Color-work

Just a cool scene from my every-day life while coming and going to and from studio...
The spray room.
Caution: Toxic.


Talk about looking superimposed! By playing with the levels in photoshop I was able to make some of the colors really pop. While I wasn't initially happy wiht the yellowy color of the walls, as it is not the natural state, it works because the photo is meant to portray the chaos of this space and plain white may have given it a "cleaner" look.

FOCUS! Artsy attempt in studio

So--I definitely like the 2nd shot better...because you can read dave even though he is out of focus, but I'm kind of unhappy with the color quality...it read much better in RAW than it does after being changed to JPEG.

Another critique from the assignment was to include more of the headphones next time so that the viewer isn't kept guessing...I suppose the mystery was what I thought made it artsy. Just something to think about.

pryz take 1

Long SS shot (as demonstrated by the ghosted figure)

Despite the rather nice coloring, we're always taught to check out the b/w version for composition as well as to see if it might end up an even better shot.

Lastly I went into the RAW image and played with the exposure and contrast settings (increasing the exposure and slightly increasing the contrast). I like how this image, though not as balanced as the previous, creates a surreal view that highlights the lines and structure instead of the overall view/experience.

Night of the frozen tundra...Basilica shots

A slightly off-angled shot of the tower and side-entry roof

A better composition, but flushed out a little.



The side entry. I like the colors--the iso settings allow us to get more light into the camera even though its nighttime. This is really close to the reality of the lighting here.

At the suggestion of some of my classmates, I attempted a zoomed-in view. Unfortunately I was too cold to have control over my fingers enough to change to my zoom lens to make it really worthwhile.

Layer Masks for Effect

Trying to find an interesting way of highlighting my friend for her senior game.

#

This one is awkward because it's just her jersey, and it contrasts a lot with the shorts...maybe I should have tried the entire uniform instead.

I think this one turned out alright. Is the contrast between the color and b/w too intense?

Original, before being desaturated

roundin' out the weekend at the court

I like that even though the ref is in the frame foreground, the focus remains on the action beyond him.

This is right up there with the tip-off shot from my last post for best shot from the weekend. This one has the 2/3 rule, she's running into the frame, freeze-action, good positioning...yeah.

B-Ballin'

Caught the ref...but I think the subject is clear not only from her foreground positioning, but her posture and gesture as well.

A good freeze-motion for the sake of stopping time...not necessarily overall composition...cropping?

I have an affinity for this shot. I think it's one of the better ones from the weekend, and it may just be the proximity of the players as well as their positioning. It almost looks like we're on the court and she's going to pass it toward the camera.

My favorite of the weekend. Hands down.

Even with the ref, the positioning of the bodies and the freeze-action of the shutter speed make me feel like I was able to accomplish my goal of really catching a moment in action.

Pre-Game motion

I caught this image without the typical blur-motion of the ball or the subject...if only it was a second sooner so it didn't appear at first glance to be resting on the floor!

This one is better. I tried to go with the walking into the frame idea and it works because of her body positioning. I also caught the motion, which is the overall goal of the weekend of basketball shots.

once again 2/3, running into the center of the frame. If i were to crop at all, it would be to focus on the subject to get a glimpse of her facial expression. The excitement is priceless.

Stop/go action...Basketball take 1

These are a few from a series of shots that I took in Rochester, NY at one of my friends' basketball games. The whole weekend of pictures was basically dedicated to attempting to work with the shutter speed and sports mode to catch the dynamic aspect that is inherent to sports. This can be captured by the freeze or the blurred motion...which I captured both of at one point or another. Each one has something that I liked, while there also always seems to be something that I want to change.

Could easily be cropped, but unfortunately I'll lose the ball, which is the focus of the players in the shot.

Could be cropped for better composition.

not happy with my positioning and that bar.

continued.

and more of the freeze and go motion.

Long exposure for pure motion...which also led to blurred lines from lack of tripod.

Stop-action.

Almost all of them are in freeze but the ball is blurred...darn. This image is pretty distracting on top of that, because of the colors, banners, lines, and multiple subjects...

This is one of my favorites on the day. It portrays exactly what is happening in the pick-play due to the motion shown in the shot. If I were to change it, I'd create a layer to "burn" (darken) the lit sign in the background because I feel like it takes away the focus from the play.

I caught the girl in the center of the action frozen in the frame, while the rest of the team is in motion around her. This was one of the best shots like this because the bench and the coach are also in freeze, to add to the overall difference between the action and still.

Here I caught one player's body in freeze and the other in motion attempting to drive past half-court. I was originally happier with this shot than I am now. I think it is the overall composition, which will probably be helped with some cropping--too much noise in the background.

Unfortunately I have this bar in the foreground of many of the images, which I may eventually crop for a better composition. I really like how the image is almost completely out of focus with the exception of the one girl at the center left of the image who just stole the ball. The only thing I wish could change is the blur of the ball. If both the player and the ball were caught in still--I think it would add a lot to the focal point.

I was working a ton with the shutter speed, and the sports mode trying to capture the motion like we were trying to in previous classes. I think this one is pretty successful at the stop-action, with only a little bit of blurring in the furthest players.

So I wasn't thinking much of this shot, until I took a second look. I guess because of the depth of field, the team in the foreground is mostly crisp while the team in the background is blurred even though they are right next to each other.

Layer masks and channel mixers

Adjusting colors within a layer in photoshop, I was able to achieve an image similar to those in old scrapbooks that have a reddish tint to them. This was accomplished by adjusting the red layer in the channels of the image.




I'd like to do more with black and white images where one portion is colored, or maybe one portion shows just certain colors. By duplicating layers, creating a hue/saturation layer, and desaturating the top layer, a layer mask can be added and by painting black over the hue/saturation layer, you can reveal the layer below (the original color photo). In this way I was able to make Pete black and white, and leave the "Flavor Burst" water bright and colorful.

a little bit of tom foolery

This was just some fooling around:

The first has an interesting color balance, while the second is a fun attempt at extreme zoom, achieved by removing our lens, reversing it, and taking a photo (being sure not to have the lens removed when the camera is on of course, as it would lead to magnetic charge and collect dust inside).

at the request for more work with motion...

I did some extra work on movement: both freeze-action and streaked...


Here are a few pics of Adam with a slower shutter speed, which also explains the brightness of the images since more light is allowed in. The majority of his movement is in his hands, but since I didn't have a means of holding the camera completely still, there is a bit of blur in the rest of the image as well.



In these, I just asked Adam to wave his arm around to see if I had a shutter speed slow enough to allow enough light in (which was a problem for me previously), and fast enough to avoid streaking. It worked. Still a little darker than I would have liked.

freeze-motion and cotton-candy effect

So...as Matt has already pointed out I need to work on this with the camera. We were SUPPOSED to work with our shutter speed and aperture in order to show motion in two separate ways...so here is attempt number one:


Cotton Candy-effect...showing motion with a slower shutter speed in order to allow the object to blur itself with the long exposure. With water, it tends to cause the "cotton candy effect" where the water blends and looks stringy.


This is the attempt at freeze-motion...where you have objects at rest, and something in motion that you capture with a quick shutter-speed so that you basically freeze time. I thought that pouring water might be a good way to show this since I had already tried the cotton candy, and we intuitively understand that water being poured is in motion...but it didn't have a super-effective outcome...so I need to work on this for next week.

I DID find the faucet reflection pretty interesting, though...so I cropped it out and threw it up here just for fun.