B&W Project 5 - Week 2

Recent photo shoot with a gorgeous young lady!

Day 266 - Portraits

A friend of mine had entrusted me with the job of getting her some head shots that she wanted to use as her profile picture.  I was quite happy to oblige till the moment I walked into the room we had found to do this in.  

My original plan had been to use the natural ambient light from the window and add a little fill flash to do the rest.  Walking into that room I knew I would have a challenge because the day was especially gloomy and the walls of the room were a pale yellow on one side and grayish-green on the other.  And we had only about 10 mins. to complete this in, so I just had to finally resort to a studio-type shot after a few test shots failed to yield the results.  So, we closed the blinds on the window, and I used the blind as the background for this.  There were too many door and window frames that had to be avoided as well as some very curious eyes watching us from behind the glass panels! :-S

Ceiling-bounced flash, and not much else went into this.  Shallow DoF at f/5.6 because the room wasn't very large and I couldn't get too much distance between background and subject.  

Day 250 - Casual Portrait Session

I managed to coax a coworker into sitting for me this afternoon after my plans of shooting in the snow went down the drain.  We hardly got enough snow to shoot, although the forecast was calling for a lot more than we actually got.

This shot was taken by the window.  I tried one with the flash bounced off the ceiling as well.

Day 247 - Getting to Know Gary Fong

.. not really the photographer/inventor, but the invention he calls the Lightsphere Universal.  You might remember that I had mentioned it in a recent post and I had barely been able to try it for want of a model.  Today, I managed to coax my son to sit for me for just ten minutes, and after a little bit of haggling and hassling, he agreed!  My lucky day!  Actually, he's agreed to sit for me now and then, but only for ten minutes each time.  I can't complain - he's a teenager after all, and has had a mind of his own since he was less than 6 months old!

Anyway, I started with the translucent photojournalist (that's what the diffuser is called).  When I had ordered this product I had noted that it came with a tutorial DVD, but when I rummaged through the box yesterday, I hadn't found it.  Upon mailing Midwest, they sincerely apologized and let me know that Gary Fong had pulled it out of the kit!  Darn!  However, when you have Youtube, there's not much cause for worry.  So I spent a few minutes watching videos on how to use it.

I did this really late in the evening, after dinner, so I didn't really spend a lot of time taking notes on the flash settings and the position of the dome, so I'm unable to post them today.  I was experimenting with the light by stopping down the power level of the flash, changing the zoom level, or changing the angle of the flash.  I will have to do a thorough study of the settings again soon to familiarize myself with the flash and diffuser duo.

Here are the results from this evening:

I tried flashing the background with a blue-gelled flash, but I obviously wasn't able to use that correctly.  While the first shot has a more or less even background, the last one is the least attractive.  I'll definitely have to work on that.  

Day 183 - Portrait session with a friend

I was looking for some practise with portraiture, and a friend offered to sit for me as he needed some photos done as well.

I am completely green at this and besides a couple of lessons on lighting a subject for portraiture, I have not done any serious portraiture at all.  And those sessions were really on how to use reflectors as a supplemental light source.  My dilemma this morning was how I could actually use a reflector, as I had no second person to help.  I had to rely on my pop-up flash for fill-light, as my YN460 is extremely unreliable.  And since we went out around 10:00 am, we didn't have a lot of time to waste experimenting with an unreliable flash.

My challenges today were mainly two - composing a shot properly with a human being as a subject, and of course the light.  I was happy with the locations I chose.  But at times the bitter cold winds made it difficult for my subject to keep his eyes open.  However, out of the 200 plus shots I took, I found that I could easily keep at least 30, if not a few more.

My next challenge, post-photoshoot, is the processing.  I hope that once I'm done with the processing, I can get some nice shots ready for delivery to my friend.

I would love to hear your comments on these shots on how I could have composed or lit them better, or if I can process them differently to improve the image.

Day 109 - Shadows

Day 81 - Portraits

These are portraits I did a few days ago, but I finally remembered to ask for permission to post them.  Many thanks to you, Jim, for the guidance and excellent tips.

This is my second time trying portraits, but admittedly the first time that I did them with any amount of seriousness as far as lighting was concerned. But it was mostly some random clicking done only to see the light we could get by using ambient light and a reflector.

I have applied very minimal PP to the first frame, and tried my hand at removing a few blemishes on the second one.  I hope they still look natural.  I'd love to know which one you liked.

Day 55 - Good news and not so good news

To start with the not so good news - I went to the photography store from where I usually buy my gear and showed my new strobe to the gentleman there hoping to figure out how to get it off-camera.  One look at it and he told me that I'd never be able to work with the flash because "It's no good!  It's not good at all!"  He seemed outraged by the purchase, to say the least.  Yet, I read up all sorts of reviews about this unit and people seemed to be getting on OK.  The strobe has a single pin!  What I probably didn't realize was that their cameras might have a single pin hot shoe which doesn't bode any trouble for them, but mine has 5.  I was warned not to use it with the camera else I might fry the circuit!  :-(  So, another eBay purchase gone to waste.  Of course, working in the amateurish ways I work in, I can definitely see myself hand-holding the flash in an attempt to sync it with the shutter.

The good news is - I splurged on a macro lens. :=)  Well, splurging isn't the good news (no way!), but getting the macro lens I've wanted for so long definitely is!  It's a Tamron, 90 mm, f2.8.  Pretty nifty, this one!  I shall post some pics of it tomorrow.

I was really tired after my late evening to midnight cooking class yesterday, and obviously had no energy to do much (although I went out hoping to do some photography, but it started pouring all of a sudden).  So, I just spent time wandering the camera store, and dropping loads of cash in there.   Once the rain held up, I quickly made my exit before I did any more damage to my wallet.

And oh, I also bought a remote release and a lens cleaning kit (long overdue), as well as a compact camera bag that will now hold all my lenses.  My concern about lens storage is now at an end.

Considering that this is a 90 mm prime lens, I thought I'd also give portraits a shot.  I've read that a lot of photogs consider the 100 mm as the best portrait lens, but this one is 90, so I figured I'd see what it has to offer by way of that.  Here is the lot from today's experiments with my newest baby!

One of my first shots with the lens in fairly low light conditions. (This is my cookie that I was eating at the time). Handheld, AV, f2.8, ISO 200.

Long shot of the park at the back, from my couch.  I love the bokeh in this one.  Handheld, AV, f/2.8, ISO 200.

Long live my gerberas.  Even after over a week, they're still pretty fresh.  Mounted on tripod, AV, f/7.1, EV 0.33, ISO 200.

Mounted on tripod, AV, f/8.0, EV -1.00, ISO 100

Mounted on tripod, TV, f/4.5, EV -0.67, ISO 100.  I used a steel tray as a reflector just behind his face, to the right of the frame.  Now I see that I should have used a higher f-stop so I could have got both eyes in focus.  Next time!

Mounted on tripod, TV, f/9.0, EV -1.67, ISO 100.  I used a steel tray as a reflector in front of his face, to the right of the frame.   I corrected that in this one.

This is my first time trying some serious portraits, so I'd love to know where I could have improved.