An Addition to the Family

Canon 7D, Raw, EF-S17-55, 33mm, f/11.0, 1/20, ISO 2000

Well, here is Lily meeting her new baby brother Ian, and vice versa of course.  He was really staring at her. She seemed to like him too. It’s an adjustment for all of them. I asked Shelley the other day if it was easier with Ian this time around. She said with him, yes, but Lily is another factor thrown in. They are all awake at night a lot, but they also couldn’t be happier. We took some newborn photos at their home on Saturday and will do a lot more Christmas morning. I will be sharing more with you. I didn’t do much to this photo:  a little white balance adjustment, noise reduction and a small curves adjustment to make sure all is right.

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Miss Lily at 19 Months Old

Canon 7D, Raw, EF-S17-55mm, 48mm, f/4.0, 1/200, 100 ISO

As you can see, she is really growing up. I was watching her play the other day and she does so much now. She climbs up on her little slide by herself and her feet even touch the ground when she sits in her little plastic chair! I liked this photo of her because you can see some of her little razor-sharp teeth and she is looking at the camera with a smile on her face. I brought the photo into camera raw and made a few adjustments. Then in Photoshop, I did a levels adjustment so the colors would pop. The biggest thing I did was crop it so she is at one side of the image. This looks much better than her being centered. What is she going to think of her new brother Ian coming in December? Please leave a comment and let me know what you think!

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The Pink Rose

 

I took this photograph at Larry and Shelley’s house. Actually, I took it with my cellphone . I believe this is the first image I have used from my phone. I wasn’t quite sure what to do with the resolution. I am not real happy with the way this looks so I may work on it later. (Update: I did change it and it looks a lot better, it is just rather small compared to my other photos). It has been several months since I posted and now that the weather is warm, I will work on doing more.  I downloaded the image using Adobe Bridge into camera raw where I increased the vibrance and lowered the exposure a little. Then took it into Photoshop and cropped it. Usually I show my metadata in the caption under the photo, but I really don’t have any to share today. I will give this a tag of Blackberry 9530, but that is all I have to report!

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In Her Pretty Red Skirt

Canon 7D, Raw, EFS 17-55 mm, 55 mm, f/4.0, 1/640, ISO 2000

I took this photo of Lily in her pretty red skirt. It kind of looks like a tutu, don’t you think? Maybe she will start dance lessons soon! You can see some of the other photos here. The skirt is a tulle fabic with hearts and a satin lining – very nice. She is looking at Papi (Willie) here and she absolutely adores him. I would say it is very mutual. I took these without a flash so I had to use a high ISO. It produced a lot of grain/noise. I was able to run my anti-noise software and take care of that. I also did a levels adjustment and a slight curves tweak in Photoshop. I am getting positive feedback regarding my senior portrait photos, but so far no new orders. Maybe it is too late in the school year. Well, I will be getting out soon to take more photos. Willie thinks I should go back to doing one a day. Now that Spring is here and the weather will be getting better, that is probably a good idea.

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Miss Lily’s 1st Birthday Party

Canon 7D, Raw, f/7.1, 1/60, EF-S17-55mm, 51mm

I cannot believe how fast the first year of this little one’s life went! She enjoyed her first ever cake and ice cream, as you can tell by the photo. I didn’t really need to do anything to this photo; this is how it came straight out of the camera. With such a beautiful subject, how can one go wrong! There are some more birthday photos here. This was on Saturday at her parent’s house. The next day we met down at the Huntington Beach Pier where there was a kite competition going on. It was kind of interesting and there were a lot of people there. You will see a few photos of Lily and Larry and Shelley there.  I also took the panorama that is at the top of this page that day. It was a beautiful week-end in Huntington Beach!

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The Youngest Piano Protege

Canon 7D, Raw, EF-S17-55mm, 28mm, f/2.8, 1/125, ISO 320

My son took lessons on this piano for nine years. This past week it was moved over to his house. I sure hope Lily wants to take lessons. You can see how much fun she is having. I watched her carefully so she would not pull up on the keys. It is ok to hit down, just not up. Anyway, I love the color of her shirt which makes her rosy cheeks stand out. I did a levels adjustment in Photoshop to brighten up the photo. There was a little noise that I also got rid of. My Canon 7D is such a great camera, after I download in Bridge and go to Camera Raw, those two adjustments are pretty much all I need to make. FYI, the sheet music is Theme From Ice Castles, a very pretty piece of music by Marvin Hamlisch.

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Lily at 6-1/2 Months Old

Canon 7D, Raw, EF-S17-55mm, 17mm, f/2.8, 1/25, ISO 1000

I know it has been a while since I posted here. I have been VERY busy, which, of course, is no excuse. Here is my Miss Lily at 6-1/2 months old. She is sitting up and showing a lot of personality. I cropped it to make it more of a close up. I love this expression on her face. Oh to have that skin! I did a levels adjustment to get the photo to pop. I ran some other software to get rid of some grain. I also love the light hitting her face. She is so beautiful.

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Lily Marie at Three Months

Canon 7D, Raw, EF-S18-55mm, 45mm, f/6.3, 1/60, ISO 125

Lily looked so cute when we were there for a Father’s Day barbecue. I liked this close-up photo because you can see her pretty eyelashes. Her hat looked really cute too. At least she is not frowning! I brought the image into camera raw and did an exposure adjustment to brighten it up a little. Then in Photoshop, I did a levels adjustment, some noise reduction and a little sharpening. I do enjoy taking photos of her but I think she is getting tired of seeing me with a camera in front of my face!

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Pink Calla Lily

Canon 7D, Raw, 59mm, f/5.6, 1/160, ISO 100

I was at Larry and Shelley’s yesterday to take some photos of Lily for her two month birthday. Shelley and I were in the backyard and she was very proud of this pink calla lily. The photo came out very nice and I really like the shadows falling across the lily. Since it is a raw image, I opened it up in camera raw and made a white balance adjustment. Then in Photoshop, all I did was a levels adjustment. Maybe I need to do something more exciting and artsy with my photos so I will have more to share with you.

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A Frowning Lily

Canon 7D, Raw, 55mm, f/2.9, 1/200, ISO 320

Here is frowning Lily at one month old, sitting on her mother’s lap. Maybe she is tired of me taking her picture! For this photo I set my ISO to automatic to see what it would do. As you can see, it went to 320 where I probably would have put it at 500 or maybe higher. This did create less noise, but maybe with the higher ISO the shutter would have been faster. I will check that out next time. I got a new Firmware update from Canon today for my camera. This is my first one – I hope I download it correctly!

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Purple Petunias

Canon 7D, Raw, 48mm, f/2.8, 1/200, ISO 100

I took this yesterday at Larry and Shelley’s when I was over there to take Lily’s one month photo. She is so cute! Anyway, they have some very nice flowers in their backyard and I went back to take some different photos. These were so pretty but I forgot to ask Shelley what they are called. Could it be a petunia? My Canon 7D takes such great photos I really don’t have to do much in Photoshop. The main thing I did was a levels adjustment which helps the white balance and then I did some noise reduction. I am a little unclear as to why it needed this since I shot it at a low ISO.

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Mother and Child

Canon 7D, Raw, 47mm, f/2.8, 1/250, ISO 1600, Nik Silver Efex Pro Software

 I took this photo on Easter Sunday. We played around a lot by putting Lily in a basket with her bunny slippers and Easter eggs. She also went through three wardrobe changes (not counting some topless ones)! Out of all the photos we took that day, this is my favorite. I did a levels adjustment, noise reduction and then converted it to black and white. I love the different choices you have with the Nik software and there are many options to customize any of the settings. It is fun to play with the different settings. The rest of the images from this day and others you can see here.  I will be adding to and removing photos from this gallery so check back.

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Baby Lily Marie

Canon 7D, Raw, f/8.0, 1/60, 17mm, ISO 2500

She is now six days old in the photo. I used a very high ISO because I didn’t want to use the flash. Inside her little bed in the living room there wasn’t a lot of light. You can see the reflection of the window on her eyes. She is getting very alert and her eyes are attracted to the light. I didn’t remove any noise but I think it looks good. This camera is great! It is doing exactly what I wanted it to do. Next week we are going to take a four generation photo. All I did to this photo was a levels adjustment and a slight temperature adjustment.

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The First Family Portrait

Canon 7D, Raw, 17mm, f/8.0, 1/40, ISO 800

As you can tell, we have a new member of our family. This is Lily Marie and her parents. She was born Monday, March 15 (10 days early). I took this photo and others of the happy threesome. I used a high ISO because I didn’t want to use a flash. I adjusted the white balance in Camera Raw then just a levels adjustment in Photoshop. I will be taking a lot of photos of this little girl for as long as I can. I will try not to bore you too much. But she will be a great subject as she grows up!

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A Great Headshot

Canon 7D, Raw, 50mm, f/11.0, 1/160/ ISO 1600, Fill Flash

Isn’t this a handsome young man? I took this photo as an assignment for a portrait photography lesson. I think it came out very well. Those gray-blue eyes have flecks of gold and yellow in them. This is my son, Larry. I called him this morning and said I wanted to come over and take some head shots of him that I needed. He said ok. When I got there, he was putting together the baby carriage for his daughter who will be here in a month. He was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt.He  didn’t understand what I was going to do because he said, “I would have shaved!” I said the shot is to show his personality and that is what it is doing. They had just gotten home from the mountains a few hours before and were catching up on some chores at home. I haven’t gotten feedback from him yet.  We used natural light in his living room, but I ended up having to use some fill flash because of the shadows on his face. It evened the light out. I do not think a reflector would have taken care of that – the light was too uneven.

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