South Florida Flickr Meetup

Yesterday was the Flickr photo walk I'd been waiting for. It was a blast. More than ten of us got together to shoot up the Las Olas river front.



Thanks to Anna for taking a kickass group shot!



We shot everything. Skateboarders, models in bikinis, trains, even on railroad tracks. Then we finished up the night with a couple of brews and burritos at T-Mex (formerly San Loco).

I was using a lot of off-camera flash yesterday. Inspired by the works of Dustin Diaz, I wanted to try and get a shot where my main subject was illuminated without blowing out the background. It took some doing to get the right exposure, but I was rewarded with these two shots:




Also, Suhey and I started taking a photo class yesterday. It deals mainly with photo composition. Our first assignment is to take 40 black and white pictures. One of these pictures will be presented in class next week. I made sure to take several black and whites at the walk last night. Almost all of them used flash. I like the way it gives skin a silky texture.



After the sun went down, we broke out the tripods.



But there was still enough light for handheld shots by the fountain.



Yesterday was more fun than I'd had in a long time. It was a long day, but definitely one I wouldn't mind repeating. I hope to see more of my new friends from Flickr. Social networks are a lot more fun when ya get to meet new people!

Click here for all the pictures from yesterday's shoot.

An Incredible Backlog

I haven't been twiddling my thumbs since July. No, I've been out taking pictures. That's no excuse for not posting, but at least there's a good amount of things to blog about. Much of my work is on Flickr already. All I need to do now is select the best pictures to highlight, write some copy, and viola! New blog post.

I'll start with the most recent event, the TNF 10-year anniversary.


My pal Ralph came down from DC for this one. He, his brother and a couple of other folks were the originators of the idea. Tuesday Night Football grew from a few highschool buddies and coworkers into a big group of football junkies.

Throughout the years, many faces came and went. (I was one of the ones who went.) But for the anniversary, plenty of old friends stopped in for a few yards in the celebratory game.


I shot most of the game with my Nikon 55-200. My only wish is that I had a longer lens. A 300, 2.8 would be nice. Yeeeaaah. But until then, I make do.

Lighting was pristine. It was late afternoon and the sun was starting to set. Aside from the MS150, I really haven't photographed many other sporting events. It's definately an aquired skill. The trick is thinking ahead of the game. You can't photograph where the ball is. You photograph where the ball is going to be.

This is where looking through the camera with both eyes open is useful. You can follow the movement of the players with the lens and keep an eye on the QB with your other eye.

This technique takes some getting used to. He'll, I'm still not used to it. The idea is an adaptation from when I was a videographer. I worked weddings and my mentor at the time told me to shoot with both eyes open. By doing this, I could keep tabs on what was going on around me and react to shoot something important that might spontaneously happen.


Click here to see more pictures from that day on Flickr.

Rusted and Broken

In my quest to rediscover Florida I've come across some interesting finds. At the top of that list is ghost towns. Now, I'm not talking about Wild West-era saloons and banks. No, most of these communities were old plantations and factories long lost to the wet, humid Florida climate.

This weekend I visited Bean City and Byant. Both towns are located in Central Florida near Clewiston. There wasn't much to see at Bean City. Only two houses remained on what looked like private farmland. The houses there are circa 1930s, one still looks to be inhabited while the other has been abandoned for years. Here's a shot of the abandoned shack:



The real prize for the weekend was waiting in Byant. It was newer, but still made for some great pictures. I'm talking about the old U.S. Sugar factory that now serves as a parking lot for oversized John Deere tractors. Lucky for me someone left the gate unlocked. I was able to sneak in and take a closer look at the factory. Built in 1972, the site was recently abandoned in 2007.





Here are some pictures from outside:







And lets not forget all the pictures I took on and off US-27 on my way to the sites:









All-in-all a great weekend. I think I'm going to continue on this ghost town kick. There's still a few more to visit in South and Central Florida. After that, I'm going to have to travel North to Jacksonville where many of the other sites are located.

Wireless Flash Triggers

Wow, over a month since my last post. Where does the time go? I've taken some time off from photography to pursue other interests, like doing nothing. Shooting for an entire day every weekend gets tiring! But it's time to get back behind the viewfinder.

I didn't take a complete break from photography this last month. About three weeks ago, I received my new wireless flash triggers from Hong Kong. They're no Pocket Wizards, but for $50 you can't ask for much. I got two receivers and one transmitter from Yongnuo Digital. They were friendly and had excellent customer service for a store so far, far away.

The remote triggers I purchased run off a standard CR2 battery. Unlike other reviews I read online, which said the batteries that came with the units had no charge, my batteries were fresh and still encased in plastic. Those two lithium CR2s are still powering my triggers after three hour-long photo shoots. Not bad I'd say. My results with the triggers were consistent. One out of every five or six shots might misfire and not sync correctly with the camera's shutter. This isn't a problem for me, since I'm still in the early stages of experimentation with studio photography.

One of the things I didn't like about the units is the Nikon-specific receivers only work with Nikon. Since these triggers don't support TTL and only have a basic flash firing pin, I thought any flash would work. However, I found my Pentax AF540FGZ would fire with the Nikon flash, but not in time to appear on the actual picture. It must fire just slightly after or before my shutter, because my subjects are consistently missing illumination from the side of the Pentax flash. I've tried using the flash's various sync modes to no avail. I've also tried changing my camera's shutter speed. No dice. Now, swap the Pentax flash out for an SB-800 and the triggers work like a charm!

However, I'm very satisfied with my initial results with wireless flash photography. I just ordered and umbrella and mounting bracket from Adorama to help me diffuse the hard light I got with the picture on the left. Can't wait until they arrive!





At this time I'd like to give a shoutout to my girlfriend Ileana. Twice she's been my patient model while I snap pictures of her, tell her to wait, adjust my flashes and take more pictures. You're a trooper babe, gracias! Here are the rest of the pictures I took at two shoots I did with her.

Conflicted

I have the photography bug. Two months ago, all I had was a prosumer Sony DSC-H1 and a dated Pentax ME Super. Now, I have a Nikon D60 and a Pentax ist D. This creates somewhat of a conundrum. Pentax or Nikon? Which brand do I want to lead me into the world of professional photography?

It's obvious Nikon and Canon are the standards out there. Pentax only serves a niche clientele, but I love the loyalty they have to their customers. You won't see a Nikon camera today that is reverse compatible with ALL Nikon lenses. No, Nikon's in it for the cash. I'm sure Pentax is too, but they approach it differently. I'll never get over the fact I can use Pentax's first-ever line of manual lenses with any of their new DSLRs.

Another plus for Pentax is the low cost. For the quality you get from their lenses, you can't beat the price. Even accessories are cheaper. Take flashes for example. A top-of-the-line Pentax flash cost me $307. The mid-range Nikon Flash cost me $300. 'Nuff said.

On the downside, Pentax has no full-frame cameras. That poses a problem for me in far-far future. Unless the new K7 that comes out in five days is full-frame, then it's problem solved.

Decisions decisions...

2009 South Florida MS 150 Bike Ride

As I shoot more and more, I notice a collection of folders are building on my desktop. They're from events, parties, nights on the town, all unprocessed photos waiting to be converted from RAW and touched up.

Now I see why it takes Rigo so long to get photos, they build up.

Another thing that builds up is sleep loss. I think I've been averaging five to six hours a night thanks to my new photographic habit. "Oh, I can edit a few images before bed," I tell myself. Then, before I know it, it's midnight. My wake up call is 5 a.m.

Well this weeks cause for sleep deprivation was the MS150 Bike Ride. It's a 150-mile ride from Miami to Key Largo to benefit the South Florida Chapter of the Multiple Sclerosis Society. It was a great experience to shoot this event, the riders were very willing to take their pictures. And to purchase them later too. This is the first event I've shot where I actually make money. Woo hoo!

But lets start at the beginning. Rigo approached me with shooting this ride a couple of months ago because he'd done the ride before. I thought it would be a great experience, so he approached the ride's organizing committee. It wasn't a bad experience dealing with them, but they were VERY unorganized. We didn't get confirmation we could shoot the event until two days before. By then we'd already thought we weren't going to shoot it, so we weren't as prepared as we'd have liked to be.

Four in the morning was my wake-up call that morning. The early hours and I have become very well acquainted lately. I drove to Rigo's place and off we went to photograph the start line and everything that followed. I only shot Saturday, too exhausted from a long week to wake up that early on Sunday. Rigo pushed through and woke up Sunday too. In hindsight, I wish I'd gone with him. From his description, the riders were much more relaxed then.

Something else to mention. Near the end of the first day, Rigo and I met another photographer stationed at the end of the bridge on Cardsound road. We went over to talk to him and, according to him, he had exclusive rights to photograph the event and was wondering why we were shooting it. Needless to say Rigo and I were surprised to know that. We continued to talk with this gentleman and found out his name was Kim Morris, an accomplished sports photographer from Missouri.

The more we spoke, the more friendly he became. Kim even offered us some advice as aspiring photographers - don't become one. We laughed, recognizing that photography is definitely something you do because you love it, not because it pays the big bucks.

Here are some pictures I took that day:









To see the full Flickr set, go here.

To purchase photos, go here.

Shooting this event taught me a lot. Knowing from the start we were going to sell photos, I made sure to take lots of pictures of people's faces. I got that, and those photos did sell, but the picky perfectionist in me thought I should have gotten more of the prop. In this case, that prop is the rider's bike. Many times I just caught a handle bar or seat. Lesson learned.

I believe a good technique is to do what Kim did, stake out a spot, pick a good frame and shoot the riders one by one as they pass. Replicating similar shots for each photographer greatly increases the chances of them purchasing a photograph at the end of the event I think. So many of my shots didn't come out because I was moving around. On the other side of the coin, shooting like that makes everyone's picture unique, so maybe it's not such a bad idea...hhhmmm.

Oh, another thing (specifically for cycling events) is to have a sign saying, "hey your picture will be taken soon!" That way photographers know to be aware and put on a nice smile or some other pose.Both hands off the handle bar and a funny face seemed to be the favorite pose that day.

City Stroll and Other Stuff

Ok, first things first, I have a new desire. This. It's a 200mm Nikon lens that stops down to f2. CRAZY! Here's an example of the pictures it can take:

Of course a spectacular picture isn't just made by a lens, it's the setup too:

Tell me that's not insane?

Well, now that's off my chest, today Suhey and I ventured around Downtown Miami in search of some street photography. The last time we did this was about five or six years ago, so we revisited for old times sake. I think this time I took much better pictures. Here are some:


Like with most things in life, shooting the street is all about timing. For those two shots above, there's several that I missed. You just have to keep going I guess and remember to shoot first and ask questions later. I'll eventually get over my issue with photographing people. In this day of identity stealing, it seems that more folks are concerned with not being photographed. So what's a photographer to do? Put on a telephoto lens and shoot them from where they can't see! :)

Click here to view all the shots from that day.

I've also got to plug this AMAZING Thai place we ate at. It's called Thai Churo and it's near the Government Center in Downtown Miami. It's a hole in the wall. But everyone know's that's where to get the best meals, right? It's got excellent food and a awesomely friendly staff that waits on you hand and foot. Their red curry was the bomb! And for dessert we had this sticky rice with coconut sauce and mango. Mmm...makes me hungry just thinking about it! This is from the entrance to thier shop:

In other news, I did some more experimenting with HDR this week. With this picture of the 812 that I ride home in the evenings:

No tripod on this one, but the images were close enough together for Photoshop to recognize and realign them. Getting the shots taken was a bit of a pain. One of the complaints I have about the Nikon D60 is it's lack of exposure bracketing. While you can do this yourself, having to press buttons and finagle the camera increases the chances the shots you take aren't going to be similar enough. Oh, and setting the exposure compensation is a pain too. But that's what you get from a entry-level SLR. I only wish I'd had the money to spend on a D300!

That's it for this week. I'd say it was quite productive photographically, even if it was at the expense of sleep. I leave you with a great little Youtube tutorial from photographer Joe McNally who offers a nice tip for holing the camera. This is a trick for all you left-eye focusers our there. All the right eyes (like myself) can do this too. How do I do it? I look through my left and keep both eyes open (I can only close my left eye). That's a little trick I learned during a short time when I was a videographer for weddings. If you shoot with both eyes open, you maintain a better awareness of your surroundings and can easily adjust if you see something more cool happening somewhere else. It's a little disorienting at first, but becomes more natural with time.

OK, enough yapping from me. Now I present Mr. McNally:

Nikonical becomes Fotojunkee

This weekend I realized Nikonical is too limiting. Yes, I love my D60 to death, but there's more to photography than Nikon. For example, I just bought a new Pentax *ist D.

Well, "new" is a relative term. My *ist D is new to me, but the actual camera is about five years old. I purchased it on eBay last week for the bargain basement price of $223. Its purpose is to give use to several Pentax manual focus lenses I have from my ME Super. These lenses include:

• 28 mm F2.8 prime
  
• 50 mm F1.7 prime
  
• 135mm F5.0 prime
  
• 70-200mm F4.0

Who can leave lenses like that to waste? Not me, so bought a digital camera that would let me use them. The *ist D was Pentax's first foray into the digital world. Like most of Pentax's creations, it's superb. What amaxed me most about the *ist D is that it's a little smaller than my D60. In 2003, when it was first released, the *ist D was the smallest DSLR out there. It seems there's a chance it could still be the smallest.

When I went shooting this weekend, I used only the Pentax. Sure, it's only a 6MP camera, but that's more than enough to print excellent high-res pictures. Here are some from my weekend trip to the Biltmore Hotel:





Click here to see all the pictures I took.

I also employed a new post-processing technique this weekend called Tone Mapping. It mimics the appearance of an HDR image and does a lot to enhance the quality of a photograph. Here's the tutorial I used to learn.

The Fair! Be there!

Last night was my second round at the Miami-Dade County Youth Fair. It's been about ten years since I've attended. Nothing's changed. But this year I had a new perspective on it, a world brought into focus by my Nikkor lens. With my tripod slung around my back, my photographer friend Rigo and I set out to shoot.

Our first stop of the night had nothing to do with photography. I'd been craving Elephant Ears since the fair arrived. After carefully eating the fried treat, and trying desperately to keep the powered sugar from falling on my D60, we left to our next stop, the giant Ferris Wheel.

I've been wanting to make an HDR image for some time. When I saw the wheel, I thought this might be a good first try. I wanted to catch it in motion, so I set up my tripod and snapped away. Below are the resulting shots, compiled from five separate exposures each.



Right around the corner from the Ferris Wheel were the bumper cars. I tried some shots with my SB-600 trying to bounce off the rides ceiling. This didn't work out too well. Instead I decided to try a photographic technique called panning. Panning is when you shoot at slow shutter speeds while following the subject with your lens, resulting in a blurred background and in-focus subject. Easier said than done. I was very satisfied with my results at the bumper cars.


But not so happy with the shots I took at the neighboring merry go round.


I still like the photo, but wish the horse could be more in focus. It was a hard capture because I had to sync with the left and right motion of the plastic beast as well as its up and down movement.

That's about it. I wish I could have gotten more good shots, but not bad for the first time shooting at a fair I think. For the full set of pictures on Flickr, click here.

It's all about the light.

Because I work during the day, it's only logical many of my photographs are taken at night and indoors. Most of these pictures require flash. Until now I've been using my camera's on board flash in manual mode. I've also employed an aged Pentax AS200 F (pictured right) that worked with my old ME Super. Now that was an OLD unit. Because it wasn't compatible with my D60, I controlled the flash intensity by adjusting the f-stop and my distance from the subject. To achieve correct exposure, I had to go by a handy, dandy table on the back of the flash. The head on this unit didn't rotate, so to get bounce or diffusion I employed several forms of improvised engineering. Two of the more effective inventions are the use of an index card and rubber band or white plastic table cloth wrapped around the unit, also held in place by a rubber band.

As of yesterday, however, I have moved into the present. Gone are the times of manual flash! I am now the owner of a Nikon SB600! I haven't gotten to experiment fully with my new toy, but these preliminary pictures show some of its amazing awesomeness. Thank you Einstien for being such a patient and candid subject.

In love with a lens nearly twice my focal length

With a sightly modified line from that infamous Shabba Ranks song, I introduce you to my new love - the Nikon 50mm prime lens. This lens proves once and for all that the cliche "love is blind" isn't accurate. No, it's not blind, just out of focus.

A maximum aperture of 1.8 gives this lens a crazy awesome depth of field. I'll admit, at first, I was put off by its lilliputian appearance and stubbornness to see outside the 50 mm field of view. Yes, it seemed limiting. But I rather like that now. The large aperture helps me focus on what I really want to capture an brings out the detail in my world.

I <3 you Nikon 50mm. Soon you will be mine!

NOTE: For those curious few, the focal length of the human eye is around 22mm.

Fairchild Food and Garden Festival

When I moved back to Miami about a year ago, one of the first things I did was become a member of Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden. It costs me 80 bucks a year, but for that I get unlimited access to the fields of green and luscious plants 364 days a year (it's closed Christmas). Also included in membership is free admission to events like today's Food and Garden Festival, the scene of this week's photo project. Taking pictures at Fairchild is easy. There's no lack of subjects to photograph. Plants, people, insects, lizards, you name it and it's there. Only 5% of the park was explored today and still I got a bunch of neat shots. Photographing strangers is something I'm not entirely cool with yet. I love candid photos, like the one above, but taking them of people I don't know is tough. I used my monopod, continious shutter release and a spoonful of luck to get that shot. Spontanious photography is something I'd like to get better at. Quick snapshots on the street or something like that. Usually I just take pictures of inanimate objects. That's where I feel most comfortable, but we all need to leave our comfort zone sometime, right?


This week I've been learning the power of RAW images. Before I got the D60, all I shot in was JPEG. I'd heard of the wonder and magnificence of RAW, but not until now do I really understand. There's so much flexibility with it. And it helps a lot more in the post processing side of things. I don't know how I ever took pictures without it. Oh, a quick aside, while shooting today, my photographer friend Rigo and I ran into another pair of photographers who introduced me (Rigo already knew about it) to this thing called the Lensbaby. Check it out. There's some neat things it can do for a photograph. Much like a fisheye, it's a creative lens. Price tag isn't too expensive, so I might pick one up.


Anyway, today yielded many great shots. I'm finding it difficult to post just a few. Why not check them all out here instead? Most of the uploads are strait JPEG conversions from the RAW files, so the colors are off. I'll be fixing those little by little.

Andrew and Tiffany's Engagement

The best thing about having photographers for friends is free photo shoots. I was Facebooking my first weekend photo project when my gal pal Tiffany asked if I’d be interested in taking her engagement pictures. A nice joke, I thought. She wasn’t kidding.

Now, engagement photography scares the film out of some amateur photographers. Capturing the essence of love between two people you don’t know is difficult. My advantage is that I know the subjects, a glimmer of comfort for me, but I was still nervous. I wanted to deliver some spectacular shots for Tiff and Andrew.

Our shooting location was going to be West Palm Beach. I’d only been to their place once before at night, so I was unfamiliar with the area. But the beach was only blocks away. If no adequate outdoor backdrop could be found for their photos, the sand and sea would do nicely.

Google is every photographer’s friend. So I wouldn’t walk into the shoot completely blind, I did some homework. I’ll share what I found.

• Tips from Chris Maxwell
• A conversation on Photo.net
  

A lot of what’s online is the same information repeated over and over again. It seems to me Chris had the bulk of it in his collection of stories. As I’d expected, taking good engagement pictures came down to your rapport with the couple. A relaxed and comfortable couple is best for photographing. Since Tiff, Andrew and I get along great that wasn’t going to be a problem.

My friend Rigo came along for this shoot too. He and I take our weekend photography excursions together. Like going to the gym, it’s a lot easier to get motivated when there’s two instead of one. He shot on a Nikon D300 with a 72-200mm lens. Between his close-ups and my wide-angle shots, we were covered.


Saturday’s overcast skies were a blessing in disguise. I’d thought to head up to West Palm in the early afternoon to scout locations. However, Tiff and Andrew already had an idea of where they wanted to go. Instead of scouting, we had lunch and Rigo got to chat with the couple and get to know them better. After a delicious meal at Too Jays, it was time to get to work.

I know the best lighting for outdoor photos is morning and night, but I never knew why. It turns out that sunlight is hard light. A hard light is one that strikes the subject directly and intensely. Think of a flashlight. The sun’s rays are like that. Diffusing a hard light and spreading it across the area of the subject helps greatly. Cue the clouds from our overcast day. They helped soften the lighting and help us capture some truly great shots.

To learn more about how light influences a photograph (scientifically) Andrew suggested I read this book: Light Science and Magic, An Introduction to Photographic Lighting. It's hysterical how physics finds a way back into everything I do. Music, martial arts and now photography. I wish more attention had been paid in class.

So that's it. First engagement shoot ever - success. Here are all the shots I took.

In the beginning...

It took a transatlantic trip to ignite my passion for the still image. The year was 2002 and I was in college. My destination was Spain. Not knowing when I'd leave the United States again, I made sure to pack a camera. Too nervous to take my brand-new, high-tech, 2.1 megapixel Canon Powershot, I opted for a more replaceable 35mm Cannon point and shoot.

The trip was an incredible experience. I shot 12 rolls of film and there learned my first photographic lesson - take 200 pictures and maybe one will be decent. Above you can see the best photo I took on that trip, a boat fallen victim to Galicia's low tide. It was my first taste of using light and a rectangular frame to capture life. While not a particularly great photo, it still brings me back to the cool morning I took that picture. The smell of saltwater and the day's fresh catch are still vivid in my mind whenever I look at this shot.

Fast-forward to 2009. For the last seven years I've been "the camera guy." At parties, I'm the savior documenting memories for the drunk. At work, I'm the cheap photographer they use for home-grown events.

Since Spain, my photographic skills have improved. Still, I'm not a pro. Not yet. But I've taken the first step by purchasing my first DSLR, the Nikon D60. Before that I operated on a prosumer Sony DSC-H1. And before that I was on a classic Pentax ME Super. For the uninitiated, the ME Super is a metal-clad workhorse from the 1979. It's a 35mm SLR that taught me a lot of things about light.

Over there is one of my more recent photos taken around six in the morning at South Beach in Miami. It's part of a new habit I'm forming that ensures I make the most of my investment in the D60. Every weekend I take one photographic trip. Sometimes it's down the street. Other times it's an hour or two drive. Eventually, I'd like to take day trips to locals around the U.S., but that'll be after I win the lottery. Right now I'm doing anything and everything to get the proper "dirt time" with my camera. That's what this blog's about. In it I will document my trip form amateur to professional and every false step in between.