PBPhoto

I Love Family Portraits

2011-12-18T14:38:00.001-05:00

It is very satisfying for me to capture and save moments of a loving family interacting with one another. The technical aspects of using a camera to take a photo become secondary to just letting a family do what they do in an interesting environment with good lighting.

So this wonderful family is the other winner of my Thanksgiving photo session giveaway. I have known them for many years. It was my pleasure to hang out with them for a little while.

We used flash with an umbrella (above).

We worked in the breezeway of the horse stable with ambient light only.

And backlit with the sun, exposing for the shadows and letting the background blow out.

I finally remember to bring some Christmas props to use for this shoot and I think they worked great. It gave the Children something to focus on and it establishes that we are actually taking Christmas portraits. This is adorable if I may.

I enjoy a series like this showing the different expressions.

The old horse stable makes for an interesting environment in my opinion.

So, sorry about being late to the shoot. I'm glad you guys weren't paying me for this one. :)

Merry Christmas. You guys be blessed.

Another Great Family.

2011-12-11T07:30:00.001-05:00

Got to spend some time with another great family. They are one of the two families that won our Thanksgiving giveaway. For location, they chose downtown Melbourne. A great choice and thankfully it didn't rain on us. A blessing. Christmas decorations are a bonus as well.

We just spent some time walking around the area and letting the kiddos play. Letting them interact with each other and with Mommy and Daddy. Group shots are a struggle at this age. Something I am oh too familiar with for my own family. So we just go with the flow. In my opinion, a perfectly posed shot of a family with small children doesn't capture the reality of a family with small children. I think it nice to have those chaotic moments captured. We (parents) will look back on them fondly apparently. At least that is what I'm told. :)

So here we have beautiful family in a great location. What could go wrong? Nothing. These kiddos are adorable.

I mean really are you kidding me with how cute they are?

This young man had some great expressions.

And they are obviously neglected. :)

This doorway was new to me but I really love the colors and the graffiti.

This pose is becoming a favorite of mine. Kiddos window shopping.

I like the details in this door in the background.

Honestly it was difficult not to just include the entire gallery in this post but in the interest of keeping it to a somewhat reasonable length I'll just throw in a few more of my favorites. If you want to see the whole thing just click on one of the photos. It will take you to it.

Thank you for making the 45 minute trip to share some time with me. I hope you enjoy these photographs. I enjoyed it

The Moment Is Here

2011-11-23T19:48:00.001-05:00

And the big announcement is here in this amazingly great video. I mean really. It is a great video. :) Just kidding. Congratulations!!! I'll be in touch so as to set up a time and location for our session.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Thanks for entering. Maybe we will do this more often. Maybe this will be an annual thing.

Eat plenty and enjoy your families.

Be Blessed.

Happy Thanksgiving And A Free Photo Session

2011-11-16T21:28:00.001-05:00

Here is a first. For the first time PBPhoto is doing a giveaway. The reward is a free setting fee for a 1 hour session. I will post the best photos in an online gallery on my SMUGMUG site. They will be available there for download, prints, mugs, t-shirts, holiday cards, etc. So the only cost will be for prints/merchandise. Check my SMUGMUG site for prices.

It must be a local session unless you want to pay for my airfare.

Oh yeah, how do you win? Post a comment on this blog or on facebook. Tell me what you are thankful for this year. We will put the names of those who comment into a hat and draw a random winner! Man what could be more exciting!

The other request is that you make a donation to a charity of your choice using some or all of the money that you would have used for my sitting fee. Currently $150.

I'm looking forward to taking your family photos! Be sure to enter. The winner will be drawn in one week on 23 November 2011.

Enter NOW!

Pumpkins & Punkins

2011-11-09T21:30:00.001-05:00

We have a few of both. These are a few of my favorites from our trip to the pumpkin patch recently. The colors are amazing. I love the blue painted picnic table where they were displaying the smaller pumpkins. Those colors definitely caught my eye.

And The Winner Is . . .

2011-10-30T07:35:00.001-04:00

I was hired by 3 families to photograph their children who were on the Homecoming court at Merritt Island High School this weekend.

So after getting lost a couple of times (thanks google maps), we made it to the stadium. By we I mean that the whole family was with me. It was raining and we were late but we made it. So I broke my first rule of photography which is: be early to the location. It gives me time to survey the situation, look for inspiration, and come up with a plan to light things if necessary. That was out the window. I walked as fast as I could with my gear to the opposite end zone where there was a tent with the young ladies and their escorts and mothers. And they were ready to start taking shots. No time to set up so I just started shooting ambient light only. Which ended up turning out well but from the back of the camera, I wasn't all that confident.

So I put a strobe on the camera and took some using the strobe for key light. I really really really don't like doing that. But the results here are good I think. After removing some red eye. I love this candid.

That didn't last long and the parents and myself headed up into the stands to wait for the halftime events. I kept looking down to the tent and thinking I wish I would have stayed down there to get some more shots. Gretchen confirmed that idea by asking me about it. So I went back down there. Not sure about security at these things. There was a couple of deputies at the gate to the field. I suppose a guy with a camera body with a battery grip and a strobe looks professional and they never questioned me. You just have to look like you belong.

This was a much better situation. No one was rushed. The kids were having fun talking and joking. And I was thankful that they were under a white tent. The worlds largest softbox. So I used it as you can see in the lead picture above. Nice soft light. I dragged the shutter (slowed down the shutter speed) to allow the field in the background to burn in.

Then came halftime.

As they walked across the field I tried to incorporate the marching band and ROTC kiddos. Looked great by the way. I took some without flash but the umbrellas were shadowing their faces too much so I went back to using the strobe as more of a fill in this case and also allowing the stadium lights to backlight them and make their umbrellas glow.

And the winner was . . . one of the girls that I was covering. How cool.

Then they all made a lap around the track in some sweet golf carts.

Great Family, Great Portraits

2011-10-16T20:59:00.001-04:00

Had the pleasure of photographing another great family this weekend. It was very relaxing and fun. And best of all, we got some great shots. I shot some with ambient light only. It was an overcast evening so the light was soft. Brought in a strobe and umbrella on some to make the subjects pop a little.

Their son is adorable. Love the missing front teeth.

He is obviously loved like crazy by mommy and daddy.

Here they are. All three. This is ambient light only.

We let the young man play some and I worked with mom and dad to give them some shots of themselves. I brought the strobe in here. But I kept it almost on axis to mimic the overcast light that didn't have any direction to it.

I like the way this gate frames this shot.

And to prove that we had fun, here 'ya go. I like the barricade and cars in the background here. It is true to the environment that we were in.

Be blessed.

Fall In Kentucky

2011-10-11T21:23:00.001-04:00

We went to my family reunion this weekend in Kentucky. Can't even describe how great the trip was on so many levels. Had some revelations about my Dad's history. Grew closer to my sister and her family (I love you guys). Here they are!

Anyway, before I get too mushy, there was some photography going on as well. The leaves thankfully changed while we were there. So in my sister and brother-in-law's back yard me and the boys had some adventures. They quickly got tired of Daddy stopping every 100 feet and setting up a strobe and umbrella. But I was undeterred.

OK I was a little deterred by this guy. If you have a genus and species on this, please let me know.

The colors were amazing.

The shots above are using a strobe in a shoot-thru umbrella.

Here are two of my favorites from down by the lake. These are just backlit shots exposed for the shadows on the face.

I'll leave you with this smiley face!

My Girl

2011-09-04T18:19:00.001-04:00

I love this shot!

Tonight

2011-08-21T20:40:00.001-04:00

Haven't had my camera for a while. It was off to Canon for cleaning and repair. It's been nice to have it back. I got Gretchen a Canon G12 so we would have something decent to carry around. I admit that it was nice to have something so light on trips to Disney etc. My 40D with battery grip feels like a tank in comparison. But it does take great images. Man! These are a few from our short trip to Cold Stone Ice Cream on the beach.

Oh What A Wedding.

2011-07-02T21:26:00.001-04:00

Not even sure where to start with this post. My great friend Mark Morgan (mmorganphotography) and I shot another wedding recently. There's so much to say about this one.

There's a lot photographically but also personal as well.

OK let's get the personal stuff out of the way first. The families represented at this wedding were awesome! They pretty much adopted Mark and I and made us feel like a part of the family for the night. It was a true blessing to be involved. To see the love that this bride and groom had for each other was amazing. And the love that they had for their families was incredible. The pastor that performed the ceremony was the groom's father. During the toasts, the groom shared about his father's battle with cancer. He has survived 6 times as I recall. A great blessing and I pray for many more years that this father can enjoy his son and new daughter-in-law.

I hope we can continue the fast friendships that we started at this wedding. They brought a band from SC. Made up of long time friends. And world-class musicians. Wow. Being a bass player I payed close attention to the bassist in the band. Soooo good! Arggh. Inspired me to pick it up some after the wedding.

Now to the photographic stuff since this is primarily a photography blog. We attended the rehearsal dinner the night before. We discussed the possibility of adding flash. Where to put them? How to trigger them? Put that decision off until the day of to see what the weather brought. They were going to make their weather call around 2pm. Around 2pm that day it was raining and thundering. We were hoping that the weather would break so they could have the ceremony outside with the beach as the background. The wedding party was apparently praying hard about this because the weather broke into the most beautiful light. It made the arch glow. The ocean met the sky and at times you couldn't see the horizon.

So I shot the entire ceremony and formal portraits with ambient light. That was good for the relaxation factor. With flash I feel I'm always waiting for Mr. Murphy to visit and cause triggers not to work or batteries to be dead, and so on.

The final product is great in my humble opinion. These two were having so much fun that it was easy to get great results.

The reception was held in a conference room type thing. With the ubiquitous white drop ceilings (God obviously loves photographers) which make great soft boxes when you shoot strobes up at them. So we set up two monolights. These were to bring up the overal light level. I was shooting at f2.8 at iso 400 or iso 500 most of the night. f2.8 gives the great out of focus backgrounds. They were triggered optically. So I carried around my camera with my Canon 540EZ in my hand. I triggered that one with the radio triggers. So the one in my hand would fire the larger monolights when it fired. By holding the small strobe in my hand which was connected to my extended arm, it satisfied my need for off camera flash and gave some direction for the key light.

I wish I had planned this but I can't. Because of where we placed the monolights, only the one on the side of the room you were on would fire. So you can see in the cake shot below that the key light is provided by the monolight behind me and to the left. The monolight on the other side of the room didn't fire so I dragged the shutter a bit to allow the decorative lighting to burn-in.

But the outside stuff came out so great I think. And having two photographers is the best way to go. We were able to compliment each other and catch some great moments.

So you two be blessed!

Kessler Wedding

2011-06-18T08:37:00.001-04:00

What a great couple and a great wedding. Bear with me please. There are a lot of photos following but I am very happy with them. My friend Mark and I teamed up for another wedding. We have come to the conclusion that having two shooters is the way to go. If you are involved in the planning of any weddings, please think of including us.

So I provided the Bride and Groom 3 sets of photos: normal color, aged, and black & white. I am including some of the aged set here as they are my personal favorite and this is my blog so I get to decide (some small nugget of something that I have control over).

Things happen so fast at a wedding so in the following photos there are examples of natural light and natural light filled with strobe flash.

These two little guys are so cute.

Not sure if we should laugh at this or call the authorities. :) Just kidding. These two were very comfortable with each other and seemed to really enjoy being together.

I love these backlit photos. A classic look.

This guy is already finding out how things work in this relationship. :)

Thanks so much for letting us capture your wedding. Best wishes to you two.

Five Two

2011-04-12T20:51:00.001-04:00

So here's what happens when you take your son to see his (and his Dad's) favorite hip-hop artist. We saw KJ-52 last weekend. And also a local artist 20th The Remix (who was awesome!). My oldest was pretty much on stage. KJ-52 was freestyling about him and took his hat off and pretended to give it to someone else. So since he was pretty much in the show, he has been pumped ever since. We had a dance party tonight in our house. Something we do pretty often. Turn off the lights, music on the computer, turn on the disco ball, AWESOME! I got inspired to do some of the photos with the edgy look that fits the music genre. Cross lighting with my two monolights with only their reflectors on.

This one is just cute.

When I see this one I think it's after he has just finished rockin' the spot in some stadium and is coming off the stage. He's tired and ready to get back to the tour bus and knock back a couple of apple juice boxes. No time for the paparazzi. "Get up off me!"

So KJ I hope you see this. Thanks for inspiring my seven year old. I am so thankful for all of the artists like you that God is using to be a positive influence. My son is supposed to be sleeping now but just came out and told us that he is writing a song called "God Rose On The Third Day". Surely there won't be any copyright issues right? :)

Sweet 16

2011-03-31T17:48:00.001-04:00

I had the privilege of photographing an awesome sweet 16 birthday party recently. What an amazing family! Thanks so much for involving me in the celebration.

So we were in the youth zone of our church. It is a very typical multipurpose room. For ambient light we have the ubiquitous fluorescent fixtures in the ceiling. Great if you like dim green light. Not exactly my favorite. So my approach was to create a zone of light that covers the room using two monolights in opposing corners of the room aimed at the ceiling but angled toward the center of the room. So I'm using the white tiles as huge light modifiers. I also put my Vivitar 285HV onto a stand to use for additional fill when needed. There was a corner of the room that was in the shadow of speakers and a big flat panel so I shot the Vivitar off the ceiling there when the subjects moved into that area.

In the above shots, I put my umbrella on the Vivitar. I moved the subject so that one of my monolights became the hair accent light. This was a very good setup as it gave me good coverage of the whole room.

This one was shot only using the monolights.

I think we did a great job of getting some quality light in here. This shot shows what a nice result we get by putting the subjects into a crosslight situation with one strobe in front and to camera right and the other behind and to camera left. You get a great keylight with a very nice hairlight.

I slowed the shutter speed down to capture some of the dancing action as well.

It was a great Sweet 16th Party. She is blessed to have such great parents and family.

Hope you all are blessed too.

Another Amazing Weekend

2011-03-06T18:25:00.001-05:00

We have been blessed lately with lots of fun on the weekends. This one was great. Two trips to Cocoa Village. One with great friends and the second just as a family. What a neat area. Architecturally interesting. Great colors. Cool art gallerys. Alleys. We even found a mountain. OK it was barely a hill but here in Central Florida you take what you can get. The shot above is in an art gallery. They have classes for kiddos which I think we are interested in.

We went in to the Porcher house. Oh I would love to have a house like that. Doesn't need to be that big but the style is great. This shot was on the back porch area that is mostly windows. The light is amazing. Would love to spend a few hours working shots in there. Too bad my current subject won't stand still for more than one shot.

The kiddos had so much fun at the park with friends.

Maggie gave me some flowers. Daddy's not a big flowers kind of guy but I'll take whatever that sweet thing gives me. So I arranged them on a bar at Murdock's restaurant. Great light and some rain gives an interesting shot.

Here's the rock and roll shot in the alley.

And here is a sad rocker that wanted to go all the way down the alley. Rocker's Mom and Dad did not.

Weekend Favs Part 2

2011-02-20T08:48:00.001-05:00

My Saturday Morning

This is how me and the boys spend most Saturday mornings. A trip to Burger King for bacon, egg and cheese croissants. Usually starts with the wolfing down of the sandwiches so that they can quickly head to the playground.

Once they are playing Daddy has to try to occupy himself. So it usually degenerates into something like this.

And often there is a bit of big brother scaring little brother.

Weekend Favs Part 1

2011-02-20T07:39:00.001-05:00

Senior Portraits

2010-12-16T20:28:00.001-05:00

This was my first official Senior Portrait session. I thought they came out great! What a great subject. She is a tough one to get to smile but as we got more comfortable the smiles came. The shot above should be an advertisement for something.

The family was interested in a walking bridge near their home so we got in the vehicles and headed over. The bridge made for a great backdrop. It was a challenge to time shots so that there wasn't traffic in the background. People were slowing down to see what we were doing.

We took some natural light shots like this one here. Sun is coming from behind so when we expose for the face some of the highlights get blown out. I like the effect.

Then we broke out the umbrella and took some using just that balanced with the ambient light.

This should be a magazine cover.

I wanted to have everything from closeups to full length shots so that they would have plenty of choices.

Here's a closeup using the umbrella to capture the eyes.

We had Mom become a photo assistant and hold a second flash. I used the second source for accent like the hair light on camera left here. I love the sitting poses. I also dig the far away look here. Mom was concerned that she wasn't smiling enough. I am thankful that she was giving the "say cheese" look all the time (like my kids). I prefer having to dig for a smile.

You can see the accent coming from camera right in this one. Still using the umbrella as key light.

Another great time with a great family. Glad you like the shots.

If you are interested in booking me please contact me using the links above and right. Would love to work with you. I will be available next year (in a few weeks).

Be blessed.

Camera's And Family

2010-12-03T07:09:00.000-05:00

When Your Camera Comes Between You and Your Family

This is an interesting article. I'm curious what you think about it. I certainly enjoy taking photographs. And photographing my family is really what drives my desire to photograph at all. But there are times when it gets in the way.

Like a theme park. Sometimes I just want to be a kid with my kids. I don't want my 40D with battery grip weighing me down. At the beach, I want to be in the water with them. I can hand off the camera at times to my wife. But she probably wants to wear this thing less than I do.

Sometimes I sense that the kiddos (and maybe my wife) are tired of me shooting pictures all the time. Those are times I try to put the camera down and slowly step away.

The most difficult times are when I really feel inspired to capture something and the family really isn't inspired in the same way. Man that is tough. But the family needs to win that battle. I like the quote in this article

"I've learned that it's okay to miss a few moments because the memories I make with my family are far more important."

That is truth.

So what do you think? Has this ever been an issue for you?

Cocoa Village

2010-12-01T18:19:00.001-05:00

What a nice evening. Perfect weather, a nice family, and my wife as my lovely assistant. This is the first time that my wife has helped me on a shoot. It was great. She was a great voice-activated light stand but more than that she has a great eye for good photography and provided some great ideas during the shoot. This was our first shoot (other than for ourselves) in Cocoa Village. This particular building is the Porcher House. Built in 1916 by a citrus grower. They rent it out now for weddings and other events. The front is kind of a colonial style look with big columns. Interesting on the back is white siding which looks great too.

It's difficult to take a bad shot of cute subjects. The girls are adorable.

Above are some natural light shots. I like to do a combination. Take advantage of whatever the situation provides.

Using the front porch and the bench (thanks Honey for the ideas) we did some flash stuff as well.

I really like this stairway on the side. This peeking over the top shot is a great look.

Here's a better look at the front of the building. An excellent location.

We weren't expecting to get the evening sun since it had been overcast all afternoon but we were blessed with it. So we used it.

Here is a candid moment. Childhood curiosity is a great thing.

You all be blessed. Thanks family for the opportunity.

Scouting

2010-11-17T20:35:00.000-05:00

Went out tonight to scout for a family photo session that I have planned for this weekend. We got out late and had already lost direct sunlight so I got off a few natural light shots and then broke out the strobe and umbrella. Downtown Melbourne, we have spent more time walking down there lately and it is actually a cool little downtown.

Above is one of my favorite shots. Got some personality from the kiddos and the wall is great.

This one is great too with the store lights in the background.

What can you say about this one. Hilarious expressions. I told them to look like they were scared of the spooky door.

The family. I like having the incandescent lights in the background to add some color contrast.

This is another one that we can put in the personality folder.

The Assault

2010-11-06T20:28:00.001-04:00

This isn't so much of a photography post as it is about a fun morning and being thankful for all of our warfighters. We went to the Navy Seal Museum in Ft. Pierce this morning for Muster, a yearly event apparently. We have never been and didn't know what to expect. We thought there wouldn't be many people and we would be in and out. Well, not so much. It was a Veterans Day celebration. I'm not good at estimating crowds but we figured between 1 and 2 thousand people there.

This is probably my favorite shot photographically. This a mechanical mock-up of an apollo capsule. It was used by the Navy for training divers to recover the real ones.

This is the actual lifeboat that was used by the 3 pirates holding the Maersk crewmember hostage. The Seals took care of this situation in an amazing way. If you don't know what this is about, you should google it.

Then the assault came. It was soooo cool. Maggie and Eli were terrified holding onto Mommy. Hez was on my shoulders, squinting from the debris blasting us from the rotors of the Blackhawks. "This is so awesome!" he says. Hummers came rolling in. Gunfire erupted.

After the demonstration we were able to meet some of the Seals and check out some hardware. Here is hez dry firing a gun-mounted minigun. I think he likes it.

Here are the boys inside one of the Blackhawks that we just witnessed in action.

I shook a hands with the soldiers I could get to and told them how thankful I am for their service. You should too.

Morning With Maggie

2010-10-24T17:37:00.000-04:00

I was sitting on the floor watching TV this morning before the kiddos came out of their bedrooms. The sun was starting to rise above the trees of our neighbor to the east. It was coming through the slider and hitting me in the eyes. I thought the light was kind of cool coming in the window at that low angle and if I could just find something nice to put in front of that light it would make a good backlit photo. So Maggie comes out with her blue baby and I new that she would make the perfect subject.

Candy Corns?

2010-10-14T21:23:00.001-04:00

One of my favorite candies of all time. Why? Because I love honey. Hi my name is Page and I love honey! And candy corns are made from honey. All of that has almost nothing to do with this post because these aren't candy corns. They only look like them. Gretchen made these very tasty cookies tonight and I got the call to take some blog shots for her.

I included the setup shot for your enjoyment (if you're into that kind of thing). You can see the cute little umbrella I recently got. I've been using it exclusively since. It's very agile for moving around the house. My other umbrella is like 43" or so.

I had to move the flash away because I wanted to shoot at f2.8 for shallow depth of field. With it up close I was getting like f5.6 or so. We tried using a white tablecloth but it needed to be ironed. You could see every crease. So I shot some just on the table. But we settled on these shot on white foamcore. Also used a piece of foamcore for fill on the left.

I wish I could transmit the smell and flavor through the photos.

Be blessed.

Atlanta

2010-10-12T06:54:00.001-04:00

Here are a few shots I took on my recent trip to Atlanta.

I didn't get to shoot as much as I wanted because real work got in the way. But I was able to take a few shots on my morning walk to get coffee. My favorite is the above street shot. Good representation of the business of the city.

I'm sure that locals can tell tourists because they walk around looking up. Admiring the buildings. At least that's what I did. This building was 2 blocks away from our hotel.

Space For Free

2010-09-25T13:21:00.001-04:00

The Space Center Visitors Complex is free once a year for Brevard County residents. So cool. It's been many years since I've been there. Always loved space as a kid and as an adult. We had a such a great time. Here are a few shots that I really liked. The T-38 above was extremely backlit by the sun just over the vertical stabilizer. Using the fill light slider on Lightroom2 makes quick work of this.

I love this shot with the clouds reflecting in the memorial. The astronauts listed in the foreground are from the Challenger disaster.

Here's one of Hezekiah trying to land the lunar lander. Thankfully they didn't have a 6 year old trying to do that. It wasn't pretty.

And here are a few more that I liked.

Inspired.

2010-09-22T20:40:00.001-04:00

I can say that I haven't really been inspired photographically speaking lately. Life has been busy and stressful. But for some reason today I was looking at Dan Winters website. It was linked off of the Strobist. I really dig the look of the site. It is kinda retro. I really liked his portraits. Probably because they are so different from what I would typically do. No popping colors. Everything is nice and muted. Not as much separation between subject and background. He has some unique lighting setups as well. He has a portrait of Tom Hanks that is cool. Interesting shadows on the face. The fill light is just enough for detail. The poses are different as well. There's a portrait of Bono where Bono is facing camera left at 90 degrees. It has a different feel to it.

So I tried to incorporate some ideas: reducing the ratio between the subject and background, muted colors and experiment with the poses.

I love the pose on the above shot. Just looking at the flash with his head turned toward the flash.

Now I gave Eli the same instructions and this is what I got.

For my colors, I put orange gels (3/4 CTO) on my key flash and then did a custom white balance on that. I left my background flash bare. The custom white balance changes the white light to blue. Nice cool (temperature) colors.

I love capturing the crying moments. Goes against the grain of children portraits. They are supposed to always be happy. Not so much.

But they are happy most of the time.

Be blessed.

Is It Halloween Yet?

2010-09-21T20:20:00.001-04:00

So most mornings recently, early mornings, as I am leaving for work, I have been greeted by walking through a spider web as I go to get in my truck. Spider webs on my face are not on my "favorite things in life" list. I have just sort of swiped it away, said lots of righteous things under my breath and gone to work. But one morning, as I walked out of the garage, I clicked the key fob for Gretchen's car. That causes the backup lights to come on, which revealed a strand of spider web. It was going up to the sycamore on the north side of the driveway. As I followed it in the other direction, I see one of the biggest webs I've ever seen. And in the middle . . . this.

Not sure what type of spider this is. If you closet etymologists out there can identify it, I would love to know. It is about the size of a half dollar, maybe a little bigger. (update: I found out that is neoscona hentzi, in the family of orb-weavers. Charlotte was also an orb-weaver. Since we just read Charlotte's web with the kids, I'm sure that is why this spider has shown up. Now I'm waiting to see some words in the web. Maybe "Some Gretchen" for her birthday. He probably doesn't take requests.)

So one morning I popped up the little flash on my camera but that looked horrible. So of course the next night after the kids went to sleep I dragged Gretchen out into the dark holding my camera stand and umbrella to take some shots. I ordered an umbrella adapter from Adorama that came with a tiny little fold up umbrella. Seriously, this thing looks like a toy umbrella but at close range on a small subject, it's apparent size is huge so it worked well.

The wind was blowing so getting a crisp shot was tough as thing was constantly moving closer and farther away. And I'm just thinking "Please God, Creator of Heaven and Earth and spiders, please don't let thing jump on me or I'm going to scream like a girl."

Don't Forget To Wonder.

2010-08-27T12:39:00.000-04:00

I have to give props to my sweet wife for being willing to home school our son. I know it's a lot of extra work on top of an already busy schedule. But between you and me (shhhh), she's a natural. I always knew she would be amazing at it. And she is.

So this new phase in our lives has lead us into a new era of discovery. Lot's of first time discovery for the kiddos and rediscovery for us. So easy to take so much for granted. But you know what, mushrooms are a really cool creation.

My wife brings the kiddos by for lunch like every other day. I get in the car and find out we are going to look at mushrooms. They had just passed by a bunch of mushrooms beside the mall parking lot. So that's what we did. And here's the proof.

So don't forget to stop, get out of the car, and wonder.

Just Go For It

2010-07-24T10:21:00.001-04:00

Sometimes I spend a lot of time to make a photo look natural. Sometimes it is fun to forget about natural and just go for it.

The Wedding

2010-07-21T22:36:00.001-04:00

I had the opportunity to photograph a wedding for a friend of our family. What a great pair they make. And great family and friends as well.

So here are some of my favorites from the event. Above is Daddy and Daughter. I really like the low angle and composition. I shot this wedding with my friend Mark and he was bouncing a camera mounted strobe off of the ceiling and suggested that I bounce my lightstand mounted one. So that's what I did. The ceiling was reflective but high. I had the strobe set to 1/4 power so I could get a lot of shots off. But I still had to shoot at ISO 1600 because it was so dark at the reception.

Here's the retrieval of the garter. He accomplished this hands free. Nuff said.

I thought this one was funny.

This was taken just before the ceremony. I have to give props to Seth. He's the guy on the right. He wanted this type of shot because they had done this type of thing at past events. Great suggestion.

This one was suggested by the bride and groom. It was supposed to have a "Top Gun" feel. But I guess they chickened out on the sunglasses at the last minute. Still came out cool I think. Another low angle shot. I gave it a high contrast treatment.

I love the light coming into the limo in this one. Amazing limo by the way.

And a few of my favorite beach shots. The lighting was perfect from the setting sun.

Fire!

2010-07-19T06:52:00.001-04:00

Got a chance to do some product photography for a cool local business. They make fire extinguishers for RV's and racecars. Very cool I think.

So the idea is that his webmaster wanted some shots on black that he could separate for use on his website HERE. So I brought some black foam core for background and some white foam core for reflectors. In the above shot I used a strobe and shoot-through for key @ camera right and white foam core for fill @ camera left. The metal cage around the nozzle didn't have a well defined edge so I added another strobe with a grid on it behind and camera left to help that situation. This set up was great for the red extinguishers. But not so much for the shiny aluminum ones. The top left edge of the canister was still being lost in the black. So I added another piece of foamcore behind and camera right to define that edge. Here is the shot and setup below.

This IS My First Rodeo

2010-07-05T07:11:00.001-04:00

Not the first one I've been to but the first one I've ever tried to photograph. And I wasn't there to photograph it. I was there as Husband and Daddy on vacation and just happened to have my camera across my shoulder. But I am a photographer so I have to at least try to get some decent shots.

Here's the deal. We are in the bleachers across the arena opposite the stalls. It is 730p and raining. The natural light level is dropping fast and we're gonna be left with nothing but the mercury vapor (or whatever they are) lights in the stadium. I start with my 18-135 so I can get a little closer to the action at least. I still have to crop to get an interesting composition. So that's what you see above and here with these two. All are at ISO1600 so it's grainy but hey that's actually a good depiction of the rodeo. So f5.6 at 1/25 is not stopping action. But you do get a good sense of motion. So I took a lot of shots just to get a few that weren't so impressionistic.

As the ambient light went away completely f5.6 wasn't cutting it so I switched to my 50mm 1.8 and was able to 1/125s. But now I did a lot of cropping to come up with this.

Bottom line, I wasn't even close to having gear suitable for this shooting situation. But I made the most of it and got a few shots that I think are cool.

Be blessed.

Throw Up Your Rawkfist!

2010-06-20T20:55:00.001-04:00

Being the great Dad that I am (at least that's what I'm told), I am raising up some future Rock Stars.

I was inspired by these awesome hats that we got yesterday. They say Rock Star In Training. I love it. Hezekiah is always striking his rock pose.

So I got a little edgy with the light. Both lights are slightly behind so as not to fill in the entire face. My umbrella is at camera left and a bare old Sunpak is camera right.

Gave it a high contrast black and white treatment in Light Room 2.

Dude, Where's My Teeth

2010-06-14T20:09:00.001-04:00

Hezekiah actually asked for a portrait after he lost his second front tooth. I was more than happy to set up 3 lights for the occaision. I've been shooting so much ambient light lately just out of convienience. So I lit the background with a red gelled strobe. Used the shoot-thru for the key light. And a bare strobe for the rim light. Since I was set up I got Eli to stand still for a frame as well.

Evening At The Park

2010-06-11T11:49:00.001-04:00

We had to return some stuff to the library. It was going to be just Mommy. Then Mommy asked Sister if she wanted to go. "Yus". Then Mommy asked Brother 2 if he wanted to go. "Yes". Then Mommy asked Brother 2 if he wanted to feed the ducks. "YES!". Then Brother 1 said "I want to go!" Then Mommy asked Daddy if he was going to go. "I'm not staying here by myself." he said.

So I grabbed my camera and off we went. The sun was getting low in the sky and provided nice light for me. In the direct sunlight above you get some good contrasty stuff going on. Then you find some shade and you have awesome soft light.

Use the sun for backlight and you get wonderful hair accents.

And some interesting things happen when the sun is reflecting off of the lake.

And here's a random shot from ground level. Not much explaining to do. I kinda like it.

In The Tent

2010-06-01T19:04:00.001-04:00

For the first time ever (ok at least from me) we will take a look inside the kids tent. It is created from kitchen chairs, blankets, pillows, a pack-and-play, and assorted cushions. I remember spending hours building tents and forts when I was a kid.

So we built the tent and my wife said "You should take some pictures of the tent". And I though "Yeah. From the inside." At first I tried with the flash inside the tent bouncing off the inside roof. Then I thought "why not shoot through the blanket from above?" It's definitely the most unique modifier I've used in a while.

A Different Kind Of Wedding

2010-05-31T20:28:00.001-04:00

For me that is. For the bride and groom it was perfect. What I mean is that all I had to do was photograph the ceremony itself. No candid shots of people getting ready. No rushing to set up for formal portraits afterward. No shots of cake being smashed into someone's face. So it made this a different kind of wedding shoot for me. Of course I've only done one other wedding. So I only have two data points.

But it was very relaxing knowing that I didn't have to set up any lights. The ceremony was outside so it was all ambient light. They were married under a gazebo. That gave some nice flat light to the otherwise pretty splotchy light filtering through the big oak trees.

Even though I was only shooting for about 30 minutes, I managed to pop off over 300 shots. I was really able to focus on capturing moments. Like this one as they spoke to each other during the ceremony.

And this one as her dress was caught up on something.

Otherwise I tried to capture some environmental shots to give a sense of the entire venue.

The reason I got such light duty was because one of the pastors (the bride's brother-in-law) is also a photographer and wanted to do it for them. But obviously he couldn't be in two places at the same time. As I left, I saw him setting up his monolight and strobe with umbrellas and taking test shots as he got ready to gather up the 40 something family members for the group shot. And I quietly thought . . . sucker! Just kidding Kyle, should you read this. I would like to see what you captured.

When Mommy Is Away Getting Food . . .

2010-04-25T21:53:00.001-04:00

This is what happens. Daddy starts recording the chaos on camera. As many onlookers gawk at the sight.

So we went to the art festival this past weekend. We wanted to take in all the atmosphere so we decided to have lunch downtown at a new diner. Pretty good burgers I must say. I guess the excitement was too much for these boys. They were really putting on a show for the huge art show crowd.

Photographically speaking, there was something cool going on here with the light. We are in a diner. It was very brightly lit from millions (ok, lots) of fluorescent fixtures overhead. The table tops were white. So no matter where you sit there is instant clam shell lighting. Reflection from the white table tops fills in the shadows giving a cool studio look. Even though these were taken an exceptionally busy diner in downtown Melbourne.

A Fruity Example

2010-04-11T15:26:00.001-04:00

Just wanted to show a progression that I went through to get the yummy shot that you see at the top. All the shots obviously didn't look that good. There is some trial and error involved in getting the right combination of exposure and light source placement.

So I start by setting my camera to it's max sync speed . . . uh not quite. My camera's max sync speed is 1/250th but with my Cactus radio triggers, I have found that I can only sync at 1/200th. So that's always the starting point. Then for aperture I know that I can get f5.6 if my flash is at 1/2 power or f2.8 with the flash set at 1/16th power. Those numbers are just approximate based on lots of practice shots.

I took a first shot and it looked a little underexposed. I decided to boost the ISO from 100 to 160 to get a little more exposure without changing the aperture. I wanted to maintain f2.8 because my 50mm lens doesn't always focus properly. The depth of field at f1.8 is so narrow that even the slightest error in focus causes the loss of the picture. At f2.8 the dof gives a little leeway if the focus is off.

The result here is overexposed. It looks washed out. We've lost the amazing red of these freshly picked strawberries.

So I set the ISO back to 100 and now we have the delicious red I am looking for. But I have the umbrella directly over the batch of strawberries. The shadows are shallow and it looks pretty much like a snapshot.

So I moved umbrella further back to increase the angle and increase the depth of the shadows. Now it is looking good. I like the exposure and the light placement. So now I just worked with composition and perspective to get the cover shot above.

The Light Stand Is In The Way

2010-03-30T20:34:00.001-04:00

When it's time to photograph in our small kitchen, the light stand is always in the way. It gets pushed, pulled, kicked, sneezed on, you get the point. So tonight I though, "you know, instead of trying to Rembrandt light everything and everyone, I could look at this as an opportunity to expand my horizons". It may not have been that dramatic in my head. Probably went something more like this, "Man I wish I could breathe! I'm just going to stick the stand in the corner and see what I get". So I like what happened. Everything was back lit or side lit. Definitely a step in the right direction. I like the specular highlights on the table from the umbrella.

New Bikes Rock!

2010-03-23T20:13:00.001-04:00

So my Eli got a new bike. He got rewarded for crying and fussing less for a few days strait and also for going a night without a diaper for the first time.

I haven't been shooting much these days. But I had some inspiration from checking on the subject of photochallenge.org. It is down low. Taking from a low vantage point. I took this from maybe six inches off of the ground. I didn't try to lay down and focus, I just held the camera low. I watched it focus and figured since I was f4 or f5.6 that as long as it focused somewhere on the bike I should have enough depth of field to have her face in focus.

Where Have I Been?

2010-01-31T21:09:00.001-05:00

Silly question to ask you I suppose. Only I would know. Anyway. In terms of photography, I haven't been doing a lot of shooting since my last family session with our friends in the previous post. What I have done though is open an iStock account. Check it out if you have never heard of it. It is a place where you can purchase licensed photography, artwork, audio, and video for use in publications or websites or any number of end uses that you may involved in. So it is also a place for photographers (like me) to sell their work.

So you can purchase some of my work or any the bagillion other photographers there. They are sticklers for quality. I have posted about 11 items so far and have a number of them rejected for being slightly out of focus or overprocessing. I have made my first sale. So that will pay for half of a piece of chewing gum.

So I've been reviewing my older work looking for things that might be a good stock shot. And then seeking model releases for those involved. Then going through the submission process which takes about a week or so.

So you may want to join as well. To purchase or to submit some of your own. If you have interest please follow the link below so that I will get a referral. Thanks to my friend Mark Morgan for telling me about the referral program.

Friends

2010-01-10T08:09:00.001-05:00

Here are some portraits of our friends that we love a lot. It was a cold day on the beach but we had a good time.

Simple lighting again. One strobe, a shoot-thru umbrella and balanced with the ambient light. It can sometimes be difficult to beat the sun with a small strobe so I've learned to wait a little longer so that the sun goes down a bit more before beginning shooting.

I love the shot at the top. That is real family life. Shows the chaos that is the norm. Kids flying and grabbing hair. . .awesome.

Here's Daddy with the boys.

And big sis with the baby.

Love you guys.

Be blessed.

Reflections

2009-12-31T18:13:00.001-05:00

I had wanted for a long time to bring along my silver reflector on a sunny day outing. Just wanted to experiment with having the sun behind or at some angle to the subject and using the reflector to direct that light as the main light source.

Some great things about reflectors verses strobes are:
1) They fold up into about a 10" square.
2) They weigh less than a pound.
3) They give a light source size that is similar to an umbrella. Which means soft light-to-shadow transitions that are great for portraits.
4) No batteries required.
5) No radio interference.
6) They weigh less than a pound.
7) They fold up into about a 10" square.

A little repetitive but man it sure is true. So it does come with some downsides. My daughter thinks it is fun to play on for one.

And it turns out that a huge ball of nuclear fusion is no easier to look at when it is reflected into the eyes. I think this picture is hilarious. The squinting and covering of the eyes is classic. I think that I've read that the way to do it is have the subject close their eyes and then open them on command at the moment you take the shot.

So I found myself directing that sunlight everywhere. Cool shot into a rotten old log. So if you don't want to spend the money on a bunch of lighting gear, just go to Wal-Mart and pic up an autoshade. Give it a shot.

Be blessed.

Another Family Portrait Session

2009-11-18T21:24:00.001-05:00

I must admit that I really enjoy these family sessions. It is informal and we take an hour or so to just hang out and capture some cool candid shots as well as some nice posed ones as well. These are a few of my favorites from my most recent shoot.

Above is the only one that I included that is lit with flash. I have my Vivitar 285HV shooting thru and umbrella camera right at full power. Even though it was evening the sun was lighting the ocean quite brightly. And I was using my 28-135 that starts at f3.5. The 50mm 1.8 just wasn't wide enough to capture enough environment here. This was at f5.6 to get some added sharpness from that lens.

This is just as sweet as anything with the baby doll.

Here we have Daddy with his girls in the nice late evening sun. I like the triangle formed with the three of them.

Someone loves Daddy. This is a nice moment with a full up natural laugh.

I love the simplicity here.

I was getting a little artsy here. The heart kind of mirrors what the dress is doing.

A couple more sweet smiles and great curls like my daughter.

I hope you guys enjoy these photos. I had fun capturing them.

Be blessed.

Fun With Black & White

2009-11-12T20:22:00.001-05:00

I really like good black and white photographs. I'm not sure what makes a good one a good one. I suppose I lack the artistic language to describe it. I took these and had worked them up in color. Just for fun I tried converting them to grayscale and to me they went from good to great. The curly hairs (that Daddy loves by the way), the super sharp eyes. You be the judge.

I haven't posted in a while. Life is busy. I am currently shucking my responsibilities as I type. I have tile work to do in the bathroom, the cedar playground needs some repair, the pavers in the back yard need work, I have to mount an igniter to the burner I installed in the grill. But it is just so much more rewarding to share photos.

Nasty Little Challenge

2009-10-27T20:07:00.001-04:00

My friend Kevin has a blog http://kevinkeigley.wordpress.com/.

He apparently has a problem with creepy dolls. Not sure what that means but I still love him. So anyway he was asking for submissions of said creepy dolls so this is what I came up with. Just in time for Halloween. Note that I have his blog up in the computer screen in the background.

The lighting is a snooted 285HV for the key light and a bare, red-gelled 540EZ behind and below for the red accent.

Window Display

2009-10-22T06:52:00.001-04:00

In an attempt to at least occasionally shoot for the daily challenge at PhotoChallenge.org I went looking for a window display. Actually the whole family went. We packed up the car and went to downtown Melbourne, FL looking for the right one. My wife suggested the year-round Christmas store. Which normally would be a great choice but the time of day wasn't very good. The reflections in the window were stinkin' up the joint.

So we drove on down the street and she spotted this one. Excellent. I didn't really like the street reflection but it was reduced some as I worked on it in LR2. The colors are great.

Family Portraits At The Beach

2009-10-15T20:13:00.000-04:00

Here's my most recent family portrait session. I had a great time with them. What a great little family with the new (ok not so new) baby. We met at the beach with about 45 minutes until sunset with another 30 minutes of twilight. First we tried to take advantage of the direct sunset light up on the boardwalk. I tried as many different light schemes as I could come up with. We used the sun as direct light. We tried using it for backlight as you can see in the following photos. Awesome how the hair just blows out and you get nice soft light for the face. I've been trying to do more of this these days.

We used the sun for side lighting. This has got to be one of my favorites of the entire section. As a Daddy, I can relate so much to this shot. I talk about capturing interactions later on and this is exactly what I'm talking about.

And for a silhouette.

Then we moved over to the west side of the dunes so that all we had was diffused sunlight which is of course soft. This makes for good photos but honestly these days I like more of an edge in photographs.

Weights And Wind

Then we even broke out the flash and umbrella. The wind was blowing hard. Earlier that day, while sitting in my office, I remembered the two times that my light stand had taken a fall because of the wind. I knew I needed sandbags but I didn't have any and even if I wanted to buy some (I don't because that costs money and costs even more money if it is "made for photography") there was no time for them to be delivered. So I'm looking around my office . . . I see my old A3 bag from the Air Force. It acts as our scuba bag and has masks, snorkels, fins, and WEIGHT BELTS! So back to the beach. I set up the stand with flash and open the umbrella. The only way this works is with the umbrella pointing into the wind. Otherwise I would be asking some of you from California to ship it back to me. Just latch the weight belt and drape it over the legs of the tripod. Works great.

Only drawback is that once it is set, it is not trivial to reposition it because of the wind and the weight so it was easier to move the subjects around in the light.

Interaction
I shoot a lot of pictures in hopes that I capture some moment that stands out. Little interactions between parent and child. I caught a few of those here along with the photo at the top and the one of Daddy kissing baby.

To my friends - I hope you guys are happy with these. I enjoyed spending time with you.

Be blessed. Let me know what you think. Leave comments.

Hmm?

2009-10-08T20:26:00.000-04:00

Here's a quick one that I captured tonight. I used the preset "Matt's Vintage New York." I like the muted tones. I added a little brightness in the eyes to bring out some detail that went away when I applied the preset.

Just used my Vivitar into a shoot-thru umbrella. I slowed the shutter speed down until the incandescent light burned into the background.

Be blessed.

My Girl

2009-10-04T18:02:00.000-04:00

What a baby! Oh I love this little one! Just another one from the backyard. Used a Lightroom preset called Steller Guru Greengold. I really like the overexposed look. But most of the presets go a little overboard. I like to turn down the exposure just a little bit to recover a little detail in the highlights.

In The Yard

2009-09-26T08:56:00.000-04:00

So we were just hanging out last night in the yard. I had read an article from the Digital Photography School. It mentioned getting out of the shade when shooting outdoor portraits. The shade gives soft light that is easy on the face. When you backlight using the sun, the background gets blown out. Sometimes you don't want that, sometimes you do. So I made it a point to try to take some with sun just out of frame. I like the edge that it gives in the photo below. You see the highlights are blown out on the camera left side of the face. Some may say that is not a good exposure. I say I really like it.

Another One I Like

2009-09-25T07:37:00.001-04:00

Can't get away from that kids eyes. Lighting here is just my Vivitar 285HV into a shoot-thru umbrella at 1/4 power.

Vintage

2009-09-23T07:54:00.001-04:00

I am really liking LR2 and all of the presets that are available for it on the web. These shots started as decent photographs with cool lighting IMHO. But the colors are just too stinkin' accurate! What? It occurred to me as I was looking at various effects to apply to these shots that I spent a lot of money for a camera that has incredible resolution, low noise, and represents colors accurately. Now I am undoing all of that. What does that mean?!

It reminds me of the tube vs. solid state debate in music circles. I have to admit that I used to be a solid state guy until I played my '74 Strat through a Fender tube amp. It just does sound better. I know as an engineer these days that it has to do with the harmonic content of the signals as you overdrive the devices. Odd harmonics from tubes and even harmonics from solid state. But that's a debate for a different time.

Anyway, I suppose that all that matters is the end creation. Use whatever tools and techniques necessary to produce the outcome that you have visualized.

So the lighting is this: I have a home-made foamcore snoot on my 285HV @ 1/4 power for the key light, and for accent, my 540EZ, bare @ 1/32 power.

I found this great preset called "Matt's Polo/Ralph Lauren" available HERE. I really like the desaturation and also the tone that is added.

More From The Wedding

2009-09-21T21:00:00.000-04:00

Here are a few more from the wedding that I shot recently. They asked me to capture the decorations so that's what I did. It did look very nice. The house is an awesome country house with a huge wrap-around front porch. The grounds are covered with big oak trees. Nice place to get married. So the first one above is a shot of one of the flower arrangements with the decorated gazeebo in the background. The flowers were in the shadow of the porch so I brought in my shoot-thru up close and camera right. The ratio here with the ambient is pretty close. It looks like maybe a half stop.

Here is the front of the house. Ambient light only here. You can see the challenge for portraits by looking at the light filtering through the oak trees and hitting the ground in front of the house. Blotchy, contrasty light; not good for portraits. So that's why I drug around my umbrella on a stand.

Here is another ambient shot of some decorations with the gazeebo framed by one of the oaks.

Great job to whoever decorated. It really looked great.

Oh yes, the cake. Yummy by the way. I hit this with the shoot-thru as well.

Cactus Trigger Update
Just wanted to add that I am still using the Cactus Triggers and have been completely happy with them. Had an experience here where when I moved inside the house with the flashes, they weren't firing at all. I mean at all. I switched channels about 3 times and found one that was clear and they fired every time after that.

The First Wedding

2009-09-13T20:17:00.000-04:00

So here they are. Some of my favorites from shooting my first wedding. I showed them to the happy couple today so now I'll show them to all both of you :).

I choose these because they are definitely my favorites but they also are indicative of the different techniques that I used during the afternoon and evening. The bridal portraits above were all taken indoors in fairly low light. The top portrait was taken in a corner where there were two large windows. One camera left and one behind the subject. This gives some great light. Nice soft light for the face and great accent on the face and shoulder from behind.

This one is taken in the same area but the subject is now standing and we can see the bare bulb lamp and natural wood of the window frames behind her. I like this one because the event took place in an awesome country house and this gives that feel. And the rustic red walls go well with the blue in the flowers.

So next we have moved outside to the gazebo and I have broken out the Vivitar 285HV on a stand with my shoot-thru umbrella. I underexposed the ambient by 1 1/2 to 2 stops so that the subjects pop. And then bring up the flash power until I get a good exposure. The shoot-thru allows you to get the flash very close to the subject which maximizes the power of the small strobe but also increases the apparent size of the light source. This gives the nice soft transitions from highlight to shadow.

I have tried flash blur before without any success. But I decided to try it again while the bride was on the dance floor. I actually got a few shots that were good. This is my favorite because the side of the bride's face is in focus but you get a sense of the motion of the clapping. So I just really dragged the shutter here. I got 1/8 of a second on this one. So I would focus, start to rotate the camera, and press the shutter release while rotating the camera.

So here is the cake smash. For this I took advantage of the white ceiling of the front porch. It was tight quarters with many people on the porch. Not enough room to work my umbrella around so I fired my Vivitar into the ceiling. I took one setup shot made an adjustment and took the rest.

I carried the stand with umbrella around a lot during the evening when shooting the special portraits. But while I had light, I took many candids at ISO1600. The noise reduction in LR2 took care of that and gives a great result.

For processing I:
1) Did the noise reduction when needed.
2) Added some contrast by bringing up the black levels.
3) For the bride, I always \reduced the clarity slider a little for some added softness.
4) Added a little vibrance to bring out surrounding colors without affecting skin tones.
5) And added vignetting to taste.

That's about it. It was a great experience. They seemed happy. I shot about 450 shots and processed a little over 200 keepers. Wouldn't mind doing this again sometime I think.

Be blessed.

Stay Tuned!

2009-09-07T10:11:00.000-04:00

So I photographed my first wedding. Really happy with the results. I haven't delivered anything to the couple yet so I want to wait until that happens before I start throwing their special day around the net to all 3 of you that read this. I learned a few things. I experimented with flash blur, something that I had tried before with little success. It rained. So the adventure will be unveiled in the near future.

Be blessed.

Just One I Like

2009-08-31T20:08:00.001-04:00

Quickly, this is just a shot that I really like. The water splash, the reflection, the adorable punkin'. It's all good.

Product Shot

2009-08-28T13:29:00.001-04:00

So this is the box that I work on every day (have been working on it for 11 years). In preparation for some trade shows I was asked to photograph it for use on banners etc. This came out well I thought. There are a few things going on with the lighting here.

First I used the Canon 540EZ, gelled red, and shot through a craft stencil for the background pattern. Then I used my Vivitar 285HV with a snoot on it for the main light that falls on a diagonal across the front of the system. The snoot was really small. You can see that the light falls off very quickly as you get away from that top right to bottom left diagonal.

At this point the top of the box was still very dark so I brought in the old Sunpak 411. With no modifiers, I just used it to add some definition to the top.

I used my Canon 50mm 1.8 lens. My favorite. I brought it back from the dead last week. It came apart when we went to Harbour Branch. I did some research on the net and found a few people had posted step-by-step instruction on disassembling it. So with the help of my friend Phil at work, we found that the metal ring inside the top lip of the barrel had twisted and unlocked. Clicked that back in place and all was well again. Thankfully. Because I want to use that next week at the wedding that I am going to shoot.

Be blessed.

Bottle

2009-08-27T20:22:00.000-04:00

Somehow I always end up making these challenges about my kiddos. They certainly are my favorite subject. So the theme for today was bottle. I saw lots of awesome shots of wine bottle and coke bottles. So after a little thinking I came up with baby bottle. Our little one is almost done drinking bottles so I thought I better capture this before she gives them up for good.

Simple light here with the Vivitar 285HV at 1/16th power into my shoot-thru umbrella. I did decide to bring the power down to 1/16th from 1/4 power. At 1/4, I get f5.6 at about 1 foot from the subject. I wanted to get less DOF (depth of field) so I brought the power down and opened up the aperture. Looks like I ended up about f3.2. Enough for the bottle but her face is nicely out of focus.

Be blessed.

It's All About The Light

2009-08-26T07:57:00.001-04:00

I have been asked recently about lighting with off camera lighting. The comments are usually like "Man I wish I could take pictures like that but I don't have any of that gear." Well, firstly, I don't have a lot of gear. One strobist kit from Midwest Photo Exchange (http://www.mpex.com) would do anyone just fine. But more importantly, these days I am learning that it really is all about the light. There was definitely a time (most of the time) in my life when I was all about having all the gear. Usually wanting all of the "best" gear. But now I see that if you have good light, you can capture a great photo with almost any camera available today. Just search for iPhone pics to see what kind of quality you can get from a cell phone. The quality from even the most modest cameras these days is more than adequate to get great pictures.

So I have a friend at work who is just getting interested in photography. He has started turned off the flash on his point-and-shoot and was surprised at how much better some of his photos were. He was starting to notice how light and shadows give form to a subject. I gave him a quick portrait tip. If you want to take a decent portrait of someone, just find a large window that doesn't have direct sunlight coming in. Put your subject in front of that window. Let that light hit them from the side. Move them around until the light looks the best, turn off your flash, and just start shooting.

The example above is just that. There is a large window just camera right. They are just inches away from it. The light is great. Give it a try. Turn off that nasty old on-camera flash.

Half Self-Portrait

2009-08-20T20:29:00.001-04:00

Interesting topic for the daily challenge at photochallenge.org. Only half of a portrait. That's best for everyone here. So you only are exposed to half of the stomach turning reflex that you experience looking at this photograph.

Did the clamshell setup here again with the 285HV through the shoot-thru as the top, and the silver autoshade as the bottom of the shell. Taken with the 50mm 1.8 lens that I have really been hyping these days. I'm sure that's why the price is going up.

For post, I modified the aged photograph preset in LR2. I pulled the exposure back down to recover some details.

Sorry for the subject.

Be blessed.

First Day Of Preschool

2009-08-18T11:45:00.001-04:00

OK. Here's another one. Our oldest just started Kindergarten and now Eli started preschool today. He was so excited and happy. That is evident from the photos.

All of these we taken with the 50mm 1.8. If you don't have one, run out and get one before the price goes up again. It was $80 when I bought mine like a year ago and now it is up to around $120. Added some high contrast post processing in LR2.

First Day Of School.

2009-08-13T12:07:00.002-04:00

Wow. My boy is in Kindergarten. It is hard to believe. My wife has been a little weepy for the past week or so (big surprise for those of you who know my sweet wife). But I have to be honest, when we dropped that young man off at school I had some tears. Actually having some right now. Man I love that kid.

So, photographically speaking, this is shot with the "plastic fantastic" 50mm f1.8 lens. I always put this lens on when low light is a possibility. Grabbed this shot as he was about to get out of the car. I really like the lens flare from the sun that is rising right over his head. It is exaggerated by the high contrast treatment that I gave the image.

Anyway, there he is. My boy!

Oh Salad!

2009-08-03T18:37:00.001-04:00

Man oh man. G decided to put all of these great ingredients together for a salad. We have grilled chicken, walnuts, diced apples, crumpled blue cheese, and top it off with blue cheese dressing. I'm not a huge salad guy but if there is dead chicken and blue cheese involved, I'm in. So I get to do the grilling and G puts it all together. Excellent. It tastes sooooo good. I mean it would be awesome if there was taste-o-net so you could taste this.

The photography is almost too easy. I have read that the default place to start with food photography is a large light source above and slightly behind the subject. I never got past that step here. You could bring in a reflector in front for some fill. So go out and get a strobist kit from southwest photo and take pictures of the stuff you eat.

I couldn't believe I was photographing this thing instead of devouring it. Well I did that after the photo shoot.

Clam Shell

2009-08-02T17:11:00.001-04:00

Here's a quick post about trying the clam shell technique. I think I've seen it done with two soft boxes. I don't have one so I used the shoot-thru umbrella for the top and a silver autoshade from Wal-Mart for the bottom. It looks nice to me. You can see both speculars in his eyes. The umbrella was directly in front of and above him aiming down. I was shooting in the small gap between the umbrella and the reflector. It is a very flat, soft look with a slight shadow below the nose.

I did a little touch up in Lightroom. The clarity slider is really cool. I backed that off just a bit to smooth the face. Brought up the blacks a bit for some contrast. Finally, just a bit of overall sharpening.

Full Contact Photography

2009-07-31T08:52:00.001-04:00

Compared with my other hobbies such as woodworking (I have some meat missing from my left thumb), shooting, reloading my own ammunition, fishing (wading the flats), I thought photography was fairly benign. Not any more. I was taking some shots of the boys last night. Trying to capture Hez with his Batman mask on. I was not successful. But I did get a good shot to my eye. I had a microphone stand with a superclamp and my Canon 540EZ on it. It started to go over and I reached for it and BAM. What I figure happened is that I did the classic "step on the rake" routine and the stand came back and got me. Too bad you can't see the cut on top of they eye better. It is a nice one. Maybe I'll add another post if it gets worse over the next day or so.

Mamaw's Dress

2009-07-26T16:51:00.001-04:00

We are very thankful to have Mamaw who is a great seamstress. She has made some really cool stuff for us like curtains and bumpers for the baby and most recently, a few dresses for Maggie Beth. I like this one a lot with the fishing and hunting stuff on it.

This is an example of the simplest of portraits. A single strobe through a shoot-thru umbrella with subject standing close to a neutral colored wall. The large umbrella first gives soft, flattering light for the subject and also a soft shadow on the background wall. A bare strobe will give a much more defined shadow. Nothing wrong with that either. But for a great looking headshot or 3/4 shot, this is simple technique.

Hair

2009-07-21T19:26:00.000-04:00

Well it has been a while since I have posted. Life has been busy. I mean homelife is always busy. The "Work" work increased there for a bit. So I haven't been shooting as much these days but I am starting again. I have some family portrait sessions coming up and even a wedding (I can't believe I said yes to that but they are my friends and they make me feel guilty :) just kidding Tim and Erin. I am looking forward to it and I like you guys a lot. I need to do some research on that though. So I don't mess up their special day.

Anyway the subject here is hair. I came home from lunch and took the picture of my sweet wife at our big kitchen window. It faces east and the sun was high so there was no direct sunlight. Then my son at our big window facing west over the back yard. I shot them wide open at 1.8 since the light was low but afterward I thought I rushed it and should have stopped down to get a bit more depth of field. Even If I had to bump up the ISO, it would have been worth it.

Must Have Roasted Marshmallow!

2009-07-07T20:35:00.001-04:00

Thought this was a funny one. The present that I mentioned before was a Quantaray 19-35mm lens. I am using here one-handed while holding the marshmallow that I just roasted for my son. I need to post a little review of this lens because it does well.

Be blessed.

Vacation

2009-07-05T19:02:00.001-04:00

Here are a few portraits that I took while on vacation. We visited our friends in SC. They are all shot from the same setup. I shot my 285HV into a shoot-thru for key light and used my bare 540EZ for accent hanging from their beams with a super clamp. The last visit, I shot some very similar portraits. The difference is that this time I let the ambient burn in for the background where as last time I lit that with a Sunpak 411.

Keep posted. I received a present while on vacation that I'm going to share.

Taking The Opportunity

2009-06-24T20:34:00.000-04:00

Had a few opportunities tonight to shoot. I noticed the evening sun coming through the boys' bedroom window and I decided to grab the umbrella and balance with the sun. So I was in the process of doing that when I hear from the master bathroom "Come look at Maggie, she has funny ears". That lead to this natural light photo. We have a big window at the bathtub that I have frosted and it makes a great light source.

So back to the boys' room and another natural light shot here with the sun filtering through the bunk bed beams.

Coming Soon . . .

2009-06-24T12:59:00.001-04:00

I'm switching back. Man I hate to do this switching back and forth but I am so bummed about the lack of widgets and the ability to customize on wordpress. They're security is so high that you are very limited in the HTML/JAVA widgets that you can add to your blog.

Typical Shoot

2009-03-15T18:21:00.001-04:00

So in all honesty this is how 80-90% of my shots look. Someone is mad, sad, unhappy, hot, cold, hungry, wants to go home, doesn't want to go home, had something taken from them, took something from someone, you get the idea. So in the interest of full disclosure I thought I would put this up for all to see. I don't think I am unique here. You probably experience the same thing. I would like to hear about it.

So what do you do when this happens? We threaten loss of treats after dinner, loss of toys, loss of stars. We use stars as a reward system. If you do something good, you get a star. Something bad, you loose stars. If you get 10 stars, you get a prize of some kind. For a while, we were getting toys way too regularly. These days, they are so bad that I can't remember the last time either had 10 stars. Arggggg.

So with a little threatening we got them to smile and stand still for longer than 5 ms.

Be blessed.

More Fun With A Reflector

2009-03-12T08:03:00.001-04:00

I have been enjoying using a reflector with the fam out back. I really REALLY really love this picture of my daughter with my wife framing her face. Wow. I am thankful to be Daddy in this house.

Anyway just using the reflector to bring in some light wherever you choose. I really want to find a gold autoshade but I may have to break down and buy an actual photo reflector to get that color.

So here are few more from yesterday afternoon. These days anytime I ask to take Eli's picture, this is the face I get. Oh well, at least he isn't running from me like he used to.

I like the pose in this shot. Like he is in deep though about something. Again bringing in the reflector for fill from underneath.

And finally my sweet wife Gretchen and my boy Eli. Hummm. Don't want to get too sappy here so I'll say . .

Be Blessed.

Just A Reflector

2009-03-07T19:33:00.001-05:00

So I went out back with the boys today with my camera and my autoshade from Wal-Mart. The day is sunny so I figured I could use the sun and the reflector for two light sources.

In the shot above, the sun is coming from above and behind the subject from camera right. I stuck the reflector in close camera right in front.

For these last two shots, the setup is thus: sun from camera left and slightly behind and the reflector used to fill from camera right.

This is a very inexpensive and effective way to make a little more interesting light. My autoshade is silver. I would like to have a gold one but I haven't found one yet.

Post processing done in Lightroom. Man I really like using that. Haven't found something to do in photoshop in a while. Especially for portrait touch-up.

Be blessed.

Our Friends

2009-03-04T08:45:00.001-05:00

Here are a few shots made while visiting our great friends in South Carolina. It rained (and then snowed) the entire time we were there so we stayed inside mostly which gave opportunity to set up the lights. The house was great in the living room here. Exposed beams in the ceiling worked great with a super-clamp from Manfrotto. So the setup is the same in this group. I used the old Sunpak 411 for the the background @ 1/4 power. A gridded Canon 540EZ is hanging from the ceiling @ 1/32th power. And the 285HV is going thru a white shoot-thru umbrella @ 1/16th power.

They also had an awesome sun-room facing west. I took some natural light portraits as well. I think the next post will contain those shots.

Be blessed.

Eli

2009-02-24T10:27:00.003-05:00

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.

Lightroom 2

2009-02-12T08:14:00.001-05:00

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?

Daddy's Girl

2009-02-06T08:41:00.001-05:00

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.

Photographing Ecaudor

2009-02-04T14:16:00.001-05:00

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.

Blue

2009-02-03T06:49:00.001-05:00

Blue, originally uploaded by paggre.

This was maybe the first shot I have taken with every intention of doctoring it in post-processing (I use the Gimp and Photoshop depending on what computer I am on).

My daughters eyes are blue and if she is wearing blue, they look very intense. But she wasn't wearing blue last night and was eating so Daddy couldn't change her wardrobe.

My other issue is not having a macro lens. So this is cropped quite a bit from the original.

In the Gimp, I started by removing stray hairs and such. Duplicated the layer and started working on the eye color that I was looking for. So I got into color-balance and moved the yellow slider presumably to remove yellow leaving more blue. That interface was not very intuitive for me.

Now that I have the color of the eye, it is just a matter of applying a layer mask filled with black and then using a soft paintbrush with white to uncover the area of the eye that I wanted to change.

To finish, I added a vignette. I don't think I even sharpened this. I meant to but forgot.

Symmetry

2009-01-30T17:55:00.001-05:00

Symmetry, originally uploaded by paggre.

So the interesting thing here about using this hour-glass for the subject of symmetry is that . . .well. . .it is not symmetric. It tilts and moves and so I had to correct that in the Gimp.

The other interesting thing here was my first use of a cookie to add some interest to the background. I found some leaf stencils that I used for camouflaging my rifle. Nice effect I think.

Texture

2009-01-28T08:14:00.001-05:00

Texture, originally uploaded by paggre.

This was another shot for the photo-a-day challenge at http://photochallenge.org.

I like the dark space here. I tried some that were only the pattern of the basket. I think the negative space adds some interest to the photo. Also tried different amounts of fill light from the right using the autoshade. Varied the distance and found that I liked less fill light. The shadows reveal the texture.

So I used my shoot-thru umbrella with the 285HV. I find that I am using the shoot-thru exclusively since I got it. It is nice to get that added aperture by getting the umbrella in very close. The autoshade is very handy and cheap. So if you need a reflector, don't pay $40 for a "photographic" one. Hit your local Wal-Mart and pick up one for $5. I wish they made a gold autoshade. Has anyone seen one?

Be blessed.

Silhoutte

2009-01-19T19:34:00.001-05:00

Silhoutte, originally uploaded by paggre.

Wow. I was surprised that this got such a positive reaction on flickr. I have done this type of thing with my son before. Makes a cool portrait.

It really couldn't be easier to do. One light with a foam snoot. I set it on 1/4 power. I set the camera to max. sync. For me that is 1/250s. Apeture set to f5.6. That is always my starting point. I adjust from there.

This is taken in a lit room. But the room is f4 @ 1/25s or so. So I am way above ambient.

So the snooted 285HV is behind the subject slightly side-lit. Then you just turn the subject or move the light until you get the effect you are looking for.

Be blessed.

Electronics

2009-01-19T09:51:00.001-05:00

Electronics, originally uploaded by paggre.

I'm taking part in the 2009 challenge at photochallenge.org. The format is a photo-a-day. That is definitely a challenge. Some days there is just no time.

Anyway this was fun. The subject was electronics. Since I work around electronics I could have used all sorts of bleeding edge ball grid arrays but no. I was borrowing my buddy's MESA guitar amp (thanks Mark and Tommy) for practicing. So I remembered the tubes. Old school. And they really do sound better than any solid-state amp. Sorry guys. That is just a fact. I used to be in the solid-state camp. But have since seen the light.

So I lit this with two bare speed lights. Experimented with color a lot. But found that the sepia treatment gave it a vintage look.

Be blessed.

What Does This Smell Like?

2008-12-31T19:59:00.001-05:00

What Does This Smell Like?, originally uploaded by paggre.

What else is there to say about this. He loves to collect flowers for Mommy. So I asked him to let me take a picture of Mommy's flowers. And this is what he did. Great stuff.

Please critique if you have time.

I Already Posed For 2 Pictures

2008-12-31T10:23:00.001-05:00

I Already Posed For 2 Pictures, originally uploaded by paggre.

This is the look I get a lot of times. At least he will pose at all because in the past he would run like the wind every time I brought out the camera.

This is using my new shoot-thru umbrella. Not much to add here other than balancing the key light from the umbrella with the rim lighting from the sun. I am liking the soft shadows. The umbrella is literally just out of the frame to the left.

If I Could Just Get This Apart

2008-12-29T14:35:00.001-05:00

If I Could Just Get This Apart, originally uploaded by paggre.

Getting a chance to play with my Christmas shoot-thru umbrella. A 43" I think. Very nice. I have had trouble distinguishing between the shoot-thru and my silver reflective one. The shadows may be a bit softer since you can put the umbrella right next to the subject. Thereby, making a larger apparent size of the light source. Ha, something I learned on the Strobist. Larger apparent size of the light source the softer the transition area becomes.

The other very nice thing is that even though the shoot-thru is less efficient at transmitting light, you still get a higher aperture for a given power setting since you can get the source closer to the subject. So here I have f7.1 @ 1/4 power. With the silver umbrella, I only get f5.6 at the same power.

Nice pose here. He is trying to get an alien apart from Ben10 that he got for Christmas. So we are both playing with Christmas toys.

Christas Morning HONL Grid Spot

2008-12-27T08:54:00.001-05:00

Christas Morning, originally uploaded by paggre.

I love this shot. I know there is a box in the lower right corner. I didn't think it was trivial to remove it in Gimp because of the gradient falloff from the new grid that I got for Christmas. So anyway, it doesn't bother me much. He is holding up his loot from his stockings and he likes to wear my hearing protection from the garage. Don't have an explanation for that.

Oh yeah, the new grid. I had been working on making a DIY straw grid but I ran into some troubles. First, the strobist DIY kit didn't have enough straws to finish a grid for the 285HV. The head is bigger than anything Canon or Nikon is making. So then I figured I could just go buy some more black straws. Nope. Wal-Mart, Michael's, Party Outlet, Bed Bath and Beyond, NOPE. No black straws anywhere. We went to Olive Garden one time. They had them but you can only jack so many straws at a time. Anyway I have two partially constructed straw grids.

So I asked for the HONL speed strap and a 1/4" grid spot for Christmas. They are very nice. Good construction and now I've thrown away my DIY's. You can see the nice circle on this shot from the grid. I have it mounted on my Canon 540EZ @ 1/16th power.

If you have ideas on how to approach removing that box, I would love to hear them.

Christmas Morning.

2008-12-26T15:02:00.000-05:00

So here are a couple shots from Christmas morning at our house. I totally stole (borrowed) this idea from http://strobist.com. What a great tip. I used my 3 flashes to light the entire room so that no matter where you run with your presents, you can't hide from decent light. So I had my Vivitar 285HV, Canon 540EZ, and Sunpak 411 all at 1/2 power. We have a "great room" that is a long rectangle with vaulted ceilings. I placed them in a triangle formation and bounced them all off the ceiling.

Like David Hobby says on his post, the light isn't all that interesting, but in my opinion it does a great job of capturing an event like this. You know that everyone will be in this room but you don't know exactly where and NO one will care about posing.

Give it a try for the next birthday party or something.

Be blessed.

My Girls

2008-12-23T08:14:00.001-05:00

My Girls, originally uploaded by paggre.

I know this is a re-post, but this is my most popular photo so far on flickr. I suppose it made most interesting at some point during the day that I uploaded it. I do not even know what that means. So how does a photo become interesting? Who decides? Anyway I think it is a great photo of my best favorite girls.

I took this using the natural light from a big window that is almost always perfect for portraits. It opens under the covered back porch so it is blocked from direct sunlight except for about 1/2 hour just after sunrise. I have been doing a lot of flash photography lately and it was nice to put on the 50mm 1.8 and just shoot away with natural light.

It has to be the eyes. I did some gaussian blurring on a few layers but left the eyes very sharp. So thanks all you flickerites. They are beautiful aren't they?

A Day At The Zoo

2008-12-20T19:35:00.001-05:00

A Day At The Zoo, originally uploaded by paggre.

I thought this would make a nice shot with the furry monkey being backlit. I took the picture. When I looked at the LCD, I thought, humm. Not exactly what I thought. Didn't think it looked like much on the small screen. So not until I opened it up on the computer was I satisfied with it.

Latest Family Photos

2008-12-16T07:15:00.000-05:00

Here are a few shots from my most recent family photo session. Very happy with these. I took these photos in their home. That worked out well because everyone is relaxed. It is very frustrating when you have to get everyone ready, in the car, and off to the portrait studio. You get there and they are always running late. By the time it is your turn, everyone has been ready to leave for a long time. So you say "Smile! So we can get out of here!".

The idea was some family photos for Christmas. But we went with the flow. Dad wanted a photo with his dog who is getting up in years. The girls wanted individual portraits to use on MySpace etc. So we took a bunch of shots.

Lighting is definitely a challenge in this impromptu situation. Especially when you are not a pro. Thanks to the Strobist for what I do know. I took some against a dining room wall that had a neutral color. Took some with the Christmas tree in the background. We also took some out on the dock over the river. But I personally liked these with the black background the best. We were able to position everyone with their backs to the living room so that I could work above ambient and acheive the black background. We tried using a hallway but my umbrella was lighting that.

So for all of these shots I had my umbrella for the key light and handheld my cheapo autoshade for the fill light. I borrowed one of the non-subjects to hold the Canon 540EZ for the accent light in all but the picture with Mom and Dad. I didn't make a conscience to do that. In fact, I didn't even think to use the accent light until the girls wanted their individual portraits. But I think it worked well. The accent light adds a bit of an edge. The photo is a bit more formal without it.

So anyway let me know what you think if you time.

Be blessed.

Sitting By The Sea

2008-12-12T07:13:00.001-05:00

Sitting By The Sea, originally uploaded by paggre.

It was a great sky so I thought I could get a good sunrise photo. But I have not found a good subject for the foreground. So as I was floundering around taking photos of a sky and ocean, I noticed this guy. I took the photo in color but it didn't really add anything so I de-saturated it. I burned in on his shirt to add some detail.

More Family Portraits

2008-12-09T12:07:00.001-05:00

More Family Portraits, originally uploaded by paggre.

Christmas family portrait for our friends. I have a 285HV into a silver umbrella, camera left @ 1/2 power. For fill, a silver autoshade @ camera right. A bare 540EZ gelled red for some background fill to the right of the Christmas tree. That spot is actually our front door. We covered it with a dark green comforter to give some place to shoot the flash.

I think this came out well. If I had another chance I would have dragged the shutter to let those Christmas tree lights burn in just a little more. Maybe opened the framing a little. But overall good I think. Everyone is looking.

What do you think?

My Girls

2008-12-08T13:06:00.001-05:00

My Girls, originally uploaded by paggre.

I love this shot. Natural light with a fast lens. I really enjoy flash photography. But it is so nice to not have to set up an umbrella and flash and just take some photos. This is ISO400 1/80s @ f1.8.

I am still in search of the "tired" face. So check back regularly to see if I get it. Tried last night. She had been doing it non-stop for like 10 minutes. So I got my lighting bag out of the car, set up, and she didn't do it once. I didn't miss her do it. She just stopped doing it.

Fall Road

2008-12-04T07:24:00.001-05:00

Fall Road, originally uploaded by paggre.

This is a shot that I took in Maryland on a hike one evening. To me it was just so so out of the camera. So I tweaked it in the gimp. Adjusted the levels, slightly sharpened, added the vignette. Now I like it. What do you think?

Fall In Florida

2008-12-01T09:20:00.001-05:00

Fall In Florida, originally uploaded by paggre.

Yes this is as good as it get for fall colors in Florida. A few oak leaves and some leaves from our sickly lemon tree (it may actually be a lime tree, we aren't sure because we have only harvested 1 fruit from it since we have lived here).

Oh yeah, photography. So I saw this vignette example in Popular Photography I think. Maybe it was Outdoor Photographer. Not sure. Wow I am really helpful huh? I don't really have Photoshop. I downloaded the 30 day trial. So I am trying to do as much as I can for the limited amount of time. I also downloaded Lightroom's trial as well. I like it all so far. Honestly though, short of adjustment layers, I can do almost everything in Gimp. I know that Photoshop does non-destructive editing but I haven't seen a problem using Gimp. So maybe one of you can point out to me what I do not understand about this.