obi-wan-yj

This is great! For something taken set against the ground, you did a great job of avoiding showing even the slightest bit of the ground itself. This wouldn't be nearly as good a shot if there were illuminated pavement at the bottom. I also like the different colors and the spacing of the fireworks -- not too much happened right on top of each other. What were the camera/exposure specs for this shot?

This is one of the best firework-only shots I've ever seen. The large burst raining down on all the well-spaced smaller ones makes all the difference. Good color variety, too. What were the camera specs for this one?

I shot this in our yard just a couple weeks after getting my DSLR.

This is roughly half of the original frame. What do you think about

the crop? Any suggestions for improvement?

I think I like this one better than your other one. Overlapping the flag on the fireworks and showing larger bursts helps fill the frame for a better composition. The flag is exposed better, too. The camera shake on the fireworks certainly doesn't help, though.

Nice composition. I like firework photos that contain other props as well. It would have nice if the flag was a bit better lit, but I do understand the possibility of motion blur in that case. I might also have liked to see the fireworks closer to the flag--perhaps even partially obscured by it. As it is, it almost looks like two separate photos next to each other. I'd also recommend that you clone out that bright white spot by the flag pole. It's distracting.

I like the framing, the location of the bursts, and the color variance between them. Enough to be interesting, but not too cluttered. I'm glad you didn't feel compelled to contain all of both bursts in your final photo, and still left a little dead space in the lower left.

 

I'd love to know what your camera specs were: focal length, shutter speed, aperture, and ISO.

Nice shot! Just enough color and light to keep it interesting without being cluttered. The framing is perfect. I'd love to know what the specs are on this photo: shutter speed, aperture, ISO, and focal length.

This is my favorite of the four fireworks photos you just posted. I think it has the best framing, especially since it includes many of the boats & lights at the bottom while still including the areal burst. I think some of your other shots were zoomed in a little too tight. This one has good colors and perfect exposure for the city/water lights below. It's a shame there wasn't just one more burst somewhere in the top half...

 

What ISO were you shooting at?

The last of my 2007 firework photos. There was a good wind last year,

so a lot of the shots had tails like this. This one always reminded

me of a bird in flight. What do you think? Any suggestions for

improvement?

Thanks for the honest feedback, David. It's nice to finally get a comment other than, "Good job," especially from somebody with your expertise.

 

I see what you're saying. I'm not sure if it's a result of how I was forced to hold the camera (in an outstretched arm pointing back over my head, perhaps causing camera shake), or if the autofocus wasn't quite spot on. I know this particular lens isn't terribly sharp, but it's not nearly bad enough to cause what you see in this image, especially at this resolution.

This is the last of my old firework photos that I'll post. I wish I'd

gotten just a little more of the top of the burst. Other than that,

what do you think? Any specific areas for improvement?

How do you classify fireworks? I'll put this one in "abstract,"

because it's always reminded me of an abstract painting. I wish I'd

gotten just a bit more space above the blast, but I still like it.

What do you think? Any other ways it could be improved? Perhaps

cropping a bit off the sides? I like having the vertical trail to the

bottom.

How do you classify 4th of July fireworks? Abstract? Astro? Events?

This shot shows that it is possible (though not easy) to get a half

decent firework shot using only a P&S camera with no manual exposure

control. Lots of trial and error for exposure, watching the guys

lighting the fuse, and anticipating the burst with the 2-second delay

timer. This was one of the experiences that pushed me to buy an SLR.

What do you think?

OK, so how do you classify a photo like this? I'll try "children."

The blur on the right is my then-5-yr-old daughter. This was an

impromptu experiment at last year's Independence Day party, merely

capturing the moment without telling the kids do do anything in

particular other than "wave your arms around." I bought a whole bunch

more colored sparklers this year specifically for photography, and

plan to experiment a lot more in the coming weeks. What do you think

about this?

While playing outside in the yard, my son kept pulling down his diaper

to scratch a mosquito bite. What do you think?

This is another shot from the June tornado & lightning storm that

rolled through town. I played with the contrast (especially near the

middle values) and the white balance temperature to the this effect.

Personally, I prefer a cooler blue temp, but most people seem to like

the warmer purple hue better. What do you think?

I like it. The colors add just enough punch to counteract the 3/4 of the image that is neutral grey. The circular lines also add an interesting element. If I were hanging it on my wall, I'd want a lot more window and a lot less wall, but there's nothing the photographer could do about that.

Alas, the eaves would not have allowed clearance for my head. I was already holding the camera up against the wood as far back as I could, and the cedar bushes below don't support ladders well. The following photo illustrates the clearance issues.

 

http://photos.jedi.com/2008/20080520/IMG_5647.JPG

 

The babies were only facing the right (toward the tree off-frame where their parents waited), so if I wanted to look into their faces, I had to come at them from the gutter side. Perhaps if I'd had one of those right-angle viewfinders or a body with LiveView, I could have gotten more usable shots.

 

The above photo was taken by my 6-yr-old daughter, who's come to enjoy photography because it's what her daddy does. She didn't realize that I'd spent an hour a few days earlier photographing those same birds. When she discovered them, she ran inside, eagerly asking for the camera. I'm so proud...

Some robins built a nest in the eaves of our front porch. It was too

high to use the viewfinder, but low enough for me to point the camera

& macro lens blindly at the nest. The parents waited impatiently in a

nearby tree with worms in their beaks while I took pictures. Any

suggestions for improvement?

Trying to document my son's "crib" stage before he grows out of it.

Any suggestions for improvement?

Each spring, half a million Sandhill Cranes stop along an 80-mile

stretch of the Platte River in central Nebraska, USA, en route from

the Gulf Coast to their summer homes in Canada and Siberia. Watching

them return by the thousands to roost on the river each night is an

impressive sight. Although I did shoot this into a hazy, orange

sunset, I had to punch up the saturation a bit. Should I have gone

farther? Would it have been better if the ground was a perfectly

black silhouete? This was taken with my older telephoto lens, so I

had to sharpen it in post to get some good lines on the birds.

Robins made a nest in the eaves of our front porch, well within my

reach. I spent some time photographing the babies with my wide-angle

macro lens (lens about 3" from the birds) while mom & dad waited

impatiently in a nearby tree with worms in their beaks. Is this too

tight a crop? I couldn't look through the viewfinder while taking

this, so I just held the camera up and guessed at its orientation, and

I accidentally rotated it quite a bit. This is the largest crop that

I could get in this orientation without any visible black corners.

Maybe that's not such a bad thing. I'm not sure.

Wow, the first three raters have been very kind. Thank you. As I look at this image more, I'm wondering if it would be better if I were to clone out the street light right next to the main bolt, as well as the flag pole right next to the distant bolt. Do those features make the shot more "real" (given that it's obviously an urban setting), or would it be better if they were missing?

I caught this from the safety of my covered front porch during a

nearby electrical storm last spring. Of 100+ seven second shots, this

was the only one to capture anything worthwhile. I'm glad I wasn't

standing about two miles SSW of my house at the time!

I wanted to document this stage in my son's life before he grew into a

real bed. He woke up from his nap rather happy, so I figured this was

my chance. After a few minutes, he grew frustrated that I hadn't yet

released him from his crib, and tried to climb out on his own.