[ravnostic]

More info: Minnie wanted ‘show’ shots; I was going for portrait shots. The ‘client’ wanted DOF for a group, and (due to light and circumstances and what I thought was good) I got shallow DOF shots which are good, but not what she expected. Fail. Probably epic. Chalk one up to the learning curve. My bad. But–it cost her nothing, it only cost me $5 in gas, and now I know to ask the client more about expectations.

I still like my shots.

//but if the client doesn’t, then I’ve missed the point.

😥

//live and learn, I’m still a newb.

[ravnostic]

Awesomesauce. Faith, indeed.

[ravnostic]

Thanks, everyone. It was a total blast. I’ve learned Minnie isn’t a fan of color; she felt I overdid it (I batched them back down to ‘normal’; good learning experience that not everyone likes color as much as I do). She also wasn’t happy with the orange skirts/red tops not being distinctly so in the images; I explained with the sun so low, the ambient light contributed to there being less distinction between the two (I could process for them, but then all the other colors would go blue or green). As for tighter portraits, my other lenses weren’t fast enough with the fading light. Still a newb at portraiture; need better glass but more importantly, more experience. I wound up with 520 images that were sharply detailed where they needed to be, but about 1/2 of those had things like closed eyes, poor framing, blown out (sunlit) backdrop (white church building), etc.

That being said, any constructive critiquing would be welcomed.

[ravnostic]

Might be a silly question, rav, but do you have a second body?

//err, yeah…that was in the original post. Used it for all of 6 frames. Turns out I didn’t need it (low light meant the f/1.8 was the name of the game), but I read long ago to always go in with a backup. Having trashed a camera in Silverton, Co., I think I’ll always have the ‘last best one’ with me, just in case. But good point regarding not switching lenses–just didn’t roll that way given the low light this time. (as I don’t have a 2nd low-light lens).

[ravnostic]

That’s funny, if I have the choice I will almost always include people in my landscapes. To me, it communicates a sharing of the moment, of the place, connecting the photographer with the viewer…or at least I hope it does.

Tastes differ. I subscribe to the Ansel Adams thought, “There are always two people in any photograph–the photographer and the viewer” (or something like that). And, of course, there are exceptions.

But I’m a loner. I like being alone in the wild, just me, and my natural gods, it’s a character trait, for good or bad.

In regards to the lighting and variations in the shot chupa, it looks pretty natural to me; I can see from the shadows that the sun is to the right, so it makes sense the sky is brighter over there. YMMV.

[ravnostic]

Okay, let’s start with the telephoto suggestion. I figured I didn’t need it. But at the last minute, I brought it anyway, just in case.

//I didn’t need it. The ‘stage’ was a grassy knoll about 40 feet wide by 30 feet deep. It was outdoors, near sunset (and into sunset) and I’m right up front, surrounded by kids and families; tough to move around (I did so best I could), so pretty much everything was with the 50mm f/1.8 (85mm equiv), set from f/1.8 to f/2.5, ISO starting at 200 and on down to 800 as the light grew more dim. Thus, everything is pretty much portraiture. (These have been resized and sharpened for G+, then again for here, so there’s less bokeh than in the larger versions)

There was no fire dancer; the church ixney’d it (damn!). But I had a ball anyway, and I’m invited back to do it again. I have an album up over at my G+ with larger images, but here’s 20 at farktography sizes, and the story behind them.

This is my apt. mgr’s daughter, who participates. It’s the first shot I took, before they blocked the choreography. She is absolutely gorgeous, and if she were my daughter, I’d give U-man a run for his money in the contests, weekly.

Two choreography shots:

Focus on the hands (which I didn’t get in the live show due to my angle at the time):

One hawt 20-something gui hamming it up for me:

//Dayum–I think I’m likin’ this current generation of Samoan! I digress…

First dance shots. I like the flow of the skirt in this one:

And the pose here:

Next was a soloist. The sun was waffling through the trees; the bigger, higher quality image captures it more nicely than this one, but you get the idea:

And another:

I liked the backlighting with my apt. mgr’s daughter here:

And this guy seems to be saying ‘oh hai!’:

You could call this “The Wave” (bigger image has more golden light to it):

This guy was a ham:

The stud muffin from earlier (my 2nd favorite shot of him):

I liked this for both poses:

This small shot doesn’t do justice to the light on Mr. Stud Muffin, but it’s my favorite shot of him. For that reason, I linky to bigger/better quality right after. Woof.

http://fossilspringsaz.com/pics/2012/aug/04/hula116.jpg

Be careful, Madge, you’re stroking in it. (be still my throbbing–err–beating heart.)

//I digress

Girlfriend, let me tell you somethin’:

All pretty ladies, lined up in a row:

I just liked her. Sue me.

The ginger was quite fair:

I liked the motion in this one:

And last, a group shot. Funny thing; they wanted a ‘nature’ background here. Yellow light to the left (from the camera vantage), bluer light to the right. Took some processing to even that out some. I didn’t use flash–on camera flash sucks and flattens, and it wouldn’t reach the tree in the background anyway.

But there was another schmuck (besides me that is), next to me [using a Nikon, of course–did I type that out loud? ;o) ], and he was using his camera’s flash. So I just set the camera to 1-1/3 seconds on the tripod, and ‘borrowed’ his light (effectively off-camera for me) while he shot, and got the tree because my settings were more appropriate for it. There’s super-mild ghosting in the full res image, but it’s not evident in post with a wee bit of adjustments.

My Apt. mgr. will probably like that I got the background (he was shooting hand-held, so surely he had a fast shutter speed). I’ll just tell her I know how to take pictures better than he did. She’ll never know the real truth.

//I’ll admit it’s not perfect– ginger is *way* too bright, and people were obscured, but at least the overall lighting is good. 😛

You can view the better res G+ album via this link:

https://plus.google.com/photos/107857888121727893520/albums/5773136113564682593

[ravnostic]

Great fisheye shot. Usually I don’t, but here I like the people in the frame, for scale. Nice angle on the double-arch.

[ravnostic]

You haven’t, by chance, bought the f/1.8 $100 50mm lately, have you? The one I bought that fell apart, it turned out, had lost a screw, which got into the camera, which 1/2 year later prevented the mirror from locking up. Didn’t learn this had happened till I went to have it repaired and converted to IR. In other words, if you did/have, maybe you got screwed like I did? 😀

[ravnostic]

Skipping this week; have more important priorities; but I’ll stop in to see the awesomeness you all come up with.

[ravnostic]

That widow image; I’d be very careful with that, olavf–she might be getting ideas. (That image is just sick in that really-really-good sense!)

[ravnostic]

Here’s the thing with G+. Nothing you share is public that you don’t want to be. But anything you share among any particular circle/s will send a notification to all those within the circle that you shared something with them. And that can be annoying to those who add you (and you add back) casually. Something to consider. It’s not FB, but it’s got it’s own quirks.

[ravnostic]

Heh. hunches, you the guy I dragged over here from G+?

[ravnostic]

Sunset rainbows are the best; everything mutes but the reds; hard to catch a double so nice work!

[ravnostic]

Really nice shots, Barra!

[ravnostic]

Something must have changed, and CISS, IIRC, is out of town and inter-webz range; nothing to do about it at the moment. :o(

//btw, I didn’t get shots for this one; no time (have a few crap shots, decided not to post them–probably wise, given some of the awesomeness this week.)

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