March 11, 12, 13

Top Picks March 11, 12, 13

**ISO100 / Shutter Speed 1/160/ Aperture: 5.6**

#1 Pick

I mostly edited this in Photoshop. I took out an ugly white bucket and made the left “eye” a little more fiery. In LRC I brightened up the white ash a nd smoke a bit

#2 Pick

*In photoshop, I straightened the photo. In LR, I sharpened it, and saturated the red more, which made the grey parts of the wood look more blue, and I liked it.*

#3 Pick

*I increased the highlights and the whites, and decreased the shadows. This is my dog in his crate in the car, looking like he is in jail somewhere!*

March 14, 15, 16

March 14, 15, 16 Top Picks

#1 Pick

*I edited this photo slighlty-cropped in Photoshop, and adjusted for clarity and vibrance in LRC. I love my reflection in the beads, but it wasn’t done on purpose!*

#2 Pick

March 17, 18, 19

March 17, 18, 19 Top Picks

#1 Pick

I am trying to get better close up pics, not sure about lighting settings.
**ISO 800 / Shutter Speed 1/50 / Aperture: f5.6**

#2 Pick

I cropped this photo and adjusted the color but didn’t quite get the colors I wanted. But the photo is sweet!

**ISO 800 / Shutter Speed 1/30 Aperture: f/5.0** **I added the vignette because this sweet mouse on my window ledge looks like she is in heaven with her piece of cheese….**

#3 Pick

I edited this photo by increasing exposure, brightening up the shadows, and clarity. It was a very dark day.

March 20, 21, 22

March 20,21,22 Top Picks

*I edited this in photoshop (quite badly) to get rid of the red strips of tape. I used the patch tool as I have been having trouble with the clone tool, it just seems to be painting dark areas?* It was originally my top pick, however, after I edited the shovel I liked it more

#1 Pick

**ISO 800 / Shutter Speed 1/60/ Aperture: f 7.1**

March 23, 24, 25

I went straight out after class to retake some of the same subjects. I took many photos of a limited number of things, which worked well for learning.

March 24 Top Picks

#1 Pick

#2 Pick

#3 Pick

#4 Pick

March 25, 26, 27

One night a friend helped me take a ton of photos of the moon. She really helped me alot! We had very very slow shutter speeds. The bad thing was, when I looked at them the next day I could see they weren’t focused! I had manual focus switched on my camera. 🙂

March 25 Top Picks

#1 Pick

I chose this photo because it was the best in a series of really messed up photos! However, I did learn to check my camera first, and learned a little more about the exposure triangle. The photo was taken at: .5 sec at f29 with an ISO of 3200. I made adjustments o exposure, lights,and clarity, but I couldn’t get it less noisy, it would just blur into itself.

March 26 Top Picks

#1 Pick

I changed this photo to black and white and developed it for exposure and lightened the whites. It wasn’t well focused, but the black and white looks interesting to me because it really looks like an old photo. 1/160 f7.1 ISO 400

March 27 Top Picks

#1 Pick

1/13 F25 ISO 200. The only edit I did to this photo was crop out a slice at the bottom to make for better composition. I am going to try and take this photo again.

#2 Pick

March 28, 29, 30

March 30 Top Picks

Today, I took 39 photos of only 2 subjects, so that I could keep trying and trying until I could get a good photo. Both photos were taken while sitting on the ground. I am trying to figure out the difference between camera shake and poor focus. These were all taken today in manual, I have been shooting in aperture priority.

#1 Pick

#2 Pick

1/100 f6.3 ISO 800 – Edited for some spot removal, and some clarity and colour

Final Two Shoots

On March 31 and April 5 I took 2 final shoots to give me some more choice for my “Final 21”. This process gave me 4 shots, so I was able to remove 2 jpeg shots (the Fairy and the Sign on my house) and one shot that was underexposed (Joat shot) and from there I added and subtracted until I was happy with the collection.

March 31 Top Pick

April 5

April 5 Top Picks

#1 Pick

**ISO 200 / Shutter Speed 1/500 / Aperture: f 7.1**

#2 Pick

**ISO 200/ Shutter Speed 1/800/ Aperture: 7.1**

#3 Pick

Final 21 Days Powerpoint Presentation:

UNIT-3-21DAYS_SHAWNA_BRADLEY-1

Final Editing/Post Production

Once I had my selections for the 21 days, I then went back and cropped (almost all) to 16:9 ratio. I also made some final editing changes, I really noticed that as time went on I could understand more of what I was seeing, and therefore, my editing needed to change.

Here are my final shots and edits:

August 3, 2020March 11, 2021

FIN 247 Unit 2

Emerging Forms of Togetherness During the Time of Covid

When I was thinking about what I wanted to photograph for this assignment, I wanted to work with an idea that is familiar all around the world; that family and togetherness has been lost in so many ways and we have had to be creative to make it work in each individual family. We are all so different in our approach to following public health regulations, it is a highly politicized issue and each individual needs to find balance within their family relationships to manage mental health and protect both themselves AND their community from the transmission of the virus.

In my family, there is only me, my wife, and our two active dogs. Both of our sisters live alone and are exceptionally limited in their interactions with other people, therefore, the 4 of us spend time together including in our house and out at our favorite pub: we are a non-traditional family of four. Outside of that, we do visit with two other sets of friends and my parents, but the rules are only outside and socially distanced. We recognize that technically, visiting outside is against current health regulations in our province. We have chosen to find a way to be with our closest “family” and keep our interaction infrequent, and as safe as possible.

Resources: Readings and Reflections

I chose two resources that speak to me both from a world view and from a Canadian view; the article from CBC on family isolation portraits and the National Geographic on a world paused by Coronavirus.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/2020/03/these-photos-capture-a-world-paused-by-coronavirus/#close

https://www.cbc.ca/arts/these-canadian-photographers-are-capturing-life-during-covid-19-one-family-isolation-portrait-at-a-time-1.5509813

When I was a kid, I had a subscription to National Geographic and it continued into my twenties, until I didn’t want to haul around those magazines anymore. I was fascinated by the photography and learning about different places in the world. This hasn’t changed and I am 50 years old. It’s strange, I always considered photography an art that you had to be born talented for, I would see something beautiful or weird or shocking and say “I wish I was a photographer so I could capture what my mind is seeing right now”. In my first year of design, I have learned that the arts are so much about skills and concepts and perseverance, that I too, can learn to do these things. These photograpers in this article, mostly in quarantine or isolation, have learned to find “Quiet Magic in the Everyday” (Alicia Johnson, photographer). I am the type of person that easily finds magic in the everyday, and I hope I can learn to take pictures of what I see.

The second article by CBC really struck a chord because I still see the joy in these family isolation portraits, and I fear that after all this time, the joy is lost. It has gone on too long. These photos were taken last March, when yes, we were all very scared, but we had no idea that almost a year later we would still be inside our homes, precious time lost with young and old family members. In our family, we have missed a trip to Ontario to see our nieces and our one great niece, and now she has a sister. It is possible at this point in time we may not be able to go this summer, either. This provided some inspiration for me so I asked our great niece (she is 5) to send us some drawings in the mail. These drawings will be part of my photo essay.

Project Proposal Outline and Test Shots

Concepts and Ideas

I have chosen to photograph the people we see in the settings that we see them in; neighbors over the fence, our friends that have a huge property so we go to walk or work with them outside, our best friends by a huge fire, and my parents having a weiner roast at our house, all bundled up and joyful to see us even though we don’t kiss or hug. Most Thursdays, “the 4 sisters” go to our local pub, we know the servers now by name.

I have organized my shot dates and warned my subjects it may have to happen more than once, with the exception of a last shot in Parksville (we have planned a 1 night getaway on March 5) , this shot will represent the time with my wife.

Production Approach

I intend to do test shots at the time of day that I will actually take the shots, so I can figure out the lighting beforehand. In terms of elements, I want to use a small bit of color (yellow) in most shots, if not all, to represent the tiny bit of happiness in most situations. At this point in time, I have 9 shots planned. I hope to begin the series with an opening image and I will experiment afterwards. My plan is for my opening image to be the drawings of my great niece, but I am still thinking about the composition of that photo to make it a tiny bit more clear what it is about. I am also really interested in texture, and I am hoping that one of my fire shots can focus on the texture of a piece of wood, with my best friends’ hands in the background feeding the fire. My plan is to create some contrast between the different compositions using scale. For example, one of my shots includes a tractor, and one includes a rubber duckie. The question is will it be more interesting to reverse the natural scale? A big rubber duck and a small tractor? One of my shots is our neighbours standing at the fence. The family is the two older parents, and the young mom, dad, baby and ten year old. I want to make it casual and informal, and will include my yellow coffee cup. I am hoping to take this shot from an angle to make it more casual.

Shot List:

Drawings from a 5 year old
Weinie roast with the folks
Sisters night out
Hot Tub Time with wife (rubber duckie shot)
Deck at girls (Casey dog with yellow toy)
Neighbors at fence
Tractor shot
Huge fire with Denise and piece of wood
Beach at Parksville with wife in yellow boots and coat

Detailed timeline

Feb 24

3 test shots: Backyard fireplace at 3pm, neighbours fence at 11 am, friends tractor at 1 pm.

Img 517 f5.6 1/100 ISO 400 I like the light and compositon from this angle. The family members should cover up the unattractive chicken house.

Img 524 f5 1/160 ISO 400 This is where I will try and fit the tractor in…how will I fit it?

Img 526 f5 1/160 ISO 400 I like the composition and the balance in this photo, the cars have such character

Img 538 f 6.3 1/100 ISO 200 I like this angle better. It is going to take a lot to make this shot interesting

Img 554 f4.5 1/250 ISO 200 Maybe a close up of all the weiner sticks would be cool here? The rest of the backyard is so drab, with little contrast right now.

I now have 3 “cards” that I will take on my first three shots to help me with settings, composition etc.

Feb 25

Photography class in am. Take any feedback and apply it to my project.

Sisters night out shot.

Feb 26

Collect “yellow” items for all shots. Confirm plans and timing with all subjects for the weekend.

Check and work on sisters night out shot in post production.

Drawings shot.

Check and work on drawings shot in post production.

Feb 27

2 shots this day:

Hot Tub (rubber duckie shot) at 5pm

Deck at girls at 3:30pm

Feb 28

3 shots this day: Neighbors at 11am, Tractor at 1pm, Family Weinie Roast Shot at 3pm

March 1

Post production :

Tractor, Neighbors, Weinie Roast, Hot Tub, Deck

March 3

Present Revisions and Shots 1-7

March 5

Parksville Shot

March 7

Huge Fire shot

March 8:

Post Production Fire shot and Parksville Shot

March 8

Arrange Composition and Shots in WordPress

Wed March 10

Blog Post 3 : Final Series and reflection statement

Thursday: March 11

Present work

Pages: 1 2

August 3, 2020February 11, 2021

FIN 247 Unit 1

Technical Assignment 1: Photoshop Tutorials

Get to know Photoshop

2. Change the image size

all rights reserved to martinhoangdesign

3. Adjust the image quality

4. Crop and straighten photos to improve composition

5. Save a photo in the best format for your needs

Camera Technical Exercise 1

On my camera I have:

Partial Metering, Center Metering & Evaluative (Matrix) Metering

On the bright area of the photo (the top of the tree) the F stop stayed the same on all settings. (5.6)

On the mid value area of the photo (the middle of the tree) the F stop ranged from 6.3-7.1

On the dark area of the photo the F stop ranged from 7.1-9.

So what I think this means is the bigger numbers in the dark area of the photo have the smallest aperature (which didn’t let as much light in).

After I did this exercise I realized it was done incorrectly. I re-did the assignment, however, I also erased those images when I formatted my SD card! Oh well. Live and learn!

Tech Exercise 1- Part 2

Although I didn’t take these in the correct order, you can see which ones are properly exposed and which ones aren’t. The second last image is correctly exposed at 1/125 and F7.1. The first three images are all under exposed at F9, F10,F11. All were ISO 400.

The duck more correctly exposed was 1/50 6.3F and ISO 800. The shadow duck is at F10.

Technical Exercise 2 – Camera Exercises 1-6

1.Shallow Depth of Field

2. Deeper depth of field

Technical Exercise 2 – Photoshop

Tutorial 2: How to use a layer mask to hide parts of a layer

3. Use Layer masks to adjust part of a photo

4.Remove objects with content aware fill

I tried this one ten times and couldn’t get the result in the video. I gave up!

5. Clean up imperfections with spot healing

6. Retouch photos with healing brush tool

7. Remove objects with clone stamp tool

8. Hide unwanted content with patch tool

Technical Exercise 3 – Camera

Photobomber 15 year old Baxter climbing up the cedar tree

Image 283 1/50 f8 ISO 800 This is the photo where I like the composition, however it is a bit overexposed (I think) as it washes out the yellow. I like that the ferns are in the depth of field, but I wanted both the shoes and the ferns. I like the story, as this huge fern in a muddy part of our yard is exactly where you need these pretty rubber boots! I am going to try the photo at 4pm (this was about 2 pm, in the shade, on a sunny day).

Image 365 The same boots 2 hours later! A bit mucky! 1/20 F10 ISO 1600

Image 375 This one is better. I changed it to F5.6 and 1/100 and ISO 800. I still wanted to get the ISO lower, but it ended up being to dark (and not as clear) -see in the image below. My aperture doesn’t go lower than 5,6. I think if it did, I would maybe have more flexibility with the shutter speed and ISO? I actually like the light better in this picture than at 2pm, it is moodier and more interesting.

Exercise 2- Shoes in Motion

Image 329 1/200 F13 ISO 800 I like this one where I tried to freeze the motion. It is interesting because I was focussing on the feet, and stopped the motion, but the ball is blurry in it’s motion. Is this because of the light metering? The light was hard here as the clouds were moving over on a bright day, changing quickly before I could figure out the shot.

Image 330 1/200 F13 ISO 800 The shutter speed worked pretty well here to stop the motion, and I like that the foot in the air look as it is almost standing on something rather than raising in the air on it’s own. It is not quite in focus, I am not sure if I moved? It was quite different than trying to catch the speed of my dog, in the following picture…

The definition of motion: a 4 year old Australian Shepherd

Although this shot wasn’t part of the assignment it is a good example because it was around the same time, in the same spot as the photo above. 1/250 F13 ISO 800.

Camera Technical Assignment 4

Exercise 1:

Hands at Rest:

Hands in Context

I had a hard time with these images as they were at night in my dark kitchen! Upon reflection, I think if I used a tripod it would have worked better, I could slow down the shutter speed more and then decrease the ISO. I also could have used my flash possibly? The pot lights really glare off my counter, so next time I will need some more light. Also, knowing I wouldn’t crop these images was difficult to set up too, as I didn’t want background “stuff”.

Exercise 2

Hands in Motion

Outcome of hands labour

Technical Assignment 4.2 Hands-outcome of labour
Image 476 – 1/50 F5.6 ISO 3200

On these 2 images above, I also had the same problems with light and composition. I like the spoon and the drip! But, I think I have some camera shake here.

Exercise 3: Strong juxtaposition

The beginning of the process and the end! The best part of having someone cook for you while you are in school!

Assignment 4 -Post Production Exercises (Before/After Editing)

With each set of images I wanted to try slightly different editing practice.

In this image I cropped it and used the clone stamp to wipe out the piece of wood.

I get such a kick out of this image I had to do something silly.

In this photo I cropped it, and adjusted the luminance and the detail to reduce the noise. I also increased the exposure, the contrast and the highlights. I like how the blurred motion of the feet and the contrast makes them look a bit like ghost chickens.

4. Lightroom Tutorial Research

Lightroom Tutorial Research : Recovering a bad exposure

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9ad-jzn1qE

This tutorial was useful as it went through many small things you can do when correcting a bad exposure, or a bad shot in general. It covers the exposure, color, sharpening, spot removal, contrast, & horizon straightening.

August 3, 2020August 4, 2020