I’ve just updated the wedding and portrait sections of my portfolio, so have a look!
Also, make sure to stop by and say hi this weekend at the San Antonio Wedding Fair at the Henry B. Gonzales Convention Center downtown! The show is on Sunday, June 28 from 12PM Noon – 5PM. If you haven’t got tickets already, get them online and save $3 per ticket!
Posted in Photoblog.
Just a quick note to say the portfolio has been updated in the portraits and artistic sections. Most notably, I’ve added some images from engagement and wedding shoots a couple of weeks ago in Oahu, Hawaii in the portraits section. The artistic section has a few new shots from a recent trip to Boston, Massachusetts. Enjoy!
Posted in Blog.
I haven’t had my 5D Mk II for very long, but since I started playing with the video mode I’ve been longing for more manual control. It only makes sense for a professional camera to have professional controls, after all, whether in still photography mode or video mode. Well, Canon has heard our prayers, and it’s just a week and a firmware update away.
The firmware update will be available for download on June 2, 2009:
http://web.canon.jp/imaging/eosd/firm-e/eos5dmk2/firmware.html
LONDON, UK, 27th May 2009: Canon announced today it will release a firmware update for the EOS 5D Mark II allowing users to manually control exposure when shooting video. The new firmware will be available for download from 2 June 2009 on Canon Europe’s support web site.
Following the launch of the EOS 5D Mark II in September 2008, Canon’s Research and Development team has listened closely to customer feedback to develop additions to the camera’s movie recording functionality.Allowing EOS 5D Mark II owners to achieve even more stunning video results with the camera, the firmware update will include the following manual controls when shooting video:
* Full aperture selection
* ISO speed: Auto, 100 – 6400 and H1
* Shutter speed: 1/30th – 1/4000th secondThe EOS 5D Mark II integrates full HD movie capability into a high-end 21.1 Megapixel camera; opening a multitude of new possibilities for photojournalists and news photographers. Since its launch the camera has proved its appeal to professionals working in diverse fields, from studio and wedding to nature and travel. Now, following customer feedback, Canon has improved functionality for professional video users, further unleashing the potential of the EOS 5D Mark II for cinematographers and photographers alike.
The firmware update will be available for download on June 2, 2009:
Click Here to Download Firmware Update
Posted in Tips & Tools.
Having just purchased a Canon G10 myself a week ago, I was none too pleased to learn of the following service notice. Luckily, my camera was already fixed at the factory before it shipped, as it has a marking on the inside battery cover on the lens side. See link for details.
To Owners of the PowerShot G10 digital camera
Thank you for using Canon products.
We have discovered that in rare instances, lines may appear in images captured by some units of the PowerShot G10 digital camera. Accordingly, we would like to convey the details and our service policy concerning this phenomenon.
We regret that some of our customers may have been inconvenienced by this issue and would like to offer our apologies to them. Canon will continue to strive to provide our customers with high quality products that they can use with confidence. Thank you for your kind understanding.
Affected Models
PowerShot G10Products with the following serial numbers are affected. Please check the serial number on the bottom of the camera to see if your camera is affected.
* Serial Numbers
Products whose fourth and fifth digits from the left indicate the following numbers may be affected.Example:
***50*****, ***51*****, ***52*****,
***53*****, ***80*****, ***81*****,
***82*****, ***83*****Among products with the serial numbers described above, if there is a marking on the lens side inside the battery cover like the one in the image below, the issue has already been corrected, and you may continue to use your camera as is with no further action required.
Posted in Blog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/2500s
You always hear about people in NYC owning telescopes so they can [creepily] look in the windows of buildings across the way. So just for kicks, one of the shots I was constantly on the lookout for was a through-the-window ‘gotcha’ moment. Nothing dirty… I mean, I don’t really know what I was expecting to catch, but every once in a while I had to remind myself to look up into the windows as I walked in the streets of NYC. Here’s one such moment. About half a second later, he closed the curtain. I don’t think he wanted to be my friend.
Processing doesn’t get much simpler than this one. My custom Lightroom preset, Grayscale, Punchy started things off, upped the exposure by about half a stop, and played with the tone curve a little.
(I love shooting with Canon’s 200mm f/2.8L by the way… wish I had more reasons to use it day-to-day.)
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/2000s
I don’t know if I’m alone in this or not, but I really find this shot interesting. The lines, the shapes, the textures, the tones… they all combine to make something special to me. And maybe it’s the little boy inside of me that sees these rooftops like some sort of cool urban tree-house. I’m also fascinated with ‘the city way of life,’ as I’ve mentioned several times before.
The view from my back porch is a large, open field. With cows. The visuals in the city… the simple things that New Yorkers probably don’t notice or appreciate in the same way as I do… are 180 degrees from what I’m used to. And that’s one of the things that I’m trying to capture in my photos of NYC. The essence of the city. The simple elements that help define its character.
In processing this shot, I started out with my custom Lightroom preset Grayscale, Punchy. From there, I adjusted the color temperature, exposure, contrast, clarity, black clipping, cropped in just a tiny bit, and finally I made some very minor exposure adjustments in key areas with brush strokes.
As a sidenote, I highly recommend experimenting with color temperature adjustments when working in grayscale if you’ve never done that before. It might seem counter-intuitive to adjust color temperature when you’re not working in color, but it actually makes a huge difference in the tones. You can really make extreme adjustments when you’re not working with a portrait, as well.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/160s
I enjoyed the way that the cook was partially obscured by the slight reflections in the kitchen window. Look closely and you might see yours truly.
Processing started out with my custom Lightroom preset, Sepia 2, then I adjusted the tone curve, cropped, added clarity, and brushed in some slight exposure adjustments to even out the tones on his shoulder.
Posted in Photoblog.
I just wanted to take a moment to apologize for not keeping up with my photo-of-the-day posts lately. I’ve been out of the office a lot recently and I’ve also been working very hard on a few things:
Any one of these things would be enough to keep me busy in addition to actually getting work done. But juggling all these things at the same time, you can probably understand my lack of energy to keep up with the POTD.
These things are all wrapping up soon, so I should get back on to schedule soon. Thanks for your patience!
In the meantime, here’s the newly designed logo. I wanted something very simple, understated, and easily adaptable to any medium, any color.
And a couple of the newly designed cards as well – a little background info: I’ve got 8 different versions of this card, each with a different photograph on the front and the name of that photo is referenced on the back of the card.
Note: I’ve since edited the email address in the business card, in case you’ve noticed my contact info is different than what’s in the design. 
Posted in Blog.
If you’ve got a Canon 5D Mk II, you’ll want to check out Adobe’s latest maintenance release for Photoshop Lightroom: Adobe Lightroom 2.3 (release candidate).
Working with Lightroom 2.3
* Mac: The Mac Lightroom 2.3 release candidate can be installed alongside Lightroom 2.2.
* Windows: By default, this Lightroom 2.3 release candidate will remove or overwrite your existing Lightroom 2.2 installation. If you wish to return to Lightroom 2.2 after installing Lightroom 2.3, simply reinstall Lightroom 2.2 from your original download after uninstalling Lightroom 2.3 using the Windows add/remove program utility.Both versions of the application share the same catalog format allowing your catalogs to be opened by either version without complications.
DownloadLightroom 2.3 Release Candidate for Macintosh and Windows.
Release Notes
The goal of this release is to address several bugs and provide additional camera raw support. A list of issues fixed in this release is included below:
Bugs – Fixed
* In the Windows 64-bit version of Lightroom an sFTP upload process could cause Lightroom to crash.
* Slideshows could return to the first image randomly during playback.
* A memory leak could cause Lightroom to crash while attempting to process files with local adjustments.
* Canon EOS 5D Mk II sRAW files could process with artifacts in Lightroom 2.2.
* Lightroom 2.2 could cause disc burning to fail for Windows customers.Camera Support
Newly supported camera models include:
* Nikon D3X
* Olympus E-30Additional Languages
Lightroom 2.3 now provides language support for the following additional languages:
* Chinese (Simplified)
* Chinese (Traditional)
* Dutch
* Italian
* Korean
* Portuguese (Brazilian)
* Spanish
* Swedish
Posted in Blog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/400s
I’m not exactly a proponent of smoking – cigarettes stink, and they will, slowly and painfully, kill you. Nonetheless, there’s just something about seeing someone puff on a cigarette when they’re all alone in the streets of the big city. Absolutely oblivious to the world around them as they indulge in their selfish little micro-suicidal pleasure.
This was one of those shots where I had an opportunity to look at my subject for more than a split second – by which I mean I had like 3-5 seconds to observe. It’s surprising the impressions (maybe they’re judgments) you can take away from such a brief encounter.
In this case, I got the impression that this guy has seen better times. I could only guess what the specific circumstances are, but that’s half the fun (sorry, street-smoker-guy).
Processing for this shot started out with my custom Lightroom preset Grayscale, Portrait 2. From there, it got a little more complicated. This was a VERY high contrast scene, so I had to do lot to keep shadow and highlight details in check throughout. So I proceeded by adjusting the color temperature and then tweaking each color in the grayscale mix. Then tweaking it some more. Then I adjusted the exposure and tint a bit, followed by another color temperature tweak. Some tone curve adjustments. I rounded things out with a bunch of brush strokes to adjust exposures (mainly bringing exposure down on the subject to pull in clipped highlights), and then cropped the image.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/6400s
As I’ve mentioned before, I traveled to NYC on this photo trip with some very specific ideas for images in my head. I knew there would be a lot of great opportunities I couldn’t possibly anticipate, but it really helps to be prepared.
This is one of those images I had in my head before the trip. Usually, the idea is loosely translated into the final image, simply because an opportunity will represent itself however it wants and you don’t get to pick placement of people/objects in candid street photography. But in this case, the end result is almost exactly what I’d imagined. Antonio was just in the right place at the right time for me.
To get this shot (and many others like it) I positioned myself on a street corner, leaning against the pole of a stoplight. In NYC, you’ll see a lot of interesting characters if you just chill on a street corner for a while. I mean, you can run about the city like a maniac chasing down interesting subjects if you like, but it’s much more enjoyable, and relaxing, doing it my way. And it gives you time to compose your shot carefully and anticipate the subject’s movement as they walk towards you on the street.
Processing, as usual, was done completely in Lightroom. I started out with my custom Lightroom preset, Grayscale, Portrait 2. (I’ll make this preset available for download soon.) I then added a graduated filter to increase exposure in the top of the frame, tweaked the grayscale mix, and then I brushed in exposure adjustments on the subject and the background for visual separation.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/1250s
I was lucky enough to catch this courier just as he was putting on his helmet to make some more deliveries on his little Yamaha Riva scooter. Right before I clicked the shutter for this one, I chuckled to myself at the thought of Eddie Izzard (comedian) and the way he says ‘Ciao’ – which happens to be my informal title for this one.
Processing began with my custom Lightroom preset, Grayscale, Portrait 2 and then I proceeded to crop at an 8×10 ratio rather than a 2×3 ratio to get a bit closer and lose some empty, boring space. I used some brush strokes to add in some Clarity for better contrast in the midtones of the subject, and then I added just a little bit of sharpening.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 640, 1/320s
I’m really torn on this image. On the one hand, I do really like the composition, timing, subjects, lines, etc… The original intention for this image as I was shooting it was to focus very sharply on the brick wall, for the texture. I wanted the texture / shape to be eye-catching and then for the figures to keep your eyes busy after that initial glance. I knew there would be compression from the 200mm lens, of course, and I wanted it, but part of me can’t help but wish that both people were of similar sharpness. But then again, the woman is the more interesting of the two, so it makes sense in a way for the woman to be more sharply in focus. The man being sharply in focus as well would probably actually make this a less interesting image.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this image – leave a comment and tell me what you think.
Processing began with my custom Lightroom preset Grayscale, Portrait 2. Next, I played with the color temperature of the image, added some highlight recovery, brushed in some clarity on everything but the man (it would produce an unsightly dark halo around him), adjusted black clipping to reign in shadow detail, removed the vignette, and finally increased the exposure a bit for a better balanced image.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 200mm f/2.8L II
@ 200mm, f/2.8, ISO 400, 1/320s
This woman caught my interest because she just had this intense, hardened New Yorker feel about her. She was so focused on whatever it was on her mind that I don’t think she even noticed I was there.
Processing started with my custom Lightroom preset Grayscale, Portrait 2 and then I adjusted exposure, tweaked the grayscale mix for the best tonality, and finally some exposure adjustment brush strokes around the face to tone down some highlights just slightly.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 50mm f/1.4
@ 50mm, f/1.8, ISO 100, 1/1250s
Walking around the streets of New York City, I happened to round a corner as this construction worker was about to enjoy himself a smoke-break. I thought the truck made an interesting background, while also providing some nice leading lines. It was important to me that I not attract his attention – I wanted this to be a true candid, and I accomplished that.
One of the key components of my NYC series is to capture regular New Yorkers living their lives just the way they do every day. I’m trying to make it beautiful in the process, of course, but at the heart of it, I just love NYC and I want to share its essence with the world.
Processing of this photo started out with my custom Lightroom preset, Grayscale, Punchy Portrait. From there, I cropped tighter, adjusted contrast and black clipping, then tweaked the grayscale mix color-by-color to get the best tonal range and contrast without sacrificing highlight or shadow details too much. Then I added many, many brush strokes to adjust exposure further, particularly in the shadows and highlights (effectively, dodging and burning in Lightroom). Finally, I threw a little Clarity into the mix for improved microcontrast in the midtones.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 50mm f/1.4
@ 50mm, f/1.8, ISO 100, 1/60s
One of the things I love about NYC is that you can walk places. Whether you need a coffee shop, deli, grocery store, or even a laundromat, chances are you can find what you’re looking for just around the corner. Now, I’m sure this is a novelty that would soon wear off if I actually lived in NYC, but coming from San Antonio, TX it’s refreshing. I’m used to driving absolutely everywhere; seeing huge parking lots and wasted space aplenty.
This image, for me, is a simplified illustration of the New York lifestyle.
Processing was a little more in-depth than usual in order to control tones, reign in highlights, etc… I started things off with my custom Lightroom preset, Grayscale, Portrait 2. Next, I tweaked the grayscale mix to control contrast without losing critical detail in certain areas of the image. Finally, with a series of brush strokes, I increased exposure as needed in clipping shadows and pulled back exposure in clipping highlights.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 50mm f/1.4
@ 50mm, f/1.8, ISO 100, 1/2500s
I imagine these women were on their way to enjoy a late breakfast – I like the feeling of companionship implied in this image. I get the sense that these women are great friends, and have been for a long time; like this is something special they do daily.
Processing was kept to a minimum because I loved the shot right out of the camera. I applied my custom Lightroom preset Grayscale, Punchy, and then I adjusted the black clipping levels. That’s it.
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 300mm f/4L IS
@ 300mm, f/4, ISO 3200, 1/60s
After a long day of taking photos in and around Central Park, I finished up with a stroll through the Mall at Central Park (not a shopping mall, the Mall). There was a couple holding hands, walking in the lamplight that looked like a scene straight out of a romance flick, so I couldn’t help but wait for them to pass. It’s not a perfect shot, and it may even be a little noisy (it was getting dark!), but I think it’s iconic.
Processing took a lot of steps, all in Lightroom, getting the tone curve just right, using the dust-spot removal tool to get rid of distractions, using gradient masks to alter exposure levels on the sides of the photo, slight cropping, color temperature adjustments, black clipping adjustments, etc…
Posted in Photoblog.
Shot with Canon 5D, 300mm f/4L IS
@ 300mm, f/4, ISO 100, 1/8s
Bethesda Fountain is such a beautiful landmark in Central Park that I really wanted to capture a little slice of it that I haven’t really seen before. To separate the fountain from the background I used my 300mm lens at the widest aperture for pleasing background blur. I had my tripod with me so I was able to drag the shutter a little for the sake of capturing the water in motion.
Processing started with my custom Lightroom preset Grayscale, Punchy. Then I cropped in a bit and rotated to straighten verticals. Next, I adjusted the color temperature to better bring out details in the foliage and statue. Finally, I brushed in some exposure adjustments to give better focus to the image and used a cloning brush to remove some distracting reflections in the water at the bottom of the image, etc…
Posted in Photoblog.
I’d like to apologize – I’ve been falling behind on my photo-of-the-day posts as I focus on finishing my portfolio and filling out and getting my print studio ready. It’s not really an excuse for my lack of posting, it’s just that I’ve been distracted. I’ll try to get back on schedule.
Posted in Blog.
