My Echo

My Echo - isn't she precious?  I adopted my kitty on August 13, 2010 and she is about a year old now.  She's a sweet little cat, but like all cats she has a very mischievous side.  In the past year I have taken dozens of pictures of Echo sleeping or bathing or exploring the corners of the house or, much like this one, sitting for a photo session.  I decided to try something a little different this time - black on black.  As I look at this picture I think there are a hundred things I could have done differently, but I love it anyway.  Just look at the sweet face and chubby little body.  I like the exposure and the rich black of the leather chair and her fur. 

My intent was to feature her soft velvety fur and her green eyes.  I supposed I could have kicked the exposure up just a stop or moved the strobe over to my right instead of setting it up on my left.  I should have also corrected the white balance or increased the warmth of the picture and bumped up the contrast so her eyes would really stand out.  Those eyes are actually much brighter in reality.  The position of the horizontal and vertical seams in the chair are a little distracting so maybe I should have placed Echo a little farther to the left.

I shot this with my Tamron 28-70mm f/2.8, mounted on my Canon Xsi, at 59mm and ISO 200.  My 580EX flash was positioned camera right and bounced off the silver lining of the umbrella.  I need to experiment more.  Maybe next time I should take off the black cover and shoot the flash through the umbrella.

Fourth With Friends

Good friends of mine invited me to their 4th of July party held on the 3rd.  Good times with great friends!  This is my friend Kerry and her two dogs.  China, on the left, was found by one of her friends roaming the streets of Las Vegas like a showgirl in crisis about five years ago.  Cinnamon, on the right, was adopted from a rescue in LA two or three weeks ago.  Both very sweet dogs and extremely lucky to be living with Kerry and her husband.

I brought my strobe kit with me, which consists of a 40" collapsible umbrella with a removable black exterior and silver interior, light stand, bracket, and a 530EX II Speedlite.  Oh...and a Canon ST-E2 Transmitter to trigger the flash.  I used my workhorse, the Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8.  It was the perfect occasion to take pictures of my friends and get some photography practice in.

I set up as soon as it got dark.  The Speedlite was mounted on the bracket and lightstand, with the silver interior of the umbrella to bounce the flash, and placed camera left.  I adjusted the height for this shot so that it was aimed at a 45 degree angle to Kerry.  I set the flash on ETTL, automatic metering, because I have not had much practice with the manual setting.  Shooting friends at a party just isn't the right time for that kind of slow experimentation.  The ISO is at 1600 and aperture at 2.8, but I would have loved to use ISO 400 or less and aperture at 4.0 or 5.6, but I'm shooting with a Canon 450D (not exactly a fast camera).  Additionally, the Tamron lens requires slower shutter speed than my kit lens and my Canon 50mm.  I don't know why that is, but it seems to be a common affliction amongst Canon-mounted Tamron users.  In post processing I used Canon's DPP.  I bumped the exposure up by one stop, slightly increased contrast and saturation.  The white balance was set to auto, which turned out great, but I am colorblind so you might see differently.  I should have done a custom balance but I had issues last time I did that - shots came out too warm.

I really love this picture.  Kerry is a great subject, she looks wonderful on camera (and off) and dogs are always good subjects.  I really like the exposure and lighting.  The sharpness is nice, but when viewed large it is a little soft.  I would have liked it sharper, but I was using such a large aperture setting to get the best shutter speed.  The sidewalk lamp on her right shoulder is a little distracting, as is the plant jutting into the frame on the left.  I would have also loved for Cinnamon to be facing the camera to get some light in her eyes like China's, but dogs don't always understand English.  China loves to have her picture taken.  I had a little photo session of her own later that night and she was very cooperative.  In retrospect maybe I should have shot further back so I can get their feet on the ground, instead of cutting half of their legs off.  But that would have presented other issues, like the light stand being in the frame.