Tilt-shift photography

What is tilt shift?
I don't think I can explain it in the most technical terms. What it really does is shift the plane of focus in the photo, and is cool when used in certain applications. I like to call it the Mister Rogers effect.

What's that? Well remember in the intro? It would show the town and all the cars and people were just figurines and such?

Tilt Shift lenses distort or re-shape to create that same effect, only for real photos.
Here is the real def:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilt-shift_photography

Until recently, I was not aware of the ability to recreate this effect is post production. It was actually pretty simple if you are a Photoshop user. Google it to find out more.

Here are some great examples:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/11/16/beautiful-examples-of-tilt-shift-photography/

Here is a photo that I attemped to alter in post.








Check out the "Lens Baby" products for more info on Tilt Shift lenses.

Holiday Photo Tips

It's that time of year.

Families get together and eat a ton of food and become lethargic and unmotivated for not much at all. Just as you settle into Uncle Norm's La-Z-Boy and a nice movie, the bugle horn is blown for family photos. Ugh..

Everyone gathers in front of the Christmas Tree and a blown out image is taken. It's how it goes. How can you eliminate this?
I have a few tips for these shots.

1. Take several shots of the group. Someone always blinks. Take 10 at least.
2. When using the pop up flash, use the business card trick if you camera allows it
http://www.diyphotography.net/the-party-bouncer-is-back-in-business

The other thing that I like to do is just take candids. Try using a room that has a lot of light and disable your flash. You can also use a small tripod and use the timer on your camera to capture some cool effects (using the timer eliminates any movement). The kitchen might be a cool shot. If there is a slow shutter speed, you'll capture lots of movement.

Don't forget to take pictures from the outside looking in. If you have snow in your area, it will create a warm and dramatic effect.

Happy Holidays!

Santa Photos at the Imagine Children's Museum

Did you get your photo taken with Mr. & Mrs. Clause this past Saturday at the Children's Museum? Please visit our client site on Shutterfly to download, print and order photos or Holidays cards:

millcreekmultimedia.shutterfly.com

There is no charge for the photos, it was a special event brought to you by the Children's Museum and Mill Creek Multimedia.

We had a great time seeing Mr. & Mrs. Clause, and all the children certainly enjoyed seeing them as well! We knew this was a perfect opportunity for us to volunteer and give back to the community we serve. We have enjoyed the Children's Museum in Everett for 6 years now, so it was only fitting to help out.

If you have any questions about the photos, or have any issues with Shutterfly please let us know.

Lighting 103: Experience is what you get when you don't get what you wanted

I hear it over and over again and again.

Talk to any pro, amateur or film junkie and they will most likely always say the same thing.

LIGHTING IS EVERYTHING

I recently followed my kids and the rest of the neighborhood clan around this past Halloween and realized just how frustrating things can be in an environment where you have no control over the light.

I was excited at one point because I had a new toy. It was a simple blowup softbox diffuser for my onboard camera flash (Nikon SB600). I knew that I could not bounce light off of anything, unless the cloud cover was going to be hovering at 10' the entire night. In theory this would have worked well if I had figured out some settings ahead of time based on subject distances from the camera.

In a perfect world, I would have a full frame camera that I could jack up the ISO to 6400, keep a shutter speed of 160 or so (kids running around with big smiles and snickers crumbs falling out of their candy jaws) and a nice aperture of 4 or 5 for semi-sharp photos. Well, that was not the situation.

I realized very quickly how my forecast failed. Since I had 2 kids, I needed to stay streetside to keep an eye on both, so I shot from far away, and the flash can only be effective up to a certain distance before it drops off. I found myself taking the diffuser off when they were at houses, then placing it back on when they were close to me so I did not blow them out against the dark background.

Lesson learned? Sure. Plan ahead next time.

Follow them around more closely and not from the curb and leave the flash @ home. Maybe I'll bring a prime lens next time. Or maybe I'll have someone hold a king size sheet on a frame and have them hover over the kids so i can bounce the flash off of that? :-)

Below are a few examples of what I was able to come up with. Not too happy about them, but post processing the RAW files helped expose the backgrounds a little bit more and underexpose the blown out subjects.

Next blog post: Holiday photo tips