Our assignment this week was to work in the realm of the shadows.  Sounds scary.  But when you think about it, and if you are a scary movie buff, what do you see a lot of in these types of movies?  Dark lighting and shadows.  For sure.

Shadows come in all shapes and sizes.  Depending on the time of day, they can be very short, really long, or almost disappear underneath a subject. They can lend mystery to a photo.  Some can be very sharp, and others can be soft.

I chose a 6:30 p.m. time frame to do my photography work this week, on a very sunny day.  I knew I could possible get some long, and very dark shadows, and some interesting lighting.

My first photo features a lovely mare (who is very interested in my camera) moving through some very long shadows of a nearby group of trees.  I really like the way the light plays on her coat, mane and the left side of her face.  Her nose and her hind end is in shadow, and so is the right side of her face.  These very soft shadows are filtered around the trees, and really lay nicely on her as she walked toward me.  Even though I did not use any off camera flash (OCF), it almost looks like I did, doesn't it?

In the next photo I went inside the barn, but used the strong sun coming in through the barn doors to help with shadowing.

I have a new camera, and my low light capabilities have increased immensely.  In this case, Sweet Pea's stall is almost at the center of the row of stalls in the barn.  With the sun setting and shining right in the front doors, and Sweet Pea thinking I might have something to eat (thereby cooperating and looking straight at the camera), I was able to use Mother Nature to do some Rembrandt lighting and take advantage of the resulting shadows.  There is definitely an air of mystery about this photo.  Sweet Pea is a friendly miniature horse, who looks very serious in this photo.

Finally, I decided to do a black and white shadow photo and experiment with a few harsher shadows.

This is what happens when you don't let the donkey eat your camera strap.  However, I did repay him by scratching his ears and the top of his head, which apparently were itchy and in need of a rub.  There are shadows everywhere.  The fence shadows are a little harsh, but I think they make the photo interesting.  Look how far down the line the donkey's body shadow lands when the sun is dropping on the horizon.  Yes, he did get his head back out.  He does this all the time, so he is very adept at maneuvering through the fence.  What was that Shakespeare line?.....to bray or not to bray, that is the question....

I think shadow work is fun.  There are so many variants of shadows, depending on the time of day and the position of the sun in the sky, or your studio lighting if you are inside.  To see what others in the much larger blog circle did this week, start here with Kim Hollis of BARKography, based out of Charlotte, North Carolina.  Enjoy your weekend!

I was hiking down a back country road just after a pouring rain storm.  Yes, I had my camera.  I was out looking for deer to photograph in the fields, and there is a pond very close to this road where I thought I might find a gray heron.

Instead I found this..

And that began my love affair with reflections.

I got lucky that day, because I wasn't really prepared for a cat near a puddle on the road.  I only had the natural light of late day and I wasn't that close, but what I had was just enough to give me a nice reflection of pretty kitty, who ran as fast as kitty legs will carry within two seconds of taking this photo.

Kitty's puddle is nice and clear, with no extreme depth, so the light is reflecting the image upward.  It's a different story when you photograph in murkier, deeper water, as you will see with the next two images.

What might have turned into a great reflection in shallower water, the choppy, deeper lake water sucks up keeping it just below the surface. Our text tells us we can't discount the shadow in the reflection process, and I've made sure my shadows are a full extension of this lovely husky.

David Duchemin is telling us that we should spend more time playing with reflections because it will teach us how to use them more effectively when we encounter them, and what to expect from them as an extension of our photography work.

It took me a good 15 minutes of playing with reflections (and Pete the turtle) to decide how to finally capture the following photo. Pete was as intrigued by his reflection as I was.

To find more reflective work, head to the blog circle starting with Susannah Maynard of Pet Love Photography, serving Greater Cincinnati and the San Francisco Bay area. Enjoy!

Internet problems pre-empted my ability to take part in the blog circle of 7-15-16, "White Balance For Mood".  It wasn't until Monday of this past week that our ability to access online activity was restored.  Turns out we needed a new modem, and, apparently, you DID need to be a rocket scientist to figure it out...or at least have a total of 10 service provider technicians (6 from foreign soil) magically try to diagnose the problem over the phone.

I am just glad to be back, and although not a part of the blog circle, here is the actual post from 7-15-16.
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Most cameras will give you white balance built in options to choose from, whether they be point-and-shoot models or professional gear.  Sometimes you will see cute little toggles like a sun, some clouds, a light bulb, etc. that you can switch to before taking a picture.  This usually signifies bright sun, a cloudy day, or inside under florescent or other lighting.

When you take a photo in jpeg mode, whatever you choose to switch or toggle to is what you are stuck with.  You might be able to adjust the lighting or color saturation, or use a photo action to change the mood of your picture, but you won't have the choices or options that you would have, had you shot the photo in RAW.

RAW format, and using Camera Raw software, allows you to customize or change the mood of your photo out of the camera.

Because I have had a rather taxing week, I have a few photos I have been saving that were not previously edited that I could fall back on when times do not allow me to get out and photograph an entirely new scenario.  This week I am going back to Billie on the patio swing.  Below I have taken the photo and processed it three different ways straight out of camera, using Camera Raw.  The only thing I've done to the photos is changed the white balance options.  Watch and see the mood change.

What do you notice about each photo?  How are they different?  Which do you prefer?

Below I have the final edit of the photo, which I did by choosing a WARM option.  Ever since I did this series of photographs with Billie, she looks to jump up and snooze on the swing whenever I take her out to the back patio.  I think she likes it!

I would encourage you to experiment with your camera settings and try out different white balance options in camera as well as through your editing process, to change the mood and feel of your photo.  Have a great weekend!

Every once in a while our blog group takes a departure from the text and selects a theme.  I hope you enjoyed SKY.  Try to stay cool, bug and weed free this weekend.  Don't forget to check out more sky-themed photos in the blog circle starting here with BARKography by Kim Hollis of Charlotte, North Carolina.

I noticed this week, while thinking about light, that of all the photographs I see while scanning the net, I am drawn most to those that use light in interesting ways.

You often hear photographers talking about morning light and the"golden hour" just before sundown.  Both are coveted when scheduling and setting up a shot.  But if we limit ourselves to those two timeframes, we miss so much of the rest of the day.  I was thinking about this quite a bit after reading The Visual Toolbox this week. 

We do have a number of ways to work with light...any light, whether it be the bright sun of midday, studio strobes, speedlights, or even the dull light of a cloudy day.  We just have to decide if we want the light to reflect off the subject, shine through the subject, how intense we want the light, and if the light we are using is adding to the quality of the photo.

I started off this week by using dull ambient light, a neighbor's exposed rock garden, one speedlight and Luke-the-I-can't-sit-still-ever dog (he is actually worse than Billie, if you can believe that).  Luke and I had to trek down a steep hill with a camera on a tripod, and a bag harnessed to my back holding the speedlight, a second lens and my remote control.  As if all this wasn't enough, I decided to use an 85mm manual focus lens to start, because I feel that I should be using this lens more, learning to focus on a spot and then leaving it there. Here is the photo.

This rock garden is under an overhang of trees. The trees do not let the sun through.  Luke did move his little legs a bit.  He gets antsy and shakes.  Thankfully, there were no squirrels nearby at the time. If there were this photograph would contain a few rocks and no dog.

I would give the quality of light a "meh."  If this were a client shoot, I would have moved to a different spot, but we are about experimenting in this blog circle, and learning by doing, so I persevered and used what I had.

The next photo is a real departure from the norm for me.  But, we spent an entire week early on in our text specifically looking to use blur in our images, instead of having everything crisp.  I thought about this, and about the end-of-the-day sun streaming down the steep hill we had to walk back up and decided to see if I could set up a photograph that I have been wanting to do for a very long time.  I wasn't sure Luke would be the right dog, but in the end, I think he was the perfect dog.

The intensity of the sun juxtaposed to the shade trees, the "shoot through" effect of the rays on Luke, my distance and position, all have an impact on this photo.  Well, and then there are Luke's ears.  I think this will long be one of my favorite photos. The ethereal feel of this photo is due to diffusion. The shadows, and Luke's shadow in particular, lend themselves to the time of day, and give the photo depth.

So we have seen dull light, intense light, and finally, below in late-day light, Luke's and my wish for you to have a happy and safe 4th of July weekend, in whatever light you choose!  I actually think he is smiling in this photo.

Don't forget to march around the blog circle and see what other professional photographers have done in terms of light quality.  Start here with Cahlean Klenke of About A Dog Photography, St.Cloud and Central Minnesota dog photographer.  Stay tuned for next week when we go off the books into a freestyle week with SKY as our theme!