Ronstar
Moderator Emeritus
Ronstar - great shots.
Can you post the originals? Interested to see how much processing there was.
Ok - I'll find them and post the originals. They are in color though. I'll think of something
Ronstar - great shots.
Can you post the originals? Interested to see how much processing there was.
That's interesting.
The original photo of the statue - I probably would not have given it second look but you have processed it into an interesting photo.
Same with the photo of the dog.
I think I need to spend more time looking at my photos and having a bit of imagination.
Time....that is definitely lacking.
Nice shot, but too much bright green for me. (But it is great in your yard). Just my personal taste, but I always turn down the greens in all my color photos.
I just took an online course from National Geographic.
How did that work for you? I mean do you think you got your money's worth from the course? Would you take more?
I did pay the annual $99 for two years running now for Kelby Training online tutorials and classes, but they are video only, not one-on-one. They do offer some seminars/classes but you have to travel to where they are, which are always in big cities. I hate big cities so I'll never go to those. And I think the annual subscription is now $250, not the $99 rate I get since I'm grandfathered in at the old rate. No question it's worth $99, I'd hesitate to say it is worth $250. They are all of good quality but you'd have to watch a lot of them to make the subscription worth $250.
Their "Fundamentals of Photography" and "National Geographic Masters of Photography" in this series are $70 each or $110 if you get both at the same time. I may do that.
The Art of Travel Photography: Six Expert Lessons
Uh-oh - The "Masters of Photography" course is not getting good reviewshttp://www.thegreatcourses.com/cour...raphy.html?pfm=BestSellers&pos=1#BVRRWidgetID
The flowers are ones I bought at the grocery store or were growing nearby. And of course I don't post my awful shots....
But I play around with the lighting a lot. I think I've posted this tulip shot before but it wasn't that hard. The background is the black side of a reflector, I had two SB-900s in umbrellas, and a third SB900 shooting straight hard light from the left. Correcting for while balance you can do the same thing with table lamps and a white bed sheet or shower curtain for a reflector so a big budget isn't necessary. But I probably shot 70 images before getting a few that I liked. Now that I know the setup it wouldn't take that long to do something similar again.
I don't get to do dogs very often but the key to them is just relaxing so they're relaxing with you and know you're not a threat of any sort. Better if they think you want to play. And they usually bribe easily with a piece of cooked hamburger or something. Just be ready with the camera and hold a bit of one near the lens and you get a look of intense interest.
I should take the junior college lighting course.
Get a daylight balanced light bulb, and just use that. Bare bulb with no metal reflector or anything else as the key light. Then use white cardboard as a fill - to bounce a little bit of light into darker areas. Cheap, and you'll learn more by laying with angles, moving the light or reflector further back or closer. You don't need flash, don't need soft boxes. Try using natural light from a window as your key light.
Expensive equipment can make your photographic process easier, but it won't make your photographs better.