Shutter Speed

Fragile Porcelain Mice and LucaBrasi

2008-05-11T21:19:30Z

LucaBrasi

Fragile Porcelain Mice

He posed for me!

Critique Welcomed and encouraged.

Yay.

2008-05-10T20:46:57Z

I got permission to shoot the Fragile Porcelain Mice show tonight.

Should be a lot of fun.

Canon L series lenses.

2008-04-22T21:18:43Z

The heavens parted and the sun shone down on me today as I learned it possible for me to own my very own L lens.

Next week, I will have the Canon 135mm f/2L lens.

f2

Seriously fast, going to be awesome and versatile on so many levels.

My grubby little photography obsessed hands cannot wait.

Esther Macomb.

2008-04-17T23:52:44Z

I took these in Feburary...Geez. It's already the middle of April!

The bassist from Esther Macomb is using my photographs, P.F.I.C and Upright Animals are as well. It's fun seeing your work other places than your own journal.

P.F.I.C

The Upright Animals

Esther Macomb

THE FEED

I've been very bad at posting.

2008-04-17T23:27:17Z

Work is growing so hectic, I'm not posting my work...

I don't necessarily like the composition of this one. I'm going to have to go back and reshoot.

Abandonded house

2008-03-23T19:27:39Z

On the way home from Downtown, my friend and I passed by this partly torn down house. We had to stop and I jumped out and snapped a quick few. Good thing they were quick, because the house next door had two mastiffs in the back yard. They were not nice doggies.

I did almost pee my pants.

LOVE ABANDONED PLACES. Will do more once it warms up.

St. Louis

2008-03-23T01:36:36Z

I had another lesson with Kelsey today, and it went well. We had fun, which was the most important thing.

I'm sort of bummed that I didn't TEACH her more this time. It was mostly about me finding shots and her following along. I'd love to see her eventually take initiative and search on her own, but I have to remember she's only 13. She is improving drastically and has already won some awards.

I'm very happy to have had such a positive impact on her. I hope I can continue to mentor her, she has some real promise.

Here are my shots for the day, they are really much better viewed bigger, but if you want to seem them that way, you can check my deviantART, I will upload them soon.

Flooded, almost the entire riverfront.

My lone color shot

I love St. Louis. There is just something inherently beautiful about the urban area that I think goes mostly unnoticed.

Throwing stones.

2008-03-02T19:55:14Z

Well, not really. More like shooting stones, I suppose.

y/n?

Portraits

2007-12-23T22:47:44Z

Doggie meds.

2007-11-24T01:52:15Z

What a way to start my day.

2007-10-20T15:42:31Z

The title of this is: Mumma, I did a bad thing.

New York City

2007-10-13T03:31:06Z

I arrived back this week from NYC. It was a fantastic trip and here are the photos from it. I took over 200 and these are the 109 that I kept. For the sake of not having to re-post all of these again, I'll give you the run down and just link back to this entry.

I will give you a bit of dialog and take you through what I did. Most of the photos were taken with my wide angle so they are best viewed bigger. So, keep that in mind as you view them, some of them are 900 x 600. And if true to form, Photobucket probably mis-loaded a few and they will be huge.

Friday morning nyhamsterhouse and myself hopped on the subway and took it Columbia University. There we had breakfast at Tom's Restaurant. You may recognize it.

The waitress was gruff and my eggs were runny and nasty. The whole wheat toast was good...

Then we walked to St. John the Divine. It burned down just before Sept. 11, 2001. Because the cathedral is built only on limestone, the smoke sank into the stone. They did not bust the windows like they usually do, because they are stained glass. There was a gorgeous gold original Tiffany roof in one of the rooms.

Some fun statues from inside:

A neat statue outside

Then we went to Midtown.

Central Park, the sun was in a really bad position and it was very hazy.

5th Avenue --

Inside a Trump building

A dandelion water sculpture

Then it was on to Times Square where she had to work for a while and I was left to amuse myself --like that was hard.

UFC!

Bryant Park

back to T Square

The famous Naked Cowboy. Rain or shine, cold or steaming hot he is out in T Square in his undies playing and taking pictures with people. Talentlessness at it's best, folks!

Walked all the way to 30 Rockefeller Center and Radio City. Christie's is right across the street from 30 Rock.

I went in and wandered around the NBC store.

Over one block is a gorgeous cathedral St. Patricks (?) I think...

Then it was all the way back to T square.

I wandered down a few blocks and decided on the wax museum.

I really <3 Johnny Depp.

Dali

I'm not a Jessica fan, but this looked so much like her, it was frightening.

Then back to T square to meet Jess.

The next day I went to Fort Tryon Park, which is a 10 minute walk from Jess's apartment. I walked around there all day and went to the Cloisters, a museum of Medieval Europe.
I was winded after the huge walk up a hill and stopped because I liked the cobblestone road.

Inside the Cloisters

The park and the Hudson River

Then it was back to T square again for a walking tour in which the guide never showed up. So, we just walked around and I took night time pics.

Several different versions of the same photo.

This one is my favorite, I like the cabs. They really make the photo.

This is where my friend works.

We had beer and dessert here at 1:30am.

Sunday we went to SoHo for shopping and wine tasting. I love that neighborhood. If I ever have a few extra million, I will so live there.

There were the chocolates bought at Mirabelle's. So good. Too bad half of them melted to mush in my bag because of the heat.

Giant Gummy Bears!

Canal Street in China Town.

Brooklyn Bridge from below

Downtown Manhattan as seen from Brooklyn.

I was on a pier and saw a wedding party taking photos. I couldn't resist.

The famous Grimaldi's Pizza. Very yum.

After pizza, we walked the Brooklyn Bridge back into Manhattan. Talk about 360 degrees of awesome.

the Manhattan Bridge

Shot of Midtown from the Brooklyn Bridge

The Statue of Liberty with my telephoto lens from the BB

Jessica

Moi

We then caught the subway to make the Staten Island Ferry at 6pm. Jess waiting

Sunset!

Pics from the Ferry Statue of Liberty on the way to SI and then Manhattan on the way back from SI

Monday before I had to catch my flight we decided to do Central Park West. This is where I found the Tibet Boutique. Best. Find. Ever. Then we did Wall Street. There was a street fair and I got to have falafel. I love falafel.

NYSE

The famous bull

Then we did St. Mark's. It is where Zeppelin shot the cover for their Physical Graffiti album. Another fantastic neighborhood. So awesome.

That's my trip. After that we went on a search (back in T square) for I <3 NY merchandise. Then It was off to the airport.

Forest Park Balloon Glow

2007-09-15T04:55:22Z

The Great Forest Park Balloon Race is tomorrow and I wanted to go to the balloon glow.

So did everyone else. It took me more time to get into Forest Park than it did to park, walk, take photos, have enough, walk back, and drive home.

It was frustrating, so I only have photos of the Energizer Bunny Balloon. There were thousands of people there, and it made it impossible to get up close. I was not wading into that mess.

It was a shame, I love hot air balloons.

The new Canon 40D

2007-09-05T02:34:31Z

It's going to take a lot of getting used to. For one, it is double the size of my XTi. Second, the camera is laid out completely different. Third, it is much more hefty and weighty. But, the body feels so much more sturdy and real.

As far the the camera goes, I've only had it for less than 24 hours and have used it for maybe a half our of shooting. My initial thoughts are this: This camera rocks.

It is laid out very similar to the 1D and the 5D where the Rebel series had everything along the back by the LCD screen. All of the settings are on top of the camera instead, for easier use and changing of settings. No more metering and holding the camera out to change stops and WB and ISO. That is all done easily while looking through the viewfinder and knowing the buttons. It's very nice.

The software, on the other hand, is quite complicated. Canon with this camera gave their own manipulation software. It is very much a new interface for me and converting a RAW file to JPEG was incredibly tedious and a bit difficult. Obviously, I figured it out, but there are many more steps than I expected. Plus, the newest versions of Photoshop do not support the software yet, because CS3 came out before the 40D so it does not recognize the RAW files. But, I really do like the Canon manipulation software a bit better than Photoshop.

I'll elaborate more later when I've had more time getting to know my 40D (which I've named Barnaby) But, for now, here are two photos I've taken with it.

Squirt would like to say hello.

2007-08-27T17:44:37Z

He'd like to show you his nose.

He was sleepy and therefore, peaceful.

Walking Away

2007-08-16T14:08:28Z

Comments?

Rocco DeLuca and the Burden.

2007-07-25T19:04:31Z

The music was fantastic. Just phenomenal.

There are 60 photos, so take your time.

They played with at the Duck Room at Blueberry Hill on the Delmar Loop.

Sara Bareilles was the first opening act.

The second opening act was The Last Goodbye. They really blew the crowd away with how talented they were.

I had moved my way to the center of the stage to get some better shots. A professional photographer dropped down out of my shot then asked me what I shot. I said Canon and he took off his lens and handed it to me. It was a Tamron 17-24 2.8. Nice. These are the shots I got with his lens.

That was really cool. He was really nice.

Greg came out on sound check to inspect everything.

Then, it was concert time.

Rocco

Bassit Dave Beste

Drummer Ryan Carman

Percussionist Greg Velasquez

Rocco talking to the crowd.

During their song "Soul", the crowd went nuts. I didn't get to capture it, but there was moshing going on.

At one point Rocco turned around and dropped to the ground. No warning, just, bam! Everyone rushed up to the stage. He was on his knees playing his Dobro on the ground.

He was drained.

During the concert, I got to meet a guy who used to play with Rocco in Long Beach. So, I got to go with them after the show and meet the band.

Raquy and the Cavemen.

2007-07-19T02:59:28Z

A awesome event I went to sponsored by Aalim Bellydance Co.

Picture heavy, so I'll cut.

A fellow classmate

One of our instructors, Megan

Then the dancing started!

This is Serena, she's being playful.

You should remember April, she was in another recent post of mine.

Then, it was Raquy time!!!

Then, Salwa took the stage. She was amazing.

Yay!

I had some problems with lens flair, but I was able to photoshop some of the more distracting bits out. I am overall very pleased!!

Goofin' off..

2007-06-25T01:07:52Z

It's a good thing I have a human subject who doesn't mind me sticking my camera inches from his eyes.

Depth of Field

2007-06-24T03:15:01Z

Playing with DoF and extension tubes.

A CD

Matches

My turquoise ring

Make-up

Monopoly pieces

Rubber billard balls

Bellydancing

2007-06-19T00:06:00Z

I had problems with low light and grain, but I think it went pretty well overall.

This is April, she is one of my instructors advanced and performance students. She was dancing at Saleem's, which is a Lebanese restaurant owned by my instructor and her husband.

This is my instructor, Salwa. She was dancing at the Hookah Lounge, Layal's. Her husband is co-owner of this as well. The venue was dark and very small. It was really difficult to shoot there. The grain on these pictures was horrible. A little run through noise ninja helped a bit. I didn't have my in camera noise reduction on. One of those little details that you forget but would have made a world of difference.

For my first time shooting a moving subject in really low light, I think it went pretty well. I need to get more now that I have my noise reduction turned on.

I kick myself sometimes.

Star trails

2007-06-09T17:28:42Z

This is an idea I have been wanting to do for a while, and last night as I was working out, I saw that the sky was full of stars, and this is in the city. I knew if I found the country, there would a huge amount more. This is what resulted.

This was just a minute nine second exposure.

This was a 10 minute exposure.

I would have gone longer, but my battery died. It was full charged, and two 10 minute exposures killed it.

I noticed that some of the shots were incredibly noisy, while others were very crisp and clear. I varied between 100 and 400 ISO and found 200 worked the best. 100 kept things way too dark and wasn't picking up the stars and 400 was way over exposed.
Some at 200 with f3.5 were still really grainy. Any answers as to why this was?

Friday night light

2007-06-03T16:26:03Z

I got home on Friday and promptly poured myself a glass of wine. In taking just the few sips, I went out side and saw a very active lightning storm. All excited, I grabbed my dog and headed toward the Arch riverfront. I could not hear any thunder, so I knew it was to the north and most likely over in Illinois already.

I got to the Arch, but the lightning had already died down. There were lots of people walking around, so I decided to shoot a little anyway.

Old Courthouse

Millennium Hotel and the Deloitte building

This is Buddy. He was latched to a carriage that pulls you around town. His driver really liked me and chatted me up. I sent her these because she doesn't only command Buddy, she also takes care of him.

Hermann.

2007-06-02T02:07:52Z

One of the only times you will see me post pictures that others have taken.

Most of these were taken by my friend Jenny with my camera while we were in Hermann, Mo. I was shooting with hers, she has a Canon 10D. She is a professional photographer. I shot in B&W, she shot in color.

I don't have the pictures I've taken yet, she has to send them to me. For now, these are hers. A few of them are mine, I will point them out.

This is Jenny and Lee, aren't they cute! Oh, and by the way, Lee is some English guy we randomly met while in Hermann. He kidnapped us and showed us one hell of a time. It was a pleasure.

This is me....

Unflattering angle.

A bridal party we ran into. The bride-to-be was putting lipstick on Lee. He was up for anything!

Best photo taken there in my opinion.

Me rocking out

Forever artistic, she is.

Some guy who was giving up shit...

Winery...

Me being drunken and happy

I like shooting in B&W. Here is a flower.