Portrait Photographer - Emily

1/100, f/1.4, ISO 1600, 0 EV, 35mm (35mm f/1.4 L)

No weddings this weekend but it was neither quiet nor relaxed. These states seem unachievable with a 16-month old charging around the house! I managed to take a few shots of Emily in the process of dismantling the kitchen. Light levels were low but the quality of light was fantastic - reflected light from the white fridge in the shot above is acting as fill light.

Check out more of my photography here: photographer in Kent

Wedding Photographer Kent - weekend off

1/125, f/2.8, ISO 100, -1/3 EV, 150mm (70-200mm f/2.8 L IS)

Having battled with rain for the past month's weddings, I have a Saturday off and the light is fantastic - typical! The sky was like a giant softbox today - a photographer's dream. Emily and I went to the park with her new scooter, where I took the above shot (which is completely untweaked). Let's hope it's like this for next Saturday's wedding.

Check out my photography here: wedding photographer in Kent

Emily's Photobook

I was invited to beta-test a printer's latest Mac software for album design last week and so decided to put together a photobook of my daughter Emily's first year. I'm sure all parents think the same - where did that year go! I thoroughly enjoyed doing this and I'd recommend putting together albums of your favourite photos - it's good to get the shots off the monitor and into printed form.

Check out more of my photography here: Kent Portrait Photography

Emily and her Nana at Deal beach

My final set of photos from last weekend - I was very busy! Emily and my Mum at Deal beach in Kent on Sunday afternoon. Taken with an 85mm f/1.2 L lens.

I'm setting off for Sidcup shortly to photograph a wedding and will be shooting another in Dover tomorrow. August is  the cruellest month!

Check out more of my photography here: wedding photography in Kent

Emily

A shot of Emily taken with my new Canon EF 35mm f/1.4 L lens (more about that in a future post). This was taken with Emily facing a large window in our lounge - light levels were low as it's an overcast day here (ISO 640, 1/200 at f/2.0 - the lens is already nice and sharp at f/2.0!). Getting shots of her with a lovely smile can be frustrating when photographing alone - as soon as I put the camera to my eye she no longer recognises daddy and stops smiling. What I end up doing is putting the camera just below my chin, pulling silly faces, and then firing away using autofocus to try and get a sharp shot - composition goes right out the window but it's worth it for the lovely expressions. I bumped up the contrast using curves in Photoshop and then applied a gentle vignette.

I'm off to photograph Sharon and David's wedding at the Manor Gatehouse and Prince's Park, Dartford this afternoon - fingers crossed the rain holds off (I'm sure this is why so many of the best wedding photographers are based in Australia).

Check out my wedding photography here: Kent wedding photographer

The sofa surfer

Just a quick post today with a couple of shots of my lovely daughter Emily. She's almost one (that went quickly!) and has just started to tentatively 'sofa surf'. Time to lock my camera equipment safely away.

I'm off to St Francis Church, Ashford tomorrow to photograph the wedding of Matthew and Tanya. Photos will be posted on Sunday.

See more of my photography here: wedding photographer in Kent

They're back!

I spent last week alone (and almost turned feral) but now my lovely ladies, Veronique and Emily, have returned. So a very brief post today accompanied by a photo of Emily in her cosy bathrobe from yesterday.

Off to a wedding at the Dog Inn in Wingham tomorrow and the weather forecast looks good!

Check out more of Emily's portraits here: Kent portrait photographer

Sandwich, Kent

The sky was fantastically moody here in Sandwich yesterday so I popped out for an hour with the 16-35mm lens and a tripod for some high dynamic range shots. Great fun!

See more of my photography here: Kent photographer

Portraits of Emily

A quick post today - two photographs (off-the-cuff natural light photos, no reflectors or lights involved) of my daughter Emily who's just learnt how to crawl. The hard work begins now!

Check out more of my portraits here: Kent portrait photographer

Everyone loves to receive a parcel!

A few essential photographic supplies arrived this morning in a lovely cardboard box full of styrofoam chips. I wasn't the only one excited about the contents! I used a splash of ring flash with -1 stop of flash exposure compensation (FEC) to balance the strong side lighting.

See more Kent portrait photography.

Emily in black and white

Since the English summer is in full flow today, and may not last long, it's going to be a brief post. A picture of my daughter Emily (click to see her full portrait portfolio) taken this morning with bright sunlight streaming in through the window. hence the high contrast.

Black and white portrait photography

Good black and white photography yields an almost primeval power - it has such visual impact. One of the keys is to achieve a good tonal range, which I hope I've illustrated with the above shot of Jack. Further examples can be seen on my portrait photography page. These results generally require a lot of additional work after taking the shot - either in the darkroom, using techniques pioneered by Ansel Adams, or using digital processing software such as Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop. The latest versions of these programs allow you to mimic the effects of all the classic B&W filters in order to enhance contrast. Another key technique is dodging (lightening) and burning (darkening) which gives you very precise control of contrast. Be prepared to experiment!

A relaxing interlude

Having a hectic evening but didn't want to disappoint my readership (Chris, your support is very much appreciated!) A calming shot of a flower to soothe fevered brows...

Rush hour in Luang Prabang, Laos

Chatted with a friend today about their forthcoming trip to SE Asia, which got me reflecting on our tour of Laos-Vietnam-Cambodia in Dec 2005 - very fond memories.
I therefore share with you this photograph from Luang Prabang, the old royal capital of Laos. 

Emily Fenwick is almost nine months old...

...and still no teeth!

St Clement's Church, Sandwich

Another photo post to get the hang of the settings. A high-dynamic range (HDR) shot of St Clement's Church in Sandwich, processed using Photomatix.

Mange-a-trois

The last image was smaller and darker than expected. I'll try another - three mange-tout.

A little splash!

It was that easy! Less than 60 seconds to set up a blog on my website. Let's try posting an image - a shot of a water droplet I took recently.

David's first post

Can Google Blogger really be this easy?