Bye, Bye, Blogger!

Time for bigger and better things!  I have been working on a new site for a few weeks and am now going to stop posting on this Blogger site.  Thank you everyone for dropping in here over the years.  I am now saying good-bye to Blogger but not to photography or my updates.  As my photography grows, my need for a new space has grown as well.   Please follow me to my new site:

http://www.cldavisphotography.com/

The site still is not fully up and running, but I have started making postings there and look forward to working from the new site from now on.   I will continue keep this site open, at least for a while longer.

I hope to see you all over here!

Advanced Pro - Week Four

For the last assignment I decided to take a song and use it as the theme of the photo shoot and interpret the message of the song into a more teen angst type of story here.   I had to post a couple extra shots to tell the story (I figured since I stuck to the limit in all the other weeks two extra pictures won't hurt this final week.)  I shot this with a 50mm lens and a Lensbaby.  Also, different this week, I decided to shoot this all inside.  I converted the shots to black and white as I felt it fits the mood of the song/theme better.  I did include a color photo at the end, so you can see how the photos originally looked.  This was fun and it was fun to see my daughter enjoy herself.  I told her what I wanted and then let her style herself and do the makeup.  (BTW - none of us smoke, so it was a challenge with the cigarette.  We had to borrow several from a neighbor and then use febreze on everything afterward to get the smell out!)

The song is "Lies of the Beautiful People" by Sixx A.M.

Well this ain't no sideshow

This is the great unknown

This is the poison we take

Yeah

Outside the velvet rope

Standing there all alone

All the grotesque and ashamed

Yeah

Well if you think real beauty's on the outside

Well that's a far cry

From the truth

Maybe all the information you received

Well you should not believe

There's no proof

Save yourself from al the lies of the beautiful people

It's time to run from the lies of the beautiful people

I feel so traumatized

Doped up and televised

Life can be cruel and insane

Yeah

But we've got these ugly scars

On our infected hearts

Maybe it's time for a change

Yeah

And if you think real beauty's on the outside

Well that's a far cry

From the truth

Maybe all the information you received

Well you should not believe

There's no proof

Save yourself from all the lies of the beautiful people

It's time to run from the lies of the beautiful people

Save yourself from all the lies of the beautiful people

Just run and hide from the lies of the beautiful people

Save yourself from all the lies of the beautiful people

It's time to run from the lies of the beautiful people

My daughter prefers the color versions, but I think for the mood and the "fit" of the project, the black and white work best.  Nevertheless, I decided to include a color version so you could see what it looked like.

Thanks for a great four weeks - it was very profitable and pushed me in directions which I never considered before.  I look forward to moving forward on this path in the future.

Advanced Pro - Week Three

Well, to start with this week I have to say, "I got nothin'!"  There was no couple nor a child which I could photograph, so it's back to my own kids...sigh.  With that, I decided to follow the soccer idea with my son.  I know and can question him about soccer as we were taking the photographs.  I asked him to do some things - try some tricks.  When he heard the camera click only once or so while he was doing tricks he got mad!  He wanted to hear the continuous shooting.  Given the mid-day light, those shots did not turn out the best.  

I kept him engaged by discussing soccer (we had been watching soccer all morning as well and he would talk about a player and some of the moves he was making and try to handle the ball in a similar manner or show me a ball handling trick.

He started out with a white ball and that one went over into the neighbor's pool.  Then he tried a black ball.  It wound up in the neighbor's yard.  The red ball was good for a while, until he kicked it over the wall.  We were shooting some with the mini ball (see second picture).  These were taken at the end and I got two, before he started acting silly and threw the ball and it wound up in the neighbor's pool as well.  They are used to it and all neighbors (behind and on both sides) regularly toss his balls back over the walls, thankfully. 

I decided I had better work at capturing his personality and I think some of comes through in the photos, including his "attitude" as well as his funny side.  In the end I like the way the photographs turned out and think I managed to get a few good portrait shots.  I didn't have a good location - just the back yard, we had to improvise and cropping helped with that.  I tried to keep things as simple as possible, so that the focus was on him and not the background and/or surroundings.

This assignment does coincide with another assignment I have with another class, which is to use reflective surfaces and without even trying, the areas I chose to shot in did have these reflective surfaces and I feel I got some very good light in the face and eyes. (When you can spy the eyes through the shaggy hair!)

Advanced Pro - Week Two

I took a different approach to this week (following the guidelines - but different from what I have done in the past!).  I used my daughter's very pretty friend as my subject and used my daughter as an assistant.  My daughter held the reflector and provided comedy relief.  It was actually good to have her there because she was a distraction and her friend was very at ease.  While my daughter's friend "posed" she was still very relaxed and natural because we all kept up a line of conversation about school, other kids and the goings on in the park.  I know that sometimes photographers like to work alone and not have other people around to distract, but in this case I think it was a benefit and added to the mood, keeping it light.

We shot in several locations at the school/park.  I had my "list" in my head of what I wanted to do and in what order.  I directed her to get the poses and looks that I wanted and while we were at each location, I always asked her if she had anything she wanted to try or a pose she wanted to do in each of the spots.  She always had something to add, which made it fun and kept the pace flowing forward. 

I posed the first two, we collaborated on the third one and picture number four was her idea.  I think it actually helped to draw in input and really helped my subject feel relaxed.  I used the "formula" of me starting out with the pose ideas and then working with her on a few ideas and then letting her do what she wants as we exhausted each of the locations.  

I did used the variations on the poses as you suggested in the video lessons, however I still find myself with a lot of "similar" looks and looks which can be silly as she made some extreme faces or certain gazes were a little off/extreme in some photos.   I think what we did pretty closely qualifies for the requirements of what we were to do this week.  She was in a single area, did not leave the steps and just moved slightly on the two steps on the play structure.  All of the photos in this set were taken in about five minutes from start to finish in this single location/area before moving on to the next location/look.

That wraps up week 2!

I Heart Faces - Yellow

My entry for this week's I Heart Faces contest - the theme is "Yellow."

Advanced Pro - Week One

This is homework for the first week of the Brooke Snow class I am taking.  I decided to stalk out a location which we have attempted to use several times in the past but have always had disappointing and frustrating results.  Neither my daughter nor I have been happy shooting here.  For a personal challenge I decided to go here again...it's been not quite a year since we made our last attempt...and this time I was going to make it work.   I always come around this area the same time of day, so that, too, did not vary from prior attempts.  I used some of the preplanned poses and shot ideas.  I believe that thinking this part through before we got here allowed us to have some more satisfactory results. 

I took a total of 109 shots with the majority being the experimental zoom shots.  I was sure that I covered the bases and included the required "portrait," "partial body," "full body" and miscellaneous poses.  I chose one from each of the categories which were my favorites.  In the past, some of the criticism which I have received when working with her was that she clenched her hands and mouth (with her braces) too much.  We worked on trying to have a little variety.  I think that having the plan in place before getting to the location helped in keeping the shoot moving along and did not allow her to get stagnant and fall back into her comfort zone of tight hands and mouth.   The portrait shot - the first one - is one of my favorites overall.  I like the light and her naturalness.

In the second shot, I tried to keep her moving so she would maintain a relaxed posture.  I gave her slight instruction on how to position herself, but let her move around and pose as she wished within my initial guidelines.   I did have to stop and adjust her hair, which was falling in separate pieces.  After that adjustment I had her shake out the hair in the back and it gave a more natural look to the pose. (The words "natural" and "pose" don't quite work together very well, do they?)

In exhausting the location I determined I wanted to make the best use of the signs which were around this wash.  We took a number of pictures around the three specific signs they had posted and painted (on the ground).  This was my pick of the set (although you can see she has the tighter mouth - darn!).  I shot this low, without looking through the viewfinder.  I wanted to get an different angle on it - more free form and something which I would naturally work against when looking through the viewfinder.

The last shot is from the action pictures we took.  This was another attempt to exhaust the location.  This wasn't planned, but since I was working from a plan from the start and all my prior shots were preplanned, I had a little time/energy to brainstorm.  I wanted to play up the structure and lines and try experimenting a bit.    She did a number of leaps, jumps and these running shots, where I was playing with the zoom (24-105).  I like the lines that are produced by the action of the zoom and I purposefully cropped the photo to have her at the very edge and running into the photo.  It was cropped a little tight on the edge, but there was a pole there and with the zoom effects I could not clone it out cleanly enough.

That's it for week one! 

Parting shot - creative play:

Maki....Two Views