TimeLine Media Blog

Dance Photography

This upcoming Monday, there are 9 past 2013 events that will be removed from the proofing website. It has been fun to go through these old events to find some exciting images to post onto the blog! I meant to come back to these images sooner, but had so many other photos to share throughout the year, that I did not find a slot for these until now. If you want to see the expiration dates and events, please visit the proofing site here:

http://proofs.timelinedc.com

It has been great to have so many photos to share, and lots of content to write about in these posts. Writing it down in this format has made me more accountable as a professional photographer. It has given me a push to keep shooting photos, to keep improving each time I make images, and importantly, to give me a concrete goal to work for every day.

Proofing Site Expiration

Undoubtedly writing the blog has made me a better editor! I try to limit the amount of photos in each post. I could just throw up 10 images in each post and write a few sentences. There are a few blogs that I follow in which this is the case, so I wanted to do something different. Also, limit the amount of photos so that only the very best are featured. That is one of the secrets of pro photographers – if you only show the best of the best, it makes it seem like EVERY photo you take is amazing! The also helps me to home in on the best images when I’m shooting, so there is not a huge number of unusable photos that need to be edited after the event.

I think there is progress from doing this blog so far, and I already have a list of ideas that I want to do this year with my photography. Some will be done at events, and some I will have to schedule outside of these. It will be interesting to see a few months from now how many of these I will complete! Again, visit the proofing site before the expiration of events.

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Testing with a Statue

Today, I have been reviewing previous posts about a new camera, or perhaps a flash. I have been making these posts from the side of what advice would I give to someone that just received a new DSLR for Christmas and what would they do with their new toy. After the first few weeks of just taking photos, getting comfortable with how the camera feels in the hand, and being confident that it would not lose any of the photos that you take with it.

One of the first accessories that people use frequently, but often incorrectly, is the flash. Going around the tourist areas, or looking at the crowds at sporting events, there are so many people that use their flash. This is because the photos from their camera using their default settings are too dark for the situation. Indoors under artificial light, or any photo taken at night, the flash will pop on your camera to brighten the scene. You will definitely make your photos brighter with the flash, but a lot of times, the light will be ugly! Here is the reason why, and how you can make it better.

This first image shows the default direction for a speedlight flash mounted on a camera. The thinking here is what you want to brighten is right in front of the camera. So, firstly, point the flash directly in front of you. This will get you a sharp, bright photo. Likely, only whatever is right in front of the camera will get the light. There will be a dark, harsh shadow right behind your subject if you pose them against a wall. To make this light better, you can take your speedlight and point it straight up to the ceiling. Doing this will “bounce” the light from the ceiling back down to your subject.

Bounce Light

The result is that the light becomes very soft against your subject because you have made the light source much larger. Instead of coming from the front of the flash before hitting your subject, the light is spread out across the ceiling and surrounding walls. By the time it hits the subject, it is much larger in area, which makes light much softer. Easy!

Some speedlights have a little white card inserted at the front of the flash. Pop this little accessory up to direct just a little more of the light forward if you are photographing a person. This will brighten their faces nicely with not as harsh a shadow behind the subject and keeping the overall light in the scene soft. If you are in a place with very high, or no ceiling, you can even point the flash directly behind the camera to bounce off a wall in back of you. It can give a similar result to bouncing off the ceiling. There are many other tips on using your speedlight flash, this is just the beginning. If you have any more questions on how to use your flash, let me know!

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Washington, DC

No, I have not gone out in this crazy cold weather to take more photos at sunrise! There has been an itch in the back of my mind since I know that not too many people will be out there, and the skies have been really clear in the mornings. However, the logical side of my brain won saying not to risk it with this record cold out there. Also, I do not have the proper gear to get out there and make images without getting frost bite! But I did make some nice ones after the Korean War Memorial walk through that I posted about earlier. When I started to walk back towards the car from that area, I saw this right behind me:

Cold Sunrise

I have already made so many images of the Lincoln Memorial, but this amazing monument that is colored pink in the breaking sunrise was too good to pass up. I did not go into the memorial, as this was not what was in the best light. With the sun very low on the horizon, the pink was hitting the structure that was built up higher first. I moved as quickly as I could into position without slipping on the frozen ground to make more photos.

The images above are just about straight out of the camera using the Vivid camera calibration from my Nikon. This last image was from an HDR of 9 bracketed exposures. I did not go too crazy with the post-processing. I just wanted punch up a little of the saturation in the sky while keeping the detail and sharpness of the building. Trying to do this on a single exposure was too difficult to balance correctly without making the masking or selection look like a mess. The HDR processing was a much faster way to get where I wanted to go!

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208