Tag Archives: photography

Site Organization

Sep
18
2011
by Jessy | 5 Comments

What is the best way to organize your site?  I have been moving around some of my galleries so that the list of “galleries” is shorter and things are easier to find.  The fist example of this is the new “places” gallery and the Savannah gallery under that.  I have several images for Philly about that are about ready to go up as well.  Is this the best idea or is there something better?

How d o you organize your site for your own photography?

I know the more information about each gallery the better, this always helps with SEO, but they can be divided so many different ways trying to determine which is best is difficult.  I have also found it’s very difficult to keep the home page updated with new things to keep returning visitors interested.  Without updating the home page users will have less reason to view further into your site.  I’ll keep researching some of the best practices and I’ll let you know what I find.

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Selling Photography #2

Sep
13
2011
by Jessy | 1 Comment

I have been playing with the FineArtAmerica site some more.  I think I’m starting to like this and the printing options are impressive!  It also has a great community of other artists that reiew and provide feedback on your art.

Check out some of the HDR here:

hdr art

FineArtAmerica also offers some different logos, and slideshows that you can place on your site to lead people back to your FineArt site. Below is a copy of one of these and if you notice it links to my FineArt site to purchase images. One thing that I do not like is that I cannot incorporate this into my site or remove/alter menu items to go back to my own site. A perfect example of this is the blog, I am not one to copy/paste to another blog, but I do not have enough time to work on 2 blogs.

Sample “slideshow” for FineArt

Art Prints


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National Geographic Weekend Photography Workshop

Sep
10
2011
by Jessy | 1 Comment

Have you ever been to a weekend photography workshop?  I recently found that National Geographic offer photography excursions and workshops.  I am thinking of attending one but am very torn on which location to go to (Paris, Rome, New Orleans, Tucson, etc) and which type of photography workshop would be best suited for my skills, or  lack of skills.   Each offer something different in the way of photographing architecture, people, landscape, etc.  If you have reviewed any of my images please provide any comments that you have about your experienced at these workshops and types of photography that you think are best.

A full list of the workshops can be found here if you are interested: National Geographic Photography


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Abstract Photography Created by Cropping

Sep
10
2011
by Jessy | 5 Comments

I am one of those people that (oddly enough) is hesitant to take a picture if I’m not sure how it will turn out.  Last weekend while in Canaan Valley West Virginia we visited SmokeHole Caverns.  I finally decided to take a few shots that I wasn’t sure of.  I took a few shots of the wall that actually worked well.  Caves are one of those places that I’m scared to take images of because the light is random and it’s always lit with spot lights.  Please note the images below.

 

This image turned out well with the light from the cave but the spotlights themselves had to be cropped out.  Once those items were cropped out its lovely with the colors and the layers.

SmokeHole Caverns West Virginia bacon staligmite

f/4.8 ISO 2500

 

This image is taken from the cave floor up the wall.  I used the camera flash for this image as the other lights were too high to illuminate the part of the wall I wanted to focus on.  As the camera flash is not idea you can clearly see the shadows created from the imperfections of the wall.  Those some of the shadows add to the image, some also distract from the image.  Some additional cropping could assist in correcting this issue.

Smokehole Caverns West Virginia canaan valley wall

f/3.5 ISO 2500

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Bridge photography contest

Aug
26
2011
by Jessy | 0 Comments

The ViewBug bridges photography contest is open for voting.  Please help me by voting for my image!  Click the “like” button on the right side of the page!

Vote

Image to vote for here this bridge at New River Gorge

New River Gorge Image

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Feature Photo

Aug
17
2011
by Jessy | 2 Comments

I have to share as this is my first ever featured photo!  In my previous post I spoke about ViewBug and today (August 17, 2011) the photo below is the second featured photo on ViewBug!  (out of 4, not too shabby).  I have also included a permanent link to the photo in case if you want to see it and see the amount of feedback that you are able to get on a single photo.

http://www.viewbug.com/photo/1273350

 


This is an HDR creation (one of my first) taken at Jacksonville beach of the pier. It had been storming that morning and I had to wait till about 9am for the sun to start coming out to get the breaks in the clouds that you see. The beach looked beautiful that day.

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Photography Contests

Aug
15
2011
by Jessy | 1 Comment

ViewBug appears to have several active Photography Contests at all times.  Its a great community with several different photography groups.

Each photo contest has specific types and rules as well as differing prizes per contest.  Many of the contests are free though some cost but you can get around these “per photo costs” by purchasing a membership.  I have found that regardless of winning there is the ability to request critiques and a great opportunity to receive feedback from other photographers!

ViewBug also has the ability to sell your photos online.  Check it out!

ViewBug

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Lightening Photograph

Jun
25
2011
by Jessy | 0 Comments

Last week it was storming and the lightening was just amazing. I set up the tripod in my garage (so the camera would not get wet), wet the ISO to 100, WB to light bulb, and Aperature to 5.6 and took these images.

I converted them to black and white because I love black and white but they could have been left in color as well. If you look closely you will notice that there are multiple strikes in the images, the shutter was open for an extended period of time due to the amount of light that the camera was waiting for. This helps to create more impressive photos with multiple strikes. These of course are not some of the greatest images out there but they show the point. If you are set up in the right location you could probably get several more strikes and have a more impressive photo.

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Butterfly Festival

May
01
2011
by Jessy | 0 Comments

Yesterday I had an opportunity to go to the butterfly festival at Tree Hill.  It was a  great opportunity for me as I was able to take some pictures of the butterfly release as well as some close up shots.  There were so many people and so many butterflies just the images of the children who caught butterflies and were holding them was great.  I have some added shots in a new gallery that I called Nature as it has the butterflies and the dragonfly I took earlier this week.  As always please provide any and all feedback so that I can continue to improve!

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Event Photography

Apr
10
2011
by Jessy | 0 Comments

Saturday I went to take some photos at an event for Plan Ahead Events.  I think it went very well.  I had some great people to work with and was thankful it was a small event so that I could get more time to concentrate in a small area.  I will be processing the images over the next few days to provide back to Becky to use for her site.  I can only hope that she appreciates them as much as I appreciate her giving me the opportunity to take the images.

If all events were set up with vendors like this particular event I think I would enjoy going to different events a little more.  The event was a baseball tournament and all the vendors had items specific to baseball!  I have never seen something so specific for the audience before, I was very impressed!

Once I have a change to get them processed and speak with Becky again I will post a few on the site to share my new work with the  world.  I hope to have the opportunity to process the images that I took while my parents were here as well.  There should be many new coming soon!

 

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