Portraiture 1st

Shanti and I decided it was time we experiment indoors with portraiture photography. We have never done any controlled environment "studio" style photography and admittedly it did require a little bit of experimentation to achieve some good results. Between fluorescent light fixture placement and fill flash we managed to achieve some fairly convincing "studio" setting photographs.


Marley, our miniature poodle (aka killer grizzly bear), did a great job of participating in the shoot. I guess pets are much like kids when it comes to attention spans.


White balance settings are a bit tricky with the mixed lighting because the fluorescent lights and flash do not mix too well. If one commits to a fluorescent white balance, typically the flash will add a hue of blue tone to the picture. For this time around I just set the white balance to "auto" and allowed the camera to do all of the guesswork for me. Not too shabby for a first attempt. Minor histogram adjustments, shadow/highlighting, and brightness/contrast tweaks make for some decent finished products. The faux framing and matting were also post production additions.

Same Scenery, Different Park

Boca Ciega Millenium Park - Seminole, FL

So you probably read the title of this blog entry and decided to skip over the pictures and read my explanation for a seemingly repeat photo shoot. I'm half tempted to insert a Conan O'Brien self-insult here. Call it a lack of creativity, or perhaps even another lame attempt at wildlife photography, but please stay with me. I promise to change the scenery in future entries and offer different glimpses of Tampa and its surrounding communities. This weekend Shanti and I headed out to another one of our great local parks for another session in outdoor "wildlife" photography.

I suppose if I were in Alaska or maybe even somewhere in the Arizona desert I might have some fearsome creature or some rare plants to show off. Nah, instead I found a heron that can be found hanging around your local WalMart pond, a lizard often found scurring across your porch, and an exotic Florida palmetto of the "green" variety. Add insult to injury and maybe I peaked your interest when you realized the pink flower isn't really much of a flower. This is actually considered a weed by many gardeners. Don't ask me the name because I can't even pretend to tell you. So why the harsh self-criticism? Not to be too boastful, but I do find some of the pictures to be of acceptable quality. What if I lived in the desert? There is a good chance you would see lots of red dirt, rocks, and sunsets falling between cacti. Maybe if I lived in Utah you would see images of snowboarders and skiiers barreling down the slopes while yours truly struggles to figure out why white powdery snow looks like one big blown out light bulb. Or in the summer, maybe some red dirt, rocks, and sunsets falling between - uh, I know, the braces of a perfect white cross at the top of a Mormon Temple. Practice is for the proactive where exotic landscapes and cultures are for the dreamers. I try and constantly explain this to my fiance Shanti who is constantly dreaming of going places far too exotic for our eyes. Sure, I'd kill to photograph Rome or perhaps the Eiffel Tower whose image in print is probably no longer considered original or even artistic. She is from Hawai'i. I think I could easily go there on my fourth vacation - this time with the burning desire to photograph of course.

Frustration is owning a rusted classic Camaro dying a slow death and not having the means to restore it to new again. Frustration is being 8 years old and staring at your prized remote control monster truck given to you by your grandma on your birthday and not having the money to buy batteries to make it go. Frustration is owning a collection of cameras and staring at the latest editions of National Geographic and wanting to be in every setting depicted in each photograph. I am frustrated because I have been all of those things and still am part of the last. (Ok, I don't own a rusted Camaro and never have. I own a beater 93 Nissan Sentra that I long ago hoped to install a 265hp turboed motor imported from Japan. I just figured the Camaro white lie would add more drama to the point I am trying to make.) I have found in my life that most past times such as piano playing, painting, cooking, or for my sake - photography - all start with extremely basic fundamentals. For the musician, he will bang out "Mary Had a Little Lamb" until his family's ears bleed. The poor painter will waste dozens of canvases trying to make an apple look just right on the wooded kitchen table. The chef? Well, at some point he has to learn how to operate the microwave. (In case you were wondering - yes, I have done and currently do all of the activities I just mentioned. Learning is a real pain.) So I guess the most underwhelming philosophical insight of this entire paragraph is that I have to stay the course and "go back to the basics." Florida is where I live and Florida is what I have to photograph.


Baby steps it is. (Did you notice the tie in with the above picture? How cheesy was THAT!) Weekends have come and gone and I have let my camera(s) sit and stare at me with closed eyes. This weekend was largely a follow up to last weekend. I think I enjoyed my short getaway so much that it made sense to just do it again the following weekend. The joy of photography really does not lie in what you photograph, but rather when you photograph. (Yet another amazing piece of underwhelming philosophy.) These small steps are turning out to be much better than I imagined. (Ok, brace yourself for another sophomoric insight.) These little weekend outings are proving to be much more rewarding than first anticipated. I cannot wait until the day I am in Red Square toting my camera and looking like an absolute tourist. Sure, I have plenty of other ideal places I would like to visit in this lifetime, but at least the journey towards framed wall art, fond memories, and sharing with friends and family will certainly have deeper meaning.
Thanks to everyone who has sorted through my ramblings or enjoyed my photos. To some extent I believe it is a cliche to use the pity approach for attention, but with all honesty the encouragement has been great. Feedback is a huge plus. Look out for future blog entries where I will feature a little more variety than the local Florida park. I hope to make it worth your while. Also, if this entry gives you any indication of the local resident, get out and explore your local parks. As an interested and aspiring photographer I did not have much interest in these places found around my neighborhoods. They do give you something back and make living here much more worthwhile. Here is to looking forward to opportunities to photographing in the Caribbean or maybe Antarctica or to painting red apples on wooden tables. Take your time. Consider, compose, then shoot. Finally, to steal a great catchphrase from the Discovery Channel, "Explore Your World."

Upper Tampa Bay Park

On Saturday Shanti and I took a short trip to Upper Tampa Bay Park to see what sunset and dusk had in store. We arrived at the park sometime around 4:50pm. I suspect sunset occurred sometime about 45 minutes later, but it didn't matter too much since we were facing the east. The late afternoon faded very quickly, but I did manage to snap a few pictures before the gnats became unbearable. We'll hopefully make it early enough to catch the sunrise one of these weekends.

Enjoy.

Cuesta Ray

January is now upon us and Christmas gifts have long been exchanged except for one. Shanti's stepfather, who lives in Hawaii, still hasn't received his. I suppose a large part of his gift has to do with a lot procrastination or perhaps a lack of motivation. The idea behind his gift is based around latin culture and one of his personal favorite past times - cigar smoking. We decided to head towards Ybor in search of some photo opportunities that might suit this theme.

Our search to locate cigar shops offering a visual sample of what Tampa's Ybor cigar scene is all about led us straight to 7th Ave ("La Septima"). We figured a Sunday afternoon would be best not only in terms of technical ambience, but minimal foot traffic. Our first drive down 7th we spotted about 3 or 4 small shops. Each had interesting windows, but from the car we couldn't tell if there was anything displayed. Nothing really appeared to be open since it was a late afternoon on a Sunday. However, there were enough people on the sidewalks and occupied parked spots to keep us driving in circles. Being the bashful people we are, we decided there were enough spectators to dissuade us from pulling over and accomplishing our mission. At this point we scrapped the idea of finishing a long overdue Christmas gift and decided to just drive around until we found a location more comfortable to photograph.

For me, personally, there is something about the common person staring while I intensely set up to take a photo. It's the response you get from your nagging family member that wonders what exactly it is you are photographing. They don't get it until they see the pictures. I don't know. Maybe someday I'll get over the fear of being criticized if even I don't hear it. I drove us away Ybor's main district and through some of the neighborhoods south of I-4. If I was feeling hesitant about shooting in public in Ybor, then perhaps cruising some rough neighborhoods surrounding Ybor was a bigger mistake. I was still itching to take some photos though and to some extent I almost didn't care anymore where we stopped. Off in the distance I saw a familiar sign that always caught my eye off of I-4. The "Cuesta Ray Cigars" sign was a little bit of hope that maybe we could take away something frame worthy to wrap up this project.

When we arrived at the factory we circled the building a few times and scoped out a safe spot to pull over. Maybe I was a little too paranoid, but I have not spent too much of my life in Tampa in Ybor City and most of my basis for caution are the scare tactics generated by the media. After a few minutes of circling around, we finally pulled over and wandered about on foot.

As I approached the building I was a bit confused on the age. The brick appeared to be new while the shutters and balconies were old and rusted out. The building did show some character despite the "new/old" feel to it so I did my best to capture a few of those roadside impressions. I suppose there isn't anything grand about this particular outing nor this particular building, and perhaps nothing of worth to our project, but the fact that Shanti and I actually got out of the apartment and photographed something made the afternoon worthwhile. Regardless, we had an enjoyable evening. To cap off the night, we hit Mema's Alaskan Tacos and ate some greasy tacos.


Sorry to leave my small audience hanging on for new content. Getting out to photograph has proven to be much more difficult than I imagined! I guess early sunsets contribute to little post workday time for shooting. Hopefully as summer and spring approach I'll have a lot more time after work to take the long route home. Take care all.