It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything, mostly because it’s been a while since I’ve shot anything.  On another note, I’ve almost accepted that I may never get outside with a camera again (at least that’s how it feels), so, I’ve been doing a lot of stuff inside.  Namely, macro.  In doing this macro work, I’ve been using a few things that I thought I’d share with you.  One of my favorite macro tools is a new light I picked up on a visit to the fine folks at Calagaz Photo.  It is one of those LED lights that’s made for video and designed to sit on your camera’s hot shoe.  I, however, use it for macro work and hold it in my hand.  This is the one I bought: Promaster LED120 Plus.  A few of the things I like about it are that it is rechargeable, which is handy.  I also really like that it has an adjustable light output setting.  That allows me to creatively control my lighting on various macro subjects.

Let me show you how this light can effect my images…

First, here’s a shot with the light held at one angle…

Here’s a shot at a different angle.  Nothing changed from this shot and the first other than where I was holding my light.

You can see how you could get pretty creative with your lighting with this little handheld thing.  I have really had a lot of fun using it myself!  I hope this little tip helps you in your macro photography adventures.

Here are a few more of the macro shots I’ve managed to make on my dining room table, all using the LED120 Plus:

As promised, I’m going to share with you how I made the lemon shot from yesterday’s post.  It really is quite simple, so let’s get started.

First, I used a square vase like the one here.  Then, to get all the micro bubbles and sizzle you see, I filled it about 3/4 the way up with Sprite.  I have also heard plain soda water works, but I couldn’t find it and, in this case, Sprite seemed to do the trick.  Next, I used a Canon 430EX speedlite to light the vase and lemon.  I placed the speedlite to the left of the vase, directly up against it so it would light the entire scene nicely.  I had the flash connected to the camera’s hot shoe via a flash extension cord, similar to this one.  I set the flash in manual mode at 1/2 power.  I had my camera set on a tripod.  To ensure correct focus, I stuck a toothpick in the lemon slice, dropped it down in the water at the depth I thought was correct and manually focused on the lemon.  Once focus was set, I was ready to try my hand at the shot.  I dropped the lemon in the water from a few inches above the surface.  It took a few tries to get my timing down on where I wanted the lemon to be, but after a few I got it dialed in pretty good.  Since I was using flash, I was shooting my camera in manual mode, too.  I set my camera between F/20 and F/22 depending on how bright the flash was on the subject.  Then I set my shutter speed at 1/160th and the ISO to 100.

This is really a fun shot to setup and try.  On a later blog post I’ll show you another good use for that vase, so don’t put it away soon

Here are a few more shots I made while I had the vase, lemons, limes and Sprite out.

Well, out with 2011 and in with 2012.  I hope you all spent the New Years Day doing something you enjoy.  I know I did.  I spent part of the day making macro photographs.  I bought a new little tool about a month ago for my macro shots, and I finally got a chance to try it out.

I’m going to share a few of the shots with you today, and a few more throughout the week.  I’ll also post later on about how I made each shot.

Here’s the first shot…it’s a yellow rose.  I’m real excited about how this one came out!  I used my new “tool” that I’ll tell you about in a later post.

Here’s another one that was kind of fun to make.It is a lemon slice in water.

Your first bit of information for all of these images is that I used my Tamron 90mm Macro Lens and my Vanguard Alta Pro 283CT Tripod to help make these.  I hope you enjoyed these shots as much as I did making them.  Stay tuned for info on how they were created.

I haven’t had much of a chance to get out with a camera lately.  Sometimes when I don’t get out for a while, I take a look back at what I photographed this time last year.  So, I looked through the archives and the closet thing to today’s date I could find was December 26th of last year.  Last year we had a small amount of snow for Christmas, which lingered for a day or two afterwards.  I took that rare opportunity to go photograph a barn I had been eying for some time.  So, that’s what I did last year…

Well, like I mentioned earlier, I haven’t been out with a camera in some time.  However, I have been in with a camera.  Since I have these kids running around the house, I have an anytime portrait subject.  I have discovered that photographing your own kids in your own home is pretty dang difficult!  They tend to want to go do what they normally do and not sit still for pictures.  I really don;t know, but I would imagine this would be a little easier to control at a strange place, since they don’t know where the toy room is at said strange place

Anyhow, yesterday I tried my hand at setting up a mini portrait session with the two babies…here are the results.

Alex went first.  Alex will be 10 months old on January 1.  He can crawl and climb like lightning, but is not walking yet.  It’s hard enough to get him to sit still now, I imagine as the days go on that will even be a harder task.  He smiles and laughs a lot, the only problem is getting him to sit still.

Next up was Blake.  Blake will be 17 months old in January.  If you’re swift at math, you’ll determine that those two kids are only 7 months apart.  We cannot defy science…he is a foster child.  Blake also smiles and laughs a lot, but has an even bigger problem sitting still.  He no longer walks.  He runs.  Everywhere.

I guess most families take their Christmas photos before Christmas, but we had several small catastrophes leading up to Christmas that didn’t lend well to photographs.  Mostly black eyes, rashes, etc.  So, we had to wait until after Christmas.  Ah, heck the Christmas spirit will be alive and well here until decorations come down at the end of the year anyhow

Here’s wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!!

The above image is our living room Christmas Eve night, a la HDR lit only by Christmas Lights and a cozy fire.

Often while out photographing, I like to try different things.  This mixture of things can sometimes be planned and sometime “happy accidents” that turn out to be artistic.  Today, I’d like to discuss a few things…shutter speeds and the use of ND filters.

When most people think of ND filters, they think of using them on waterfalls, which is a great place to use them.  I like to use them in places that you wouldn’t conventionally think of using them.  The examples below are case in point.

These two images were taken standing in the exact same spot on St.George Island at sunrise.  The first was taken with available light with no filters at all.

Technical info: ISO 100, F/22 @ 1/15th

While this is a nice image, I wanted to smooth the water, for a more artistic feel.  The way to do that is lower the shutter speed.  As you can see in this composition the sun is directly out of the frame to the right.  You can see it’s reflection in the foreground.  Slowing the shutter speed shooing into the sun will surely blow my image out…unless I use a ND filter.  That’s what you see in the next image.

Technical Info: ISO 100, F/16 @ 30 seconds

I was able to achieve this shutter speed with a 10 stop ND Filter.  You can see the water has smoothed out greatly, which also gives us a much longer reflection of the sun.  That’s artsy, huh?

Here’s another example of using shutter speeds to create feel, without the use of filters.

These two images were shot just minutes apart, the first using a fast shutter speed to freeze the action…

Technical Info: ISO 800, F/6.3 @ 1/400th

You can see the effects of the fast shutter above.  Most noticeable is the mud flying up from the horse in front.  It had just rained and the mud was flying off those horses hooves like crazy.  I wanted to capture this, so I used a fast shutter.  As fast as I could given the available light  and the effect I wanted to achieve.

This next picture, taken from a different perspective, offers a much different feel than the first.  I “dragged” the shutter and panned, or moved my camera along with the horses, as they ran past me to achieve the “motion” look and “movement” feel.

Technical Info: ISO 200, F/16 @ 1/15th

Both very different images that show movement, only in a different way by simply using shutter speed.

Here’s an image I made while out in the Tetons this past fall that I don;t think I’ve shared yet.  It is an image of the Milky Way.  I had never attempted to shoot the Milky Way before, but I had done my research and also shot star trails a few times, which applies a lot of the same principles.

This image was taken with my 15mm fisheye lens

Here’s how I did it…

I shot in manual mode and tried to let as much light in as I could, without getting too much movement in the stars.  I shot this wide open at F/2.8 manually focused at infinity.  I jacked my ISO up to 3200, something I never do on a regular basis.  Then I set my shutter speed for 30 seconds.  This allowed the Milky Way to show up clearly without getting a ton of movement in the stars.  I chose the fisheye lens for this to capture as much of the scene as possible.  I also like the effect it gives.

Just a quick tip tonight to remind you to not overlook the vertical, or portrait, orientation when out shooting.  A lot of times I shoot a horizontal, or landscape, composition then go ahead and shoot the same scene with a vertical composition.  Sometimes I like the horizontal better, sometimes the vertical and sometimes both.

Here are a few examples.

It even works for HDR

In this case, I like both shots.  This is a simple tip that is often overlooked!  Just trying to remind you not to do that

As part of our Grand Teton Workshop this past fall, we had arranged for some wranglers at a local ranch to pose for us after their day’s work was done.  While they were posing we decided to shoot some silhouettes of them on their horses.  When we did this many of the workshop participants had several questions about shooting silhouettes.  Shooting them is really quite easy and I thought I’d share a few tips on how to do it.

First, you need to have your main light source behind your subject.  In this case our main light source was the sun.  Next, simply underexpose the image by 1 or 2 stops, whichever you think looks better.  I decided to go with 2 stops.  I simply did this by shooting in Aperture Priority mode and dialing my Exposure Compensation down to -2.  If using the sun as your main light source, you will notice that it will still “blow out” at 2 stops underexposed.  Don’t sweat that!  Nobody cares, first off.  Secondly, the sun is “blown out” when you look at it with your eye, anyhow.  I’ve noticed a lot of people seem to get hung up on the technicals of photography way too much.  So, my last tip is…although you need to understand the technicals of photography, don’t get hung up on them.  You can have an incredible image with blown out highlights.

I hope this helps next time you decide to go out and shoot with silhouettes in mind.

…shooting waterfalls or landscapes?

Nope.  Never.

I’ve been looking at all the “…of 2011 photos” websites lately.  You know, the photos with the most impact, or most powerful, or best of.  I noticed a lot of them had a common element.  Nature.  Usually in it’s evil, dark sided form.  What I mean is, most of the photographs are of deadly tornadoes, tsunamis, hurricanes, etc.  They usually show people standing next to the remains of their homes or businesses.  Sometimes they show just sheer destruction and devastation in piles.  Those photographs are very powerful.  They remind us how Nature can get pissed and do some horrible things.  Those horrible things get T.V. time and press.  They are burned into our memories from those sources day after day.  One thing you will probably never see on a major news network is a photograph of Caney Creek Falls with all of the Mountain Laurel beautifully bloomed around it.  I guess that’s one of the reasons I enjoy shooting Nature so much.  To remind myself, and hopefully others, that the majority of the time Nature is peaceful, calm, relaxing and beautiful.  That is also why I love and will never get tired of photographing it.

Q: What do you do to help monotony, or mix it up, while out photographing? 

A: This may seem like an obvious answer, but I try different things.

Q: Show us.  (Not a question, but ok.)

This is Parker Falls in Bankhead National Forest.  This is my favorite “style” of shot and the one I like doing most.  It is extreme wide angle with an element in the foreground.  This was shot at 17mm on a full frame camera.  While I do love these types of shots, it is important to remember to try other things.

Q: What kinds of other things do you usually try? (finally, a question again)

A: The quickest and easiest thing to do is move.  Changing your vantage point can change the photograph immensely.  Next, you can zoom in and isolate portions of the scene.  In this next photo, I have changed lenses and zoomed in to 135mm, still on a full frame camera.  This allows you to see intricate details in things you cannot see at a wide angle.  I like the detail here in the rocks, water and tree.  This is the same waterfall as above, just shoot form a different vantage point and zoomed in.

Q: Ok, what else?

A: “See” things you don’t normally see.

Q: What? You’ve lost it!

A: Look at this next photo.  It is of Mize Mill Falls, also in Bankhead National Forest.  At first glance it may look like a regular old photo of a waterfall.  What makes this one different is it is a 7 shot panoramic.  Not only is it a panoramic, but a tight one.  What I mean is normally when you see pano shots, they are just that great panoramic views of great vistas.  Not a thing wrong with that at all.  I love those kinds of shots.  However, don’t overlook trying a pano shot on something you don’t normally see in that format.  Also, getting in tight on the waterfall gets us details that you wouldn’t normally see, much like zooming in did for us earlier.

Q: Can’t I just do that with my wide angle and crop it to that pano format?

A: You could.  BUT…you wouldn’t be able to see all the details as well, especially when you want to print it and hang it on your wall.  You have the option of printing panos at a much larger size while still seeing all the fine, little details that you might normally overlook.

Q: Is that why I see a lot of large panoramic photographs hanging in art galleries?

A: Yup.  They are cool, look cool and who doesn’t want one hanging in their home?

Q: Surely your out of ideas.  Anything else?

A: Usually, yes.  I don’t have much room to store ideas up here in my noggin.  However, I do have one more thing to try.  It kind of goes along the “see what’s not there” line.  This one is try out a Lensbaby.  It is a selective focus lens that allows you to isolate certain areas of your subject.  Most of the time, when people think about Lensbaby, they think portraits, or maybe some macro shots.  If you try a Lensbaby out on a landscape, you might be shockingly surprised.  It gives you a different take on the subject and an interesting look.  Below is a shot of Mize Mill Falls again, this time with a Lensbaby Composer.

Q: That’s pretty cool!  How did you slow down the shutter speed with the Lensbaby to get that milky water effect?

A: I used the F/11 aperture disc (since the Lensbaby is an “all manual” lens, you have to change out little aperture discs inside the lens to change the aperture.  You cannot control this on your camera. )  I also handheld a 77mm circular polarizer in front of the lens.  That allowed me to kill some reflections and slow the shutter down a bit more.  I used a 77mm because I had that with me and I didn’t have one to fit the front of the Lensbaby.  Having to hold a larger one was a bit tricky to work with, but I somehow managed to fire the shutter.

Thanks for looking!  Hopefully you got something out if it