A simple study of light

I took several photos of some flowers we picked in our backyard yesterday with my iPhone. I just took them for a record so I could possibly work on identifying them with my children. I think they do a good job of demonstrating the effect of light direction.

This first was taken with the camera flash on (coming directly from the iPhone). Notice how it effectively flattens the appearance of the flowers in the water. This might be the look you are after or it might not.
I find it very interesting.

In the next two I simply turned the flash off so that the flowers were lit by the light coming in from the windows to my left. Notice how the flowers appear more dimensional.
But in the first, the large flower is turned away from the light. Notice where your eye is drawn.

In this last one, I turned the large flower to open toward the light.

Family Photos in Abuquerque

I took a few photos for this neat family last Friday evening. They wanted photos of everyone while the grandmother was here visiting. We planned it to be shortly before sunset to use the shade behind their house for a more diffused light and take advantage of the pretty sky in the background for another setting on their back deck area. Everyone was patient and cooperative - quite a feat for any group of children!

In the first shot we used pure natural light, as they were in the shadow cast by the house, on the hill right behind their house. I used aperture priority mode, with an aperture of f/10 so as to keep everyone in focus. I had to overexpose as the sky was bright, with evaluative exposure bias of 2/3 of a stop. This brought my shutter speed to 1/160 of a second. Since I was using a focal length of 50mm, this shutter speed was just ok as long as no one was really moving. In order to get at least this I bumped the ISO to 1250.

In this second shot, I used my studio lights. I used two right next to each other for the main light in order to get enough light on everyone.  I had go to complete manual on my camera for this. I wanted the background to be darker than in the previous photo, so first I set the camera to expose for the background and then adjusted the lights so the family would be properly exposed.
 

Headshots!

I took photos of this family for the sole purpose of creating headshots for each of them. These they can then print in a large quantity for their agent to use in promoting them for acting. They are such sweet  and beautiful kids. The little girl has already been acting, including a part in a recent Hallmark movie. I had my husband alongside to either hold a reflector or diffuser (depending on lighting conditions). All were taken outdoors. Here are a few of my favorites.

Ramblings

If you had me take a photo of you or your family a year ago or even two years ago, you will find I've changed. I am never happy with stagnation. I want to create. I want to do everything better. I'm rarely satisfied with where I am at. And I think I have improved. I hope I continue to improve!

When I couldn't be taking business during the last year, I decided to plow ahead and do what it takes to get certification. This meant doing a thorough review of my work from the previous two years, and picking 20 photos from 20 different photography sessions that could be classified as being good photos. These had to be reviewed by a certification committee and approved. Then I studied the extensive field of photography, mostly via the book "Photography" by London, et al., and also via webinars, and studying of information on various sites.  This is a great book, and I will continue to enjoy it and refer to it in the years to come. It is packed with information and photos to help in explaining everything. After studying, I took the certification exam in July - a 100 question test covering just about every important area in the field of photography. I wasn't sure I'd studied enough, but decided to still go for it at least as a learning experience to help me better prepare for a next time. However, I passed. I am glad, but also want to learn this stuff better! So I'm officially a CPP now - certified professional photographer. One of 6 in the Albuquerque area.

What will this mean? Well, I'm not sure. It proves I've studied the field, and understand the basics of professional photography. It doesn't mean I'm better than everyone out there who hasn't decided to get certified. But I guess it means I've attained a certain level of professionalism. :-)

Meanwhile, I have a desire to create something beautiful, something to cherish, something to enlarge and put on your wall, something to come back to and look at again and again and enjoy as a piece of art. If I can attain this for someone, I have succeeded.