Haven’t posted a music shot in some time. This is Nita Strauss, from Alice Cooper’s band. This is where shooting a band more than once helps me. I get to know who to watch and what to watch for. I love this shot, I put it into my portfolio.
Photo of the Week #191 - A New Toy
Everyone likes new gear, right? I’m not one to lust after the newest camera body at all, I’m pretty happy with what I have. New bodies brag up all their new features but the truth is that other than better high ISO capabilities, they are currently catering more to the video crowd. Both my bodies are working well for me. That said, how about lenses? Lenses are a bit more specialized, they are the key piece of gear that go the furthest to help you get the shots you’re looking for. All my lenses are pro level lenses, f2.8 or faster because that’s what I needed for shooting weddings, then live music. It would be hard to shoot music with anything other than a 2.8 lens in anything other than the best lighting. Sometimes in concert photography, you are shooting from FOH, (The sound board) usually located at the rear of the venue, far removed from the photo pit. I’ve made do with a 70-200/2.8 and a rather large crop up to now but the other day, I pulled the trigger on a new toy. The Nikon AF-S 200-5— ED VR and I don’t think I’ve ever been more pleased with a new lens. It is sharp, scary sharp in fact. This photo of the woodpecker below is at 500mm but what I’m also impressed with is that it’s only 1/125th of a second. The VR is so good in this lens, I can shoot that slow at 500mm and get a tack sharp subject. The rule of thumb dictates that for that focal length, I really should have been at a minimum of 1/500th of a second to achieve a sharp shot. I am extremely impressed that a lens of this ilk can still be hand-held. It is a workout to carry it around but considering the specialized work this lens will be doing, I won’t be too bothered about that.
Photo of the Week #190
Competition in photography is a much debated topic. Some people like it and others don’t. The image above is heavily processed and entered in the “Creative Experimental” catagory in our club comp. In this image, I isolated the woman on her own layer. There was actually a friend walking with her but I removed her to make it look more lonely. I then did my blurring of the beach and water, then replaced the woman with composition in mind and I made her shadow for more realism. Lastly, I took the image back to Lightroom for finishing contrast and colour adjustments. In total, I’m guessing maybe two hours of work.
Below is a judge’s comment that I received on this image.
“the empty space, the soft colors and lone figure to show perspective is really well done. a very moody image that is nicely composed. this category though requires more experimental work than just blurring lines or panning a camera for higher scoring.”
At first, I was confused, how could this judge not recognize the work that I’d done? The reality though is that I still got 24 out of a possible 30 as a mark…….not too bad at all really. The bottom line is that I do my art for me first. If others like what I do, of course it makes me feel good but if you do something creative to please others, you will often lose interest in it eventually. I love this image and I put a lot of thought into it so that’s the most important thing to me.
Photo of the Week #157
My wife and I were down in the Adirondacks and came upon these two fellows fly fishing in the Ausable River not far from Lake Placid. I love photographing people, it is often easier to tell a story when people are involved. Will be so nice to travel again, even smaller trips like this would fell so great, wouldn’t it?
Photo of the Week # 189
I first went to the maritimes in 2004 and I immediately fell in love with lighthouses. So much so that I spent quite a bit of time touring around taking photos of as many lighthouses as I could. Since I was just beginning my journey in photography too, most of those photos weren’t very good. Sad really but goes with the territory I guess.
Lighthouses are woven into the very fabric of maritime Canada. They were used for many years to help people navigate safely to their destinations. They obviously exist in other countries too and as I’ve traveled a little, I still find myself attracted to their lighthouses.
Faro Castillo del Morro - Havana, Cuba