Trip to New York

Trip to NEW YORK CITY

My wife and I drove to New Jersey. We stopped at Lane Farms in Georgia. I love peaches but hate the peaches we by at the store so I wanted to go to the source.

We went inside and they had big juicy peaches everywhere. We bought a box for $30. We ate peaches all the way to N.J. By the time we reached New Jersey I had peaches coming out of my ears.

We took some photos inside.

Ever take a photo indoors using flash? If you want to make your background lighter or darker put the camera on MANUAL and change your shutter speed. To make the background darker use a higher speed like 1/60 or 1/125th of a second. The photo of my wife was taken at 1/125th of a second at f/4.

If you want to pick up the ambient light (existing light) lower your shutter speed to 1/30 or 1/15th of a second. The shutter controls the ambient light and the aperture controls the flash. At this lower speed look at how brighter the background came out.

Hold the camera steady. As you pick up ambient light at slower shutter speeds you will start to pick up movement so don't go too low.

I think we were in South Carolina when we came across this water tower. Pretty cool.

When we got to New Jersey my inlaws treated us to dinner and we celebrated my wifes' birthday. She is 29 "plus". I don't know what the "plus" equals. The last person that knew her real age was accidentally run over by a Fiat.

By the way, the waiter that took this photo really needs to come to one of my seminars or buy my DVD's. If he keeps taking bad photos like this he might get hit by a Fiat.

My sister ordered (and paid for) our favorite cake. A Napolean Cream Puff cake from Carlos' Bakery in Hoboken, N.J. It is the house special. Nobody makes it better. I mean nobody. $100 serves 20 people. I should have taken a photo before we devoured it. It was a work of art.

Next stop was Liberty State Park in Jersey City New Jersey. I wanted to take a photo of the Statue of Liberty but did not have time to go to Lower Manhattan or the Island itself. So I had to settle for a back view of the statue. New Jersey is a great state but has always been the butt of everyones' jokes. They even placed Miss Liberty with her back to the state. Oh well.

Now, if you have been using my rules of composition you know that this is a badly composed photo.

The photo below is much better.

I walked around a bit and came across this Monument below. It is of an American soldier of WWII carrying a Concentration Camp survivor.

Nothing that is worth anything in life is ever free, especially freedom.

Next blog will be about my day in New York City. I went to my favorite place. B and H photo. It is the most colossal photo, video, electonics store ever. Don't miss it!

In the meantime, if you should see a Fiat run for your life!

Went to see the Shuttle take off!

There were people everywhere waiting to see the Shuttle blast off. Some were standing on the island in the middle of the road. It was fairly crowded.

To bad it was cancelled because of the weather. Oh well, that's okay I prefer taking photos of people. Which brings me to the next set of photos.


The photo below was taken around 11:30 AM. on the beach. Normally taking a portrait of someone mid day is not good because of the harsh shadows on the face caused by direct sunlight. Fortunately the sun was behind some clouds and we had "Flat Lighting". Whether the shade is provided by a tree or a cloud the end result is almost the same. The photo was taken without flash or reflectors.

We later took photos at sunset. When photographing a person with a sunset remember to get the exposure for the sunset first. Here is what I did.

First I put my camera on "manual" and set the ISO for 100. Then I put the shutter speed at 200. This is the highest shutter speed that the camera will synchronize with the flash. Next I aimed the camera at the sun and adjusted the f/stop according to the light meter indicator in the viewfinder. I took a photo to make sure the exposure (brightness level) was good. I took this photo at 1/200th of a second at f/8. Background looked good.

All that is left now is to turn on an external flash. The built in flash in your camera is not strong enough so you'll have to use a flash that attaches to the top of your camera. Even though your camera is set to "MANUAL" both flash and camera "talk" to each other. Your flash will set itself to f/8. Now your flash will match the brightness on your subject to the brightness of the background. Both will expose properly. The end result will be similar to the photo above.

If you want your photo to come out exactly like mine you will have to invest in a second flash. This photo was taken using two flashes. One was on camera and the other my assistant held to the right of me. Using two flashes makes a world of difference when you print the photo.

When buying a flash unit buy the most powerful. Canon and Nikon flashes have built in transmitter and receiver so one will set off the other. If you have any questions about this technique call me and I will explain it to you over the phone. 727-375-0480. Typing is not one of my strengths.

To everyone that has ordered my Instructional DVDs thank you. Thanks to those of you that emailed me to tell me how much you liked them. In the future I will post some of those emails. . If you still have not ordered yours now is the time!

Women are from Venus where they like to spend their time at the mall. Men are from Mars and there are no malls on Mars!

Ah, here is my lovely wife getting ready to go to the mall to shop. Why am I not in the picture? Because I don't like to be photographed with the look of fear and dread on my face. I know what I am about to experience.












You are looking at a photo of the Apocalypse. These are two of the Angels that will destroy the Earth. One mall at a time. You have not expeienced shopping untill you accompany my wife and her sister.










If going shopping with my wife and her sister is so bad Why is Cosimo smiling? He is coming back to tell me he has found a store that sells rope so we can hang ourseves. :)

Posing

How should you pose a subject?

There are specific poses that I can show you and I could show you how posing works. Weight distribution and body language are important.

Rather than trying to describe something that is better left to a live demo let me give you a few ideas.

Learn to be a really good observer. The best photographers are just that. Great observers, and then they translate what they "see" on paper. It's no different when it comes to posing. Most people pose themselves really well by just being there. However, the moment you point a camera at them they become self conscious and "break" the pose.

After I take a photo where I have posed someone I tell them to "relax" while I set up the next shot. As I move the camera or tripod I keep on eye on the subject. Without fail they will relax into a really terrific pose. If at that point I tell them I am going to take a photo they will freeze up and break the pose. So I simply tell them, "don't move that looks great" or " do what you just did a second ago".

You will be surprised how many poses your subject will give you if you just observe.

A mistake I often see is the photographer asking the subject to pose. This will only give you awkward poses that look fake because you are asking the person to perform making them self conscious.

Lastly I look for poses that the subject looks good photographed as a full length (head to toe). If he or she looks good full length I can also take some from the waist up and head and shoulders without making the person move. This way you can create extra photos from the same pose.

If you look at these three photos you'll see that I started with a full length pose. Then I took a photo from the waist up and finally a head and shoulder. All within a matter of seconds. If you repeat this 10 times you'll have 30 photos.

All this by just observing how someone is seated or standing