Starving Artistry

Know the Audience

// April 28th, 2012 // 1 Comment » // Photo

Who is the photo for? You can take the same group of people, and pose them differently to fill two separate needs.

Photo A

Photo B

You can see that in the first photo above, I have the Grandparents on the outside with the kids and grand kids congregated in the center. In the second photo, I have the family split by the grandparents in the middle. I feel that whoever is featured in the center is the target of the photo.

So, in my opinion, the younger generation would be more likely to print and frame the first photo, but the grandparents may not like it as much since they seem kind of tacked on. However, you just split the family and place the grandparents in the middle, all of a sudden they have a photo that features themselves a little more prominently. Or they’ll print both of them… one can hope.

Sleeping Dogs Lie…

// April 7th, 2012 // No Comments » // Photo

… on top of one another. Apparently.

Man, I like my 5D mark III a lot. Now that I have the flexibility to push the ISO a lot higher, I can try to select the appropriate aperture for the situation rather than always shoot wide-open. The living room in my parents house has really poor lighting. It’s just… really bad. But when the dogs were napping today and my sister’s dog Oreo put his head on Daxter, I had to go take some pics no matter the lighting conditions!

I had my 35mm f/1.4L lens on, but I was shooting anywhere between f/1.4 and f/11. Interestingly enough, even at f/11, not everything was in focus. Full Frame cameras REALLY have shallow depth of field. Good thing that ISO rocks out so high.

f/4.0 1/60 ISO3200
“zzzzzzzzzzz…”

f/11 1/30 ISO12800
“Huh? Wazzat…?”

f/4.0 1/50 ISO1600
“Ugh, why. Why do you always take pictures of me?”

f/1.4 1/250 ISO640
“Sigh. Do what you must. A dog’s life is so hard.”

Cinetics CineSquid

// April 4th, 2012 // 1 Comment » // Photo, Video

CineSquid

A while ago, I put some funds into the kickstarter program to fund this suction cup camera device. The way they pitched it (among other applications) was a way to mount your camera to your car. They (the company is Cinetics)couple their suction cup device (the cinesquid) with the Gorillapod Focus (flexible tripod).

I mounted Taylor’s t2i to her Civic (please, risk my 5D mkIII on a test?? And on my NEW car? I don’t think so) and took it for a spin around the block. Here’s the video. I’d be interested to try it out again, mounted more securely for a faster spin, maybe with an IS lens to stabilize some of that vibration.

Here’s the vid:

And some more pics from the week:

5D mkIII

// April 2nd, 2012 // 5 Comments » // Photo

My new camera arrived today, so I guess it’s ByeBye forever, 7D! We had such good times… alas, you were not able to keep up with my hunger for low light photography!

I haven’t been able to put it through its video paces yet, fortunately for me I have two video shoots later this week…

In any event, here are some of the first photos I snapped. Nothing to write home about really…

Coke Zero… like, 3 weeks old

Someone Needs a Haircut

After dinner though, Tay and I decided to walk to the Ice Cream place, so I decided to try to put it through its paces in low light.

So far So good… this is ISO 1000

Ah, here we go. ISO 12800

ISO 12800

ISO 3200

On my 30″ monitor, you can definitely see the noise, however I’d certainly peg ISO10000 or so at around the noise level of ISO3200 from my 7D, or ISO6400 from my 5DmkII.

Other immediate thoughts… the grip is huge. It almost feels too big for my hands, but hopefully that just means I’ll have a better grip on it when it’s in use. What else… I love the dual card slots. Today I only shot with a 64gb SD card, but I imagine i’ll be using that card as a “backup” while continuing to use my CF cards as the primary ones. I haven’t had a card fail yet, but I’m paranoid. You don’t want to be shooting someone’s wedding and lose a chunk of the evening due to a card failing.

Aside from the low light capabilities, I’m also glad that the AUTO ISO from the 7D is present in the mkIII (it was missing in mkII). But you know what’s funny, is I got really used to setting my ISO manually. It was a huge learning curve from the 7D to the 5DmkII because of that, but now that I’ve gotten used to it, I found myself surprised at times not being aware what ISO my camera was shooting at.

April is a big month of engagement shoots, and Tay and I have a wedding in about 3 weeks, so that’s when I’ll really be putting it through its paces.

And for those of you who are getting portraits this month with me… well, yay, you get to have the latest and greatest Canon camera taking those photos. =)

Day 365

// January 5th, 2012 // 2 Comments » // Photo, Project 365

Blown Away

And tonight is the night. The big 3-6-5. Three hundred and sixty five photos. One year. All over tonight!

And, tonight is an example as to why I “slacked” off on so many nights. It took 45 minutes to set up (used my new soft-box speed ring mounts I got from my Dad for Christmas!) let alone shoot, and let alone edit! It was fun though, and I’m so happy to have the skill set to take a picture like this now.

I’ll be trying to find some time in the next couple of days to write a little retrospective on my year of taking a photo a day. I’ve learned so much, it may take a while to collect my thoughts!

Day 361 – 364

// January 5th, 2012 // No Comments » // Photo, Project 365

Well, I can’t say I’m too proud of these photos leading up to my big final 3-6-5…

Penguin Head

Stop… just stop…

Time Flies

Too Much Conditioner

So on day 364, I had like a 3 hour meeting with Troy and Martin but I didn’t bring my camera! AHhhh, so at the last second before going to bed I had to figure out something to take a picture of…. so… conditioner.

Day 363, I went out and grabbed a beer with a former student. Nothing makes you feel older than realizing the kid you taught when he was a Freshman in high school is now old enough to legally drink at bars with you.

Day 362, yes. Another daxter picture.

Day 361, no words…