Sunrise/Sunset Assignment

Welcome back to Assignment Wednesday! I'm going to break my own rule this week because I did not get a chance to shoot at either dawn or dusk this week because of my travels. So here's a picture that is probably my favorite sunset picture I have:



Even without Jake and the canoe, it would have been a pretty sunset picture because the lake is so still and there is a great reflection, but adding a subject just makes me love it!

If you had the time to take a picture this week, add it to the comment section below.

Next week's assignment:

-- Perspective --

When you see something you want to take a picture of, don't always be satisfied with putting your camera to your eye and pressing the shutter button. Look at your subject from different perspectives and see if you can make a more interesting picture. Climb a ladder to view your subject from above, or lay on the ground to get below it. Get behind the subject or just get closer. Have fun! It's due next week.

Wes & Amy's Wedding

A couple of weeks ago we got to fly home to Dallas to be a part of Wes & Amy's wedding (I was a groomsmen). We had a great weekend seeing family and friends and the wedding was beautiful. They had a great photographer, but you know me, I had to take some pictures! I had the D50 and not the D3, so these were shot at ISO 1600 and have way too much noise, but here are a few of my faves:









Congratulations, Wes and Amy!

Day 2

Day 2 is now over and I'm even more tired tonight than I was last night. This morning we spent a ton of time on off-camera flash, and as you know, I already feel very comfortable with that. After lunch, we headed over to a public park where we had the opportunity to shoot more with the models from yesterday. Had a great time and the weather was perfect!

Please realize that many of the shots from today and yesterday that I am showing you were either set up by Cliff or he at least helped me to make them, but I feel like I am definitely capable of capturing images like this, and I will work hard to transform my entire portfolio to images of this quality over the next few months.

Here's my favorites from today:

Day 1

Day 1 of the Cliff Mautner Workshop is over and all I can say is, "WOW!" It was chopped full of great information and plenty of shooting as well. We got to take a trip to an historic prison where we had exclusive access to some really great places to take pictures. Cliff had hired 5 models (4 girls and 1 guy) for the day, and they were excellent.

I'm exhausted from the full day and tomorrow will be just as busy, so I will just leave you with a few of my favorite images from the day. Cliff is a great teacher and these images reflect some of the things we were working on.

Cliff Mautner Workshop

Today I am on my way to Philadelphia for the Cliff Mautner Workshop. Cliff has been named one of the TOP 10 Wedding Photographers in the world! I can't wait to get there and come back 10 times the photographer I am today! Registration for this workshop was capped at 15, so we will get plenty of hands-on help as the week goes on.

I'm certain to have some photos to show you because we will have the opportunity to shoot professional models in bridal gowns in downtown Philly! Wow! I will try to blog everyday if possible, however, it will be a full schedule while we are there.

See you soon!

The HUGE Advantage of high ISO's

I don't have any pictures to show you for this post because I am in TX for a wedding this weekend and did not bring my card reader, but here's what I learned last night:

We had a nice dinner for the families and wedding party at Brio Tuscan Grille. They had put us in a great private room that was dimly lit. The walls were painted dark as well as the ceilings. Immediately, I knew it would be hard to take good pictures even though I had brought an SB800 flash. Why? Let me explain...

If you read this blog often, you know how much I hate using direct on-camera flash. With most photographers, that is considered to be very unflattering light and your pictures end up looking totally flat. However, you can usually bounce your flash off the corner of the wall and ceiling and get much nicer, diffused light even with the flash attached to your camera. The problem is this... light takes on the color of what it hits. So when you have a big white wall, everything is great, but when your wall and ceiling are dark brown (like the restaurant last night), you're in trouble because the light become dark brown!

I did have my 50mm f/1.4 lens with me last night, so I immediately switched from the 18-200 to it, knowing that I would need to be shooting at 1.4 the entire time, I just didn't know if even that would be fast enough. So I put the camera in Aperture Priority, dialed down to 1.4 and took a picture... too slow of a shutter speed. Dialed the ISO from 200 to 400 and took another picture... too slow of a shutter speed. Nervously, I dialed the ISO to 800 and took another picture... too slow a shutter speed.

Now, on my D50 (I just couldn't make myself bring the D3 on this trip), as with most DSLR's, you don't want to use an ISO above 400, but if you have to, go to 800. But that was not fast enough for me last night and I had to take pictures the rest of the night at ISO 1600 which I know will have plenty of noise in them once I'm able to look at them on the computer.

The D3 is such an incredible camera, and is awesome at shooting with high ISO's without any noise, and if I would have had it last night, I could have dialed in an ISO of 2000 without even thinking about it and snapped great shots all night. Instead, I was frustrated with my situation and really didn't even feel like shooting (good thing I am a groomsmen for this weeding and not the photographer!).

I'm not sure what the point to this entry is... I guess I'm telling you to go out and buy a D3 for $5000... or you could get the new D700 with the same chip for $3000

Bokeh Assignment

To get good bokeh, you need a couple of things:

-a good fast lens (one that offers big apertures)
-space between your subject and the background, foreground

In this picture, I was using my 70-200 f/2.8 lens which is great glass and I was zoomed in at 170mm. The background is not only blurred out, but it is a very pleasant look with those little circles of blur that you see.



There was nothing in the foreground because I was zoomed in so far, so there is no bokeh to be had in front of my subjects. I'd love to see some of your shots from this week so comment below with a link to them.

Next week's assignment is:

-- Sunset/Sunrise --

One of the most common photographs is that of a sunrise or sunset, so get out there early or late and see how creative you can get!