If you asked me, I would tell you that a tripod is a must for making long exposure photos. In fact, I have already shared some long exposure ocean photos from San Diego featuring the Ocean Beach Pier that were all shot with my Nikon mounted on a tripod. That said, if getting a tack sharp image is not needed, handholding a slightly long exposure photo, especially with a lens that has VR (vibration reduction), can produce some very cool shots. The latter was the method I used to hold my Nikon right above the incoming water at Imperial Beach, San Diego, California at sunset. Why do a long exposure? Because it makes the water look like stretched out cotton. In the above shot you might easily think it was taken from a boat in deep water, when in reality it was me in less than ankle deep water letting that few inches of water whoosh past me as the camera’s shutter stayed open for 1/6th of a second.
Business Headshots suited to the client in Albuquerque
Jeff visited the JCP Home Studio in Albuquerque, New Mexico needing a very specific business headshot with guidelines provided by the new company he is working for. They had a neutral, soft gray background and were a centered orientation style headshot. Here is a photography secret: you do not need to go out and buy a gray background. A white background, depending on how you light it, looks gray! The physical background used for this headshot, is the exact same one used for this one, for example. Know matter what your headshot needs are, I can produce a professional, modern headshot for you here or right at the location fo your choice, be it your office or home.
For the first 4th of July in a long time I had my camera out on a tripod using bulb mode and an index card to capture multiple fireworks burst in one exposure. Setup in a wide open field at Balloon Fiesta Park in Albuquerque, New Mexico I had a clear view with little wind to blow smoke into the frame, but on the other hand not much of a foreground to set the fireworks in. My step-by-step guide for making fireworks photos goes into even more detail about how and why I like to photograph fireworks. Still, I was pleased with the images I was able to make even from a good distance away.
The Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce has added some new team members since I last made headshots for them in September of last year. So I took my mobile studio headshot photography setup back to the Chamber, but this time shooting outside in a breezeway. The American Flag and the New Mexico State Flag were still used as the background, and I still used my signature setup of a 26” softbox setup as a beauty dish with a silver reflector for the lighting. One addition this time was putting a light on the flags to provide separation of the background from the subject, as the end of the breezeway was in dark shade.
The ski resort town of Taos, New Mexico is a place one would expect to find sweeping views of mountainlandscapes. For my photograph of such a well known view, I wanted to make it standout by using in the foreground and old, relic of a pickup truck to juxtapose with the natural features of the background. Both the foreground and background contain old things, with the former old in terms of human years, and the latter in terms of geological millennia.
Assistant Attorney General visits JCP Home Studio v2.0
For the second year in a row it was my pleasure to donate a headshot photo session to the Paws and Stripes charity. This year’s winner was no less than Assistant Attorney General Cholla Khoury. She was also the very first client in the all new JCP Home Studio v2.0! This was no ordinary headshot shoot for sure! AAG Khoury wanted a serious look for her headshots. To add variety to a similar headshots I photographed her on both a white and a black background which allowed for two quite different looking headshots, despite going for a similar look in pose. This was a great inaugural photo shoot in my new studio space!
A place long past its hey day, Bombay Beach, for the curiosity seeker, can still hold a lot of interest. The beach itself looks like the wasted remnants of a beautiful sandy beach. Even the rock jetties and wooden posts have fallen into an eerie decay. It feels like a place that has suffered a horror, and that feeling is tangible to the visitor. Stride away from the water and come across a ghost ship, a mysterious cube suspended within a cube, and other assorted random forgotten things made into art or just forgotten memory. Bombay Beach is no longer a vacation destination, but definitely a place to seek out, experience, and then get out before one becomes part of the lost landscape.
