Low Key

For day 118 I wanted to work with a few different things: a single light, shadow and silhouettes. I needed a subject with some interesting and varied texture to pull this off, and I found something around the house that worked:



This key and lock belong to a hundred-and-some-odd years old barrister bookcase that my wife inherited some time ago. The combination of the woodgrain and metal work gave me the texture I wanted and the cloverleaf handle of the key gave a good shape and texture. I wanted a harsher light so this is not shot with an umbrella or diffuser, but there is a Honl 'frost' gel on the flash to soften it ever so slightly.

I've been working with a trial version of Photoshop Elements 8 as opposed to a two-step process of Canon DPP and GIMP, and I think this shot has convinced me that I need to buy the software. The control over the RAW image is just great, and the amount of polish you can great straight from the RAW image is just head and shoulders above the other solution.

Another thing I need to save my pennies and dimes for!

Work, work, work...

I managed to get the family shoot set processed and sent off for printing, and I also managed to finish processing about 30 shots from the soccer game last night. It's a good start, but I have a lot more to go.

For day 87, I'm sticking with the theme, and I did a shot of something their coach dropped off for me on Friday:



A little shot taken for their website. Nothing serious, but then again, I don't have a heck of a lot of time for a shot tonight! Hope I'll finish off the soccer pics tonight, and then I can get to work on the rest of the bar gig shots.

I feel like a real photographer!

The crime rate around here is nuts...

Hello friends, and welcome to day 56 of my Project 365.

I was feeling a bit goofy today, so I decided to try doing something like my Exhibitionst candy shot here, so I decided to once again dive into the seedy side of the life of your average nut:



Thank goodness that they have CCTVs there, maybe the cops can catch the guy who did it.

You can click through to the Flickr link for a larger view, but the full size images is big, 4096 by something, and 9MB. You've been warned.

Sick of ice yet?

For day 54, one more ice cube shot. Last one I promise, at least for a while.

The reason is that I wanted a different treatment of a similar subject. Last time, I was blowing out highlights, and getting tightly cropped, so this time I went low-key and gave it some space in the frame:



Shot on black fleece which does a really nice job of killing any reflection, and it only needed very, very minimal cleanup of light spill. Basically, twenty pixels or so of gray right haloing the base of the glass, the rest of it is clipped. This was accomplished with the 580EX II off-camera, shooting down from above, and snooted with a Honl flexible snoot/bounce card.

The shot might have been better with a second point of focus, because otherwise there is just a lot of black, but so be it. It looks like I expected, good or bad.

More shots for Defiant Racing

Here are the other keepers from my late night, really cold shoot for my friends racing team last night.

Comments and criticism are always welcome!

So tired...

It's late and I'm tired. Day 39 meant going to a friend's place and shooting some photos the website of his new motorcycle racing team, Defiant Racing.

I've been PP'ing his shots all night, and now I must sleep. Here is one of the shots from today:



Can I go to bed now?

Portrait Pictures!

Thank you a million times over to my very good friends who were kind enough to let me not only take their family portraits, but to share them with those of you who chose to read along as I undertake this incredible learning curve.

Here are four of my favourite pictures from today's shoot.

Their kids and dogs:



Mom and Dad:



Their son, the Drummer-in-training:



Their daughter:



For my first portrait shoot, I am very happy. Lots of room to improve, but nothing here that I am disappointed with.

This post may cause paralysis...

Day 30 of my Project 365 and I was playing with lighting again.

Inspired by the legend of the Hand of Glory, a candle and/or candleholder made the from the hand of a hanged criminal. It was said to immobilize any who saw it lit. You've been warned.



If you can still move, please read on.

I shot this a few times and it was pretty frustrating honestly. You have to frame the shot, fix the focus, set up the lighting (or in my case the light blocking sheets of bristol board), turn out the lights and then do a ten second exposure while hoping you don't knock your models hand. This was my sixth or seventh snap and the best by far.

Things that didn't work the way I would have liked: Ideally I would have preferred to have a single, defined flame at each fingertip, but I could only get my wife to hold her hand still for so long, so this all had to be done in the aforementioned ten seconds. I would have preferred not to see the tip of the lighter in the shot, and I'm sure a more competent post processor could have removed them, but all of my attempts looked horrid.

Things that did work: The fingers are crisp and in-focus, and the soft candle-like light gave a bit of an eerie glow to the hand. My wife did a fine job of keeping her hand steady for this shot, and also she agreed to help in the first place!

Once again, a shot I like more than I dislike. I had an idea, and within a half hour or so, I had a shot that looked like I imagined.