Photography Class Week 4

After two very long weeks of sickness, I think the plague is finally gone. Nasty colds/chest infections, stomach flu and pink eye have all made the rounds in our house. I have a lingering cough, but other than that, I think we're over the worst of it.

On top of that, the kids spilled soda on my keyboard and fried it. I was able to use an old wireless MS keyboard, but it interferred with my Mighty Mouse and made it freak out. Also, since there was no Apple key, I couldn't use Photoshop very effectively. Thankfully, my new keyboard arrived Saturday. Gotta love Apple's shipping--fast and free!

So those are my excuses for being so behind on my class. Thank goodness there's no penalty for late assignments. :) I've got to get busy this week and try to catch up.

Week four's assignment was "Parents as Props." Lots of fun. I have several that I didn't use that I'm planning to put into a story board for Alex's room and Neil's office. The first one was added to the Picture of the Week Gallery. :)

Photography Class--Week 3

This week's assignment was action shots. Hard to do in cold Chicago wather. I used pne of my favorites from the summer and got the other two just in time.

Andy jumping on his bed made Picture of the Week. It's a little grainy, but she liked the expression. I'm definitely framing this one.

Photography Class--Week 2

Week Two's Assignment in my BetterPhoto.com class was Extreme Close-Ups or child as botanical. Again, it was challenging to get close up shots of a very mobile 8 month old with dreary indoor light. (I'm trying really hard not to use my flash at all.)

Here's what I came up with...

This one made Photo of the Week. :)






I actually really love all of these and am having them printed to hang on my new photo wall. (photos of the photo wall are coming soon.)

Photography Class--Week 1

I'm taking a great photography class at BetterPhoto.com....Photography Kids and it's awesome. The assignments are fun and I'm learning tons. The instructor is great too. Her critiques are very helpful and she answers all kinds of questions in the forums. I'm definitely taking more classes there in the future. It works with my schedule so much better than a live class.

The first week's assignment was to shoot 3 sets of before and after shots. The before had to have a child looking away from the camera and not smiling. The after had to have the child looking into the camera and really smiling...connecting with the camera/photographer. It wasn't nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

Here are my before and afters.






My critique was pretty good and the first picture of Alex made her Picture of the Week. (She chooses her favorites, so it's not just mine.)

And yeah, it's been far too long since I updated, but I decided to just start now instead of trying to play catch up. It's too overwhelming so I think if I start fresh now maybe I'll be able to keep up better. (You've heard that before, right?) LOL