Dangerous Spouse Pics
- Thread starter Dangerspouse
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Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Nice! Helps that I like Jello :unconscious:
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
For the "Glass Challenge" this week I decided to try glass refraction, or glass "reversal". Filling a rounded glass with water turns it into a big lens, but with the image reversed since it's only a single lens.
I only processed the first one, as it was the one I entered in the challenge. I do like the beer stein shot, but I think the wine glass just has a bit more presence. I was torn about using the head-on picture, or the one with the camera slightly elevated and looking down, as that created a double defraction. The hardest part was positioning the soft boxes behind the glass, only illuminating the backdrop. If the light was in front of, or even with, the glass, it created large catchlights - which you can see at the base of the glass in the second picture. That's one of the reasons I decided not to use it.
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(Edit: beer glass with PP):
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The setup:
I only processed the first one, as it was the one I entered in the challenge. I do like the beer stein shot, but I think the wine glass just has a bit more presence. I was torn about using the head-on picture, or the one with the camera slightly elevated and looking down, as that created a double defraction. The hardest part was positioning the soft boxes behind the glass, only illuminating the backdrop. If the light was in front of, or even with, the glass, it created large catchlights - which you can see at the base of the glass in the second picture. That's one of the reasons I decided not to use it.
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(Edit: beer glass with PP):
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The setup:
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Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Just got back from the land of sausage gravy and good ol' country music: Nashville, Tennessee, y'all. A lovely town. Unfortunately I didn't get to see any of it, as I somehow got roped into helping my wife run her booth at the annual Nashville Market Needlework Expo. My wife is a cross-stitch designer and teacher, and this wholesaler's event is the highlight of their season. So, 4 days of no outside light or air, and crummy hotel corporate issue buffet food. If I never see another grit it'll be too soon...
Anyway, I did lug along my D5500 and two kit lenses and managed to catch a few shots in the brief moments I had to myself. The event took place in the Nashville Embassy Suites hotel, and each designer's room was converted into a showroom, with their windows being used for product displays. Each designer hung a name banner over the railing outside their door - four floors were taken up in total! Shop owners from all over the world showed up over the 4 days, stopping in rooms and ordering their goods for the upcoming season.
EDIT: I wish I'd thought to bring a polarizing filter. Of all the novice mistakes....
Anyway, I did lug along my D5500 and two kit lenses and managed to catch a few shots in the brief moments I had to myself. The event took place in the Nashville Embassy Suites hotel, and each designer's room was converted into a showroom, with their windows being used for product displays. Each designer hung a name banner over the railing outside their door - four floors were taken up in total! Shop owners from all over the world showed up over the 4 days, stopping in rooms and ordering their goods for the upcoming season.
EDIT: I wish I'd thought to bring a polarizing filter. Of all the novice mistakes....
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Dangerspouse
Senior Member
For the "What's on My Desk" weekly challenge.
I can't keep anything on my desk because MY STUPID CAT. Every. Freakin'. Morning. I even had to buy a wireless keyboard so I could quick move it onto my lap whenever he jumps up - and he ALWAYS jumps up. Generally he will lie down for an hour or two before going out to his food dish or litter box, then...back onto the desk.
Why don't I close the door, or somehow otherwise keep him away? Because his yowl registers about 120 dB, and he can keep it going until my shift is over. That's 8 hours. It goes over the air louder than I do, and my mouth is pressed right up against that mic.
But my wife loves him.
Anyway, this was today. I like the B&W version also. I was just putting the camera down when he decided to leap off - had I waited just a second I could have gotten a better shot.
Can I also mention that in instances like this, the pop-up flash on my D5500 is a welcome feature? I really wish my D500 had one sometimes (along with a full articulated Live View screen).
I can't keep anything on my desk because MY STUPID CAT. Every. Freakin'. Morning. I even had to buy a wireless keyboard so I could quick move it onto my lap whenever he jumps up - and he ALWAYS jumps up. Generally he will lie down for an hour or two before going out to his food dish or litter box, then...back onto the desk.
Why don't I close the door, or somehow otherwise keep him away? Because his yowl registers about 120 dB, and he can keep it going until my shift is over. That's 8 hours. It goes over the air louder than I do, and my mouth is pressed right up against that mic.
But my wife loves him.
Anyway, this was today. I like the B&W version also. I was just putting the camera down when he decided to leap off - had I waited just a second I could have gotten a better shot.
Can I also mention that in instances like this, the pop-up flash on my D5500 is a welcome feature? I really wish my D500 had one sometimes (along with a full articulated Live View screen).
Bikerbrent_RIP
Senior Member
Great Halloween Witches Cat! 
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Our local camera club had a meetup yesterday at historic Waterloo Village, a (semi) restored 18th century mining and mill town in northwestern NJ. It was nice in that it's not really tourist season yet, so it was easy to take pics sans people. On the other hand, it's early enough in the spring that there's little in the way of foliage. Everything is pretty dull colored. But we had fun, and I like some of the shots I got. Particularly of the oddball things left over in some of the windows from last Halloween!
A portion of the old Morris Canal runs through the town, which is how the grist and saw mills exported their products along with iron ore from the surrounding mines. There are cutouts along the walk representing how young boys used to lead mules with their lines attached to the canal boats, pulling them along:
Caught this couple, with the girl's arm mimicing the angle of the cutout boy's:
A little whimsy at the end of the rope:
They weren't all creepy:
A portion of the old Morris Canal runs through the town, which is how the grist and saw mills exported their products along with iron ore from the surrounding mines. There are cutouts along the walk representing how young boys used to lead mules with their lines attached to the canal boats, pulling them along:
Caught this couple, with the girl's arm mimicing the angle of the cutout boy's:
A little whimsy at the end of the rope:
They weren't all creepy:
Attachments
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Forgot I had a panorama waiting to be stitched.
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Lying on the floor next to my cat gave me a good opportunity to grab a few shots for the "Details" challenge this week. Fortunately I had my 40mm Micro on the D500, and it was close at hand. But even tuckered out from an hour's worth of attacking my hand and tussling like mad, it was hard to get even one shot where he wasn't moving or twitching. And there was only one window light, giving very dim light at that. So...it was tough. Of the 30 or so shots on the roll, only two really came out even reasonably sharp. I had a tough time deciding which to enter.
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Dangerspouse
Senior Member
I've been practicing my portrait shots lately at the request of my wife, who apparently needs a number of them for some reason. Rather than have her sit through interminable sessions while I fiddle with lights and settings, I thought it would be more humane to get an inanimate stand-in. Everyone, meet Headly Lamarr...and Dell.
I set up Headly yesterday and hadn't gotten two minutes into setting up lights when Dell decided she needed cuddling up to. Does Annie Leibovitz have to put up with this? Oh well, it was just practice. Away we went....
I set up Headly yesterday and hadn't gotten two minutes into setting up lights when Dell decided she needed cuddling up to. Does Annie Leibovitz have to put up with this? Oh well, it was just practice. Away we went....
NestorStura
Senior Member
HAHAHA...
I'm more for dogs than cats, but I never thought a black cat could be so cute and photogenic!!!
Great for Dell!!!
Enviado desde mi RMX1931 mediante Tapatalk
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Thanks Nestor! Yeah, he thinks he's a star whenever I take my camera out, lol. I love dogs too!
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
The fox family that lives under our neighbor's shed has been a source of real entertainment the past few days. The six kits are getting bigger, and apparently feeling their oats as they are constantly running about and pouncing on each other...and mom. Mom is only infrequently seen though, as she is forever hustling back and forth trying to keep the little buggers supplied with chipmunks and whatever else she can drag back. And when she does, one or more kits instantly mob her and try to snatch the meal right from her mouth. For the first time yesterday we also saw Dad during daylight hours, although it was tough to get a pic of him because he stayed off to the side of my window vantage point.
Did a rather dumb thing, in that for several days previous to this I'd been using my D5500. When I switched to the D500 for these fox shots I reflexively turned the wrong knob and set the aperture to f/11, when I meant to increase shutter speed. And of course I was so busy looking at the scene I completely missed the readout in the viewfinder until halfway through. Oops. Motion blur, anyone? But I did manage to salvage a few, including some that were helped with the application of Topaz Sharpen AI.
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Sharpen AI job:
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Dad:
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This last pic shows two cubs under Mom! They bolted and dove under her belly as soon as she arrived with some fresh kill. They're the same two in the shot above, just after eating. It was amazing seeing her completely unfazed by these two hellions bucking and fighting right underneath her as they tried to be the one claiming the bloody prize. She just stood there calmly until it was over. (Mom is the top wad of fur, the one with the hind leg being raised off the ground.)
I'm entering this in the "Under" challenge for this week.
Underfoot:
EDIT: I had taken off the option to export pictures with EXIF data a few days ago, and forgot to turn it back on. These were all taken Friday 4/15/2022 with my D500 and Nikkor AF-P 70-300mm. Almost all are at 300 mm, except the pic with the 4 kits which needed a little wider field of view to fit them all - I think that one was at 270mm
Did a rather dumb thing, in that for several days previous to this I'd been using my D5500. When I switched to the D500 for these fox shots I reflexively turned the wrong knob and set the aperture to f/11, when I meant to increase shutter speed. And of course I was so busy looking at the scene I completely missed the readout in the viewfinder until halfway through. Oops. Motion blur, anyone? But I did manage to salvage a few, including some that were helped with the application of Topaz Sharpen AI.
.
Sharpen AI job:
.
.
Dad:
.
.
This last pic shows two cubs under Mom! They bolted and dove under her belly as soon as she arrived with some fresh kill. They're the same two in the shot above, just after eating. It was amazing seeing her completely unfazed by these two hellions bucking and fighting right underneath her as they tried to be the one claiming the bloody prize. She just stood there calmly until it was over. (Mom is the top wad of fur, the one with the hind leg being raised off the ground.)
I'm entering this in the "Under" challenge for this week.
Underfoot:
EDIT: I had taken off the option to export pictures with EXIF data a few days ago, and forgot to turn it back on. These were all taken Friday 4/15/2022 with my D500 and Nikkor AF-P 70-300mm. Almost all are at 300 mm, except the pic with the 4 kits which needed a little wider field of view to fit them all - I think that one was at 270mm
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Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Two more, from Easter morning....
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Peter7100
Senior Member
Better keep an eye on Dell :cat: with all those mouths to feed :concern:
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
You ain't kidding. He's trying his damndest to go meet them too, as he can see them frolicking out of every window in the back of our house. Yowls like a banshee at me and my wife, trying to get us to open a door or a window. No matter how many times we sit him down and explain "Frolicking is practice for cat killing", it never seems to sink in. Kids, I tell ya :stupid:
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Just in time for this week's "Flowers and Trees" challenge, some flowers and trees showed up in my yard! Always takes longer for things to bloom up on our mountaintop compared to the areas below, so I wasn't sure if they'd arrive in time. But they were very considerate this year and popped their little heads up a few days ago.
These little beauties are Bleeding Hearts. One spring about 5 years ago they just showed up growing against the side of my garage. We didn't plant them, I've never seen them elsewhere. But there they were. And they bloom every year now.
They actually grow in a very crummy looking spot of my yard. Right on the side of my garage as I said, but also right where the front brick facing in front meets the cracked concrete side. You can't get a good pic without getting all kinds of junk in the background. If you pivot a little for a better angle, you get the driveway and our cars also.
So I decided to try the ol' studio portrait trick of relying on light fall-off. I wasn't gonna lug my soft boxes out, but I just got a set of Rogue Flash Benders on clearance and I figured this would be a good test of them. I set up the biggest one on my Yongnuo speedlight.
The technique is simple: with the flash off, take pics of your scene and adjust the settings until the background is totally black. Don't worry about the subject. Unfortunately there was so much sunlight that even my most extreme available settings still showed some detail. But it was good enough. Then I turned the Flash Bender into a wide snoot, pointed it at the flowers, and switched on the speedlight. At that point I just took a series of pictures, adjusting the power output of the flash until it illuminated the flowers, but the light falloff behind them kept the background dark. When I finally got it dialed in, I used the Luminosity Range mask in Lightroom to turn all the low exposure portions of the photo bright white by dropping the saturation and increasing the exposure.
And it comes out like this:
Just for reference, this is what it looked like before turning the flash on:
Then I went over to a daffodil that was growing alongside a rock on my front lawn. It's on a bit of a slope, so by lying down I could point the camera up at it for a "hero shot" perspective. As luck would have it, the sun was at the right angle that it not only back lit the flower, but I could get it in the shot for effect. I still had the Flash Bender on, and by using a tighter snoot and dropping the flash power to 1/32 I was able to take the front of the flower out of shadow. Without the flash, it looked more like a silhouette:
I have to say, even though this was my first outing with it, I'm pretty impressed with the Flash Bender. Gives a softer light than a speedlight, and wraps around the subject well. Knocks out a fair amount of shadows on subjects that are even rather close to a background wall. I've been lamenting the lack of a pop-up flash on the D500, since I like using it for fill on sunny days. I think this Flash Bender will do a better job, albeit at the cost of having the bulk and weight of a speedlight attached to the body. Still, for outdoor portraits where you can't bring in a strobe or soft boxes, this seems like it will be an acceptable alternative.
These little beauties are Bleeding Hearts. One spring about 5 years ago they just showed up growing against the side of my garage. We didn't plant them, I've never seen them elsewhere. But there they were. And they bloom every year now.
They actually grow in a very crummy looking spot of my yard. Right on the side of my garage as I said, but also right where the front brick facing in front meets the cracked concrete side. You can't get a good pic without getting all kinds of junk in the background. If you pivot a little for a better angle, you get the driveway and our cars also.
So I decided to try the ol' studio portrait trick of relying on light fall-off. I wasn't gonna lug my soft boxes out, but I just got a set of Rogue Flash Benders on clearance and I figured this would be a good test of them. I set up the biggest one on my Yongnuo speedlight.
The technique is simple: with the flash off, take pics of your scene and adjust the settings until the background is totally black. Don't worry about the subject. Unfortunately there was so much sunlight that even my most extreme available settings still showed some detail. But it was good enough. Then I turned the Flash Bender into a wide snoot, pointed it at the flowers, and switched on the speedlight. At that point I just took a series of pictures, adjusting the power output of the flash until it illuminated the flowers, but the light falloff behind them kept the background dark. When I finally got it dialed in, I used the Luminosity Range mask in Lightroom to turn all the low exposure portions of the photo bright white by dropping the saturation and increasing the exposure.
And it comes out like this:
Just for reference, this is what it looked like before turning the flash on:
Then I went over to a daffodil that was growing alongside a rock on my front lawn. It's on a bit of a slope, so by lying down I could point the camera up at it for a "hero shot" perspective. As luck would have it, the sun was at the right angle that it not only back lit the flower, but I could get it in the shot for effect. I still had the Flash Bender on, and by using a tighter snoot and dropping the flash power to 1/32 I was able to take the front of the flower out of shadow. Without the flash, it looked more like a silhouette:
I have to say, even though this was my first outing with it, I'm pretty impressed with the Flash Bender. Gives a softer light than a speedlight, and wraps around the subject well. Knocks out a fair amount of shadows on subjects that are even rather close to a background wall. I've been lamenting the lack of a pop-up flash on the D500, since I like using it for fill on sunny days. I think this Flash Bender will do a better job, albeit at the cost of having the bulk and weight of a speedlight attached to the body. Still, for outdoor portraits where you can't bring in a strobe or soft boxes, this seems like it will be an acceptable alternative.
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Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Thanks! Good suggestion, I'll give that a try soon :encouragement:
Dangerspouse
Senior Member
Took my cat outside this afternoon for a walk around the yard. Being outside is such a rarity for him - this was the first time in a couple of weeks - that he's still somewhat overwhelmed. He sticks right next to me for security, rarely venturing more than a few feet from my shoes.
But today, a milestone! I was sitting on the lawn with Dell stretched out along my leg, when all of a sudden he leaped up and bolted for the side of the house. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the back end of a chipmunk disappear into our gutter drain pipe, and Dell slamming into it a fraction of a second later. His first prey! I was so proud. Ok, he didn't catch it. But at least he recognized what it was. Score!
Of course, he then spent the next half hour snuffling up and down the pipe in a vain attempt to coax the bugger out. No dice. But that gave me time to run in and grab the D500. Got a couple of keepers, none great, but the challenge this week is Low Key Pets, so....
Dropped the exposure in Lightroom to make them low key:
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Once I managed to get him inside so I could process the pics, he immediately jumped up on my office chair and stared out the window, no doubt in case any other miscreant rodents dared to cross his yard again. The light was starting to set a bit, and between that and the dark chair and black cat, it gave it a low key effect without need for any PP. My D5500 was right next to me, with the 40mm Micro attached, and:
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I'm kind of on the fence about which one to enter. The last two are better technically, but, well, "proud poppa" and all that. We'll see, gotta think on it a bit.
But today, a milestone! I was sitting on the lawn with Dell stretched out along my leg, when all of a sudden he leaped up and bolted for the side of the house. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the back end of a chipmunk disappear into our gutter drain pipe, and Dell slamming into it a fraction of a second later. His first prey! I was so proud. Ok, he didn't catch it. But at least he recognized what it was. Score!
Of course, he then spent the next half hour snuffling up and down the pipe in a vain attempt to coax the bugger out. No dice. But that gave me time to run in and grab the D500. Got a couple of keepers, none great, but the challenge this week is Low Key Pets, so....
Dropped the exposure in Lightroom to make them low key:
.
Once I managed to get him inside so I could process the pics, he immediately jumped up on my office chair and stared out the window, no doubt in case any other miscreant rodents dared to cross his yard again. The light was starting to set a bit, and between that and the dark chair and black cat, it gave it a low key effect without need for any PP. My D5500 was right next to me, with the 40mm Micro attached, and:
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I'm kind of on the fence about which one to enter. The last two are better technically, but, well, "proud poppa" and all that. We'll see, gotta think on it a bit.