Into the Blue (Westy 52)

Hi all - A little early this week, but I have a busy weekend ahead, so thought I would get the shot 'in the bag'.

The shot is very simple to set-up:

A baking tray filled with water, with a bag suspended above it, dripping water (in this case, with red food colouring in it).

Manual focus on the 'splash area'.

The shot is lit from the back, by firing a single flash onto the white backdrop.

The blue tint to the water is simply achieved by setting the WB on the camera to tungsten.

It takes lots of trial and error, but occasionally, you get a really nice shot!

SB-900, D300 + 105 2.8 Macro.

Second this time

Another shot of mine was voted second in Kate Day's Telegraph blog last week.

The shot was taken at Woburn Safari park, during the Birds in Action display.

Kate runs a photo competition every week - The quality of entries is usually excellent.

The link to Kate's site is: Here

The full size Parrot image is viewable on my Flickr site, by clicking on the image below:

Beauty (it's a Beast)

Really pleased with the Mac Pro now.

It has taken me 10 days or so to get it set-up as I would like.

The set-up now is:

• MacPro (2.66 GHz Quad-Core)
• 6 GB DDR3 Ram
• 640GB internal HD
• 500Gb internal mirror HD
• drobo (2 TB)
• 24" Samsung 2443BW Monitor
• 20" Apple Cinema Display
  
• Airport + Bluetooth Card

Simply amazing performance - Aperture and FCP Studio 2 just fly.

I am considering a Canon MP980 printer to replace the ip5000 - But that may have to wait another month.

Can't catch me

G9 for this image - Loved the lighting caused by the holes in the tunnel that Megan was crawling through.

Perfectly (bit of a fluke!) matched to the soles of her sandles.

Trial from Blogo

New version of Blogo to update my weekly Westy 52 Postings.

Blogo for Mac

Hands Up (Westy 52)

Hands Up
Originally uploaded by Westy Photography

A macro image this week (still playing with the tripod).

Natural light, taken with the Sigma 105 f2.8 (my only 'non-Nikon' lens).

Really like the background tones created by the Bokeh from the Sigma.

Piin-sharp focus achieved by manually focussing (check out the dust on his helmet - Loads of detail).

Wrong side of the lens (Westy 52)

Wrong side of the lens
Originally uploaded by Westy Photography

Yes, another portrait, but a VERY rare one!

Taken with the SB-800 and Ezybox again - (D300 + 85 1.4).

Thought I would try out the new tripod, and the usual models are getting a bit bored of posing, so had to use the self timer too!

Converted to B&W with Silver Efex Pro directly from Aperture.

Me and My 'Yoyo' (Westy 52)

Me and My 'Yoyo'
Originally uploaded by Westy Photography

Back to the portraits this week (although another Motorsport images was a VERY close second!)

I chose this image for two reasons;

1. It was my first real 'play' with the Ezybox softbox + SB800.

Believe it or not this was taken with a just one single flash.

2. I wanted to try out the Crimson paper background - I think it really compliments the pink in the image.

The Ezy box is a great tool - Brilliant value for money. Check the lovely catch-light in Megan's eyes.

As usual, the shot was taken with the D300 + 85 1.4 (my 'standard' portrait set-up now).

R8 GT3 (Westy 52)

R8 GT3
Originally uploaded by Westy Photography

This weeks image may not seem very creative, however it is probably technically the toughest shot so far.

Taken with D200 + 18-200vr (hardly my choice for motorsport, but it was all I had with me!).

I pre-focused on the racing line, and followed the car out of the corner, shooting when it was in the centre of the frame.

The key to this image is a slow (ish) shutter speed (1/200 in this case) to blur the background and wheels whilst keeping the car as sharp as possible.

The panning technique does require practise, but gives a great feeling of speed in a still image.

Really pleased with the result.