Day 122 – Crazy Day

It didn’t start out that way. In fact, I was actually able to get away at lunch which allowed me to take this lovely photo.

Peaceful and lovely.

BUT.

Then I found out that a corporate visitor would be arriving late in the afternoon rather than tomorrow morning AND wanted me to schedule meetings for him.

Say what?

I’m the executive assistant so I needed to be there, but I was also supposed to leave for class at the same time Big Guy was scheduled to show up. Something had to give.

Quick email to Jeff letting him know that I would not be able to make class which bummed me out because I was hoping to get some feedback on my prints. Gracious man that he is, Jeff offered to take a look at my prints tomorrow. So at 9am I’ll slip away to his studio which is literally right around the corner from where I work (after arriving at work early to make sure Big Guy is all settled in).

I left work around 5:15 and took a different route home trying to miss all the spring/summer road construction.

I missed the construction, but not the head-on collision traffic jam on the alternate route.

You have GOT to be kidding me.

I arrived home after 7pm.

More f/2.2 – In color this time

I mentioned yesterday that I would post more photos from my f/2.2 experiment on Friday. Here they are. The only adjustments I made were to correct the white balance as there seems to be a bit of a disconnect between my camera and Adobe Bridge, and I bumped the exposure on a couple of them to brighten the photos a bit. Lighting for all: Diffused daylight through my office window and white fluorescent lights above (set to low). No reflectors. (I’m still trying to talk Sweetie into letting me shoot him today. In the meantime, he’s off flying his radio-controlled plane with his pals.)

Day 118 – Starting to get the hang of it

If you can stand another self-portrait. I’m fascinated with shallow depth of field portraiture, so I was experimenting today – on myself again since I had no one else at hand. I’ll have to try this on Sweetie this weekend, if he’ll let me. I think I could get better results if I didn’t have to rely on auto-focus to get the shot.

I shot this in my office. Lighting: diffused daylight to camera right and I held a large white box cover camera left to fill in the shadows on my right side (your left). Shot at ISO 100, 1/60s at f/2.2. The extremely shallow DOF puts my eyes in focus but makes the rest of my face and hair quickly fall off into blur, and even my nose is slightly out of focus. I really like this effect when I see it, and from what I’ve read, can be an effective technique when shooting the “mature” face.

Okay, that was fun (Edited)

I read this tutorial on removing blemishes and smoothing skin and I just had to try it out.

EDIT: I’ve created a side-by-side jpg to show the subtle changes I made per my note in the comments. As always, clicking on any image will take you to a larger version, and will be very helpful for this particular image.

I took this photo from the other day . . .

Removed a few blemishes, lightened the dark areas under my eyes, corrected a few lines and smoothed my skin. The tutorial said to go 50% on the smoothing, but I just went 25%. Anyway, it was a fun exercise. And the results are interesting. It’s still me, but better.

I’m stopping on my way home to have my camera’s sensor cleaned. I was horrified today to notice specks of dust. And since the camera is nearly two years old, I am sure it needs it anyway.

No photo of the day until my baby is all cleaned up. I’ll check in later.

EDITED SIDE-BY-SIDE (click on image for larger resolution)

Day 106 – Serendipity

Sometimes you just get a lucky shot.

A friend of mine posted a link to this Virtual Lighting Studio (be patient…it takes a while to load). Of course, I had to play with it. What’s really cool about it is that once you find a look you like, you can save it as a jpeg. When you open said jpeg, you see not only your image, but a diagram on where to place the lights to get the same effect. Pretty nifty, huh?

And so you know, I felt the call to try it out. I clamped a dark blanket to our living room windows to block out the bits of sunlight that leaked through the wooden blinds. I shoved the hutch away from the tall wall and pushed the sofa and love seat to each side of the room. I grabbed my studio lights and set them up, along with my camera.

“NO!” I told myself. “Get your taxes done. THEN you can play. And while you’re at it, start some laundry.”

Sigh. Okay…

I quickly worked through our taxes (and lo and behold, we’re getting a bit back – taking a couple of photography classes at the university does have other benefits!)

I finally was able to get going, and just had some fun for a bit. But the best moment was when Maya jumped up onto the chair I’d been posing in. She’s a bit shorter than I am.

As for what I was trying to accomplish in session today…highlights in my hair and a defined jawline. It’s all about seeing the light.

Main light (soft box) was in front of me to camera left and high, angled down. Second light (soft box as well) was behind me and to camera right. Slightly lower than the main light. This light got moved quite a bit during the session to try to give me what I was going for. I moved it closer, raised it, brightened and dimmed it.

I know I'm not smiling, but look at the highlight on my cheek, and my jaw looks great!

I really like the highlight along the right side of my face. Nicely lit hair too.

I'm liking the hair and the cheekbones.

I need to get to know Lightroom

I bought it a few weeks back when it was on sale, but haven’t really fiddled with it much. I need to!

Here is one of the shots taken last night processed in Adobe Lightroom and adding the B&W Creative – Creamtone preset. I kinda like it.

Day 101 – Under the wire

Apologies. Nothing to write home about here. It’s been a busy day and I spent the hours after class tonight processing photos I shot in Jeff’s studio last week. Our class shot three models and we are required to provide some shots to each of them for their portfolios. The hour was getting late so I quickly set up my studio lights and shot a few self-portraits to try out some lighting effects.

I shot these with the light above my head to camera left and a fill card at camera right. Shot at f/1.8, just for fun. I have to apologize…not my best work.

Day 91 – Family Portraits

It’s the first day I’ve had to catch my breath since jumping on a plane a week ago last Thursday. I’ve got an assignment to complete this weekend for lighting class (more about that later), but the wind is far too furious for picture-taking. My camera would get sand-blasted and full of dust and nastiness. My final project for my lighting class is in the formative stages, but I know that I’ll need to light and shoot people properly, so today I set about taking some portraits. First me, then Nina, and even Sweetie let me drag him into my office lighting studio.