Tonight was the beginning of decorating Easter Eggs. We got most of the coloring done, and some stickers on just one of them. I was taking some shots of the process, and of course I forgot to lower my ISO when I shot this so it is a little grainy. In the end though it gets the point across. I am sure that Wednesday I will have another egg shot to show you.
Yesterday was a busy Easter Sunday so I didn’t get around to posting my picture of the day. It was actually late at night before I even took my picture of the day. I took a few during the day, but I don’t like posting faces on the blog. It is a weird little rule that I have yet to break. Instead I have posted this picture of the basket that the Easter Bunny brought me yesterday. I am not bragging, but it was pretty good.
When I came home tonight I noticed that one of the drawers in the living room had become very full during the day. I guessed who may have done this but you never know I guess. It was over 100 degrees outside today so I didn’t spend much time out there getting a picture. I kind of liked the challenge that this picture presented.
This picture gave me some trouble. The colors just never seemed to look right. Maybe it was the way that I captured them in the first place in the low light. I did have some fun with this in Lightroom though so any new information that I learned is well worth it.
Over the past couple of months I really have just started playing with light. I guess all of photography is playing with light, but I have been experimenting with exterior light sources. In October I bought a Canon 430ex II speedlight to use. I really like some of the shots that I have taken with it, but I really wanted to get it off of my camera. Over the last couple of days I have received a couple of key components to getting my flash off of the camera. For Christmas I received two Pocket Wizard Plus III transceivers. I may or may not have played with one of them a bit in Mackey last week to see just how they worked. The only problem with the Pocket Wizards is that when I got my second on Monday I found out that I needed cable to run them that of course are not included. I picked up a couple of hot shoe adapters so I could use my speedlight for portraits. Of course they came today, and without a model present this afternoon I had to improvise a bit. Goofy seemed to be a willing participant, and agreed to do a small photoshoot with me.
For this shoot I had a few things on hand to start with. I had my 60D with the 50mm f/1.8 on it. I had my 430ex II on the back of a 20 inch soft box. I had one Pocket Wizard attached to the light stand, and one in the hot shoe of my camera. I tried a few shots inside of the house, but I knew the shot that I wanted. This crook of the tree seems perfect for capturing the late afternoon sun as it sets. I knew what I wanted to do, but I had to get set up to do it. I had Goofy sit in the crook of the tree. I placed the soft box just out of the frame on the right hand side. I of course was shooting straight on here creating a triangle between myself, the subject, and the light source. I tried a few shots before I realized at this point what I needed to do to get the darker shot that I wanted. When I went over 1/250th of a second I had the black bar on the frame where the flash did not illuminate. I then realized that I would control the background of this shot with the aperture. I would like to have a high aperture so that the background is soft, but I really wanted the darker look. So I lowered my aperture to f/11 to darken my background and the tree a bit. The biggest hurdle that I think I have ahead of me is keeping the flash awake. I had to keep going over to it and cycling the power to wake it back up. In the future I need to address that, but for now I like what I was able to accomplish. I have already seen some things that could be better, but that will come down the road. For one I think that waiting for the sun to peak out at f/22 would create a very nice starburst effect in the background. That will come on the next shot.
As someone who was born in the 70’s will tell you nothing was quite like Star Wars when I was a kid. I remember having nearly every single action figure from Empire Strikes back. That Christmas was one that I will never forget. Of course all of those figurines have long since been lost, but the memories remain. For some reason I am more excited for this new movie than I have been for a movie in a long time. Sometimes the movie does not live up to the hype. I have a feeling that this new Star Wars movie will live up to the hype. Everything that I have seen so far tells me that it will, and the newest trailer does nothing to change that opinion in my mind.
One good thing about Disney buying Lucasfilm is that they have a little more Star Wars presence in Orlando. I enjoyed seeing the many characters as we walked around Hollywood Studios this past summer. I made the photo above just after my step daughter posed with Mickey and Minnie mouse dressed as Star Wars characters. My step daughter could care less about the franchise. To her it is just a boy thing. Maybe the new movie will change her mind.
This past weekend this little blog hit a milestone. I passed my previous record for views in a year. Earlier in the month I zoomed past the views from last year. It is amazing to me just how much this blog has grown, and to break my yearly record in October is something else. I do not live or die by how many people come to this blog. It does serve as a metric to measure my growth though. As a former disciple of the Deming method I look for trends to help me see where I am headed. This is a trend that is very welcome to me. Last summer I had thoughts of scrapping the blog altogether. The views were at an all time low. I decided to work harder on the blog, and I have been very pleased with the results. Thank you for reading this little blog, and I hope to give you something worth coming back to.
I know that I have been spamming my posts each day with a plea to vote for my Josh Bell photo in the MiLB awards, but it really is something that I feel strongly about. Voting continues over the course of the next week, and the result could have a bearing on what I do next summer. I am not one who cares much about awards, but this one could lead to much more. If you have a minute please vote for my celebration photo here.
When we went to Disney World this past summer my family had to stop a few times so that I could make a photo. Here we stopped before we even made it into the park so that I could make this photo. What you don’t see are the individual photos of the kids in front of the hedges here imitating the poses. We eventually made it into the park, and had a good time. Of course that was after a small photo shoot out in front before.
As this posts I will be at the Tippecanoe County Courthouse reporting for jury duty. This has been an interesting week with trips back and forth to the hospital in South Bend. Last night we cut our trip up north short so that I could get back for this jury duty. I have always said that I wouldn’t mind serving for jury duty, but of course it comes during the worst week possible.
One goal that I had this year was to make more interesting portraits of people. The year started with me being part of a very unique and interesting studio. That studio failed, but it was great fun to get in there to play around with light a little bit. I also tried to find more interesting moments with people involved. When you are shooting sports it is very easy to just get involved with the action. Sometimes the best moments are the emotion that comes with the sport. I think that heading into 2016 I still need to improve my focus on making portraits. The opportunities will be there so why not make something interesting with them? For now though lets look back at some of my favorite photos of people from the past year.
15. This is more of a I was there photo than a people photo. This past August my family treated me to a live taping of Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me in Chicago. The program is one of my favorite things to listen to as I travel, and it was great to see it in person. After the show was over the participants were taking questions so I made a photo.
14. Here is another photo from another event I attended this year. Joel Grimes gave a talk in Indy that I wanted to be a part of. His work is amazing, and it was great to get to see him in person. His talk was even better. His approach to photography is great, and it inspired me to go for it as the year went on. Much of what I accomplished, and will accomplish was based off of that go for it approach.
13. Here is one photo that I did not expect to make. I was making some engagement photos downtown, and I just popped into the Lafayette Theater to photograph the Lafayette Brawlin’ Dolls as they read trivia to the local Comic Con audience. This man dressed as Batman looked interesting, and combined with the cool background I knew that I had a photo.
12. When you are hired to shoot a wedding that means you must do many things. The #1 responsibility though is to capture the moments of the wedding. This was one of my favorite moments of the day. The reserved groom broke out during the garter toss, and provided us with a great show. I was glad that I had picked this location to shoot from as it worked out perfectly.
11. This past August I was tasked with making some photos of the Purdue football players while they waited for their group portraits to be taken. The light was horrible so I decided to try something. I pulled out my flash, and held it off to the side as far as I could get it to add a little more drama into my photos. This photo of Ja’Whaun Bentley was one of my favorites from the day.
10. After a long day of shooting the NCAA Softball Regional at Notre Dame I made my way back to my hometown of LaPorte, Indiana. The timing was perfect for a senior photoshoot of Matt. He was coming off of a baseball doubleheader himself, and on his way to prom. We set everything up so that we could get as much in during the short time that we had available to us. I loved this photo of the catcher posing with his bat.
9. Speaking of wedding moments this shot tells you all that you need to know about this couple. You can see the love in the photo which is what you want to capture. It is my favorite shot from that long day, and one that will stay with me for quite a while.
8. After a long day of basketball I had one last assignment during the first day of the NCAA basketball tournament in Louisville. I was tasked with covering the Hampton basketball team as they squared off against Kentucky. During a timeout I went over to the Hampton band to make a photo. Their team was out of the game, but the band was still going strong. One trumpet player made this shot with his enthusiasm.
7. My first photoshoot of the year was one with these two newborn twins. These two cuties made the cold day very fun as they posed for me. This year has been amazing as I have visited them every three months to chronicle their first year. They really are what makes this job so much fun. I think that I may play more than I shoot on our photo days, but that is what makes it great fun.
6. During a wrestling match this past year I noticed Braden Atwood standing next to me. He was cheering on a teammate, but he still had some blood on him from his match. I don’t know much about wrestling, but I do know a good photo when I see it. I was very close to Braden with my 300mm lens, but I think that is what makes this photo.
5. Just after a successful hockey season I was able to get some members of the Purdue Hockey Club into the studio for a shoot. They were great guys, and they humored me as I tried a few things. A misfire with a light convinced me to try something new during the shoot, and this portrait was a result of that.
4. Another shot from the studio is this one of Roller Vortex of the Lafayette Brawlin’ Dolls. This shoot was about a week after the hockey shoot so I had some new tricks to try out. What ended up resonating with me the most though was the simple shots. This shot of Alex for some reason has always been one that I have loved. You see the softer side of roller derby here.
3. One of my first big influences when I started taking photography seriously was Trey Ratcliff. This past summer he came to Chicago to lead a photowalk. I wanted to make a portrait of Trey, and liked the composition here. The Adler Planetarium makes for a nice backdrop, and a favorite Trey preset for Lightroom finishes off the photo.
2. For the last two photos we stay close to home. This photo is one reason why I think photography is great. With the sky absolutely on fire this past summer my stepdaughter went outside with me to photograph it. She had her camera, and I had mine. I realized that we could do something cool so I had her stand on top of the hill in our yard, and I got down in front of her. Her natural flair for dance was perfect for the situation.
If you follow me on Instagram then you may know that I just spent a week in Florida at the various Disney World resorts. We had a large group of people with us making some great memories for all involved. I made this photo on our last night in town as we were trying to leave the Magic Kingdom. We had just witnessed the early fireworks show, and we had to get to our dinner reservation at the Polynesian resort. The problem was getting through the crowds already positioning for the light show and the next fireworks display. As we were leaving the park I broke away from the group for a minute to make this photo. I love how the blues and yellows play together here, and I hoped that I could do the scene justice. Without a tripod I had to hold very still to make a usable image. When it was all said and done this was one of my favorite photos from the trip.
I have been trying to use Instagram more than I currently do. I really use it heavily while on vacation, but sparingly when back at home. To solve that problem I have decided to post at least one photo a day to my account for this calendar year. You can view my profile here. Over the course of the trip I made many photos with my dSLR, but then pulled out my camera to make another photo from the same location. I know that you do not have to use the square format anymore, but I like the way that it makes me look at the scene a little differently. At times it resulted in the dSLR coming back out to try one more angle. This blog started with a photo 365 project with my dSLR. Now once again I will use the year long project to change how I look at everyday life.
At the end of the year I made my first trip to Epcot since I was almost twelve years old. This was a trip that I was really looking forward to making as I was excited about the photographic possibilities of all of the different countries. Epcot is definitely a more grown up park, and that seemed to hold true for me. Just walking around I was amazed at the little nods to the different countries that were incorporated into the design of the park. This scene from Japan was one of my favorites. You have the classic look of Japan mixed in with the iconic Spaceship Earth in the background. I played around with putting Spaceship Earth into the background of my shots a little to give a sense of place. Here the large Epcot Christmas tree also adds a sense of time to the scene.
When I visited Disney World in June I thought about finally purchasing the Canon 24-105mm lens before the trip. I did not, and I had to constantly think about what lens to take each day. This time I had the Canon 24-105mm lens with me, and it was the lens on my camera 95% of the time on the trip. One day I took the Canon 17-40mm lens into Epcot for a night just to change it up a little. For the most part though the 24-105mm was there. It gave me a wide range to work with to make many different photos. For my money this is the ultimate walk around lens. I like the wide angle view of the 24mm end as well as the ability to get in a little closer on the 105mm end. I talk about this lens a lot on the blog, but it really has become the lens I go to when I need one to take with me.
I have been trying to use Instagram more than I currently do. I really use it heavily while on vacation, but sparingly when back at home. To solve that problem I have decided to post at least one photo a day to my account for this calendar year. You can view my profile here. Over the course of the trip I made many photos with my dSLR, but then pulled out my camera to make another photo from the same location. I know that you do not have to use the square format anymore, but I like the way that it makes me look at the scene a little differently. At times it resulted in the dSLR coming back out to try one more angle. This blog started with a photo 365 project with my dSLR. Now once again I will use the year long project to change how I look at everyday life.
One thing that you notice as you spend more and more time at a Walt Disney World property is the vision of the entire team behind Disney. Everything seems to have already been planned and thought out. The property is always changing right before your eyes. Trash disappears without a person coming to get it. Entire sections of flowers change overnight. The park is constantly changing in a way that I have only seen in Las Vegas. During our trip I wanted to photograph a lot of new things that I had not previously seen before. I also wanted to photograph things that I photographed six months prior to see just what had changed. This statue was very near some construction during our trip to the Magic Kingdom in June so I could make a photo that looked like I was there before the park opened. On this trip there was nothing that I could do about the thousands of people all around. I decided that they were part of the photo. Hidden in the background is a group of my family members just before we posed for a group shot in front of the castle.
One big change from our first trip was the theme in the park. With Christmas just ending they were still in the Christmas spirit big time. The temperature was exactly what it was in June if not a bit hotter, but it still felt like Christmas. A little fake snow coming down on us on Main Street USA helped create the illusion a little better. The park is alive with Christmas music, and for just a few days more the spirit of Christmas can live on.
In case you have not figured it out over the course of the last few days we spent some of the holiday break at Walt Disney World in Florida. When we first were planning the trip I was not too sure about heading down there during the holidays. It is the busiest week of the year in between Christmas and the new year. We ran into some crowds, but it did not seem as bad as what we experienced in June. The spirit of the holidays really made it a fun time to visit. Our last night in town was New Year’s Eve. We had a blast watching the early fireworks show inside of the Magic Kingdom. I made a few photos of the fireworks, but then stopped to watch how much my family enjoyed them. Here is one of the early fireworks shots that I really liked. The early show was great, but the shows the resorts put on around midnight were amazing. Watching the fireworks from our room near Epcot we could feel every firework, and there were many. The books may say to stay away at this time of year, but I say go for it and go. It is a great experience.
I don’t ask for a lot on this blog. Last year I begged for votes for the MiLB photo of the year. Thankfully you guys came through and helped me win the vote. Usually when I ask for something though it is not about me. One of my childhood friends is going through a tough time. A freak farm accident has left him unable to work, and fighting for his life. A GoFundMe page has been set up for Chad to help defer the large expenses of his treatment and travel during this rough time. You can find that page here. All I ask is that you go to the site and read about the incident. You don’t have to give, but if you could help spread the word that would be great.
While at Disney we spent a lot of time in lines. Sometimes to see a Princess you need to get into a line before the line has started. When we saw Aladdin and Jasmine that was the case. I was just starting to see where the visit would occur over an hour before it happened when the line started to form. I quickly found a place in the line so that the kids could see their heroes up close and personal. Once the doors open you find yourself in another line as you wait for the people in front of you to have their time. You could get upset about this time in line, but you realize that everyone gets quality time with the characters at Disney. The time is spent in line for a very good reason so you might as well make the most of it. Here was a quick shot that I made in that line to see the characters of Aladdin just before we made our way to the front. They had the book that opened the movie on a table in some interesting light. I read the book to my step daughter and then snapped this photo. Sometimes it is these little detail shots that really help bring back the memories of a trip.
Tomorrow the Powerball drawing occurs again. The estimates say that the jackpot could payout over $1.3 billion dollars. Think about that for a second. What could you do with such a large sum of money? Would you donate it? Well you would donate a large sum of it right away when you pay your taxes on it. That would get that total to well under a billion. You still could do quite a bit with such a large chunk of change. At some point in the coming days someone or a group of people will hit the jackpot. It will be interesting to see what they do with all of the money, and how it changes them. Sometimes you are living your wish, and what you think you need will just complicate things.
Part of the fun of our trip to Disney at the end of the year was the different dining experiences that we had. Epcot was was amazing with the different ways that you could spend your evening. Our first real experience of the trip was at the Biergarten restaurant in Germany. While you ate they had an authentic German band that came out to perform a short show. The show could not have been much more than ten minutes, but was very entertaining. We saw two of the performances, and while the kids were on the dance floor I made this image of the singing of silent night. They brought house lights down with a single spot on the guitar player as he sang. I don’t get to shoot a lot of music so I had some fun shooting the band. The architecture in the background adds a little to the image. This was a fun image to make early on in the trip.
This was my first trip back to Epcot since I was about twelve. At that age I thought that it was a boring place. Why would I want to learn about other countries? The one country that held some interest to me was Canada because they had hockey pucks for sale. On this trip I had way too much fun walking around the various countries. I think that the kids enjoy the Magic Kingdom a bit more, but Epcot really is a great place for the adults.
On our last day at the Magic Kingdom we decided to try something different for lunch. We ate in Tomorrowland. The food of tomorrow is very much like the food of today. In fact I did not notice a difference. I guess that we have reached the peak of what we can do with food. The view from our table was amazing though. Tables were hard to come by at first, but luckily for me this one opened up. Instead of eating I spent most of my time looking out the window. I finally brought out my camera to make a picture of the scene in front of me. It was a thick window which I thought might ruin the view, but in the end I quite like it. It is a great reminder of a fantastic spot for lunch. You also get an nearly person free view of the castle which is hard to come by.
Yesterday I featured a post about the great women’s basketball game that I attended the night before. I had a blast shooting the game, and I was looking forward to shooting another game as soon as possible. For some reason though my women’s basketball posts fall flat. I had thoughts of heading to Columbus to cover the Boilers game against #5 Ohio State tomorrow, but it is hard to justify the time spent when the posts don’t go over well. I don’t know what has happened. In the past the women’s basketball posts have gone over very well. This year though they have not. At some point I have to look at the time spent coming up with the material against the return. I love Purdue women’s basketball so I may attend many more games this year, but unless something changes I may just attend as a fan. This is part of a trend that I noticed last year, but kept ignoring as I wanted to keep posting about a sport I love. The hour or so to put up the Exposure page seems a bit excessive when you see the total views on it. Certain sports at Purdue do very well while others do not. Today I will be shooting track and field again for Purdue. Historically those posts are great. Men’s basketball posts do well historically as well. Maybe my audience just does not prefer the women’s side of the sport. If that is the case then I think you guys are missing out. What do you think? Should the sports posts keep coming? If so which sports do you enjoy seeing on the blog. Leave me a message in the comments.
We love spending our week on the boardwalk in Ocean City, Maryland every year so when we were choosing a resort to spend our holiday week at Disney we settled on Disney’s Boardwalk Inn. The resort is pattern after the famous Atlantic City boardwalk. As with everything Disney it was really done very well. Just a quick look into the lobby will tell you all that you need to know. So much attention is paid to the little details that you start to believe that you are somewhere else. The resort is also a very quick walk to Epcot which is very nice. The photo above was made at one end of the boardwalk looking back towards the Dance Hall on the far end.
My friend Dana has a blog called Dana’s Mouse Tails where she talks about her experiences at Disney. You can find her blog here. I was reading about Disney before we made our first trip to the Magic Kingdom last year. You can pick up little tips from someone who has been there many more times than you. Give her blog a look and see what you think. It is a very personal look at what you can experience at Disney World.
While at Disney you really marvel at what was accomplished there. Swampland turned into one of the biggest moneymakers around. Walt never really saw what he imagined come to life in Florida. I am sure that the would be pleased if he could see what his idea has become. I liked this shot of Mickey and Walt seemingly looking over the crowd. This is one of the most popular photo spots in the Magic Kingdom because of the view behind Walt and Mickey of the castle. I decided to take a look back the other way. In the end I like the different take on a popular photo.
This year we took a trip down to Walt Disney World at the end of the year. I enjoy using Instagram, and I really use it while on vacation. Sometimes I see something where I don’t think that I need to make an image with my dSLR so I just use my phone. It is a way to get creative with the device that I have with me. Other times I use the phone to show off a location that I think is pretty cool. Looking through my Instagram photos from the trip I can see about half of them are just iPhone shots, and the other half are things that I was making a serious image of with my dSLR, but I wanted to share what I found right away. As I did with my summer vacation Instagram photos I thought that I would share a few of them here for you to see. You can also find a couple of hidden Mickey’s if you look closely at a couple of the photos.
As I was making these images in December I had a thought of starting another photo 365 project, but with Instagram. If I was at a place like Walt Disney World everyday that would be easy. The truth of the matter is though that I don’t lead that interesting of a life to have something to share with the world everyday. In 2011 and 2012 I had a photo 365 project that really forced me to look outside of the box with my photography. While I agree that it was a very good thing for me it also was a huge undertaking to make something good everyday. I do not think that I accomplished that all of the time. I think that my standards of what makes a good image has changed a lot since that time. What I have done though is made a decision to post a photo to Instagram every day. It may be one of my older images, or it may be something that I am currently doing. Follow me on Instagram @pinolaphoto to see what I have been posting. I have found that I have been much more engaging on the platform when I am posting on it everyday.
On our last night at Walt Disney World we had just watched the early fireworks show for New Year’s Eve. We had dinner reservations at the Polynesian Hotel so we had to get out of the packed Magic Kingdom and on the monorail. As we were fighting through the crowd I also had my eye on any possible photo opportunities. I loved the light in this scene so I hurried up and made this image. With my group leaving the park in a hurry I did not have much time, but I knew what I wanted and got it. This was a quick grab shot, but was one of my favorites from the trip.
My favorite travel lens is the Canon 24-105mm lens. I talk about it a lot on this blog, but it really works very well while walking around. I could zoom in to get some of the details of a scene, or zoom out to 24mm to capture a scene like the one above. This is a lens that I wanted for a long time, and finally was able to buy. After using it for a few months now I wish that I had bought it in 2012 when I first was looking at it.
This is one of those photos that I made while on vacation that required a little patience. I made this shot as our family walked by without the monorail in it. As I looked at the frame though I realized that it really needed the monorail to work. My group started making their way to the next stop of the day, but I stayed just a couple of minutes longer to catch the monorail coming through. In the end that was the right choice, and it made a picture that I am really happy with from the trip.
My friend Dana is really the expert on Disney. I just go to the parks and find the pretty things to look at. She knows all of the ins and outs and what you must do when you get there. She has a blog that details some of those things called Dana’s Mouse Tails. Head on over and check it out for some tips on what to do while you are at Disney World. She will be running in the Disney Half Marathon this weekend so I am sure that the blog will be updated after this weekend. If you want more photos from my trips to Disney just click on the Disney tab on the left side of the page or click here.
While we were taking a break in Italy one day we saw a man walk by us with a whistle and a very small gondola. He stopped and put a rope line down on the ground, and my daughter and I had a front row seat to see Sergio the mime perform. He put on a great little show, and the kids just ate it up. My daughter was only two at the time, but she was clapping along and laughing at his antics. He even gave her one of his soccer balls to be part of a gag. I was so into the show that I really did not make many photos of Sergio. Near the end I realized that this was one of the great moments of our trip so I pulled out my camera to make a photo.
All throughout your trip at Disney you have things that you have signed up for in advance. You want to have a FastPass to see Anna and Elsa. You want all of your dining taken care of as soon as you can. You plan many things in advance of your trip to Orlando. The thing that often produces the best memories though is the things that you did not plan for. This performance by Sergio was one of those moments. These little things are part of what Disney does so well. I went from a skeptic last June into a Disney fan in a hurry. This is a well oiled machine that really impresses me with all of the attention to detail.
