23-FEB-2008
23 Feb
Beacon 225 Medium Format Camera. It takes (and is actually still loaded with) Kodak 620 film. I have honestly never used this camera, I found it at the "Swap Shop" at our local Transfer station about 5 years ago (someone was getting rid of it). I just realized it still had film in it when I opened it a few weeks ago. Its too bad, I wonder if I could still develop it (actually I should try).
I am seriously looking at getting a Medium Format camera, either a Rollei or a Yashica.
In the spirit of Medium Format, I've cropped this to a square...
OK, so I had to Google the Beacon and found
this link. I think I will grab some 120 and re-roll it on the 620 spool (OK, time suck. . .). And while I am at the store to get the 120, I might as well get the mint (like never used) 1958 Yashicamat while I'm at it.
22-FEB-2008
22 Feb
My son enthralled by the internet. . .
My oldest is having her birthday sleep over (she's 13) so my son is the odd kid out. He's actually quite happy to be able to spend a lot of time on the computer (usually his sisters hog it).
21-FEB-2008
21 Feb
My wife curled up with a book (normal evening activity for her - I either take my PaD or Process it).
Just a simple casual shot emphasizing textures more than anything else.
20-FEB-2008
20 Feb
I swear that PaD photos are starting to find me now. . .
Just when I feel like I have nothing to shoot, I head out on a quest to nowhere and find something worthy of a few MBs on my CF card. . .
I actually walked up towards the tree, over a snowbank (pocked with deer tracks). Luckily all the rain and cold weather helped to keep me from dropping through and filling my shoes with snow. I took something like 60 photos of this sign, right off the bat I knew I wanted this to be a selective color photo, the question was how to compose it. I'm still not 100% satisfied with the background on the right, it needs more contrast. Part of this is my inexperience with CS3, as it was, I couldn't figure out how to get the mask to work on the ACR Smart Object (I tried to mask out the ACR settings on the green). I gave up and copied and pasted the green to its own layer then overlayed it.
I mimicked the "RAW BW 02" preset in lightroom (that I downloaded from somewhere). I think a BW Adjustment layer would have worked with the added benefit of lightening the right side background.
19-FEB-2008
19 Feb
We have a teenager. . .
Can't believe that we are now parents of a teenager. And we will not be allowed to forget either.
Mom got her red streaks in her hair for her birthday, dad got a captive model for a couple of shoots (to get a picture of the red streaks for the grandparents).
Two lights, camera left and right. Had to actually get them in rather close, even then there is still some shading. I can now see the need for the third hair light too, add a bit more definition and contrast between her and the background. This is from the 2nd shoot, the first had no black background, behind the black cloth is our brick fireplace. The brick was a good idea at the time, but it provided almost no contrast and there is a black metal door (mock oven) that was just too distracting.
18-FEB-2008
18 Feb
Photo of my son and his trains.
Very foggy, dreary day today, not conducive to digital equipment (at least not mine).
This is a simple shot from when we still had better daylight. Things are tight with the 100mm, had to get him pretty close to the train to keep it all in frame (I was about 6' back, not much more room to go either).
17-FEB-2008
17 Feb
Spooning Banannas.
Back on the still life thing. I used the Northern lighting again (tomorrow it is supposed to be overcast/raining so most likely no more natural lighting this weekend).
Took photos of fruit (exciting weekend, huh?).
Today, my intent was a Black and White photo and it wound up a split tone.
The black and white wasn't working on this shot (my favorite of the bunch, so to speak).
All Post Processing done in Lightroom.
03-FEB-2008
16 Feb
My wife bought some flowers for the children for Valentine's Day and I just noticed them on the table. Brought them upstairs to our bedroom with the North Facing window and took a lot of different shots. I intended to stick with color for this, but on a whim I applied a BW preset & really liked it. I did a bit more tweaking and like the tonal range in BW versus color.
15-FEB-2008
15 Feb
Went back to the destruction site today and took a bunch of photos of one of the piles of house.
I didn't notice the writing or the grain on this particular stud until later during Post Processing.
I did all PP in Lightroom, I wish I could have done more selective muting of the highlights on the snow & reduced some of the grain in the background (clouds/sky). I'd wanted a bit of a spotlight effect on the grainy wood too, something I could do in Photoshop Elements, but am struggling with in CS3. I'm just not as comfortable in CS3 yet. . .
14-FEB-2008
14 Feb
While walking in Prescott Park today, I saw this Snow Statue/Sculpture. It was tough to get a good shot, much less walk in the park (lots of water beneath the snow).
Got better detail in Black & White.
13-FEB-2008
13 Feb
I am trying to look for scenes with Red Green & Blue in them, yesterday I found one, but during Post Processing, I realized the colors were so muted (shot in the shade on an overcast day anyway) that it didn't look right. Today I was too busy for a lunch and never made it outdoors (though it was raining all day, so I didn't miss much). This evening I had to come up with an idea.
My kids were kind of fascinated by this shot, though I had to keep telling them to stop moving. I had Live Preview on, zoomed in max and had manually focused the shot. I had the timer set to 10 seconds which was just enough for the movement to stop (kind of). Our dartboard is on the second floor, 3 kids, all drawn to Dad with his camera gear... Lots of movement.
Ambient light is spot halogen, used the 580EX2 bounced to the rear off a Cape (slanted) very white ceiling.
I am still playing around with ACR Calibration, I found a plugin that works, but after running for a 1/2 hour, I didn't follow instructions and screwed up the final open...
Oh yes, I know ISO 1600, this was more of a "yeah, I can do usable ISO 1600" than a "I really needed ISO 1600" type shot.
12-FEB-2008
12 Feb
My goal was to run through the
AcrCalibrator and have some stunning colors to display. However, that was not the case. The script kept crashing, I tried to debug it, but I am not familiar with the Adobe CS3 Object Model (yet) so I was able to make it further, but still had some problems.
This is a Door (yeah, like you needed to know that). I saw it in Strawberry Bank, in Portsmouth, NH. The whole door looked incredibly boring, besides the details of the cracked paint were lost, this is a pretty tight crop. I think it gets the character of the door correct.