Bollman Bridge

Ok, so I though I'd do a photo shoot for FHE tonight (under the guise of playing at the cool bridge) because I can get an 8X8 photobook for free if I order by the 30th, so I wanted to get enough good shots to have a good siblings with new baby book. I had my successes and failures again, but I thought I'd post my best and some I wish were better so you can all advise me if you have solutions.

There's a lot, so get ready!

55 mm 1/125 F5.6 400
I wish I'd gotten more tracks here, with the boys more at the bottom. Composing a shot was really hard with how fast these boys move.

55 mm 1/200 F5.6 400
Jeffy is such a poser these days. This one seems strange because the bridge is the same type of angle as his head.


55 mm 1/200 F5.6 200
Faster shutter speed for this one? Actually, I kind of like it showing his constant movement.


33 mm 1/200 F4.5 200
Man, I just caught that dimple big time.

18 mm 1/200 F3.5 200
I had to come to terms with the fact that this is the best I'll get of Ethan. Those power lines can be photoshopped out.


31 mm 1/250 F4.5 200
I was lucky to get this extreme closeup. Ethan is in constant motion. It's really tricky to keep the lighting right when I have to zoom out, move around, and keep an eye on everything. I do realize I can make the aperature stay put even if I zoom at some levels, but man, I'm not sure I should if everything changes so quickly!

37 mm 1/200 F5.0 200
Finally got a thumb sucking shot I like!



33 mm 1/160 F4.5 200

46 mm 1/160 F5.6 200

33 mm 1/125 F4.5 200
Check out that bokeh baby! (Is that what it's called?) Does the lens do that? Ah, but no one is looking with THAT smile in the picture!


18 mm 1/100 F3.5 200
I think I was going for movement here, with that shutter speed, but my depth of field was way too short so I didn't focus right. Ugh.


18 mm 1/100 F3.5 200
I had NO time time to set up for this, so I'm surprised it turned out so well!


18 mm F3.5 1/125 400
Jeffy on his way to Mordor.


AN EDITING SECTION

37 mm 1/200 F5.0 200
I got this shot . . .

turned it b/w . . .
then cropped it closer.

18 mm 1/200 F3.5 200
I took this lame-o shot and . . .

made this panorama ACTION shot!

Ok, so my questions for this shoot: When do you use higher shutter speeds and when do you use higher aperature? I don't know which to change when. Also, what's the best way to keep the lighting right when I zoom my camera a lot or my kids move a lot? Tricky!

Today's Lesson: FLASH

Cami, the flash is not evil. If you are documenting a friend's going away party and it's indoors in the evening, JUST FLASH! (Didn't you learn that at Emily's reception????) Otherwise, yes, you'll have to go all the way up to 1600 sometimes, and everyone will have dark eyes. Ugh. Why didn't you think of that!?

That is all. I'll leave some examples, and a few good shots from the party.

Ok, so in the above picture I used a flash and I hid the shadow well. Why not in the picture below?

See, the picture below is how most of the shots turned out in the back part of the house. I was looking so much at the light meter that I forgot about how the shadows would fall on the faces.

In the front room they were better because there was evening light coming in the window, as seen below. And even so, someone's shadow is falling over her, and with a flash that would have been eliminated.

Ok, so in the picture below, I was just rejoicing that I got both boys smiling at the same time! Oh these two are hard! Never underestimate a good "BLA BLA!" to get a kid's attention. Lame that I didn't move that stuff in the background until the next group of shots! Oh well--PHOTOSHOP!

I've decided not to put the specs on here because next time I will work with the flash a little more in an indoor evening party.

In other news, thanks to Kellie who gave me a bunch of photography books today! Also, she is now going to be a contributor!! Woohoo!!

Today's Pictures

Thanks for all the answers everyone! Please don't feel obligated to answer the questions I put on here. I mostly ask them to myself so as to make myself answer them sometime. But I DO appreciate help from you all!

So, I made myself go out and practice for 5 minutes today. Further trials involving shutter speed and aperature. Finding the right balance is getting easier. I took much fewer pictures today to get the same results.

Just a simple picture of the house, but it was harder to get than it seems. It is hard to find good composition for a townhouse.

18 mm 1/200 F3.5 200

Good composition:

55 mm 1/200 5.6 200

Bad composition:

55 mm 1/125 F5.6 200

Jeffy was moving a lot but I was able to get a couple pictures nonetheless. I'd like a little more contrast in the light for shots like this. Zoom out, move in to get more light. Plus, work on that composition! I could always crop it, but I need to stop putting so much space above his head like that.

34 mm 1/125 F4.5 400

Too bad the background was my legs and his bum. These feet are pretty cool!

18mm 1/125 F3.5 400

Better Now (Indoor)

Ok, so I think the bulk of my problem in the last shoot (post below) was that it just wasn't good light. I waited till 11:00, opened the window a little more, and I had MUCH more luck! Here's what I got:

I did the first one at ISO 1600 just to save myself some anguish, and I got this one.

ISO 1600 Tv 1/125 F4.5

I saw that there was enough light, so I went down to 800 and played around with Tv and Av and got this one. I also turned her the other way by this point to face the light. And she was really mad.

ISO 800 Tv 1/125 F3.5

I turned a couple bw and found out that on my little photo professional program they DO have curves, so that's fun. I changed it only a little, because they seemed pretty good on their own.

ISO 800 Tv 1/125 F3.5

ISO 800 Tv 1/125 F3.5

This one of the boys is kind of funny, and my feet are in it. I still kind of like it.

ISO 800 Tv 1/125 F3.5

And this one is cute of Jeffy. Too bad the baby's face is in shadow. Although that's kind of cool too.

ISO 800 Tv 1/125 F3.5

So, I guess I can't make the f-stop if the camera doesn't let me. I'll figure this all out eventually.

Ugh

Oh, the frustration. It seems the more I learn, the worse I get!

Here's what happened today. I went to get the baby some clothes and left her on my bed. I came back and she was sucking her thumb so cute! So, of course, I ran to get my camera, and proceeded to take pictures which got worse and worse as I experimented. Today I was looking at the light meter and trying to get it right by experimenting with everything!

The only one where I actually GOT the sucking of the thumb was this one:

ISO 1600 F5.6 Tv 1/8

There was no light except my bedside lamp. So of course, it's horrible. Even at ISO 1600 I had to have such a slow shutter speed that there was no chance for a clear picture.

So, I opened up my window shades and got the 7:00 a.m. sunlight. I thought I should have been able to get a good shot, but no. I guess I was reluctant to put the ISO all the way to 1600, so I kept it at 800 and tried to adjust the shutter and f-stop. I couldn't get the f-stop right, so my shutter ended up still being too slow. Ugh.

ISO 800 F3.5 Tv 1/20

I had to put the baby back to bed before I got the picture right, so I used Jeffy next. I wanted to get a shot of him with his beloved blankie. It took me a while, but I finally got some goodish pictures once I gave up on ISO 800 and just went back to 1600. I don't know why I was able to do it with a faster shutter for him. Maybe the angle of the shot, maybe I let more light in the window. Who knows. I wish he had a little twinkle in his eye. I need another light source. I thought the lamp would do it.

ISO 1600 F4.5 Tv 1/100

I doctored the blankie one a little to make it sort of look antiquey while still retaining the color of the blankie. Again, no photoshop right now, so it's the best I could do at the time.

ISO 1600 F5.0 Tv 1/125

HOW do I get a good indoor shot?? I still feel like I'm not taking any better pictures than I did with my p.a.s. camera.

ALSO, new question, why do I not have total control over the aperature? Sometimes I can only get it down to 4.5, but in some of my pictures it's at 3.5. Was that when I was experimenting with a different priority mode? I'm not sure. But why can't I do it in full manual mode?

Also, I think I need a new lense. Matt tells me there is a good one for low light that's pretty cheap. That's what I need. I thought I should learn the ropes before getting some nicer lenses, so we didn't get the image stabalization lense right away. And that's probably true. I'd probably be more frustrated. Let's see what I can do with what I've got first.

Shutter Speed and ISO

I went to the park today and thought I'd try out shutter speed. I had it on manual setting, but I didn't change anything else besides Tv and ISO. Av was F5.6, Split Metering, Flash was off and I mostly used manual focus.

This picture was actually not in the shoot, but I take a lot of pictures on this white chair by our big glass sliding door. How can I get it right?
Tv 1/30 ISO 800

Jeffy was playing in the sand in partial shade. This is the best one I got, but two seconds later I got the one below, which is too dark on his face. I don't love the composition of either.

For the last two shots: Tv 1/320 ISO 200 F5.6

These are some shots of Ethan in shade. They are nice, but a little dark.

Both shots: Tv 1/250 ISO 200

I got a lot of shots that were really dark like this. How disappointing! They were really cute.
Tv 1/250 ISO 200 Full Shade F5.6

I used Digital Photo Professional to lighten this one and the next one by clicking Tone Curve Assist--High.

I like this one but the baby's face is so dark. Is there any way to fix that besides arranging shade better?

This one I should have focused manually. Ethan's sweaty head is in focus.

This one's better, but the baby is still too dark and the background too light. I feel drawn to that upper corner.
For all three above: Tv 1/250 ISO 200 F5.6

How DO you get a good aerial shot? I can never figure out the angle.

I just snapped this without thinking of focus, but only those chubby little thighs are in focus here. I usually do close ups, so I need to make sure I can take a picture with everything in focus too.

Both shots Tv 1/250 ISO 400 F5.6


After totally washing out a few shots, I got to this setting. Still a little too light unless that's what I was going for. Tv 1/250 ISO 800

These two are a better for lighting (I think--are they still too dark?) but this is a GREAT reminder to always focus manually. They are almost identical, but in the first one her whole face is out of focus--it focused on her dress. In the next one her face was in focus. I was holding her hand to make her happy. All I did was shift the camera a little to change the focus.

Both shots: Tv 1/250 ISO 400 F5.6

That's it for today. I was going to ask what people use for a typical setting in the shade would be, but since I used the same setting and some turned out and some didn't, I guess I should just keep experimenting. I guess for starters I could always turn it to the auto shade setting and see what the camera thinks it should do and then I could mess around from there. Also, I read a little today about using Av and Tv auto settings and just changing one setting instead of two. I'll have to try that out as well.