Welcome Amanda

Hi Gang! Brandi here. Wanted to introduce you all to Amanda. Amanda was the winner of Wordless Wednesday with Jay'me two weeks ago. She's joining us today as our guest photographer.

Here is a little about Amanda in Amanda's words.

My name is Amanda and I have been interested in photography since high
school. I have a wonderful 8 month old and a husband who can be
wonderful too!! I started my blog in June and have been learning and
growing in my skills since with the help and encouragement of blogs
and challenges like 3 Chicks and A Dude.

The skinny on Amanda's photo in her words -
While I was looking at Jay'me's Friday Faces post I panicked a little.
How in the world was I going to find a link that would work with a
picture I took?! And then have it put up among these great
photographer's work and have it be okay!? Then I took a breath and
headed out with a couple of ideas. I was looking up a lot while
walking with my boy and saw this tree and it spoke to me I guess. The
great part it was a gloomy, moody day and it translated into the
picture. Then in post processing I played up that part. So just to
be clear the link between Jay'me's picture and mine is looking up a
tree!

Thank you for this fun opportunity,
Amanda


Here is what you're really after, Amanda's mesmerizing photo -

Canon Powershot A495
Exposure: 1/50 sec
Aperture: f/3.0
Focal Length: 6.6 mm
ISO: 800


After you've posted a comment here telling us your thoughts or feelings on this photo head on over to Amanda's Blog and give her some 3C1D love. She's got some great work over there.

To keep pace on a fantastic weekend we're going to have Dan with another guest photo tomorrow. Sah-weet!

Faces Friday with Jay'me

What a struggle. In three days I have taken over 500 pictures and most of them garbage. Over exposed, under exposed, blurry, or just irrelevant. I've narrowed them down to about five maybe usable pictures. Then sat here staring at them thinking "Not good enough"!
The last few days were splendid, fabulous, and magnificent! The girls I took out to the fields and pond behind us today were charming and delightful. My skills - not so much.

I tried to simulate the color and layout from Sere's post with this "Up the Tree" photo. I played in and out of soft and hard natural light and adjusted my depth of field a lot. I'm figuring out how to adjust more to help myself.
I do like the depth of field in this one. The leaf in the foreground is slightly out of focus as is the background. I need a vitamin and a nap now...



Cannon EOS
Manual
No flash
1/80
f 5.6
ISO 100

Fall is Coming....

I wanted to get everybody into the fall colors mode with this picture. I love being in the midwest during the fall season, the colors are always so absolutely gorgeous! I know the east is supposed to have the "best" fall colors but I think I would have to argue with that :0).

Nikon D90
Lens 18-200mm at 48mm
Aperture f7.1
Shutter Speed 1/125 sec.
ISO 200
Natural Lighting

This was taken at Copper Falls State Park outside of Mellen, Wisconsin up near Lake Superior. The whole area is gorgeous with tons of waterfalls and rivers to peruse. The colors were at their prime while we were there and I have several other fall color shots taken from the area but this one ties in well with Scott's water shot from yesterday. Where he was HOT, we were on the COLD side although this day was gorgeous.

I was trying to figure out how to get the waterfall which was in shadows, along with the bright blue sky. As you can see I ended up blowing out the beautiful blue sky in order to get the water.

I hope this gets you all revved up for fall color. It does for me, so get those cameras out and start shooting!!! I can't wait to see what Jay'me comes up with for Friday Faces tomorrow. Enjoy!

Wordless Wednesday with Scott (subbing for Brandi)

Rules:

The poster must post only one (1) photo and settings. No additional verbiage (other then the rules) is allowed.

Commenters (that's you) must comment and guess how the photo associates with the previous (Tuesday's) photo. The winning guess gets to be the guest photographer for Sunday.


No previous photography experience required. In fact, wanna-be's like us, are encouraged. The only criteria; you must be able to take a photo (any camera will do), email said photo, allow 3C1D to publish said photo and follow the rules...


1 guess only per person. All rules strictly enforced with a paddle (Brandi style)!

Ready Set GO!!!!!!

Canon 30D
Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8 L
Shutter Speed 1/3200
Aperture f/6.3
ISO 100
Aperture Priority
Natural Light

Dewy Fireworks

Canon 30D
Canon EF 100mm Macro f/2.8
Shutter Speed 1/200
Aperture f/2.8
ISO 100
Aperture Priority
Natural Light

I went out this morning to brave the frigid frost and dew and had a blast. It's just amazing what there is to see in your own backyard. In case you're wondering, I live in a modest home with a small yard that backs to a small wetland area. On the other side of the wetlands is more houses - a lot more houses. This means as I crawled around my yard and the wetlands I again had ample time to further incriminate myself as the weirdo of Lake in the Hills. I can't wait to see what my next door neighbor has to say.

For this shot I used my macro lens and a small aperture coupled with a tripod and remote shutter. I tried to highlight the end formation. I succeeded to a point but you can see that some of the droplets at the end are blurry. This speaks to the challenge of aperture selection. I actually thought I had f/4.0 dialed up but while uploading I discovered I was at f/2.8. Bummer! F/4.0 has slightly more depth of field and is sharper on the whole and is still sufficiently small to achieve a beautiful bokeh. Oh well - next time.

As it is, I'm happy with the results. I had to wait for quite a while for the sun to peek above the house next to mine but in the meantime, I managed to get many other shots. All in all, though I froze my tush off, I had fun crawling around with numb fingers (you know it's cold when you can't tell if your finger is on the shutter release button!). So get out and shoot you photogs!

Scott

First Frost fading fast!

So Sunday kicked my butt as did my camera. It's been misbehaving and I will have to take it in to hopefully get it working properly. The lens is broken and the body is very temperamental... I got this shot a day late (sorry Scott Please post when you're ready). This morning isn't exactly chipper either. I went out to catch the first frost with out socks & shoes. Guess what, I remember what snow feels like... I got this lovely shot of my lawn with our fall decor on our flagstone, birch trees with morning sun peeking through them out of focus in the background. I rushed in loaded them up, clicked onto blogger, cleared to 200 shots off my camera, went back to iphoto and My pictures didn't finalize and were gone! I put the kids on the bus, almost screamed, just to scream, HE HE HE (I'm crazy). The frost was disappearing as fast as I was running. That darn old sun was stealing my pictures!!! I'm still barefoot with my hair disheveled and looking for shady areas getting a little light... I don't care who can see me, I need a shot - YESTERDAY! So, with out any further adieu I give you our first frost fading fast!!!!

Straight off my camera
un-cropped & un-adjusted




Cannon Rebel XT
Aperture Priority
1/50
f 25
45.mm
no flash