Advanced Photography Class - Previsualization

Last Wednesday I began the advanced (probably more like intermediate) photography class. Our lesson was on previsualization. Our project for the week was to previsualize a photo, take it according to the steps laid out in this article by Ron Bigelow, and then send it in explaining our steps. I took a lot of photos I liked over the weekend, and a lot of them previsualized and technically better photographs, but I decided to send in the one that stirred me the most.

EMOTION

This year over 1400 runners registered to participate in the Soaring Wings Ranch Half Marathon. The proceeds from the marathon benefit abused, neglected, and abandoned children in the state of Arkansas who reside at Soaring Wings Ranch. As the marathon participants run their course, the children of the Ranch line up by the finish line to prepare to pass out medals. When runners come over the finish line, the children excitedly hand them a finisher's medal and shout out words of encouragement and thankfulness. It was the feeling during this moment that I wanted to capture. Many of the runners participate strictly because of the cause. The children enjoy cheering them on and runners are touched by the greeting they receive from these happy children at the finish line.

APPEARANCE OF THE FINAL IMAGE

I am actually on staff at Soaring Wings Ranch. I am their graphic designer and in charge of publications for the Ranch. I wanted to capture a photo that could be published for our newsletter. However, there are state regulations on publishing photos of children in DHS care (for the protection of the children). With those goals in mind, I knew I had to capture a scene that did not include a child's full face. Image quality just needed to be good enough to produce a small print for publication. I visualized an image that showed part of a child's face and an extended arm handing a medal to a runner.

EDITING

I shot in RAW since I was having to quickly take photos while shooting in manual mode. I was unsure whether or not I would be able to expose everything perfectly and have everything as sharp as I wanted so I wanted the comfort of that flexibility (BUT I still tried very hard to get everything correct initially in the shot).  Out of camera, the photo was a tad underexposed and I also needed to sharpen the hands up a bit and up the contrast levels, but editing was minimal.

METHODS OF SHOOTING

Lens: I chose a long lens to capture the scene from a distance and minimize my depth of field even further to blur out the busy backgrounds at the race.

Position: I squatted and positioned myself, focusing on the hand of one of the children and waiting for the opportunity to arise to snap the photo. I was excited when I got this shot of a runner stopping to hi-five one of our kids and take time to speak with him personally after receiving his medal. 

ISO: I chose a medium ISO that gave me maximum flexibility for fast changes of exposure.

Aperture: I chose f/7 so I could minimize depth of field and yet still insure that I kept the subject in focus if he moved slightly.

Shutter speed: I made sure my shutter speed was quick enough to keep up with the movement going on in the scene.

Multiple shots: I set my camera on continuous shooting mode so I could shoot bursts and capture the photo at exactly the best moment.

Photography Challenges and Class Submissions

I posted this photo awhile ago, but I'm reposting it to take part in today's Simplicity photography challenge: Flowers.

I'm also submitting one of my favorites to the Aspire photography challenge: Lovely.

And now for this week's class submissions. Last week in class we discussed flash techniques and ISO. Our assignment was to experiment with different types of flash and to shoot in an ISO mode we'd never shot with before. Here we go:

My friend Beth, who is also taking the class, got together with me to practice. This photograph was taken using fill flash and a diffuser. She was positioned turned sideways with her back toward the sun to give direction to the light and shadows and fill flash was used to remove excessive shadowing from her face.

I posted this one a couple of days ago, also, but it was taken with fill flash. My family was positioned where they were backlit by the sun and fill flash was used to remove shadows from their faces. I also practiced with metering on this photo. I believe I took a meter reading off my hand to set the exposure for this shot.

This photo was taken in the evening at home after I had washed the freshly-picked apples and getting ready to peel and slice them for freezing. I used bounce flash with a mirror, bouncing the light off the ceiling to give a more even and natural looking lighting.

Lastly, my ISO picture. I took this with 3200 ISO, shooting inside at AWANA Sunday evening. This kid is adorable, but high energy, so I had to have a relatively high shutter speed to capture him clearly. I also used a diffuser on my flash to even out the lighting.

And just because I want to, here's another photo...this one taken by my husband. Isn't it nice? That's another picture of my fall table centerpiece. I'm diggin' the burlap.

Class Submissions #4 / Our Weekend

Last week in class, we talked about lenses and how longer lenses allow for more shallow depth of field. The class assignment was to take two photos with the same aperture but different lenses. I only have the one lens for my PowerShot (you actually can buy lenses for that camera but I haven't made the investment since we plan to upgrade to an SLR soon). Since I couldn't experiment with lenses, I took two photos with the same aperture and varied my focal length. 

Close up without zoom (7.4), f/4.5:

Close up with zoom (36.7), f/4.5

The rest of our project was centered around meter reading and exposure. With my camera I'm not able to take a meter reading, but I can change metering modes. I tried and did my best. I wasn't very happy with the results, but I tried! 

My husband was kind enough to let me practice on him. We loaded up our very black dog, Hitch, and took him to the school practice ball field where we knew there would be white walls for maximum contrast. 

Spot-metered on midtones of shorts and skin

I wasn't happy with the exposure but I think this would be way easier using an SLR. Because my husband is handsome, and because he and Hitch are buds, I dragged them around and took some other pictures of them, too. Hitch wasn't real sure what was going on.

Hitch is a good 'ole boy. He lived at my mom's house with us before J.C. and I got married. We got him from a lady who fostered dogs from the Humane Society. J.C. and I would often take him with us on our evening walks when we were dating. When we got married, we took him with us and he became OUR dog. He's part Mastiff and part Lab. When people see us with him, they make comments like, "Whoa, that's a big dog!" or "Nice looking horse you have there!" because he really is HUGE. He makes me feel safe, and it's fun to have a big, bad dog (even though he is actually one of the gentlest dogs you will ever meet). Evening walks with my little family make me very happy.

Saturday evening, we had to take a trip to Little Rock. We had to get to the fairgrounds early, because I had photography submissions that had to be turned in for the State Fair. Solid Rock does the production for the main stage at the State Fair every year, and when I go to see J.C. while he's working it's kind of fun to have something interesting to do, so I submit some photos to Arts and Crafts. 

Since we weren't quite ready for dinner, J.C. suggested that we go walk around by the Rivermarket and maybe walk the bridge. So we did. And I took a few shots for fun. We had a good time. We saw some cool stuff, some weird stuff, and some very interesting people. An evening out with my best friend is always a good time.

This Week's Class Submissions

Last week's lesson focused on shutter speed and depth of field, so we had to submit four photos demonstrating these ideas. My husband was working the fair last week and we had a birthday party to attend over the weekend, so I figured those would give me opportunities to do some shooting. My submissions:

Slow Action - White County Fair Ferris Wheel
[4 second exposure; f/3.5]

Stop Action - Ethan in the Sandbox
[1/500 second; f/4.0]

Shallow DOF - J.C.'s M7
[f/2.8; 3 seconds]

Wide DOF - Little Rock National Cemetery
[f/8; 1/50 second]
Unfortunately, this is one I was less than pleased with. f/8 on my point and shoot is as closed as my aperture gets, so it's still not all in sharp focus.