365 coming soon to a blog near you…

What is 365?? If you said the number of days in a year, you are worm, but not quite there yet. 365 is a photographic project where you take a picture of yourself, your reflection, ora part of you every single day for an entire year. Yes, AN ENTIRE YEAR.

I’m fearing this project as much as I’m looking forward to it. Many photographers I know have taken on the challenge, and I need to do the same. It will be fun, it will be tough and it will be defintely a challenge. I hope to start it on September 1st. Be watching for what is to come.

DIY Round One

I finally decided to try out some of the stuff that I have been reading on Strobist. Here are a few of the things that I made using stuff from Michael’s for a total cost of about $20. Comments, ideas and critiques are welcomed. I will practice these pieces on my new (quite shinny) bike that i piked up today. On with the show.

Flash wrap: This is basically wide hook and loop velcro attached back to back. It is adjustable. It wraps all the way around my Sunpak PZ5000 with about 2 inches to spare. Used for attaching bounce cards, gel holders, the new Honel Grid I did it this way to avoid gluing or permanently attaching the velcro to my flash. Loop side always closest to flash.

Bounce Card: See photo. there is really not more to say about it. This is silver colored foam crafts paper.

Snoots: The Long snoot is 18 inches which is a tad long, but more for experiment sake. The shorter is 12 inches. The velcro flash wrap is pictured also, but fairly out of focus. for the snoots, I used the thinner velcro (about 1″ wide) running the entire length of the snoot. You also do not need the velcro wrap to put these on the flash.

Snoot outputs:

18 Inch

12 Inch

Some of the ideas are also derived from other DIY posts on the Strobist flicker group and other DIY sites. materials and methods vary, but the results are fairly the same.

<b>Here are some of the resulting attempts on my new bike</b>

Gooooooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaalll……

Well, if you haven’t been looking at the flickr bar on the right side of the page, I got to go to the Columbus Crew’s home opener against Toronto FC. I have been reluctant to go to Crew games because, well, ….., errr, their level of play had just been down right awful. I plain terms, watching them made me very frustrated.

In Friday’s news paper there was an article about the Crew and Toronto FC starting a rivalry. Toronto was bringing some 2500 fans down to Columbus for the game, and the Crew have just gotten their own bran new ‘Black Hole” with three fan unions pulling off some very European style cheering. Correction, I should call it the Black and Gold Hole (The Crew’s colors). On of the cheering union’s leaders happened to by my wife’s cousin. The light bulb (or flash in my case sometimes) went off in my head. This is a great opportunity to go and do some action photography of the game and the crowds. What I got was way more than anything I could have asked for.

I went into this event with two ideas:
1) I AM A SOCCER FAN. And that is what I wanted to capture. The fan, the face paint, the flags, luckily my camera doesn’t have a mic because there was a lot of profanity flying around. But there is great enthusiasm that can be captured. The Crew won the game, so there was quite a bit of happy faces. I’m sure there will be times where there will be gloomy faces in the future,
2) I WANT TO GET SOME ACTION SHOTS. And I was greatly rewarded with a shot of the second goal (see first picture) and some other various action shots.

* NOTE: I DO NOT HAVE PRO LENSES (yet).

Crowd Shots Taken with: Tamron 17-50mm F2.8

Action Shots Taken with: Canon 73-300mm USM II F4-5.6

Check here for the entire game set.

Lions, Tiger and Bears….Oh my

Well, no, now that I think about it, I did get pictures of all three on my most recent trip to the Zoo.

I’ve always had fairly bad luck in taking pictures at the zoo. There is usually too many people all over the viewing windows are screens. Little kids licking the glass and sticking their dirty hands all over the place. Parents that take as much space as 4 people just because they have a stroller with a sleeping baby in it. AHHHHHHHH. Very frustrating for a photographer. But, rather than whine about it, I came to a great realization. If I go to the zoo when the weather is not the greatest, THERE IS NO ONE THERE.

This was a planned trip by the photography group I belong to. For our luck, it had snowed the entire day before and part of the morning. By the time we got there though, the weather broke and the sun came out. For our troubles, we had a zoo EMPTY of patrons and full of photographers.

Here are some of the results:

Things I see on Sunday Morning (or Saturday Evening)

I was at church this weekend with my camera as usual, and I got some free time between services. I have been in a closeup mode lately and I though I take pictures of random things that I usually see on Sunday morning. The result was some cool lines, sound boards, colors, and symbols. Take a look.

That is really it. I’m realizing more and more that there are details all around me and I’m growing to explore the little by little. I have some closeup filters, but I can’t wait to get a macro lens or try reverse mounting.

It’ all in the ATTITUDE…

No really, having to do portraits of people that you don’t know is very unnerving. Sure you can pose them however you like, but then you end up with a stiff look in usually an awkward position. Sure it looks easy enough for the photographer, but he is not the one who has to hold that pose until the strobes fire. I look at catalogs of studio supplies and the “example pictures” that they show. Complexly designed scenic backgrounds, props, etc… and the person looks that they are acting or standing in a way that they would probably not do in real day to day life.

I, personally, as a fan of the simple backgrounds and setups. better yet, I rather take the whole shoot outdoors (if the weather is descent). My best portraits so far in my portfolio are of people that I knew well.

David & Amanda. Good Friends (my first wedding too)

Taking pictures of friends and family tends to look the most natural. They know the photographer, the environment and sometimes even what to expect. Even if the idea sounds crazy. See examples below.

From front to back (Luke, Matt, Roy)

My Favorite part of this shot is that every facial expression is a fairly accurate description of each of their personalities. The Artist, the athlete, and the musician.

Lastly, even with a fairly unknown subject, I try to really get to know them, what they are into. With high school seniors, it’s where they are going to college, what are they going to major in, their sports interest, their senior activities etc… Usually we start getting crazy and creative around the last half an hour or so of a shoot. I open the floor of their ideas and suggestions, or an image will flash in my head about a pose. In some cases I can “see” the shot before taking it then I have to make it work.

Kevin (Senior, guitar player, musician)

All 7 Seniors that I did shoots for this year chose very non traditional portraits for their yearbooks. I don’t see myself as a “traditional” photographer, but I’m not way out there either. Creative, i guess, is my happy medium.

Oh Where is my Hair Brush….

That has nothing to do with what this blog is about. i just had the song stuck in my head. I intend to use this space to display more of my photography. Some, as you can see, is displayed on the sidebar, but I want this setting to be more intimate. In most cases I take a picture that I “feel” and not always see.

I have been doing a lot of photo journalistic style stuff lately, starting to see some things around me in what could be macro format. I hope to explore some of these pictures and share them here. I hope to have a new ring light system by the end of the month, but till then, I’ll have to get creative with my lights.