18:57:00.004+02:00

As I promised in a previous post ...

Bee-fly (Bombyliidae)

2010-03-22T19:12:00.003+02:00

A bee-fly from Bombyliidae family, probably Villa genus.

Wood Ducks

2010-03-19T23:33:00.004+02:00

Wood Ducks or Carolina Ducks (Aix sponsa).

Mandarin Ducks

2010-03-18T19:44:00.003+02:00

Mandarin Ducks (Aix galericulata) - a symbol of conjugal affection and fidelity. The drake is the one with the beautiful colored plumage. More photos than usual, but I think it's worth it.

Green Lacewing

2010-03-17T20:59:00.004+02:00

Green lacewing (Chrysopidae family) that sneaked into my room through the window. It has less that 2cm in length. The photos were actually vertical (the insect was on the wall), but I rotated them. In the last photo there's a smaller Green Lacewing already dead and dried (I found it by the oven). The live one got away.

Sarcophaga Fly

2010-03-16T19:23:00.003+02:00

Close-up of a Sarcophaga fly - part of the Sarcophagidae flesh-fly family.

Butterflies

2010-03-15T18:57:00.004+02:00

In order of appearance : Yellow-White butterflies (Pieridae family), Old World Swallowtail butterfly (Papilio machaon) and butterfly from Lycaenidae family (probably Small Copper - (Lycaena Phlaeas)).

Indian Peafowls (Pavo cristatus)

2010-03-14T13:51:00.005+02:00

Indian Peafowl (Pavo cristatus), also known as the Common Peafowl or the Blue Peafowl. Last pictures are close-ups of a peacock half asleep.

Common and Wiskered Terns

2010-03-13T09:20:00.008+02:00

Common Tern (Sterna hirundo) in flight. The last two photos might actually represent a Wiskered Tern (Chlidonias hybridus). If anyone knows for sure please let me know.

Black Swans

2010-03-11T18:49:00.004+02:00

Black Swans (Cygnus atratus) on the lake.

Eurasian Collared Dove Hatching

2010-03-10T19:51:00.005+02:00

Eurasian Collared Dove (Streptopelia decaocto) sitting on eggs in a flower pot on an exterior air-conditioning unit. After a couple of weeks the eggs hatched and that's what could be seen - the first pictures of new born chick (or chicks - I can't tell if there's more than one).

Hoverfly

2010-03-07T13:56:00.002+02:00

Hoverfly (Syrphus Ribesii from the Syrphidae family) on a flower.

The Chase

2010-03-06T20:31:00.002+02:00

Black-headed Gull (Larus ridibundus) chasing a Common Tern [ro. chira de baltă] (Sterna hirundo) for the freshly caught fish.

European Bee-Eaters

2010-03-06T20:21:00.002+02:00

European Bee-Eater birds (Merops apiaster) - colorful but very small and very far, so cropping was a must.

Twilight

2010-03-05T19:41:00.004+02:00

The last sparkles of the sun and the shining of the full moon, reflected on the lake. Actually, the second photo is also the sun, but edited to create the impression of night lighting. I'll present the final picture later is some other post.

Firebug and ants

2010-03-03T19:32:00.004+02:00

Firebug (Pyrrhocoris apterus) nest [left] and a colony of ants [right].

Broken Wings

2010-03-02T19:42:00.003+02:00

The Painted Lady (Vanessa Cardui) [left] and the Red Admiral (Vanessa Atalanta) [right] butterflies, both with parts of their wings missing.

Drone Fly

2010-03-01T19:19:00.006+02:00

European hoverfly (Eristalis tenax), also known as the drone fly (or "dronefly"). The last picture was taken with a Hoya +4 close-up filter in front of the lens (no crop). Not exactly the best quality for macro photography but the best portability in the absence of a dedicated macro (1:1) lens.

Brush-footed Butterflies

2010-02-28T20:20:00.005+02:00

Brush-footed butterflies (Nymphalidae family): The Painted Lady (Vanessa Cardui) [first 3 photos] and Freyer's purple emperor (Apatura Metis) [next photos]. Unfortunately I could not get Freyer's purple emperor to open its wings.

In a Hurry

2010-02-27T12:35:00.001+02:00

The Sea in Winter

2010-02-26T19:12:00.002+02:00

Sunset

2010-02-25T18:38:00.009+02:00

Sunsets in and out of the city.

Dragonflies

2010-02-22T19:16:00.006+02:00

Blue and yellow dragonflies. Possibly Black-Tailed Skimmer in the first photos and Yellow-Winged Darter in the others (not sure if it could be a Red-Veined Darter in the darker photo).

Black bumblebee

2010-02-22T00:13:00.006+02:00

B.B.B.B.B.(B.) = Black and blue baby bumble bee (Bombus) gathering pollen ... well not really a baby but I loved the sound of it.

Camouflaged grasshoppers

2010-02-21T22:29:00.003+02:00

Locusts (or I should better say grasshoppers) blending with the environment.

Honey bees in flight

2010-02-21T12:29:00.001+02:00

Some more sunset sparkles

2010-02-20T19:56:00.002+02:00

Waterfalls

2010-02-19T23:33:00.002+02:00

Yellow-jacket wasp

2010-02-18T22:16:00.005+02:00

Yellow-jacket wasp, or common wasp (Vespula vulgaris).

Diffraction

2010-02-18T19:40:00.004+02:00

Diffraction through the tree leaves (f/13 and f/22 apertures).

Moon

2010-02-17T19:44:00.003+02:00

Sunset on the outskirts of the city

2010-02-17T19:26:00.005+02:00

Traditional Romanian Handicrafts

2010-02-16T20:52:00.005+02:00

Bush sculptures

2010-02-16T20:27:00.003+02:00

Sparkling reflections

2010-02-15T20:28:00.003+02:00

Toadstools

2010-02-15T20:14:00.004+02:00

Poisonous mushrooms in a forest clearing. In the first picture one can see a close-up of the gills (with a few spores). The toadstools are probably "fly agaric" (Amanita muscaria), with the close-up one representing an older mushroom. NOT eatables.

Summer Agriculture

2010-02-14T18:59:00.004+02:00

Funfair

2010-02-14T12:37:00.004+02:00

Bracket fungi (Tinder)

2010-02-13T15:49:00.001+02:00

Bracket fungi from Ganoderma genus.

Fire and Ice

2010-02-13T13:15:00.001+02:00

Hot summer water fountain (with rainbow)

2010-02-13T01:24:00.002+02:00

Just the right pictures to post in the middle of a ruthless winter :D

Stray dogs

2010-02-13T01:07:00.003+02:00

Abandoned stray dogs roaming the city streets. Some are cleaned-up, neutered and marked, "adopted" by persons and then released back on the streets, others are not even caught in the first place.

Falling on snow

2010-02-12T10:52:00.006+02:00

On the ski slopes people fall
all the time and unfortunately
accidents (more or less serious)
happen.

Skiers

2010-02-12T08:49:00.019+02:00

Snowboarders

2010-02-10T20:20:00.003+02:00

Lilies

2010-02-10T19:53:00.003+02:00

Christmas lily (Lilium longiflorum) and Waterlily (Nymphaea Alba)

Remember Spring

2010-02-09T19:42:00.013+02:00

Silent Snails

2010-02-08T20:39:00.005+02:00

HDR with Qtpfsgui

2009-10-06T22:39:00.005+03:00

Just found out about Qtpfsgui. I had some previous struggles with HDR images but the tone mapping I was able to get by local adaptation wasn't quite what I wanted and it took a lot of work (see my previous post for some more samples). Following (more or less) the tutorial from garmahis.com I managed to get some really dramatic images (Fattal algorithm is really striking). When it comes to High Dynamic Range images you can get better results with Gimp and Qtpfsgui (open source tools) than with Adobe Photoshop or Photomatix (the Adobe image aligning algorithm is quite good and even the HDR creation seems better that Qtpfsgui's but it lacks "dramatic" tone-mapping algorithms). There's a long way to go into HDR imaging, but here is a comparison between my previous tone-mapped images (on the left) and the ones generated with Qtpfsgui (with minor tweaks and some layer blending).

Subway advertising (Quack quack in the back)

2009-10-04T00:36:00.005+03:00

Subway advertising.

Quack quack in the back !

"Stick 'em up !"

Or as one of my colleagues mentioned to me: "What what in the butt !"

Homemade remote control

2009-10-03T22:51:00.005+03:00

The Samsung GX-20 (as Pentax K20D I guess) is great overall: very ergonomic buttons with intuitive controls, great build quality and feeling but it has some major drawbacks (in my opinion): no option for turning noise reduction completely OFF (so a 1minute exposure takes two minutes) and the bulb button has to be continuously pressed for long exposures (and these lead me to the conclusion that the 14.5MP sensor is rather noisy and the manufacturer knows that ;) ). But I really want to be able to do some night photography too, even if the camera is obviously not intended for that. I bought a Pentax infrared remote control (since the Samsung is also IR capable) but the first time I tried to shoot some stars I found that it's not practical at all - there's no locking mechanism on the remote control and I still had to keep that darn button pressed for the entire exposure time, which got me frustrated rather quickly.

But, there's also the cable release option. Since I had already spent some money on the (mostly useless) IR remote I decided not to buy a cable remote, but to make one myself. The remote control is rather straightforward (and the same way might be for Canon, Nikon, etc.). If for a Canon A530 a (USB) homemade remote control you need some power source, CHDK, and a little more work, the homebrew cable release for a DSLR needs only some circuit closing (with switches and/or pushbuttons).

Parts needed:
- some container (I used a dental floss box)
- a cable with a 2.5mm male stereo jack (or a 3.5mm jack cable and an adaptor)
- a switch (for continuous shooting and bulb mode)
- two push buttons (for shutter and auto-focus)
- tools of the trade (soldering iron, solder, pliers)
- (optional) adhesive Velcro so you can stick the remote to the camera during a long exposure.

Pinouts: ground, auto-focus button, shutter release (test it before soldering to find out which is which).

Making of my homemade DSLR cable release: stick the buttons into the box and solder the cables: ground goes to all three buttons, shutter release goes to one push-button and the switch, autofocus goes to the other push-button.

So that's it - homemade Samsung DSLR remote control !

Rainbow Pigeons

2009-09-13T17:10:00.005+03:00

Pigeons with a fountain rainbow in the background.

Frogs

2009-09-13T16:30:00.007+03:00

Freshwater Turtles

2009-09-13T16:03:00.012+03:00

My best guess these are freshwater turtles from the Trachemys Genus - Trachemys scripta (also known as the Pond Slider) or Chrysemys Genus - Chrysemys scripta elegans. If any one of you know better please leave a comment.

Samguns G20 firmware check/update

2009-09-01T21:38:00.007+03:00

OK, all over the net every search leads me to the fact that the new Samsung GX firmware (Ver 1.03) was released. But I have one question. HOW DO I FIND OUT WHAT FIRMWARE I ALREADY HAVE INSTALLED ?! Sorry for the CAPS but it really drives me crazy. I've been searching through the camera menus to no avail. The only method so far is reading the EXIF of the photos. Still searching for a in-camera way ...
...and...after a while...
...just updated the firmware and the answer to my question was there. Just turn on the camera while keeping the Menu button pressed. If there's a firmware update on the memory card the update process starts. IF NOT, the current version is displayed on the LCD screen. Yeeey !!! No other info though, just "VER:1.03".

PS: "When the firmware is upgraded, all the camera settings are set to their default values" say the instructions.

> Well, not in my case. All my settings were kept intact which was great (spared me a couple of minutes and a lot of effort trying to remember my custom settings).

Startrails

2009-08-23T21:02:00.002+03:00

My first atempt of startrails. Made from a couple of 1minute shots with Canon A530 and CHDK.

Dusk Ducks

2009-07-30T23:58:00.001+03:00

Early summer ghosts.

Some flash, some movement, not enough light and this is what I got.

Hidden pigeon

2009-07-28T22:42:00.000+03:00

One of my first pictures taken with my new camera (Samsung GX-20).

Rainbow

2009-07-03T19:56:00.001+03:00

Just a rainbow after the storm.

Crazy Sky

2009-06-17T15:30:00.004+03:00

After a summer storm.
The craziest clouds I've ever seen.