Ok some of the shed burning

Small fire to start with





Bit of smoke















Roof comes in and we start having to douse the bay tree and fence thats on fire, all under control...........










The proper ones for here though









I took some protraits as well tonight that I am happy with so I might try and get those up here to some comments and do's and don't's.

Also a readjust of one of the other photos ( cropped and hopefully not as dark )

New


Orginal

Ok so been busy and a bit ste to be honest. Good news is I seem to know crap when I see it now. Instead of coming back with 200 photos, I can delete half when I am out and about and then get it down to about a third of that with a quick scan on a screen, then down to a few afterwards.

So much post processing with RAW compared to a point and shoot. Not that I am complaining.

Ok nothing to write home about but in the interests of the thread I have two I am not shamefully embarrassed to show.




(All processing done by me, no instagram or other programs)

Next thing, I have been doing a few landscape shots and know the problem is trying to get both landscape and sky, nightmare and there seems to be two ways, PS with a couple of shots or grad filters. I have seen a set for £30 with adapters and thinking of getting them to just give me a taste.

Also my Birthday is coming and my wife wants to buy me something Photographicy. I think a lens would be nice, at the moment I have a 18-55 kit lens which has a slight scratch on the front. I also have a 50mm prime which I got for a steal. Now I don't know whether to ask for a secondhand Sigma 10-22 or to try and push for a canon 15-85.

My thinkings are, the sigma is good for wideangle shots, but the 15-85 would allow me to go wider than I can can now as well as zoom more and be of better optical quality than my kit lens.

I originally wanted a wideangle, now I have taken more photos I think that train of thought might be a bit "all the gear and no idea", I think I need to just keep on trying and the canon lens seems to allow a greater range and better quality.

Any help or advise ?

My thoughts are either stick with the kit lens and get the wideangle and then I am good for wide angle for yearsd and years.

Then later buy a ?-100/200 lens which will give me the better opitics and better zoom.

My only fear is having a kit bag of equipment and still taking average shots.

If you are into landscapes then a used 10-20 sounds ideal, certainly a number of the landscape folks in here use / used them.


Knowing that the shots you take aren't what you want is part of the battle
Sometimes you know a subject looks interesting but you don't somehow manage to capture it properly (or at least how you want). Might be poor composition, not paying enough attention to the borders of the frame, rubbish background choice, etc..

Skills like composition and having an 'eye' for taking a nice shot are great skills to work on - you carry them with you regardless of the camera you are using (bit like buying some driver training over new track day tyres )

So if you are looking for birthday pressie ideas, I quite like the book 'The Photographer's Eye' ( £11.69 on Amazon).


Anyhow, enough rambling

Nice to see your pics progressing, I'm an avid reader of this thread now. I must get out more and get some practice. I ventured out to the local farm with the kids in toe last week, I've still not transfered them to the PC yet. Doh.

Ok a little different to the rest but I am practicing before doing a similar shot with the kids



Hopefully get some good ones down on the coast when the fog clears.

Yeah the light was way off, you can see I have tried the rear dining room lights to help inside, as for the cropping, loud and clear.



Looks better.

OK so been taking shots and working on them. I am now trying to get a bit more specific about what I am trying to do. So I thought i would have a go at entering the monthly competition here as a way of getting me to take definite shots and to think about them.

So far I have these.

For the hair one

And


And for the movement one.






Comments if you please, worth entering ? which ones ? back to the drawing board ?

Good points Matt, always seems obvious when other say it.

Ben