The New Year

so 2007 is gone and 2008 is finally here...even though 2007 seemed to have went by so fast...we had some good times and memories...its been a while since i have updated so i'm not going to bore you with to many words and more pictures this time...so here we go...

we'll start it off by telling you..this past saturday mikey, kyle and myself went downtown greenville and took a couple quick pictures...its was really dark...we didn't really use any flash and we all left our tripods in the car lol...so that meant high iso settings, low shutters and it was cold...so shaking hands realy messed up most our pictures...anyways...here are some of mine...

Kyle and Mikey

Flag outside of a building
Sign near the waterfalls

the falls

in another note...i'm sure you've noticed...we added two new people to the blog...welcome Robbie and Kyle...we (mikey, jeremiah and myself) took a trip to NC to meet up with Robbie and Billy...we sold Robbie, Mikeys old D40 since he upgraded to my D80 when i got my D300...
Robbie
I haven't been to busy with pictures so i've just been snapping random things i see...so this section will have random pics along with candid shots from other shoots and just walking around...
Sky taken from my window of my car
me with my d300 and sigma 10-20mm lens in the bathroom of my office
my wife and her sisters posing funny in between pics at a christmas portrait shoot
my daughter next to her mommies car

other then that i just have christmas pictures and stupid randoms no worth showing haha....so back to that trip mikey, jeremiah and myself took to NC...like i said we met up with Robbie from the blog to sell him the D40 he is currently using...and of course i don't go anywhere without taking my camera...so i snapped a couple pics...we had so much fun...going through Bass Pro Shop where we ran around and we actually made jeremiah drink fish oil out of a bottle in the bait department haha...and of course we ran around and played with everything we could get out hands on...
jeremiah in stealth
Robbie taking down my Yuengling black and tan since he's to young to drink lol
jeremiah with a camo helmet on in bass pro shop
Mikey and Jeremiah sharing a tomato in the mall...you can see billy's face below the tomato lol
me TRUMPING billy in DDR
Mikey on the drive up to NC (we are from SC)
i took this hanging out the window...man did my eyes dry out
jeremiah pretending to cook up something lol
my 10-20 makes that barrel look LONG
billy aiming at robbie

basically as you can see...we had a lot of fun...we plan on taking the trip again to meet up with them...and of course i'll have more pics and i'll get to posting them alot faster then i did these...now that the new year is here i shouldn't be to busy so i'll update this alot more...

also guitar hero has been killing my time haha...mikey, jeremiah and myself have been playing like crazy...but i'll find time while mikey is beating jeremiah to edit pics and post them up...

everyone have a happy and save new year...2008 ftw!

My first post

Hello everyone, my name is Kyle Barnett and I've beeninto this
photography thing for a few years now but got my d50 in jan 07. I got
a 50mm f/1.8 for Xmas... Here Is a shot of it on my d50 that I took
with my iPhone, which I am posting from... I'll post back later with
more info about myself and my gear when I get more time. Until next
time...

TEST

Mikey

mikey and i (mario) got blackberry pearl phones...so now we will be able to update the blog from our phones...we don't have to be in front of a computer...so we shouldn't miss any days posting now...i know we've been slack lately...but the new update i make will be huge...and welcome to robbie...hopefully he will help contribute a bunch to the blog

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

New 50mm Lense

Well like I said I was gonna do I went and did today, went to the camera shop and purchased the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 lens. At first I was having a little trouble using it, but it's one of those lenses you really gotta get used to and use it alot before you can get good with it. Now that I gotta decent with it I love it, heres and example of the 50mm f/1.8

i had the exposure set at 1/100 and the aperture at 3.5, the ISO at 400 and it came out like this.

Enjoy!!

Robbie's First Post

This is also my first post on this blog, I just recently got into photography from teh man (Mario) and Wondermike (Mikey), I Purchased a Nikon D40 from Mikey on this past Sunday where we all met up (Mikey,Mario and Myself). It took me a couple days to get used to using a DSLR just because I've never owned one. Mario and Mikey both have pretty much carried me step by step on how to make pictures look better and even some editing tips.



Here are just some of the pictures I've taken
over a three day period of having the camera. I will soon be buying some new lenses and stuff so I will keep everyone updated. Thanks again :)

Ok my first post on here.....unfortunately Mario has already got a good jump on what we have done lately.....My name is Michael Godwin (Mikey as Mario calls me)....Like Mario said we pretty much do all of our shoots together....which will help you alot if you are starting out in photography. To me it helps you out knowing that you have somewhere there to back you up and give you a hand with equipment...also it gives you different ideas of what to take...such as angles and different way to move lighting so that your expsure turns out better....Mario has helped me out alot with all of this....when I first met Mario I was still using the Auto setting on my camera...LOL which after hanging out with Mario and learning more about how to set up the camera my photos took a huge leap at getting better images....here are a couple of my first images....

Ok while not too bad you can definately tell the difference.....

Although the last two images have flash use you can still tell the difference in the image....So like Mario said....if you just stick with it and be determined that you can have a great outcome in your images.....So stick with it and subscribe to our blog and you will definately learn along the way.....Well I guess that gets the intros out of the way maybe in the next few posts we can squeeze in some how-to's to help yall out.

Random Rants (Double R)

So it's day three. We went out shooting last night...but there were no cameras involved...I recently got a new .22 so last night I got a group of friends together and we went out shooting. My brother, Manuel Maldonado, brought his Smith and Wesson 40 caliber, Justin Roberson brought his new Beretta 9mm. We fired regular target rounds and hollow points to see the difference in the kickback...hollow points definitely win that fight with no contest haha...so you know i'm not going to leave you with out a picture...

Walthers P.22
Yeah, thats my baby...it's calming to go shooting. if you even have a really bad day and just want to blow off some steam, go fire off about 100 rounds, clip after clip...it'll work lol...one of my other favorite things to do is just go walk around the town. Mikey and I recently did a little walk around...it was right after i purchased my D300 and let mikey take over the D80 (upgrading for the D40)...if u are on any of the forums we are on, Mikey posted a thread called "walk around town"...it showed off some of the pictures we took...which in my opinion were pretty good considering i didn't know how to use the D300 yet haha...here are a couple of his pictures:

The menu of the D300:Me with the D300Hampton Inn downtown Greenville
Here are a couple of mine...i didn't edit as many of mine as Mikey did...for some reason the camera raw plug -in for my Photoshop CS2 just stopped working. so i have to open the pictures one by one is Nikon NX (software that came with the camera) then convert them to Jpeg...which got old really quick...so once i finish fixing CS i'll have more pics:

All I can say is practice makes perfect...the more u just get out and shoot random stuff...the better you will get...you learn with your hands really...don't be afraid to get down and dirty...if you see potential for a good shot...do what ever you have to do to capture it on film (or sd/cf cards in our case)...so i will show you one of my randoms...i was driving down the road with my D300 and noticed the sun kind of coming down...in mid-drive i roll down the window adjust the shutter and aperture and snap this button...think of how scared i was that i would either drop my camera out the window or slam in to the back of the person in front of me...it wasn't the safest thing to do...but i love the outcome:

it's all about trying and pushing yourself...same thing applies to flash work...most people are scared with the concept of flash but it's really the same...i started using flash extremely early and i'm ready better then some people who have been using flash for a long time...it's how dedicated u are and how much time and effort you put in to it...which really is dedication haha...so dedicate to dedication and you will be good. Take Mikey and myself for example...in these pictures we look like we know what we are doing:

but we really don't...i kid i kid...haha...we some what do know what we are doing, but thats only because we got out there and tried even when other people told us it was stupid and we are trying to early...the outcome is great...we are pleased with it and most important...the customer loved the pictures...if someone puts you down and tells you that you can't do something...do whatever you can to prove them wrong...because most of the time they are only going off how they learned...just because someone else is a slow learner doesn't mean you won't pick it up fast...OH and i need to thank this guy:

Kyle BarnettHe supplied me with my last SB-600 i bought for a extremely great price...he is also a fellow Nikon user...shooting with a D50...He might not say it himself but i will...he takes some KILLER automotive shots using natural light...I always talk about how flash makes a picture look great...but if i could shoot with natural light as good as this guy...i'd put down a flash or two and just rely on the sun...big ups to Kyle...

Just for a little customer feed back........if you wanna know how I am getting some of my pictures to look a little weird and kind of "stretched"...it's the lens...when I upgraded from the D40 to the D80 I bought a Nikon 50mm f/1.8...it was my favorite lens...and i was happy i didn't have to use the AF-S lenses anymore that i could ONLY use on the D40...i loved that lens more then anything...but it was the smallest lens i had...i needed something smaller for some more up close and personal shots...so Mikey and I went to Wolf Camera on Haywood Road and i was looking at lenses when i came across a Sigma 10-20mm F/4-5.6It's a wide angle lens...so it gets a farther spread of whats around you...i can sit in the driver seat of my car...point the camera forward without putting the seat all the way back...and if i take a picture...it will get the whole dash and even some of the windows...and i drive an Expedition...i just get someone to lean towards me and I just above them and angle myself down and snap the picture...then do my love/hate editing to it...thats how i get all my goofy pictures...just so you know :)

till next time...and hopefully Mikey will stop being lazy and post something on here...

Tis The Season

December is always great for portrait photographers. Mikey and I have had a lot of people ask us to do photos for Christmas and we never turn down a shoot. Like all our other shoots, we use a lot of flashes...i dunno why it's just something we've gotten use to doing...this will be one of those posts that I was talking about when I said my editing is sometimes not something everyone likes...

I've been looking at other photographers a lot and trying to catch a feel for other peoples editing...in this I found a photographer named Dave Hill...I was fascinated by his editing that I tried to learn how to do it myself...and that's what everyone hates...I either get "it's over-sharpened" or "too contrasty"...but if the client likes it...why stop? that's the way I look at it...so here are some spoofs from some recent shoots we've done...
Wondermike himself:Kristin Dalton (model from a shoot)

Now that I'm done showing the spoofs...I'll show some of the actual portraits I've (tehman) done this past month...not all of these are from Christmas shoots but it's also stuff I've messed with trying to get the editing more pleasing to the eye I should say...

Jeremiah Greer (side/film photographer)
Mario Maldonado (tehman/Me)Ozzy (friend):Hayleigh Maldonado (tehmans daughter):Tiffany Maldonado (tehmans wife):
The last few were actually from Christmas shoots...I just wanted to show you some of the other things we've been toying around with...Wondermike got a shots from out last shoot of me using the beastly D300 with the MB-D10 attached to it:
Best camera I've ever used. There will probably be a couple more blogs after this one of nothing to important...well at least until we get some better shoots or more time to actually edit and upload all the good shoots we've done. Till next time