Flashback Friday – Lego Blast Off

 

.fotobird.

Flashback Friday – Name That Town.

.fotobird.

 

Flashback Friday – Name That Town.

.fotobird.

EPCOT Engagement

A couple weeks ago, we had the pleasure of doing an engagement session at EPCOT here in Orlando. We’ve done a few engagement sessions, and we’ve done a family session at Magic Kingdom, but this was our first session of any type at EPCOT. Our clients, Erica and Jorden, are friends with a friend of ours from UCF, Lisa (who also has a blog about running, check it out at http://lisabonadonna.wordpress.com/), so it was a opportunity for us!

We started by meandering around EPCOT for a few hours. Lucky for us, we got there at the very beginning of the day, so we avoided the bigger crowds of the day. I’d say the only “bad” part of the day was that it was kind of windy, but we were able to work around that for the most part. Of course, when you do anything at EPCOT, the whole point is to “go around the world”, and that was part of the reason for doing pictures there. We were able to fit in Mexico, Norway, France, UK, China, and Morocco. We were unable to do all of the Countries because we had a special second half of the session over at the Boardwalk!

Erica and Jorden were both awesome to work with. Their personalities go so well together, so we know they’ll have a great wedding and a great marriage. Some of the greatest shots of the day are below. Leave some comments!

.fotobird.

The Harry Potter Light Show

So I’ve been sick. We’re in the middle of something like the worst flu season in the history of man. Well I’m just happy to be a part of history.

With that, I’ve had a lot of downtime at home. I haven’t had a gig in a while either, so my creative systems are running low. Luckily, during the holiday’s I read up on how to utilize my 430 ex ii flash, off-camera. It isn’t the most professional of systems though because in order for it to work, the pop-up flash on my T3i has to be up. Of course, the best way to overcome the pop-up is to use a telephoto lens and zoom in on the subject. As an aside to that, I’ve been thinking a lot about macro photography. I don’t have a macro lens, but considering the potentials of the off-camera nature of the 430, and my sick days, I determined it was time for some experimenting…

I grabbed some Harry Potter Lego’s we had laying around (old gag gift) and a few sheets of paper to set up a staging area. I used my reflector to block any light that was seeping through a close window and turned off both computer monitors. Because I had the staging area on my desk, and the tripod was holding up the flash (no umbrella, I don’t own one yet), I had to hold the camera – not a huge issue for this experiment as I was using fast shutter speeds.

At first my thought was to just take pictures of the Lego characters themselves, but after I saw what the shadows were doing, I took it a step further. I had to shift the 430 further away to get a more dramatic lighting behind the characters. The end result was sharper than what I was getting at first, but still not 100% sharp. I’ll need to work on that more. The other end result was a short fight scene. Took me back to my younger days when playing with Lego’s was all in a day’s work.

Leave me some thoughts on this project. I plan on renting a macro lens in a couple of months, so I hope to do this again, hopefully with some better lighting.

.fotobird.

A Whole New (fisheye) World : 2013! : Post 4 : Enter The New Fantasy

More fisheye fun at Walt Disney World. New Fantasyland just opened at Walt Disney World this past November. The only thing missing at this point is the Snow White mine roller coaster. Beast’s Castle and Be Our Guest Restaurant is done, Ariel’s Grotto and Under the Sea Ride is done. Gaston’s Tavern and other buildings flank the back area. It’s a nice addition, very well done.

Today’s picture features a portion of the entry way after you walk through Cinderella’s Castle. By all means, *this* is the entry into New Fantasyland.

Have you been there yet? What do you think of the new area?

.fotobird.

A Whole New (fisheye) World : 2013! : Post 3 : EPCOT

Tonight’s image is another fisheye, back at EPCOT. This image shows a few different things: the bottom half is the ramp you take to board the ferry to the other side of the World Showcase. The top half is the World Showcase Lagoon with Spaceship Earth waaayyy in the background. The picture was taken in front of the Morocco pavilion, and to the left, by the large tree, you can see the tall architectural feature that, I believe, is in front of the Canada pavilion.

I have a few more pictures to share in this set, so I hope you’re enjoying!

.fotobird.