Category: barclay

Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, navi, pets2 Comments

After our discussion of depth of field last week, the lady who runs our photo club suggested we get a copy of Understanding Exposure, so I went right out and ordered one. It’s a fantastic book. Within the first 20 pages I at least doubled my knowledge of how the camera works. It is setup with lessons and exercises, so I was playing along with my camera, figuring out how the settings work as I went.

Barclay and Navi were hanging out with me in a shady part of the yard, making for some challenging shots, but the techniques in the book all made sense. The hardest part was getting the dogs to sit still long enough to change the settings.

Barclay is a lot of help! Note the one ear turned in my direction. He’s an expert at ignoring me!

Pretty Navi!
After dark I headed out to take some night pictures. Last time I used a higher f-stop, thinking that would be correct for depth of field, but it didn’t gather enough light to get any results. My camera is limited to a 30 second exposure. So this time I used the smallest possible f-stop, which leaves the aperture wide open, and that did much better.

This is the constellation Lyra – with the brightest star in the summer sky.

This is part of Pegasus (he’s upside down from this angle – the big quare is his body). The label points to the fuzzy blob that is the Andromeda Galaxy.

Here’s a closeup of that section

And this is Cassiopeia Rising behind the tree in the backyard. This is one of my favorite constellations because it’s so bright, I could easily find it even from the light polluted city where I grew up!

So I was pretty happy with my results for my second night out with the new camera. There are a lot of techniques to use to get better shots of the night sky, many of which have to do with creative post-processing. I guess I’ll have to work on that next.

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Portrait Studio – blue backdrop

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, dave, jack, navi, pets1 Comment

Today I sewed together my blue backdrop and tried it out. I think I like it even better than the neutral/grey one.

(And Yes, Barclay is just as huggable as he looks!)

Only problem today was getting them up on the stand one at a time, because they were all clued into the fact that whoever is up there gets the most cookies!

So the other two got to practice down-stays while I worked with them one at a time. I need a wider bench for them to sit on, and try to get all three up there at once for a group photo!

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Portrait Studio

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, jack, navi, pets2 Comments

A friend who is involved with a local pit bull rescue, Diamond Cut Loyalty, invited me to come to a fundraiser they are having next weekend and take pictures for donations. So of course I said yes, because it’s a good cause and they are good people, and I LOVE to take pictures. However, I don’t have any proper portrait studio equipment, so I had to get something set up.

So I went to the fabric store and bought some neutral looking material. When I got it home I cut it and sewed it into one big piece. While measuring and cutting I had some ‘help’…

Thanks, guys!
I also went by Home Depot and got a couple clamp lights and some fluorescent ‘daylight’ bulbs. I wanted light I could leave on, but that wouldn’t get too hot.

This one is a single bulb for lighting up the backdrop.

This one has a splitter so there are two bulbs in it, for lighting up the subject.

And all together it looks like this:

And with the lights on and a willing participant (with the help of cookies), it looks like this:

And the first test shots look like this:

Couldn’t get Barclay to hold still!

I’m happy with the results so far, I just need to experiment more with positioning the light to see what works best, and I think moving the stool out farther from the backdrop so it will be a bit more out of focus. But a good start.

Update: A few more shots

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Barclay and the bird

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, mighty, petsLeave a comment

This morning the dogs alerted us to something exciting going on outside, and we looked out in the backyard to see Mighty slinking past the back door with a freshly caught bird in her mouth – one of those little purple swallows. Bad cat! We thought she was taking it to go eat it, but a few minutes later Barclay went trotting by with the bird in HIS mouth! Apparently the cat had brought it into the dog run, and Barclay took it.

So now Mr B was running around the house with a bird sticking out of his mouth. We conered him after a short chase, and I took him to the bathroom where we could discuss this without the other dogs involved. Dave brought in the best treat we had to offer – sandwich meat.

He held a big wad of sandwich meat in front of Barclay and said ‘Ok, Barclay, drop it and you can have this. Who wants some lunchmeat?’ and as if to say ‘I do!’ Barclay snatched the meat out of his hand – WITHOUT DROPPING THE BIRD! So now Barclay had a mouth full of lunchmeat and bird (which he was pretty happy about) Dave was standing there shocked and lucky to still have all his fingers, and I was laughing so hard I about fell over! Luckily when Dave offered him the rest of the lunchmeat, Barclay went ahead and dropped the bird so he could eat, and we snatched it away. Poor bird! But I’ll never forget Barclay snapping away that lunchmeat without giving up the prize he already had in his mouth – what a determined pup!

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Puppy-sitting!

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, jack, navi, pets2 Comments
We have company!
Yup, Sake and Sitka are back, so we now have FOUR ESKIMOS for a couple days – poor Jack is SO outnumbered!
Well, we know he really loves it!
Time for a water break!
Oh, Barclay’s got his eye on the next target!
Run, Navi! Barclay is going to get you!
She can protect herself!
 Sake gets into it by grabbing his brother by the tail!

I love this shot of Barclay.

And this one of Sake!

Sitka couldn’t hold still for pictures, he was too busy!
And off they go again!!
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Barclay, the great white shark

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, navi1 Comment

I was playing fetch with the dogs, when I held the ball over Barclay’s head and he gave me this hilareous look, with his eyes rolled back and his tounge lolling out to one side, and I thought – that would make an awesome picture, I’ll go get my camera!

Things are never that simple!
Ball thrower in one hand, camera in the other, ask Barclay to wait, navi is in the background doing that super loud, super high pitched bark which means THROW IT THROW IT THROW IT THROW IT!
** CRUNCH **
Drop it! Now, WAIT!…
** CRUNCH **
Now, wait…
** CRUNCH **
** CRUNCH **
** CRUNCH **
The picture I was trying to get?
Sorta like this…
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The Birds and The Bees

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay, navi, petsLeave a comment

Just having a little fun on a sunny morning, laying on my tummy in the grass taking pictures of the bees visiting the clover. Of course the dogs kept wandering by and interrupting the bees, or trying to eat them (now that would have been a great picture) or licking me on the head while I was busy looking through the camera, but it wouldn’t be the same without dogs helping, now would it 🙂

I took a LOT of shots, but none were quite what I was looking for. Bees have a tendancy to be facing the wrong way, or fly away just as you hit the shutter!

And with so many clover flowers, it’s hard to get the shot where you can make the bee stand out in the field.

This turned out to bee my favorite of the lot…

I got this shot of a rose, straight out of the camera without any messing with the colors – wow!

And our big locust tree against the cloudy sky.

And these tiny, tiny little flowers, hidden in the grass – these flowers are about a quarter inch across – so tiny!

Barclay, hanging out by the fence. They are so happy to have access to the backyard now that the blackberry vines are gone and I’m not as worried about coyotes hanging out back there, lying in wait.

Navi, digging a hole. She stuffs her face down in the hole and snorts 🙂

She’s happiest when she’s getting dirty!

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The Camas Camera Club

On By stefrobrtsIn barclay2 Comments

Last night I went to the first meeting of the Camas Camera Club. Camas is a small town about 15 miles south-east of here. It was held in the library. A friend of a friend started it, she’s a professional dog photographer, and my friends encouraged me to go. There were only five other people there, but it was the first meeting!

Everyone was supposed to bring two pictures, but I couldn’t decide and brought three.

It was fun to see the other pictures people brought. Some of them are quite accomplished professional photographers, people who have had exhibits, stuff like that. I think being able to learn techniques and get critiques from people who know more than I do will be good for improving my skills.

We started out with an assignment to come back next meeting with a new picture of an ‘interaction’ – our choice on how to interpret that. It has already energized my picture taking, I’m eager to get out there and try something!

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