I convinced my youngest daughter to sit for me for a few minutes. I mostly wanted to try to capture her eye color but I really liked how she looked in this one. It seems to capture who she is.

Strobist: One strobe at 1/4 power bounced into a silver umbrella at camera right.

365.17 Frustration, originally uploaded by headcase.

I getting so frustrated with myself lately. I have barely given photography and lighting (more so lighting) the time or attention it deserves. I feel like at the rate I’m going, I’m never going to “get it”. I’m also totally frustrated with the poor-man’s setup I’ve got going. Sheets and tablecloths will only get me so far, and there are precious few places for me to take a picture that doesn’t reveal the barely contained toy chaos that seems to sprout in every room in the house.

Not to mention how much I’m disliking my portraits lately. I have such a serious expression in most of them because I think I look like a total goober when I smile. That and the camera is unforgiving. Some of my photos reveal the subtle signs of aging that I never noticed. The gray hairs, the crow’s feet starting to appear. It’s giving my photoshop chops a workout. Usually I fart around trying to fix a few things and then usually scrap that and go with the original, even though I’m not entirely pleased with the dark circles (which I can’t seem to fix with makeup OR photoshop). Seriously, I think I’m going to be doing a few DIY projects in the next week or so, just so I have an easier time working with the single strobe I own. I want to put some foam-core on one side for fill, however I have no where to put it and nothing to hold it. It’s cramping my already limited options.

I’m starting a list of possible photo ideas (not just self-portrait either).  Some may pan out, some may not, but I won’t know until I try.  I need to start exploring outside of my comfort zone.  Any tips or advice anyone can share as to how I can do that?

365.16, originally uploaded by headcase.

I’m getting seriously frustrated with my lack of gear. I’m starting to think I need at least one more strobe and a few stands to hold reflectors, etc. Maybe a trip to the pvc aisle in Home Depot is in order soon.

Strobist: One strobe camera right near the ceiling, 1/2 power through a “softbox” (my macro studio cube).

I hate that the background is wrinkled.

I haven’t been able to spend the time I’d like on lighting techniques or photography in general. One of the things I need to do is take my camera with me everywhere. Already I’ve seen a few things that I wanted to shoot and realized that I was out of luck because my camera was sitting at home on my dining room table. I threw together a few shots today just to keep my feet in the water. I think they can be improved, but I’m not interested in staying up until midnight to figure it out. I’m hoping to devote more time in the coming weeks to taking photos.

Strobist: One strobe at 1/16 power to right of balls and slightly above. Shot through white fabric to soften and white foam-core on right to bounce the light back.

This is a cup and saucer set that was my grandmothers.  I was looking for something to shoot and my eyes landed on this.

Strobist: Strobe through side of macro studio at 1/16 power just above the base. I wanted to try to get some of the detail to pop out.

Sort of a strange title considering I don’t post a self-portrait every day.  I took this in the foyer.  I figured it was time for a daytime shot with something other than a black background behind me.

Strobist: Ambient light coming in from rear camera left. Flash at 1/4 power through softbox (ok, really it’s my macro studio box over the flash) from camera right.

Our magnolias are blooming, the first sure sign of spring.  I had to capture them before I missed my opportunity.

Strobist:  Vivitar 285HV at 45 degrees behind the flowers at 1/4 power (I think)

Here’s my self-portrait for the day. I’m feeling especially strong and good about myself after a fantastic lesson in tae kwon do.

Strobist: One Vivitar 285HV fired from directly above at 1/16 power. I tried to soften it by shooting it through a few layers of tracing paper. I really need to get a softbox and/or white umbrella, ya think? Sent through PS to black out the background.

Strobist: Nuked with one Vivitar 285HV at 1/16 power placed slightly behind and level with the flower about 3 feet away. Sharpened slightly in photoshop, and fixed the background. It was a velour type material and the light raked it badly.

This was mostly an experiment to try to get the best focus and sharpness out of my kit lens. I’ve been struggling with finding the sweet spot, and I realized that I’m going to have to do a little sharpening in PS to get the results I’m looking for.

Given that I managed to get back into the 365days thing, I thought I would do a more arty type self-portrait.

I’m sitting on the floor with black foam-core behind me. I have one Vivitar 385HV strobe shooting at 1/16 power through a snoot a bit in front of and to the right of the camera, mounted about 4.5 feet high. I did some PS work to get rid of blemishes and try to tone down the shine. I tried using a reflector to bounce light back at me to give me some separation from the background, but either I couldn’t get the angle right, or I really need another light/flash in order to accomplish this.

Yesterday, I suddenly remembered that I have a Canon Elan film SLR around the house. I dug it out and lo and behold there is a 28-90mm lens on it. A kit lens sure, but it’s another lens I can use for my Rebel.

Then today, I was cleaning out my bookshelves and…what’s this I found? Oh, it’s Adobe Photoshop CS2! Given that I was running PS 6 (and CS2 is equivalent to 9.0 I believe) this was a spectacular find. I can only think that I bought it either right before or right after we moved two years ago and promptly tucked it away and forgot about it. And earlier I was bemoaning not having the new healing brush, among other things.

To put the cherry on top, my daughter found $20 in the back yard. Tomorrow maybe I should play the lottery.