Day 41...

Today we shot some fun pictures with my 3 month old. I am going to work on some more shots of her tomorrow, as she needs her 3 month pictures taken and sent out to family. She makes such a great model. I am hoping her baby high heels that I ordered come in the next couple of day so we can take some more fun pictures. This was taken in natural light around 4pm with my 50-200mm lens.

Day 40...

Sorry guys, we have family in town and the last two days have been very busy. Today I ran around trying to find things to shoot inbetween family and finishing a lot of homework. Pictures are kind of lame-o.. I promise you much better shots this week :)

Day 39..

Was a windy day today, and baby Cameron doesn't like the wind. So I tried to shoot some shots around the house. Worked a bit on my depth of field. These were taken in the garage, shutter was around 60, apeture was set around f5.6. White balance set at shade. ISO was around 400.

Day 38...

Sorry all no post tonight.. Spent the day shopping with my daughter for her belated birthday present... then boot camp, no bed exhausted.. will make up for it tomorrow.

Day 37 part two...

I couldn't pass up a little macro today, when I found this flower growing in my backyard.. the rain is awesome!

Day 37..part one portraits

Some more portrait photography... I took all of these with my 50-200 mm outside in shade around 400-430pm. I set my white balance at shade, ISO 200, and speed around 60 always with a F 5.6. Skin was softened to cover up inperfections on the teenage girl and boy in Imagnomics a plug in for photoshop. The shot of my husband had no editing aside from my logo.

Day 36..

Sorry about not posting for the last two days. Things have been busy around the Donaldson household. So my wonderful husband bought me and excellent book I have been reading , Lighting Photo Workshop, and I have been trying to remember all of the basics of great photography to capture a great shot. One of the things I haven't been paying much attention to has been my white balance setting, and my ISO, which this book reminded me of that. I took just a couple of basic portrait pictures with my white balance setting on shade +1, this was taken around a 5.6 with a speed of 50. For just some basic portraits I think the overall lighting technique worked well. I also used photoshop to crop these photos and a program/plug in called imagnomics to take away any frown lines, wrinkles, or imperfections. Although this is family so there already pretty perfect to me. The imagnomics program makes the skin appear very soft and smooth. I also placed my subjects facing the sun, and I was with my back towards the sun. This was taken around 630 pm Arizona time.

Day 35....

I am going to post pictures again today, as my day goes on.. Today I am working on some natural lighting, and used my daugher as the subject. I set up in our garage, which provided me with ample shading to give what I think is beautiful natural light. My shutter was set at 1/50 with an F5.6. Let me know what you think of these shots..

I also took some shots of Gerber daisies from Trader Joes.. they are my favorite, so bright and brilliant.. Check these out, I may blow some of them up for some art for my daughters room.. I love them!

Day 34 part 2...

Here are a couple other pictures from today.. I love Arizona
More editing tomorrow.. I am spent.

Day 34...part one..

So I am going to upload these pictures as I edit them today.. My lap top is running so slow because of the size of the files I am trying to edit.. So we went to the Desert Botanical Gardens today, wow never appreciated the beauty of our Arizona desert as much as I do now. Makes you know there must be a God, to create such amazing things. The sun seems to be my enemy these days. I have been trying to rely on my light meter to tell me where I should have my aperture and speed set, and I have to tell you it's failing me miserably. I think I need to go back to shooting how I am comfortable. With that said.. I took some macro pictures and some regular photos.. All were taken with my long lens (55-200mm) , aperture setting and shutter varied depending on location of the sun and the closeness to the object. I was so proud of my bee on my flower shot, I have been dying to get a shot like that.. Can't believe I accomplished it really.

Again you can click on photo to enlarge.. I apologize I am having to decrease the resolution of my photos to get them on this site, they are really large.

Day 33..

A family visit to the zoo today.. opened up many photo opportunities.. I once again shot during "devils hour" and lighting was against me the entire venture.. I usually shoot in manual focus, and manual mode for all of my photos, but today, I shot in auto focus, manual mode.. My aperture stayed around a 5.6 and my speed varied depending on what my light meter read. Lots of fun shots today, and my family and I enjoyed the beautiful Arizona weather! I will work on posting more later, my computer is running really slow tonight and it took me about 3 and a half hours to edit these images.

Day 32... NEED YOUR OPINION!!

OK.. need some help from my peeps.. Tomorrow is my final class project, and I am to present my favorite photo I have taken. It can be new or old.. I took these flower photographs with my lens extension today, and they came out pretty cool. I am to take that picture and blow it up into a 8x12 and present it to the class. Here are the ones I am trying to decide on which one to use. I have never presented any pictures of Cameron to the class, I have always tried to not be that mom.. But a couple of these I think are really good, and would look good in an 8x12. Please need opinions...

Day 31..

Terrible shots tonight I know.. I have been stuck inside all day reading for my psychology class, I had to take a quiz, read two chapters and write a 1000 word essay, which lead to the headache. I wasn't going to not post anything at all so I just shot this. Unfortunately today there wasn't enough time in the day to enjoy shooting pictures.. Tomorrow is a new day, and I am sure many more photo opportunities will present themselves.. Sorry for the bogus shots.. :(