As I was leaving the Detroit Professional Photographers Association meeting this evening  stopped in the men’s room to dump out my glass of water for the drive home.  My eye was caught by the water droplets on the cold water pipe that supplies the urinal.  As I walked closer my orange t-shirt made a great accent color in the reflective chrome, so I got out my iPhone and composed a picture.  This is a somewhat common sight, but I am quite pleased with this image.

If you have been to my workshops then you may have heard me talk about white balance. This is a great example of blue light.  The more the sun is filtered or blocked the more blue you will see in the light.  White Balance on a digital camera is attempting to correct for the color cast and present the image closer to the white of sunlight.  Here I did not want to “correct” the color, I wanted to celebrate it!  The sun was up enough to provide light, but not strong enough yet to whiten up the scene.  Fog in the early morning looks much more blue than it will say 30 minutes later.  It starts to look more gray as the sun filters through and adds warmth.

When I saw this scene out my window I grabbed my tripod, because weak light means long exposures, and headed out the back door.  The self timer and tripod combined to allow me to get a nice crisp image.

While out walking in the natural area near my house this morning I came across this deer.  He was as curious about me as I was about him.  We stood and studied each other for over 2 minutes.  I know because I checked my watch.  Two minutes can feel like forever when you are trying to keep still and not spook a wild animal.

I shot this with my 105mm f2.8 Nikon Macro lens, which was the only lens I took with me.  I was expecting to be shooting some first signs of Spring, such as budding trees, etc.  Tomorrow I think I’ll take my 70-200 f2.8 for a little more reach.

I came across these bagels this morning at Bloomin’ Tots Pre-school.  My immediate reaction was YUCK.  Some things just shouldn’t be green.

I tried one and it tasted fine, but I still think YUCK when I see them.

When photographing children I never want to post a recognizable image without the parent’s permission.  This image allows me to include something from my pre-school shoot this week without risking an upset parent.

I shot at f2.8 so the hands would be the only thing in crisp focus.  The rest of the scene was nothing special so i wanted it to just fade into the background.  I would venture to guess that even with the slight glimpse of these hands the parents of this child would recognize her if they happen to come across this post.  You don’t have to show much for a person to be recognizable.  A silhouette or even a shot of someone from behind can be quite recognizable to someone that knows that person.

I stood quietly nearby as the teacher painted several hands and then helped them to make nice prints onto their papers.  This is no place for type A neat nicks.  You have to be willing to get a little messy.  The results were very fun; the type of art works that becomes family treasures.  The photographer in me loved the array of color.  The parent in me watched to see if anyone wiped their hands on their clothes before getting over to the sink to wash.  From what I saw there were no mishaps.

People say that I exhibit great patience when waiting for that perfect moment to take a shot, perhaps, but I don’t think I would have the patience it requires to work with a room full of kids daily.  They are fun to visit with, but boy are they active!

I spent the bulk of my day at a pre-school photographing  a wide variety of subjects.  This young man above was a Knight (at least for a few seconds), there were Princesses, Astronauts and more.  Plus I was fortunate enough to be there the same day they were having a Magician!  So I got to enjoy a very entertaining magic act complete with a rabbit.

I spent most of the day scooting around on the floor looking for interesting angles from which to capture the action. Remember, you want to shoot children from their level or below to get a unique perspective.