Frankie is a shih tzu that is part of a very special and adorable family. I was honored to be able to photograph them for their Christmas portraits this year.
Girl in the Mercado
I took a cruise to Mexico earlier this year, and have been hanging onto this image. Doting over this image. Thinking about the pixels in the image and trying to help them out a little bit. So with the new year upon us, it is time to release this image.
This little girl was in a mercado in Mazatlan, Mexico. We visited the market upon suggestion of my photojournalist uncle, and I feel like this image is the reason I was there. Certainly not the animal carcasses that my chef boyfriend was so very excited seeing in the meat section. I took some other photos, but this little girl just grabbed me. I was walking by her area, and she saw my camera (I have to work on my stealth) and gave me this little smile as I walked by and got a click.
I will work on this photo more as time goes on. But this is my first step in the process of releasing my little girl into the world.
Canon 5D Mark II, Tamron 90mm lens. May 2010.
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Not leaving well enough alone
OK, in my previous post, I featured this image captured in Disneyland.
However, I wasn't happy with it, which was just gnawing away at me in the days since I posted it. Finally, I decided to get a purely critical POV from objective eyes, and utilized a critique forum on Flickr.
After taking a couple of the suggestions in the forum, I edited it a bit differently in Lightroom, mainly getting rid of the ugly extreme vignetting and toying with the contrasts a little bit:
Could this be a better image? Absolutely! I took this with my point and shoot, so I was limited when it came to DOF. I wish the little girl had turned a bit more my way to reveal more of her eye. And I really wish that she hadn't worn a striped shirt.
However, I loved the image in that moment. This little's girl's pensive pose will always remind me of that October day in Disneyland on the Rivers of America. I also think the reflection on the banister is kind of cool, and it may not have caught my eye if she wasn't wearing that striped shirt.
Please feel free to tell me what you, esteemed reader, think of the image. Was the second edit better? Do they look the same?
Thanks as always for stopping by, and for sticking with me through my photographic journey.
Child's eye
I always have some sort of camera with me, and I make sure to charge my batteries in my point and shoot the night before I visit Disneyland. Usually I like to get photos of my niece, but I also love the photographic opportunity that Disneyland presents. It's a beautiful, magical place (no matter your age) filled with people and things you don't see on a regular day. I was on the "steamboat" taking a ride on the River of the Americas, enjoying the beautiful October day (Hello, this is Southern California!) and I noticed this little girl right next to me just leaning on the railing and enjoying the view:
I love the perfect profile of this little girl, and the contrast of her striped shirt to her smooth hair. The reflection of her shirt in the rail is something I noticed but didn't think came out until I started editing the photo. I created this as a B&W image in Lightroom 2 because the colors in the original were competing too much with her stripes. B&W also adds to the pensive mood I felt when creating this image. I couldn't help but wonder what was going on in this little girl's mind as we cruised down the river. I like that you can see a hint of her eye in this portrait, because for me, the photo just isn't worth taking if you cannot see an eye of your subject.
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ESRI UC 2010
My career happens to be Geographic Information Systems, map making for those of you not familiar with the term. Mapmaker, mapmaker, make me a map, find me a location..... (Just imagine Babs singing that!) Every year, thousands of my fellow GIS'ers and I attend the ESRI User Conference (the industry conference) at the San Diego Convention Center.
Here are a few photos of my take on the ESRI UC from this year, (July 12-16) recently featured on the premier GIS website, GIS Lounge:
The ESRI logo at the San Diego Convention Center.
Attendee Kelly Minniti solves "Where in the World?"
The new GeoLounge allows attendees to kick up their feet for a much needed break.
Check out the rest of the set and let me know what you think.
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Whiskers on puppies
OK, if you don't like puppies, just stop reading. Actually, if you don't like puppies, maybe it's time for a little self reflection. Who doesn't like to at least look at puppies??!
So, my lovely friend had some adorable puppies about 7 weeks ago. Well, her dog did. I have been waiting for these puppies to become little fuzzballs of love for their closeups, and I was not prepared for the cuteness before me:
Camera: Canon EOS 5D Mark II Exposure: 0.013 sec (1/80) Aperture: f/2.8 Focal Length: 90 mm ISO Speed: 4000
They are a mix of possibly Jack Russell Terrier and Chihuahua (but they are cute, I swear!). I only got a chance to really photograph two of them, since puppies have A TON of energy. The little black and white guy (called Marcel Marceau) and this other little guy, named Fatso:
(That's my friend Kelly kissing her puppy)
Camera: Canon EOS 5D Mark II Exposure: 0.013 sec (1/80) Aperture: f/2.8 Focal Length: 90 mm ISO Speed: 800
The light in both photos is from a Tungsten light to the right of the camera in front of the subjects. Guess which smarty pants forgot to bring their powerful 580EX II flash? That would be me.
I love both of these photos because they really show the bond of human and animal, and how tiny and helpless these puppies are in the hands of a human being.
I like the paws and nose detail of the first photo, and the juxtaposition of puppy paws and human hands.
So this is another case I couldn't pick one photo of the day for my Project 365ish Photo 65. It's just too hard when cute puppies are around.
This reminds me of a photography teacher whose class I sat in on VERY briefly in college. She handed out the syllabus, and told us she really wanted us to push the envelope, and didn't want to see pictures of puppies and kittens. I didn't go back for the second class. But that's another story...
Thank you Kelly for inviting me to take photos of those precious little puppies! It was a blast chasing them around!
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