I heart faces: fix-it friday

I LOVE a challenge! I heart faces has "Fix-it-Fridays" where they give you an image and you play with it and give it your style! Ooooo- fun!

This week’s photo comes from a very special family. Angie posted about them today:

“The dad in this family has been struggling with cancer for years and they found out the devastating news in December that his cancer is now terminal. They are now doing everything they can to enjoy the rest of the time they have together on this earth.”

Wow- I cannot imagine what that family with 3 small children are doing to handle this news. Not sure how anyone can handle news of that caliber. Sometimes there just are no words anyone can even say...



And here is my color take- I just popped the color with saturation and contrast. I then removed the truck in the right corner and the swing on the left.

And here is my black and white vintage version. I LOVE black and whites...have I mentioned that?!

Best Face Photo

I Heart Faces is having a new challenge and it's called your best face. I was so unbelievably TORN between three photos! All were black and whites, but two were of my girls and one was of my nephew! So, after hours and hours of debating (not quite "hours")I decided that I will honor my nephew and not have to choose between my two girls :)

I choose this photo, because it pretty much is a photo that shows where I am as a photographer. I LOVE black and white photography and I am trying my best really get my black and whites to be great.

The deciding factor was this was his mom's favorite image :) That was enough for me!

What to wear?!

One of the buiggest questions I get with my photo shoots is "What should we wear?!" I am not a fashion guru and sometimes I need total help with my own style; however, when it comes to my photo shoots I know exactly what looks good and what doesn't. I really dislike matchy outfits and even though I often dress my two girls alike (something I SWORE I would never do) I recommend for you NOT to have matching outfits for a shoot. What I do recommend is selecting a few colors and make them work. Start with a base as in the below photo (the base is white and navy) and then go from there. Pull in brown for shoes and pull in red for sweaters under coats, scarves, etc) You can do this with any set of colors, just compliment the outfits. Here is a wardrobe I just suggested for my clients.

Photo Shoot December by noelmarie21 featuring American Eagle Outfitters

Tuesday's Tip - Get Outside!

I cannot stress enough how much light controls your photograph. I promise if you start taking photos outside you will see 100% improvement in the colors of your subjects! I PROMISE! In these two photos just look at the green color on Mr. Insect. See the difference? I know Michigan weather really strains us to take photos inside, but when you get a chance and the weather holds up even for an hour- grab your kids and head OUTSIDE!

Mr. Insect taken indoors without a flash

Mr. Insect taken outdoors (I know it's not a direct comparison, but you see my point right?!) without a flash using natural light.

Mom*tog - Plymouth, MI Newborn & Infant Photography

I stumbled across a great Photographer in the California area. I loved her style and energy that shone thru in each of her photographs. I followed her blog and we super excited when she came out with a specialized blog for "Mom*togs" or mom photographers! This was such a great idea and she gives tips and trick to mommies with cameras! I teach photography at Henry Ford Community College and I love sharing my knowledge to interest others in my passion! Anyways it's a great blog and has tons of tips. One tip I learned from Drew was using fabric as a backdrop! No need to buy expensive backdrops when all you have to do is drop by JoAnnes! Thanks Drew! I LOVE LOVE LOVE Momtog!

Here is a photo using a backdrop that Drew suggested!



Check out her blog! www.mom
tog.com

Tuesday's Tip - Outside!

The weather here in Michigan is crazy and you can't count on it, so today's tip is get outside when you can! You just got home from a crazy Halloween party and your kids are cranky?! Sounds like how it was for me today! When you get a small opportunity to shoot outside you have to seize it! I had my girls almost ready to crash and then I realized it was a REALLY rare nice day and they were partially in costumes. Instead of going inside and getting them ready for dinner (which was what I wanted to do) I grabbed my camera and got them outside. Not only did I have a little bit of nice light left - I had fun with my girls outside! It was awesome and here is a little glimpse of the kind of photos I got- just from taking a 15 minute detour from my schedule!

Tuesday's Tip- quality prints

I love my image on my screen on the computer and when I printed it out the colors were terrible. Why does it look different on my screen?

Ahhh. this was my favorite question, and I can answer it fairly simple by 1st asking where they got it printed.

It's about quality. You spend money on your camera and you spend time on taking and processing the photo. Right after the photo is ready to print you fail, you end up printing it at a cheap place and guess what? It shows! All that work and quality equipment is transferred to a cheap print and it looks like crap! Most professional photographers either have a photo printer at hand or they have their computer monitor calibrated to the lab's printer to ensure the most accurate color during printing. I recommend finding a great lab or online service and stick with them. There are quite a few labs that are excellent and I have not calibrated my monitor to such as www.mpix.com.

My tip for this Tuesday is: choose a quality printer.

Tuesday's Tip - Too bright!

I get question in my class almost every session:

I take a photo near the beach and the subject's face is too dark! Why is that the case when it is so bright out?!


Your camera is adjusting and reading the exposure of the background which, esp at a beach, is very bright and has a lot of light. There are a few things you can do to avoid this:
1- use a flash. If you use a fill flash you will light up the subjects face while still having the correct exposure for the background. If you don't you will either have a blown out background or a dark subject!
2- have the subject face the sun...This will work well if they are wearing sunglasses :)

Tuesday's Tip- go with the flow

Today's question come from a student of mine.

Everytime I actually get my stuff together to take photographs my kid acts up! What do you do?

I go with the flow. Not all frame worthy photos are of children sitting nicely and smiling with their hands in their laps. If that were the case my daughter's photo would never be in a frame! I was so excited to get a tutu for A when she turned 2 and actually planned a trip to Henry Ford Village to take some 2-year photos. SHe completely melted down and threw the biggest tantrum. Yes- this photo is actually framed on her wall.

Tuesday's Tip - RAW files

I have been getting quite a few e-mails on being a mentor or helping out with some photo related question. I decided that I will try and answer some of these questions on my blog as I am not ready to take a mentoring role...just yet.

If you have a question please send me a note and I can answer it on my blog.

Today's question...What is a RAW file?

A RAW file is the unprocessed file that is captured by your DSLR camera when you take a photograph. It is basically the closest thing to what film is in a film camera. RAW is uncompressed unlike JPG. RAW gives you flexibility and room to edit the photo in post processing to fix and adjust things you may have missed in the actual shot. For example you can recover blown out whites (within limit) Unfortnatly you can't take a RAW file and print it out- you must first convert it to a JPG or TIFF. So, using RAW increases your abilities, but it also increases your workflow. Hope that helps!