Quick Family Picture

My parents were in town this past weekend and wanted to get a family portrait on Sunday after church (since we all looked so good, ya know). It was hot, but I agreed to set up a couple of lights and a backdrop in the garage.

For those of you who are intimidated by off-camera lighting, it's really not that hard... or scary. I set up one SB800 high and camera right shooting through a Lastolite Tri-Grip Diffuser. That light was set to TTL (through the lens metering) with the exposure compensation set to +1.0. I set another SB800 high and camera left but further back than the light on the right. It also was shooting through a Tri-Grip. I set it to TTL and adjusted the exposure compensation to -1.0.

With the further distance and less power, the left light becomes my fill light.

I set the camera in manual mode, 5.6 and 1/60th. White Balance to "Flash" since I was using.... wait for it, wait for it.... flash. I took one practice shot and I nailed it. Why? Because it really is THAT easy.

Hall Wedding

On Saturday I had the opportunity to shoot at a wedding as a third photographer. It was nice because there was absolutely no pressure. I took the D700 with my 70-200 lens and that was it. I shot with available light all day and wound up with some very nice pictures. Here are some of my favorites:

Ducks

My kids love ducks. I love my Canon G9.

Affirmative Assignment

Welcome back to Assignment Wednesday! Here is a quick refresher of what your assignment was:

-- Affirmative --

This should be a fun assignment. Basically it's just a goal to take pictures of things that suggest something showing an affirmation or approval. Suggestions of thumbs up, applause, those foam "we're #1" fingers, etc... Make sure you have some fun yourselves as well!

On Saturday night, Rachel and Tyler had a private, gourmet meal at her home cooked by her parents before we did our portrait session. I'm talking lobster, filet mignon, the works! So when Rachel's plate was set down before her, without even prompting her, I got this:

Classic! It didn't make the "keeper" stack from the shoot, but it was the perfect shot for my assignment this week. I hope you were able to try this assignment. If you did, just post a comment to this blog and add a link to where you keep it.

Next week's assignment:

Review my post from a few days ago on "Depth of Field" and try making two portraits of someone. One where the background is very close to them (think leaning against a fence or wall) and one where they are much further away from the background. It should be an obvious difference in the depth of field and one of them will probably be a much more pleasant portrait.

Homecoming King and Queen

On Saturday night I had the opportunity to shoot the Homecoming King and Queen of First Academy before they left for the dance. The setting was her house that had access to a dock out by the lake. We took some shots in the yard and then went down to the water. We started pretty late and had hardly any sunlight left. Here are a few of my favorite shots with a quick explanation on how I got the shot. I used my 85 f/1.8 the entire time.


This shot was in the backyard, no flash. I just dialed down the exposure compensation to make up for the dark background. Great formal looking portrait.

This was our walk across the street toward the lake. I got on the ground to allow for the street to lead up to them. I usually don't like keeping some color in a black & white picture but the shoes being red turned out pretty cool and Rachel loved it so the shoes will stay red!

For this shot, I got up on top of the railing going around the dock. Getting a different perspective will really make your pictures more interesting.

My favorite shot! I feel like this could be an ad for some fancy perfume or something. I cranked up the ISO on the D700 for most of these shots on the water because it was DARK!!! I love that sensor!

Flash. If you know what you're doing, you can make great looking shots at anytime of the day. I had Tyler (Rachel's boyfriend... I mean King) hold the SB800 high and to camera right while standing on the bench going around the dock. I lowered my shutter speed to 1/5 of a second and held my breath like crazy! Any faster shutter would have made the sky totally black and I wanted to show as much color as we had left for this shot. I kept my aperture all the way down at 2.8 because any higher, and Rachel and her dad would have been totally blown out. It sounds like a lot of stuff to think about, but when you understand it, you can get this shot on your first or second try.

On this shot of Rachel and her dad, I exposed for the beautiful blue sky and the moon which totally put them in a silhouette. Nice moment.

Thanks Rachel and Tyler for letting me be a part of your special night. Congratulations on being the King and Queen of the First Academy Universe!

Depth of Field

We went to the pond the other day so Brooke and Ainsley could feed the ducks. While they were doing that, I snapped a few shots of Braxton sitting in the stroller. I was using my 85mm f/1.8 lens wide open at f/1.8. When you are wanting a very shallow depth of field so that only your subject will be in focus, the bigger the aperture (smaller number) you can get, the shallower your depth of field will be. I personally love this look and that is why I shoot "wide open" 90% of the time.

You will see that in this image, only Braxton's eyes are tack sharp and everything else begins to fall away very nice to give that great bokeh.

Most lenses that come as "kit" lenses with your DSLR do not have fixed apertures and usually don't have a bigger aperture than f/3.5. For this reason, I only have "pro" lenses with fixed apertures (the aperture does not get smaller as you zoom in) no smaller than f/2.8. My primes (50mm & 85mm) are f/1.4 and f/1.8 respectively.

Try shooting wide open as often as possible and put some space between your subject and the background for the shallowest depth of field.

Eyes Assignment

Wondering how your assignment turned out. I'd love to see how they turned out. Just post a comment on this blog and put a link to where you keep your pics.

Next week's assignment:

-- Affirmative --

This should be a fun assignment. Basically it's just a goal to take pictures of things that suggest something showing an affirmation or approval. Suggestions of thumbs up, applause, those foam "we're #1" fingers, etc... Make sure you have some fun yourselves as well!

I have a few small jobs this week so I will let you know how they went. See you soon.