Playing with Landscapes and HDR

So a few weeks ago I had to take a trip for work. We were on our way off post in the evening for our dinner break when I saw this fishing pond with the sun setting right in front of it. I quickly told my guys that I would catch up with them in a few minutes (a few minutes turned into about an hour standing in front of this pond watching the sunset). Its hard to notice with the picture so small (damn blogger) but the shot with the windmills in the background is 4 exposures and because the windmills were spinning while I was shooting, it looks like they have 4 or 5 sails instead of the 3 that they actually have. I hope you like them.

Another Shoot with Linda and Rebecca

You may remember a couple of months ago when I wrote about my shoot with Linda and Rebecca (you can see the blog here). After we were done shooting the first time, they mentioned that once the weather warmed up a little bit, that they would love to shoot some swim suites. Well the weather is finally nice, so I gave them a call to see if they were still interested. Needless to say, they were.

I told them about a cool location I had found that had a waterfall with all of the rocks around it covered in graffiti. I had found the location for another shoot that unfortunately never came to be, but I think it worked out great for this shoot. You can see all of our shots by going onto my Flickr stream here.

Night Shots Around Colorado Springs

Well I know its been a little while since I have posted anything on here, but its not for a lack of having stuff to post. Since my last post, I've had another shoot with Linda and Rebecca (those should be up later on today as well), a shoot with a great model up in Fort Collins (hopefully have those up in a day or two), some landscapes from a secret location (really, can't say where it is, but hopefully will have them up soon), and now finally had the chance to go out and do some night shots around Colorado Springs. I have been wanting to go do some night shots for a while, but have never had the chance. Finally last night I decided to go to Palmer Park and get some sunset shots, and then go wander around town and take advantage of the full moon. Unforutnately, I got to Palmer Park a little late (sun was a little lower then I would have liked) not to mention the mountains were almost completely covered with clouds so you couldn't see anything hardly. Oh well, we will try that again soon.

So by the time I gave up hope, it was night. Was going to head down town and get some shots, but didn't have anything in particular in mind. The first place I came up to was the Colorado College campus. The campus is pretty cool. It has several of its orignal buildings like the church and administration building, mixed in with a bunch of modern buildings. I was surprised to see the front door to the church open (it was like 10 pm) and empty. I almost went inside to shoot some, but decided against it.





After I got done on campus, I went downtown. I was hoping to do some stuff around the clubs (it was a Saturday night on a 4 day weekend and the military just got paid), but I didn't really see anything that caught my eye. I kept driving and ended up at the pioneer museum where I had done my shoot with Jeannie. It actually looked pretty cool at night.



When I walked around to the back and looked at the art work we had used, it was pretty cool. It took me a few tries to get the exposure right, but I really think the shot came out great.



I was getting ready to leave, and then thought about something I had wanted to try when I was shooting with Jeannie. I wanted to try and get some light beams coming out from behind the piece out towards the camera. Unfortunately that day it was broad daylight, but now it wasn't. Up until now, i have never really tried any kind of effects with my lights, but figured this was a good chance. I never managed to get the look I was going after (despite about 10 attempts), but I think that this is a pretty nice look reguardless.



You can see the rest of my shots from this night on my "Night Shots" folder on Flickr.

Fashion Shoot with Jeannie

I'd like to introduce to you all Jeannie. Jeannie answered a casting call that I had placed on Model Mayhem a couple of weeks ago. She is a local spokes model who was looking to add more shots to her portfolio. We met on a day when the weather was questionable at best. We had had scattered showers the last few days and as I was driving downtown to meet here, there was nothing but black clouds coming over the mountain. I almost called to reschedule but I figured we would give it a shot. Thankfully, the weather held long enough for us to shoot (it literally started to finally rain as I was walking to my car to head home). The clouds actually did a great job of softening up the light some too.

Most of the shots here took place at and around the Pioneer Museum downtown. I saw the giant paperclip (yes that's a Giant Paper Clip) and wanted to use it. After we shot there, we wondered around and stumbled on a few other really cool areas. Once we shot there we were looking for somewhere else to shoot at. Before we met, I found an alley way that looked kind of cool. When we finally walked down it we saw this awesome garage door that made an amazing background.

One other great part of about this trip, was it was the first time that I had tried using my flash (only a little SB-600 for right now) with a model. We used it primarily in the alley way, but I like the way it turned out. Thanks Jeannie for dealing with me while I was constantly messing with it and changing settings trying to get it to work the way I wanted it to. Since I am still to cheap to go out and buy a wireless trigger for it, we were using my heavily modified (I need to post an article on this sometime) off camera synch cable (connected with a piece of CAT5 cable) to get the flash in position). All and all, we both had a great time shooting. I think the pictures came out very good and I can't wait to work with her again.

Please make sure you check out the entire session on my Flick page.

Don't Spill the Beans

Here is the second of my "cliche" shots that I was able to shoot with CC a couple of weeks ago. Our first cliche ("Hear no Evil, Speak no Evil, See no Evil") turned out great. Our second cliche was "Don't Spill the Beans". Unfortunately, we weren't able to shoot my original idea because I had problems getting a couple of props so when she showed up to shoot, I wasn't totally sure what we were going to do. We started just trying out a couple of ideas, not really sure what we would end up with. When I got home and got to looking through the shots though, I realized that we might actually have something kinda cool. It wasn't my original intention to show the progression of her spilling the beans, but it just kinda worked out that way, and I have to say, I really like the final result.

You can the rest of the shots from both of our cliches by checking out my Flickr.

Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, See No Evil

I met CC right after moving to Colorado on Model Mayhem. We decided to try out my latest idea, a series of cliches. The two that we decided to shoot were "Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, See No Evil" and "Don't Spill the Beans". Here you can see "Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, See No Evil". The weather was supposed to have been very nice that day but when I got up to Boulder to shoot (my first time up there by the way), it was extremely windy and a mix of sun and clouds as a storm was getting ready to move in.

I showed up about an hour early to try and scout out some locations and wasn't having a lot of luck. I knew for this shot, I wanted something a little more grungy or industrial. It got to the point where I thought the best I was going to do was a couple of dirt piles or maybe a loading dock. Just as I was walking back to my car after looking at another location that didn't fit the bill, I looked across the street and saw a panel of about 10 air conditioning compressors lined up. They weren't running, but the wind outside was causing their fans to spin. I saw and thought that this was perfect.

When CC showed up, I showed her my location and we were both ready to go. I think you can agree that the results here actually came out really good and I couldn't be happier with the final product.  You can see a few more by checking out my Flick

Linda and Rebbeca

I had the pleasure of going out and shooting with Linda this weekend (my first shoot since moving to Colorado Springs).  I found here a couple of months ago on Model Mayhem when I was first starting to scout out models in the area.  After we setup her shoot, she asked me if I would mind her bringing along her cousin Rebecca along.  Rebecca is a great girl who is just starting out modeling.

We decided to meet in the middle of downtown Colorado Springs on a Sunday afternoon.  It was a little brighter outside then I would have prefered (the day before was a nice overcast day, but with 30 MPH winds, just wasn't going to work) but I think we made it work pretty good.  This was the first time any of us had shot fashion which made it kinda fun.  The girls definately got some looks walking around the streets but I think the results were well worth it all.

Take a look at these few shots and check out the rest of the shoot on my Flickr page.

New Location, Same GI

Well I know it has been a pretty long time since my last blog post.  Its not that I haven't been out taking any photos recently (haven't taken as many as I would like, but still been taking some), but I have been busy getting ready to move.  The Army recently moved me from Fort Riley, KS to Peterson AFB (yes, I know I am Army but I am now on an Air Force Base) in Colorado Springs, CO.  We got here on Monday, have a house, now just waiting for the movers to drop our stuff off so we can get settled in (fingers crossed they show up tomorrow).  Anyway, I just wanted to invite anyone in the area that is interested in working with me an open invitation to send me an email and lets get something setup.

Shop Talk Group Shoot

Over the weekend, I had the pleasure of going to another one of our Shop Talk group shoots. These are always fun because you get the chance to work with a couple of different models and not just one. Also, it is great to be there with several other photographers at the same time. It gives you a chance to see how they interact with the model and direct them (something I am still working on personally) and also how they get some of the photos that they get. This time we met in Heritage Park in Junction City. I shot 2 women, and also got to take a few more shots of Liz (she usually plays modeling dummy for us during these things). It was cold as hell outside, and I discovered that I had apparently left one of my gloves in my rental car in GA the week before (not a good thing). Anyway here are a few of them. Make sure you check out my Flick stream for more too.

Night Shoot around the area

So over the weekend I decided to go out and try my hand at night time photography.  I was browsing around Flickr and came across some really cool shots doing what they call "Light Painting" where you basicly take a long exposure picture and selectively light different parts of the frame for cool looks.  I am going to try that, but for this, I was just taking some long exposure picutres to see what kind of stuff I could get.  I have to say, other then freezing my ass off, I am really happy with the results.  Below are a few of what I got.  Check out my Flick to see some more.