Blog

Philip and Jessica Armstrong

Sat, 11 Oct 2008 17:21:37 -0600

This weekend I shot another wedding. This wedding was at the Hudson Gardens and Space gallery both really neat locations with lots of good photographic opportunities. The couple was really cool and very easy to work with. The weather too was decidedly cool but not nearly as easy to work with. I think the temperature was in the 30s and 40s for much of the day. Making the coldest wedding I have shot yet. I had to think on my feet for the group shots as we had planned to do them outdoors but it was raining so that was out. We ended up finding a decent indoor location to do the group shots. I still would have preferred to shoot them outdoors for lighting reasons but everything turned out fine in the end. On the up side the falls colors made for some really nice shots once the rain stopped. I guess with fall outdoor weddings you takes your chances.

Johnny and Tina Bradshaw

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 16:34:04 -0600

This weekend I shot a wedding up in the mountains. Johnny and Tina and the entire wedding were great. The location was right next to The Cache la Poudre river so it was very scenic and I really enjoy outdoor weddings because the lighting is so much better. We did have a little setback with the weather as it rained off and on all day long and it did delay the group shots getting done. it’s important during such times to keep your cool, go with the flow, and help alleviate any induced stress of the wedding party by staying positive. In this case Tina was not stressed at all so that it made it easy.

I used my new Lowepro Street and Field quick belt system. Aside from looking decidedly dorky like only a giant camera fanny pack possibly could. It was very functional and made life much easier. So it will be going with me on all my shoots and largely replacing my backpack and vest.

Urban Assault Race

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 16:15:18 -0600

This weekend I shot the Denver Urban Assault race with a friend of mine David Merril. It looked like a fun race. Two person teams had to go to different stations and at each station they would have to complete some sort of event. The events that I shot were a keg walk where each racer had to walk on top of cut down kegs. And a bike wheelbarrow race which involved one person holding on to the pegs of a BMX bike wheel and the other teammate holding there legs and pushing them around. At the finish there were big wheel races, a water slide, and ultimately beer and food. This is something I could actually see doing asa participant.

Josh and Lisa Wise

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 15:44:45 -0600

This weekend I shot a wedding for a nice young couple. We had a lot of fun and they were great to work with. I talked them in to ducking in to a bar for a couple of shots just for something completely different.

One challenging aspect of this shoot was the indoor lighting situation at the venue it was quite dark and so a lot of flash was used. In order to diffuse the flash I did a lot of foofing. That is bouncing the flash over your shoulder off of walls and corners using them essentially as big umbrellas. This helps quite a bit with the harshness of flash lighting. One thing I really lean on in situations like these is my 50mm f/1.4 EF prime lens. Nothing beats a really fast prime in low light. One thing I am now thinking is for these types of situations I could use a bigger selection of fast primes.

Also I wore my photographer vest for this shoot and I found it wanting. It does not have big enough pockets for some of my larger Canon L lenses. I set one down under the cake table to go shoot some groups. and when I came back it was gone. It was a $1500 lens so I kinda freaked out for a few minutes until someone pointed out that someone had set it aside for me. Needless to say I will be looking in to a belt system to replace my vest.

Boulder Peak Triathlon

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 15:58:48 -0600

Another weekend another Triathlon. I found it challenging to get a decent background for much of this race. There were telephone and utility poles everywhere. It seemed like no matter where I moved I would have poles coming out of peoples heads. I did snap this nice pic of Matty Reed which I was pleased with. I used flash on this to get some fill light to help with the harsh daytime sun.