with Lorelle and Brent VanFossen

Tag Archives: lighting

Backlighting Devil’s Club Overhead

Traveling to Seattle, a friend and I went to the John Bastyr School for one of their health and herbal festivals. A nature walk through the forest next to the campus intrigued me. It was incredibly informative, discussing how to use plants in the wilderness for medical treatments and health. The Pacific Northwest forest was […]

Lavender Festival: Photographing People and Hats

When I photograph people and I don’t have time for signing model releases, I take care to hide their faces. This beautiful woman, an artist selling her wares at the Lavender Festival, Washington County, Oregon, turned her head away to reveal the lovely hat she was wearing, which was what I really wanted to capture […]

Background Magic Part Two

Specific Crimes of Ignoring the Background In part one of Background Magic, we looked at what makes a perfect background and what questions to ask yourself as you compose a photograph, and some of the typical techniques used to change, clean, or manipulate the background to improve it. In this section, we cover the specific […]

Background Magic

We are often so caught up in the excitement of photographing the subject, we often forget the single most important element that can make or break our photograph: the background. The background, and in its own way the foreground, can accentuate or completely distract from your subject. How many times have you gotten back vacation […]

Equipment Lust – Light Accessories

When we hit the road with our cameras, we plan carefully for all possibilities. We can’t anticipate everything, so we carry the following filters and accessories to enhance our “light opportunities”. Filters Filters are popular accessories, but use them wisely and carefully. They enhance, affect and change the image we see through the lens. There […]