Oh Snap! Holidaz - Holiday lights!!

I've been running around the last few nights shooting Holiday lights.  I've been perfecting my version of David Hobby's blog post on shooting lights.  How did I do?



While scouting other opportunities to add to my collection I ran into a couple houses I couldn't wait for good light to shoot - they were just too tempting.  As a result, I decided to launch my first annual "Griswald-Hall" contest.  The rules are simple, the most enthusiastist decorations win.  And you get to choose the winner!

First place goes to the entry that comes closest to Clark Griswald and Buddy Hall's triumphs (personally, I'm glad I don't have to vote on which of those 2 would win!).

So here we go, our first 3 candidates (hey, it's all I've found so far!):

Candidate #1

Candidate #2

Candidate #3

So help me pick a winner, add a comment and pick your favorite, or email me directly (I'd rather you leave a comment below, so I ain't gonna give you my email here if you don't already have it - I'm a a stinker!)

Let the voting begin!!!

Oh Snap! Frolicking in the Park

A cool morning, no wind and cloudy skies met us on our morning walk. So, off to the park to play some ball....

 Eyes on the ball Journey!

There you go, that's the ticket!

Uh, um... you don't wanna go up when it's coming down...

Or you'll be coming down when it's going back up!

See the ball, BE the ball... WATCH THE BALL!!!!

 See Skittles? She's got the idea!!

You got it!!!!  Now bring it here!

Not there, HERE!!!!!


If he drops it, 'cn I have it?!

S'all cool Dude, I got this!

I'm thinking...  Lunch! Who's in?!

Hope you enjoy...

Oh Snap! Over the top

Quick vote - let me know if you like or don't like these images?!

I hate when this happens - last night I was reviewing a cool set of photos that deliberately over-exposed images of structures, etc.  It was the inspiration for the pictures below.  Over-exposing is nothing new, but when something inspires me I'd like to be able to give them proper credit.  Once again I have to apologize to the Unknown Photog.

Over exposing means pushing the dynamic range and ending up with black-n-white images which look very much like pencil drawings.  To do that, however, you have to have a bright whites and strong shadows to start with...

Skittles, Journey and I headed off for our walk (what else is new), and returned to Windsor Lake with the over-exposure idea in mind.  First thing we run into is the park bench (1st shot).  After that, I just shot whatever tickled my fancy.

Each image was 2-3 stops over-exposed, then pushed further in Lightroom.

Again, am interested in hearing what you think!

Bench by the lake

Winter Tree

Overhang
(yes Virginia, I shot daylight balanced, and yet the shadows turned blue!)

Lone Tree by the Lake

Even Bigger Overhang

Somehow these feel old-school, old-tech to me. I kind of like them, actually.

Of course! I wouldn't have posed them otherwise... :)

Hope you enjoyed...

TTV Shoot

I just finished attending  a 2-day live-stream workshop of Jeremy Cowart via CreativeLive.  The topic was experimental photography - trying new ideas and keeping your photography fresh.  Great workshop, Jeremy showed us a lot of great ideas, and some neat tricks.  The one I'm playing with in this blog is shoot your subject through the viewfinder of an old, vintage camera.

The best cameras seem to be those with larger viewfinders (remember the old Rolleiflex box camera?), but Jeremy's first set with this trick seemed to be a very small camera with a small viewfinder.  He created some really cool images with this setup.  During today's session, he also used a camera more like the Rolleiflex mentioned above.

I liked the idea so much I thought I'd try it.  It just so happens I have one of my Dad's old cameras - a Graflex Custom Graphic medium format camera.  I remember many unhappy times as a child, waiting while Dad fiddled with settings, loaded film cartridges, tweaked my posture, my position, and grumbled over my frown or frozen smile.  Now, when I look at it I just grin, but back then... JEEZ....

For this post I wanted to include a shot of the my Dad's camera.  So, in keeping with the experimental nature of Jeremy's workshop, I played with hand-painting the camera against a medium gray seamless.  First, I painted the camera with a straight tungsten flashlight with a black cinefoil snoot.  I then followed up by painting the area around the camera with a blue gel on the same flashlight.  This was my result, after merging a few select layers in Photoshop:

(ok, it needs a little work - but hey, it's my first time!)

For the shoot, I set Dad's camera on one tripod, and posed Tammie in front of an east facing window with the blinds down.  I hung some filmy black material over the blinds to create some texture to give it a better look.  I used my Hoodman loup to check focus on the back glass of the Graflex, and then scan the whole frame to ensure I had things set as I wanted.  I had a touch of nostalgia, imagining myself doing this back in the 50's when this kind of thing was commonplace.

Next, I set up a strobe with an 11" reflector, set it up high and aimed down at Tammie's face.  Using just the modelling light, I set the camera's white balance to 2800 Kelvin.  Here's what I got:


One of the cool things about my Dad's old camera is the tilt-shift capability of the lens.  I took advantage of that when I set up this shot.  I angled the lens away from Tammie's face so her left eye was even more blurred than the wide open aperture was giving me.  As you can see, even her nose is also significantly blurred, and just her right eye is in sharp focus. 

Something you'd want to do with a live model?  Maybe not, but as a first attempt I think it looks quite cool!

Notice also, the daylight streaming through the window behind her turns a nice blue when I set the white balance to match the tungsten modeling light I was using.  Nice!!!

Here's a pull-back shot, which I also like quite a bit as well...


Kinda cool, yes?

An interesting trick/technique, which I'll be exploring further.  There's dirt and spots on the back glass as well as the lens, and I think that adds to the effect so I'm not planning on cleaning it as long as I'm using it this way.


Hope you enjoyed...