Seascapes & Coffee FAQs
Are the photos on your blog really taken with a smartphone? Most of the photos are taken with a midprice Android smartphone on the stock Android camera app using manual settings. These are identified by the watermark. I usually set the manual settings to ISO 1600 or higher, shutter speed is usually 1/30 or 1/60 handheld - a bit tricky without a tripod so there are noticeable grain and blurry effects on a few photos. Finally I adjust the white balance slider to try to get a picture as close as I can get to what I see. A few photos were shot on my iPhone 7 using the Halide iOS app in either auto or manual mode.
Why is your blog called “Seascapes & Coffee? Well, I originally was going to call my photography blog “Penang Crepuscule” to describe the ethereal quality of the light in the sky at twilight on the beaches at Tanjung Tokong. Also I thought the French origin of the word crepuscule makes it more memorable. In the end, though, I went for the simplicity of ‘Seascapes”. As I started cafe reviews to document Penang’s coffee culture, the title was updated to Seascapes and Coffee.
Do you use special effects like Lightroom filters to achieve the brilliant hues of red and orange at sunset in many of your photos? The short answer is No. Some photos are quite obviously cropped. But no processing is applied.
You seem to like pop culture. Are some of the titles based on pop or jazz songs? Yes. Mr Blue Sky is of course one of the tracks by ELO that was used to great effect in one of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies. And I also managed to insert a line from Sonnet #18 by the world's greatest playwright, Wm S.
Do you have plans to add hyperlapse videos? Well, I just took delivery of a tripod and Osmo action camera. Still waiting to get some ND filters. Watch this space.
What is your background in photography? I was in the Photography club in my high school. My parents had a basic Kodak camera that shot B&W square format rolls. At uni I continued to shoot mainly landscape pictures using Fujica SLRs that used the old X Fujinon mount. I also owned one of the early Casio QV consumer digital cameras which came out in 1997 or 1998, if my aging memory is correct.
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