Chpt 3 - seeing the light

[kellymdempewolf]

Taking some shots of my son playing with his new mega-cool RC truck today. 

It was about 4pm in Kansas, so sun on it's way down and starting to warm up, but definitely very harsh as there weren't any clouds around.

This one was inspired by the "Shadows" section of the chapter...not being afraid of shadows.

canon t2i
1/2500 sec (I was shooting on shutter-priority to catch the 30mph RC truck in various shots, and it was still that high for this one although this one could have been much lower, lowering the ISO some...but still not a high ISO so it's OK...I didn't want to change back and forth between super speed and regular speed as I would miss the shots of the truck, etc.)
f/4.5
27mm
ISO 320

[goldcoastgolfer]

I think your shadow shot idea works really well, particularly with the colours your son is wearing to contrast against them.

A couple of things from my perspective.  You've used a fairly wide angle shot which creates a deep depth of field.  I don't know that the background adds anything to your son and his shadow so I'd be inclined to extend your focal length to give you a shallower depth of field (I'm assuming f/4.5 is as fast as your lens will open up to).  There's also a pole in the background just beside your son's head that's a bit of a distraction to.

Also, a lot of the modern cameras are able to go to quite a high ISO - over a 1000 without affecting the quality of the image too much.  I'm pretty sure most modern DSLRs will comfortably handle ISO 800.  I regularly shoot up to ISO 1600 for portraits with my Nikon D7000, and up to 6400 for sports and action shots so don't be afraid of bumping up the ISO if you need more light.

Hope this helps

[kellymdempewolf]

I had it on shutter-priority to catch the quick movements when the car was in frame so I wasn't controlling the aperture to get more bokeh.  So I did a little PP bluring and took out the flag pole (you're right, it was distracting right off his head...can't believe I didn't see that!)

My camera goes up to 6400 ISO and it's actually been reviewed as one of the best mid-range DSLR's in terms of shooting low light with high ISO.  I just personally don't like the grain that comes with it.  I know you can remove noise, and I do through camera RAW in photoshop elements, but I still just don't like what it does to a picture...it softens instead of having a crisp image that I can then soften when and where I want.  It's better than nothing (some of the ones of my friends' girl in the dance studio were up to 3200 because I had no choice with that light), but when I remove noise to the point that I'm happy with the grain-aspect then I lose the sharpness.  And if I increase the clarity or sharpness then the grain comes back.  It works, but I prefer to shoot as low ISO as I can.  And since these were in a bright sunny day, I didn't have to worry about it here.

I really appreciate your feedback!!!!!

[goldcoastgolfer]

You did a great job of hiding that pole   The blurring seems to work well too.

You may find that removing noise a little bit (say 30 on the slider) is enough to remove the grain in a photo and then adding a bit of sharpness brings back the crispness and being comfortable shooting at higher ISOs and then removing the noise gives you a lot more flexibility in low light situations. Obviously using as low an ISO as you can is always the preferred option but perhaps consider taking some practice shots and working with noise as part of your learning experience.

On a side note, there aren't many people that provide photo commentary here on a regular basis (I'm not part of the site's administrators - I just help out where I can with certain things).  You may want to post some of your photos on the Cambridge in Colour forums (http://www.cambridgeincolour.com)  There are a lot of people who are much more talented at a range of photography than I am that might be able to help you learn faster as well.

[Ginny Felch]

I think you are getting really close to a bold image here.  Look at the image again and notice that the dark garage etc are eye-grabbers.  I would love for you to see, when you are making the image in the first place, that the simpler the background the better.  With or without bokeh, your subject is the boy in the red coat and the shadow, so just the plain driveway or building alone behind him would have been ideal.