Tag Archives: TxsportsPix
Victoria – 2012 Senior Portraits
Victoria and I made an appointment to shoot her high school senior photos. When I first met her on location in Round Rock she was just a little nervous to say the least. I watched Victoria play volleyball quite a few times and she is a fierce competitor on the court, but this photo shoot made her more nervous than any championship game. After about the first 10 minutes she was finally relaxed and having fun. She will be attending Texas Lutheran University in the fall of 2012 and playing volleyball.
Victoria – 2012 Senior Photos
Victoria – 2012 Senior Photos
Victoria – 2012 Senior Photos
Victoria – 2012 Senior Photos
Grand Canyon
I finally made it to the Grand Canyon! During my last visit to Las Vegas we decided to drive to the West Rim of the Grand Canyon. We decided to take the Maverick Helicopter Tour and it was AWESOME! Our pilot Matt was a great guy, there was only the three of us on the flight and words can not describe the experience. This is one experience I plan on doing again!
All of the photos in this post were shot using a hand held, 3 exposure technique and then processed in photomatix for the HDR. I used a Canon 5D with a 24-105mm f/4 lens.
Inside Grand Canyon West Rim 1
Sky Walk - West Rim - Grand Canyon
Grand Canyon West Rim - Eagle Point
Guano Point - West Rim - Grand Canyon
Standing on Guano Point - West Rim - Grand Canyon
Inside Grand Canyon West Rim 2
Inside Grand Canyon West Rim 3
Trisha
I have recently shot some high school senior portraits. This was a new location for me and we had the opportunity to use a 1938 Ford Fire Truck with a flat head V8 for one of the settings. Special Thank You to the volunteers at the Round Rock Fire Department Museum for allowing us this wonderful opportunity.
Trisha with 1938 Fire Truck
Cowgirl Style
Lauren – 2012 Senior Portraits
Sydney and Whitney
Sydney is a friend of mine who played volleyball with my daughter. I was asked to shoot some photos of her and her sister Whitney the weekend after Thanksgiving. It was cold and windy but we made the best out the the short amount of time that we had to shoot. I shot the entire session with the 70-200mm and one 580exII flash.
Sydney - Canon 5D Mark II - 170mm - f5.6
Whitney - Canon 5D Mark II - 200mm - f5.0
Shock Top Party
Shock Top Earthwork HDR - © Copyright 2011 - TxSportsPix.com
Canon EOS 7D, 24-105 f/4L, 60mm, F 16, ISO 400
I had the opportunity to photograph the Shock Top party held by Brown Distribution in Austin Texas. The highlight of the event for me was to ride in a helicopter to get an aerial view of the Earthwork by the international artist Stan Herd. Shuttles were provided and I was transported off to the site. There were three helicopters available for use to view the earthwork. I chose the open door as to get better photos of this amazing work. This work took several months to complete but the end result was truly awesome. This artwork is about 5 acres in size and various types of natural materials were used. The green in the sunglasses are limes! Once back at the party I was able to meet Stan Herd and he is truly a genuine, down to earth person. If you judge an party by the amount of fun to be had by everyone, this event was a HUGE success. Everything from the food to all the various types of entertainment was truly incredible.
Click here for Shock Top Party Photos
Stan Herd & Agnes Fuccello- © Copyright 2011 - TxSportsPix.com
Josh Hamilton visits Round Rock Express
Josh Hamilton Homerun - Copyright © 2011 TxSportspix
Canon EOS 7D, 70-200mm f/2.8L, 175mm, F 2.8, ISO 3200
Josh Hamilton of the Texas Rangers made a brief trip through Round Rock, Texas to play three games with the Express baseball team. He is always a crowd favorite and spent a lot of time prior to the game signing autographs for the fans. Hamilton hit this homerun in the 3rd inning with 2 on and 1 out. The Express defeated the Sky Sox 9-4.
Busy as a Bee
Busy as a Bee - © Copyright 2011 - TxSportspix
Canon EOS 7D, Canon 24-105 f/4L, 105mm, F 5.0, ISO 200
I think we could all learn a bit from the honeybee. We need to work on our craft everyday and put an effort into getting better. Take a little time each day to practice on your skills. It can be a full blown photo shoot or as little as catching a Kelby Training video online. Just like with everything else, “If you don’t use it, you lose it.” I carry my camera with me constantly, hoping to catch that magical one in a million shot. Work a little each and every day and you will constantly get better. You will become more familiar with your equipment and how to compose and shoot a great photo. Tasks that you had to think about will become second nature. If a little bee travels an average of 1600 round trips in order to produce one ounce of honey, up to 6 miles per trip and to produce 2 pounds of honey, bees travel a distance equal to 4 times around the earth, how much are you willing to work to catch that magical moment with your camera?
Improvise, Adapt and Overcome
Zac Brown Band © Copyright 2011 by TxSportsPix
Canon EOS 7D, Canon 70-200 f/2.8L, 80mm, F 2.8, ISO 3200
When I listen to music my first choice isn’t country music. I am a classic rock kind of guy but I will admit the Zac Brown Band put on an amazing show in the Dell Diamond Stadium. I was familiar with a few of their songs but wasn’t sure what to expect for a performance. It
was a long frustrating few days trying to get proper photo access. I finally talked to several people and was told that I could shoot the event but my official pass was missing. This left me out of the photo pit but once I saw the photo pit back at the sound board I was glad I wasn’t stuck all the way back there.
The stage setup was the largest I have ever seen at the Round Rock Express home field. The opening act was Blackberry Smoke and I would classify them as southern rock. It wasn’t a long set but the music was pretty good. The crowd continued to grow during their performance and over 10,000 people were expected to attend. After sunset the temperatures dropped slightly and the breeze was just enough to keep things cooled down. I wandered around from side to side waiting for the moonrise. I had seen the full moon the night before and had planned for this event. What I was planning for and what happened were two different things. I was planning to get a shot of the band on stage with the Dell Diamond logo and moon over top of the stage. What happened was the moon arose from the right of the stage not even close to the band. I was already trying to shoot between cowboy hats to get a clear view and that was becoming more difficult as everyone pushed towards the front of the stage. I was standing in general admission trying to shoot photos through the crowd, when several members of the band walked out onto the runway to sing “Toes” (most) everything lined up perfectly! I finally had an improvised shot, Zac Brown and a full moon in Round Rock, Texas. With all this being said every planned shoot isn’t going to be perfect every time. You will face numerous obstacles and unforeseen circumstances.
To quote one of my favorite actors (Clint Eastwood) and movie lines (Heartbreak Ridge) , we must “Improvise, Adapt and Overcome”.
Blackberry Smoke - © Copyright 2011 by TxSportsPix
Canon EOS 7D, Canon 70-200 f/2.8L w/ 1.4x, 280mm, F 4.0, ISO 1600
The Journey
Valley of Fire Sunset in HDR - Copyright © 2011 TxSportspix
Canon EOS 7D, Canon 24-105 f/4.0L, 24mm, F 18, ISO 400
Becoming a good photographer is a journey that is never easy and the road isn’t always clear. There are new technologies to learn, different techniques, thousands of ways to edit and always multiple distractions. I have always had a camera and tried to learn as much as I could on my own, but after attending my first Photoshop World in September 2010, I was truly reenergized and focused on developing my road to becoming a better photographer. I had seen some photos from other photogs that had attended the pre-conference Safari and I was amazed with the Valley of Fire. I knew this was one place I wanted to go to tryout some of the new techniques I had learned at PSW. I saw a few HDR (high dynamic range) photos about a year ago and knew this was a style I wanted to learn more about. I saw that Artist Photo Canvas was having a photo walk with Brian Matiash so I signed up and was a little disappointed that the class was full and I was on the wait list. When I received the email from Brian that a spot had opened up I jumped at the chance to learn from one of the best. It was a very educational experience and since then I practice and experiment with HDR as much as possible. It was then that I believe my journey to become a better photographer truly began. Since PSW I have been blessed to become Twitter friends with numerous excellent photographers and graphic designers. We are all on our own journeys and try to help each other with tips, tricks and suggestions. For the journey to be successful surround yourself with talented people. Each of us has specialties and knowledge and if we share this information and work together as a team, our journey though filled with bumps and curves won’t end up out in the weeds.
I would like to dedicate my first blog post to all of my family and friends and my wonderfully patient wife for supporting me on this photography journey.