Day 253 - Patience Is a Virtue!

I had no idea what I would shoot today - I was almost going to call it a dry day when I realized that I needed to finish the last two sips of Grand Marnier.  This way I could pitch the bottle out and make room on my kitchen counter.  My cooking classes are going to start at full blast and I have to clear up and clean out my kitchen ASAP.   So, the irony was that it did turn out to be a not-so-dry day(no pun intended).

That's when the idea came to me - shoot the wine splash!  And what better way to practise my flash photography than to do some speed shots.  Out came the glass, the wine, the ice cubes and the flashes!  And within minutes, I was all set up.  I should have used my white seamless background, but honestly, I keep forgetting I have one.

Camera Setting: 100 mm, 1/200s, f/9.0, ISO 100, WB set to Flash

Flash Settings: Right flash at 10 deg., 50 mm, 1/32 power; left flash at about 35 deg and rest similar to the right flash

 However, I had a few challenges I had to overcome, first.  I set up both my flashes to bounce light off the wall at the back into the glass, rather than flash the glass, which would cause a glare.  I got perfect light right behind the glass, but found a darker band at the top of the frame. like so:

Next, I found I got some strong reflections on the glass, so I got out the polarizer.

After a little thought I realized that the light wasn't reaching the top part of the frame and that was what caused the darker band at the top.  My flashes were set on manual, with the zoom set at 85 mm and power level at 1/32.  So, I adjusted the angles of the flashes so one was pointing at the wall at about a 10 degree angle, and the other at around 35 degrees and adjust the zoom to 50 mm so the light would spread a little bit further (that's what the zoom on the flash does - works exactly the same way as the zoom on the camera lens).  And that did the trick!  The light evened out.

The rest of the shots were taken on the previously mentioned settings, and I was just trying to get the timing right.  I kept missing the moment when dropping the ice cube because continuous shooting wasn't an option as it wasn't giving the flashes enough time to recycle.

It took me about 30 odd shots to get four or five I could keep.  But the patience to get the timing right paid off.  I had been really out of practise with speed photography for a long time.  I don't remember when I last tried it.  Thus, the slow ramp-up to getting the shots right.

I still have a lot to work on this as I need to figure out a way to remove the vignetting.  This is obviously being caused by the light fall-off as well as due to the lens.  Oh well!  I will just have to keep trying. 

Day 232 - Happy New Year!

I'm back from my trip and back to the grind!  I had a fantastic time with my friend and her hubby - they went all out to give me and my son the vacation of the decade!  We have come back spoilt!  I can't thank them enough for it and I'm really looking forward to seeing them soon.

My friends and I brought in the new year with a great dinner (straight from the kitchen of Chef Swati), a drink and topped it off with a  photo shoot.  This was my second serious attempt at portraits and although this was a very casual affair, the results were pretty encouraging.  My friend has a great eye for portraiture, having done some modelling in the past, and I learned quite a bit from her about posing and make-up.  I will post some shots from the shoot after I've had the chance to process them.

But, more than anything else, here's wishing you all a very happy, healthy and prosperous new year!  May peace, accomplishments, rewards and joy be the cornerstones of 2011!  And may you be blessed with great  photo ops and the best light to keep shooting in! ;-)

Day 205 - Week of Lights - Lemonade

My weekend started today as I've got the day off tomorrow.  But I would have loved this long weekend more if I knew I could just chill and do as I pleased.  Well, life isn't so simple, nor was it meant to be.  So, I have to run errands and get a lot of important stuff done tomorrow, including an oil change and getting winter tires put on.  At least I know that driving will be better when the snow hits.

To commemorate the early start to the weekend, I decided to drink lemonade out of my stemware!  What an idea!  No, I'm kidding!  I just needed another subject for the light experiment for this evening, and I thought that trying to catch the rainbow reflections would be nice.  But the light from the iPod wasn't bright enough to do that.  But I got close to what I wanted, so I gave up after about 10 shots.  Again, I shot these images with the lights off.

In the first image, the colour you see in the background is created by the streetlights reflecting on the wall; and the junk I had on my table, behind the subject, helped create the soft patterns.

Both shots were taken with the 90 mm lens with the glass placed on top of my iPod screen with the light coming from the Lights app.

f/6.3, 30s, ISO 400, Aperture Priority, AWB

f/6.3, 1/6s, ISO 400, Aperture Priority, AWB

I think I like both the shots!  The bottom one looks quite pretty actually.

Day 179 - Baubles and candlelight

Trying these shots in candlelight, with a table lamp placed about 10 - 12 feet away.  I need to do something about the reflections on the glass.  A C-PL would be the best answer for that, but it would cut out a lot of light.  I will have to figure something out for this.  Maybe use two table lamps on either side?  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!