Day 23 Portrait

What I wanted to do here was:

photograph myself with all the hairs, wrinkles and skin blemishes on show
use natural lighting
try a white and dark background, and
finish it all in black and white.

The white background didn't work as as well in terms of capturing the detail of my face. This may be because I found it difficult to focus while being the subject and needing to overlay two pairs of reading glasses to see the LCD screen in enough detail. Getting old is getting old!

30 Days - Day 23 - image 1 - student project

Here is the original photo without any filters added in post:

30 Days - Day 23 - image 2 - student project

Next up was the black background. This proved to be a lot better in capturing the detail, although I still added a clarity filter.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 3 - student project

And here is the original colour shot without any filters added:

30 Days - Day 23 - image 4 - student project

Here's another...

30 Days - Day 23 - image 5 - student project

And below are the setup shots, one with a diffuse filter and the other with black blankets.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 7 - student project

Day 22 - Bodyscape

This image was assembled by overlaying four images of my hands and applying a range of blends. I like the abstractness of it all.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 8 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 9 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 10 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 11 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 12 - student project

The following is the crease that forms when folding my arm. It was used in the above composition.

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Day 21 - Half

The photo was a bit grainy, but what I wanted to do was play with a range of filters in Affinity Photo.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 14 - student project

Day 20 - Together

I went for an everyday shot when my wife and I took the dog (out of shot) for a walk in a local park.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 15 - student project

The edit below is an attempt to fix the white balance and warm up the skin tones. It did start to yellow up the green grass, but I managed to mask it to keep the lush spring green grass and foliage.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 16 - student project

Day 19 - The Object is a Box

When I was a kid, I enjoyed playing and making things out of boxes. With all the recent work packing stuff up in the garage, I thought the object I could have some fun with was the cardboard box.

It was tight but I managed to fit - well most of the way.

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Something is not quite smelling like it should...

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Okay, so just in case you are wondering how I did this, here is the photo without the box...

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After a while, it's a bit of a drag when you are left hanging around...

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Thinking about what's next...

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Trying to sit on a box that is about to collapse isn't recommended.

Day 18 - Mirror

I liked the idea of using the mirror to get a glimpse into a space that is filled with lots of things happening around it. In this case, I'm spending my weekends tidying up the garage and packing stuff into boxes to make more space. It's still a mess, so it's the perfect background to set a mirror.

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And because the camera was set on a tripod, it made it easy to superimpose another image into the mirror.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 23 - student project

Day 17 - Birds Eye View

It was hard to decide what to do for this one. It's supposed to drop down to 1Ã‹Å¡C today and I'm wearing shorts and a short sleeve shirt. On heading into the office to pick up the camera it struck me that I could place the camera above the stairwell, so that's just what I did. I made use of the skylight above the stairwell and put some soft box lights at the bottom of the stairs. It was still a bit dark so I upped the ISO to 1600, and adjusted the levels in Affinity Photo.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 24 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 25 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 26 - student project

And below is the original with bald patch and carpet stain (It wasn't me!) before editing in Affinity Photo.

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Day 16 - Water in Motion

I wanted to capture the water in motion for this challenge. I had to take a lot of photos in full sunlight. The shutter speed was set to 1/1000 s and the ISO to 100. The hard part was getting it in focus manually with all the glare from the sun and sky. I'm pleased with the results, even if I don't look like I'm enjoying getting wet. It's instinctive to close the eyes when something is heading for them.

Tip: If you are going to do this in winter like me, use warm water.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 29 - student project

In the shot below, I missed completely. I like how this shot captured the water as it snaked up into the air.

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Day 15 - Undercover - The Shroud of Chris

Just playing around with a screen and lighting front and then behind.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 32 - student project

Day 14 - Trussed Tomatoes

Imagine my surprise when I found a tomato that looked just like me!

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Day 13 - Record Albums

My brother's record albums were fun to experiment with.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 35 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 36 - student project

One more...

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Day 12 - Shadow Story

It's the first sunny day in over a week, so I went in search of interesting shadows with the iPad.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 38 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 39 - student project

Day 11 - Mirror

This one was taken with the iPad. It's not the best choice of shirt for a photo. I liked the way the lighting reflected off the mirror.

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Day 10 - Dress Up - All dressed up and nowhere to go!

This is an outfit I bought for documenting a client's work last year. The backdrop is one I painted for the first Skillshare class I put together. I used to paint backdrops for photographers many years ago.

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Day 9 - Upside Down (Sort Of)

Not completely upside down. There was nothing to hang from.

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Day 8 - Motion Blur

Spinning around isn't exactly fun to do. it gets a bit dizzy. I tried holding the camera in front and to the side.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 44 - student project

Day 7 - Zoom Out (The Beach)

It's the middle of winter here but warm enough to be out and about in the sun. I borrowed my daughter's camera because mine needed charging. I was hoping to take more photos, but my daughter's camera battery went flat! I still got some nice shots this morning. It's all clouded over now and the temperature is starting to drop.

30 Days - Day 23 - image 45 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 46 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 47 - student project

Day 6 - Hockney Style

Well this one took a bit longer to put together, but well worth the effort. I had the camera on a tripod and just turned a little for each shot; rather than moving the camera and staying still.

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I'm not a big fan of the background, so I decided to mask a lot of it out. It was really useful for learning how to mask in Affinity Photo; something that has eluded me until now. I used to do my masking in Pixelmator. This meant I could play at merging some of the photos. It's pretty rough, but well worth experimenting. This opens up all sorts of possibilities.

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Day 5 - The Book (Instantaneous)

And the word is instantaneous...

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Day 4 - Mirror (iPad)

I don't have a mirror in my office, so I improvised with the iPad and used that as my mirror. I liked the idea of playing with the scale by making my hands look bigger.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 52 - student project

Day 3 - Peekaboo

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Day 2 - The Object (Music Stand)

Spying on the camera through the holes in a music stand...

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 55 - student project

Day 1 - Pot Scrubber (Beard)

I thought I'd start with my beard given it has so much interesting detail.

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30 Days - Day 23 - image 57 - student project

30 Days - Day 23 - image 58 - student project

Chris Heath

The Geometrical Design Guy

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