Welcome to week 6 of Photography Friday. Photography Friday is a 20 week challenge to help improve our photography skills. There is a weekly prompt / theme for each week that you can be as creative with it as you'd like. This week's theme is anything Valentine's Day related and next week's theme is your pets or nature. For further information please click here.
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First off I just gotta say HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!! I hope each of you have a special day.
Today I'm in Idaho celebrating my nephew's 1st birthday (who was born on Valentine's Day) and Dave is in New Mexico with his good friend skiing. Since we are apart for our first married Valentine's Day we celebrated last weekend. Normally we would have traveled but we were snowed in and couldn't really leave Woodward. We first went to Walmart together to pick out some flowers for me. Poor Dave, he tried super hard to get me flowers but he never could make it in time to the flower shop because of the snow. I assured him Walmart flowers were just fine. Personally I think they are just as pretty and I enjoy picking them out together. After the flowers we ate dinner at a local steak house. It's always odd because I order a big fat 10 oz. steak and Dave orders chicken. When the waitress brings out the food she always goes "Here is your steak sir" ... Then I pipe up "Oh, that's actually mine". It's always a bit awkward and I'm sad to say this isn't the first time that has happened either ... oh well. I gotta replenish after crossfit, what can I say?
Here is the actual part of this post about photography. First, thanks to all you lovely readers for your suggestions and comments. I took those suggestions and implemented them. It was recommended to me that I move what I am photographing to a window to get natural light and to put props / decorate around the subject I am photographing. So that's what I did peeps and your suggestions worked great. Thanks a bunch!
For starters - here is my 'photography box'. I was asked about it and said I'd share the picture of it. I made it from 3 thick poster boards. I cut one of them in half and then duct taped it all together. Easy! The L photo is in the dining room lighting and the R photo is natural lighting.
In these next two pictures I can tell a huge difference from the dining room lighting versus the window lighting. We also had snow so that brought much more light in as well. The flowers photographed are the flowers Dave bought me. I thought it would be a good way to capture them in memory of Valentine's Day.
ISO 6400 f/11 SS60
ISO 3200 f/10 SS 1/160
ISO 6400 f/10 SS1/160
ISO 800 f/2.2 SS1/1000
ISO 800 f/2.8 SS1/640
ISO 1600 f/2.8 SS1/640
This one is just for kicks (pun intended). First off, aren't those socks cute? They are from my granny and she is the best. Secondly, I was standing on my table, in my second story apartment, right by the window. I'm sure on-lookers thought I was crazy but I really tried to get some good pictures. I told my husband if the neighbors saw me they probably thought I was crazy and he said he thought I was crazy. Welcome to marriage, Dave! ;) Anyone else do crazy things to get pictures?
What are your thoughts on these pictures? They are my favorite ones so far. I think the lighting turned out really great and flowers are just fun to photograph. I think I could have focused some of them more but overall I'm super happy with them.
What are your Valentine Day plans? I'd love to know! <3
PS - 50% off all my ads today and tomorrow with the code VALENTINE =)
gorgeous! I need to make myself a photo box for sure! ps those socks are so cute!
ReplyDeleteBeautiful!!! I am not much pf a critic when it comes to photos... But I loved these:) Happy Valentine's day! Have fun celebrating your nephews first birhtday! My family and I are celebrating one of my nieces first birthday this weekend! Isn't it so fun being an Aunt?:)
ReplyDeleteHey Katy! Thanks for letting me know the link-up wasn't there. I created it but apparently didn't add it. It's all fixed now so feel free to link up. =)
ReplyDeletewow that lighting makes such a difference!!! great pictures! those roses are GORGEOUS too by the way!!
ReplyDeletei find it funny that they always assume the steak is his!!! oh stereotypes! :)
Thanks, Nicole! I have really enjoyed this photo box. I think you could even make it smaller if needed. Mine is good but is bulky.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Rachel!
ReplyDeleteYes! Being an Aunt is so so so fun! My nephews have filled my heart with more love than I knew possible. That's exciting that you are celebrating your nieces birthday =)
The light box does make a huge difference. I saw something similar on Pinterest so I recreated it.
ReplyDeleteIt is funny that people always assume the steak goes to the man! ha! I showed them ;)
Thanks, Stephanie! It has helped me take much better pictures.
ReplyDeleteYes, the lighting is SO MUCH BETTER. 100% difference. They look great! I do tons of crazy things to get pictures :) You're not alone.
ReplyDeleteI will say that your ISO is really high. I've read that you don't want it to get higher than 800 if you can help it, but more like 200 or even 100 is best. The higher the ISO, the more "grainy" your picture will be if you ever wanted to print it or blow it up bigger. Try to get light in my adjusting the aperture or shutter speed, and adjust your ISO last of all.
ReplyDeleteI'm having a big battle with the whole 'triangle' of ISO / aperture and ss. I got a new lens for Christmas (50mm 1.4) and when I lower my f/stop ( say f10 or higher) it really blocks out light. I'm gonna have to do some more research. =)
ReplyDeleteI took an on-line photography class and they told me to always start with ISO and then change the other two options. However, maybe I should try the other two first and see how that works.
Thanks for the tips!
All the contents you mentioned in post is too good.
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