Trying to become the man my dog thinks I am

[Neal Osborn]

This weekend was another series of photography lessons for me.  I continue to practice and this weekend I got to play with some of my new lenses.  Of course, Chloe the dog was there to protect my equipment although she seemed more interested in protecting her chicken jerky from the other dogs in the park.  

Some shots from Piedmont Park in Atlanta

I decided this first shot with the 12-24 wide angle lens had too much wasted space and didn’t offer much perspective so I changed to the 105mm and framed the building as the focus of the picture which seemed to be a better picture.

Guard Dog

I can see clearly now the rain is gone

Ben – your help with macro photography and lighting is paying off.  This is a metal bar left in the yard overnight.  I wanted to capture the dew in an interesting light.  First shot is with a blue filter.  Second shot is with a green sign/paper backdrop and the flash shot through an orange Gatorade bottle.

[Ben Cochran]

WOW Neal! That last shot is great and I love the effect as well as texture in it. Bottles are great to shoot through and the dark coke bottles give off some really cool effects too. The only thing that I would also offer is, you can use gaffers tape to control the splash, by covering up the perimeter of the gel object, from lighting up the other things that you may not want that filter to hit, like the background. I think that I will just have to send the rest of these fly’s up to you as you are getting better results than I am now. 🙂

I know that you are shooting in manual mode only now so, in those top shots, I would set the Kelvin at about 6000 and adjust from there, it will help to WB control the yellowish hue on the grass and trees. You can adjust it out in ACR too but it is more enjoyable getting it in the camera first. Love those 105 shots that is a great lens. Guess you will be going for a Hasselblad next? LOL

Hey, I am no genius here but that looks a lot like a Manfrotto tripod, I am guessing a 190ProB model? 😉 How do you like it?

[Neal Osborn]

I would set the Kelvin at about 6000 and adjust from there, it will help to WB control the yellowish hue on the grass and trees. You can adjust it out in ACR too but it is more enjoyable getting it in the camera first.

Thanks Ben, you honed in on the main thing I struggled with this weekend. I was very frustrated with the colors and especially the nasty green/yellow off-balance in the outside shots. Couldn’t correct it in PS but I never thought to adjust WB first.  I am going to make that my next lesson.  

BTW, yes I did get the 190XPROB tripod instead of the 055XPROB.  I like the tripod and it certainly holds the camera (even with all the accessories it’s still just under 8lbs).  I chose the 190 because it’s lighter and easier to carry on hikes.  The ability to flip it on the horizontal axis for macro photography was the deciding factor.  Personally, I think the 055 is a better tripod overall and I might consider exchanging if the 109 turns out to be too flimsy.  Interestingly, they both cost the same which threw me off at first.

[David Anderson]

Wow, that last shot is impressive, and not just because you and Ben found a use for Gatorade !

www.dsaphoto.com

A picture is thousand words that takes less than a second while a thousand words is a picture that takes a month.

[Ben Cochran]

It is an extremely impressive photograph, Neal! I have to keep this honest though, Neal is 100% responsible for the composition, lighting use of gels and the use of the Gatorade bottle, I just express ideas and opinions as I love to see people thinking out of the box.

I had a couple of small guard dogs like that once, my best friends and I do miss them terribly. They were miniature Basset Hounds and stood about a foot high. I had trained them both to go straight for the neck, which made them perfect guard dogs! I then took them to a guard dog training academy but the staff told me that they were far to short and would not be able to jump high enough to go for the neck. I explained, to the staff, that I have already trained them to do so but that is not what I wanted them to train my dogs to do, I got that part covered. They asked what I wanted their staff to teach the dogs to do, I simply explained that I just need someone to teach at least one of the dog’s how to say, “can you lay down for us?” 😮

[jay mcdaniel]

I’ve had many cigars on that dock at piedmont. beautiful spot.

[Author]

Posts