Day 71, 365 Day Project

Today my 5 month hold niece Jayden had her baptism. There were 8 other children who also had their baptism as well making for a very packed house. Could only shoot quickly with on camera flash. This image though was one I liked from the ceremony and I think my sister and brother-in-law look good. I also liked the way that Jayden was mesmerized by the flame on the candle.

Canon 7D, 24-70 f2.8 @ f4, 60mm focal length at 1/60th sec at 400 ISO.

Day 70, 365 Day Project

Arlen and Becky were two of our volunteers as subjects for today's wedding photography class that I teach at SAIT. This is one of the images I created while demonstrating how to work with a couple quickly. A little different for me as I am trying to learn to crop tighter for these types of portraits.

Lighting was two Balcar Mini-Z heads with umbrellas side by side at camera position to create a wall of light. Canon 7D, 24-70 f2.8 @ f11, 1/125 sec at 100 ISO.

Day 69, 365 Day Project

We picked up this Ukulele on our last trip to Hawaii 3 years ago. I brought it down to the studio and set it up on a black piece of muslin and lit id with a Balcar studio head and a 3 degree grid spot. Using only the modeling light I shot from a low angle with the Canon 7D, 24-70 f2.9 @ f2.8 for 1/400 sec at 4000 ISO white balance set to tungsten.

Day 68, 365 Day Project

This old lens has been with me for two decades now and sits quietly in the corner of my office on my Zone VI 4x5 field camera. It produces the most exquisite images but now sits as a collectors piece as digital has replaced it in my life. Still I plan to pull it out this summer dust it off and shoot some new photo's with it. The one thing I learned from working with this camera and lens was to slow down, plan the image and compose it properly. So if you see me on the streets of Calgary with the old dark cloth over my head, stop by and say "Hi".

Canon 7D, 24-70 f2.8 @ f2.8, 1/160 sec at 12,800 ISO. Illuminated with the fluorescent tubes in my office and white balanced to match.

Day 67, 365 Day Project

Cool created this interesting sculpture the other night using a fork, paper cup cone, tape; plastic tape core and playdough. I though he had been very creative and know I wanted to photograph it so he can have a record of it. So I took it down to the studio and since it looks like a lamp I knew exactly how I wanted to shot it.

I placed it on black muslin close to the edge of the table and then set my Canon 7D on a tripod, set it to bulb and placed the cable release on it. Using the 70-200 f2.8 I set the f-stop to f8 and zoomed in to 110mm from 1.4 meters away. Shutting of the lights I opened the shutter for 19 seconds and used a flashlight with a cine foil snoot fashioned around it for a narrow beam of light. I got down low and shone the flashlight up into the cone to give the feeling of a light bulb inside the sculpture. White balance was set to tungsten, but I added some warmth back to the image in photoshop.

Day 66, 365 Day Project

Again inspired by others who are doing this project I have chosen to look for the everyday object and try and make something interesting of it. We have so many tools at our disposal today and they are quick, clean and environmentally friendly. Today's image was shot while waiting for Cool at his choir practice. Using my iPod touch I composed the image to have the bricks add converging lines to the fire extinguisher. I then brought the photo into Pictureshow to add a vignette, some saturation and adding rough edges gave me the shot that I was looking for.

Day 65, 365 Day Project

Today's image was created during my advanced lighting class at SAIT. The technique is combining both strobe and hot light. The strobe here is a Balcar Mini Z with a small Chimera strip softbox set for f5.6 to light the subject. The background is a halogen portable work light with a piece of cardboard cut to act as a cookie. Shutter speed is 0"4 of a second thus creating the movement in the arm. Canon 7D, 24-70 f2.8 @ 100 ISO.