Miramar Beach

Visiting with the family! I decided to take my new waterproof iPhone case for a spin.

Photography Masterclass Series: Indoor Shooting

Want to be a better photographer? Get in the kitchen.


Lighting a subject is, for me, one of the most challenging things in photography.  You have to take special care to position the lights correctly, how to angle the speedlight, how strong to use it... ISO is even more picky than normal... There's no ambient light, so if you're not paying special attention to all of these things, every shadow is a hard shadow, and hard shadows are bad shadows.

Depending on your location, you may also have to battle the kind of lights that are installed in the location. For example, shooting in a friend's kitchen to capture the gorgeous cupcakes he or she makes can be difficult if they have huge florescent lights and few windows. In the kitchen I usually try to shoot near a window, but if it is absolutely not possible I set up a few test shots to play with my white balance until I find what I like. There's no one answer as far as indoor white balance goes, because every room and every light bulb is different.

Today I baked a banana bread and photographed my progress.

All images were shot under florescent lighting with a side window that had indirect sunlight filtering through. Today I am shooting with my Nikon D700 and I have chosen the SB900 speed light with Gary Fong's cloud dome, and the Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 lens. Projects like this can also look gorgeous with a 50mm f/1.8, too. I set the camera to ISO 200, set the speed light on TTL, set the WB to shade, and shot at f/2.8. 

Banana Bread Recipe

• Prep time: 5 minutes
• Cook time: 1 hour

Ingredients

• 3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 cup sugar (can easily reduce to 3/4 cup)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1 Tablespoon Allspice
• 1 Tablespoon Cinnamon
• 1 Cup Walnuts

Method

No need for a mixer for this recipe. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the sugar, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. Add the flour last, mix. Pour mixture into a buttered 4x8 inch loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour. Cool on a rack. Remove from pan and slice to serve.

Yield: Makes one loaf.

As I shot I had difficulty with shadows, as I always do inside. The best way to cure this problem, I have found, is to just take a step back. I'm not the tallest person in the world, so I usually keep a step stool or chair nearby to stand on. I pointed the speedlight up and behind my head so that as I shot it was pointed at the ceiling behind me at about a 30 degree angle. This helped lessen my hard shadows.

Shooting food is an excellent exercise for any photographer, because shooting food is a very particular kind of project. Not only do all of the normal rules of photography apply regarding clarity and sharpness and lighting, but you also have to make the stuff look like it tastes good, too. There needs to be a certain amount of warmth and yumminess portrayed in the image. No one wants to eat dinner with a weird color cast from a wrong ISO, and looking at your image with harsh shadows isn't exactly going to make anyone's mouth water.

Mastering the art of still food photography is going to make you a better photographer, so get to cooking. It's loads easier to chase around screaming children with your camera in your studio once you have these indoor skills nailed down, so soak up all the practice you can while the subject is a stationary one that you can completely control, like walnuts.

Enjoy the banana bread!

Constructive Tendencies now calls Destin, Florida home sweet home

A lot has changed since the last time I wrote, and all for the better! Constructive Tendencies Photography is now serving the greater northwest Florida area from their base in Destin, Florida. With access to beautiful beaches and the cute towns of Fort Walton Beach and nearby Pensacola, the photo possibilities are endless!

Now specializing in Engagement and family style photography, Constructive Tendencies has been rebuilt from the ground up to better represent the artistic passions of the company. No longer are we just a portrait company... Portraits are boring!

Creative and gorgeous photography is the goal, with an emphasis on creating work that is both personal to the client, and beautiful to any onlooker.

Stay tuned for updates and client stories here, and make sure to check out our newly redesigned website at www.ConstructiveTendencies.com

-CT

Keep It Simple: Bike love.

While wandering around San Destin with my sister and best friend, I happened across quite possibly the cutest bike ever produced. I was lucky enough to squeal in delight about how cute it is feet away from its owner, Rachel, who was sweet enough to not only allow me to take copious amounts of photographs of the bike, but also jumped in for a few! Florida is just one of those states that is too nice to lock yourself in a car while traveling through, so plans are to gather up an equally adorable bike for myself. Green, economical, and trendy, one just cannot resist!

Lately I have become more and more aware of my environmental footprint, and I want to do every little thing I can do live green, save some money, and better my quality of life. (Getting in shape as a result isn't a bad side effect) If I am not spending $60 a tank on gas, $400 a month on a car payment, $80 a month on car insurance, and all of the other random expenses that come with maintaining such a large machine, I could easily put that same money towards something more fun..... like decorating ;)

Tutorial: Awesome Portraits (Breaking all the rules) Lesson Three: Roleplaying and Props

Let's get creative.

Nothing says awesome like when art meets art, so let's marry some photography with some performance art. A great way to gather a few really interesting portraits is to act out a concept, idea or embody a character/idea. This can be done with costumes, makeup, dance or props, and can take place in a variety of different locations, and you can be as complex or minimalist as you like. Since I am not really an in-front-of-the-camera kind of girl, I went for minimal.

I had the pleasure of shooting with Mike Boike (you can see his deviantART profile here.) and we headed out into the wilds of The Woodlands, Texas to shoot along the waterway before heading to Mercer Arboretum and Botanic Gardens to take advantage of the grounds for some vintage photographer inspired portraits. (Mercer has two sides, the Botanic Gardens side, which is landscaped and offers a variety of great shooting areas for just about any kind of session, and the Arboretum side which is a very lovely forest with great trails. We chose the Arboretum side.)

I am a collector of antique cameras, (It is like an illness, I do not even want to admit how many I have) so the concept I chose was based around this collection. I brought out my No. 1A Autographic Kodak Special and a vintage tuxedo inspired outfit and did my best to not look silly in front of the camera.

If you are shooting digital there is no reason what-so-ever not to snap loads of pictures and just have fun with it! Do a little dance, make a little art, and have fun with it.

Here are a few of my favorites from the shoot, enjoy!

Tutorial: Awesome Portraits (Breaking all the rules) Lesson Two: Crazy Lighting

Today's Awesome Portraits article centers on using interesting lighting to being another element to your photography. Anyone can go outside and take a photo of someone sitting on the grass with the sun shining, but if you are going for something striking you might want to spice things up a bit.

After all, people are not normally blue, so when they are people look.

Places with fun lighting exist everywhere, so keep an eye out!

The easiest way to locate fun lighting is to observe your surroundings while you drive around in the night-time. Businesses often have illuminated signs in fun colors, so stand near one and let the light shine on you. Inside cafes and lounges there are often neat colors of mood lighting, and in many cities there are parks with really great colored lighting that goes with the landscaping. The aquarium is a great place to get a few blue shots :)

Make sure you turn your flash off, or the whole effect is lost!

The Fatal Exception

Saturday night I had the distinct pleasure of photographing (and enjoying the music) at a concert featuring a band called The Fatal Exception. (You can download their album for free here.) I love using stage light in my photos because it makes everything look almost painted. Between the long exposures and the lasers I made some superfun shots occur.

They have a very retro 8bit meets electronic sound and it's best played loud!

The venue was dark and filled with lasers and fog-machine smoke, but the lighting was extra fun to play with. Here are a few shots from the show, enjoy!