tnbandmom

I will be driving to Orlando from Memphis Tennessee the first week in June for

a conference. I am planning to split the drive into two days. Thinking about

driving the bulk one day and staying in Panama City for one night or Mexico

Beach or somewhere along the coast there. This will give my teenagers a night

on the beach. Would like to be able to get some sunset & bird pics and then

some shells. Then the next day will finish the drive into Orlando. Thought

about driving a 'scenic' route alone the coast from Panama to Tallahassee and

picking I 10 back up to head into Florida. So I'm looking for some suggestions

if there's someone from the area that could recommend suggestions for some

good picture locations in a short time.

 

Also I've read on the board where Orlando Wetlands Park was recommended. Would

this still be a good recommendation being that it is June and would be

considerablely warm.

 

We've also found at that Friday while we will be there, the space shuttle is

scheduled to launch at 7:43 pm. So we were thinking about going to Cocoa Beach

for this. Does anyone from the area know if this is something a lot of people

will be doing so the beach would be very crowded?

 

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

Cindy

Thanks for the feedback. One of the areas I struggle with is perspective and how small the small images really should be. Also just like in scrapbooking I don't like pages that have one or two images and alot of embellishments. I did find some samples on the sample pages that you guys recommended that had more pages with more than just a couple of images. It just seemed like the images when I was resizing them would look too small.

 

So what is the smallest size you typically will use?

Would you be so kind as to critique my first flush mount album? The purpose of

the album is two fold. I wish to use it at consultations with furture

prospective clients and I plan to show it to the father of this bride in hopes

of getting them going on one. So I picked out the pictures that I thought they

would most like and most show the feeling of the day. I still have 3 spreads to

complete which will be of the family and friends at the wedding.

 

Do you feel the layout flows?

 

Too many black backgrounds? Do the non-black backgrounds work? On the formal

page for the guys there are two copies. One with black and one with a brown

because a coworker said the black was overwhelming with the tuxes. Your

opinions?

 

Thank you in advance for your time and advice.

 

http://www.osborn-photography.com/galleries/liz-Jeremy/album/

 

 

Cindy

William is right on his summary of some of it. It was a check it out and see. Working with the depth of field of the two lenses is exactly what my main focus was. Sometimes my daughter was way to flighty for me to keep testing. The focus right now is working on the depth of field and working only with one or two lenses right now to fully figure out how I like them and working with them. I never said or thought any of these were great. I do love the 85 1.8 and am trying to get more efficient with it. I did have the reflectors with me in the truck but didn't pull them out. I know shame on me.

 

Yes we are planning a return visit this weekend if the rain stays away. And yes I will be pulling the reflectors out. But I still am only working on exploiting the DOF.

 

Thanks for the pointers.

Thanks guys. I do have that book and do have Photoshop. But I only want to use it for enhancement. So I only did a few of the images in Photoshop for that reason. The other test that I was working on was handling the harsh light too. Guess I didn't do an adequate job in that area. I do like the contrast you added to the one image. Sometimes when I've done the curves or contrast adjustment in the past I didn't like it because I didn't get the right mix.

 

Thanks for all the comments.

Thanks for the comments. Yeah I knew it wasn't the best time of the day. Our plan was to just check out the place because several people kept saying go there. I was pretty shocked about taking pics in a cemetary too. So finally we said we would check it out. Originally we were just going to check it and work on some aperature and fill flash stuff. Then my daughter decided to go and her friend. I hated that the time of the day was really wrong since they were agreeable but figured worth the practice. And these are pretty tightly cropped because that was what I was specifically working on. Guess I should have mentioned that. I struggle with the cropping too tightly vs there's too much space. And I was specifically working with the specific lens.

 

Yeah Suzanne it is normally extremely hot and humid here. Outside weddings are very slim here. Even when we have planned to do outside shots at the weddings the brides will have multiple locations planned. I always make them choose the one spot that they most want because most likely the day of they are going to decide it's too hot for it.

This past weekend my daughter and a friend were gracious enough to give my

husband and I some practice time at a location some people had been talking

about. These shots were taken at a cemetary. It had such great backgrounds that

I plan on doing engagement sessions and senior sessions here. This was the

first time doing some portraits with the 85 1.8. All the pics with img_ were

taken with the 85 1.8 or 70-200 4.0. I would appreciate any feedback technical

or on image choice. I am planning to make this my "senior portfolio" on my

website. There's a couple of images that are the same but with different

affects. I haven't decided which of these I like the best and there are a

couple of 'cheese' ones that my subjects are in color and the background in bw

because my daughter saw that on one of her friends and just thought it was the

coolest so she had to have it.

 

http://www.osborn-photography.com/galleries/christyjessica/

 

Thank you so much for you time and any feedback.

 

Cindy

I wish I was closer to Knoxville. I love that area although my husband says I'd be too close to Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. Wish I was closer as I would love to work some with you.

No he didn't want the reflections because he warned the requestor that they were going to be there. I didn't have my camera and being this was my first time observing him and so forth I didn't think that was the time or place for me question him as too many people around etc.

 

It was doors in the middle of solid glass all the way across. Yes he was standing straight in front of the group of groom and groomsmen that he was setting up as a group shot similar to a traditional altar group shot.

 

At some point I was going to test and see but just thought I would ask you guys to get some opinions. So in my testing or if faced with this challenge and the reflections are ugly a parking lot and a road with cars going down it, I would need to position myself off to the side at about the 60 degree angle and try the filter at that point. Am I translating correctly?

 

Thanks for all the feedback and the physics lesson.

I was observing another photographer this past weekend who is a traditional

film photographer moved to digital. There were nice wreaths on the doors which

were glass. There was a porch overhang but the parking lot and other things

were reflecting in the doors. Now my question is wouldn't a polarizing filter

have cut those reflections?

I have to second what others have said about Asuka Book's marketing techniques. I signed up with them last year and haven't actually used them yet but in that time I've only gotten a handful of emails and a couple of postal mail pieces. Now pictage on the other hand I regret inquiring about because that email a whole lot more.

I too got several toys for Christmas and the birthday. I got the Whibal pocket and studio cards which I absolutely love. I also got the CP-E3 battery pack. Used it at a co-worker's child's birthday party to test it out. Loved the recycle times and lightness. I also got the 85 f1.8 and the tamron 17-55 2.8. I have to say I am so in love with the 85 f1.8. I am so glad I took the advice of the wonderful people on this board. I also finally got a couple of umbrellas and have been working through the techniques on strobist.com.

Has anyone tried the Sanyo Eneloop Hybrid AA rechargeables? I couldn't find

much on photo.net when a co-worker was telling me about them. He purchased

some and I tried them out this past weekend. They have not been charged yet.

He used them in his digicam and then we used them in my husband's Pentax istD.

We took 670 full res jpgs and the batteries are still charged. From Thomas

Distributing they cost about the same as the other rechargeables I've been

using. So I was just wondering if anyone else had tested them and had any

experiences.

 

http://www.thomas-distributing.com/sanyo-eneloop-batteries-aa.php

Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I think I'm going to go with the 17-55 2.8 Canon as suggested and definitely go with the 85 1.8. Ever since I bought the 50 1.8 and the tamron 28-75 2.8 I really fell in love with the fast better line of glass.

I hate to ask but I've been pouring over the forum and reading and searching

and searching other forums about lens to try to figure out which way to go and

I just can't decide.

 

My current equipment is: 20d, 70-200/4, 50/1.8, 28-75/2.8 as far as what

counts as my favorites and what I use. I have a XT Rebel as my backup camera

body. The last wedding and a couple of family events I used both cameras.

Either one had the 28-75 and the other had the 70-200 or 50 1.8. I really

liked working this way better than changing lenses but I think I am going to

get another 20d as sometimes I forgot which camera was set which way.

Predominately the 28-75 is always attached to the camera. I have decided I am

definetly adding the 85/1.8 but I can't decide on which wide angle to go with

and whether to do wide angle prime or wide angle zoom. I find that sometimes

the 28-75 is too wide in dressing room and not wide enough for group shots.

 

The zooms that I am considering are:

 

Tamron sp af 17-50/2.8 xr di-ii

Canon ef-s 10-22/3.5-4.5

Canon ef 17-40/4.0L USM

Tamron af 17-35/2.8-4 DI LD

 

I was figuring that the 2 camera would be something like this:

getting ready - 85/1.8 & 28-75 or the 17-40 if I went with that one

processional 28-75

ceremony - depends if forced in back of church or allowed to move - normally I

have 70-200 and 28-75 on the other - usually have time here where I could

switch to a wide angle to grab a couple shots.

reception and cake cutting is usually the 28-75 and 50/1.8. but thought that a

wide angle and the 85 would make an excellent addition here.

 

So what would be your advice on which wide angle zoom or prime that you think

would best fit this? I have no local places to rent.

I use Mals-e commerce cart which I intergrated into the Photoshop gallery. The template took a little bit of coding to get it set up but the free version of the shopping cart works pretty good. There is a free version of the orders program that he also has written which will download the orders from online to you pc. Then because I like access I use the option to dump the data out into access. If you would like to see it let me know. It's pretty good since the only fees are for paypal processing. I've used it for 2 years of marching band events. Works pretty good now that I have my workflow down to a bit of a science for it. Mals is at www.mals-e.com

Elaine,

 

I too just did the trying to step out of the box and use RAW instead of letting the camera process. I shot the family and dogs some to test and then branched out to a baby shower. So I had been playing around with it for a few months. Well this past weekend I finally felt comfortable enough to shoot a wedding this way without doing the RAW+JPG. I too have the 20D and the Canon Digital Software. I tried to process the files in there. That was frustrating. The Adobe Camera RAW seems to be better for me to make some adjustments and then taking the pics into Photoshop to finish adjusting since Photoshop is where I am more comfortable there.

 

Good luck.

Thanks Marc and all for the comments. I was looking for the skin to be right and just wasn't getting there. Also I was trying to use ACR more than using photoshop. Pulling it into Photoshop I was able to get the skin much better without getting the blue. Found that I could change the temperature to around 3100 and then clip both sides of the histogram in levels and much better picture. Now the real goal is to avoid this post processing completely.

Thanks Marc. I was hoping you would respond. I do have my monitor calibrated with the spider and usually recalibrate monthly / weekly depending on how much I'm working on. So would this adjustment be better or more proper?<div></div>

Thank you for everyone's responses. My husband and I were just having a disagreement about the correction and since this wedding is a co-worker's wedding I wanted to get some other opinions from some other photographer's in place of asking my normal co-workers that usually give me opinions. Since this is a co-worker I didn't want to show them at the daytime job. Each time I edited them then they went more bluish.

I'm having a hard time deciding if my images from this last wedding are too

yellow. So what do you guys think? Is this image too warm?<div></div>

I agreed with David. I like the idea but the B/G is just too oof for me. I wouldn't use it on any marketing materials either.

Well if you go to www.constructad.com the website is under construction for almost every link. Seems like if they are really legit the website would be a bit better.

Cindy Osborn - West Tennessee

Are there any photo.net members that are participating in the

Wedding Assignments that are located in San Carlos CA area? I am

coming out to the area for a computer training class this Friday and

will be there for 12 days. I was wondering if I might be able

to "hook" up with a fellow photographer out there during my trip.

Please email me privately at cosborn4@midsouth.rr.com if you might

be interested in talking and sharing with this Tennessee

photographer who's never been out west.