Point and Pray Photography

Audrey's Little Man

 

Jim and I got to babysit Logan for a few hours this weekend. I haven't seen much of him in the last month since I've been on the road for work ... and I'm simply stunned by how freaking big he's gotten. At almost nine months, he weighs 25 pounds and looks like he's more along the lines of 18 months. He's crawling all over the place, and it won't be long before he's pulling himself up and walking.

I had Jim sit with his back to an open window and put Logan on his lap, while I stood behind them and took some pictures. I just love natural lighting!

Shot with fixed 50mm f/1.4 Nikkor lens (I am absolutely in love with this lens!); 1/50s at f/3.2, ISO 200.

Art Deco Details

 

This is the second year we've held a meeting at the Cincinnati Hilton Netherland Plaza. There is an overwhelming amount of stuff to see (and shoot) in this historic hotel.

 

The literature says it's decorated in the 1930's French Art Deco style.

 

What I see is a lot of brass, a lot of marble, a lot of mirrors...

  

...and these intricate wood carvings.  You'll find them near the ceiling (being used as moulding) as well as on decorative pillars.

  

This was the perfect opportunity for me to eschew flash and put my new-found manual-shooting-skills to the test. I shot these with my newest lens: a 50mm that will shoot as low as a delicious f/1.2.

 

This could easily become my favorite lens for shooting everything except children. I spent a lot of time thinking about how to frame each of these photos ... all of which are SOOC (straight out of camera).

 

What a beautiful little slice of history. 

Rats with wings

I hate birds. Especially seagulls. It's like the pelican said in Finding Nemo - "They're rats with wings." 

 

But that didn't stop me from spending a good 20 minutes photographing them on the pier in San Diego last week.

 

I'm finding my camera to be a safe barrier behind which I can examine all sorts of things I dislike or which frighten me.

  

With my trusty 70-300mm Tamron, I had a good view of these babies without having to get any closer than absolutely necessary.

 

From this distance I can actually appreciate their grace, and the beauty of the light filtering through their feathers.

 

As long as they're not dive-bombing my head, I'm okay. A telephoto lens is a beautiful thing...

Shot in daylight using 70-300mm lens at f/5.6 and ISO 400.

Final Preparations

 

I caught this moment at our San Diego Dealer Meeting, early in the morning as the first presenter of the day was walking the stage. Angela was mentally preparing herself for the crowd of 400 that would soon come streaming into the hotel ballroom. From a photography/technical standpoint, there are a number of things I can spot I should have done differently, but as a speaker, something about this shot touches me on a visceral level. The warmth of the stage lights, the rows upon rows of soon-to-be-filled chairs ... I've been in that moment so many times over the past several years, and as a speaker, it's one that you yearn for. It means all your preparation, all your rehearsal, all your work is about to come to fruition. There's such energy in that moment...

Shot with Nikon D200 using 70-300mm lens; 1/30s at f/8 and ISO 1600.

Sibling Revelry

 

Believe it or not, this is a fairly candid moment between this brother-sister pair that captures the love and affection they share.

All boy

 

This little man is definitely all boy, full of those silly, goofy smiles that drive his mother crazy when she tries to take his photo. I didn't have the right words for it when we did our joint photo shoot, but afterwards, as I looked through the shots I caught that afternoon, I figured it out.

 

Those faces, those silly looks, are totally him, as he is right now. Sure, it's not a traditional portrait smile, but I think these photos capture so much more of his personality because of those goofy grins.

 

In fact, I think that's one of the reasons I love shooting photos of infants and children - more so than adults. Kids are authentic. They haven't yet learned all the internal self-dialogue that happens when someone points a camera at you. (Omigosh, my hair's a mess, I'm going to look so fat, I hate my teeth, I wish I had her nose, or his smile, or...)

 

They don't know they should be anything except themselves. That's a beautiful thing, and it's a privilege to capture.

This last shot is one of my favorites. With older children, I try to get them talking, telling me about their favorite things, or what they did that day. This little guy was quite the storyteller, and it made for a terrific shot that captures his fiery spirit.  Now that's cool.

Natural Beauty

 

I had the chance to shoot this sweet girl and her brother several weeks ago. Their mom is a friend I hadn't seen in a while, and she asked me to share a few of my photography "secrets". We figured a joint photo shoot would be a good way to do that ... but I didn't really think I had much in the way of "secrets" to share.

 

They say the best way to confirm you understand something is to teach someone else ... and boy, is that true! Trying to find the right words to describe re-setting your AF focal point, and seeing what it does to your photo based on your aperture settings; that was a bit of a challenge for me!

 

We hit the light at just the right time...  "magic hour" as they call it. I was entranced by the way the setting sun kissed those sweet cheeks and made her hair look like it was on fire.

 

And her mama chose that dress perfectly; I love the way it matches her beautiful blue eyes!

  

And those freckles. SO sweet.