Sunnyvale, CA near Lockheed Martin.
Prohibited
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Utah or Bust!
I had an incredible time in Utah at iStock’s Utahlypse event. Basically, a convention of sorts for iStock contributors from all over. Three days of shooting, talking and hanging out. I met so many wonderful people and had such an incredible time.
Driving back I covered three states in one day and stopped briefly in Bonneville for some photos.
Very memorable time and I got many, many great images for stock along the way. I thought a lot about my journey in photography. How starting out so long ago, my photography was aimless and without purpose. I took photos of what interested me– how I saw the world. Unfortunately I couldn’t make much money doing what I loved so I had to reconcile my love of photography with making money along the way. I still shoot photos of what I love and I think my stop in Bonneville attests to that.
KISS
Nope, not the on the cheek, lips or even the French variety. Not the band either although that would be pretty sweet.
It stands for keeping it simple … stupid.
I had a teacher in j-school. That used to say that all the time. He was big on acronyms, CAR (Computer Assisted Reporting), KISS, FAQ, etc.
As photographers we sometimes try to overdo things when we really should be keeping it simple. The photo of Nico was shot on my bedspread, after I changed him out of his Canary-yellow pjs into a white outfit, knowing it would look good on the bed. The lighting was even simpler, a single light pointed up at the ceiling, directly behind him, adding a bit of back-lighting.
Kiss indeed.
Center for Youth Development Through Law
Happy Birthday Micah
Taking photos with just a 50mm in midday sun only at f1.2 is something everyone should try at least once or if you’re like me all the time!
The shallow depth of field not only makes the challenging that much more challenging, but it also can lead to beautiful, shallow depth of field images.
Young and Hip
Had a good shoot at Salesforce.com (the cloud computing company) that was all about fresh out of college grads hitting the workforce with nothing but gusto and the mantra of “It’s our time now.”
Moving Along
Moved my blog here to its new home at WordPress.com. Now I am able to take advantage of increased functionality by being able to post much larger images on the feed in addition to many other “bells and whistles.”
If you have an iStock account or are in the market for stock photography, clicking through the ad on the right rail will enable you get a free 10 credits when purchasing select credit packages.
Archive-John Denver 1995
The first State of the World Forum was held in San Francisco in October 1995 at the historic Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco.
It’s All in the Details
Edited
I bought a set of genuine handcuffs from Amazon.com and had a guy paint them with the stars and stripes. I then set up a white, tabletop studio-shot. Lighting was one main diffused light on camera right and two small diffused lights, camera rear, pointing back at the cuffs.
The real work began once the photo was shot. Moderate processing, consisting of a slight levels bump. The big deal was lack of contrast. By far the biggest pain was the amount of cloning needed. Small flaws in the paint required a tremendous amount of touch up. The area where the chain links rubbed together were the worst. Red paint was mixed with the blue and vice versa, making that section look muddied and worn. Stars were retouched as well.
The final step was to create a path around the handcuffs to mask the background 100 percent white and lastly add in a drop shadow.
I didn’t log the amount of time this image took, but it was a lot. Needless to say I haven’t even made back the cost of paying the guy to paint the cuffs. However, I do feel it was worth it in processing experience alone. I was able to hone a few techniques on path creation, masking and cloning. And that has made a world of difference in other illustrations.
Unedited
Liberty
“No one aspires as a child to grow up and enter into a domestic partnership. But they do aspire as children to grow up and be married.” –Ted Olson, attorney
