Abi’s Floor Routine – Redmond

02. December 2012 · Comments Off on Abi’s Floor Routine – Redmond · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

So I know I take a lot of landscapes, in fact I post more landscapes than anything else, and I’ve stated in the past that I like to shoot vista’s more than portraits as you don’t have to talk to a sunset or interesting view.  I think (not sure) I’ve also stated that Abi is very into gymnastics, in fact she’s in a “Rec-Opt” (which I’m told stands for Recreational Optionals) program at her local gym.  She’s been learning all her routines for the last 6 months in preparation for the competition meets she’s now attending.  As a girl gymnast she obviously does her obligatory four events Beam, Uneven Bars, Vault and Floor.

Well today was her second meet.  This one was at her own gym too so we didn’t have to travel too far to see her in action.  This is a tough sport though, not only for the participants but also for the spectators.  Abi works out 3 times a week putting in many hours in the gym to get better, and today I had to sit through 6 hours of gymnastics to see my daughter for less than 3 minutes.  It was brutal!  But I have to say worth it as my little girl was amazing.

This is now dad bragging time so you are going to have to just put up with this (nope I’m not apologizing).  111 kids turned up today in her event, and 18 were in her age category and skill level.  Abi got 8.9 on the beam and came 6th, she got 9.25 on the floor and came 2nd, she got 8.8 in the vault and came 5th and 8.8 on the bars and came 3rd.  Overall she came 4th, and her team came 3rd.

She works really hard at this and I have to say I was very proud of her.  I like watching all the events but my favorites are the beam and floor.  They last the longest and to me look the hardest to do.  The trouble with taking pictures at these events is that the lighting is terrible and there are always people in the way.  Also the kids move very fast so that with low light means that getting focus and no motion blur is really hard.

For tonight’s picture I decided to post this one of her about to start her floor routine.  You can see the concentration in her face and she did REALLY well.  When I see her tumbling across the floor doing her cartwheels and round off back hand spring I’m just amazed and again very proud.

Tonight the guys found some “Glassy Baby” candle holders to play with.  Apparently these are very popular – I’ve never heard of them.

Carousel – Redmond

01. December 2012 · Comments Off on Carousel – Redmond · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

Tonight Lisa, Abi and I went to Redmond to see the “Redmond Lights” event when the city officially turned on its holiday decorations.  The event started at City Hall where they had a number of pretty big trees decorated.  They had loads of kids events too and a carousel (with the longest line of people you have ever seen).  Once you’d seen everything around City Hall, there was a well lit walking trail covering around a mile or so with musicians and entertainers on the way.  They also had a load of christmas decorations on route too.

The city had planned everything out, you were encouraged to leave your car by City Hall and then walk the trail.  Then the City had a number of Microsoft connector coaches at the other end to bring you back to your car.  So off we went.  It was pretty cool, very pretty with loads of things to see on the way.  The problem was the trail wasn’t very wide and it was full of people.  And of course there were those idiots you always get with strollers who were trying to walk in the wrong direction, so it was a little nuts.

We didn’t walk the whole trail as Abi was getting tired, so when we got to Redmond Town Center we cut across town to get back to the start.

Before we started on the walking trail I stopped by the carousel to grab a picture.  Obviously it was full of people when I got there so I waited until the carousel stopped and everyone got off and then got some shots.  Of course as soon as everyone was off the carousel people started getting on again so I had to be quick.  This shot was captured with a wide aperture so I had a narrow depth of field throwing everything in the background out of focus.

Master Chief tonight decided to play a game of Table Tennis.  He lost!

Danielle – Redmond

28. November 2012 · Comments Off on Danielle – Redmond · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: ,

I don’t take many portraits, I tend to prefer to shoot landscapes.  It’s not because I don’t like shooting people it’s just that I’m not overly confident and landscapes don’t get disappointed if I screw up!  Having said that I don’t think I’ve upset anyone yet, but then like I said I haven’t taken many.

Anyway back at the beginning of the year Danielle asked me if I wanted to shoot her at her gym.  She wanted at the time some facebook pics showing her doing what she loves to do which is lift weights.  So I went to the gym and captured a few action shots and posted one on the January 13th.  Well Danielle liked the picture, at least I think she did as she asked me to shoot her Senior Portrait.

For those of you who don’t know (mostly friends from the UK) here in the US it’s very common for senior high school students to get nice portrait pictures in their last year.  These (I think) go into their last year book and also act as a nice reminder of what they looked at when they were 18.  In the US there is quite a large industry for photographers taking senior portraits.  So Danielle wanted hers done and she very kindly asked me to help.

Seniors usually get environmental pictures doing their favorite past time or hobby and for Danielle again she wanted to go back to the gym.  So off we went and we took some shots.  I’m really not sure who was more nervous, Danielle or me, but we both got through the experience unscathed.  These pictures were not suposed to be her lifting anything, just her posing by equipement looking gorgeous.  She of course pulled that bit off no problem, so the pressure was definitely on me to get some nice shots.

At the end of the day I think I got around 140 pictures, 30 of which she really liked.  So I cleaned them all up for her (which mainly involved me tidying up the wall behind her and adding a little vignette.)  Tonight I asked her if she minded me posting one fo the shots and she said no problem go for it.

I have to say I really liked all of the 30 we we ended up with, but selected this one as it had the weights behind her and her leaning on a medicine ball.  So as an environmental portrait it came out well.  I also put a fan on her for this shot and liked the effect it had on her hair.

I should say here that Danielle is very pretty so for me this was pretty easy to get a nice picture, and I’m very grateful to her for asking and am pleased she likes the results.  So thanks Danielle for a great experience, who knows I may one day do it again.

Tonight the guys found a wooden horse to play with and were found “hanging” from something sensitive!

Velodrome – Redmond

27. November 2012 · Comments Off on Velodrome – Redmond · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

When I left work tonight at 7:30 it had been dark outside for nearly 3 hours – how nuts is that?  So I’m driving home and you know what I’m thinking, what am I going to post tonight?  On the way home it was a really nice evening, the moon was full and looked huge and it was dry with a pretty clear sky.  So I decided to look for a night shot.

On my way home is Marymoor Park and they usually have these big flood lit sports fields so I thought it might be interesting to shoot one of those with the moon in shot.  So I detoured off into the park.  Unfortunately there were a load of people playing soccer and the fields were all full.  I really didn’t want to go through the process of asking people if I could shoot them so I looked for something else.

Marymoor is a pretty big park and they have loads of different sections for visitors, one of which is the velodrome.  For those of you who don’t know, a velodrome is a large circular bicycle track for cycle racing.  It has large banked corners so they can ride super fast around the whole track.  Tonight the place was completely empty and totally lit up with these huge flood lights.  So I had complete autonomy to set up wherever I wanted and got the chance to take loads of pictures from different angles.

Obviously I wanted to get the moon in the picture too so ended up selecting the image below.  Here I got the start line on one side and the observation building, some of the bleach seats and the first corner banking off to the left.  I angled the camera a little to accentuate the curve of the track and got the moon in the image too.

All I did for this picture was add a heavy vignette to darken the corners.  Other than that the image is right out of the camera.

Tonight the guys found a drum kit to play with, but all Master Chief could do was kick the drum!

Carving – Redmond

21. November 2012 · Comments Off on Carving – Redmond · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: ,

The rain let up today for about half an hour so I grabbed my gear and headed out.  It’s quite funny what you see when you walk around looking for something interesting to shoot.  I was was driving out of Redmond towards Duval and I was driving down the hill I live on around this really windy road.  On either side of the road was heavy woodland and something caught my eye.  So I turned round and went back for a look.

Just off the road in the trees was a fallen tree trunk and someone had carved this bird on the bottom.  I had to dodge traffic and jump over a barrier to get the picture so I risked life and limb for this one.  But how cool is this?  Firstly I’m shocked I saw it, but after checking it out really close I’m really glad I did.

There was a lot going on around the carving (loads of trees and plants etc.,) but I wanted the focus to be on the bird.  So I selected a pretty narrow depth of field so plants behind were out of focus and added a vignette to the picture so the bird carving is the lightest item in the image.  I actually took a few versions of this art work, some from further away and others really close up and tight.  But this version was my favorite, it showed you all of the carving and placed it in context in the wooded area too.

Master Chief brought Carter a gift today, his own “Grow Tiger”, cool eh?  Now he just needs to find some water.

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