Messages

31

Portrait / Re: Portrait - Trying something new

« on: December 09, 2012, 01:58:36 AM »

As a wedding photographer, if the opportunity arises again in the future that I need to start bringing along larger knives, I'm going to start to get worried 

As long as you are holding the knives and axes, no worry

And you will need special gear to hold them. I wonder if CR is going to have a giveaway on a knife and axe belt

I'm not even kidding, that was one of the most difficult parts of my day! I was lugging around a ThinkTank Airport Security suitcase with all my gear in it... and couldn't for the life of me think of where to put this stupid knife. I didn't want to put it in one of the front pouches, for fear of cutting up my bad (They are just elastic on the front) and the inside was completely full... So I opted to hand carry it and get a little bit of unwanted attention.

You could try to use the new content aware move tool in CS6, but it might be hard given the busy background, and lack of space for it to get a good match.

Thanks, I'll give that a shot, but I highly doubt I will like the results due to the background. It doesn't help that her head intersects the window either. I'll post an updated photo in a couple days when I have some off-time to work on it again.

32

Portrait / Re: Portrait - Trying something new

« on: December 08, 2012, 11:08:51 PM »

RPT: Thank you, you are correct that the photo is slightly off compositionally. I'll see if it can possibly be fixed with cropping, it's just one of those things... I still think the photo has promise, but it certainly could have been better if I took a little more time with it. You know how weddings go, quite a hectic day. I'm not sure about lengthening the knife, but it is something I will certainly try out to see how I feel about it.

You are very welcome. Don't get me wrong, the picture has promise. A few tweaks and I am sure you will be happy with the outcome. About the knife, that comment was for any such opportunity in the future. I did not mean for you to edit the knife...

As a wedding photographer, if the opportunity arises again in the future that I need to start bringing along larger knives, I'm going to start to get worried  I grabbed the biggest one I had on the way out the door that morning, but maybe I'll have to pick up a larger butcher knife for future photo shoots.

I must admit, we got some crazy looks that day. A bride and groom with a photographer stalking them around a cemetery whilst carrying a butcher knife must look weird to some people. Not sure why. Thanks for your help.

33

Portrait / Re: Portrait - Trying something new

« on: December 08, 2012, 08:30:38 PM »

Looks like its time for some off camera flash...the lighting needs some contrast to give it some real mood.

The groom is actually lit by a 430exII/PW Flex TT5 in the outhouse, albeit, very dimly. I didn't want him to be brighter than the bride, for obvious reasons. It may also ruin the creepy feel in my opinion. I agree with lighting the bride with some OCF, but time was short, and I didn't have a softbox handy, and I don't feel my shoot through umbrellas would have been the best choice for this type of shot, so I opted for natural light. Next time I'll try to be a little more prepared.

Great picture! One thing I would do: position the model slightly to the right, so her head is not intersecting the window sill...

I agree completely, but it's too late to reposition her now =) Just something I'll have to pay better attention to next time.

34

Portrait / Re: Portrait - Trying something new

« on: December 08, 2012, 07:47:03 PM »

First of all, I would like to thank everyone for your input. I will definitely be incorporating several of the ideas into the final photo.

I like your idea.
Here are some of my ideas or suggestions:
For a horror / Halloween theme I would make the image abit darker and use cold color tones. I would use more blueish color in the shadows to emulate how things look at night / dusk.
I took the liberty of doing a 5min edit in PS, I hope you don't mind. It is not the final product, I just wanted to show the concept and my idea.

I'm at work right now. Mind if I ask for a brief rundown what you did for the smoke/haze/cloudy portions? Clouds filter? Either way, I'll give it another shot when I get home.

Distant.star: Thanks for your input. I can agree with your cropping suggestions somewhat... but for whatever reason, your crop just doesn't work for me. I just feel like too much of the picture is missing. I don't mind what Kernuak's done with the picture though, slightly cropping the top, so maybe I will try something in between your photo and my current photo as far as crop goes.

RPT: Thank you, you are correct that the photo is slightly off compositionally. I'll see if it can possibly be fixed with cropping, it's just one of those things... I still think the photo has promise, but it certainly could have been better if I took a little more time with it. You know how weddings go, quite a hectic day. I'm not sure about lengthening the knife, but it is something I will certainly try out to see how I feel about it.

Thanks again everyone!

35

Pricewatch Deals / Re: Canon EOS 5D Mark III Body for $2599 via eBay

« on: December 08, 2012, 05:38:19 PM »

You shouldn't really be "wary" of it, but you need to be aware. I purchased a 7D from them about a year and a half and it was a miserable experience. They claimed to have been "Scammed" at the time, insisted that I never payed for the camera (Although I had the receipt) said I needed to cancel the order and place it again, which I did, and still never had the camera in my hands. There I was, double charged, with no merchandise. They said I never made the first payment and so they could not refund it.

Eventually I had to file a report with paypal, and paypal was able to get a manager from Bigvalueinc on the phone. That is when they explained they were being scammed, placed all orders on hold (Understandable, but still frustrating) and after about a month of fighting, I got my camera shipped and the original $1700 refunded. Total nightmare. If the deal is good enough, like the current 5dIII deal is, I think a little hassle may be worth it though. You are covered by ebay and paypal both, just be ready to file that claim =)

36

Portrait / Re: Portrait - Trying something new

« on: December 08, 2012, 07:09:27 AM »

Thanks for the tips. I may have to post a few more pictures of this same building, the building itself is very crooked. This made it extremely hard for me to get the picture "straight". This may sound stupid, but I think the leaning to the right is an illusion created by the building. The building itself leans, and the board on the right side is broken off, which makes it look even worse. Looking at the base of the building, and the right side (Not the broken board hanging away from the building)

As for cropping the top off the building... yeah, sucks I did that, but nothing I can do about it now. I will play around with some tighter crops and see how I feel about it. Thanks again.

37

Portrait / Portrait - Trying something new

« on: December 08, 2012, 01:02:12 AM »

Hello all, my wife and I primarily specialize in weddings and couple portraits. I tend to favor the only slightly edited, color corrected, photo journalistic approach, doing my best to capture the day as it really looked. I tend not to like the extremely post processed photos.

The downside to this, is that sometimes work calls for us to work outside of our comfort zone. When this couple told me they were into skeletons/halloween stuff, and they wanted to have their wedding portraits done at a cemetery, I grabbed the butcher knife (They had the masks) for the photo shoot and couldn't resist trying something new. We stumbled upon an old, beat-up outhouse, and everything was perfect in my mind's eye.

The problem is, this is way out of my comfort zone. How did I do in creating a horror-esque themed photo? Slightly desaturated, extreme clarity adustments... What should I look to change? Keep it as is? Thank you for any feedback!

38

Technical Support / Monitor Calibration Lost on reboot/monitor slepe

« on: November 15, 2012, 10:15:31 PM »

Hello all, I've been running into a very strange issue that I can't seem to track down. I currently run a dual monitor setup and would like to calibrate both displays. Both displays calibrate correctly and look great, until the PC is either shut down or one of the monitors goes into sleep mode. All software and drivers are up to date. Here are my current specs:

Dell u2711 (Primary display)
Dell u2410 (Secondary display)
X-Rite i1 Display Pro
Radeon HD 5870 Graphics Card
Windows 7/8. I just upgraded to Windows 8 yesterday, and this issue occurs both with windows 7 and 8.

The Dell u2711 is calibrated automatically using automatic display control within the x-rite i1 profiler software while the Dell u2410 is calibrated using manual controls. I create and save the profiles for both monitors. I checked Windows color management and made sure that the profiles I just create are set to the system default. As I said, everything looks great, until a reboot or some other event that may occur after an undiscloed period of time (Monitor sleep, power off, etc...?). The only thing I know for sure is they are lost on reboot, but I have also lost the calibration without a reboot after a certain amount of time. After the monitors no longer match, I check and the profiles are still selected as defaults in Window's color management panel. Recalibrating with X-rite's software corrects the issue temporarily.

Thoughts anyone? Thanks for any assistance.

39

Lenses / Re: 100 f/2.8L or 135mm f/2L

« on: November 15, 2012, 06:52:21 AM »

Since you're shooting APS-C, I'd say get the 100L Macro.  For most indoor portraits, the 135L is too long on APS-C.

This is important to note. I will say that for portraits, I found even the 100L to be too long for my tastes on my 7D. It wasn't until I recently picked up a 5D Mark III that the 100L became one of my favorite lenses ever.

40

Lenses / Re: 100 f/2.8L or 135mm f/2L

« on: November 15, 2012, 05:10:43 AM »

JMan, unfortunately, I do not own the 135L to compare it to, but I absolutely love my 100L. Like you mentioned, I use it primarily for portraits and only occasionally for true macro. Although I don't own it (I've used it once though), I would not trade my 100L for the 135L. They both offer amazing image quality, and I am constantly impressed with the results I get from the 100L. I think you would be hard pressed to tell the difference between the two lenses by comparing images from each.

Image stabilization, while not that important for the true macro work, it incredibly useful for portraits. It has been a great lens for typical portrait sessions, as well as low light wedding photography work. If I could choose just one lens, I would say the 100L is the way to go. I was going through the same decision about a year ago and decided the image quality and versatility of macro and IS were too good to pass up. Just my opinion of course.