BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #8

Today’s post of Crystal is my last from the BAPC portrait field trip.  Before I took this shot, I knew that I wanted three things:  dad was only going to be a prop, the photo was going to be about emotion and the photo would work best in black and white. 

I knew that there was many things working against me getting the photo I wanted:  dad was wearing a light blue shirt and Crystal was wearing a relatively bright orange shirt.  Neither shirt would help me achieve what I wanted.  I arranged dad’s and Crystal’s arms so that they would form a nice diagonal across the entire frame.  I positioned the light to camera right and I feathered it so that it fell softly on Crystal’s face. 

Crystal is a natural in front of the camera.  She has no hesitation about looking straight into the lens—which is exactly what I wanted—that look connects her perfectly with the viewer.

I used nik Silver Efex to convert the photo to black and white.  When I took the photo, I was pretty sure that I would be able to use the red or orange filters—which act the same as red and orange filters with black and white film—to darken dad’s shirt.  The filter did lighten Crystal’s shirt, but I felt that I could live with that.  Overall, I pretty well got the look and feel that I wanted.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3x, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 shot at 70mm, ISO 200, f/9.5 and 1/60th of a second with large Elinchrom softbox to camera right and feathered slightly.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom—Set black and white points, adjusted saturation of various colors, added mid-tone contrast and vignetting.

Photoshop—used nik Silver Efex Pro to convert the photo to black and white.

BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #7

Today’s post is a portrait of Ashley.  Her instructions to me were simple:  “make me look good.”  Not a hard task considering what I had to work with!

I wanted the viewer’s focus to go immediately to her face and expression.   As a result, I wanted very shallow depth-of-field so I selected 3.3 as my f-stop.  I can usually get most of the face in focus with this f-stop at 70mm yet convert the background into a nice soft blur.

I elevated my Elinchrom light so that most of the light actually went above her head—I used only a small portion of the light to illuminate her face.   

What should I have done to make this an even better portrait of Ashley?  First, I would have made sure that her necklace was hanging properly.  Next, I would have had her look a little more at the camera (somewhere between where she is looking and straight at the lens).  I think that this eye position would have increased the relationship between Ashley and the viewer.   Finally, I would have added a hair light to add greater separation between her and the background.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3x, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 at shot at 70mm ISO 200, f/3.3 and 1/125^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom—Set black and white points, added clarity and mid-tone contrast.

Photoshop—Removed stray hairs, used nik Color Efex Pro Glamour Glow filter at 35% opacity.

BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #6

Friday’s post of Fred’s portrait was one of Catherine and me (I am the one without the great smile and the natural good looks).  Today, I want to post a photo of Catherine and her father.

My photo does not include the emotion of Fred’s but it does offer a great example of contrast—smiling Catherine and a very serious dad.  The reason that this photo works, at least for me, is because both people are very much “in character.”  They are doing what you would expect of a daughter and father.  It tells a little story of who they are.

As I look at the photo, I think it is all about Catherine and her supporting cast—dad.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3x, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 shot at 62mm, ISO 200, f/8 and various 1/30^th of a second.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom—Set black and white points, cropped photos, and changed and added saturation of certain colors.

BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #5

This is not a photo that I took during the field trip.  This photo was taken by Fred Cerkan, a fellow Bay Area Photo Club member.  Here is the message that Fred wrote me:

“Larry:

 I think this was one of my best images of the night. 

Thanks for the workshop.

Fred”

I do not think that I have ever seen a photo that Fred has taken of a person before he sent me this one.  As I looked at the image, I tried to figure out why Fred thought this was one of his best.  And then, it dawned on me—there is more than the likeness of two people in this photo.  There is some interaction.  There is some real emotion.  It is fun to look at the image.  So, is there a lesson here.  Yep, there is, but I will let you figure it out on your own. 

The only thing that I did to the image is to crop it into a 4x5 format (the one that I prefer for portraits).

Enjoy.

BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #3

Sometimes portraits are more about the person’s personality than their face.  In this portrait of Catherine, I wanted to show-off her brightly painted finger nails.  I thought that the finger nails would add some of her personality to the photo.

I underexposed the background by about 1½ f-stops so that all the attention would be drawn to Catherine.  I wanted the photo to be about her eyes and painted finger nails.  I was happy with the exposure and the basic elements of the photograph, but I should have had Catherine spread the fingers of her left hand so that all of her left eye was exposed and also had her place her hands more gentle on her face in order not push on her face. 

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3X, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 shot at 70mm, ISO 200, f/8 and 1/180^th of a second with Elinchrom Softbox at camera left.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom—Set black and white points, increased mid-tone contrast and changed saturation of various colors.

BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #2

My next portrait from the field trip is one of Amy.  This portrait may have been the most challenging one I took all night.  Why?  Well, Amy is so tiny and seemed quite shy that I had a hard time framing her—there was just not enough of her to fill the frame.  Part of my problem was that I really had no idea of how the image should look.  I tried various things, but did not like anything that I was getting.  In desperation, I started to study Amy’s face and think about how to photograph it.

Here, I must say that I think this is a habit that many photographers follow—keep shooting until you get something rather than seeing the image and then going about creating it. 

After studying Amy’s face I decided that I wanted to show-off that great completion, color and bone structure.  I took a high to low camera angle to simplify the image and help get light into her eyes.  Because she is so slight, I had no problem broad lighting her—lighting the largest part of the face.  In hindsight, I wished that I had moved her hair back on the left side of the camera so that her great cheek and jaw line would be set-off against the background better.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3X, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 at 52mm, ISO 200, f/5.6 and 1/60^th of a second with Elinchrom large softbox at camera right and feathered towards her right cheek.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom—set white and black point, increased contrast with a tone curve adjusted hue and saturation of various colors.

BAPC Field Trip—Portraits #1

Last Saturday, our field trip was to an abandoned warehouse where we set-up to take portraits.  We had some great models and some good backgrounds to set them off against.

My first portrait from the session is of Christen.  She wanted a photo to make her look glamorous—hard job, but someone had to do it!  I wanted to establish some movement within the frame so I asked Christen to lean slightly backwards.  Her lean did not get me where I wanted so I titled my camera to increase her lean.  Some people may be bothered by the angle of the lines on the background, but it does not bother me.  I tried several different poses of her eyes, but I liked this one best because her eyes seemed to follow the line of her arm which to adds to the overall look that I was trying to achieve.

A large softbox to camera right was the primary source of light for the portrait.  It provided some nice soft, even light on her face and upper body.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3X, Nikon 28-70mm f/2.8 shot at 40mm, ISO 200, f/8 and 1/45th of a second with large Elinchrom softbox to camera left and feathered slightly.

Post Processing:  

Lightroom—Set black and white points, adjusted saturation of various colors, added mid-tone contrast and vignetting.

Photoshop—used nik Color Efex Pro Glamour Glow filter.

Houston Zoo #15

This is one of the attendants at the merry-go-round.  He greeted everyone with this big smile.  As I watched him do his job, I saw how everyone seemed to perk-up a little as they met him.

My trip to the Houston Zoo produced a lot of fun, some stupid mistakes, a little learning and 15 shots that I posted on my blog.  Overall, I must say “a very successful outing.”

Thanks again, Bob.  Too bad you have raised the bar on what I expect from you in the future.  But, that’s life.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm, shot at ISO 200, f/4.8 and 1/250 of a second.

Houston Zoo #14

This lady was stalking me.  Everywhere I went, I would look-up and there she was.  I thought about calling the park police, but then again, you do not want to destroy a young girl's dreams.

OK, so I might be fantasying just a little.  OK, a whole bunch.

I had seen this young lady several times while walking around; and, although she is very pretty, what really struck me was how she always seemed to stand or sit in a very graceful way.  It was like someone was directing her during a photo session.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm, shot at ISO 400, f/5.6 and 1/250 of a second.

Houston Zoo #13

This is Emily.  She is a twin.  Her sister is hiding behind her father, peaking at me.  Her father is telling Emily that she cannot do something.  Do you think he made a sale?

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm, shot at ISO 200, f/7.1 and 1/1000 of a second.

Houston Zoo #12

Meet “Crash”.  If you watched this little tyke for a few minutes, you would clearly understand why his parents have tagged him as “Crash.”  He is 100% boy.  He thinks his face is part of his landing equipment, especially when he has something, like pop corn in his hands. 

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm, shot at ISO 200, f/8 and 1/250.

Houston Zoo #11

I was taking a photograph of some children playing when I felt this tap on my back.  I turned and there was Jolle.  She asked if I would take a picture of her and her mom for her dad.  I agreed.  Her mother told me that she was shocked that Jolle had asked since she is a very shy little girl.  After several shot of both of them, I zeroed in on Jolle.  This is my favorite because I think some of her shyness shows.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm, shot at ISO 200, f/8 and 1/250 of a second.

Houston Zoo #10

Two things struck me as I looked at this young girl—her expression and the lighting on her face.  I wanted to zero-in on her, and only her. I was somewhat conservative in my selection of f-stop since I do not shoot very often with this lens/telconverter combination, I was not sure what depth of field I would get.  Normally, I would have selected a f-stop that produced much shallower depth of field.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 560, f/8 and 1/125 of a second on tripod.

Houston Zoo #9

As I was getting a drink, this black bird flew over and landed on the post about 15 feet from me.  I had just changed my lens to my Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8.  I wanted the photograph to show the blue/black of the bird against the bright, multi-colored background of flowers.   From where I was sitting, the bird’s tail was positioned where it was not framed by the colorful flowers.  I decided to take the shot as it was presented (which is this one) and then try to move my position so that all the bird's tail was framed by the flowers.   About the time I got repositioned Mr. Blackbird remembered he had an appointment and flew off.  So goes the live of a famous bird photographer.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 70-200mm f/2.8 at 200mm, shot at ISO 200, f/8 and 1/250.

PS--I checked today's posting and noted the background does not have any of rich, deep colors that the shot has (even when I hit preview posting at blogger).   Any ideas about this?

Houston Zoo #8

As I looked at this bird, I could not help but wonder why they stand on one leg.  It does not look comfortable.  I thought that the bottom portion of the body and the top part of the legs might make for an interesting perspective of this unusual practice.  I should have used a larger aperture so that the background would have a little more blurred.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 200, f/11 and 1/90 of a second on tripod

Houston Zoo #7

As a noted bird photographer, I could not pass-up this photo opportunity.  This scene did not look like it was inside a zoo.  I underexposed my shot by about 1 EV and then adjusted the brightest part of the bird so that it was not quite pure white in Photoshop.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 200, f/11 and 1/250 of a second on tripod.

Houston Zoo #6

To get this shot, I had to put my tripod on a bench and shoot over the fence.  I underexposed the photograph by about 1 EV because I wanted the colors to be very saturated.  I then put some light on the tiger’s face with a curves adjustment in Photoshop.

This is one of those shots that you wished you had a better background for the tiger--I just do no think they normally live on this type of grass!

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 200, f/8 and 1/125 of a second on tripod.

Houston Zoo #5

This monkey was sitting in the tree watching all the people walk by.  I could almost hear him thinking:  “If I evolve, do I have to wear that shirt with those pants.  I sure hope not!”

I really liked the monkey's pose and the clean background in front of him, but I had two problems:  there was a lot of “garbage” on the monkey's backside and the light was very hard on his front.  I decided on a slightly unconventional crop that did not show all of his body to solve the garbage issue and decided to underexpose the image by about 3 EV to make the photograph as much about the lighting as the subject.  I really did not care whether the fur on his front legs blew-out; I thought that would just help separate him from the background.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 200, f/13 and 1/750 of a second on tripod.

Houston Zoo #4

I watched “Mystery Animal #3” for some time.  He was totally engrossed in eating his lettuce, but he was so far into the shadows of the trees that I could not get a good shot of him.  

After a while, another “Mystery Animal #3” came close to him and he moved into the light where I got this shot.   When he moved into the light, the lettuce became a very bright green which significantly took away from his eyes. I wanted his eyes to be emphasize in the final image, so,  I used selective color and saturation (green) layers in Photoshop to lower the brightness and color saturation of the lattice.  I thought about reducing the light on his tail, but then elected to leave it as it was recorded.  I believe the image looks like this little guy is out in the wild rather than in a zoo.

Enjoy.

Camera settings: Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 400, f/13 and 1/60 of a second on tripod.

Houston Zoo #3

I have seen some interesting photographs of “Mystery Animal #2.”  The photos are usually straight on, and showed his painted face—that is the shot that I wanted; but, this guy was behind a wire fence.  Shooting through the fence, I kept getting lots of lines in my shot.  Finally, I noticed a small brake in the fence that I could focus through.  This guy kept walking back and forth in front of the hole, but never looked straight at me.  I changed my plan and tried to get a profile shot of him with the light hitting his back.   I pre-focused on his position when he was in the opening and the started firing away at full speed while he walked from one side of the hole to the other.  I cropped-out the lines of the fence on all sides and selectively added some light to his face in Photoshop.

Enjoy.

Camera settings:  Nikon D3, 300mm f/4 with 1.7x teleconverter attached (effective 500mm lens), shot at ISO 400, f/13 and 1/125 of a second on tripod.