Hello there. I am Terry and I am a full-time undergraduate based in Singapore. I take photos, write a blog and design websites.

And no, I'm not a teddy bear.

Three days in cloud nine

Three days in cloud nine

As my grandparents came down for a short stayover, my parents will be bringing the family to a highland resort that is merely an hour’s drive away from the city center today *screams in joy*. I’m a little excited and yet a little nervous because for some reason, my university has arranged that I shall register for my courses on today as well. So far, my plan is to get a cup of coffee, plop my butt in Coffee Bean and make use of their Wifi, heh.

In case you are curious, the photo above in not a composite but an actual photo taken during my previous trip to the highland’s theme park. The ride is called turbo drop (formerly called Solero Space Shot but renamed and had its sponsorship dropped after a fatal accident) and it’s the tallest structure in the theme park. Modifications in photoshop only involves five simple steps:

  1. Using quickmask, isolate the sky and pumped the saturation
  2. Desatured the rest of the photo
  3. Cropped the photo
  4. Removed that annoying bug in the photo
  5. Rendered clouds (using Filter > Render > Clouds) on a dummy layer and blended it with the rest of the photo using overlay. Opacity adjusted to 50%.

Here’s a before and after comparison:

Three days in cloud nine - Before & After

Three days in cloud nine - Before & After

I took a photo today in my garden. The sun was strong (but the weather was hellish later in the afternoon) – so strong that I don’t even need an advanced flash kit to shoot photos at 1/500 of a second. Pure awesomeness! I grabbed the garden hose and started spraying while snapping away happily. Here’s one of my favourites:

Jumping fountain? Nope. It's just water from the garden hose.

Jumping fountain? Nope. It's just water from the garden hose.

I simply placed my thumb over the opening of the hose and aimed my camera at the top of the parabolic curve. It does require a few rounds of trial and error. I had the shutter speed set too high at first (thus underexposing the photo) and for a few unlucky tries, aimed at other stuff, like the white wall behind. This photo has it’s own Flickr page too!

There will most probably be no updates until I’m back ;) hang in there, folks!

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12 responses to “Three days in cloud nine” » Leave a response

  1. DestinyResponse

    Beautiful configuration!! Thanks for listing the steps! I always just mod my photos in Lightroom… they have great effects and adjusting there. I’m the same way as you, I can go back and revisit a place and find something new that I’ve never seen before, or capture an angle that I never looked from before.
    I will miss you for the next three days, hope you have an enjoyable and safe trip with your family ^_^

    Check out Destiny’s latest blog post » When the Girls Come Out

  2. bongkerszResponse

    How wonderful, to be able to register your courses online. Remember my time, I need to rush back just to register my subjects, what a waste of time. (and money!)

    Have fun in Genting!

    ps: You are above legal age to into the casino, right? Haha!

  3. med

    enjoy ur holiday! ;)

  4. abdusfauziResponse

    i wanna go there too!! hehe.

  5. WendyResponse

    Beautiful picture…and I think where you have taken it from :P I have been to that specific area as well, last year.

    Enjoy yourself!

    Check out Wendy’s latest blog post » A Kitty So Cute I Wanna Bring Him Home!

  6. |1f34|-|1r3Response

    i stayed at Genting hotel once for free…haha…first time i’m in a hotel room without air conditioners…LOL

    Check out |1f34|-|1r3’s latest blog post » Invite Up : The easist invite ever !

  7. sueResponse

    my gosh. it looks so much nicer after postprocessing.
    argh dont have those skills yet, maybe someday it would come to me =D

    Check out sue’s latest blog post » 19th November, Project Rock Climb

  8. DaynaResponse

    That was a nice photo taken. :)

    Honestly speaking, I’m not fond of registering for courses online. I did that during my polytechnic days and it was bad. The server was overloaded and everything. It simply doesn’t have that sense of security for me. I prefer enrolling via the traditional paperwork. :P

    Check out Dayna’s latest blog post » APB Family Day at the Zoo

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