Day 170

Day 170, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I just watched all of the “Within the Frame” podcasts by David duChemin and I took away from those some really important image making ideas.

This image represents the subject matter idea of the abstracting people to convey an idea. A couple of different ways of doing this is thru a silhouetted image or not showing the person’s face. This helps convey an idea that is less specific to the actual person in the photo and more of a universal statement that can pertain to all people. I’ve done this in the past with some of my other photos but never thought about it this way but when I listened to David’s explanation, a lot of things became much clearer.

In the case of this image the boy has his face turned and is looking back into the frame. So he stops being a specific boy and becomes all boys. This allows for a emotional connection to the image without being distracted by the specific identity of this boy.
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Day 170: I just watched all of the “Within the Frame” podcasts by David duChemin and I took away from those some really important image making ideas.

This image represents the subject matter idea of the abstracting people to convey an idea. A couple of different ways of doing this is thru a silhouetted image or not showing the person’s face. This helps convey an idea that is less specific to the actual person in the photo and more of a universal statement that can pertain to all people. I’ve done this in the past with some of my other photos but never thought about it this way but when I listened to David’s explanation, a lot of things became much clearer.

In the case of this image the boy has his face turned and is looking back into the frame. So he stops being a specific boy and becomes all boys. This allows for a emotional connection to the image without being distracted by the specific identity of this boy...

Day 169

Day 169, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I saw this on my way from work today. I pulled off into a parking lot up on a hill and tracked this balloon as they floated down thru Sammamish Valley. There was a crazy amount of sensor noise on in this image so most of the prost processing time was spent cleaning it up. Looks like I have some cleaning to do on my sensor.

Day 168

Day 168, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I didn't have a hole lot of chances to take a photo today but as we were sitting in the window seat at Linda's Bar in Seattle for a quick drink before the premiere of Deeper this portrait of George presented itself. The light was great at this time of day as it was streaming in thru the window. This is a different composition for me as George is not looking into the frame which is what I normally would shoot but it still seems to work. I think that there a balance to this frame that lets me get away with the gaze out of the frame. The gesture and expression on his face really help too.

The dust on the glasses is an interesting detail that I'd like to expand on. What that dust means to me is that this person has been wearing glasses for most of his life and really doesn't mind have a little dirt on his glasses. Over the years he's learned to accepted the dust and worry about more important things; whereas, someone new to wearing glasses would not tolerate the dust and would have cleaned it off. It's a small detail but it quite telling for this portrait of Georg, I think.

Day 167

Day 167, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

It was a soft, overcast day so it was the perfect light for shooting portraits. I set myself up on the 85th Street bridge, in back of work, and just started taking pictures of people as they returned from lunch. These were mostly people I work with so I wasn’t too creepy. This is Scott Rudi, one of the designers here at Zipper. I pointed the camera at him and he went into his deep thought pose.

I shot this with a polarizing filter which helped to minimize the reflections on his glasses so his eyes are a little more visible. I developed this with a nostalgic feeling which works with his college cap and soft lighting.

Day 166

Day 166, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I shot this first thing this morning because I knew I wouldn't have time to shoot anything else today because we were going to be putting up a shed in the backyard. This is the Rhodie's in our front yard and I shoot them almost every weekend in search of the perfect shot. I took almost the same shot a couple of weeks ago but something else always made it as the shot of the day. I remembered that this morning when I was planning my day and with the rain we had the night before, I really though it would be a great shot. I shot about 60 captures and used a preset called "Touch of Blue" to develop it I applied the preset to all of the captures and chose the best one.

Day 165

Day 165, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

We took Sebastian and Violet out for a trip around Martha lake this morning for Michele's first time out on the kayak. I really wanted to make sure we had perfect weather for Michele's first time out and we were rewarded with a wonderful sunny, warm morning. We had a little wind to fight in order to get back to the launch but it was still an easy trip and I think Michele's more than willing to go back out. Maybe next time we'll try a river so we can just go with the flow and not worry about wind!

Day 164

Day 164, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

These things give me the creeps! But the web was so perfect and the background was dark enough to show it off I just couldn’t resist taking this shot. A spider web is a natural compositional element, I just made sure the creature was in focus and in an interesting position in the scene.

The Autumn is a great time for taking spider photos in the Pacific Northwest because they are everywhere. So if you like that kind of thing, this is the time for you to get your camera out and start shooting. It’s actually one of the few things I dislike about living here. I can’t stand it when I walk out my back door and walk right into a web.

Day 163

Day 163, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I was at a loss for what to shoot today. It was sunny when I got up this morning and I had a great idea for what to shoot but by the time I left for work the skies clouded up and it was pouring rain by noon. It cleared up a little bit in the afternoon so I went for a quick walk over by city hall. I saw this parked car and I wasn’t all that excited about it. I went through the motions anyway and took some close ups, some very graphic style captures and some weird angle perspectives.

In this one, I was trying to compose in the camera with the shape and lines of the car. I liked this one because of the contrast between the smooth lines of the car and the rough surface of the curb and road. It has a nice balance between the top and bottom halves and the rain drops create and nice stippling that adds some interest to the chrome and soften the contrast just enough.

I really had to pull this one off in the develop process because as a capture, it wasn’t working. It may make for a nice fine art type print and it’s nice to know I can pull something off even when the conditions less than perfect.

Day 162

Day 162, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

We took the dogs to the beach in Mukilteo today to end my vacation. As we were sitting there a couple of divers came up from the water and were displaying the starfish they caught to a small crowd of people who gathered at the water's edge. Everyone was touching the creature and squealing with delight, it was a fun little moment. I shot a bunch of photos but I like this the best as it shows the beautiful shape of the starfish.

Day 161

Day 161, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

Terminal One at O'Hare. I stood to the side and took this picture as people made their way from one moving sidewalk to the other. I don't think anyone even notice I was taking their picture. Such a busy airport!

I shot this at waist level using my body as a human tripod and flipped up LCD screen to preview the shot.

I like the contrast of the blurry, moving images against the structured, lighted background.

Day 160

Day 160, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

This is my first self portrait as a 50 year old. I took this at "The Bean" in downtown Chicago after see the Henri Cartier-Bresson show at the Art Institute. The Bean is a very large reflective, bean shaped sculpture that is in the middle of Millennium Park. It's a public sculpture so you can walk right up to it, touch it and can ever walk under it. Because it's surface is a polished chrome it has this great house of mirrors feeling to it. Crowds of people come there everyday to take their pictures so it seemed fitting for me to shoot a self portrait.

In this photo it really feels like my eyes are smiling. The arc made by my glasses and it's reflection in the Bean create a nice smile shape too. There's a great passage in Chris Orwig's book "Visual Poetry" about the time he photographed Ben Harper. Seems there was another photographer trying to get Ben to smile for a photo and after an exhaustive effort Ben just said "I smile with my eyes".

The Cartier-Bresson show was excellent and I couldn't have seen it with two better people than my wife Michele and good friend KathyT. It was great being in downtown Chicago again and it brought back some great memories.

Day 159

Day 159, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

Geno's East in Chicago has the best pizza in the world just don't take a nap in their booths.....long story!

This place is just covered in graffiti which they encourage. I held my camera up above the booth and shot this in really dim light. The roundness of the people's heads break the structured lines of the composition and the hanging light helps to balance the people. The graffiti creates this overall texture that almost flattens out the entire composition but brings it all together.

Day 158

Day 158, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

This is the start of the festivities for my 50th birthday party. I can't thank my brother Gary enough for all he did for this party. He was the person responsible for finding the band and getting them to play. Little did we know his alternative motive of making his first stage appearance as a guitarist. Thanks for all the hard work Gary!

This capture is about the breaking of the symmetry. The ladder in centered almost perfectly under the tent's roof frame to create a symmetrical composition while Gary and the fabric he's hanging, break that symmetry. The negative spaces of the background trees are nice framing devices that bring the viewers eye to the center of interest. I developed this with a morning light kind of feeling.

Day 157

Day 157, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

Well, this was the last photograph of my forties. I meet up with my old friend, Kathy Sands, who brought her three Yorkies over for a photo shoot tonight. OMG! They were so hard to photograph! They were in constant motion and always had their noses to the ground. But, with the help of Michele and some treats we were able to get them to stand still for a little while to get a couple of good shots.

After the shoot was over I didn't have much hope for an acceptable image but I was pleasantly surprised by this shot. I was really attracted to the rim lighting and the ray of light from the upper left in this shot. It also reminds me a lot of the dog in the RCA advertisements from the fifties and sixties so it has a nostalgic feeling to it.

At first I was a little disappointed that the dog wasn't looking into the camera but this pose has so much symbolism to it that seems apropos with my turning 50 tomorrow. It has the feeling of saying goodbye to youth and looking into the future. The ray of light symbolizes the gift of wisdom as one gets older. It really can have a lot of different meanings and it was the result of a happy accident as I couldn't pose those dogs to save my life. I didn't even realize what a great shot it was until I imported the captures into Lightroom and it jumped out at me as I was reviewing the shoot with Kathy. Serendipity is such a cool tool!

So, I'm spending my final moments of my 40's listening to Jack Johnson, sipping a drink, making art and sharing it with all of you...life is good and living in this day and age is awesome! A good friend told me that when you're in your forties, you're old for a young person but when you're in your fifties, you're young for an old person. I think I'm going to embrace my new youth!

Day 156

Day 156, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

It was a travel day today but I still managed to get in a quick shot at SeaTac. We were heading home to celebrate my 50th birthday back in Wisconsin. I kept my camera accessible and captured this as I was waiting for our flight to board. I like the contrast of warm and cool lights here and the women looking into the frame helps the composition.

Day 155

Day 155, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

This is a typical site in Seattle, a bucket of umbrellas. These are mainly made available for the tourists because no local worth their salt would be caught dead with an umbrella. We make sure we have a hood on our jackets. You see these all over in different shopping areas and they are free for people to use, it’s just understood that they will be returned. The Chicago in me just says, “hey, free umbrella!” so I have a hundred of these in the trunk of my car....totally kidding!

This one came as a bit of a surprise to me. I was walking around Redmond Town Center desperately looking for a shot. I was shooting down from the balcony and up into the structure of the buildings but nothing was looking good. I shot this as I was leaving and really thought nothing of it until I got back and started going thru the images. The capture itself wasn’t anything special but once I stated to develop it, it came to life. By using warm tones and a little blur I gave this a warm, rainy feeling that was a reflection of the day in Seattle. I like shooting the details, it gives the viewer a little glimpse into what life is like in my world.

Day 154

Day 154, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I just found my new favorite photo location, The Ste. Michelle Winery in Woodinville. It holds a wealth of photo opportunities for me. It’s just up the road from where I work in Redmond and actually on my way home. As the sun starts setting earlier, I’ll be stopping in there to take some golden hour photos on my home.

It really is an amazing place. It makes you feel like you’re in a totally different part of the world. You can point your camera in any direction there and get a good capture! I wandered around the grounds and took the typical postcard shots of the buildings and gardens. But then I started to push past that and tried to take something original. This fountain behind a hedge caught my eye and I went to investigate. After shooting some establishing shots I got a feeling for the light. This shot gives the viewer a feeling for the winery without being too typical and the couple sitting at a lawn table gives the photo a human presences…….and it feels very French….

Day 153

Day 153, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I wanted to challenge myself today and just use a 50mm prime and work for a shot. Most of the time I go out with a 18- 200 zoom lens, stand in one spot and just zoom the lens as needed to frame a shot. With a fix lens, you actually need move the camera to get the right framing. It’s much more physical but it really forces you to get in tune with your subjects. A 50mm prime is considered a normal view lens so that it’s close to how your eyes actually see the scene. This makes it impossible to impose any optical effects on the capture like you would with a long or short lens. It’s really up to the photographer to give the photo personality.

This is the calf at Farrel-Mc Whirter Park in Redmond. I shot this just inches away from the cow’s nose and right after I took this, it relieved itself in a splashing fashion. Thankfull, there was a fence between us! This was composed in the camera and I didn’t need crop at all in Lightroom. In the grand scheme of things, that’s not all that important but it’s a good thing to practice so when you’re shooting something important, your sense of framing becomes a natural instinct.

Day 152

Day 152, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I haven't shot a self portrait in awhile so it's a good time to get one done. My sister said I need to shoot more self portraits while I'm still 49 so I remember what I look like while I was still young. She's a funny girl!

In this photo I'm shooting into a mirror in the backyard while previewing the shot on the camera's LCD. I'm using my new vertical grip which makes it easier to shoot in portrait format. I processed this in Lightroom with a preset call "Black and Beautiful". This softens up the higher contrast black and white while still keeping the details of the shot. I'm using a 5.6 F-stop to keep my face in focus while letting everything else blur out. The camera's auto face detection did a nice job focusing on my face even while pointed at a reflection in a mirror.

I actually shot this with the kit lens that came with this camera. I haven't used it much because It's a 16-55mm zoom and that doesn't seem to have enough of a range so I usually mount my 18-200mm to be sure I have the reach. The 16-55mm is so much lighter and with the added weight of the vertical grip, I may be shooting with it more often. It may also be more practical for hiking too because of the weight.


So there you go, a young Terry with a camera.

Day 151

Day 151, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I only had a little while to get my shot today so I worked in the backyard. This little guy was stolen from the Sammamish Club eight years ago and now sits outside on the kitchen window sill. When we brought him home Gilda thought it was for her and wouldn't leave it alone. If she were to get here teeth on that guy he would be shredded in seconds. That's why he sits outside, poor little guy!

Anyway, I was working with my 50mm and my new vertical grip. I was looking for some good bokeh shots. The 50mm and the grip are a great combination but it's taking me a little bit to get the feel for how to carry the camera with the extra weight and size of the new grip. There's a lot of new hand holds with the new grip, almost too many but it really feels stable

Day 150

Day 150, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

This was an actual drive by. I was sitting in traffic on my way back from shooting at a park in Kirkland when I saw this sign from the driver’s seat. My camera was riding shotgun so all I had to do was turn it on and take the picture. Things happened so fast that I had to compose on instinct. I had to crop in a little when I got back to Lightroom but I’m happy with the composition.

The light today was very flat because of the clouds today so I was looking at texture being my subject matter. We call the cloudy days in Seattle as going under the grey blanket. Contrary to popular belief, we don’t get as much rain as people think but we do have more cloudy days than any place on record.

I tried to develop this with a little nostalgia because of the subject matter. The blues are different from anything I’ve worked with before and normally I wouldn’t have chosen that shade of blue but I’m looking for something a little different here. Because the light was so flat I had to add my own light, some inner glow, in order to give this image some life. I can see now that shooting under Seattle’s grey blanket is going to take a lot more work in the Lightroom to pull off good pictures.

Day 149

Day 149, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I was shooting some flowers over on the other side of the river when Kim, a designer at Zipper came walking down the path in a Jets, Brett Favre jersey. So, of course I had to give her a little bit of a hard time about the jersey and snuck a couple of pictures. I like this one but I really should have got her to turn a little toward the sun to get some nicer highlights in her eyes. Some of the flower photos turned out nice too but the more I take pictures the more I need to have a human subject in the scene to make it satisfying.

Day 148

Day 148, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

Day 148: When I went to lunch today I was all set to take a soft lighted, Asian restaurant still life. But as I was sitting at my table, Andrew, a friend from work came into the restaurant and demanded that I take his portrait. What could I do? I had to take his picture. He’s bigger than me and could have me fired. He sat on the other side of the table and said that it better be a good photo!

All of the above is a total lie. I set out to take a soft lighted still life, I was in a restaurant when Andrew came in and I took his picture. But the first version is much more interesting and seems to fit with his portrait. And if you know Andrew, you could almost believe my lie.

This is only the second picture of the day that I had to make some alterations in Photoshop. There was some distracting items in the background I had to take out and I just haven't bonded with the new cloning tool in Lightroom. As I’ve said before, I’m trying to stay away from altering anything in Photoshop just because this project is about learning new things and not resorting to old habits. I’ve been using Photoshop for almost 20 years now and it’s part of my job so I really don’t need to practice it. But this time, I had to get rid of the ugly background to make this photo work. They’re my rules, I can break them if I want.

Day 147

Day 147, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

It was a rainy day in Redmond today. I took a couple of pictures by the library during lunch but I wasn't satisfied with the shots I took of this sidewalk behind the building. I went back after work and set up my camera at waist level like a twin lens reflex to get a vintage look. I was able to frame my shots by looking thru my tilted up LCD on the back of the camera. I set my aperture at f16 and was using slow shutter speeds which is just a crazy, hard exposure to hand hold but that's the reason I held the camera at my waist. As I was taking pictures this women walked into my frame with this great umbrella. It was the perfect addition to my composition! She's a little blurry because of the slow shutter speed but it works with the vintage look I was going for. For a final touch, I added some film grain.

Day 146

Day 146, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

We had our first paying client for AllPaws Photography today! This is our vet, Dr G from Helping Hands Veterinarian Clinic. He was the person responsible for bringing Mischu back to health. He's a wonderful, caring man and we're really glad to have found him. He specializes in geriatric dogs and cats which is actually how we found him. We went to his seminar about how to take care of your older pets and we were very impressed with him. So much so that we took Mischu to him when she got sick. Because his focus is on geriatric pets, we wanted to get a picture of him with Gilda, our 14.5 year old Golden. He also bought over his kitty, Chu, which we also photographed with him but I really like this shot. I hope it makes all his vet friends jealous and they come to us for their portraits!

It was a hard shoot because there wasn't much light to work with today but we lucked out in the end because we finished up just before it started raining. We actually shot inside near a window too but I had to set up a work light to fill in some of the shadows. I don't really like studio lighting but it was a necessity. The soft light outside was really nice though, I just wish there was a little more of it. It made for some slow shutter speeds so we did end up with a lot of blurry shots.

Day 145

Day 145, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

"My Wife's Left Foot" We were at a party tonight and I noticed how cool Michele's foot looked in here new sandals. Feet make for such expressive portraits I may start shoot more of them. The feet are on the one of the farthest body parts from the face but they has such a unique quality for each person. Plus they like to get dressed up! This is the second foot portrait I've taken so I guess I've just started a new series for my self, "Foot Portraits" Let's see who put's there's up as their Facebook profile first.

Day 144

Day 144, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

Day 144: We went to Home Depot today to shop for a small shed to put in back of the garage. This was our sales person Neil who was really a good sport about having his picture taken. The nice thing about shooting at a retail store like Home Depot is that the people working there are paid to talk to you so it's easy to strike up a conversation and get someone to pose for you. I'm sure it seemed pretty weird to him that someone would be taking pictures while shopping at Home Depot and he's probably right. But it was the only chance I had to take some pictures today. Another thing I discovered while at Home Depot was the wealth of patterns and repeating shapes in the store. I may go back when I start exploring shapes and patterns in abstracts images later in the year.

This is a bit of an environment portrait of Neil. The structured bokeh in the background is fitting for him as he seemed like a structured man and although he had a great sense of humor. He was a no nonsense guy and he was a great help in picking out a shed and getting it out to the car. I like how his head is tilted. It helps bring the viewer's eyes into the frame.

Day 143

Day 143, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I was feeling a little under the weather today so I kept my photography close to home. The light on the deck was amazing today and I set out to get a portrait of Ollie. It took over 200 captures but I finally got one. This was literally the last shot.

Day 142

Day 142, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

Redmond City Hall has this wonderful reflection fountain that I’ve photographed before but this time I tried something a little different. I’ve seen this guy cleaning in the pond before and I really liked how the squeegee handle he’s holding mimics one of the glass pieces of the sculpture. I set up in a place where there was a minimal background and strong reflection. Then I waited for him to come into view and capture a gesture that would work with my composition. I shot a lot of frames and had a hard time picking one out that I liked best but this one just seemed to have what I was looking for. I wanted this photo to feel like a glass, pixie sticks jungle and at first glance the man seems like part of the sculpture but then you realize he’s real.

Day 141

Day 141, originally uploaded by Terry Schmidbauer.

I went to the Bellevue Botanical Garden during lunch today. I was walking around taking some flower pictures and I struck up a conversation with this volunteer, her name was Nancy. I asked her when they would be putting up the Christmas decorations. This place go all out and puts on a great light display for the holidays. She said they are already working on creating the flower lights but there’s a lot more to make this year because someone broke into the storage building and stole a large number of flower lights mainly for the copper wire. Just a horrible this to have happen because they add to their display every year.

This was really a scouting trip for me as I really would like to go back a shoot more. I’d really like to be able to photograph some of the volunteers making the decorations and then of course shoot the light displays on a rainy night for some great reflections.