Week 10 Photo Challenge: Open Challenge

For this week’s final photo challenge with it being left open to us to do anything, I decided that I wanted to make it look as real as possible that I was actually in my direct field. So for the challenge I looked for a photo online of sports photographers on the sidelines doing what they do best of taking photos of the game that is in progress. I set my camera up on my tripod with my high definition telephoto zoom lens on the camera as well so it would match up with the other photographers in the photo as well. I took my Nikon 35mm film camera and put it on me down to my side so it looked as if I had a back-up camera as well and I also put on my press pass to make it look as legit as possible. I then had an assistant capture a photo of me using my Iphone 4 taking multiple photos of me set up in the position of me to be taking photos on the sidelines as if I was really there. After taking enough photos and looking through them to make sure that there is one that was usable, I uploaded the photos into my computer and did some small exposure correction in bridge. After that, I took the touched up image into photo shop and cut myself out of the original background and placed myself into the photo that I found online. I did some resizing of the image of myself to make sure that it fit well into the image and that I fit correctly. After I got myself into the photo I went back into the exposure levels and did a few more adjustments to make sure that it looked all natural.

Week 9 Photo Challenge: Legendary Photo

For this week’s weekly photo challenge I had to come up with the idea of how to create a legendary photography. I had one idea in mind on how I wanted to accomplish this challenge, but after some serious consideration on how to do it I didn’t feel it would truly fit this assignment to well. So after I had seen another classmate’s photo I got a different idea of how I wanted to create mine. Since I plan to become a famous sports photographer and I plan to someday work for the Dallas Cowboys directly, I went just a little different way. I wanted my photo look and represent as if I was walking on the red carpet for a show or award ceremony. I wanted my background to look like the walls that all the celebrities stand in from of when the paparazzi is trying to get that great photo. So I made sure that I had myself dressed up nicely to look like I was really going to an award ceremony. I took my snuggie that is a Dallas Cowboys blanket and pinned it up over the door in my apartment and then set my camera up on the tripod. I decided to use my smallest lens that I have which is my 50mm lens. I had my ISO set at 100 and the f/stop was at f1.8 with the shutter speed set at 1/125 of a second. I took many different shots to try and get the perfect legendary shot. I did use all the ambient light that I could in my apartment plus I felt that I may have needed that extra bit of light so I also used my 560 off camera flash with a soft box diffuser to help give that softer look to my skin.    

Week 8 Photo challenge: Combat Photography

For this week’s photo challenge of a combat photographer, I was a little confused on exactly what was required for this challenge. So I had the opportunity to talk to a couple different people and asked them what their interpretation was of the assignment. I got a couple different answers to my question and decided to take the second answer and go for that approach on this challenge. I decided to capture a photograph of myself having a pillow fight with myself. I set my camera up on my tripod next to my kitchen so I could have enough light without having to use a flash. I was using my 50mm lens and had the f/stop set all the way down to an f/1.8 aperture. I also had the ISO set at 400 due to the minimal amount of light that was available. I had the shutter speed set at 1/125 of a second. I took various shots to try and create the illusion of the idea that there was actually two of me battling each other. I wanted it to look more real than fake so I made sure that I had different shirts on and that my hair was styled differently. With having taken many different shots there actually was only 1 shot from each direction that actually worked well with each other. Once I had gotten the two that worked I took them and uploaded them into bridge first to correct the lighting of them, following up with them in photo shop. After getting the first image lined up I took the second image and used the magnetic lasso tool and cut myself out of the other image and lined myself up in the new photo. After that was done then it lead you to the image you see before you the final product of my version of a combat photograph.

Week 8 EOC: What makes a Photograph Great?

What do I think makes a photograph great? That is actually a harder question to answer than most people would think. When it comes to making and creating a great photograph, there are many things that come into factor with the whole process. With what many will think it is not the printer that makes a great photograph or the camera its self, no it’s the person that is actually looking through the viewfinder at that particular moment in time. Every person that aspires to become the next great photographer thinks they have what it takes to be the best. Well that is true in some sense of the word; every person sees things in a different aspect than the next person. What may look great to one person may not have the same exact effect on the next person. “Every image needs strong underlying compositional order so that it grabs the eye from a hundred feet away.” A great photo has to have something in the image that is going to make the viewer look at it and say something that is going to express the greatness behind your photo that will always be in your mind when you or anyone else ever looks at that photograph. A great photograph is one that will get out there to the right person and will end up being published all around the world. A great photograph will be great to the extreme of a Pulitzer Prize. A photographer knows when they are taking the photograph whether or not that photo is going to be classified as a great photo. A true photographer has the eye to see a great photo as it emerges unlike someone that is just taking photos as a hobby for fun.

Week 7 Photo Challenge: Manet

For this week’s weekly photo challenge I decided to choose a famous painting that was painted by Edouard Manet. It is called the “surprised nymph”. I chose this particular painting because after viewing the film in class this week when they began to gradually great a little more artistic with the small amounts of nudity in the photographs. When the whole time the famous painters had already been painting nudity into their artwork. That is how people would view it as was art not some kind of pornography. This particular painting was actually painted on a canvas with oil paints in the year 1861. The Nymphs are spirits of fields, woods, streams, of nature in general, personifying its fecundity and gracefulness. They were considered secondary deities; nevertheless, they were respected, sometimes feared and prayed to. This painting was created in Paris, France and falls under the style of Realism, and is in the genre of mythological paintings. It to this day resides in the gallery of Museo Nacional de Bellas, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. This painting to me looks like she was sitting in the woods alone as if she was thinking about something very important and decided to remove her clothing while she was thinking, and she had gotten startled by someone that snuck up on her and surprised her. Argo, the whole name of the painting “Surprised Nymph.” To fulfill this weekly challenge I took this painting into photo shop and used the text tool to add my personal watermark to it as I do when I make and finish editing all my own photographs.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Collage

For this week’s photo challenge, we had to challenge ourselves to come up with a great idea for a collage. After watching the movie in class it shows that you can always change that you are if you truly believe and find the passion that you may have for something. The main idea for that is to really go forward and push you to make that change in life. The idea I came up with for my collage has a lot to do with the career choice and field of photography I want and plan to pursue in my life. I felt that I should truly express my real passion for the sport that one day I plan to work alongside permanently. With my special field choice in the photography world I’m planning on being a sports photographer I had to represent my team in this collage. So I decided to take 5 different photographs that I had taken over a year ago in an earlier class and edited them beautifully. I started out with a blank document in photo shop and sized it up to be a 5x7. I picked and chose the 5 still life shots that I had edited and placed them all around the blank document as I thought they fit well. I also had to resize them so they would all fit accordingly. I followed that by setting up my camera on my tripod in my room to capture a self portrait of me in my jersey and my logoed pillow matched up well with the concept. I used my 50mm lens and had the iso turned up to 800 based on the ambient light I had in my room. I had the f/stop set at the lowest stop of an f/1.8 to get that little depth. I had to turn the shutter speed way down to 1/60 sec just to get the right kind of light. Finally after I captured the right shot that I wanted to use I placed it into photo shop and did a little touch up on it and added a nice vignette to help accentuate the photo. I then added it to the collage in the correct spot for it to get the final look that you see before you.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Editing A Photo

For this particular photo challenge, I chose to set up at the desk in the lobby of my apartment building. I asked special permission to set up and take a photograph in their area. I decided to set up the camera on the tripod from an angle back behind myself so that way the image I was editing could be seen on the screen of my laptop. I decided to use my 50mm lens so that way I could try to have a little more depth of field in the background. I had used the ambient light that was coming from the lights above me.  With the light that was coming from them still wasn’t that bright that I had to actually turn the ISO up to 800. I had the shutter speed set at 1/125sec and then had the f/stop set at f/1.8 the lowest setting on that particular lens. The flash was not fired in this shot at all. I finally after the shot was finally captured the way that I wanted it to look like, I took the photo and placed it into photo shop to do some final editing. With this picture I decided to remain dressed in the same clothes from my interview to help it look as if I was actually sitting in some kind of business atmosphere to help make this photograph fit the challenge even more. The image that I decided to make it look like I was editing it was an image that I took a couple of weeks ago in another class. The male in the photo is actually another one of my instructors and the lady is a model that we were actually using that day for that particular shoot.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Photo Store

This photo was not too much of a challenge for me. I took a self portrait in the local well known photography stores in town, Casey’s Camera. In order to accomplish this I called ahead of time to speak with the manager of the location to get permission to come into their store and set up my camera on top of my tripod and take a picture. I offered the manager to join me in the photo if he pleased, and I also informed him that I would be putting the photo on my blog and would make a tweet about the store to try and give them some more recognition. The next day I arrived at the store and asked for the manager that I had previously spoken to letting him know who I was and then asked him where it was ok for me to set up at? He allowed me to set up anywhere I chose to so I decided to place myself in the frame with the selection of cameras and lenses behind me. I like the fact that in the background of this photo on the very top of the shelves you can see a selection of old fashion film cameras. In this photo I didn’t use any kind of flash I just used the ambient light that was available in the store and the natural light that was coming in from the windows. I changed my white balance to match up with the light from the store so I changed it to florescent. I had my shutter speed set at 1/40 of a second and I had my f/stop at f/4. I was using my 28-105mm lens so I wouldn’t have too much depth in the background so everything behind me from the store could be seen. I also had my iso set at 100. During editing I decided to add the text up to the top right hand corner, the name of the store to help with the recognition for them.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Incredible Photo

With the very challenging photo challenge that I had to do this week, I decided to go to a place that I haven’t been to in about 15 years. I had actually forgotten just how beautiful this place actually was. In some ways this was surprisingly kind of a fun challenge but a little more difficult at the same time because of the destination that I chose and trying to get up to where I finally captured my photo. The place where I went to is the beautiful Valley of Fire. I climbed up on a boulder cliff rock that was called “the Beehives”. Getting up on top of this one was definitely a little scary but fun at the same time. In order to capture this image I arrived out there a little late in the afternoon, so I could get some amazing shots of the rocks as the sun was beginning to set then the orange on the rocks was so gorgeous. In the image that I found worthy of using, I’m sitting atop the boulder while my camera is set up on my tripod at the other end of the boulder. I used my Canon Rebel T1i and had my 28-105mm f/4-5.6 lens on there. I had the ISO set at 100. I had the f/stop set at an f/5.6 and the shutter speed was set at 1/60 of a second. I used all natural lighting for this image. The shot was captured at 5:30pm when the sun was starting to go down. I finally placed the image into photo shop to do a little bit of touching up before the image was final as you can see before you.  

Weekly Photo Challenge: Paparazzi

The photo I shot is an image of me posing as paparazzi, I am wearing my press pass in the image that allows me to have access to any sporting event, special event, or any kind of event that will need paparazzi or photographers at to capture every moment of the event. I didn’t choose any kind of special location to take this photograph at. It may have made the background a little more appealing if I would have but the main focus is on me not necessarily on the background. For this photo I set my camera up on a tripod and used my 50mm f/1.8 lens to capture the image. I used my Canon Rebel T1i and had the focus set on manual. I used my wireless remote to capture the image at the right second. I had the f/stop set at f/3.5 and I had the shutter speed set at 1/125 of a second. I used an iso of 100. I didn’t use any kind of flash when I fired this shot I used all natural ambient light. I shot the image at 5:28pm so I only had a little bit of natural light to actually work with. I also took multiple images to finally capture the correct exposure and get the perfect image. I then followed up with the image into photo shop just to make sure that I had all the exposures correct and do just a little bit of skin retouching before I could allow the image to be finalized.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Self Portrait

The photo I chose to do for the weekly photo challenge is Ansel Adams “Waterfall” that was taken in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. This photo came out of his collection called Wilderness.  Ansel Adams worked mostly in black and white photography but in his later years he also specialized in some color photography as well. The photo that I chose is one of his most beautiful color photos that he ever made. I looked online to find one of Ansel Adams beautiful landscape shots that I could use as my background. That is when I came across this gorgeous image. I took a self portrait of myself using my canon rebel t1i camera and used my 28-105mm lens. I placed my camera atop of my tripod and shot the image outdoors to try and match the coloration of me to the image done by Ansel Adams. I had my aperture set at 1/125 of a sec and I had my f/stop set at 4.0 with my iso at 100. I also used the setting on the camera that I could use my wireless remote to help capture the image perfectly. After I got the image that I wanted to use for this assignment I took the photo of myself and the one I got from Ansel Adams gallery I put them both into photo shop and used a couple of layers and placed the image of myself into the image created by Ansel Adams and made it look like I was originally in the photograph when he actually captured that moment in time.