The Munchkin's Notebook

This year was a busy year for me, I started a 52-week photo challenge, which I did not complete because of all the cosplay work I ended up doing at conventions (Katsucon and Anime USA) and with the DC Cosplayer and Photographer group. I loved working with the DC Cosplay group, because it is an excellent group of cosplayers and a great venue to practice new techniques. I also did do some landscape work during my annual vacation; this year it was to Yosemite and Sequoia National Park.  Overall Yosemite was nice but preferred Sequoia.  So now, it is time to look back as some statistics and my favorite photos from the year. This year I edited 5851 photos, (that is the number of edited images sitting in Lightroom not the number of photos I took); my most used focal length is 28 mm, with a shutter speed of 1/100s at an f5 and f8 aperture, and ISO 100 and ISO 400. You can see the distribution of each of focal length, shutter speed, aperture, and ISO below. I also looked ...

A few weeks ago my dog was lying in a sunbeam coming through the window.  I thought it would be an excellent photo opportunity, to catch his relaxed expression in the sun.  I took this picture with my Cannon 70D with an 18 – 200mm lens.  This photo was taken with only natural light, at ISO 100 an aperture of F5, a shutter speed of 1/160 at 18mm.  As you can see my dog’s face is slightly over exposed and while the background is dark, you can still see several distracting elements.  Original For the final image, I pulled the photo into Lightroom, darkened the exposure, and adjusted the highlights and shadows.  Specifically, I darkened both the highlights and shadows to reduce the distraction in the background. I also added local adjustments to darken the bright spots such as the computer screen, reflections off the chrome on the chair, and the second window.  I then bumped the color saturation and clarity up a little bit. I also adjusted t...

At the beginning of November I shot with the DC Cosplayer and Photographers meet-up group at the National Portrait Gallery in DC.  The National Portrait Gallery has a  beautiful interior, especially the third floor which has several interesting little nooks. The other nice thing is the Portrait Gallery does allow flash photography in most areas, the only limitation for this shoot was photographers could not use light stands or tripods.  This limitation was not an issue, since that is the same limitation I work with at most conventions.  Hopefully, we will get to shoot there again because I know I missed some interesting areas. For the Portrait Gallery shoot, I was limited to handheld equipment only and I did not have an assistant to hold things. I was shooting with my Canon 70D, with an 18 -200mm lens, a 450 EX II flash, and LumiQuest 80/20 flash modifier .  The modifier is called an 80/20 which when the flash is pointed straight up will bounce either 80 ...

I have finally finished editing all my photos from AnimeUSA 2016. ( AnimeUSA 2016 Gallery ) I like shooting at AnimeUSA because it is a small convention and allows the use of light stands and other photographic equipment, which allows me to be a bit more creative.  The convention location also has a very nice garden area and a nice white room that is set up like an antique sitting room.    I shot this convention using a Canon 70D, 18-200mm lens, Yongnuo radio triggers, speedlight, light stand, and an 80/20 bounce attachment.  For hall shots, I had the light stand mounted to my backpack so I could continually use off camera flash. Now let’s talk some statistics. This year I had 12 individual sessions lined up, of which two were groups of six plus people.   Of 991 photos taken during the course of the convention, 75% were shot at 28mm equivalent and only 2% were shot at 55mm equivalent.  Then 72% of my shots were taken at f5 with 10% were taken at f...

At the beginning of October, I got the chance to do a steampunk photoshoot with Nerdenheim Jen at Fort Washington National Park.    The only downside is that it was raining that morning. Fort Washington NP, is located in Maryland along the Potomac River, and is the site of fort built in 1842. It was the only defense for the US capital until the Civil War.  The fort is very well maintained and has several of the original structures from the 1840’s. It also has concrete structures and embattlements from World War I and World War II.    All this makes it an excellent location for a photo shoot and has both outdoor and indoor areas. For this shoot, I had to obtain a permit from the National Park Service, because I was using a model and lighting equipment.  For the shoot I used the following equipment: Canon 70D, 18-200mm lens, Yong Nuo radio triggers, speed-light, painters pole, 2 large golf rain umbrellas, camera rain cover, gallon sized Ziploc...

At the end of September, I got the chance to work with the DC Cosplayer and Photographer meet up group again. This meet up was held at Lake Accotink, which is park Fairfax County Park system.   The theme for this meet up was steampunk. For those who don’t know what steam punk is, it is a subgenre of science fiction that incorporates technology and aesthetics designs inspired by the 19-th century industrial steam powered machinery.  The clothing is reminiscent of the British Victorian era or the American “Wild West”. For this shoot, I used a Canon 70D with an 18-200mm lens, a speed-light attached to Young Nu radio triggers mounted on a light stand with an umbrella.  For most of this shoot, I was in bright sunlight, so I used the flash as fill and to separate the subject from the background.  I stuck with an ISO of 100, but varied my aperture and shutter speed depending on the location in the park while mostly using 100% flash power.  I was happy with se...

In September, I got work with a lovely cosplayer, IchigoGami on a Ren from Maji shoot.  I have always liked the costuming of Ren from Maji because of the full skirt and elegance of the costume.  Due to the elegance of the costume, I chose to do the shoot at Green Spring Gardens , in Fairfax County.  The gardens have several nice areas to include a pond, two gazebos, and several small garden areas.  For this shoot, I used a Cannon 70D with an 18-200mm lens, along with flash unit connected to Young Nu radio triggers, a light stand, and umbrella.  I started the shoot in the gazebo located next to the pond then moved through the gardens to the trellis area. The issue I had was trying to correctly expose the model while still trying to capture the interesting cloud pattern in the sky.   For most of the images, I shot using an ISO of 100, with an f5.6 aperture and a variable shutter speed.  In most cases, I was using the flash at full power. ...

I have been busy over the past few months, so got behind on my blog posts.  Therefore, I’m catching up on them now.  Back in June, I entered a photo contest sponsored by Magnum photography through Lens Culture.  Magnum Photos is an international photographic cooperative owned by its photographer members. It “ is a community of thought, a shared human quality, a curiosity about what is going on in the world, a respect for what is going on and a desire to transcribe it visually. ”  Lens culture is one of the most authoritative resources for contemporary photography, and look for exciting work from every continent with a diverse point of view.   I knew I wouldn’t win the contest, because my work is not very “avant-garde”.  I only entered so I could get a critical review of my work.  I entered two set of photos, a general set and a set of just portraits. I felt the critique of the general set was very good and helpful. The reviewer analyzed the pi...

I like doing water drop photos for four reasons: 1) it looks deceptively simple, 2) the challenge in capturing the moment of impact, 3) the surprising images you can capture, and 4) the fact there is no right way to do it.  For my most recent attempt at water drop photography, I light the drop from below, so the light would come up through the water.  This is different compared to other water drop photos where they light from the side or from above.  I feel lighting the drops from below give them more of a liquid glass appearance and an inner glow. Surprisingly, the set up for these photos was relatively simple.  I used the following items:          large edged baking sheet (to catch any overflow),          a bowl (to protect the flash equipment),          a flash with radio trigger,          an upside down aquarium (water drop platform),     ...