The DIY Ringlight

Just the  cheapest DIY ringlight-hack ever!! Total cost? Like ten dollars.

 

Ring-lights instantly turn a "blah" photo into something much more. In comparison to harsh, direct lighting, ring-lights give subjects an almost angelic glow. Unfortunately, these little fuckers are expensive and cumbersome. So here I have... TADA! The cheapest macro photography ringlight


 

Materials Needed:

Christmas Lights (battery operated if you want it portable, LED preferred)

Wire hanger

Simply bend the wire hanger into an O-shape and wrap the Christmas lights around. Bigger bulbs such as G12 ones will result in a brighter, more effective ring-light!

These lights are best for macro photography but they will also produce beautiful results when taking photos of small pets, delicious foods, jewelry, makeup, etc! When you are done, you can easily store your ring-light by hanging it in the closet. If you want to be a bit craftier, you can bend the hanger into any shape you want. Heart-light, anyone?

Until Next Time,

Cristina

Freshlooks Toric Grey

I think this will be my last contact lens review but I wanted to share what I thought about my current everyday lens. I think its safe to say that I will no longer be wearing circle lens anymore. I've actually grown out of wearing them as Ive realized that with my insanely large eyes that regular contact lenses look better. Just a preference though!

To be honest, I was kind of scared of not wearing circle lens and having blonde hair anymore. Though these are superficial things, I've had circle lens and blonde hair for an eternity and without them I feel weirdly not me. Like I chopped off my arm or something. But now I actually like this new look a lot more. It looks less artificial on me (quite a contradiction when really I have like 20lbs of make-up on) and I can concentrate on other things. NOT DYING YOUR ROOTS EVERY FEW WEEKS IS AN AMAZING FEELING!!

For some odd reason since my last complete check up (not follow up) three months ago, I've developed mild astigmatism. I suspect its all the squinting I've been doing without contacts or glasses lately. The eye doctor told me I could opt for regular lenses or toric ones but assured me that the toric ones would fit better though they would be a tad more expensive. Though the option of having many other colors was tempting, I just kind of said fuck it. I don't want anything weird to happen to my eyes!

Anyways toric lenses are a bit thicker and usually last a month since they have to retain their shape. I was not used to wearing toric lenses (even the regular clear lenses) and it took me a while to get accustomed to the feeling... Especially when you first insert them and the base has to rotate. I do admit that these lenses aren't the most comfortable, but neither are my clear ones. I use eyedrops every once in a while to retain moisture as it feels a bit dry mid day. The color is fairly bright but not obnoxiously bright in my opinion. Price wise, you are going to need to sell your first born child... Seriously. With rebates and everything, I spent around two hundred plus on a years supply. But honestly, I'm fine with it because NOW I CAN SEE IN HD! I think I'm just so used to buying yearly circle lens for what?... Twenty dollars that the price increase kind of shocked me. It's probably quite comparable to the American contact lens market price.

LENGTHY POST!! I am working on le studio lighting oh ho ho so what do you guys think? Comment responses are going to be a bit laggy as I'm trying to post all the photos I've taken quickly!

Until Next Time,

Cristina

Faux Gel Nail Tutorial

Just like I promised, a super easy nail tutorial of epic proportions on how to get gel-like nails without spending that extra cash! (plus it keeps your nails super healthy as well!) This was extremely fun to do! I forgot to include that if your nails aren't rounded, feel free to file them to the appropriate length and to dab the glitter nail polish to make a gradient. Light dabs! Any nailpolish that has colored glitter is fine to use for this tutorial.

Until Next Time,

Mint

Fucking Legit Photo Tutorial

Alright I've had a lot of requests (& I mean a lot) about how I take my photos so I decided to do a small tutorial on how to make your photography more kickass. I was going to do a chain of tutorials but I know that I'll never have all the time in the world to cover natural lighting, artificial lighting, lenses, etc. so I'm going to give you a few tips to begin with

First off, I am going to ruin everything you think you know about photography with this: camera is not everything. OH NOS!! But its true. Most people like big cameras because you can get these cool bokeh effects and what-not but bokeh is only pretty when used correctly. You need to adjust your fstop (if you have a dslr) accordingly to make the best photo possible. Now look at these two photos, which one do you like more? 

If you said the first photo, you're wrong!! No, just kidding. Theres no wrongs to photography haha. But really what you should be looking at is the composition of the photo. The first photo is dead center, with a "whatever" background, and is not incredibly sharp where it should be whereas the second photo has a very interesting background, amazing lighting, and has the perfect amount of focus. See what I am trying to teach you is that bokeh isn't everything, composition is! So it doesn't matter what type of camera you are using (well okay... it does but only to some degree), because you can have an amazing camera and still take shit photos.

Being said, in today's lesson (haha I feel so cool being a teacher), I am going to teach you how to make some interesting photos. Think to yourself a time when you wanted to take a photo of your food (yuim yum) and think about how you take the photo. Most of the time you take a photo straight down of what you are eating, right? Well now imagine your food is a whale. This is what it probably looks like

Oh god how unappetizing! This photo is so flipping bad, I'm not even gonna watermark it. So whats going on here? First off, our whale is kind of in a weird place. Its sort of in a corner but not really. Alright now imagine you are taking a photo of the same whale or food with an angle.

Much better! Now see, our whale's face is positioned into the third part of our photo. If you make an imaginary line that splits our photo into thirds, you'll know what I'm talking about. The rule of thirds is a key concept to making your photos more interesting. Combine this with some angles and you'll be set! If you are still confused, imagine this as something like a piece of cake. Instead of shooting the cake straight down, shoot it off to the side at an angle. Makes sense?

Alright now say you want to make it a little more interesting. Playing with your foreground and background can enhance that. Int his photo I'll be playing with the foreground of the photo.

If you are wondering what that is, those are dangling necklaces I put near the camera so that its out of focus. Okay we're not done yet because now that looks like I made a boo boo! Now I am going to position more crap in the foreground of this photo.

Bam! A much more interesting photo. Now this photo looks as though it has more of a story to tell instead of looking like I put a whale in a random place. 

I'm going to end with, its really really hard to photoshop a shitty photo to look better. Its easier to enhance an already amazing photo with photoshop. Trust me on this part! And guess what? If your photo is kickass you can do whatever the fuck you want with it and it'll still look amazing. To demonstrate I'm going to photoshop the lighting a bit and then write some random blurb on that photo and it will still look deep/insightful/overall amazing .

See? it makes no flipping sense but it looks good! (well at least i think it looks amazing) Imagine trying to shop that on the first photo of our whale up there... it would look like a piece of shit with a creeper message. Anyways, I hope these tips help you in your photography adventures & if you need any help with your cameras or anything you can always comment or tweet me!

Until Next Time,

Mint

p.s. I don't follow these rules all the time but its the simplest way to get your photos looking more professional :) :).

My Photos from 2010 & New Shoes

I never do this but I guess I'll take the plunge! So anyways while I was clearing out my computer and getting rid of bits&pieces, I realized that I take so many photos but I never share them with anyone. Kind of depressing right? So anyways I'm gonna start to actively share the photos I take. These are my favorite shots of 2010. So I'll write a little description of the story behind each photo

This photo is beyond trashy. It was freezing cold outside when I took this. Poor model got sick!

 

I took this photo for Toge's clothing line. It took so many hours of post production work to find the photo she liked & "style".

One of my favorite photos because this was so fucking hard to do. It involved using second curtain shutter so I could get the frozen person but trailing lights and timing everything perfectly. Those are glowsticks btw, not ribbons.

Just a bathroom shot. Lighting this SHOULD have been easy but this was in a corner so you can imagine how hard it was to fit lights in here. This style totally reminds me of Mark the Cobra Snake's style sans the extreme vignetting.

Anyways here is a photo I took recently. I don't have the time to schedule photoshoots with models anymore but this era sure was fun. From now on, I guess I'll use myself for lighting practice. 

 

 I like this dreamy effect a lot but ironically, I think my features look pretty harsh here. hmMm..

New shoes. I'm not really a "product" person when it comes to photography but I had so much fun lighting these shoes. I think its because I'm used to lighting now so I don't have to experiment a lot anymore... at least regarding products. People are always a hassle!

Anyways I bought these and a pair of black pumps a long way back but it took FOREVER to ship. These are sooo comfy but the 5.5-6inch heels are a bitch to walk in. I mean I can handle everything up to 5 inches but these are totally different. I guess I just have to get used to them!

I'm so excited for my t2i to come so I can finally start filming! TWO T2IS TO FILM?!? Am I crazy?!? No seriously, I am so frigging excited to edit my videos!

Until Next Time,

Mint

Portal2 Review & Mortal Kombat Came!

 

Mortal Kombat came!!! I bought it because Amazon was having a video game sale and it was 20 dollars off (no way). And I heard this was the best Mortal Kombat since the first one. TBH, I'm not a fan of fighter games but Aaron is so I bought it essentially for him. 

I just played it today so I don't have any real thoughts on it yet. I do love the grotesque setting and slutty costumes that all Mortal Kombat games have so yay *u*!!

I'll do a review on it when I finish (if I finish.. I might just play versus forever with Aaron because the "lucky" chance is so addictingly fun). But now to get down to business....

I beat Portal2 already in both single player & co-op!! For the people who don't know, Portal2 was one of the most anticipated games this year. Let me give a brief run through of what Portal is like... 

In short, you are locked in Aperture Facilities and you have to try and escape with your portal gun. Now this is the freaky part. Your gun creates one portal that when you enter, leads you to the other portal. I think the picture above explains it better than I ever could. Its essentially a first person puzzle game.

Now onto the review. I've played Portal1 and I liked it a lot but I would get frustrated because I'd blow myself up all the time (err well I would just let the laser hit me and die). In Portal2, I actually died probably.. two three times in the entire game. I don't know if they baby proofed the course but I actually enjoyed Portal2 because it was more challenging, but definitely harder to die.

CO-OP is a must have. If you don't have friends, make some... and then persuade them to play with you. The CO-OP story mode is actually around the same time length as the single player. You would think co-op would be easy but its actually pretty hard! We spent a pretty long time figuring the last course out... but thats probably because you can always be a total dick and kill your partner.

Now onto the bad parts. First off, like Portal1, its way too short! This game probably plays... 20-30 hours AT MOST (CO-OP included)... And that is if you have some sort of cognitive disability and can not process shapes and objects. The good thing is that there will be an update where users can create their own maps later on... ILL BE WAITING ON IT

Another bad thing is of course there is zero replay value... once you finish this game. Its done. Also, there isn't a companion cube... WHAT THE FUCK?!? there were actually no other "characters" I could bond with like the first one I know bond with a cube.. dumb right?

Overall I still think this is one of the best games of 2011 simply because of the witty humor and storyline. I mean come on... HOW CAN YOU RESIST POTATO GLADOS?!? HILARIOUS!

Now onto food & etc things...

 

Here is me wearing the shirt I bought the other day! 

We went to Yummy Yummy on Irving St after discovering that New Sandy's chef left... So we are directing our pho and pho-related activities to Yummy Yummy for the time being (well... until New Sandy's cleans their act up!)

The rolls are to die for! Its not your conventional roll but rather, a roll covered in panco-esque batter,

Of course, our beef carpaccio. This is not as good as our usual place but it will suffice for now!

AMAZING!! Spicy noodles. Now I know you guys are all thinking... who eats that at a pho place? Well this is the bomb!!

I kind of miss using my dSLR lately so I've been trying to take photos but then I realized why I use my camera on my phone more now... First of all the convenience... and second of all because dSLRs show all your flaws and imperfections if you don't know how to light the face. But here is a candid photo of me with rilakkuma! I took it myself with my shutter wide open so obviously could not focus as well as I wanted it to ): I should have used f/4 or f/5 instead. DARN ME FOR BEING GREEDY AND WANTING A LOWER ISO!

 

For those of you who are wondering --> f/2.8 iso 400 1/60

Gosh I love the coloring on this lens! Even if I did shop the colors a bit!

Okay before I leave, I wanted to ask you "what games do you guys play?" this can be childhood or whatever (OCARINA OF TIME FTW) Primarily because I've always liked playing until I reached puberty when I decided that tits+make-up>entertainment+games so getting back to playing these past years is really refreshing. 

Until Next Time,

Mint

Food, Outfit, and Why I Use Flash

Theres been a lot of problems since I updated my URL. I think a lot of people who followed my blog before I updated it can not see my posts on their "Google Reader". If that is the case, please refollow me ): Sorry for the inconvenience! But anywho, this week has been fairly rough with midterms (again) and preparing for the Cherry Blossom festival at my work! I work at a purikura store and its the funnest place ever! 

Today, I would like to touch upon why I like flash on point and shoot cameras and when is the proper occasion to use it. I just felt the need to explain myself on why I hate natural lighting because I have been getting questions from my friends on what type of lighting I prefer.

Now I would like to explain why I use flash for all my photos. THIS PHOTO ABOVE is the reason. When I don't use flash, my features get so cartoony (especially with my make-up!) that it looks like I photoshopped the fuck out of it. I assure you, I do not photoshop anything other than the lighting on my photos. I actually got a lot of shit from it before (thus, I feel the need to explain myself). Sometimes I contemplate about photoshopping my eyes smaller so I can look more normal ): ... If you don't believe me you can look at my twitpics. I can't photoshop those since I update it with my phone. You can even look at my twitter to see which ones I've updated with my phone, and which ones I've updated via web. (I actually knew girls who used to post photos after they photoshopped the shit out of it onto twitter which totally defeats the point of using twitter). Anyways if you are still in disbelief, look up the exif data. 

The outfit I wore today. Pretty casual for school (thats not a scarf its a whole shirt btw! Pretty cool huh?) Now if i take photos outdoors, I prefer natural lighting a lot more... But given the option and a professional lighting crew, I would never use natural lighting... Unless I had a bunch of mirrors or reflectors.

A photo with flash. I think I look so much more normal here. (hehe red nose sniffles allergies) So overall what do I look like IRL? I actually look like neither photos. I look more inbetween the photo with flash and the photo with natural lighting.

Now when to use flash -- In a club (LOL),  at night, when there is sun behind you (VERY IMPORTANT), when you wear a shitload of make-up.

In short, if you don't have a lot of make-up on, do NOT use flash. If you have a crapload of make-up on, use flash. I will probably be uploading a tutorial later on about photography lighting (glamour, dramatic) on camera + off camera with a dSLR when this month is over -cries-.

Moving on, I have been eating out a lot lately! Here is some hipster food porn.

We got free salad at this European-Japanese restaurant!

 

My drink!

I got curry! It was so good but I was too fat. Could not finish.

Shirley got HAMBAGAHHH steak. Its just Japanese hamburger steak with toast + potatoes + etc.

Cherry blossoms near my work place

 Flowers for my deceased relatives. I took one home.

My dog being a BAMF

Went out to eat Pho today. Aaron's thai iced tea.

Papaya salad -- it tasted like shit.

Some spring rolls with our pho. 

I just felt the need to give a short update because I'm pretty sure I'm going to be so busy this month, my blog might feel a bit neglected.

BUTTT next time, I'm gonna update on my MAC haul my friend got me & some make-up goodies Shirley gave me! I love my friends :3

Until Next Time,

Mint