Entry for February 4, 2008

Over the weekend I got Ella to sit for 2 more sessions and I have now completed 23 letters!  I am having a lot of fun with this project, so much fun, I am thinking about doing a color book and a number book too!  The only letters I have left are Y, V, and L.  I am going to do Yarn for Y, Lion for L and I have no idea what to do for V.  I hope to finish the picture part of this today, but I am not going to drag my stuff out of the closet until I know what I am doing.  If the book prints well we will be offering this idea as a package deal on our website.  Here are the letters I have ready…

 ooops, I just noticed that I spelled Xylophone wrong, I will have to fix that!

In business related news I had the opportunity to photograph a lovely family for their family pictures and for Valentines day cards to send out to their family. The whole family was great, but the older son in particular was a jewel to work with.  He took direction well even though he was exhausted.  We got some great shots of him for the V-day cards.  I think we got an awesome family shot, and I loved doing the “frame” pictures with them.

 

 

And last but not least, your photo tip!

Depth of field, or Bokah.  Use Depth of field to your advantage.  When you are using a lower number f stop you not only get more light onto your cameras film/sensor you also decrease the amount of the picture that is in sharp focus.  The lower the f stop number, the less of your picture that is in focus.  It looks great in portraits to have your subject in focus and your background fuzzy.  In these pictures from my Baby Dipper photo shoot for www.babydipper.com I used depth of field to bring your attention to the subject of the photograph, the bowl.  In my first example, you can still see the baby, and she helps to tell you what the product if for, but since the bowl is in perfect focus, you are drawn to look at it.  That is a good thing, since the purpose of the picture is to sell the bowl.  In the second image both the baby and the bowl are in focus.  While you can still see the bowl, the cuteness of the baby draws your attention away from it.  We don’t want you looking at the baby, so this isn’t as successful as the first image.  

 

This third image is an example of how this can work with portraits in an untraditional way.  Here, the subject of the photograph is the engagement ring, we still want to see the happy couple, but we really want to show off that rock, so here is one way you can use depth of field to make a better picture.

 

 

Now it is time to get out and take some pictures!

Shannon