Working It, Lake Sam Rayburn TX That’s me working my composition during sunset. I’ve been posting so many photos of Nini lately I was starting to feel left out! And since she loves to see photos of me too, this is a mini-gift to my beautiful wife on Valentine’s Day! Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! This is a single 15 second exposure. It’s rare that I’d be moving my composition around when the colors are erupting like this. Usually I prefer to set up my composition and just wait for the colors. But this sunset was giving me trouble because the puffy clouds on the left of the frame were moving out and the wispy clouds were moving in. My composition was being ruined by what looked like dark spots on the left side of the horizon because only those last few puffs of the puffy cloud were in the frame. You can judge my final composition for yourself HERE. CreativeLIVE is live and FREE today with Jen Rozenbaum and workshop titled “Building a Successful Boudoir Business.” Check it out FOR FREE 24hrs a day for the next three days at www.creativeLIVE.com/live1 Critiques are always welcome. Daily photo: February 14, 2013, taken February 2, 2013

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Red Wisps, Lake Sam Rayburn TX

We caught a beautiful sunset at Lake Sam Rayburn this weekend. We had a great time hanging out on the beach, watching the sun go down. This trip was extra special because we were joined by wedding photographer extraordinaire Sarah Williams and her 13 month old baby boy! It is so fun to hangout with other photographers, especially when they are as cool as Sarah. And our little puppy Sala must have sensed that there was someone near his own age there, because he could not get enough of the little guy. Click on Sarah’s name above and check out her award winning photography.

This is a single six second exposure. I used a three-stop soft-step graduated neutral density filter and a two-stop soft-step graduated neutral density filter to even out the exposure between the sky and the water. The sky was cloudless most of the day, so I felt very lucky to have these clouds during the blue hour.

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 25, 2013, taken February 23, 2013

Mural Pose, Lufkin TX

Downtown Lufkin is full of murals. This one reminded me of Sue Bryce’s posing technique with the shoulder, although I’m sure she’d tell this mural to work that shoulder even harder! I was in Lufkin to meet an amazing wedding photographer, Sarah Williams. I’ve been searching far and wide for photography friends in East Texas and I am so lucky to have found an such an awesome one as Sarah. I can’t wait to hang out with her again soon!

This is an Iphone photo.

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 23, 2013, taken February 21, 2013

Beauty, Nacogdoches TX

My beautiful wife Nini in downtown Nacogdoches. For our anniversary she received a massage, hair and makeup at Julia’s salon, while I was given this photo shoot! It was fun, my wife is awesome!

In this photo Nini is lit with one light, a beauty dish just out of the frame to the camera left. I like how the beauty dish looks on Nini, but I also like how it creates a natural vignette on the brick wall.

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 22, 2013, taken February 3, 2013

My Shot, Nacogdoches TX

I decided to jump in front of the camera after setting up these lights for Nini’s anniversary shoot. I put the camera on a tripod and pre-focused. Unfortunately I didn’t step into the right spot so that I would be in focus! Making self-portraits with shallow depth of field is always difficult. I also discovered that posing is much harder than I thought and I’m especially bad at posing for men.

Yesterday was really busy for me, both at work and at home. At home we’re dealing with a lot of problems with our landlord because our house is falling apart. Hopefully they will take care of the problems or let us out of our lease without having to go to court.

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 20, 2013, taken February 9, 2013

Nacogdoches!, Nacogdoches TX

The train yard in downtown Nacogdoches. It started to thunder and lightning, so I had to leave before I really got this composition figured out. On my way home I drove the most torrential downpour I’ve ever seen. I couldn’t see anything even with my windshield wipers blasting at full speed. Luckily I only had a few blocks to get home and could get there going only a few miles per hour. Our street looked like a river. And they say we’re in for even bigger storms later this week.

This is a 5 exposure HDR. One of the 5 exposures was taken at f/18, creating the starburst effect on the lights. The other four exposures were taken at f/10.

Critiques are always welcome.

UPDATE: The composition that I wanted to try before the storm hit, was to compress the frame using my 135mm lens and moving a long ways back to get most of this Nacogdoches sign, some lines from the train tracks, and the Lone Star Feeds sign in the background but within the frame of the Nacogdoches sign. Maybe I'll go back during blue hour today.

Daily photo: February 19, 2013, taken February 18, 2013

Crashing Waves, Lake Sam Rayburn TX

A beautiful cloudy sunset on our favorite beach. The sunset was beautiful despite all of the clouds, as you can see here. The waves were crashing gently on our beach.

This is a single ½ second exposure. I like the wave action that is captured with this fast shutter speed. Usually I shoot at longer shutter speeds that washout the details of the waves. I like both looks but prefer the long exposure look a little more just because it looks so much different. You can read about my filter set up for this shot here.

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 18, 2013, taken January 25, 2013

Spooning, Nacogdoches TX

Cheech and Sala spooning for an evening nap in Big Red’s kennel. Cheech and Sala have become great friends but Big Red has been much slower to warm up to Sala. At this point I’d say Big Red tolerates him, but will be quick to put Sala in his place if he gets too rowdy. Sala on the other hand, adores Big Red. He follows Big Red everywhere and is constantly submitting to Big Red and trying to gain his favor. It seems Big Red’s dominant strategy is paying off. Cheech and Sala both submit to Big Red and he is the undisputed leader of the dogs, while I am Big Red’s undisputed leader. I think that’s why Cheech and Sala like laying in Big Red’s kennel.

This was taken indoors with available light, mostly from a ceiling light. The dogs were entirely in the shadows. I didn’t want to spook them by bringing out a flash or reflector, so I just cranked up the ISO to 6400. I rarely shoot above ISO 320 or 640, so 6400 is like a million to me, and it introduced a lot of noise. When I do shoot high ISO I like to convert the image to black and white and embrace the graininess of the high ISO noise. I didn’t add any additional grain in processing, and I did apply quite a bit of noise reduction.

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 17, 2013, taken February 12, 2013

Warm Grass, Lake Sam Rayburn TX

I love the way that a sunset can light up a foreground! This glowing grass caught my eye as I was looking for a new foreground composition that included the reflection pool. We hope to get back to the lake this weekend and maybe even today!

This is a three exposure HDR. I haven’t made many HDR photos lately, but still find it to be a handy technique when I have to shoot into the sun without any filters. The only filter used here is the circular polarizer.

CreativeLIVE is live and FREE today with Jen Rozenbaum and workshop titled “Building a Successful Boudoir Business.” Check it out FOR FREE 24hrs a day for the next two days at www.creativeLIVE.com/live

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 15, 2013, taken January 21, 2013

Working It, Lake Sam Rayburn TX

That’s me working my composition during sunset. I’ve been posting so many photos of Nini lately I was starting to feel left out! And since she loves to see photos of me too, this is a mini-gift to my beautiful wife on Valentine’s Day! Happy Valentine’s Day everyone!

This is a single 15 second exposure. It’s rare that I’d be moving my composition around when the colors are erupting like this. Usually I prefer to set up my composition and just wait for the colors. But this sunset was giving me trouble because the puffy clouds on the left of the frame were moving out and the wispy clouds were moving in. My composition was being ruined by what looked like dark spots on the left side of the horizon because only those last few puffs of the puffy cloud were in the frame. You can judge my final composition for yourself HERE.

CreativeLIVE is live and FREE today with Jen Rozenbaum and workshop titled “Building a Successful Boudoir Business.” Check it out FOR FREE 24hrs a day for the next three days at http://www.creativeLIVE.com/live1

Critiques are always welcome.

Daily photo: February 14, 2013, taken February 2, 2013

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