New born baby portraits are some of my favorite images to make.  I’m not talking about posed studio infant portraits, I’m talking about in the hospital new born photographs.  They are the most precious things on the planet and I can not get over the tiny little fingers that work just like big fingers.  Sebastian is an alert little baby with a lot of strength, and he loved the camera.  Here are just a few shots from the hospital.  More to come later, slideshow and all…

I told you, I have been very fortunate lately.  My infant portrait sessions have been wonderful, all of the kids have been very calm and cooperative.  This one was kind of a reunion, I shot child life portraits of big brother a few years back, so it was fun to see him again.  He has grown so much and of course, I am sure he didn’t remember me, but we told him he did, and he at least pretended to remember me, so I felt good about that.

Here is the slideshow and a few examples of my favorite images from the infant portrait session.

I love watching the relationships between an infant and their older siblings.

Dad’s initials are the same as the infant’s initials.  This is dad’s cuff link.  It was a spur of the moment idea on dad’s part.  I liked the way it turned out.

This was a cute little blanket with a teddy bear head at the top.  A great photo to start a baby book, I thought.

Great-grandpa made the rocking-horse in the background.  This is the reason I advocate going into the baby’s space rather than going into a studio to photograph an infant portrait.  There are so many very important things that are missed.  I am always going to take important historical significance over cute portraits any day.

As I was photographing the baby on the floor, I noticed that dad was looking in with interest.  So I changed my angle and asked mom to join.  This to me is the perfect little story.

Here is great-grandpa with the boys and their respective rocking horses, both made by his hands.  I can’t think of a more important photo that I took that day.

This one speaks for itself.

Big brother was getting a bit bored of the photoshoot, so I took a few minutes to goof around with him and do something he thought was super fun.  When I suggested he climb into a pile of his stuffed animals, his eyes lit up.  I don’t think his parents knew about this photo at the time, I think it is a surprise for them.  I think they will like it.

Random hats came out.  I though this one was a winner.

There is always the photos of the small little hands contrasted with the parent’s hands, but I like to push the limits of that photo and get something a little different with some unique framing and compositions.  This requires a lot of attempts with a large number of failures because the baby is often moving a lightning speeds, but there are always some successes.

I had to wait for the crying with this little guy as well.  He was such a pleasant little baby.  But I think I got a good one.

As we wrapped up the evening portrait session, the family started winding down and turned on the FOX News Network.  Big brother (only 4 or 5) was completely engrossed in whatever Bill O’Reilly was saying.  There’s a future politician for you.

And I couldn’t have asked for a better wrap up photo than this one.  Great-grandpa and great-grandma relaxing with the baby.  You couldn’t get this photo in a studio, no matter how much planning you did.   Studios are great for formulaic portraits and perfect lighting, but they don’t lend themselves to capturing life.  And as Henri Cartier-Bresson said, ”photography is nothing, it’s life that interests me.”

It is always a blast shooting Kevin Burdick (www.pianorockstar.com).  He’s wildly expressive, has no inhibitions and is just an all around great guy.  And I’m not just saying that.  We’ve been friends since high school, made music together then and even some very screwy home movies and music videos.  One of them included a scene that almost resulted in Kevin’s death, but instead, thanks to Kevin’s strong neck muscles, and our quick response, we ended up only with a massive rope burn around his neck.  Come to think of it, I think we continued filming for a while before we realized he was in trouble.  Flailing legs and a red face can either mean great acting, or eminent death…

I’m glad he’s still with us.  He has made some great music since then and he’s always been a great friend.

So, this is a fun little set of images to wet your whistle.  We first shot a few studio shots and Kevin went to town with the facial expressions.  The best way to see them is in connection with each other.  Tomorrow I am posting the fantastic images we got from the on-location portrait session, which include Kevin, various umbrellas, lots of wind and a vast empty landscape.  Until then, enjoy this funny little set of photos and go listen to some of Kevin’s music at www.pianorockstar.com.

Think snap shot.  Think completely auto exposure.  Not 3200 ISO, not 6400 ISO, but 12,800 ISO.  Here’s what I would expect:

First, this shot is a problematic one for an auto exposure.  It is 100% back lit and as a result, most cameras are fooled into believing that the brighter light is the primary exposure, so the face (the only truly important element in this photo) would be underexposed.  But without any forethought or exposure compensation, the Canon Mark IV nailed the exposure.  The face was exposed perfectly and the highlight on the side of the face didn’t even blow out, and this was a JPG, not a RAW.  I would anticipate even more latitude from a RAW shot.  My first auto exposure expereince with the camera was a very good one.  The camera made all the right decisions and maintained information in every important highlight and every important shadow.  We’ll see how it performs over time, but this was a problematic situation and it got it right.

Furthermore, I would like to point out that at ISO 12800, I was able to shoot an indoor photo with a small 40 watt lamp as a back light with no other lighting and get a nice little snap shot.  1/80 sec shutter speed (fast enough for a 50mm lens) and f2.5.  Any other camera in my bag can’t get that done at those settings.

Second, at an extreamly high ISO, bulky grain structures that would soften the photograph and disrupt the thin lines of an eye-lash or other fine details.  Thus making a sharp focus look soft.  But the Canon Mark IV has a pretty fine grain structure at 12,800 ISO.  Notice in the detail below, the eyelashes are indeed sharp and do not look fuzzy like they might on a 5D Mark II at 6400 ISO.  This is due to what appears to be a much finer grain structure, which describes these fine details far more accurately.

I would also expect major color noise.  In fact, my 5D Mark II at 6400 ISO is always turned to balck and white.  They look nice, but color is problematic.  In fact, as you can see, I initially turned the photo to black and white to avoid color noise.  But again, I was pleasantly surprised at the lack of color noise.  You will recall yesterday’s post, I was impressed with the color noise of the lower ISO settings.  Now I am really impressed.  Using the default color noise suppression settings in Lightroom of 25,  I got absolutely no color noise at 12800 ISO.  This means that I can use this camera at every ISO setting in color or black and white.

I have to admit, I am thrilled so far with the camera.  The lack of color noise and the fine grain structure at even the very highest ISO settings is just short of miraculous.  I’ll be tracking a bunch of moving children with auto focus tomorrow.  We’ll see how it reacts to that rigorous test.  For that matter, we’ll see how I react to that rigorous test…

I went out with Bill K., a previous student of mine to shoot some portraits of Tayler.  It was a fun morning and we got some nice shots.  The entire shoot was done south of Chandler, Arizona.  This area is filled with farmland and this month, we were fortunate enough to have a few fields of wheat.  When we decided to do the shoot, I knew we had to do it here because Tayler’s hair and skin tone are both perfect for the setting.

The Farmlands south of Phoenix, Arizona make a great backdrop for Tayler and her golden hair.

Tayler's hair reacts perfectly to the sun, but that powerful hair light can be a challenge as well. The last thing I want is a blown out highlight in that angel hair.

Eyes, lips, curls... nothing else mattered in this photograph.

Just a quick thought about exposing in the harsh sunlight of Phoenix, Arizona. There is almost no place like Phoenix on the planet. The hot, dry desert climate tests your skills as a photographer.  On a cloudless day (which is the majority of our days) there is nothing to soften the light of the sun and without humidity, there is very little in the atmosphere to refract the light, so we in the desert, are challenged to find ways to equalize the light.  One of the simplest ways to remove the harsh shadows from the subject’s face is to turn them away from the sun’s light.  In the shadow of their own body, there are no harsh shadows.  Just the expansive soft light from the opposite side of the sky.  However, just turning the subject is not enough.  Without some additional light source, the shadow side of the model’s body would be extremely dark and by exposing for her face, I would have to completely over expose the background.  So I must expose for the background and then light the subject with either a flash or a reflector and since I would prefer not to blind her with a reflector, I chose a flash.  But on-camera flash would flatten out the face and body, so in order to avoid the obvious flashed look, I took the flash off camera with Pocket Wizard’s new TTL System.  By using the Pocket Wizard, I am able to allow the camera and flash to work together to determine the proper amount of flash (with some flash exposure compensation on my part -2/3) for the subject, while my only manual exposure concern is the background.  My assistant holds the flash off to my right at about a 45 degree angle to the model, which helps to give her more volume than we would have gotten from an obvious on camera fill flash.  Direct on camera flash is almost always the worst form of light one can use to light any subject.  Look for ways to get that flash off o f the camera, or avoid using it all together.

There aren’t any perfect Wireless TTL systems out there yet.  But I think that Pocket WIzard is the closest to getting it right.  We’ll see how things improve as time passes.

In this image, Tayler is backlit by a very hot and bright morning sun. Exposing for the background puts her in a very dark shadow, making the image unusable. But with the help of off camera TTL technology from Pocket Wizard, both she and the background are just right.

Being able to find a small country road in the middle of the sixth largest city in the US is one of the reasons I love Phoenix, Arizona. We have such a great variety of locations in this state, the possibilities are endless.

During the photo shoot, I am often looking those natural moments between the poses. This image is one of my favorites from the shoot.

And sometimes, no matter how harsh the desert sun happens to be, soft light is still available in the subjects own shadow.

Im not sure what it says about me, but solitude attracts me to an image like nothing else does.

My good friend, Kevin Burdick, lives in Los Angeles.  I was out in LA to shoot a baby portrait and stopped in to see him.  Kevin is a musician and lives with a bunch of talented people.  Tim Nichols (another friend from my college days) is a screen writer and Dale Spollett (who I met that day) is a comedian.  So, you can imagine that this group of guys will do anything to ham it up in front of a camera.  I had my camera, so what else would a photographer and three attention grabbing performers do…

Writer - Tim Nichols, Comedian - Dale Spollett and Musician - Kevin Burdick pose for a photo outside the workshop at their Los Angeles estate.

Always looking for textures, lines, frames and interesting settings, this workshop in the Tim’s back yard caught my eye.  Everywhere you look there is something interesting.  Tim is framed nicely in the door, notice a saw blade hanging above his head, just for a little added interest.  I love the white paint that has been tested on the left, but never finished.  And the rakes, ladders and barrels leaning against the wall are very useful in adding angles, leading lines and additional frame edges.  It is also worth noting the way the frame interacts closely, but not too closely to all of these objects in the photograph.  You can make this set up!  Truth is better than fiction…

Kevin Burdick and Dale Spollett in a loose tribute to American Gothic...

Dale Spollett in the moment. Dale is, himself, and interesting set of textures.

I love the way the barn fades as it recesses into the background. Who would think we are in LA?

Photographing a group of creative performers is an a completely different animal all together.  No longer, are you attempting to pull expressions out of your subject, but rather you gear up and hang on for the ride.  They move through ideas, expressions and moments pretty fast.  Some of it works, some of it doesn’t, but you just have to be ready to capture it all.

Dave Spollett waits for his food at the California Chicken Company. It was a crowded place. "They'll find us," he says.