We were only human, this at least we'e learned.

uninspired... sharpening images

This is my dog Schmar before and after sharpening the image. Above, sharpened, seems to lose the contrast. I think that was the difficulty of picking a black subject. I like it sharpened though because there is so much detail in his fur. You can see how curly his hair is rather than in the picture below when you can see how black he is, but see no detail.

you're now allergic to the rumble and noise

The first picture is an unedited photo of my fiance Burke. While I sure love him, this picture is probably not the best (sorry Burke). The next picture is one that I edited in a standard way that I might using photoshop. I adjusted some of the levels. In the final picture I whitened Burke's teeth by selecting them and decreasing the yellow and red saturation. Then I created a copy of the image and applied a heavy gaussian blur, from which I erased Burke's body. This created the illusion of a greater depth of field, making him a stronger focus of the picture. The last thing I did was increase the contrast so his black jacket looked more black. If the picture were a little better, I would definitely like it a lot.

And I hope the rumors will break your fall

After poking around on Dr. Jenny's blog on Zenfolio, there are some definitite things that I like about the site. I am fascinated by the ability to leave a comment on a picture. On blogger you have to leave a comment on the post, not even a specific picture; however on Zenfolio you can not only pick a particular image, but you can select a part of an image to comment on.

I liked the ability to add an entire gallery to my shopping cart. I also liked the option of purchasing each image as a different object. I was specifically interested in the wall mounts, but I thought they were quite expensive.

Also intriguing was the ability to password protect entire galleries. Although I thought this was an unusual concept for a professional photographer to employ, it does seem rather necessary.

The only part of the website I am not especially a fan of is the slideshow function. I usually think they are too slow for me- even if the speed is adjustable clicking through is much more functional.

Stand back! Expansion is what we do the best

Julie and I took pictures all over HAL and outside, but this is my favorite lighting situation by far. We first tried HAL 211, then outside, then we used the spotlight in an open room, but this light came from the sun while we were inside. I thought this light had the warmest glow without washing out her face. I was in manual mode without a flash and I had the aperture open as far as it would go. The iso was 100 and I had the white balance set to sunlight. I would like it if there was more of a catch light in her eyes, but I think what there is is quite acceptable.

Here's a toast to now

The Station
This is one of my favorite photos I took. I didn't see anyone else photographing this cement block with exposed wires and bolts, but I thought it was very interesting. I took several pictures of it and this is one of my favorites. I had an aperture of 4.5 and a shutter of 250. I also like the picture below this one. I think it also captures the essence of the station.

Macro/ Up Close
This was a picture I took of the actual rail road track when we first got to the station. I really like the frost on the metal. The aperture was 5.6 and the shutter was 125. The picture below is another close up picture I took inside the building Aperture of 4.5 shutter of 15.
Flash/Slow Sync
I'm not a huge fan of this picture, mostly because I loved shooting outside and inside was a little less exciting. Also, I could have picked a more interesting subject, but I guess it's okay. It took me several attempts to even get a good picture that wasn't blurred.
EXIF data for this image is aperture of 3/5 and shutter of 1.6seconds. I had the ISO set to 100.

when all i want, all i want/ is a state of hope

The flash on my Canon EOS Rebel has a built in flash with several options. It fires automatically in low light and backlit conditions in most of the basic modes. The flash has to be manually turned on when using the camera in a creative zone (Program, Tv, Av, M, and A-DEP). When using Av, the main subject is captured with the flash and the background is captured with a long exposure using a slow shutter speed.

Red eye reduction can also be turned on in most modes of the camera. There is also a Red Eye Reduction lamp indicator which can help to adjust the effectiveness of red-eye reduction. It is most effective in indoor areas and when the subject is near the camera.

Flash Exposure lock is the last option with the camera. It works in the creative zones.