Lauri Stumph Photography Blog » Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota based natural light newborn, children’s and senior photographer.

A couple abstracts for this week’s project…(and by this weeks, I mean this week in March).  I’m catching up, I’m catching up!

Texture - lots ‘o texture, thanks again to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden where I could probably do project 52 every week and never get the same shot twice.  This is a shot of the Prophecy of the Ancients by Brower Hatcher.

24mm f2.8 1/4000 ISO400

Super congratulations to my {{awesome}} husband for being named one of the 2010 Top 40 Under Forty by the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal.

Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal Top 40 Under Forty- Jase Stumph

Don’t forget to check out all the other honoree’s as well this year.  It’s quite a list!

Oh how I’m tempted to scan the newspaper article instead of just post this mini link (although I rather like the photo of him so I’m glad that’s in there) but the last thing a photographer needs is to be busted for a copyright violation!

Also, although the article is just a week old, he actually has accepted a new position with LS Black Constructors in St. Paul!  I like them already because they built an awesome *green* building located at one of my favorite shooting locations.

If you’re in the market for any build out’s or want a super cool LEED certified green building,  feel free to contact Jase for any information.  jstumph@lsblack.com  You can email him too, just because.  You know, for network-y kind of stuff.   He’s kind of good at that…and he likes to talk.

Have a great weekend!

Our assignment this week was a technical one…back button focus (BBF).  Most SLR cameras have two ways to focus; the first is pressing the shutter button half way down and the other is the ‘back button’ which is generally just to the left of your right thumb.

I could go on to explain it but this link explains it quite well!  (I apologize to Nikon lovers, myself included, but Canon did a good job on this).  Back Button Focus explained. This feature is on Nikon cameras as well.  Take a peek at your manual to see whether it needs to be programmed or if it’s a default feature.

And here is my BBF experiment.

I set my single focus point on the cherry, because of course, that’s the most important and pressed my BBF button.   I was shooting at f14 so a lot of the scene appears to be pretty focused but the background is not quite as sharp.    I was bending down as close to the ground as I could without sitting down.  But I don’t particularly like the composition.  It’s a little too even.  If I would have just tilted the camera up to capture more of the sky, there would have been a bit too much distortion for me (the buildings would appear to lean to the center even more than they do in the second photo).  To get more of the sky in the photo would have required me to lay on the ground and it was very…soggy.

So because I had pressed the BBF  before my first shot and didn’t touch it again, the focus was still locked at the exact distance to the cherry which would allow me to recompose without losing focus.  Instead of laying on the ground, I just put my camera close to the ground, took my shot and I like the composition much more.   The sky is more appealing than the soggy brown grass and the focus is exactly where I set it with my first shot.