focal length: 48 mm
shutter speed: 1/500
aperture: f/2.8
ISO: 200
flash: none

This is part of my “red-shirt” series. Different angles taken on the same day in front of the same window. Yesterday’s daily pic was shot with the wide end of my lens, resulting in a slightly distorted view of my subject; the “big-nose” effect if you will. For this shot, I used a longer focal length, so my child doesn’t look like a clown anymore. I thought it was interesting that her reflection happened to be in front of a tree through the window, which makes it more visible. Can you see it?

I can’t believe how quickly she’s growing. It seems like only yesterday she was lying on a pillow on top of my coffee table waving her arms and legs in the air.

focal length: 24 mm
shutter speed: 1/20
aperture: f/2.8
ISO: 200
flash:none

Being cooped up at home isn’t ideal when you’re trying to take some nice photographs of your kids. Because Sophie isn’t walking all that well yet, I’m hesitant to take her out by myself to take pictures of her. So for now, I’ll have to settle for shots like this hanging around our front window where the light is the nicest! At least you can see a bit of green in the background of my unkempt lawn! I used the widest focal length on my lens since she kept walking towards me! Aperture was wide open and ISO at the lowest setting. I did process this somewhat and I don’t think I’m getting the skin tone just right. What kind of processing do you do to achieve the bright, contrasty look I’m trying to get?

Thankfully, Sophie is drinking her milk. She’s a bit underweight and I’m trying to fatten her up! How do you like her hair cut? Tee hee… two snips and voila! Funny face!

focal length: 50 mm
shutter speed: 1/60
aperture: f/2.5
ISO: 200
flash: fired

It’s Love Thursday again at Shutter Sisters and with love in our hearts for mothers, I thought I’d post one of my Umma (”Mother” in Korean). I searched through the photos I had on this computer and finally found one taken last year. I actually used my external flash (Nikon SB-600) for this shot. The room was quite dark and the flash did the trick. I bounced it off the ceiling if my memory serves me correctly. Normally, I don’t use a lot of flash but when I do, it has to be my external unit and must be bounced off something, otherwise the light is too harsh. I’m still learning how to use my flashes but I think this one turned out decently.

I love my Mother with all my heart! And she loves me too!

Today I felt like doing some experimenting with post-processing in Adobe Lightroom (download the free trial here). I thought about some pictures I took two weeks ago and thought perhaps I could do something with them. I remember that after taking those particular shots, I felt disappointed with the results. Here’s the shot straight out of camera (SOOC):

Yeah. Pretty bland isn’t it? The composition is off, there is a shadow to the left of the chairs that’s distracting and overall, the photo doesn’t make any kind of statement. Blah! Normally this kind of shot deserves to go straight into the trash bin but I’m a bit of a pack rat and also a bit lazy so I left it without even bothering to process it with the other photos I took that day.

So, I tried something different. I used that terrible picture and played around with it. What do you think?:

I might even print this! It’s still not a perfect picture but it sure speaks to me more now than it did in it’s original state. I didn’t spend much time working on it either; a whole 5 seconds! A little cropping and a Lightroom preset I found by Mike Lao here. It’s called the “300″ preset mimicking the look for the movie “300″. I think it’s pretty snazzy, so, thanks Mike for sharing!

There you go! A photo destined for my trash bin, saved! Sure, it’s still not a perfect image but a little processing made it more interesting and meaningful. So go through your not-so-perfect shots and see if you can make them into something better. You never know what you might end up with!

focal length: 52 mm
shutter speed: 1/125
aperture: f/2.8
ISO: 200
flash: none

I love a great action shot! Sometimes motion blur could be a distraction unless it is part of showing what the moment was all about. This photo makes me smile because I can imagine her madly swinging her arm up and down while holding on to the mess of streamers. I cropped it a bit to minimize the cluttered background. Such is the biggest challenge shooting everyday photos in your home. Of course I’m not assuming you have a disorganized home. Simply, with respect to photographs, anything in the background that can distract your eye from the main subject can be referred to as clutter. Cropping is one way to reduce the distractions in your photos.

Sophie had a great time playing with the streamers we finally took down since her birthday party; a whole two minutes of fun.