Trip Report, Part 2 - Family

As I mentioned earlier in the week, I had great aspirations for this trip. One of them was to step outside of my comfort zone. Specifically, I avoid taking pictures of people as much as I can. I don't consider portrait photography a strength of mine. However, with my family in town, I decided to rethink my strategy. Some results:





There were some favorable conditions that helped me, such as:

1) Choice of clothing - the bright colors are a photographer's dream! These were taken 30 minutes before sunset on a cloudy day, so the pink and the stripes helped me make sure these pictures stayed natural.

2) The park wasn't too crowded - this afforded us freedom of movement.

3) Everyone wanted their picture taken. I don't take this for granted, given my track record.

Some considerations:

1) My niece moves fast, so I bumped up the shutter speed to around 1/40.

2) Because the weather was cloudy, I bumped up the ISO to 200-400, depending on the shot.

3) Several of these pictures required that I bump up the exposure during postprocessing. I was really careful not to overdo it. I didn't want them to look fake or overprocessed.

4) I cropped some of the pictures to give a more intimate feel.

I still think I have plenty of work to do, but I really considered this progress from my previous attempts. This is probably because I had a lot of control over the setting. I was also really motivated to do a good job. I'm sure both factors had some influence on the outcome.

Till tomorrow!