Thankful!

Happy Thanksgiving!

This has been a whirlwind week of activities with the kids out of school, lots of projects needing attention, and 21 people for Thanksgiving dinner. I don't know what made me think that I would have lots of photo opportunities on Thanksgiving because when one is the hostess over a great feast, there just isn't much of a chance to stop and pick up the camera...however, the following day we had some friends come over for an air boat ride. Russ brought his old Pentax film camera to try some shots. (The pop of red under his chin is the ear protector worn to muffle the sound of the huge fan that propels the air boat.)

1/250, f5.0, ISO 400

I was intrigued with the color and shape of this water lily and how the water

droplets clung to the leaves as it began to rain. Another time it would be fun to see if a raindrop could be captured just as it landed on the leaf!

1/250, f5.6, ISO 400

We don't always have such calm conditions during a ride, but the water was as smooth as glass and made for a perfect mirror image on this tree lined canal.

1/400, f4.0, ISO 400

Thanks again, Brooke, for opening my understanding of how to use my camera in manual mode. It opens a whole new world and I feel like an infant taking those first unsteady steps. Just like anything worth doing well, becoming a photographer will take diligence and practice in order to master exposure, composition, the use of light, and bring them all together into beautiful, creative photographs. I'm glad that I still have a lot to learn. After all, Helmut Newton said, "The first 10,000 shots are the worst." That gives me plenty of chances to find my own style! Next week I'm off to Utah to try my new found knowledge out on my grandchildren - Yippee!!

Carrying on the Legacy

"If pictures have anything important to say to future generations, it's this: I was here. I existed. I was young. I was happy and someone cared enough about me in this world to take my picture." ~anonymous

My dad, an avid photographer, captured the wonder of Christmas in the photo above, taken when I was 4 years old. It embodies the essence of what I think we try to do as budding photographers - capture the authenticity of life's moments, whether they be significant or mundane - or perhaps making the mundane, significant!

This is the agronomist and the home economist, parents to one little girl. Among the legacies left to me from my parents is a curiosity about almost everything and a desire for continued learning. From my mother I gained a desire to be like her - positive, organized, faithful, compassionate, musical, patient, wise, and a thoughtful cook. I'm still working on it (practice, practice, practice)! From my father I gained an appreciation for travel, other cultures, languages, and peoples and to document it all in pictures. They both taught me that it's possible to learn to do, to make, and to try many new things. From this tiny family unit, my world has quickly grown to include all of the people in the photo below...

...and they are the reason that I do what I do in life. My husband is my best friend, advocate, and support. Our children, their spouses, and our grandchildren are my favorite people in this world and I am so proud of them, their character, their abilities, their accomplishments, their enthusiasm and energy. Each adds a unique and "awesomazing" thread to the tapestry that is our family. They are my whole motivation to become the master of my camera and fulfill my desire to artistically capture our important moments in time.

"It's not so much the choosing which door that matters,
but pulling one open and enjoying the journey." ~Thomas S. Monson

Huge thanks to Brooke for allowing me to join her journey and
sharing the things that she has learned along the way. To my classmates, I have thoroughly enjoyed seeing your photos each week and hope that our paths will cross in the future!

It's All About the Light

Side Light
f5.6, 1/15, ISO 400
Bradley is one of the children I borrowed for this shoot. It was really a good learning experience to pay more attention to where the light was coming from. I realized that I have a lot more to learn about directing my subjects while posing. Brooke, you make it seem so effortless and conversational...this pose came naturally while Bradley was waiting for me to get the camera settings ready to go.

Back Light
f 5.6, 1/320, ISO 200
This week's assignment was the hardest for me so far - I took a couple hundred shots of the kids while trying different aperture, shutter speed, and ISO combinations. Practice, practice, practice, right?! Shooting into the sun made my camera "spaz"...but...in the end I am happy with many of the shots. The addition of the hat as a prop kept Emalyn's interest long enough to get some fun shots of her pulling it in different directions.

Front Light
f 5.3, 1/200, ISO 200
It's funny how fast a three year old's moods and expressions can change.
One second she's all smiles and the next those little brows are knit in a frown,
all the better to capture her personality! I like the way the palmetto leaves in the background point to her cute little pouty face.

Natural Reflector
f 5.0, 1/25, ISO 1600
The late afternoon light coming into this tack room cast the
golden glow from the walls onto the saddles below.

Silhouette
f 18, 1/1250, ISO 400
This was a fun effect to try and capture. I laid on the ground and shot up and didn't really know how the photos had turned out until I got home and uploaded them from the camera.
I chose black and white to emphasize the silhouette effect,
but the original with the dark blue cloud was cool too.

Here are a couple of Jackie's (the kids mom) favorite shots:

Emalyn was laying on the pool table, which is by a big picture window.
We (her mom and I) were saying, "Look happy...look sad...look surprised..." and got catch lights in her eyes :)

Creating a Composition

1/30 second, f 4.0, ISO 400
This is my Grandma Hunter's flat iron and one of her hand-sewn quilts. I put a photograph of her as a young woman in the shot above and used a large aperture to blur her image to give the feeling that even though she's gone, her memory lingers on in her handiwork.
Contrast this with the shot below:

1/25 second, f 4.0, ISO 400
I feel that this is a little stronger composition because an odd numbers of objects, in this case 1, in the shot seems more pleasing to the eye than an even number...but it's missing the personal element of grandma's photograph. Any suggestions?

1/15 second, f 20, ISO 400
I wanted to make 3 totally different compositions in terms of subject and feeling. This week while we were giving a tour of the ranch to some more out-of-town visitors I saw this shed on one of the cattle units -- Who was it that said that she was going to start carrying the camera with her all the time? - - I have been doing that more...not ALL the time, but more, because you never know when you might come upon a photo opportunity. So this shot uses elements of color, texture, and the lines of the corrugated metal in contrast to the weathered wood of the door. The line of the hitching post and the small contrast of the dark horseshoe both seem to draw the eye to the door. It would have been nice to be able to have the door a little more off-center, but the building wasn't wide enough to do that.

1/1250 second, f 16, ISO 1600
Even though I took this photo on my first day of shooting...before I realized that I needed to change the ISO or check the white balance (I must have been fiddling with the menu one day before that and changed the ISO to 1600)....I like it. I was concentrating on getting the hang of spinning the command dial while at the same time trying to get a 3 year old to stand still and pose. Consequently, all the shots I took that day were underexposed or over-exposed as I struggled to figure out what my camera was doing. The ocean was really calm that day so the waves look soft right before they break on the beach. The composition elements used, some of which I was already aware, were the color of the sea next to the sand, the contrast and lightness of the clouds, the texture of the footprints, and the rule of thirds in placing Emalyn as she gazes down the beach.