Lloyd K. Barnes Photography

The 2010 Celebration of Light fireworks competition got underway last night with the entry from the USA team. This year USA, Mexico, Spain and China will be competing.

Fireworks, with lots of light, colours and motion, are a great subject for photographers. I'm amazed at the incredible details of the plumes of light that show up in the photos, even though the fireworks last only a few seconds.

Here are a few tips for taking some great photography photos:

1. Use a tripod. You need long exposures (several seconds) and holding the camera by hand will cause the images to look shaky. If you don't have a tripod handy, look for a spot that you can place the camera.
2. Use a cable release - this also prevents camera shake.
3. Exposure: 4 seconds at f/8.0 works well (ISO 100). You can play around with the exposure - usually you'll buy seroquel online want a long enough shutter speed to capture the trails of light, which is about 4 to 6 seconds.
4. Use manual focus. You can prefocus on some bursts and then keep the same focus for the subsequent shots.
5. Try focus blurring - this is a little tricky but the idea is to change the focus during the exposure to give some interesting looking shots. Check out Focus Blur group on Flickr for more details.
6. Try setting the camera's shutter on "bulb" and covering the lens with a black cloth (in a pinch your hand will do). When a particularly dramatic explosion happens, you can remove the cloth for a couple of seconds and then cover it and wait for the next one. After 2 or 3 bursts you can close the shutter.
7. I prefer to shoot in RAW format and adjust the image later using Lightroom (or any other raw image editor). Try different white balances - tungsten usually looks pretty nice!

Related links:

Fireworks photography guide

11 Tips for Sparkling Fireworks Photos

I love night photography and Vancouver is a great place for it. My favourite time for taking night shots is during the first hour after sunset. It’s called “The Blue Hour” – when the sky is a beautiful rich blue – even when it’s overcast. But it is dark enough for the city lights, which adds more interest and drama to the shots. Buildings, traffic signals, cars, neon signs all look great at night. After about one hour, the sky turns dark and doesn't look quite as cool.

I took this photo on Commercial Drive, which comes to life in the evening with lots of people enjoying the restaurants, coffee shops and bars or just picking up some groceries at the shops.

Some tips for night photography:

• Bring a tripod! The shutter speeds will be too slow to take handheld shots. If your camera takes decent pictures at high ISO settings and has image stabilization, you might be able to get some good handheld shots with a faster shutter speed.
• Use a cable release or remote if you have https://assaultvictimlawyer.com/buy-cialis/ one. If not, use the self-timer so that you do not touch the camera during the shot giving, you sharper images.
• I turn off the image stabilization with my camera (Olympus E-510). The image stabilization is unnecessary with a tripod and actually adds motion blur!
• Try f/16 or smaller apertures - the lights will have more twinkle and bright lights will have starry rays!
• Moving cars look very cool with long shutter speeds
• Moving people will be ghostly and blurry - sometimes totally disappear. I like the motion blur effects as it adds more energy to the shot. If you want sharper focus for the people in the foreground, you can use a flash.
• Try different white balance modes - tungsten and fluorescent often look really good. Daylight mode will look warm and orange which can give a cozy feel to some scenes. If you shoot in raw format you can easily play around with the white balance when you process your raw files.

Here's a slideshow of some of the night images on "The Drive":

Here's another version of the photos in a music video style slideshow: Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

It’s great when everything comes together during a photoshoot! I’m expanding my editorial portfolio and love anything edgy, alternative and surreal. One of the jobs of a photographer is to translate creative vision to photographic images. I'm attracted to the creative possibilities in fashion editorial photography, where models, makeup artists, hairstylists, wardrobe stylists, and photographers work together in the creative process.

For this shoot, the team consisted of wardrobe stylist Laura Anne Image, model Yomee and makeup artist Sylvia Szczepanska. Laura Anne's concepts are inspired by her art work, which she brings to life in the photoshoot. She was great to work with because of her creative vision and great art direction. Also, she did an amazing job sourcing the wardrobe and accessories. Sylvia is a very talented makeup artist, graduated from John Casablancas Institute. Yomee is an alternative model from Australia who is now lives in Vancouver.  She was also wonderful to work with and responded to art direction with great poses and expression. This is the first time that I have worked with this team and hope to do more shoots in the future!

Laura Anne described her vision as "colour contradiction where innocent colours look villain-like."  The colour palette was to be pastels - light https://www.rossitchpediatricdentistry.com/buy-lasix/ pink, light blue, lilac and a white background. Unfortunately the original model broke her leg before the shoot, so Yomee was the replacement. Yomee is an alternative model with body mods - piercings and tattoos. However, Laura Anne wanted clean skin for the model. I was up to the challenge of Photoshopping the the tattoos away. I've done it before and can make it look convincing. Also, the model's eyes were to be blank - again another Photoshop challenge! I've never tried that before - I have done much Photoshopping of eyes - removing contact lens edges, clearing up small blood vessels, brightening the eyes, darkening the pupils, changing the eye-colour - but never completely removing the irises and pupils!

I  used a beauty dish for the main light because it gives a bit more edgy look with more shadow definition than with a softbox, but still gives soft light. I used a white seamless paper background, lit with another strobe and a gridded strobe behind the model as a hair light.

I think the photos have a creepy feel mainly due to the unsettling blank eyes, and the styling, model and makeup go together to make some beautiful images that brought to life Laura Anne's creative vision.

Here is a slideshow with more images from this shoot:

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The Olympics are now over after an incredible final gold medal for Canada – with an overtime win in men’s ice hockey in an intense game against Team USA. The Canadian athletes had their best ever Winter Olympics winning 14 gold, 7 silver and 5 bronze medals. No country in Winter Olympic history has won 14 gold medals before, making it a major achievement. A large part of Canada's success was the massive support from the fans and spectators. Every day thousands of fans filled the downtown core, celebrating the latest medal winners and just having a good time. Their cheers and spontaneous singing of "O Canada" was broadcast across the nation, so that the entire country could join in! I'm sure the excitement of the fans helped to spur the athletes on to do their best.

The athletes also received much support for their training and expressed their appreciation whenever they were interviewed in the media. They https://www.ncmutuallife.com/buy-vibramycin-online/ were able to pursue their dreams and get recognition for it too! Some of the Canadian athletes who did not win medals expressed how they felt they let down the country who had supported them over the years and deserved to see them win a medal. But most Canadians will agree that it is enough that they competed and did their best.

Of the many Olympic moments during the games, the most memorable was the figure skating performance of Joannie Rochette, who despite her mother passing away suddenly 4 days earlier, skated to win a bronze medal. She said that her mother would have wanted her to compete, which inspired her great performance.

Other amazing performances included the gold medal for snowboarding half-pipe won by Shaun White from the USA, and the gold medal for ladies figure skating by Yu-Na Kim of South Korea.

But the biggest story for me was the great atmosphere of celebration, peace and fun in Vancouver! I'm happy to live in such a great city, which is not only beautiful, but is also populated with so many awesome people!

Here are some more photos of Jennifer Nguyen from a photoshoot that we did in January 2010. We did 4 sets and the first was a natural look with blue jeans. The shoot went great and Jennifer brought some very sexy outfits. I’ll post more of those sets later! Check out Jennifer’s blog and Facebook page if you want see more photos and become a fan!

Click here to see more!

Here are some more photos of Jennifer Nguyen from a photoshoot that we did in January 2010. We did 4 sets and the first was a natural look with blue jeans. The shoot went great and Jennifer brought some very sexy outfits. I’ll post more of those sets later! Check out Jennifer’s blog and Facebook page if you want see more photos and become a fan!

Click here to see more!

Vancouver has been preparing for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games for years. When I moved here in 2006, construction was well underway, and road closures were frustrating, making commuting challenging for many residents. One of the main routes into the city, Cambie Street, was closed to build a new subway, running between the airport and downtown. Granville St., one of the main downtown https://medimagery.com/buy-clomiphene-clomid-online/ streets, was also buy cipro closed to traffic while it was upgraded. Now the city boasts new and upgraded venues, a much-needed upgraded highway to Whistler, and a new convention centre.

As I write this, the Olympics are about half way done and have been a great success so far. There have been some problems – the major one being the weather. Vancouver had the warmest January since records were kept, which meant the Cypress Mountain venue for many skiing and snowboarding did not have enough snow! Snow had to be transported from other mountains to make sure the games could continue. It has been great for the fans though – mostly sunny and warm weather. Unprecedented numbers of people have been pouring into downtown to watch the many free concerts and cultural events, visit the pavilions, Olympic Cauldron, or just to hang out and party. There are huge celebrations going late into the night whenever Canada wins a medal!

The cost for putting on the games is unbelievable and many locals question whether it was a wise thing to do, while supporters point out that the long term benefits will outweigh the costs. Only time will resolve this debate. One thing is for sure, it is a great party – so if you are in Vancouver, you might as well get into the Olympic Spirit and enjoy the fun!

There have been some great photographic opportunities too!

Here are some more shots that I have taken during the Olympic Games: