“A good snapshot keeps a moment from running away.” ― Eudora Welty
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Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac All Rights Reserved.
While on a short hike this morning I came across a small grape vine growing along a fence. It was a great place to stage Tim Giggling Minion.
Nikon D700| Nikkor 35mmf/2 AF-D@ f4.5| 1/100s| ISO 200| Manual Priority| Matrix Metering| Hand-held
Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac All Rights Reserved
I had the whole day free so I played with my continuous lights and SB600 Speedlight. I bought a couple of pieces of jewelry recently which started me thinking about Jewelry Photography and lighting. I am still trying to get more accomplished with external lights and photography and I hope this exercise will help me grow in that area.
After studying lighting techniques, and jewelry styling for a couple of days I got my props together and by late this morning I was ready to start taking some photos.
I still don’t have the lights quite right for the sparkle I want. I’m looking into getting a Dazzle Bulb for the future. I also need another high wattage bulb. I’d also like to add some plexiglass sheets to my kit as well; I see a trip to the hardware store in my near future.
This is my tabletop set up. I set up on the kitchen table with a white sheet, white foam core board, and my lights. I had to hunt for something to tie dental floss on to be able to hang the jewelry and this is what I came up with. My daughters old high-school locker shelf. It came in handy after all these years of non-use.
I took the photo of the set up with a Nikon D300s and 24mm f2.8 AF-D and on-camera flash.
Nikon D700| Nikkor 85mm f1.8 AF-D, and Nikkor 28-105mm AF-D| Continuous lights 1 full Daylight camera right, 1 soft light bulb camera left, SB 600 camera front
I did all the photo development/processing in Photoshop CS6. All my processing starts in Adobe Camera RAW then I moved to Photoshop for levels adjustments, output sharpening, cloning out the thread that held the ear-rings and necklace, cleaning up dust spots, and adding my watermark then resizing for the web.
P.S. Several times today I wished I had a macro lens!
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Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac. All Rights Reserved.
When I saw this Tern calling out while sitting on this buoy that says Danger I immediately thought of the Peter, Paul, and Mary song If I had a Hammer.
Nikon D700| Nikkor 300mm f4@f8| 1/1600s| ISO 640| Manual Priority| Matrix Metering| Hand-held
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Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac. All Rights Reserved.
It took 2 weeks, but I collected the entire set of McDonald’s Happy Meal Minions.
Back row- left to right: Phil Jelly Whistle, Purple Minion Noisemaker, Tim Giggling, Purple Minion Giggling, Stuart Blaster
Front Row-Left to Right:Tom Babbler, Jerry Wizar Whistle, Dave Banana Babbler
I’m getting a little better getting my Speedlight positioned so the black background stays black. This only required a few spot healing passes to clean up lint. Yeah!
I used my kitchen table for a larger work surface and placed the toys further away from the background, and bounced the light off the ceiling and a white foam core bd which I had placed on the right side of the set.
Nikon D300s| Nikkor 24mm @ f8| 1/250s| ISO 500| Matrix Metering|Manual Priority|
SB600 TTL mode camera left bounced off a white ceiling, white reflector right
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Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac. All Rights Reserved.
Tern| Nikon D700| Nikkor 300mm f/4
Common Yellowthroat-Male, originally uploaded by CircadianReflections Photography.
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Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac. All Rights Reserved.
If I’m right and this is a Common Yellowthroat it’s a first for me. I’m really excited about that. I only shot three bursts before it was gone and two of the three frames were nothing but blur. I feel pretty lucky to have managed to get this one. As you see I wasn’t metered correctly. I was taking photos of Sparrow just before this bird flew in my view and was metered for that lighting. Thanks to ACR in CS6 I was able to recover what I needed of the bird itself. PHEW! I think the “high-key” looks good though. It shows off the colors of the birds and fennel really well. The sky was still a bit gray at this time of the morning.
Nikon D700| Nikkor 300mm f/4@ f/4| 1/400s| ISO 400| Manual Priority| Matrix Metering| Tripod
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Copyright © 2013 Deborah M. Zajac. All Rights Reserved.
This Mockingbird is a frequent visitor to my yard this year. He mimics a car alarm every afternoon from atop of the telephone pole. He’s pretty fearless too. I’ve seen him chase away crows on more than one occasion.
Nikon D700| Nikkor 300mm f4 + Tamron 1.4x TC| Hand-held
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