Art?

I decided to take a small break from editing pictures (I probably shouldn't be), and I came across this picture that I took of Shalene a couple of years ago. If you can't tell, I tried to make it look as if she had painted the flowers. I just thought I would share. I was hoping it was a bit more "art" like than the first one I posted. :)

Flowers

Panning

I thought I would just post this for everyone to see just incase there are more people who would like to learn how to pan.

I am not an expert on panning so here is a link I found that probably explains how to do it better than I can.

http://tr-photo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/04/panning-how-to-capture-motion-in-your.html


For the shots I have taken using panning, I have used a shutter speed of around 15-30. You can of course adjust this to your liking. If the subject is moving faster than say a child running, you might want to adjust your shutter speed to 60-100. For panning, you need to shoot in either shutter priority mode or manual mode so you can control your shutter speed. If your camera has a continuous focus mode, I would use that setting. Also if your camera hast a burst setting, I would use that as well.

The trick to panning is moving your camera at the same speed as your subject. Normally, you stay stationary as you try and take a picture of your subject. When panning, you are pretty much just trying to mirror your subject's movement with your camera. This really takes some practice. In the beginning, I would save only one shot out of 50. The rest I deleted. Now I can get around 10 out of 30. I hear it takes some luck too, to get that "perfectly" panned shot. I haven't been lucky yet, so anyways...with Braedon on the fire poll type thing, I had to move my camera down as he was moving down. With Shalene, I tried to move my camera at the same speed she was moving by me. Her movement was easier to mirror than Braedon's. I think her face ended up a bit more in focus because of it.

I have found that panning works best when the subject is moving past you at an angle and not coming directly towards you. Does that make any sense? I don't know if panning would even work with someone coming towards you. I would think not unless you are moving backwards at the same rate. Might need a car or something to do that. I can't take a picture and run backwards at the same time. I would damage myself and others. ;)

Panning is just a fun little thing to do. It makes for some interesting pictures. If you have any questions, I would love to help in any way I can, but like I said, I am not an expert!

Motion

The first two are taken using the "panning" technique. It is hard for me, but I got a couple that I like okay. I do have another panning picture of Melanie Jarocki running in her half-marathon race over the weekend. Jenn, Mara, Heather, Paige, and Melanie all went down to Oregon and ran over 13 miles!!! I was very lazy and just took pictures of them "enjoying" their run, but I am so proud of them! They all did great. I still can't believe that they could actually even run for over two hours! :) I need to get permission of the runners before I post their pictures. I don't think it would be fair to them unless they agreed to have their pictures posted. I really like this one picture that I took of Melanie though.

The picture of Ky is at Tolt Park. The kids love walking on that fence. The pictures was taken right after Ky lost his balance and is falling off.

The pictures of Cameron don't have a lot of motion in it, but I thought they were fun, little pictures. She would hardly try and catch the ball. She would just stand there, close her eyes, and scream with delight when I threw the ball at her. ;)

A Day at the Park

I took the kids to the park the other day. It was cold, but at least it wasn't raining...well, it did snow/hail on us a couple of times. :) The sun kept coming out so I had to wait for it to go back behind the clouds. It was sure creating some harsh lighting. The lighting still isn't that great in these photos, but I just got a light meter yesterday to help! I have been trying it out, and I love it. It was a bit frustrating at first, but now I am catching on. I hope it helps me improve the quality of my pictures.

I think that I like the B&W of Cami better, but I thought I would post both anyway. I don't like the hue of her face in the color photo. I am just terrible when it comes to correcting color.

I posted one more picture...inspired by Rebecca's photo of her kids. Not as cool, but hey! ;) And yes, these are taken in Carnation. The tree is across the bridge. You park in the parking lot close to the bridge and walk on over the bridge. The tree is there to your right.