At the Botanical Garden Cafe

 

Nikon D40

1/100s

f/5.6

ISO 800

135.0mm

Boy in a Tree

Saturday, February 27, 2010

 

Nikon D40

1/320s

f/11

ISO 800

100.0mm

Snowy Backyard

I've been feeling under the weather the last couple of days, and am getting caught up on posting.  Although I have been completely unmotivated to take pictures for a few days, I have actually shot a handful of pics each day anyway.  I'm just getting around to posting them.  I'm not really proud of any of them (which is probably why I was in no rush to post them), and I didn't really have fun taking them, but I did it anyway.  I hope to get some motivation in the next few days.

Nikon D40
1/4s
f/3.5
ISO 200
18mm

Handy Man

Thursday, February 25, 2010

 

Nikon D40

1/60s

f/5.0

ISO 200

52.0mm

Sesame Seeds

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Chapatis

Nikon D40
1/60s
f/5.6
ISO 400
95.0mm

Knitted Centipede

 

Another of Isaac's birthday presents--handmade by my friend Carolyn.  I did an educational shoot tonight--I set up my tripod with this shot and tried several different apertures and ISOs, took pictures with and without flash (not sure why--with the tripod there's no need for flash anyway.)

Nikon D40

1/2s

f/5.6

ISO 200

70.0mm

Getting Ready for Bed

Forgot to take pictures today...

Nikon D40
0.8s
f/9.0
ISO 800
18.0mm

Winter Walk

I should have learned this lesson two years ago, but today I forgot to check the ISO before I went out on a nice winter walk with Mark and Isaac. I had been taking pictures inside yesterday, and the ISO was set to 1600--the worst setting for taking pictures outside in the winter on a very bright sunny day. I didn't realize it until the very end of the walk.

I like my camera for the most part, but one thing I really don't like is that it doesn't have a digital display on the top of the camera body to show settings like that. Looking through the viewfinder I can see shutter speed, aperture and exposure compensation (and two other things that I don't know what they mean--I'll have to look into that). In order to see the ISO setting you have to press the info button on the back of the camera to display that and lots of other information on the LCD monitor. Now, it's easy to do this, and I really should remember to do it before I start taking pictures, but it would be nice to have all that information more readily available.

Well, since I won't be buying a new camera any time soon, I need to get into the habit of pressing that info button and making sure everything is set the way I want it for the type of pictures I'm taking.

Something else I learned through this mistake is that when I edit my pictures in Picasa, it changes the ISO information on the saved copies of the pictures I take. When I look through my pictures each day, I save a copy of all the potential posts, so I can edit the pictures for posting without changing the original. I save a copy of the RAW data file, and Picasa saves it as a jpeg. When they do this, for some reason I can't fathom, they also change the ISO from whatever it actually was to 250. So, when I provide my photo information I guess I need to go back and look at the original file in order to get all the information right. I wondered why I kept seeing ISO 250 on so many of my pictures...

Nikon D40
1/200s
f/10
66mm
ISO 1600

Blocks

Friday, February 19, 2010

Nikon D40
1/60s
f/4.8
ISO 250
48.0mm (72mm)

Popcorn

Nikon D40
1/60s
f/13
ISO 250
112.0mm (168mm)

Untitled

Nikon D40
1/40s
f/5.6
ISO 250
135mm (202mm)

Tomorrow's Lunch

Nikon D40
1/60s
f/5.3
ISO 400
62mm (93mm)

Birthday Present

This was one of Isaac's birthday presents, not mine. I like taking pictures of toys. I think there will be more toy pictures in my future.

Konica Minolta DiMage Z6
1/50s
f/3.2
ISO 160
12.4mm (74mm)

Winter Day

Nikon D40
1/1600s
f/5.3
ISO 400
58mm (87mm)

Speed Skating

I'm sure it is against a rule to take a picture of the TV--oh well. We enjoyed watching the Olympics tonight.

Nikon D40
1/25s
f/5.6
ISO 250
90.0mm (135mm)

Breaking Rules 2

This goes back to Freeman Patterson's book Photography and the Art of Seeing, where he suggests thinking about the rules of photography and then going out and breaking them. Rule 1 was: Keep your camera steady. Rule 2 is: Put the main subject of your photograph in sharp focus.

Nikon D40
1/200s
f/5.6
ISO 250
38.0mm (57mm)

Birthday Boy

Well, his birthday was actually Monday, but as Mark's mom says, it's really a birthday season.

I know I said earlier I wouldn't post pictures of Isaac unless I posted a picture of something else also. Today, though, I didn't take pictures of anything else. He's such an irresistible subject that I could easily resort to photographing only him every day, but I really don't want to do that.

My first year of Photodilettante I started at the end of March, which meant the weather was starting to get nicer and I was out of the house more. This time, starting in January, has been a challenge. Getting out of the house at all is difficult with the winter weather, and getting out specifically to take pictures would be a little complicated because I have this little person to be paying attention to. I'm going to have to start thinking outside the box. In the next couple of days I'll try to take my camera (well, Mark's smaller camera) with me whenever I go out for anything.

Nikon D40
1/60s
f/5.6
ISO 250
66.0mm (99mm)

Lady Bug

I had a similar post to this one in my first year.

Konica Minolta DiMage Z6
1/40s
f/3.2
ISO 64
10.3mm (62mm)

Untitled

Nikon D40
1.8s
f/5.6
ISO 400
135mm (202mm)

Lamp

Nikon D40
1/40s
f/5.6
ISO 250
90mm (35mm equiv. 135mm)

Cleveland Greenhouse

Nikon D40
1/160s
f/5.0
ISO 250
50.0mm (35mm equiv. 75mm)

Uh, Mom--Dad Won't Let Me Play...

My good friend Katie gave us this Duplo train set as a hand-me-down a few weeks ago. We got it out for the first time today, and Mark had a great time...

Camera: Nikon D40
1/60s
f/4.0
ISO 250
Focal Length 20mm (35mm equiv. 30mm)

Birthday Cake

I baked Isaac's birthday cake from scratch today (and I made the frosting myself,too). It turned out very yummy. You'll have to check out Facebook for the rest of the pictures of the party.

Camera: Nikon D40
1/60s
f/4.2
ISO 250
Focal Length 32.0mm (35mm equiv. 48mm)

Clouds?

First off, I am kind of disappointed that I've already had my first day where I forgot to not only post, but even take any pictures. :( I was so busy getting ready for Isaac's first birthday party (which is tonight), that photography pretty much slipped my mind.

But, as I did before with my first year of pictures (during which, by the way, it was several months before I forgot to post...), I will make up for it with two shoots today.

This first picture looks to me like clouds seen from an airplane when you're flying above them. But, it is actually the new bathmat in my bathroom, taken with Mark's Konica Minolta on its supermacro setting, with a little camera movement just to see what would happen. I think I like it...

Also, I'm going to start trying to include camera information for my pictures in each post. Picasa now displays some metadata with each picture, and I think paying more attention to this will improve my photography. Here's the info for this shot:

Camera: Konica Minolta DiMage Z6
1/6s
f/3.2
ISO 160
Focal Length: 10.3mm (35mm equiv. 62mm)

Winter Sky

Lost Party

This picture will mean nothing to those of you who don't watch Lost. We had a great time enjoying our Dharma snacks and watching the season premier. You'll have to check on Facebook in the next couple of days for more pictures of the party, including the party-goers in our costumes.

L6 Summit

The premier of the final season of Lost is tomorrow night. Some friends and I gathered tonight for the L6 summit--an evening of discussing the mysteries of the first five seasons and posing questions we hope will be answered in the sixth. We also put together this basic time line, which proved to be challenging given the time-travel aspect of the show.

Tomorrow, expect pictures of the season premier party, complete with costumes and all things Dharma.