Biddeford pool Maine

All the equipment were soaked in the rain but were still good. Thanks to their excellent seals.

On our third day in Maine, the weather was still not cooperating but that didn't stop us from going around to explore the beautiful scenery around us. We went to Biddeford pool to hang out and take shots of the beach on this rainy day. It was a pretty good experience.

I had to use an ND4 filter for this shot to slow down my shutter speed to get the slow water flow effect. It was pretty overcast but I still was getting a lot of light from the sky. 

It was pretty good because there was no lightning. Only rain...lightning would have changed the game and we wouldn't have gone out. I wouldn't recommend going out to shoot in a thunderstorm...I break this rule sometimes as I can get really awesome lightning shots in a thunderstorm.

Houses by the shore. I wonder how much it costs to own one?

I was alternating between my 17-40 f/4L and my 70-200 f/2.8 lens. It's awesome to take really wide angle shots of the shoreline with everything in it but the scene from faraway rocks and structures made me swap lenses. It takes skills to swap lenses in rain and water without getting stuff in your sensor.

The rocks near the beach has stuff in it, probably seaweed which gave it a little texture.

I just can't stop taking shots of the rock up close. They kinda looked prehistoric.

We came back days later only to be stuck in a thunderstorm in the parking lot of the beach. We just wished that we saw the beach on a very sunny day at least once. We had fun in this place though. 

A close up of the houses near the beach.

Nubble lighthouse

A close up view of the Nubble lighthouse

On our third day in Maine last June we decided to drive to Nubble lighthouse in York Beach Maine. It was about a 20 minute drive from where we were staying. The weather was still rainy as it was the past few days, though that still didn't stop us from going down and taking photos of this magnificent lighthouse.

At the side of the lighthouse where I mostly photographed most of my shots.

This time I brought along my huge bag filled with photographic goodies from lenses to wireless triggers. 2 particular lenses were very useful that day for me. My favorite 70-200 IS USM became my main lens that day. The 17-40 f/4 L was an awesome companion to it for the wide angle shots of the beach.

A very close up of the lighthouse itself

The 70-200 was perfect in zooming in at the lighthouse. It was across from where we were standing and it has restricted access. Only people that work in the lighthouse are the only ones permitted to cross to get to it. That does not stop me from using the 70-200's awesome reach to get really close to the lighthouse. It was just enough to fill the frame with the lighthouse without me moving back. 

Swapped the 70-200 with my 17-40 to capture the lighthouse and the sea.

The 17-40 enabled me to capture the lighthouse and the sea in one shot. I was hoping to get a photo of the raging sea and the lighthouse together, and my ultra wide angle let me to do that. I actually filmed a couple of videos of the sea with it too. On situations where you don't know how far your subject is away from you, like in our case because it's our first time in this area, it's really helpful to bring multiple lenses. 

On the other side of the lighthouse was this. An awesome view of a structure and the raging sea.

Man the place was great and had a ton of photo opportunities. We were going from side to side taking shots everywhere we look. We really didn't mind the overcast sky as it added drama to our shots. Well, that's what my wife told me, lighthouses and storms do look good together on photos. After we came back home I was looking at my shots and she was right.

I had to take a portrait orientation shot of the lighthouse of course. 

It was getting late so we headed out and ate. It also loked like a bad storm is headed our way so we called it a night. We had dinner and promised to return another day to take shots of the lighthouse at night.

My first hummingbird shots

Fall of last year we went to our favorite botanic garden in Glencoe Illinois to take photos of the last blooms of the season. The weather was getting chilly and the flowers were on their last blooms. Also wildlife is starting to get rare, with a couple of birds and bees and animals going around gathering food to get ready for the cold winter. My friend from work told me a week earlier that hummingbirds are now frequenting some of the spots in the garden. I have never photographed a hummingbird in my life...this will be my first attempt. 

As soon as we got to the garden, we saw a bunch of photographers waiting for the birds. All brandishing their cameras of choice, from medium formats to point and shoots. My camera of choice was my 5D MK2 equipped with my favorite 70-200 IS USM f/2.8 with my Kenko 1.4x DGX 4 attached to it for the extra reach. The telephoto 200mm range will now become a 280mm...I think that'll be enough for what I'm gonna use it for. Of course my f2.8 lens with the teleconverter attached is now an f4 lens. Still not bad for the maximum aperture. We had plenty of sun that day which translates into faster shutter speeds for me. Excellent when capturing hummingbirds.

As soon as we get to one spot, 2 hummingbirds were already flying around. With hummingbirds you really have to have a very keen sense of hearing and sight. These birds aren't big enough to be noticed and they also fly really fast! The busy landscape of bushes and flowers doesn't help too as it helps to hide these little birds. 

I set my camera to aperture priority to let me set it to the maximum aperture that I can so I can have the maximum speed that my camera will allow me to have with the lighting conditions. I know I should've set it to shutter priority so I can specify my speed but it was getting darker in the late afternoon that I am not taking any chances with underexposed photos. I was thinking, it's better to get a blurred hummingbird picture than to get a very dark image of it. Next time I'll remember to bring a flash.

I handheld my camera waiting for the hummingbirds and managed to take some shots while they flew in front of me. 

This hummingbird just froze in front of me for about 4 seconds. Enough time for me to snap this. 

I was lucky with this one. The sun was shining directly into the bird that my camera allowed to have a 2000/sec shutter speed to freeze it in motion.

This season I have my longer 400mm ready for any birds that might come along. I'll be ready to take it with soon when I hear the hummingbirds are back in the gardens!

Model head shots

I did a couple of model head shots when I had that model photo shoot weeks ago. Head shots are pretty simple to do. It is one of the most fun parts in portrait photography. It was actually the highlight of that day.

When doing head shots, I prefer using a longer lens. A longer lens doesn't give you bad distortion in the models face. You know you have bad distortion when your models nose becomes pulled in towards the center of the frame. Giving it a larger than what it's supposed to be look, a very common error for head shots. The longer lens also gives you breathing room between you and the model. Models usually don't like it when there's this huge camera less than 2 feet away pointed at their faces. The extra breathing room a longer lens provides makes the model feel at ease.

For this shot I used my 70-200 lens. The distance between me and the model gives me that perfect frame. For this shoot I used my favorite beauty dish for the top light, and a strobe with a softbox below the models face. I then used strobes for the background, overpowered to blow out the highlights in the background. The beauty dish gives the models a punchier light than a softbox without burning the highlights...as I've said before, you can't live without one for portraits.

The rest of the shoot was just plain fun. We were making the models laugh while shooting them. Making the photos look more natural than real staged ones.

Using the telephoto for flower shots

Using the telephoto lens for shooting flowers is an excellent idea if you are kinda tired of shooting close ups or macro. We all get that feeling of running out ideas when we shoot and it often happens to me. Actually it happens to all of us. Whenever I see flowers I get that urge to get really close and start shooting macro. Though in a lot of cases, the flower as a whole is a subject that sometimes gets overlooked.

The telephoto is an excellent lens for flower shots. It's not only used for shooting animals or subjects from a distance but it is also used for portraits as it gives you a washed out background because of its long focal length. This excellent feature is why it is a good choice for photographing flowers. You basically choose a subject...shoot...and the telephoto gives you that creamy, out of focus background. The 70-200 IS USM that I use gives me the perfect bokeh, or out of focus areas all the time.

Using a shallow aperture gives you a better bokeh. I usually use an f2.8-f4 for really out of focus backgrounds. This is where a long telephoto with a wide aperture excels...that's why they cost a lot. Also some lenses give you better bokeh than others. A good bokeh is something that looks creamy...not busy.