“Earth laughs in flowers.”-quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Happy Friday everyone! A little love to spread to begin the weekend. 🙂
xoxo,
Christina
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Nature’s Heart
“You are one decision away from a totally different life.”-quote by Mark Batterson.
I’ve been thinking a lot about choices today. How personal choices can affect those around you on a small scale as well as a larger scale. These pictures are called Nature’s Heart. May we always remember to try and make choices from our hearts.
xoxo,
Christina
Beauty
“I am-the two most powerful words in the world, for whatever we put after them becomes our reality.” -Susan Howson
While I was attending my daughter’s piano concert, I noticed this beautiful bloom outdoors. I had to sneak outside to capture the beauty.
xoxo,
Christina
Beauty in Imperfection
It’s beginning to warm up here and show signs of Spring. I was motivated to get out and capture some of nature’s beauty. This past year has been extremely busy for me with going back to work full time as a special education teacher. I have been given the opportunity to learn how to create balance between work, family, and my passion of nature photography. I plan on posting more pictures throughout the week so I would love for you to come back and visit me! xoxo-Christina
Winter’s Garden
“Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye.” Quote by H. Jackson Brown Jr. I wish all of you a joyous week!
Xoxo-Christina
Joy in Memories
This month I’ve given myself the challenge of photographing something that represents Joy. I didn’t really think about it too much and knew that if I brought my awareness up to what I was looking at through my lens, that the image would come to me. Today, when I walked into Whole Foods, I saw the Pussy Willow branches. I immediately scooped up two of the bundles. My grandmother used to always have these branches in her house. Every time we visited her, there would be a couple of branches and I would get to leave with one of my own. I began to cherish these moments when I visited her. The last time I saw her, she gave one to my oldest son, who was young at the time. Even he associates the tree with my grandmother. 🙂 We had just planted a Pussy Willow tree last weekend in the yard and he said, “When they bloom, we should cut some branches and put them inside so we can think of your grandmother.” It brought me joy today to be able to find these branches and put them in a vase in my entryway. There definitely is joy in memories.
Hugs,
Christina
Head Shots
This beautiful lady, inside and out, is also a lawyer who needed a new head shot for her LinkedIn page as well as her law firm’s website. We snapped a few pictures one morning for her to choose from. Such a sweet lady!!
Hugs,
Christina
White Balance
Have you ever taken pictures and then wondered why they may look yellow? Or maybe have a bluish tone to them? That has to do with your White Balance. Setting your White Balance gives your pictures the correct color. There are different ways to setting your White Balance in your camera. One quick way is to choose it on your camera such as Daylight, Cloudy, Shady, etc. There are different temperatures to each of those. For example, Daylight has slightly different bluer tones in it where as Cloudy has more yellow tones. You can also set your White Balance manually in a few different ways. One way is to shoot a white card and then select the custom White Balance in your menu options. Then, shoot the next frame and you’ll see a difference in the colors in your photo. Another way that I customize my White Balance is to use the Portrait Expo Disc.
I slide the Expo Disc over my neck and I shoot through the solid white side to first set my White Balance. I then go into my menu and choose the “custom White Balance” and then shoot away. If I move positions or the light changes, I just reshoot through it and reset it. It takes literally one minute to set. Now the skin tones of the person I am shooting is nice and even in temperatures regardless of the lighting around me.
If you go to your camera’s menu and select White Balance you should see the following options:
AWB (auto white balance), Daylight, Shade, Cloudy, Tungsten Light, White Fluorescent Light, Flash, and Custom. Each setting has a different temperature (of color) that is portrayed in your photos.
For example, look at these next two photos. The first one has the cloudy setting of White Balance and the second photo has the daylight White Balance setting. You can see the first photo has slightly more color to the face in regards to more yellow and the second photo has more of a blue undertone to it.
I highly recommend setting your White Balance manually. If you do not have an Expo Disc, or the white balance color cards to shoot than I suggest playing around with your settings. If you shoot as RAW (instead of a JPEG) you can also change the White Balance in your photo editing software. Personally (and this is just my personal style) if I do not choose the custom setting White Balance, I will choose the daylight setting for shooting indoors (with no flash). For outdoors, I will typically choose the cloudy or shade setting. I recommend playing around with the various White Balance settings on your camera by taking several pictures of the same object or person. You’ll easily see the difference in your photos.
Have fun exploring the White Balance in your photos!
Christina
What Is Your ISO Speed?
So, you want to shoot more on manual and get off of the automatic setting? Have you been working on adjusting your f-stop or aperture? A long time a go I made a post on the importance of adjusting your f-stop. If you missed the post and would like to read it, please click here http://beeskneesphotographync.com/2012/06/19/whats-your-f-stop/.
Another essential step in nailing the exposure of your photo is setting your ISO speed. Your ISO number makes your camera more sensitive to light and can give you brighter images. Just be careful, when you crank your ISO speed up you will have more noise or grain in your photos. For some photos, it truly creates that mood you’re trying to capture.
Some basic rules of ISO settings are such:
Indoors (low light): ISO 800-1600
Open Shade outside (such as on a porch or shooting in the shade of a tree): ISO 200
Full Sun: ISO 100
Cloudy: ISO 400
Magic Hour (the hour before the sun sets): ISO 400-800
Of course, these are “basic rules” and I don’t always follow these. 🙂 As you gain more confidence, you’ll adjust quickly and comfortably to your settings.
Here are some examples…
I shot this photo inside with the use of natural light coming from a side window. ISO was 400 since I had some nice open light from the window:
This is another photo taken indoors using only natural, filtered light through a window. The ISO setting was 800.
This photo was snapped in the middle of the day, a bright sunny day. I set up a big market umbrella and waited for him to run past the open shade. The ISO setting is 100.
This picture was taken a couple of hours before the Magic Hour so it was still pretty bright. The ISO setting is 200.
Don’t you just love those late day naps on the couch? My daughter fell asleep and it was pretty dim in the room. Very little natural light so my ISO speed was 2000.
I hope this helps you in understanding how to adjust your ISO setting for help in nailing your exposure. I would love to see your photos as well! Please share your website with me in the comments so I may visit you.
Christina
Ethan’s 6th Birthday
My son had his 6th birthday party this past Saturday. We had so much fun! We had a carnival theme with games, prizes, face painting, and of course, a photo booth. The kids enjoyed dressing up silly and having their pictures taken. Here’s a highlight from our backyard photo booth. 🙂
Christina
Bees Knees Photography 