Category: Photography

This weekend I tried something new in my photography adventure. I recently got a soft light box and wanted to practice lighting from different angles and work on a technique that has never been a part of my toolbox.

I think some of the pictures came out okay. I definitely need to practice. I decided to use things that we had around the house to use as subjects. Initially, I tried to use Julianne as a model but she would not stop moving. She is a great model, but has trouble focusing sometimes. The models I used today were much easier but I have to say that taking photographs of people and landscapes are still my favorite subjects.

It was definitely a challenge to get things set up and then constantly tweaking it to get things lined up just for one shot.  Moving things a little bit at a time just to get the the light hitting the model at the right spot.  As difficult as that was, it was even harder to get the entire model in focus.  At higher apertures I had to use slower shutter speeds (obviously) but still had difficulty getting the whole model in focus.  So I  started using the Speedlight to get some filler light. Which in some cases made the backdrop look like stars, an unintended but cool effect.

Next I want to experiment with focus stacking as well as just practice my focus technique.  Until next time.

Today Julianne and I went on a day hike to the Santa Rosa Plateau to get some fresh air and take some pictures.  This is something that I have wanted to do for a while now but either ran out of time or it was way to hot.  Today was beautiful.  It was cool and there was a very nice breeze, plus the cloud cover made for some great light for the photos.

We went out from the South Trailhead and went about 2 miles toward the old ranch.  We did not quite make it all the way to the ranch but did see some awesome views along the way.  As expected this time of the year it was extremely dry and the grass was a very interesting shade of gray.

I hope that you enjoy the photos, there are some new ones in the Landscape and Black and White galleries as well.

Last night was a little special since it was an October Harvest moon.  That is the closest full moon to the fall equinox.  It occurs about 1 in 4 times, normally the harvest moon is in September.  I decided to walk out to a field not far from the house and see if I could get some good pictures.

My photography assistant was Julianne and we had a very nice time talking about the moon and watching it rise.

It got to be much brighter later in the evening but we only shot the moon rise.

This morning on my walk at sunrise would have been a great time to shoot as the moon was still very bright in the sky.  I think that may be my next post.

The solar eclipse turned out great.  Even though we only saw about 61% of the sun get covered by the moon it was still really neat.  The solar filter that I made worked great, but I was only able to make one for 70-300mm.  I attempted one for the GoPro that probably was not necessary, but it did not work out and I did not want to risk using the video camera without one.

The kids did have school today, unfortunately, so they were not home to see it live, but I will be sharing the photos with them as soon as they get home.  I hope that they at least talked about it at school and maybe watched it with a viewer.

So today I was able to test out my homemade solar lens filter. I got very lucky and was able to get some photo quality solar sheets from a telescope manufacturer in Illinois called Astro-Physics.  I followed and modified some instructions I found here.

I took some test photos, just to make sure it works and see what kind of pictures I can expect to get.

I am going to try to build a second one for my 28-135mm lens and maybe one for the GoPro and see if I can take a timelapse video.

Pretty excited to see it even though it will only be about 66% here in Southern California.

So I have been going through some of my old photos, reorganizing and sorting them and came across some that I wanted to post. 

I sorted them into black and white and landscape. I am not sure why but I have a fondness for black and white photography.  The landscapes are a new thing for me.  Still learning how to get a good shot.

Black and White

Landscape