Psssh... Routines Shmoutines

As I am preparing for my first final in photography school. I decided to sit back for a minute and think a little bit about the last 2 months.

My life has changed SO much. I used to have simple routines while working in the business world - Monday thru Friday work 8am-6pm, Starbucks everyday (yes, they knew me by name), squeezed in a happy hour here or there and perhaps even a soccer game and pretty much did whatever I wanted on the weekends (which meant two full days of playtime with the love of my life).

Today, it's a little different. The closest things I have to a routine these days are sleeping in my bed, watching The Bachelorette every Monday night (which has now ended) and walking my dog. I'm either in class or at work and when I am not doing either of those I am doing assignments for class, working on my blog or post-processing my bajillion photo's that I have taken - And no, there is no rhyme or reason to the madness. My schedule is different every week so I basically just hang out on my toes, ready for whatever. Weekends don't exist. That's probably the hardest part of all of this, I miss my precious free-time with my honey. But don't get me wrong, he's 150% supportive and we figure it out. I am the luckiest girl the world to have him.

I've learned a lot about the art and business of photography over this time period too. I've spent hours upon hours sitting behind my camera and my computer figuring out different techniques to make my pictures look the way I want them to look. I've had some frustrations, some major headaches, a couple *light-bulb* moments and many many moments of.... hmmm... (how do I explain this?)... Well, moments of 100% joy and excitement, feelings of fulfillment... times where I take a picture and it turns out exactly how I wanted it to and it's beautiful and it's perfect and I literally can feel little elfs in purple and gold jumpsuits prancing for joy inside my belly - and that giant, child-like smile on my face, yeah, I can't help it. Those moments, that happen time and time again, those are the moments that assure me I have made the right choice.

So to finish this post up I want to pass on some of my biggest lessons from this semester:

• The first is that if you're thinking about taking photography more seriously, know that it is a HUGE commitment. Everything about it takes time and patience so be prepared to really dedicate the time to it that it deserves.
• Figure out a process for downloading and editing your images. Without a process you will find yourself losing photo's that you so desperately need. The first thing I always do with a new set of pictures is copy the raw, original images directly to a DVD to store in a safe place. That way if anything happens to my computer of the files on my computer, I still have the source files to fall back on.
• A tri-pod can be very helpful. My teacher goes as far as to say that it's the most important purchase after you get set up with a camera. So far, I love working with my tri-pod... what I don't like about it is dragging it around everywhere. You can get a shoulder strap or a carrying case for it though so I highly suggest taking that route. It's amazing how much a tri-pod can improve your photo's.
• Take time to fully understand resolution and pixels and how they effect each other and your image. It's a major headache at first but it's imperative to your success as a photographer.
• Always return your camera settings to their starting point when you're done shooting for the day. It's inevitable that one day you will forget that they still need to be adjusted and will end up doing something like taking a whole batch of photos with your ISO set at 1400.  Wah waah.
• Adobe TV is a great (free) resource for learning tips and tricks on editing your photo's in Photoshop
• It's ok to buy an off label lens - I've never really been a brand girl anyways... Why spend more on a name when you can get the same thing somewhere else for a much cheaper price? I'm sure plenty would be happy to debate on this topic but I bought my first professional grade lens for 1/3 the cost of the equivalent Nikon lens and you know what, I love it.
• This one is from my dad - "It takes money to make money." Between school and equipment, I'm in the 'taking' money stage and more broke then I have ever been in my adult life. But that just motivates me even more to keep working hard - I know one day it will pay off and I will be a successful entrepreneur like my pops. :)

Lesson 3: Aperture, The Sunny 16 Rule, and Your Exposure Indicator

I've been shooting so much lately that it's been awhile since I've posted anything informative. So today I am going to give you some helpful tips and tricks for working with aperture, plus a few other helpful tidbits.

As a quick review, aperture is the hole/opening through which light travels into your camera. A small aperture lets in less light, a big aperture lets in more light. A small aperture is represented by a larger f number and a large aperture is represented by a smaller f number. Why? Just to keep all of us photogs on our toes.

The Sunny 16 Rule
The 'Sunny 16 Rule' helps to give you a baseline of where to start with your camera settings if you're a bit unsure. Always remember that on a sunny clear day, generally speaking, you should be able to put your camera settings at an f# of 16, shutter speed of 1/100 or 1/125 and an ISO of 100 and get a pretty good shot. If it's a little gray out or very bright, start with these settings and adjust accordingly.  Or, keep the below guidelines in mind:

f22 - Snow/sand
f16 - Sunny
f11 - Slightly overcast
f8 - Overcast
f5.6 - Heavy overcast
f4 - Open shade/ sunset

As a reminder, here is what an aperture with an f# of 16 looks like (bigger f number, smaller aperture):

And for an example of what a shutter speed of 1/125 looks like, check out this snazzy animation: Photocourse.com

Great Resource, Shortcourses.com
Speaking of Photocourse.com. This is another GREAT resource for anyone and everyone who wants to learn more about digital photography. Most of the stuff has to be paid for but if you go to Shortcourses.com, they usually have some free books and animations posted, I highly suggest you check them out!

Using Your Exposure Indicator
Most digital SLR cameras these days have an exposure indicator and once you find it, your life will never be the same. Check out your user's manual and see if you have one.

It should look something like this:

This handy-dandy little tool will tell you if your aperture and shutter speed are lined up to make a well-exposed picture. On my camera, this doesn't only show-up on my monitor but when I look through my viewfinder, I can see it there too. It makes adjusting your aperture and shutter-speed settings so freaking easy! Keep in mind that depending on your lighting you may not always want to line up your exposure perfectly at zero, you may want to over-expose or under-expose depending on what works best for your settings and how you want your picture to turn out.

Something To Think About 
A large part of being a good photographer means being prepared.

"Being prepared involves understanding your camera well enough to capture what you see the way you want to interpret it."
-Dennis P. Curtain

Photography is not just about taking a picture of what we see... it's about taking what we see, interpreting it in our own individual way and portraying it to others, exactly as we want them to see it - To do this we must first understand how to use our tools in order to create the interpretation that we desire.

Understanding the in's and out's of our camera's isn't always fun and sometimes it can be quite complicated but taking the time to understand now will, in the end, lead us to our nirvana.

I'm off to another shoot for class. Today we are shooting at the Phoenix Airport, it should be an awesomely creative time!

Adios and stay inspired.

Lesson 2: The Camera, Framing and Visualizing

Last week, we focused a lot on getting to know our cameras. I am pretty familiar with all the different aspects and functions of my camera, however, I did learn that I have manual focus ring on the lens of my camera, which I was unaware of. I am so glad that I discovered that little ring, because now I never have to worry about the auto-focus not focusing on what I need to it to focus on ever again!

Our teacher also told us about an awesomely resourceful website: www.photoanswers.co.uk. They give a ton of tips and tricks and it's all for FREE! I highly suggest you check it out!

Our assignment last week was on framing and visualizing. We were tasked with finding and shooting all 26 letters of the alphabet but here's the catch, it couldn't be something that was meant to be a letter (i.e. you can't find a 'E' on a sign and use that) AND, you can't use the same object twice.

Here are a few of my favorite finds:
B:


E:


i:


Q:


Z: (This shot was taken at night with a shutter speed of 1.6 seconds and an f # of 4, without a flash)

A Crane Clan Photomerge

This past weekend my family and I were lucky enough to all be together for Fathers Day. See that adorable beautiful family, those are my peeps, The OG's (Original Gangsta's). As my dad would say, "yup, that's the whole fam damnly." My dad likes to make jokes, always.



So, anywho, the family pic above, how does it look? Anything out of the ordinary? Besides my brothers face? Just kidding bro. ;)

Well, the truth is, it's a lie. I wasn't going to say anything because I figured I could get away with it but it's been eating at me. I didn't sleep at all last night and this morning, I swear my alphabet cereal spelled out the letters f-r-a-u-d. I can't take it anymore... so here it is.

That's not the original photo.

On fathers day, we took a couple family pics but one in particular was my favorite. Everyone looked great but unfortunately, Tiff (oldest sister, far right) was the only one who got caught in an awkward mid-smile (see below). There was another pic taken where my sister has a perfect beautiful smile (see below the one below) but unfortunately you can't see my sisters full one-piece denim jumpsuit, which is obviously unacceptable. So, in order to fix this family portrait faux pas, I cut off my sisters face. Wait, that sounded bad. What I meant was I performed a face swap. It's kind-of like that show Wife Swap but way less disturbing and more practical.

Below are the two pictures I merged to get the final picture which is shown above. It's not perfect but I'm pretty happy with it considering I taught myself how to do it. (Sidenote: I may have an unusually small head, but head size does not correlate with brain size. I know because I asked a doctor.)






How I did it:

In Photoshop...

First, I cut out Tiff's smiley face with the lasso tool feathered at 5. Then I copied and pasted it onto my preferred photo.

Next I adjusted the size of her face to fit appropriately only to find that the color tones didn't match.

I adjusted this by adding 2 adjustment layers to my face layer. One for hue and saturation and another for brightness and contrast. I tinkered around with those two settings for a bit until I found a color that matched the original.

I finished it off by using the eraser tool to fix the places where the face didn't quite match up perfectly and then voila, I gave my sister a gift that only doctors and Gods can give, a new face. (If you're wondering, yes, I did just compare myself to both doctors and Gods.)

So, there you have it. The Crane Clan Photomerge. If anyone has any other tips or tricks for performing a face swap, send 'em my way, I'd love to hear them!