PBPhoto

I really like this shot. One of those moments that I didn't intend to capture but it just happened. The boys are up on top of my truck. The sun is setting and I am trying to see what I can get in such low light. The minute I took it, I knew it was a good one. At least to me that is.

I worked on it a little in LR2. Brought up the blacks a little added the gradients from 3 sides.

Be blessed.

Here are a few shots that I took yesterday in the late afternoon. The sunlight is great. I have been so into using strobes lately that I have forgotten how much fun it is to just take pictures without setting up umbrellas and reflectors and radio triggers.

So I post-processed these in Lightroom 2.2. What a great tool. I thought I might give my current opinion on Lightroom verses Photoshop. I find myself staying in Lightroom and not using Photoshop. Now I'm not an expert Photoshopper at all. So I know that there are those that can really get things done quickly in there. But Lightroom is more intuitive and keeps the layers and non-destructive editing under the hood. Very nice. I believe that Lightroom 1 did not allow for local adjustments such as touch-ups for skin and eyes. Lightroom 2 does this. It has a healing tool and clone tool, which in my opinion are two of the best things about Photoshop.

In these shots I have also used the gradient tool. I learned about this tool from David Ziser's website http://www.digitalprotalk.blogspot.com. This is a very powerfull tool. Instead of being constrained to a circular vignette, you can darken, in a gradient fashion, anywhere. This could be done with the Burn tool but this is quicker for me.

I'd be curious if you have experience with the two. What do you think?

I am very happy with this one. Got this one last night. Mommy took the boys out on a toy run and Maggie and I had a photo shoot. Poor thing has a cold so she had redness on her cheek and chin from the snot (sorry, too much info).

The lighting setup is two-lights. One 285HV into a white shoot-thru umbrella camera right @ 1/4 power. Very close to the subject. And a bare 540EZ camera left and behind for the accent light. I am going to try to include a lighting diagram created at http://www.qhphotography.com/Resources/Online-Tools/Lighting-Diagram which is a really neat tool.

In Photoshop, I had to fix the red areas on her face. I tried selecting and apply curves to the red channel but could never seem to get the right selection. So I was removing red in areas that I didn't want to do that. So I ended up using the healing tool with good success. If you have better ideas about this, please let me know.

So here is the lighting diagram.

Hey all,

I am looking for some help from you all.  I will be traveling to Ecuador in April on a mission trip.  I plan to take a bunch of pictures.  So I am looking for input.  Have you traveled to Ecuador?  Can you give some tips for travel photography?  Have you read any great books on the topic?  Seen any great websites on the subject? 

I am really looking forward to the trip and want to be well prepared.  I am sure I'll be busy working but I plan to always have my camera ready.

Please help me out.

Be blessed.