London, Part 1

(calling this "London, Part 1" as I'll be going back in a 1.5 weeks for vacation, so will actually get to see the city and have more to share)

I got to go to London for a work trip last week, and though I didn't get to see much more than the inside of a conference room the whole week, I did snap some cool pics of the Tower Bridge and a neat little alley when I first got in. Despite my jet lag, couldn't have asked for a prettier day!

FYI all of these photos have not been edited. I did play with exposure while I was taking these pics (used Manual mode). No post processing has been done.

Portraits

Our assignment this week was to take portraits. I got a new lens this week (a Nikon 35mm f/1.8 that I LOVE) and of course had to give it a try. This new camera allows me to go down to f/1.8, which produces a shallow depth of field (blurs out the background). It's great for closeups and portraits so you only have the subject matter in focus and sharp. Check them out!

See, very shallow depth of field. This is at f/8.

Love this one of Shadow. It's the intensity in his eyes that do it for me. This is at f/2 and 1/500 shutter speed.

This is my wonderful husband. Unfortunately I didn't realize at the time the white in the background is distracting. The horizon cuts
through his eyes. Should either be all the blurred scenery or all the white. But he's still cute :)

Background is terrible again but the light is starting to catch in his eyes. That's what you want in portrait.

Logi thrilled about getting his picture taken. Such attitude. f/2. 

The White Balance is off in this one. He's normally warmer than this. Had it on Incandescent.

Water + Tripod + Playing with Shutter Speeds

I got a Tripod for Christmas that is just great. Its compactible (is that a word?) enough that I can put it in my backpack when I go hiking, yet sturdy enough for holding my lens in place just fine.

We went to East Palisades Hiking Trail that goes along the Chattahoochee (the 'Hooch). It was a pretty cloudy day but we took both boys and had a great time. I decided to play with my tripod and making that cotton-candy water from the rolling Hooch.

Shadow with his pack.
So handsome.

The Water

All were taken in Shutter Priority from a tripod.

1/125 sec

1/60 sec

1/20 sec

Starting to see the water blur in together and get that smooth look

1/10 sec

1/5 sec

And the last one. Look how smooth the water is!
















There was also a bamboo forest that was pretty cool too :)

The Logi Monster

As I showed off the regal Prince Shadow, here is Logi, the Bringer of Destruction.

Logi - Guard Dog Extraordinare.

This picture of him in the window was harder to take because you've got the natural daylight of outside shining in along with the incandescent light inside.

I tried altering my White Balance to handle the incandescent light, however it turned the outside light shining in blue (makes the very warm incandescent light cooler).

In the end, I found that taking it with my White Balance set on "Daylight" gave me the best results as far as "what my brain saw".

Prince Shadow on Red Brick

As I don't have children yet, my dogs are my children. Shadow is my oldest at 4.5. He is a black lab/beagle mix and in my opinion is not a dog. Logi (our other one, pronounced like Yogi but with an L) is a dog. Shadow is my little man. Here I tried to capture his elegance.

Flowers on a Book

The Assignment

Our assignment was to take a picture of something that interests us. I was about to wash dishes when the flower in the vase next to the window caught my eye. My husband had just bought me flowers and this was a gorgeous pink rose in full bloom. It was definitely something that interests me (I love flowers, especially gerbera daisies) so thought I'd try my hand at taking a creative picture (or two).

The Book

I wanted a nice hardcover book to lay my flower on, to give it some pop. I loved the Game of Thrones book, especially Daenerys. So I grabbed the 5th book and laid it out to hold my flower.

See what I came up with below!

The Journey Begins

A Spark is Lit

I love to travel and love exploring the outdoors. For me, I want to live life to the fullest and experience every thing this world has to offer. Naturally I wanted to capture the world (and my experiences) in all its glory as I see it. 

See I'm a math nerd, like real technical nerdy, and photography (and cooking) are my creative outlets. And with anything I set my mind to, I want to do it right. I got a Nikon DSLR 3200 a couple years ago but was always on Auto mode. So logically, the next step would be to take a class and learn not only how to better use my camera, but how to compose photos.

Training Begins

I recently started taking a Beginner's photography class at the Spruill Center for the Arts (the local non-profit organization that offers a variety of art classes) and really learned a lot. I wanted to take the Intermediate but alas I was the only one, so I took the Beginner's again because I like the teacher and felt I was drinking from the firehouse the 1st time I took it. Fingers crossed others want to take the Intermediate class this time around so it's offered!

Start of the Blog

What better way to capture my Photo Journey of Discovery than with a blog! Mainly this blog is for me to watch the progression of my photography skills. But I've also found that I can't find real life photos posted with information on how the damn thing was taken! I probably won't do it with all my photos, but I'll try to do it with a lot to help others understand what f-stop, shutter speed, ISO, and focal length I used.

Here we go!