Ben and Alexa held an engagement party. They had a prom theme, hence the outfits. Since I had my camera loaded up from the wedding I was shooting earlier in the day, I decided to be the “party photographer”. There a bunch more of the pictures here.
Category Archives: Photo Shoot
St. Joseph Wedding
Saturday was a blast. I shot a wedding out in St. Joseph near St. Cloud Minnesota. The couple getting married had gone to school at St. Johns/St. Benedict’s so it was a fitting place to have their wedding.
It was a great location, and I will have more pictures later once they are processed, but this is the church they were married in.
Lake Harriet Pictures
Went to Lake Harriet Sunday night with Kristen. As I got there and was looking for her, I spotted some great light on some tulips, so I had to stop to take this:
The background looks painted, but it isn’t a photoshop effect, just a result of taking the picture at f/1.8. I did some burning on the background, but that is about it.
We were there to hopefully get a sunset picture, but not much luck. No clouds. I did get a couple of things though.
 
 
Kristen then had to leave, but I when down to the Band Shell, and took some shots of the tenders and boats there. It was really calm, so you could get longer exposures without bluring. This is a couple of my favorites.
 
Worldwide Photo Walk Day
Scott Kelby is putting together the second anual WorldWide Photo Walk. This year it is July 18. If you don’t know what a photowalk is, you should check out the site. Basicly it is just a bunch of photographers that decide to get together on a particular day and all walk together (more or less) in the same direction. The idea being that you would chat, get to know each other, help others, and maybe learn something from your fellow shooters.
Last year was a lot of fun, and I met some great people here in Minneapolis. I still follow their pictures on flickr a year later. We had that walk on Lake Harriet/Lake Nakomis. The picture above was taken while on the walk. The picture below was my favorite from the day, but it was long after the walk while I was headed home.
I am not sure where this years walk will be. Unfortunately, we don’t yet have a walk leader for Minneapolis. Boo hoo. Anyone out there want to step up?
Rasberry Island Dormanen Wedding
I took some pictures at¬†Gina and Shawn Dormanen’s wedding on May 16. It was a lot of fun. One of the things we did was head outside to get some pictures of the Bride and Groom in this little structure that was build last fall. We were just a little late getting here. I would have liked more blue to the sky, but I think we got some good pictures out of it. I really like playing with flash and trying to combine it with ambient light, especially with some fun colors going on.
I did some work in photoshop to these images. I needed to darken the stage. It was a ugly grey from too much light spill. The stage doesn’t look quite as dark on my computer. Here they look a little “floaty”. I also did another adjustment layer to get her dress back¬†in the color direction of¬†white.
Steve Portraits
My friend Steve needed some portraits done, so I offered to help. I was at his house over the weekend and took some pictures. We tried to mix it up and take some stuff that was more “portrait” like, and some different shots that showed a little more of Steve. Here are¬†a few that I liked.
 
Out at a Horse Farm
 
 
Well, I swear that it is a horse farm. I didn’t really get any pictures of horses that I liked. Oh, well. I was trying to get pictures of the horses when I missed the only real color to the sky. This is all that was left when I finally turned around. Oops.
Once the sun was down we turned to playing around. First up was taking pictures of the moon. This turned out well. The clouds were moving, so they give a spooky / erie feel to the picture.
 
I need a farm house or something below it. Maybe I should try to combine the two shots that you see here. Well, after that we pulled out the speedlights. I first tried to light someone with hard light from both sides, and that did’t quite work. Next up, I had the voice of Hagrid in my head saying “You’re a wizzard Harry.” I was trying to go for the two balls of light in my hands look. I wish we were a little wider, as the light actually gets cut off at the edge of the picture.
MN Strobist Meet Up
This Sunday I went to a MN Strobist meet up event. The MN Strobist group is a flickr group that uses small (usually) flashes to light their pictures. This was the first meet up event that I have attended. This event was held at the Jackson Street Roundhouse. It’s a train museum, and I had no idea it was here. I definitely need to bring my kids back here. There are a ton of cars that you can walk through, and see what life on the train would have been like.¬† There are also a bunch of toy train tables to entertain kids if they get bored and you want to wander.
Looked like a movie set!
The event was very interesting. I am not sure what I expected, but it was very loose. The location was organized, but once there you are on your own. You need your own equipment, your own vision, and the gumption to grab a model and start taking pictures.
I was a little overwhelmed. I have been using my single flash a little bit, but dropping into an unfamiliar location and coming up with a place to shoot and an idea in my head of what to do was difficult for me. I mostly wandered around and watched others. There are some very good shooters here. There are professional studio photographers, location photographers, and other amateurs here. I was one of the few rookies Sunday.
In a sleeping berth.
It seems like a good group. Many people knew each other and formed up little groups right away. Like in most of these situations I don’t tend to jump right in. I am a little more reserved, but I did meet and talk to several people. I did set up a shoot with Jorge Rimblas, and globbed on to a shoot that Ben and Martin had set up. Martin helped me out quite a bit, so thanks! My pictures from that shoot didn’t turn out unfortunately. I really need to pay more attention to the expressions on the model faces, and be more prepared and willing to direct. The pictures of Michael here were from the setup that Jorge and I did.
Head shot for Michael
My pictures are definitely not up to what some of the others shot, but I really shouldn’t let that get me down. It seems like many of these people have been to a lot of these things and have quite a bit of experience setting up their equipment. I have a lot to learn, but there seems to be people there that will help me out, especially if I step up and ask.
I’ll be back.
Check out the MN Strobist group on flickr for more of the pictures from the day.
Available light shot taken while others were working.
Just Visiting Stone Arch Bridge
The last of the Just Visiting pictures. This one gets a full view of the stone arch bridge in the background. A minus 2.0 EV and a 2.5 sec exposure at f/8 brought out the color of the lights on the bridge/water.
I had my camera on a tripod, and was triggering on a cord holding my SB800 with diffuser on, out to the right. Next time I am going to bring the umbrella and see if I can get better light.
Had to do some white balance/color correction to remove a lot of blue color in the concrete from the Guthrie’s lighting in Aperture.
Just Visiting Sunset
 
Here is another of the “just visiting” shots of my father. This one was less about the buildings and more about the sunset. This image was underexposed -3EV to really bring out the sky. The colors were all there, but I did pull them up a bit in Aperture. I then hit him with the flash, a SB800 with the diffuser.
Now, after getting into Joe McNally’s Hot Shoe Diaries a bit, I wish I had tried something that he has done, which is to take the diffuser off and zoom in the flash. Maybe try a snoot. Something that would focus the light on the person and control the amount of light that hits the railing, which is kind of ugly.