Exhibit, Sunsets and 1st Place

Hello All,

I’ve been very busy these past few weeks and am proud to say that I am having my very first photography exhibit at the Astoria Federal Bank in Whitestone Queens, NY starting tomorrow (11/14/09) until the middle of December. If you live in that area please stop by.

Two Mondays ago I took first place and photo of the month in the digital category for one of my photos and I was thrilled to the eyeballs. Another first for me and it won’t be the last. Yes!!! See the winning shot below:

I also spent last Sunday at Long Beach in Long Island, NY strolling along the beach in the warm autumn sun and capturing the beauty and serenity of the sea, sand and sun.  I arrived at 10:30am and didn’t leave until 6:00pm and captured the most gorgeous sunset; some shots look like a martian landscape and the sun a firery molten ball. Enjoy and stay in focus. www.photobycate.com

Regards,

Cate

Sleepy Hollow Cemetery

Happy All Souls Day and Happy belated Halloween.

Halloween is my very favorite holiday of the year and this year my friends and I visited the legendary and  historic   Sleepy Hollow Cemetery  in Sleepy Hollow, NY. This is where Washington Irving penned the thrilling story of  The Headless Horseman and is also his resting place as well as the Headless Horsman’s. Yesterday was a very “dark and stormy day” but the rain did hold back until the evening making it a soggy night for Trick-or-Treaters.

I must confess that when I got home and uploaded the images I was very upset to see that most of them were not exactly “tack” sharp; to be honest they were quite blurred.  Why? Because I was trying to shoot in very low light without a tripod and in my excitement to be in this wonderful historic place I was not paying attention to my shutter speed vs. my focal length ratio and after emailing a good friend and professional photographer he confirmed that this was indeed the problem.

Ok, I messed up big time on this one but it is a lesson learned. Luckily I did not completely flip out like I usually do and delete the whole “shootin” batch. I closed down the computer and set the camera battery to recharge, made myself some popcorn and watched Night of the Living Dead to calm myself down. Nothing like a good ole B grade black and white scary movie to do that.

This morning refreshed and feeling a little more friendly towards my photos. I began reviewing the images again and wondering how to salvage them. One thing I quickly realized was that although the color and composition were great one tomb stone looks just like another and that I was getting bored. So, reflecting on the movie I watched last night I decided to convert the cemetery shots to black and white and then add filters like diffused glow, radial blurs, spot lights, and canvas textures and some I converted to infrared to give them a more somber, haunted, walking-in-a-dream look and to add some diversity and excitement to the overall composition. It also hides the “mistakes” too!  It worked and they look great. Thank God for Photoshop! They will make great prints. I posted a few shots below or click here for the full gallery.

We also visited the Philipsburg Manor  and low and behold the sun came out for about an hour and I was able to take some great fall foliage shots and yes these were tack sharp. I added them to an existing gallery entitled Autumnal Fun.

Fun with Black & White Conversions

I had a blast last night at my bi-weekly meeting with the Manhattan Miniature Camera Club where the program featured two photographers from the Huntington Camera Club who stopped by to discuss the pros and cons of black and white conversions and using layers to edit your photos.  I am still a novice at digital darkroom “stuff” and can do the basic image editing: color enhancement, sharpening, cleaning, etc.  but I still have to master layers and that is going to take some time. So, mean while I’ll have fun with B&W and then move on to bigger and better things later.

Since I have been shooting digital I have grown to really appreciate the nuances of black and white photography especially when done well.  With digital images you can take a good color photo and turned it into a dynamic black and white image with just a few adjustments. So tonight I have been doing my homework and have worked on about seven images and came up with three  which I have posted that I think came out great.  You can view more black and white images on my website

Our next meeting is November 1st and it is a competition night and I’m am going to submit two black and white images. I’ll let you know how I do. Til then, stay In focus.

www.photobycate.com

Back to the Basics 2

Hello Everyone,

As per my last post (click here)  I had my third meeting with the Manhattan Miniature Camera Club this past Monday and as always the first Monday of the month is competition night.  I sent in two digital images (see below) one for texture and the other for architecture. I was hoping for a 9 on the texture which I call Rust & Port Hole but alas the judge who was very fair, experienced and basically wonderful, but a tad picky felt it was an 8 as she did with my second image of the Piano Building looming up into the great blue sky. Eights are great but nines are fine and I’m determined to get at least one nine per month and to do that I have to make sure the image has a WoW factor; it’s got to bowl the judge over. This is terrific practice for me as I plan to expand my submission to bigger and more prestigious competitions in the future and the MMCC is giving me a good grounding. I have to say that I really like doing this; I am learning so much about photography just by looking and listening to a constructive critique of my work as well as my fellow photographers. There are some damn good photographers in this club and I’m thrilled to be a part of this group.  The next meeting is October 19th and it is a discussion program called Photo Conversations. I’m already planning for the next monthly competition and am thinking of submitting two black and white photos that I took this year. There is also a separate competition (the first of three for the year) in November and the theme is simply Zoo. So, off  to the Bronx I go.

I am also on my third assignment with the Photographic Society of America and this project is people. This is tough for me because I do not like shooting people, that didn’t sound right did it? I meant photographing them because well just because I don’t know what the heck to do with them!  I feel uncomfortable trying to pose them, etc. and I’m sure the model picks up on that. I’m an urban industrial photographer and you will rarely see people in my photos but I made a committment to do whatever it takes to become a great photographer and learning to shoot (there I go again) people in different scenes, clothes, lighting, predicament, whatever I will do. Thankfully my friend Claudia of Lampreart is a very willing model and also very patient as well as a fantastic artist. That’s the sign of a good friend. I’ll start this Sunday photographing her in her art studio. For the assignment I have to read ten chapters or projects and then pick three to do and then submit. Gulp! Hopefully I will have some to post on this blog in a week or two. Keep your fingers crossed.  Have a great week.

Stay In Focus,

Cate  www.photobycate.com

Looking Through Windows of The Past

This past weekend I visited the Historic Village of Richmond in Staten Island New York. This museum village was settled by the Dutch way back in the 1600’s and some of the homes and shops are still standing today. I left my friends with the tour guide and took off with camera in hand to meander around this neighborhood of bygone days and wallow in the textures and colors of the old abandoned buildings.  The sky was overcast so any color was wonderfully saturated and added a terrific contrast to the subject matter bringing out its age and history.  I was in my own little photographic world and at times felt like I was in a strange little dream with ghosts of the past watching my every step.  When I peeked into the windows of workshops or stores  I could spy the tools of trade as they would have been over four hundred years ago.   See for your self; peek through the windows below and feel the spirits within.  To see the full gallery of photos click on this link: photobycate

Stay In Focus,

www.photobycate.com

Back to the Basics

A few months back I had posted that I was in a photo phunk and wasn’t sure what to do to get out of that temporary black hole. Until now, or a few weeks ago when surfing the net I came upon the Photographic Society of America and through them I discovered the Manhattan Miniature Camera Club. Both of these organizations have been around since the 1930’s and are open to all photographers who love and are serious about the art and science of photography.  It is a breath of fresh air to find such forward thinking and open minded photography organizations like these two. 

PSA: I immediately signed up for a beginners photography course that I do online.  I am a self-taught photographer and my education in photography was through books; anything and everything that I could learn from the internet; photography blogs and sometimes forums  and of course the best teacher of all; trial and error.  But I really needed a good grounding in the basics so, when the opportunity presented itself in the form of a course done on my time schedule and with a prestigous organization with professional and highly respected photographers like PSA I jumped at it.  As recommended I purchased The Complete Guide to Photography by John Hedgecoes (2004 edition) and this is my text book so to speak. I am assigned an instructor and communicate via email where I receive and turn in  my assignments. I’ve completed the first photography assignment demonstrating auto focus, depth of field, shutter speed and apeture priority this past weekend and received my second which I will work on in the next week or two; lots of reading and three projects to complete.

MMCC: It’s terrific doing the online thing but I also needed to meet and talk with other photographers face to face and have a place to show my work to be critiqued and to gain experience in competition.  I had my first meeting and competition at the MMCC last Monday. At first I was very hesitant about meeting these photographers since  most of them have been in the business for many years and I’m just starting out. I quickly felt comfortable after the first hour especially as everyone was so friendly and by the end of the night I knew I had made the right decision in joining.

The meetings are twice a month every 1st and 3rd Monday with the first Monday as a competition night. Each photographer submits two images (there is no theme) in one or each of the three catagories; digital, print or slide, and is scored from 5 to 9.  I had one image that scored a nine and I almost fell out of my seat and one that scored only a seven and a half.  It wasn’t until I saw that image projected on a screen that I noticed the subject was dead center of the photo. Doh!  The scores are recorded each week and tallied at the end of the meeting year with the top scoring photographers receiving an award and showcased on the website. A total score of nine is an award and an eight is an honorable mention. There are also three theme based competitions during the year with a separate scoring and awarding. 

I had my second meeting yesterday and the program agenda was “You Be The Judge”.  We  all took turns critiquing each others work just like a judge would at a competition.  This was competely new to me both judging and being judged. I really thought I would have a problem with hearing another photographer judge and comment on  my work; I wasn’t sure how I would react but I  found the critique very informative and constructive in a positive way and again had to remind myself that I am dealing with professionals and that all of this is a learning/teaching experience.  Fun.

I am definitely out of my photo phunk and on my way to being a better and more educated photographer and having the time of my life doing so.  I’ll keep you posted as to my progress as the weeks go by.

FYI, the photos below are from this past Saturday’s trip to Governors Island capturing the beautiful scenes and the peaceful tranquility on an island just minutes from the hectic City of New York; truly an oasis.  I’m going to submit one of these for the October MMCC competition.

Enjoy and stay in focus,

Cate – www.photobycate.com

Stormy Weather

This weekend is a bit cloudy and stormy for the beach but great for photography due to the terrific and menacing looking clouds which I captured while standing on the N & #7 platform at Queensboro Plaza in Long Island City. I shot with a polarizing filter on to really bring out the dark grey or almost purple cast to the clouds and to make whatever color in the photos pop. I also processed them in B&W and the effect is quite exciting. It’s overcast today and the cicadas are singing their little hearts out being that it is their kind of weather; hazy, hot & humid. Enjoy the photos below and you can find them in the color versions in gallery Long Island City and the B&W versions in gallery Urban Black & White on www.Photobycate.com

Stay in focus.

South Beach Staten Island

Hello Everyone,

I hope you have been enjoying your summer or winter depending on what part of the globe you live.

I spent Saturday at a little beach that I didn’t know existed in Staten Island, NY called South Beach now it is not the same as the South Beach in Florida, or the fashionable diet, the only thing they have in common is the name but this little beach was lovely and sits in the shadow of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge.

It was a hot and hazy day and the sky was not cooperating with me so I focused my mind and camera on what I found while walking along the shore. Whenever I am at a beach I always take a long walk because I am just fascinated with what the ocean has washed up onto the shore.  South Beach had plethora of beautiful shells, crustaceans and just plain ole flotsam and jetsam that I loved photographing. Take a peek  at a few shots below or view the full gallery at www.photobycate.com

Wishing you a great week and as always Stay in Focus,

Cate

I Hate Digital Noise

There is only one thing about digital photography that I hate and that is digital noise. G-r-r-r-r.  I can’t wait until the day when the “theys” create a digital camera that eliminates this annoying side effect of high ISO completely. The frustration of it almost makes you want to go back to using film. I know I can minimize it in post processing but it does soften the image and sometimes the noise is so bad the image is trash.

 This rant started with my new computer that I bought this week. My old HP laptop was acting very weired and I brought it into Best Buys Geek Squad to have the hard drive diagnosed. Well the poor little thing was infected by a Trojan virus. Now I could have had the drive cleaned and restored and upgraded but the upgrade would have been minimal due to the age of the lap top so I opted for a brand new Dell Studio with 500gig of hard drive space and 4 gigs of RAM. That should hold me for awhile and allow me to upload larger images. Now that I have more space I might give shooting in RAW a whirl. Anyway when I viewed my photos on the new crisp, clean and clear 17″ wide screen they looked beautiful and full of detail and low and behold some of them had waaaaaaaaaaay more noise than I thought they had when I viewed them on my old laptop.  I was crushed and panicked. I went back to the originals and reprocessed them removing as much noise as possible but I had to admit defeat on a few and removed them from my website.  Sigh!  Anyway I love my new computer and still have many, many, many wonderful and beautiful photos that don’t have noise. Life is good.  Stay in focus.

Cate  – www.photobycate.com

Lower Manhattan & South Street Seaport

Hello All,

I hope everyone had a great weekend. I had a blast; beach on Sunday (yes, the sun paid NYC a visit and stayed all weekend) and a delicious BBQ on Saturday. I’m over my “phunk” and spent all day Friday shooting the historic neighborhood of lower Manhattan (Wall Street)  and South Street Seaport all decked out for the 4th of July.  Despite all of the trendy tourist traps that have now become part of this landscape there is still the feel and sense of  the old New York of 200 years ago.  I think my photos have done it justice. Enjoy.

Stay in focus,

Cate – www.photobycate.com