Nikon D90 Architecture Photography Lesson in St. Petersburg Florida with Bill

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Bill with his Nikon D90 practicing architecture photography outside of Signature Tower in downtown St. PetersburgMy third DSLR Photography Lesson with Bill on Saturday morning was our first 1-on-1 lesson as his wife Ria could not make it for this one.  We met at the usual spot in downtown St. Petersburg on a typcially beautiful, sunny and warm Florida spring morning.  The focus for this lesson was on making architecture shots, and how to use aperture priority mode to get a general idea of the exposure wanted, before switching to manual mode to fine tune it exactly to the desired results.  

At the very beginning Bill showed me some shots of the St. Petersburg skyline and waterfront he took since our last lesson, homework so to speak.  This was very useful to me in being able to show Bill which settings were correct, and which ones needed to be changed in order to produce a better shot.  We then simulated some of those shot circumstances during our lesson so Bill could practice getting all settings correct for better results.  

We had time during this lesson to start to discuss composition more, especially when photographing buildings.  I showed Bill my parallel edge photography tip while saying that the entire building does not always need to be in the frame.  

Our next lessons will start to include digital photography editing in addition to more shooting practice.  I am looking forward to seeing Bill's early morning dawn shots of St. Petersburg with the help of the things we practiced this lesson.

Guided Photo Tour of St. Petersburg Florida featuring The Pier Vinoy Park & Beach Drive

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2-hour Photo Tour of downtown St. Petersburg for $25 per person
  • Guided by local pro photographer 
  • Learn great photography tips!
  • Take the best vacation shots ever!
  • Fun & interactive group activity
  • Sunset, bird, portrait opportuities & more!
  • Start at Vinoy Park finish at The Pier
CALL: 813-240-5357 E-mail: CONTACT FORM FACEBOOK

 

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Sun setting through downtown St. Petersburg Florida HDR

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Sunset through the trees in Vinoy Park St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Tamron 17-50mm @ f/8 ISO 200 9-exposure HDR tripod mounted with cable releaseVinoy Park is my favorite spot in all of downtown St. Petersburg.  It juts out offering panoramic views of the downtown skyline and also The Pier and Tampa Bay too.  It is the best public place to watch the sunset in the area also, well, maybe the top of The Pier is just as good.  I am always looking for different perspectives, trying not to just use my own eye level for composing shots.  For this one I closed the legs of my tripod so that I was shooting just from about a foot off the ground.  This also allowed me to get the sun right under the tree's lowest branch.

  • Photography Tip:  Use your tripod at its lowest height, or lay on your stomach if no tripod required for a unique, low perspective.

Marina view from Vinoy Park St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Tamron 17-50mm @ f/8 ISO 200 9-exposure HDR tripod mounted with cable releaseMoving in front of the tree in the lead photo reveals a marina, on the far right Vinoy Renaissance Hotel and in the center 400 Beach Drive tower.  There are benches to sit on to enjoy this view.  I cannot imagine there are many sunsets they go unused.

North Straub Park in St. Petersburg Florida - Nikon D300 Tamron 17-50mm @ f/8 ISO 200 9-exposure HDR tripod mounted with cable releaseAll along the downtown St. Petersburg area are parks like North Straub Park above that offer quiet places to sit and enjoy the green environment that city developers very wisely preserved.  It is these parks that in my opinioin make St. Petersburg the most beautiful area to live in all of Tampa Bay.  

Banyan Trees on Beach Drive in downtown St. Petersburg

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The two famous banyan trees on Beach Drive in downtown St. Petersburg, Florida - Nikon D300 Tamron 17-50mm @ f/8 ISO 200 9-exposure HDR on tripod with cable releaseThere are banyan trees throughout the downtown St. Petersburg area and nearby surrounding areas, but no banyans are as famous or more photographed than the two trees above located right on Beach Drive NE.  As large as they are, they always seem to appear all of a sudden to passersby who often audibly gasp upon seeing them.

I first photographed banyan trees in the St. Petersburg downtown area back in August 2011 when walking back to my car after a meeting I passed by this pair.  

Photographing the famous Beach Drive NE banyan trees is rather challenging.  Their large branches and wide trunks create deep shadows and on one side of them is always a row of parked cars not making for the greatest background.  The angle of composition I chose was the only one I could find that included almost no man-made objects in the shot.  I used my Induro CT214 tripod with all the legs collapsed, shooting from just about a foot of the ground.  I chose to make a 9-exposure HDR image in order to get detail from within the trunk shadows as well as in the bright sky above.

St. Petersburg dumpster named after fighting meth?

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A randomly named dumpster in St. Petersburg? - Nikon D300 Nikkor 105mm VR micro @ f/4 ISO 200 1/500thI took some time a few weeks ago to just walk around downtown St. Petersburg with my Nikon D300 attached to my Induro CT214 tripod with my Nikkor 80-200mm lens attached.  Before I left the house I had the idea to bring just this gear and make what shots I could using this somewhat unusual gear grouping for shooting an urban environment.  

I came across this dumpster beside a building in a nondescript location.  It seems that dumpsters for some reason are named in St. Petersburg.  Long ago I photographed one named "KRESS."  Now that I think about it, these "names" very well could be applied by a third party and not the city sanitation department itself.  In light of that, I feel sure now that this dumpster named C.U. METH. is not random.  So it seems there is a further story behind this photograph lying with the person who painted the name on the dumpster and why.  One guess, this is where the person tossed away the last remnants of items used for taking meth.  

Now that I have realized St. Petersburg dumpsters have given names, I will keep an eye out for more.  If you see any, be sure and get a photograph of them to share.  

Business Headshot on white background in Clearwater Florida with Kathy

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Business headshot done on location in Clearwater, Florida - Nikon D300 Nikkor 80-200mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/60th Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/2 power in 42" brolly to frame left - white background added digitally in PhotoshopThis afternoon I drove to Clearwater to meet Kathy to make her business headshot.  Earlier in the week we discussed the specifics, like how she needed both a standard vertical headshot and also a full body headshot, both of which needed to be on fully white backgrounds with no shadows.  This is easy enough to do if working in a studio, but I made these shots right in her office.  Therefore, I needed to maximize the amount of blank wall I could get behind her in the space given to make it as easy as possible to add the white background later in post.  For the above standard vertical headshot, it was no problem to do.  

Full body business headshot - Nikon D300 Tamron 17-50mm @ f/5.6 ISO 200 1/60th Strobist: SB-800 @ 1/2 power in 42" brolly to frame right & SB-600 @1/4 power with diffuser cap to frame left - white background added digitallyNow for the above full body shot, adding the white background was much trickier because as of about two-thirds of the way down the skirt the border of the wall started and then the dark blue-gray carpet began.  This made selecting the edge of the subject using the Quick Select tool in Photoshop somewhat in exact, even after refining the edges.  After placing just the subject onto a new layer and painting in a white background, I then took that same 100% white Brush Tool and tediously smoothed the edges especially around the border of the shoes, ankles and lower skirt where the carpet was.  Still, this technique allows me to make on location shots with any background the client requests.

Kathy was a great subject easy to pose and we also had help from her cheerful office mate Rosemary.

Brolly & snoot ice cream sundae strobist lighting setup

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Would you eat this ice cream? Nikon D300 with Nikkor AF-S 105mm VR micro f/2.8G lens @ f/16 ISO 200 1/250th Strobist: Nikon SB-800 Speedlight in 42" brolly @ 1/4 power behind to left & Nikon SB-600 Speedlight @ 1/8th power in Honl snoot to frame right triggered using Yongnuo remotesThis ice cream sundae is one of my favorite possessions.  It looks good enough to eat right?  However, it is made by a famous company in Japan that produces realistic food models for display in front of restaurants.  It is common, almost required, for a restaurant to put many of its dishes on display in front of the restaurant to entice passersby to come eat there.  I had been waiting for an opportunity to photograph it, so I finally decided to use it as a subject for a demonstration on what each light does in a two-light strobist setup.  The above shot is the completely lit final image.  I got the idea to show how adding lights changes a shot from this video of a photographer setting up $60,000 worth of lights to get a shot of a Lamborghini Aventador.  I cannot recommend watching the video enough as it is outstanding.  This post does not compare at all to that video, but it is something you can practice in your living room assuming you do not have access to $60k of lights and/or a Lamborghini.  

This is the off-camera-flash setup I used right in my (cramped) living room space.  My trusty new 42" brolly is on the left with a Nikon SB-800 Speedlight shootoing into it.  In the lower right corner you can see a Nikon SB-600 Speedlight with a Honl snoot attached.  The SB-800 was @ 1/4 power and the SB-600 @ 1/8th power.  I set my shutter speed to 1/250th (the fastest I can sync with the Yongnuo radio triggers) in order to produce a black background (read more about how to make a black background).  I had to carefully position the lights so neither bounced light off the wall behind the ice cream, which from where I shot was the wall space next to the rear wheel of the bicycle.  In a studio or larger space this shot would be much easier to setup.

From the angle I was shooting at you can see that the brolly though the largest light source does not add much light to the subject.  If I had just used the snoot, the handle and back part of the ice cream would remain too dark.  The top image in this post shows what both lights combined can produce.  

Try making a shot like this at home with using multiple light sources and see the effect adding, moving or removing a light source has on how your subject looks.  Be sure and post a link to your results in the commments below. 

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