Free Study

"Awesomeness Comes In Any Size" - Lisa

Kevin, my model, came up with this saying to go on the photo.

I will take credit for the rest of it. I'm not sure I got the exact results I wanted but it was worth trying?

Christmas Songs

Next Week: Free Study
With Christmas here, we'll all hopefully be getting some fun pictures. Find your favorite and post it. Matt

"He's Making a List and Checking It Twice..." - Lisa

"I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Clause" - Matt

Jen and I came up with all kinds of fun pictures for this category, but this was our favorite.

Ornament

Next Week: Christmas Songs
Take a picture of a phrase, word, or theme from a favorite Christmas song. Matt
 
 

"Snowmen" - Matt

These aren't just five snowmen

as anyone can see

I made them with my hand

which is a part of me

now each year when you trim the tree

you'll look back and recall

christmas of 2011

when my hand was just this small!

"Snowmen Family" - Lisa

My daughter made these cute little snow people out of sculptey clay for my son and his family for Christmas and I needed to take a picture of it before we sent it off and thought it would be fun to get the bokeh affect in the background.

Christmas Card

Next Week: Ornament
I like Christmas, so the more Christmas pictures, the better.  Take a picture of an ornament that wows us all.
Matt

"Christmas Lights" - Matt

Jen would never go for this because it doesn't show the family, but I thought I'd take it just for fun.  I did the same picture with Liz in Dec 2008 and posted on Southernshots.  I intended on making a card out of this, but couldn't get it to look as good as Lisa's, so I gave up.

"Santa's Been Framed" - by Lisa

We had a lot of fun taking these pictures on Saturday for our Christmas letters this year. This comes with a silly poem, which I will share with my Southern Shots friends to wish YOU all a happy holiday!

Post Processing Styles

Next Week: Christmas Card
We've already done our family Christmas card, but I thought it would be fun to play around with the idea.  I plan on coming up with a card I like but that Jen would never let me send out as our "family" card.  As a warning to all, Lisa excels at this type of thing, so don't be disappointed when she blows us all away.  Matt

"Grandma and Baby" - Matt

Here's another that I thought might be fun to post process.

Matt - didn't do much more than the square crop and a bit of touchup.  Noticed, once post processing, that I should have framed it better.  Focus was off slightly.  Should have increased depth of field so more of Grandma was in focus, though I would have been pushing it with the diminishing light.  Colors were decent and the exposure was just about right.

"Liz" - Matt

Just a quick portrait. Interested in seeing what you come up with.

Isaac's take on Matt's photo: Color and exposure were good to start with, the composition though could be improved. The original feels off balance with Liz's left side cropped but empty space on her right. Because the composition was already so tight, the only option left was to go tighter. By coming tight on all sides, the left ear crop doesn't seem out of place and our focus is drawn to her eyes and her smile.

Fixed By Lisa

Matt, I thought we were supposed to post BAD photos for us to fix!

I took the same close-up approach as Isaac and took off some blemishes on her face and tooth (there was a little black spot on it) and bumped up the saturation on her eyes a little more. She has such a cute shaped chin that I felt needs to be emphasized somehow and thought that removing some negative space would help.

Matt - ended up similar to what Lisa did.  Once I started post processing, I noticed I seemed to have blown the highlights a bit on her cheeks and could have framed her a bit better.  Wish now that I had gotten a little lower to take the picture.  Focus was slightly off, and the flash would have been better a little further to one side.

 

Watching the Race - Mike



So we have this Thanksgiving tradition of a race after Thanksgiving dinner just before eating pie. Keith loves being outside and I liked this shot of him looking around while the others were running laps around the yard. The sky was overcast, so the lighting is a little cool. I haven't decided quite yet what I'm going to do to post-process it, but it should be fun. I've been enjoying Adobe Lightroom 3, but still have a lot to learn.

50 mm, f/2.8, 1/160 sec., ISO 800

Isaac's take on Mike's photo: Good composition, I like the negative space in front Keith. It allows the viewer to follow his eyes as he gazes at something out of the frame (a race, presumably). To me, the original was underexposed and cold (color temperature-wise). I brightened the image and warmed it (more orange) to what I imagine it looked like to Mike when he was there.

Revision by Lisa

I loved what Isaac did to the picture and liked his idea of having the negative space in front of Keith. I wanted to try a different approach and zero in on the expression, which to me was the most eye catching part of the photo without the distractions of color and negative space. Because the picture was grainy which shows up more in b/w, I softened it in LR (probably too much, but he is cute baby!) I would have liked to have gotten more of the graininess out especially around the neck but LR2 isn't as good for that as LR3?

 Matt - brightened the overall picture and also brightened his face an eyes.  Added a bit more vignette.  blurred the background a bit more.  I was thinking similar thoughts to those by Isaac, but wanted to keep it cooler rather than warmer.

Okay, I am going to be the first to load my photo that really needs help. In fact, I am embarrassed to even post this one, but I think it will be fun to see how you guys fix this up. Here is my quick story... These friends needed a photo for their Christmas card. Their daughter is planning to add all their grandchildren to it in a collage format later. We were going to meet in the late afternoon, but the husband was delayed by work so by the time they come over, the daylight was gone and I had to improvise quickly. They were standing too close to my fuzzy blanket backdrop but I couldn't move them forward because what was behind the blanket would show; I had makeshift lighting all over the place with incandescent light which made every thing orangey; and I bounced the external flash off from the side wall to avoid shadows. This is what I got. I was disappointed. So do your magic, if you like and I will show you later how I tried to "save" this photograph to the best of my ability. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving and take lots of pictures! Lisa T

Isaac's take on Lisa's photo: My first impulse to correct this mix of flash (cool light) and tungsten (warm light) is to turn it into a black and white. It's the lazy way out but what's wrong with lazy, right? It looks nice as long as your collage isn't going to be in color. The second thing I changed is the background.
The interesting thing to me is that most of the challenges with this photo were recognized by the photographer before the photo was even taken. It's not uncommon to postpone addressing a challenge until after the photo is taken- especially when you have live subjects who are looking at you like "just push the button already". Mixed light is always hard to correct in post because as you adjust for one source, the portion of the image lit by the other source gets worse and worse. You always just end up with a compromise. It's much easier to make your sources match (for example, add an orange gel to your flash so that it is similarly colored to the incandescent light) or eliminate one source (use a shutter speed fast enough to black out the tungsten lights). One external flash is plenty to light a portrait like this.
Lisa also noticed that the background was too close while she shot this, but mentioned that there were spacial constraints limiting how much she could move them away for this picture. In this case the only fix is to select the background in post and blur it or replace it entirely. I only did a quick selection for this assignment, but would certainly put in a little more effort it it were to be used for a Christmas card. If I were trying to fix this before I took the picture (and its hard to say for sure since I was not there) I think I would move the couple further away from the backdrop even if that meant there was some clutter showing in the peripheries. As long as it is not "touching" the couple in the image, it is a lot easier to clone that stuff out than make a perfect selection around our couple.

Matt - this one was a challenge, particularly because of the different light colors.  I decided to desaturate on the yellow and red a bit, which gave it a bit of a sepia-type coloring.  Added some pretty strong vignette (maybe too much).  Darkened the background and sharpened their eyes.  Cute couple; too bad the sun didn't cooperate for the photo shoot.

Periodic Table

Next Week: Post Processing Styles

Don't know if this will work, but I'd like to try. I envision this taking 2 weeks, but depending on participation it could go faster or slower. Here it is: Take a photo and blog it without any post-processing. Later, post-process your photo and blog it. Finally, post-process and blog a photo taken by one of the other SS'ers. You should blog at least 3 photos: your own untouched, your own touched up, and your touched up version of a photo someone else originally submitted untouched.

I'm interested to see what we learn of other's photography and post-processing techniques. This could be a good topic to inspire some discussion. Obviously, this requires multiple entries, so please, everyone participate.

Matt

"C - Carbon (2 kinds) and Au - Gold" - Cary

Interesting how the value of carbon varies dramatically based solely on how the atoms are arranged. Gold is pretty much always valuable.

E-3 w/ 50mm, 1/100 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 100, remote flash

"Neodymium" - Matt

Don't know why, but I'm fascinated by these things.

"Cu - Copper" - Mike

I struggled with ideas for this challenge until I realized that I had a lot of copper pennies.

17 mm, f/2.8, ISO 200, 1/200 sec., Flash, Processed in Lightroom 3

Step-By-Step

Next week: Periodic Table

Take a picture of one of the elements: H, He, Li, Be, B...
Matt

"Taking a Sunrise Landscape Picture" - Cary

Step 1: Check the weather for the morning you plan to shoot. Step 2: Check the sun angle in candidate locations for that morning. Step 3: Set your alarm. Step 4: Get there and hope there are some - but not too many - clouds. In this case, the only clouds were due to a passing plane's contrail so it wasn't the most spectacular of sunrises. Such is the nature of landscape shooting. The final shot is a five-frame HDR in 1.0 EV increments.

"Eating an Apple" - by Lisa

"Creme Brulee" - Matt

I tried to keep the photos simple, just like the dessert.

Halloween

Next Week: Step-By-Step

I saw this category on dpchallenge, and loved the pictures. Go out and take one like this:

http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=979611

Matt

"Black Cat" - Cary

I know you've seen her here many times before but Luna is a good sport (better than my kids most times) and my teens weren't really into the Halloween thing this year (they actually had tons of homework that night, if you can believe it). Benjamin was a pirate and I did get a picture of him in his costume but it was kinda boring and plain. I liked this closeup of Luna with an orange background better.

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 60mm, 1/125 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 100, bounce flash

"Kung Fu" - Matt

I wore this same outfit when I was his age and ran around single handedly fighting crime in wild Laie, HI. It's held up pretty well all these years. He loved putting it on and acting the part.

Grandkids - by Lisa

Okay, so I totally didn't take this picture -- my daughter emailed me the photos of her kids in their costumes BUT I did make the pumpkin craft years ago out of wood and took a picture of that, used Adobe Element's magic extractor to get rid of the background and saved it as a png file to add to my scrapbooked photo. It is the best I could do for this week's theme.

For our ward Trunk-or-Treat, I set up a photo booth in the trunk of my car. Since I didn't get parental permission to post the kiddies photos online, I'm just going to share this one of one of our own SS members. In retrospect, I wish I had photographed one of the angry birds so that I could photoshop it in flying through the air... oh well.

-Isaac

Delicate

Next Week: Halloween
Bet you didn't see that one coming.  Ghosts or ghouls, princesses or fairies, pumpkins or candy.  Take a good Halloween shot... or two, or three.  Matt.

"Yellow" - Matt

Similar to Cary, my ideas were already taken.  I thought either water on a feather, or a flower with a yellow background.  It was fun trying to get the lights to play out the way I wanted them to.  I wanted a soft-ish light that still gave some depth.  I ended up bouncing the flash off the wall and ceiling and using a piece of yellow card stock in the background.

"Grace Under Pressure" - Cary

I had two thoughts for this week's theme - an egg in a C-clamp and water drops on a feather. Looks like I chose the right one as I wouldn't have done as well as Lisa. Angie laughed at the gyrations I went through to set up this shot but I had fun with it and it turned out pretty much as I had planned. I didn't even crack the egg.

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 56mm, 1/100 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 100, 2 flashes

"Dew Feather" - Lisa

It was rather embarrassing getting down on my belly in my backyard hoping my neighbors weren't looking out their window and then standing back up soaked and covered with wet grass clippings just to get this picture.

Atypical Angle

Next Week: Delicate

Thought it would be interesting to try to capture a more abstract concept. Take a picture that depicts "delicate". - Matt

"Matt's Mother - In - Law and My Sister" - Lisa

"Trio" - Matt

Wanted to play around with a flash from above; turned out pretty good.

"Yellow Flowers, Blue Sky" - Cary

With an abundance of blue skies lately, these road-side flowers were just begging to be shot from below and behind. Once again having an articulating LCD and LiveView really comes in handy for shots like this, especially when you're wearing a suit.

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 37mm, 1/800 sec @ f/8, ISO 100

Bonus Pics:

"HDR Triple-Tree" - Cary

While putting some branches in the woods in our yard, I noticed this triple-trunk tree that all comes from one stump and root system. I thought it might make a cool atypical angle shot but with a bright sunny sky, it needed an HDR treatment to bring out the trunk detail.

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 12mm, 5 shutter speeds @ f/8, ISO 100, HDR w/ EV -2, -1, 0, 1, 2

Can't remember if I shared this one yet. Jen took these, and I put them together. Matt.

Games

"Game Day" - Cary

The BYU drumline gives a pre-game jam session just inside the northwest gate at Lavell Edwards Stadium before home games. My brother Craig and I attended last week's game and enjoyed not only the band but also the come-from-behind, last-minute win. By the way, being a former band geek from a high school that took its band very seriously (Lake Braddock), I'm pleased to say that BYU's current band is a huge improvement from when I was there. They rock!

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 27mm, 1/320 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 100

"Spounge-Bob Game of Life" - by Lisa

Wanted to capture the spinning action. I would have liked the spinner to be a tad bit slower but my daughter's fingers were getting tired of spinning after many attempts to slow it down a bit. I actually had to merged two photos to get what I wanted in focus.

ISO 200 58 mm f/9.0 1/10 sec

IreneM

Next Week: Games
Board games, word games, sports. Whatever type of game you want - Matt

"...By Any Other Name..." - Cary

I really liked Irene's style with respect to getting interesting lighting reflections off the surfaces of various substances - particularly the rainbow reflections - which I unsuccessfully tried to reproduce. In the end, I only had time (and talent) to do a more basic shot. I liked the challenge, however.

E-3 w/ 50mm, 1/100 sec @ f/8, ISO 200, wireless diffused flash positioned above and to camera right

"Leaf" - by Lisa

Couldn't reach the same caliber as Irene -- maybe it is because I don't own a macro, my camera isn't as expensive as hers, and like Matt, haven't got the lighting (or all three!). I love her work, btw.

I tried two attempts. Here is the second one:

"Counting Machine" - Matt

This challenge was harder than I had anticipated. She's really good at lighting... and I'm obviously not there yet.

Where I Live

Next Week: IreneM

Take a picture in the style of IreneM on DPChallenge. Here's one of hers:

http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=965140

You can click on her name below the photo to view more of her work. - Matt

"Septic Tank" - Cary

On Monday, it was Septic Tank Replacement Day where I live. The tilt-shift treatment was something I thought of to make the shot more interesting (how interesting can a septic tank be?). Looks like it was a popular technique this week.

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 16mm, 1/160 s @ f/5.6, ISO 100

"Mixing Bowl" - Matt

We live right off a civil engineer's dream, or nightmare!

"The Street Where We Live" - by Lisa

The panorama was fun to do though I felt a little silly taking several pictures across the street wondering what my neighbors were thinking...

Back to School

Next week: "Where I Live"

Take a picture that shows or represents where you live.  Matt.

"High School" - Cary

Matthew's in 10th grade this year and has the courses to prove it. That's his trumpet case to the left and his swim suit to the right. The only thing missing is his driver's permit which he keeps in his wallet. Still hard to believe that we're all that old...

E-3 w/ 12-60mm @ 36mm, 1/80 sec @ f/5.6, ISO 100, bounce flash

"Reading" - Matt

My kids love to read; they wake up and grab a stack of books, find a place to sit/lie next to each other, and read while Jen and I are still sleeping.

"Back to School" - by Lisa

Our youngest started High School this year... sigh.