Ingredients

About This Photo:
Aperture: f/5.0
Exposure: 1/50
Focal Length: 50mm
ISO: 1000
Lens: 50mm f/1.4

Every day, I make myself  green smoothie. The components will vary, but lately I'm digging on pineapple, lime, Fuji apple, stevia, and spinach (all combined with ice and water in the VitaMix, of course). Even when the cutting board is a bit of a mess (like this), I think the yellows and greens are so pretty -- especially with a turquoise cutting mat as a backdrop. For me, this translates to serious visual yum!

I tried shooting this setup from so many angles: getting down on the counter at eye level, shooting from above, and from either side. I think the only thing I didn't try was shooting from underneath. I think I like this angle and set-up the best, though I might have changed my mind if you ask me tomorrow.

I used a smaller aperture (f/5.0) than I typically do for this shot because food photo don't do well with a lot of bokeh. I bumped up the ISO to compensate so I wouldn't have to compromise on my shutter speed. One of the actions I took in post-processing was to use a cross-processing effect -- in my opinion, this really makes greens (as wells as yellows and blues) pop.

And now it makes me want another green smoothie.

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Lessons Learned or Affirmed:

• Experiment, experiment, experiment (angles, lighting, settings, compositions, etc). I'm posting one photo that I like. There were about three that were contender's for tonight's post out of the 45 or so that I took. Yeah. 45, and I got two or three that I really liked. Welcome to photography!
• Don't neglect the post-processing. Post-processing might not be able to take a photo from good to great, but it can make it look much more polished and enjoyable to look at. The actions I took for this photo were few and very simple, but made it took what I had and made it a little bit better. Take a look at the before and after:

Natural side light + baby blues + square cropping through the middle of her face = something luminous and magical

About This Photo:
Aperture: f/1.4
Exposure: 1/40
Focal Length: 50mm
ISO: 320
Lens: 50mm f/1.4

"It goes by fast!"

Boy, does it ever! I can hardly believe that my baby girl is 4 months old today. She's growing so fast (and so beautifully), I wonder some days if I will wear out my camera trying to keep up with her.

I've been wanting to get some photographs her in some good, natural sidelight for awhile now. Today was my chance, and what you see was the result. I left the aperture open wide so I wouldn't need to set the ISO too high, and I followed the one rule I never break when a person's face is the subject: set the focus point(s) on the eyes. I figured her skin would look this luminous, but I honestly had no idea the eyes would look this brilliant.

This photo required only minimal processing: I did some sharpening, and I boosted the colors slightly before blending in a subtle and soft pink layer and doing the square crop. The way I cropped might seem like an unusual choice. Why cut it off in the middle of someone's face?

To answer that, let me start by showing you the SOOC (straight out of the camera) shot for this photo:

Now pay attention to the eyes. The right eye (from the viewer's standpoint, the one we see on the left side of the photo) is sharp and clear. The left eye, on the other hand, is soft and blurred. This is because I had the focus point set on the right eye and had the aperture open wide, creating that soft creamy bokeh all around the focus point. When you're talking about eyes on a subject who is facing the camera almost directly (like she is here), it just doesn't really work to have one sharp and one blurry.

I didn't really want to cut off half of her face, but there wasn't going to be anything I could really do with the left eye to bring it into as clear of focus as the right eye is. I don't know how to explain why I chose a square crop except to say that "it just felt right."

So I went with it. And I don't know about you, but I love the result.

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Lessons Learned or Affirmed:

• Focus on the eyes! I know I've said it multiple times already, but it is affirmed in every portrait. Sharp, in-focus eyes for portraits are a must.
• Don't abandon a challenging photo that has something great going for it. If you can, use cropping or other creative editing techniques to create a look that might be a bit avant garde or otherwise unexpected.
• There is nothing like using side light from a window to create some drama.