<<< o >>>my little brother 23 comments + add yours
chromasia.com

Yep, it's babies again ... as far as the eye can see ;-)

The good news though is that I'll be shooting three different ones tomorrow so at least I'll be posting shots of one that you haven't seen before. And the even better news is that I'm definitely going to make some time later this week – either on Friday or Saturday – to get down to the beach and shoot some new material.

On a totally unrelated matter: I was checking through my referrer logs and found that one of my recent images has been nominated for the Photo of the Year category of the 2007 Photobloggies. And I'm not mentioning this because I'm pleased about it (which of course I am) but because it's worth checking out the rest of the shots in this category. I think my favourite is probably this one, but this one comes a close second.

captured
camera
lens
focal length
aperture
shutter speed
shooting mode
exposure bias
metering mode
ISO
flash
image quality
RAW converter
cropped?
3.13pm on 12/2/07
Canon 5D
EF 24-70 f/2.8L USM
60mm
f/4.0
1/100
manual
n/a
evaluative
100
580EX
RAW
C1 Pro
no
 
children [portraits] + no print
comment by m at 10:40 PM (GMT) on 20 February, 2007

It's a good job you like kids ;-)

comment by John Duncan at 11:25 PM (GMT) on 20 February, 2007

Congratulations, your work has always deserved recognition. And I think yours actually beats your first choice, but might not in my eyes beat the second (heresy, I know, sorry, but YMMV and all that).

:-)

comment by djn1 at 11:31 PM (GMT) on 20 February, 2007

m: yep, though I could go off them ;-)

John: lol. Actually, I think both of those are better than the one of mine that was selected (as are a couple more of them), so don't worry about the heresy ;-)

comment by kwerfeldein at 12:24 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Well, the emotion in your last images are great, indeed. I would like to see the eyes of the baby sharp , and I hope critique is cool for you ;)

comment by jelb at 12:53 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Bonjour,
Nice portrait! Well done! Bravo!

comment by ROB at 05:40 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Agree with photobloggies - it always introduces me to sites that I have not seen before.

The little tacker in this image seems none too pleased about his current situation. Not nearly as happy as sis in anycase.

comment by MarkDM at 05:55 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

All the finalists for Photo of the Year, yours included, are excellent. Congratulations.

comment by Jennifer at 08:36 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Snow wins hands down for me, yours second (soz!) and the 3rd is not my cup of tea (too National Geographic!) though well executed. Your tiny model has had some great expressions over this series - looks decidedly worried here!

comment by Ryano at 10:12 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

again good shot Dave, I love the grumpy expression on this kid hes probably thinking "When will these guys stop looking at me "

comment by Claude at 11:15 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Superb series of portraits. Simply beautiful. Bravo!

comment by Darren at 11:49 AM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Enough with the baby shots !!!

comment by Ralf at 12:08 PM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Great portrait, I love the expression in the baby's face! Perfect composition. You sure know the art of capturing emotion on "film". If you would like to contribute some pictures to our site for artistic photographers, we would be more than happy! Our screeners will give you useful feedback on every photo you upload and we will post your photoblog-address so that even more people will have the pleasure of finding it! This usually means a lot of new visitors! Hopefully you could find some inspiration there too. Take care! // Ralf

comment by Alice at 03:01 PM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

I love his expression! Great shot!

comment by Simon Goodchild at 03:19 PM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

Sorry to be the lone critic, but this could have been sharper. Looks to me as though the AF has gone for the baby's right eye and hand. With such a narrow DOF the left eye is a bit soft. FWIW I struggle with this all the time with my 24-70 F2.8L as it's so tempting to use the large aperture you've paid so much for. For shots like this I now tend to use manual mode with F5.6 and 1/125sec and the flash either bounced or off-camera with a home-made brolly.

I'll get my coat!

comment by JD at 04:56 PM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

congrats on getting the nominations and good luck ;)

great series your producing at the moment
I know this is slightly out of focus, but I love it for its softness :D

Not too sure what simon means with his suggestion, as its not like you were shooting wide open??? heck I shoot wide open all the time (F1.4), and can come up with some extremely sharp images (although selective)?
was it your intention to have the softened effect? and if so how did you manage it? filters, photoshop etc???

comment by Simon Goodchild at 09:41 PM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

JD: I too shoot wide open sometimes (again F1.4 at 50mm) but I try to avoid it when taking close pics like thos because the DOF is a couple of mm max. In some controlled tests that I have done the 50mm F1.4 only gets really sharp from about F2.5. Below this images aren't quite so well defined.

comment by Dominic at 10:42 PM (GMT) on 21 February, 2007

The master of baby shots! I am sooooooooo looking forward to some of the other stuff! LOL

comment by Dean at 09:13 AM (GMT) on 22 February, 2007

Is it just me or does this guy look like a new born Godfather. The Don is back ;-)

comment by MikesRightBrain at 02:33 PM (GMT) on 22 February, 2007

David first of all congrats on the IOTY nomination. I think that was one of my favorites of yours ever. As for this shot, I think the expression of the baby's face is priceless in comparison to that of the mother. Very sweet.

comment by schmee at 03:06 PM (GMT) on 22 February, 2007

perhaps you should take some babies to the beach and you could kill two birds with one stone... think about it.

on the real though, i really think you gotta do something different soon or forever risk the same fate suffered by anne geddes.

comment by John at 05:37 PM (GMT) on 22 February, 2007

I completely agree with your photo of the year choice. It is mine as well. I haven't seen a more striking image posted to the net all year. If it doesn't win I will be very disappointed. Your image was excellent as well, but I thought a few of your other images were better than that particular one.

comment by djn1 at 08:31 PM (GMT) on 22 February, 2007

Thanks everyone, and John, I agree, it wasn't the best shot I've put up recently.

schmee: I'm not a big Anne Geddes fan either ;-)

comment by tonisha at 03:54 PM (GMT) on 26 September, 2007

i think its a ace picki thanks for putting it up ! :P