Jen Chapin and friends

[LoveLife]

Tazzie wrote:

LL, they're brighter than I'm used to seeing from you. Brighter than I really like. The B&W with grain or whatever of Jen is vey good. I really like it. I wish you would divulge your secret for having such excellent sharp focus. I'd guess getting as close as possible is part of the answer;, but please share your thougts on achieving that hallmark of yours... dead-on focus. peas, peas, peas

I don't know except for one I think the exposures are correct. I think what is throwing you is the black background. I kept the flash intensity down and used bounce to make sure the background was dark and did additional PP work to make sure. The B&W head: I was too impatient and took this shot without the flash firing. When I got it on the computer it was so black that I could hardly see anything. I played with the shot pushing level brightness and contrast. It turned into a color-flecked mess. Then I ran multiple noise reduction and sharpening runs. Then I removed all the color saturation leaving B&W. Sprinkle with more level brightness contrast and sharpening; there you have it.

When the FZ30 gets a good focus lock it is very crisp. Sharp focus not all the time in fact, for me, the FZ30 has a 19% focus failure rate. Some times I can see it in the viewfinder and I am constantly hitting the focus button sometime 3 per shot but when you are waiting for a flash recharge it is bearable. It slows me down and I could never use it for street candid work. I use my FZ10 for that I have never had a focus failure with the FZ10. Here is an example of FF:

[Tazzie]

LL, good enough for me. Admire your work considerably. Its not my style, or better, not my interest or the type of shots I could or would do. Whenever something anything is done really well every one appreciates it. I enjoy getting to se your musicians and the backgound information.

Perhaps you would help me with respect to exposure? When shooting in low light, which I love and you do a fair share of, I try to capture what I see. The rubb is that often calls for setting negative exposure when unning in Apeture mode, or any other mode, and no matter what digital camera or metering choice. Why do these modern cameras determine "properly exposed" means a certain brightness level? What have I missed? Shouldn't a correctly exposed photograph I've taken be as I saw it? I hope you undersdtand what I'm asking? Throwing dynamic range, etc out of this for the moment. Whats the deal?

[Puddock]

Top stuff!

I love your use of the the flash and the black background.

Really makes the subjects stand out.

When you say you used bounced flash, what is it bounced off?

cheers,

Max

[HarjTT]

Hi JerrySome cracking stuff - really like the way you captured them. Spot on colour, WB and hardly any noise or non at all. I was asked last week to do a shoot soemthign similar but I had to back out becuase I wasn't 100% sure that I could do it and do it well. The B&W pic is really cool - and all that noise/grain make it work even better.CheersHarjTT