I just wanted to quickly wish everyone a fun and safe New Years Eve! See you all next year!!
Monthly Archives: December 2008
BOILING HOT
12.29.08 – 5:00 pm
There’s something so calming about drinking great tea. Helen says that I enjoy it more now because I’m getting older. I’m only in my late 20’s, so I don’t think I’m that old, plus what’s with the stereotype that older people drink tea? As a matter of fact, I’ve been drinking tea since I can remember and we always keep our place stocked with all kinds of tea. When there’s time, of course I drink the great tea’s, you know the ones that actually don’t come in tea bags. But when I need a quick fix of relaxation, I turn to Tazo for my fixes. I find it funny that depending on how I’m feeling that day, will help me decide on which tea to drink. Do you think that we can know how someone is feeling by the tea they drink? or maybe the type of tea really does say what kind of person you are. Who knows, but there’s probably a study out there that exists. Right now while I’m typing away at this post, I’m enjoying “Zen” Green Tea and trying to think about why I picked it today… hmmm..
WINTER WEDDING SPECIAL
12.26.08 – 2:00 pm
Well I hope everyone is having a fabulous holiday so far! The 2008 wedding season was so awesome and I’m really looking forward to next year. For the beginning of 2008, we offered a special on winter weddings and next year will be no different. The normal wedding season normally runs from April till December and I like staying busy throughout the year and shoot awesome weddings!
So if you’re a bride getting married from January 1st, 2009 to March 31st, 2009 and you would love for me to shoot your wedding at a special rate, please click here to send me an email or click on the connect tab up top to contact me.
I love to travel too! so if you’re having a destination wedding during that time, the special applies to you too! so make sure you get in touch with us to take advantage of the special.
Here is one of my favorite moments of 2008.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
12.24.08 – 7:00 pm
Well it’s finally here! A time to get together with friends and family and eat, eat, eat.. well that’s what we’ll be doing anyways and watching a ton of movies. I had such a fun year meeting new people and loving life! I want to thank all of my past, present and future clients for making this year super fantastic! I hope that makes sense, but this time of year I always feel extra appreciative. Happy Holidays everyone!!
I always feel dorky in photos, I don’t know why.
MY LIFE IN 16 SQUARES
12.23.08 – 2:00 pm
I must admit, I bring my point and shoot camera everywhere I go and for good reason. I always find interesting things everywhere I go and I have an urge to document it. The only downfall is that the photos always stay on my point and shoot and don’t see the light of day for at least a month. I’m sure we all do this and for me since my point and shoot camera is my fun camera, I like to see what I’ve shot in the past month. For the photos that collected on my point and shoot this past month, were mostly from my trip back to Connecticut and some fun stuff that happened when I came back home. You’ll probably see me do this more often for future blog posts, because I think it really does sum up what I’ve seen, what I’ve done and where I’ve been.
Here is my life or should I say my month in 16 squares.
RANDOM PHOTO
12.20.08 – 1:00 pm
This is one of my many oops photos that I discovered recently, while downloading photos from my point and shoot camera. I was walking to my car last weekend and I must have hit the shutter button by mistake and it took this photo of the glaring street lights. Sometimes you get lucky I guess and find something interesting.
FAQ: REDUCING NOISE IN PHOTOS
12.18.08 – 2:00 pm
I’ve recently received a few emails from photographers asking, how can they get smoother looking photos at high ISO’s with NO noise? Here is what I do and by no means is it the right way, it’s just how I do it.
Shooting: When you must shoot at 1600 ISO or 3200 ISO or more if you can, one thing that I find helpful in preparing the photo, is to NOT shoot the photo underexposed. By doing so, any of the areas that are black in the photos will tend to create more noise, such as shadows etc. You will want to nail that exposure dead on if you can.
Software to reduce noise: There are many softwares out there that can help reduce the noise in your photos. The one that I use is called Neat Image and I have the plugin version for Photoshop. I find the plugin version for Photoshop great, especially if you want to batch a bunch of photos at one time and it’s a pretty inexpensive tool.
Here are 2 samples below and I will run though how it was shot and the settings I used to reduce the noise. Please note these photos are “straight out of the camera” except the one that I used Neat Image on.
I purposely shot this photo in low light and an object being black to show you the noise. This photo was taken with my Canon 5D, 50mm F/2.5 Macro lens, Manual Mode, 3200 ISO, F/2.5, 1/40. Notice the grain and color noise on the photo.
Here is a screenshot of my settings. Play around with the settings and see what works best for you. Please note the green circled area. This is how I adjust how much noise I want to reduce. 100% is really strong and if you use it on people, they will look like plastic “Ken & Barbie” dolls.
Here is the result at 100%. Again, it’s great to use 100% on objects. The only downside of reducing noise in photos, is that you loose sharpness the more you reduce the noise. If you have any further questions or comments, feel free to leave them below. Have a great day!
BRIAN & ANNIE ENGAGED
12.17.08 – 1:00 pm
Yes I know, I’ve been such a bad blogger lately. But I hope I can make it up with this post. Annie & Brian, I can’t even begin to describe how cool and fun these two are, so I won’t. I’m sure the people that know them will sure agree with me though. This past weekend we shot their engagement session at not 1 or 2, but 3 locations! I think it’s always a great idea to switch it up and shoot at different places, especially if they have special meaning. We started the day at Angels Stadium with a special private tour. Unfortunately there was a game on the field and we couldn’t get on the field, but we still had fun. We then headed back to their old high school, where again we were denied access to where they wanted to shoot. I sure didn’t feel like hoping a fence and getting arrested since the police station was across the street, so we just stayed in front. We finished the day at Old Towne Orange, which kinda felt like my old home town. Here are just a few of my favorites from their session and I can’t wait to shoot their wedding next year! Thanks again guys for the wine!
Something just told me it was going to be a great day!
They were actually allowed to sit on the promotional Corona chairs!
Brian was warming up a bit before the shoot.
There’s something so special about two people in an empty stadium.
This was pretty much as close as we could get to the field and almost got hit by a ball!
Annie’s hair and makeup was so excellent that day and it was done by the talented JAC Beauty.
These were taken at their old high school in some beautiful light!
Annie workin’ it! and Brian trying to be the center of attention.
I found this cool little spot while walking in Old Towne Orange. That place has so much character!
This photo reminds me of walks in NY.
There was some serious fun, laughs and modeling that day!
