Talk-N-Angels First Live Radio Broadcast

Last night I had the privilege of attending the first live broadcast for Talk-N-Angels radio show. My fab friends Rita Strough and Michael Gross have been co-hosts for this radio show for quite awhile, but this was the first one done with a live audience.  I brought my trusty camera and am happy to have the event photos online.

The full album can be viewed at http://www.gjfoto.com/albums/Talk-n-Angels Live 2012-12-12. You can download any photos by right mouse clicking on them.

Again, you can see all the photos at http://www.gjfoto.com/albums/Talk-n-Angels Live 2012-12-12.

Open Air Public Exhibit in Philadelphia

A very cool public art exhibit just ended in Philadelphia – the Open Air project.  It was a unique interactive light display. People recorded a message, and that message was transformed into light patterns which varied in intensity and direction depending on the individual voice’s frequency and volume.

According to the website, this display could potentially be seen from 10 miles away depending on atmospheric conditions.  My mom was in town for her vacation, so we went to the Philly Art Museum to not only catch this show, but also see the Art Museum, Waterworks and Boathouse Row in their nightly splendor.

Below are some of the shots I took of this unique exhibition.  I’m very pleased to live in a city where public art has a long and strong tradition.

All photos © Colleen D. Gjefle, 2012

Here are a few photos in the area of the Art Museum, unrelated to the Open Air light show. It’s a lovely area during the day and breath-taking at night.  The photo below is the rear of the Art Museum with the Romanesque designed Waterworks in the foreground.

Below is Boathouse Row. Not as crisp as I’d like – on a technical note, one annoyance was that it was quite windy and instead of taking my heavy duty tripod, I took my lightweight one, which did shake slightly from time to time with the wind gusts.  The heavy duty one gets VERY HEAVY VERY QUICKLY, so when doing a fair amount of walking, I take the lightweight tripod. So even though it’s not as crisp as I’d like, it still makes for a decent “scrapbook” photo.

Below is a view with Philly city hall as the center of attention. Too bad about the large truck sitting in the parking lot behind the statue!

A few fellow onlookers enjoying Open Air on the steps of the Art Museum.

I have to include a final photo with my Mom.  Or should I say “Ghost Mom”.  I had a long exposure with a shutter speed of 3.2 seconds, so when she moved, I got the ghosting effect. I don’t mind it – just call it “artistic” and then it’s fine!

When life hands you an apple, make applesauce

Or just take some totally cool and fun photos! 

I wanted to do some water shots with apples, so I looked for apples that weren’t a solid color. I found some that had a lovely mixture of red and green/yellow tones.  Finding apples that had the right “look” was easy – finding ones that had stems still attached was tougher! An old guy kept giving me funny looks as I picked up apple after apple, looking for the surprisingly elusive stems.

Setting up for the actual water shots took almost as much time as finding the apples, but it’s actually a pretty simple process: Tie a string around the apple stems and hang from a horizontal boom arm. Place an inflatable kiddy pool underneath to catch the water. Set up 3 flashes – one at about 45-degrees front and slightly above the apples, one set opposite the first except slightly below the apples, and one set behind the apples and to the side.

Then it’s a matter of filling a plastic cup with water, throwing it up at the apples with one hand while releasing the shutter with a remote cable with the other hand. After taking the shots, I removed the cord from the photos in either Lightroom or Photoshop, and then rotated many of the photos, since I think they look cooler horizonal.

Voila! The results:

All photos © Colleen D. Gjefle, 2012

Review - Pro Optic Budget Auto Extension Tube Set

I do jewelry photography, so I need to get close to really small stuff.  I had been  looking at the Kenko extension tubes to augment my Sigma f/2.8 50mm macro lens, but I really didn’t feel like  spending $200 on them.  So I decided to give a try to the Pro Optic Budget Auto Extension Tube Set sold by Adorama and which I bought through Amazon since I had some points to use towards them.

Water Drop Magic – a fun photo technique

This is what I do when I’ve got some spare time to play!  I’m calling this “water drop magic” because with a simple technique you can create some totally cool photographs. The magic of this technique is not so much capturing the water drops splashing, but taking advantage of the reflective properties of water.

Below is a picture of my setup – a glass baking dish that I filled with about 1” of water and a cheap, old flash that I connected to the PC terminal of my camera.  There’s also two bottles – one I filled with water and the other with a really watery gray acrylic paint mixture. I also am showing a small painting that I used to capture the color.  I used several different small abstract paintings as well as colored papers to get the different color patterns in the shots.