Sunset from a few nights ago. Of course, I didn’t have my camera with me. :(

Mugshot: Yesterday was John Luke’s 10th birthday. I of course was going to take his birthday picture, but I unfortunately waited till dark. I took it inside, with him sitting on the stairs. He’s a bit of a ham, so there’s a lot of goofy shots, and strangely enough the one I ended up liking the best is this serious one. (There are nice smiling ones too… I just like this one the best.) Strobist: SB-900 on right, firing through a diffuser around 60 inches from his head, and a SB-600 with a diffusion dome firing a very weak blast around 12” on the left. Adjustments in Aperture 2.View On Black

Bokehfall: Everyone should play with a water fountain… it’s alot of fun! I want to do the water droplet thing… I think that would be interesting too. I just haven’t gotten around to it. There was a great tutorial on strobist a while back… I shall perhaps try it. It’s also my littlest brother’s tenth birthday today, so prepare for more bad portrati photography! (Hint: I picked up a new tool, arriving today!) Strobist: Single SB900 on the left, originally just to catch the droplets in action, later to create the glistening bokeh!View On Black

I’m not a bike man, but this one is niiiiice.

This is one of the worst pieces of art I’ve ever seen.

Light My Way: I have heard the argument on whether we as photographers create beauty, or simply capture it. I think it’s just semantics. Up to this point, I’ve only captured. I saw something in the world that I liked the way it looked, the way the light fell on it, and I carefully framed that, bottled it up and showed it to you as a series of ones and zeroes. If a subject’s light wasn’t perfect, I either over exposed and then burned out what didn’t need to be there. This to me although a form of artistic expression, is sort of just capturing.Strobist has set me free. The power of small flashes is that I am not bound to the restrictions I once faced when it came to natural lighting… Shooting in broad daylight so that I can pull the aperture to a reasonable level, trying to barely contain the highlights as I seek to at least get the thing completely in focus. It brings a brand new set of challenges and complexities surely, but it’s worth it in the long run. Now I’m creating. For this shot, I saw a subject I wanted to capture, and a setting in which to put it. That’s two out of the three needed components for a good photo. The third is light, and I luckily brought enough of that in my bag. The two light setup I’m favoring these days is a mixture of what I’ve learned over the last few mistakes. I usually put a diffuser dome on the fill light (in this case a SB-600), and place it far back enough so that it in some way cancels out the shadow the key throws on the background. I’ve been shooting antiques, so I like the grime and character that the years have given the object. To really bring this out, I’ll shoot with my SB-900 zoomed all the way to 200. For this shot, because of the glass pane’s reflectivity, I shot the zoomed SB-900 through a diffuser which I held with one hand while I shot the camera using a remote. I did check, even though the light was shot through the diffuser, there was a slight change between zoomed to 200mm and zoomed out. I liked it zoomed in. As usual, I threw a gel on there, to change up the color a bit. I think no matter which color shift I choose in raw, adding a hot/cool contrast helps the feel of depth in the image. I then composed, and shot a few until I got one I liked. I then dodged and burned, and did my usual Aperture magic. I hope you like the result, please comment your thoughts.Always Better Viewed Large On Black

Searching the Web Through Quicksilver

The Helm: Growing up, I was fascinated by control structures. I can remember building paper facsimiles of dashboards of cars, using broomsticks for flight controls, and using paper plates for steering wheels. The things we use to interact and control our technology is interesting to me, from this old beat up tractor to the multitouch iphone. Much Better Viewed On Black

Warnin: I love old machinery. There’s a weird utilitarian beauty to them. They were made to do one thing well, without thought as to how they looked. Still they retain so much character. It’s amazing.View On Black

Sun Going Down On The Job: I’m going to try and do some flash experiments this afternoon. I’ve kind of neglected the 28thfloor and all my other projects this week, it’ s been kind of hectic. I’ve got a few articles working their way through my mind as well.View On Black

Lonely Worker: Apparently, this thing still runs. I wonder what all the ipods and shiny computers will look like in 60 years and whether they’ll still be working. Interesting thought though. Maybe I’ve watched Wall-E too many times. :D

Straight Up Bluegrass: I need to take some photos… but I’ve been really busy. Enjoy this image from my recent birthday shoot with my brother Christopher. I think the hot vs cold light worked *really* well here. Strobist: Warm Gelled SB-900 on left, Diffusion domed SB-600 on right as well as a large window. Camera set to Tungsten WB.View On Black

Reasons to Use Quicksilver #2

Gotta love you an office prank.

Demonstration of Quicksilver