May 27th 2014 - Summer is here.

Summer is here finally. It's been a busy month and hence I could not post earlier this month. When you live in a place which has 6-7 months of winter, you welcome the summers even more. There are parts of the world where the summers are too hot . Here at my place the summers are mild. Even, an 80 degrees Fahrenheit (26 degrees Celsius) seems like scorching heat. Anyways, for good or for bad the summers are here and so are the flowers trees, bees and the baby birds. 
The first picture is of a Poppy flower with rain drops.
Aperture-F4
ISO- 100

The next picture is of the Tulip flowers. A few miles from my place is the city, Holland. Few Dutch settlers from the country Holland founded the city and a large percentage of people here follow Dutch traditions and culture even today. Such a cool way to preserve your culture. They even have a Tulip festival. The picture is from the Tulips gardens of Holland Michigan.

Aperture - F9.5
Shutter Speed - 1/60 secs
ISO- 100

This next picture is of the trees in my backyard which were snow capped in the winters and now every branch brimming with life. It's a refreshing site. The breeze has a melody - the melody of the summer and with every whiff of air you can smell the fragrant flowers. Lots of song birds have nests in these trees. It becomes the busiest place. The blue skies, the green rustling leaves, can bring life back into your life. With all the busy birds, I was also busy at home doing all the pending jobs which were back logged during the winters.

This summer I was in no case going to miss taking shots of the baby birds, so one day I went in search of goslings and chicks. I found a few and took lots of shots. Here is a shot of a gosling very close to me. 

Aperture - F11
Shutter speed - 1/500 sec
ISO - 2500

This is all for now from me, but I have taken lots of flower pictures which I will definitely share with you in my coming posts. Hope you all are keeping yourselves safe in the summers by keeping hydrated. Have a great week!

April 26th 2014 - The new look and feel of my website.

Check it out at www.dipalis.com.

Your feedback is welcome.

Won Staff Favorite on April, 2014 on Viewbug.

I received 1 Awards, won 1 Trifectas, 16 Likes, 9 Peer Recognitions and 9 Favorites on viewbug.com

More of my work on View bug is at

http://www.viewbug.com/dipali

February 18th 2014 - Still under the spell of storms.

This has been a long winter and it's not over yet. There is not much to do in these winter storms apart from staying warm and healthy. Just an occasional outing for pictures is all that can be done. The scenes of winter are picturesque only when the sun is out and the surroundings are filled with sunlight - a rare  commodity this winter.
This is a scene at a Park near where I live.
Shutter Speed: 1/750
ISO : 100
Setting : Manual


In the same park I saw this Coniferous tree. It was huge. Really loved the blue sky which we rarely see here at this time of the year. It is always greyish and cloudy. You can imagine how huge it must have been. It is so surprising that some trees just stand in the adversities  to grow and flourish. Kind of like the quote - "When the going gets tough, the tough gets going". Also reminds me Kelly Clarkson's - "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger". I love this song. One can also say that they are made tough genetically. So standing strong in adversity is not their property but their genes are like that. Anyway, they are a delight to the eyes amongst the white snow.

Shutter Speed - 1/200
ISO- 100
Setting : Manual



Below is a shot from a road over a highway. This is what I am talking about -the cloudy, gloomy but this one has a little sun shining through the clouds at sunset like hope in despair.

Shutter speed : 1/30
ISO : 100
Setting : Manual
Click on the images to get a better view.

  When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Well, this is exactly what I am doing. With this optimistic note I end this post. Hope you all will stay warm . Have a nice week!

December 3rd 2013 - World in Black and White.

There was a time when photography had no color. Since the discovery of color in photography we have been seeing color everywhere. Black and white still captures the world in all it's essence and beauty. Even today when we revisit pictures in black and white, a sense of purity and simplicity prevails. So, on one hand, color attracts the viewer with its catchy designs and color, black and white attracts the viewers by it's composition, lighting, focus and the story in the picture. A beautiful excellently executed black and white picture can surely beat a flashy color picture. I love color and capturing it is just what I do, but lately I've been attracted to the black and white. There are so many tones to black and white and capturing the right one for the right thing is just as important.

The topmost picture is of Holland Beach. It is a sunset at the Great lakes. The colorful sunset can be captured in black and white with equal drama even without color. Click on the images to view a larger version.

Shutter speed - 1/40 secs
Aperture - F10
ISO - 100

The picture on the right is of Fredrick Meijer Garden. It has sculptures of various artists.  That day, when I reached the garden it was closed , so I could only take shots from outside.

Shutter speed - 1/1000 secs
Aperture - F4.5
ISO - 100
The clouds and the sky can change your black and white picture from ordinary to dramatic.

This is a picture from the Zoo. This is the African elephant. Note the skin has come out beautifully in the black and white version. The wrinkles in the skin have come out perfect. They give the texture to the picture against the blur background.

Shutter speed - 1/320secs
Aperture - F7
ISO - 200

I have even added a new gallery for black and white on my website www.dipalis.com. Feel free to visit and leave your feedback. The other thing I've been working on in the last few weeks is Illustration. Hope to share a few in the next posts.

Hope you all will enjoy these pictures as much as I did capturing them.

November 15th 2013 - The first snow fall of the season.

Taking a picture in studio is like creating art, while capturing something in nature, or architecture or landscape is like capturing art. I like to do both the things but some photographers think that in studio pictures do not take much effort. It  is more difficult to create than to capture , I believe. I say this because the past week I have been trying to create and for that you need  fresh ideas and fresh mind, which were both not possible this week as I have exhausted myself with work. This is a random thought which came to my mind, anyway I was lucky to take a few pictures of the first snowfall we had this season. Here are a few...

In this picture I found a few leaves on the path leading to the woods which I thought would look good in SC.

Shutter Speed -1/60 secs
Aperture - 4.5
ISO - 125

As this was the first snowfall , there are a few brown, red leaves on the Oak trees even now. So this shot is of 8:00 am in the morning when the sun was lighting up the leaves on the top of the trees. The golden hour light is always considered the best time to take pictures outdoors. The pictures are soft and magical. I usually miss this time when I am not on vacation, which means I am working as this is the busiest time. That day I left everything and shot a few first snow pictures.  It looked magical. Being a photographer you are blessed with such views and feelings. Very often you can just admire the beauty that surrounds us. 

Shutter Speed - 1/60 secs
Aperture - F16
ISO - 100  

This picture is of the snow on the deck. Just loved how the leaves are sitting there and the sun rays dancing it's way through the railings of the deck. You will be seeing a lot more snow pictures  from me as it's here to stay for some four-five months. Hope you enjoyed the view too and hope you all will have a nice weekend.

Shutter Speed -1/20 secs
Aperture - F16
ISO - 200

October 31st 2013 - Fall is here and Winter is not far behind.

Saw the first frost last week in the morning. Beautiful fall colors are covering the paths. The leaves which have fallen from the trees are no longer with us but they have transformed the place into beautiful paintings.

This is my capture of the frost.

Shutter Speed - 1/20
ISO - 200

Love the Oak leaves. They have lots of curves and are bold in shape.

 
A path in the park will give you a good idea of what the fall in Michigan is like this year. This was taken in the evening at the time of the golden light.
Shutter Speed - 1/13
Aperture - F13
ISO - 100
This is a short post as I have been busy with kid's stuff. Not much accomplished in the field of photography this week. Just working on my other passion and that is web designing.

Hope to get some pictures for my next post. Wish you all a happy Festival season. From the place where I come, we have Diwali - festival of lights, which is a four to five days long festival. Wish you all a very Happy Diwali!!!!

July-August Pictures

All of July I was on vacation. Had a nice time with Family and Friends. Here is a picture from that time.
I was on an Auto Rickshaw, and believe me, not in a comfortable position at all and  neither stationary - the auto rickshaw was at 40 kms per hour. I used a Panasonic camera for this shot.
Some more info-

• ISO - 100
• Shutter Speed - 1/1000 sec
• F number - 3.1

Back home my backyard was blooming with grapes. This just cropped up when i came back . To my surprise I had never seen this vine before in my backyard. 

Some more info-

• ISO - 100
• Shutter Speed - 1/30
• F number -9.5

A walk to a nearby park in the evening when the weather is good is what an evening should be. This shot is of a covered wooden bridge over a river in a nearby park.

 Some more info-

• ISO- 400
• Shutter speed - 1/60
• F number - 5

And lastly to end this post here is something as fresh and as beautiful as a Sunflower . Happy weekend !

Some more info -

• ISO - 100
• Shutter Speed - 1/4 sec
• F number - 22