A Portrait in Autumn Colours

Last weekend I had a very pleasant photo shoot with two kids of my wife's friend. This is one of the pictures that I liked most. The nice separation from the background was achieved by underexposing it by one stop. The light is coming from the camera left where my assistant is holding a 430EX flash with 1/4 CTO gel and a shoot-through translucent umbrella on a monopod. My Canon 5D synchonizes only up to 1/200s, however, with the new PocketWizards Flex and Mini I could actually achieve a synchronization at 1/250s, which allowed for a better background blur at F4. The young lady was very happy with the final result. Camera spec: Canon 5D mark ii with Canon 70-200 4F at 168mm, F4 @ 1/250, ISO 100.

A Small Girl in a Big World

Here is another natural light portrait which I like quite a bit. The positioning of the girl quite a bit off the center to the right (even behind the rule of thirds) adds some drama and expectation to the photo, while on the other hand the blue/violet color tones allow the viewer to calm down. Another point which I think makes the photo to pop up is its simplicity. Camera spec: Canon 5D mark ii with Sigma 50mm 1,4 at 50mm, F2,8 @ 1/160, ISO 100.

Oh my Darling ...

I really like this portrait I took in spring this year. The day was cloudy and provided very even soft lighting so it was nearly impossible to take a bad picture. The long zoom lens at F4 helped to achieve a nice blurry background attracting the attention to her eyes. The depth of field was just a few centimeters so even the eye further away is out of focus. But as long as the front eye is perfectly in focus, the photo looks very sharp. Camera spec: Canon 5D mark II with 70-200 4L at 172mm, F4.0 @ 1/200, ISO 200.

Running for Joy

I took this photo several years ago. I managed to get about three shots and this one was the best and the sharpest one. These little dogs can run really fast, so it is a good idea to go for the servo mode. Camera spec: Canon 20D with Canon 28-105 3.5-4.5 at 105mm, F7.1 @ 1/200, ISO 200.

A Break Dancer

A few years ago I was visiting Stuttgart and met a bunch of very skilled break dancers performing on the street. I asked for their email and send them a few pictures I took during their performance. We exchanged a few emails and quickly agreed on a small photo session in a nearby park. This picture was one of the best thanks to the diagonal composition and the fact that all leading lines point towards the dancers face (the leg, the ground line of the right hand-side buidling, the join line between the left and right hand-side bulding). The colours were slightly enhanced in Lightroom. The photo is natural light only with a little bit on-camera flash as fill-in. Camera spec: Canon 20D with Canon 28-105 3.5-4.5 at 30mm, F8 @ 1/125, ISO 200.

The Palace of Justice

Putrajaya in Malaysia is a great place to visit at night. There are absolutely no people at all and all buildings are lighten up. This photo of Palace of Justice was taken at around 1 am from my mini-tripod at the ground level. The symmetry of the buildings, reflections and colors were really great. Camera spec: Canon 40D with Tokina 11-16 2,8 at 12mm, F8 @ 3.2s, ISO 200.