Day 8 - Sunday, April 29, 2012

Today I was lucky enough to piss off this robin as I was walking around the yard.  It made for a wonderfully stationary(ish) object as it sat there and continuously chirped at me.  In the end, I think the picture turned out alright.  I was really expecting to find my picture early in the day; I'll probably shoot some more tonight later on.  Looks like we might be getting some rain tonight.

Exposure Info
1/60 sec, f/5.6, ISO 100, 300mm.  SB-600 on camera.


Original file can be found here.

Day 7 - Saturday, April 28, 2012

Today I decided to work on my lighting some more.  Although I had all day to go out and shoot, I chose to nap, clean, and then nap again.  My available lighting I had to work with was my SB-600 on slave, and my popup flash.  This photograph was shot with my popflash being blocked away from me, towards the SB-600.  The SB-600 had a homemade snoot on it, to direct the light more towards my face.  I also put a 1/2 CTO gel over the snoot, as the original light was too cool, (this was before I decided to do this shot in B+W.)  Took as few attempts to get everything to be correct (difficult to have the lens auto focus on a black chair while I was operating the lens.  Activated the shutter with a wireless release.  Moderately happy with how everything turned out.

Exposure Information:
1/60 sec, f/4.8, ISO 200, 135mm.  SB-600 infrared slave, fill flash diverted to activate slave.


Original can be seen here.

Day 6 - Friday, April 27, 2012

Day 6

This past week, a young girl was struck and killed by a passing car in an accident.  This is the vigil that is set up near where the accident occurred.  This tragedy is sad, but I am glad for the full showing of support for the families involved.  Rest in peace little Jalyn.

Original file can be seen here.

Day 5 - Thursday, April 26, 2012

Day 5

This is not a picture about a mug.  Nor is this a picture about beer.  This isn't even a picture that is about focus (albeit there isn't much in focus.)  This is a picture about light. This is a picture about my way of modifying light.  As I continue learning about the craft, I realize more and more that what lens you have on your camera doesn't matter as much as the light.

I shot this photograph with my SB-600 in infrared slave mode.  Popped up my on camera flash and fired away. The flash was held up by a wonderfully drunk talking light stand.  It's not much--but it's a start for me.  A start to better understand how I can use light to enhance my images.

Exposure Information
1/60 sec, f/1.8 (mistake), ISO 100, 35mm.  SB-600 bounced off the table back at the camera.  Triggered by built in lens FLASH.
Ending remark:
I apologize that this isn't as interesting as a photograph.  Truth is today was difficult to get my shots in. Work went directly into cover letter writing, which lead to dinner, then resume writing.  I had about 30 minutes between when I finished that and starting Trivia. Alas, not much time for creativity.  On the bright side, my weekend looks open.

Original file can be seen here.

Day 4 - Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Day Four

I actually had a bit of fun with this one.  Once again I was having difficulties deciding what to do.  Actually...that is not true.

My original idea for a shot was of two houses in Beaver Dam--one of the neighbors has many recall Walker/Fitzgerald signs, while the other has many support Walker signs.  While I was able to get some pictures, I was not happy with them.

I went to my old standby, head down towards the lake.  I went to the park and noticed that the light on this handicap pier was pretty interesting.  The sun was already very down, so I didn't have much to work with for a nice still image.  Then the idea came to me--long exposure.

Exposure Information
15mm, 20 seconds, f/22, ISO 800; Shot @ 15mm with a Tokina 11-16 on my D7000.

The blurry white blob is me walking towards the camera from about 2/3 the way down the pier.  I walked past the camera with about 4-5 seconds left on the exposure.  My guess is that the camera sensor was not picking up on my dark pants, so it decided to expose the dark background, which included a spot light from across the lake.  I didn't realize my ISO was at 800, which was disheartening due to the amount of noise that it added to the photograph.  Oh well--I still like it.


As always, original photograph can be seen here.

Day 3 - Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Day 3

I promise that I will not only post pictures of the lake.  I wasn't feeling particularly creative yesterday and it was an easy picture.  I know, that's not the purpose of this exercise.  Today it's raining so now I'm a bit worried about how Day 4 is going to go.  Oh well.

Exposure Information
1/6 sec, f/11, ISO 100.  Shot with my D7000 and Tokina 11-16 f/2.8


Original can be seen here.

Day 2 - Monday, April 23, 2012

Day Two:

I didn't plan on taking a picture of the sunset and the moon, that was just a happy coincidence.  Today I managed to shoot during my lunch time, after work a bit, and now at sunset.  When I was shooting at the park, I was a bit distracted by a sign that stated, "no picnic tables beyond this point."  I wasn't able to recreate the light properly for the scene.  Off camera flash would have been great for that.  Side note:  tomorrow my SB-600 should be getting here--and I'm very excited about this.  I might have to invest in a cheap lighting solution from Strobist.

Exposure Information:
35mm, 1/6 sec, f/9, ISO100

Original can be seen here.

Day 1 - Sunday, April 22, 2012

Introduction:

I have never been into the blogosphere much.  I don't usually read a whole lot of blogs, and I would never really expect people to pay much attention to what I would have to say online.  My experiences with other people on the internet vary, but the overwhelming majority of them can be summed up by the following statement: "The internet is the playground for assholes."

All that being said, I'm starting up this blog as part of a project that I will be doing for the next 364 days.  Each day I will go out and take a picture of something--it doesn't matter of what or whom.  I'll try to add some extra information about the picture for anyone interested (assuming this blog ever has someone read it.)

One (assuming one reads this) might ask, "why are you doing this?"  It's a good question.  The main reason why I'm going to do this is to help develop my photography skills.  Photography is a hobby for me.  I don't get paid to take pictures, although I think it would be wonderful to do so.  Another reason, is the fact that I stumbled upon this project while looking for information on photographing a wedding.  I thought it might be a beneficial idea--so now here we are.

I might not post every day, but the goal is to take at least one picture every day.  As this is 
the first day, I'm adding in some information below incase anyone might be interested.

What I currently take my photographs with

Camera Body:
Nikon D7000

My lenses:Nikon 35mm AF-S f/1.8

Nikon 70-300mm AF-S f/4-5.6 VR

Tokina 11-16mm ATX f/2.8.

Flashes:
SB-400 Speedlight

SB-600 Speedlight (on the way, currently)

My photography history:

My first dSLR I purchased was a Nikon D3100 last February, amidst the massive protesting of Governor Walker.  My reason was simple:  I didn't have a decent camera to help document a once in a generation type protest.  It was an impulse buy--yes, but now here we are over a year later.  I ended up selling the D3100 to help purchase the D7000.  The main reason behind the upgrade was due to the D7000 having its own AF Drive Motor in it.  As a happy coincidence, it is arguably the best non-full-frame camera out there currently.  I personally tend to shoot prime lenses (although I currently only have one.)  Simply put, the price/quality ratio you can get from shooting primes greatly outweighs shooting with zooms (and the price is the most important part for me, as I don't make money with my shooting.)

Back to the photograph...

This photograph was taken outside of my parents' house.  A flower blossom on some sort of tree (I really have no idea and didn't bother to ask.)  I know that they don't stay in blossom for long, so I thought it might make for some sort of unique photograph.  Perhaps it isn't the best way to start this blog, but it will have to do.  I did all of my editing in Lightroom 3 (vignette added, boosted clarity, fixed distortion, fixed color, watermark added)  The original photograph can be seen here.

A side note:  I cannot stand how when I start a new sentence near the right border, the double space to start indents in.  /rant