by successfulbob | Lumix GH4, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, photography education, photoshop tutorial
Sound Bites Grill hosted Daniel and the Lion in the show lounge last Tuesday for Dance Night. There were quite a few people out on the dance floor and I’m pretty sure I heard talk of them coming back for another performance. Make sure you watch out for it if you are in the Sedona, AZ area! Or check their web site for other dates. BTW they are opening for the Counting Crows this summer.
If you follow my blog you know I create art images of the performers at Sound Bites Grill here in Sedona. Here is the image that made it to the ‘Wall of Fame’…
I capture all the musicians individually and try to get their personality worked into the photo.
The individual musicians are selected in Adobe Photoshop then composed into the art piece adding drop shadows and others effects. Different texture images are also layered over the master with different Blend Modes applied. The signatures are done with black Sharpie on white paper. Then the signatures are scanned and laid out individually. I Invert the color and change the Blend Mode to Screen and the black disappears leaving just the autograph.
This is more of a straight capture of the performance of the band. Lumix Vario lens 12-35mm settings 15mm f2.8 1/30th sec at 3200 ISO
I’m using the Lumix GH4 which makes it easier to capture the large range of lighting that occurs in a live venue using LED lighting. This is a single capture. The image was then taken in to Adobe Camera RAW. Highlight slider was brought down to tame the blown out areas and the shadows slider was brought up to bring some detail out of the darker areas. This camera has a tremendous density range. If I was going to really work this image to control the light even more I would have blended bracketed photos together for even more range of density. It is very possible to accomplish this in one capture because the camera shoots at 12 frames a second and can bracket up to seven stops of light with one push button of the shutter.
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | Lumix GH4, Lumix Lounge, photography, photography education, photoshop tutorial, video
Finally started playing with the 4K video capture to make still images on my Lumix GH4.
Why would you want to do that? Well having access to 30 fps images allows you to capture micro expressions during a fast moving shoot of a baby or if you want a photo from a video you made and couldn’t grab stills from. I didn’t realize how useful this could be until I started trying to photograph hummingbirds at the new feeder my wife put up. This is a pretty good image that will print fairly large. If you are using the entire frame you can grab an eight megapixel image from 4K video.
After grabbing the Frame for the video I opened the file in Adobe Camera Raw so I could use those controls by highlighting the image in Adobe Bridge and hitting Cmd R (Cntrl R for PC users). After some additional adjustments for color and sharpness and removing the bird feeder in Adobe Photoshop here’s the still photo result.
This image came in at 15 MB after cropping. Depending on the output media this could easily make a 20 inch or larger print.
Here’s the video.
YouTube Video on the original 4K video capture.
I’m thinking that his has more applications than I originally thought. When I first heard about this idea I was thinking there’s no way I’d want to dig through that many images for an expression or specific moment. Found out it wasn’t that hard stepping through the frames in Adobe’s Premeire Pro CC.
The photography landscape is changing as the lines between video and still capture get closer together.
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | photography, photography - art quote
It’s my opinion that having fun has a lot to do with being creative. If you are mentally constipated because you are taking things way too serious you are not leaving room in your little grey cells for happenstance and that makes for less than original work.
Today’s quote comes from Comedian Jerry Seinfeld and gives you some thoughts on how to live life. I do not recommend this all the time or you may end up in an early grave like writer Hunter S. Thompson. I suggest at least you give it a shot at least once a week.
Life is truly a ride. We’re all strapped in and no one can stop it… I think the most you can hope for at the end of life is that your hair’s messed up, you’re out of breath, and you didn’t throw up.” Jerry Seinfeld
While researching a bit for Jerry Seinfeld information I came across this Leadership blog by Kevin Kenberry on what it takes to be successful. Take a look I think you’ll like it. http://blog.kevineikenberry.com/leadership-supervisory-skills/what-leaders-can-learn-from-jerry-seinfeld/
Here’s a bonus quote from a very successful, and one of my favorite actors, Alan Alda, “Be brave enough to live life creatively. The creative place where no one else has ever been.“
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | Lumix GH4, people photography, photography, photography education
On the riverboat cruise at the TNPPA Convention last week I happened across these blue eyes of a child sitting on his father’s lap. I was breaking in my use of a new lens to me, the Lumix G Leica DG NOCTICRON 42.5mm/F1.2 Lens. It is a sweet piece of glass. Enjoying the shallow Depth of Field These images are pretty much straight out of the Lumix GH4 camera with a small exposure adjustment. Be aware of beautiful light moments with wonderful subjects… But remember to ask if it’s OK to make the image.
Dad’s blue shirt and his plain grey shirt along with the tight crop allow his eyes to take center stage.
He was getting a bit of extra direction from grandpa and others so we started to loose expression but I still think it’s cute.
He was very cooperative but I’ll bet he was a bit on the tired side. He enjoyed seeing his photos on the back of the camera.Yours in Photography, BobPS I’ve lost my formatting on the upgrade to the latest version of WP. I’ll work on getting the old look back ASAP.
by successfulbob | graphic design, people photography, photography, photography education, photoshop tutorial
Pierre Stephenson was presenting a program on photographing underwater portraits. So being the shy guy that I am I asked if he could grab one of me cause I was looking for something different… And boy did I get that.
Pierre immediately said, “Yeah that would be great! I see you in a cross legged Buddha pose.” I’m all over it so off to the pool we go…
Because it was very hard to hold position this is two combined photos. One for the legs and lower half of the body and one for the upper half and reflection. Image © Pierre Stephenson used with permission.
When I showed Pierre the image (he gave me the files to play with) He said, “Wouldn’t it be cool if you were in a grotto?” I remembered a photo in my files of a set of arches from a shoot in Tuscany and started work blending it into the underwater photo image.
Added the ‘Grotto-ish’ background using masks and blend modes in Adobe Photoshop.
With a bit more Adobe Photoshop tweaking and color work this is pretty close…
This is a case of playing with an idea and developing it through playing with ideas. Is this complete? Not yet. It needs some refining as most of this was done on small files with very quick selections. I’m going to check in and see if Pierre likes the direction I hope he likes it…
Yours in Photography, Bob
