An oddball post

I'm taking care of some paper work and I've got a few photographs that I want to post on the blog.  Don't worry, the new launch of the site isn't far out.  Just getting the final colors/layout under control.  I've also completely blown off writing any words about myself.  I really do need to get around to that part!

So what's going on?  I'm going to post a few photos that were taken today and also at the MMA show in Millersville PA.
In Millersville I was running around with an ultra wide angle zoom on a full frame camera. It exaggerates perspective pretty easily and sometimes it's just what I'm looking for. It gives a distinct and unique perspective.

 Jim wanted Brent to text him the address of the place we were going to eat at, after the fights.  Well Brent didn't want to text it and they fought back and forth for a few minutes over it...finally this was the solution, brent brought it up on his phone and Jim typed it on his...I can't remember off-hand but the address was three digits (I think 109) and Prince...

 This is Bill Bookwalter, and he's been in the cage a few times (inside joke, but seriously he has been).  I have no idea why but I felt it appropriate to take his photo a few times. Also Kevin Killian is on the left of the frame.

 Like I said I have no idea why but I was talking photos of Bill.

Jim spent half of the night typing on his phone.

This photo is funny because I believe the 2 are a couple.  The guy was our waiter/bartender.  He was a nice guy and had the kitchen staff stay to make our food.  The girl she was taking photos of our table like a paparazzi.  Well I caught her.  Had I been about 1 second sooner, I would've captured that on camera.  I don't know why but I think taking a photo of someone taking your photo is neat...only if they don't know that you know.

 

 

So today we decided to go for a walk.  Well Dad can't leave the house without a camera.  Sometimes it's incredibly convenient to capture what I see.  Other times I feel bad that I'm looking through the lens at something rather than looking with my own two eyes.  I think though that having the photos of my son are going to be worth it.  He's not quite 18 months, but it's fantastic looking at how much hes grown from birth to now.  He was a little late to the walking game, but he's loving it so far now.  I fear though that I'll have to worry about the constant bruising from him exploring and learning what he can do and where he can go.

This is him chilling out in his wagon.  The ducks were coming up by and he was smiling, cooing and laughing at them.

Remember what I typed a second ago about him exploring?  He thinks grabbing his wagon wheels when it's moving is cool.  Mommy and Daddy tell him it's an ouchy, but he doesn't care.

Back to lounging

Now he thinks it's a game. 

After awhile he had enough of being pulled around and he wanted to push the wagon.  He became frustrated quickly because the wagon doesn't push well.  Those steer wheels don't work well in reverse.

This is just a photo of the waterfall there.

Same with this one.

 

 

Alright, see you soon! 

 

Warrior Challenge 9-22-12

I was at Millersville University for the most recent installment of Warrior Challenge MMA.  It was a great show, good fights from start to finish.

The full gallery of photographs for sale can be seen on my website at, THIS LINK HERE!

Here are a few photograph highlights from the show,

I shot the show using my usual set up of 2 Canon 1DIV cameras.  However I wanted to test out how well the 5D3 would do with its limited frame rate (6fps) and more limited buffer (partly because of the size of the files, they are monstrous).  The auto focus at times was worse, at times on par and at times better than the 1DIV cameras.  This consequently means that the 1DIV's were at times worse, at times on par and at times better than the 5D3.  The ISO handling of the cameras is similar (the 1DIV is a great high ISO camera) with an advantage towards to the 5D3 at higher ISO.

My verdict as of now is, I wouldn't repalce the 1DIV's with a pair of 5D3's, and I wouldn't replace a pair of 5D3's with a pair of 1DIV's UNLESS the feature set of the other camera was something that you needed more.  What I mean by that is this, the 1D series has spot metering linked to the af point...that's freakin' awesome.  The 1D series has a higher sync speed (1/300 vs 1/200) which is again awesome.  The build on the 1D is better (300,000 shutter rating vs 150,000, better weather resistance et cetera).  The 1D also has the appearance of increased magnification as a result of the 1.3x APS-H sensor vs the full frame 35mm sensor in the 5D3. 

I'm not really interested in doing gear comparisons on a photo blog aimed to show images to prospective, and past clients, along with fans of photography and what I shoot in general.  I do know a few photographers follow this and will find the information helpful.

Thank you for the read.

CDMMA 9-15-12

Hello all.  First I want to touch upon a subject before I post any fight photos and a link to the fight photos as well.

When I shoot a photograph, I own the rights to that photograph.  That means you cannot take, reproduce, edit, change or do anything to that photograph without my permission. 

My to my surprise, I've seen my photographs on news sites, and nutrition sites...photos that weren't bought, and photos I'm given no credit for (even though I took them). 

I am a friendly individual and I do not look for any problems.  I know that some people do not understand the damage they are doing when they do this.  I know that there's other people who simply do not care.  The fact of the matter is simply this.  I am a business.  If I am being stolen from, then means my income decreases.  If my income decreases, I am no longer feeding my business.  If it continues to decrease, I'm no longer feeding myself.

When you look on my site and see a digital download for $4.99 or an 8x10 for $10.99, and you find a way to take which doesn't belong to you,  you have essentially stolen that money from me. 

Okay, enough of the drudgery because I do hate that kind of talk, I just find that I've been taken advantage of quite a bit lately and I'm going to do my best to put a stop to it.  This means if I see that you've used a photograph without permission, you'll be asked for payment and a credit. 

I photographed Complete Devastation MMA at the Clearfield County Fairground on Saturday 9-15-12.  It was a great night of fights.

Here's a few highlights of the evening,

 

The full gallery, with photos for sale is here Fight Photos CDMMA

A few flowers, a lens review and a personal update.

I'm posting a few new stills to both the blog, then they will be processed and for sale shortly on my website.

I don't tend to get asked this very often by clients, but I do get asked by other photographers what system I shoot.  I use Canon cameras, and Canon lenses.  I don't use any third party items.  I recently added a new lens to my line up.  The Canon 24 1.4ii L.  The lens is one impressive looking piece of glass.  It weighs (guessing) as much as my 24-105 (which is less than my 24-70).

I added it because I wanted another low light prime.  Well I bought 2 of them that just couldn't focus to save their life.  When I used them and they hit, the results were magical.  They were simply unobtainable by another lens.  It's the fastest wide angle lens with auto focus Canon makes.  I did some research and it appears that the 24 1.4 that Nikon has it equally a piece of crap to use in the focus department and isn't even as sharp as the Canon version.

What good is sharp when I can't get the stupid thing to focus?  People have suggested sending my cameras in because they could be the problem.  Seriously, what are the chances that I have 3 professional level Canon bodies that work FLAWLESSLY with 8 Canon lenses, zooms/primes, but have a problem that they can't work with another lens?  I actually had someone suggest to me that perhaps the bodies and lenses I have were ALL out of adjustment just enough, but close enough to each other to work.

Seriously?  No, I either got 2 bad 24 1.4ii's (I went through two of them extensively) or the 24 1.4 just sucks.  It was a 1599 after the 200 dollar rebate piece of crap.

I sent it back and I won't be revisiting it anytime soon, that's for sure.

Someone suggested using manual focus, but sorry I didn't buy a lens to use as a manual focus only lens.  I would've bought a Zeiss instead if I wanted over priced manual focus only optics.

Aside from being a professional photographer, I do have a few other interests/hobbies.  I enjoy working out, playing music and studying Judo and JuJitsu.  I received my black belt in Judo this month.  I plan on doing a write up and some photos of that here soon.  I'm excited and looking forward to that write up.

Here's the still's I was talking about before I started the wall of text :)

They will be available for purchase on my website shortly. Thanks for tuning in and stay tuned for the new website launch.

Status update!

The website redesign is going well, so well in fact that I think launch isn't too far out.  Just finalizing details, and *gulp* writing some bio stuff up for you guys to read!  I'll keep you posted.








A friend of mine and I were having a discussion about things in life that are never not worth something.  There's multiple types of watch movements.  Automatic, and quartz.  Basically self winding and battery.  A self winding machine is true to real watch making as you get.

There were other items on the list as I'm sure you can imagine, but it was a good talk.

Pictured is a 90's era Omega seamaster (Think James bond circa 95, only the first three they had were quartz and not automatic) with a faded bezel. 

I'm going to see if my friend wants his collection photographed, because it's always unique trying to get cool concept photos of nice items.  He's definitely got some cool/interesting pieces and like I said, I'm going to try and photograph them.

Complete Devastation MMA 5

I shot the complete devastation 5 event at the Blair County convention center in Altoona, Pennsylvania on July 14th 2012.  I enjoy working with this promotion, because they are interested in more than a quick buck for their pockets.  They legitmately care about putting on quality shows, treating fighters right and growing their name.  So it's good to work with someone that isn't a sleezeball.  Jason, the owner, listens to feedback well too. 

It's been a learning experience for them I'm sure.  They've really been working on their production too. 

Lighting is always a bitch at sporting events held in a building (and outside but that's a different story).

See UFC style lighting is tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of lights and grip equipment.  It's trusses and 10's of thousands fo watts of light.  Strung up from high in the ceiling and feathering out over.  I don't want to get too into a lesson on lighting, but let's just say it's always a challenge in these types of situations.

The lighting could've used some improvement.  You see our eyes see things that our still and video cameras do not.  Just for fun, take a look at a scene in your house that has very dark shadows and very bright highlights.  For instance your desk with your computer in a room with the lights out.  Your eye can pick up detail that your camera cannot.  It's not that our eyes are "sharper" than our lenses.  Rather that the human eye has an incredible dynamic range.  Our eyes have 20-25 f/stops of dynamic range (various books/sites are my sources for this information).

My cameras (canon eos 1div, until the 1DX hits shelves, the top end Canon 1 series cameras) at ISO 100 have a dynamic range of about 12 stops...TWELVE!!!  That's anywhere from a little more than half to a little less than half of the human eye!  At ISO 12800 as most of these events are shot...it PLUMMETS to 8 f/stops.

To put this into plain terms, each f/stop greater in exposure value means double the amount of light.  Each f/stop lower in exposure value means half the amount of light.

f/4 lets in half the light that f/2.8 does, f/5.6 lets in double the light of f/8.

Just thinking of things in numbers rather than f/stops.

1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16384, 32768, 65536, 131072, 262144, 524288.

We can say that's relative to the 20 f/stops the human eye sees.

At ISO 12800, the 1DIV sees,
1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128.

What does this mean in simple terms?  Our eyes see the show just fine.  Our video cameras and still cameras only see parts of the show.  There's really much more to it, but rather than bore you and make my kid not see daddy for awhile, I'll move on.    It just means the video and pictures from the show will not be as strong as actually being at the show.  It means that details become smeared and we don't get as much "info" in the photo/video.

Rather than focus on negatives why don't we talk about some of the positives?  The show was great and the crowd was really excited for some good fights.  There were big names on the card.  TUF Veteran Jeff Smith, UFC fighter Corey Hill, M-1 veteran George Sheppard, local fighters like Levi McCord, Jason Royer and champion Charlie Gathers. Semi-Local (he used to live in town here but moved down south) Brad Mountain was on the card as well.  So the card was stacked. Matchmaking was great.

There was a sweet after party WITH THE VIDEO OF THE FIGHTS PLAYING!. 

It was really a great value for entertainment and a way to support MMA in this region.  I'm glad the promoter brings me on to shoot these shows.  Trust me when I say this, each show gets better than the last one. 

It was definitely a blast to be there.
Here's a few snaps of the show,

The full gallery of photos

Oh, if you're a fighter that's in one of these photos listed on THIS BLOG (not the website, they are not permissable to steal) you can feel free to download it and put it on your facebook.  With the following exceptions,
1; My watermark cannot be edited.
2; the photo cannot be changed.

Thanks!

See you at the next show!

beautiful wedding, new site.

Just shot a beautiful wedding with Karinn and Dustin.  It sure was a hot one, and the humidity was just as high!

I signed with a company to do my website.  The changes will begin here in the near future.  The old site will remain up until we are ready for launch, so everything is seamless.

Here's a quick pick from the wedding,

Stay tuned!

We are off this weekend!  Take care and see you next weekend with CDMMA photos!