May 15 2007-The quest for knowledge, Part II

Just thought i'd give a brief out line from last night, for those that are interested.:-)

Instructor brought in her light system and her 19 year old daughter, who as it turns out, does not mind having her picture taken, unlike my daughter.LOL

Her system is pretty basic, but does a very good job. Two 500 watt strob's and stands, a plain Jane rod and stand fore backdrops and that's it.
Back drops are painted muslin, and canvas, and props were foam cushions to raise people up to make a nicer, rounder group photos. We worked on the 3', 6', 6',6' triangle being subject 3' away from backdrop and the lights 6' away a6' between them. This is her basic small studio setup.

We spent an hour or so watching her pose and shoot her daughter, and showing us various ways to soften light with out a softbox, and use home made reflectors for shadow reduction in certain cases.She showed the class how to work the light meter, at least i can do THAT.:-)

With home made light box, and metering, it only took her a moment to set the power on the stobs for her working ap of F8. Stob's trigger by wire and i see now what you need for the hotshoe to do that.
She works with a D70.

At the end of the night she posed a group of 5 students, some tall and some short etc, and showed us ways to position them, and also briefly touched on using a flash and umbrella as studio lighting in a pinch.
I may have to go this route for any pet store shoots, as if they are all small like the Petvalu my wife works at,. i won't be able to utilize the 6' method, but the one stobe method sh eshowed us. Either that or get the stobbracket and just lift the flash off the camera.

The best part was at the end, she asked to see the horse, pet and kid pictures i was asked to bring in, and she thought they were all great. I'm happy.:-)

Next week, our turn to wreck havoc in the photography world.

LOL.

Oh, my Pentax K10D partner, was not able to get his Sigma flash to sync wirelessly, so i think thats a dead issue, if anyone is thinking of getting the 500dg super for wireless flash.I thought i was getting it to work, but i have some shots with the flash in the picture and the red ready light is still on, so maybe my cheat method failed.
Now, to find the cash for a 540.

Thanks for listening.

Dave

May 8, 2007- The quest for knowledge begins after 50

Hi gang.

Well last night, was the first of 5 lighting/portrait classes in Barrie. Long day as I was in the field until 5:30 then a made dash to the school, a hour a way. Took a while to find everything, but we did.

As I walked in to the class room, one gent in the class was raving about his new digital camera, must be a Nikon shooter, says i. LOL

Nope, he has the K10D and kit lens, so I whipped out mine, K10D camera that is, and we bonded. I feel so good now. :-)

Teacher is not the regular instructor for the class. Great I think, a Physics Prof. teaching me photography.

Wrong. She also teaches the night classes for Wedding and Children's portraits.

Bonus, says I. Maybe this is worth the drive to Barrie, me thinks.

Course outline was presented and a two hour talk about portraits, what to look for, the "shapes" thing.(how to set up the people to form, in principle, diamond, triangle and eclipse. Not really sure how to explain this yet, but it made sense in the examples)

She asked us what we wanted from the course, and I mentioned more experience with not only on board flash, but how to light and expose for studio stuff. I mentioned about the possible pet work in stores. She used to do that before just going to people portraits, so she will add that to the class, and will bring in a bunch of tips for me.

Sounds like a real night class. Learn what you want, not what the school says you need to:-) Instructor seems to know her stuff, and is a good speaker. I think I’ll learn something here.

Looking forward to next week, She is bringing her lighting in and we get to play. She will be setting up the subjects, and will shot them herself, but we can do our own shooting, if we want(I want).

Thanks for listening

DJB

May 2, 2007- Turning the corner

Hello faithful reader.

Well its now May, and as the header say's I'v turned the corner. The Jan-April blah's are gone, the grass is greening up, the property taxes,house insurance and Truck insurance have all been paid and the John Derre is charging its little battery for a summer full of grass cutting and squirrel chasing. The grey one hates that, BTW.

May also brings out my other self, the equine photographer. My first show starts on the 20th. Good thing Monday after is our Stat holiday. Chance to snooze.
Lots of good things lined up. I have several shows back that i lost to another company last year. Seems politeness is still needed in some business after all.(I'm the polite one :-))

Had a visit Monday with my Doctor. Man getting old sucks. More problems found. Quess all of those gout attacks over the years has produced some nice arthritis in said foot/toes.However it has now pushed me to actually do something, and i'll be getting my 17 year old Norco mountain bike out this week, and start peddeling my arse around town. Gotta lose a few LB's and get the legs in shape for all day standing at the shows.

Just about lost the end of my thumb this morning. Cut it on a broken bottle that found its way int my garbage. Nasty cut along the top. Probably should have gone for stitches.

Daughter and Boyfriend are now hooked on Vegas. Gota nother one.

Bwaa Haa Haa:-)

Well thats it for today.

Thnaks for listening

DJB

April 24, 2007-Back to basic's

Hello faithfull reader. In keeping with the main spirit of my blog, that being horses and photography, i'm happy to announce that i have found a College night class that will allow me to hone up on studio lighting and Portrait photography.

Its a bit of a drive from my humble abode, about 80 Km's, but its also the closest facility i can find. Over the past 8 years or so, after putting photography on hiatus for most of the 90's, i have managed to remember, or atleast find classes, in all that has been forgotten. Several classes in B&W darkroom, now gone the way of the Dodo bird in most areas, general tips of the trade from the good folks at Pentax Discuss Mailing List(PDML), and now pretty much my last learning curve, that of studio lighting.
After this, next will be a specific class on Photoshop for photographers. I have just enough experience now, to be dangerous.

LOL

I have read up on the internet about this, but i tend to need to be able to see it in action before it really sinks in.

I was a bit disappointed that the school i took the B&W classes in, had stopped the class due to low enrollment, but i have enough experience now to be able to develop and get out some sort of print, if and when needed.
I still love film B&W prints, but digital software has come along way over the past few years, and coupled with printers like the Epson 2400 and Canon i9500(i think) excellent B&W conversion prints are now possible.

Well thats it.

Thanks for stopping by.

DJB

April 17, 2007-From desert to spongy grass

Hello faithfull reader. Sorry about nothing posted for a week or so, but i was on vacation in Las Vegas last week and am just getting back into Ontario life. We had a great time, as we always do, but its always great to be back home.

I don't mind flying to destinations, i just hate the very act of getting to an airport. Left the house early as suggested and arrived to an almost empty terminal. I did our check in over the internet and it only took a few minutes to get past Air Canada desks. For everything i dispise of AC, these ladies were great. So now we have a long wait, and beer is $10.00. Arggg.:-)

The hotel we stay at is a smaller one near the Flamingo, and is a nice, quiet building. It used to be our favorite place to play, and still is, but they don't have the ever popular $1.00 beer, so we now have two extra hotels we like, O'Shaes and Casino Royal. Dollar beer tastes great.:-)

Went on a tour to Valley of Fire National Park and that was excellent (insert Mr Burns here). A lot of nice photos were shot that day. The SO and i loved the quiet enviroment.
Went and saw the Wynn and Venetion hotels and the Secret Garden at the Mirage. Got my night shots around town, i missed last time in Vegas. It took a bit, but we managed to find our favorite slot machines that used to be at the Flamingo, but we found them at Bally's. The double diamond McDonalds one. Get the bonus lady and play a snakes and ladders type of bonus for extra points. I seem to be able towin on this one.

Even managed to come back with a few bucks.

Thanks for listening

DJB

April 5, 2007-Up down and film meets digital

Good day all. Well it may be the end of the first week of April, and Easter Weekend to boot, but you sure can'nt tell from here ist spring. The great weather the last few days, even of it did rain, it was warm, has turn sour again, and we had a small blast of winter over night. The wind picked up, the temp dropped and over 2 million people in Toronto and the GTA all forgot how to drive all at once. Amazing 1 cm of snow and cars and truck bounce off each other lik a pin ball game.

People, SLOW DOWN. How hard is that.

On a good note, a friend of mine, i have a link to his blog, knarf, recently bought a Pentax istD camera. Why is this so important, well because now, film is officially dead. He was probably one of the last hold outs of the members of the PDML.

Notice though i said Pentax, not Nikon or Canon. This is for all you people brainwashed in to thinking only N or C can produced good pictures.

Well, all i have to say is that Pentax has made excellent film cameras and lenses for over 35 years, and it proves some people think for them selves and not let marketers rule there lives.

Pentax makes a very good Dslr in the K10D and K100. Shake reduction in camera, great image quality and viewfinders.

Now don't get me wrong, nothing wrong with N or C cameras, i just wanted to let you know there is another choice.

I use Nikons BTW for my equestrian work as Nikon had better dslr;s before Pentax came out with theirs.

I use both and for different reasons. Do your self a favor, and try a Pentax when looking for your next camera.

Thanks for listening
DJB

April 1, 2007-Is it time to slow down folks

As i sit here in my livingroom, that serves as my "Office" and watching the rain beat down on an already soaked environment, i thought today might be a good day to jot my thoughts down, as i'm having a slow day, and thats what i wanted.

I, and I'm sure many others out there, find it hard to get up and going in the mornings. It takes me a good hour to get up, stretch, pour some wake up juice down my throat and talk my self into joining the mad rush, the 24/7 people, the traffic jams, and the company voice systems, so dominate in our lives today.

I don't know about you readers out there, but i long for the good ol days. Not so much nickel bread or $4.00 a case of beer, although that would be terrific, but the way things were up to the early/mid 80's.That being, stores that actually closed for a Sunday off. Beer, liquor, gas, grocery all of those things. Was it so hard back then, to actually think a day or two ahead and STOCK UP on things you'd need for 1-2 days.Heck i can remeber when Beckers actually closed for Christmas, the only day of the year.
They don'nt do that now, do they. Gotta sell the 1/2 expired jug of cream and a few packs of smokes.

I quess the whole point of this, is that there never seems to be that slow down or shut down day to unwind and enjoy life. Oh i'm out of tick-tack, quick to Wally World.

I think it would be nice to head back in that direction, don't you. I know i would not mind. Then a long weekend actually becomes a long weekend, not just Monday off.
Of course, i still live in the 60's so it may be the herbs talking, or that voice i keep hearing in my ear, the one that says, "buy more camera gear". Thought is was going somewere else there, did'nt you.

Point is, less stress equals less problems. Seems simple to me.

Now if we could do that,AND, get rid of company voice mails, that would be just as nice as stopping global warming.

Thanks for listening

DJB