Day 20 of 365

I realized tonight while looking at the pictures I took tonight after work that a month ago I would have come home and looked at some really disappointing photos. I'm really surprised how much I've learned about my camera in just the 20 days I've been doing this project.

ISO 100, 31mm, f/4.5, 1/1000 sec

I have a couple questions. Is this too dark? What would you change about it to make it a "sellable" photo? Personally if I were to do some Photoshop work on it I may try and highlight the light on the water a little more but I like the dark lower area and the one lone person silhouetted gives it some scale for me. Any thoughts?

Day 18 of 365 - Sunset on the bay

I was looking at some sunset pictures the other day and realized I've lived on the coast for over 7 years now and have only tried taking sunset photos once. I'm glad I went out as it was a beautiful day and I found a great place to go to next time I want to take sunset photos...probably should take my wife out with me next time so she can enjoy the view as well. The hike was around a mile each way but most of it was on old roads left over from the military. The colors were pretty vibrant but I had my circular polarizer on so the colors are even more so.

ISO 100, 300mm, f/5.6, 1/10 sec

I took quite a few photos but decided on this one because I like the boat and tree silhouettes. I posted a few others on my Flickr site and will post more from my shot later.

What I learned tonight was to pay attention to my metering. I used shutter priority and adjusted my shutter speed to keep a consistent f/stop between 4 and 8. I did ignore the flashing f/stop number a few times to get a little more darkness.

Day 14 of 365

My wife made these bags to use as dry bulk goods bags instead of using the plastic bags at the store. I'm still a bit frustrated with color issues with the light box. It looks perfectly white to the eye but then regardless of what setting I use it's either orange or this peach color. Not sure if it's the light bulbs, which are full spectrum, or something else. My next test will be getting a gray scale card and using it to set a custom white balance in the camera.

Day 13 of 365

I was inspired to take a photo of the moon this evening. I've tried to take a photo of it before and it always turned out looking like a big ball of light so tonight I was bound and determined to get it right. I'm posting two photos. The first is my unedited photo of the moon and the next is 8 photos combined to show my progression of shutter speed settings until I got it right.

300mm, ISO 100, f/5.6, 1/80

From left to right (all at 300mm, ISO 100, f/5.6) 1/4000, 1/2000, 1/1000, 1/800, 1/500, 1/320, 1/200, 1/125

I'm sure there was an easier way to do this. I didn't include the completely washed out photos as there were many while I played around with using Shutter Priority setting. Once I switched to Manual and paid attention to all the blinking numbers and the Exposure Compensation readings. My only disappointment was not deciding to do this a couple nights ago when it was a full moon.

Day 12 of 365 - Spooky

I'm having so much fun with my project that I've decided I'm just going to play with different techniques until something strikes my fancy and holds me for a time. Today I played with long exposure and the "ghosting" effect. I couldn't decide which one to post so today is a twofer day.

I originally thought I would need to use a ND4 filter because it light enough to still read by but the first few photos were almost completely black even at a 20 second exposure. I removed the filter and discovered a new issue...just how do you focus on a subject that you can hardly see through the viewfinder. So a few pictures later and a little commonsense thrown in I found the right focus. I set the camera to manual, exposure to bulb and my f/stop to 8 and focal length of 38mm. What I wanted to do was work with motion in a long exposure setting. As I've mentioned before this old Army base has a story to tell and there just may be some ghosts wandering around. I used my boots as my focal point and locked my shutter release open while I moved down to stand in front of the boots. Stood for about 10 seconds and then moved to the first step and stood for a few seconds and so on until I got to the top. The shutter was open for a total of 61 seconds.

No motion in this photo as I just stood in front of the boots. I used the same settings as above but the shutter was only open for 47 seconds. Because of the background light I wasn't sure if this would work and I wonder if I had left the shutter open much longer if I would have disappeared from view entirely.

Day 11 of 365 - Reflections

I went out to run some errands this morning and took all my gear with me and fully intended on taking a picture of the boots. That has been postponed until tomorrow when it's a little darker as I want to explore something I'm envisioning. Who knows if it will work but I figured I have 350+ days to figure out how to make it work right?


Got home from running the errands and told my wife that I'm just going to do more light box shots and she reminded me that I was going to do "sketches" on Sundays. Sigh...only a week into it and I've already forgotten.

I went ahead and did the light box shots as I intended. I have a couple new toys...as I mentioned a couple days ago I wanted to see how the watch would look with a reflection. I went to the local art store and bought a small sheet of Plexiglas and some small mirrors. I took about 140 photos today of the three different watches my coworker loaned me and some books my wife made in her Book Arts class she took a while back. Since I took so many pictures I really didn't know which one to post so mentioned it in Twitter and Lnorigb throw out #119 to use for my post. Thank you and what you see is #119. The rest of the watch photos will be going through some post processing so I can show to my coworker. If you're interested to see what else I did with the watches stay tuned to my Flickr. While I'm having fun with the photo a day project I also need to do some Photoshop work otherwise I'll get bored. :)

The reflection photo comes at a good time as I've had a few days to reflect on my progress. I think overall I'm doing well. I'm not shaking up the industry with my artistry but I'm learning something new each day and I'm learning from my mistakes...what more could I really ask for? This project has started to wake up the passion I knew I could have for this hobby and I'm meeting some really nice and helpful people on Flickr and Twitter.

Day 10 of 365

There are acres upon acres of concrete and World War II era buildings on this old Army base. This shot is only a small part of a much larger concrete field that was once a motor pool.

Today I realized that I automatically did my checks without really having to think about it. I checked the ISO, made sure the WB was set correctly, was able to find and manipulate my aperture control while looking through the viewfinder. After I take the shot I automatically check the histogram and have consistently been in the good range. I think one of my lessons that I set for myself is starting to sink in. Yay!

I would like to thank everyone who has been following along and have been leaving comments. Thank you so much...knowing that I'm not the only one looking at my project really is making this much easier and something I look forward to doing every day. Please feel free to leave comments with constructive criticism, tips, kudos, links to sites that I may enjoy or just a hello. It's all welcome.

Day 9 of 365

Flaaavvoor Flaaav! What time is it?


Time to post my daily picture...that's what time it is. More playing around with the light box and macro lens. Need to work more on the reflections and shadows, especially with something as shiny as a watch. Tomorrow I'm going to the craft store to look for a shiny black surface to use...want to try to get a good reflection.

Day 8 of 365

My 3 year old nephew Noah loves Matchbox cars. His Christmas gift to me was my very own Matchbox. Thank you Noah...I think it is wonderful.


So with my new car I thought I'd work with the newly built lightbox and play around lighting and white balance. I think I got the lighting about right shadow wise and got a nice little reflection on the white foam board. One thing I need to figure out is how to keep the white foam board white and not this not quite sure what color white. It may be the light bulbs I'm using...will check those first next time I practice.

Day 7 of 365

I've been wanting to incorporate the old rope climb into a photo for quite some time but haven't figured out a good way to do it. I think a foggy day may be better and then some post processing into B&W would get the mood I'm looking for. However it was neither foggy nor can I do any post processing for this project.

Day 6 of 365

I've had three pieces of white foam poster boards out in the garage for a month now fully intending on making a light box according to the specs found in this article from StudioLighting.net. After work today I stopped at the nearby Target and bought a six pack of Fat Tire beer and came home and proceeded to build it. One beer later I had a homemade light box. Have three cheap work lights from Home Depot and find I need one more so off to the store tomorrow.

So I have a light box and lights. What to use as my baseline project? Ah...a pair of moccasins I wore as a kid...like almost 40 years ago. For any of you that may be reading this and thinking I have some kind of shoe fetish...not at all. I mean I do enjoy having a few pairs of John Fluevogs, which does make me much cooler than most, but not a shoe fetish...honest :)

I have several art projects of my wifes to photograph so the light box will come in real handy. Lighting has been a frustration for me so this photograph is my baseline and from here I hope to get better.

Day 5 of 365 - Rituals

As I'm learning with photography there is a certain amount of ritual involved with taking a picture. You find your subject, move around it looking for the best spot to shot from, choose your ISO, check your white balance, decide if you want aperture priority or shutter priority, decide on those settings, frame the shot in the camera, recheck all these settings and then, just maybe, you're ready to press the shutter release. I'm sure I've left steps out but I don't feel like having my wife dictate while I verbally run through my checklist with my camera in hand.

I was thinking about what I wanted to shot today and since it was a rainy miserable day outside decided to do something inside. I was looking at my old boots and thought they really need a good polish. In the military there are a number of rituals, some meaningful, others mundane but worthy since it keeps you from getting yelled at. One ritual you learn very early on in your military career is one of spit and polish.

These old boots need some spit and shine...much like my photography skills. A little polish buffed to a nice sheen with a brush will do but for the real shine I'm going to need a little elbow grease. It's going to take putting some polish on a soft damp rag and working methodically in small circles until I can see my reflection. That's what I'm working for...ritual.

Day 4 of 365 - 'Sketch Day'

As I was leaving to go out and run a few errands and to take my daily photo my wife asked me if I needed my boots as I was walking out the door. I told her I thought I'd give the boots a break on Sundays. She replied with "Sundays will be aboot something else". Heh...something about the way some Canadians say about just gives me the giggles.

I took a weekend photography class recently and the instructor gave us the opportunity to bring in some of our work and he would review it. The instructor, Dennis High, happens to be the former executive director/curator of the Center for Photographic Art in Carmel-by-the-Sea and is a national portfolio reviewer. I was a little hesitant to show some of my stuff since I really haven't been doing this that long but I printed out a few of my photos and brought them in. It turned out to be a great learning experience and he gave me some homework. The homework was to take my camera out and sketch. Just turn my brain off and point the camera at different things and take pictures. Much as a painter or sketch artist would do to warm up before putting paint on a canvas or going into detail work. Just take pictures. So today I just went out and took pictures. No props, no setup, no trying to find the best vantage point.

Since I do need to post one of the pictures I took I had my wife pick out the one she found the most interesting. The rest will go into a folder that I will look at at a later date.

What Dennis is trying to get me to do with the sketching is to discover the energy or emotion behind the picture taking. The funny thing is I had taken a drawing class years ago and at the beginning of each class one person would model and the rest of us would do quick line sketches of the person in which we were trying to show motion or the energy of their body. I didn't quite get it then but at this point in my life I think I understand now...now I just need to put into practice.

Day 2 of 365

I had to scramble this morning to get out of the house before it started raining. Thankfully I only live 5 minutes from the location I wanted to use today. The shot location is a raised platform about 5 feet high with stairs leading up past the first aid cross. The platform has a railing all around it so there was some difficulty keeping the rails out of the shot as I leaned into the platform to take the shot. I was hoping for a little more bokeh blurriness between the boots and the red cross but I was using my kit 18-55mm lens that doesn't have a very low f/stop rating. I'm looking at getting a 50mm 1.4 (maybe) or 1.8 (most likely) here soon which will help with the look I'm going for in this shot.

Lesson learned:

• I'm not sure if it was the white balance (I used the cloud setting) or I needed to work with my shutter speed as the shot seems flat.