Indy SoJourn

I'm soon off to visit the newly re-opened Oceans Exhibit at the Indianapolis Zoo. My hopes are high, and hopefully I shall return with some tasty photos of the exhibit as well. I'll share them with everyone here. I really missed the old exhibit with it's beautiful live corral reef.

There are a few things to keep in mind when photographing through glass, these guidelines apply to aquariums and museum displays. Turn your flash off if it you can get a decent exposure using the exhibits built in lighting. Glass is highly reflective, mixing it with flash is a recipe for disaster. Get your lens as close to the glass as possible, if you can use a flexible lens hood or a large baffle push that bad boy right up against the glass. In a pinch. a baseball cap works well for shading reflections off the glass in front of your lens. (Don't let the front element of your lens hit the exhibit glass!) Finally, make sure the glass is clean, fingerprints in front of your lens will only lower the quality of photos taken in an already challenging environment.

Labels: Aquarium, indianapolis, Indianapolis Zoo, Oceans, Zoo

The world outside is melting and it's absolutely wonderful. It's so nice to go outside and not feel the inside of your nose freeze. Sensationalist news stories of impending flash floods to the area due to melting snow have been the order of the last week. Sigh.

This photo was part of a self imposed assignment to capture the melting and thawing that is taking place. No one else is gonna push you to make work like yourself, self assignments are excellent motivators.

This image makes use of the Orton Effect. This technique was originally done with sandwiched slide film and harkens back to era of Pictorialism. It is an attempt to evoke a mood and feeling within an image rather than a straight representation of the subject. I occasionally switch into this mode of working when my concepts and subjects are both being difficult. Tricks in a bag.

Labels: Flooding, Flower, indianapolis, Melting, Snow, White

"Hey, your flash didn't go off!" I love hearing that. Most of the time. Except when I look down at my camera's screen and see a mostly black square.

In this shot I bounced my flash off the ceiling. Par for course during interior events with ceilings under 20ft tall or so. The subjects don't end up looking like deer caught in headlights and it's relatively easy to balance the ambient light. In this situation E-TTL works well. The camera is set on manual to set the ambient exposure, here about 1/2 stop under exposed. While the flash illuminates the subject.

Depending on the surface I'm bouncing my flash off of, ambient light conditions, and the subject bounce flash doesn't always produce the best skin tones. In such situation the on/off switch on the flash works wonders. Here I switched from Manual mode to Aperature priority and shot at f/4 without flash. It's a different look that might work in some situations. In this particular situation I'm slightly partial to the flash shot, but the boys expression is better in the ambient light shot. It happens.

Labels: College Mentors for Kids, colts, indianapolis, Tony Dungy

Wow, what a comeback. Despite the first real snow of the winter and a bad history with the Patriots, the Indianapolis Colts triumphed this last Sunday. On to the Super Bowl.

Labels: colts, indianapolis

Today was a good day. A good day to remember great people. For the first time I heard someone publicly speak about the loss of James Brown, that gladdened my heart. His passing was all but lost in the wake of the death of President Ford.

Big Crowds, lots to see and learn, and a food drive. The museum itself was, as always, a masterpiece of exhibit design. This was my first time in the future Indiana section. It was... neon and entertaining. Go play there!

Labels: indianapolis, state museum