02-04-13 A Favorite of Mine

I like this photo so much I may have already posted it, though I'm guessing it is a color version. Though the colors are good in the original, there is something about this soft sepia version that I like. Of course, what makes this a good portrait is the subject, who is every bit as real, pleasant and happy as this photo implies.Incidentally, I write about this photo, as well as others, on my "Better Photography Blog." Just click here.Canon 5D 1/160s f/8.0 ISO100 67mm

02-03-13 Death Star?

This photo is the result of a totally serendipitous process. I have been playing with a Canon Speedlight and a Canon infrared trigger (the ST-E2) off and on for the last few days. I have also been using a snoot to focus the light on macro subjects. I started with the Christmas cactus I photographed in natural light a few days ago. I then moved to a freshly printed dollar, thinking that bright, focused, angular light might result in something cool. (It didn't). And then, just a short time ago, I went prowling for something with shape and texture and I found a Shure microphone I just happened to have lying on my den floor. (Why? You ask. There's no good answer for that question other than there are a lot of things on my den floor.)And this is the result. I like the picture but, as I've often said, that doesn't mean it's a good picture. What I like, though, is that I think I've made a fairly usual thing look interesting because of the the point of view and, more importantly, the way I've used light. The other thing I like is that I used a iPad mini box as a reflector on the right side of the subject. Beyond that, my "studio" is nothing special in this photo. In fact, here's what the shot set-up looks like:There really was as much ambient light in the room as you see in the snap shot. The reason everything besides the microphone is so dark in the final photo is that the Speedlight was bright, it was very close to the the microphone and the light was focused by the snoot.Canon 5DIII 1/60s f/9.0 ISO200 100mm

02-02-13 Morning Sky

This photo found me. I was heading west yesterday morning to run an errand on the way to work and I noticed nice, soft blue and scarlet hues in the western sky. Thinking that I might have a good sky to drop in to a photo that has I less interesting sky, I took this photo.I really wasn't thinking that the photo would stand on its own, but when I worked on it in Aperture 3.4, and with Nik HDR Efex 2, I decided I liked it.

02-01-13 Captain Shep

On a day when the wind chills have dipped to -42 degrees centigrade, I'm left dreaming of warmer climates. This photo was taken last June in the British Virgin Islands, where it rarely dipped below 75 degrees. And that's our son, Jon, at the wheel.

01-31-13 A New Arrival!

Wow! Yet another "How To Be A Better Photographer" blog??!!! Yes. The story is that a year ago, after assigning a blog project to my Social Media Marketing students, I decided to create a blog that does something different than this one: I use explicit teaching tactics rather than the subliminal ones I use here. (You didn't know that I was often secretly trying to educate you?)And so (a year later!) I have launched "The Better Photography" blog. My mission is to teach and enlighten and, from time to time, to talk in more technical detail about how I create the photos that show up here. So how about visiting my new blog? And you really should subscribe to it because it won't be quite as regular and this one. What? You haven't subscribed to this one yet? Just go to the bottom on this page and put your email address in the blank provided. No obligations. And you can cancel at any time.

01-30-13 Christmas In January

This cactus lives on a shelf in our main bathroom and during much of the year it just sits there. But once a year, spurred on by forces a photographer like me could never comprehend, it blooms.And when I went into the bathroom a few minutes ago, I wasn't thinking about macro photography. But I couldn't ignore the blooms, which were backlit by soft sunlight filter through thin clouds in the winter sky. And so I abandoned my original mission, and got my camera.Incidentally, this is a Christmas cactus, but given that it is January 30, I think this one is a bit of a nonconformist.Canon 5DIII 1/60s f/4.0 ISO1600 100mm

01-28-13 Orientation

I couldn't resist posting one more High Art Museum (Atlanta) interior. Like the other one, I think that this photo shows one of the reasons I like most art museums: there is great light and warm wooden floors (that often creak when you walk on them.)

01-25-13 Stand Out

This is deja vu all over again, given that I have already posted an HDR photo of this tree. I moved closer to the tree for this shot and I used a slightly different HDR process to make this picture. And Monet painted the same thing over and over and look where it got him. . . .

01-24-13 Self Portrait With Red Chair and Wooden Thing

Am I reaching a bit too far down into the barrel to have something to post today? I'm not answering that question.

01-23-13 Threesome

Here are three of my Lake Area Technical Institute photo/media students taking photo at the Coke Museum in Atlanta. I enjoyed our visit to the museum, though I think it is interesting that throngs of people (like us) are willing to pay Coca Cola Company $16 to be immersed in a giant advertisement. America: it's a great country.Canon 5DIII 1/400s f/10.0 ISO1600 22mm

01-22-13 The Promised Land

On the night before he was assassinated in Memphis, TN, Martin Luther King, Jr., addressed a small group of people. And in that speech he said

“Like anybody, I would like to live a long life--longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now… I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land.”

The cause he was in Memphis to help further was a strike by the newly formed Sanitation Workers Union, who were working to get better pay and improved working conditions. One of the signs that the strking workers carried said, "I am a man."Yesterday, as I returned to my hotel, I rounded the corner on to Peachtree Street in downtown Atlanta and encountered the Martin Luther King Day Parade. It was an eclectic affair, comprised of groups representing the Girl Scouts, the Boy Scouts, the "Free Tibet" movement. And many more.The group photographed here carried replica signs that copied and extended the message of the Memphis sanitation workers union: "I am still a Man."On the day after a black man took the oath of office for the presidency of the United States, I am left thinking about "the promised land." No, America isn't the promised land and I don't think Barack will lead us there. But I believe we have moved much closer to the promise that the US holds for all of its citizens.Two days ago, I gave up my seat at the front of the bus to an elderly black woman, who smiled pleasantly at me as she sat. I was not trying to make a statement. I was not thinking about race. I was only doing what was right. Today, I realize that perhaps my act stands as a small symbol of the promise King spoke about the night before he died.

01-21-13 Peace and Quiet

Today's image was taken only a short time after yesterday's and yet they seem to me to be a world apart. And, frankly, I enjoy the world depicted in this photo.This photo was taken at the High Art Museum of Atlanta and I was lucky enough to visit shortly after it opened on a Saturday morning. And for much of the time I was there, I had several of the galleries to myself, including this one of the top floor of the main wing.There is a juxtaposition of warm and cool tones in this photo, accentuated by the way my camera sees light. The wood floor is very warm of course, but the ceiling light (which is daylight) is obviously blue. Did the designers of this space consider this? I would guess they did . . .