light test

Just setting up lights for a shoot today and thought i would have some fun.
Funny part was that the door to the studio was open and a girl walked by and didn't know what i was up to.
In photoshop i cranked the clarity and then boosted the contrast. Sharpened alot also.
Added a grunge border i downloaded from the internet.

available light at f1.4

Of course i mentioned in my last post that i was a flash photo kind of guy but this weekend i kept them in the bag and used available light for a couple shots of my son. He was putting on his shoes in the first one and i ran and grabbed my camera. Getting ready for bed in the second and was lit from the tv. I thought it looked pretty cool so once again i said "dont move" and ran for the camera again.
I have been playing with a new to me black and white software called nik silver efex pro 2. It is sweet. There are lots of presets and then you can take it way further and selectively alter various areas of the image. I haven't used it much so i still have alot to learn but so far so good.

recent shoot

I did a shoot recently and happened the scene above by fluke.
I did a bunch of different setup shots that the client wanted and i mainly used two sb flashes bounced into large umbrellas for light. I had finished out back and moved to the counter shots but needed something to stand on. I went back out back to get a milk crate and this guy was cutting a muffler off. I just so happened to have my camera around my neck so i started shooting. The only light was from the torch and burning metal, with ambient bringing up the rear. I cant remember what lens i had on the camera, a 50 or a 35mm. All i know is that i wanted to get closer but was worried about getting burnt. Large groups of sparks were hitting the ground and spreading fast. I got as close as i dared and shot alot of frames.
I would certainly call myself a flash kind of guy as in pretty well every situation i am always thinking "flash would make this look great". Once in awhile i do get a surprise from the ambient.

three lights and a model

One of my favourite models i might add, and just any old three lights.
Had a main light shooting through a 24" umbrella, a hair light pointed direct but with a snoot made out of black foil, and a background light point direct and zoomed in to control the spill (sb 900 flash zoomed to 135 at a power of 1/32 and 4 steps from background).
I processed the black and white in lightroom and used a preset called b&w creative creamtone. I then tweaked the sliders a bit and opened in photoshop. Just did a little retouching and burned the floor and legs down a bit as they were quite bright.
Total time of shoot was about 5 minutes and mabey 10 more in computer.

shoot through umbrella

I was asked to do a quick shot of someone on a phone for the web the other day and he was nice enough to let me post it to my blog. I used a shoot through umbrella (medium size) with a sb flash. I placed it above the back of the computer to camera left.
My worries were many as usual, will pointing flash at his forehead blow it out in comparison to the rest of tones, will it be too bright on white computer, will body be too dark due to computer blocking light, can i get the light far enough to left due to wall, is background distracting due to window on right of image. Some of these concerns turned into small problems but overall i accepted these as what i could do with what i had available. When he looked at middle of screen his eyes were dark so i had him look at top left corner of screen and kept joking around with him for an expression (note: this is not the image that will be used on the web, its just one i liked). The shoot only took about 10 minutes, was fun, and will work for the intended purpose.

starting 2012

A new year once again and time to reflect on the past year and one to come. I have read alot of blogs of photographers speaking about the same thing but i was late in putting my thoughts into the mix.
Speaking of last year, it was great. I was happy with my work, tried some new things, and worked with some wonderful people.
Moving ahead to this year, I would like to continue, full steam ahead. One thing i would like to do is more one on one shooting, mainly for fun. I want to do a few portraits and try some new lighting things that i have been thinking about. Shoot more perhaps also, although i dont take any lack of photos in the course of a year. I bought a book for some new inspiration and have read it off and on over the christmas break. I also want to work out at the gym like a madman, in my spare time of course.
Hopefully the year will be healthy, and very happy.

christmas trees

This is more a test of posting a longer photo than anything but also wanted to put a few images up of helping a group move 700 christmas trees from a woodlot into town. Great day.
I walked around for a bit with a 24mm lens and took about 200 photos. At the end of the day i met and had a long talk with a very interesting 80 year old man who showed me his camp and told me all about his woodlot and the history around it. What i really wanted to do was photograph him in his camp but would have had to walk back to my car to get my camera which was not close at all.

fun group

I shot these individually on a white background and stripped together in photoshop.
These jobs are always fun and i love doing them.

fun night

Had a great time at state of the city address tonight and got a few good photos too.
I will post a photo in the next couple of days to explain why i have not been posting lately.

Movember

Hard to show the stash as it was very light in color but did some selective burning and dodging and put two heavy vignettes on it and masked out the areas i wanted light.
Just used one light here, softbox up high to right side. I retouched it out of the glasses.

hdr at dusk

I shot this building for a client and they requested it be done at night. That to me means go just before the sun goes down and shoot until its dark out. There is a time when you can get that nice blue in the sky and still have it look like its at night. On this one i blended 9 images in photomatix and then played with the photo quite a bit. I cant really remember what i did as i was just playing. Now i want to photograph my son and his friends on their skateboards at night and strip then into the scene.

quick portrait

This portrait took all of about 2 minutes to shoot. I set up an off camera flash and when i took the first photo i turned it off. The remainder of the shots (about 10 in total) were with natural light. The raw photos were really flat and blah. I spent far longer in photoshop tying to go a little into the dramatic. First of course was a conversion to black and white, and then multiple layers. I would duplicate my background layer and then darken it, or whatever, and then create a mask to bring her face through from the original layer. I probably did this 5 or 6 times and then went into gaussian blur and did the same thing. I blurred everything except the face and a bit of the shirt. I then did some selective burning and dodging and sharpening and pretty well had it. I really was not sure on how to crop it and still not 100% sure that this one works. The birch tree in the center of the frame really throws the composition for me.

available light

I heard someone say once when asked if they use available light or flash, "i use both, whatever is available". In my opinion, 90% of the time when shooting a portrait, you need flash. Even if its just to pop the eyes and you let ambient light do most of the heavy lifting, you still really need it.
The photo above did not need flash. It honestly was one of those fluke shots that i was not required to shoot but when you see a background like this and light hitting a subject like this, you need to shoot it.
Thanks to my subject for letting me post it to my blog.

family time

Used 2 sb flashes here pointed direct and self timer so i could run into photo.

something new

I am planning a self project with portraits and text, written by the subjects. I have the concept, have the people, and just need to play a bit with the design. This is just a test.

another skydome shot

I am still playing with panos i took at the skydome on vacation. I havent done the one yet that i really want to try but hopefully that will be next. This pano was made from 33 photos, shot left to right in three rows to get the whole scene in. I exported from lightroom to photoshop for the building of the pano.

vacation

I took a very nice, very needed vacation this summer. I didn't shoot much but managed about 1200 shots on a trip to toronto.
Here are a couple panos. I have another pano i will strip together of three rows of photos and then am going to make it look like a model scene.

engagement photo

My baby sister is getting married and i took a quick shot of the happy couple today for the invitation.
I used a sb flash bounced into a small silver umbrella, mainly just for a bit of light in the eyes, placed to the left and balanced with the ambient so it would not show up much.
I did a fair amount of work in photoshop mainly with color correction and retouching. Where i shot it on the lawn it was quite green from light bounce.
Now i am excited to see the invitations and even more excited that the wedding is getting closer. Should be a nice day.

color casts

As you can see the title of this post may be a bit of a play on words.
My sons casts come off tomorrow and my neighbors on wed this week. We of course had to get a shot of them together while they were still on. I was very happy with the shot photographically. I used one sb flash bounced into a big 60" umbrella (which the wind caught and destroyed during the shoot). The flash was on full power and in fairly close to them. They were standing in the shade and i think the camera was set to f8 or f11 and 1/250 sec at 100 iso. This of course darkened the sky and background down a bit but made everything from foreground to background in focus. In photoshop later i created a new layer and put a strong gausian blur on it (if i was being fussy i would have blended the layers better, you can see the problems in the grass). I then masked out the kids to keep them sharp. I applied a curve and a vignette, sharpened and was done. Time now to order some new umbrellas.

night time hdr

I was driving by a building i have shot a few times now and thought i would try a night shot, and of course feed some mosquitoes while i was at it. I bracketed 9 shots and chose 5 to run through photomatix. It was pretty much as easy as that. I did a curve but nothing fancy and sharpened and that was it.