Capturing the Action!

Oh to have Jessica's ankles even though they are blurred out above. Look how high she is flying. These are from a quick trip to the farm last weekend to visit the girls. We spent the majority of the time down by the lake were they enjoyed the cool water and I did my photography assignment for the week, which was playing with shutter speeds.

The top shot was my best panning shot and my teacher told me that I should enter it into the upcoming Photography Society of America's competition on movement. This is like the highest compliment she can give and since she is often a judge of their competitions I am seriously considering doing it. Panning is when you set a slow shutter speed like 1/30 of a second and move the camera with the action. The person/thing moving doesn't have to be crystal clear which is what was bothering me about some of my attempts but just needs to be relatively clear, like Jess is. The background should be blurred and show the movement.The second shot is also with a slow shutter speed which shows the water as one silky entity rather than the individual droplets that you see with a normal shutter speed. It helps to have a tripod for sure when using slow shutter speeds but when dealing with moving kids you have to just hold the camera as steady as you possibly can.

I had an appointment with my orthopedic surgeon the other day to check things out before we go on vacation. As I mentioned I've felt like I've regressed the past 3 weeks and have been having lots of weird pains and tenderness. My suspicions were unfortunately correct. There are actually two things going on in my ankle. For one thing I have a screw loose. I've gotten a kick out of using that line but I guess it's not a laughing matter. I can feel it moving around down there but it's not where the pain is coming from so they are going to leave it alone for the time being. If it starts causing problems or if some of its pals also start leaving the plate they will have to go in and take them out.

But the real problem is something that occasionally happens when there is trauma in the bones. My ligaments in between the two fractured bones are turning into bone which is called ossification. The x-rays from 6 weeks don't show anything but the one from this week has all kinds of white bone growth were there shouldn't be any. There isn't really anything they can do to stop it. If it gets worse they will have to do surgery to remove it. It obviously can be painful and he said to use Ibuprofen and call him if it gets more painful.

Mike said that he never should have told me that there was something actually wrong. I have a tendency to make excuses when I'm feeling lazy He said he can hear me now saying, "Can you get me a soda, my ossification is bothering me." The one good thing is that there is nothing to stop me from going and enjoying my vacation. My doctor said to just bring an ice pack and end the day with some Ibuprofen and a glass of wine. I think I can follow those doctor's orders!

Exploring Shutter Speeds

I recently discovered the most amazing website for new digital camera users called Digital Photography School. Since buying my new Canon PowerShot A650 IS digital camera over 6 months ago I have been hesitant with it and not sure of how to go about learning all of its capabilities. I've read other sites that talk about different setting and things like shutter speed and exposure but they were way over my head. This site comes at from a newbie perspective and gives you exactly what you need to know without overwhelming you with terms that will just confuse you. Then if you want to read further they give additional lessons on important topics.

One of the first things I read was 4 Reasons Not to Write off Shooting in Automatic which is the only thing I've ever read that reassured me that it was ok to use the auto setting on my camera. So many sites make you feel like an idiot if you just use auto mode but this article actually encourages new digital users to keep it on auto for the first 3-6 months while you get a feel for your camera and learn about framing and develop your eye.

This weekend I took my camera to my husband's bar band show, the Bloolights, at a great venue near our house called M.T. Rockers. It is kind of a dive bar but the lighting is good, the stage is large and has interesting backgrounds, and there is plenty of room to move around and get different angles. I think the other patrons started thinking I was the crazy girl with the camera but I'm all right with that. I explored shutter speed since the guys were in motion a lot of the time and some different settings. If you want to see more from the night they are in the Bloolights set on flickr. The top shot was done in good old auto mode with flash on and is a perfectly fine shot that we could use on their website. It shows Mike on guitar and his brother on drums pretty clearly.

This shot was done in black and white mode with a higher shutter speed which gives it a crisper image that I like. The higher the shutter speed the more it freezes the image is what I learned in this article called Moving towards Manual Settings: Understanding Shutter Speed.

This final image was done with a much lower shutter speed in a vibrant color mode that I like. The lower the shutter speed the longer the image is exposed so it has more time to pick up movement. It gives it a blurred effect which can be cool. Mike says it looks like he lost his arm but I think it's interesting since it shows the movement.

This weekend I plan on exploring Aperture and depth of field as discussed in this lesson. I'm hoping to learn how to do those artsy shots that are always on the front page of etsy with the interesting blurred focus. I'll share anything I learn next week.