A Little Spot of Color

I had an awfully hard time trying to figure out how to connect to yesterday's post for some reason. It's winter and snowy out here in the midwest and as such I have lots of winter, snowy type pictures that I have taken this week. Not much to connect with on those. I thought about doing friendship, but really who wants to see a picture of me.

I LOVE the flower in Jay'me's hair, a little spot of color during a cold winter. It made me think of this picture that I had taken a few days ago. One with a little spot of color in it as well.


Olympus Stylus Tough 3000
ISO-200
Aperture F/4.3
Shutter 1/5 sec.
Focal Length of 15mm
SOOC

This picture was taken through the windshield of my husband's truck while I was waiting for him to get out of Lowe's. I was bored and playing around with the camera when I spotted this blue car next to all these white, black, and gray cars. It just totally stuck out.

Photography is not just about getting a technically good picture (of which this would NOT be a good example of) even though that is important. It is also about being able to spot things in the world around you that stand out and capturing them.

Jay'me is up next. Let's find out what she sees in the world around her.
Sere

Ripples in the snow

National Geographic talent I do not have. It's very frustrating actually, because they are normal people like me, nothing special, but yet they have it, I don't. I'm sure they could have captured the ripples in the snow that God's hand has made and with their talent shown something fabulous. Unfortunately you are stuck with my somewhat mediocre talent, so here is my best shot.


Nikon D90
ISO-100
Lens 18-70mm at 55mm
Aperture F/13
Shutter 1/250 sec.
Exposure -0.3
No Flash, Natural Lighting

I went out at high noon today to water the dogs and just fell in love with the wind patterns on the snow, just like with Brandi's shot. The patterns are all unique looking and just beautiful. Normally high noon is not a very good time to take pictures, but it was great for the play of light and shadows I was trying to capture. Part of the reason why I went black and white is to enhance those shadows, which black and white does far better then color.

I also had turned my exposure down some because when shooting in wintery, snowy conditions your sensor gets a little messed up reading the snow (reads it as much brighter then it actually is) so you turn down your exposure to help compensate for some of that. I turned the picture to black and white in Photoshop and bumped up my blacks a tad to give it a slightly more dramatic look. 3C1D had two adorable baby pictures recently, one in low light, almost black and white looking and one in full beautiful color. Brandi had her shot done in full color for our most recent Wordless Wednesday, so I changed mine to black and white to continue the theme. Anybody else wishing they had National Geographic talent??? Or am I the only one??

Sere

Friday Faces with Sere

Totally thought my day was tomorrow. Glad I hopped on to see everybodies pictures from the last few days and realized that it was my turn today. We had two Snow Days this week, which is fun, although it extends our school year. We were out playing in the snow, sledding, and letting out "Whitey" to run around and play with. "Whitey," the little fluff ball is going to his new home tomorrow. I also had my son practice taking snow pictures as well, gotta get him interested in photography now right? I can't have my family members cutting off heads in photos and he enjoys it as well. What cuties these guys both are, I had to post the picture I took of the two of them.



Nikon D90
Lens 18-70 at 60mm
Aperture F/5
Shutter Speed 1/400 sec.
ISO-400
No Flash, Natural Lighting

Snow and ice. Lots of snow and ice in my shot and Brandi's and the color red.

Take Care!
Sere

Carhartt's Are Cool to Wear....

Sere here to announce our Wordless Wednesday winner! Yay!! Random.org chose Mamalu to be our winner this week. She said "Merry and Bright, molded cartoon figures to bring delight." Loved the rhyming, very catchy. The story behind that picture was that I was taking down our Christmas tree when I saw Mickey, Donald and Pluto all set up by my son on my end table. They immediately caught my attention as possible subjects because of their bright colors. I also wanted to play around with Christmas lights as a backdrop one last time before I let the holiday season go. So there it was, my post and connection to Brandi's toy picture. Bright colors and a whimsical, child-like charm to both.

I am so excited to see what Mamalu has in store for us! Mamalu please email us at 3chicks1dudephoto@gmail.com for your further instructions. Now on to my post for today.

But before I show you my post I have to tell you the story behind this post. I had been waiting all day to see if the snow would start falling so I could practice taking pictures of snow and snowfall and all of that. Well the snow never showed up, at least during the day, so now I am scrambling to try and get a picture of something before my light fades.

I am out doing my dog chores and realize that if I am going to get any shots I need to take them, like now. So I'm out in my chore clothes which are Carhartt's trying to fumble around and get a picture taken. I understand if you don't have any idea what Carthartt's are. Until I moved out to the middle of nowhere, I had no idea what they were either. But around here, they are as commonplace as, well, ipods in the city and suburbs. And soooo very cool to wear. In fact you see people wearing them out on the ski slopes so you know they have to be cool, haha. I am including a couple of shots of what they are under my post. So here is what I got.


Olympus Stylus Tough 3000
Point and Shoot @ 7mm
Aperture F/5
Shutter 1/100 sec.
ISO-64(not sure how it came up with that number)
No Flash, natural lighting

My Nikon was giving me fits about this cold weather so I had to switch to the Olympus, which can handle the cold weather a lot better. But it is a point and shoot with all these scene modes that you can choose, not anything I can set up on my own. But it supposedly had a Macro and Super Macro mode that I tried. It wasn't so macroey, but that's okay it was still fun to use. My connection to S4's is the white light in the background of his shot and my white snow. Now as promised my Carhartt pics. Yep my Carhartt's are almost identical to these, except my pants are black and my coat is more of a brown color then a tan color. Mine even have the cool zipper that runs up my entire leg so you can unzip the pants to get work boots on and off. Totally awesome!

Jay'me is up tomorrow. Enjoy!

.

Happy New Year!

Hi Sere here! I am celebrating the New Years with family right now. We are getting ready to eat and play some games. Hope your New Year is equally blessed.


Olympus Stylus Tough
Aperture F/3.5
Shutter Speed 1/2 sec.
ISO 250
No Flash, Straight out of the camera

My husband and I have been lucky the last couple of days to have spent them skiing and since I am not the best on skies I brought my point and shoot, shockproof, freezeproof camera to the slopes to be on the safe side, instead of my regular DSLR camera. My point and shoot definately has it's place in my world, but not necessarily for taking the best pictures, at least at low lighting conditions. Or I can't figure out how to do it the first time using this camera.

I was trying to show the ambiance of where we were in this shot. The champagne for New Years Eve, the fire in the background for warmth and the snow for our skiing adventure. We were in the "chalet" ski lodge for New Years Eve and the picture was facing outward to the hills. My connection to Brandi's shot was the champagne and/or drink.

Now I am off to enjoy family time! Cheers!

Winter Snow Crystals

Yes we did finally get some snow down south and yes I was out with my camera trying to capture it. Well that and a little sledding as well. I needed to get out and capture it fast because it will be gone in a day or so. No kidding, we are supposed to be 60 degrees in two days here. Crazy, crazy, so back to my picture.....



Nikon D90
Lens 18-200mm at 120mm
Aperture F/6.3
Shutter Speed 1/60 sec.
ISO-400
Off Camera Flash with orange filter, Nikon Speedlight SB-900

I knew that I was going to have to use a flash because I wanted to get the effect of glittering snow. I had to shine the flash through the branches of this weed, because that is what it is a weed, in order to do that. So I knew that I had to use my flash off camera and the Nikon D90 can be used in commander mode in order to control the flash. I believe the flash was turned down not quite as low as it can go, but close. I used the orange filter to soften some of the harsh blue/cool light that you get in the winter. When I first tried this, I had tried it on some leaves that were still on my tree and it actually gave the picture a very fally look to it. You can see that shot here if you would like to.

I love taking pictures of snow, especially if it is at all glittery and shiny. My connection to Brandi's is in the white, kind of glowiness look of both of them. A bit of a stretch, but I see it. Hope you do to. Enjoy the glitter of winter.

Sere

Two Turtle Doves....

Okay not sure if these guys are turtle doves but I do believe that they are doves of some sort and there's four instead of two, but hey who cares!! As I have stated before we do not have any snow right now so this picture is an archival picture, but I think that it ties in well with Brandi's picture from yesterday. It was great to be able to catch these guys up in the tree and it was before all the snow and ice had either melted or been disturbed. You know that quiet time after a snow storm where everything is just calm and beautiful. I love that time.

Nikon D2X
ISO-320
Aperture F/11
Shutter 1/400 sec.
18-200mm lens at 200mm
Exposure +1
Natural Lighting, No Flash

We might actually have a white Christmas, I'm hoping. It sounds like we might even get that snowfall on Christmas Eve which would be even more exciting. That will be so pretty.

Here's hoping that your holiday is calm and peaceful, filled with the love of family and friends.

Sere

Mele Kalikimaka...

.... means Merry Christmas in Hawaiian, which is where I would LOVE to be about right now. Who wouldn't right? I was just listening to Christmas songs today and this one came on (you can't have Christmas songs without Bing Crosby singing some of them) which made me think about one of my Christmas pictures that I had taken a few days ago. So I am connecting to Brandi's picture by a song; along with the fact that Mr. Hippo looked like he was in some water and my picture has water in it.



I couldn't figure out how to align this center so, sorry.

Nikon D2X
Lens 18mm to 200mm at 105mm
Aperture F/8
Shutter Speed 1 sec.
ISO 400
No Flash, I did add a soft filter to this because I like the look of it and filters are fun, otherwise not much else was done to this picture.

If you look really closely you can see that this ornament says "Aloha Hawaii" on it. I have a tradition of picking up an ornament from every place that I vacation at. So our tree is full of Colton's handiwork and ornaments from the different places around the country we have been. It's a lot of fun to put the ornaments up and talk about and remember that particular vacation and something that we had done. Colton also really enjoys helping me to pick out the ornaments so it's a good way to get him to come shopping with me as well.

Sere