Depth of Field

Better late than never. Yesterday was a crazy day!

Depth Of Field

f5.6 ISO 800 Shutter Priority Mode

Depth of field

ISO 200, SS100, Aperture 1.8

Shutter Speed

I had 1 other group of pictures with Kyle riding his bike but I was encountering some uploading problems. Here is my entry for this week. From what I know about Shutter Speed, the faster the shutter speed, the faster the camera takes the picture. The slower the shutter speed, the slower the camera takes the picture. I usually don't have the need to have my SS be the priority so this weeks topic helped me to open my eyes to the possibilities and advantages of choosing your own shutter speed. (It is good to use your S priority mode on your camera if you would like to control the speed of your shutter if you are trying to stop or freeze motion or to show action.)

Shutter Speed

SS 1/200 sec. Aperture f10, ISO 100. I like how the slower shutter speed makes the bird a little blurry. If I would have had another chance before the bird was gone, I would have slowed it down even more to get more of the wing movement. I was hoping to get a really cool SLOW shutter shot, but I haven't had time lately, so here are a couple FAST ones to freeze the action.

SS 1/4000 sec., Aperture 1.8, ISO 400 (red shirt)

SS 1/6400 sec., Aperture 1.8, ISO 100 (pink shirt)

Shutter Speed

Manual Mode: F13, 2 sec.


Here's the before picture before I put it in motion.

Shutter speed refresher

This week's challenge is shutter speed. The shutter speed affects how long the shutter stays open. The longer the shutter is open (low shutter number), the more light goes in. To open and close the shutter quickly and allow less light, use a quick speed (high number = quicker shutter). The shutter numbers are really fractions that is why the large numbers are the fast speeds and the low numbers keep it open much longer.
A fast shutter speed freezes motion instantly- a slower one can imply movement through slight blurring of the movement. Photographers use a slower shutter speed to create the smooth waterfall pictures as opposed to freezing drops of water instantly. There are alot of cool effects you can do by adjusting your shutter speed. Try some out. We can't wait to see what different 'interpretations' we get a chance to view this week! For more tutuorials and info, check out the following links with more shutter speed details.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shutter_speed
http://www.shutterbee.thinkrandom.com/#ShutterSpeed
http://www.trustedreviews.com/digital-cameras/review/2006/11/23/Digital-Camera-Tutorial-Shutter-speed/p3 (pages 3 and 4 show examples of the same pictures at different shutter speeds)
http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/shutter-speed/ (this one gives examples of different shutter speeds and examples of what you might use them for. It has great shutter speed photos. (The digital photography school also allows you to sign up for a weekly newsletter that includes lots of tutorials, info, photos, and anything that a photographer is interested in).
http://www.jeffgalbraithphotography.ca/shutter-speed-tutorial.html

These all have good info and good examples. You can do a search for more shutter speed tutorials if you are thirsty for more.
So, for this week, either slow it down (low shutter number) to show movement and allow more light, or speed it up (high shutter number) to freeze motion instantly.
(I am secretly hoping to see some slower speeds). Have fun lens friends!

Shooting an an angle

F5 / SS 400


F2.2 / SS 60


F4.5 / SS 320


F5 / SS 200


So I couldn't decide which picture to post so I did 4 of them. :)

Shoot At An Angle

ISO 200, f/7.1, SS 1/15

Blue

manual mode: ISO 400 SS1/10 f5.6

My cat has the most beautiful blue eyes. When I saw the theme for this week I knew I wanted to capture them. He was not cooperative at all. Totally broke the "rule of thirds" here but I wanted to join in with my first post.

Blue "Otter Pops"

Manual Mode: F 4.5 , 100

F 5.6, 160

blue

ISO 320, Shutter speed 1/512, Aperture (f-stop) f/14, focal length 28.00 mm.

Welcome Back!

Feb. 22............blue
Feb. 29............shoot at an angle
Mar. 07..........shutter speed
Mar. 14...........depth of field
Mar. 21...........play
Mar. 28...........before and after
Apr. 04...........natural lighting
Apr. 11............framed
Apr. 18............spring
Apr. 25............something western
May 02..........a place I love
May 09..........personality
May 16...........shoot from behind
May 23...........window
May 30...........chronological 4 photo series
Jun. 6..............should be in a magazine!
Jun. 13............document the facts
Jun. 20............backlighting
Jun. 27.............love is in the air
July 4...............God Bless America
July 11..............new
July 18..............together
July 25..............white space

more to come...

We have had a long leave of absence due to illness and life in general. But we are back! We also want to invite more participants to learn with us. If you would like to participate leave your email in the comments.
Also, we are still planning the second half of the year's themes. Please leave your theme ideas in the comments that you would like to do or see us do. Thanks for your support!

Natural Lighting

Feathers

depth of field

Thought I would add another depth of field. I shot them through the decorative accent on the fence.

depth of field

Depth of Field

Feet

I have more feet pictures and will add soon.

Shooting at an angle

I took my family out last night and did these photographs. This was my first photo shoot outside on manual mode. I am so excited the way they turned out.

When I left the location I was so frustrated because my kids would not cooperate at all. They kept running off and wouldn't go where there was good lighting. I decided I didn't have the patience to do photo shoots and I was ready to quit (yes you know like put my camera down never to pick it back up again.) But much to my surprise when I got home and looked at the pictures on the computer I captured some really great images of my children and captured their personalities. I am so excited how this shoot turned out. Here's just a couple images of what I got at an angle. I have been trying to focus on shooting on an angle and it is really fun to see the difference it makes in a photograph.

Lines

feet

Eyes

I am late in posting these eyes but had to share this picture. I took it at a pool party on Labor Day.

Reflections

Hey everyone....sorry I am way late in posting on reflections! I got the pictures ready last week and then didn't get the chance to actually post! I LOVE reflections and found a couple different varieties of reflections in some of the pictures that I took.

Picture one is all about the reflective light of late afternoon sun coming in and hitting the keys of the piano and reflecting off of the little boys face. When I metered for this I had a hard time because his face was so lit up by the sun but his body wasn't so I had to make sure not to overexpose him and let the rest of his body be a little darker so that you could see how much light the sun was really shedding.

Picture two shows how an ordinary wood table can be turned into a reflective surface when it has light coming at it from two angles. There is light coming from the front and from the right to really shine up this table that is actually a dark wood table.

Picture three uses early morning sun filtering in from shutters to cast light on only the little boys front. Because the light is direct light and there is no light behind the boy it makes everything behind him all dark....even the laundry piled behind him! Also...that direct sunlight bounces off of the light wood floor into his eyes causing great catchlights.

Picture four is using a mirror to capture an image. This can be tricky as you need to make sure that you aren't caught in the picture like I was a couple of times! Also you have to remember to focus on the person in the mirror and then when they turn to look at you focus on them and not the mirrored person. I goofed a couple times on that one!

Picture five is the most technique challenging. To create this image you buy a piece of plexiglass at Home Depot. Mine was probably 3ftx4ft maybe. You lay it over a black sheet on top of your table or floor. Then take the rest of the black sheet and drape it upwards...mine was attached to my fan on the ceiling. Then place your baby on top of the plexiglass and shoot quickly before they pee! This is a super fun way to get a cheap reflection.

I don't have any pictures for the lines post but I will be back next week for the
"shoot at an angle" post!

Lines

Wow! It has been so busy around here! And for everyone too- were all late posting!

I like in the first one how all the lines repeat and go in different directions. I love that ceiling!

In the second one, I love how all the subjects in the photo (even the fountain) are all on a line of this fence. I also like how the decorative scrolling breaks up the straight same direction of the lines.

In the third, simpler one, I used the pool fence to frame my subject. She looks so cute!

Reflection

I just wanted to add that I took this photo on manual mode. (Which is a miracle that I got such a great picture becuase I'm just starting to figure out this whole manual mode thing.) I took it on F5 and 1/3 sec. I also added a bit of contrast on the picture to brighten it up a bit. I really like the way it turned out.

another set of eyes

I am going to be out of town this week and will be late posting, so I thought I would put a better shot of for 'eyes' from a couple weeks ago.